Legrand SA (LR) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good afternoon. Welcome, everyone, to the 2026 Legrand Capital Market Day. We met 2 years ago in 2024 in London. And I mean, we are back here in Singapore. And thanks to all the 1 who made the effort to come here, and we see a number of faces we know well. I hope you enjoyed the Bus tour this morning as we enjoyed it from the Legrand team. So today, pretty busy agenda. We'll start with a short overview from the CEO, Benoit Coquart around the strategic road map of the group. Then Brian DiBella, the Head of North and Central America will go through the data center strategy for the group. We'll have a short lunch break, don't worry, at 1:00 p.m. or 1:10 p.m. And then in the afternoon, a pretty detailed technology keynote around our data center offering and product road map. Then a focus on Malaysia, that is a strong success story, sorry for Legrand with very nice growth perspective. And then Franck Lemery, the CFO, will walk you through our upgraded 2030 ambitions, then a conclusion from Benoit. And then a Q&A session where we will take in priority the questions from the room, but also questions online because the event is a webcast, and I would like also to say good morning, good afternoon and good evening to all the people who are connected and following the event. And now let's welcome on stage, Benoit Coquart, the CEO of Legrand.

Hello, everybody. Thank you very much for coming to Singapore, which is a place to be for at least 2 days for the data center world. A big hello also to those who are connected remotely. So I'll try to be fast because we have quite a packed agenda. I'd like to start with a few basic slides about Legrand that you -- all of you know well. So I'll go quick through those quickly to the slides. So as you know, we are in a large market. We estimate our market to be EUR 150 billion. We have a lot of competitors, some of them attending this DCW event. We believe that we have at least 6,000 competitors and probably a lot more than that. Some people might see that as a threat, which is that a fantastic opportunity because some of those competitors are, of course, natural targets for acquisitions. And last, EUR 150 billion of market, Legrand sales, EUR 10 billion, EUR 1.5 billion, EUR 11 billion. You might think that, well, 6% or 7% market share, it's not a lot, but the reality is that we do 2/3 of our sales as #1 or #2 on our market. So with leadership position. And these 2/3 metric is valid both for building and for data centers. Well, we have a large portfolio of close to 0.5 million product SKUs, which is probably the strongest and biggest asset of Legrand. We have catalogs, which are big like that. You see the breakdown of our sales. North and Central America represent now close to 50% of our sales; Europe, 35%; Rest of the World, 18%. Sales by end market, 32% data center, 29% resi, 39% nonresi and by solutions. Again, 32% data center, 22 energy transition, 5%, digital lifestyle and 41% essential infrastructure. Last basic information at Legrand. We were IPO-ed 20 years back. So we are celebrating the 20th birthday of our IPO. And you see that we had a pretty decent performance with our sales multiplied battery, EPS by 10% and share price by with a total shareholder return of 13.5%. We are not NVIDIA yet. But over a period of 20 years, this is not that bad. A couple of words on how we stand compared to the ambitions we released 2 years back in London. So not a surprise to you. We have exceeded our ambitions. Top line we intended to grow from 6% to 10% per year, half organic, half inorganic, where last year, we did 13.2%. And if we take our latest updated guidance, we are shooting for 16% to 18%. So we are doing basically twice as much as we thought we would do in terms of top line growth, which is nice. In terms of profitability, we set a guidance 2 years back, a long-term ambition of 20%, and we were at 20.7% last year and from 20.5% to 20% this year. So both in terms of top line and in terms of bottom line, we have done significantly better than our 2024 CMD ambitions. How it is compared to our peers? Well, we didn't spend weeks thinking of the peer group. We just took ABB Eton Schneider. In terms of like-for-like growth, we are growing slightly less than the 3 guys, but we are bridging the gap and we used to grow a lot less organically. And you see that now over 2 years, we grew 17%, they go on average 21%. We are doing a lot more M&A than they do. So in total, like-for-like plus M&A, we are basically growing almost 1/3 faster than those guys with a total growth of 33% over 2 years as opposed to 25% for our peers. When it comes to profitability and cash generation, well, those numbers are well known from everybody. We have an EBITDA margin, free cash flow to sales and cash conversion, which is significantly above our peer group. So -- but when comparing to our 2024 ambitions and when comparing to our peer groups, I think that we've done a pretty good job for the past 2 years. Now let's jump into our strategic road map. As you know, our strategy is designed around 3 focus areas, of course, data centers, and we'll deep dive into data centers quite a lot today. As a reminder, data center, 36% of our sales in the decenter come from North and Central America, 12% from Europe, 12% from the rest of the world. So we are very much North American even when it comes to data center, which is not a big surprise because that's the hottest area worldwide in terms of data centers. There's a second focus area, which we're not probably not talking of, and we intend to talk a little bit more about that in the quarters and years to come, which is energy transition. So I say a word letter energy transition, which is more geared towards Europe, 46% of our sales in Europe, 27% in North and Central America, 27% in the Rest of the World. And then we have essential infrastructure we actually embedded our digital lifestyle small business into that, which is more the traditional Legrand business. And you see that it's more balanced in terms of in terms of geographies, close to 40% of our sales in North and Central America, a little bit more than 40% in Europe and close to 20% in the Rest of the World. So 3 focus areas. I'd say a quick word on each of them. Well, data center, this is a topic of the day, pretty nice performance. We grew from less than EUR 1 billion of sales back in 2021 to more than EUR 3 billion in 2026. We -- you have a couple of nice numbers on this slide, 32 acquisitions, an organic CAGR of 21% from '21 to '26 and accelerating, if I may say, because last year, we did close to 40% organic growth. This year, our last guidance was 25% to 30%. So pretty nice growth. We have 140,000 SKUs. You could see for those who are attending physically to this event, you could see some of them on our boost, thousand of customers. Of course, the big guys are the big customers, where the hyperscalers or colos, and we are a global player, even though 3/4 of our sales are made in the U.S., we have data center sales in 45 countries. And we will not find any single Legrand country without a data center approach, a data center dedicated team changing opportunities. Well, I'm extremely proud of this slide. You could see downstair that we have build a comprehensive product offering. Actually, I sometimes have the feeling that the financial community is looking at Legrand with the 2019 glasses. So sometimes you're hey, guys, you are PDU maker, you are [indiscernible] maker. Well, we do a lot more than that. I hope that you could feel that in the bus. I mean -- and for example, who knows that we are able today to do container with genset, which can be gas-powered oil powered, 1 container, 225 megawatts each for backup power and main power for off-site data centers. Unfortunately, we don't show it on the bus, but we are doing that with [indiscernible]. We know that we are the world leader in load banks and that we -- we are the first 1 to introduce liquid cooled load bank in order to test not only the electrical loads but also the liquid installation of a data center. Who knows that we have software, which is instead on millions of devices to manage the load, the compute load to compute the energy to bring security to report information to the DCIM system. So today, we have a product offering, which is much larger, much deeper than what you could think of when you look at Legrand again with the 2019 glasses. Well, this slide is important, and this is my last slide dedicated to data center, we will capitalize on new capacity and architecture. So it's worth spending a few minutes on this slide. Today, so you might here, but a lot of different numbers. We believe that today, we have 8 gigawatt of IT loads, I mean, today last year, 2025, which I installed. When you put all the announcements which were made by the hyperscalers and the big guys, you end up with a potential total load of 420 gigawatt by 2030, most of the industry analysts discount that because you have a gap to demand a gap to supply. So not all the data center going to be built as expected and on top of that, you might have some bottlenecks you in there, chips or whatever. So if you look at the India and other market intelligence people, they discount that to 250 gigawatts. When you talk to our industry peers, they even further discount that to EUR 180 million. So we take the more conservative number, EUR 180 million, which means that from 2025 to 2030, we're going to have 100 gigawatts of additional capacity being built on IT loads, which is a massive opportunity for Legrand, an absolutely massive opportunity. If you look at year 2030, itself 30 gigawatts of action capacity is going to be built. Now the question that some of you raised on the bust tour was how does it translate into content for Legrand? Well, we look at our current offering and the road map, and you have here the numbers, we believe that the current AC architecture bring a total accessible market for Legrand. Again, if we have 100% market share, which we never have, basically, so it's a total accessible of $2.5 million per megawatt. And you have here approximate breakdown between critical power, compute and so on. Hybrid architecture with a site called $3 million -- more than $3 million; and full BDC, it's more than $3 million. Let me address 1 question I had down stair I was asked, what about SST? Well, SST are not in those numbers because we are currently considering -- we are working on SST. We have yet to decide whether we launch it or not. It depends on many things, including the economic conditions of an SST. Without the time for the ground would be a little bit more than EUR 3 million, EUR 2.2 million or 2.3 million to be precise. And with SST, we believe that it's going to be 3.8%. So even without a we have an accessible market, which will be in excess of total accessible market in excess of USD 2 million. So well, simple math, 100 gigawatts built over the next couple of years, $3 million per megawatt. Well, that's it. The opportunity is absolutely massive. And now the challenge for us will be to grab as much as possible of this opportunity. So I pose her eon data centers, and I will let then the rest of the Legrand team to deep dive in into the topic. Pretty busy slide. And the 2 slides dedicated to energy transition doesn't -- do not really just the potential of this business. So energy transition as a reminder, we're not doing -- we're not selling heat pumps. We're not selling electric powered press, injection press. We are selling a bit of EV charging station, but not a lot. But every time you have a heat pump, electric press or EV charging station, you may have somewhere upstream, secure, switchgear, transformer, load cheating, measurement, load management and so on and so forth. So we are selling the back end, if I may say, of the energy transition and the electrification. If you're looking at the 3 zones, you have massive opportunities ahead of us. Take Europe, the crisis with -- I mean the war between Ukraine and Russia and the war between the U.S. and Iran, acted as a wake-up call on the fact that Europe is too dependent upon gas and oil and that it was an absolute geopolitical potential issue. So there was the plan Electrify Britain. There was the now a plan Electrify France. Last week was announced a plan Electrify Germany. So every single European countries is moving towards more electrification. And you see that the share of electricity in the op energy mix will move from 23% to 46%. So doubling in 15 years. And we have a full action plan, which I will not comment to make the most of that. North and Central America, we are cracking the code of energy transition. Until very recently, we consider that energy transition was already occupied by a number of big players that you know well, and we didn't really find how we could be part of this market and still it represents less than 10% of LCAs. Now we've made a number of acquisitions dedicated to data centers that have brought us also the products, the engineering capabilities, the customer connections to sell those products into other verticals of grip or generation, solar industry and so on and so forth. And we have here, again, a lot of potential because, as most of you know, the grid in the U.S. is of very low quality, and massive investments will come to renew and upgrade the win. And rest of the world, which is quite an obvious one, you have a growth in population, growth in industrialization that should also put the demand for energy transition businesses. So we really see energy transition as a second pillar, which should bring us a lot of additional growth opportunities. This slide is interesting. It's an example of what I've just said. We made a number of operations in data center, Daven, Astron, Kratos, DTS, SRS and so on. And they brought us sales in data centers of about EUR 700 million, but they also brought us sales in other energy transition verticals, again, industry, infra, PV and so on and so forth. After all that you saw downstair, half of the sales in data centers, half of the sales in North America. So now we have a market position, we have the teams to start growing significantly our business, energy transition in the U.S. and in Asia, which we didn't have before. Well, I see the clock running. So super fast. We are not giving up on essentials. We still believe there's a lot of growth and profitability potential behind our traditional business. So in Europe, markets are supposed to grow again. We have put the euro construct numbers that show that progressively, the market is improving. It will be slow. It will be progressive, but it will come, and we have a number of initiatives to make the most of it. North and Central America the numbers are more muted and both in resi and office, well, numbers are not getting any better. The fact is that we have significantly reduced our exposure to resi and office building. We have put the numbers here. Back in 2023, office and residential represented 45% of our sales. This year, it should be something like 25%. Of course, a lot of that is coming from the fact that we have grown a lot of data center business but we have also been able to diversify into other verticals, health, education and a few others. And rest of the world, that's where the opportunity is, of course, absolutely massive. If you look at the GDP growth and population growth in Africa, Southeast Asia, India, Middle East, we have a lot of opportunities. And again, we have put a number of examples. If I take one, which is, for example, India, well, India, it's the Legrand fourth largest market. So U.S., France, Italy, India. It's already 6% of our sales. It's growing double digit. Of course, we have a data center opportunity. Of course, you have an energy transition opportunity. But for example, you have 10 million houses a year missing in India. So there's huge wave of construction coming, and we will be able to sell a number of products worn devices and so on and so forth. Our growth engines are working well. Innovation, we have increased our spending in R&D and we intend to keep running the group with a level of E2 sales of about 5%. Customer experience every year, we survey about 0.5 million customers. We get 20,000, 30,000, 40,000 responses. We have 80% satisfaction rate. And here again, we are shooting for ambitious targets. We want by 2030 to maintain this customer satisfaction rate at 80% to have NPS of at least 50%. And pricing, since we started to record these metrics, we have only experienced year-on-year average increase in prices, and we started back in the 90s, right? So last year, 2.2%. And going forward, we still intend to have positive pricing every year, which magnitude will, of course, depend on many factors, raw mats and so on and so forth. Another gross engine M&A, which is really a great area of expertise for Legrand, we are a good M&A machine. So we've put a couple of numbers to show you how selective was the process last year, which is a typical year. So we screened 1,000 targets. We engaged with 120 companies and we closed 8 deals. So we see how selective we are. We are closing less than 1% of the potential opportunities we have. And it's a pretty industrialized approach, big pipeline, clear strategic and financial criteria including something that the market seems to have forgotten, which is sometimes it's better to have an EVA accretive deal. So to be higher than you want within a reasonable time frame, 8%, 9% within that time frame. With the managed docking process. And we have a track record, which is pretty in line with our strategy. And if we look at the past 2 years, we have invested close to EUR 1 billion. We have acquired so close to EUR 1 billion of sales. We have paid on average 12x EBIT, and it's even better for '26, it's closer to 11. And against its EBIT of the year of the acquisition pre-synergy is not forward-looking 2030 normalized EBIT, including synergies, it's really the synergies, the multiple at the time of the acquisitions. We have a team, which is engaged, motivated, young, 52 -- so this is the Executive Committee of Legrand on average 52 years old. So those are the people that will have the responsibility to handle the plan. good mix of Legrand experience better as well as newcomers diverse in terms of profile and background. So you already know of, of course, Franck, Brian and Blandine will speak. Some of you have met one, especially those of the group 1 with our EVP Strategy, Brands and Digital, who worked a lot in putting together this event. And then if you happen to go on the boost this afternoon or tomorrow, you'll probably meet also the 2 other zone leaders, [indiscernible], for Europe and Jean-Parte. The rest of the world, we're also attending this event. Well, last slide on my side, I have 1 minute left to tell you about our 2030 ambitions, but don't worry, Franck will give you a lot more granularity in those targets. So we are upgrading our organic growth ambitions. We are shooting for 3% to 5% per year. We are now shooting for 6% to 8% per year. We are upgrading our M&A targets. We're shooting for 3% to 5%. We're not we are now shooting for 5. We're going to be financed #1 out of our existing cash flow. And number two, we have identified a couple of assets, which we believe are very interesting assets, but less core to Legrand and that we intend to sell for an average representing sales of between EUR 0.5 billion and EUR 1 billion on a yearly basis, and that will help us to accelerate the move towards energy and digital transition. A word on those divestments because it's been the first time we announced divestment. So margin level consistent with group average, so not dilutive to the group. And again, good businesses, but part of the essentials product family, not as core as other businesses. So instead of growing 6% to 10%, we intend to grow 11% to 13%, excluding FX and divestments to give you order of magnitude, it will -- I mean I will let you do your math, but it will probably lead us to something like between EUR 16 billion and EUR 18 billion of sales by 2030, depending on the assumption you take for FX and for that divestment. And in terms of adjusted operating margin, we were shooting for 20%, and we are now shooting for 21% to 22%, of course, same definition, so including dilution coming from acquisitions and including any restructuring expenses, no change in definition. That's what I wanted to tell you. And on that, I'm now turning the mic to Brian DiBella, President and CEO of Legrand North and South America, that will give you more granularity about our data center strategy.

Okay. Well, good afternoon to everybody that's here in the room, and good afternoon, good morning, good evening to our folks that are remote. Really glad to be here to talk data center, right, is if we haven't had enough this morning. But let's get into it. Okay. Well, I did recognize the names by show of hands, who was in London 2 years ago? Yes. A lot of folks. And I know we have some folks remote. Well, we've been awful busy, and I was reflecting on a lot of the questions and conversations that we had in London. At that point, in 2024, we were just at the beginning stages of this AI era that we're now very much in. And there were a lot of questions about where Legrand was going to play, how much growth potential. And well, what we've learned is a lot, right? So the first thing, the numbers Benoit shared the overall growth data center business since the close of 23 last full fiscal year, 2.5% growth. Now given this is a financial audience, that's probably the thing you're most interested in. What's that? Yes. 2.5x, 250%. Thank you. Good one. But it's the numbers -- the other numbers that to me are more meaningful here. because this is really defines, one, how we got there. But more importantly, as we face this AI era, we understand it much better. We know what we need to be doing and where we need to play we have positioned ourselves. We've transformed ourselves in terms of our offering. So we've completed 15 data center acquisitions since 2024. And so in 2 years, 15 acquisitions. What has that done? It's increased our addressable market by 3x. And we haven't forgotten how to innovate. So in addition to the acquisitions, 20 new platforms launched. And we use that term platform. So think about a next generation in technology. It is a DC bus bar that you saw downstairs. It's a next generation of our Zeros platform. These are not just individual SKUs, but entire platforms that are built to do what? Well, to address the radical changes in infrastructure that AI is requiring, right? This has been about solving that equation of what's it going to take to be successful in the next several years in this AI era. And because of this activity, we are now positioned in what we call the critical systems layer. And I'll explain a little bit more what that means. But ultimately, this is about being relevant to customers, solving their biggest problems and helping them ultimately achieve their objectives. So we saw this data before the sales by region, 76% in the U.S. That's reflective of 2 things. Number one, it's the overall strength and size of the market. But number two, it's a demonstration of our effectiveness of establishing key positions with the market leaders, right? We're focusing on where the market activity is the hyperscale companies, the go locations that come out of U.S., we are establishing a strong foundation with those key customers. And we've done that. So as we look at where we are today, 76%, 12 to 12 as those hyperscale companies, those colocation companies look to expand which they're doing right now, and I'll share some stories with you in a few slides. We're going to see those numbers increase. We're going to build off of the reputation, the proven solutions that we have. And then we see the sales by solution. This is, again, a reflection of that adaptation of our product offering, right? We're not just in PDUs, if you will. We've got 1/3 of our business in critical power. Physical compute, monitoring, management and control, that's that Zeros and other technologies, 25% advanced cooling. So that is liquid cooling and then testing and life cycle services 10%. So a much different -- it's not a 2019 lens on Logan. We are a very diverse player with a very meaningful participation in this market. So this is the slide that Benoit shared, and I'll go into a little bit more detail where this fits into our strategy. But I want to sort of share the philosophy of how we got here. We are selective at where we're choosing to play. Now our history, our foundation was built sort of in what we would call the white space area. And I think what that allowed us to do is understand the relationship immediately between compute and infrastructure. When you are directly connected or in the cabinet, small changes in compute have direct impact to us, where companies that were way upstream in the gray space maybe didn't have to deal with. There was no change to them. And so as this AI era has evolved. We have identified those products and systems across this infrastructure where differentiation in the product. So being able to handle generational changes like we heard in the DC area today, the interconnection between gear, customization add real value, they solve real problems. And we have kind of worked our way back all the way across the powertrain too, that source of energy from generators or power, utility power coming into the building. And we have taken positions in what we call the most critical parts of that infrastructure. And that does include commissioning, right? You can have all the products in there, but if they don't work together, if you can't test and validate, can't turn the data center on. So our footprint, those dots, those are approximately 60 manufacturing locations that are primarily or exclusively tied to data center now Legrand has more than that. But this is really a reflection of what I'll call the heritage of Legrand that it's a local specialist. We've grown through acquisitions, but also organically. And when we go into a market, we developed very close relationships with key contractors with the people that are influencing the market. We understand the codes, the standards, the practices. Now that means we have that local knowledge, but we're not a holding company. We're an operating company. So there is a network that sits on top of this that allows us to coordinate globally to take a global view on solutions with customers, but to have the agility and decision-making that happens in a local market. And again, I'll go into a little bit more detail about what this means from a strategic standpoint, but this is where we are today. So now I want to talk about a few of the key trends that really influence and impact our view of the future and our strategy. So first one, AI, and top of the slide, workloads are driving increases in rack densities and power demand. You can go back 20 years in the data center market, and there was always a story about rack densities, we're increasing and increasing power, but it's different this time, right? You can see the shape of the curve is steepening. There is a completely different level of power requirement. That means we've got to use new technologies. And that's primarily DC power and liquid cooling. But again, it's also a good story because there's a lot more power needed. Benoit shared the figures in terms of the value per gigawatt. So what have we got here? Well, here's kind of a look, and this is our view of what we think the mix will be in 2030. So again, new architectures, direct current and for those in the room that had a chance to go through the booth, really that understanding of the different generations of power that we can anticipate. Now this is our view of 2030. And what you can see is they're all still here, right? And what makes us unique is we're not trying to advocate for 800-volt LDC or a sidecar. We can handle all of it. We have the ability to be in the present in the future and in the distant future, based on what our customers ultimately need based on the deployments of individual projects or the availability of technology. And the same goes through for cooling here. Now a big shift, and this is 2025, if we went back a few years before that, it would all be air. So we know liquid is coming as these power levels go up. We've got a lot more power to cool I think 1 of the important parts of this that I think for us has been not a surprise, but a good evolution. Once you invest in a liquid cool infrastructure for that direct to chip cooling there's an obvious solution for everything else that's in the cabinet, and that's a rear door heat exchanger. So we can see where maybe a little bit in the past, a little bit more of a niche solution, we think regardless of single phase or 2 phase in the future, that role of rear door heat exchanger as providing the best cooling solution from an efficiency and from a cooling capacity is here to stay, and we have a very good position there. As if all that technology and infrastructure change wasn't enough, we've also got to go faster, right? And there's some practical parts of this. Obviously, we know the big hyperscale companies, the AI companies are racing to compete with 1 another for model training. We now have this concept of time to token. So there's an economic return for it. I think beyond that, there's a practical limitation, which is labor and resource availability. So things like modular construction, prefabrication, they're new to the data center. Their innovations in data center construction. I would tell you from a Legrand perspective, who's been in the construction game for a century plus, they're familiar to us and they make good sense. They make the products sufficient to manufacture, they again allow for rapid deployment consistent quality. And again, it's state of the market right now. So to wrap up the market view, the trend view this really on 1 slide, and we'll frame up this AI era, not surprising with 2 major driving forces. Number one, the 1 that's upfront is power, right? We need more power. That means, number one, different technology, right? We need DC power, the physics require it, the efficiency is there. So we're going to see that, but it's not going to be an overnight switch. And I'll talk a little bit about our perspective on that in the coming slides. Obviously, when you have more power, you need a different cooling technology. That brings us to liquid cooling. And then power generation. Benoit shared some data about energy transition in the U.S. market, in particular, we just don't have enough. So what we're seeing is more and more bring your own power being required for large data centers. Speed to build. Number one, what do customers want? How do they want to deploy, again, prefabrication. We saw the structural containment. These are all parts of what I'll call productivity on the job site. They create speed modularity, again, a key part of that. And then safety, 2 dimensions here. The power levels are going up, so they're inherently more dangerous. And when we're trying to go fast, we want to make sure both in the construction process, and the operation that we're keeping people safe. Okay. So this is our strategy on a single page. And the way that this section is going to work is I'll go through each of these pillars or vectors of the strategy and then share some customer examples because this isn't just words, this is really happening today. And I think those customer examples will give you some insights into what it really looks like and how the Legrand differentiation is coming to life. Now fundamentally, what does this all mean? Very practical focus. It's helping our customers solve this technology transition with infrastructure that can be designed, built and manufactured, deployed and commissioned right? We know there's going to be technology changes at the chip. We know that's going to lead to a lot of disruption and change in the infrastructure. We're here to solve it for them. We want to help them achieve their objectives, whether that's token factories or cloud services or communications. So pragmatic DC transition with our customers. Now again, I think we had a good sense of that. The DC transition is here, but it's not coming cleanly, it's not coming all at once. And so I'll explain a little bit more about how we're going to do that. You got a sense for the folks that are here in the booth, thinking about the different generations of technology, owning the critical infrastructure layer. Again, we want to play in areas where differentiation on service, on design makes a difference. It's important to the success of the project. Again, we've been in construction for over 100 years. We've proven we know how to manage projects and deliver on time. That is an absolute reputation that we have in the market. We've got to continue to be excellent at that. Wind, liquid cooling and racks and commissioning. So the liquid cooling market is still evolving. There's a lot of questions. We've made some choices here about where we want to be the best. And then glocal. And I think this is the most unique part about this strategy. It's a really big differentiator as far as Legrand shared the map that showed all those different local locations, we have teams, and again, I'll bring another map up to show a different view of that. But that ability to have deep expertise, deep relationships in market, but a global coordination, global scale and capability, we can be local and fast, but large and efficient. Okay. So this is a repeat of Benoit's slide. And I think the important part here is that thinking across the generations is an essential part of this. We put this 1 up front because we know it's been a question on your minds. I'm going to move quickly through this 1 because, one, the folks that were in the booth that are here, I think, saw this in action. And for the folks that are remote, we're going to have our technology keynote after the break, and Blandine and Rebecca will talk a little bit more about the specifics. So what does that look like? What does pragmatic DC evolution look like? And this is a real example. For those that were in the booth this morning, we actually talked about this. This is a hyperscale company that we've been working with and you heard the term rack and stack cabinet. This is a very specialized cabinet that we had developed for this hyperscaler over several years. This is their preferred way to deploy fully populated. So that's as much as a very heavy car or truck fully populated. A lot of other unique features that we had designed before DC power into this cabinet. And they said, we need to go OCP, right? We're going to -- this was a black well ultra, so that generation of NVIDIA chip, and they wanted to use OCP standards and 48-volt DC in the rack. They said, "Can you do it. But don't change anything about this cabinet that was never designed to do that. Just make it the same, but make it DC capable. And we were able to do that. We worked directly with them from design through prototype. Again, they came to our factory to validate and test the cabinet. So we now have met all of those load and transportation tests. This particular 1 is both UL and CE certified because this is a global platform. So this is what pragmatic looks like. It's take what I know. Don't make me change too much, but power up the stuff that I need inside my cabinet, and that's what this has been all about. So here's that view of critical infrastructure. And I think, again, that history of starting in the white space and understanding the relationship between the IT equipment that this is all about and where as you go upstream, any sort of break or interconnection or schedule issue can cause a critical path failure on the project. So again, as we understand the evolution of this DC architecture, where do we want to play, where are the products and systems that really support that critical path to bringing these data centers online. And that's what's reflected here. Again, global opportunities for us, from IT compute through load banks and commissioning. We'll talk a little bit more about that all the way back to generators and cable bus, which this pathway system that, again, essential to powering generators and I'll go into our first example of that one. So we had a safety moment down in the booth for folks that don't know as a manufacturer. We take safety really seriously. That absolutely translates to job site and operations, a data center. So this one, a little less technical, but really important. So this is a cable bus. This was a large colocation facility. And there are about 30 generators that feed the facility, and they're set about 20 meters back from the building. So think about that. These rows of generators and then these cable bus systems is about meter-wide running 20 meters to the building. They need to be inspected regularly. They need to be -- there's maintenance that has to happen, and they're running low on the ground. So you can imagine it would take a while to walk up and down the roads. Now the practical reality is the guys that are doing that, they're going to hop over and they want it a trip in fall hazard to, they could damage the cable bus. So we designed for them basically a ladder system step system that allowed them to go over and short cut across to be able to inspect very, very efficiently to have a better vantage point. Now is this highly technical? No, but it makes a difference. It's the reality of what happens on the job site about the application. The other piece with this product, not unique to this project, these are separate structures. So those gen sets are out on pads 20 meters away, then I've got a huge building that it's connected to. Now you can imagine when there's a weather event or a seismic event, that's when you need your generator most. Those buildings and structures could move separately. So again, 1 of the things that we design in that's unique is 6-plus inches of flexibility on 3 different dimensions, not just for the outer structure, but the conductors inside. So again, that insight, that expertise, there was some questions we had this morning about so what, is it really different? It is. because we've learned about what really matters over time. Now this more traditional example. And I would say if the other 1 was a job site installation-related insight. In this case, we are effectively an extension of this hyperscalers internal engineering team. That powertrain, there's a lot of different places that you can put technology in there from monitoring to switching. This particular hyperscaler uses our low-voltage switchgear and power panels. It is the heart of their powertrain. It is where all of the most important parts, again, not just the power distribution but monitoring, protection switching is all designed into this. And like everybody else, they're coming out with their new generation to begin their AI deployment and they said, we need to completely redesign the product. We need to be capable of handling higher loads, and we need you to increase your capacity by at least 50%, and we need it as soon as possible. And so that's what this really came down to is working with them in 1 year's time, we went from a conversation to a fully vetted listed product, UL, seismic rating, very flexible circuit protection, modular design built into it and we increased our capacity by 60% out of our core factories in the U.K. and Ireland, and we are now adding 2 new production sites, 1 in the U.S. and 1 in India for this key player. And we are, again, their #1 most important supplier design for their data centers start with us. So our track record of of service. Again, 100 years in the construction business, we know that we've got that global picture, the ready-to-serve factories that I shared. We understand project management. That doesn't mean just doing things in spreadsheets. It means being on site. That's what construction project management is. It's in our DNA, technical engagement, so from design through commissioning and then, of course, post commissioning, start-up and support, it's -- again, it's how we do business as a company that's been in construction for a long time. But the numbers here are actually pretty important as well. The first 1 -- so Benoit shared the numbers about our profit improvement are great free cash flow. While we are generating that free cash flow, it also gave us the resources to invest 4.5x our historical level in new capacity, allowed us to be ready today and for the future to meet the demands of all the growth in this data center market. And the other number, which again, I'll dig deeper on in a few slides, 400 in-market support professionals, not salespeople, not in-office engineers, but field support people that are out there to be on the ground to make sure these projects go well. So what does that look like? Well, this 1 -- this is a colocation company in Latin America, specifically in Chile. And they're doing -- in addition to doing compute colocation, this was for a fiber network. So supporting hyperscale and other enterprise businesses in the Latin American market. And they're building this whole fiber access. They had a vision or a plan to build basically fiber consolidation data centers and they came to us for certain part of the infrastructure and we're looking at it and the risk of trying to do this traditionally to go out into what are some fairly remote and rugged locations and build a data center. We just said, you know what, would you be willing to entertain doing this in a modular way. We can bring everything together for you in a container. We can handle sourcing all of the key systems, things like fire suppression and cooling that aren't part of our expertise. We'll do that directly for you. We will factory test and validate every part of the infrastructure to make sure it works. We'll do that up to high-level communication standards. Again, these are communication data centers and will arrange the deployment on site. And so we have been successful. The first 4 have gone perfectly well. You can see what that looks like. So this is the container. There is the infrastructure in there, fully built designed and delivered and installed by Legrand, again, from the design phase all the way through site level support when those things are getting dropped in. And of course, when you do it right, you get more business. So the first 4 will lead to 6 more. In this case, go back a couple of years, '24, '25, the AI race was really ramping up. I'm sure you all had a general awareness of it. This particular really big hyperscaler, it was in a frenzy competitively to get out in front of the market. And they were securing capacity from a real estate standpoint, from a power standpoint, and from a material and component standpoint as fast as they could. They also had a bunch of co-location partners doing the same thing. And they really, as a company moving fast, got a little bit out of sync. They didn't realize quite how much they had committed dumped an awful lot of unforecasted demand on us. but they had made customer commitments as well based on it. And so they're sat here sort of with more work, more projects and more demand that they could handle and quite frankly, than we were really sure what to do with. So we had several phone calls with them. They actually came out to our site. We worked together to prioritize how we want to manage this massive backlog of products. We had them work with us to validate some additional suppliers to strengthen our supply chain for this higher level of demand. And we also brought on some contract manufacturing to help hit the peaks, again, all with them working directly with us. So from this, I'll say, slightly out of control, surge of demand. 5 months' time, we were able to triple our output. Now that to them means no risk to their projects because they're going to have all the components that they need. They're going to have the systems. In this case, it was our Starline system, which is vital to the commissioning because you're providing power directly into the rack. We brought our lead times overall down 24 weeks from 40 to 16. That increase unlocked $170 million of additional demand, that sales for us that we fulfilled in the year. So winning in rack level cooling and commissioning. So first 1, doubling down on rear door heat exchanger. As I mentioned previously, this was back in the day, and we're talking -- go back 2019 pre-COVID. A niche, very clever solution, very high efficiency but you wouldn't necessarily choose to bring in liquid cooling infrastructure for it, but it had a role in the market. Well, what we've seen, obviously, as direct to chip becomes more prevalent and becomes necessary, quite honestly, once I've invested in that liquid cooling infrastructure, I've got a whole lot of other things that need to be cooled, right? I have power shelves, I have networking and communications equipment. There's a lot of other equipment stuff that's in the rack or cabinet that generates heat, got to do something with it. It's absolutely the best way to handle that. And again, once I've gone liquid cooling, the price of entry comes way down in terms of complexity and cost to add that. Now direct to chip, it's a reality. We're going to play there. I think there's still a lot of questions about how that technology is going to evolve, especially when we start talking about 2 phase, which again, the physics start to pull you there at some point in time. So we will continue to play. Again, I'd say there's a lot of R&D and evaluation. And then we've got load banks. And this is a hidden gem in terms of participation in the liquid cooling market. And then there's a story I used when we were evaluating this company that I'll share with you is the easiest way to think about it. Anybody heard of the gold rush of the 1800s in the U.S., right? All the prospectors we're running out, everybody was hoping to make it rich. That's kind of what's going on in the liquid cooling market. There's a lot of different competing technologies. But in that gold rush, there were maybe a few people that actually did strike gold, but the people that got rich were the ones that we're selling shovels and PICCs and Levi's jeans. And that's what liquid-cooled load banks are. Regardless of the technology that's out there, you need the commission, you need to validate that your liquid cooling system is sufficient and secure. And so no matter what, we don't care what you choose for liquid cooling technology because you're going to be buying a load bank from Legrand. So this 1 -- this is an AI specialty company, very innovative in terms of their infrastructure design, very aggressive guy at the helm in terms of schedule. So it can be very demanding, but it's a customer we really like having. It keeps us out what I'll say, on the leading edge in terms of technology. So this was MGX 1.1. So again, this is a black well AI chip set. So this was as of not that long ago, the latest and greatest. They needed us to take -- and again, make a DC compatible rare door heat exchanger. So bring DC power into it a product that was never designed for it, but this is what they needed and we need it right now. So again, from the request to working through prototypes and actually first article, we're able to do that in 8 weeks. What does that mean? Well, they get what they need in terms of their cabinet. They get a great cooling solution for, again, everything else that's in the cabinet. Also by going directly to DC, we save about $7,000 per cabinet for a rectifier because this is now a native DC rear door heat exchanger. This one, I love this one. It's a huge colocation company, huge, huge colocation company, their first liquid cool data center. And of course, they called us because we're the leader in load banks and said we got to get this right. We're not really sure about this. We want to make sure the system is going to be reliable. So before we get to product, we spent several weeks in meeting upon meeting, working out the testing scenarios with the owner, with the contractors, with the engineers, right? What do we need to do? How do we make sure that this whole system is going to be safe? What does this box need to have in terms of monitoring and tracking? And at one, strength plays to strength. We had -- we gained insights from that scenario planning that actually influence the design of the product and certain features that are built in. Number two, obviously, we became the standard for their fleet when it did come time to commission that data center. And what we learned, the #1 issue, you don't want to leak because that will shut down $1 million rack in terms of equipment could damage it. The impact in terms of loss revenue can be very, very significant. But the other thing, yes, the primary purpose is to make sure it's reliable. But by calibrating correctly. So you can adjust your inlet water temperature, you can adjust your flow rate you can make this cooling system even more efficient. Those pumps and those chillers, they do take a lot of energy, and we're talking about 20%, 30%, even 40% more efficient when you calibrate them correctly does 2 things. One, make sure you are using the least energy possible, but also make sure that those GPUs aren't going to throttle down, right? You don't want them to overheat and throttle when you're doing training. So for us, again, great, great advantage. We were the first to have the product and the product was designed with specific features that we learned through this exercise. So glocal. Again, I would say this is a unique part. For folks that know Legrand, we've grown over the years through acquisition. Our history was in the electrical business. And I'll say, local codes and standards, local practices is really at the heart of what we've been for a long time. And those things are still extremely relevant because data centers are buildings that get built somewhere. And so having relationships, understanding who is making the market, who the influences are is really, really powerful. It's also really hard to replicate to take a big global operation and try to drive it into a local market. I can tell you because we've learned, it's a lot easier to build an overlay network to control and manage and coordinate across all of these local resources and capabilities. So what do we look like? I said -- I shared the number, 400-plus in-market people. You can see here by market, the U.S. 200 sales and 160 field service and support South America, 70 and 55, et cetera, Asia, 315, a lot of salespeople in Asia, 150 support and services. And then we have a global key account team that sits on top of all of that for the largest global accounts where they want global product road maps. They want assurances on product quality, et cetera. So let's talk about what that looks like. So this is actually a local one. This is a 100-megawatt data center. It was a -- it's a colocation site for a hyperscaler, right? So it's colo, but it's hyperscale occupant. Now we got into this from 1 of our global accounts and a specific product that was sort of spec-ed in. So the global teams, we got to do this is going to be a project for this particular product, best way product I want to make sure the local team is ready to support it. So the local team is saying, what do we know about the project. And so they figured out who the contractor was turned out as a contractor that they know really, really well. and conversations with the contractor, they found out who the engineer was. Engineer, they know really well. And those conversations led to this, hey, this engineer is really pushing for a faster schedule Yes, great that you can provide the 1 product, but can you help us reduce the time line? We need to do this faster. This engineer is obsessing about this, we didn't know what it was exactly, but this really aggressive time line which by the way, turns out was from a bet with his boss that it could be done. So that was the whole reason that they were looking, but what that led to for us is a much deeper conversation about how to take 1 product and engineer an entire solution. So you saw the folks that are in the room, the structural hack, where we had all those systems built in. Imagine getting that all done from 1 supplier. Everything is going in, in schedule, all of those infrastructure from power delivery to cable management, PDUs, all coming from a single supplier in a single schedule just ready to drop in and connect. That's what this project was all about. And again, this was the first one. It's a 100-megawatt facility. There'll be more. We are now the default. And you're going to hear a bit more about this after the break from our local team members. Okay. This is kind of the other side of this. This is a true global situation. So another hyperscale customer here. standardized on our PDUs, next-generation PDU for their edge AI sites. So these aren't the big training mega sites. This is when you're taking AI and you're rolling it out to your phone, right? If you've got that in a phone or you've got an AI app in your pocket how many folks have rock or whatever, you're not going back to the center data center for that. That's being replicated somewhere on an edge site. So again, like everybody, we need more, we need them now and we need global quality. We want to make sure that these are going to work. These are edge sites that they tend to be more remote management. So quality was absolutely critical. So what we did, number one, we had to work with them, increase global capacity by 50%. Number two, not only trust but verify, you've heard of that statement. This was very much because these are going in remote locations because the schedule is so critical, couldn't have any quality issues. And these are intelligent. So they use our Zeros platform. So the sensing and all those other features are really critical in addition to that power delivery. So we actually, again, worked with them to come up with an approach. We built an AI-enabled using cameras, quality control system and test system for every 1 of those PDUs that is fully documented and shared with them. So they know whenever they ask, how is it going? We can share that, make sure that they have the assurances that they need to roll out a single global model for this edge deployment. For us, $40 million of incremental revenue in 6 months' time. And again, reinforcing that strong position of Legrand as the key partner in critical infrastructure. So we put all this together, right? AI, not a shocking thing to say, it's transforming the market. It's reshaping what infrastructure looks like. So scale is much bigger it's much more complex, right? We know we're going to be going through power transitions. We know we're going to have to deal with hybrid infrastructures and differences on projects and differences that each 1 of our customers, whether it's a hyperscaler or a colocation company are going to demand. But our expansion of our portfolio puts us in a position to address all the major elements of that critical infrastructure. We take that strong reputation that we've built, the know-how in terms of construction and project management and apply it across that critical infrastructure. And that, for us, is a strategic differentiator. That's the unique part about Legrand. And I think it really positions us in a very, very unique and powerful way for AI infrastructure and beyond. So that is the AI -- the data center strategy for now. We are, I think, the clock. I'm a couple of minutes ahead of schedule. So have a couple of important announcements. First thing, we are going to go to a lunch break. So I think we have everything close by. We're going to come back and you want to be back at 2:00 p.m. because we're going to start our technology keynote. And up on stage, and I'll introduce them here. We will have Blandine Antoine, our Executive Vice President of Products and Technology; and Rebecca Gilstrap, who is Senior Director of Data Center Strategy and Products. So with that, that's a wrap. All right. Thank you, everybody. [Break]

Good afternoon, good morning, good evening to those who are following us online. We have the toughest slot in this day, which is right after lunch. So I thought I'll make it easy for you and give you the takeaways right now, the 3 of them. First, Legrand has a broad portfolio of highly specialized, high-performing solutions that serves the needs of our customers throughout the power chain into cooling, from low voltage to medium voltage, from cooling to powertrains from hyperscalers to enterprise data centers. We have all the solutions, and we're getting ready for more. Second, our open architecture design philosophy and our worldwide integration capabilities allow us to provide customization at scale, thereby enabling customer choice and thereby winning customer preference. And third point, as you've seen on the booth, as you've seen on our slides, we are ready for the transition to direct current. We are building a reference design that supports this transition and will allow our customers to pick the degree to which they want to move into direct current. With that said, Brian has explained to you that core to our business and core to our success is our ability to solve our customers' solves problems. And whether the toughest problem today is to get compute online as quickly as possible in a world where permitting where power are becoming scarcer and more difficult to get. So how do we do that? We must simplify complexity. Those are complex projects. We're talking gigawatt scale design centers. 2 years ago, 1 gigawatt project would only mean a nuclear power plant. Even the biggest airports are at best 200, 250 megawatts of power. And outside of China, it takes 6 to 15 years to build 1 gigawatt nuclear power plant. Our customers want to build 1 gigawatt systems in less than 2 years. This is a very complex project, and our goal is to help them by simplifying it. Second piece is when they start executing. They want to reduce risk and they want to go as fast as possible. This is where our integration capabilities, the prefabricated solutions and the center solutions that you've seen on the booth come into play. And finally, when the facility is ready to go live, we want to make sure that it runs as a clock with high-end energy efficiency, 24/7, 365 days a week. We do that by supporting them not only through design and installation but also through testing, commissioning and maintenance services. And finally, we know that every megawatt matters. Sustainability has been core to the cross portfolio design for years. We're on to our seventh CSR road launching next year, which means we've been in this business of sustainability for 20 years. So we know that we need to make our systems more efficient in terms of energy, water, but also materials in particular, copper. So how do we do that? We believe that providing best of read systems is a really good place to start. You know that our data center position has been built on acquiring very successful businesses with very specialized solutions all over the world. So we started with that performance, but we know it's not enough. We complement it with application engineering and cortisone so that we create those unique solutions that our customers need because they have unique needs, unique ways of working, unique operating systems. And to facilitate this integration, we adopt what we call the open architecture. We are integrators. We have our own systems. We have our own solutions, but we don't mind pulling into our systems a good and efficient product from somebody else. That's what our panel billing business have been doing for years. And we believe that it is the best way to serve our customers, but we don't log them into a particular architecture, a particular system. We give them this freedom to operate, which is why they trust us and continue to work with us. So a lot of people talk about grid to chip. I'd like for you to think that we better to talk about chip to grid, because the work doesn't change come from? The change comes from the chip technology evolving very rapidly. So we'll be showcasing in the ski note, first focusing on our current portfolio and then looking at how it will be evolving on half of those changes in the chip technology are pushing changes through the whole power architecture. We like to think of our business as 5 pieces. In the previous presentation that we're bundling together the physical compute infrastructure and the monitoring systems here, we'll be splitting them in 2 because we want you to understand really what makes the solutions special. So we'll start from the chip, so I call computer infrastructure, your racks your PDUs, et cetera, talking about how we design them so that you can have monitoring through different sensors and integration in intelligent platforms. Moving into our cooling technologies, talking about critical power. And then finally explaining how our service business is supporting the performance of our customers throughout this powertrain and cooling technology. Rebecca will present you A quick overview of our portfolio. It's not only anything to do. As we mentioned, it's roughly 140,000 SKUs altogether. So we'll try to keep it compact. But if you need more details, we'll be very happy to answer any questions you have. And then I'll take the mic back to talk about how we see the transition to low voltage to high current. And with that, Rebecca it's up to you.

Thank you, Blandine. One of the most important points that I want you to take away is that Legrand has been in the data center business, and we have built that business and that portfolio, that product portfolio based on physical infrastructure. Down in the booth, you saw all of these components pulled together into a full data center architecture. Here, we have the physical infrastructure pieces that make -- that are closest to compute and that are supporting the most valuable assets within the data center space. So starting with racks, cabinets and enclosures were actually housing is the first line of security and protection to those valuable compute assets. You have pathways taking power and connectivity and connecting right, those cabinets. And then we actually have the connectivity pieces that are running the data, the bits over those pathways. And then a you saw the high end bridge power bus way that we have that's pulling all of that together. So we are protecting, we're creating the pathways and then we are also powering and pulling together again for our most valuable assets. One of the things that our customers rely on us most for is our intimate knowledge of airflow, power densities, cable management, Again, if you were to do stairs and you were in the booth, you actually saw the rigidity and the density that we're able to get within our cabinet platforms. We took all of this and we combined it with the OCP, the Open Compute project, ORV rack, so that we could have the best of breed from the Legrand systems and combine it with open systems and an open platform for the next generation of AI mass compute. Additional pieces that can be added to this. You could see in the OCP and LVDC infrastructure that we had, power shelves, bus bar liquid-cooled bus bar and also the application of our ZPE serial console and then also taking all of this together and adding intelligence on top of it with our Smart Rack controller. So again, all of the physical infrastructure to protect those most valuable assets within the data center while also adding on the intelligence on top of that. The other piece that I'll add to this is that it's not only the cabinet showing up and being there and then being loaded, Legrand has impeccable capabilities in terms of rack and stack. So the density that can be deployed in dynamic loads. So if you think about these cabinets being fully loaded, you can actually see on the bottom here, caster, so they can be rolled in to the data center and still keep the structural integrity as if they were a static load. Physical compute infrastructure is expanding beyond, right, just the typical pieces that you've seen. And it's becoming the backbone of AI factories. Structural hacks are these backbones. Again, if you saw in downstairs, the -- there was actual like data center structure set up, and so what you have is this structural hack is supporting busway it's supporting cable and power pathways. It's supporting liquid cooling, right? So heavy, heavy manifolds that are coming out and coming down into the racks. And it's also supporting again that separation in that -- and of those critical systems. One of the other pieces that is important is that you can take these pieces as stand-alone parts but you can also put them together. And that is 1 of the unique pieces for Legrand is that we know this space. We understand the criticality of the space as a whole and we understand the need for the durability and security. The other piece that I'll add to it is it's the energy efficiency that we're able to do. So you're getting consistent airflow within the structural hack. You were also getting the structural integrity of the actual backbone and you're also getting faster deployment speed and safety and serviceability. So as we separate out those systems, so you can actually see the structural hack coming out. We're creating design so that those -- each of those individual critical systems can be serviced and sustained through the lifetime. Moving on to monitoring management and control. So I'll take you back, right? A reminder on business school, you have to measure to manage. And we take that to heart in the data center in order to be able to manage better efficiency and optimization, you need to be able to monitor and manage your platforms. And so our intelligent Rack PDUs are serial console servers, and then also the additional intelligence that we have taken and applied to other products. So with these visualizations, we actually enable data center owners and operators to have revenue-grade metering capabilities. We give insights so that data center owners can make proactive PE optimization decisions and we give the command and the control to data center operators so that they can deploy faster, and then they can keep operational resilience within their portfolio. And then by doing so and taking all of that and extending it outside of the rack, we have created the most extensive communications protocol on the busway market. Rack PDU user, an excellent example of how our engineering teams are working hand in hand, where we are taking market-leading and first-to-market technology from a hardware perspective and coupling that with the firmware that we have from our Zeros platform. So again, coupling the engineering expertise in both hardware and again also in firmware and software. By doing this, it has given us the largest PDU patent portfolio in the industry. The other attributes that we're able to get from this are visualization of harmonic distortion. So while we have these capabilities at the rack level, it will become more important as Blandine gets into her section is that we're looking at other product portfolios how we take this technology and apply it across our full product portfolio. And for example, we take our customized intelligent edge and power and e-house modules, and we're able to apply the intelligence to these new construction models. They're customizable, they're prefabricated and they're helping customers deploy compute faster to the degree of 50%. The other piece that we do from a differentiation is that we are able to be the design and engineering pieces through the entire life cycle and our monitoring and management gives us visibility to the health of these systems, and we're able to provide that proactive participation within the data center ecosystem and help data center owners understand what the environment looks like and how they can improve their operations from an efficiency perspective. The second example that I want to give you from a monitoring and management control perspective is a research project that we are doing where we are driving to reduce operational expenses by 50%. The other key metric with this is that we are driving and striving to reduce the carbon footprint by 60%. So these are the types of R&D projects that we are going, and we're partnering with and we're going out into the market, and then we're also making public, right, so that we can continue to drive that innovation and bring improvements to our product portfolio, but also to the industry. Legrand's advanced cooling portfolio is a heterogeneous and pragmatic approach to cooling. Again, we went over the hot aisle containment and the importance of air flow from a cabinet level but also from a structural HAC perspective. The next stepping stone is the rear door heat exchanger, where we move into active airflow and we can handle up to 140 kilowatts per rack. The next step is that we have 2 single phase direct-to chip and also 2 phase direct-to-chip. And 1 of the unique abilities that we have is being able to understand that compute and then also couple technologies together so that we can provide, again, heterogeneous approaches to our customers. So let's dig in a little bit deeper on this. Our rear door heat exchangers have been in the market for over 20 years. They have been a supplement and supportive of HPC, high-performance computing environments. By taking this and by taking the densities that we have coming from AI, we have a tried and true technology that we are able to deploy and provide to our customers. Earlier, Brian shared with you 1 of the achievements that we had for a leading AI company in the U.S. And we had the customer ask of taking our technology that we had and deploying a 48-volt rear door heat exchanger. Again, we went from customer ask to prototype in less than 4 months. We went from customer ask to production in less than 5 months. And this is the speed and the customer intimacy that we are driving, again, across our portfolio. The other piece that we are looking at from a cooling perspective is, again, I mentioned it before, how are we combining technologies to get the highest efficiency possible. In 2027, we are launching a combination between the strengths that we have within the rear door heat exchangers alongside direct-to chip immersion level thermal performance. This is something that is ideal for multiple platforms and also incorporates many of the features that you saw within our physical compute infrastructure including the ORV 3 rack. So across the critical power infrastructure, you saw it down in the booth Brian had multiple customer success stories. Legrand is playing across the full portfolio from generation to power distribution to power protection and power quality. Our strength is not only in the product portfolio itself, but also the local depth that we have and the global support that is behind that. One of these examples is from our Kuraflex AI -- sorry, excuse me, our Kuraflex AI team. The Kuraflex UPS team that developed the highest efficiency UPS with a modular design in the industry came and put together a solution for us to have an AI simulator. This AI simulator is able to replicate the high fluctuations that we've been talking about from an AI workload perspective. By doing so, it is able to look at the peak loads and make sure that the UPSs and other technology are able to filter and decouple these fluctuations. This comes in 300-kilowatt modules and is a scalable solution. And again, by having solutions like this, it gives us the testing capabilities to make sure that we are protecting the compute and that AI workloads will be protected. Across the critical power infrastructure, we have moved from being a panel builder to extending out to global engineering and integration for our containerized solutions. So whether it's modular, whether it's prefabricated, we have power solutions that are being pulled together that are helping our customers move faster, deploy faster have safer environments and also have better certifications and lower risk within the data center deployment. Not only is it the deployment pieces that we are helping from a critical infrastructure, but we are also helping with the life cycle services of these offerings. And so again, this is where our monitoring portfolio comes in and gives us that visibility so that we are able to proactively again, work with our customers from a preventative maintenance perspective provide health checks, be proactive with spare parts and make sure that our customers were working with them hand-in-hand on that component management. Again, we are reducing risk. We are shortening time to token and we are making a safer environment for our customers to operate. Across these testing and life cycle services, we are working hand-in-hand with our customers to design and install to commission and accept do the acceptance testing. And also, as I've said multiple times, to be proactive in the preventative and corrective maintenance across our portfolio. This is building trust. It's building partnership. And again, it's working with our customers to make sure that the most valuable assets within the data center are protected. An example of our testing and life cycle services extension comes with the acquisition of Avtron. We extended the power and thermal load testing capabilities, and as Brian mentioned earlier in the customer success story, we are able to test liquid cooling with our Avtron liquid cooling load banks. By doing so, we are able to take and replicate the loads of AI liquid-cooled servers, but we're also able to stress test those loads. So it's not only mitigating the risk before commissioning, but it is also the optimization of those systems so that they can be running as efficiently as possible. And in all of that, we are driving, again, the performance and the reliability across our portfolio and for our customers. So regardless of what the construction modality is, Legrand is helping our customers move faster, move safely and also deployed at a speed and in a density that we have not seen before. As we head into 2030, there are market reports saying that the construction model can change up to 50%, and again, Legrand is rising to this challenge and is here to work with customers. And as Benoit said, regardless of what is going into these pieces, we take an open and agnostic approach and work hand-in-hand with our customers to make sure that we meet their application needs. And with that, I'm going to hand it over to Blandine to go over how we are powering the DC architecture revolution.

Thank you very much, Rebecca. So I think you've understood how all the solutions illustrate my 3 takeaways: One, through acquisitions and organic development, we have built a portfolio of highly specialized industry-leading positions that we want to continue to leverage. Second, our open architecture and our integration capabilities allow us to do customization at scale, which is really a premium offering today in the market. And third, as illustrated by some of the novelties that Rebecca highlighted, particularly in the cooling technology field, we are ready for what's coming. And I think what we're trying to demonstrate in the next chapter is how we'll be leveraging the 3 strengths to take a very strong position in the direct current transition of architectures. So you all know a lot about directs, nothing new. It's actually the first formula of electricity that we have discovered back in the 17th century when people and Mr. Volta in particular, were drilling with current. It was direct current at that time. But since then, we've moved to AEC for a lot of many good reasons. Now the industry is trying to move back to directer for 2 reasons: space and power constraints. Space. Why? If you want to have a very efficient compute system, you want your chips to be very close to one another so they can work in sync. The further way they will be, the more the chances that they will disconnect. So you want them very close. So you want to put as many chips as you can in one rack. To do that, you need to take out of the rack anything that's not a chip. Start with your conversion modules. Second, power. As we're coring rig density, I think it was either Brian or Benoit, who showcase that very fast trending density in the racks, we need to bring power to that rack. And I'm sure you've seen on the various booth at the exhibit to data, we already have fairly big cables coming into the racks. So if we're multiplying power density by 10, 20, maybe 50 we would need with a similar architecture to multiply the number of cables by 10, 2050, which will become completely untracked, not practical. So how do we keep growing the power without growing the number of cables. Well, you have 2 solutions, either you grow intensity, but that's not practical because you grow intensity, you need to put more pipes for power, you need to put more cables or you grow voltage. So the engineering solution is to grow voltage. When you do that, the benefit is you reduce your losses, so you can either reduce the amount of material that you put in your system, have pipes twice as large as before or reduce the losses and hence, improve your [ PU, ] have more effective operations. And operators will make different trade-offs they'll probably meet somewhere in the middle on those 2 benefits. The second thing you want to do is not just increased voltage, but also shift to direct current because when you do that, you can decrease the material resistance. And more importantly, as Brian showcased, you will reduce the number of conversion steps, hence, growing the effectiveness of your whole powertrain. And now that you've decided to take the conversion modules out of your IT service to get more space in our, rack, it's very easy to say, well, if I'm taking them out of the rack, I can move them pretty much anywhere in my powertrain. The first solution is to centralize them inside the rack, and that's what the OCP ORv3 architecture does. But then you can move it into a side car and then you can move it further upstream closest to the grid so that you win on this conversion and the number of conversion steps. So space and power are the 2 driving factors behind the transition to direct current. So how will that transition take place? We believe, and I think it's an industry consensus that this will not take place overnight. It will be a phased transition. Phase 1 is pretty much where we are today in the most advanced deployments where the rigs are not just standard rice, they are OCP ORv3 racks or versions that are off, where you pull the AC converters outside of the servers, centralize them in the power shelf in you rack and use a director and power bus bar at the back of your rack to power those service. So you gain a little bit on the conversion because you centralize everything, you gain in terms of spatial density into the rack. The next phase, and we have been showing on this model here, what will change with blue representing the direct current technology. The next phase is to take those power shops outside of the rack and bundle them next to the rack in a sidecar. We've demonstrated our prototype downstairs and booth. So the power side car will allow the rig to be fully direct current with a 48-volt that is a current server technology. The benefit of the sidecar is that it's retrofit friendly. You can use the same AC powertrain as you have in current buildings and convert your compute to direct current just by putting a side car and changing your IT rack. In that sense, while we call it Phase 2, we believe it could actually be quite a permanent solution. There are many facilities that will likely choose to retrofit, and just for the sidecar and the IT rack next to it rather than upholding the whole investment in changing the whole powertrain to direct card. Phase 3 is where you get all the benefits from eliminating the conversion steps in the powertrain, moving the direct conversion from the chip closer to the grid, closer to your transformer. You'll hear about SSTs. I'll talk a bit more about them. We believe the TRU, rectifier unit has a bit more potential at least in the short term. Low-voltage iron current distribution, low-voltage iron bus ways. Obviously, your protection systems need to move to direct current. We're introducing the [ AI load-stabilizer. ] I'll talk a bit more about it later. And obviously, your IT rack will also evolve with ultimately the conversion happening from a still directly in the service. So going back to my thesis, it's not grid to chip. It's really chip to grid, and you see that the move of direct current coming close and corrosion the grid is driven by the increased density in the rack. This chart summarizes this transition. This is your traditional AC architecture, where you have your servers where the conversion from ACDC takes place in the PSUs. And then moving forward to the grid, your TRx PDUs, the low voltage AC busbars and busway, secondary protection, the UPS, the main protection, the transformers, the medium voltage switchgear and ultimately, your substation and the grid. Legrand has solutions for every single box on that line from the rack to the medium voltage switchgear. The architectures that are being deployed today in the most advanced data centers are the OCP ORv3, which we just talked about. Rebecca shown you what the rate looks like in that rack, we're pulling the conversion outside of the service into this power shelf. Everything stays the same. Here again, we have solutions for every single box on that drawing. Next phase, which is a bit of a bridge architecture where we're allowing retrofits from existing AC architectures to a direct current rack by introducing the site car, which will bundle all the various converters into one place, same thing. This doesn't change and Legrand has solutions for every single box in that line. What we see coming next is a conversion happening further upstream, and we believe we can take 2 versions. One is keeping your very robust, highly reliable electromechanical transformer. You've seen some of them or bushes big study cases in transformers with a big magnetic core, aluminum windings, cast resin around them. Those are highly reliable, industry-proven technologies. They don't fail. You can easily make them redundant. And we know that our customers are very risk averse. I'd like to give this as an example, as you've seen one of our deals of the crown are the rare door heat exchanges. We've iterated on this solution, more energy efficiency, hot swappable doors, lower weight, and yet customers still buy the old version because the old version has been in the market for 20 years. It is reliable. It doesn't sell and it does well, we know how to fix it. And they are willing to let go over the other benefits because of that reliability. So they will not get rid of the medium voltage, low-voltage electronic clinical transformer anytime soon. We're introducing the rectifier which is basically a power electronic system that brings that voltage from AC to DC and then getting the rest of the powertrain to convert to a direct current technology. There is a little bit of a risk here because you have power electronics in there. We believe this is a risk that we can control because as rectifier is basically half a UPS. And as you've seen in the previous presentation, we have quite a strong engineering background in UPS. We have the highest efficiency UPS in the market. We know how to deal with those matters. So here again, if we think about this phase of transition to direct current, Legrand is developing or already has solutions for every single box on that line. And finally, when the technology is ready, solid state transformers, whole bunch of questions about how we get there. But it is likely that semiconductor technologies could provide benefit at this stage. All of that will be done in the Legrand way. The way that we know how to create value for us and for our customers. Those pieces are being developed as modular, customizable systems so that we can tailor them to the exact needs of our customers. And we're adding a data control and management layer, the famous Xerus platform that you've heard about going a bit today and then I'll go to more details too. So this is our site car. It's on the booth. It will be ready for commercialization in '27. It combines a lot of our strength with customization capabilities, intelligent redundancy integrating the backup units to a certain level. This is a 660-kilowatt unit with going down to 550, if you want some redundancy. Advanced monitoring, seamless serviceability, how easy to maintain, easy to install. And obviously, sustainability core to our offering. We're aiming for industry benchmarks, efficiency was up to 98% conversion efficiency. So going back to my transition description. We're showing here what we believe is the most likely and state in the next 5 years, which is your transformer, your old electronic call transformer combined with the TRU. So if I go again from chip to grid, we have a new [indiscernible] rack. We're introducing this AI low stabilizer, which will basically buffer the fluctuation that AI is imposing into your power system. Your LVDC protection, the rectifier that transformer haven't picked it heat care, but you would have your meeting in voltage switchgear and then the substation. So what do each of the things do? Well, this is your rack. We're connecting everything with a bus way, easier to install, easy to maintain, with flexibility and where you put the top of boxes, you can integrate protection in those boxes, the stabilizer, the protection unit. We design protection units, we have panel building businesses across the world. It's just a matter of integrating solid-state circuit breakers in those designs, and we'll be able to create those offers. So across that line, we have solutions for each box. Now I'd like to get a little technical because I think it's fun. So this is our chips going to the grid over there. You can imagine your rack as being a panel of various GPUs. So all being put in the same place with your DC to DC conversion, bringing the 800 DC to the 48-volt that's used in the service connected to your protection system, backup generation, which could be solar panels or more likely battery energy storage systems. Your ACDC rectifier, potentially AC power generators, like those that we sell with our new acquisition Girts and then your substation over there. What does this thing do? It's connected to that bus way and basically creating a reservoir of power so that any excess demand here does not pull from the grid, but pulls from that bank of energy. Some people out there, very respectable people are trying to convince you that you protect the grid, you need to put a big system here to absorb those fluctuations. Control theory 101 in engineering classes so that you need to control the perturbation as close to the source as possible. That's true for noise. That's true for power. That's true for anything that could transfer energy into your system. Because if you don't quench it here, then you get oscillations throughout. You're moving the trouble upstream, and that can create quite a bit of damage. Why? Because those things will go up and down in power intensity quite a bit, very fast frequency. If you combine several of those data holes, sending those high-frequency changes throughout the system, best case, you'll have to oversize your system, so putting a lot of CapEx to make sure that you can cater to the peak of demand. Worst case, you get into an insulation system. And you can look up on the web, the Tacoma Bridge accident in 1940 where the winds put in resonance a bridge and the bridge just crumbled. That could happen in such a system if you ended up having all your data holes coming into resonate. To make it simpler, I like this hydraulic metaphor. So current is water flow, pressure is voltage. So your high-voltage damage here, pushing the current into the expansion tag, which would be your transformer, bringing the voltage to a lower level. Having your valve here to cut the power if everything goes wrong, that's your protection system, moving into this distribution of taps. And those -- each of those taps, each of those faucets is one GPU. So if one is off, when he's on when he's up for the no, you have somewhat of an average system. But as we said in introduction, the benefits of putting all those things together is to get synchronized compute because that's where you get efficiency in your training. So all of the taps going all at the same time or at the same time, and at the same time, of at the same time. If anyone's on gardening, you know that if you suddenly open the top of your gardening hose, you'll find it jolting because it gets a lot of high-pressure suddenly, and you don't want that drought to percolate through your system. So we're introducing this double tank system with one small super rapid transient response reservoir, i.e. a super capacitor and one larger, slightly slower reservoir that can pick up the demand once the capacity has already shipped it. And that's your BBU, your battery backup unit. So the combination of the 2 systems is the AI-load stabilizer. And depending on your load profile, how big the swings are, how fast the changes are, you can choose to have more supercapacitor, more expensive or more batteries less expensive but not as rapid. So each customer will be able to customize their system based on their own needs. So that's the AI-load stabilizer. As I mentioned, the challenges is ultrafast power load fluctuation. And the solution is to absorb it by putting these CBUs and BBUs on the bus way so that they can absorb what's coming from the various racks in the data hall. So it performance 3 functions. The first one is to be the energy buffer for this powertrain. The second one is to shape the load. So if you sell those correctly, instead of seeing very high swings of demand, you'll see a much smoother, more stable load curve that won't give us high -- it's basically an average of your peaks which it makes it much easier to get a permit from a utility company. They don't like those swings. But if you can commit to a very smooth load profile, they'll be happy to give you the permit. And you won't need to oversize your upstream power train to match that very high intensity. You can just put it at the level that you've chosen based on your design. And finally, it also performs a right through function, which is your typical UPS function of preventing any perturbation from the grid to making the damage to your IT rack. All of that will be enabled, monitored and controlled by our Xerus platform. So lots of sensors in Iraq, lots of sensors in the AI-load stabilizer, to check power harmonics, to check voltage, to the at current, but also temperature, water leakage, intrusion, motion. We've developed this completely in-house on an open platform even the sensors are enhanced. So we have our own PCBAs and CPUs, embedded operating system, which is called the Legrand, if you want, in Xerus, and then a variety of application and APIs, which allow the systems to communicate to the DCM of the customers. It was not super famous for software, but we believe that with this particular one, we need to make a bit of a buzz. It's already deployed in millions of devices across the world has been on the field for more than 13 years. So my 3 takeaways. By now, you should be able to repeat them after me. First, we have a very robust portfolio of high-performing solution that has been built over the years through acquisitions and organic development. with our specialty solutions recognized as leading solutions by the market. Second, our open architecture design philosophy, coupled to our integration capabilities allows customization at scale, driving customer preference by enabling their choice. And finally, we're able to cater to rapidly changing needs. Our history from the first racks we built to our indirect system design shows that we can understand customer needs and very rapidly bring a solution to market. You heard about our rear door example system in less than 8 weeks, we're able to put a new design in the market. We have many of those stories and this transition to direct current is another one. Direct current will not be one size fits all. There will be a variety of architectures coexisting in the market from OCP ORv3 to full direct current, and we have solutions for each of those phases from low-voltage, medium voltage for hyperscalers to enterprise systems for AC to DC. And with that, it is my pleasure to welcome on Achraf Hegazy, the CEO of our Malaysia business and Jason Lim, Managing Director of Bus Power Systems.

Good afternoon, everybody. Good morning, good evening. Let me now take you to Malaysia, a place that has become very strategic recently. A lot of players are investing heavily in Malaysia right now. And for Legrand for us, it's not only a place where we want to catch opportunities and continue to grow. It's also where we are building strong capabilities to support the data center industry. Let's start with, first, why and how Malaysia is leading the way in the data center development in the return in Asia Pacific. Of course, there is the diversification of the hyperscaler from U.S. Of course, there is the spillover from Singapore a few years ago, where operators are looking places not too far to build capacities in IT and megawatt. But there is also the fact that in Malaysia, there is affordable and available land power and water A part of this power is already renewable. There is a strong regulatory framework, such as the CTF, the Greenland pathway that helped build data center faster and connected to the grid. There is a vision. There is a strong governmental policy that aim to transform Malaysia as a digital-driven and high-income nation by 2030 and the regional digital player in the region. All of this has proven successful because we jumped from a few years ago from less than 100-megawatt to 1,300 now. And the projections are giving us 2,500 megawatts by 2030. Important point to note, 70% of this demand will be AI driven. So what has started as a spillover from Singapore a few years ago has now gained its own momentum. It's a momentum built around scalable power, industrial debt, execution speed, connectivity and hyperscale capital. On our side, what have we done and what's the journey of Legrand in Malaysia. We have been in the country for a long time, for 4 decades now. Before the data center boom we're relying a lot on the commercial and residential segments with the acquisition of Mega Power, the leader in PVC conduit in 2011. At that time, 85% of our sales was coming from Electrical Essentials. A few years after we acquired our first capabilities in the white space with the acquisition of HA manufacturing. But it's really the past 2 years that we grew a lot and increased our position with the acquisition of Linkk Busway System, the leader in bus duct and bus way in Malaysia and in the region and the acquisition of SRS Power Engineering, the leader in critical power infrastructure. The shift has happened for us in Malaysia. We jumped from USD 20 million business to a USD 300 million business with 65% of our sales coming from data center and 30% coming from energy transition followed by electrical essential. Behind every adventure, behind every success, we are in every story, there are teams, and we are lucky to have great teams in Malaysia. You see here the different teams that we have and all the talents that we have in Malaysia. We work together, we move in sync to bring more value to our customer and to support the industry. More than products, we want, of course, to build the solution. What makes our platform unique in Malaysia is that we leverage both on local capabilities, local engineering and on the Legrand global portfolio with all the brands that you have seen, such as CRS or [indiscernible] and we are capable to leverage on both local capabilities on manufacturing, engineering or execution and on regional one. And this helps us to tailor according to the needs and to tailor according to the local requirements. This takes me to the platform that we have built in Malaysia. We have invested a lot in 3 different dimensions. The first one being the fact that we can do ETO or CTO, 1/3 of our sales today come from solutions that are assembled and already tested in our factories and facilities before being deployed to the customer side. Supply chain, today, we are capable to accompany a hyperscale player and deliver product on a different site in the same time on this plan of a few months or a few years. On the opposite, we are capable to sprint and deliver needs for a specific project of our customer. Last point, seamless execution from engineering validation through the FET to commissioning, testing and installation. We have teams that are dedicated to follow up the full life cycle of the project. This being done, it's the 3 different ingredients of our platform, and it's helping us to build a strong partnership with our customer. Few words on this and this, I think, was also mentioned by Brian before. The old game on the [indiscernible] , it's because the data center buying journey is becoming -- is already a complex honey and it's becoming more and more complex. And the game that we are playing or trying to place to make Legrand Global agreement and framework work locally. For that, we event, of course, on the different agreement that we have, and we leverage on our local team. So the game is to make the local works in our region. We support, of course, also regional and local player. And by playing on the different dimension and engaging a different level. We can engage early the specification, influence the specification and make execution easier locally. All of this is helping us to build long-lasting relationship with key players of the industry. And I believe you can illustrate some of it.

Thank you, Achraf. Good afternoon, everyone. Good morning, good afternoon and good evening, I guess, to everybody at home. I'm Jason Lim. Managing Director at Link Busway Systems, Malaysia. Malaysia is indeed a very vibrant market right now in the DC landscape, and we love our position in it because we have built a very strong track record with some of the most demanding data center customers in the region. Let's look at some of these successes. Firstly, on the left, you see international global location customer. We participated in [indiscernible] project last year. The first phase of that multiphase project was 100 megawatts. But more than the scale of the project, I'd like to focus on the breadth of the project. We participated in it. And we delivered many products throughout the Legrand portfolio in this project from cable management, hacks, power distribution units, bus waste, bus bars, all the way from the gray space throughout the data center to the white space. And for us, this proved a very important point. Through global credibility and local execution, we are able to not just supply 1 or 2 products, we are able to supply a fleet of products. And through that, we push up the value pool here. Secondly, we go to the middle, slightly different case here, a very large local colo. What is very striking here is how these local colos have also grown very rapidly. What was our first purchase order from them was for 36 megawatts of bus bars a few years back. It was now 80 megawatts last year. And this year, it looks like we are going to double that through a fleet of products. This colo incidentally themselves have made a public announcement to say that they are going to build up 1.5 gigawatts and the lead up to 2030. So that's pretty crazy. And for us, we are fully embedded in this ecosystem. We know the local contractors. We have long-standing relationships with consultants. We navigate tight time lines with them. We anticipate execution risks. And because we are able to do all of this. This data center colos, they love us. And through that, through problem-solving with them, we are heavily involved in their projects. And as you can see here, we have supply busbars, base, skids, low-voltage Swiss gear, we have in to do the servicing and commissioning with them. More than that, we feature very strongly in their road map and their pipelines coming up. Third of all, hyperscalers. Hyperscalers have very strong demands in custom solutions and repeatability. So thanks to our global key account team, which I said plenty of traction with these hyperscalers. Here in Malaysia, what is tangible for us is that we see many more opportunities, many more allocations. And that's happening month-to-month that number is going up. This track record is very important to us. Why? Because Malaysia, as I said, is a vibrant market. We don't just -- from our position, we don't want just to be counting the megawatts that are in Malaysia. We want to maximize and capitalize on Legrand content in every single megawatt in the pilots in Malaysia. So scaling up, the market is scaling up. Legrand is scaling up as well in its capabilities. They have acquired these 2 companies Linkk went from an SRS this past couple of years. Linkk is a market leader in power bus bars in Malaysia and SRS is a market leader as well in LV and medium-voltage power protection solutions. And these 2 acquisitions have brought EUR 135 million for combined revenue at time of acquisition. Obviously, these numbers have gone up a lot since I see a smart on tenor, so he's pretty happy about it. Apart from this, it's not just the numbers. It's the synergies that have been created. Just now Brian mentioned data center out have gone from 18 months to 9 months. It's pretty crazy. And in Malaysia, we see plenty of that. We haven't seen the meta tens yet, but it might be a sign of things to come. So the focus here in Malaysia has been global credibility, but definitely local manufacturing, local involvement, local proximity. This global idea is very appealing. And that is totally in our Legrand wheel house. We have that through these acquisitions. And through this, we see a lot of synergies and these synergies provide multiplier effects for more inbound business going ahead. And synergies require good docking, as I learned. And Linkk, I hope, is a very good example of this from very humble industrial routes in 1990. Two, over 30 years, we have built manufacturing capability. We've developed Epoxy technology. We have expanded internationally. And by 2024, we were market leaders in power bus bus sitting on 2 factories in Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia. And in 2025, when Legrand acquired us, it was a proven industrial business. But what is very interesting here is what happened in ensuing 12 months. Integration took very short time. And in 12 months, now today, we are sitting in factory 3 and 4 with factory [indiscernible] coming up on the horizon in coming months in anticipation of the rising demands in the market. And it has been truly an accelerator in all essence of the world. And we see that in a few areas. Firstly, the team. To cope with this kind of crazy demands, obviously, there is a burgeoning workforce. And this workforce with Legrand has been able to tap into global resources, global knowledge and applied it locally and regionally. On top of that, whilst doing that, employee satisfaction has been very high at 90% or more. Beyond that, there has been a lot of value created. Just now, we talked about how we win projects with the local colos and the international colos. On top of that, we do have interaction between Linkk and group R&D. We create an accelerated product road map, more customized solutions, locally and for the region. Going forward, what do we want to do? We want to continue to win and win more. And from there, we want to as well build more in Malaysia, developed in Malaysia and serve Legrand customers around the world. Thanks. Back to you, Achraf.

Thank you, Jason. To conclude, 3 points. outlook look good in Malaysia. In the next few years, the digital economy should contribute by 1.2% every year to -- there is a clear vision, and we see a projection at 2.6 gigawatt by 2030. Second message, as Jason already mentioned, we are not starting from scratch. We are already in it. we have already built our platform, and this is putting us in a good position to continue to catch opportunity and to continue to bring value to our customer. With this being said, with the extended portfolio that we have capabilities that we have built locally, we are confident to double the sales in Malaysia by 2030. This being said, thank you, and I believe it's time to welcome our CFO, Franck Lemery. Thank you.

Good afternoon, good morning, good night, probably for some of the people online. It's now time to share a few key financial figures. As an introduction of 2030 ambition, I just would like to recap a few of the major achievements and major financial achievements of the group recently. First achievement is that in let's say, challenging economy, we have been able to grow. We grew 43% between 2025 and 2019. Obviously, in a retreating building market, the volume growth was very modest, and it was supported only by energy and digital transition. But 2 other growth engines worked very well. The first one is the pricing which was at plus 22% on the period. Pricing, as you know, is a strategic asset of the group. It can be also a tactical asset in an inflationary backdrop. And the second engine definitely has been M&A acquisition, bringing 21 plus 21% of scope on the period. Now the second achievement is the margin evolution and the value creation. As I said, sales were up 43%, operating profit, 48% with adjusted operating margin improving by 70 bps. It improved by 70 bps on 3 factors. The first one is the organic or let's call that an operational leverage of 180 bps, mainly driven by productivity. Inflation balance was not that favorable at a time, but productivity has been very strong. I said 4% of volume like-for-like headcount, minus 12%, that's huge productivity at the border of the group. The second factor is that we have invested, we have invested a little bit more than usually in restructuring. Just to give you one figure. You know the millions, but we closed 40 sites during that period. And the last factor is a very usual one, the one you know very well is the dilution coming from our acquisitions. Third acquisition, it's more about cash. First, the free cash flow -- first -- third achievement, sorry, it's about cash. So first, the free cash flow, very robust free cash flow generation EUR 7.2 billion over the 6 years at an average ratio of 15.1% of sales. What did we do with that money? Capital allocation in the period, top priority was M&A, EUR 4.3 billion, dividend comes EUR 2.8 billion and some share buyback for EUR 0.8 billion. Capital allocated is slightly below the -- above the free cash flow meaning the debt slightly increased, but the balance sheet remained very solid, very robust at the end of 2025. Net debt to EBITDA is EUR 1.9 million. So this is for looking back. Now let's look ahead to 2030 emission and start with the market conditions. We are expecting the 3 focus era of the group to be positive for the upcoming years. Starting with data center, 32% of our exposure, current exposure we are expecting the market to grow mid- to high teens. Energy transition, 22% of the current sales should grow mid-single digit. Essential Infrastructure 46% [indiscernible] sale is expected to grow low single digit with a progressive recovery. Now what does it mean for Legrand in terms of top line? 2030 growth has been revised up as far as organic is concerned, we aim to achieve an organic CAGR of plus 6% to [ 0.8%. ] M&A through acquisition, the scope should be around 5% per year in average. And as it has been produced by Benoit, there should be some divestments comprised by EUR 0.5 billion to EUR 1 billion of sales. In terms of margin and cash, once again, we have upgraded our adjusted operating margin outlook. Shooting now for 21% to 22% of adjusted EBIT margin, obviously, always including [indiscernible] and acquisition Free cash flow should remain strong at 13% to 15% and cash conversion above 100%. As far as cash is concerned, that is for capital allocation. Capital allocation will still be very clear and the policy will still be very disciplined. Top priority remains M&A, where we should dedicate roughly 60% of our free cash flow. Dividend remained attractive at 50% of net income payout. Some share buyback selective, what does it mean selective means at least compensate the dilution coming from LTI and employee shareholder plan and if relevant, a little bit more. And according to that, embedding the divestment, the 5% of scope. We want our balance sheet to remain solid with a leverage of net debt-to-EBITDA comprised between EUR 1.5 billion and EUR 2.5 billion. So that's it. My last slide is a kind of a wrap-up of this financial model of those 2030 upgraded ambitions. As you can see directly -- as you can see, it's highly value creative. It's about stronger growth profile. It's about improve adjusted EBIT margin, it's about cash generation and disciplined capital allocation policy. With that, I'm [indiscernible] back to Benoit.

Thank you, Franck. Well, I feel the level of energy has gone down a little bit. I think you need another technical key note maybe. So I'm going to be very, joking, no. Well, I'm going to be very fast, and then will open the Q&A. So a lot has been said, I'd like to emphasize the fact that all what we've been telling you will position ideally Legrand for the next decade. If we look at the percentage of our sales made in what we call energy and digital transition. So data center, energy transition and digital lifestyle, it used to be 40% of our sales back in '21. Last year, it was 53% of our sales and by 2030, if we do what we intend to do, should be 70%. So our objective is not to shoot for 2025 targets yet. But we're going to have an exciting decade given the repositioning we have made. As a conclusion, we've been successfully repositioning Legrand and I believe we have strengthened a lot the growth profile as illustrated by '25, '26 and the new guidance. We, I believe, have unique business model supported by best-in-class profitability, cash generation and M&A, and we have upgraded our ambitions with value creative, value-accretive ambitions for 2030. This being said, now I think it's time to open for questions and answers. Thank you.

Okay. So we'll start the Q&A session, of course, giving priority to the room here, and I see already many hands that are raised. So please, when you ask your questions, stand up, tell us your name and the institution you are working for, please, before asking your question. Ideally, as I see that we have many questions, if you could have 1 question with 1 follow-up, and then we'll hand over the mic to someone. So maybe we'll start here with Ben. You can stand up, and you'll get the mic.

Thank you very much, Ben Uglow from Oxcap and thank you very much for the comprehensive presentation throughout the day. I'm sure there's going to be a lot of questions about 800-volt DC. I'm -- the number that really stuck out and frankly, continues to blow me away is your acquisition track record in this space. You did 8 acquisitions acquired EUR 1 billion of sales at 12x EBIT. And my question is, how and how sustainable the environment that we're in seems to be absolutely insane everything is expensive. How can Legrand do it? And how are you doing it differently from competitors which are allocating massive amounts of capital at far higher multiples.

Well, I cannot talk on the behalf of -- can I take that one. I cannot speak on behalf of my competitors. How are we doing it? Well, we try to entertain a close relationship with targets. We pay fair prices. Sometimes it's 13x or 14x EBIT, so it's not always [indiscernible] I think we are a good home for companies. We respect our words we are fast in terms of negotiating the deal. Companies who joined Legrand knows that they're going to grow. We also have ways and means to incentivize underlying interest. So for example, we are doing a lot of burnout or even JV sometimes so that the owner can stay and participate in the growth of the company. And we have a critical reputation. So we've been able to have reasonable multiples. And I still believe that in years to come, I cannot commit to a precise number, but I'm confident in our ability to continue to make deals at reasonable price. The key criteria is not that much a multiple. It's really the return on invested capital. So we can accept to be at 6% or 7% on year 1, provided with a reasonable time frame. We exceed the WACC. So we should be at 9% or 10% within 3, 4 years. And I believe it's a reasonable framework. Maybe we can have the testimony of Jason. Because sorry, Jason. Well, this one, you didn't mention that, but he's the founder of Linkk. So we created the company about 30 years back. So he's the one who negotiated with Legrand.So maybe you can -- from the target side, let's say, test our friends, how did it work out?

I think for us as a founder, especially going through this crazy data center exponential curve, it is new to somebody like us, new to an organization like us and obviously, our heart goes to the people around us. We do not want short-term gains only. We want the company to be in a better place, the people to be in a better place. And I think that's why Legrand a beautiful fit for a company like us and for hopefully, many more acquisition targets we feel like it's the best place that provides growth and provides a safe ground, safe learning, growing ground for the people that are there. That's what I feel.

Quick follow-up is just on -- I guess, I don't know if it's for Ben or Franck. But on the margin upgrade to '21, '22, where is that more to do with productivity? Or is it to do with operating leverage on the data center side?

Well, we cover the world. Globally speaking, I think we -- there are 3 types of levers that we can -- organic levels that we can unlock. The first one is just the growth the growth coming from synergy of acquisition coming from better absorption of its cost, then we have the second type of lever, which has been the usual one of Legrand. You know the Legrand we restoring productivity lean. And the third one is about some -- or new levels like AI, we have ambition in productivity in here, more IT, more digitalization. So all that will contribute. Obviously, it's embedding under '21 to '22 is embedding also the dilution -- potential valuation of our acquisition. When we never know what it will be, but probably will be that dilutive. But there are plenty of things that can be -- that they can be improved in the company.

The world is different when you are growing 6% to 8%. No, but I mean when you are growing to 4%. I mean makes your life a little bit easier. You have more SG&A to absorb. You have more leverage on your production costs. So yes, it's -- we believe that it's consistent with the fact that we are upgrading our sales target.

Daniela e Costa from Goldman Sachs. Two questions. A quick one for Franck on the targets and then a more general one. Starting with the one on the targets. You've upgraded the margin guidance, but you didn't change the free cash flow range. Is the -- what you're preventing to just a more capital-intensive business? How should we think about like CapEx or working capital?

No, no. Well, yes, free cash flow to sale is not upgraded. The value, of course, is upgraded because the top line is growing. But as far as the percentage of free cash flow to sale is concerned, well, it remains stable because we have more growth emissions and 2 types of growth, organic growth has to be financed is consuming some cash. And so on additional M&A, previous M&A target was 3% to 5% of scope. Now it's around 5%. And you know that the acquisitions are dilutive on the working cap.

Okay. And then just more.

But in terms of CapEx to sales we should be approximately the same level as today. So we are shooting for 3% to 3.5% of Capex.

Yes, exactly.

Typical working capital sales and typical CapEx to sell shouldn't move. We'll have more CapEx dedicated to capacity for data centers, but it will be compensated by less CapEx elsewhere the total level of CapEx will be unchanged compared to the past.

But 1 of the 2 is increasing slightly in percentage of sales, I guess, working capital.

Working capital, mainly on behalf of acquisition -- accelerated acquisition.

Yes. Got it, clear. And then just more in terms of the structure. I think when Legrand was more essential infrastructure used to be a very decentralized organization that was sort of how used to explain the greater margins than you had versus peers and others. The data center business is a much more customer concentrated, more global. You're talking about bundling products. So how do you -- how have you adapted the organization underneath? Have you changed incentive systems? How does that whole decentralized model versus a more centralized customer and opportunity.

Well, we used to be decades ago, a very decentralized company, but for the past 10 years, we've made a journey of being a little bit more centralized on a number of topics. Now when it comes to data center, the global globalization is mainly on 2 things, product development and customer management. On product development, we have a central team led by [indiscernible] with combining the capacities or capabilities of many different companies we acquired and making sure that the work is done consistently and maybe we'll say a word on the way it is organized through tiger teams and make sure that the specialist in power management is talking to the [indiscernible] is back and that everything works as a system. And it is now organized and processed so that the teams can work together. As far as the customer fronting is concerned, that's what Brian said. We had a team of key account managers handling the international key accounts, which are hosted in the regions, and we work together and manage it organized. So the fact that we are mostly a country-based organization when it comes to front office is not an obstacle, neither in terms of product development, which has always been organized quite globally and what we call the P&T department nor for the customer fronting, which is organized with key competitors. As far as incentivization is concerned, no, I mean -- but of course, we have adjusted the targets. The data center guys are expected to do a strong growth. So you can grow 20% and not get 100% of your bonus because sometimes we feel that it's not enough. So we are just -- we have adjusted. But the basics of the bonus relying for country managers, mostly on organic growth and profitability improvement and also CSR hasn't changed. Do you want to say a word on those the product development is organized?

So we've recently implemented a new position, which is the one that Rebecca is leading as a global data center product portfolio, product management position. So her role is not easy because you know that even though we have global customers, there still are local norms, local installation habits. And so it's making sense of all of that to develop the unique data center product road map that takes into account the specificities. We have massive opportunities in that role. You are mentioning we're getting productivity. We believe that platforming some of our offers which were developed over time through acquisitions as one big opportunity for getting better cost because we know that even though our customers are currently racing to install power at some point, they will also try to put some pressure on the margin. So we're guessing ahead of that to make sure that we continue to have a very efficient portfolio and that we're able to cross-sell those local teams such as Achraf and GSI have that knowledge of their market. They have that knowledge of the customer. It's our responsibility to make sure that they know about our whole offer, which is a complex and very broad offer, 140,000 SKUs across various [indiscernible] families. So this central position of product management will be particularly helpful. It also helps us Rebecca is based in the U.S. It helps us bridge with our U.S. teams were very familiar with the hyperscalers and their requirements and make sure we understand them and bring this knowledge to other markets in which they're deploying capabilities.

It's Max from Morgan Stanley. Could you just walk us through for your data center growth target of mid- to high teens, how have you actually gone about formulating that? I realize you can look at kind of gigawatts dollars per megawatt market. But maybe just so we understand it from our side, what's actually gone into that assumption? And is there any market share gain as well?

Well, we are not very sophisticated longer. So we took the gigawatt. We said the market is going to move somewhere between the 17%, 18% in 1 gigawatt, and we'll do approximately the same. But again, if we can do more, we'll be able -- we'll be very happy to do more. But for us, the best proxy of the underlying market growth remains the gigawatt.

Okay. And just as a follow-up. So you previously said that you'd like the data center business at 40% of group or maybe that's kind of how you thought about it longer term, but you didn't want to go too much. You'll probably get there easily organically. So just when we think about kind of future acquisitions, should we think about maybe you're done or we see more of a balance of acquisitions and where they've been quite data-heavy. How should we think about it?

It's difficult to say because, of course, to make an acquisition, you need to be 2. I think you're likely to see more data center acquisitions coming, but not at the pace we have had so far. And we've -- well, -- what was the number you shut 15 acquisitions in 2 years, which are data center related. Well, it's a lot. I don't believe we'll see that pace. You're likely to see a number of vision coming in energy transition because we really intend to build energy transition as a second pillar for the growth. But then it will depend on opportunities. We'll really see and even in traditional Essentials, if we find something which is highly complementary, a little bit like the 2 deals we made in -- I mean the 4 deals we made in Australia and New Zealand, we'll consider. So there's no taboo provided it makes sense and it fits into the portfolio. And we'll have the financial means because not only we intend to dedicate as Frank said, 60% of free cash flow to acquisitions, but we will also have this divestment that will provide us additional capital to reallocate to those acquisitions.

Gael de-Bray from Deutsche Bank. Could you provide the breakdown of the $2.5 million per megawatt by category between compute and on critical?

Well, already giving a lot more information than any old market. No. I mean we have, of course, a precise breakdown. Well, it's probably -- if I can give you a number, probably a little bit less than -- approximately half is probably critical power, let's say, and the other half is the rest to compute blood management, cooling and so on and so forth. So this is the only order of magnitude, but I cannot give a lot more granularity because then it will we need to get into the individual product families. But half critical power has the rest approximately.

And why do you expect the physical compute infrastructure segment, the market potential for that to increase over time and the low voltage direct current architecture is the final one doesn't look like very intuitive knowing that the value of the PDUs will certainly get lower. .

Yes, but the PDUs represent a very, very small value of the compute part. And then you will have an AI stabilizer. You have a high-density IT rack. You have a number of components that will either remain or be added. So then again, if you take the $3 million or the $2.5 million of PDUs, they represent a very small part. But we happen to have a very strong market share in PDUs because it is a historical business where we made 2 acquisitions. But it remains quite a small part of the EUR 2.5 million.

If I may. We already see it today with the ORV3 racks that we're selling. So the value of the power shelf and the bus bar is equal to or greater than the PDUs. So everybody focuses on that, but there's other infrastructure that replaces it.

Move to James. You go James, you stood up already. Okay.

Andre from UBS. I have a quick question on the growth targets. I just run some math here and with data centers growing mid- to high teens, that gives you 5% to 6%, I think, already. See if we throw in 1% for the energy transition, then it leaves very -- not much growth for the rest of the group at the low end of your target. Is that how you see it? Or is that your kind of traditional conservativeness.