Envipco Holding N.V. (ENVI) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, everyone. My name is Simon Bolton, CEO of Envipco and very much welcome you to our Q1 2024 Earnings Presentation. Joined by 2 colleagues, Bob Lincoln, President and Head of the U.S. business; and Mikael Clement, who is Investor Relations and Corporate Strategy Officer. Normal disclaimer. Just very solid Q1. It gives me pleasure to report, Group revenues, EUR 27.4 million. So that's over 160% higher than a year ago. I think we've passed a really good threshold. So last 12 months revenue is now over EUR 100 million as we continue to execute our growth strategy that we've laid out over the last few years. Gross margins, 35%, gives a gross profit over 170% up at EUR 9.6 million. Overall performance for 1Q, very positive EBITDA of EUR 2.7 million and certainly significant year-on-year improvement versus a loss of just under EUR 1 million a year ago. I think for those who are following the business, a couple of months ago, we did a very successful private placement, which raised EUR 26 million, which funds all the growth opportunities that we'll tell you a little bit about in this presentation. Maybe for those who are just joining for the first time, a little bit about us, Envipco. So we're a recycling technology business. We've actually been around over 40 years. We've got a very, very solid business that Bob will tell you about in the U.S., 40% market share. And for the last few years, we're really focused on the European market, where all the growth is coming from. And this is really driven by legislation, which has recently been revamped to really focus on the recovery of single-use beverage containers. And to do that effectively, the best way of doing that is to put in a deposit return scheme, a DRS, which gives a small deposit, which consumers of the beverage can get back when they return the container. And to do that volume, billions of containers a year in most markets, then you really need automated solutions. And that's where we come in. We provide the technology, the RVMs, reverse vending machines, and the systems and services around that. So once again, we've now -- last 12 months, we've passed over EUR 100 million, which is 2.7x 2021 revenues and with 35% gross margin. So we continue to be on track to our -- what -- in 2021 were long-term targets of 4 to 6x in revenue. 30% market share in these new greenfield markets that are opening up in Europe and a gross margin of 40% as we exit 2025. If we look at how that has come through over the previous years, you'll see that whilst the U.S. business remains a real solid foundation for us, and we're seeing some really great opportunities for growth and development in that market at the moment. You've seen nearly a 10x increase in revenue in Europe. And again, all of these markets are starting to put in deposit return schemes, which needs our products both now and in the years ahead. So that kicks off the start. Now, I'll introduce Bob, if you could talk us through the operational review? Thanks.

Thanks very much, Simon, and good morning, good afternoon to everyone. I'm going to take us through an operational review. But a question we're often asked. I mean, these are vast market opportunities we have, tens, thirties, thousand machine opportunities. So the question comes, why are we winning our share? We have a lot of proof points that we're doing that already. It starts with the product portfolio. We have probably the broadest product portfolio in the business from very small applications all the way up to hypermarket applications. So there's no customer that we don't have a product form that we can meet their demand with. We also have significant global customers. We've acquired new global customers in Europe, and we're performing to their expectation. Production capacity is very critical. Some of these markets like the U.K. are 30,000 RVM opportunity just in that market. So we need to prove to retailers that we can scale our production. We can do 30,000 stand-alone units a year and our specialty products, which is Quantum and Modula, we can go from 8,000 to 10,000 a year. So that's ample production capacity to meet the market needs. But importantly, we really work very hard on understanding the target customer, what they're facing. This is new to everybody. These are all greenfield. And these retailers really have no idea what they're facing. Obviously, we're experts, but we're more collaborative in trying to understand how they're going to handle this waste stream throughout their store. We pilot extensively with retail. We do very well on pilot. And by the time we get to the RFP, we're certainly in a very good position to win, and we've proven we can win. I want to spend just to touch on the Quantum a bit. I mean, this product really is a breakthrough product. I mean, it's a true bulk feed. The platform processes over 100 units a minute, super reliable, very high container storage. And we've had a big success in Sweden with this. We've had a big success in Greece with it. We also have just done an installation in the Netherlands. And it's been an important platform, and there's nothing really unique about these markets, Sweden and Greece. Stores want to use their footprint to sell goods. If they can move this function outside, the Quantum is a perfect application. In Sweden, we're seeing much greater consumer uptake, more foot traffic into the store, volume lift because the machine is so simple to use. So when we're looking at these new markets, we believe Quantum is going to be a more important platform, more installations, more critical application for those markets going forward. And on Modula, this is our backroom system, which is also an important feature for a large retail. And what we've done here is, we've looked at the competitive products, and we've refined our offering. We've made it smaller, more discrete, more cost-effective, very flexible. It's plug-and-play. It can fit into any existing backroom systems. So that's a very important product for us. So we definitely have the low-end, very well captured. And now we have high-end applications, very competent products in those segments. In terms of operational updates, in North America, the Connecticut -- the state of Connecticut doubled their deposit value in January to $0.10. We've seen a significant increase in our container volumes, which, of course, hit our bottom line. It's been very visible this law change in the neighboring states of Massachusetts and New York. And we have every expectation that both of those states will also double their deposits. We have a very big machine base in both of those states. It's legislative. So it's hard to pinpoint when it will happen, but inevitably, those states will also double their deposit. California is a big focus area for the company. Last quarter, we launched a pilot there to establish some proof points on how we can raise redemption rates in existing locations. We've had the state regulators look at this site, visit it, highly complementary. It's still a very difficult market, but we are not giving up. We are going to put a lot of effort and scrutiny on how to crack the code in California. In Europe, I just got back from Ireland. We have a very solid start there. We have an unbelievable team. We have reporting on reliability on our machines in Ireland to the system operator. We're at 95% to 97% uptime on our platform in Ireland. So this just goes to the reliability of our technology, our responsiveness of our service force. So that's off to a very strong start. Hungary, of course, continues to be a big revenue driver, not just in this quarter, but we expect Hungary to continue to be an important revenue driver throughout the year, demanding customer MOHU. We're meeting all of their expectations. The Romanian business is still moving forward on a constant steady state. There are still Tier 1 opportunities, traditional retail, small retail and municipal applications in Romania that our sales team is working. So we believe there is growth to become in the future in Romania. And as I mentioned in the Quantum slide, this continues to show success, Greece, Netherlands, Slovakia. So we're moving forward in a meaningful way in these markets. And now, I'll turn it over to Mikael.

Thanks, Bob. I'll bring you through some of the financial highlights and details for the quarter. Revenues, as Simon mentioned, a very strong performance in the first quarter of the year. Revenues at EUR 27.4 million, a growth of 164% from Q1 last year, somewhat down from Q4, but still a very, very strong performance. Gross margins in the quarter, 35%, up from 33.9% in the corresponding quarter in 2023, with gross earnings up 172% year-over-year. Gross margins were slightly down on a sequential basis from Q4 as we had some manufacturing cost effects from the Q4 capacity buildup due to the very strong sales we had in that quarter. Operating expenses were up 48% year-over-year versus a growth in revenues of more than 160% year-over-year at EUR 8.5 million, driving an EBITDA of EUR 2.7 million versus an EBITDA loss of EUR 0.9 million in the corresponding quarter last year. EBIT positive EUR 1.1 million versus a loss of EUR 2.2 million in Q1 '23. The key driver behind our growth in the first quarter of '24, once again is Europe. European revenues were up close to 800% to EUR 19.9 million. Key driver being installments of RVMs across several European markets, Greece, Hungary and Romania continue to be our key growth markets in the quarter. In Q1 '24, we also saw our first revenues from Irish installations. program services at EUR 0.7 million in the quarter. Keep in mind that during warranty periods, we do not generate any service revenues. So the sharp rise in installments that we've seen over the last few quarters will take some time until we start generating service revenues on. To North America, North America continues to be a very stable and profitable business for Envipco. Revenues in the first quarter amounted to EUR 7.6 million, a drop of 7% versus Q1 last year. We did see a turnaround in program services, with a positive growth of 3% in Q1 to EUR 7.1 million. We are seeing, as Bob mentioned, positive volume effects in Connecticut from the doubling of the deposit values following then several quarters of negative growth in program services. RVM sales in the quarter were EUR 0.5 million, down from EUR 1.2 million in Q1 last year on difficult comparisons as the Connecticut DRS expansion gave very positive sales effect late 2022 and early 2023. We continue to invest in our business, and we will continue to invest in our business to take on the new market opportunities we see coming. Operating costs in Q1 were up 48% year-over-year to EUR 8.5 million. OpEx as a percentage of sales came down from 55% in Q1 last year to 31% in Q1 this year, up slightly on a sequential basis from 25% in Q4. We exited the quarter with 418 employees, slightly up from the latter part of 2023. Over to our balance sheet. Total assets increased to EUR 126.4 million in Q1, up from EUR 96.3 million at the end of Q4. The key driver being in current assets up to EUR 94 million from EUR 65.7 million. Once again, driven by the private placements in March with gross proceeds of EUR 26 million, with a cash balance of EUR 33 million at the end of Q1, up from EUR 9.9 million at the end of Q4. Gross working capital also increased slightly to EUR 60.5 million, driven by a slight increase in inventories as we try to be responsive to key customer demands. Noncurrent assets in the quarter at EUR 32.4 million, slightly up sequentially with total equity at EUR 68.4 million for an equity ratio of 54%, up from 44% at the end of Q4. We had total borrowings of EUR 19.6 million at the end of Q1. Finally, a look at the cash flow during Q1. Cash flow from operations were negative EUR 2.7 million, driven by a positive EBITDA of EUR 2.7 million and a working capital buildup of EUR 4.8 million. Cash flow from investing activities was a negative EUR 0.9 million, driven by capitalized R&D of EUR 0.5 million and CapEx of EUR 0.4 million. Cash flow from financing, finally at EUR 27.2 million positive, giving a cash balance at the end of the quarter at EUR 33.5 million. With that, I'll leave the word back to Simon for a look into our future.

Okay. Mikael, thank you very much. That's great. Maybe before we go on, what we see on the screen here is an example of the Quantum product that Bob was talking about. So there you see Marc Vlaar from Bungas, the first installation in Netherlands, getting a very small bag into the Quantum. So thank you, Marc, for that. And I think it shows the opportunity for the Quantum platform, both Netherlands and in some of the other markets that Bob has talked about. So maybe to close off before we open up for Q&A. Journey ahead, we continue solid quarter. We continue our growth journey. The journey that we laid out a few years ago, and we'll talk a little bit about a couple of key legislative and market updates that are quite specific that have come through in the last few weeks. Promising revenue outlook, '24 and beyond. We've talked previously about Hungary, Romania, Greece, the U.S., very solid foundation businesses that we'll continue to deliver in '24 and then new markets coming through mainly next year, but certainly a very positive outlook. And then as we continue to build and scale our business, we will see some quarterly variation. I think, Mikael talked to that on gross margin. But overall, our focus is to exit 2025 with a 40% gross margin business, growing revenues 4 to 6x versus 2021. And then in these very important greenfield markets have a 30% plus market share, which we've got several demonstratable proof points on at the moment. For those who have followed us a little bit, you've seen this slide before, basically the market for our products, reverse vending machines is set to travel from about 100,000 in the market to 300,000 in the market. So it's adding 200,000 at roughly a EUR 20,000 average sales price, that's a very significant market opportunity. And I think, if anything, that market opportunity has been reaffirmed and crystallized with what is a watershed moment for EU legislation. So the EU Parliament last month approved the packaging and packaging waste regulation, so-called PPWR, which really sets out as a regulation now, hard targets for the recovery of beverage containers, 90% by 2029 and also the reuse of that material in new beverage packaging. So what we have is, and also within the regulation is an acknowledgment and a mandate to use deposit return schemes to drive that enhanced recovery. And with 13 out of the 27 EU countries yet to introduce deposit return schemes, this obviously gives us a lot of confidence in the future. I think another key market that we had great commercial success last year, disappointed it didn't go live is Scotland and the U.K. And I think one of the reasons why the Scottish system didn't go into -- wasn't -- didn't go live was their concerns about interoperability between Scotland and the rest of the U.K. nations. And really a few weeks ago, there was a major announcement by DEFRA, effectively the ministry environment in the U.K. that would introduce a scheme going live in Q3 2027. And has set out a very clear time line to purposefully get to that date and introduce a nationwide scheme. And as Bob said, that's a really significant market, maybe 30,000 to 35,000 units. And we already have a great business in the Republic of Ireland. We've done great work over the last few years in Scotland. So we have lots of work and preparation work done. So we feel very, very positive now about the U.K. and really welcome that announcement from the U.K. government. So just a final slide before we hand over to any Q&A. We stay on track, solid quarter. We keep going. We focus -- continue to focus on greenfield markets. A great country coming up is Poland, really excited with the extra activity that we're seeing in that market. There's still a few things that we know are being looked at within the country about the law, but certainly, the first operator has been appointed, and we certainly see increased activity. And certainly very positive about that coming through into results in 2025 next year. We go for profitable growth. As Mikael said, we're really looking to continue to make investments, which show operational leverage as we scale the business. And we want to continue to strengthen the business foundations, so finance, IT, HR, as we grow to make sure that continues to support the business and also look at opportunities to increase, expand and enhance our technology offering in some of the areas that Bob mentioned earlier. So with that, that finishes the presentation. And I think, Mikael, we'll have a look to see if we've got some questions from the audience. I don't know, Bob, if you want to join as well?

Sure.

I got quite a few questions coming in here. So I think we'll just walk our way through. There are a couple of questions here in regards to gross margins, 35% gross margins in Q1 included some Q4 manufacturing costs. Can you shed some light on what the margin would have been excluding the manufacturing costs, and also further what we expect in the coming quarters? Well, what happened there or the effects in Q1 were largely that we had a very, very strong revenue buildup in Q4, on which we built up production capacity. And, of course, it's difficult to shut that off immediately following a sequential downturn in revenues. We've adjusted that through the quarter. I would argue that our underlying gross margins in Q1 adjusted for this would have been at least at the level or slightly higher than what we had in Q4. And we expect that underlying trend to continue. However, as we also argue that we will see some quarterly variations and actually moving ahead as well. But we do stay committed to our 40% gross margin target in the end of 2025.

Yes. Absolutely.

Let's see here. Could you please unpack the revenues in Europe by markets in the first quarter? What are the key markets explaining the EUR 8 million decline sequentially from Q4? I don't know if you...

Yes, I mean, I think in general, we had, I think, 2 things. Certainly, we saw in Greece and also in Hungary, a kind of year -- a traditional year-end push. So the customers had certain projects or certain targets that they wanted in stores by the end of the year. So we really saw those 2 markets have exceptional delivery at the end of Q4. So most of the difference is around those 2 markets. And again, they are good contracts. We see growth continue in '24 and then probably into '25 as well for those 2 markets.

Yes. Because that's a follow-up question here. Do you expect Greece to grow in '24 compared to '23? And the answer to that is yes, we do see further growth potential in the Greek market.

Yes. Just to -- yes, absolutely, Mikael. I think just to add to that, it's a pre-DRS market. So it's a little bit more variable than I think a DRS market. But certainly, as Bob said, the product is really well received, and we do expect that market to continue to grow over the coming years.

Then there is a question in regards to Poland. When do you expect contracts to be signed in Poland? How is Envipco positioned? And could you elaborate on the development in the Polish market so far this year?

Sure. Yes, good question. Look, I think it's -- I would say we would like to see contracts signed this year. I think, although the volume really, we expect that to be in 2025. So the -- what we understand at the moment is there's 1 or 2 potential small changes to the law. But with the first operator announced, which is [ new ] since the end of the year, I think there's a real feeling that there's momentum now in the Polish market. And certainly, what we understand is that, the official go live will be still the beginning of next year, 2025, but really it's going to kick in from a volume point of view more towards the end of next year, which would mean kind of contracts and revenue coming through in 2025. But yes, I think great market. We've got a business team deployed on the ground. We've got pilots going. We've got a showroom. We're engaging with all the necessary stakeholders. So we're doing very much -- we're using the prototype from Scotland, from Ireland to position ourselves for, we hope success in that market. So very exciting.

And then there is a similar a couple of questions in regards to Portugal.

Bob, you want to take Portugal?

Portugal has decided to not include glass, which we think is a good thing. It's certainly good for Quantum. We have a very seasoned team that's been working the commercial cases there. The potential to go live is in 2026. We expect probably significant RFP activity coming into the first half of 2025. But we're quite well positioned in Portugal, several pilots with all the major players and deep relationships being built in that market.

Good. I guess, Bob, you can continue with this one. Can you elaborate on the pilot in California and that opportunity? Who is our partner? How are retailers currently planning to handle the legislative changes potentially from next year?

Good question. Well, there are some important dynamics that we believe will help introduce RVM technology. The most important is retailers throughout the state of California had an opportunity to simply pay the state to not comply with the law. The state said, you can't do that anymore. So you must take back containers if you sell containers. Now, the law allows for the groups of retailers to have a common site. So that's what they're opting to do. These cooperative, so multiple retailers will invest in one site. Again, very advantageous to Quantum. So if you have accumulation of volume among many retailers in a single site, that's Quantum. We hope to have a Quantum out of the ground in the next quarter, certainly. But what we've done now is, we've put our Optima platform with an existing player called CRV, which is a traditional take back parking lot retail provider that's just weighing whole containers. So we put our Optima platform in there to automate after hours when it's heavily queued, excess volume can go through our platform. All these things help raise the rate of return, which is what the state is interested in. The state wants us there, and we're working very closely with the regulators to make sure we have a model that works and is durable going forward.

Good. Then there is a question in regards to growth after -- beyond 2025. What type of growth opportunities do we see?

Yes, that's a great question, and probably -- there's probably 2 hours of that. Look, I would say, I think a couple of things. First of all, as I referenced, the packaging and packaging waste regulations, that has a target 90% by 2029. So we've been talking about a lot of markets that are now active, Portugal, Poland, obviously, Hungary go live, Ireland go live, Romania go live. But we also have a lot of other countries, some of them quite large, France, Spain, Italy, Czech Republic, Bulgaria and so on, who have just started that journey. So by the time that journey starts, even if you started a pace now, that's going to be after -- by definition, after 2025. So that's going to be more 2027, 2028 to 2030 itself. So we expect all of these countries ultimately to adopt DRS schemes that were maybe in the '90s to be expanded opportunities like the Netherlands to add more technology. So very good growth, certainly in Europe in 2030. And then I think thereafter, we have lots of really interesting opportunities in North America, and then there's kind of the rest of the world. So medium-term, Europe and North America are our traditional strong markets and then obviously, geographical expansion more widely after that.

Yes. And there's another question in regards to the manufacturing cost effects. I think we addressed that already. Do you see further working capital build in the remaining quarters in 2024? I think, I mean, we have built inventory a little bit during Q1 to be able to be responsive to some key customer demands. I think we'll see -- I mean, we try to manage working capital very tight, and we'll continue to have focus on that. I think we'll see a more -- further increase in working capital, that mirrors our growth in revenues to a larger extent. Do you have any seasonality effects in your revenues? And if so, is there a difference between the U.S. market and the European markets?

Good question. Do you want to maybe take that, Bob?

I think seasonality is important if you have throughput models where you're making a small percentage of the handling fee as volume goes through the platform. That's a big feature in the U.S. So we see definite seasonality in the U.S. In Europe, it's more a sales and service platform. So volume really doesn't come in and affect our numbers on a seasonal basis. Throughput deals, if we do those in Europe, then you'll see seasonal effects.

And how long are warranty periods?

It depends on market. Good question. It depends on the market. I mean, our kind of standard, which is similar throughout the industry is 12 months. But depending on the customer, that could be 18 months or up to 24 months. Yes.

Do you see any dividends in the future?

Yes. Look, I think, obviously, that's up to Board and shareholders and so forth. But certainly, we see a lot of exciting growth prospects. I think you see that coming through in our results over the last few years. So -- and the reason to do the capital raise is to have that capital and have that cash available to really pursue all of these growth opportunities. So it's such an exciting market that, yes, shareholders agree with me, but let's use the cash to pursue those opportunities.

Good. And I think that brings us to the end of questions. I don't know if you want to have any concluding remarks.

Yes. So thank you very much. Bob and Mikael, thank you very much for also talking through the business. Yes, and thank you very much for your interest. Again, a solid quarter, continues a really great uptick that we've had Q3 and Q4 last year. We'll continue. It's been a pleasure talking about our business. Obviously, we're available as a company to answer any questions you have. And we look forward to seeing you at Q2 in a few months' time. Thanks very much, and have a great day.