TXT e-solutions S.p.A. ($TXT)

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the TXT conference call, during which Group CEO, Daniele Misani, will present and comment the main KPIs for the first quarter 2026 results, together with some business updates about the future evolution of the business. I will then take the lead to provide more details about the financials, and the call will end with a Q&A section. And for such purpose, you can drop your question in the dedicated section of the meeting room. We will just wait a few seconds, and then we will start with the conference call. And I have the pleasure to introduce Daniele Misani to this call.

Thank you, Andrea. Welcome to everybody. So this is the presentation of financial results of the first quarter that was very strong. So as you know, we are implementing a strategy of growth with contribution coming from aggregation of new companies and synergies we create among the companies of the group. This strategy brought good results for the last few years, and Q1 is still in this direction. So this makes us confident to meet the goals that we have already communicated to the investor and all the financial stakeholders related to our industrial plan for the next 3 years. Looking for the numbers of Q1, there is a strong growth in terms of top line almost EUR 110 million with a growth of 18% with respect to the same period of the last year. The important indication is coming from organic growth, like-for-like growth that is plus 17%, EUR 16 million added in the top line with respect to the same perimeter of the last year. We keep -- nevertheless, the investments and, let's say, the investment made also to sustain the growth. We keep a good EBITDA margin that is almost 14.5% with a total EBITDA consolidated for the first quarter of EUR 16 million, 16 with a growth of 18%. So our, let's say, strategy is sustainable. We grow in top line, but we are focused on the value proposition. So projects with good margins, our own smart solution, proprietary software that in order to keep a good EBITDA margin in a sustainable way. Looking to the total numbers, the growth is, let's say, have contribution coming from all the division of the group. We have this approach very end-to-end from the advisory to our proprietary asset and to the system engineering capability to deliver complex projects. All the division registered a good growth for the first quarter. Total growth is 19%. System engineering is 18%, 23% strong growth for the advisory part mainly related to the public sector, 15% in the growth of our proprietary assets, smart solutions. Looking to the EBITDA contribution also in this section, you can see that we have a constant growth from all the division by keeping the same margin we had also the last year, incrementing, let's say, the investments, both commercial and R&D in order to be more effective in our value proposition. So software engineering growing of 18%, strong contribution from Digital Advisory plus 24% and 15% coming from Proprietary Solutions for a total EBITDA almost EUR 160 million, 14.5% as a margin. We continue to invest. As I said before, our growth must be sustainable for the long term. The investment made in our proprietary solution is about EUR 6 million. That is a strong growth with respect to the same period of last year that was 24% less. So we continue -- we believe that the technology and the latest, let's say, technologies available on the market, including AI algorithms and AI technologies are fundamentals in order to improve the capabilities of our smart solutions. So for this reason, we are continuing to invest for the existing product lines and also for the new products that we will launch to the market in the next future. In terms of revenues, so the investment brought growth also in the Smart Solution part, so our proprietary asset with a total revenue of EUR 22 million in growth of 15% with the same period of the last year. Internationally, we keep the market share. This is because the growth of the domestic market in which we are already a leader, and we continue to be a reference point for digital innovation is growing. And so we are growing also internationally. The revenues coming from international business are EUR 16 million, that is 15% of the total business. In terms of debt, our let's say, approach as you know, is a sustainable approach. So we invest for new acquisitions by financing the acquisition with the cash we generate. And also, we have active buyback plan in order to continue to buy back our own shares to be used there in future acquisitions. During first quarter, we closed the deal with the American company for fuel optimization. So for aviation and aerospace in the first in general, that has, let's say, an impact of almost EUR 10 million in terms of euros and EUR 2 million are coming from investment in other start-ups or minorities that we have in order to increment the footprint and continue to grow. The total net debt adjusted so without financial investment is around EUR 100 million. That is a projection below the 2x EBITDA that we expect at the end of the year. So we are in a perfect line with our let's say, guideline. And we still have treasury shares, in particular, first quarter was strong in terms of buyback. We acquired more or less EUR 2.5 million in our own shares and the total amount of shares at least evaluated the share price at end of March is about EUR 30 million today also because yesterday was a very good day after the results in terms of stock price. So overall, we have almost EUR 50 million in our own shares to be used for future acquisitions. Looking for the industries, which we are. So we have these 6 pillars, competence centers and clusters that are growing according to the, let's say, guidance we gave during the industrial plan, and the first quarter registered also performance stronger than also what we planned during the industrial plan itself. So overall, it's 19%. And also in this case, the good things is our diversification allow us to be more sustainable and reliable pushing on the markets that are fast growing, but having also good results coming from synergies from the other markets. So everybody, every industry, every cluster that we have is growing and the particular, let's say, driver of growth is related to the public sector that we expect to grow in this segment because the backlog that we acquired in the past few years and the projects that are increasing in this area. Aerospace & Defense, that is the other, let's say, main driver for the growth on the year level is growing at 10% first quarter generally is by design in the first quarter almost lower because at the end of the year, we start with big projects. So the new business will ramp up during the year itself. So still we grow of 10%, and we expect to grow much more in the next 9 months. It's in particular, let's say, good to point out the growth contribution coming from tech and gaming and industrial. -- specifically, Tecon gaming is going in a good way in the first quarter for a big contract we acquired in the gaming industry, for which we are partnering with a big player on the Italian market. for the renewal of their own digital infrastructure. So this new contract was, let's say, an upsell very strong that contributed in third quarter for the total growth and for the industrial, we are starting to consolidate the new business that we launched last year -- in the second half of the last year. related to the monitoring of complex and critical infrastructures. This business is completely organic, so it comes from investments internally and synergies we create among, let's say, different business lines by providing software proprietary platforms towards the market of critical infrastructure the growth -- strong growth all organic in the first quarter. The overall is EUR 2.5 million more or less of revenues coming from this business. in the first quarter and is expected to grow in the next months. The other division are in line with the plan with an average growth of 10%. Looking to the events that are, let's say, happened after the closure of the first quarter and the evolution of the business, as I said, so all the strategy that is a mix of M&A, so aggregation of companies and synergies are doing and bringing results. In terms of investment, we closed in March the investment in a new startup in partnership with Polytechnic of Milan to build a company that will create, let's say, set of advanced algorithms in order to monitor critical infrastructure, AI native. So we are investing with the new coming from the polytechnical and the ability as software let's say, factory that we have internally to build, let's say, additional functionalities to be provided to our customer in this domain. The investment is a startup that was founded in March for which, let's say, TXT will contribute a financial, let's say, investor and also as, let's say, a provider of technology together with the pattern with Politecnico di Milano. So the goal here is to leverage of AI capabilities and our engineering knowledge to capture market opportunity and to grow the business that already started in a good way in terms of monitoring of critical infrastructures. Other investment we did when we closed it was in first of April, we acquired fasting that is a smart solution provider with a footprint in the proprietary asset in terms of the OT, IoT in general for industry and for complex production systems. They have also inside the company, a proprietary solution, argon software related to warehouse management. And for us, it's a strategic because synergic with the Industrial division. So we had customer base and we had new assets to complementary to the assets that we are ready to strengthen our position as an end-to-end provider or complex solution for the industrial overall market. the company we acquired registered in 2025, EUR 4.4 million turnover margin around 20%. So we expect a continuous growth before synergies accelerated by the synergies we can provide. -- just to inform the market. So we already closed the deal with a customer of the new acquired company by providing existing solutions we have in the group. So it's allowing in fruit that we closed -- we are speaking not of very big deals. So we are speaking about 100,000 cases in new licenses, we provide to a customer of fasting by leveraging the synergies with the rest of the group. So this is the most point for us important. So the opportunity to create synergies, upsell and cross-sell and technological synergies in order to be stronger on the market. We paid for this acquisition at closing EUR 4.5 million, and we expect that will generate growth across the 2026 and further. The other acquisition we completed is on fourth of May. We completed, let's say, the deal who aggregate net Vidalia a smart solution provider in the martech domain that have also a proprietary solution related to performance marketing, very complementary to the company that we have already in the group that is refined. So together, these 2 companies became 1 of the leader at least in the domestic market of performance marketing, let's say, offering -- and for us, it's strategic also in order to support the internationalization let's say, scale-up initiative that we launched last year. because we create critical mass in terms of software assets, resources for the operation and market reach to address more strongly and quicker the scale up towards the international business. Net profit in 2025 had revenues of EUR 4.6 million with EBITDA margin more or less 20%. And at the closing, we paid EUR 5.5 million in order to acquire 100% of the shares of the company itself. And also in this case, we expect generate synergies with the market, let's say, division of the group in order to be stronger in front of the competitors and the requirements of the market. So as I want to highlight that these 2, let's say, acquisition plus the investment in the startup with the polytechnical are strategic and in line with our, let's say, industrial plan because we are looking for a very specialized company with already a good customer base and the market presence and with, let's say, innovative and proprietary technologies that generates immediately with good EBITDA margin we had this rent overall today our group because we are adding companies that are an average EBITDA margin is above the average of the group. So we are speaking to with these 2 companies, EUR 2 million pro forma with respect to the overall EBITDA of the group. And of course, press synergies, EUR 2 million paid growth. So we expect this year, the contribution will be better. I let maybe now ask Andrea to before -- so I already gave some flavor about the growth in the different even that we have. So -- the main point is that for us, AI is in leverage in terms of go-to-market for all the divisions that we have either a service-based division and smart solutions, so proprietary product. And we have different opportunities in pipeline in terms of commercial pipeline to extend our footprint of the market. So the results of Q1 are good. But it's the beginning of a year that we see very strong in terms of, let's say, opportunities in terms of sustainability of the growth in all the divisions that we have. So I ask Andrea maybe to go through the financials in order to share more detail about the financial performance. Thank you, Andrea.

Thank you, Daniele. Thank you for this very comprehensive res overview about results and business updates. So now we go a little bit deeper into the financials, starting from top line top line was broadly discussed by Daniele. We recorded a 18.5% growing first quarter 2026 with, let's say, mostly of the contribution coming from organic growth with 17% of growth on a like-for-like, let's say, perimeter. In terms of that cost, we have an increase of 14%, slightly lower than the growth of the top line bringing a positive effect in terms of core margin, which reached approximately 36% in the first quarter of 2026. And looking at the indirect cost, we have a solid growth of our research and development cost as said before, by Daniele, we are still investing in new technologies. We want to push in our smart Soto portfolio to keep it above of the competition in terms of innovation, and this is a growth of 24% outperformed the growth of revenues and in specific or Smart Solutions, but the return on this investment is expected already from the second quarter and for the future years. So as a reminder, we fully expand all our R&D into the P&L. So we do not capitalize any of our resource and development costs. very significant growth was recorded to commercial costs. Here, we have includes also, of course, the management cost and the marketing cost. Here, we have some very strong campaign acceleration investment, both in internal resources with the clustering of the group offering by industry with a new key position and also with some accrual of sales commission and bonuses which are somehow linked also to the very strong performance recorded in the first quarter of the year. Also the marketing investment and the marketing initiatives supported the growth reported of 59%. And we expect this growth to be slower in the rest of the year. In fact, if you look at the incidence of commercial cost over revenues, there's a significant increase from 6.6% in the first quarter of 2025 to almost 9% in the first quarter of 2026. But as I said, we expect this incident to get a bit lower in the rest of the year. Looking at the general and administrative costs, the growth of approximately 20% brought G&A cost to EUR 7.5 million with an incidence of 6.9% over revenues broadly in line with the 6.8% incidents reported in the first quarter of 2025. So the EBITDA margin maintained a 14.5% level in 2026 first quarter as was in the first quarter of 2025. It's important to say that the different mix of fastest-growing of software engineering and advisory should have less diluted at the margin, which instead we were able to keep, thanks to synergies and operational efficiency. Moving to the next slide. below the EBITDA, the group reported total depreciation and amortization, excluding PPA, at about EUR 3 million. And with an incidence of 4.3% of revenues. Here, the main items are related to IFRS 16, so the appreciation related to lease for about EUR 2 million with an incidence of 1.8% on revenues and the remaining items are mainly related to the depreciation of fixed assets for EUR 0.8 million and depreciation of intangible assets, excluding PPA for EUR 0.2 million and an aggregate incidence of 1%. The overall growth of depreciation and amortization and write-off excluding the PPA is 17%, so slightly lower than the growth of the top line. Of course, PPA instead have a very significant growth because it includes all the acquisition completed up to, let's say, 2025 while in the first quarter of 2025, the allocation of the price on web Genesis and other main acquisition of 2024 were not included as the group has a 12-month period in order to reflect PPA effect into the books. So of course, the incidence of PPA revenues increased significantly from 1.1% into first quarter 2025 to 1.8% in the first quarter of the current year. Also in terms of net financial income and charges with the net results of EUR 2.7 million reported in 2026 first quarter showed a growth of 45% compared to the same period of the previous year, and they are the main effects linked to the different financial and structure and debt structure of the group, as we will see in the next slide that the group also increased the exposure towards bank in order to sustain the ongoing M&A plan, which is very active in the first half of 2026. And of course, we have the results from the minorities, broadly in line, let's say, compared to the first quarter of the previous year, less than EUR 100,000 of net loss compared to EUR 23,000 of net loss in the same period of the previous year with an earnings before taxes adjusted by PPA, which ends at EUR 10 million in 2026 first quarter versus EUR 8.9 million in the first quarter of the previous year, with a net increase of 12.6%, down performing, let's say, the 18.3% of the EBITDA margin, but this is mainly related to the different financial results. The net profit adjusted as a similar rate as an incidence of 7% on revenues versus the 7.1% from the previous year. And in terms of net profit reported the difference of 80 basis points is to be attributed to the PPA mainly and also to the different financial results. In terms of results from the net profit attributable to interest, we have EUR 0.4 million in the first quarter of 2026 versus EUR 0.5 million in the first quarter of 2025. Looking to the next slide, the net debt of the company increased overall by EUR 2.7 million, and the increase in the net debt comes from an offset of the very strong free cash flow generated by the company in the quarter. which was, let's say, above historical data and both targets, thanks to a better DSO reported in the period, and other effects on the net working capital. But this effect -- this very positive effect was offset by the extraordinary investment incurred by the group, in particular, EUR 12 million coming from M&A, of which EUR 5 million related to earn-outs and EUR 2.4 million related to capital increase into minorities and the repurchase of treasury shares already disclosed by Daniel by EUR 2.6 million and also the payment of interest and financial charges for EUR 2 million. If you look at the net debt by nature, we have cash and cash equivalents for EUR 114 million. with an increase of approximately EUR 12 million compared to the previous year. And this is also reflected in the total backlogs and borrowing that are about EUR 210 million in 2026, end of March versus EUR 197 million end of 2025 with an increase of EUR 13 million. So the group is getting, let's say, more cash in order to be ready to, let's say, pay for the M&A that are on plan. Just as a reminder, as of today in the second quarter, 2 acquisitions were already disclosed and closed and there are the possibility to close further M&A. And other letting items into the net debt position in terms of financial assets, there are financial instruments at their fair value, which report which are quite stable with EUR 226 million decrease coming from the fair value of such financial instruments. And in terms of main liabilities order than bank loans nor we already commented, we have IFRS 16 liabilities. For overall short term and long term, EUR 18.5 million with a net increase of EUR 0.4 million. We have earned out liabilities for about EUR 16 million with a net increase of EUR 5 million related to acquisition and closed in the first quarter of 2026. And those are the main financial liabilities, including the net debt. The difference between the net debt reported of about EUR 119 million as of end of March 2026 versus the adjusted net debt as of the same period, EUR 401.5 million is related to the financial investment in Banca del Fucino which is expected to be monetized within the area, at least, let's say, a big portion of it. If we look to the next slide, in terms of balance sheet, the balance sheet of -- the consolidated balance sheet of Grupo show total fixed assets as of end of March 2026 for EUR 25 million with an increase of about EUR 10 million compared to year-end 2025 in -- and the main category is intangible assets equal to EUR 290 million as of end of first quarter 2026 with a net increase of EUR 9 million. Within intangible assets. The main category is related to goodwill for a total amount of EUR 141 million as of end of March 2026 with an increase of EUR 311 million compared to the year-end 2025 following the acquisition of the period and the related fair value of the earn-out. The remaining item accounted for within the intangible assets are mainly customer relationship intellectual properties coming from M&A with a net book value of EUR 45 million as of end of March 2026. Tangible fixed assets are equal to EUR 4 million in -- as of end of March 26, with a net increase of EUR 0.4 million compared to the year-end 2025. And the main items included consist of office and car lease recognized under IFRS 16 for a total of EUR 20 million, 1 building with a net book value of EUR 4 million, plant and machine with a net bank value of EUR 4 million, which are mainly related also to the new lab in which the group invested between of 2025 and beginning of 2026, and laptops and other electronic equipment for a total net book value of EUR 3 million. The other fixed assets, so the last item -- last category of the fixed assets amounted to EUR 29 million as of March 2025 with a net increase of EUR 0.7 million. and the balance mainly include the investment in Banca del Fucino with a fair value of approximately EUR 18 million in line with previous year. the investment in unconsolidated subsidiaries for EUR 8 million with an increase of EUR 1 million compared to year-end 2025 and other minority amounts linked to, for example, security deposits on lease and deferred tax assets. The net working capital of the group in the period reported a net decrease of EUR 2.7 million, which positively contributed to the cash -- the operating cash generation of the period itself. Here, if we look at the trade receivable with customer, the increase at the lower rate compared to the top line, thanks to the improved DSO and the effect of invoice discounting while payable with supplier and work in progress increased at a rate in line with the growth of the business itself. The other items are related to other short-term assets -- the short-term receivable, which increased by EUR 3 million in the first quarter, mainly for the increase in deferred expenses account. Tax payable instead increased by EUR 1 million in the first quarter, following the recognition of income tax of the period, which more than offset the reduction of deferred tax liabilities account. The main decrease of the net working capital is related to other payable and short-term liabilities, which decreased by 6 here, the main effect is related to the increase of deferred income related to a subscription invoiced during Q1 for a total EUR 5 million and for the increase of payable with employees for accrued holidays and salaries related, for example, to the 13-month salary. In terms of other items, severance and other nonrecurrent liabilities are in line with the year end of previous year end, shareholder equity is the net effect coming from the net results of the period and the effects on treasury shares, while the net financial debt was this is the reported let's value was broadly reported into the -- and commenting with the previous slide. If we move to the next slide, in terms of shareholding structure, the structure as of end of March 2026 is broadly in line with the year-end 2025 with Lavin being the financial vehicle of [indiscernible] accounting for 20% of the overall capital we have managers with more than 20%, so 24% stake, which includes a manager both part of the executive team and also those who entering the group following the M&A plan as the group used to has a tendency used to pay, let's say, price partially in cash and partially interest shares, which become, let's say, shares owned by management. And then we have a market so the from Mark owning 40% and 3% related to treasury shares, in particularly related to treasury shares during the first quarter of 2026, the treasure price reached -- the treasury shares amounted to approximately 430,000 shares, representing 3.3% of the issued shares or comparing the treasury shares were 234,000 as of end of year 2025 and the increased shareback program. In fact, during the first quarter, Textured shares at an average price of EUR 27.3 per share for a total investment of approximately EUR 2.6 million. In terms of dividend for 2026 and based on the 2025 results achieved by the group, the shareholder meeting, we saw the distribution of a dividend of EUR 0.35 per share, calculating on outstanding shares excluding treasury shares, which will correspond to a payout of approximately EUR 4.5 million. The dividend payment date is May 20. So let's say, the payout is not reflected into the figures reported in the first quarter of the year. In terms of performance of the TXT stock, during the first quarter of 2026, TXT share price reached a high of EUR 31.4 as of March 1, 2026, and the low of EUR 23.85 as of February 16, 2026. As of end of March 2026, the price per share was EUR 29.6. We completed the financial overview section of this conference call. We will now go through the Q&A that we have collected during the presentation.

We currently have 2 questions. I will publish first question coming from Andrea Randone, which I don't see any more -- maybe I pushed the wrong bottom. But anyway, the question was asking if you can -- if we can provide more color about the EUR 500 million of bids on the public sector expected to be awarded by 2026.

Yes. So we are speaking -- the business for our public sector division is based mainly on public tenders. So in order to acquire the backlog that we are now delivering. So also the results of the first quarter are related to tenders we won in the past few years that we are delivering is needed to continue to do, let's say, new bids, new tenders in order to have the continuity of the business for the next few years. So in terms of acquisition, we participated to a lot of new tenders because in the first part of the year, there is a new wave of big digital transformation programs for the Central public administration and local public administration for which we have a goal to acquire at, let's say, to keep the level of the backlog cost growing 10% in order to deliver in the next few years, the growth. So far, there are no public, let's say, information related to the closure of these deals that are expected to be completed in the first half of the year. And of course, for these tenders, there are also, let's say, possible discussion between who participated, it's a long-term vision. And in order to have more, let's say, details about this information, we will publish as soon as we secure new deals compressive communication of the deals we acquired during the year. So far, there are no, let's say, information also prices to share. The point is that we are positioned in a very good way. So we expect to collect at least backlog in order to give continuity to the business of the public sector, let's say, cluster that we have in TxtGroup.

Thank you, Daniele. We have additional 3 questions, 1 from Andrea Randone from Intermonte, 1 from Nicolas from Kepler and the other from Andrea from Acro. So we start from the second 1 from Andrea Randone and asking, can you explain us Arcteas able to secure the European Defense Fonds project and what our business expectation. Artica appointed coordinator of the consortium.

Okay. Thank you. So we just announced and we just received, let's say, the confirmation we get these let's say, project from the European Defense Fund that is related to a data collection platform for interoperability across different events across Europe for which we were a coordinator. Coordinator means that we presented as ahead of this consortium, the proposal to the fund, and we won. Also against big players, we achieved this result because of these, let's say, topics of the defense at European level fundings and innovation. Yes, we are preparing and positioning ourselves. So we built a strong relationship with big players. And in the particular case of the achievement, we reached we decided to participate together with other big players in order to be an alternative also at European level, and we managed to win this one against also more big or structural companies. Since the focus is related to innovation in the consortium, there is a lot of patterns that are more industrial and producer like Safran or MDDA, for example, we, as a technological provider of digital innovation are a perfect, let's say, coordinator of this activity because we will coordinate contribution coming from big players and also from academic world in order to deliver an otic solution for the European defense. So it's strategic for us because it put us on a different plane with respect to the past because here, we are protagonist of this kind of initiative and for us, it's strategic. In terms of business, impact the overall funding is almost EUR 30 million in 3 years, for which our share is 20%, but this achievement is not the only 1 with the fund or other funds related to defers innovation investments, is just a part of a total that is much more bigger. So we are speaking about a total of EUR 10 million in fundings and new projects we acquired. And also for this we will have during the next period, better communication also through not only financial channels of the initiatives in terms of content of what -- which contribution we will provide for the innovation of the digital infrastructure of the European level.

Thank you, Daniele. I will go through the next question from Nicolo Marketier of Kepler. So the question is you flagged additional extraordinary transaction expected by end of Q2. Could you give me -- could you give us a sense of the typical size and verticals being target. It's longer. Do you want to answer first this one? Or do you want me to read the entire question.

No. If you publish it...

If I publish, in sometime they disappear. So if I publish then the risk is that I don't see it anymore. So we can't publish.

So this first question, so we have a line and additional acquisition. We will not address too much, let's say, the details because we are working on it. But strategically, we are acquiring a company that will be in line with the offering that we have, according to our strategy to strengthen the competencies and proprietary asset and strengthen the position in the cluster that we already have. In particular, this company has different business unit that is covering at least 2 or 3 of our business lines. So we'll be a sort of addition in order to to strengthen more than one. And the focus is more to the industrial side, banking and finance as a cluster. And the size will be bigger than the two acquisitions that we did in the first quarter. So I gave riddle more or less. But let's say, is still ongoing. We have good probability to close it. But as you know, until you sign is not done. So since we don't disclose too much about the new operation, opportunity that will be disclosed as soon as completed.

Thank you so much, Daniele. And the second question, continue with another question and another topic with Brent and jet fuel prices having meaningful higher year-to-date route optimization solution become more economically compelling for airlines on a premium basis. Are you seeing this translate into a tangible step up in commercial activities for the FPO Smart Ras offering, both in terms of inbound interest from new airlines and new pricing power on. Could you share how the sales pipeline has evolved over the past few months and whether you expect this fuel-driven tailwind to accelerate the contract signing in the remaining 2026.

So for sure, all the pressure related to a fuel price, it's a driver for growth for this business line and strategically, we decided also to accelerate the acquisition of SmartTrials in order to be a stronger player in this field. In terms of, let's say, immediate growth, of course, already FPO, our optimization solution to the market, it's something that takes time in order to go because it's not something that reduce fuel by just pressing a button, but it's a software that is running in the cockpit of an aircraft connected with the control tower. So with a stronger implication related to security of the data that data privacy and, let's say, usage of professional operator like pilots that are regulated. So they will start to use the tool as soon they have the proper training and the certification in order to use it the impact, of course, accelerate the trials from customer or the selection of this kind of tool with respect of other many initiatives that are in fuel optimization, but the impact in terms of revenue stream is on a longer term. So what we are experiencing now is an increase and is an upsell to the current customer base. Just as an example, American Airlines that is already adopting the solution ask for an extension of licenses in order to adopt the solution of other fleets and other models of aircraft that are already in the fleet. There is an upsell potential in the immediate, let's say, return on our profit and loss. And there is more long-term return that we expect to have starting from the next year because the number of trials with customer is increased in the last period because the interest is much more. And of course, the fact that it's not a solution immediate to say fuel, but is more a sustainable long-term solution for the airlines as this effect on the revenue stream the adoption of the technology itself. For us, for sure, flight optimization, is the smart solution offering that we have in portfolio, fast-growing and with more profitability. And of course, we are also in the middle of a period in which the market request demand is increasing. And so we are investing in it. So we are deploying additional also functionalities to our platform because it's a fuel optimization, but strategically as a broader adoption by the airlines itself because it became a communication device to exchange the real-time information across the fleet of a company -- an airline company. So for us, strategically, it's a part that is growing faster, and we want to continue to invest in order to capture opportunity that will be -- will come in the next period.

Thank you, Daneilel. We have 1 last question for now from Andrea Bonfa from Banca Akros. Was asking, can you provide more details on the grow building block for the next 9 months? You already anticipated an organic growth rate around 10% or that of your business plan, but more details would help.

Andre, Bonfa wants too much secret that we will keep in our house. Now in general, you see the first quarter is already above the guidance we gave as a group. One -- first of all, because we are data that are sustainable. So we deliver on promises. So we promise what we can reach. And of course, we are pushing in order to exceed the expectation and the declared one. Of course, starting with the Q1, so strong they expect the guidance for the next 9 months will improve, we reflect to the 10% guidance we gave at the beginning of the year. We are planning to do an update of our industrial plan after 1 here and alfa. So we are planning to do that immediately before summer or just after the summer break that will give more details about the contribution of growth of the different business lines. For sure, with respect to the first quarter for which we have a strong contribution coming from also the growth of Tecon gaming for the new contract with the gaming, players that we have acquired during the first quarter, we don't expect that this segment will continue to grow stronger for the next of the year, but the contract is at least 9 months to 1 year, so the contribution will last for all the year. We expect a stronger growth for the Aerospace and Defense. As I said before, First quarter is a season in which there is a seasonality of the business itself because a lot of Smart Solutions business and also the projects in terms of service delivery, in general, increase in the Q4 of the year, in the last quarter of the year. we had a ramp up very strong. The performances of Q4 for this industry were stronger. And so we started from a platform already -- and so the first quarter is more a starting of the new activity coming. During the year, we expect more growth very strong, as I declared also in the past meetings. Last year, Aerospace & Defense growth of 20% overall, we expect similar growth for this year for the Aerospace & Defense. So the first quarter is 10% means that next quarter will be stronger than 20% in order to have the average 20% of all the year. Plus we have opportunity and risks. Of course, some areas are more under pressure like the telco business. Some are ever opportunities that are not yet reflected in numbers, specifically the initiative related to the digital payments domain for which we have a good commercial pipeline, but this must be closed in order to have results in our profit and loss. We have the international scale up of the MarTech business that is less than expected when we design our industrial plan, specifically because first start up at the international level was in Dubai and Dubai in this period is frozen because all the activities in Middle East. So we think that the stronger domains that will grow and will continue to grow, will compensate the possible risk that we have in other area and the average of 10% growth of first quarter of the industrial plan is already exceeded in the first quarter. We expect to continue to grow at a better rate with respect to what we declared in the industrial plan. Of course, as I said, as soon as we will present the revision of the industrial plan, more details will be provided.

Thank you so much, Daniele. I think we didn't get any further question. So we can maybe close the call. And for any other questions or information that the market might require, of course, we remain available for all ops.

So I would like to thank you, everybody. So as let's say you noticed probably yesterday after the publication of the results, also the market was well impressed about sustainability of our business. We renewed those to the Board. So we have let's say, a strong commitment from the management team in order to continue to implement, to execute our strategy in terms of further acquisition and, let's say, enabling synergies among companies in order to capture opportunities and became more and more player were recognized on the market and deliver value for the large customer that needs company like us to support the innovation by putting new technologies in the core processes in their core business. So we will continue on this in order to meet and exceed the results that we communicated to all of you. Thank you very much and have an update after the results of the 6 months in which we will give more detail about the business, what you asked. Thank you very much. Thank you, Andrea, for continuing.

Thank you, Daniele. Thank you, everyone.

Bye-bye.

Bye.