Cushman & Wakefield plc

Good day and welcome to Cushman and Wakefield's first quarter 2025 earnings conference call. All participants will be in listen-only mode. If you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star then one on a touch-tone phone. To withdraw your question, Please press star, then two. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Megan McGrath, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, and welcome to Cushman & Wakefield's first quarter 2025 earnings conference call. Earlier today, we issued a press release announcing our financial results for the period. This release, along with today's presentation, can be found on our investor relations website at ir.cushmanwakefield.com. Please turn to the page in our presentation labeled Cautionary Note on Forward-Looking Statements. Today's presentation contains forward-looking statements based on our current forecast and estimates of future events. These statements should be considered estimates only, and actual results may differ materially. During today's call, we will refer to non-GAAP financial measures as outlined by SEC Guidelines. Reconciliations of GAAP to non-GAAP financial measures, definitions of non-GAAP financial measures, and other related information are found within the financial tables of our earnings release and the appendix of today's presentation. Also, please note that throughout the presentation, comparisons and growth rates are to the comparable periods of 2024 and in local currency unless otherwise stated. And with that, I'd like to turn the call over to our CEO, Michelle McKay.

Thank you, Megan. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. This quarter marks true momentum in our growth strategy in numbers, mindset, and operations. For the past 18 months, we focused on building the strength to fuel long-term growth, and today we're seeing that strategy come to life. In the first quarter, we increased revenue in each of our service lines, achieving mid-single-digit organic growth in our services business, two quarters ahead of target. We drove 100 basis points of year-over-year adjusted EBITDA margin improvement and further reduced leverage by paying down an additional $25 million in debt. Since I took over as CEO, we have repaid $230 million in debt and have successfully refinanced and repriced our debt five times, reducing our annual cash interest burden. And in the same way that we have attacked our leverage over the past year, we are now attacking growth. And we are delivering results ahead of schedule, entering new phases of expansion and building momentum, positioning ourselves to win through the cycle. Our disciplined investments have not only stabilized the business, but have unlocked new areas of organic growth. We've taken bold steps to remove complexity. better aligning teams to opportunities, and create the clarity and agility that sustainable growth requires. We believe these changes will allow us to scale faster, move with purpose, and seize growth opportunities as they emerge. They are also enabling us to respond more quickly to market shifts and uncertainties as we are operating much more nimbly than in the past. Our key differentiator continues to lie in our ability to meet clients where they are and guide them on their desired journey. Our flat organizational culture allows us to swiftly adapt the client's buying patterns. We deliver customized bespoke solutions tailored to each client's needs instead of relying on predefined approaches. Our teams not only work harder than our competitors, but they also work smarter. By fostering a culture of solutioning, problem solving, and trust, we let our people shine. We recently held a call with our global think tank on current market conditions where we had upward of 4,000 clients join to hear what our teams are thinking. Talent is a critical component of our growth strategy, and we continue to attract strong teams to our platform. Year to date in the Americas, we have recruited leasing and capital markets brokers with more average annual revenue than we recruited in all of 2024. All of this work is culminating in momentum across our business. For example, in the Americas, our pipeline of large capital markets deals is two times the size it was one year ago. In America's leasing and our multi-market occupier group, which represents roughly one-third of our tenant rep business, our RFPs are up by 35% versus last year. In our valuation business, bid volume was up 30% in Q1, with March setting a two-year record for volume of bids. In services, in the past two years, our global occupier services team has won all or a material part of the largest outsourcing deals in the market. Our APAC services business continues to demonstrate both resiliency and momentum, with strong retention rates on existing contracts and five new sizable contracts coming online in the first half of this year. And our CW services business, once referred to as our janitorial business, is now 70% mechanical and engineering, following a major contract win, making it more technical and a more strategic fit for us. We've built a strong growth engine, which is now powering us forward across every part of the business. We're leaning in with clear purpose, excellent market positioning, and a stronger foundation. Now, I'll turn the call over to Neil.