Good morning, everyone, welcome to this virtual analyst meeting. My name is Jurgen Pullens, Director Investor Relations for Arcadis. We are here to discuss the company's trading update for the first quarter, released this morning. With us are Peter Oosterveer, CEO, and Virginie Duperat, CFO. We will start with a presentation by Peter and Virginie, which will be followed by a Q&A. For the analysts attending this call, in case you would like to raise a question, please notify us by using the chat box, typing, "I have a question," or simply, "Question." Please do so only after we have opened for the Q&A. I will call out your name, after which you can verbally raise your question to Peter and Virginie. Kindly keep to a maximum of two questions at a time.
Lastly, we call your attention to the fact that in today's session, management may reiterate forward-looking statements which were made in the press release. We'd like to call your attention to the risk related to these statements, which are more fully described in the press release and on the company's website. With these formalities out of the way, Peter, please begin.
Okay. Thanks, Jurgen. Good morning, everyone. Thanks again for joining us today to discuss our trading update for the first quarter of 2021. I will start by providing you with a summary of our operation results for the first quarter, followed by some more insights in the current market developments and also talk about our order intake. I will then turn it over to Virginie to get into further detail on our results. When looking at our performance for the first quarter, it is almost hard to imagine that we're already dealing with the pandemic for over a year and still largely working from home, finding new ways of collaborating with colleagues and with clients while growing our business at the same time.
In that context, and with that as a backdrop, therefore, really proud and pleased to report that we started 2021 strong, driven by the dedication of the more than 27,000 fellow Arcadians who have continued to support our clients during the current pandemic. Our now institutionalized performance enhancements, such as Make Every Project Count and focus on our key clients, combined with the actions we identified in the early part of last year, have created further margin improvement, as well as continued strong order intake in the first quarter. The order intake was driven by large infrastructure investments and a further increased focus by our clients on carbon reduction and climate change mitigation. I will talk about some of that in more detail a little later.
As you will have seen, the revenue was organically 0.5% higher than Q1 of last year, 0.8% when excluding the Middle East, and back to growth compared to the previous three quarters, which, of course, were impacted by COVID-19. Our operating margin improved like- for- like with 2 full percentage points to 9.2%, driven by particularly strong performance in North America and the U.K., as well as the beginning of a recovery in China now that it returns to a degree of normalcy. Our performance in the first quarter, combined with our strong balance sheet and our 3% growth in backlog, gives me confidence in our ability to create further growth throughout the year, despite the still challenging circumstances.
As we discussed during our Capital Markets Day, we see four global mega trends, urbanization, climate change, digitalization, and societal expectations across the globe, which impact societies and also obviously impact our clients, and which, as a result of that, provide many opportunities for Arcadis. In addition, we see public stimulus and regulation in especially the U.S. and Europe that also favor the variety of solutions we can offer in resilience, in mobility, and in places. The EU taxonomy, which is an important enabler to scale up sustainable investments, sees energy, transport, and construction, but also water supply and remediation activities as sectors that have the biggest opportunity to contribute to greenhouse gas emissions reduction.
These are obviously the exact areas that many of our clients are in, and where we can advise them on how to best mitigate their impact on the climate and allow them to meet their sustainability goals. The U.S. Stimulus program focuses amongst others on new mobility, clean energy, electric grid modernization, and EV network support. We already see many EV-related infra opportunities globally, and are increasingly advising large automotive clients on the new build or the transformation of their factories to accommodate them in meeting their sustainability ambitions. In environment, we see a strong pipeline of opportunities for key clients, such as, for example, the U.S. federal government, which actually also includes opportunities for PFAS remediation. In the water sector, clients increasingly choose us as their innovation specialist. We use artificial intelligence practices to optimize the enormous water consumption that clients face across many industries.
Goes without saying that sustainability has become mainstream. For us, that includes clients who, for instance, need new data centers, which in itself is already a market growing at a 10% growth per annum. Pharmaceutical, chemical clients, just to name a few. Finally, in places, we see an almost obvious increase in clients' requests, obviously accelerated by COVID, to optimize and repurpose their office space, as well as optimize their operational and maintenance spend through deeper data analytics. Looking ahead, we are really well-positioned to maximize our impact, as well as the impact of all of our stakeholders, by seizing the opportunities which really play to our strengths, allowing us to apply our global capabilities, our global knowledge, and our global experiences, continue to invest in our strategic priorities, and delivering the resilient and future-proof solutions that our clients need.
You will actually see a few examples of these future-proof solutions on this slide. The order intake in the first quarter was EUR 693 million, resulting in a favorable book-to-bill of 1.1, and an improvement on a like-for-like basis compared to Q1 last year. Our further sharpened focus on our key clients continues to generate more work for these key clients. For example, we won projects for a total of $24 million for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers related to the remediation of several defense sites. In the U.K., we had a really nice EUR 3 million win from Roche to set up laboratories across U.K. hospitals. Another example, a little closer by, in Germany, we won a project where we offer our digital solutions for groundwater management by making use of modeling and flood simulations.
Back in the U.S., we continue to win work from significant public clients, like the Departments of Transportation in Alabama, Louisiana, and Georgia, to help reduce congestion and improve mobility for people around major cities in these states. As we have started to implement our new strategy, Maximizing Impact, we will obviously continue to focus on creating a lower carbon future, mitigating the impacts of climate change, and consistently provide digitalized and sustainable solutions to our clients. This is clearly exemplified in the work we have won from both our public and our private sector clients. Additionally, our recent wins in infrastructure demonstrate our excellent position in capitalizing on the significant investments made in sustainable infrastructure, in particular in Europe, including U.K., but also, obviously, in North America. I'll now turn it over to Virginie for further detail on our financial performance.
Thank you, Peter, and good morning, everyone. Let me share with you some further comments on our performance in the first quarter. First, operating margin and free cash flow improved. In our first quarter, we delivered a net revenue of EUR 632 million, which resulted in a 0.5% organic growth, and excluding Middle East, this organic growth was 0.8%. Foreign exchange resulted in a negative translation impact of 4.5%, notably due to the weakness of the U.S. dollar, taking EUR 30 million off our top line in the first quarter. Our operating EBITDA in the quarter further improved by 21% to EUR 58 million, leading to an operating margin of 9.2% in the quarter.
As usual, we annually have cash outflow in the first quarter. Q1 2021 free cash flow was a - EUR 39 million, showing a significant improvement compared to a -EUR 84 million end of Q1 2020. This resulted in a net debt position of EUR 107 million to be compared to EUR 424 million a year ago. To put our quarterly results in perspective, you see that we reversed the negative organic growth trend this quarter. After three quarters of revenue decline, we are back to organic growth despite the still challenging circumstances. As mentioned, our operating EBITDA in Q1 increased significantly to EUR 58 million or 9.2%, creating one of the best first quarters in many years. Net working capital as a percentage of gross revenues was 15.3% compared to 19.2% in Q1 last year. Day sales outstanding decreased to 78 days compared to 95 days one year ago.
This is clearly the result of the cash program undertaken, launched at the end of Q1 2020. The working capital levels are impacted by a seasonal pattern and generally are at a higher level than of first quarter. As you are used from us in the trading update, please find a few comments on the revenue developments in the segments. In the Americas, we have seen an organic growth of 3% and a FX impact of -10%. In this region, and especially in North America, growth in infrastructure and water for public clients compensated for a decline in environment for private sector clients. In Latin America, organic revenue growth was really strong, driven by infrastructure work in Brazil. In Europe and in the Middle East, revenue growth was 3%, despite the declining footprint in Middle East. Net revenues in continental Europe were in line with last year.
Site revenue decline in the Netherlands was compensated by growth in infrastructure work, especially in Belgium, Holland, and in France. Net revenues in the U.K. increased organically due to strong growth in infrastructure, water, and environment, compensating for a decline in buildings. Finally, revenue in the Middle East slightly declined, driven by our decision to reduce our footprint in this region. Moving to Asia Pacific, revenue decline was -4%, as China recoveries did not fully compensate a decline in other Asian countries continuing to face challenges due to COVID-19. Moreover, Australia shows a decline in revenue as Q1 2020 was exceptionally strong due to the contribution of one significant project, and COVID-19 crisis resulted in a temporary delay in award of projects in 2020. Net revenues in CallisonRTKL are in line with Q4. However, like- for- like, impact of COVID-19 is still highly visible.
Organic net revenues declined by 18%, affecting mainly retail and commercial sectors, which were severely impacted by COVID-19, and we show small signs of recovery in healthcare sector. To conclude, return to revenue growth in combination with good order intake and solid backlog position demonstrates that we are on track to deliver solid organic growth for the year. With that, let me hand it back to Peter.
Yeah. Thank you very much, Virginie. Let me now wrap up our presentation, reminding you about the strategic targets we set for 2023, which we did present back in November of last year during the launch of our strategy Maximizing Impact. I will also provide a brief summary of our Q1 update, before we obviously will go over to questions and answers. We are maximizing our impact in our projects driven by our passion to improve quality of life, making the world we live in a better place for our clients, for the communities in which we work, and for all of our people, obviously, as well. We will continue to make the right choices to remain a resilient business, focusing on regions, on clients, on projects, which clearly provide us an opportunity to win while addressing the global societal challenges through sustainable people-centric solutions.
In terms of our financial targets, we simply aim for further improved, predictable, and profitable growth, satisfying the interest of all our stakeholders, and we feel confident about our ability to deliver on the commitments we made during the recent Capital Markets Day. In terms of non-financial targets, we want to further advance our course to be the employer of choice through lower voluntary turnover and higher engagement by creating a diverse, inclusive culture in which everyone can be their self.
We commit to further lowering our carbon footprint to align with the 1.5 degree science-based targets, and to achieve this as soon as possible, but in any event, before 2030. We furthermore plan to develop a structure which will allow us to, in a more tangible way, define how the work we deliver on projects for our clients contributes to a better and a more sustainable world.
To summarize our performance in the first quarter, I really believe we had a good start of the year, considering the circumstances. Our current performance, in combination with the strong order intake, gives me confidence that we are on track to realize further growth in 2021. The strong underlying industry fundamentals and economic expectations do support this strongly. Our much-improved balance sheet gives us the financial room to further invest in strategic priorities, to grow our business, and to maximize value for all our stakeholders. With that, I'd like to hand it over to Jurgen, who will, after some short instructions, open it up for Q&A. Obviously, we're happy to take any questions you might have. Over to you, Jurgen.
Thank you, Peter, and hereby we would like to open our Q&A. In case you have a question, please let us know using the chat box, and I see already some questions, by typing, "I have a question," or simply, "Question." Subsequently, I will call out your name, and you can verbally address your questions to Peter and Virginie. Keep your questions to a maximum at two at a time. I see a first question for Luc. Luc, go ahead.
Yes, good morning. Thank you for taking my question. First, a question on the profitability. You had the best margin in, I think, quite a long time in Q1. Is this all sustainable, or are there any cost fluctuations or temporary factors that also drove up the margin in this quarter that we should take into account when forecasting the rest of the year? My second question is on CallisonRTKL, where with the Q4 results, you said that you had some spare capacity left because you expected a pickup. Now you report some hopeful signs in healthcare. Can you indicate if you still have the same expectation for the pickup going forward, and are still comfortable with the spare capacity that you are keeping?
I'll probably start, Luc, with taking your first question, or at least part of it, and then I'll hand it over to Virginie to add any color on the first one and also to speak about CallisonRTKL in detail. The improved profitability is obviously already on a trend which has started some time ago and is being created by the institutionalized performance enhancements I spoke about, and we have spoken about those almost for as long as I've been here now, four years. That includes, of course, our focus on much better project execution through Make Every Project Count, a deeper use of the Global Excellence Centers, as well as focusing on a smaller set of key clients. All these things have helped to improve our performance. They probably have the biggest contribution, the biggest share of the improvement.
Obviously in 2020, as we became aware of the pandemic, we added a set of actions. I would say that the underlying institutionalized performance enhancements have contributed, laid the foundation, and will continue to contribute to further margin improvement. Virginie, please go ahead and add, and then maybe also take Luc's question on CallisonRTKL.
Thank you, Peter. I think quite true for sure. We are not back to a pattern where we travel a lot and such, so we have some savings on that front. I won't say that it becomes anecdotal, but this is not what creates the performance. The performance really comes for our capability of executing well our projects, and this is really what it is about. Moving to CallisonRTKL. CallisonRTKL is finally delivering in this quarter a revenue which is again in decline, but a level of margin which is in line with full year 2020 and Q1 2020 if you restate from the impact of the provisions that we've been taking at year-end. Yes, we see some signs in healthcare and such, but this is not strong enough to impact our P&L and to change really the pattern of what it is.
As we said before, we think that there is a future for this business. We expect this business to start picking up again. We've not been entering in massive restructuring movements. That's also maintained a, let's say, quite low or relatively low margin for the buffers to come before we see this pickup really happening on the market. At the moment, that delivers something, as I said, end of 2020, which is in line with a rough 7%, which isn't fantastic, but it's not either a drama based on what they face in terms of a hiccup of volume of acquisition.
Okay, thank you.
I see Henk. Henk, go ahead.
Hi, good morning, Peter, Virginie. Also two questions from my side. Firstly, on the buildings end market where you indicate that there is still a decline. I think you mentioned it for the U.K. When you look at your backlog today, which obviously has also grown year to date. Do you see tangible signs of a recovery in the buildings, the more difficult buildings and markets? That's my first question. My second question is the focus on the key accounts. Can you maybe split your group organic growth and your group order book growth? What was that number for the key accounts? Thank you.
Okay. I'll do the same as we did with Luc's question, Henk. Probably use the improvements we're seeing in China as, I think, the beginning of a trend. The moment that we do see societies, communities going back to a degree of normalcy, then work is picking up. We know that in our prepared remarks that the improvement in China is visible. Last year, Q1, China, of course, was the first region in Arcadis to be hit by corona. It is clearly also the first region to come out of the pandemic because of the fact that it's largely under control, that results in business picking back up. As you well know, most of our business in China, the Arcadis business that is related to buildings.
In addition, what we do see, and we are no exception ourselves, is that clients are, of course, thinking about what is the building use of the future. How are we going to use buildings? How frequently will we use buildings? What purpose do we use them for? This is an area in which we are advising our clients quite extensively, particularly those clients who happen to have a lot of real estate across the globe. The buildings business in the future, or at least in the immediate future, I would say, is going to show a different profile. We will continue to see new build in places where you would expect new build. That, of course, includes, particularly for us, China, at least for now. Then also quite a bit of focus on repurposing buildings for a different usage going forward.
Virginie, feel free to add to this one as well as to any color you can provide on the key accounts.
Okay. Thank you, Peter. I think that it's probably worth mentioning that in terms of backlog growth, we see the backlog growing everywhere, and it's probably more growing in infrastructure and mobility than anywhere else. There is still a growth in building, even if it is, let's say, moderate compared to the growth in infra or the growth in water and environments. Hence, we still see opportunities, nice projects to bid on and backlogs to execute in the coming quarters. The pace is not at all the same, and we have a focus on execution at the moment, which is coming from the big elements we have in backlog on environment and infra side. In terms of key accounts, I would say that there is no specific pattern because we've been getting some big contracts with those over the quarter.
I wouldn't see anything quite specific in terms of difference to highlight compared to the previous quarters, I would say.
Okay. Good, I see that Hans Pluijgers has the next question. Hans, please go ahead.
Yes. Morning, all. First of all, on the revenue trends and the order book, again, a little bit more, let's say, detailed by private and public. Of course, in the past last few quarters, you indicated that there's also weakness in private. Public is still doing quite well. Could you give maybe some flavor? Do you still see stabilization in the private market or still is it weakening? Could you give maybe some flavor on let's see by those two segments compared to previous quarters, is there some change visible? Secondly, on the working capital and the cash flow, could you give maybe some feeling on the trends in unbilled receivables and in payments? Is there any material impact or change compared to what we've seen in previous quarters?
Virginie, please go ahead.
Okay. Thank you, Peter. Maybe starting with cash flow and all that stuff to park this question out. Net working capital at the moment is showing an increase in unbilled and in payables. I would say there is a bit of this which is due to mechanical impact on the fact that we are closing a little bit earlier. We usually release our financial statements one week later to be able to release on the 20th for sure. There has been some anticipation of closing in some entities, the exact amount of invoicing taken in the last one or two week has probably not been quite reflected in the figures we show. That's not at all the same thing when you are a giant, where you have a lot of weeks and such to really work on the exact number.
The pattern of Q1, in my view, is not worrying at all. It just corresponds to quite a mechanical impact that you have to anticipate a little bit of closing to release a Q1 at that moment in a project business. That where I would see the things. As you've been seeing, we've been quite able to get to a negative cash flow, which is our pattern in Q1, whatever happens, but which is quite well measured. That also corresponds to the fact that people have been quite diligent in maintaining the effort and collecting cash. Again, getting back to Q4 2020, end of Q4, we had received a bunch of cash that was quite significant and was supposed to be received in Jan and Feb.
This cash is quite definitely missing in Q1, as we don't have the same pattern end of Q1 to affect Q2.
Any impact from payables changes?
Payables is almost the same. You probably don't have all the payments that relates to the one to two last weeks of the month.
Okay, thanks.
Next question for Martijn den Drijver.
Sorry.
Please go on.
Sorry, I think I didn't answer the second question, Jurgen.
Oh, sorry. No worries.
I don't want to leave that open. Yes, we were discussing, I think between private and public clients and that's clearly something, yes, we probably have a pattern in terms of order intake, which is going to public clients as you can expect at the moment. Does it really mean that private clients are inactive? I'm not sure I would say so. I think that's probably also the volume of stimulus and of projects that are on the market and that we can tender on, which is quite important on the public side. Rather than saying that a private sector is not moving because there is still a lot of momentum on private client side in a lot of very interesting things. Jurgen, the floor is yours. Sorry.
No problem. Martijn, I see you have a question as well. Martijn?
Yes. Good morning, Peter. Good morning, Virginie. Can you hear me?
Yes, we can hear you.
Great. I'll repeat my good morning to all of you. My first question relates to the European operations. If you could provide a bit of color on the Dutch operations, the negative development there, how do you see developments throughout the quarter going into the second quarter? The same for France, where you did see some positive developments. A bit more color on both countries would be appreciated. The second question is on attrition levels and recruitments. How did attrition develop from Q4 into Q1 and then moving into Q2? What are you seeing in terms of your efforts, in recruitment? Is it getting more difficult? Is it actually becoming easier? Just a bit more color on those two fronts, if possible, I have a third question, but I'll leave that up to Jurgen to decide if I can.
Okay. We'll take these first, Martijn. I'll start with the second one. Virginie can provide color on the first one. Attrition, throughout the whole of 2020, of course, developed extremely favorable to a level we have not seen in a long time. Actually, probably right or at least close enough to the ambition level we had. You will recall from the past, particularly after I joined, I said that attrition needed to be much lower. It was in the 15% range at that time. We wanted it to be single digit. We are seeing still single digit attrition. In fact, I looked at it early this morning in preparation for the call. In most regions in Q1, we've actually seen it further come down, further decline.
For Arcadis as a whole, it's still roughly at the same level, so around the 9%, which is where it sat in Q4. With business picking up, it is going to likely be somewhat more challenging going forward to continue to hire people, and particularly in businesses which are already quite sizable and have quite a bit of promise for future growth, and that includes in particularly the U.K. and North America. There is an expectation that it will become a bit more challenging going forward. I will remind you that one of the biggest levers we have available internally to potentially stem any attrition you would have is to push more work into our Global Excellence Centers. That is probably the most meaningful availability or lever we have available. Particularly in North America, we still have that opportunity plentiful available to us.
Not pressure on cost per se or not any meaningful pressure, but as business continues to develop favorably, which is our expectation, you will see, because we're not the only ones seeing a favorable outlook, you will see a bit more pressure on attrition. It's still at a level pretty close to our ambition around the 9%.
Okay.
Maybe coming back to your question, Martijn, around the, let's say, the pattern in Europe and the difference between the various countries. I think that we can first probably drive a general pattern across Europe. That would be to say that there is less leave taken in Q1 2021 than there are usually. Obvious that people couldn't go skiing this year, February breaks that you have all across Europe have been quite disappearing. More or less people chose to work in some of the countries and such, and that's probably explaining part of it in France, for example, and in other countries like this in the U.K. also. On top of that, in some of the other countries, and that's, for example, in the U.K., there is a huge backlog to execute some projects really impacting the growth of the activity.
You see mobilization increasing on those projects and then the execution ramping up, which gives a certain volume to execute and you see a gap then. Turning to the Netherlands, good performance, I would say, in environment and in buildings, and probably a weaker performance in the infra side. Here in that country with the nitrogen law, we have difficulty to start executing some projects we have in backlog or our clients are pushing away, waiting from the law to move in the Netherlands. We see that also on the potential order intake side. For the moment, we were more or less waiting for it to happen.
We know that we have the capabilities of reorienting our team as we are now completely able to work remotely and to support teams of other countries to execute strong infra backlogs that we have, for example, in the U.K., in France or in other countries, and use these experts on other projects we have. That's probably also is the kind of answer to also your question of potential pressure on the market of hiring and such, because as we have our capability of working more transversally and helping support each other on an international market.
Okay, thank you.
Thanks, Martijn. Let's first give the floor to Quirijn, and then later we can come back to you. Quirijn, please go ahead. Hello, Quirijn? Quirijn, we can't hear you. Can you otherwise type in your question? Quirijn?
Maybe taking another question while Quirijn maybe trying to connect.
Yes, okay. I do see Martijn den Drijver , you have a question as well. Martijn? Also Martijn, we can't hear you. Otherwise, please, if you have a question, Quirijn and Martijn, please write it in the chat and then I can take your question as well.
Let's try Hans. Hans has a follow-up question as well. See if Hans can connect. Otherwise, we have a technical issue, I'm afraid.
Hans?
You hear me?
Yes, I can hear you.
Yes.
Okay. There was no technical problem. Okay, two for me, more detailed questions. First of all, on Australia, you pointed out that you see some delay in order rewarding. How do you see it going forward? Do you, based on that, expect, let's say, a return to growth in the coming quarter already, or give maybe some flavor on that? Secondly, it's already a little bit discussed on the GECs, but could you give maybe some feeling what the growth was in that part of the business of the GECs, what sales growth was coming from that part?
Yeah, I'll provide some perspective on both, and then again, Virginie can add answer. Australia, as we noted, was an issue and affected already. I think we already noted that in Q3 and with our Q4 report that, and it seems now that it's way behind us, but Australia also dealt with COVID, of course, and that made the government redirect their attention to other things than awarding large programs, which is the business we're in to a large extent in Australia. We already said halfway last year that we're starting to see or started to see that awards would slip into the new year, into 2021, and that trend has continued. It is not like the business all of a sudden shows a very different profile with much less opportunities. It's simply timing, and timing on large programs.
Unlike small projects, which don't necessarily are impacted that much by significant delays, large programs, which what we are, to a large extent involved in in Australia, tend to slip quite easily because they're big programs requiring big decisions. It is simply a move of awards from 2020 into 2021. It actually continued in the first quarter. It's nothing we are overly worried about. It is not because a lot of opportunities fell by the wayside or have been eliminated. It's just a timing issue and no more than that. On the GECs, we noted at the end of last year that we had, in spite of the pandemic, met our goal of increasing the GEC hours over 2020 in all regions. That was also in the wake of the pandemic, and that was not a small achievement.
We are quite proud that we were able to do it. For 2021, of course, we have further increased the goals, and it is actually positive to see that one of the regions we noted before as the region with probably a significant opportunity to further use the GECs, which is North America, that they have actually for the first quarter slightly exceeded the plan for usage of GECs. We are definitely still there on the same trajectory of using GECs more. It is now, I think, just over 11% of our total. Heading in the direction we wanted to go into.
You said that last year it was about 10%, 15% growth of the GEC hours. Is that the same number?
That was what we said for 2020, indeed. Yeah. 2020, we wanted to do 15% more hours in the GEC, billable hours, and we achieved that in 2020.
That's the same trend we're currently seeing more?
Yeah.
More or less.
That is the trend we will continue to follow.
Okay, thanks.
I see a question in the chat from Quirijn Mulder. I think the first question around the situation in Australia is already answered by Peter, but the second one is about, can you update us on the situation with regards to the non-financial targets, excluding attrition? Peter.
I think the other non-financial targets are the targets I did mention, or at least to an extent, mentioned in my prepared remarks, Quirijn. That, of course, includes reducing our carbon footprint and committing to the no more than one and a half degrees Centigrade science-based targets by 2030 or earlier. That is something we will definitely achieve. The other one is on diversity and inclusion to get 40% females in our workforce by 2023. I am convinced we will achieve that as well. We have signaled already with the Capital Markets Day, that particularly on sustainability and on diversity and inclusion, that throughout the three-year cycle, we will introduce additional targets to further focus in those two areas. We are on track with the targets we established, what is it? Only six months ago.
We will continue to add new targets, particularly on sustainability and on diversity and inclusion, as we progress through the current strategy cycle.
Thanks, Peter. First, I want to give the floor to Martijn, and then after Martijn, I go to Henk. Martijn, please go ahead.
Yes. I think there was already a question on incidentals in the quarter, to which the answer was no, I understand. In Q4, there was an element in the cash flow, which was positive, bringing on balance the insurance captive. Did that have a role in the first quarter as well relative to Q1 2020? I can already see Jurgen nodding no, but would be interesting to hear a little bit more about that. With regards to the repayments of the deferred taxes and VAT, was any of that repaid in the first quarter? Those two were my questions.
Thank you, Martijn. I think that captive will have had an impact only the quarter where we consolidated for the first time. You had the movement that appears in the cash flow statement, and this is more or less where you have to say where it is. If we had a strong movement, would mean that one way or the other, we would had send a very big use of claim facility or not, which generally does not happen because you always need to balance the cash that you send, and now it will be purely intercompany movement. The captive should not create anything in the future until the moment we might could decide to close it, for example, and then get it out again, and then you would see elements coming from that.
I would analyze that as a pure, let's say, technical effect of the first consolidation. Then, I think your second question was about defaults of payment, and I think that this quarter, over the EUR 37 million we had to reimburse, it's probably something around EUR 8 million that has been reimbursed. So our cash flow for sure is affected by this small group.
Thank you, Virginie.
Did you say EUR 8 million?
Yeah.
Great. Thank you.
Okay. We go to Henk, and then after that, we have a question from Quirijn. Henk, go ahead, please.
Yes. Thank you, Jurgen. One follow-up from my side. On the larger infrastructure wins, which you mentioned in your press release are embedded in the order book. How will it phase throughout the remainder of 2021? Thanks.
Virginie, you want to take that one?
I'm sorry, I didn't hear it well. Can you repeat it for me, please, Peter?
Yeah, sure. You indicate in your press release larger infrastructure wins. I think maybe some of them also relate to, obviously, the recent stimulus, and the plans in the U.S. and in Europe. Can you indicate how will these projects in the order book, how will they phase throughout the remainder of 2021?
Yes. Thank you, Henk. In the U.S., for the moment, I think we perceive the movement. There are projects that come on the table and such, but I would say it's far too early to say and predict, more or less, any strong pickup or strong change in the award of this project. That always take quite a long time, and I think this is probably what will happen to this stimulus in the U.S. Question is really about materialization of all those contracts. Definitely, we think that it is a good opportunity, and at least that we hear about it, and we are on the track to position ourselves and take our fair share. I have no crystal ball, and it would be quite, I think, exaggerated to give anticipation as of now of what it could do in terms of impacting our 2021 order intake.
In Europe, there are already a few programs because there is also a kind of potential requalification of existing programs that were either launched or on the verge of being launched, to get in the Green Deal or in launching programs. That's quite different, and some of the projects that either had been awarded or were just to be awarded and under discussion, seems that they can be qualified from time to time. That can result in changing a little bit the proposal or such to cope with different requirements or demands. That can be also positive in terms of future volume of work, even if it delays a little bit from time to time. It's just the existing program which is stamped as is, and it's probably part of what we see as momentum in the infra in Europe, which answers to that question.
Yeah. If I could maybe add to a little bit of additional color. The reference you made is the reference to the press release where we did indeed speak about those infrastructure projects which we have been able to win. That includes, as Virginie just mentioned, HS2, which is a project we've mentioned in the past, and of course, a significant project for Arcadis, but a significant project for the U.K. as a whole as well. That project has a lifespan which is well beyond what we typically see on our projects, because this is a multi-year program for which we expect to be involved for many more years going forward.
The other one which qualifies under that reference in the press release was the work actually I mentioned for the Department of Transportation in Georgia, in Alabama, and in Louisiana, which is to help our clients there reduce the congestion around the larger cities. That is probably a bit more of the typical project work with a duration which is more typical for Arcadis. We do like the programs like HS2 because it is almost like an annuity, whereby for many years you will get and stay engaged in a very large program which will run for at least another, I don't know, seven or eight years.
Thanks.
Thanks, Peter. I see also a question from Quirijn. In terms of cost savings, the 30% lower cost, are they on plan? That's the question. Peter, Virginie?
Yeah. I probably have to ask, I don't know whether Quirijn is able to speak other than typing, but I'm not sure where the 30% came from, Quirijn. Can you clarify where the 30% came from?
It's the office footprint we mentioned in the capital markets.
Oh, the office footprint. Okay.
Yeah.
If it's solely about office footprint, thanks for clarifying, Jurgen. Of course, that is an issue whereby you deal with, in most cases, leases which span over multiple years. We have committed to, over the next three years, reduce our footprint with 30%. That is on track. I can't give you a specific number at this point in time, but we are still committed to reduce our footprint with 30% over the time span of our current strategy, so three years.
Maybe it's worth mentioning that to deliver that, we have a plan. We know exactly what will be the venture of savings that will come year after year, as you can embed it in sort of those plans. As Peter rightly said, a lot of that is being around leases. There is a huge part which is back-end loaded, but yet we exactly know what and how it will come, and a small tranche will start impacting 2021 for sure.
Thank you.
Thanks, Quirijn. We see that you typed in office cost now, and hopefully we did answer your question. Thanks for the clarification.
Martijn-
I think there's probably one from Martijn. Yeah.
Yeah. Martijn? I see that you are on mute. Not on mute anymore, but we can't hear you. Can you maybe type in the question, Martijn? Probably don't. Maybe someone else? Martijn, you have another question? I see you, no. Okay. Are there any more questions? No? I'd like to hand it over to Peter for some closing remarks. Peter?
Yeah. Thank you. Martijn, we will get to you separately because there seemed to be a technical glitch not allowing you to actually speak or even type in. We'll get back to you separately. First of all, I want to thank you for joining us today for our Q1 trading update. We've talked about the pandemic a lot over the last, what is it? 13, 14 months now or so. We also concluded before that we were, and no one was really very well prepared to handle the pandemic. That being said, as I mentioned in response to some of your questions, the improvements we identified over the four years since I joined have really paid dividends for us, and particularly throughout the pandemic. Without these improvements, I would have probably been sitting here in a different mindset with a different mood.
Clearly the performance improvements, that includes Make Every Project Count to focus on our key clients, the extensive use of Global Excellence Centers, have helped us a lot in weathering the storm. The additional things we did at the beginning of last year, as we became aware of the pandemic, have also provided further tailwind. I sit here being really proud of what we have done, again, in the first quarter, pleased with the performance. I also sit here with confidence when I look forward and see what the developments in the world are. The fact that, as I mentioned in my prepared comments, sustainability is now absolutely mainstream, and we see client after client now asking for capabilities needed to help them address their sustainability challenges.
I sit here as someone who's pleased and happy with the performance we have delivered in Q1 with the foundation we created over the last four years, but even more with confidence about the future, looking at what the world needs and how well Arcadis is positioned to address the needs of our clients and of the world at large. With that, I want to thank you again for joining. I also wish you to stay safe and healthy. Thanks, everyone, and we'll see you again in the next quarter.