Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the earnings call of MBB SE following the publication of the first half-year figures of 2026. The company's CFO, Torben Teichler, will guide you through the figures and the presentation in a moment, followed by a Q&A session via audio line and chat.

Having said this, Torben, the stage is yours.

Thank you very much and good afternoon, everyone. My name is Torben Teichler.

I'm the CFO of MBB and I will now take you through our H1 results. Before we do that, let me, as always, start with a very quick recap of what makes MBB special.

MBB offers long-term succession solutions to sustainable Mittelstand companies. The way we do this is quite unique because we are a family business ourselves.

Our two founders, who founded the business 30 years ago, are still the major shareholders and operationally very much involved. That means that in many ways, we share the same DNA with the businesses that we want to acquire.

Secondly, we're fans of the capital market, and that's why we're here today as a stock-listed company. That's also why three of our subsidiaries—Friedrich Vorwerk, Aumann, and Delignit—are stock-listed.

Having brought all of these companies to the stock market in order to finance their growth and development is in my point of view a special differentiating factor for us. Moreover, we have a long-term focus, generally when we buy, we don't have an intention to sell, but seek to develop and grow our businesses in the long term and remain the anchor shareholders in our companies.

Lastly, we focus on sustainable businesses. With that, we don't mean that we have an environmentalist agenda, but we believe that trends like the energy transition or IT security just offer enormous business potential for us to grow and develop our companies in.

Today we are now a group of five companies generating round about €1.2 billion in revenue and double-digit EBITDA margins. Before we now turn to our H1 results, I would briefly like to take your attention to our announcement today regarding the sale of our smallest portfolio company, Teddy-Formpolster, to Nexiras.

We're very happy to announce that Nexiras is taking over 100% of Teddy-Formpolster and that it is committing itself to developing the company further going forward. We believe that Teddy-Formpolster will be really in the best of hands possible given that Nexiras is backed by Christian Tröger and Constantin Mang, who many of you still know probably quite well because Constantin has been a member of the MBB team for more than 10 years and MBB's CEO from 2021 to 2025.

Now, for us at MBB, the rationale for our decision to sell the company is primarily to sharpen our focus on developing our existing portfolio companies, as well as to ensure that we have sufficient capacities internally here to pursue M&A. Teddy-Formpolster has contributed around €12 million in revenue as well as €0.4 million of EBITDA in H1, and will be deconsolidated going forward.

We agreed not to disclose the purchase price, but overall, you can expect the transaction to have a moderate positive impact on our net cash position. All in all, would like to thank the entire Teddy-Formpolster team for its tireless effort and commitment over the past 16 years, and wish them the best of luck for the future.

With that, let's now turn to our H1 results. H1 was phenomenally strong with EBITDA increasing by 53% to €117 million and hence almost a 22% EBITDA margin, while revenue of €536 million remained broadly stable year-on-year.

We'd seen strong profitability improvements already in Q1, where EBITDA had grown by 40% year-on-year despite a relatively cold start into the year at Friedrich Vorwerk. Q2 has equally underscored this trend as Friedrich Vorwerk, DTS, Aumann, and Delignit delivered strong results.

Q2, as I said, contributed disproportionately to our H1 performance with revenues up 5% year-on-year to almost €300 million and EBITDA up 62% to €75 million, which translates into an EBITDA margin of 25% in the quarter. As I said, this was driven first and foremost by Friedrich Vorwerk, which significantly drove our EBITDA in relative as well as absolute terms, but also DTS, Aumann, and Delignit, which held or even improved their margins in the second quarter.

Let's dive into some of the details now on the following slides. Looking at Friedrich Vorwerk here on the left, the company continued its very strong run in the second quarter.

Q2 revenues grew 17% year-on-year to almost €200 million, while the EBITDA margin reached an impressive 30.7%, up more than 9 percentage points year-on-year. Key drivers were the successful execution of the ongoing large projects with a notably higher share of own works and less material costs, but also the continued recruiting success with headcount up 7% in the first 6 months, as well as increased contributions from joint ventures.

Order intake remained solid with a total project volume won of €470 million in the first half and a very healthy order backlog, including JVs, of more than €1.4 billion. Looking ahead, we see a strong pipeline of new and attractive projects across all verticals.

Concrete projects in the market are, for example, the Stecker-Odenwald link, a 117 km natural gas pipeline to be commissioned by 2028, but also a 100 km electricity project, for example, called NordOstLink section 2, or the 400 km Windader West project, just to name a few significant projects the company is currently looking at. On the clean hydrogen side, Vorwerk will moreover start execution on the H2 Coastlink, which is a 24 km hydrogen pipeline connecting a 320 MW electrolyzer in Emden with the growing industrial hydrogen infrastructure in northwest Germany.

Related to that, there are several large hydrogen pipeline projects such as the Delta Rhine Corridor or ETL 187, which add significant additional project volume to the market over the coming years. Finally, the upcoming carbon capture plans in Europe, with the first projects by major TSOs starting to take shape, provide a significant new market for Friedrich Vorwerk and its companies going forward.

Then there are the small but very exciting niche businesses, such as, for example, an international project which is taking shape in Kazakhstan right now, where Vorwerk's subsidiary, 5C Tech, won and is currently realizing around 1,500 km pipeline with specialized welding robots, which shows you that also these technological side businesses are gaining traction and round off Friedrich Vorwerk's portfolio very well. The project pipeline is really well filled, in our view, and we are confident that Friedrich Vorwerk will keep up the good momentum as we move ahead in 2026.

For the full year 2026, management of Friedrich Vorwerk has hence increased its EBITDA guidance to €180 to €200 million from previously €160 to €180 million, while revenues remain expected in the range of €730 to €780 million. Thanks to the really strong first half of the year, I think the company is very well on track to achieve these targets as we move along.

Turning to DTS now on the right-hand side of the slide, the company saw a strong EBITDA margin uplift of almost 5 percentage points to more than 17% in Q2, which was largely driven by better product mix geared towards services and own software, as well as efficiency improvements throughout the organization. Revenues, on the other hand, were down 19% year-on-year to €26 million and impacted by project delays, primarily related to the current memory chip crisis, meaning that we partly still see supply bottlenecks and high prices for certain components and continue to carry a certain order backlog of projects which we cannot finally commission.

At the same time, especially Mittelstand customers remain cautious with several projects shifted into the second half of the year. On the other hand, on the public sector side, we're really excited to announce that DTS won a €30 million framework contract from a large public sector client with a duration of 5 years.

We expect call-offs from this contract to be quite front-loaded with a meaningful contribution to profitability this year. This shows you the varying dynamic in the market right now, and well, I'm very happy that we started to position ourselves more on the public sector front over the last 2 years, and that is obviously paying off right now.

That's really good news, in my point of view. Overall, I'm therefore fairly confident that we'll see improving dynamics over the coming quarters.

Turning to Aumann here on the left, revenues came down as expected pretty much by 30% year-on-year to €33 million in Q2, while the EBITDA margin remained broadly stable at a strong round about 10% in the second quarter, which I think really speaks for the company and how well they've handled the current environment. Overall, order intake as well as order backlog stood at €65 million and €150 million, respectively, in H1.

While the automotive environment remains challenging, the dynamics in the Next Automation segment are clearly positive and underscore Aumann's increasingly successful diversification into new end markets, such as clean tech, aerospace, and life sciences. Next Automation order intake in H1 grew by a stellar 72% year-on-year to €38 million, and already boasts an order backlog of €62 million, and hence accounts for more than half of overall order intake and order backlog already.

That really shows you how the company has transformed in a fairly short period of time and has managed to make this transition happen by investing particularly in sales and also execution capacities in these new markets. Thanks to the company's continued strong net cash position, management is able to continue to expand also in these new end markets, not only organically, but potentially also through acquisitions.

For 2026, management expects revenue of €160 million with a very solid 6% to 8% EBITDA margin. We hope that with the rise in EV registrations, which we see, and hopefully a normalizing macro environment, that will eventually improve the overall investment sentiment again, and then allow us to grow in order intakes again.

Moreover, Aumann has finalized its share buyback offer for 10% of the outstanding shares in July, in the course of which MBB reduced its shareholding to round about 38%. Our rationale for the reduction was to use the, in our view, attractive buyback to increase the free float while remaining the anchor shareholder in the company.

Together with the planned extraordinary dividend, I think Aumann is doing a great job to take care for its shareholders while we're waiting for overall order intakes to return to growth. Turning to Delignit here on the right, we saw a very strong quarter with revenues up 21% year-on-year to €20 million, primarily driven by the segment Technological Applications, while profitability reached a healthy EBITDA margin of 7% in Q2, thanks to good cost discipline and a nice product mix.

Although the LCV and caravan business remains challenging overall, there are interesting opportunities outside the automotive industry, such as in the rail floor business, which the company continues to capitalize on. The lease extension with Pelotti in Italy until the end of January 2027 gives the company time to evaluate a permanent takeover of the rail and marine business unit, which could provide a really interesting hub for growing the business outside the automotive industry.

For 2026, Delignit has hence increased its revenue guidance to €68 million from previously €66 million, while continuing to expect a very solid 7% to 8% EBITDA margin. Last but not least, Hanke and Teddy-Formpolster had a solid recovery in the first half of this year despite a challenging consumer environment.

Both companies together grew Q2 revenue by 11% year-on-year at a healthy 10.5% EBITDA margin, and have continued to optimize their cost bases while focusing on managing energy and raw material volatilities. Looking at 2026 as a whole and taking the varying dynamics in our portfolio into account, we continue to expect broadly stable revenues in the range of €1.1 to €1.2 billion, but have recently increased our adjusted EBITDA margin guidance to 18% to 20% from previously 15% to 18%.

By the way, the deconsolidation of Teddy-Formpolster has no impact on our guidance. Our balance sheet remains, as always, rock solid with more than €1 billion in equity, which corresponds to an equity ratio of 68%.

During the first half of the year, we have returned capital to shareholders by paying an increased base dividend, as well as by completing our share buyback program, which means that we will return round about €30 million to shareholders this year already. Our financial strength is also underscored by a net cash position of €769 million at group level, of which €432 million are attributable to the holding.

Our companies thus continue to have ample room to maneuver the current environment, to pursue M&A, and to focus on capital allocation. Finally, we believe that MBB remains attractively valued, as you can see here from our sum-of-the-parts valuation, as we try to illustrate in this speed meter graphic, which most of you probably already know from the previous calls.

Our net cash at holding level as well as our shareholding in the listed portfolio companies Friedrich Vorwerk, Aumann, and Delignit together accounts for a value of almost €200 per MBB share, while the current share price of MBB is at around €183, and hence at a discount to our liquid core portfolio. Obviously, then you still have the value of our private portfolio companies, first and foremost DTS, but also Hanke, which basically are not reflected here in the valuation and come on top for free.

I think that makes the MBB stock still quite attractive, and I'm optimistic that our share price has the potential to catch up with the very nice development we've seen here in the first half of the year. I hope I was able to give you a brief walkthrough of these H1 results and the outlook for 2026, and I'm happy to take your questions now.

Thank you very much for the presentation, Torben. Ladies and gentlemen, we are now moving on to the Q&A session.

If you would like to ask your questions in person via the audio line, please click on the raise your hand button. If you are dialed in by phone, please use the key combination *9 to raise your hand and *6 to unmute yourself.

Additionally, you are also welcome to place your questions in our chat box. The first raised hand is from Victor Beyer.

The stage is yours.

Hi, thanks for taking my question. I have one on Aumann, where you obviously participated in the share buyback program.

I was just wondering the allocation ratio was just about 6%, but you significantly reduced your stake. What was the intention to sell additional shares in the company because it's valued just close above cash, and you said you will stay as a convinced shareholder?

What was the intention about this? Because given your high level of cash on the MBB holding level, which brings us to the second question, it doesn't seem to be the case that you're in need for cash because we've seen this growing nicely quarter-by-quarter.

When can we expect maybe also news from the acquisition side? What's your current view on the M&A market?

Thank you.

Sure. Maybe first of all, I think what we really appreciate Aumann is pushing this transition into Next Automation.

Obviously, what's a bit disappointing is the automotive environment, and that is obviously affecting overall order intake. The company has over the years done a really good job in capitalizing on its markets, has maintained and grown a balance sheet which has put it into a position where it now can in a time where overall order intake is weaker, actually do something for its shareholders, and it has done so through this share buyback program and also through the planned dividend.

We as shareholders do appreciate that the company is engaging in this. Obviously, the balance sheet has a lot of room for them to still engage into M&A and also in organic investment.

I think the share buyback program was attractive. We did not expect the allocation to be that low, to be honest.

We were hoping for a higher one, but okay, that was the nature of the program. We obviously saw the increase in the share price in the course of this share buyback program and realized that it was a high volume.

We felt that was an attractive price and fairly opportunistically took the chance to sell some shares and increase the free float and support basically the company in promoting the share. If you look into our history after the IPO, we also had 38%, it's not a level where we haven't been yet.

It was from our view a fairly opportunistic thing, and well, we are excited to see what's going to happen in the next quarters. I think the Next Automation is providing interesting tailwind.

We still have the M&A topics going on, which were alluded to in the Aumann call. From our perspective, this was an attractive part of capital allocation of Aumann.

With regard to our own net cash position, well, obviously, that has gotten a bit bigger through that. We are obviously looking at new M&A targets and would like to invest this money first and foremost in M&A.

You've seen now we sold Teddy-Formpolster. We were approached by Nexiras, which was a great thing and so the decision came rather quick to sell the company.

I think it frees up capacities for us internally to put more pressure on the M&A pipeline going forward. I think overall that has also been a good development for us.

Does it answer your question, Victor?

Yes, thank you very much.

Thank you. Then we move on to the questions in our chat box.

You have shed some light already on a few, Torben. I will read them out.

"MBB has lowered its exposure to the subsidiaries by about €100 million in H1 2026, while reinvesting a similar amount in equity securities, a substantial capital allocation decision. As investors, we would like to see more transparency from management on the composition of this portfolio."

What you already did is shedding some light on the M&A environment. "How reasonable is it to expect significant acquisitions of stand-alone companies on the HoldCo level?"

Maybe a bit on the composition of the cash. There is around €160 million invested in equities.

The rest is largely in government and corporate bonds. If you look at it from the top, less than half is invested in equities.

That equity portfolio is large-cap, rather US-oriented portfolio, which if you looked into it, would not surprise you. You would know most of the names in that portfolio.

Plus not all of the cash we invest directly into shares, but also in some funds. I think we have a fairly diversified and balanced approach to this.

For us, it's just part of our treasury activities and a way to optimize a return on that cash. We definitely do not want to share individual stock names here because then this conference call would become very long and we would discuss whether we should buy Microsoft now or not.

That is something we definitely want to avoid. To give you a flavor of the nature of this, it's large-cap.

It's rather US-oriented. It's diversified, partly done by us, partly also some external funds, and if you look into it, it would not surprise you what's in there.

With regards to the bonds, here the approach is not to speculate on some interest rate levels. It's a rather short-term-oriented portfolio with an average duration of round about 2 to 3 years and very well-diversified over a large number of positions, more than 95% investment grade.

That is something which is just a way to enhance the return on that part of the cash pile. I hope that that gives you a bit more color and flavor of what we do there.

With regards to M&A, particularly stand-alone, we do look at things. We are faced with a challenge with which fairly all investors in Germany are faced, and that is that the investable market in Germany has become significantly smaller, which doesn't mean that you cannot look at automotive or something like this, but I think you must look really much more carefully and it really has to be a super attractive price to push us towards an investment in that area.

If you look at the attractive parts of the German M&A market—infrastructure, defense, and IT, and these types of things—then you also have a fairly large amount of institutional money in this market, particularly in the size of businesses we're looking at, because for us, it obviously doesn't make sense to buy another €20 million company, but we would like to make a larger and more meaningful investment which fits into our current portfolio. That obviously is a space where a lot more people are looking.

That, I think, is just how the M&A environment has developed for us. That doesn't mean that there are no opportunities.

I think we've built a very nice track record with Vorwerk, for example, but also DTS or Aumann, where we have provided an attractive structure for a succession solution or where, for example, you have several shareholders, one or two want to get out, some others want to continue the business. I think we've proven that we are very flexible to accommodate that on the one hand, and then we've basically brought a certain angle into all of our companies to develop them in structural growth trends.

That has enabled the IPO of Friedrich Vorwerk. It has enabled the IPO of Aumann.

There are people who recognize this and see this and approach us because of this. I think in these situations, we have a chance to find a good deal.

Together, maybe even with the seller, develop a perspective of how we can develop a new business going forward. That is what we focus on because we're not a fund, we don't have to generate deals one after another.

I think the success of MBB comes from a very few deals which just turned out to be very good ones. That is what we will also focus on going forward.

Thank you very much. The last questions so far, ladies and gentlemen, please feel reminded to place your questions if you may have some now.

"MBB is committed to the capital market. When will DTS be ready for an IPO?

Why did MBB sell shares in Vorwerk and Aumann?"

DTS is obviously, well, impacted, on the one hand, by, as I said, this memory chip crisis, also some private sector hesitancy, but public sector is developing very nicely. I think that's providing good tailwind, and I think for the full year, you will see a very nice profitability improvement.

That's great. However, we believe that for an IPO, probably it makes sense to grow the company a bit further, make it a bit larger.

I think we've done that, I think, or the company has done that very well organically in the past. We would like to help a bit more with M&A to gain more scale.

Then maybe in a few years' time, an IPO might be on the table, but for the time being or at the moment right now, we're not thinking about an IPO. As I said, Aumann, I think I already answered.

Friedrich Vorwerk, well, at the beginning of the year, we had still attractive share prices and we've just decided to basically, continuing from last year, to still reduce our shareholding a little bit, but we were slightly below 40% after the third quarter first quarter, sorry, and now we're slightly above 40%, so, yeah. Clearly at the current share price level, I think it's a rather attractive level, yeah, we feel quite comfortable with the 40% at this stage.

Thank you very much. As no further questions have come in, we come to the end of today's earnings call of the MBB SE.

Thank you very much for your questions and your interest. A big thank you also to you, Torben, for your presentation and your time.

Should you, ladies and gentlemen, have any further questions at a later date, please feel free to reach out to MBB. I wish you all a successful day, and having said this, I'm handing back over to you, Torben, for some final remarks.

Thank you very much for your interest in MBB, and well, I look forward to seeing you or hearing you soon.