Earnings call transcript: Norma Group Q1 2025 sees revenue drop, stock falls

Norma Group AG reported its financial results for the first quarter of 2025, revealing a challenging period marked by a decline in sales and a negative earnings per share (EPS). The company posted net sales of €284.2 million, a decrease from the previous year, and an adjusted EPS of -€0.01. Despite these challenges, InvestingPro data shows the company maintains impressive gross profit margins of 57.35% and a healthy current ratio of 2.02, indicating strong operational efficiency and liquidity. Following the announcement, Norma Group’s stock price experienced a decline, dropping by 7.24% in pre-market trading. The company’s revenue forecast for the full year remains unchanged, despite the first-quarter struggles.

Key Takeaways

• Norma Group’s Q1 2025 net sales fell to €284.2 million.
• Adjusted EPS was reported at -€0.01.
• Stock price dropped by 7.24% in pre-market trading.
• The company maintains its full-year forecast despite challenges.
• Transformation program aims for double-digit EBIT margins by 2028/2029.

Company Performance

Norma Group’s performance in Q1 2025 reflected the broader challenges facing the automotive industry, with net sales declining due to unfavorable market conditions. The company struggled to reduce fixed costs in line with lower revenue, impacting its profitability. Despite these setbacks, Norma Group continues to focus on innovation and efficiency, targeting a transformation into a leading industrial powerhouse.

Financial Highlights

• Revenue: €284.2 million, a decrease from the previous year.
• Adjusted EBIT: €10.3 million, with a margin of 3.6%.
• Adjusted EPS: -€0.01.
• Net debt increased by 2.6%.
• Equity ratio improved to 49.3%.

Earnings vs. Forecast

Norma Group’s actual EPS of -€0.065 fell short of market expectations, contributing to the stock’s decline. The company’s revenue of €284.2 million did not meet forecasts, reflecting the challenging market environment. These results mark a significant departure from previous quarters, where Norma Group had managed to maintain steadier performance.

Market Reaction

Following the earnings announcement, Norma Group’s stock price declined by 7.24% in pre-market trading, closing at €10.76. This movement reflects investor concerns over the company’s ability to navigate current market challenges and achieve its long-term transformation goals. The stock’s performance contrasts with its 52-week high of €19.8, highlighting the volatility faced by the company. According to InvestingPro analysis, the stock appears undervalued, trading at just 0.53 times book value. The company has maintained dividend payments for 14 consecutive years, demonstrating long-term financial stability. For deeper insights into Norma Group’s valuation and more exclusive ProTips, visit InvestingPro.

Outlook & Guidance

Norma Group maintains its full-year forecast, anticipating a better performance in the second half of 2025. The company is focused on its Step Up efficiency program and aims to achieve double-digit EBIT margins by 2028/2029. InvestingPro data reveals strong free cash flow generation and a robust Altman Z-Score of 8.32, suggesting financial stability. Despite current headwinds, Norma Group is committed to its strategic initiatives, including optimizing its global manufacturing footprint and enhancing product offerings. Access the comprehensive Pro Research Report for detailed analysis of Norma Group’s transformation strategy and growth potential.

Executive Commentary

Martin Wilhelm, a key executive, emphasized the company’s commitment to transformation, stating, "We will transform NORMA into a focused supplier of connection technology." He acknowledged the challenges of Q1, noting, "Q1 numbers have shown that we need to get our act together." Wilhelm also highlighted the company’s selective approach to business, aiming to enhance quality and efficiency.

Risks and Challenges

• Unfavorable market conditions impacting sales.
• Difficulty in reducing fixed costs with declining revenue.
• Geopolitical challenges, including tariffs and trade conflicts.
• Slow electric vehicle market growth in Europe and the US.
• Global car production uncertainty.

Q&A

During the earnings call, analysts inquired about the company’s outlook for Q2, which is expected to show improvement. Questions also focused on the impact of tariffs and the ongoing CEO search. Executives provided insights into their negotiations with customers and the continuation of the water management disposal process, expected to conclude by the end of the year.

Full transcript - Norma Group AG NA O.N. (NOEJ) Q1 2025:

Martin Wilhelm, Executive Board Member/Management, NORMA Group: Yes. Hello. From my side, a warm welcome to all the participants here. I’m here in Maitre together with Annette Stiebel, CFO to Norma Group, and we’ll take you as usual through the slides. Also as usual, answering of questions will be pushed to the back end of the presentation.

Let me start with a few general remarks. I guess it’s obvious to everybody that Norma is a company in a period of change. Our decision to sell the water business has been the first very decisive step to free up resources and enable future growth and at the same time crystallize value inherent in that water business. But that alone is not enough. There still is a lot of homework to be done in the company, in the remaining company to ensure that the margins, the business setups, the cash flow of that remaining business meets our expectations.

Above all, this means putting structure of our company to the test. This morning, we announced to our employees that we are starting a transformation. We will further elaborate on this one the details for you as shareholders towards the back end of the presentation. But let’s first start with the Q1 numbers and take it by walking through the various slides. First overview with the slides with the key figures here is net sales totaled to $284,200,000 That’s obvious a decrease against previous year, mainly driven by unfavorable market conditions.

The adjusted EBIT came down to €10,300,000 and reached a margin of 3.6% for the first three months of twenty twenty five. One off effects had a major impact on those figures combined with our, call it, inability to reduce the fixed costs to live with lower revenue amounts. CO2 emissions, one of the points where we are on track, it’s looking good. We measure those at a rolling twelve month basis for actions we’ve taken to reduce CO2 emissions. The next slide takes us from €37,000,000 down to €34,000,000 which is €3,000,000 less.

The following slide shows the regional development. Here in this we are sticking to the standard sequence of our slides. This is a little bit tricky now as we reallocated certain volume between industry, automotive and water business. Keep that one in mind. It’s more obvious once we go to the following slide where we actually look at the business by industrial area.

Nevertheless, as I said, we are sticking to the previous slide sequence. Let me talk about the Americas region first. Overall, I already mentioned down by €4,000,000 We have seen that our Industrial business slightly down. Then the Water business in fact is about €3,000,000 down. New mobility energy has seen a decrease of about €5,000,000 down to €131,000,000 revenue.

The next block takes us to EMEA, where we see overall a reduction from €137,000,000 down to 120,000,000 Key factor there, as previously mentioned, is in the area of new mobility and new energy. APAC, on the other hand, has seen a smaller downward movement by 3,000,000 from €37,000,000 down to €34,000,000 Key area there was again mobility, new energy. Car production in general, we have to note that on a global scale is very soft, has been soft and the uncertainty is causing further difficulties for the industry as a whole. Now we turn to a slide that shows everything by business unit. This is also important to see what the impact of the sale of the water business will be to our numbers.

We are starting with the industry applications on the left hand side. Sales there increased by 6.4%. Reallocation of business that previously was with M and E that we moved over. This was sales from construction, agricultural machinery as well as energy storage. We are now showing in industry that has a positive effect.

Why did we reallocate those segments? In terms of their business type, in terms of their order behavior and also in terms of their production volume they are ordering from us, They behave more like industry customers. They behave more like the typical industrial demands, I. E. Smaller volumes, a little bit different fluctuation of the business.

Therefore, those customers are simply better allocated to industry because it gives us a chance to service those customers with resources from the sales as well as engineering side that are simply better trained to deal with their demand. In the middle of the slide, you see the water management business. Their sales came down by 2.3% and the reallocations moved €1,600,000 of business into that business. The very far right hand side shows with €1,700,000 the impact of the TCOG acquisition in the first quarter. Next is new energy, our biggest segment in terms of sales with €180,600,000 back in Q1 twenty twenty four.

There we’ve seen a reallocation of €11,300,000 in order to focus the sales team more on the really key automotive customers. Volume and mix down by €1,600,000 Currency a little bit helpful with €1,200,000 As mentioned before, automotive industry has been hit very hard in the first quarter of the year. We also expect that the second quarter for automotive business will remain more tricky and later on will actually be moved to the fact that we see the second half of the business year doing better than the first half. With this, I hand over to Annette to Steve, who will take you through the financials of Q1 twenty twenty five. Many thanks, Marc.

Hello, everyone, and a warm welcome also from my side. Let’s start with an overview on the development of our P and M. Our material cost ratio improved by 180 basis points due to cost reductions in purchasing and also lower purchase prices. Our gross profit ratio was up by 30 bps, mainly resulting from lower material costs and a reduction in inventories of finished goods and work in progress of 1,500,000 In Q1 twenty twenty four, we had an inventory increase by €3,200,000 On the other hand, personnel expense ratio was up by four twenty bps. This includes expenses in connection with the premature departure of our former CEO.

The other expenses decreased in total. These costs include temporary workforces, consulting and marketing as well as IT and telecommunication expenses. In Q1, we had additional one off costs for the rollout of a new ERP system in Germany, mainly from temp mainly for temp workforces, special freights and IT consultancy. The system is now up and running. The good news is however that even with these additional costs, the expense ratio remains stable and in relation to sales.

Adjusted EBITDA as well as adjusted EBIT were primarily impacted by the decline in sales, an increase in personnel expenses and the one off costs in the first quarter. Let’s have a look to our adjusted EBIT margin per region. In EMEA, adjusted EBIT margin came to minus 1%. The negative development was caused not only by the decline in sales due to the market environment, but also by temporary additional expenses. These additional expenses originated in the already mentioned rollout of an ERP system here in Maitai at the beginning of the year.

They mainly comprise costs for special freight and extra shifts as well as for IT and consulting services. The EBIT margin was also negatively impacted by the inflexibility in personnel costs due to lower sales. As a result, personnel costs could not be fully adjusted to the revenue level in the first quarter The adjusted EBIT margin in The Americas region was at 9.6%. It was negatively impacted by temporary inefficiencies in personnel structures, meaning that personnel expenses increased disproportionately compared to the weak sales.

In contrast, slightly lower costs for regular trade supported the margin in The Americas. The good news here is that after the weak start in January and February, March is already looking more friendly in terms of sales and margin. Adjusted EBIT margin in APAC amounted to 5.5%. The main reason for the decrease was increased personnel costs due to existing inflexibilities in personal structures in connection with lower sales. At the next slide, we show our operational adjustment in the P and L.

This year, they are expected to include around €15,000,000 from PPA effects. In addition, we assume around €20,000,000 associated transaction costs in connection with the sale of the Water Management business. On top, additional adjustments from one offs for transformation costs are to be expected. One important remark from my side, we have not adjusted for any further one off costs in Q1 for example severances or something like this. Let’s have a look on our EPS on the next slide.

Adjusted earnings per share. Adjusted earnings in the current period were negative and amounted to minus €300,000 This development is due to the following circumstances. On the one hand, they were caused by the significantly lower adjusted EBIT as a result of lower sales in the first quarter of the year. On the other hand, it resulted from a high tax rate in the current quarter, which is due to a noticeably lower adjusted pretax profit in relation to the actual tax expense. All in all, the main reason for that is the non recognition of deferred tax assets in the EMEA region.

This resulted in a negative adjusted earnings per share of minus €01 for the first quarter. Let’s move over to the balance sheet figures. Our net debt slightly increased by 2.6% against the end of twenty twenty four. Leverage was stable at 2.4 times adjusted EBITDA compared to 2.4 times in Q1 twenty twenty four and up from one point from 2.1 times at the end of the full year 2024. The total equity levels at €698,000,000 Equity ratio further increased by two thirty basis points to 49.3% against 47% at the March.

On our next slide, we will discuss our net operating cash flow. Overall, our net operating cash flow has turned from negative to positive compared to the first quarter of twenty twenty four. And on top, our net operating cash flow significantly improved compared to previous year, mainly due to an improved trade working capital. The positive trade working capital effect is based primarily on measures from our step up program. In addition, prudent investment behavior at the beginning of the year slightly supported the net operating cash flow development in Q1 twenty twenty five.

With this positive news, please let me turn you again to Martin. Yes. Thanks a lot, Annette, those extra insights on the numbers. It’s obvious the first quarter was not satisfying for us as a group. There are many explanations in terms of external effects, also one off internally, which at the end of the day are stories to explain what has happened, but not a reason to continue in that level going forward.

For the time being, we as a Foerstadt as an Executive Board of the company stick to the full year forecast we announced back in May. Our data shows quite clearly that second half of the year will be better than the first half of the year. NORMA will focus on maintaining and expanding the profitability going forward. All businesses have to be strategically aligned accordingly. And amongst other things, we have to ensure that we increase the operational efficiency measures, for example, through the growth and efficiency program step up as well as other measures we’ll be talking about as we move on.

This will mean for us as a group continuously improving the overall set up being very careful with spending to ensure that we actually come out with better results as we move forward. On the remaining slides, I will give you an overview of the step up progress program as well as our transformational measures we are taking going forward. Let’s first look at some interesting improvements within the overall setup of the company. Here, an example from our plant in Michigan, St. Clair, which produces quick connectors.

Interesting projects the team has developed there by analyzing the standard work in the molding process opportunities to reduce waste were identified by the team. The team designed and implemented an automation solution within the production cell that replaces all of the operator tasks, including like parts handling, packaging, counting, granular work as well as label printing. As a result, the teamwork could save six operators for those jobs, provide them to new jobs and deploy them clearly in what I would call higher qualified positions in packing This is a great example of how we can with constant work improve the daily setup of the company. Another example more from the sales side, growth initiatives there, the sales team went out and saw consulted various new customers.

An interesting one, as mentioned here, is this one coffee machine for large industrial use I. E. Not a small machine one has a toe, but this is really a more commercial machine with an interesting story. This customer, a maker of coffee machines located in The U. K, had an issue with leakage problem in his machine.

We developed a very customized normal V band connection to help him there. This product of ours totally took care of any leakage in the machine and we will now ship like 20,000 clamps a year to him for that specific purpose. All in all, not a very strong revenue story, but typical example of how normal engineers, normal application engineers and sales team help customers to design to produce a better product. This door opener will allow us to sell more products to that customer and therefore underline that if one provides a great product, it’s easier to sell a second product to that customer. This slide reinforces the measures that further growth and efficiency is needed in order to improve Norma’s group’s midterm margin.

And those will take us as we move forward to the lower double digit level. In order to achieve that, a number of actions are required. Here we have the interim slide on the transformation. And it’s important to recognize it is a move forward to improve the economic setup of the company. I mean, what is a quick assessment of the current situation?

Since like 2020, the overall economic and geopolitical environment changed. A couple of root causes here coronavirus, Russian war in The Ukraine, global overall customs conflicts with tariff and non tariff burdens, hiccups being built up left and right, making it harder to do international business, sluggish market ramp up for electric vehicles, specifically in Europe and The U. S. China is slightly different. Electric vehicles do there much better.

In fact, in Shanghai, we recently noticed that like one out of sorry, six out of 10 vehicles are electric vehicles in that city of Shanghai. In Europe, in The U. S, we are still far away from that one. Yes, to adopt to this new normal and for the company to come out stronger, we need to organize us more efficiently, more effectively in order to remain competitive and grow positively again. Only if we are financially strong, we will be able to seize opportunities that the market offers, have the funds to invest in innovation and to successfully transform the company.

To achieve our target vision of becoming an industrial powerhouse in the area of our products, We need to identify duplicate structures in our organization. We need to take out waste in the overall administration and handling of the companies and also cut our cost structures to date reality, which is a sharper business mindset of the overall business life we are living in and a more volatile business we need to be prepared for. So if we move the slide forward to the NORMA’s Group’s target vision, I’m talking to the right hand side of this slide. The target vision is we are pursuing actions measures necessary to create Norma’s to transform Norma into a focused supplier of connection technology for industrial as well as mobility customers or as we like to call it industrial powerhouse. We will differentiate us as an innovative, high quality driven solution provider, one that customers like to come back to and give us their business in the years to come.

In the new setup, we will see a lean organization under two sales segments, Industry Applications and Mobility New Energy. As a result of our transformation, the group should be able to return to lower double digit adjusted EBIT margins. The entire transformation is to be expected fully implemented in 2028. Let me now share with you a couple of the elements of this transformation. We are currently developing a comprehensive transformation list of actions that will consist of three building blocks.

First, footprint. We will optimize our global manufacturing footprint over the coming years. Over the past decade, we have seen NOMA expanding its manufacturing locations by several acquisitions often with very small plants that are clearly below 50 employees and alike. This is not very efficient. This has led to a footprint which is rather fragmented and not streamlined according to the current market needs.

We will thus optimize our footprint by integrating smaller production facilities into larger locations and thereby taking advantage of economics of scale in many aspects of the plant P and L. I will give you a first example how we proceed at the next slide. The second building block in this transformation is administration. We will have to increase the efficiency of our organization in the administrative area. As part of this measure, we will eliminate double functions in the new setup manufacturing site in the now fully loaded manufacturing site, streamline the organization under the two sales segments, but also shifting parts of the admin capacities of the admin work into shared service centers in best cost countries.

This overall should help us to get to a situation of an economically more affordable overhead structure at normal. In terms of OpEx, we will work to optimize our spending in those areas, which is a, helped by less plants, but b, also helped by having fewer focused employees working on various matters. This OpEx saving will affect spendings in all areas like consulting, marketing, IT, professional service, office supplies as well as insurance. Insurance, by the way, will also be helped by reducing the number of sites and also disposing of the water business. We are fully aware that you require far more information than this in order to fully evaluate the impact.

And of course, we will provide this information as time moves on. However, for the time being, we need to stick to the communication links that force us to also talk to the social partners, to the employees to in order to communicate the plans to them as well. Against this background, we will finalize the analysis and report more details with the Q2 numbers or H1 numbers on August 12. To close this off with the first step of change that is happening at normal, we are reducing the number of plants in China. Currently, we have four plants

We will be relocating the work of the smaller plant, Wuxi, that has come to us through M and A transaction and relocate it to a nearby larger site in Guangzhou. It will allow us to save on management capacities, IT capacities, local annual close capacities, etcetera. One off cost of about €1,700,000,000 will hit us for that relocation. But going forward, this will provide a payback within about three years. Also note that the current building in Boucher is in fact owned by us and the depreciation will for the time being remain in our books.

This project can be seen as a blueprint for what we are doing with the manufacturing setup. It is not about closing a plant, but more about merging a smaller plant into a larger plant and therefore, benefiting from economics of scale in manufacturing, but also in local administration and related expense. Concluding, let me please give you an overview on the next step of our transformation in the last slide of this presentation. Here are three blocks. It starts off at the bottom with a finalization of the analysis.

That is key to, in fact, do the next planning steps. In parallel, we have started to work on the transformation details in terms of employee efficiency, in terms of employee reallocation of work and also reallocation between the locations. Cost and benefits from these measures to be decided upon will be duly calculated in the weeks to come in order to ensure it is only set, but we can document that the numbers are right and to create confidence amongst our shareholders that those actions will happen. As mentioned before, we will communicate the details with our August 12 call around the H 1 numbers. With this, I close the overall session and we open the lines for questions.

Moderator/Call Operator: So the first question comes from Nikita Lal of Deutsche Bank. Over to you. Yeah. Hi. And thanks for taking my question.

I have three if I may. So the first one is on your current development. So how is Q2 evolving so far for you? Could you please comment about the current environment and markets in each SBU, especially with regards to the tariff situation? And my second question then on tariffs is how it evolved in March and April?

And is there a run rate we could assume if tariffs do not change over the course of the year? And my final question is on your transformation program. You indicated that it should be fully implemented by 2028. Can we expect a double digit margin by 2028 then? Because until now you were just talking about midterm targets.

Thank you.

Martin Wilhelm, Executive Board Member/Management, NORMA Group: Nikita, thank you for this question for sure. So Q2 how is it evolving? To be honest, the month is not still really dry what I see. But all in all as we saw already March was already much better than January and February. And what I currently see from April is financial guys are never orthotic, but it looks reasonably good I would say.

So that is what we expected. As in particular, we had also dipped in our water management. The year started slow. That was mostly due to weather patterns very cold weather patterns in The States. And we had enough orders, but at the end we were not nobody was able to bring that under the earth neither us nor the competitors.

So what I see there is much more yes, promising and the run rate shows that we are on good track. Maybe that is what I can say. All in all, in terms of automotive business, where we were all prepared that this will be a bumpy year. Nobody thought that tariffs would come in this different varieties I would say anyhow. We are touched by a lot of them.

Our Q1 figures are nearly not touched because the main bulk develop later. But at the end, we will pass that over to our customers. We are with each and every customer in negotiation. We already made it more or less for water management and well power M and E that is never that easy because you have to touch each and every contract. But most of them, well, they have an understanding for that.

And currently, the tariff sky is lighting up again. There are no redundancies anymore. So let’s see what comes. To your question, what I expect until the end of the year to be honest, I can’t say it because this has not nothing to do with any economic logic. These are ideas which are reversed after a certain time.

So we follow that up in detail. We take that serious. But how this spiral is going up or down, I can’t answer for the moment. That’s a pickup on that one. I mean, it’s not us doing the tariffs.

Therefore, it’s hard to ask us on how they will come out. But the agreements with the customers is that we pass on the tariffs. Technically, mathematically, as we pass on those costs to the customers, the margin in a smaller percentage simply comes down because we add cost to the revenue. And therefore, there’s a small margin compression effect with customers in the automotive area. Industrial business is a business where we want to do more.

In many instances, it has a slightly different customer supplier relationship. It makes it a little bit easier to pass on different elements of the tariff, tariff increases in a flat increase rather than we do it in automotive where we need to document every cent of tariff spend towards the customer and then get the adjustment. Best example for this easier passing on is, in fact, our water business, where May 2019, we will implement a 5% price increase across the board for all retail customer derived price lists. This includes overall cost increases, but also tariff related increases we have to do on individual products. Assuming this covers your second question, let me move to your third question in terms of our transformation program.

It runs till 2028. It should be finished in 2028. So if the last action hits us in December 2028, the new margin, the double digit margins will realistically appear in the early part of twenty twenty nine. But on the way to that, we will see various improvements as time moves on, driven by larger more visible actions like other plant. I’m not using the word closures, but other mergers of plants that give us a better loading, a more efficient manufacturing setup than So maybe there I’m even me, I’m a little bit more optimistic, not too much.

But as we are targeting clearly with this program not at 10%, I hope that already in 2028 we have the double digit. So finally, as we are targeting on a good double digit margin, 13 plus, 14 plus we should be on that level. But the answer is yes double digit is key and it’s a good double digit because we are on a good transition path for M and E where we still have things to do but for IA which is also a very good margin we are really confident. Hope this takes care of your question.

Moderator/Call Operator: Yes. Thank you. Perfect. Then we are moving on to the next question. The next question is from Marc Rene Ton of Warburg Research.

Over to you.

Marc Rene Ton, Analyst, Warburg Research: Yes. Good afternoon and thank you for taking my question as well. First one will also be on the transformation program and there may be two parts. First would be, admittedly, appreciating that you will give more details August. But can you already give us some detail when you would expect the net positive impact from, let’s say, from the transformation.

Is this something which may already happen in 2026? Let’s say, with the costs associated with the programs and the benefits, is it something we should more look to be achieved in 2027? And related to the transformation program, think when you launched Step Up kind of the program was finalized before the former CEO joined the company. Do you expect, let’s say, with this transformation program now being launched, is there, let’s say, already someone as a CEO you have in mind you’re already talking to and who is, let’s say, part of developing the program? Or would, let’s say, a future CEO then be basically executing the program you are currently working on?

Whether there’s any details you could give us on that that would clearly be helpful. The second question would be a bit more general regarding margin developments particularly in Mobility and New Energy. And considering that you have different technologies basically for the old ICE business probably leaning a bit more to metals and never forming and for everything which has to do with e mobility a bit more going to injection molding. Do you see any difficulties here? Let’s say, how do you see this developing with the volatility which is in the market concerning the e mobility pickup or customers let’s say kind of trying to limit you on price increases that’s for metal products to let’s say in exchange for giving you new contracts for injection molding products?

Any update on that would be helpful. And the third question, if any maybe that’s a bit of can you give us any more color on the

Martin Wilhelm, Executive Board Member/Management, NORMA Group: water management disposal

Marc Rene Ton, Analyst, Warburg Research: process? Perhaps some update regarding the time line which you would expect how we should look at this for the quarters ahead? Or just some general statement on how satisfied you are with the I would say with the stream of offers coming in? Thank you.

Martin Wilhelm, Executive Board Member/Management, NORMA Group: Many thanks, Martin Luther Martin you. So maybe I start and then I pass also over to Mr. Wilhelm. So first of all, our transformation project. So there I really ask for patience at the end.

I think Mark explained a lot already in his explanation, but we will really detail that with our next announcement at the H1. But now give you any kind of estimate what is not fully aligned with all the others that is not a prudent work. So we will give you and provide more detail and more substance about that with H1 this we promise. But please I ask you for understanding that we are not going now on estimates and guesses and whatever because that is all dependent on each other. Towards the CEO search, I hand it over to Marc Williams.

Yes. Thank you. Mentioned before, we as a company or as a Supervisory Board, my colleagues have engaged a very reputable headhunter to help us select the right fit there. If that person is not yet identified, that person has not been involved in developing this plan. Having said that, this plan to me is so obvious that there can hardly be a disagreement of a new person coming into the company and saying he or she does not want to improve the margins.

The need to more efficiently set up the company is very obvious. The Q1 numbers have shown that we need to get our act together and do a couple of things quickly. For example, like the China plant rationalization, it’s something that the manufacturing team noticed, accepted, accepted also from our sales team that new orders better fill of that Wuxi plant is not on the horizon and therefore they reacted quickly. Why is that not happening overnight? In the automotive business, you always need to have the agreement of the customer for the new manufacturing location, any potential changes to the process, etcetera.

And therefore, it takes a bit of time. Manufacturing things, the relocation will be finished by August. I have personally seen the vacant space where we will install those machines at a plant when I was in China like two weeks ago. So the space is there. The power lines are right now under construction.

Now if the plant if the machines are relocated by August, by the time the plant, the legal entity is fully closed, it will be end of the calendar year. Then you asked about margin development, ICE business versus new electric vehicles. As a company, we are taking a very hard stance to be selective in the business we take. We are doing our initial calculations always with a 10% EBIT margin as a goal for the team. We work hard to stick to that one that should help us going forward.

While Norma has a lot of expertise in metalworking, we also do have good expertise in plastic injection parts earlier on. I showed an example of this St. Clair plant in Michigan, which is the Americas plant for quick connectors. Good improvements are happening there that underline that we can improve profitability in plastic injection products, in automotive products, in electric vehicle products as well. It should give you comfort that we will maintain a good balance of margins between ICE and electric, between metal and plastic injection products as well as between new mobility, which in essence is automotive products and industrial products.

To come to your third question, water disposal time line, there is no change to the time line that we’ve previously announced. The process is moving along. We will soon see that we will approach the various bidders with more information to allow them to work on their proposals. Before summer breaks that process should be reasonably well stabilized so that we by then have signed signed deal. Hopefully, we should be there.

And our current goal is to have everything squared away towards back end of this calendar year. Now you know that summer break is at very different points in the year in various countries of the world. And do not push me to the Hessian summer break, which is the first one to start infection. Hope this answers your questions.

Paul Schutter, Analyst, Bankhaus Metzler: Thank you very much, Jakob.

Moderator/Call Operator: Thank you very much also from my side. All right. We are moving on to the next question. The next question is from Paul Schutter of Bankhaus Metzler. One moment please.

Over to you. Please go ahead.

Paul Schutter, Analyst, Bankhaus Metzler: Yes. Good afternoon. Thanks for taking also my questions. I have two questions left on your working capital and material cost ratio, if I may. My question on trade working capital.

If I look at your slides, you’ve mentioned a positive trade working capital effect on your cash flow in the first quarter. And I was wondering if you maybe could give us a hint about how sustainable is this going forward? And the question I have on material cost ratio, which also significantly improved in the first quarter is if maybe you can give us main drivers of this improvement? Because what I’m trying to understand is if this was more just a short term pricing relief we saw in the first quarter? Or should we see this improvement in material cost ratio as sustainable one for the upcoming quarters?

Thank you.

Martin Wilhelm, Executive Board Member/Management, NORMA Group: Well, many thanks, Paar. So in terms of trade working capital, how sustainable this is, we expect that pretty sustainable. On the one hand, we improved that continuously with our step up measures. On the other hand, we have to keep in mind that we had higher inventories on board by the end of the year because we knew we needed safety stocks. We knew that we have to change our ERP system.

Therefore, we built some safety stocks and therefore we had higher trade back on capital than usual. So therefore, I expect that this improvement can be really carried over. The other hand material costs. So well our major material costs for the time being that looks all pretty well. These things are paying in our pockets.

So that’s at the end logistic costs whatever energy is also on a good slope I would say that is if we can speak about a tailwind that might be the tailwind. The question is how these prices might develop under the recognition of any kind of tariffs. That is pretty hard because there you always have to go via the full supply chain.

Paul Schutter, Analyst, Bankhaus Metzler: Okay. Thank you very much.

Moderator/Call Operator: Thanks a lot. The next question is from Peter Rotten Eichel of Baader Bank. Over to you. Please go ahead.

Peter Rotten Eichel, Analyst, Baader Bank: Hello. One question on this ERP system topic. So could you quantify what was the negative earnings impact approximately in the first quarter? And are these issues with ERP introduction done? And are there further introductions to come up which might also result in some additional burdens.

Martin Wilhelm, Executive Board Member/Management, NORMA Group: It was very, very I could not hear you pretty well, but I’ll try my best. And otherwise, I motivate you to ask further. So what was the issue? The issue was well, starting with the good news first. The problems are solved.

We are on a good way. But anyhow, MindTal is in the slope of that is not a new system or anything. Norma Group identified already five years ago roughly we introduced a core model of ERP to the group. This group system has been rolled out to more than 20 factories and is one of the latest because Maintal is one of the most complex and comes from a very, very exotic I would say old system. So therefore, our major problems there were in terms of logistics more or less order management things have been solved now.

We had to invest there more money in these different things, but things are done. We created a little backlog, but also that is now improving. So I would say we are in the situation that these costs will vanish and will not occur anymore in Q1 and Q2. But finally, we have to pay them for Q1. That’s clear.

And the major points there for sure when you have points like this, you invest in special freight and special freight once you paid it, it’s paid. So you don’t get it back. So let me add to that one what Anatas Steven said, it’s not a new system. It’s a system that has been launched in a number of other plants. It’s Microsoft D365.

It’s a recognized ERP system, not too common in Europe, but globally still a very common system. And as we are moving from an extremely diverse ERP setup a couple of years back to a common setup, we are also able to generate more efficiencies from having the same ERP system versus having different systems. Having said that, the launch of a system that is different for the end user, for the hourly workers is always a little bit, call it, troublesome, more work than one would like to have. But again, as we are using a common system now in virtually all plants, it is much easier to generate efficiencies throughout the organization and get better as an overall company. Maintal was the last very big company.

We have a very a few very, very small ones, but that was the last significant one. And I assume the cost I estimate them to that is the lower single digit million cost. So something around CHF 5,000,000.

Peter Rotten Eichel, Analyst, Baader Bank: Okay. Thank you. And my second question is on the water management disposal. You mentioned you are on track with these negotiations, etcetera. Do you think has there anything changed with the new overall geopolitical tariff situation regarding the potential selling price you might be able to recognize?

Or are the statements you made end of last year still valid with perhaps potential selling price of more than €800,000,000

Martin Wilhelm, Executive Board Member/Management, NORMA Group: Let me just be clear on one thing. You said negotiations. We are not in negotiations with a single bidder. So that’s clear. We are offering the company through a full process, a process that is being started.

So do not think there’s specific negotiations. Overall, what we need to recognize, the business is a good U. S. Business with pretty low impact from the whole tariff China thing. It is benefiting from more extreme weather, an issue that will not go away pretty soon, rainstorm, dry days make it specifically in areas like California, Arizona difficult to maintain your garden.

So those business drivers will remain unchanged. What we, however, do need to keep in mind, the euro amount we get from a potential buyer may change depending on the FX rates that are prevailing on the day he transfers a month. We have all seen that the dollar got a bit softer over the last couple of months. Hard to tell where that actually pans out in the next six months. So to be honest, for sure things like this and you also discussed in the project, We our investments banker, Goldman Sachs, I would say is one of the best in the world.

We also discussed these questions. But the feedback we get from the market there is that NDS is somehow a once in a lifetime opportunity and that is pretty much unaffected by these short term things. So at the end, we by ourselves by the way searched since 2014 for a second NDS and we have never found one. So therefore, I think the big potential companies who have big interest there know what they get Therefore, we are very confident and I don’t see a significant impact.

Peter Rotten Eichel, Analyst, Baader Bank: Okay. Thank you very much.

Moderator/Call Operator: You very much. Dear ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for participating and for your questions. As there are no more questions, I am closing the Q and A session now and handing the floor back over to the host.

Martin Wilhelm, Executive Board Member/Management, NORMA Group: Yes. Thanks a lot for your interest in NORMA, your interest in how this company is evolving going forward. And as mentioned with the Q2 numbers or H1 numbers mid August, you will hear more details about the transformation process. Goodbye.

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