Arribatec Group ASA (ARR) Q4 FY2025 Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Hi, and welcome to our Fourth Quarter Presentation for 2025. My name is Jakob Kjolvik, and I'm Interim CEO of Arribatec. And with me, we have our CFO, Magnus Hofshagen. Together, we will give you some business highlights and a financial review of the quarter. Along the session, you can submit questions using the web form, and we will address them at the end. I will start with a quick overview of Arribatec before we dive into more details. We are a global team of about 300 dedicated people serving around 1,700 clients across all industries. Arribatec is built around 3 business areas: Business services, which is our largest business area, deliver products and services around ERP, financial planning and analysis, analytics and own IP solutions for research institutes and apprentices. The team runs transformation projects. They do everything from defining the specific client solution requirements to the implementation and ongoing support. Cloud delivers flexible, secure cloud services for both private and public sectors. They offer hosting across hybrid environments plus consulting, outsourcing, end-to-end cloud solutions. EA-BPM delivers transformation and AI enablers such as enterprise architecture and business process management solutions and services, hence, the name EA-BPM. And they are helping organizations working smarter, better, faster and in accordance with internal and external laws and regulations. Together, these areas deliver mission-critical systems and services across industries. Our people bring deep expertise, not just technology around our software, but also in the industries we serve. And the market is moving towards industry-specific competence rather than one size fits all. We also see that generative AI; it's not just about productivity anymore. It's also becoming more a real driver for business transformation. And this brings us to the next slide. AI brings tremendous opportunities, but many organizations stumble by starting at the wrong place. At Arribatec, we make sure your organization is truly AI-ready so you can unlock the real value, not just boost productivity, but use AI as a strategic tool for business transformation. The key is understanding your architecture. If you don't know your strategies, processes, people and IT systems, et cetera, how disconnect, your AI journey is likely to fail before it starts. This is why we begin by ensuring your processes work as intended. Only then it -- does it make sense to power them with AI. So the architecture and operational excellence gets your systems and processes aligned. ERP executions add power and insight into your operations and cloud unlocks automation and enables AI technologies on secure platforms. When these elements work together, AI becomes a true enabler for transformation and not just being a buzzword. The architecture ensure clarity and alignment, operational excellence, deliver efficiency and readiness, and ERP provides a backbone for execution and control and cloud unlock the innovation and future scalability. I will now give you some highlights from the business from the fourth quarter before Magnus share more on the financials. There are 4 things I would like to highlight from this quarter. The continued growth in the company that we have gone from our restructuring phase to a more scaling phase, the market tailwind we experienced on sovereign cloud and AI. And finally, I will walk you through the performance improvements we are seeing in EA-BPM. Okay. So let's begin with the financial highlights, where we continue to see strong growth. Revenue grew by NOK 18 million year-over-year, representing a 13.7% increase. Recurring revenue remains a strategic priority, and this went up nearly 16% year-over-year. This growth reflects not only increased sales of our own IP and partner solutions, but also a deliberate shift in how we structure our service delivery. On profitability, the EBITA development is especially encouraging. We improved by NOK 30 million compared to Q4 last year, bringing our margin to just below 10%. This demonstrates that our improvements are translating into real bottom line growth. With that foundation in place, let's turn to the 3 key drivers behind these results. This heading captures where we stand today. The work we have done restructuring our operations is showing up in the numbers, and we are now shifting our focus towards scaling. Let make you -- let's walk you through these -- each of these segments. Business Services continues its positive development, delivering 23.6% revenue growth and bringing the total revenue to NOK 90 million with a healthy EBITA margin of nearly 15% and NOK 13 million. This reflects a high activity level, successful cloud migration projects in both new and existing markets, several new client wins and contract extensions and increasingly effective use of AI. We're also seeing growing revenue contribution from our own IP, which is strategically important for our long-term margin profile. In EA-BPM, revenue came in at NOK 27 million, down 2.7% compared to Q4 last year. This is primarily driven by fewer available FTEs compared to 2024. This again is driven by a high number of parental leave. More telling is the margin development. EBITA now exceeds 15%, driven by the operational and structural improvements that we have put in place. In cloud, revenue was NOK 37 million, slightly down 1% with a negative EBITA of NOK 1.4 million. We lost a key client during the period and the new clients coming in did not replace them quickly enough to offset the gap. However, this is a segment that we deliberately is investing in. Sovereign Cloud is attracting a strong market interest. AI capabilities are being embedded directly into our offerings and how we work, and our pipeline gives us a strong confidence going forward. Taken together, these 3 segments tells a consistent story. The restructuring is behind us, and we are building for scale. Moving to the third highlight, the market we operate in and why we believe the timing has never been better for Arribatec. We would like to mention our 4 significant market drivers converging right now. Regulations is tightening with the EU AI Act, Data Act, cloud sovereignty framework, all taking effect in 2025 and '26. The Norwegian government has committed over NOK 1 billion to AI and digital R&D, targeting 80% of the public sector AI adoption. At the same time, the geopolitical landscape is shifting. The U.S. CLOUD Act creates a real and permanent sovereign conflict. And today, 64% of Norwegian public IT runs on U.S. providers. And finally, there is a growing demand for AI solutions that can process sensitive data with Norwegian -- within Norwegian borders. The net effect is clear. Every regulations or regulatory wave increases the addressable market for Norwegian operated sovereign infrastructure. This is precisely where Arribatec is positioned. Our sovereign cloud offering is a Norwegian operated cloud infrastructure, data stays within Norwegian jurisdiction with no exposure to foreign legal systems and full compliance with NIS2, GDPR and sector-specific regulations. Complementing this is Arribatec Nexus, our sovereign AI operating model. This is an AI-powered development platform operating entirely within Norwegian borders, purpose built for sensitive workloads and positioned directly for the government AI adoption mandate. The market number speaks for themselves. Sovereign cloud spending is projected at $80 million (sic) [ $80 billion ] in '26 with 83% growth year-over-year in Europe and 84% of EU organizations already planning sovereign cloud adoption. We are not chasing this market. We are building the platform for it. Moving to the last highlight I want to present, EA&BPM, the operating system of the organization. This is a powerful way to think about what EA-BPM actually does. Just like an operating system running everything behind the scenes on your computer, enterprise architecture and business process management is the backbone that makes an organization run effectively. We work across 3 stages. First, we map, helping organization understand how they actually work across architecture, processes, people, systems and independencies. Then we optimize, reengineering operating models and value chains to ensure compliance and drive business transformation. And finally, we transform, enabling system to go-lives, cloud migrations and AI readiness with architecture and change management as the backbone. What makes this particularly valuable is how it connects across all the other segments, feeding directly into business services through, for example, ERP change management and into cloud through QualiWare on cloud infrastructure. Two practical examples illustrates this well. For global shipping and logistic company, we engaged on changed management for a major ERP transformation. And that pre-project scoping has grown into an ongoing delivery role. This is exactly how EA-BPM embeds itself into large-scale programs. For a leading Norwegian energy company, we are updating their EA-governance model and integrating the key data sources into QualiWare, making them AI ready, a concrete example of EA-BPM as an AI enabler in the industry. And finishing on the Q4 momentum, we enter the new year with a new EVP and a new management team in place. Our team close to full -- and the team is close to full capacity. We see a growing traction in the defense sector, and we have strengthened the BD and sales team, and we also have a new partnership agreement secured. So I would say the foundation is strong. Okay. That finishes off the business highlights, and we can move over to the financial review of the quarter. So Magnus?

Thank you, Ole Jakob. As you heard, this was a solid quarter. What we're seeing in Q4 is the fourth consecutive quarter of profitable growth and on continuing operations. Let me walk you through the numbers. Revenue came in at NOK 152.5 million in Q4, up almost 14% year-on-year. That makes it our strongest quarter and the fifth consecutive quarter of year-on-year growth on continuing operations. Growth was primarily driven by Business Services, which grew 24%, while cloud and EA-BPM saw modest declines. On a full year basis, revenue reached NOK 579 million, up 16% from NOK 500 million last year. Recurring revenue grew to NOK 67 million in the quarter, up 16% year-on-year and now represents 44% of total revenue. This is an important indicator of the stability and predictability of our revenue base. EBITA improved from negative NOK 15.8 million in Q4 last year to positive NOK 14.4 million this quarter, a swing of over NOK 30 million. The EBITA margin landed at 9.4%. For the full year, EBITA came in at NOK 50 million, representing an improvement of over NOK 92 million compared to 2024. That's a full year margin of 8.7% compared to negative 8.4% the year before. This confirms that the operational improvements we have implemented are structural and not seasonal. Turning to cash flow. Operating cash flow was strong at NOK 21.9 million in Q4, up from NOK 18.8 million in the same quarter last year. Profit before tax contributed NOK 10.4 million. Working capital movements were roughly neutral. We had a negative swing on NOK 1.1 million from receivables and payables combined, offset by a positive NOK 1.6 million from contracted assets and liabilities. On the investing side, we used NOK 7.8 million on capitalized development of intangible assets, primarily related to our own IP products. So if you adjust the operating cash flow for these capitalized development costs, net cash generation was approximately NOK 14 million for the quarter. Financing activities were broadly neutral at positive NOK 0.3 million, including NOK 1.5 million in proceeds from share issued in relation to our warrant program. Cash ended the quarter at NOK 73.8 million, up from NOK 60.5 million at the end of Q3 and more than triple the NOK 23.1 million we had at this point last year. On the balance sheet, the picture is strong and clean. We have 0 interest-bearing debt. The full credit facility remains available as a backstop. Equity stands at NOK 301 million, giving us an equity ratio of 63.6%, up from 42.8% at year-end 2024. The improvement reflects both profitable operations and the capital increases completed during the year. Total assets are NOK 473 million. On the liability side, our main items are lease liabilities of NOK 24 million, accounts payable of NOK 34 million and contract liabilities of NOK 30 million, all ordinary working capital items. In summary, no debt, strong cash and a solid equity base that gives us flexibility going forward. That concludes the financial review for the quarter. I will now hand the word back to you, Ole Jakob.

The Board proposes a dividend for 2026 based on the 2025 results. This will be presented as a recommendation to the Annual General Meeting. The proposal is a dividend of NOK 1 per share, which on 69 million shares outstanding gives a total distribution of approximately NOK 69 million. At the closing share of NOK 7.98 on December 31, that represents a dividend yield of approximately 12.5%. The Board considered this appropriate given the strong full year EBITA and our cash position. The company retains sufficient financial flexibility for operations and future investment after the proposed distribution. Okay. That was it for now. Now we will give you a couple of minutes to submit your questions, and we will be back shortly. Welcome back. We have received a lot of questions that we will answer one by one. The Q&A session will be led by Magnus. So Magnus, over to you.

Thank you, Ole Jakob. Yes, we'll go through the questions in a structured manner. We have a few overlapping questions. So there, we will answer based on those themes. We'll start off by commenting on the high capitalization and investment during the quarter and a bit on expectations for 2026. So generally, we expect CapEx in 2026 to be broadly in line with 2025 levels. Regarding Q4 specifically, we had an elevated level of capitalization, which was driven by a one-off catch-up related to development costs. We concluded that these costs qualify for capitalization and that the underlying development also overlaps with an approved SkatteFUNN project for 2025. This was more a timing and classification matter rather than a change in our run rate capitalizations. Further on, we have a question on the breakdown of our ARR revenue and what is derived from software licenses compared to services. Great question. On our Q4 breakdown, which is broadly representative for the business mix for each quarter, our support and services account for roughly 25% our own IP, roughly 15% and third-party licenses roughly 60%. There was a question whether we had a change in strategy for in-house software add-ons to our client offering. And we have not moved away from developing in-house add-on software for our clients. Rather on the contrary, we believe that this remains an important part of our road map and value proposition to clients. In Q4, we also invested in reorganizing our development teams so that we can facilitate faster development cycles and deployments and more scalability towards our clients. And we expect this to support continued growth also on IP going forward.

We also have this new Nexus -- Arribatec Nexus development platform as well that will make the development more -- much more effective with the use of AI as well.

Yes. We had some questions related to share-based compensation. So on this, I want to mention that the share-based compensation cost in Q4 includes a catch-up component from a previous allocation. Going forward, there will be ongoing noncash charges related to the vesting of the program, but they will be at a lower run rate than the levels that were recognized in Q4. Pending share price, of course. Good. We have a question regarding development in OpEx compared to Q3. I would say OpEx increase Q4 compared to Q3 is largely affected by nonrecurring items. We have the previously mentioned share option catch-up and we also, as written in the report, have a one-off sales bonus periodization affecting those numbers. On other operating expenses, we see similar share-based compensation element under a consulting agreement. In addition to that, we carried quite a bit of headquarter costs related to the reverse share split we completed and also various warrant exercises leading up to the completion of that program in early January. So in short, a large share of the increase is nonrecurring or noncash in nature. Yes. We have a question here if there is a plan to release any financial targets for coming periods. That's not up to us. It's up to the Board. The Board is [ evaluating ] this, but -- and we will communicate in due course if that is -- keep in mind that would be in addition to the dividend policy communicated yesterday. We have some comments to order intake and pipeline relative to the year-over-year comparison, so -- and also expectations. This Q4 was lower than what was reported for the same period last year. However, I would say that we don't see or experience any structural changes in the underlying demand for our services. We expect order intake for '26 to largely follow a similar seasonality as we experienced last year. And generally, we would say that our pipeline remains healthy across all business areas. Good. We have a question regarding ability to scale revenues on current OpEx, i.e., operating leverage. Generally speaking, I would say that our business model has inherent operating leverage, particularly in cloud to a very high degree. Business Services and EA-BPM, similarly so in the sense that higher utilization or recurring revenue streams translates to margin. Specifically, I'd say that we're not providing any margin guidance at this stage. But the characteristics of the business does support margin expansion as we continue to scale.

Anything else coming in?

Let me check.

Should you have questions after the session as well, you can also use the e-mail at [email protected], and we will answer those after the session when they come.

Yes. We have one question there, maybe for you, Ole Jakob. What is your view on the resilience of ERP systems like the ones we deliver to our clients and software and the sensitivity to a potential AI disruption. I tend to see with enterprises that we work that this is something that adds value to the ERP systems that we deliver, but I'll...

No, I absolutely support that. We actually -- we'll see this as a strength because we can add on with AI functionality to the ERP software. So we don't think any AI tool will come in, in short-term and disrupt the ERP deliveries that we have. The ERP system is standing strong at the client side. It would be [indiscernible] to replace that with some AI-made solution because the ERP that we bring in is software that has been adjusted and perfected over many years. We don't only bring in a system, but we also bring in a wealth of deep expertise in the software in the industry. You will also take part of a larger community when you use one of our ERP solutions. So I think how we see this is that we have used the strength that comes with AI in developing useful add-ons. So I think, yes, it will affect the ERP solution, but it will not replace it. But there's a lot of things in AI that we will use when we deliver the ERP that will strengthen the functionality in ERP systems. It will probably be AI agents that can do stuffs in the ERP solutions. We can probably automate more with the use of ERP. But if you kind of connect the AI with ERP, you have a great technology that can explore or take advantage of the rich data one ERP system has. So I think from how we see it, it's just an upside.

Thanks a lot. Last question, we have a question regarding timing of dividends, also given our current momentum in the business. So I think, first of all, the proposed [indiscernible] confidence in the company's ability to generate cash. Secondly, I'd say we expect similar cash flow dynamics in '26 as we experienced in '25. We do have also significant prepayments from customers early in the year, providing a strong working capital inflow for the business. And besides that, and as communicated yesterday, we have communicated what we see as necessary cash requirements for operational cash within the business. Yes. Let me do a final check here on questions. I think that's it for the Q&A session.

Thank you so much for all the great questions. I think we'll just leave it at that. Should you have other questions, please send it to our IR e-mail. And then we'll just thank you for listening in. Thank you for the questions, and have a great rest of the day.