AtkinsRéalis Group Inc.

Thank you for standing by. This is the conference operator. Good morning and welcome to Atkins Realis' third quarter 2024 results conference call. As a reminder, all participants are in listen-only mode and the conference is being recorded. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To join the question queue, you may press star then 1 on your telephone keypad. Should you need assistance during the You may signal an operator by pressing star then zero. I would now like to turn the conference over to Denis Jasmin, Vice President, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Grim. Bonjour tout le monde. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Before diving in, we invite you to view the slide presentation that we have posted in the investor section of our website, which we will refer to today during this call. So this call is also webcast. With me are Ian Edwards, Chief Executive Officer, and Jeff Bell, Chief Financial Officer. Before we begin, I would like to ask everyone to limit themselves to one or two questions to ensure that all attendees have an important space. You are welcome to return to the queue for any follow-up questions. I would like to draw your attention to slide two. looking information. This information, by its nature, is subject to assumptions, risks, and uncertainties, and as such, actual results may differ materially from the views expressed today. For further information on these assumptions, risks, and uncertainties, please consult the company's relevant filings on Citadel+. These documents are also available on our website. Also during the call, we may refer to certain non-RFRS financial measures. Reconciliation of these amounts to the current are reflected in our earnings release and MD&A, which can be found on the SIDAR Plus and our website. Before I pass the call to Yen, I would like to take the opportunity to acknowledge the retirement of Jacob Boot, Managing Director, Equity Research at CNBC, who is participating through his last quarterly call with us today. Thank you, Jacob, for all your help, advice, and support over the years. We wish you all the best in your retirement. And now I'll pass the call over to Yen Edwards. Yen?

Thank you, Denis. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. I'm going to begin today's call by providing an overview of our performance in the third quarter, our continually growing backlog, and the current success and opportunities we are seeing in our four engineering services regions and our nuclear businesses. I'll then pass it to Jeff to provide more detail on our financial results before we open it to Q&A. So let's get started on slide three. We're entering the final months of 2024 with continued momentum following another quarter of strong results. Success is Passporter further highlights the growing demand for our services to address the energy transition and an aging global infrastructure. We're encouraged by the steady profitable growth of our services and our nuclear businesses across the majority of the geographies and markets in which we operate. increased 14%, with segment-adjusted EVA increasing 27% to approximately $239 million. Engineering services regions revenue organically increased 8% to $1.8 billion, while nuclear revenue organically grew 35% to $369 million. That log, at the end of the third quarter of 2024, was approximately $16.8 billion, an increase of 35% year over year, another record high for Atkins Realis. Results year-to-date reflect our purpose-built strategy of expanding into geographies and end markets with high total returns. Our nuclear expertise continues to be a distinct competitive advantage as we secure key wins this quarter and have a clear line of sight to substantial near-term revenue, and we generated over $200 million in operating cash flow this quarter. We are helping public and private entities achieve their net zero goals and address the energy trilemma, providing clean, affordable, and secure energy solutions. Our historical track record makes us the partner of choice in these endeavors, and we're proud to play a role in providing a better future for our planet and its people. On slide four, you can see the continued progression of our backlog growth across Atkins Realis services. Our 35% growth in the third quarter versus last year was driven by key wins across our core engineering services and nuclear businesses. In nuclear, we secured a life extension contract at the Quinshan Nuclear Generating Station. As discussed in detail at our June investor day, the entire lifecycle of a nuclear asset from design to decommissioning. This new agreement is only one example showcasing the global demand of our nuclear capabilities. In the UK and Ireland, we continue to support major capital investments by the government in transportation, like the latest technology screening services we are implementing at Heathrow. Our end-to-end capabilities in engineering services enable us to win in the market, including at one of the world's busiest airports. Turning to slide five, our engineering services business had a robust organic top-line growth. achieving an 8% increase year-over-year in the third quarter. Our revenue generation was driven by the continuation of our ability to secure new wins across our geographic scope. Segment-adjusted EBITDA over net revenue margin was 16.9% during the quarter and represents an increase of 160 basis points compared to Q3 2023. we continued to increase our backlog, which now stands at $12 billion, representing a 17% growth versus our backlog as of September 30, 2023. Beginning on slide six, we will provide an overview of each of our four regions and their performance in Q3. In Canada, we saw year-over-year organic revenue decline 8%, while segment-adjusted EBITDA was $35 million, representing an approximately 15% margin. Gross revenue declined due to the ending of a project which had a high percentage of flow-through revenue. But as you can see, the underlying net revenue increased 12% year-over-year to $226 million, and our business in Canada continues to strengthen. Backlog increased 23% year-over-year. We continue to capture key awards across transportation, buildings and places, power and renewables, and are increasing our presence in Ontario and Western Canada. In Toronto, we were awarded a key rail project, and in Quebec, we entered into an agreement for the expansion of the sterile injectable facility in Montreal. We are executing on our strategy for Canada, and we're making meaningful progress on our margin enhancement mandate as we lean into a profitable pipeline. In the UK and Ireland, we continue to win notable contracts utilising our end-to-end capabilities, particularly in defence, water, aviation and power and renewables. Our nimble and focused approach has built a solid foundation for our presence in the region and is a leading to our performance. Organic revenue grew 6% versus the third quarter of 2023, while segment-adjusted EBITDA grew to $93 million. We witnessed a record high EBITDA margin of 18.5% this past quarter, supported by a gain from a closeout of a major project. We saw continued battle of growth during the third quarter for approximately $1.7 billion. primarily due to new work orders in the water and rail signalling businesses. We continue to demonstrate that our partners of choice would network rail as we secure a key contract to upgrade and digitise the UK's signalling for the next 10 years. We also entered into an agreement to renew and enhance the infrastructure on 6,000 miles of track in the east of England. Additionally, we've made further progress in expanding our access to the growing water market in the UK, with several major framework wins related to the AMP8 programme. Currently, announced plans indicate that the water sector aims to increase its investment significantly to £96 billion by March 2030, and near doubling of current levels. This will provide ample opportunity for Atkins Realis to capture further water projects related to this investment in the UK. Our long-standing position in the UK has as well aligned to key commitments by the public sector to create a cleaner future. We're making meaningful progress on opportunities in transnational renewable projects and plans to upgrade the UK grid. We are also trusted advisors across defence, as capacity and spend is expanding under the AUKUS trilateral security partnership. Turning to slide eight, in the US and Latin America, we saw continued growth trajectory across many high-growth customer and markets. Organic revenue grew 11% year over year, while segment-adjusted EBITDA increased to $51 million. We continue to leverage our expertise in transportation with key wins across Georgia and Florida in the quarter. Our thoughts go out to those impacted by the destruction from Hurricanes Helen and Milton. We are partnering with FEMA to support recovery efforts in the communities most impacted. Q3 backlog increased 7% year over year. as we continue to advance our land and expand strategy, prioritize our key clients, and leverage our unique differentiators. Our list of prospects for further contract wins is expanding across geographies within the U.S., and we believe represents solid opportunities for sustainable growth. We will be steadfast in our approach to accelerating our foothold across the US to ensure that we are winning our share of potential new contracts. We also believe that potential M&A opportunities exist to expand our presence in the regions and in markets where we have a line of sight to our growth potential. revenue grew 33% on an organic basis versus the third quarter of 2023, as we saw higher volume for the buildings and places projects in the Middle East. This work also led to a segment adjusted EBITDA of $39 million, representing a 17% margin over net revenue. The Middle East part of our business has grown materially over the last 18 months, and it is a level we are comfortable with, and therefore we expect to be more moderate in future courses. Total backlog in EMEA grew 16% in the third quarter. In Asia, we successfully re-secured the Formula One work we have been delivering for the last 10 years, enhancing our already strong relationship. In South Korea, we secured a design, engineering, and procurement services for a new bioprocessing product center. We have expanded capacity and capabilities in Australia as we are seeing the pipeline of prospects accelerate in the power and renewables and defence markets. The future is bright in this region and there are exciting long-term opportunities ahead for our end-to-end capabilities. I'd now like to move to slide 10 and the results of our nuclear business. We continue to demonstrate significant growth with an organic revenue increase of 35% in the quarter compared to the third quarter of 2023. Our nuclear backlog is $3.2 billion, which represents more than a 200% growth versus our backlog as at September 30, 2023, driven primarily by life extension bookings in the Can-Do fleet. segment-adjusted EBIT grew 18% to $46 million. As a percentage of segment revenue, segment-adjusted EBIT was 12% in the quarter. On slide 11, we highlight the achievements across our nuclear can-do and services portfolios. The demand for our expertise in nuclear was emphasized again this quarter as we signed key wins and made continued progress on projects across each of the regions we serve. In Canada, we continue to garner support from the public and private sector as we onboarded additional key stakeholders for our Canadians for Can Do campaign. In our Can Do business, we're making excellent progress, particularly on our Can Do life extension projects. In our services business, Atkins Realis was selected in the US to develop the pre-concept design for Type 1 Energy's fusion pilot plant in Tennessee. We also see increasing opportunities to work with other technologies or providers for SMR development. In the UK, we entered into an agreement with GE Hitachi to support the delivery of its small modular reactor technology, and we are continuing to provide new build support at Hinkley Point C and Seisel C and decommissioning services at Sutherfield. Our success is being recognized by third parties. As you can see on the slide, we have recently received a number of awards in the US and in the UK. Turning to slide 12, I want to further highlight the near-term and long-term can-do revenue opportunities within our nuclear business. As you can see, through our backlog growth and contract wins over the past couple of years, our customers are continuing to recognise our nuclear expertise. This is translating into revenues that we are booking today, while also building a robust backlog of strong future revenues for Atkins Realis. As I mentioned earlier, we secured a 30-year life extension contract for the two CANDU reactors at the Quinshan Nuclear Generating Station. In addition, we continue to make good progress on new build contract negotiations for C3 and C4 at Cerna Voda in Romania. When signed, it will mark the return of CANDU reactors to the world nuclear market. and discussions continue on the next phase of our Cernobolus C1 life extension project. Our current success in Canada and Romania highlights the opportunities for CANDU support and life extensions across the globe today. We're also currently building the technology for our Monarch nuclear reactor. In tandem, we're in discussions with public entities about building new reactors to help support net zero goals. These potential contracts represent a massive opportunity for our business and could deliver significant growth over the next 10 years and beyond. We are one of the few public companies with the expertise and capabilities to service the entire lifecycle of a nuclear asset. And through this, we can build a backlog that will grow over time and providing recurring revenue for decades to come. The projects you see on this slide are representative of today's wins, but offer a glimpse into the future potential of this business. Our growth and key wins today showcase the demand and potential of our nuclear prowess across the globe. Now, moving to slide 13 and our links on LSGK and capital businesses. Our links on segments saw 32% year-over-year organic revenue growth in the third quarter, maintaining its strong volume momentum from the first half of the year, and realized 310 basis points of EBIT margin expansion. Backlog of $1.6 billion at the end of the third quarter was 32% higher than the third quarter of last year. Demand for our transmission and distribution services remains robust. On LSDK projects, the commissioning and testing on our two Ontario projects are running as planned. The trial running of the Trillion line just took place, and the result was a success, and we expect substantial completion of this project imminently. The total backlog decreased 38% to $190 million at the end of the third quarter, primarily reflecting the REN project, which is progressing well. As we finalize the LSDK projects for our clients, we continue to pursue claim recoveries that we believe are owed. and these discussions remain ongoing with our clients. On capital, we received $15 million of dividends from Highway 407 and Q3 as traffic patterns continue to improve year over year. Subsequent to quarter close, we received an additional $47 million in dividends in the fourth quarter. There are also no updates to provide as it pertains to our planned deposition of our interest in links on and Highway 407. We will update you when we have more information in the future. So with that, I'll now turn over to Jeff to discuss the financial highlights. Thank you, Ian.