(AOF) – In a press release published last night, Atos revealed that S&P Global had lowered its credit rating from “BBB- with a negative outlook”, to “BB with a negative outlook”. This rating change is expected to have only limited impacts on its operations and funding, the company says.
According to her, the impact of this change in rating on the structure and cost of debt is very limited. The only one of its existing debt instruments whose cost is subject to a covenant linked to its credit rating is the €2.4 billion revolving credit facility, which remains almost entirely undrawn to date. The terms and conditions of the bonds remain unchanged.
On June 14, 2022, Atos presented its project for the study of separation into two listed companies and deployment of “an ambitious transformation plan”.
“This project, which has already generated considerable motivation and commitment from the Group’s employees, and has been very well received by its customers, is not impacted by today’s rating change, nor is the medium-term financial objectives communicated on June 14”, specifies Atos.
As indicated in the S&P Global press release, Atos’ liquidity is strong and its financial policy is appropriate. In particular, S&P Global specifies that the group’s expected level of liquidity should give it the means to carry out its transformation plan, with a term loan of 1.5 billion euros, a revolving credit facility of 900 million euros, lower use of commercial paper, and 700 million euros for planned disposals of non-strategic assets.
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Key points
– International leader in digital transformation created in 1997, European leader in cloud, cybersecurity and supercomputers;
– Activity of €10.8 billion, divided into 3 divisions – infrastructure & data management for 54% of sales, business & platform solutions for 34% and big data & cybersecurity for 10%;
– Geographical balance of revenues: 23% of sales in North America, 25% in Northern Europe, 23% in Central Europe and 22% in Southern Europe;
– Sustainable digital transformation business model;
– Open capital (9.96% for the Siemens pension fund and 2.2% for employees), Bertrand Meunier chairing the 13-member board of directors, Rodolphe Belmer being managing director;
– Solid balance sheet with debt/equity ratio of 28% and leverage of 1.9, hence management’s exclusion of any capital increase.
Challenges
– New Strategy: refocusing on digital, decarbonization, security and the cloud, which should contribute to 65% of revenues in the medium term / recovery plan in Germany / towards a sale of on-site infrastructure and traditional datacenter activities, i.e. 1/5th of income;
– Innovation strategy developed in 18 R&D centers with a portfolio of 3,000 patents: open innovation via partnerships with university centers (quantum computing, exascale computers, artificial intelligence, HPC, multicultural leadership, etc.), with alliances with other players (AWS, Dell, Google, Huma, Microsoft, OVHCloud, Sparkle, etc.) and with customers / 2 scientific communities of expert collaborators of the group / Scaler program of collaboration with 50 start-ups;
– Environmental strategy supported by the Digital Transformation Factory, the Hybrid Cloud, the “Business Accelerators” solutions, the “Connected Intelligence” and the “Digital Workplace” and aiming to meet 3 major challenges: carbon neutrality from 2028 and halving of emissions by 2025 vs 2021 / sales of decarbonization solutions, reinforced by the acquisition of EcoAct / investments in hydrogen supercomputers and quantum technologies / launch of the 1st “green” loan;
– Reinforcement in security with the purchase of the British company Cloudreach and the opening of a sovereign security center in Bulgaria;
– Visibility of the activity with an order book equal to 2.1 years of turnover.
Challenges
– Slowdown in order intake and reduction in the duration of new contracts;
– Russia-Ukraine war: low impact in terms of income (0.4%) but high in terms of labor forces, services previously provided from Russia having been transferred to India and Turkey;
– Rapid recovery expected after the loss recorded in 2021, against the backdrop of rumors of takeover bids by Airbus, Orange, etc. and the IPO of BDA and security activities;
– After a start to the year marked by a drop in sales, the 2022 objective, confirmed, of revenues ranging from +0.5 to + 1.5%, an operating margin of 3 to 5% and free cash flow between + €150m and €200m
Maximum staff turnover
Companies in the IT services sector have seen the departure of more than 20% of their workforce in twelve months. This trend is not unusual in the sector, but it is reaching an unprecedented scale, in a context of strong growth and good recruitment dynamics. In addition, employees have new requirements and aspirations. The main criterion is the flexibility of work and the way it is implemented in the company. The American-Indian company Cognizant saw around 35% of its 330,000 engineers leave the company in one year. Capgemini, grouping 32,000 French employees, recently suffered its first strike since 2008, with a demand for a collective increase in remuneration.