Alten S.A.

Good evening, everybody. I would like to thank you for joining this conference call where we'll be talking about the third quarter of 2023. As you have likely read a few minutes ago, our turnover was 3.37 billion this year. In France, the activity grew by over 9% and outside of France by 8.8%. So the group's activity has grown by over 10% plus 9.8% in France and over 9% outside of France. During the third quarter, growth slowed, which was nothing, which was no surprise, but there are certain elements which we will come back to. Even if the results are satisfying, the growth is in line with our predictions, which were fairly low. So our overall growth is 7.6%. 10.5% in France, 6.3% outside of France. The quarter had certain negative effects and when comparing with 2022. But overall growth has been of 9% this quarter, which remains entirely satisfactory. And so overall we're at 3.8% growth. Let me remind you that it takes into account the data for the company sold. And that is why the growth level is lower than that of the activity. The number of working days has also had an impact on our figures and penalized year to date figures of around 7%. Level activity in the third quarter was at 91%. And when compared to 2022, this is respectable. And so we have seen a drop of 1% in relation to 2022, which is entirely normal, given that our level of activity has come back to normal levels. We have, there's been little change in number of staff. At the end of 2022, we had over 60,000 members of staff. At the end of June, there were over 57,000. And at the end of September, we are at 55,000. 11,000 staff in France and the rest located outside of France. At the end of September, we had 3,000 more engineers 520 in France and 2,700 outside of France. And we recruited more engineers. In the third quarter, we will have only gained three engineers. So more in France, but fewer elsewhere. And there was a drop in staff levels in July and August, which is more than usual. And that is why September couldn't highly compensate. On an international level, the drop in staff is mostly in Germany where there are a hundred fewer staff and in India where there are 80 fewer staff. Whereas in other countries, the staff level is stable or even growing slightly. If we analyze the activity of this semester in terms of geographical regions, you can see that the drop, the slowdown is not general across the board. In France, Europe and the Benelux countries, growth is doing well. In France, Even though there were some difficulties, the turnover grew by over 10% and 10.5% in the third quarter. So that represents 12.5% if overall. The activity is dynamic in the automobile industry, aeronautics, defense, where we're still growing and security. On the other hand, we're seeing some difficulties, as you know, in the banking sector and more generally in the IT sector because the retail sector in France is affected by the slowdown of activity, which was more than we had anticipated or higher than we had anticipated. So in Spain and Portugal, activity is doing well. So it's grown by 16%. All sectors are growing, including banking and finance. In Germany, there was a strong slowdown in the second water and this has continued into the third quarter. Growth in Germany is at 8.4% year to date, so 1.4%. And so it will have been 2.7% in the third quarter. The automobile industry has seen a sharp, strong slowdown. So we can see a deceleration of activities in the air nautic. and analytical industry. And these two sectors represent 70% of the company's turnover. Growth is 12.5% year to date, which remains satisfactory. Even we can see growth had a growth of 8% in the third quarter. So what I would like to underline is that we have a company where we had 850 consultants, which now represents 40% of the activity in the geographical region. But the growth has been almost zero, which explains the apparent slow growth, slow down of growth in the UK. In historical geographical Asia growth is still growing at over 15%. In Italy, we have seen growth of 24%, which is still robust and all sectors are growing, finance, tertiary sectors. In the next countries, the growth has also been maintained at 15%, which is higher in Belgium, notably in life sciences, but As the market slowed down in the Netherlands, the semiconductors in Scandinavia, the scenario is similar to in Germany. So the activity slowed down for automobiles and heavy goods vehicles. And there is a slow growth of 6% year to date. In Eastern Europe, growth has remained satisfactory. So it's remained 14% in the third quarter. Poland, which represents two-thirds of the zone, has grown by more than 25%. Romania grew by 17% thanks to the automobile sector and the tertiary financial sector. In North America now, so the activity grew by 5%, but we've seen a significant slowdown in the third quarter, given that growth is only at 3%. In the US, this slowdown is due to automobile accounts and then to projects in the oil and gas sector. We already talked about this at the end of the first quarter. In Canada, the slowdown is also due to the banking sector. In Asia Pacific zone, we've published a growth of 3.6%, but zero growth in the third quarter. As I explained during the previous publication, we must reprocess the data given the significant drop of activity in Singapore following the end of certain projects in gas and oil. So Singapore now only represents 3.5% of the zones, a drop of 65%. So given the result is a 14% growth. And so the figures still remain settled.

Looking at the other Asian countries.

China has shown a significant drop in the telecom sector. So this is a significant drop. And there's also been significant drop in semiconductors and electronics. On the other hand, automobile sector has still been growing at over 30%. So India, 35% of the figure is continuing to grow at 15% thanks to the tertiary sector. Japan has increased its growth at plus 30% and South Korea, 10% of the growth hasn't grown by more than 25% thanks to its automobile and electronic contracts. So as you can see, the group's growth is fairly uniform overall and we consider the geographical areas all together. Certain zones have seen a significant slowdown And then three, um, so Germany, Scandinavia and North America, but all other geographical regions are continuing to grow significantly. Now, if we, to look at the analysis, according to a sector, so the automobile industry has grown by 15%. All manufacturers have shown, um, growth of around 22%. So the slowdown of so which we can see in part manufacturers is most notable in Germany. So the sector is continuing to grow five, 6% aerospace has still growing at around 26% in civil aeronautics. The sector is doing well. Defense and security activities are continue to go at a plus 30%. So year to date growth is at 27%. Defense and security have grown by 30%. energy is over 7% which is dropped by 8% because of the oil and gas activities. Certain significant projects have continued in Africa and North America and following the withdrawal of Russia have had an impact and to be honest We do not have any indicators on the trends that we may experience. When it comes to energy, the nuclear sector life sciences are still growing. Industry equipment and electronics and semiconductors by 12% across the board, even if they're at tech sector has slowed down generally in all geographical areas. Helicoms are stable. So you can see a slight drop of three. So operators are continuing to grow. The finance sector saw the slow growth in the third quarter, notably because of activities in France and in Canada. The retail service and public sector also slowed down quite uniformly across all geographical areas to summarise. So aside from oil and gas, and telecoms, all sectors are continuing to grow in year to date and in the third quarter, even if the growth rate is slowing down. Some verticals are also affected in certain areas, mostly banking and the auto industry. Other markets are doing well and are performing fairly uniformly. Our external growth policy can continue to be pursued. We launched an acquisition proposal and we should finish the acquisition in Japan in the coming days. Other companies are underway. So for 2023, as we anticipated, activity has remained satisfactory, even if growth has slowed down. We'll likely see the same in the last quarter. So the last quarter or the last half of the year, we may see better results than last year. And we will be able, and this will be due to a few working days, And then also expected to grow organically by 9%, which is satisfactory in given the current environment. If you would like. And I will be able to give you the results. I think everybody will have, will be up for asking questions. So we have a question from Mr. Kaigoi Ramius.