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Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Draegerwerk full year 2024 earnings conference call. I'm Sandra, the course call operator. I would like to remind you that all participants have been listened only more than the conference has been recorded. The presentation will be followed by a Q&A session. You can register for questions at any time by pressing star and one on your telephone. For operator assistance, please press star and zero. The conference must not be recorded for publication or broadcast. At this time, it's my pleasure to hand over to Stefan Dreger, CEO. Please go ahead, sir.

Yes, good afternoon, and thank you for joining our conference call on our financial results for the fiscal year 2024. I have with me today Gertard Biclesko, CFO, as well as Tom Fischler and Nikolaus Hammerschmidt, both investor relations. We would like to take you through the results of the presentation that we made available on our webpage this morning. Following the presentation, we will open the floor to your questions. Let's get started on page five for the business highlights. 2024 was a successful year for Drieger with a robust business performance and a significant improvement in profitability. While net sales were slightly below our expectations, we maintained a strong performance achieving around 3.4 billion matching the prior year figure. This is an outstanding achievement, considering that we benefited from strong catch-up effects in 23, driven by the improved delivery capabilities and assertion demand for ventilators in China. And importantly, although business in China fell in 24 by almost half, to what it was in 23, we successfully compensated its impact through substantial growth in the rest of the world, highlighting the resilience and adaptability of our business. Our EBIT increased by 28 million euros to 194 million, thanks to our operating business, and also supported by one-off effects totaling around 22 million. With earnings growing stronger than last year, our EBIT margin increased from 4.9% to 5.8% in the full year, ending just above our expectations. Our order intake also developed positively and exceeded the high level of the prior year at around $3.4 billion. This underlines the sustained demand for our technology for life and gives us confidence for the future. Following our dividend policy, we are going to distribute around 30% of group net profit to our shareholders, resulting in another dividend increase. I will come back to this topic at the end of our presentation. Improving profitability remains our primary focus. In the medium term, We want to contribute to this by strengthening our innovative power and expanding our business model with expertise in the areas of interoperability and systems business. In the prior year, we promoted the implementation of these goals by introducing more innovations. These included important product approvals, such as our new VISTA patient monitoring system and our updated BabyLeo TN500 open care warmers. among others. Moreover, we started with the implementation of our new site concept in Germany. I'll comment this in a few minutes. Regarding our FDA warning letter, the expected FDA inspection in ANOVA has taken place in November, and it did not reveal any formal deficiencies. That's to say, no FDA Form 483 was issued, and that means zero findings. We are awaiting the final list of the warning letter from FDA, even if it is currently not foreseeable when this will take place. Due to the restructuring within the FDA, processing appears to be delayed. In terms of sustainability, we achieved several milestones in 24. On the one hand, an executive board department for sustainability and quality has been created, which is headed by our new board member, Stephanie Hirsch, since July 24. On the other hand, we have defined three focus areas to implement our sustainability strategy. Let's take a closer look at this on the following pages. So, we come to page six, Dräger's impact on people and environment. Ladies and gentlemen, for us, our guiding principle is technology for life. This means that we take responsibility. It gives greater meaning to our work and creates a sustainable foundation for our business model. We are aware that we have a footprint. Of course we do. And we believe that the overall positive aspect of the footprint is larger than the negative footprint. The result of our being, our existence in the world, is overall positive. On the one hand, we improve healthcare with our medical technology and help sick people heal with our devices and services. On the other hand, occupational safety all over the world, we help with our safety technology. And the purpose of technologies for life gives our work a greater meaning and makes us an attractive employer. And we reinforce this part, the S on the ESG, by offering employees fair pay in addition to reliable and meaningful employment. We also make a positive contribution on the local and global cost domestic products, the salaries, the taxes, the earnings that we pay out. Around 10% of our net sales is invested in research and development. On the other hand, here the left side of the clock, we need resources for our products that are not yet returned to a complete material cycle. We also contribute to climate change as part of our business activities, and our employees are exposed to risk of accident and work and unequal treatment. We also cannot rule out human rights and environmental risks completely. Without ignoring the negative effects on people and the environment, we therefore say we love our footprint. What we also say is there is no sustainability without profitability and vice versa. Our focus therefore remains on our corporate acceptance number one, namely improving profitability. Our goals remain to increase the EBIT margin by an average of one percent point every year. Now let's turn to the next sustainability page seven, the strategy. With this strategy, we're concentrating our efforts on focus topics in the areas of environmental society, customer and products, and company and employees. In these three areas is our aim to improve along measurable targets. We are certain that no lasting of economic progress can be achieved without social environmental sustainability in our supply chains and vice versa. Our main goal in the field of environment and society is to reach a CO2 neutrality by the year 2045. To this end, we are actively involved in reducing scope one, two, and three emissions. Moreover, we are promoting environmentally friendly and socially responsible business practices by establishing sustainable supply chains. In the field of customer and products, we want to develop new products according to the equal design criteria and aim to lower their CO2 footprint. We approach the overarching principle of a closed circular economy through material reduction in the area of product and transport packaging and through individual pilot studies and actions as part of product development. This enables us to consciously expand our portfolio of environmentally friendly products and services, offering sustainable solutions to our customers. Furthermore, we support the environmental and cost objectives of our customers through innovative and efficient methods. When it comes to company and employees, one of our main goals is to get them the last time incident rate below four points by implementing our Vision Zero program. Hence, we focus on securing employee loyalty and commitment through greater workplace safety and the promotion of health. We also want to strengthen diversity, reaching a female share of 30% in management positions by 2035. We will continue to develop training programs in order to prepare our employees for any future challenges. Now, please turn to page eight. Ladies and gentlemen, when I talk about profitability and sustainability, I also have to mention our new location strategy in Germany, which aims to optimize resource utilization for domestic operations. Currently, we have 17 sales and service hubs nationwide employing around 2000 people. These facilities act as basis for our field service teams and serve as training facilities for our German customers. In addition, there are also so-called customer project locations. That's to say locations that reside from individual contractual relationship with the customer. In recent years, our space requirements have changed. Digital collaboration has grown due to the coronavirus pandemic and has integrated new forms of work into everybody's life. We are therefore examining the extent to which we can consolidate locations in order to use them more effectively and meet future requirements. We want to create an attractive, future-proof working environment, taking into account the trend towards more mobile working. We are creating locations that are equipped for the future and whose premises are adapted to working methods. At the same time, we keep our focus on the customer. As part of the new concept, we will close eight locations out of the 17 by 26 and make changes such as downsizing at four other locations in addition. We are planning to do this for the existing workforce. Our aim is to improve services for our employees and customers. Of course, there will be some savings from rental and ancillary costs, which amount to around €1 million per year. But our focus is on a qualitative benefit. This includes an improved performance for our customers through the expansion and modernization of our academy capacities and space, as well as the digitalization of the range of workshops and improved processing and capacity management through centralization of the workshops. The full savings per year will become effective for the first time in 27. In addition, there are further indirect costs, for instance, complexity reduction. This more needs-based use of our resources will also contribute to more sustainability at Stringer. Ladies and gentlemen, before I hand over to Gerd Hartwig for the financials, I would like to elaborate on our strategic goals in the area of defense and security on page nine. The start of the Russian war against Ukraine has ushered in a new era and dramatically changed the security situation. Expenditure on modernizing our armed forces is therefore being significantly increased. This is a development that will also affect us. Just as the German army is defending our national borders, we also have a mission. We protect those who protect us. We do this with our technology for life. In other words, products that protect, support, and save people's lives. We already have trusting relationships with important defense authorities, public clients, and as their supplier, also the producers of military equipment. Our aim is to systematically develop these relationships further and to position ourselves as a partner and solution provider in the context of strategic defense programs. In this way, we want to drive forward the structured expansion of our market position. Unlike in the past, we now have considerable project inquiries and offers in the pipeline, although it's not always certain whether these will actually materialize. These seals also have very long lead times. Nevertheless, our prospects are very promising because we can use our unique expertise and skills, which have made us one of the world's leading manufacturers of safe technology. As part of its 24 national security and defense strategy, the German government has defined key technologies that we have been covering in our product portfolio for many years. This includes, for example, breathing air monitoring and supply for military vehicles, sensor technology, and space protection, as well as our personal NBC protections. Our total net sales in the defense business are currently still below the 100 million euro threshold. However, due to the changed security situation, we expect a substantial increase in the coming years, as we believe that our sales team in this area will be able to more than triple by 2028. I turn over to Gerd Hartwig, who will explain our business development in more detail. I will then turn to the dividend and outlook. Gerd Hartwig, please.

Thank you, Stefan. I would like to extend also a warm welcome to everyone joining this conference call for our results for the fiscal year 2024. Please turn to page 11 for a real view on the Draeger Group. As usual, I will be stating currency-adjusted figures whenever referring to growth rate. As Stefan mentioned, demand for our technology for life remains strong. Overall orders increased by 3.4% to around 3.4 billion, with growth in both divisions. In the APEC region, demand declined due to the challenging market conditions in China, impacting almost all Western tech supplies. However, growth in other regions allowed us to compensate for this downturn. In Q4, order intake increased by 8.6%, supported by both divisions and across all regions. Net sales remained robust at around 3.4 billion, matching the level of the previous year despite the known base effects like higher order backlog in the prior year. Net of currency effects net sales increased by 0.5%. thanks to the growth in the safety division, which compensated the decline in the medical division. In nominal terms, net sales of the group were stable at around 0.1% below the prior year figure. In Q4, net sales increased by 2.6% to around 1.1 billion, driven by growth in both divisions and all regions except EMEA. Benefiting from favorable pricing and reduced quality costs, among other factors, our group's gross profit margin rose by 1.6 percentage points to 44.9% at the end of the year. Functional expenses increased by 1.8% in 2024. This resulted, in particular, from the increase in personnel expense owing to higher employee figures and remunerations. but also the one-off effects had a positive effect on expense development. As Stefan mentioned, our earnings were positively affected by one-off effects of around €22 million. With around €15 million, the impact in our safety division was stronger than in our medical division with around €7 million. The total one-off effects consists of positive one-off effects totaling approximately €37 million, offset by negative one-off effects of around 15 million euros. The positive one-off effects largely included the sale of a local non-core division in the Netherlands and the sale of real estate in the US in the second quarter. These sales amounted to around 20 million in total. In addition, the positive one-off effects included the sale of a building in Spain in the third quarter of around 10 million euros. Around 32 million of the one-off effects are included in the functional expenses. The adverse effects include the depreciation in connection with the valuation of an associate in Q4. This depreciation is included in the financial results before interest results. All details are included in the annual report in Note 40. Including the 22 million from the one-off effects, our EBIT increased by around 17% to 194 million euros in 2024. Consequently, our EBIT margin rose from 4.9 to 5.8%. In the fourth quarter, our EBIT of around 114 million euros was also significantly higher than the prior year's figure of around 90 million euros. The EBIT margin rose by 2.1 percentage points to 10.6%. The four-year EBIT development is in line with our medium-term goal to increase the EBIT margin by one percentage point per annum on average. Even when excluding the one-off effects of roughly 22 million, the underlying profitability in 2024 is roughly 5.1%, exceeding a prior year's margin that itself had substantial tailwinds from the China effect and the high order burp. We remain committed to our plan to improve the mid-term profitability further. The guided 2025 EBIT margin includes an additional margin improvement on the higher end of the guidance range. Our DVA in 2024 was just below the prior year figure of around €54 million. Let us now take a closer look at the development of the two divisions, starting with the medical division on page 12. Following a slight decline in the prior year, our order intake in the medical division rose by 1.2%. This was primarily due to higher demand for our services and warming therapy devices. The lower order value in the APEC and EMEA regions was more than offset by an increase in the Americas and Germany. Demand improved notably towards the year's end. In Q4, orders rose by around 10% driven by all regions as well as a high demand for ventilators and hospital infrastructure. So, a very positive momentum at the end of the year. Net sales in the medical division fell by roughly 3% in 2024. This was due to the mentioned base effects and the challenging market environment in China, which burdened our overall development in the APEC region. In Q4, on the other hand, net sales rose by 2% thanks to the significant growth in the Americas region. As a result of successful price enforcement and lower quality expenses, our gross margin in the division increased by 1.1 percentage points in 24. In Q4, it improved even stronger by an impressive 5 percentage points. This was due to the significant increase in gross profit, mainly because of significantly lower expenses for field actions. Functional expenses increased by roughly 1% in 2024, which can be largely attributed to personnel costs. The EBIT on the medical division decreased by around 24% to around 28 million euros, while the EBIT margin was reduced by 0.4 percentage points to 1.5%. In Q4, on the other hand, the EBIT increased significantly from around 39 million euros to around 56 million euros, thanks to the good operating business. The EBIT margin was 9.2% after 6.5% in the prior year quarter. Our DBA in the medical division was significantly lower in 24 at around minus 50 million euros, coming from around minus 23 million euros in 23. I will now turn to our safety division, which delivered another good performance. We are now on page 13. Our safety business continues to grow, both in the full year and in Q4. Order intake rose by at least 6%. This was primarily due to a much higher demand for respiratory and personal protection products and the positive development in all regions, especially in Germany. Net sales increased by around 5% in the fiscal year, with all regions contributing to growth. In Q4, net sales increased by roughly 4%, driven by the Americas region as well as Germany and APAC. As a result of our effective price enforcement, our gross margin in the division went up by 2.1 percentage points in 2024. In Q4, it increased by 3.3 percentage points. Functional expenses were around 4% higher than in the prior year, mainly due to higher R&D expenses and higher sales costs in the region. The EBIT of the safety division increased considerably in 2024 by around 28%, reached roughly €166 million. The EBIT margin amounted to 11.3% after 9.2% in 2023. In Q4, the EBIT stood at €57.5 million, coming from €50.1 million in the prior year period. The EBIT margin was 12.5% after 11.2% in the same period of 2023. Our DVA and the safety division also improved significantly by around 21 million to around 104 million euros, coming from 83 million euros in the prior year. All in all, a very positive development in our safety business. Let's move on to some key ratios on page 14. Despite a lower operating cash flow, our free cash flow was slightly above the prior year figure at 124 million euros. Next to the higher earnings, the biggest driver for the development was the positive effect from the increase in trade payables, but also a lower investment cash flow due to the sale of the non-core fire and gas business in the Netherlands and the property in Spain contributed positively. Cash equivalents amounted to around 231 million euros at the end of 2024, down around 41 million euros on the prior year figure. Net financial debt significantly improved in 2024 and amounted to 165 million euros at the end of the year. Net financial debt to EBITDA improved as well. With 0.5, leverage is on a healthy level. At the end of the first quarter, we secured an additional loan commitment from the European Investment Bank totaling 100 million euros. enhances our financial flexibility, supplementing our existing unused credit facilities of 375 million euros. We have maturing debt totaling 100 million euros in Q3 of this year and Q1 of next year. Capital employed increased by around 5% to around 1.6 billion euros. However, the improvement in EBIT resulted in an enhanced 12-month return on capital employed of 12.1%, up from 10.9% in the same period of the prior year. Networking capital was around 13% above the prior year level at just over 740 million euros. The positive business development, among other factors, contributed to a further strengthening of the group's equity position with an equity ratio nearing 50%. Now I hand back to Stefan Dreger for the outlook, starting with our dividend proposal on page 16.