Krones AG (KRN) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good afternoon to ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for joining our Q3 2023 conference call. At first, some information. Please note that this call will be held as a Microsoft Teams meeting. Krones will not record this event in image and sound and will not provide a recording of this call. Krones has disabled the standard meeting recording feature in the MS Teams. We kindly ask all participants to refrain from recording this call neither through third-party tools nor through Microsoft built-in functionality such as policy based on compliance recording. As a participant, please be aware that personal information such as your video stream, audio stream, phone number or name might be visible to other participants, depending on your way of participation and your interaction in the call. So after this technical information, Krones have -- with a strong growth in the first 3 quarters 2023 and a significantly improvement in profitability. This was the headline of our press release in the morning. Now we want to present you the figures and more details about the first 9 months 2023. And give you also the possibility to ask questions. I think you are very familiar with Teams and need no technical advice. As mentioned, after the presentation held by Christoph Klenk and Uta Anders, you have the possibility to ask questions. And I think you also familiar how we make our Q&A session. [Operator Instructions]. So -- and with that, I will hand over to Christoph. Christoph, the floor is yours.

Olaf, thanks a lot. Yes, warm welcome to the Krones conference call as well. Uta and myself, will present, as always, you our numbers for Q3. We take it very short and briefly, as always, that we have more room for M&A -- sorry for Q&A, not for M&A, for Q&A that we can go to your specific questions. And I hope things will not get longer in the beginning that we clarify all these technical and legal stuff. So I'm jumping over the highlights here because we go to everything in the presentation. So no need for it. You have seen it even over the big numbers I had shown in the beginning because we go now to the details immediately. First of all, order intake, and I think that's most probably one of the most important subjects for today's meeting that our order intake in Q3 was again above EUR 1.3 billion. And just to frame that a bit, I mean we were saying that between EUR 1.2 billion and EUR 1.3 billion should be, let me say, the average which we should receive that we are in line with the plannings we have. And now in the light of, let me say, the economical challenges we have around the world, I would say, in particular, in this slide, the EUR 1.3 billion are looking from our perspective, very promising. Now certainly, the question comes up, how does Q4 look like and just give you a very brief smell on that. We do anticipate that Q4 will be again between EUR 1.2 billion and EUR 1.3 billion. I would say that's a -- for the time being, I mean, we are at the end of October, we can justify quite well where we are and that's the reason why I'm saying we are above EUR 1.2 billion and going most probably in the middle of EUR 1.2 billion to EUR 1.3 billion. So I think that's an important message for the beginning that you see where we are. I know it's less than Q3 last year, but this was anyway an extraordinary year. I'll come to that a bit more in a later slide, to give you a framing where we are in total in the long-term growth of Krones. Now even more important is the orders on hand because if you look to the book-to-bill ratio, which has been rising again by 18% this year, with the any -- very high level we had already. This has 2 different sides of the coin. One is, of course, that with that, we have a very, very good capacity utilization for 2024, and it's even going up to 2025. So this gives us a very good visibility and I would say, a very good fundament for the plans for 2024 in terms of sales and profitability and for 2025. We have not yet given a guidance for 2024, but I can say we will grow in the magnitude as we have been growing in 2023. And we are confident on that. I mean, mainly, this order backlog is on, let me say, machine, lines and projects. Of course, a smaller proportion is of our aftermarket business. But this looks at the moment extremely sound and robust. So I would say we have a very good fundament saying that for 2024. And the important thing is that we have for all segments this order backlog. So we are very well set. We will come later to the segments, that in the segments have good order backlog and a good visibility for 2024. Of course, the other side is the long lead times. I don't want to skip that. The long lead times are a bit of a problem for us. You see that here, indication is 75 weeks for a standard bottling line. Our competition is a bit better, but nevertheless, I would say, even this gap narrows down at the moment. So we see that things are even more balanced in the market. And I would say, even with competition, delivery times are quite long, they are still a bit better than ours, but nevertheless, this is from our point of view, manageable. If we look now to the long-term order intake, the very long row of years, so starting in 2006, but if you look more to 2018, '19 and then to '22 and '23, where you see that we had a stable growth over all the years. Then, of course, COVID-19 came with all the issues we know very well. Then we had this extraordinary yield in 2022 with EUR 5.7 billion. And you see here that we make a statement that we are this year above EUR 5.2 billion and with what I have said previously for Q4, I can say we are above EUR 5.3 billion on order intake for 2023. So all in all, a very positive outlook. And if you look to the growth, we are delivering with them and is the fundament we are giving for our sales with that. I would say it's really looking very, very good for us. And I would say, if you look midterm into the future, it enables us to reach our midterm targets, I would say, on a very stable path. Now what is the driving factor behind all that? I mean it's not only one. And for those of you joining us for a long time already, you know those, this is a growing population around the world. I mean, we are going in 2040 to 9 billion people, which is a such huge number and helps us to get investments from our customers. Then we have a rising middle class. I'll come to that a bit more when we talk about the markets, which is still there, in particular, in Asia and in Africa. Then we have this urbanization that more people are living in cities. And last but not least, and this is a big driver for us is sustainability because all our customers have 2 major targets. One is, of course, CO2 and energy reduction. But second is water reduction as well. So this will be a big driver for us for innovation and, of course, for investments of our customers. Now if -- I have been there on sustainability, just a short remark, we have received the EcoVadis gold medal again. We have been already on that level. Unfortunately, because of one of the missing audits we had, we slipped down to silver metal. Now in the meantime, we are on gold level again. So I would say this is a good news for all of us that we are in the right direction and being regarded as one of the premium machine builders in terms of having the EcoVadis ranking. In addition to that, and being short on that as well, we have just published our Carbon Transition Plan, which is very important. You're seeing in the beginning only about CO2 reduction, of course, if you read the Carbon Transition Plan, but for us, it's a bit more because it's climate action and climate action is for us as well, food and beverages. We're all aware of that food and beverage is around 20% of the greenhouse gas emissions around the world. And if we could save ingredients in, let me say, beverages, we are going to save as well, greenhouse gas emissions. So it's about food and beverages on one side. Of course, it's on the other side, in this report, about saving plastic material because, yes, a lot of our products going into PET bottles are shrink-wrapped. So even the point of what do we do with the plastics is addressed here. And of course, in a very big scale is climate change and our commitment that we do whatever possible that we contribute to the targets we have given. Now just a short look on Scope 1 and 2. Without naming the numbers, you see that we -- our target is to reduce our Scope 1 and 2 by 80% until 2030. We are on good track, as you see the green bars in the middle. So we are beyond -- below the tracking line, which we have, on a good path. Nevertheless, we all know that I would say, as more as we have reduced the remaining stuff will be the more difficult ones, and we are tracking that every 4 weeks with our measures in place that we see that things in the future are moving in the right direction. I can say we are on a good track. We have good ideas. We spend a lot of money for it. So we invest into that, which is reserved in all the budgets for the coming years. So we are going to get that track definitely. For Scope 3, we will talk certainly more about that in one of the coming meetings we have together. But for today, I think it was far too complicated to jump into that even as we have still some inconsistencies in how we measure it, and I would say when this is on a rock-solid level, I assume that by the Q1 next year, then we can talk more about it. Coming back to the markets. If you look to our customer split and the revenue split over the regions, we added this slide, this is new for the presentation because we got so many questions how our customers are segmented and if you look to it in the light blue section is the small and midsized companies we have, which is around 30% around the globe. So it's not regional. It's just around the globe. Then we have around 40% of regional accounts. What is a regional account? A regional account is, for example, Niagara, it's the biggest mineral water bottle in the U.S., but he's predominantly, let me say, 95% in the U.S. active, so we don't talking about a global key account. So it's one of the big players in a local market. And the same would be true for many of our African customers, for our Asian or Chinese customers. So this is the regional accounts there I would say, in 1, 2 or 3 countries but having a strong base in one of the regions. And then, of course, the global accounts, the Cokes, the Pepsis, the Heinekens, which is around 30% of our customer base and of our order intake. Now if you look to the split per region, you see that still, Europe is the biggest one with 28%. I come to the changes we have seen. North America is quite strong with 26%, then it's South America, Asia Pacific was 14% again, China on 7%, Central Asia, which is everything between Eastern Europe and the big countries in China and in Japan. And then last but not least, Africa and Middle East, which takes around 9% to 9.5%. And I would say it's important that you see we have a very global base. We are saying we are in 152 countries active every year, and this is reflecting the whole world despite those where we are not allowed to act. And finally, here how the regions have developed, and you see some remarkable things. Number one, on the left-hand side, North America has grown significantly. So that's doing still good for us. Very good business there, driven to a certain extent by conversion into aseptic filling that has one proportion, but nevertheless, the market is growing all in all. Then Europe, you see going down. That has a bit to do with the uncertainty on investments we see. Eastern Europe, Central Asia, I would say -- you see, of course, the drop '21 to '22, which is definitely Russia, which was going out of the revenue. But nevertheless, staying at 5%, and that looks quite stable even if you look from the order intake, it's very promising for us that the other countries are stable in Central Asia and that we have a good business there. So we are catching up at the moment. So I think even by the end of the year, order intake will be quite in line with the revenue you see. Then China, quite stable on 7% to 8%, so no big changes at all. Below you see Asia Pacific, and I mean this was quite clear. They have been the latest coming out of the COVID-19 crisis and still some, I would say, moderate investments because there have been the ones having the biggest lack of investments over COVID and even already before. So we believe this is a quite stable level seeing them at 14%, maybe even going them up to 15%. Then the next one, Africa, Middle East. This is the critical one. And here we see in Africa Middle East that has nothing to do with the conflict in the Middle East. We see right now because it's revenue, and that's history. It has a lot to do with Africa, and there are several reasons, the economic development in Africa. The rise of the food price is there, then the FX problems we have whether it's translation and then products getting expensive to be ordered or even the availability of FX currencies. So that's a big problem for them. And of course, the ones being biggest harmed is the middle class in Africa at the moment. And this is for the brand owners, certainly a problem why they have then invested pretty low. And last but not least, if you look to the region, this is certainly a region with a lot of ongoing local, regional civil wars, which we have to deal with and our customers, of course. And this is the reason why Africa is compared to previous years, quite low invested. Then South America, you see that is picking up, going in the right direction again on a good level, and we believe that we'll maintain on that good level since they have all these raw materials and their economy in most of the countries is going forward in a stable way. So we believe South America will stay on the level where we are. Yes, so far to the markets. And with that, I hand over to Uta.

Thank you, Christoph. Good afternoon also from my side. I will continue on with revenue development. First of all, let's look at Q3, you can see EUR 1.165 billion revenue, which is an increase by 10% compared to quarter 3 of '22 and you can also see that year-to-date, we had EUR 3.486 billion, which is a 14.5% increase compared to 2022. As we have indicated also in previous calls, approximately 1/4 out of that is coming from price. And also looking at this point of time already at the guidance we have given for fiscal year 2023. As you know, we have increased [ guidance ] to 11% to 13%, and we are believing strongly that we will be able to achieve that also with a good quarter 4. Continuing on with EBITDA. Also here, the story continues. We had -- we were at year-to-date 9.5% margin after Q2. Q3 itself contributed also with 9.5%. So we are year-to-date at 9.5% and have as you can also see, in absolute and relative terms, an increase in EBITDA compared to last year year-to-date, but also for the quarter. Also, at this point already, I mean, we have been able to do so because of the measures we have implemented already in previous years. The price increases we have done were to cover additional costs in material and personnel expense. Also here, at this point already, we are confirming our guidance for EBITDA which is between 9% and 10% EBITDA. And as you can see, we are year-to-date in the middle, and we are expecting a same quarter 4. EBT, the trend I mentioned for EBITDA follows also in EBT, a very good quarter 3, EUR 74 million, which is an increase compared to last year. The same for year-to-date, EUR 235 million, 33% increase. The increase is even higher compared to EBITDA because year-to-date, we have a favorable interest effect. Q3 itself, interest was neutral. We had year-to-date, a very high positive interest result, which was to a certain -- to a large effect also impacted by a onetime effect here shown as the second point on the explanations we had in Q2 and a positive interest effect coming from an adjustment of a contingent purchase price development on the other hand and that -- on the other hand, we had a negative effect because of a valuation adjustment of an intangible asset. All in all, taking together, no effect to EBITDA, no effect to EBT, but it had an effect to EBIT. Looking at full fiscal year also here, we are in line with our expectations. Personnel and material cost as the main cost elements of our P&L. Let me start with personnel costs. As you can see, we are below 30% as a ratio out of total performance. We were a little bit higher after Q2, we are a little bit lower now, but around the 30%, which we have always indicated as being important. If we look at the increase compared to last year, a large extent comes from additional FTE, which we will see later, but the other effect, of course, comes from increase in payroll expense, which is about 5% to 6% compared to 2022. Material cost, 50.6%. We are above 50%, so higher than we had been year-to-date Q2, but also previous years. And this has to do with the higher share of new machine business, which comes with a higher share of material cost, but also here in line with our general expectations. And as we have also mentioned in the last calls already, further cost increases in both categories are covered in our backlog by the price increases we have done in the last 2 years. Krones employees, I already mentioned that we have increased employees significantly. You can see that here comparing to 2022 December, we have increased head count by close to 1,100 employees, this is 6.4%. The increase is about even between Krones AG, outside of Krones AG but outside of Germany. We have one, if you want to call it, kind of special effect. We have -- in the increase year-to-date, we have Ampco included, which had not been part of our workforce end of December. That's about 140 employees. Looking overall, where did we increase. Already in Q2, we had mentioned, we have taken over approximately 200 temporary labor to stabilize our workforce. Ampco I already mentioned, very important for us always this increased service technicians. So approximately 80, our digital community has increased, but also we see all across our locations increased to cover or to be able to execute the growth we have seen in order intake and the execution of our backlog. Coming now to the segments and starting with Filling and Packaging Technology, EUR 2.881 billion year-to-date. This is an increase by 12.9%. Quarter 3 was EUR 954 million above quarter 2, slightly below quarter 1. Looking at our overall expectation for the fiscal year we will be in our guidance as we have also indicated already in quarter 2. Year-over-year, both also here, 12.9% already mentioned. Coming to EBITDA, strong Q3, again 10.3% Q3, but also year-to-date and 0.7 percentage points increase compared to last fiscal year. And as I had already mentioned for Krones Group, this is because of the measures we have implemented, but of course, also because of top line growth. Looking at our guidance, we will be in line with our guidance we have given for the fiscal year 9% to 11% for 4 quarters. Process Technology to continue on. Revenue was EUR 338 million, and this is an increase by 27% and quarter 3 was EUR 123 million higher than quarter 1 and quarter 2. We have some 2 digit -- low 2-digit million euro figure. Ampco included in here already, but no full year effect, the same applies later on for EBITDA. Looking at the guidance, the revenue guidance, we will be at the upper end of the guidance we have given 20% to 25%. And that is not only due to Ampco, that is also due to a strong core business without Ampco. EBITDA year-to-date. Quarter 3 was 7.2%. So we are already at the upper end of the guidance. Also here, I can say that the effect of Ampco is there, but not significant. Also without Ampco, we would be on the upper end of the guidance. Because, as I mentioned earlier, it's only 4 months Ampco included here. Last but not least, Intralogistics, year-to-date, EUR 266 million, 18% increase. As we have always seen the last years, Intralogistics is a business with a strong fourth quarter. And taking that into consideration, we confirm our guidance here also for revenue. But here, we will be rather on the lower end of our guidance given. Looking at EBITDA, we are at 5.0%, which is higher than last year in absolute terms but also in relative terms. And also here, we expect a strong quarter for to confirm also our guidance we had given 6% to 7%. But also here, we will be on the lower end of the guidance. So far for earnings. Now let's look at balance sheet and cash position. First of all, strong statement, as you already see in the headline, we are financially very strong. This continues to be as it has been also in previous quarters. Let me start with equity on the right side of the chart, you can see that we have added EUR 86 million equity throughout fiscal year 2023. And this is despite of the fact that we have paid our dividend, and it's also despite of the fact that we had some FX changes, negative ones, also here. When we look at the ratio, we are close to 40%, now 39.8%, and that's an increase because our equity in relative terms has increased by 5.4%, whereas our total balance sheet has only increased by 1.6%. Looking at the middle of the chart, you can see that we are holding a cash position of EUR 289 million, so continues to be strong. We are having free credit lines of EUR 859 million, used [indiscernible] and giving us a total liquidity reserve of EUR 1.4 billion, which enables us to execute the backlog, to continue to grow and to develop our company. Working capital. Working capital is now year-to-date at 17.3%. Have in mind, this is an average over the last 4 quarters, average working capital in comparison to average revenue, so it is decreasing. If we look at -- or it has been decreasing, in that KPI, if we look at the overall working capital, we will see that in the cash flow statement. It increased quite substantially compared to December '22, but as expected. Looking at the right side of the chart, the composition of working capital. Received prepayments, if we look at the absolute number, it's about at the level we had end of December, but in relative terms, it decreased by 2.1 percentage points. Inventory, we have increased throughout fiscal year '23 inventory and this is again because we are holding safety stock in order to be -- deliver and meet customer expectations. So 0.7 percentage points increase. Accounts payable, also here in absolute numbers, we are at the same level as we had been end of December. But in relative terms, it decreased by 1.6 percentage points. And looking at accounts receivable, including POC receivables, there we have a substantial increase in absolute numbers, but also in relative terms and this is because of increased business activity, also because we are executing the backlog, and we are eating through, a certain extent, the down payments we have received in '22. This is to be seen also in the free cash flow, Q1, so year-to-date. First of all, free cash flow before M&A is minus EUR 166 million. So Q3 was negative. To make the statement, just at first, we are expecting a positive Q4 as we have indicated also in the previous calls, Q4 has historically been a very strong cash generator and also with all what we are seeing, we are expecting a positive one. Now looking at the reasons why we are negative. I already mentioned that change in working capital is EUR 344 million negative, so we have -- we are now higher than EUR 900 million in working capital as of end of September. Then looking at other assets and liabilities, also an increase compared to last fiscal year. And here, we have several components. The biggest component here is income tax payments, but there are also other components such as VAT payments, but also pay outs of balance sheet items. So which brings us to a cash flow from operating activities of minus EUR 105 million, CapEx on the same level as last year. Other insignificant also on last year's level and free cash flow minus EUR 166 million. M&A activities coming from quarter 2, acquisition of Ampco and then looking at the bridge then to our net cash or change in net cash financing activities. Other, there we have the payout of the dividend, but also we have some FX cash effects but also lease payments. So overall, and now looking at the whole fiscal year, again, we have said throughout all our calls that we are expecting a negative free cash flow for fiscal year 2023. We are seeing a positive cash flow for Q4, so that stands. And looking at '24, we are expecting a positive free cash flow on a normal level, not on the level when it comes to the cash conversion rate as we had it in '20 and '21, but on a good level. Last but not least from my side, in the presentation, return on capital employed, 17.5% year-to-date and so also here an increase compared to last year, and that's because of the strong income performance and an under proportional increase in capital employed brings us then to 17.5%. And also here, we are confirming our guidance, which was 15% to 17%. So far from my side.

Thanks a lot, to Uta and to Christoph for the presentation.

Not yet finished Olaf.

Not yet. I'm sorry. The outlook. Sorry, Christoph.

I mean there is not much to say. I mean you have heard all the numbers and our statements. So just simply the page is saying we are confirming the numbers we have given in the guidance, which is the revenue growth of 11% to 13%, the EBITDA margin between 9% and 10%, which you have seen, we are at 9.5% and a ROCE between 15% and 17%. And then, of course, finally, the key takeaways, I don't want to go to each of them, but the point is we are in a very good position since we have a huge backlog, which enables us to have a quite solid base for the years 2024 and 2025 to come. Profitability, Uta mentioned already is going in the right direction. Number one is we did good things on the pricing and had a good translation of material cost increases and personnel cost increases into pricing. And of course, we have taken a lot of measures to manage to profitability. And last but not least, of course, our service business is still very strong and growing. So this is underlying then definitely, our targets for the midterm plans we have. I don't want to go into the other aspects because I certainly believe this will be covered and by your questions anyway, and we have stated those. So I would say now, Olaf, it's up to you. We are done for our presentation, and we are looking for the questions and hopefully, then giving you the answers you expect.

Thanks to Uta and Christoph, sorry to be too early for the Q&A session, but we start now. And I get the first question over an e-mail, but -- not the question, but Mr. Sven Weier from UBS wants to have the first question. Sven, it's up to you.

The first one, Mr. Klenk, just to follow up what you said during the presentation, if I understood you correctly, you're expecting a similar growth rate for next year than for this year. So between 11% and 13%. Did I get that correctly?

Yes. I can't tell you whether it's 11% or 13%, but I would say it's -- let me say, it's between EUR 400 million and EUR 500 million. That was actually what we -- what we have in mind, and this would lead then to 10%, if I would calculate that, but this is roughly the numbers we are going to see here.

And which is -- which seems like a good number, given what you said in the past, right, where you were still uncertain whether increased production enough, right, to grow at such a clip also in 2024. So is it really that supply chain has changed now in the meantime? Or what has made you more optimistic on that end?

Yes. It's definitely the supply chain. I mean we are not yet through it 100%, but what we see is that in Q3, things have improved significantly. Q4 is going much better. And I would say, by Q1, we are definitely out of the supply chain issues, then we have still some remaining effects in terms of being efficient because we need to clean up all the -- let me say, the special things we have done in order to cope with it. But nevertheless, this is the driving factor behind it that the supply chain is working and that we can utilize our capacities to a full extent.

And how do you think about the pipeline? I mean you talked about Q4, but I guess your visibility already goes into the first half. I think we've even heard Alfa Laval talking about increasing food CapEx next year. So after maybe a bit of a deceleration, sees an acceleration. How do you think about book-to-bill then now that the revenue is growing very fast. You think you can still have a book-to-bill of around 1x?

Yes, that's what we are going to see and for what we plan, that book-to-bill will be around 1x, even slightly above 1x. That's what we see.

Good. And the final question I have, just when I think about your 2025 margin outlook, the midpoint is 11.5%. This year, you're 9.5%. So it's still 2 percentage points. Should we think about an equal distribution? Or is it a bit more back-end loaded you think?

It will be a bit more back-end loaded. I mean, first of all, we have to make the next step. For us, it was important just to get the 9% to 10%, which we are confirming we will make a next step in for next year. And we want to be stable also in that next step. And then looking further beyond 2024 is, I think, not realistic at this point. But overall, we are confirming our 10% to 13% EBITDA.

The next one is Sebastian Growe from BNP. I see you're raising your hands. Sebastian, your questions, please?

So the first one would be on the revenue growth and the point that you made Mr. Klenk, before when it came to having the right lead times. So based on the comments that you made before in the sense that you see book-to-bill rate of above 1x for the next year. Am I right to assume that you are not at all considering slowing down order taking. So it's all about really just getting sort of really the execution up and running, and that is it. So the pipeline is extremely robust as I would take from your comments earlier on or is there anything else we should pay attention to?

No. I mean your conclusions are absolutely correct. We are -- whatever we do on top is revenue growth and by really increasing performance, as I said, the numbers before. So we are in good shape for increasing revenues and sales next year significantly. If I say that, then the book-to-bill ratio is related to that so that we are in order intake above the revenue growth we have next year, that's definitely the plan. And that's what we see from the markets, and I can underline that when you know that we have a very close connection to our customers. We have a quite good system to analyze how serious they are on investments and we do not forget to ask them under the given geopolitical risks because that's all the time, a question. But I would say, our customers have learned that even in geopolitical critical situations, they can invest and then maintain or gain market share. And that's the reason why still the investment scheme is definitely around the globe in a good way.

And I think we discussed previously, mostly I think 3 sort of bigger buckets, which are driving that very, very project expansion or capacity expansion of customers. So the first one would be upgrade of the installed base because there's simply a useful life, so to speak, for this equipment. I would then also think efficiency improvements are very, very much relevant because of the still high electricity costs. And then there are sort of, if I may phrase it that way, more luxury eventually considerations like having greater exposure towards recyclable PET for company XYZ. So how should we think about this kind of risk that there is a bit of a -- we push some part of the eventual investment spend further to the right because not everybody wants to go the same sort of speed as eventually was envisaged a year ago. So if you could walk us through this.

Yes, let me put it this way. I would say the most important scheme at the moment is the efficiency upgrades because and I would put into that efficiency in terms of running costs down, even which is related to labor costs in our production lines, this is one thing. But of course, then addressing efficiency issues in terms of energy consumption and don't forget the water consumption, which is an essential part with our customers that drive down where they have water-intensive products that this goes in the right direction. So if we take that, this is the biggest proportion out of it. And I would call upgrades today, not as big as it has been previously. I would see more that there are new lines coming in because of new products. I mean, we have -- I explained that already last time that we have a big wave of aseptic investments in the U.S. replacing hot fill, so that's for several products, but we see those investments in other markets as well because they have introduced new products, milk-based, whatever. So that's one big category. And then I would say there is a lot of things to do with recycling in case they are PET-based that the first thing for them is getting the weight of the PET bottle down, which is, in many cases, investment in new lines, higher speeds, which is reducing waste, that's one driver of it. Of course, there is some recycling activities at all going on. And then we see in the meantime, nice conversions, let me say, more on the back end of the lines where you have a typical shrink pack, which is a plastic pack to shrink the PET bottles, which is, in many cases, converted being to paper. And those, I would say, are the big schemes. And then there's #4 one, which we should not forget, there are still some markets, I said that earlier, Asia, for example, they have been -- those being already down on investments in 2018 and '19 because of the uncertain economy. Then COVID-19 came. It took the longest for them, and they are recovering. And I would say Asia is an area where we would look in the short, mid and long term on very good investments even as the population is growing strong, urbanization is going on. And I said the effects that I have not invested in the last couple of years might make them very strong in terms of investments. So the schemes are really good. And even the last talks we had under the latest geopolitical developments didn't make any of our customers afraid. I can't really say that.

That sounds encouraging. And the last one is just a quick follow-on question to Sven's question when it came to the EBITDA margin trajectory. So the point that I would like to better understand is really the sort of headwinds that are related to the bottlenecks for electronic components, you have been repeatedly pointing to that aspect. So question 1 to -- this one is by how much eventually has this been holding back the margin if that is possible to calculate and if you want to also share it with us. But against that, obviously, then the other question needs to be -- and banking on your comments that you made that the supply chain is in order now, that quarter 4 is obviously coming through pretty strongly, as you said. Are we then indeed above the peak, so to speak, that from here on, we are rather in the phase of -- we should expect tailwinds?

The first question is the most difficult one to say what is exactly margin embedded in the issue of the shortage of the electrical components. And to be honest, we do not know exactly where this lies at the moment because it's very difficult in our organization to follow that up to have an exact number that will be translated then into our P&L even as some of the business is affected and some of the business is not affected. But what we can say is for our new machine business, there is potential. In particular, I would say, at the end of 2024 that we see efficiency gainings. And with that EBITDA gainings because of that. And why is that so late? I mean you could say now the supply chain crisis is over and now things are settled. Yes, I would say, components we get, but we have still a lot of things, which we have to rectify that they are going okay. And we have still to catch up with all this let me say, remaining issues, which we have in the market and in our operations. So this will take even as we get the supply the next 6 months to clean that out and to gain efficiency. Where this exactly can be translated in exactly EBITDA? Difficult to say. But there is certainly a possible upside, I would say it this way, but I can't really -- I mean, Uta, I don't know whether you want to translate. Uta, shaking the head of -- even some problems in terms of translation.

Something we would probably try someday.

Yes, we try to be honest, that's one of the big things we discuss internally and how we get really a handle on that to say what is that exactly. But again, there is an upside because of that. That's for sure.

And let me rephrase it in the following way. So you had obviously or do have this range of 9% to 10%, and that obviously comes always with some assumptions. Is part of that assumption framing then also that the supply chain issue should be kind of overcome faster, and this has taken longer. Is this sort of the right thinking?

When you -- to that -- we have -- as I said, we have -- might have effects at the end of 2024 in terms of efficiency gainings and they are not factored in, that's for -- clear. What we have factored in is that the supply of the components as such by the end of this year. And of course, throughout the whole next year, is sufficient. There is no lag of it. That's the assumption we have, but we have no assumption in that this will give gainings at the end of the year.

I see the next raising hands coming from Jorge González from Hauck Aufhäuser. Jorge, your questions, please.

So my first question will be around again on sales for '24. I was wondering, since you haven't announced price increases this year, if we should take into account some price increases for next year that we -- that you have not mentioned in the past, I imagine that this is not the case because of the long lead times. But just wondering if it's going to be pure increase of volume compared to our previous estimates. And then I'm also interested because it's always so difficult now to estimate the impact in the working capital with the prepayments. And I always find difficult the definition of working capital you have. Can you tell us a little bit -- can you give us more color on how you see the end of the year? I think in the past, you mentioned some high double-digit number of negative free cash flow. Is -- that has changed at all for the end of the year?

Can we do it this way that I take the price.

Yes.

And you take the working capital and free cash flow. I'll hit first on pricing and how we do that. I need just to explain that to a certain extent how we manage pricing in total. We have indicated and published officially 2 price increases, okay? Historically. You are aware of those. We have communicated those to a large extent. Now this is a message to our customer, "Hey, dear customer, prices are increasing." Nevertheless, we are calculating each individual project individually. And this is very important because depending on the components, depending on the technologies, there might be different price levels into that. And this is important because we have dealt with the material cost and the labor cost increases all the time the way that we translated those on a regular base every 6 weeks into what should it be on the customer side. So the customers with the official statements we do, they have, let me say, a kind of a frame where things are going to. They don't see it necessarily exactly the same way in their lines because one line could be -- in case we have in total said, it's 9%. It could be in 1 line, 8, it could be in the other 12. For us, the mix is important and that we have an overview per line, and we know exactly where we are with the gross margin and do not cross the border lines that we manage profitability. So this is the way pricing works, okay? Now saying that and looking forward to 2024 and how we deal with pricing and what is the expectation on that. Since we do expect that in channel material cost will stay stable or decrease slightly depending on geopolitical developments, but at least at the moment, what we see is that electrical components still rising, but we see other components have a decline in terms of their costs. So what we predict at the moment is that we are stable. And with the strong price increases, which we have made we don't see room for 2024 because our customers are calculating as well, very clear, straightforward on material that we have, let me say, significant price adjustments. And this is -- it's not going down, this we tell every customer because they're forcing us to say, "Okay, look, material costs are going down. Now you should do something." We don't do that. We stay stable. That's the expectation for now, but we are reviewing that every 3 months that we are sure doing the right thing and giving our customers the right indications. I say that many times, pricing has to go into the DNA of Krones. I can say it's arrived. We are dealing quite well with that. But nevertheless, at the moment, we see very few room for any increases at the time being. And this is true then for 2024, so far to the pricing. I hope that answers your question.

Continuing on with working capital and free cash flow expectations for Q4 and end of the fiscal year. I mean looking first of all at working capital. We were end of September at EUR 938 million of working capital. So that significant increase I mentioned earlier. And we expect that by end of Q4 to go down. So we will have a positive effect, first of all, coming from earnings, of course, but then also from working capital. And why do we expect that to go down? Because we expect to close out some customer sites and with that collect some cash, which is included in the last portion of the project. We have seen delays there this year. We have seen delays because of the supply chain issues because it takes much longer to close out, but with all what we know right now, we will be able to do so for some. So we expect accounts receivable to go down. And with a good order intake, we have also seen -- we also expect them to get additional prepayments. And that overall makes us confident that we will have a good quarter 4 in terms of cash flow. You mentioned, Jorge, that we have always said the high 2-digit negative number. It may be a little bit higher, but as said, we will have a good quarter 4, it will be around that range. That's what all we know right now. As I said, it really depends a lot on how we close out the customer sites and then at the end, the customer paying us.

Very clear. And maybe I'll catch up with the guidance -- [ whole ] guidance, with the first look into next year. I was wondering because you also mentioned in -- I don't remember if in the press release or the presentation that these results are supporting your view on '25 targets. Is there any chance that you can anticipate any of the metrics maybe in earnings, profitability to '24?

No, not yet. We are not yet there. So budgets are made but not approved and as always, I mean, we will be later in the year once we give the guidance. And then certainly, as we have done that in the past as well, you will see the matrix, where are the points coming from? What are the improving numbers on EBITDA level, what are the driving factors for growth. So we will give that indication, but not today, that's too early. I think we need first to have an approved budget.

I'm looking at my e-mail account. I didn't see any additional questions, but I see Peter Rothenaicher. You're raising your hands, Peter Rothenaicher from Baader-Helvea.

Yes, one question regarding the mix. So you mentioned in the third quarter that the new business was stronger, as you said, an impact on the material cost ratio. If I look now on your statement that you are expecting for the year 2024, also a low double-digit percentage growth. Does this mean then that the share of the new business will increase further that service business will grow slower and with that also the implication that the materials cost ratio will increase further.

Yes, that's a quite good conclusion. I mean, we are growing fast in the new machine business and faster than in the service business. And for those of you covering us for a long term, you know that this has usually some implications in terms of profitability because, of course, the service business is more profitable than the new machine business. But I would say this we have reviewed very, very carefully, and we are even predicting growth in EBITDA for 2024, even as the product mix is not as favorable maybe as in 2023. So this is factored in, and we stay with the statement that we are improving EBITDA margin further even with the strong growth and the over-proportional growth of the new business.

And perhaps, can you a little bit comment on the service business, how it is developing, perhaps, what growth rates do we see here? And what is here, your expectations going forward?

Yes. I mean you know we are I would say, a bit hesitant in terms of the growth rates because I would say, particularly our customers looking deep into that. But I can say it's growing. It has never had the dynamic growth as we have seen that in the new machine business, that never happened at all. It's a very stable and constant business. And if you can manage a growth by having really enlarged either the level of machines to service. I mean you know our statement that we usually service around 70% of our machines, which is rising at the moment. We are gaining more long-term contracts in terms of services, not contracts with a big risk because for us, it's important to plan on material and labor. That's usually what is in the contracts. So we are gaining on that. And we see nice growth, on a significant lower level than you are -- look to the new machine business in 2023. And we have no reason to believe why this should not happen with the measures in place, why this is going to happen in 2024. So we will have growth in 2024 in the service business as well. It contributes, of course, to the profitability. But nevertheless, I would say, important for us is that we even have the cost base of the new machine business under control.

And in terms of the service margins, so the headwinds here experiencing, particularly regarding personnel cost increases. I think in the service business, you are fully available to pass this on, and there should not be any dilution in profitability from that.

Yes, that's correct. I mean in services, I mean, it's anyway invoiced on the cost level we have. So usually, it's current cost level. So this should not be on a larger scale. Sometimes we have an issue in case we have, let me say, installation planned, which is 2 years ahead. And then we have some changes there. But even this is now I would say, day-to-day business that we have to look into what might happen in the next 2 years in terms of the labor cost in an individual country and how do we have to build that into the final price of our lines. So I would say that's not unusual anymore for us to calculate on that. It should be quite well calculated up to now what we know. There should be no surprises, I would call it this way. So we have really a long-term view on what things -- how things are going on and have built those into the order backlog margins, which we are reviewing whenever we can.

And the last point, perhaps on your recycling business for PET, perhaps you can comment on this. What is going on here? And what volume of business are you able already to generate? And what can we expect going forward?

Yes. I mean I think I can say that we have a target of getting to EUR 100 million in terms of our recycling business in the next 3 years. We are today at around EUR 65 million we had to -- in terms of revenues and sales for this year. So numbers for next year are really looking good. The limitating factor is indeed our -- the head count and the people we need. I would say we could realize more in case we would find the people. That's one limitating factor and second, we are carving out the business at the moment because it was integrated in AG, and we believe it should stand alone. And why is that? Because so far, we have concentrated very much on PET recycling, but we need to get more plastic materials on board, in particular, polyolefins. And for that purpose, we need to move a bit out in terms of the customer base we have, out of the, let me say, PET recycling era into the polyolefins. And with that strategy, we are quite confident running into the direction of EUR 100 million. And I can say for the time being, we are a market leader in the meantime on the big projects we have delivered to North America in terms of PET recycling. That's really remarkable.

I see the next question coming from the Deutsche Bank. Lars Vom-Cleff. Lars your question please.

Two quick ones, if I may. I mean, first of all, I can't resist given how you started the meeting to find out whether M&A was a kind of [Foreign Language]. And so I'd like to ask whether we should expect any short-term M&A activities after you successfully also seem to have digested Ampco pumps already.

Yes. Well, it was a [Foreign Language], really to say, and we were talking during lunch, which was just 20 minutes ago about M&A, but not in the sense, okay, we buy something tomorrow, more in the sense what would fit next to us. So it's not that there is something in the pipeline you can expect tomorrow. It was really talk over lunch, and it was [Foreign Language].

Perfect. And then, yes, discussing the recyclability of PET, I had several discussions recently with companies and other investors telling me it's not that easy and the quality is suffering, but recyclability of PET seems to be a big thing for you. So you're really confident that this is topic of the future and then can be properly managed without any quality losses.

Two different answers. I would say the business and if we look forward, that's a big thing. I mean the whole community, which is using PET is looking to get rid of ocean littering. I mean, put it this way because we can't generate that waste you see around the world. I think it's not a big problem here in Europe because, for example, Germany has a recycling rate of 95% plus at least on PET. But nevertheless, the reason that everybody is committed to get the waste down and get -- PET an attractive package, and that would mean no waste is driving recycling significantly. So that's one thing, and that's the reason why we believe that the business is going well and will increase in the future. Now to the point how good and how bad you can recycle PET. I mean there are limits for it because as of today, once you recycle, you can do that only a couple of times without losing, let me say, barrier properties and molecule lengths. So I would define it this way. If you want to do it more times, you need to add virgin material, and that's a weak point today. The long-term thinking of the market is having the standard recycling you see right now and then there might be chemical recycling, which is very expensive and not feasible as of today. But if that might be added in the future, we can really close the loop and would not need and run for virgin material. But again, the material we recycle and the one that you gain for it is food grade. And this is observed when you look to the U.S. for example, from FDA, they need to have this food grade approval for the recycling process being operated. And this is tested for any batch. So there is, I would say, in the long run, you would degrade the material, yes, but for the first cycle, you get certainly food grade material packaging. Does that answer your question?

I see that Sebastian Growe from BNP has an additional question, Sebastian?

And 2 more on for me. And the first one is just on the growth comments that you made and then also the mix comments so that the original equipment or project business is growing faster than service. We had this year the situation that obviously the Process Technology and Intralogistics is growing faster than what you refer to as the core business. Can you just give us a bit of an idea how you think the trajectory in terms of growth between the segments might be based on what you have in the books for '24, if that is not going too far. And then the other question is more on the order intake, sorry, if I had eventually misunderstood it, but you have in the slides, obviously, a number which is EUR 5.2 billion for '23. I think I heard EUR 5.3 billion, might also be possible if you could just confirm that. And the very last one around working capital, make it just as simple as possible. So obviously, that there is the sort of current mean reversion in regards to prepayments. That is what I do understand. It's just a normal, I think, a reflection of what's happening on the order intake side. But are there other elements where you think you are kind of going in a way too much into safety mode. You, I think, also made reference to safety stock. And are there sort of possibility simply to get the working capital, at least as a quarter to sales down in the year '24 over '23?

Tackle the first 2 questions, segment growth and then the EUR 5.2 billion to EUR 5.3 billion.

Yes.

So it's not a segment for us -- to be honest, we have not yet, I would say, in detail, talked about that in the public. I can say that for each segment, we plan growth, okay? I would say, Processing will be certainly, again, on the upper end. That has a bit to do with the acquisition, but even with a very good order backlog. In our core, the bottling and packaging is anyway very, very big order backlog, and we have to increase and grow just to make sure that the lead times are not going out of the frame. And by 2026, we want to be back on a reasonable lead time. That's the target we have. So I would say this is growing. And even Intralogistics, we are quite positive for next year. We have a good order backlog. So even that looks -- it's growing. And I said, on life cycle, there is no reason why it should we not grow on a very moderate base, of course, as we have always been. So I would say each segment is contributing, but of course, in different levels. Now you didn't get it wrong, what I just said was that EUR 5.2 billion versus the EUR 5.3 billion. In the presentation, we have the EUR 5.2 billion in, okay? So this is the statement we have on a piece of paper. Nevertheless, since we are talking every morning about order intake and went through that, I justified and clarified again with the Head of Sales, Thomas Ricker, where we are and what is the defined projections we have. We went through that. And that's the reason why I came up with the EUR 5.3 billion. So we will be above the EUR 5.3 billion.

Then let me continue on with working capital. I mean, looking at the 4 major components I mentioned earlier, where do I see a decrease in the next year that's going to be inventory because we are holding inventory stock. And if I look at what happened this year, we increased further than we already did last year. We will very carefully evaluate that in '24 once all the supply chain topics are over. We will be above history. So history before supply chain crisis just because supply chains are different now, but there I see improvement. Where do I see also improvement? That's accounts receivable, because, I mean, in accounts receivable, as I mentioned earlier, we are also seeing all these inefficiencies in collecting the final cash. Looking then at AP and received prepayments, yes, received prepayments will be rather decrease a little bit also because of the conversion of the down payments. But overall, we expect continue to below 20%. This has been our long-term target. We are now at 17% and that's -- so that we have a positive effect next year, at least from working capital, yes, that's what we are expecting. I hope this answers, with long words, your question.

Let me just do this sort of granularity in the discussion for the '23 year, you have this guidance, 11% to 13%, you have the 15% growth after 9 months. Have you been any sort of more specific in the beginning of the presentation today and saying if you feel more comfortable with the upper bound or lower bound? And then if not, then do you want to do this right now?

No, we haven't, to be honest. But I would say Q4 will be, I would say, not as strong in growth as you have seen in the previous quarters. And there is a very simple reason for it. There is, at the end, 10 days missing of the month December. And you wouldn't believe that this is being so big effect to us. But what we have seen is that our workforce has been quite challenged by all the supply chain issues this year, and they have worked quite some overtime, and we had argued not to take all the holidays. So what we see is we need to relieve them already I would say, 1 or 2 days before Christmas into their holidays. And then very simply, these days at the end of the year are missing. And this is actually taking away some of the growth which we have in -- usually in the quarters. So that has nothing to do with any other reason rather than that. And we are staying -- let me say, we say 11% to 13%. This is the growth rate we have. And I would say we are reaching somewhere in the middle. I would say it's not on the upper, certainly not because of...

I will check my e-mail account. No further question from the e-mail account. I didn't see any raising hands. [Operator Instructions] No, I don't think so, Christoph and Uta, I think no further questions at the moment.

Yes, then we can say thanks a lot for joining us today and listening to us. I mean you see the 2 of us and including Olaf, of course, quite confident about and [indiscernible] confident, confident about 2023. We are confident about 2024, with the things we have in hands, and I would say -- I can really say we are quite happy that we have achieved that with our team because a lot goes to the overall team of Krones. So that's a great pleasure that this great team has done so much for this year, and we have good basis for next year. Thanks a lot. Talk to you.