Infrastrutture Wireless Italiane S.p.A.

Good afternoon. This is the Chorus Call Conference Operator. Welcome and thank you for joining the NWIT Q1 2023 Financial Results Conference Call. As a reminder, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Should anyone need assistance during the conference call, they may signal an operator by pressing star and zero on their telephone. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Fabio Ruffini, Head of Investor Relations and Corporate Development. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you, operator.

Good evening, everyone, and thanks for joining us. With me today is Diego Galli, English General Manager, and Emilia Tolu, Chief Financial Officer. Before we begin, please allow me to draw your attention to the Safe Harbor Statement on page two. Following the presentation of the quarterly results, we will open the floor to questions. Over to you, Diego.

Thank you, Fabio, and welcome, everyone. The first quarter results show continued progress in all the main indicators. We presented an updated business plan just over two months ago. This quarter is the first step of execution, building on our track record. Industrial KPIs recorded a strong beginning of the year, better than in the past, where Q1 were slower. In particular, for new sites, an area of focus for us, they were up more than two times. Organic growth is well into the double digits, at the back of multiple sources of growth and best-in-class MSAs with strong inflation links. InWit can count on the best assets in the market and two Tier 1 anchors, sources of competitive advantage underpinning our results, particularly in the current context of higher macro uncertainty. This positive trend, coupled with the reduction of list cost, led to margin expansion, with a deducted list above 70%, best in class. Investments were also up, as compared with last year. We broadened our infrastructure with more sites, more upgrades, more dust systems, and land ownership, confirming our ambition to be the leading digital infrastructure player in Italy. Let's now briefly comment the quarterly results on page four. Revenue were up nearly 13 percent up from 9% in the first quarter of 2022, as we continue adding tenancy, and the CPI link reflects average 2022 inflation. On a relative basis, new services were up the most. We reduced list cost in absolute terms despite a bigger asset base and inflation, thanks to our real estate efficiency measures. This led to 19% growth in EBITDA after lease and supported cash flow generation. Indeed, leverage was down after a turn to 4.7 times net debt to EBITDA. Moving to industrial KPIs, we have been working to deliver new sites and new POPs in a smoother way. We are satisfied about the beginning of the year with 130 new sites and more than 1,000 new pots. This is a function both of solid demand fundamentals as well as an improved internal delivery process. On the real estate front, we made progress in our plan of renegotiation and buyout transactions. At the same time, we reached an agreement with Telecom Italia for the purchase of about 200 land plots underneath Inuit towers. This is the first step of the commitment to invest more in land buyout, and it will be structurally reduce our cost base. So in brief, a quarter of continued execution consistent with guidance. Now we'll turn over to Emilia for a more detailed review of the results. Thank you.

Thank you, Diego, and good evening, everyone. I am particularly glad of being here today in presenting this set of results, and I look forward to meeting you in person soon. Starting on page five, we zoom in on industrial KPIs for ANCORS. Q1 2023 was one of the best first quarters ever for INUI, confirming solid demand and growing quarterly pace. We added 730 new ANCOR pops, improving sequentially from Q4 and totaling about 2.5,000 new POPs in the last 12 months. This improvement was driven by in the form of new sites, about 130, and new POPs on existing sites, part of the ongoing network optimization efforts of our anchors. As mentioned, new sites were up more than 2.5 times year-on-year and will continue trending higher in the coming quarters. in line with guidance. Through shared infrastructure, we act as partners to customers seeking efficiency network deployment. We allow savings in cost and capex to operators, establishing a synergic and industrial relationship. Team Evodafone today accounts for nearly 39,000 hospitalities in our network, growing 7% year-on-year in volume terms. Moving on, follows on page six. Hospitalities with other clients were up significantly, plus 18% year-on-year, for a total of more than 12,000 POPs. We had 350 new POPs in the quarter, up more than 50% year-on-year, despite Q1 typically being seasonally lighter. This continues to be one of the strongest organic growth trends in the sector and assessment to the attractiveness of our infrastructure. In Q1, we added new hospitalities from all clients, MNOs, FWAs, and others. In terms of mix, coherently with guidance, FWA and other clients, especially utilities, accounted for the bulk of growth, about 80%. In page seven, we review new services. New services have been growing . They are now at nearly 9 million euro per quarter, up 17 percent, representing a key growth driver for the business plan to 2026. Dedicated coverage projects, mainly through indoor dust systems, have been the main determinant of this growth. Dapps are multi-talent active equipment. They work in synergy with towers and repeaters to provide optimal levels of mobile connectivity and capacity indoors and outdoors. The result is superior user experience and security as compared with other technologies. They also enable advanced applications and are an answer to growing data use in high traffic locations. Demand is growing, particularly by location owners, and while operators may have a selective approach, we expect the expansion to continue. We have been stepping up our efforts on this front with a new and wider sales organization in place, the launch of an indirect sales channel, and specific marketing actions. In the first quarter, we added 20 new dedicated coverage projects including flagship locations in luxury hotels, museums, and sports centers. Additionally, we continue to add tenants to existing assets, which are about 7,000 remote units and 1,000 kilometers of highways. Moving on to the P&L on page eight, you see that quarterly revenues were up to 233.6 million euros, plus 12.8% year-on-year, as a combination of CPI link, based on average 2022 inflation applied from January 1st, growing hospitality across all clients, and expansion in new services. Growth was evenly spread between ANCORS and HOLOS, with new services performing at 17% as mentioned. As compared with Q4 2022, HOLOS discount fewer other revenues which were particularly strong in the last quarter of 2022. This effect more than offset the positive portal-on-portal growth of all of hospitality's revenues. With regards to cost, OPEX was slightly up year-on-year, mostly due to maintenance. Groundless costs were lower. Efficiency in real estate more than offset the higher number of sites and projects, as well as inflation. driving margins expansion. It's worth mentioning that the figure does not discount the benefit of land acquisition transactions with Telecom Italia. EBITDA after lease stood at €165.6 million, up nearly 19% for a 71% margin, up broadly 4 percentage points here on the arc, and at top levels in the sector. Interest costs were up in line with the variable portion of debt, about €530 million linked to Euribor. Tax rates continued to be materially below the Italian statutory rate on the back of the goodwill tax scheme entered into by the company in 2021. As a result of the above, the income stood at €82.9 million, up nearly 22% year-on-year. On slide 9, we discussed cash flow. Cash flow generation in the first quarter was up 8% year-on-year, with recurring free cash flow at about 137 million euros for a cash conversion of 64%. As usual, we had minor cash outliers for recurring capex, amounting to 5.5 million euros, and almost no tax cash out. Two timing effects occurred in the quarter, and real reverse from Q2. Networking capital was slightly negative, and least of payment cycles, which similarly to last year, is typically concentrated in Q1. Continuous organic growth, and the reversal of the above-timing effects are coherent with an improving recurring free cash flow growth rate from Q2, in line with guidance. Net financial position was about stable quarter-on-quarter at 4.1 billion euro, including ISRS 16 liabilities. Because of EBITDA growth, leverage came down to 4.7 times from 5.2 times in terms of net debt to EBITDA. Costs of debt remain fairly low at 2.3%, with more than 80% of debt being fixed, and no relevant maturities before 2025, with the expiry of a term loan of €500 million. With this, I thank you, and I leave again the floor to Diego.

Thank you, Emilia. A few thoughts from my side, beginning with slide 10. We highlighted three short-term strategic priorities as part of the plan, and I would like to go back to some key highlights. 2023, we'll see a further step up in new sites, material growth in new services, and a renewed approach to capital allocation. Work done so far has already provided some positive results, an improved pace of site delivery, new dedicated coverage projects for DARS, and the AGM approval of the company first share buyback. So the quarterly results as well as progress on key priorities allow us to confirm our guidance as detailed on page 11. Purely in organic terms, maximizing the growth opportunity in the domestic market in which aims to deliver. High single-digit organic growth through 2026, coupled with seven percentage points of EBITDA margin expansion to 76 percent, and recurring free cash flow above 730 million euros in 2026, with per share accretion linked to the share buybacks. Organic growth is one of the main levers of value creation for Inuit, which continue on page 12. Our business plan builds on the fundamentals of the company and its ability to create sustainable value in the long run. Beyond organic growth, we invest to expand digital infrastructure with compelling returns. There is an opportunity ahead of us to deploy more CapEx to maximize growth on top of business plan targets. We provide balanced returns proposition to shareholders, deploying all tools available. With this, I thank you, and we are now ready for the Q&A session.

Excuse me, this is the Chorus Call Conference Operator. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touchtone telephone. To remove your question, please press star and two. please limit your questions to one per analyst or investor before rejoining the queue. And please pick up the receiver when asking questions. The first question comes from Roshan Ranjit of Deutsche Bank.

Afternoon, everyone. Thank you for the questions. I just got one, please. Just on the TIM purchase, the 200 sites, Is that incremental to the raised number which you gave at the business updates back in March? Or is that included within the kind of, I think you said, additional 2,000 at the time? That would be useful. And if I could just maybe squeeze in a quick one kind of related on, you mentioned new next-gen EU sites. Is it possible to tell us the number of sites within the 130 new sites that are part of the EU fund? Thank you.

Yeah, thank you, Roshan. So on the first question, the 200 land purchase are part of our targets. It's a way for us to accelerate and deploy at scale, but they are included in the targets. The second question is about the next generation EU funds sites, which are not included in the 130. Deployment of these kinds of sites will start in Q2, and so we will start seeing them in the next month. But as far as Q1 is concerned, as I said, the 130 does not include the Next Generation EU funds new sites.

Perfect. That's helpful. Thank you. Welcome.

The next question comes from Andrew Lee of Goldman Sachs.

Good evening everyone. Thanks for taking my questions. I had one main one which was just given we've seen speculation on Vodafone-Iliad tie-up resurface again. I wondered if you could give us an update straight recap of your thoughts on the impact of a consolidation deal between Vodafone and Iliad in Italy on your business. How would you think about that? And if I may just, if I were to be given a follow-up, it would just be on the anchor new POPs, which were particularly strong. And I know, Amelia, you mentioned that that was partly driven by the new site, the 130 new sites. But I think you mentioned it was also driven by something else. So I wonder if you could just either repeat or give us a bit more color on what's driving those strong KPIs. Thank you.

Good evening, Andrew. On the consolidation scenario you mentioned, I think that when thinking about it and assessing it, we need to bear in mind that Inuit has the best infrastructure in the country, the best locations, and has also strong contracts, particularly strong MSAs with the anchor tenants. which have key features and which are relevant when considering this scenario. First of all, the all or nothing clause. And second, the feature related to the fact that the MSA is related to the frequencies available at March 2020. So new frequencies used on the ANCOR network will drive additional fees. So considering these elements, our current assessment is that the consolidation scenario is basically neutral, if not positive to Inuit. Clearly, let me also say that in case of consolidation, eventually we would, as a negative, lose the potential business included in our business plan for the future with Iliad. But again, considering the positive and the negatives, our current assessment is for a neutral to positive and net impact. With regards to the anchor new POPs, yes, it's the result of the new sites. so new tenants on a new site, as well as the continuous optimization of the network, so also new tenants on existing sites for the build-up of the common grid between the AMCOs.

Thanks very much. Nothing massively new, just strong execution. Yes. Thanks very much. You're welcome.

Our next question is from Sam McHugh of BNP Paribas.

Hi there, guys. Just a short follow-up on the TIM land acquisitions. When should we expect the capex to be booked for that transaction? And then do you think you have potential to do more? Is there a further pipeline of discussion with them that could further pull forward lease optimization? Thanks very much.

Hi, Sam. Can you please repeat the second part of the question, please?

Yeah, it was just a question of whether there's a bigger pipeline of deals done with them and whether we could expect more similar deals to pull forward lease optimization.

Thank you. Okay. Thanks, Sam, for the question. I'll take it. Well, considering the CAPEX, the CAPEX reported in Q1 included the seed transaction partially, And, of course, we would love to do more of such deals in the future if opportunity arises because it is an efficient way to execute our plan with larger deals.

Sam, was that clear? That's right. Very clear.

Thank you. The next question is from Fabio Pavan of Mediobanca.

Yes. Hi. Thank you for taking my question. Just to follow up on the FWA demand and also for new services, numbers remain absolutely strong. Do we have any for the coming quarters, I guess? expecting some acceleration on that front. This trend to remain stable, new clients coming, so anything would help. Thank you very much.

Hi, Fabio. Thanks for the question. With regards to fixed wireless access, we have experienced across the last quarter some volatility. So there are up and downs. we do see still a strong demand. And honestly, we are working on to make this demand more, can I say, stable and visible for the long term. What we actually, this is particularly, we've already done with open fiber and the plan for building new sites with open fiber, will display its impact in the coming quarters. And we think it's a reasonable initiative and action also for other customers. With regard to new services, we are really excited by the opportunity because the, and I refer to mostly indoor coverage, And thus, for improving indoor coverage, because we do see strong interest in the market for better indoor connectivity. And 5G, with its technology features, which we know is less effective in penetrating the walls of buildings, will make even more relevant technologies. the additional equipment within the buildings to provide better connectivity. So we do see the market opportunity, we do see strong interest, and the location owners are keen to get better connectivity to provide better service to their customers or to increase the value of their locations, and we do expect to accelerate. We are putting additional initiatives internally, additional resources, And we have strengthened the sales organization. We build also a dedicated unit within the company to capture the opportunity and to drive a significant step up on this revenue line.

Thank you.

Excuse me, sir. The next question is from Georgios Yerodiokonou of Citi.

Yes, hello. I hope you can hear me. I've got one follow-up and one question, please. My follow-up is on the comments you just made on new services and also more broadly now that you are executing on the site additions, whether you are seeing any incremental demand beyond the commitments when you discuss with the anchor tenants. There's always concerns about their financial outlook But I'm curious if the operational needs do force them to engage with you for more sites, regardless of the fact that the market is competitive. And then my second question is just to clarify a few things about recurring level free cash flow. And I appreciate you already made a comment on networking capital seasonality. If it's possible, can you perhaps talk us through a couple of the other lines, including taxes and financial expenses? Just to get a bit of clarity as to how we should expect them to evolve during the year.

Thank you. Thanks, George. With regards to the demand, I think that actually already in the plan, the updated plan we shared on last February, We have included actually additional demand in terms of new sites and basically new relatives, new POPs. So actually we added 200 additional sites. And this shows the fact that clearly there is demand and there is focus on keep on building stronger and optimized network to support 5G deployment. And as we discussed in the past, actually, it's been more up to us to put on the ground the capacity to deliver new sites as much as possible and as soon as possible. So we are very pleased with the progress we made in the last quarters. And actually, we will continue on this pace and accelerate also in terms of number of new sites in the next quarters.

To the cash to the networking capital trend, as mentioned, you want discount due timings effect. The partial, the networking in particular discounts, the partial reverse of positive networking capital in Q4 2022. So that so we do expect this timing effect to reverse starting from from Q2 and, um. On a full year basis, we do expect neutral to positive net working capital for the full year, at least in line with 2022. Overall, in terms of recurring free cash flow, we do expect cash flow generation to remain strong on the basis of ongoing growth of EBITDA and margin expansion. due also to this cost efficiency lower carrying capex in the order of two to three percent on sales and limited cash out or efficient tax payment following also the benefit of the goodwill tax schemes and relatively let's say Relative low cost of debt in the order of 2.3% considering that the bulk of our debt structure is fixed. We have just 20% floating, so the variable cost is applicable to this portion.

Thank you.

Thank you.

The next question is from Luigi Minerva of HSBC.

Yes, good evening. Thanks for taking my questions. I have two. One is, again, going back to new services. I was wondering if you can, you know, we have reached like the pace of 9 million per quarter and you hinted there will be more. So if you were to think of a sort of steady state scenario in 2024, 2025, what sort of contribution from new services you would expect on a quarterly basis? And secondly, just a clarification, Diego, I think towards the end of your remarks, you mentioned the deployment of digital infrastructure investment on top of the business plan targets. I may have missed more of your remarks there, but can you just give us more details about that statement? Thank you.

Yes, good evening, Luigi. With regards to new services, Yeah, we do expect to change, again, order of magnitude, actually. We do expect by 2026 to achieve a business which is basically three times 2022 business size. So 2022, we expect to grow by basically three times. This is on the back of mostly the coverage. Um, or projects, bigger projects, which may be a mix of indoor and outdoor, and then gradually just by the end of the plan, we will have also the contribution by coming from a small cell. Um, with regards to, yeah, to let me say the additional additional topics, uh, during the. I was referring to the additional financial flexibility to the financial headroom that we have embedded in our plan, considering that we have a target leverage corridor between 5 to 5.5, and we will have a strong capacity to deliver. And also, after the additional shareholder remuneration, actually, our leverage will be down to basically four times by 2026. So these allow us to consider additional investments in small towers portfolio, in DAS assets, in additional land buyout, in large special coverage projects, and maybe medium term also clearly considering the involvement in the active equipment when the opportunity will be unlocked by the operators and probably with a progressive approach. So as shared, our focus is clearly enhancing, boosting the organic growth with expanding our perimeter and leveraging the flexibility, the room that again will be gradually available to build on top of the organic growth already embedded in the plan additional growth. Thank you very much. Welcome.

The next question is from Ben Ricketts of New Street Research.

Hi. Thanks for the question. First question is just a follow-up on your comments on owning the active equipment. The story is that Wintrae is going to have a majority stake in their active equipment to EGC. I just wondered if you had spoken to them buying the active equipment that's hosted on your sites and whether that's a transaction you'd looked at and rejected or any comments there. And then second question is around your anchor POPs. So very strong in Q1 and they seem to be ahead of the rate implied by the guidance for the full year. So I just wanted to check whether you're accepting that rate declined throughout the year, or could the guidance be a bit conservative there?

Thank you. My apologies. The line was a bit off on the second point of your question. What implied rate were you referring to versus guidance, please?

The anchor pot guidance. So we're saying it would be less than 9,000 anchor tenants by the end of the year.

Yeah, thanks, Ben.

With regards to the active equipment, we do see over time the opportunity because clearly it would make sense for a tower company which manages the passive equipment to extend the perimeter, to extend the partnership with the tenants, with its customers, also to to the to the active part of the network. And this is also consistent, potentially consistent with the development of technology with the open run, where actually the active equipment on the towers will be a little bit. Let me say no, not in a technical way, but a little bit less intelligent or less relevant from a strategic point of view for the operators. And then there could be more willingness to outsource and to offload to the to the tower companies. So in our portfolio of opportunities, when thinking about the deployment of the financial flexibility that we do have, this is clearly an opportunity that we have in mind, but again, it's mostly up to the operators to unlock this opportunity. We are open to assess and support and to consider it. With regards to the Anchor Pops, yes, it was a very good quarter and also we are happy that we started the new year with good pace. I wouldn't say at this stage this goes beyond the guidance of the year. We will. There will be some some some fluctuations across the years. We do expect, but anyway, I think is a sign of health. In terms of our capacity to the result of our capacity to deploy new sites. And again, it's a good start. What we will see in the next in the next quarter. It's a higher number of new sites which gradually which gradually overtime will a little bit translate in a high level of new POPs on site. So overall, let me say, too early to call for an upside, but very pleased we started in the right manner.

Okay, thank you. Just on the first one, did you look at the wind tray and the equipment?

Win3 is our customer, so the Win3 active equipments are also on our towers, yes.

Okay, thank you.

Welcome.

The next question is from Stefano Gambarini of Equitasim.

Good afternoon, everybody. Just a few questions regarding M&A deals. Do you have something on the table and could we expect some small acquisitions in the forthcoming quarters or M&A is postponed next year? And the second regarding the buyback, 300 million euros are now available, will be spread over the 18-month period for which you received the authorization, or could you try to concentrate this purchase as early as second half 23? Thanks a lot.

Hi, Stefano. With regards to the M&A, yeah, let me say there are small M&As which we are working on. We hope we are exploring, we are scouting to identify opportunities for a small, yeah, acquisition of assets, again, to keep on increasing our perimeter. So this is clearly a more focus area. Nothing major as visible as today. With regards to the, let me say, the big M&A and as we discussed in the past, clearly at this stage still not a priority considering that The market prices are still high. We still have a situation of high financing costs. So we monitor, but I wouldn't say it's a priority for us now. With regard to the buyback, actually we have been waiting for the green light from the security authority, Italian security authority from CONSOB. As soon as the green light will be received and we do expect in a few weeks, clearly we will disclose the way the plan will be set up. For now, to your point, we are thinking about a more spread approach across the 18 months.

Thank you. Welcome.

The next question is from Maurice Patrick of Barclays.

Oh, good evening, guys. Thanks for taking the question. Just a simple one from me, please. On slide seven, you've talked about in the new service division, you talk about the sort of new sales organization and revamping your indirect sales channel. Just wanted to give some thoughts in terms of how quickly that's likely to result in a change in growth. And I guess by a new organization, it's presumably a higher cost as well. And when that starts flowing through, we're very helpful. Thank you very much.

Yeah, the that that's that's for us is a key is a key priority. The the in which that we do see as two main can I say two main legs? One leg is the operational capabilities to deliver to deploy, deploy new sites, new dust and so the operational excellence as a. as a, how can I say, a network, a network, and a network infra player. So excellence in deploying and delivering. So mostly operations. But the other leg that is as well as important is the leg in terms of commercial capabilities. So not only the delivery machine, but also the sales machine, which means not only being on the pull side of the demand from anchor tenants and other customers, but also being on the push side, on chasing opportunities, on chasing clients and customers, including location owners. And this is where, after the progress we made on the delivery capabilities where we are focused now on stepping out the sales and commercial capabilities on key verticals as they are presented on page seven. So leisure, public administration, travel and transportation, health care. We've done already quite well in the past. We are leading on DAS in the market, but we think there is the opportunity to do more. That's why we revamped the sales organization. We enhanced the leadership. We are bringing on board people also from the market to increase the power, the strength of the organization. So clearly this is a process which started already by the end of last year. And we do expect to see signs of tangible results gradually, starting already from Q2 and then piling up across the following quarters. As I said before, we have the ambition to grow by three times the new service revenues we reported in Q2. And that's clearly the sales organization, the sales capabilities are a key lever to achieve that goal. Okay, thank you. Welcome.

The final question is from Fernando Cordero of Banca Santander.

Hello, good afternoon. Thanks for taking my question. It's just on the financial side. Your balance sheet is quite comfortable and the outlook is good. But I would like to understand your thoughts regarding the refinancing on 2025 and at which extent do you believe or do you feel that to be full investment grade credit rating is required or not? Or in other words, how are you seeing the market dynamics in order to force it to be full investment grade or not? Thank you.

Yeah, actually, the full investment grade is not an explicit goal as part of our industrial plan. Our leverage profile and deleverage profile will bring us there because we will get, after the additional surrogate remuneration, close to basically at about four times by 2026. So it's a target which is clearly achievable, but it's not as well as the target corridor that is of leverage, which is between five and five point times. So actually it's achievable, but it's not an explicit target also because honestly, our bonds and our are already appreciated. So actually we, there wouldn't be a material tangible benefit in terms of cost. So, in short, not an explicit target for us at this stage.

Thank you. Welcome.

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