Welcome to today's event where we have the pleasure to present Audientes. To help us through the presentation we are joined by Steen Thygesen, CEO of Audientes. A busy half year, busy quarter. We will go through all this, all about the adjusted expectations and the new product launch, but I'm sure, Steen, you will get more into details with both of that. As always, ask question down in the box down below. Do it through the presentation, I will see if fit in, or else we will do it after the presentation. Do feel you can ask both in Danish and English, but we will because of your new marketplace, we will do this presentation for the first time in English. Do ask the question in Danish. I will translate into the best of my ability, Steen. For now, I think I will hand the call over to you. Thank you very much. Welcome to this half year financial report coverage. We have today announced what we actually managed to achieve in the first half, and we have published a report that I hope will be a useful read to really understand where we have put our efforts and what results we have achieved during both Q2 of course, but also summing up the first half. Today, the agenda really is to have a you could say a quick look at maybe the new attendees here that hasn't been present at earlier events what Audientes is sort of about, what we are focusing on. An update on the Indian market and of course the insights for the Q2 and half one results. We'll also look a bit at the U.S. market, the new rules that has been published and what we are looking at for the remainder of this year, and of course the investment case in its own right. I think it's clear that to most people that Audientes aim is really to bring out a new category of affordable hearing aids that can help people in markets around the world. We have developed a quite unique self-fitting hearing aid concept that we have launched in India, and that is currently our key market, but by no means the only market that we are going to work in in the future. We started selling the product in at the very end of first quarter this year, and of course that's the reason for why there is a lot of the revenue to date is really in the second quarter. A self-fitting hearing aid device built around a sort of a versatile hardware and software platform together with an app that makes a complete end-to-end solution for fixing hearing loss. We call it binaural, so for both ears. Using industry standard techniques for actually measuring out the hearing loss and fitting the device. That's the product we are currently marketing and selling primarily in India. I would say during the first half we really managed to get a lot of feedback from customers and we've used that over the summer to actually release several, you can say, interesting new features that I will come back to in a little while. But we have some good feedback now from end users that we are using, like from Balaji here, who has really found a good solution in the Ven product for his particular hearing loss. We have been developing new concepts for going in kind of to the retail market with some in-store pop-up shops that we are now rolling out in across the sort of southern part of India with Hearing Wellness Clinic. You can see the picture here for how it looks. This is really to emphasize the solution in stores and hopefully drive more traffic through the store for that sake. Let me get back to the actual purpose of this presentation. The operational highlights is a key part of what we, I think, are talking about. We introduced the product, we started selling, we expanded, kind of doubled really the number of retail outlets in India during the first half to now more than 350 individual stores. We have managed to activate around a third of these over the summer. Now we're working on really bringing the rest of them to a point where they're trained and ready and actually stocking and selling the product. That's what are gonna drive our growth, of course, the coming months. We managed to surpass DKK 1 million in revenue. We, of course, continued to invest in actually product development and to the tune of around DKK 3.6 million, which was in line with our expectations. A lot of it around Ven, of course, but we're also starting now to invest in other product developments such as the Companion product that we are coming back to in a little while. We have focused on making sure we do not get hit by supply chain issues at the end of the year and into the new year for that sake. We have started to build up the inventory and have now a really good position to deliver products to the market in the coming months. Of course, key part of what we have been working on is to prepare the change to the Spotlight Stock Market from the Nasdaq First North Growth Market in Denmark, which we have been receiving approval for as well. That is going to take place on September 19th, which is going to be the first trading day at Spotlight. Performance highlight number-wise, I would say key part, of course, is revenue and the other elements of what we are actually focusing on driving, you can see listed here. There is maybe not that much you can say is a surprise to many of these, but I think the revenue, of course, is a number that we will continue to track and of course staying on target with our EBITDA expectations for the year, which is basically something we will also get back to in a little while. After the end of the first half, we announced Companion by Audientes. We also announced a new nice feature whereby our professional partners can actually update the audiogram manually because some people needs a really tailored fitting. So far we have been relying on the built-in self-fitting, but now giving dispensers that feature is something that will basically address another kind of sub-segment in the market for us. Basically, dispensers who when selling this product, the Audientes hearable, hearing aid, they also want sometimes to actually tweak this, the settings for the individual user. We have made this app that you can see the picture of running also on my iPhone here, which we think is a really novel solution, and help us expand our presence in our existing channels as well as in new channels, in the future. We also released the iOS app. It's now available worldwide and of course also on Android. These were things that happened over the year, sorry, over the summer. Now recently, FDA published the final rules for the OTC hearing aids, and I'll get back to you in a little while what that is about and why that is super interesting for us. This is what we have been waiting for, clarity, so we can work on basically completing our product development and introducing that to the market next year. Of course, we continue to develop the retail channels and announced a sort of a new partner in Meenakshi who is a hearing aid kind of clinic chain in the northern part of India. Now, as you said, Michael, we did adjust our outlook for the year. We have been, of course, as everyone has been, seeing how the stock markets have been developing, and we have really found a need to level our expectations with the point of where the market is, what we can attain in funding, and what we should really aim for, investing in the business going forward this year in particular. We have decided that we need to be a bit more, you can say, in tune with where we think we can actually achieve funding-wise. We have been looking at, okay, we're growing the business, but maybe we can grow it at a slightly more moderate pace, and thereby reducing some of the planned spending, in particular marketing and online advertisement, which we have found is a place where we're doing quite well as it is. We need to work a bit more on parts of the go-to-market model in the online space. We are instead going to focus on the B2B channel more for the time being because that really seems to have a really good conversion rate for us. That's why we have sort of both adjusted the kind of the revenue expectations. When we are investing less in marketing and sales, of course, it's just gonna generate less in actual income. That's for sure, but this will be aligned with what we believe is attainable from the funding process we have to start here. The EBITDA loss has been reduced similarly because we are not investing that much, of course, and then it's natural that our loss is kind of smaller as a consequence. We will of course in the future invest significantly in marketing because that's how you attract customers. I think for the time being this is a very prudent thing to do for us. If I can just maybe shift gear a bit. We have been focusing wholeheartedly at marketing and introducing Ven in the Indian market, and we will continue to do that of course in the future and in particular for the remainder of this year, really get the traction that we believe is possible to attain. We do have our sights on other markets and in particular the U.S. market where there are certain opportunities arising from this new over-the-counter legislation. We certainly want to enter that as soon as we can and with the right offering. At the same time, we are seeing opportunities in the U.S. market and for that sake, other markets in Asia and Europe where we can introduce a variant of our solution, based around, you can say the same hardware and software platform, but with some adjustments that means we can introduce that as a consumer electronics product. This really links with the sort of U.S. market opportunity that for us, we plan to enter that market with a FDA-approved hearing aid for this new legislation, at a later point in time in 2023. We have actually found that we have an opportunity in the shorter term where we can introduce the Ven product, but in a slightly, you can say a product variant that is adapted for the consumer electronics market. That is the product we have introduced, announced at least, as called Companion by Audientes. Essentially it's the same form factor, but software-wise and functionality-wise, it's a solution that I think for many people will be an easy step to address situations where they can improve the clarity of hearing and for that sake, you can say, participate in conversations more easily. We are going to get back to that much more later this year. Just for now, to clarify what you asked about, Michael, this is what we have kind of made, you can say, opened the veil for right now. For the remainder of this year, we're gonna focus on really you can say broadening and improving the access to the market in India through the existing retail points we have, but also growing that number of retail points with new partnerships that can enable us to have you can say the right retail presence to sell the number of device that we want to. In fourth quarter we are introducing Companion to the market, and we'll be also of course clarifying the go-to-market plans for that product at that stage. You can say going forward, as I detailed, our plan is really to enter the U.S. market also at a later point in time with this OTC hearing aid that would be FDA approved according to this 510 approval route. That's, you can say, so we have our work cut out for us. Of course, this is for many people that maybe see this for the first time. This is actually part of the roadmap we have outlined a long time ago. Now of course it's becoming more concrete, and it's also becoming, you can say, expanded in some ways in the sense that Companion was not really envisaged early on. Now this is an opportunity that we have been seeing materializing, and we are, we're going to capture that. You can say wrapping up here, Audientes. We think Audientes is a very compelling investment case because we're addressing this large market opportunity that virtually is unaddressed. Basically hearing aids in markets where the penetration of hearing aids is very low, this is what we're focusing on. India, many countries in Asia is where we think we have got a great solution, and we're going to really work on developing that. At the same time, there are these opportunities arising elsewhere in the world where you can say different market segments probably, but, you know, can say the similar needs. We are going to find out how to participate in that, in that opportunity in the best possible way. The product is ready. It's out in the market. It's selling. Companion coming a little while down the line. We think that we are expanding our portfolio and market reach in a very sensible and cost-effective manner. I think from India point of view, very clear positioning of what we're about. High quality, low cost. The same you can say a playbook will be more or less applied in the U.S. market. Of course, the demographics are different, but there's still a lot of people that cannot afford very expensive hearing aids and are looking for maybe also different solutions for their hearing loss. This is what we think we can expand into markets with, like the U.S. in a with a sort of a good offering in time as we get to that. Finally, of course, we have a team in India and in Denmark. We are working really well together and you can say expanding this market access we have. I think it's really exciting. I'm gonna be traveling down there next week, again, as part of an SDG accelerator program that we are part of. We're gonna meet with many new stakeholders and hopefully expand the platform we have in India, with new market opportunities. Finally, I would say, Michael, you also touched on that a bit earlier. We are in the process of making this change from the Nasdaq First North Growth Market to the Spotlight Stock Market. You can say things are put in motion. This is gonna happen now, in the middle of September, virtually. We will be, of course, communicating a lot more about this to our existing shareholders, what it means. Of course, also we'll be starting to broaden our profile in the Swedish market much more and being more present there. We're very excited about it. We think it's the right thing to do and for us, we are looking forward to that new adventure as well. This is what I had prepared for today. I hope you found it interesting, and I'll be looking forward to answer any questions that may arise. The first one, Steen, is how is the supply chain regarding Companion? Can you use the same components? Can you use the same, you know, moldings and everything? You know, you had a delay in the start of the year. I know the supply chain has probably gotten better, but I guess if. Is it primarily software that is changing the Companion, so the knowledge you build up on the Ven, can you use that in the supply chain on the new product? Yes. Yeah. I would say to a very large extent the hardware design platform, form factor, everything is the same. It is a software exercise for us coupled with some element around the gift box. That is of course, it's a different sleeve and there's a different guide in it, but functionality-wise, it's a simplified offering of the Ven that I think will be a really good fit for new segments. For us, supply chain-wise, it's of course the different production batches being run, different tests being run on them, but material-wise and everything is the same. Perfect. Then there's a question here. Are the outlets, sales outlets already you have in India, is that enough to deliver on your sales expectation? Or are you still investing into it? You know, you have reduced your sales spend, but is that more on the indirect sales, the marketing, the ad campaigns? Do you still want to have more outlets to deliver on your sales targets? Right. Absolutely. We are gradually expanding the Indian sales force with people who are covering different regions. We are investing in building out the, you can say, the retail presence. The dealers, absolutely, that's part of what we're doing. We're also investing, I would say, quite a lot in making them successful in understanding the product and being able to sell it through to the end users. We get really the good flow going. Absolutely expanding as well as growing. You have that covered by your current guidance, that is a part you are building out, if I understand. Yes. Of course, you can say the Companion offering is also destined to drive sales. So, you know, they will go hand in hand quite nicely we believe. I know the business. A new product with audio in the back there, that always helps. Yes. Are you in the process of building up any partners in the U.S., or do you have to do that on your own like in India, you know? I know it's early stages, but do you have a thinking about attacking maybe a bigger market, where more are probably going to go into the market if we listen to all this? Yes. I can't detail that much at this point in time, but there are two channels, you can say, directions in the U.S. One is with the professionals, like the clinics as we are doing currently. That is definitely of interest, but you can say the broader consumer electronics market, different retailers, distribution points is what we are considering for Companion. I would say the online market access in the U.S. is actually you can say the price point of the products that we are marketing is selling a lot more in the U.S. than in India. In India, our solution is a relatively expensive device to buy online. I think in the U.S. that's gonna be quite different. Yeah. If I can stay on the price point, I know you can't predict it, you know. I am seeing people, companies writing about between $250- $1,000 they expect the OTC market. I know some will put out a little bit more expensive, really close to professional hearing aids. Where will you be in that spectrum? Can you We will be in the middle part of that spectrum. Absolutely. We will try to make the price as attractive to really get it out in substantial units. You know, the price that we are retailing for in India is between $300 and $400 converted, you know. I think that that's the price we think is probably a good starting point in the U.S. We have to see where we end up, what our local partners feel is the right price. The right price. Yeah. A little bit of a nerdy question. I think on the slide you are showing 18 million. I'm watching everything from 30 million- 48 million potential clients. Are you just taking the most conservative number you have received? Yes. Yeah, those numbers are basically not including all the mild kind of cases. 'Cause then you get a much larger number. We're focused on the kind of cases from moderate to sort of higher. Yeah. That, that's the explanation. Perfect, thank you. Yeah. How has the India sales ramped up since the close of H1? As expected or if you can give some a little bit feel. Of course, we always want to. Yeah. Go a little bit further than the results. I think largely, you know, when you go out and you actually start marketing a solution and you have a certain number of retailers, you need to have them being able to sell it through to end users before they are gonna place new orders. We have been really focusing on helping them, but also expanding to a new number of retailers, so the remaining. I think that's going as expected. India, of course, is a country that is plagued by many exciting things like monsoon and everything. Sometimes there are periods where you can say those retail points are doing less, and then other times they're doing more. I think overall for the quarter, we should definitely be improving on the last quarter. I think we have a lot of things in store working for us right now. Perfect. Just to clarify, the new hearing aid, or version of Ven, you have made that so it lives up to the regulation in the new OTC compliance. You don't need to make any big changes to your hearing aids to comply to the rules? As for the U.S. market, you mean? For the U.S. market, the OTC, 510(k). Yeah. No, absolutely. Yeah. No, absolutely. Our plan is the product for the OTC market is going to be an improved variant of the Ven concept, which you can say, you can consider it a version two of the offering with some improvements for that market. Because in order to get the FDA kind of approval, there are certain things that we have to anyway work on literally from scratch. That's what we are, we're going to do for that. It's gonna be a version two, and you know, improved in various ways that are making it, I think, a really good fit for that market. You don't see any big hurdles in turning around your technology to comply with the rules? They were as you expected under the hearings? Yes, because we have been aware of this 510(k) model for a while now. It's just that it's a lengthier process than if you are introducing a consumer electronics device, what we're doing. The 510(k) has just got many steps. Yeah. Of course, you can say now that they have published them, and many manufacturers will probably look at that and say, "This is interesting," then I think it'll become quite sort of a good flow in the whole approval scheme around that. There's a question here. How do you protect your technology in India, China, U.S., all the markets you are looking at? Do you have a global patent on some of your solutions or? Well, we are trademarking our design in basically in as many markets as we can. That's the physical design. The software-wise, it's the software in the product is encrypted and cannot be extracted from the product and used in any way. It's, you can say, that's how we protect it. I think anyone with a good idea for doing a product can, of course, come up with a form factor that looks like it. Of course, we're not the ones that invented the form factor for neck-worn devices. Mm-hmm. We use that form factor actually because it's quite popular in many segments, and definitely in India, it's a well-known form factor for headsets. But we then, you can say, made our own innovations around that. Can you say a little bit more about the capital injection timing and how dependent you are on that still to go through delivering on your new guidance? Yeah. We of course have been working, as I mentioned earlier, on preparing that and, you know, I would say we are definitely getting closer to when it'll be executed. I think we'll be able to come back to that in the foreseeable future with more detail. I think for now we are, we have sort of, you can say, been diligent at doing the necessary things. We are, we're not far from, I'd say, commencing that. Perfect. I know you can't say much, so it's okay. Can you say anything about how much you earn per sale? A little bit about the gross margins, how are they like? I don't know how much you wanna publish. I cannot, you know, detail our BOM and everything. What I can say is that our product is actually a higher end product in that category. It's a quite nice quality product. It's not, you can say it's not in the very bottom of the range, not kind of production cost-wise either, but it has got good margins for the dealers. In India, for example, they believe this product could actually cost more because it has the many features it does, and can handle the binaural hearing loss and go up to quite high amplification and work with smartphones. All these things brings it up to a point where it could be sold for more, but we have chosen to sort of introduce it at a quite good manufacturer's recommended retail price. That's what you do in India. You actually set a maximum price. I think for the Indian market, it works basically. People are motivated to market and sell it, and they can make good money on it. Perfect. The U.S. market, do they expect to have better margins there, or is there more to take the pie than you have in India? Yeah. Some expectation maybe about. I know it's early stage. No, but some channels in the consumer electronics space, they do work with kind of lower margins, and because they are turning over the product faster with less support. In those channels, I think it will also work for us quite nicely. I know there's many combinations of marketing support and what you do in the end for to sell a product, but if you go into the more professional channels in the U.S., I think the picture will be very much like in India, because they are handling products in a different way than in the consumer electronics channels. I think B2C of course is a totally different thing. Yeah, that's you kind of invest more in the online marketing and you earn a higher margin when you are selling the product. Yeah. I know it's early stage. Yeah. It was just as a curiosity. It seems you have a little bit higher price in the U.S. but maybe some are need to be divided out more there. Yeah. A final question, Steen. What is your long-term expectation for positive EBIT? How many years? I don't know whether you have any rules that during a capital raise you can't give new long-term guidance. No, I mean, I can just say that, as we started out around the IPO, our aim was to really have sort of like a cash flow positive business in 2024, break even. I would say this is now two years out for us. I think this is still very much doable. We are running a sort of a lean organization, and we have some products that are, as I said, have sound margins. As we scale the business, that is definitely going to be achievable. There are of course other ways that you can look at the business saying, you want to look at it from the long term and invest more in new markets. I think right now we have the mindset that we want to become sustainable as a business and kind of grow from that platform sooner rather than later. That's where I think the market is nowadays, and that's what we're looking at. I think you're right on the financial market, at least right now. Perfect, Steen. Thanks to the audience for listening in. Yeah. Sorry. It's key. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks to the audience for listening in, and thank you to you, Steen, for taking us through your second quarter result and also looking a little bit ahead. May everybody have a nice day. Thank you.