InPost S.A. ($INPST)
Earnings Call Transcript · March 18, 2026
Earnings Call Speaker Segments
Gabriela Burdach
ExecutivesGood morning. My name is Gabriela Burdach, and I'm Investor Relations Director at InPost. Welcome to InPost Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2025 Earnings Call. A usual disclaimer, today's call includes forward-looking statements that are subject to risks, and it is possible that the actual results may differ materially. One very important highlight with respect to the proposal to acquire all shares in InPost, we will not answer any questions related to the tender offer. This call is strictly focused on financial results, trading performance and the outlook update. This call is also being recorded, and the recording will be available on our IR website shortly after we wrap it up today. After the slides, we will have a Q&A session. Today's presenters are Rafal Brzoska, CEO; Michael Rouse, CEO International; and Javier van Engelen, CFO of InPost Group. I'm now pleased to hand over to our CEO, Rafal, over to you.
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesGood morning, everyone. Thank you all for joining us today. 2025 was a truly transformational year for InPost Group. We continue to scale rapidly while strengthening our international footprint through targeted M&As and strategic investments. Let me start with the highlights. In 2025, we handled 1.4 billion parcels, an increase of 25% year-on-year. This reflects increased merchant adoption, strong customer loyalty and the operational advantages of our expanding network. At the top line, we generated PLN 14.7 billion in revenue, up 34%. And importantly, as shown in the revenue split, more than 50% of group revenue now comes from outside Poland. The international diversification is no longer an ambition. It's a structural driver of our business. Our profitability remained solid. Adjusted EBITDA reached PLN 4.1 billion, growing 12% year-on-year. At the same time, the bottom line came under pressure, particularly in the fourth quarter. This reflects temporary integration-related costs in the U.K. as well as higher investments in network expansion, logistics, IT and AI-driven initiatives. Javier and Michael will cover the details later in the presentation. CapEx increased accordingly as we continue to build infrastructure and capabilities required for long-term European scale. With that foundation, let's move to the key messages. Looking specifically at 2025, there are 3 key messages I'd like to highlight. First, we delivered a very strong peak season. On the busiest day of the year, we handled 15 million parcels. This was a clear proof of the robustness of our infrastructure, reliability of our operations, and the trust that merchants and consumers place in InPost. Second, our B2C performance remains solid, supported by continued momentum from international marketplaces. Across Europe, more merchants choose InPost as their preferred out-of-home partner and more consumers shifted to lockers as their default delivery option. Third, 2025 was a year of strategic expansion. We completed 2 major acquisitions, which are already reinforcing our competitive position. Michael will talk about it later. Together, these elements make 2025 productive and strategically important year for InPost. Let's now move to how this execution translates into our expanding network and international leadership. 2025 was also a year in which we strengthened one of our greatest competitive advantages, the largest and the most advanced locker network in Europe. We ended the year with almost 95,000 out-of-home points, including over 61,000 APMs, an increase of about 14,000 lockers versus last year. This represents exceptional acceleration and clearly demonstrates our ability to scale consistently across multiple markets. Poland remained our strongest and most mature APM market with nearly 3,000 new machines added, but the real engine of expansion came from international part. In the Eurozone, we added almost 7,000 lockers and in the U.K., more than 4,500, further strengthening InPost's leadership position. Let's now move to the next slide, which compares our performance with overall market trends. In Poland, in full year, despite already holding a leading market position, we continue to expand our market share. Poland remains a stable and profitable foundation for the group, a market that reliably supports our international ambitions. Moving to the Eurozone. We saw broad-based double-digit growth across several countries. While the overall market expanded in the high single digits, our Eurozone volumes grew significantly faster. This region is becoming a true engine of diversified growth for the group. And finally, the U.K., where we delivered one of the strongest growth trajectories. The market itself grew modestly, but InPost, supported by the acquisition of Yodel, expanded at a multiple of the market rate. With that, let's move to the ESG chapter and how we continue evolving our sustainability strategy. This morning, we officially published our 5-year sustainability strategy, which is fully detailed in our annual report. We aim to refine our previous approach continuing the direction, but with greater maturity. On this slide, I will highlight just a few of the most important elements. Last year, we delivered tangible progress across our key sustainability KPIs. We reduced Scope 1 and 2 absolute emissions by 56% versus the 2021 base year. And we increased the share of renewable energy in the group to 91%. These results reflect systematic, disciplined work, not stand-alone initiatives. Our new strategy is structured around 4 pillars: planet, consumer, people and trust. We commit to ambitious science-based emissions reductions and a clear path to net zero across our value chain. We focus on transparency and accessibility. In people, we strengthened training, inclusion and safety. In trust, reinforces governance and risk management. Together, these pillars embed sustainability into how we operate, grow and create long-term value. With that, let's turn to Poland. Poland remains the foundation of our business, a market where the strength of the InPost brand continues to drive stable, reliable growth. In 2025, both domestic merchants and international marketplaces contributed to that growth. In Q4, total parcel volume increased by 5%. APM volumes were broadly stable, reflecting the high base effect from last year. To-door volumes grew strongly, driven primarily by increasing demand from international marketplaces. This pattern continued at the full year level. It is also worth emphasizing that domestic merchants performed very well, particularly in categories such as fashion and beauty, sectors where convenience and delivery reliability are critical to conversion. Now let's turn to loyalty, an area where Poland continues to set the benchmark for the entire group. We operate the #1 APM network in the country. And in 2025, we expanded it even further. Locker density remains one of our strongest competitive advantages, reinforcing convenience and proximity for millions of users. What stands out most is the scale of our active customer base. Today, around 26 million people in Poland use InPost, either through APM or to-door deliveries. Our mobile app remains a key engagement driver, reaching 16 million users and maintaining an outstanding rating of 4.9 out of 5, one of the highest in the Polish digital ecosystem. These strong customer relationships translate directly into loyalty metrics. InPost holds the #1 NPS position in the market with 94% of consumers receiving parcels via our lockers and 89% sending parcels via lockers. InPost is the undisputed leader in consumer preference, trust and everyday relevance in Poland. We want to build on that. Let's see how on the next page. At InPost, we love to explore new directions and we are always looking for ways to extend the ecosystem we have been building over many years. InPost is a link between users, merchants and delivery services, and we are now experimenting with how that connection can be expanded through a more integrated digital experience. Today, I would like to introduce InPost Plus, a new product we are developing to help customers search, compare and shop online in a simpler way. [Presentation]
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesWe are introducing a new service for users and merchants and AI-supported shopping experience integrated into the InPost mobile app. Online shopping today can be fragmented and time consuming. Our intention with this project is to explore whether parts of that journey can be brought together into a more coherent flow. The product includes an AI shopping assistant that supports conversational search, both text and voice. InPost Plus connects merchant integrations, assured catalog and product feeds to help users identify items that are available and relevant to them. If the experience works as intended, users will be able to move from product discovery to payment with InPost Pay and eventually to returns within the same environment. We are currently beginning external testing, so some active InPost users may start seeing this feature in the app in the near future. This is an early version of the product and we expect to evolve over time as we learn from user feedback, so we appreciate your patience as we continue to improve the experience. Why do we believe InPost is well positioned to introduce new services? Because our customer base is both loyal and highly engaged. Around 20% of our users are super heavy users, collecting more than 40 parcels a year. This group generates 70% of our total APM volume and is also highly active within the mobile app. Importantly, they shop across multiple platforms. They compare options, look for value and are open to exploring the wider e-commerce ecosystem. We see an opportunity for InPost Plus to support them and all our users by providing a more informed, streamlined way to make shopping decisions. With that, I will hand it over to Michael for an update on our international business.
Michael Rouse
ExecutivesThanks, Rafal. Good morning, everyone. As Rafal highlighted, a landmark moment for InPost in 2025 was that international revenue now represents more than half of the group. A lot has happened to drive that both organically and through M&A. So let me walk you through the key developments starting with the Eurozone. Across our Eurozone business, our strategic plan has taken shape. We continue to grow and gain market share in line with our strategic priorities, development of our B2C merchants and the growth of our APM network, while also gaining access to to-door, which will allow us to reach an even broader base of consumers for the future as we continue to develop across this region. You'll also see PUDO volumes are lower year-over-year. Again, this is deliberate. As our APM density improves, we are migrating volumes away from PUDOs to our own network which is both higher margin and better consumer experience. Volume in the Eurozone segment increased by 23% in Q4 2025 or basically 105 million parcels during that time, driven by B2C volume growth of 60% year-over-year on APM deliveries, which were up 51%, translating into improved full year profitability. Growth was supported by acquisitions. However, even excluding the sending business, which we acquired in July 2025, organic InPost volumes still grew an impressive 17% in Q4 2025. This marks another quarter in which we are growing twice as fast as the e-commerce market itself. Importantly, our Eurozone margins continue to improve, as I mentioned. Full year adjusted EBITDA margin reached 15.5%, up 60 basis points year-over-year, demonstrating that our scale benefits are translating into structural profitability improvement. Javier will cover this in more detail later. So let's have a look at Eurozone network and Mondial Relay brand on the next slide, please. In Q4, we expanded our APM network by 55%, adding almost 7,000 machines in '25. Across the Eurozone, we remain the #1 locker network. APM expansion was driven by strategic partnerships with major retail chains such as Carrefour, Conforama, Lidl, Auchan and E.Leclerc as well as collaboration with the public sector. As in previous quarters, while we continue adding new PUDO points, we're also closing those located too close to our APMs as part of our network optimization strategy. Customers are clearly shifting towards out-of-home with lockers gaining in popularity. Mondial Relay awareness has reached a high level of 91%. Together with our #1 NPS, high Trustpilot scores across the region and a growing mobile app user base, we are well positioned to replicate our love brand success across our Eurozone markets. So let's move on to the U.K. on the next slide. In the U.K., we more than tripled our volume in Q4 year-over-year, reaching 92.6 million parcels, a 240% increase. This reflects the first full peak season with Yodel and clearly demonstrates the scale of the combined platform. Importantly, this growth was B2C-led. B2C volumes increased 13x year-over-year in Q4, significantly strengthening our position in the strategically important segment within the U.K. market. At the same time, C2C continued to grow at a healthy pace, up 1.5x year-over-year, supporting overall momentum. For the full year, volume reached 262 million parcels, up 181% year-over-year. We now capture around 8% market share in the U.K., already a visible and meaningful scale in a highly competitive market. We're also seeing a clear acceleration in consumer shift towards out-of-home. Out-of-home volumes doubled year-on-year, confirming that lockers and PUDO are becoming increasingly embedded in checkout behavior. Peak trading was strong across all services. We grew within our existing client base and increased share of checkout. We delivered operationally during peak. Profitability in Q4 was deliberately impacted by our decision to invest in service quality as we highlighted on our previous call. This was a conscious time-bound trade off, our purposeful choice to invest in merchant relationships on long-term volume growth within the U.K. market. Javier will cover the margins in more detail in the following section. But just like in the Eurozone, this confirms we're executing consistently on our strategic volume priorities, scaling B2C, accelerating out-of-home, in particular, our locker development in the U.K. and building meaningful market share. Next slide, please. We continue to expand our out-of-home network, and importantly, network density is now creating a structural competitive moat in the U.K. In Q4 '25, our total out-of-home footprint reached over 19,000 locations, up 59% year-over-year. APMs alone grew by 48% year-over-year and over the last 12 months, we've added approximately 4,500 lockers, firmly securing our position as a #1 APM network in the U.K. At the same time, our PUDO network almost doubled, reinforcing accessibility and convenience for our consumers and the importance of continuing to build density. What differentiates us is not only scale, but the quality of locations. We accelerated expansion through strategic partnerships with leading national retailers. We signed a trial agreement with the U.K. Post Office covering over 300 initial locations, representing a potential opportunity of more than 1,500 sites. InPost has also strengthened cooperation with Lidl where the 7,000 locker location was installed, Mitchells & Butlers with over 500 pub locations signed and Iceland targeting deployment across more than 200 stores in key high street locations. From May 2025, InPost lockers are also available in Northern Ireland, further expanding geographic coverage across the U.K. This growing density improves consumer proximity, strengthens merchants value proposition and raises barrier to entry, making our network not just bigger but structurally stronger. Moving on to the next slide. The U.K. has reached a turning point in parcel delivery with lockers becoming the preferred choice for both consumers and businesses alike. 40% of consumers now receive parcels through lockers as frustration with home delivery grows and more people look for flexible out-of-home options. In addition, 44% of consumers send parcels using lockers. These figures show that lockers are now one of the U.K.'s most trusted and widely used out-of-home delivery options. We're extremely pleased that over 60% of locker users choose InPost lockers now. This shows that we are well positioned to benefit from this shift towards out-of-home delivery. Our combined mobile app has reached 7.5 million unique downloads and our Trustpilot score stands at 4.7. These metrics are particularly meaningful in the context of the quality reset we've executed post Yodel. That confirm that consumers are responding positively. Moreover, our merchant feedback post peak has been positive with active choices we made to deliver on our promise playing through in our continued development within the market. So let me close the international section with an update on our recent investments and how they position us for 2026. In Q4, we made a deliberate decision to prioritize service quality during peak. We absorbed the cost impact in Q4 '25 and the results validate that decision. Q4 marked the operational trough that we need to go through to build on the future of that U.K. business. The U.K. business now enters '26 with the #1 APM network, restored quality leadership and a clear and credible path to profitability. January marked the restart of One Network that unlocks logistics cost synergies with benefits flowing through from half 2 '26. We also released the volume cap meaning we can now fully utilize the Yodel infrastructure combined with the existing infrastructure, improving absorption and driving operating leverage. At the same time, improved service quality is translating in strategic merchant wins such as Debenhams, reinforcing higher quality revenue growth. On margins, let me be clear on cadence. Half 1 '26 remains an investment phase. The step change comes in half 2 as synergies and full utilizations come through. This supports a credible path back to mid-single-digit adjusted EBITDA margins by the second half of '26. In Eurozone, the Sending integration is fully on track. The acquisition has helped us widen our merchant base, and we've improved Sending's Trustpilot score from 1.3 to 4.3 in just 6 months, an impressive result. We've also started redirections to converting Sending to-door volumes into more profitable out-of-home deliveries. The next steps in the Sending integration are merging the logistics networks, rebranding and the continued optimization of the network offer. So thank you, and I will now hand over to Javier for the financials.
Francisco van Engelen Sousa
ExecutivesThank you, Rafal and Michael, and good morning, everyone. Let's now see how all of this translates into the company's key figures for Q4 and full year 2025. Yet as the title already suggests, despite the strong top line performance, Q4 EBITDA has been under pressure due to the investments in quality in the U.K. Before getting to the U.K. details, in the table on Slide 24, you can see the overview of our Q4 and full year performance. Let me here just highlight the main points. Starting with repeating the good news on volume and revenue. In Q4, we handled 418 million parcels, up 30% year-on-year. Q4 revenue grew 33%, reaching a record PLN 4.5 billion. As mentioned by Rafal and Michael, the strong top line growth reflects continued strong organic growth and market share gains combined with the impact of our international expansion, including contributions from Yodel and to a lesser extent, from Sending. On profitability, Q4 adjusted EBITDA reached PLN 1.1 billion, down 4% versus 2024, yet still at a healthy margin of 25%. Importantly, the year-on-year decline in EBITDA is a result of a solid and broad-based EBITDA growth in Poland, across all key Eurozone markets and in Newstrade yet fully offset by our significant strategic investment into quality in the U.K. parcel business ahead and during peak 2025. On a full year basis and despite the Q4 U.K. investments, 2025 adjusted EBITDA is still up by 12%. Q4 adjusted EBIT came in at PLN 481 million and adjusted net profit reached PLN 199 million, both significantly lower year-on-year on the back of the mentioned U.K. quality investment as well as higher financial costs in Q4 2025 compared to last year. I will walk you through the key drivers behind these movements in a moment. On CapEx, let's turn to the full year numbers as quarterly swings are mainly driven by timing of payments. For full year 2025, we invested PLN 1.8 billion, a 31% year-on-year increase and representing a 12.5% of revenue. This reflects continued strategic investments in our APM network, logistics infrastructure, IT and AI-driven projects, all essential to further strengthen our Polish business and to support our longer-term European scaleup. Finally, full year group free cash flow in 2025 stood at PLN 84 million, with Poland continuing to deliver strong free cash flow generation of PLN 1.6 billion at a continued strong 46% adjusted EBITDA conversion. The negative international free cash flow reflects our continued commitment to invest in network expansion, logistics and strategic M&A. I'll again discuss some of the mentioned elements in more detail on the next slides. So next slide, please. As to the results by segment, let me again call out some of the key numbers. Rafal and Michael already covered the strong volume, revenue and market share progress across all segments. What I want to add here are 3 takeaways from the profitability lines. First, Poland profit margins continue to strengthen with adjusted EBITDA margin reaching 49.5% in Q4. Second, in the Eurozone segment, full year adjusted EBITDA increased 25%, with margins continuing to creep up. And lastly, here, you notice the significant impact of the investment into quality in the U.K.&I parcel business. On the next slide, let's review this in more detail, starting with Poland. As already discussed, in Poland, we saw a 5% increase in Q4 volume reaching 220 million parcels. Full year volume was up by 8% versus prior year. Q4 revenue in Poland grew 12% to over PLN 2.1 billion, outpacing volume due to repricing and a favorable volume mix. Full year revenue ended up plus 11% versus 2024. Q4 APM volume was slightly down versus Q4 2024 on the back of a high base and changing volume structure. In the to-door segment, revenue grew slower than volume due to merchant mix and high activity of international marketplaces. On profitability, Q4 adjusted EBITDA grew by 16% year-on-year to PLN 1 billion, lifting our margin to 49.5% and reflecting a combination of solid volume growth, strong cost management and a continuing shift in volume structure. Let's now look at the Eurozone results. In our Eurozone markets, in Q4, we delivered strong and broad-based growth showing accelerating momentum across all key markets. Q4 parcel volumes increased by 23%, reaching 105 million parcels fueled by another quarter of expansion in the strategically important B2C segment as well as continued APM adoption across the region. Q4 volume growth also reflects the consolidation of Sending which strengthened our to-door capabilities in Iberia. Excluding Sending, our Q4 2025 was still strong with volume up by 17% year-on-year. Revenue in the Eurozone grew by 22%. Excluding FX, revenue growth was broadly in line with volume. Q4 adjusted EBITDA increased by 20% year-on-year with margin broadly stable at 17.1% despite the consolidation of Sending's lower margin. For full year 2025 and excluding the effect of Sending, Eurozone adjusted EBITDA margin improved by over 100 basis points. Let's now move to the U.K. As mentioned before, top and bottom line show 2 different pictures. On top line, 2025 marked the year when InPost delivered a step change in scale and market share through the strategic acquisition of Yodel. In Q4, we more than tripled U.K.&I volume over delivering on our initial plan and answering some of the initial key concerns. Along 2025, we have materially strengthened our market position and reinforced our relevance in both the B2C and C2C segments. Parcel revenue increased broadly in line with the underlying volume growth with Newstrade adding another plus 10% Q4 revenue increase to the mix. Turning to adjusted EBITDA then. Following 3 strong quarters of continued margin expansion on the U.K. parcel business, we moved into a loss position in Q4. This reflects our strategic decision to invest in guaranteed service quality following our One Network implementation at the end of Q3. While we invest in capacity and quality, we kept volumes to protect customer experience and post a further One Network optimization, consciously deprioritizing short-term cost savings in favor of operational stability. Following a successful peak season, we are now resuming cost optimization through both operational efficiencies and right pricing the quality services we offer. Next slide, please. On this page, you can see the bridge between adjusted EBITDA and adjusted net profit for full year 2025. Year-over-year, adjusted EBITDA increased by 12%, reaching PLN 4.1 billion with a margin of 27.9%. As mentioned before, excluding the U.K. parcel business, we would have grown adjusted EBITDA by 21%. Below EBITDA, the margin progression reflects higher depreciation and amortization mainly driven by the Yodel consolidation, the integration of Menzies and our continued investments in APMs, depots and automation. After taking these D&A effects into account, the adjusted EBIT margin stands at 13.8%, with adjusted EBIT slightly lower year-on-year due to the higher depreciation base following acquisitions and integration. Between adjusted EBIT and adjusted net profit, we see financial costs related to debt, including the interest component of IFRS 16. We also recorded unrealized FX losses on intercompany loans driven by the strengthening of the Polish zloty versus the euro. As mentioned in previous periods, this is a noncash effect arising from translation differences on euro-denominated debt held at the Luxembourg parent company. In total, adjusted net profit for full year 2025 amounts to PLN 1.1 billion with a margin of 7.7%. Let me here remind you that the difference between our adjusted and reported numbers is primarily driven by 2 elements. First, the usual incentive programs, which are excluded from adjusted performance to better reflect underlying operating trends. Second, the exceptional cost line which this year mainly reflects restructuring and transformation initiatives within Yodel. These are nonrecurring in nature and relate to the integration and operational reset of the business. Let's now look at our free cash flow on the next slide. For the full year 2025, Poland generated PLN 1.6 billion of free cash flow, corresponding to a 46% EBITDA conversion, as always reflecting our disciplined approach to cash generation. As part of our strategy of accelerated expansion, the Polish domestic cash flow gets reinvested into our international operations, including spending on APM deployment, network scale-up, integration-related CapEx and expenses for Yodel and Menzies. After incorporating international EBITDA, integration CapEx, changes in working capital and FX at group level, we ended 2025 with group free cash flow of PLN 84 million excluding the cost of M&A acquisition. To conclude the financial highlights section, let me briefly address net debt and leverage, as shown on this slide. At the end of 2025, gross debt increased to PLN 10.1 billion, driven by financing restructuring, strategic investments in Yodel and higher lease liabilities. As a result, net debt rose to PLN 9.1 billion. With adjusted EBITDA growing 12% year-on-year, net leverage increased to 2.2x. Now let me walk you through our outlook for full year 2026 and the Q1 2026 trading update, yet starting with emphasizing that our outlook assumes stable operating conditions. Ongoing geopolitical conflicts may impact oil and energy prices, inflation and broader macroeconomic stability, which means actual performance could differ from our current expectations. Starting with group volume, we expect to continue gaining market share and to deliver year-on-year volume growth in the mid- to high teens. This should be driven by a diversified mix across markets. Mid-single-digit growth in Poland, high 20s growth across the Eurozone and low 30s growth in the U.K. International markets, therefore, remain the key engine of pan-European expansion. In terms of group revenue, we anticipate mid-teens year-on-year growth. Revenue in Poland and the U.K. should grow slightly below volume, while Eurozone should grow in line with volume. Moving to profitability. We expect group adjusted EBITDA to remain broadly flat year-on-year, with a margin in the mid-20s. In Poland, margins should remain strong, but lower compared to 2025 at the mid-40s level. In the Eurozone, we expect a continued slight margin improvement as higher profitability from out-of-home delivery is partly offset by the expansion of our to-door offering. In the U.K. and Ireland, we anticipate a recovery with adjusted EBITDA margins improving to the mid-single-digit range. From a network perspective, we plan to accelerate deployment to approximately 20,000 APMs across all markets, around 3,000 in Poland, 12,000 in the Eurozone and 5,000 in the U.K. Regarding CapEx and cash flow, we expect capital expenditures of approximately PLN 2.4 billion, with around 60% allocated to APM production and deployment. As a result of higher CapEx and flat adjusted EBITDA, we anticipate negative free cash flow in 2026 and a slightly higher net debt-to-EBIT ratio year-on-year. Finally, looking at Q1 2026. As of today, we see group volume growth in the high 20s percentage range. Poland should deliver mid- to high single-digit growth, while international markets are forecast to grow by approximately 70% year-on-year. And with this, let me hand over to the operator for the Q&A session. Thank you.
Operator
Operator[Operator Instructions] Our very first question this morning is coming from David Kerstens of Jefferies.
David Kerstens
AnalystsI was wondering if you could provide, please, more insight into drivers behind the expected lower EBITDA margin for Poland, mid-40s versus 49% last year. Doesn't mean you have now more visibility on how the relationship with Allegro will play out this year on the new contracts with the clarity on volume and pricing. Is that an important driver behind that lower margin? And Rafal, you talked about the new AI shopping tool that is still being finalized. What will be the related investments in 2026 that will lead to lower profitability in Poland? And maybe a quick question on the U.K. What was the organic development in the U.K., excluding the acquisition of Yodel in terms of volume and revenue?
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesMaybe let me first answer the second question, and then I will hand over to Javier for the first and the third one to Michael. So indeed, our new focus, not maybe completely new because we were preparing ourselves for a huge transformation in terms of AI development and finding new levers for our future growth already for many months and quarters by developing, for instance, InPost Pay, which is a critical enablement platform for us to make that development of AI shopping assistance as simple as possible and as seamless solution for our end consumers. And indeed, if you ask me what are the priorities currently, the priority is not to sacrifice future opportunities by keeping extremely high level of the EBITDA, specifically on our most mature market. We are heavily investing into human resources. We are bringing best talents from all around the world to AI data teams because we believe this is our future -- next future engine that will boost our development on e-commerce markets, existing one and also future one. End users are extremely ready, in our opinion, to disrupt traditional way of shopping and their willingness to test is profound. We started -- just to give you a flavor, we started 24 hours application form for our testers, for people who will test our solution, 0.5 million linked to the form, 300,000 applied to become a tester and it was all within 24 hours. It's way above my expectations being very frank. So yes, this year is a massive investment into human resources, OpEx related to new development, specifically on the new features in our mobile app. And this will continue as a focus for the management Board.
Francisco van Engelen Sousa
ExecutivesThank you, Rafal. David, I'll take on the first question that you raised on the margin. As a caveat, let's start from the 49%. And we mentioned a number of times also that the high 40s is a nice place to be, but we said strategically, it's not necessarily we want to be. We want to reinvest into the business, which you basically also see coming back in the guidance that we have for 2026. The key components there is indeed that we look for volume and also for pricing, the investment that Rafal has talked about, and that's an investment both in terms of CapEx and in terms of OpEx to make sure that we have the right capabilities in the organization. And also, of course, compared to previous year, we've got slightly less leverage on the volume, where our volume is projected to be mid-teens and so there's slightly less leverage. Now having said that, in investment phase where we want to change also the digital capabilities of the company at a 45% margin. We think we're still delivering a very, very healthy and very acceptable margin for a business which we think can still scale for the future and which is still the bread and butter of our business. So we still feel 45% is a very reasonable and acceptable guidance for 2026 in view of the extraordinary results of 2025 and then the investments we take to build the brand and to keep on building the Polish business. Then on the U.K., I think Michael can add perspective on the organic numbers.
Michael Rouse
ExecutivesThanks, Javier. David, on the U.K. numbers, on a pro forma basis, full year, the numbers were 20% growth and I think it's important to remind ourselves during Q4, in particular, we capped volume actively as well as we exited larger parcels or what we call as uglies out of the network during that time as well. So considering the restriction on volume, the full year pro forma is actually 20%, which is a very strong result considering where the market growth was at as well.
Operator
Operator[Operator Instructions] Another question just came in from Henk Slotboom of The Idea.
Henk Slotboom
AnalystsSo I have 2. First of all, if I look at Slide 25 of the presentation, then I'm trying to reconcile what's happening there. First of all, the growth in APM volumes. I do understand that it mainly has to do with the Allegro in-sourcing. And then I see a 36% growth in out-of-home, which you attribute to international platforms. But the gap between the volume growth of out-of-home and the value growth, the revenue contribution of out-of-home is widening. And so on a full year basis, plus 19% volume, plus 17% revenue. In the fourth quarter, the GAAP widens, 36% versus 27%. What exactly is happening there? And my second question relates to the agentic AI model, Rafal, maybe you could answer that. And what exactly is the revenue model behind it? Because on the one hand, you'll see that bringing business to web shops is at no charge to the web shop. I read in the same press release on the same statement that delivery and returns are for free. Is the delivery -- is the revenue model for you more in terms of a volume driver, which obviously in an operationally geared environment is a positive. Is it perhaps you mentioned InPost Pay as an important carrier for this project? Or is it perhaps the data, which, in due course, you might be able to monetize? Those are my questions.
Francisco van Engelen Sousa
ExecutivesHenk, thanks for your question. Let me take the first one and then hand over back to Rafal. In terms of volume versus revenue mix, let me just walk in, especially Q4, walk you through some of the key dynamics on why there's different developments. On Poland, basically, 5% volume versus 12% revenue is mainly the impact of pricing on the APM, which is positive. And so the RPP on APM is slightly up. Then on to-door, it's a slight decrease in revenue per parcel. But then the mix between to-door and APM creates basically the higher revenue per unit that we see in Poland in Q4, and that's a slightly different dynamic on the full year. On Eurozone, there's an FX impact happening here, which means if you exclude FX, our revenue would be roughly in line with volume. And there, again, you have the positive impact of APM still growing. You have a little bit of impact of the mix of to-door, but that would still be a small impact on the total revenue. On U.K. and Ireland, where you see the biggest difference, take into account that volume does not include Menzies and revenue includes Menzies and Newstrade business. The Newstrade business in revenue is growing 10%, whereas the rest of the business is growing on volume 240%. So you cannot really compare U.K. and Ireland on volume and revenue without splitting up Newstrade from the rest of the U.K. parcel business. So that creates some of the changes we have on volume versus revenue.
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesI think answering the second question, so you're spot on in terms of key observations. So definitely, for us, this platform is, first of all, agnostic that has to support independent players in doing more transactions based on our high user base consolidation and loyalty. Secondly, this platform will be an open platform at the end of the day, internationally, and will boost cross-border deliveries. So it's a volume driver, domestic one, for sure. Why it's a volume driver? If you may guess that there is no take rate because we don't want to undercut people's neck here in such a highly demanding and competitive environment. We want them to be competitive against the giants and let them develop their own e-commerce businesses seamlessly and that will naturally translate into overall e-commerce adoption growth where we believe being such well positioned player, we will benefit from that on the transaction basis. Transactions means volume naturally, volume from cross-border because linking all our markets and the merchants from different geographies, you can imagine how much it may boost the volume on cross-border. It's not that the delivery is for free. The delivery is free at certain minimum order value for the end consumers. Typically, merchants have to cover that cost, but that cost will be very competitive for them vis-a-vis other existing solutions. Then you are right, InPost Pay will become a platform where multiple of financial services will be built on top of that. And this is the most attractive part for us where we want to be a serious player on that field. Data is rather an enabler. We don't want to monetize the data externally. We want to create most compelling, most personalized customer experience, people may imagine. And let's be very frank, what we've shown 2 days ago on a demo, no one has shown globally. There is no single platform among the giants or smaller start-ups who may start and finish end-to-end purchase process in e-commerce like we have shown. So it's more, of course, how to build a compelling solution. There will be dozens or even hundreds of different functionalities we'll develop just this year in our AI assistant and we have extremely strong pipeline of those developments, and we'll surprise the market and the consumers most probably even more by adding services that they haven't even expected. And that's also part of our investment into human resources to have best people in the world working for us.
Henk Slotboom
AnalystsCan I perhaps squeeze in a third question, and that's the famous A word of Allegro. Any developments in the contract renewal talks in that respect?
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesFirst of all, we are in a continuous dialogue with our colleagues from Allegro naturally because we have a pending contract, which means we have to interact on several basis to fulfill our own obligations that are on us. So we may have different views on market evolution in future or what they focus on as key levers for companies should be like. But maybe let me not comment on what's on our friends from Allegro agenda is. We have as InPost to own our own destiny, not us being dependent on someone else's decision. And this is a paradigm that is like highlighted by us, and that's actually driving all our forces full steam to be and control our own destiny.
Operator
Operator[Operator Instructions] We'll now go to Piotr Lopaciuk of PKO BP.
Piotr Lopaciuk
AnalystsI just wanted to clarify a little bit about the upcoming shopping assistant. So if I understand correctly, the free delivery will be financed by merchant. And I also saw a remark somewhere that there's no fee from merchants for service is valid till September this year. Is it true? Or how do you see it? And the final question would be, is it roughly a correct estimate looking at your EBITDA forecast for this year in Poland that you roughly plan to invest PLN 200 billion to PLN 250 million in the new platform, and that would be it.
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesThank you. Happy to pick it up. So first of all, I don't want to comment exactly how much we want to invest. This will be a very, I would say, proper investment vis-a-vis our belief in terms of transformational impact on the market. We want to be first. We are first. That's done. We want to be the fastest first-mover advantage because the others, for sure, will try to follow that development. But yes, that will be a bold investment. This will not be a dozen or 2 dozens of millions, this will be a profound investment into that new tool because we believe the market is shifting, and we will be the main proliferator of that shift. You're right that there are some so-called complete free of charge elements until September for all those merchants who made the bet on InPost's strategy and InPost's vision but it doesn't mean that starting from September, everything will change and there will be, let's say, take rate like the market set up for recent years. I want to confirm once again, there will be no take rate we know from the current world also after September. So we will do our best to make that platform best for every single player willing to collaborate with InPost strategically. It means it's also an open platform for marketplaces. As you all may have noticed, Modivo, for instance, it's a marketplace, x-kom is becoming a marketplace. Means this is a platform as well for the marketplaces. Those marketplaces will feel that InPost is the right partner to team up in the new disruptive era of AI.
Operator
OperatorWe'll now go to Marc Zeck of Kepler Cheuvreux.
Marc Zeck
AnalystsReally just got one again on AI and the agentic shopping assistant or AI that you want to introduce. I guess, OpenAI and ChatGPT tried to do something like this a couple of quarters ago, and it's probably fair to say that they failed. I would be interested to learn what are your thoughts about what OpenAI got wrong and why they failed and why you believe that you can succeed? Is it merely that they had basically no idea how to monetize this? And the examples you just mentioned on monetizing on volumes and the Pay app. Is that kind of the only difference? Or do you think there were also kind of conceptual, technical or consumer behavior hurdles that prevented OpenAI from succeeding? And yes, what are your thoughts how you would overcome this?
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesYes, happy to comment. Frankly, I was surprised how quickly they dropped the ball here because still with their capabilities and if there is more focus, I would say, I would definitely try harder being in their shoes, but it's not me about commenting what's the priority in front of them right now. But yes, partially you answered rightly that question. First of all, they control just one piece of the overall process. When you look at the process of e-commerce delivery, you need to understand that, first of all, there is the search and discovery phase which was well covered in my opinion, by them. But then you need to somehow search, discover and check if what you've discovered is really the thing you've been looking for, the price is right and the inventory is there. And this was the first lacking point for them. So you cannot provide end-to-end seamless process for the end consumers without having proper relationship with the merchants, having proper relationships, direct relationships with the end consumers. And at the end, the most boring stuff. If you don't control end-to-end logistics process and you are dependent on third-party providers, the whole beautiful quick search or comparison or whatever process you may use ChatGPT and other LLMs for is destroyed. Means your tool is destroyed completely out of your control because a random merchant or a random delivery company destroyed the customer experience in that process. And this was the main reason that they -- because they couldn't control end-to-end process, they cannot provide best customer experience. If you look at InPost and what we do, we keep all the elements in our hands, and we can control, we can put a stamp of InPost quality over it and take full responsibility if something goes wrong. And that's the main difference. And that's why this is globally the most disruptive and the most revolutionary solution that was ever presented.
Operator
OperatorAs we have no further audio questions, [ Danielle ], I'd like to turn the call over to you to take any questions submitted through webcast. Thank you.
Unknown Executive
ExecutivesThank you, George. We have a few from the webcast this morning. So can you provide more color on the disconnect between the high 20s volume growth guidance for Eurozone markets and only a slight increase in adjusted EBITDA in the region. What is the specific margin headwind from the to-door expansion? And at what point do you expect operating leverage to kick in and translate volume growth into meaningful profitability improvement?
Francisco van Engelen Sousa
ExecutivesYes, I'll take that question. Thank you, Pavel. Must be some misunderstanding here because if you look at our guidance, what we are saying is that we will be growing at the high 20s volume in Eurozone. And when we talk about the slight increase in Eurozone, it's about margin. It's not about absolute profitability. So we still expect to grow EBITDA margin slightly which means that in absolute terms we'll be, of course, slightly better than what we do on volume growth and revenue growth in the Eurozone. And that exactly reflects what you're saying. It's basically that we get more leverage in Eurozone. Let's go back to a couple of years ago when Eurozone was kind of at low teens. We're now at the high teens basically across Eurozone and key markets. So leverage is clearly there. And your question is probably misinterpretation of what we mentioned in terms of margin progress versus absolute EBITDA progress.
Unknown Executive
ExecutivesThanks, Javier. We have a few more from Pavel. You flagged investments in pricing and volume as the key driver of margin compression in Poland. Can you clarify whether this reflects a broader strategic repricing of APM deliveries and to what extent this is linked to the competitive dynamics with Allegro, specifically whether there are any ongoing or prospective discussions around resuming commercial cooperation?
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesHappy to answer that, Pavel. I think we already like answered that question several times, but just to reinforce, we want to be continuously a helping hand for the merchants, means both repricing/incentives against higher volume are key elements of our strategy which goes alongside with the new tools development. So the answer is, yes, we are ready to make concessions for those players that are happy to go with us in each and every new tool, each and every new service, they position us very well, that drives the volume. And that's so visibly well perceived in terms of the pace of volume growth on the independent merchants and international marketplaces because exactly this is the strategy on the top line. So nothing will change here. We won't continuously be perceived as well by the international players, specifically in cross-border, as the first choice partner for their deliveries.
Unknown Executive
ExecutivesThank you. What is the technology stack behind Von Halsky and how deep is the Bielik integration? Is the model being trained on InPost's proprietary data? Or is it a third-party LLM with the product feed on top? And also, how does the offer ranking algorithm work? What determines which merchant appears first?
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesI don't want to go into too many details. As you may imagine, such questions are on top of our competitors has right now. I can only say that it's extremely complex environment that we've created. It was more than a year of work on that. We use both Bielik local domestic model and big LLMs, as you may imagine, providing a quick answer from the product catalog. We've been literally less than 5 seconds with description, which is personalized, which includes the memory and all of that. It's a very multi-agent, multi LLM environment that was created by us. In terms of what's the key driver or what are the drivers of -- for the listings of the products, price, quality opinions, including historical opinions of the consumers validated by the LLM, that's like the key differentiator, giving you answer which product will be listed on what position. And later on, naturally once the consumer becomes well known for the AI shopping agent, then the memory place and the personalized items are the key differentiator to match people's expectation what has to be listed in at the first place.
Unknown Executive
ExecutivesThanks, Rafal. Next, on the Eurozone, what is the optimal split between PUDO and APM in the medium term? Have you seen any specific trends or preference from merchants, customer cross-border versus domestic towards PUDO and APM?
Michael Rouse
ExecutivesLet me take that question. Thank you. I think if you look today, our mix in Poland is 90% APM and 10% PUDO. If we look towards the Eurozone, there's certain constraints, particularly in inner cities that we would anticipate right now, clearly, we're moving towards a 50-50 split. And over the medium term, we want to drive that more towards 75-25. Longer term, it's unlikely we'll be at 90-10, similar to Poland because of certain constraints in inner cities that exist in London or Paris or Rome and we anticipate that more to be 80-20, but we're certainly driving towards a 50-50 and heading towards a 75-25. And then particularly in France already within the Eurozone, we have overtaken actually PUDOs this year during the midpoint of the year. When you look at preference, we see consistent trends that we've seen at the very beginning since we started the journey in the Eurozone. But ultimately, NPS score is significantly higher in an APM versus a PUDO. And clearly, the studies we're doing at the minute with the Mondial Relay brand show increasing consumer preference. Looking at the merchants themselves, domestically, there is a strong request for APMs now. We see that consistently driving our B2C trends as the coverage and density continues to improve. And even on international merchants, clearly coming into Eurozone and particularly France, out-of-home is a preference where clearly, as a market, it's nearly 1 in 3 consumers will choose out-of-home as a preference today and that continues to improve as our coverage and offering increases.
Unknown Executive
ExecutivesThanks, Michael. And then what are the challenges of integration of Yodel versus Mondial Relay? Is it the size of InPost today versus 2021, '22 that is making it challenging?
Michael Rouse
ExecutivesNo. I mean, the size is not relevant to the integration. I think it goes back to the rationale in terms of the investment and what we saw as an opportunity to take a 5-year leap in terms of coverage in the market and volume and scale. But what came with that, clearly, and what we spent to buy Yodel was a really cheap asset. And a cheap asset because it had been in the market for a number of years for sale and significant underinvestment and no automation, right? So that literally is a journey we're on. And I think it's a reminder, this is a journey that won't happen. We only acquired the asset in end of May. And clearly, we started that journey with an ambition trying to trigger some achievements pre-peak, but we decided as we flagged, the quality and service over peak were too important to put any further risk into the plant, so we stopped that integration. But it's important to stress, this was a stressed asset under-invested in. And clearly, it now need that investment, and that reflects the price we paid for it but the opportunity we see and what it's already bringing is quite significant and the scale that it helped accelerate in the market, as you see on the volume numbers already.
Unknown Executive
ExecutivesCan you also comment on CapEx intensity for Poland and international in the medium term?
Francisco van Engelen Sousa
ExecutivesI'll take that one. From a CapEx point of view, if you look at where we are today and if you look at the guidance for 2026, you see that the overall company will probably be around about 14% of turnover in terms of CapEx investment. If you break that down between Poland, international, we mentioned that before, Poland is at higher single digit, whereas the international business will be at a higher double-digit and I think that's going to stay as long as we are looking for that strategy across international to keep on expanding the business and take a competitive advantage. So I think that's still where we will end up. And then it will depend on the mix between Poland and international. But so this is a proven successful and proven to have a very good return on investment. So we keep on that strategy.
Unknown Executive
ExecutivesThank you. And next from the webcast. To what extent do you plan to reduce revenue per parcel in the current year. As I understand it, the pricing increase for Allegro is expected to be implemented in accordance with the existing agreement. Are pricing adjustments for other clients driven primarily by competitive dynamics and the continued decline in Allegro's share?
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesHappy to answer that question. So it's rather not predefined revenue reduction per parcel. It's rather a function and a result of product mix. More smaller, tiny parcels where the pricing is different vis-a-vis average B or C size parcels, that's point number one. Point number two is what I've said earlier on, a proper balance in terms of the repricing capabilities vis-a-vis proliferation of imposed services among different merchants. And giving you just one example, we haven't repriced one of our clients this year at all because the client became part of our new AI shopping tool. The client had implemented InPost Pay in the checkout and below the product card driving his share of checkout on every transaction from less than 50% closed transactions towards 75% closed transaction. What does it mean? It gives you a clear flavor that in exchange for lower price because of lack of repricing, our volume from that client had increased by 20 percentage points and this is the logic behind our pricing strategy. And by the way, it's nothing new. This is something what was in the past as well, a rule in terms of how and whom to reprice.
Unknown Executive
ExecutivesThank you. Should the development of the InPost Plus service be interpreted as a potential indication of the conclusion of InPost cooperation with Allegro under the Smart! program beyond 2027?
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesI don't want to comment about our future plans and what InPost Plus will be in the future and how will it look like. I will just want to reinforce previous statement. We are agnostic. We are driving all the merchants on the market towards better checkout, better conversion rate and proliferation of e-commerce vis-a-vis physical retail. And we'll use all our leverage on making it happen at speed. So stay tuned as more to come.
Unknown Executive
ExecutivesThank you. Our next set of questions. How does your volume guidance compare to expected overall market GMV growth and volume growth in Poland?
Michael Rouse
ExecutivesI'll quickly answer that. At this point in time, as you see from our guidance, Poland is basically plus 5%, which we expect to be roughly in line with the market. It was very difficult to say today what the market will do in view of everything which is happening around us, but with our current market share as projected to maintain that market share in Poland is clearly the minimum that we want to do. Internationally, you see that in all the markets, we are accelerating in terms of growing our market share. So as an overall company, it's clearly a market share gain, the combination of stabilizing Poland, where we are as a forecast and gaining significantly in the international markets.
Unknown Executive
ExecutivesThank you. And then based on your statements for Poland, it seems that you expect 2026 to be a year of growth investments, both in price and OpEx, but you don't expect the impact on volume. Can you please elaborate on why and when one should expect the investments to pay off?
Michael Rouse
ExecutivesThank you, Richard. I'll also take this one briefly. I look at it slightly different, okay? It's an investment, but with the profit margins we make in Poland, it's an investment with a very quick return on investment. So whatever we invest in Poland to make sure it delivers, whether it's in 1 year or 2 years, it's for sure the right thing to do in Poland to defend our home market, where there's still growth opportunities. So yes, we're investing, but remember, 45% profit margin is still a place where it's a good place to go from a return, and that's what we're doing.
Unknown Executive
ExecutivesThank you. And our final question from the webcast. How do you convince major online retailers to join your AI shopping platform despite giving up a key customer touch point?
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesHappy to answer that. I think it's proven already when you look at the list of clients are the major Polish merchants already sitting with InPost alongside with InPost to develop the future of e-commerce and shape the future of e-commerce. For them, it's not about sacrificing their existing channels. We are not expecting that. We create a completely new channel where all of them are nonexisting or if they want to be there, they have to invest a lot. They have to invest a lot that at the end of the day, very often, they will end up where OpenAI has ended up, without controlling the full end-to-end value chain. And that's the difference. Our partners are smart partners. Smart partners understand that it's easier to collaborate versus compete against someone who is giving you best-in-class customer realization. And that's why, simply smart people.
Unknown Executive
ExecutivesThanks, Rafal. As there are no further questions, I'd like to hand back to you for final remarks.
Rafal Brzoska
ExecutivesThank you very much, guys. Thank you for joining the call. As you've noticed, 2025 was a year of accelerated growth, accelerated ambition which markets we should operate at speed and where we can fast track. U.K. naturally, we knew from the first day will be a challenge as acquiring Yodel, it's all about acquiring slightly different history and slightly different culture. But I can only say Q4 was the best investment for future we could have, and we made the right decision to invest over quality and it's paying off in Q1 already visibly seeing how many clients are turning back towards Yodel when they left a year ago or 2 years ago, because of the quality. This was the best investment. Looking at the CapEx spending, you may also read clearly that we don't want to pause. We want to accelerate actually and develop the markets at speed because we feel and we see the momentum is here. The others try to catch up. The others try to follow but that's why, again, a year ago, we made the decision that we'll make a big bet on AI. I'm a big AI believer. I strongly believe that now is the moment to sacrifice earnings by investing into AI, and this will be the right decision. Looking at the pace of development and what was 6 months ago, 9 months ago, 12 months ago, available as a tool set to create new products, it's changing rapidly. And only those who are similarly big believers that AI may change the landscape completely and will vanish many of the existing old-fashioned business models by creating new venues for growth, those players will win. And that's why we need to invest more, that's why we want to invest more and I strongly believe this is the best for the company. And yes, thank you, every single investor supporting us in that journey continuously. And thank you for your participation in the call, guys. Thank you.
Francisco van Engelen Sousa
ExecutivesThank you, everyone.
For developers and AI pipelines
Programmatic access to InPost S.A. earnings transcripts and 32,000+ others is available through the
EarningsCalls.dev REST API. Plans from $24.99/month — full transcripts, speaker segments,
full-text search, and the recently-added /api/v1/transcripts/recent polling endpoint for ETL pipelines.