FACC AG

FACC AG

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Q2 FY2026 · Earnings Call TranscriptAugust 19, 2026

Operator

A warm welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the earnings call of FACC AG following the publication of the first half-year figures of 2026. I would like to welcome the company's representatives this morning, and they will guide us through the presentation in a moment followed by a Q&A session via audio line and chat.

With that, I'm happy to hand over to you, Mr. Steirer.

Michael Steirer

Many thanks, Ingmar, for the introduction. Good morning from my side as well, and thank you for joining us today.

Welcome to the FACC's half-year 2026 earning calls. As already mentioned, my name is Michael Steirer and I'm joined today by our CEO, Robert Machtlinger, and our CFO, Florian Heindl.

As always, detailed financial information have been made available in the press release issued earlier today. If we are unable to address all questions during the call, we will be happy to arrange follow-up one-on-one discussions.

In this case, please get in touch with our investor relations team in order to schedule appropriate meetings. Said that, I will now hand over to our CEO, Robert Machtlinger.

Many thanks.

Robert Machtlinger

Michael, thank you for the introduction. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.

Welcome to the FACC earnings calls. I'm happy that you are joining us.

Before we go into the slides, please let me share some of my personal thoughts summarizing the first half year of 2026. I think we all are aware that aerospace is growing despite the fact that the environment remains dynamic in certain areas.

Besides global tension, those ones we have known at the end of 2025, but new ones, especially now in the Middle East, are certainly having the one or the other impact and asking for the one or the other countermeasure. Still, the aerospace industry is quite resilient, is growing as our customers has presented in the last two weeks, but also, I think, it replies the one or the other challenge to the industry.

Farnborough was very clear as well. The industry has high demand and the full focus of everyone in the industry, starting from the OEMs, but also the Tier 1 partners like FACC, are fully focused on the delivery of the very high demand.

Supply chain, not only an issue with our OEM customers worldwide, also the one or the other issue with Tier 1s, but also FACC, is probably one of the most significant headwinds we are currently seeing. I think growth could be slightly higher in a more stable environment.

Nevertheless, I think the industry adopted here and there and is able to manage what we see. Overall, in terms of ramp-up, we are watching this very closely.

If we look into the last couple of years, starting in the year 2022, especially in the first quarter of every year, we see some order demand adjustments from the industry. Orders are placed in the last quarter of the past year, and normally in the first two to three months of the actual fiscal year we see adjustments.

This also was the case this year, not isolated to one customer or to one platform, it's more a generic thing. We planned for that one.

We learned to plan with it. We changed our processes over the last couple of years, and I'm quite happy to say that we are agile enough and focused enough to manage this changes we have seen in the past and we have seen this year.

If I talk changes, they normally coming in the first quarter. The remaining quarters, also as a feedback from the last years and what we see in Q2, but also in the early phase of Q3, the order demand is quite stable.

In saying that, I think the forecast are still positive, also for the industry, but also for FACC. If we translate this one into FACC, I'm quite happy to say that what we have planned as a Management Board with our leadership team pretty much materialized.

We have guided the market to a growth also in the year of 2026. We have delivered growth with a revenue of €526 million, which is a growth of 8.6% compared to the first half year of 2025.

This is pretty much in the middle of our guidance. Guidance was 5% to 15%.

More promising is the EBIT development. It's a 37.9% increase compared to the EBIT of the first half year of 2025.

This certainly is a result of our CORE initiatives. CORE is even getting a higher momentum the more we are in the program because savings we have introduced are getting bigger.

This is definitely in line with our expectations. Very positive, increase in cash flow by 54%, also a result of, of course, more volume, but the efficiency measures we have taken.

The EBIT is right now at 4.8%, which is another percent more than we have achieved in the first half year of last year, but it's also above the year-end EBIT of 2025. Florian will guide you through the numbers more in detail.

Guidance, with a wide spread at the beginning of the year because of some inconsistencies we have seen already, we are able right now to narrow down the guidance, and we will share the details, of course, at the end of the today's presentation. A couple of highlights: FACC is quite active with all of our customers.

Besides many highlights with nearly all of our customers, we have delivered the first all-new cabin for Embraer's Praetor business jets, one of the most successful platforms in the mid-segment of business jets. We definitely set a new standard in personal traveling.

The feedback we get from Embraer and the feedback Embraer gets from his customers is exceptional. We're currently ramping up the new configuration, which has a higher value for FACC compared to the other business jet interiors we are producing.

Overall, it's certainly a milestone for our Interior division. We reported early in the year that we are extending our capacity for a couple of reasons.

The industry ramp-up, which is going concurrently and in parallel with every platform that currently is existing, widebodies, narrowbodies. All of our customers are ramping up.

This is very unique, and we have to plan for those ramp-ups on contracts we are already having. We also have acquired and have been awarded a couple of new programs.

We are currently implementing and we're starting serial production in the next periods. Also for this volume, we have to put capacity in place.

So €350 million over the next couple of years until 2030 is the investment we are taking in technology, in new projects, but also in our global footprint. The €120 million investment, we are currently in the planning process.

Grooming the ground is later in the year, and operations will start in this all-new digital, automated facility by the year of 2028. Also Croatia, we have further expanded.

Croatia is a key element for a long-term sustainable, profitable business in our Interior division. Again, Florian will talk about the performance of Interiors in his speech.

What we have done is we have further implemented technology in Plant #6 in Croatia, meaning that we right now have also composite manufacturing capability in Croatia, which was not the case until the end of last year. We're vertically integrating in order to have a more turnkey capability established there, removing cost, removing logistics cost, which nobody's willing to pay, and, of course, it's improving our flexibility as well.

Overall, nearly 9% increase in growth come from all of our customers, not speaking about one. It's everyone is ramping up, and that's good.

As FACC is producing components independently if it's Interiors, Aerostructures, or Engine & Nacelles for all platforms that are existing. We are ramping up in every program at every location, and this, of course, is the fuel for organic growth.

On top of that, we are currently introducing a couple of new products, especially in Aerostructures through this contracts in the primary structure environment. We are currently doing the production setup with serial production ramp-up starting in Q4 of this year and further ramp-ups in the year of 2027.

Drones, as we are very active in drones since 2017. Also here, we see a stabilization of the industry.

A few drone manufacturers in taxi drones are on their road and to qualify the products. What we see as FACC, and as a reminder, in the last two to three years, the revenue in drones mainly was developed out of engineering services and milestone payments, non-recurring costs.

This is still ongoing, of course, because developments are not finished. Besides revenue out of engineering services, we see revenues in terms of serial production as well, giving a little bit of a guidance for the year of 2026.

We see a recurring revenue stream out of our drone business in the range of €35 million to €45 million, with a trend to further increase. A few words on the market: This picture, it's a little bit of an update on rates we are currently seeing in Q2 of 2026 in terms of the major platforms generating most of the revenue in FACC.

What you can see from the charts, every platform is ramping up. For example, the A320, we're currently approaching a rate of 10 per month.

By the end of the year 2028, we're expecting a rate of 13 airplanes per month, which is another 30% organic growth that is in front of us. I'm not going through every single line item right now, but the message here is we are well established, widespread on the industry, and whatever platform is ramping up, we can participate with this ramp-ups.

A few informations on how the Middle East crisis was impacting the industry. You are all specialists.

I think it's not too much information that is new for you. However, we wanted to share on a very top level.

Of course, the Middle East airlines and the traffic coming from the Middle East and going into Middle East had a steep downturn with the start of the crisis between Iran and the United States. There is a rebound coming slowly, but steady.

80% of the traffic already is back. There's another 20% gap to be closed.

This might take a while. If you look on the upper lines, the green and the yellow, globally, in global transportation and aerospace, this crisis in terms of passenger revenues, the picture has not changed at all.

Besides that effect, of course, fuel pricing has increased. Airlines normally are hedged in terms of fuel pricing, but I think the longer-term hedging, once the current hedging is ending, of course, might add pressure to the airlines.

In terms of FACC, we never talked about, but I want to have a few words, FACC is also hedging energy cost in normally a 12 to 18-month rolling planning horizon. Any energy fluctuation we have seen in the last couple of months is not impacting FACC in the short, mid-term because also our hedging was based on terms and conditions we have seen on the market by the end of the year.

For the time being, we are well hedged on energy cost. No impact for the time being, but we're watching the situation, of course, very very carefully.

In terms of output of the industry, continuous trend going up. On the left side, you see the Airbus and Boeing outputs compared to the previous years in the first half year and then on the last two bars the 2025 half year and full year.

Overall, Airbus is still dominating the market, coming from a very stable foundation. However, and this is getting very transparent, Boeing is coming back.

They are picking up in monthly, weekly, quarterly output. I think very impressive what the Boeing leadership is currently doing.

Looking into the second half of the year compared to the first half of the year, 665 airplanes delivered from both between the months of January and June. The second half of the year, as always, will be stronger, with quarter number 3, the quarter we're currently in, seasonally normally is a little bit impacted.

Also nothing new for you. Our Q3 always is a little bit weaker compared to Q2, but also Q4.

We will see this as well this year. Business jets on the right side: As you all know, a little bit less than 20% of our total revenue is generated by the business jet market.

Also here, we see a stable and growing demand, especially in the large and medium jets where FACC in the mid-size jet cabin interior outfitter is the market leader. Also here, a positive trend that is basically accelerating and supporting FACC's long-term growth plans.

In saying that, I would like to hand over to Florian giving you more details on the financials.

Florian Heindl

Thank you, Robert, for your remarks. I will now guide you through the financial figures of the first half year 2026.

Familiar picture. On the first slide, on the left side, you see revenue in the last couple of years compared to the H1 2026, €526.3 million, as already outlined by Robert, a growth of roughly 9%.

As we will later hear in Robert's outlook remarks, you will or you can expect an acceleration in growth in the second half of the year, which is also true for the EBIT, as you will also later hear in our guidance remarks. EBIT on the right side came in first half year 2026 at 25.3%, margin 4.8%, as already outlined.

Reasons for that, I think, are very well to be found in our CORE program that we have started in October 2024 already. This program is working.

We can clearly see that. Jumping over to the next slide in terms of revenues, we have here a little bit of a mixed picture.

Aerostructures and Cabin Interiors with growth compared to H1 2025. Engines & Nacelles, as you all know, smallest division in terms of revenue, but in terms of margins, our margin strongest division, had a revenue decrease of 6%.

Is this something to worry about? No, because it's very well explained and it's missing development work in this division, which we expect to pick up in the second half of the year.

For the end of the year, we are expecting growth in all three divisions. As I said, guidance will later be specified by Robert.

Growth acceleration in the second half year of 2026 is to be expected. In terms of EBIT development on the divisions, starting with Aerostructures on the left side, see comparing it to the first 6 months of the previous years, we had a strong development in the last 12 months.

From €2.8 million, 1.6% margin in 2025 up to €7.8 million, 4.2% margin in Aerostructures. Very good development.

Basically, as said before, the plan of the Management Board is working, as we outlined to you in the last several quarters. CORE is impacting all of our three divisions, and this, of course, you can also see in the Aerostructures environment.

Engines & Nacelles, margin driver, very strong double-digit margins in the past. We had a little bit weaker margin in the first half year 2026, roughly 10% margin, €8.7 million in absolute figures.

Again, nothing to worry about as it is well explainable with missing development work, some milestones that we could not achieve in the first half year, but we expect to catch up in the second half of the year. Last but not least, Cabin Interiors, and I think this is the most promising picture that we have seen in the last couple of years, €8.9 million of EBIT, 3.5% EBIT margin.

Also very clearly visible here, our plan is working in the Cabin Interior environment. As Robert already said in the beginning, the actions that we are taking in Cabin Interiors in terms of CORE, but also the continuous ramp-up in Croatia is, of course, helping Cabin Interiors.

As Robert outlined already, we are still optimizing the processes in Croatia, investing in more efficient process flows, and this will help us in the future to increase the margin in Cabin Interiors even further. My connection failed.

Sorry, my laptop went out. Have to look on Robert's screen.

In terms of free cash flow, the development is also very positive. More than 50% plus in terms of free cash flow generation.

You see that €48.9 million compared to the €31.7 million in the first half year of 2025. Very strong development.

Of course, jumping over to the next slide, this is helping us tremendously in improving our net debt and leverage position. This is also something that we frequently explained to you in the last quarters that we are not happy overall, of course, with our financial position in the last couple of years.

We were a highly levered company, and this is, of course, a very important point for us to bring net debt down, improve EBITDA, and also, of course, bring the leverage ratio down. We are very successful in that.

Leverage in H1 2026 is standing at 2.05, which is a very good rate. As you all know, we have a very strong financial composition in our balance sheet.

We are currently extending the syndicated loan that is expiring in February 2027. This improved financial profile of FACC is, of course, also helping us in terms of negotiating better terms and conditions.

For the future, you can expect also to a reduced interest expense of the company because of much better terms and conditions in our core financing capabilities. In saying that, I'm handing back to Robert for the outlook.

Robert Machtlinger

Florian, thank you so much. As said at the beginning, we can narrow down our guidance.

Where we had a certain spread in the early phase of the year, and based on the performance and based on what we see on the order book, we're also able to give a guidance in terms of EBIT. Overall, the market is in place based on today's environment we're seeing, and we think we have put in some mitigation plans.

The guidance is specified. We will grow in FACC between 10% and 15% in terms of revenue, which is on the upper end of our previous guidance.

We're expecting a EBIT further improvement with a range of 5.25% to 6.25% coming from a 4.2% at the end of last year. We're clearly focused on a couple of key objectives.

Of course, safety and quality in all we do remains our philosophy. As Florian mentioned, CORE is having momentum in every four areas where we applied it across all facilities.

The CORE initiatives are accelerating. Improvements we have implemented late last year are providing full benefit as we speak.

We continue CORE, and some of the processes will become standard. One issue we are working daily is to stabilize and optimize our supply chains.

Supply chain is important for our customers, but also for FACC. We're currently redefining some of our supply chains.

Some non-competitive supply chains are replaced. We're currently in the transformation phase, and, of course, that's also a part of our focus areas.

Capacity expansion, as we speak, remains a focus, all supporting the ramp-up of our customers. Saying all of that, and Florian mentioned many times before, we stick to our 2027 target, which is an EBIT of more than 8%.

We're confident we can meet that target, and we're right now happy to take your questions and give you answers accordingly. Thank you for listening.

Operator

Yes, thank you very much for the presentation. To all participants, we are now moving to the Q&A session.

If you want to ask a question, please use the raise your hand button. If you're dialed in by phone, please raise your hand by toggling the star nine button on your keypad.

If you're not able to speak freely, you're welcome to write a question in our chat. We start with the audio line.

First, we have Bastian Brach. Mr.

Brach, you should be able to switch on your microphone and ask your questions. Please, Mr.

Brach, go ahead.

Good morning, Robert. Good morning, Florian.

Two questions from me. The first one is on the Middle Eastern crisis and the energy costs.

It has been going on for several months and you mentioned that you have hedged most of the energy costs for the next quarters. Can you give a midterm outlook on possible cost increases on your side and whether you are confident in passing them on to your customers, or do you need to increase efficiency within your organization to compensate for part of that?

Robert Machtlinger

Bastian, good question. As said before, we are hedged, normally rolling 12 months.

There was quite some dynamic in energy costs going up and down. We are hedging, also forward hedging if terms and conditions are attractive for us.

Mainly it's natural gas we're hedging and electric power. Electric power, we're getting more and more independent because of our photovoltaic investments.

Giving you an answer, looking into the first half year of 2027, we have hedged a little bit of the Q3 of 2027 as well. For the next 12 months, we are not seeing an increase in energy cost in FACC.

Concurrently to that, we are increasing efficiency. Giving you a number, in 2020, the revenue of FACC, full-year revenue was slightly above €500 million.

The energy cost we had in that year was pretty much the same we have this year. It's not only driven by price, it's also driven by, of course, utilization of the facility, which is very good at the time being, but we also have improved on our efficiency on how we use the energy.

Overall, for the next 12 months, we have secured energy cost. Also to let the total cost of energy in comparison to revenue is slightly above 1%.

The cost driver in FACC is not energy, it's others like material.

Perfect. Thank you.

My second and last one is for Florian. You mentioned the successful reduction of the net debt, and on the other hand, the need for investment for your new production site in the next several years.

Can you remind us if you plan to finance this only via internal sources or by raising debt or maybe equity as well?

Florian Heindl

Good question also, Bastian. The picture has not changed in the past, and also it's still unchanged right now.

We have the capacity to invest this €120 million in the new plant as well as our €350 million that we want to invest in the next 5 years, which include this €120 million plant investment out of our own cash flow. Of course, and this was what I mentioned before, we're currently extending our syndicated loan that we have in place, but it will not mean that we increase the necessary funding or capacity in this syndicated loan.

The volume of that loan will roughly stay the same. Also very clear answer, we don't need a capital increase to fund these investments that we have in front of us if our plan as we have it in the books and in the medium-term planning works out.

Perfect. Thank you very much.

Florian Heindl

Welcome.

Operator

We move on to one participant dialed in by phone, Mr. Elias Neef.

You should be able to unmute yourself and ask your question. Please, go ahead, Mr.

Neef.

Yes, good morning. I hope you can hear me.

Congratulations on the strong results. I have a couple questions.

I'll take them one by one. Firstly, perhaps on the revenue outlook for the remainder of the year.

If we take your new revenue guidance when you're guiding for 10% to 15% growth following the H1 growth of around 9%, this would suggest around 16% year-on-year growth for H2. Just wondering whether you expect the growth to be kind of evenly spread across Q3 and Q4, or do you expect a very strong Q4 again, same as last year?

Also, which segments in particular would you expect to contribute to growth? Will growth mostly come from Cabin Interiors again, same as last year, or will it be more broad-based, evenly spread across divisions?

Robert Machtlinger

Elias, I think the growth, well, we have a strong Q2, H2 in front of us. You're right.

I think comparing Q3 of last year comparing with Q3 this year, we're expecting, of course, Q3 will also be stronger than last year's. Again, and you are right, the Q4 will be significantly stronger than Q3, but also Q2.

It's certainly a more back-end driven growth, and the growth comes across the platforms. However, we need to say that Aerostructures and Engine & Nacelle will pick up in growth.

Why is that the case? Cabin Interiors is more benefiting from from the A320 family ramp-up, but also the business jet ramp-up, where we have reached a level where we are more stabilizing.

The ramp-up curve is a little bit less steep than it was in the in the months before. Especially the widebody families, the Airbus A350, the 787, are right now entering a further step-up in demand, where Aerostructures and Engine & Nacelle has a bigger workshop on it.

Widebody ramp-up is more benefiting Aerostructures and Engine & Nacelle. We might expect some catch-up in in in revenue growth in these two divisions, whereas Cabin Interiors has a growth pass in front of it as well, but the difference between the three segments will narrow down.

Great. Perhaps just on that guidance upgrade, what gives you the confidence to raise the guidance to the 10% to 15% of revenue growth?

Is this at all related to Airbus' new internal delivery target of around 900 commercial aircraft, or what sort of sparked this guidance upgrade on your behalf?

Robert Machtlinger

We have the orders basically in our books. We have prepared for the ramp-up.

We see the ramp-up also in the second half of the year. As stated in my starting statement, we normally, and that's a repeating thing we have seen since 2022 once the industry came back, we always have seen a slight demand adjustments in the first two to three months of the actual year.

This was the case as well this year, but this is why we had a very wide spread, 5% to 15%, at the early guidance. Since April of the year, our order book is very stable, I have to say.

It's less than a percent up and down, it's very stable. What you're also seeing, of course, from our customer is if there is a shortage which is interim and there is a plan in place where the shortage can be mitigated, they are producing the airplane.

For example, if the engine is not there, they are producing the airplane. They hang the engines once the engine is there, and they're delivering the airplane, which I think was a case, besides others, in the Q2 with all of our customers that the output was higher compared to Q1 because some of the bottleneck equipment showed up.

We are confident in our guidance, and definitely we're not speculating. What we have in our books is supported by our customers' demand.

Great. I guess two final questions from my side.

First one would be on the Cabin Interiors margin. If I understand correctly, in Q2 of last year, you received a one-off compensation payment of around €4 million.

Just wondering whether there's anything to call out for the Q2 Cabin Interiors margin this year, or whether that's sort of purely organic, no one-offs?

Florian Heindl

No, there is no one-offs in the revenue generation. You're right, this was a settlement we had last year.

This is not the case this year. What's in there is sustainable and long-term, no one-offs.

Great. Final question would be on kind of FX and hedge rates.

Given the recent US dollar-euro moves, could you give us an update on your average hedged FX rate for 2026 and 2027 and what percentage you have hedged so far for both years? That would be very helpful.

Florian Heindl

Yes. That 2026 is already basically in the books.

Sorry, I have to excuse, my video went out, you're just hearing me. So 2026 is already in the books.

Hedge rate for 2026 is roughly 1.14, this is fine. For 2027, we also already have hedged the majority of our exposure.

The budgeted rate for next year in 2027 is 1.20, and the hedge rate that we have secured so far for 2027 is lower than or better than the 1.20, somewhere in between the 1.14 and the 1.20. As I said, percentage hedged for next year is roughly 70% right now, we are very good on track also in terms of our mid-term guidance.

The dollar rate, of course, what we have seen so far in the first half year, and if you take a deeper look especially also in terms of our equity, you will recognize that our equity ratio went a little bit down compared to the December 2025 figures. The reason for that is, of course, the valuation of our FX derivatives, and, as avid IFRS appliers and understanders, that a certain part of our valuation is pulled through the P&L already, and the bigger portion of our hedging portfolio is, of course, in the equity section of the balance sheet.

Of course, then you have fluctuations in there, and that's the reason why the equity ratio went a little bit down in H1 2026. Overall statement on FX rate, we are not worried by the fluctuations of euro-dollar.

We are very confident for 2027 that we have secured already a very decent rate supporting our plans for next year.

Great. If you say somewhere between 1.14 and 1.20, assuming a midpoint would be a reasonable assumption right now, 1.17?

Florian Heindl

A little bit above the midpoint.

Great. Perfect.

Thanks a lot for that.

Florian Heindl

You're welcome.

Operator

Yes, thank you very much. We move on to one participant who has written a question in our Q&A chat, and I'll read this out for you because we have a participant on the phone.

Aurelien Favre asks, "What happened with the Engines & Nacelles division in the Q2? Why is the margin down?

Is same level of sales profit as last year in that division? What we should expect for the full year?"

Florian Heindl

As outlined already in the beginning, in Engine & Nacelles, and Robert also had it in his statement, Engine & Nacelles also comprises our drone business. Especially in the drone business, we have, as Robert said, a mixture of serial production, but also still development work.

Of course, as it's usual in development work, you have certain milestones that you have to achieve. If you don't achieve the milestones in time, then, of course, you have some missing revenue and some missing profits.

That's the reason or one of the main reasons why the revenue and also the level of profit margin went down in Q2 for Engine & Nacelles. Again, nothing to worry about because we expect to cover up for that in the second half of the year and come back to the rates and margins that we had in the previous quarter.

As we were hovering around the 12% EBIT margin, and this is definitely something for the division that you can expect for the full year as well.

Operator

Thank you very much. We move on to a participant, Aymeric Poulain.

Aymeric Poulain, you should be able to unmute yourself and ask your question. Please.

Yes. Thank you very much for taking my questions.

I have three, please. The first one is on the margin range for the year guidance.

Why is it so wide? Because if I understand the revenue delta for the second half will be €50 million.

If I look at the low versus the higher end of the margin guidance, it's a 28% gross margin leverage, effectively. It seems that you anticipate some higher gross margin or there is some additional cost that could swing the final number.

Could you explain this wide margin band for the yearly guidance? Second question is on the drones.

Archer received more support from Boeing, especially going now into the military drone segment. Is that an opportunity for you?

Otherwise, could you update us on the start of their civil production program, please? The last one is on the €120 million investment that you mentioned in the presentation.

I'm not entirely sure if it's the first tranche of the €350 million program that you mentioned or if it's a new, additional capex program that you just announced. If so, could you give us effectively the capex spend that you anticipate for 2026, 2027, and beyond, just to understand how the phasing of this capex development is going to happen?

Thank you.

Florian Heindl

Thank you. I will take the first one in terms of the margin guidance that we have given, the 5.25% to 6.25%.

Why is it so wide? If you remember last year, we also had exactly the same guidance in place with 4% to 5% in the second half of the year.

Why we are doing that is, of course, and Robert outlined it also in his remarks, we still have issues, of course, in the supply chain. We see that if we also take a look in the balance sheet, you will realize that we have an inventory hovering around €200 million.

One of the reasons for that is, of course, that we have a higher amount of semi-finished products in our books, meaning there are some missing parts out where we are waiting for. This is something where we expect to solve that issues in the second half of the year.

As I said, supply chain is still a tricky thing. It's improving, but we still have certain suppliers.

The number of suppliers is basically going down where we have issues, but it's still an issue for us. That's the reason or the main reason why we want to have some safety buffer in terms of the margin outlook because, of course, we have a certain product mix in the company, and, of course, it matters which products that we can deliver and which are still sitting in our semi-finished portion of the inventory.

Robert Machtlinger

In terms of the other two questions, drones, well, where are we? I think with passenger drones, with our customers, we are in the middle of certifications with all of our customers.

Concurrently, however, we are running at a low serial production rate, it's components we're producing for test airplanes. This is serial production standard.

Still running on this larger drones, the passenger drones, at lower output. The higher output we see on non-passenger drones, logistic drones having certain applications.

Here we see a good demand overall with round about €35 million of revenues stream just in this year, with a positive guidance in further ramp-ups next year. In the logistic drone area, we definitely have a position right now where the product revenue stream by far is higher than the development revenue stream, which was the case in the previous years.

On this side of the business, we are quite happy with the development. On the passenger drone side, I think we need to be a little bit patient because certification takes longer than everyone had expected.

The customers we're working with are on the right track in finishing milestones every month, every quarter. In terms of military applications, drones are everywhere at the time being, also, of course, with a significant increase in let's say momentum in the defense area.

Our drones are currently civil used, with a dual-use application on one or the other passenger drone where especially US military has bought equipment, but this is a dual use and not a defense only. In terms of drones for let's say defense applications, we don't have contracts at the time being.

We're working with the one or the other customer on potential opportunities, but nothing that is concrete yet. In terms of the investment of the €120 million in this highly automated, digitized Aerostructures facility, this is part of the €350 million.

This is not coming on top. It's part of it.

It's probably the most significant investment we will do in Austria, with another €30 to €40, €50 million in other facilities in Austria. The rest of the investment is technology development for new platforms, next-generation airplane technology, but also outside of Austria.

Croatia is one element, but also United States, Canada, and the other markets. It's not on top of it, it's part of the €350 million.

The spending, I think the spending curve is not linear, it's a little bit lower spending still this year because we're in the preparation phase. The biggest spending will be in the years of 2027, 2028, and then the spending in the later years, 2029 and '30, will more normalize.

There is certainly a peak in spending in the years 2027, 2028.

Thank you.

Robert Machtlinger

You're welcome.

Operator

Mr. Folansky, you have a question, raised your hand, and you should be able to unmute yourself and ask your question.

Please, Mr. Folansky, go ahead.

Hello. Thank you for taking my questions.

Can you hear me?

Robert Machtlinger

Perfectly,

Operator

yes.

Thank you. My question is more long-term strategic vision for the company, and it is Airbus has declared aerostructures core to their business, and they are developing the Wing of Tomorrow in-house.

When the NGSA make-or-buy decisions are made, what specific work packages are you positioning for, and have you received any indication from Airbus on whether composite control surfaces will remain outsourced on the next-generation platform?

Robert Machtlinger

Yes, this is a perfect question. Besides the day-to-day business and the short-term, mid-term execution plan we talked about today and in the past calls very much in detail, we're working on the long-term strategy of FACC as well.

There is a strategy that goes into the year of 2035. We're currently in the middle of formalizing everything, and by the end of the year, meaning in the last quarter, fourth quarter of 2026, we plan to roll out this strategy very much in detail, also informing you what we intend to do.

Answering some of your questions, Airbus Wing of Tomorrow, FACC is an R&D and development partner. We have done quite a lot of work on large wing skins in new technologies.

We have worked on all-new applications, including thermoplastic applications on control surfaces. In terms of next generation of components we are producing for Airbus, but also customers at the time being, this is landing flaps, this is spoilers, this is ailerons, but also certain wingtip devices.

If this will be winglets on the next-generation airplane or wing extensions like we already see it on one airplane remains to be seen. We have defined our portfolio, which is certainly moveables on wings, also on the empennages.

I think in one of our calls we talked about our empennage strategy, we are producing rudders and elevators, horizontal and vertical tailplane parts spread on various platforms, and our objective is on one of the next platforms to have a turnkey solution for an empennage is one example. We have similar strategies developed for our engine nacelle and engine composite business, where we are engaged with all major engine manufacturers, also in their new engine developments.

I can talk about Rolls-Royce on the UltraFan because this is public information what we have done there. Also here, we have a technology roadmap and a product roadmap aligned with our customers, and we do similar things with the other two main engine manufacturers.

The same is true for Cabin Interiors, where we are quite well and highly integrated. FACC is one of the top four interior specialists.

Here we have a very strong portfolio. We know what we want to do.

Overall, I think we are preparing for the next-gen airplanes. The big question remains, however, when does it launch and when does it enter the revenue services.

At the time being, we think it's rather a little bit later than sooner. Our forecast is launches probably at the end of the decade, maybe a little bit beyond that point, with entering to service between 2035 and 2038, depending on what airplane we're talking.

We are part of the development, and we are part of the strategic groups, we work very focused with all of our customers on what we can contribute on the next-generation airplanes.

Thank you very much.

Operator

We have one last participant, Mr. Miro Zuzak.

You should be able to unmute yourself, please. Switch on your microphone and ask your questions, Mr.

Zuzak. By now,

hello? Can you hear me now?

Operator

Yes.

Thank you. Good morning.

I have two questions remaining, or three depending on how you answer. The first one is on the guidance range, 10% to 15%.

Given the fact that you upgraded the guidance now into the upper range, are you confident basically internally that you will end up rather at the higher end of this 10% to 15% or right in the middle? Because probably if you expect to be rather at the lower end of the 10% to 15%, you wouldn't have upgraded the guidance, the right thinking.

Florian Heindl

Thank you. I will take this one.

As I said before, in terms of the margin, a broad margin range in terms of the EBIT margin, and also as we talked when we have last met in Switzerland a couple of weeks ago, I think we also outlined that a little bit. Second half year will be stronger, and, of course, the guidance in terms of revenue was adapted because we have seen the need to do so, and therefore, we chose this range.

As it stands today, and as I said before, it's also driven by our backlog that we are having, meaning the semi-finished goods sitting in our company currently, and what will be able to be solved in the next couple of months and can be delivered to our customers will define where we end up in this revenue range. As I said before, we are confident to narrow down that revenue guidance to the 10% to 15%.

Of course, as it stands right now, we are not able to give you an exact revenue guidance on that.

Okay. Then a quick one regarding Q3 and Q4.

Last year you grew exactly 12% in each of the two quarters. Given the fact that the basis of the last year's two quarters is relatively even, shall we think about the growth rates in the upcoming two quarters also to be relatively even?

Because you mentioned the weaker Q3, but that's a seasonal thing, right? That was also last year.

Do you think that the growth distribution between the two quarters is even or is it more back-end loaded in Q4?

Florian Heindl

As Robert said before, what we expect definitely is a strong Q4 this year, this is something that you can watch out for. Again, I have to relate.

We know we have the orders in the books already. We have sitting in our inventory certain semi-finished goods already.

It's a question, and we are already basically nearing the end of Q3 by the end of August, and then we have 1 month left in September. Q4 is already right around the corner.

Definitely what you can expect for is a very strong Q4.

Good. Thanks a lot.

Bye-bye.

Florian Heindl

Thank you.

Operator

Yes, thank you very much. With no further questions, we now come to the end of today's earnings call.

To all participants, thank you very much for your interest in FACC. A big thank you to Mr.

Machtlinger, Mr. Heindl, and Mr.

Steirer for your presentation and the time you took to answer the questions. From my side, I wish you all a successful day.

For some final remarks, I would hand over to Mr. Steirer once again.

Thank you, and bye-bye.

Michael Steirer

Thanks a lot, Ingmar, and also from my side, thank you very much on the interest of FACC. As already initially mentioned, in case of any further questions, please get in touch with our investor relations department, then we can arrange appropriate one-on-one meetings again.

Said this, I would like to thank you for the interest in FACC and wish you a successful day as well. Thank you so much and have a good day.

Thank you. Bye.