engcon AB (publ) (ENGCONB) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Hello, everyone, and warm welcome to engcon's presentation of the fourth quarter 2024. My name is Krister Blomgren, and I'm the CEO here at engcon. With me today, I have our CFO, Marcus Asplund, he is with us for the second time. Together, we will take you through the Q4 report with the highlights and the key financials of the quarter, and then we'll move on to the Q&A session after that. Before we start with the highlights of Q4, I would like to take a look on 2024 and our development during the year. Our vision is to change the world of digging. Are we getting closer to that? 2024 was a year with challenging market conditions, weak demand in the Nordic region that slowed down the sales, while Europe posted growth despite the cautious market with falling excavator sales. 2024 is a historic year where Europe is our largest region, passing the Nordics. We now have 2 markets that generate the majority of our revenue. They generate 80% of our revenue together. If we're taking a look at the doughnuts, we can see that year 2012, the Nordics were 88% of our revenue and Europe had 10% and Asia-Oceania 2% and America more or less nothing. Year 2023, we can see that Nordics are still the largest region with 43% and Europe, 34%. And now 2024, we're having the historic where Nordics are not the largest region anymore. It's Europe that our largest region and Americas and Asia standing for approximately 20% together. For us, that's a huge step towards changing the world of digging where Nordic is not the largest region anymore. To grow in Europe when the excavator market is decreasing with approximately 25%, that means that we are climbing up on the product diffusion curve and that we have a higher penetration percentage in Europe now. Can we keep increasing the penetration when the excavator sales are taking off again, then we will grow really, really fast. The importance of the Nordics have decreased, but with a substantial drop, it impacted the group's total revenue in 2024. The drop is approximately SEK 225 million of revenue for the year in the cyclic Nordic region. The rest of the world has not been able to compensate for this decline yet, but the larger we get in the other regions will be less cyclic in that way. But nevertheless, we have maintained an EBIT margin of 18%, which I view as a clear sign of our strength and evidence that our business model is scalable. We know that the Nordics will bounce back once confidence returns and excavator sales pick up again. It will be exciting to see if Europe can continue growing fast enough to stay ahead of the Nordics in 2025. So to answer my own question, if we are closer to change the world of digging now compared to a year ago, my answer is yes. Europe have been taking big steps where more or less all markets having a strong year 2024, and the penetration is higher on all markets in Europe than a year ago. We're jumping in then to the highlights, and then we start with the most positive thing, and that's the order intake for the quarter was the highest since the fourth quarter of 2022. It is SEK 506 million, and that's an organic increase of 22%. What's also very positive is that all regions posted increased order intake this quarter. And the largest increase in order intake took place in the Nordic region with 34%, which was the result of a preordering and can be seen as an indication of a more optimistic market view. In the Americas, our order intake increased organically by 17%. Over the past year, we have announced challenges within our organization in the U.S. As a result of this, we have decided to make changes to the management structure and part ways with our previous regional director. We still have a positive view in the North American market and are investing to increase our sales there. We're also choosing to increase our investment in Asia by setting up a sales company in Japan. Japan offers a great potential for our products, driven by the ongoing labor shortage and our country's strong demand for greater efficiency and productivity in the construction sector. As a further step on our sustainability efforts, we have joined the world's largest sustainability initiative, the UN Global Compact Initiative. We are proud to join thousands of other global companies that want to make the world a better place. And that's important in days like this when people and countries focus on themselves first. If we're moving over to numbers then, we're starting with net sales, and we're having organic growth of net sales with 27%, and that's really good, even though it's from low levels in Q4 2023. If you're looking on the order intake, here, we're coming out really strong with 22% organic growth. And as I mentioned earlier, this is the highest levels we've seen in 2 years. So really positive there with the order intake. Gross margin amounts to 43%. This is a more long-term sustainable level for us. It is a decline from the high levels of 46% in quarter 3. But as we said back then, stars will align in terms of gross margin with a profitable product mix and a strong market mix. And as I said now earlier here, 43% is a more long-term sustainable level for us. And Markus will guide us a little bit more around the details later on then. The EBIT margin amounts to 16%. Here, we see that the volume increase from last year helping us to reach this healthy level. But we are not satisfied here. And to get the extra percentage points on the EBIT margin, we need to grow net sales further to reach the 20% that's where we want to be. And last one is return on capital employed. We are climbing up to 38% and closing in on our financial target of 40%. If we're moving over then to looking into order intake and net sales over the last 8 quarters then. And then if we want to put the fourth quarter in a perspective, if we're looking there, we can see that the order intake amounts to SEK 506 million, and that's the highest in all these 8 quarters that we're showing here. We can also see that the fourth quarter shows a clear increase from Q3. And the main reason for that is the preordering, especially in the Nordics then, and the increases from SEK 360 million up to SEK 506 million. So it's a clear increase also during this period. And if we're looking deeper into all the other regions, and we will start with the Nordic region. And here, we see a strong order intake increase in quarter 4. And it's a really positive sign that we see some dealers daring to place preorders. Dealers also see a larger interest for machines in general now and have a more optimistic view on the market. And the result of this more optimistic view of the market is the preordering effect that we see then. We normally have this preordering in Q4, but we didn't expect it this year because of the lower price increase and the uncertainties that still exist in the world. We believe that March and April will be the most important months for the Nordic region regarding order intake, and that will set the tone a little bit for the rest of the year, how big increase we will have in the Nordics. But we believe that this preordering in Q4 has strengthened what we have said earlier that the Nordic region will have a solid increase compared to last year. Then we're going over to Europe. That's our largest region. And even if Nordic had a big increase in order intake, Europe is still our largest region, both on order intake and net sales this quarter. So that's also really showing strength from Europe there to still being the largest one. And as I mentioned earlier, 2024 has been a historic year in that sense that Europe have passed the Nordic as our largest region. We can also see that each quarter have over-performed the last throughout the year and how the rolling 12 numbers continue to increase in the diagram there. The increased penetration of more or less all markets have occurred and since we're growing and the sales has been down around 25% on the machine sales in Europe. We can now also see the benefits of our hard work over a long period. We have a stable organization that have been able to use -- enable to educate the end customers about the product which make them more likely or willing to invest even in tougher positive if looking -- Sorry, that the different markets has been doing good over different periods of time. This is a strength for us that we have several legs to stand on also within the region. Clear is, however, that the development in DACH region has stood out and shown good growth throughout the year. So DACH region and Germany especially have been doing really, really good for us then. And speaking about Germany, then we look forward to continue this journey to keep on to change the world of digging in Europe. We're also having the largest exhibition within construction, Bauma coming up in April 2025 in Munich that will also boost the interest and knowledge of our tiltrotators. Then we're going over to Americas. And here, we see an increase in the quarter, both on net sales and order intake from low levels. We hear from dealers and OEMs that the market development is pretty stable without any significant ups or downs. We take this as a positive sign as we will continue our efforts to penetrate the market. We can also see that some market uncertainties have increased since Trump was reelected as the President. For the moment, we are unsure of the consequences that the potential tariffs will have on our business, but we are not that worried since all our competitors are from Europe, and we'll have the same issues as we will have then, so we can deal with it from that. During the year, we have communicated challenges in our organization in the U.S. We have reviewed the organization to optimize resources and improve our long-term sales strategy. As a result of this, we have decided to make changes to the management structure and part ways with our previous regional director and also our sales manager. Our COO and former Head of Sales, Anders Smith, will lead operations until further notice. We are also actively trying to recruit new sales staff, including a new sales manager. We have never doubted our long-term view of the American market, and we are doing these changes to increase sales and change the world of digging. Going over to our last region, and that's Asia-Oceania. We also see that both order intake and net sales have increased, and we see a good performance throughout the region. In quarter 4, we also see the highest order intake for the year and how the rolling 12 numbers develops in a promising way. To better tap the market potential and strengthen our position in the region, we are currently establishing a sales company in Japan. There's a huge potential for our products due to labor shortage and a great need for increased efficiency and productivity in the construction industry. MLIT, Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism in Japan has stated that tiltrotators are now part of The Increased Productivity Program within Construction Industry that they have been running for a while. It has mainly been about digitalization with, for example, machine guidance on the machines. And the long-term goal have been autonomous machines, and they have realized that they need tiltrotators to reach that goal with autonomous machines then. And this is something that we and our partner, Kobelco have been pushing for in Japan for a while also. What does this incentive from the MLIT mean for the end customers then? They need to have an approved tiltrotator from MLIT and then they will get the higher rates on the governmental work sites. And that means that they will have an even faster return on the investment if they're investing in tiltrotators since they're getting higher rates and they can do the work faster and so on. So that's a big step for us in Japan. But it's also really positive for many other reasons, not only that the customer getting even more incentives to buy the tiltrotator, but it also clears up some uncertainties that have been in the Japanese rules and legislation regarding what you can put on an excavator boom. Before this, the focus was solely on weight, which caused some unclarities that now have been resolved and making it much easier for us to sell an in Japan. Now it's time for Marcus to guide us through the financials.

Thank you, Krister. As expected, EBIT improved compared to the low levels in Q4 2023. Between the quarters, EBIT increased by SEK 44 million, which corresponds to an increase of 231%, driving the EBIT margin from 6.2% in the fourth quarter 2023 to 16% in 2024. While EBIT margin shows a healthy recovery compared to Q4 2023, it is down slightly compared to the strong performance in Q2 and Q3 2024. This decrease is attributable to the lower revenue and gross margin, which I'll explain in more detail next while going through the various items in the income statement. Net sales in Q4 came in at SEK 393 million, a significant increase from the low levels of Q4 2023. Gross margin rose to approximately 43% from 40%. This improvement reflects the impact of higher net sales, which allowed for better absorption of fixed production costs. While 43% represents a sustainable long-term gross margin, it's a decrease from the higher levels of Q2 and Q3. As noted in our Q3 report, the 46% gross margin then was due to several favorable now diminished factors, mainly market and production mix. Moving on to the expenses and the ERP implementation costs, which decreased from SEK 10 million to SEK 6 million. However, administrative expenses remained stable due to increased activity in other ISIT areas. All in all, this summarizes to an EBIT of SEK 63 million or 16% for the fourth quarter. Looking at the full year 2024, we summarized the year with a net sales of SEK 1.65 billion, lower levels versus 2023 due to the weak demand in the Nordic region. A satisfying gross margin of 44%, strong aftermarket sales continue to support this margin. We, therefore, summarized the year with a stable EBIT of SEK 295 million, resulting in an EBIT margin of around 18% for the full year. This is a stable level considering the lower net sales during 2024 and confirms our scalable business model. Moving on to the cash flow. The cash flow from operating activities increased from SEK 96 million to SEK 108 million. We conclude that the new net working capital is at higher level than in Q4 2023 coming from higher inventories and accounts receivables due to the higher level of sales compared to Q4 previous year. The strength in cash flow for the quarter is driven by higher operating profit. The unutilized total liquidity for the last of December was SEK 446 million. Return on capital employed continues to recover from around 28% in Q1 and Q2 to around 31% in Q3 to end up at around 38% by year-end, and the upward trend is expected to continue. At the same time, the average capital employed is increasing, mainly due to balanced R&D expenditures. Looking at our performance for the full year 2024 towards our financial targets, we see a continued strong capital structure and increasing capital efficiency during the year, albeit still a couple of percentage points below our target. The profitability also comes in a couple of percentage points below our target, but we see this as a solid performance considering the lower net sales in the Nordic region. Despite a European-wide downturn in the excavator sales, Europe managed to partially offset the negative growth in the Nordics. Summing it all up, the Board of Directors proposed a dividend of SEK 1 per share. And with that, I leave the word back to you, Krister, to sum up and give us an update on what's ahead.

Thank you, Marcus. When we summarize the quarter, we can see that we have a strong order intake in all regions and especially in the Nordic region. It's our best quarter for 2 years. If we look at the whole year, it has been a strong year in Europe, as Marcus mentioned there, despite the machine market that have been down about 25%. We have been doing good in more or less all markets in Europe, and that's a strength for us going forward. So we're not depending on just one country in Europe or anything like that. We can work with all the markets we are there. That's really positive. And with the changes already made in North America, we feel confident that we are on the right way and that we'll see improvements during the year. We're also investing more in Asia, where we have started up our sales company in Japan, and it's enormous potential in Japan given the ongoing labor shortage and the country's considerable need for increased efficiency and productivity in the construction industry. MLIT incentives will also be an extra boost for our products on the market that have to change the way of digging. We're also going to release more units of our third generation -- models of our third-generation tiltrotator. During 2024, we launched EC319. And during 2025, we will launch more models of the EC3 series then. In 2025, we're also taking a step up to the Nasdaq Stockholm Large Cap. This marks a significant milestone and reinforces the exceptional growth journey we have been on and the exciting path still ahead. And an update regarding the Rototilt lawsuit. The hearing in the patent lawsuit against Rototilt has been conducted this week, and the verdict will be announced on March 27, 2025. If we're looking ahead then to 2025, our starting point will be to continue to create profitable growth and strengthen our market-leading position with innovation as the foundation of our business. And that's where the 3 Series will be important for us to keep that one step ahead compared to our competitors. Market conditions continue to contain a significant degree of unpredictability, partly due to the geopolitical situation and the potential tariffs in the U.S. As previously communicated, we expect stable development with continued growth, forecasting an increase from low levels in the Nordics. We also anticipate that the growth in Europe will continue. And with that, I would also like to give a huge thank you to our incredible employees, customers, partners, investors for being part of this journey. Your dedication and support have been the key to engcon's success so far, and I'm excited for 2025 and can't wait to change the world of digging together with you guys. That was all in our presentation, and we will now open up for questions that can be asked in the telephone conference. So operator, please go ahead with the first question.

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Zino Engdalen Ricciuti from Handelsbanken.

Just starting off on the order intake in the Nordics. Could you share something which you might hear from your customers on the drivers behind this prebuying effect? Is it that they anticipate a return or an improvement in the replacement cycle? Or what is the driver behind that?

I think it's overall that they see more optimistic on the market view, and they have been running out of stock of tiltrotators and so on, and they now dare to stock up a little bit also in that way. They're starting with preordering and maybe calling them out in late Q1 or in Q2 to be delivered then. So I think it's more an optimistic market view. We also see some trends that have been a little bit more larger rental fleets orders that's been out there. That's also been important for the OEMs or dealers in that way that they see there are a lot of business going on. And it's the Nordics haven't had that large rental fleet, but they're getting more and more common. And it's also pretty normal that when you're having more uncertainties that you maybe don't want to buy, you start with renting then instead. So it's also why maybe renting fleet is growing a little bit right now. Long answer to a short question.

Very good answer. And jumping to Europe, previously, you highlighted that Netherlands and France are countries that have been further ahead. Now you're talking that DACH is performing well. When you're looking at those countries, France and Netherlands, that is, how do you see that the development has been going there?

Netherlands has been taking big steps in the penetration part. I mean we are growing there, and there are -- machine market is going down. So in that way, we are -- have increased the penetration part. So Netherlands are strong. France had a really good year 2024 also, U.K. also. And -- but DACH is -- are extra good. They are the -- as I said, they've been going from being the problem child to be the golden child right now. So they have increased the penetration a lot there in Germany also. I mean it's a huge market, the German market. I mean it's a good year, 35,000 excavators coming out, and it's been dropping maybe then 25%. But still, it's a huge market and the increase we've been getting there is fantastic in many ways.

Very, very good. And...

And hopefully, you can see that if you're coming to Bauma and visit the exhibition.

Sounds good. Just a question on overall on the order intake. Would you say that there is any difference in terms of the timing, for example, in Q1 -- if the Nordics are delivered maybe late Q1, early Q2, would it be the same, for example, in Europe?

It's more or less -- the preordering is more or less only the Nordics that we have seen it. And as I said, it's normally like that, that they do in preordering, but there was not any significant preordering last year. And since the price increase was such we didn't expect it this year. But I think it's the positive market view and also that they are running out of stock that they feel that they have to start looking and being ready for when the machines start going out.

Very good. And just one more question on your EC3 models. Could you give any kind of insights into, for example, the markets where it's comparable, how the EC3 in terms of sales compared with the second generation?

Can you say that question again? What do you mean where...some markets and so any reflects on?

No. When you -- what I'm trying to get to is how the traction of the EC3 or like the third generation compares with the second generation in terms of sales?

Yes. So far, it's been really low volumes. So it haven't been -- it's really hard to say anything about it. We will have now from March, late March, early April, we will have the opportunity to launch it towards more machines. So far, it's been more or less only a few machines that -- or brands that have been able to get that new third series. But from end of March there, we will be able to sell it to more or less all brands. And after that, we can say more about it. But there are a lot of questions about it, a big interest and the ones that have been trying it are really, really pleased with it. And it's -- there are a lot of advantage with it regarding how the configuration makes it much easier to do the configuration. You're getting the optimal configuration on it and you also reduce the need of fuel or so on. And you also run it much, much smoother in that way. So there are a lot of positive things with it, but it's a little bit too early to say since there are so few units out.

The next question comes from Agnieszka Vilela from Nordea.

So maybe starting with the current trading, Krister, can you tell us how is the order intake performing in January and February? And also, do you expect any kind of stability or acceleration from Q4? Or should we expect a typical sequential drop, especially in the Nordics?

It's hard to say, I mean, exactly how we should look at it. But we still see the positive signs in the Nordics. There are no difference even if the -- we mentioned the geopolitical situation and so on, but still running positive in the Nordics. Hard to say if it will be better or worse exactly on the order intake right now then.

And March will be most important for you?

March is -- March and April will be the most important months for us. And so that's a little bit like -- a little bit early for us to say how good it will be in Q1 since we need March that are one of the 2 key months for us. I think those 2 months will set the tone for more or less the rest of the year for us. in the Nordics.

Yes. And then just -- I mean, we noticed that your backlog in the Nordics and overall actually increased quite substantially in Q4 already, given that orders are running above sales right now. So can I ask you what is your production planning for the coming quarters? And also, do you believe that you can realize this backlog in volumes and in sales?

Yes. I mean we are running pretty smoothly now in production. There are always some hiccups. I mean that's the normal status with production. But we don't have any issues with ERP or anything like that. It's more like getting supply and all that in time. So no, the signal is that we're doing pretty good in production. Of course, that's also maybe a signal that we have been getting more and more orders that's why the dealers then also are getting a little bit longer lead times, and that's why they also want to order so they are ready when they're getting the machines. So we may be up a little bit from our 2 weeks to 4 weeks type of thing right now then.

Great. And then the last question really, like can you elaborate on the upside potential in the Nordics overall? Where are your volumes today? And what's the kind of upside to kind of normalized volumes in the Nordics? And also overall then for your company, are you already prepared for the stronger market to return? And would you be needing to add production resources or some OpEx costs? How will it look like?

I mean if you start with the last question there, we -- if we increase even more, then we will, of course, need more people on the assembling line and so on, but that's not a huge cost or anything like that. We don't have any problems yet with the volumes in that way to need to go to a second shift or anything. We still will handle that during 2025. It's more a long-term planning we're having on the production part for that to increase. We feel pretty comfortable that we will be in a good situation for 2025, and we're preparing for the growth that will come then also '26 and '27. To answer how much we anticipate the growth to be, that's a little bit harder. But I mean, we've been dropping around 50% in the Nordics. And if you have been dropping 50% and you're going to get back, there will be 100% increase. But we don't expect it to happen in 1 year. We see it like a 3- to 4-year thing to get back on that level then. So we expect good growth in the Nordics that will boost our sales in that way. So that will be positive. And hopefully, we'll have -- as I said, it will be a fight between the Nordics and Europe about who will be #1 next year, who will be the largest one. And hopefully, Europe can grow faster than the Nordics. And that's a good sign because we believe that it will be a good increase in the Nordics.

The next question comes from Anna Widstrom from Carnegie.

So my first question is if we maybe can go into some more details on the offensive investments that you're doing in the Americas but also Japan that you talked about. So for example, one could interpret that there could be some cost scale-ups during 2025, looking for some additional competence and so on. Could you maybe give us some details in this regard?

Yes. If we're starting in the U.S., then like we -- or in North America, as we mentioned, we have made some changes in the management, and we're trying to recruit a new sales manager as fast as possible. And we also need to get more salespeople on board. And so there will be some additional cost, yes, regarding that. But we also will be looking on not maybe being everywhere, but pushing from the East Coast and going west from that way, if we say like that. And we also will have more inside salespeople that maybe also cost a little bit less than the outside salespeople and so on. But absolutely, there will be extra cost in North America on the sales side. And in Japan, of course, we've only been working with partners there, and we will have our own staff and we will have our own location. So that's also additional cost for that. But we have a rent location there. facility. But we believe that we need to be there by ourselves to be able to grow the market faster.

Okay. Great. Very clear. And the positive trend that we've seen in the Nordics with prebuying, was there any difference between the Nordic countries? Or was it very general in that region?

I think -- I would say at least 3 out of 4 had a good preordering effect. It was maybe Denmark that had a little bit lower preordering, but Norway, Sweden and Finland had a pretty good preordering.

Okay. Great. And then maybe some discussions on -- obviously, it's very difficult to say how the tariff is going to have effect and what's going to be the end game. But just given the comments that you've made on basically all the players being from Europe and very solid investment headroom that you currently have, would it maybe strategically be a bit interesting to look into maybe having some own production in the U.S. going forward?

Yes. Long term, it will be -- but we need to have higher volumes there to be able to keep the good quality level. And also even if there are tariffs, the prices on doing it on these low volumes would be higher than paying the tariffs. So still there is a long way for us before we're doing a full production there. It might be some easier assembling where we're trying to make it easier to pack the containers in a better way with more -- maybe not IKEA flat package, but a little bit more flat package in that way and doing the final assembling in North America. But we are looking at it, and we were looking on it even more than before this year. But with the trend break we got this year, we need to build up the volume on a higher level for really start looking at it again.

[Operator Instructions] There are no more questions at this time. So I hand the conference back to the speakers for any closing comments.

Okay. Thank you all for very good questions. And if you have any further questions, please don't hesitate to reach out to any of us. We are more than happy trying to help you to answer those questions. And also then thank you for listening in today, and we hope to see you all soon again. Thank you then from me and Marcus.

Thank you.

Bye-bye.