Sandvik AB

STO:SAND

Earnings Call Transcript 2021-Q1

[Louise Tjeder, Head of Investor Relations & VP]

Hello everyone, and a warm welcome to Sandvik's presentation of the first quarter results 2021. My name is Louise Tjeder, Head of Investor Relations. And beside me, we have our CEO, Stefan Widing; and CFO, Tomas Eliasson. We will, as usual, start with the presentation, where Stefan and Tomas will take you through the highlights of this quarter, and then we move on to the Q&A session. [Operator Instructions] And with this, it's time to kick off the presentation and over to you, Stefan.

[Stefan Widing]

Thank you, Louise. And welcome also from my side to Sandvik's first quarter report in 2021. I will come back to a version of the picture you see in front of you here right now. This is our Top Hammer XL, surface drill system based on the Pantera DP1600i rig that we launched in the quarter, and it is one of the contributing factors to that our surface drilling division had an all-time high order intake in the quarter. But let's start with the big picture. We have a positive momentum in the business with a broad-based improvement across most of our segments. We had a very strong order intake of plus 12% versus last year. We see a positive momentum in both the mining and construction segments, which are at a record high order intake in this quarter. We also see continued improvement in our short-cycle segments, driven by automotive and general engineering, in particular, but also several of the short-cycle businesses in SMT. Demand in aerospace and energy segments continue to be low, but we started to see some signs of improvements in oil and gas towards the latter half of the quarter. We also delivered a strong earnings in this quarter. Adjusted operating profit margin of 19.2% versus 15.8% last year. Our rolling 12-month EBIT margin is at 17.6% versus 17.9% in the same period of last year. So this means that after 12 months of COVID, we have an average margin that is almost the same as the 12 months prior to COVID and that is something we are very proud of in the company. Of course, this is supported by good savings, and Tomas will talk more about that in his part of the presentation. This is also the first quarter that we present Sandvik Rock Processing Solutions and Sandvik Mining and Rock Solutions at two separate BAs. It's been a huge effort by the team to make that happen, make the separation while also keeping focus on customers in a time of record high order intake, but they have done that in a very good way. So we are happy that we have done that now. In this quarter, we have also launched a new company purpose and an updated strategy for 2025. So we continue also to focus on long-term improvements for the group. If you follow us closely, you have most likely already seen our updated strategy. It is in the annual report. You can also find quite a lot of material on our website, home.sandvik. We have a new purpose, as you see in the middle of this circle, we make the shift advancing the world through engineering. We have reinforced our core values, customer focus, innovation, fair play and passion to win. And we have added or refined 6 strategic objectives in the outer circle that the whole group will focus on going forward. We have 3 foundational transformational shifts, shift to growth, the digital shift and sustainability shift. We have three more foundational objectives related to be the employer of choice, our customers' first choice and to be agile through the cycle. For each of these, we have also defined concrete targets where we aim to be in 2025 to ensure that we drive also good strategy execution. I talked about the Top Hammer XL, which is a new product we launched in the quarter. Here, we are essentially taking the top hammer drilling technology and make sure that it can be used also for larger hole diameters, where you usually in the past and have had to use down the hole drilling. This means higher efficiency, up to 50% better fuel efficiency and up to 20% higher productivity. So a really great innovation from the surface drilling team here. And it's not only the new drill rig, it's also a new rock drill and new rock tools that goes with it. So something we look forward to see what it can do in the market going forward. The start in Q1 has been encouraging. Looking then at the market development and starting with our main regions, Europe, minus 1; and North America, plus 5. These numbers would have been plus 5 and plus 7, if we take away the major orders we had in SMT oil and gas last year. So the underlying development shows a strong momentum here. Asia, plus 26%. Here, China is plus 23%. And for SMS, China is plus 11%. And last year, China was minus 1% for SMS. They were not that much impacted by COVID in the quarter as a whole, so strong underlying performance there in China. And then the rest of the regions are very much driven by the high order intake in the mining side. Looking at the segments. Strong year-over-year improvement in mining, clearly. General engineering are now back at the same level, maybe slightly above last year, which we are happy with also here, we were not that much impacted by COVID in Q1 of last year. So this is positive. Automotive is strong, continued sequential improvement and high single-digit improvement versus last year. So strong underlying demand there. Energy, as I said, still at the low level versus last year. We started to see towards the second half of the quarter increased customer activity on the oil and gas side, and we booked a few smaller orders on the umbilical side also towards the end of the quarter. So we see things picking up there, promising signs. Construction, strong order intake in the quarter, but the underlying demand we still consider to be more or less on par with last year, where we had some impact coming from COVID. Aerospace, again, not much of an improvement. I would say it's the only segment now where we're still waiting for things to start to pick up. We see promising data from customers and travel, but is not yet visible in our order books. And this also translates to why some specific countries are maybe a little bit weaker. Sequentially, mining continues at a very high level. Engineering -- general engineering is going up versus Q4. Automotive continues to strengthen versus Q4. Energy and aerospace, as I said, staying at a fairly low level then and construction improving. From a regional perspective, all regions are improving sequentially versus Q4. Order intake, then plus 12%, close to SEK 26 billion in the quarter. Revenues, trailing a little bit at plus 1%. But obviously, looking forward to converting that order intake also into sales here going forward. EBIT development, strong, almost SEK 4.2 billion in the quarter, plus 12%, operating profit year-over-year, a margin of 19.2%. Would have been 18.7% versus 16.6%, if we exclude metal prices in SMT. We have a headwind from currency of around 30 basis points in this. But yes, a very strong operating leverage based on just how the math plays out here. Good savings and again, good rolling 12 months level. Going now into the various business areas and starting with Mining and Rock Solutions. Order intake, up 36% year-over-year to all-time high level. We had several divisions, load and haul, underground and surface drilling that are all at an all-time high level. And we also booked some larger orders in the quarter. You should note that we have lowered the limit for what we call a major order from SEK 400 million to SEK 200 million, so it might show up a little bit more frequently on this list going forward. Revenues trailing a bit. Of course, there are lead times in this business to translate the order intake into revenues, but still up 8%. And a strong margin of 20.5% in a quarter that is seasonally, traditionally weaker for Mining and Rock Solutions. So this is an all-time high margin for Q1 for them. Then we have, of course, DSI. The DSI acquisition is progressing. We have received some good regulatory approvals in the quarter. The process is moving ahead. Might close end of Q2, might also slip into Q3, but sometime around midyear, we expect it to close. Sandvik Rock Processing Solutions, I mean, really happy. The first time we report this externally. They have a fantastic quarter. Order intake, up 28%; revenues up 19%; profit up 36%. Seasonally, typically weak Q1, and they still deliver 16.4% EBIT margin, which is very good, I think. Here, the order intake is split into both strong equipment and strong aftermarket. Aftermarket, up 22%, is partly improved then by catch-up effects from last year. We can see in the mix that it's a high portion of spare parts, which indicates that some customers were running the equipment maybe a little bit longer. We also see in some of the businesses like on the mobile side, customers placing larger orders to secure deliveries in the future since we have had very strong order intake in some of those businesses. The strong margin is, of course, driven by the revenue increase, but also that they had an A&S spend that is maybe slightly lower than we expect them to have going forward. Shifting to Manufacturing and Machining Solutions, happy to see that they are back on par with last year on the order side. Revenues are trailing a little bit, as we have seen in the past quarters, which is normal in an upturn. If we dissect the order intake a little bit, we also have a strong order intake in Wolfram, the powder business, which is a very good leading indicator. Wolfram is helping the order intake with about 200 basis points. On the other hand, we have a similar negative impact from working days. So the underlying order intake rate for the quarter is flat if we compensate for both of those factors. Really happy with the margin here, 22.9%, despite a 3% drop on the topline and a good impact from structural savings programs here. Also, here, we are launching new products. I'm happy with the first product we are launching with what we call the data matrix. Here, we have put a QR code that is unique on each insert, so we can track and trace each individual insert in the production facility, which is important in, for example, aerospace. We can also attach specific data to each insert that will, ultimately, help also with productivity. So it's a first launch. I'm excited about what the technology will bring going forward. SMT, finally, minus 13% on order and revenues. If we exclude the major orders in Q1 last year in oil and gas, they are up 3%, excluding those. I would say, if we exclude the oil and gas and aerospace, all of their other businesses see a strong momentum, in industrial heating, consumer-related segments, in strip application tubing and so on, are all doing very well. Also happy with the margin, 7.5%, if we exclude metal prices versus 9% last year. Some of you ask from time to time what SMT would do without umbilicals. We can say that invoicing for umbilicals has been very low in the quarter. So this is a good answer to that question. As I also mentioned, we did see activity picking up in oil and gas towards the end of the quarter. Pipeline is growing, and we took some first smaller orders. When this will translate into a more noticeable improvement, that remains to be seen. But at least we see activity levels picking up. The process for the listing is continuing according to plan. A big workload for the team to conclude on those activities, but we are progressing according to plan, which is to proceed with a listing then in 2022, as previously communicated. I will come back at the end. Now I hand over to Tomas for a while.

[Tomas Eliasson, Executive VP & CFO]

Thank you, Stefan. So let's jump into the numbers and start with the financial summary as usual. If you look at the upper right-hand corner, you can see the components of the growth, everything included, 12% organically for orders and 1% organically for revenues. We have quite a heavy headwind when it comes to currency, so minus 9% for both, giving a total growth of plus 2% for orders and minus 8% for revenues. If we then walk down the income statement, the operating earnings adjusted 12% up, SEK 4.2 billion, and really nice margin improvement from SEK 15.8 million to SEK 19.2 million. The financial -- net financial items came down. We will come back to a specification on that. Tax rate also looking good, but we'll come back to specification on that. Working capital, below 25%. So let's start with the margin and look at the bridge here. And of course, if we start with the organic development, price, volume, productivity, the leverage looks a little bit off, plus 288%. But I mean, the top line number is very low, plus SEK 227 million, that's 1%. And then earnings, up SEK 654 million, that gives you a leverage of 288%. Now the question here is what is behind this development, apart from a good operational efficiency and financial performance. Well, it's the savings, of course, the savings programs. So let's go immediately to that analysis here now. And here, we have an update of all the savings programs, same format as you have seen over the last 4 quarters. And we can see here that we have both permanent savings, that's the first section, and we have temporary savings, that's the second section. And the way this works is that on the permanent side, we have the program from mid-2019, which is still giving a tail of year-over-year effects, a total of SEK 70 million in this quarter. Then we have the new program that we have worked on through all of 2020, volume-related and structure-related savings programs that gave SEK 125 million, together, close to SEK 200 million. Then on the temporary savings, as you might recall, we've had like SEK 500 million, SEK 600 million on both work time reduction and other temporary savings, which is basically discretionary spending. Work time -- short-term working weeks or work time reduction came down in the fourth quarter, as many of our businesses went back to full time. And this time, you can see that work time reduction has gone down to 60. It's mainly a part of SMM and mainly in Germany, which is still on short-term working weeks. The discretionary spend is just below SEK 300 million, so that is coming down as well. Some traveling has increased or started, mainly within the countries -- within the big countries like Canada and the U.S. and Australia and so on. International travel is still restricted. So all in all, SEK 550 million in the quarter. And the game plan for this has always been that in 2021, temporary savings will go down, and they are coming down as volumes are picking up. And they will be partially replaced by temporary savings, especially the program from 2020 will continue to increase in speed during the year. And then in between, we have a business cycle recovery. So those are the three buckets on the road going forward. So let's move on and look at the finance net. Look at the first line here, which is the important one here. The interest net is SEK 90 million compared to SEK 126 million a year ago. We have a lower debt. We have paid back some of the bonds during the year. So all looking good. The guidance here is below SEK 400 million for the full year. We have that in sight. The tax rate, we have guided 22% to 24%. We came in on 20.7% in the quarter, excluding items affecting comparability. It was a capital gain, which we took out from adjusted earnings, but we have an accounting correction in the quarter as well on the tax side. So if you adjust for that, we have a normalized tax rate of 22.4%. So we're still within the range. Moving forward, we can say that we don't foresee any changes really in the range, so this is probably the bottom of where the tax rate will be. It has come down from 27%, 28% 5 years ago, now to these levels here, and this is what we see, unless something happens, unless some big countries will start to increase income tax rates for corporations. But we don't know anything about that right now. Going over to the balance sheet, working capital. Of course, working capital is lower than a year ago, as you can see in the graph on the left-hand side, driven by the volume reduction or the volume decline during 2020. But sequentially, it is picking up. And of course, as order intake picks up and the activity level goes up, working capital will go up as well. You can see on the right-hand side that 3 of the 4 business areas have a higher relative number, of course, building up for deliveries in the second quarter and during the summer. However, SMM, as you can see, is actually going down in relative numbers, but that's not intentional. We need to build inventories in SMM as well to secure stock availability as well. It's just that the sales was a bit better than we had planned for. So production didn't keep up really. Okay. Next slide, the cash flow. Cash flow came in good. If you look at the right-hand side here, 4.9 -- sorry, SEK 2.9 billion in the quarter compared to SEK 3.2 billion a year ago. And of course, as we are now in a business cycle recovery, we will see impacts here from working capital going forward. But I mean, we will still have a good cash flow. The net debt then with this good cash flow continues to improve. We are in net cash position, including pensions and leases, the gearing is negative 0.02. If you take out pensions and leases, we are -- we have a financial net cash position of SEK 10.7 billion. All right. Let's look at some of the guidance. Look at underlying currency effects. We guided for SEK 750 million negative. We came in at minus SEK 789 million. So basically, it's spot on. This is translation and transaction effects. Then if you add the revaluation differences here in a bridge way, which ended at minus SEK 483 million. And this is mainly due to a big negative revaluation effect in Q1 a year ago. The in-quarter revaluation effect in Q1 2021 was very limited. So this is just a reversal of that negative effect a year ago. Metal prices guided for plus SEK 60 million. We came in at plus SEK 119 million. This is mainly driven by nickel. CapEx, SEK 0.8 billion. Interest net, as you heard, SEK 0.1 billion. And the underlying tax rate, 20.7%, but a bit more than 22%, if you adjust for the accounting correction. Guidance for the second quarter 2021 and full year, we have not changed the CapEx guidance. We still say below SEK 4 billion. Currency for the second quarter, just taking the exchange rate by the end of March 2021. We see mathematically that it will be SEK 350 million negative, but then you never know where the currencies will go. But if you just use that, those rates, this is what you get. Metal prices plus SEK 50 million in the second quarter. And interest net, well, SEK 400 million or below, as we said. And the tax rate sticks 22% to 24%. And with that, I'll hand back to Stefan for summary and conclusions.

[Stefan Widing]

Thank you, Tomas. Yes. So we -- as we said, we see a positive momentum, good growth in our mining and in the construction segment. I mean equipment orders up 88%. Aftermarket, up 9% in mining, as an example, is, I think, shows the strength there. We see a gradual improvement also in the short-cycle businesses. They continue to improve sequentially. Automotive now also in growth year-over-year, general engineering back at prior year levels. Solid results with significantly stronger margins, despite a revenue increase of 1%. We also see underlying market conditions continuing to improve. I mean commodity prices are at a good level, and the global industry production trends are also showing a positive trajectory. We do expect to have to manage some challenges on the supply chain side. We have not seen any impact from, for example, semiconductor shortages in our business. We will see what happens going forward. But at this point, we have not. We expect our own supply chain to be a bit constrained given the high order intake levels we see in some of the businesses. So it's something we will have to manage. So far, we have done it in a good way, I think. We'll continue to focus on this operational efficiency and, of course, continued agility to adopt to whatever happens here going forward. I'm also happy that we are not just focusing on the short-term operational performance, we are also setting the scene for a continued sustainable growth journey. We have launched a new purpose, a new updated strategy for 2025. We have the new group structure implemented. We are proceeding with SMT process aiming for 2022. We see good speed in terms of new innovations and product launches, and there is a good organizational commitment to the strategic objectives we have launched, for example, our M&A agenda. So overall, I think we are positive with regards to the future. Thank you for listening, and let's go to Q&A.

[Louise Tjeder, Head of Investor Relations & VP]

Thank you, Stefan, and Tomas. So we will now open up the Q&A session. So we can take the first question from the call. Please, operator.

[Operator]

The first question comes from the line of Max Yates from Crédit Suisse.

[Max Yates, Research Analyst]

Just my first question was around the mining businesses. And I wanted to understand a little bit more around the equipment orders. Do you think this was mining companies coming back and replacing equipment that maybe they didn't do last year? Or are you seeing a much larger sort of pickup in expansions and larger sort of brownfield spending? And maybe as an extension of that, how should we think about this level of order intake when you think about your large order pipeline? Is this level sustainable or does it feel like there was a bit of a catch-up in the end market in Q1?

[Stefan Widing]

If we start with sort of the type of projects, it's about 30% replacement, 45% brownfield and the rest greenfield. So that's how the mix is looking like. I mean, if we have a record high order intake, as we had this quarter, I think, eventually, the growth rates will come down, of course. That's not sustainable. The CapEx guidance from both major and smaller mining companies that are relevant for us are positive going forward, both for '21 and '22. But yes, we expect a good order intake to continue, but not at the levels that we saw in this quarter in terms of 88% growth. That is not sustainable, I think.

[Max Yates, Research Analyst]

Okay. And just my second question was around the strategy on Rock Processing, maybe now it's a sort of stand-alone division. Could you just give us a feel for what, in your mind, the real sort of priorities for this division are? Is it margin expansion story? Is it to really go out there and kind of capture growth? Or do you potentially see sort of down the line this as something that you may think about sort of its future in the context of the Sandvik portfolio. Maybe if you could just talk about sort of what the priorities are for that division?

[Stefan Widing]

I mean we're always looking for a little bit better margins. But I think when they are about 16%, they are about the level that their market is sort of supporting, doesn't mean that they cannot go a bit higher than that. But I think then they are well performing, if you put it like that. We see this as an opportunity to add growth to the group. It's not a super big business, but it's sizable enough. If they can grow as we have communicated them faster than twice the pace of the market, we think it will be a good addition to the overall growth of the group.

[Operator]

And the next question comes from the line of Lars Brorson from Barclays.

[Lars Wauvert Brorson, Director]

Two questions, if I can. One on SMM and one on cost savings. Just on SMM, Stefan, you've seen strong sequential improvement, I guess, low mid-single-digit in April versus the first quarter. Normal seasonality, I think, is sort of roughly flat Q2 versus Q1. Can you talk a little about how sustainable you think that sequential development is, particularly in light of potential customer inventory restocking in light of some supply chain disruption among your customers. I guess, U.S. is your most indirect market. I'm curious what you see there, U.S. or North America seems a bit soft to me still, asking, of course, with weaker end markets, but I wonder what you're seeing from an inventory restocking standpoint?

[Stefan Widing]

Yes. I -- let me comment on North America. I think it's a good observation. I mean, it's still for SMM then down in the high single digits in the quarter. But in March, it was up in the high single digits. So we saw a significant improvement in the U.S. or North America in March. So I think that was good to see, I think, because they have been lagging a little bit the rest of the world in terms of coming back. Now we know we have more oil and gas. We have more aerospace there, but still it was good to see them coming back in a good way in March. In terms of the beginning of April, as you say, we have said it has started sequentially then towards Q1, low single up to mid single digit improvement. I have said it before, and I say it again, please be very careful to draw too much conclusions from the first couple of weeks, especially this period. We have the Eastern moving a little bit back and forth. And even if the numbers we give are compensated for that, it is sort of daily rates. It's still difficult to really nail down what number you should put there. This is the best guidance we can give for how April has started with the data we have. We see, as we have said, not really an impact from the semiconductor shortages in our order intake, of course. We see that we have customers that have been impacted. But so far, we don't see that. And I'm speculating now, but it might very well be, as you are also a little bit alluding to that, of course. If you want to secure your supply chain going forward, you might keep the order level up a little bit when it comes to the cutting tools then. But that's what we can say at this point.

[Lars Wauvert Brorson, Director]

That's helpful color. And secondly, to maybe more to Tomas, on the temporary savings, Tomas. We're down from -- was it a little over SEK 700 million in the fourth quarter, now at SEK 355 million. I wonder whether you can give us a bit of color on the quarters ahead, particularly, it's good in the 2 mining divisions, I guess, we are down to very small work time reductions here. Presumably, that turns into overtime over the next few quarters. And more broadly, for 2021. I wonder whether you can give us sort of a sense of a net number from a cost saving standpoint as you see reversals of temporary cost savings, presumably either partly or completely offsetting the structural savings that are coming through in the SEK 1.3 billion program.

[Tomas Eliasson, Executive VP & CFO]

Well, I can try to put some color on it. I'm not sure I can give you all those numbers. But if we look at the short-term savings or the temporary savings, work time reduction will soon be gone, as you see in the table provided in the material. It's mainly SMM, which is doing that now. And nothing on mining. I mean, mining stopped it already in Q4 or late Q3 last year when the orders -- the order intake started to recover. But it will soon be gone for SMM as well. Other temporary savings came down from SEK 500 million to SEK 300 million from -- sequentially from Q4 to Q1. We don't have a specific guidance on that, but there will be a substantial contribution from that also moving forward until international travels opens up and we can start to travel freely and go to conferences and meet customers and do all of those things. But we don't have a number for it, et cetera. But it will continue to be there for a while. Then if we look at the permanent savings programs, the new program that we launched in a number of steps during 2020, the total full year run rate, annual run rate for that program is SEK 1.3 billion and more than SEK 1 billion will hit the income statement during 2021. And we had SEK 125 million in the first quarter. So the rest, you can basically spread out over Q2, Q3 and Q4 without giving any specifics, really. But then, of course, it all depends. It's all dependent on how the business cycle recovery goes. I mean if we -- if it continues, it would be like this. If it becomes a bit more troublesome who knows, then we have to do more again. I think that's all the guidance that we can give on this.

[Operator]

The next question comes from the line of Daniela Costa from Goldman Sachs.

[Daniela C. R. de Carvalho e Costa]

I want to ask on two things. The first one regarding -- I think you've emphasized that the CMD, a lot sort of more focus on moving SMM towards like metrology, and we've seen a couple of companies announcing they're out there for sale. I guess, we've seen a lot of other peers also flagging they're interested in metrology. Can you give us maybe a little bit of an update on how your pipeline looks at the moment and whether you're seeing more competition for us looking at? That's my first question. And on the second question, I wanted to just I follow-up on your commentary regarding the spin-off SMT and whether that would ultimately be conditional on any end market trends or that's definitely set for middle of next year, no matter what happens in terms of end market development?

[Stefan Widing]

I can start with SMT then. I mean, we have a clear plan, and that is to proceed towards a listing in 2022. Then we have caveated that with that the circumstances needs to be right at the time. We can just say that currently, we don't see anything that shows that it would not be possible to do this in 2022. I mean we see the margin in Q1. It's -- even without oil and gas. This is, I would say, a performing and stable company. The caveat we have put in there is, I mean, there are certain points in time, maybe March, April last year or some months during the financial crisis, where clearly, you would not want to list the company. So, yes. There are conditions for it, but currently, I think we are on track to do the listing next year as we have planned, provided that the shareholders approve it, of course. On metrology, yes, I mean, it's an area that, I think, has been consolidated for quite some time, maybe over a decade. So I don't think it's a surprise that there are other companies acquiring assets in this area. We -- our strategy is built on that we want to connect certain solutions to machining and design and planning earlier in the machining process or the additive process. We are not first time looking to become a broad generic metrology company. So yes, I think we continue on the path we have said. And at the moment, I don't see any obstacles to that, even though it's always going to be competition for -- when you do M&A.

[Operator]

The next question comes from the line of Maddy Singh from Bank of America.

[Madhvendra Singh, Research Analyst]

Just a couple of questions from my side as well. Firstly, on the mining business, obviously, very solid orders. So in terms of looking ahead, how is the pipeline looking? And in terms of -- especially in terms of large orders, if you could sense whether you probably going to have similar kind of large orders in the coming quarters as well? Or this quarter really is an exception? And also, how about greenfield trends, given the extent of spurred in the order momentum. Do you think there is a good scope for some pickup in greenfield side as well? And then secondly, on the SMS side, if you could talk about -- I understand the guidance on a quarter-on-quarter basis, but if you could also just explain how the trend exit rate rather was on a year-on-year basis? And what would you need to see for it to further accelerate, especially given that aerospace probably is going to take longer to recover. And when -- by when would you expect the order levels to reach, let's say, 2019 level and beyond or grow from that level?

[Stefan Widing]

Yes. I mean, if we start with the mining question, the pipeline -- the general pipeline is strong, and that's what we see. I mean, it's the second quarter in a row with very good order intake. How that will ultimately convert into orders going forward? We expect a strong performance, but I don't want to speculate in specific larger orders and so on. But, yes, the CapEx guidance from our customers is strong. We would expect it to continue at a good level. And in terms of specific projects, yes, there are also there, of course, some activity especially related to some minerals with very good prices currently. But I have no specific guidance there either. I think we have to go to our customers to ask those questions. For SMM, it's clear, as you say. Aerospace is still low. I mean, essentially, it's the same level as it was in the fall. For order trends to continue sequentially to improve -- sequentially I'm talking about now in SMS, we need to see general engineering to continue. I mean it's on par with prior year now. There should be a possibility for that to continue to improve. Automotive already at a good level. We'll see what that can bring. Then we need to see aerospace also starting to pick up. We see, of course, some delivery numbers improving among customers. We see some air travel statistics picking up, but I don't want to speculate on when that will start to hit our order books. I think we will start to see some sequential improvement eventually here, but exactly well, I don't know. But that is the last thing we need to eventually get back to growing beyond 2019 levels.

[Madhvendra Singh, Research Analyst]

And if you could contextualize the exit rate in terms of year-on-year trends? Are we in the growth already -- growth levels already?

[Stefan Widing]

The exit rates in March?

[Madhvendra Singh, Research Analyst]

Yes, you talked about low to mid-single-digit in April, right? So just wondering what does that mean in terms of year-on-year comparison?

[Stefan Widing]

Yes. But if we say that the quarter was flat from dailies. And now in April, we are up single -- low to mid-single digits, it would imply, of course, growth even compared to Q1 levels, yes.

[Tomas Eliasson, Executive VP & CFO]

And the next question comes from the line of Gael de-Bray from Deutsche Bank.

[Gael de-Bray]

If I try to compare SMM organic growth over the past couple of years to some of the other industrial companies we cover in the space in Europe, it seems that SMM has lagged the broader cap goods sector growth by nearly 20 points now over 2019, 2020 in total. So I understand this is largely related to mix effects given SMS exposure to aerospace and energy markets and also given its comparatively lower exposure to China, but my question is really about the catch-up potential from here. Do you think that SMM will be able to fully catch up the lost ground in the next couple of years, and therefore, outperform the sector growth? Or do you rather see some fundamental shift, structural changes in the tooling market that would prevent that from happening?

[Stefan Widing]

I don't see any fundamental shifts, as you described it. I mean, I cannot really relate to all the numbers you are referring to here since you compare to others, so to say. We tend to focus on ourselves, if you see what I mean. But I mean if you take just aerospace as an example. If it's down now in the region of 40%, and you weigh that with the exposure we have in aerospace, in SMM, you would immediately have, I guess, half of the gap you just mentioned here as an example. So when we look at automotive, now in Q1, for example, we have seen that we were lagging a little bit in end of Q3 and Q4 in our automotive figures versus automotive production. But on the other hand, we see that we are overshooting now in Q1. So quarter-by-quarter, there are these effects, but I don't see. If we look at each specific market that we are behind. So I can only see the mix impact in various segments in the way you describe it.

[Gael de-Bray]

So for you, it's just a question of mix. And the quick exercise you did for aerospace, can you perhaps do it too for the energy market and some of the other general engineering applications. Would that be possible?

[Stefan Widing]

Well, general engineering, I cannot break down further than just general engineering. And there, we are now flat year-over-year. And I don't know exactly what you would compare that with towards end market data or statistics, but that's where we are. For energy, we are down in the double digits in SMM. So you can do the same math there, you would get even closer to that gap you mentioned.

[Operator]

And the next question comes from the line of Rizk Maidi from Jefferies.

[Rizk Maidi, Equity Analyst]

I have a couple, please. So first of all, can you perhaps give us an indication of the order intake growth for the mining divisions? If you were to adjust for catch-up effects and pre-buys as well in the quarter, would be interested to see what the underlying growth there is in the mining side? Then secondly, I understand that from a supply chain constraint, you're not directly impacted by the semi chip shortages impacting the automotive production, but you talked about some supply chain contracts within your own factories. Can you perhaps just help us understand which components are where you see those sort of bottlenecks and which divisions are impacted? And then lastly, perhaps if you could just help us with the inventory changes and how that has impacted SMM's margin in the first quarter?

[Stefan Widing]

Yes. I'll take the first two. Maybe you can talk the last one? I cannot really give you a good number on what you call an underlying order intake in mining because it's not always -- I mean, we cannot always see what is a catch-up, what was a pre-order versus a normal order, if you see what I mean. So I think I have to pass on that. It's something we are also, of course, trying to understand, but I think trying to guess a number would just -- yes, it would just be speculation. So I think you, like us, will have to figure that out based on other fundamentals, I guess. On the component side, it is -- I mean, SMT and SMS, obviously, highly vertically integrated, no issues on the supply chain in that sense. Rock processing is also fairly integrated and not -- they have some raw material price impact that they are compensating with their own price adjustments, but really not that much of a constraint. So it is on Mining and Rock Solutions, where some of the larger ingoing components. You can have hydraulics, brake systems or engines and so on, where a quick ramp-up is causing some constraints in the supply chain. So far, it's being managed, and it's important to note that when we -- I mean, you have a 6 up to 9 months, maybe, lead time in these orders anyway. So we had already planned for the next half year in a sense. So it's a lot now to manage deliveries for Q4 and even Q1 of next year that the team is working on.

[Tomas Eliasson, Executive VP & CFO]

Should I do the production rates? Okay. Yes, of course. Production rates are going up for SMM, and it has a positive effect on the EBIT margin, 60 bps in the quarter. It's not really inventories straight up and down, it is how the production rates are moving up or down. And what happens is that you get over or under absorption. But right now, we get some over absorption. From increased production rates of 60 bps, and that translates to 20 bps for the full group. There's a little bit of a negative number for SMT here, but the total is 20 bps up for the group.

[Operator]

And the next question comes from the line of Joel Spungin from Berenberg.

[Joel Adam Spungin, Analyst]

Yes. Actually just continuation of Rizk's question actually. Just coming back on this point about what you were saying on rock processing and about whether there's been a catch up effect and the preordering. Could you maybe just elaborate about catch-up effect is that you need to rock processing on the aftermarket side? Or do you see it in SMR as well? And is it something that you would expect to continue as we go into Q2? And then again, on the preordering, I think you said it was on the mobile side specifically. Could you just elaborate about why it affected that business specifically?

[Stefan Widing]

Yes. We call it out for Rock Processing because they had an aftermarket growth of over 20%, and that is not sustainable. There, we want to call out that there is a catch-up effect. We see a high mix of spare parts, which typically indicates that they have been running the equipment for longer last year. And now they need to replace some spare parts. In Mining and Rock Solutions, maybe there is some catch-up on the -- but more marginal and the aftermarket growth there of 9%. It's not as uncommon in the situation that we are in. So I think it's primarily a comment for Rock Processing Solutions. There might be some in mining and rock as well. Then I forgot your last question, what was that?

[Joel Adam Spungin, Analyst]

It was just on the -- you mentioned the preordering on the cost side. Again, I was just wondering if you could elaborate a bit about what's going on there.

[Stefan Widing]

I mean, on the mobile crushers, we typically have a good order intake in Q1 as ordering for the construction season later in the year. And we had a very strong order intake there. And then typically, customers will see when they place an order that maybe the lead times are a bit longer than they had expected. And then typically, they might place a second order later in the year. And in some cases, now they might have come back and placed also that order now to secure a production slot, so to say within the timing that they wanted. So that's what we saw on the mobile side.

[Joel Adam Spungin, Analyst]

Okay. And then just one more very quickly. I was just wondering if you could not there some comments on the why it's about price increase. I was just wondering if you could elaborate a bit about what's going on with pricing and whether you're successfully offsetting the impact of any raw materials inflation?

[Stefan Widing]

Yes. SMT, of course, has pricing built into their surcharge, I mean, it's built into the system, so to say. So that's not a big factor when raw material prices change. SMS, I mean, we have our own powder business, not very much impacted. To the extent they are, they can offset it with price. They had a price realization in the quarter of 1.2% for the cutting tools, which I think is good under these circumstances. Both Mining and Rock processing have done price adjustments. In some divisions, they are going back now to do a second round, simply because they see cost inflation and they want to secure that we don't fill up the order backlog with sort of the wrong pricing. So at this point, we feel it's being managed in a good way. There might be some timing effect. Sometimes it works against you, sometimes it works for you in terms of when you can realize price versus when you get the price increases in through your supply chain, it depends on lead times and so on. But overall, I would say, over time, at this point, it is being offset in a reasonably good way.

[Louise Tjeder, Head of Investor Relations & VP]

Thank you. I think we end this with one last question from the web and it's from William Mackie at Kepler Cheuvreux. He's wondering the Wolfram had a 200 bps impact on the order intake. Could you give some color on the actual growth?

[Stefan Widing]

Yes, it's -- if you do the math there, I think you can probably do the math, more or less, but it's almost triple digits. Is what you could say. I mean, very, very high double-digit growth, which is fairly typical. I mean, we see it also in our additive business on the powder side where the market is picking up, and you want to secure deliveries of the powder. So it -- and it's early in the supply chain, so everyone want to protect their supply so you get this bullwhip effect with very high orders coming in.

[Louise Tjeder, Head of Investor Relations & VP]

Thank you. And with this, we close the Q&A session, and we also conclude this hour with saying thank you for calling in and for your questions and wish you a nice afternoon.