Eckert & Ziegler SE (EUZ) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

With me is Karolin Riehle and also [ Juan Schrider ], among other colleagues, they are going to help me out if later on, we have some questions or you have some questions, which we might jointly answer. I've been in London yesterday to talk about Eckert & Ziegler as such, not publishing the numbers which we have received today. So for some of you, this might be already commodities and apparently common standard. For others, hopefully, some also new information. If you look to the first slide, you see the biggest change for our company is as we move from Aktiengesellschaft to an SE and that's why the AG has been crossed out, and we are now no longer an AG but an SE, and we have also taken out [indiscernible]. So it's Eckert & Ziegler SE for the next 150 years. All other things will remain unchanged, but an SE helps us to act more Europeanly and to be a better comparable to other companies, public traded companies in Europe. Having said so, let's move to the slides and to the content. Some of the slides are known to you, particular, you know my colleagues, Jutta Ludwig and Frank Yeager. Jutta is responsible for the Asian Pacific, China business. And you know that we are doing big business in Jintan, close to Shanghai. That is all under Jutta's umbrella and Frank Yeager is responsible for the Isotope business. Now the most important topic is what is happening in Big Pharma. And this is a slide which becomes more and more busy. And if you look here to -- and here's the pointer. This one here that has been published this week. Another big deal in incredible high values, EUR 2.4 billion AstraZeneca paid for candidate 1. Candidate, a Fusion based on Actinium, so that is really impressive that Big Pharma more and more jumps on the train and wanted to make sure that radio-pharmacy is also within their portfolio. And even for a very promising candidate of Fusion, which is coming from Heidelberg in Phase I is worthwhile for AstraZeneca to acquire that company and that is based on Actinium. So that demonstrates not only that Eckert & Ziegler is in the right niche of radiopharmacies and radiopharmaceuticals, but also that when we talk about specific isotope that Actinium is of highest interest. All the other deals you have seen POINT Biopharma and others are known to you, and I do expect that there are more deals to come. And if you look here to the portfolio of Eckert & Ziegler, Y-90 is the Actinium's deals, equipment, our hot cells facility where NorthStar is a customer. Lilly is now a Lutetium customer and others and more to come. This is our view to our customers for either Lutetium or Actinium or CMO activities. And here, I also do expect that from time to time or every time when we do see each other that this list might and will become longer. You know that Eckert & Ziegler is active in 2 areas. One is the medical area that is here what we are doing. We are producing radio isotopes, the full value chain from the development -- from early development to CMO activities to Isotope production, which we are then delivering to either hospitals, clinics or then later on also it's forwarded to the patient's need. And then we have the radioisotopes, which are used for industry purposes, for calibration and that is the lower part where all the different industry areas are covered by Eckert & Ziegler products. These are the -- one of the highlights of the last quarter between October and December. This is going to be updated on a quarterly basis. And you see that we are continuing to setting up more supply contracts for Actinium, particular also here with PharmaLogic, we have also a new contract with Lutetium. So both is going into the right direction. And interestingly enough, that Lutetium contract was immediately followed after our joint venture publication with DongCheng Pharma in Jintan where we are jointly cooperating for isotope production in a new building, a new facility, and you have seen already some pictures demonstrating that. We are continuing to reporting about isotope products on the one side here and then also the pharmaceutical within the medical area. We will not further continue to report on Pentixapharm and Myelo, that is our discontinued operations, but I'm also, of course, happy to answer all questions you might have. Now having a look to full year numbers of last year, this is a picture which you are familiar with. What you see in green is the isotope area; and orange is the Medical business. Revenue and also profitability wise, it's basically split at 50-50. There is a slightly better profitability in Medical, in particular, if you look to the numbers which are published here, you see that revenue per employee is EUR 200,000, it's EUR 300,000 for the Medical and based on the employees, also the EBIT ratio is a better one. That's why in Medical we have profitability of EBIT is more than 50%. So let's have the numbers, which have been always published throughout the year. '23 that was the guidance, which was published a year ago where we said our final income number will be EUR 25 million. And for those who have had time already to look to the numbers, the net income of Eckert & Ziegler of last year was EUR 26.3 million. So we delivered on our guidance and even exceeded that slightly hopefully to all your happiness and satisfaction, so that the success story of Eckert & Ziegler continues as much. Now let's have a look to some specific numbers, both for the entire group and then also later on for Medicare industry in more details. If you look to the overall performance, this was a double-digit growth of 11% from EUR 222 million to EUR 246 million. If you look to net income or EBIT, that has been not fully reflected, in particular, as we spend quite a lot of money for Pentixa. So if we look to the Pentixa adjusted numbers, and then it's comparable EUR 30 million to EUR 30 million, if that not discontinued operations is to be added, then net income would be relatively stable. Still, we have some extraordinary effect where we have discontinued business from other areas, which were still in their hyperinflation, currency effects, and these extraordinary effects do lead to a situation that from now on we want to demonstrate our profitability on another definition, I come to that in a minute. So in Medical, strong growth with 27% from EUR 90 million to EUR 150 million, which you see here and above. Basically, that is to the majority coming from our GalliaPharm, our gallium generator, which is a continuous success story, and that is going to be continued, not only in the existing markets but we are also aiming to continue that in countries where we are not active yet. Net income is increasing by 6%. And here, again, we see a strong currency effect of EUR 1.8 million. We have deconsolidation of a business, Wolf-Medizintechnik, which belongs to the Medical segment earlier on, another EUR 1.2 million. And if you add these extraordinary effects, back to the '23 results, then the growth rate would be comparable to the strong net sales ratio, as you see above. In isotope areas, that is a stable third-party business. However, as we always demonstrated, it is basically a constant business with EUR 130 million. Last year was the same ratio, they're like EUR 131 million. So that is basically the same. But if you look to the net income, you see a strong increase here of profitability by 9%. That is due also that in those areas where we have a strong industry growth for Oil Well Logging industry, gas and oil sector that has immediately effect on the profitability. And I'm mentioning here that Oil Well Logging were increasing 12% versus prior year. That's why that has also a consequence here on the net income, which is quite satisfaction. Now let's have a look to the definition and a lot of -- you always mentioned that the net income is, to a certain extent, irritating for you. And we took that into consideration and we want to change from net income to an operational business or as we call it, EBIT before special items from continuing operations. So that is our EBIT as reported, and then we take what you see here, currency effects, hyperinflation, acquisitions and divestments. We take these bullet points, which you see here, we take them off so that we have then an EBIT before special items, which allows you to better compare apple-to-apple. And of course, for those who are still interested in net income, that will be also reported. But in terms of guidance and for you to compare and to value our performance and activity I would appreciate if we then have a joint understanding that this specific EBIT before special items is the number you will look in to. And if you then see what the comparison is last year to this year, then that would be a number of EUR 43.8 million and EUR 46.9 million. So if we -- and that I tried to describe earlier on if these special items are going to be excluded, then you see also not only a strong performance in revenues, but also here in EBIT before special items. So the operating result is pretty positive. And that will be then also the number when we later on speak about the guidance. I continue to give you some more insights about the revenues. And here, you see a split between Europe, North and South America, Asia and rest of the world. And what is worthwhile to mention is that our Asian business is becoming one of the important engines of Eckert & Ziegler. You see here a growth of 37% compared to previous year, still the numbers from EUR 20 million to EUR 30 million. But if you look to the growth momentum which we see in China, basically doubling its revenue compared to previous year. I'm pretty convinced that this is going to continue. And this is one of the reasons why we are so happy that our investment in our joint venture with DongCheng Pharma was successfully closed or concluded by November of last year and that we now have a 50-50 joint venture partner equally paying cash into that company, [indiscernible] name of the company and then aiming for producing isotopes in China for the Chinese market. That is what this slogan is, and we are adding by selling produce in China for the Chinese market, together with a Chinese partner because we have the technique, we have the know-how. Our partner has the access to the market and that seems to be an ideal combination of combined forces. And that's why we are very confident for our China development. Radiopharmaceutical, that is the core of the medical business. The definition you see here, that is the Isotope business, both for Y-90 Lutetium in the years to come. Actinium, but also in our generator business, in particular, the Gallium generator, a little bit also of Technetium generator in South America. Cold Kits and CMO, CDO work plus our hot cell facility. And you see here the growth, in 2022, we were still demonstrating the inorganic growth of Technonuclear, which we acquired that year. We will now put all under 1 umbrella, but you see here, radiopharmaceutical has grown of nearly 30% compared to last year, very satisfying, but also simultaneously [ quite a hurdle ] also to continue this for the years to come. Balance sheet. How does the balance sheet look like? You know that our balance sheet has become longer with approximately EUR 400 million total assets. So on the other side, equity and liability, that is split up in cash receivables, you see that number here. Actually no big change to the previous years, but let's have a little bit more look into the details. That's why Julian has put '22, '23 a comparison. And you see the numbers I just mentioned that is to increase in EBIT before special items. Cash flow has increased by quite substantially 20%. We need that money for our investments because you see that in last year but also in this year and also in the year of '24, we want to continue in investing in our existing facilities, but also exploring new business opportunities in our core business. This is the production of isotopes. Loan liabilities have remained stable. Cash, we used some of the cash to pay for our investments. Equity ratio remains above 50%. And headcount-wise, we topped the 1,000 headcounts by autumn of last year and have now really good number in which we can be a company still in a niche area, but we stated all over the world, and that is going to be continued. Here, you see, in a nutshell, what Eckert & Ziegler stands for with the comparison of last year, basically same slide than just [ preferred ]. Now let's have a look to the outlook. That is how this year will look like. And what we see is that is the EBIT number I just mentioned, 47% or 46-point-something. That is going to be increased by EUR 50 million for the year '24. And if you look to the revenue, that will be an increase from EUR 246 million to EUR 265 million. So that is the growth above the market with something around 8%. And if you look to the 2 business units that will be double-digit growth for medical, relatively stable in terms of Isotope business here in plus/minus 0. If you look to the EBIT numbers, and what is quite important also is that EBIT here for Medical is growing by 11%, which demonstrate that we want to keep our profitability also in that area to continue this growth top line and bottom line wise. This is a calendar. There are lots of contracts coming up. And today, of course, is very important because we want to discuss with you the different aspects of last year and this year. But if there's more for you to have a look to either for Eckert & Ziegler or if you have specific questions also for Pentixapharm, happy to answer that as well.