Thank you, and thank you all for listening to this presentation about the Q3 2026 report for Hexpol. I will start, Henrik Elmin, CEO, and I'm here with Peter Rosén, CFO.

We will use the slide deck from our web page as guidance through the presentation. Before we start, I would like to say that I'm very excited to be the CEO of Hexpol since 1st of August.

I'm really looking forward to lead Hexpol on this exciting growth journey. After the summary, but before the Q&A, I will also share some short reflections after my first two months on the job.

Let's go to the agenda slide. We will comment on the overall group results, go through the three business areas, then Peter will go through the financials, and after a summary, we will open up for Q&A.

Let's start with an overview. If we look at the right side of this page, we had another strong quarter with 12% organic growth.

Very nice to see that all business areas grew versus last year. Currency added 1%.

Especially the Thermoplastic Compounding business area had a quarter with strong growth, and adjusted EBIT came in on a good level at 723 million, 5% above last year. The adjusted relative EBIT margin came in on 13.6%—13.6%, somewhat lower than last year.

This is actually mainly coming from the Rubber Compounding business area, and I will come back to that. Then also the reason for the adjustment on EBIT is a one-time cost for changes in the management team that was announced at the end of July.

If we look then at volume and prices, our organic growth is driven by both volume and increased prices. We saw volume growth in wire and cable industry, general industrial segment, but also automotive saw some volume increase.

If we take the prices on raw materials, they stayed on a high level, and the situation is still very volatile when it comes to raw material pricing. Our teams have handled this again in a very good way.

In general, we can say we have compensated with price increases to customers for the higher raw material prices versus last year. Our average sales price increased sequentially and also versus last year.

If we then take the markets on the left here, on average, if you look at the global market, we see a similar level as last quarter. If we go deeper, the market in North America was a bit more stable, while Europe is more challenging.

It differs very much across industry segment. For example, wire and cable industry is growing due to the trends—increased energy demand, electrification, and data centers—while other industries are on a lower level.

The situation for the raw material supply chain remains volatile, but we see no major interruptions in our deliveries, so. If we then go to the next slide, and we look at Rubber Compounding, our biggest business area: good growth organically, 9%; adjusted EBIT, 483 million, which is somewhat lower than last year.

In general, we can say that the whole market is still on a relatively low level. When it comes to these captive volumes, as we call it—this is when the customers does the compounding internally—we can say that we still don't see many new investments in captive capacity, we don't expect that the captive share will increase long term.

However, there is still a general overcapacity in the rubber compounding industry. For us, we saw good progress on winning market share in North America.

Average sales prices were higher sequentially versus last year. On the margin side, we have a lower adjusted EBIT margin versus last year, two main reasons: we are investing in growth and efficiency, increased OPEX linked to that, but also some specific new lower-margin contracts came in in North America.

Here we will focus on improving the profitability over the coming quarters. Let's go to the next slide.

We are very happy to see 19% organic growth for the Thermoplastic business area, second consecutive quarter with high organic growth. Here volume is driven by wire and cable, automotive, building and construction, medical, also general industrial, quite across the board.

EBIT came in at 157 million, which is 31% higher than last year. I will also come back to that, but two very exciting acquisitions since the last quarterly report.

If we look at Engineered Products: performed very well with organic sales growth of 10%; good improvements on EBIT for the quarter at 83 million, and this is 30% higher than last year. The wheels business performed very well, especially in China.

The gasket and seals demand is somewhat lower for gaskets for plate heat exchangers right now, but long-term trends support future growth. If we then go to slide 7: so we have two very exciting acquisitions since last quarter.

First on the left side, we have VIPA, which is the leading thermoplastic compounder for wire and cable industry in Italy. This fits very well into our thermoplastic compounding area, and adds substantial size to the business area with €76 million revenues and also good profitability.

VIPA operates in an attractive growing segment, wire and cable, and the growth is really driven by electrification and increased energy demand. VIPA is part of Hexpol then since October 1st.

Then we have Cimplast, a leading Turkish specialist compounder, also a very strategic to our thermoplastic business area. Cimplast specializes on so-called TPE and TPV compounds, and in other words, this means a type of polymer that is a little bit in between thermoplastics and rubber, it fits really well strategically in our portfolio.

Cimplast has a very broad customer base across segments, and here closing is expected in Q1 2027. With that, I hand over to Peter for the financials.

Thank you, Henrik. If we then take a quick look at the quarter, as Henrik mentioned and you've seen, we delivered 5.3 billion SEK in the quarter in sales, and we have an adjusted EBIT of 723 million, given an EBIT margin of 13.6%.

As Henrik mentioned, the adjustment to EBIT stems from cost related to changes in the group management that was communicated at the end of July this summer. Cash flow in the quarter is solid at just shy of 700 million SEK, and adjusted earnings per share increased 8% compared to Q3 last year.

The net debt-to-EBITDA ratio stands at just about 1, below last year, we closed the quarter with a very strong financial position. If we then take a look at the highlights of the quarter: sales are up 13%, all of it basically driven by organic growth that we see in all three business areas, and we'll come back to this in a little bit more detail.

EBIT increased 5% to 720 million SEK. EBIT margin is down 110 basis points to 13.6%, and this is mainly affected by the relative increase in OPEX.

This is impacted by increased investments in IT and digitalization, but also more people resources that we need to support further growth. If we take a little bit more detailed look on the sales development, we see that the increased sales of 13%, out of that, 12% is organic growth, and we have minor FX effects.

There are no acquisitions included in these quarterly numbers. The organic sales development is driven both by higher volume in the quarter, but also higher sales prices.

From a geographical perspective, we also saw growth in all areas: North America is up 15%, Europe 10%, and Asia grew 16%. Asia is primarily driven by good sales of the wheels segment for us.

If we then take a look at the EBIT drivers in the quarter, we have the 5% increase in EBIT to 723 million SEK. The driver of the higher EBIT is simply the higher sales, while gross margin is on the same level as we saw in Q3 last year.

The OPEX increased compared to last year, and this is mainly driven by a higher cost to improve digitalization and efficiency in the business, but also investments in people resources that we need to drive growth. Even though there is increase compared to Q3 last year, I just want to highlight that the OPEX are on the same level as the second quarter of this year, it has not increased sequentially.

It's just compared to same period last year that we see the increase. If we then go into the three business areas in a little bit more detail: Rubber Compounding delivered sales of 3.3 billion SEK in the quarter, which is up 10% compared to last year.

Out of the 10%, 9% is organic growth, and it's driven by a combination of higher volumes, but also higher sales prices. In the quarter, the higher volumes were seen in North America.

From an end-customer perspective, we saw growth primarily with wire and cable, general industry, while automotive showed basically stable sales and volumes. EBIT in the quarter for the segment came in at 483 million with a margin of 14.5%.

This is where we see that lower result and margin are affected by these more resources that we need to support further growth and efficiency in the business. If we then move over to Thermoplastic Compounding: delivered sales of 1.6 billion in the quarter, which is up 20% compared to last year.

As for Rubber Compounding, basically all of this growth is organic growth. Again, it's driven both by higher volumes and higher sales prices that we see across the companies and geographies in the segment.

From an end-customer perspective, sales was—positively affected by higher volumes to most end-customer segments: not least building construction showed good growth, as did general industry, automotive and, not least, wire and cable. The drivers that we see here are increased volumes to existing businesses, but also ramp-up of projects that have been agreed with customers before and now start to deliver higher volumes.

Following on the higher sales, we also saw strong improvement in EBIT, that increased with 31% to just shy of 160 million SEK. At the same time, we saw strong improvement in the margin in itself, which increased 80 basis points to 10.0% for the quarter.

Then if we look at Engineered Products, the last of our three segments, we saw sales of 397 million in the quarter, which is up a fair amount compared to 353 million last year. The increase here was driven by high sales of the wheels products, and as I mentioned, this is especially visible in Asia.

A higher EBIT followed on the higher sales, with further positive margin effects, giving a high EBIT margin of about 21% here in the quarter, very strong performance from the segment in the quarter. If we then leave the P&L for a moment and look at the working capital, it's slightly higher than the same period last year, and this is driven by a higher inventory, and it's affected by the situation in the Middle East.

In some cases, we've increased inventory levels to ensure we have access to all the material that we need, but also the higher raw material prices impact negatively. Depending on how the situation evolves in the Middle East going forward, we view this as temporary as we turn our inventory quite quickly during a year.

This is basically exactly the same picture that we also had in the second quarter of this year. There are no changes in underlying payment terms.

Then taking a look at the operative cash flow, delivered 669 million in the quarter, where depreciation and investments are balanced, while we had a small impact from changes in working capital, and this is inventory movements. Then to summarize the financial section here of the presentation: at the end of the quarter, we stand with a net debt of 3.3 billion SEK and a net debt-to-EBITDA ratio of just about 1, which is below last year.

All in all, from a financial perspective, we continue to stand with a very strong financial position here at end of Q3. With that being said, I hand over to Henrik to summarize the quarter.

Thank you, Peter. To summarize, a quarter with continued strong growth, all business areas and geographies growing.

I would highlight 19% organic growth in Thermoplastics, 5% increased EBIT on the adjusted level, and then I would say on the supply chain, we are managing to compensate for the volatile raw material market, and not last, at the end, two strategically important acquisitions. Before we go to the Q&A, since I am new as CEO, I just would like to share a couple of reflections after two months on the job.

My first priority has been to get out in the market and meet the teams, learn about the business, but also to understand the status—where are we today? I have met many of the great Hexpol teams, but also several customers, suppliers in US, Europe, and China.

From all these meetings, I have a few reflections to share. One is really that Hexpol has a very solid way to create value for customers, and it's very much about providing a full solution to them.

It's known, of course, that Hexpol is providing the polymer materials, but actually when you are out there, you see that it's much more than that. We work very closely together with customers to find the best overall solution, and this can mean that we include recycled content in the materials together with customers.

It can be how we achieve very demanding specifications, but also how we can help customers run their production machines with higher productivity. We have many loyal customers where we are really a critical partner.

Then, secondly, to be able to deliver this value, it is very much about people. It's a lot about competence, and we have many very experienced people that collaborate in teams—R&D, production, quality, purchasing, sales—working together to find this best solution for customers.

Then I have been on the Board of Directors for three years before taking on this role, I'm familiar with the strategy laid out last year, and for me, the strategy remains the same: no major changes on the overall level. We are on the right track, and we need to focus on organic growth as a base, but also there are lots of opportunities when it comes to M&A.

It's a fragmented market. A strategy is only as good as its execution, and execution will be one of my focus areas: do we have the right set-up, the right resources to implement the strategy with speed?

I think if we can gain speed, we will grow faster, and we can create more value. With those short reflections, I think we can hand over for Q&A.

Hi Henrik and Peter. Just a couple of questions from my end.

Firstly, you had slightly higher OPEX year-on-year. You mentioned that it's roughly flat Q-on-Q.

Should we sort of see this as the new run rate into 2027? How should we think about this?

Hi, Peter here. I think if you look at Q2 and you look at Q3, we are basically exactly the same OPEX level.

I think going forward, I think it's fair to assume in this range that this is the run rate, at least in the coming quarters.

Very clear. Also, I know that you don't usually quantify the volume-price split, but could you just give some kind of indication?

In Q, you said the majority was volume.

Yeah. We had 12% organic growth for group as a total.

We saw both volume and price being in the mid-single digits, maybe a little bit more on the pricing side and a little bit less on the volume side, but in that range.

Okay. Clear, thank you.

Also, Henrik, you mentioned some new lower-margin contracts in rubber in North America. How large are these roughly, share of rubber in North America volumes?

I don't have the exact share, but when it comes to the volume growth in North America, part of that is coming from these new contracts. As I mentioned, we are very happy to get that share and will work on improving the margins going forward.

Okay.

You also mentioned that Europe is more challenging and rubber volumes fell, if I understand correct. Which segments are weakest, and is automotive a part of that?

I think it's a very broad market. I would say on the automotive side, it's relatively slow, no major change compared to last quarter.

The area where we see more growth is linked to electrification and energy, wire and cable-related rubber products. It varies very much per industry, but we have a very broad base of different industries in rubber.

Okay.

That was all from my end. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Yes, hello guys. Thank you for taking my questions.

Firstly, going back to the organic growth here, can you just help us with the split in between segments? Is there anything that sticks out on volume versus price in the three segments?

No.

No, it doesn't. It's similar development both when it comes to volume and pricing.

To clarify, there's no additional price increases in the quarter, but it's the full-quarter effect of price increases that we did during the second quarter. The picture is similar between the segments.

Perfect. On that note, with the current prices and raw material prices, would you expect a similar price effect in Q4, or is there anything we should think about there?

I think there are a couple components. One is depending on what happens with raw materials.

Right now, the view is that they will probably continue to be elevated at these current levels. If that changes, then we will also adjust pricing.

Otherwise, pricing should be fairly stable sequentially.

Perfect. On that, a bit bigger drop here in gross margin quarter-over-quarter.

If we look back, the last time prices were rising, it was a similar pattern. Is there some prices that still lags, or how do you view that?

No. Actually, there are two other explanations to your question.

One is we almost always see a drop in gross margin going from second quarter into third quarter. It's driven by customers closing down, primarily in Europe.

Our volumes almost always come down from second quarter to third quarter, and we've seen that for numerous years. That gives us less cost coverage in production.

That's why we typically see a drop in gross margin. We saw exactly the same pattern last year.

Actually, exactly the same movement, actually, on the gross margin as we did this year. The second one is when we implement price increases, although it sounds counterintuitive, the gross margin in percentage actually goes down since we pass on the absolute increase in raw materials.

I would say that the gross margin decrease we saw sequentially is a seasonal pattern and also the mathematical effect of price increases.

Perfect. That's very clear.

Then on the strong American growth, can you elaborate a bit more on the main drivers, captive volumes, the new automotive programs that you've talked about before, or if it's price hikes? What's the main drivers for the North American growth?

On the rubber side, it is very much linked to both, you can say, share gains, but also what we call taking over captive volumes. It's convincing customers about the fact that we can do the job better and more efficiently than they can themselves, or the competitors can do.

Nothing other than that. It's really great to see those volumes in a relatively flat market in rubber.

Perfect. Then the last question.

If you can just help us a bit on how the profitability looks in the last acquisition of Cimplast. You gave the revenue number, of course, but if you can help us with the profitability level.

Both when it comes to VIPA and Cimplast, both companies deliver profit margins above Hexpol average.

Perfect. I'll get back in line.

Thank you for taking my questions.

Thank you.

Thank you. I have a few questions.

Maybe starting or coming back to the overhead costs, if you could be a bit more specific: where are you investing really in your overhead? Also, I think, Peter, you mentioned that you are increasing the IT and digitalization costs there.

Is it a kind of one-time increase, or will that costs be recurring?

Difficult to answer the last part, but if we break it down, the increases that we see: we do investments in IT, and that's to drive digitalization that we need, but also improve internal efficiency. That goes into various ERP systems and support systems around that.

If these are one-time costs, yeah, the incremental improvement will be one time. Exactly where it will be down the line is more difficult to say.

I think it's fair to say that IT investments, whatever shape and form it takes, will continue going forward. The second category of the growth in OPEX is people, primarily.

We see we invested both in sales resources to have a better coverage of the customer landscape, but also more R&D resources to improve our R&D efficiency. Those are basically the two or three categories, depending on how you view it.

Yes, understood. Thank you so much for the color.

Then maybe a question to Henrik as well: looking at your strategy, you are focusing on driving both the acquired, but also the organic growth. If you could comment on what are your organic growth initiatives, and how can you keep that momentum in gaining market shares and regaining the captive volumes?

Yeah. If you take the captive volume, of course, we have seen over the years that some customers are doing the compounding internally.

What we see right now is very little investments in more capacity. When there are new factories built or new programs launched, etc., they do not tend to do that.

It's not that easy, and it's also costly. I think over time, we have the chemists, the material specialists to make the best materials.

We also will focus on automating production to make it very efficient, and also you increase quality that way. In short, I think we are competing by just offering the best total value for our customers.

I think over time, we see several trends that can help us gain growth on that side. Then if we take thermoplastics, it's a little bit different, because it's a very big market, and we need to create critical mass and synergies to really take a bigger part of that market.

Yes, understood. Maybe just follow up on thermoplastics: 19% organic growth in the quarter.

Were there any special effects in it, and the timing of projects kicking in, or do you believe that this kind of, say, double-digit growth will be sustainable?

It's hard to give any guidance on the expectation there going forward. I think we are, as I said, very small in the big thermoplastic market.

Just to give one example, we have growth in recycled, let's say, materials with recycled content in Europe for the automotive industry. Despite a quite tough general market in automotive Europe, we have the right product competence to increase the share of recycled material in the cars, and we see very strong growth in that niche.

Our strategy going forward is really this more, you can say, special solutions, special materials where it's not so easy to do it. If we continue with that focus on this niches, I think we can continue to grow well in the market.

Perfect. Thank you.

The last one from me on the wire and cable segment: I think maybe one year ago you said that this business represented about 10% of the group, but we have seen quite good growth in this market recently. Also following the acquisition of VIPA, can you give us any indication how much of wire and cable represents now in your sales pro forma after VIPA?

To give you a very detailed number, we will need to come back after we've completed and have VIPA included. Let's put it this way: wire and cable was about 10% when we closed last year.

We've increased sales, that will have given a couple of percentage points in addition to that. Then we will have VIPA we will consolidate as of 1st of October.

VIPA in itself, which is a wire and cable company, represents about 4% of our total sales for Hexpol. We'll come back with a more detailed number after we have VIPA included, but as you hear, Agnieszka, the number will increase substantially.

Sure. Thank you.

Yes, thanks. Good afternoon, everyone.

Just on the thermoplastics growth, it's a fairly material addition to sales, I guess, you've shown here in the last two quarters. I'm just thinking, firstly, perhaps to rephrase the previous question, but how sticky do you argue this business is?

Secondly, is there sort of a learning curve in these new contracts that you've taken, i.e., that would imply that perhaps you gain productivity in those contracts over time, over a year or two or so? Is that a relevant factor?

Johan, Johan, could you repeat your first question? We missed a couple of words.

We didn't hear exactly what you asked.

Sorry about that. No, on thermoplastics, the added customer contracts you talked about last quarter,

and

if you look on what you delivered here in Q3, it's roughly 1 billion in sales if you annualize that. What I was interested to hear whether there's some sort of learning curve experience for those fairly material new contracts, i.e., that you would sort of gain profitability on those contracts with time, or would you argue that it's sort of standardized products that you can sort of reap normal profitability from day one?

No, but I would say it's not a couple of big contracts. It's a broad growth in many of these niches around thermoplastics.

I would not say there is a big, let's say, difference in terms of profitability in the beginning of the contract and then later on. It's many small or medium-sized customers behind, I would say it's more normal business with many customers and different type of materials.

Got you. It seems as if in Hexpol here, Henrik, when you look at the last couple of quarters, when you've added a bit of OPEX and yeah, other costs as well, it seems to drive growth.

Would you argue that this is closely connected, the cost increases we've seen recently with the sales increases we've seen? Or is it more like you're doing investments for the future in terms of driving growth long term?

I'm talking about OPEX you've had now in the current year basically.

No, but I think it's very hard to measure what is what, really. I think as I mentioned during my reflections, I think we're really in special compounding.

We have a very strong focus on the total solution for customers. Then I think we invest in digitalization, automation to do it better than others, let's say.

It's very hard to say what is what. Some of it needs more time to have impact on the top line, to say.

Got you. Final question: you talked about M&A obviously, and sort of driving organic growth, but are there any other major initiatives, Henrik, that you're looking at at the moment to improve sort of return metrics in Hexpol?

I don't know, factory footprint, or parts of Hexpol that perhaps fits less well in this system? Just curious to hear, given that you're new in the position.

Yes. No, but you're right.

On the top line, we have certain initiatives around organic growth and also M&A. Then I think more on the operational excellence side, we have opportunities to, and we focus on that already, to automate more of the production.

That drives a lot of efficiency. It's about R&D to have some R&D centers so we can centralize part of the new material development, certification of materials.

Then you're right, it's also, for sure, on the map to review the footprint, the operational footprint. We continuously do that, and have in the past taken action.

It's a combination of these things.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Yes, hi everyone. Two questions.

First, on automotive, if you could talk about the main drivers here for the volume growth, at least in some parts of your business, and whether electrification and hybrids are part of that, because data looks pretty strong so far this year against an otherwise fairly soft automotive end market.

Peter here. If we talk automotive in general, automotive production in the markets, Europe, North America, haven't really moved in the quarter.

The growth that we see for rubber and thermoplastic is basically, if we call it market share growth, or as Henrik mentioned, that we have products that have been launched, not least with recycled materials. That's where we see the sales growth.

It's not the market in itself. It's us that grow on that market.

Does electrification have an impact? It does in the long term, in the sense that on the margin, electrical vehicles have a little bit more content than a traditional driveline.

From our perspective, the best one is the hybrid car, because then you will have the traditional engine and the electrical parts. It's not negative.

Will it change the market dramatically? No, it will not.

Electrification and the EVs, they also have a positive side effect in the sense that charging stations need to be built, that contains material, and it also drives wire and cable because the energy needs to be transported from its source to where it's consumed, and that will drive wire and cable. Volume growth automotive, I would say, is done by us in this quarter.

Electrification in general is positive for us.

All right. One for me: the wire and cable business, if you could share some more color on the differences between the European business and the North American business, and if the Europe business is seeing similar growth, and yeah, size to the overall European business?

Yes, I can comment on that. We have, let's say, wire and cable business both in the rubber compounding side, but mainly in the thermoplastic side.

If we take our thermoplastic business, it's mainly in Europe, where we have several entities now and including VIPA. Then when it comes to the rubber business, it's, of course, both in Europe and North America.

I would say when it comes to the demand and the growth, it's definitely higher in North America, linked to energy, data centers, and so on.

All right, thanks a lot.

Hi. Thank you.

A couple of questions from me. First, Henrik and Peter, I guess.

Henrik, you have been on board now for two months, and it's already two quite substantial acquisitions made. Are you able to keep up this momentum, or will you digest these acquisitions first for a while now?

How should we see it? No, but

we have a strong M&A team, and we continuously work on the pipeline and have a lot of discussions ongoing continuously. We will continue that.

Then, of course, when things close and things really happen, it's very hard to say. It can always be that it comes continuously, or a bit more scattered, to say.

It's very hard to say. For sure, we continue full speed on the M&A track as well.

Thank you. In Rubber Compounding, I guess margins were affected by this low-margin contracts, you mentioned, but raw materials are also sort of moving upwards.

Have you been able to pass those forward, or is there dilution due to that as well?

No, wouldn't say there is dilution related to raw materials and price increases. We acted quickly in March, April, when the raw material prices starting to increase.

We implemented price increases during the second quarter, and I would say that we've been able to largely compensate for movements in raw materials.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, everybody, for listening in and for very good questions. Wish you everybody a nice weekend.

Thank you.

Thank you.