Netcare Ltd Unsp/Adr

Good morning everyone and a very warm welcome to Netcare Limited's presentation of the audited group results for the year ended 30 September 2024. A warm welcome to our Lead Independent Director Alex Medici, members of the Netcare Board, our EXCO and our senior management teams. Allow me to express our sincere gratitude and pay tribute to our former chairman, Mark Bauer, who retired in September at the end of the financial year. Mark gave tirelessly of his time and expertise and made a very significant contribution to NetCare over his many years as a non-executive director and chairman. Let me also express my sincere thanks to our management teams and our NetCare staff across all of our divisions for their incredibly hard work, collective efforts and commitment over the past year. And also thanks to all the board members for their support and guidance. I will begin with an overview of the group performance as well as that of our operating divisions before handing over to our Chief Financial Officer, Keith Norman Gibson, who will unpack our financial results in more detail. I will then conclude by providing more detail on the progress we have made on rolling out our strategy and present our outlook and guidance for the 2025 financial year. Just a quick reminder of the comprehensive and growing array of facilities and services we provide within the NetCare ecosystem across 10 unique divisions. Looking at our overall performance, despite what was a very challenging macroeconomic and inflationary environment, NetCare has produced a strong financial performance and excellent traction on our strategic projects. This was characterized by good operating leverage supported by reduced strategic costs along with digital efficiencies. We maintained a strong balance sheet and improved ROIC by 90 basis points to 11.7%. In line with our capital allocation policies, We've returned 1.6 billion rands to shareholders in dividends and share buybacks over this past financial year. In terms of the execution of our strategy, we have now completed the rollout of electronic medical records across our entire ecosystem. The remaining second and third phases of our strategy are gaining momentum and the second phase of our environmental strategy is on track to achieve our 2030 targets. This solid operational performance translated into our strong financial metrics and ongoing operating leverage. And so, Turning to the numbers, the strong financial performance can be seen across all of our key metrics when compared to this past year. Revenue for the full year rose by 6.3% to $25.2 billion and we continue to achieve good operating leverage. as evidenced by the 10.1% increase in EBITDA to 4.53 billion rands. Our EBITDA margin increased by 60 basis points to 18%. Adjusted headline earnings per share rose by 7.6% to 113.7%. And despite the significant share buyback program, our net debt to EBITDA ratio remained unchanged at 1.2 times versus last year. And finally, as a result of the improved performance we are pleased to declare a final dividend of 40 cents per share, which together with the interim dividend amounts to a total distribution of 70 cents for the year, which is 7.7% higher than last year and represents 61.6% of adjusted headline earnings per share. Now let's unpack the operational performance of our respective divisions in more detail. Turning to the hospital and emergency services and focusing on activity, total patient days grew by 0.3% year on year, with a hospital division growing by 0.2% and a KESO by 1.3%. Pleasingly, we experienced a 2.1% growth across our acute hospitals in the second half, reversing the decline of 1.7% experienced in H1. Average full week occupancies have steadily improved and rose to 64.3% in our acute hospitals and 70.3% in mental health facilities. The graph on the left hand side depicts six monthly occupancies achieved in our acute hospitals since the first half of the 2020 financial year prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. As you can see, we are now exceeding those occupancy levels over the last six months. The graph on the right-hand side demonstrates a similar pattern for mental health, with average occupancies over the last six months now reaching 71.4%. Let's unpack specifically the numbers in our hospital and emergency services in more detail. Revenue grew by 6.3% to 24.5 billion, and we continue to achieve good operational leverage, resulting in an EBITDA growth of 10.6% to 4.4 billion rands. Operating profit rose by 13.1% to 3.1 billion. Acute hospital revenue per patient day increased by 6% and surgical cases contributed more than 70% of the revenue generated. We also experienced an increase in acute length of stay to 4.5 days from 4.4 days in the prior year, driven by higher complexity in cases. Overall EBITDA margin for the segment rose by 70 basis points to 17.8% versus 17.1% in the prior year. And as outlined on this slide, this expansion was underpinned by digital efficiencies, stringent cost management, and lower strategic costs. However, the overall segment margin was diluted by costs incurred in our startup businesses, specifically the rollout costs of our pathology network. EBITDA margin for the hospital and pharmacy sub-segment alone was up 100 basis points to 18.6% versus 17.6% in 2023. We've also grown our specialist base by granting admitting privileges in acute and mental health facilities to a net 113 new specialists. Turning now to our primary care division, revenue grew by 7.4% to $712 million. However, medical and dental patient visits declined by 3.1% on the prior year. We have experienced financially constrained consumers opting first to self-medicate before assessing the need to visit their GPs. We continue to see strong growth in occupational health. EBITDA margin declined to 23% versus 25% in the prior year, normalized for a capital profit of 2 million rand in the prior year. The margin was negatively impacted by an increased contribution from lower margin occupational health contracts. As a result, EBITDA declined by 2.4% to $164 million versus that in the financial year 2023. I will now hand over to Keith to unpack our financial performance in more detail.

Thank you, Richard, and good morning, ladies and gentlemen. This morning, I'll be stepping you through NetCare's group financial results for the year ended 30 September 2024. Following the mismatched timing of the Easter school holidays, leading to volume decline at the half year, activity levels normalised during the second half, resulting in a full year growth of 0.3% in total paid patient days. For the 2024 financial year, the group has been able to expand its EBITDA margin and achieve solid operating leverage. The business has maintained its healthy state into financial position with continued improvement in return on invested capital, or ROIC, to 11.7% from 10.8% in the prior year. And the business continued with its share buyback program, which commenced in September 2023, and has to date invested over one billion rands to repurchase 84.8 million shares in the market, which represents 5.9% of the shares in issue. at the beginning of the financial year. I've included this slide to illustrate that the business has continued to deliver operating leverage and achieve strong cash generation, despite relatively low levels of volume growth. In FY 2023, on the back of 6.7% growth in total paid patient days, the group reported 9.5% revenue growth, which converted into a 17.7% increase in EBITDA and an uplift of 23.9% in operating profits. In the current year, on the back of more modest activity growth of 0.3% in total patient days, the business has managed to convert growth of 6.3% at the revenue line into 10.1% EBITDA growth and 12.6% growth in operating profits, reflecting a two times operating leverage. The last graph reflects the group's net debt balance of 5.3 billion rands at 30 September 2024, which has increased against the prior year by 278 million rands. However, this is after 722 million rand that was utilized in our share buyback program. And notwithstanding this outlay, the group has maintained its conservative net debt to EBITDA gearing cover of 1.2 times. This brings us to the group statement of profit or loss for the year ended 30 September 2024. And to aid comparability, the numbers reflected in this slide exclude the impact of exceptional items unless otherwise indicated. Revenue for the year amounted to 25.2 billion rands compared to 23.7 billion rands in the prior year, growing by 6.3%. EBITDA for 2024 grew by 10.1% to 4.5 billion rands against 4.1 billion rands in 2023. Strategic costs for 2024 amounted to 131 million rands, reducing from the prior year's 258 million rands following the completion of our digitization rollout at the end of April 2024. Substantially less load shedding occurred in the current year, and consequently we made less use of our generators, causing generator diesel costs to drop from 124 million rands to 47 million rands. Unfortunately, the benefit from lower diesel expenditure was largely offset by increased electricity costs. This is partly due to higher utilization of electricity from the grid than in the prior year, but the bulk of the increase is attributable to the significant increase in electricity tariffs implemented during the year. So these factors, along with maintaining a tight rein on costs and contributions from digitization, contributed to a 60 basis point improvement on the group EBITDA margin from 17.4% to 18%. Our operating profit increased by 12.6% to just short of 3.2 billion rands compared to 2.8 billion rands in 2023. Other net financial expenses of 561 million rands increased by 20.9% from 464 million in the prior period and reflects the impact of high prevailing interest rates as well as higher average net debt balances over the course of the year. The IFRS 16 interest charge attributable to lease liabilities of 511 million rands increased from 454 million rands in the prior year. Profit before tax increased by 12.7% to almost 2.2 billion rands. The group's tax charge amounted to 602 million rands at an effective rate of 27.7%, which is marginally higher than the statutory tax rate. And profit after tax before exceptional items amounted to R1575 million representing a 10.3% improvement against the comparative year. Exceptional items comprised property impairments of R39 million with an offsetting R11 million tax impact. And profit for the year inclusive of exceptional items therefore amounted to R1547 million, which is 15.8% higher than the prior year's profit of 1,336 million rands. Next we move on to headline earnings per share and as usual we've presented the standard HEPs metric as well as adjusted HEPs in which we strip out exceptional and unsustainable items. And we note that adjusted HEPs is the primary measure used by management to assess performance. HEPs amounted to 113 cents for the year which is an 11.9% improvement on the 101 cents reported in 2023. Adjusted HEPs for 2024 amounted to 113.7 cents, increasing by 7.6% from the prior year's 105.7 cents. The Board has resolved to pay a final dividend of 40 cents per share for the 2024 financial year, bringing the total dividend for the year to 70 cents, which equates to 61.6% of adjusted HEPs. In addition, we continued with our share buyback program, which commenced in September 2023. And during the current reporting year, 60.4 million shares were acquired at an average price of 11 rand 93 per share, amounting to 722 million rands. And collectively, since commencement of the share buyback program, the group has repurchased 84.8 million shares on the market for just over R1 billion, equating to an average price of R12.27 per share. Between the 2023 final dividend, the 2024 interim dividend, and the shares bought back in 2024, almost R1.6 billion was returned to shareholders in the current financial year. If we add the R508 million in respect of the 2024 final dividend, that is to be paid on the 27th of January 2025, a grand total of over two billion rands will have been returned to shareholders. Moving on to the group statement of financial position, I remind you the Netcase Capital Management Policy is to maintain a strong statement of financial position and to retain an investment grade credit rating while reducing the cost of capital with a safe level of debt. As at 30 September 2024, total assets amounted to R28.4 billion, increasing from R27.8 billion at September 2023. CapEx spend during the financial year amounted to R1519 million, R100 million relates to expansionary projects, and the balance of R1419 million relates to replacement CapEx. Total shareholders' equity decreased marginally by 69 million rands to just under the 11 billion rands mark, with the benefits of an improved operating performance being offset by dividend distributions and share buybacks of 722 million rands made during the year. And finally, since September 2023, the group has produced a further improvement of 90 basis points in ROIC to 11.7%. Next, let's review the group's debt position. Gross debt amounted to 7.1 billion rands at 30 September 2024, offset by cash balances of 1.8 billion rands. Therefore, net debt totaled 5.3 billion rands at the year end, increasing by 278 million rands from September 2023. And this is after outlaying almost 1.6 billion rands in the current year in dividends and share buybacks. along with capex of 1.5 billion rands. At September 2024, net debt to annualized EBITDA remained flat at 1.2 times coverage. And I note that this metric is calculated on normalized EBITDA measured after the adoption of IFRS 16 against bank debt only. Inclusive of lease liabilities recognized under IFRS 16, net debt to EBITDA coverage is 2.4 times which again is in line with September 2023. In compliance with our policy, we retained our credit rating of AA minus for long term and A1 plus for short term as published by GCR in February 2024. Cost of debt as of the year end of 9.1% is 20 basis points higher than the 8.9% cost as at September 2023. However, the average cost of debt for the financial year of 9.3% was 70 basis points higher than FY2023 of 8.6%, and this reflects in the 87 million rand increase in interest costs when compared to the prior year. Currently, approximately 37% of the group's debt is at fixed interest rates, which is achieved with the aid of interest rate swaps. NetCare is compliant with its banking covenants, which firstly require that the net debt to EBITDA ratio be below 2.75 times, where EBITDA is measured excluding the impacts of IFRS 16 on a 12-month backward-looking basis. The second covenant metric is EBITDA to net interest cover, which must be greater than four times, and both of these covenants have been met with ample headroom. Moving on to our debt facilities, At the year end, NECA had cash balances of 1.8 billion rands on hand, and we also had committed but undrawn debt facilities of 1.1 billion rands. So the group therefore has access to resources of 2.9 billion rands of cash on hand and committed debt facilities from which to fund its future requirements. Our debt tenure reflects a manageable and appropriately staggered maturity profile, and the group therefore has sufficient capacity and access to funding sources for the foreseeable future. And finally, I'd like to recognize the considerable efforts of our finance staff across the group in preparing the 2024 results and the related materials. And I extend my personal thanks to them. I'll now hand you back to Richard, who will update you on the progress of our key strategic projects and share our guidance for the 2025 financial year.

Thank you, Keith. In this section, I'll give a brief recap of NetCare's strategy and then discuss the launch of the next phases of our strategy, followed by updates on our other strategic initiatives. Now, just a quick recap of NetCare's strategy. Our strategy is a 10-year journey to transform the way we deliver health and care. As you are well aware, our strategy responds decisively to the three global healthcare megatrends of customer centricity, digitization, and data, and leverages off our unique ecosystem of assets and services to transform the way we deliver health and care. We call this person-centered health and care that is digitally enabled and data-driven. And through this, we are intentionally committed to creating a sustainable competitive advantage for the group. Just to recap, we have three fundamental phases of our strategy as demonstrated on the slide. Over the past six years, despite a challenging macroeconomic environment and a significant impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, we continue to invest in our strategy and have now completed the first phase. This has enabled us to embark on the very exciting second and third phases which are being rolled out coterminously. Let's take a look at the first phase of what we call digitally enabled. As we reported at half year, the rollout of electronic medical records across all seven of our operating platforms was completed on the 28th of April of this year. The ultimate focus here was to digitize our clinical records, but also, importantly, to achieve operational efficiencies. We broke even in terms of the costs associated with the project and the operational efficiencies generated. As you can see from the graph on the right hand side, the blue bars represent the implementation costs, which we have previously classified as strategic costs. And the beige bars represent the ongoing operational and licensing costs associated with the digital platforms. The solid white line represents the benefits or operational efficiencies we have achieved to date. and the dotted white line plots our original forecast as per our business plan. Clearly, one can see that we have exceeded our own forecast this year. We had forecast benefits of 120 million, but actually achieved efficiencies of 190 million. But what is very important to emphasize is that these benefits or operational efficiencies represent both actual cash savings and cost avoidance benefits. The table on this slide unpacks the overall costs and benefits of the first phase. We have invested capex of 320 million and incurred 350 million in implementation costs to make the business digitally enabled. Cash savings and avoidable costs of 331 million have been achieved since 2022, producing an IRR of greater than 23%. This is an improvement on the 21% we had previously reported. Finally, in terms of this phase, we were delighted to report that in June of this year, NetCare won the Digital Innovation Award at the seventh annual international quality awards held in London. NetCare was chosen from 87 entries, submitted from 19 countries as the best example of using innovative digital solutions to improve business processes and quality outcomes in quality management. Let's take a look at the next phase of what we call data-driven. The completion of our first phase over the past six years has now enabled us to embark on the second phase of Data Enabled. We're currently generating close to 50 gigabytes of rich clinical data daily, and this phase will focus on achieving what we call clinical efficiency. To be able to utilize this data to achieve this goal, we're in the process of implementing a world-class big data analytics platform which will be completed in December of this year. During 2025, the platform will be enriched as we upload a wide range of clinical, safety, patient outcome, and financial data points. We will also be focusing on onboarding self-sustaining business units with direct access to NetCare's big data platform to enable them to independently identify, plan, and monitor data-driven improvement opportunities and support clinical research. This phase will take NetCare between two to three years to complete and realize the full benefits. These benefits will provide real-time clinical analysis and reporting, result in accurate, auditable digital outcome measures across all clinical parameters and disciplines, enable opportunities to improve outcomes, enhance patient safety by reducing infections, allow for earlier detection of potential outbreaks, and reduce antibiotic utilization. Allow us to develop machine learning and AI-driven models for early warning and recognition of sepsis, kidney failure, and heart attacks, and thus reduce the risk of mortality and readmission. facilitate efficient overall cost per event through optimizing clinical efficiency, and will provide a powerful tool to enable the publication of clinical research by our clinicians and healthcare teams. Turning now to the last phase of our strategy of person-centered health and care. The final phase will... take three to four years to complete and is also divided into three sub-phases. The first, which completed last year, focused on improving digital ease of access to our facilities. The second phase began this year and will be completed next year and focuses on improving in-hospital ease of use. And finally, phase three will focus on providing clinical information to our patients via our care on notes and summary of care. This slide demonstrates the various features of phase one, which we have elucidated upon in previous presentations. This slide demonstrates the features of phase two, which are currently in development for the rollout during 2025 and are in hospital focused to enhance the ease of use and stay in our hospitals. And finally, this phase, expected to be completed over the next three years, involves providing patients access to care notes and a full summary of the care they receive from NetCare. Paradoxically, however, this represents for us the most challenging phase. Unfortunately, medical records as we know them are often filled with difficult-to-understand concepts and medical jargon. With the advent of generative AI, we are working to help de-jargonize complex medical terminology. It will take time to cover the full spectrum of conditions and allow us to focus on what matters to you as a patient rather than simply what's the matter with you. And since the launch of our app just over a year ago, it has been downloaded by more than 370,000 people and patients. Our strategy of building the sustainable advantage and fundamentally transforming the way we deliver care may sound theoretically plausible. However, as we are acutely aware, there was enormous skepticism that greeted our digitization strategy when we introduced it in 2018. And it has taken several years for analysts in the market to fully appreciate the potential benefits of the first phase. So in terms of the second and third phases, I would like to, by way of an example, demonstrate the art of the possible. In one of our divisions, we have already been able to successfully execute on all three phases and demonstrate the real impact of combining a person-centered approach in a digitally enabled and data-driven environment, which in our view will also result in increasing patient retention. This is a case study of one of our division's national renal care. National Renal Care provides dialysis and other therapies to patients suffering from end-stage kidney disease. Fully digitized electronic medical records were rolled out and completed in 2021. And in 2022, clinical records were provided to every patient via a specially developed app called Nefron from April in that year. Initially, the uptake was incredibly poor and less than 2% of patients engaged with the app or even looked at their results. There was a clear lack of understanding of results and the potential impact it could have on reducing the risk of dying and improving quality of life. And so we quickly realized we needed to explain the so what and the focus on what matters to you as the patient as opposed to what's the matter with you. We then identified seven key markers for patients to constantly monitor in terms of their health and wellness. Let's take a look now at the results of our interventions. Engagement on our app and patients downloading their results gradually increased. And as you can see from this graph, it is now over 93%. And patients are spending on average a remarkable 16 minutes on the app. One of our biggest learnings here is to ensure that our patients are fully educated, empowered, and informed as to the so what in order to drive engagement by patients in their own results and illness. What is most remarkable, as you can see from the left-hand side of this slide, is that patients are spending almost a third of their time on the app. checking the particulars of their session, their results, and tracking their symptoms. Now, this may be well and good, but what real impact does this engagement have on patients' well-being? The graphs on the right-hand side of the slide demonstrate the difference in physical well-being and mental well-being of patients prior to receiving electronic records and access to the Nephron app. and afterwards and the improvement is apparent. We are also observing statistically significant differences in key blood laboratory parameters as we analyze the rich data we are producing and we will be looking to publish these outcomes next year. And finally, What are our patients saying about our approach? Patient on the left-hand side says, my experience with the app is amazing. Easy to access my results, my new recipes, exercises, and many more. I can't face each day without logging into my account to get new updates on kidney health. Big up to this NRC app. Well done. The patient on the right-hand side says, It is so good and efficient because I don't have to get to the unit to see the blood results and recipes. The other thing, I can register a complaint or compliment right at the comfort of my home. This app can also help me with the diet where to increase and decrease some minerals. I can also book for treatment while I'm on holiday through this app, and hence I say it's very efficient. Let's briefly turn to other strategic initiatives. Focusing on NetCare Plus, this portfolio is growing and contributing to NetCare's ecosystem. NetCare Plus products provide increased access to private healthcare beyond traditional medical schemes, as well as further coverage for those with medical cover. Approximately 62% of our book comprises corporate lives with retail lives of 38%. We continue to steadily grow our book of insured lives as we build a sustainable business, contributing to NetCare's ecosystem and increasing access to private healthcare beyond traditional medical schemes. We're delighted that NetCare Plus was ranked first in the medical insurance brand category at the Ask Africa Orange Index Awards for 2024 and 2025. Our growing portfolio of products focuses on extending access for the uninsured and also enhancing cover for medical scheme members. We launched additional prepaid procedures as well as primary care insurance, baby care and emergency medical illness cover in the second half of this year. And we also completed enhancements to our existing products. Turning to our sustainability program, Our 2030 targets are well underway, and we aim to reduce Scope 2 emissions to zero and reduce Scope 1 and 2 emissions by a combined 84%. Our strategy aligns with JET-IP and further aims to achieve 100% renewable energy utilization, zero waste to landfill, and a further 20% reduction in water utilization by 2030. We have already reduced our water utilization by 16.8% to the end of this financial year. The Wind Power Renewable Energy Wheeling Agreement between NETCARE and NOAA concluded last year in 2023, has now reached unconditional status in September of this year for five of the six phase one sites in our 100% renewable energy by 2030 initiative. These locations will receive up to 100% wind power by September 2026. And finally, we are delighted to announce that last week NetCare was awarded the 2024 healthcare climate champion for the African continent. This is one of seven global awards adjudicated by the Global Green Healthy Hospitals, an association with over 2,000 members in 86 countries and representing more than 70,000 hospitals and health centers. Finally, before turning to our guidance for the new financial year, a brief commentary on National Health Insurance, or NHI. As you are well aware, NetCare has long recognized the need to address the inequities and deficiencies in health care in South Africa and remains fully committed to universal health care coverage, or UHC. We do, however, have legitimate feasibility and legal concerns with the NHI Act. In September of this year, the Hospital Association of South Africa presented an alternative to achieving UHC based on a proven and carefully phased solution of mandatory medical cover for the formerly employed, greater public-private collaboration to ensure system strengthening, and joint efforts on human resource training initiatives. The HACA proposal would alleviate pressure on public health resources and extend the public budget per capita, thereby improving healthcare access for all South Africans. In November 20 of this year, Business Unity South Africa submitted to our president its recommendations in respect of the NHI Act in order to inform potential future engagements. We strongly believe in NetCare that a collaborative partnership between the public and private sector is absolutely critical in finding sustainable and affordable solutions aimed at achieving UHC for all South Africans. There are several immediate opportunities where the private sector can collaborate with government to address critical healthcare gaps and demonstrate quick wins on the path to UHC. Finally, turning to our outlook and guidance for the new financial year. We are guiding towards patient day growth of between 0.8% to 1.3% and revenue growth of between five to 6% versus this past year. In terms of our strategic projects, we expect it to spend 60 million of OPEX. In terms of EBITDA margin, normalized EBITDA margins are expected to benefit from operational efficiencies off this past year's base of 18%. And finally, we expect to spend $1.5 billion on CapEx in the new financial year. And that concludes the formal presentation of our results, and we're now happy to open the webcast to questions.

Thank you, Richard. The first question comes from Gerald. Good day. Congrats on the results. Could management elaborate on their thinking around doing share buybacks when the earnings yield is around 6% versus the cost of debt of around 9%? Message for Keith.

Thanks very much. Thanks for the question. So I think just to begin with our policy around share buybacks, and this is something that we've established and adhered to for quite some time now. So we firstly want to pay out a sustainable ordinary dividend to shareholders. After that, we look to see what capital we can apply within the business. And then if there is surplus cash available, Our view is that that must go back to shareholders, and our first preference is a share buyback. If that was not possible, we would consider special dividends. I think we are fairly comfortable that there is value in the share as we've been doing the share buyback program, and that this has been accretive to our earnings in the current year and will become more so as interest rates decline going forwards.

Thank you, Keith. Another question for you. This comes from Tracy from Sunlum. The interest cover covenant does not have much headroom. Are you going to do something about it or will you just let the current interest rate environment correct it, i.e. rate cuts?

Okay. Yeah, thanks again for the question. So, yeah, as I have noted, interest rates are coming down, but I think the premise of the question is not actually correct. The banking covenants that we have, our lenders still have a preference to report those on a pre IFRS 16 basis. So when you compare the quoted EBITDA to net interest covered times that we have on the left hand side of the slide, that is on a post IFRS 16 basis. And I can assure you that adjusted to pre IFRS 16, we have ample headroom on that particular covenant.

Thank you, Keith. We have a question from Patsy David for Richard. With regard to the new CEO, while we are not taken away from the fact that Netcare remains in very steady hands with the extension of Richard's tenure, can we please get an update on who the new CEO is and when they start? We were given to understand from Mr Bauer that the candidate had been secured. The wording now says identified.

Thank you very, very much for that. My understanding is the board is not in a position to reveal the name of the candidate. The candidate has been, as I understand, identified and secured, and that timeframe will be made public in due course.

Thank you, Richard. We have a question from Roy Campbell. How will the strategic costs for the next data analytics phase compare to the rollout phase in phase one?

Yeah, thanks. Thanks for the question, Roy. So, yeah, the data costs, the strategic costs that we will incur in the next couple of phases are going to be absorbed into the operational base. There are ongoing costs of running our digitized system, but the benefits will outweigh those, as has been indicated on the graph that we supplied in the slides.

Thank you, Keith. We have no further questions at this stage. I think we'll just pause for a few seconds. We have refreshed the link. No questions. No further questions. I'm just going to hand over to Richard for some closing comments. Thank you.

Thank you very, very much, everyone, for affording us the time to go through our results this morning. We remain available to take any of your questions, both in the individual sessions or group sessions that have been arranged. And also, we can field any questions you may want to send to our Head of Investor Relations, Marcel Jankolo. Thank you very, very much.