Thank you, Christian, and good morning to you all, and welcome to this Q2 Q2 earnings call with Astor Group. We don't need to discuss the disclaimer, but today's presenter is myself, Martin Elovsson.

I'm the CEO for Astor Group since May this year. We reviewed my background with my last Q1 together with Mattias for the Q1 results.

I I suggest we we proceed here. There could be some new newcomers here who is interested in in Astor, I give want to give you a brief update about Astor, and also Astor as a purpose-driven company just to get the feeling of what what driving our forces, accepting delivering bottom-line results.

We believe, and we are ready to fight for a world where freedom and safety are a shared reality for all, and this is actually not the case for all today. You can see the pace of conflicts has accelerated, hybrids, multidomain, unannounced tactical shifts, of course, in days instead of decades.

The old defense playbook no longer works. Here is the a role, a clear role for Astor to play.

We are a company who is who is supposed to be perceived as innovative, agile, fast, and responsive. Here is a fit for Astor in the Astor Group in this context.

We also see the need for Europe made resilient through readiness, unity, and industrial strength. This is really important for us.

We see ourselves as a as a European defense company here. We have already, and we continue to build on our ecosystem engineered to involve, respond, and adapt to every shift in this paradigm.

Talking about the Astor ecosystem, we will come back to this. This will be be even more focus going forward in in in our company to actually develop and evolve our ecosystem even further.

Very briefly, Astor is a purpose purpose-driven company. We we have a role to play and and Astor Group is exactly such an entity as I described here.

We see ourselves as one of Europe's most united defense-first, and this is also important, defense is our niche, defense-first ecosystem, and we are engineered for for change, but also for innovation, agility to to respond fast and support support our customers out in Europe, to say. Strengthening Europe's readiness and resilience through unity, ownership, and industrial capability.

We are today located in four four countries in Europe. We have Sweden, Finland, Latvia, and also a a presence in in Germany.

Going from purpose to our missions, and our mission is to unite a rising force of thinkers, innovators, and producers. This is our team.

This is our team members in the Astor Group because our society's readiness and resilience depend not just upon those who fight, but but also those who actually built and support the fighters. This is the mission we we have in our guiding star.

We see ourselves We are We are quite big number of companies in our portfolio, and and we see ourselves as a rising force of small giants in niche segments with with outsized impact. Very briefly, very short Astor Group going forward.

A few days ago, we announced that we go from three to two business areas where we actually include Astor Tech in Astor Protect, and the rationale behind it is I want to see more synergies, I want to see more sales. I I want to drive cross-sales and drive efficiency in in Astor Protect.

I see big possibilities for for, for example, Immunity to cooperate with MSG. I see good possibilities between Scandiflash and Immunity.

We see Oscilion, MSG, etc., etc. I want to to facilitate this, and I want to strengthen this, we we really have a a good palette of solutions to to discuss and interact with with our customers.

Astor Industry on the other side other side is is two typical verticals in our portfolio. We have the composite side, and we have the the precision machining verticals.

I'm very pleased with the result in Astor Industry today and how they perform and how we will we will scale and evolve this. From a geographical size, Astor Protect, we have Airsafe in Uppsala, sorry, Airsafe in Upplands Väsby.

We have Scandiflash in Uppsala. We have Oscilion in Kista.

CSO, a subsidiary of MSG, is located in Katrineholm. We have MEA, also a subsidiary of MSG, in Visby.

We have Immunity in Riga. This is the new Protect.

Then we have the Industry with Mikroprecision and and Marstrom as the main drivers with the subsidiaries in in Vasa, Avesta, Värnamo, Västervik, Ljungby, and we have actually two production slots in in Malmö. This is very briefly about the new organizational layout.

Going into Astor in brief, and we can see we we continue on our growth journey. We are positioned for further growth.

As you can see, the net sales last 12 months go from 433 up to 569. Adjusted EBITDA, and most of you maybe have read the report today, we have have communicated an adjusted EBITDA today because of we do an extraordinary income this quarter by the acquisition of MSG since we had 36.5% of MSG before we did the full full acquisition.

According to to to financial policies, we need to to visualize that that gaining. Order book going from 289 up to 610, mainly driven by MSG adding on top of this, we have more or less 600 million SEK in order book going forward, and we will discuss how we will execute this going forward.

We continue to grow also from an employee perspective, 245 full-time employees at the moment located at 13 sites and in four countries. This is Astor in in brief.

Stopping up, talking about Q2 and the Q2 report highlights. Actually the net net sales increase is 89% this quarter up to 171 million.

It's actually the strongest Q2 in Astor's history. In this case, both valid for Q1 and Q2, and for H1.

It's driven by acquisitions. Based on different how should I say?

We have some some softer organic growth in this quarter, but but we can discuss that in deeper going forward. Overall, top line, I'm very pleased with the result and what the team has performed.

I'm not satisfied with with the results, but I'm I'm very positive that this is just a one-time how to say? one-time event, and that we actually come back to our historic historical margins going forward in Q3 and Q4, that I see good possibilities.

Adjusted EBITDA amounted to 10.6 million. Here we see the consequences of some disadvantages in product mix in in some production companies, but we also see that some of of our larger contracts that were supposed to be delivered during Q2 actually slide over to Q3 or Q4.

We we are quite convinced within the team that we will recover this slide-over effect from Q2 to to H2 in the remaining year. Adjusted EBIT, -2.2 million SEK.

As again, I repeat repeat myself, we see this as a temporary effect in Q2, and we are confident that we will come back to to Astor regular margins going forward. Cash flows from operating activities amounted to -25.9 million.

This is because we have built up an inventory stock ahead of the deliveries that now will be executed during H2. This is the opposite side in Q4 2025.

We had the opposite bump in in the operating cash flow because of a prepayment for this delivery. I think the cash flow from the company this exploded is according to plan.

Earnings per share before dilution, 2.09 SEK, and after dilution, 2.06 08, sorry. The equity-to-asset ratio go down to 38.6 38.3% from 64.1%, affected by the increased borrowing in connection to to the acquisitions we have made primarily with MSG going forward.

To summarize the Q2 report, top line is is good, we follow our plan. Bottom line, we are not fully satisfied just as we write in the report.

We have already addressed actions in specific areas where we where we can see that we can control it ourselves, and the rest is actually influenced by by external conditions. Overall, a good Q2 report from that I'm very pleased with.

If you dig into the financial development, the order book more or less doubled based on the acquisition of MSG up to 610, 111% growth year-over-year, which is decent. Out of this order book, almost 600 will be actually expected to be delivered this year, and the remaining part in the initial part of 2027.

I don't see a risk here that we we end up without orders during 2027. We continue to fill the pipeline for 20 2027 continuously, and we also need to have in mind that our type of industry don't have a regular production in all business areas.

Some of the businesses running on a monthly, very predictable basis. Some of the businesses have one-time contracts that needs to be delivered before you receive a new one, etc., and and we have a mix of of companies in our current portfolio, I'm I'm quite convinced that we we could push out what is stated for for the for H2 2026, and that we continue to fill 2027 going forward.

Order intake for the period was 81 million, and again, a lot of these contracts we we negotiate, especially within contracts, it's big, long-term sales, and they they just don't happen on on a quarterly basis. You need to see our trend on a little bit more long-time horizon to see how we build up our order intake.

From a net sales and EBITDA perspective, going back to from 2024 up to to Q2 2026, I think we have a quite good trend and ending up with 89% year-over-year growth for Q2 2026 with an EBITDA level of 10.6 million. I I think it's important to understand we we see a lot of activities, a lot of leads, a lot of dialogue with our customers.

We are in in the defense and the industry sector, there is a lot of activities in general. We think that we have a portfolio of companies that are well positioned next to utilize this this growth in the sector, and I'm quite positive going forward.

Looking in the segments, as I stated earlier, we have gone from three to two segments, and I'm very pleased here to present the performance we we do within within the Industry area here. Top line, 74.7 million, EBIT level of 12 12 million.

I think this proven that we have a very productive and effective Industry segment working continuously with cost reduction, operational excellence, and play in segment verticals that that are very healthy for us to operate in. Going forward, we will continue to build the Industry segment in in this area.

Looking at Protect, we see some some short-term hiccups. I shouldn't say hiccups, it's a bad expression.

We see some challenges. We have some challenges with product mix.

We have long-time cycles of of sales. We see some orders that has slide over from Q2 to Q3 and Q4.

We also see some external issues with with with, for example, North America. We see some challenges with our products in North America.

We see we see other external challenges that short-term affect the margin of Protect, but long-term we we see a good progress in in most of the companies here. From from Q2 and one month, we have MSG in our portfolio, and I really see a a lot of activities in MSG going forward into Q3 and Q4.

To conclude it a little bit, it's a strong quarter that could have been even better. We have a record book of 610 million.

It's up 111%, and it's proving a strong visibility into the the remaining part of of this year. Marstrom, Mikroprecision, Airsafe continue delivering organic growth and strengthen their market position.

I'm very pleased with with that part. Industry segment can prove to improve operational efficiency while maintaining strong activity levels.

This is in the Industry segment, it's really about efficiency, operational excellence, and be agile and and be be responsive, well done. We also have a lot of dialogues with with customers regarding new leads and quotes and so, and we see the need to to continue to invest and build capacity in Immunity, Marstrom, Mikroprecision, and MSG going forward to meet this actually growing growing demand.

Areas impacting Q2, we have talked about it, a little bit of repetition. Planned deliveries is postponed postponed from Q2 over to H2.

I'm quite convinced that we will catch that up during this year. Product mix, we have talked about.

Global trade barriers, we have indicated, this is a little bit struggling. We need to have patience.

We're building a sustainable company. We have a very clear trend.

We have a very clear target going towards 2028 and and going forward. We have two engines of growth.

We will continue with organic development of the companies even though it will be a little bit fluctuating quarter by quarter. We will continue with the acquisition process going forward.

We have also implemented some cost reduction and efficiency activities into parts of the organization where we need to to improve and adjust going forward. Going back to to to the statement, it's a strong quarter, but we are not pleased and fully satisfied, and we we see very positive going forward into Q3 and Q4 this year.

Commercial activity remains high across the group, and I think that's reflected in the book. The activity is there.

We also see it's not only the the industry itself, it's also the activity around our companies. We see increased amount of leads.

MSG now fully implemented into our our order book, but also into our organization, and we continue to develop together with MSG together with MSG. It will be a big part of Astor going forward, and I also see it very inspiring and positive about the potential in both subsidiaries of MSG.

We have MEA, and we have CSO, and I think they are both on the right track in in in a right spot at the moment. Most of the order book will be delivered during H2 this year.

Just a very brief update about our latest acquisition. It's PBH Teknik.

It's located in Karlskoga. For those of you who don't know, familiar with the Swedish geography, Karlskoga and the area around Karlskoga is one of the center of the defense sector in Sweden, it's very strategic to have a presence there, but also this company is a perfect fit into the other parts of Mikroprecision where we can actually utilize effects of synergies, leverage, and actually, I expect actually that we can one by one will be three instead of two, and they are, as the other companies within the industry, they are niche players with high automation, high productivity, and good good quality.

They also have a very strong defense exposure and long-standing customer relationships. This will be compliments in Mikroprecision's existing capabilities.

Purchase price, 88.2 million, 75% paid at closing, and then we have an earnout over the upcoming three years for the remaining 25%. Net sales 2025 was 34.4 3 million with an EBITDA of 16.3 million, it's a healthy, well-operating company that have a very good strategic fit into one of our verticals, in this case, the precision machining vertical with Mikroprecision as the as the main company or the mother mother company.

We haven't received the the final acceptance from ISP yet, but we we don't see any constraints at all actually. We just waiting for it over the summer summer period, and we expect it to be, we hope at least, to be to to have PBH Teknik integrated in our figures from 1st of September this year.

This is a snapshot of the comparison of acquisitions we have done. Just to be very clear, Astor have two two growth engines.

We need to continuously develop and grow our our portfolio companies, but you also need to to continue acquire additional companies. I think we have a a very proven track record what we are doing.

We're acquiring profitable and growing companies to an attractive EV-to-EBITDA level or multiple. I think it's good to understand we we are very selective and we have high demands on our our companies, but the counterpart also see a big benefit of be a part of Astor Group, and I think this is a key message going forward that being under the umbrella of Astor Group is really strength to these companies as well.

Even though we maybe not always have the highest price, we we still can come to a deal here because of the attractiveness to Astor Group. This is really positive.

If we frame out, look at 2026 and beyond, we see, as defense market is increasing, larger and more complex procurements resulting in longer lead times and greater quarterly variations. This is just the name of the game.

We see some delays from Q1 that from H1 that will be implemented into H2. We have addressed short-term cost adjustment measures to to improve improve areas where we need to to have some extra focus, and this is really, really important also.

We are confident in the outlook for the remaining part of this year and also entering 2027. I have high expectations on our portfolio of companies here.

If we go back to the purpose, we want to become a significant ecoplayer player in Europe, and we actually plan to build the next defense powerhead in Northern Europe. We have our footprint in Sweden, but we we continuously evaluating and and identifying additional footprints to to expand in Europe, of course.

Our journey have just started. We will continue acquiring companies, and during the upcoming years, I foresee a couple of companies that needs to be acquired into our portfolio.

Here it's really, really, really important to understand we need to prove to the market that we buy the right companies, we need to integrate them in a correct way, and we need to prove that we also can integrate and make profit of the combined package. We have an aggressive acquisition plan, but we need to have patience to actually do this in a correct way to secure the confidence from investors that we are doing the right track.

Going forward, we have a quite ambitious ambition to acquire almost 1 billion during the upcoming the upcoming years. To me, the future is quite bright.

I think we are well-positioned. We we more or less have control of our costs, we have a lot of activities, and we have a lot of companies in a pipeline on good trends.

M&A will continue, active but selective, and this is important, active but selective. Operational efficiency, I think we have proven that we we do this really well in the Industry segment, and we will continue to implement new companies into this environmental of operational excellence and scale them up further.

Last quarter, we communicated that we had add a number of sales resources additional to the group, and we also see a lot of leads and discussions out there. My expectations now is that we we actually can convert this pipeline into wins and actually increase our volumes.

This is a really focus area to to drive sales internally here now. CapEx and capacity, we are really close to our customers, and we see cap at increase needed, and we we continue, as I mentioned earlier, we we continue to invest in capacity in multiple companies within the portfolio, and I'm very positive for a bright future in this industry.

In the end, group platform leverage. I want to see I want to see more synergies, I want to see more leverage out of of combined sales, combinations of our our companies, and that's why we created the new Astor Protect to to get leverage out of that.

This is top top-five priorities going forward for 2026 and beyond. This was what I intended to present regarding the Q2, the results.

If Christian feels okay, I think we open up for some Q&As.

Christian?

Simon, do you hear us?

Yes, I do hear you.

Good morning.

I hear you. Fantastic.

Now you hear me as well. Good morning.

Thanks for taking my questions. I have a couple, and I would like to go through them one by one.

Initially, starting with the shift effects that you mentioned from Q2 into H2, how much of sales and EBITDA have shifted? What products were involved?

Of course, why has this shift happened, in your view?

Without going into details, Simon, we have communicated earlier a quite significant order in the past that was the intention to take out during Q2. We have some dialogues with the customer, it was actually customer wants to have them in a different way packaged.

This postponed the delivery, and we know that this will roll over to the next quarters instead.

Okay. Then speaking of next quarters and of the backlog, which looks really reassuring looking into H2, how confident are you that you can work off these almost 600 million in backlog dedicated for this year?

Can there also be maybe a shift into Q1 next year, similar to what has happened in Q2 already?

Of course, there is a risk, I would say. Within Industry, we are well prepared, and we have a plan.

I'm quite convinced that we will run according to plan within Industry. In Protect, we have some bigger deliveries that could, for any reasons, our fault or our counterpart's fault, be postponed, but with the knowledge I have today, I'm quite confident that we will deliver this during Q3 and Q4.

Okay. Can you share any hints on the EBITDA margin that is baked into these order book contracts right now?

My expectation is that we don't communicate forecasts on EBITDA that detailed, but my expectation is that if you look on the history of Astor, I think that's an expected level going forward as well. Again, Q2 is, to me at least, an one-time drop in EBITDA, and we come back during Q3.

Understood, yeah. At the end of the day, the EBIT margin was really strong on an H1 level in the Industry segment already at roughly 20%.

Do you think this is sustainable going into the next quarters? What's the explanation for this step change in the margin in the segment?

To be honest, my expectation is yes, we will continue on this level for remaining part of this year. I think that our team, Fredrik and his team, Jörgen and his team, is doing this really well.

We focus on cost, we focus on improvements and operational excellence, and we really, really try to do this in the most efficient way. I think we have a pipeline for the remaining part that support that trend.

Okay. Last topic is on order intake.

Can you provide a split for the Q2 or H1 order intake by, I don't know, segment or unit level, or at least some indications? Maybe also on the outlook for MSG specifically, are there any larger tenders that are worth mentioning and that you are allowed to share currently with us?

No, we are actually not allowed to share any tenders, but let's summarize it to be clear and honest, there is a lot of activities. My expectations on the acquisition of MSG is high, and I expect us to see results of that going into Q3, already going into Q3.

All right. Yeah.

Thank you very much, Martin. Best of luck.

Thank you.

Without going into too much details here, but I think that Industry is doing well, really well and according to plan. Protect is doing good, but we need to have in mind we have a good Q2 reference to refer to, but we also have a couple of companies in the portfolio that don't have predictable sales.

We need to look a little bit wider horizon how we take in orders. One example, one of our companies have limited numbers of customers, and they have quite big order that they deliver on continuously, and they will not receive the next order until they have delivered the current one.

There is a mixed fleet within Protect, it's not easy to elaborate on the general view here.

No, it's not the only, but also as I stated earlier, and you can also see it in the cash flow. We have taken a lot of costs in Q2, but we have delayed the output, I think that's the remaining part of the explanation here.

I don't comment on the cost savings programs per company, but some of the companies have a challenge in market situation because of internal or external factors, and based on a summarized view, I take action to secure that we fulfill our long-term target regarding profitability.

Our capitalized development costs is primarily linked to our previous business area, Tech.

I think this is a very fair question, and we always evaluate different ways of financing growth. One way could be to take in new capital.

One way can work with banks and other credit suppliers, we continuously monitoring this to make this as efficient as possible going forward.

comment on it, my expectation also. We always drive on operating cash flow, and of course, over time, we should support and generate internal cash flow to also continue and support this growth.

This is really important.

I don't give any guidance on MSG's performance for 2027. There is a lot of activities, and it's a lot of activities going on, and the expectations from my side on Peter, Henrik, and Fredrik are high.

The short answer is more or less no. It's an environment wherein a innovative defense solutions and protection solutions remains very attractive, and we think our offering is well positioning going forward.

You also need to be in mind that these kind of sales in this domain takes time. It's a lot of steps to pass: development, testing, verification, negotiations, etc., etc.

You also need to fit different financial buckets. We still see interest out there, but I can't say more than that today.

We continuously working with several customers.

Also, we have Oscilion. We think we have a relevant product, and we work with different customers, and our ambition is to proceed this development work, but I can't guarantee when we get an order if that's what you're aiming for.

We see we are relevant and we have a lot of dialogues and present what we have, and try to be close to the customers.

I think this is a very relevant to Europe if you want to be a European player in the defense sector. There are several reasons why we have corporations with MESKO and others: joint procurement programs would be easy for us.

There is lead times up to 24 months in different parts of the supply chain, by going together and cooperate, this will benefit us. There also starts to be demand for European-based components and supply chains, which is also make it important for us to cooperate within Europe gaining this market.

The final one, Immunity, we do a lot of investment in Immunity, and we think the company develop really, really well. We see Immunity as a player who is very close to customers.

We are very flexible in our production and we can customize and handle orders fast, and also, yeah, customize. The reason, to summarize it: cooperation, demands from EU, internal production, and agility.

I think, without saying too much, Dollprop is a very innovative and interesting company and product. The collaboration with Cube Squared mean that we continue to invest and that we see progress in this.

We also have get the recognition regarding the SUD-X underwater project from different stakeholders. We have a long-term plan within Dollprop, and I think we follow it, and yeah, that's it.

To me, I shouldn't boast anything more. I'm very positive to MSG.

We have made a very detailed due diligence, and we also see the long-term patterns in the defense sector, but also in the civil infrastructure sector for the upcoming 10-15 years. We see, according to our understanding and estimation, a huge need for this.

I think by letting MSG prove themselves going forward, quarter by quarter, we can visualize to the market the real potential here.

We have a sales office in Germany, and MSG historically have not been so active in Germany based on workload and work capability and capacity. Now they are into Astor Group, and Astor Group can support MSG in their growth from a footprint perspective.

Without saying too much, I'm positive that we will be more active in this domain going forward in Germany.

How should I say? Of course, we use tools within AI, etc., to secure that we follow our path here.

AI is one part of strength in the competitiveness for the products, but more than that, I can't comment.

Baltic defense lines start in Balticum: Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. Estonia and Latvia have ongoing discussions regarding Baltic line.

Lithuania is still investigating financial setups. We have ongoing dialogues in these two countries that are ready to have dialogues, not meaning that we have received or taken order yet, but we are close to following the Baltic line with local presence.

You can see in our Q2 report the balance between domestic and international sales, and I think we have a good balance between these two, even though we have a quite Northern Europe footprint. Especially, I think that especially Immunity is one of our bridge out in Europe to reach a larger part of Europe.

I'm positive that Europe will evolve according to plan.

We don't comment on quarters, unfortunately. We see a lot of activities, and when we on a quarterly basis present our order intake and so on, that will be the feeding stream for this.

We have a mid- and long-term strategy. We want to be a significant player in Europe.

That is our intention, for sure. To be able to become that, we need to prove ourselves regarding profitability, how we can handle acquisitions and how we can integrate them, and how we can, on a quarterly and yearly basis, deliver earnings per share results to get this confidence, to get us continue investing.

This is the mission we have. We are in a phase now that we have grown, we have got a palette of companies, and now it's up to us to actually visualize to the market and prove ourselves to continue grow and growing the earnings per stock continuously, and get trust.

The biggest risk, again, we need to prove ourselves every day. We need to do something better today than we did yesterday, and as long as we continuously improve ourselves, driving operational excellence and continuously work on improvements, I'm convinced we will reach our long-term product.

If we deviate from our strategy and don't deliver according to commitment, there is, of course, a risk, but we have a plan, we follow it, and we work on offensive with sales, but we also work defensive, focusing on costs and balance this in a good mix.

We mentioned a little bit earlier, I think that we have a good portfolio of companies, I'd say, and I think we have a good fit for growth in the Protect side, and I think we have two verticals within Industry that is doing really, really well, and where we continue on this path going forward.

We took a decision to do that. At the moment, my and my team's focus is on delivering results and delivering the operational day-to-day tasks.

When we have reached the next size level in our plan, then we can bring up this kind of discussions again. Now, we focus on operation and operational excellence and execution, and maybe not so much on the listing.

We are pleased with the status we are in today, and we need to focus on operational growth the upcoming years.

Yes, of course. This is one of my big topics to emphasize above all, but we also need to be very clear: we will get the investors if we prove ourselves.

They want to see long-term trend. They want to see that we can acquire companies, integrate them in an efficient way.

They want to see results bottom line. When we have reached a certain standard that we have proven ourselves, I'm convinced, based on the dialogues I have with different institutions, that they will step in and take part in the journey to build one of European's eco-defense systems.

This is up to us. We need to prove that we are reliable, that we are durable, and that we do things right all the time.

I think my conclusion, first of all, I've not been CEO for Astor for so long, but I have been visiting more or less all sites. We have great companies, we have great team members that want to do something better today than they did yesterday.

We have the fundament for growth, and I also think we have the portfolio of companies settled for continued growth. Now it's up to us to deliver upon it.

Again, I'm satisfied with the top line. I'm not fully satisfied with the bottom-line results, but I see a lot of activities.

I see a lot of dialogues, short-term, long-term, and I'm quite optimistic going forward. Have in mind, we are growing and we are growing heavily, almost 100% year-over-year, but we never forget the cost focus.

We still is a company that have a profitable growth.

Thank you for joining all, and thank you for the good questions.