All right. Hi, everyone. I'll just get a confirmation that you can hear me. Shane, if you can give me a thumbs up. Yes, perfect. All right, welcome, everybody. Thank you for turning up, relatively short notice. I know, today we just wanted to discuss a bit more in an open forum the acquisition of the BNP Securities business, which we're announcing this morning, but we're actually also settling it today. It's in the process of being settled right now. What I want to do is just quickly go through a pro forma on BNP. It's not particularly large. Just talk a little bit about the business, but ultimately just get to the point of the strategy and why we think it's an important pickup. I'll also introduce David, who's joined us on the call today.
Just kicking off, BNP is effectively a patrol and guarding business based in New South Wales. It's been run by the owner essentially for 30- plus years. It's very longstanding, a very known brand in its market. They over the last couple of years started to see the value of cameras, particularly in poles and trailers, and started to push that way and were seeing success. So they sort of had come out of the physical manpower space and started to push into the electronic space. We're very much in the electronic space looking to push the other way, which we'll get to. R eally came up to a succession time. So the former owner as of today, was at retirement stage, looking for a new owner, quality business with a quality existing customer base.
In terms of the metrics themselves, it's not a particularly large deal for us. It's AUD 4.2 million cash, just a clean transaction, there. On an underlying basis, we're sort of pointing to earnings of about AUD 1.4 million. Look, the reality is, marginally they're probably a little bit better than that, but we're also planning to put a bit of investment into the business. It's really giving us a start and a base to work off, with a longstanding reputation. In terms of customers, very stable. What they really do at the moment is a core little operational team, guarding patrol work, and then they effectively subcontract all the actual manpower.
So they're going out to a range of different providers, taking a margin off their brand, and making it work. So we're not actually acquiring a whole lot of employees here. We don't actually strategically want to have, a lot of, effectively manpower employees. We will be a subcontract business. As we push into the guarding space, we will need the support of manpower as well to fulfill some of these contracts. So this model is actually, sort of the perfect model for us moving forward. A little bit about BNP as I've covered, it's an over 40-year-old business, again, a lifetime sort of security veteran, built and owned it for the business, has all the core processes of it.
It's very clean, it's a very good-looking business, sort of matches the quality, that we are and aspire to be, and certainly the ADT brand. W e said it's very efficient, like it's a good little business, focused on commercial. So essentially, commercial operations looking for guarding or patrols, that's their market. with a small business like that, of course, very client-focused, friendly, responsive, as we aim to be and are, and a really good market position. So certainly if you go around sort of parts of their relevant area in Sydney, you'll see their brand around, we'll be looking to co-brand moving forward.
The really important thing about this is what does this all mean for us? W hy do this? What we have, so I guess to step back, as we've been trying to make clear, we're very happy and confident about our electronic solution, our video, live video monitoring solution. It is proving to be very effective, and we are the first major brand globally to put it at the forefront of our strategy moving forward. In reality, as an electronics business, usually in a contract which is largely about guarding and patrols, those contracts typically come through a sort of tender contracts or large contracts that get put to the market.
In our model prior to live video, we were the sub, always a subcontractor. So we were always, a Wilson's SXP type player would go out, try and secure these contracts and then come to us and say, "Hey, we've got a couple of buildings as part of this. Would you like to monitor them?" M aybe if you've got the tech, would you also like to look after the cameras that are on site? And that represented a very small part of the dollar value of those contracts in the value chain a nd that was our relationship. T hen, of course, on the other side, where we need patrols and response, we work with our strategic partners as we will continue to do and keen to do.
One of the things I think we've found in this space is that, given that historically we haven't been out looking for these large contracts, we haven't actually, our business hasn't been built for that. We've been either responding to subcontract or dealing more with in the larger scale commercial access control opportunities that then broaden out. A key, point here is that with this business and what we'll talk about shortly with David, we are now going to go principal for these contracts. To do that, we needed to be credentialed. So we needed to be able to turn up to talk and be a like-for-like guarding business, but our solution is much more electronically focused.
We'll still have some subcontract, requirement for people, but we're approaching with a fresh look, but with a credentialed appearance, and we think that will really help us open up the sales conversations. What we've found so far is we haven't lost any opportunity we've gone for, but they've certainly deferred moving to a full solution. I think part of the reason is just that bit about, well, we've been calling ourselves a guarding business, ADT Guard, but, are you really? Do you understand the language? Are you credentialed in the space or not? Y es, we are.
We do have customers now, but, it's that sort of early kind of reluctance to be an early adopter. I think this is part of trying to solve and bring forward those conversations and attack that market with focus, on a like-for-like basis. So for us, we're calling this entry into a new vertical. It's allowing us to go after it. It's allowing us to broaden our capabilities a nd one of the things I'm excited about is this will give us the ability to now tool up making, or securing, supplying our own sort of trailer and pole technology in the video space, which is a part of the market.
When you drive around building sites, you will see other providers with cameras. Those cameras are not necessarily live monitored. They're certainly not police response live monitored like what we're doing. Most cases, they're reporting back to a site manager or a building manager, or through several chains to potentially getting a response. we will be able to put a police response proposition to the market, and this gives us the capability and a starting scale to build that out. A s I say, ultimately, leads into a much larger opportunity.
So for those that were alert to the last presentation or two we've done, we've talked about the scale of opportunity in front of us, having moved from a sort of AUD 2 billion market being the pure electronics market, which was really access control intrusion. This now takes us out to what you'd call a security control market, which we've called out. we think our opportunity is more like a AUD 9 billion market. This is a key plank as to how we're going to go about that. again, just to be clear with how effective our solution is now, we're moving on, but as a result, we called out. we've got over 300 sites.
We're growing them week on week on week across our business. we've had over 30 arrests from events, but I think most importantly, we're now deterring, sorry, more than 11 events a month across our business. We're stopping events from happening a nd that's a really key statistic because that's the crossover between the old electronic security industry, monitoring industry, and the industry that we are leading into Australia. We could never deter crime before.
Now we can deter and capture using these technologies with an association, obviously, with the police and the great, relationship we would like to have. So we are seeing it as it is being highly effective. We now need to lift the penetration, and the confidence and the use of it and to call it out, as I've said, which ultimately really lifts the potential opportunity in front of us, from what was a, really decent industry size to now being a really substantial opportunity. This is not guidance. I've had a couple of a bit of feedback about this. People seem to have struggled with the notion of us trying to point out that the opportunity set has grown significantly with video. Well, it has.
Sorry if we haven't articulated that well enough, but this is opening the door for us to now directly go after that much bigger market, position, and drive it back through our business. So for the first time, what I've been saying internally, certainly our direct brand ADT is now a security business. I think in the past it was an electronics product solutions provider. Now we are a security business. We're actually selling security. So that, that's the sort of rationale for BNP. I think the secondary part and what I wanted to have this forum for today, which was not necessarily tied in announcement, is to introduce sort of David to the group and the support network.
What we've also done concurrently is David has joined us here. David joins us having been one of the founders of SXP Southern Cross Protection. He's joined the business a couple of weeks ago. We've known each other now for well over a year. We met when, and as part of our journey, IMG has been looking for partnerships across the industry to try to accelerate growth. We have some great partnerships, including SXP, which remains today. We're looking to continue to work closely with them.
I think David and I won't speak for him, he has seen what we're trying to do is the experience of being part of a sort of startup culture, even though we're a large business, we're really pushing in this industry into new areas again a nd what he brings though is that experience on the physical manpower side, the ability to talk to customers as a experienced person selling that product and then to highlight, the value that the solution brings. As part of D avid joining us, we are hiring and, and also in-sourcing direct resource across our business to focus on this area.
So with BNP being in Sydney, we've also got resource capacity being developed in Victoria, and also looking into Queensland so that we can properly go after it. So David, I don't know if you'd like to just say a few words and introduce yourself to the team, but David's official title is the General Manager of ADT Guard. But he's a senior, senior player in our business, and look where we're looking to go. But, David, if you want to say a few words, you're welcome.
Thanks, Dennison. Good morning, all. And, yeah, it's a great opportunity today. So we're very excited about BNP coming on board and being part of the business. I think one of the really nice things about BNP, it has a good solid corporate-based client as it is. There is a number of sites that are under a video sort of camera monitored solution, but not the level that we'll be providing a nd they also have a number of local councils a nd when you look at that space, that is a very key target area for ADT going forward. Big Tender Solutions will have a track record to support our tenders and we have clients on board.
We've converted to ADT Guard, that live video monitoring solution a nd there are a number of large FMs in their space as well. So we're covering warehouse facilities, development locations, construction sites. So I think it'll give us a very good platform to move forward into those larger tender, solution needed clients. The name itself gives us a lot of support being the ADT name a nd I think taking that forward as we go into the true manpower businesses or tenders, we should lead that ourselves, as Dennison said. Typically, it's been a manpower leader with an electronics as a support. We'll flip that now, especially when we can talk about proven solutions, good track record, client testimonials.
We have a real access to that coming on board with us. And especially with three new resources coming to the business, they have all come from a manpower style solution, but all believe truly in the electronic solution taking this forward and giving us greater market penetration. So a really exciting time ahead. For me to move here was, yeah, a very easy decision to move. And, as Dennison said, we've been, we've known each other for a good 12 months now talking about it. A s soon as I saw this product, we tried to take it to SXP and it was a bit of a slow conversion for the manpower businesses. They're going to be a little bit fearful of this, I think, at some point.
They'll see that it'll take a lead and it'll flip the tables on how the tender responses are submitted and lead. But it'll be a really great opportunity for us. So good times ahead. Thanks, Dennison.
Yeah. thank you, David, and welcome aboard. Really, really awesome to have David, and his experience in the team as well. So, I think, across the board, a fabulous, person to have on the team. So, I really appreciate it, David. I think the point that I'd make, and I've made this point in my travels to people, but, we have run, a couple of case studies now, for pretty significant pieces of work, and what we are seeing is a significantly better value proposition for a commercial customer, and probably a superior result, whether that's risk reduction, people being on site, getting hurt on our rounds, actually being where you need them to be, and also outcome in the event of an event.
I mean, the more we get out and talk about it, the more engagement and enthusiasm we get a nd we're in a unique position because we have the live monitoring stations that are doing video. we do have technicians that are able to apply it. So we have a complete solution. I'm confident that a lot of like little businesses will pick this up and also engage with us on the bureau side, what have you. I think the difference is, the ADT end-to-end quality solution is scalable and you can talk about, really significant pieces of work, which really aren't available to small scale operators. Y ou have to have the scale and the infrastructure, the end-to-end solution to be able to do this properly.
So we're in a privileged position, but we now have to like build the customer, the interface and the results, to justify what we think is going to be a pretty exciting next couple of years. I'll probably just pause there. Now, what we're going to do today is we're living and learning as we're going to run a Q&A session. Shane's going to run it. If you want to ask some questions, just chuck your hand up, I think, Shane, and you'll filter them and unmute so that we can just have a bit of a controlled situation. So happy to take questions on anything, far and wide as you like. Obviously, also acknowledging the audited results throughout last night so we can cover that off too, but off we go. Shane, do you want to moderate there?
Yes. So actually, we've got Nick, coming on. So Nick, go ahead.
Go for it, Nick.
Okay. There we go. Thanks, Shane. Probably one for Dennison and it relates to the acquisition. Just trying to understand what sort of uplift you could potentially envisage if you converted all of the BNP customers to your video guarding. I know it's very hypothetical, but.
No, look, so the first thing I'd just say about BNP in particular, one of the reasons we're attracted to it is they are already deploying video. So they have, and you have to back me up on this, David, like it's over a hundred, sort of cameras and sites out effectively at the moment. I think what the opportunity with them is, their solution is not AI live monitored. It's actually live monitored, so they have people sitting up all the time trying to watch cameras and that's not a scalable situation, right, so you do have a few people out there running live camera feeds, trying to pick up events.
What we will do is we'll go back through their technology base with our solution, which will actually make it much more efficient, so in actual fact, in the first instance, there's probably a cost saving that'll come along, which will be, aligning our best practice to what they do, which will actually save some money. That, that's of the order of about AUD 100,000 would be my view, being a little conservative, but that type of dollars and, but it will take us redeploying. The wider point actually is more the ability to go after growth. W e think as a business, like, the interesting crossover here is they are really getting it themselves.
Like they were sort of at that, this is looking really exciting, starting to grow but hadn't had access to the real technology, and all the room, and the whole scope that we have. So, I think it's probably as much about accelerating them again with David's sort of stewardship, thinking a bit wider and going through. The current customer base opportunity is actually just upgrading the technology, which will save money and probably give a better result. The real opportunity is to get them taking their success already off a lesser solution and pushing it harder using their credentials.
I think one of the real opportunities in their business will be the patrol sector, Dennison. I think they're doing a lot in their guarding space with the construction site warehouses. That is certainly the retrofit, but I think there's a lot of work in their patrol space that will have the customer. We can actually go and talk to the customer directly, convert them to a ADT Guard solution, and we should see a real change in that mix. I think that's where we'll be able to grow that business as well quite clearly. t'll be a good solid margin on that business instead of the typical patrol margin.
Yeah.
Yeah. Then I thought that was all really helpful. But yeah, I guess that's kind of what I was sort of trying to understand. Like I know they're doing some video stuff themselves already, but like, focusing on the like legacy patrol stuff, what sort of uplift could you potentially see if you convert a customer from, a legacy patrol contract to your new video guarding solution? Would you guys have any sort of indication on that, guys?
I'm happy to throw it to you, David. You can have a crack at it.
Yeah. I'd be happy to talk about. I'll talk more about the gross margin. At the revenue point, I don't think you'll see a material change in that. It may actually be an effective that will place a CHeKT solution on that site. What you'll find though is we should be able to change the number of patrol calls that are required there. So typically a good patrol business will run at 24% to 27% gross margin. An ordinary one will run at about 19%. I think what we've been seeing with the CHeKT solution, we can run that at about 45% to 50% gross margin on the monitoring. So I think that's the uplift for us in that patrol space.
We'll need to go through the numbers certainly to get some clarity around that, but that'll give us a, we'll need some time to do that. But that's the key position on patrols work. Going to a Virtual Patrol model is the real game changer. Look, I've spent 15 years in the manpower business. I was an owner of Southern Cross Protection and we sold it to a group out of India, SIS. I stayed on as the MD for a number of years and an advisor on the board. Patrols is a really nice space in the business because it's a business that you can optimize. If you go to typical guarding businesses, they're like labor hire. It's one to one. Put a man in there for 40 hours. You've got to charge 40 hours and you charge a margin.
It's pretty hard to optimize it. The way we'll change that space is by placing the ADT Guard solution, which should be able to take some hours out of the client, take some hours out of the manpower need, give them a broader outcome or broader service delivery for the full period with less man hours required. So we'll drive up gross margin there. But the patrol space is when you've got cars running around doing 80 calls a night and 20 or 30 in a big city, it's about how we can penetrate that market and take away those cars off the road, put more check solution in there or ADT Guard solution in there and drive that.
So that's going to bring down the cost and we should actually be able to charge a little bit more for the service, for the monitoring and take the cost out. So it's really a gross margin impact. I think that's where the big number will turn.
That's really helpful. Thanks, guys.
I think the reality, as I said, is if we prove this to be successful, which there is no reason other than, execution is probably what I call it now and timing, just, how long does it take us to, but we will either way erode that patrol revenue for an existing player. W hat then happens is it descales them, right? So they're really network businesses. So you'd be surprised how cheap actually a patrol cost actually is, given it's human. It surprised me, but it's all based off network scale. If we start to eat their network scale across the place, we'll actually implode the economics of that industry quite quickly, actually, which, ultimately is a disruption.
So when I step back, again, looking at IMG and what we're doing with live video and video, we are an AI disruptor. I'm not looking to trade off keywords here, but that is the reality. Like we're using AI video tech to eat into essentially physical labor. Now we, we will also have to scale up in our room. So, sort of one to three, probably, three people off the road, one into our room would be the way, maybe a way to think about it. But, it's very disruptive and changes the economics of the existing industry.
T hat's why, in the first instance, to be clear, we've tried to partner and we're still open to working with players and we will work with them because we want, we want to support a level of physical, response we will always need. So, we're not, we're not here to destroy an industry, but it definitely will change the economics in the industry and we, it's definitely to our favor and I think ultimately to customers as well. So it'll be quite exciting to see where we can go with that. We are one of the few companies that is excited about AI and probably what it can bring to our world is distinct to scared of it.
The manpower businesses can actually leverage off the back of what we're doing. By doing the AI process, we'll reduce the need for manpower, but with the right quality manpower, they'll be able to charge a differential rate because it'll be a true requirement for that person there and a better quality person, not just trying to put numbers out in the road. So I think we'll see a different dynamic there. W e've going to have a good partner. So we are dealing with Southern Cross at the moment. I think we need a good national partner, a good strong partner to be able to assist us in delivering our service. So it's not you want to push them away.
It's about bringing them in and showing them the value of it. And it'll be good for them to use with their clients and change their business up and work with us. We should be able to bring someone on the journey.
We can share, right? So that there's a big profit margin pool here. So our intent is to share and work in partnership with good partners. It's just that we need to lead it. Otherwise, there is a general conservativeness. I don't know what the right exact word is, but, conservative nature in this industry around change and adopting. I think given it's, it is largely people and largely process, the only way to get it is you have, you have to, the tasks are hard work, but you actually have to go after it to show, and then it will drive the right partners, closer and closer together. So, Shane, any other questions out there?
Yeah, I've actually got, there's two questions in the Q&A from Andre, but, Andre, actually, you can come off mute and ask your question if you want.
David and Dennison, thanks for the call. One question is, given that BNP is New South Wales based, with the acquisition, do you see expanding into other geographies beyond New South Wales, or do you see the potential to make other geographical acquisitions? It might be a Victoria acquisition or a WA or a New Zealand acquisition.
Yeah. W ell, David, I'll let you talk about what you're building at the moment and we'll go from there.
Okay. So right now we're going to use the BNP acquisition as a real demonstration of the product. It's a seeing is believing and you can use that as a good leverage point a nd we're going to use our sales team on the exec board as a first point of call, get that working, and we'll build a sales team to further support that and drive it, especially through tender response work. We'll have a new product to take or a new service to take through that tender process, which will be very important for us. If we come across a business that is very similar to BNP has the same sort of metrics and we can get that turnaround, I believe we should venture after that.
That's not on the radar right now, but certainly as we go through the process of business reviews and looking at the marketplace, and if we could find another BNP in Victoria, Queensland, or say a Perth, I'd certainly be promoting that we'd look at that to bring it on board and to give us that scale, that footprint, and also to give us some local penetration of market where the camera solution is being seen to win and to work because it's really nice to be able to take a client there and show it to them and talk about it. When you actually show people the product or the service and how it turns into a service and how it's delivered and how it works, it's like a switch goes on for them. And we've had a couple of demos now and people are just super impressed with it.
Yeah. I think that the attitude at the moment is that David's building a sales teaM&An organization, BNP being a good part of it. Like it gives us a bit of mass, it gives us some existing customers. We've already got other case studies to add to it, focused on building out some direct sales for ADT Guard in Victoria and Queensland. So we've got Victoria, Queensland, New South Wales covered, with David leading a nd then we'll spend this next period just bidding it in. we are, albeit, the comment always is, you've done a lot of acquisitions and things like that are thoughtful and timed.
This one, probably would've been by far our fastest turnaround just following the strategy through. But, I look at Western Advance, the other acquisition we've made this year. I mean, that was essentially two years in the making. So we'll pragmatically follow opportunity. Could I imagine us buying more potentially? Yes, I could. We don't have anything directly on the table today, and for me, if I'm just to speak candidly, it's probably New Zealand would be my thing to say, right, be cause that would also help the New Zealand operation and we could leverage across.
But we'll see what comes our way. I mean, I would note it's obviously a very accretive, we're confident in the business and that we'll preserve it and be able to grow it, which has been our experience since we bought ADT. W e'll just see where the journey takes us. But I've always been clear, we're not an M&A business, we're building a business. We use M& A to supplement, to support, to improve, where it makes sense , and I like the fact that today, like if I died, or everything stopped today and we are who we are and we only had what we had, we've actually got everything we need.
We just need to actually focus on executing in any given day. I think in the results last year, the pride I had about the results was the underlying growth. we are starting to see reasonable underlying organic growth and it, we are expecting to continue to build on that. U ltimately, that's where we make, really our best money long term is building a great, clean underlying business. That's actually what we are focused on doing. We use M&A as a win and if it makes sense, like we strongly believe it has done here. It's allowed us to bring David in to build a team, to really go after this opportunity properly.
I think if we didn't do this, the counter would be we know the opportunity's there, we're having a bit of a go, we're trying, but it's not got the real focus and direct ownership that it really needs for us to be able to go after it. We'll just see as it comes. A ny other question? Keep going.
Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Thanks, David and Dennison. Second question is around margins, just clarifying on what you mentioned earlier, David. What I heard was that a 45% to 50% gross margin with BNP. I'm interested to know, is that BNP standalone or is that when with BNP integrated into IMG's infrastructure? And if not, then what do you think that margin could get to when it's within, existing fixed cost base?
Okay. So we'll requalify that. So that I did say a good patrols business at a 25% gross margin level and ordinary was at 20%. It's the monitoring that creates that 40% to 45% in the gross margin perspective. So I don't believe the BNP business will ever be a 45% business because that does have some manpower inclusion. The 45% gross margin comes out of a patrol service that's done by Virtual Patrol, not an overall business.
Yeah. I'll just put a framing on it just to, so the BNP's starting margin is actually, I'll call it 21%. So it's around our current group margin today. So it is actually a well-run type business as it stands now. That is because they have moved more to video over the last year or two and it's pulled up their margin on those sites. We think we can improve those economics further with our solution. So it's already, got a pretty good starting position and business and sort of pricing. W e think we can just improve the economics and then ultimately grow. So it might maybe just restate it that way, Andre, as well, just for the benefit of the starting position.
Got it. T hen I guess from your annual report, which you sent last night, the gross margin's 29%. Do you see it adding to that or, how would you see it compared to the current run rate at 29%?
So against our group business, yeah, I mean, like technically I would say it will be consistent with our current economics across the business is probably the best guide I could give. One of the things, and I'll be open, I struggle with the margin comment is margins an outcome for us. Like it's, we're building a business, we're particularly, if you go back to the economic model based on a basic level, we get a new customer, we do a bunch of work upfront, which we charge for, which is typically lower margin than the recurring, ongoing stream.
So if you're in a growth phase, trying to bring on new customers and we are growing, our growth is strongly in installation with new customers. It has been from last year through to this year and we expect to continue for some time as we're building the recurring base with that. It does mean your margin moves around a bit. Like it's not that we can't forecast it, but it doesn't necessarily, it gives me a little bit of shivers to be too predictive on a year-on-year basis. What I more do is step back and look at our sort of overall earnings, where we make our money and what I think is a reasonable margin over time.
I've been fairly clear, like I think 22%, which is the group margin is our kind of base. it could maybe go down if we really accelerated a bit of new customer work that then flows through and lifts the long-term recurring. So again, it depends a little bit on growth and the margin of the new customer work. But I think that's a pretty good base level. Then I think over time, given the long-term recurring profitability that we get, that should actually drift up over time. we are on a global basis already one of the higher margined businesses, certainly in security, but also electronic security. So we're not underperforming from a value point of view at all.
Like there's no kind of issue that we are fat or anything like that. But I do think scale will allow us to put it up. So look, t hey're obviously pretty general comments, Andre may not meet specific questions, but I think this business is pretty consistent with our current margin. I think the trade-off though is, and why I'm being a little concerned with BNP is we also want to invest. W e're buying a business. It's very accretive to us today. It's very stable, we want to use that base to accelerate. S o our mindset as a business is actually a three-year view.
W hi lst I recognize the importance of managing period to period, and producing results and continuing to build confidence, what we are looking at is the opportunity over the next two and three years to build a really substantial and significant and successful organization. W e sort of oscillate between the now and the where we want to be. And we're trying to make trade-offs in that way. But our trade-off bias is to invest in the business and actually get growth, ramping up, at this phase. So I hope that helps. Shane.
Yes. Thanks, Dennison. So I've got Richard Harrisburg. Richard, do you want to go off mute, please, and ask your question?
Yeah. Thanks, Shane. Thanks for taking the question, guys, and congrats on the transaction. Dennison, you mentioned a little bit more about the acquisition, sort of being able to enhance your ability to go after some of those larger tenders. Could you maybe just unpack that a little more, in the current pipeline you guys sort of mentioned that the previous result, I think it was AUD 37 million. Did that sort of include some of these large tender opportunities that you'll now be able to go after, or is that on top of that pipeline?
Yeah. Zero for that. So like what, what I found in the situation, look, it's, it's a lot of seasoning, right? Like I've always said, on a personal level, I started with no industry experience. What is this industry? How does it work? What have we got? Let's invest in it. Oh, got that kind of right. Needed to learn a bit more. And one of the things when I reflect back over the last few years, like every now and again someone would come and go, oh, there's a council contract, should we tender for that? I t'd be like, I'll just pick up, WA Council or something or Perth Council. Y ou go, well, it's not what we do and who would do that?
What is that? Y ou'd let it go to the keeper, but you'd be like, oh, that's a big, that's a big tender. Like that's AUD 2 million. Like who's winning that? W e'd never played there. It would always go through to the keeper. Every now and again you'd hear about one or two and we'd just go back to work a nd our work would be, like either direct customers, again, coming into ADT, it's either residential effectively for intrusion alarms historically, or it's been for access control, which we restarted effectively two years ago and it had been very successful in that restart. Now we're focused on video and the solution that we can drive out.
The final piece was these kind of contracts. And so I don't have a good feel. I mean, David, you might like to comment about sort of that market and how big it might be in any one year and what a contract. I mean, we don't want to talk it up, by the way. Like it's going to take us time. W e have to win a few and do all that sort of thing. But I mean, as a general comment, David, like what sort of things come through each year and this is all added to Richard.
Okay. So through the tender process, through tender searches and so forth, I reckon there's up to AUD 14 to 15 million a year in revenue available from a combination of guarding and patrol services. That will go across a whole range of verticals, anything from transport logistics through to critical infrastructure, aged care, nursing, FMCG sort of stuff. That's where it sort of fits, AUD 10 to 15 million a year. That excludes the really big government style contracts where you would see an MSS or a Wilson or a Certis playing in something like an airport for manpower versus a defense contract or whatever it might be. Airports, defense, big government stuff.
Airports run at AUD 100 million a year. That's what it costs to run an airport from a perspective of guarding, a manpower solution. So they're enormous. But other ranges, AUD 10 to 15 million a year through councils and the verticals I mentioned.
I think, David, like the point is, you made a comment a week or two ago about the cost of a full-time guard in Australia and the current climate. I don't know if you want to reiterate that for the folks,.
For a guard, if you run a one-man 24-hour guard at a gatehouse or at a public building, the cost of putting that man there is AUD 400,000 a year. That's no margin. That's the cost of putting him there under the national wages instrument, under fair work. Imagine how many of those there are out there, working around everything from distribution centers, gatehouses, councils with people at buildings, libraries, people at hospitals for protecting entry access points. That's the number. It's a significant number. I f you look at the average patrol customer per month on three calls a night, let's say five or 10 minutes a call, they're worth, AUD 1,000 to 1,500 a month in recurring rate.
Whether you take that out based on virtual patrols, you revisit the manpower and you can maybe reduce that by 30% to 40% by taking out a lot of the hours when there's nobody required there, we can put the cameras to manage it. There's a material change available there. It's about going through and quantifying those opportunities and dealing with them with the client and providing a true security solution.
Yeah. W e need to step through that, right? Because you've going to do it properly. You've going to build it up. This is a compounding story, right? Like you've going to win and then do the next, get it right, do it well, get the next one and it, and it accelerates. And we've got our start, like we've got customers, but we now need to like widen it, widen the net and, and deliver. I think the other thing with that cost, the other way I would put it is, there's a lot of people that would like to have a guard that don't because of that cost.
I f you are going in and with a substantially different economic proposition, and by the way, one of the points and some of you would've met Wes from CHeKT when we brought him through Australia and New Zealand a few weeks ago, one of the points around a guard is, as good as a guard may feel, a guard is only as good as where they are at that time. Whereas with a full camera solution, like we can be everywhere on site that you want us to be all the time, right? Whether that's the back alley, the stairwell, around the corner, the back of the shed, the front of the shed, by the gate, wherever you want us to be, we can be there 24 hours a day and a guard can only be in one place.
Whilst it's expensive, it's also only one. And so, there are more than a litany of stories of people even being on site, being burglars or offenders who are just hiding, waiting for the guard to go past before they continue their work, right? Now that can't happen. So point remains, like not only is it a more valuable or less expensive service to a customer potentially, it's also potentially a superior service in terms of the outcome and the, and the safety, and security that we can provide. So t here's a really compelling proposition here. We just need, just need to drive it, drive it out into the market more widely more thoroughly. Any other questions?
I was going to say, I've got John Hein. John, do you want to come off mute and ask your question, please?
Sure. Thanks for the presentation, Dennison. I think you can probably read the questions there, but, just in terms of housekeeping, do you have an update on the tax situation? I missed your introduction on David. So how did David come to be with the group?
Sure.
I guess, what's his role and what's his future look like at the group?
Hopefully good. Now, look, just to paraphrase, David and I met about a year or so ago, frankly, it's probably longer than that. David was a founder of Southern Cross Protection, and Southern Cross was sold to MSS in India a number of years ago. David stayed on to help for a long time, and including most recently being on the board of that entity with the Indians. He stepped off that and joined us in an operating capacity. He's now the general manager of ADT Guard, which is, a senior significant role for us that we are looking to really lean into and build. David's here as long as he wants to be.
Hopefully that's a, that's a long time, a little like myself. So we've got a pretty good cadre of executives. I don't know, David, if you'd want to make a comment about the team you've joined and, what you see as you've gone around the business. It might be worthwhile for others to give us, give us an honest take on it.
Yeah, I will actually. It's a really nice entry into the, the business. The people are good. I think there's a really high level of passion in the business. There's a great depth of skillset within the business. I think it's just like when you really walk into a business, it's nice when, when people actually put their hand up and want to help each other. The opportunities we've got, I think, it stands out, a new market, ADT Guard opportunities for the, the market size and the opportunity to go and grow a new service delivery into what you'd typically call a pretty, mature market. I think it's a great opportunity for us. But the people are good. It's great people, and lots of enthusiasm, lots of knowledge.
I think that's really something that people forget sometimes when you look at the actual, IP in this business. It's quite significant.
No, thanks, David and John, turning to the tax, Yes. So look again, just to step back. So the tax issue, which I would point out at our size, isn't actually that material, but it is a bugbear. It is, deeply frustrating internally, or certainly to me and, and the board, but it is what it is. It relates to our historic tax losses. Our former advisor's advice was, they were available and we've submitted tax returns on that advice too, by the way, and have had no problems. 2024 tax return to the ATO, no issue.
The work though, that when we got a new auditor in and we re-looked at that post buying ADT and the business getting larger and more, also becoming a New Zealand operation, which our old tax advisor didn't cover, sort of showed that there might be some weaknesses in some of their work, not the material work actually, but just more around just the bits and pieces, which kind of reflected we were a smaller company that probably didn't have as much likelihood of trading through as probably others would've thought at the time. I t put a bit of doubt in the auditor's minds about the tax losses being available, the issue being Similar Business Test.
The Similar Business Test is , the front and center question is, did buying ADT change IMG such that it's no longer a similar business? Now the board is highly confident, as am I, that if you have a small banana that's yellow and you then get a bigger banana that's yellow, it's still a banana. In fact, that's why the law and the tax law went from a same business test to a Similar Business Test. Unfortunately, we have a lot of highly paid advisors in Australia, who aren't prepared to follow on advice necessarily to verify that with their best advice being, well, you better ask the ATO. It's like, well, that felt like something my nine-year-old daughter could have told me, but fine.
So it leaves us in a situation where to get the audit signed off, the auditors were prepared to sign off on a 40% probability of the tax losses being available. T hat's what's reflected in those audited accounts out last night, which was down. The probability was down on the probability used in the prior result that we put out a month ago, which I think was 50% or might have been 60%, but the delta was a couple of million dollars of impact on the P&L for tax. Tax is the only issue. The rest of the audit was all fine. Reality is, we needed to get the audited accounts out so we can move forward.
I certainly didn't want to be suspended, while this is working through, we will now be able to get clear of this process and go through and prosecute what the actual situation is. I think there is a wider point though to make here. And actually it's positive, but it may come across as sounding negative. And that is, amortization is not a tax shield. W hen you look at our P&L and it's my bigger frustration's always been the global accounting standards and the way amortization has, run rife over our P&L, and our reported profit. Amortization though is not a tax shield. So while it sits there in our reported profit line and makes us look particularly loss making, the reality is if you take it out, we're actually quite profitable.
That's how the tax department would see it too on a moving forward basis. Therefore we will file the tax returns very quickly. Like we are a profitable business from a tax point of view currently and have been for some time. So while this is the frustration is it's creating some noise, I'd argue it's not material from an NPV point of view, frankly, but it is material from a, sort of cash and making sure we are conservative in the short term. But ultimately, we have a profitable business here. It is profitable outside of the accounting standards, which mean we have to amortize our the customer base we've acquired through this journey in a far faster fashion than the reality, economic reality of that customer base.
Night and day, totally stupid, but I'm not in a position to challenge global accounting standards apparently. So that's fine. W e'll bear with. So look, the update is they are the audited accounts that were out. It reflects a 40% probability of collectibility of the tax losses. We will submit our tax return in a couple of months, which is when we will actually find out what the, the real tax position is for the '25 year. between now and then we're going to again take separate counsel. We will take counsel is probably the best thing I can say right now about how we move forward. Ultimately, in a year's time or so, it doesn't matter anyway because we'll be a taxpayer whether we like to be or not.
M y final thought on it is, well, pay tax and thank God for the income. it reflects that we've actually got a really great business that's making money, that's not a bad position to be in, but we will, we'll have to continue to work on it. It's been very frustrating internally because it's taken up frankly pretty valuable time for a fairly low value outcome. W e certainly would like to get clarity and move forward. We will have to run the business probably conservatively, in the meantime. T hat's certainly our mindset has been to try to be conservative. W e're not looking to risk what we have for something we don't need, until such time as we have real clarity.
But, those accounts that are out now are sort of the land, landing point from a lot of highly paid people, coming together to smoke cigars and drink cognac, as I like to say. So, I apologize for that, but it's the best we could do. Jason Biddle's on the call and I'd encourage anyone that wants to take it further to reach out to him. He's happy to chat people through the exact mechanics. It's, I'm obviously aware of it, deeply, but it's not my day-to-day, actual focus, through this time. Does that sort of give you a bit of a go there, John? Happy to take any more questions on it.
That's great, Dennison. Thank you for the color.
No, that's fine. Anything else, Shane?
Nope, that was it, Dennison. We don't have any more questions. Any more questions? Anyone else?
Cool. Well, I'll just make some closing remarks and just reiterate, or actually go for it, Andre, before I fire up.
Yeah.
Thanks, Dennison. Just one quick question. Looking at the slide that's currently presented, just around, so obviously like 25% to 30% of AUD 9 billion is a huge number, big number. Yeah. So I guess, 35 years to work towards that, but it, big jump from today. So I guess maybe like any comments around the bridge between now and getting to the promised land. H ow much organic versus acquired guarding versus other products, just like any sort of color or ramped from now towards the promised land?
Yeah. No, no. Look, really good question. I have to be honest, it has seemed to have, it's had an interesting effect putting those comments into the world. I have had a few people that have really struggled to kind of get to the bottom of it. So the first comment I'd make is it's not guidance. Like we're not saying, take AUD 9 billion, 30%, and that's where our revenue will be in three years' time. What we are really wanting to do, and, look, it's the flip to this is like, this is why I don't like being a public company because I don't want to highlight this to every single one of my competitors and, where we're at, what we're doing and the advantages we think we've built and what we think the opportunities and potentials are.
But what I thought was important was to make a clear case as to what the opportunity is. And, I want investors to understand that we're intentional about it. Like we're not, success for us won't be a 5% growth in profit year on year over the next three years. Like, and anybody that's tracked this story understands the people involved and all the people that have joined us, and I'd include David in that. Like I don't think anybody's really here just to kind of phone it in or, see some minor, improvement and what have you. That being said, it's a journey and you go.
How do we get there? Look, in reality, there are still opport, probably likely to come opportunities for some M&A, and, and it, there is some material potential M&A that could be done. Am I, am I planning on it? No, I think we're building a business that can grow to it. Can we realistically go from 120, sorry, what's our revenue today? AUD 200 million plus revenue, to AUD 3 billion in three years organically? No, that looks like a stretch just from a resourcing point of view. So, we would have to probably acquire rapidly technology. But I do think we can scale to, and I think it's important that we're clear about that, like the nature of the opportunity, the scale, right from the start of this journey, the view has been this industry does not have a leader, a clear leader for security across the board.
Wilson's is actually the closest to what people would associate with that today, but they are a subcontract sort of pieced together business, actually, and not to be disrespectful of them. Like, they do a good job and they've got a large, seeming footprint, but even they are not that significant when you compare the scale of the industry and a share relative to another service provider. So, I don't have a definitive plan sitting today. We've always played the balls that are bounced in front of us. There are some big balls. I've always said there's some big questions we'll have to answer in this journey whether we would. I can see things that make sense. I mean, from an investor point of view, the board has a high alignment to investors.
We are not doing this for the aggrandizement of scale. We are doing this for investor returns. I'd hope you'd see today BNP is a good example of that. It absolutely had to hit a return criteria as much as it had to be strategic. Like we won't do one without the other. But, it is, there will be some questions I've gotten through it. So yeah, look, in the first instance, it was to set up an outline as to what we see the opportunity is. I think now the question is, the fair question you ask is, all right, well, if you see that's the opportunity, how are you going to do it? And our answer is, well, how are we going to do it? We're going to start really attacking these markets, figure out what works and how to go about it.
We've got the solutions. Like we don't have a, oh, we don't know how to, we've actually got everything we need today to do the job to meet the demand. What we need to do is scale it up and figure out how to scale up. And that's exactly the journey we're on. That's why David is part of the team. That's why we're building out David's team. That's why we are attacking it in a focused way with ADT Guard rather than, sort of having it as part of a meshed organization with a number of priorities. It's why we are doing everything we are doing. in reality, personally, for me, the first target is AUD 500 million of revenue. I just look as an organization and an organizational basis.
W e started when I took over as AUD 30 million of revenue, sort of AUD 3 to 4 million of EBITDA. we've gone through a hundred, we're at 200. the next major mark for us from a P&L and business point of view will probably be around that 500. at the moment we're very much focused on building that, as an organic business with a very clean model that now we know what we are, we know what we need to be, and we're, we're really focused on execution. So it's a very long answer. Sorry, Andre, it probably doesn't answer it exactly how you want, but it's throwing out the challenge really to ourselves to answer that question over the next year or two.
T he answer will be delivered either through the opportunities that come at us or through, being able to accelerate to the extent where we can get close to that. But we should, we shouldn't be in business or, and or listed and or doing this if we don't have the desire and the focus and the goal to go after that.
Awesome. Thank you.
So look, I'll, I'm noting the time. Appreciate the short notice. Apologies for that today. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your questions. Thank you for your interest. Very excited to just keep rolling forward. We're very focused on the job at hand. We'll go and get back to it, but please reach out if you'd like further talk. David and I will probably do a couple of, sort of meetings in a week or two's time for those that would like to sort of have a coffee or a share the breeze or dig a bit deeper. we'll make ourselves available in a week or two for that. Otherwise, thanks very much. Look forward to the next year or two and see where we can go with this. Thanks, David.
Cheers, guys. Thank you.
Cheers, team. Thanks. Thanks, team. See you. Bye.