Tracsis plc (TRCS) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Welcome to the Tracsis Interim Results Webinar. [Operator Instructions] This webinar is being recorded. I now hand over to Chris Barnes, CEO; and Andy Kelly, CFO. Chris, over to you.

Good afternoon, everybody, and thank you very much for joining the presentation. Andy and I will split this between us over the course of roughly the next 30 minutes. And then as [ Tonsan ] said in the introduction, we'll then open up for any Q&A that you might have. So just as a general introduction, we'll just sort of, first of all, just to give you an overview and introduction just to the business for any of you that are new to the Tracsis story. So fundamentally, our purpose is making transport work and the business is split into 2 areas of roughly equal size in terms of revenue. We have a Rail Technology & Services business, which is -- which has high levels of recurring revenue and is a mix of both software and hardware. That business has a footprint that originated in the U.K. and has grown through a mixture of organic growth and acquisitive growth and now has a footprint also in North America. On the other side of our business, we have very much a services-driven side of our organization, which focuses on data collection, the analytics and data science behind that information. The provision of expertise in the form of consultancy to go with interpreting that data and actually applying that into the operational environment. And then we also have an events business that runs major sporting events and major music festivals across the U.K. And increasingly, what we're looking at is how do we bring together data software and product provision together to form a really powerful combination of events that can help transport for our providers, local authorities, governments make decisions that link together big investment projects, improvements in performance of public transport and also ultimately improve sustainability outcomes through decarbonization. So it's a really powerful combination of capabilities and skills, but with 2 distinctly different sites to the organization. In terms of the overall highlights for the first 6 months of this year, our results look quite unusual, and they're quite unusual for a reason, and we flagged those very early as well. So we are currently in the middle of transitioning or transforming the Tracsis business. We had a number of items in the comparative period in the previous year that didn't reoccur this year, and Andy will take you through those details. But what's really important is that despite that slightly unusual H1, we have a very strong H2 ahead of us. That is based upon some really important strategic pillars. The first one of those is an increase in recurring revenues. So we saw over a 12% increase in recurring revenues in the period. which is a really important part of our overall strategy. And alongside that, we've seen a doubling of our rail software pipeline across both the U.K. and across North America. In North America, in particular, we've seen almost a quadrupling of our pipeline over that period. And that is really as a result of the investment we've been making in increasing the size and the capability within our sales teams. So that's great to see and puts us in a really strong position moving forward. Alongside that, we've won a number of large multiyear contract wins, and we're able to disclose a number of those in this presentation today. And alongside that, we're about to enter through the go-live of a really important software product in the U.S. into a large new sector of opportunity in that marketplace, which, again, we think will underpin significant amounts of organic growth for us moving forward. Alongside that, we have taken some exceptional costs in the period, and that is linked to transforming the Tracsis business model. Those activities will complete in this financial year, but they're very much part of the One Tracsis initiative that launched 2 or 3 years ago on the basis of how do we bring together a much more integrated organization. We've made the conscious decision that we don't want to continue to be effective like a holding company with a number of different operating silos. We think the real value proposition attracts us moving forward is joining together what we do on the data side, what we do in the product side, what we do on the services side to actually bring that together as a really powerful proposition for our customers. And as a result, there's been a significant amount of change going on across the organization. And then finally, to underpin our sustainability commitments, we are about to launch our carbon reduction plan. That really clearly lays out the initiatives we'll be taking as a business through to 2030 to meet our carbon reduction targets. And also just to further strengthen the value proposition that sits behind our investment case in terms of we're a technology company, but one that is inherently driving or being part of the sustainability agenda that governments and all of us need to follow moving forward. So lots going on, but a number of really important strategic things that have happened over the period. Alongside that, a number of you would have seen an announcement this week from the labor party about their vision for the future of the rail industry should they win the next general election. And that very much aligns with the messaging that we have put into this presentation. So if you look at the U.K. market right now, it has been a challenging period with so many things going on with strike action with the end -- with the sort of coming to the end of Control Period 6 and then the movement into Control Period 7, there is definitely uncertainty with regards to the future shape of the U.K. government. But what's really interesting is that we think what labor are proposing actually will open up new opportunities for us moving forward. So a number of train operators are already nationalized or run by the government by a department called the [ operator of last resort ]. Those operators are continuing to invest. They have budgets and funding available to make improvements to their service and the technologies that they choose to make, and there seems to be more certainty of direction for those train operators than some currently owned and managed in the private sector. So I think from our perspective, we work equally well with privately owned train operators or publicly owned train operators. I think for us, what's just important is we see that long-term strategy in front of us where the industry tends to continue to invest and continue to look at ways in which you can use technology to make improvements to train performance, its reliability to the customer choice that you give people through smart ticketing, through delay, repay and through other features. But also another increasingly important element is helping the industry cope with extreme weather and climate change. As you can see on this slide, there is a large chunk of money has been allocated in Control Period 7. So that's for the next 5 years to help the industry understand what the impact is going to be of extreme weather here in the U.K., and we're well placed with our data analytics and Geo Intelligence capabilities to be able to help in that area. The U.S. is a different landscape. So in the U.S. there seems to be a huge appetite for new digital transformation technologies. I've met with our team's senior clients across the U.S. market over the last few months. And there are some really interesting areas of opportunity for us there, particularly in parts of the industry where they don't have large in-house teams of capability, but rely very heavily on external specialists. We've got a really interesting portfolio of products both already present in North America, but also obviously in the U.K. where we think there are going to be significant opportunities, both across the passengers' rail space, the freight space and also specifically with private operators like port operators and industrials, all of whom are under pressure to both get improvements in operational efficiency, but also to drive significant improvements in safety levels. So there is lots of noise around government change in both the U.K. and the U.S., but we think we are really well placed to be able to gain increased market share and grow our business both organically and importantly, also through acquisition. So Andy, can I hand over to you now just to provide everybody with an overview of the financials, please?

Yes. Thanks, Chris. So our financial performance in the first half is overall in line with our expectations, and it really reflects where we are in our journey to transform the business to implement a new operating model and to build the pipeline of opportunities that will allow us to accelerate growth going forward. As we explained with the full year results back in November, our revenue growth in FY '24 will be much more weighted towards the second half of the year. That reflects both the timing of milestone deliveries that we have in the order book, as well as some revenue items in the first half of 2023 that didn't repeat. In total, there's about GBP 3.5 million of those. And I'll talk you through the details of those when we get into the divisional overviews. As Chris mentioned, we've seen continued strong growth in our recurring revenue in the Rail & Technology Services division. That was up 12% to just over GBP 12 million, and that's a really important strategic focus for us. And we continue to see high activity levels in the Data, Analytics, Consultancy & Events division, where revenue in total was up 3%. Our EBITDA margin in the period was lower than you normally expect from us. That includes both the revenue phasing and the mix effect and also the investment that we're putting into the business to enhance our commercial capabilities as well as our technical and delivery capabilities, and we're already starting to see the benefit of that with the significant pipeline growth that Chris mentioned earlier. We are well positioned to return this business to growth in the second half of the year. As we do that, we will also see a recovery in our EBITDA margin. So we expect for the full year '24 to be delivering an EBITDA margin that's consistent with the historical levels you've seen from the business. And then as Chris mentioned, we have incurred GBP 1.3 million of non-repeating exceptional cash costs in the period. That's associated with delivering the transformation activities, I'll take you through the details of those in due course. We expect approximately another GBP 1 million of those in the second half of the year to complete those activities by the end of this financial year. Just looking now at the divisional performance. So in terms of the Rail Technology & Services division, this is where we had approximately GBP 2 million of that nonrepeat revenue in the first half of last year associated with perpetual licenses where revenue is recognized at a point in time. And strategically, we are looking to move our business model more towards a recurring revenue model and move away from those large lumpy items of revenue. Some of that was in the U.K. So we have seen underlying growth in the U.K. side of this division. The other part was in North America. And we will see a slightly softer full year performance in North America this year as we build the pipeline of opportunities. And as Chris said at the start, that is growing rapidly, and we're excited about the future opportunities in that part of our business. In the Data, Analytics, Consultancy & Events division, we also had some nonrepeat revenue items here. This was mostly in our data analytics business, and related to some contracts in Ireland, public sector contracts, which were taken in-house by our customers. In many cases there, they also transferred our teams and [indiscernible] delivering that. So whilst it's given us a revenue headwind, the EBITDA effect from a group perspective was much more modest. And again, we have seen underlying growth in that part of the business. And we continue to see high activity levels in the Traffic Data & Events business that was integrated last year. Events in particular has seen some important contract renewals in the period and some new contract wins, including for fixed end use. So as well as supporting greenfield music festivals and sporting events. We also support fixed venues such as sports stadium, shopping centers and places like that. And that gives us a nice level of repeat monthly revenue alongside the once or twice a year events that we support. From a cash perspective, the group continues to generate healthy levels of cash. We closed the first half with just under GBP 17 million of cash, which is broadly the similar level to where we were 12 months ago. And during that 12-month period, we've had approximately GBP 10 million of cash outflows on earnouts and the exceptional costs for the transformation activities. So on an underlying basis, we're eating healthy levels of cash. That includes the unwind of the large trade receivables balance at the year-end, which has given us a strong working capital performance in the first half. We have invested in IT hardware to support the IT transformation activities that are underway. And we've continued to invest a modest amount in developing our own technology products, including the Hopsta smart ticketing app, but we'll talk about later. As we said at the year-end, all of our material historic earnouts has now been paid. So with no debts on the balance sheet, we are well positioned to continue to invest in growing the business both organically and through M&A. And in terms of the transformation activities, there's a lot of change being managed through the business at the moment. We're making good progress, and we're moving at pace at this, and our objective is to have this completed by the end of this financial year, so that we go into FY '25 with a model that allows us to really scale this business as we start to deliver that revenue growth. As part of our organizational change, the Rail Technology [indiscernible] business is now managed by a single management team. And the final piece of that jigsaw was recruiting a Chief Technology Officer, who joined the business in November, and now oversees all aspects of our product development and architecture across the whole Rail Technology portfolio. Having invested in bringing capability into the business, we have been going through a head count reduction process for roles that are either duplicated in the new structure or are no longer acquired. And we're reinvesting that in bringing further additional capabilities into the business that will allow us to access these future growth opportunities. We've transformed our IT and software product operating model, so that includes enhancing things like cybersecurity, privacy as well as implementing a group-wide IT support desk. And again, that's an important part building that scalable model that now supports all of our enterprise software developments in the U.K. and allows us to scale that up as we get and work through more and more deployments. We have a new group-wide finance system that goes live in the final quarter, and then we're also working hard to rationalize and simplify our operating structure. So that includes of the entity simplification process, and we started to consolidate our operating sites. So we closed 2 of those in the first half, and we'll continue to review that as we move into the second half of the year. So as I said, we think there'll be another approximately GBP 1 million of exceptional cash cost in the second half of the year, and that will complete these transformation activities and lead us well placed to scale the business up as we move into FY '25. And then to bring to life some of the new contract wins and some of the deployments we've got in the order book for the second half of the year. We've got a few case studies to go through, and I'll pass back to Chris to start to talk us through those.

Okay. Thanks, Andy. So we -- Andy and I again will split these between the 2 of us. The first one to talk through is one that those of you that know us well will be familiar with. It's the RailHub platform that we launched across Network Rail about 2 years ago now. This platform is now used by 22,000 users daily within Network Rail, and around 20,000 users daily within the rail supply chain within the U.K. And what it is, is a tool for basically long and short-term planning to make sure that when people are go onto the railway line to do either emergency maintenance work or long-term infrastructure planning, there is a full digital sign-off process and work package that sits behind that, so that they've got schematics, diagrams or the information that they need available to safely deliver their work. And as part of the evolution of this product, there are more and more features that will be added to this platform and more and more content that will improve it as a single -- and sort of log in some for users across Network Rail. So we just secured another multiyear -- multimillion pound extension to this piece of work. The first element of that -- of the work has already launched, which was in March of 2024, and that's an access register feature, which enables people across the Network Rail to now be able to see when different parts of the railway line are going to be closed for maintenance work, that could be track renewal, that could be track repair, that could be vegetation maintenance. It could be telecom's work. It could be electrical work, but it allows them now to look at the whole landscape and to make sure that things that are far more efficiently and can drive operational savings in terms of minimal disruption to train operators and obviously, the most efficient use of resources from a Network Rail and a supply chain perspective. And in addition to that, we've got some really important content that we'll be delivering through to the start of 2026, linked to replacing some legacy systems within Network Rail, which are all to do with how you actually bring together every element of short-term, long-term planning and bring that together such that ultimately, this piece of software is used to save lives and to increase, and to improve safety as we deploy people on to the railway. So just as a reminder, this is very much like the App Store in terms of the platform. You can see that in the right-hand image. So more and more feature content can be very easily added to that. Those features can interact with one another. And hence, you can end up with a single source of truth, if you like, where you can find different pieces of information, bring them together as part of the planning process and ultimately make sure that, that delivers ultimately a safe work pack, so that people can go safely onto the railway and deliver the task that they need to do. So really important example of how we've worked in partnership with Network Rail and others to understand the requirements to deliver a software solution. We own the IP behind that software solution. And then how we're able to grow and build that over time by working with a broader and broader subset of the rail industry. So a fantastic job done by the team to bring that product to life and to now continue to evolve that, too. And there's a very clear road map that sits behind this product through the rest of Control Period 7 as Network Rail building more and more features and content in this platform. The second example to share is a really important new product that launches in May in North America. So this -- we have had a dispatch product in the U.S. for a long time. But a few years ago, a new safety protocol was launched in North America called Positive Train Control, and our therein of Dispatch System did not interface with Positive Train Control. So before we bought RailComm, RailComm were actually contracted by Northern Indiana Commuter Train District -- Transportation District to develop a new product based on our existing historic products, but to bring in Positive Train Control capability into our products. So a very important new development. And that product is now in its final stages of sign-off before it launches in early May of this year. The image you can see on the screen here it shows you sort of a typical control room in terms of how the dispatch I can see where their trains are, where their trains are going to be rooted and how they can safely manage them across the network. And NICD is a commuter rail provider from -- that goes from Northern Indiana into Chicago. So it comes into a very busy part of the rail network in the U.S. They're the first adopter of this piece of technology. And we've been very -- working very closely with them over a number of years to bring this product to market. But what's really important it is -- it's opens up a significant annual recurring revenue opportunity for us in this marketplace. So currently, in the U.S., there's only one provider of Positive Train Control variant of dispatch. And so bringing us into the marketplace enables us to bring more competition. It opens it up as an opportunity where we can grow our dispatch footprint. And importantly, these are significant sized contracts. So they will -- and our objective behind this is, hopefully, to be able to sell these on a multiyear recurring revenue basis rather than on a perpetual license basis. So the team, again, in the states have done a fantastic job. This is a highly complex system. It's need an interaction with multiple both suppliers and with the operator themselves. And here's another great example of the kinds of technologies that we have within the Tracsis portfolio. And hopefully, this will underpin some significant growth for us moving forward. We're already seeing inquiries from other train operators. We're already seeing some early stage RFQs around the next deployment of this technology. So this is a really important area for us moving forward.

Okay. The next 2 case studies cover our Pay As You Go smart ticketing technology. We have -- that has been deployed now with -- in South Wales to transport for Wales, and that is running the first contactless bank card version of that solution on the National Rail Network outside of Transport for London. And during the period, we also won a contract with -- to deploy this technology with Merseyrail, so they're running a tap and go ticketing system that's going to launch in autumn of this calendar year. The first phase of that will use and it's a smart card front end. And then that will also then progress to be a rollout of a contactless EMV solution. So that's how the bank card and Apple Pay and those technologies. So again, that more a case study here of continuing to grow market share in this space. And then we've also developed the Hopsta mobile, so this puts this same technology onto a mobile phone. And the key benefit of that is it removes the need for expensive gate line infrastructure. So this solution is able to geofence to the railway for those parts of the network that don't have significant gate line coverage, brings that Pay As You Go technology into the hands of the consumer. So we've signed our first pilot contract that's underway with a U.K. transport operator. So that's using our smart tickets technology. It's giving a best value fair guarantee, and it's giving genuine Pay As You Go; tap in, tap out travel in this region. And that will be in the hands of consumers and available to download from the App Store from the middle of May. So this is a really exciting moment for us. It puts this technology into paying customers' hands. And it also allows us to really then understand what the uptake model is, what the usage model is so that we can ultimately start to size this opportunity for investors to understand. So that's the [ end ] result of the investment that we've been making in this product through last year and into the first half of this year. So I'll pass it back to Chris now to wrap up and cover the forward-looking section.

Thanks, Andy. So in terms of our outlook, this is split into 2 sections. So there is -- there are clear priorities for the remainder of this financial year. One of the main questions at the moment and people's mind is our H1, H2 split and can we deliver H2 this year. So our real focus over the next few months is closing out that gap for the remainder of this year. So we can see line of sight to all the opportunities that we need. They are all in procurement. And we have just now focused very much on converting those opportunities so that we can recognize revenue through the remainder of this year. Those opportunities are largely all in North America. It's quite usual for us to have contracts that we need to land in the final quarter of the year, but it's quite unusual for them all to be in one geographic location. So the team are very much focused on this. As I said, those opportunities are all in procurement. They're all highly visible. We know we can deliver them within the period. We're just now focused on those activities to make sure that they're completed in time. So alongside that, we will be completing the business transformation activities. As we've said in this presentation, they will complete by the end of July. We will be implementing our carbon reduction plan and really importantly, alongside the delivery of the large products -- projects and the new technologies that we're developing. Andy and I have now got an increasing amount of time to focus on acquisitions. So having made the changes we've made to the senior leadership team within the group, we now have more and more capacity to look at M&A and the strategic opportunities that go with that to grow the business. So again, anybody that's followed us for a long time, I know we haven't made a major acquisition for 2 years. That's because of all the business transformation activities that have been going on in the organization. We are now in a position with the cash balance we have, with the team that we have and with the headroom that we have -- now have to really start pursuing growth again through acquisitions. So we are very much looking at software and technology-related acquisitions in both the U.K. and North America, and we are looking to buy businesses that are profitable and have a proven track record of capability, but equally how strong levels of recurring revenue. So that's our objective over the coming period, and we're in a really good position to be able to deliver that. Longer term, as we've talked about in this presentation, digital transformation it remains an integral part of both the rail and the transportation industry's future, lots of strong client engagement across a number of different sectors. Our pipeline growth demonstrates that, and that is not -- and that is common across freight. It's coming across passenger, sectors. We're seeing that across different geographies as well. So that gives us real confidence that the products we have are well matched to the industry's needs. And our growth is not just all about rail. As we shared in this presentation, our Data, Analytics, Consultancy & Events division is performing strongly. They've got great line of sight to all of their second half work. It's all in the schedule already and we've got high confidence that that business will continue to perform well. And as I said just a moment ago, M&A is it increasing importance to us. And what's really interesting is now we've rebranded to Tracsis in North America. We are seeing lots of inbound inquiries from organizations that really like the concept of what we've created in the U.K., and they are really excited and interested to be involved in what they think we're now going to create in North America. So lots of growth opportunities ahead of us, a really strong team supporting us. And hence, that leaves us in that -- in a really strong position moving forward. So that's it in terms of the presentation. We'll now open up for any questions that you might have.

[Operator Instructions] And the first question is, what percentage of the forecasted full year '24 revenue is actually contracted at this point? You've talked about pipeline, but what's actually contracted?

So we -- we've got site to most of that revenue. We've got the last sort of 2% or 3% that needs to be contracted in terms of the full year revenue. So as Chris said, that's very normal for us at this stage of the year. And we know exactly what those opportunities are, and they're in advanced stages of procurement. So we've got good line of sight to it, and we're working hard to make sure that we close those opportunities in time to recognize the revenue.

Excellent. And what scope does the company have to benefit from AI innovations within the key areas of operation?

That is a key part of our thought process right now. So we actually have a strategy event on May 8, which is actually looking at our strategy through to 2030. So one of the big benefits of the changes we've made into the organization, especially in the technology roles is that we are now seeing some really interesting propositions to come forward in terms of as the sort of next generation of technology that we should be developing, but not just the technology, but the commercials that go with it. So where is the market opportunity? What's it worth? How do we monetize it? So one of the key themes on our strategy event is actually each business unit for the first time will be presenting comprehensive technology road maps. And as you can imagine, one of the key themes of those presentations is data, machine learning, and AI and how we play our part in terms of -- so what capabilities do we develop ourselves and what capabilities do we buy in or use because there are standard tools out in the industry that we can plug into our products. So it's very much front and center of our thinking. And as you can imagine, given the vast amounts of data we collect across the transportation industry is something that's going to play actually a key role for us moving forward.

Great. And you've referred to the fact that nationalized railway wouldn't affect you very much or it could be beneficial. Could you just explain how nationalized is different from unnationalized railway management?

That is a great question. So today, if you are managed by the [ operator of last resort ] and there's 4 train operators in the U.K. that are they are LNER, TransPennine Express, Southeastern and Northern. In those circumstances, you're already effectively nationalized. You've been run by an arms-linked government organization, which is headed up by experienced rail people. The private sector [ talks ] today have to refer any -- very quite -- actually quite low levels of spend to the department for transport for authority to spend those sums of money. So it really depends where you draw the line in terms of private versus public. So there are a number of privately owned train operators, but they are quite tightly controlled by government in terms of where they can and can't invest. So it's quite a gray area at the moment to kind of explain exactly what that means. I think from our perspective, what we see is the more of the train operators -- the train operators that are owned and managed by the OLR appear to have, at least from our perspective, greater access to funds and ability to move more quickly. However, we've got strong relationships with all of the different train operators. And hence, really, I guess from our point of view, we are quite agnostic as to which way that model works. I think what we're just being really clear about as we can see the logic of what the labor party is suggesting, but equally, we could benefit either way, depending on how this model plays out. But at the moment, I think they lack a central sort of center of direction for the industry. So the concept of Great British Railways is just fundamentally needed, to give the industry the clarity that we need moving forward. And we might be able to benefit significantly from that. So for example, if you looked at the press coverage this week, there's a lot of discussion around Nationwide page, pay As You Go smart ticketing. There's lots of discussion around Pay As You Go to labor pay. Well, at the moment, we're the market leader in both of those areas. And that's before you start talking about some of the other areas in which we operate. So I think our objective is to stay very close to government, and just to make sure that we are involved in those discussions and aware of those plans such that we can adapt appropriately moving forward.

And do you think in the short-term, it will lead to delays in investment while they're sort of going through the process?

There are already delays to some decisions. Again, what is really important is that you've got a big enough pipeline that you can cope with those movements and changes. So what -- one of the hardest jobs we have is actually predicting the procurement time line. So just because you told you've won something, doesn't means to say you're going to see a purchase order immediately. A lot of these things can take quite a long time because of the approval process they have to go through. So there is definitely an impact, but given the size of our pipeline, what we benefit from is the fact that there's real optionality there. So our overall objective is just continuing to focus on growing that pipeline. We've changed our commercial model in the U.K., so we're now selling -- in rail technology we're selling across -- we're selling our whole portfolio on a key account basis. So rather than silo selling, we're trying to make sure that we're picking up the most that we possibly can by widening out the customers' awareness of our portfolio of products and how they interact with one another. So we're still seeing strong pipeline growth in the U.K. What's interesting is the size of the average opportunity is much bigger in North America than it is in the U.K. So although we're still seeing lots in the U.K. the U.S. looks to us to have a far more exciting long-term growth prospects. So I think the U.K., we continue to grow organically, we can continue to grow organically at strong levels. And -- but certainly, the changes that are being proposed would just help give much more clarity and perhaps help accelerate some of that a little bit faster.

Wonderful. So in the U.S. regarding PTC, what's the competitive landscape in these solutions in particular? And are there applications for freight operators as well?

So there's currently in the PTC dispatch space, there is currently only one other provider of that solution. So when our product goes live next month, we will be the second provider. And yes, there are applications in the freight space, we believe, as well as in the passenger space. So PTC becomes most relevant where you've got commuter passenger rail -- operating on the same rail line as freight trains. And if you got that, then it's quite important that everybody is using a system that can interface and can talk to each other. So yes, definitely opportunities in both areas.

Great...

And just to add to that a little bit more what is important in our strategy in the states is where we target our sales efforts. So there are much larger operators in the U.S. that have their own resources, and they don't rely very heavily on external suppliers. So we're, therefore, not spending an amount of time in those areas. There are others that don't have any real depth to their internal capability because they're smaller, and they rely very heavily on external partners. So we're being very selective in terms of who we approach and then who we work with, to make sure that we're getting the -- making the most of the opportunity that we believe exists in that marketplace.

Great. And the operating margin has been hit in this period. What's your target for the operating margin in the medium term?

So our immediate target for this year is to return to the historical levels that the business at sea, which is approximately the 20% level. The strategy work that we're going through that Chris mentioned next month will allow us to really set out what we think that fright path looks like over an extended 3- to 5-year period, and that is something that we'll be able to share later this year.

Great. And on the cost side, with the level of change in the business and lots of personnel changes, what gives you confidence that there won't be further exceptional costs next year?

Well, we've got a very tightly defined program activities. So we've got sight of all the things that we need to -- we need to do to complete that. And those are scheduled to complete for the end of July. And frankly, we don't want to become an organization that has continual buckets of exceptional costs. So this is very much focused on a defined set of activities that we deliver this year. With the pipeline growth that we're seeing, this is all about being able to access and deliver those activities as soon as possible. So both from a commercial and a reporting perspective, it's important that we're in a position as we go into FY '25 to how do those activities completed, and we're ready to get on that growth curve.

Great. And going back to the PTC contracts. Do you think 2 years will be the typical PTC length of signing up operators?

I think our view is somewhere between 12 and 18 months. And that's really based on our knowledge and understanding of how the U.S. budgeting cycle works and the time required to build those budgets, and then deploy those budgets and obviously go through the contracting process. So -- and that is not that dissimilar, to be honest, to the U.K. in terms of the sort of typical time lines that we see. So we would expect to be seeing in probably the back end of half one of next year, the first of those next generation of dispatch contracts being awarded, and that's very much what we're working towards.

Great. And has the NICD contract being sold as a perpetual license or is a SaaS contract?

No, that was sold as a perpetual license, but that was sold as a perpetual license in 2020. So very much part of our plan moving forward is, we would love those contracts to be sold on a recurring revenue basis. So that's very much what we're exploring with operators is to understand their preference and their mix of sort of CapEx versus OpEx, and how we can align -- best aligned to their requirements, but equally from our point of view, maximize the recurring revenue opportunity.

And are most of them open to SaaS?

There is definitely a trend in that direction. I don't yet know. I don't think we know exactly how open they're going to be to that model. I think it very much depends on where funding is available from. So if they've got -- I don't know federal funding that has to be spent within a time window. It might be that they favor more of the perpetual license model. If it's more of an OpEx-focused financing model that sits behind them, I think we'll be able to convince some more to go down the recurring revenue path. But we're definitely starting to see other customers requesting now for software to be hosted on the cloud rather than hosted behind firewalls on their own networks. So that does stops -- does appear to be a change of direction starting to take place. But our preference is definitely for the recurring revenue model.

Great. And going back to the U.S. and PTC, is the competitor Alstom? And if that's the case, do you see your immediate opportunity in the mid-market where you can offer better value and quality? And how large is that market.

Okay. So we're currently going through an exercise to scale [indiscernible] build out to work out the addressable market for that product. It isn't Alstom. Alstom don't compete in the PTC dispatch market, but it is another big multinational provider. So we are much, much smaller than that organization. And what we're focusing on really is, is very similar to the things that are built Tracsis reputation in the U.K. So it's kind of and agility to bring products to market, working in partnership with customers to really understand their requirements and the nuances that go with it. But also if we can to try and down -- to drive down sort of a standard core product with configuration around the outside, but something that is, yes, that can flexibly meet customer requirements, but also offer a very clear and well understood benefits case that sits behind it. So we really -- we understand well the competitive landscape we're in. There seems to be a demand for new incumbents -- sorry, new entrants, and that's something we're obviously very keen to take advantage of.

Great. And you have 2 divisions. How linked are they? Would it be easy to split them? Or do you have common development teams, for example?

No, we have set -- well, yes, we have separate development teams. So there are -- the rail tech businesses are work more closely together, as you might expect. But we do have a RailTech North America and RailTech U.K. separation at the moment. So we've got different teams in those 2 different geographies. I think certainly part of our strategic thinking will be about how do we get those teams working more collaboratively and more globally because there are -- the software commonality in terms of software development, there's commonality in terms of hardware development and some of the tools and capabilities that we use. And we're increasingly seeing our data teams work more closely with our rail teams. But definitely, on the Traffic Data & Events side, that is a very separate capability. That is much more around operations. It's much more around vehicle fleets. It's much more around health and safety risk. So there are some carry-across us because we are looking to put more technology where we can into the Traffic Data & Events Business. But broadly speaking, they do operate separately.

Great. And can you provide an update on the potential for further RCM contracts in North America. At the time of the full year results, it was indicated that there was potential for several new multimillion contracts with Tier 2 or Tier 3 providers, but there's no mention of this opportunity in the interim results.

Yes. No, what we talked about in the full year was that there was opportunities for the dispatch system link to those types of customers. For Remote Condition Monitoring, we are still winning some work in North America. But we are not -- we haven't quite worked out yet what the value proposition is that sits behind that product. So we understand really clearly in the U.K., the value proposition. And obviously, we're very successful here in the U.K. at selling Remote Condition Monitoring, but we haven't yet found that magic greening, if you like, yet in North America. So we still -- we are working in partnership with a number of operators who have some trials in place. So we have a number of pilot programs ongoing, but RCM is one of those areas that we haven't yet fully understood how we can accelerate our growth path. So at the moment, we probably do about $0.5 million to $1 million of RCM work in North America each year, but we haven't yet worked out how to scale that up. So that's very much again one of the key items we're looking at in our future strategy sessions over the coming weeks.

Excellent. That's the end of questions. Chris, do you have any closing remarks?

Yes. Just to say thank you very much, everybody, for joining us today. We've -- the team across Tracsis is managing a lot of change right now, but they're doing a fantastic job at managing that change. Pipeline growth gives us huge confidence that we have the right products, the right sales team and are moving in a really strong direction. And we have the financial horsepower and the headroom now to really accelerate our activities in the acquisition space. So this business is really well positioned. We've got a really strong team around us and a really exciting future ahead of us. So thank you very much, everybody, for joining us.

Tremendous. Many thanks to you both and for all your comprehensive answers. [Operator Instructions] Many thanks for joining. This is the end of the webinar.