Inchcape plc (INCH) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us for Inchcape's 2022 full year results. I am joined by our acting CFO, Adrian Lewis; and our Head of Investor Relations, Raghav Gupta. As usual, we'll begin with a presentation followed by your questions. The presentation is already available on the group website and a recording of this call will follow later today. We've set out the agenda on Slide 3. I'll begin by running through the year's strategic highlights and headline KPIs before handing over to Adrian, who will provide more detail about our financial performance. I will then present a few slides on Derco, updating you on the first 80 days following completion of the acquisition at the end of last year. I will also cover the progress we've made with our Accelerate strategy since unveiling it at our Capital Markets Day in November 2021. We'll then close with a looking ahead section. After that, we'll take your questions. So let's get going. On this slide, we have summarized our 2022 strategic highlights and what a great year we have had. I'd like to thank each and every one of our colleagues who have fully embraced our Accelerate strategy and through their expertise, dedication and teamwork are helping us drive our business to new heights. Fantastic execution from our teams drove double-digit profit growth across all our regions, and the group delivered another excellent level of free cash flow generation. During the year, we made substantial progress with our Accelerate strategy and our 2 exciting strategic growth opportunities, distribution excellence and vehicle life cycle services. Firstly, in distribution excellence, we have continued to extend our global leadership in automotive distribution. The shift of our portfolio towards distribution has been accelerated by the transformational acquisition of Derco and a continuation of our bolt-on M&A strategy. I'll come back to Derco shortly, but let me reiterate how pleased we are to have completed the transaction in 2022 and how excited we are to have the business in our group. It is evident that we are increasingly recognized as the consolidator of choice in the highly fragmented automotive distribution industry. Early in 2022, we completed a swift exit from Russia, further reducing our retail-only exposure. Furthermore, in distribution excellence, we are leading the way with our digital and data capabilities, rolling DXP, our digital experience platform out to more markets and more OEMs and also added new functionality to both our DXP and data analytics platform. This is a key area of differentiation for us versus our distribution competition, which supports our drive for further consolidation. Secondly, vehicle life cycle services or VLS, where we have identified a huge profit opportunity beyond the first user phase of a vehicle's life. We launched bravoauto, a digital-first used car platform in Q4 2021. And during 2022, we have rolled it out to all 3 distribution regions. Our second VLS opportunity is the digital parts platform. During 2022, we focused on developing the platform and piloted it in Australia. I'll come back to talk about VLS a little later. And finally, we've made excellent progress with our responsible business strategy. Responsible business sits at the heart of everything we do and is central to our future plans. It benefits Inchcape by bringing us closer to our customers, ensuring we remain a trusted partner to OEMs and helping us recruit, engage and retain the best talent. All of these elements are fundamental to the successful delivery of our Accelerate strategy and to ensuring Inchcape sustainability for the long term. Responsible business has 4 pillars: Planet, People, Places and Practices. In Planet, we've made considerable progress towards our Scope 1 and 2 targets, helped by the adoption of renewable energy sources in our markets. In People, we launched a number of important programs during 2022 across the business, such as inclusion and diversity training as well as initiatives to promote mental and physical well-being. We also continue to expand our women in leadership program across the business. In Places, we have partnered with charities in our local communities to create prosthetic limbs, made them spare car parts and introduced road safety awareness programs. And in Practices, we have also promoted our whistleblower hotline and have received recognition from ISO for our global health and safety program. Slide 6 shows our headline KPIs. Inchcape's performance in 2022 was fantastic with growth and progress across all our key financial and nonfinancial indicators. The group reported revenue of GBP 8.1 billion, 18% ahead of the prior year. The combination of this strong top line growth and higher operating margins drove the group's PBT of GBP 373 million, up 50% from GBP 249 million in 2021. We delivered another year of excellent free cash flow performance, generating a record GBP 380 million. The group's return on capital employed in 2022 was 41% with the year-on-year increase driven by the improvement in profitability and our full year dividend amounts to 28.8p. The positive momentum is also evident across our nonfinancial indicators. We have continued to increase the proportion of women in senior leadership positions, which in 2022 stood at 22%, up from 18% in 2021. In Planet, we have reduced our Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas emissions by 24% versus the 2019 baseline. This is considerable progress towards our target of a 46% reduction by 2030, and we have clear plans to get there. We have also increased the proportion of battery electric vehicles we sell with it today accounting for 1.8% of all new vehicles. And finally, in terms of customers, we focus on a third-party measurement of what our customers say about us and their experience across our network. Our Reputation.com score increased again and at 671, we are significantly above the industry average 555. Let me now hand over to Adrian, who will run through the financial performance in more detail.

Thank you, Duncan, and good morning, everyone. Let's start with the headline financials on Slide 8. Unless otherwise mentioned, all numbers are stated in actual currency rates and on an adjusted basis. Organic figures are on constant currency rates. In 2022, we generated revenue of GBP 8.1 billion, which is 15% above the prior year on an organic basis. Moving to profitability, our operating margin was 5.1%, and group PBT was GBP 373 million. This reflects the strong improvement in revenue and operating margin driven by a combination of robust consumer demand and price mix tailwinds following a prolonged period of new vehicle supply shortages. We had another strong year of free cash flow generation, generating GBP 380 million in the year, the group's highest ever level. The year-end net debt position of GBP 378 million reflects the completion of the acquisition of Derco and results in a net debt-to-EBITDA ratio of 0.6x. Adjusted EPS amounts to 72p, in line with the group's dividend policy, which pays out 40% of annual basic adjusted EPS, the full year dividend per share is 28.8p. So it's a great set of results. And on Slide 9, we show the key income statement items with the half yearly splits. Looking first at revenue, you will see it was second half weighted. The GBP 4.2 billion was 19% above the prior year on an organic basis. Growth was in part supported by the continuing improvement in supply, having reached its lowest point during late 2021. The second half also benefited from the full impact of the acquisitions of Ditec and Simpson, which we started to consolidate from Q2. In respect of margins for the year, a combination of the improved top line performance, higher than historical gross margins and operating leverage supported a significantly better operating margin of 5.1%, which is 100 basis points ahead of 2021. In the second half, operating margin was 4.9%, which reflects a degree of margin normalization, setup costs related to new OEM relationships and some VLS related investments. The improvement in operating profit flowed through to group PBT of GBP 373 million. Slide 10 shows distribution revenue performance split by region. In light of the acquisition of Derco, we have realigned our regional disclosures to be consistent with the group's management responsibilities and reporting structure. As such, Americas will be reported separately from Africa, which is now combined with the Europe region, while APAC will be reported as a single segment, including both Asia and Australasia. We have provided the first half and full year splits based on both the new and old segmental disclosure in the appendix. In 2022, total distribution revenue rose 22% year-on-year in constant currency and 17% organically, a continuation of the strong performance we have seen since the pandemic. In APAC, revenue grew 2% on an organic basis, with a strong rebound in Australasia, offset by unfavorable trading conditions in Hong Kong and Singapore. Performance across the rest of Asia was good. Looking ahead, we expect performance in APAC will continue to improve in 2023, underpinned by improving vehicle supply, particularly in Australasia. And whilst early days, we are starting to see signs of positive momentum in Hong Kong, helped by the reopening of the border with China. In Singapore, we expect to see improved vehicle license availability from 2024, and performance across the rest of Asia is expected to trend positively. In Europe and Africa, revenue increased 30% on an organic basis, driven primarily by continued market share gains in Europe, supported by an improved vehicle supply situation. Performance in Africa was also helped by higher volumes and the aftermarket business. In 2023, Europe and Africa is expected to benefit from an improving vehicle supply situation, which will support the delivery against a strong order book. Americas revenue grew 32% organically and was up 56% in constant currency terms as the region benefited from a meaningful contribution from new distribution businesses. Organic growth was driven by strong performance across all major markets, including Chile, Colombia and Peru. The start of 2023 has seen some markets in the Americas, in particular, Chile and Colombia lap difficult comparators. Our performance in the region has nevertheless continued to be solid, supported by our geographic diversity, strong operational execution and a broad brand portfolio. As is the case with many of our markets in which we operate, the Americas region benefits from the long-term structural tailwinds of high GDP growth prospects and low motorization rates, and we are optimistic and confident about the midterm growth opportunities this region presents. Turning now to distribution operating profit and margins on Slide 11. The strong top line growth drove operating profit to GBP 363 million and an operating margin of 6.2%. We delivered growth across all regions with an increased participation from our higher-margin regions, the Americas and APAC. Profitability in APAC improved due to a combination of the strong top line performance and cost control in Australasia. Profitability in Hong Kong and Singapore was supported by cost mitigation measures against the backdrop of a subdued top line growth. Elsewhere in Asia, our newly acquired commercial vehicle business in Guam and Micronesia contributed positively. In Europe and Africa, revenue growth in Europe supported the improvement in profitability, while our business in Africa proved resilient. In the Americas, the strength of demand against the backdrop of only gradually improving supply supported profitability. In the second half, margins returned to a more normal level as vehicle supply stepped up. We also saw newly acquired businesses contribute positively. Turning to retail. Following a significant disposal program, including our remaining Russia business in Q2 2022, the retail segment now only includes the results of our U.K. and our retail-only operation in Poland. Revenue amounted to GBP 2.3 billion, up 10% on an organic basis, following an improvement in new vehicle supply and growth of our used car business. Operating profit was GBP 48 million and operating margin 2.1%. Second half margin normalized to 1.5% with the reduction versus the first half owing to normalizing vehicle profitability and our investments in bravoauto. Looking ahead, the beginning of this year in the U.K., certain manufacturers have changed the way they sell new vehicles, choosing to sell directly to consumers via dealer groups. This means that Inchcape will only recognize revenue as a handling fee and not the selling price of the vehicle. The estimated impact of this change on Inchcape's reported retail revenue is a circa GBP 200 million reduction, which will also impact the group's organic growth rate in 2023. The impact on operating profit is expected to be negligible. This change in operating model is not happening in our distribution markets where we make the decision regarding the most efficient and best route to consumers. Now turning to Slide 13 and looking further down the income statement. In aggregate, we delivered operating profit of GBP 411 million in 2022. Our net interest expense of GBP 37 million is above the prior year, owing to higher financing costs due to the changing interest rate environment. With adjusted PBT of GBP 373 million and an underlying tax rate of just over 26%, the group's adjusted EPS was 72p. We have laid out our expectations for net interest expense and the underlying tax rate in the appendix. We think a net interest expense of GBP 110 million is a prudent estimate for 2023 based on prevailing interest rates with the step-up versus 2022, reflecting higher rates, financing of Derco and some transitional FX impact of refinancing the debt acquired with Derco. The underlying tax rate is expected to be slightly higher than the historic average at between 27% and 28% due to the country mix of profit following the acquisition of Derco. There is no change to our expectation that Derco will be more than 15% accretive to Inchcape EPS in 2023 and more than 20% accretive to EPS in 2024. On a reported basis, group PBT was GBP 333 million, which reflects GBP 40 million of adjusting items, owing to acquisition-related expenditure, the impact of one-off gains relating to pension scheme changes and a noncash charge related to the adoption of hyperinflation accounting in Ethiopia. Moving on to Slide 14 and cash. The group delivered another excellent year of free cash flow generation, reflective of the highly cash relative nature of our business model. As per the previous slide, the group generated operating profit of GBP 411 million. During the period, we benefited from a net working capital inflow of GBP 75 million. This was primarily owing to a rebound in the level of inventory financing, which more than offset the rise in inventory levels. Full year net CapEx was GBP 56 million, well within our guidance of less than 1% of sales. Total free cash flow amounted to GBP 380 million, representing a free cash flow conversion rate of 92%. Net acquisitions and disposals pre Derco, amounted to an outflow of GBP 100 million, largely related to our 2 acquisitions in the Americas region. In 2022, we made a total dividend payment of GBP 89 million, and we bought back GBP 70 million worth of shares. The completion of the Derco transaction took place on the 31st of December, and we paid GBP 407 million in cash consideration and assumed GBP 522 million of Derco net debt. We, therefore, closed the reporting period with net debt of GBP 378 million, excluding lease liabilities. In terms of considerations for 2023, as detailed in this morning's announcement, in light of the deal timing, it was agreed that the pre-completion dividend owed to the Del Rio family and the acquisition of minority interest shareholdings would occur in 2023. This represents a GBP 270 million cash outflow mostly in the first half of this year. At the time of completion, this was largely offset by circa GBP 200 million of higher debt related to the higher-than-anticipated working capital. We would expect these 2 items to broadly net out over the course of 2023 as we focus on the fundamentals of working capital management. And this brings me to capital allocation on Slide 15. Let me first reiterate that the group's capital allocation policy remains unchanged. Inchcape is a very cash-generative business and has a track record of disciplined capital allocation over many years, and you can expect the same level of rigor and prudence to continue. Our first priority is to invest in the business. Given our relatively asset-light model focused on higher-growth distribution segment and increasing focus on digital, this tends not to be a large call on capital. We have maintained our CapEx guidance of less than 1% of sales post the acquisition of Derco. The second priority is dividends, where our policy is to pay out 40% of basic EPS. The third priority is value accretive M&A, which remains a key feature of our policy. And finally, after each of the previous 3 priorities have been considered, we consider the appropriateness of share buybacks. Underpinning all of this is our view that the maximum leverage ratio that we would consider appropriate for the group is 1x EBITDA on a pre-IFRS 16 basis. And now to sum up on Slide 16. This is a business with extremely attractive financial characteristics reflected in both high returns and cash generation. It also has very exciting growth prospects. In 2022, the group ROCE was 41%. Highly attractive returns is one of the many attributes of the distribution business model. Following the group's strategic choices regarding portfolio optimization, the distribution segment accounts for a greater proportion of the group's capital. Post Derco and including intangibles, the group expects to generate a return on capital employed of circa 25%. Our free cash flow conversion in 2022 was 92%, another very strong year. However, as we look further ahead, the group's free cash flow conversion is expected to normalize towards its historic range of between 60% and 70%. Following the acquisition of Derco, the group's leverage is 0.6x EBITDA. This is well within our 1x EBITDA level that we consider appropriate for the group. And we firmly believe that the highly cash-generative nature of the group will support our ability to continue to execute the Accelerate strategy and deliver further growth, both organically and inorganically. And with that, let me hand back to Duncan.

Thank you, Adrian. 2022 was a fantastic year. And on the final day of the year, we completed the acquisition of Derco. Over the next few slides, I'd like to remind you about the business we have acquired, how the first 80 days have gone and why we're excited about combining Derco with our existing Americas business. Let me first say how delighted I am with the work of the Inchcape team in getting the deal done, all the way from origination through to due diligence, negotiation and completion. Many of you will have met Romeo Lacerda at our Capital Markets Day in 2021 and on our investor webinar where we put the spotlight on the Americas. Romeo is the CEO of the Americas region, which now includes the Derco business. Derco is LatAm's largest independent distributor and broadens our OEM footprint, adding some fantastic brands and extends our geographic exposure in the Americas. As a reminder, we agreed an enterprise value of GBP 1.3 billion, which included the 9.3% stake in Inchcape granted to the Del Rio, Derco's founding family. In addition, we welcomed Juan Pablo Del Rio to the Board of Inchcape. In 2022, Derco revenue was GBP 2.2 billion. We expect it will generate an operating margin toward the top end of a typical distribution margin, the range of which is between 5% and 7%. Derco's margin in the second half of 2022 was 8%. We expect the combination with our Americas business will generate significant value and confirm our expectation for recurring synergies of at least GBP 40 million, which will drive EPS accretion of at least 20% in 2024. Let's move to Slide 19. Derco brings a highly complementary market footprint and brand portfolio, which deepens Inchcape's existing key OEM relationships and adds attractive first-time distribution partnerships. In the Americas, Inchcape had operations in 11 markets, pre-Derco. This transaction significantly extends our brand presence in Chile, Peru and Colombia and adds Bolivia. Bolivia is a typical Inchcape market. That is a market with a low rate of motorization, 84 vehicles per 1,000 people and attractive economic growth prospects. Across the Americas, Inchcape is the distributor for 25 OEMs, the portfolio of brands that we have complement those of Derco's. The transaction provides an opportunity to deepen relationships with some of Inchcape's key OEMs such as Suzuki and will drive growth with other brands, some of which are new to Inchcape. The addition of these brands within our market is exciting and will give us exposure across each of the brand types typically available in the market. As we showed at the Americas webinar, the addition of new brands in an existing geography is key to driving efficiencies. On Slide 20, we provide a progress to date and the key focus areas as we look ahead. Antitrust regulation prevented any interaction between Derco and Inchcape teams from the time of the announcement of the transaction in July through to the completion on the 31st of December. As such, we have only had access to Derco since the beginning of 2023. But I am pleased to say that the first 80 days have progressed as expected. In that time, Romeo was appointed his Americas executive team. There is excellent cultural alignment between both organizations, which is supporting the integration process. While early days, we have started to plug Derco into our digital and data capabilities and migrating the back office systems. I am pleased with the progress so far. Over the past few years, our Americas team have acquired several new businesses, and we have developed a proven track record of integration. As we look forward, the key focus areas are on the delivery of the recurring synergies, which we quantified as delivering a per annum cost benefit of at least GBP 40 million. At announcement, we said that we saw significant opportunities for revenue synergies. Whilst this is as yet unquantified, we believe that by leveraging the infrastructure and best practices of both businesses, we will drive revenue growth. The total cash costs required to realize the recurring cost related and revenue synergies will be up to GBP 60 million over 2 years. Now that we are in the business, we also believe there is an opportunity to improve Derco's working capital efficiency by applying our rigor and processes and by leveraging our data analytics platform. Bringing it all together, the transaction is totally aligned with our Accelerate strategy. It's early days, but it's very much what we had expected during our due diligence process. It enhances our growth prospects by increasing Inchcape's exposure to higher growth markets and we'll use the scale of the enlarged business to capture a greater share of a vehicle's lifetime value. Derco is margin accretive for the group, and we are confident that our proven track record of integration will help us deliver the recurring synergies to further benefit margins. As a larger business, it better positions Inchcape to continue to consolidate the fragmented global automotive distribution space, of which we are the market leader. The transaction will deliver significant shareholder value through EPS accretion and efficient allocation of capital with ROIC expected to exceed project WACC in 2025. I hope you can sense how delighted I am to have Derco in our group and how excited we are about the future. Let's move on to the progress we've made with our Accelerate strategy since unveiling it at the Capital Markets Day in 2021. Let me start by reminding you of Inchcape's purpose, bringing mobility to the world's communities for today, for tomorrow and for the better. Everything we do in our group is guided by our purpose. Some of you will recognize this slide from our Capital Markets Day, where we detailed the foundations of our ambitious growth journey. We have made fantastic progress against each of these areas in the past 15 months. We have further extended our leadership in automotive distribution with the acquisition of Derco, providing a step change to our scale. We have continued to consolidate the industry, securing several new distribution contracts and bolting on new businesses, which we have integrated into our plug-and-play distribution platform. Digital and data continues to be an area of differentiation and a significant competitive advantage versus our peers. Our progress and capabilities in digital and data continues to impress our OEM partners. Having identified vehicle life cycle services as a source of new growth opportunities where we could leverage our existing infrastructure, we've made great progress with the rollout of bravoauto and the development of the digital parts platform. I detailed the fantastic progress we have made on responsible business during 2022 on each of our pillars, which is supporting the growth ambitions for the group. This is collectively helping Inchcape deliver significant value through organic growth, consolidation and cash returns. On Slide 25, we show the 2 key growth drivers for our business: distribution excellence and vehicle life cycle services. And you can see that the opportunity in each is enormous. On the left-hand side, we show the total number of new vehicles that are sold every year around the world, approximately 90 million. The OEMs insource distribution in the largest markets. This includes China and the U.K., but also in markets like Brazil and Mexico. Outside of the larger markets, there are about 17 million vehicles sold in markets that are best suited to Inchcape. So a 17 million addressable market for distribution excellence, of which today, we have a little over 2% share, including the acquisition of Derco. That makes us the global leader. It also clearly demonstrates that there is still a huge amount of headroom for growth in both markets we operate in today, which account for 30% of the addressable market and new markets where we are not present today. On the right-hand side, we break down the vehicle life cycle value, the initial user phase where Inchcape has strong presence, accounts for 25% of the total profit pool for each vehicle's life. 75% of the profit terms are from year 4 onwards, and that is a segment that is currently underserved by Inchcape. This is the focus of the vehicle life cycle services growth driver. So 2 enormous opportunities where we are focused on taking a greater share and are the 2 key growth drivers of our Accelerate strategy. Since the Capital Markets Day, we have made significant progress with capturing more of the global distribution opportunity, where we believe we are uniquely placed to accelerate our growth. Through a combination of acquisitions and contract wins, we have increased our exposure to higher growth markets. We've extended our leadership in both digital and data analytics, and we have moved faster in consolidating the global market with the acquisition of Derco and 4 bolt-on deals, Simpsons Motors, Morrico, Ditec and CATS. We also added 3 new contracts, giving us responsibility to introduce OEM brands into a number of markets where we already have distribution presence. In terms of digital and data, we've made substantial progress over the past 15 months, but continue to look forward to see how we can improve the consumer experience and drive further efficiencies and faster growth for our businesses. At our Capital Markets Day, we highlighted 4 focus areas: DXP, our omnichannel platform; DAP, our data analytics platform; our architecture, which would support growth for the group; our digital delivery centers or global tech hubs where most of our people would be based. Our Chief Digital Officer, Mark Dearnley, hosted a webinar in November last year, where we put digital and data under the spotlight and show the progress against these key areas. As we look forward, our goals are to provide a complete omnichannel purchasing and ownership experience for both new and used vehicles to have every action optimized by our proprietary analytics; quickly migrate new businesses onto our digital architecture, supporting the process of onboarding OEMs in both new and existing markets; and finally, to ensure our global tech hubs continue to drive innovation and efficiencies for our business. Let me also remind you that at Inchcape, in terms of digital and data, we are doing more, doing better and doing it faster for the same spend. M&A is a key pillar of our growth story, and the number of deals we have done and successfully integrated has accelerated in recent years. You can see that clearly on this chart. Since 2016, when the group started to be more focused on distribution as its main driver of growth, we have announced 26 distribution deals, added more than GBP 3.7 billion of annualized revenue, broadened our OEM footprint, representing 17 new brands and gained entry to 15 new markets. And since the Capital Markets Day, we have announced 8 distribution deals, adding more than GBP 2.5 billion of annualized revenue, 10 new OEM brands and 3 new markets. This includes the deal we announced earlier this year to acquire CATS Group, expanding our distribution footprint into the Philippines, which is expected to close in the second half of 2023. The combination of Inchcape's leading global position and digital and data capabilities means we are well placed to successfully execute our strategy to accelerate growth, both organically and by industry consolidation. On Slide 29, we show how the group's portfolio has evolved since 2016. It shows the progress made in consciously reducing the group's retail only exposure, the most recent of which was the disposal of our operations in Russia earlier this year. Since 2016, we have disposed of GBP 2.4 billion of retail only revenue. At the same time, the group has a much larger distribution business. The acquisition of Derco provides an even further step change in the group's portfolio with distribution accounting for 78% of group revenue and 92% of profit on the basis of the 2022 results. The chart also provides the regional splits with the Americas accounting for 36% of revenue and 50% of group profit today compared to 2016 when the emerging markets region accounted for 4% of revenue and 13% of profit. APAC, which has been a larger business in the past, in 2016, it accounted for over 50% of group profit, has some room for improvement given known headwind to this space, particularly in Hong Kong and Singapore in recent years, while Europe and Africa has developed nicely, largely driven by organic growth. The group was generating GBP 360 million of operating profit in 2016, and the enlarged Inchcape business is more than 60% bigger. And given the shift towards distribution, we would argue the quality of earnings and growth prospects is much improved. Turning now to Slide 30 and our second growth driver, vehicle life cycle services. Historically, Inchcape has been predominantly focused on the initial user phase of a vehicle's life. In the subsequent phases, the profit opportunity is 3x as large as when the vehicle is brand new. At our Capital Markets Day, we quantified the expected contribution from VLS as at least GBP 50 million of annual profit within 5 years, and we made great progress with new opportunities identified over the past 15 months. Bravoauto, which I will come back to in a minute, has been rolled out to all 3 distribution regions as well as our U.K. and Polish retail operations. We have further developed our digital parts platform. As a reminder, this leverages our core distribution competencies and technological expertise and attempts to modernize the aftermarket parts industry. During 2022, we ran a successful pilot of the business in Australia and will now move to full launch in 2023. On the third opportunity, the B2B used car listing platform, we are still working through how we best explore this opportunity, and we'll update you when we have something more concrete to say. Let me reiterate this is a huge opportunity with highly attractive and accretive economics. We will look to capture this in a methodical and prudent manner in keeping with the asset-light nature of the group's business model. And if any of the opportunities don't work, we'll stop investing. We launched bravoauto, a digital-first multi-brand B2C used car platform around the time of the Capital Markets Day. While the business is still scaling, the initial results are as we expected. Our proposition is unique in so far that it leverages our existing infrastructure and the technologies built to be globally scalable. Our focus areas are profitable sales. We are seeing a fast payback upon rollout, capturing new customers. We have successfully won business that we previously sent to wholesale, global best practice sharing where our teams are connecting more regularly through workshops and market visits. In terms of financial drivers, our business model is built on leveraging dominant aggregators in the market and therefore, ensures low marketing costs. It encourages penetration of finance and insurance products, which help us maintain connectivity with the customer during their ownership. We make smart use of analytics to inform our vehicle pricing decisions and value of vehicles we are buying. We offer aftersales servicing, which is a higher-margin revenue stream. As of the end of 2022, bravoauto is live in 9 markets. We will continue with the rollout during the coming months with 3 markets in the plan for 2023. While we are scaling, all of our teams remain focused on the 6 execution parameters, which are critical for the success of bravoauto. On Slide 32, we bring this all together, showing the drivers of our financial performance. In terms of distribution excellence, organic revenue growth will be driven by our exposure to higher-growth markets with low motorization rates, the catch-up in new car volumes, which today are still circa 10% below the long run average across our markets. We'd also expect to outperform growth of new car volumes through market share gains, driven by our digital capabilities and data insights as well as higher penetration of finance and insurance products. In addition, our aftermarket business provides resilience. In terms of organic profit growth, we benefit from operational leverage and our investments in technology will also drive efficiency gains. M&A comes on top of all this. We have the ability to grow revenue through both distribution contract wins and via acquisition and to, in time, drive revenue synergies. As outlined in the Derco section, we are able to generate cost synergies which supports profitability. In terms of vehicle life cycle services, organic revenue will be driven by growth of the new businesses. Bravoauto is dependent on the volume of used vehicles sold, and we are progressing well towards our target of an incremental 80,000 units with our multi-market rollout. After sales servicing will also help drive growth. With the digital parts platform, the business is primarily driven by the volume of parts sold through the marketplace and some marketing revenue. Both businesses are typical Inchcape businesses and that they are capital light and deliver high returns, and we stand by our profit guidance. Overall, we remain confident in the medium-term outlook set out at the Capital Markets Day in November 2021. Distribution excellence, mid- to high single-digit profit CAGR plus M&A, vehicle life cycle services, more than GBP 50 million of incremental annual profit within 5 years. So to sum up and provide our outlook. 2022 has been another year of fantastic execution for the group. We delivered double-digit profit growth across all regions. Our investments in digital and data are delivering tangible results, and our leadership position continues to be noticed by OEMs. We have started to scale bravoauto and will make further progress with our vehicle life cycle businesses in the months and quarters ahead. We completed the acquisition of Derco, which accelerates our portfolio shift towards distribution, and we have actively reduced our retail-only exposure. It also increases our exposure to higher growth markets. As we look forward to 2023, while we are mindful of the changeable economic environment, the strength of our business model and diversification benefits of our global operations are expected to support the group's performance in 2023. We're trading to date in line with our expectations. We anticipate that the new vehicle supply will continue to improve throughout 2023 and support a normalization of order books. In 2023, we expect to make strategic, operational and financial progress underpinned by the integration of Derco. This group has a really exciting future. Before we open up for Q&A, let me remind you of our investment case. Inchcape is the leading global automotive distributor, combining our exposure to high-growth markets and diversified revenue streams with our history of market outperformance, we expect to deliver strong organic growth. By leveraging our scale, by making operational improvements and through our focus on higher-margin activities, we can drive margin expansion. The highly fragmented nature of distribution and our strong financial position also provides significant consolidation opportunities. In addition to the exciting growth prospects, the business is asset-light with attractive financial characteristics with high returns and cash conversion. Combined with a disciplined approach to capital allocation, we believe this should enable the group to maintain its long track record of delivering significant value to organic growth, consolidation and attractive shareholder returns. Thank you. Adrian and I are now ready to take your questions.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Andrew Nussey at Peel Hunt.

Yes. A couple of questions from me, please. First of all, in terms of VLS, you indicated in the presentation that there was continued investment in the rollout of bravoauto. If we look at -- well, VLS in aggregate or actually bravo, did it make a contribution in FY '22? And how should we think about the step-up in profits towards the GBP 50 million of incremental in FY effectively '26 given that 5-year time line? And the second question, you obviously reiterated -- well, the guidance around the 15% earnings enhancement in the first full year of Derco and -- sorry, greater than 15%, greater than 20% in year 2. Just to confirm, is that obviously still intact post the guidance you've given today in terms of interest and obviously, the tax rate, please?

Very good. Andrew, thank you for your questions. I'll take the first one, if I may, and Adrian will take the second. In fact, he's just come back from Chile, so he'll really be able to give you some insight. On VLS, look, let's step back as to what we committed. We committed to an incremental 80,000 vehicles -- used vehicles per annum towards the end of our planning period and an incremental GBP 50 million of profit per annum, again towards the end of the planning period. Now during 2022, what we've done is we've built bravoauto out into a global used car platform. It's in 9 markets from Colombia through our European operations and into Asia Pacific. It is a business we're building ground up. So it's not contributing or creating a lot of headwinds for our business either at the moment, either in PBT or cash. It's up and running. We've got good consumer feedback and it reinforces that model we set out at the Capital Markets Day, which is -- which really works for Inchcape and leverages our distribution business. So, so far, so good on bravoauto, and we'll continue to scale that in a prudent, sensible way through to our commitments that we gave you at the Capital Markets Day. And don't think of it as being a near-term headwind to cash generation or profitability. Now I should also mention what we've done the digital part platform, another VLS initiative, which we piloted in APAC in the second half of 2022. The software is built. We really improved the user experience. It is being actively used for parts distribution in Australia. We'll launch it this year. We did originally say we'd launch in '23 or '24. We're definitely launching in '23. We've got a few more markets that we're looking at. We're seeing good response from the independent aftersales workshops and from the independent parts distributors. So far, so good, nothing to say, no forecast on that business yet, but I like what I'm seeing so far, and we've got some good results in Asia Pacific. As with all our VLS initiatives, they are proper Inchcape businesses. They are capital-light, high returns, great cash flow from them. And if they don't work, we'll kill them, as we've said, very consistently since the Capital Markets Day, but I feel very nailed on for the incremental 80,000 vehicles per annum and that incremental GBP 50 million towards the end of the planning period. Adrian, the second question for you, please.

Yes. Thank you, Duncan, and thanks for the question, Andrew. As Duncan mentioned, I was in Chile back in February, and I'm really, really excited about what I saw. It really reminded me what a unique asset Derco is that we've acquired and the complementary nature of these -- of our 2 businesses in Latin America is going to create enormous shareholder value. We're very, very confident in reaffirming our guidance of 15% accretion in year 1 and 20% accretion in year 2. And that's based on the synergy guidance that we gave back with the transaction arose, which I'll remind you was GBP 40 million, of which 30% is in year 1. That's across the organization, that's across technology, and that's across operations. It excludes revenue synergies, and we're really confident about delivering the firstly, the cost synergies, and we'll have more to say about revenue over time. But yes, certainly, Andrew, reaffirming our 15% and 20% accretion.

Our next question comes from Georgios Pilakoutas from Numis.

First one on Derco. I was just wondering if you could provide a bit more of a live update on that Derco margin, slightly where some of the industry data in Q4 was slightly weaker for the Americas region. So are we still trending more like that second half, 8%? Or is it kind of similar back in that 5% to 7% range that you spoke to? And then similarly, Derco, just on the working capital, you mentioned that there was potentially a bit of an opportunity there. Just wanted to understand a little bit more. I might have thought that order books were running high and therefore, working capital might be a headwind. So if you could just clarify that. Then one on the group margin, operating margin for the year ahead. I guess there's kind of in theory, margin tailwinds from the Derco integration a couple of dealer acquisitions, synergies, and I guess, the agency model is in there also a tailwind to operating margins. So just interested in how you see that versus further normalization from more general margin environment from the second half? And then the third one is just on Asia. I guess, particularly kind of Hong Kong and Singapore, Hong Kong, just a bit of an update on the border situation? Or is it perhaps touched on kind of legislation around electric vehicles and perhaps how your business might kind of improve the market share position there? And then in Singapore, just any update on kind of the profile of [ permit ] through the year, if that's okay.

Very good. Georg, thanks for the question. So I'll give a little bit of color in terms of Derco and how our Americas business is performing. Adrian, if you could comment on operating profit margin, working capital and operating margin for the group, and I'll take Asia at the start. So in terms of our Americas business, so it is performing exactly as we thought it would do in our planning of Derco but also our traditional Inchcape markets. If I give you some color, we're in 12 markets in the Americas. 10 of those markets, we're seeing very, very strong growth year-over-year, good levels of traffic coming to DXP, good engaged traffic, great sales leads and year-over-year growth in order intake. There are 2 markets that we are seeing lower total industry volume as an industry, not just as Inchcape. That is Chile and a little bit in Colombia. The way we built the Derco business case was we expected volumes in Chile to come down in 2023, that is exactly what's happening. And then in terms of our performance, our brands are maintaining share. And actually, in many cases, our brands are gaining share and are showing growth versus the first quarter of 2022 and versus 2021. So the business is performing well. We're seeing strong consumer demand in that Americas business. I'll hand over to Adrian to talk a little bit more about margins in a moment. Let me hop over into Asia, Georg, if I might, but for your last question. So we are seeing green shoots of recovery, both in Hong Kong and in Singapore. Don't expect very much more from those businesses in '23 that you saw in '22. I'm thinking more '24 onwards as we see those markets pick up. We think COE or license availability in Singapore will come back in -- during 2024. And you know that's a great market for us with really strong margins. In Hong Kong, we're seeing a much better picture. The border is now open. The teams introduced the Great Wall ORA EV brand into the Hong Kong market. Also, we've opened a used car facility in Hong Kong, and the team feels really, really upbeat. Opening the border, of course, opens up that segment of vehicles, which is these luxury people carriers, which are quite margin rich for the group, and we're starting to see orders coming in for those. Now when we get the stock for those is a different matter. I think much -- they're not arriving now, will come later in the year or into '24, but we're seeing green shoots of recovery in Hong Kong and in Singapore, but let's not get too excited too soon. Adrian?

Yes. Thank you. Thank you for the questions, Georg. I'll tackle Derco margin first and your point around where is the normalization going. And you'll remember the very elevated margins that was in the circular documentation when the transaction was first published, around 12%, you saw second half of around 8%. We're confident that the guidance we've provided of towards the top end of the traditional distribution business of 5% to 7%, excluding synergies, is where we expect to see Derco normalizing over 2023 and beyond. You mentioned working capital, you're absolutely right. When you look at the balance sheet that we have acquired, there was a slightly higher level of stock than had been anticipated. And how does that connect with order banks. It's a good question. The order bank and the supply shortages are brand specific, actually. And if you look at the brand exposure that we've acquired with Derco businesses, there's a greater exposure to Chinese brands. In those brands, we've seen probably better levels of supply and so you don't necessarily see the same level of order bank. So that's why we've got a slightly higher inventory level. And as you also know, managing S&OP, managing stock, managing working capital is one of the core competencies of Inchcape through our S&OP processes using data and the digital investments that we've made. And they are some of the first things we're beginning to integrate into Derco, and we see a really good opportunity from a working capital perspective. I would just temper that a little bit, if I may. What you see in the core Inchcape group is a very, very optimized working capital position, and you can expect that to normalize as supply further eases across Inchcape. And now to group margin. Look, you see a story of 2 halves in the core Inchcape Group. Half 1, you saw very elevated levels of margin. And if you remember, we were coming out of the trough of supply in the second half of '21. That caused elevated margins both in our distribution businesses, but you also saw month-on-month inflation in used cars. That created very, very high levels of profitability in some of our retail markets. So I'd encourage you to look at the second half performance, where we had a regional mix tailwind, and you saw quite a bit of normalization across all the different regions, except for perhaps Europe, where we continue to maintain quite a high level of order bank. So I think we're really confident around margin as we look forward. In the appendix to the pack, you'll see hopefully a helpful bridge which helps you articulate that. And in relation to agency, which you mentioned very briefly, yes, that will be a margin tailwind because obviously, we're not going to be recognizing the revenue and it's broadly agnostic at profit level. So hopefully, that's helpful.

Our next question comes from Arthur Truslove at Citi.

So yes, 3 from me, if I may. The first one is on interest guidance of GBP 110 million. I think it's about GBP 37 million in [indiscernible]. And the second question around inventory financing. I would guess return to uplift to net interest [Technical Difficulty]

We've lost you after halfway through question 2.

Okay. [indiscernible] question 2. [indiscernible] the uplift in net interest would do for that. And I understand that that was probably [indiscernible]. And are you able to give a idea of inventory days are sustainable in your [indiscernible]. And also give us an idea of how long interest free period typically are in terms of that [indiscernible]? And then final question, again, going back to the [indiscernible]. I think you mentioned that a lot of [indiscernible] net debt was brought in between GBP 500 million and GBP 600 million with [indiscernible] inventory and [indiscernible]. But how much did that come down realistically. [indiscernible] financing to sort of OEM [indiscernible].

Arthur, thank you very much. So I think you're proving very popular on the set questions. Adrian, so over to you.

Yes. Sure. So I'll take them in turn, Arthur. From an interest cost perspective, yes, sure GBP 110 million is our guidance, and that's made up of a number of different factors. Firstly, you've got to think about the Inchcape Group was a net cash group with surplus funds during the course of 2022. And as you know, we've taken on debt to finance the acquisition of Derco. So you should think about foregone interest income as one of the first building blocks. The second building block, as you quite rightly articulated, and I'll perhaps cover point 3 now around the Derco, debt of GBP 500 million to GBP 600 million, that's obviously going to be refinanced by our corporate level debt. Now I do want to make one point here where we've got some transitional FX costs that will flow through the interest line. We're going to have to make a choice as to how we finance Derco in the short term whilst the underlying free cash flow of this business catches up a business which we expect that over time will be fully self-sufficient. We have 2 choices. We can put down permanent equity or we can put down intra-group lines, the latter of which carries some hedging costs. If we put down permanent equity, it's quite expensive to repatriate the cash because of friction costs out of Latin America, absolutely part of our acquisition case. But if we put down intercompany loans, we don't suffer those. So we're going to take some short-term pain in that regard, and we're valuing that at about GBP 10 million. And then your final point around inventory financing. So look, the way to think about this is that we have different relationships with different OEMs and some OEMs give us interest-free periods that typically cover shipping times. And some OEMs don't provide any payments honestly. It's quite different across all of the different OEMs. And often, our inventory financing facilities are floating rate based and are typically in the currency of purchase. They're not all linked to SONIA. Our acquisition financing was the SONIA point. So hopefully, that's helpful. As we move into 2023, from an interest -- from an inventory financing perspective, you will see us bring inventory financing into Derco. But as I said in my opening comments, you will see what is a very elevated level of -- or a very optimized level of working capital in the core group slacking off a little bit. Hopefully, those answers are helpful to articulate the GBP 110 million.

Thanks, Adrian. And Arthur, let me add about the way we think about sales and operational planning and how it works with our digital assets. This is a core competence of our group about how we match demand with what we order from our OEMs. We have globalized all of our processes. We are backward and forward-facing analytics in terms of what we land into a country and our teams excel in here. So we are very good at managing inventory. And you should imagine that discipline will absolutely be applied to Derco and continue right throughout the Inchcape Group. Hope that helps, Arthur.

Our next question comes from Mike Allen at Zeus.

Just a quick one on agency. I know you've articulated the impact it will have in U.K. retail, but I'm just thinking further afield than as a distribution aspect for Inchcape around the world, if OEMs kind of adopt the model in more countries. Just is there a fee that those discussions going on in some of your major companies at the moment? And obviously, the role Inchcape might have in some of those key countries as well, please?

Okay. Very good. Thank you, Mike. So I'll take this. Adrian, if you want to add, please do so. So look, I think Mercedes is a good example of what's going on in the market, Mike. They've said they're going to run 20 markets directly themselves where they will be the national sales company and deploy the agency model. The U.K. is a good example of that. They've also chosen another country to deploy that model. That will cover about 80% of their volume and then 20% of their global volume, they'll use independent distribution and that's, of course, where Inchcape fits. And all the things we've done around our distribution excellence and our plug-and-play platform, whether it's our digital assets, the way we manage our people, the processes we deployed into that business, we know we're a leader in running those more complex, smaller volume markets for OEMs. And the technology we're deploying and if you look where we are with DXP, the latest version that we've just put into Asia, we're again seeing very high levels of customer satisfaction from where DXP is deployed. We get much better conversion rates in our leads to sale. We get way more engaged traffic. And I think OEMs can see that, that experience and the way we manage markets and the way we've transformed consumer experience, we're a great platform for our OEMs to continue to grow with. And I think if you look at the M&A agenda or our contract wins agenda, we're seeing more OEMs believe in that Inchcape platform and start to use it. You can see that with Great Wall ORA in Hong Kong, BYD in BeLux, more Geely markets in the Americas. And of course, just a few weeks ago, Mike, we announced another piece of business this time in the Philippines, and it's our first Mercedes market outside of Asia for distribution, and I think shows the strength of, one, how Mercedes see they want to run their markets around the world and the second bit about how powerful that Inchcape platform is. So in markets where we are the distributor, we make the choices on how we manage and transform that route to market. But I think we're doing okay, Mike. I hope that answers the question.

Our next question comes from James Zaremba at Barclays.

Has the enterprise value effectively become GBP 1.5 billion or it is higher than the initial kind of GBP 1.3 billion given the working capital outflow? Or does that reverse in FY '23? Then secondly, just in terms of PBT, which is about GBP 100 million higher than I initially expected, can you break down the drivers of this kind of series of upgrades in terms of new volume, used volume, gross margin, OpEx versus what you thought at the beginning of the year? And then on these points, can you kind of comment on where you think they are versus normalized levels? I think you already commented on new volume Duncan about used volume, gross margin and OpEx?

Very good. Thank you very much, James. Adrian if you can take 1 -- well, 2 and 3. But I will make a comment first, James, on -- if you look at our improvement in '22 over '21, where profits from continuing operations were up the best part of 50%. Look, fundamentally, this is Inchcape executing its strategy. We are setting out to lead in automotive distribution right around the world. OEMs believe in what we're doing. We're seeing increased volumes because we perform really well and because of our digital assets, more OEMs coming on board the Inchcape platform because of the way we run distribution and I'd point you with those contract wins that we've just mentioned. And of course, we're getting M&A also feeding into that. So I think it reinforces the whole investment proposition in Inchcape in terms of what you saw in 2022. It was the execution of strategy that led to an improvement in our results. But let me hand over to Adrian.

Yes. Thank you, Duncan. Thanks, James. So in terms of the enterprise value, no, there is no change in the underlying terms of the transaction and the enterprise value of 1.3%. I think you should think about this as having an elevated level of working capital that's offset by an elevated level of debt. And that's why the terms are broadly unchanged, actually. And it was the family that chose to opt to receive part of their consideration across 2023. So we're really confident that the value we've paid is reflective of the value of the organization and consistent with the terms that we published when we did the circular say. Hopefully, that's helpful. In terms of the drivers versus 2022, Duncan mentioned a few points there. Look, if I roll back to where we were at the start of 2022, I don't think we could have foreseen both the elevated levels of margin that's coming out of both used cars and to a degree, our distribution businesses particularly in Latin America, where we saw inflation, and we were able to get slightly ahead of that. So what you saw in the first half of this year was significantly elevated levels of profitability. What you saw also in the second half as a tailwind around foreign exchange, that the weakening of sterling, and as you know, most of our profits are in overseas currencies now. So that was a further tailwind as we disclosed. And if I remind you, what we guided at about half year was GBP 350 million to GBP 370 million, and we landed at GBP 373 million, so pretty much in line with our consensus. And so hopefully, that's helpful to bridge you versus our initial expectations of 2022. We do appreciate it was significantly better than where we had started. And then thirdly, around normalized levels, and I'll refer you back to the comments I made around half 2. Where we've seen markets where supply is eased, we've seen a degree of normalization in the second half, particularly around operating margins. That's been offset by a favorable mix, where you've seen a stronger APAC and a stronger Americas business slightly offsetting that. But if you look at some of the regional splits, you'll see some of those regions normalizing. The one exception to that is probably Europe, where we're continuing to see a reasonably high level of pent-up demand and order bank, and so you still see an elevated level there. So as you model into the future, I think you should take the second half as a pretty good starting point for how we should roll into the future.

James, does that answer your questions?

Yes, I guess maybe it's a little bit of semantics and kind of -- I guess the net equity plus debt paid is now GBP 1.5 billion. I guess you've got, as you said, GBP 200 million more working capital. So [Technical Difficulty] be paid more for a larger business and...

Very good. James, thank you very much. So just to restate, we believe that we are right in line with what we said at the circular and what we said in the middle of the summer.

Our next question comes from James Wheatcroft at Jefferies.

3, if I may. First of all, just wanted to catch up on some of the acquisitions you sort of completed through the year, so Ditec and Simpson, how they sort of contributed to the business and how they maybe have developed further relationships with some of the OEMs. Secondly, sort of following on, how should we think about M&A in light of where the balance sheet currently sits and how is the pipeline looking? And then lastly, just in terms of supply outlook, just give us a feel for how that's going to shape up, maybe through '23 and into '24, please?

Very good. Thank you very much, James. So I think I'll cover most of those. Adrian, as ever, please add if you feel you should. So the acquisitions we made since the Capital Markets Day, James, are all performing ahead of business case that we approved in the executive and of course, with our Board colleagues. So we're really pleased with how those acquisitions have played into the company, an important part of our growth levers as we consolidate this market. If I give you an example in terms of Ditec to start with, our performance in Ditec has been really, really strong. We've gained market share with those brands in Chile, and they continue to perform well as you look into 2023. I've spent time and so has Romeo with the Porsche Latin American team, they're based out of Miami. And they're really, really impressed with the Inchcape distribution platform, particularly around the combination of what DXP does and for what the analytics platform does that sits underneath DXP, which improves consumer experience, operating metrics, after sales retention. And I think that bodes well for more markets with Porsche over time. Nothing to announce at the moment, but I think it shows us in a really, really good light. And we are adding other OEMs. If you look at the Caribbean where we bought the Simpsons business, our performance again is above where we expected, and we have the opportunity to add more OEM partners into those markets over time. The other deal I would talk about is Marico, which is a construction and heavy goods vehicle business that we bought in Guam. What we've seen now that's under Inchcape ownership, of course, they have real confidence in our performance and also the financial strength of our business. And that's given us access to more stock in that market, and Guam continues to be a really strong market for Inchcape. So I think we are absolutely living the dream of what happens when Inchcape acquires these assets. And we're not buying bad businesses, James, but we are making them even better. Look, in terms of M&A, the promises we've made is we won't over leverage the company, and we'll be very disciplined about valuations. That said, the market continues to be strong, and I think we are seen as the natural consolidator of what is a very fragmented market. Even if you look at our progress since 2020, 2021 to now, we've got from 1% of our target addressable market now to 2 and a bit percent. We still have loads of room to grow. So we absolutely have the ability to continue to consolidate this market through contract wins and M&A. The pipeline, save having one very large Class 1 transaction that's completed at the end of last year with Derco. Pipeline is really strong across the 3 distribution regions and also into Africa. We just announced the deal in -- with CATS in the Philippines. And I think that also shows you that by moving Ruslan, who built up the Americas business for us, largely through acquisition, him landing in APAC and working with our M&A team, you can see the pipeline improving. The CATS deal is one example of that. I think there'll be more to come from that team over time. So I remain in a place where we're very optimistic about our M&A pipeline. These things are always lumpy. So I'm not going to make any forecast as to when these deals will land. But the pipeline is good. We remain disciplined on valuation and we're getting good support from OEM partners. Final point in terms of supply. So supply is gradually coming back. Many of you will know that semiconductor supply is improving. Again, I wouldn't draw a one-to-one direct line between increased semiconductor supply and more vehicles because modern vehicles are taking way more semiconductor content than previous generations, but we will see an increase in supply during 2023. It won't be uniform across all OEMs or all regions. I imagine the Chinese OEMs will continue to have very, very good levels of supply. And then we'll see a little bit of patchy performance, I would say, across OEMs, from other regions. But the general picture would be a slow uptick of supply during 2023. And our view and my view remains that normalization of supply is unlikely to happen until around 2025. Don't forget, we are, as an industry, way, way down from the 2018, 2019 levels in terms of annual sales and at an Inchcape level, probably 10% down on the 2018-2019 basis. So let me pause there. Adrian, if there's anything else you want to add?

No.

Okay. James, is that helpful?

Our next question comes from Sanjay Vidyarthi from Liberum.

A question on the shape of your dealership network and your distribution markets. And I guess the answer will differ across Asia, Europe and the Americas. But do you see the number of dealerships growing or shrinking? And do you see much scope for consolidation? So actually M&A amongst the dealer groups within those markets? And how much influence would you have on the shape of those networks and that kind of consolidation? And I guess also then tying into bravoauto and the omnichannel model, the kind of dealerships that you'll be encouraging really can be fewer and bigger dealerships. Just I guess that's the number of the question.

Thank you very much, Sanjay. This is a cracking question actually. So first thing we should say is where we're the distributor, we choose the shape of that dealer network. You should think of us owning an Inchcape Group about 1 in 4 of those physical assets we own. They tend to be in the very major cities. But our real job is to leverage an independent network as a distributor in those markets. So Inchcape Group and average 1 in 4 that we will own. Derco owns about 1 in 3 and has an interesting twist on the way they run the physical side of their business. We think this is going to change. So if you look at what we are doing with our digital assets of DXP, our omnichannel, and our analytics platform that sits with it and based upon consumer feedback right around the world because almost all buying journeys for new and new start online, there will be a reshaping of that network, which might vary by geography over time. We're running a number of pilots around that. So if you look in Australia, we're separating out in some tests we're running the sales space and the after sales space. We're putting after-sales facilities in shopping mall car parks, which were being great feedback from consumers on. So we are running a number of models, but a lot of it is driven by technology and consumer demand, and I want to reemphasize, in our market, it is Inchcape that's making that choice around how that dealer footprint works. Let me just mention a little bit about Derco because it's one of the interesting things about that business model they have, where they run a number of brands through the same physical space, which has all sorts of benefits for OEMs and for Inchcape. Now we will leverage that as part of the Derco acquisition for traditional Inchcape brands to then go through in more regional cities to that Derco center network. So this is absolutely changing, a lot of it driven by technology and consumer demand. You asked a point about do we see consolidation of dealer groups. Look, you can absolutely see this in Western Europe that dealer groups are consolidating. It is a little -- it is subtly different in some of the more developing markets. So if you go through the Americas or Asia or Africa, for instance, you don't have these big dealer groups that have yet formed. We tend to work with individual companies and owners, and we help them to be really, really successful. So yes, this is changing. It's driven by technology and what consumers want, and Inchcape, I would say, is leading the way. Sanjay, was that helpful? Did you want to have anything else with that?

Yes. Just to follow up on that. I guess, as you say in West markets, you can particularly -- capacity is just too many, the number of dealerships is just too high. Would you say that that's not the case in most of the few distribution markets?

So I would say that is not the case in the majority of our distribution markets. Don't forget, these have low motorization rates. If you look at the -- if you look at our business that we acquired with Derco, the average -- in 3 of the markets, the motorization rate, number of vehicles per 1,000 people is less than 100. Chile is the most developed at just over 300. If you look at the U.K., there's 500 vehicles per 1,000 people, the United States are close to 800 vehicles. So we're in markets which are growing. So you would imagine, therefore, that you would see a growth -- we see growth in vehicles will need to be closer to consumers and join them on that journey. So a different dynamic from what you're seeing in Western Europe, where car volumes are relatively flat and maybe in some markets declining.

Yes. So there's an opportunity to reshape that network kind of leapfrog in a way, taking learnings from how omnichannel is developing in more developed markets?

I think that's right. It reminds me a little bit of banking services and what happened in Western countries as you went through physical banks to banking on a PC to banking on mobile phone networks and how countries in Africa, for instance, bypass the middle stage of banking of PCs and fixed line networks and jump straight to mobile. We are looking about what's going on in developed markets, what's happening with our technology as to how we shape dealer networks in the countries where we are the distributor.

We have a final question from Andrew Nussey at Peel Hunt.

Apologies if I just jump in with a follow-up. Just the interest guidance of GBP 110 million. Consensus, as far as I was probably around GBP 80 million. So GBP 30 million delta of which GBP 10 million, I think you referenced to the financing of Derco. So of the balance, if that's largely coming from inventory-related financing, to what extent is that recoverable through higher [ Fuji's ] cost to the consumer? Because one would imagine you should be able to recover that. So it's probably not a direct hit to overall profitability over the medium term?

Good question, Andrew, and I know someone who can answer it. Adrian, over to you.

Yes. Thank you, Andrew. It's a great point. You're absolutely right. You should think about us as a cost-plus business. And you should think about interest costs and the cost of holding stock in the same way you think about shipping costs in the same way you think about the actual cost of the car. It's all part of our pricing model, and ultimately, you're absolutely right. That latter part of that bridge that you're doing, you should absolutely expect that to be reflected in effectively in pricing and gross margin.

Thank you very much, Andrew.

We now have a question from Paul Rossington at HSBC.

If you're going to see why the industry supply start to normalize, more volume coming into the market, that means I think that you're going to see an increase in volumes going into the used car market as well. So my kind of thinking is, does that mean there's some upside risk to your -- what feels like relatively cautious expectations for vehicle life cycle services profit of GBP 50 million over a 3-, 4-year period? Is there some upside risk there if we're going to see higher volumes across more markets?

Thank you, Paul. Good question. Very good question. Look, I think there's a couple of upside risks to our VLS bravoauto business. One is Derco. We've gone from distributing 50,000 vehicles per annum in the Americas now to over 200,000. And I think with some tricks that we can play on finance and insurance, we should see a very high quality level of vehicles coming back to us and an increased quantity of vehicles coming back to us, which we can then determine how we leverage that asset for the company and for our customers. To the point you've asked about better supply, that I believe is true. Now whether that accelerates the GBP 50 million in 2026 that we've spoken about and brings it forward is another matter. But what we're very focused on is getting high-quality supply and high-margin supply, which generally comes from us buying directly from consumers, either in trade-ins via bravoauto or via our dealer network, whether it's ours or our independents. So yes, you're about right. The timing of it and when that actually happens depends by OEM and by market, but your point is absolutely spot on. Paul, is that helpful?

Yes, that's fine for me. Thank you.

We have no more questions at this time. I'll now hand the call back to our host to wrap up proceedings.

Very good. Listen, thank you very much to everybody who's joined the call. Thank you for those who have asked questions. And if you're watching on replay, thank you also. We've just announced a really, really strong year inside Inchcape. We know as we move into 2023, we'll see more strategic progress, more operational progress and, of course, more financial progress. So thank you for joining. I look forward to meeting you all in the coming months. And as ever, if you have more questions, grab Raghav. Thank you.