Aston Martin Lagonda Global Holdings plc (AML) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Aston Martin Lagonda Full Year Results 2021 Webcast. [Operator Instructions] Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Lawrence Stroll. Please go ahead.

Good morning and thank you for joining us for this Q&A on our full-year results for 2021. I hope you have had the chance to read the release and also watch my address and the presentation of the results from Tobias and Ken that are on the IR section of our corporate website as usual. My second year as Executive Chairman of this iconic and great company has been another of significant progress. We have successfully transitioned our operating model to that of an ultra-luxury brand with customer demand well ahead of supply. Our core business is strong and delivered to plan with substantially improved profitability. We have strengthened our teams, adding more luxury and automotive experience to the Board, broadening relevant experience at the executive level and substantially bolstering our operational and development teams. The return of the Aston Martin name to Formula One Grid has dramatically increased our brand exposure, desirability, global awareness in-line with our growth ambitions. The Aston Martin Valkyrie program pushes the boundaries of what is possible to bring to market outside of the Formula One racing environment. We inherited a challenging program. And while it was disappointing that some deliveries were rescheduled from late 2021 following an in-depth review and now under a dedicated team, we are confident of continuing to deliver these truly extraordinary vehicles to our customers with no compromises. We have a strong pipeline of extraordinary products to come with both the DBX707 and V12 Vantage this year, and a full new generation of front-engine sports cars for 2023. This high-performance new portfolio will command much stronger pricing and profitability compared with the past, driving delivery of our financial targets. Our path to electrification is clear with 3 of our product launches in 2021 featuring hybrid technology; our first plug-in hybrid coming in 2024, our first battery electric vehicle targeted for launch in 2025, and all car lines will have an electrified powertrain option by 2026. When I invested, I knew this transformation would take 4 to 5 years to recreate Aston Martin as the world's most desirable, ultra-luxury British performance brand. We have made strong progress already and are well on plan to achieve our ambitious goal. And with that, we are now happy to take your questions.

Operator, can we poll for the Q&A, please?

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from the line of George Galliers from Goldman Sachs.

Obviously you're very excited and enthusiastic about the refresh or the complete revamp to the product line for 2023. Can you give us any insight into what kind of price increase you're expecting as a result of that, is the first question. And then, the second question is just on the DBX707. Perhaps you could just give us some indication of what the initial reaction to that vehicle has been? And then any insights into the sort of exact timing from a production ramp over Q2 and Q3 would be very helpful.

Okay. On the pricing of the sports cars, as I mentioned, with all cars, we are delivering now, starting with DBX707. We will be working on a 40% -- minimum a 40% contribution margins. That will have an increase of some of the cars more, some of the cars less, depending on the model. The prices have not yet been finalized for 2023. But you are correct, that's much more than a facelift. It's a full new generation of sports cars: new exterior styling, brand-new interiors, brand-new infotainments, new power units, higher horsepower, better vehicle driving dynamics. So it's truly a new generation of sports cars for us in all 3 models. So it's quite extraordinary and it's kind of the bridge we've been waiting to get to in 2023 because as you know, front-engine sports cars are the hearts and DNA of this company. As far as DBX707 is concerned, we've had tremendous, tremendous response from our customers. We've never received as many car orders on our configurator in the history, although granted it's a new model for us. But the reception is -- really was a response to the consumer demand that we listened to the consumer who said, "We love your DBX, but we would like it to be more aggressive. We'd like to have more horsepower. We'd like to have more performance for that certain car enthusiast customers." So we catered with our standard DBX to a customer and we create to a more car enthusiast with the 707.

The next question comes from the line of Charles Coldicott from Redburn.

I had 2 on cash flow actually. So firstly, on the Valkyrie, deliveries of 75 to 90 units this year, I think that's less than you'd previously expected. Given that you've taken most of the cash for those cars and deposits already, how much cash will that save you this year by not building and delivering as many Valkyries as you'd expected?

Yes, ask your next question and I'll come back to that.

Sure. And then thinking about the cash flow more broadly for this year, so cash burn of GBP 123 million last year, obviously the core EBITDA will be up significantly this year, but so will CapEx. So is it fair to assume that cash burn is going to be similar in 2022 to what it was in 2021? And also, thinking about 2023 and the target being cash flow breakeven, what are the major changes next year?

Yes, Charles, in terms of your second question, it helps answer the first for me. Broadly, yes, you're right. I'm looking at the cash burn being similar to slightly better for 2022 as it was to 2021 for exactly the reasons you say, because we're expecting the EBITDA to be higher, but so too is the CapEx. And within that, on the working capital movements, I'm expecting the core working capital to be somewhat positive. And I'm expecting the Valkyrie-related deposits to have a modest net unwind which, yes, some unwind happening, of course, related to the 70 to 90, yes, a bit lower than it would have been if it were higher with that unwind mostly offset with fresh deposits on Valkyrie Spyder, second deposits on the Valkyrie Spyder and new deposits on Valhalla kind of balancing that out a bit.

The next question comes from the line of Philippe Houchois. Please, can you confirm your company?

Yes. It's Philippe Houchois, Jefferies. Just real quick question on your guidance. When you talked about the accelerated depreciation of the aging models, we're clear that this will be part of your reported profit. It's not going to be treated as an exceptional below the line. Is that correct?

Yes, true. It's just regular DNA, yes.

Right. And can you comment more generally about -- I understand, although we don't have the numbers, but your wholesales were below your retail again in 2021. You could maybe quantify the amount by which you destocked and comment about your inventory levels from here. I understand it's generally low compared to history, definitely, but also maybe compared to where you would like to see.

Our inventories have never been better ours and the dealers for that matter. We retailed, to answer your first question, approximately 400 vehicles more than we wholesale. Might be the first time in this company's history to retail more than we wholesale, which was the first step towards what I put in place when I became Chairman. As you recall, I said we're going to align the management supply. We very, very successfully have done that and as I mentioned, our inventories as well. But by the way, in the fourth quarter, we even had to ramp up our inventories a bit more in order to get the dealers more stock because their inventory levels were too low. So we've never been in a better place and that's part and parcel of only manufacturing vehicles to order, which is what I said when I took over almost 2 years ago.

Right. And if I can last -- squeeze in the last one please. The line I look at the most in your P&L is the gross margin and I'm a bit disappointed that it hasn't really improved in Q4. And I think now we need to get to 40% as a sustainable level for the proprietary of Aston Martin. So what's the road map? Can we expect the gross margin to improve in '22, considering that at the same time you have some aging products? Or is it really dependent on the mid-engine and the new family upfront?

So the first new car under this team's leadership is the DBX 707. That is the first car that will come with a minimum -- hope to be more than that, a minimum of 40% contribution margins and every car that we produce from now on going forward will have that same minimum.

The next question comes from the line of Pushkar Tendolkar from HSBC.

This is Pushkar from HSBC. I have 2 questions. The first one is regarding the Valkyrie shipment indication of 75 to 90 units for this year. At the Q3 call, you had indicated a run-rate of 3 Valkyries a week, which at best would mean around 150 cars in 2022, while you now indicate only around half of that as shipments. So please, could you just comment around this disparity? And then the second one is on the EBITDA margin guidance. How water tight is this guidance and has room for error been built into it, considering that the main purpose now should be to restore confidence in the company's ability to achieve its targets after the miss last year?

Let me do it. Firstly, the miss last year was caused by one issue only, which was the Valkyrie. Let me be crystal clear. All these Valkyries are sold. They have deposits, both Coupes and Spyders. We have received no cancellations. So by delivering them slightly later is simply a timing issue. The timing issue arise because we want to deliver these vehicles with no compromises. I think you're having trouble understanding. This is the most complex vehicle ever made to be driven on the road. Being the owner of the Formula One team, I can testify that it's more complicated than building my Formula One car. So we want to deliver them to perfection. They're all sold. They all have deposits. We're taking our time to deliver them perfectly. We've assembled a new group of Formula One mechanics to actually manufacture and put in place these and produce these cars. So it is a project that we are extremely proud of, very ambitious. We're the only ones to undertake such a project and that was our only miss last year. On much more fundamental importance on the core program, which was over 6,000 vehicles, we were exactly on target. As far as the second question, I'll let Ken respond as it was a financial one. I don't remember what it was.

Second question -- yes, to the margin. Clearly, yes, we've sought to strike our guidance at a level that we can meet the needs for 2022. And as we've done that, we've talked about the margin expansion that we're looking to achieve, supported by the new product introductions of the DBX707, which Lawrence already talked about on the call, and the V12 Vantage, both of which give us a good opportunity to move the EBITDA margin forward.

The next question comes from the line of Gabriel Adler from Citi.

Can you talk a little bit about your expectations for core ASP this year? Obviously, the lineup refresh in 2023 is going to be very supportive for this. But what should we be expecting in 2022 in terms of ASP improvement from DBX707 and general price increases given your comments around the inventory situation earlier?

Yes. I mean, we were -- I mean, first off, I'd say we're pleased to see the ASP improved into 2021 to around about GBP 150,000 per unit. And although we're not kind of providing specific guidance on the ASP for 2020, the new products that I've just talked about give us the opportunity to think about improving that forward by circa 10% plus in double-digit number in 2022. That's certainly what we're going to be looking forward too. It depends a bit on product mix, of course, et cetera, et cetera. But with the 707, the V12 Vantage, those products give us a good opportunity to move the overall margin of the business forward. And of course, that needs to be driven by the top line.

The next question comes from the line of Thomas Besson from Kepler Cheuvreux.

I guess it's me. So it's Thomas Besson at Kepler Cheuvreux. I have 2 questions, please. The first relates to deposits. Could you please just comment on the level of deposits at the end of '21, how it compares with the end of 2020? Was it therefore an inflow, an outflow? And whether we should expect an inflow or outflow in '22? That's the first question. The second, looking at the prospects of a complete generation change for sports car, if I understand correctly between Q2 and Q3 next year, could you just help us understanding how you manage to maintain interest around the existing 3 vehicles? And whether we should expect pricing to hold or to eventually weigh in a bit on these vehicles into their replacement?

On the second question first, it is quite incredible and it shows the power of this brand. Sports cars are already sold out into the fourth quarter -- beginning of the fourth quarter of this year. That shows how strong our demand is for the DNA and the history of the company. So continue to remain very, very strong order book and full market price, no -- less VM, no markdowns. So this shows what we put in place at the beginning of aligning supply with demand and only manufacturing vehicles to order. So the sports cars continue to be strong, as I say, sold out right until the beginning of fourth quarter of this year. So we have no problems and concerns about the demand until we deliver the new model, as you rightfully say, in the quarters next year.

And on your first question, it's in the RNS and we have a GBP 340 million deposit balance at the end of 2021. That was a net GBP 70 million inflow in the year, a bit more than we expected largely because of the pace of Valkyrie deliveries as we already discussed in 2021, and the strong inflow that we saw on Valkyrie Spyder, a strong customer reaction also to Valhalla helped drive that inflow in 2021 to the level I just said. For 2022, as I said earlier on the call, I expect probably a net modest unwind of the overall deposit balance with Valkyrie, unwind of deposits relating to Valkyries that we deliver in the year being mostly offset by the second deposits on the Spyders and further customer interest in Valhalla.

Can I squeeze-in actually a third question please?

Sure. Go for it.

I just wanted to check whether your volume guidance, so above 6,600 for the year. Given the strengths of sports cars you're mentioning implies that those categories are going to rise in 2022 in sports cars and DBX or whether we should assume that 100% of the increase in volume in '22 comes from DBX and notably the newer model?

Yes, we're not providing a split of the volume expectations this year. I think Lawrence has already said we're really pleased with the underlying demand for sports cars. This year, we also have V12 Vantage addition that's coming that will be part of the sports car mix. But yes, at the same time, we do expect most of the growth in volume in the year to come from DBX, obviously driven by both the 707 that the launch is underway and the straight 6 derivative, which we launched in China back end of last year and deliveries commencing this year.

The next question comes from the line of Horst Schneider from Bank of America.

Horst Schneider here from Bank of America. I just have got one left please and that refers to this arrangement that you have got with Mercedes-Benz Group AG because you say in the release there are currently no plans to issue additional shares to Mercedes until early 2023. I remember you had a kind of put option in place where Mercedes gets compensation if the share price falls below a certain level. Could you maybe remind us of this agreement? So what is now the strike price? What compensation payment you have to make if the price remains as it is right now? I know a lot can change within a year. But I'm getting it also right, there's no payment going to be made this year.

That's a very reasonable question. Thanks for that. There is no payment to do this year. But what we see is a timing change. So when we drafted the whole agreement with the Mercedes back in the days, it was in '20, we're very premature. So with new assessments about the technology, we pushed it a bit further down the road. And then our expectation there is never going to happen a payment. That's clear.

The next question comes from the line of Daniel Roeska from Bernstein Research.

Lawrence and team first of all comeback on a big step in the right direction. Maybe 2 strategic ones and a tactical one. First of all, could you give us some more details on the progress of your electrification journey? And I saw that on some of the latter slides. What pieces of the puzzle are in place and which areas are you still working on? And then secondly, competitors of yours are spending a lot more time talking about kind of how to integrate the digital lifestyle of their consumers into the cars. But has you're thinking on kind of how that relates to a luxury brand like Aston changed or evolved over the past year? Kind of how do you see that question of digital lifestyle coming into the car for your brand and how it shapes the luxury image? And just tactically, maybe very short, I'm sure there's some leeway built into the guidance for material costs and logistics this year. Could you give us just the color what kind of the margin headwind it is that you're expecting this year from those external cost increases?

You go to last one.

I think in terms of the margin accretion, I think the top part, in the short term, we're thinking about the products in front of us and the DBX707, the V12 Vantage and the next generation of our sports cars, all giving us the opportunity to move the price points of our vehicles northwards really supported by the product substance that we're putting behind those fresh generation of new products. And as we look forward to electrification, we're thinking about it in terms of the brand development that we're doing, combined with product substance within there, looking clearly therefore to sustain the margin improvements that we're going to build over the next 2 years through that into our electrified products.

I take the other ones. Electrification journey, yes, it's clear, plug-in hybrid first one in early 2024. As you know, Valhalla as a mid-engine program is a plug-in hybrid. We actually launched, honestly, the straight-6 in China, which is a mild-hybrid. And then, we go further down the road. So we have a bespoke electrification program for Valhalla. When it comes to the drivetrain, the battery is a share battery. And we have a clear understanding how we're going to electrify as a plug-in hybrid at DBX and probably as well ours classical sports car portfolio as well as a variant. It's not all of them, but there for sure has a variant in there. And as you know, '25 we are about to launch and this is the clear target for us, the first electric vehicle with Aston Martin. Digital Lifestyle, that's a very good question. This is a kind of a very good discussion anyway in automotive industry in that industry. So but I'm not talking about digital lifestyle. It's all about for us as a brand in the ultra-luxury world. It's all about customer experience. And that gets even more important when you come or when you get into the journey of fully electric or best fully electrified cars. The brand plays a major role in future, and therefore the customer journey is much more important as of today and the customer experience. What you're going to see from us and that starts next year with the new generation sports cars. We're not going to use any more Mercedes infotainment HMI. So we started that journey exactly regarding this issue, exactly because we know that it is very strategic for us for the future. So you're going to see our connected environment, our environment, our app, so everybody take it that way or put it that way, kind of the ecosystem, the digital ecosystem with an Aston Martin account, with our own back end, with our own HMI to get on their journey in regards to the customer experience, which is much more important in the future than it has been probably back in the days.

The next question comes from the line of Charles Coldicott from Redburn.

Just had a couple of follow-ups. Firstly on the order book, I think you mentioned there the sports cars are now 6 to 7 months' worth of orders you've got. I had in mind previously the average for the group was 3 to 4 months. So has that increased significantly? And I think Tobias you've said before that you don't want the order book to get too long. Can you just remind us what you think the right sort of length of order book is for a luxury brand like Aston? And then the second question I just wanted to ask was on the DBX. You've got the more powerful version now with the 707. What do you think the DBX volume should be this year as a result? And beyond that, what will be the most important levers in getting you up to 5,000 to 6,000 units of the DBX per year?

Coming to the order book. It is a good question regarding the order book of sports cars. But that shows exactly the momentum of the brand. And yes, we are really good sorted out with the order book for the sports cars this year and it's -- but you have to consider. We know that we are going to have an uplift of that. We have a new generation of sports cars with us next year. So we are careful with our initial assumption how many cars we are going to deliver to the market. More important for that order book is how many retailed orders you see. And this is a new high. I think ever since the company exists what we see as retail-type order, so customers ordering a car with us. That's almost there what we targeted. So we have a good order book for sports cars. It is, I think, 8, 9 months, it could be 12 months. That's perfect. If it's going to be longer, sometimes you have an issue that customer probably not going to wait anymore in that world of sports cars. It's different for battery or special or other cars. What was the other one? If we see such a tremendous 5,000-6,000 demand on the marketplace, this company is always able to produce that because we are not limited in our infrastructure when it comes to production. But there is no limitation for us because everything is back in the days, it was set up in a high level of capacity. So as you saw last year, we consolidated a lot of on our site to be more efficient and this is what pays off now.

The next question comes from the line of José Asumendi from JPMorgan.

José Asumendi, JPMorgan. Few questions, please. Can you speak please a little bit around CapEx and the delta of CapEx between '22 and '21? What are the big projects that are driving this increase in CapEx? And then where are we in the cycle? Are we peaking in '22 or is it '23? Second, Tobias, can you speak a little bit more about this excellent ASP that you're running to the business. We heard about some of the drivers. I believe you mentioned 10% improvement in ASP in '22 versus '21. Where do we stand on the cycle? Can you improve the ASP of the business beyond 2022 and make it structural? What are you thinking? How can you do this? This is obviously the biggest delta obviously to generate cash and bring higher earnings. And then, Lawrence, on strategy, I mean you put a fantastic team together on the management side. Can you just remind us a little bit what is your #1 priority? And is there anything on the strategy side that currently you're missing, that you would like to sort of add to the company for the medium term?

I'll start, then you guys can answer it. As far as strategy is concerned, I'm beyond proud and happy and pleased to say we are exactly on plan. There were 5 milestones, as you're aware, that they had to accomplish when I took over, from the refinancing to deleveraging the inventory to Mercedes joining us as a partner and successfully delivering the DBX first full year last year. So -- and most important from a marketing point of view launching our own Formula One team. And the launching of that team has shown in the sales and the demand for the product and the desirability for the brand, it's truly been incredible. So strategically, I'm exact thrilled and exactly on plan of where we want to be. And now, we will have the launch of all our new front engine sports cars next year and the launch of our opening price point mid-engine after we deliver our Valhalla. Again, this is technology, some of it taken from our Formula One team. So strategically speaking couldn't be happier, if anything, really ahead of plan based on retail outperforming wholesale significantly last year.

On the CapEx side, the biggest driver going into 2022 compared to 2021 is really the investment in the next generation of our sports cars. That's the biggest single element of spending in '22 and the reason -- the biggest reason for the growth. Also, of course, in '22, we've got spending connected with our electrification program that we talked about earlier in the call and also the mid-engine program. So all of those things driving some of the growth from '21 into '22. Shall I go on.

Yes, on the ASP development, I think as we look forward, it's clearly a journey that helped drive the margin growth that we're targeting. And so as we step forward into '22, we talked about a couple of the drivers, the 707 and V12 Vantage give us the opportunity to move the overall ASP forward. I think as we look then into 2023, the next generation of the sports cars gives us the opportunity to think about further pricing for the extra product substance that's going into those vehicles as we take them to the marketplace. So a bit early to say exactly where that goes, but we do see the opportunity for development.

It's basically a clear strategy to improve ASP further on. So we have the double-digit now and in '22, and we have a clear strategy with the new generation of sports cars. And as Lawrence and everybody in the company is clear in the strategy that we have to achieve 40% contribution margin in each and every single product, you can imagine that this is a given target and a given strategy to improve ASP further on.

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from the line of Christoph Laskawi from Deutsche Bank.

It's Christoph from Deutsche. The first one would be on headwinds essentially from raw materials and input costs. Most of the suppliers are currently negotiating with the OEMs to pass on what we've seen as normal price inflation, et cetera. So the question will be do you see the same discussions right now? And is there a certain risk you put to that for, say, the second half gross margins? And given you've just alluded on the ASP strategy quite in detail, the question will be in case we were to see quite a bit of a demand from supplies in the second half, I would assume you have enough flex in pricing to just address the new launches that you plan for '23 in order to show the gross margin that you've just highlighted. And then as a second part of question, just on the core business profitability, is it fair to assume that, that is around high single-digits right now and the 15% uptick in '22 should put it closer to double-digit or in double-digits?

Headwind for regarding supply chain, yes, absolutely. We faced that as well, like everybody. But we have -- we gave us the clear task and we are on a journey there to reduce our costs further on this year. So we are likewise able to overcompensate that. So there is no -- there is always a danger zone for margin, but this is not -- this is -- and we are pretty confident that we're going to achieve that, that we can overcompensated everything, what it comes in as raw material price lift, blah, blah, blah. So we faced that every day with every supplier almost. But it's a normal business. That's our industry and that's every industry at the moment faced the same issues. Yes.

And on the second question on the core margin I think you talk about, I mean we're not giving a split of the profitability of the business between core and specials. We just wanted to provide a bit of texture. But for sure, the sort of direction of travel that you're describing is not far on.

And if I can sneak in one follow-up on ASP development across the regions. Seen the strong demand that you have in North America and Asia, particularly, and those have been typically the markets where you achieved the highest ASP. Can we assume that your pricing power there or the uplift that you can get into the market is outsizing the uplift you see in Europe? Or should it be pretty similarly distributed?

Similar. It is similar. We see the same opportunities in Europe.

The next question comes from the line of Stephanie Vincent from JPMorgan.

Just given the news yesterday about a competitor IPO as well as their potential entry into Formula One. I didn't know if you had any, I guess qualitative comments that you'd like to make, given some of the news flow about them in F1 over the past few months? And then my second question was, Lawrence, you had made some comments about addressing high-cost debt. Currently, the RCF is drawn. Given your view that you'll return to profitability and better free cash flow position I guess from 2023 onwards, any further comments that you'd like to make there or the management team? And then finally on the deferred tax asset balance. Obviously, this has risen over the past couple of years. Do we have any indication how this is going to wind down over time?

I take the last one last.

Stephanie, on the deferred tax asset, we expect that to wind down through the next 5 to -- in the latter part of the decade, let's put it that way.

And as far as refinancing the debt, you're correct. As I said yesterday, this is very much on our radar. We will be addressing that as the bonds become callable over the next 2 years.

[Operator Instructions]

I think we don't have any more questions. Lawrence, did you have a closing remark or 2?

No. Once again, just to repeat, I'm very proud in our first full year together as an organization. Last year, we delivered as promised on all our core numbers. The fundamentals of the business are in place. We have 2 exciting launches this year and the very exciting next generation of all our sports cars next year. So our future is mapped out as we always said it was from the beginning. And now it's simply a matter of executing on that. And we've shown we're extremely good at executing on those plans. So looking forward for extremely exciting times. And as I leave you, I will head to Barcelona where our Formula One team currently just took to the track and started testing. Thank you.

That does conclude the conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may all disconnect. Have a nice day.