Karnov Group AB (publ)

STO:KAR

Q1-2025 Earnings Call

[Operator]

Welcome to the Karnov Group Q1 2025 Report Presentation. [Operator Instructions]

Now I will hand the conference over to CEO, Pontus Bodelsson; and CFO, Magnus Hansson. Please go ahead.

[Pontus Bodelsson, executive]

Welcome, everyone, to Karnov Group's earnings conference, where we will present the outcome of the first quarter of 2025.

Please go to Slide 2. I'm Pontus Bodelsson, President and CEO of the company. With me, I have our CFO, Magnus Hansson; and our Head of Investor Relations, Erik Berggren. Magnus and I will present the outcome of the quarter using a few slides, and then we'll open up for questions. With that said, let's get started with the presentation of the first quarter. Please go to Slide 3.

In Q1, we achieved solid growth, strong cash flow and improved margins. Customers are adopting our AI assistant. Usage of the AI assistant is increasing steadily and our customers become significantly more efficient.

Net sales grew to SEK 673 million in the quarter. The organic growth was driven by strong online sales in Region North, including customer upgrades to our AI solutions, while offline sales in Region South were weak.

The adjusted EBITA margin improved to 26%, which is an improvement of more than 3 percentage points compared to Q1 previous year, a result of achieved synergies. Thanks to our strong operating cash flow in the quarter, leverage has improved to 2.4x, well below our financial target.

Let's move over to Slide 4. Our customers are typically renewing their annual online subscriptions primarily during the fourth and first quarter every year, generating strong cash flow for Karnov Group. We are pleased with the strong cash flow in the first quarter.

During Q4 to Q1, we have generated an adjusted free cash flow of SEK 455 million compared to SEK 265 million during same quarters previous year. Thanks to our synergy efforts, our margins are improving quarter-by-quarter. In Q1, we reached 26 percentage in adjusted EBITA margin. Our acceleration initiative has now progressed into Region South for additional synergy achievements and margin improvements.

The legal market is progressing in the shift to AI-supported solutions, and our AI assistant is the leading AI solution for legal research in our markets. Our customers become significantly more efficient. And in the next slide, I provide a deep dive into the usage and sales.

Next slide, please. Usage of our AI assistant increases steadily, thanks to significant efficiency gains for our customers. Once a customer has adopted the AI assistant, it becomes a daily collaborator for research and usage is increasing every month.

A charming story from real life is this. Thanks to our AI assistant, a lawyer from a small law firm in Sweden could identify a highly relevant argument that made him win in court against a large law firm with significantly more resources. Yes, our AI assistant attracts customers in all segments.

In Q1, Deloitte's Swedish branch adopted our AI assistant. They have since adopting it, increased the number of licenses and expanded usage to additional departments, thanks to significant efficiency gains.

In May, we launched a major update to our AI assistant, providing additional customer value. The assistant now has an agentic workflow with, for example, multistep questioning, refined searches and targeted answers. We have also developed a follow-up prompt suggestion feature and users can preview our sources directly for higher efficiency. Our AI road map is ambitious, and we will launch additional customer value in 2025, including a specific solution for case workers in municipalities.

Next slide, please. We are pleased to progress ahead of plan with the Region South synergies. The annual run rate synergies amounted to EUR 9 million at the end of Q1 as we have continued to deliver on all work streams. We reiterate our ambition to achieve annual run rate synergies of EUR 10 million by the end of 2026.

Next slide, please. In parallel, we also progress ahead of plan with our group-wide acceleration initiative. We have now initiated synergy harvesting in Region South. At the end of Q1, the annual run rate synergies amounted to EUR 8 million. Our ambition is to generate cost efficiencies of EUR 10 million with full effect on a run rate basis at the end of 2026.

Next slide please. In this slide, you can see our 2 cost-efficiency initiative running until the end of 2026, with the ambition of harvesting efficiencies of EUR 20 million in total. At the end of Q1, we have achieved annual run rate synergies of EUR 17 million.

Next slide, please. I will now comment a little on our segment performance, starting with Region North. Region North continues to perform excellent, both in terms of growth and profitability. We delivered strong growth, thanks to increased subscription-based online sales, including AI uplifts. Moreover, our EHS businesses continue to expand their customer bases, attracting new customers.

Margins continue to improve, mostly thanks to achieved synergies from our acceleration initiative, but also operational leverage from the increased net sales and product mix. The integration of the acquired carved-out Schultz legal information business progresses according to plan.

Next slide, please. We progress with our business cases in France and Spain. Our French business generated solid growth in the quarter as we are attracting new customers. Our Spanish business has declined in the quarter as off-line sales were weak. I am taking the necessary actions in Spain to address the weak offline performance. The Spanish merger is complicated, and we can reap the full benefits of our strong local proprietary content. The merger is completed.

And during Q1, we launched the Infinita product, which contains all content from the merged business as well as AI functionality. We are pleased with the market response so far. The Spanish merger is completed.

In France, the new versions of our 3 flagship products, all with AI, have generated strong interest from the market. Our efforts generate the expected returns, and we are attracting new customers in France and expanding our customer base.

In May, Guillaume Deroubaix is leaving Karnov group. He has played an important role as entrepreneurial integration lead in Region South, successfully merging the 2 Spanish businesses and relaunching the flagship products in France. We are now in a new phase. And moving forward, our country managers in Spain and France will report directly to me.

Next slide, please. With that said, I will now hand over the floor to our CFO, Magnus Hansson. He will tell us more about the financial results. Magnus, the floor is yours.

[Magnus Hansson, executive]

Thank you, Pontus. So let's start with an overview. Switching to Slide 12. In Q1, we achieved net sales of SEK 673 million, a net sales growth of 7%. The growth is driven by increased online sales, including selling more licenses to existing customers, upgrading customers to new packages, including AI packages and attracting new customers.

Currency effect had a negative impact on net sales of 0.4%. Furthermore, the acquired carved-out Schultz legal information business has contributed with SEK 20 million in net sales in Q1 relating to acquired customers on the Danish municipality market.

Please go to Slide 13. Breaking down net sales and segment level, we see continued strong organic growth in Region North and negative growth in Region South. Region North had an organic growth of 7.7%, thanks to strong online sales performance while Region South declined 1.7% due to weak off-line sales in Spain. Revenues from AI sales is increasing quarter-by-quarter as the subscription revenues are recognized over the contract period.

Next slide, please. On Slide 14, you see the net sales development within online and offline, split into the segments. In Region North, the online sales increased by 19% compared to Q1 last year and accounted for 88% of the net sales in the quarter. In Region South, the online sales increased by 4% compared to Q1 last year and accounted for approximately 80% of net sales in the quarter.

Please change to Slide 15. Subscription-based sales increased during Q1 and represent 88% of sales in the quarter.

Please change to Slide 16. The adjusted EBITA amounted to SEK 175 million in the first quarter. This corresponds to an adjusted EBITA margin of 26%, which is an improvement of more than 3 percentage points. Synergies are coming through as expected, meaning personnel expenses are decreasing. Items affecting comparability amounted to SEK 28 million in Q1 and are related to the integration of Region South as well as the group-wide acceleration initiative.

At the end of Q1, we have achieved synergies within the group of EUR 16.7 million on an annual run rate basis. The effect in the quarter compared to baseline amounted to EUR 3.6 million. We are progressing according to plan to achieve synergies of EUR 20 million with full effect on an annual run rate basis by the end of 2026.

Let's move to Slide 17, please. In Q1, net sales amounted to SEK 338 million in Region North. Organic growth was 7.7%. The growth is driven by online sales, and we continue to strengthen our market position and attract new customers.

Adjusted EBITA reached SEK 157 million in Q1. This is an increase of SEK 30 million compared to last year. The adjusted EBITA margin amounted to 46.6%. The improvement is due to 3 components: efficiencies from the acceleration initiatives, operational leverage from increased net sales and product mix contributions.

Please move on to Slide 18, which is the Region South segment. Net sales in Region South declined by SEK 3 million compared to Q1 of last year. Our French business continued to grow through online sales, whereas the Spanish business declined through weak off-line sales.

The adjusted EBITA margin was 12% in the first quarter. We continue to invest in our French business to generate growth and have allocated AI resources for future growth throughout the region. Synergies are coming through according to plan. Compared to baseline, the cost has decreased by SEK 25 million.

Apart from that, depreciations have increased by SEK 3 million compared to last year. The acceleration initiative is now picking up speed in Region South, and we will continue to harvest additional synergies.

Moving to Slide 19, which presents the segment group functions. Expenses in Q1 was SEK 23 million. Exploratory AI projects for future customer value are included in operating expenses.

Please go to Slide 20. The adjusted free cash flow was SEK 245 million in the first quarter, which is an improvement of SEK 138 million compared to Q1 of last year. Our colleagues have made a strong effort renewing customer contracts during Q1, and we are pleased with the improvement. The leverage was 2.4x EBITA last 12 months at the end of March, well below our financial target.

I'm now handing over to Pontus again, who will present our last slides.

[Pontus Bodelsson, executive]

Thank you, Magnus. Please switch to Slide 21. Our efforts generated strong cash flow and margins improvement in the first quarter. Our customers become significantly more efficient, thanks to our AI assistant.

We are benefiting our customers and advancing sales while achieving synergies across the group, improving margins and generating value for all stakeholders. We continue our efforts, helping our customers to become more efficient. In the beginning of May, we launched new value through AI and more will come during the year.

Please go to Slide 22. And by this, I'll end our presentation, and we are now ready to take questions. So I'll hand over the conference again to our host.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Thomas Nilsson from Nordea.

[Thomas Nilsson, analyst]

Congratulations on a strong report. You report strong customer adoption and positive feedback on your AI assistant. Could you elaborate more into how this translates into upsell rates or new customer wins?

[Pontus Bodelsson, executive]

Yes. Thank you for the question. It's -- I think it's spot on. This is one of the most important things we are talking about in Q1. Even though good numbers in general, I think this is the most important one. I mean bearing in mind that people all over the globe talk about AI and how AI should help us going forward, and we have had a good interest from our customers, it's when it comes to how we see that they are actually using it. That's what matters. And we can see that the efficiency gains, obviously, are great because we could see per user that the usage is growing almost week by week.

So yes, we have set the price uplift in every market, though it differs from geography to geography. In general, at least 30% price uplift. So that's the price we had from the beginning when launching it. And as the usage is now growing, hopefully, the word is spread that the efficiency gains that our customers can get is great. And thereby, we are positive in keeping that price uplift as we go along.

And on top of that, we are, of course, as I mentioned, adding even more customer value. We had a launch on 6th of May in Denmark and Sweden, adding even more customer value. So well, we see no stopping that. So hopefully, the increase in adopting the AI services will stay on going forward.

[Thomas Nilsson, analyst]

Okay. And one additional question, if I may. When it comes to France, it was exciting to see that the French business grew now in Q1. What level of top line growth can we expect from France in 2025 and 2026? What would be reasonable to expect?

[Pontus Bodelsson, executive]

Yes. It's wonderful to see the growth. I mean, as we have been talking about Region South in general, Spain is one thing, France is another one. So in Spain, we've been talking about a bottom line story, taking out costs, and we will see growth, but it will take some quarters. In France, we have, from the very beginning, focused on top line growth. So we have had an ambition to better match the product market fit. And therefore, we launched the services this autumn and winter, 3 new versions of the flagship products. And the growth we have seen is in line with our financial targets, meaning a growth of 4% to 6% and of course, fingers crossed that we will keep that. We see no dark clouds. So we still have a positive view on continued growth in France.

[Operator]

The next question comes from Predrag Savinovic from Carnegie.

[Predrag Savinovic, analyst]

The first one, if you could discuss around the margin synergies in South in some more detail, the synergies that are -- that we can expect to come through now? Will they land evenly in every quarter? So just as an example, the full run rate in Q1 here for South, for example, at EUR 9.3 million. Can we take that number divided by 4, and that's the least we can expect to see in the second quarter, for example, how is this going to pan out?

[Magnus Hansson, executive]

Yes. You should expect to see the synergies coming through evenly across the quarters. It is, of course, the synergies -- the ambition with the synergies is, of course, that they are structural. And that means that when we have achieved the run rate savings, it should be following the -- through in the coming quarters.

[Predrag Savinovic, analyst]

Okay. Super. And then on the organic growth in North, it's still -- you're delivering on a quite high level. And you have called out a few things like the AI product online sales growth, but if you can discuss in terms of pricing, new clients, upselling and so on and overall expectations 2, 3 years here going forward as well?

[Magnus Hansson, executive]

Well, that would be a long time to discuss. We have our financial target of 4% to 6%. We have grown faster than that in Region North. And we are also, as Pontus mentioned, quite optimistic for the launches we've made this fall and this year. So in this quarter, it is -- as you mentioned, it is online sales that's growing. We have a strong EHS growth this quarter. And of course, there's no reason to think that within the near future, that will change.

We also -- I mean, we have several good things coming as well, which we are quite happy about. For example, we're launching a new product for the municipalities. We have special AI service for the case workers in the municipalities, we're launching this fall. So that's also something that we are quite optimistic about.

[Predrag Savinovic, analyst]

Okay. Nice. And then on Schultz, now that it's been in the books, and it's not been there for such a long time, but if you could discuss the benefits that this acquisition brings to you and the positioning in Denmark and expectations there for the longer term?

[Magnus Hansson, executive]

Yes. We're really happy about the Schultz carve-out acquisition. It is mainly focused on the municipality segment in Denmark. And as we're now launching -- as I just mentioned, we're launching the new AI service for the municipalities for the case workers. The benefits of having the great content from Schultz combined with ours and then launching that for the municipality segment in Denmark is something that we're quite excited about.

[Predrag Savinovic, analyst]

And just finally on that, in Schultz in terms of how it improves your position in the market relative to competitors and so on, if can you remind us on that as a final note?

[Pontus Bodelsson, executive]

We have a strong position on the municipality market in Denmark. So the acquisition was, of course, the customer contracts, but as Magnus mentioned, the content means a lot. We all know that creating really good AI-supported services going forward, demands that we have high quality content and a large amount of it and thanks to this acquisition of not only customer contract, but also their excellent content, it's even a better starting point now creating services -- AI-supported services, thanks to this. So we have a strong position, and we are eager to deliver something really, really valuable to our municipality customers in the autumn. That's for sure.

[Operator]

Next question comes from Ina Djupsund from SEB.

[Ina Djupsund, analyst]

So I have a question on Spain. So what kind of growth do you see Spain delivering going forward? And could you talk a little bit about the actions you're planning to take in Spain either in terms of growth or cost related there in 2025?

[Magnus Hansson, executive]

Yes. Thank you for the question. As we've said, Spain starting out is definitely a bottom line story. We are eager to work on the profitability, thereby taking out costs and also focusing our efforts on specific products. There's a huge range of products in Spain that Aranzadi LA LEY, our combined company there has under its wings. So we are doing a job focusing our products. We could call it product rationalization. We could call it that we focus on the most profitable ones. That take some efforts in general. So that's a main focus point.

Adding on to that, we can say that we have seen for many quarters decrease in off-line products. That's not specific for Karnov, not even maybe specific for this industry, but that's what we've seen. This decrease accelerated a bit during Q1. And we have started actions to address that decrease specifically in off-line products.

So in general, to summarize it all, we focus our efforts on the most profitable products. We treat the other ones slightly differently going forward. And we're also looking specifically into the off-line products.

[Ina Djupsund, analyst]

I see. And I mean you have now come quite far in achieving the kind of cost savings in Spain and South. Do you still think that South will be delivering margins of 17%, 18% in a steady state? Or do you see that there could be kind of further long-term potential in kind of bridging the gap between South and North?

[Magnus Hansson, executive]

It is slightly difficult to hear you, Ina, but I will try to answer. Yes, we have a target which we mentioned in the Capital Markets Day a few years ago of 16% in Region South and then we added the acceleration initiative. So -- and that's, for sure, our ambition going forward as well. So there's no changes to our ambition levels.

[Ina Djupsund, analyst]

Okay. Hope you can hear me a bit better now. Final question on leverage. So you're now significantly below 3x. And what's your take in kind of doing more near-term M&A? And do you see any kind of exciting opportunities here?

[Magnus Hansson, executive]

Yes. So M&A is a part of our strategy, of course, and we are constantly looking at opportunities. We have a quite strict handbook for how we would like to do it. It's typically 2 kinds of M&As we look at. It's either geographical expansion or it's add-ons to existing products, which, for example, then the Schultz carve-out was a good example of. So we are constantly looking at that and have a good pipeline at the moment.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions]

[Unknown Executive]

So we have a question from the audience directed to you. It's regarding Schultz and the launch of AI tools. Could you give an example of how case workers would benefit from the case worker tool?

[Magnus Hansson, executive]

Yes. I'll try my best. This is one of my favorite topics. So we have this good content that is available for the case workers. And for example, a social worker, then takes many decisions every day that affects private citizens across Sweden, for example. And if we then can help that case worker to make a decision that is more consistent throughout the country, but also more in line with policies in the municipality, for example, and in line with the law, then society gains from that, the municipality increases efficiency and hopefully, we then can charge some for that as well. And also, you should remember that these case workers or it could be social workers, it could be a case worker within construction or building permits, they are typically not legally trained. So if we can help them understand and take decision based on the law in a better way, then I think there's a win for both us, municipality and society.

[Unknown Executive]

Thank you. No more questions from the audience?

[Operator]

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

[Pontus Bodelsson, executive]

Okay. Thank you. And thank you, everyone, for listening and for your questions. We will disclose our Q2 report on the 21st of August. So we hope to hear from you then, if not earlier. Thank you for today. Have a nice day.