ALS Limited (ALQ) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good day, and thank you for joining. Welcome to ALS investor presentation for H1 FY '25 results presentation. [Operator Instructions] Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the call over to your first speaker today, Mr. Malcolm Deane, CEO and Managing Director. Thank you. Please go ahead.

Thanks, Desmon, and good morning, and thank you all for taking the time to join today's briefing. It is great to be back with all of you to share ALS half year results. I am here today joined by our Chief Financial Officer, Stuart Hutton. As usual, this presentation will run for approximately 40 minutes, and it will be followed by a Q&A session. So let's start by running through the highlights from our half year results. All in all, we are pleased with our progress as we continue to grow and build resilience into the portfolio. Underlying EBIT increased by 2.1% to $250 million despite adverse foreign exchange impacts. Underlying EBIT on a constant currency basis was up 8.5% to $266 million. We saw industry-leading organic growth in Life Sciences led by Environmental and Food testing. The Environmental business continues to benefit from supportive industry megatrends, and we are further integrating and growing the global environmental platform in key geographies. On Commodities, the business demonstrated resilience at the top and bottom line despite subdued market conditions. Our world-class hub-and-spoke model, best in-market client service offering, unique, high-performance methods and continued diversification to downstream all support Minerals performance. The EBIT margin for the Mineral division was once again maintained above 30%. We have capacity in place in geochemistry to service any increase in volumes associated with high commodity prices and future demand linked to global exploration activity. Integrations of recent acquisitions are on track with good momentum in Nuvisan both in the execution of the transformation plan and business development pipeline. And we achieved strong cash conversion in the half, representing 91% of underlying EBITDA, the strongest H1 seasonal performance for a number of years. At ALS, we remain guided by our vision to be the global leader in the discipline of scientific analysis in pursuit of a better world for all while keeping safety front of mind. Health and safety underpins everything that we do and is prioritized in every aspect of our business. This is essential to protect our people, to drive better performance and to build trust with our clients. While this chart indicates we have leveled out, ALS continues to deliver leading safety performance, and we remain focused on continuous improvements to further decrease injuries and promote a safe environment for all employees. So with that, let's turn our attention to the financial result highlights for the first half of fiscal year '25. As shown in this slide, our business delivered strong overall revenue growth of 14% to $1.4 billion. Organic growth was solid at 5.6% despite the challenging market conditions. Underlying EBIT grew by 2.1%. The overall EBIT margin declined to 17.1%, reflecting the dilution from recent acquisitions and adverse FX impacts from the stronger Australian dollar. During the half, we generated strong free cash flow of $274 million and return on capital employed increased by 66 basis points to 19.4%, noting that this is calculated net of the impairment of Nuvisan. Underlying net profit after taxes was $152.3 million, a decline of 3.9%. On a constant currency basis, underlying NPAT increased by 3.3%. As mentioned before, our cash generation, balance sheet and liquidity remain strong, supporting implementation of our refreshed capital framework and continued growth journey as we move forward. In this regard, the Board has declared an interim dividend of $0.189 per share, which equates to a 60% payout ratio. Franking has increased to 30%. So now let's go to the segments highlights. Starting with the Commodity division. In Minerals, we saw modest organic revenue growth of 0.3%, a positive result given subdued exploration, which led to volatility in sample flows and lower levels of metallurgy activity. Margins in Minerals continue to demonstrate their resilience, staying above 30%. Industrial Materials performed well with strong organic revenue growth of 12.2% and margin improvement. Combined, the margin in the Commodities business was down 140 basis points to 28.2%. In Life Sciences, Environmental saw strong organic revenue growth of 11.8%, with double-digit growth across most regions. As expected, Environmental margins in the first half were adversely impacted by recent acquisitions. In Food, organic revenue was up 7% with double-digit growth within our largest European markets offsetting some softness in other regions. And finally, our Pharmaceutical business had a negative organic growth of 3.4%, with mixed performance across operations. Excluding Nuvisan, the Pharmaceutical organic revenue was up 0.6%. Combined, the operating margins in the Life Sciences business was down 55 basis points to 14.4%. However, excluding acquisitions, the margin in the legacy business improved by 69 basis points to 17.1%. I will now touch on the strong revenue growth we saw in the first half. As mentioned before, our business delivered $1.4 billion revenue in the half, a 14% increase compared to first half of the prior year. 5.6% of this was organic growth with 11.6% from acquisitions. There was an adverse FX impact of 3.2% largely from the AUD strengthening against currencies in the mature and emerging markets. Organic growth resulted from sustained global demand for environmental services, further demand for value-added services and growth of mine site production testing in the Mineral business, growth of the European Food business and improved condition within the Coal and Oil & Lubricants businesses. These were partially offset by uncertain geopolitical conditions and continuing constraints on mining exploration expenditure. On the pharma business, while there has been some more positive signs recently, the ongoing slow recovery and deployment of funding for drug research and development impacted the Pharmaceutical volumes. Scope growth of 11.6% was supported by the initial contribution to the Environmental business from the recent acquisitions of York and Wessling as well the additional 51% interest in Nuvisan. So let's now expand on our Commodities division, which again demonstrated resilience in what continues to be a soft market. Total revenue for Commodities declined by 1.7% from subdued exploration activities and adverse FX. On a constant currency basis, revenue growth was 2.4%. The underlying EBIT margin declined to 28.2%. Pleasingly, the Minerals margins remained strong at 31.2%, reflecting reduced cyclicality, flexibility of the cost base and improved revenue mix. We continue to strengthen our leading position in Minerals and deliver stable margins despite the slowdown in exploration spending. The strength of our commercial and client service offering, innovative high-performance testing methods and the acceleration of our mine site operations are all supporting the resilience of the financial performance. Reduced sample volumes were partially offset through market share expansion, increased value-added services take-up and downstream growth. Following our record first half last year, Metallurgy revenues and margins declined due to lower volumes of projects. There remains a solid pipeline of projects with good growth opportunities in green metals-related services. Industrial Materials had a strong result, supported by market share and pricing growth within Coal and Oil & Lubricants. The inspection business was in line with last year and has been impacted by reduced volumes similar to Geochemistry. Now let's move to the sample flow volumes, a chart that typically gets a lot of attention. Sample flow's performance reflects the ongoing fluctuation of the exploration environment. We have seen variable sample flows in the first half. Even so, it is more positive than this time last year, with overall decline in sample flows of 0.5% against a 12.3% decline in the first half of the previous year. Volumes exhibit regional nuances with strength in EMEA offset by relative weakness in both Lat Am and Australia. North America volumes were slightly down. While strong commodity price and the longer-term energy transition agenda are supportive of future exploration, this has not yet translated into increased sample volume. Pleasingly, business development activities remain solid, supporting our leading market share position. Our client mix moved slightly towards majors due to juniors remaining somewhat capital constrained. Our commodity mix tested remain consistent with global macro trends, including increased demand for electrification and battery-related metals. We remain focused on reducing the cyclicality to exploration activities. Within Minerals, exploration testing services made up 78% of revenue in fiscal year '21. This has reduced to 74% in the first half of fiscal year '25, with new service offerings and downstream activities now contributing more than 1/4 of Minerals revenue. While sample volumes declined by 0.5%, Minerals delivered organic revenue growth of 0.3% and the EBIT margin remained above 31%. This illustrates how we continue to decouple revenue from sample volumes and demonstrate reduced earnings cyclicality. So with that, let's now move to the Life Sciences portfolio. Life Sciences had a strong growth in the half. This was led by the Environmental and Food business with total revenue growth of 25.6%. Organic growth of 7.8% and contribution from recent acquisitions were partially offset by adverse FX movements. The underlying EBIT margin was 14.4% and was impacted by lower margins associated with York, Wessling and Nuvisan acquisitions in their early integration phase. Excluding these acquisitions, the margin of Life Sciences was 17.1%. Our Life Sciences business are aligned with industry megatrends, including increased regulation and enforcement and outsourcing; and we see accelerated growth potential in emerging contaminants, especially PFAS. Strong performance by the Environmental and Food business in the half were offset by mixed performance in pharma. So let's take a moment to talk about the legacy Life Sciences margins. Life Sciences organic revenue growth was 7.8%. Excluding Nuvisan, Wessling and York, the legacy Life Sciences organic growth was 9.3%, reflecting the continued strength, operating scale and strategy execution of our global Environmental business and the regional Food business. Legacy EBIT margin was 17.1%, an increase of 69 basis points from the first half of last year. This includes Environmental margins growth of 137 basis points net of acquisitions. While the recent acquisitions are margin dilutive in the short term, we are targeting continued improvement in Life Sciences margins with the ongoing integration and optimization of these acquisitions. Consistent with our value creation framework, we are focused on delivering the expected 15% return on capital in the medium term. So let's move now to an update on the acquisitions. Wessling saw revenue growth momentum and is undergoing a cultural shift to improve efficiencies and productivity. Cost reduction programs are ongoing through fiscal year '25 before most of the emphasis moved to growth of business. Both revenue and EBIT for Wessling are slightly ahead of expectations and on track to deliver expected returns. Regarding York, the integration is on track, and York is expected to contribute meaningful growth to our U.S. Environmental business from fiscal year '25 onwards. Financial performance of York is ahead of the prior year, delivering mid- to high single-digit organic revenue growth. On to Nuvisan where the transformation program is progressing well. As you know, there's a big focus in execution of the transformation plan in this business. And during the first half of full ownership, we have already implemented savings of approximately EUR 13 million. These are expected to progressively benefit during the second half. The program is on track to deliver the expected EUR 25 million cost reduction over a 2-year period. We are seeing signs of improving market conditions, and revenue for the first 6 months was in line with expectations. Proposed U.S. federal legislation to shift global pharma operations outside of China is having a positive impact on Nuvisan as the pharma industry looks to shift operations. Pleasingly, Nuvisan made a low single-digit EBIT contribution in the half compared to an EBIT loss last year and is expected to maintain ongoing profitable growth. We are pleased with how the sales pipeline is building. Several major contracts have been awarded, which are likely to translate to new third-party revenue, supported by marketing efforts. To add some evidence, closed sales opportunities for Nuvisan, both in value and order numbers, increased by approximately 10% against last year. We are replacing contracted revenue with new third parties, which diversifies our revenue sources. Lastly, Nuvisan has great capabilities, systems and relationships already in place, and we are progressively leveraging these across the broader Pharmaceutical business. So now let's turn to PFAS. As you know, PFAS is increasingly prevalent in the environment and is known to be a persistent, toxic and bioaccumulative contaminant. We are seeing evolution in regulation, litigation and increased consumer awareness of the risks these substances have. ALS has significant experience and expertise, and scaling PFAS testing. We have one of the largest PFAS testing lab networks globally and have locations in 6 key regions, providing standardized, high-quality testing services. We also have preferred relationship with key suppliers, which allows us for prompt incremental capacity growth when required. It is important to note that while we believe PFAS testing has substantial growth potential, PFAS testing currently represents approximately 5% of the Environmental business. However, organic growth in PFAS revenue outpaced the Environmental organic growth by more than 2x in the first half of fiscal year '25. We expect these elevated growth to continue for PFAS testing. There are substantial opportunities in testing for PFAS within our broader Life Sciences portfolio across broad clients and markets, including food, packaging and cosmetics. Our One ALS approach is being taken to pursue this opportunity. So with that, I will now hand over to Stuart, who will take you through the financial performance of the business during the half.

Thanks, Malcolm, and good morning, good afternoon, everyone. In short, ALS delivered resilient financial results amid mixed market conditions. Malcolm has already touched on these, but I will quickly recap. Revenue grew organically by 5.6%, and with the initial contributions from recent acquisitions, we achieved 14% overall growth in the half. Underlying EBIT increased by 2.1% to $250 million. This was suppressed by adverse FX impacts associated with the stronger Australian dollar during the half. The operating margin declined to 17.1%, reflecting expected dilution from the recent Life Sciences acquisitions and lower volumes in Minerals as well as an adverse FX impact of approximately 60 basis points. Net interest expense including lease interest increased, reflecting our growth agenda. Underlying NPAT declined to $152 million, again impacted by FX. This is in line with the revised guidance communicated to you all in September. So moving to margins. As noted earlier, the group margin contracted by approximately 150 basis points to 17.1%, reflecting dilution from acquisitions and the impact of lower minerals volumes. Life Sciences margins declined by 55 basis points, and Commodities declined by approximately 100 basis points, reflecting the sustained slowdown in exploration activities. As Malcolm noted, Minerals margins remained above 31%, reflecting our efforts to reduce the cyclical exposure by increasing value-added services and growing downstream activity. Group FX impact of approximately 60 basis points was largely due to unfavorable currency impacts in the high-margin commodities business. As guidance on FX sensitivity for translation of foreign earnings, on an annualized basis, a 1% move of major currencies against the AUD equates to an estimated impact of $3 million and $2 million on the EBIT and NPAT lines, respectively. ALS is also exposed to a number of emerging countries with significant fluctuating FX rates that have decoupled from major currencies and adversely impacted the reported results in the half. In this half, this included a number of Latin American, African and also some European currencies. I'll now talk through our disciplined approach to capital allocation on Slide 21. The group's strong cash flow generation supports future deleveraging and growth. The group had liquidity of AUD 375 million with balance sheet flexibility to pursue growth opportunities post the current period of consolidation in FY '25 and most likely into FY '26. Leverage of 2.3x is at the upper end of our targeted range of between 1.7 and 2.3x. We are committed to reducing this over the next 12 to 18 months with an ongoing focus on improving working capital metrics and free cash flow to reduce net debt. Free cash flow increased to $274 million and EBITDA cash conversion improved to 91%. We are on track to deliver further EBITDA cash conversion improvements during the remainder of FY '25. During the half, total capital expenditure totaled $75 million or thereabouts compared to $85 million in the prior period. This is due -- mainly due to timing of spend rather than anything fundamental. This represents 5.1% of revenue. Roughly 2/3 of the CapEx was for growth with the balance for maintenance. Full year CapEx spend is expected to be between 5% to 6% of revenues. We have a disciplined approach to capital allocation. In line with the revised value creation framework presented earlier in the year, acquisitions in the half were focused on the environmental business. The strategy remains to pursue opportunities that fit within existing core capabilities or attractive adjacent markets in areas of the portfolio we have identified as protect and extend and expand. The group has consistently returned capital to shareholders with dividends at the top of the payout range. The interim dividend of $0.189 per share franked at 30%, which is up from franking of 20% at the previous corresponding period, represents a payout ratio of 60% of underlying NPAT for the half. With our ability to increase the franking from 20% to 30%, on an after-franking basis, this dividend payout is in line with the prior period, reflecting the resilient first half results and the strong liquidity position. In addition, the dividend reinvestment plan will continue to operate for the interim dividend at 0 discount providing future capital flexibility for the business. Now moving to cash. As noted, EBITDA -- and as noted earlier, sorry, EBITDA cash conversion of 91% was up approximately 90 basis points versus the prior period. And this demonstrated the strongest seasonal first half performance for a number of years. This was achieved through a progressive improvement in all facets of our working capital management during the period. As an example, and I think we called this out on the earnings call a month or so ago, we were out of shape on our accounts receivable, our DSO metric in the first quarter. However, with a focused effort by many, which I'd add is ongoing, we were able to bring that back into shape by the end of the half. Increased M&A expenditure relates to funding for the Life Sciences acquisitions in the U.S.A and Western Europe, reflecting a growth focus in line with our value creation framework. So now to the balance sheet. As at 30 September '24, the balance sheet remained very strong. During the half, the group finalized new multiyear revolving bilateral and fixed rate facilities totaling approximately AUD 500 million. These new term debt facilities increased overall liquidity, removed any near-term finance risk and extend the group's weighted average debt maturity to approximately 5 years. The net interest expense in the half was $41 million, up from $23 million in the prior period. This reflects higher average net debt levels associated primarily with funding recent acquisitions and our growth agenda. Other contributing factors were subpar working capital management in the first quarter, which I mentioned before, higher average interest rates and acquisition-related lease interest expenses. And I know this is something that would cause a bit of angst with the earnings call earlier. This information related to lease accounting is not available -- was not available during the due diligence phase as lease accounting was not required under German GAAP, which was relevant for Wessling and also Nuvisan. We anticipate a similar run rate for interest expense in the second half of FY '25 to help with guidance for the remainder of the year. Now moving to corporate costs and how these have evolved. Corporate costs during the period were well controlled in the half and are slightly below expectations at 2.1% of revenue. We are on an ongoing quest to improve our operating leverage of our corporate functions. The increase versus the prior period reflects increased people costs and additional functional support in key areas such as strategy, finance and procurement. As guidance for the second half, corporate costs are expected to be approximately 2.2% of revenue for the full year. And with that, I will now pass back to Malcolm to close out the call. Thank you.

Thanks, Stu. So let's revisit our value creation framework, summarize key performance for the businesses throughout the half and lay out the perspective of fiscal year '25. Earlier this year, we introduced a new value creation framework to support growth and profitability. Many of you will already be familiar with this. The framework combines a risk-weighted approach to capital allocation that will protect, extend and expand the portfolio. Overall, the group expects to deliver mid- to high single-digit organic revenue growth, achieve a steady improvement in operating margins and strong ongoing cash generation. Allocation of growth capital will be deployed, seeking a minimum return on capital employed of 15%, ensuring maximum growth and returns for shareholders over the medium term. Our recent acquisitions of Life Sciences, York and Wessling demonstrates how we are applying this framework to growth opportunities for our portfolio. So let me now provide an update on our progress in implementing this framework. We continue to be a global market leader in minerals testing. This half, we continue to grow our market share across the total value chain and increase exposure to downstream production activities. We are pleased with the resilience and reduced cyclicality now built into the Minerals portfolio, with Minerals margins maintained above 30% since fiscal year '22 despite softer market conditions. Our high-performance methods continue to see strong uptake from clients. Metallurgy saw market-related revenue decline and margin compression in the half following a record prior year. Pleasingly, margins were maintained above 30%, reflecting flexibility and speed of adjustments to the cost base. Within Industrial Materials, both Oil & Lubricants and Coal saw market share and pricing growth with margin expansion. Price improvement in inspection largely offset volume weakness and was in line with last year. The Environmental business stream delivered strong double-digit organic growth across most regions as well as a positive initial contribution from the York and Wessling. As mentioned before, integrations of these acquisitions are on track, creating future growth drivers for the stream and expanding market share in key geographies. Disciplined price management in Environmental is resulting in improved efficiencies. Our Food business saw mid- to high single-digit organic growth and margin expansion with strong performance in key European markets, also benefiting by the same price discipline we are pushing throughout the portfolio. In pharma, the Nuvisan transformation plan is progressing well with small positive earnings contributions and optimism in the sales pipeline building. All in all, we are pleased with the performance across our portfolio through the half. So let me give you some perspectives for the second half. Reflecting the strength of the ALS portfolio, the group is targeting mid-single-digit organic revenue growth in fiscal year '25. This is subject to ongoing uncertainty in global markets in which we operate, particularly for commodities. It is expected that the Life Sciences business will continue to benefit from positive structural megatrends. On operating margins, the group is expecting modest improvement in margins for the wider Life Sciences division, excluding the initial dilutive impact of the York and Wessling acquisition. Continued margin resilient in Minerals is expected, and ALS is well positioned to capitalize on any market recovery. Nuvisan is expected to deliver ongoing positive earnings with further progress on successfully implementing the transformation plan to drive longer-term value. On capital allocation and in line with the value creation framework, risk-weighted growth will be prioritized for the Environmental and Mineral business. Our focus for now remains on the integration of recent acquisitions and the Nuvisan transformation plan. As Stuart noted, we are focused on reducing net debt and returning leverage to the midpoint of the target range of 1.7 to 2.3x over the next 12 to 18 months. So to finish with, let me lay out the unique strengths that ALS has in building a resilient business for today and the future. First, the TIC industry in which we operate is exposed to attractive end markets with underlying above GDP organic growth potential. Our portfolio is unique and diversified. We are proud to hold leadership positions globally in Minerals and Environmental with regional strengths across our food and pharmaceutical services. Our innovative data-driven approach continues to provide growth opportunities and enable us to better support our clients. Looking further ahead, we are on track to meet our fiscal year '27 objectives. And our targeted revenue of $3.3 billion and EBIT of $600 million are driven by progressive implementation of our strategy and discipline in the allocation of capital. Delivering on our growth objectives and shareholders' return is at the core of our strategy. Before I open for questions, I would like to once again thank the entire team at ALS for their support and commitment. And with that, operator, please open the floor for discussions and questions. Thank you.

[Operator Instructions] First question comes from John Purtell from Macquarie.

Just had 3 questions if I could. Starting with Nuvisan there, nice to see it move to profit in the first half. Are you expecting further improvement in profitability in the second half versus the first, noting the timing of cost saves?

John, thank you. Thanks for the question. The answer is -- I think as we outlined in there, the answer is yes. We've still got to -- from a cost-out point of view, the program is progressing to plan. And we've -- I think what we've -- as we stated, we've seen some more encouraging signs in the revenue line. So that's still a quest for us to get that revenue line growing in a positive trajectory. But that is -- it looks -- we're more confident of that now than we were 6 months ago is probably how I'd describe that. And we're certainly -- as I said, on the cost out, we're about halfway through implementing the cost-out program, so we will see progressive impact from those costs coming out. A lot of that is people related, and there are some notice periods that have got to be served, and they tend to be somewhat longer dated than we're perhaps used to in this country in Germany. So we've got to sort of wait a little bit of time for them to impact, but they will progressively impact through the second half. Hope that answers your question, John.

And just a second one on FX. The impacts were quite large there. So there's obviously translation, but there's also some margin impacts that you've referenced there. So is that -- to better understand that, is that really more about margin mix? Or is there a revenue cost mismatch in terms of FX in Latin America for example?

No, John, what it is, it's the weight of impact of FX in some of these emerging economies. So the ones that I called out, some in Latin America, where those currencies have clearly disconnected from the U.S. dollar and just that adverse translation impact because the margins, as you would hope that we would be pushing for in those emerging economies are pretty strong, as those earnings translate at a lower number, that impacts our margins. That's just pure math. There's nothing -- there's no disconnect with being able to pass through costs in those markets. It's just a translation impact only.

Okay. Got it. And last one, Malcolm, just in terms of what you're seeing on the Minerals side, there, obviously, the business continues to be very resilient. But I suppose any recent indicators that you can comment on and maybe what your customers -- any anecdotes there in terms of what they're thinking for calendar '25? I mean we note that junior financings have picked up very recently but still pretty early days.

Thanks, John. Thanks for the 3 questions. On sample flow, one comment that you see that we included a chart early in the presentation, so hopefully, we made your life easier on that. But we see a very volatile environment still. I know that last month, the junior raisings were record for, I think, the highest after 31 months. But probably similar to what we discussed in May, it's very early for us to call any positive change on the cycle. We've been bouncing on a low cycle for the last 2 years. And obviously, from a commodity price perspective -- and I think that the global demand for energy transition also supported by high gold pricing, we would be expecting a turn on that cycle. In terms of what we've seen in the last 6, 7 months, we have very good momentum in some weeks, and following weeks, they were down materially. And they were down 14% to 20% volume. So similar to what we call on the call 6 to 7 weeks ago, the volatile environment continued. We've seen slight improvements in some regions, like Australia, after that call, probably gold picking up but very, very slow, still behind last year. North America is going through this seasonal cycle right now, and you will see that sample volume will start slowly declining as winter starts. Hopefully, if junior raisings continue improving, we'll see a cash -- sorry, an improvement for juniors to drill after the winter season, but it's all expectations right now. We are managing the business with a focus on keeping the resilience in terms of margin, delivering new methods and really expanding market share. This is an opportunity for us in this slower market for us to continue pushing -- increasing market share in exploration and as we noted on the call, also on downstream and other areas of the Mineral business.

Our next question comes from the line of Jakob Cakarnis from Jarden Australia.

Just 2 for me if I can. The first one for Stuart. Can you just help us understand how difficult it is to implement some of the benefits of the hub-and-spoke model that you guys have got whilst you're seeing volatility in those sampling flow volumes? Are we expecting that you're going to be better aligning the cost base with the volatility that you're seeing exiting the first half?

So thanks, Jakob. Let me take this question if that's okay. So the complexity on -- that we call this year is not related with the hub-and-spoke model. I think that we have a pretty mature hub-and-spoke model, and we are improving that model every year with better processes and supported by these unique limbs that we have. What we call out as the challenges this year are more related with the specific volatility we've seen through the year with very strong weeks followed by very soft weeks. So it's hard for us to have a greater visibility. If we can improve forecast, I think that, that will depend a lot on clients rather than us. We see the samples at a certain point, but we cannot forecast more than a certain period of time ahead. And we have to be conscious that, otherwise, if we don't have the right resources, the turnaround times and service will be impacted. So it's -- the challenges that, I think, Stuart and myself were calling is not connected with the hub-and-spoke model but very specific things that we saw during this year that were very different from prior years. Stuart, do you want to add anything?

Yes. That's -- I think what Malcolm described is right, Jakob. But I think your question -- and I get it. I think we -- I would say to you, we have been more disciplined in reshaping our cost base in the last -- for the second quarter of the half. And rather than, I guess, waiting or expecting a turn in the commodity cycle, we've basically reshaped to what we're seeing rather than hoping for a turnaround, is probably the way I would describe it. So we have got better at reshaping our cost base commensurate with the volumes that we're seeing rather than what we would hope or expect to see is probably how I would describe it. So expect that to continue in the second half.

Yes. So 1 quarter really of that disciplined cost management, Stuart, and I guess, then you get maybe a continuation of that, like you say, into the second. Just while we're sticking on that Minerals business, can you just give us an update of where turnaround times are currently, please and then secondly, just that seniors, juniors mix, please?

So let me start with the second part. I think that from major, juniors, similar to what we call in May, probably right now, majors are 70%, 75%. What we've seen in the last year was closer to 70%, so we've seen an increase. And obviously, that's related with the challenges that the junior faced. In terms of turnaround time, our focus and one of the aspects that makes us unique is a superb turnaround time and consistency on services. So how we manage the cost base is also connected with the service delivery that we expect. Turnaround time is in the same levels that we've seen at the beginning of the year, and it didn't change materially until now.

Okay. And then just while you've got the microphone, I'm just wondering how you're seeing the portfolio balance at the moment in Life Sciences. Obviously, environment continues to perform strongly. You've given us the capital allocation framework. How do we think about pharma and food in the outlook going forward? Obviously, some of your peers are choosing to exit some of those other verticals. So just wondering how you guys are thinking about your portfolio mix, please.

Yes, thanks. So we are pleased with how the portfolio is shaping up. Our focus in food, and let me start by that, is probably have a more regional focus rather than a global focus, and that's a difference from some of our peers. And we are seeing a very good momentum in our European food business. This means that for that specific business, that regional business will continue supporting growth capital for organic growth and also strategic opportunities if they come at the right time. I cannot comment on the rationale and the reasons of why the competitors have decided to exit. But clearly, the food business is the largest market within the TIC space but obviously a very challenging market. Within pharma, I think that the portfolio, we have -- as we discussed sometimes in the past, we have 3 different buckets. We have the CRO piece with Nuvisan, the beauty and personal care business and the batch release. And right now, the focus is to take some benefits from each of those different divisions and have some synergies between them with a new focus and a new vision. The focus of the team right now is the transformation plan of Nuvisan that will cascade benefits also to batch release and also to beauty and personal care. We have strong regional positions in that Pharmaceutical business. And I don't think that, at this stage, we will change our view on trying to compete globally in every single market. So to your point, I think that in the future, you should expect to continue seeing a similar mix in the Life Sciences portfolio with the position of Food and pharma being -- approximately each of them 12%, 14% of the portfolio.

One final one just for Stuart. Those corporate costs are a little bit less than what you guys were thinking, but you've maintained guidance there or thereabouts for the full year. Will those corporate costs drop away in '26 as you guys get confidence more around the turnaround of Nuvisan? Or are they going to hold these levels, do you think, moving forward?

I think they're likely to hold there, Jakob, to be honest. I mean we've -- I think we were probably underweight, to be honest, in some of the functions. Now I think we've got them about right. I mean our expectation is, look, as the business continues to grow, we shouldn't have to add any further corporate costs. I mean there will be odd costs from time to time. But I would think that we've got -- now we've got a reasonable foundation, and we should be able to leverage that going forward. So that's the expectation. I don't think anything will specifically fall away post these integrations because those costs are being allocated to those integrations themselves. So they're not sitting in corporate. But that's how we sit.

Next question comes from the line of Rohan Sundram from MST Financial.

Just a couple for me. Malcolm, at the start of the call, you talked about -- I think you mentioned lab capacity in -- just in the Mineral sense. Can I just confirm if -- given we're in a very slow environment, but if you do see improvement, how would you describe the capacity in the labs at the moment? Is it sufficient? Or would you feel the need to invest into more capacity at some point?

Thanks for your question. So we are always investing in future growth for the Mineral business because it's a cyclical business and the best time to invest is in a slower period. You don't want to be building capacity when the cycle is up. Otherwise, you will be running behind the demand. As mentioned in our meetings and calls in May, we are investing in expanding our hub facilities in Lima, and we are increasing our sample prep capacity also in West Australia. In terms of how the capacity is for the current market, we are happy with that, but we are building capacity for a future cycle to be sure that the current market share that we have will not be impacted and we can service our clients as needed.

That's helpful. And just the last one for me is encouraging to see the talk around improvement in markets for Nuvisan, also momentum in Europe. How would you describe what's driving that or just how you're seeing those markets at the moment?

So what we are seeing in Europe is a very positive year in all of our regions -- businesses, sorry. We are seeing probably with the exception of Minerals. We had a very strong year in Environmental, including PFAS with new PFAS capabilities in some specific subregions in Europe. We had, as I mentioned in the call, a very strong performance of our Food business, both in the U.K. business and the Continental Europe business with market share expansion, and I think that that's also connected with the better price discipline that we have been pushing throughout the portfolio. And lastly, news and I think it's a combination of facts. I call out that we had the first 6 months of full ownership that gave us a very good deep dive and understanding, and we were able to push a cultural shift with the management team, the Nuvisan management team. They are fully committed with the transformation plan. With that cultural change and with the alignment with the management team, we were able to speed up the transformation plan and leveraging opportunities that the market is presenting with the U.S. legislation that I called out in the call that was obviously presenting opportunities. And I also think that we are doing a much better job than in the past in terms of marketing and getting the Nuvisan name and brand to be known. To be quite frank, was not as known as needed. But the service delivery is high and clients really value that. So I think it's a combination of the market but also a lot of positive that the team is execution on that -- executing in that specific business. I hope I answered your question, Rohan.

Our next question comes from Nicholas Rawlinson from Morgans.

Just on geochem, sample volumes were only down 0.5%. It feels like the industry is down much more. So is it safe to say you're taking a fair bit of market share? And if so, is that on-site or offsite share?

Thanks , Nicholas, for the question. So we see that our BD efforts are being successfully both upstream and downstream. In terms of downstream, we've seen a number of new mine site projects that we won. I think that in total, we are adding 8 new mine sites to our pipeline. Some of them are in pre-revenue stages, under construction. Some of them will generate revenue in Q4 of this year and probably 2 or 3 in Q1, Q2 of the following fiscal year. But it's also a big effort to capture market share in a slower moment of the cycle, so we can benefit -- we can take the benefits on the up cycle in the exploration side. We have very clear targets, and we've been competing very strong to increase market share also in exploration. So it's -- the answer is a combination of both. I cannot give you the exact number at this stage because we will need to receive market information to have a precise number of market share and probably you will see this on the full year results. But we are pretty satisfied with how the business is tracking in that regard.

And just following on from Rohan's question on volume capacity in geochem. Could you give us a rough indication of how much spare capacity you have right now? Like could you give us a number, like 20%, 15%?

Thanks, Nicholas. And I think it's not a number that we will give in a call. We are happy with the current capacity that we have and how the team, as mentioned by Stuart, specifically after Q2, is managing the capacity. And we are ready, if the market turns, to take any benefit from the up cycle. But giving a specific number would not be prudent or reasonable.

Okay. No worries. Just a last one from me. I know you've given guidance for an improvement in margins ex acquisitions for Life Sciences and you obviously delivered strongly on that in the first half. But how should we think about improvement in margins for the whole Life Sciences business? It sounds like Nuvisan's cost out is going well. York and Wessling are slightly ahead of expectations. But if you could help us with sort of your expectations for margins in the whole Life Sciences business from here, that would be super helpful.

Yes. Look, I think, Nicholas, we've guided to steady improvement in the, call it, the legacy businesses. And what does that mean? I mean it's not going to be linear, but I think you should be thinking somewhere around like 20 to 40 points a year is where I would see it. And some years, we might do a bit better than that. Some years, we may not. And then on the -- I think the way to factor in Nuvisan and Wessling is if you have a look at what the revenue numbers that we acquired, and then I would -- for the simple fact of modeling, I would -- we guided to the returns that we expected to make on those acquisitions. And if you did that on a straight-line basis over the 5 years, I mean, again, it won't be that -- that won't be how it will be perfectly, but you're not going to be far away in terms of how we would see the improvement in those margins during that period. Now what does that mean? I think York, we would expect to be at or better than Life Sciences average margins. I think Nuvisan and Wessling, I think you've got to expect those to -- that's a longer-term proposition. I think they're more in the low double digits margins is how I'd be thinking about those 2 acquisitions. And the simple fact is that's what we need to do to deliver our 15% return on capital employed, and that's what we're targeting to deliver.

The next question comes from John Campbell from Jefferies.

Sorry, guys, I think I had it on mute. Yes, just on minerals testing, have you ever really had any genuine forward visibility to sort of identify turning points in sample flow? I mean, like we understand why you're sort of cautious in talking it up. But do you ever get any genuine forward visibility?

So it depends on the term that you're thinking, John, and thanks for the question, sorry. It really depends on the term. We have visibility in a specific term, but it's very volatile. If the market turns, you could see a jump of 10%, 20% from -- in 2 weeks' time. And obviously, we keep lines open with juniors and with majors, with all of our clients to understand what they're going to do. But sometimes they don't even know how fast they will react to a positive turn on the market. Clearly, we have our own metrics and we try to build our best forecast. But sometimes the market has a very positive surprise or a very negative surprise. And we've seen this year that, that was the case in biweekly case. So it's -- to be quite frank, it's very hard to build a longer-term view in this market.

Yes. Okay. And still on minerals testing, and you've already talked a bit about your mine site presence, but in terms of building out your penetration and your -- the opportunity, if you like, in that subsector, how do you do that without creating excessive competitive pressures when you're seeking to dislodge incumbents?

Look, I don't want to sound arrogant in -- but we use our service, similar service solutions and that the clients like from our exploration side of the business into mine site. And we are very targeted in the type of clients that we approach. There are specific volumes or size of mines that we want to serve. There are specific type of mines that will be very good suited for our services. And we offer the clients the full range of services that includes the processes, the quality systems, the data and all of that sustained are supported by our LIMS. I think you're right. We don't want to get into a price competition because the price competition only goes down. And we try to compete on value-added services and the uniqueness of having ALS as a full service provider for the mine. To be quite frank, that's what we do. Obviously, it's pretty simple to say, but it's very hard to do. And that's why in a very big market that is the downstream, you're going to see steady growth but not exponential growth year-on-year because we're going to be very selective in the type of projects that we want to win because these projects need to be supportive of the margin resilience that we are building into Minerals. If we are too aggressive with pricing in a down cycle, we will have a big impact on our margins. And the story for us is we are reducing cyclicality because we know what clients and what type of service to deliver in mine set as well.

Yes, okay, that's very helpful. Malcolm, so -- sorry, please go on.

Yes. Sorry, John, I'm just going to say that -- I mean, I think -- look, clearly, it's an opportunity for us, but I think we see this as a slow burn. I don't think there's -- to Malcolm's point, I don't think it's -- we can flick switch and we can go out and secure a lot of market share. There's incumbents in place. I mean we are just, I guess, pitching for that work as some of those incumbent arrangements become at maturity, and that's how we're being able to secure these positions without fighting on price because we have no interest in fighting on price.

Yes. Okay. Well, that was certainly where my question was directed towards, that this is going to be incremental without detrimental to margins effectively. I mean I'm putting words in your mouth but it sounds -- yes. Yes. Okay. That's very good. Last question from me. So core Life Sciences organic revenue growth of over 9% was obviously strong. Can you sort of split that out roughly by volume and by pricing?

John, this would be a guess, but I would say it would be 2/3 volume and 1/3 price is how I would say it. And it's going to -- like it's going to vary market by market, but I think that's the best way to think of it. So we're still -- the discipline that exists throughout ALS in making sure we recover cost inputs is still in place. I mean it's something that became very disciplined and I think probably not just us. It's through the industry post COVID. I'd say to you that's getting harder than easier, and that's perhaps no surprise because COVID's now 3 or 4 years ago. But that is -- the question we have at a minimum is to recover the cost inputs that we -- or imposts that we are suffering. And I think those -- sorry, let me just speak. Cost headwinds, I think, have abated a bit. I mean, our biggest cost clearly is people. And depending which country you're in, I think the cost pressures have moderated, but they're still there.

Yes, very good. And just an observation, I'd be interested if you've got any comments. It seems like your major global peers sort of take the same approach, cost recovery, margin, slight margin accretion. It's not to say that everyone is acting in concert but more that everyone's got a sort of a sensible commercial approach on the life sciences side.

Yes. I think that's -- as Stuart said, it's something that we all learned a tough way during COVID, and it's something that, I think, that the industry will try to continue pushing. I cannot comment on what the peers are doing, but definitely something that -- that price discipline that we have in such a good way we're managing in minerals, we are pushing throughout the portfolio, and we are seeing very positive signs, as we mentioned, in Environmental, in Food as well. So I think that your comment is right without giving a view on the peers is right what we're doing. It's right on spot on what ALS is doing.

Our next questions come from the line of Shaurya Visen from Bank of America.

Malcolm, first one for you just on PFAS. I'm just curious to get your thoughts on the food and the cosmetic end markets that you spoke about. Just curious, my understanding is, right now, your exposure to those markets is fairly limited. It's more environment. Could you give a sense of that? And as you go forward, right, given the opportunity, you spoke about if you need to break into those markets, what's your strategy. Do you reckon you can do that with your current setup? Or you think you would need some investments? Or how do you think about that?

I hope that the competitors are not listening to the call, but thanks for the question. Now -- but it's a good question. Look, clearly, PFAS is a service that we can deliver using our One ALS Approach. From a technical perspective, is a complex testing. But once you get the extraction right, you can run it with a hub -- in a hub location. To your point, we have a good presence of -- for example, in the cosmetic industry, both in Americas and from Nuvisan, one -- a part of Nuvisan is a CRO focused in dermatology products in France. And that gives us, again, entry point to specific clients. The big push on cosmetics and packaging from our perspective is coming from the U.S. legislation. There is a similar legislation in New Zealand. We expect that Europe and other countries will follow. And that MoCRA legislation will start pushing all cosmetic products to be tested, to be banned from PFAS or without PFAS. So current SKUs and new SKUs will have to be tested on that. So the approach is, I think we are well positioned in Americas to take that opportunity. Within the U.S. in the cosmetic part of beauty and personal care, as we call it, we probably have around 5 to 6 sites, of which, obviously, there are clinical trial sites, and now we are pushing for that sites to also have the PFAS capabilities. In -- regarding the food industry, as I mentioned, I think we're going to have some opportunities coming from the U.S. But as you know, we have a very strong market share in Europe, in specific countries, but in U.K., in Southern Europe and now with Wessling, that gives us an entry point also in food and pharma -- sorry, in food, in France and Germany. So I think we are well positioned to capture those opportunities in the markets that we want to compete, in the markets that will be leading the PFAS regulations and enforcements. And we started not now, probably 18 months ago, to push that One ALS approach to be sure that when the legislations are starting to be enacted and enforced, we are ready to take our benefit from the upside.

Super helpful. Stuart, quick one for you. Just on your guidance for the full year, right, you were talking about mid-single-digit organic growth. Just curious, could you help us with a few numbers around how should we think for the Commodities and the Life Sciences?

Yes. So it'd be consistent with what we said at the start of the financial year. So we've guided to mid-single, which means I think Life Sciences will be a bit better than that. And then by definition, to get mid-single, Commodities will be a bit worse than that. And I don't think we'd see any change in that. Now if you look at what's happened in the first half, that's pretty much exactly how it's played out. So I would expect, at this point in time, a continuation of the same.

Our next question comes from the line of Megan Kirby-Lewis from Barrenjoey.

My first question is just on the Pharmaceutical segment. There's a comment in the presentation about excluding Nuvisan, you saw margin compression. Just keen to understand the drivers there and how we should think about that margin outlook in the next, say, 12 months.

Thanks, Megan, for the question. So the margin compression came primarily from the beauty and personal care business in Americas. We called out in May that we're going through a transformation of that -- of those businesses where it was an acquisition that we did in Latin America a couple of years ago -- 2 years ago and integrating that into our network. So a big part of the market compression -- or the margin's compression, sorry, came from that business. The analytical batch release was stable in terms of margins, and we're seeing improvements now in Asia and some of the European businesses that we have. So you should think about that compression coming primarily from that part of the portfolio.

Great. And then just one for Stuart just in terms of the comments about the focus on returning leverage to the midpoint of the range. Should we interpret that as meaning that there wouldn't be any more acquisitions until that happens?

Megan, I think, prima facie, you should assume that. But again, what we've always said is if there was -- and we obviously can't control when assets come to the market. But if an asset came to the market that was right on our strategy and as far as we're concerned, we needed to have it, we would find a way to make it happen. So that may mean that our leverage would stay, could even go up or we might use equity, whatever. We'll work that out. But I think prima facie, you should assume our focus as it is, is on deleveraging. But we are certainly not in a -- we would not see that we're that constrained that we would not be active participants should an asset come to market. As I said, in our eyes, we should have, and it fits with our strategy.

[Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from Nathan Reilly from UBS.

Just one question on the sample volumes for Minerals down 0.5%. I was just wondering, can you talk to the growth rates you saw for both upstream and also downstream volumes that drove that net 0.5% decline, please?

Well, the sample volumes is more -- is not really the downstream activity because that's at mine sites. That's really in our hub-and-spoke facilities. And I think, therefore, kind of it is what it is. The market, as we've been talking about is -- has been called bouncing along a low point, whether that's as low as it can go, time will tell. We hope it is. But I think that's the best way I could describe it to you, Nathan. So the sample volumes relates to our hub and spoke, not as opposed to what happens on a specific mine site.

[Operator Instructions] At this time, there are no further questions on the line. I'd like to hand the call back to management for closing.

Thank you very much. Thank you all for listening and looking forward for the next catch-up in 6 months. Thank you.

That does conclude today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect your line.