A warm welcome to this call focusing on SKF's performance in Q4 2025. We are ending the year with improved adjusted operating margins, both at the group level and in our large industrial business area.

This was mainly driven by strong cost management, but also solid commercial execution. I'm Sophie Arnius, heading up Investor Relations.

With me, I have our CEO, Rickard Gustafson, and our CFO, Susanne Larsson. After their presentations, there will be opportunities for you to ask questions.

There are two ways to do that. If you are joining via the telephone, you can at any time press * and 1 to ask a question.

If you're instead watching via the webcast, you can already now type in your questions, and you do that in the tab just above the slides. Without further ado, it's a great pleasure to hand over to you, Rickard.

Thank you very much, Sophie, and thank you for joining us for this earnings call. I am pleased to once again report an improved adjusted operating margin year-over-year despite very challenging market conditions and headwind from currency.

As you can see from the chart on the right-hand side, in the quarter, we do report flat organic growth, which is in line with our guidance. It's important to stress that this does not imply, if we compare to Q3, that we have deteriorated market activities in Q4 versus Q3, but rather a consequence of tougher comparisons.

We do report organic growth in our industrial business, while we still see some softer demand in our automotive that are still in a declining organic growth territory. The automotive separation, of course, continues at high pace and strong momentum.

I am very pleased to say that we have identified an opportunity to further accelerate the phase-out of the automotive contract manufacturing that will benefit both businesses. It will require some additional transfers of assets, which means that we now plan to list our automotive business during Q4 2026.

Clearly, I will come back to more details around this later in my presentation. I will also take this opportunity at this call to reiterate some of the key messages from our Capital Markets Day in November, really outlining the foundation for how we see long-term value creation in both our future businesses.

With that, then, if we move in and start by taking a look at the full year 2025. Net sales came in just south of 2 92 billion Swedish kronor, representing a flattish organic growth, or to be specific, -0.4%, where industrial grew some 1%, and automotive negative organic growth at around 4%.

The adjusted operating margin actually improved to 12.7% in the year despite very challenging market conditions, geopolitical tensions, and significant headwind from currencies. The net cash flow from operations ended at north of 8 8 billion, at 8.4 billion, which is somewhat lower, 2.5 billion lower than the year before.

The reason for this is spelled items affecting comparability, which amounted to almost 3 billion in the full year. The main drivers there was our rightsizing initiative that we initiated in 2025, our ongoing footprint optimization activities, and, of course, our efforts to separate our automotive business.

When it comes to dividend, the board will propose to the shareholders at the AGM a maintained dividend at 7.75 Swedish kronor per share, which actually is reflecting our strong financial performance. They will also recommend that this year it will be paid out in two tranches, one in April and one in October.

If we then turn to the fourth quarter and take a brief look at that. We have net sales at 22 billion, which is a flat year-over-year organic growth in line with our guidance.

We do have organic growth in our industrial business, as I will talk more shortly, while we have still a slow demand environment in automotive. The adjusted operating margin moved up to 11.8%, and the main drivers for this improvement comes from good price/mix activities to compensate for tariffs.

The rightsizing program contributes with almost 200 million in the quarter. We have finalized our World Class Manufacturing program that is also contributing in the quarter, and we also have had generally very efficient cost management, not the least within automotive, and also when it comes to material costs.

Net cash flow in the quarter, 2.7 billion. This is some half a billion roughly less than what we reported the same quarter last year, and again, items affecting comparability is part of this.

The main cash drains, though, has been the auto separation that is ongoing, cost related to our rightsizing is coming in here, and then we have also in the quarter closed our manufacturing operations in Argentina, but you're going to hear from Susanne and give you some more color to this as well shortly. If we then move on to our sales by region.

Let's start from the top with our largest region, EMEA, where you can see we have flattish organic growth, but if we then break it up by the different segments, we see positive organic growth in our industrial business, primarily driven by aerospace, magnetics, and also off-highway. In general, I would say that for industrial in Europe, we see that the market has bottomed out, but we don't really see any significant signs of a significant bounce-back or uptick in the market, but a sound and solid bottoming out is clearly there.

When it comes to automotive, it's more challenging, still rather soft market environment, and as reflected in low demand for light vehicles and also commercial vehicles in Europe, while the aftermarket business is holding up a bit better. Turning to Americas, also flattish growth in general.

Here as well, we have positive organic growth in our industrial business, to large extent driven by tariff-related price increases to compensate for tariffs, but if we break out some industrial verticals that actually seems good development is aerospace. It's also high-speed machinery and automation.

When it comes to automotive, it's also a challenging market with soft demand, and particularly in commercial vehicles for us in this region. China & Northeast Asia, single-digit organic growth on the holistic view.

Again, here we have organic growth in our industrial business, and that was primarily driven by distribution, which actually had a good ending of the year. We also saw that the wind-related pre-buys, they did end in Q3 as we expected.

We actually have negative organic growth in automotive, but that is driven by a tough comparison, especially for light vehicles in the quarter. If we break that apart a bit, I'm pleased to say that our EV business continues to grow at high pace in the region, as well as solid development in commercial vehicles.

Finally, India & Southeast Asia, flattish on the total level. On the industrial side, it's also actually flattish growth.

Here we are facing tough comparisons, which is the main driver. In general terms, we see good demand development in India, and industrial verticals such as heavy industries, agriculture, and automation contributes to growth.

We are flattish in automotive in the region, where we see good development in commercial vehicles, while actually it's been a bit soft in the aftermarket business in this particular region. If we then turn to our segments and start with industrial business, as you can see on the top hand this chart, represents some 73% of our net sales in the quarter and 96% of the adjusted operating profit in the quarter.

As I said, we are reporting organic growth here, just north of 2%, driven by Europe or EMEA, Americas, and China & Northeast Asia. The adjusted operating margin is strong, 15.6%, up versus 14.6% the year before, driven by the price/mix activities that I mentioned to compensate for tariffs.

The rightsizing benefits of almost 200 million contributes here, because it targeted towards our industrial segment, as you know. We also have the World Class Manufacturing program that is helping and contributing in the quarter, and all of this enabled us to actually offset a rather significant currency headwind that is eating some 1 percentage point into our earnings in the quarter.

Then on automotive, representing 27% of net sales and 4% of the adjusted operating profit in the quarter. As I mentioned, more soft demand development, negative organic growth of close to 6%.

Here, the main drivers what we find in EMEA and Americas, but as I mentioned, also in China, but it's more kind of a comparison to last year on the light vehicle side. Again, EVs are continued to perform well for us in China.

The adjusted operating margin is weak, only 1.7% in the quarter, despite very strong development in cost takeout when it comes to material cost, but it struggles to fully compensate for a rather significant currency headwind, as you can see here, of almost 3 percentage points in the quarter. I think it's important also to zoom out a bit and reflect on the auto business for the full year.

For the full year, the adjusted operating margin is relatively unchanged, just north of 4%, despite this turmoil, low demand environment, and significant currency headwind. It's also comforting to mention that throughout 2025, we have won a number of strategically and margin-accretive contracts that builds a strong foundation for our automotive business as we move into the future.

Some of those contracts are also related to the aftermarket business, which means that they will also start to contribute already in 2026. If we then leave the numbers and start to zoom in on some of the strategic initiatives, I want to focus today on the automotive separation, where the program as such continues at high pace with a very, very good momentum, and we're delivering according to our plans.

We have recently identified an exciting opportunity to actually faster reduce contract manufacturing between the entities, by moving or releasing some additional assets to automotive. This will be beneficial both for our future industrial business and our automotive business.

It will drive further competitiveness. What are those benefits, then?

As I mentioned, it's clearly we can reduce the contract manufacturing faster, but it's also, for industrial, we can get improved capacity utilization. For automotive, they will have a better control of a larger part of their value chain that will drive competitiveness for them.

Longer term, this will also further reduce the capex need in our automotive business. These additional transfers will take us some additional effort, and that means that we now plan to list our automotive business during Q4 2026.

It's also important to stress that this additional asset transfer will be managed within the already announced cost and capital expenditure for the automotive separation as we presented it at the Capital Markets Day in November. The contract manufacturing will, at point of separation, be roughly the same as we mentioned also in November, however, though, with a much steeper decline trajectory thereafter.

We're excited about this, and this will create an even stronger starting point for both businesses. Finally, before I hand over to Susanne, just to reiterate some of the key messages from our Capital Markets Day: how do we build and laying the foundation for long-term value creation.

As we have said since we embarked on this journey, there are very different dynamics between industrial and automotive. We laid out the plan for the value creation of industrial that rests on three pillars and seven levers, where the three pillars were reignite growth, innovation leadership, and business-driven value chains.

For automotive, their value creation plan rests on two pillars and five strategic levers, where the pillars are accelerate growth, and then build lean and fit-for-purpose organizational and supply chain structures. For industrial, we also named the long-term targets that you can see here on this chart, while we were a bit more vague on the automotive side, and the automotive team will come back during 2026, closer to the listing, with their own Capital Markets Day, and again, then, be more specific on their long-term targets.

More to come here during 2026. For those of you that may have missed the information at the Capital Markets Day or are curious to learn more, please visit skf.com, where you find all the information.

With that, it's time to hand over to Susanne to take you through the more details in the numbers. Susanne.

Thank you, Rickard, and good morning, everyone. I'm really pleased to be here with Rickard today and announce our quarter four results.

The financial summary. As you have heard, net sales was down 11%.

While we finished the year with a flat organic growth, there was a significant and continued FX headwind. The gross margin was 25.7%, which is then slightly below last year, but if you then adjust for the one-off costs, the gross margin was instead 28.7% and slightly better than last year.

The adjusted operating margin ended at 11.8%, again, a proof of our improved margin resilience. I will further comment on that on the following page.

The one-off costs in the quarter added up to approximately 1 billion, where half was related to the ongoing automotive separation and the other half was related to our footprint optimization, where the closure of our Argentinian manufacturing operation in October was the main one. Let me try to explain the result in quarter four year-over-year, elaborating on the organic, cost, currency, and structural explanations.

Starting off from left to right. Although we had the flat organic growth, we had a positive result impact of 113 million Swedish kronor and improved our margin with half a percentage point.

This positive margin effect was mainly generated by the positive price/mix actions within industrial business, compensating for an overall weaker automotive. Our cost management generated a strong contribution to the profit and a 1.7 percentage point improvement to the margin.

There are some main drivers of that. The first one to talk about is the rightsizing activities that are now starting to give a positive contribution year-over-year of some 190 million.

This impact falls positively through our results as the dis-synergies of automotive separation will come as from the start of next year, where automotive will be operating more independent within the SKF Group. The main dis-synergies will be derived from IT and their management structures and consequently offset the impact of the rightsized activities.

By that, I still reconfirm the positive impact of the rightsizing activities of some 2 billion and a relatively linear effect until the end of 2027. Moving on, we also have a positive impact of the World Class Manufacturing savings that now have come to an end and we have finalized the program.

We have continued positive material cost effects, and this comes mainly from automotive, but also from our product mix. As you heard Rickard say, when it comes to tariff, we continue to largely compensate for those also in this quarter, and we do expect that this is the case also moving into quarter one, given what we know today.

Currency effects continue to be significantly negative and reduced our reported sales by 10.6% and impacted our operating margin by 1.4 percentage point of negative effects. The main currencies are the same: they are dollars, CNY, and Turkish lira.

Structure is minor and refer to last year's acquisition of John Sample Group, net of the divestment of Aerospace Hanover that we completed in the spring. Moving on to cash flow.

In quarter four, we delivered a solid cash flow, where one-off charges impacted cash flow by 1 billion Swedish kronor. In this picture, the starting point is the operating profit for the quarter, and that ended at 1 1 1.6 billion Swedish kronor, which is some 0.8 billion lower than last year, and this is mainly explained by the higher amounts of one-off costs and the negative currency effects.

The non-cash items is higher than last year as a consequence of reducing the provisions related to the rightsizing program from now payouts. Taxes paid in the quarter was 685 million, higher than last year, while in line with the full-year last year if we look at the full-year values.

Changes in working capital was good, and we ended at a positive 1.4 billion, which is some 300 million better than last year, and explained by less build-up of AR and more AP at year-end than last year, but also with a minor improvement in inventory. This led us to a quarter four cash flow from operation of 2.8 billion.

From that, we deduct 1 billion of capex and ended with a cash flow after investment of 1.8 billion. For the full year, the operating cash flow amounted to 8.4 billion compared to 10.8 last year.

In 2025, we then have a cash outflow from IACs amounting to 3 billion. Balance sheet and return on capital employed.

Our net debt excluding pension declined from 7 and 1/2 billion Swedish kronor in the end of quarter three to 5.7 this quarter end and the full-year end. This is due to positive cash flow, but also a stronger Swedish krona.

Net debt in relation to equity excluding pension reduced from 13 to 10%. Net debt in relation to EBITDA excluding pension reduced further to half 0.5.

Including pension, we ended at 1. The adjusted return on capital employed remained stable at 14.3%.

As Rickard said, SKF ended the year with a good cash flow, with a strong liquidity, and a low net leverage. Hence, the board has decided to propose to the AGM a dividend of 7.75 per share to be paid in two installments, one in April and the other in October.

This corresponds to 45% of the adjusted net profit. Now I come to my last slide related to the outlook.

We expect the market demand in quarter one to remain at the similar level of quarter four. Consequently, we expect an organic sales to strengthen somewhat in quarter one year-over-year, supported by also more favorable comparisons.

The guidance for quarter one with respect to FX, we anticipate a further negative impact of earnings sequentially in quarter one. This is driven by a continued weakness of dollar against Swedish krona alongside with mainly Turkish lira.

We now estimate the impact to be -800 million year-over-year for quarter one, given the rates we had by the end of the year, last year. When it comes to guidance for the year, the tax rate is expected to be 28%, and there we exclude both automotive separation implication as well as divestments.

Capex we estimate to end next year at some 5 billion, where the industrial part is in line with what we communicated at the Capital Markets Day of 5% in relation to sales, while we for automotive have some further separation-related investments that are also included. We have also decided to guide for one-off items related to the automotive separation and footprint optimization, as we also communicated those at the Capital Markets Day.

We anticipate these to be in the range of -2 and 1/2 to 3 billion for this year. This is fully in line with the 6 and 1/2 billion guidance for the period of quarter four 2025 up until 2028.

Finally, then, the guidance for the full year and IACs does not include capital gains from the divestment of Elgin. That we expect to soon close.

By that, over to you again, Rickard.

Thank you, Susanne. Before we move into the Q&A session, let me just take a few minutes to summarize the quarter and the full year.

We have navigated throughout 2025 and also, of course, in the fourth quarter in a rather challenging waters in terms of geopolitical uncertainty, a lot of volatility, and a lot of tension in the world. Unfortunately, I do not think that 2025 will be in the history books a unique year, but rather a new norm, we need to continue to navigate in a volatile environment.

Therefore, I'm very pleased that we can report an improved adjusted operating margin improvement, both in the fourth quarter and for the full year, demonstrating the margin resilience that we have thrived so hard in the last few years. Strategically, we are excited about the future.

There will be a lot of activities in 2026 to finalize the separation that is planned now, as you heard, for Q4 2026. That we have found a way to strengthen the starting point even further for both the industrial and automotive business, that we are very excited about.

Then, we will not just focus on the separation in 2026. We will also, and the organization is fully charged, to work on delivering on those strategic pillars that I mentioned that would be the foundation to unlock the full potential of both our industrial and automotive business.

These two things will be the main focus in 2026: to finalize the separation and gear up for profitable growth in both our businesses. With that, I thank you so far for your attention and turn you over to the Q&A session.

Yes, thank you. We will now open up for questions, and there are two ways to do that.

Let me just remind you, if you're listening in via the telephone line, you can ask a question by pressing * and 1, and if you wish to withdraw, you instead press * and 2. Also for our webcast audience, you can post your questions, and you do that in the tab above the slides.

We will start with a question here from the telephone line. Before we do that, I can see that there are quite many of you that want to ask questions, please, if you can ask one question, and then if there are time, you can happily join the Q&A queue again.

We will start with a question from Klas Bergelind at Citi. Klas, please go ahead.

Thank you, Sophie. Hi, Rickard and Susanne.

Klas at Citi. I just want to zoom in a bit on the dis-synergies versus the rightsizing here into the first quarter.

First on the savings, you did 190 million already in the fourth quarter, and, Susanne, you're still saying the savings will be linear and that we will reach the 2 billion run rate end of '27. If it's linear, I get this to a 2 billion level earlier than end of '27.

Or do you expect the pace to slow here into the first quarter, i.e., did we have an abnormally high savings quarter? Then, obviously, the other side of it is the cost side.

Out of the around 1.5 billion of total dis-synergies that we can read from your Capital Markets Day slides, how much of those dis-synergies do you expect here in the first quarter? That was, I realize now, a very long way of asking what is the likely net effect that we should look at here from dis-synergies to savings into the first quarter?

Thank you.

Susanne, do you want to shed some light?

Yes, I will do my best. Good morning, Klas.

You're right. Starting off with the savings, then.

We have had a good pace in settling with employees, as we have said, and we have come to more than 80% of agreements before the end of the year. We had slightly more positive impacts in this quarter falling through our P&L, while we from now onwards anticipate it to be a linear path up until the 2 billion by the end of 2027.

That's the benefit part of it, then. When it comes to the cost and the dis-synergies, then, so as from 2026, by design, you could say, we will operate automotive as an independent organization within SKF, allowing them to have a fully dedicate management that is now being onboarded, and also having own IT structures, etc.

That will start to come in play already from next quarter, and we believe that the positive implications will be offset by these negative dis-synergies that we will take on. That's what we will say about that.

Just to clarify, Susanne, you say from the second quarter, this will gradually turn and then No, sorry.

Did I say that?

No, next quarter.

From the next quarter, I meant. Sorry.

Next quarter is actually Q1, you should take it from Q1. Sorry.

Next quarter is quarter one. Sorry for confusing.

No. First quarter.

Okay. The dis-synergies in the first quarter will still be greater than the savings from the rightsizing, because that is, I think, what you write in the report, right, in the first quarter?

Yes, that's correct. It will be somewhat larger, and, of course, then the pace of the rightsizing savings will, of course, increase in the coming quarters, Q2 and onwards.

Can I squeeze in just a very, very quick final question on the outlook, just very quickly? When you say somewhat higher sales growth, is it 1, 2, 3?

Because consensus is around 3%. The reason why I ask that is if you look at automotive, it's down 5.8% year-over-year, but if you look at light vehicle production forecast into the first quarter, it can get much worse than that.

It would imply, to reach expectations, that industrial is to grow mid to high single, and that looks quite high. I'm just curious, Rickard, sort of between industrial and automotive, how we should think about the growth within the guide?

Thank you.

Right. Somewhat, we will not quantify what that means in numbers, but you should think about it that, as we said, that the activity levels will remain roughly the same as we have had in Q4.

That will mean that, from a comparison point of view, Q1 over Q1, we will report a somewhat organic growth in Q1. As we had in Q4, you're right, we have seen an organic growth in our industrial business, while automotive has still been in a softer market environment.

That's what we imply also when we say that the market activities will roughly remain the same.

Thank you.

Thank you, Klas.

We will now move on to the next question, and that comes from Daniela Costa at Goldman Sachs. Daniela, please go ahead.

Hi. Good morning.

Thank you for taking my question. I wanted to ask on two upcoming regulations, I guess, that are coming, and how do you see them impacting the business, and how you deal with that?

First, I guess, sort of the steel import quotas into Europe. Maybe if you can give us a little bit of an idea how you source into Europe and if that means something or nothing for you.

Then CBAM, and how you would reflect that going forward?

Rickard, it's a question for you here.

Right. When it comes to steel and Europe, we primarily source our steel that we consume in Europe within Europe, so that is not a major headache for us.

CBAM can have some implications, and there are lobbying still ongoing on how to fully implement this, because it may impact, I'm not speaking about SKF in specific, but European companies rather, that there might be some disadvantages versus other companies that originate in other parts of the world than Europe. I think we watch that one closely, and we are engaged with those channels that we can to find a good implementation of that legislation.

Thank you.

We move on to John Kim at Deutsche Bank. John, please go ahead.

Hi, good morning. Thanks for the opportunity.

I'm wondering if we could focus a bit on the separation timeline. You did cite the changing nature of the contract manufacturing relationship.

Can you confirm for us that the timeline's not being impacted by external parties, whether it be tax authorities, unions, regulatory bodies?

I can answer that one. Yes, I can confirm that.

Has nothing to do with that. The program as such is actually running extremely efficient, I dare to stick out my neck and say, where we're really holding the timetable that we set up from the beginning, with a lot of the heavy lifting in terms of IT cutovers and legal restructuring and all of that.

I'm rather impressed how well the organization has set up this challenge and the efficiency in how we drive this program. As market has evolved and so forth, we have identified this opportunity to actually faster reduce the contract manufacturing by reallocating some of the assets in a different way than what was written in the plan.

When we saw that and we saw the benefits and we realized that this will actually create an even stronger starting point for both businesses, we were very eager to go after that opportunity, and therefore, we feel confident with a planned listing timing now for Q4 2026. It's not driven by any conflicts internally, not at all.

Okay. Thanks for confirming.

Thank you.

We will continue with a question from Seb Kuenne at RBC. Seb, the line is open.

Thank you for taking my question. Again, on the separation.

You talk now about value creation for both businesses, but the way I understand it, you simply shift some production lines into automotive to deepen the value chain and to buff up the margin for automotive, but at the same time, you take business away from industrial. How does that create value for both businesses?

I still don't understand the logic behind it. To me, it's just helping automotive to float in the market, but at the detriment to industrial.

Where am I going wrong here? Thank you very much.

Rickard, could you please respond to this?

Sure. I think maybe where you might struggle a bit is that at the moment and given the low demand environment that we experienced for quite some time, we have said before that we are far from maximizing our utilization.

We have found a way to shuffle some of the assets around a bit and free up more capacity, we're not taking any business away from industrial, but we're avoiding to having a lot of undercapacity, unnecessary undercapacity. That's kind of the main benefit for the industrial side.

Also thereby reducing contract manufacturing will also be a positive contributor longer term also for industrial. There are a number of good things for industrial here as well.

We truly believe that this is a good thing. If I may, I don't want to criticize you in any shape or form, but just saying the word lightly, "just shuffling around some assets," it is a bit more complicated than that, I must say.

Tell you, though, about the reality that we face as well.

You can't create business out of thin air, the business is what the business is, demand is what demand is. By moving assets from right to left, how does that increase capacity utilization?

I can only explain it by you basically taking out some more capacity and so just make the business a bit more streamlined, right?

That is true that we do get a stronger starting point, better asset utilization, and also we are then believing that, longer term, we will continue to also increase growth and improve growth in industrial business, that will further utilize assets. As a starting point, you're right.

It's really to set the utilization at a better rate from starting point.

Understand. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you, Seb. We will continue with a question from Rory Smith at OxCap.

Rory, please go ahead.

Good morning. Thank you for taking my question.

It's Rory from OxCap. I was going to ask on the Q1 guidance, but I guess I'll stay on the topic of this contract manufacturing piece.

Maybe coming at it from a different angle here. If the separation is going to take a little bit longer and the jumping off point is the same at 5% of industrial sales, but the phasing down is going to be more aggressive, a, can you give any kind of indication or comments on how quickly you do expect that 5% to go to 0%?

Then, thinking that through, does that put some upside risk to the medium-term margin targets for industrial if we're going to get there quicker? That would be my question.

Thank you.

Right. I can't quantify any of this, but you're right, we do see, as I said, that this will be a steeper reduction of contract manufacturing than we planned originally.

You mentioned that we'll go to 0. I hope that we've been very clear.

The plan is not to take it to 0, but it's going to be a rather low final amount. There's a tail assortment that will make no sense to shift around, there will be some trading also longer term, but that will not have any material impact.

The vast majority will disappear. You're right, we did say at the Capital Markets Day that we needed at that time, we said for the next two to three years to finalize this, to reach our mid-term target.

That has not changed. We're now saying that there are two years left of that, and that's kind of where we're aiming to.

Exactly the difference and how much faster, we will not go into any details, but it will not have a negative risk in terms of delivering on our mid-term target. No.

Thank you.

Thank you, Rory. We will continue with a question from Alex Jones at Bank of America.

Alex, please go ahead.

Thanks, good morning. Maybe continuing on the auto spin, is there a critical mass of profitability in terms of margins or absolute profits that you think you need before the spin in order to ensure sufficient liquidity and size in the new company, and therefore, do the low margins this quarter influence in your mind the spin timeline going forward at all?

Thank you.

Right. Thank you.

Of course, we have very sound plans for our automotive business that will take it to a certain profitability level and cash generation level. We cannot really disclose any details of those, but as I said in my during my comments through my presentation part, in Q4, sorry, in for the full year, the margin is relatively unchanged, and that we have throughout the year won a number of strategically important contracts that are margin accretive.

The business that we want to win, we normally win. That indicates a strong respect and trust among our customers and that we have a very competitive offer, both technology-wise and price-wise.

That is building a strong foundation, we have very positive views on the long-term buildup of automotive. The Q4 in isolation, that we had a tough quarter also with a lot of impact from FX, as I mentioned, has not made any influence on our decision to plan for the spin in Q4 2026.

Thank you.

We will continue to Andre Kukhnin at UBS. Andre, your line is open.

Yes, good morning. Thank you very much for taking my question.

Can I just start with a clarification on the dis-synergies versus savings, and to make sure we kind of have the right math. If you said we're going to go from 750 run rate to 2 billion during 2026 and 2027, that's 1250 over two years, and hence, 625 per annum, round down to 600.

Are we right to think that during 2026, you're expecting dis-synergies to be around that 600, equivalent to the savings, but the run rate will be higher in Q1 and Q2, and then in Q3, Q4, you'd expect the savings to start exceeding the dis-synergies? Is that the right way to think about it?

Susanne, do you want to comment on this?

I'm sure we will be able to disclose this by quarter because I realize the importance of both the rightsizing and the dis-synergies, we are prepared to do that. As we said, and you're right, with a run rate of this year of 750, we will end 2027 with a run rate of the 2 billion we are committed to save.

We will now have relatively linear throughout these two years, and we are taking on dis-synergies that will more than offset already now in quarter one. I think that that means that we will have dis-synergies in line with the savings throughout this year until we spin the business.

Then we will have, of course, the leverage of the rightsizing program that will more than compensate for dis-synergies and contract manufacturing, as we stated at the Capital Markets Day.

Great, thank you. That's really helpful.

If I may, just a much broader question on pricing and your ability to price up and to pass through headwinds. In 2025, you clearly surprised positively on that.

Do you think from that experience, should we be more confident on your ability to do that in 2026 as well, or should we worry about kind of price exhaustion and customer tolerance to that that's starting to fade, and hence, it becomes a bigger challenge as I'm sure there will be other headwinds to pass through as we go through 2026?

Rickard, could you answer this one? I'd

be happy to. Given the tariffs that we know today, we are confident that we will be able to largely compensate for that also in 2026, where the net negative impact will be found in automotive, but we will largely compensate.

I do believe, if I leave tariffs aside for a second, I do believe that 2026 will not be a year of large general price increases. I don't think there is room for that in the market.

However, though, we will always do specific or targeted price increases where possible. Clearly, when we deliver new solutions or engage with new customers, we also focus on the value that we provide, rather than just the cost of manufacturing the bearing.

That will continue, clearly, throughout the year. If the tariff landscape will change materially during 2026, we will have to take that on and find a way to mitigate that as well.

It's hard to second guess, because there might be a limit at some point how much you're able to push through, but no one really knows what might come. I feel confident that we have demonstrated that when things happen, we are reacting fast.

Our organization takes the right measures, and we're able to compensate. We're going to do everything in our power to maintain that regardless what they throw at us.

Thank you. We will continue with a question from Andreas Koski at BNP Paribas.

Please go ahead, Andreas.

Thank you, and good morning. I also have a question on cost savings, but not related to the rightsizing program, rather to the World Class Manufacturing program that you've been running for, I think, five years now.

When it was launched, you said that you were going to save 5 billion SEK on COGS, which implies that that has generated cost savings of about a billion a year. I just want to check if that was sort of the savings number that you had in 2025, and if there will be any carryover effects in '26, or if the savings from the World Class Manufacturing will be 0 from now on and forward?

Thank you.

I confirm your assumption, we have finalized the program this autumn. We had the 5 billion ambition level that we delivered on, and we will expect continued benefits of that as we move along into also 2026.

Yes.

Yes, it will be a bridge effect, you can say, primarily first half of this year.

Understood. Thank you.

Good. Let's continue with a question from Rizk Maidi at Jefferies.

Please go ahead.

Yes, good morning. Thanks for the time.

It's just really clarification and maybe something that I misunderstood is so on the rightsizing savings, we're talking about roughly 600 million SEK to be achieved in 2026. I think at the Capital Markets Day, you talked about dis-synergies to be roughly around 1.5 billion.

My understanding this morning is you're trying to scale the dis-synergies closer to the savings number, but it's still a big number. It's 1.5 billion.

I think automotive needs to stand on its two feet by the end of this year, because that's when the listing is going to happen. It's just how about sort of bridge that gap between the 600 million and the 1.5 billion this year?

I think this is really what the market is struggling with this morning. Thank you.

When we have talked about the rightsizing program that we initiated last summer, we have said that we will have an annual benefit of that of 2 billion, and that will more than compensate for the dis-synergies and the contract manufacturing. That's what we said as a general remark, then.

When it comes to the savings, that will now be linear, as you imply, and if we talk about the dis-synergies, then, and that is, again, why we actually launched the rightsizing program is to rightsize the industrial organization, and that work is ongoing, but it's also to cover up for the independence of automotive that we are taking on now to be able to spin by the end of this year. We are now trying to say how that benefit is offsetting the dis-synergies, and how we will then, when we have left automotive, be in a better place still with the contract manufacturing from the takeoff.

Thank you very much. Then, just very quickly, does the capex plans for the industrial business now changing given the transfer of assets that you're going from industrial to autos?

Thanks.

No, it will not. We remain with a 5% of sales for industrial in spite of this scope change of the transfer.

Thank you.

Good. That is at point of departure, and then it will decline faster as we talked about here.

We have time for a final question, and that will come then from Daniela Costa at Goldman Sachs. Daniela, please go ahead.

Hi, thank you so much for taking the follow-up. Wanted to follow up on the points on tariffs.

You've been very clear you're going to compensate that, I guess, from a margin perspective and passing that through. Have you observed sort of any trends in terms of market share, or everyone is doing the same price increase pretty much in the market?

Just wondering when you talk about compensating fully if you are willing to give up on market share as part of that or the industry is just all increasing by the same?

Thank you. I would say that so far, it seems like the industry has gone down the same path.

It's a bit too early to tell, but we have no indication that we have lost market share in the general terms, but rather, as you say, that our competitors, they also safeguard their earnings and reacting and trying to compensate themselves for these tariffs. Maybe a bit premature to be too specific, but we have no indication that we're losing market share.

No.

Got it. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. That was our final question.

Before we end, Rickard, do you want to give some concluding remarks here?

I'd be happy to. Thank you for joining us this morning.

I am pleased that we are able to navigate in rather challenging environment and maintaining a resilience and even improved adjusted operating margin. That demonstrates a shift in behavior and capabilities in SKF over the years.

That to me, it's also a proof point that our strategy that we launched a few years back is delivering in line with what we anticipated. We are eager to gear up for growth, clearly.

We have been in a long period in a negative market or negative demand environment. We foresee that, as we said, that Q1 will be roughly in line with Q4, but we are preparing for an uptick.

Given what we have done in the past, I'm again very convinced that we will have a very strong starting point and some good leverage once the market turn back up again. We are committed and confident about our plans for automotive, very exciting about this small shift in the asset reallocation that will create an even better starting point.

As I mentioned, the organization is now really gearing up to deliver on those strategic pillars that would unlock the full potential of our business. We're excited about the future, more to come, and I thank you so much for your attention today and wish you a lovely weekend once you get to that.

Thank you.