Abb Ltd

SIX:ABBN

Earnings Call Transcript 2023-Q1

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Greetings to you all and nice to connect again as I welcome you to the presentation of our first quarter results. I'm Ann-Sofie Nordh, Head of Investor Relations. And next to me here is our CEO, Bjorn Rosengren; and our CFO, Timo Ihamuotila. They will take you through the presentation as per normal before we open up for the Q&A session. But before we begin, I should mention the information regarding safe harbor notices on our use of non-GAAP measures on Slide 2 of the presentation. Also, I should mention that this call will include forward-looking statements, which are based on the company's current expectations and certain assumptions and are therefore subject to risks and uncertainties.

And with that said, I hand over to you, Bjorn and Timo, for your quarterly comments before we do the Q&A.

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

Thank you, Ann-Sofie. And a warm welcome from me as well. The first quarter was strong for us. Almost everything went our way, and we improved most of our KPIs. From a demand perspective, it was another good quarter. And despite the very high comparables, we grew comparable order intake by 9%. Orders of $9.5 billion is record high quarterly level for the current setup of ABB.

Just like in the previous quarter, the supply chain was smooth and we could convert orders backlog into revenues. Despite the strong comparable revenue growth of 22%, we had a book-to-bill of 1.2, meaning we had another quarter building order backlog. It was good to see the teams leveraging the higher revenues into earnings. We achieved an operational EBITA margin of 16.3%, which is the highest ever for the first quarter.

I'm also pleased about the pickup in cash flow. Cash from operating activities was $282 million, up by as much as $855 million from last year. This was supported by higher earnings and lower buildup of net working capital. That said, we still have a job to do in bringing down our working capital. The ratio to revenues is too high, and this will continue to be a focus area for us. So with that said, we expect a good cash year. This supports our balance sheet. In early April, we launched a new buyback program of up to $1 billion. Today, we have also announced our plans to delist from the New York Stock Exchange and to deregister with the SEC. There is no change in our commitments to the U.S. market.

But you know that the market access has increased through multiple digital platforms. We simply do not believe it is necessary for us to be listed on as many as 3 different markets. This delisting will be another step towards further simplification and efficiency at ABB. Timo will talk more about that later on.

Now let's turn to Page 4 for some more market comments. To tell a short story, the only segment which declined was residential constructions. However, it remained stable from Q4. This high customer activity resulted in order growth for 3 out of 4 business areas. Momentum was particularly strong in process automation.

The PA saw broad and strong customer activity across the segments as well as good timing of some project orders. I want to spend some time on robotics and discrete automation, as it was the only business area where orders dropped from last year. The order decline of 20% year-over-year looks bad, but it is worth noticing that RA's orders intake increased sequentially from Q4, and the order level of $1 billion is actually 1 of the highest levels ever for the PA. And the book-to-bill ratio was 1.1.

Now let's turn to Slide 5 and look at the market pattern from a geographical perspective. Comparable orders increased in all 3 regions. Asia, Middle East and Africa posted the highest growth of 11%. This is strong given that the largest market, China, declined by 3%, which is good given the very high comparable in last year, and pretty much in line with our expectations. But I want to mention a very strong progress in India.

In Europe, comparable orders improved by 10%. This, however, included the impact of the order debooking last year. That aside, we saw a mid-single-digit improvement in Europe. Comparable orders in the Americas were up by 5%. This was driven by strong growth in most countries, although U.S., the largest market, dropped by 3% from the last year's very high comparable.

Now let's turn to Slide 6 and our earnings outcome. In the chart, you see the strong improvement in both earnings and margins. We improved the operational EBITDA by 28%. And if we exclude the negative FX, the earnings were up by as much as 33%. The operational EBITA margin improved by 200 basis points to 16.3%. This includes a negative margin impact of about 20 basis points from portfolio changes, primarily related to the spin-off of Accelleron. It's good to see how the strong revenue growth feeds into sharp improvements in the gross margin.

Higher volumes, improved cost absorptions in production and pricing was up about 6%. In total, we improved the gross margin by 190 basis points to 34.6%. In total, this was one of ABB's strongest earnings and margin quarters ever. I would say we are on a good path. With that, I hand over to Timo.

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Thank you, Bjorn. And greetings to everyone also from my side. Before we will move to the business areas, I want to remind you all that this was the first quarter when we report the E-mobility business as a subsegment of Corporate and Other and not in business area electrification. As noted on this slide, Corporate and Other amounted to total costs of $111 million, out of which $83 million relates to what I would refer to as real Corporate and Other, $28 million relates to the E-mobility business.

This is somewhat lower than what you have seen recently in this fast-growing business, in which we are now dealing with a bit of a growing pains. We are investing somewhat more to renew our offering in order to capture the full potential of this exciting and fast-growing market. Let's then move to electrification on Slide 7.

As just mentioned, this was the first quarter when we report electrification numbers exclusive of E-mobility division. We have restated the charts that you see on this slide accordingly, and data is available on the Investor Relations website. You see in the left-hand chart that despite facing a very high base from the first quarter last year, Electrification managed to grow comparable orders by 5% with total orders reaching $4.1 billion.

Demand improved in most customer segments, except for residential construction, where we saw a decline in all 3 regions, very much a similar pattern to what we saw in the fourth quarter. This impacted primarily smart buildings, and to some extent, also installation products. Otherwise, the overall demand was strong. On the back of some banking turmoil, we have, during the quarter, received quite a few questions on the commercial construction. Let's see what happens going forward. But for what we have seen so far, the demand in this segment has remained solid.

Comparable revenues grew strongly by 16% from last year, and the chart in the middle here also shows a nice positive sequential trend in absolute revenues with the quarter coming in at $3.6 billion, the highest level in many years.

Volume continues to be supported by the solid market demand and order backlog execution, and we had another quarter with strong pricing. You can also see that the book-to-bill ratio was clearly above 1, resulting in another increase in the order backlog, which now sits at $7 billion, and should continue to support revenue generation through 2023.

I'm very pleased with Electrification's operational EBITA margin at 19%, up by 310 basis points year-on-year on the back of good operating leverage, lower-than-expected input costs and strong pricing. The margin improvement was driven by all divisions except smart buildings, which was somewhat tampered by adverse mix due to the earlier mentioned weakness in residential construction. Looking ahead into the second quarter, we currently expect a double-digit revenue growth and somewhat improved sequential operational EBITA margin.

Let's move to Slide 8 and the Motion business area, which again showed a strong delivery. On a comparable order growth of 8%, total orders reached $2.3 billion, which is the highest level in several years. When looking into the details, one can see that there was a positive development in our drives business, the traction systems offering, as well as service, all of which benefit from the global energy efficiency megatrends and for all of which we have a strategic growth mandate.

On the other hand, we saw some declines in low voltage motors with weakness in the HVAC segment due to software construction demand. Regionally, orders increased in both AMEA as well as Europe, as decline in their largest markets, China and Germany, were offset by strength in other countries. Americas remained stable versus a tough comparable.

Motion increased comparable revenues by as much as 29%. And you can see in the chart in the middle that it is partly driven by an easy comparable from last year when customer deliveries were still impacted by supply chain constraints.

Nevertheless, it is good to see that strong order backlog execution and continued support from earlier implemented price increases have resulted in the highest revenue level since the formation of the Motion business area in 2019.

On another positive note, the operational EBITA margin reached so far uncharted territory coming in at 18.9%, which is up by 150 basis points from last year. This was driven by an efficient execution of the higher volumes and strong price execution, which more than offset the negative impacts from higher input costs.

Additionally, the margin was somewhat supported by a positive divisional mix due to the strong growth in the drives business. Looking ahead into the second quarter, we anticipate comparable revenues to grow at somewhat lower pace than what we saw in Q1 and operational EBITA margin at a fairly similar sequential level.

Then turning to Slide 9 and Process Automation, where we saw very strong customer activity. Orders came in at a very high level of $2.1 billion on a comparable increase of 55%. Customer activity was high across the customer segments and supported a broad-based strength across divisions and regions. There was also a good support from timing of some larger projects and admittedly some support to the growth rate also from the debooking of approximately $190 million last year's comparable period.

Particular strength was noted in the Energy Industries division. This was driven by the oil and gas segment, including LNG. High activity was, however, also noted in new energy sources such as hydrogen. This is coming still from a low base though. I noted, as I went through the numbers, that PA's current order backlog of $6.9 billion is well above PA's total revenues in 2022. Comparable revenues grew by 15%, a bit faster than expected and with a good mix. Looking at profitability, the operational EBITA margin of 14.2% improved by 120 basis points year-on-year. This is particularly impressive as last year's margin included approximately 140 basis points contribution from the high-margin Accelleron business that we spun off in October '22, meaning that the underlying margin improvement was a high 260 basis points, driven by higher volumes, better project execution and continued benefits from improved quality in the order backlog with higher gross margin.

Operational EBITA margin increased in all divisions except for a slight decline in Marine and Ports, which was hampered due to the lower share of Arctic marine propulsion business. On the other hand, it is very nice to see stronger-than-expected performance improvement in measurement and analytics. Looking at our expectations for the second quarter, we foresee double-digit comparable revenue growth and a slightly lower sequential operational EBITA margin, depending on the revenue mix.

On Slide 10, we turn to Robotics and Discrete Automation where comparable orders, as Bjorn discussed, declined 20% year-on-year. As you see in the left side order chart, the highest bar in the middle is the comparable from the last year, which benefited from prebuys in a period of a strange supply chain. So order intake of $1 billion in this quarter is actually a historically good level and even up significantly from Q4.

Both divisions and all 3 regions declined at a double-digit rate. We continue to build backlog in RA with book-to-bill at 1.1%. From a customer segment perspective, there was a favorable development in the auto segment. This was, however, more than offset by the adverse development elsewhere, including some inventory adjustment noted, particularly in China. With no real supply chain constraints, revenues continued to rebound and increased by 35% on a comparable basis. Both divisions also benefited from the solid pricing actions taken last year.

Operational EBITA was $140 million, with the margin coming in at 14.9%. This was an improvement of 820 basis points from the low point last year when component shortages prevented deliveries. Main contributors to the margin increase were the strong operating leverage on higher production output as well as better pricing execution. It would have been really nice to hit that 15% mark already this quarter, but we feel confident that the RA team is on a good path to get there in the near future. For the second quarter in 2023, we expect a somewhat sequentially lower growth rate for comparable revenues and the operational EBITA margin to be similar to Q1.

Moving on to Slide 11, showing the group operational EBITA bridge. The profile is very similar to the last couple of quarters with the earnings improvement driven by strong operational performance. The impacts from our strong price execution and leverage on 22% comparable revenue growth more than offsetting the adverse effects from cost inflation. All in all, a 28% improvement in operational EBITA with 200 basis points increase in margin. Job really well done by the whole ABB team. Now let's move to cash flow on Slide 12, which, as Bjorn mentioned, was strong for the first quarter.

Cash flow from operating activities was $282 million, up by $855 million from last year. And it was good to see that all business areas contributed on higher earnings.

Net working capital increased sequentially, mainly driven by higher receivables triggered by the strong revenue growth as well as higher inventories on back of continued strong order intake. While the net working capital buildup was lower than last year, we will continue to focus on this area as we want to bring down the ratio to revenues from the current level of 13.9%. Q1 set us off to a good start to what we expect to be a solid cast year, clearly up from 2022. And then on Slide 13, I want to shed some more color on our planned delisting in the U.S., which Bjorn also mentioned earlier.

You know, we are listed on 3 exchanges and there are several reasons as to why we take this step to reduce the number of listings. First, investors' capital market access has increased through trading on multiple platforms, providing new possibilities to investors. Secondly, the delisting and deregistration in the U.S. will be yet another step towards further simplification and efficiency at ABB.

And last but not least, in my view, we have a strong balance sheet and a good capital markets access, which I believe will support our capital allocation priorities going forward. On this basis, it feels excessive to entertain 3 listings. From a time line perspective, we plan to file the required Form 25 with the SEC on or around May 12, 2023. In connection with the delisting, we intend to establish a Level 1 ADR program, which will allow investors to continue to hold and trade ADRs on the U.S. over-the-counter market on ABB shares.

Eventually, we intend to apply for deregistration with the SEC and for termination of our equity reporting obligations under the U.S. Securities Exchange Act. But this can only be done once we satisfy the U.S. average traded daily volume condition.

It goes without saying that we will remain committed to an open and frequent dialogue with U.S. investors and maintain the highest standards of corporate governance, including a transparent financial reporting. I also want to highlight that we will remain fully focused on serving our customers in the important U.S. market, ABB's top country by revenues.

The United States is critical to our success as a market. As you can see on the right-hand side of this slide, we are currently accelerating our growth strategy in the United States by investing approximately $170 million into our operations to ensure that we support our customers in the best way forward, a more energy-efficient future.

And with that, let me hand back to Bjorn to finalize the presentation.

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

Thank you, Timo. On Slide 14, I want to mention our first integrated report, which we published in February. This includes the 2022 sustainability report, where we show solid progress towards our 2030 sustainability goals. In the interest of time, if it was to mention just a couple of highlights from our first strategic pillar, it would be that we reduced our greenhouse gas emissions by 43%. This means we have reached a total reduction of our Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions by 65% versus the 2019 baseline.

We have also defined a new emission reduction target for our supply chain, covering suppliers that accounts for 70% of our procurement spend. The largest positive environmental impact we can make is through providing our customers with resource-efficient products. This is core of our purpose and part of everything we do. Now let's finish off with Slide 15 and some outlook comments. Market activity and our operational performance in the first quarter was so much higher than we initially anticipated. Consequentially, we feel confident enough to raise our guidance for 2023. We now expect our comparable revenue growth to be at least 10%, and we expect to improve our operational EBITA margin year-over-year, meaning up from the 15.3% we reported for 2022.

Looking at the second quarter, we anticipate double-digit growth in comparable revenues and year-over-year improvement in the operational EBITA margin, up from the 15.5% we reported last year.

And Ann-Sofie, now let's go for the Q&A.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Yes. Let's do so. [Operator Instructions] And with that said, I think we should just fire away with the first question, which we will take from the conference call. And I think and hope Sebastian from RBC that your line is open. Can you hear us?

[Sebastian Kuenne, analyst]

Yes, I can hear you. My question is regarding the good progress in the gross margin. And I was wondering to what extent the staff cost or operating cost increases are already included, or to put it in a different way maybe, the price rise that you have for this year planned, are those compensating for the upcoming staff cost increases?

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Gross margin question I guess...

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Thank you, Sebastian. First of all, on gross margin overall, before I go to the components, we are very, very happy with the 34.6% gross margin. I think it's up 190 basis points, and that's one of the focus area for us when we have been driving the quality of revenue at ABB. And important to note that now both in Process Automation and Robotics and Discrete Automation, the backlog gross margin, which we have been talking about, is actually coming through in the revenue gross margin. Gross margin went up in all of our 4 business areas.

When we then look at pricing, yes, we have a very good coverage by price compared to the cost level. So we had 6% price increase in Q1, probably wouldn't expect that to continue quite on that level. But then when you look at the cost components, if we look at overall cost components in gross margin, if you go back a couple of quarters, we had sort of almost $350 million increase.

Now we had about $100 million. So it really is growing down and labor and gross margin increase of that was maybe about $40 million. So yes, we would expect to be able to cover that also going forward as we see a situation now.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Thank you, Seb. We'll take the next question from the conference call. Alessandro with Octavian. Are you there?

[Alessandro Foletti, analyst]

Yes, I'm here. Just a quick one then on the E-mobility business. I think it's included in the corporate, and the order intake was around $190 million. I was wondering if there is anything included from others that is offsetting the number? Or if that number is 100% E-mobility?

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

We can say it's for all practical -- there can be $1 million here and there, but yes, it's for all practical purposes for E-mobility.

So as you saw, we had positive book-to-bill and also about 50% revenue growth in that area. But of course, it's sort of a small issue in the ABB overall context.

[Alessandro Foletti, analyst]

Yes. But the fact that it is below last year is no reason for -- any change of view in that segment?

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

No. Last year, we had a very, very large one-off order in E-mobility. I don't remember exactly what it was, but it was like $100 million and we had about $300 million orders. So it's like a very special situation last quarter. So that comparable is not really a comparable one-on-one to what we had now on that about $190 million.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Okay. Thank you. And we will take a question here from the online tool, and we have a question from Gael and he wants to know on the net working capital, actually.

He says, "There was once again some significant working capital build up this quarter. I wonder if that was in line with your internal expectations?"

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Yes. So yes, that I think was very well in line with our internal expectations. It's fair to say that our order growth was actually a bit faster or a bit higher than our expectations when going into the quarter. And if we look at the net working capital dynamics during the quarter, actually, inventory went up less than last year. However, in receivables, we tied a bit more than last year. Payables was also a bit of a positive driver.

So you can see it's actually, I'll call it, moving closer to cash. And we already saw inventory starting to decline at the latter part of the quarter in March. And also when we look at this inventory to backlog ratio, it actually started to go down. It went to 28% from 30% the previous quarter. So I don't see any issues in the net working capital.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Okay. And we'll take one more question here from the net. And it's regarding medium voltage. And the question is, "could you elaborate on the performance of the medium voltage segment within electrification? And how do you judge the progress on the turnaround here?"

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

Yes. Maybe I can talk a little bit about the medium voltage, where we see the medium voltages in the DS, in Distribution Solutions. And as you know, we have made some changes there in the division. We have moved some of that low-voltage switch gear over to smart power, which means that DS now is more focused on the medium voltage. So that is traditionally a very strong part of our portfolio, and I think we are market leaders in the most places.

And I think the good development in the medium voltage is related to infrastructure. And there is a lot of electrification infrastructure being built. So it's quite a good momentum there now.

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Yes. Maybe to throw in a number here. So if you look at our divisions, which are more exposed to medium voltage or the trends which Bjorn was talking about. So ELDS, drive systems, services, in motion, traction. So these all grew last quarter, let's say, average 20% when you take them. So it is really, you could say, quite a strong, at least at the moment, demand we are seeing in this medium voltage type of area.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Okay. And we'll take the next question from Alex at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

[Alexander Virgo, analyst]

I wondered if you could just dig a little bit more into the EL trends for us actually. Strong decline described in the U.S., declines in Germany and in China. I just wondered if you could just dig a little bit more into the vertical trends. You've obviously called out resi specifically and the broader implications of that. I just [Technical Difficulty].

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Alex, You cut out in the middle there. So we didn't really hear the ending of -- can you just repeat, please?

[Alexander Virgo, analyst]

I can. Simply the dynamics in EL. Trying to reconcile calling out the weakness in resi, but you've actually still got some reasonably good order numbers actually. It's not as strong a decline as it looks, if that might be the right way to ask the question.

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Yes, Alex, maybe I'll comment on that a bit. So first of all, when you look at electrification, the whole buildings side of electrification in our case is about, if I remember correctly, some 35%, and resi is maybe 12%, 13%. And resi is actually big for us in Germany, in particular, with Busch-Jaeger, but also with ELIP in the U.S. and also in China. So proportionately, the resi from our mix is coming maybe a bit more through in those markets. And as we discussed earlier, then we have some other areas of the business where we have really quite strong trends as we were discussing on the medium voltage on the energy security, energy transition and so forth.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Okay. And we take one question here from the online tool and it's from WhiteOak India, and they would like to know, can you elaborate on detail what is driving order inflow growth in India?

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

Well, maybe I can start there. First, I think the dynamic in India has been quite good during the last year. We know now it is the biggest market -- the largest number of inhabitants than any other market in the world, and we've seen a good dynamic in growth in that market. And I think one of the factors is that the internal market is growing, but I think also there is a certain amount of diversification from companies using India also as from supply chain opportunities.

So you see double there, good internal market, but also start seeing more an expert from that market. And if you look at India for us today, it's actually a growth of 40%. So it's quite impressive at the moment. And we have had this dynamic now for a year almost. Anything you want to add up there...

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Just that in all business areas, we're growing.

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

Yes. It's really good to see that market.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Okay. Then we take a question from Andy at JPMorgan.

[Andrew Wilson, analyst]

I wanted to ask, I guess, it's a broad question really around China. You made some comments in the release around I guess what looked like a very good start to the year, maybe some slowing around China New Year. And obviously appreciating the headline numbers that are impacted by the Q1 comp from last year. So really just trying to get a sense on kind of what you really think you're seeing underlying in terms of China, both in terms of Q1? And then, I guess, any earlier indications in terms of outlook for the year?

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

Yes. First, if you look at the comparison numbers, it's like both in U.S., China and Germany, they are negative. So in the first sight when you look at it, that it will be such a weak, but it actually isn't. We have a very, very high comparable in China, both this quarter and also next quarter. So if you look at it from that perspective, I think if you see last year, that ended up quite weak from the COVID situation. And then we saw the market opening up first before the New Year and then after the New Year. And we've seen quite good. We don't see the growth in China that we saw in the Western world after the COVID, maybe wasn't expected. But we are quite optimistic that we should see good growth in China, especially in the second half of the year. Anything you would like to add on there?

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

No. I think it's good.

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

So it, from comparable, maybe not looked super strong, but I think it's quite good numbers in China. I think it's the third strongest quarter, yes.

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Yes. Positive book-to-bill we had...

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

It's also important to say that even though we saw good revenues there, we still have a positive book-to-bill. So building order book in China still. I hope that gave some clarity.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

It seems like it. He's quiet. So we'll open up the line for Ben at Morgan Stanley. Ben, can you hear us?

[Ben Uglow, analyst]

Yes, I can. Just on the margin bridge, Timo, the $703 million price volume boost, if you like, about 9%, can you just tell us and give us some kind of indication on price versus volume? And within that, I guess, a sort of general question for Bjorn, how are pricing conversations with customers? Are customers becoming more reluctant to take on these price increases? How is that going, particularly in electrification, but in general?

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

So why don't you start then Timo?

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Yes, sure. So in the bridge, we still have a bit more price than volume. So to you sort of semi-exact numbers, probably about $380 million is price and about $320 million is volume, and then there is a little bit of supply chain savings and that kind of stuff against that $100 million I spoke earlier, which was the cost increase in the call.

And when you look at the price, we have about 6% price. And out of that, maybe about 5% is carryover, but we still had also a bit positive price actually in Q1. So yes.

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

Yes. If we talk a little bit about pricing, as you know, we implemented our pricing strategy departments and divisions before actually we saw the inflation coming. And now we had it in place, so it actually helped us good. But I think the important thing with pricing is what we call value-based pricing. That is actually we deliver good value to our customers that we need to get paid for.

So I think that -- last year, we saw a lot of driven by cost increases, price increases. I think going forward, it will be more looking at where do we deliver the right value and we should get paid for that value. So it will be much more different between different segments and different markets. So when you see the price increases of the 6% in the first quarter, there is, of course, a lot of overflow from last year. So when we look at the cost structure, commodities, logistics and so on, that has, of course, gone down dramatically. So we don't see these cost increases as we did last year. But the important thing is actually the gross margin. And we follow it. The divisions follow it, and I think that's the security for delivering good performance also in the future.

Do you want to add anything?

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Well, as you hoped in the gross margins, we had very good gross profit productivity. We have spoken about that measure earlier.

So happy that, that also is moving to the right direction. We actually didn't have that much headcount increase and the gross profit has improved significantly.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Thank you, and we'll open up for another question from the conference call, and we have Daniela on the line, I hope. Daniela are you there?

[Daniela Costa, analyst]

Actually, I was following up on some of the last comments. But I mean, when we look at sort of like margins at 16% ahead of your medium-term targets, clearly like gross margin in the near term and price cost mix very favorable. You've been clear about that. But can you talk about like is this more you see it sort of at more of a structural level, sort of if price is now 1% on orders, when the price cost normalizes, sort of what can we look up to have compensating for that and allowing to keep this high margin going forward?

Do you still have many businesses under percentage of business under margin focus like you used to give that figure. Maybe you can articulate how can we look up to this as more sustainable beyond the pricing.

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

Yes. I mean, when we saw a lot of the divisions delivering good performance. And it's very simple in ABB, you add the divisions together and if the divisions are doing well, we also do good as a group. I think there is, in every division, a lot of work, and you know the stability, profitability growth. Still we have around 30%, maybe a little bit, 30%, 35% of the divisions that have a margin improvement mandate, so driving profitability. And then you have about 70% driving growth.

So more and more divisions are moving over to that. But we also saw some of the very high performers who have a growth mandate that also improved their margin. I think it's important. And I think I said this already in 2020, ABB is a company that should be operating above 15%. And I think that is the part.

And then, of course, we said that 15% is an intermediate target. So we will, of course, continue to drive performance in the different businesses as well as more and more focus on really growth. And then we're talking organic as well as inorganic. So yes, I see there is a good potential in this company to grow. But this, of course, varies also over business cycles. But when we say over 15%, we mean over a business cycle. And I think we are coming up to levels where this company should be. And as you all know, this is very much in line with the best-in-class in the market.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Okay. And we'll take another question here from the online option. And they are asking to elaborate a bit more on the $170 million-ish investments in the U.S. And if at all, the link to the -- all right. Thank you.

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

I think we talked quite a lot about dynamics in growth opportunities in the market. And U.S., as you've seen, has been very strong. And there have been numerous incentive packages that have been electrifying America, the IRA Act, but also on the semiconductor today. So quite big dynamic in that part.

At the same time, as a group, we have said that we want to be local even if we are a global company, meaning that we want to be more and more self-sufficient in the different areas. China, we are around 95%; in Europe, it's more or less 100%. And in U.S., we were around 80%. So we are building up our production capacities in that market also, but also to be in line with what's requested in the IRA Act.

You need to produce, you need to source it from the local market also to qualify for those subsidies that are being planned. So it's a good market in U.S. and the divisions have felt that they need to strengthen up and that's what's happening and that's why we do the investment there. Anything you'd like to add on that?

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Well, maybe just that, of course, these megatrends, what Bjorn was talking about, on energy security and energy transition, and also automation, in a way that people are, as Bjorn was discussing, India, looking to diversify their sort of manufacturing bases. So these are strong trends for us. And in that sense, we upped our revenue for the full year now. And we would still, given these trends and taking everything into account, expect at the moment, we are standing here to have a positive book-to-bill also for the year. So maybe that to add because U.S. is, of course, a big part of that.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Okay. And we have a follow-up question from Sebastian at RBC. Your line should be open, Sebastian.

[Sebastian Kuenne, analyst]

I have further question on the profitability of robotics. You had these troubles in China in the production last year, and that, of course, helps now in the revenue recognition and operating leverage. But I was wondering if you also produced large amount of components into your own inventory. So you couldn't deliver them, but you had them in your inventory. Which would then potentially lead to better margin when you sell it out, because you don't have certain costs associated with those inventory sell-through. So my question is, is there some inventory destocking effect that would have supported the margin, or is the margin that we see a true margin in Robotics now.

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

Thank you for the question. This lies very close to my heart, so I think I'll take this question. very clearly here, I mean, we've been saying, when it comes to the robotics, this should be 15% market and grows 10% per year. That's what we think that this business should be. And I think we've done a good job now in working up the margin from, of course, a very difficult last year because of supply chain issues and so on, but I think we are coming up to the levels where we need to go. We also see good demand in the market. I'd like to underline that even if it looks, at the first sight, minus 20%, it's still the second or third best robotic quarter in orders, so $1 billion is a good number.

When you look at the margin there, one of the things we've been quite transparent with is that the gross margin in the robotics have continuously increased. And we are seeing that gross margin now going through to the EBITDA margin. They have been able to keep that costs under control, and that means that the gross margin will actually come down into that. There is nothing from releasing robotics, but more than you can say, the 35% growth compared to last year, that is a very high number. But that is still book-to-bill ratio, meaning the $1 billion order is actually higher than what we put out in revenues.

So lastly, we were hampered by not getting out the margin. Now we are getting out the margin from what we are invoicing. And I think the levels we see in invoicing is what we should at least for a couple of quarters also see. So there was no special release. I think this is the level where they are at the moment.

A little bit on robotic also. I mean when you look at the automotive, you look at general industry, you look at some of the other segments. And you know the strategy which they have been implementing here during the last 2 years is to move away from low-margin automotive industry, especially from the system side, and focus more the general industry side, where you see significantly higher margin.

And I think that is also coming through in the gross margin of the business. So overall, I think the performance is in line with the expectations, but also where they want to come.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

And we should have a question from James at Redburn.

[James Moore, analyst]

So I got cut off for a bit. So I hope I'm not covering old ground. But a question on orders, if I could, please. The $9.45 billion is a record quarter if you strip out grid, which I think it's pretty remarkable to be up year-on-year when a year ago was the pre-buy quarter on raw materials or supply chain profits. So I guess now that the supply chain is easing and raw materials are lower, one could argue this is more of a more normal quarter. So I guess just really is this a normalized number because it's 33% above the $7 billion you were doing in the 2 years pre-COVID. And when you look at the kind of tender pipe and the customer conversations at the moment, do you think we can be stable from here or grow from here or further normalize?

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

Thank you for the question. Maybe I can take it. I think, first, I must say that when we went into this quarter, we were a little bit cautious because we really didn't know where the market was going. But we've actually been seeing a strong market actually from January all the way to March. So it's been very consistent strength during this quarter. So even though we're growing 22%, the book-to-bill is 1.2%. So it is a very high one.

I think it's difficult to say if this is going to hold on in the future. The only thing we can say after 2 weeks, which is a very, very short time in Q2 that the market are still keeping up, but I think it's a little bit too early. But we do expect, even though we see in the full year at least 10% growth, a book-to-bill ratio that is above 1, which gives a certain indication that we do expect markets to be reasonably good also in the coming quarters.

You want to add something?

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Maybe just on Q2 that we, of course, have also a very high comp on Q2. So we had 20% order growth last year. And this quarter, we had also quite a few large orders.

So of course, the 9% includes quite a bit of large orders. But even if you take those out, the so-called base order growth was 3% in Q1. So let's see where we land up in Q2.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

And we have a question from Lars at Barclays.

[Lars Brorson, analyst]

I was really just going to follow up, Bjorn, on the commentary around industrial short-cycle trends, particularly in RA. You called out some channel destocking in China, which I gather is primarily in your robotics business. Are we at the end of that? Or do you see more sort of channel reset there? I appreciate your earlier comment around sort of quarter positive commentary in China. But key note to where you see the channel inventories sit at this stage.

And also on the automation side, B&R, you're not calling out prebuy, and are we now sort of more normalized? And maybe if I can briefly, just on the North American side, a bit more concern there, I would say, currently around the short-cycle trends. Can you comment a bit about what you see as far as sort of potential inventory destocking and short-cycle trends in the North American market?

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

Yes. I think we mentioned in the previous quarter that we saw some destocking around some of our customers also in certain markets like China, but also in distributors in the electrification. So yes, I mean if you look at the orders that we have seen in, so we actually see growth in all 3 business areas except from robotics, but that is, of course, exceptional comparables.

So yes, I think that is probably normalizing somewhat from that. I think from our perspective, we were also a little bit surprised that the market kept up on this high level. When you look at robotics and B&R, yes, I think on the B&R side, we have, of course, a huge order book. So I think they have, compared to any other businesses, the largest order book, and more or less everything that they are going to supply this year is already in the order book. So yes, I think there has been a lot of customers that preordered some of that prebuys.

Anything you would like to add or anything...

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Yes. Maybe on the destocking question. So that is naturally happening in the resi construction and that is one of the reasons where we see a little bit of that. It's totally understandable that when the supply chain eases on the shorter cycle business, you see a bit of destocking. But of course, we have taken how we see this into account in what Bjorn said about the full year book-to-bill and all that.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

And I think we finish this session up with a follow-up question from Ben at Morgan Stanley.

[Ben Uglow, analyst]

I really wanted to just go back -- and apologies for being pedantic, but go back on, I think it was Andy's question just about China. I think the point you were making, Bjorn, was that there was a year-over-year comp effect and also that the pickup, the improvement had not been strong post COVID and what we've seen in the West.

But when I look at the press release, it does say that customer activity slowed somewhat I believe after the New Year. My question is, are you actually seeing, post New Year, any sort of significant pickup in China. So if we think about sequential demand in electrification and the other businesses between March and April, is it fair for us to assume that China is getting better now?

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

I think it's a good question. I mean when we talked last time, I said that maybe we see an upside in China to get some of that really big increase that we saw in the Western world when COVID was out. We have not seen that big one. On the other hand, if you look at orders in the 3 different months, March was very strong. So it picked up quite good in China there. And talking with our businesses and the general mood, we are quite optimistic about China going forward. But of course, we do not expect to see the same as we saw in U.S. and Europe, which was really a kick back in the market. So it will be probably a good market, but maybe not so dramatic as you saw in the Western world. So something like that.

[Ann-Sofie Nordh, executive]

Thank you. And with that we round up this session, and we'll see you in the summer. Thank you very much for joining us.

[Björn Klas Rosengren, executive]

Thank you. Bye-bye.

[Timo Ihamuotila, executive]

Thanks.