VusionGroup

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Vision Group first half 2024 results conference call and webcast. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you need to press star 1 and 1 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star 1 and 1 again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to your speaker, Mr. Olivier Guénon, Investor Relations Officer. Please go ahead.

Thank you very much, Radia. Ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon and welcome to RH1 2024 Results Conference Call. I'm here today with Thierry Gadou, our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. as well as Thierry Lemaitre, our Deputy CEO and Chief Finance Officer. Thierry Gadot will start with some remarks on the group's first half business and ESG highlights. Thierry Lemaitre will then comment our financial performance, and Thierry Gadot will conclude with some comments on our full year outlook. After these remarks, we will be happy to take your questions. As a reminder, some of the information to be discussed on our call today is forward-looking and subject to important risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. For these, I refer you to the safe harbor statement included in our press release and on slide three of this presentation. This evening's release was issued a short while ago and is available in French and in English on Vision Group's website, vision.com. The slides of this presentation can also be found on our website in the regulated information section, and a replay and a transcript will also be available on our website after the call. And with this, it's my pleasure to hand you over to Thierry Gadot for his opening remarks.

Thanks, Olivier. Good afternoon, everyone, and thanks for joining our conference call. Let me first summarize H1 performance in a nutshell. So sales in line with guidance, strong business momentum and record order entries, sharp improvement in margins and cash flow generations. Overall, H1 confirms Vision Group's excellent performance. The second half should be excellent. We're confident in our objective of one billion adjusted revenues, and we raised our initially bid-down margin target. Let me now come back on the semester's main business highlights. As I said, revenues were in line with our plan and with our guidance, so no surprise here. It's the order entries which were the exceptional achievement of the semester. Over 700 million euros new orders intake, up 38% year on year, and that only includes a fraction of the 1 billion euro purchase orders signed for the second tranche of the Walmart contract. 2024 continued to be the year of records. In March, we passed the 1 billion mark in rolling 12 months order entries. We signed our first billion euro purchase order in April, and we should pass the 1 billion mark in annual revenues at the end of the year. USA, now our first market, is clearly the primary driver of that momentum in 2024. The Walmart contract has entered now a very intensive phase. We're currently rolling out the program as planned with slightly below 250 stores installed at the end of June, as we stated in July, and with an objective to have shipped 500 stores at the end of the year. and 2300 stores by the end of 2026 so the rollout acceleration will continue in 25. we're happy to announce that we have signed a new ems which is foxconn to further increase our capacity on edge sense our software revenues are growing rapidly as well and overall the program is on track and the customer is happy and new solutions and use cases are being tested to expand the partnerships There were several other successes in America. We announced recently a contract with Ace Hardware, the 21st largest retailer in the US and one of the top DIY brands. It's a high potential contract and a major win. We have announced a rollout with Hy-Vee, one of the top regional grocers in America. And we have many pilots underway with US tier one retailers and hope to announce new deals in the second semester. In Europe, new orders intake were back to growth in H1, with many successes in France, in the UK, in Germany, in Scandinavia, in Portugal. In food and grocery, of course, first, with wins of Sonae, of Netto, of Spar, and others not yet announced. But also in a multitude of non-food retail segments such as pharmacy, sports, DIY, furniture, household appliances. So good performance in Europe. And I remind you that the only reason for the temporary deep in European revenue this year is the finalization of a very large pan-European rollout. And don't forget that prior to 2024, Europe has grown at 45% per annum in average since 2020, a much, much faster pace than the targeted 20% growth rate in our Vision 27 plan. So we are consistent with this average growth trend in Europe, and we expect an excellent 2025 with all the wins I mentioned. On other aspects of the semester, H1 has been the semester where we have successfully rebranded the company, and Fusion Group is already one of the fastest growing and admired brands in retail tech. We have come out with our vision of a positive commerce enabled by IoT data and automation. we have launched EdgeSense and VisionOX, two major innovations which will reshape retail as they turn physical stores into smart grids where it becomes possible to synchronize and connect products, associates, and shoppers. EdgeSense is also a fantastic driver of sustainability as it reduces by approximately 50% the total carbon footprint of ESL systems. And this is just the beginning because H10s will soon be powered by in-store light energy harvesting. We continue that in 2023 to reduce our carbon intensity, minus 13% last year. And we have again made progress on all our ESG initiatives, including our Great Place to Work program, which I'd like to highlight. Our internal satisfaction surveys show great employment engagement. confirmed by a very low attrition rate of 8%, which is an exceptional number in the tech world. And because we believe in creating shared value and in fostering a sense of long-term belonging among our teams, we have further expanded our employee shareholding program to now include all categories of employees. We believe it's all about people, and the superior level of motivation in the team is what explains our good performance. Good performance, which I will now let Thierry Lemaitre explain in more detail.

Thank you, Thierry. I will start with the key financial highlights of this first half year. And first, as already discussed in July, revenue stands at €409 million and €431 million on an adjusted basis, which is 13 revenue growth versus H1 2023. Our significant investments in product innovation and differentiation give us more pricing power and drive the increase of the profitability of our operations. Hence, the variable cost margin increase was strong in H1, growing by 3.8 points versus H1 2023, and the adjusted EBITDA grew 36%, which is a 2.3 points margin increase versus H1 last year. This contributed, of course, to fuel the group free cash flow generation, exceeding 200 million euros over the first half year this year, and closing the first semester with a 215 million euros net cash position. Now, if we go more into details in the P&L, I remind you that we are presenting the group financials both under IFRS standards and also adjusted of some Walmart-related IRFS 15 restatements to provide a more business view of the evolution of the Vision Group operations. Over the first half of 2024, Vision Group delivered €409 million and €431 million adjusted revenues, growing 13% versus H1 last year. Profitability increased over the first half. We said almost two years ago that the profitability improvement would come from the variable cost margin And this is what you can see here. In adjusted terms, the variable cost margin increased by 3.8 points at 28% of the sales in H1 2024 versus 24.2 in H1 2023. On the OPEX side, when we presented the full year 2023 financials, we said that the OPEX ratio would not decrease in 2024 versus 2023 because of requirements to be made in the US and also in the support functions. In H1 2024, the opeth ratio increased by 1.5 points at 14.3% of the cells versus 12.8% in H1 2023. On a full year basis, we believe that the opeth ratio grew by less than 1.5 points, given the strong revenue growth expected in H2. As a consequence, ABDA is also growing significantly, improving at 37 million euros and 59 million euros on understood basis, which is 13.7% of sales, an increase of 2.3 points versus the EBITDA margin in H1 2023. Non-recurring or non-cash items are mainly consisting of IFRS 2 expenses on performance share plans. The financial income is impacted by both in H1 this year and H1 last year, the revaluation impact of the sale value of the warrants. This restatement impacted H1 2024 by minus €13 million and H1 2023 by plus €76.4 million. These effects are mainly impacted by the share price evolutions. Adjusted of this IFRS restatement, the cost of financing remained quite stable at approximately €6 million and the balance is consisting of exchange gains in H1 2023 and exchange losses in H1 2024. So the significant investment to drive innovation on product differentiation has definitely improved the VCM and EBITDA margins. They also translate into increasing depreciation expenses. EBIT and net income margins are therefore temporarily decreasing, but we are confident that these margins will further grow moving forward. On the following slide, you see the main factors that explain the 2.3 points increase in the adjusted ABDM margin. And as you can see, it is mainly the VCM margin, which is driving this growth. Forex had no impact in H1. The average Euro-dollar exchange rate remaining stable between H1 this year and H1 last year. OPEX ratio negatively impacted by 1.5, the ABDM margin improvement. And we believe that we will continue to further improve the profitability in H2. On the following slide, self-financed tapets are back within the 5% to 7% tapets to sales ratio as targeted. Over the first half of 2024, the group kept on investing in R&D and IT. It represented approximately 15 million euros over the first six months, and 54.5 million euros were capitalized under manufacturing lines, fully pre-financed by customers. The self-financed tapets reached 23.4 million euros over the first six months, which is 5.4% of adjusted sales. Thanks to all these elements, the group delivered a strong free cash flow supported by a good operating margin capital management at 15% of the sales, which is exactly the same level as at the end of 2023. This is therefore the third consecutive semester showing a positive free cash flow and the group closes the first semester with a net cash position of €215 million. The free cash flow over H1 this year is including down payments and also customer finance capets. So we made the exercise on the following slide, on this slide, to assess what the free cash flow would have been over the last six months, excluding these two impacts, and you see that it would have been approximately plus €24 million free cash flow showing a 6% free cash flow to sales ratio or 41% EBITDA to free cash flow conversion. In conclusion, free cash generation this semester is not only due to down payments. The group is definitely structurally generating cash from its operations. That's it for the financials, and I now hand over to Thierry for the outlook.

Thank you, Thierry. No surprise. Again, our outlook is very positive. We are entering a phase of acceleration in the modernization and digitization of physical commerce. And Vision Group is at the forefront of this digital transformation. So we confirm a very good momentum in H2 and confirm our target of $1 billion adjusted revenue for the full year. In particular, Q4, we'll see a new acceleration of the exchange deliveries, as new facilities will ramp up in production. We believe that the macroeconomic situation will continue to weigh on our new non-recurring VAS activities, so we anticipate a total VAS revenues of around 120 million euros for the full year, close to the low end of our initial range. However, we confirm our objective of 60 million recurring VAS revenues. We expect to announce significant new deals, and robust growth in order entries again this semester. We anticipate a further improvement of profitability in H2 and have raised our EBITDA margin improvement range for the full year from 50 to 100 BIPs initially to now 100 to 200 BIPs. And finally, we expect continued positive cash flow. In conclusion, 24 should be an excellent year and we are already preparing for an even better 2025. I'll now hand over for questions.

Many thanks, Thierry. Before we hand over to you, Razia, we wanted to address a couple of questions that we have received recently. The first one concerns the level of accounts receivables at our Austrian subsidiary, and the second one relates to the pace of the rollout of our ESL solutions at Walmart in the U.S. So for these two questions, I give the floor to our CFO, Thierry Lemaître.

Thank you, Olivier. I would like to come back to the general principles that we explained in the past, starting with this slide that we already showed. Mainly for inventory and demand planning optimization purposes, Vision Group SA, the parent company, has centralized all the sourcing and the procurement of finished goods from the contract manufacturers assembling the tags and now the rails. The parent company purchases in dollars the finished goods and resells them in euros to the European subsidiaries, which are distribution entities and which have a contractual relationship with end customers. This is the first category of intercompany flows between the parent company and its subsidiaries. The second one is relating to cash pooling. The parent company is regularly pooling the excess cash in its subsidiaries. This creates a receivable in the subsidiary's account and a liability in the parent company's accounts. If we now focus on the relationships between the Austrian subsidiary and the parent company on the following slide. The Austrian entity gained a very large German-based customer in 2020. This customer has been invoiced in dollars to mitigate, at that time, the Euro-dollar-FFS effect at the group level and they have been invoiced in dollars since the beginning of this rollout in 2020. Every year since the beginning of the rollout, the Austrian entity has been collecting more dollars than euros. The Austrian entity has been collecting less euros than its total expenses denominated in euros. The parent company has been regularly and consistently putting the dollars collected by its Austrian entity in its cash position. and the parent company has been regularly and consistently lending euros to its subsidiary in Austria to pay its expenses in euros. Over the years, the intercompany balance sheet positions have been piling up, so it is irrelevant to compare a balance sheet position cumulating the flows over multiple years and the flow in the P&L for one specific year. What is relevant is to compare the change in the balance sheet positions with the flow of the considered period in the P&L. And if we do this for 2023, we can note that the receivables in the Austrian entity accounts increased by 243 million euros versus 2022, meaning that the dollars pooled by the parent company increased by such amount, which is approximately 60% of the 2023 revenues of this entity, which is very in line with the proportion of revenues generated by this entity in 2023 with this German retailer. By the end of 2024, this large rollout will be completed and the parent company and the O3M company will agree to net out their reciprocal position before the year-end closing. On the second topic regarding the pace of deployment of the Walmart stores, an online article posted in the Austin American Statesman dated June 25th mentions that Walmart had deployed digital shelf labels in 63 stores, of which 32 in Texas. We can confirm this number was correct, but at the end of April, which is the end of their Q1 for Walmart, and this number of stores is also reported by Walmart in their Q1 result disclosure, which is available on their website. As mentioned by Thierry, we have been ramping up ever since in our deployment, and as mentioned by us, at the end of July and by Walmart in their Q2 results release on August 15th, we had deployed close to 250 stores at the end of H1. Bear in mind that as this is the case with all of our customers, there is always a small difference between delivered and installed stores due to the timeline between the shipment of our solutions and the actual installation on premise. Hence, there can be small some small discrepancies between our numbers, which account for stores delivered, and Walmart numbers, which indicates the stores, the number of stores installed, but this is here all very coherent. Regarding the expert call, we do not know who this person is nor where the figures come from or to which pair this refers, but everyone should refer to the official numbers communicated by Walmart in their quarterly disclosures, and we showed that they were very in line with our statements. In conclusion, and most importantly, both Vision Group and Walmart are pleased with the current space of the rollout, which will continue to ramp up in the coming quarters. Hence, we can confirm our target to have shipped around 500 stores by the year end, 2024, and 2,300 stores by the end of 2026.

So with that, Razia, we turn it over to you to manage the Q&A session.

Thank you. As a reminder to ask a question, please press star 1 and 1 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star 1 and 1 again. Once again, please press star 1 and 1 to ask a question and wait for your name to be announced. Thank you. We are now going to proceed with our first question. The questions come from the line of Aurélien Sivillon from Adobe HS. Please ask your question. Your line is opened.

Aurélien Sivillon Thank you. Hi. Good afternoon, everyone. Thanks for taking my question. I have four, please. The first one on the H1 VCM, can you provide us more color on what contributes to the increase economies of scale, the value-added services mix, or if there are other reasons we should know. A second one related to the OPEX to sales ratio. So for the full year, I believe, Thierry, you said the ratio should be close to 14%. Can you tell us where do you stand in terms of recruitment in corporate function also in the US? And the underlying question being next year, Should we expect this ratio to remain stable or to decrease from 2025 onwards? Third question, could you elaborate a little bit on the working capital trajectory in H2? I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, but you should record again a significant amount of down payment from Walmart especially. At the same time, I guess, you also need to prepare the ramp-up expected next year, for instance, inventories and so on. So all in all, should we expect H2 working cap on the same trend than H1 or rather different? And the last one, if I may, about the pre-funded CAPEX for the new HN assembly lines. Can you give us the expected amount to be invested in H2 and also in 2025? Thank you.

Thank you, Aurélien. I think that you have almost asked all the questions that we could ask for this semester. Give me 30 minutes to answer them and I think we'll be there. So H1 VCM, the effects, just if you consider, of course, the VAS, you can see that the VAS mix is slightly decreasing, so it has a slightly negative impact on the VCM evolution. The VCM is mainly driven by the improvement of all our operations. I mean, because we succeed in setting because we have also some very good solutions that the customers are liking. So it's all the profitability and the pricing power that we start gaining. It's true that on top of that, now we are manufacturing very large quantities of hardware. So, of course, Walmart is also contributing to the scale effect that you've got from the industrial business. So that's the ratio for the rationale for H1 VCM improvement. OPEX ratio, we said that on the full year, it should be below plus 1.5 points. So below the trajectory of H1, it would be close to 1 point increase versus 2023 full year. We still have some requirements to make in the US, definitely. So that is something that we should keep on doing. Nonetheless, we believe that this increase is temporary. There should be no increase in OPEX in 2025. We are a bit early to talk about 2025, so I will not give more details. But there is no reason at that stage to say that the OPEX ratio will increase in 2025. It would rather decrease. Working capital trajectory in H2, you're right, we have collected the vast majority of the down payments in H1. We're going to keep on collecting part of it in H2, so we expect the working debt to positively contribute to the cash flow generation in the course of H2. And just regarding the pre-financed debits, just to let you know, you know that we have We already received an order from Walmart in 2023 for one manufacturing line, which is $83 million, approximately 78, 79 million euros. You see that part of it was invested last year. The remaining part was almost invested in H1. But we also received in June this year two additional orders for two incremental lines that we will start investing in the course of H2. So yes, the base of capex, pre-funded capex by the customers will keep on certainly increasing in the course of H2.

Okay, very clear. Thank you very much.

And just to add on the VCM, it was a continued trend since 23. I remind that from 22 to 23, we went from 21 to 25%. And now from 25 to 28, so it is a more general trend that is, you know, happening. It's not a specific H1.

Next question, please.

Thank you. We're now going to proceed with our next question. The questions come from the line of Ben Tillman from Birenburg. Please ask a question.

Yeah, hey, good evening, everybody. A couple of questions from my side, if I may. First question would be on free cash flow. You mentioned already that free cash flow excluding prepayments was still positive, and you're guiding for a continued positive cash flow generation. This probably excludes prepayments, right? And my question would be, what can we assume how free cash flow excluding prepayments is going to look like in H2 and maybe even in 2025. Any color on that would be super helpful.

Yes. I think we said there is a 6% free cash flow to sales ratio. And this is not a surprise. What we said in the past, and this is very consistent, You state the EBITDA minus capex minus change in rating capital, and no surprise, you get it. So we said that we're going to increase the EBITDA margin at the level by 100 to 200 bps. So you've got approximately the figure that we should get in the course of H2. We diverted the capex at 5% to 6% on the full year, and approximately 15% working capital to sales ratio, so you can do the math and then you get the figure for H2.

Okay. Maybe next question would be back on the Walmart topic. You touched on that one already in the latest call. You were saying that you aim to cover a little bit less than half of the 500 stores. for the first tranche by mid-2024. Is that still up to date? It seems like there was a newspaper article and the 63 stores was not an up-to-date figure, but is it fair to assume that as of today you have roughly 230, 40, 50 stores of Walmart in the U.S. covered with ESL?

What we said is that the 63 was correct, but it was 63 at the end of Q1, Q1 for Walmart, so the end of April. And of course, since April, we have ramped up significantly. And we confirmed, and this is some figures that you can also find on Walmart's official disclosure. So we say something which is confirmed by Walmart. We are very close to 250 stores. installed by Walmart at the end of July and shipped by Vision Group at the end of June. So this is just a reality, actually. We are not inventing or assuming anything. This is just a reality that we confirm and which is also confirmed by Walmart. That's it.

Yeah, but how does it come that, how can we imagine how the run rate of supplied stores can look like? I mean, if I assume roughly 63 stores by the end of April or Q1, it means like you covered like 15 to 20 stores per month. But if you have, let's say, 230 stores as of today, that would mean that your run rate in Q2 was higher. significantly better than in Q1. And I was wondering why is there so much dynamic in the number of stores you're covering between the month? Can you maybe help us on that?

Yeah, of course. I can help you on that because we have already explained that several times throughout the year. We are ramping up new facilities. And in Q2, I think we said This is also why there was a significant increase in revenue from Q1 to Q2, that we are ramping up EdgeSense, which is a completely new technology. So actually, the 63 stores were much slower because most of the lines were not in production yet. And we said, I think we wrote, that manufacturing lines will start ramping up in Q2. It's only explanation. And I prefer to make very clear that because we are ramping up new facilities. I've just explained we have an additional EMS. So the speed of production on this program is going to increase and not stop. It's going to reach a very, very high rate in January because we're ramping up. So I hope this explains. And it's been explained that there was a ramp up in production and in the speed. And that's how we, okay. And so it's why we have very precise plannings, you know, and it's going to be on plan. We gave a number for the end of the year. We gave the number for the F26. If you calculate, you'll see it's a significant pace and we're adding lines. Thierry just explained there were two more lines ordered in Q2, which will be implemented over the next month. So it's a ramp up, it's a ramp up. And clearly the pace is accelerating.

Okay, that's clear. Maybe one final question, then I'll go back into the queue regarding the new EMS Foxconn. Can you maybe give us a couple of numbers like what annual production capacity do they have? Is it somewhere in the range of 100 to 150 million ESL as we see in the industry for maybe some other plants or some numbers on that would be super helpful. And when is that expected to be up and running at the utilization rate you're expecting?

Well, no, this is a bit too much detail. But we are going to be up and running rather soon, in a few months. It's going fast. As you know, we are tripling the capacity. because we had one line installed. Sherry just explained it. We are moving to three, and that may not be the end. So, you know, and you know the total output of the program over, you know, until the end of 26. So it's easy to make, you know, sort of rule of thumb numbers to give you the sense. But we're not announcing, you know, we're not clear, you know, disclosing the breakdown between REMS.

Okay, perfect. Thank you. I'm going back into the queue.

Thank you. We're now going to proceed with our next question. The questions come from the line of Frederico Tech from SGCM. Please go ahead with your question. Your line is opened.

Hi, thank you, and thank you for taking my question. Could you please explain why in 2023 there's a 127 million euro difference between what Vision Group says it is owed by the Austrian subsidiary and what the subsidiary reports it owes to Vision Group. Could you please clarify this difference? Thank you.

Sorry. We would probably be happy to revert to you, but here we are discussing the figures of the consolidated groups, so we are not making an in-depth analytical review of the Austria and the CTO towns. Let's just have a look at it, but definitely I don't have the individual figures per subsidiary, but we will revert to you. Just to precise one thing, when you do the consolidation, one of the basic principle is that, of course, you make sure that all the inter-companies are properly balanced between two entities. So they are obviously completely reciprocal. Maybe there is something which is saying that a part of it is with the entities, So let's have a look. On top of that, just keep in mind that the entities have multiple relationships between each other. So all the intercompany flows in the Austrian entity are not necessarily made by the French entity. So it may happen that part of it is with France, part of it is with some other entities. But can you just give me back the figures that you were saying?

Oh, yeah. So it's a 127 million euro difference. So in 2023, I have the figures here. The Austrian sub-accounts say there's a liability of 627 million. And then Topco says there's a 500 million receivable from the Austrian sub-entity.

Okay. We'll have a look at that on the review. I'll see you, of course. Thank you.

And we'll put the answer to the question anyway on the website so that anybody, you know, can have the answer, have access to the answer.

Thank you.

Next question.

We are now going to proceed with our next question. The questions come from the line of Jill Crispon from Alizé. Please ask your question.

Good evening, Thierry and Thierry. Congratulations for the momentum and thanks for the perspective. Thanks for taking my question. If you allow me, I'll have two. One is just a confirmation on the Walmart contract. You mentioned that 2,300 stores would be rolled out by end 2025. Is that the whole thing or is that including what will have been? implemented in 24 and second question is could you give us some color on the backlog on the overall backlog possibly split it or give us some color on split in between Europe and US and possibly give us from your historical experience give us some light on how it converts into orders. Because I understand that this is an entry backlog, but possibly there is an outcoming backlog too. So if you can give us some colors there. Very much appreciated. Thanks.

Yes. So on your first question, so the number is, you know, we've signed with Walmart that we would complete half of their U.S. fleet, which is roughly 4,600, slightly above 4,600 stores. So half of that is 2,300 stores. And so that's the total number, which should be completed in 26. And so that's the number, obviously, including the total number of stores that would have been installed. Unless we sign, of course, we have a frame contract for the total fleet, but that's another story. It's another SOW, as we say, SOW3, which is to be signed later. But at this point, it's half of the fleet, and that's towards 26. So that's the total number of stores, including the 200 or slightly less than 250 stores that were shipped at the end of H1. And regarding your second question, we don't disclose backlog. We disclose order entries. So the only thing I can tell you is that obviously we have a big backlog and great visibility for next year's growth. I think I mentioned in my early comments that we've had significant successes in Europe, including some which have been announced and some which will be announced in many verticals and on top of food and grocery. I mentioned names. So we've been sort of adding order backlogs in Europe. Obviously, a billion euro purchase order in 24 makes a big backlog in the U.S., so our backlog is quite high in the U.S. and higher. Nevertheless, you know, Europe is roughly, you know, half of our business. We're expecting an excellent growth in Europe as well as, you know, very high growth in U.S., so that's, you know, That's the color I can give you, high visibility and obviously this year going to be a record year in order entries and therefore also in backlog.

Okay, could we consider the backlog, well the order entries is something in line with or will it be strongly different if you could just shed this level of light, which is still fairly obscure?

Well, you know, it's absolutely, I mean, one thing that is interesting to look at, you know, is what we call the book-to-bill ratio. Because the book-to-bill ratio is a good sign of, you know, of the future growth. So, you know, our book-to-bill ratio is significantly above 100%. And so I think it's a way to respond to your question. And we look at the book-to-bill ratio very closely, and it's significantly above 100%, which means our other entries are significantly higher than our sales, which means we're on board future growth. And that's why we said, and I said earlier, we think we'll have excellent growth you know roughly 25 percent growth in 24 and that we're in expecting an even better 25 so i think it gives a lot of of color already on the picture thank you very much thank you we're now going to proceed with our next question the questions come from the line of laurent from bnp exam please ask a question

Good morning, gentlemen. One question regarding the Walmart contract rollout. So you mentioned that you have been reaching 250 at the end of H1 and 63 at the end of Q1. So it's kind of 187 delivered in Q2. But then you are calling for 500 stores being installed this year. So it seems that the pace will somewhat be lower in Q3 or in Q4 versus Q2. So is there a level of seasonality here, or are you low-budding expectations? Could you do more than 500 for the year?

Well, you know, as Thierry said, you are entering into a lot of details, but As Terry said, when you think about an operation like a rollout in technology in sports, I think Terry mentioned you need to differentiate the shippings, which is the base of your invoice and your revenue, and the installations, which is usually done by the customer. And it takes time. You ship and then you install, right? So there may be differences. The other particular thing you have to also know in retail is that, especially in the U.S., there is something called, and I'm sure all the U.S. listeners on the call, we know that there is what we call the very critical holiday season, which starts in November. And we're everywhere. It's a well-known rule. You don't install anything in the store. You don't disturb the holiday season commercially. So I think that's the explanation I can give you.

Okay, and another one for the other two reasons. Regarding your calculation of, let's say, adversely cash conversion, so restated from done payments, why don't you just take out from the change in working capital the done payments versus calculating, if I understood well, a kind of theoretical change in working cap, applying the growth of the company and the standard 15% working cap to sales ratio?

You could do it, and you would get the same filler, actually.

Okay, fine. That's perfect. Thank you, Jay. You're welcome.

Thank you. We are now going to proceed with our next question. The questions come from the line of Adam Gilday from Bank of America. Please ask your question.

Hi. Thank you so much for taking my question. Just one relatively quick one from me. You mentioned when going through the P&L the change in depreciation and the temporary decrease in EBIT and net income margins and that that could reverse. I was wondering if you could maybe give a little bit more color on how you're thinking about those in H2 and then maybe even into 2025. So what is a fair way that we should be thinking about the depreciation ratio moving forward? Thanks.

Well, first of all, you know, we depreciate the assets that we capitalized for R&D over five years. But at the beginning, we have invested massively for H-Cents. H-Cents starts delivering revenues and is going to fuel additional revenue growth in the coming quarters and years. So at the very beginning, when you say take a normative one year or six months depreciation expense, it only fuels the limited growth compared to what is going to fuel in the coming quarters and coming semesters. So that's the reason why we are confident that moving forward, given the traction that we've got, especially in the US on H-cents, this is going to create significant acceleration in the revenue generation. So very likely in the course of 2025, the EBIT margin and the net income margin will improve again.

Okay, that makes sense. Thanks.

Thank you. We have no further questions at this time. I will now hand back to you for closing remarks.

Okay, so I hope we could answer most of the questions. We have one question which will be maybe detailed and answered a little later. I thank you for joining our conference call. I wish you good evening, and we'll see each other at the next Q3 conference on October 28. Thank you very much. Bye-bye.

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you all for participating. You may now disconnect your lines. Thank you.