SKAN Group Stock

Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for joining today's conference call. This morning, we published our half year 2026 results. Joining with me today is our CFO, Burim Maraj; and our Investor Relationship Manager, Thomas Balmer. Together, we will walk you through the key highlights of the period before opening the call for questions.

Let me briefly walk you through the agenda today. I will begin with an overview of the first half, followed by an update on our strategic progress. Burim will then discuss the financial results in more detail. I will conclude with our outlook, and then we will be happy to take your questions.

Let me highlight a few key achievements from the first half. We delivered strong growth and improved all key financial metrics compared to the previous year. Order intake increased by 16.3% to CHF 247.6 million. Market momentum improved, particularly in the U.S., while demand in Europe remains solid. Our sales teams did an excellent job in winning several large and complex projects. In addition, we successfully converted a number of engineering contracts into orders for complete systems.

As a result, our order backlog increased by 27.8% to CHF 442 million. The backlog includes several major projects extending into 2028 and provides good visibility for the coming years. Net sales grew by 22.2% to CHF 165.5 million (sic) [ CHF 164.5 million ] or 24% at constant currencies. Growth was supported by both our existing businesses and acquisitions completed last year.

Profitability improved significantly. Project execution was stronger than in the prior year. The contribution from Service & Consumables increased and our efficiency measures delivered first results. As a result, EBITDA increased to CHF 15.3 million, while net profit reached CHF 5.4 million. Overall, we are pleased with the first half performance. The strong order intake, growing backlog and improved profitability gives us confidence in achieving our full year targets.

Looking at our segments, both businesses contributed positively to the first half performance. In Equipment & Solutions, demand remains solid, particularly for large and complex projects. Customers continue to invest in new production capacity for oncology drugs and increasingly for biosimilars. We also saw very strong interest in our Ebeam technology.

In Service & Consumables, growth was even stronger. The business benefited from healthy organic growth, contributions from acquisitions and the continued expansion of our service offering. As a result, the service now accounts for almost 40% of group net sales and continues to make an important contribution to our profitability. Together, these developments demonstrate the benefits of our increasingly balanced business model and support our long-term growth and margin ambitions.

Let me briefly update you on our strategic progress. We continue to execute on the 4 priorities we presented at our Capital Markets Day last year. First, we strengthened our market leadership by winning most of the larger fill/finish line projects in the U.S. market. Second, we continue to expand our addressable market through the development of our next-generation Ebeam solution.

And in the third pillar, we made strong progress in Service & Consumables. The share of the group net sales increased to 39% there. As a highlight, we secured several multiyear service contracts, which is great to see our progress there. We also continue preparations for the launch of our Pre-Approved Service offering. And finally, in the fourth pillar, we delivered first digital twin projects, supporting customers in improving equipment performance and productivity. This is an additional differentiation layer in our sales process.

Overall, we are executing consistently against our strategy and are making tangible progress towards our long-term objective of growth recurring revenues and improved profitability. Let me now turn the call over to Burim to cover the financial results. I will come back with some additional commentary on the outlook later.

Thank you, Jonas, and hello, everyone, also from my side to this half year financial results presentation. So let me start with the order intake and first briefly put the market environment into the context. So the market activity was healthy in the first half with particularly good momentum in the U.S., supported by investments in new production capacity, the regionalization of critical supply chains and ongoing onshoring initiatives. Europe also showed a solid demand environment.

At the same time, the market continues to normalize after the exceptional growth phase during COVID. So customers are more selective, decision cycles remain longer and competition has intensified. So against this backdrop, we increased our order intake from CHF 213 million to CHF 247.6 million, which is up 16.3% year-on-year. We consider this as a good result, which demonstrates solid demand for our solution despite a more selective investment environment.

The largest contribution to growth came from Service & Consumables, as you see, which accounted for around CHF 30 million or almost 80% of the increase at constant currency rates. Equipment & Solutions contributed a further CHF 8 million to the growth. When we look at the book-to-bill ratio, it remained at 1.5x after 1.6x in the prior year period. So the key message is that even in a more normalized market, order intake continues to run ahead of net sales, together with a healthy order pipeline, this gives us confidence in our growth trajectory.

With that overall picture in mind, let me turn to the regional development. Starting with Europe, our largest market, order intake increased from CHF 125.3 million to CHF 138.6 million or by 10.7%. This confirms that the region continues to provide a stable base for the group. The more pronounced development came from the Americas, where order intake rose from CHF 66.1 million to around CHF 100 million, an increase of almost 50%. As a result, the region's share of group order intake increased from 31% to around 40%.

This brings the Americas back to a level broadly in line with the range we have seen historically.

The prior year was subdued, as you all know, mainly because a number of customer decisions took longer to materialize during the first half year, several of those decisions progressed into firm orders. In Asia, order intake declined from CHF 20.8 million to CHF 9.1 million. This is a fluctuation or this fluctuation is largely driven by the timing of larger individual orders and should, therefore, not be overinterpreted for -- in that quarter. So in summary, Europe remained a stable backbone with a solid increase, while the Americas regained a more normal share of the order mix.

Turning to the net sales. We increased sales from CHF 134.6 million to CHF 164.5 million, representing a growth of 22.2% year-on-year. At the constant exchange rates, growth was 24%, while organic growth reached 13.3%. This growth was broad-based with Service & Consumables accounting for roughly 2/3 of the group net sales increase and Equipment & Solutions also making a meaningful contribution. Of course, the acquired businesses also developed very well and provided an additional contribution to the reported growth.

So overall, the increase in net sales was supported by a healthy underlying business across both segments, complemented by the contribution from acquisitions. Importantly, the higher level of net sales was achieved while maintaining a strong order base. So as you see, the order backlog increased from CHF 346.1 million at year-end to CHF 442 million or around 28%, which provides us visibility -- good visibility for the coming periods.

As you also see within this backlog, approximately CHF 15 million to CHF 20 million remains subject to potential cancellation risk. It's important to understand that this is the same exposure as we have already disclosed at year-end and does not represent a new risk. So the matter remains currently unsolved, and we are closely working constructively with our customers towards a commercially sound, mutual acceptable solution that supports the long-term relationship with our customers. So despite the strong increase in net sales, we entered the second half with a higher order backlog and good visibility for the coming periods.

Now turning to the profitability. EBITDA improved from CHF 0.9 million to CHF 15.3 million, lifting the margin from 0.7% to 9.3%. At group level, you see on the right side, both segments, Equipment & Solutions and Service & Consumables contributed to this improvement. In addition, strong revenue conversion, more favorable project progression and the measures taken to improve the cost base supported the result.

On the left side, this is visible in the cost development, and we see the operating expenses increased from CHF 135.7 million to CHF 154.5 million or by 13.8%, while the net sales grew by 24%. So the key point here is that the net sales grew materially faster than the cost base, which results in an improved operating leverage at group level. At the same time, we are really clear that this 9.3% EBITDA margin remains below our target range. The progress is, as mentioned, encouraging, but there is more work to do with our focus remaining in the second half on execution, product mix and also cost discipline.

With the group level picture established, let me now turn to the segment performance, starting with Equipment & Solutions. In that segment, the order intake increased from CHF 160.4 million to CHF 166.4 million or by 3.7%. So compared with the subdued CHF 88 million recorded in H2 2025, this represents a clear step-up in the market activity. The Americas contributed meaningfully, as already mentioned, as customer decision progressed after the longer approval cycle seen previously and in parallel prior year slot reservation, as we have announced and engineering orders continue to convert into equipment orders.

When we look at the nature of the orders, the majority were for large and complex customized filling lines, and we saw particularly good demand in high-speed lines featuring with the Ebeam technology. So this demand was supported by new drug projects, especially in the core field of SKAN, the oncology applications and increasingly also by biosimilars. This order development supported an increase in backlog of around 24% from CHF 293.1 million to CHF 362.5 million, providing a substantial base for future execution.

In the middle of the graph, net sales increased, as you see, from CHF 90.7 million to around CHF 100 million or by 10.2%, supported by less project delays, better execution and higher share of projects, which came in, in the value-added or value-intensive phase. This operational improvement also translates, as you see on the right side, on the profitability where the EBITDA moved from minus CHF 9.1 million to plus CHF 2.3 million, which is an improvement of CHF 11.4 million and the margin improved from minus 10% to plus 2.3%. So Equipment & Solutions is moving in the right direction, but profitability still has further to go.

Turning to the Service & Consumables, a different picture. So the segment Service & Consumables continued to develop very well in the first half. As you see in the order intake increased from CHF 52.5 million to CHF 81.2 million or by almost 55% with organic growth of almost 27%. The important point is the quality of that growth. So the underlying Service & Consumables business remained strong, while the acquired businesses provided an additional contribution and broadened our offering. So growth is, therefore, being supported by both the existing business and the acquired activities.

When we look on the net sales, same pattern is visible, which increased -- or the net sales increased from CHF 43.9 million to CHF 64.6 million, representing a growth of 47.2%, including an almost 15% organic growth. At the same time, the order backlog, as you see, almost doubled from CHF 40 million to around CHF 80 million, supporting activity into the second -- in the second half. This development increased Service & Consumables share of group net sales to 39.3%.

This is strategically very important.

Over the medium term, we aim to increase the contribution from Service & Consumables and thereby strengthen the share of recurring business within the group. EBITDA on the right side increased from CHF 10 million to CHF 13 million or by 29.7%. The margin remained healthy at 20.1% compared to 22.8% in the prior period. The softer margin mainly reflects the product mix and a timing effect across parts of the Service & Consumables business.

So in other words, activities in that segment are aligned with our customers' operating plans, while the related personnel costs are recognized throughout the year. So as scheduled customer activities are executed over the remainder of the year, we expect the related revenues to increasingly come through and drive the margin development in the second half. Overall, the segment Service & Consumables remains an important contributor to group growth and profitability and its increasing weight in the group is, as mentioned, strategically relevant.

Now let's have a look on the cash generation. On the left side, the operating cash flow was CHF 16.3 million in the first half, supported by the improved operating result. A key structural feature of our business model is customer advance payments, which are an integral part of project financing and remains an important driver of operating cash flow. On the investment side, cash outflows amounted to CHF 13.6 million and primarily reflected continued investments in our Pre-Approved Service offering.

Even after these investments, free cash flow remained positive at CHF 2.7 million. And when we look at the cash and cash equivalents, which moved from CHF 94.1 million at year-end to CHF 88.5 million at end of June. The important message is here that customer advance continue to provide structural cash funding, while the working capital remained controlled despite the higher level of activity. This cash discipline supports a solid financial position, which brings me to the balance sheet.

Net debt stood at CHF 42.2 million at the end of June, corresponding to a net debt/EBITDA of 0.8x. This is particularly relevant in the context of the acquisitions completed over recent periods. Despite those investments, leverage remains below 1x, preserving capacity for operations and selective growth. On the right side, the equity stood at CHF 125.5 million, corresponding to a reported equity ratio of CHF 26.1 million (sic) [ 26.1% ]. This figure needs a little bit of context that is materially affected by the accounting treatment of the acquisitions-related goodwill.

So when we look at this KPI on an adjusted base, excluding this effect, the equity ratio would be above 40%. Taken together, the balance sheet remains solid, leverage is controlled and the group retains adequate financial flexibility.

Let me close by summarizing the key message of the financial results from the first half year. So the market remains attractive even as customers are more selective and decision cycles are longer, our order intake and order pipeline shows that demand for our solution remains healthy.

Operationally, we made clear progress in the first half with higher net sales, improved profitability and strong momentum in Service & Consumables. At the same time, our priorities remain clear: drive margin improvement across the business, execute the backlog and maintain cost and cash discipline. We have a good basis for the second half, and our focus remains firmly on execution.

With that, I hand over to Jonas, who will take us through the outlook and our priorities for the remainder of the year and beyond.

Thank you, Burim. Let me provide an update on the market environment and our outlook. The long-term growth drivers in our industry remain attractive. The demand continues to be supported by the increasing requirements for quality, for automation, the containment and the regulatory compliance, including the Annex 1 topics. In addition, the growing importance of biologics and antibody-drug conjugates and cell and gene therapies continues to drive investments in advanced aseptic manufacturing solutions.

At the same time, the market is evolving. We have political discussions around drug pricing, which continue and many high-revenue biologics will lose exclusivity. There is this patent cliff coming over the coming years. And we also see customers becoming more selective in their investment decisions as competition and cost pressure increases across the industry. However, we see all these developments as creating attractive opportunities for SKAN. In particular, we expect continued investments in new production capacity for both biosimilars and innovative next-generation therapies.

We believe SKAN is well positioned to benefit from these market trends and to continue delivering double-digit growth rates. Our strong market position, technology leadership and broad portfolio provides a solid foundation for future growth. At the same time, we are strengthening our competitive edge. We continue to advance our innovation projects. We enhance our operational excellence and expand our sales and service capabilities. In addition, we are establishing a new leadership structure with clear segment accountability. This will further strengthen the execution and increase our customer focus.

Looking ahead, we will continue to accelerate the growth of our Service & Consumables business. And at the same time, we place a stronger focus on improving profitability and increasing our EBITDA margin. Based on the attractive structural growth drivers, our solid order backlog and our strong first half performance, we remain confident for the current year. And with that, we already come to the guidance. We, therefore, confirm our guidance for 2026 and continue to expect net sales growth in the high teens and an EBITDA margin between 13% and 15%.

With that, we come already at the end of our presentation, and we can now go to questions and discussion section, and I hand over to Thomas.

Yes. Thank you. So we are going to Q&A. We will first take questions from the telephone conference. [Operator Instructions] After the questions from the telephone conference, we will also take questions from the webcast. [Operator Instructions] Please, operator, go on with the telephone questions, please.

And the first question comes from Tanya Hansalik from UBS.

I have 3 questions, please. So the first one on the 2026 guidance you confirmed today, this requires an H2 acceleration on sales and margin uplift. Can you maybe go through for us the main drivers in the different divisions that will drive this better second half?

Well, the main driver is in the project business. As you have seen, we have a strong order backlog, and we have projects that will come in the value-intensive phase, which will drive our net sales contribution or revenue recognition and therefore, also drive the margin. And we have also shown this in the last past years that the business driven by our order intake, which came in -- which comes typically at the end of the year, which drives, also a little bit of the seasonality will be the impact. We are confident that we will make the second half year in Equipment & Solutions.

And for Service & Consumables, as I mentioned, is also second half lasted (sic) [ loaded ] as customers or operation plan of customers, the timing when they set the services to be provided is this year a little bit in the second half driven. And therefore, we have also a strong backlog, as you have seen, double the order backlog -- the backlog, and we will execute our performance service in the second half, which, again, will be -- will drive the margin improvement.

Great. And the second question is in Service & Consumables, can you discuss what were the impacts on the H1 margin on an organic basis? I think taking out Metronik, you would have had a lower teens margin, which is well below the last 5 years. So...

Yes, you have to understand the EBITDA margin of Service & Consumables in the past years was also -- or 2024 was driven. We were at 28.9% EBITDA. There was an extraordinary impact from Aseptic Technologies, which is not anymore here. And now the contribution from Metronik is, of course, it's a positive impact, but also there, this business has also certain seasonality, as mentioned, also the software business will have a positive impact in the second half and improve the margin at levels that we have also seen in historically.

And the last question is, can you provide an update on Pre-Approved Services? I understand you said approval, we still expect this year. What about commercial revenues? When do you expect this? And how long will it take to ramp up to your targets for the business?

Basically, nothing has changed since the last communication. We are still working to these approvals. And we already started to do first production runs, non-GMP production runs, but there's very small revenue contributors, of course. But the meaningful business will start next year, and then it will develop over 3 to 4 years, and they will be communicated. So we are on track there. It's a complex topic to bring this all live, but we are making good progress.

And the next question comes from Estelle Bétrisey from Berenberg.

Also 2 questions from my end. First of all, from the order intake for Equipment & Solutions, you mentioned the majority is for large and complex customized lines with the duration going into 2028. Could you just please explain the nature of these extensions? What it means also for the lead times? Because I remember during COVID, these were around 18 months for larger projects and have recently gone down to around 12 to 14 months. So yes, just to understand.

Yes. Of course, these are what we -- these larger projects that we did win in the U.S. are high-speed lines. And so in the U.S., they really increase the output of their production and these super high-speed lines, they are typically then run at the limit of the technology can provide. So yes, typically, they still take 18 to 24 months to deliver, but these are also, in some cases, new technologies that some of our partners provide in this project. So we are a little bit cautious about what is the time frame we need to deliver that backlog. So maybe it's a few months on top of the 18 months when we talk about the large project.

Okay. Also just if you could guide us on how you expect the split between both segments to evolve this year? If we should expect something around like we have just seen right now, the 39% for Service & Consumables or more going back a bit more towards the full year 2025 split?

I did not fully understand your question, but I assume that you asked that what are our targets for Equipment & Solutions margins and Service & Consumables, right?

I think it was more on the split of the business, like you intend to go towards more of a 50-50 split in the midterm or long term. So how does it evolve from the first half into the second half?

Yes. We assume as both segments will develop in the second half, as already mentioned, so the split will remain more or less in this between 30% to 39%. But long -- or midterm, our goal is to have a 50-50 split between both segments, which gives us or makes us less dependent on the project business -- on the fluctuation of the project business.

[Operator Instructions] There are currently no further questions by phone. So I would like to turn the conference back to Thomas Balmer for any written questions.

Thank you. We have a written question from David Robertson from Chelverton Asset Management who asked, as we look over the coming years and if EBITDA margin rise into the teens you expect, what do you think free cash flow will look like? Will it have a stable relationship to EBITDA? And what level of EBITDA conversion into free cash flow should we expect?

As we have announced that we were in an investment cycle until Pre-Approved services is live. We were negative in free cash flow, now we are positive. We expect that the free cash flow will be also positive on a higher level, but this will -- yes, we will communicate later on when we communicate the guidance, the overall guidance in March.

There are no more written questions. I give back to the operator. There is now another one coming. Sorry. There's a new one from Marc Possa from [ VV Vermögensverwaltung ]. Is the split between Equipment & Solutions and Service & Consumables also valid for the impressive order intake in the U.S.? Or are there differences?

I can maybe give a little bit of color to that. I mean in the U.S., we clearly see that the investment climate is very strong. The U.S. -- in the U.S. market, we see a lot of investment in new production capacity. So the order entry in that sense did grow much faster there in the Equipment & Solutions part and in the Service & Consumables. You could even go a step further saying that as the drug prices are a little bit under pressure in the U.S., the U.S. customers start to try to reduce their operation cost in a way that they are still investing quite heavily into new capacity.

At the moment, there are no further questions from the webcast. So we hand back to the operator.

We have one follow-up question from Tanya Hansalik from UBS.

Yes, I wanted to follow up on Aseptic Technologies. You had quite a strong development in 2024. Can you maybe update us on how the pipeline is going and the interest for your vial technology, when we can expect maybe this business to accelerate?

Can you repeat the question? Sorry, I couldn't get it again. What was the question...?

Aseptic Technologies, the business, how do you expect this to develop?

Yes. The pipeline, as you know, we disclosed, it's around 400 -- or our customer has around 400 ingredients in the closed vial. It's more or less stable. And we have still these 8 drugs commercially in our closed vials. And as you know, the whole funding was -- we had -- the funding had constraints during the last 2 years, which also impacted a little bit the development in cell and gene.

Now it's picking up, and we expect also there that this will have a positive impact on Aseptic Technologies. But as you all know, these are cell and gene and the majority will not make it to commercial. But the good thing is that our pipeline is still on a stable level and our consumables is still the majority of the vials compared to the 8 products that we have for commercial.

So there are currently no more questions by phone. So I would hand back to Thomas Balmer for any more written questions.

Yes. We have more questions from Marc Possa from [ VV Vermögensverwaltung AG ]. First question, is the value proposition for customers in the Pre-Approved services still unchanged, meaning 12 to 18 months savings of go-to-market?

It's still valid, yes.

And his second question, how has the competitive landscape changed over the course of the last 12 months, maybe from a technology and market share point of view?

Of course, we need to look into the different segments. And probably the question is more geared towards our core business, the isolator business. Of course, we are not the only one in the market. There are other big players. I'm sure you also observe what's going on with Syntegon and some of our other competitors there. In the past, we were in a market where it was more kind of there was not enough demand or not enough supply and the demand was very high. Now I would say we are more in an equilibrium between demand and supply.

So we actually have now tenders in the market, and we have to win. It's not just a given. So we have to fight much more to win the business. We were super successful in the first half year, and I'm actually super proud about our sales team, specifically in North America, where we did win most of the larger projects. So yes, there is more competition and good customer relationships, strong project execution is more important than ever.

Then we have a question from [ Nicole Schultz ] at [indiscernible] Invest. He's pointing out that full-time equivalents have been reduced by 61 positions compared to year-end. Does that mean that personnel expenses will go down in the second half of this year? Question one. And question two, were there are costs related to this reduction in headcount?

Yes. The thing is exactly the headcount has been -- or the FTEs have been reduced by 61 and the full impact will be shown or will be -- will have an impact in the second half. And it's a bit difficult also to compare because in the personnel costs, we have also the acquisition included. But when we look from a like-for-like comparison, of course, this will increase. And it will not be the full year effect. The full year effect of this decrease will be -- will have the impact in 2027. But it's also a meaningful reduction in 2026.

Okay. Thank you. We don't have any questions -- any more questions in the webcast. And as I can see, also no more questions in the telephone conference. Therefore, I hand over to Jonas for his closing remarks.

Thank you all for participating in this call. I'm again very happy with our half year results. And with that, we conclude the session for today.

Thank you very much.

Thank you for joining us today. I'm Jonas Greutert, CEO of the SKAN Group since January 1 this year. This morning, we reported our 2025 results. And with me today is Burim Maraj, our Chief Financial Officer. Together, we will go through the presentation.

Let me go briefly through the agenda. Burim will start with the overview of the past business year, I will then talk about the strategy execution before I hand back to Burim for the details of the financial results. After that, I will briefly talk about my first view as CEO and then the outlook for the next year. At the end, we plan to have some time for questions.

With that, I hand over to Burim.

Thank you, Jonas. Let me start with a brief overview of the financial year 2025. So '25 was a year of solid order intake. We continued our strategic progress, but also of timing shifts in the project business. That affected mainly the net sales and, of course, the earnings.

The order intake increased to CHF 370.6 million. When we look originally, the picture was mixed. We saw very strong demand in Europe, while business in the United States was more cautious. At the same time, our success rate on the submitted orders and realized project remained at around 50%. That confirms our strong position in the relevant high-end segment where we are in with SKAN. The order backlog increased also to CHF 346 million, and this gives us a good visibility especially in the equipment business.

When we look at the net sales, it declined by 7.7% to CHF 333 million. The main reason here as we have in the past, communicated, was exceptionally the high number of project postponements, primarily vaccine lines that were deprioritized by customers, mainly due to resource constraints on the customer side. What is important here is the business was -- has not been lost net sales recognition has shifted into future periods. As we also highlighted in the past, it will be '26 and also some of them will shift in 2027.

In our business, that's not unusual. We are in the project business, but 2025, it happens to a clearly above-average extent. As a consequence, both EBITDA and EBITDA margin came below the prior year level, EBITDA amounted to CHF 38.6 million and the margin corresponding to 11.6%.

Nevertheless, we continue to invest decisively in the future of the business. So the total investments amounted to CHF 45.9 million, and we invested significantly in our strategic initiative, preapproved services. In addition, the 2 acquisitions we made with Metronik and ABC Transfer expanded our portfolio and further strengthened our position in the higher-margin service and consumers business. These steps enhance our strategic position and open up additional growth and earnings potential. Despite what was an operationally demanding year for us, we generated net profit of $17.6 million, and the Board of Directors will propose a dividend of CHF 0.22 or CHF 0.32 per share, corresponding to a payout ratio of 30%.

When we look at the segment level on the next slide, the Equipment Solutions demand for complex filling lines for oncology and biotech applications remains fundamentally intact. However, the financial performance was in this segment, as mentioned, impacted by the project postponements, which created production gaps. And we were able to partially compensate this by pre-producing our standard isolators, especially for the severity testing. At the same time, we continue to make strategic progress in the integrated process solution, which Jonas will elaborate a little bit later on, on that. And we maintained also our investments in R&D.

In service and consumables, the picture was very robust. The installed base continued to grow, which is important because it forms the foundation for sustainable growth going forward. In addition, Metronik and ABC contributed positively to both net sales and earnings and supported the strategic expansion of our high-margin service and consumables. We further advanced preapproved service initiatives, we have guided several customers through the launch facility. We got a very positive feedback from them. So the commercial launch is unchanged in the first -- in the second half of 2026. So overall equipment solutions temporarily impacted by project postponements while the service and consumables performed robustly and supported the group's strategic development.

Saying that, I will hand over to Jonas for the strategic overview.

Right. SKAN group strategy remains unchanged. And as many of you are already familiar with this slide, Therefore, I will only give a brief overview before moving on to the progress we made in 2025. Our strategy aims to continue our growth, increase the share of recurring business and improved profitability. We focus on 4 strategic pillars that reinforce each other and strengthen our position along the entire value chain.

The first pillar is about consolidating and further expanding our market share in our core business, innovation and deep process understanding play a major role here.

The second pillar focused on increasing our share of wallet. We are expanding our offering with additional elements along the value chain. These first 2 pillars grow our installed base and create a foundation for the growth in the third pillar.

And the third pillar, our service and consumable business is a key driver of recurring revenues with attractive margins.

And the fourth pillar is digitalization. We believe that digital capabilities will become a strong differentiator in our markets. Go to the next slide.

I will now turn to our achievements in 2025. In Pillar 1, I want to speak about the ebeam technology. We are the clear technology leader in that field of ebeam systems, we have now installed more than 50 ebeam systems, and we will continue to expand our portfolio in this area.

In addition, we have developed a fully modeling line for aseptic ATMP manufacturing, enabling us to serve a key market and one of the fastest-growing pharmaceutical segments even better than before. In Pillar 2, we delivered our first integrated process solutions system, which is a very important milestone for us. It will go into operation this year and will serve as a reference for future sales. And in Pillar 3, we strengthened our service and consumable business through 2 strategic acquisitions, Metronik and ABC transfer. I will briefly discuss both companies on a later slide.

And then we have now 8 trucks filled in 80 vials that are now on the market. With 19 approvals from 6 regular authorities. Our customers have achieved fewer approvals than expected. However, the pipeline of trucks in 80 closed vials remain strong, and we can look very positively to the future. And in Pillar 4, we have begun using AI to increase service productivity.

We go to the next slide, a few words about our preapproved services and status. So the preapproved services will enable our customers to perform stability testing directly on SKAN system in advanced and thereby significantly shorting the time to market for new drugs.

We have invested significantly in developing this capability, and we still plan the commercial launch in the second half of 2026. The project has been slightly delayed due to higher complexity in the digitalization and automation area, but our goal of serving the first customer this year remains unchanged.

Let me give a little more color regarding the delay here. We are building a multimodality manufacturing site, which comes with a high level of complexity that we partially underestimated. The important point is this. All systems have been installed, all of them are functioning, and we are now working on preparing everything for regulatory approval. Once again, commercial launch is still planned for the second half of this year.

The acquisition of Metronik significantly expands our offering and strengthens our services and software business. Metronik is a leading provider of digitalization and automation solutions for regulated life science production. And Metronik works with blue chip customers such as Novartis and Sandoz, and completed more than 20 projects in 10 European countries last year. The expertise of SKAN and Metronik is highly complementary, enabling us to deliver substantial added value to our customers. We go to the next slide.

Our second acquisition strengthens our consumable portfolio. ABC Transfer is an innovation leader in patented safe rapid transfer systems. It's ports, containers and transfer bags meet Annex 1 requirements and are compatible with existing market standards. So ABC is still a small company, but it's customers already include leading pharmaceutical companies such as GSK, Sanofi, Lilly and Burke. And with this acquisition, we further expand our position in high-margin recurring business segment.

With that, this concludes my first remarks, and I hand back to Burim for the financial results.

Thank you, Jonas. So let me now come to the order intake where the overall picture remains robust. Order intake increased by 3.1% to CHF 37.6 million. This confirms the demand that remains fundamentally intact and continues to prove a solid basis for future growth.

What also matters is the quality of order intake. So at a large share of the pipeline consists of projects in the oncology therapies particularly antibody drug conjugates, where we are strongly -- historically stronger -- strongly positioned in that segment. Over the course of the year, however, the pattern became more differentiated. After a strong first half with CHF 213 million, order intake in the second half amounted to CHF 157.7 million.

In the U.S., we initially saw a certain degree of caution following the so-called Liberation Day. And at the end of May and June, we were then being able to win several larger projects which initially made us more confident for H2. Nevertheless, now we know the development in that -- in the region remained softer overall the second half. This was mainly driven by longer decision cycles and the general challenging -- or for sure, general challenging geopolitical environment.

So the important point is that we do not see structural weakness in demand. The pipeline is still on a high level with about CHF 1.4 billion. What we are seeing is primarily a timing shift in decisions and revenue realization.

Regionally, on the right side, Europe remains the largest market with 62.4% followed by the Americas with 28.5%. The lower share of Americas reflect the softer development in the U.S., as mentioned, while growth was mainly supported here, we see we have been growing by 8%, but the growth came mainly driven from services and consumables segment in that region. The decline in Asia was primarily due to a strong prior year comparison.

When we move from the order intake to net sales on the next slide, the difference between demand and realization becomes very visible. So net sales declined by 7.7% to CHF 333 million. On a consistent currency base, the decline was 6.4% and as already mentioned, the main reason was an exceptionally high number of project postponements which shifted revenue recognition into future periods into the current year, but also in 2027.

But I want here to be very clear on this point. It is not a lost business. It is first and foremost a timing effect. That can happen in our project business, although in 2025, it was clearly above the normal level. This becomes particularly visible in the half year comparison, what we have in the middle.

Net sales in the first half amounted to CHF 134.6 million, and in the second half, they increased to almost CHF 200 million, which is around 48% above H1. This recovery was primarily driven by a catch-up effect from the sale of preproduced standard systems, particularly in sterility testing. At the same time, order backlog increased from CHF 318 million to CHF 346 million which gives us a good visibility and planning reliability for the coming periods. But you have to consider that around CHF 15 million to CHF 20 million within this backlog is currently subject to potential cancellation risk. Importantly, the positions have no impact on the current year's revenue planning because they are not included in our current expectations.

When we look now on the next slide on the EBITDA, it declined by 32.3% to CHF 38.6 million with a margin of 11.6%. Earnings were impacted by the lower net sales mainly from the project business as elaborated -- already elaborated. With this particularly important, however, is the development over the course of the year. EBITDA was generated almost entirely in the second half after CHF 0.9 million in H1, we reached almost CHF 38 million in H2. That corresponds to a margin of around 19% and clearly shows the dynamic -- the strong dynamic and earnings power of our business.

There were also positive effects on the cost side. On the left side, what we see, the material intensity improved from 26.4% to 23%, mainly thanks to the higher share of service and consumables but also supported improvement or supported the gross margin. This was offset by higher personnel and other operating costs, mainly as a result of acquisitions and continued resource expansion. This reflects our unchanged positive view on long-term growth of SKAN and the need to build qualified resources at the early stage.

In our industry, as you may recall, it takes about or around 1 year for new employees to become fully productive because the required capabilities are typically not available externally and are developed through our own SKAN Academy and on the job. So overall, 2025 earnings were clearly burdened by lower sales, but profitability improved significantly in the half -- in the second half and provide a solid basis for further development.

When we take a deeper look on the segment, order intake in segments Equipment Solutions at CHF 248 million was slightly below the prior year while backlog increased by CHF 3.6 million to CHF 293 million. The somewhat softer order intake was mainly driven by delayed customer decisions as I mentioned before, particularly in the U.S. but at the same time, several customers secured production slots and placed engineering orders, which provides a good basis for larger follow-on orders.

Net sales in this segment declined by 20% to CHF 216.8 million, and this was mainly due to the project postponements, as mentioned, and the temporary suspension of the -- of a larger GLP-1 project, which we also have communicated in the past. EBITDA declined to CHF 9.4 million with a margin of 4.3%. At the same time, profitability improved significantly in the second half after. And you remind after a negative EBITDA of CHF 9.1 million in H1, we saw a clear recovery in H2 supported in part by the sale of preproduced standard system. So in parallel, we also continued our strategic investments in a very consistent way about 7.4% of net sales was invested in innovation, particularly in Integrated Process Solutions, where we already have delivered the first machine to our customers last year.

On the next slide, service and consumables present a clearly more robust picture. The order intake to increase to CHF 122 million, corresponding to growth of 17% organically, growth was 2.4%, which is a solid result against a very high comparison base from 2024. The prior year was particularly shaped by the strong performance of the Aseptic Technologies we had also larger spare parts orders and multiyear maintenance contracts, which we recorded in 2024 and generate revenue in the next years.

Net sales increased by almost 29% to CHF 116.5 million. Also here, organic growth was 11%, this was mainly driven by the further expansion of the installed base as well as the retrofit business. The strategically very important -- this is strategically very important for us because a larger installed base forms the foundation for sustainable revenue growth in service and consumables in spare parts, but also the retrofit business.

Profitability in this segment also remained at a high level EBITDA rose from CHF 29.2 million with a margin of 25%. As you see, the margin declined slightly due to the extraordinary performance of Aseptic Technologies in the period but they still demonstrate the quality of this business in the segment.

Additional momentum came from Metronik and ABC transfer, which has been consolidated since August 2025 and contributed positively to both net sales and earnings. And finally, we see also here an order backlog in the same -- in this segment increased to CHF 53.1 million, which is up 50% and strengthens again, the visibility and planning reliability in this segment.

When we go on the next slide to cash flow and ROCE Here, the overall picture remains solid. Operating cash flow increased significantly to CHF 64.1 million, which is supported by customer advanced payments, solid order intake, as mentioned, and also disciplined working capital management. At the same time, we continue to invest consistently. Increased cash flow mainly reflects -- so investing cash flow mainly reflects the expansion of preapproved services supplemented by the 2 acquisitions. And in the financing cash flow largely reflects the funding of this transaction through the new RCF facility. ROCE stood at the 10.3% below prior year. This was mainly due to higher capital employed and, as you know, a lower EBIT. And in our view, is primarily a temporary effect of our growth investments.

On the next slide, when we look at the balance sheet. Despite the acquisitions, the overall picture remains also here solid. So total assets increased by 25.1% to CHF 481 million. mainly attributable to the 2 acquisitions and the related balance sheet effects. At year-end, we reported a net debt of CHF 37.4 million, which corresponds to a net debt EBITDA ratio of 0.97x. In our view, this continues to underline a low and manageable leverage profile, which also leaving us sufficient financial flexibility to fund future growth.

On the right side, the noncurrent financial liabilities increased from CHF 9.5 million to almost CHF 130 million, primarily, again, reflecting the 2 acquisition and the related RCF financing. Total equity amounted to CHF 127.6 million, corresponding to an equity ratio of 26.5%. The main decline versus priorities is mainly acquisitions, acquisition-related and largely linked to the accounting treatment of the goodwill from the 2 transactions. So in our view, this is, therefore, not an indication of structural weaker balance sheet quality, but first and foremost, an accounting effect related to the acquisitions.

Dividends on the next slide. Despite the lower net profit of CHF 16.3 million and earnings per share of CHF 0.72, we will -- the Board of Directors will propose a dividend of CHF 0.22 per share to the Annual General Meeting. This corresponds to a payout ratio of 30%.

On the next slide or my closing slide, if I have to summarize 2025 in 1 sentence, it was a very -- it was a year of temporary timing shifts on the revenue side. But at the same time, one of intact demand, robust order intake and strategic progress that positions SKAN well for the next phase of growth.

Saying that, I hand over to Jonas for the overview.

Thank you, Burim. So we go to the next slide. In my first 80 days come, I was able to meet many colleagues. I visited key site around the globe and engaged with many, many customers. And today, I would like to share some of my observations with you.

What I've seen confirms that SKAN is built on exceptional strengths that position us extremely well for the future. First, SKAN is a leader in a growth market driven by long-term structural trends, and I will come back on a later slide on them. In our niche, we actively shape this market.

Second is our technology -- our technology leadership is unmatched in many areas. The depth and uniqueness of our know-how in some areas built over the years are extremely difficult to replicate.

And then third, SKAN has an exceptionally strong company culture, the passion, expertise and dedication of our employees are impressive. This includes, and this is very important, a strong customer focus, which was confirmed repeatedly in my conversations with many customers. This culture is a true competitive advantage.

And fourth, we have a long-standing trusted partnerships with customers and partners. These are built on performance, reliability and shared understanding. And finally, the SKAN Group has the right strategy, a strategy focused on sustained growth and increasing profitability.

For 2026, we have 3 priorities: first, to accelerate growth in our service and consumables business, a strategic pillar with high potential for recurring revenues at attractive margins. In 2026, this includes the market launch of preapproved services in the second half of 2026 and securing the first customers for that service. This also includes completing the integration of our recent acquisition, Metronik and ABC Transfer.

And second, strengthen our processes under our organization. After several years, of strong growth now is the right time to sharpen execution, streamline operations and prepare the organization for the next phase of growth.

Let me go to the next slide, and we come to the outlook and guidance. As mentioned earlier, our market continues to benefit from underlying structural growth drivers. These include a continued expansion of the global pharmaceutical and biotech sectors, a strong shift towards injectable drugs. They're now dominating drug form in development pipelines, driven by biologics, biosimilars and cell and gene therapies. The replacement of traditional clean rooms is safer and more sustainable isolator technology and the ongoing reshoring of pharmaceutical production, particularly to the United States, which is really happening. These dynamics support sustained demand for SKAN equipment and very important for our services and consumables. Our solid order backlog and pipeline reflects this clearly.

Now turning to the business development. Based on these fundamentals, we, the board and the management team are confident for the current year. In the biotech sector, momentum is improving and we are seeing a healthy level of project discussions. We believe that this is translating into faster decision cycles and significantly fewer investment delays than last year. And in cell and gene therapy, we are seeing a rebound after 2 to 3 years of capital scarcity. Projects are restarting, funding is returning. And while we do not yet see an increase in orders that's come from this area, we expect to benefit from this renewed momentum going forward.

With our premium technology, our deep expertise and expanded capabilities gained through our recent acquisitions, we are now better positioned to deliver a holistic offering across the biotech value chain, enhancing customer value and unlocking meaningful additional growth potential. In summary, SKAN is a strong company and a strong market with the right strategy and the right capabilities to create meaningful growth and attractive returns.

With that, we come to the guidance. Let me now turn to our guidance for the full year 2026. As you review our guidance, I would like to highlight a few important assumptions. Our guidance assumes no major escalations in tariffs and that the impact of the conflict in Iran remains limited. Meaning it does not materially affect customer investment appetite in our core markets, specifically the U.S. and Europe. As in previous years, our guidance also assumes no significant currency effects.

Now turning to the guidance. For the full year 2026, we expect sales growth in the upper teens. Our EBITDA margin is forecast to be in the range of 13% to 15%. And our midterm outlook remains unchanged with mid- to upper teens sales growth and a gradual increase of EBITDA margin to upper teens.

This concludes our prepared remarks, and we are now open to questions.

We now have a question from the phone from Estelle Bétrisey from Berenberg.

Yes, I just wanted to ask you where you stand currently on the execution of the projects that got postponed last year? You managed to really start straight from January, and how you see the situation in the U.S. so far? If it has normalized a little bit or yes, following the cautiousness in the second half last year?

Let me first -- this is Jonas. Let me first answer the question -- the second question the cautiousness of the U.S. market. I mean the, second half of last year was clearly not fantastic, and we saw a lot of cautiousness. In the meantime, we see this much improving. So we have a lot of very good project discussions and also orders from the U.S. market. So it looks like, at least for the time being, that the cautiousness has gone away quite a bit.

Maybe I can add to the first questions regarding the progress of the postponed projects. As these were mainly vaccine lines where we have won during the COVID times, we have made quite a significant progress. But the last step or the last portion, the set into operation of the customer has been postponed or deprioritized.

And as we also mentioned, it will progress, but on a lower level. So we expect the revenue, which is not really significant. As you may recall, our revenue recognition is the last 10% to 15%, which will be realized during 2026. But also we know it will take a little bit more. So it will be also shift in 2027. But the impact is on a lower level for the current year.

Okay. Operator, then we take the questions from the webcast.

Yes, we have some questions from the webcast. We have a question from the David Robertson from Chelverton Asset Management, who is asking if we could split out the successful quotation rate between Europe and Americas.

Well, as mentioned, the success rate in Europe was, of course, significantly higher or significantly higher. It was higher. As elaborated in the U.S., we saw -- clearly saw cautiousness in decision taking of projects. And currently, what we see is, again, this rebound in the U.S., we see more activity now compared to Q4 2025. But again, Europe was on a stronger level.

Then the second question is what was the acquisition impact for 2025. And if this should be brought up or calculate to get the 2026 full year impact?

The impact is mainly in the service and consumables business, as you see in the slides, what we have disclosed. On a net sales point of view, it was CHF 60 million. And on a margin point of view, it has a single-digit impact. And as you have seen, it's only consolidated from August on. So next year, we also expect a growth in these acquisitions. So just having the same pro rata for the next year, maybe it's quite conservative.

But yes, the impact on the balance sheet, as I elaborated is on the equity ratio, we have offset the goodwill that we paid against the equity. So that's why the equity ratio decreased from 52% to 26%. But structurally, again, it's an accounting topic and not a structural weakness of our finance structure.

And then the third question, asking what level of CapEx can be expected for coming years?

For the majority of our CapEx cycle is -- as we disclosed in the past was increasing our production capacity and the main investment went into preapproved services as we are in the completion phase of preapproved services, the CapEx will remain on a mid-single-digit level of the net sales.

But then we have a question from Martin [ Rater ] who is asking that -- or he's writing that the U.S. has been considered by Federal Council as a country at war. Whether SKAN is somehow or will suffer from them if isolators could be dual-use goods?

Our customers are big pharma companies, and they are not regarded as weapon manufacturers and therefore, we don't see this as a risk.

Then we have for the time being the last questions in the webcast from Teresa Vilanova from UBS, who is asking how much conservatism of the 2026 guidance in that?

Let me answer this in the following way. Last year, we missed our guidance and had to correct it. We certainly have no intention of repeating that. In that sense, I would say it's our best estimate of the current year, but there is, of course, always a little bit of unknown and maybe convert this minute.

Operator, that's all from the webcast now.

We now have a follow-up question from Estelle Bétrisey from Berenberg.

Yes. Maybe to follow up on the previous question. So just trying to understand, to be sure to understand correctly, like this is operating guidance for 2026, does it account for the cancellation risk that you mentioned CHF 15 million to CHF 20 million? Or in case this cancellation happened...

No, no. It doesn't -- sorry?

Yes, just to say that in case this happens, it gets canceled, which this growth be then a bit lower?

No. As I elaborated, we didn't plan with this order to happen or to recognize any revenue or impact in 2026.

Okay.

I'm going to be clear. So in the guidance, it is assumed that this project will not happen. So you could say, if any, it's an upside.

Okay. Okay. And then what does it mean for the midterm guidance, what gives you really the confidence to maintain that guidance? Yes. Maybe you could give a bit more color on that one.

Of course, we currently have the resources to create sales for more than what we will do this year. So in a way, we have already built the resources that we need for next year's sales, that will certainly have a positive impact in our EBIT margin going forward, then we will also grow our service and consumables and software business over proportionally. So we have -- and then the underlying market and our pipeline is strong. So we have a lot of very good customer discussions. So we are actually very confident on this year, but also going forward from this point of view today.

Okay. And maybe if I can just ask a last one. You were talking about the CapEx beforehand. Could you just tell us a bit more how it's evolving in the U.S. right now. I think you were discussing about looking for assembly lines previously. So yes, what update you can provide us, that would be helpful.

So we have this topic with increasing production capacity in the U.S. And currently, when we reflect, again, we have built out Germany. We have increased capacity in Switzerland. We are building a logistic hub in Germany. So from today's point of view, we have enough capacity, meaning assembly halls until 2029, somewhat 2029. So as soon as we will grow or we will need -- we will reevaluate the need building up assembly hall in the U.S. was currently is not needed.

Okay. Thank you.

Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question from the phone. Back over to you for any written questions from the webcast.

Yes, there is one more question from the webcast from [ Antoine ] on both launch of Kantonalbank. We're saying that the guidance has basically being unchanged since 2021, March guidance of 13% to 15%. The midterm goal of up teens for the guidance is the same, even though service and consumables increased its share. So what ensures that midterm will someone be reached and are there any ideas changing the way midterm outlook is given?

Yes. Maybe an indication is if you look at the second half of last year, our EBIT margin was around 19%, roughly with roughly CHF 200 million of sales. So that gives you a little bit the way we are thinking and how our -- how we need to set up ourselves for the future. And that's exactly what we are doing. So there is a lot of confidence that in the next couple of years, we can increase our margin.

Of course, there is also market pressure. We are not alone in that market. This is potentially one of the reasons why we have not been more successful at expanding margin. If you remember, the second topic I have, the second priority I have for this year on the slide was also looking more about optimizing our processes, working on productivity topics and setting up the organization for the future. So these are all activities we are starting now. As in the past, all the activities have been focused on growth. We now have a more balanced approach to this. Burim, you want to add?

Exactly. Just in addition to that, so the clear margin driver, as we always said, for the midterm, is once the commercial -- once, we are commercial with preapproved services, this is the one -- the first driver. The second driver is clearly also the consumables business from Aseptic Technologies and now also Metronik, but also ABC Transfer with the Betuvax business, which is clearly the main margin drivers in the service and consumables business.

And what makes us confidence when we look at the pipeline of our customers and the approvals, the majority of the medication that are approved is injectable dosage forms. And this trend is still happening or it continues to happen. That's -- is needed that our solution is needed also to fill in this segment. And for the moment, the fundamentals are still intact as mentioned during the presentation, this gives us a clear confidence for the midterm growth.

Then we have another question from Thomas Jäger from Mirabaud, who is saying that another question regarding mid-single digit to sales would be a very low CapEx in full year 2026 and going forward. Is this correct?

This is correct as we are not a capital-intensive business, how the maintenance CapEx is around 2% and now for 2026, what remains as CapEx is the finalization of preapproved services. And as I mentioned, the logistic hub, which will be done during 2026 and maybe a small portion in '27.

There are currently no more questions from the webcast. And I see no more questions in the telephone conference. So I would say we wrap it up.

Yes, thank you all for listening in and looking forward to all the further exchanges. Again, we are very confident for this year, but also the years -- for the coming years. SKAN is a solid business and we're very happy of where we are today going forward.

Thank you all, and have a good day.

Thank you.