SKS Technologies Group Limited

SKS Technologies Group Limited

AASX:SKS
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214.83MMarket Cap
Feb 23Next Earn

Q4 FY2026 · Earnings Call TranscriptAugust 18, 2026

Matthew Jinks

Run through a presentation for the company's FY26 results. Gary and I very pleased to sit with you today and run through the FY26 results, which sees another consecutive year of record performance across all metrics.

Yep, thanks Simon. Just running through sales revenue up 33% from FY25 to FY26, which is a quantum leap, but probably more importantly, a 64% increase from the first half of FY26 to the second half, closing the year at just short of $348 million, which we're very pleased about.

EBITDA up 81%, net profit before tax up 89%, and a 93% increase on our net profit after tax. Again, significant quantum leaps across all of those metrics.

The company continues to produce strong operating cash flows of $45.66 million for the year. Linked to the strong performance and the overarching performance of the business in FY26, the board has declared a dividend of 6.5 cents for the second half, representing 10 cents for the full year to give back to the shareholders that have been on the journey for quite a number of years.

Maybe if we just jump to the next slide please, Simon. Gary can run us through the P&L.

Gary Beaton

Thank you Matthew. The main takeaway from this page is that we've seen revenue growth of 33%, but really expense growth of 28.2%.

With the exception of depreciation and amortization, every expense line has grown at a lower rate than the revenue line. Obviously the increase in depreciation reflects the increase in capex that we've undertaken during the year.

As Matthew mentioned, sales revenue is up 33% and 64% up on the previous half. We're currently sitting on a fixed cost base that we think can support $500 million of revenue, and at this particular stage, that is all quite logical.

One of the other key points that comes out of this particular page is the continued increase in profit before tax margin, where we can see that graph out to one side where we've got 11.2% for the year. Thank you, Matthew.

Matthew Jinks

Thanks Simon. As we get into the detail of the business, we might just start with the traditional revenue of the business, and we'll get to the data center revenue and unpack that a little bit further in the slide deck.

Really pleasing continued growth of traditional revenue of the business. We can see there a compounding annual growth rate of 19.1% over the last three years, and 16% from FY25 to FY26, with a representation of a little over $140 million or 40% of the business we saw in the traditional revenue of the business.

We are obviously seeing some really significant growth in the data center revenue at 47.6% from FY25 to FY26, and that is really becoming a significant part of the business. Certainly within the four walls of the business, the generation of revenue for the business is really important to us.

We embarked on a number of initiatives over the last few years, and it's really important to us that we continue to see that growth. Really pleased with 16% on the traditional revenue of the business.

Thanks Simon.

Gary Beaton

Thank you, Matthew. On this particular one, cash flow from operations, obviously another strong year, up from $35 million to $45 million, obviously a very strong first half.

Working capital is very similar to the previous year. We just point out that's on the back of the Delta acquisition, the increased capex, and dividends that have been paid.

Obviously net cash flow come back as a result of the Delta, capex, and dividends. Just moving over to the trade payables column.

Trade payables increased overall in line with sales as at 30th June '26, and consistent with the stages of our major projects, as well as the corresponding reduction in contract liabilities, which also aligns with the stages of the current projects. Bank facilities, we've just continued to increase them over the years, we're now sitting at bank guarantee facilities of $52 million, and we've finished the year with a cash on hand of $49.6.

Matthew Jinks

Thanks Gary. Yep, thanks Simon.

Over the last sort of four or five years, we widely talk about an aggressive organic growth strategy. We break down our strategy into growth, consolidation, growth, consolidation, and we are and have achieved many many things through FY26, whether it be on the growth or the consolidation side.

We continue to pursue an aggressive organic growth strategy, and we do feel that we've got a lot more to get out of that organic growth. We do remain opportunistic to acquisitions, and as part of that, and we've spoken about that over the last couple of years, and in January of this year we acquired a New South Wales-based business called Delta Elcom.

Again, I'll talk a little bit more about that further in the slide deck, but that was fully integrated through the early part of this calendar year. We've significantly grown our work on hand by 56%, now sitting at $312 million off a $200 million base level.

Really some significant achievements across that. We maintain a rigorous approach to all of our investment opportunities, and we're always keeping a constant eye on our capital needs.

As Gary said, we have seen continued support from the Commonwealth Bank, who is our banker, now having bank facilities of $52 million, and we've maintained our working capital level, even despite the $10.9 million related to the acquisition of Delta Elcom. We maintain a really high percentage of repeat business, currently sitting at 95% of repeat business across not just the data center space, but also the traditional revenue of the business.

As I touched on earlier, a six to a 16% increase in our traditional revenue up to $140 million for FY26, again which is a really pleasing metric for us. Thanks Simon.

Just to expand on the Delta Elcom integration. As I mentioned, January of 2026, we acquired Delta Elcom, which is a New South Wales-based business, quite a small business in the scheme of things in terms of turning over roughly $25 million and bringing with it 40 40 resources, primarily working in and around the data center space, but at a small level.

We did feel that the bringing the businesses together continued to pursue the data center opportunities, and much larger opportunities as time goes, it will be a stepped approach, and you would have, if you've heard us talk before, you would have heard us say that you won't be hearing us announce a major project in the data center space in New South Wales off the back of Delta Elcom. It will be a stepped approach.

We do know what it takes to deliver these sorts of projects, and the last thing that we want to do is take on something that we haven't got solid capability for that will give us a poor-performing contract or fracture a relationship that we're already seeing really great results with. We will build capability and have already begun that process.

We have began tendering work at a larger scale than what traditionally Delta would have prior to the sale to us, but again, it will be a stepped approach. The integration is 100% completely done.

It is important to note that in consultation with the original owners of Delta Elcom that we decided to rebrand the business from day one to SKS Technologies. It does operate in the New South Wales region as SKS Technologies, and has done now for the last four or five months since the acquisition.

We're really pleased with how more broadly the company and everyone in it has embraced that acquisition, and how the original founders and the resources that have come with that acquisition have morphed into the broader group. Thanks Simon.

In terms of the consolidation, as the business continues to grow, really important for us that we've had a strong focus on recruiting the right people. We've seen significant top-line growth in terms of sales.

We've got a significant growing work-in-hand position and another step-change in our pipeline that's coming behind it, and we can't convert that work and deliver all that work without the right people. We've had a strong focus on that, and as I sit here today, including our group training apprentices, we now hover around 1,300 staff members and growing.

We feel that the team has done a great job in terms of resourcing, in terms of our recruitment, getting the right people in the business with the right skill set. Over the last 12 to 18 months, we've introduced a HV division to the business.

We've obviously had to attract the right people with the right skill set. Whilst that is electrical work, high-voltage work is very different to medium- and low-voltage work, and so the right resources need to come into the business to do that.

That is a significantly growing team, and we are pursuing some greater opportunities on the HV side of what is the electrical infrastructure work with some of these facilities. We've introduced a company-wide leadership program where we've identified the first 12 cohort of people as the future leaders of the business, and put them through leadership program to arm them with the right skills for their future development.

We continue to build on our systems and processes. Obviously a much larger scale business needs much stronger and growing operating platforms, and we continue to work hard at that.

At the same time, we have a really strong focus on maintaining the fixed cost base of the business, which we feel we've done a great job at. With that comes the scale benefits.

We, being very selective with the projects that we pursue and ensuring that we maintain our margins across all of our projects linked to that the maintaining the cost structure of the business means that we can benefit from the scale benefits. I think we've seen that in FY26.

We'll progressively continue to align sort of security controls as part of the Essential Eight with our IT frameworks. We've spent a lot of money and we invest a lot of money into our IT systems to support the growth of the business and building those operating platforms, and that all dovetails into not only the deliverables of the project, but also maintaining a really strong safety culture which we need to do, and I'll again talk about that a little bit in more detail shortly.

Might just jump straight to the data center forecast slide Simon, next one please. This slide is definitely not meant to be an exhaustive list.

It's really just to give the reader a flavor of some of the key players within the data center sector, whether that be from a hyperscale perspective or a data center operator perspective. There's a lot of varying forecasts out there around the sorts of opportunities and the size of facilities that these types of companies are pursuing.

Even though those forecasts vary, really what all of the forecasts show is an extraordinary level of growth right across the board, and we feel that we're very well positioned to pursue those increasing opportunities and increasing size in facilities with the current customer base that we're working with. Thanks Simon.

Just to sort of go into a little bit more detail around the data center side of our business now, where we've seen 47.6% growth in that data center revenue between FY25 and FY26. We've seen quantum leaps in the pipeline of activity now sitting just short of $1.5 billion.

Through the course of FY26, we secured our largest contract size to date of $210 million, which goes to the capability and the delivery capability of the company and our ability to resource those sorts of projects of that size. Throughout FY26, we've handed over one approximately 107 MW of data center capacity, which has generated close to $208 million worth of revenue, and we start FY27 with $245 million of work in hand in the data center space alone.

Really significant growth when you look at FY24, '25, and '26 across all of those numbers. As each year goes on, the capability of the business is just getting stronger and stronger off the back of those foundations year-on-year.

Thanks Simon. Looking at the order book more broadly, $312 million is where we start FY27 with.

That is a significant increase again from any prior year. You can see $200 million was the base when we started FY26.

A quantum leap in terms of our starting work-in-hand position. Data centers make up now 78% of that, just over 78% of that.

Really pleasingly too that the work-in-hand position and our pipeline, which I'll talk about shortly, the traditional revenue of the business is continuing to grow as well. Really strong growth in our order book, which obviously drives future revenue.

Thanks Simon. In terms of the pipeline, just touched on, the traditional work pipeline is continuing to see strong growth.

It's a little bit hard not to notice the top line there of the data centers, which near on runs off the page. Again, another quantum leap.

I think in May of this year, we were talking $1 billion of pipeline of activity. That's now jumped up close to $1.5 billion.

I think once we reported it in May to now, whilst we've made some small announcements around early work packages and things like that, we haven't announced any major project or conversion of a major project in its entirety. Whilst the timing of those projects is still to unfold, there's further projects and opportunities coming on, and hence why that number is continuing to grow.

Now representing 87% of the overall pipeline is data centers. Really, really buoyant and unrelenting demand within the data center space, and we continue to see that.

Thanks Simon. In terms of SKS Indigenous Technologies, this is an area of the business that we're very proud of and what we've achieved in a very short period of time.

We feel we are making really meaningful contributions to Indigenous households by providing job opportunities. We now have over 43 Indigenous people working within the business.

FY26 saw revenues of $28.6 million and a net profit after tax of $432,000. For those that aren't aware, SKS Indigenous Technologies is a for-profit business, and we use the opportunities that come through that business in order to support future pathways for Indigenous people, as well as providing back to community through a number of initiatives.

Really really pleased with the result of SKS Indigenous Technologies and how that continues to develop. Won't spend too much time on this, but some of the major projects that we've either commenced or completed through FY26: New Footscray Hospital was the largest health project that has ever been done in Victoria, where we did the audiovisual services for, and now that that project's at a completion, it is up for a number of industry awards, really proud of what the team has delivered there.

We're involved in the redevelopment of the Westfield in Mount Gravatt in Queensland, and just coming to the final stages of handover for MEL01C, which is the third project that we've done for STACK Infrastructure as part of that MEL01 facility. 52 MW of completed data center capacity being handed over, and the team has done a great result there.

Thanks Simon. Safety for us is of paramount importance.

We have a much and increasingly growing workforce, 22.7% increase in number of employees throughout FY26, and a 32.1% increase in productive working hours on FY25. You can see as you've gone through the last five five years there, significant changes in our employee numbers.

With more employees and more productive working hours brings a higher risk to injury, and we have a very rigorous focus and safety plans associated with that. Very pleased to report that we've had no lost-time injuries throughout FY26, and certainly no serious injuries over the last 12-year history of the business.

A fantastic safety record, and we continue to maintain that. Thanks Simon.

I guess, in summary, the current state of the business and the outlook where we find ourselves, we do find ourselves in an area where there is an unrelenting market demand across all of the market sectors that we work in, but particularly accelerating growth forecast in terms of the data center sector. We have a really large and growing and accelerating pipeline that's coming in behind that, again led by the data center sector.

We do feel that we remain flexible in terms of our growth strategy, whether that be organic, where we've got a lot more to get out of that off the back of laying some really strong foundations over the last five years or so. We will continue to remain opportunistic to acquisitions.

We're not working on anything at the moment, but we will continue to remain opportunistic to that, and if we do feel something aligns with the overarching strategy of the business, we'll have a closer look at that. We feel that we've got a solid level of working capital, and we have a strong ability to fund the future growth of the business.

We continue to see strong support from Commonwealth Bank in terms of increasing our bank facilities, and so when you sort of wrap your arms around that, we feel that the ability to grow and take advantage of our opportunities, we can do comfortably. The operating platform of the business, we'll continue to have a strong focus on that and making sure that we provide efficiencies to all of the people within the business to make it easy to get such a growing and increasing large number of projects delivered.

When you sort of I guess wrap all that up, we're comfortable in saying that our FY27 forecast earnings will be roughly or approximately $500 million of revenue with a $60 million representation of profit before tax. Thank you, and might hand it back to you, Simon, for any questions.

Operator

All right, thanks for that Matthew, and thanks Gary as well. Just before we get to some of the analysts, always had a couple questions come through.

What's factored into the $500 million revenue guidance in terms of work in hand, win and do, and then Delta incremental contribution?

Matthew Jinks

We start the year with $312 million. You'll see in the traditional revenue of the business, and we sort of often talk about $10 to $11 million every month that we need to win and do just as business as usual.

I think when you look at the FY26 traditional revenue number of $140 million, so that effectively in essence almost puts us at a starting position of $450 million. Roughly $50 million of work that needs to be won and done for the balance of the financial year.

Whilst we have, I would say some really strong conviction around converting our pipeline, that's yet to be done. We're comfortable in saying 500.

We've obviously got a bit of work to do to win and do that $50 million. Depending on project timings and things like that, there might be opportunity to increase that in time, but for now that's what we're comfortable in saying.

Operator

Right, thanks Matthew. Just quick question around STACK and potentially being up for sale.

Does a change in ownership affect SKS at all, or is the data center operator removed from the head contractor's decision?

Matthew Jinks

No, we actually saw that with AirTrunk a couple of years ago when AirTrunk sold. That actually didn't affect us at all.

It actually, if anything, accelerated what their plans and growth strategic direction looked like. No, I don't see that as halting in what they're doing.

I don't think businesses buy other businesses and then stop what they're doing. I think they will take that on and maybe even accelerate what they're doing.

They certainly have quite a number of years of activity in their pipeline. Not concerned about that.

Operator

Next we've got a question, James Filius at Morgans. James, please go ahead.

James Filius

Hey guys, thanks for that. Can you hear me?

Matthew Jinks

Yes, thanks James.

Gary Beaton

Yep.

James Filius

Congratulations on a fantastic result. I guess just one question for me to start off with.

Obviously you've seen quite a marked step-up in your pipeline, even just from May. Can you sort of give us a feel for whether that's sort of expansion of I guess projects that currently exist in your pipeline or whether it's new work being tendered?

Maybe just the composition, is it still very much Victoria-centric or can we expect to see now that you're sort of integrated Delta Elcom, some more New South Wales-based projects in the mix?

Matthew Jinks

Sure. Thanks for the question, James.

In May we were talking $1 billion on that pipeline, and now obviously jumping up to $1.5 billion. By and large, it's for existing customers that we've traditionally worked for, and it's either further growth in existing facilities, or in one case, it's the next facility for that company.

In summary, it's for the customers that we've traditionally worked for, more work within existing planned facilities, and in one case, it's their next campus.

Gary Beaton

Very Victorian-centric as well. Yeah.

James Filius

Understood. Maybe just another one for me.

Obviously you've talked to Delta Elcom and the integration of that business. I think when you acquired it, you called out that they're about a $25 million in revenue sort of run-rate business.

Now that you've integrated it in, well, we haven't yet sort of seen any material contract wins out of that New South Wales side of things yet, but how should we think about the ambitions for that business over the next few years and how that ties into your existing business and, I guess, your presence in Victoria?

Matthew Jinks

Sure. I guess it's coming off a relatively low base, being a $25 million business, and so, when you talk about materiality, some of the projects that they may convert is material in the sense for what was Delta Elcom, maybe not so much the material for what is the group now.

It would typically kind of do work up to sort of $5 million. We are now sort of tendering opportunities that are north of that, more in that sort of $10 to $15 million sort of range.

We're not working on any major facility in New South Wales using the Delta Elcom business that looks like the size of contracts that you see in Victoria, and we've widely spoken about that because we do feel it needs to be a stepped approach. We'll continue to see growth in that, or we have an expectation to see growth in that business, but it is going to be off the back of maybe contracts that are material to what was Delta Elcom, but maybe not material to the group at this point in time.

James Filius

Understood. Thanks for that.

That makes sense. Thanks, guys.

Appreciate it. I'll jump back in the queue.

Matthew Jinks

Thanks, James.

Operator

Thanks, James. Next up we've got Warren Jeffries at Canaccord.

Warren, please go ahead.

Warren Jeffries

Thanks, Simon. Guys, just on that pipeline though, just how quick do you think it converts into contracted work on the data center side?

Matthew Jinks

Thanks, Warren. There's a lot of variables that are outside of our control when it comes to timing of conversions.

All of these projects are at different stages in terms of their lifecycle. We announced four weeks or so ago around the $28 million early works package for the next campus for a particular customer.

Obviously you would think is going to happen a bit quicker than others where they aren't turning dirt and digging holes at this point in time. I think when you look at the whole sort of $1.5 billion of pipeline, it's probably a different answer for each customer and each campus when you sort of get in behind the detail.

Then it's subject to those sorts of variables that might change a contract award. We would like to think that probably over the next sort of 6 to 12 months, we would have an answer on that pipeline, and then you're sort of looking at a 2.5 to 3-year kind of buildout with some of the size of the facilities, just to sort of talk quite high level, if that answers your question.

Warren Jeffries

Yep, understand. Just, potentially, in other geography, such as South Australia or WA, I guess given the amount of work going on there or potentially going on there down the track, your existing relationships here in your footprint there, given there is this established footprint for you guys over there?

Matthew Jinks

South Australia, for a long time, probably until the Delta acquisition, has been our second largest branch, and so we sort of hover between 80 to 100 resources in South Australia. We've coming towards the end of a data center in Darwin, which has sort of been facilitated between Melbourne with its skill set and the local workforce in Darwin.

We could probably do something similar in South Australia should the right opportunity arise. Western Australia, we've been in Western Australia for over 10 years.

It's a relatively small workforce. In the last couple of months, we have introduced a new general manager to that business to focus a little bit more on the Perth region, as opposed to some of the mining work that we've traditionally done over in Western Australia.

We do have expectation and ambition to organically grow what we're doing in Perth, particularly. As opportunities arise, then we'll assess those opportunities.

Certainly at this point in time, the big sort of major projects, we're seeing the most activity in Victoria, which suits us because Victoria, as is hometown.

Warren Jeffries

Yep. I guess Northern Territory will remain probably a small opportunity going forward?

Matthew Jinks

Look, the data center that we're doing up there, it's a sizable project for what is Darwin. It's not as big as what you see in Victoria and New South Wales, obviously, but it's definitely a big project for what is Darwin.

Darwin doesn't see the amount of skilled resources that you see in Melbourne and in Sydney, obviously. Much larger projects up there come with larger challenges in terms of logistics and getting the right people with the right skill set to do different facets of the projects.

I think if there's any sort of larger sort of opportunity happening up in Darwin, we'd need to be measured in how we go about potentially facilitating that because it does need interstate support.

Warren Jeffries

Cool, mate. No worries, guys.

Thanks for that.

Operator

Yep. Thanks, Warren.

Before we go to another analyst, we'll just ask a question. There is talk in the US of data center overbuild and overcapacity.

Is there a danger of this occurring in Australia in the next couple of years, and are we prepared if there was a slowdown in data center work? Look,

Matthew Jinks

from what we see, I would answer that as no. By the time a data center operator is building a facility, it's generally because they've already signed contracts for the tenancy.

Certainly the customers that we're working with, and, look, there's a lot of people out there wanting to build data centers. There's your traditional data center operators and your hyperscalers that have been doing it for quite a number of years, but now you're starting to see property developers, you're starting to see companies that you haven't heard of just pop up and wanting to build a data center.

Maybe those companies are looking to build data centers and with the philosophy of build it and they'll come. I'm not sure.

Our efforts are not focused there. Our efforts are focused on the customers that we've traditionally worked with.

Those customers traditionally sign contracts before they actually go and pull the trigger and build. With what's in our pipeline, you can comfortably see 3 to 5 years in terms of contracts that they've already signed, facilities and campuses that they have in planning to build.

If we're on a project designing a project and it's got 2.5, 3 years to run, it's because someone's already taken the tenancy. I wouldn't put that in the class of overbuild at this point in time.

Operator

Thanks, Matthew. Let's get a question from Nick Maxwell at Pac Partners.

Nick, please go ahead.

Nick Maxwell

Thanks, guys. Thanks for taking the question.

Done again on the result. Just first question, I guess extension of that last one, just around, I guess, council pushback and anything on that side of things.

Are you seeing anything there?

Matthew Jinks

No, Nick, no. I suppose by the time projects come to us, that's already been handled.

By the time a data center operator has come to us and looking for us to get involved in a project from a design element, they've already got their HV connections, they've already got their planning and approval permits, and it's really this project is now a live project. The early works order that we announced sort of four weeks or so ago, they'd already done the demolition, they were already turning dirt, and the project is well underway.

Whilst there is a lot of publicity around sort of community backlash, around power, water, what data centers need to do in terms of requirements around where they're getting their energy from and renewables, that conversation is really happening well before it gets to us. Certainly from our point of view, we haven't had a data center operator come to us saying we're not doing this project anymore because the council hasn't given us approval.

We just haven't seen that.

Nick Maxwell

Perfect. Thanks, guys.

Just on the, I guess, acquisition strategy you sort of spoke to, would you be looking at targeting, I guess, more traditional work away from data centers, or is there any sort of strategy, or is it just if something looks good, you might have a look at it?

Matthew Jinks

Look, no, it's opportunistic. Again, we've sort of spoken to this before as well, whereby things come across our desk all the time.

Sometimes I had one yesterday, actually. It was in Southeast Queensland for a residential electrical contractor.

Obviously, got zero appetite to do that. Those sorts of things come across our desk all the time.

Sometimes it's a two-second email back. Sometimes we might fly somewhere and meet someone where we don't have an acquisition strategy.

We don't have a list of targets that we're pursuing. It's really more opportunistic, and if we feel that there's a particular region or a particular sector that we might want to accelerate our efforts, then we'll have a closer look at it, but we're not working on anything at the moment.

Gary Beaton

I'd just simply add to that is we certainly wouldn't look to overpay for any acquisition.

Nick Maxwell

Perfect. Thanks, guys.

Much appreciated.

Operator

With Q&A segment closed, I might just turn it back to you Matthew for closing remarks.

Matthew Jinks

Great. All right, no more questions.

Thank you, everyone. Really appreciate your time for jumping on this morning and joining Gary and I to run through our FY26 results.

We are very pleased with our FY26 performance, and probably more importantly, we're really comfortable about where the business finds itself, the work in hand that we have running into FY27, and the opportunities that continue to be presented to us. We're certainly very buoyant about the future and looking forward to everyone being on the journey with us.

Thank you for taking the time.

Operator

Thank you.