Merck Kgaa

Dear ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Merck Investor and Analyst Conference call on Q2 2026. As a reminder, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. I am now handing over to Florian Schraeder, Head of Investor Relations, who will lead you through this conference. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you very much Heidi. Good afternoon, good morning everyone and welcome to our Q2 26 results call. Thank you for joining us today. My name is Florian Schraeder and I'm the Head of Investor Relations at Merck. In our Q2 call today, Kai Beckmann, Group CEO, will begin with sharing an update on first steps since we announced our new strategic direction in May. Kai will then provide a brief overview of our business performance and key developments in the second quarter as part of his executive summary. Helene von Roeder, Group CFO, will guide you through the detailed financial overview. Before we move into the Q&A session, where we will be joined by Jean Charles Wirth, CEO of LifeScience, Danny Bar-Zohar, CEO of Healthcare, and Benjamin Hein, CEO of Electronics, Kai will share our updated outlook and guidance with you. With that, I'm pleased to hand it over to Kai to kick us off.

Thank you, Florian, and good afternoon, good morning, and thanks to you all for joining us today. So before we get to the numbers, let me first give you a sense of where we stand strategically and highlight the milestones we have achieved in recent months since announcing our strategic direction in May. Each of these milestones addresses the evolving expectations of our customers and patients in an increasingly complex world. Geopolitical tensions, shifting trade dynamics, active policy debates, and Accelerating AI Driven Technology Rays are all shaping the environment in which we operate. In this context, only a clear plan and disciplined execution will move us closer to the sustainable, profitable growth we are building for our company. Allow me to share a few early proof points. Let me start with the signing of a definitive agreement to acquire Biotechnik Corporation on June 25th. Subject to regulatory approval and closing, Biotechnics' complementary portfolio of high-quality reagents, analytical instruments and diagnostic systems for precision medicine is expected to be immediately accretive to sales growth and margins. In parallel, we continue to invest in the capacity required to scale our manufacturing and R&D in electronics, delivering precise, reliable and scalable solutions across the semiconductor value chain. In June we opened a new metrology and inspection site near Grenoble, France. This 20 million euro investment will expand our capacity for M&I tools in a key semiconductor hub. Our rare diseases portfolio continues to show strong momentum and our pipeline has also advanced. Oxivio and Gomecli both delivered quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year growth. In addition, timicotinib generated first sales in China and preparations for a U.S. launch are underway. The FDA granted breakthrough therapy designation for empatoran for the treatment of lupus with active cutaneous manifestations. And the first patient was dosed in a phase 3 trial evaluating our NTC-Chem-5 antibody drug conjugate Presem-TCT for the third-line treatment of metastatic colorectal cancer. So I stop here for today. Going forward, we will continue to share further proof points demonstrating that we are focusing investments where we see the strongest growth opportunities. We will make it easier for customers to work with us through more integrated solutions and we will share capabilities more effectively across the company. And we will continue to use partnerships and acquisitions where they accelerate progress. And with that, let me turn to our operational and financial performance in the second quarter. So Q2 was a pretty robust quarter. Following a solid start into the year, we continued to build growth momentum in the second quarter. Organic sales growth accelerated to 4.1%, supported by strong contributions from life science and electronics. In life science, growth was broad-based across all regions. Both the solutions again delivered strong growth with sales up 15% organically. And as a reminder, we expect the growth profile to normalize in the second half of the year. Advanced solutions also contributed solid growth while discovery solutions showed slight growth in a still muted market environment. In healthcare, as I pointed out, rare diseases continued to make a meaningful contribution. To better align with our operational structures, we have reorganized the remaining franchises. Cardiometabolic is now reported on a standalone basis, while fertility and endocrinology has been established as a newly created franchise. Both were broadly stable in the quarter. Specialty care, which comprises of neurology and oncology assets, drove the overall organic decline in healthcare, mainly reflecting the impact from Mavenclad in the US and continued competition for Provencio. In electronics, organic growth accelerated significantly to 12% in Q2. Semiconductor solutions delivered very strong organic growth of 17% fueled by continued momentum in advanced nodes. Optronics remained broadly stable while headwinds in consumer electronics and markets are expected to increase further. As a result, we delivered on our ambition to generate profitable organic growth for the group while continuing to invest in innovation. Beta pre-margin expanded year over year by 1.6 percentage points to 29.4%. And based on these robust results, we are raising our full year guidance and I will share the details with you later in this call. Looking now at the group bridge in more detail on page 6. Supported net sales increased by 3.4% year over year in Q2. Organic sales growth reached 4.1% driven by life science and electronics. A negative currency impact amounted to minus 1.1% and portfolio effects contributed 0.4%. In Q1, organic growth of 2.9% was more than offset by disproportionate foreign exchange headwinds and negative portfolio effects. This quarter, the entire mix of organic growth, FX, and portfolio effects improved visibly, leading to an accelerated growth momentum. Organic EBITDA pre-growth was pleasing 9.3%, also driven by favorable comps in electronics in Q2 2025. So I'm handing over to Helene now to share further details.