Polestar Automotive Holding UK Limited

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Polestar Q1 2023 results conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1 1 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star 1 1 again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Brianna Flint. Please go ahead.

Thank you, operator. Hello, everyone. My name is Brianna Flint from Polestar Investor Relations. Thank you for joining our Q1 2023 results call. Before handing over to Thomas Singenlaas, our CEO, and Johan Malmqvist, our CFO, for their opening remarks, followed by analyst and shareholder questions, I will handle some housekeeping points. I would like to remind participants that many of our comments today will be considered forward-looking statements under U.S. securities laws and are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties that may cause pollsters' actual results to differ materially from what has been communicated. These forward-looking statements include but are not limited to statements regarding the future financial performance of the company, production and delivery volumes, financial and operating results outlook and guidance, macroeconomic industry trends, company initiatives, and other future events. Forward-looking statements made today are effective only as of today, and Polestar undertakes no obligation to update any of its forward-looking statements. For a discussion of some of the factors that could cause our actual results to differ, please review the risk factors section of the annual report on Form 20F filed with the SEC. In addition, management will make references to non-GAAP financial measures during this call. A discussion of why we use non-GAAP financial measures and information regarding reconciliation of our non-GAAP financial measures with our most directly comparable GAAP measures is in the investor update presentation issued earlier today. With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Thomas. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Bojana. The first quarter was a good example of the team's hard work and commitment. We have achieved record first quarter deliveries of 12,076 cars, up 26% year on year, and entered the second quarter of this year with good commercial momentum. I would like to spend a few moments reflecting on what has enabled this, the main things that set Polestar apart as a brand. As the first quarter shows, We are in the middle of a period of strong growth, creating a footprint across 27 markets that allows us to adapt our commercial operations to match supply and demand across the world. This is complemented by our stable production base with over 130,000 cars manufactured to date. We also have a well-balanced mix between retail and fleet customers. Our global partnership with Hertz supply 65 000 cars is working well and with a significant numbers out there this provides a fantastic opportunity for potential customers to experience our cars reflecting how we are maturing as a business we are starting to see our first repeat customers This is a significant step for our young brand, like us, as it reduces our reliance on only winning new customers. It also provides the foundation for our pre-owned business, creating another entry point for new customers. Recently, we introduced significant upgrades to Polestar 2, and I'm happy to say that it remains one of the top-selling bets in many markets across Europe, North America and Asia. The recently launched BST 230 Special Edition also pushes the boundaries of performance and has been very well received. Pulsar 3, our design-led electric performance SUV, had its debut in North America recently, where it generated very strong interest. We successfully unveiled Polestar 4, the latest example of our design and performance capability, a few weeks ago. We launched it in China and expect to start production in the fourth quarter. But we also received major interest around the world and we plan to start deliveries in other markets from mid 2024. In addition to design and innovation, sustainability is what the Polestar brand represents. It is our focus across all parts of the business, and we reduced our relative CO2 emissions per car sold by 8% in 2023, decoupling our emissions from sales growth. This is a foundation that we will continue to build Pulsar's premium luxury brand on. We are totally committed to this ambition and as such believe that price stability is important to our customers. Now, as you might have seen, Volvo Cars announced early today that they need additional time to complete the software development for the new all-electric platform, which is also the basis for our Polestar 3. This means that start of production in Chengdu, China is now expected in early 2024. Importantly, the start of manufacturing Polestar 3 in Charleston, USA is still on track for mid-2024, and the adjustments to Polestar 3 does not impact Polestar 4, as they are based on different platforms. We also acknowledge the tougher economic outlook for the automotive industry. And due to both of these reasons, we have adjusted our 23 global volume expectations to a range of 60,000 to 70,000 vehicles, representing an annual growth rate of 16% to 36%, following record deliveries of 51,491 cars last year. We have actively managed our cost base since mid-2022, but we need to do more. And that's why we are intensifying our efforts, including putting in place a group-wide hiring freeze and reducing our headcount by 10%. We're doing this in a structured way across all our markets while safeguarding our programs. These next necessary actions will benefit our cost base this year and more so in 2024. Now, I would like to ask Johann to comment on our financials. Thank you, Thomas.