SBM Offshore N.V. (SBMO) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for holding and welcome to the SBM Offshore Full Year 2023 Earnings Call. [Operator Instructions] Just to remind you, this conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand over the conference to Mr. Bruno Chabas. Please go ahead.

Thank you very much, Operator, and welcome to SBM Offshore full year 2023 earning call. I'm Mr. Bruno Chabas, CEO of SBM Offshore, and I'm joined today by Oivind Tangen, our CEO; and Douglas Wood, our CFO. Let me present SBM Offshore's result and our main achievement for 2023. After which, Douglas, will go through our financials. As always, we will welcome your question after the prepared section of this call. So please note the disclaimer. And now, let's start with a reminder on how we create value for all stakeholders. As an energy transition company, we seek to reconcile global demand for secure and affordable energy supply with sustainability by putting our oil and gas experience and expertise and deepwater expertise at the service of a new energy era. We simplify our approach by consolidating 2 platform, transition the core and new energies into one named transition to facilitate a single focus on the overall energy transition. This leaves 2 value creation platform; Ocean Infrastructure and Transition. So let's start with the Ocean Infrastructure platform, which covers our operation and assets under construction. Supported by life cycle learning and digital tool, the operating fleet has become increasingly efficient with a lower carbon footprint and both a leading uptime and safety track record. This platform is based around the contractual backlog, which provides cash flow visibility up to 2050. It is evolving with new generations of lower emission products set to be added. [Technical Difficulty] is the value platform for further enabling the energy transition and business transformation. We seek to be a leading supplier and operator of floating energy solution for focus -- with a focus on competitiveness through Fast4Ward and reducing carbon footprint of future assets through the emissionZERO program. In addition, through this platform, we aim to deliver new and improved value proposition to market, such as we are investing in new energy technology development, especially in floating offshore wind, energy storage and transportation of alternative energy sources such as hydrogen or ammonia and in facilitating the carbon capture and storage value chain. [indiscernible] also covers activities that leverage SBM Offshore operational data, digital solution and expertise to continue to deliver value to its customer. In 2023, we delivered a strong performance. The success is once again directly driven by the talent, motivation and dedication of all SBMO employees. So let's start with our financial performance. The company generated a record EBITDA at above $1.3 billion and a year-end order book remaining at above $30 billion. Our performance is translated in our industry-leading shareholder returns. This year, we have increased our shareholder returns versus previous year via new capital allocation policy where we will distribute $150 million through our dividend and perform a $70 million share buyback. Considering share price performance of multiple years of both substantial growth in our backlog and shareholder return, we consider that allocating a portion of our annual fixed return amount to buyback offer more values and optionality to shareholders. Douglas would give you further detail on this. Secondly, we continue growing the core in 2023 with FPSO Prosperity delivered and on hire. Sepetiba reached first oil in December 2023 and was formally on hire January 2, 2024. Our presence in Guyana was reinforced by the FEED award for FPSO Jaguar on the Whiptail project and the 10-year O&M agreement signed with ExxonMobil for the Guyanese fleet. In addition, Liza Unity was purchased by ExxonMobil in Q4 2023. Our fleet uptime was in line with our historical trend and the HSSE performance was good with a total recordable injury frequency rate at 0.08 while we produced our highest level of work hours ever. Finally, we're progressing in our transition journey. In floating offshore wind, the company's construction and installations curve of the 3 offshore floaters of the Provence Grand Large project have been completed. We continue to progress our emissionZERO program, supporting our oil and gas decarbonization mission. A great step was achieved with our partnership with MHI on the carbon capture module, which is an essential solution to substantially reduce the carbon footprint of our FPSO by an estimated 70%. In addition, we can be proud of the outstanding performance from units which recently joined the fleet operating with much lower emission intensity than industry average. All the operating parameters have shown a consistent improvement since 2017. We can speak about safety where we have improved our operation. This is reflected in the downward trend on our total recordable injury frequency rate and this is why the level of activity has significantly increased. We can speak about the most progressive sustainability agenda with carbon reduction which are ahead of our net zero 2050 plan presented in 2020 and our best-in-class operating status with on-time delivery, operating performance, and startup. We significantly grew our annual revenue and EBITDA by 18% compounded annual growth rate and we also significantly grew our net cash flow backlog by USD 2.8 billion, growing from USD 6.8 billion to USD 9.3 billion between 2019 and 2023. During this period, the net cash flow backlog per share grew respectively from EUR 29 to EUR 47 per share while we increased the return to shareholders, but the average share price decreased from around EUR 16 in 2019 to EUR 13 in 2023. Regardless, we focus on continuing to grow the intrinsic value of the company, delivering the existing backlogs to excellence in project execution and operation, and grow these backlogs through new awards. We seek the outlook for growth as extremely positive. So let's start with the current energy challenge. By 2050, the world will have to safely, affordably and sustainably supply energy for 2 billion more people with an expected doubling of the world level of wealth. To face this challenge, regardless of the scenario considered, whether it is the net zero scenario or the Announced Pledges Scenario defined by the International Energy Agency, oil will be needed for decades to come to ensure smooth transition as new energy sources will come to market in the next 20 years. We've included the stated policy scenario in this view for some perspective. Assuming we can meet announced pledge so far, combined with the natural decline of current oil production, without new sources of supply, the shortage will be between 10 million to 20 million barrels of oil per day until at least the end of this decade. To address this gap, the world will need carbon and cost-efficient solution until renewable energy can cover global demand. Fulfilling future energy demand in an affordable and sustainable manner is possible with technology and investment, but it also requires pragmatism, transparency and realism from all key stakeholders. Within the oil and gas industry, deepwater developments are both economical and environmentally resilient. Offshore deepwater development have the lowest on average greenhouse gas intensity at 10 kilograms per barrel of oil produced and are amongst the most economically cost cohesive at an average break even prices of around $40 per barrel. As such, deepwater field development should and would be the preferred future supply of oil going forward. If we look at the Announced Pledges Scenario, deepwater production is forecast to grow 26% by 2030. The offshore deepwater contribution to the overall upstream production will increase to 13% from less than 10% to-date. In this context, deepwater FPSO are the solution of choice. SBM Offshore, as a leader in this market, has a key role to play in the energy transition, with our Fast4Ward FPSO contributing to low development breakeven prices ranging between USD 25 to USD 35 per barrel with a greenhouse gas emission intensity of around 40% lower than the average of the oil and gas industry. Based on the strong fundamentals, the market outlook for FPSO is very positive. This does not change our approach to be selective and disciplined in bids we pursue to continue delivering value to all key stakeholders. Our capacity continued to be of 6 FPSO at this front stage of construction in our portfolio. We currently have 3 FPSO and 2 MPF hulls under construction, one of which is already allocated to the Whiptail development project in Guyana. We foresee over 30 potential FPSO awards over the next 3 years, of which at least 15 being in our niche market of large and complex FPSO, again, providing energy with both the lowest breakeven prices and emission intensity. Most awards are expected in the high quality reservoir of South America, including Guyana and Brazil, where we have a strong foothold, but also in other basin in Western Africa and Gulf of Mexico for which a Fast4Ward solution is well suited. Exploration in [indiscernible] basin has been very active in the past year, supporting our positive view on the outlook. To illustrate our oil prediction performance, let's zoom in on the company track record in terms of FPSO delivery and the value it brings to our clients. Time to market is a key parameter to our clients' economics. Our performance in Guyana is a great illustration of what we managed to achieve. On the left hand side of the graph, you can see that over the past 10 years, it takes on average over 9 years for deepwater field discovery to reach first oil. Despite the increasing complexity of new FPSO and the impact of macroeconomic events of the pandemics and the war in Ukraine, SBM Offshore has supported our clients' outperformance for Fast4Ward program. This result requires discipline, experience and strong project management, further enhanced by own optimized and standardized FPSO design. This performance is further improved through our early engagement with clients, supply chain and other contractors. The combination of these factors allow us to accelerate discovery to first oil in our future project. On the right hand side is the performance in Guyana with a time to market of less than 5 years for Destiny development which targeted early production and less than 7 years for Unity and Prosperity development. You can observe that Guyana track record is below our total fleet average, which includes our historical portfolio, thanks to the parameters I already mentioned. This accelerated time to market combined with our capacity to safely increase production of the unit above nameplate capacity has allowed production from discovery in 2015 to our latest delivery in Guyana with FPSO Prosperity to have a cumulative installed capacity of above 645 barrel of oil per day. This is a huge achievement in 8 years when you consider that most field have not even started their production phase since discovery in this time frame. This is a great testimony to many, but particularly of Fast4Ward concept and the SBM capacity to perform. A crucial factor in the success is the startup of the unit where SBM has a unique experience built through the full life cycle of the asset from engineering to operation. Our expertise in commissioning is testified by your best-in-class startup of the FPSO and the background flare achieved ahead of schedule for Prosperity and soon to be on Sepetiba. This has a significant impact to lower the environmental impact and to accelerate production at full capacity. This part of our value generation proposition to our clients by bringing in the assets online safely in a short time span, allowing production to start and ramp up ahead of schedule, generating additional revenue. The Fast4Ward concept has helped optimize the startup, thanks to the standardization and replication of the asset. 2023 saw the successful delivery of 2 major FPSO projects in 2 countries. FPSO Sepetiba is the first FPSO delivery of Fast4Ward concept in Brazil, showing the success of this model across different markets and bringing SBM operating fleet to 7 FPSO in the country. It is currently SBM's most complex FPSO operating in the Brazilian waters. FPSO Prosperity is the third FPSO delivered and processing in Guyana. As already mentioned, the background flare was achieved ahead of schedule, followed by the quick ramp-up of production which resulted in the material acceleration of revenues for our clients. These 2 units will have relatively low emission intensity and low development oil breakeven prices and will contribute to fulfill world energy demand by adding 400,000 barrel of oil per day of combined capacity. So looking at our entire execution portfolio, the overall progress on the 3 FPSO under construction stand at around 71% of overall percentage of completion. Construction has started on 2 MPF hulls order and is progressing as expected. The first FPSO that went through the pandemic are getting delivered to the client. The lesson learned from this unit have been and will be implemented on newer projects, to further our unique competitive advantage by capitalizing on the learning curve of the Fast4Ward concept to mutual benefits to our clients, partners and SBM Offshore. We have now a clear view of the impact of the aftermath of -- after effects of the pandemic, combined with supply chain and inflation constraints we have been experiencing globally. Project teams have been working hard in delivering schedule on track with the over -- and the overall margin remains robust at portfolio level. Turning to the lease and operating division. This segment continued to deliver good result with an uptime of 98.2% for 2023. The number of operating units stand at 17 with an installed capacity of over 2 million barrel of oil per day. 3 units will be added to the operating fleet within the next 2 years. Following the sale of Liza Unity, we will continue to operate the vessel for ExxonMobil under a 10 years O&M agreement signed earlier in 2023. In total, this portfolio provides backlog visibility until 2050 and an associated healthy and predictable cash flow. Again, to bring some perspective, the average marginal cost of our fleet for our clients is around USD 5 per barrel produced, which underpin the resilience of the fleet cash flow. As part of the full life cycle, Deep Panuke and Capixaba are both being decommissioned following the highest standard. On our net zero commitment, we made some key milestones toward our long-term future. As an energy transition company, we're focused on our energy -- emission reduction mission. In line with our previous announcement, we have the ambition to achieve net zero by no later than 2050. To ensure we remain on track, the company has set some target which are reducing our emission by 50% for the Scope 3 downstream on leased asset, taking 2016 as a base year, achieving a zero routine flare by 2030 and offer the market a near zero emission FPSO by 2025. Now the latest update on emissionZERO. Since 2020, the company has been working on lowering the emissions for FPSO through an ambitious program based on in-house concept, design and technological development to support clients in reducing their carbon footprint. Looking at program road map and past achievement, we now have closed flare in project tenders -- in all our project tenders. We have digitalized our fleets through smart operation to monitor and reduce emission, and we have a market-ready electrical drive FPSO. A major success for the program in 2023 is market readiness of the carbon capture module developed with our partner Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. So zooming on this program, we first foresee that the demand for decarbonization of FPSO operation is expected to increase rapidly. Through our collaboration with MHI, we are now able to open the door to offshore CO2 capture and storage development, making a concrete contribution to carbon neutrality effort. The signing of this partnership agreement marked key development within our emissionZERO program. This technology is part of the discussion with our clients for future projects and has been vetted by DNV. Our expertise in traditional oil and gas deepwater floating solution can be applied to alternative energy such as floating offshore wind, hydrogen and ammonia. The Provence Grand Large wind farm, where three 8.4 MW floating wind units were successfully installed in October, is a demonstration to our capacity to turn innovative ideas into reality and contribute to the energy transition. The floating offshore wind market has a big potential, but we will take time to materialize. We have the ambition to be a major player in this field, leveraging our EPCI experience while remaining selective and disciplined especially as the economics remain challenging. Most projects are expected to be sanctioned toward the end of the decade and beyond. As such, we're looking to broadening our technology portfolio while adapting our spend in this activity. Therefore, while investigating partnership opportunity to broaden our capabilities, further establish ourselves as a recognized leader in our pursuit to this promising market while doing it on an economic basis. The PGL project is a concrete example that show how to capitalize on decades of experience in floating solution to support the energy transition. With over 500 floating anchored assets delivered in 60 years, we have the know-how, the strength and the experience to support our clients in decarbonizing offshore energy production. As alternative energy markets are maturing, we will remain selective and disciplined in transferring our capabilities in developing technical solution, whether it is for floating offshore wind, carbon capture, ammonia, hydrogen or digital solution. We're well positioned to capture promising future new market opportunities but we will pace our activities in alternative energy in line with respective market development, remaining selective and disciplined. Our strategy is to pursue reimbursable FEED and EPC model for this market. Finally, we have defined our strategy priority and action plan based on the topics that matter to our stakeholders. As such, environmental, societal and governance topics are embedded in our strategic core. We make significant difference in 2 areas of focus that are people and emission. Concerning people, we're following our steps from last year with improved safety performance by focusing also on employee wellbeing and the welfare of people who work through our supply chain and by making our impact locally with the example of the Plympton Farm development in Guyana which produce fresh fruits and vegetables for our crew onboard the FPSO. On the emission reduction, we are proud to be ahead of our 2050 net zero target plan. We're on a journey to decarbonize the production of oil and gas and our performance in 2023 has been excellent and ahead of our plan since for the 2050 net zero. One example is the flaring intensity which has significantly decreased. We are also progressing as per plan on our intermediate Scope 1 and 2 target. We are pleased to see our effort and achievement being recognized again by third party experts when they review SBM Offshore's sustainability performance. As an energy transition, we're committed to providing the world with safe, sustainable and affordable energy. Under Ocean Infrastructure, we're dedicated to executing the growing backlog, thanks to our operation excellence and new vessel joining the fleet. Under Transition, while we're adapting to new business model, we're looking in the future to enhance the backlog through our emissionZERO program on the FPSO side, but also profitably enter the alternative energy market that are shaping it. Our key ambition, we're aiming to maintain a portfolio of up to 6 FPSO under construction for at least the end of this decade, getting traction to the market on our emissionZERO FPSO and delivering our emission reduction target. We demonstrated with our PGL floating offshore wind project that we can leverage our expertise and experience to bring new floating solution to the market and we aim to do this to win new order in emerging alternative market. We expect to deliver near zero emission FPSO into the next decade and then grow our business in alternative energy solution to support our path to net zero by 2050 and ensure sustained success for long-term future. Now over to Douglas on the financials.

Thank you, Bruno, and good morning, everybody. So the planned purchase of Liza Unity by Exxon helped drive EBITDA to more than $1.3 billion, a record level in line with our latest guidance and the impact of the Unity sale resulting in a significant level of EBITDA in the directional Turnkey segment also demonstrates the overall cash flow robustness of Turnkey over the cycle. Then, notwithstanding a record $4.5 billion level of turnover during the year driven by the new 10-year O&M agreement in Guyana, we maintained our order book or backlog at above $30 billion at the year-end. Now earlier in the year, we secured the remaining $3.2 billion project financing required to deliver this backlog, which is expected to deliver $9.3 billion of net cash after debt repayment and other expenses, and that's equivalent to almost EUR 47 per share. We also secured additional financing to support construction of new multipurpose hulls in anticipation of the strong market demand. Now given the evolution of the traditional financing market for oil and gas projects, new models and sources of finance will need to mature. Leveraging the new O&M agreement in Guyana, the expected contract for the Jaguar FPSO contemplates an EPC and operate type model. As such, the EPC component will be booked in Turnkey and then the O&M parts in Lease and Operate after startup, and we're seeing increased interest in this kind of model from other clients. We anticipate that around 50% of future awards will have more of an EPC and operate profile, and this will result in acceleration of cash flow from such projects and a lower requirement for project financing. But to be clear, the depth and breadth of our experience and relationships with financial institutions will allow us to continue to offer lease financing options to clients. Now we're maintaining our track record of increasing shareholder returns with a 12% increase to an aggregate $220 million in 2024, which is equivalent to $1.2 a share. We're also evolving our returns policy to allow us flexibility to distribute our annual cash return amount via share buyback as well as dividends. Considering share price performance over multiple years of substantial growth in our backlog and significant and increasing shareholder returns, we consider that allocating a portion of our annual return amount to buybacks offers more value and optionality to shareholders. Consultation with several large shareholders affirmed this view. From the increased $1.22 per share return, we're therefore proposing a dividend of $0.83 a share and we'll pay the equivalent of $0.39 per share through a EUR 65 million buyback. I'll explain more details on the revised return policy on the basis of the cash flow supporting the increase in a moment, but first, to review the key metrics for the year on a directional basis. Starting with the backlog, the foundation and generator of our substantial long-term cash flow. Now, this was maintained in line with last year at $30.3 billion, despite the record $4.5 billion revenue. Main contributor was the new O&M agreement in Guyana, which added an order intake of over $3 billion with no associated CapEx. Moving to net debt, this increased by around $570 million to $6.65 billion. We repaid the facility for Liza Unity from the proceeds from the sale of the vessel, but then we drew further on project financing facilities to fund the construction portfolio as well as the new MPF hull facility. Next to the P&L metrics. The total revenue was $4.53 billion, compared with $3.29 billion for the same period in 2022. This near 40% increase was driven by the Turnkey segment where revenue was around $2.6 billion, compared with just over $1.5 billion in 2022. Our main driver of this increase was the sale of Liza Unity, and with further positive impact from work orders for the Jaguar FEED and Prosperity. There was an offset on a comparative basis from the one-off effects of the partial sale to partners of 2 Brazilian FPSOs and the completion of Liza Unity in 2022. Then we also booked relatively less percentage progress on Almirante Tamandare and Alexandre de Gusmao as the projects reached the topsides' integration phase. On the Lease and Operate side, revenue was $1.95 billion, an increase of nearly $200 million compared with 2022. This reflects the start of Prosperity in the fourth quarter of 2023 and improved fleet performance in Brazil, with a partial offset from the fact that Capixaba left the fleet. Turning to EBITDA, this was around $1.32 billion, just over 30% higher compared with 2022. And while there was a slight increase in Lease and Operate EBITDA, which stood at $1.12 billion, the main elements being the same as for revenue, the impact of the Unity sale drove the overall increase through Turnkey EBITDA and this was $296 million versus $7 million for 2022. This impact underscores the point we made at the first half last August that on a life cycle basis, Turnkey is positive under directional, in line with the robust overall standalone segment margin that you see under IFRS, which for the record was 22% for 2023. Finally, other EBITDA was around $100 million negative. That's higher than the $77 million negative last year. It's principally explained by costs associated with the establishment of our corporate business solutions center in Porto, for which we had a one-off charge of $11 million in the first half, plus some implementation costs over the second half of 2023. Going forward, we expect other EBITDA to return to historical levels. Now, turning to cash flow on a directional basis. For cash from operations, this was boosted by the Unity sale from which the majority of the proceeds were used to repay the associated project financing and overall cash from operations covered debt, service tax and the dividend. Looking at growth cash-out and associated debt drawdown, this was driven by our significant construction program, 5 FPSOs and 2 MPF hulls in the construction phase last year, and the maturity of the construction portfolio drove an unwind of working capital. On the debt side, we closed the aggregate $3.2 billion financings for Almirante Tamandare and Alexandre de Gusmao. We also finalized the $125 million funding loan from China Merchants Financial Leasing related to FPSO Cidade de Ilhabela and received the funds. And then we implemented the new $210 million revolving credit facility for MPF hulls, which was fully drawn at year-end. The RCF was drawn for $550 million at year-end. We drew on this in anticipation of net equity investment on the construction portfolio in early 2024, bridging some working capital and cash flow timing effects. Looking at liquidity. At the end of the year, we had $2.28 billion. In addition to cash, we had $1.2 billion from the undrawn portion of project debt and around $0.5 billion from undrawn corporate facilities. Now to look at the directional debt on our balance sheet at year-end 2023, how this enables growth in cash and value, and how this is correlated to and well structured versus the contracted cash flows in our backlog. So what we've done on this slide is map out our year-end $6.65 billion net debt against the various phases of our FPSO portfolio, together with the revenue and associated net cash backlog for each phase. And what you see here is that nearly all of the debt we had outstanding at year-end is linked to FPSO projects and their respective contracts where each project has its own specific financing. In the construction phase, you can think about the debt as funding working capital for an EPC project, which then becomes non-recourse when the project is sold to the charter company and the vessel starts up operation. And this has just happened, in fact, with the FPSO Sepetiba financing last week. Project debts then paid down well in advance at the end of the FPSO contract. And then you can see the committed future revenue and expected net cash that the vessels in each phase will generate and the clear correlation between debt and generation of future value. So while our debt has increased as we've won more awards, so has the associated future net cash flow. Now, around 50% of the debt at year-end was financing projects under construction which under directional are not yet contributing to EBITDA, but which as you can see, deliver around 50% of the future net cash flow. So if you're wanting to apply EBITDA multiples to assess the value of SBM or benchmark debt levels, it's important to factor in and adjust for this committed future value that's not yet reflected in the P&L. Also important to note that our debt is prudently structured with individual debt facilities tailored to the related FPSO contracted cash flow, meaning there's no refinancing risk. Furthermore, 90% of our debts hedged for its full tenure and benefits from healthy debt service cover ratios. As I mentioned, we expect that around 50% of future rewards will have more of an EPC and operate profile with associated financing, if any, being short-term in nature. So this would change the balance sheet profile in future with less project financing. However, again, based on interaction with our existing lenders plus new alternative financing relationships we're establishing, we will be able to continue to offer leasing options to clients. Now you can see the extent of the debt service cover when you compare annual debt service with annual revenue from the backlog and then the gearing ratio of net debt to the overall backlog, which was just 22% year-end. So that's one of the reasons for bringing our classic backlog chart back into the main presentation. But we also wanted to emphasize its strength and quality. It's based on firm long-term committed contracts from premium clients, and if you do a weighted average per dollar of the credit worthiness of our clients, this is investment grade. This is supported by the fact that our Guara Norte project bonds or FPSO Ilhabela in Brazil are rated BBB minus, just 2 notches above the sovereign grade, reflecting the credit worthiness of the various clients and the fact that the charter payments rank as OpEx for our clients. In addition to the credit quality of our clients, the developments that our FPSOs help to monetize are also of very high quality with very low breakeven costs, so they're robust even in low oil price scenarios. Then we have strong inflation protection. All contracts cater for OpEx, either on a reimbursable basis or through indexation. When you put all of this together plus the fact debt is tailored to individual contracts and hedge throughout the full tenure, we have a strong level of certainty and visibility for 26 years worth of revenue and associated net cash, which has an infrastructure-like profile with very limited volatility. On this next slide, we're showing an associated net cash we expect to receive after we have paid OpEx debt service and tax out of the revenue from the main components of our backlog. So these are the Lease and Operate part in blue and the part relating to BOT sales of vessels in orange. Since we started publishing this net cash view on the Lease and Operate and BOT backlog at the end of 2019, it's grown from $6.5 billion to $9.3 billion. It's worth noting that the year-end backlog does not integrate the expected Jaguar award, where the EPC and operate model I mentioned will significantly accelerate cash flow timing upfront during the EPC Turnkey phase. Then at the same time as financing and growing the future cash value of the company over these 5 years, we've also returned $1.3 billion to shareholders. On a per share basis, the net cash backlog has grown from around EUR 29 a share in 2019 to nearly EUR 47 a share. We've been providing a per share discounted cash flow analysis of the Lease and Operate and BOT net cash backlog for some years now. At this time, we've done it at a wider range of discount rates from 5% to 30%, leading to a range of EUR 30 to EUR 12 per share. Then, for reference, we have on the chart below the 20-year yield curve for B minus to BBB plus, which ranges from 5% to 7%, so very much at the lower end of the discount rate we used. Now, we believe this analysis of what we see as the foundation of SBM's value before factoring in the clear growth potential should give pause for thought. And indeed, it's the facts on this slide which have caused us to pause and evolve our shareholder returns policy. I'm going to come back to this in a moment, but first to look at where we stand in thinking about allocation of capital, which is driven by this net cash flow. So the well established model we apply when thinking about allocation of net cash from the backlog is to look at the cash flow from the Lease and Operate portion net of corporate overheads as the so called in-hand cash flow we have to provide for stable and growing cash returns to shareholders, plus any necessary growth investment expenditures. We have, as usual, provided a 6-year average view on this in the table on the bottom left. Net of an assumed annual average of $75 million for corporate overheads, this gives an average of $405 million for the period. On top of this, we expect to receive an aggregate of around $500 million contribution from future BOT sales. Then for investment expenditures, in our cash planning for project funding, we typically look to priorities finance facilities deferring our equity investment. And last year, we guided for around $850 million of net equity investment, which has reduced to around $550 million for the same perimeter. This is expected to be phased over the next 2 years. Larger FPSOs require higher absolute net equity investments and on some projects we've had to invest more than planned as a result of impacts from the pandemic and supply chain pressures. So these are the elements for the existing Ocean Infrastructure, construction and Lease and Operate portfolio, which you can see is expected to deliver an aggregate of around $2.4 billion free cash flow over the period. Then, as we hope we've demonstrated this morning, through our Transition growth platform, we very much expect the growth activities we pursue through our Turnkey business to result in new awards such as Jaguar and generate additional positive net cash flow and backlog in the Turnkey and Lease and Operate segments. As a result, consistent with past guidance, during the next 6-year cycle, we expect Turnkey to generate new incremental positive cash flow that will be more than sufficient to cover growth focused Turnkey overheads and R&D spend of around $100 million a year. And to note, typically every year, we generate a margin of around $50 million from services business that offsets around half of this. Then the fact that we anticipate around 50% of future awards following an EPC plus operate type of model will obviously make a positive impact here too, delivering equivalent MPV to Lease and Operate awards, but with a much accelerated time frame. Going forward, in the absence of the exceptional macro events we've seen in the past years and more EPC and operate awards, we'd anticipate a significantly lower aggregate net equity investment requirement relative to the next cycle of new awards. As already mentioned, we intend to pace our activities in alternative energies in line with market developments. 2 years ago, we guided for $150 million spend on renewables pilot projects for 2022 to 2024. We've now concluded this phase having spent around $100 million. We're also not planning to expand our portfolio of floating wind development projects where we have minimal commitments and aim to at least recoup our investment on a portfolio basis. Looking ahead, we intend to pursue a reimbursable FEED/EPC model for all alternative energy activities. Finally, we also maintain the option to accelerate cash flow from the backlog in the form of further equity sell down or equity cash flow acceleration from project refinancings. Now, volatility and pricing levels have made this less attractive in the past few years, but we're monitoring the evolution of the market depending on which various opportunities which we had paused may become attractive again. And now to return to the evolution on our shareholder returns policy. Despite growing the backlog to record levels whilst paying significant and increasing returns, the share price has not responded, creating a significant valuation gap. Driven by this fact, having consulted with a number of large shareholders on their views on various alternatives, we're proposing an evolution in our returns policy as you see here. And there's no change in the basis of our policy. We continue to commit to pay a stable cash return to shareholders, which grows over time linked to growth in the backlog, and we maintain the option to apply surplus capital for incremental returns on top of this. Therefore, linked to the increase in the in-hand cash flow, we're proposing to increase the return by 12% to $220 million which equates to $1.22 a share. Now, the evolution in the policy provides flexibility to pay a portion of this cash return as a share repurchase in combination with a dividend. For 2024, we intend to allocate the cash return commitment approximately 70/30 between dividend and buyback with a proposed $150 million dividend and a $70 million equivalent to EUR 65 million share repurchase. All shares repurchased as part of the cash return will be canceled. Total cash yield is 9% per share, with the dividend component representing a 6% yield which is still very much top quartile for dividend yield if you compare with, for example, the EURO STOXX 50 companies. Now, regarding the mix of dividend versus share buyback, we intend to maintain a material level of dividend. So we're guiding for $150 million as a base level on the dividend part and in determining the mix, we'll consider input from shareholders, then what we would say is that in the context of share price levels we've seen over the period since we restarted paying returns in 2016, we'd see the focus being more on increases on the share purchase element of the cash return. And with the increased returns announced today, we're maintaining our track record of increased returns with now 8 consecutive years of growing cash returns. As you saw from the cash flow analysis on the previous slide, we have a good coverage for this level of cash return with further upside in the existing portfolio, especially after the current investment cycle. On top of this, there's clear potential to further grow the cash flow with a likely lower requirement for growth investment. And this is what we'll continue to focus on day-to-day, discipline in generating and growing cash flow. And finally, to update you on our guidance for 2024, 2024 directional revenue guidance is around $3.5 billion, of which around $2.2 billion is expected from the Lease and Operate segment and around $1.3 billion from the Turnkey segment. 2024 directional EBITDA guidance is around $1.2 billion. That's it from me. Now back to Bruno for a final word.

Thank you, Douglas. And before we open the floor for question and we resume normal activity, it has been a huge privilege to serve the company as a CEO for the last 12 years. I've had the honor of leading a team of talented, dedicated and passionate people who transform SBM Offshore. Today, the group is well established with a vision, purpose and structure and a leading market position and strong growth prospect in the industry. We're extremely well positioned in the deepwater segment. Our Fast4Ward solution is testament to our competitive advantage of delivering value for all stakeholders. It is a platform of strength to build on, to further improve and to showcase our unique competitive advantage through execution excellence. It has already changed the way deepwater provinces are being developed. For example, TotalEnergies declared that it's taking ExxonMobil's model for deployment in Guyana as an example for its own operation in the Block 58 offshore Suriname. Secondly, we demonstrated our ability to grow, generate value despite the headwinds we faced during the COVID episode during the first batch of Fast4Ward project. First, with a backlog doubling from 2016 to today. Second, with a return to shareholders, over USD 1.6 billion or the equivalent of EUR 7.6 per share was returned over the last 8 years, building on a unique track record in the industry. Yet, there is a significant embedded value in the company net cash backlog to the tune of EUR 47 per share, notwithstanding the high growth potential in the coming few years. Finally, we're set for the future. The team taking over, continuing and building on SBM Offshore strengths is the one that has delivered the successful operating result. They're going to focus on improving the performance. I'm extremely -- specially proud that SBM Offshore has a leadership team which makes an internal succession possible, and extremely pleased that at the next AGM to hand over my responsibility to Oivind Tangen and the talented team of SBMO. No doubt, they will successfully guide the company to achieve its ambitious energy transition targets while generating value to all stakeholders. On this, thank you for your attention, and the floor is now yours.

[Operator Instructions]

Good. It shows that we answered all the questions. So as such, Evelyn...

There are no further questions. Mr. Chabas, please go ahead.

Okay, superb. So thank you very much for your attention. And you now can all resume a normal activity.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for attending. This concludes the SBM Offshore event call. You may now disconnect your lines. Have a nice day.