March 26, 2024


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Preliminary results for the year ended 31 December 2023

W.A.G payment solutions plc ("Eurowag" or the "Group"), a leading pan-European integrated payments and mobility platform focused on the commercial road transport ("CRT") industry, today announces its preliminary results for the year ended 31 December 2023.

Full year financial and operational highlights

Sustained strong growth from our business critical products and services

  • FY 2023 performance in-line with expectations.
  • Total net revenue1 +34.4% to €256.5m (FY 2022: €190.9m), with organic growth +14.5%2
  • Payment solutions1 +9.0% to €147.0m, driven by +8.4% increase in active payment customers and growth from toll revenues.
  • Mobility solutions1 +95.6% to €109.5m, organic +28.3%2, driven by effective cross selling and strategic OEM partnerships, which are an important new sales channel.
  • Adjusted EBITDA1 +33.2% to €108.7m (FY 2022: €81.6m), organic growth +12.2%, and adjusted EBITDA margin1 of 42.4% (FY 2022: 42.8%).   
  • Adjusted profit before tax1 was €56.7m (FY 2022: €54.9m). Statutory loss before tax of €39.3m (FY 2022: profit before tax €28.0m), with the year on year reduction primarily relating to amortisation from acquired intangibles, finance costs and a non-cash goodwill impairment of €56.7m.

Completed intense investment phase; M&A and building the industry’s first digital app

  • Completed significant acquisition of Grupa Inelo, S.A. (“Inelo”), enhancing the Group’s scale and product capability. As expected, net debt increased to €316.8m, with net leverage3 at 2.9x net debt to adjusted EBITDA.
  • Total capex spend of €50.9m (FY 2022: €43.2m). Transformational programme largely completed and in-line with €50m guidance (FY 2022 €25.5m and FY 2023 €21.7m).
  • Development of industry-first digital platform on track, soft launch still expected Q4 2024. 

Outlook

  • Despite macroeconomic challenges, the Group remains confident in the medium-term value creation delivered from the platform and acquisition synergies; guidance remains unchanged. 

Martin Vohánka, Founder and CEO, commented:

"2023 was a year of both significant strategic and financial transformation for the Group, where we completed our largest ever acquisition and delivered further organic growth, despite a range of macroeconomic headwinds across Europe. Whilst these headwinds are expected to persist in 2024, I am confident in the positive outlook for the Group, thanks to substantial investments we have made in the business and in our market positioning. 

Eurowag sits at the heart of the European CRT industry, providing a range of critical services that drive increased efficiency and profitability for customers who operate in a highly complicated, admin heavy sector. With only a small proportion of road transport companies having embraced digitisation to date, there is huge potential to grow our customer base. This will be accelerated with the launch of our industry-first digital platform later this year – a significant milestone for us, that will take our growth to the next level. Consequently, we remain confident in the prospects for the Group and re-iterate our near and medium-term financial guidance, as we unlock further value for both our customers and shareholders.”

Outlook, near and medium-term guidance remains unchanged

Eurowag enters 2024 in a strong position, despite the macroeconomic environment impacting the CRT industry across Europe. Many of the economic pressures the industry faces are expected to continue into 2024, impacting loads and therefore resulting in less kilometres driven. 

Following its strategy, the Group is coming out of a heavy investment phase in both technology and acquisitions to create an industry-first integrated platform driving growth by offering new digital solutions to many of the CRT industry’s biggest challenges. Eurowag’s investment in recent years has delivered a mission-critical product suite to its customers, which underpins the Group’s confidence in delivering mid-teens organic net revenue growth in the near  and medium-term.

With further integration work still to take place in respect of recent acquisitions, Adjusted EBITDA margins in FY 2024 are expected to remain in-line with FY 2023 at around 43%, and grow over the medium-term. 

Whilst the absolute amount of capital expenditure reduces this year and the transformational programme (guidance to €50m) reaches completion, several deferred consideration payments of circa €35m from past acquisitions are subject to payout in FY 2024. As a result, the net debt to Adjusted EBITDA ratio, at the end of FY 2024, is expected to be moderately above our target range (1.5x-2.5x) with a priority to return within the range in FY 2025.  

The launch of the much-anticipated digital platform in Q4 remains on track, with expectations to unlock further opportunities whilst driving value for Eurowag’s customers and shareholders. The Group is confident this offering, an industry first, will drive further cross selling and value for all stakeholders. As a result, the Group is confident it will deliver strong growth in-line with expectations, and medium-term financial guidance remains unchanged.

Notes:    
1.    Net revenue, Adjusted   EBITDA, Adjusted EBITDA margin, Adjusted profit / (loss) before tax, Adjusted earnings (net profit), Adjusted basic EPS are non-statutory measures which provide readers of this announcement with a balanced and comparable view of the Group’s performance by excluding the impact of Adjusting items, as disclosed in the section Alternative performance measures and Note 5. 
2.    Organic growth for the year represents Group growth, excluding Inelo and related synergies and integration expenses.
3.    Net leverage covenant calculation as per bank definition using Adjusted EBITDA for the last twelve months. Net debt includes lease liabilities and derivative liabilities.

You can read the full announcement on our Results, reports and presentations page