Koenig & Bauer AG (SKB) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, good afternoon. Thank you for joining today's call. I'm very happy to welcome you. And I'm very happy to start off by simply saying that we're going to be presenting to you the strongest Q3 operational performance that Koenig & Bauer has had in the last 7 years. So our strongest Q3 since 2018, showing that we're clearly well on our way to our operational turnaround in terms of profitability. And therefore, we'll also confirm our guidance today for the full year. If we look at Koenig & Bauer at a glance, as usual, on the first page of the presentation that you can also see in the webcast, there's a lot going on. On the market side, of course, I mean, everybody reads the newspaper and knows that the global markets are difficult throughout the world in every corner of the globe, but we've done a lot. We had a lot of activities in Q3, trying to develop our alternative markets, strategic market development I will talk about in India and Middle East, also very active on the market and making Koenig & Bauer as visual as possible to our customers at various trade shows throughout the world and also marketing and launching new products, particularly on the software side, which I'll also talk a little bit about today. But I think the main message and the focus in these calls is, of course, the operating performance in the quarter. And as you see under point 3, and as mentioned, our Q3 operating EBIT improved significantly. After the first 9 months, we're now up EUR 37.6 million compared to the prior year and at plus EUR 6.4 million after 9 months. That compared to last year, where at the same time, we were presenting figures with minus EUR 31.2 million. So operationally, as mentioned, driven by our Spotlight program and the strong cost savings programs that we've done in the last 18 months, a very strong improvement. Revenue, order intake and order backlog, my colleague, Alexander Blum, will be talking about more in detail. Also here, a strong revenue, strong turnover compared to prior year. Order intake slightly down, but still sitting, and that's perhaps the next major message, sitting on a very high and stable order backlog at the group. Our order backlog of over EUR 1.04 billion at a historically high level in a very difficult market times, but we're quite comfortable now moving into the next quarter on meeting our guidance and bringing us into 2026. If we look at the two segments on Paper & Packaging, we'll report positive revenue development and a significant operational earnings improvement and a strong Q3. And also there, strong order intake, just very slightly down year-on-year, still well over EUR 500 million or above around EUR 500 million year-to-date. In our segment, S&T, also here, a very strong earnings improvement. S&T, to remind you, was the focus of the Spotlight program, and you can see it in the earnings that there they're hitting the bottom line and helping us improve profitability significantly. And please also remember when we look at the order intake in that segment that 2024 was buoyed by a very strong order intake from our Banknote business. If we correct for that, also here only a slight reduction in order intake year-on-year. So the main message is operationally, we're clearly on track. Our programs that we've been talking about the last quarters have worked. They're hitting the bottom line. We've become more profitable and we'll end the year profitably. And that's been our major task the last 4 to 6 quarters. And on the order intake side, despite the challenging times, we were still able to book orders in Q3 and maintain an order backlog at a very healthy level above EUR 1 billion. So if we move into more detail on Page 3. Also here, just repeating some of the points I made in the introduction, Spotlight delivered. We were talking about savings of EUR 40 million to EUR 50 million compared to 2023, and we've delivered. We're now looking at a Q3 EBIT that's the best we've had since 2018 at EUR 15.4 million, a very strong 3 months. And this is what we needed for profitability improvements for stabilizing the business. Q3 after 9 months improved now from this minus EUR 31.2 million to plus EUR 6.4 million. So the trend we had promised you and didn't quite show you in Q1, but started to show you in Q2. We made a huge step forward in Q3 in our operational performance driven by Spotlight. At the bottom of the slide, you see the order backlog development. And I know there's already first comments out there about order backlog -- order intake being down, but I'd like to really focus on this page. Our order backlog of EUR 1.036 billion is historically high. Even having a book-to-bill in Q3 slightly under EUR 1 billion compared this to where were we in Q3 '23, Q3 '18, '19, '20, our order backlog moving into the rest of the year, moving into next year is still quite healthy. We're able to book orders, not at the same level that we booked revenue in Q3, but I just, again, would like to point out, we do have a solid basis for the final quarter and beyond, and our order backlog is strong compared to where we used to be. On Page 4, a little bit more detail on order intake for the single quarter. After 9 months, we're at EUR 857 million. Also here, Alex Blum will talk more in detail. At a first glance, this is 13.3% down. But I remind you, last year was driven by a single one-off large Banknote order. If we correct both years for the stochastic Banknote, then we're talking about order backlog more in the lines of -- or sorry, order intake more in the lines of minus 3% year-on-year, which considering all of the peer group studies that you know from perhaps the German manufacturing associations or various other publications and order intake decline on our core business without considering banknote of only minus 3%, I think, is a quite good result. We're pushing our products into the market in this difficult times at a level that we're still able to report these strong order backlogs. If we look at the two segments, Sheetfed at -- I am sorry, the Paper & Packaging Sheetfed Systems at EUR 150 million, slightly down versus prior year. The biggest drop you see here in the S&T segment, where Banknote is also located. Tariffs are out there. I mean I've spent a lot of time traveling in the last 6 months. I just came back to the United States last year. The tariffs, it's a reality. It affects our order intake in the United States, and it does have an impact in the way countries throughout the world are considering their investments throughout the world. We're managing it. We are selling machines in the United States, but the trade policy tensions are something we simply have to be aware of and figure out how to manage it. How are we doing that? We're putting a lot of focus on alternative markets, particularly today, I will highlight India and the Middle East. We're strengthening our presence at trade shows throughout the globe, and we're developing these new products and launching these new products so that we can generate revenue from new sources. If I go into that in more detail on Page 5 --two, I think, main messages. Koenig & Bauer will close 2025 with the strongest year in India ever, and we will close 2025 with the strongest year in the Middle East ever. We spent a lot of time this year focusing on these markets. Also me personally visiting both countries and extended visits because we see them being alternative growth sources for Koenig & Bauer in these new markets. We see in India, we expect the packaging market to grow by double digits, over 10% in the UAE between 5% and 6%. These are markets we have to penetrate and have to be successful. We've been present in these markets since the 1970s, 1980s. We have decades-long partnerships with our agents there, with our customers there. And now it's about just increasing our presence and increasing our sales to these alternative markets. And I think we're doing quite a good job. These are just two examples. Of course, we have activities ongoing in Latin America, in China, in Asia as well. The main message is at a macro level, we clearly see the European market still being weak. We see the United States being weak. And we -- but we're a global company with presence throughout the world, and we spend a lot of energy with our sales teams, with our business units, figuring out how to address these markets. On Page 6, you see the other big push. It's not just about getting sales teams and traveling and visiting customers. It's about being present in the markets. We had five major trade shows in Q3 that we were present at in Bangkok, in Dusseldorf, in Nuremberg and Rome and another time the K 2025 is similar -- it's one of the largest trade shows in the world for flexible packaging, where we also had a major booth. So we're present in the markets. We're present with our customers and these various trade shows are different parts of our business from flexible packaging to metal printing to corrugated board to our traditional sheetfed offset packaging shows. And that's the initiative. I think the main message we're trying to bring is the two singular biggest tasks the last months have been managing our profitability improvements and managing our order intake and the profitability improvements you can clearly see, Spotlight worked. And the order intake, even it is slightly down year-on-year, still been able to maintain this large order backlog. And Alex Blum will give you some more focus on what that means in our financials. And of course, the third big topic of our guidance, et cetera. So on Page 7, the last highlight for me, and then I hand over. We announced at our Capital Markets Day and throughout the summer, two new product lines on the software side. On the left, you see the launch of our protected at print initiative, which is designed for product protection, so brand security. And this is a very interesting product because the know-how comes from our Banknote business in developing secure banknotes and counterfeit secure banknotes, and we develop software solutions for how you can use an app, an iPhone to verify that a banknote is real based on the security features embedded in it. This is a very specific know-how to our industry, a very specific know-how to Koenig & Bauer. And I think the update today is that we launched these just really a matter of -- just a couple of months ago in around August, September, we launched these products. And on the vision and protection side for protected at print, we have already successully acquired not just the first customers on the brand side, but also one of the strategies here is to find packaging manufacturers as multiplicators for our technology. And we have the two , Schwarz Druck and EURPACK that have been -- have now been certified by us as being able to offer to their customers our solution, protected at print. And this has all happened really just within a matter of weeks after launching the product. On the right, you see our second software with AURAVEO. This is a different type of solution in our Koenig & Bauer Kyana spin-off. It's focusing more on connected packaging and how to embed as a digital tool, a way to connect packaging to the consumer. Also here through not just apps, it's about entire technology stack supported by Google and how we can use, for example, also the new barcode laws in Europe that are being relaunched requiring new identifications on individual packaging. How can we leverage that at the part of the value chain that we support and we, I would say, even own in the pre-press workflow solutions in our presses of what has to be printed, how can we use that step to embed information and embed more value into the package itself or into the printed material itself. So very interesting times. Both of these products were just recently launched just a matter of weeks ago. We're not to the point, of course, where we're going to talk about sales and revenue and EBIT. But I think the main message, what we want to say is we're working on a lot of different areas in our traditional business throughout the globe in new products and in innovative products in order to secure the future of Koenig & Bauer going forward. So that was it for me on the Koenig & Bauer at a glance and a few of the business highlights in the quarter. And that being said, I would hand over to my CFO colleague, Alex Blum, to walk you through the rest of the slides and the financials.

Thank you very much, Stephen. Having a look at our revenues first, we were able to increase our revenues in the first 9 months of this year by 5% and if you have a look at the very left-hand quadrant, we have nearly at the same level still in order intake. So the book-to-bill ratio at Koenig & Bauer up to date -- year-to-date is very close to 1.0. And keep in mind, as Stephen Kimmich already said, we have a very high order backlog with over EUR 1 billion. You can find this on the very right-hand side. And here you have a closer look to the line diagram below, you find there the historic order backlog that Koenig & Bauer had. And there you will see that we are still on a very, very high and decent level up to now. On the next page, you have the -- you have a closer look at our profitability. And for a better reading and for a like-for-like comparison, we are not only showing to you the reported EBIT according to IFRS, which you will find on the left-hand column, but also on a very adjusted EBIT, which is maybe a better view on a like-for-like comparison basis. But let me start with the reported EBIT. Koenig & Bauer managed to achieve a positive result after 9 months of EUR 1.6 million. And that is a fantastic result considering the last years, which were negative. And we have -- we show an improvement of nearly EUR 60 million on a year-on-year basis. In the middle, you see the EBIT bridge, where does the EUR 60 million improvement derived from? Yes, there are nonoperational extraordinary items of EUR 30 million, but you also find there additional nearly EUR 30 million of operational improvements. The volume effect is nearly EUR 15 million. But within this volume effect, please keep in mind that there also is an improvement of the use of our capacities and utilization measures of EUR 1.3 million. So this effect is not only valid due to higher revenues, which we achieved by 5%, but also by a better management of our existing capacities. And on the other hand, you still find there the operating effect of above EUR 12 million, which strongly belong to the Spotlight product project by reducing costs, but also improving the prices and the product mix as well as our manufacturing costs. Having a closer look on the third quarter stand-alone, you will see on the bottom line how the profitability has especially developed in the recent quarter. We improved it on a reported basis by nearly EUR 40 million, but we also -- we still improve it, which is on the bottom line on the very left hand, but we still improved it on an adjusted operating basis still by nearly EUR 12 million, up to EUR 60 million quarter results operating EBIT which is a very strong development. On the revenue side, on the headline, you find there an improvement by over 20%, which is showing -- which is the result of strong efforts in the third quarter also to flatten out our year-on-year business or our business over the year. You still remember the fourth quarter is still very, very important and very strong. And historically, especially in the last year, it was very, very strong. But we have mentioned this quite often, this is not healthy. We want to have -- we see a more stable development over the quarters within the year, and we want to flatten out the seasonality within the year. And as a first result, we managed to achieve revenues by over EUR 300 million already in the third quarter, which is a very good result of our management approach with regard to the seasonality. The order intake, you find also on this slide in the third quarter was challenging. You see there a decrease by 28% compared to a year-on-year basis. But keep in mind that there was one of the stochastic order intakes of the Banknote business included in the third quarter last year. And this was an order intake not only for the next 12 months, but this is an order intake for the next 3 years for Koenig & Bauer. So we adjusted it to have -- to give you a better idea how the order intake adjusted by the B&S order intake would look like. And then you see there a drop of 12.5%. This 12.5% is within the range or even better if you take compare it to the peers of Koenig & Bauer or to the general machinery business within Germany. The association for machinery, the VDMA just announced the last results in October and -- sorry, for September. And this -- the decrease that you see in this publication was above this 12.5%. On the next slide, we see the LTM development of EBITDA ratio. And LTM is without seasonality as it simulates always the last 12 months as a full comparable to a calendar year. And we were still able to increase from Q2 to Q3, now up to an EBITDA margin of 7.4%. Very nice result. It shows you two things. First of all, the overall trend within our profitability. It is not only a quarterly result, which you see, which is improving, but you see there a general trend over the last quarters on an adjusted basis and an LTM basis. And you also can see that the result without depreciation is even stronger improving compared to the EBIT. I think over the group income statement, we don't need it line by line. Let me just add two comments. The increase in the administrative costs is explainable. It's not big. Nevertheless, it is not what we are aiming for. We are not satisfied with this development, and we will place further emphasis and management attention to also to these cost types and working on further improvements. And on the second note, with regard to the interest result, it improved compared to last year due to lower Euribor on the one hand. But on the other hand, we also had to hand out more accruals more -- guarantees, thank you very much. Guarantees for our strong order backlog. And that's this position, the interest result is a mixture of these two positions. On the next page, we are having a look on the Q3 cash flow, which was with nearly EUR 22 million in Q3 2025, very positive. And this shows if we have the right quarters with a strong revenue after the operational improvements that we took that also the cash flow is positive. The overall net working capital is comparable to the level of last year, but it is still pretty high as we had to increase our inventory significantly compared to the end of last year. And having said that, we jump to the cash flow statement for the first 9 months. And there you still see a free cash flow, which is negative by minus EUR 62 million. And this is the result of the -- especially of the strong order -- of the strong increase in inventories that is necessary in order to perform the existing orders that we have in order to fulfill the order backlog that we have still on hand. We also see that the prepayments that we receive that these are challenging times. First of all, we see more revenues in the Eastern part of the world and prepayments in the Eastern part of the world is more difficult to receive compared to the Western part. So that is -- this is also impacting our cash position after the first 9 months of this year. And on the other hand, we were presenting to you the order intake of Q3, which was lower compared to last year. And of course, this has also a negative impact on the level of prepayments. Having said that, basically, we can summarize the free cash flow by these two events and explain it. Strong increase in inventories compared to the end of last year, where it was comparably low -- on a low level and the prepayments are -- receiving enough prepayments is -- was challenging, especially in the last 3 months. The balance sheet is for reading only one comment with regard to equity. It is nearly unchanged and still on a ratio of nearly 23%. Having a look at our two segments. The Paper & Packaging segment is with regard to order entry on a -- still on a very high level. The order intake, you find there with EUR 500 million after 9 months, only minus 2.2% below last year. And remember, last year, there was a drupa event, which, of course, has especially for the offset printing business, a big effect. So having this in mind, the development this year with regard to order intake is still very strong. We also -- you find also revenues with plus 4.4% compared to last year with an EBIT, which was a little bit below last year. The reasons for the decrease in EBIT is that we see there a geographical shift within our revenues. We were very good in increasing our revenues in the Southeast Asia side and in the Middle East geographics, as Stephen Kimmich described to you in his presentation. But in these areas of the world, the margin -- the contribution margins for Koenig & Bauer is lower than in the regions of the Western world. And if you take a look at the regional report and the regional level, you find there a big decrease within the North America area from nearly EUR 230 million last year to only EUR 200 million this year. And this is also true because this year, we still have there some impact in the revenue numbers of the tariffs and the customs, which is increasing the revenue side on the one hand, but it's not adding any contribution rate. If you jump back to the segments and if we have a look at the S&T segment, there you see that the order intake was significantly lower this year compared to last year, but this is especially true because of the big order intake by Banknote business last year, which was not expected to be repeated this year. So the main effect is due to Banknote business. With regard to operational performance, S&T segment made a huge step forward and improved its profitability significantly by nearly EUR 35 million plus. And this is especially also, as Stephen mentioned, due to Spotlight program where all the attention was shifted to the S&T segment to improve profitability. And we managed to improve profitability significantly in this year, even though the challenging times and even though the order intake was much below last year. You also find in the backup the Digital & Web business unit. And if you have a special look at the order intake with Digital & Web, you find there that the America tariff situation affected the DNV business unit, especially because the order intake dropped from EUR 100 million last year to around EUR 60 million this year. With a higher order intake in this business unit, we would have achieved also an profitable EBIT in the S&T segment after 9 months. Having a short look on the situation with regard to trade agreements between EU -- the Europe and the U.S.A. and I'm sure you're all familiar with it. We only want to quickly summarize this. We are affected by the tariffs of at least 15% plus on our machines. But not only this 15%, you also have some parts which belong to the section -- so-called Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act. And that says that these parts have a special taxation of minimum 50% plus with regard to steel, copper and aluminum. And our machines are partly affected by the special Section 232 as well. Having this in mind, this, of course, explains why the shift in markets or the shift in revenue, which is also repeated on this side on the bottom left -- right-hand corner, you see the decrease, and this explains mainly the decrease in sales. The U.S. and the customers in the U.S. are very curious to place orders with regard to CapEx items, and we find this in our revenue by region as well as in our order intake situation. Having said this, we are more than happy that we still confirm our guidance and the outlook for 2025. We stick to the revenue growth to EUR 1.3 billion, and we stick to the corridor of the EBIT between EUR 35 million to EUR 50 million. But it is more fair to say and to state that with regard to the challenging geopolitical development as well as the trade policy uncertainties just mentioned within the United States, or the general macroeconomic conditions that we find it more realistic to end up with an EBIT in the lower half of the mentioned corridor. With regards to expectation management and with regards to regaining and building trust within the financial community, Stephen and I, we decided to be there very, very straightforward and try to manage the expectations as good as possible in order to walk our talk and to be straight with the financial markets. So this was the end of our presentation. And now I'm happy to hand over to the operator for your questions.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Stefan Augustin with Warburg Research.

Congratulations to the good earnings in Q3. But indeed, my first question will arise around the order intake. Unfortunately, I think the tariffs will not go away in the near term. So we might see this continuing for a while. And looking at your last year's order intake in Q4, it was very, very strong in both segments, also in Paper and Packaging. If you want to have an order intake around your guided sales level, you would need more than EUR 400 million of order intake in Q4 again this year. Do you think this is possible? And could you also comment a little bit here on the Banknote order pipeline, big order pipeline you have in special? That's my first question.

Sure. Maybe I can start, and then Alex can expand if necessary. So I mean, I think two or three different parts of the answer. First, the straight answer, we don't guide for order intake. So we're not going to answer that part of the question. We're trying to win every award we can. And of course, the goal is always to have a high order backlog and high order intake. We're comfortable with our order backlog so that the order intake in Q4 is not linked directly to our sales performance in 2026. So I think that's just kind of a technical answer, but we don't guide for expected order intake. The market in the U.S. is tough, and I think the tariffs are here to stay. It's my personal opinion. The market will absorb them eventually, but margins become under pressure and what becomes more expensive gets sold less. So I think there are a 2-part answer. We are selling machines to the U.S. It's not that the market has disappeared. The machines that we're selling are taking longer in the decision-making. The customers are a little hesitant to order, but the market is still there and margins, of course, become under pressure as things get more expensive. And we're not overly reliant on the United States. We have opportunities outside the United States to compensate. I think that we mentioned often enough in our presentation. And we have our new products that we can also push into the market. So that overall, I think we're doing everything we can. And even the order intake level in Q3 is not something that makes us nervous. I mean we're placing orders in difficult times, and we just have to keep pushing. So I think that answered all your questions. And we, as a company, I think the entire industry and has to just prepared that this new reality of tariffs for the United States is part of doing business with the United States and not sit back and expect that to change anytime soon.

Maybe a quick add-on that one. If I look at their Digital & Web orders and order intake also that, as you mentioned, was a bit hurt. And basically, many of your key customers here from the first products have been in the U.S. So do you see emergence of interest for these products in the other regions as well? Or do we need to think that this might remain a difficult pocket of the product?

I mean, I think it's clear that Digital & Web still remains our most difficult challenge. It's solved on the cost side. I think the spotlight is clear. We can show you that the structural cost measures we did for Digital & Web, they worked. But now we have the second challenge now on the top line. U.S. is an important market for hi-tech, and that is the digital -- particularly digital printers and Digital & Web. But we absolutely see markets outside of the U.S. We're installing the first machine in Korea. I was visiting -- I visited a RotaJET three weeks ago, installed in India. We -- I had discussions in the Middle East of customers that are interested in buying RotaJET. It's a shame that the U.S. is softening. Of course, that doesn't make our job easier. But absolutely, we see markets other -- outside of the United States, and that's the task. That's the management task going forward.

And Koenig & Bauer is successfully addressing these markets, as you can see in the order intake. Otherwise, our order intake and our book-to-bill ratio after 9 months wouldn't be 1.0.

Two other ones. The first is, would you make a comment on your cash flow expectations for the full year? And can you remind me if there is any, let's say, considerable amounts due from operational restructurings or spotlight to flow out? And the last one is actually technicality. In Q1, you very successfully hedged U.S. dollar expected sales. Do I find the respective gains on the exchange rate in, let's say, the paper and special divisions? Or is it rather coming up in the holding and consolidation line?

Yes, happy to answer. Let's start with the cash flow. We don't guide specifically on cash flow, but the cash flow in Q4 is definitely to be expected on a high -- on a positive level as well. We expect to decrease our net debt also in Q4. So we will see improvements with regards to debt and with further improvements with regard to free cash flow in the first -- in the fourth quarter. With regards to the hedging, the most positive effects of the hedging are directly booked as other comprehensive income to the equity. So the most gains out of these hedging does not touch our P&L. So it means our P&L is not at all inflated by any hedging gains. It is more or less -- it is pure operational performance within the P&L. We only see a very small effect of hedging gains of EUR 1.6 million, which is directly booked to the revenues and which is indirectly affecting positive results. But the P&L is very much not touched, not inflated by the book gains of the hedging business.

Is this EUR 1.7 million then in Q3 alone or 9 months?

It was after 9 months.

All right. And then just the cash outs from spotlight, first of all, is anything missing? Or is everything already?

In the -- up to now, it is 95% to 100% already done. And we -- but it is a very good question because in 2025, we saw a cash out of nearly EUR 10 million out of the Spotlight measures. We don't adjust it in our free cash flow. So it is affecting negatively our free cash flow after the first 9 months this year and by roughly EUR 10 million cash out due to spotlight measures.

Our next question comes from Jorge Gonzalez with Hauck Aufhäuser Investment Banking.

Firstly, congratulations on the progression of the margins, very impressive. And my first question is on this regard. I know that you have still not detailed the guidance for next year, but let's say that in a scenario that you have a flat development, which is the additional support in EBITDA or EBIT that you are expecting, thanks to the improvement in terms of the salaries reduction and other cost efficiencies that you have achieved at this point. Can you give us some color on the expectations of the support from cost savings for next year? That will be my first question, please.

Yes, I mean, we can restate that you find there some -- that you see a lot of cost reductions within -- out of the spotlight program within our P&L. And there are different ways to report them. The way how we were for our banks, for instantly calculating the spotlight reductions that we have, it was on a stand-alone basis compared to the end of 2023. And maybe you remember the numbers because I think they were also shared with you in the investor telephone conferences of EUR 50 million to EUR 60 million. So all the measures reached an effect of, let's say, EUR 55 million. But compared to the level -- to the end of -- compared to the base or the baseline was end of 2023 on the one hand. And on the other hand, increases -- cost increases were not shown in this number. So it is a broad -- excuse me, a gross number and not a net saving numbers. But if you have again a look on the EBIT page in our presentation, and I think you can -- it is presented to you and is shared via the screen to you, you see -- no, it's not. Then let me say the number -- it's Page #9 in our presentation. Within the EBIT bridge, you find other operating effects of at least EUR 12 million compared on a year-on-year basis. And this is mainly due to the cost reduction measures out of the Spotlight program. And as I mentioned within my presentation, with the other volume effect of savings of nearly EUR 15 million, out of the EUR 15 million, there are EUR 3.5 million due to better utilization of our capacities on hand within our group. And that is also partly effect of Spotlight. So within the EBIT bridge, within the, let's say, nearly EUR 30 million operating improvements, most of these effects are due to the Spotlight program.

I would only add, I mean, when we announced Spotlight, we had said $40 million to $50 million in '25 and $50 million to $60 million in '26. So roughly $10 million difference between '25 and '26 on average. I think that was your question about what do we expect in '26. And it's too early for us to say. We sped Spotlight up as much as possible. So the year-on-year impact '26 versus '25, there will certainly be an impact for measures that were not fully installed in 2025, but we're talking about a much smaller figure, and that's not going to be a key driver for profitability improvements next year. With Spotlight, we would consider to be closed out and finished at the end of December 31, 2025, that Spotlight is done. And next year, we're not going to be sitting here talking to you about Spotlight impact in '26.

Okay. Very clear. Maybe -- so the bridge is around EUR 10 million 1 year to the other. But how much are you expecting in Q4 similar to Q3? Or there is any even improvement for Q4 in terms of the year-on-year cost savings comparison that I should take into account?

No, I think the way to think about it is that Spotlight is finished, is installed. So the further year-on-year impacts starting Q4 and 2026 versus prior year, they will decline towards -- that will not be the driver of future profitability increases. So I wouldn't model for Spotlight effects in Q4.

Okay. And this -- regarding the first comment that you have for '26, this 5% to 6% margin. This was referred to -- in the case of achieving a sales revenue of around EUR 1.5 billion -- or up to EUR 1.5 billion as you have in your original target or this corridor is also compatible with a flat development in sales? Do you have a view on that at this point?

It is -- yes, it is a strategic target of Koenig & Bauer, and it is in line with -- and the target EBIT margin of 5.6% is also -- it is bound to a revenue level of EUR 1.55 billion. But with regard to next year, we don't want to -- as we are in the middle of the budget process and internal discussions, we don't want to guide today on the next year, but we will come to you with regard to 2026 on a later date.

Okay. And last one, if I may, regarding also the demand levels. And I know that you don't want to speak much about this year. But I'm wondering if your general view is that we see the worst in North America in terms of demand, and it is more like a wait and see strategy of the clients just to obviously avoid paying above final prices. And then it will depend on the clients' view on if the tariffs will remain or not. And so demand will resume at some point? Or do you think maybe we see further deterioration in North America? That will be helpful because I imagine this is basically the region where maybe you have less visibility at this point.

That's a very good question. And what we can see is that we -- yes, there are still orders from North America. And the situation improved also a little bit with regards to our Paper and Packaging segment in the last month. So is it already the end of the corridor? I'm not sure. I mean, we have seen so many surprises with regard to the U.S., it's really difficult to say. But we can definitely confirm, first of all, there are orders from the U.S. And yes, we also see a slight improvement or we see a slightly improving situation with our Paper and Packaging segment with regard to order intake from North America. But I'm still -- as a finance guy, you're always careful. So to talk often completely change in the situation with regard to demand. I think this might be too early. But at least it is what we also don't see, it is not further worsening.

I would only expand, I just came back to the U.S. last week. It is very tough to judge what will happen and the policies are very erratic. But I think the straight answer to the question would be, I think the U.S. customers are now pricing in the tariffs in their business models and no longer in a wait-and-see mode of maybe the tariffs will go away. This is a fantasy, frankly, in my opinion. And my impression from the U.S. customers is that they're accepting that the tariffs are a fact. They're pricing it into their business models. They're putting pressure on pricing and margins because the machines are more expensive due to the tariffs. But there's this wait-and-see attitude of let's just not buy anything because maybe the tariffs will go away, that is getting much, much less. What hits demand is the more expensive machine due to the tariffs, making business cases less attractive and therefore, driving to fewer buy decisions. But it's less the uncertainty and more just the general -- or less the tariff uncertainty and more just the general everything is more expensive. I hope that makes sense.

Yes. No, makes all the sense. Maybe you can help us here. In terms of units, can you give us how it compares this year with the historical average of the last 4 to 5 years? I mean is -- maybe you have seen a year that could be a floor in terms of units or because you are delivering also machines pre tariffs during the year is not -- I mean, it's difficult to compare, I don't know. If you can see in the numbers that maybe -- yes, I mean, we have seen the worst here, but that doesn't mean that it's going to recover fast, but I don't know. Is there any green shoots there that you can share with us?

No, I think understood, and I think it's too difficult of a question to answer today in the call. We'll think about how to communicate in some way, how do we see the North American market. It's a clear question. It's not so easy to answer. So I think for today, we have to leave it at that. And if it's okay with you, I think we have only 5 minutes left and I have one more person in the line if we can move on.

[Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from Patrick Speck with Montega.

And also from my side, congrats on the -- yes, very strong development in Q3, especially in earnings. When I look at the details, I was a bit surprised by the decline in operating EBIT in the P&P segment. Was this mainly due to the tariff situation? Or was there anything else?

Yes, it was indirectly due to the tariff situation because the geographic mix changed in the Paper and Packaging segment. We generated more revenues within Asia Pacific area as well as Africa and Latin America, slightly increased, but a significant lower part within the North America business, and Europe was nearly stable. So that is the main reason for the decrease -- the relative decrease in profitability within Paper and Packaging.

Understood. And would you assume that -- yes, a similar development in Q4 for both of the segments or a slight decline in Paper and Packaging in EBIT and a strong recovery in S&T?

Basically, the strong recovery in S&T. That is the main driver of the result. As you can see within the segment reporting, Paper and Packaging is more or less stable, and the increase derived from the S&T segment. And this will stay true for the fourth quarter as well.

I would also -- I find hard to talk about a decline in Paper and Packaging. I mean at the size of the business unit, we can talk about really it's more of just a flat development. I mean it's a few hundred thousand euros down year-on-year, but I would not describe that as a declining profitability. I would say it's more or less a flat development in terms of operating performance. And I totally agree with Alex, but I remind everybody on the call, the focus of our organization and our management in the last 18 months has been improving profitability in S&T. Deliberately was the focus and spotlight on S&T. That doesn't mean we ignored Paper and Packaging, but I think you can see the results, and they're obvious in all the charts no matter where you look. We did a good job in fixing the profitability of S&T, particularly in Banknote and MetalPrint, also on our holding costs, and did have success in Digital & Web that unfortunately is being counteracted by volume effects in that segment. So we just keep pushing.

And secondly, supply chains are coming up as a topic again, especially in automotive industries, but also in the capital goods sector. How dependent are you on chips, for example, or anything else? Do you see any upcoming and increasing risks for your supply chain?

Not until now. So the exterior effect, which was in the press, we don't see it right now in the supply chain. And personally, I do not expect another supply chain topic in the recent -- in the next months, at least not for putting above -- sorry, a little bit more specific.

And lastly, a quick update on your PowerCo cooperation would be helpful if you can share some information about that.

It's ongoing. That's -- and we are working hard with Volkswagen together to industrialize. There's no new status to report. We promise to come back to you when there's something new. I think the only real status update is, it's -- we're also there, we're pushing forward. And we are still very positive on that -- on the further development.

Ladies and gentlemen, this was our last question. I would like now to turn the conference back over to Mr. Kimmich for any closing remarks.

So thank you very much for joining, and we are exactly on time, 1 minute before 2 o'clock here in Germany. And thanks for your attention and your interest in Koenig & Bauer. It was -- I think to sum up today's call, you can clearly see our operational performance improvements and our focus on cost and cost and cost, and becoming more resilient at a new structural cost basis. That's working. That's been our big effort. And the second big challenge now is alternative markets getting products into the field. And the market is challenging. We're doing a good job. We're happy with our order backlog. Of course, you can always do better, but I think we're still well positioned moving now and towards the end of the year and look forward to talking to you all again, most likely in February when we publish our preliminary results and no later than March in our annual report then on March '26. We'll look forward to talking to you again until then. Talk to you soon. Thank you very much.