Landis+Gyr Group AG

Welcome to the Landis & Gere full year 2025 results presentation. Please note that this call will be recorded. During today's call, webcast participants will be in listen-only mode while we conduct the question and answer session. If you wish to ask a question, we ask that you please use the raised hand function at the bottom of your Zoom screen. Further instructions will follow at the time of the Q&A. I'd now like to turn the call over to Christian Welty, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, moderator, and good afternoon, good evening, everyone. I'm Christian Welty, head of Investor Relations, and I'm joined today by Peter Mainz, our CEO, and by Davinder Otwal, our CFO. As you know, earlier today, Lansing Gear issued an ad hoc release and related presentation on the full year 2025 results. which are available on our website. This session will follow the structure of the presentation, so we encourage you to follow along. We'll conclude with Q&A, where our moderator will provide further instructions and where you will be able to ask questions. Please take a moment to review the usual disclaimer on slide 2 of the presentation. After this short introduction, I'd like to hand the floor over to our CEO, Peter Mainz.

Thank you, Christian. Good afternoon and good evening, everyone. I'm here with Davinda, our Chief Financial Officer, and we are pleased to present our full year 2025 financial results. With that said, let's now start with a review of the achievements in 2025. Let's turn to slide 3. Financial year 2025 was a pivotal and demanding year for the teams at Landes & Gier, marked by the successful execution of our strategic transformation. At the same time, we remained firmly focused on operational delivery and we met our targets. This highlights the strength and depth of our talent base, which continues to drive disciplined execution across multiple fronts. We began the year focused on the process of divesting our EMEA business. In September 2025, we signed an agreement with a private equity buyer and in April 2026, we successfully closed the transaction. With the transaction, we have created a business with elevated EBITDA and cash profile with low capital intensity and an attractive financial profile going forward. Our 2025 revenue growth reflects our continued focus on execution and customer engagement. Strong customer demand is evidenced by solid order intake and a sustained high backlog. Profitability improved further, with an EBITDA margin of 14.4%. This performance enabled us to return approximately $70 million to shareholders. For 2026, we intend to continue rewarding shareholders and propose an increased distribution of CHF 120 per share. In addition, we are progressing with our share buyback program to return the net proceeds from the EMEA divestment, with approximately $140 million remaining. Let's move to slide 4 on order intake and backlog. The sustained strength of our pipeline, the strongest pipeline I've seen, is clearly reflected in our order intake. We're pleased to report order intake of $1.1 billion in financial year 2025, highlighting the continued robustness of our pipeline. In contrast to last year, order intake was broad-based rather than driven by a few large contracts and included a significant contribution from new logos. This resulted in a book-to-bill ratio of around 1, representing a solid performance. In the fourth quarter, we maintained a book-to-bill ratio of approximately 1 while delivering revenue growth of 25%. Our entry into the gas metering market with ultrasonic technology paired with expanding our gas endpoint offering is clearly gaining momentum as a strong pipeline is translating into order intake. In Asia-Pacific, our grid edge offering is seeing increasing adoption, though from a smaller base but with lots of runway left. Overall, we're seeing solid momentum across our global platforms. We are particularly pleased with our order backlog, which remains stable at close to $4 billion. Approximately 43% of the backlog consists of software and software-enabled services, typically recognized over a period of 8 to 10 years, providing a strong foundation and enhanced visibility for long-term growth. And now I will give the floor to Davinda, our CFO, and he will run us through the financials in more detail.

Thank you, Peter. Good morning and good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Let me begin with our consolidated financial results on slide 5. For the full year, net revenue is $1,166.2 million, representing 4.2% year-over-year growth, primarily driven by strong performance in the Americas region and continued adoption of our Revelo platform. Strong operating execution drove higher revenue, and together with a deliberate mixed shift towards software and software-enabled services, supported expansion in both gross margin and adjusted EBITDA margin year-over-year. Adjusted EBITDA margin for the year was 14.4%, coming in at the high end of our guidance range. Turning to slide 6, I'll walk through our fourth quarter results. New orders in the quarter kept pace with revenue, resulting in a book-to-bill ratio of 1, reflecting sustained demand for our products and services as well as continued discipline across the sales organization. Fourth quarter net revenue was $352.4 million, representing approximately 25% year-over-year growth, driven primarily by increased adoption of the Ravello platform and a continued mix shift towards software and software-enabled services. Growth margin expanded by 460 basis points year-over-year, reflecting the realization of operational efficiencies and the favorable impact from our evolving revenue mix. Moving to slide 7, let's look at full-year performance in the Americas. Revenue in the Americas increased nearly 8% year-over-year, supported by strong demand for our Revelo platform, which continues to gain traction with customers across the region. We are also driving incremental growth through a strategic shift towards higher ASP software offerings. Both gross margin and adjusted EBITDA margin expanded year-over-year, reflecting disciplined execution and a sharper focus on operating expense management. On slide 8, I'll cover fourth quarter results for the Americas. Strength in new orders resulted in a book-to-bill ratio of one for the region. Fourth quarter net revenue was $322.8 million, representing approximately 32% year-over-year growth, driven by continued adoption of the Revello platform and increasing contribution from software and software-enabled services. Gross margin expanded by 660 basis points versus a prior year, reflecting operational discipline and the benefits of efficiency initiatives. Next, turn to slide 9. Let's review our APEC results. APAC revenue declined 19% year-over-year, primarily due to the completion of an AMI project in Hong Kong that contributed revenue in the prior year period. Adjusted EBITDA margin in APAC was impacted by lower operating leverage and mix when viewed on a normalized basis, which excludes a one-time real estate gain recorded in the prior year. Finally, on slide 10, I'll review our liquidity position. As of the end of March 2026, net debt stood at $198.9 million. Key movements from the prior year end included $98.3 million of operating cash flow, $69.8 million return to shareholders, including $41.2 million in dividends and $28.6 million in share repurchases under our ongoing buyback program. and $38.7 million in capital expenditures focused on growth and efficiency initiatives. We close the year with a net debt-to-adjusted EBITDA ratio of 0.9, reflecting continued balance sheet strength while funding our capital allocation priorities. That concludes my prepared remarks. Thank you for joining us today, and thank you for your continued interest in Landis & Gere. Now I'll turn the call back to Peter. Peter? Thank you, Davinda.

Let's discuss our guidance for financial year 26 and our mid-term guidance next. Let's move to slide 11. Let me start with net revenue for financial year 2026. Revenue next year will be impacted by the transition between two large-scale contracts. We have a category-defining Revelo contract, which completes deployment in the course of first half of financial year 26. On the other hand, we have a $0.7 billion contract awarded to us in FY24, which begins deployment and reaches scale in the fourth quarter of FY26. The transition between these two large-scale deployments is expected to result in an estimated $60 million revenue gap between project roll-off and new deployment ramp-up. While our backlog remains exceptionally strong, these transitions are not seamless and will become visible around the middle of financial year 26. We therefore expect net revenue in the range of $1.05 to $1.125 billion. We expect adjusted EBITDA margin in turn to further improve to a range of 14.5% to 15.5%. continuing our trajectory of margin expansion despite slightly lower revenue. For the first full year without EMEA, we further expect our cash flow to improve significantly. Let's have a look at our midterm expectations on slide 12. Our previous guidance cycle concluded with the fiscal year 25 results. With our new structure now in place, We believe it is appropriate to provide updated mid-term guidance. For the next three years through fiscal year 2028, we expect organic revenue compound annual growth rates in the mid single digits. This implies a return to meaningful growth in fiscal 27 and fiscal 28, supported by our strong backlog. The previously referenced large contract is expected to be fully ramped by fourth quarter fiscal 26 and continues through fiscal 28, contributing approximately 5% to growth. In addition, a major grid edge deployment in Australia is expected to add an additional 2% growth contribution. As we continue to execute, we expect to benefit from operating leverage and higher margin software and software-enabled services, resulting in EBITDA expansion and growing at approximately twice the rate of revenue. Let me close on slide 13 with a preview on our next highlight, our Capital Markets Day in New York on June 1st. The successful divestment of our EMEA business has created a more focused Lundesen gear. At our Capital Markets Day in New York, we will share an update on strategy, highlight our core markets, and present our technology roadmap for grid-edge intelligence. On the financials, we will detail our capital allocation priorities and financial framework and introduce a new business segmentation as we move from a regional to a product-focused structure. I'd love to see you all there. And now, we'll open the call for questions. Moderator, please.

Ladies and gentlemen, we'll now begin our Q&A session. If you have a question, we ask that you please use the raised hand function at the bottom of your Zoom screen. When it's your turn to ask a question, you'll receive a prompt, please accept, and once called upon, you may unmute and proceed. If you want to withdraw your question, please lower your hand using the raised hand function. Thank you, and a moment for the first question. Our first question will come from Akash Gupta with JP Morgan. Please unmute your line and go ahead.

Yes, hi, good evening, and thanks for your time. And thanks for also addressing the guidance moving parts. The question I have is that, again, I mean, you are giving us some indication on 27, 28, but when we look at your backlog at the end of March, and when we look at, like, you know, how much typical revenues you get in those years, like... What's the degree of confidence on this high growth that you are expecting in 27, 28 from existing backlog? Or is it contingent to commercial activity in the next 12 months? And maybe you can also talk about the pipeline for projects and orders. If I hear you right, you said the pipeline is strongest that you have ever seen. Maybe if you can elaborate more on that.

Yeah. Thank you, Akash. So a couple of things. Let's be clear. The growth we see on 27 and 28 is in our backlog today. And that's really what we tried to articulate. In 26, you see the transition from, I would say, a category-defining contract with, I think, the customer up in the Northeast. We can talk about the name National Grid. We put GridEdge AMI 2.0 on the map with that contract. And Successful winning the contract and now by the contract ramping down, it's another success story that the deployment was a success as well. The contract that is coming right after is a contract that we have in the backlog that is ramping up. We always say in some of those large contracts, it takes somewhere around 15 to 18 months between the signing and really starting the contract. And here we're talking about ramping it up. Exit quarter, that contract we expect to operate and be delivering at full pace. That is a starting point into 27, 28 and actually beyond. And then the second element is there in Australia. That's a contract that we also, we have announced. That's a great edge contract putting us on the map in Australia with great edge and new offering. We have that on hand. We don't need to win that. We need to execute that. That gives us confidence. And also the strong win rate that we had and the wins we had in the final quarter of 25. Let's not forget, we were growing our revenue by 25%. And still in that quarter delivered a book to build to one that is helping us to deliver the 27 and 28 growth, also growth that is in the backlog as we speak on today. And then across the year, we see the overall trend, software, software enabled services, grid intelligence, as we will start to call it, is really driven by the installed base of Ribello. And that is really increasing every day. So a The short answer is the growth is really in the backlog as we have it today, the close to $4 billion on hands. And it's just the revenue transition pattern that we have tried to lay out and give confidence that this backlog actually contains the growth for 27 and 28 today. The pipeline overall, I think, sorry.

No, no, I was asking on pipeline and book-to-bill expectations. Thank you.

So pipeline, the next thing, pipeline, probably the strongest pipeline. If we're looking at the pipeline, the strongest pipeline certainly I have seen, in particular, obviously, in America is where we're focusing today. The more interesting and the more important part for this group is how is pipeline translating into order intake? Q4 was a good indication for us that we are very successful in bringing the pipeline into order intake. And that is also the task for 26 and beyond. And anytime outside a large contract, the task is the book to build to be at around one. And then with the large contracts that we're pursuing, the timing is always not certain quarter by quarter that will move us above one. But strongest pipeline that I've seen, and we have seen a tremendous success with our offering to move the pipeline into order intake and then put it in a backlog, supporting the growth.

Thank you. Our next question will come from Patrick Rafesh with UBS. Please unmute your line and go ahead.

It's great. Thanks. And hi, everybody. Thanks for all these explanations, especially around the guidance and all the clarity. But I have one follow up on the midterm and two other questions, starting with the midterm. um a bit more clarity would be helpful here so um is the the these components that you outline with the five percent plus three plus two per annum that assumes that the base business is sort of flat over that period is that the correct assumption i what i try to understand is the upward or downward sensitivity of this of this kegger

So on this page, we are articulating the growth in the year of 27 and 28, which mathematically needs to be close to 10%. And what we try to articulate here, that these growth rates are basically in our backlog as of today. And I would say that's the growth, that business is part of the base. That's what we do. So I'm not...

Okay, thank you. We'll go to our next question.

Yeah, no, can I, sorry, can I ask? Yeah, the other two questions would be first on the... the shift towards higher ASP software that you alluded to for Americas. Can you add a bit more color? What do you mean by that? And is it possible to segment maybe your current software exposure into these maybe lower and higher ASP parts? And what those are exactly would be interesting. Thanks.

So I mentioned higher margin. And here we're getting the territory that we want to cover in the capital markets day. But it's fair to say what we call grid intelligence or software and software enabled services already today has a gross margin level that is above the average margin level of the business. And also, if we break it down and look at growth rates for that segment, whereas the device or platform part of our business has growth rates above and beyond that. what we see on the platform side. So that mixed shift has two element. Growth rate is a bit faster than we see above the average than we see for the business, the mid single digits, it's growing much faster. And then the profitability is also nicer and higher. Obviously that stands for nicer. And with that shift also helps us to move the profitability over that period up. The more concrete breakout, we certainly want to take advantage of the capital market state to provide the detail that you're looking for here, but that's how we view that part of the business and that's how we see it in the midterm.

Great. Super. Thanks. Yeah. So looking forward to those explanations. And then the last question, maybe for Davinder, you talked about the cash flow and you mentioned a significant improvement now with EMEA out. Can you maybe help us understand how you expect that to translate into free cash flow? Is it possible to provide a bit more of a guidance around what you expect there?

Hey, Patrick, good to hear from you. Absolutely. So with the new business profile, we are targeting around 80% conversion of EBITDA to free cash flow, which is significantly better than we ever saw previously.

Perfect. Thank you very much, both.

Thanks, Patrick. Thank you. And just as a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please use the raised hand feature. When your name is announced, please unmute and ask your question. Sean Milligan with Needham & Co. Please unmute your line and go ahead.

Thank you for taking the questions. Just curious, two questions. One, in North America, you mentioned a really strong pipeline there. I'm curious if there's anything in the market, whether that's regulatory, you know, policy or funding that, you know, might kind of cause fluctuations in being able to win awards, like timing quarter to quarter or any push outs. And then the second question was along Revelo, just could you remind us where you are in terms of like Revelo penetration against the existing installed base of legacy products that you had?

Okay. The first one, and thank you, Luisa. When we talk about, you know, Revelo and grid intelligence on the installed base, I think when we talk about North America, where we're further advanced in the penetration compared to Australia, we are, I would say, mid-single digits of the full available base, which is 160, 165 million endpoints. So still a substantial amount of runway left for that transition to Revelo or GridEdge technology. On the regulatory front, also it's It's important to understand that it's not the same in every state. And we don't certainly affordability is a theme in the industry. And then sometimes that spills into the regulatory process with PUCs as well. But overall, we don't see a dramatic change from where we've seen before. And it's also fair to say that a lot of the discussion for the approval of the capital projects that we provide to our utilities. When utilities have good relationships with the PUC, that's really not an issue that lands with the PUC. So we have a good mixture that I would still say it's unchanged from the complexity dealing with PUCs that has been part of the industry for an extended period of time. So a long-winded way of saying not really any substantial change.

Okay, thank you. We'll go back to Louis Billon, see if you can unmute your line. One second. Thank you.

Hi, good afternoon. Can you hear me?

Yeah.

Yeah. So thank you for taking my question. So my question is concerning the 0.7 billion contract. How confident are you with the calendar? And what are the reasons that could delay the ramp up? beyond the one quarter to another? So that's my first question.

To be clear, that contract is in our backlog, that moved to our backlog in fiscal 24. And I would say that that is 100% on the execution side. And that is, I would say, in our hands today. And we have the confidence that we'll deliver the Revelo product to the customer up in the eastern part of Canada.

Okay, thank you, that's very clear. And maybe another question on the Asia-Pacific region for the year 2026. What do you expect in terms of order intake?

We're not really guiding for order intake per se, and I continue to state the same outside of those large contracts like one we have just mentioned. The target is always be a book-to-bill of one, and obviously any contract of the magnitude of 0.7 billion dollars will tilt the order intake and the book-to-bill substantially above one. It's difficult to articulate it quarter by quarter, but that's the ambition that we continue to drive in that business.

Okay, that's very clear. Thank you.

As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question today, you can do so by using the raised hand feature, which can be found at the bottom of your Zoom screen. We've just had one another follow up from Akash Gupta from JP Morgan. You may now unmute your line and ask your question. Thank you.

Yeah, I think you and I have follow up on this revenue shortfall and the question. First one is that you're giving us the impact on revenues, which is, I think, around sixty and six and sixty odd million million dollars. But can you quantify what will be the impact on margin like if you haven't had this revenue shortfall? what would have been the margin guidance because when I look at the drop through of these revenues with 35% gross margin that or north of 35% gross margin that you make in North America then it kind of indicates to me that if you haven't had this then the margins could have been quite higher so First one on impact on margin from this revenue shortfall. And the second one is that you have this situation where you have a lower load for a few months. How realistically it is possible that you can ask customer for this 0.7 billion contract that how about starting ramp maybe a couple of months early because you have capacity? Like, could this be a possibility or that is not really we should be looking for? Thank you.

I leave the gross margin to Davinda. Let me tackle the timing. As I said, this is a contract that's been in our backlog since the end of fiscal year 24. Those are fairly complex contracts as it relates to the deployment with the customer and the rollout and embedding it in the business processes of the utility. We have taken advantage of substantial planning on our side and on our customer side. And I feel fairly comfortable that the exit quarter is the one quarter where we'll be ramping and deploying it at full scale. But where we stand on the planning today, there are too many dependables that I don't see that this is a plan that can be accelerated substantially just because we have capacity. This is a firm plan that requires so many elements so that what we have depicted here is a good depiction of our revenue profile in 24, 26. And on the margin profile, obviously, when you miss $60 million of revenue, it has an impact, but Davinde can describe that a bit better.

Hi, Akash, happy to take that one. So I think of the gross margin level, you can assume kind of a normal, let's say, 35%. So if you take about a third of that at $20 million, but if that flows down, none of the OPEX would have really been affected by that. So what you would have seen at that point is a margin uplift on adjusted EBITDA that kind of moved pretty close, you know, to 15.5, 16%. So that's where that really does hurt us.

Thank you. Well, that was our final question. So that does conclude the Q&A session. I'll now hand back to management for closing remarks. Yeah.

Thank you for joining us today. Appreciate your time and interest in landing here. And I look forward to meeting all of you soon, either virtually or in person, in particular during the Capital Markets Day. Have a great one and goodbye.