Solutions 30 SE (S30) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Thank you.

Thank you, and thank you all for being with us today. I'm here with you to comment our full year results for 2020 and our Q1 revenue for 2021. I will make a brief introduction, while Amaury Boilot, our CFO, will further comment our financials. And Robert Ziegler, our new Chief Transformation Officer, will detail our market outlook and transformation plan. Robert was chosen after a search started in October 2020. He was appointed at the beginning of the month and joined the group Management Board. He has extensive management expertise with multibillion-euro companies and a demonstrated history of successfully managing business transformation and business planning as well as structuring corporate organizations. His mission within the group is to accelerate the transformation and the structuring of our organization as the new growth phase is opening for Solutions 30. We have done a lot already in the past 2 years, and we will clearly remain committed to continued improvement. As you can see from our fiscal year and Q1 releases, despite the pandemic and the heavy allegations against us, Solutions 30 is growing strongly. And we have great opportunities ahead of us in a context where all of Europe is launching huge recovery plans, of which a large part will go into telecom and energy distribution infrastructures. These investments are beginning now and will go on for several years, opening up several great and long-lasting business opportunities. Next slide, please. 2020 has been a new year of double-digit profitable growth. Next slide, yes, thank you. Telecoms drive growth in most regions, and we are prepared to capture new growth opportunities, in particular, with 5G deployment in the mobile sector -- mobile network segment. We have continued our geographic expansion through the successful integration of new activities in Poland and the first acquisition in the U.K. Looking forward, we have strong opportunities to pursue our double-digit sustainable growth. Pre-COVID trends emerged stronger in all business units, and we have a strong M&A pipe. Finally, we have continued the improvement of our compliance with the first reporting under IFRS, the transfer to Euronext Paris and the integration of the SBF 120 index and the enhanced integration of ESG into our growth strategy. The financial results of the company are very good, but 2020 has been a very difficult year for us. And once again, I want to warmly thank our employees, our customers, our partners and our shareholders for their continued support. Next slide, please. In 2020, despite an unprecedented crisis, we have been able to deliver a very strong operational performance. Our revenue increased by 18% to EUR 819 million. Our EBITDA increased by 19% to EUR 106 million, maintaining a high 13% margin. During the lockdown, we ensured service continuity in critical activities, and we enjoyed fast recovery as early as June. Our flexible cost base and our agility were key to restart faster than competition and to record strong rebound in profitability in the second half. During all the year, we applied rigorous cash management through cost savings, temporary unemployment measures and strict discipline in cash collection. Our free cash flow more than doubled to EUR 125 million, representing 15.2% of revenue. We enjoyed a net bank cash position of EUR 59 million at the end of the year, before IFRS 16, and we are entering 2021 with strong momentum. And our first quarter sales increased by 19% to EUR 225 million. Next slide, please. To summarize, facing an unprecedented sanitary prices in 2020, we have proven the resilience of our business model, we have confirmed the agility of our organization, and we have demonstrated our ability to capture growth. Our employees have been key to these achievements, and their commitment has been exceptionally strong. Post-COVID, the world may not have changed as much as some predicted, but is clearly driven by digital transformation and energy transition. These trends are even amplified by the European stimulus plan, which will boost market growth in every region and in the long term. We are ideally positioned to benefit from this, while gaining market share and replicating our successful model outside France. With Robert and the whole management team, we will go further to strengthen our internal processes in governance, risk and compliance. This will power Solutions 30 to achieve a continued double-digit growth as we are now getting close to our target of EUR 1 billion in revenue. And now I'll leave the floor to Amaury Boilot, our CFO, who will go through our financials.

Thank you, Gianbeppi, and good afternoon, everyone. So I will start with Slide #9. For 2020, Solutions 30 posted a revenue of EUR 819 million, going up by 18% in comparison with 2019, including 13% organic growth. Actually, after a strong start at the beginning of 2020, the first lockdown generated a 35% drop in the activity between mid-March and in May. However, most of our markets bounced back quickly, and Solutions 30 returned to sustainable growth as from June. As you can see on this slide, the increase in volumes was particularly visible in France, where the performance was mainly driven by 40% growth in the telecom business linked to fiber sales. In the other countries, the revenue benefited as well from the resilience of the telecom business, but also from the contribution of the strategic acquisitions made by the group in 2019 and in 2020. First, the group entered the Polish market with the acquisitions of Telekom Uslugi and Elmo, but also the U.K. market, more recently, with the acquisition of Comvergent last December. Second, the group developed its capabilities in the mobile network and 5G business with some targeted acquisitions in Spain, with Provisiona; in Italy, with Algor; and in the U.K., with Comvergent. Finally, the group acquired IPG and Brabamij in the Benelux in order to be prepared to save large-scale opportunities in the energy business in this region. Finally, this good performance in the very specific context of COVID is also explained by the fact that 59% of our revenue is recurring because it is done through recurrent maintenance activities. Now going to the next slide and looking now at our margins. In 2020, the adjusted EBITDA margin was up 10 basis points to 13%, thanks to a continued control of our costs during the first half of 2020, at the peak of the pandemic, through temporary unemployment measures and also optimized balance between direct personnel and subcontractors. Excellent momentum in the second half of the year helped this operating margin bounce back for the period, wiping out the decline in profitability from earlier this year. And in this context, the operational costs slightly increased during the year, representing 77.2% of our revenue, while central organization costs kept decreasing below 10% of our revenue. Our adjusted EBIT margin stands at 7.4%, slightly down due to a slight increase in operational depreciation and provisions. Next slide, please, per geography now. Well, in France, the EBITDA reached EUR 86.6 million, which represents a margin of 16.6%, going up by 0.5 points in comparison with 2019. And this is mainly due to the strong acceleration of volume through the second half of the year. In the Benelux, the EBITDA margin amounted to EUR 21.4 million and remained stable at 15.7% of the revenue. Finally, EBITDA margin in the other countries was slightly up at 4.8% of the revenue, despite severe lockdown impacts in Italy and Spain and start-up effect in Poland. Next slide, please, following with the P&L below the EBIT margin. Well, our net income group share stands at EUR 36.9 million, representing 4.5% of our revenue. It is actually almost stable in comparison with 2019 when you adjust from the nonrecurring profit of EUR 5 million that was booked in 2019 in relationship with the sale of our Italian subsidiaries, BSI and BRSI, and also the recognition of a badwill on last year's acquisition. The EUR 2.3 million increase that you can see on the amortization of intangibles is directly linked to our acquisitions in 2019 and 2020, with the amortization of the client relationships acquired. Regarding the financial results, it increased, and this -- it increased by EUR 2.3 million. And this increase is mainly explained by 2 factors in 2020: first, an adverse basis effect seen in 2019, a financial income of EUR 1.5 million was booked in relationship with the revaluation of external debt; and second, an adverse foreign exchange currency impact in 2020 now that the group operates in Poland and in the U.K. If we now go to the next slide. So obviously, to operate this growth in revenue, we had to develop the organization. The evolution of our workforce is actually directly linked to the growth of our business, with a good balance between employees, technicians and supervisors on the one hand and managers on the other hand. So excluding the subcontractors, in total, the group increased its staff by 981 additional employees in 2020. Operational staff increased by 15.4% and admin staff by 16.2%. On the next slide, you have a view on our balance sheet at the end of 2020. Actually, our balance sheet remains very robust. Equity amounts to EUR 172.4 million, up EUR 37.9 million versus 2019. In 2020, as you can see, the group built a very strong cash position amounting to EUR 159 million in December 2020 against EUR 84 million at the end of 2019. And this is mainly explained by the tight control of the cash and working capital requirements that we performed all along the year in the context of strong uncertainty in relationship with the COVID crisis. Part of this increase in cash is also explained by the amount of the outstanding receivables sold to our factoring providers, which stands at EUR 93.5 million in 2020 compared with EUR 54 million in 2019. In the meantime, we also managed to keep our debt under control. Excluding IFRS 16, the group's position actually shifted from a net bank debt of EUR 3 million at the end of 2019 to a net cash position of EUR 59 million at the end of 2020. This breaks down between a gross cash position of EUR 159 million and a gross bank debt of EUR 100 million. On the next slide, well, you can see -- you have another view on our debt position. At the end of 2020, our net debt amounts to EUR 29 million. And our cash position, net of bank debt, amounts to EUR 59 million. This gap of EUR 88 million between the 2 items -- these 2 items is explained by EUR 64 million of leasing liabilities according to IFRS 16, and to EUR 24 million of potential financial debt on future collections and earnouts related to past acquisitions. As a result, our net debt-to-EBITDA ratio decreased from 103% to 27% at the end of 2020, and our gearing decreased from 68% to 17%. On the next slide, you have a view on our cash flow generation. The group actually generated very strong free cash flow of EUR 125 million in 2020. Our cash flow from operations amounted to EUR 91 million. This is directly linked to the good delivery of our operating performance and our EBITDA level. The change in our working capital requirements generated an additional EUR 45 million of cash, and this is due to 2 main factors. On the one hand, it is due to a slight improvement of our working capital before deconsolidated factoring, thanks to a rigorous cash collection from our clients and an increase of subcontracted activity generating a positive impact on our cash flow. On the other hand, this improvement of the working capital requirement is also related to the increase of EUR 39 million in the amount of receivables sold to the factoring providers. At the end of 2020, again, the total amount of deconsolidated factoring was EUR 93 million. Net operational investments amounted to EUR 12 million or 1.4% of the revenue. This is actually a bit lower in comparison with last year. But actually, in the context of COVID, we have been very careful with the cash this year. And we clearly limited our investments in 2020. Regarding financing activities, we actually used EUR 13.8 million to finance our M&A activities, including earnout payments. Like previous years, we financed these acquisitions through bank debt. But in 2020, we managed to pay back a large amount of our debt, and that is why the net increase of loans is limited to EUR 5.5 million in 2020. Finally, you can see the financial expenses related to the leasing contracts according to IFRS 16, which amounted to EUR 24.7 million. In order to summarize 2020 on the next slide, I would like to highlight 3 key items. First, we delivered a strong financial performance in 2020 despite the COVID impact in the first half. Then we ended 2020 with a strong balance sheet and a solid financial structure. And finally, thanks to our financial policy, we are in a position today where we have all the financial resources in order to finance the important growth that we have ahead of us. Maybe just a few words again about our financial policy. And let me remind you 3 pillars -- the 3 pillars of this financial policy. We are actually using factoring in order to finance our working capital requirements at a minimum cost. We pay less than 1% per year on this factoring. This allows us to free up the cash that would remain blocked into our receivables in order to finance the scale-up of our new contracts. And that will be very important for the significant ramp-up that we will have to operate in 2021. And finally, we used bank debt in order to finance our M&A operations. Now moving to our first quarter performance on the next slide. Just after with the first graph, well, you can see that in Q1, we continued to have strong sales momentum and very positive market trends. Our Q1 revenue was up 19% to EUR 225 million. Organic growth was at 15.4% and external growth was at 3.6%, mainly related to the acquisitions made at the end of 2020. The share of our recurring revenue is still at 58% of the total group revenue. On the next slide, you have a split of this very good dynamics across the main geographical segments. In France, revenue went up by 22%. This is a purely organic growth since we did not perform any acquisition in this country. Benelux developed its revenue by 6%, including 1.7% organic growth, and is actually preparing the ramp-up on acceleration of its revenue as from Q2. In the other countries, well, dynamic was very good, since the revenue grew up by 21%, of which 7% is organic. And this is actually a good news since it is related to the good recovery of the business, both in Italy and in Spain. On the next slide, we go into more details about the development of the revenue in France. The 22% organic growth in France was driven by the outstanding performance of telecom business, up again. It was up 29%, thanks to the continued rollout of the national fiber optic network and an increasing number of subscribers to the fiber. Energy business recorded a 16% organic growth. This business benefited from a favorable base effect at the end of the quarter. Because, as you may remember, we had to phase out of the installation of Unit-T smart meters last year at the end of the first half of 2020. And then in the first half of this year, well, the effect is -- this favorable base effect will offset the slowdown in the number of smart meters installed. Remember that mass deployments are expected to end in December 2021. The IT business was up 6% over the quarter. And regarding other activities, mainly security and payments business, the revenue was down 22%, being, again, affected by the lockdown measures, curfews and travel restrictions. On the next slide, now talking about Benelux, the organic growth was soft at 1.7%. Actually, the telecom business grew organically by 8%, and we're offering stronger outlook with the forthcoming deployment of Belgium's broadband Internet network. Energy business was strongly up at 55%. The signing last December of the contract to deploy smart meters in Flanders actually began to contribute to revenue in March, but it's expected to contribute even more in the future. And IT revenue remained almost stable. And these activities -- I would say, the behavior of these activities are quite similar as the observations that we made regarding France. On the Slide 22, where we have a view on all the other countries. So organic growth was up 7.4%. As you can see, Germany is almost stable at the end of the first quarter of 2021. Actually, the activity was only slightly impacted by the COVID crisis on the first half 2020, but the situation worsened at the end of the year and during the first quarter of 2021. The underlying trends remain very strong, and the group expects broadband and the deployments to begin in the next month. In Italy, while the business grew up organically by 13%, the group actually benefited from a favorable base effect and the start of the contract signed at the beginning of the year with Telecom Italia to deploy its ultra-high speed infrastructure in Piedmont and in the Aosta Valley. In Spain, revenue grew organically by 23%. This is mainly explained by the strong momentum in the telecom business, both in fiber and in the 5G mobile networks. In Poland, where the group revenue remained almost stable compared to the first quarter of 2020. And finally, regarding the U.K., I remind you that, at the end of 2020, Solutions 30 announced its entry into the U.K. market with the acquisition of Comvergent, which has been consolidated since December 1. Thank you for your attention. I now leave the floor to Robert, who will present our strategy of growth and our transformation plan.

Thank you, Amaury, and good afternoon to everyone. My name is Robert Ziegler, I'm the Chief Transformation Officer of Solutions 30 since April 1. Very pleased to be here with you today and to talk about the market outlook and our growth as well as the transformation plan for 2021. Next page, please. The markets in which we operate remain very strong. If anything, the current crisis has made them stronger. Governments in Europe are scrambling to deliver instruments of digitalization, telecommunication and energy. They do this to catch up with the needs of our new reality during and after the pandemic, but also to deliver much-needed stimulus to Europe's economies. In many countries, such as Germany, the U.K., Poland and Belgium, the fiber rollout is finally picking up speed. All the other geographies are continuing from network rollout into actually connecting all businesses and households at fiber. The demand for technical services in telecommunications is driven by the proliferation of IoT devices and, of course, the need for video conferencing from every home. The whole market is expected to require another EUR 150 billion in investment until 2027. At the same time, 5G networks are being rolled out at a fast pace and interconnected with the fiber backbones. New mobile applications, such as autonomous mobility, will continue driving the hunger for bandwidth and speed. Another EUR 150 billion of investment are expected until 2027 to enable this full 5G vision. The switch off of the legacy copper networks will also be a major factor in the demand for technical field services, both for commercial and environmental reasons. Excess technology equipment for fiber occupies only a fraction of the space occupied by copper. Copper switches off -- switch offs saves 60% energy cost and frees up much needed real estate. We can see this already becoming a reality now. We already have some small projects starting, for instance, in the southeast of France. Next slide, please. As you can see on this slide, a great number of large telecom investments have been announced in Europe for the coming years. Solutions 30 is ideally positioned to benefit from this growth as a trusted partner of the incumbent operators. Our vast experience in France can be translated into other geographies, which are only now starting to prioritize investments into their telecommunications networks. Last but not least, Solutions 30 has a proven track record to be able to scale up quickly with its customers and to capture market growth. Next slide, please. As the effects of the pandemic slow down, we see a reignition, really, of the drive against global warming, with the U.S., China and even Russia being on board with a global agenda and the need all over Europe to modernize, digitalize and expand energy networks. This market looks ready for a long-awaited wave of stimulus and investments. In Europe alone, 2/3 increase to over EUR 150 billion is expected in 2020. We're seeing the market for charging stations taken off all over across Europe, especially in Belgium and Germany, but also in Spain and the U.K. The players are very diverse, from big oil to utilities to start-ups, and they require a standardized approach to managing installations across geographies. Many of these players are multinational, and that is where Solutions 30 can really play its European scale. Solutions 30 has the density of its service network, the technical skills and the ability to uberize the technician/customer relationship to make this happen. We will professionalize the rollout and maintenance of charging stations for electrical vehicles, microgrids, smart grids and smart meters. Next page, please. To summarize, the energy transition, the digital transformation, as well as the continued pressure on productivity in every other sector of the industries, are being turbocharged by the coming stimulus packages across Europe. The target of EUR 1 billion turnover for Solutions 30 is consequently getting close. Next page. On the following slide, I'd like to explain how we plan to marry growth, stemming from these markets that I just spoke about, with a transformation that is needed in Solutions 30 to actually sustain that growth. Next page. Since its inception, Solutions 30 has never seen a year without double-digit growth. In the past few years, this profitable growth has even accelerated to bring the company to where it is today. My job will be to sustain this growth trajectory and to achieve our ambitions for the coming years, while maintaining current levels of profitability. Next page, please. We, the management team, understand that operating at a level of EUR 1 billion-plus in revenues requires additional discipline, discipline needed to assure that we can sustain this growth without exposing ourselves to risks from the increased size, and therefore, complexity of the organization. At the same time, the DNA and strengths of Solutions 30 is its entrepreneurship and the drive of its people at all levels of the organization across Europe. Therefore, the challenge we see and can accept is to become more structured and have stronger internal and external controls, while preserving this entrepreneurial spirit at the heart of our teams. The very -- a very pragmatic transformation approach is needed, which will be driven by the top management, and reach into the very details of our operations. We need to do this without creating an obstacle to our continued growth. Next page, please. Therefore, our approach will be -- to transformation will be twofold, focusing first on the continued growth of our business. I'll support this growth actively as part of the team which is highly committed to deliver quality service to a loyal customer base, and all that within a healthy and proven business model. The financial strength of Solutions 30 will allow us to fuel that growth within a very agile organization and with short decision-making processes. To give you an example, I'm currently deep-diving into the German business and driving the growth there. We're building a stable platform there to grow organically in our core markets of telecommunication and energy, but we're also seeking opportunities to capture the current market momentum in Germany. We're investing into capabilities for bringing new, fast Internet to homes and businesses. The main challenges there is to build resources and capabilities fast, all that in a market that is characterized by very high demand and a constant lack of supply. We also bring additional resources to the German market. We're applying several strategies. One example is that we've built a supplier sourcing platform, and this platform will allow us to source supplier companies from all over Europe. It will allow us to offer them projects or ongoing work all over our European entities. This platform will evolve into our main tool for managing subcontractors. Next page, please. In terms of my second priority, we will take steps to improve our structures around governance, risks and compliance. We're continuing to implement on a number of quick wins in this area. We're introducing new risk controls and compliance policies, which we are rolling out to all countries and all managers. We're building a platform for managing subcontractors and for monitoring all transactions related with those related parties. We keep strengthening our governance and governing bodies. We're continuously improving the legibility of the organization. 14 subsidiaries were merged in France in 2020, and we will keep reducing the number of subsidiaries. We're improving our commitment to ESG. And for the first time in 2021, ESG criteria will be part of the management's bonus targets. Next page, please. Beyond the quick wins, we're starting a project with an external consulting firm who we've already selected. The project will focus on building a comprehensive governance, risk and compliance framework. We've chosen to implement the best practice model called GRC or the 3 lines of defense. This framework covers governance, risk and compliance instead of looking at them as separate topics. It is centered around the first line of defense, which are the core processes of our company. This means it's grounded in the business rather than a layer on top of it. We want to use GRC not just as an approach to fulfill external norms, but also to prepare the company for the coming growth trajectory. GRC will help us strengthen our structures and improve our internal controls. We will do this, first and foremost, to protect our business and avoid mistakes in the fast-growing organizations. The second line of defense are internal control systems, which interact with our core processes. We want to avoid those becoming a burden. We will, therefore, immediately implement easy-to-use workflow technology to facilitate the introduction of those internal controls. The system will support us in steering decision-makers along the process. It will document all relevant decisions and make them auditable. The challenge will be to design this in a way to stay agile, while being more rigorous and disciplined at the same time. Once the first 2 lines have been implemented, we will activate the third line by auditing, whether we're doing the right things and whether we're doing the things right. Next page. In terms of organization, we will increase the size of the Supervisory Board from 6 to 9 members this year, therefore increasing the number of independent members even further. We'll broaden the powers of the Group Executive Committee, which will take over day-to-day tasks from the Group Management Board, to help run the company more smoothly across geographies. There will also be regular interactions with the Country Executive Committees. Each country will follow a similar template for its organization, but we will, of course, allow for differences in size and other local specifics. Next page. We've already significantly improved the integration of ESG matters into our strategy. The improvement in our ratings shows this. Solutions 30 was ranked by Vigeo to be the second most improved company on the Euronext Paris. Awareness for ESG has strongly increased throughout the group over the last year. And clearly, today, our customers are expecting their key partners to commit to sustainabilities. In 2021 we intend to go further and, for the first time, make ESG part of our managers' performance targets. We believe that this will further improve integration of ESG into our daily operations. The business will also increase its green revenue by growing the e-mobility charging networks throughout Europe. New initiatives will support human capital development. And last but not least, our own fleet will become more sustainable. Our first ESG report will be available in the coming weeks. Next slide, please. When we look at the time line for our transition plan, we expect the quick wins to be implemented by the end of Q2. The next-stage growth plan and GRC implementation are expected by the end of Q4. We also plan to follow up our GRC efforts with another external audit on GRC early next year. Next slide, please. Excuse me. In a nutshell, we want to deliver a stronger organization, with stronger control for a stronger outlook. Thank you for your time and attention. Gianbeppi, Amaury and myself will be happy to answer your questions now. I now leave the floor to the Q&A session.

[Operator Instructions] And the first question comes from the line of Julien Fouché from Societe Generale.

I've got 3 questions, please. So first, could you give us more color on the growth trends you currently see in both 5G and electric vehicles? And more precisely, what does it represent in terms of revenue at the group level? Secondly, for modeling purposes, Amaury, could you provide some sort of housekeeping update in terms of below-the-line items like interest, tax, CapEx? And any thoughts on working capital requirements for 2021? And then in your last letter to shareholders, you said you were contemplating all strategic options for the group, including the strengthening of the company's shareholder base, which could go as far as delisting. Could you give us an update on this point?

Thank you, Julien. Amaury, if you don't mind, maybe you can take the first 2 ones. And then I take the third one.

Yes. Thank you. Well, actually, regarding the outlook on the new businesses that we developed, as I said earlier, our capabilities in the mobile business. So we acquired Algor. We acquired Comvergent. We acquired Provisiona. And we are gaining new contracts in this activity. So in 2021, we'll be able to generate something like, at least, I would say, in a conservative way, EUR 30 million is seen in the mobile business. In the EV -- regarding the EV business, this is actually starting almost everywhere in the different countries. So it's -- I cannot give you an accurate figures, but as we already mentioned, it should become visible on our top line, representing several million euros. I think above EUR 10 million for sure, but hardly to say how we will -- how much we generate the new contracts this year. What you can expect, I mean, regarding your second questions about the P&L, as I said, we are facing, currently, significant ramp-ups in several geographies. We need to recruit, train, buy equipments for several hundreds of technicians in Italy in order to serve the new contract with Telecom Italia for the rollout of fiber. We need to do the same in Belgium in order to perform the new contracts related to the rollout of smart meters in the Benelux. And that's almost the case in all the countries. So basically, we expect to have our working capital needs to increase in 2021. That's why it was important for us to rely on our strong financial policy in order to secure this purely organic growth. And this will also impact the level of CapEx that we will have in 2021 since, for these new customers, we need to adjust our IT platform, but we also need to buy additional equipments for the newcomers that will operate this contract. However, we should remain in the regular range of our CapEx. This year it was quite low, around 1.4%, which will remain below or around maximum of 3%, I would say, in 2021. I hope I have answered your question. And I will maybe leave the floor to Gianbeppi for the strategy questions.

Yes, thank you. Thank you, Amaury. I'll take the last one. Yes, Julien, I think you are reflecting what several people in this call are thinking, which is frustration when you see the operational performance of the company and the reaction of the stock price. As you can see, we are doing things in one direction, which is to make the company stronger by delivering. The financial performance of 2020 and the first quarter '21 has been very good, especially in a year where COVID came. And the other thing is improve -- continue to improve our governance, as Robert said. It's something we initiated in '19 when we moved to IFRS standards, and then we moved to the regulated market. And then we went into the SBF 120 index, and we will continue to do that. And then there is another priority, which is take care of the capital structure of the company. And of course, it's our duty as director of the company to check if there is too much of a disconnect between the intrinsic value of the company and the value of the stock exchange, to see what the options are. And of course, the options include talking to investors who can become anchor investors and contribute to stabilize the capital of the company, or take the company in the private. Of course, all of the options are open, are on the table. And of course, we are working to add as many options as possible for the benefit of our shareholders.

There are currently no further questions coming via the audio line. [Operator Instructions] And there are no further questions coming via the audio line, so I'll hand the call back to our speakers for the webcast questions. Thank you.

Yes, I see a bit of questions. "Good afternoon all. Gianbeppi, our investors keep asking, could you comment on the 6 months of messaging missing?" Yes, I'm happy to comment on that, and I'll tell you what happened. We -- I have a very large mail box with several years of e-mails. And about 1 year ago, I got stuck with the impossibility to receive or send e-mails. So one of our IT people entered from remote in my computer and archived locally about 6 months of e-mail. The archive stayed local, in my hard disk. What we then do is an upgrade of our PCs. And in the process, this local archive was lost. Deloitte, in the independent audit that was carried out, got access to more than 10 years of my e-mails, which was 440,000 e-mails, because it's really quite a lot. And they got both the physical copy of my hard disk and also the copy of what was on the mail server. So basically, we gave all we could. Unfortunately, there was this accident with 6 months of mail, and that's the story. Second question, "Do you expect FTTH to take in Germany? It is backed by contracts on hand." Robert, since it's Germany, you may want to comment on that?

Yes, happy to. We do see a lot of demand for FTTH in Germany. We have very concrete discussions with customers about contracts, about large contracts. The challenge at the moment in the German market is that there is not a lot of supply to actually respond to the demand that is in the market there. So our first order of business is to build up an organization that can actually deliver these very large contracts. We have a couple of ongoing installations and projects right now. But these are more trial installations, where we see how the interaction where the customers is working, how the regulations are working and how we can make it a successful business model. At the same time, we're looking at acquisitions in Germany. We're looking at hiring staff. And we're also building this platform to bring new capacity into the country by bringing in subcontractors from outside of Germany. We're also working with our sister companies within Solutions 30 to see how they can bring their own resources into the German market, so we can quickly take off there.