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Intrinsic Value is all-important and is the only logical way to evaluate the relative attractiveness of investments and businesses.
Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the CompuGroup Medical Investor and Analyst Conference Call for the Second Quarter and First Half Results 2022. It's great to have you with us, whether you have dialed in via the phone or are following the webcast.
You find all the relevant information such as this presentation; the half year report; the press release, which we published early this morning on our website.
We're going to start with the presentation by the Spokesman for the Managing Directors and CFO, Michael Rauch, followed by the Q&A session.
Before we start, as always, there are some housekeeping remarks. Let me remind you on our safe harbor statement, which is shown at the beginning of the slide presentation and is valid for the entire call.
Thanks for your patience. And now let us start. I hand over to Michael Rauch. Michael, over to you.
Thank you, Claudia. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and a warm welcome to all of you. I'm happy to talk about the first half of the year where we delivered across all segments. With 10% sales growth, we achieved EUR 517 million in group revenues. This development was supported by solid organic growth of more than 4% and up 5%, excluding our German Telematics Infrastructure business. The adjusted EBITDA growth has also been solid with 8%. And all of this is based on a resilient and future-proof business model as the already very good quality of our revenues reflected in a high share of recurring revenues has been increased once again.
Based on these results of the first half year and including the acquisition of INSIGHT Health, we are raising our full year guidance for revenues, adjusted EBITDA and organic growth for the group. I will come back to this at the end of my presentation in more detail.
We continue to build an excellent position across Europe and the U.S., and we are well set to speed up growth in the second half year of the year. Let me update you on some of the building blocks for the additional growth we expect in the second half of this year.
We've already booked more than EUR 40 million order entry relating to the Hospital Future Act and are starting to recognize the first revenues. We're completely on track with our plans to realize between EUR 50 million to EUR 80 million in revenues until the year 2025 within this governmental program to modernize and digitize hospitals in Germany.
In the Ambulatory Information Systems segment, more than EUR 7 million order intake has been recorded within the framework of the Ségur program, an initiative to digitize the ambulatory processes for doctors and paramedics in France. We are also here fully in line with our expectations for the full year, and there will be more to come in the next years from this program.
In the CHS segment, we are well prepared for a busy second half of the year. We've stocked enough connectors to be able to continue making sure that our customers stay connected to the telematics infrastructure to perform vital functions within the health care system, and we've received more than 14,000 orders for exchanging connectors so far.
In the data business, we have strengthened our portfolio with the acquisition of INSIGHT Health. We added around 600 new customers to the strongly growing business area.
And finally, we've made sure that our customers in the Ambulatory and Pharmacy Information Systems segments are ready for handling e-prescriptions in time.
So to summarize where we are at this point, there is significant progress in all segments and the development gives us confidence for a stronger second half year to reach our targets and to even raise our guidance for 2022.
Now during the first half, group revenues have grown by 10% year-on-year, leading to an adjusted EBITDA of EUR 105 million in the first 6 months of 2022. The corresponding adjusted EBITDA margin stood slightly above the 20% hurdle.
Our adjusted earnings per share advanced to EUR 0.82 for the first 6 months.
Free cash flow has been impacted by the buildup of the TI inventory for the connector exchange and some higher CapEx spend in the second quarter.
Also for the second quarter, our revenue growth was 10%, so just like for the half year and the first quarter. Adjusted for acquisitions and foreign exchange, it was slightly above 3% organically, mostly attributable to a strong prior year comparison in the Telematics Infrastructure and a very strong organic revenue growth in Q2 2021 in the Hospital business. Organic growth ex TI resulted in a 4% increase year-over-year.
Recurring revenues increased over proportionately by 12% and represent 68% of total revenues in our second quarter. The revenue quality has also increased compared to the same quarter last year.
Let me now take a quick look at the segment overview, where we report strong revenue growth in every single segment. The overall double-digit revenue increase was mainly driven by the HIS segment, supported by the VISUS and KMS acquisitions and the CHS segment where we've seen a strong development of our data business.
Total adjusted EBITDA increased by 5% in the second quarter. Growth in adjusted EBITDA was slightly slowed down due to further investments in order to fully execute on our sales opportunities in the second half of the year and beyond.
Please let me go into more details, starting with the Ambulatory segment. Strong revenue growth of 7% was supported by foreign exchange effects, resulting mainly from our U.S. operations and consolidation effects from last year's acquisitions in France and in the Netherlands.
Organic revenue growth stood at 2%, resulting mostly from additional modules rolled out, such as the electronic sick note module and vaccination certificate in Germany as well as the e-prescription module in Austria. So far in Austria, more than 11 million e-prescriptions have been processed. They have more than 5.5 million throughout the systems of our customers. And the U.S. business is looking back on a successful quarter as well.
Revenue quality has always been high in this segment, Q2 being no exception. And with 77%, we increased the recurring revenue share by 1 percentage point.
Coming to the Hospital segment, we can say that revenue growth, including the acquisitions of VISUS and KMS was very strong again with 13%. And organically, a 4% organic growth is also remarkable, given the strong prior year quarter organic development and has been driven mainly by the continued G3 rollout, specifically in Germany. Recurring revenues increased even by 19% and their share of total revenue stood at 67%.
Impacted by ramp-up of investments to execute on Hospital Future Act and further rollout of our G3 technology, adjusted EBITDA decreased year-on-year and so did the margin. But these investments are beginning to pay off. We have now started to realize the first revenues in the context of the Hospital Future Act, but this will be still small in Q3 and we expect more impact hitting the P&L in the fourth quarter of this year. And as you know, the main revenue impact will come in the years 2023 and beyond.
Let's now move to the Consumer & Health Management segment. Revenue growth of 14% has been supported by the acquisition of INSIGHT Health that we started consolidating at the beginning of May. On the other hand, TI revenues came in below the prior year quarter, which have been impacted positively by strong card reader sales. As a result, total organic growth in the segment was roughly stable.
Excluding, however, Telematics Infrastructure, the organic growth rate was strong with plus 13%. We continue to see a strong performance in our data business, and the second quarter was especially strong in the insurance business. Recurring revenues showed an overall growth of 27% due to the acquisition of INSIGHT Health.
EBITDA has been impacted by increased investments in data solutions.
And finally, let's talk about our Pharmacy segment. The PCS segment recorded a very strong quarter with double-digit growth rates in revenue and in adjusted EBITDA. Revenue development was driven by new customer wins and higher hardware sales, resulting in plus 11% year-on-year.
Due to a controlled and prudent cost management, adjusted EBITDA grew with 21% even stronger than revenues, leading to a margin of 32%, up 3 percentage points versus the prior year quarter.
The share of recurring revenue has been impacted by the hardware sales, whereas total recurring revenues are up by 5%.
As already mentioned, we've seen an unusual but not unexpected cash flow development in the second quarter. Q2 is typically our weakest quarter in free cash flow, but this year, the Q2 figure stands out. To be ready to support our customers with the upcoming TI connector exchange in the second half of the year, it is essential to prevent a possible delivery bottleneck and further inflationary spikes, especially in the current market environment, which is characterized by delays and shortages in the supply chain for tech products.
In order to avoid a single practice of not being able to be connected to the TI network, especially now that all of the use cases are in full usage and rollout, we bought and stocked a sufficient number of connector boxes in the second quarter. The logical consequence is reflected in a negative cash flow of minus EUR 36 million for the reported quarter. However, this will spring back in the course of the second half of the year depending on the timing of the corresponding cash consideration.
Net debt at the end of the first half was EUR 75 million higher compared to end of December as dividends and the INSIGHT Health acquisition have been paid in Q2, leading to a temporarily higher leverage at 3x EBITDA.
When talking about our cash firepower, please let me also highlight that our available financing capacity has increased. Besides the EUR 400 million term loan and the EUR 600 million revolving credit facility, we recently signed a financing contract with a European Investment Bank, a strong vote of confidence in the digitization capabilities for our teams and into the stability of our business, thus extending our financing by another EUR 200 million.
So in view of the development of the first half of 2022 and given the consolidation of INSIGHT Health since May, it is a logical step to raise the guidance as follows: we now expect group revenues between EUR 1.1 billion and EUR 1.150 billion, supported by a stronger organic growth now between 4% and 8%, resulting in total adjusted EBITDA in the range of EUR 240 million to EUR 260 million.
On the segment level, we are raising the revenue guidance for the CHS segment and you will find the details in the backup.
Looking ahead, we are fully prepared and 100% focused to deliver on our ambitions with an experienced and strong leadership team. And by the way, you will have the opportunity to meet all of us in person at the upcoming Capital Markets Day on September 1 here at our headquarters in Koblenz plus also Derek Pickell, our U.S. CEO.
Angela Mazza Teufer, who joined CGM at the beginning of 2022 from several leadership positions at SAP and Oracle, is responsible for the AIS in the DACH region and Telematics Infrastructure.
For the European region of the AIS segment and our Pharmacy business, Emanuele Mugnani has taken the lead who joined CGM many years ago.
And you've met Eckart Pech already, who is responsible for our strong growth prospects, one of the strong ones, data business solutions.
And finally, with as many years of experience in various leading management positions at CGM, Hannes Reichl is continuing to drive digitization and growth in the hospital sector successfully since many years.
Together with all of our teams staffed with highly energized employees, we are in the right position to deliver on our midterm ambitions to achieve a compounded annual growth rate of more than 5% and organic sales growth throughout the years 2021 to 2025 to deliver a recurring revenue share of more than 70% by 2025 and to significantly improve the adjusted EBITDA margin back to a level of 25% where it used to be in the past and then further up to 27% in 2025.
Looking forward in terms of upcoming disclosure events, I'm really looking forward to the 1st of September, as just mentioned, our Capital Markets Day, and I really hope to meet a lot of investors and analysts here at our headquarters in Koblenz. In addition to the presentations of our managing directors, you will also have the opportunity to see several product demonstrations live and in person.
And the next reporting milestone is the publication of Q3 and our 9 months results on November 3.
Now thank you for your attention, and we are looking very much forward to your questions, and I'm handing over back to the operator for the Q&A session.
[Operator Instructions] The first question is from the line of Laura Metayer with Morgan Stanley.
I have 3, please. The first one is, so your new 2022 guidance implies a lower adjusted EBITDA margin if we take the midpoint. Could you please explain the drivers for this? And also with the margin expected at 22% now for 2022 at the midpoint, what are the levers to reach your 25% margin guidance for 2023?
My second question is around the workforce attrition level. Could you please give us a bit of color on what you've seen and how is this evolving?
And my third question is around the Pharmacy segment that you've registered a high organic growth in the last 2 quarters than what was seen recently. Could you please comment on the drivers? And how long do you think this is going to last?
Thank you, Laura. Excellent questions. So let me start with the first question regarding the guidance. So on the face value numbers, this is a very obvious fact of just including the INSIGHT Health acquisition, which we have in our books since May. And that comes in with a lower margin as we had also talked about when presenting the acquisition into the market. And so we just have taken the INSIGHT health revenue and we have also taken the INSIGHT Health EBITDA into account, and that actually brings the margin overall down. So there's nothing else behind.
And then you asked a second question or a follow-up question on the first question regarding the levers to bring the margins up, and that is one where the whole team and the overall company is very much focused on. We said actually at the beginning -- or sorry, at the end of 2020, we're going to invest in order to get higher growth in the years 2021 to 2025 and we have been going through that investment period. And we said that we will see some further investments trickling into or spilling over into 2022.
And now actually, we are at a point where the investments bear fruition and where we will recognize the sales going forward. So we don't need to have that level of investment anymore, which we had in the past, and that will bring up our margins going forward with higher sales.
So we are highly confident that we'll actually see that margin pick up already in the second half year of 2022 and then surely beyond going into 2023.
Your next question area was regarding the workforce attrition level. And we have to say that we have a highly energized and motivated team here, and we are very proud to have our team. And we clearly want to make sure that everybody has a brilliant place here at CompuGroup. So attrition levels have not gone up, and we see that also as a main point for us to make sure that we keep our excellent team around.
The third question was on PCS. And let me just remind you on the long-term guidance, which we gave for all of the businesses. So for the PCS business, which is typically our smallest of the 4 segments, we said it's going to grow between 1 and 3 percentage points. And you're right. So 9% is clearly an exception here.
Where does it come from? We are preparing ourselves, as I was also mentioning for the e-prescription, and there needs to be download functionality also installed on the PCS side. So expect this number to go down in the future so that we, on average, will be around that 1% to 3% for PCS going forward.
The next question is from the line of Knut Woller with Baader Bank.
Also 3 questions from my side. First, Michael, you -- looking at the quarterly statement, we could find that you implemented a restructuring program. Can you provide some more color what this program is targeting and also whether we should expect further costs in the remainder of the year?
Then secondly, looking at the P&L, it seems like other operating income was unusually high, or at least if we compare Q1 to Q2. And also other OpEx were up, I think, probably also reflecting the management changes. Can you give here some more color on these 2 line items?
And lastly, you mentioned the connector exchange and your preparations. Looking at press articles in Germany, it seems like gematik is evaluating alternatives on the back of the pressure of KBV that's -- it's reconsidered whether a physical replacement of the connector is really the right path to go.
Can you share here some insight on what you are observing? You said you have already a lot of preorders. Is there any risk that there will be a different solution than the physical exchange? And what would be the impact on your outlook?
Thank you, Knut. I will start with the first one on the restructuring program. So according to IFRS, this is actually called restructuring, but let me just rephrase that what we are doing is we are reorganizing our German operations on the AIS side with a program, which we call Doctor First. So we want to go into a much more functional set of making sure that we do the best here for the health care providers, and that's why we've recognized costs.
Now your question was, can we expect some further restructuring to come into that field, and we will guide for around a mid-single-digit euro number. Now I think we are at 3.4% recognized. So it might go up a little bit, but not too much over the second half year.
This is basically our -- what's called restructuring program, but it's clearly a reorganizational program in order to come to a more functional setup in the way we cater our customers.
Your question on the connector exchange is the next question for me. Just in order to say one word from my side very clearly, we need to make sure that the Telematics Infrastructure is not falling apart. And we are the ones that had the first-mover advantage being the first ones to deliver connectors to the customers to make sure they are connected to the Telematics Infrastructure. And these security certificates have a lifespan of 5 years. They run out now, and we need to make sure that no single doctor is actually disconnected from the Telematics Infrastructure. So there is no other opportunity than to clearly exchange the connectors, and that's exactly what we're working on.
However, we also welcome all other alternative thinking and obviously CompuGroup is always at the forefront of helping finding solutions, which could then enable us going forward different possibilities on how to treat the whole Telematics Infrastructure business. But for the time being, there's absolutely no alternative and we need to make sure that no doctor falls off the Telematics Infrastructure system.
Now on the operating income and operating expenses, there basically is always ups and downs. So there is nothing unusual to be reported about. We just went through the documents here with the team, and Knut, this is nothing unusual. I hope that answers your questions.
Yes. Just a quick follow-up, Michael, on the restructuring program. You said Doctor First, is the impact rather trying to accelerate growth or maintain growth? Or is it also one to improve profitability in the German core market?
We want to make sure that our customers are happy. And when you have happy customers, and then you also have opportunities to sell more and to improve the business for them. And that's for sure an area where we will go for.
The next question is from the line of Charlotte Friedrichs with Berenberg.
Three as well. The first one would be on the CHS division, and specifically, can you talk a little bit more about what is driving that strong underlying growth? You did allude to the insurance solutions, I believe?
The second question is how big is the impact that you saw from the connector stocking in the first half of the year?
And then the third one would be around sort of customer churn numbers, if you've seen any changes here this year compared to the normal level.
Yes. Thank you, Charlotte. I'll start with the CHS side. Yes, 13% organic growth in the data business, which we have not only achieved in the second quarter of the year, but actually also in the first quarter of the year. So this is very strong. And as you know, we are playing that data into various constituents, and this time, we just emphasized that we played it more back to the insurance side. So but we play it back to all different, as you know, pharmacy companies, to doctors, to various providers we're playing it back.
Then you asked a question regarding the impact on the connector side on free cash flow. That's a double-digit million euro amount, but a low double-digit million euro amount. We also have seen higher CapEx. As I think we were talking about also in the first quarter call, we are doing some investments here also on the compound in the headquarters.
One, for instance, that's an interesting one, going in the main discussion which you know we have regarding the environment, we're also going to install heat pumps here in order to be, from an electricity point, fully independent. So we're doing some investments here, but this will be rather a onetime of nature. So it will not impact the cash flow going forward.
The third question, sorry, what was the third question?
Customer churn.
Customer churn, yes. Thank you. The team reminds me just on customer churn, I apologize for that. We have not seen any elevation on customer churn here. So no, very sticky business.
The next question is from the line of Martin Jungfleisch with BNB Paribas.
Two questions for me, please. The first one is on the U.S. performance in the AIS segment, if you can provide some color there on the growth in the second quarter and then also what your expectations for the second quarter on because there have been some layoffs at some peers, just Cerner in the U.S. So just, yes, wondering what your plans there are.
Then the second one is on wage inflation and pricing. If you can provide some color on wage inflation, what your expectations there are for the full year? And then on pricing, to what extent you expect price increases to mitigate this effect. So do you have any inflation protection activated in your contracts and also how customers react to those price increases?
Yes. Thank you, Martin. So on the U.S. side, whilst we actually don't break down the growth on the AIS segment in the different regions, we can give you a bit of color. So that was a mid-single-digit organic growth rate for the second quarter. Actually, the growth versus the first quarter was picking up here organically.
We are seeing continued good business on the revenue cycle management side and the situation, as you mentioned, was, for instance, Cerner has nothing to be with our business. So that's in a good condition and good shape.
Your question regarding wage inflation, yes, of course, we are also impacted on the wage inflation side, but as we were mentioning also during the previous calls, we have a very good pricing power, particularly on our recurring revenue, which is the main part actually of our revenue where we price the software maintenance and service fee contracts. And we can actually update here the pricing on a regular basis. So we don't feel worried.
The next question is from the line of Florian Treisch with Kepler Cheuvreux.
I have some follow-up questions to the TI topic as a whole. So the first part would be on the connector replacement. So as you have now highlighted 14,000 orders placed by your client, can you give us maybe some more insight on the timing of the expected revenues? What is an ASP per connector device?
And is it fair to assume that the margin for the reselling of the hardware is above your group EBITDA adjusted margin? I think in the last big connector placement cycle, we were surprised by a quite decent and good margin off it.
The second part to the question is, if I'm right, that's probably up to 30% of your client base. So listening to your comment you made already on the call, you would expect that this will go up to 100% next year maybe?
And the last one, we are only talking about connector replacement at the beginning of the year, the focus was more on software update, a new module update. Is this still expected to start in H2? And can you give us some update here?
Thank you, Florian. I'll start with the last one. Yes, we expect the software upgrade, the so-called PTV 5 upgrade, to come in the second half year. So this one is also part of our guidance, it's fully included.
Now regarding the connector, you asked a couple of questions. I confirm again, we have reached more than 14,000 orders for the connector exchange. The first connectors were installed in Q4 2017. So they need to be exchanged now starting September, and we are in the progress of doing that. And that's why we expect also more orders coming in.
We have not yet a clear view with regard to the timing of how many connector sales in essence we will actually achieve in the second half year and what will go into the first quarter and second quarter of next year. The CompuGroup connectors have been mainly installed until kind of like June 2019. And so if you add 5 years, you can kind of calculate on when basically the full turnover of the connector exchange would be completed.
The last portion of the question was regarding the sales price for the connectors, and we just released a press announcement and we said we will do our contribution here in order to react to the pricing, which has been put out by the relevant parties negotiating so that the doctors don't need to pay. So we go actually on to the adjusted price, which has been agreed upon the negotiating parties.
[Operator Instructions] The next question is from the line of Andreas Wolf with Warburg Research.
A couple of questions also from my side. So on the connector pricing, obviously the price is lower than what CompuGroup has initially asked for. Does this have any implications for your margin expectations for next year or EBITDA expectations for next year? I would assume no.
And then linked to this question is also probably the level of capitalized R&D that we should expect going forward as, obviously, investments are supposed to decline and higher margin levels are supposed to be associated with, let's say, more or less stable R&D levels, R&D initiatives and economies of scale. So maybe you could also provide some comments on this P&L line.
And then the third is on the data-related business in CHS. Is this business more or less recurring because I remember that in the past there were quite often project-related revenues in this segment. Maybe you could provide also some comments on this business, especially the insurance-related business.
I'll do so and I'll go in reverse order. So on the data-related business, you're right. There is a recurring portion in it, but there is also actually in the business project portion in it. So it really depends on what kind of projects we are actually driving with our customer base.
And so if you think about the classical Intermedix business, there is higher recurring business. If you think about project business with institutions with pharma companies, so you might have projects onetime revenue. So that really depends on what kind of business you can actually get and realize.
Now on the level of capitalized R&D, yes, you have a fair point. So if we say we're going to scale back our investments, we always said that in absolute terms we wanted to actually make sure that the investment OpEx, CapEx are not going to go much up, which means in relative terms, one would expect that also here the level of capitalized R&D on total R&D costs would go down.
We have not yet released any detailed guidance regarding the year 2023. And we will do so as usual when we go into February 2023.
That brings me to your first question regarding the connector pricing. Yes, indeed, the EUR 2,300 is a price, which we released also in our press statement. And with that, actually, we are fully confident that we can achieve our margin guidance or our overall revenue and EBITDA guidance for 2022. And so we will also take that into account when we communicate our February guidance for 2023.
The next question is from the line of Yannik Siering with Stifel.
Two questions left from my side, please. So one would be on INSIGHT Health. Are you able to provide an update on the growth rates at this business?
And then the second one would be an update on the government approval process for the Hospital Future Act. Have you seen any changes here over the course of the summer, maybe also incrementally compared to Q1?
Thank you. I start with the second question so we have not seen any change, but actually, I want to go along the speaking lines of the first quarter call. What we see is the overall process of approval takes some more time than originally estimated. Meaning whether it's federal approval, whether it's state approval, it takes a bit more time. That's why we also communicate now the EUR 50 million to EUR 80 million, which we see for us as revenue to be recognized with the Hospital Future Act, will be recognized until the year 2025. In the very early assumptions, we were thinking we could be done by 2024, but now it goes into 2025.
On the order intake, however, on the Hospital Future Act, as I said, we are realizing now more than EUR 40 million order intake. So that looks very good. And we have also started on the first invoicing now recognizing revenues, but still on a low single-digit million euro amount.
On your question regarding INSIGHT Health. So just for obvious reasons, stating it again, it will be not included in the organic numbers. Comes April 2023 and only thereafter it will be part of the organic growth number. I said that because it's an acquisition, so for the first 12 months we don't include that. And we see, nevertheless, good growth also here in the INSIGHT Health business, and Michael Hensoldt and his team are doing an excellent job. So thank you, guys.
Okay. Thank you very much. And since there are no further questions, we would like to close the call. Thanks for dialing in to all of you. And as always, in case there are further questions, Investor Relations is available. Please don't hesitate to take Frederic -- oh, sorry, there is another question now. Of course, we're happy to take it. I think it's from Andreas Wolf.
Yes. The next question is from Andreas Wolf, Warburg Research.
7 Sorry, and thank you for squeezing me in. I just had a quick one. As Michael, you were talking about hospitals and the approval process, we've seen a couple of companies in Germany blaming the public sector spending less. Have you observed similar obstacles in this approval process because it seems a bit like money is being saved for the defense fund or whatsoever. Have you seen anything here? I guess everything is still as it should be, but just to confirm.
I don't think we all recognize that these are challenging times, and the corona crisis has put a burden on the overall health care system. And now, as you mentioned, there comes some macroeconomic and political risks.
But I think all parties involved here are doing an excellent job, and I really want to congratulate all of the health care providers particularly that are keeping our population very healthy in these difficult moments. So we cannot complain. We will do our own job, and we will make sure that everybody stays healthy.
All right. And since now, there are really no further questions, you've all heard my closing speech before. So Frederic and I are here if there are any further questions.
And we wish you a great day. Thank you, and bye-bye.