Bouygues

Hello and welcome to the BWIG Q1 2025 Results Conference Call. Please note this conference is being recorded and for the duration of the call your lines will be on listen only. However, you'll have the opportunity to ask questions at the end of the presentation. This can be done by pressing star 1 on your telephone keypad to register your question. If you require assistance at any point, please press star 0 and you'll be connected to an operator. I will now hand you over to Frédéric Delaveau, Head of Investor Relations, to begin today's conference. Thank you.

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us for the presentation of Bouygues' first quarter 2025 results. This presentation will be led by Pascal Granger, Deputy CEO and CFO of Bouygues Group. Pascal Granger is accompanied by Christian Lecoq, CFO of Bouygues Telecom. Following their presentation, they will be answering your questions. Pascal, I give you the floor.

Thank you, Frédérique. Good morning, everyone. Before listing our highlights, I would like to point out that we had mentioned during the presentation of our 2024 results that the global microeconomic and geopolitical environment was uncertain. The first quarter of 2025 has not proven us wrong. Yet, I am pleased to say that we had a good start of the year. Therefore, first, we confirmed the group outlook for 2025. Second, group sales on COPPA in Q1 2025 were both up year on year. Third, excluding the exceptional income tax surcharge for large companies in France of 33 million euros, the net result attributable to the group was up year on year. I remind you that the effect on the net profit attributable to the Group of the French Finance Law and the Social Security Financing Law for the full year 2025, including mainly the exceptional income tax surcharge for large companies in France, had been estimated at around €100 million. This is still our evolution to date. and more than 40 million euros have already been recorded in the first quarter of 2025, having particularly strong distorting effects on the net result attributed to the group of the first quarter. Fourth, at the end of March 2025, our net debt was lower than at the end of March 2024, after acquisition of nearly 1.2 billion euros made over the year. Last, I have two comments on our business segments. At Equance level, COPPA increased by 44 million euros at 177 million euros and COPPA margin improved by 0.9 points reaching 3.8%. This increase demonstrates successful execution of the strategic performance plan. And in our construction businesses, the backlog at end March reached a new record level at 34.2 billion euros, up 3.8 billion euros year on year, and up 2 billion euros since end December 2024. Let's now have a look at our key figures on slide five. First, let me remind you that Like every year, mainly due to the seasonal nature of COLAS activities and to a lesser extent those of equants, Q1 results are not indicative of half-year and full-year results. This is particularly true this year for the net results attributable to the group, given the tax effects mentioned previously. Group sales stood at 12.6 billion euros, up 2.2% in the first quarter of 2025, compared to the first quarter of 2024. This increase was largely driven by Colas, Bouygues Construction and Bouygues Telecom, which recorded the sales contribution of La Poste Telecom. Like for like, on a constant exchange rate, group sales increased by 0.9%. In the first quarter of 2025, the group COPPA increased by 43 million euros compared to the first quarter of 2024 and reached 69 million euros. This increase was mainly led by Equance. The net result attributable to the group was minus 156 million euros. This amount is not comparable to that of the first quarter of 2024. as it includes an exceptional income tax surcharge for large companies in France of 33 million euros. Excluding this surcharge, on a comparable basis, the net result attributable to the group was up 23 million euros at minus 123 million euros. Net debt was 7.1 billion euros, an improvement of 645 million euros year on year. This is a good performance, even very good if we consider the amount of net acquisition made over the year, mainly including Brick Telecom's acquisition of La Paz Telecom for almost 1 billion euros. This is a theoretical vision. Of course, but without these acquisitions, our net debt would have improved by more than 1.8 billion euros year on year. Net debt at end March is always higher than at end December of the previous year due to the seasonality of our activities. The increase in net debt at end March compared to the level of 6.1 billion euros at end December 2024 was, however, more limited than one year ago. I will provide you more details about these figures later during this call. Let's now turn to the review of our operations on slide 8. Let's begin with the backlog in the construction businesses. As I mentioned during the introduction of this call, the backlog at end March 2025 was at a new record level of 34.2 billion euros, up 12% year on year. This strong year on year growth in the backlog was driven by both Bouygues Construction and Colas. Please note that all geographies represented on the chart, namely France, Europe excluding France, and international excluding Europe, contributed to the growth. Looking into details on slide nine, let's start with Colas backlog, which was up 1.3 billion year on year at 15.1 billion euros, with rail backlog up 18% year-on-year. In roads, the backlog was up 5% year-on-year, of which French and international backlogs were respectively up 5% and up 6% year-on-year. At end March 2025, the backlog to be executed in the current year and the next year were both at a higher level year on year, providing good visibility on our future activity. In Q1 2025, order intake at Colas stood at 4.1 billion euros. In Rhodes, order intake was up year on year, with a strong increase internationally and a slight decrease in France. In rail, new major contracts were awarded. notably in the UK, in order to operate and maintain the on-track machines used for track maintenance across Britain during eight years, a contract worth around 380 million euros. In Morocco, in order to develop the Kenitra Marrakech high-speed line, a contract worth around 250 million euros, to which is also added a contract for the related civil engineering. Moving to slide 10, at Wood Construction, the backlog stood at 18.3 billion euros, up 2.6 billion euros year on year, mainly driven by civil works with the exceptional contract one for the Torrens to Darrington project in Australia in the third quarter of 2024. In building, the French backlog was up 7% and the international backlog was down 3%. To be noted that the backlog to be executed in the current year and the next year were both at the higher level year on year, providing good visibility on future activity. The order intake in Q1 2025 stood at 2.3 billion euros and amounts largely driven by the normal course of business, which means for brick construction, the contracts worth less than 100 million euros. New major contracts were awarded in Q1, for example, for the building of the mother-child unit at Rennes Teaching Hospital in France, a contract worth around 100 million euros, or for the building of the college campus Cardiff and Vail in the UK, a contract worth around 140 million euros, or a data center in France, a contract worth around 110 million euros, or the modernization of airports in Cyprus, worth around 120 million euros. The diversity of these new contracts highlights the know-how of buoy constriction in specific business lines such as healthcare infrastructure, academic buildings, airport facilities, or data centers. Finally, at Bouygues Immobilier, the backlog was at €0.9 billion at end March 2025, a low level reflecting the still changing market environment. Let's have a look at sales on slide 11. The construction businesses recorded results which, like every year, due to seasonality, are not indicative of the first half of the full year results. Sales were up 3% year-on-year and 2% like-for-like at constant exchange rates. First, at Colas, sales were up 3% year-on-year at 2.7 billion euros driven by rail, up 12%, reflecting the momentum in relation to demand for self-mobility infrastructure. Roads were up 2%, with France up 2%, INEA up 6%, Asia-Pacific strongly up 29%, and North America down 9%. Second, brick construction sales were up 3% year on year, at 2.5 billion euros, driven by international building up 13%, while civil works were slightly up and France building was slightly down. Last, at Bouygues Immobilier, sales were up also year-on-year at €0.3 billion, with residential property up 4% and commercial property remaining at a very low level, reflecting the market situation. Next slide. Current operating results from activities of the construction businesses. was minus 240 million euros, improving 24 million euros compared to Q1 2024, driven by BRIC construction and the lower loss at BRIC immobilier level in relation to an adjustment of structure costs implemented in 2024. Please note that in Q1 2024, BRIC immobilier has also reviewed some operations and booked some provisions. COPPA at good construction was up compared to Q1 2024 with a 0.4 points COPPA margin improvement. As usual, Colas had a non-representative minus €305 million current operating result from activities and amounts very comparable to Q1 2024 figure. Let's now turn to the review of operations for Equance on slide 14. Equance continues to deliver significantly improved results in line with its roadmap. Equance backlog was up 1% year-on-year at 26.4 billion euros at end March 2025. The order intake in the first three months of 2025 stood at 5.2 billion euros, with still a gradual improvement in the order intake margin, highlighting notably positive impacts of the pricing lever of the PERFORM plan. Sales were globally stable year on year in Q1 2025, reflecting both the continued selective approach to contract strategy, overall positive market trends, and some wait and see stands in the short term in a few activities in France and Europe. France sales were down 3% year-on-year, and international sales were up 2% year-on-year, despite the ongoing exit from the new-built business in the UK that we mentioned in the previous publications. Equance's contribution to the group COPPA represented €177 million with a 3.8% COPPA margin, up 0.9 points year-on-year. This is a very good start for the year. To end with Equance on slide 15, let me just add that in 2025, Equance will continue to roll out its strategic plan and its targeting. Continued organic growth at a lower pace than in 2024 due to some weight insistence in the short term in a few activities in France and Europe, as previously mentioned. A margin from activities close to 4%, possibly slightly higher. And a cash conversion rate before working capital requirement of between 80% and 100%. As a reminder, ACONS aims to gradually catch up with the organic growth of sector peers and to achieve a margin from activities of 5% in 2027. I now give the floor to Christian Lecoq for a detailed presentation of BookTelecom.

Thank you Pascal and good morning everyone. Turning to slide 17, let's start with a few comments on BookTelecom's growth strategy in 6 with strong actions undertaken during the first quarter. First, convinced that our customers deserve the best of technology, Book Telecom has been the first operator to discontinue the marketing of ADSL and Wi-Fi 5 in France in the first quarter of 2025, and to enhance its BNU Pure Fibre offer in Wi-Fi 7, a unique proposal in the market. Committed to ensure customer satisfaction through transparency and quality of service, Book Telecom is the first operator in Europe to publish performance metrics and technical support on a daily basis with, for example, over 90% of technical support calls being answered in less than one minute and over 80% of appointments to resolve incidents scheduled within 24 hours. Last, I would like to remind you that, according to RCEP, BookTelecom is the operator with the lowest Sticks Complaint Await in France for five successive years in a row. On slide 18, our commercial performance has remained this quarter solid and fixed, both in volume and value, with a favorable momentum observed for big and B&U-per-feet browsers. As you can see on the left side of the slide, we had a total 5.2 million fixed customers at end-March 2025. This represents an increase of 69,000 customers in Q1. FTTH continued to experience strong growth with 148,000 new customers during the first quarter. With a total of 4.3 million customers, FTTH customers represented 83% of our fixed customer base, up from 75% one year ago. This is the result of a wider FTTH footprint, combined with the excellent quality of our network and services. The momentum remains good on value, with fixed EBPU up 0.7 euros year-on-year, at 33.2 euros per clients and per months. Commercial performance in mobile was also solid, as you can see on slide 19, and the initial results from BIG's authors are satisfactory, both in terms of acquisitions and churn. At end March 2025, Brooks Telecom had 18.3 million mobile plan customers, including M2M, thanks to 63,000 new customers in Q1. As of this quarter, we present the mobile eBPU including Lapos Telecom as shown on the right side of the slide at 17.5 euros per client and per month. In the still competitive market on the low-end segment, with low prices for new customers, mobile eBPU excluding Lapos Telecom was at 18.6 euros per client and per month. Let's have a look at the key figures on slide 20. First, we achieved 6% growth in sales bills to customers year-on-year. They were up 1%, including La Poste Telecom, and driven by fixed. Total sales were up 5% year-on-year, on which 2% rose in other sales. EBITDA after leasing decreased by 14 million euros compared to Q1 2024, on which This change is explained by, first, a growth in sales built to customers and outgoing efforts to control costs. Second, a higher e-fair tax on mobile sites. And third, higher energy costs due to the end of very favorable edging conditions. The current operating profit from activities was down 29 million euros at 101 million euros, reflecting the decrease in EBDA after leases associated with the increase in DNA in line with our CAPEX trajectory. Last, you can notice that gross CAPEX was 394 million euros in Q1 2025, and that these investments reached 38 million euros with the disposal of some data centers. Moving to slide 21, Book Telecom's 2025 targets are a slight increase in self-build to customers versus 2024, like for like, excluding La Poste Telecom, to which is added the contribution from La Poste Telecom. Broadly stable EBITDA after leases compared to 2024, as in 2025, Book Telecom will no longer benefit from the very favorable low-edged energy prices launched in 2020 and 2021. I remind you that La Poste Telecom's contribution to EBD after leases will be limited in 2025, with the full effect expected from 2028. And last, a gross capital expenditure of around 1.5 billion euros excluding frequencies, including expenditure related to the preparation for the migration of La Poste Telecom mobile customers. And now, Pascal, I'm giving you back the floor.

Thank you, Christian. Turning to slide 23, let's talk briefly about TF1's results, which were released on the 1st of April. First, the TF1 group maintained its audience leadership in the first quarter of 2025. The total audience share among women under 50 who are purchasing decision makers was at 33%, and the total ADN share among individuals aged from 25 to 49 was at 30.1%. In the first quarter of 2025, total sales were up 2% year on year. Media sales increased 2% year on year, with stable advertising revenues and a continued strong growth momentum for TF1+, up 37% year-on-year. Studio TF1, the new name of New One Studios, posted stable revenues year-on-year, including a 9 million euros contribution from GPG and less significant production deliveries during the quarter. COPPA amounted to 43 million euros, up 6 million euros year on year, and COPPA margin was 8.3% in Q1 2025 versus 7.3% in Q1 2024. The programming costs remain in the first quarter 2025 similar to the level of the first quarter 2024 at 221 million euros with premium programming maintained for both linear and streaming. Turning to slide 24, I will end on TFN Group by saying that in an advertising market with a very limited visibility, TF1 Group's objectives for 2025 are a strong double digit revenue growth in digital, a broadly stable margin from activities compared to 2024, and on the dividend side, aiming for a growing dividend policy in the coming years. I will now turn our attention on the financial statements on slide 26, starting with the PMR. We have already discussed first quarter sales and current operating profit from activities at the beginning of this call. Let me add a few comments this morning. First point, PPA was minus 29 million euros and a month slightly higher than in first quarter 2024 in relation to the acquisition of TPJ with TF1 and La Poste Telecom with BRIC Telecom. Second point, other operating income and expenses which do not reflect operational activity were negative at 19 million euros in the first quarter. This amount is largely linked to non-current charges in relation to the Equence Management Incentive Plan, which represented 25 million euros and to a lesser extent to non-current income at Bouygues Telecom for nine million euros. Third point, financial results, which comprises cost of net debt, interest, expenses and lease obligations and other financial income and expenses stood at minus 97 million euros compared to minus 74 million euros in Q1 2024. This change is mainly due to the impact of the post telecom acquisition on the decrease in the return on cash in relation to lower interest rates. This decrease being however mitigated by an increase of the average cash over the period. Fourth point, a tax charge was recorded from 21 million euros in relation to higher operational results. This amount excludes the 42 million euros of exceptional income tax surcharge for large companies in France. First point, the effect of the tax surcharge on the net result to the group was 33 million euros, leading to this result to reach minus 156 million euros. Let's now turn to slide 27. to describe the net debt evolution between end December 2024 and end March 2025. As you see, net debt increased by around 1 billion euros since the end of 2024. This negative change is usual and related to the seasonality of our activities. The good news is that the magnitude of the increase in the net debt is lower than that of last year, which was 1.5 billion euros. This increase includes first acquisition net of disposals, totaling minus 84 million euros, including small acquisitions at Colas, investments in joint ventures at Bouygues Telecom, and purchase of TF1 shares. capital transactions and other for 9 million euros, including exercise of stock options on the liquidity contract. And last, minus 939 million euros from operations that I will comment in the next slide. Turning to the breakdown of operations for the first quarter of 2025 on slide 28, you can observe that first, Net cash flow, including lease expenses, stood at 421 million euros, an improvement of 89 million euros compared to first quarter 2024. Second, net capex was 500 million euros, a lower amount compared to first quarter 2024, and a decrease largely explained by lower net capex at BRIC Telecom. And third, you can see on the chart, that the change in working capital requirements models stood at minus 860 million euros, a usual negative change for Q1 due to seasonality, though less negative compared to first quarter 2024. I will now turn our attention to the group financial structure on slide 29. The group maintain a very high level of liquidity at 14.8 billion euros, which comprise 3.8 billion euros in cash and equivalents, and 11 billion euros in undrawn medium and long-term credit facilities. Net debt was 7.1 billion euros at the end of March 2025, a strong improvement compared to end March 2024, even stronger if we take into account the amount of acquisitions over the year. As such, net gearing was 50% at end March 2025, an improvement compared to 55% at end March 2024. You can see from the chart on the right that the debt maturity schedule is well spread over the time. I remind you that our next bond redemption is in October, 2026. Last, I would say the group benefits from a strong, we would say that the group benefits from a particularly strong position and that our financial credit rating remains strong. I will now conclude this presentation on slide 31 by saying that in a very uncertain global environment, we confirmed the group outlook for 2025. That is to target for 2025 a slight increase in sales and in current operating profit from activities versus 2024. The effect of the French finance law on the Social Security Financing Law for 2025 on the net profit attributable to the group are estimated to date at around 100 million euros. Thank you for your attention. Operator, please open the floor for questions.

Thank you, sir. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question or make a contribution on today's call, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. If you change your mind and want to withdraw your question, please press star two. And please ensure your lines are unmuted locally, as you'll be prompted when to ask your question. Our first question comes from Molly Whitcomb from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Hi, good morning. I have two questions, please. Firstly, I was wondering if you could give us a little bit of color around the telecoms market at the moment in mobile and fixed and any pricing pressure that you may or may not be seeing. And my second question is on equines trends. Could you give us a little bit more context on how synergy extraction is going and margin improvement? What kind of trends are you seeing in terms of order book margins? A little bit more detail on that would be fantastic. Thank you.

Thank you for your question. I will answer the telecom question. First, at the mobile market, we observed the mobile market remains less dynamic than previous years. with a small growth in Q1. Concerning the low-end part of the mobile market, we observed a sustained competition on this low-end segment during the first quarter, and we started an upward trend on TOWIS with a recession-free at the beginning of the quarter. The last player decided to not follow us and so that's why this low end part of the market is still very competitive. On high end, I remind you that we have implemented a new marketing strategy N24 to enhance customer satisfaction and reduce our churn level. And we observed during this first quarter good results on our big offer, with good sales dynamic and always a decrease in churn. But this good result will give us an impact in turnover in the medium term. Regarding the fixed, the market is still good. We are taking market share and our BPU is still growing. We are delivering a profitable growth thanks to the excellent quality of our networks and our boxes. So that's a very, very good position. I will manual that in the fixed business we are getting market share in rural areas because we were not in these areas in the past with ESL and we are now taking market share in these rural areas with FTTH.

But concerning Equant, we have, as you mentioned, It's like we have implemented at Equance level a PERFORM plan where there are different levels in order to improve the profitability of Equance, which are, for instance, how the pricing is made in the different contracts and how the the purchasing is done. Obviously, we had some non-performance business centers which we are restructuring and lastly we have some projectivity to reach in certain areas for certain type of projects and all these levels are gradually implemented in the whole perimeter of Equance and this induce that first we have a gradual improvement in our margin backlog but considering that this has to be very gradual because you know when you have a long-term relationship a relationship with the client you can't improve your margin very rapidly you have to be to be very gradual and this is the reason why when we guided on what will be the future margin of equants, we said that we had a path to go from the initial level which was 2.3% to 5% in 2027. We consider that all things already implemented at Equance improve gradually the margin. You have seen that we are quite optimistic on the margin for 2025. As we have added, that probably will be, we said previously that we will wear Our machine informatics should be close to 4% and we have added that possibly we will be slightly higher, so that's fairly good news and we are on track to obtain what we get. We are quite positive on that.

Can I just follow up, sorry, on the second question on equines? Can I just check that the guidance that you've given, you're not seeing any impact in terms of tariffs that might change your level of confidence for achieving those margins?

No, in fact, it It's not the impact of tariffs because we're producing a lot of things locally. In the U.S., we are quite local. The question is more what is the global economic environment and how confident are the economic actors in this role than a direct effect on our P&L.

Okay, very clear. Thank you very much.

The next question comes from a line of Carlos from . Please go ahead.

Hi, everyone. Thank you for the presentation and for taking my question. I have a quick one also on equines. As you said, you're slightly improving your 2025 outlook to possibly slightly higher than 4%. Do you believe that we could see another outlook improvement in the following quarters? And considering that you have an updater, your 2027 view, do you see any upside for that target as well? Thank you.

We prefer to remain very prudent when we change a guidance. We are not in a situation where we intend to change our guidance until now. We are improving gradually our margin. We know that there is room for improvement due to the different levers I mentioned previously. We consider very favorably how the market evolves because we see that our peers are performing very well too. We consider that in the medium-long term, we will reach levels which would be comparable to our peers. The customer relationship is very important in this business. Going too fast could be a real problem. So we prefer to remain very gradual.

Extremely clear. Thank you.

The next question comes from Rohit Modi from Citi. Please go ahead.

Hi, thanks for the opportunity. A couple from my side. Firstly, a follow-up from Molly's question around the tariff impact. I believe you mentioned that there's no impact on the equines. Can you also confirm if there's no impact on the construction side of business, given there's some equipment that you still source, I believe, from Europe? Just a bit of comment on that. Second question on telecom margins, EBITDA margins particularly, if you can confirm excluding the impact of energy tax and LaPosay, if the margins were stable or growing or declining, any color on that would be really, really helpful. And lastly, apologies for bringing this topic again, but we have seen a lot of news in the past few months around trends consolidation and bugs being involved. If you can give any comment around that, it would be really, really helpful. Thank you.

Considering your frustration about equipment you could import, in fact, in the U.S., You know, it's a second-range issue for us. We are globally local where we work in the construction activities and the equine activities. The main subject is really the global economic environment. And this is the reason why we have mentioned that we consider the environment as very uncertain in reality. Every day we read the newspapers and we have some news from the US. So it's obviously something which is very important for our activities. We need, obviously, confidence. The second subject is for Christian Lecoq.

Regarding the EBDA margin, the impact of energy costs for this quarter is around 20 million euros. The impact of E-fair tax is around a bit less than 10, 9 million euros exactly. Regarding the margin, I remind you of two things. First, La Poste Telecom will have a dilutive impact until the end of the migration of the mobile client to the Telecoms network. We are still paying wholesale costs to SFR in 2025. Second point, the fact that our turnover growth is coming from the fixed business as also a dilutive impact because in the fixed business we went the network, we do not own the network, the fixed network, and so the EBITDA margin in the fixed is lower than the EBITDA margin in the mobile. So two reasons, excluding energy and E-fair tax, First, La Poste Telecom, and second, growth in the fixed business.

As far as the consolidation is concerned, in fact, we read the newspapers, as you do certainly, and we have seen that probably the debt restructuring of Altice is on track, and this is... an event which is very important for Altice but doesn't change anything for us. In this context, we have read a lot of things about the consolidation. I remind you that a lot of attempts have been done in the past in this respect. This is a very complex issue and regulatory issues, competition issues, commercial issues, nothing substantial to say at that stage.

Thank you so much.

A quick reminder, if you'd like to join the queue for questions, Please press star 1 on your keypad. The next question comes from the line of Eric Ravary from CIC. Please go ahead.

Yes, good morning. Three questions from my side. First one is on equine, so you mentioned some market segments slowing down in Q1. Could you be a bit more specific and what are the trends that you see for these segments for the rest of the year? On Colas, we've seen a fall of the oil prices over the last month. So are you observing also a fall in the betterment prices and could it have a temporary positive impact on the Colas margins in the next quarters? And last question is on BRIC Telecom. So Christian, you mentioned that the fixed EBPU is still growing, but the growth rate slowed down in Q1 compared with 2024 at plus 2%. Shall we expect for the rest of the year the growth rate of the EBPU to continue to slow down with the new pricing that you introduced? Thank you.

I will start with Equance. Considering Equance, we can give two examples, for instance, considering the latency mode I mentioned previously. The first one is, for instance, factories for batteries, where you have seen that probably we are sure that the vehicles will be electric in a few years, but the pace of growth of this market is lower than expected, and this induces some difficulties for certain actors of that market. For instance, the North World issue. The second example is probably data centers. The pipe is just fantastic, but we are in a period where actors are slowing a bit their decision because first there is the issue on the US policy, industrial policy in the US, which could modify where they have to invest, but they haven't decided. Secondly, you know that in terms of technology, we have a new technology that is now very promising, which is the liquid cooling technology, and a lot of factors are reflected. have to decide if they maintain their original project or they move to this new technology of liquid cooling. So for all these reasons we are very confident on how the market will evolve in the future. But we see in our turnover during the first quarter that there is a wait and see situation. Concerning Colas, we have learned a lot about inflation in 2022. and we have negotiated in our contracts in order to be protected against evolution of bitumen but that's the good news we are protected but the consequences the consequence is that when the bitumen decrease this decrease our cost but this decrease also our turnover that said We have a collapse level plan in order to improve margin, and you have seen that during the past years, year after year, we are improving our margin, and we are not at the end of this story. We are on track on that plan.

Yes, we have observed already a strong growth in our fixed EBPU over the past two years, catching up with the market EBPU. So today, three points to have in mind. First, like in mobile, we stopped to reprice our clients. in mobile and also in the fixed business. And so, of course, the growth on fixed ABPU will be lower in the next coming years. Second point to have in mind, we are working to increase our ABPU. For example, the fact that we are following our decision to cease the commercialization of DSL and Wi-Fi 5, We have adapted our fixed offer to incorporate new technologies and we have increased our prices. For example, we offered to our clients to move from our Wi-Fi 5 bucks to Wi-Fi 7 bucks, for example, by paying 3 euros more. So positive impact, we could have a positive impact coming from that. Last point, you know that we launched our BNU Pure Fibre offer at the end of 2024. This offer is not cannibalizing our existing clients, neither the acquisition of the quarter. And thanks to that, we have a good momentum in volume. But at the same time, as the BNU pure fiber tariffs are lower than the normal tariffs, I will say, this could have a small impact on our fixed CBPU in the next quarter. So to conclude on that, I will say that... our fixed ABPU will continue to grow in 2025, but you are right to say that it should be at a slower pace than in previous years.

Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Nicolas Cot-Colisson from HSBC. Please go ahead.

Well, hi. I've got a few questions. Just a follow-up from Christian's answer on the ABPU in fixed So would you say that now we are down to close to 2% growth is mainly driven by stopping repricing clients for this quarter? I hear what you say for the coming quarters, but I was more interested for Q1. So is it the lack of pricing this quarter that leads to a slowdown in growth? And back to your comments on the macro environment. both at equants or looking at the backlog in the construction on the international side of things. Do you think it's more an issue of clients not taking decisions right now, or are you also seeing some pricing pressure leading to adopt a more selective approach from your side? And my very last question, housekeeping, just on the working cap, I'm not trying to read too much into the number in Q1, but Just to check on equals, there's a big swing for Q1. It's a positive number when usually we have a slight negative number for Q1. So is there anything that has changed there or we should just shrug and ignore it? Thank you.

so first on the fixed bpu yes uh nicola usually when we uh we did repricing in in the past it was in q1 so uh we did not do that we didn't do that this year and so yes this has a negative impact uh probably maybe one one other point if you look at uh Q1 ABPU compared to Q4 2024 ABPU, you will see that the ABPU is down 0.2 U compared to the last quarter, Q4 2024. It was mainly due to a drop in non-recurring elements in Q1 compared to Q4. We had a high level of new customers in Q4, and so we had some activation fees, more activation fees that we have taken in our BPU in Q4, more activation fees in Q4 than in Q1. This is the impact, the main impact, if you look at the difference on fixed BPU Q1 compared to Q4. Regarding the next quarter, I don't know what will be the trend. It will depend on the results of our BMU-Percy broker.

Of course. Thank you.

If you consider your question regarding equants, the first question obviously when you are being selective have an impact on our margin. You know that, for instance, we have decided to withdraw from the market a new building in the UK because we consider that the margin was not possible to have the good margin in that sector. Having said that, Obviously we have a double impact, which is we try to improve margin, but you know that the different actors in the market are aiming for margins which are at a level which is comparable or higher than the one we have to date. of our customers on pricing, but as we have a lot of competencies and the kind of scarcity in resources in that market, we are quite confident that we can continue to improve our margins. Concerning the working capital, you knew perfectly when we bought Equance. I would say that we said that, I don't know if everyone has believed us when we were saying that, that we had room for improvement on working capital at the Quants level, and we implement policies gradually in order to improve that, and there is no specific issue of the first quarter explaining that the working capital improved this quarter compared to Having said that, you have to know that it's quite difficult to modelize working capital requirements for construction activities. But in the same way, it's quite difficult to do so at Equance level. But a lot of pressure is put on that subject at all levels of organization in Equance. Same way in other entities of the group, by the way.

Eric, if I may just ask a follow-up. On the lower backlog in construction on the international side of things, is there any region that is driving this, or is it more a general effect?

Sorry? No.

For building activities, you mean? Yeah. No, you know... You know, our building activities is mainly realized with big projects. So, you know, order intake of one quarter for our construction activities makes simply no sense. We have to consider the backlog, which is very good, which secures the next year and the year after. And then we have projects in the future. in the pipe, so we are not anxious at all on that subject. But as a matter of fact, when you have an important order intake one quarter, for instance, the first quarter in 2024, it's not the reason to have the same level of order intake one year after. a quarter is a very short period for these kind of activities.

And sorry, maybe you misunderstood, but it was more on the backlog for international building, but I hear what you say.

Sorry, I have not understood your question, sorry.

No, no, no, I was more referring to the backlog for international building, the minus 3%.

But I get your answer. It's not significant at this stage. Activities for next year, this year and next year are very well secured, so we are not anxious at all about that movement. It could go up next quarter or not, but no anxiety at all for next year and the year after to bring Okay, that's perfect.

Thank you for that.

Thank you. The next question comes from Nicholas Mora from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

Yes, good morning, gentlemen. Just a couple of for me. Just on the cross, in the release, it seems you hint to a slightly better performance at the revenue level to the next few quarters. I was just wondering what would give you that kind of confidence, especially taking into account the bit of the wait and see from customers. And especially in France, we see so Q1 is down three. Some of your peers, but not all of them were so down. It seems the outlook is relatively challenging. That's the first one. And then on Equance, on international also, You're still growing in Q1. Where are you growing? Which geographies? Just if you could shed a little bit of color. Third one on CODAS. What are you seeing in France? The order intake is slowing a little bit, but you had good momentum in 24. You're still seeing good activity ahead of the municipal election. And the U.S., where you had, on the flip side, a very poor order in 2024, and the revenues are still under pressure. Is there a silver lining there? And last point on coal and steel, rail continues to grow three, four times the road business. Is there a margin mix impact there, or basically you do the same margin in rail and road, and we should not care too much about this? That would be it.

OK. Starting with your last question about COLAS, firstly, in fact, our margin in road construction and road construction on rail are quite equivalent, so no mixed impact to anticipate at this stage. I could add that, you know, Generally speaking, in average, our rail contracts are bigger and longer than contracts in our road activity. So when we increase our backlog, the execution of these contracts will be executed during periods which will be far longer, which is good news because we have to sign the contract also to realize it and the increase in activity will be lower than the increase in the backlog on the shorter term. That's the first question. The second question is concerning COLAS is about US. Effectively, we have seen an important improvement of the backlog of the US activities. And so we are now quite optimistic on the activity in the US. The third question related to COLAS was the order in France. You know, there is a good news. We know that probably after the local... There is a cycle for activities in France and before the local election we have an increase in the activity. We have this improvement and the good news is the fact that we are now not too far from this election. I think it's March 2026 and the backlog remains quite good. We probably will have a slowdown after, but we don't see that at the moment. So that's fairly good news. I think I have answered all your questions about Colas. I will move to Equance. You know, how will be the growth? Obviously, we have a 0% growth during the first quarter, which is the effect of our selectivity. We have decided to be selective, and added to that, we have a wait-and-see mode that I explained previously. This is the reason why we have mentioned that probably the pace will be lower than the one we have in 2024. We have a lot of things in the pipe. Effectively, we don't know precisely when the wait-and-see mode will change. We'll see. The trends are good in all these activities. what it will be in 2025. We will see quarter after quarter.

There are no further questions, so I hand you back to Pascal Granger for closing remarks.

Thank you for your question and for joining us today. We will be announcing our year 2025 results on 31st of July 2025. Should you have any questions, please contact our investor relations team. Their contact information is on the press release on our website. Thank you very much.

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