5/13/2026

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

Good morning and welcome to our Q1 2026 presentation. It's now been seven years since we listed Norbit on Oslo Stock Exchange. Many of you have followed us through the whole period. Thank you for your engagement and trust. The one-to-one meetings during these quarterly presentation days, they add fuel to our motivation to continue to explore more. So, thanks. Okay, let's dive into the number. First quarter, 2026. Once again, demonstrate the strategy of having uncorrelated verticals so three verticals having completely different market drivers two also three performs very well one segment is partly slower than the comparable period last year with this we are able to deliver top line growth of 40% where segment connectivity and PIR contributes most to the growth. EBIT in the period ended at 156 million NOX, resulting in an EBIT margin of 21%. So into the segments. In OCEAN's first quarter 26, ended with a decrease of 12% compared to Q1 2025. The year-on-year decline is very much explained through some lower sales of sonars towards rental companies. In Q1, 25, we had several, summing up to three large orders in that sub-segment. So, Pei Fiscom will comment more on that also later during our presentation. This quarter, the EBIT margin in oceans ended at 25%. And as you see, as I commented, the decline is based on lower wing head sales. And as you can see, Q1 25 compared to 24 was particularly strong on that part of our business. We have during the last weeks announced that we're now in some exclusive negotiations related to an acquisition. It's a company that fits very much to our criteria for add-on acquisitions where we'd like to see clear synergies We'd like to see that there is a relevant fit when it comes to technology and market. We'd like the acquisition to be accretive to all the shareholders. It's been many questions and many guesses what kind of company and who this could be. working now to conclude the due diligence and we will finalize an SPA and when everything is ready, we will give you more flavor to this. But it's a very positive add-on for Norbit when everything is concluded. Connectivity, the first quarter of 2026. Connectivity had a new record quarter, 211 million NOFs in revenues, 45% growth since Q1 2025. This is very much as expected, driven by sales on our newest connectivity product, so-called GNSS onboard unit. So this is units used in trucks for satellite-based road toll collection, where we have a strong position working with some of Europe's leading companies in that field. The EBIT margin ended at the 27%, more or less at the same as it was the same quarter last year so and looking into the different product lines as you can see standard onboard units is exactly the same as Q125 it's a decline in tachograph enforcement modules we've been in that period where it has been some retrofit of tachograph units, it's expected to get back to normal, even if maybe Q1 is regarded to be somewhat lower than what we would expect to be normal going forward. On satellite-based tolling units, as I told you is the main driver of the growth from 17 up to 106 million locks in revenues so very important contribution and the final segment product innovation and realization and maybe to remind those of you that has not followed us that closely so in Norbit we focus a lot on doing tailored technology into some selected applications the technology we work with should be hard to create so it motivates the engineers And we are very cautious that when we invest money in R&D, it should be market-driven, meaning there should be an identified need and someone that would be willing to pay for us to sell these products based on this technology later on. So when we were building Norbit, the changes we did back 2008 to 2012, when we acquired some factories to get the capabilities of manufacturing into our own operation, ensuring we are in control of our own destiny, we chose also to continue to do some contract manufacturing. So, although the total manufacturing capacity A little bit more than half of that is used to make Norbit branded products. The remaining part is sold on contract manufacturing terms to other industrial clients. So R&D services and this contract manufacturing is what we report in the product innovation and realization segment. It's been a very interesting journey in the PIR segment. It's been very steep growth, so more than 100% from Q1 last year. So we delivered 339 million NOX in revenues. And with an EBIT margin of 20%, compared to the 14% the same quarter last year. And as we've said, this is very much driven by strong demand from defense and security related clients. We've had some higher degree of other industrial and automotive clients in the past. Some of that we have chosen to scale down free of capacity and also optimize what we do and allocate the resources where we see that we could get or build most value for our clients. And as we said during the last presentation, in Q1 we also opened our new expansion of the serbifactory and have added more capacity on assembly lines. We have announced during the quarter a new award, 150 million NOC contract to an undisclosed European client in the defense and security sectors. This order is to be delivered in the quarter we are already in. headed well into the second quarter of this year. With that said, I'd like to allow Peg Nistrand to give you some more flavor to the financial figures.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

Thank you, Peg, again. I will spend a few minutes walking you through the financial highlights of the quarter. First quarter started out well with high activity across our business segments. It was a solid step in the right direction in order to move us towards the target for this year's plan. In short, revenues were up 40% year on year. Even margin came in at 21%. We continue to strengthen our working capital efficiency where cash flow conversion was 105% in the quarter. leading us to reporting a 36% pre-tax return on capital employed for the quarter. Revenues came in at 732.1 million kroner in the quarter, an increase of 40% from the corresponding quarter of 2025, and 45% in constant currency, as both the US dollar and the euro depreciated against the Norwegian kroner. Gross margin was 53%, down from 62%, partly as a result of segment mix, with a higher share of revenues coming off the period segment in this year's quarter, and also partly due to lower realized margins in connectivity and PIR, which I will revert to more on the next page. EBITDA for the quarter was 201.8 million, representing a margin of 28%. This compares to 162 million and a margin of 31% in the same quarter of 2025. Operating profit was 155.9 million, translating into a margin of 21%, and this compares to 127.4 million and a margin of 24% in the same quarter of 25. Net finance expenses were negative 12.5 million, largely explained by 9.5 million in net interest expenses, while tax expenses were 32.4 million, and the net income for the period ended at 111 million, translating into an earnings per share of 173. In the first quarter, oceans delivered 12% revenue decline. Foreign exchange headwinds impacted the top line, and the decline in constant currency was 5% year over year. Revenues declined partly due to lower sales of wingage owner, as first quarter 25 was an unusually strong quarter for wingage sales to rental companies. in which three orders totaling 40 million Norwegian kroner in deliveries ended in last year's first quarter, all of which did not materialize in this year's first quarter. When adjusting for these orders and foreign exchange, the activity and growth in the end markets outside the rental were actually quite healthy compared to the same period of last year. The gross margin was down one percentage point. Payroll expenses increased 1.5 million. while operating expenses was up 4.6 million on freight, sales and marketing and travel expenses, in addition to higher allocated group costs. The EBIT ended at 50.8 million, down from 81.4 million in the same quarter of last year. Collectivity reported an increase in revenues of 45% and 48% in constant currency. The increase was explained by deliveries of the GNSS onboard unit to Toll for Europe, Revenues fell a tad short of expectations as some deliveries were moved into the second quarter this year, creating some timing effects on the results in this year's quarter. Gross margin fell five percentage points, partly explained by product and interest segment revenue mix, partly as a result of weaker euro against Norwegian kroner, as well as price increases on certain raw material components. Employee benefit expenses were up 6.2 million on new hires and wage inflation, while operating expenses was up 4 million on higher activity-related spending. The EBIT result for the quarter was 56.4 million, up from 41.5 million in the first quarter of 2025. PIR posted a significant improvement in revenues of 111% from the first quarter of 2025, primarily driven by increased demand from security and defence. Gross margin came down 6 percentage points on higher share of high-volume manufacturing, Payroll and operating expenses increased 12.6 million on new hires. The EBIT result was 66.8 million in the quarter, up from 21.8 million in the same period of last year, demonstrating strong cost discipline and scalability with our robotized manufacturing setup. Next, balance sheet and financial position. Property, plant, and equipment, including right to use assets, increased 6.4 million. This was partly driven by investments in machinery equipment, as well as a smaller expansion of the floor capacity at the Rødes factory. Intangible assets rose 5.3 million, explained by R&D investments, partly offset by amortizations. Trade receivables were down 49.4 million in the quarter, following a sequential revenue decline and strong cash collections in the ocean segment. Inventories declined 17.1 million in the quarter, Quarterly fluctuations in the inventory level must be expected given the anticipated growth, short delivery cycle, and what is becoming a more challenging supply market for some electronic components. Net interest-bearing debts stood at 204.2 million at the end of March, a decrease from 364.5 million at the end of 2025, following strong cash flow generation, as well as a depreciating euro impacting the Euro term loan in Norwegian kronor. Our equity ratio was 50% at the quarter end, up from 46% at the end of the fourth quarter on a positive net profit. In the first quarter, we continued to create additional financial flexibility by extending our revolving credit facility to July 27. We also added two one-year extension options to the facility. We also entered into agreement to amend the repayment terms on our term loan in which no repayment is made if the net interest paying debt to EBITDA ratio is below two times. At the end of the quarter, our ratio stood at 0.5 times down from 0.8 at the year end. Our available liquidity measured by cash and undrawn committed credit facilities stood at 921 million. And our financial position creates a strong platform to deliver on our capital allocation framework, including distributing a dividend in May as proposed by the Board of Directors, as well as accelerating growth through acquisitions with the use of our balance sheet. Lastly, cash flow for the quarter. Cash flow from operations was 212.6 million, primarily explained by an EBITDA of 201.8 million, a net decrease in working capital of 52.5 million, and taxes paid of 41.7 million. We invested 56.4 million in the quarter, mainly explained by 35.2 million in R&D investments, and 21.7 million in investments in machinery and equipment. The investment levels for the full year is reiterated, Cash flow from financing activities was 93.7 million in the quarter, primarily explained by repayment of debt and leases. I will then give the floor back to Per-Jurgen, who will give you the outlook section.

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

Thank you, Birgit Jan. So, looking into the future. So, we started this year with an announcement ambition of delivering revenues in excess of 3 billion Norwegian kroner and with an improved EBIT margin compared to the 22% achieved in 2025. And we today reiterate that based on the outlook we see today, we remain firm at that ambition. Looking into the short-term outlook, we expect oceans to deliver in the range between 210 and 250 million Norwegian kroner in Q2. And oceans is the segment that has the highest degree of seasonality, although over three segments. Usually Q1 is the slowest. Last year, Q1 was a very strong quarter. Q2 is typically quite busy quarter. Q3, a little bit slower again, some holiday season. And Q4 is usually the strongest. So we expect to deliver in the range of $10 to $250 million. Connectivity is... expected to continue to grow based on deliveries on the NSS onboard units. So our guidance for today in connectivity is a range between 225 to 250 million Norwegian kroner. The strong demand from defense and security remains in PIR and we expect based on this and other orders to deliver between 370 and 390 million NOX in the second quarter. That being said, we are, as earlier announced, now in a phase which is the most motivating part being allowed to work in the management team of Norbit. We are framing a new four-year ambition plan and looking very much forward to meet you again in August, where we will lay out these 2030 ambitions. So I think with that, we could go to the Q&A session.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

So a fair few questions on oceans. Can you help us understand the underlying trends in the ocean segment? Both Q4 and Q1 came in a softer than expected, despite strong comparables, with FX acting as a drag. Q2 guidance points to minus 4% year-on-year growth, plus 2% FX adjusted. Should we interpret this as a sign of weakening in markets, share loss, or are the temporary or company-specific factors driving the slowdown?

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

We are satisfied with the development in the underlying markets. We think our position is still strong in the market. But as you've mentioned also, of course, there is some currency effect, but maybe the most is as we tried to explain that in Q1 2025, three orders from rental companies came in in the same quarter. In some, that was around 40 million NOK. our Intel says that the utilization of the assets from the rental companies are high so in in this business I mean in oceans we are delivering quite high value products so when one or two or a three large orders is in a quarter or out of a quarter that affects the numbers.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

And adding to that, generally, at least from the bigger rental companies, these orders, when they come, are quite large. And predicting the timing of when these orders will arrive, even into a period of six months, it's quite challenging. And the purchasing patterns are also quite difficult to to assess. So first half in 25 was a significant period for buying assets from us by the rental companies. This is slower in this first half. At the same time, as I mentioned in the presentation, if you adjust for that and foreign exchange, you see that the underlying Growth actually only in the other market is in the range of 15 to 20 percent compared to last year So it's it's still a quite healthy market Yeah That may be the summary of of of of oceans Could you provide more details on the add-on to acquisition and Specifically, where is the company located? Which products it adds to your portfolio? And what synergies do you expect to realize? And what's been the historical margin profile?

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

So I think when it gets to this, we're not going to disclose anything more today. I see there is some attempts to To solve this equation, I'm guessing which kind of company it is. If we undisclose one more unknown, maybe it's getting possible to solve the equation. So I think we pass on that.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

Yeah. Again, maybe a question along the same line as the previous one. The midpoint of the Q2 guidance portion appears to imply mid-single-digit organic growth. Could you elaborate on where you are seeing relative strengths and weaknesses across end markets? Are supply chain constraints currently affecting our ability to deliver on demand? So maybe the last one. I think I have answered the first question already.

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

So when it comes to the supply, the component market, we experience increased price on elevated lead times, especially on memory circuits. I think it's fairly significant. known it's nearly that they talk about it in the kindergarten now so and so what we have I'm very satisfied that we during the last years has been able to build up a strategic supply chain organization moving from being more pure procurement to a strategic supply chain and I think that's been important for us now and we don't have many products with challenges related to memory circuits and we've been able to take good precautions and secure material as needed.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

Could you provide an update on market traction for the deep sea winged sonars?

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

I think this market is still for us a new market. We have delivered some initial orders and I think there's not a lot related to these deep sea sonars in the the numbers. We don't expect that to be as high as shallow water either. It's a different use case. And I guess with some more references and good data to provide to the clients, we will squeeze ourselves in and take our position in that niche application as well.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

Could you provide an overview of the typical average selling prices across your Sonar portfolio? So both the profile list and forward-looking Sonars. I don't think we need to go into the specifics, but what we have stated in the past is that we have broadly speaking two platforms, the Winged Sonar and the DBMS platform, and The winged sonar is a bit more expensive than the VBMS platform. What we have said before is that on these platforms, there are multiple variants of different sonars with different specifications tailored to different applications. And some of these sonars are quite expensive. Some of them are a lot cheaper. So the price on our sonar screw range on this platform from anything to... from one million Norwegian kroner to four million Norwegian kroner. So there's a quite big spread, which is why it's difficult to comment on average selling prices. Okay, a question maybe on, let's stick to oceans. Can you give some color on the FX impact on your Q2 guidance? How has customer response to the new Winged product release has been so far? And how do you expect sales from this product category to develop through 2026? Let's start with that question.

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

If you start with FX, I could comment on things related to the Winged.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

So, if you look on the guidance we've given now, it's in oceans to 10 to 250. And that compares to around 239 million in Q2-25. If you look at the basket, generally in oceans we sell in euros and in dollars. If you look at the basket of around 50-50, it's around 8% impact on currency in Q2. on the negative side. So that's reflected in the guidance that we've given.

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

Maybe you would say something about the winged? Yeah, so I think when it comes to the winged, what I want to comment is that we also, I mean, we introduced this X paradigm, started with the VBMS, and then also doing that on the winged, And this week we announced a new feature possible for our X, our Sonar clients having an X Sonar, which is a 3D point cloud viewer going in a web browser, allowing the surveyor to get real-time feeling of the data while collecting the data. So I think one thing is that we want to get some revenues also on these new add-on features, but I think this kind of new features also as a sales enabler going forward. So we continue to do this kind of tailoring of features to both strengthen our offering compared to competition, but also to open up for new use cases.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

Okay, moving to connectivity. What is the gross margin on the new GNSS onboard unit compared to the rest of the product portfolio? Also, are contracts structured in a way where we're able to offset component prices if these remain a head-win-head?

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

I think this is a question which is quite specific and given that there could be, I mean, towards other players in this market, not very eager to disclose these details on commercial reasons. But it's, I mean, you could see that the GNSS onboard unit represents quite a high share of the total revenues in Q1. So giving some indication if you do the math based on that.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

A question on iData. Could you provide a post-mortem on the acquisition of iData and reflect on the key lessons learned? At the time of the acquisition, iData was acquired for 14.5 million euros with reported revenues of 5 million euros and EBITDA approximately 1.9 million euros. While part of the consideration was settled through the issuance of around 1.2 million orbit shares. With the share currently trading at 225, how does management evaluate the long-term value creation of this transaction in hindsight, both strategically and financially, and what aspects of the thesis was provided or proved correct or incorrect?

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

Yeah, so I'm not sure if I got the question right, but when it comes to that, acquisition of iData. This has been an important part of building connectivity into what connectivity is today. So iData has for a very long time been a service provider to Europe's leading so-called ETH providers, sorry about the very specific terms, but in supporting and collecting road tolls in this DNS space tolling in the Hungarian market. Adding to Norbit's reliability and Norbit's proven knowledge making us relevant in that domain. So an indirect part of this has been building the position and momentum to become a GNSS onboard unit provider as we are now. Looking specifically on on iData, on the lesson learned, it's that what we expected is that it takes some time to align on culture and gain momentum to be relevant for each other. We've learned that what we expected on that part took some time. Today we are very happy with the setup. We're happy with the ambitions. This part of connectivity also brings into our discussions now on where we're heading towards 2030 with connectivity.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

Okay, some questions on foreign exchange. Can you remind us of your FX hedging policy piece, both on assets, contracts, cash flow and liability side? And what are your assumptions for your 2026 guidance? So when it comes to foreign exchange, I think it's worthwhile repeating that Even though a significant part of the revenues in connectivity and in oceans are Euro, and in particular for dollars in oceans-based, there's a lot of raw material costs that are purchased in US dollars. So you need to reflect that also in terms of the strengthening of the Norwegian kroner, there is an offsetting balance here in which raw material prices are bought at a lower price in Norwegian kroner over time converted into the profit and loss. So even though we have some impact on the top line, you also get enough balancing fees on the raw material side. And largely we are long euros, and we are relatively neutral in US dollars, maybe actually on the short side. and which is why we don't typically do short-term hedges in the currency portfolio. We do offset the euro exposure on the liability side, in which we have a 38 million term loan, which create the balancing act, both on the interest and the balance sheet for euros on the FX. And with regards to assumptions for 2026 guidance, I don't think I want to be very particular on that. We came out with the guidance to you in February, and I think it's fair to assume that the developments we've seen in the foreign exchange market over the last month is something that we could not necessarily predict. Okay, some questions on the... Guidance on margin. In your 26 guidance, you uphold your estimate that the EBIT margin will improve versus 25. Over the last quarters, we have seen a decline, partly because increased weight on your PIR business. Could you give some more color on what will make your EBIT margin target hold? Again, we are reiterating our guidance for this year, targeting an EBIT margin above 22%. We are three months reported into the year. So I think you should just note the guidance that we've given. And also worth mentioning that the EBIT margin in T was 20% this quarter. It's been a demonstration in cost discipline and scalability in the operations. So we continue to stick with the guidance, and that's also what's been reported today. One question on... Are you worried about the pressure on margins due to higher costs going forward?

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

I think we are continuously monitoring what happens in the component market. As you said, a lot of expenses are in foreign exchange and the same with the revenues. We are very cautious about cost. We take very seriously any kind of employment, not only the new employments, but those also already done many years ago to ensure we have the right people on the bus and to ensure to have them in the right seat. And I think that's how we'd like to continue to build the company and keep a strong culture for allocating the money where it can really help us grow and deliver in a way which is fruitful for all relevant stakeholders.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

Margin question in oceans. Is 25-26% margin the new normal in oceans going forward, or do you expect margins up to 35% again? So I believe that 35% might be referring to our EBIT margining to 125. I think it's difficult to... to assess the quality of the margins of the oceans based on one quarter alone. What we have said in the ambition plan that we have set out is that the EBIT margin oceans should be in the range of 25 to 30%. Over the recent period, we've been delivering in the higher end of that guidance. And we haven't commented specifically on the margins in general today. So that is something that we will report on and maybe also give some more color on when we present our long-term ambition plan in August. What are our current bright spots in the oceans portfolio? How has Ping DSP developed over the past two quarters and what's your thoughts on it going forward?

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

It's important to remember that, as we mentioned, we have three uncorrelated business units. Inside each business unit, as for example also Oceans, there is different kind of products that have some different underlying drivers. Ping, also the acquisition we did of Ping DSP, continuing that as Ping DSP and Norbit company has been very good. I think we've seen that by allowing this company to work closely with the broader Norbit global sales and distribution platform has been good and I think also that for this company having a strong technology complementary to the rest of the Norbit sonar portfolio just by being a Norbit company in the brand recognition has also helped to support growth in that part.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

You may have touched on this already, but do you include FX adjustments in your longer-term contracts, such as the Tachograph contract with Component Hall and the agreement with Toll for Europe? So... When it comes to, so you're referring to some of our contracts in the connectivity segment. These contracts are largely Euro-based. These are European clients, and I'm not sure what the FX adjustments would refer to, but the contracts are regardless based in Euros. If you view AUVs as a key growth opportunity going forward, portion segment, assuming so given the potential acquisition, which products or sensors do you feel are currently missing from your portfolio to fully capture this opportunity?

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

That's a nice try to get one more known in this unknowns. I think we've... we've said in the announcement on this acquisition that it's a company with technology relevant on AUVs and ROVs.

speaker
Peg Nistrand
Chief Financial Officer

Good, there was one final question on the acquisition but I think you already said what you needed to say so With that, I don't think there's any more questions from the listeners. Okay, and thank you for your time today.

speaker
Per-Jurgen
CEO

See you in August.

Disclaimer

This conference call transcript was computer generated and almost certianly contains errors. This transcript is provided for information purposes only.EarningsCall, LLC makes no representation about the accuracy of the aforementioned transcript, and you are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the information provided by the transcript.

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