Metso Oyj (METSO) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

[Audio Gap] has been already delivered to our customers. And our crush offering scales according to customer needs. We have big crushers for big quarries or even big mines. And we [Audio Gap] screeners for different type of applications. And our R&D is really focused on sustainable crushing and digital solutions. You can also see in the picture our live room example where, just a few days ago, we were announcing a couple of new products in our Lokotrack range, and you can visit the website marked down there, live.mogroup.com and see a little bit more. You can actually dive into the details of 3D models of our machines there. Then one key area in our strategy is actually developing our business in East. And East for us means basically the China, as was mentioned, by Pekka, but it also means India as well as many other regions in the Eastern hemisphere. And one announcement done very recently, a couple of days ago, is our new investment in adding new -- another 20,000 square meters of factory space in our Alwar plant in India, which then will make it our biggest largest factory going forward. We are also having a great engineering and R&D hub in there, a total of 800 employees, and this additional 20,000 square meters actually represents about a bit more than 200 new employees coming into the premises. Also we are -- we have been announcing earlier that we are developing a modern Lokotrack factory also in Tampere, in Finland. And later on, we will be talking more about that. Then one area -- or one way that we have been reaching more customers is to develop far-reaching distribution network. And today, we have already more than 200 distributors worldwide, and we are covering basically all the different corners of the world. And during this year, we have even added another 42 distributors into the global network. And this work, of course, continues, and we are developing our distributors. We have been adding more, we have been developing the existing network, and we are also looking for new distributors in different parts continuously. We are actually approaching our customers with several different product offerings, and we are building separate distribution networks for each of our offering. So extensive growth avenue for us as well. Then as the last topic in my presentation, I'd like to touch a little bit about the sustainability and our Planet Positive offering. Our -- one of the areas where we are approaching or developing our offering towards a more sustainable offering is electrification. It's actually a really important strategic goal for us to develop the electric offering. Just to highlight briefly what our offering is like, we have actually 3 different areas where we are developing our offering: stationary equipment mainly meant for quarries; wheel-mounted equipment, which is kind of a semi-mobile, typically isn't quarry, but also can be moved from place to another; and then we have truck-mounted machines, which are then a bit more mobile and can move with their own power, basically, have their own engine included. Within this offering, the stationary equipment has been basically is naturally fully electric. Wheel-mounted offering has been developed to be fully electric already many years ago. And on the truck-mounted offering, we have traditionally used diesel driven machines, but now really big R&D effort is put on developing the dual power offering, which then basically means that you can run the crushing with electricity, with grid power. And you can also see a little bit how our volume -- or how our customers, how much stone they can crush with these different machines. So our stationary equipment, typically, the annual sold capacity for our customers is about 120 million tons of crushed stone in their processes in our customer processes, when wheel-mounted machines are representing about 30 million tons of capacity for our customers. And then the truck-mounted machines is representing about 200 million tons of crushed stone capacity. And this stone then is still used to build infrastructure, build roads, build buildings, make concrete, et cetera. So that's kind of a brief look at the aggregates business offering. And then I'll hand it over to my colleague, Markku Terasvasara, who is President of Minerals.

Thank you, Markku.

Thank you.

Hello, everyone. As Pekka already mentioned, green transition, as it called, that is continuously increasing the demand for metals and minerals. And we at Outotec want to make sure and have an active role in improving our industry performance in sustainability by providing them sustainable processes, products and services. In this presentation, I will highlight some of the very well-known industry challenges in sustainability and how some of the -- some of our recently introduced Planet Positive products will help our customers in the green transition. But first, a short update on market and our recent developments. So looking back for the last, let's say, 1.5 years, it has been a very active period. Integrating 2 companies in a little bit challenging COVID environment has brought us new things, new challenges. But at the same time, I think that's also forced us to think and rethink and find new ways of working. We have made good progress in many areas. We have introduced a new strategy that is supporting growth and sustainable mining, as mentioned. And of course, combining 2 already strong portfolios and offerings together are [indiscernible] great state-of-the-art offering for the whole concentrator plant value chain to meet our customer needs. But we have also already started looking ahead and developing new things. So it's not only compiling what we have had, but also more than 20 new portfolio products and product launches have taken place since the merger. And there are many, many interesting things in the pipeline. And of course, from the market point of view, as you learned from the quarter 3 results release, good order intake. We have had good order intake and also see that the project execution has been on a good level. We have been, from the beginning of the year, started labeling our sustainable products, which offer customers more efficiency in terms of water and energy with this Planet Positive label. And I must admit that the interest part from the customer side has been very great because already, year-to-date, today, more than half of our order intake is actually these labeled products -- Planet Positive labeled products. So that has been really well accepted and approved by the customers. But we also are committed to always have sustainability targets in all our R&D projects. And of course, last but not least, also digitalization will definitely improve our customers to develop their processes and meet their sustainability targets. There's a bit of a teaser coming up later on this digital topic. I think an interesting thing that we will soon tell you more about. So what are the challenges? I think this list is very well known by everyone. The mining and minerals industry is challenging with the water stewardship. And when we look at it, we look at it from 3 different aspects when we look at our production offering. We, of course, one way of solving it is to try to offer customers dry processing, which we can today do in the beginning of that process part. But it's also, as a second point, basically covering the reduction of the need for freshwater intake. So processes that need less and less water and make sure that we can recirculate that water quickly as well. And then the third area, which we are looking at closely, is to make sure that our flotation process, we are able to purify the process water that is used, so that the metallurgical performance of the flotation plant with this recycled water remains on a very good level. Energy consumption, there are a number of products on that area that are in our portfolio already improving energy consumption. And then, of course, maybe a new thing, a modular design in our process plant, which enables us to increase flexibility and agility, but also increase speed in implementation, has been high on our development priority. And the new levels of reliability, I mentioned digitalization and may be there. I think what we are just about to launch, it's an interesting groundbreaking metallurgical digital twin, which actually will help our customers in improving their performance. It integrates basically all the competence we have in the company from our modeling software into all the sensors and optimizers that we have developed throughout the year in the process, and put that together in an end-to-end process view, that definitely will help our customers this year their processes in a good way. And when implemented, this will support our customers in online decision-making basically based on complete oversight from material folds, plants and production assets. But more about that a bit later. And not in this presentation, I think we will come with a bit more information in a couple of months' time. But of course, there are a lot of new products that we have developed over time that are already available, and this is just the selection of the newly launched Planet Positive solutions that we have, addressing all parts of the concentrator plant value chain. I will not go in depth in all of it, but maybe just highlighting some of the things. Of course, you have this first launched energy efficient crushing and conveying solution, with in-pit crushing and conveying stations as a new product, the first reference put on the market. We also have a variety of different grinding solutions that we're talking about, HPGRs or HRCs as we call them, and vertical mills that are definitely bringing new level of energy efficiency to the flow sheets. Into an interesting new add-on, Concorde, a new type of flotation system where we can capture the ultrafines and fines from the concentrate much better than in the past and in a way -- in a relatively simple way, significantly add value of the concentrate as these fine, ultrafine particles typically ends up in a waste pond rather than being captured in the process. So they just a few examples, and there are other like new pump drains, definitely efficient in energy, and new type of tailings filtration solutions that will help our customers to circulate the water. So this is just a quick snapshot of what is coming, and we are happy to tell you more about new things as they come. But here, maybe I hand over to my colleague, Heikki.

Thank you, Markku, on this one. So if we then go -- give me a sec. My name is Heikki Metsala. I'm the President of Consumables, and I'm here with my colleague, Sami Takaluoma, President of Services, talking to you about some advanced service offerings that we possess within Metso Outotec. So first of all, I want to say that within Metso Outotec, we do possess unique maintenance and optimization capabilities as well as process expertise that we can employ to our customers and we can help our customers to reach their targets. And for me, of course, things start with our customers' expectations. What are they expecting from us at Metso Outotec? Digitalization, faster, more efficient, fact-based decision-making processes through digitalized offering that we have. Sustainability, our customers expect us to be their partner, a sustainable partner for our customers, and we are expect to help our customers reach their sustainability targets. Safety, whatever we do, we do not compromise on safety, and we ensure that products and services, solutions that we sell to our customers, we give to our customers are safe. And of course, increased production. We are there to help our customers reach their targets. Looking at Metso Outotec services business, we are more than 50% of the sales of the company. And we are here to improve [Audio Gap] the equipment and process efficiency [Audio Gap] of metallic foundries as well as rubber and polymer factories. And in those operations, we need to say that safety is a key factor to us. We target at 0 harm in our own operations as well as when we do work in our customer sites. And looking at it as a sustainable partner to our customers, in 2020, we already managed to reduce our CO2 emissions in our own operations by 60% and in our logistics by 29%. So we are in a good way to reach the targets that Pekka was referring to at Metso Outotec. Basically, we can see that we have some examples of Planet Positive products on the services front as well. We have some of them that are direct replacements to the existing solutions out there. So our truck body, our unique BSE screen, our upgrade and modernizations, all of these are replacing products that we can replace the existing solution. We can gain energy efficiency, we can gain water efficiency or we can just make the production better overall, and this contributes as a Planet Positive product in that sense. Then we have solutions where we make the most out of the materials and equipment, such as our optimized wear parts and repairs. There, we take the maximum effort out of the materials are being used. We use them to the full extent, make sure that within those processes, we minimize energy consumption, maximize production and reduce waste to a minimum in that sense. And then to top it off, we do operate in recycling solutions as well. So we want to take back with our customers the worn parts, reuse them and bring them back as new components to our customers. So we take back the worn liners as an example, we reuse the material to generate new parts and solutions to our customers. This is something that we are investing heavily, and this is something that we are really proud of, that we are creating circular economy to the products that we sell from -- at Metso Outotec. Then I'm going to hand over the floor to my colleague, Sami Takaluoma.

Thank you, Heikki. Good afternoon, everyone. I'm Sami Takaluoma, Head of the services business. What I would like to start is to explain to you our life cycle services concept, where we are aiming to support our customers to help them reach their full potential. This is an excellent concept from that perspective that with the customer, we connect and have the same common objectives for the long-term commitment and contract that we do between each parties. There are certain pillars that are always in the game. We have full commitment on the safety part of our own operation and helping also then our customers' operations to be full safety compliant. And then sustainability is always part of that equation as well. Basically, we are looking to create the highest asset efficiency possible for our customers throughout these life cycle services contracts and concepts, and the main driver is that there is a lowest sustainable total cost of ownership throughout the life cycle. We are very proud. We have more than 400 life cycle services contracts already. And just to mention that this year alone, we have been able to sign 100 new contracts, and this will continue. We are launching now in Q4 a renewed offering regarding our life cycle services packages. They are going to be geared up for inspections and technical support at the customer side, optimizing the shutdown services, creating the maintenance service packages, renew them and then going all the way to the plant solutions, where we are optimizing the process, maximizing the value that the customer is at that moment looking for. And then we have several technology-specific LCS packages for filtration, crushing, pumps, analyzers. And those are targeting for optimizing or maximizing the reliability and the production of the equipment and thus the plant. And in our Aggregate segment customers, we have a new services concept as well. Same aim, we want to help the customers to reach their full potential through these services, packages and concepts. Aggregates customers, we were looking the picture from the customer themes or customer need perspective and then tailoring our services around them. To name few here, asset protection, for example. It's expensive equipment, an asset that is taken into use. So giving insurance through the services concept that we have is one of the themes. Availability is a very big driver for our customers, so ensuring that the production hours are happening through our services packages, again, is one of the concepts. And not only ensuring the hours, but also that the production is optimized and maximized. So then the performance is one very important driver for the customers that we are creating the solution. And from the sustainability perspective, upgrades, very good, reliable equipment. When coming to the end of the life, we have packages and [indiscernible] hours and years to the already existing equipment and thus extending the lifetime of the equipment. The packages are covering a lot of different components from inspections, the spares and wears, kits, inventory, support, chamber selection for different needs, field services, upgrades, remote monitoring and digital services are coming to the game as well. All of this was actually launched last week in our Lokotrack Live Room event, and that's also one of those sustainability actions that we basically have a very nice remote exhibition to promote certain things virtually.

I will then continue a bit more to give you a bit of an insight on our customer-facing digital solutions and how we aim to improve our customer experience with the digital capabilities that we possess, something that we can already do at Metso Outotec. So we can utilize the data to optimize our customers' processes and react in advance to upcoming favors. This we can achieve by remote monitoring of our customers' processes, tracking the performance of the equipment and seeing how we -- how our products and solutions could better yield results to our customers. We can have the digital solutions to manage our field service globally, make sure the field service experts are available for our customer when needed and where needed in that sense. And of course, we have the monitoring capabilities of our installed base. We can monitor the equipment. In certain cases, we can monitor the wear part performance as well, how much they are wearing, how they are performing in the operations. And of course, we utilize that data to the benefit of our customers, but as well as optimizing our own supply chain, making sure that our customers have the parts available when they need them. Some selected highlights on this front, we have performance centers globally covering the whole globe, and we are managing more than 100 connected mining equipment within those performance centers. At the same time, on the Aggregates front, we have done aggregates metrics. We have more than 1,500 machines connected globally where we can enable a better service to our customers and more fact-based decision-making to our customers to optimize the performance of these equipment. Also we have WearSense, which is a wear management system, online wear monitoring system that we are implementing to new solutions day by day. And this enables us to track when the customer needs to shut down the equipment and replace the wear parts as an example. On top of this, we have digitalized our field service group. So more than 900 of our field service engineers are digitalized. This enables them to lead better and more efficient when at our customers' side. So they are possessing the digital capabilities to take on the necessary know-how. They have all of the experience on the background to be -- give our customers the best possible service. Some things, a bit of a sneak peek on what's coming. So now in Q4 '21, we will launch our new virtual reality solution for mill lining inspections. So this is coming up still during this year. This is something really interesting for us, enables, again, for us, utilizing virtual reality to inspect mill lining applications in this case. On 2022, we are going to renew our metrics online monitoring system for Aggregates, so a new better featured product is coming on that one. We are launching our Metso Outotec metrics for screen equipment, specifically condition monitoring for screening equipment. And we are working on to launching a new customer portal featuring our digital solutions in this case. Handing back over to you, Sami.

Thank you. And to be able to truly serve our customers, we have extensive global services network and footprint. Services business requires that we are close to the customer to be able to have a deep understanding of the customers' processes, products, designs and technology. And for that, we have this extensive footprint of field service experts. Globally, we have more than 3,000 of them, most of them constantly at the customer site, helping our customers actually sometimes being integral part of the customer processes as well, working alongside with the customer personnel. Service locations, we have 140, and many of them do also have the repair capabilities, and this is part of our sustainability work as well. So we have the capability to refurbish parts and have rotable programs with our customers. And then as Heikki was mentioning, currently, we have 3 performance centers, where we have a remote monitoring capabilities. They are located in each of the time zone. So 1 in Chile, 1 in Finland and 1 in China. When it comes to our manufacturing footprint, so we have 6 own foundries, and we complement the metallic parts need then with our selected partner foundries. And worth mentioning here is that it's a true partnership with these foundries, meaning that we are having a good alignment of a way of working, quality and also some value for us in the Metso Outotec. So we definitely want to ensure that also our supplier base is in the same task with us to create the Planet Positive. And then our rubber and polymer products, they are mainly coming from the in-house manufacturing locations, and we have 9 factories globally all around the world. All this is then combined together with our logistics network, which we have been reshaping. And as a result, there is already, compared to the 2019 baseline, the CO2 emissions are reduced more than 1/3 from the baseline levels.. [Audio Gap] network going forward, making sure that we are able to fulfill the customer promises and that we are minimizing the CO2 footprint in our operations. That was our story about the services side. And now I hand over to my colleague, Jari Algars, President of the Metals.

Thank you, Sami. Interesting presentation. So I will take you through a team called metals for a healthier planet. As Sami already pointed out, I'm Jari Algars. I'm the President of Metals in Metso Outotec, and I will take you through the exciting world of metals refining in Metso Outotec. We are a unique global supplier. We have an industry-leading sustainable product and services portfolio for hydrometallurgy, pyrometallurgy, sulphuric acid and agglomeration and heat transfer. It's not only the widest that is there in the industry, it's also very deep. As an example, I can tell you that about a month ago, I was talking to a client that was intending to invest in a string of gold plants. And the client said to me that some of these plants are very simple. So there, we can also use others. Then you -- but in some of these, we have very complex need for technology. The process is very complex. So there, we will be only talking to you. And that is really showing the depth and the competence we have in our team. We have really, really good people and really good technologies that we can deliver to our clients. In some of them, we are able to have a leading solutions for decreasing also the CO2 emissions. As you know, global warming is really the theme of the day. And we have 3 technologies, copper flash smelting, alumina calcination and ferrochrome smelting, which provide the lion's share of the CO2 savings, not only in metals, but for the whole Metso Outotec. So these are really, really strong technologies to bring CO2 emissions. For our customers, we talk about the handprint here, not the footprint. That means save emissions for our customers. From the left side of the presentation, first, we have a precious metal plant for recycling. And I would say that, together with the battery chemical plant, is really new technologies from our side. So we are talking about recycling metals, which is obviously something we have to do more and more going forward. Battery chemicals plants, 2 of them, we have also been able to get during this period since the merger, 1 of them in U.S., the other 1 of them in Russia. And on top of that, we have a number of studies. So if we look at how do we get orders in metals, usually, first, we have to do a study together with the client. Client sends over material to us. We test the material. And while testing it, we also come up with what is the best process of getting the best yield out of this material. And that is then the basis for the basic engineering, which usually is the next step. We do the basic engineering to come up with the layout and the flow sheet for how the plant would look like. And then when that is -- usually, we move into the next step, which means then getting the whole order. All of these, what you see here are orders which have been -- let's say, we have had the studies first and then we've added some of them also the basic engineering. That way, we can also secure that when we are delivering something, it is actually bringing the results that we are looking for. And if we then go into something, which we call maybe more our base business or base technologies, we have 2 alumina processing plants, and then we have 6 iron ore pelletizing plants. And what makes this exciting and also is showing how cost competitive we can be, too, is that out of these 8 plants, 7 has been won in either China or India, which is, really, I would say, the most competitive markets in the world where you can be. So this is also showing that not only do we have the depth of the technology, not only do we have a very strong process technology, we can also be very competitive in our deliveries, which comes then from that we have been able to standardize these and really look for good supply chain solutions for these plants. Then if we go to the right-hand side, we have EUR 100 million zinc plant for Russia, what we got late last year. Then on top of that, we have also EUR 90 million nickel smelter modernization also for Russia, which we also got late last year. And then the project, I would say, it's the biggest project that Metso Outotec has ever got during this 18 months period, obviously, it's also the biggest project Outotec had ever got, if we look backwards. So it's really the biggest project we've gotten in our history. EUR 360 million copper smelter to Freeport Manyar, and that is really showing that what we can do with the breadth of our technologies. We have both smelter. We have hydro processing plant. We have also a acid plant. And on top of that, we have also a slide concentrator from our Minerals business. So it's really showcased for what we can deliver technology wise. And then on top of that, we also have received 3 copper processing plants. Maybe something that comes into your mind, and you look at this, is really that you see projects. And I would say, yes, we are a little bit different animal than the other businesses. We are further down the value chain of the process, and that also means that the, let's say, mechanical wear and tear, what you see earlier in the process in the mine site or earlier on in the mining area or in the aggregates, is not something what we are having. Usually, our wear and tear is coming from acidities or corrosion. So service portion is smaller. Also that our deliverables are not in, let's say, a number of small orders. It is more the bigger orders. So this -- what I'm showing to you here is really the, let's say, lion's share also of the order intake volume we have got during this period. If we then look at our R&D focus, we -- I would say we are really in the hotspot. It's a great place to be when you look at our R&D opportunities, what we have. We have carbon-free production. You saw some examples of that already earlier that we were able to save a lot of CO2. But going forward, also, we have technologies for hydrogen into the iron area, also bio-based reductant in metals processing, what we are looking to develop. We have circular economy. As you saw already, we got an order for this. So it's not only kind of in the R&D stage. We already have products out there, but we are developing further. And one of the areas where we are developing is also going into battery metals, where we are looking at recycling the -- what is called the black mass, that is mean all the batteries that are coming from the cars back and which we can recycle. But we are also into the battery process. So going from the whole minerals chain all the way down to cathode active materials, and there is an area where we are bringing in new businesses and developing new projects. So for instance, lithium hydroxide, we've gotten a few projects already this year, something new coming from battery metals. And then also we've gotten projects in cobalt and other areas. And obviously, not to say the least, obviously, with a lot of batteries, we also need to have a lot of charging station. And we need to bring much more electricity infrastructure into the world, which is leading to our base business, which is copper. On top of that, we have gold, where we have gotten already some quite interesting sizable orders, but we are looking forward to, what you see there on the top modular plants, digital solutions. We really have very far forgone digital solutions, where we have both systems that we can run the training and copy the system, what you're running in real time, so you can train the people with systems on the side. And at the same time, also, we are, as said, for order -- for us to be very competitive, we have to develop these modular plants because if we do them every time as a tailor-made solution, it will be very -- we will not be cost competitive. All of this is leading to what you see here on the right-hand side, Planet Positive products. We expect 50 new products between 2021 and '28, and 100% of these are R&D projects, which have sustainability targets. Thank you. Now over to Helena.

Thank you, Jari, and thank you, everybody, for very, very good presentations. And now we have time for some questions. Maybe we could welcome Pekka here and, of course, the other Business Area Presidents as well as needed, if there are relevant questions for you.

We do have some questions already, but please do send them in more. We still have time to cover them, so it would be interesting to get some more. But if we start Pekka now for the first question relates to the NPS. You mentioned that, of course, relating to customer feedback. What is the feedback you have received from customers now a bit over a year in operating as one company?

Yes. That's right. Customers, certainly, they do value our service presence. They do value our safety approach in specifically and, naturally, our products. Customers also, I mean -- and that we are welcoming also the feedback, which is where we need to improve. And customers are saying that we need to develop our responsiveness, we need to develop availability of our spare parts. And naturally, when we live times like this, we all know what challenges there have been in supply chains and logistics in the world. And it's clearly a focus that both Sami and Heikki have in both in consumables and services to make sure that we can back up customers in a timely manner.

Good. Then a question slightly related from Guy Woodford from Aggregates Business, Europe International. Has Metso Outotec experienced much supply chain disruption in its quarrying or Aggregates businesses? If so, how is the company attempting to minimize that?

Yes. Good question and very, very much a topical question. At this moment, I would say that during the first half, we -- up until end of first half of this year, we didn't experience too many sort of disruptions in that side. We -- naturally, we saw the current situation developing already earlier, and we did place quite sizable orders of components and parts already end of last year, in fact, in anticipation that something like this might happen. We have started to see a component shortage to hit us, and well-known fact that some of the diesel engines are not available as they used to be. But we do have alternative engines available for our local trucks, for most of them, in fact, so we can deliver units that are working and operating with world-class engines, but not in all cases, really the one that is preferred by the customer or by our distributor.

Okay. Good. Then a couple of questions relating to digitalization. You mentioned that the development is done together with the customers, that you -- it should be joint forces with customers. So what is Metso Outotec's approach to this? And how do you actually do this together?

We naturally -- we cover now a big part of process in all businesses that we do and that, of course, gives us a certain visibility through our equipment to measure things, to monitor things, to optimize things, to improve things. And naturally, our customers who are operating every day their mines, their plants, there's a lot of accumulated knowledge and other data. And these 2 sources of data should be connected and combined. And there's new value that we could be able to create together with that one. I think we all understand that point. But I mentioned that I would like to reach more cooperation in this field, and we are open for cooperation from our side. And we can secure the data, and security of that data with the processes, we have all the readiness for that one, that is the issue, which is preventing us in doing more of this kind of cooperation.

So something that you probably have already covered in many ways, but in what areas in digitalization do you see the biggest potential? And also the same goes for sustainability.

Yes. Naturally improving things. I mean, there is a lot of data, data that equipment that we can collect out of equipment or processes. And really combining this data in a new innovative way, we can learn about new things, putting some AI or machine learning on top of it. And we can enter in such a sort of a space that a human mind cannot sort of handle, but modern computing can definitely do that, and that is the area where I believe that we will be able to operate things in much more sustainable manner in -- with higher productivity, higher reliability. As well, I mean in many industries, equipment can be sort of updated and upgraded with the data that's been collected and life -- service life can be extended with the use of data and with the right actions, and that is the future that I would like to see. And I want to pinpoint that shortage of people and labor in -- altogether and experts and the expertise, and we work in an industry that, by definition, is not necessarily the most attractive. But I would say that our, really, ambition should be to make this industry an exciting industry, an industry that attracts the best talent that is available.

Absolutely. Then a question about battery metals. I don't know maybe, Pekka, you take this, unless Jari wants to come and answer. But how much is the growth of the demand for battery metals actually impacting our business in concrete terms?

Good question. I'm sure Jari has one answer. Maybe I'll hand it over to Jari, but I want to say that, just shortly in the beginning, that, yes, we do see some forecast, but I don't think the need for batteries is not fully known -- is really, really fully known at this moment. And therefore, the forecasts are not maybe giving the full picture yet, what it is. I have heard that by 2030, 10x more battery metals are needed, just to have batteries available for the cars that are planned. But Jari?

Yes. Thank you, Pekka. Yes, we can clearly see it already in our order intake. As mentioned, we got a few orders already in the battery metals segment. On top of that, we have a number of studies. I think it's more than 10 studies we have with different customers at the moment for new projects. I'm sure some of them will lead to new business during next year. So it really is a strong one, but I would not say we should not only look at kind of this, let's say, direct battery metals like lithium. We are talking cobalt. We also can clearly see that this is driving a lot of demand in the copper side, and copper is still the #1 metal for us going forward. So it's really driving -- it's hard to say how much because you cannot only count on the direct projects we get for battery metals producers. We also have to look at the projects that we get from copper and nickel, where we also are looking at improving the nickel grades to work as best as they can together with the batteries. So we see a lot of business. I would say it touches many of our projects, what we are getting at the moment. So it's kind of a hidden driver for a lot of our business today and not only -- not so hidden driver also for a few projects we are getting.

That's right. And probably, needless to say, but battery makers, they are really expecting that all the metals that are needed for batteries, they need to be as green as possible, produced in the most sustainable way.

Good. Then maybe actually, Jari, because there's a question here relating to aggregates that are asking about new product launches possibly coming. But maybe you could -- while Markku comes here, maybe you could comment on the metals one if you want to, Jari. Or...

Yes. So...

Product launches, if you can say something about that.

Yes. We are planning to launch, I think, somewhere around 60 new products during this year. So we've already launched a number of them. So for instance, to mention a few, camera for smelters. So really, who can look at less than a degree's exactness, the whole surface of the smelter, everywhere on the smelter, what is the temperature. And this is really important for us going forward, so we can also run the smelter even more exact. That is something that has been missing for us in the past. Immediately, as we launched this, we got a huge response for this. But on top of that, we have some really exciting products that I hope we can again surprise the market with positively here going forward. So there are a lot of them. So now I leave over to Markku.

Markku. Yes. Upcoming -- or if you on your table talk about then the recent ones, there have been some...

Yes. I think if I paint the picture that what are the areas where we are launching products, so in the mobile machines, we are launching products towards the electrification of the machines. And then in the crusher world, I think we are launching products towards bigger and bigger crushers, especially for the Chinese market. But I think there is a lot of development ongoing, and I think there is a lot of exciting news that we can bring on in the future for new product launches. But I wouldn't want to go into the details of the future launches before they are actual. So...

Okay. Markku, maybe you can actually stay. Guy Woodford, Editor from Aggregates Business Europe International, again, asking JCB is making big strides around green hydrogen for its construction machines. Has Metso Outotec got plans in this area for its quarrying or aggregates business?

We are -- in this area, in the hydrogen area, for our machines, I think we are in the kind of a follower role. So the number of machines that we are developing or selling is fairly slow compared to these excavator quantities. So we let those companies develop the technology. But as soon as there is relevant technologies available, instead of our current technologies, we will be adopting those immediately.

Okay. Thank you, Markku, and thank you, Pekka. This was actually all the questions we have received so far. And it looks like there aren't more coming, so I guess we can actually close the session now. But now still before ending, we could look at a couple of customer testimonials this time coming from 2 customers in Russia. [Presentation]

Thank you for your participation. Please note that we will post the recordings of these sessions on metsoutotec.com, so they will be available afterwards as well. Thank you very much.