Xplora Technologies: Soft ARPU, good cost control - ABG
* Q1 EBITDA -35% vs cons on lower ARPU and Kids device sales * Doro Connect and XploraOne progressing well * Expect cons to cut '26 EBITDA by 5-7%, share to follow
ANNONS
EBITDA NOK 28m, -35% vs cons
Revenue was NOK 376m, -3% below FactSet cons of NOK 387m (+2% vs. ABGSCe NOK 370m). Gross margin was 54.3%, -2.6pp vs ABGSCe of 56.9% and -2.3pp vs cons at 56.6%. Opex was NOK 176m, +5% above ABGSCe of NOK 168m and in line with cons of NOK 176m. This is an increase of only 8% y-o-y which shows good cost control in our view. This gave an EBITDA of NOK 28m, 35% below cons and ABGSCe of NOK 43m, corresponding to an EBITDA margin of 7.4% vs. 5.2% in Q1'25. The miss was primarily driven by lower ARPU and lower device revenue in Kids & Youth. Capex was NOK -9m (ABGSCe NOK -12m), resulting in adj. EBITDA-capex of NOK 19m, -39% below ABGSCe of NOK 31m.
Service revenue soft, -5% below ABGSCe
Total device revenue was NOK 284m, 4% above ABGSCe of NOK 273m. Kids & Youth device sales of NOK 40m was -24% below ABGSCe, and Senior device sales (Doro) of NOK 244m was +11% above ABGSCe. Watch activations was 93k in the quarter, which is higher than the units sales indicating that distributor inventories declined in the quarter. Kids & Youth service revenue was NOK 92m, -5% below ABGSCe of NOK 97m, corresponding to a growth of +15% y-o-y. Number of Kids subscriptions ended at 474k as pre-announced, of which 299k were Connectivity (ABGSCe 296k), 125k were Premium (ABGSCe 117k), 32k were B2B (ABGSCe 33k), and 18k were Service fee (ABGSCe 16k). However, the ARPU continued to decline and this quarter came in at NOK 65/month vs. ABGSCe at NOK 69, which is a 7% decline compared to NOK 74 in Q1'25. Some of this decline is due to FX and part of the decline is due to strong subscription growth in Germany where ARPU is lower.
Solid progress on Doro Connect and good launch for XploraOne
As of Q1 Doro Connect was live in Xplora's own webstores in 7 of Xplora's core markets, with the last two (Germany and Denmark) launching in April/May. It will be launched on Amazon in UK, France, Germany in Q3. And the first major retail launch with Power is also underway. Premium services for seniors is also progressing as planned, with soft launch in June and full launch expected in September. Additionally, the kids phone XploraOne was launched in Q1, and achieved 2k units sold during the quarter. This is a very promising start in our view.
Expect a 5-7% share underperformance today
Altough the Q1 miss vs consensus is quite large, it is important to keep in mind that Q1 is a relatively small quarter for Xplora. On the back of today's report we expect consensus to cut '26e EBITDA by 5-7% driven by lower ARPU. Thus we expect the share to to underperform by 5-7% today.
