Erik Petersen
Hello, everyone, and welcome to NYAB result presentation for the fourth quarter and full year of 2025. Today, NYAB has released its year-end report, and with us today in this call, we have CEO Johan Larsson and the Group CFO Klas Rewelj.
My name is Erik Petersen, and I'm the VP of Corporate Affairs and Head of Investor Relations at NYAB. Participants who wish to ask questions after the presentation are welcome to join the teleconference via the link you find in the invitation to this call.
There you will also get the dial-in details. You may also submit your questions in the chat, and you find the chat box under the presentation windows on your screen.
If we have time after the teleconference, we will go through some of the questions. Now to get started, I hand over to Johan, who will go through the results.
Johan Larsson
Thank you, Erik, and welcome, everyone. Have to state that we have had a solid finish to 2025.
Strong full-year execution. We built scale.
We expanded our operation and our offering and established a Nordic platform. Our growth is driven by a well-balanced project portfolio and increased delivery capacity, healthy profitability and strong cash generation.
Our markets, the markets we address are very fine. During 2025, we have spent a lot of time to increase our volumes and our future volumes in niches such as water work, rail, and more.
Our order intake developed well, high-quality order backlog with good visibility and a balanced risk profile. We enter 2026 with a larger and more diversified business, and through a very strong cash flow during 2025, which adds to our strong financial position further.
Revenue growth: for the full year, we have a revenue growth of 58%, which of 27% were organic. Note very well that our organic growth engine, where we have our best margin, Sweden, has even higher growth than this showed organic growth.
In the quarter, we increase by 32%. Our operating profit: steadily increasing, been a fact for, I would say, close to 12 years.
In the quarter, we have 8.2% EBIT margin. Our EBIT as a whole grows with 3% towards a very tough comparison period, since we had some project bonuses and other things in Q4 2024.
Happy that we managed to grow our EBIT as a whole, and if we exclude the consulting Dovre dilution, we are, of course, at even higher levels, not far from the EBIT margin the previous year. For the full year, we end up with a EBIT margin of 5.6%.
Our order intake: positive as always, should be, when we are a growing company. We grow in a steady pace year by year.
Note that 2025, we had a very high growth, a bit too high to margin-optimize, but still not risking our margins, and still showing healthy margins. You can see that in our positive order intake, that the trend continues.
Even my kids expect us to grow during 2026 further. Our order backlog: well-balanced, and it supports our continued growth.
It grows with 18% year-over-year. Here you can note that we have a couple of Phase 2 projects that, of course, are not booked, but for Svenska kraftnät, we have a Phase 2 of 1.5 billion that we hope to be appointed and sign during May, June.
In our joint venture, we have the Uppsala tramway of approximately 5 billion SEK. There's a lot more in the order book than that, and as we've shown recently, that we have been assigned by Trafikverket for two road maintenance contracts, those volumes are both higher than we announce, and it gives a great platform for the coming years.
The development is good, and we as always do our best to have a diversified and correct backlog. What market should know is that contracts that we have announced that have quite high margins and are more niched, such as rail contracts, the production of those will start May, June this year.
We have won contracts of quite significant size from end of 2025 and early in 2026. When it comes to water works, we grow our acquisition of [Dyk och Anläggning?]
quite heavily, that's also a niched market where we expect a lot of growth, and when it comes to power headlines, same thing. The percentage of the total order book that are of niched character and has structural higher margins is a fact, and I hope that that will be clearly visible from May, June 2026.
Selection of new contracts: I direct and indirect already mentioned a few of these. We have Svenska kraftnät, transmission lines for Letsi-Svartbyn.
Svenska kraftnät is a very good client for us. We have good cooperation and work very well with them.
We are now executing in Phase 1, meaning pretty much planning and projecting. We won to the Swedish Transport Administration a new railway contract of 380 million SEK, €36 million.
Looking very much forward to execute on that contract during the summer. It will be completed already in September 2026.
As you see, it's a very high work rate on those kind of contracts. High volumes in short time.
With Swedish Transport Administration, we signed another railway contract of 22 million. It's an upgrade of Silverhöjden rail line in Bergslagen.
Trafikverket is a quite big client of ours. I think that during 2025, out of our Swedish business, we had 42% of our total revenue towards Trafikverket.
Here we go, our long-term financial targets. We have a target, important for us that we communicate very clearly and follow up.
We have a long-term goal of a revenue growth exceeding 10%. Outcome 2025 is 58%.
Must say that I'm happy with that. If you could choose and pinpoint exactly, I would prefer to be on 50% on a year like this with acquisition we have had.
Long-term, I know it's good and great and I know what we're building. It's a better and stronger company, and 2026 looks very favorable.
Our profitability: we have a target of exceeding 7.5% EBIT. We reached 5.6%.
As we stated quite early this year or last year, we won't reach our target for 2025 due to our acquisition of Dovre. We have a consulting business that dilutes our margin very noticeable.
If you exclude our consulting business and only look at our civil work business, we are just about 7%. We are in the right region, and on a year where we scale things up, where we go for new niched markets, I would say that I'm quite pleased with our EBIT margin anyhow.
We will do our very best to move towards our long-term goal during 2026. Capital structure: less than 1.5 net debt in relation to EBITDA.
We have a negative net debt, demonstrates the strong cash flow from our business. If you all bear in mind, we purchased quite a big company for quite a hefty sum 1 year ago, and we are already back on track and have a negative net debt.
We have asset-light business model and we do a lot of things right. We have a very strong cash flow, have always had and hopefully will always have.
We have a goal of a dividend exceeding 35%, and as the board recommended, the outcome for 2025 and what's proposed is a dividend of 47%, just shy of €10 million. Over to you, Klas.
Klas Rewelj
Thank you, Johan. We reiterate some of the facts on financial and our business segments.
We start with the revenue for the group. As you heard, the fourth-quarter revenue was €154 million, and that represents a growth of 32% in relation to the previous year.
The organic growth component was 10%, and the acquisitive component linked to Dovre 22% for the fourth quarter. Our full-year revenue landed on 547, as we said, million euro, and that represents a growth of a full 58% from the comparison period.
The organic component of that was 27% for 2025, and the acquisitive driver 31%. Additionally, our 2025 revenue was divided in the following way.
Including the acquisition of Dovre, we got a split with civil engineering representing 79% and consulting 21%. Between the market segments, energy was the largest 2025 with 54%, followed by infrastructure 35, and industry 11.
Sweden was the largest geography for us with 67%, followed by Norway and Finland. Private sector represented 65% of the group revenue and the public sector 35%.
In summary, 2025 was not only a year of expansion and development as Johan informed. We could definitely say we also materialized substantial revenue growth from the activities.
Moving to profitability for the group. The fourth-quarter operating profit was €12.7 million.
That is a small increase over the 2024 very high result, and the quarterly operating margin was 8.2%. Our full-year operating profit landed on €30.6 million, which was an increase with 21% over previous year.
Net of the IFRS items, the Dovre business contributed to quarterly operating profit increase with €0.6 million, and the full-year equivalent was €1.2 million for 2025, and that includes the quarter one transaction costs 1.4. As expected, consolidating the acquired Dovre business diluted the group operating margin.
Combined with investments in capacity build-up that we've reported on previously, this gave a full-year operating margin of 5.6%, and that is still below our financial target. Earnings per share for the full year increased with 27% to 3 euro cents per share.
Yeah. A particularly strong point, I think worth stressing, continues to be our financial position.
The free cash flow for the fourth quarter was €18.6 million. The continued high operational cash conversion results in a cash position much higher than the interest-bearing liabilities.
Thus, we ended the year with negative net debt reinstated. A highlight in 2025 performance was a cash conversion towards EBITDA, adjusted for the Dovre acquisition payment, of a full 110%, and that should say be underpinning the financial health of the business in total.
Return on capital employed was 14%, and the equity ratio at the end of the year 68. We now take a look at our business segment, and we start with civil engineering.
The financials: the civil engineering quarterly revenue increased with 10% to €127 million. The segment's operating margin was 9.9% for the fourth quarter.
For the full year, revenue increased with 27% to €435 million, and the operating profit increased with 17% with an operating margin of 7. In 2025, both Swedish and Finnish operations increased their operating profit.
The growth driver for this segment was the Swedish projects where the activity was high, and we have expanded on the scope and volume, and worthwhile mentioning, with healthy project margins retained during the year. The Swedish operations have invested in capacity build-up, and the cost have partly offset profit increase and margin.
A new country manager, Sweden, is joining in the first quarter this year. In Finland, we saw increased margins, whereas the revenue declined.
After the reporting period, we have expanded the operations in the Helsinki area, and the focus will be building an increased order backlog with profitable projects under the new Country Manager, Petri Kotkansalo. For civil engineering, the market activity remained high, and new material projects wins were secured in the fourth quarter, as we've said.
Quarterly order intake was €102 million, which is up 77% year-on-year. The full-year order intake was an increase of 32% and represents a book-to-bill ratio of 1 to 1 for 2025.
Total order backlog showed increase of 18% over comparison period and includes a well-balanced project portfolio and healthy margins. The strong backlog, combined with multiple large-scale opportunities in the pipeline, sees the civil engineering business preparing for new milestone steps towards further profitable growth.
Next, the consulting segment with Dovre and Sittema. Just as for previous quarter, the Norwegian offshore activity showed ease, and several large client projects where we are affected reached completion.
The Nordic market for renewable energy remained quite soft, while the public sector activity remained stable. The segment order intake increased over previous quarters, and full year represented a book-to-bill ratio of 0.8.
The consulting fourth-quarter revenue was €27.7 million, with an operating margin of 2.6. After the first year with Dovre, the 2025 full-year revenue was €114 million, and the operating margin 3.2% for the segment.
After the reporting period, we have announced the divestment of the Dovre North American operations, this to focus on our core markets and improve segment margin profile. Under a new leadership and with developed offering, the segment will execute initiatives to realize synergies, profitable growth, and increased margin.
That was all from me on the financials and the segments, Johan, over to you to summarize.
Johan Larsson
Thank you, Klas. Yeah.
Pretty much goes by itself, but anyhow, solid end to the year. I'm quite pleased with our full-year performance.
I'm never really pleased or fully pleased, but it's a good year. Important steps has been taken, and we move in the right direction on pretty much all relevant areas.
Our full-year revenue increased 58%, quite heavily. Our operating profit increased with 21%, and our margins remained healthy.
Order intake developed well, and the order backlog increased, providing a robust platform into 2026, and quite astounding numbers in order intake in Q4 towards the comparison period. We have a increase there exceeding 100% or something like that, but then again, a quarter is a quite short timeframe.
Strong financial position and cash generation. The board proposes a dividend of €0.014 per share, that's an increase with 40% and amounts to close to €10 million.
We are in a very strong financial position, and our cash position is really good, we are quite certain that we will generate a good cash flow also during 2026. Our strengthened market position in 2025 with the expanded Nordic platform and offering, we are reinforcing the segment leadership.
We are looking to have the right leaders on the right place and to reach synergies within the Nordics. There will be a lot of further cross-border collaboration.
It took a year or something for Swedish NYAB to start the right cross-border collaboration with our Finnish business, and we are well on our way with Dovre. Related to that, of course, is that we chose to divest our consulting business in North America.
We have a 2026 ahead of us where we will focus on building a better and stronger company. That's it.
Erik Petersen
Thank you, Johan, and thank you, Klas. We will now open up for the teleconference and questions.
To join the teleconference, you find the link in the invitation to this call, and there you also find the dial-in details that will be provided upon registration. Our AI voice will explain further how you dial in.
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 Simon Jönsson from ABG Sundal Collier. Please go ahead.
Simon Jönsson
Thank you, and good morning, guys. On the larger Phase 1 contracts, you have a few of those ongoing, the Svenska kraftnät power line, for example, and the tram project in Uppsala.
On those two specifically, can you just reiterate the expected timeline for those when they could turn into Phase 2 orders? I think on the power line project, you first wrote Q1 in the press release, and now sounds like we should expect Q2.
Is that correct? What about the Uppsala project, how's that progressing?
Johan Larsson
Hi, Simon. Great question.
When it comes to Svenska kraftnät, Svartbyn-Letsi, it's expected during Q2, and the most recent we've heard and know from Uppsala, that really has been the timeframe all the way, is also late Q2.
Simon Jönsson
Okay. Thanks for that.
Then turning over to the margins, of course Dovre is a diluting part here. Looking in the civil engineering margins, we had or you had declining margins in Sweden last year due to strong growth, partly.
You talked about, Johan, that you have more niched contracts in rail specifically with higher margins maybe coming up this year. Is this something you think could help margins in Sweden to come back up, or do you think that high growth in general should continue to weigh on margins in Sweden?
Johan Larsson
I would say that first of all, we are big fans of EBIT and margins, and of course, when you build a company like this with high organic growth as we do in Sweden and just selective bolt-ons and such, you look for the right projects, the right niches with the right margins. Then again, you have to build it so you have a platform.
You have to have a certain amount of collaborative contracts that are safe on volumes, you have to have long-term frame agreements and such while you build it. What we have done during 2025 is that we have increased our capacity within rail, we have increased our capacity within water works, we have increased our capacity within power headlines.
When it comes to rail, we have only had costs, I would say, and the contracts and the production starts May 2026. That, of course, will have a positive margin effect.
When it comes to our power headlines that has been quite a big niche and segment for us where we have a broad competence and good relation with our clients, we expect that to grow quite heavily as well. Same goes with water works.
We bought a very small company who had a revenue of approximately 20 to 30 million SEK annually. The volume expected for 2026 on that niche is several hundred million SEK.
That is also a niche with high margins, and it's the same thing there. We have taken the costs first.
So 2026 is rigged, and the setup is there to improve our margin within civil engineering.
Simon Jönsson
All right. Just a follow-up on that, on increased capacity, would you say that that's partly for to gear the company for upcoming Phase 2 contracts or should we expect that maybe there will be more investments for those?
Johan Larsson
That's a part of it, but it's also in general to manage those kind of contracts.
Simon Jönsson
All right. Thanks for that.
Makes a lot of sense. Then just a final one from me on Dovre.
You did a divestment here of the North American part, looks like a bit margin-dilutive part of the business, and you do more to improve the margins. What are you sort of targeting for that business over the coming year or so?
Johan Larsson
I can't really say what we're targeting, but I can say that we were well aware when we did this acquisition what was really interesting for us was, of course, the Norwegian platform and the possibilities that that brings with synergies and how we can work together with each other from NYAB and Dovre and such. In this case, we had the interested buyer who we thought had a decent valuation of that business, and that business was diluting our margins.
We do a lot of activity to increase our margins. Dovre are moving the right way, even if we have a weak Q4 EBIT-wise.
I feel quite confident that we do the right thing. We have the right leader at our business.
As we have announced, we will have a group leader for our consulting business joining in June. We take the right steps.
It will surely dilute NYAB's margin during 2026 as well, but not as heavily as it did 2025. That's our estimate and goal.
Simon Jönsson
All right. Then just a follow-up on that.
To unlock higher margins in Dovre, do you think cross-border collaboration that you talked about, is that sort of a key issue, you think?
Johan Larsson
That's one of them. There are many things and many ways to improve our margins.
It's about delivering solutions instead of hours. It's a little shift in culture, a work that's been ongoing pretty much since the get-go.
There are a lot of things to do, and I feel quite comfortable that the market will see what the management sees by the end of this year when it comes to improving our consulting business.
Simon Jönsson
All right. Thank you so much for that.
That's all for me.
Operator
As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key 5 on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Christoffer Jennel from Inderes.
Please go ahead.
Christoffer Jennel
Hi Johan, Klas, and Erik. A couple of questions from my side, and I take them one by one.
I start with some follow-up questions on margin. Now you have had two quarters to integrate the expanded workforce from H1 last year.
The EBIT margin now in Q4 came in at 8.2, increasing quarter-by-quarter. Can you give us some color on how the utilization of this expanded workforce has developed through Q4, and more importantly, what trajectory should we expect for margin through 2026 as this normalized further?
Klas Rewelj
Thank you, Christoffer. I think when it comes to our civil engineering business, we are now at the phase where we can scale the business based on the capacity build-up that we did report on.
The margin outlook there we have as expect is positive both in terms of the project portfolio we have, as we said already, but also in that we are now ready for further growth. That's the effects we expect for civil engineering.
As Johan said, for consulting, it's a step-by-step journey, and there they're more now it's about executing the right actions to build a long-term, highly profitable consulting business within NYAB Group, and that's the only thing that's important there.
Christoffer Jennel
All right, and then a follow-up on the consulting segment where the margin came in at 2.6, down from 4.5 in the previous quarter. Is the seasonality in the current operations higher today than in previous year, or what was behind the quite large drop in margins quarter-on-quarter?
Klas Rewelj
Of course, this is what we have with Dovre and in Norway towards the energy sector is much of a project staffing business, and as such, it depends on the volume development during a specific period. If the volume goes down, as we reported on, it will have a negative effect on profit and margin in the short term.
That's what we saw in Q4.
Johan Larsson
It was Klas stated in the presentation, that there was a decline in demand from the offshore business. They finalized a lot of projects simultaneously.
Historically, Dovre has always been in the hands of a few big clients. It's what happens.
I would also say that some of the margin dilution also comes from our investments for the future. Rearranging the organization and there are things happening there, building for the future Dovre.
Klas Rewelj
Absolutely.
Christoffer Jennel
All right, then one question about Finland. Finland showed a quite big revenue drop in Q3 with a 20% decline, which was attributed to timing effects.
The year-on-year drop in Q4 was about 30%. My question is, is this timing effects that you mentioned in Q3 moved further away, or what was the reason behind the weak top-line growth in Q4?
Johan Larsson
Yeah. It's same there.
It's timing effects. As a whole, the Finnish civil works business or civil engineering business are performing quite well, and the market looks better.
We expect growth there. You must also take into consideration that we have stated quite clearly that one of the reasons why we in Civil Engineering Sweden can have a growth of over 40% during the first three quarters and in the region of 33% or something like that for the full year is due to using Finnish workforce.
In our key projects, we have Finns working in Sweden, and they don't get the revenue. The projects are owned by Swedish NYAB.
You see that in the loss of revenue. We have been a bit too effective with cross-border collaboration.
Christoffer Jennel
All right. Good.
Then a final from me. As we now are in 2026, you're facing a different environment than the past year in terms of a bit tougher comparables, no M&A boost, and a still quite mixed market picture with Sweden strong, Finland quite cautious, and Norway more normalized maybe, or weak.
How are you thinking about top-line growth for 2026 and beyond?
Johan Larsson
It's quite obvious if you look at our backlog and our order intake, and our Phase 2s, you mentioned them yourself. It's obvious that we are growing as planned.
You can never decide exact the exact growth. What I have stated quite clearly already since Q2 2025, that I would wish that our growth was a little less than it will be during 2025 and that it eventually became.
We are rigged to we can grow quite hard with healthy margins, as we have. Note that what's growing is the civil engineering business in Sweden, and the optimal level for the group as a whole is to have a organic growth in the region of 20%, 15% to 20%, somewhere there.
You can also margin-optimize. Then you can go up to 40% growth, but then you come into situation where you can't optimize your margin.
You have to take costs in advance and stuff like that, because you are irresponsible otherwise.
Christoffer Jennel
All right. Thank you.
That was all for me.
Johan Larsson
Thanks.
Operator
There are no more questions at this time. I hand the conference back to the speakers for any written questions and closing comments.
Erik Petersen
Okay. Thanks for the teleconference.
We have a market-related question from the chat. We have time for that as well.
Do you see any AI-related orders coming in, particularly linked to power infrastructure or data center expansion?
Johan Larsson
We can't disclose too much at this stage, but what we can say is that we see a clear activity when it comes to data centers. We see that the expected growth of AI will lead to a lot of AI investments, and up in the Nordics, you have a reliable grid, over time a decent energy price.
That's a market that's coming. That that's pretty much all we can say at this stage.
Erik Petersen
Thank you very much, Johan. I think we will end the question, the Q&A, for now.
NYAB will release its interim report for the first quarter of 2026 on the 7th of May. For now, we will say thank you for participating and see you again next time.
Klas Rewelj
Thank you very much.
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