Nobia AB (publ)

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for calling in to this Q1 results presentation. The presentation today will be conducted by our new president and CEO, Mr. Kristoffer Ljungfeldt, and then our CFO, Mr. Henrik Skogsfors, will dig into all of the financial data. With that, I hand the word over to you, Kristoffer.

Thank you Tobias and good morning everybody and welcome to this quarterly update. I am Kristoffer Jungfeld and CEO since 1st of May. Some of you might know me since CFO back from 2016 to 2022 and now I'm back here again having a chance to talk to all of you and it's great to be back in this fantastic company. Let's start with the financial update for Q1. Our sales dropped considerably in the quarter. However, it was very much in line with our expectations and earlier communications. Organic sales of minus 20%, whereas UK was minus 14% and the Nordics was minus 25%. Top line was heavily burdened by the large decline in housing starts and completions in the construction industry. And on the back of the poor completions, our organic sales decline in the product business was about 35%. in both Nordics and the UK. However, on a very positive note, we see indications of recovery in the retail segment in all our markets, and our appointments are picking up again. And our consumer campaign generated an improved order book for Q2 deliveries. Another positive note is that gross margins improved by 0.6% to 0.37.3% on the back of improved average order values, It was also driven by the segment mix where the consumer sales with a higher gross margin was more resilient in the period. We're really pleased to see that the gross margin improvement in the Nordics as we have worked hard to sustain efficiency and order values despite volume decline. We had a slight gross volume decline in the UK, which was below our expectations. However, the drop was mainly related to our under absorption in the supply chain what our average order values in Magnet was up year on year, which is in line with our strategy to drive sales in the mass premium space. We're also very confident that we took share in retail in the mass premium segment in the UK during the winter campaign, which is a testimonial that our strategy works. Despite the high inflationary pressure, our currency adjusted FD&A was improved 116 million Swedish crowns compared to the same period last year. That's a good result, but it's not enough to drive positive results in this very difficult market. And consequently, we are investigating further opportunities to come down in cost in all areas, and we'll return with more insight on that during the second quarter. EBIT came in at negative 27, which is in line with expectations given the market circumstances, but it's also clearly a disappointment. However, on a positive note, as the consumer sales now show signs of improvements, we will push harder for sales growth in that segment and review our cost base again. Cash flow is normally weak in the first quarter due to seasonality. The operating cash flow, including investments, amounted to negative 574 million SEK. The primary reason behind the deviation compared to last year is the high seasonality outflows and investment in our Jönköping factory, and Henrik will come and shed some more light on that one. If we take the next slide, please. Slide three. As you know, we have strengthened our balance sheet considerably during the quarter, and I really have to thank Jon and Henrik and our shareholders for completing the share rights issue. the sell and lease back of the Jönköping factory and the divestment of non-core assets, which let us have the chance to focus on our core operations, where we historically have shown we can make solid double-digit margins. On the back of that, Henrik and team managed to extend credit facilities with our banks with maturity in 2027. With these measures, we are in a substantially better financial position to deliver on our strategic priorities and make us an even stronger company. Let's have an update of our strategic priorities, which we divide into three segments. It's maximizing cost efficiency and the leverage, realize full Nordic potential, and the UK transformation. So let's start with the first one, where we come, as I just said, a long way to strengthen our balance sheet. I will not dwell more on that. We have also done a huge job in taking out costs across all parts of the business. However, with current market situation, we are looking to do more on cost as long as the market remains soft. And any measures we do now will also give us good operational leverage when the market finally recover. Secondly, realizing the full Nordic potential, I am encouraged by the progress I have seen in Jönköping, which I visited with some customers a couple of weeks back. We've already started to manufacture components and certain cabinets to other parts of the supply chain network. The quality and efficiency we get out of the new machinery is really impressive. And as a true kitchen geek since 10 years, I must say that I have never experienced anything better than that, what we can get out of that factory. There is a long way left to manufacture full-scale kitchens in Jönköping, but I have a lot of confidence in the team and the progression that's being made. We have fantastic brands in the Nordics with a new harmonized product platform. The brands will have even better products, a better choice within the mass premium segment and yet much more cost efficient range. And we also in the Nordics harmonize our processes and systems to drive further efficiency in our support function. And you can already see that as an example, our brand TIG Dalmabodal Invita Novart, They operate in four different countries, but they look very similar in pretty much everything they do. Thirdly, the UK transformation is going well. We're addressing our large fixed cost base by consolidating manufacturing, unprofitable store leases and consolidating certain functions. We probably have to go harder on cost for slightly longer due to tough underlying market situation and are investigating further options during Q2. And currently, we're also carrying out strategic review of our store portfolio. On a very positive note, the Magnus brand is extremely strong in the marketplace. And with improved product portfolio, we can already demonstrate improving average order values, also help by better segment mix as consumer sales is growing again. And with this really good brand and strong brand, it's been fairly easy to find partnerships and have conversations about selling the brand in different channels through concessions. And mainly we have done concessions and discussions in and around London and also to some extent in Scotland. And we have signed our first franchisee in South London, which is very interesting indeed. The next one, please. So on the market, so I already shed some light on it, but a bit of a repetition here. As I alluded to, it's been a difficult market situation, but in general, we see the consumer sales recovering somewhat. And in the Nordics, consumer confidence is turning up, and we estimate that the market will recover further from this point. The Nordic project market is, however, extremely challenging, and we currently don't see any triggers for improvement in the short to mid-term. And adding the four Nordic markets and housing starts, which you have there to the right, if you add those together during a normal market circumstances, housing starts is about 40,000 a quarter, dwelling to quarter, whilst currently we are trading around half of that. In the UK, the situation is somewhat similar. The consumer market is still soft, but the trend and trajectory is positive. And on top of it, Magnus is performing well in that space. Housing stocks in the UK is historically very low as well, as you can see on the graph here. We all read that the UK government talks about a demand of about 40,000 new dwellings per year. So the current situation is must be unsustainable, and the pent-up demand is just to keep on building. However, this is obviously not something we can do about short-term. We just have to make sure that we win the few projects that are out there to the right margins. And next one, then I hand over to you, Henrik.

Thank you, Kristoffer. Nordic region first quarter, a solid improvement of 1.6 percentage points to 33.9% for the gross margin. A strong performance considering the large volume decline. We had improvement on back of price realization, reduced cost on input materials, as well as a favorable price mix that Kristoffer was alluding to before, where consumer sales holds up better than the professional segments. The improvement was partly mitigated by adverse currency effects. Organic sales, just like in the fourth quarter of 2023, experienced a decline of 25%. Price realisation continued to support the top line. However, it was counterbalanced by a large decrease in the volume effect in sales performance in all countries and segments. The project segment observed the most significant sales decline by 35%. followed by lesser drops in the retail and the trade sectors. Finland encountered a large decline in sales, traded by Sweden, Denmark and Norway. The selling and administrative costs supported the result in the quarter, where the impact from the restructuring in cost outflow that was communicated in January last year resulted in savings of approximately 10 million SEK. mainly staff cost reduction but also property cost coupled with benefits from the transition we did in Finland in the fourth quarter of 2023. As outlined in the quarterly report, we accounted for SEK 17 million as item affecting comparability in the quarter. These costs are associated with the transition of the new factory in Jönköping. I am pleased to note that we are successfully managing the situation and leaving a positive ebit despite a very challenging market situation. Next slide, please. UK. Gross margin remain on high levels in the UK, driven by the progress in our UK transformation strategy with higher or average order values on back of higher share of sales in the premium segment that Kristoffer talked about earlier. Organic sales declined by 40%. The UK kitchen market, much like the Nordics, was soft during the quarter. In addition, our sales were also impacted by the exit of certain low margin parts of the product segment. The economic handling in particular affected the project and the trade segment. while the retail segment displayed single-digit growth following the successful conclusion of the important annual winter sales campaign. The decrease in gross margin by 1.1% is a mixed effect of the winter sales campaign and volume distillation in the product segment following the Dewsbury exit in the first quarter of 2023. The savings resulting from the restructuring cost-out program last year impacted the quarter by 50 million SEK, slightly surpassing our expectations and driving the reduction in selling and admin costs. Despite the sales decline of 14% on an organic basis, the UK operating profit is flat compared to last year with a strong support from the implemented saving activities. Next slide, please. the financial position. Cash flow from operating activities declined by 593 million SEK minus the negative 258 million SEK in the quarter area, primarily on back of reduced working capital liabilities. Working capital has a seasonality and is usually weak in the first quarter every year. The quarter was also negatively impacted from supplier payments related to machinery purchases in the Jönköping factory. Working capital is also impacted on the year-on-year comparison by the development we did of our business in the Netherlands, Brebus, and in Austria, Eva. The strong winter sales campaign in the UK resulted in an increased account receivable balance as well as a ramp up of inventory. However, that will be seen in sales later during the year. The operating cash flow, including investments, amounted to negative 574 million SEK. Well, the investment in the quarter, which is primarily related to the new machinery for the factory in Jönköping, amounted to 324 million SEK. Net debt, excluding leasing and pension debt, decreased from year end by 630 million to 2.8 billion SEK. The decrease is related to the earlier communicated debt-reducing activities. The Salen Leaseback, the divestment of Rebus, and EWE, which are the main drivers behind the reduction of net debt in the quarter. The positive effect was mitigated by continued investments in the machinery for the new factory and the effects from working capital that I have mentioned. And after the close of the quarter, we also successfully closed the rights issue of 1.26 billion SEK, which is another debt reducing activity that will positively impact our net debt in the second quarter. It's important to keep in mind, however, that we still have approximately 800 continued outflows during the year before the investments in the factory are completed. That's all from the financial positions. Over to you again. And next slide, please. Okay.

So finally, let's look at the summary of our priorities going forward here. Again, retail market is looking better, and we will pool our resources into winning share in that market. I expect we will go slightly harder on driving footfall via the digital channels than what we have done previously, but we will finance it through cost control and pooling spend from other parts of the business. We will not increase cost. As alluded to before also, we expect that our project business to remain soft throughout the year, and on the back of that, we will target further cost activities, and we will come back on that. and what that entails during . We will drive hard towards completing our strategic initiatives as fast as absolutely possible in order to also enjoy the financial benefits as fast as absolutely possible. Strong focus and priority will be to get Jönköping operational during the year. With that also comes finalization of our harmonized Nordic range, and we expect some new exciting products in the mass premium space to be launched on the back of that. In the UK, we will close manufacturing in the Halifax site this month, which reduced manufacturing sites from five sites in 2023 to only two sites by the end of this May 2024. So that's really well done to Team UK to deliver that in just a year. We will also continue the strategic overview of our store portfolio and transition to our new partnership model. So thank you for listening, and we are now ready to take your questions.

Thank you.

Please open up for questions. Thank you.

As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star 1, 1 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star 1, 1 again. Please stand by. Once again, to ask a question, you will need to press star 1 1 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star 1 1 again. We will now take our first question. Please stand by. And the first question comes from the line of Rasmus Enberg from Handelsbanken. Please go ahead. Your line is now open.

Yes. Hi. Good morning. Can you hear me?

Yes.

Hi, Rasmus. Hi. I was just wondering on the new build in the Nordics, am I right in thinking that it's declining sequentially going forward as well?

Yes, the decline will definitely taper off from Q2 and onwards, but we expect it to be somewhat declining still in the second half.

And on the consumer side, can you put some flavor on the potential recovery there in consumer?

It's really hard to say at this point. We can see some leading indicators pointing towards a recovery of the market. But it's too early to say how much that will come out of it. Okay, thanks.

Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, you'll need to press star 1 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star 1, 1 again. As there are no further questions, I would now like to hand back to Tobias Norby, Head of Investor Relations, for any closing remarks.

Well, thank you everyone for calling in today and we welcome you all back on the 18th of July for our half-year results.