Earnings call transcript: Havas Q2 2025 shows steady growth amid challenges

Havas reported its financial results for Q2 2025, revealing a steady increase in revenue and profitability despite some regional challenges. The company’s net revenue reached €1,346 million, marking a 2.9% year-on-year increase, while adjusted EBIT rose by 8.3% to €144 million. The stock experienced a slight dip of 0.8% post-earnings, closing at 1.428, before recovering to 1.5 in later trading. According to InvestingPro analysis, the company appears undervalued, with a P/E ratio of 8.44 and an attractive dividend yield of 5.33%.

Key Takeaways

• Havas achieved a 2.9% increase in net revenue year-on-year.
• Adjusted EBIT improved by 8.3%, with a margin increase to 10.7%.
• The company launched a new AI-driven strategy, CONVERGE, with significant investments.
• Geographic growth varied, with strong performance in North America but declines in Asia Pacific.
• The stock showed minor fluctuations, reflecting a cautious investor sentiment.

Company Performance

Havas demonstrated resilience in Q2 2025, with a focus on organic growth and profitability. The company reported a net revenue increase of 2.9% compared to the same period last year, driven by organic growth acceleration to 2.6% in the second quarter. Adjusted EBIT also saw a significant rise, highlighting the company’s operational efficiency and strategic investments in technology and talent.

Financial Highlights

• Revenue: €1,346 million, up 2.9% year-on-year
• Adjusted EBIT: €144 million, up 8.3%
• EBIT margin: Improved by 50 basis points to 10.7%
• Net debt: €79 million, with €1.2 billion in available liquidity

Market Reaction

Post-earnings, Havas’ stock experienced a slight decline of 0.8%, reflecting investor caution amid regional performance disparities and macroeconomic uncertainties. Despite this, the stock price later stabilized, showing a modest increase of 0.23% to 1.5, indicating a neutral to slightly positive market sentiment.

Outlook & Guidance

Havas reaffirmed its full-year guidance, projecting net organic growth above 2% and an adjusted EBIT margin between 12.5% and 13.5%. The company remains cautious about geopolitical and macroeconomic challenges but is optimistic about achieving a mid-term EBIT margin target of 14-15% by 2028. InvestingPro data shows the company maintains a GOOD financial health score of 2.6, with analysts forecasting EPS of $0.23 for FY2025, supporting management’s positive outlook.

Executive Commentary

CEO Janik Boloire emphasized the transformation towards an AI-driven organization, stating, "We are transforming Havas to become an AI-driven organization fueled by human ingenuity." CFO Francois Laoz highlighted the positive trend in profitability, noting, "Our ability to increase the EBIT ratio from 9.5 to 10.7 is a very positive trend we want to confirm."

Risks and Challenges

• Geopolitical and macroeconomic uncertainties could impact future performance.
• Regional disparities, particularly in Asia Pacific, where growth declined.
• The potential for client budget cuts affecting revenue streams.
• The need for continuous investment in technology and talent to maintain competitive advantage.

Q&A

During the earnings call, analysts inquired about the potential impact of AI on revenue models, with executives noting that significant effects have yet to materialize. Questions also focused on regional growth, particularly the recovery in North America and the challenges in Asia Pacific, with expectations for stabilization in the latter region.

Full transcript - Havas Nv (HAVAS) Q2 2025:

Sergei, Conference Coordinator: Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Havas Half Year twenty twenty five Results Conference Call. The speakers are today, Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer and Francois Laoz, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer. My name is Sergei, and I will be your coordinator for today’s event. Please note this conference is being recorded. And for the duration of the call, your lines will be in a listen only.

However, you will have the opportunity to ask questions at the end of the presentation. This can be done by pressing star one on your telephone keypad to register your participation at any time. Please note that three questions and one follow-up question are allowed to each analyst. I will now hand you over to your host, Janik Voloret, to begin today’s conference. Thank you.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: Yes, thank you very much and hi everyone. Thank you for joining us today. Before we dive into today’s presentation, there’s been Maier is asking me to draw your attention to the disclaimer in the presentation that you should read carefully. Please take a moment to review it as it provides important legal information and cautionary notices concerning forward looking statements. So as you can see Havas has delivered a solid first half of the year.

All our key indicators are trending upward both in terms of business and profitability. In terms of business, in the 2025, net revenue reached EUR 1,346,000,000.000, representing a 2.9% increase year on year. We delivered an organic growth at 2.3% on the first half with an acceleration during Q2 at plus 2.6% confirming positive momentum. In terms of profitability, adjusted EBIT came in at €144,000,000 marking a strong 8.3% growth compared to the same period last year. The adjusted EBIT margin improved by 50 basis points to 10.7%, reflecting enhanced operational efficiency.

Francois will provide further insights in a few minutes. This solid financial performance reflects the strength of our model, which continues to deliver across key strategic pillars. If you go to the next slide, Commercial Momentum. First, we are driving dynamic commercial momentum, particularly in North America along with numerous integrated wins we are especially proud of. We are delivering robust performance in both new business and in business growth, which clearly demonstrates the strength of our clients’ partnerships.

A few examples of key wins this half year include Olive Garden or Isleed or even Under Armour for the creative assignments. And we have continued to grow with existing clients such as Sanofi or GSK. One year ago, you remember, we announced the major strategic pivot with the launch of our new global strategy and operating system called CONVERGE. This transformative project is clearly bearing fruit and delivering meaningful impact for clients. If you go to the next slide, creative excellence remains at the heart of everything we do and we are especially very proud of Can ION this year with 39 awards including two Grand Prix and three Gold Lions.

If you go to the next chart of talent and unique corporate culture, fostering collaboration and creativity are key drivers of our performance and we are very proud to have welcomed as you can see on this chart, top tier talent from some of the most respected groups in the industry since January 1. On the next chart, our Data Tech and AI strategy is clearly another powerful asset. Last year, we announced an acceleration of our investment in this field as we reaffirm our EUR400 million commitment through 2027, so EUR100 million a year. We pursued strategic investments and partnership with major players, some of them are on this chart to strengthen its capabilities and we accelerate innovation and we help clients address their specific business challenges. AI, which is of course of the utmost importance, we are clearly transforming Havas to become an AI driven organization fueled by human ingenuity.

We’ve made incredible progress over the past year, so much progress that we decided in Cannes to evolve into converge.ai to mark the next chapter of our transformation. We are fully committed to this journey with the goal of having 100% of our workforce train to harness AI’s full potential. In terms of dynamic and M and A strategy, we’ve continued to execute on our strategy of targeted bolt on acquisitions. We acquired majority stakes in five agencies, in Spain we CA Sports or Havas Play, in The U. S.

With Channel Bakers for e commerce in Argentina, a creative agency done, a very powerful creative agency, a smaller acquisition in France FMAT for the launch of our health agency, Jacques Paris and recently a CRM agency in Canada, Inverta Digital. These acquisitions not only expand our capabilities, but also support our ambition to strengthen expertise in high potential areas of our business. I’ll now hand over to our CFO, Francois Larose, who will walk you through the financial performance in more detail.

Francois Laoz, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Havas: Hi, everyone. Pleased to welcome you on this half of your call. I will start by the performance of the first quarter second quarter, sorry, with this EUR $697,000,000 revenues, it’s 0.8% growth. This growth coming from 2.6% from the organic, reminding the acceleration of the second half second quarter coming from 2.1% on the first quarter to 2.6% on the second. The scope for the second quarter is 1%, and we have negative ForEx impact on the second quarter.

We had positive 1% during the first quarter. But as you know, the evolution of the euro dollar currency leads to this minus 2.7% after the impacts of the slowdown of the US dollar after liberation day. On the Q2, you got the spread geographical spread of our organic growth, 2.6% for the World Group. Important to point out the very strong performance of the North American continent with 4.6% positive growth, but also Europe 2.6% after a weaker first quarter. Latin America is still growing by 2.5%, and Asia Pacific is down by 4.9%, mainly due some budget cuts from some sub clients, but no negative trend neither on macro or on the positive evolution of our client portfolio.

If we just move now to the whole first half, the figures are roughly on the same trend with 2.3% of organic growth, still very strong in The U. S, 3.9% positive in Europe and Latin America and slightly negative in Asia Pacific for the reason I just gave. On the next page, important to remind the scope and ForEx impact. On the scope, we were at 1.4% on the first quarter. It’s 1% on the second quarter for 1.2% for the whole first half.

On the ForEx, we have this strong evolution. We were positive by 1.7%, and we are negative by 2.7% on the second quarter. It’s, as I say, mainly due to U. S. Dollar, but also some Latin American currencies, which have negatively impacted our revenue during this second quarter.

In terms of revenue breakdown, no major change compared with the last communication we did six months ago. Havas Creative is still the first business unit with 41%, Havas Media 36 and Havas Health 23%. Same for the geographies, North America at 35%, France number two with 18%, and UK number three with 16%, the rest of Europe being at 16% as well. In terms of sectors, health is still our first business sector with 30% of the revenues, followed by finance and consumer goods at 10% each. If we now focus on the P and L of this first half, as you have seen, the net revenue is up by 2.9% on the net revenue, And our adjusted EBIT margin is up by 50 basis points from 10.2% to 10.7%.

This mainly reflects our performance in terms of staff cost management as our staff cost went up by 1.6% compared to 1.6%, sorry, compared with the 2.9% increase of the net revenue. So that is this evolution, which explain our performance in adjusted EBIT margin from 10.2% to 10.7%. The adjusted EBIT in gross figures moved from EUR 133,000,000 to 144,000,000. It’s an 8.3% increase. If we now move to the full P and L, starting by the adjusted EBIT, then we add the net financial expense, which are minus EUR17 million for the first half, mainly due to the net foreign exchange loss of minus EUR 10,000,000 on this first half, also due to the evolution euro dollar.

On the income tax, we have a reduction of our tax paid from tax accounted, sorry, from EUR 48,000,000 to EUR 37,000,000, And non controlling interest are slightly above last year, EUR3 million more, mainly due to the good performance of our recent acquisition, among which Uncommon, which has delivered a very strong first half. In terms of cash flow generation, we moved from this positive cash of EUR211 million at the end of the year 2024 to a net debt of EUR79 million. As always, during this first half, we have a very strong seasonality impact on our working capital. Our working capital deteriorated by €183,000,000 That’s, as I said, the common trend of the first half. But let’s remark that during the first half twenty twenty four, the deterioration was higher at $2.00 €4,000,000 So nothing to worry about this evolution of the working capital here again due to the seasonality of our business.

The operating cash flow before working capital is still solid at EUR 117,000,000. And then you see all the evolution, CapEx EUR 15,000,000, M and A EUR 25,000,000, tax EUR 37,000,000 and the transaction with shareowners, 88,000,000, which is the sum of the dividend pays by €84,000,000 and the share buyback that we have launched early June for €4,000,000 This net debt evolution is truly impacted also by the ForEx, more than EUR 50,000,000 due to the assets of in dollars, which have been impacted by the evolution of the euro dollar currency. So it’s EUR 79,000,000 net cash net debt at the June. And the next slide, we compare this with the June 2024. It was minus EUR 26,000,000, so it’s net debt of EUR 26,000,000 one year ago.

And between the two, we have the EUR 50,000,000 evolution of the ForEx. So if we restate this net debt of EUR 79,000,000 from the ForEx impact, we are roughly at the same level than last year. Important also to remind our liquidity available, which is EUR 1,200,000,000.0 at the June, $350,000,000 coming from our net cash, the remaining coming from the authorized credit line, RCF of EUR 700,000,000 and some overdraft which has been negotiated. So today, Havas has EUR 1,200,000,000.0 available liquidity in case we should we would like to accelerate in our M and A policy. In terms of guidance, before entering into the guidance, let’s remind what we have achieved over the last two years in terms of revenues, in terms of organic growth and adjusted EBIT.

You see on this chart our revenue going up from EUR1.2 billion to EUR1.3 billion, and the adjusted EBIT coming from EUR120 million to EUR144 million in two years’ time. We also remind our ability to increase the EBIT ratio from 9.5 at the June 2023 to 10.2 June 2024 and now 10.7 in June 2025. That’s a very positive trend we would like to confirm for the future. So in terms of outlook, we confirm the guidance we gave in November and reiterated in March, with this net organic growth above 2%, with the adjusted EBIT in the range of 12.5% to 13.5%, the payout ratio of 40% around 40% and the mid term guidance, which is still the aim of reaching 14% to 15% of EBIT margin in 2028 and the payout ratio still high at around 40%.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: Thank you, Francois. So maybe we jump to Q

Sergei, Conference Coordinator: And our first question is from Lisa Yang from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Lisa Yang, Analyst, Goldman Sachs: Good evening. Thanks for taking my questions, and congratulations on the results. First, I’m just wondering, if you can maybe, give us a bit of an update on how you’re thinking about Q3. Obviously, Q2 saw a very good acceleration. And I’m just thinking in q three, you should see the impact of new business wins you had earlier the year, Olive Garden or LVMH, for instance, faster comps are easier.

So you think we could do you think we could get to basically two and a half, 3% for for for q three? That’s the the first question. Second question, I was just wondering, obviously, the lot of concerns on the impact of GenAI on the agency, especially in creative. How your, basically, agency is being impacted so far or, you know, any sort of conversations we have with clients regarding, for instance, renegotiating the fees because you can now do things people faster or on the opposite? Does that enable you to do more for your clients and therefore potentially even earn more revenue?

And the third question is just on the margins. So you grew your margin 50 bps for in h one. I was just wondering, is that basically ballpark the the right level of margin improvement for the full year as well? Or what are the moving parts which basically would get you to a lower or higher margin improvement for

Annique Maas, Analyst, Bernstein: the full year? Thank you.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: Thank you very much, Lisa. So maybe I take the first and second question. You take the question on margin, maybe you want to answer on Q3. So on Q3, it’s too early to say. We will have a favorable basis effect on Q3 to be fully transparent with you because last year we had a decline on Q3.

So we are quite confident that we believe we can achieve our guidance. We are still cautious or prudent, because we are still living in an environment where we have a lot of geopolitical or regulatory and macroeconomic uncertainty. So we prefer to be prudent and to be confident that we can deliver on our guidance. And the wins that you mentioned will mainly affect Q4 and especially 2026. But still, having said that, we are confident that we can achieve on our guidance for full year.

When it comes to Gen AI, we don’t see yet any kind of impact or significant impact on the revenue to be frank with you. We have adopted Gen AI since the 2022. It started with midjourney and now with Adobe and all the great tools. So we are more in our discussion with clients and the mood to do more for the same price, more assets, like thousands of assets now generated through AI. And we believe it could be for an agency like Havas an opportunity to grow, especially on the production side of the business, where we’re a little bit late on this those changes.

So I believe GenAI could help us to maybe leapfrog the industry on production. So it’s too early to conflict, I think it could be at the end a good opportunity to grow for us. And maybe, Francois, on margins?

Francois Laoz, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Havas: Yes, on margins. First of all, let me remind that our margin profile is not the same on the two halves because we have finalized 10.7% for the first half, and we still intend to be in

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: the range of 12.5%

Francois Laoz, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Havas: to 13.5 for the whole year, which confirm that the second half is far stronger in terms of EBIT margin. But to answer clearly your question, we still have the intention to increase our margin for the whole year at the same pace than the first half, roughly around 50 basis point.

Lisa Yang, Analyst, Goldman Sachs: Okay. Thank you.

Sergei, Conference Coordinator: Thank you. Our next question is from Annique Maas from Bernstein. Please go ahead.

Annique Maas, Analyst, Bernstein: Good evening. So I have three as well. The first one, I understand you don’t give comments on Q3, but why do you keep your full year guidance? It feels very cautious to keep it at the current level considering you are already more than there and your comps are getting much easier. So do you actually see something happening in q three, q four that is worse than what it is at the moment?

That’s my first one. The second one is on North America. If you could just tell us what is driving the growth except the fact that or besides of the fact that the comps were easier. And then on APAC, you suggested that there were some budget cuts, which explained the decline of net revenues. Is that now totally phased out?

Or shall we expect some more of that impacting the next quarters? Thank you.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: Thank you very much. So thank you, Henrik. So on the guidance, I mean, I hear what you say. And of course, I mean, it was a question we raised with Francois and the team that have asked, should we read something about the guidance because we guided the market above 2% and we are 2.3 on the first half with the favorable basis effect on second half. But I mean, that’s the first year of the flotation for Havas, not the first year, but the first year since the last IPO.

So I mean, we you know where we are. We want to make sure that we can deliver on our on our results. We don’t have any client loss that will affect the the the growth on the Q2. So there is nothing that we are hiding. We are being fully transparent with you.

In terms of North America, Francois, and Tudor,

Francois Laoz, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Havas: North you want to America, I think, first of all, it’s anticipated bounce back of the Health business, which has been hit by the loss of Pfizer 2020 the 2023, impacting 2024. So there is this anticipated burn back on health. But not only we have our operation in direct marketing in San Diego, which have performed very well during this first half with some nice wins like Jacuzzi or others. So that’s explained the performance. And I would say more to come on media, where we have some nice win.

I was referring to Olive Garden that will impact maybe fourth quarter and more important, the year 2026. So U. S, it comes from all year all business, including health for the bounce back after the performance in 2024, but also media, which has performed very well during this second quarter and the direct marketing. On APAC, as I said, it’s clearly some when I was referring to client loss, we had some big clients in automotive, and I would say in the ancient times automotive, which are partly replaced by electric ones in Asia. And we have to adapt our agency out our offer to this new paradigm.

So we are not worried about the future, and we consider this poor performance of the second quarter must not be projected in the full year.

Annique Maas, Analyst, Bernstein: Thank you very much.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: Thank you.

Sergei, Conference Coordinator: Thank you. We will now move to our next question from Julien Roch from Barclays. Please go ahead.

Julien Roch, Analyst, Barclays: JULIEN Only questions for Francois and Janik. So if the exchange rates stay the same for the rest of the year, can we get the full year impact of FX? That’s my first question. And can we get some indications of the items between adjusted EBIT and net income for full year twenty twenty five? So one, level of exceptional two, level of interest.

It was much higher in the first half. So is it going to be higher for the full year pre tax rate and for minorities? And then finally, how much of your EUR 127,000,000 of pass through in 2024 were linked to production?

Nicolas Langley, Analyst, BNP Paribas, Exane: Merci?

Francois Laoz, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Havas: On the exchange rates, quite simple figures. Today, if we take $0.10 on the US dollar, it impacts for 100,000,000 for the full year. So if we on the first half, were at EUR 108 for U. S. Dollar, euro.

And if we remain in the range of EUR 116,000,000 to EUR $118,000,000, it will impact, let’s say, EUR 50,000,000 for the second half. So it’s roughly EUR 100,000,000 for the full year, EUR 50,000,000 for the net revenue for the second half. That’s the figure you should have in mind. In terms of P and L, we are not able to give two precise figures on the financial as we had not anticipated this net losses, the exchange losses due to the evolution of euro dollar. But we consider that the impact on the second half should be far lower as we do not today anticipate a new evolution of the dollar, which seems to be stabilized around the range of EUR 1.16, 1.18.

So if it’s the case, the net financial expense for the second half will be far lower than this loss of EUR 17,000,000. On the income tax, we have this 31.8% effective tax rate that we today project for the whole year. And, you know, non controlling interest, we we should be above last year due to the performance of uncommon and some agencies in which we do not own 100%.

Julien Roch, Analyst, Barclays: And pass through?

Francois Laoz, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Havas: On the pass through, it’s partly due to production and partly due to our events operations. I will give you the the detailed detailed performance, but it’s both production and event driven operation as we did last year in in Saudi Arabia or things like that.

Sergei, Conference Coordinator: We will now move to our next question from Laura Metayak from Morgan Stanley. Congratulations

Laura Metayak, Analyst, Morgan Stanley: on a good quarter. Three questions from me, please. On AI, just a follow-up question. How do you expect the business modelpayment model to evolve? Do you have any clients today asking for more outcome based payment model?

Or is it more time and materials than retainers? Second question on margin expansion. So the trajectory has been quite impressive. Are you able to give us a bit more details on where exactly you’re creating efficiencies? And then third question, you’ve mentioned some client wins.

Can you tell us why you think clients pick Havas over other ad agencies and how you differentiate?

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: Thank you very much for your comments on the quarter. Honestly, on the AI business model, we don’t see, think Francois, correct me if I’m wrong, but any huge changes in the way we are remunerated?

Francois Laoz, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Havas: No. Up to now, no, we have not seen any change.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: Okay. And where the increase of the margins are coming from?

Francois Laoz, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Havas: Yes. The increase of the margin, I think, again, we always refer to that. But I think this first half confirm the success of our integration operation with development of what we call the InBiz. Hence, we have some clients who will give us more and more assignments, the one who entered through media and now one creative or production. And we know this type of assignment are more profitable than the other.

So I would say the increase of the margin is, first of all, this ability to have more profitable revenue through in biz, and the second being our ambitions to do more business with the same staff. Our headcount are stable since the end of the year 2024, even if our revenue went up. So we try to be able to do more business with the same stuff. I think that’s the two main reason why we’re able to increase our EBIT ratio half after half.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: And I will help us achieve, of course, those margin expansion. And why have asked? I mean, it’s a key question why have asked. It’s a question that keeps at night, as you can imagine. And we’ve been very I mean, clients have been very positive with us during this first half.

I mean, it’s a combination of different things. First, I want to highlight the quality of the teams because it’s always Francois and I that are front on this kind of meetings, but we have 23,000 great people at Havas and you’ve seen some of the the newcomer, new joiner, but the quality of the teams, the longevity of the teams, I mean, teams have been working at Havas for a long time. I would add the quality of the service. We are clearly a client client centric. The integrated model, the creativity, not just about being a creative, doing creative campaign, but the way we we do media, the way we do production, the way we do everything, we try to do something more.

A great strategy and also we have invested heavily on our tools. And now I’m proud to say that, we might have the best tools or some of the best tools of industry in the take data and AI space. So this is this combination of things that I think makes quite giving us a high quality client satisfaction and is satisfaction and is giving some reasons for client to decide to join Havas.

Laura Metayak, Analyst, Morgan Stanley: Merci. Thank you, Merci.

Sergei, Conference Coordinator: Thank you. And our next question is from Nicolas Langley from BNP Paribas, Exane. Please go ahead.

Nicolas Langley, Analyst, BNP Paribas, Exane: Hello. Good afternoon, Nicolas. So I’ve got three questions as well. So it’s great to see all those business wins. Can you tell us what was the impact of net new business in the first part of the year and whatever you expect, an acceleration of that effect in the in the second part of the year?

Secondly, you have mentioned the rise of agentic platform at Avast. I’m just curious if the plan is to use them mostly internally or you plan to build environment at client level. And do you think those platform can actually bring additional businesses or mostly improve what you already provide to clients? And finally, on the scope effect, given the recent deal announcement, what sort of impact we should expect in in H two on top line? Thank you.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: You wanna take the question, Francois?

Francois Laoz, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Havas: First of all, yes. Let’s start with with the scope. We give these figures for the, first half of 1.2%. And I would say that for the full year, depending on the closing on the different agencies we are looking at, could be in the range of 1.2% to 1.5% for the whole year. So roughly in line with with what we have announced, but it still can change as we have several operation does the process of acquisition.

In terms of newbies impact, it’s not easy to answer on the impact. As you know, we start year after year budget and business with what we call unearned new business. So we, first of all, have to fill the bucket of the unearned new business, which we have done very strongly during the second quarter with the nice wind Yannick described. So today, we are in line with our forecast. And if we keep on, I would say, winning some clients during the third fourth quarter, we’ll be able to be more optimistic on the impact on the organic growth.

But until now, we have we are exactly in line with what we anticipated. And so maybe more if if some nice wins come in the coming are are to to to be confirmed in the coming months. On the platform, not sure I got a 100% of your question, Delphine.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: It was about the in housing now, Nicolas?

Francois Laoz, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Havas: Can you can you, Nicolas, can you come back on the question two? I’m not sure I got it.

Nicolas Langley, Analyst, BNP Paribas, Exane: No. The the question is whether the agentic platform will be will be mostly used by your own employees, or you plan to build environment using the agentic platform at client level. And I’m interested to understand go ahead, sir.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: No. So sorry. Go ahead. Go ahead. But I got your question, I I think.

Nicolas Langley, Analyst, BNP Paribas, Exane: No. No. And finally, just to understand whatever you think this bring additional businesses to for you or whether you are mostly improving the services you already provide to to clients.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: Yeah. No. I mean, it’s a it’s a great question. Thank you very much. So we launched our our platform called Converge last year, which was basically an evolution of of our previous platform that has been boosted with data, tech, and AI.

So it’s a platform that is used both by our people, but also with our clients. So for all the validating process, everything, we are shifting from sending hundreds of emails to validating everything on the platform, from building, audience segment, this kind of thing, all the production, the validation of the credit. So everything is used on the platform both on the agency side, but also on the client side. The news is that we are incorporating, much more AI now. So it’s gonna become a kind of agent seek led platform.

So everyone will have an agent. So we’re coming in on the platform. So it would be much more intuitive and easy to use it. And at the end, everything we’ve converged, sorry to use the same word, on this platform, both from talents, clients. And I mean, it’s really bringing lots of effectiveness and also efficiencies for us.

So we are transform transferring all our existing clients to this platform even though most of it are already using it today and we are onboarding all the new clients to this platform. Today, the feedback we receive from clients is very high on this platform when they compare with what they can found on the competition. So we’ll continue to invest in this platform.

Nicolas Langley, Analyst, BNP Paribas, Exane: Okay, perfect. Thank you, Jules.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: Thank you, Nico.

Sergei, Conference Coordinator: Thank you. And we’ll now take our final question today from Conor O’Shea from Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead.

Conor O’Shea, Analyst, Kepler Cheuvreux: Yes, thank you for taking my questions. A few on my side still. Just firstly, in terms of the wins, I think I know you don’t like to discuss individual wins, but I think there was one, LVMH, you won some territories. On the media side, the six largest global advertisers. So just wondering if that is more significant than some of the others and can make an incremental contribution in the second half of the year.

Second question, just in terms of can you give us a sense of what the growth breakdown or in broad terms was between creative and media activities in the first half? And then last question, just in terms of the health care business. It seems from your comments, Janik, that health and Fosmer, that held up very well again in the second quarter. Do you see a risk that some of the activity in this sector was maybe pulled forward in the first half of the year ahead of maybe some tariff changes or other changes in The U. S.

Health care sector, in particular, maybe later in the year? Thank you.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: Yes. No, thank you very much, Conor. So on the health care for now, I mean, have a very strong dynamic. Last year Havas was seriously impacted by a big loss of the health client, but it has allowed us to do a lot of new business last year. So today, this year, Health is growing fast.

Client satisfaction is very strong. We don’t see any slowdown for now. There is a lot of uncertainty on the, I would say regulatory environment with some rumors on the market that the new U. S. Secretary of Health can make some changes.

But honestly for now, we haven’t heard anything. So I mean, the two main rumors, the first one is on the potential ban of TV advertising for prescription based drugs. If it happens, we are working with our clients to transfer it to digital, so it should marginally impact our results. But still I’m talking about something we don’t know because nothing was official. And there’s a second rumor was about the vaccine, which is not the main activities of Havas in The U.

S. For the healthcare. So we won’t be impacted seriously by vaccine. So for now, we don’t see any slowdown. Clients are investing, teams are working very hard and we are mostly bearing the fruits of all the investments on health.

So it’s for now it’s positive. On the terms of wins, so we don’t disclose too much the wins. The wins we’ve mentioned, Olive Garden, Eastdil and Under Armour are impacting this year. We didn’t mention LVMH or some other wins because they will impact 2026 mostly because it’s client that have awarded us with their business, but it will start in 2026. So it won’t have any impact on our business this year.

And in terms of growth breakdown, Francois?

Francois Laoz, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Havas: Yes, we do not disclose the growth breakdown by business unit, but you can confirm that all the business unit contributed to the performance of the first half. Hence, we have some very rapid growing agencies in both business. In Creative, we have had very strong growth in some top creative agencies, including Uncommon or others. And in media, just say. So what is important is to understand that all these discussions contributed to the growth creative media and and to direct marketing, which is part of media and as for sure.

So it’s has been what what spread during the same time.

Conor O’Shea, Analyst, Kepler Cheuvreux: Okay. Very clear. All right. Thanks. You.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: Thank you very much, Konur. So I think this is the end of the Q and A session.

Nicolas Langley, Analyst, BNP Paribas, Exane: Thank you. With this, I’d like to hand the

Sergei, Conference Coordinator: call back over to Janik Valore for closing remarks.

Janik Boloire, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Havas: Okay. Noto, thank you very much for joining this conference. I know you have a lot of other conference to attend, so I will leave you now. So thank you.

Sergei, Conference Coordinator: Thank you. This concludes today’s conference call. Thank you for your participation. Ladies and gentlemen, you may now disconnect.

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