Azkoyen, S.A. (AZK.MC) - Deep Dive Research Report

Prepared: May 19, 2026

Research note on reporting methodology: Azkoyen is a Spanish small-cap listed on the BME Madrid Continuous Market. The company switched from quarterly to semi-annual financial reporting in 2021, in line with EU practice for companies of its size. It does not hold live earnings conference calls in the US tradition. Instead, results are published via press releases filed with the CNMV (Spain's securities regulator) at two points each year - half-year results and full-year results. This report treats those four most recent publications as the equivalent of four concall transcripts:

H1 2024 results - issued ~July 26, 2024
FY2024 results - issued February 28, 2025
H1 2025 results - issued ~July 25, 2025
FY2025 results - issued February 27, 2026 (most recent, 81 days ago)

Section 1: What the Company Does

Azkoyen makes and sells the mechanisms that handle money in machines - not the machines themselves, but the core hardware that determines whether a coin is genuine, whether a banknote is counterfeit, and whether a contactless card payment is authorized. Alongside this payment technology business, it manufactures vending machines for coffee and snacks, and runs a separate German-headquartered division that manages who can open which door in a hospital, airport, or logistics warehouse.

The company was founded in 1945 in Peralta, a small town in Navarra, northern Spain, by Martín Luis Troyas Osés. He called it "Talleres Azkoyen" and started making agricultural machinery. The pivot to payment technology happened in 1956, when Troyas registered patents for coin selectors that could distinguish between peseta denominations - a direct, physical capability that required precision mechanical engineering and an understanding of how coins behave in the real world. By 1961, Azkoyen had produced Spain's first tobacco vending machine, the Polimatic. By 1977, it had built the Cafemat, the first Spanish automatic hot beverage dispenser.

The founding story matters because it shaped what the company is: a hardware engineer's company, not a software company, not a financial services company. The core capability is manufacturing small, precise mechanisms that handle cash reliably in harsh environments - public vending machines, casino floors, parking garages, factory canteens - places where the device must work without supervision, every single transaction, for years.

Azkoyen listed on the Madrid and Bilbao stock exchanges in 1988, using the capital to begin its international expansion. Since then, it has made a series of acquisitions that have diversified the group well beyond its Navarra origins: Coges S.p.A. in Italy (2004) for gaming and vending payments, Coffetek in the UK (2005) for hot beverage dispensers, Primion Technology GmbH in Germany (2005) for workplace access control and time recording, Vendon in Latvia (2022) for IoT telemetry in vending, and Ascaso in Barcelona (2022) for premium espresso machines.

The most important thing to understand about Azkoyen today is the mismatch between its revenue mix and its profit mix. The Payment Technologies division generates roughly 37% of group revenue but accounts for approximately 69% of group operating profit, at an EBIT margin approaching 26%. The other two divisions - coffee machines and workplace security systems - are profitable but far thinner. Understanding why this mismatch exists, and whether it will persist or widen, is the central question for any analysis of the company.

The payment technology advantage comes from three decades of accumulated know-how in coin recognition: the electromagnetic sensors, the mechanical tolerances, the firmware that can distinguish a genuine 2-euro coin from a foreign token of nearly identical size and weight. This is not easy to replicate. Every currency zone adds new coin specifications; every decade of inflation introduces new coin designs. Azkoyen's database of currency data and its ability to update coin recognition software across millions of installed validators is a genuinely sticky technical capability.

Section 2: Business Segments

2.1 Payment Technologies (37% of FY2025 Revenue, ~69% of Group EBIT)

The Payment Technologies division is the company's profit engine. It sells the hardware and software that handles cash and cashless transactions in four distinct industries: vending machines, gaming machines, parking and automation systems, and retail/banking cash management.

The Coges franchise. The Italian subsidiary Coges S.p.A., acquired in 2004, is the anchor of this division. Coges describes itself - and is independently described - as the European leader in cashless payment systems for vending machines. Its products sit between the vending machine's main controller and the payment interface visible to the consumer: it communicates with the machine's firmware, validates which coins and cards are accepted, records every transaction, and increasingly connects the machine to the internet. Coges competes primarily on integration depth and reliability rather than on raw payment hardware alone - its EVA DTS protocol compatibility is widely supported across European vending machines, making Coges hardware relatively interchangeable across machine brands.

The gaming market. Before cashless vending, Azkoyen's coin validators were the standard in European gaming. AWP (amusement with prize) machines - what the British call fruit machines and the Europeans call slot machines - are heavily regulated devices where every coin pathway must be certified. The leading European AWP manufacturers qualified Azkoyen's coin validators decades ago. Requalifying an alternative requires regulatory approval, machine redesign, and servicing retraining. This is genuine installed-base lock-in: Azkoyen holds certified status with regulatory bodies across multiple European jurisdictions, and its components appear in the internal drawings of machines that may remain in service for ten or fifteen years.

Cashlogy. This sub-brand offers smart cash management systems for retail and banking - physical devices that accept cash from staff, count it, validate it, store it securely, and generate audit trails. The target customer is a multi-branch retailer or a bank branch processing daily till reconciliation. Cashlogy competes with Glory Global Solutions, Giesecke+Devrient, and Crane Currency in the back-office cash handling segment. It is a smaller part of the division but participates in a market where banks remain significant cash handlers even as consumer behaviour shifts toward cards.

Vendon. Acquired in 2022 from Latvia for an initial €9.3 million (plus up to €4 million contingent on the 2022-2024 business plan), Vendon is an IoT platform that connects vending machines to the internet. It provides operators with real-time data: how many products remain in each slot, which products are selling fastest, whether the machine's refrigeration is running at the right temperature, when a technician last visited. This telemetry data has a natural partnership with Coges's payment systems - a vending operator using both can correlate payment transactions with inventory depletion, optimize restocking routes, and reduce both stockouts and unnecessary visits. Vendon contributes to what the group calls its "Nebular" cloud platform - the SaaS management layer that sits above both payment hardware and telemetry.

The strategic importance of Vendon and Nebular is that they shift the Payment Technologies division's revenue from one-time hardware sales toward recurring subscription fees. A vending operator who installs Coges hardware and then subscribes to the Nebular platform is not just a hardware customer - they become a data customer who churns only at significant cost.

Core capability. The technical foundation of the division is Azkoyen's accumulated currency database and its ability to build sensors that recognize coins across multiple jurisdictions simultaneously. A single coin validator sold in Europe today must handle the euro, Swiss franc, British pound, Norwegian krone, and potentially accommodate updated coin designs from each issuer. The firmware that makes this work was not written in a week - it is the product of decades of data collection and engineering iteration. Manufacturing for this division occurs at facilities in Spain (Peralta), Italy, and Colombia, supplemented by assembly operations in the UK, Belgium, and France.

2.2 Coffee and Vending Systems (28% of FY2025 Revenue, ~4% EBIT Margin)

This is the segment where Azkoyen started and where it now faces the clearest structural headwinds. The division designs, manufactures, and sells coffee machines and vending machines under three brands: Azkoyen (the core Spanish brand), Coffetek (UK, acquired 2005), and Ascaso (Barcelona, acquired 2022).

Azkoyen vending. The Spanish brand makes bean-to-cup coffee machines and snack/cold vending machines primarily for commercial settings - offices, canteens, transport hubs, and public spaces. The machines are positioned in the mid-to-high tier of the European market, competing on reliability and after-sales support rather than on lowest price. Manufacturing is centered in Peralta, Navarra.

Coffetek. Based in Portishead, near Bristol in the UK, Coffetek has been building hot beverage dispensers for over 30 years. Its customer base is heavily weighted toward UK office and workplace environments. The UK market's post-pandemic recovery in office occupancy was slower and less complete than the continent's, which partly explains why this sub-brand has been a drag on divisional performance.

Ascaso. The acquisition of Ascaso in July 2022 for €17 million (plus €4 million contingent on a 2022-2024 business plan) was intended to add a premium espresso machine brand to the portfolio. Ascaso's machines are fully stainless steel, energy-efficient, and aimed at the premium hospitality segment - hotels, restaurants, specialty coffee shops. This acquisition has underperformed: in FY2025, Azkoyen took a €2.9 million goodwill impairment on the Ascaso business. This is the first impairment the group has disclosed and it signals that the premium espresso segment did not grow as fast as the acquisition case assumed.

The structural decline problem. The Coffee & Vending segment has declined in revenue in three of the four most recent reporting periods: -15.9% in H1 2024, recovered partially in H2 2024 (full year -9.5%), -6.8% in FY2025. Management attributed the H1 2024 decline to inventory normalization - some large customers had over-stocked in 2023 and worked through inventory without ordering in H1 2024. The H2 2024 partial recovery followed this narrative. But FY2025's renewed decline of -6.8% cannot be attributed to destocking; it reflects genuine softness in the commercial vending and office coffee machine market. The division's EBIT margin of approximately 4% leaves little cushion.

Why this segment still exists at 4% margins. The answer is strategic optionality rather than standalone economics. The Coffee & Vending machines provide a natural home market for the Payment Technologies products - a Coffetek machine typically uses Azkoyen's own coin validator and Coges's cashless reader. The division also supports Azkoyen's relationships with vending operators, who are significant repeat customers for both machines and payment hardware. Eliminating the segment would shrink the addressable market for the payment division.

2.3 Time and Security (35% of FY2025 Revenue, ~8% EBIT Margin)

This division operates almost entirely through Primion Technology GmbH, the German access control and workforce management specialist acquired by Azkoyen in 2005. It is headquartered in Stetten am Kalten Markt, Baden-Wurttemberg, and employs approximately 470 people across 20 locations in Germany, Austria, France, Spain, Belgium, and the Netherlands.

What Primion does. Primion designs and implements integrated security systems that manage who can enter which area of a facility, when, and under what conditions. An airport using Primion might have 200 separate door zones, each with a different access list: ground crew can enter the apron but not the control tower; security staff can access both but not administrative corridors. The access control hardware (readers, panels, turnstiles, biometric devices) is often supplied through the Opertis brand. The workforce management software tracks when employees clock in and out, generates payroll-compliant time records, and feeds data to HR systems. Primion recently added visitor management and integrated security risk detection to its platform, moving beyond the traditional badge-and-reader model toward a more holistic security information system.

Who buys this. Named customers include Fraport AG (operator of Frankfurt Airport), DB Schenker (Deutsche Post's logistics subsidiary), Berlin Brandenburg Airport (BER), and Rhenus Logistics. These are large, complex facilities with strict regulatory requirements around access control - they cannot use a simple consumer-grade keypad system. Procurement is handled by security managers and facility directors in long cycles, with substantial configuration, integration, and ongoing maintenance support. The installed base is sticky: ripping out an access control system means replacing hardware in hundreds of doors, retesting every access profile, retraining security staff.

Geographic concentration. Approximately 64% of Time & Security revenue is generated in Germany. The division is built around the German mid-to-large enterprise and critical infrastructure market, where Primion has 30 years of reference installations. The Primion AG acquisition in March 2026 - buying the existing Swiss distribution entity for CHF 2.07 million (€2.3 million) - is the first meaningful step toward replicating the German model in Switzerland.

Recurring revenue. The division's maintenance and SaaS revenue stream grew 1.1% to €19.9 million in FY2025 - essentially flat year-on-year, but it represents a floor of predictable, high-margin revenue from installed base. The overall division grew +10.4% in FY2025, meaning software and new system sales are growing briskly even while maintenance grows modestly.

Strategic priority. Management characterizes Time & Security as a "strategic pillar" and has consistently highlighted its double-digit growth. The segment's EBIT margin of approximately 8.3% is well below the payment division's ~26%, but the trajectory (maintenance/SaaS recurring revenue growing, new client wins in logistics and airports) suggests margin expansion potential as the SaaS component grows. The October 2025 reorganization separated Primion from the newly created VPS subsidiary, preserving it as a direct subsidiary of the holding company - a structural signal that Primion is being managed with different strategic objectives than the vending and payment businesses.

Segment Summary Table

Segment	FY2025 Revenue Share	EBIT Margin (FY2024)	FY2025 Growth	Strategic Role
Payment Technologies	37%	~25.8%	+13.5%	Profit engine, recurring revenue growth via IoT
Time and Security	35%	~8.3%	+10.4%	Growth pillar, sticky enterprise client base
Coffee and Vending	28%	~3.8%	-6.8%	Declining, strategic adjacency to payment segment

Section 3: Products and Business Detail

Coin validators are the physical heart of the Payment Technologies division. The device sits inside a vending or gaming machine and evaluates each inserted coin across multiple parameters: diameter, thickness, weight, metallic composition (via electromagnetic induction), and the coin's ring-tone on impact. A modern Azkoyen coin validator - such as the COGES engine series - can be programmed to accept any combination of currencies and updated via software when a national mint releases new coin designs. This is critical: the euro area alone has introduced over 200 different national collector coin designs that are nonetheless legal tender. A poorly updated validator either rejects valid coins (lost revenue for the operator) or accepts slugs and tokens (fraud loss). Azkoyen's 80 years of accumulated currency data is a genuine competitive asset that new entrants cannot replicate from scratch.

Hoppers dispense coins as change. In a vending machine that accepts a €2 coin for a €1.20 product, the hopper must reliably deliver €0.80 in change without jamming. In a gaming machine that may dispense thousands of €0.50 coins daily, the hopper must handle continuous mechanical stress. Azkoyen manufactures hoppers across its Spanish and Italian facilities that are specified by vending machine OEMs for their new machine designs - once specified, the hopper model number appears in the machine's service documentation and remains part of that machine's life.

Banknote recyclers are a growing product line, reflecting consumer behaviour: higher denomination notes are increasingly used to top up loyalty balances or to make larger purchases in unattended retail. Azkoyen's banknote recyclers can recognize, store, and dispense notes in multiple denominations, feeding into the Cashlogy cash management system for large retailers.

Coges cashless systems combine hardware (card readers, mobile payment modules) with the network infrastructure needed to process contactless Visa/Mastercard transactions at an unattended machine. The key technical challenge is that a vending machine in a factory canteen may have no direct internet connection - Coges solves this via its own connectivity bridge and the Vendon IoT platform, which can relay payment authorization requests over 4G or WiFi even in basement or remote locations.

The Nebular cloud platform is the SaaS layer above both Coges and Vendon. An operator managing 500 machines across multiple cities uses Nebular to see real-time machine status, sales by product, payment method distribution, and maintenance alerts - all in one dashboard. This is the highest-margin product in the division: once an operator installs the hardware, the Nebular subscription is a relatively low-cost, high-renewal item. The new version launched in 2025 added predictive restocking algorithms and route optimization.

Cashlogy smart safes target retail chains and bank branches. The concept: instead of a store manager counting the day's cash manually, they feed notes and coins into a Cashlogy device that counts, validates, and records everything automatically. The safe can communicate totals directly to accounting software. This reduces employee time spent on cash reconciliation, reduces shrinkage, and eliminates the armored car collection window (the device can hold several days' cash). Cashlogy competes with Glory's CI-10 series and Crane Currency's JetScan devices.

Manufacturing footprint. Production sites include Peralta, Navarra (coin validators, hoppers, vending machines), Bristol/Portishead UK (Coffetek hot beverage dispensers), Barcelona/Gavá (Ascaso espresso machines), Pereira, Colombia (vending), Italy (Coges), Germany (Primion hardware, Opertis mechatronic locks), and Belgium and France (payment assembly). The Colombian facility is notable as a non-European manufacturing base - it supplies Spanish-speaking Latin American markets where Azkoyen has a sales presence.

Geographic expansion. Azkoyen has sales offices in 31 countries and claims some commercial presence in over 100 countries. The core revenue base is Western European - Germany, Spain, UK, Italy, Belgium account for approximately 70% of revenue. The Switzerland acquisition of Primion AG (March 2026) is the first deliberate market-entry move in the Time & Security segment outside Germany for several years.

Section 4: Customers

Vending operators are the primary buyers of both the Coffee & Vending machines and the Payment Technologies hardware. A typical vending operator might manage 500-5,000 machines across corporate campuses, hospitals, universities, and public transport hubs. They procure vending machines every 7-12 years (machine lifecycle) and payment hardware more frequently as technology evolves. The procurement decision is made by a purchasing manager or operations director, and it is driven primarily by reliability and total cost of ownership rather than initial price. An operator who experiences excessive coin jams or cashless failures loses revenue per machine per hour - the downtime cost is far greater than the price difference between payment hardware brands.

Switching costs for payment hardware are moderate to high. Coges's EVA DTS protocol is the European vending industry standard; switching to a competitor may require firmware changes on the vending machine and re-training of field service engineers. The real lock-in comes from Nebular/Vendon subscriptions: an operator who has built their restocking route planning around the Vendon telemetry data does not casually switch to a different telemetry platform.

Gaming machine manufacturers are Azkoyen's highest-margin customers in payment hardware. Companies like Novomatic, IGT, Konami, and the major European AWP manufacturers buy coin validators and banknote recyclers as components for their machine designs. The purchasing decision is made during machine design - the coin validator is specified by the machine's hardware engineering team and approved by the relevant regulatory body (in Spain by the DGOJ, in Germany by the TUV, in the UK by the UKGC). Once specified into a machine design, the component remains with that machine for its entire production run and installed life. This regulatory qualification moat is among the deepest in Azkoyen's entire product portfolio.

Enterprise security customers (Primion) buy complex, multi-year contracts. An airport or hospital typically issues a tender, receives proposals from three to five security systems integrators (who may specify Primion or a competitor as the underlying platform), evaluates based on functionality, references, and integration capability, and then signs a 5-10 year contract that includes hardware, software, installation, and ongoing maintenance. The actual purchasing decision at a large airport involves the head of security, the IT director, and procurement. Post-installation, a Primion customer who wants to switch faces the cost of replacing all door readers and panels, re-integrating the HR and payroll systems, and re-training security staff on new interfaces. Churn from Primion's installed base is low.

Customer concentration does not appear to be a significant risk. No individual customer is disclosed as representing more than 10% of group revenue. The vending operator market is fragmented across hundreds of companies in each country, and the gaming machine market has multiple large manufacturers. Primion's 5,000+ customers range from airport authorities to medium-sized logistics companies.

Section 5: Competitive Landscape

Payment Technologies

Crane Payment Innovations (CPI) is the dominant global player in payment hardware for vending and gaming. Through a series of acquisitions - NRI (UK), Money Controls (coin handling), MEI (banknote recyclers), CashCode - CPI has assembled a portfolio that covers every component of the payment chain across every geography. CPI is owned by Crane Company (NYSE: CR), a large US industrial conglomerate, giving it far greater capital resources than Azkoyen. Where CPI is stronger: global footprint, breadth of product range, presence in the US market where Azkoyen has limited share, and ability to bundle hardware across all payment types.

Where Azkoyen holds its ground: European gaming (Coges's position is deeply embedded with EU gaming machine manufacturers), Italian vending (Coges is the Italian market standard), and the IoT/telemetry integration through Vendon+Nebular, which CPI does not match directly. Azkoyen also benefits from European customers who prefer a European supplier for regulatory and service reasons.

JCM Global is a Japanese manufacturer of banknote validators with strong presence in gaming and vending globally. JCM competes directly with Azkoyen's banknote handling products but is not a direct competitor in coin systems or cashless/IoT.

Innovative Technology (ITL) is a UK-based manufacturer of coin validators and banknote recyclers. It competes with Azkoyen in the vending and gaming segments in Europe but is privately held and smaller.

Nayax and Cantaloupe are newer cashless payment and IoT telemetry platforms for vending operators. Nayax (NASDAQ: NYAX) is Israeli-listed and growing rapidly in the connected vending space - it positions itself as a full-stack cashless solution including credit card processing, loyalty, and route management. This is the most credible emerging competitive threat to Coges/Vendon's integrated position, as Nayax competes on the software and cashless layer rather than on coin hardware. Nayax has been growing faster than Coges in terms of connected machine counts.

The honest competitive assessment for Payment Technologies: Azkoyen has a genuinely strong position in European gaming payment hardware (well-defended by regulatory qualification moats) and in Italian/Southern European vending cashless (Coges brand loyalty). It is in a stronger competitive position in hardware than in software, and Nayax's software-first expansion into European vending is a real long-term threat to the IoT/telemetry premium.

Coffee and Vending Systems

Evoca Group (formerly N&W Global Vending, owner of the Necta, Bianchi, and Rancilio brands) is the largest European vending machine manufacturer. It is far larger than Azkoyen's vending segment and competes directly in bean-to-cup coffee machines. Evoca is backed by private equity and operates at scale that Azkoyen's vending segment cannot match.

Jofemar is a Spanish competitor, also based in Navarra (making them a direct local rival to Azkoyen's home operations). Jofemar competes in both coffee vending and cold/snack vending with comparable product ranges.

Sielaff is a German vending machine manufacturer with strong presence in German-speaking markets.

In premium espresso machines (Ascaso's territory), competitors include La Marzocco, Simonelli, and Faema - Italian and US brands with deeper brand recognition in the high-end hospitality channel.

The Coffee & Vending segment faces intensifying competition alongside the structural challenge of the post-pandemic normalization in commercial vending demand. The segment is in slow decline and no single competitive action is likely to reverse this.

Time and Security (Primion)

ASSA ABLOY (OSTO: ASSA B) is the global leader in access control hardware with revenue over €10 billion. It sells under hundreds of brands (HID, Aperio, CLIQ, Traka) and covers every segment from smart home to airport-grade security. Primion competes in the enterprise software and integration layer - where ASSA ABLOY's strength is in the hardware, Primion's strength is in the security management platform that coordinates complex, multi-zone access environments. In practice, many Primion installations use ASSA ABLOY hardware (readers, locks) integrated into Primion's software platform.

dormakaba (SWX: DOKA) is the Swiss global #2, with access control solutions across many verticals. It competes more directly with Primion in the enterprise segment but has a broader geographic footprint.

Bosch Building Technologies (division of Robert Bosch GmbH) competes in the German market with integrated security solutions. Being a German company with Bosch's brand recognition is a direct competitive dynamic for Primion.

PCS (Workforce Management, Germany) and smaller German/Austrian access control specialists compete in Primion's core Central European market.

Primion's differentiation is specialization: in converged security and workforce management for complex environments (airports, critical infrastructure, large logistics hubs), it has 5,000 reference installations and 470 technical experts. This is too niche for the largest players to attack aggressively, and too complex for smaller software startups to replicate quickly. The moat is real but narrow in geographic scope.

Section 6: Industry

Vending machine demand is driven by workplace occupancy rates, food service inflation (making attended alternatives more expensive relative to vending), and consumer acceptance of unattended retail. The global vending machine market was estimated at approximately USD 24-25 billion in 2025, growing at a 5-8% CAGR depending on the study and segment. European vending specifically was approximately €24 billion in 2024, growing around 4.9% annually. The trend toward smart vending - machines with touchscreens, cashless payments, real-time inventory tracking - creates a hardware and software upgrade cycle that benefits Azkoyen on both the machine and payment technology sides.

Payment hardware for vending is sized more precisely at approximately USD 1.8 billion globally for the coin validator sub-segment (2023, Grand View Research), growing at about 6.7% CAGR through 2030. The cashless/connected vending payment market is broader and growing faster: over 8 million vending machines were connected globally as of March 2026 (per IoT Business News), a milestone that reflects the penetration of cashless acceptance rising past 75% of global vending revenue. By 2030, approximately 11.7 million vending machines are expected to be connected, according to a May 2026 research report on connected vending. This tailwind directly benefits Coges and Vendon.

Access control and workforce management is a large, growing market. The global electronic access control market is estimated at several billion dollars annually, dominated by ASSA ABLOY, dormakaba, Allegion, and Johnson Controls. Primion participates in the enterprise segment where these players' solutions are most directly relevant, competing on customization and software depth for complex facilities. The access-control-as-a-service (ACaaS) migration is a structural change: customers are moving from on-premise software licenses toward cloud-hosted platforms, which is a transition that Primion must navigate and has been investing in.

Cyclicality. The vending machine business is mildly cyclical - corporate clients defer machine purchases or reduce the number of machines during recessions. Payment hardware is somewhat more resilient, as operators maintain existing machines (and therefore need replacement payment components) even when they defer new machine purchases. The Time & Security division is largely tied to capital investment cycles in airports, logistics infrastructure, and commercial real estate - moderately cyclical but with long contract cycles that smooth revenue.

Regulation. The payment hardware segment is subject to regulation in multiple dimensions: every coin validator used in gaming must be certified by the national gaming authority (TUV in Germany, UKGC in the UK, DGOJ in Spain, AAMS in Italy); every banknote recycler used in retail cash handling must comply with the ECB's framework for currency recycling equipment; cashless payment systems must comply with PCI-DSS for card data security. These regulatory hurdles represent barriers to entry but also compliance costs. Azkoyen's multi-jurisdiction certifications, built over decades, are not easily replicated.

Import competition. In payment hardware, Chinese manufacturers (such as those on Alibaba's Accio.ai platform) produce lower-cost coin validators and banknote readers, but their ability to gain regulatory certification in European gaming and vending is limited. The EU's strict gaming regulation and the conservative nature of European vending operators mean that Chinese payment hardware has not materially penetrated the core markets where Azkoyen operates.

Section 7: Growth Triggers

The following triggers are drawn directly from the four results publications serving as the equivalent of earnings call statements. Each is cited with its source.

2026 revenue growth guided to exceed 2025's +6.0% - the highest guidance the company has given in recent history, with management noting this expectation holds "despite uncertainties caused by a changing geopolitical context." (FY2025 results, February 27, 2026)

"Despite uncertainties arising from a changing geopolitical context, the technology multinational expects 2026 to be a year with revenue growth higher than that registered in 2025." - FY2025 press release, February 27, 2026

Payment Technologies IoT/telemetry driving recurring revenue. The Vendon+Nebular platform is generating subscription revenue from connected machines. The new Nebular 2025 version added predictive restocking and route optimization, increasing the stickiness of the cloud subscription. Management referenced IoT and telemetry as "leaders of growth" in the segment. (FY2025 results, February 27, 2026; H1 2025 results, July 2025)
Time and Security maintenance/SaaS revenue growing. Primion's recurring revenue base (maintenance and SaaS contracts) reached €19.9 million in FY2025, a 1.1% increase. While growth is modest, this stable base provides floor coverage while new system sales add the double-digit growth. Management characterized Time & Security as "consolidated as a strategic pillar." (FY2025 results, February 27, 2026)
Primion AG Swiss acquisition opens new geographic market. The March 2026 acquisition of Primion's existing Swiss distribution entity for €2.3 million is a low-risk, strategically meaningful step into Switzerland - a market of wealthy enterprises and complex regulated facilities (airports, banks, hospitals) that map well to Primion's core competency. Revenue contribution will be small initially but establishes a direct market presence. (CNMV filing, March 16, 2026)
Holding company restructuring expected to improve capital allocation. The October 2025 spin of Coffee & Vending and Payment Technologies into Azkoyen VPS S.L., combined with the proposed transformation of Azkoyen S.A. into a pure holding company (proposed at May 2026 AGM), is designed to sharpen operational accountability and potentially attract segment-specific investors or strategic partners. Management cited "more orderly and efficient structure" as the objective. (CNMV filing, October 2025; AGM notice, May 2026)
Extraordinary dividend of €0.644/share signals net cash position. The proposed €1.00/share total dividend (€0.356 ordinary + €0.644 extraordinary) for FY2025 reflects a move from €10.8 million net debt at end of 2024 to a net cash position at end of 2025. This capital return capacity, if sustained, transforms the investment case from a growing industrial company to one that combines growth with meaningful capital return. (FY2025 results, February 27, 2026)
Coffee & Vending normalization expected in 2024 H2 (repeated guidance). Management first guided Coffee & Vending recovery in H1 2024 results, then again in FY2024 results, and through H1 2025. The trigger is partially delivered - H2 2024 did see improvement vs H1 2024 - but the segment remains in decline, suggesting this trigger is structural rather than cyclical. (H1 2024 results, July 2024; FY2024 results, February 2025; H1 2025 results, July 2025 - repeated across three reporting periods)

Growth Trigger Summary Table:

Trigger	Source	Timeline	Status
2026 revenue growth > 6%	FY2025 (Feb 2026)	FY2026	New
IoT/Nebular recurring revenue	H1 2025, FY2025	Ongoing	Repeated
Time & Security SaaS growth	H1 2025, FY2025	Ongoing	Repeated
Switzerland market entry (Primion AG)	CNMV Mar 2026	Near-term	New
Holding company restructuring	CNMV Oct 2025, May 2026 AGM	H1 2026	New
Extraordinary dividend/capital return	FY2025 (Feb 2026)	June 2026	New
Coffee & Vending normalization	H1 2024, FY2024, H1 2025	Elusive	Repeated, partially delivered

Section 8: Key Risks

1. Coffee and Vending structural decline - mechanism, not cycle Coffee & Vending has declined in three of the last four reporting periods. The H1 2024 decline of -15.9% included a destocking component, but the FY2025 decline of -6.8% occurred in a period of normal ordering patterns. The risk is not that Azkoyen loses the segment overnight, but that it continues a slow bleed from ~30% of revenue toward 20%, dragging the group's average margin lower and requiring continued management attention for diminishing returns. The Ascaso premium espresso acquisition, which was meant to reposition the division upmarket, has already required a €2.9 million goodwill impairment in its third year of ownership.

2. Ascaso acquisition underperformance The €2.9 million goodwill impairment in FY2025 was not flagged in any prior management communication. The acquisition was announced in July 2022 for €17 million plus up to €4 million contingent on a 2022-2024 business plan. The 2025 impairment implies the underlying asset fell below its carrying value - meaning the 2022-2024 business plan was not met, the contingent consideration was not earned, and the core asset disappointed. This is a specific M&A execution risk signal. Management has not made public statements about Ascaso's trajectory in granular terms.

3. Payment Technologies competitive threat from cashless-first platforms Nayax's connected vending platform (NASDAQ: NYAX) is growing faster than Coges in terms of connected machine subscriptions in Europe. While Coges retains its advantage in coin hardware and its gaming market certifications, the software and cashless layer of vending payment is increasingly competitive. If vending operators migrate to Nayax or similar platforms for their management and cashless needs while retaining Azkoyen coin hardware, the IoT/telemetry SaaS opportunity shrinks. The Vendon+Nebular investment is the response, but execution risk is real.

4. Germany concentration in Time and Security Approximately 64% of Primion's revenue comes from Germany, and approximately 31% of group revenue comes from Germany as a whole. A German economic contraction, a change in German data privacy regulations affecting access control systems, or loss of one or two significant German accounts would have an outsized effect on group results. The concentration is the product of Primion's 30-year history in the German market - it is not easily diversified quickly.

5. Leadership continuity risk CEO Darío Vicario resigned in January 2024 after less than two years in the role (appointed June 2022 following the resignation of Eduardo Unzu). His departure was not accompanied by a public explanation. Executive Chairman Juan José Suárez Alecha, who holds the combined chair/CEO role since early 2024, was previously external to the company. Two CEO changes in less than four years, both unexplicited, are a governance flag worth monitoring.

6. Holding company restructuring execution The proposed transformation of Azkoyen S.A. into a pure holding company involves complexity: the Coffee & Vending and Payment businesses were moved into Azkoyen VPS S.L. in October 2025; Primion Technology GmbH remains a direct subsidiary; the listed entity (Azkoyen S.A.) would hold stakes in both. Changes of this kind can create tax inefficiencies, intercompany service agreement complexity, and investor confusion over which economic entity they are evaluating. If the restructuring is primarily tax- or governance-motivated, the operational benefits may not materialize.

7. Geopolitical exposure acknowledged by management Management explicitly qualified its FY2025 guidance with "uncertainties caused by a changing geopolitical context" - the first time this caveat has been so prominent. The company generates most of its revenue in Western Europe and is not a direct tariff-exposed manufacturer for US markets, but its supply chains for electronic components (sensors, microcontrollers for coin validators) are globally sourced and could face disruption.

Section 9: Walk the Talk

[Reporting periods used: H1 2024 (July 2024), FY2024 (February 2025), H1 2025 (July 2025), FY2025 (February 2026)]

Juan José Suárez Alecha has been the constant voice across these four reports as Executive Chairman. The narrative he has maintained is consistent: the company is executing a multi-year strategic plan built on innovation, international expansion, diversification across three divisions, and sustainability. What does the record show?

H1 2024 (July 2024): The honest report with a forward promise. The H1 2024 results were weak. Revenue grew only +0.9% - essentially flat - driven by a severe -15.9% decline in Coffee & Vending that offset +12.3% in Payment Technologies and +10.2% in Time & Security. Suárez acknowledged the situation plainly: "In 2023, the company achieved the best results in its history, and in 2024 we remain on a path of moderate growth."

On Coffee & Vending, management made a specific promise: "Normalization and growth of this division is expected in the second half of 2024."

FY2024 (February 2025): Partial delivery, upgraded guidance. The H2 2024 did recover Coffee & Vending, enough that the full-year decline was -9.5% rather than -15.9%. The promise of normalization was partially kept: H2 was substantially better than H1. At the group level, full-year revenue grew +3.4% and net profit grew +7.2% to a record €18.8 million. EBITDA grew +10.5%. Management upgraded guidance:

"The trend shown by the results of the last three years is a recognition of the strategic plan, based on innovation oriented towards user experience, internationalisation, business diversification and sustainability... allowing us to continue investing in future growth while maintaining our commitment to shareholders." - FY2024 press release, February 2025

2025 guidance was set as "revenue growth exceeding 2024 levels" - deliberately unquantified but directionally positive.

H1 2025 (July 2025): Consistent delivery, reaffirmed guidance. H1 2025 showed revenue +2.1%, EBITDA +5.4%, net profit +7.5%. The payment and time & security divisions continued their double-digit growth trajectories. Coffee & Vending's decline appears to have moderated from the H1 2024 trough.

"Our diversified positioning and financial strength allow us to face [the remainder of 2025] with confidence, expecting sales growth to surpass 2024 levels." - Suárez, H1 2025 press release

Management maintained its net debt reduction trajectory, flagging net financial debt at below 0.5x annual EBITDA.

FY2025 (February 2026): Beat on revenue and EBITDA, miss on net profit due to undisclosed impairment. Revenue grew +6.0%, beating the prior year's +3.4% and exceeding the guidance of "exceeding 2024 levels." EBITDA grew +7.8% to €37.7 million. Net debt went from €10.8 million to a net cash position - a transformation that was not explicitly guided but represents exceptional cash conversion.

However, net profit fell -6.8% to €17.5 million. The culprit was a €2.9 million goodwill impairment on the Ascaso acquisition. This impairment was not pre-announced, not flagged in any of the three preceding reporting periods, and represents the first time management disclosed that a material acquisition had underperformed its original business case. Ex-impairment, net profit would have exceeded €20 million, meaningfully above consensus expectations. Management did not quantify the impairment explicitly in the main press release; it was reported and analysed by independent analysts (Renta 4's César Sánchez-Grande) rather than management flagging it proactively.

Net assessment on management credibility. On revenue and EBITDA guidance, Azkoyen's management has a strong track record across these four periods: they guided moderate growth, delivered it, then guided acceleration, delivered it. The guidance pattern is conservatively anchored and then beat - a hallmark of credible management.

The credibility concern is the Ascaso impairment. A €17 million acquisition that requires a goodwill write-down in year three, disclosed without forewarning in any of the prior three results, is a mark against transparency. Management chose to absorb it in a year where the headline metrics were otherwise strong - which is the rational moment to take the charge - but it deserved earlier flagging when Coffee & Vending's structural challenges became apparent in 2024.

The repeated promise of Coffee & Vending normalization (H1 2024, FY2024, H1 2025, FY2025) is the second credibility flag. The segment is still in negative territory. Management stopped actively highlighting this as an expected recovery by FY2025 - which is a tacit acknowledgment that "normalization" will not mean a return to growth.

Promise-vs-Outcome Summary:

Guidance Made	When	Outcome	Verdict
"Coffee normalization in H2 2024"	H1 2024 (Jul 2024)	Partial - FY2024 total was -9.5% (H2 recovered vs H1)	Partially delivered
"Moderate full-year 2024 growth"	H1 2024 (Jul 2024)	+3.4% - moderate ✓	Delivered
"2025 growth to exceed 2024 (+3.4%)"	FY2024 (Feb 2025)	+6.0% ✓	Delivered, beat
Net debt below 0.5x EBITDA in H1 2025	H1 2025 (Jul 2025)	Actual net cash at year-end	Exceeded
"2026 growth to exceed 2025 (+6.0%)"	FY2025 (Feb 2026)	TBD (H1 2026 expected Aug 2026)	Pending
Ascaso acquisition rationale (2022)	At acquisition	€2.9M impairment taken 2025	Underdelivered, not pre-flagged

Section 10: Shareholder Friendliness Index

Dividends. Azkoyen has paid a dividend in every year from 2021 to the present, on an annual cadence with the ex-dividend date typically in June-July. For the three most recent financial years: FY2022 results generated a dividend of €0.185 per share (paid July 2023); FY2023 results generated €0.359 per share (paid July 2024), a 94% increase that reflected management's shift to a 50% consolidated net income payout policy; FY2024 results generated €0.384 per share (paid June 2025), a further 7% increase. The dividend for FY2025 results has been proposed at €1.00 per share total: €0.356 per share ordinary (50% of net income, slightly below FY2024's because net income fell due to the Ascaso impairment) plus €0.644 per share extraordinary, funded from the net cash position achieved in FY2025. This extraordinary component represents management returning the accumulated excess cash - the company had paid down all its debt by end of 2025, leaving surplus cash with no immediate deployment need.

Buybacks and share count. No share buyback program has been announced or executed in the periods covered. The company held 0.297% of shares as treasury stock as of October 2022 (the most recent figure disclosed in the corporate governance report). The total shares outstanding are 24,450,000 - a number that has been stable; there has been no material dilution from option grants or convertible debt.

Verdict: Returns Capital. The consistent 50% payout ratio, initiated clearly from FY2023 onwards, combined with the extraordinary FY2025 dividend, shows management that distributes earnings rather than hoarding them. The absence of a buyback program is the only note against - at a net cash balance, repurchasing shares would be an alternative capital return mechanism that the company has not yet used.

Section 11: Insider Activities

Primary source: CNMV "Comunicaciones de operaciones de directivos" (EU MAR Article 19 notifications), supplemented by corporate governance disclosures. The CNMV maintains a public registry of PDMR transactions; however, the database was not directly extractable during this research. What follows reflects documented disclosures and verified transaction patterns from secondary aggregation.

Ownership context. Understanding insider activity at Azkoyen requires understanding the ownership structure. The company's shares are held in concentrated blocks:

Inverlasa S.L. (29.65%): represented on the board by Ana Ruiz Lafita (proprietary director)
Carolina Masaveu Herrero (12.66%): member of the Masaveu industrial family of Asturias; proprietary director seat
Diego Fontán Zubizarreta (12.63% total, including indirect): proprietary director
Santander Asset Management (6.40%): institutional holder
La Previsión Mallorquina de Seguros (5.32%): financial institution
María Carmen Troyas Careaga (5.06%): believed to be a descendant of the founding Troyas family
Free float: approximately 22.6%

Over 75% of shares are held by stable, long-term anchor shareholders who are represented on the board. This ownership structure means standard "insider transaction" signals - a director buying shares in the open market - carry less weight than at a widely held company, because most insiders already have very large stakes through holding companies.

Documented recent transactions. The most specifically documented transaction identified through primary research is a series of open-market purchases by Diego Fontán Zubizarreta on or around September 30, 2025. Fontán holds approximately 150,000 shares directly (0.61% of capital), in addition to his indirect holdings through associated entities that bring his total disclosed stake to approximately 12.63%. The September 2025 purchases were characterized as multiple buy orders. The timing is notable: September 30, 2025 was approximately three months after the H1 2025 results (which showed the company on track for its best full-year results) and approximately two months before the October 2025 extraordinary shareholders' meeting that approved the VPS segregation. A proprietary director adding to a position in the open market ahead of a major corporate restructuring vote is a bullish signal - insiders with full visibility of upcoming events chose to buy, not sell.

No major open-market selling by any director or significant shareholder has been documented in the last 12 months from available sources. The Troyas family stake (through María Carmen Troyas Careaga) has been maintained without publicly disclosed changes.

Cautionary note on data completeness. The CNMV's online registry of PDMR transactions (under the "Comunicaciones de directivos" section) was not directly accessible to extract a full transaction list during this research. The transactions described above are based on secondary aggregation from insiderscreener.com data and CNMV filing metadata. Readers seeking a comprehensive 12-month transaction log should access the CNMV's primary database directly at cnmv.es for Azkoyen (NIF: A-31065618).

Net assessment. The documented signal is mildly bullish: a proprietary director made multiple open-market purchases in September 2025, the period preceding a major corporate restructuring. No material insider selling is on record for the past 12 months. The large anchor shareholder blocks (Inverlasa at 29.65%, Masaveu at 12.66%) remain stable. The overall insider picture is consistent with a company where major shareholders believe in the current trajectory, and where no insider appears to be reducing exposure.

Section 12: Scenarios

Bull Case

In the bull scenario, what has been working continues to accelerate while the drag stops dragging. Payment Technologies grows at 14-15% annually for the next three years: Coges gains share in European vending as operators upgrade machines to contactless post-pandemic; the Nebular/Vendon IoT platform converts a meaningful share of Coges's installed base to recurring SaaS subscriptions; gaming market certifications in new jurisdictions open Eastern European markets. Time and Security adds new Primion reference clients in French and Dutch airports, replicating the Fraport relationship in two new major infrastructure accounts; the Swiss market entry via Primion AG opens a €5-10 million revenue opportunity within three years. The Coffee & Vending decline stabilizes as Coffetek wins a few strategic UK workplace contracts in the returning office market, and Ascaso finds its channel in premium Italian and German food service.

The holding company transformation unlocks value: with Coffee & Vending, Payment, and Time & Security now in clearly separated entities, a strategic partner or private equity firm approaches Azkoyen about acquiring a minority stake in the VPS subsidiary, crystallizing value that the listed holding company doesn't reflect. The extraordinary dividend becomes a recurring feature as the group's cash generation consistently exceeds reinvestment needs.

Base Case

In the base case, management delivers roughly what it has guided. Payment Technologies grows at 10-13% annually, driven by Coges's European market expansion and steady Vendon/Nebular adoption, consistent with the FY2025 growth rate of +13.5%. Time and Security grows at 8-11% as Primion adds new German enterprise clients and the Switzerland entry contributes modestly. Coffee and Vending continues a managed decline of -5 to -7% annually - neither a crisis nor a turnaround, just gradual weight loss. The holding company transition completes without material disruption.

The group grows at 5-7% annually, consistent with 2025's +6%. The ordinary dividend grows modestly each year, tied to earnings growth. The extraordinary dividend is a one-time event as the group's net cash position is returned to shareholders; thereafter, capital allocation returns to the 50% ordinary payout, with no buyback. Margins improve slowly as Payment Technologies grows as a share of the mix.

Bear Case

In the bear case, multiple things go wrong simultaneously. The Ascaso impairment was not the end of the write-downs: management took the Ascaso charge but the underlying Coffee & Vending division faces further restructuring, potentially impairing Coffetek's goodwill (the UK market for commercial coffee machines has been weak post-pandemic and an office market softening could worsen it). The division's -6.8% FY2025 decline becomes -12% in FY2026 as corporate clients reduce their vending machine footprints.

In Payment Technologies, Nayax accelerates its European expansion and wins three major vending operators from Coges's base to its all-in-one platform, while simultaneously signing a distribution deal with one of Azkoyen's existing gaming hardware OEM customers for cashless payments. Coges retains its coin hardware moat but loses the high-margin SaaS layer - Nebular subscription growth stalls.

At Primion, a procurement freeze at a major German infrastructure operator (triggered by a German government austerity program) delays two significant Access Control contracts. The division posts flat growth for two years, decompressing margins.

The holding company restructuring, instead of creating clarity, creates confusion: investors discount the listed entity as a complex holding structure with no simple earnings story. Combined, these pressures result in the group missing the FY2026 "growth exceeding 6%" guidance - a significant credibility moment given management's unbroken guidance delivery record.

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