Rentokil Initial PLC /Fi Q4 FY2023 Earnings Call

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you all for joining us today. In a few moments, Stuart's going to provide you with details of our overall performance in 2023 and our technical guidance for 2024. I'll then come back to provide a very brief update on each of our categories before we focus today on North America. Here, I'll start by taking you through our organic growth model and our analysis of what happened in the second half. Brad Paulsen, our recently appointed CEO for North America, I'm delighted, joins us here in person. We'll then go through our RIGHT WAY 2 growth plan. I'll then wrap up with a brief update on the excellent progress that we're making towards integration. And then we'll take questions. So to set the scene, let me just say a few words by covering the highlights for the year. In 2023, we delivered a good overall Group performance with revenue increasing by 45.8% to GBP5.4 billion, of which organic growth was 4.9%. Adjusted operating profits grew by 57% to GBP897 million, and we delivered a Group margin of 16.6%, which was an increase of 120 basis points. Adjusted EBITDA for the year was GBP1.2 billion. Our bolt-on M&A continued to create value with 41 deals, delivering annualized revenues in the year before acquisition of around GBP106 million. Our cash conversion was at the higher end of our 80% to 90% target at 89%, and we reached a 2.8 times net debt-to-EBITDA ratio one year ahead of our plan. So a good overall Group performance. As you can see, we continue to make very good progress against the vast majority of our targets. And even in the case of organic growth, where we experienced a more challenging second half in North America we nonetheless delivered organic growth of 4.9% against our medium-term target of 5% plus. The Group is performing very well overall, and we've got a plan in place to reinvigorate growth in North America. Now as I just mentioned, our second half organic revenue performance in North America was below our expectations at 2% and at 3.5% for the full year. At the heart of this was a reduction in inbound sales leads contributed to by a range of factors, including the performance of our own digital marketing channels, the impact of our ongoing integration activities, increasing spend by a number of competitors and a softer consumer market. And I'll come on to explain this in greater detail shortly. Having analyzed our organic growth performance in the second half, we've created a detailed plan, and we've put in place a very talented and experienced sales and marketing leadership team ahead of this year's pest season. We're calling this our RIGHT WAY 2 growth plan, and it aims to enhance our performance across all aspects of organic growth in North America from both new and existing customers and in particular, to increase our inbound lead flow. We're investing for growth with around $25 million being put to work to support our growth ambitions with investments into the team, into sales leads from technicians and into our digital channels. And this also includes our first advertising campaign to exploit Terminix's position as the most recognized pest control brand in the United States. Whilst we've got a very clear action plan, and we're beginning to execute that now, it will take some time to get the business to the levels of organic growth that we expect. And as such, we're expecting organic growth in North America to be between 2% and 4% in 2024 with around 2% expected in the first quarter. Touching very briefly on the excellent progress we're making on the integration, we've now completed phase 1, and we've exceeded our 2023 synergy target by $9 million. Our branch co-locations are going very well with around 100 fewer branch properties and with a further 75 also to be exited this year. And we've announced today that we're increasing our gross synergy target by $50 million to around $325 million. We're investing $25 million of that into sales and marketing, which results in our total net synergy target increasing from $200 million to around $225 million. We are also extending the branch integration phase into 2026 to derisk the program and to deliver these greater synergies. As a reminder, our original plan was to deliver net cost synergies of $150 million by the end of 2025 and our latest plan takes us to $187 million by that point, and then on to the $225 million by the end of '26. So a good overall performance, a plan in place to reinvigorate organic growth in North America and an increase in our gross synergy target of $50 million. So with that, let me hand over to Stu.

Thank you, Andy, and good morning, everyone. I will go over the financial highlights of another successful year. I will begin with the Group level numbers, then move through the regions and discuss cash and the balance sheet. Unless stated otherwise, all figures are at constant exchange rates. The business achieved a solid top line performance this year. Revenue increased by 45.8% to GBP5.4 billion. Organic revenue rose by 4.9%, spurred by strong performances in Europe, Asia Pacific, the UK, and LATAM. This resulted in an adjusted operating profit of GBP897 million, representing a year-on-year increase of 57%. Free cash flow for the year stood at GBP500 million, up 34% from 2023, reflecting the positive profit performance, with adjusted free cash flow conversion at approximately 89.4%. This includes legacy termite warranty claims but excludes one-off cash flows mainly related to the Terminix deal. The combination of these factors, alongside the ongoing success of our bolt-on M&A strategy and the dividend payments, led to a net debt-to-adjusted EBITDA ratio of 2.8 times at the end of the year, achieving our target of below 3 times a year ahead of our initial guidance. When excluding one-offs, the ratio is just under 2.6 times, slightly above our medium-term target of 2 to 2.5 times. Our AER diluted adjusted EPS increased by 8.8% to GBP0.2308, while at CER, diluted adjusted EPS was up 12.9%. Due to a strong full year performance, the Board has recommended a final dividend of GBP0.0593 per share, bringing the total dividend for 2023 to GBP0.0868 per share, a 15% increase year-on-year, aligning with our progressive dividend policy. Now looking at our performance by region, starting with North America. Our North American business saw revenue growth of 79.2% for the year, with 3.1% being organic growth. This progress coincided with significant advancements in the Terminix integration. Organic revenue in pest control was 3.1%, and 3.5% for pest control services across commercial, residential, and termite customers. This performance, however, fell short of expectations due to diminished new business lead generation in the second half. As anticipated, Q3 2023's weaker growth persisted into the low season of Q4, which recorded 1.2% growth for pest services. We forecast a Q1 2024 growth rate of around 2%. The expected full-year organic revenue growth for North America is projected to be between 2% and 4%. We have implemented a plan, RIGHT WAY 2, aimed at revitalizing organic growth in North America, which Andy and Brad will detail later in the presentation. Adjusted operating profit in North America increased by 95.9% to GBP618 million, driven by higher revenues and the Terminix acquisition. Effective pricing strategies have more than compensated for inflationary pressures, resulting in adjusted operating margins rising by 160 basis points year-on-year to 18.7%. We've made notable improvements in colleague retention in the region, with total retention, including Terminix, increasing by over 5 percentage points. Customer retention in North America slightly increased to 79.5%. Despite focusing on the Terminix transaction, we successfully carried out 13 bolt-on M&A deals in North America, with annualized revenues of around GBP46 million pre-acquisition. The next slide highlights the significant progress made in North American margins. For a clearer view of the underlying margin improvements, we used a pro forma baseline from 2022 of 16.3%, which included the annualized standalone Terminix margin of 14.7% we disclosed during the 2022 prelims. Consequently, North America's margin has improved by 240 basis points. This growth was fueled by two main factors: trading activities, including growth and density improvements, contributed around 100 basis points of margin, and synergies yielded $56 million, contributing about GBP45 million or approximately 140 basis points to the margin. Notably, adjusted operating margins now exceed 20% once we exclude the distribution business. We anticipate modest margin progression in North America in 2024, with improvements more pronounced in the second half, driven by the expected organic growth trajectory and increased investment in sales and marketing. Shifting to the European region, we observed a very strong overall performance, bolstered by effective price increases and robust demand. Revenue rose by 14.6%, surpassing GBP1 billion, a significant milestone. Organic revenue growth reached 9.2%. All three businesses in Europe delivered impressive results. Pest control revenue increased by 21.8%, while Hygiene and well-being grew by 5.8%. France Workwear exceeded pre-COVID performance levels and was supported by new business sales, increasing by 13.2%. Adjusted operating profit in Europe rose by 12.5%. As anticipated, H1 margin pressure reversed in H2. The impact from hyperinflation in Argentina contributed to a slight reduction in the adjusted operating margin for the year, bringing it to 19.5%. Although inflationary pressures persisted across Europe and most of LATAM, our ability to implement pass-through pricing helped safeguard margins. Customer retention remained strong, with impressive colleague retention figures now exceeding 90%. We completed a total of 11 business acquisitions last year, generating annualized revenues of around GBP12 million before acquisition. In the UK and Sub-Saharan Africa, the region posted solid results despite a challenging macroeconomic environment. Revenue increased by 7.9%, with organic growth of 3.5%. Within this, pest control grew by 8%, and Hygiene and well-being rose by 7.7%, despite strong COVID-based comparators in the medical waste segment. There was a notable contribution from the recently acquired Urban Planters business, which supplies plants to retail properties, offices, and restaurants. The UK Property Care business also performed stronger year-on-year despite the property market downturn. Regional adjusted operating profit slightly declined by 0.5% to GBP95 million, with a margin reduction to 24.1%. As noted earlier, first-half margin performance was impacted by the anticipated decline in COVID disinfection services, such as needle and PPE disposal, along with the non-recurrence of U.K. COVID credit note releases. However, these issues largely resolved by the second half. Although inflationary pressures were significant, the region's established pricing and margin management strategies helped counter these cost increases. The region achieved improved customer retention rates, along with a strong rise in colleague retention. Two business acquisitions were made in the region this year, contributing around GBP18 million in annualized revenues. Turning to Asia and MENAT, the year exhibited a solid performance, led by the largest markets including India, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore. The overall market conditions remain supportive, with a more favorable contribution from China. Regional revenues rose by 11.2%, with organic growth at 10.2%. Adjusted operating profit in Asia climbed by 4% to GBP47 million, while adjusted operating margin decreased by 100 basis points to 13.1%, impacted by the expected drop in COVID disinfection revenues. Customer retention slightly declined, while colleague retention saw significant improvement. The region made seven acquisitions with total annualized revenues of about GBP8 million. Finally, the Pacific region experienced another strong trading year, with regional revenue increasing by 15%, of which 6.8% was organic. Pest control revenue surged by 25.2%, particularly in commercial services, and Hygiene & Wellbeing rose by 6.4%. Demand for Ambius services remained robust. Regional adjusted operating profit increased by 19.8%, with adjusted operating margin growing by 90 basis points to 21.7%. Customer retention remained strong, and colleague retention improved significantly. The region completed eight acquisitions, yielding total annualized revenues of around GBP22 million. In summary, our regions have overall performed well this year, demonstrating the benefits of our Group’s global presence. The following slide illustrates our Group margin development through 2023. Overall, the adjusted operating margin for the Group increased by 120 basis points. Successful execution of our strategy—such as densifying routes and products, M&A, optimizing overheads, leveraging technology, and active cost management—continues to effectively support margin expansion. The overall trading performance added net 90 basis points, and in the first full year of the Terminix integration, synergy delivery contributed 100 basis points to the Group margin, more than offsetting the 70 basis point pro forma underlying impact from the inherited lower-margin Terminix business. Despite ongoing inflationary cost pressures, particularly wage inflation, we remain focused on our ability to mitigate cost increases through strategic pricing. As mentioned, with the updated integration timeline that Andy will discuss shortly, we now expect to achieve our medium-term Group margin target of over 19% by 2026. Now, regarding our cash performance, adjusted EBITDA reached GBP1.28 billion, marking a 43% year-on-year increase. Noncash one-off and adjusting items primarily relate to Terminix-related share incentive schemes and asset impairments. The working capital outflow mainly stemmed from growth and movements in provisions related to termite warranty claims settlements, which met expected levels. We incurred net capital expenditures of GBP197 million during the period, reflecting growth and the inclusion of Terminix's capital expenditures, while lease payments rose by 45.2% due to the full year of Terminix. Cash interest payments amounted to GBP166 million, which was GBP127 million higher than the previous year, reflecting the timing of interest charge payments linked to the financing of the Terminix transaction, and this trend will continue each year. The uptick in cash tax payments is a result of higher profits. Free cash flow was GBP500 million, exceeding the 2022 full-year figure by GBP126 million, yielding an adjusted free cash flow conversion of 89.4%, at the upper end of our guidance. We spent GBP242 million on acquisitions this year, with dividends contributing GBP200 million to cash spending and GBP107 million impacting cash from one-off and adjusting items primarily related to Terminix. Net debt decreased by GBP133 million to GBP3.146 billion, leading to a net debt-to-EBITDA ratio of 2.8 times by year-end, achieving our target of below 3 times ahead of schedule, which included a slight benefit from U.S. dollar FX rates at year-end. Notably, excluding integration costs, the leverage would have been below 2.6 times. Our next debt maturity involves a EUR 400 million bond due in November. Approximately 81% of the Group's interest costs are fixed, which ensures good visibility in a fluctuating rate environment. In July 2023, S&P Global reaffirmed the Group's BBB investment-grade rating, and in October 2023, the Group received a second BBB rating from Fitch. Regarding technical guidance, we are updating certain aspects of our technical guidance to assist with the full-year models. I encourage you to review these at your convenience; however, I will highlight a few key items. On the P&L, we expect Terminix integration costs to be between $90 million and $100 million. Interest expenses are anticipated to be in the range of GBP135 million to GBP145 million, net of a noncash hyperinflation credit of $10 million to $15 million. Our full-year FX guidance reflects the strengthening of the pound against the dollar, which we anticipate will create a headwind of GBP25 million to GBP35 million, largely reflected in market consensus forecasts. Please note the impact on 2024 of the planned closure of our Paragon distribution business in North America. As mentioned earlier, due to the increased expected synergies, we anticipate achieving a Group margin of over 19% by 2026. At this point, I will pass it back to Andy, who will discuss the business category performance.

Thank you, Stu. I want to give the North America section as much time as possible this morning. So in the interest of time, I'm going to turn the pages on our usual employer of choice and business categories at some pace. But I'm delighted at the excellent progress being made, and I'll be obviously happy to take questions later. Our tried and tested operating model continues to perform very well. And if we start with the employer of choice, you can see that colleague retention has improved globally by 4.7% with all regions improving. And that equates to around 1,900 more colleagues choosing to stay and therefore, fewer roles needing to be recruited for. North America increased colleague retention by 5% in the year, and that's really great progress, and I'll come back to that later. You know how important safety is in our company. And in 2023, we delivered further improvements on our world-class safety standards, and we were again recognized by RoSPA with their prestigious Gold Award for the sixth year running. Customer service levels were high. Customer satisfaction, which we measure at branch level using the Net Promoter Score is now approaching world-class levels in many parts of the Group, including indeed, in Terminix. In ESG, we've made continued good progress on emissions in 2023, and we're again ranked amongst the leaders in our sector, something that's very important to us, as I know it is for all of our stakeholders. If I turn now to pest control, the global market remains very healthy with independent market analysts forecasting growth of around 5% to 6% per annum through to 2028, given our global footprint in around 90 countries, we're ideally positioned to exploit. Indeed, our focus here has delivered revenue and profit CAGRs of over 20% since 2015. And last year, our global pest control business continued its growth journey to around GBP4.3 billion of revenue, organic growth of 4.5%, and we delivered margin expansion of 70 basis points. And for those of you who operate in U.S. dollars, you can see on the chart here, the scale of our global pest control business, where we are the number 1 in all regions around the world with $5.4 billion of revenue and profits of just over $1 billion. Now as you know, innovation in pest control is very important to our customers. It's a key growth driver. So let me just give you a few examples of why Rentokil is the global leader in innovation. We now have over 350,000 Internet of Things, PestConnect units operating in our customers' premises, and that's an increase of around 23% year-on-year. We're launching EcoCatch, and that's our new proprietary outdoor fly control solution, which in our innovation center test was 60% more effective at catching flies than the current market-leading fly track. And we've got Lumnia. Lumnia is for indoor flying insect control, and we've sold around 445,000 units since its launch in 2017, and we're now developing the next-generation devices using cameras and AI-based technology. These are just three examples of our innovations that differentiate Rentokil from the competition. And each of these will start to be rolled out in North America this year. Moving on to pest control's sister category of Hygiene & Wellbeing. Here, we operate in a resilient market, which we're expecting to grow by around 4% to 5% through to 2028. Since 2015, this business has delivered revenue and profit CAGRs of 6.5% and 8.1%, respectively. And during the year, the business delivered revenue growth of 7.8% of which 4.8% was organic, profits grew by 4.1% and full year margins were 18.4%. Our core services inside the washroom delivered organic growth of 4.5% last year, and we continued to develop new products, which support the increase in the number of service lines per premise, which increased over the last 12 months from 1.83 to 1.92. Outside of the washroom, we delivered organic growth of 5.3%, with increased focus on well-being services such as air and surface hygiene, scenting and plants. Whilst M&A in Hygiene & Wellbeing performed well in 2023 with seven deals, delivering annualized revenues of GBP30 million and that's ahead of our medium-term target to deliver annualized revenues from acquisitions of at least GBP25 million. In France, our workwear business benefited from excellent colleague and customer retention and delivered revenue of 13.2%. Adjusted operating profit grew by 23.6%, and the business delivered margins of 17.5%, which were the highest for at least a decade. Turning to our bolt-on M&A program. We delivered 41 deals in '23 with annualized revenues of GBP106 million, and our M&A program continues to perform well at or above our required hurdle rates. And we've got a good pipeline in place for 2024, and our current view of M&A spend this year is around GBP250 million. So a good overall performance, and now let's move the focus to North America. Clearly, we're disappointed with organic growth delivery in the second half. I'm now going to take a few minutes to explain to you how our organic growth model works, both the elements that underperformed in 2023, but also the elements that performed well. Brad will then take you through the plan to reinvigorate growth in a little bit more detail. So let me start with the market, the U.S. pest control market. That's the world's largest pest control market, and it represents around half of global pest control demand. Based on our internal estimates, we believe that the U.S. pest control market grew by around 4% in 2023. And whilst this is around a one percentage point reduction against the historical average of around 5%, the current consensus of third-party commentators calls for a return to average growth rates of around the 5% mark in the period to 2028. And as we think about future growth in the U.S. pest control market, it is perhaps worth noting that third-party estimates suggest that in residential and termite, the unserved market is nearly seven times that of the current served market. So this represents a significant potential future growth opportunity to expand the size of the market. So here's our model for organic growth in pest control, and it starts at the top with strong colleague retention and expertise in our frontline techs and in our sales colleagues. You then have sources of organic growth coming from existing customers, and they're running down the left-hand side of the chart there, and sources of organic growth coming from new customers, and they're running down the right of the chart. In short, happy, engaged, well-trained, experienced technicians will deliver a high-quality service to our customers, which then overtime drives up customer retention. Happy customers are accepting of our annual price increases, but they're also willing to purchase additional services from us with our frontline technicians making recommendations to our customers and submitting those as sales leads to then be sold by the sales team. Once the sales team has sold the lead, it's important that the technician gets the work order completed quickly, as an urgent response is often very important to our customers. As I'll explain in a moment, revenue from existing customers was not our issue in '23. That said, it's nonetheless clear that we've got an outstanding opportunity to generate improved growth from our very large existing customer base. So what about the right hand side of the chart, new customers? Growth from new customers was undoubtedly weaker in the second half of last year, primarily because of lower inbound sales leads in residential and termite and in our high street business customers. And why was that? Well, our analysis is that there was not a single major cause, but rather a range of contributing factors collectively impacting on our execution. As I mentioned, growth in the market was down, reflecting the tougher economic environment. The performance of our own digital marketing channels was disappointing at a time when our marketing and sales leadership teams were undergoing considerable change. Whilst our service technician retention showed excellent improvement, our frontline sales colleague retention was flat year-on-year and in Terminix, it remains well below where we need it to be. At the same time, some of our competitors were increasing their spend in digital channels. And in addition, we were clearly very focused on the integration program, perhaps more than the external market. So we've analyzed each part of that model that I just showed you, and let me put a little bit more meat on the bones before I hand to Brad to take you through the RIGHT WAY 2 growth plan. So let's go back to the model. Was our lower growth caused by colleague retention? Well no, it wasn't. In fact, colleague retention was up by 5 percentage points in North America last year. And since the deal closed, we've delivered an impressive 8 percentage point improvement in Terminix technician retention. In 2024, as Brad will come on to highlight, there will be no letting up on our focus on this, but we will have a far greater emphasis now being put on sales colleague retention. On the right-hand side, our key customer service metric of state of service remains strong in '23 as was customer satisfaction, where Terminix' Net Promoter Score of 65 is truly excellent, and indeed, this improved by 1.5 points last year. Continuing around the model, our pricing remained tightly managed in North America, where we successfully covered cost inflation with increases to our prices. Overall, our technician lead performance in '23 was fine. In fact, it was slightly up on 2022, and we deployed the new trusted advisor program in Terminix, but here again, we believe that we've got a significant opportunity to improve in this space going forward. Last year in the United Kingdom, 88% of technicians submitted successful leads, whereas in North America, it was just around 50%. So turning now to new customers, Terminix is the best-known pest control brand in North America. It leads on both top of mind and unaided brand awareness. So whilst the awareness of the Terminix brand is excellent, it is fair to say that we haven't yet invested in the Terminix brand, particularly in terms of the top of funnel marketing, as we've been very focused on the foundation phase of our integration. There's clearly a great opportunity here. Brad will outline the plan shortly to start to leverage this market-leading pest control brand in 2024. Looking at the right-hand side, as I mentioned earlier, the part of the model that is scored in red is new customer acquisition, where inbound sales leads were down by around 2% to 3% in the second half. I went through the contributing factors earlier, including the performance of our own channels and increased spend by competitors, but with a good understanding of this, we've now created the RIGHT WAY 2 growth plan. Once we get leads in from technicians or inbound leads from marketing, there's a funnel through to the sales team. So how effective were the sales teams at selling those leads? Well, the short answer is, they did a decent job of converting leads into sales with a sales conversion rate that was effectively in line with '22, but in my view, perhaps this could also have been better, given that our sales colleagues had fewer leads to work on. So clearly, improving our sales colleague retention will be an important part of the plan. Once the sales lead has been sold, it's passed to the techs to complete the work order. As I mentioned earlier, the time between order and installation is critical. Completion rates remained high throughout the year. And whilst we do see good opportunities to achieve yet further productivity, this was also not an issue for us in 2023. So I've taken you through the model for organic growth. I've outlined the range of factors, which influenced the lower organic growth performance in '23. And I hope that I've also started to demonstrate the range of opportunities that we're focusing on in '24 and beyond. But all of this comes down to execution, execution of the plan and to ensure that execution. As you can see on the screen, we're starting the 2024 pest season with a highly talented, experienced and fully staffed senior sales and marketing team in place. Leading that team is our new CEO for North America, and that's Brad. And with that, I'm going to hand it over to Brad.

Thank you, Andy, and good morning, everyone. Since joining the Rentokil team in mid-December, I have been incredibly impressed with our team's commitment to our colleague and customer success and I'm excited to represent the North America team today. You've just heard a summary of 2023 and everyone understands our organic sales growth was below expectations in the second half of last year. As a team, we are laser-focused on our plan to return our business to faster-than-market growth levels. To accomplish this, we will use our RIGHT WAY 2 grow framework, which we expect to deliver a world-class service experience to our existing customers, while executing several key actions to increase our growth performance from new customers. Up first is Employer of Choice, an area we view as both a strength and differentiator for our team in the market. We believe strongly that our colleagues are the foundation to our success, and we'll continue to invest in their training and development through our RTX University and RTX Way programs, while also simplifying automating daily field task through the planned launch of over 60 enhancements to our field handheld devices. At the same time, we do recognize we have an opportunity to improve our sales colleague retention. As a point of reference, our legacy Rentokil business has historically delivered sales colleague retention at nearly an 80% rate, while our Terminix business has struggled with rates below 60%, particularly for colleagues with less than six months of service time. In 2024, we will address this opportunity by standardizing our talent acquisition and onboarding processes, while also modifying our new sales colleague compensation plans to better fit the required training and ramp-up timeline for a new sales colleague. Our expectation is that over time, our Terminix sales colleague retention will reach 80%, which we believe will have a positive impact on our sales conversion rates. Next is our focus on delivering a world-class service experience. We feel we offer a differentiated experience and attribute much of that to our talented and trained service technicians. As I mentioned earlier, we will continue to invest in our technician skills and credentials through tiered and vertical-specific certification programs. We will also double down on our efforts to mine available data to identify which parts of our customer experience have room for improvement. Our aim is to provide a frictionless experience for our customers and have targeted 2024 improvement opportunities in our existing billing, scheduling and issue resolution processes. Addressing our recent digital marketing and customer acquisition challenges is one of our most critical 2024 execution priorities. To do this, we have developed a two-part plan that begins with increased investment in our Terminix brand. Starting this month, we will launch a new targeted campaign for our Terminix brand that reinforces our expertise and dependability through our new tagline, 'Terminix It'. We believe that campaign's fun, yet functional messaging, will strengthen our top of funnel marketing efforts and help position Terminix as the first brand residential customers think of when they require pest control services. We also have plans in place to increase awareness and strengthen our Rentokil brand, specifically with our commercial and national account customers. The second half of our two-part plan is reigniting our customer acquisition engine. Our execution plan to accomplish this is multifaceted, beginning with a fully staffed team of experienced and capable marketing and sales colleagues. While this proved to be a challenge, particularly for the second half of 2023, our 2024 team was fully staffed and includes a terrific blend of internal and external talent that has a proven track record of connecting with customers and delivering results. Our most recent leader additions include our new digital marketing, residential marketing and sales leaders, which all bring deep expertise and experience to their respective leadership roles. Next, we recently transitioned to new creative and media agency partners, we are confident, will help improve the effectiveness and return on our marketing and search spend. And the final piece of our plan is the opportunity for improved bottom-of-the-funnel initiative execution. This includes increasing the productivity of our own media and digital platforms, plus implementing plans to drive more efficient customer and geographic targeting. So to get leads flowing from new customers, we're making our first investments in the powerful Terminix brand and funding the key marketing, sales and digital experience initiatives we believe are necessary to return our business to historical growth levels. Okay. Before we proceed, I'd like to take a moment so we may play a short video that highlights our new Terminix brand campaign. Please start the video. Well, like I said, we are all excited about this campaign and are looking forward to its launch this month. The next component of our RIGHT WAY 2 grow plan is sales conversion. We consider this an area where we have performed okay, but believe we still have an opportunity to deliver a material year-over-year improvement. Much of that improvement will be driven from the expected increased sales colleague retention we discussed earlier. In addition to that initiative, our new sales leadership is focused on reengineering our internal processes to decrease the amount of time between initial customer inquiry, site inspection and ultimately, sales completion. An equally important part of our RIGHT WAY 2 grow plan is pricing execution. As Andy mentioned earlier, we have proven that our pricing practices are effective, as we consistently mitigate the impacts of inflation on our business. That being said, with large nationally scaled residential and commercial business segments, it is imperative that we use all available tools and technology to constantly evolve our pricing practices to deliver value to our customers for the services we offer. A key component of this will be the increased use of data and AI to deliver more market and segment specific pricing, while also seeking to eliminate any process inefficiencies from our existing processes. I'm also excited for the bundling and promotional plans we have planned for 2024 as both represent nice growth opportunities that we believe will appeal to our customers. We are eager to see our pricing practices evolve in 2024 and are confident we have the appropriate plans to once again offset any inflationary impacts on our business. The final two areas of our RIGHT WAY 2 grow plan are customer penetration and technician productivity. Earlier, you've heard about our Trusted Advisor program, which we all view as a significant opportunity to drive additional sales leads from existing customers. Today, around half of our technicians in North America generate leads from our existing customer base, which is far below the experience in other countries and Rentokil Initial. In 2024, we have already added an accomplished operations leader from our UK business, with a singular focus being to develop the right process and tools to deliver over time the same Trusted Advisor participation rates and revenue generation realized in our top-performing countries. Finally, technician productivity remains a top priority. Two key actions in motion for 2024 include improved route productivity and on-time arrival initiatives through our Best Fit routing program and the launch of our customer service quality program that we expect will drive continuous improvement in our service experience, while also being a great training and development tool for our field colleagues. In closing, I'm proud of the progress our North America team continues to make, as we come together as one team. I'm also confident we have the right team and the right growth plan focused on colleague retention, reestablishing our sales and marketing excellence, strong pricing discipline and improved Trusted Advisor program execution. I believe our team is up to the challenge to execute this growth plan, and I am excited about our opportunity to deliver improved organic sales performance in 2024. Thank you for your time today, and I'll hand it back to Andy.

Thank you, Brad. I'm going to conclude with a few comments on the excellent progress we're making on the integration. You've all heard me talk about how we're bringing together businesses to create a pest control powerhouse in North America. We are the number one pest control company in commercial, in residential and termite. It's a business with scale and density. It's got an outstanding branch and route network across the entire United States of America. This is a business with multiple drivers of revenue growth from our millions of existing customers and from new customers alike. And in addition, the integration of the two businesses will deliver significant cost synergies and long-term growth opportunities. As you can see on the screen, for 2023, we set a net synergy target for the year of $60 million. I'm delighted to report we exceeded that delivering $69 million in the year. In total, to-date, we've delivered gross synergies of $104 million. We've made $22 million of investments, and we've delivered net synergies of $82 million. We've now completed phase 1 of the integration program. And this slide covers just a few of the many activities and achievements that our disciplined approach to this integration has delivered. And just to pick out a few, we've streamlined and unified the organization to create a single Rentokil Terminix team. We've delivered a single payroll and benefit system for all 22,000 colleagues. We've moved 10,500 colleagues onto Workday. So all of our colleagues are now on a single people management system. And that change was crucial to aligning our people management processes, but will also enable the future harmonization of pay plans. And we've successfully reduced the branch property network by around 100 branches. Importantly, during this phase, our branch integration playbook has continued to be tested and refined having undertaken integration pilots as well as successfully migrating 10 standalone acquisitions onto our IT platform. So the foundations for future success have been laid, and we've now entered phase 2 of the integration plan, which is the local planning phase ahead of full branch integration. And we've got seven large regional pest control markets in the United States, and each integration will be executed over approximately 10 months from planning to completion of the rerouting. The first six months will be used to develop specific local plans for the branches being integrated based on the playbook. This then delivers the integration of branch systems and the migration of data. For the following three months, we evaluate before then undertaking the final part of the process, which is the rerouting and the harmonization of tech pay. Only having completed the detailed planning phase, we then move on to phase 3, which is the first full branch integration, which will begin this coming summer. Our first market will reduce the number of branches from 76 to around 50, and that will increase the average revenue per branch by around $2.5 million. As we move through this third phase, we expect the integration process to become more standardized as the Terminix branches are all using the same systems and processes. In 2026, we reached Phase 4. This will mark the completion of the branch integration program and the delivery of our new synergy target. Importantly, post the integration, our ambition remains to deliver organic revenue growth in pest control services of 1.5 times the North American market over the medium term. At the very heart of our integration is a commitment to best-in-class technologies, systems and processes. And whilst this is an extremely important part of the overall story, it's perhaps not the easiest to communicate. So we produced this short video to bring the IT program to life for you. Right. So excellent progress in technology, as I was saying. Now I know a lot of you here today are now termite experts after my teach-in last year. I'm pleased to say, as you can see on the chart, we've made good continued year-on-year progress in 2023 to address the historical Terminix termite warranties. So before I wrap up for questions, here's a summary of our plan for synergy delivery through to 2026. We've increased the gross synergy target by $50 million. We've increased our investments in sales and marketing by $25 million and therefore expect to deliver net cost synergies of around $225 million by the end of 2026. In summary, last year was a good year for us, a good overall performance, organic growth of around 5%, margins up 120 basis points, cash conversion of 89%. We've reduced our net debt-to-EBITDA ratio to 2.8. We beat our synergy target, and we go into the 2024 pest season with a fully resourced senior sales and marketing team ready to execute the RIGHT WAY 2 plan to reinvigorate growth in North America. So with that, thank you very much. We'll now take any questions. We'll start with questions in the room, and then we'll take additional questions from the audience online.

I have three please. The incremental investments in sales and marketing, $25 million, when should we expect the benefit from this plan to drive improvement in organic growth? Is it Q2? Or is it more second half weighted? And have you already started the new investments as of January, or is it yet to start? Second one, what's your plan for the distribution business in North America, please? It's been dilutive to both growth and margins in 2023. Do you really need to be in this business? And the third one, on Slide 27, you've mentioned that while overall pest control growth organic has been 4.5%, North America organic growth has only been 3%. Maybe Terminix has been a bit dilutive here. So can you maybe talk about what's happened historically? And what gives you the confidence to target 1.5 times pest control market growth in this region in the future? Thank you.

Thank you very much. Regarding our sales and marketing expenses, where we invest and the areas we prioritize are quite sensitive competitively. Therefore, I hope you're not expecting too much detail on our spending. We've dedicated significant effort to developing our plan, and pest control is influenced by seasonality. In North America, the season generally begins in late March, depending on the weather. If we have a warm and early spring, the season kicks off earlier, and we've positioned ourselves to start stronger than in previous years. Predicting future outcomes is challenging. However, we previously stated that we anticipate around 2% growth for the first quarter. With two months into the quarter, we have a general sense of our trajectory, but I can't provide more specifics as it relies on seasonal factors and the effectiveness of our campaigns. Regarding growth, it's essential to excel in both organic and paid digital channels. Organic growth happens through searches where the first results are paid ads, followed by organic listings. We're focusing on both aspects, including top-of-funnel marketing and advertising campaigns. As for distribution, we intentionally operate in this area for vertical integration, allowing us to purchase a large volume of pest control supplies at lower costs than if we sourced them externally. Although it's a lower-margin sector, we assess our portfolio annually with our Board, considering whether we should continue operating in this business. Your third question touches on the confidence we have in achieving 1.5 times the market growth. It stems from our thorough understanding of various growth sources within our market and our business. Our superior performance across these areas, combined with our larger scale and better density compared to competitors, assures us of our potential. We've demonstrated success in other markets, as seen with our results in Europe. Importantly, high retention of our colleagues leads to strong customer retention. With innovation at the forefront of our business, there's a wealth of new offerings to engage customers, which positions us favorably. I'm confident about reaching our goals, but we need to navigate through the integration process first. Thank you.

Hi. It's James Rose from Barclays. I've got two please. It seems like the pilots are largely complete now. Could you tell us what you've learned incrementally from them? And are there any tweaks to the integration program since the last time you updated us? And then secondly, on the higher gross synergy target announced today, where does the confidence come from to increase that target? I mean, so far, you've done a lot of preparation, but you haven't done an actual regional integration just yet.

Hi, James. We've conducted many pilots, and while the video of IT may appear simple, it involves a considerable amount of work behind the scenes. Each aspect, whether it's the handheld devices for the technicians or the customer service interface, has undergone extensive piloting, testing, and retesting. It feels like we've never truly stopped piloting. As for what we've learned, I wish it weren't true, but not all branches are the same; they each have their unique characteristics. Just when you think you've understood a branch, you discover that it operates a bit differently than another. This ensures that there's always a need for customization in the integration process, which is why we invest time in thorough planning to cover everything. While we haven't completely finished piloting, we've conducted numerous tests on various elements. In our earlier pilots, we've recognized the significance of a systematic approach—after the first pilot, which is the toughest, the subsequent ones should become a bit easier. As we move to integrating a larger number of branches, it won't be merely a one-size-fits-all approach. Instead, we'll have a dedicated team, similar to a pit crew in Formula 1, ready to support the process. These integrations will come with a playbook accompanied by a team present throughout the integration process. Additionally, we will establish a dedicated customer service line so that if there are any issues, the customer will not be routed to our general call center but to a representative familiar with that specific branch. Overall, we have gained some valuable practical insights. Regarding the synergy aspect, could you please repeat your question? I got a bit sidetracked there.

Where does the confidence come from to increase that target? I mean, so far, you've done a lot of preparation, but you haven't done an actual regional integration just yet.

Yes, thank you. Where is the confidence? We have always maintained a very detailed plan, which we keep current. We track it regularly, not every day, but every week. We conduct reviews of the program every two weeks and ensure that all team members involved update their assumptions consistently. What have we learned? It turns out there was a bit more in procurement than we initially thought, and we can adjust for that. There is also a bit less in other areas. Our insights have come from our experiences and the progress we are making. As you saw, we delivered ahead of our plan this year. It would be misleading to say we discovered a new opportunity that we had not previously identified. Rather, we can now clearly see the evidence of what we can achieve, and it's coming from both SG&A and the branch network. Thank you. I welcome questions for the CFO.

Hi. It's Andy Grobler from BNP Paribas Exane. So one for Stuart to start with and then two on North America. Just in terms of the central cost for 2023 that came in below, I think, expectations. Can you just talk through the drivers last year and then what you think will drive the increase in 2024? And then on to North America. When you talked about colleague retention, clearly, it's much lower still at Terminix. Can you split out a bit between those new joiners? The people that have been there for six months, don't likely to leave, what the difference is? And then, I guess, explain why when you're treating people the same, paying them the same, there's such a difference between those legacy Rentokil people and the legacy Terminix people. And then on to branch integration, as we go through that during the year, from your experience as you go through that process, what is the impact on growth? Do you get one, two, three months or whatever it may be, where focus is just elsewhere and growth rates slow down? And then how long does it take to come back?

Yes. In terms of central overheads, there are a few factors at play. We received some short-term credits in 2023 that are not expected to recur. As we assessed Q3, we were not satisfied with the growth rate we observed. Being a responsive business, our team at Rentokil Initial worked hard in the second half of the year to ensure we met our commitments to the market, and our results reflect that success. For 2024, we will see the annualization of our investments, including acquisitions that are being managed at the center, such as the global workday system and identity management, both crucial in the current IT security landscape. We are investing in these areas, as well as dealing with compliance issues, especially SOX, which will affect us for a full year in 2024. Thus, there's a significant amount of investment tied to Terminix that is reflected in the central overheads. Assuming we fulfill our commitments, we expect a more typical cost structure in 2024 compared to 2023. There are several interconnected elements to consider.

Could I just ask what were the one-off benefits?

Just an insurance benefit we got, a slight listing benefit that we got. So nothing that would sort of raise its head, but when you do the bridge is 1 million or 2 million on those sorts of things. So it's nothing remarkable for us.

All right. Andy, regarding your second question, which has two parts, we need to consider whether there's a difference between the tenure of newcomers, those in the first 0 to 6 months and 6 to 12 months, compared to those who have been with us longer. Additionally, we need to examine why there's a difference between Rentokil and Terminix, especially when everyone is compensated similarly for the same roles. The first part of your question is insightful, and it's not just a Rentokil issue; it's a global trend observed by many large companies and their HR departments. After hiring someone, retaining them has become increasingly difficult. We focus intently on the first 0 to 6 months and the 6 to 12 months, because if we can keep someone for their first year, they are likely to remain with us for an extended period. In tight labor markets, the quality of candidates we hire can be impacted. We emphasize finding high-quality candidates and ensuring an exceptional onboarding experience. Many employees tend to leave early if their initial experience isn't positive. We’ve implemented initiatives like Friday afternoon calls to check in with employees about their week, as we've found that people often leave employers after a tough week. Regarding your second point about Terminix and Rentokil, we are still in the process of harmonizing pay for sales and technician roles, which will happen as we integrate branches. The current pay structure for sales at Terminix complicates things, and we recognize the need to support our sales colleagues better during their initial six months. Brad is already considering adjustments to the pay structure for new sales team members, and I believe that will drive improvements. Lastly, regarding branch integration and its effect on organic growth, the answer is nuanced. In many past integrations, we experienced no impact on organic growth, which is our goal. However, some integrations do yield a few percentage points in growth. This usually relates to how well we manage customer changes during integration. If the transition between technicians isn't handled smoothly, it may cause customers to reconsider. It's crucial to communicate effectively with our customers and ensure a positive experience during these changes, as most customers adapt well if we manage the process effectively.

Can you guys maybe just touch upon the competitive environment you're seeing in North America? When you kind of look at your share, maybe who are you donating share to? Is it mom and pops? Is it larger players? If you look at the larger players that are growing quite rapidly. And then when you think about kind of your self-help plan, how does that work challenging, let's you say, mom and pop versus a larger player? And maybe where is that all targeted to that?

Thanks. I'm not sure if I like the term "donating share," as it's not something I've ever considered. The competitive landscape in North America is very tough and has always been. I've been in this business for 15 years, consolidating the market through acquisitions. Fifteen years ago, there were an estimated 19,000 pest control companies in the United States, and today, that number remains the same in North America. There are many small, local operators. It's important to view us as a multi-local business rather than a multinational one. Market share is won and lost locally. While we do have national accounts, the real story is on a local level. To be successful, we need to perform well in countless cities across the United States. The good news is that we have the best local presence of any competitor. Terminix is already the most recognized brand in pest control in these areas, even before we ramp up our investment. You're correct that we need both a local strategy and a central marketing plan. A key focus area will be in gathering reviews, whether on Google or Angie's List. It is crucial that in every local market, we encourage satisfied customers to leave positive 5-star reviews, as these are invaluable in competing with smaller businesses. You've rightly pointed out that while we need an overarching brand strategy, our success depends on executing well in numerous localities. I don't believe the competitive dynamics have changed significantly. It's more about gaining and losing many small customers in different towns rather than losing a large portion of market share to a big competitor. Therefore, we need robust marketing strategies, which is why we have both a local and national marketing plan.

Just one question, please. Could you run us through the definition of organic growth that you've used in full year 2023? And if that's been the same as what was used in H1 and then how it compares to previous years? I noticed that helpful detail in the release today, but if you could just run us through that, that would be great.

Yes, I'll take that one. Hi, Nicole. The definition of organic growth for everything excluding the Terminix transaction has remained the same for many years at Rentokil Initial. We decided to approach the Terminix acquisition differently because typically we don't use the pro forma revenue base from acquired businesses in our organic growth calculations. However, for Terminix, we wanted to provide a very clear like-for-like calculation, which we feel is more representative for the market. So, when we consider both businesses together, we wanted to know what their combined like-for-like growth would be if we had owned them during that time. As a result, we made a slight adjustment to our policy for Terminix. This adjustment means that in 2023, we recorded a minor decrease compared to our usual method for calculating the Group's organic growth. This change is only applicable for the first year, and in 2024, we will revert to our standard approach. Therefore, we made an exception for Terminix in this calculation to ensure a clear like-for-like perspective.

Three for myself. Firstly, just on the net debt sort of strategy or the leverage strategy, obviously, I think net debt was down by around $100 million net this year. Are you happy with that tenor in terms of the year-on-year declines? I know you put up the dividend. Obviously, you've still got the M&A in there. Is that sort of the level of deleveraging that you're happy with? And I suppose that, along with that, I suspect the net debt-to-EBITDA, a lot of the driver of the decline and that is going to be the EBITDA rather than the level of net debt as it were, just if that's correct. And then two other things. I know that you mentioned around about better colleague retention in North America. I think during the numbers, if you look at the branch managers at Terminix, I think there's been about 18% churn there since you closed the deal. That seems quite high. Is that a level which you're surprised about or something which just happens at a voluntary level? And then the last question is just on the delayed integration. What's the best way of thinking about that? Do you feel there's too much stress on the business to perform to the level that you wanted to if you captured the original plan and the growth would have been even lower this year if you had captured that? Or if you could just maybe just talk through a little bit about your thoughts there. Thanks so much.

I'll begin with the topic of deleverage. You're correct that the majority of the improvement is driven by EBITDA rather than a reduction in debt. I am pleased with how this is unfolding, as it aligns with our guidance. We experienced a slight benefit at year-end due to average earnings being at a better dollar rate compared to year-end net debt, resulting in roughly 20 basis points of improvement. While this is modest, I am very satisfied with our progress. As we developed our business plan, we incorporated our progressive dividend policy and made room for potential mergers and acquisitions. Additionally, we have around $100 million in costs related to achieving our goals in 2024. When considering the costs and a slight margin increase in the U.S., I anticipate that our deleveraging in 2024 may not follow the same path as in 2023. However, once we navigate through the costs and start realizing synergies, I expect to see a significant decrease in deleveraging from 2025 into 2026. Overall, this is completely in line with our plans, and I am quite pleased with the results.

I honestly don’t understand what data you’re referencing for that quote. Perhaps it’s a topic for coffee later, but I can assure you the retention rates among branch managers are exceptionally high. I’m puzzled by the recent misinformation; I don’t recognize any issues here—it's all quite positive. Regarding the integration, I've dedicated 35 years to handling large deals, providing me with considerable experience. We’re committed to taking the necessary time to execute our plans effectively. We approach this with caution and thoughtfulness, never rushing decisions. I've advised my team that if there's any uncertainty, we should delay—we won't proceed unless we’re ready. This integration is significant and complex, demonstrated in the video. I don’t view this situation as a delay; instead, I see it as a re-phasing based on an understanding that the synergies will be greater, and we’re gathering insights as we progress. Yes, this will take longer. We’re not running the business solely to boost the share price; my focus is on running operations as effectively as possible. However, we recognize that our organic growth has been affected, partly due to being overly internally focused and the impact on our integration efforts. By pacing things more slowly, we aim to foster better business-as-usual organic growth alongside the integration execution. This isn’t about shifting the plan abruptly; it’s about being realistic in light of what remains to be done. My principle has always been to start when we’re prepared and to take the time needed, irrespective of any previous timelines shared with the market. This should reassure you that our decisions are grounded in business needs, even if it takes additional time. As a result, we’ll maintain a greater presence in regular operations rather than transforming everything all at once.

Thanks, Oliver Davies from UBS. Andy just one question. Following your description about the importance of local share and the local battle. When we think about that, in your wheel, the red bit here on sales and marketing that a lot of these presentations were about. Was the challenge you faced there and therefore, the response you're going to give, was that more a certain localities? Or was it broadly across the whole country?

Yes. To clarify, the situation wasn't limited to specific locations; it was more widespread. We assess performance across our numerous city-based branches, so I'm aware of both the top and bottom performers. Overall, we did experience a decline in lead flow. Some areas were impacted more than others, and this was due to various factors including market conditions, competition, and our own performance. For our success, we need to excel in many cities across the United States. Fortunately, we have the best presence compared to our competitors. With our local positioning, we are well-established, even before we enhance it further. However, having a strong local strategy is crucial alongside our main marketing plan. A key component is receiving positive reviews from satisfied customers in each location, like Google or Angie's List reviews. These 5-star ratings genuinely help us compete with smaller local businesses. It’s essential to blend our national marketing efforts with tailored local initiatives. I don't believe that the competitive landscape has changed significantly; we aren't losing substantial market share to a single competitor. Instead, it's about gaining and losing many smaller accounts, which is why our marketing strategy, both local and national, is indispensable.