2/7/2025

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

My name is Jeanette Reuterskjell and I'm president and CEO of Netel. With me today I have Fredrik Helenius, our CFO. In the last quarter of the year, net sales grew 1.5%, driven by good development in power in Norway, as well as telecom in Sweden and Germany. When it comes to profitability in the quarter, power had a strong ending of the year with improved profitability and an EBITDA margin of 11.6%. However, we saw a decrease in the quarter in infraservices and telecom, which impacted the overall profitability. And Fredrik will later go into details of that. Even though the underlying market trends are strong, our performance can, of course, fluctuate between the quarters because we are a product-driven business where the timing of the project's completions affects our short-term development. The order backlog continued to develop favourably and we see a growth of 600 million SEK in the last quarter. A strong development reflecting the underlying market trends we have in our segments and our strong market position within them. As you know, we announced a few weeks ago that we had made the decision to sell our operations in Finland. All numbers in these presentations refer to continuing operations unless other is stated. Fredrik will later go into details of the effects in numbers and reporting. As part of our efforts to build a more sustainable and stronger Natel, we have conducted a comprehensive review and decided to divest our loss-making operations in Finland. During 2024, we have seen some improvements through several margin-enhancing measures, but considering our group's strategic plan, and the historically negative development we had in Finland, which we have aimed to address for several years, we believe that this decision creates greater opportunities to create and generate value for Nutell in both short and long term. We are working to complete the sale in 2025. And until then, we will continue to operate and develop the business as usual together with our team in Finland. By divesting the Finnish operations, we can focus on infraservices, power and telecom in the larger markets we have in Sweden and Norway, as well as the growth markets we have in Germany and the UK, where Netel is assessed to have greater opportunities to create value and reach our financial targets on the mid-dare. 2024 has been a transformative year for us. We have developed a clear growth strategy and taken significant initiatives to build a stronger and more profitable Natel. A year ago, I introduced our new organizational structure where we now primarily operate and manage by function. This shift has improved our ability to allocate resources more effective and better meet customer needs across our Infraservices, Power and Telecom divisions. It has also strengthened our capacity to identify business opportunities with both new and existing customers. One of these key initiatives is, of course, the preparations for selling our finished operations. At the same time, we have launched several efforts to enhance internal efficiency across all of our processes. This includes working smarter, improving follow ups and allocating resources more effectively. A crucial part of this transformation is increasing digitalization and implementing new group-wide digital tools. One of the most important of these is our business system, which will soon be fully deployed across the entire group. This system will be instrumental in enabling quick analysis, providing a clear overview of our progress and ensuring efficient resource utilization. We have a strong market position in Sweden and Norway, where we see significant opportunities for growth, both with our existing customers and by expanding our customer base. A larger business with an extended geographical presence also increases our ability to create synergies. During this year, we have, for example, won new and bigger contracts with Telenor, UGG, Telia, Elvia and Vattenfall. Another milestone we are proud of is the validation of our climate targets by the Science-Based Targets Initiative in December last year. This validation allows us to continue strengthening our collaborations with customers and business partners as we work together to create a more sustainable and emission-free society. Within Infraservices, besides water and sewage product, we also deliver products within civils. For example, this project where we build a pedestrian and bicycle path undertaken by our company Moberg on behalf of the Swedish Transport Administration. It is a construction of three and a half kilometers pedestrian and bicycle paths and started in 2024 and will be completed in autumn 2025. And within power, our power company in Norway, Nettjänster, has signed a new framework agreement with Norway's leading energy company, Elvia. The agreement covers the design and installation of new control systems for Elvia's substations to a value of 320 million. We deliver complete protection and control systems to existing and new substations and has a total responsibility for everything from planning and material procurement to assembly testing and commissioning. The agreement runs for four years with an option for additional two plus two years. This is a large and important agreement for Nettell. It provides increased volumes and extended geographical coverage, and we are proud of the in-depth cooperation we have with Elvia. We have just started in this new contract and expect to see increasing revenue during this year. This is an important step to our growth expectations we have in power in Norway. In Telekom, our German team have won another contract with UGG for rollout of fiber networks. This contract covers the rollout of fiber to over 7,000 households in Moldenstause near Leipzig, worth 50 million euro. The new product will start immediately and the rollout should be completed in 2026. In June this year, we announced another contract with UGD to roll out fiber to 5,000 households in Lagoon Gessnit, north of Leipzig, worth 10 million euro. We are very proud of UGD's extended trust. Germany is a fast-growing fiber market, and UGD is an important player with the goal to improving people's quality of life to fiber networks. UGG is a German company. It's headquartered in a Bavarian town in Eastmaning. It was founded in 2020 as a joint venture between Allianz and Telefonica Group. So, let's move on to our financial performance. Fredrik, welcome.

speaker
Fredrik Helenius
CFO, Netel

Thank you, Annette, and good morning, everyone. starting with the full year 24 we delivered 3.1 percent growth almost all organically and reached 3.3 billion in total sales we saw growth across all three divisions with infra services in the lead almost nine percent growth in infra services and in particular that was during the first half year which was on the stronger side Margin-wise, we reported an adjusted EBITDA of 5.2%, down from 5.7% last year, as we saw lower volumes within telecom from UK and Germany, and due to infrastructure usage, which came down in the year-on-year comparison. However, we closed 24 in line with the provided indication in January, and with an all-time high or the backlog of 4 billion for continuing operations. Now, before digging into the Q4 performance, we'll walk you through the status of the process regarding Finland and the outcome of the Finnish operations, given that we, from this report and onwards, will report those operations as discontinued. As previously said, we have decided to, let's see if we can get the correct slide. Like that, we have decided to initiate the process of divesting the Finnish operations and we expect to confirm closing during 2025. Whilst we of course focus on our continuing operations, the process with regards to Finland has started and we are evaluating our alternatives to move forward. As of today, we do not have any details on a specific timeline or the evaluation, but as said, we expect to close the divestment during this year. Our discontinued operations have not performed in line with our expectations, and we believe that, as Conette said, both Nutella and the Finnish operations will have better opportunities by finding a new structure. Finland is from now on considered discontinued and reported separately in all of our statements. Finland's performance in 24 reported in line with the indication that we provided, with 241 million in sales and a net profit after tax of minus 105 million. As the decision was made, we evaluated and stress tested relevant positions, contracts and projects, the organization in Finland and the outcome and loss for 24 includes what we believe to be necessary updated assumptions regarding the business to enable a successful divestment process. This means that the fourth quarter and the full year 24 includes additional costs with regards to the organization, the projects, other business related activities, and also estimated costs for the transaction and ongoing process with regards to selling the operations. The divestment process has, however, not implied any adjustments to other intangibles or goodwill for the group. This is our position as of today. And as said, the financial outcome includes our estimates for the coming process as well. We will, of course, get back to you once we have additional details on the process. Now, the following slides will refer to the continuing operations, just as the report did that we published earlier today. And looking at the financial performance for the continuing operations, the fourth and last quarter, we grew by 1.5%, driven by good development in power in Norway and from new growing sales within telecom in Germany and Sweden. This provided important answers for us, for both divisions, power and telecom, as we continued with growth in Germany and as we turned back to growth for the Norwegian power business. All in all, we delivered 957 million in the quarter compared to 943 million last year and almost 3.3 billion for the full year, as we said. During the last few months, we have had the pleasure to release contracts with, for instance, LVI Norway and UGG in Germany. And together with other added contracts and orders in our existing agreements, we grew the order backlog to an all-time high level of just about 4 billion for the continuing operations. The underlying demand is promising with the need for electrification, digitalization, improved infrastructure. And we believe that we have a good position with the existing water backlog. And together with additional volumes, we can enable the stepwise improvements towards our financial targets on midterm. In terms of profitability, we recorded an adjusted EBITDA of 57 million with a margin of 6% in the quarter, slightly below the 6.9% last year. The profitability was driven by strong performance from Power and Sweden with a series of finalized projects and good margins, especially regarding substations that we saw. We did not fully manage to reach last year's margin in total as we saw lower margins from telecom and a few projects with profitability and a continued competitive market within infra services. This holds for the full year 24 as well, where we recorded 169 million in adjusted EBITDA with a margin of 5.2 compared to the 5.7 last year. We continue to believe in our process as we now enter 2025 with a strong order backlog and continuous measures for further growth and improved profitability. Turning to cash flow, in the fourth quarter we saw that we once again achieved the best quarter for the year in line with the so often referred to seasonality where we are able to close projects and finalize our invoicing towards the end of the year. We reported 7 to 1 million as the operating cash flow for the group during the quarter. Telecom and Norway contributed on the positive side, as did Power and especially Sweden, where we had a good run closing profitable projects. The cash flow in the last quarter was affected by fewer projects being finalized. And for the year in comparison, we note that 23 was very strong and benefited from the release of cash previously tied up as working capital. For the full year 24, we delivered 115 million in operating cash flow, below last year due to low profitability levels, but also certain one-off effects, as for example, the 70 million positive effect from a legal dispute in 23. Looking at 24 standalone, we closed the year with around 10% net working capital in relation to sales, which we believe is within expected levels for our business. And we achieved improvements within projects and increased the cash flow awareness across the group. And with these levels, we believe that we are on track to reach our potential going forward as well. Closing 24 also meant that we paid the remaining earnouts. And in total, we recorded an outflow of 124 million from earnouts during the year. Effectively, we remain above our capital structure target on net leverage, being around 2.8 times in comparison to the target of 2.5. But we continue to have a solid liquidity and will continuously focus on cash flow activities to gain advantages and improve our financial position. If we take a look at the performance across our divisions, Infraservices delivered sales of 238 million in the quarter, just below last year for the full year. Infraservices contributed to the growth for the full year volume with 844 million in sales, up with almost 9%. As previously mentioned, the profitability within Infraservices was negatively impacted by some less profitable projects in the quarter. And as we still notice relatively higher competition within our markets, we recorded an EBITDA of 14 million or 5.9% compared to 11.7 last year. For the full year 24, we delivered a 6.4 margin, below last year where we saw very good performances across the entire division and year, and a very strong Q4. We believe that we have good opportunities for Infraservices as well as our other divisions, and we continue to evaluate our new orders on the basis of our mid-term financial targets. Within Power, we produced sales of 317 million in a quarter with a growth of 3.2%. Norway increased the production within both our Power Service contracts as well as from from projects and stations and added to the division's growth in total. Sweden, on the other hand, managed to finalize projects with better margins, which resulted in an EBITDA of 37 million in the quarter and a margin of 11.6%. With a strong delivery here in Q4, we closed the year at just above 1 billion in sales and with improved profitability to 7.6%. Power remains as a very interesting market with key drivers being digitalization trends and the need to increase access and capacity across our power systems. And we are happy to recognize the growth from Norway in the quarter as we have released recently one contract with important customers and previously within the industry sector as a new strategic initiative. Q4 marked the end to two profitable years for the division with good performances and we are looking to add additional volumes going forward to the order backlog and try to utilize on the momentum in the underlying markets. Telecom delivered 402 million sales in the quarter and continued with growth despite the lower yearly volumes from our growth markets. While UK remained on the low side, Germany continued with the growth for the second quarter in a row and added important volumes to the division, partially from the new contracts as we previously mentioned with UGG. Sweden closed the year with good progress, especially within mobile networks, as the swap of certain equipment was to be finalized before year end. And for the full year 24, telecom showed growth and remained slightly above 1.4 billion. The EBITDA of 0.5% or 2 million in the quarter was negatively impacted by lower volumes in UK. We are not satisfied with the 14 million or 1% margin for the full year 24. And as previously stated, our focus on increased margin remains. However, as we now see new volumes and the growth in Germany, we are implementing new tools for efficiency within our biggest service contracts in Norway and have interesting opportunities in Sweden. We share the view of the true importance to increase the profitability and expect a stepwise improvement going forward. Telecom is our biggest division today with almost 45% of sales and we aim to leverage on our order backlog today and new contracts in order to increase our profitability going forward. Finally, 2024 implied a lot of activities as previously described by Conett where we have been working with actions for a new organization. both in terms of structure and personnel, actions to increase efficiency. We have seen new customers and increased geographical presence. Again, this resulted in overall organic growth of 3% and adjusted a bit of 5.2 and a cash flow from operations of 115 million. Now, leaving 24 and having our eyes on 25, we entered the year with a solid order backlog of 4 billion. out of which more than half refers to 25, and we entered 25 with continuous measures for further growth. Improved profitability is key, but we further know that we have the ability to generate healthy cash flows, and with our earn-ups paid, we can continue and increase our focus on the balance sheet, monitoring our net leverage position, evaluate necessary debt levels for our business. We need to continue to improve our financial stability and with market rates continuing to improve, we can gain advantages and together with better projects and profitability levels, reach our financial targets in mid-term. We certainly have a lot to do and look forward to 2025. And with that, I believe that we are ready for some final remarks from your side, Conette.

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

Yes, thank you Fredrik for this in-deep presentation. I will finalize today with a presentation with some concluding remarks on our growth strategy and how we build a stronger Natel forward. We have a clear strategy and plan for how we will grow and improve our profitability step by step. As we said earlier, we operate in markets that are driven by strong megatrends. We have a strong position in these markets and we are therefore very well positioned to continue growing and creating value. Our strategy to succeed in this is divided into three areas, growth, operational excellency and our talents. We see clear opportunities to grow with our existing customers in all geographic areas, as we have proven under 2024. We have long standing relationships with many of our customers, and we now know that we managed to exceed their expectations. We therefore have the competitiveness to be able to grow existing customers by winning contracts that can encompass both larger geographical areas and new areas of responsibility. We have also identified opportunity to enter new customer segments, not least in power, where we have begun to approach the industrial sector in 2024. This opens up new existing opportunities that we are approaching step by step. With our customer base of large, well-established, both listed and publicly owned companies, we know that sustainability is an important competitive advantage. More and more of our customers and also suppliers want to work even closer so that together we can contribute to a more sustainable society. Our activities in the area of sustainability are therefore an important and competitive advantage and also a step in building a stronger Natel forward. The second area is operational excellency. We have already covered in the presentation and we are pleased with the progress we have made in 2024. The activities to improve operational excellency aim to both strengthen our offering to customers and improve internal efficiency. These initiatives often go hand in hand. For example, a more effective risk management in our products not only benefits our own profitability, but also means that the customer can benefit from us delivering with good quality in time and within budget. Last, but for us most important, we must secure that we have the best talents in the industry. There is a competition for talent and we are working focused to build our employee brand with the goal of keep and develop our employees and attract new talents. These strategic initiatives lay the foundation for a stronger and more sustainable Natel. We are confident that we have a clear, well-developed plan that we will continue to deliver on. And with this, we open up for questions. And as you know, you can either call in to us or mail questions through the webcast.

speaker
Webcast Moderator
Conference Operator

If you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key 5 on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial pound key 6 on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Gustav Berneblad from Nordea. Please go ahead.

speaker
Gustav Berneblad
Analyst, Nordea

Yes, good morning. It's Gustav here from Nordea. Maybe just to start off here I mean looking at the order bookings it seems to have accelerated up 12% quarter of a quarter. Would you say that this is a consequence of more projects coming out on the market or are you taking market shares or what's your view here?

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

Yeah, on our point of view, we actually are taking market positions, especially in the power segment, but as well actually in telecom with the new agreement, for example, with Telenor in Norway and also with the new contracts with UGD in Germany. So I would say a lot of it is that we are expanding in geographical and with other services as well.

speaker
Gustav Berneblad
Analyst, Nordea

Okay, interesting. If we look at the water backlog today are you seeing the share of projects related to power becoming sort of a larger share or larger percent of the backlog and would you say that this is likely to drive a favorable mix here going forward?

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

I would say in the telecom, the kind of contracts we have there in the service agreements, they are often very big and for many years. So normally that proportion in the order backlog is coming from telecom, but we see an increase in the order backlog as well in power and infra services.

speaker
Gustav Berneblad
Analyst, Nordea

Okay perfect and then looking at the margin here in power it looks to be surprisingly strong here in the quarter. Would you say that this is abnormally high for this quarter or is there a reason to think that this segment is boosted somehow or should we sort of extrapolate this?

speaker
Fredrik Helenius
CFO, Netel

The margins for power in the fourth quarter is mainly driven by the very strong ending from the Swedish performance and the closing of several substation projects that we managed to close out with exceptionally good margins. So we value this quarter as a very strong one for us, if that answers your question, Gustav.

speaker
Gustav Berneblad
Analyst, Nordea

Yeah, definitely. Thanks. And just the last one here, sorry. The margin in infra service looks to have taken a quite big hit year over year and you comment on finalization of low margin projects but can you just explain here is this cost overruns for these projects or did you take them initially at lower margins or what can you say here?

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

No, I would say that it is a competitive market for us, but we always go in with our contracts in line with our financial targets. But if we compare to 2022 or 2021, it's more competitive for us to win projects if we compare the profitability that we have had in Division Infra. But for these products, the contracts are okay, but we have some problems managing some of them, which ended up with a lower margin.

speaker
Gustav Berneblad
Analyst, Nordea

Okay, perfect. Thank you very much. That's all for me.

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

Thank you, Gustav.

speaker
Webcast Moderator
Conference Operator

The next question comes from Karl-Johan Bonnevier from DNB Markets. Please go ahead.

speaker
Karl-Johan Bonnevier
Analyst, DNB Markets

Karl-Johan Bonnevier Yes, good morning, Jonathan Frederick. Coming back to just getting some more color on the backlog, is it possible you could divide it up a little between the areas of geographies so we feel what is driving the big move there?

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

Yes, as I said earlier, we have a strong backlog and within Telekom, it's normally unusual that we have big contracts for many years, which are reflected in the order backlog, of course, with that. But we have seen stronger development for the order backlog also within power. And we see in infra services, we have more contracts that are smaller and normally for one year ahead. So you could more or less see the order backlog as a comparison on the sizes of our divisions.

speaker
Karl-Johan Bonnevier
Analyst, DNB Markets

Excellent. And given that you have struggled a little on the profitability in the service contract, and I think you earlier normally alluded to, Jeanette, that the order backlog will support your margin target of 7%. Is that still true, or should we have maybe a lower profitability kind of assumption for the backlog?

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

No, that's still true. We have expanded a new agreement with framework agreements, for example, in telecom in Norway with, for us, better contract, both increase in geographic area and services provided in that contract. So we expect it step by step to improve our margin in those contracts. But as you know, and I told you, the contract we go into, they are for many years and it's very important to us that all the new contracts that we have taken last year and so forward is that we are matching our financial targets on mid-term then. So we expect to step by step improvement.

speaker
Karl-Johan Bonnevier
Analyst, DNB Markets

Excellent. And, Fredrik, I think you mentioned that more than half of the backlog is supposed to be delivered during the current year. And do you see the room when you look at, say, other opportunities in-year kind of things to then come up to your level of growth ambitions that you have in your financial targets of around 10% per year? Is there nothing going on in the pipeline and in the market for you to deliver growth here? Is that too ambitious?

speaker
Fredrik Helenius
CFO, Netel

I mean, we believe that our position entering the year now is good. Then, of course, this is a natural part of our business. We have a lot of single-year contracts. Infra services usually are working with a lot of tenders during the early parts of the year, and the very same contracts usually end towards the end of the year. So given the order backlog of about 4 billion today, out of which we say that more than half refers to 25, We see that we have good opportunities for our business, but we still have to continue to evaluate new alternatives and win new contracts for 2025 this year as well.

speaker
Karl-Johan Bonnevier
Analyst, DNB Markets

And on that basis, is it the infra services where you have the biggest hold to maybe find orders for and work for during this year or spread over the whole area?

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

Yeah, I would say that we still see that in 2025 it will be a competitive market, but we are expecting that it will be an increasing market due to the housing projects, especially now in Sweden, maybe we'll start more housing building. So we expect a bit in the end of the year anyway. But for us in the markets we are, we see more or less the same situation that we had 2024 as 2025. And we will continue with the same strategy that we have done in 2024 with new one contracts. And we are strong in the markets we are. So we are expecting that we also can improve our capability to run the product as well as to increase our margin for infra services this year.

speaker
Karl-Johan Bonnevier
Analyst, DNB Markets

Excellent. And Fredrik, just a couple of questions on the cash flow as well. Good highlighting the impact of Finland on the cash flow. Was that back-end loaded during the year or was that evenly spread out over the year? Because I couldn't really make up the Q4 numbers on the reporting levels on cash flow.

speaker
Fredrik Helenius
CFO, Netel

Yeah, we present the cash flow from both the entire group, given that cash flow is, I understand it's a bit tricky to back out. Then we present the cash flow for the continuing operations and for discontinued operations in the report. So you have all the numbers there, Johan. But Finland provided for the year almost minus 60 million in operating cash flow. And that was... well, in general, spread out throughout the year, but it was backloaded towards the second half year. And I think that we saw up to minus eight million in the fourth quarter.

speaker
Karl-Johan Bonnevier
Analyst, DNB Markets

And when you look at the weighting that the operation is disposed of and leads you, is it a factor similar kind of 15 to 20 million kind of than negative operating cash flow coming out of that? Or have you neutralized it?

speaker
Fredrik Helenius
CFO, Netel

Sorry, take that again, Carl-Johan.

speaker
Karl-Johan Bonnevier
Analyst, DNB Markets

Do you refer to the... No, if you look at Finland still being part of the group, obviously, until you dispose of it, or it's an agreement, is it fair to assume that it's going to be a burden of 10 to 15 million on the cash flow basis over the quarters that you still have it?

speaker
Fredrik Helenius
CFO, Netel

I mean, that all depends on the process going forward. We have made our assumption and estimates now for the cost base for the selling process. Then potential impact cash flow wise also depends on the potential transaction going forward. So it's hard for us to comment on today.

speaker
Karl-Johan Bonnevier
Analyst, DNB Markets

And also on the cash flow, are you now finalized the last of the acquisition payments that you have?

speaker
Fredrik Helenius
CFO, Netel

Yeah, so we now we paid 125 million almost during 24 and we are now down with our earnouts, which means that we have another situation looking forward and we'll continue with our cash flow activities and continuously increase the cash flow awareness across the group, making sure that we get the the needed action that we want to have within our projects.

speaker
Karl-Johan Bonnevier
Analyst, DNB Markets

Excellent. And looking at the working capital situation at the end of the year, do you see opportunities for further relief? Are we now in a more stable situation?

speaker
Fredrik Helenius
CFO, Netel

that we will always have things to work on. I think that the level of awareness regarding cash flow can still increase in our tender processes, in our projects, in our finalization phases in the projects and this is something that will continue to be key for us as it gives us the most important answers on our progress in the projects and the business. So I mean the The focus will remain and we expect that we will still have things to work on. For instance, we have seen now within telecom, which has been a rather tougher market for us in terms of cash flow, that we have managed to get better terms. We have managed to get sort of front loaded invoicing processes in some of our telecom projects. And that's additions into what we have seen in the past. So we will continue on that ambition and try to decrease the needed level for working capital in our business.

speaker
Karl-Johan Bonnevier
Analyst, DNB Markets

Excellent. But when I look at 2025, is it true to say that it is really the profitability drive that you're talking about, that it's also going to be the driver of the cash flow rather than some other items then?

speaker
Fredrik Helenius
CFO, Netel

Yeah, as we said, profitability is key. We need to improve our profitability. Our focus is on how we can improve our profitability, and we expect to leverage on the order backlog. But again, we have to continue to work on our ambition with regard to working capital items and other cash flow activities as well.

speaker
Karl-Johan Bonnevier
Analyst, DNB Markets

Excellent. Thank you very much.

speaker
Not provided
Not provided

Thank you.

speaker
Webcast Moderator
Conference Operator

Thank you. The next question comes from Kristoffer Carlesker from Kepler-Chevreau. Please go ahead.

speaker
Kristoffer Carlesker
Analyst, Kepler-Cheuvreau

Good morning, guys. Thanks for taking my question. I'll start with an M&A topic. Well, in light of you deciding to divert Finland, how should we think about your M&A strategy going forward? It is like a step back from the M&A scene and you're not having that part of the toolbox to expand operations. and maybe you can weave in that if there is still M&A in your toolbox. Is that rather in-market consolation or would you look for new markets?

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

In our long strategy, of course, M&A is an important activity for us further on. But for now on, our main strategy is to focus on our stability, financial stability and financial platform to be able to continue with M&A. But on the long term, it would be a value for Netel in our strategy to work with M&A. So we have our ears out and always look for potential on long term. But for now, our strategy is to get our financial stability within.

speaker
Fredrik Helenius
CFO, Netel

Yeah, and I certainly agree. I mean, Finland is a business driven decision. Strategically, M&A will continue to be an important part for Natel in terms of growth in the longer term. Then again, we need to increase and have our focus on our financial stability and consider the effects and the opportunities that we have today on our balance sheet.

speaker
Kristoffer Carlesker
Analyst, Kepler-Cheuvreau

Understood. Very clear. And going back to your mention profitability, quite a few times today. And if we look at the EBITDA margin profile of your different divisions, it's quite, as we say, very different profiles in Q4. So we see, for example, power having a massive quarter, right? So can you talk to us about what is like the sustainable levels and the different profiles of like infra, power, telecom, in terms of margin is a reason to believe that one should be much higher than the other.

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

No, I think our aim is to have all our three divisions on our financial target levels. But we are, as I said earlier, we have a product driven, especially within power and the infra services, private driven contracts, which could make between the quarters and year in that way as well, fluctuate margin results during that. yeah our main target is that we we we should get our divisions on on our financial targets levels but it's going to be as as you can see for telecom which is our biggest it is a step-by-step journey for us thank you and

speaker
Kristoffer Carlesker
Analyst, Kepler-Cheuvreau

Just to build on that, you've mentioned margin enhancing measures today. I had some technical problems dialing, so maybe I missed this and apologies in that case. But could you please elaborate a bit what you have done or what you're doing to actually expand your margins?

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

Yeah, it always starts with the contracts. So our new contracts have another position than our old contracts have had. And it takes time to deliver on the contracts and go into new ones. And of course, when we start this big new contract, it always is a bit of also delay before we can see the result of them as well, both on the revenue and on the margin. We always have some cost in the beginning and so forth. But I would say we can see the development from there.

speaker
Kristoffer Carlesker
Analyst, Kepler-Cheuvreau

Got it. Maybe last one on the UK. I mean, it's another Poor quarter. So could you talk to us about the game plan to get back to growth? What's the market situation? Are you winning any contracts? Or is competition just too harsh at the moment?

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

Well, I was saying UK, it's been a bit harsh for us, but we also have changed our strategy, what kind of contracts and also customer base for us, what would be good for our organization in UK. So it's been a transformative year as well in UK considering customer base. And we are looking forward further on to present the development there in the UK. But for our part, it's been a change of customer base, I would say.

speaker
Not provided
Not provided

Okay, thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

speaker
Webcast Moderator
Conference Operator

As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key five on your telephone keypad. There are no more questions at this time. So I hand the conference back to the speakers for any written questions and closing comments.

speaker
Jeanette Reuterskjell
President and CEO, Netel

So thank everybody for today. And we look forward to see you next time for our quarter one.

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