Fastned B.V. Aktie

Hello, and welcome to the Fastned Half Year 2026 Results Conference Call. [Operator Instructions]

I will now hand the word over to your speakers. Please go ahead.

Thank you, operator, and a very warm welcome to everyone joining this call as well as to those listening in via our webcast. You can find a copy of the presentation used during this call on our Investor Relations website at ir.fastnedcharging.com.

As always, I'd like to use the cover slide to show something I'm genuinely proud of. This quarter, it is the big difference our drive-thru stations make for caravan owners driving towards their holiday destinations.

The summer months are when people drive long distances. That is exactly when fast charging matters most. And it is also the season when a lot of people put a caravan or trailer behind their car. So those things arrive together and they arrive at our stations.

At Fastned, wherever we possibly can, we build our stations drive-thru, a deliberate choice to put ease of use for our customers first. You drive in, you plug in and you charge. The caravan never leaves the car. Just think about it how different this is when needing to unhitch the caravan when charging elsewhere. And this is just one example of where our work over the past decade on the best charging concept pays off. Drivers who know what a Fastned stop is like choose us on purpose. That preference is what makes our sales grow faster than the market.

Before we start, I'd like to draw your attention to the disclaimer on Slide 2, which applies to the entire presentation, including any forward-looking statements we may make today. And with that done, let's go on to Slide 3.

Let's start with a quick introduction. My name is Michiel Langezaal. I'm the CEO and one of the founders of Fastned. Remco Samuels, our Interim CFO, is with me on this call today. And together, we will present this webcast.

About today's agenda, we have a great half year to talk about, and I will start with the highlights. As always, we will take a look at the electric vehicle market and therefore, our charging market, how it has developed. And as you know, there is a lot happening right now, high oil prices, the conflict around the Strait of Hormuz and Europe accelerating its electrification plans.

After that, I will give an update on the business, discussing the progress made in acquiring new locations and how scaling up our build pace is developing. I will also update you on our commercial initiatives and on the work we're doing on organizational efficiency.

Following this, Remco will take you through the financial results for the first half of 2026, which we also published this morning in our interim report. And as always, we will update you on our station economics. And we will close with our guidance and outlook for the rest of 2026, where I can already tell you Remco has a nice update for you.

After our presentation, we'll be happy to answer your questions. If possible, please limit them to 2 questions per analyst so we can give everybody the opportunity. We've scheduled this call to last for 1 hour. So let's get started.

Moving to Slide 4, the highlights. And let me start with the big one, one I've really been looking forward to presenting to you. Over the past few years, we've scaled the organization and took on the costs of putting Fastned at the time, a leading Dutch charging company on a pan-European growth plan. And the question we regularly got on calls like this was, when does revenue and EBITDA start to grow faster than the cost base? [Foreign Language] as we say in Dutch. The country teams, the construction managers, the permitting specialists, the local leadership, you pay for all of that for years before it earns anything back. There was never a detour from the plan that was the plan. And well, this is it.

Underlying company EBITDA for the first half, EUR 13.7 million against EUR 1.4 million in the same period last year. Operational EBITDA, EUR 37.4 million, more than double that of last year. We have reached the final phase of our initial scale-up plan. Hiring against it is leveling off. Revenue is doing what it is doing, continuing to grow fast, and we're working hard to grow it even faster. And the gap between those 2 lines is now opening up rapidly. This is a trend we expect to continue.

Now, let me take you through the rest of our numbers. We delivered 56 gigawatt hours of electricity in the second quarter, up 44% year-on-year. Over the first half, that is 112 gigawatt hours, up 38%. And in the same period, the electric car fleet across our markets grew by 30%. So once again, we grew faster than the market we operate in. We handled 2 million charging sessions in the quarter, up 41%.

Note the relationship between those 2 numbers. Sessions up 41%, energy up 44%. So the sessions are getting bigger. Batteries are getting bigger, cars charge faster and drivers take on more energy per stop.

Higher charge speeds means that next to time-based utilization growing, also power utilization of our assets is improving. Gross profit was up 59% at EUR 0.60 per kilowatt hour against EUR 0.54 a year ago. So volume up and margin up at the same time. We are not buying volume growth with discounts. That combination, volume outgrowing the market, margin expanding and a cost base that has stopped chasing it is what produces accelerating EBITDA numbers.

We ended the quarter with 434 stations operational. We acquired a record number of new high-traffic locations in the quarter. More about this later.

Our cash position at the end of June was EUR 100 million, showing a continuous strong cash position supporting our growth ambitions. And then the last figure on the slide, CO2 avoided. In this quarter alone, we avoided 51,000 tonnes of CO2 equivalent, up 44%. This is why Fastned was founded, building a network and charging business that operates a charging network that allows people to make the switch to owning an EV and curbing CO2 emissions while creating new valuable industry.

For the past few years, investing with an eye on curbing climate change and avoiding CO2 emissions was often dismissed as idealistic or even woke. Well, look at Europe this summer. This year-to-date, 0.5 million hectares of forest burned down across Europe. Heat, drought, fire, all of them are showing record numbers impacting our economies, and that cost is not small. Triodos Bank estimated the potential output loss at around EUR 180 billion.

At the same time, electrification has stopped being an ideological position. This summer, it is heat, fire and drought. A few months ago, it was an oil crisis and our sovereignty. The EU now has so many reasons to get off fossil fuels faster. That is the context of its electrification action plan, which the commission published just 3 weeks ago with the stated ambition of making Europe the world's first electro-powered continent.

Moving to Slide 5. And it is not only policymakers that are moving. Consumers and businesses are moving as well and electric vehicle sales are accelerating. But let's be clear, our market is not just electric cars sold. It is the total number of electric cars on the road, the fleet. Every car that joins that fleet stays for well over a decade and needs energy year-after-year. And it is technology evolution that drives the change from people owning fossil cars to electric vehicles being the best and cheapest choice.

Batteries keep getting cheaper and better. Electric drivetrains are simply more efficient, require less maintenance and have 0 emissions. You could say technology is the engine, everything else from oil prices to policy changes, that is the weather. Which is not to say that the weather does not matter. The oil price is a real tailwind for us. And what makes it bite harder this time is that European consumers have been here before.

After the Ukraine gas price shock, households looked at energy independence, electrification and efficiency. Insulating a house and putting in a heat pump is a serious and expensive undertaking. Choosing an electric car because of high oil prices is a far easier decision.

Now to the slide itself, markets with the largest absolute growth we see on the left. The markets in the middle are actually the more advanced ones, close to mass adoption. Those on the right are in the early phases of growth. The largest absolute growth is coming from 3 big markets: Germany, France and the U.K. That is where the fleet is expanding the fastest in absolute numbers.

In terms of where we stand in each of them, it is Belgium and the Netherlands that have the fleet penetration for stations to deliver real returns today. That is where our stations are already earning.

In Germany, France and the U.K., the focus right now is on continuing to deploy the network, while at the same time, driving traffic to it to improve station economics. And in those 3 big markets, it is about implementing the commercial strategies and the playbook that we developed and honed in Belgium and the Netherlands, a playbook we know that works.

And that brings us to Slide 6. This slide shows monthly sales on our network over the years. And it makes one point. We are entering the strongest part of the year. Three things behind that. First, the fleet keeps growing. That is expanding recurring demand.

In the first half, we delivered 112 gigawatt hours, up 38% against a fleet growth of 30%. Growing faster than the fleet is not something that simply happens to us. It is something we actively work for. It means capturing an outsized share of the market growth by being where drivers actually want to charge and by earning their preference.

Second, seasonality. Winter fast charging demand for electric cars is structurally 20% to 30% higher than summer due to cold weather. A cold car takes more energy to heat and more energy to move because colder air is denser and creates more drag. That is physics and it repeats every year.

Third, bigger batteries and faster charging make long trips more convenient, which, as we've always said, is what grows this market. Proof of this is more people now taking their EV towards their holiday destinations. This in turn, drives up our summer volumes. Put those together and the most of the year's charging demand lands in the second half, which is exactly where we are now.

Let's go on to Slide 7. Our focus for 2026 rests on 3 priorities: build, grow and optimize, build more stations, sell more at the stations we already have and optimize the organization and what we spend. Let us walk through each of the developments briefly.

Moving to Slide 8, 4 milestones that I want to mention for the quarter. First, it takes us to London. We opened Hatton Cross, our first station in the city under the Places for London joint venture. That gives us a foothold in a very important urban market in Europe. And it is the first of 25 stations the joint venture is committed to building across London by 2030. Building in a large city like London is hard, and I'm very happy to mention that more and even bigger stations in the city are progressing well for delivery this and next year.

Second, Germany. We passed 60 operational stations. Germany is among Europe's largest car markets. And as I showed you earlier, 60 stations with very serious additions still planned for this year means Germany is starting to become a meaningful part of our network. A milestone that coincides well with the charging market in scaling mode there, as discussed earlier.

Third, signing new additional locations. We signed 48 new high-traffic locations in the quarter, a record. This is a leading indicator to future growth of our network and our road map towards 1,000 stations. The sites we sign now are the stations that will open in 2028. And this pipeline is what makes our network expansion guidance credible for the years ahead.

Now, all 3 of those opening stations in London, scaling in Germany, signing a record pipeline have one thing in common. They need capital, which brings me to the fourth milestone. In June, we raised over EUR 36 million in a single retail bond issue, another record for us.

Let me spend a moment on what that program actually is because it is easy to read it as just another financing round. We now have EUR 337 million in retail bonds outstanding under this program, with EUR 69 million raised this year to date alone. The bonds provide covenant-free fixed interest funding for our network expansion from an investor base of more than 12,000 people, growing by around 800 with every issue. But next to it being a sizable program, there is something more interesting about it.

First of all, it is a good deal for both parties as it gives these investors the opportunity to ride the wave of value creation the charging sector offers. And in doing so, earning a healthy and fixed 6% interest on their capital.

Second, and important to Fastned, once people are invested, they stop being spectators. They begin to follow the company. They talk about it with friends and family. They become ambassadors. And very often, they become the next person in their street to drive electric. This pattern of citizen participation as a solution to embracing the new, new thing is a well-known effect that we've also seen with wind and solar. People support what they own a piece of.

Back to Fastned. Strategically, having 3 separate funding channels, equity, retail bonds and bank financing, each connected to deep markets provides Fastned resilient funding to stay the course.

Let's talk about build pace. Moving to Slide 9. Let me be straightforward about where we are. We opened 20 stations in the second quarter and 28 across the first half of the year against an average of around 18 for the same period over the past several years. Against last year, it is an improvement of 11 stations. So progress, but more is needed and more is wanted by us. How does that connect to the full year expectations? Well, it is good to remember that seasonality has an effect on station openings.

Two reasons. First, authorities tend to make their decisions about permits towards the end of the year or just before summer break. So permits arrive in waves. As a consequence, the start of construction follows that same wave pattern. Second, when you're ramping up to a pipeline, the increase always comes through the most at the end.

To open more stations in the next year and beyond, one needs more great locations and more permits to fill the pipeline. These are the leading metrics we steer on for the long term. And as mentioned in the highlights section, with 48 new locations acquired in Q2 this year alone, we're doing great.

Now back to this year and to the second half. Since the end of June, we've opened another 8 stations, taking us to 442 stations operational today. And we have 49 sites under construction right now. These 49 sites under construction means sites in the fences, construction companies on site, transformers going in, trenches for grid connections being made, street work being laid down. An average site takes around 15 weeks to complete. So the majority of those 49 are expected to open before the end of this year.

On top of that, we expect to take further sites into construction during the third quarter, and some of those have a good shot at opening before year-end as well. These are the numbers that lead to our outlook of 70 to 100 new stations for the year.

None of this is easy, and I would not pretend otherwise. Permits, grid connections, municipalities, those are the bottlenecks, but they are also the barriers to entry in this market. And there's no way around them if you want to build charging stations exposed to high traffic.

And that brings me to Slide 10. Getting to the second pillar of this year's focus, growth, selling more at the stations we already have. Let me give you a helicopter view on the step change that we are making.

For most of our history, growth came from having the best charging concept and letting drivers find us and that worked, but it was largely passive. Years ago, when this company had a few million in revenue and the number of EVs on the road was small, you also simply could not build a business case for a sales organization. The impact it would have is simply too small against the cost.

At our current scale, that has completely changed. So next to a great functional concept that people happen to prefer, we are now moving into active commercial engagement. This is a real shift in how this company operates, and it takes 2 forms. The first is propositions and actions aimed directly at drivers and companies.

In the B2C segment, we have been increasing conversion through optimizing propositions and communications. Gold memberships grew fast and stands today at 15,000, close to triple the figure from the start of the year. Although, this basis is not yet sizable in comparison to our revenue, it does show progress of something that can have a significant positive impact in the future.

Our B2B charge card, which went live in May, has already handled some 2,500 charge sessions. Through this channel, we actively reach out to fleets that drive lots of kilometers in order to show them the benefits of charging in our stations and incentivize them to do so. The base of this is logically small today as we just got started, but on a serious growth path to contribute to the commercial performance of our network.

The second is the more indirect form of engagement. This is about deals with leasing companies, large fleets and car manufacturers. These deals aren't about us talking to individual drivers. They're about steering traffic towards our stations being the visible or even prioritized option on a navigation screen in the car. It's about making it attractive for a large corporate fleet to incentivize employees to charge at Fastned rather than something somewhere else.

Fastned stations sell 3 to 4x more kilowatt hour volume than is average in the market. This is how far we have come with a great concept that people prefer and is situated where they need charging most. Optimizing propositions for our customers and actively working on our sales channels is how we improve performance even further and continue to lead this market.

Moving on to the cost side of things on Slide 11. The third focus area of 2026, organizational efficiency. Let me clear about what this is and what it is not. It is not a -- is not a cost-cutting program. It is about optimizing the organization we have recently been scaling, making people and processes more effective, improving priority setting and controlling costs. On the slide here, we mentioned 4 key areas that we have our spotlight on, number of FTEs, marketing spending, station costs and professionalizing procurement of indirects.

Let me give you some color on how we're progressing on these. On station costs. Last year, we have developed and rolled out a company-wide policy on grid costs. That is a large part of why our operating cost per charger has gone down, an important part of the explanation of our bottom line accelerating.

Second, procurement. We've often told you how much we've honed station CapEx procurement. Now we have taken the whole company into scope, including indirect spend. The latter has grown to some EUR 20 million of addressable annual spend by now, large enough that professionalizing it delivers real bottom line impact.

Third, the scaling up of the organization as part of the plan to make Fastned a leading European charging company is leveling off. At the same time, revenue and margin growth are taking off. That is how a great plan comes together.

And with that, let me hand you over to Remco. Next slide, please, and over to you, Remco.

Thank you, Michiel. I will take you through the financial performance in the first half of 2026, the economics of our stations, the cash flow development and our updated guidance for the full year.

Well, the central message is straightforward. Fastned is growing strongly, and that growth is increasingly translating into gross profit growth, operating leverage and underlying profitability. At the same time, we continue to invest substantially in expanding the network for the years ahead.

So I will start with the unit economics, which are based on the second quarter of 2026, then move to the consolidated results and cash flow over the first half of 2026 before concluding with our guidance.

So first, economics of the average Fastned stations. So in Q2, sessions per day increased from 45 to 53 year-on-year. Annualized energy delivered per station rose from 436 to 537 megawatt hour, while annualized revenue per station increased from EUR 292,000 to EUR 387,000. It is clear that this is not only a network expansion story.

On a like-for-like basis, excluding the contribution from newly opened stations, organic volume growth at existing stations was approximately 30% year-on-year, in line with the BEV fleet penetration growth from an average of 5.5% to 7% in Q2 2026, so also a 30% increase.

The improvement is also visible in profitability. Gross margin per station increased from EUR 236,000 to EUR 320,000, while operational EBITDA per station nearly doubled from EUR 97,000 to EUR 184,000. The operational EBITDA margin per station increased from 33% to 48%. We see the same trend in utilization and returns. Time-based utilization increased from 11.6% to 12.9%, while the return on invested capital, or ROIC, increased from 11% to 19%.

At the same time, operating cost per station remained broadly stable at EUR 136,000 compared to EUR 139,000 last year. In other words, we are adding substantial volume and gross profit without a corresponding increase in the cost base of the average station. This is the operational leverage in our model.

And as Michiel already mentioned, this efficiency is supported by 4 concrete areas of focus. So organization size, marketing discipline, station cost, indirect procurement.

On station costs, company-wide grid cost policy we introduced last year is helping to stabilize cost per charger. In procurement, we have extended the discipline we apply to station CapEx through full spend. And at the same time, organizational growth is leveling off, while marketing spend is being managed more tightly.

Together, these actions are helping us to become more efficient as we scale. The network is becoming more productive, more profitable and more capital efficient, while the cost base is growing much slower than the revenue and gross profit it supports. These are annualized Q2 station level indicators rather than consolidated H1 figures. However, they provide an important explanation for the financial development I will show next.

So moving to Slide 13. Turning to the first half year results. Charging-related revenue was EUR 75 million, representing growth of around 40% year-on-year. Charging-related gross profit increased to EUR 66 million, up 61% year-on-year, and gross profit per kilowatt hour increased to EUR 0.60 compared with around EUR 0.50 in previous year, so first half of '25. This reflects a combination of growing energy volumes and stronger gross profit economics per kilowatt hour.

Electricity costs slightly decreased with EUR 0.02, mostly due to slightly lower energy prices in the Netherlands during Q1 as well as renegotiated service fees with energy providers, while e-credit prices supported the gross profit development with around EUR 0.07 compared to H1 2025. The remaining EUR 0.01 is due to sales price increases.

Network operating costs increased as we expanded the organization and the network, but went down on a per charger basis. This increase in total operating cost was significantly lower than the increase in gross profit. That's the operational leverage becoming visible in the numbers.

Operational EBITDA more than doubled year-on-year, increasing to EUR 37.4 million from EUR 17.8 million in the first half of '25. The reported operational EBITDA margin rose to 50% compared to 33% last year, although this comparison is not fully like-for-like because EUR 5.1 million of Dutch e-credit revenue was not yet recognized in the first half year revenue, while the e-credits granted were already reflected in inventory and cost of sales. So on a comparable basis, the H1 '26 margin was approximately 46%. I'll come back to the Dutch e-credit explanation later.

Operational EBITDA reflects the performance of the charging network. At company level, after network expansion costs, underlying company EBITDA increased to EUR 30.7 million compared to EUR 1.4 million last year. Reported EBITDA was EUR 15.7 million compared to EUR 2.9 million in the first half of '25. Difference between reported and underlying EBITDA relates primarily to specific items, including the German highway tender and other exceptional or timing-related effects. I will come back to that when discussing cash flow.

The net loss narrowed to EUR 13 million compared to EUR 18.3 million in the prior year period. We remain in an investment phase, but the direction of travel is very clear. Stronger station economics are translating into stronger consolidated profitability.

So let me now turn to cash flow, where it is particularly important to distinguish reported IFRS cash flows from the underlying operating trend. So reported operating cash flow was negative EUR 10.1 million compared with negative EUR 6 million in the first half of '25. That reported number is affected by 2 specific timing effects.

The first one is related to the German highway tender, which covers 34 motorway locations in Germany. At the end of H1 '26, there is a EUR 5 million timing effect due to prefinancing the construction of German highway stations, while the related government subsidy is received progressively upon site release and commissioning.

Second, as already mentioned, EUR 5.1 million of Dutch e-credit revenue was not recognized in IFRS during the first half because the relevant transfer process could not be completed through the government portal.

The current expectation is that it will be recognized in the third quarter. Importantly, the timing of this effect -- this item, sorry, does not affect H1 gross profit because of the corresponding cost of sales treatment. There are more details of this included in the appendix of the presentation and the interim report.

So when we look at the operating cash flow without these 2 timing effects, normalized operating cash flow was neutral compared with negative EUR 3.3 million in the first half of 2025. So the message is that after separating these timing effects, the underlying network is moving towards positive operating cash flow.

We continue to invest heavily in the rollout. So capital expenditure was EUR 44.6 million compared to EUR 42.8 million in prior year period. Good to note here that the 9 German highway stations opened are not accounted for as CapEx as we do not own the assets, but only build and operate them.

Network expansion costs were EUR 22.9 million. Cash at the end of June, EUR 100.7 million. This reflects the continued investment in new stations, grid connections, land rights, equipment as well as the timing of funding inflows and outflows.

Our funding model continues to develop in parallel with the network. Alongside the Euronext listing and the retail bond program, we now also have access to a green loan facility from commercial banks of up to EUR 200 million, including an initial committed amount of EUR 100 million for Belgium and Switzerland and a further option to increase subject to facility terms.

We already raised EUR 69 million through retail bonds during the first half of the year. This diversified funding base gives us flexibility to continue investing in the network whilst maintaining discipline around liquidity and capital allocation.

Moving to Slide 14. So let me close today's presentation by discussing our guidance and outlook. So let me start with the network. We have shown you where we stand today and what we expect in the second half of the year. That trajectory underpins our network guidance, which we reiterate unchanged.

Turning to the financials. We delivered an operational EBITDA margin of 50% in the first half compared with our initial full year guidance of 35% to 40%. As said, the reported 50% is not directly comparable with the basis on which the guidance was set. The reason is the part of revenue from e-credits that has not been recognized, which means reported revenue denominator is temporarily lower. Including that deferred revenue on a comparable basis, first half operational EBITDA margin is 46%.

Looking ahead to the second half, we expect electricity prices to be somewhat higher in line with normal seasonality. At the same time, we expect to make further progress on organizational efficiency and commercial performance. Taking all these factors into account, our current outlook points to an operational EBITDA margin of approximately 45% for the full year. We are, therefore, updating our guidance accordingly.

Let me now turn to revenue per station, where our guidance remains EUR 350,000 to EUR 400,000. Given the commercial traction we described earlier, we expect to finish at the upper end of our current revenue per station range.

To conclude, revenue is growing faster than the market. Costs are beginning to level off as planned when we set out to build a pan-European company. That operating leverage is now translating into accelerating operating profit. That's the story of the first half, and it gives us confidence in the trajectory ahead.

Thank you for your time this morning, and we look forward to your questions. And now I hand the word back to the operator.

The first question comes from Thymen Rundberg from ING.

Yes. Two from my side. Firstly, you raised the operational EBITDA margin guidance to around 45%. You also said that the operating leverage is really now starting to come through. So should we view the first half as a genuine turning point with further operating leverage and margin expansion continuing in the second half and into 2027 as volumes continue to grow and on a largely established cost base or cost base that grows at a faster pace? Or are there factors, including the current contribution from e-credits, that mean the 45% margin should not extrapolate yet beyond 2026?

And secondly, on the -- continuing on that e-credit, they're becoming more of a meaningful contributor to the economics of your business. How do you think about the role of those credits in your business model over the long term? And so should we view them as a sustainable part of the return on your charging infrastructure? Or is it ultimately a policy mechanism whose value will increase, whose value will just more and more you say that will be passed on to customers through lower charging prices and stronger competition?

Thymen, first of all, thanks for the questions. I think maybe starting with a bit of color on that -- on the last part of your story. I think the charging prices in the market are there. We take a position in that market, right? So any e-credit system or whatever there is in a certain market already has a certain effect on, like, the margin of companies and what they do. And yes, that will have an effect going forward, but it already has an effect and it was there in the past as well, yes.

So I don't think that there is -- in that sense, there is -- yes, there will be impact, but it's not going to massively change. Maybe on the guidance and the turning point, I think maybe Remco, do you want to say something on it? But I think...

Yes. Look, we give guidance for 2026. This is the answer that you expect, but you don't hope, right? So instead, we always guide around estimated station rollout, revenue per station, operational EBITDA margin, which we did. So we have upgraded our operational EBITDA margin because of what we see happening now and we are reaching a critical scale. Yes, that's all true. But other than that, yes, we cannot give any other guidance. We also have given you some color on the cost per charger, expansion cost, CapEx per charger. This should guide you towards an EBITDA range going forward.

The next question comes from Nikita Papaccio from Deutsche Bank.

First, congratulations on the great results in H1. My question is on the current charging demand. I mean it's essentially high because also of the oil price. Do you see a risk that this would change if the oil price normalizes?

And the second one, what are you currently observing in the overall European CP market? Do you expect consolidation in the near future? And would you be interested to buy existing stations or even another CPO if it fits to Fastned's concept?

Yes. Thanks, Niki, for these questions. I think on charging demand, so I think a part of what we see is definitely people, let's say, seeing the price of filling their tank and in, for example, cases where they have access to a second car that more of them choose the electric. So we see that there is a potential shift there. But we also see that the price of driving electric is fundamentally so much better that, that teaches them something. So we have many reasons to believe that, that not necessarily is a reason to go back because it is fundamentally a cheaper option.

I think, too, on that is the sales of EVs and people making the switch to an EV, an electric car doesn't take oil in its tank, right? So that's a difficult one to go back to. So I think fundamentally, I think it is a real shift. And there will be -- yes, in the case of oil prices maybe going down to different levels before as before that might, let's say, have a dampening effect. But at the same time, the technology trend just continues. So I think all in all, I think this is a fundamental shift that is not going back.

On the CPO market, there is consolidation happening. We've foreseen that. There's logic to it. I think the key thing there, I think, is to see is that there is just many -- yes, let's say, many CPOs that have gone into this market with the idea to do maybe similar things as, for example, Fastned or others. And what we see is that there's a massive difference between the amount of sales that a great concept like Fastned can generate. We do roughly 3x to 4x the sales on the site that the average of the market does. And that, in the end, are factors that will drive a business case for consolidation in the future.

The question, of course, is when is the time right and when is the timing also to come into action mode. So a couple of years back, we took over a small network of the charging company of MisterGreen. And we might do similar things in the future, and there is other companies that also do things. But the fundamentals are, I think, that difference in the success of the concepts that are out there. Yes.

The next question comes from Thijs Berkelder from ABN AMRO ODDO BHF.

Congrats with a beautiful performance, especially on controlling and delivering on operational leverage. Can you maybe give a bit more guidance on what you're planning from a cost perspective, what kind of FTE counts we should expect? Let's start by, let's say, end of '26.

And then another question is I've been looking by geography in your H1 report. There you see Netherlands is strongly EBITDA positive but also Germany and France have become EBITDA positive. You also see there that you already invested EUR 76 million in other Europe. Can you maybe give a bit more explanation on when you expect Italian and Spanish station rollout to accelerate? Is that not yet logical in '26 with more focus on '27?

Yes. So thanks for these questions. I think on guidance, I think maybe the consequence of updating guidance for the second half and seeing the positive note, people are now asking, like, how will those -- how will the wedge between the 2 lines of cost and revenue, how will that continue to grow? Yes, I think the simple answer is we're not going to give at this stage in time, guidance already for the years ahead.

So that's if and when. I think we tried to give at least some color on the topics on cost reductions or cost control. So taking, for example, into account these, let's say, the indirect spends. And I think there are benchmarks out there which you can achieve with that. But I think we're not going to give any guidance on that today because we're also still in the initial phases, right? But I think that could at least already give you some color on that topic.

On the geographies, Italy and Spain, we've been building our portfolios there with 25 sites under development in roughly each of them. The typical development timeline of such a site is when it ends up on this map saying it's in development, that means that there is a land lease signed, and we're working on the next steps. Typically, such a project before going into construction takes somewhere between a year and 1.5 years to 2 years, and that's a consequence of grid connections and permitting.

And it will not surprise you to say that, let's say, there is some impact on the bureaucracy level of the country. So I see some potential, let's say, in some of the countries in Italy and Spain to be harder than maybe, for example, the Netherlands, but we've also seen similar effects maybe in Germany. So meaningful contribution of the work that we're doing today will land later in '27 and serious in 2028.

The next question comes from Jeremy Kincaid from Van Lanschot Kempen.

Since we won't give any guide on costs, I'll have just 2 questions on different topics then. First one on the performance of Hatton Cross, that's now up and running. Clearly, the London locations will have a lot more traffic than, say, the rest of your portfolio. Are you able to provide some color on how those are performing and maybe with some hard numbers, how much more energy they deliver compared to the rest of your portfolio?

And then my second question is just on the number of sessions per month. Obviously, you have the helpful chart in the report. And looking at the numbers, it looks like growth has been accelerating every month this year, except for June, but there was a big step up when the war started, but then growth has continued to accelerate. So I was just wondering if you could provide some thoughts around what you think is driving the continued acceleration and particularly why the exit rate in July is quite strong.

Yes. I think maybe trying to sort of summarize, I think about your question, I think you're trying to look for, like, what are the driving factors underpinning market growth and the growth of Fastned, right? So I think when we're looking at market growth, I think there is things that are stacking. So on the technology side, the market is developing. Cheaper cars are coming to market, more choice, better batteries, cheaper batteries, faster charging, all of that makes that market bigger.

Two is that technology shift drives a shift in the charging market with fast charging being more interesting in comparison to the other modes because charging is becoming faster. So that drives our market. When we're looking at Fastned's performance, all the work that we're doing on a great concept, that's something we've been working on for a decade, that puts us already at a very significant difference compared to the market average in terms of capture rate, et cetera.

On top of that, we've embarked on a journey, let's say, last 1 to 2 years to put on top of that a well-performing commercial organization, driving those sales channels. And that is now starting to pay off. So that is another factor driving that. And I think, yes, those are structural factors, if you might like. And then if you look at the weather, take that oil crisis, take other effects, higher petrol prices, et cetera. These accelerate people to take the decision to say, let's go on my holiday destination with my electric car. 2 years ago, I found it was scary, but maybe given the price difference, let's try.

If you want to try and see how great it actually is and how easy it is and what the cost difference that is, that decision was maybe triggered by a high oil price, but the price differential is so big that these people are not going to go back. And -- all of these things together, they drive that market. So I think that on general performance and general acceleration of charging demand.

I think on typical -- like, on a specific station Hatton Cross in London, I think it's difficult for me now to, let's say, to give you a very exact number. But I think we have -- we already had a single station operational in the London market for years that was performing very, very, very good.

You're talking about, let's say, doing EUR 1 million in sales a year annually with only 6 charging positions available. Let's say, Hatton Cross has, like, that location, an exposure to very high traffic and has more chargers available. So it's ramping up well. It's getting to that similar levels or maybe even beyond, but that is a trajectory. So we're very happy with that performance and yes, scaling from there on.

It appears there are no more incoming questions. So I will hand the word back over to the speakers for any closing remarks.

Well, thank you, everyone, for listening and looking forward to see you back at the Q3 presentation in a much colder environment with many, many more electric cars on the road. And on that note, let's wave off. Thank you.

Thank you.

Welcome to the conference call. [Operator Instructions].

Now I will hand the conference over to Michiel Langezaal, for his opening statement. Please go ahead.

Thank you, operator. And I'd like to extend a warm welcome to everyone on this call as well as to those joining via our webcast. You can find a copy of the presentation used during this call on our Investor Relations website found at ir.fastnedcharging.com.

Moving to cover page. As always, I'd like to use that cover page to show something I'm really proud of. Looking back on this quarter, I wanted to shed some light on the snow and winter conditions we've seen during the recent holiday season, a time when many people go out and travel long distances. The last 2 weeks were cold in Western Europe and the Netherlands, in particular. The Netherlands in particular received also a significant amount of snow. The news was full of messages about trains and our airports struggling to cope with the weather and travelers being stranded.

Often, communication was also mentioned to be lacking. In the same period, Fastned delivered. We enable drivers to reliably charge their vehicles even on these peak Saturdays on route to their winter sport destinations. Despite adverse weather conditions and station usage being the double of the average for 2024.

We continued to deliver the same high-quality charging experience. So fast growth on 2 axes. The network and station usage while delivering in adverse conditions. This is not a small feat if you think about it, a serious challenge, and our team has passed this test with great results which puts Fastned in pole position for 2026. And please note that this picture is taken by a Fastned team member just after a big snow dump. Logically, snow removal and road salt are on their way. So I used it to put our brains here on snow and cold and not to make you think that a road covered in snow is what we mean by a great experience.

Moving to Slide 2. With reference to the information provided in these slides and discussed during this call, please ensure you take note of the disclaimer.

Moving to Slide 3. My name is Michiel Langezaal, I'm the CEO and one of the founders of Fastned. Victor Van Dijk, our CFO, is with me on this call. And together, we will present this webcast. Today, I'll take you through the highlights of the final quarter of 2025. We'll present our latest results and update you on our plans for 2026 and release our 2026 guidance.

Victor will take you through the top line results for Q4 and as always, we will also update you on our station economics. After our presentation, we will be happy to answer your questions. If possible, please limit them to 2 questions for analysts so we can give everybody the opportunity. We've scheduled this call to last for 1 hour. So let's get started.

The Q4 highlights. For Fastned, Slide 4, December marked an important milestone. We surpassed EUR 100 million in revenue for the year and the pathway towards this number is staggering. We founded the company in 2012, the market for electric vehicles at the time was virtually nonexistent and EVs were the new thing. 6 years later, in 2018, Fastned, for the first time, surpassed EUR 1 million in revenue. In 2021, the company surpassed the EUR 10 million milestone.

Roughly another 4 years later, we do it again with tenfold revenue and surpass a milestone of EUR 100 million in revenue. This demonstrates the power of our team to scale and the scalability of our business model. Additionally, this also illustrates our growth path towards our 2030 North Star of 1,000 stations each generating EUR 1 million in revenue, another 10x.

About locations. We are now beyond 2/3 of our way towards our goal of 1,000 prime A locations across Europe for our great charging stations. This portfolio of locations is the backbone of a great fast charging network that delivers returns. And we are continuing to expand our proven model at rapid pace. Again, this is not a small feat in a market where several others are trying to rationalize their portfolios of charging stations to find the solutions for the sizable long tail of unprofitable charging sites.

Finally, in the fourth quarter, we raised a record amount of retail bonds totaling EUR 110 million for the 2025 combined. This reflects the continued confidence of our investor base in Fastned. The strong cash position of EUR 70 million at year-end 2025 and continued retail bond funding is expected to fund the 2026 rollout. Also, bank financing for further scaling of our growth is under development.

Moving to Slide 5 to update you on an important piece of industrial policy that drives the electrification of transport in Europe. On the 16th of December, just before the end of the year, the commission published the long-awaited 2025 automotive package. To keep it simple, there are 3 things I'd like to say about it. Now let me start with the negative, but also the smallest item.

Originally, the commission's automotive policy was targeting a 100% reduction of tail pipe emissions by 2035. This has been diluted to 90%. Up to 10% of cars can now still have tail pipe emissions if fully offset by green, low carbon steel and sustainable bio and e-fuels. Logically, we would have preferred the 100% to stay in place but, we understand the political need for the commission to provide some flexibility.

Two, and this is the more important one, with this package, the commission sends a clear signal. The future is electric and delivers a package of measures, including the battery booster, the Green Fleet initiative and the small affordable European car initiative, all expected to drive Europe's automotive industry towards electrification.

Of course, there is the knowledge that the electric car is the technology of the future and the technology is on a pathway to segment by segment become cheaper and better -- deliver cheaper and better cars with internal combustion to become cheaper and better than cars with internal combustion engines. Still, this industry policy provides additional important long-term certainty about where the market is headed and knowing it can count on continued support from vital stakeholders, national and international governments to drive adoption.

Three, the package sets important directions for incentives to drive BEV adoption that are to be adopted by all member states. Most important to mention here is the corporate fleet requirements. Here, mandatory targets will be set at the member state level to support the electric vehicle uptake by large companies. And this brings me to the right side of the slide. It is industrial policy on electrification that puts the industry on a learning curve.

This has happened in 2 areas in the world, in Asia or China to be specific and in Europe. The learning curve that resulted has now more or less brought most car segments to parity. And the industry is an unstoppable trajectory of lower battery and car prices. This will result in all cars becoming electric. This is what we see on the right. This is what we see on the right side of the slide. The majority of the market analysts expect this market to grow rapidly by some 30% year-on-year until 2030, almost quadrupling today's electric car fleet and therefore, quadrupling our charging markets. And this brings me to have a quick look at the development of BEV sales.

Moving to the next slide. In the fourth quarter, the battery electric vehicle market continued its strong momentum with battery electric vehicle sales once again reaching all-time highs. The Netherlands, Belgium, the U.K., France, Germany and Switzerland, in all these countries, we have a significant presence. And in all these countries, we have seen strong growth of electric vehicle sales shares.

In the Netherlands, full BEV sales even surpassed 40% of all new cars sold for this year, underlying how the market continues to scale and accelerate. Please note that the graph on this slide shows a slightly lower number because it is a full year best estimate based on data up to November as we are still awaiting the final figures for some countries. Nevertheless, we felt it was important to already include this recent news from the Netherlands about the full year BEV sales for 2025, surpassing that 40%.

Over the past years, we've often discussed the gradual weakening of EV incentives in markets like the Netherlands, where EV sales start to become significant. That trend has continued. But -- and this is confirmed again by the numbers on this slide we show here today. The underlying fundamentals of electric cars have more than compensated for this. Total cost of ownership has structurally improved. Model choice keeps expanding across price points. Purchase prices continue to come down. Range and charge speeds are getting better at the same time. Charging infrastructure has scaled rapidly in both quality and density and societal and regulatory pressure to decarbonize road transport continues to increase. Put together, these factors mean that even with reduced incentives and subsidies, the overall value proposition for drivers to choose electric is stronger than ever. And this is a structural tailwind for Fastned growth.

Moving to Slide 7 to look at how the sales of electric vehicles has grown the electric car fleets in each of our markets. On this slide, you can see how the EV fleet is growing decisively across our key European markets. The Netherlands, where we started is now at an adoption level of around 7%, one of the highest in Europe and only surpassed by the Nordics. Belgium has accelerated strongly in recent years and has now caught up to a similar adoption level.

Large transit countries like France and Germany are moving a little slower, but they are clearly catching up and are at the beginning of a steep growth curve. In markets like Italy and Spain, we are just getting started. EV adoption is still slower -- is still lower. But as the car industry approaches price parity between EVs and cars with internal combustion engines, these countries have the potential in the end to catch up faster than the early adopter countries did.

And this may be contrary to what many people might assume based on income levels or macroeconomic conditions. The key takeaway is that most mature markets of our network are still below 10% BEV penetration, implying a tenfold market scaling ahead of us and a threefold increase expected in the medium term up until 2030.

In France and Germany, we are effectively still at day 1 of an exponential growth curve and the scaling factor towards 2030 and even 2035 is higher. So Fastned operates in a market that is growing by roughly 30% per year. And our strategy is to both drive that growth with great charging infrastructure, and to, at the same time, profit from it by using our great charging concept to continuously capture an outsized share of this rapidly growing market. And as you'll see later in the presentation, we continue to do so every year.

Moving to the next slide. As we look at this slide, the story is very clear. We are at the tipping point for price parity between battery electric vehicles and traditional combustion cars. And we've been saying this for years, parity already arrived earlier in the larger, more expensive segments. For example, when the Tesla Model 3 came to market and could compete head on with premium [indiscernible] Sedans. That was the first wave.

What we're now seeing is that this shift is moving segment by segment through the market. And today, the medium and smaller segments are starting to hit that same tipping point. BEV prices are falling rapidly and are on track to become cheaper than their fossil counterparts. This is driven by powerful forces working together, falling battery prices, continuous technology improvements, massive industrial scale-up and a regulatory environment in Europe that clearly favors zero-emission vehicles.

At the same time, ICE volumes are collapsing. In many segments, they are already down by 50% to 80%. That destroys the scale advantages that used to make combustion models affordable, maintaining something like a EUR 33,000 VW Golf becomes very hard when you no longer have the volume to support that platform. On top of less scale advantages, one has to add the additional costs to make such cars compliant to very strict emission regulations.

So when you compare price range and charge speed in a stable, you're not just seeing where we are today, you're seeing a snapshot of when the lines are crossing. The economics are shifting decisively towards BEVs segment by segment, and that shift is permanent. So that is what I wanted to say about our markets.

Moving on to talk about how we developed the company. Here, I wanted to mention, in Slide 9, 4 important highlights from last quarter. Germany, we've now reached an important milestone, 50 charging stations in the country, and our team is working hard on further rollout of stations and on delivering the early tender wins for both the regional and motorway tender lots, which together form part of the Deutschland nets framework.

These tenders put us on a clear trajectory to roughly fourfold the network to around 200 stations in the coming years in the country. What's more? These stations are not just anywhere, they are at A locations along key transport arteries and in affluent densely populated areas, which are also the most BEV-dense parts of the country. This is the direct result of Fastned having secured the right tender loans, and it positions us very strongly for future growth.

Belgium, our team in Belgium delivered, on the same milestone, 50 stations. And with them being on A locations along key transport corridors, it is these 50 stations that make Fastned the leading charging company of the country. Moving to saint Yvi, the first 0 emission service area in France. We almost couldn't believe it. The first tender for an all-electric service area in France is issued for the location saint Yvi, that's funny, right?

While the news gets even better. Fastned has been selected to build and operate France's first all electric service area at this location in Brittany. This is a major milestone for electric mobility in France and a big win for Fastned to continue to drive our advocacy on a need for tenders. The site will feature 6 400-kilowatt charges per shop and proper restrooms. After pioneering this vision in [indiscernible], Belgium, France now becomes the second country to adopt all electric service areas, underlining the shift in thinking of policymakers.

On retail bonds, I mentioned this one before. Fastned raised over EUR 39 million in its third bond issue of 2025. The largest single bond raise in the company's history, bringing total funding from its 2025 retail bond program to approximately EUR 110 million versus about EUR 82 million in 2024. The scale, repetition and rollover in the program underscores Fastned's ability to consistently access retail debt markets to support our high-growth CapEx investment plans.

We've also installed the first megawatt charger in the Netherlands at our Aalscholver station on the A6 motorway. This shifts the technical frontier of public fast charging from hundreds of kilowatts towards megawatt level. This is an important development for several reasons.

First of all, to learn and test; secondly, to ready ourselves for trucks and cars coming to market with higher charge speeds. Just look at announcements from BYD on flash charging, or CATL. This technology will soon find it's way into European cars and on to European roads, and we want Fastned to be ready to deliver and profit from this development.

Moving to Slide 10 to update you on our network expansion. What I would like to say about network growth, 3 things. One, I'm very proud of our team and how they delivered on our network expansion plans last year. At year-end, we had 406 charging stations operational which means we have opened 60 additional new charging stations in 2025 within our guidance range for the year. You can see this number in the box on the top left.

Two, we have been significantly ramping up the number of construction projects. This is more than just new stations. We expanded existing stations to accommodate more chargers. We have been adding shops and kiosks to our charging stations to make sure customers can enjoy a coffee, sandwich and toilet break. These are works that are incredibly important to deliver a great customer experience. This number is not on the slide, but in total, we delivered more than 92 construction projects in the year.

Three, looking ahead, I see that the team is making good progress on increasing pace and smoothening the delivery of stations from a, let's say, push year-end mode to a more stable quarter-by-quarter delivery of stations. Making the calculation using the numbers on the slide here, in 2025, we, in total, built 60 new stations. In the last 3 quarters, we've built 53 charging stations. And currently, we have 26 stations under construction of which we expect the far majority to open before the end of this quarter. Digging a little deeper, last quarter, we reported to have 30 stations under construction, we delivered 26 of that. So that's more than 80%.

Today, we have 26 locations under construction for Q1, to compare in the first quarter of 2024 and 2025, we opened 10 and 7 stations, respectively. So base is increasing, and the curve is smoothening. This brings me to our guidance for 2026. We expect to build at least 70 new stations, while pushing to grow by hundreds. The latter would bring the network to 506 stations at year-end 2026. And this brings us to the financial insights for this quarter.

And therefore, I'd like to hand you over to Victor Van Dijk, our CFO. Next slide, please, and the word to you, Victor.

Thanks Michiel, and welcome all. On this slide, I wanted to put revenues per station growth in perspective versus the overall public charging market growth and infrastructure build-outs. As discussed during the H1 results, we have seen a very strong build-out of charging infrastructure in the market, especially in 2023 and 2024 when the infrastructure grew faster than the growth in the BEV fleet. What we saw starting in 2025 and expect to see in 2026 and the coming years is fleet growth above infrastructure growth again, which provides for a better market dynamic than in 2023 and 2024. So that is positive.

Fastned has outgrown these market dynamics throughout these years when looking at revenue per station growth, as you can see in the graph, and we expect to continue to do so. With this, we also expect to outgrow the public charging market in 2026 and guides for average revenues per station of EUR 350,000 to EUR 400,000 in 2026. That is a 12% growth at the midpoint.

Next slide, please. Here, I wanted to shed some light on the performance of our stations in countries at different stages of the transition. Dutch and Belgian station revenues are around EUR 450,000 annualized Q4 2025, and we expect other countries to grow to this over the coming years with BEV fleet penetration growing. What this slide shows is that sales per station in our less mature markets follow almost the exact same path as they did in the Netherlands over the last 7 years which we added in Slide 16 -- 17 of the appendix.

In 2019 in the Netherlands at a 1% BEV fleet penetration, we did around 100-megawatt hours of sales per station annualized, like we do in Spain and Italy right now. In 2023, in the Netherlands, at a bit over 4% BEV fleet penetration, we did around 370-megawatt hour sales per station, like we do in the U.K., Germany, France and Switzerland on average now. Belgian sales per station are comparable to Dutch station sales right now at a comparable BEV fleet penetration.

This shows the dynamics in newer markets are very similar to historic dynamics in the Netherlands. And it shows that Fastned's model is fully replicable in these markets. And this gives a lot of confidence in the growth potential in these markets as we know that BEV fleet penetration will go up. Therefore, we expect that over the coming years, the station revenues in less mature markets will grow to the current Dutch level of EUR 450,000 revenues annualized and beyond driven by an increase in BEV fleet penetration.

Going to station economics on the next slide. We grew energy sold per average station by 10% last year. So that is the combination of organic growth of selling more at existing stations plus the sales at newly opened stations in 2025. Organic sales growth. So the sales growth only at the existing stations came in at 18% for the quarter. This tracks very nicely again with fleet penetration growth, which was 20% for the quarter.

Note that building stations in less mature markets has a dampening effect on our overall average station sales growth. We estimate this effect at minus 2% in 2025 and minus 4% in 2026. But of course, building in less mature markets is valuable. As we are convinced, those stations will follow the same revenue growth path as in the Netherlands and Belgium, as explained on the previous slides. Gross margin per station increased by 21% year-over-year to EUR 300,000 due to volume growth, the price increase and lower energy costs.

The station economics are quite unique for our sector, with sales per station close to 4x higher than the average of the market and utilization at around 2x the average of the market. They are a testament to our high-traffic locations, our best concept and customer experience.

With that, we haven't felt pricing pressure. The majority of the fast-charging locations of competitors are deeply and structurally unprofitable due to poor location choices and/or a poor customer concept. Lowering prices won't fixed that. Actually, it will deepen losses. So we haven't seen that happening in any significant way. Our proven concepts replicable across markets at different points of EV adoption gives us a lot of confidence in continuing to expand our network. We will build the capacity to cater for the strong growth in BEV fleets across our markets in the coming years.

That brings us to the final slide of the presentation on our guidance.

Thanks, Victor, for the deep dive and clear explanations on station economics. As always, we end with our outlook and guidance. During the presentation, we already discussed each of these items, but let me quickly bring them together here. Let's start with network growth. We closed 2025 within our guidance range at 406 stations. And with construction pace ramping up, we guide for 70 to 100 new stations this year. Revenues per station in 2025 came in at EUR 335,000, nicely above our guidance range. We showed you how the BEV market and public charging infrastructure supply is expected to develop, which also formed the basis for our 2026 outlook of station revenues of EUR 350,000 to EUR 400,000. As mentioned, today's trading update is top line only. So the guidance review on EBITDA is planned for the release of the annual report in March.

Before moving to questions, I'd like to briefly circle back to the broader context, which is now even more positive. The 2035 automotive package sends a very clear signal, the future is electric. On top of that, the performance of our stations and the way we have scaled since 2012 is what gives us a lot of confidence.

And on that note, I'd like to conclude by saying it's been a great fourth quarter, and we're excited about the road ahead, and we look forward to continuing this journey with you. So thank you all for listening.

And with that, we're happy to take your questions. I now hand the word back to the operator.

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from Thymen Rundberg from ING.

Two for my side. The first one is on the cash position. You reported a EUR 70 million cash position at the year-end. And I just wanted to ask you if you can help us understand the key drivers behind, in our view, what was a higher-than-expected cash outflow in Q4. I assume this is very much CapEx related. I see that grid connection costs continue to increase, but also a significant number of existing stations getting expanded, redeveloped or upgraded. So basically, just wanted to better understand the cash-out dynamics and also the impact of existing station expansion and upgrades and how these are expected to continue in 2026?

And then my second question is actually on the megawatt charger that you mentioned in your presentation as well. So with the first one now installed, how do you see this type of charger fitting into your broader network strategy over the next few years? And is it possible with the existing grid connections at your current stations? And if you install -- if you intend to install these at all your existing locations?

Let me start, Thymen. Thanks for the question. Let me start with the cash position. Yes, it's indeed due to the stations we built in Q4 that is, of course, a large part. What is also a part is the -- we had a bond maturity in the fourth quarter of about EUR 7.6 million. So that also adds it to that. And then there's indeed on the station -- and there's station expansions. And like you rightfully say, we see that, yes, the CapEx for stations. We see that going up. We also indicated in the presentation in the back. Yes, and all that combined leads to the cash out in Q4. I hope that answers your question.

Maybe then on the megawatt charger. I think the fit in the strategy, I think, at a very high level, we see the market continuing to develop in terms of technology. So we expect cars to be taking more power. We see already cars on the market today that can take 400 or a little bit above. I think, for example, about the smart #5 I think it takes around 420 kilowatts as an example. The BMW Neue Klasse also is capable of taking more. And we see CATL, BYD, for example, coming with 6C, 5C charging technology. So at levels of 600 to 800, maybe even higher kilowatts. I think BYD, for example, calls it Flash Charging. So you see that moving up to a megawatt, and in our view, is something we will see scaling the market because it makes an electric car simply more attractive. So that is a very important sort of piece of context, scaling the market, but then you also need to provide the infrastructure.

And that is, I think, the second part, that's our part of it. we see that the faster we can charge, the more attractive fast charging becomes, and the higher the throughput is that we can realize at our stations because cars simply don't spend 15, 20, 25 minutes on a charging position, but they only need to stand there maybe 5 or 10 minutes. So the throughput of the locations can increase.

Then if you look at the technical implementation, basically on all the sites, we have very significant grid connections being deployed. And that is an investment that we made into the future to be able to, let's say, to take advantage of the hockey stick, if you might like. I think what you also see more and more is that all charging stations in the longer run will have battery buffers to make sure that the higher peak loads created by, let's say, 1 megawatt or more charging are taken by these buffers.

And we are also working on that to make sure that we basically have the entire landscape of energy management, faster charging and batteries covered. So that may be on that topic. Does that give you a bit of an answer to those -- yes, let's say, I think quite broad questions?

Yes, yes, indeed. And just to follow up on the last one. So is it right then to infer that you ideally would like to roll out these megawatt chargers at all your existing locations, given that you already have the grid connection available?

No. So the existing locations, there won't be meaningful changes in the setup. And we have a lot of capacity left in -- with 400 or 300-kilowatt chargers, yes. So our average charge speed is now around 70 kilowatts. So there's still -- yes, if you can charge -- a charger can do 300 to 400 kilowatts, we have a lot of capacity there left headroom. So that's -- we don't see a CapEx cycle there. But for our new stations, it's simply more efficient to work with these [indiscernible]. So we'll definitely look into that. We're testing it. And if it works, and then it's a likely solution for new stations.

This is also why the unit has 1 megawatt of power, but it can divert to more than one charging spot, right? So it's a way to, on the one hand, be efficient and work with that significant headroom there is in the market. And on the other hand, like make that peak load available. So important new technology, but as Victor says, like not necessarily something we will see happening on existing stations that much, but in future sites, definitely, yes.

The next question comes from Nikita Papaccio from Deutsche Bank.

I would have also 2. The first one is on your guidance. So thanks for all the details on the cost structure we should expect for 2026. Having this in mind, how do you expect to grow your operational EBITDA margin?

And the second one, more broader on the industry. The latest studies show that flexible pricing could improve demand for individual stations. What are your thoughts here? So could we see flexible pricing by station or time in the coming years?

Yes. Thanks, Nikita. I'll start with the guidance question. So operational EBITDA margin. So what we also indicated that we see network operating cost per charger stabilizing around the level of 2025. And we also indicated that we see revenues per station increasing. So that should stabilize or actually improve operational EBITDA margin. I think that's the short answer. So the network operating cost per charger have been growing in the previous years, but we see it stabilizing this year. I think that's an important message. On flexible pricing, do you want to take?

Yes. Maybe I think you're asking about improving demand. So I think we're talking about improving the catch rate of the existing stations or of stations and maybe specifically of pricing. I think there's many ways in which you can optimize catch rate. You can think about marketing, improving signage, improving the user experience on site by creating a customer preference. So there's many things that we're working on, on that topic. Pricing is one of them. I think the industry is coming from a, let's say, quite simplistic pricing scheme. So we'll see also changes on that.

And yes, I think there is a lot for us to win. And I think we've talked about this over the year already a bit that we see, let's say, 2, 3 years ago in an environment with EUR 10 million revenue, you cannot hire teams to optimize revenue. But during the context of, let's say, EUR 100 million or a couple of hundred million euros of revenue, there is a reason to do that. So it's definitely a trajectory that we're on. So we're -- I think maybe in that sense, just scratching the surface. We're seeing a lot of things that will happen in that area in the coming years, but not something I can just give you today. So the answer is yes, but no direct news yet.

The next question comes from Luuk Van Beek from Degroof Petercam.

First of all, a question about the investments that you've done to reinforce the organization. You already commented on the more stable rollout pace over the quarters. But I was also wondering if you can comment on this, say, the time lag between securing a location and opening it if that is reducing as well. And on the cost efficiency of developing a location, if that's improving?

And my second question is about the securing of new locations. You signed a number of new locations, but can you comment on the pipeline and the opportunities that you see there?

Yes. Let me try to take a bit. I think one by one, I think what we've seen, we've been investing in that organization, as you mentioned. And I think what we've been doing, one is putting the teams in those countries and replicating, let's say, what you could say what we had at the head office and the first 1 or 2 countries where we started to expand. So really building a solid infrastructure organization in each of those countries to organize that pipeline of developing sites and building sites.

Two is to make sure that, let's say, they have all the tools, the suppliers, the methodologies, the processes to build stations at pace. And of course, the first stations in the country, they cost significantly more time to get a contractor up to speed to get that team organized. So we're working on a time lag. We're working on smoothening that curve, getting the learning curve in those teams. And I think at a high level, what we're seeing, I think, is that Fastned is becoming an international organization.

So we used to be quite centrally organized. And now it's much more the central organization that's providing governance framework guardrails, if you might like. And the local offices, they are, let's say, over the last 1 or 2 years, being put in a position, being supported by all the tools and traits that they needed to run the execution to deliver on their local plans. And I think that whole framework is what is going to help us in the next years to further scale up. And I think, yes, what we already see, and of course, that is a bit with erratic behavior is that the construction pace is going up.

We see that the number of stations permitted is going up. We see that the acquisition of sites is going up. We've seen private site developments growing a lot last year, but we just haven't seen any big tenders. So basically, the underlying engine on all these parameters is increasing pace, but we just haven't seen big tenders and that softens the site acquisitions a little bit. Does that give you a bit of color on that topic and explanation on how that organization is scaling?

Yes, that's helpful.

The next question comes from Thijs Berkelder from ABN AMRO ODDO BHF.

Question first on, let's say, the sessions per station, which in Germany even come down while BEV penetration goes up by 25% or so. In Belgium, session per station only up 6%, while BEV penetration up 50% and the U.K. sessions also are down year-over-year per station, while the fleet is up 25%. Conclusion is simply you're losing market share and maybe not against your fast charging competitors, but isn't it more likely that you're simply, as a sector, losing share versus home and destination charging where prices are, especially in a home, of course, much, much lower. And with the car range rising quite rapidly, simply the price differential is so large that avoiding fast charging stations is logical. So my question is, what is your view on fast charging versus other ways of charging?

And then the second question is, again, coming back on pricing first. Your CFO says that pricing won't come down, then you confirm that you are looking at potentially using flexible pricing schemes over the day. Your competitors already confirmed they are looking at flexible pricing during the day. Yes -- isn't it so that either home charging needs to become much more expensive or public charging to prevent the market share of fast charging fading away further?

Yes. I think, Thijs, I think maybe -- I think you can sort of peel the onion in a couple of elements, right? One is the desire for customers. So we see cars coming to market with higher and higher charge speeds. And at the same time, AC infrastructure is not -- that proposition is not changing. So there is a continuous technical development and ask for faster charging. And people are coming to our stations. We see that scaling. We see growth at stations. I think if you dive deeper on the markets, I think in -- if you look at the U.K., for example...

Sorry, which stations -- which stations?

Stations in the Netherlands, in Belgium. So you see generally many markets where the take-up of sales at these stations increasing. I think what you point out is that there is some markets where, let's say, the scale of the Fastned network needs to increase significantly to start capturing more of that market growth. And that is a trajectory we're on, right? So that's just -- that needs to happen. You need to open burger places to sell more burgers. So I agree there.

I think on the desire to fast charge versus slow charge, I think we're very clear on that. We don't expect the entire market to start fast charging, but we see that there is a need for people that don't have access to home charging, longer journeys, all kinds of use cases to have access to fast charging and that being very reliable, et cetera. That's proven again and again. And I think when you come down to pricing, I think there, I think I'm fully with you. On the one hand, I think we will see the effect what Victor says is that infrastructure needs to deliver a business case to continue to scale.

On the other hand, there are areas in the day and the week where utilization is lower and where you could play with certain price offerings, be it flexible pricing in time, et cetera, et cetera. So one doesn't exclude the other. And I think that is an important remark. And we see some parties in the market, clearly, I think you're mentioning them or you're referring to them. We see them already playing with that. And there is -- yes, certainly a lot of logic to do that as well.

I think maybe to add to that. So indeed, in the evenings, in the night, our stations are not utilized. During the day, they're utilized quite heavily. And so that first part gives us the ability to indeed look at pricing offers and then potentially be more attractive than the other charging modes like AC charging. And that is big volumes there, so big potential there.

So -- but we need to develop that capability, and that's something that is on our road map for this year. Yes, maybe an opinion on why others are doing this more because others -- we have our stations very much utilized during the day and others have simply less utilization. So they probably feel forced to do this sooner than us. But yes, there's a lot of potential. We've scratched the surface. We're scratching the surface right now.

Yes, as an industry, I agree.

There's a lot of potential to optimize station utilization and optimize the whole gross margin, the absolute gross margin you make on the station. Well, it's a good point, Thijs. It's something the industry will develop and optimize with that, the returns on the station.

And maybe it's the same point that Nikita was pointing to, right?

Maybe one add-on on the Netherlands, how you're now sort of getting more in a new targeting potentially also municipality rollout for Fastned. What should we expect from that rollout? Is that part of the [indiscernible] plan for, let's say, 2026? And can you update us maybe on the news from ACM where they want to have 2 suppliers for future site in future tenders. Have you had discussions with them? And how is this opinion developing at ACM?

Yes. So maybe on the municipalities, it's a project that we've been working on for a long time, gathering a lot of data, creating clarity in this country in the Netherlands around like how many petrol stations do municipalities, let's say, where municipalities offer lands to operate petrol stations and how to govern that transition. The insight roughly is that there's a significant amount is being leased land by municipalities to petrol stations and that offer the opportunity to, let's say, end those leases at the moment that it's logically to end them, so either cancel the contract in due time or just await it to end and then tender out those locations as charging stations. So that provides a very interesting platform to -- for municipalities to support the transition and to build the needed infrastructure in villages and cities to allow people to have access to charging.

So for us, I think it gives us a way to also work on the tender landscape there. I think the time line, I think yes, there, I think it's difficult to say what the exact time line will be. But we've seen at least that there is a good uptake with the municipalities in understanding what is happening. It is now also with the parliament. So there is quite some building of consensus, but it will take years.

And I think if we then move to the motorway landscape in the Netherlands. So, yes, we await the retendering of locations there. A significant amount of our concessions on that road network ends in the period, let's say, 2028, 2030, a little bit beyond, and there's a smaller portion, although important sites that last a bit longer because they were developed later. Well, first of all, I think maybe important to mention, this is something which is incredibly important for the industry and for Fastned and for EV drivers because the investments in those sites, they've been made on a 15-year horizon, horizon that is shrinking in that sense. So a new concession is important there to allow for a next phase of investments. So that's one.

I think two is the legislative package, which has been developed in, let's say, collaboration with market and et cetera, et cetera, that is currently out. It's under review. I think we can say it looks good. A lot of the important items that we think are -- should be there are in there. I think about separate concessions for charging and petrols, unbundling of tenders. So I think that looks good.

Maybe on the topic of ACM that you mentioned, I think it's also important to note that the feedback of the ministry on that document is there. Maybe to touch upon that, their feedback is -- could be interesting, let's say, competition on site, but there's several aspects that we need to take into account. And we're talking about traffic safety space and not just cars alone, but all services that need to be provided, parking, rest, petrol, et cetera. So they say, yes, the majority or a very significant amount of locations, we do not see any logic to have more than a single concession for petrol and a single concession for charging. There will be sites where they see the space available to do so, and they will evaluate whether also the traffic is there to make such investments logical.

Well, then the next step is the tenders. That is, of course, something that comes after, let's say, the legislative basis. We expect that the ministries will start to work on that and a road map to look at which sites first and what the plan is there. So that is for the coming 1 to 2 years. Logically, we are also preparing on our side. So I think good progress. Fastned is very well positioned to win a significant and good share of those upcoming tenders. But -- and I think that's also I have to mention, we will logically not win all these tenders. So the network along the motorway in the Netherlands will shrink. And I think that is a logical thing to expect.

The situation that is there today that Fastned has, let's say, 80% of the motorway locations. That is not a logical market situation in the long run. And that is also one we advocate for. So we advocate for transparent tenders where quality and the best parties may win. And that is a storyline that helps us to scale across Europe, but that same storyline will mean losing a number of sites in the Netherlands, although given our fantastic concept, we see country by country that we win more than our fair share of tenders. And I think that is also a good outlook for the Netherlands. So a bit longer story maybe than usual, but I thought a good question, Thijs. So maybe this is, I think, the information that you're looking for.

Shall we, based on that, move to the next question.

The next question comes from Paul de Froment from Stifel.

So 2 questions for me. The first one is on Slide 11. Can you detail the number of 18% related to charge point growth? Is it related to public charging points, high charging -- fast charging points? Does it include home charging? So if you could detail a little bit this number, it would be helpful.

And my second question is related to the [indiscernible] package. You mentioned it several times. And I was thinking about grid connections and grid permits, do you expect to see first positive impact as of 2026 or later?

Yes. Thanks, Paul. On your first question, on Slide 11, the 18% is the projected increase in public charging infrastructure, and that is both fast charging and slow charging. So I think that answers your question. And then on the automotive package, I'll hand over to Michiel.

Yes. So the automotive package on grids. I think it's difficult to exactly say when that impact, let's say, will be seen in actual requests and being handled faster and getting capacity faster. I think what we do see, I think, and that's maybe also because, yes, that package is out, but there is also a physical constraint, right?

I think what we do see already is that the push for change, the push for flexibility is moving. So we have recently seen that grid operators start to become more flexible and see that Europe is pushing, the Dutch government is pushing. So we do see change there. But given, let's say, the physical constraints, that doesn't mean that it is -- the problem is solved. So we would expect, let's say, the will to enable technical solutions to solve the problem, a battery, flexible power, smart IT to work together to solve it.

That I think that will is increasing, but that doesn't mean that suddenly, there is capacity, which before didn't exist. So let's be very clear that there is no magical solution there. Does that give you context on that topic, Paul?

Yes.

Then I think we're coming to the last questions, right? Any last questions?

The last question comes from Jeremy Kincaid from Van Lanschot Kempen.

I've got 2. The first one is on your CapEx guidance per charger. Last year, it was EUR 130,000. This year, it's EUR 160,000. Could you talk to the factors which are causing that to increase?

And then my second question is just on costs for 2025. I know you can't provide any exact numbers, but I was just hoping if you could outline any factors that we should think about or if there are any factors we should think about when it comes to costs in 2025, particularly on the network expansion side?

Yes. On the CapEx guidance, indeed, we see -- we're actually going up, as you said, from EUR 130,000 per charger to EUR 260,000, that is all costs, including the grid connection and also the -- what we call the civil works. And that is the places where we have seen the cost increase. So it's not on the charger part, but it's only the grid connections. We see a cost increase there in certain markets. And also on the civil works, we see a cost increase yes, and that is -- yes, it's on the one hand, some markets simply have higher costs like Switzerland, U.K., they are significantly higher grid connection costs. And yes, when there -- with their share of the overall locations increasing in our total mix, that also has an impact on the average cost per charger. And yes, it's a similar story on the civil works.

Maybe to add a small note, I think in the beginning, I think the Netherlands is a very large basis of our build. The Netherlands only has, let's say, 2 large grid operators and 1 smaller one. So let's say, 3 serious players that govern, let's say, what a connection looks like. So that standardizes things a lot.

Germany maybe has 800 good operators. So that gives you a bit of context on a level of standardization. And logically, you see that also back in cost levels. And the U.K. has a network, which, although there is some level of consolidation at the network is old. There's a lot of differences in the network, so that leads also the higher cost of the tactical implementation. So I think that is, I think, what but maybe gives you the background on why there is a difference.

And then on network expansion costs. Also there, we indicated -- we gave some indications. So there were around EUR 23 million in 2024. We expect them to roughly double by 2026. And that is, yes, the build-out of our teams in the markets that we have talked a lot about over the last 1.5 years. And that is to build out we need to do to scale our location expansion. We have done a lot over the last 1 or 2 years, and we need to do still a bit more in this year. And then we expect also that element of the cost structure to taper off the growth in that, like we see on the network operating cost now for this year. We also expect to taper off the increase in network expansion costs after this year. So I hope that gives some further context.

Maybe to give you a little bit of context from my side, again, like, let's say, from the organization, I think the goal is to build a machine that can acquire, build 100 to 150 or a little bit more sites per year. So that is, I think, that has a cost to it, building that machine in terms of people, et cetera, et cetera. And that is, I think, the cost that Victor is referring to, and we expect to still be finalizing the build of that machine, that organization. But we don't expect, let's say, to continue to scale directly thereafter. So I think that -- it's not a moving line. Does that answer your question, Jeremy?

Yes.

Do we have other people in the line that still have questions available for us? Or are we then through?

There are no more questions at this time, so I hand the conference back to the speakers for any closing statements.

That's great. Thanks a lot, and that makes it efficient call. And I would say, thanks a lot for listening. Looking forward to see each other with the release of the annual report and the first quarter figures. Yes. Bye-bye.

Thank you. Bye-bye.

Good day, and welcome to today's Fastned Q3 2025 Trading Update Conference Call. My name is Serge, and I'll be your coordinator for today's event.

[Operator Instructions] And now, I'd like to hand the call over to Michiel Langezaal, CEO. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you, operator. I'd like to extend a warm welcome to everyone on this call as well as to those joining via webcast. You can find a copy of the presentation used during this call on our Investor Relations website found at ir.fastnedcharging.com.

Moving to Slide 1, the Title Page. Hopefully, everyone has that in front of them now. As always, I'd like to use the cover to show something I'm really proud of. This quarter, it is the opening of our 2 stations at Gentbrugge, on the route from Amsterdam to Paris roughly in the middle, two large charging stations with 16 chargers for cars each and a separate charging area for trucks.

On top of this, you will find there a fully branded large Fastned restaurant. The road next to it has some 50,000 cars passing by each day on either side to ensure great station economics. Already today, after just being open for a few weeks, we see more than 100 sessions and even more shop visitors per day and only growing from there on. But there's more to this flagship location. It is the first zero emissions service area that was standard out and built in Europe. An important development to ensure ample space is made available for charging along the motorway. This instead of just adding a charger or two to an existing petrol station, which unfortunately is still happening way too often.

Logically, I'm very proud that Fastned was able to win this important first tender and was among the parties that helped shaping it. This not only gives us a several decade-long investment horizon on the strategic location, it also gives us tools to work with governments across Europe to accelerate the build-out of our network, and there's more to come.

Moving to Slide 2. With reference to the information provided in these slides and discussed during this call, please take note of the disclaimer. Moving to Slide 3. My name is Michiel Langezaal. I'm the CEO and one of the founders of Fastned. Normally, Victor Van Dijk, our CFO, is with me on this call presenting this webcast together. Unfortunately, Victor is on a temporary leave of absence and is unable to join us today. So it will be just me presenting this. For the Q&A, I'm accompanied by our Head of Investor Relations, Patricia Allam, who many of you already know. So warm welcome to Patricia.

Today, I will take you through the highlights for Fastned during the third quarter of 2025, and I can tell you there is a lot to talk about. Logically, we will discuss the latest top line results, an update on network growth and electric vehicle sales is also on the agenda, and as always, we will discuss station performance for the quarter. After the presentation, we will be happy to answer your questions. If possible, please limit them to 2 questions per analyst so we can give everybody the opportunity. We've scheduled this call to last for 1 hour. So let's get started.

The following slide presents the highlights of the third quarter of 2025. Starting with growth, we are continuing to deliver strong profitable growth, growth that tracks the rise in electric vehicle adoption and revenues of EUR 31.5 million set a new quarterly high for Fastned, up 44% year-on-year, and this is no small feat, especially in a market that showed a temporary shift in the balance of supply and demand to the supply side over the last 2 years.

Moreover, and something we discussed in our calls previously, a market with some new entrants, significantly discounting prices in attempts to boost station utilization, yet Fastned continues to win. Energy delivered was up 32% year-on-year to 46.8 gigawatt hour, which compares to an increase in EV stock of 30%. So we roughly grow with our fair share of kilowatt hours sold, but revenue related to charging grew by 44% year-on-year, significantly outgrowing the market. This is an important and unique differentiator. We have great pricing, fair but with a decent margin. We have good sales volumes that grow fast like the EV market. So we have both. We're not just putting down chargers. We're building a sustainable, profitable charging business.

Our gross profit growth, up 40%, clearly demonstrates the fast growth of solar power. With solar prices dropping, sometimes even negatively during midday hours on sunny summer days. Most people use their cars during daytime when the sun is out, and fast charging, when needed, is happening in that same period of time.

So the takeoff profile of our fast-charging stations quite nicely follows the sun's radiation curve. This feed allows Fastned to benefit from fast-growing solar generation capacity and low or even negatively negative energy prices.

Our network at the end of the quarter encompassed a total of 380 stations, and we are extremely proud of our construction achievements. But we're not resting on our laurels. We're acutely aware of the ambitious goals we've set, reaching 1,000 stations by 2030 means ramping up our build pace to 100 and eventually 150 stations per year.

On top of this challenge comes the fact that we are constructing much larger, more complex stations, which demands more from our teams and our contractors. The average station size has grown from 4 charge positions on average to more than 6 nowadays, representing a 50% growth in capacity deployed. We're also accelerating the rollout of retail facilities, offering coffee, sandwiches and toilets at our sites. While these don't add to our station count, they are vital to our customer experience. But at the same time, they ask a lot extra from our construction teams.

Just think about the build of the 2 shops we've seen on the title page. Those 2 shops alone are to work for several people for full year. So yes, we are proud of our progress and our results this quarter, but we also recognize the road ahead. As we start 2026, we'll have less than 600 stations to go to reach our 1,000 station targets by 2030. That requires a sustained build pace of 100 to 150 stations per year. Our teams are focused on this. In this fourth quarter, we will be delivering at an annualized build pace of above 100 stations. Our aim is to maintain and grow this momentum quarter after quarter. I'll share more details on this later on.

Turning to site acquisition. End of the quarter, we had a total of 624 locations in our portfolio, of which 380 are operational today and 244 under development. With our acquisition pace now consistently above 100 locations per year, we are firmly on track to meet our 2030 goal. A particularly point of pride this quarter, the opening of our very first 2 stations in Spain. Fastned is now active in 9 countries with each in-country team having people for the scouting and developing of locations, people to design our stations, people to manage construction and people to maintain our stations. This setup is to ready the company for the next scale phase in our development, further accelerating our build pace and allow our kilowatt hour delivered to scale with the massive BEV growth ahead of us.

Having scaled our organization from a leading Dutch charging network to a leading European charging company while continuing to deliver the same reliable charging service is one of those experiences that gives our team confidence, the confidence to deliver on our ambitions ahead, such as scaling our build base.

Moving towards cash. At the end of Q3, our cash position was standing at EUR 87 million. Fastned is currently issuing its third bond round for 2025, which will close at the end of this month. Concluding, we're pushing hard to deliver on the ambitious targets we've set, and we're seeing very positive momentum and continued growth. The stations we've built are delivering strong results, even in a market with slightly fewer cars than previously expected at this point in time.

In this context, the gap between Fastned and the competition is widening. Yes, some other companies are deploying charges quickly, like we do, or sometimes even faster for periods, but none of them have stations and a concept generating revenues anywhere near ours. Several are discounting prices in an attempt to attract traffic to less desirable locations, which negatively impacts their revenue.

Moreover, after a wave of big oil companies entering the charging markets, we're now seeing divestments and a slowdown in investment from that sector. Our status as a pure player charging company with a profitable station concept is placing us in a strong and unique position in that market. We're continuing to build our network and our competencies to thrive and lead discharging markets.

We're doing the hard work, the work that is needed to build charging stations on great locations to deliver a great charging experience and deliver on all these other items that make up a great charging concept. We're taking down bottlenecks. It is the hard work that leaves behind a very serious barrier to entry for others. That is part of the value we create. We remain ambitious on network growth, but we will not compromise on investment discipline. This combination is what makes Fastned unique.

On that note, let's move on to the next slide to talk about BEV sales. On the left, you can see that Q3 was another great quarter for EV sales with year-on-year growth in practically all markets. The sales share in Belgium grew slightly from an already very high basis. The sales share in the Netherlands was stable at roughly 1/3 of all cars sold being electric. The much larger markets, Germany, the U.K. and France made significantly larger strides, moving towards or even beyond 20% of new cars sold being electric.

The absolute registrations, you can find at the bottom of the slide, show the impact of market size with a country like Germany registering more than 300,000 new electric cars year-to-date. Also, when adding these up, it shows that the total number of EVs in Europe is growing strong.

In terms of outlook, we expect to see even more. In H1 of this year, around 850,000 EVs were added to Europe's fleet. Schmidt Automotive forecasts 1.2 million more arriving in H2. So the fourth quarter of this year will be ramped up even more.

How does this fit the bigger picture? Well, earlier this year, Brussels gave OEMs some extra wiggle room on the fleet average CO2 targets. Instead of having to comply with the 95 grams fleet average per kilometer in each year over the period from 2025 onwards, they are now allowed to average for a period of 3 years. This gives them some flexibility to delay the scaling of their EV sales by some months, but make no mistake, those electric cars still need to be sold in order to deliver the same 95-gram average, and this is why more growth is expected in the months to come.

Looking further ahead to 2030, there will be a significant step down in the target emissions with a maximum of 49 grams CO2-fleet average. To achieve this milestone, roughly half of all cars sold will need to be electric. So there's a lot more to be done. Which brings me to the 2035 roadmap and discussion with the European Commission and OEMs on this topic.

Moving to the next slide. The President of ChargeUp Europe have had the privilege of sitting at the table in some of the highest-level discussions shaping the transformation of one of Europe's largest industries. Our automotive sector, a sector worth hundreds of billions and with roughly 7% of GDP, representing a significant share of our continent's economy.

The fact that we, as Fastned, are at this table and not other players in our industry is a testament to our commitment to shaping the future of mobility, and to Fastned's position, as a true industry leader. The photo you see on the right of the slide is what they call the family picture and was taken during my recent visit to the European Commission's Automotive Dialogue Session. But this is just one of the many moments where Fastned leadership has met with high-level officials, which happens in the member states and in Brussels, each time driving the change our industry needs to deliver on its mission. So when we talk about industry leadership, this is what it looks like.

Now let's return to the topic of 2035 and share our perspective on the ongoing conversations in Brussels, in Germany and how the media is covering these developments, along with what is expected to move forward. To put it simply, we recognize that the European automotive industry is uneasy about the growth path ahead. Achieving 1,000 Fastned charging stations by 2030 is an ambitious goal for us. Reaching electric vehicle sales, representing roughly half of the total is an equally bold target for the car industry.

Without a growth mindset and the right organizational culture, it is a daunting challenge. When we look at these interactions, they can largely be summarized like this. The European Commission is asking the industry for ideas on how to accelerate progress and increase certainty on delivering on the targets set because, as they say, the future is electric, no matter what.

Meanwhile, the industry is often asking for concessions and a slower pace, seeking comfort and maneuvering space. So far, we've generally seen the European Commission insisting the 2035 goals will not change. While carmakers request that those goals will be watered down. Given the political situation, it is prudent for the commission to show some flexibility, but the goals remain unchanged. We see an example of this in Germany where Chancellor Mertz has declared that the future is electric and intense to open the tab of incentives to boost EV demand, while also negotiating for wiggle room with the commission.

So the future is electric. That is the stance of the car industry, that is the stance of the commission and the stance of the member states. So we expect to see more incentive packages coming in order to scale BEV demand and deliver on the targets set. And yes, we most likely will see some small wiggle room provided to industry to deliver comfort. That is the summary.

With our team and ChargeUp Europe, we do much more on shaping our industry. Through European channels, we work on the progression of AFIR, the alternative fuels infrastructure regulation, or simply put, the law that sets the direction for the development of Europe's charging infrastructure. Through this channel, we work on ensuring market access and competition. This is incredibly important for Fastned as without access to great sites, we cannot build charging infrastructure.

And a great example during the third quarter was the visits of Commissioner Ursula, just ahead of the opening of Gentbrugge, the first zero-emission service area in the European Union. This is the station I proudly showed you on the Title Page. Commissioner Ursula is responsible for the climate policy of the European Union and ensuring that Europe reaches its climate commitments. Thus, it was a significant opportunity for Fastned to convey the importance of what we do more. And for policy, changes are needed to allow us to compete more freely across Europe and accelerate e-mobility transformation.

We informed Ursula about the importance of AFIR competition and gave examples of issues we face in some markets, such as bundled tenders, short-term concession contracts and nontransparent administrative processes. By walking around our Gentbrugge station, we were able to show him what can be achieved when market rules are applied correctly, and the best player wins.

Moving to Slide 7. And I think our Gentbrugge station really shows what the best means, but it's worth looking at the time line of development of a great location like this, which can stretch's to several years. It all starts with initial discussions with policymakers, in which we bring our experience and best practices formed over more than a decade in all our markets. This means we can bring innovative new ideas and best practices for tender processes and location design, which is exactly what we did here.

This was a bare patch of concrete with no mandates beyond installing some chargers, and we turned it into this. Our concepts are the best in the market and give us a chance, a great chance to win key tenders like this one, the first tender for a zero-emissions service area in Belgium, in Europe with a concession for 25 years. And why is this zero-emissions element so important? Well, we see that governments across Europe are obliged to update their policies for motorway locations and get ready for an electric future where fossil fuels are a thing of the past.

This shift means there is overcapacity of petrol stations and an urgent need for more charging infrastructure, especially on highways. Zero-emission service areas, like Gentbrugge, are important because they demonstrate the value of developing additional new electric-only service areas that deliver crucial charging capacity to the markets and decouple such developments from locations where contracts with sitting petrol station owners can delay deployments.

Any roadmap to decarbonization must include a step-by-step phaseout of petrol stations, which can well be triggered by the regular concession renewals for motorway locations. Gentbrugge is a showcase on how to progress with such roadmaps and should give policymakers guidance on developing their motorway service area policies in relation to this phaseout, but this takes time as the time line shows. If you're not in a market for such locations now, and you're not in touch with policymakers now, you will not be able to build something sizable in the period up until 2030.

And speaking of Gentbrugge, with restaurants, and toilets, and playgrounds and fresh coffee. Does this mean we're coming baristas? No, we're not. We are working with a range of partners and developing different commercial setups to cater to different situations. So sometimes, we invest in the restaurants and work together on a revenue-sharing basis, whereby our partner operates and Fastned provides the concept.

In other cases, we choose to rent out the building and have a more hands-off approach. This approach gives us a pile of options, allowing us to be flexible in how we introduce our amenities to our great charging stations without falling into the trap of thinking we would also be great baristas ourselves. And this wasn't the only big opening for Fastned during Q3.

Moving to the next slide. In September, our first 2 stations in Spain opened to electric drivers. With the official inauguration taking place just last week, this is our ninth national market and a crucial time for Spain. The market share for EVs is growing fast and reached 9.4% in June this year. So I'm extremely proud to see our iconic stations opening on a fantastic motorway location, just down the road from Barcelona, but it is only a success for Fastned -- but it is not only a success for Fastned. Spain's car industry is Europe's second largest. It is a crucial contributor to the country's economy and it brings with it many jobs.

This means that embracing the transition to electric cars, the next evolution of technology is vital for Spain. And we're delighted to be bringing our expertise to the country. What is key to rolling out charging infrastructure at speed are simple, efficient tenders, long-term concessions and the removal of bottlenecks related to grid connections and permitting.

The latter is the bureaucracy that can add several years to a project's time line in Spain. The official inauguration was intended -- was attended by dozens of guests, including many distinguished politicians and high-placed officials. Most notably, the Spanish Minister of Industry, whose speech aligns with our views on what needs to change to roll out charging infrastructure faster in Spain. So the opening of these 2 stations and having the right people at this opening is a great step forward for Fastned.

And continuing with our market updates, moving to Slide 9 to talk about Germany. In Q3, we also delivered our first charging station built under the contract with Autobahn Gentbrugge, our very first charging station on the Autobahn. And yes, this station isn't as beautiful as you would expect from us. It's a lot more plain and basic. This wasn't our decision. The design was decided by the tendering authorities beforehand, based on German highway regulations.

That said, I'm incredibly proud of us for making this happen. The German motorways were, until recently, completely exempt from any competition, be it for fuel, for charging or for food. All of this was in the hands of Tank & Rast, which has also held back investments in charging infrastructure. With the tender to realize charging stations and motorway service areas, this will now change and Fastned is happy to be part of that. This charging station has 6 charging positions, a great addition to the charging options EV drivers have on German motorways.

I am very proud of this result, especially given the complexity of these works in Germany. The cultural barriers to break are significant. Just like how the car industry in Germany is struggling to adopt a growth mindset, one can imagine how difficult it is for a transport authority to do so and for Fastned to gain pace. So lots of things to learn and improve for all actors.

In the coming months and year, we are gearing up the deliveries of roughly 30 such motorway locations in Germany. And that brings me to a summary.

Next slide, please. Before we move on, I wanted to show how Fastned is becoming a pan-European charging network. This delivers on the accelerated plan we embarked on in 2021, to see us hit the milestone of entering the ninth country in Q3 validates our decisions to put teams in place in each of these countries. The decision to invest in scaling our organization and invest in the acceleration of our rollout base.

Scaling our company and organization while continuing to deliver that incredible quality of our charging service we are known for across 9 countries, has been a serious milestone and experience for the team and its leadership. It is in this context that we look with confidence at the challenge of further scaling our build base.

It is amazing to think you can drive across these 9 countries using only Fastned's renewable energy to charge. And that's what we're seeing more and more during the summer period. Our network now spans many holiday routes that can cater for it. And with long-range and very fast-recharging cars on the market, the EV family road trip is becoming a reality for many. Logically, we're very happy to see drivers preferring our charging stations to take their brakes and charge their cars. We've seen this holiday -- the seasonal holiday traffic playing a role in our great results for the quarter, so I thought that would be valuable to say a little more about this, including talking about other seasonality effects.

Moving to Slide 11. With the fourth quarter coming up, it is an interesting moment to talk about this. When you look at the graphs on the slide here, there are roughly 4 important factors influencing monthly sales of our business on top of the holiday traffic we just talked about.

The first is the growth of our markets, with such stellar growth of the number of EVs on the road, the customer base in January is just very different to that of December. For 2025, the impact is significant. We started the year with some 6 million BEVs on European roads, adding 850,000 BEVs to this in the first 6 months, growing the fleet by 14%, and the expectation is that the fleet will grow by another 1.2 million in the second half of this year. This means that December will have some 30-plus percent more EVs to sell kilowatt hours to than in January.

Two, in summer, many people take their cars on holiday trips, leading to a lot of charging sessions to power their journeys, the typical Black Saturdays with waiting lines in front of petrol stations are a great moment for our business too. We analyzed the impact of this and estimated to be in the high single-digit percentage of revenue.

Three, cars and especially EVs needs more energy to drive around in winter than in summer. Air density is higher when air is colder, and thus, it takes more effort to push a brick through the air. So cars need more energy to drive around. On top of this, people like to have the cabin needed and batteries also like room temperature, both adding energy consumption. In total, this adds up to easily more than 25% when colder.

Last but not least, when it rains, people more often choose their cars instead of cycling or walking to the train station. It is these effects that accumulate sales growth towards year-end. And that you can see on the graphs here for the years before. So we are readying ourselves for another record quarter, whereby, as always, September is a slight slowdown after summer. And as soon as business starts moving and temperatures gets colder, growth hits our network.

But there is more to mention on growth of our network. Moving on to Slide 12 to talk about London. We've said it before and it's worth repeating, if there was one tender to win in recent years, it was that to create London's charging network in a joint venture with Places for London. Securing this project was a major achievement and one we're incredibly proud of.

Now just a year after winning the tender with Places for London, we are very excited to share the very first construction pictures with you. Our inaugural site is at Hatton Cross, right next to Heathrow Airport, a prime location with some 80,000 cars passing by every single day. This station will feature 12 charging points, double the amount of our #1 station in the U.K., which is Ramac Way, and which, by coincidence, is also in the city of London. This station operates at very high utilization rates and sells EUR 1 million plus in kilowatt hours annually.

So you can imagine, we have high expectations for Hatton Cross. If all goes according to plan, we'll be opening the sites before the end of the year. Getting from tender win to contract, through permitting and all the way to the start of construction in such a short time frame is a massive accomplishment by our team. Also, it is a testament to what is possible when governments implement best practices for tenders and create the right conditions to accelerate the rollout of critical infrastructure. On that note, I wanted to give you an update of our pace of construction.

Moving to Slide 13. Already earlier, I mentioned that construction pace is our current challenge. So where do we stand in tackling this? Well, let's start with our goal for the year. We began the year with 346 stations in our network. In the first 9 months, we built a total of 34 new stations. Right now, we have 30 stations in defenses with active construction underway as we speak. We expect the far majority of these sites to be completed before year-end.

Additionally, we anticipate opening even more construction sites this quarter, although most of these will likely be commissioned next year. Altogether, I think this should give you a good ballpark of where our network will stand by the end of the year.

Now let's talk about construction pace. In the first 9 months, we built 34 new stations and expanded another 13. These expansion projects require nearly as much effort from our teams as building entirely new sites from permitting to the on-the-ground work. On top of that, we delivered two large restaurants, a major achievement for our project delivery teams, and realized several unmanned shops and built 3 truck charging facilities at existing stations. All in all, this means we completed a total of roughly 54 construction projects in the first 9 months, including some very sizable new developments. This figure demonstrates how we are ramping up our construction capabilities.

Just to compare, over the full year 2024, we delivered a total of 58 construction projects. At the current rate, we're on track for an annualized build pace of 72 construction projects, that is an increase of 24% compared to last year. So we are ramping up.

And if you look at the number of sites currently in the fences, with contractors on the ground, that pace is above 100 sites per year. So things are moving in the right direction, and we're moving forward with determination. To construct stations, we need locations, great locations to build.

So let's look at how the site acquisition is delivering. Moving to Slide 14. So let's start with the facts. In the last quarter, we ended -- we added 20 sites to our pipeline, bringing the total for this year to 60 sites signed. By the end of the quarter, our portfolio had grown to 624 locations, 380 of which are operational and with another 244 under development. I mentioned these numbers earlier in the highlights section.

So how are we tracking towards our goal of 1,000 stations? With 624 locations already secured, we have fewer than 400 to go to reach that milestone. On this slide, you can see our acquisition pace for last year and over the last 12 months, both consistently above 100 sites per year. With the ongoing onboarding of the already planned for growth of our development teams, we expect this to increase even further. So we are firmly on track to meet our 2030 goal.

To give you a bit more context on these numbers, there has been a notable shift from public to private sites in our pipeline. Unlike last year, when the German highway tender added a large batch of sites all at once, this year's growth is close to completely driven by the ramp-up in deal volume of single sites.

It's also important to note that our tender win last year with Places for London, covering 25 large charging stations in the city is not yet included in this overview. That's because the contracting for the individual locations is still underway. However, most of these sites have already been identified and their development is far more certain than a typical prospect, thanks to our signed joint venture agreement.

And there's more of this, as the same more or less goes for our German regional tender wave. That gives us access to 92 search areas in Germany where Fastned has been appointed as the concessionaire to realize charging infrastructure in the region. For us, the key aspects of securing new locations remain unchanged. We focus on high-traffic sites, long lease tenors and the ability to build according to Fastned's quality and concept standards. This is what ensures a strong business case and our industry-leading customer satisfaction.

In conclusion, we don't trade off quality for quantity. We'll continue to invest with discipline. This is where doing the hard thing really matters. We approach it with a growth mindset, always looking for ways to increase our pace while maintaining both quality and quantity. We're not cutting corners.

Moving to Slide 15, to start talking about station performance. This graph highlights the results of our unwavering commitment to building only high-quality stations in prime locations. It's about getting every detail right, what we often refer to as delivering the best charging concept in the market. Over the last -- over the past 3 years, we've nearly tripled the number of charging sessions per station, all while maintaining a significant lead over the market average.

Throughout this period, there have been frequent predictions that the competition would quickly catch up, yet, as the market enters its next phase of acceleration, our absolute leads remains just as strong as ever. In fact, with time, now being much more precious than before, our relative advantage over the competition is actually widening. This higher level of sales per location translates directly into outperformance on a unit economic basis, which brings me to our usual update on station performance.

Moving to Slide 17. As said, our stations continue to outperform the market. We grew energy sold per average station by 13% since last year. So that is the combination of organic growth of selling more at existing stations plus the sales at new stations. About organic sales growth, the sales growth at existing stations, this came in at 21% for the quarter and tracks nicely with fleet growth, which was 22% for the quarter. The gross profit per kilowatt hour was at the same level as last quarter at EUR 0.54.

Operational EBITDA for the average station is at 38%, which puts it also in the guidance bracket given earlier this year. These results are really unique for our sector. They are a testament to our high-traffic locations, our best concept and customer experience. It is this proven concept and business case that gives confidence in continuing to expand our network and build the capacity to cater for the massive growth in BEVs in the coming years.

And that brings us to the final slide of the presentation to talk about guidance. Throughout today's presentation, Slide 18, we've explored the context and details behind each of the guidance items you see on this slide, so I won't go into each one of them again. Instead, I want to leave you with a final thought about culture. When faced with big audacious goals, there are 3 ways to respond. The first is to feel uncomfortable. And as we've seen with the German car industry and how they try to deal with the goals now. The second approach is to cut corners, hitting the numbers, perhaps, but losing sight of the basic business case and business sense. We've seen some in our markets take this path.

The third way is the hard way to stay strong, to embrace a growth mindset and to constantly ask what more can be done to achieve the goal or to increase certainty in attaining it. This is about engaging teams and working together to remove bottlenecks. It is only the third path that creates real and long-term value. And this is the path Fastned has chosen and continues to choose. It is this culture that explains why the gap between us and the competition keeps widening.

And on that note, I'd like to conclude by saying, it's been a great third quarter and an even better fourth quarter is ahead of us. Thank you all for listening.

And on that note, I also hand the word back to the operator for questions.

[Operator Instructions] And our first question is from Thymen Rundberg from ING.

Two very brief ones from my side. The first one is on the charging volumes. So charging volumes per station, I think you just alluded to it, they grew 13% year-over-year in Q3, is an improvement over Q2, but it's still well below the 22% growth in BEV penetration. So I think it's interesting to compare those two. So what are the key drivers behind this gap? And could you maybe share how year-over-year volume growth looks like, specifically for more mature stations?

And then the second one is on pricing. So revenue per kilowatt hour remained stable versus previous quarters. Gross profit increased per kilowatt hour. So basically my question is, should we expect any changes to pricing levels going into the fourth quarter or even beyond?

I wouldn't comment on any price changes, let's say, going forward, but yes, nothing I can basically give you there at this moment. I think maybe what we can say, I think, is that we're happy with this level of gross margin. So I think that gives you some content and some color on the topic. I think on volumes, I think -- yes, I think what I said is in that sense, if we go to the slide on the station performance is the organic growth, so the sales of existing stations, that grows basically in line with EV sales. So roughly at 22%, 21%, and I think that's something we're very happy with.

If you look at the growth of all stations, so including the new stations, there is, of course, ramp up in there. So new stations simply need to be found and that ramp-up period in the first couple of weeks has a significant effect. If you look at that on a total year because they are new. And that basically means that, that 13% is lower.

It's also the fact that we are obviously expanding in countries with lower BEV penetration. So we're just for the -- what you would call mature stations. We're in countries where the BEV penetration is simply higher. So this is something that is going to be an effect in the coming years, but eventually, it's going to even out when the BEV penetration catches up.

Yes, true.

We will now move to our next question from Luuk Van Beek from Degroof Petercam.

So I have 2 questions. So first of all, about the efforts you put into new construction. You've done quite some things in the past year, including some very large sites. So can you comment on how that's helping you to become more efficient in building new sites? And also I was wondering with the shops that you've developed, is that now a blueprint that you can more or less apply with changes on new sites? Or is it something that's still figuring out what's the best approach and that you ramp that being from spread for every new site?

I think this is a very good question, Luuk. I think -- in the end, what I wanted to show and tried to show a bit is that -- and it's, of course, it's not an apples-to-apples comparison, but we looked at a bit basically at these construction projects. And I think if you look at it, what I wanted to explain is there is capacity in team to do permitting and to manage these construction projects. And in that sense, building a shop also requires a permit, the whole permit process. It also requires our people on the ground to manage that project. So that is, I think, one thing. And I think there, what we see, we see is that compared to last year, we're ramping up that capability. So we're roughly 25% above the capability of last year.

We're using it a bit more to build shops. So that doesn't help in that sense to deliver on the station pace, that's one thing. Two, is I think -- and that is a nice detail that you're adding here, I think, is that, over the last 1.5 years, 2 years, we've been building a platform, so a standardized shop we can build, we know what we're building, a standardized kiosk system, a standardized concept for trucks. And that, of course, will accelerate the deployment in the years to come. And I think that is an effect that we haven't seen yet, but we will see in coming year.

And maybe to add to that, Luuk, also, I would say the same goes here. We just opened up in Spain as a new country. Of course, building in a new country always comes with unforeseen new circumstances. But I think now that we've opened in all countries, we're also improving and getting faster in each country where we're operational.

Yes. Does that give you the color that you were looking for?

Yes, that is helpful. And I have one other question about the Spark Alliance. I know that you're still building out the cooperation. But can you give some comments on the first experience you had this summer? And how do the follow-up steps will go in the coming quarters?

We've seen the first integrations happening with the basically technical cooperation working between Atlante and Elektra, some rudimentary sort of integration between the other parties. And we see that people are using it. People also give us nice feedback on the fact that they can see a bigger trusted network in the apps. But yes, it's also to be said, it's not that you deliver this us within a couple of months. So we have a -- we have an aim to really deliver, yes, year-end early next year, the full integration to make that technically available for all -- across all networks. And logically, we expect to see much more then.

We'll now move to our next question from Paul de Froment from Stifel.

Two questions for me. The first one, can you give us some feedback related to grid connection in Spain? I mean, did you experience some delays? What's your view on the grid in Spain? And my second question is, did you have the chance to test the new BYD fast charging points?

Yes. Maybe on fast charging. So, yes, we're in good contact with BYD, most likely, we're not the only ones. I think what for us is incredibly important that they are well supported in bringing these cars on the road, and that's for our business important, and that's also for the EV drivers important, and it's important to the mission, because in the end, it is BYD brings are definitely that step to affordable electric cars. In that sense, we're happy with their support on faster charging, and we're logically testing a lot of charges in the market, but we haven't decided on any technology from BYD at this stage in time. So yes, that's basically why we have our testing center, but no decisions yet.

And I think maybe on faster charging, I think it's good to mention Alpitronic's has launched a 1-megawatt, 1,000 amp charging solution recently that is already in the market. We are testing that. ABB is coming with a very similar system as well. So we see basically, yes, let's say, that the development of what BYD is doing and some other players in the market, that is adopted by larger markets, and I think that's really important to get to get the innovation and the delivery keep pace to our networks happening.

So I think that's really, really good, and it has an impact on also less cable theft, for example, we've seen some things in the news. Moving to more liquid-cooled cables, higher power level, of course, increases the number of visitors on the site, but it also leads to lower cable theft, because there's less copper in the cables.

So a lot of good news on innovations there. Maybe on grids, yes, I think the grids in Spain and the processes to get access to that are probably amongst the very -- among the most difficult ones in Europe, the development of that station in Spain, and we've also mentioned this, I think, in the press has taken us at least 3 years or so. And a large part of this is permitting an access to grid. The key issue, basically, there is one, the way that they organize the process. So they want basically the stations to first be built before they take an application into processing, which is the opposite of what happens in all the other countries. And two, is they're just incredibly slow, bureaucratic, you could say. I think the great thing is that this is recognized. So it's recognized by politicians. They know, it needs to change.

There's a bill to parliament in Spain. It's on the radar of the commission. So I expect a lot of change to happen there on this topic in Spain, but across Europe, because it needs to change to deliver on the infrastructure needs. Does that give you an answer to -- yes, does that give you the color on that topic that you need?

We'll now take our next question from Robert Vink, from Kepler Cheuvreux.

I have a question on the average station economics in Q1 and Q2 had -- was a strong increase in operating cost per station. And in this quarter, we see a more modest quarter-over-quarter increase in operating cost per station. And as a result, you see more operating leverage kicking in, resulting in more EBITDA on average per station. So previously, at the start of the year, I think you said operating costs were mainly increased due to grid fees organization expansion. So I'll be interested to have a bit more color on why the operating cost per station, why the dynamic is improving this quarter? What is kind of happening there?

And the second question is on the rollout. So currently, you have 30 stations under construction. And then maybe you can still launch some more constructions that could finish by the end of this year. So I'm wondering, why you have decided to maintain the lower bandwidth of your current station guidance for the year-end. So currently, it's standing at 400 to 425 stations. So why have you maintained the lower end of that bandwidth and maybe not raised that outlook?

Yes. Maybe on guidance, I think we -- I think we've basically given sort of what we can say now. So I think it's very difficult for us to deliver more detail than what we've given you on that topic. And I think that should give everyone, I think, very nice sort of detail where we're expecting to land year-end.

I think on station economics, I think if you look at there, I think this is really in the end, the secret sauce of Fastned right? And yes, we -- over the last 2 years, did a very significant ramp-up in our organization, FTEs also associating other costs, to get to a higher build pace, a higher acquisition pace, to build this organization in those countries across Europe, to make sure that we everywhere can deliver that same reliable service, but that goes in step changes to some extent.

So we're moving now towards territory to start optimizing, let's say, that FTE base and accelerate the deliveries that, that FTE base does. So I expect significantly -- yes, significant further acceleration of that leverage. Does that answer your question, Robert?

I think that gives a bit more color. And maybe the grid fees, did that picture change quarter-over-quarter? Or is that still the same trend?

Yes. I think -- so on grid fees, I think, basically, there's a couple of moving elements there. So one is the element that, as a consequence of the energy transition, grid fees are increasing in the whole country for everyone, et cetera. So that's one. I think we've implemented a significantly more data-driven approach to our -- yes, to the buying of contract power in that sense and how we manage that. So that's -- yes, let's say that puts a little bit more strategy in place to, let's say, how we look at grid fees, and that does manage costs also somewhat, although, yes, if you would try to optimize for today, they could be significantly lower, but we just don't want that given the need of power in the years to come.

So in that sense, there is an inflation of cost as a consequence of investments in our future. Does that come across helpful? It might be a little bit complex, but I think, it's good to say it's one investment in the future. On the other hand, there is significantly more control over that.

Yes. It's a balancing act, long-term growth and also keeping the cost at a reasonable level. Very good.

Perfect.

And the next question is from Jeremy Kincaid from Van Lanschot Kempen.

Just following up on Robert's question about the operating cost per station. In the third quarter '25, you say that, that number is 142,000 per station, but I see it's based off the first half '25 average. So my question is, can you confirm that, that number hasn't changed that much from the first half moving into the third quarter?

And then my second question is just on access to grid connections. Obviously, the grid in the Netherlands has been congested for a while and arguably less congested in other parts of Europe, but obviously, the world is now changing with AI and data centers. So I was just wondering if your ability to get a grid connection is changing in other parts of Europe because of that dynamic, or if it's not really a factor?

Good question. Yes, maybe quickly on the cost level, I think this basically is our policy. So we've always been doing that, basically looking at a P&L reporting on a half year basis, year and half year. And so the costs always are basically lagging to that previous period. So that's correct.

And when looking at grids in the Netherlands, I think you're spot on. The economy is electrifying, the energy transition is accelerating and that puts a strain on the grid and the movement to AI in that sense, makes it even more congested. What does that say to our ability? Yes. Let's say, I think what we've seen is basically the Netherlands hit the wall the earliest. So that was mostly a consequence of the fact that it's also that far ahead in that transition.

And yes, I think basically, what you see now is that on the one hand, we hit on a, let's say, a spreadsheet level, the nominal maximum capacity in the grids. So there is a peak level where, let's say, once a day, twice a day, a couple of days a year, the maximum of the grid capacity is reached.

On the other hand, 70% of our grids are not utilized today, the average utilization is below, maybe 30%. And that is the key discussions that we are having with grid operators, whether more flexible contracting of capacity is possible. So we're moving forward with the first projects on that. Initially, most likely, this is going to be what they call time-based power availability, for example, in night, hopefully, also partly in daytime.

And that's basically with a significant battery of 1 or 2, 3-megawatt hour per site would also allow the build of a charging station. And that is most likely future where we're going to see across Europe, especially in countries that are moving from coal-fired power plants and gas-fired power plants to renewables.

So I think the negative is it delays basically our build-out in the Netherlands, our -- but that of any other party in the market that scales the revenue on the existing locations in those years. And the benefit in that sense that we see is that we are among the very first to build a capability to deliver energy solutions, energy managed charging stations with batteries in a situation of grid-constrained areas, which will be needed all across Europe.

So yes, it's a bit of a step change, you might say that we expect there in the coming years. And that is happening. And the main thing is that the grid operators, they need their information. So they're working very hard to get their systems digitized to make such projects available. Does that give you a bit of context on this topic?

Yes. Very helpful. And maybe a follow-up, what percentage or how many of your stations already have batteries attached to them?

And so we're currently having our first site with batteries available, and we're working on a pipeline of several more. But logically, given the battery prices are going down year-over-year, we rather buy them at the latest point in time. So any capacity we can get on the grid, we would always buy first, but we will see a significant ramp-up in batteries over the coming years.

Sorry, go ahead.

Sorry, go ahead. I was just going to say, so does that mean you're also prepared to deploy batteries to locations even if they don't generate -- the battery itself doesn't generate the economic return because it would give you access to electricity and give you access to that location?

Yes, I think you can only use a battery once, right? So you can choose to use the battery to deliver services on the FCR market or frequency control reserve, for example. But yes, you do need to clearly define its winter time, for example, I need that battery. And then, yes, you can't deliver two business cases at the same time, right? There's only one piece of technology. So then we have to choose, but in our case, we choose to, in that sense, use that to deliver electricity to electric drivers with a margin of EUR 0.54 per kilowatt hour. And I think that's a very good business case.

Yes. Jeremy, sorry, just a small note to your first question and to clarify that the estimate on per charger cost is indeed H1. So we do not have the exact Q3 numbers in yet because we only do the top line. So it is indeed an estimate, but we don't think there's a massive change to that, but just to make that clear, it's an estimate.

We have a question from Thijs Berkelder from a sell-side analyst (sic) [ ABN AMRO, ODDO BHF ].

From ABN AMRO, ODDO BHF, you mean. And so yes, I've heard you -- our long bullish speech on what you all have accomplished, but let's -- at the same time, you're mentioning in your speech that it's about getting every detail right. In the financials, I'm not seeing every detail right in the sense of coming back on the stage and dynamics. It's an outdated picture you're giving, and you're comparing it with an adjusted version of last year's presentation.

Last year, you presented an operational EBITDA in Q3 of EUR 125 million and now EUR 127 million. So that's a minor change year-on-year, but now you've downward adjusted last year's presentation. On the OpEx per station, making the calculation on the details you've given today, I'm already at EUR 23,000 per charger in the third quarter. So again, 4% higher than in H1.

On the initial investments, you're still presenting EUR 802,000 per station, which is an outdated number because you've delivered that fantastic Gentbrugge location in the third quarter. So that number must be way higher meanwhile.

Coming to a conclusion to a question, cash out in the third quarter has been EUR 30 million, 3-0 million, and you are still not yet investing and that wave is close to coming in, in the new Alpitronic's 1-megawatt chargers. So what is the -- when do you plan to start rolling out these 1-megawatt chargers? What will that cost? How much will the investment per station go up, et cetera, et cetera?

I'm really worried about seeing only a growth of 13% in electricity sold year-over-year per station versus 22% for the fleet. And that while you benefited from the holiday traffic, all the Dutch people traveling through France and Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium themselves, local for local was not -- was even weaker. So a lot of questions in one. I want to have as financial analysts also on the financials, all details right.

Thijs, let me talk a bit about Alpitronic because I think that was a clear question. I think they looked at this -- let's say, at this topic as well. And their goal is actually to the opposite of what your risk or worry is. They're thinking about making the system more CapEx efficient. So we expect also to start rolling out after our first testing cycles, et cetera, et cetera, with a system that actually is able to deliver us similar or better CapEx efficiency for our sites or at a little higher investments, allow with low investments to add truck charging options.

So it's definitely a development that is really in the right direction, faster charging at similar or lower CapEx levels.

CapEx per offered kilowatt.

Definitely per offered kilowatt, but lower CapEx in general, I think that's an important thing. We don't expect the system, and that's a consequence of its integration to significantly be more expensive than separate stores and -- the reason why that is, is that currently, if we would, for example, put down 4 cabinets that was 400 kilowatt in there, then you put 1.6 megawatt hour of -- sorry, 1 megawatt of power stacks in a location.

If you would look at, like what is charging there, the average charge peak is currently 70, 80 kilowatts will go up, but not to 400 within 5 to 10 years. So what that system of combined architecture allows us to do is to scale down instead of 1.6 megawatts in power stacks to only put down 1 megawatt in power stacks to deliver the same needed charging speeds, but for cars that have the ability to charge much faster, even go higher. So it's just a smarter system.

But do you mean that you plan to use that 1 charger for 3 or 4 spots for sourcing 3 or 4 spots, but then your station needs more or less a redesign, a quite large need to be done.

Not necessarily because basically, the power stacks, the big box that you see, and I think basically Alpitronic isn't the only one, right? ABB and BYD and others are coming with similar systems. Those big power stacks that would stand, let's say, quite close to the transformer stations and deliver to stores, which basically only have liquid cooling and some connections taking place, the HMI, and that being close to your car. So it would actually even make our stations look lighter, more customer-friendly than they are looking today.

Well, I'm really curious to see, but point is, you are heading for a new CapEx round in replacing your existing charges for new chargers. So that was the point when can we expect that starting to happen. Same for the batteries, we said we are waiting until the time is right. Is the time right in '26, '27?

I think the answer is not never. I never say never, but that's definitely not going to happen before, let's say, 2035. Looking at the technology we're deploying that is 400 kilowatts capable already today, like a single charger can deliver 400 kilowatts. The layouts of the stations are built in a way to future-proof them already on that path. So what we will be doing is, first, basically, we have 400 kilowatts split over 2 cars that today is more than sufficient for the current fleet. In due time, we will take off a single cable, enabling 400-kilowatt nominal per charging position on the existing technology platforms already installed.

We would add another 400-kilowatt charger to enable that. So there will be expansion at existing stations that is relatively low investments. And when looking at the deployment, of the 1 megawatt Alpitronic or other technology basis then we're basically moving on very similar cost levels, but just increasing the capabilities of our stations. So it becomes smarter and it allows for higher peak power delivered to cars. So we don't expect any significant investments to do renewals. We might see beyond 20 -- let's say, 2030 or so, that we will be moving towards 400-kilowatt nominal position at existing stations that are already built.

And Thijs, just to add to your first question, it's the same answer as I gave to Jeremy, which is that last year in Q3, we reported an estimate based on H1 costs. And the number for 2024, we're reporting now is the actual assets in the footnote based on the full cost per charger for 2024. So that's why there will be differences. And it's a trade-off. We can either decide to report later once the costs are consolidated and reconciliated and in place, but we like to be ahead of the curve and get quickly out with our reporting. So we have to make some compromises. So apologies for that, but we'll see where we can improve. Thanks for your questions.

Yes. I have another one on -- is there any progress in your discussion with the Dutch regulator on their plan to get to operators per highway side?

I think you know, we don't have a government in the Netherlands at the moment, right? Or let's say, not...

We have the regulator.

I think -- yes, I think the answer is in that sense that the ingredients for new policy have been out already for several years. The markets, the ministries are working on a plan to get that into legislation. But the base of that, given the fact that there is no government enforce in that sense, it's not very, very fast. And I know I've seen the report as well that you've seen. It's a bit of a -- yes, it feels a bit of like a rogue report from the regulator. There is -- yes, there's been quite a bit of feedback by the market to say like that is a strange publication that they did because it doesn't comply to a lot of regulation and legislative, let's say, regulation and legislation out of Europe. So we don't expect much from it anyway. Basically, the expectations of it by the ministries and the markets are nice opinion, but no backing in law and research.

So I think in that sense, I think what we see is the government is continuing or the ministries in that sense, are continuing their preparation on the path that they embarked on. And that's good. That's a good path. So I think that's admirable. The pace is not as high as we hoped for. So I think in that sense, the risk that we see going forward is that -- and I've mentioned this recently, I think, a bit more is that the risk we do see is that, we will get the question from ministries in due time. Dear Fastned, can you enlarge your stations because electric drivers are waiting for it, then we will have to say, yes, we can only do this based on new 15-year concessions. And we cannot do that just on a yearly extension or whatever.

Is -- that's basically, I think, the trap that we're falling into now is that government is not on a pathway or on a time pathway from all that we hear that they're going to be ready in time, and that is going to mean that it will be difficult to make significant investments in these locations. And that will mean that the infrastructure in that sense will be very highly utilized, which is not great for electric driver, but this is what it is.

But sorry for getting, why are you then managing your Dutch utilization at staying at the low 13% level and not make them -- forced them to wake up, because also in your famous station economic slide, there's a kind of suggestion that your utilization will go much and much higher. But for now, for the past 5 years, you're simply managing it at staying constant at 12% utilization. That's not yes, bringing, let's say, an urgency feeling to governments and to customers.

The typical mistake that we've seen made by many in our industry had to focus on utilization. And then in the end, you have to sell no when the growth is changing. So we're focusing on sales and not on utilization because in the end, that is cash in the bank.

But that then also will mean that next year prices will go up further, because costs will go up further as well.

From what?

Well, your cost price per unit will rise further consistently because you're introducing all kinds of new shops, full electric? Are you making all kinds of expensive grid connections, whatever, everything gets more expensive.

Shall we move to the last question from others, Thijs, given the time, because I think it's good to -- I'm more than happy to talk about it, but I think looking at time, I think we also -- I took a little bit more time, but I think we need to move to the end.

We'll now take our last question today from Nikita Papaccio from Deutsche Bank.

I would have also two. The first one is on the contracts, which were discontinued during Q3. Could you give us some background information? And should we expect similar quotes or even rising figures for the next quarters? And the second question, in your presentation slide deck, we are seeing that you're targeting for new markets, which are Ireland, Poland, Luxembourg, and Austria. Do you have any time line on when do you expect the market entrance or how they're developing currently?

Yes, Nikita, thanks a lot. Yes, on contracts, I think just checking like what kind of contracts are you looking for? Do you mean like location contracts or ...

Yes, exactly. On your first slide, there's like written that two contracts were discontinued in Q3. I think it's about the secured locations.

Yes. So I think the explanation is quite simple. In the end, we -- out of the whole pipeline, we, in the end, sign sites, developments, lease agreements. And in very rare cases, we have locations where after a couple of years in the end, it's just not possible to either develop a connection to grid or we cannot get it permitted. And then in the end, we sometimes have to choose to abandon the sites. And that's just what we report on here. So that's on those. So looking at...

Talking about for the next quarter -- sorry, just as a clarification. So this is really a rare case and nothing to worry about in the next quarter?

No, it's just ongoing. We've had them, I think, every other year or so, there's 1 or 2 sites, which just in the end, with all desirable, sort of, let's say, development works, just are not are not desirable to permit or cannot be permitted. And then we decide to abandon. It's also a commercial decision at some point. As said, we want to maintain investment discipline. So we don't want to develop sites if it in the end doesn't make sense. So it's a combination of these things.

New markets, yes, time line, we're putting people in these places, putting teams in place. So we are putting a team currently in Austria in -- yes, in the country. So we have people on the ground there working on tenders, working on building a pipeline slightly similar in Poland. So we're working there on scouting, but not having a team in place yet. So we're really working towards basically, let's say, ready in these countries for rollout, let's say, probably more geared towards 2027.

We really now focus what I just said on -- a bit earlier in the call, we've made a massive step in the organization growth, and we're working on optimizing that organization to deliver more. So slight developments in these 2 new countries, but not something that we want to actively focus to scale in the coming year. We really are building our pipeline in that sense to get towards scaling in 2027 in those countries. Does that give you a bit of color on those?

Any other final questions?

No, sir, this was the last question today. With this, I'd like to hand the call back over to you for closing remarks.

Well, thank you very much, everyone, for listening. Thanks for all the great questions, and looking forward to see you in Q1.

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation, ladies and gentlemen. You may now disconnect.