Intelbras SA Industria de Telecomunicacao Eletronica Brasileira

BOVESPA:INTB3

Earnings Call Transcript 2024-Q3

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

Hello, everyone, and welcome to our Video Conference to discuss the Results of the Third Quarter 2024. My name is Bruno Teixeira. I'm the Chief Investor Relations Officer. I'm very happy to be here with you now. And we also have Altair Silvestri, our CEO; Rafael Boeing, our CFO; as well as Paulo Daniel Correa, our Head of Security; Henrique Fernandez, the Head of Communication and Information of Communication Technology; and Marcio Ferreira, the Head of Energy. And we're going to start our video conference now.

This video conference is being recorded and will be made available on the company's IR website along with the slide deck. The slide deck is already available and can be downloaded already. And after the end of the conference, the recording will be available. [Operator Instructions] The information contained in the presentation and any statements that may be made during the conference call about the business perspectives, projections as well as operating and financial targets for Intelbras are based on the beliefs and assumptions of the company's management and on currently available information. Forward-looking statements do not guarantee performance.

They involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions as they refer to future events and therefore, depend on circumstances that may or may not occur. Investors should understand that general economic and market conditions as well as other operating factors may affect the future performance of Intelbras and lead to results that differ materially from those expressed in such forward-looking statements. [indiscernible] these elements. We'll now get to the presentation, and then we're going to have the question-and-answer session.

As usual we start with the key financial indicators. We see that the revenue has grown substantially. We had a 33% increase year-on-year. We have a record in our net revenue in the quarter, BRL 1.2 billion. We performed well in all of our pillars. We had BRL 150 million EBITDA, and our net income grew 16.6%, almost BRL 130 million. The increase in revenue is not seen in the results yet due to the compression of the gross margin, and we'll be addressing this during the presentation. And the ROIC is the average we have had minus 1 percentage points, 21.3%.

We had the 33% increase in the quarter. And we also had an 18% increase in the year-to-date figures when it comes to the net revenue. So we have a good real growth being delivered by the company. And EBITDA grew 17% in the quarter and 16% year-to-date. This is slightly lower than what we had forecast for the year, but it is still quite healthy when it comes to operations, and it shows how solid our history is. I'd like to highlight when it comes to EBITDA that when we compare to the third quarter last year to this quarter, the third quarter this year, we had a minor drop because in this quarter, we had a more compressed gross profit.

That's related to the exchange rate and logistics. Expenses have been varying as expected, and we have a growth in EBITDA, but at a more compressed margin. When we look at the consolidated gross profit, and I also showed this slide in the second quarter presentation, we see that our consolidated gross profit is quite stable. Last year, it went up and then it went back down. And this year, it's fluctuating, but as per our history. So we had 31.1% last year, 31.8% and we're still fluctuating as per our history. And in the long run, the company will be fluctuating in this interval.

The company delivers growth in revenue and results associated to our history. So we have basically seen in this third quarter, the margins climbing back to every month's level. So in September, we had the best margin of the quarter. That is a result of the price transfers that we had in July and August, and they had their impact in September. So there is a perspective that the operations are under control, and we have been delivering results as per the current situation with higher costs. Now we're going to go into each one of our main segments. We start with security. It accounts for 54% of our revenue.

It grew substantially year-on-year, 27.3%. When we look at the quarter-by-quarter analysis, and I usually say that the second and third quarter are quite similar, and we see that we have about 1% growth quarter-on-quarter. And what we're reporting concerning revenue can be seen on the ground. This was a concern that the inventory turnover should keep up with the sell-in speed. There is especially hard drought in the duty-free area in the duty-free region.

So we see that the duty-free area in the fourth quarter is going to be substantially better than what we had in the fourth quarter last year, and we have substantial inventory to continue to operate. And speaking specifically about the inventory, we're highlighting it here in security, but it applies to other segments as well. We had an increase in inventory in our consolidated figures also due to the increase of traffic in imports. We had a transit time that fluctuated when it was from Asia to Santa Catarina and Manaus.

And now it's established about 30 days. So this allows for the inventory in transit to rise. This is the point we wanted to highlight because we have brought in a lot of inventory to cushion the impact of the drought. As for information communication technology, it accounted for 23% of our revenue in the third quarter. It also grew substantially year-on-year, slightly over 37%. And a quarter-on-quarter growth was 7%. So it's also quite interesting. So you can see that our new lines are well-adjusted. It's suitable, especially when we think about GPON and cables.

Entrepreneurial applications are a bit slower. And these lines are the main lines where there is a revenue increase. And if we compare it to third quarter 2023, we have an increase in the portfolio that was built in these past 12 months because there's no KU Band in the third quarter last year. There's no KU Band in this year's third quarter. So these are the portfolios that we're working with and the portfolios that we believe are going to deliver the growth opportunities for the coming quarters.

And so much so that as of January, over 1,000 ISPs, whether they are direct providers from Intelbras or through the distribution channel, we have had a client database that has been established. So we have seen improvement in the past. So we have seen that the improvements are being seen with these suppliers with these ISPs. We see in energy and power, now the third pillar, it was 23% -- it was 22% of our revenue, and we see a substantial increase both year-on-year as well as quarter-on-quarter. This doesn't mean that we're not maintaining profitability.

We want to be consistent in revenue and in profitability. If we look at the grid and the price basis that we have, it's the same, if not slightly lower comparing to the third quarter this year. So very consistent growth on the following lines as well on the other lines as well. So we have off-grid solar generators that had a substantial improvement in this quarter. As for the cash flow, this is a subject that we have been talking about as of the second quarter as well. We had an expectation of some pressure in operating cash.

So we have generated some operating cash, and we burned some cash in the investments, concluding the payments for the distribution center in Sao Jose and the BRL 90 million dividends paid out in August. So we go from BRL 150 million to BRL 130 million. And as per the plan and inventory level has to go back to normality now and we'll see the operating cash climb back to normal levels. As for the CapEx growth, construction works are now concluded. The distribution center in Sao Jose have been running since the start of August. We see now that CapEx is likely to come to a lower level in the upcoming quarter.

And the maintenance CapEx is below inventory levels, but it should be in this historical interval in the coming years as well. As for the perspectives, what I'd like to share with you all is that we see the year going really as per our expectations when it comes to revenue. So the three businesses growing solidly. We have a robust portfolio backing us up.

And we saw faster growth in the past, but because the market was also growing faster in general in solar energy, but we see that in the third quarter, we see how consistent our portfolio is and how consistent or adjusted our strategies are, but there are also higher costs that have put some pressure on our margins in the third quarter. In the coming months, we should see a similar scenario. And we understand this is a temporary position.

And slowly, but surely, we will be stable and deliver the results that we have always delivered. And last but not least, we have capital allocation to inventories -- should be normalized in the coming months. Maybe up to the second and third quarter next year, we should start seeing inventory levels get better -- we understand is the reality of operations, especially finished products and this whole situation in Manaus that we have been experiencing.

So this is the end of the presentation and in this quarter, before we start the Q&A, I'd like to give the floor to Mr. Altair so that he can complement the presentation. You have the floor, Mr. Altair.

[Altair Silvestri, executive]

Can you hear me well? Good afternoon, everyone. It's a pleasure to be here with you to discuss our quarter results. We know that our results for this quarter could have been better. We had expected to be better. We got there when it comes to revenue, but the results themselves didn't get to what we had expected. The dollar exchange rate has gone up, and that impacted pricing. And in some of our channels for us to apply the new prices with the change in costs, it takes a while in some channels. So we also waited for the exchange rate to be above BRL 5 to change the table.

So there is a delay to adjust prices. And that at the moment that the inventories were growing quite strongly. Bruno talked about logistics costs that had an impact on our margins. Manufacturing costs for us to have inventories on the right level. We need to hire people. We need to buy new machines, increase our manufacturing capacity. And this is always in the coming -- in the first months, instead of generating an improvement in results, we have an increase in costs and expenses. So manufacturing costs went up in this quarter, but we're likely to see these prices go down now.

And the manufacturing costs in ICT, Bruno mentioned that, too. The implementation in the productive process was slower than expected. We had more challenges than we expected. So costs also went up for that reason. But we're now and the normal process again. So we should go back to normal levels. So we had all of this impact in this quarter. But you know that Intelbras is quick to react. This is a moment for us to make adjustments. It's an opportunity for us to -- as we have done before, last year in the last quarter, we reacted, we improved.

We have had the problem now and we are reacting already. And the whole company is laser-focused on our ROIC for every category, for every segment, not only for their value, but for every account that compose the ROIC, and that's very important. And this is new. This is not something that we had for every category, for every segment. And that is causing a lot of impact. And with that, the company can focus on the segments, the projects that yield better results. And the company can also analyze cautiously and carefully the products that are not giving us good results.

So changes can be enacted and adjustments can be made. So these are moments that can be seen as opportunities. And what really matters is that we know what is off and what needs to be done about it, and we're already doing it. In this next quarter if no disaster strikes, we are going to see better results. This whole quarter was not as good, but we're going to get to the end of the year with good results compared to our historical figures.

Profit is not as we expected above revenue, but it's somewhat above revenue. So we're quite confident. We're reacting. And we're going to certainly have new quarters to come in the more traditional interval of results we had in the past. We're very confident the company is well organized. We continue with our growth avenues. We continue with our verticals.

Security stands strong with access control, having a lot to be delivered still. We have a strong market share as we did before. ICT has got a lot to be done and has a lot left to achieve with new products being implemented. So there's a lot in the pipeline. Our Energy segment is also reinventing itself, pursuing more growth. So we continue to be confident. So we're not going to be daunted by this quarter that had slightly worse results. Thank you, everyone.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

Thank you, Mr. Altair. Now we're going to start the Q&A session. We have Bernardo as the first person to ask a question.

[Bernardo Guttmann, analyst]

I've got two questions. The first one has to do with the consolidated margin. This was a quarter with additional compression, right, a bit bigger than we expected, a bit stronger. You had some of the impact caused by price adjustments. September was a bit stronger already. I understand that it's a bit harder to forecast your margins.

There are several variables there. But September's margin looks a bit better. It could be a reference for the rest of the year. Do you reckon you could give us a bit more color around what to expect in 2025 and in the fourth quarter 2024? And when it comes to communication, right, ICT, I'd like to understand the drivers for this strong growth -- the impact caused by the new portfolios with the new partnerships and the local versus imported SKUs.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

Would you like to take the first question, Mr. Altair?

[Altair Silvestri, executive]

The fourth quarter, with everything that happened in the past and is no longer happening now, we expect better results, and we can already see signs of that. So that's what we can see, and that's what we believe.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

Henrique, would like to talk about the other matter.

[Henrique Fernandez, executive]

Thank you for your question, Bernardo. You asked about revenue in the SKUs. These new partnerships play a very important role in our growth. We can see that the portfolio is being really embraced by the market. We have new providers on our database, and now we have better technologies. Slowly but surely, we will increase our market share and increase our revenue. The markets we're tapping into are large. And to my mind and to my team's mind, we can continue to increase our market share.

And with a stronger presence in the market alongside our distributors and providers, we can improve, but we're not going to give more information about the revenue than we have already provided in our documents. And the local manufacturer is normally Curve A, right, is what we call Curve A? Yes, Curve A. The items that are going to help Intelbras and the plant be more productive. We don't want to produce just something minor that's going to be slightly better here, but we want to produce something for the whole.

So we have really set our sights on what we're going to be producing here or manufacturing here locally. And it's only products that are going to be good for Intelbras and for our customers. And they have an impact on our revenue because they are large volume items. That's why local manufacturing leads to our understanding that our margins are going to be better.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

Now Maria Clara from Itau BBA. We can't hear you, Maria.

[Maria Infantozzi, analyst]

I'd like to talk a little bit more about the revenue. That was a positive highlight. Revenue in security was much higher than expected. And you're already a leading player in this field. So what are your expectations for growth, especially in security? What opportunities do you see to continue to grow? What innovations could we have with other contributors? Can you also talk a little bit about what is in the ICT pipeline for the short term and the long term?

[Altair Silvestri, executive]

Can you talk about the growth avenues in security?

[Henrique Fernandez, executive]

Mr. Altair already mentioned some examples, verticals projects. We have some clear growth avenues in security. We have our installed systems that can have new technologies, improved technologies. And there is also a lot of opportunity when it comes to our verticals, our projects. We can deliver a full security solution. Also, access control has been having good results in the past years.

We also have digital locks, WiFi routers, even products that were already more mature with have an opportunity for better improved products for our customers. And these apply not only for the short term, but also they apply to the long term as well. We always want to give customers our best solution. And we don't want to deliver a single product [indiscernible] but a thorough solution with a software solution that is going to be integrating every product, every device, also now including AI and other points that will add value to the client.

And the past quarters have already been consolidating these results. The strategy is not new. It's something that we have been working on for a long time, and we can see that it is yielding results. And it continues -- will continue to do so in the future.

[Altair Silvestri, executive]

She also mentioned ICT. Can you talk a little bit about the new portfolios and the opportunities that we have to grow in ICT.

[Henrique Fernandez, executive]

We have redesigned our portfolio with new partnerships. And our main growth avenues are especially in GPON. So you have an ISP provider that comes to your home installs optic fiber or fiber optics, and connect you to the Internet. And we have the ULTs, the devices that will distribute that to all of the end customers. We have these cables that go from the provider to the customer's home. So these are important growth avenues. Another one is corporate networks. We have a market niche.

We're calling it Enterprise Networks, working with medium-sized and large companies, helping them with connectivity. So WiFi [ APs ] and all of the tokens that command and control all of that. And another growth avenue that is important but not as large as in radio communication. This is also the child of a partnership we have struck, and this is going to improve our local competitiveness and it's an important growth avenue.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

Gabriel Gusan from Citibank. We can hear you.

[Gabriel Gusan, analyst]

Question to do with pricing and security. Everything seems to be doing well when it comes to pricing. But when we look at the Chinese partners conference call there is a chance of being more aggressive. What do you have to say on that front? Paulo?

[Paulo Correa, executive]

Thank you for your question, Gabriel. Price competitiveness has been faced by us for a long time. We have had some adjustments in pricing at the start of this semester at the start of the half -- the second half of the year. And the foreign exchange rate applies to everyone. So we see that the competition is doing the same.

We need to understand what our competitiveness is and every business line has a different situation. So we need to act in the right way. We see that the competition is also making adjustments on their side for the same reasons. So really monitoring what the market is doing. We see constant revenue not only on our side, but also out there in the market. So these have been really references for us to monitor the market.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

Vitor from Goldman Sachs.

[Vitor Tomita, analyst]

When it comes to inventories, could you give us some more color on what trends you expect to see in the coming quarters? And if inventory days should increase in the fourth quarter in comparison to the third quarter before we see these figures being normalized in the first half of 2025? And what do you expect when it comes to inventory levels after this normalization in the first half of 2025?

Our second question has to do with the margins and the expectation that they will improve in the fourth quarter. What are the factors that you believe are going to allow for that to happen? Is it going to be the price increase that we had in the third quarter or do you see that the market is more stable or would you talk about any other reasons like that fiber optics are being manufactured locally now?

[Altair Silvestri, executive]

I think Rafael can answer the first question, and I'll answer the second question.

[Rafael Boeing, executive]

Thank you for your question. In the fourth quarter, I don't believe we'll see an increase in inventory days. It should be stable or maybe even decrease. We have basically adjusted our inventory levels. So we're not likely to see an increase. Rather, we're likely to see more stability. I think that's it. Inventory days in structurally, right? As Bruno said in the presentation, starting in the first half 2025, we're likely to have our inventory days in line with our history.

[Altair Silvestri, executive]

Talking about inventory still, Vitor. The factor that impacts inventory going up and not down is this movement that the whole company is making, our managers in every segment concerning ROIC, as I mentioned. We need to look at all of these elements and the inventory sits with them. So there is an improvement there that improves inventory levels. Isn't that right?

[Rafael Boeing, executive]

Yes, that's very important. Very important that you mentioned the ROIC. We have internal indicators, and we're keeping track of every business segment. These are very important indicators. They are directly connected to performance in these segments as well. So this is going to give us a lot of engagement and get inventories to the most suitable levels.

[Altair Silvestri, executive]

That's what we had for the first part of the question, right? As for the second part of the question, why margins are going to be better in the fourth quarter? It's because the main issues that I mentioned already that caused pressure on the third quarter results have either been fully addressed or at least mitigated. We have logistics costs having been brought down.

We have the price table, price schedule better adjusted now. We didn't have a reaction as quick as we should have had, but this is it. This shows that the fourth quarter is more -- is likely to be better than third quarter. And the fourth quarter normally has better revenue. It's the best quarter of the year. Yes, not to mention that, Bruno. The margin tends to be better because it's the fourth quarter alone.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

There's a question in writing from [ Olivia ] from J. P. Morgan. About the competition affecting margins or impacting margins. Henrique, Marcio would like to talk about ICT and energy. I think we've already addressed that in security.

[Altair Silvestri, executive]

You may begin, Marcio.

[Marcio Ferreira, executive]

In solar power, we know it's a more volatile business or more volatile segment, and we've learned that. We're improving our approach, and we're working well in the other lines. The retail is a bit slower to accept price adjustments. But we decided to pursue profitability. So we're doing our homework. And I think we're within the normal interval that we know with the market.

And just before Henrique starts, I just wanted to say that this whole movement and the focus that I mentioned that we have in a handful of segments allows us to give more focus, more investment to the segments where we have a competitive edge that allows us to stand apart -- to stand out from the market. A substantial part of our portfolio in ICT, I mean, pricing competitiveness is complex. This has always existed.

And when we think about price increase, when we increased prices because of the higher dollar FX rate that impacted sales but we continue to grow. And what we see here is a good ratio between revenue and margins. We're not willing to sell at any cost. And with the margins being above these levels, we're likely to see our EBITDA grow soon because expenses don't grow at the same rate. This is a point that I've been really harping on for the fuel of our past results or earnings calls, but I think it's worth to mention it again.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

And Henrique, what about the ICT product ramp-up? We talked about some pilot products in August and September, there would be some manufacturing already. Can you tell us a little bit more about the local manufacturer? This is something that Olivia is asking about.

[Henrique Fernandez, executive]

Well, we just mentioned the Curve A products, right? We're producing over 50% of our Curve A products already. We're gaining more momentum in our plant and we have basically 50% of our Curve A, which is what we aim to manufacture. And there can be better productivity for the company as a whole. So we expect to see even further growth for the next year, increasing works shifts -- and this is for electronics. When it comes to cables and fibers, we have our plant at Tubarao running full blast for fiber optics and metallic cables. And we're looking at other possibilities for next year as well when it comes to cables.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

I'd like to give the floor to [ Gustavo ] from UBS.

[Unknown Analyst]

Can you hear me?

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

Yes, we can hear you.

[Unknown Analyst]

I've got two of them. The first one has to do with inventory and imports. We saw that go up in this quarter. And we see there is some more challenging logistics when it comes to the Chinese party. So what is your expectation on that front? And the second question; is there any comment on the leader succession, how that's been discussed internally?

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

When I was talking about inventories and security, I touched on that matter briefly. So we have imports in transit over BRL 600 million or rather BRL 700 million. And most of this volume is associated to an extended and extending transit time has been extending from the beginning of the half of the year, the second half of the year. So products used to be delivered in 40, 45 days, now taking about 60 days. And to Manaus is about 90 to 100 days.

So it's natural that you'll have higher inventory volumes in transit because of this context. And supply, thinking about future demands in the fourth quarter and first quarter 2025. Well, I would say that this should be seen as a more normalized share of inventory in transit. But we do have this increase in the number of days in transit. that we have had in the past three to four months. And as for succession, Mr. Altair, would you like to talk about that matter?

[Altair Silvestri, executive]

After four to five years work, we've been working internally and with the company's Board. And it really has been a year with a lot of conversations, a lot of thinking. And we have chosen the three candidates that Marcio, Henrique and Paolo. And Henrique was chosen not because the other two are bad. But because of some details, Henrique surpassed the others, outdid the others for what we expect the company to do in the future. So now that we have chosen the successor, it's a lot easier because we couldn't be talking more about matters with one because the other would grow suspicious.

But now every aspect is clear. He's now become our VP. We're going to work a lot together -- we are planning the year of 2025 and our next five years now and is going to be working closely with us. We're going to be meeting all of our channel representatives in the course of the next year. So this process is going to be now really happening as it should with the baton being passed on safely. And I'm not going to abandon ship all of a sudden, right? I'm going to stay here to support however I can as of the 1st of April as a Board member.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

Now I'd like to give Lucca the floor from the Bank of America.

[Lucca Brendim, analyst]

I've also got two. You talked about this extended shipping, right? Can you tell us a little bit more about the cost for international shipping costs, if there has been any changes and how much that will impact on our COGS? And also a question on ITC. Now that you have operations running closer to what is going to be, do you have more clarity on what the margin for the segment is going to be from a more structural perspective when everything is more normalized?

[Henrique Fernandez, executive]

I can talk a little bit about the logistics side. I have already been looking at that with the procurement folks. Shipping costs have been higher. That is a fact, at the end of the second quarter and during the third quarter as a whole, not only due to the drought in Manaus, there have been additional fees charged because of the drought, but also to [ Itajai and Recife ]. The costs have stopped going up at least.

So I think there is also a chance of prices going down or costs going down in the future, as Mr. Altair mentioned. I sat with our Chief Logistics Officer recently, and we see negotiations at better prices already. So shipping costs are tending to go back to previous prices. The amount of inventory that arrived had higher prices and then the average inventory prices get closer to the higher prices on an average with what we already had, but you have a more immediate impact.

Right at the beginning, Mr. Altair said that this additional amount of items in inventory with higher pricing had this impact that we saw, and that's what we saw in the third quarter. And the costs are to be seen or are seen right now, and they are unlikely to go up. Just the FX rate is a point that we have to be always attentive to. And not talking about shipping costs, but the fact that this past quarter had a lot of inventory items and had transport, ports.

We had a lot of additional costs that were a one-off. We also have better management, better organization. Inventory now being delivered in a more organized fashion that is going to help reduce logistics costs. And ICT, our strategy when it comes to the new portfolios, especially GPON and cables, we wanted to price it at the right price in the market, even though the costs were high, we're not yet in the ideal operation that we wanted to have because we wanted to have national manufacturing and a better oiled logistics process.

And we have been successful in our implementation more recently. And we see this decrease in our margin. But our expectation for the future, especially for next year, is that this operation should be better oiled, more well rounded. And the key point is there is an increase in revenue. The margin impacted because of all the operating items, but the expenses do not grow at the same rate. So as a consequence, the bottom line is going to improve.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

I will give the floor to Bernardo, who's already asked the question. I'd like to give the floor to Daniel.

[Daniel Federle, analyst]

I'd like to understand some of your messages a bit better. In the release, you mentioned that the margins are likely to fluctuate as per the historical margins of the company. But when we look at the pandemic years, we had 16%, and there were years where there were 12%. So do you expect margins to go back to 12% and then be 16%? Is this the fluctuation gap that we can expect? And my second question has to do with energy growth.

You talked about growth in the third quarter and that 40% increase in volume. But in the third quarter last year, we had a bigger challenge to address. Should we think about this 40% growth for the fourth quarter as well or should we use any other indicator as a reference? And following up on Rafael's comment around the inventory levels going back to normal, are you now planning to always have to deal with droughts and the normal inventory levels are going to be higher than they used to be or are they going to climb back down as if there was no drought to come in the coming years?

[Altair Silvestri, executive]

If I may just answer briefly before I give my colleagues the floor. We had to invest quickly because of the droughts. And we had to normalize our inventory in security. And there were some issues in management, right, in this rush to replenish inventories. So we're going to have more careful management as of now, knowing that the ROIC can impact every segment with better interest rates or worse interest rates. So with the inventory levels back to normal, there shouldn't be a need for an increase and security is covered in that.

Well, there is a drought almost every year. But this year, the situation was worse than last year. And last year was worse than the previous years. So we need to keep a weather eye on that. And if droughts continue to be at the level that they were this year, then we need to do something similar to what we did. but this is something that we need to analyze year-by-year. And if the drought becomes a known variable by operators, well, then they also prepare themselves to deal with it. So the port had the floating port, and we relocated items to ferries.

So I think this is an issue that is a nonissue, so to speak. Of course, we're not going to depend only on operators finding solutions on their own for a problem like that. But the structure is already different to what it was last year, for example. And we learned how to manage that. We're not going to increase the amounts too much unnecessarily because we've learned. Last year, it came as a bit of a surprise. But this year, we planned for it in a better way. And logistics is more efficient this year than it was last year. And next year, if we have the drought again, we will have had our lessons learned from the past years. So we will be able to manage the situation better.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

There was a question about the margin and energy growth. Margin about the historical growth and the energy for the fourth quarter, if we should consider the 40% increase or not. 16% in 2020 had some clear one-off effects. And if we look further back, we see that this is not the normal margin for the company. We should expect to have 13% to 14% in our EBITDA margin. This is how we have positioned ourselves.

During the IPO, we're talking about 12% to 13%. We increased it a bit to 13% to 14%. We could have 13% give or take 1 percentage point. A better year is going to be closer to 14%, a worse year is going to be closer to 13% or slightly under 13%, but not under 12% when it comes to our EBITDA margin. So this is something that we can consider for the future, always thinking about the fact that we need to continue to deliver growth. And Marcio, if you want to talk about the fourth quarter.

[Marcio Ferreira, executive]

Thank you for your question. Specific percentage is difficult to say, but we have been selling more generators than we did last year. There was price pressure this year as well. We thought we had gone to the bottom line, but from June, now the watt costs have gone down. So we have an increased number of sales in generators, but at a lower average ticket. [indiscernible] more light agreement for the Amazon was also a good contract. We're executing it well.

We're getting good results. So it's a year that we're really focusing on the bottom line. This is not a year that we're looking to get more market share, but we're looking to be more consistent. And we're going to continue to do that until the first half of next year or during the first half of next year as well. So we want to build muscle and deal with this process better. And then we think about increasing our share. So 2024 was a year that was according to our forecast, but I'm not going to be giving you a percentage in comparison to last quarter.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

Thank you, everyone. We still have a few questions in writing. We're going to answer these questions per e-mail. And there were two questions to be asked per voice, but we got to the end of our 1-hour video conference. So Shane and Bernardo, you didn't have the chance to ask your question, but I will make myself available to cover any points left outstanding. And the analysts that send their question in writing, we're going to be e-mailing you the answer individually.

And just as our final remarks, I think we can piggyback on Daniel's question around margins and growth. And it's important that we look at Intelbras as a company that is well structured in terms of growth and portfolio, and we have been responding to the market as per our expectations and perspectives. We had expected results to grow more this year than our historical average. So maybe surpass 14%. But we're more likely to be there between 13% to 14% by the end of this year.

And this is what we see for the future. We've been saying that this year could be a bit stronger, but that in 2025, we should see the company delivering results with the profitability as per our historical figures. And these historical figures fluctuate between these two numbers I mentioned in Daniel's -- in answering Daniel's question. So we're going to conclude the year well on a high note. And it's very important that we get our expectations clear. Mr. Altair, would you like to say anything else? Can we wrap up? You're on mute.

[Altair Silvestri, executive]

I'd just like to stress what you just said. We just stumbled here and there, but that's going to make us stronger. And the team is very confident. The team is well structured with our brand, with our channels. And we stand strong and we're going to go back to our normal levels. Thank you, everyone, for joining our call.

[Bruno Teixeira, executive]

All right. Thank you, everyone. Have a good one. And this is the end of our third quarter 2024 earnings call. Thank you, everyone. Have a good day.