4/23/2026

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

The Fugro Q1 trading update will begin shortly.

speaker
Katrien van Buttinga
Investor Relations

Good morning, all. Thank you for dialing in to this webcast, audio webcast. Katrien van Buttinga is my name, Investor Relations. I'm here with Mark Heijnen, CEO, and Barbara Gele, CFO. We have a short presentation to... give to you about the Q1 trading update, which will last, I don't know, I think around 10, 15 minutes in total max, and then we'll open the floor for your questions. Mark, please go ahead.

speaker
Mark Heijnen
CEO

Thank you, Katrien. Good morning, everyone. Q1 2026 trading update. As anticipated, Q1 was seasonally low and the market conditions remain challenging. with a lower offshore wind activity impacting our top line. Revenue declined by 2.1% on a currency comparable basis. We saw growth in other markets, especially oil and gas and infrastructure, largely offset by offshore wind softness. The EBITDA margin slightly improved to 10.4%. EBIT margin was in line with last year, driven by lower revenue, largely offset by cost reductions. The 120 million cost reduction program is completed, but we're also prepared to take further action if required. Free cash flow improved due to significantly lower capital expenditure. However, working capital increased because of large ongoing contracts, high activity of billing, especially at the end of the quarter, and very high payables last year in the first quarter. remain focused on what we can control, maintaining cost discipline, actively managing vessel capacity, improving cash flow conversion through reduced capital expenditure, and lowering working capital from elevated levels seen in the recent quarters. At the same time, strengthening sales momentum remains a clear priority with a strong focus on accelerating the conversion of opportunities into awards. Our backlog for the coming 12 months stands at 1.4 billion, slightly lower than last year, 3.5% lower, with a strong tendering activity across markets. Next slide, please. The direct impact of the conflict in the Middle East has so far been largely confined to our operations in the UAE and Qatar. And this relates to, amongst others, to our two key vessels there, Fugro Proteus and the Pacific Grouse. The latter one is a charter, a long-term charter, that will probably release later in the year. And, yeah, they have been facing limitations on operations in the UAE and Qatar. And please note that these vessels currently do not require the passage through the Strait of Hormuz. The other vessels in the region, the Kobi Ruik and the Fugro Mapper, have been and are operating outside of the affected area and are less exposed. Still, we have experienced some knock-on effects in other countries and regions. Going forward, we continue to monitor the situation, ready to respond when necessary, with safety of our people as our foremost priority. Next slide, please. If we talk about the markets, a brief update compared to what we said earlier in the full year presentation. Official wind markets in Europe are indeed showing first signs of recovery, with increased tender activity in several key markets in Q1 2026. And that's notable in the UK, Germany, Netherlands, France and Ireland. The war in the Middle East, which might well have meaningful and long-lasting implications for the global energy sector, with increasing localized oil and gas investments and the diversification of the energy sources we dive a little bit deeper in oil and gas what's also here on the board and we spoke about that before as well energy companies in oil and gas are selectively expanding their oil and gas portfolios through targeted exploration programs with obviously a strong emphasis on tight timelines and cost efficiency And there's heightened attention on energy security and energy independence. And that's also expected to support continued client investments, particularly where the higher oil prices improve project economics. If we talk about the offshore wind market, we already said that we see the signs of recovery of the market. It will take some time. So it is important to note that this is obviously happening. We see it happening. We see activity increasing over time but it will take a little bit of time before that materializes where they increase installations only from 2030 31 onwards in asia pacific short-term challenges remain as we said before but the sector is cautiously optimistic about the auction frameworks and that are revised there and the bottlenecks are addressed obviously we don't see any new fields coming to the market in the U.S., albeit we saw the first emerging wind activities in Latin America, Brazil, and Canada. And with that, I would like to hand over to Barbara.

speaker
Barbara Gele
CFO

Thank you, Mark, and good morning, everyone. Thanks for joining us. I want to first talk about revenue and margin development. In the marine, revenue is declined by 2.4%, with the vessel utilization of 60%. Overall, we increased market share during the period, despite ongoing price inflation. In the Americas, and to a lesser extent, Europe, Africa, lower volumes of offshore wind work were only partly mitigated by higher activity levels in traditional energy markets. Middle East and India reported growth driven by surveys for multiple field developments in the UAE and Saudi Arabia. The marine events, was adversely impacted by delays arising from vessel-related challenges on an inspection and monitoring project in Denmark. The land revenue declined marginally, as you can see. The EBIT improvement was mostly related to the strong growth in nearshore projects in Europe-Africa, which was partially offset by permitting delays stemming from the prolonged US government shutdown. Next slide, please. First, let's look at the free cash flow graph on the left. First of all, operating cash flow before changes in working capital was $13 million for the first quarter of the year. The working capital increased by $55 million, and this was driven by higher billing due to higher activity towards the end of the quarter in combination with high payables for the comparable period last year. A couple of additional comments on the working capital. While we previously noted large receivables at year-end 2025 have been collected, we are reporting an increase in Q1, as you can see on the right-hand side graph, compared to year-end 2025. And this is outside our targeted 10% to 15% bandwidth, which we are always communicating about. And obviously, we're not pleased with that, and we remain focused on bringing working capital back within the bandwidth. And also, please note that March 2025 was exceptionally low. If we look at the cash flow capex, one more comment, you can clearly see comparison of the spent 101 million in Q1 last year versus 31 million of this year. The net leverage amounted to 1.8 times at the end of March. And in connection with our full year guidance, we expect this ratio to return to below the one and a half targets towards year end. Next slide, please. And if we look at the backlog, the 12 months backlog stands at 1.385 million, which is a modest three and a half percent decline. And just like previous quarters, this reflects the step down in offshore wind related activity since Q4, 2024. And I do want to point out that this is a lower decline than we have seen during the past couple of quarters. And this decline was largely mitigated by successful replenishment of the backlog with oil and gas and infrastructure projects. And this underscores our ability to recalibrate our business through our diversified and market agnostic business model, serving clients across different end markets and geographies. And we see a solid thundering activity across most markets now, although conversion into awards remains slower than usual. And now I would like to hand back for the outlook to Mark.

speaker
Mark Heijnen
CEO

Thank you, Barbara. For the outlook 2026, we can say once again that we anticipate margin improvements as our cost saving and efficiencies are now fully implemented. The capital expenditure will be reduced to 150 to 165 million for the year, well below the 2025 levels. The first quarter you saw was 30 million compared to 100 plus million last year. We're closely monitoring the situation in the Middle East. So far, the impacts have been mainly confined to the UAE and Qatar, but the broader implications are uncertain in the longer term. The safety and well-being of our people remain our top priority. That's always good to emphasize there. The medium to long-term outlook across our core markets remains sound. In addition, emerging markets, including nuclear, critical minerals, and security solutions for safeguarding vital undersea infrastructure, also present promising mid-term opportunities. With that, I would like to go over to questions. Over to you.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, we are now ready to take your questions. If you wish to ask a question, please press pound key five on your telephone keypad. Our first question comes from Thijs Berkelder from ABN AMRO, ODO, BHF. Thijs, go ahead.

speaker
Thijs Berkelder
Analyst, ABN AMRO

Yeah, morning all. I first want to thank Barbara Gele for her period at CFO, and I wish her good luck in the rest of her career. Can you give us any update on the succession uh track of of the cfo uh where are we uh second question is uh on uh small nuclear reactors you were active there for ai and data centers in in the us last year already Rolls-Royce announced three of these SMRs in the UK. And there are many more to come in the rest of Europe. And finally, in marine, offshore wind is weak, but the grid market is very strong. Are you switching in marine from in focus from offshore wind to grids? And is grids reported in renewables or in the infrastructure? Thank you.

speaker
Mark Heijnen
CEO

Thank you, Thijs. Good morning. So three questions. First, the succession of Barbara. I guess I need to answer that because that would be strange if Barbara does that. But obviously, thanks to Barbara as well for her period. Let me emphasize that at Fugro, where she really brought the company to the next level on the financial side. So thanks. Thanks a lot, Barbara. We're in a good, decent process for succession of Barbara for the new CFO. That runs well. And as soon as we have more to announce, then we'll let you know. And the second question was about nuclear SMRs. We are involved in those. We have communicated about that with a project in the US last year. We have also secured the next project there. and we're bidding for a few projects in the US. So this is something that you will probably hear more of from Fugro moving forward. We also spoke about the partnership that we signed for the UK with Fermi. So we're also really on top of that moving forward on this market in Europe. Europe obviously still needs to make some changes around accepting nuclear developments in the wider European region. So this is to be done. And then I expect this also to take off in the rest of Europe. We'll be on top of that. In the US, for instance, we are one of the three parties that can actually do the ground investigation work and being accredited for that. And then the last question is around the grids and offshore wind. Indeed, the grid market is active. That's obviously onshore. Then we will put that in infrastructure. And we are involved in several of these grid developments, for instance, in Germany with the Sud line, interesting development there, obviously, but there are several other activities that we're getting involved in. But if it's offshore, then it will be part of renewables. So that is what I can say at their test.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Okay, thanks. The next question comes from Philip Nogoto from Kepler Chevreu. Philip, go ahead.

speaker
Philip Nogoto
Analyst, Kepler Chevreu

Good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. I have three, if I may. First of all, the comments on the cost reduction program that you could take additional measures if required. I was wondering what measures that could possibly be, because you have done already quite a bit, of course, in terms of FTEs. So where could you still see cost savings opportunity if it's needed? Second question is also on the comment that you make that you're taking market share despite ongoing price and pressure. I was wondering if you could provide a bit more commentary around that. Is the price and pressure also intensifying versus The last quarter and in the past you spoke of course about geophysical versus geotechnical, where geophysical is much more competitive. Is that trend the same or is geotechnical also seeing price and pressure? And I'm also wondering, are there situations where you're choosing not to bid just because prices are not right in your view? And last question is on working capital. I was just wondering if you could indicate which regions saw the largest deterioration in Q1.

speaker
Mark Heijnen
CEO

Barbara, you might want to start with the last one, the working capital.

speaker
Barbara Gele
CFO

Yeah, first of all, thanks, Thijs. Going back, but yeah, so on working capital, what are the regions? Well, there is some distinction to be made in the regions. As we mentioned before, in APEC there are some large contracts which we are executing at the moment and we expect working capital to decrease there as a result of these large contracts. Middle East has been hampered, you will not be surprised also by the Ramadan and the conflict. And there, that is also a different, I would say... How should I say that? It's a different structurally situation in the Middle East of working capital, as we are all aware. Europe, Africa is very sound. And that is also where the revenue is towards quarter end. And the invoices sent out are mostly located, I can say. That's why we also say that the receivables portfolio remains the sound. And the Americas is pretty stable, I would say, from a working capital perspective. That's what I can share. So there are some differences within regions. Overall, the sum of the parts is too high at the moment, but we're confident we can bring that back within the bandwidth. And some regions are already showing that in April due to the good collections that

speaker
Mark Heijnen
CEO

Okay, thank you, Barbara. Then the other two questions. So cost reduction program, I think you're right, Philip, that we have done a lot. So in that sense, small further cost reductions are not going to make a major difference. Then we need to look at our assets where we are actually also preparing this year for a few changes. If you take assets out, then obviously everything related to those assets at cost will come down as well. I spoke earlier about a vessel in the Middle East, a geotechnical vessel, the Pacific Grouse. That will be taken out once we have brought the resilience over from the U.S. to the Middle East. Obviously, we monitor the situation there very carefully if we want to proceed with that. But this is the plan, and the Pacific Grouse will absolutely go out this year. Latest, I think, September time, but maybe a little bit earlier. We're also looking at the Explorer beyond lifetime. That vessel is still operating in the Americas. Also, geotechnical platform will take out in the second half of the year. The date or when we do that is primarily depending on when we don't have work anymore for that vessel. She's at the moment working, so that's good. We're also looking at taking a geophysical vessel out, the Meridian, this year. This is another thing that we're going to do and not replacing those vessels with something else. We have a few more vessels that had low utilization also last year and need a change. For instance, the Equator in the Asia Pacific, we're in the process of flagging her Indonesian so that we can deploy her in that country. And we're also obviously deploying the Resolve with our Blue Dragon, the new seabed robot, the geotechnical robot that should also drive utilization up for a vessel like the Resolve. So just a few indications what we're working on related to cost savings and also changes in assets there. If we talk about market share, yes, we made that comment because we see that competition actually has more idle capacity vessels alongside. Fugro is still working against the lower pricing. So we have seen that in previous crisis as well, that we managed to keep going, but pricing is under pressure and we see and expect that that will probably increase that pressure a little bit more during the course of the year up till the time that we see activities in wind and oil and gas really stabilizing and increasing again. We also see that in geotech now coming in because there is also competition that has less work there. So obviously that puts pricing under pressure. So that's what we can say about market share and competition and pricing pressure.

speaker
Philip Nogoto
Analyst, Kepler Chevreu

Okay, thank you very insightful.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Thank you. The next question comes from Luke van Beek from the Grove Petercam. Luke, go ahead.

speaker
Luke van Beek
Analyst, Petercam

Yes, good morning. First of all, a question about the oil and gas, which seems to be showing a recovery. And those customers are typically quite cash flow driven and with the higher oil and gas prices, they have higher cash flows. Do you see any signs that are accelerating things that are in the pipeline that would benefit you? And furthermore, on the wind markets, you mentioned that most of the work will be executed in 2030 or installed in 2030, 2031, but obviously your activities are mainly ahead of that. So can you indicate in what period we should expect the impact for your revenues from these installations?

speaker
Mark Heijnen
CEO

Yeah, Luc, I think everybody's asking three questions, but I will take your two. So oil and gas. We obviously see this market picking up. I said before as well in the previous announcements a full year that we were actually expecting oil and gas to already increase last year. We did not see that because we saw the second half of the year more cash discipline from the oil and gas companies and therefore keeping the cash in the wallet, so to say, postponing things. We do see projects back on the board. we are not 100% sure how fast these things are going because, yes, oil prices and gas prices are high, higher. They also face a lot of challenges, obviously, these companies, so they need to get the act together. And, yeah, with a higher oil price for a couple of months, it doesn't mean necessarily that then immediately all these things will move ahead because, yeah, any investment decision, final investment decision is obviously taking place. uh with a view of longer term oil and gas price developments but it is absolutely helping and we do see those those markets being more buoyant also it's more acceptable to talk about new oil and gas projects because the world starts to realize that this is still on the board for for many years to to follow so in that sense we see a general uh yeah more buoyancy in that market um If you talk about wind and the installations 2013-31, obviously we know about the conference in Hamburg earlier this year. There they communicated the nine countries together, 15 gigawatts installation per year from 31 onwards. That means that they need to start doing ground investigation work probably two to three years before that. So you could expect in 27 onwards more activity for Figueroa. The big question mark there, Luc, is at the moment which parties are starting earlier because everybody knows that the activity will increase and this is going to happen for many years to follow because they said up to 2040 year 15 gigawatts installation. I still need to see if that's achievable. But having said that, even if it's less than that, that's three to five times more than what is being done over the last couple of years. So enormous uptake. And that means that, yeah, in the years to come, maybe already some things this year, as we see with AR7, AR8 is pulled forward because the industry is pushing the UK to launch a new license round to bring more fields to the market. So that is positive. We see obviously France making strong commitments around additional investments in the wind market. Also, the Netherlands committed to two additional licenses. So there is quite some buoyancy there. But everything takes a little bit of time. It's not like, okay, this is brought to the market and then immediately these projects kick off. Having said that, we are executing, you also saw in our press release, a new announcement on a project in Taiwan, which is positive for the development in Asia Pacific and gives some more confidence that this market is also continuing for Copenhagen Investment Partners is starting there. And you also see, that we are about to execute a large project from AR7, which is also announced there in the press release, which will start during this season this year. So you can see if there are new licenses, then absolutely before even the licenses come to the market, we will work for the governments, RVO, BSH or EnergyNet, you name them, or we'll start working for the energy operators to collect more ground investigation work.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

That's clear, thank you. Our next question comes from Jeremy Kincaid from Landschop Kempen. Jeremy, go ahead.

speaker
Jeremy Kincaid
Analyst, Landschap Kempen

Good morning. I have a few questions about the vessel changes. Obviously, the Explorer and Meridian, you say they will be taken out. What does taken out mean? Does it mean they'll be sold for parts or sold as whole boats or just destroyed? And also those two vessels, I believe, are owned and not chartered. So can you explain some of the thought process behind retiring those vessels which are owned rather than taking a chartered vessel out of your fleet? And then my next question is also about the Pacific grouse. You're planning to release that charter later in the year. Do you have to deliver it to a certain location back to the original owner? In other words, is the fact that the Strait of Hormuz is closed, could that be an issue for you in the future? And then finally, you mentioned that there was a project in Denmark you were working on which impacted earnings in the marine business in the first quarter. Do you think that will continue to impact earnings in the second quarter? Thank you.

speaker
Mark Heijnen
CEO

Thank you, Jeremy. Maybe first. about the changes there on the Explorer and the Meridian. Those are owned vessels. I recall discussions started probably more than 10 years ago around retiring the Meridian. Then we extended for five years. And you go blocks of five years, more or less, or three years, because you need to go from survey to survey. So a special survey every five years. or an intermediate survey every three years, so to say, or in the midterm between those five years. And basically, then there's a judgment call to make. How many millions do you need to invest to get the vessel again on an accreditation or certification to be operational? So that is something that over time, when the vessels become too old, become too expensive, and then we need to make a judgment call. So we had the Meridian and actually the Explorer already twice on the board to take out. So it has been basically on the board for a longer time. We have extended that. So basically, we squeeze the maximum out of those vessels. And then at some point in time, also to drive utilization up, we want to have a bit more tightness in that market. No doubt there will be times that we need to hire probably a third-party vessel then again if we need to ramp up. But that's possible because we have also the equipment to put on temporary vessels if we need to. Explorer is obviously geotech, meridian is geophysics, so that's important to know. Pacific grouse, Strait of Hormuz, I need to check where we need to deliver that vessel. I think in the region, but I need to confirm that, Jeremy, I don't know, because it has been a few years ago that we hired that. I thought it came out of the region, but something to be confirmed. And then Denmark, you want to answer that, Barbara?

speaker
Barbara Gele
CFO

Yeah, we're nearing completion there on the Denmark project.

speaker
Jeremy Kincaid
Analyst, Landschap Kempen

Sure. Okay, thank you very much. And Barbara, all the best with the future.

speaker
Barbara Gele
CFO

Thank you, Jeremy.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

The next question comes from Kyrein Mulder from ING. Kyrein, go ahead.

speaker
Kyrein Mulder
Analyst, ING

Yeah, good morning, everyone. And... especially thanks to Barbara for all these contributions to Fuso. Let me say a couple of words on the working capital, I have a question. And the reason is related to what, let me say, if you speak about 17% at the end of the quarter, what percentage was caused by the decline of, let me say, by the decline of the payables compared to the first quarter of 2025? To get an idea about... how the splits between, let me say, the activities in the month of March and the payable adjustments, as I see it. And the second question is about the US, or about the Americas, in fact. We see a strong development of order intake. When is it being executed, do you think? Because it looks like that the relation between, let me say, revenues and backlog is quite high at this moment. So is it being executed, let me say, in the coming months, or is it being executed for later, let me say, second half of 2026? That were my two questions.

speaker
Mark Heijnen
CEO

Thank you, Thuy Rijn. Maybe first on the working capital, Barbara.

speaker
Barbara Gele
CFO

Yeah, I can say, Thuy Rijn, and thanks for your kind words. that the payable decrease was a major component, actually. So if you look at the delta between year-end and quarter-end, it's mostly in the receivables that have gone up. And as I mentioned, these are very young receivables, so we don't see a deterioration. But if you compare it to last year, where really the step up is, if you like, is there is no longer the payables dues, and those were unwind, and partially that is related to the lower CAPEX. And as we mentioned, we went from 100 to 230, and there were some personnel expenses in there. So that is really the biggest, by far the biggest component, is the unwind of the payables. And you're right to say that it is high. That's why we're saying we bring it back. We did see an absolute decrease in receivables quarter on quarter. However, not to the same effect as the revenue drop. And that's why also the percentage went up. So there's a couple of factors there.

speaker
Mark Heijnen
CEO

And the factor of high CAPEX last year will also remain because that was last year was high and this year will be significantly lower. So we'll see that effect to a certain extent working through. If you talk about US, America as in general, and the backlog increasing, and then when it's being executed, well, quite clearly you have seen also not necessarily high activity executed then in the first quarter. You're right. And that has to do with some delays in the startup of these projects. We do expect in the coming quarters that these things will continue to to kick off. So we have a lot of things in the backlog, especially also on the land business and nearshore business that will really start in the second and the third quarter. A good example is we are doing some work for some of the islands there for actually security purposes of the US, some survey work, and we could not mobilize the equipment. This is just an anecdote. We could not mobilize the equipment because there was no military plane available to mobilize the equipment, and that was obliged to that area because of the conflict in the Middle East. You can't really come up with these things in advance, but this is just a consequence of what can happen in the world if you have conflicts like that. So that project is now being mobilized, but it was delayed because we would initially start already in the first quarter.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Thanks. Our next question comes from Christoph Samoy from KBC Securities. Christoph, go ahead.

speaker
Christoph Samoy
Analyst, KBC Securities

Yes, good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. First of all, Barbara, all the best for the future to you. I have two questions. First one, coming back on the U.S. backlog. As a follow-up, could you, because the evolution is quite positive, could you disclose some kind of percentage to what extent the backlog composition is firm signed orders and then quotes with high award potential? That's the first question on the U.S. backlog. the regional performance i know on a on a quarterly basis you you do not disclose profits per region but could you could you shed some more light on the evolution of of of the profitability of the different regions in the first quarter what the trends were per region were they above expectations thank you so the last the last question you were dropping out a little bit christopher could you repeat that Okay, so on the regional performance, you do not disclose regional profit margins or regional profits on a quarterly basis, but could you give some more color on the evolution of the profitability during the first quarter of different regions and which one went according to plan and which one was better or disappointing?

speaker
Barbara Gele
CFO

Well, maybe I can comment on this last question before going to the other one. I think it's what I can say about Q1. Q1 is always the lowest season. As a project business, there's quite a lot of pluses and minuses in the regions. I think if you look at also the backlog and the composition, that is a good representation. And I think it goes too far now to qualify that further because it's only one quarter in the year.

speaker
Mark Heijnen
CEO

Okay. And then your question around backlog. That depends a little bit. If you look at the 1.4 billion roughly for the next 12 months, then there's roughly around 65% is firm and others are highly likely prospects. If we talk about obviously different periods, the remainder of the year or the next three months, there are different percentages involved. specifically around the US. I don't have that split from how much is firm or highly prospects.

speaker
Barbara Gele
CFO

No, what we can say there is that obviously indeed you see a strong increase in the backlog in the Americas. That's also related to traveling from a lower base after the offshore wind drop last year. But having said that, on the AI, the data centers and the SMRs, that looks very positively and encouraging, I would say. So this is mainly on the land and the marine asset integrity side of the business.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Okay. Thank you. Our next question comes from Thijs Berkelder from ABN AMRO-Oldo, BHF. Thijs, go ahead.

speaker
Thijs Berkelder
Analyst, ABN AMRO

Yeah, thanks. A couple of smaller questions. Can you quantify the impact of the late arrival of the vessel in Denmark on the Q1 results, roughly? Second question, you sold offers in Hong Kong. cashed in $13 million. Did you also account for a book profit in Q1 and is that included in your report to the adjusted EBITDA? A third question is on your activities around Cyprus. Are these and cash-related, are these activities hampered or ongoing?

speaker
Mark Heijnen
CEO

Maybe I will take the last question there, Thijs. So Cyprus, we have seen some impact. We could, for instance, not do a crew change in the place that we wanted to do. So we had to deviate to a different port. So there was some impact, minimal, but some impact there. Before I hand over to Barbara for the proof there, Maybe first on the Denmark side, that was the Fugro Resolve that we basically mobilized for that with ROVs on board. And that had to do with maybe a bit more color with the Aquarius that we sent over to the US to serve the large Brazilian contract because we have now, oh sorry, the dweller that moved over to the US. The Aquarius is already working there in Brazil albeit the crisis is in a dry dock at the moment. So that's also good to mention, unfortunately, a bit longer than expected. That has some impact on the first quarter as well. But the resolve in Denmark basically was mobilized last minute. They had some issues and then we had some permit issues from Total that took a bit longer. So it had a couple of million impact there in the region. So that's what I can say on the result. Then maybe to Barbara.

speaker
Barbara Gele
CFO

Yeah, so the sale of the building in Hong Kong was indeed included in the EBITDA and the EBIT as other income.

speaker
Thijs Berkelder
Analyst, ABN AMRO

It was kind of book profit should we think of?

speaker
Barbara Gele
CFO

Well, it's in the cash flow, right? It's less. It's around 10 million.

speaker
Thijs Berkelder
Analyst, ABN AMRO

10 million book profit or 10 million proceeds or both?

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Both.

speaker
Thijs Berkelder
Analyst, ABN AMRO

Okay.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Thanks. Our next question comes from Kyrein Mulders from ING. Kyrein, go ahead.

speaker
Kyrein Mulder
Analyst, ING

I have one question. So for me, it's a little bit unclear why, let me say, your revenues were a little bit down, okay, but not dramatic. It's 2% organically. And you had realized massive cost savings. So I understand that it's partly to blame because of low pricing in certain projects. And to what extent is also related to extra costs? Can you give me some idea, some flavor on how you can explain that? So cost savings, as you told, 10 million, let me say 120 million a full year, combined with revenues 2% organically down, that should lead to higher earnings. Is there maybe a good explanation for that?

speaker
Barbara Gele
CFO

Well, there's a couple of factors. And if I can answer that question. So first of all, historically, Q1 EBIT is low and the margin is low. And the EBIT margin now is protected as a result of the cost savings on the personnel cost and other operating expenses. And I think we should not forget that we had a revenue trouble, 427 million last year. So we adjusted the cost base to the new reality. The cost base did decrease quarter on quarter, as demonstrated by this, by, as you say, a flat EBIT with a 32 million revenue drop. So within that, the cost savings are included. And that is what we can say. And then there is indeed additional operational issues, as we just explained. And there is also the Hong Kong building that was there. Plus, we had limited impact of the conflict in the Middle East. However, based on the millions of EBIT, that is still in Q1 a couple of million. So there's a couple of pluses and minuses that are playing a role in the EBIT. But the cost savings have definitely increased. are definitely there. Otherwise, the EBIT would have been much lower.

speaker
Operator
Conference Operator

Thank you. Thank you. And with that, I will now turn the call back over to Katrien for any final remarks. Katrien, go ahead.

speaker
Katrien van Buttinga
Investor Relations

Yes, thank you so much for participating in this call. If you have any other questions or remarks, you know where to find me. Thank you. Have a good day.

Disclaimer

This conference call transcript was computer generated and almost certianly contains errors. This transcript is provided for information purposes only.EarningsCall, LLC makes no representation about the accuracy of the aforementioned transcript, and you are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the information provided by the transcript.

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