Bang & Olufsen a/s

Hi, everyone, and welcome to this Bang & Olufsen's interim report for Q2 2023-24. Today's call is being recorded. For the first half of this call, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. Afterwards, there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question, please press 5-star on your telephone keypad. I would like to introduce your first speaker, CEO Christian Ter. Please begin.

Hello, everyone, and thank you for joining the call. As always, I have Nicolai Wendelbo, our CFO, with me. I will begin with the financial highlights for our second quarter, followed by an update on how we are progressing with our transition towards luxury timeless technology and our key priorities. Nicolai will take us through the financials in more details, and I will conclude the presentation part before opening up for questions. If we move to slide number five. In the quarter, we delivered a positive EBIT and free cash flow, despite a revenue decline of 16%. We are not satisfied with the revenue development. However, this is also partly a consequence of the deliberate strategic choices as we continue to execute in line with our luxury timeless technology strategy. Let me exemplify. We exited multi-brand stores not aligned with our strategy. We invested in our branded channels, especially with the opening of flagship stores in London and New York. We improved product quality and introduced two new product innovations. We increased brand awareness through our partnership with Ferrari, and we added more customers and increased the number of customers owning more than two products. We are pleased to report another quarter of positive earnings with an EBIT margin of 3% and we delivered a record high gross margin of 53.1%. This is the third quarter in a row we are delivering a gross margin above 50%. This shows that we are building a more robust company. The continuous improvement of our gross margin has also enabled an important gradual strategic shift away from non-luxury multi-brand doors towards branded channels. In our branded channels, we can showcase the breadth of our portfolio and brand and give our customers the full B&O experience as well as support better price stability and build brand equity. Over the past 12 months, we have closed more than 2,000 multi-brand doors as part of this strategic reorientation, which supports our ambition to deliver more sustainable growth. As mentioned, we are not satisfied with revenue development in Q2, which amounted to 700 million, a decline of 16% in local currencies compared to Q2 of last year. If we look at the first six months of our financial year, revenue declined by 8% in local currencies. We had expected negative growth for the quarter since we had a very successful launch of theater last year, and we have exited from multi-brand and e-tail doors. Overall, our branded channels continued to perform well. We did, however, continue to see more cautious replenishment of inventory from our monobrand partners. Sales were also impacted by the slower than expected economic recovery in China. This is also why we report a higher negative growth than expected. For brand partnering and other activities, revenue declined by 27% in local currencies. This was driven by several factors, but especially licensed income from our automated partner was impacted by factory strikes in the US. So despite the revenue development, we are pleased to deliver a record high gross margin and profitable quarter. This also supported the improvement of our free cash flow, which increased by 23 million compared to Q2 last year. Please turn to the next slide. We continue to see stable consumer demand in most markets, with like-for-like sellout growing 2%. Like-for-like sellout for a company-owned source grew by 10%. Looking at product categories, we had a positive traction on most product categories. Our flexible living category grew by 6%. On-the-go category grew by 3%, while the stage category declined by 2%. In general, we don't see like-for-like sellout being negatively impacted by the price increases. In EMEA, like-for-like sellout declined by 1% year-on-year. The company-owned stores delivered solid sellout growth driven by growth across markets, particularly in London and Paris. Monobrand stores had a small sellout decline. Sellout in America has declined by 6%. Negative growth was seen across all channels, expect in e-commerce, which showed solid sellout growth. Our company-owned stores reported negative growth due to the relocation of our Madison store, which was closed for a month. Our Soho store reported double-digit sellout growth during the quarter. In APAC, like-for-like sellout grew 8%, mainly driven by China, with a sellout growth of 17%. Sellout growth in China was across product categories and channels, though generated from a low comparable due to the restrictions and regional lockdowns last year. In addition, improved inventory levels had a positive effect on sellout. Please move to the next slide. We made progress with our strategic initiatives in the quarter. I will highlight some of our achievements across our five shifts. This quarter, we had a particular focus on improving the channel network and retail excellence. We have added retail capabilities to my global leadership team by hiring a new head of global retail in November. She has vast experience from retail and from the luxury industry, and she will help us to take our retail experience to the next level. We know when we do retail right, with the right training of staff, with the right activations, the right merchandising, the right support from marketing, sell out increases considerably. Two important milestones were the opening of two company-owned stores. We opened a store in New York in November and our new flagship store in London in December. We continued executing structural changes in our channel network to promote and improve our branded channels. We also reduced our presence in selected multi-brand and retail stores that does not fit with our luxury positioning. This included exiting some stores, but also being more selective with the product assortment available in the remaining multi-brand and e-tail stores. In Q2, we onboarded 5% new customers and grew the number of customers owning two or more products by 2%. The numbers show that we continue to attract customers and expand our business and loyalty with existing customers. Our branding efforts during the quarter centered on activating our partnership with Ferrari. We had multiple activations promoting our Ferrari product collections launched in Q1, and the Scuderia Ferrari Formula One sponsorship continued to help us build brand reach and awareness. We announced two new product innovations in Q2, both covering the most important use cases of our customer sound and TV ecosystems. Our new Biolab 8 can be used as a system speaker to create an immersive home cinema setup with the compact size of a rear speaker and the beautiful design of a front speaker. It can also be used as a powerful standalone speaker, installed onto walls, set up on floors, secured onto ceilings, or placed on top of any flat surface. It is designed with product longevity in mind, which is a key customer requirement and a core value for B&O products. The speaker is designed using cradle-to-cradle principles and is pending complete certification. The second innovation announced in Q2 was Biosound Bollard. This is our first outdoor speaker and it's developed in collaboration with Origin Acoustics. With Biosound Bollard we can now offer our customers a seamless Bang & Olufsen experience outdoors without compromising on quality. The speaker has been available in retail since January 2024 in selected Bang & Olufsen stores and through our customer installation partner Origin Acoustics. In Q2, we also introduced a beta version of a new, more intuitive and customer-friendly app interface. The improved Multiroom app features makes functionality more interactive and easily accessible. The update has been available since January. Our win-city execution continued across our cities, London, Paris, and New York. In London, Q2 sellout growth was 13%. Our two stores in Harrods and Selfridges delivered strong growth and had the best quarter ever. As mentioned earlier, we opened our flagship store on New Bond Street in December, and I will go more into details on that on the next slide. In Paris, sell-out growth was 2%. Our company-owned stores reported high double-digit sell-out growth, while our monobrand network was significantly challenged. Overall performance in Paris was not satisfactory, and we are planning and making changes to our organizational setup to enable a better execution. In New York, sellout declined by 10%. The quarter was impacted by one of our two company-owned stores being closed for a third of the quarter as it was relocated. Sellout in our Soho store grew double-digit, driven by several strong in-store activations. In November, we relocated our store at Madison Avenue. With this new presence in the city's premier shopping district, we can deliver the full brand experience and showcase the breadth of our portfolio, including our bespoke offering. In the second half of the fiscal year, we aim to commence a new Wind City, this time in Hong Kong. The city's significant wealth, high density of very high net worth individuals, and history of being Asia's most prominent luxury destination, we see ample opportunity to grow our presence. Our current three company-owned stores in Hong Kong will serve as the foundation for reaching our Hong Kong-based target audience. In our brand partnering business, we extended our Cisco partnership with a new true wireless earphone built with enterprise grade features and customized for professionals. As part of our strategy to strengthen our luxury timeless technology proposition, we engage in strategic partnership and brand collaborations to support the growth, brand awareness and customer acquisition. With the expiration of the HP partnership in June 2024, we are pursuing new partnership opportunities which reinforce one or more of our luxury timeless technology pillars and further expand the proposition of our current brand partnering and licensing model. This will be realized through proprietary software-enabled audio experiences and by leveraging our design and craftsmanship offerings. We have an exciting pipeline and will disclose new partnerships when possible. If we move to the next slide. Before I hand over the word to Nicolai, I just want to put a few words on the new store concept that we revealed with the opening of our new store on New Bond Street in London. We believe that providing superior and multisensory retail experiences are key to our strategic transition. Over the past year, we have developed and refined a new concept to enable to provide that experience to our branded channels across the world. The new concept applies principles of modern luxury and is designed to provide the ultimate listening and visual experience and showcase the full potential and brand, including a designated bespoke and event area for private and personalized customer events. This London store is a pilot of the new concept, and it is in the months to come we will extract learnings from staff and customers. It's too early to say how it will unfold in all branded retail, but it sets the bar for how we intend to deliver experiences for our customers in key locations across the world. All in all, we have made solid progress with our key priorities in the first half of 23-24, which has contributed to a more clear positioning of our brand and more robust company. And with that, I would like to turn over to Nikolaj. Thank you, Christian.

Now please turn to page 10. Reported revenue in Q2 was 700 million and a decline of 16% in local currencies compared to Q2 of last year. reported regional product sales decreased by 17% or 15% in local currencies. This was due to several factors, which I will go more into detail with on the next slide. In terms of channels, the decline was across most channels and especially related to the multi-brand and e-tail channels. As mentioned, we are undergoing a strategic transformation in our channel network to focus more on branded channels. This means that we across regions are becoming more selective in terms of how and where customers can experience our brand and products, aiming to ensure they get the right experience. This also meant discontinuing more multi-brand stores, resulting in less overall volume into multi-branded channels in Q2. Our brand partnering and other activities declined by 28.8% against last year, corresponding to a 26% decline in local currencies. This was mainly related to reduced license income as the automotive industry was impacted by factory strikes in the US. License income from HP also declined. Income from product collaboration was lower due to the ramp-up of the Cisco partnership last year. During the quarter, we expanded the partnership with Cisco and introduced the Bang & Olufsen Cisco 950 earphones. That did not affect performance in Q2 and is expected to generate revenue in the second half of the fiscal year. Please turn to the next page. In EMEA, revenue declined 14.5% or 15% in local currencies to 342 million. Company-owned stores and e-commerce delivered growth. Monobrand declined mainly due to the price increases implemented September 1st, putting some demand from Q2 into Q1. For the first half of 2023-2024, revenue from branded channels in EMEA increased 9% year-on-year. We continue to optimize the channel network and the number of monobrand stores will reduce by 14 year-on-year. Revenue for multi-brand and e-tail decreased significantly. As part of the strategic transformation, the number of multi-brand stores in EMEA have been reduced by 125 stores since Q2 of last year. In terms of e-tail platforms, we have limited the assortment available. In Americas, reported revenue was 72 million on a year-to-year decline of 31.3% or minus 27% in local currencies. In general, the launch of bills on theater in Q2 of last year meant high comparables. Company-owned stores were also impacted by a store closure due to the relocation of our Madison store. Our Soho store reported double-digit growth during the quarter. The custom installation channel declined due to high comparables, while the monoband channel declined partly due to an unsatisfactory performance in California. Revenue from the multi-brand channel was reduced as part of the strategic transformation. We entered the partnerships with both T-Mobile and Verizon and have consequently reduced the channel by more than $2,000 since Q2 of last year. Revenue in APAC was 211 million corresponding to a 15% decline or minus 10% in local currencies. Revenue from China decreased by 24.5% or minus 16% in local currencies and accounted for approximately 54% of total APAC revenue. In China, the e-tail network continues to struggle with traffic and the channel declined during the period. Multi-brand reported growth after the channel was reset over the past quarters. Including one partner with high inventory levels, our monobrand channel delivered growth during the period, reflecting the mentioned reduced sensitivity in customer behavior in this customer segment. For the stage category, revenue decreased by 16% to 278 million. The development was mainly driven by the successful launch of BWL Theater in Q2 of last year. The good performance continued on a more normalized level. The decline was partly offset by the launch of BWL 8 at the end of the quarter as well as higher revenue from BWL 50. For the flexible living category, revenue declined by 5% to 135 million. Sales volumes were generally lower, reflecting a high comparable in China due to inventory replenishment in Q2 of last year. For the undergo category, revenue declined by 24% to 212 million. Across speakers and headphones, the development was mainly driven by a few large deals on headphones and earphones in Q2 of last year as part of our efforts to reduce end-of-life inventory. In general, the optimization of the multi-brand channel affected this category negatively for the quarter. The decrease was partly offset by improved average selling prices. Please turn to the next page. Our gross margin increased to 53.1% from 44.4% in Q2 of last year. The normalization of component and logistic costs have significantly lifted the margin level for the third quarter in a row. In Q2 of last year, extraordinary costs adversely impacted the margin by approximately 6% at this point. In addition, price increases supported an improved gross margin, as well as relatively more revenue from branded channels. The strong gross margin also contributed to an EBIT margin before special items of 3% against 1.6% last year. Please turn to the next page. Looking at the underlying development, the gross margin was favorably impacted by a change in product mix towards higher margin products as well as price increases implemented since last year. An improved channel mix combined with a strong price focus also supported higher margin levels. Last year, the gross margin in the on-the-go category was impacted by a few larger deals on headphones and earphones to reduce end-of-life inventories. Gross margin from band partnering and other activities was 87.9% compared to 82.6% last year. The increase in gross margin was mainly due to a lower proportion of product revenue from our brand collaboration with Cisco. Last year we ramped up our partnership with Cisco to sell the Bang & Olufsen Cisco 980 headset for hybrid work. Please turn to the next page. Total capacity costs were 355 million and 4% below Q2 of last year. Development costs were 71 million against 81 million last year driven by lower incurred costs and a higher capitalization ratio compared to last year. Distribution and marketing cost decreased by $9 million to $246 million. The decrease was mainly related to the launch of Biosyn Theolta last year and reduced warranty cost. The marketing cost ratio was 10.6% compared to 9.5% last year. Administrative expenses increased by 5 million to 38 million, driven by a higher cost for patent protection and extraordinary amortizations of IT assets. Special items were 4 million against 1 million last year, which were related to a reorganization in EMEA. Please turn to the next page. Net working capital decreased by 25 million during the quarter to 286 million. Net working capital to the last 12 months revenue was 11% and slightly below last year. Inventory has declined by 18 million during the quarter driven by our focus on inventory management. Since Q2 of last year, we have reduced our inventory by 108 million. Trade receivables increased by 38 million to 365 million. The increase was driven by higher sales in Q2 compared to Q1. Sales with extended credit accounted for 2% of revenue in the quarter compared to 1% in Q1. In Q2 of last year, extended credit was 12% of sales due to product launches. Trade payables increased by 48 million to 451 million, mainly related to the timing of supply. And please turn to the next page. The free cash flow improved by 23 million to 24 million. The developments in last year was driven by the improved EBITDA and the positive change in net working capital. Capital expenditures were 57 million, which was overall in line with last year. Investments were primarily within intangible assets and related to new products and platforms. Finally, capital resources, consisting of available liquidity and available drawing rights on our revolving credit facilities, stood at 323 million, up 13 million from Q1. This was mainly due to the improved free cash flow. Our available liquidity was 163 million at the end of the quarter, consisting of cash and securities offset by repo transactions. And with that, I would like to hand the word back to Christian.