Thank you, Matthijs, and welcome everyone. Let's start with some highlights of the fourth quarter and the full year. We delivered on our 2025 outlook, and group service revenues increased by 2.7%, with all segments contributing. Adjusted EBITDA and free cash flow exceeded guidance. We maintained strict cost control across the organization. Indirect costs were EUR 10 million lower than last year, marking a clear turning point in indirect OpEx. In the fourth quarter, we saw consumer delivering another quarter of strong commercial momentum, especially in broadband, with record net additions for the full year. Business growth was mainly driven by SME, and wholesale continued to grow, mainly driven by sponsored roaming.
Last year, we expanded our footprint by adding 440,000 fiber homes and around 400,000 homes connected, and we strengthened our mobile network with the launch of our tower company, Althio. Through ongoing investments in cybersecurity, we ensure a resilient network that protects all users. For 2026, we expect service revenue growth of 2%-2.5%, EBITDA of approximately EUR 2.67 billion, CapEx of about EUR 1.25 billion, and free cash flow of more than EUR 950 million. Our dividend per share is expected to grow by 10%, and we intend a new share buyback of EUR 250 million in 2026.
All in all, we closed the year in a good way, and we are well positioned to sustain healthy service revenue growth in the coming years, supported by our leading positions in consumer and business markets and continued growth in wholesale. At the same time, we are accelerating our transformation to deliver around EUR 100 million in annual net indirect OpEx savings by 2030. Reducing CapEx below EUR 1 billion by 2027 next year will drive strong cash generation and deliver attractive shareholder returns. Later, Chris will give you more details on our financials and 2026 outlook. We delivered on our 2025 outlook. Service revenues grew by around 3%. EBITDA slightly exceeded guidance.
Free cash flow was strong at EUR 952 million, ahead of the upgraded outlook we gave at the half-year results, despite slightly higher CapEx. We reiterate our dividend commitment, and we will pay a regular dividend per share of EUR 0.182 over 2025, following AGM approval in mid-April. At our strategy update in November, we reaffirmed that we are well on track to achieving our Connect, Activate & Grow strategy, which is supported by three key pillars. One, we continue to invest in the leading networks. Two, we continue to grow and protect our customer base. And three, we further modernize and simplify our operating model. And together, these priorities support our ambition to grow service revenues and EBITDA by approximately 3% on average, and free cash flow by approximately 7% over the entire strategic period.
Let me now walk you through the operational performance in more detail. We hold a clear lead in the Dutch fiber market, both in homes passed and connected, and in business parks through our joint venture in Glaspoort. And together with Glaspoort, we now cover nearly 6 million Dutch homes for around 70% of the country. And to maintain our network leadership, we further optimized our rollout process and shifted focus from passing homes to connecting and activating households. And this approach is paying off with a record number of homes connected in Q4 and continued growth in fiber broadband net adds. Consumer service revenues continued to grow, driven by consistent fiber and mobile service revenue growth. A commercial momentum remains strong across both fixed and mobile, with subscriber growth exceeding our fair share.
Throughout the year, our Net Promoter Score improved, supported by operational excellence, our Combivoordeel offer, and initiatives launched to strengthen digital engagement. Now, let's take a closer look at our fourth quarter KPIs. Thanks to strong execution and proactive base management, we delivered double-digit broadband net adds growth for the third quarter in a row, supported by a healthy inflow of new fiber customers. Our fixed ARPU held firm despite continued investments in our base and the competitive markets. Together, these achievements drove service revenues growth of 0.4%. In mobile, we added 24,000 postpaid subscribers, and postpaid ARPU increased year on year, supported by the price increase in October, partly offset by the ongoing promotional activity in the fourth quarter. Combined, these factors led to 2.9% growth in mobile service revenue. Now, let's turn to B2B.
Business service revenues increased by 2.3% year-on-year, mainly driven by SME. Also here, Net Promoter Score improved throughout the year, reflecting the continued trust from our B2B customers for stability, reliability, and the quality of our networks and services. SME remains B2B's main growth engine, driven by broadband, mobile, and cloud and workspace. LCE service revenue growth trend remains relatively stable, supported by continued growth in unified communications, CPaaS, IoT, and a growing customer base, partially offset by continued price pressure in mobile. Finally, tailored solution service revenue decreased, reflecting a focus on value steering. Wholesale continued to grow, mainly driven by the strong performance in mobile. Broadband service revenues increased, driven by fiber, and the growth trend leveled off compared to previous quarters, driven by the decline in the wholesale copper base.
Mobile remained strong, driven by continued growth in international sponsored roaming, and other service revenues increased, mainly due to an uptake in visitor roaming. ESG remains a core element of our strategy, and on this slide we show you the progress on carbon reduction, circularity, and diversity. And to further reduce our carbon footprint across the value chain, we increased our green energy sourcing in 2025, supported by a solar energy partnership with Eneco. And our Scope 2 emissions have further decreased by 70% year-on-year, while Scope 3 emissions slightly increased, but this was due to an expanded scope. Next to this, we of course remain committed to improving our diversity targets. Although achieving gender balance in recruitment remains challenging, diversity and inclusion continue to be top priority for us.
As we summarize, we ended 2025 in a strong position, and we carry that momentum into 2026. With a strong commercial execution, a healthy base inflow, and improving ARPU, we are well positioned and confident in delivering on our 2026 outlook. Now, let me hand over to Chris to give you more details on the financials.
Thank you, Joost. Let me now take you through our financial performance. First, let me summarize some key figures for the fourth quarter and the full year. First, the adjusted revenues were up 2.7% year-on-year Q4, driven by a service revenue growth across all segments, and also higher non-service revenues. Second, our adjusted EBITDA increased by 5.1% compared to last year, supported by higher revenues and lower indirect costs. Underlying EBITDA growth, excluding Althio, was 3.7% in Q4, and our EBITDA margin improved by a hundred basis points to 44.6% of total adjusted revenues. Third, our net profit increased 12% year-on-year, supported by a one-off tax gain of about EUR 20 million from the recognition of a deferred tax asset.
Finally, for the full year, our free cash flow increased by 5.8% year-on-year to EUR 962 million, mainly driven by EBITDA growth. Also, our free cash flow margin over total adjusted revenues grew by nearly 40 basis points. With our ongoing share buybacks, we reduced the number of shares outstanding. Our free cash flow per share growth is even stronger at 7% year-on-year, and we'll share more detail on the underlying cash developments later in the presentation. In the fourth quarter, group service revenues grew by 1.8% year-on-year, supported by growth in all segments. In this mix, we saw consumer revenue service revenues increase by 1.2%, driven by continued solid commercial momentum in both fixed and mobile.
For 2026, we expect consumer service revenue growth about 1.5% year-on-year, supported by base growth and commercial improvements. Business service revenue growth was 2.3% year-on-year, mainly driven by SME. Tailored Solutions were negative, reflecting our focus on margins and contract quality. For 2026, we expect B2B to grow about 3% year-on-year, with growth weighted towards the second half of the year, given the segment's strong performance in the first half of 2025, and therefore, the comps it will weigh against Tailored Solutions revenue growth. Our higher margin SME business will continue to show growth in the 5% region throughout the year. And finally, wholesale service revenues increased by 3.9% year-on-year, driven by ongoing growth in international sponsored roaming business.
For 2026, wholesale is expected to grow by about 3%, supported by mobile. For the full year and on a like-for-like basis, so excluding IPR benefits and the contribution from Althio, our adjusted EBITDA grew by 3.1%, exceeding our 3% CMD hurdle. This growth was driven by higher service revenues and supported by strict cost control. Direct costs or cost of goods sold increased mainly due to the service revenue mix effects in B2B and higher third-party access costs due to Glaspoort. In 2025, we reduced indirect costs by about EUR 10 million, marking a clear inflection point after two years of inflationary pressure. The savings came from disciplined cost management, automation, digitalization, lease portfolio optimization, and workforce reductions of over 300 FTE year-on-year, or more than 500 if we include contingent external staff.
As shared in our strategy update, we are targeting EUR 100 million in net indirect OpEx savings over the next five years under our transformation programs. In 2026, we expect about EUR 15 million-EUR 20 million in additional savings, driven by faster digital transformation, AI-enabled process improvements, and continued cost base optimization. Our cost reduction program clearly builds momentum and will show gradually accelerating benefits over the coming years. Our operational free cash flow continues to show healthy growth of nearly 10%, or about 6%, excluding IPR benefits and Althio. The growth is driven by EBITDA, while CapEx was marginally higher than last year, primarily due to a non-cash accounting reassessment relating to cable damages.
For 2026, and on a like-for-like basis, so excluding IPR benefits and excluding IP sales, we expect to deliver a mid- to high single-digit growth in operational free cash flow, in line with our CMD guidance. This underlying growth in operational free cash flow will be driven by EBITDA growth and effectively stable CapEx. In 2026, after completing the heavy lifting phase of our fiber rollout, we expect and confirm a significant step down in CapEx of about EUR 250 million, bringing total CapEx to below EUR 1 billion. With EBITDA growth and this CapEx step down in 2027, operating free cash flow is set to grow by about 10% annually on average over the strategic period.
The strong cash conversion will lift operating free cash flow margins from 24% today to about 30%, placing us among the top performers in Europe. This underpins our long-term value creation model and reinforces our confidence in delivering sustainable cash flow growth in the years ahead. Turning to now into the moving parts of our free cash flow. At EUR 952 million, our free cash flow is about 6% higher, driven by EBITDA growth and partially offset by changes in working capital and an increase in cash tax and interest payments. Excluding the cash component of the IPR benefits, our free cash flow grew at low single-digit rates. Note that the delta provisions is related to lower pension effects, pension provisions, and some timing effects.
Our cash margin over revenues improved by 85.40 basis points to 16.3%, reflecting the solid cash generation momentum of KPN, and we ended the year with a cash position of EUR 552 million. KPN remains focused on creating long-term value, which is evidenced also by the strong return on capital employed. Our ROCE improved by 30 basis points year-on-year to 14.7%, nearing and marching towards our midterm ambition of 15%, driven by operational efficiency, demonstrating our continued commitment to create value through operations and investments. We maintain a strong and resilient balance sheet. At year-end, with a leverage ratio of 2.4x , stable compared to previous year and below our self-imposed ceiling of 2.5 x. Our interest coverage ratio has also remained strong.
Our average cost of senior debt decreased by 30 basis points year-on-year, mainly due to optimization of our derivatives portfolio, and our exposure to floating rates remains limited at 14%. Our total liquidity position of around EUR 1.6 billion remains strong, covering debt maturities until the end of 2028. At our strategy update, we reaffirmed our mid-term 3-3-7 financial ambitions. We see healthy service revenue growth through coming years while accelerating our transformation to deliver about EUR 100 million in net indirect operating savings annually by 2030. Which means for 2026, group service revenue growth is expected to between 2% and 2.5%, with all segments contributing.
We expect adjusted EBITDA after leases to be around EUR 2.67 billion or around 3% growth on a like-for-like basis, i.e., excluding IPR benefits and IP sales and in line with our midterm ambitions. Growth will be driven by continued service revenue growth and lower indirect costs. We anticipate net indirect OpEx savings of EUR 15 million-EUR 20 million next year. Throughout the year, EBITDA year-on-year growth is expected to be strong in Q1 and Q4, while Q2 and Q3 will face tougher comparisons. CapEx will remain at around EUR 1.25 billion, in line with our midterm guidance, and we expect a free cash flow of over EUR 950 million.
On a like-for-like basis, so including the aforementioned one-off effects in 2025, our free cash flow expected to grow low to mid-single digits, primarily driven by EBITDA growth and partly offset by higher cash taxes. And finally, over the entire strategic period, we reiterate our financial ambitions to grow service revenues and adjusted EBITDA by 3% and free cash flow by 7% per annum on average, as reflected in the 3-3-7 KPN model. Note that our underlying 2026 guidance and our daily trading are both in line and on track with this multi-year ambition, and we feel confident to reach our planned level of cash generation and shareholder distributions. On that very matter, our financial framework is centered on long-term value creation for all stakeholders.
In this respect, we are committed to returning all free cash flow to our shareholders. Our free cash flow per share was up 7% during the year, providing ample room for growth in our dividends per share as well, which means we intend to pay a regular dividend of EUR 0.20 per share over 2026, up 10% compared to the DPS over 2025, and fully in line with what we communicated at our strategy update. For 2027, we aim for a further increase to about EUR 0.25 or EUR 0.25 increase year on year. And in addition, as announced this morning, we will launch a share buyback program of EUR 250 million in 2025, notably starting tomorrow. Let me conclude with some key takeaways. We delivered on our 2025 outlook.
Consistent service revenue growth across all segments. Adjusted EBITDA and free cash flow came in slightly above guidance, and disciplined cost management delivered a EUR 10 million reduction in indirect OpEx, marking a clear inflection point after two years of inflationary pressure. We saw solid commercial entry in consumer and business, including record growth and net adds in consumer. We continue to lead the Dutch fiber market with accelerated delivery of fiber-connected and activated homes. Our strong progress in 2025 confirms the successful execution of our strategy and positions us for future growth. We reaffirm our 3-3-7 financial framework, and the announced 2026 targets are fully aligned with this multi-year plan, including the CapEx deadline in 2027 to unlock enhanced cash conversion. We are accelerating transformation, targeting EUR 100 million in indirect OpEx savings over the next five years.
Beyond 2027, we expect mid-single-digit free cash flow growth, supported by strong fundamentals and disciplined execution. Cash momentum was very strong and solid going into 2025, providing us with confidence. Finally, we are committed to returning all free cash flow to shareholders through growing dividends and buybacks, and the latter starting tomorrow. Thanks for listening. Now back to your questions.
Thank you, Joost and Chris. We will now start the Q&A session. Please limit your questions to two, please. Operator, could you please open the line for the Q&A? Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, as you just heard, we will start the question-and-answer session now. If you would like to ask a question, you may do so by pressing pound key five on your telephone keypad. The first question comes from Mr. Polo Tang from UBS. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Afternoon. Thanks for taking the questions. I have two. The first one is just about consumer broadband net adds. So they've been very solid for the past three quarters at more than 10,000 a quarter. But do you think this level of net adds growth is sustainable going forward? I'm just asking the question because you referenced taking more than your fair share earlier in the presentation. Also, you've got Odido gaining subscribers with FWA. VodafoneZiggo seems to be making progress in stabilizing its broadband base and will also start wholesaling in the Delta Fiber footprint. So I'm just interested in how you're thinking about competitive dynamics for the broadband market going forward. Second question is just on B 2 B.
Do you think that B2B service revenues can grow in Q1 and Q2, given that you've got that tough comparable and tailored solutions? And what's your view on the Dutch macro environment, and are you seeing any signs of caution from your B2B clients? Thanks.
Thanks for your questions, Polo, and I'll start, and then Chris will join me, I guess. Yeah, on consumer broadband, net adds, you're right, three strong quarters in a row. And meanwhile, we operate in a very competitive market. That remains competitive. This is more or less normal course of business for us nowadays. And I think what we can more or less conclude is that the new strategy of ours is working, where we focus on base management instead of acquiring new customers who leave in a year for a free TV set from another service provider. So we invest a lot in our customer base, and that seems to work. Is it sustainable, you said?
Well, you mentioned FWA from Odido, changes in the portfolio from Ziggo strategy. I think FWA is a niche market. That's in a country where households have two or three fixed lines into a household, where one gig is the standard, and four gig is becoming quite normal, fixed. Unlimited is the standard on mobile. Fixed wireless access as a broadband connection is more for a niche segment than anything else. We more or less have, by the way, the same for rural areas. And for the Ziggo, they're clearly now making noise around being a full, always-on provider when it comes to quality and content. But let's see.
I think for us, the best answer to everything for the last years was believe in your own plan, believe in your own strategy, and execute on that. Last quarter was pretty good. Of course, we plan to continue, perhaps not always above 10, but we plan for strong growth, healthy growth on broadband this year as well. And on this, B2B service revenues, I mean, the Dutch economy is growing and also expected to grow in 2026. SME is very important segment for ours. That will grow probably around 5%, like we did last year. Yeah, you see some changes in our top line in B2B because we, what we mentioned, focus on the value steering.
That is mainly in the tailored solutions part, where we say goodbye to revenues that are not really contributing when it comes to margin. So, of course, for us, very important to explain that to you in the quarters to come, but, when it comes to healthy margin-rich revenues, I think we will do fine in B2 B. Chris?
Yeah, Polo, on your first point on broadband, just two points to add is that obviously, the important drivers behind the solid net adds were lower churn and lower migration. Churn has been consistently lower and declining during the last half year. I think it also has to do with the fact that our copper base is gradually shrinking, so the vulnerable part of our business is declining. Migrations from front to back book have—we've managed that successfully, Combivoordeel would work . I would say the churn side has been very positive. If you look at fiber, our real net adds, you know, fiber net adds, excluding copper upgrades of clients moving from copper to fiber, has been pretty consistent now for multiple quarters in a row. I no see reason to see that stop.
On B2B, as Joost rightly pointed out, on the tailored solution side, we've been, you know, focusing value and margins, which mean that, you know, SME will continue to grow north of 5% basically during the year. I mean, that's the highest margin business that we have, and that continues to grow nicely across all quarters. I expect the LCE business to also show positive growth across the quarters. Tailored solution will be negative, I guess, in the first half year, due to the comps. That means that reporting-wise, B2B, across the entire year, will be growing around 3%, but heavily tilted towards the second half of the year and run flattish, I guess, in the first half of the year. But that's really the only set of pure tailored solutions effect.
The high-margin businesses, SME and LCE, will continue to show steady growth throughout the year. And then when the comps start to work for us, you, you see the acceleration of at least of reported growth. But I mean, the 3% for the year is, is pretty well supported. It just will be, as you rightly pointed out, tilted toward the second half of the year.
Clear. Thank you very much.
The next question comes from Joshua Mills from BNP Paribas. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hi, guys. Thanks for the questions. A couple from me. The first one was on the consumer side. So, I think, Chris, you might have mentioned that the annual service revenue guidance for consumer, if you could just remind us of that. I assume it will be accelerating throughout the year. And my question is, what's gonna drive that? Is it continued volume growth, or are you also expecting ARPU to improve as well? And then secondly, related to that, if I look at the price increases last year, you were broadly in line with both Odido and VodafoneZiggo. On the broadband side, I think you're a bit ahead on the mobile side.
Now that you are outperforming your net add share relative to your market share in the Dutch market, and given some of the more aggressive price increases we've seen from the likes of Swisscom yesterday, and incumbents taking advantage of their network leadership to put prices up, how are you thinking about the value versus volume mix going forward, and is there the opportunity with this fiber networks be a bit more ambitious on price take? Thanks.
Yeah, when I come to you guys, 1.5% growth throughout the year. It becomes no issue what we do today. I would say mobile itself should continue to grow nicely, should be north of 3%. During the year, we were now hovering around 3%. That should be fine. Continuing with that, you know, pretty healthy net add growth and supporting ARPU. I think I picked something similar. Joost talked about the base dynamics, current improvements, and a flat to up ARPU. So during the year, I'd expect a continuation of reasonable net add growth and flat to increasing ARPU, supported by some price indexations. Obviously, we're looking at back book and front book alike to make sure we are fully consistent with orienting with a value orientation.
So strategy-wise, to also take on your second question, we are a value over volume business. We'd love to take a bit more than our, you know, running market share, which we do. I think that's a reflection of the networks and the quality that we've, we've built. We see some effects on network quality, both in mobile and fixed, positively reflecting on us. So that should allow us to get, you know, continued inflow of, of net adds. But it, it's a—it will remain value-oriented anything else, and that means for consumer, 1.5% growth during the year.
I would say during the year, I would expect mobile to be strong in their first half of the year, and the second half of the year, possibly some of the combi promo effects will fade, with fixed, you know, carrying the baton from the second half of the year a bit more. And on price increases, I mean, that's a call we make every second quarter of the year on broadband. Last year it was more or less centered around the CPI, so inflation.
Got it. Thank you very much.
The next question comes from Siyi He from Citi. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hello, thank you for taking my questions. I have two, please. The first one is just going back on the consumer ARPU comments, and it seems that the mobile ARPU has stabilized, and despite that, you have the combo discount on the fixed products, and you still deliver a stable fixed ARPU. I'm just wondering if you could comment on what you see in the ARPU development. Should we expect there is a solid reason for us to believe that ARPU is going to be stable and growing going forward? And the second question is really a quick one. Just wondering your views on the increasing rigid stance from the EU on the Chinese vendors, and if you could comment on what's your exposure there, and what do you think it could potentially impact your CapEx plan? Thank you.
Yeah. Thank you. Let me take the first question on ARPU. I think for both mobile and fixed, we expect, you know, stable to a modest increase in ARPU. On fixed, driven by price indexations, a shift towards higher speed levels, that we had this year as well, and a relatively manageable amount of migrations from front book to back book. In the latter, obviously a margin diluted, but that's the effects tend to be increasingly limited. We're able to manage that pretty well. A big chunk of our broadband base is in contracts, so with that, I expect fixed ARPU to be stable to have a modest growth over the year. Something similar for mobile. Obviously, we had a step down in mobile in last year, or at least lower growth, mostly in the no-frills part and driven by the non-committed part of the ARPUs.
I think that is, it feels like stabilization in that pace, at play. So what to drive mobile ARPU? It is, indexations, surely in b ack book, possibly more. It is a gradual continued move to unlimited customers. A significant amount of our new sales are now in unlimited. We're basically at our targets, and we want half in unlimited. And I think also gradual stabilization of the market in a no-frill segment with, I would say, less pressure on the non-committed parts. So in summary, I'd expect both fixed and mobile ARPU to be at least stable or deliver some modest growth during the year. Yeah.
And on Chinese vendors, yeah, we are well on track on implementing 5G Toolbox, swapping non-Western suppliers from critical systems while we introduce European vendors there.
We already started down this path many years ago, and we are fully aligned with the Dutch and the EU security guidelines. Of course, there's some discussion in the market about the Cybersecurity Act. Seems it's proposing a further ban on high-risk vendors. For me, too early to tell what the full consequences are, and I expect extensive debate there, and yeah, more finalization in that towards the end of 2027. But I think the main message is, we already started this many years ago, and we follow this life cycle with assets in our approach, so we do not see any impact on our CapEx envelope in the future.
Thank you.
The next question comes from Ajay Soni from JP Morgan. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hi, guys. Thanks for taking the questions. I've got a couple. The first is on your 2026 wholesale growth. You guide it to 3%, medium-term target here is 4%. So what are the headwinds you see this year, which you expect to fade into the medium term? Then the second one is just around the convergent impact on your fixed service revenue. So just wondering what the impact was in this quarter versus Q3, and then how you expect that impact to evolve over 2026. I think you've already said it will kind of fade by H2. So just some clarity on that. Thank you.
Yeah, let me take both of them. On wholesale, we need, like, on wholesale, broadband, mobile. Mobile is continuing to do well, both on the national solutions as well as our international sponsored roaming solution. There's a very good funnel of customers waiting to be connected, or to be contracted. In broadband, we've seen usually a decline in our total base, mostly copper. So we decline in copper, increase in fiber. Has to do with our main wholesale broadband customer, shutting down the brand. That effect will probably continue into Q1, but then gradually expected to fade towards the half year. Although you should ask the client for more intel. But I think that happened last year, and that effectively shows up in the numbers this year.
So basically, a stabilization this year will mean, you know, supporting service revenue growth in 2027. There's always, like, a bit of a year lag between base developments and what you actually report in terms of service revenue. So to me. And also it's moderation of broadband service revenue growth in this year and support next year, as this, you know, brands fade away, brand effect starts to fade away, supporting growth in 2027 onwards and continuation of the sponsored roaming effects. And on the convergent, the Combivoordeel effect, we reported a fixed service revenue growth of 0.4% in Q4. If we hadn't made this investment, fixed service revenue would have been around 1% for a year, as fixed only. So basically, that's kind of the magnitude of things.
If you look at the total service revenues of next year, the total effect for the, for the year is probably around 15 basis points of growth for KPN as a whole. Look, it's a small amount, but as we were talking about, few digits after the comma, it actually has an effect. Basically, fixed would have been around 1% for in Q4 instead of 0.4%, and for the full year 2026, I think the effect on service revenue growth of this investment is about 15 basis points of growth. I expect this gradually to fade as second half, be it towards the end of the year. More like Q4, you'll see less and less.
And basically, the investment will continue, but then the base that is subject to the plan will be big enough so you can see lower, the effect of lower churn. Already, for those customers who've been part of the Combivoordeel, you know, plan, have shown markedly lower churn, so that will start to weigh in the numbers in the second half of the year. And let's be conservative, more towards Q4 than Q3.
Great. Thank you.
The next question comes from Keval Khiroya from Deutsche Bank. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Thank you. I've got two questions, please. Firstly, you talked about mobile growth within consumer of 3% in 2026. Q4 was at that level, but benefits from quite an easy comp. Can you just elaborate a little bit more what's gonna drive the acceleration to that 3% in mobile for 2026? And secondly, Delta and ODF have now pretty much completed their fiber rollouts. What's happening to your customer churn in these areas? Is it slowing as they've ended their rollout, or is churn still at similar levels, given they're still ultimately trying to penetrate these networks? Thank you.
Well, look, on mobile side, actually, you've got different, more challenging comps, but, at last, we've done both front book and back book repricings, last year. We looked at a more for more price increase last year, and, we might as well just repeat that action this year. So there are a number of pricing actions we do on our mobile business, rate indexation and the more for more for existing customers. I think that's one. Secondly, our base has grown. Our total mobile base has grown by 129,000 over the year. Actually, I mean, 2024 was a fantastic year. That makes 2025 look like a lesser year, but remember, 2025 was actually still a lot better than 2023 and 2022. So still, it's still one of the best mobile years in history in terms of that.
So basically, next year, you have the benefit of a higher starting base to continue, and base continues to grow in Q4 and also the first weeks in this year. And then you have another round of price indexations and possibly a more for more indexation as well for customers. So that should support mobile revenue growth. And secondly, obviously, the big unknown is the amount of traffic and uncommitted. That has declined a lot, but it feels that hopefully, we'll reach the bottom of that as well. So that gives us comfort that in general, mobile growth should be healthy, also in the tougher first half year comps.
Yes, Kevin, you're right. Delta and the ODF are no longer expanding their fiber footprint. They're clearly focusing more on yeah, trying to connect households. These are footprints of different qualities. In the Delta footprint, we originally in some places have a lower market share, and the ODF built their footprint in mainly the strong signal area, the larger cities. So it's a bit of different dynamics in both footprints. And in the ODF area, we're building as well. And yeah, our strategy there, of course, is to not only pass households, but also connect and activate. And I think that's a big difference between us and the others. So on fiber, by overbuilding in the cities, we're doing good.
Market shares on copper in other fiber areas are, of course, lower than the than we represent the fiber areas, but still doing okay. I think expanding our footprint to 70% and connecting so many households, and at the end, moving up to 85% makes the churn in the copper areas also slowing down.
That's clear. Thank you both.
The next question comes from Paul Sidney from Berenberg. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thank you very much. Good afternoon. A couple of questions from me, please. Just the first one, just perhaps building on a few of the earlier questions around customer behavior. You've made some very positive comments around churn, retention, network quality, appreciation, especially interesting, given the price increases that you've been putting through over the past few years. But just a very high-level question: Does this really suggest a wider appreciation of the services you provide for consumers and businesses? And the follow on from that is, you know, it feels like there's substantial room for price increases to continue over the next few years. And again, just coming back to an earlier analyst comment around the Swisscom move yesterday, it does feel like a bit of a shift, but I'm just interested to hear your comments around that.
And then, just, secondly, Chris, on capital allocation, your decision to return all the free cash flow to shareholders over 2026, is it a fair assumption that there is therefore no sort of small bolt-on acquisition opportunities on the horizon? And could there be such opportunities perhaps beyond 2026? Thank you.
Yeah, Paul, I'll start. Well, I think one of the most important changes, we started to in our strategy, beginning of 2025, was that we said, "Let's focus more on the customer base." So, giving away discounts or, Netflix for free or free TV sets to new customers, while old loyal customers get a price increase every year, is a bit annoying for the customer base. Since we represent the largest customer base, we shifted to, to building more, quality in the base. So, Combivoordeel is a service where you can combine your, your services. You, you, you get more loyalty points, and at the end, you can get something for free. We launched a free security package for all households they can activate themselves.
We launched a new MijnKPN app, where you can really organize everything yourself, order or de-order connectivity or whatever. Very simple. So I think the whole message to our customers is we invest in you and we invest in your loyalty, and that, of course, is something you can't measure on a daily basis. Acquisition, you can. But after a couple of quarters, we can say the churn is really slowing down, and Net Promoter Score went up. So doing things like that, hand in hand with a price increase, works, works much better. I think this is an important switch we made, and we will continue to focus on this strategy because it's also far more positive.
Yeah, on the point, also on network quality, network stability, we have seen, especially in the business segment, some corporate customers turning to us recently. So more interest volume-wise for corporate customers to select KPN simply because of network quality, network stability, which I think is a positive, right? It does. It's a payoff. And that's not necessarily massive pricing power, but at least give you a volume and competitive advantage in that market. On your second question, returning all cash to shareholders, that's what we do. We ended the year with a 2.4 x leverage below our self-imposed ceiling of 2.5 x. We typically, by growing our EBITDA, delever by about 1.1 turn per year. But if we wouldn't return our cash to the shareholder, we delever faster.
But typically, if you, you know, grow your EBITDA, you delever by 0.1 turn per year. That gives a reasonable headroom towards the self-imposed ceiling. So I think, Paul, yeah, our war chest is big enough for bolt-ons. That doesn't mean we're going on a massive acquisition spree, but if we bump into something interesting, we have the room and means to do it. And obviously, especially with bolt-ons, the first, you know, hurdle is, does it create value for us? Is it value creating for shareholders, value creating for the business? How does it compare to buying back shares? Yeah, we always check whether, an acquisition does something strategically and financially, does it stack up to buying back our own shares.
But if we find some opportunities, we have the room to do so simply because our balance sheet gives us sufficient headroom while returning all cash to shareholders.
Yeah. That's really helpful. Thank you very much.
The next question comes from Andrew Lee from Goldman Sachs. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, guys. I had two questions. One was just to follow up on that Chinese, on the Chinese vendor question that Siyi asked. Could you help us understand, so, does the extent of the risk extend to just you, having to, fast track the, swap out you're doing anyway out to 2027, or could it mean e-even greater swap out of equipment? And can you just give us a sense as to the scale of that, if you were to fast track it and do it in 1 year, h-how much is that? How much does that cost you? And, a-any, any, any help on the scale would be help- would be useful.
Then just secondly, on the copper migration competition on wholesale that a few questions have been asking around, and specifically the ODF and Delta Fiber competition. Are you getting a sense that now that the build slowing down or has slowed down, that the ability for those operators to actually win customers is starting to decrease, or are you seeing no real letup in the near term from their ability to gain customers? Thank you.
Yeah. So like I said, Andrew, with respect to Chinese vendors in particular, I mean, we made good alignments with our government years ago, and we're fully on track to move out, like we mention—like we call this non-Western vendors out of the critical systems, mobile core, fixed core. Mobile core is Ericsson, fixed core is Nokia. That's all known in the market. And we're almost done there. So we're pretty good on track, and we do this, like I say, in the life cycle thing. So when it comes to other assets, we're also good on track. And we do not see any acceleration or uplift in CapEx on any risks. I mean, there's a discussion around this Cybersecurity Act, but that's all taking time.
Taking into account where we are and our plans are, we invest, by the way, every year in our mobile network as well, and we have a multi-vendor approach, so we like to not be dependent on one vendor. So, can't give you all the details, but I think what I can tell you is that we're good on track, and we do not see any risks there in CapEx uplifts in the coming years.
But Andrew, we have a CapEx envelope and a CapEx level, so if we had to fit it in, we'd make it fit in. So then you have to give priority to one project or to others. That would be...
I would say, with the visibility that we have today, whatever we have to do, you know, as you said, it most likely fits within our life cycle plans anyway. If we had to fast track it, we'd make it fit into the CapEx envelope and prioritize this thing over something else.
Thank you. That's clear.
On your question on the wholesale and Odido, possibly, probably, yes. So we're seeing less churn in our business altogether. I don't have a full econometric model explaining it to you, but I do relate to the fact that, you know, most people are effective in getting new customers upon rolling out fiber in the street. So you open the street, you know, people are working in the street, and that's the moment it becomes visible, and the moment you sell, that's the easiest way to sell fiber. So once the rollout stops, actually, the getting new customers in is more difficult, certainly if you don't have a household brand. And thirdly, also, if you see the feedback from some of these parties on their door-to-door sales has not been very effective.
So I would say, I don't have a foolproof, scientific proof for you, but it's true that that actually helps us. And in the wholesale side, we also see most of our customers not actively migrating customers. So if you don't just start to migrate a customer to one network to another, the churn risk is way too high. So we do see that the end of the role of the third parties benefits us on the churn side. So long story short, you see.
Thank you.
The next question comes from David Vagman from ING. The line is open. Please go ahead.
Yes, so good afternoon, everyone, and thanks for taking my question. First one on mobile. So we recently saw VodafoneZiggo being more aggressive on speed. Do you expect speed tiering to become more difficult to monetize? And does this affect your view on mobile ARPU evolution? And then my second question on the Glaspoort Delta deal, what do you think is the end game here? Have you noticed any progress in the conversation with the regulator? Do they want remedies or something else? Thank you.
Yeah. Okay. You just want to go ahead, take the first one? Okay. On the first one, on the speed tiering thing, well, I think the fact that some of our competitors do not have speed tiering, we don't see it as a sign of strength, with the sign of a network, as in our, from our point of view. So at this point, no feedback on that, no market fallout from that. I think people do value and understand the quality of the KPN network. And quality is more than speed, but it's also coverage and stability, the risk of disruptions and distortion. So I think in a broader sense, not having speed tiering is not always a good sign.
It could also be a sign that you don't have the network to deliver it. But our view is that customers value the KPN network, you know, extensively and should be able to fend it off. Yeah. So-
Okay.
Not much of a change there. And on Glaspoort, yes, well, it was since December 2024 that we're waiting for our regulator to come up with a verdict. It takes very long. So, it's clear that they find it very difficult to give it a go. So, we're still waiting. No news there, and I think, whatever the outcome will be, we'll decide on the next step. Like we said before, it's not a super significant deal. It's about 200,000 households, which is representing more or less four months building. So, yeah, in hindsight, it took us very long to get where we are today on the discussions with the government or the regulators.
So, probably they will come up with something, coming months. But let's see. It's the Netherlands, everything takes long when it comes to legislation and on the government side. So, let's wait. Okay. Thanks very much.
The final question comes from David Wright from Bank of America. Your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hello, guys. Thank you for taking my call. I just wondered if you could give us a little guidance into the cash flow, perhaps, Chris, just where you're expecting that cash tax to come in. I know previously you talked about EUR 80-odd million. Looks like that could be a little lighter. Where you might expect working capital to show, and any other items that you might just be flagging in advance, it'd just be super helpful for the modeling. Thank you.
David, thank you so much. I've been so much waiting for this question. There, there he goes. There he goes. No. Let me give you quick perspective on 2025 and 2026, right? So 2025, we had an EBITDA up by EUR 129 million, operating cash flow up EUR 120 million. Positive on delta provisions, basically means the cash quality of our earnings went up as well. So basically, more cash earnings. This year, in 2025, interest were up 30, taxes up 32, so together, interest and taxes, yeah, brought, took more EUR 60 million, and then working capital was flat. That gave you basically, a EUR 50 million free cash flow increase in the year. Obviously, there's some IPR benefits in there as well.
So that means the way I look at it, from 2024 to 2026, you get effectively a 2.7% annual CAGR. Next year or 2026, we said EBITDA will be EUR 2.67 billion, obviously EUR 33 million up, but including the fading of the IPR benefits. CapEx is stable. It might be slightly down, stable, expect stable. So it means your operating cash flow up about EUR 40 million, if you take the guidance. Cash restructuring will be around stable. I would say interest about stable towards this year, possibly a little lower. We're always trying to optimize our interest spend. Taxes, up EUR 40 million, estimated about EUR 225 million - EUR 230 million-ish, to EUR 225 million next year. Working capital, flat, possibly negative. We're cautious working capital. And then other flat, that gives about EUR 950 million.
So just modeling wise, EBITDA, you know, 2.67. CapEx, stable, slightly down a few million. It gives you operating cash flow increase of EUR 40 million. Interest, stable. Taxes up EUR 40 million to EUR 225 million. Cash restructuring, stable, and working capital, flat to a small negative, gives you basically a flat free cash flow, but that includes, of course, the compensation for the fact that we don't have IPR and IP benefits again this year, which means that effectively, we're growing our free cash flow by, you know, 2.5%-2.7% year- on- year, from 2024 to 2025 to 2026. So I can't make it more easy for you, David. This is a, I think, a pretty clear guidance.
Yeah, job's done for me. Thank you so much.
Okay, thank you all for your questions. This concludes today's session. In case of any questions, you know where to reach out. Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's presentation. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect your line. Have a nice day.