Smurfit WestRock PLC

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Smurfit West Rock 2024 full year results webcast and conference call. At this time all participants are in a listen only mode. After the speaker's presentation there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question you will need to press star 1 1 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to Kieran Potts, Smurfit Westrock Group Vice President, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thanks, Heidi. Just as a reminder, statements in today's earnings release and presentation and the comments made by management during this call may be considered forward-looking statements. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from our expectations and projections. Those risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, the factors identified in the earnings release and in our SEC filings. The company undertakes no obligation to revise any forward-looking statements. Today's remarks also refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliation to the most comparable GAAP measures are included in today's earnings release and in the appendix to the presentation, which are available at investors.smurfawestrock.com Before handing over to Tony, giving me the full day of investor engagement, I would ask you to limit your questions to two, and should you require any clarifications on what we are discussing today, myself and Frank will do our best to make ourselves available after the call. I will now hand you over to Tony Smurfit, CEO of Smurfit Westrock.

Thank you, Kieran, and good morning and good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for taking the time to join us today. As you will have seen from this morning's release, we have reported a strong fourth quarter performance with an adjusted EBITDA of $1.166 billion, and an adjusted EBITDA margin of 15.5%. Importantly, for the full year 2024, we delivered a combined adjusted EBITDA outcome of $4.706 billion, fully consistent with our stated guidance back in October. On July 5th last year, Smurfit Kappa combined with WestRock to create the new Smurfit WestRock company. The scale and dimension of this company It's quite remarkable. As you can see from this map, we have many operating facilities in many regions across the world, with principal operations in North America with approximately 60% of our business, EMAA and APAC with 33% of our business, with the balance being in Latin America, and that's based on revenue. Our combination created the go-to sustainable packaging partner of choice, with an unrivaled product portfolio expertise and scale. To put that into numbers, the number of converting facilities, whether they be in corrugated, consumer, bag-in-box, sack conversion, or specialty packaging, is over 500 units, with 62 mills, again, in different areas of sustainable packaging, corrugated papers, consumer papers, and some specialty papers. To support our paper mills, we have over 14 million tons of waste paper, which we process, as well as having our own forestry of some 300,000 acres, principally in Brazil and Colombia. With over 100,000 people worldwide, operating in 40 countries, generating net sales of over 31 billion last year, it's important to remember that in creating this company, we didn't want it to be just big, but we wanted it to be the best. And you can only be the best in any industry if you have the right management team. Every business will, of course, say that people are their greatest assets, to the point that one can be jaded by this statement. But I will say that the Smurfit West Rock leadership team, right through all levels, is a team that is stable, experienced, and has navigated many different challenges over the years, while at the same time consistently delivering against all performance metrics. This team and the broader team grew the EBITDA margin of legacy Smurfit Kappa from 13.8% to 18.5%, ROSI from 12% to 17.1%, reduce the leverage from multiple from 2.8 times to 1.4 times, and increase the dividend 10 times. In parallel, we've invested capital to continually improve the asset base and to support customer growth. I'm proud to say we have built an irreplaceable and high quality asset base and footprint that is globally unique. In short, most of this team were responsible for the transformation of the former CAPA group and successfully delivered for its stakeholders. We have done this by very simply sticking to our knitting. We apply an owner-operator model and a performance-led culture with decentralized operations where every manager has P&L responsibility for their own operating unit. This, of course, means a sharp commercial focus whereby the company supports management to improve efficiency, operating costs, and to deliver for our customers. And of course, this can only be done if we reward and continually train our people at all levels of the organization to make them feel unique and part of a unique culture. This is what essentially has led to the success of Smurfit Kappa. So in essence, our team and many of our new colleagues from Legacy Westrock have joined together so that we can have a successful, bigger, and brighter future together at Smurfit Westrock. A lot has already been done. Firstly, we delivered to plan at 4.7 billion of adjusted EBITDA. We did what we said we were going to do. Secondly, we developed a synergy program, which we are more than confident we're going to meet, if not exceed, the 400 million. And this will be completed by the end of the current year with the benefits realized this year and next. Thirdly, as we've delved into the business, we've seen many more opportunities than initially thought, at least in excess of 400 million, an additional 400 million. We believe that by unleashing the power of our people, there are significant operating improvements through cost takeout, commercial approach, and quick-win CapExes to release greater profitability. As you know, I and my senior colleagues have now visited a significant majority of the facilities. And while there will always be work to be done in our operations across the world, in the current year, we have revised our estimated capital spend to somewhere between $2.2 and $2.4 billion, which reflects the strong positioning of the assets. But as I've said before, assets without people are nothing. Bad assets can make you money if you have good people, and the contrary is also true. I've been so happy in my visits, both in Atlanta and the operations around the world, to see the enthusiasm and buy-in of people to contribute to the success of the new Smurfit Westrock. In the seven months, I believe there has been a tremendous foundation and platform for growth for the future. Of course, along the way, with our model of decentralization and making accountability lie at the closest area it can to customers, it has been necessary to streamline the business. And in this process so far, North America, Mexico, and the rest of the world, over 1,000 people have or will be leaving the company. That said, we've also initiated a major program to train and develop our talent as we invest behind our people. Like you in the investment community, we believe in investing in good management. In addition to this, over the years, we're continuously optimizing our production. Difficult decisions have been made to streamline assets, and you will see from this slide that both Smurfit and Westrock continue to optimize production in both converting and in mills over the recent period. While these are always difficult decisions, they make for a much healthier and stronger company in the long term. Well, of course, closing is always difficult. Investing for growth is something we've been continually doing also. Across our world, whether it's in North America, EMEA and APAC, or Latin America, converting mills are specialties where we see opportunities for growth, we will invest behind them. The examples on this page represent over $750 million of investment in just a few plants, phased over a number of years, highlighting the commitment we have to ensuring this company continues to get stronger in order to serve our customers in an efficient and productive way. These examples are purely for illustrative purposes, because across all of our facilities worldwide, we're investing for growth or cost reduction to ensure our future success, assuming, of course, these projects meet our expected rate of returns. While we're at the beginning of our journey, it seems hard to believe it's only been just a little over seven months since we completed our combination July 5th. What we clearly see is that we will be able to capitalize on our excellent market positions and asset quality to ensure our customers receive their products in the most efficient and reliable way. We see the opportunity to continue to empower and motivate our people who are and want to be part of our winning team. We believe that we are sharpening our commercial focus across the organization to ensure our efforts and investments have attractive returns. We're committed with our vast data bank of innovative solutions in all areas of our business to ensure that we give our customers the right innovations and at the right price. And there'll be no change to our operating financial model, which is a proven success. We are aligned at senior management as shareholders in the company. And we'll continue to think of capital as a scarce resource which must pay off so that any capital allocation decisions that we make are in the best interest of all stakeholders. It is a philosophy that has been around this company from the 1930s all the way through to today. I now pass you to Ken, who will take you through the financials.