Green Landscaping Group AB (publ)

Thank you and welcome to today's earnings call. And as mentioned, my name is Johan Holmström and I'm joined with our CFO, Markus Holmström, who will manage the financial section of this presentation in a few minutes. So before we dive into the presentation per se, Let me ask you a high level pitch on how we look upon the second quarter and put that into context. So we started the year with a weak Q1, given the lack of winter and snow removal activities. And this, of course, had a spillover effect in the month of April, meant that we had slightly lower revenue and profitability. And of course, it did have a negative impact on our cash flow as well as the activities we do in the first quarter. They are invoiced in that quarter, but typically we do receive payment in the beginning of the second quarter. So that had a negative effect on our leverage at the end of the day. Beginning in May, things picked up quite significantly. So I would say that both May and June came in according to our expected levels and this is also the high season where we start up with the landscaping activities on a big scale. And of course, if you look upon the market as a whole, we can still see that there are headwinds in the marketplace. It hasn't really picked up. Again, when we talk to the entrepreneurs about their outlook, they are positive as always, and that's a good thing. But nonetheless, from our perspective, I would say that the market is trending sideways so far this year. Our margin expansion activities in Sweden are progressing according to plan. So that's where we have the discontinuing of a couple of our operations and unprofitable customer contracts and such. And that is a work that has been ongoing for some time. And I assume this will have full effect towards the end of the year. So as we enter in 2026, I do expect the profit margins in Sweden to increase from current levels. And then there are a couple of other things in the quarter that I would like to highlight. First of all, I would say the improved profit margins in our Finnish operations are quite substantial. So I'm happy to see that Finland is back on track. That sounds, it looks really promising to us. And then we also issued our first bond in the second quarter and that have diversified our financing in a good way. So it gives us options as we move into the future. And then third, of course, that's the M&A activity as we have invested in one company that is Wagner in the south east of Berlin. And then today we announced our second investment this year, and that is Tesmo and Zonz in the Hanover area. And with these two investments alone, we're actually halfway through our M&A ambition for the year, as our ambition is to acquire around 80 to 100 million SEK. And these companies being slightly bigger with a good profit margin, That means that we are, as I said, about 50% down the road in terms of the M&A activities, and that's really good. So now let's move into the presentation. So if we move into the slide there about the Green Landscaping Group, I assume that most of you are aware of the company. But if we look upon the market we are active in, it's outdoor services that we provide, and the market per se is a very big market. It's a fairly stable market. And of course, there are favorite macro trends in it. So being active in this type of market will enable us to choose the type of services we provide and the type of customers we provide. And that gives us room to maneuver, so to say. And also for the M&A side of things, if you have a lot of companies and different regions to choose from, you have a large landscape. And if you want to be a serial acquirer, that is really important. Now, applying the right business model. That is really about the three levers that we talk about if you want to be a successful serial acquirer. And that is, of course, you need to have organic growth. You look upon the acquired growth and you look upon margin expansions. And how do you level this out? And from my perspective, organic growth is probably the one that we have focused least upon. Historically, and as we move forward, we will probably play some more emphasis on it, even though we don't want to grow too fast organically in that area. At Quiet Growth, we have been acquiring companies for the last five, six years, and I think we have gained some experience on what to look for and what to avoid. So that is pretty much moving along according to plan, I would say. And then, of course, it's about elevating our margins. So the industrial average is about 5%. We are roughly at 8%. And we are on a positive trend. So our ambition is, of course, to continue to improve and expand our profit margins. So I think that concludes to a large extent the first slide there about the active market, the business model we have chosen, and of course the M&A strategy that we have been working on. Now, looking upon the rolling 12 months, net sales was to some extent, I would say, almost unchanged to 6.1 billion SEK, where we had an organic growth of a negative 7, acquisitions contributed by 9%, and then we have a negative impact on exchange rate by a negative 2%. The EBIT A decreased by 8% to 479 million FECK and the margin went down from 8.5 to 7.8. And cash flow from operating activities, they came in at a very strong 464 million SEK versus 276 million. So that's a significant improvement in the last three, four quarters, as we can see. And we have also had some extra activities on that one, because we saw a while back that the cash flow was a bit weak. So we have focused on that one for almost a year now, making sure that we actually turn the EBITDA into cash, M&A activities we have so far for the rolling 12 months completed seven investments. So in overall, when I look upon the numbers, given the week Q1 in particular, I'm not overly excited about the outcome, even though it is related to the Q1 and the lack of winter and the market headwinds. But again, it could be better. The performance in Sweden and in particular Finland are improving. And we also see a stable situation in Germany, even though that is a new market for us. So given the headwinds in the Q1, it's moving along, I would say, pretty much according to plan. If I move on to the second quarter of this year, we can see that the net sales decreased by 3% to 1.6 billion SEK. And we have a negative organic growth by 9%. And as I said, that is a month of April that came in weaker than expected. And also, of course, as we are working on expanding our margins, we can see a slight negative impact from those activities. And then it's a market headwinds. EBITDA, we saw an increase of 1% to 145 million. So basically we are having a slightly slower or negative organic growth while we are flat or improving on the profit margins. And also the margins there are 9% versus the 8.7 we had a year ago. And then cash flow, they came in at the minus 78 million versus minus 11 million. So the second quarter, that is a quarter where we start with the landscaping activities. And that means that we are building up capacity to execute those one and that ties up capital in the second quarter. And then typically we receive that cash back in the third and the fourth quarter that is cash positive for us. So this is the normal trend we have. The negative number is slightly bigger than we would have expect. And that comes from the negative impact on the Q1. They've been to activities that we typically invoice in Q1 and then we receive that cash in the second quarter. If you look upon their financial leverage, we are at 2.9%. slightly higher than our financial plan but not significantly higher i would say so typically that's a trend we have over the year that it goes up in the second quarter and then we have a deleverage going on for the remainder of the quarters uh during the year and also for the the second quarter we completed one investment in the second quarter and we also communicated one uh after the end of the second quarter uh today And as I did mention, our ambition is to invest or to acquire about 80 to 100 million. And typically we say that the sweet spot company for us is have a revenue of 100 million SEK at a 10% margin. And that's how we communicate eight to 10 companies per year. We have actually achieved the 50 million or in that neighborhood of acquired EBIT A into companies this year. That is really strong. I like those companies and do welcome them being a part of the group. The long-term performance of the company, It means we have been growing significantly for quite some time and now it's slowing down. So right now our three year CAGR in terms of revenue is about 8-9% and the EBIT A growth is about 5%. And to some extent there are market headwinds and the winter as I have been saying that that's impacting those numbers. But we're still a growing company and are having an active M&A agenda. stable market and right business model, that's what I referred to earlier, that we are active in a very big market with long term contracts, we have positive mega trends and so forth in the market. And also it's a fairly low cyclicality in the market we are active in. Moving on to Sweden for the early 12 months, we saw a decline in net sales of 12% to 2.5 billion SEK and a 38% decrease of EBIT aid. That means that we are let's say the winter impact and the market expansion activities, Sweden are clearly seen for the role in 12 months. While the second quarter, they will see that the net sales decreased by 9%, but we have a significantly lower decrease in the profitability. So the profit margin came in at the 5.5% in the second quarter versus 5.7% the comparable quarter. So there's an effect of mild winter in the beginning of the quarter, but otherwise I would say that the margin expansion, margin improvement activities are still going on and active in Sweden. Norway. So for the rolling 12 months, we see that we have a decrease of net sales by 2%. And organic growth is actually quite low. I assume it should be higher given the winter activities, but actually it's in down 3%. And we have a 5% positive contribution from M&A activities. So there's an okay performance going on in Norway. There's a decline in the EBITDA on 22%, meaning that the profit margin actually have come down from 9.9% to 7.9%. And that is to a large extent related to the winter activities. The second quarter, we can see a declining sales by 7% and also a decrease by 30% on the EBIT A. And I would say that in Norway, the business condition for landscaping is in line with the preceding quarters. But in the markets we're in, I would say that Norway right now is probably the market where we have the biggest headwinds. Sweden and Finland is moving along in a I would say a better way from what we hear from our entrepreneurs. And of course, also Germany and Lithuania moving along nicely. So Norway are the one we are monitoring at this point of time, how we can grow that business and also how we can be slightly less winter dependent as we saw in the first quarter. So that's the activities we have in Norway. And then, of course, as we move over to other Europe, and this is the focus area for us in terms of the M&A growth perhaps, we have an active M&A agenda in Europe. So for the rolling 12 months, we see that the sales are increasing by a hefty 52% to 1.1 billion SEK. That's a very fast growth we see in Germany. Organically, even though the German market has been I would say in a tough market situation for the last two, three years, we actually see that the organic growth is a negative one. That is really good. And the EBIT A, of course, have increased by 48% to 227 million with an extremely strong profit margin of 19.3%. And then, of course, in the second quarter, we saw that sales increased by 24% to 333 million SEK. And we also saw a large increase in EBIT A. And again, with a very strong profit margin of 19.5%. So even though we don't have the winter activities in Germany, it could be good to know that they have a low season in the first quarter as they have less landscaping activities, you have their Christmas breaks and stuff. So that means that typically the first quarter is low season, even though they don't have the winter activities in Germany in general. But again, we can see that in other Europe that you have the Finnish companies who are improving the profit margins, and that's really good. So we have strong development in other Europe. Now, moving on to the companies that we have invested in. So the first one is Vagno. They are located in southeast of Berlin in that area. So that's where they're operating in. And it's, I would say a typical landscaping company. They do general contracting work. So it's a company that was founded back in 2007. They have an annual revenue of about 11 million euros. and profit margins higher than the group average. So we do welcome that company being part of the group. And it also means that we're getting a couple of companies in the neighborhood of Berlin. We're starting to see us building a cluster as well in that region. And then moving on to the latest one that we announced today. And this is Tesmo and Son. They are based in Hanover. It's a typical landscaping company who does similar work to what Wagner is doing. And that's the majority of the companies in Germany. That's the type of work they are doing. And this is a company that was founded by the father back in 1967. And they operate in the Hanover area. And they do the classic landscaping part of it. That's earthwork, drainage. There's a picture of a private garden there. That's a very small proportion of their business. So they're basically business to business company. It's a fairly substantial company of the revenue of about 16 million euros. And again, it's a company who has a higher profit margin than the group average. So we do welcome TESMO and the employees of the company to being part of the Green Landscaping Group. So I think that concludes my part of the presentation. And then I gladly hand over to Markus who will walk you through the financials.

So, Marcus. Thank you, Johan. And as I said, I will cover the main financials. And selecting a few on this slide, as Johan already mentioned, Q2 showed net sales of 1.6 billion, bringing our rolling 12 months to 6.2 billion, resulting in a flat growth in rolling 12 months. EBITDA in the second quarter came in at 145 million, which was largely in line with last year, but the margin was slightly better at 9.0%. The financial result in Segment Sweden Norway was negatively impacted by continued challenging market but also effects from the mild winter in the start of the quarter and then the activity levels gradually increased throughout the quarter. Segment Other Europe delivered a positive performance and positive development specifically in the Finnish operation. Johan also mentioned the development on the cash flow side. Following several strong cash flow quarters in a row, we came out slightly below the seasonal expectation on working capital development in Q2, much due to the weak Q1 we had, resulting in a cash flow from operating activities at negative 78 compared to negative 11 last year, which drove financial leverage up to 2.9 times in quarter. Order backlog increased sequentially to 7.6 billion. That was lower than last year. But please have in mind that the size tends to fluctuate between the quarters and should therefore not be used as a short-term leading indicator. And going to bottom lines, earning per share in the quarter was up 11% to 1.15 crowns compared to 1.04 last year. But digging a bit more into the cash flow side of things, as I said, following several strong cash flow quarters in a row, cash flow from operating activities amounted to minus 78, which was due to the low activity level during the winter season that impacted us here now in Q2. and as the activity level gradually increased during the quarter and it impacted our networking capital going out the quarter and we expect as the seasonal cash flow developed over the year that we will have positive contribution in q3 and q4 and And also mentioning our rolling 12 months cash flow being 464 compared to 276 last year. So cash flow and working capital has been and will continue to be a focus item for us and we continue to address actions where needed. And looking at cash flow bridge in the quarter and operating activities minus 78, then we complete the one acquisition in form of Wagner, which was warmly welcome to the group and also paid out earn out considerations totaling a cash flow from investing activities of minus 97. Then we had also capex and other lease amortization, which was in line with traditional quarterly levels, minus 67. and we also issued bonds during the quarter and diversified our funding and we'll come back to that but the net proceedings for that was positively 495 and in order to optimize our liquidity position we used some surplus cash generated from the bond and amortized our revolving credit facility in order to not pay too much of available cash position totaling our cash flow at minus 82 million in the quarter financial leverage and our financial net debt increased to 2.4 billion and leverage increased to 2.9 times compared to 2.7 last year we still have headroom to our financial covenant in the financing agreement and steady state from here would mean that we would be deleveraging q3 and q4 based on our seasonal cash flow Looking at our loan maturity profile, we can see that we have 1.4 million in total net debt in the quarter and our We issued bonds which broaden our financing base and provides us with additional flexibility going forward. As you can see in the maturity profile, we also will, during the second half of this year, refinance our bank in-depth and that dialogue has already been initiated with our banks and moving along positively. The new bond that we issued in the quarter was well received and will mature in December 2028. And concluding my end of this presentation, looking at our financial targets, as said, enrolling 12 months, we have a flat growth, heavily impacted by the effects we saw in Q1 with the mild winter. On EBITDA level, we're slightly below 7.8, which also is impacted by the weak Q1 we had, but the profitability was in line and slightly better in relative terms now in Q2. Financial leverage at 2.9 times, which is higher than the target. And as I said, steady state from here with our operating cash flow, we should leverage towards our target at the end of the year. And our fourth financial target when it comes to dividend and in line with previous years, the AGM in May 9 decided to not distribute any dividend for fiscal year 2024. And with that said, I will lead back to you V1.

Okay, so thank you. And yes, the final remark there, as we said that we started the year on a weak side with significantly less snow removal activities. So we had a weak Q1, we had some spillover effect that had, I would say, a negative impact on the month of April. But from there on, I think the activity levels, I think, The activity level did pick up during the month of May and June, and that is a high season for us. And those months actually came in pretty much as expected. We are talking about the market headwinds and so forth. And yes, there are market headwinds, but also we have to keep in mind that our market is quite stable. So overall, yes, there's a negative impact on the market, but on the other hand, there's a stability in the market. We are talking about the margin improvement in Sweden going on, and those are progressing according to plans. I'm really happy to see what's going on there. And then I did highlight the improvement we see in Finland, what is going on there. And then, as I did mention, as Markus came back to that, it's a bond and the two acquisitions we've done so far in this year. As I said, I'm not so happy about the financial outcome, but really what we are doing inside the company will lead us to a good place as we will continue throughout this year. So by that, I think that concludes the presentation per se, and then we open up for questions.

If you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key five on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial pound key six on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Dan Johansen from Seb. Please go ahead.

Good afternoon. Are you on the market? Yeah, a couple of questions from my side. Spillover effects here from the mild winter in Sweden and Norway, just so I understand correctly, is that because you started doing some preparatory work already during Q1?

It seems like we have some technical difficulties here because right now we are ready to open up for questions.

Hi, Joanne Marcus, can you hear me?

So we actually can't hear anything here. Can you hear me now?

The next question comes from Alexander Silgestrom from Pareto Securities. Please go ahead.

Good afternoon, guys. Can you hear me? Okay, hello.

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Hello, let's try again here.

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Yeah, we can hear you.

We apologize for this one. OK. Yeah, no worries. So just starting off here with my first question on the organic growth. You mentioned that it picked up quite significantly in May and June. Could you please break out the organic growth that you saw in those months?

That's not the data we have ability to disclose at this point of time now. So it's a quarter per se that we are reporting.

But as we say, you mentioned that you were quite happy.

Yeah, it came in according to our expectations in the month of May and in the month of June that we, given the previous year's development and then we, of course, as you do, add on the acquired companies into it, then we had an expected number and we saw that happening. So the week performance was particularly in the month of April, not in May and June.

Okay. And did you have a positive expectation for organic growth for May and June?

We had a slightly positive trend during the quarter, yes.

Okay. And then moving on here to the acquired contribution and then looking at the acquired contribution to Edita. At least to my estimates, it was softer than expected. So also wondering here if this was sort of according to your budget or if it also was softer than you had anticipated. And then if you had seen any margin pressure in the acquired companies. Yeah.

I didn't really catch the first part of your question there. Can you please repeat that one?

Yes. So looking at the acquired contribution to the contribution from acquisition, it was softer than we expected. So just asking if it was softer than you expected as well. And if you have seen any margin pressure in the acquired company.

No, I think not. The answer is actually that the acquired companies came in according to our expectations, pretty much. So that was pretty much in line with what we had inspected.

Okay, that's clear. And then just looking at the different markets, you talk about sort of Norway, the business conditions in Norway being in line with previous quarters. And here we saw minus 10, right? And I guess most of it is explained by April then, but given that you had H2 growth of 9% and 3% respectively, is that what you are referring to in terms of sort of normal business conditions that you are at, at least maybe 3% organically?

Yeah, we have, if I compare Sweden, that's just off my head here. So if I compare the organic growth, we have been focusing quite significantly on improving the situation of the profit margins in Sweden. And when you do that one, you don't want to see too high organic growth at that point of time. In Norway, we have had a baseline of a higher organic growth compared to Sweden. So even though there are headlines, we still see that there has been organic growth going on in Norway at the same time as they were negatively impacted by a very weak winter in Norway. So the first quarter did hit the operations in Norway quite hard, I would say. that they have had a higher baseline organic growth historically than we have had in Sweden.

Okay, thanks for that and then follow up on the margin performance in Sweden. Just wondering why the margin profile isn't picking up given that the Unprofitable contract has been exited and also you mentioned now that you see margins improving in 2026. Previously, I think you talked about H2. Has this been postponed or have I just misunderstood?

No, not really from my perspective. It's probably my wording that is bad. What I expect when we're basically saying is that when we are beginning of 2026, then we should have completed the majority of all the activities, meaning I should basically see the full effect of the activities we're doing. I do expect us to see a gradual impact during H2, in particular in the fourth quarter. So it will be a gradual increase of profit margin year over year. When you compare the quarter, you have to clean out for the Q1 because you can't compare the role in 12 months as you have a Q1 to deal with in this year. But if you compare the performance in the third quarter and in the fourth quarter of this year to last year, yes, my expectations are that we should see improved profit margins going on in Sweden. Okay, that's very helpful. then as you move into to to january 2026 then of course we should have more or less the full effect of the the majority of those activities uh to be shown for yeah okay yeah that's crystal clear thanks thank you and then maybe just two last ones on on uh on m a uh so so i think you mentioned that you you had 50 million in uh

acquired EBITDA now from the two last acquisitions. So just running the math here, looks like it's 16% EBITDA margin for those entities. Could you confirm that?

We typically lose that number, but the problems I have is that we typically when we communicate the ambition level of how many companies, it's actually How much EBITDA do we plan to acquire during the course of the year? And then we say the sweetpot company, as I said, is 100 million SEK at a 10% profit margin. That means 80 to 10 companies. But in reality, that means 80 to 100 million SEK to be acquired. And as we have made two bigger acquisitions so far this year at a higher profit margin, then I'm not totally sure we're gonna end up with eight to 10 companies. I think we're gonna be more careful on that one, because if I'm already at 50% by two companies, then I end up, how do I communicate that to the market? And that's the situation I'm in. So yeah, if I say I have the ambition of 80 to 100 million EBIT A, and I done 50 on that one, and you know the revenue, then you can backtrack the profit margin. It's yeah. It is what it is. These are really great companies to begin with. I'm happy that they are coming aboard. I do prefer slightly bigger acquisitions as well, because they do have a tendency of having a better structure internally in terms of how they all structuring, calculation, bidding, project management, and so forth, because it's not down to one entrepreneur. If you have like 40 million SEK company revenue, then it's the entrepreneur who basically does everything. If you are running 150 million SEK, you need typically three to four skilled project leaders. You need to have a slightly higher level of order in those companies so they are more resilient. So I'm really happy with that one.

Yeah, gotcha. And then last one for me, and then I'll jump back into the queue, just following up here, adding another 50 million in EBITDA through M&A with leverage at 2.9x EBITDA. Is that realistic? Yes. In your perspective?

Yes.

Yeah, okay. Nice one. That's it for me.

Okay, super.

Thank you. The next question comes from Carl Johan Bonnevir from DNB Carnegie. Please go ahead. Thanks.

Good afternoon, Johan and Magnus. Just to pick your brain a little on the snow effect that transpired into Q2, I think a lot of us might have thought that the weak snow condition might have allowed for earlier start to maybe normal kind of summer activities. How does that transpire in reality?

To some extent, I was surprised as well, because I was actually thinking the same as you did. As we don't have snow, we should have moved into the green season uh already in the by ending march so we should have a head start in the quarter not being negatively impacted by the winter but as it turned out the companies in northern sweden and also in norway weren't able to do that to the extent that we had anticipated and that ended up in uh so they they weren't ahead of schedule that's what i'm saying i i thought they should as actually as you did and uh that did not turn out to be the case Then separately from that one, you have the high invoice going on in Q1 when you have the snow activities, and then you have a negative impact on the cash flow in the first quarter because over the year, we typically have a higher leverage, so to say, in the second quarter as we tie up more working capital. And then that is, to some extent, reduced by money coming in on paid invoices in the month of April. And of course that didn't happen as well. So that's a separate issue going on there. And that meant we came in at a slightly higher leverage than expected, but that is actually slightly higher than expected. It's not really a big number from our expectations for the second quarter.

excellent thanks for the extra color there and and the other part of this is uh i guess there's a thesis then when money saved on snow removal in the in the first quarter that the part of the budget might come back in other type of projects in in the second half When would you normally see those kinds of budget thinkings coming through from the local municipalities, if it happens?

Yeah, it happens. But again, we can't guarantee that it's going to happen. But typically what goes on in the fourth quarter, somewhere in the middle of the fourth quarter, We sit down or entrepreneurs sit down with the customers and they basically go through the situation on how much do we have in budget, how much have we used so far, what's their accrued rate and how much money do we have left before year end. and what activities can we offer to the customers in the month of, let's say, half month of November and in the month of December. So that's typically when we do those type of, are having those type of budget discussions with the customers.

It's a proactive discussion basically coming up in September, October in that respect.

No, it's too early because they typically have that towards the end of the year. So I would say in the month of October, November, to my experience, that's when we have that discussion.

Excellent. And just a question also on the looking at the business combination note in the report. Did you pay for the Wagner acquisition fully out in this quarter, or is there more to come? Otherwise, it looks to be a very nice price tag for that acquisition.

Pause.

Okay, thank you. Thank you very much. All the best out there.

Okay, thank you very much. The next question comes from Julia Sunville from ABGSC. Please go ahead.

Yes, hello and good afternoon. Just one question from my side. It's on the Finnish operation and the improvements there. Is this on the market improvements or is it internal measures that have improved?

No, thank you for the question. And hello, Julia. The market conditions overall is stable, I would say. There are no major changes in the macro environment. Finland has been, I won't say suffering badly, but in the markets we're in, I would say Finland is the most troublesome market we have had within the group. And we actually don't see any significant change in the market conditions in Finland. We did change the regional manager and took one of our successful managing directors and placed him in charge. And then he started to do some changes, and all of a sudden we have, I would say, quite a significant change in those companies in Finland. So I'm really excited about what they've done.

Okay, perfect. That was all from my side.

Okay, thank you. Thank you.

There are no more questions at this time, so I hand the conference back to the speakers for any closing comments.

Okay, I don't have much to add to this one. I think we are moving in the right direction. As I said, we like the market we're in, we like the companies, we like the business model we're operating under. And I'm really looking forward to what the future will come or what type of future that will come here for the reminder of the year and in particular as we're moving into 2026 and we don't have to have the Q1 in the rolling 12 numbers because you have to have that one for a year before it goes away. But otherwise, I think it's moving along in the right direction, even though the numbers are weak in the second quarter. No question about that one. The leverage might be on the high side, according to some opinions, from my opinion, when I look upon the trend over the year, because we typically are peaking in the second quarter. And given the type of profit margin we have and the type of business we're operating under, that is no major concern from my perspective. I don't see that being a hinder or difficult to continue to invest in other companies for the remainder of the year. So from that perspective, we're going to continue to do what we do and to improve. That's what it's all about.

Great. Thank you all for listening in and have a nice summer.

Yeah. Have a nice vacation, everybody. Thank you.