Ibstock plc (IBST) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

So good morning, and welcome to the 2023 Full Year Results presentation for Ibstock plc. I hope you enjoyed that little video, which I think embraces the heritage of our brand and our diverse offer to the market. To those of you joining us in person today, I'd like to welcome you and for those of you dialing in, welcome and thank you for joining us. With me today as normal is our CFO, Chris McLeish. So turning first to the agenda. After my initial overview, Chris will walk us through the financials and cover divisional performance, after which I'll provide a market update and talk about the progress we've made both operationally and strategically as a business over the last 12 months. Having covered the outlook, Chris and I will be very happy to answer your questions. So turning first to the overview. I'm pleased to report a resilient performance for the year in what have been challenging market conditions. Delivering a performance in line with the expectations set at the beginning of the year really underlines the quality and resilience of the business and the investments in our people and assets over recent years. As well as taking decisive action to manage performance this year, we've continued to build the platform for sustainable growth over the medium term. And I'm delighted to say that we are now commissioning our new lowest carbon brick factory at Atlas in the West Midlands which will offer the U.K.'s first carbon neutral brick. We also made 2 small bolt-on acquisitions in concrete, which complement our existing portfolio, which we expect to grow over the next 2 years. And we continue to develop Ibstock Futures with strong top line growth in our facades business and solid progress towards the development of investments in decarbonization. I retain a strong conviction that Ibstock can be a leader in sustainability and decarbonization across U.K. construction markets, and this has moved closer to reality in the last 12 months. Our balance sheet remains strong with leverage in the middle of our target range, and this is a source of resilience in these uncertain times and also provide strategic optionality as we think about the opportunities presented by market recovery. And with that, let me hand over to Chris to take us through the financials.

Thanks, Joe, and good morning, everyone. Revenues of GBP 406 million represented a reduction of 21% on last year, reflecting significantly lower activity levels in our core residential markets. Adjusted EBITDA reduced by around 23% to GBP 107 million. I will provide more detail on the divisional profit drivers later in the presentation, but overall group margins remained strong at over 26% despite the more subdued market. Adjusted earnings per share of 13.9p was around 39% below the level of 22.7p reported in the prior year period. With a continuing focus on cash management, our balance sheet remained strong with leverage at 1.1x. Our return on capital employed reduced to 13.4%, reflecting both the lower operating profit and an increase in the capital base as the group deployed capital into our major organic growth projects, 2 small acquisitions in the Concrete division and inventories to support our medium-term ambitions. The Board has recommended a final dividend of 3.6p, representing a full year dividend of 7p, a payout of 50% of adjusted earnings per share, in line with our capital allocation framework. Moving to revenue. We set out on this slide, group revenues compared to the comparative figures in 2022. U.K. domestic book deliveries reduced by 30% compared to the prior year. Clay revenues reduced by around 21%, reflecting materially lower volumes in line with the broader domestic brick market. Selling prices remained stable, which, combined with pricing action taken during the latter part of 2022 meant that the division achieved a year-on-year price benefit. In Concrete, revenues also reduced 21% with a similar volume impact within the residential product categories. Our infrastructure business, which operates in a number of attractive niche markets delivered a more resilient performance. Stable pricing through the year delivered a price benefit within the Concrete division as well. Turning now to cover divisional financial performance, starting with Clay. Despite the backdrop of lower market demand, the division delivered a solid performance with EBITDA margins in the core business, excluding the Futures investment in line with the prior year. The key to this outcome was consistent efficient factory performance allied to robust commercial execution and decisive cost action across all areas of the divisional cost base. We ran the factory network at levels above market demand, taking the opportunity to build back inventories from lower levels to ensure we are well positioned to support customers as market activity recovers. This provided a benefit to EBITDA as we absorbed around GBP 13 million of fixed cost into closing inventories in the Clay division. As we guided at the start of the year, we continue to invest in research, innovation and business development within Ibstock Futures, recognizing costs of around GBP 5 million in this regard, in line with 2022. Turning to cover Concrete. The Concrete division performed well despite the market backdrop with the breadth of end market exposure, supporting strong performance and a stable EBITDA margin percentage which at 16.4% was in line with the 2022 year. Joe will say more about the Concrete business later in the presentation, but this good performance reflects the attractive product categories we compete in and the ability we have to deploy our factory network in an agile way in response to levels of market demand. Our infrastructure business performed well with customers valuing the innovation and our reduced carbon proposition with top line growth and a strong margin contribution. The division also built inventory delivering a modest benefit of around GBP 2 million to EBITDA in the year. In response to the weaker near-term demand outlook, during the year, we completed a comprehensive operational review to reduce our fixed cost base and ensure that our network capacities are more closely aligned to market activity levels. The program of restructuring arising from this review involved a number of temporary actions, including extended shutdowns and reduced shift patterns across many of our factories. We also took the decision to close 2 Clay factories at Ravenhead in the Northwest and South Holmwood in the Southeast. Together, these factories accounted for approaching 10% of our Clay brick capacity at the start of the 2023 year. We also took actions to reduce our indirect headcount and cost base across the business. In total, this restructuring program will deliver annual benefits of GBP 20 million, with around GBP 5 million of this achieved in the 2023 year. We have recognized exceptional costs of GBP 31 million in relation to this program, of which GBP 10 million are cash costs. Around half of these cash costs were paid in 2023 with the other half to be paid in 2024. Additionally, we expect to incur cash costs of up to GBP 5 million over the next 12 months as we decommission the permanently closed sites. I have included a table in the appendix to today's presentation to set out in more detail both the profit and cash impacts associated with this program. Moving to cover cash flow. During the period, the business invested GBP 37 million in working capital. The majority of this related to an increase in finished goods inventories, which will provide the platform for rapid recovery as markets normalize. Tax represented a small inflow of GBP 1 million as we benefited from the accelerated tax write-down for qualifying capital expenditure. Other cash flows increased slightly to GBP 15 million, principally due to a property lease entered into within Ibstock Futures, which is the new scalable base for our facades business in the West Midlands, and also includes the GBP 3 million cash consideration for the Coltman Concrete acquisition. We continued to invest in fixed capital with GBP 66 million deployed in the period. Sustaining expenditure amounted to GBP 21 million, with the balance of GBP 45 million relating to the redevelopment of the Atlas and Aldridge factories, investment in brick slips and several other smaller growth projects. Moving to the balance sheet. Net debt increased by around GBP 55 million in the year to GBP 101 million. As I said, the group invested almost GBP 100 million in fixed capital and inventory during the year to ensure that the business is well placed for market recovery. At 1.1x leverage remains in the middle of our target range. As Joe said, this position continues to afford us both resilience in uncertain times and strategic optionality in respect of future growth opportunities. Looking forward, I would anticipate a degree of seasonal working capital build during the first half and for working capital to be broadly flat across the 2024 year as a whole. With the group now in the latter stages of a significant capital investment program, I would like to remind you of the cost and return expectations from our key organic growth projects. Commissioning of our new Atlas wire cut factory is now well underway as is the adjacent factory at Aldridge in the West Midlands. We have just under GBP 10 million of CapEx to be spent during the current financial year, which will bring the total cost to GBP 75 million. Although we will be managing the output of Atlas and Aldridge in the near term, in light of market conditions, at full output, we expect the investment to generate some GBP 18 million of incremental EBITDA. We're also making good progress on building a scaled leadership position in brick slips at our Nostell site in West Yorkshire. The numbers that you see on the screen include the 2 related investment projects. The first, an automated cutting line is now in its commissioning phase and will create capacity for 17 million slips per annum. The second investment and extruded slip systems factory will be capable of producing up to 30 million slips once operating at full capacity. To date, we have spent around GBP 12 million on these investments and we'll match the remaining build schedule to market growth over the next 2 years. Overall, once operating at full capacity, we expect the slips investments to generate incremental EBITDA of at least GBP 12 million per annum. Before I hand back to Joe, I would like to briefly update the moving parts of guidance for the 2024 year. We expect residential construction markets to remain subdued in the 2024 year. Overall, our base case assumes flat domestic market volumes year-on-year, with volumes being weighted towards the second half. As I said earlier, we expect our restructuring actions to deliver an incremental GBP 15 million year-on-year with this benefit being broadly equivalent to the EBITDA benefit we recognized in 2023 from fixed cost absorption. On energy, we have locked in around 70% of our projected requirements for the balance of '24 at prices broadly in line with 2023. Underlying interest expense for the 2024 year is projected to be above the level of '23 as borrowings increase under the variable rate bank facility. And the underlying effective tax rate is expected to be around 26%, reflecting the full annualized impact of the 25% U.K. corporation tax rate and normal levels of nondeductible expenses. On cash, I expect sustaining capital expenditure to remain at around GBP 20 million and growth capital on Atlas, Aldridge and Nostell to total between GBP 25 million and GBP 30 million. We expect to pay both the remaining GBP 5 million severance costs from our restructuring program and up to GBP 5 million of site decommissioning cash costs over the next 12 months. With that, let me pass back to Joe.

Thanks, Chris. So turning to first update on our markets. We can see the impact on the slowdown in new build housing on the U.K. brick industry. In 2023, the brick market reduced by 32.5% versus 2022, down to just under 1.7 billion U.K. manufactured bricks were down at 30%, with imports down by 42%. With inventory levels increasing, the industry has adjusted capacity for the near term with site closures on mothballed assets. Inflation is easing and mortgage lending rates have moderated, leading to some early more positive indicators this year, such as inquiry level and sales rates per site per week. However, this has not translated into activity levels yet and affordability, especially with first-time buyers is an ongoing issue. With the general election at some point in the next 12 months, we note the statements of support from the major political parties for more accelerated levels of housebuilding, but the speed of recovery will be dependent on the remobilization of housebuilding supply chains and planning lead times. Overall, we anticipate residential construction markets will remain subdued in the near term with some improvement as the year progresses. Despite this, however, it's important to note that the fundamental drivers underpinning residential market demand over the medium term remain firmly in place. We know there's significant unmet demand for new housing with supply falling short of household formations consistently over many years. 2023 and the projected levels for 2024 will exacerbate these shortages, which will be further compounded by the forecasted population growth in the U.K. We also know that the age of housing stock in the U.K. will require widespread replacement and retrofit over the years ahead. And the changing regulatory landscape, including the future home standard will require the use of more sustainable materials and solutions. We expect that addressing these issues will be a key election theme, we hope as well for any prospective government and would therefore assume that policies would support first-time buyers and much needed planning reforms, all of which should stimulate new build housing. But as the market comes back, it will continue to evolve. We will see more diversified forms of ownership, greater high-density urban residential development and an intensifying focus on building safety, quality and sustainability. So how is Ibstock positioned to deliver and support this recover. Although we have closed 2 sites last year, we have major capacity coming on stream with the Atlas project, and we have invested significant capital over the last 5 years to upgrade the reliability and efficiency of our factories. Most of our remaining 16 Clay brick sites have seen material investment of enhancement or growth capital over the period since 2018. These investments give us cost and energy efficiency, reliability and capacity increase to support the market as it comes back. It also means we have, on average, the most sustainable, low-carbon products on the market. We've also seen a strong and consistent pipeline of new product development in Clay, which have been successful at displacing imports. And we are sharpening our commercial capabilities with major steps taken in 2023 through the creation of a unified one Ibstock brand and an integrated commercial team across the core businesses, meaning we now go to market with a single sales force. I'm pleased to say that these changes are already delivering some initial benefit through solution selling and a more joined up approach to commercial pipeline management. You can see on this slide the evolution of our Clay network capacity over the last 12 months and how this will evolve as the market recovers. And I think it's important to appreciate that the Clay network post Atlas will be 5% larger than Clay network in place 12 months ago and it will obviously have a fundamentally improved cost position and lower carbon footprint as a result of the investments that we've made. So let's just spend a bit of time on the drivers of performance in our Concrete business, and I want to explain why I think this business will be a key part of delivering our medium-term ambitions. So our diversified concrete products business operates in both residential and other construction markets and has delivered strong performance through the cycle, underpinned by an agile, scalable operating footprint and an ability to innovate and drive decarbonization in its product offering. We've deployed capital in a disciplined way. On top of sustaining capital load of at least GBP 3 million per annum, we've invested growth capital last year our walling stone factory in Anstone near Sheffield, which will increase capacity and reduce fixed costs from 2024. We've also made 2 small bolt-on acquisitions, which will broaden our customer proposition and provide greater network flexibility. Together, we expect these acquisitions to deliver revenues of at least GBP 15 million over the medium term. The breadth of our end market exposure continues to be an important for Concrete and I was delighted to see the strong performance of our infrastructure business, which grew its top line in 2023 with margins above the divisional average. Key to this growth was the way that we're able to innovate our products to meet the needs of our customers to reduce carbon and make our products lighter and easier to work with. Our customers are increasingly looking for solutions rather than just products. And with the alignment of our commercial teams across the core business, I'm convinced that the complementary nature of our Concrete business will drive increased value for us over the medium term. But whilst we're committed to developing our core business, we also know that U.K. construction markets are rapidly evolving, and that's why we are also focused on diversifying our business through, Ibstock Futures to respond to these forces of change. The mid high-rise construction market is growing rapidly with both new build and retrofit representing attractive new markets for Ibstock. Over 12,000 buildings in the U.K. require significant remediation work and sustainable firesafe solutions are being sought to address this challenge. The industry is also seeking low carbon solutions to address climate change. To this end, our extensive clay reserves and our R&D in creating energy from waste present the potential for Ibstock Futures to be a leader in decarbonization led growth over the years ahead. You can see from this slide on facades that in a relatively short period of time, we've built a strong portfolio of solutions and products to position Ibstock in the mid- to high-rise and modern construction markets. In addition to our existing core offer, we now have an array of glass fiber reinforced concrete products and panels, a range of mechanical fixed systems and other cladding materials, including natural stone and ceramic panels. And whilst revenue in this area is coming from a low base, we achieved impressive year-on-year growth in 2023, and we set further ambitious targets for growth in the years ahead. The key to achieving this will be leveraging the operating platform we are now putting in place. This platform includes our facades innovation hub at Power Park in the West Midlands, as well as the first phase of our significant slips investment in Nostell in Yorkshire. I'm really excited about the potential of our facades business and continue to see a strong pipeline of opportunities to grow it over the medium term. But as I said, we've also got some exciting options for growth centered on production of lower carbon materials. Following extensive technical studies, we've now completed the evaluation of our clay reserves and confirmed they have the properties, making them suitable for producing high-quality calcine clays. The wider use of calcine clays can meet the growing demand for cement alternative materials. And with existing supplementary cementitious materials such as fly ash and slag in shorter supply and with the need for cement producers to decarbonize, we believe calcine clay will become an important cementitious material. We've started discussions with potential partners around commercial arrangements for the production and sale of calcine clays, and we expect to progress this further in 2024. And we're also moving to the next phase of our development program for the use of waste material to produce alternative energy sources, allowing us to reduce and ultimately remove natural gas from our production processes. Having improved the technical feasibility of this process at our pilot plant last year, we are in discussion with partners who can collaborate with us to realize this technology at industrial scale over the next 12 to 24 months. So now let me summarize. I believe the strategic progress made over the last few years and the work done in 2023 to rightsize our business has given us a platform for growth in a number of areas as the market recovers. Firstly, in our factory network through investment and an optimized footprint and through our continuous focus on operational improvements, the fleet we now have in place will deliver high levels of capacity, efficiency and reliability with a materially lower carbon footprint. Secondly, having unified our powerful Ibstock brand, we have now created a single market-facing commercial team to drive improved, customer focus and enable cross-selling of our product ranges. This team is supported by the creation of a dedicated innovation and new product development organization. We believe this will unlock significant value over the years ahead through the quality of our brand and unrivaled product portfolio in the U.K. construction marketplace. Thirdly, we believe that the investments in facade systems and our leadership in brick slips will open up significant growth in the mid- to high-rise and modular markets. And finally, our R&D and decarbonization will give us big growth over the years ahead. Okay. So turning finally to the outlook. Looking forward, we anticipate that the residential construction markets will remain subdued in the near term with volumes improving as the year progresses. Against this backdrop, we have and will remain focused on doing the right things to respond to market conditions and deliver performance in the near term. But regardless of market conditions, we continue to focus on the execution of our strategy, ensuring that we are well placed to benefit as conditions improve. The improvements we have made over recent years, including organic investments have created a strong platform for recovery and growth and we retain a robust balance sheet affording us resilience and strategic optionality. Subject to the timing of market recovery and given the strength of our business and conviction and market fundamentals, we remain confident in achieving our stated medium-term financial targets. And with that, Chris and I again, I'll be happy to take your questions. As normal for the record, I'd be grateful if you could state your name and institution when asking the question. We'll take questions first from the room, then from the phone lines and finally, any written questions. And there are microphones doing rounds.

Gregor Kuglitsch from UBS. Maybe a couple of questions. So the first one is just sort of maybe if you can give us a sense now with all the moving parts and fixed cost capacity reduction what you would expect your operational leverage to be. So let's say, simplistically, your GBP 400 million revenue now? I don't know if just 10% extra volumes? How would you expect that to drop through to the bottom line and maybe taking into consideration also the sort of ramp of the new investments. And the second question is just on the cash flow walk for '24. So I was just telling up all the different elements of guidance and sort of strikes me that basically cash neutral, just tallying up the CapEx, the I guess, an EBITDA expectation baked in there, roughly where consensus is. Just if you could confirm that or if there's anything I'm missing.

Yes, I'll take this. Thanks, Gregor. In terms of the path to recovery, I mean our conviction is predicated on a belief that the brick market will get back to the levels that it was operating at in 2022. So remember, in '22, we were looking at a total U.K. brick market somewhere in the region of GBP 2.5 billion. And last year, that was just under GBP 1.7 billion. So that's the sort of 32% down that Joe referenced. As we build back, clearly, there will be significant volume coming back into the market as we get back to that. That GBP 2.5 billion was predicated on essentially building just over 200,000 units. So starts and completions were just over 200,000. That isn't consistent with the ambition that's been stated publicly. We need to fill that gap. But nonetheless, it gets us back to that level that we were at in 2022. The operational leverage in our P&L is such that as we see those volumes come back, we would expect to drop through somewhere in the region of sort of 45% or so. So that's the order of magnitude that we would look at. On top of that, clearly, there is the incremental value that comes through from those major growth investments. And when you think about Atlas, that is a function of 2 things. It affords us more volume in net term. So Joe talked about the incremental 5% but on the entire [ GBP 150 ] million that are going into the network, it puts a sort of fundamentally different cost point relative to the capacity that's replacing. So again, that sits in addition to that sort of operational leverage that comes through from the volume recovery as it comes. So we see the path back to that sort of normal market as we define it in 2022 bringing through a recovery in the top line driven by volume at that sort of level of drop-through and then the incremental return from the growth investments. In terms of the guidance on cash flow, Gregor, you're right. I mean I think the moving parts that we've set out today are such that free cash flow is sort of modestly positive in adjusted terms, we've got around GBP 10 million of exceptional cash payments that we expect to make in '24; GBP 5 million related to severance, GBP 5 million related to the decommissioning that we talked about. And if you assume a sort of level of payout consistent with '23 on the dividend that moves debt from around GBP 100 million, somewhere closer to sort of GBP 120 million to GBP 130 million, which I think is where the market has digested in our guidance is sitting, which I think it has that sort of view in the right sort of place.

Rob Chantry from Berenberg. Just a couple of questions from me. Very clear on, I guess, on the medium-term recovery dynamics. But could you help us think more about the '24, '25 story in terms of some of the nonobvious factors around remobilization of the housebuilders, planning factors which are kind of impacting the short-term volume recovery? And then secondly, on energy, 70% hedged, I think you put in the statement this morning. Where do you think that leaves your competitive proposition on price versus the market going into this year? And is there any related change to the hedging policy that you've kind of been through or will be looking at in the coming years, given how the pricing dynamics have worked over the past year or so?

I take the recovery. Okay. So look, I think we are seeing, as I said, some early green shoots, more inquiries, more sales rates per site but the reality is what we need to see is that that's going to have to translate through. And there's a lot of things that affected planning. It's taking longer at the moment. I think we've heard from 12 months to 18 months, at least now for planning. That is a bit of a thing. Housebuilders haven't bought as much land. So that's going to have to come back and it takes time to purchase land and get that planning through. And then the remobilization of supply chain. I think people go away, groundworkers, bricklayers, subcontractors, they fall off and do other things. So we have to make sure we can remobilize them. So I think it's -- we expect 2024 to be flat ourselves. I think the CPA have got it slightly down. I think there's a slight recovery that the CPA forecast for next year in terms of housing starts and completions by about 5% in 2025. There's probably a lot of political stuff going to happen as well, and there's lots of promises, but those promises need to translate as well. And I think everyone -- there has to be some growth vectors for the U.K. economy. And I think that both sides of the house would be supportive, but that has to actually implement itself. So I think we're seeing flat this year and maybe a slight improvement second half and then into 2025 progressive improvement, probably about 5%, I'd say.

And Rob, just on energy. As you know, we consistently operate a policy where we purchase forward the energy that we're going to utilize in any given financial year. The logic for that is to give us price certainty and to enable us to be insulated against some of the major shops that have driven dislocation in energy markets going forward. So we think that, that continues to be the right strategy. As you say, we have 70% covered. As we sat here 12 months ago, we talked about a conviction that actually, we saw quite a big price premium in forward energy markets. And therefore, we're a little bit shorter than we would otherwise have been. And therefore, we took a little bit more covered during the year in '23. I think at 70%, that's a pretty normal level of forward coverage as we sit here looking towards the '24 year on the piece that we've locked in, as I said in the guidance, pretty much cost flat. So no inflation or deflation in that 70%. I think if we see a continuation of recent trend in energy markets with some level of softening, it presents the prospect of us being able to acquire that residual 30% of prices that could be below where we were in '23. But at this stage, it's too early to project exactly where we will do that. So I think that's pretty clear in that regard. And I think as we go forward, we'll continue to operate that policy. It's important to remember that energy is a large part of our cost base but it's about 1/3 of the variable cost base. And when you look across the rest of the variable cost base, which is really outbound transportation and the material and ingredients that we purchase for our processes, both on the clay and the concrete side, we're seeing a degree of inflation across those categories which is sort of low to mid-single digits. And then if you look on the fixed cost side, again, you're looking at something in that same sort of ballpark. So overall, that's why we referenced the fact in the statement that inflation is still a factor, but it's much more modest than it's been in previous years. That's the way to sort of think about things going forward.

Clyde Lewis at Peel Hunt. Two if I may. Could you help us with the profile of the ramping up that you expect to see in Atlas, Aldridge and Nostell. And I suppose sort of just to sort of check whether or not you're likely to fully load them as quickly as you can and given they're more efficient in terms of plants, but also trying to get a little idea of how quickly that brick slip market could evolve for you? The second one is around, I suppose, Concrete, that division, we've probably got a pretty good idea of how Clay evolves. Do you think Concrete will be materially different to Clay this year? But again, resi versus infrastructure is probably the debate there and also in terms of sort of the energy cost, the price cost, the inflation and the mix as to how that might evolve in terms of profitability for that business.

Okay. Do you want to do Concrete?

Yes.

As you run the Concrete business last year. So look, I think the key thing we're actually commissioning the Atlas and Aldridge projects right now. And the key thing is to get the commissioning done at 100% as fast as possible because you have a lot of cost with OEMs on site, so you want to try and improve that factory and really deliver the commissioning to capacity as quickly as possible. We expect to do that. We're doing it now. We expect that should be over by the midyear. We will obviously not get full capacity this year, but we'll ramp that factory up as fast as possible, but we will have to be conscious of market conditions. So what we tend to do, especially with a brand-new factory is build a healthy level of stock. So customers know it because you have a brand-new factory. And if you have issues, you want to have stock levels so that you can then sell into the market and still do your product development and so on. So Atlas will ramp up fully. But by the end of the year, it will be hitting, I would say, all of its top capacity. Aldridge is a bit of a smaller factory, and it's a little bit of further ahead because we've already been commissioning that at the end of last year. So that given the merchant market, which it really plays into the merchant market, it may not be having full utilization this year, but it's a much more carbon-friendly factory. You mentioned brick slips as well, Clyde. I think look, we believe we've got a market-leading position and a first-mover advantage there. The market is evolving rapidly, and we're going to have 17 million bricks worth of capacity for the automated cutting line this year. And then we will continue to evolve that. So we don't want to have all the capacity coming onstream immediately. And we've got existing systems that fit very well with those automated cutting lines and then the second extruded line will ramp that up into 2025. Do you want to say something on Concrete?

So on concrete, Clyde. I think, I mean, the Concrete business performed well. And I think we have a view that '24 will continue to be resilient. I think when you look at the breadth of product categories that, that business competes in, many of them are exposed to residential markets in the same way that the brick business is. So fairly similar sort of trends there. It has a slightly higher skew towards RMI than the new build which has proved slightly more resilient, obviously based on the data that you can see. So I think on that basis, we continue to see resilient performance there. Infrastructure was a very strong suit within the Concrete division last year. And clearly, HS2 is continuing to give us some work there. It is the end of the network rail control period, which transitions across to the next one, which normally means there's a degree of pause for breath as the industry goes from one control period to the next. But I still think that the infrastructure business will continue to be a source of strength for us as we go forward in terms of volume. And in terms of the sort of price cost I mean it's got a higher proportion of variable cost as a percentage of the total cost stack, and that's a little bit of a mixed bag. So you can see, for example, things like steel becoming somewhat cheaper, but actually in many of the ingredients within the Concrete business, we are seeing some continuing inflation there. But again, I think we would look to manage that business in a manner that seeks to maintain those margins which are broadly consistent with the medium-term ambition that we've got for concrete going forward. So I think that's the way that we would see things going forward in Concrete.

Aynsley Lammin from Investec. I think I've got 3, please. First, just wondered if you could give kind of view on the pricing discipline this year, obviously, particularly in the context of where inventory levels are, the new capacity from both yourselves and [ Forterra ] coming on stream. And then secondly, just on the kind of RM&I market, do you expect that to interest where the kind of stock levels are in the supply chain? Do you expect the merchants to also see a bit more demand coming through in the second half for that side? And just on imports, imports kind of where you expect them to trough here? Or do you expect them to fall away a bit more this year?

Okay. So with pricing, I think we've shown a bit of a track record of being holding price leadership in the market. And I think it's been a really important hallmark of our margin performance, managing price over cost is key to maintain our margins. We talk a lot to our customers around the investments we're making and having a well-invested industry to supply into the -- and support them. And a lot of the conversations I'm having with them are around the quality and the service and the ability to supply into the market as it comes back. So we will continue to maintain price discipline. And I think I'm saying that generally, there's not a lot of volume to be had anyway. There's always a bit of trading at the margins, but there's not a lot of volume to go after. So it's a zero-sum game. So I think we would hope to maintain stable pricing for sure. RMI, I think we're seeing some of the builders merchants, they've destocked. They know that the lead times are much shorter now because there's plenty of stock in the manufacturing yards, but we are seeing a little bit of restocking now. I wouldn't say that's on mass yet but there's a little bit of restocking. The RMI market is equally as subdued as the new build housing market, not much is going on at the moment. But we know there is pent-up demand with all the things around the housing stock and so on. And imports here, they fell. I mean, we said last year, I think in this meeting, I expected imports to come down to sort of GBP 300 million, GBP 350 million and that's exactly what happened. I think they'll maintain a market share, but I think they'll continue to be around 18% to 20% of the market.

Harry Dow from Redburn Atlantic. Just a couple of questions. On that point around capacity and where we come back as we sort of leave, I think that chart showed capacity to be 5% higher in the longer term versus '22 that you spoke then around a share of imports being 20% or something like that in the long term. That's going to be higher than historically we've spoken about and maybe we spoke. I don't know what level, but maybe lower than that structurally if the domestic market could supply it. You've taken out 10 that's permanent. I suppose the question is, how permanent is that? What are you doing with the sites in the longer term? Is it a case of a completely new plant? Or what's the opportunity there to feel to take share from imports in the future so that you could be 120% of the production you were in '22? And then just on the sort of technical question really on the pro forma contributions from the 2 acquisitions you did and then also on the calcined clay, what's actually needed to sort of take the clay and make it into that product? How long is the lead times? How does it cost?

So should I take the first and the last, and you take the middle. So yes, I mean, look, I think the industry has been investing. We've closed 2 older factories. Those 2 factories won't come back. We will continue to do what we normally do, which is recycle the assets potentially in land sales or other activities to generate cash to support our balance sheet over time. We've got a healthy level of capacity. I think that -- and we've moved up the competition have also invested in capacity. So the U.K. construction is still going to have a good level of capacity, 2.1 billion tonnes -- 2.1 billion bricks at least for the market. I think the issue around import is more nuanced. Imports tend to be softmud bricks, Ibstock has got the largest share of softmud and it's around product development and aesthetics that we need to do to displace further imports. Price is important, but increasingly carbon and bricks traveling a long way and especially some of the ethical issues associated with some of the bricks coming from where they come from. So I think that's what I would say on our capacity. We've got confidence that we can supply back into a GBP 2.5 billion market and maintain our market share very easily.

And just Harry, to build on that point. I mean we've talked in the past about realizing and recycling capital from a property estate over time. And we continue to believe that, that's an important source of capital. A good example is the actions that we took in 2020. Actually, there were 3 factories that we addressed as part of that rationalization. Nostell which we're now recommissioning as a diversified growth vehicle in Futures, there was a site in the south of England that was recycled and we generate exceptional cash flows of GBP 8 million in that regard. And the third one was Atlas that we were developing within the core. So we've got an array of options, and we'll continue to make the right choices around the deployment of that capital, either recycling it or using it within the core business as we go forward to make the right decisions for shareholders. In terms of the sort of pro forma contribution of the Concrete acquisitions, the Coltman business is a flooring business that's based at a freehold -- an attractive freehold site in the West Midlands. It's involved in the production of hollow core, staircases and landings. It sits very nicely against the existing business that we've got that's focused on floor beams and lift shafts today. So it makes a lot of sense from a synergies perspective to put those together. -- the G-Tech, rail business is a smaller business that operates in the rail sector, produces components that go into the production of platform Copers, which is already a product category that we operate in. So again, highly synergistic in -- in terms of the pro forma impact of those, the top line was around GBP 10 million. And together, they generated just over GBP 1 million of profit. So that's the sort of run rate that you can expect. Clearly, Coltman happened right at the end of the year, so you get a full year sort of impact of that as we go forward.

Yes. And as I said, calcine clay is very exciting. You can see what's happening in other parts of the world. People have converted cement factories to calcine clay to almost produce very, very low-carbon cement. And as you know, cement is made by limestone, heating limestone to create clinker. That clinker is the source of high carbon emissions, but it's also the source of the reactivity that you get to make the hydraulic binder. So calcine clay is a really big opportunity in reducing that carbon because it burns at much lower temperatures, and it's very reactive and has very low process emissions when you burn it. So it can really take out between 50% to 60% potentially. In terms of how do you get that into cementitious substance, there's different ways of doing it. You can calcine the material yourself and sell it to cement producers or you can look at partnerships with cement producers. And so different options are being explored at this stage.

[ Steven Rolands ] from Applied Value. Two from me, if I may. First of all, on facades. Quite obviously, you're doing brick slips and moving into making facades for yourself would be one way of using up that capacity and adding to earnings. How are you looking at that? Are you looking at that as sort of an EBITDA play or a return on capital play and how does it also work with customers who also make facades who might see you competing with them in that space? And how would you sort of square that off? And secondly, over the coming weeks, we're probably going to a number of meetings where people will tell us what wonderful product concrete bricks are. I wonder if you could sort of briefly remind us of the pluses and minuses of fire play bricks, which is still going to be the major product that you're going to be making for the next 10 years at least. Could you just talk us through that a little bit? And so we go fully equipped into the next few months.

With pleasure on the second one. But let's start with facades. Look, I mean we said a couple of years back, we did a big study to look at the mid- to high-rise market. This is the main area that we're playing in. There are some modular markets off-site housebuilding, but our main focus is the mid- to high rise market where you've got a concentrated job site with a lot of contractors, concentrated resources and complex supply chains. And increasingly, what we're seeing is the need for either mechanical fixed systems or panels going on to the outside of buildings, but they need to be noncombustible. So the ACM, the Aluminum Composite Materials, they're out of the way now. So people are really looking for aesthetic panels or solutions to go on. And that's what we're trying to do. And actually, most of that universe, you're not competing with anyone. It's small mom-and-pop contractors installing and it's Tier 1 contractors, the large people who want to do it. So having Ibstock when I go to talk to them, they're quite excited to have a larger player moving into that market because when you've got a GBP 300 million building going up, you want some indemnification that things are not going to go pop because of a small contractor. So they're quite excited about that. It's quite an interesting learning for us. It's much more -- a lot more design estimation and overhead to get the solution on that's not just a product, it's a whole solution, and it's the lead times are a little bit longer. But we see that -- the market is a huge addressable market, both from the mid high-rise growth with things like build-to-rent and commercial, residential, student accommodation and so on. and also the recladding. So we've got solutions for recladding as well. So this is a really important market for us. It's an EBITDA play because we want to grow the business and diversify it. And we've said on the slips, for example, the investments we're going to make will be GBP 12 million EBITDA. But the rest of the business, the facade sort of business, we want to grow that to GBP 100 million in the next -- we said in our -- a few years ago, the midterm targets. So we're excited about facades and will continue to grow. I mean last year, we didn't -- we came from a very low base from GBP 4 million to GBP 12 million in a year, but that shows the potential for growth and movement. Concrete bricks. Look, there's lots of stuff going on about concrete bricks. Concrete bricks are a good product. We make concrete walling stone. We make concrete, we like concrete. But I think there's quite a lot of misconceptions around the carbon credentials of a concrete brick. When they compare with clay bricks, they take the whole of the U.K. clay brick range, which is about 4,000, and they compare that with the best 3 that concrete have got, okay? If I was to take the best that Atlas will be, you're looking at 13 meters of carbon, kilos -- 13 kilos of carbon per meter compared to a concrete brick, which is about 24, right? So -- and the aesthetics that you get with clay when you vitrify it and the longevity, the lasting enduring nature of clay brick, most people want a clay bricks. And then also, I think there are other benefits in terms of absorption, liability, infrastructure. So it's Clay, we believe, Clay in terms of the aesthetic on the facade is a champion. But we're not down play in concrete bricks either, we think there is a place for them in the market. Are there any questions online, no? And there are no questions on the phone. Okay. Well, with that, thanks very much. Look, we believe we've had a really resilient performance last year in quite challenging conditions. But I think we are well positioned for some real potential growth as the market comes back. So thanks for your attention today, and we can have a little chat afterwards. Thank you.

Thanks all.