Afry Stock

Good morning, and a warm welcome to Afry's presentation of our Q3 results. I am Linda Palsson, President and CEO, and I will, together with Bo Sandstrom, present our numbers. And after the presentation, we will open up for Q&A.

Afry delivered stable results for the third quarter with improvement in several of our key metrics. The order backlog remains strong and amounted to SEK 22.1 billion. Total sales growth was 1.9% with positive contribution from the company, AMC, that we acquired in the second quarter. Organic sales declined 1.5%, marking a lower rate of decline that we have seen in recent quarters. We continue to build on the operational improvements we have achieved over the past year. Our EBITA margin improved to 6.8%, supported by the utilization rate, which increased to 72.9%. And as we said in Q2, our focus has shifted to organic growth across the organization. And this will be key to translating the improvements into a sustainable profitability uplift.

So let me now walk through the performance of each global division, starting with Energy. Here, we continue to see strong demand across all segments. Long-term market trends are favorable. They're supported by electrification, grid expansion and fossil-free energy production. And in August, Afry Management Consulting was recognized by Forbes as one of the world's best management consulting firms, and that was for the fifth year in a row. And increasing the share of advisory services remains a key priority in our unlocking Afry strategy. Our strong reputation and position in the market is an important enabler for continued growth in this area. So Energy reports solid sales growth in the quarter, driven by strong demand across our segments and was supported by a high level of material sales. With stronger order backlog, we see good opportunities for growth in this division.

Moving over to Industry. In the industrial sector, market conditions remained mixed with strong growth opportunities in some areas and softer demands in other. In the Life Science segment, we continue to strengthen our position. In Germany, which is one of our growth markets, we have established a local team and hired dedicated senior leadership within the Life Science sector. Germany is one of Europe's largest life science markets, and we see strong growth opportunities driven by the need for modernization, capacity expansion and a more sustainable and digitalized production. And by strengthening our local presence, we can better leverage Afry 's broad engineering capabilities to support clients across the full life cycle and capture this market potential.

During the quarter, total sales growth was 5.5% for the division, while organic growth was slightly negative. The EBITA margin was higher than last year and the AMC acquisition and the project closings contributing positively to both sales and profitability in the quarter. And from that, moving on to Transportation and Places. Here, the market for transportation was stable. At the same time, opportunities within the real estate market were mainly driven by defense-related investments, health care and data centers. During the quarter, we also established Architecture as a separate segment in the division.

This builds on the launch of Afry Architects that we did in the beginning of the year, which brought our architecture and design expertise together under one brand. It strengthened our ability to engage early in projects to support clients across the full life cycle and to simplify collaboration across segments. If we look at the results for the quarter, the performance in the Transportation business was solid. This was, however, offset by continued weak results in the real estate business.

Turning to some of our new client projects in the quarter. All these assignments reflect long-term trends that underpinned our strategy and drive demand for our services, including electrification, the energy transition and modernization of critical infrastructure. So in Switzerland, we have been awarded a contract by Swiss Grid to support the modernization of the transmission grid. This type of project is an example of the strong investment activity we see in power network and grid resilience across Europe, areas where we have a leading expertise. The second example is North Star H2, where we have been selected by Uniper to lead engineering for one of Sweden's most promising Power-to-X projects. This project aligns closely with our focus on supporting the energy transition by also strengthening Europe's domestic e-fuel production.

And finally, the ongoing need to modernize and maintain critical infrastructure remains an important driver in our Transportation and Places business. And in Stockholm, we will deliver detailed design for the renovation of the Liljeholmen bridges, a vital transport link in the city. Recruitment is a key priority as we focus on driving organic growth. Our efforts spans engineering, advisory and project management disciplines aligned with areas where we see strong growth opportunities. And in addition to growing capacity in core markets, we are also scaling capacity in our global delivery centers to further improve access to skilled resources.

We also have dedicated programs for onboarding and capacity development. Examples include our future energy program for recent graduates and our Nuclear Academy, enabling employees to develop expertise in the growing sector. We are also harmonizing our employer brand to create a more consistent presence globally in our markets. And building on our strong employee reputation evidenced by external rankings, this makes us well positioned to continue to attract and retain talent. Together, these efforts support our growth ambitions and long-term capability needs.

So let me give you a brief update on our work with AI. As shown before, this picture summarized our approach to AI at a high level. We are gradually building the capabilities, tools and governance needed to integrate AI in both internal process and in client deliveries. In this work, we prioritize use cases with the potential to create value across multiple segments. And to bring this a bit more to life, I would like to share a practical example with you. So we have started applying AI in conceptual design. This is the early stage where engineers develop and shape solutions. In this case, the AI-powered solution reviews contents as we create it, checking hundreds of documents and flag questions for our engineers to address early in the process. Deep sector expertise and judgment remains critical, but AI can significantly reduce the time spent on manual reviews.

So this opportunity goes beyond productivity gains because by freeing up time, it enables our engineers to explore more alternatives to develop new ideas and to solve client challenges that goes beyond today's project scope. This example comes from our Life Science segment. It's a good example of a scalable AI solution developed by our own teams that has the potential to create value across A3.

And with that introduction, I would like to hand over to Bo for the financials.

Thank you, Linda, and good morning, everyone. I will, as usual, cover the financials for Q3 2026. Quarter 3 showed net sales of SEK 5.8 billion and EBITDA, including IAC of SEK 392 million. Adjusted organic growth remains in negative territory at minus 1.5%, but a step less negative than seen in previous quarters. With positive total growth in Q3, we are now on rolling 12 months at SEK 25.3 billion on net sales. And with the quarterly EBITDA higher than last year, rolling 12-month EBITA margin increased marginally to 7.4%. The order backlog continued to develop favorably and is reported at SEK 22.1 billion, an improvement of 8% to last year, the same level of improvement as reported in Q2. As in last quarter, all divisions improved their respective backlog year-over-year with relatively small movements sequentially.

In Q3, with a net sales of SEK 5.8 billion, we report total growth of plus 1.9% and adjusted organic growth of negative 1.5%. Whereas the organic growth continues to be pressured by the restructuring agenda from past quarters, we see a first step of improvement in the quarter. Total growth that turned the trend already last quarter has now moved into positive territory, mainly driven by the AMC acquisition. The market price pressure in some segments seen since the latter part of 2025 is still visible in Q3. This is particularly evident for some segments within Industry and Transportation and Places.

Structural effects in Q3 relate largely to the acquisition of AMC completed in Q2 2026, in combination with 2 months related to the acquisition of Veta in Q3 2025, net of smaller noncore divestments completed in the beginning of this year. The negative adjusted organic growth in Q3 was the least negative since Q1 2025, with positive sequential movements in Global Divisions Energy and Industry. Global Division Energy improved the organic growth step-by-step from the low levels during the end of last year. The organic growth in Q3 was supported by a high level of material sales. Global Division Industry that since the beginning of last year has been in significant negative growth, stepped up materially in Q3, supported by continued positive trending on utilization and several positive project closings.

As the effects of the restructuring efforts will completely phase out in the beginning of next year, we aim at moving into positive territory for the division. Transportation and Places remained at a similar level as in Q2 as a consequence of capacity adjustments in the end of 2025, combined with the continued weak real estate market. As seen throughout this year, we will face pre-restructuring comparisons also in the fourth quarter.

We reported utilization of 72.9% for Q3, as in last quarter, close to 1 percentage point higher than last year. And again, we see improved year-over-year utilizations for all divisions. This is the fourth consecutive quarter where we report an improvement to last year, and it is a continued important step for our strategic efforts to improve operational efficiency in Afry. We will continue our focus on improving this metric to be one of the main drivers of profitability improvement over time. Since the low mark of 72% of rolling 12 a year ago, we're now close to 73% and well on our way to 74% being the set ambition in the 2028 road map.

EBITDA is reported at SEK 392 million with only marginal positive calendar effects and no items affecting comparability. The EBITA margin was at 6.8%, an increase of 0.4 percentage points to last year, also when considering calendar effects. Group costs were in line with last year as we are continuing to balance driving a large change agenda with driving efficiency gains related to support functions. Continuing with the EBITA margin development by Global division. Global Division Energy, supported by improved utilization and a positive backlog development continued to report a strong EBITDA margin at around 10%. Industry has a strong quarter and a margin more than 1 percentage point better than last year. The margin uplift is supported by the high-margin AMC acquisition, but also by positive project closings in the quarter. The margin in Transportation and Places remained pressured from restructuring effects and a soft real estate market. The year-over-year decline remains, but clearly a smaller decline than we saw in Q1.

Following a very strong operational cash flow in Q2, the third quarter showed a more modest operational cash flow. While Q2 was SEK 500 million better than last year, Q3 was SEK 350 million lower than last year. Part of it related to phasing effects from last quarter, while the remainder was related to a lower level of advanced payments. Available liquidity decreased to SEK 3.9 billion and net debt increased to SEK 4.8 billion. As stated last quarter, we remained on leverage at 3x for Q3. And we continue to expect to close the year at or below our financial target of 2.5x at end of year as significant restructuring costs are phased out of the EBITDA component in Q4.

And with that, I leave back to you, Linda.

Thank you so much, Bo. So to summarize the quarter, we delivered stable results with improvement in key metrics. And looking ahead, our priorities are clear. We will drive profitable growth by continuing to win new projects, build a strong order backlog and most importantly, deliver to our clients every day. So to support delivery and organic growth, we will increase recruitment and scale capacity in our global delivery centers while maintaining our cost discipline and strong focus on efficiency. We will also continue to advance our digital and AI initiatives. And with a strong platform for growth in place, these priorities support our ambition to deliver profitable growth to achieve our targets for 2028. And with that, I would like to open up for Q&A.

Thank you Linda and Bo. So now we will open up for questions. [Operator Instructions] And today, we're going to start with Julia Sundvall from ABG.

A few questions from my side. And I would like to start with the group EBITDA margin that was mostly driven by the industry improvements. And you say it's because of the AMC acquisition and several project closings. Are you able to quantify like is it some one-off effect with the project closing? Or what's the margin on the AMC acquisition and so on? Just to get some more flavor on the margin.

Yes. I'll comment on those. Well, the AMC acquisition is a high-margin acquisition for us. The details are actually disclosed in the report, Julia. So you can look at the details. But to give you a view, it is an entity that is typically operating on between 10% and 15% EBITDA margin. So that typically comes on top, also providing some support for the overall margin for the group. In relation to the positive project closings, that is like you imply, it is more of a one-off characteristics in the specific quarters. When we don't disclose the exact amount, but we still point at it, then we are typically talking about kind of between SEK 10 million and SEK 20 million in effect. And that is an effect both then supporting the top line and the EBITDA in the specific quarter.

And then I have a question on the hourly rate. You comment that you have some weak pricing development in Transportation and Places and Industry. Is it energy that's driving the pricing improvements? Or can you give some more flavor what you see in the market?

Yes. We have very different in that sense, theoretical price development in the different divisions. Energy has a good price development. But then if you actually dive into it, you can find some mix effects depending on our improvements in the Asian market with a different pricing profile. But energy, in general, holding very stable ground on pricing as do parts of the industry segments and the transportation, part of Transportation and Places. Just like we said in Q2, when we talk about pricing pressure, we typically talk about automotive, specifically on the industrial side, where we continue to see a quite tough market. And we talk about places on the Transportation and Places side, just like we pointed out in Q2.

And then one last question from my side. On the operating cash flow, you talked about it's due to the lower advanced payments. Is this a timing effect that will reverse in Q4? Or is it more of a permanent trend?

No, it's -- advanced payments -- it's a very specific item for us when we have large -- typically large projects, they sometimes have advanced payment structures. And we -- the advanced payment perspective is more related to a quite high level of advanced payments in Q3 last year. That's part of the explanation part. So it's not considered to be -- we shouldn't consider that to be a negative phasing effect going into next year or a positive one, or a next quarter or a positive one on that side either.

Then we have the next question from Jesper Stugemo from Handelsbanken.

A few questions from me, if I may. First on net recruitment here. When do you believe you can turn to a positive net recruitment? Is it more in like 2 to 3 quarters? And how do you balance growth ambitions versus margin protection going forward?

Yes. Good question. No, everything that we do aim to be in the right place in the end of our strategy period, meaning in the end of 2028. So we are now gradually ramping up our ambition. And it goes actually across, as we said in the beginning, across advisory, engineering and project management. And we see it actually across the divisions and several of our geographies. So it is a wide competence need that we stand for until the end of 2028. Of course, we do that to protect the margin, but the margin starts actually with the projects that we sell and that we include in the order backlog. So now it's to meet those as sold levels with the expertise and competence that we need to execute on those projects. But it's a gradual ramp-up, and we say that we will have a net growth of 2,000 to 3,000 employees by the end of 2028.

And coming back to price and price pressure, do you still see that you have a positive yield between price and salary increases?

I think we discussed that quite a bit kind of last couple of quarters. And at that -- when we closed Q2, we were not actually in the point where we had a clear positive spread on that yield. And I would say that nothing has changed from a Q3 perspective on that end. We have some segments really supporting our price development, but we also have some segments where we're experiencing clear and still are expecting clear price pressure and are reasonably upholding the yield that you're referring to, but not particularly moving in the right direction yet on that.

And could you give some more flavor perhaps on the utilization rate in Energy and Transportation and Places given the slightly softer margin development there?

Yes. I think what we are experiencing is a very stable development for all divisions on utilization. From a year-over-year, as you're well aware, we don't report utilization development by division externally, but we typically comment on it. And we can -- for different quarters, it can be a bit different in which division that are taking the most -- the biggest step forward for different reasons. I would not particularly link the margin development that we see in a specific division to the utilization development that we experienced in Q3. It is quite stable all across the divisions in Q3. And there are other reasons why EBITDA margin is behaving as it does rather than utilization development.

[Operator Instructions] Then we have the next question from Dan Heimer from SEB.

Maybe circling back a little bit to that comment on the 2,000 to 3,000 additional employees by 2028. That's close to 15% more employees compared to what you have today. So to me, at least, it sounds you're quite confident on demand, your order book and your ability to deliver on that. You had a little bit of a step change in organic growth compared to Q2 where you took a step back. So would you say that you're more confident now on your ability to deliver organic growth compared to where you were 3 months ago?

Yes. As we said, we're working all the way towards the end of 2028, but we have so many supporting KPIs now driving in the right direction. So yes, this is why we now increase the ambition.

Very clear. And then maybe on Transportation & Places, you've taken out 500 employees there compared to last year. And despite that you're losing almost 50 bps on the margin, organic growth also deteriorated a little bit further compared to the previous quarters. I'm being mindful that it's a small quarter and it's a lot of vacation, of course. But do you plan to implement further measures here? Or do you see a sign of a market that's getting better? Or how do you address that weakness, which I guess is particularly in the real estate part?

Yes. As we said, the story for this division is really two-folded, where we see the stable demand from transportation that we have seen, yes, for a long time now, and we actually see that, that is supported by governal investments and so on. So -- and actually, the project within that sector could be 10 to 15 years. So it's a really sort of slow-moving part of our business, but stable on the transportation side. If we then look at the places side and the facility side, we do see some positive signals, not yet fully materialized, but the signals we see are very much linked to what we also started talking about last quarter. They are linked to data centers, to hospitals, to defense-related buildings and so on. So we see more and more positive signs in that direction.

Sounds good. And then maybe a final one, if I may. Looking at your leverage, you expect that typical deleveraging to occur here in Q4. And yes, just how you think about the leverage situation as we leave this year, did the acquisition of AMC. Can you give some thoughts on your M&A pipeline and also your willingness to execute on M&A given that acquisitions will likely be needed to reach your sales targets?

Yes. I won't say much about our M&A pipeline, but just reiterating that we are in a phase where we're still quite conservative in relation to M&A, although we're nurturing situations that come across if they are from a strategic perspective, important enough to do so. But then linking to the leverage development, we were quite confident following Q2 that we would deleverage in Q4 to the extent that we will be at or below our financial target at the end of the year, and we practically reiterate that. We don't expect -- we expect normal seasonality in Q4, which normally implies a strong operational cash flow in Q4. And that is then also supported by a significant restructuring costs from Q4 last year, leaving the EBITDA component, rolling 12. So we're quite comfortable that to end the year at or below our financial target of 2.5.

Thank you, Dan. And that was all the questions we had today.

Thank you so much for joining us here today, and see you again in Q4.

Good morning, and welcome to AFRY's presentation of our results for the second quarter of 2026. I am Linda Palsson. I'm CEO of AFRY. And as always, I will begin by sharing my perspective on the quarter before handing over to our CFO, Bo Sandstrom, who will take you through the financial results in more detail. Following the presentation, we will open up for questions.

So let's begin. In the second quarter, we have continued to make progress in the execution of our strategy. As a result, we strengthened the order backlog further. It increased 8% year-over-year and now amounts to SEK 22.4 billion. We also continue to improve the utilization rate. And after 14 consecutive quarters of decline, we have now delivered 3 quarters with consistent improvement. This is a strong validation of the actions we have taken.

In the quarter, we completed our restructuring agenda aimed at optimizing our portfolio and adjust capacity. Total sales was minus 2.4%, and the organic sales growth adjusted for calendar effects was minus 5.3%. This reflects the strategic capacity adjustments we have implemented over the past year.

The EBITA margin, excluding the items affecting comparability, was in line with last year and amounted to 6.7%. It is evident that our progress is not yet reflected in our financial results. We are now shifting focus to organic growth to capture profitability uplift from the actions we have taken. And we have reached several important milestones during this quarter that will improve efficiency and support organic growth going forward. And I will come back to this later in the presentation. But first, let me take you through how our division performed during the quarter, and we will start with Energy.

The overall energy market remains strong. It's driven by the global energy transition and the increase in electrification of society. Reflecting the high level of demand and the strong offering that we have in all our segments, we reported a record high order backlog in Energy division this quarter. In light of the geopolitical developments, the focus on energy security and reducing dependence on fossil fuels continues, which further strengthened demand for our solutions.

Profitability remained at solid high levels, while growth was impacted by the phasing of execution in larger projects. But it is encouraging to see the market momentum and order backlog that we have in this division. And our full focus going forward is on delivering on the backlog and to drive growth.

If we then turn to Industry. The market conditions here are broadly in line with the recent quarters. We see strong demand in areas such as defense, mining and metals, while sectors like pulp & paper and automotive are softer. We also see that a longer period of lower demand is contributing to weak price development in parts of the business, such as within the automotive industry.

The acquisition of AMC within Mining and Metals segments, which I highlighted last quarter, contributed positively to sales this quarter. And it is encouraging to see how the addition of this type of high-quality business is already strengthening the division, enhancing our offering and reinforcing our position within this segment. The decrease in sales we saw was primarily a result of implemented capacity adjustments and profitability was impacted by the lower sales volumes, combined with weak price development in parts of the division.

If we move to Transportation & Places. We continue to see solid demand in transport infrastructure. The real estate market continues to be challenging with weak price development, although we are seeing strong momentum in some of our selected focus areas such as data centers, defense and health care. The effects of the restructuring and other changes that we addressed in Q1 are starting to phase out. The EBITA margin remained at a stable level year-over-year, while sales volumes are lower, much due to the strategic capacity adjustment.

Then moving over to projects. And one example of the growth opportunities in the infrastructure sector, I would like to highlight a key contract win during the quarter within our Places segment. It's the new hospital in Helsingborg in Southern Sweden. This is one of the largest hospital projects in Sweden in decades, and AFRY has been entrusted with the key role. It's built on our expertise in complex health care environments. And health care infrastructure is a strategic growth area for us. We see significant market opportunities, and we hold a strong position here.

We have also been selected by energy company Acelen Renewables to provide project services for its new biofuel plant in Brazil. The facility will produce renewable fuels, including green diesel and sustainable aviation fuel. So this is a great opportunity for AFRY to leverage on our chemical and biorefinery expertise, while supporting the decarbonization of transport and aviation sectors.

And finally, we signed a framework agreement with Ellevio, one of Sweden's largest power distributors. As demand for electrification continues to grow, significant investments are being made to strengthen and modernize the grid infrastructure. With our long track record in the energy sector, AFRY will provide technical consulting services across a wide range of disciplines to Ellevio.

I would now like to take a moment to highlight another area where we are currently seeing strong momentum and where AFRY has a competitive and comprehensive offering, namely data centers. The demand for data center is growing rapidly, driven by cloud adaptation, digitalization and investments in AI infrastructure around the world. And according to our estimates, the market for engineering, project management and advisory services that are related to data centers is expected to grow by more than 20% annually through 2030.

What makes this particularly exciting for us is the breadth of our offering in this area, where we have the competence to support clients across the full data center life cycle. It draws on expertise from across AFRY, combining advisory, architecture, engineering and infrastructure capabilities. And with our new structure, and we are working across AFRY, we are very well positioned to deliver integrated data center solutions on a global scale and across the full life cycle.

And I would like to highlight that our capabilities are particularly strong in areas such as site selection, localization, building design, combined with the deep expertise that we have in power supply and grid infrastructure. We also help clients to improve their sustainability performance through leading solutions for energy efficiency and for heat recovery. So to summarize, AFRY are well positioned to capture growth opportunities related to data centers going forward. It is a market with strong structural growth, and a clear strategic fit and one where we see opportunities to create value for our clients in the years ahead.

And as I mentioned, the key driver behind data center expansion is the accelerating adaptation of AI. So let me give you a short update on our work in this area. Because for us, AI is not about isolated tools or initiatives. It's about systematically redesigning how we operate across the business.

AFRY's strength lies in our deep sector expertise, our strong references and our proven project delivery capabilities. And by combining this strength with AI, we see significant potential to improve productivity, quality and speed in our deliveries. And our priorities are focused on 2 dimensions. It's the client delivery, and it's the internal efficiency. So in addition to supporting our clients to realize the value of AI and data in their businesses, we are designing an engineering delivery platform that connects our employees with tools and data to deliver projects more efficiently. Through standardized solutions and secure data architecture, we are establishing the foundation required to scale the adaptation of AI and future technologies.

We are also working with selected partners to explore new delivery models for scalable productivity, and we have several pilot initiatives underway. Then when it comes to our own operation, we are increasingly using AI to improve efficiency in bid management as well as automating routine tasks through AI agents and self-service analytics. Because with the right implementation, AI can free up capacity from repetitive and low-risk work, enabling our engineers to focus more on advanced assessments, problem-solving and closer client dialogue. And as AI continues to evolve, we build the capabilities, platforms and way of working -- ways of working needed to capture the full potential over time. It's an important area for us.

And with that, I would like to hand over to you, Bo, to take us through the financials.

Thank you, Linda. So I will cover the financials for Q2 2026, and I'll start with the overview. Quarter 2 showed net sales of SEK 6.5 billion and EBITA including -- excluding IAC of SEK 434 million. Adjusted organic growth remains in negative territory around minus 5%. On rolling 12 months, we're currently at SEK 25.2 billion on net sales. Rolling 12-month EBITA margin remains at 7.3%. The order backlog continued to develop favorably and is reported at SEK 22.4 billion, an improvement of 8% to last year and 4.2% sequentially. Again, the order backlog is the highest ever reported.

All divisions improved sequentially and year-over-year. The majority of the sequential improvement stems from the industry division with some good wins in the quarter and also supported by the AMC acquisition as their order backlog is now included in our reported numbers. The backlog for the Energy division now surpassed SEK 7 billion, leading to an 18% increase year-over-year. The division is now well set for increasing the growth pace in the upcoming quarters.

In Q2, with a net sales of SEK 6.5 billion, we reported total growth of minus 2.4% and adjusted organic growth of negative 5.3%. Whereas the organic growth continues to be pressured by our restructuring agenda, total growth has turned the trend following the AMC acquisition. The market price pressure in some segments seen since the latter part of 2025 is still clearly visible in Q2. This is particularly evident for some segments within industry and transportation & places.

Structural effects in Q2 relate to the acquisitions of Reta during Q3 2025 and AMC completed in May 2026, net of smaller noncore divestments completed in the beginning of this year.

The negative adjusted organic growth in Q2 was somewhat lower than last quarter's with small sequential movements in respective division. Global Division energy again show low but positive organic growth. Adjusted organic growth for the Industry division remained in the minus 6% to 8% territory, reflecting a continued challenging market in parts and capacity adjustments during the last 24 months. Total growth for the division is minus 2.1% with the AMC acquisition as the main structural contributor.

Transportation & Places remained at minus 5.4% in Q2 as a consequence of capacity adjustments in the end of 2025, combined with a continued weak real estate market.

We reported utilization of 73.5% for Q2, close to 1 percentage point higher than Q2 last year. Again, we see improved year-over-year utilizations for all divisions. This is then the third consecutive quarter where we report an improvement to last year, and it is a continued important step for our strategic efforts to improve operational efficiency in AFRY. We will continue our focus on improving this metric to be one of the main drivers of profitability improvement over time. Since the low mark of 72% on rolling 12 a year ago, we are now at 72.6%, and well on our way to 74% being the set ambition in the 2028 road map.

EBITA, excluding IAC is reported at SEK 434 million, with positive calendar effects of SEK 27 million. The EBITA margin was at 6.7%, reasonably in line with last year reported and calendar adjusted. With the business margin pressured by lower sales volumes, group costs were lower than last year as we're now starting to see effects of the restructuring efforts related to support functions.

Looking at the EBITA margin development by division, they are, in general, in line with last year. Energy, supported by improved utilization and strong backlog development, continue to report a strong EBITA margin. Global Division industry continued to improve utilization, but is pressured by significantly lower volumes and weak price development in some of its market segments. In addition, the division carried SEK 15 million of transaction costs for the AMC acquisition in the quarter. The margin in Transportation & Places remained pressured from restructuring effects and the soft real estate market. That said, in Q2, we clearly see the restructuring effects that we experienced in Q1 starts to fade out, and we expect those to be fully phased out in the second half of the year.

We report SEK 54 million restructuring costs as items affecting comparability in Q2, and closed our restructuring program fully in line with our guidance given throughout. During the program, we made significant progress in our efforts to reshape the portfolio, and we have, in addition, made good progress on addressing the cost base. This we will continue to do despite closing the program. We see effects of the increased cost effectiveness from the program on the group costs and increased utilization in accordance with our expectations. But from a full run rate perspective, effects are still offset by lower gross margin contribution, given the currently lower sales volumes.

Following a moderate cash flow in Q1, the second quarter showed a very strong operational cash flow, close to SEK 500 million better than Q2 last year. We managed to release significant working capital outside what we normally experience in Q2. On a rolling 12-month perspective, the operational cash flow is exceptionally strong. As part of the strong cash collection seen in Q2 is normally seen in Q4.

Available liquidity decreased to SEK 4.3 billion and net debt increased to SEK 4.7 billion as we distributed dividend and closed the AMC acquisition during Q2. Our financial position remains strong. With a strong operational cash flow in Q2, we managed to keep our leverage, including restructuring costs at 3x closing the restructuring program. We expect leverage to remain around this level for Q3, and then to close the year at or below our financial target as significant restructuring costs are phasing out of the EBITA component, particularly in Q4.

And with that, I leave back to you, Linda.

Thank you, Bo. So let me now provide you with an update on our strategy execution. Our Unlocking AFRY strategy sets the direction towards our 2028 targets with a focus on leading position in selected segments, deeper client relationships across the full life cycle, expand our presence also beyond the Nordics and an improved efficiency through harmonization and simplification. And over this past year, we have been driving significant change at a high pace to position AFRY for profitable growth and long-term competitiveness.

As you know, we have introduced a new group structure. It's supported by a clear road map with concrete initiatives and actions. We have executed an extensive restructuring agenda, which we now have completed. We have divested or exited noncore business, and we have completed 2 strategic acquisitions in mining and metals, one of our key growth areas, and we are well underway with the integration.

And in addition, we have launched a new resource management platform. As we now move forward, we shift focus to organic growth, combined with cost discipline to capture the profitability uplift from the measures already implemented.

Our priorities also include further implementation of the resource management platform towards a more consistent, transparent and connected way of working across the group. We are also gradually scaling our global delivery center capabilities to strengthen project execution, improve access to skilled resource and enable a greater cost efficiency. These efforts will be key to realizing the full benefits of our strategy and to drive profitable growth towards our 2028 targets.

And with that, we would like to open up for questions.

Great. Thank you, Linda and Bo. We will now open up the Q&A session. [Operator Instructions] And first in line, we have Dan Heimer from SEB.

I hope you can hear me well. It seems like it. So that's good. Maybe start with a question on profitability, and you've taken now close to SEK 300 million restructuring cost. I think you said 12 months payback on that and your billing ratio is up. But the EBITA margin, just 7.3% now on an LTM basis, only marginally up versus a year ago. So help me first to understand why it's not following the improvements in the efficiency where it's sort of the slack in the system, so to speak.

Yes. I think it's, of course, a multifaceted question and the answer to that. I think the simple answer is that with a quite pressured organic growth that we see, the decline in a sense in gross margin contribution from that volume that we have, in a sense, deliberately taken out is then, in a sense, compensating for the efficiency effects that we see, both on the utilization effect and as a consequence of the restructuring program. I think that's the simple answer to the question.

Then, of course, it's not easier kind of experiencing a bit of market pressure, price pressure on top of that, also kind of affecting it. But the main aspect is practically the very suppressed organic growth.

Understand. And maybe a follow-up on that since now you seem to have a plan to accelerate organic growth from these levels at least, and you have the order book in place. So just how do you ensure that sort of the ramp-up in organic growth lead to the anticipated improvements in profitability? Because looking at '21 to '23, it was a special period, but you had a relatively high organic growth back then and your margins did not follow. So yes. just help me to understand why it's different this time when you probably need to ramp up recruitment as well, which initially could be margin dilutive.

No, but exactly as you said, historically, our growth has always come with higher costs. So we haven't sort of fully get the benefit of scale through AFRY. Now with the very sort of necessary and structured approach that we have had, we have deliberately taken out volume. We have done a lot of cost implemented measures, very structured. But as Bo said, we do need now the organic growth to get the full benefit. So we have pushed down costs. We will continue to push down cost. But now we have a systematic approach of keeping it that when we have the growth then coming here on top.

And as you said, I mean we are -- the growth is supported by the strong order backlog. The timing, of course, of the projects in the backlog is a bit different. It varies from very small to extremely long projects over a period of maybe 10 years. So it will be a bit of a different phasing in this, but we do see within our strong areas such as energy, defense, some part metals and mining that the growth will come towards the end of this period.

And I'll add to that since you also referred to the '21 to '23 in a sense, growth that we had. That growth was primarily then driven by acquired growth and then not in the same -- not to the same efficient platform that we are currently kind of moving into a much more harmonized and efficient platform to add the organic growth to also reaping the benefits of that growth from scale.

Okay. Perfect. Makes sense. And maybe just 2 clarification questions from my side as well. But the phasing in energy of larger projects, are you referring to a negative impact in this quarter that you expect to catch up? Or how should I read that comment?

And also the SEK 15 million transaction cost in -- for the AMC, that's not included in items affecting comparability, right?

I'll start with the last. No, it's not included in items affecting comparability. It's included in the industry division's EBITA for the quarter. And to your first question, yes, in that sense, negative phasing effects on the sales side, also the -- looking at the relative low growth in the specific quarter for the energy division.

And then we have the next question from Adela Dashian from Jefferies.

Firstly, on the pricing pressure that you're experiencing. Do you see any signs that this is stabilizing anytime soon? Or do you have any proactive measures to, I guess, get past that?

Should I start?

Yes.

Yes. As we reported now, we have seen some of the parts of the market where we have had pressure over a long time or a softer market over a long time, leading to overcapacity in general. And we see that in the price development, especially in automotive and to some extent, also in the building part. To address that, we are going into pockets where we see growth, and where we see where we have a strong position. And for -- to be concrete, when it comes to the places and buildings, for us, that means going even more into the hospital side of it, going even more into data centers, going more into defense-related buildings.

So we are going to the parts of the building business, where we are relevant and where we can find the right margins for AFRY going forward.

Okay. And then on the backlog. Nice to see the improvement in the quarter, and you did mention that you have a combination of larger and smaller orders. But does it differ a lot from previous cycles? I think one of the efforts earlier on when you joined was, to some extent, increase your visibility with the orders. So is it still very similar? Or have we seen somewhat of a change to it?

Yes, we have seen some changes. We have seen a larger part of sizable projects in our backlog, which is good, but they are also converted over a longer period of time. But we do see a shift towards even more projects and more sizable projects in our backlog, and we're very comfortable with the margins of those projects.

That's good to hear. And then lastly, on industry and pulp & paper, what -- can we get a market update on that specifically?

Yes. On pulp & paper, we have reported also that it has been a weak global market, and especially Europe has been weak. We don't see any big shifts on the CapEx side on the European market. We do see continuous improvement of the operation on the existing facilities. And there, we continue to be very well positioned. But we don't see the big volume uptick on pulp & paper, especially not in Europe yet.

Next question is from Julia Sundvall from ABG.

Just a first question on the order book again. We see the revenues falling, but how should we think about the timing in the order backlog as it is growing that much as 8%? You say it's longer than before, but is it like 2027 heavy or 2028? Or just some more flavor how we should think about the order backlog and revenue together?

Yes, I can start with the backlog development. So yes, you are right. It is spread in time more than maybe we have seen before. That means that the impact is still ahead of us. We do see parts of the backlog already in position to start to accelerate. We find them within energy. We find them within especially transmission and distribution part of energy. We do find it within mining and metals, and we do find it within defense. So the sequence is a bit different for our different segments, but we do have a couple that are ready to start converting this year, but then the majority you will see going forward.

And to build on that, on the latter part of your question. The phasing is then of the backlog is very different by division. Some being much more kind of long cycle in nature. But as a rule of thumb, if you look at AFRY overall, you could estimate that in the next 12 months, then we will carry approximately 50% of the backlog as revenue. Then it can differ a bit between the divisions. So the majority of the backlog is to be delivered before end of 2027 from where we are, then with the continuous fill up and take out of the -- from the backlog.

Yes, perfect. That's a good answer. And on the organic growth or decline, could you give us some flavor how much of the decline is due to capacity reductions and how much is like end market softness? Or -- yes, I think you understand the question.

Yes. I'll start on that. If you look at the negative organic, so 5% in the quarter. The vast majority of that is volume driven. So we don't have a positive effect from pricing in the quarter. So the vast majority of the decline is volume driven. Then I would say that the volume -- the volume reduction that we've done is practically a part of the strategic reductions that we've done throughout the last year.

The big majority of that is related to our own decided efforts. They are, of course, looking at the different segments on our attractiveness in relation to it. So there's a market relation to it, but it's still kind of a conscious choice of reducing our capacity in those segments. So it's difficult to kind of distinguish between, in a sense, market-driven strategic capacity because they go into each other.

Yes, yes. Yes, I see. And a follow-up on that one. The number of FTEs is still down quarter-over-quarter, mostly in the corporate and support function but also some in transportation and places. How should we think about net recruitment from now on? You say you want to focus on the organic growth, but how should we think about net recruitment?

Yes. So we are now shifting focus even more on the organic growth part. And with that comes naturally also a higher recruitment pace. Just want to emphasize that we have welcomed 1,500 new AFRY employees this year, and we will increase that pace even further going forward. So you're fully right. We are now accelerating our initiatives to recruit.

And from a divisional perspective, I mean I would not expect the group functions FTE to increase, but I would -- rather to decrease. But then from a divisional perspective, typically, the Energy division is the division which is the most geared for growth in a sense. So in terms of distribution between the divisions, that's where I would expect the most ramp-up over the upcoming year.

Then we have Johan Sunden from DNB Carnegie.

I'm stuck a little bit on the kind of organic growth discussion we have had here. Can you just help us bridge how long it will take for you to start to grow organically again? Because if you just look at the number of FTE that you report here at the end of Q2 and compared to what you had in H2 last year, you are still at some 4% -- 3%, 4% below that level. When in, say, 2027, will you be able to start growing organically? Is it before mid-summer '27? Or is it earlier than that?

I mean it's a good observation, Johan. And of course, looking at the -- in a sense, the phasing of the FTE development over the last 18 months or so, then you see that the biggest decline was at the later part of 2025 in a sense. So from that perspective, we will, throughout this year, always meet, in a sense, a bit higher comparables from a year-over-year perspective.

Then going into next year, then we won't have that comparison in a sense anymore. Of course, organic growth would then be a combination of being successful in the market on pricing, but also then just putting the capacity there from a year-over-year perspective in terms of FTEs because of the order backlog we have in that sense. So already going into next year, we have a much better starting point for actually being in positive territory next year, but it will be much more difficult throughout this year just based on the phasing of the structural takeouts that we've done.

And you mentioned 1,500 newly recruited people. How has -- any comment on kind of employee turnover over the last quarter?

Yes. I mean, in a business like ours, it's a people business. It's absolutely crucial that we are an attractive employer and that we are with the right type of projects and that we're driving the development in the direction that we want. I think that is shown in our ability to also attract and recruit people. But in the business like this, also people are leaving us. So we are basically net 0 so far, looking over the year. We are seeing a positive trend from Q2 going forward, and we will accelerate that as we said. But our general attrition level is on a healthy level and in line with what -- how it has been historically going forward as well. So no big shifts in our attrition curve.

It was very stable. It was very stable in Q2.

Yes.

And then I had a couple of questions on the AMC acquisition as well. Do you expect significant synergy potential or -- on either revenue or cost that we should be aware of?

I would rather go -- we are expecting synergies from that acquisition. It links and matches very well into our metal and mining segment from a global perspective. I think it's a very complementary acquisition in that segment for us. So we will have some synergies, both on the revenue side, strengthening our kind of life cycle offering across metals and mining. And we will have some on the cost side. But a good balance, kind of in between. But the overall perspective on the AMC acquisition is that it's a really -- it's a really good company. It has a very good strategic match for us, and it complements our offering in a good way. So it should be a good synergy case, but not a material part being either on the revenue or the cost side, a bit from both.

Can you give some kind of indication what kind of post synergy multiple you have paid? Because when I read the kind of acquisition analysis, it seems like a pretty rich multiple for the revenue level and EBITA, as it is today.

I mean I think we -- I mean, it's always a very successful company, kind of with good growth opportunities, then you pay a bit of higher multiples than a turnaround -- than you would for a turnaround case. But I don't see that we paid any elevated multiples for the AMC acquisition.

And the kind of priorities on capital allocation as of now, going for buying AMC for -- from my perspective, rich multiple versus buying back shares? How has those discussions developed or been?

I mean I think we said kind of all the way through that we will be careful in making acquisitions, but when we find the right target, even though we are in a phase of focusing very much on creating the basis for profitability uplift, then we will do that acquisition. And AMC was just that example, a very good fit into the company.

Then I think you can always make that balance in between. But the M&A, the M&A side of things is that kind of when you really find the attractive target, then you have to act on it in a sense. Otherwise, it will pass.

Then we have Fredrik Lithell from Handelsbanken.

I'm coming back to the backlog a little bit. What's the -- actually, what's the definition of the backlog? Because if you say it's growing 8% year-over-year and the growth is improving, but if the duration of the backlog is pushed out in time, it's a little bit weakening that number. So is there a duration stop? Or could it be that the 8% growth is sort of contracts you will deliver on 5 years from now, all of a sudden? Or how should we think about that? I understand, Bo, you said that I think about 50% of it within the next 12 months, but what's the definition?

The definition is projects sold not yet delivered. So that is the definition for us. And for a framework agreement, it's not booked as into the backlog until we have an actual signed call off from the framework agreement. So that's how we work with it. And then as you said, rule of thumbs, we have a clear ambition that to support our growth ambition, we will continue to increase our order backlog. We have said that we want to push it towards SEK 30 billion in this strategy period. The mix, healthy mix, but we will guide even further on the conversion rate. But rule of thumb, still half of it in the next year. So the more we push it up, the more we have to.

Yes. But still to give you some guidance kind of indirectly on the question, the 8% year-over-year increase, it's an actual increase of the order backlog. It's not compensated, by just pushing the backlog out in time, even though that's a bit of a part of it. But we don't have a time stop on the backlog. So we can practically be a 20-year project, even though that's quite uncommon. But practically, it can be.

Okay. That's very clear. And then a question on sort of the nonbillable FTEs and what you have done there and what you have done with your sort of the structural capital so far the last 12 months and how much you feel the sort of the new platforms you're moving on top of and so on, how much more of efficiencies you can reap out of that in terms of sort of nonbillables and lower costs for platforms and so on going forward?

Yes. I mean I think we made a lot of efforts during the last year. And then with that said, there's still a lot -- still some way to go. What we're practically doing is that we're doing what many companies have done over a very long period of time. We're doing that in a significantly shorter period of time. But what we have done is that we've kind of organized ourselves structurally in a sense, the functional support domains, both from a group function perspective, but also in the business in a sense and then started to work kind of much more on harmonizing processes and finding efficiencies throughout.

At the same time, we are pursuing a lot of kind of platform investments that we've done over a long period of time working with ERP transitions, process harmonization, diving in towards kind of utilizing AI in those processes at the same time. Those things will, over time, take -- they will take a bit of time. So we progressed quite a bit, but there's still a significant potential for us to move forward in practically in the couple of years to come.

So that will sort of lead to that, the nonbillable staff and other types of costs will be a lower share of your total revenue going forward for the coming 2 years? Will you see a decline in that going forward?

Yes. We don't -- I mean, it's 2 very different parts of the kind of nonbillable part. It's the more pure support part, and it's the nonbillable part that is then connected to the business kind of as such. Those are quite different in their nature. One which is much more sales and delivery oriented and one which is much more support oriented. But we are expecting to further decrease those costs, particularly as a share of revenue in a sense to actually get the scale effects that we haven't been able to get previously to actually get that this time around as we are now shifting towards driving organic growth.

Just a final one. Linda, you talked about the resource platform that has been in place now since the 1st of June, I think it is. We talked about this on small and mid-cap seminar we had. Can you give some sort of feedback on how it's progressing? And how do you see any effects from it this very early in?

Yes. I mean, the effect -- we have been working with the implementation now for some time. And I mean, the early effect you actually see in the improvement of our utilization rate because this is part of our tool to visualize and enable understanding of where we have the projects, where we utilize our resources. So that's the first, I would say, sign that you see is the improved utilization rate. Then moving forward, adding more and more intelligence and AI on this platform, we will be much more efficient in our tender work, but much more efficient in the staffing of our projects. So there, you will see over time, an uptick both in lower cost, as we talked about, but also in higher project margins over time. So it's 3 dimensions that we look.

The first one is related to utilization rates. Then we have the bid side of it, and then we have the execution side -- sales side of it, and then we have the execution side of it, where we will see impacts in all 3 over time.

Then the next question comes from Johan Dahl from Danske Bank.

Just 2 brief questions. Firstly, on the order backlog, Linda, you talked about good profitability in the order backlog and a fairly sort of swift -- yes, swift invoicing, half of the backlog being invoiced in 12 months. But I mean, I'm just trying to understand what's your visibility of that profitability? Because if you look on the restructuring that AFRY have done now, several KPIs moving in the right direction, such as billing ratio, sort of group common cost. But now you talked about price pressure.

So I'm just thinking -- everything indicates that the backlog you're starting to invoice on, especially in the industry is perhaps deteriorating profitability. But why is that the wrong way of looking at it?

I can start because the weaker price development we see is very much connected to the parts of the market where it has been challenging for a long period of time. It's very much connected to automotive. We know that, that business is going through a transformative change. We also have seen it in the building. So it is the short-term conversion of -- conversion projects related to those parts of our business. So it's not a general price pressure. It is quite connected to parts of our portfolio.

And just to add to it, kind of for your understanding, when we talk about price pressure, it's mostly seen then in the very short cycle business. The short projects or even ranging towards the professional services business, whereas what goes into the order backlog is then primarily projects and projects of longer characteristics. And there, we have kind of very meticulous in a sense, profitability checks, particularly the bigger the project is, the more we require in terms of securing that the profitability margin of that project is at the right level.

So where in the business, are you seeing internally sort of that the order backlog is sort of contributing to profitability in AFRY? Is it happening in energy in certain places? Or where do you actually see it?

So we see it in energy. We see it in -- especially, I would say, in hydro and nuclear parts of energy so far. We expect it in transmission and distribution as well. But I would say it's most evident in hydro and in nuclear so far.

Got you. Just a final question. Bo, you talked about the phasing of restructuring in buildings that would sort of impact the second half. I wasn't sure I followed you there, what exactly did you mean?

I'm not sure what you referred to actually.

We'll take that offline later.

Okay. Thank you. That was all the questions we had for today.

Okay. Then we would like to thank you all for listening in today, and we wish you a wonderful summer. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hello, everyone, and welcome. Thank you for joining us today as we present AFRY's results for the first quarter of 2026. I am Linda Palsson, and I am the CEO of AFRY. I will begin with some highlights from the quarter before handing over to our CFO, Bo Sandstrom. And after that, we will open the line for questions.

In Q1, our strategy execution continued to progress according to plan. Our order backlog grew 6.4% year-over-year to SEK 21.5 billion, which is a testament to the strength of our client offerings and our focus on sales execution. Our strong order backlog position us well to drive profitable growth in line with our strategy going forward. In the quarter, we improved profitability with an EBITA margin that increased to 7.5% from the calendar adjusted margin of 7.1% in Q1 last year. This was mainly driven by a continued positive development of the utilization rate, which improved 1.1 percentage points.

We saw strong performance in our Global division, Energy & Industry, while results in Transportation and Places were weaker. Net sales declined 4.3% organically in the quarter, and that is mainly a result of a challenging market and the capacity adjustments we have made over the past year. Global uncertainty remained high at the beginning of the year, which continues to impact the market conditions in some of our segments.

As we conclude the first quarter, we are now approaching the end of a comprehensive restructuring phase aimed at optimizing our capacity and portfolio. With steady development in Q1, we are moving in the right direction, and we will continue to execute our strategy to reach the performance levels we are targeting.

We're then going into the divisions, and let's begin with Energy. Here, we see a continued favorable market across the sector, which reflects in a strong order backlog development in the quarter. Investments in grid capacity and resilience of energy supply chains are driving strong demand in several areas, most notably in transmission and distribution. But demand is also solid in hydro and pump storage as well as in nuclear. And in the quarter, the division delivered positive organic sales growth and EBITA margin improvement. And that was driven by the solid performance and the higher utilization in several of the Energy segments.

Moving on to Industry. And here, we continue to see that persistent market uncertainty is impacting overall demand as clients remain cautious around investment decisions for the larger projects. At the same time, demand remains strong for defense-related solutions that strengthen resilience and national security. This continues to be a key growth area for AFRY going forward, and we are, therefore, reinforcing our strategic focus on security and resilience. And to support this, we launched a new defense segment within the Industry division during the quarter.

The segment brings together AFRY's technology and engineering expertise to better support clients and partners in the Nordic defense sectors. So with more than 70 years of experience, we will continue to deliver our leading solutions across engineering, cybersecurity, digitalization and resilience. In Q1, profitability within the Industry division improved despite declining net sales. This was mainly driven by efficiency measures and higher utilization.

Then moving on to our final Global division, Transportation and Places. Demand in the transport infrastructure remains stable. It's supported by large national investment programs. We also here see increased defense-related investments across the infrastructure sector with focus on strengthening infrastructure resilience. Meanwhile, conditions in the real estate market continue to be challenging. Competition is high for the projects that are available, which leads to weak price development in our main markets.

To address the challenging market environment and strengthen our position going forward, we have implemented restructuring measures and other necessary changes in the real estate business over the past few quarters, including organizational adjustments and rebranding initiatives. These changes, combined with a challenging market, have pressured our performance in parts of the division this quarter. And we expect that the impact of these changes have phased out in the second half of the year, while we continue to navigate the market conditions in the real estate sector.

As mentioned, we strengthened our order backlog during the first quarter with several new client projects. And as usual, I would like to highlight a few examples. First, I was pleased to see us further strengthen our partnership with Statnett, as AFRY was entrusted to lead the overall project execution for a new transformer station. This is a key grid infrastructure project in Norway that will strengthen the power system to meet growing electricity demand driven by industrial development and electrification.

And within our Chemicals and Biorefining segments, we secured another important partnership as energy company, Wega selected AFRY for the pre-engineering phase of a new biorefinery facility. Once realized, the facility will become Finland's largest biogas plant, producing clean energy and supporting sustainable agriculture. And finally, we were awarded a contract by Berlin's water and wastewater utility to design a new ozone treatment stage at one of the city's wastewater treatment plants. The facility serves around 300,000 residents and by improving the ability to remove micropollutants, AFRY will help deliver a resilient and sustainable wastewater treatment for the city.

Moving on, a key focus area for us in our profitable growth journey is to focus on capturing opportunities in sectors with long-term growth potential. And in the quarter, we announced an agreement to acquire AMC, a leading mining consulting firm based in Australia. AMC has a strong global reputation and deep sector expertise, particularly in the early phases of mining projects. And by joining forces, we will further strengthen AFRY's mining and metals offering and expand our ability to deliver comprehensive solutions across the full life cycle for leading clients in the mining industry.

AMC also brings a strong data foundation that enables data and technology-driven mine design, capabilities that position us well to meet growing client demand. So this is a -- this acquisition is really a strong strategic fit for AFRY. It's supporting our priorities in terms of segments, geographic presence, life cycle offering, culture and size. So I'm very much looking forward to welcoming AMC's employees to AFRY in the second quarter when we expect to finalize this transaction.

Another area that is a key focus for us going forward is, of course, Artificial Intelligence. And strengthening our delivery through AI is a core part of AFRY strategy. We are applying AI across multiple parts of the business and are continuously exploring new digital opportunities to remain at the forefront of this development. And as a part of these ambitions, we have entered into a strategic collaboration with a Swedish tech company, Endra, which has developed an AI-based platform to support engineering in building design.

We are now evaluating the technology from the inside and early results indicate strong potential to automate process and improve system and design accuracy. These types of solutions have the potential to amplify our expertise and enable our consultants to focus more on the deeper analysis, sharper insights and greater strategic impact. So very excited to follow this partnership going forward.

And now I would like to hand over to our CFO, Bo Sandstrom, who will take us through the financials in greater detail.

Thank you, Linda. So I will cover the financials for Q1 2026. Quarter 1 showed net sales of SEK 6.3 billion and EBITA, excluding IAC of SEK 473 million. Adjusted organic growth remains in negative territory, in line with last quarter. On rolling 12 months, we're currently at SEK 25.3 billion on net sales. Rolling 12-month EBITA margin increased slightly to 7.3% despite a negative calendar in the quarter.

The order backlog continues to develop favorably and is reported at SEK 21.5 billion, an improvement of 6% to last year and 5% sequentially. The order backlog is the highest ever reported. The majority of the sequential improvement stems from the Energy division, which is now 16% higher than last year. The remainder of the increase comes from Transportation and Places, in particular from Road and Rail.

In Q1, with a net sales of SEK 6.3 billion, we report adjusted organic growth of negative 4.3%, same as last quarter where volume continues to be pressured by capacity adjustments related to our restructuring agenda. The market price pressure in some segments seen in the latter part of 2025 continue in the beginning of 2026. This is particularly evident for segments within Industry and Transportation and Places.

Total growth is reported at minus 6.3%, affected materially in the fourth consecutive quarter by FX movements. Structural effects in Q1 related to the net of the acquisition of Reta during 2025 and 3 smaller noncore divestments completed in the quarter. The negative adjusted organic growth in Q1 was the same as in Q4 2025, but with some movements in respective division.

Global division, Energy is now again showing organic growth despite strong comparables from last year. Industry remains at minus 6% adjusted organic growth, reflecting a continued challenging market and capacity adjustments during the last 24 months. Transportation and Places declined further in the quarter as a consequence of capacity adjustments in the end of 2025, combined with a continued weak real estate market.

We reported utilization of 72.2% for Q1, more than a percentage point higher than Q1 last year. We see improved year-over-year utilization for all divisions, in particular, for Global division, Industry. This is the second consecutive quarter where we report an improvement to last year, and it is a continued important step for our strategic efforts to improve operational efficiency in AFRY. The level of improvement this quarter was, however, partly supported by weak comparables. We will continue our focus on improving this metric to be one of the main drivers of profitability improvement over time.

EBITA, excluding IAC, is reported at SEK 473 million with negative calendar effects of SEK 11 million. The EBITA margin was at 7.5%, an improvement from 7.3% reported last year and 7.1% last year calendar adjusted. Currency movements have limited impact on the EBITA margin, but in absolute terms, we estimate a negative currency impact of SEK 17 million on EBITA compared to last year.

As in last quarter, Global divisions, Energy and Industry support the margin development of the group. And particularly for Industry, we see positive trends that the division is coming out of the restructuring agenda with improvements in utilization supporting the EBITA margin development despite negative growth.

Energy supported by improved utilization and strong backlog development, managed to improve from already high levels. The margin in the quarter in Transportation and Places was pressured by effects from restructuring and other measures during the last 2 quarters in combination with the continued challenging real estate market.

We report SEK 47 million restructuring costs as item affecting comparability in Q1, bringing our total to SEK 239 million in the ongoing restructuring program. The restructuring costs, again primarily relate to redundancies across the group and for Q1, now more focused towards support functions. We've made significant progress in our efforts to reshape the portfolio. And as we have now moved into 2026, we intensify our efforts on addressing the cost base. With only 1 quarter to go in the restructuring program, we reiterate our estimate that the total restructuring cost will be at the upper end of our guidance of SEK 200 million to SEK 300 million.

Following a record strong operational cash flow in the fourth quarter, we have a more moderate operational cash flow in Q1, somewhat lower than last year. On a rolling 12 months perspective, the operational cash flow remains strong. Available liquidity increased to SEK 5.2 billion as we are prepared to distribute dividend and close the AMC acquisitions during Q2.

Our financial position remains strong. We see a marginal sequential increase on net debt and a corresponding increase on net debt over EBITDA. Dividend distribution and the completion of the AMC acquisition will increase leverage further over the next 2 quarters, but we expect to close the year at or below our financial target.

And with that, I leave back to you, Linda.

Thank you, Bo. So to summarize the first quarter of 2026, the execution of our unlocking AFRY strategy continues to progress according to plan. As part of this, we are now nearing the completion of our restructuring agenda. We saw steady progress in both the utilization rate and EBITA margin in the quarter as a result of the structural measures to improve efficiency.

We also again strengthened our order backlog, which is another key enabler for profitable growth going forward. At the same time, the overall market uncertainty remains high, and it is evident that market conditions in some segments do not yet support our ambitions for profitable growth. With that said, looking ahead, we are focused on capturing growth opportunities in the market. We continue to prioritize sales to maintain a strong order backlog and build on this foundation to drive backlog conversion.

We will also continue to advance key initiatives to harmonize our operation, improve efficiency and sustain our positive utilization trend. Finally, we will complete the restructuring agenda in the second quarter as planned, while working to ensure an effective transition out of the restructuring phase to enable continued strategy execution at full speed.

So with that, we will open up for questions.

Great. Thank you, Linda and Bo. So now we will open up for questions. [Operator Instructions] So we will begin with Julia Sundvall from ABG Sundal Collier. [Operator Instructions]

Can you hear me now? Perfect. Okay. A few questions from my side. I would like to begin with Transportation and Places that are quite weak. You say it's because of the real estate market. Has it become worse during the quarter? And which geographies do you see it? Has it become worse? Could you just give us some flavor on that?

I can start with the market. Well, you know the building market has been weak for some while, and we see that in the price development for the opportunities that are in the market. So we see actually price pressure in parts of the real estate business, and we see that actually across the Nordics.

And then just to add on that, I mean, we're saying that, of course, the market is not supporting the development, particularly then for Transportation and Places, looking at the real estate business. But that's not the only thing that we see in a sense in Q1 results. We also see a prolongation of many activities and restructuring efforts that we've done over the last couple of quarters. And we see that they in combination with the continued weak market, that affects the profitability in the quarter specific.

Yes. So a combination of several factors. Yes, I see. And my second question, the number of FTEs is still down in the quarter -- quarter-over-quarter. And if I don't mistake, you said in your Q4 report that you were going to focus on the support functions from now on regarding your restructuring program. But we see the FTE down during the quarter. How -- could you give us some more on that?

Yes. I mean you see the FTEs, it's always tricky just like when you look at utilization, it's always tricky to look on FTEs from a sequential perspective because the quarters have different characteristics. But you're right, we continue to be down on overall FTEs. Then when you look at support functions specifically, then we actually made quite significant adjustments at the very end of the quarter in relation to support functions. So that is not reflected in the reported FTE numbers, which looks at the average for the full quarter.

Okay. Yes, makes sense. And just a question regarding your debt. Your net debt to EBITDA is now at 2.7. That's above your margin target. How do you view this together with the recent M&A?

We've always had a very strong seasonality of our leverage. And when we look at our leverage target, that is reflective of the end of the year. So the slight uptick that we have in leverage between Q4 and Q1 is not abnormal in terms of normal seasonality. So we should have ample room to cover the M&A and still be on track to be at or even below the leverage target by end of the year.

Okay. Makes sense. And just a last question from my side regarding the geopolitical uncertainties. Have you seen any effect of this in the quarter? I see the Industry order backlog is down somewhat. Is that a reason because of the geopolitical uncertainties? Or is there other reasons behind it?

Yes. The geopolitical uncertainty continues and the impact it has is a little bit of a start and stop mechanism in some of our projects. We don't -- we're not directly impacted, but we are indirectly impacted by this since it's disturbance in our clients' investments program. So yes, we are, to some extent, impacted, but I would say the majority of it comes from delays in large CapEx projects. We are balancing this situation with a combination of smaller projects and managing the projects that we have in a smart way.

And if you look at the Industry backlog and link that to global uncertainty, I think what we're seeing from a short-term kind of global uncertainty perspective, that is not reflected in the development of the Industry. I think we've been for a longer period of time. We've had global uncertainty from many different aspects. And that is, of course, pressuring the amount of larger projects in the Industry division. And that's what we're seeing a bit more over time, but not really reflecting the short-term uncertainties.

Thank you, Julia. Then the next question comes from Johan Sunden from DNB Carnegie.

Linda and Bo, hope you can hear me. Three questions from my side. Firstly, it's on the order backlog. And just curious to hear some reflections on pricing levels in the order backlog. Are you satisfied with them? Or are there -- are you taking some kind of strategic contracts to build volume?

We're very happy with the development of the order backlog, and we're also actually happy with the margins of the new projects in the order backlog. It's very much of the new backlog is related to -- well, it's actually a good spread, but I would say the majority comes from Energy, and we are happy with the margin development of the backlog in that part.

That's clear. And then if we stay on Energy, and I see the order backlog development, which is really encouraging. But at the same time, we're seeing a number of FTEs coming down both sequentially and year-over-year in the Energy segment. How should we think about the kind of bridging the rolldown of FTEs in Energy division versus the kind of growth potential from the order backlog and activating that?

Well, I think Energy is the clearest example. As you know, in our plan, we have first the profitability uplift, then we have the growth, the profitable growth path. And I see that Energy is now where they should be in terms of profitability. So now we really kick off the growth in Energy, and we have the backlog to support that. So we are now aiming to grow faster in Energy than we have done in the last couple of quarters.

And that work to kind of recruit in Energy segment starts now basically, and you have been holding that back up until today?

That is -- it has started, but it takes some time before you could see it in the numbers.

Okay. But -- so organic growth acceleration, it is a little bit too early to anticipate that to happen in the Energy segment already in Q2, right? Great. And the final question is also staying on the FTE numbers. Just of curiosity, when you look at the kind of FTE split between the various segments, I note that group common and eliminations has actually an uptick in number of FTEs in Q1 '26 versus both Q4 '25 and Q1 '25. How comes that?

Yes. I mean it is well spotted. Kind of one angle of it is what I said on Julia's question, the changes that we've done, kind of we did that at the very end of the quarter, so that's not reflected in the numbers. But then as you remember, during last year, we took a big step on actually consolidating everybody that worked kind of with support functions into that one category. And that work, we made that kind of 80% through at that point of time. But we've had some kind of continued actually moving individuals from the divisions over to the group functions, which is not fully -- is not fully restated in that sense between the different categories. So you see a bit of effect of that as well.

So more like intragroup shifting your own people rather than that you're recruiting at the headquarter?

Exactly.

Thank you, Johan. [Operator Instructions] And the next question is from Jesper Stugemo from Handelsbanken.

Yes. Good day. Can you hear me? All right. Great. So on the commentary in Transportation and Places, you highlighted the weak result as a part of the restructuring. But I was thinking that this should yield the opposite result for you. So when do you see some improvement from the efficiencies that you have implemented? And on the utilization rate there, could you say something how much it's up year-on-year, 1 percentage point more or less or flat?

Okay. I'll start with the first part of the question. Restructuring measures, I think, was it and that it should have the opposite impact. Yes, we, of course, do this because we believe it's the right thing in the end, and we are holding our direction going there. But take some time to see the impacts in some parts of the restructuring agenda. So -- and especially then in Places, we are expecting this to turn upwards, but it's taking a little bit longer time than we expected.

But yes, you are right, we're doing the restructuring to get ourselves in a better position in terms of profitability. We can see it slightly improving in the utilization rate also in Places part in the -- in Q1. And that's sort of the story that we want to build further on.

All right.

And then to guide you a bit on your kind of utilization development. Utilization development for Transportation and Places is not quite as strong as for the group overall, but close to a percentage point. And then that's then driven from the road and rail part of the business rather than the real estate operations.

Okay. That's perfect. And a follow-up on prices here. You mentioned some price pressure and given the salary revisions this year. Do you think that you can have a positive yield per consultants throughout this year? And do you see any new areas with price pressure in subsegments? Or is it still the same weak areas as before?

Yes. In general, we can say it's the same weak areas that we have seen. As we have reported over the last couple of quarters, we have weak development in buildings or in phases, and we have it in parts of the industry portfolio. And it's also there where we see the weakest price development this quarter. Then, of course, if we see more of that going forward, I wouldn't say that. I would say that we see it still in the same weak segments. And we are, of course, working with measures to do that. We have talked about the restructuring capacity adjustments that we are through now. But of course, it's also about how we source to the projects. So we are scaling our ambitions also on global delivery centers as one example on how we are mitigating the sort of price pressure in these segments.

Okay. And just one last question from me on AI, it would be more interesting to hear your thoughts, you mentioned Endra here around efficiency and output. And yes, if you can give us some more color on this and if it's becoming more complex to run this through the organization as you also are implementing several restructuring initiatives, et cetera.

Yes, there was a lot in that question. But if we start then, then, of course, AI is a vital part of our business, both sort of for our internal efficiency, but also for our external or the projects that we deliver. And you saw Endra here is one example of our engineering capabilities within buildings. So we actually believe that our new strategy and the segment-based organization that we have chosen enable us to work even faster with AI than we could before. So we see there is a potential for both sort of increasing the quality and increasing the productivity. And again, I think our deep sector knowledge together with the AI tools will put us in a good position.

Okay. And from the customer side, have you seen any new dynamics in projects, for example, lower contract values or you're moving from variable prices to more fixed price also here in the Nordics?

We haven't seen a mix or a shift in the mix between fixed price and time and materials, not at least not yet. But we are quite used to work in these large fixed price contracts as well. So it's a natural part of how we deliver.

But fair answer is that we don't see clear movements in the customer dialogue as of now.

Thank you, Jesper. The next question comes from Johan Dahl from Danske Bank.

Just a brief question on Transportation and Places again. Just trying to get my arms around how sustainable that margin pressure is. But is it sort of correct to make the interpretation that as the order book is developing quite nicely in Transportation and Places, there is still sort of fair prices to achieve in this business?

And secondly, the pressure on margins, to what extent is that related to your ability to source competence in this quarter? Have you had to sort of source external supply of competence and that has sort of bumped up cost in the quarter? And just trying to understand how we should look at this margin level going forward?

Yes, I'll try to answer those. I can start with the last one. No, not specifically kind of external sourcing in relation to this quarter. I think to go back to kind of the start of the question, I think it's very clear that Transportation and Places are covering 2 sectors that are behaving quite differently kind of at the moment. You have the stability in the transport infrastructure sector with reasonable price development, a good starting point and kind of stability in general.

And then you have the quite weak market in the real estate -- on the real estate side that has been weak for a while, where we have, over the last couple of quarters specifically, we've done a lot of actions into these businesses. One of them kind of digging into kind of restructuring efforts, but also complementing that during this quarter with rebranding efforts and where we have also had kind of pockets of attrition that we've talked about a lot kind of during Q4. But those things playing out in combination as pressured, particularly the real estate side of the business for the quarter as such. But it's very much kind of 2 different businesses under the hood of 1 division. And that's very clear for us in this specific quarter.

Yes. So if you then focus on real estate, that part of the business, have you sort of accelerated cost savings effort or exiting certain businesses to sort of mitigate this? Or will you sort of try to sort of bleed this out in the coming quarters?

I think we went into this restructuring phase with a very high pace, and we have continued to have that high pace throughout and to some extent, that's also what we're seeing in this specific quarter. We're doing a fast pace, a lot of changes in the business, and we see that in the results of the quarter. But I wouldn't say that we have accelerated it. In general, we're sticking to the plan that we had going in.

Thank you, Johan. And that was all the questions we had today.

Okay. So with that, I would like to thank you for joining us here today. We will now move on to our Annual General Meeting, which will take place later this afternoon here at our headquarters. So have a great day, and we look forward to speaking to you again in Q2.

Good morning, everyone. Earlier today, we released AFRY's Q4 and Full Year 2025 Results. And I'll start by taking you through the main highlights from the report, and then I will hand over to our CFO, Bo Sandstrom, who will share more details on the financials.

So let's begin with a brief overview of the full year of 2025. To summarize the year, it has truly been a year of laying the foundation for sustainable and profitable growth for AFRY. Since I took on the role as CEO a year ago, we have moved quickly, implementing a new simplified group structure and launching an ambitious restructuring agenda. This has enabled us to initiate harmonized ways of working across the business and measures to improve operational efficiency.

In November, we introduced our new focused strategy, unlocking AFRY, which aims to realize the full potential of our company. Alongside this, we also introduced new financial targets for 2028. So as we enter 2026, we are already well underway in executing on our strategy. And while we have driven change across the organization, it has been absolutely essential for us to maintain the business momentum and continue delivering to our clients, which remains our top priority. This has meant a strong focus on capturing opportunities in sectors with significant growth potential.

At the same time, we have navigated challenging market conditions in several of our segments this year. Global uncertainty has remained high, impacting the overall investment sentiment across many sectors. We have also adjusted capacity throughout the year in line with our strategic priorities, which includes market-related capacity adjustments. This has, together with the significant currency effect had an impact on our sales development for the full year.

We also experienced a weak calendar during 2025, which impacted EBITA by minus SEK 128 million, while the calendar adjusted EBITA margin was in line with last year. Based on AFRY's financial position and results for the year, the Board proposes a dividend of SEK 6 per share for 2025.

So taking a closer look at the fourth quarter, we are now seeing clear steps in the right direction. We strengthened our order backlog, which increased 5.4% adjusted for currency. And while sales growth levels remain pressured, the EBITA margin, excluding items affecting comparability, improved to 8.7%. And I was also glad to see that the utilization rate increased year-over-year for the first time in 14 quarters. This reflects our strong focus on operational efficiency and our commitment to improving this metric.

In the quarter, we also made significant progress in our restructuring agenda to optimize our portfolio and adjust capacity. And finally, we ended the year with a strong cash flow and strengthened our financial position, which gives us a solid foundation as we enter the new year.

So let's go into the market environment and the performance of our global divisions, starting with Energy. As we have seen for quite a while, the overall demand in the global energy market is strong, and we have a stable order backlog development in the quarter. The demand is particularly strong in areas such as transmission and distribution, hydro and nuclear power. At the same time, we are seeing some regional variations in some of the segments. And this, together with significant currency effects impacts the sales in the quarter. Profitability remains at high levels, supported by strong project execution in several of our segments.

Turning to Industry. The market remains mixed. This is the division where we see the most impact from global macroeconomic and geopolitical uncertainty, which continues to weigh on market conditions. At the same time, defense-related investments are driving strong demand in several areas, and the mining and metals market remains solid, pulp and Paper, however, continues to be soft. We have negative sales growth in the quarter. But despite this, we managed to improve profitability, which is a result of the restructuring efforts that we have implemented in the division.

And then finally, turning to our third global division, Transportation & Places. Here, we see that the transport infrastructure market remains globally strong with public investments remaining stable across the division's markets. Demand in the real estate sector remains low with activity shifting more towards refurbishment, public sector projects and investments related also here to defense. The decline in the net sales for the quarter is driven by capacity adjustments to mitigate the weak market in parts of the division. And this also impacts the EBITA margin.

But looking forward, this division has an important and exciting strategic journey ahead. And that's why I'm very pleased to introduce our new Head of Division, Richard Beard. Richard joined AFRY just a couple of weeks ago as the new Head of our Global Division Transportation & Places. And Richard, he brings extensive experience from leading global businesses and his deep understanding of our industry makes him an excellent fit to lead this division going forward. He also has a strong background in leading transformational change, and I am convinced that he will be a great addition to AFRY's executive team. So welcome, Richard.

Now I would like to talk a bit about some new client contracts that we won during the quarter. To start with, AFRY was awarded a contract by MEPCO for project management services related to their new paper machine line. We have been involved in the project from the development stages, and now we are continuing with assignments to secure successful completion of the project. And as you know, Pulp and Paper is an area where we have globally leading expertise, and this is a great example of how we support clients throughout the full life cycle of large-scale projects.

We also have a very strong and long-standing collaboration with Vattenfall. So it's great to see that we now have signed a new framework agreement with them. The agreement covers technical consulting services for nuclear, hydro, and wind power across several areas and regions of Vattenfall's operations. So this will be a very important agreement for us going forward.

And in Switzerland, we continue to strengthen our position in the transport infrastructure market as we were selected for the expansion of the Lotschberg railway tunnel. This project is a part of a large national initiative to strengthen sustainable transport through the Alps, and we were very happy to support with our railway engineering expertise.

And speaking of our ability to win new contracts and stay competitive on the global market, I would like to mention another highlight from the quarter. The new 2025 ENR ranking of top engineering and design companies confirms AFRY's global leading position in the key segments. We maintained our strong positions in the overall industry and energy sectors, placing us #6 in both categories.

It was also encouraging to see that we continue to hold a market-leading position in pulp and paper. We advanced significantly in the hydro category, moving up to #3. And for the first time, we made top 10 position in the solar category. This ranking helps us strengthen our long-term relationships with our key clients as a trusted partner. And they serve as an important proof point in connection to new clients to prove our global capacity and provide full life cycle offering.

Another central element of our strategy that I want to touch upon this quarter is our attractiveness as an employer. As we are going through a period of significant change as a company, it's especially important that we closely monitor employee satisfaction and engagement. And our focus on leadership and culture is a part of our DNA and a key priority for us. And we continue to see that our employee reputation is strong. In Universum's most recent ranking, AFRY was recognized as one of Sweden's most attractive employers.

We also track our attrition rate closely, and it's encouraging to see a steady decline in group attrition since 2022 and that we've been able to keep it stable throughout this transformation journey. We are confident that our strategic direction creates clearer benefits for our employees, providing exciting projects with leading clients and global development opportunities. Our healthy attrition rates reinforces our confidence in this direction as we continue to focus on attracting and retaining the best-in-class engineers and advisers.

And with that, I would like to hand over to you, Bo to talk a little bit more in detail about the financials.

Thank you, Linda. So I will cover the financials for Q4 and full year 2025.

Quarter 4 showed net sales of SEK 6.6 billion and EBITA, excluding IAC of SEK 577 million. On rolling 12 months, we closed the year at SEK 25.8 billion on net sales and remain right below SEK 1.9 billion on EBITA. For the full year, development compared to last year, we carry significant negative currency and calendar effects, explaining approximately SEK 700 million on net sales and SEK 190 million on EBITA. In Q4, with a net sales of SEK 6.6 billion, we report adjusted organic growth of negative 4.3%, where volume is pressured by capacity adjustments related to our high-paced restructuring agenda.

We maintain a positive underlying pricing, but the market price pressure in some segments seen in Q3 continue in Q4, and the average price development is somewhat lower than seen in the beginning of the year. Total growth is reported at minus 6.2%, affected materially in the third consecutive quarter by FX movements from a strengthened SEK earlier in 2025. The negative adjusted organic growth in Q4 was sequentially somewhat lower, but materially in line with what we saw in Q3.

Global divisions, Energy and Industry both saw small sequential improvements from low levels, where in particularly Industry continued to experience a challenging market but is starting to move out of extensive restructuring. Transportation & Places showed sequential decline, mainly related to capacity adjustments in Q4.

The order backlog continued to develop favorably and is reported at SEK 20.4 billion, improving to last year and in line with last quarter. Currency adjusted, the backlog has improved 5.4% to last year despite strong comparables in Global Division Industry in Q4 '24. Given current currency headwinds and our restructuring efforts that are ongoing, we're particularly happy to see a solid backlog development in all our 3 divisions.

EBITA, excluding IAC, is reported at SEK 577 million with no calendar effects. The EBITA margin was at 8.7%, an improvement from 8.3% last year. Currency movements have limited impact on the EBITA margin, but in absolute terms, we estimate a negative currency impact of SEK 20 million on EBITA compared to last year.

Global divisions, Energy and Industry support the margin development of the group. And particularly for Industry, we see positive trends that the division is coming out of the restructuring agenda with improvements in utilization, supporting the EBITA margin development. The year-over-year margin improvement in Energy and the decline in Transportation & Places reflect normal quarterly fluctuations in our project business.

On utilization, we report a utilization of 72.8% for Q4, the highest in 2025 and an improvement of 0.5 percentage points to last year. This is then the first quarter in 14 quarters where we report an improvement to last year, and it marks an important step for our strategic efforts to improve operational efficiency in AFRY. We will continue our focus on improving this metric throughout 2026.

We report SEK 161 million restructuring costs as item affecting comparability in Q4, bringing our total to SEK 192 million in the ongoing restructuring program. The restructuring costs, again, primarily relate to redundancies across the group. We make significant progress in our efforts to reshape the portfolio. And as we move into 2026, we will intensify our efforts on addressing the cost base. With 2 quarters to go in the restructuring program, we estimate that total restructuring costs will be at the upper end of our guidance of SEK 200 million to SEK 300 million.

With Q4, we report our estimated calendar for 2026. We estimate that calendar will have a small but positive effect to EBITA, particularly in the last quarter of Q4 of 2026, that is. As anticipated, we carried a very strong operational cash flow in the fourth quarter. Cash flow from operating activities in Q4 was in line with the record high Q4 2024 and was particularly strong given the heavy restructuring agenda that we currently carry.

Available liquidity increased to SEK 4.4 billion. Net debt fell below SEK 4 billion. Deleveraging to close the year was at 2.5x. And that was then straight on our financial target.

We go into 2026 with a solid financial position, and the Board proposed an unchanged dividend of SEK 6 per share for 2025.

With that, I leave back to you, Linda.

Thank you, Bo. Now I would like to wrap up the presentation by summarizing our main messages from the quarter and share our key priorities going forward.

We are now starting to see results from our efforts to focus, simplify and harmonize the business. We are ending the year with a fourth quarter in which we have improved the margin and utilization rate, strengthen our order backlog and with a strong cash flow, all of which are key priorities for us.

Meanwhile, global uncertainty continues to shape the broader market landscape. As we now move into 2026, it's essential that we maintain our business momentum and that we navigate the current market conditions effectively. We will continue to executing our strategy at a high pace, including efforts to further strengthen our order backlog and improve utilization.

We will also finalize the remaining parts of our restructuring agenda and portfolio optimization. And this action will be critical for delivering on our strategic ambition and targets as we set for 2028. And we have entered 2026 well into the strategy execution phase, and we are fully focused on the direction ahead.

So with that, I think we open up for Q&A.

Yes. So we will now open up for the Q&A session. And let's start with Dan Heimer from SEB.

Maybe I'll start a little bit on how much of the run rate savings did you benefit from this quarter from the restructuring measures? And now when you're aiming for the higher end, is it still mainly personnel-related savings you see? Or what's the swing factor sort of versus previously? And do you still see 12-month paybacks on those savings?

Yes. Thank you, Dan. I'll take that. Yes, I mean, as you can see, we stepped up the restructuring efforts in the quarter. And I would say to generalize it, is particularly towards the end of the quarter that we executed on those measures that you then see reflected in the restructuring costs. So some, but limited effects on the margin in a sense in Q4. Most of it will then carry into 2026.

And looking at what we are executing on, the entire restructuring program will be redundancy related. So it's practically personnel related, but it's personnel with a focus on different parts of the organization. So the original guidance in a sense that we said on a payback of 12 months, it still holds. It can theoretically be a bit different kind of quarter-by-quarter as we go through. But from a general perspective, it still holds on where we are right now.

Understood. And maybe a question on Transportation & Places as well. You saw a bit of a margin drop here versus last year. Why is the capacity adjustment not help you here like industry since you are fewer employees? Is it because the market has continued to deteriorate or what explains? And also you say it's a little bit of low attendance. So if you can elaborate a little bit on that.

Yes. So I mean, as we said just recently, I mean, most of the restructuring efforts, then particularly in Transportation & Places were towards the end of the quarter. So we didn't get any support in the quarter from a margin perspective in that division. Then we see some movement on the attrition, which we also then report in the report. But I would say from a general perspective, what we see in Transportation & Places for Q4, we practically see that it's normal fluctuations that we see in the project business. And there is no specific effect that is particularly strong and affecting the results for the quarter.

And the final one from my side. You're saying that the effects are coming in late in the quarter. So I know you had a very slow start to Q1 last year. How do you feel about January, I mean, in terms of billing rates, et cetera? Does it look a little bit better this year compared to last year?

I can say that it has been a clear priority and focus for us to keep the business momentum and keep the development on these important metrics that we have. So we are working very focused with these KPIs also going into 2026.

Then we will go ahead with Adela Dashian from Jefferies.

Just one from me on the backlog specifically. It continues to develop in the right direction, if you say so. Could you comment a bit on the quality and maybe also pricing of this backlog? And also, I guess, how much is driven by larger long-cycle projects versus shorter cycle? I know that has been maybe an area or maybe a priority for you to create better visibility by taking on potentially larger projects.

Thank you. Very good questions. Yes, we are happy about the development of our order backlog. It has been also one of our areas where we've focused quite substantially. And what's good to see is that we have good order backlog development in basically all our divisions and strengthening this going forward. So we have a healthy balance in the backlog between our divisions, between different project sizes and also in terms of geographies. But it's very important that we keep monitoring this and have a clear understanding of what enters our backlog going forward, and also to what margins projects enter our backlog. But we are quite happy with the mix as it looks today.

Could you comment anything more specifically on pricing in 2026? Are you already seeing any sort of like cost headwinds, or do you feel comfortable there as well?

I mean what we can say on the pricing on the order backlog specifically is that, I mean, we're very clearly committed to the kind of profitability uplift that we have. And of course, being diligent in securing that we have the right mix in the order backlog is a key component for that in the upcoming years. So even though we have price pressure in some of the segments that we have, we're quite diligent on just securing that we're not practically letting in a poor mix into the order backlog for the years to come. So to give at least one flavor.

Yes, that's really good. If I may, just one more. Obviously, defense is a strong sector right now. I believe it has been roughly low single-digit exposure as a percentage of total top line. Could you say what it represents today and what do you envision it to end up at if this very strong momentum continues?

Absolutely. And as you said, we have a lot of services related both to total defense related topics, but also to defense related. So this is a growing business for us, and we have a lot of the needed capabilities to expand our position within defense going forward. So it's a strong and promising market for us.

And what's the exposure today on a group level?

It remains at the lower single digits, but it's kind of -- it's between 4% and 5%. Then it's a difficult area to be kind of really specific about. But 4% to 5% is still where we are, slightly up from where we were a few years ago, but still on the lower side on the single digits. But clearly, it is a growth area for us, but we haven't guided on a kind of specific target set for how big share of the group that it will be in years to come.

Then we have the next question from Johan Dahl from Danske Bank.

A few questions. Firstly, on the order book sort of timing on that. I mean, fairly encouraging backlog growth. Can you say anything when you sort of expect that to sort of be translated to also invoicing growth? Are you able to have that visibility today?

Yes. As we said before, it's quite a big mix of project sizes and project length in our backlog. So it's -- we have different time lines on the conversion. But of course, as we grow the backlog, we come closer and closer also to the conversion. So we hope to see signs of that in the end of this year.

Right. Got you. On the billing ratio improvement, in your view, is that merely an effect of the restructuring carried out previously in '26? Or do you see any sort of organic changes in that from your perspective?

Yes, I would say it's both. Of course, the restructuring helps us here. But I would say our structural approach to this and how we now address this internally increases the transparency. So that is also part of the improvement that we see and that we will carry into the next year as well. So we're working focused on several elements in terms of our utilization rate. It's the planning, the resource management part of it. It's, of course, the rightsizing of our organization, but it's also the back end of our organization. So we work with 3 different parts, I would say, that will help us continue to improve our utilization rate going forward.

All right. Just a final one on attrition. I mean you addressed that here in the presentation. But I'm just wondering, especially in Transportation & Places, have you come across here, we're assuming mid-February, sort of any projects where you have apparent problems in sort of delivering on your commitments to customers?

No, we haven't had any delivering problems. As you said, we have had pockets of higher attrition here and there. The overall attrition for AFRY is intact or even declining, but pockets here and there, but they haven't impacted our ability to deliver to the clients.

Then we have a question from Julia Sundvall from ABG Sundal Collier.

I would like to come back to the utilization rate. I just have a question on this improvement. Do you see this as a new trend? Or is it just something like a one-off effect or something like that? And if it is a trend, what is a reasonable turnaround pace?

Yes, I can start at least. I mean we don't see it as a new trend in that sense. If you follow the year-over-year development over a longer period of time, you see consecutive steps in a sense of a bit of change of direction in the year-over-year development, starting practically kind of mid-2025. So the utilization that we see and the development from a year-over-year perspective, the Q4 practically follows what we saw as an indication in Q3, where we were somewhat lower than last year, but marginally so in that sense, and it's following that.

To give you an idea of where we're heading, we included utilization as a supporting KPI into our 2028 targets. And there, we said that we're going for a full year utilization level of 74%, which will mean an improvement of 2 percentage points from mid-2025 in that sense. Then at the end of the day, it's a big organization. It's a big metric. So we might see up until 2028, we might see quarters with bigger progress, and we might see quarters with smaller progress. But in general, we estimate the trend in a sense to be reasonably intact over time up until 2027, '28.

Perfect. And I just want to come back to the Energy and the regional differences. Could you please remind me what is the problem here and what needs to happen to improve?

It's much related to the thermal and then also to some extent, the wind and solar side, where we see a very low number of wind power projects, for instance, in the Nordics. On the other hand, we see that we have a lot of orders coming in, in Southeast Asia in wind, but also in solar, as you have seen, we made #10 now on the ENR ranking. So that's a proof of that. So it's very low demand on especially wind and solar in the Nordics and Europe. Thermal projects, a little bit slow, but slowly taking off as well in Europe and Nordics. And then full speed ahead on transmission distribution, hydro and nuclear.

Perfect. And then a little bit of a bigger picture question. But yes, at the start of the year, there has been some AI scare in the market and the sector. What is your position here? And is there any interruption in your development here regarding the restructuring? And are you missing or getting behind in some kind of sense or yes.

I can start. No, I wouldn't say that we do. We monitor this closely, of course. And there's many dimensions to AI. It's, of course, dimensions in our internal operation and how we utilize the AI to its full extent there. But more importantly, maybe in our clients' projects and their development journey. So we are monitoring both of these parts quite closely. So I wouldn't say that we lag behind. And the restructuring agenda...

I mean from our perspective, kind of the AI in a sense, both kind of impact and opportunity on our industry, it's not a short-term topic. It's a mid- or even long-term topic in that sense. So even though we are a part of the -- we're taking great kind of efforts into that area and nothing has changed kind of in the beginning of the year on that approach.

Yes. And is there some sector or clients that can be more affected than others according to you?

No, not that we can comment on now.

I mean I think you would switch it around and then you would think of it as if it affects different disciplines or different kind of focus areas rather than affecting specific segments or sectors.

Thank you, Julia. And that was all the questions we had for today. So I'm going to hand back to you, Linda.

Thank you so much, and thank you for following us, and see you again after Q1. Thank you.

Thank you.

Good morning, everyone, and a very warm welcome to Afry's Capital Markets Day 2025. I'm Johana Hallstedt from Investor Relations, and we're glad to see so many of you here today and look forward to sharing this with you.

At the beginning of this year, we initiated Afry's next chapter, turning a new pitch in our 130-year history. Over the past months, we have worked intensively to shape a clear strategic direction for Afry. And today, we are excited to present our new strategy, unlocking Afry. This morning, we also announced new financial targets for 2028, which we will, of course, talk more about today.

Now let's take a look at the agenda. We'll start with the presentation from our President and CEO, Linda Palsson. following that, Daniela Spetz, our Head of Corporate Development and M&A, will take us deeper into the key elements of our new strategy. Next, we'll move into the Global Divisions presented by their respective heads, Elon Hogg and Nicholas Oksanen, while Linda Palsson will present Transportation & Places. And then after another break, our CFO, Bo Sandstrom, will walk us through Afry's value creation journey. We'll wrap up with a Q&A session where you in the room will have the opportunity to ask your questions, so please [indiscernible] them until then. And finally, Linda Palsson will conclude with some closing remarks before it's time for lunch.

Let's get started. I would like to welcome our first speaker, our CEO, Linda Palsson.

Good morning and also from me, a warm welcome. Today, I look forward to share our perspective on Afry's strategic direction going forward. Our path towards profitable growth and our new financial targets. In short, how to unlock Afry. So let's dive in.

I have actually been with Afry for 12 years now, but when I stepped in the role of CEO in January this year, still my first priority was to fully understand the full scope of Afry's current position because Afry is a much larger and very different company than it was 10 to 15 years ago. We have experienced strong growth, both organically and through acquisitions, and the acquisitions have ranged from very small ones to the large platform acquisition of Pöyry in 2019. This growth has significantly broadened and diversified our footprint. This has, in many ways, served us well. But at the same time, our business and delivery models have shifted.

We have moved from being primarily a professional service organization selling our time to one that increasingly operates through a project-based delivery model. And the key insight for me in this was to what extent this has added complexity to our business. And over the last years, we have seen that our profitability and our utilization levels have dropped, a clear signal that we need to adapt and refocus. An equal key insight to me was the huge potential that we have within Afry. Our starting point is that we have top-tier expertise, 18,000 highly skilled employees that offer our clients world-class technical expertise and deep sector knowledge. We hold leading positions in several key segments, providing a strong platform for continued expansion, and we have many strong client relationships, clients that we have worked with for many, many years.

However, our broad range of offerings has diluted our attention across too many projects and too many clients. And we have sometimes struggled to adapt to changing market demands due to limited transparency and inefficient resource management. This hinders us from fully leveraging on our capabilities across the business, and it makes it difficult to run a cost-efficient operating model. And I think it's evident to all, that we have not met our financial targets for a long time and that our organization has not been operating in an efficient way. And this was the result of a very decentralized organization with limited focus on steering. So you can imagine my frustration when seeing all of this untapped potential, but that was also the starting point for our work with this new strategy. And today, you will hear me and my team talk about how to unlock Afry's potential going forward.

And since January, we have taken significant steps towards simplification and greater focus. This is Afry's today, after the initial reorganization. At the core of our business is a clear ambition to lead the energy and industrial transition and to contribute to the development of resilient societies. We achieved this by delivering Engineering, Project Management and Advisory Services across 3 global divisions: Energy, Industry and Transportation & Places. And while the majority of our 18,000 employees are based in the Nordics, Afry has a truly global footprint. We have offices in 50 countries, and we execute projects in over 100 countries worldwide.

In 2024, our net sales was SEK 27.2 billion, and our EBIDTA margin was 7.8%. And of course, one reason why we are here today is talk about how to improve these numbers going forward. The 3 Global Divisions have chosen strategic segments. There are 2 in Transportation & Places. There are 5 in Energy and there are 6 in Industry, and these segments all share something, a large transition need. Each plays a vital role in the Energy and Industrial transition and support the development of resilient societies. These segments all represent areas where we see strong long-term growth potential and where Afry is well positioned to capture significant share of the addressable market going forward.

And while each of these segments addresses different aspects of the transition, the diversity enable us to mitigate cyclicality. And in addition to these segments, we have the Management Consulting segment. It's organized under the Energy division. They deliver Advisory Services across the group, but with the mind share within the Energy division. Sustainability is in the core of the solutions we provide and how we operate as a company. It starts with our people, our most important essence, promoting health and safety and promoting diversity and inclusion. This also includes our efforts to reduce climate impact within our own operation as well as ensuring responsible business conduct. But our greatest impact comes from the projects we deliver.

By making conscious decision on which clients and which projects we engage with, we actively contribute to energy solutions, efficient material usage and to resilient societies. And by steering our project portfolio towards more sustainable solutions, we stay relevant and we stay competitive.

So now let's look into our 3 Global Divisions. Energy is currently our smallest division, but it stands out with the strongest growth momentum and the highest profitability levels. Our expertise in Energy spans production, distribution and storage across all energy sources and throughout the entire energy value chain. This is also our most global division with operation in offices in 45 countries and project executions in more than 100, and we have a particularly strong footprint in the Asia Pacific region, reflecting our ability to deliver advanced engineering solutions on a truly global scale.

Then turning to Industry, and this is our largest division. Our portfolio here spans across Advanced Processes and Manufacturing Industries. And in Industry, we support resilient supply chain and enable access to fossil-free material and commodities. These are critical components in driving the transformation of advanced industries and the energy transition. And our capabilities span the entire project and asset life cycle by combining the deep process know-how with a strong project management. So we deliver world-leading industry expertise on a global scale.

And last but not least, we have our Global Division Transportation & Places. This division plays a vital role in shaping efficient mobility and transportation systems and in the development of sustainable places that meet evolving needs of the population. We lead large-scale complex infrastructure projects across transport, real estate and urban development. Here, we have a strong presence in the Nordics and the Central Europe with Switzerland and Germany as key markets in addition to the Nordic countries.

And already today, Afry has a strong global footprint with leading market positions in many of our Industry and Energy offerings. The largest part of our business is in the Nordics, and this strong base has served as a stepping stone for our international expansion. And over the last 3 years, we have seen strong growth in markets outside the Nordics, driven by the solid position that we have established in many of our segments.

And in the important Global ENR ranking, Afry overall ranks #5 in industry and #7 in energy. And on a sector level, I would like to highlight our #1 position within Pulp and Paper, but also strong positions that we hold in areas such as food, chemicals, metals and mining. On the Energy side, we hold top 10 positions in thermal, hydro and wind. And on the Transmission and Distribution segments, where we see large growth potential going forward, we are ranked as #7 worldwide. And in Transportation & Places, we are one of the top 5 players in the Nordics, both within the road and rail and in the public and commercial segments.

So this strong global market position across Afry's portfolio reinforces Afry's role as a trusted partner in our selected segments, which is a key driver to win new business and to build profitable growth on a global scale. And of course, our strong market position is a result of the strong client relationships we have established over the year. Today, we are proud to be trusted partners to clients that are leaders in their respective industries in all of our divisions. And here, you see a strong representation of some of them. And there is an untapped potential in these relationships. And going forward, we will increase our focus on clients like this because a diverse client base with international presence enable us to expand to new markets, expand across life cycle phases and across offerings. And we can also generate recurring projects for the same client more effectively and increase the value that we deliver to these clients.

And clearly linked to our clients is our order backlog. These are the projects that we have sold but not yet delivered. This is a very important KPI for us. And during my years as Head of the Energy division, we worked actively with building our order backlog and improve the quality. And this is something we now bring forward the whole of Afry. And we do this by coordinating our sales activities more effectively across the business. By that, we can deliver projects more effectively, and we can optimize our own resource management over time. And I'm happy to say that we have already taken significant steps in this direction.

Our order backlog have grown also on a group level in the recent years, and continuing this development will be even higher on our agenda going forward. This is a key component for profitable growth.

Now I want to give you two real lifetime examples of how this will work in practice. In Taiwan, our client is developing one of the country's largest offshore wind farms, which is expected to begin commercial operations in 2026. Afry here plays a key role as expert adviser throughout all phases of the project. By combining Afry's deep technical expertise and extensive experience in offshore wind power, in this case, from the Netherlands with the local competence in Taiwan, we deliver world-leading capabilities to our clients. So this approach is a strong example of how we can effectively expand to new markets by leveraging our deep sector knowledge and a scalable global delivery model.

And another example. This is a state-of-the-art greenfield pulp mill in Uruguay, which went successfully into operations in 2022. Here, we partnered with UPM and supported them from early phase feasibility studies to detailed engineering services to operational excellence and maintenance. With our pulp and paper expertise and deep local insights into South America, we can support our clients in all phases of this project. So this is a great example on Afrys' strength as a partner to leading clients across the life cycle.

Okay. So let's broaden our perspective and look at the forces shaping our clients' need and thereby also the demand for Afry's services going forward. Decarbonization is a key driver from scaling low-carbon energy sources, the transformation of industries and advancing carbon capture technologies. Closely linked to this is the electrification of transport, heating and industrial processes. There is a push for greater resilience in the current geopolitical situation, and this links to securing access to raw material sourcing as well as circular solutions. And artificial intelligence is a potential transformal force in most of the industries. So this complex development, of course, also means that the needs of our clients are evolving. We see that there is a growing demand for multidisciplinary services for the same client that are broader and span the entire project life cycle and involves several of our disciplines. From early-stage studies to the implementation and to the operation. This also results that our clients increasingly need our support in project management and the need for Advisory Services is growing.

The rapid development of digital technologies, in this case, particularly AI is creating new expectation for our Engineering Solutions to increasingly include new intelligent capabilities. So we established by now that Afry is a trusted partner in the industrial energy transition, backed by deep sector expertise in areas corresponding to the global trends and evolving needs. So this enables us to support our clients in navigating complex transition. So now I have described where we are today, the changes that we have made so far this year, what the world looks like and what our customers are looking for.

So let's move on to where we take it from here. To Afrys' new strategy. Unlocking Afry for us is about more focus, being more global and having more focused client relationships to build stronger project delivery capabilities. So let me explain what I mean by this. There are five areas that will be critical drivers to our success moving forward. By focusing our businesses on selected segments with large transformation needs, we can grow our business and operate more effectively to enhance the value to our clients. The segments that we have chosen represent areas where Afry is well positioned to take leading market roles and where we see strong long-term growth opportunities.

While our current business is concentrated in the Nordics, our ambition is to expand and position us as a global player. This strategic shift will unlock new growth opportunities and increase the long-term resilience of our business. So we will prioritize large leading clients within our segments. This will build a diverse client base with an international presence, enabling us to generate recurring business across the project life cycle. This, in turn, reduces sensitivity to business cycles and that we can leverage our existing client relationships to build and expand to new geographies. And by developing the full life cycle offering and expand our strategic Advisory and Project Management Services, we will enhance the overall value to our clients. We will also continue to build deep sector knowledge while building a structural knowledge that can be reused globally and adapted to local requirements. And we believe that these strategic efforts will also strengthen our ability to attract and retain the best-in-class experts. This is our most valuable assets.

And by engaging in cutting-edge projects and collaborating with the most exciting clients in the industry, we can offer meaningful development opportunities and reinforce Afry's position as one of the most attractive employers in the field.

So with the strong market drivers supporting us, combined with our market position and the strategic initiatives that we now are implementing, I am confident that Afry has a bright future ahead. And since taking on the role of CEO in January this year, we have worked intensively to set the foundation for Afry profitable growth journey. This has included an extensive portfolio review across all parts of our business as well as a thorough assessment of our operating model. We have already introduced a new group structure and implemented operational measure, including the ongoing restructuring efforts that we communicated in Q2 this year. And today, we are proud to present our new strategy, Unlocking Afry. And over the coming 3 years, we will execute on the strategic foundation we have established to reach our targets by the end of 2028.

This includes to focus and grow our core segments to fully leverage our expertise and operate more effectively. We will increase our share of Advisory and Project Management Service, enable us to better support our clients throughout the entire life cycle and capitalizing on our high-value offering. In addition to this, we will implement a unified global delivery model across the business, allowing us to expand our global footprint. These strategic initiatives are underpinned by a strong margin expansion, driven both by strategic priorities and operational improvements across our organization. This will unlock the full potential of Afry. And for us, this means becoming a large-scale global powerhouse and competing with the major global players. We are building a business model with a global scale, sales and delivery capabilities. Our strategic focus on high-value segments and services will fuel profitable and sustainable organic growth.

This also opens up opportunities for value-adding M&A to further strengthen our long-term value creation. And this new strategy is actually built on the strength we already have. We will stay firmly rooted in our core strengths and values that serves us well. But make no mistake, this is a strategy that will transform Afry over the coming years. We will actually shift from an unfocused and complex organization to a focused segment-driven approach, concentrating on areas where we have the strongest market potential. Scattered position in non-core segments are being phased out as we concentrate on the segments where Afry has the best conditions to lead. We will transform from a diluted client approach to prioritizing large leading clients in our segments. We will simplify our cost base, moving away from a cost-intensive setup to a leaner structure that better support our business. And we will break down silos and enable cross-staffing across the entire group to maximize utilization.

We will also streamline our data and application landscape, creating a more harmonized system environment that includes AI-enabled delivery capabilities. By doing this, we'll pave the way for increased value creation and for profitable growth. And as a part of this strategic journey, we today announced new time sales financial targets for 2028, replacing our previous financial targets.

So we have set new absolute targets for sales in 2028 by SEK 35 billion. This target aligns with our strategy period and the initiatives that we are now launching. It clearly shows our priorities, but also how we view the market going forward. Our EBITDA target for 2028 also affirms our commitment to deliver improved profitability within this strategy period. We reiterate our target for net debt. And our CFO will come back to these targets in detail later this morning. We are also updating a few of our sustainability targets to better align with the strategic drivers going forward. So we stay committed to our target of Net Zero CO2 emissions by 2040. We have introduced a target for our project portfolio to closely align with the solutions and that support the green transition. Our target of 40% female leaders by 2030 remains, and we are adding a target of achieving an employee Net Promoter Score in the top 25% of the Engineering and Advisory Service sectors. This is actually a key metric for ensuring employee satisfaction and engagement, and this is essential for our long-term success.

So to reach our financial targets in 2028, we will execute our strategy in two phases: a growth path and a profitability path. In the first phase, which we started earlier this year and will follow throughout 2026, our focus will be on margin improvement across Afry, paying particular attention to the low-performing segments. This will be complemented by organic growth in high-performing segments that already have satisfactory margins. M&A activity will be selective. It is a firm ambition that we will reach sufficient milestones on the first phase by the end of 2026 to be able to enter the second phase starting 2027. And with the improved margins as the foundation, the second phase will be about accelerating growth, both organic and inorganic. And we will also continue to expand the margins across the business.

So to conclude, we have now established a solid foundation by reviewing our portfolio, our operating model and our organizational structure. This has set the foundation for profitable growth. And today, we launched a new strategy to transform Afry to unlock the full potential. The strategy builds on focusing on the leading clients in selected segments, growth to global delivery model and to levering our deep sector expertise. And as you saw, we have a clear phased path towards reaching the 2028 financial targets with decisive actions on cost utilization and on profitable growth.

So with that, I would like to hand over to Daniela Spetz, who is Head of Strategy and M&A, to go deeper into our strategy and to the growth path.

Thank you, Linda, and good morning, everyone. I joined Afry about 2 years ago. And earlier this year, I joined the executive team, and I'm responsible for strategy and M&A at Afry. And I've been part of setting the new strategic direction for us, and I'm really excited today to present the path to profitable growth. And I will go through some highlights of our market and competitive outlook, the new strategic direction and deep dive into what unlocking Afry really means. And I'll also provide some insights to our strategy execution path and give an update on M&A. So let's dig into it.

Let's start with market and competitive landscape. When looking at where Afry is today, where we play, who we compete against and where we're going. We need to take a step back and also look at the journey we have had today. So I want to take the time to, as Linda mentioned, go through the journey, and we note that Afry today is very different from where Afry were 15 years ago or even 10 years ago. 15 years ago or if I should say, 150 acquisitions ago, we generated around SEK 4 billion, and we represented predominantly a Swedish professional services business with an expansion journey ahead.

Today, we generate around SEK 26 billion and represent a leading Engineering, Project Management and Advisory firm with global operations. And over the years, we have expanded our business not only to geographies, looking at Europe, Asia Pacific and Americas. We've also added new services and new offerings, and today, we are building on that to create the future of Afry. We are focusing our efforts to unlock Afry, and with the base we built over the years, we have a unique opportunity to build and become a large-scale global powerhouse in our industry, unlocking transitions and resilience. So let's dig into how we will do that.

If we start with our offering today, it all starts with Engineering. We provide Advisory Services, Project and Program Management Services, Engineering and Design, Product Design and Development and Operations and Digital Solutions, but it all stems from our engineering heritage. And looking at the trends that we as well as our competitors face, we see substantial market opportunities for Afry, to capture around transportation and logistics driven from enhancing resilience in society and supply chains, energy and power, driven by the green energy transition and increased electrification, digital and social infrastructure, driven by the merger of AI and technology, water and waste driven by, for example, our climate change actions. We also see large transition needs in our industries related to decarbonization and the need for new sources of raw materials.

Needless to say, we see large market opportunities and large transformation needs that are here to stay. And to capture the market opportunity, we meet with both the local and global players as well as specialists and generalists in market. Local competitors includes players such as [indiscernible], and [indiscernible] and global players includes WSP, Jacobs and [indiscernible]. And generally, more and more, we compete with global players also on our local home markets as well as on the global base. And in our field, we usually meet with both engineering and design firms as well as management consulting firms, especially within our Management Consulting segment. And even though we see some consolidation in the market recent years, new players continue to arise and even the largest player today still holds a fairly small market share, and this indicates both the market size as well as growth opportunities for Afry.

So with our portfolio and foundation, the long-term trends and market opportunities we see and our global leading position in key segments, we believe Afry is in a unique position to continue scaling globally and building on existing platforms and positions.

So start diving into the new strategic direction of Afry and what unlocking Afry is all about. Our new strategy is all about focusing Afry and harmonizing the company towards a joint and unified strategic direction as well as implementing a fit-for-purpose operating model. And I'll spend some time into digging into each of the pillars today.

Let's start with focus on segments with large transition needs. With a broad portfolio as a starting point, we performed a portfolio review earlier this year, and we narrowed down the focus for Afry forward. In essence, by focusing on selected core segments, Afry unlocks the transition towards sustainable society and represent a market with large and long-term transformation needs, not only today, but for the foreseeable future. And they represent markets where Afry can leverage our solid foundation and secure a leading position in each segment. Clarifying our focus will also sharpen our offering and we will be even better to capture market opportunities and become a better partner for our clients in the selected segments. And structuring ourselves organizationally in segments is a key element to enable our strategy.

By organizing ourselves in global segments, we have client-centric model combined with a global delivery model. And each segment can build deep sector knowledge, references and practices, which can be scaled on a global basis. And we enable cross-segment collaboration through efficient staffing and ensure segments are operating effectively. As we operate through segments now, we also see that some segments are specifically building now their own -- [indiscernible] building all strategies now for each segment under the group umbrella. And we have some segments that are positioned for growth. While we have some segments that are more focused on profitability improvements, we have segments that are ready to capture the market and to continue to build. And a few selected of them, you see here, Road and Rail, Transmission Distribution, Mining and Metals and Nuclear. And I'll deep into a little bit some of them in this presentation today.

So going into our second pillar, competing on a global scale. Afry portfolio is currently tilted towards the Nordic, and we have an ambition to grow that footprint relatively to strengthen our position as a global player. And throughout our journey, we have built a global base over time. We have offices in 50 countries and projects in over 100. So what's really different this time?

Well, when we are assessing our global footprint, it's clear that we are subscale in certain markets, where our platform for existing in the market costs more than our operations generate. And we will prioritize and focus our geographical growth to markets where we have the ability to create a complete and competitive offering and secure a leading position either globally or through a niche offering. And to clarify, we will continue to grow in absolute terms in the Nordics, which will continue to be a core market for us, but we will fuel that growth with extra growth on a global basis. And we're also looking into the long tail of our countries to evaluate potential exits where Afry is not in the position to win long term. And even though we don't believe that this will be a long list of countries to exit, we still believe that this is essential as part of the strategy to focus our efforts where we can win.

And our segments today have a different level of geographical footprint and market growth outlook until 2028. Here, we're tapping into pockets of growth for segments with high market growth potential and further expansion. Even though some segments might seem to have moderate growth outlook, markets such as mining and metals are massive. And here, Afry have a large potential to tap into the market and profitably grow its market share. Other such segments represent Road and Rail and Life Science. And instead of each segment growing everywhere, our strategy is to focus on specific growth markets for each segment and build on our existing footprint.

To provide an example of what we mean by this, I'd like to present Mining & Metals. Our Mining & Metals segment offers primarily Engineering and Project Management offerings with a large base of its employees in the Nordics and in Brazil, but we operate on projects on a global basis. Growth potential includes adding early-stage offerings into our portfolio as well as geographically expand into key mining and metals markets such as within the Americas, Canada and Chile, within the APAC, including Indonesia and Australia. And this also represents countries where Afry has an existing footprint today. These countries are key markets within the segment. And by adding Afrys' global services into the local market, our offering become more competitive and complete. And further to it, we build scale into our existing footprint.

Going into the third pillar, partner with leading clients. Starting with our client needs that continue to evolve. We also continue to develop our offering to meet the needs of our clients. We see that our customers request full life cycle offerings and complementary services across the disciplines. Further, they want a solid partner regardless of industry cycle or project type. They want to request both strategic advice, but they also want it from a reliable partner who also has an edge in engineering. For example, our Strategic Management Assessments within the energy transmission and distribution field becomes even more reliable where we partner up our engineering and management consulting teams to serve our clients. And we see that projects become more and more multifaceted with more stakeholders involved, which requires stronger Project Management services from us.

And lastly, we see an increasing demand of integration of AI and digital tools into our offering. And as we are gearing up to meet the client demands, we need to strategically assess our offering and how we continue to evolve it, but also how we should focus on our client base going forward, both to ensure that our offering is sharp, but also that we are competitive to the right client group. And we are also effective in our operating model as we go to deliver the services. So I'll go into an offering in a little bit and now focus on our client base.

In our new strategy, we set out clear focus, to focus on our leading clients in each segment. And our strategic client base will be diverse. It will include a mix of private and public clients, naturally representing top-tier clients in each segment. The total client base will be then diverse across our segments and provide opportunities for recurrent projects and ability to scale projects from one country to another through our clients. And if we look at our starting point today, we currently have a base of 18,000 clients. And that base includes leading and large clients in our segments and about 100 of our clients represent 50% of our revenue base.

However, looking at our long tail, 11,000 clients represents less than a percentage of our revenue. While we highly value our clients, administrating small nonrecurring projects drives cost, administrative task and is ineffective to manage. This has further implications on our operating model where systems and processes have to be applied for multiple business models. And as part of the new strategy, we will focus on prioritizing large clients and leading ones and build a strong client relation, reduce long tail of small clients and gain a more effective commercial model. And we see strong proof that this strategy is already working today.

I'll give two examples, one within Pulp and Paper and one within Hydro. When Afry has a leading position, such as in Pulp and Paper segments, even in market downturns, we are the preferred partner to take on operations and maintenance projects, providing recurring projects to Afry as we have originally engineered and designed the original pulp mills.

The second example in Hydro, we see that where Afry established state-of-the-art installations, such as in hydro projects, the leading question for the next installation is who designed and engineered the market-leading hydropower plant? Well, since the answer is Afry, we will continue to perform the next and the next hydropower projects around the world and scale knowledge assets from one country and one client to the next.

Moving into our fourth pillar, evolve project delivery across the full life cycle. For over 130 years, Afry has developed deep sector knowledge to unlock transitions. Today, we are a trusted partner to deliver and develop the world's largest road and rail tunnel projects. We have been involved in 90% of the largest pulp mills designed globally, and we have enabled over 44,000 kilometers of transmission lines. And we have contributed to 15% of the global hydropower capacity. It's clear that we are a trusted partner with deep sector knowledge to unlock transitions. So how should we go about doing that forward?

Afry is successful when we build deep structural knowledge. And to do so, we will think that we need to focus on building a business model based on project delivery. And this is rather than what we call Professional Services, which is rather providing the client with a person for a certain activity. We focus on projects that are team-based delivery efforts. And by focusing on the project-based delivery model, we will continue to build structural knowledge for Afry. We will enhance client relations. We will enable stronger up-selling as a part of our delivery and enable efficient resource management and also strengthen the value for our employees to be part of Afry.

And in addition to focusing our delivery model to the project form, we're also sharpening our offering even further. With the new strategy, we're also taking actions to balance our offering and further strengthen our project life cycle coverage. Today, we are heavy in the Engineering and Design offering and we're especially heavy in the mid- to later stages of the project life cycle. So as part of the new strategy, we will increase early-stage offerings such as Strategic Assessment and Feasibility Studies. We will increase the share of Advisory and Project Management Services across our portfolio, and we will reduce our overall share of Product Design and Development Services. We will, to a greater extent, leverage AI in our delivery model, which is enabled by harmonizing our operating model and system landscape. And lastly, we will put emphasis on driving a global delivery model to gain cost efficiencies and take advantage of cost arbitrage.

Moving into our fifth pillar, being the home of best-in-class engineers and advisers. Our business is all about people, people that come together every day to bring extraordinary value to our clients. And our success relies on our capacity to attract and retain the best-in-class experts. As part of the strategy, we will continue to prioritize development opportunities for employees, strong performance management culture, secure market compensation levels and drive internal mobility and global exposure for employees.

Today, we have high employee engagement. We have healthy retention rates. We are one of the most attractive employer in the Nordics, and we'll continue to value and empower diversity, inclusion and equal opportunities. And by delivering cutting-edge projects to leading clients in the industry, we believe that this is the best possible way for us to both attract and retain employees over time. We can develop strong and attractive practices and provide development opportunities on a global scale. We will continue to secure thriving culture and strong connection between the purpose, the values and our work and an inclusive culture and leadership that nurtures collaboration and innovation.

With this, we have put forward an emphasis on our leadership principle as well as employee principles, which is very well tied to our new strategy. So to sum up, the new strategy, we are setting a clear direction of focus for Afry, and we are, with this, reaching the full potential of us as a company. And to sum up the strategy part of this session, I'd like also to put emphasis that we are also looking into the resilience of Afry as a company for the long term.

Part of building the new strategy is also to ensure that Afry is set up and geared for the future and that we are managing our risk exposures properly. And we can conclude as we go live with the new strategy that we are building stronger resilience for Afry as a company. Because in this new strategy, we are well balancing the segments, big geography spread, client and project types and offerings throughout the life cycle of the projects. And this creates a better risk exposure for us, and we bring stronger resilience for us as a company.

Now I'll talk a little bit about the strategy execution path and where we are heading. Linda already introduced the framework to our execution path, the two phases and the two paths. And it's clear that we will unlock significant value as we embark on the new strategy. Our CFO, Bo Sandstrom, will talk more about the profitability path in just a bit, but I'll now provide some highlights into the growth path.

Growth is not only a natural part of our business, but it's a fundamental element. Reviewing our portfolio, we have segments today with healthy margins and a good outlook. Combined with a favorable market, growth becomes an enabler for us to expand our profit base and strengthen our position in the market for the future. But our segments are in different shape and the markets are in different cycles.

So going into 2026, low-performing segments are prioritized to recover and yield significant margin improvements. While we are capturing pockets of growth for high-performing segments. Some of the high-performing segments where we see growth potential includes, for example, transmission distribution and nuclear. We have further identified profitable growth opportunities within mining and metals and life science as well as road and rail. And this is fueled by the investment in resilience in mobility for both industry and society. And we further expect to grow the share of our advisory and project management offerings across our segments. And we also look to capture cross-segment opportunities such as within the markets of total defense and resilience, data centers and water.

And during this phase, we will also continue to add selective and strategic bolt-on M&As in high-performing and high-growth segments. And that said, our main focus during the period is to recover and yield significant margin improvements across the group. And as margins are expected to improve and we move into 2027, we will continue to accelerate growth across well-performing segments and high-growth markets and continue to add both organic and inorganic growth efforts.

So with that, I'd like to take the moment to talk a little bit about M&A at Afry. We use acquisitions as a vehicle to execute on our group strategy. It's not for all, and it's a complement to our organic growth journey. And at Afry, we work proactively with strategic M&A. That means that we build pipelines in performing segments and growth markets where Afry has M&A as the right lever to accelerate reaching wanted position. We are disciplined in our target assessment, and we have clear criteria of the potential acquisitions we evaluate.

Lastly, we go for full integration into Afry. And our M&A strategy is fully aligned with our group strategy and follow clear lines of targeted geographies, segments, offerings, and we have clear requirements on the delivery model, size of the business and assessing the culture of the company to secure smooth integration to Afry. And to highlight some of the parts of our M&A strategy, we are generally look to acquire and expand globally outside of the Nordic to build on our current footprint in Americas, rest of Europe and Asia Pacific. Here, we can continue to create a complete and competitive offering for AFRY.

And we specifically look to acquire within the Energy segment, multiple of our industry segments, including Mining and Metals, and Life Science and within transportation [indiscernible] And we have updated our integration approach, looking at best practices, [ AFRY's ] strategic agenda and learning from our previous M&As. And with that, our new and clear integration approach secures capturing synergies upfront, with integration into AFRY's operating model and transferring into AFRY's brand. And we also upfront address cultural integration matters to secure long-term success of the acquisitions. Also here, we have clear requirements and time plans that we followed, and we have high focus on business enablers and synergy gains.

So with that, I'd like to take the opportunity to provide 3 key takeaways from the session. Firstly, we are in a unique position to win in core segments by leveraging our deep sector knowledge and global delivery models. Second, we put forward a clear strategic objective and drive profitable growth with disciplined execution measures for each base in our execution. And lastly, we have built segment-specific strategies, balancing margin improvement and organic growth, while M&A acts as a selective strategic lever to reach our wanted position.

Thank you very much, and over to you, [ Johanna ].

It's time for our next session, where we'll explore 3 global divisions, and we will start with Energy. And with that, I am pleased to hand over to our Head of Global division, Energy, [indiscernible].

Thank you, Johanna. Good morning, everyone. Modern life runs on energy. Electricity powers hospitals, keeps trains running, and keep data centers in operation. This also helps us decarbonize our industrial processes. The task for the society is twofold. Cut emission but keep the supply rock solid. I'm here to talk about Global Division Energy and how we are driving change in the energy landscape. But before I do that, I would like to show the full picture, starting with this slide.

Global Division Energy is accelerating the green transition, helping energy, production, distribution and storage towards more sustainable solutions. As mentioned before, we're active in 45 countries. We have projects in more than 100 countries. So a very global division. With our strong financials and global reach, we have a good position currently ranked as #7 in power according to the [ ENR ] and that we are very proud of.

Regarding sales, approximately 1/3 in the Nordics and more than 50% in EMEA, APAC clearly smaller but growing fast. Our division holds 6 segments, 5 with a clear engineering profile, and one more advisory profile that is Management Consulting, not only delivering energy, but also to other industries. Our strength lies in delivering local projects with global expertise. We take great pride in our project execution. We often talk about trends and what will change. But equally important in our business is to ask the question, what will not change?

And for us, delivering big projects out there, it's about, that our clients in the future, they want to have their projects delivered on time, [ correct ] quality and according to budget. That's why we are investing a lot in product management and have been doing in the Energy division.

What more? Clear focus on building on our existing geographical footprint that we have been addressed before by [ Daniela ] and also Linda. Regarding market opportunities, we focus on the trends of course, building on our key offers where we know we are strong. We focus on strategic clients. One example of this is that we have now a segment called Renewable and Energy Storage, a new segment to capture the high-growth potential and drive development and expansion within this segment.

We are also focusing on building strategic advisory services with the introduction of Management Consulting as a dedicated segment across AFRY. We believe strengthening our ability to deliver strategic value for our clients even more. What is driving the Energy market today? The Energy market is undergoing rapid transformation that we can hear about in the news. We also can see it in various projects. Driven by electrification, decarbonization and integration of renewables.

We outlined 4 trends, decarbonization and climate change, expansion of grids driven by electrification, high demand for energy storage, hybrid projects with integrated solutions. And for example, grid expansion, we see strong momentum as more renewables comes online. When it comes to hybrid projects, we see a combination of renewables and batteries in the project. These trends are creating opportunity for AFRY since we have a strong competence in production, distribution and storage, and working in the full life cycle in projects.

We also have a strong ability to deliver tailored solution combining technical expertise with the strategic advisory and sustainability to help clients navigate in this transformation that we are seeing. Building on these trends and how we can capture the market, we have selected the 6 segments. These are the 6 segments where we can see greatest opportunity for value creation. And these segments are now shown in the picture.

It's Hydro. We have been mentioning it before. Here, we have a very solid footprint, 130 years of experience. Nuclear, growing interest. Thermal, also market potential and a solid, you can say, [ ENR ] ranking in thermal for AFRY. Renewable and Energy storage, high growth potential, Transmission and Distribution high-growth potential and Management Consulting. These segments have a lot in common. At the same time, we see differences when it comes to project size, regional differences due to client priorities in terms of technology.

We started this journey years ago with the global segment. Some are already well advanced, like Hydro, Transmission and Distribution and Renewable and Energy Storage, while others still developing the global journey. Transmission and Distribution is a good example in many ways. We have a slogan that says there is no transition without transmission. We see both need for grid refurbishment upgrade existing infrastructure, the global need is accelerating investments across markets, and we can scale the business using the existing footprint that we have. Very important.

We can see growing interest in Nuclear. Alongside life extension and decommissioning, new build projects are picking up especially in the feasibility stage in Europe, but also beyond. AFRY is ideally positioned to support both established and emerging nuclear operators. We have some core competence within this field that we will utilize.

Now coming to clients and order backlog. Also mentioning some technologies in the picture, you see a double curved [indiscernible]. This is a tough design, and it's really state-of-the-art when it comes to hydropower and generation. The curve, perfectly shaped, can withstand high water pressure. This solution can be very effective for large reservoirs when you have a narrow value. And this is a good example of what we are doing within the technology and the segments. How we can adapt to a specific location through the need that the client is asking for.

We are proud to work with the largest energy clients in this picture. Our relationship with leading energy companies are built on a strategic key account management approach. Staying close to the client, understanding need, and how it evolves over time, gives us the opportunity to address the full spectrum of our services, from engineering to advisory. This proactive engagement not only strengthen our position as a trusted partner, but also we can do cross sector collaboration among us.

In the picture, you also see our backlog development. the backlog includes both big, medium and small projects, which is important to balance the workload over time. The segment's compositions of the backlog differs somewhat. But overall, the reflection is the volume, the secured projects are waiting to be executing, providing visibility and stability for our division, and also for our segments. We are also working a lot with sales and a healthy sales pipeline to support the profitable growth journey. We are focused and we make priorities.

Now let me come to a client case. This is [indiscernible] existing combining heat and power plant in [indiscernible] in the middle of [ Finland ]. It's expected to reach the operational lifetime in around 2035. The client is exploring solutions after the end of lifetime. What should we do? SMRs, small modular reactors, are among the alternatives under consideration for future heat production. AFRY is delivering them Finland's first environmental impact assessment for SMR district heating project solution, along with high-level [ EXECUTE ] study. This work involves investigations, survey and close engagement with stakeholders. And will be completed in spring 2027.

With other -- with many other countries also looking in newbuild nuclear and SMRs, we can, with the global team that we have in nuclear with decades of experience, we believe that our position is attractive to many clients when it comes to navigating the regulatory, financial and environmental landscape in the nuclear space.

Talking a little bit about our core markets and global presence and how we're focusing. Our core markets are Sweden, Norway and Finland. As I mentioned before, 1/3 of the sales. We see growth opportunity in Europe and high growth potential in APAC. Global Energy division and AFRY's global footprint continues to be a key strength for us. In Europe, we see strong growth in Central and Eastern regions, particularly within [indiscernible] where our expertise comes in use. Recent wins, including a major nuclear district heating design in the Czech Republic reflects our ability to deliver complex solutions across diverse markets.

In APAC, we support renewable integration, sustainable baseload solutions like hydropower projects, such as a 3,000-megawatt and pump storage project in India. The Americas remains an emerging market for us in Energy with close collaboration with the global division industry.

Final remark regarding geographical footprint and market focus. Across all regions, our ability to combine the local knowledge and insight with the global expertise position us to capture growth opportunities and is very important for us.

Key takeaways and closing remarks. The green energy transition continues. Two, we have a long history in energy, and we are well positioned due to our capabilities within production, distribution and storage, and how we execute projects. We focus on building strategic advisory across AFRY through management [indiscernible]

By that, thank you for your attention. And I will now leave over to Nicholas Oksanen, EVP and Head of Global Division [ Industry ].

Good morning, everybody. Yes, 30 years in the company has been an amazing journey. You know why? Because this company is so great. It has such an expertise and great people, and now we are even accelerating the journey, what we have done so far. So I'm really happy to walk you through the Global Division Industry profitability growth journey.

What are we? You saw the figures already earlier in the [indiscernible]. But there is, of course, one and it's this EBITDA margin. I'll come back to that later. We will improve that. That's key priority one. We are a global division. And [indiscernible] countries, offices and hubs and serving 50 markets. And of course, that needs a lot of expertise and cultural knowledge and also a strong project delivery platform that we have in place. P&L ranking #5 in Process Industries, now I must say that it's calculating only the international market. If we take also the home market, we are #4. So a pretty strong position already now, and we will even more accelerate internationally.

Strong base in Nordics. And I take Americas here because you can see that it's the second strong position here, and it also shows our future potential. I'll come back later to that. Our segments, [indiscernible] Life Science, Mining, Metals, food, [indiscernible] and [ Biorefining ]. And we have a leading position, as Linda presented in her presentation. I'm really proud of that. And the food is #1. As Linda had in the presentation. And then in Life Science, we are also #6. That was not earlier mentioned, but also coming back to the growth path.

Unlocking industry. First of all, I want to say the modern industry transformation is really happening. Although there are some hiccups, as you know, on the political scheme, but it's really happening. The decarbonization is happening. The production will be decarbonized. The supply chains will become more resilient and the digitalization is driving the operational efficiency as well and in the assets. And that's a strong message for us as AFRY how we will build up our expertise and what kind of an expertise we have to support our clients in that journey.

Of course, I'm very happy that we have now in our AFRY company, the full industry together so that we can leverage together the global growth. And of course, as I said, the profitability is the key priority #1. And we will improve that through utilization improvement. We need, in some certain segments and locations, the rightsizing, and that will happen. And then we have as well some business model shifts where we have the intention to change the low margin businesses towards higher value-add services like project deliveries and also advisory services. And then, of course, our product development and R&D, so we will towards the project business as well. And these are, of course, to last segment, parts here are related to Automotive and other Industry segment.

The market and the industry trends, yes, the global political situation is, of course, currently challenging to think about long-term investments. But there is, for sure, a strong demand for resilient supply chains, and that is also seen in our markets and needs for services. But then, of course, this industry decarbonization digitalization is there and will continue. And we have multiple examples for our projects that we are currently executing that is a clear trend forward.

But then as well, there is a diminishing sector boundary and emerging technologies. And it's quite interesting that, for example, the pulp and paper companies they are actually getting bigger and bigger in their assets, and they are becoming energy producers. Huge pulp mill is a big energy producer. And that, of course, then affects also the environment around the [ power bill ]. And also the energy companies also have the CO2, which they want to capture. There is a lot of renewable energy. And with that, they become [indiscernible] producers. And there, of course, we have great opportunities with [indiscernible] Energy division to work together.

Then also Integrated Solutions. So the clients don't want just report. They want to continue support to execute the business idea or operations improvement in their assets. And of course, since we are in the full life cycle of the operations. So we are in a [indiscernible] position to support our clients in the path forward. And that, of course, gives us also a strong position globally.

And how do we capture the market? Yes, we have the strategic advisor. We have the advisory services, we know the markets, we know the technology, the trends, et cetera. So it gives us a good opportunity to create business cases to our clients, together with our engineering people. And then we can, of course, expand these ideas and scale it also globally as [indiscernible].

Then, quite interestingly, are these growth sectors. A couple of years ago, quite many start-up companies were established around these sectors to create the clean transition opportunities. And of course, since we have the technology and process know-how, so we were in [indiscernible] position to develop that concept and the innovation together with our clients. And there were many companies putting a lot of efforts to that. Yes, of course, now, as we know the situation, there has been a little -- I come later back to that, but a little bit of ease. But the trend is clear. They will continue, and there will be a bright future for us to support them in the different mature technologies like [indiscernible].

And then, of course, it's always a balancing issue between the large investments and then the operational improvement services close to clients' assets and -- and definitely, when you have a life cycle, the sectors and segments. Yes, they will stabilize each other, but we need, as well, right balance between the large investments and operational improvement services. And I come back a little bit later. You can see it from the order backlog how we are prepared and how we have done in this a little bit, I'd say, market-wise, difficult couple of years now.

And then, of course, for us, I'm really proud, I must say, of our industry people because we are in the whole life cycle of the investment start from the strategies. We are creating the business case for the asset in our innovation. Then we are doing the technical stuff around the business case, meaning then the investment cost estimate pre-engineering and getting prepared to -- for the client to make the investment decision. And then we are helping in the whole project delivery, all disciplines, meaning also the procurement, construction management at site, and helping the client in the project management, then to implement the project. And finally, then, of course, when we have implemented the project. So yes, normally establishing the office close to the asset so that we can support the client locally in different kind of operations and maintenance issues. And that has been a successful concept for us for a long time. And therefore, we have also established operations in quite many places close to our clients as well.

Now I will say [indiscernible], #1 in the world. In U.S., we're actually #2. And our target is # 1. And I show you one client case a little bit later, which is great evidence how we tackle the U.S. market as well. [ Mining & Metals ] [ Daniela ] explained already quite nicely the Mining and Metals strategy forward. One what you certainly have seen also is the [indiscernible] M&A, what we did this year. [indiscernible] is a Brazilian-based mining early stage engineering company. I visited them, and I must say that this is a great hub together with our AFRY hub to go forward in the Americas market and also expand to North America. And then from the [ metal ] side, in Europe, we are in all of the 3 green steel projects currently.

Life Science #6 in the world. In Life Science, we have a very strong base in the Nordics. And as already earlier was mentioned. So we will expand the Life Science as well. The early first initial steps have been taken to go into Americas. And currently, we are involved in one interesting project executing that and building the platform forward to expand the Americas.

In food, yes, we are #1 in the world. Food certainly is lower-margin business, and we need to still improve our operational efficiency in the food sector, and then also find the angle to utilize the different platforms and segments locally in the different regions to serve our customers in the Food.

Chemicals and Biorefining, of course, very interesting as well to support the pulp and paper because of the chemicals, so the bleaching chemicals, what are [indiscernible] for the pulp and paper mills. So there we have an extremely good potential to also globalize our chemicals and biorefining through the [indiscernible] chemicals experience and then as well taking into account the [indiscernible] market and Nordics, and Europe. So we will also have their expansion potential.

Automotive and other industries. We have -- in that segment, we have the automotive defense digitalization Also, we have, as I already mentioned, the product and software development. And for sure, we have, in this segment, the certainly a bigger part, we will fine-tune with the value creation services towards project services. And then as well we will select the profitability path for automotive and others so that we improve the total profitability of the Industry division.

Our clients, you can see strategic key accounts as the Energy division as well as many you know here, long-term clients. We have had them trusted partner for their long-term investments. We have frame agreements with them, and it's a partner relationship as already [ Daniela ] was saying. Then related to the order stock, you can see that the plus 3% improvement over the years and definitely the market with a lack of large investment projects have been challenging, but we have still been able to increase the order stock.

And then, of course, the jump from the quarter 4, '24 you can see here, and there we booked the 2 big projects, [ SSAB ] and then the Arauco [indiscernible] project. And the jump is in there in the orders [indiscernible] So principally, we have taken the larger investments from the market, what have been there, and we have been pretty good, and we are pretty good, well prepared for the next investment cycle to come.

And here is the client case, Greenway packaging in U.S. The pulp and paper mill, we started the cooperation already some 5 years ago with the strategic advisory and helping them in the early-stage [indiscernible] studies and a trusted partner supporting them in creating this business case, and the engineering case, and now implementing that project. It's about sustainability and then preparing as well then for the next growth path. And roughly 100 people working with this project. And of course, as I said earlier, our #1 target in the U.S. market, and this is one way to it.

On top of that, there's one interesting curiosity because we are doing this in cooperation with our U.S. and Brazilian resources. And since we have a very strong platform in Brazil with the EPCM delivery potential, so this gives us a cost competence foundation towards the North American market. Then you can also certainly think about this [indiscernible] area related to Mining and Metals. So for sure, use the same idea to extend the mining and metal delivery potential in North America. But [indiscernible] for the start-up.

And then our growth path. You can see we are international. We want to become even more international. We have the high-value growth segments for sure, Americas a very important market. Europe will stay an important hub for us in technology and know-how. But we have a great opportunity with one project delivery platform to support from Europe, the different projects in Americas and also in Asia. And you saw also from the presentation of [ Daniela ], the growth regions, so North America and Americas was a big part in it. So certainly, it's one of the industry priorities as well.

And then in Europe, yes, we have interesting operational efficiency projects, data centers. And then as well, we are waiting for the clean transition, larger investments to come in a couple of years. And we are very nicely prepared to implement those in the [ EPC ] mode.

To conclude, number one, profitability journey. So we will improve our profitability. Number two, we are prepared for the next life cycle investments. And of course, the high value segments are the base for that. And we will selectively select the projects which best suit for us and bring the best turnover and EBITDA margin. And in which we can, in the best way, support the clients. And then number three, we are prepared for the international growth, and I'm really happy for that because I have been seeing the international competitors, what [ Daniela ] also mentioned. So we are well prepared to compete.

And then our mission, we have great expertise. Great people in the company. And I must say that combining that with the strategy and advisory, engineering, creating business cases for clients. So really, really great. That supports the mission in the industrial transformation for the decarbonization and the digitalization and the resilient supply chains. And that's what the people also want to do. And then, of course, everything is about expertise, and combining the expertise and getting teams together, and we have tools for that, and people for that. We have a much more clear organization which then allows the people to work together and that makes the success.

One thing to mention, to be honest, infrastructure needs to keep the pace as well, right? And there, we have the transportation and places and of course, efficient mobility and fancy places. Right, Linda? Great. Thank you.

So hello again. As you might know, we are currently in the process of recruiting our future Head of Global Division Transportation and Places. But I am happy to present the division today. But just wanted to say here that we have [indiscernible] with us here. [ Took ] actually yesterday stepped into the role as acting or interim head of the vision. [indiscernible] I think you might get out there and you have the opportunity to meet in the [indiscernible].

Okay. So starting with an overview of this division in figures. And as the headline suggests AFRY's Global Division Transportation and Places, is about shaping the future of mobility and creating places that stands the test of time. With around 6,500 experts across Europe, we bring together deep competence in transport infrastructure, real estate, water, environment and urban development.

Our strength here lies within integrated services within engineering, architecture, design and advisory. The division is built around two segments. It's the road and rail, and it's the public and commercial places. And we will explore them more in just a minute. The footprint here spans 10 countries in Northern and Central Europe with projects in additional 5. And it is the combination between local insights and international expertise that position us among the top 5 players in the Nordics.

This division leads a variety of smaller and larger projects that contribute to a resilient, inclusive and future-proofs cities and communities. And we are proud to be part of this solution, accelerating the transition to more sustainable societies, and we do it one project at the time. So let's take a look at the strategy and the direction for the division.

So this division, Transportation and Places, has already taken significant steps in its strategic refocus to maximize the value creation and the profitability. Here, we are shifting focus in our [indiscernible] efforts to concentrate on large key accounts in each country, ensuring that our resources are aligned with the most impactful opportunities. We also recognize that part of this business, especially in the segment places have developed overcapacity over time. And this has been due to market shifts. However, we are now actively addressing these areas, making the necessary adjustments to ensure that our teams going forward are fit for purpose and agile. By doing so, we now rapidly respond to the market demands, and at the same time, we are seeking and leveraging on the growth opportunities that we see, especially in the transport infrastructure market.

So ultimately, our goal is to unlock the full potential of this division. We are refocusing our client base. We are optimizing our capacity, and we are expanding our advisory services, and we are targeting growth areas, setting the stage for profitable growth. And yes, the position is now positioned for profitable growth. We have done this by addressing the urgent need for sustainable transportation, for resilient infrastructure, with defense, and with energy-efficient urban environments.

Here, we also see a growing maintenance steps across our markets. And yes, the division offers engineering, product management, advisory, architecture and design, as well as environment, water and sustainability services. And by leveraging our international expertise, and expanding the advisory services, we are positioned ourselves for early engagement in the opportunity life cycle. With an increased focus on larger recurring clients, we will tailor our offering and position ourselves to be the preferred partner in supporting the transition towards a more sustainable future.

So the Global division, Transportation and Places is quite easy. It consists of two segments. So we have the road and rail. Here, we deliver cutting-edge mobility solutions across tunnels, bridges and transport infrastructure. Then we have our public and commercial places where we provide architectural and building solutions for public, private and commercial sectors. And the Global division, [ Transportation & Places ], has a robust order backlog and strong relationships with clients across Europe. You see some examples here. And I would say, despite the recent fluctuations that we have seen, the focus on our key accounts and strategic partnerships ensures the continued resilience and position us for long-term sustainable growth also in the infrastructure sector. So again, we will concentrate larger recurring clients, and to engage with them in the project life cycle, especially through advisory, architecture and sustainability services.

I would like to give you one example of this. You see that our proven expertise in large-scale infrastructure is exemplified by the Swiss Federal Road Authority, where we have planned the refurbishment of the Western bypass in Zurich in Switzerland. This project demonstrates our ability to deliver complex, high-value solutions, showcasing AFRY's position as a trusted partner for the public sector [ science ] across Europe. And in this project, AFRY was involved in the construction of the original [indiscernible] 20 years ago. And now we have returned this year for the rehabilitation and the modernization work. So now we plan to deliver planning, supervision and [indiscernible] of the critical operating and safety equipment and traffic systems, with the aim to minimizing the traffic in the city of Zurich. So again, I think this is a testament to our long-term partnership with the Swiss Federal Road Authority.

So this division, when we look at the geographical footprint, this division leveraged its strong Nordic routes and a solid Central European footprint to compete successfully in local markets. So we will secure profitability by continuously improving our position across both segments, but prioritizing growth within rail and road. And the chosen path is to improve the Nordic position and to continue to grow in Central Europe. So I think there are really good prospects ahead also for this global division.

[Presentation]

Good morning. I'ts almost 3 [indiscernible], and it's fascinating to see real examples of what we actually do. But I will talk about our value creation journey, and link it to our financial targets.

So during this session, I will start with reconnecting to the financial targets and give some background. Then going into our profitability path and talk about the priorities to take us to the right profitability level in 2028. I will also spend some time on some [ selected and neighbors ], also important, although not directly yielding financial benefits. Finally, I'll talk about AFRY's capital allocation in the strategy period. Let's get to it.

We are today presenting new financial targets for AFRY. Time set targets for 2028 on net sales, EBITDA margin and net debt-to-EBITDA, replacing our old targets. For 2028, we have a target of SEK 35 billion on net sales currently at right above SEK 26 billion. That is combined with a target of 10% EBITDA margin, currently at 7.2% on rolling 12 months. On leverage, we maintain our targets on supporting -- or targets of around 2.5x net debt-to-EBITDA at the end of the year. We're also presenting our targets on supporting KPIs also for 2028 to serve as guidance on these important metrics. Order backlog should increase materially, and we target at SEK 30 billion by 2028. Utilization, currently at 72% on rolling 12 months, should improve by 2 percentage points to 74% by 2028.

Our first and prime focus is on profitability. So let's look at where we're coming from. Unsatisfactory profitability is not new to AFRY. [indiscernible] when joining 3 years ago, this was the main challenge for AFRY, and it was our ticket to play. Focus had been almost solely for many years on growth, and the company has not been able to leverage on the growth that have been achieved. We have since made significant efforts to improve. The most successful with the comprehensive infrastructure improvement program launched 2 years ago, setting the previous infrastructure division on a positive profitability trajectory that has been carried since.

In addition, we have, during the last 2 years, managed a quite mixed market with several of our large segments being clearly challenging. The secure not dropping even further in profitability, we made continuous capacity adjustments to secure the downside. This has then pressured also growth and we're currently in negative territory on growth last few quarters, although managing to maintain a stable operating margin.

But even if it's clear that the market has not helped us along the way during the last few years, it's evident to us that if we need a more comprehensive approach to turn the profitability. And I will address in my section, some of the key activities that we will undertake during the next years to drive the trend reversal, some of which have already been initiated earlier this year.

Our profitability path as Linda introduced it is divided in 2 phases, and we're already well into the first phase. We're addressing a number of items, both as key drivers profitability uplift and as enablers to on a run rate level improvement. Run rate improvement level reach as far as we can as quickly as we can in Phase I.

In Phase II, we will continue to drive margin expansion, but with the fundamental in place -- we talk about profitable growth, and we present new time set targets on net sales and EBITDA margin. In terms of value creation, growth and margin are key value drivers for us. But in the project business, it is important to understand the importance of order backlog and utilization. Thereby, we present them as supporting KPIs.

Linda already talked about the importance of order backlog, and I'm further stressing the importance of utilization. Order backlog works both as a growth driver and the driver to profitability whereas utilization is primarily a profitability driver.

Cash flow generation, capital allocation, naturally important, and I will address them later on in the presentation. Order backlog then, as I said, is a key measure for AF, being the most important KPI for profitable growth. It is a growth driver by being an indicator for secured work ahead. And it drives profitability through its composition and to some extent, size.

We firmly believe that a sizable order backlog with the right composition is a strong driver for operational efficiency through utilization. And from a commercial aspect, there is an underlying margin in the order backlog driving the overall margin directly. Utilization then is a key measure of operational efficiency and an immediate driver of EBITDA margin, assuming stable underlying price cost development.

Either of these measures are absolute or stand-alone. At the end of the day, it is the EBITDA margin that matters for AF in the profitability path, but they work well as supporting KPIs to give more light on our journey ahead to drive improvements on these metrics and ultimately, the EBITDA margin I have 4 prioritized areas, each comprising a set of actions included in the profitability path.

The priorities are quite wide in their nature, ranging from commercial leadership the fixed cost optimization. But that is a reflection of what we believe is needed to drive the profitability path towards the target. The 4 priorities are: commercial leadership portfolio and delivery enhancement, it for purpose support structure and fixed cost optimization.

I will go through each of these priorities, focusing on actions in each to support our profitability. Starting with commercial leadership, building a solid and profitable order backlog is a key driver [indiscernible] as already mentioned. It's equally important to grow in size as to achieve the right composition. And it's all -- and it is important for all our 3 global divisions.

The right backlog is about balance. It's balanced between markets. It's balanced between projects length and size between margin between various capabilities and also between clients. With such a sizable portfolio at hand with thousands of projects we will take further steps to strengthen build and execution tollgates to further improve the composition of the backlog to strike the right balances supporting our path towards the financial targets.

Related to this is to finalize harmonization of our backlog data to improve analysis and predictability, which were determined to complete well within the strategy period. The leading commercial approach to us is to enhance focus on the strategic client base and even further develop our key account practices to support that.

Particularly across segment and across divisions, as you've heard from the division heads. We have many strong examples developed during the last years, and we will continue to build further on this. In the area of portfolio and delivery enhancements, we have several actions that support the profitability path. Starting then with the portfolio. But portfolio management has its focus in Phase I, initiated with a full portfolio review that was performed during the spring.

From a portfolio perspective, we will drive profitability improvements across the company, but particularly in segments which are underperforming to their respective potential. Here, we will continue to adjust capacity where needed. While those segments that are growth segments will focus on organic growth, potentially boosted by M&A.

The portfolio review gives us that approximately 10% of 2024 revenues were non-core, typically in small parts. Here, we will diligently reposition, divest or phase out such business, and those efforts are already ongoing -- on the delivery side, we're already having several strong capabilities. We will continue to develop a cost-efficient global delivery model where project-based deliveries are in focus.

We have these capabilities in place already today but they can be developed further and more importantly, cover larger scope than today. Here, resource management is at the core and efforts to harmonize, reskill and increase transparency throughout Afry will provide opportunities for improved cross staffing throughout the company. This opens opportunities both to improving utilization and also further exploring cost arbitrage opportunities.

Activities in this area are generally initiated in Phase II or in Phase I, but we expect material effects to be more in the midterm. Lifting more internally. One of my priorities relate to our support structure in our operating model. With an efficient operating model in our line of business, significant growth should create scale effects to be visible on the overall company.

Looking at our SG&A development over time, it has been flat in relation to revenue over a long period of time. When the company has grown significantly. We achieve those scale effects, we're executing a number of actions starting by enabling a scaled model through process harmonization and tool development but also addressing the organizational setup.

In the new group structure, many of these resources are part of a new organization, and we're step-by-step moving towards an efficient support structure. Included in this priority is also evaluating global delivery options also for support services, but also embedding AI and digital solutions to drive internal efficiency. Well aware that it will take some time to get full effect of this transformative approach, we're acting decisively to get a good majority of the run rate effects in place before end of next year.

As a part of Phase I of the profitability path, the final priority aims at fixed cost optimization. Here, I want to highlight 2 areas, both with ample size and each covering approximately 30% of our fixed cost base. Starting with the IT side. We have a developed and efficient core scattered system landscape in the business. Here, we see potential to consolidate gradually over the next years.

Facility costs is the second area where we have, over the last 5 years, done selective efforts to consolidate our lease portfolio. Here, we still have a large number of offices, and we see opportunity to consolidate and reduce both number of offices and size of offices. We're already on this journey today, and we have, last couple of years, been slowly declining in a number of offices.

This will continue and will as we enter into new facility agreements, gradually provide profitability support. Where relevant, we will be opportunistic to buy ourselves out of lease agreement but we don't expect this to be a material portion of the restructuring efforts ahead. Worth noticing in contrast to many of the other activities.

These two areas will support profitability but not through improvement Bringing the priorities together and looking at sizing and facing, unlocking Afry entails a broad and ambitious agenda on the profitability side. My prioritized areas are all material in size, although we believe that the fit-for-purpose support structure is somewhat larger than the others and also where we can move the fastest.

Any of the actions we execute on will bring gradual effects. But given the expected potential on the support structure, we're committed to on a run rate basis to close more than half of the GAAP margin gap in Phase I. Since some of the actions we're taking are such that many other companies have taken before us, the most difficult part on this journey is not figuring out what to do.

It's actually executing, making it happen and yield the results. So therefore, I want to spend a bit of time to talk about some of the enablers. One clear enabler for success of the profitability path is a transparent and harmonized organization. Being one of the main reasons why we went so quickly into the new group structure and launched our restructuring program upfront.

A harmonized organization drastically improve potential for successful implementation in general. And the restructuring program also reduces internal barriers to execute. With the new structure and the organization behind it, we took big steps towards a harmonized organization, but we will continue to optimize in the new structure.

In general, we're progressing according to plan. With SEK 90 million taken in Q2 and an additional SEK 30 million in Q3, we estimate some further SEK 170 million to SEK 270 million in restructuring costs. As in the first quarter, restructuring costs will primarily relate to redundancies. Looking at the mix of redundancy restructuring costs, approximately 1/3 relate to each of the categories managerial, support and capacity.

When starting the program in Q2, we stated that we estimate the payback of the restructuring costs of approximately 1 year as they occur, and this still holds. Another enabler to address is steering structures in the company. With the new organization in place, we're now taking steps to improve our performance management model in Afry, harmonizing what has previously been differentiated. In addition to this, we've already taken first actions to harmonize also the short-term incentive structures in the company.

We will build one consistent incentive framework throughout the organization, where it previously has been scattered and, to some extent, suboptimizing our overall performance. Focus will reflect focus in the incentive structure will reflect the organization and we built on our organizational global divisions and segments.

Also, we will explore options to more quickly be able to adjust incentive drivers throughout. The final enabler to highlight is technology and AI. Technology and AI is one of the enablers for Afry both to reach our wanted position and deliver a significant uplift in profitability. We look at technology and Aon for 2 main perspectives. The first in client deliveries, both related to project delivery and to offering it and to providing digital offerings.

The second to streamline operations. both in terms of the business and in relation to support services. We're already progressing in many areas, and I will share some words on how we apply AI and specifically how we address the core of AI, which is data. We are entering a new phase, which allows us to accelerate the digitalization and automation of our core processes. This is not about isolated tools or pilot initiatives. It's about systematically redesigning how we operate across the business.

On project delivery to finance, HR and engineering workflows. We're embedding digital capabilities and AI where they create measurable value. These efforts will contribute to support improving margins, reducing overhead and enabling scalable growth. At the same time, our client-facing work continues to benefit from our unique combination of deep sector expertise and rich engineering data.

For over 130 years, if we has built a knowledge base that empowers our teams to deliver real value. By combining this with modern technology platforms, we ensure our deliveries are not only technically sound, but also transparent and efficient.

Find centricity remains central, whether we are streamlining internal operations or using AI to optimize project delivery, our goal is to improve delivery precision and relevance for our clients -- to realize the potential of AI and digitalization we're taking clear steps to build an AI-ready organization. The foundation is already in place, skilled people, valuable engineering data and scalable technology platforms.

To do this, we're focusing on 4 concrete initiatives. First, opening up our enterprise data platform to enable better access to insights across the organization. Secondly, driving efficiency by rethinking our processes and tools from the ground up for the AI year. Thirdly, upscaling our workforce through tailored AI training programs; and lastly, equipping and empowering teams and engineers with AI tools and smart agents to automate routine tasks and improve decision-making.

Technology and AI are not stand-alone initiatives. They are integrated enablers that support both our strategic ambitions and our financial performance. As the final section, I want to share some considerations on capital allocation. Afry is generating a stable and positive operation or cash flow and has done so over a very long period of time.

We're upholding a disciplined capital allocation. With limited CapEx investments, and a stable and unchanged dividend policy, excess capital has historically been used for bolt-on M&A, maintaining a strong balance sheet with a stable leverage at approximately 2.5x at the end of the year. I will say a few words specifically on the operating cash flow and capital allocation to M&A for the strategy period. Looking at operating cash flow during the last 4 years.

With the exception of 2022, where we experienced a clear post-COVID working capital rebuild up, we see a steady EBITDA to operating cash flow ratio. M&A spend has been significantly lower since 2022. Despite this, we have stable leverage given lower EBITDA levels driven by restructuring and particularly weak calendar.

But looking ahead with a stable cash conversion ratio improving EBITDA performance will drive cash flow generations in years to come and be the primary driver of continued positive operating cash flow development. Some additional words on capital allocation to M&A, in the 2 phases we have described throughout this morning.

In the first phase, we will continue to be conservative on M&A and direct any M&A to core segments typically already performing. Directionally, we will maintain our leverage profile while doing this. When coming into the second phase, EBITDA improvement will drive operational cash flow and additional M&A bandwidth will also come when growth picks up. In this phase, we expect more intensified M&A activity to support the organic growth.

So as a final note, I will provide 3 highlights from the CFO section. Afry is implementing a focused profitability path, targeting a 10% EBITDA margin by 2028. And through improved order backlog, higher utilization and strategic cost reductions. We are addressing multiple enablers to support and secure operational efficiency.

Disciplined capital allocation underpins the strategy with stable operating cash flow, selective M&A and a solid balance sheet, ensuring financial resilience and capacity for growth. Thank you.

Thank you, so now we will begin the Q&A session. So I would like to welcome Linda Bo and Daniel La on stage again. Are we ready? Yes. Then I think we have a first question over there.

Raymond from Nordea. Two questions for me. You said non core is about 10% of Afry. Could you help us understand a bit better what portion of this can be converted into other projects? And maybe what portion of this you think might be divested potentially?

Yes. so that is around 10%. And you followed us in Q3, so that we had quite a substantial negative growth in our Industry division. And that is one of the reason is why we are addressing this non-core elements. So we're doing this constantly. Also, as Bo said, it's quite scattered this non-core business that we have. So it's only small bits and pieces here and there. So yes, would you like to add something to that, Bo.

Yes. I'll just add, specifying the 10% was 2024 revenues, right? So -- and we're already addressing this to a large extent. And that is also one of the reasons why we are experiencing negative growth during this year. So a portion of it is already handled, typically then by phasing out -- we have not -- at this point, we have not divested any of the pieces, but we still hold that as an opportunity.

And then we will -- of course, we will reskill and reposition as much as we can in a sense to cover the growth needs that we have in other segments. So I will not specify it kind of more than the 10% of the 24 revenues, but we're well in our way -- and like I said and like Linda also said, it's typically quite small pieces.

No, I think that's great. You also answered my second question, so I'll give the mic back.

So let's then we have a question in that corner from Fredrik.

Good insights on your strategy here. I have a question, boon your slides you stated that you're going to reach 74% billing rate as part of this margin improvement journey. In 2021 and 2022, you had more than 74% billing rate, and you reached 8%, 8% margin at that point.

So is the majority of the improvement more focused on cost this time.

Yes. Yes and no, I would say. I think part of it is for sure, cost related, and it's also related to the potential that we see on the support structure side. But that is not the full equation to I think looking those a few years back and doing that comparison that you just did, just linking that to the comment that I had in relation to utilization as a driver, it assumes stable price cost development, right?

I mean everything else alike, it assumes that the dependency or the link to the EBITDA margin is dependent on that. I think looking those years back, we've had a falling curve on utilization but still, we haven't fallen all that much on the EBITDA margin. We have deteriorated, but not in relation to the deterioration in utilization.

And that is because taking opportunities on kind of price development during that time, specifically. So I think the 74%, it's a -- part of it will be cost driven. Part of it will be related to -- most of it will be cost driven, right, but with different types of costs, some actually more in the business and just increasing the efficiency in the business and some supported then by support functions.

Then of course, we will, of course, always strive to have a positive balance on kind of price and cost development from an underlying perspective, but that is not included in that metric.

In the front here, we have a question from Dan.

Dan from SEB here. I think I'll do 2 questions here. A little bit on how you're thinking about balancing growth versus profitability. You still have a quite ambitious growth target around 10% per year if you calculate backwards, and just on your thinking about how do you ensure that your spread to fill again? And also if it's possible to give a split. This is a 50-50 split between acquired and organic growth in that 10% as you see it.

I can start. Well, as of the strategy period that we -- is clearly into 2 phases. First is about fixing the profitability but already in the first phase complement that with organic growth in the already performing segments. So we will capture some organic growth in the first phase as well. Then in the second phase, we are then on a good profitability level, and we will increase both the organic and the inorganic growth by the M&A and I will let Daniella sort of fill in here, but I can assure you that our history of, as I think you said, 150 M&As has made us very scattered.

And I don't think any of us would like to end up in that situation again. So we have a totally different M&A agenda going forward. we will actually be very selective and very focused in our M&As from the very first discussions. But maybe, Daniella, you will add to that perspective.

So first of all, yes, we have now focused segment strategies and also looking at where we should build for the future as well on a geographical market as well. And here in our M&A strategy, I refer closely with my team together with the divisional heads that the segment had to very proactively build our pipelines and do further assessments, and we have very clear requirements on what type of targets we should focus on to make sure that we build on the lessons learned, the previous history and also that we don't build too much of that scattered and position as we had previously.

It's really building on our core leading position, adding offerings and adding geographies that actually build a competitive position for Afry.

And then if I can follow up with another question, perhaps on -- spoke a lot on the Americas opportunity. And just so I understand it better, I mean, it's a big market, but it does means that there are a lot of bigger industrial players active in that market. So just -- it would be interesting to hear and understand a bit more what you think you can bring to the table in terms of the confidence you can bring that will separate you from...

Absolutely. Thank you. Very good question. I think here, as you saw, we build very much on the segments where we have a leading global position. So for instance, in pulp and paper, as we mentioned, we are #1, and we are already #2 in Americas. So of course, that's 1 natural field where we will continue our structured efforts.

There are other segments where we also have leading positions, looking into the metal and mining, for instance. So it's mainly about the industrial segments when it comes to the Americas. One additional sort of benefit for us there is that -- and I think maybe, Nicholas, you had some examples on that. We have a strong presence in Brazil -- and of course, we can use that competence also going into the North America, for instance, on the partner paper side then. So it's very sort of focused growth on segments where we have a strong position already.

But just to add to that, when we talk about Americas, we're not necessarily talking about the U.S., right? I mean it is of course, a big part of the Americas, but it's not where we are currently the strongest. And we're not saying that we're going to double down on U.S. expansions in the upcoming years. Not saying that we're not going to continue to grow there, but that's not what we're saying.

Johan from Danske. Just had 2 questions. Firstly, on the topic of risk, I guess what you're saying, building more order backlog, expanding globally. I guess there's also you could argue that sort of more risk, higher profitability -- to what extent has that been sort of a factor which have taken into account in developing this strategy, i.e., do you want the organization to take a bit of more risk? Or is it sort of unchanged in that respect?

Also a very good question. You heard us talk about the importance of the backlog. But hopefully, you also heard us talk about the quality and the content of the backlog because the content of the backlog is what will help us as a company to become more resilient. So we are aiming not necessarily for higher risk.

We are aiming for a backlog that consists of smaller and larger projects throughout the full life cycle of a client or a business cycle. Because again, when you have sort of a stop on large CapEx investments, the OpEx investments or the modernization and upgrading projects will continue to be there.

So for us, building a strong backlog, it's not about adding more risk or not necessarily adding more complexity. It's about adding different projects to the portfolio mix. And adding to that as well as you've seen as part of Afry resilience, you also see us building clearly a balance of our segments, which are in different markets and cyclicalities.

We also build in different geographies to also balance the difference between where we are in the world and how policy and acres, for example, are driving different economies. So we do drive our resilience also by the strategy of being more diverse in terms of both segments and geographical markets.

Got you. And finally, just on sort of incremental investments to deliver on this strategy. You talked about improving processes, better control, better system support to get visibility into the order book, et cetera. What should we think about that in terms of new incremental CapEx or cost to develop that?

Will you take that one?

I can take that. I mean I think linking back to the journey that the company has been on for many years actually. Some of you who's been kind of with us for a long time know that we have been on this journey already for quite some years starting with [indiscernible] and PD coming together and the kind of formation of Afry. We started making investments into system landscape into data structures and so on. And we kind of kept the reasonably similar investment level throughout these years.

And what we're practically saying is that we will continue on approximately that level for another few years, not necessarily saying that it's not going to be any changes, but we're not seeing any material increases in investments compared to what we have experienced the last few years. Then we have in the front here.

We have another Johan.

So Johan Sunden from DNB Carnegie. A couple of questions on my side as well. Talking a little bit on Dan's questions on the global expansion and maybe focus on core clients, the ones that represent half year revenue. Just curious to hear how you kind of work with thinking about pricing, I guess, the biggest accounts are the most competitive accounts versus smaller ones, maybe less competition and not say how you play with pricing versus the utilization side?

Yes. Well, I think building on clients or partnerships that you have had over a long period of time and where we have a structured key account approach is what will enable that resilience within a free, different types of services to the same client. Actually, I think that reduces our cost of sales. So necessarily I don't agree fully with that correlation that you do. I think we have a more efficient footprint towards our larger clients.

I also think it's very good for us when we are able to follow a client to another country. So if we have one customer building a factory in Denmark, and they do the next one in Brazil, we can be a partner there as well, utilizing our or capitalizing on our local presence, but also adding our global competence.

So and it requires quite sizable clients to be able to follow them also on their global expansion journey. So it will be a mix going forward, but we will put extra focus on these large key accounts clients.

Clear. The second question, maybe more related to Nicholas presentation on the industrial side, you showed a pie chart with the various segments within the industry segment. It was quite a big portion of that pie shot that was automotive and other. Can you give some more color what's in that? And how core that should be for you.

Absolutely. I try and then you can fill in Nico. Now true automotive and other is quite a big one. And naturally, there is automotive industry, which has been and is quite a sizable business for free and a lot of large clients within there. There are parts of this sort of unfocused business that we are addressing is also in there.

There is also this important segment of defense, which we are addressing and that we are currently re-skilling and refocusing towards. So it's a mix within there with automotive, defense and some other parts. And ballpark distribution of that part between Defense automate and the rest?

Maybe Bo, you can.

No. I mean, automotive is -- it's a very sizable part of that segment. It's a historically strong position that we had. And I would estimate right below half of that segment is automotive related. And then you have the remaining part distributed between other segments that we have historically not addressed segments, but rather through the capabilities that we have within that.

That was also kind of part of the reason why it's automotive and others because the others are not historically addressed typically through the sector competence, but rather by our capabilities as such. So I would say that and also within that segment from our -- besides the automotive part, which is very clear, defense, which is also quite clear.

The other ones will go through kind of the transformation journey also kind of during the next few years.

And final, if I may. Related to the non-core part and your kind of 2020 revenue target. Your pens in that target you have included the potential divestment of that non-core part? Or how should we think about investment on the '28 target?

Yes. Any potential divestment that would take place would be principally included in that target? So it's a total size target. So it includes any acquisitions or divestments during that time.

Perfect. And we have a question right and you can pass on the mic be.

Johan Dahl Danske Bank. A couple of questions. Sorry for coming back to the 10% again in '24, but can you just help us understand the EBITA percentage given this 10% in '24 and also a large percentage of the 10% you should expect that you will bring on into 2026.

So you were talking about the 10% non-core in 2024.

Yes, correct.

And asking about the profitability level of more or less, yes.

On the EBITDA, if it was 10% of the revenue, how much was on EBITDA?

I mean it's fair to assume that it's a lower-margin business than April in general, right? It's fair to assume. Typically, we haven't historically, and we're not now -- we're not carrying negative business. That is not what we're talking about. So it's more lower margin business than on average than anything else. But then just to clarify, I mean, non-core does not necessarily mean that it's the lowest margin that we have from a segment perspective, putting that into non-core.

That's not the full qualification of what segments that we aim to incorporate in but of course -- but of course, there's a correlation. I was more interested what happened during 2025.

Hence, the 10% in '24, how much is it by end?

No, we will see. [indiscernible] But clearly addressing the non-core part of the portfolio with different tools is a Phase I topic for us. So by the end of next year, we will be where we are. I mean, for sure, we will have parts of our business that you could classify as a non-core part also in years to come. That's the nature of what we do, right? But for material purposes, we aim to handle that throughout '25 and '26. That's fair. I will not dwell on that anymore. A question on these getting to larger customers and larger contracts.

Obviously, I like your ambition on utilization. That was in the details, et cetera. But do you see any risk that, in my view, at least, the best opportunity for optimizing utilization is to have really large projects that you have like 80% and you top up with 20% of smaller contracts, it can always here and there.

Do you see any risk? Or do you have enough of this tail with the contract to customers to secure the utilization.

I mean you're right. I mean talking about order backlog that, that is a balance act. Utilization is also a balance act like you into. And I would say, a good combination is not necessarily 80% of the really large project and then 20% in between. I think it's more, let's say, half and half or some large mid and smaller parts in combination.

So that is the -- and I think our -- we have, of course, all these categories today. But I think it's fair to say that in some segments, not all segments some segments, we have too few of the really sizable ones. And that's also kind of linked also to the overall strategy that we aim to increase that. It doesn't go for all, but it goes to some segments.

And very last for me then, better aligned performance management and also incentive structures you talked about. Can you just give us the current status and when you expect to get this fully enabled -- is it dependent on ERP systems, et cetera, to be implemented throughout the group.

Yes, addressing firstly, I think the incentive structure then. We are taking decisive actions now, and we have already actually implemented partially a new setup for the second half year 2025 to already now take the first steps. And we expect that to be clearly aligned next year and then maybe fully aligned in the year after that.

But we have a very scaled starting point here, but we are taking decisive actions. I think, of course, having joined the incentive structure is very good for us as a company, making us all run in the same direction. But I also think 1 of the big sort of upsides for us is that it enables internal mobility because that has been one of the reasons before that we have not been able to capture that full internal mobility due to incentive structure.

So it's an important step for us. And just a comment on your last part of your question. The ERP journey as such, it relates to many different things, but not necessarily the incentive part.

Tom Guinchard from Pareto. On the financial targets, especially on the growth, how much is contingent on market development or end market development, say, in pulp and paper and automotive industry moving forward? If you can give us any insights there?

Well, the plan that we have made for the strategy period is based, of course, with what we know on the market now. So it is based on the current market situation, our presumption of that for 3-year period. So of course, a significant downturn or significant upside will have an impact, but we are based it on what we know today.

And to flip that around to clarify. I mean, the targets as such, they're not dependent on kind of a major market upturn. Of course, we believe that we are in a bit of a downturn. So it's realistic to think that the market will, all in all, kind of be in a better state at '28 than it is today, but it's not a target set that is dependent on something all different.

And also to add to that, I think some of the markets that we are going into are already huge markets that we can grab market share from. So the market doesn't necessarily have to grow that but for also us to grow in the market. For some of the segments.

Thank you, Tom. Then I think we have another question from Raymond here.

Raman from Nordea again. Just 2 final ones. So first on group function staff. Before your new structure, you had some 530 people in group functions and after your new structure, you had closer to 920 people. Just curious like how this come about? And how do you expect this to develop going forward?

Yes. I mean it's more a reflection of our organization and how we report that. We have since going into the new organization, we have from a functional perspective, also in the kind of support structure journey. We have included functional resources in the company throughout the company into -- as a prolongation of the group functions.

So practically kind of the shift in reporting that you then also see kind of when we went into the new group structure, it's not adding new people. It's actually a reflection of our changed model of kind of the internal organizational model. Then, of course, looking at the number and the expected development per se.

Of course, we expect that number to rather be lower than in a sense on years to come as we progress on some of the profitability levers that we went through.

And then finally, just a clarification, maybe. Maybe I misheard you go. But did you say that you expect more than half the margin gap to be closed in Phase I and also the gap that you referred to in that case, is that 2024 against 2028?

Yes. What I said was that when we exit Phase 1, our ambition is that from a run rate perspective, we aim to kind of progress to close more than half of the gap. That's what you're, in a sense, heard me say. And that -- you can look at the full year perspective, and you need to look at what have we actually executed what actions and what benefits do we have from that?

But we're quite committed to come far enough in the profitability journey in Phase I before we enter into Phase II. And given how they are kind of set up then if we're not on a run rate level passing kind of closing half of the gap, then we're not far enough, right? So it kind of goes hand in hand.

Yes, we have Daniel again. That's time.

I just had 2, sorry. Yes, a question on a little bit opportunities in the market. You talked a little bit about total defense and so on. We know that you work with on et cetera. And we also know that on the nature, this 5%, 1.5% is the infrastructure. Can you comment a little bit on how you will optimize your ambition here, and we know that you markets that are growing nicely and so on.

So just to give our current positions, orthos and ambitions.

I will start and then you jump in. As you might have heard, Daniella mentioned, we have a couple of the strategic initiatives going across our current segments and total defense being one of them because what is total defense. Well, it's about energy, it's about infrastructure, it's about access to food, to medical and so on.

So I mean that comes very much in our already existing segments. Then of course, we have the defense capabilities as such, which has been an area that we have been developed over the years and also an area that we see large investment opportunities going forward.

So we are exploring that path both in total defense, which is a natural part of our business and then the defense sector as such.

And here we are looking at both, of course, the defense industry, you could say. But then we're looking at, for example, the military defense and the civil defense as well. And we're building our total defense offering across and yes, we are very strong in Sweden. We actually have a good offering also in the Norway and then looking into Denmark and also Finland.

So starting that kind of Nordic base, which is our stronghold, and we continue to build on that.

Do you receive a lot of -- or do you see not invented here in consulting -- in products and software, we can see not invented here, i.e., that the Italians favorite, for example, perhaps but is the services side more, especially in at countries is possible to work in different geographies.

I think here, well, First of all, there's a lot of restrictions, you could say. So there's, of course, a preference to work with local players and have that local defense resilience as well. So that we do see. However, of course, there is supply chain needs and there are efforts to improve also in the supply chain of the defense manufacturers as well and that we face and we work with the suppliers as well.

But here, we have a stronghold in the Nordic market, working with the leading players.

Thank you. So that was our last question, but let's put the discussions going outside for lunch. And now I'll hand back to you, Linda for some closing remarks.

So thank you. So thank you for all the good questions. We are coming to an end of our Capital Markets Day but I just wanted to take the opportunity to make some final remarks. Repeating what we have said then. Today, we have presented a strategy that will transform Afry over the coming years. We build on what works, but we become more focused in everything we do. We have selected segments with a clear market potential.

We will leverage our position to grow globally, including in our largest markets within the Nordics. We will continue on our strong partnerships with leading clients, and we will evolve our project delivery across the life cycles. And the strategic direction that we have chosen will strengthen our resilience as a company by balancing the exposure that we see across geographies by expanding our offering throughout the life cycle.

In doing so, we will capture the growth opportunities while we are building an agile and resilient Afry. And the keys to this free lies within our own hands. We have already taken significant steps to deliver. We have implemented a simplified organizational structure and we have measures in place to reduce our cost base.

We put even more focus going forward on our order backlog, and we will increase our utilization levels because they are key drivers to improve profitability I'm very proud of the speed and the precision in our execution so far. We have taken great steps of the company in a short period of time.

I'm also exceptionally proud of the expertise that we have within our company. Our people is the foundation of the journey ahead, and I have full confidence that this new and more focused strategy will bring out the very best in all of us.

I look forward to the coming years as we positioned fed to become a global leader in driving transitions and strengthening resilient societies. So thank you all for joining us today and following Afry on our exciting journey.

Good morning, everyone, and warm welcome to our presentation of Afry's Q3 results. I will begin with some of the highlights from the quarter, and then our CFO, Bo Sandstrom, will provide a more detailed overview of the financials.

So in the third quarter, we delivered stable results and improved our EBITA margin to 6.4%. We also saw a positive development of the order backlog, which increased 3.6% compared to the same period last year, or 5.3% when adjusted for currency effects. We achieved this despite a decline in net sales with a total year-over-year growth of minus 5.1%. Similar to what we saw in the second quarter, currency effect had a significant negative impact on sales. For Q3, it amounted to minus SEK 118 million. Sales volumes were also impacted by a challenging market we experienced in parts of our business, mainly in our global division Industry.

The third quarter was also the first within our new group structure and our 3 global divisions. Under the new group structure, we have intensified our efforts to improve utilization and to structurally address the cost base. As part of this, we have continued executing on the restructuring agenda that we initiated during the second quarter. And for the third quarter, we report restructuring costs of SEK 31 million related to this, and they are classified as item affecting comparability.

So to summarize, I can conclude that we have been able to deliver stable results despite a decline in net sales, and we continue our efforts to pave the way for profitable growth.

Moving on then to the market, and let's start with Energy. We see a continued strong long-term demand across segments and on a global scale. Market activity is particularly high in areas such as transmission and distribution, hydro, and nuclear. At the same time, we are seeing some short-term regional variations. This is evident in areas such as thermal, solar, and wind power, where, for example, demand in the Nordics is currently somewhat slower. With that said, this kind of variations are expected over time for a growing and dynamic sector like the energy sector.

For Global Division Industry, the demand remains mixed. We see that persistent global uncertainty continues to impact the overall investment sentiment in several segments. For example, in the Pulp and Paper, where the demand for new large-scale projects remains at low level. The slowdown in the Nordic industrial market is also impacted in the automotive segment. At the same time, we see strong market opportunities in areas such as defense and also within mining and metals, which is encouraging to see.

And finally, in Transportation and Places, public investments in transport infrastructure and water remains at good levels across the regions. The investments are driven by large-scale infrastructure programs and increasing focus on climate and defense-related projects. At the same time, we see that demand in the Nordic real estate market remains at low level and is mainly driven by refurbishments and public investments.

So now let's dive a bit into our new global divisions and their performance in the quarter, starting with Energy. We continue to see high project activity in several of our segments, which reflects the overall market that we experience in Energy. We report negative total sales growth in the quarter, which is impacted by significant currency effects of minus SEK 45 million as well as short-term regional variations in some segments. We keep profitability at a solid level of 9.8%, which is slightly lower than last year.

Moving on to our Global Division Industry, a challenging market reflects the net sales development in some of our segments. Despite this, profitability improved year-over-year, and this is due to the ongoing capacity adjustments and the improved utilization in the quarter. In the second quarter, we announced the acquisition of Reta Engineering, a Brazilian company specializing in project and construction management services with a strong foothold in the mining and metal sectors. And in the third quarter, we completed the acquisition, and the numbers are consolidated into the Industry division as of September 1st.

And finally, Transportation and Places. Here, we saw some sales growth in the quarter, which was driven by high activity in projects as well as improved attendance rates. Also on the EBITDA side, we continue to see positive development, driven by the continuous efficiency measures that we do in the division.

I would also like to highlight some of our key project wins in this quarter. In the Mining and Metals segments, we were selected by the British mining company, Anglo American, to lead the pre-feasibility study for the Sakatti mining project in Finland. The mine is planned as a highly automated underground operation with low carbon footprint. And once operational, the mine will supply critical minerals that are essential for Europe's green transition. And Afry's strong expertise in sustainable engineering makes this a great fit.

On the Energy side, we have signed a strategic framework agreement with Svenska Kraftnät, Sweden's national grid operator. This is the second of 2 recently announced agreements and covers technical consultancy and design planning services within transmission and distribution, which will strengthen Sweden's energy system. Svenska Kraftnät is one of our key clients in the Swedish energy market, and we are pleased to strengthen our partnership with them through these agreements.

In Denmark, we have won a contract in the Road and Rail segment, covering comprehensive advisory services in intelligent traffic systems, traffic management, and emergency preparedness. With Afry's extensive experience in traffic engineering, this project is a great opportunity to deliver innovative and effective solutions that improve road user safety and mobility.

And with these great projects, I would like to hand over to you Bo.

Thank you, Linda. So I will cover the financials for Q3 2025. Quarter 3 showed net sales of SEK 5.7 billion and EBITDA, excluding IAC of SEK 362 million. On rolling 12 months, we are now at SEK 26.2 billion on net sales and remain right below SEK 1.9 billion on EBITDA. On the rolling 12 months development compared to 12 months ago, we carry significant negative currency and calendar effects, explaining approximately SEK 600 million on net sales and SEK 240 million on EBITDA.

In Q3, with a net sales of SEK 5.7 billion, adjusted organic growth came in at negative 3.7%, where volume continued to be pressured by capacity adjustments during the last quarters. As previously, the decline in volume was partially compensated by positive pricing. For Q3, we continue to see higher average fees, although at a somewhat lower level than the last number of quarters. Total growth is reported at minus 5.1%, affected also by FX movement from a strengthened SEK compared to last year.

The negative adjusted organic growth in Q3 was sequentially lower, and global divisions, Energy and Industry, both saw lower growth levels. In particular, Industry experienced a challenging market and continued capacity adjustments pressure growth rates. In Q3, Industry also saw show lower sales of material than last year, affecting the quarterly growth. Transportation & Places showed sequential improvement, mainly driven from the Road and Rail segment.

The order backlog continued to develop favorably and is reported at SEK 20.4 billion, improving to last year, but somewhat lower sequentially. Currency adjusted, the backlog has improved 5.3% to last year with improvements primarily from Global Division Industry. The Energy division maintained the largest order backlog in relation to net sales at a level in line with last year, but improving 3.7% adjusted for currency effects.

EBITDA excluding IAC is reported at SEK 362 million, and the EBITA margin was at 6.4%. Calendar affects EBITA with plus SEK 15 million and the EBITA margin with plus 0.2% to last year, so that calendar adjusted margin was marginally better than last year. Currency movements have marginal impact on the EBITA margin, but on absolute terms, we estimate a negative currency impact of SEK 13 million on EBITA compared to last year. Global Divisions Industry and Transportation & Places support the calendar-adjusted margin development of the group, while Energy reports the highest margin of the global divisions, but somewhat lower than last year in this quarter.

We reported utilization of 72% for Q3 in line with the rolling 12-month level. Looking at the year-over-year development by quarter, we see that Q3 '25 is again behind last year, but with a decline at a lower rate than seen last 2 years. Utilization is a clear focus for Afry, and we are determined to turn the negative trend.

We report SEK 31 million restructuring costs as items affecting comparability in the quarter. The restructuring costs again primarily relate to redundancies across the group. In the new group structure, we will continue to address our cost base as well as making portfolio optimization in quarters to come. And we reiterate our estimate of restructuring cost of SEK 200 million to SEK 300 million in the quarters from Q3 '25 to Q2 '26. We have not guided on phasing, but given that the cost levels were slightly lower in Q3, it is fair to assume that they will, on average, be higher for the upcoming quarters.

Cash flow from operating activities in Q3 was stronger than last year. Available liquidity remained at SEK 3.8 billion. Net debt remained at SEK 5.1 billion, where the positive operating cash flow compensates completion of the acquisition of Reta Engineering that was completed during the quarter. On net debt to EBITDA, we remain at 2.9x. Normal seasonality would provide significant deleveraging in the last quarter of the year and take us to around or below our financial target of 2.5x.

With that, I leave back to you, Linda.

Thank you for that, Bo. So I would also like to say a few words on our next chapter and what we've achieved in the third quarter. So as I mentioned in the start of today's session, we launched a new group structure in the third quarter. We now operate through 3 global divisions, representing 14 core segments, which all will drive global sales and delivery. This has been a key milestone, simplifying our operating model and paving the way for profitable growth.

During the quarter, we also intensified our efforts to improve utilization and to structurally address our cost base. As a part of this, we continue to execute on our restructuring agenda, which remains on track and will proceed as planned through the second quarter of 2026. We have also reviewed our existing incentive structure, and we took action to align and harmonize them. This will reduce complexity and suboptimization and ultimately drive group performance.

And finally, strategies for each global division and segment are now in place, which provides a strong foundation to deliver on our strategic ambitions going forward. And even if we are still in the initial stage of our strategy execution journey, it's encouraging to see the progress we are making. As we finalize our group strategy and have the organizational foundation in place, we are ready to fully move on to strategy execution. We will share more details about this at our upcoming Capital Markets Day.

In parallel, we are progressing according to plan with the implementation of the fit-for-purpose operating model while continuously working to address operational efficiency and our cost base. And as mentioned, we are looking forward to welcoming you to our Capital Markets Day on November 4, where we will be presenting our new strategic direction and our plans ahead. I'm excited to meet many of you there and to good discussions and insights.

And with that, let's open up for the Q&A session.

[Operator Instructions] And let's start with Raymond Ke from Nordea.

A couple of questions from me. I'll take them one by one. The short-term regional differences in energy, could you elaborate a bit in terms of whether it's due to market, certain customers being hesitant, or where you are in these projects? Any color to help us understand sort of how long this might persist would be helpful.

They are related to wind, solar, and partly to thermal, and it's mostly related to the Nordic region. We don't expect it to be that long-term. We see it more as a temporary bump, but there are delays in some investment decisions from clients in the Nordic market. On the other hand, on the same segments, we see a strong growth in Asia in the same segment.

And regarding your restructuring plans ahead then, which, of course, may impact personnel. How many FTEs or how should we think about this when we compare sort of consultants against back-office employees? What's the sort of share of head count reduction distribution there?

Well, I'll provide some light on it, and then hopefully, you get even more light when we come to CMD. We haven't provided guidance on that split. But like we elaborated last time, Raymond, you will have a split between different kind of redundancy costs coming out from this restructuring. There will be a part that is more on a managerial level. There will be a part that is more based on the support structure of the company, and then there will be an operational part as we move ahead into the restructuring efforts. We experienced that in Q2. We see it again in Q3, and we'll elaborate a bit further when we come to CMD.

Looking forward to that. And just one final one. On the new incentive structure that you talked about there briefly, could you maybe just clarify how was it before and why you expect it maybe to make a major difference or where you expect it to make a difference this time around?

As we talked about before, now when we have deep dived into our organization and the setup and our ambition to simplify, we actually saw that we had a lot of different incentive structure programs that were somewhat contradictory to each other. So, by harmonizing this, this will drive our efficiency, it will drive internal mobility. And ultimately, it will support the development of Afry.

Then we'll open up for Johan Dahl from Danske Bank.

Just on this -- interesting to hear that you finalized the plan for the new divisions here to sort of improve the margins. I presume that's some sort of multiyear progression to achieve financial targets. And the question is, you have been quite clear on cost-out actions in the near term, the coming 12 months. But what other buckets do you identify in this plan to sort of drive towards financial targets? If you could just broadly outline those.

I can start. Yes, of course, we have the cost side, but we also have the revenue side. And here, I mean, our sales effort is paving the way for that. As you have heard over the last quarters, we have been quite successful in securing important contracts going forward, and we are building our order backlog. And this will continue. So we've continued to put a lot of efforts into our sales force and also to our structured key account approach. And this is evident that this is a way forward for us. So that's related, I would say, to the revenue side and our structure going forward.

And then maybe you should comment, Bo, on the other initiatives.

No, I can just add to it. I mean, ever since we started the work with the next chapter of Afry that we will present in just a couple of weeks, it has been clear that it's a multi-component effort that we're working on, kind of starting in sense with the clients and the commercial aspect of the business that we're doing, but also looking at what is actually the portfolio and how do we structure that and then leading into the operating model and the cost-out actions that you are referring to. So it is a multifaceted, and we'll do our best to explain that in better detail also on CMD.

Do you see currently -- you talked about positive pricing in the operations. But can you see currently in the order book proof of concept that the sort of intense -- you start talking about improving the order book quality quite some time ago. Can you see that for a fact now that's having an effect? Or is that still something you expect going forward?

Yes, I'll elaborate a bit. It is tricky. I mean the order book is, of course, a very long-term -- it's a very long-term order book, particularly given what we do and the length of many of our large projects. At the same time, the market is developing and the market is developing fairly short-term in that sense. So it's that combination. But of course, we're happy with the order book and the profitability margin in it, and the steps that we're taking towards a better profitability through the order book. But it's really difficult to see, in a sense, quarter-by-quarter, the development. But over time, we're happy with where we are also compared to 1 or 2 years ago when we started talking about these things.

Final question. Just the increase, 5%, 6% FX adjusted on the order book, when will that translate to revenues, do you think? Or when would you see that inflection point on reported revenues?

I start, yes. Yes. And that is exactly the tricky ones, as the order book contains of large projects over many years, and it's also very short-term. So of course, we see that continuously, we will improve, but it's difficult to say exactly what kind of revenue is converted from the order book in Q4, for instance. So -- but we see a slight improvement quarter-by-quarter.

Next question is from Fredrik Lithell from Handelsbanken.

Maybe a follow-up on Johan's question there. The order book, is it broad-based the development? Or is it sort of very narrow in certain pockets of exceptionally good demand? Or how does that look?

No, I would say it's broad. We present the differences between our new 3 global divisions here. But you can see that there are some differences. And of course, that Energy, for instance, had relatively stronger order book than the others. But I would say with -- it is a broad base that we have in our order book. So it's no segment that is without orders.

Another question is on sort of your support platforms. You have earlier, and we have talked at length many times before about your upgrades of CRM, HR, ERP, maybe billing systems, maybe something else. Where are you on that route? And how big of an impact have you had so far in better being able to follow your trends, offboarding, onboarding, billing rates, and what have you. So it would be interesting to hear you elaborate.

Yes. It is a broad question, Fredrik. But we come quite a bit on that journey. It is a long-term journey because, like you said, it involves kind of several parts of the company. It's not just a one system, and then you can measure how far you are progressing. It's a combination of different things. I would say that we're more than halfway in that sense, but we still have a bit to go kind of to get to fully there. And successively, we're getting -- I would say that in the phase where we are right now, we're getting better and better transparency. We're shifting into the part where we can also translate the transparency to efficiency and improvements. But that is also kind of a gradual shift, if that is elaborating a bit on your wide question.

Yes, yes, it's very helpful. And on that, just a follow-up, do you have any sort of heavy lifting? Are there any specific big steps in this project in any way? Or is it really just a gradual work every day?

It is, to a large extent, from an overall perspective, it is a gradual work. Then, of course, we have internal milestones that we are kind of kicking off as we go. But from kind of from an investment and cost perspective, we're not expecting any significant effects kind of shifting upwards that will be material for the group as such.

Thank you, Fredrik. Then we welcome Johan Sundén from DNB, Carnegie.

A few questions from my side as well. I think, firstly, a little bit curious to hear some kind of high-level comments on the kind of sentiment within the organization. How has voluntary employee turnover developed over the summer? How is commitment among employees? Just curious to hear those kind of feedbacks.

Thank you. That's a good question. I would start by saying it was a big shift for us of what we are doing. With that said, I think it's quite logical and well understood why we're doing it. So there's a lot of commitment within the organization towards our new strategic direction. But of course, when you are impacted directly, there will be some additional question marks. So it's not all sort of 18,000 super happy. But I would say the overall direction is good, and we have our employees with us on this journey.

The second one was related to the employee turnover. Was that right? Yes. Actually, we haven't seen any sort of negative development on that. So it's in line with what we have seen the last quarters. So no change there. Healthy level.

And also on the kind of more of an HR place, maybe the leadership within Transportation places, where are we in the process there?

Yes. So Robert Larsson will do his last day here at AFRY, the 31st of October. And then from 1st of November, we have an acting solution in place, Tuukka Sormunen, who will take on the division as acting. And we are in the final stages of the recruitment process for the successor.

And then maybe a little bit of a nitty-gritty question for Bo. Firstly, on the order backlog, and there's been pretty negative news flow regarding the forestry sector in the Nordics recently. Should we be worried for cancellation or those kind of things that could impact the order backlog going into Q4?

No, I wouldn't be particularly concerned, Johan. I mean you're right. We're not floating a lot of positive news now, but we haven't really had that positive news flow over the last couple of years. So we're not necessarily looking at a large order backlog that is particularly exposed. So I don't see a big kind of downside risk on that from where we are right now.

That's encouraging. And then 2 small nitty-gritty questions. Firstly, on working capital. If it's just possible, been a busy reporting day, I haven't had time to go into all the details, but can you please go through the dynamics between the kind of how you come with such good working capital release in this quarter?

Yes. I mean you're right. We had a healthy working capital flow on an overall perspective, particularly if you look at a normal Q3 for us, it was a bit stronger this year than it was in a normal year. We don't have a big reason for it to present in that sense. You should expect that, that would be more seasonal swings also, then looking at how Q3 is normally then composed, then this could very well kind of have a contradicting effect in Q4. That's how it's normally played out. But it's nothing out of the ordinary in that sense, more referring to seasonal swings that we saw in a positive way, of course, in Q3.

And on overhead cost, which has trended a little bit higher first quarter this year, I think you mentioned in Q1 that there was some intra-year phasing that pushed that up a little bit in Q1. Should we expect very low overhead cost in Q4 then? Or how should we think there?

I mean we're clearly -- I mean, now we closed Q3, so we're pretty far into the year. So as been seen throughout the year, we will expect -- I mean, you should expect a higher full year than last year. That's pretty evident where we are kind of 3 quarters out. Looking at Q3 specifically, then the main rationale for the year-over-year is we have -- we carry a very high activity level currently, or particularly during this year. That's one side of it. And then we have some currency-related effects that sneak into the net group cost that we report as well. But in general, I would more look at the activity level that we are carrying at this moment.

And when should we kind of be ramping down to more normal levels? Is it '26?

Yes. No, I don't necessarily see that. I mean, over the next few quarters, we will be looking at more normalized levels. That is to be expected. Then whether it will happen in Q4 or going into '26, too early to say. But this is not -- it's not a permanent level, I would envision.

Next question is from Dan Johansson from SEB.

Two additional ones. Linda, I think you spoke briefly on the billing ratio declined slightly versus the quarter last year, but perhaps less so than previously. And connecting this to the restructuring program, how do you think it's progressing versus the initial plan you had when you introduced it? I know it's a short period. And I assume you did not see much now in Q3, it's a summer quarter. But you have taken out SEK 120 million of restructuring costs now. So for Q4, if we look into that, do you expect to see some first positive signs in terms of utilization? Or will it take a bit longer to see the effect from that? Just so I get it right from a run rate level here going forward.

I start? Yes. Our important topic of utilization rate. And actually, as you saw on both slides, this was actually the -- it was still lower compared to Q3 last year, but not as much lower as we have seen before. So that's why we say we see some early positive signs within the quarter, and we also see the end of the quarter going better. So we will keep our focus on this question during Q4 for sure and during next year.

In terms of the capacity adjustments, that is ongoing at the moment. And as Bo said, we can also expect relatively more in Q4 from that adaptation, our capacity towards our current workload, and see that we get that right, and by that, also improving our utilization rates going forward.

Just to add a bit on it. I mean we are progressing according to our plan, and we're seeing the effects that we expect in a sense so far. But still, also with the guiding of the restructuring program that we launched right before the summer, I mean, you're completely right. We just passed a summer quarter. And then looking at the SEK 200 million to SEK 300 million that we guided, we have just stepped into that bucket, so to say, in terms of restructuring efforts. So where we are right now, a bit early days still, but we are seeing the effects that we anticipate, but more to come.

And maybe a final one, if I may. In the industry, I'm still a little bit stuck in the past on your old segment structure here. So just to improve my understanding, the industry margin uptick, is that mainly an effect of your Process Industry business, the Pulp and Paper part, I guess? Or is it more like a -- the local broader industry part you have in Sweden that's a little bit better than last year, i.e., the Industrial Digital Solutions, we look at your previous segment structure. What sort of the improvement here in the quarter?

If you're talking about the order backlog, it's more related to the Process Industries part. If you're looking at the net sales development and the negative growth, it's more related to the historical the IDS part.

Thank you, Dan. And those are the questions we had today. Super. So then we say thank you for today, and we look forward to talking to you again at the Capital Markets Day. Have a nice weekend.