Welcome to the people that have already joined. Let's hear Gavin and Ryan.
Just good, hanging in. It's not like an automatic thing.
Haven't got many on, Paul. Maybe they're all sickly.
Richard, there's only two here. Is there more in the waiting room, or?
No, there's heaps. There's heaps there. You just got to scroll down.
Oh, okay. All right.
Now we can smile there.
We just keep adding. That's the job.
Okay, now. Paul and Richard.
Yeah, there's one more there. Angus.
All right, give him one more minute.
Okay.
You're going to give a little talk, Jeremy, about getting reelected, tell them how wonderful you are.
Okay, 10:03. Welcome everyone to Smart Parking's annual general meeting, which is all by Zoom, a virtual meeting. Welcome to, sorry, I got a script now, virtual annual meeting of Smart Parking. My name is Chris Morris, and I'm the Chairman of Smart Parking, and I'll be chairing the meeting today. I'd like to introduce my fellow directors and Company Secretary who are present at the virtual meeting, Paul Gillespie and Richard, who are in the Melbourne office. Fiona is somewhere, we're not sure, but she's on the thing. Jeremy, I think, is in Australia and not in Canada. Mr. Richard Ludbrook, our CFO and Company Secretary, is also in attendance. I would like to also welcome the company's auditors, Grant Thornton. Advise the meeting that there's a call in present.
Therefore, the meeting is properly constituted, and I declare that meeting open at 10:04 A.M. in Queensland and 11:04 A.M. in Melbourne and other places in Australia. If shareholders wish to ask questions during the meeting, I confirm that there will be an opportunity before putting any resolutions to the meeting to ask questions of the board as they relate to formal items of the business of this meeting. If you wish to ask questions, please do so by typing a question into the chat function in Zoom. We ask that when typing a question, shareholders include their name so that the board can properly address the shareholder. All questions in the first instance are directed to me as chair.
Please note that while you can submit questions from now on, I will address all questions at the same time at the relevant stage of the meeting, which will be after all the items of business and proxy positions have been presented. The notice of meeting contains details of how to vote, and it is also shown on the screen. Voting today will be conducted by way of a poll on all items of business. In order to provide you with enough time to vote, I will shortly open voting for resolutions. At that time, if you are eligible to vote at this meeting, a voting icon will appear on your screen. Selecting this icon will bring up a list of resolutions and voting options. To cast your vote, select one of the options. There is no need to hit a submit button as the vote is automatically recorded.
You do, however, have the ability to change your vote up until voting closes. I now declare voting open on all items of business. Please submit your votes at any time. Proxies, please refer to your screen for a summary of the proxy votes received for each resolution. Where a valid proxy vote has been given to the Chairman without voting instructions, please note that in all cases, I intend to vote in favor of the resolution. Information on how to access the notice of meeting and explanatory statement dated 10th of October 2025 is distributed to all shareholders, and I will take that notice as read. All resolutions contained in the notice of meeting and to be put to members today will be displayed on your screen, so I will not read out each proposal resolution. We will now move on to resolution one.
We're on?
Oh, did they come in originally?
You are on mute, please.
See you.
Okay. Resolution one. The resolution terms and the proxy votes for resolution one are shown on the screen. Are there any questions on the resolution? This is the adoption of the remuneration report. Sorry. Give you a couple of minutes. No questions. I'll now put the resolution to a vote. All right. Resolution two, approval to adopt employee incentive scheme. The resolution terms and the proxy votes for resolution two are now shown on the screen. Are there any questions on this resolution? No questions? Okay. I will now put this resolution to a vote. Resolution number three, allocation of equity to Managing Director under the employee share scheme. The resolution terms and the proxy votes for resolution three are shown on the screen. You did quite well there, Mr. Gillespie. Are there any questions about this resolution? I now put the resolution to a vote.
Resolution four, reelection of Director Jeremy King. The resolution terms and the proxy votes for resolution four are shown on the screen. Does anyone want to have a chat to Jeremy? Do you want to say anything, Mr. King?
Not really. I'm interested to understand the 13 million against. I am very happy to be reelected, and I think the company and the board are doing some wonderful work. My background's legal and corporate, so I look at things through that lens effectively. I like to think I give some reasonable support to the executive as they're making their way through building the business and particularly looking at acquisitions.
How long have you been on the board, Jeremy?
I think it would be 10 or 11 years.
10 years since we converted from an investment company to Smart Parking.
That's right. I think I just joined the board a couple of years afterwards. Yeah, I think originally I was company secretary when we did that.
Okay. I now put this resolution to a vote. Other business. That concludes the resolutions to be voted on today. Could all shareholders voting online please ensure you have submitted your votes. I will now pause to allow you time to finalize votes. Thank you, everyone. Voting is now closed. The results of this meeting will be released to the ASX later today. We have now completed the matters contained in the notice of the annual general meeting of shareholders, and I declare the meeting closed. Mr. Gillespie, our famous CEO, will now give a presentation. Following that, you will be able to ask questions. Paul.
Thanks, Chris. Good morning, everyone. Thanks for joining our annual general meeting for 2025. Today, I'm pleased to update you on the progress we're making as we execute our growth strategies. This execution strength is a key driver to our long-term earnings performance. Over the last couple of weeks, and ahead of some broker presentations, we released an updated slide pack to the ASX. It includes a review of the FY 2025 and a trading update of the first quarter of FY 2026. Today, I've updated those slides in order for today's meeting to share with you. You will see in this deck that we're building the foundations for multi-year growth. We've made a strong start to the new financial year, and we have momentum and tailwinds going into the second half of FY 2026. As usual, after today's presentation, we'll be very happy to answer any questions that you may have.
Let's start on page two, please. FY 2025 continued our strong growth trajectory, delivering record results supported by a transformational acquisition in the U.S.A, Smart Parking has again demonstrated that it's a fast-growing, profitable, and cash flow-positive company with the ability to scale in large markets and self-fund our organic expansion. We have robust technologies and the capability to deliver long-term sustainable growth. On page three, if we take a look at page three, we can review our record results for FY 2025. The last financial year, revenue increased by 42% to AUD 77.2 million. Adjusted EBITDA was up by 47% to AUD 20.5 million, and earnings per share rose by 37%. We generated adjusted free cash flow of AUD 13.3 million and finished the year with a strong balance sheet and cash of AUD 12.7 million. While the results are impressive, we're still very early in our growth journey. Our markets are nascent.
We feel we're at the forefront of driving industry change, raising standards, and delivering better outcomes for site owners. Our opportunity is to scale quickly and entrench Smart Parking as a leading technology provider of parking management solutions across major markets. How are we progressing in building scale across these markets? The U.K., our largest market today, continues to grow, and we have impressive contributions from the new territories. Revenue in the U.K. was up 19% to AUD 52.5 million, driven by new site additions and a broad base of new business wins. We issued 13% more PBNs, which is consistent with the year before, and closed the year with 1,335 sites under management, which is an increase of 19% on the PCP. EBITDA increased by 17% to AUD 16.7 million. These are solid results in a core market. Our U.K. business has a long growth runway.
We estimate the TAM is around 45,000 sites, with our market share at less than 3%. So we have plenty of scope for growth. We also have substantial growth opportunities in the new territories. In particular, our New Zealand business is a highlight. It continues to perform strongly. Revenue was AUD 7.4 million for the year, up 62%. Adjusted EBITDA increased by 128% to AUD 3.2 million, and margins are the highest in the group, at just under 43%. We closed FY25 with 238 sites under management in New Zealand. That's up 47% on the PCP, and we delivered 48% growth in PBNs. The business has more than doubled in two years. Once again, there is substantial scope for long-term growth. With the TAM of 3,000 sites, we have less than 1% of the addressable market. In Germany, growth is accelerating. Revenues for the year increased by 60% to over AUD 4 million.
PBNs were up 37%, and the number of sites under management at June 30 was 107. It's a good milestone. While we continue to invest, scale is building, and it will deliver profitability in the near future. We started our operation in Denmark in February of 2024 and now have a sales team and a structure in place. The business has performed to expectations and generated revenues of AUD 1.3 million in the period. At the year end, we had 48 sites under management and a strong pipeline to convert. However, as we highlighted the full year, there have been changes to the regulations around PBN issuance in Denmark. After discussions with the Transport Department, they have decided that the first notice to KIPA, or the PBN, in the enforcement process should be placed manually.
Whilst this has added some costs to the business and also slowed our progress with PBN issuance as we adjust our operations, Smart Parking is well positioned to respond with proprietary technology to drive efficiency. Elsewhere, we continue to expand our footprint with a new business in Switzerland. We see this as a constructive market and a natural extension to our growing European operations. We've recruited a well-qualified managing director to lead the business, and I'm busy setting up our operational structures to support scale. We've recruited sales and operational people so we can win customers and commence revenue generation very soon. Overall, Smart Parking is well placed to continue to grow in existing and new markets for many years to come. Of course, as we grow the number of sites under management, our revenue and earnings will also grow significantly.
After a series of successive record results, what is Smart Parking today? We are a leading technology-driven service provider to the parking industry in the territories in which we operate. At September 30th, we had 1,799 sites under management. That is site growth of 31% on average over the last seven years. I will note that that figure does not include the 71 locations we removed from Queensland during the first quarter. We employ over 330 people globally, with 90 heads now in the U.S.A., It is important not to forget that at our heart, we are a technology company. Our systems and platform are proprietary and are the foundations of our ability to scale across multiple markets. Our growth strategy is consistent.
You will have seen this slide many times before, but to recap, we aim to drive long-term value creation through strong organic growth in existing territories, build scale in new territories with constructive regulatory settings, and complement this with selective accretive acquisitions. I can tell you that as a CEO, there is great value in our strategic consistency. It allows us to focus on execution. Everyone at Smart Parking knows their role in the process, which allows the team to work seamlessly. We build discipline to drive performance, with everyone in the team pushing in the same direction. This is one of the keys to our success. This playbook has enabled us to expand over the last four years into five territories, complete five acquisitions, and increase revenue from AUD 23 million in FY2021 to over AUD 77 million in FY2025. In FY2025, we made further progress.
We surpassed 1 million PBNs issued, which is a significant milestone for us. We delivered double-digit revenue growth in the three original markets, the U.K., New Zealand, and Germany. We established a beachhead in Denmark from where we can build our presence across Scandinavia. In February, we entered the largest parking market in the world, the U.S.A., through a highly attractive acquisition, Peak Parking. This acquisition has already contributed to immediate accretion to earnings and provides a significant point of difference against local competitors by enabling the implementation of our market-leading proprietary Smart Cloud AI engine. The acquisition was funded by a successful equity raise of AUD 45 million through a fully underwritten placement and entitlement offer. We thank the shareholders for their support and mandate for growth. Through our entry into new territories, we have expanded our total addressable markets opportunities to over 250,000 suitable sites.
Given the size of the U.S., market as well, that figure is arguably conservative. Our goal is to execute on the opportunity and deliver sustainable growth that will endure for years to come. The key to delivering our exciting future is our ability to grow and win market share in large markets. Let's reflect on why we win. First, we solve an important problem for our clients. We enhance returns for site owners. We ensure genuine customers always have a place to park. We increase footfall and turnover without any need for them to invest capital expenditure. We do this in a compliant and constructive way. Second, we have invested in and developed market-leading technology. Of course, there are two parts to this.
First, Smart Cloud enables a collection of huge amounts of data from the whole estate, processes plate images and payments, generates all contraventions, communicates with government agencies, issues the breach notice, manages the appeals process and customer interaction, and finally, deals with the debt resolution process. This is the back-office solution that drives our business across all our operating territories. Second is Smart Hub, which we launched last year and is the customer-facing portal that provides our clients with data analytics, flexibility, and deep insight into their parking location. This is a unique level of control that we give back to our customer that allows them to see exactly how the site is performing. It also provides instant access to data, something that the vast majority of landowners have never had before. This data and reporting are competitive strengths.
The car park is often the first entry and engagement point our clients have with their customers. It's a lead indicator of business performance. The data is both insightful and valuable to our customer base. Our technology separates us from the competition and gives us a significant competitive advantage across all markets in which we operate. The technology is the cornerstone of a highly efficient industrial strength and scalable activity system which we've created. This activity system includes another key strength: our disciplined sales process. We leverage our deep domain expertise, regulatory strengths, and proprietary technologies in a systematic way to build the estate. We target attractive sites and optimize performance across the estate, and we diversify our portfolio across sectors and landlords to reduce contract risk. In summary, we've created a deep moat that sustains our competitive advantage and drives our superior long-term performance.
Having seen that our operating activity system is highly scalable, what is the financial model that underpins Smart Parking success? SPZ is capital-light with attractive incremental margins and high returns. We invest approximately AUD 18,000 in installing technology at each site, to which we retain ownership. We typically see a payback on this of 9-10 months compared to a contract life of 3-5 years. Each new site generates an incremental EBITDA margin of 55%, which drives our long-term margin expansion. We generate strong, positive cash flow and can self-fund our organic growth strategy. We have covered our products, our service, our strategy, and FY25 performance. Let's now turn to the first quarter trading update on page 11. I'm pleased to report that Smart Parking has started FY26 well. We have maintained our strong exit run rate from FY25, and growth is continuing across our major markets.
Three points to note before we get into the numbers. Number one, Q1 does include a full contribution from Peak Parking, which is not in the PCP. Second, it also includes all startup costs in Switzerland. Again, they were not in the PCP. Third, I will remind you that Q1 is a seasonally positive quarter for the northern hemisphere, with the northern hemisphere holiday season increasing foot traffic across some of our areas of the estate in July and August. That said, revenues for the first quarter were up 69% compared to the PCP. Adjusted EBITDA is up 56% at AUD 7.9 million. PBNs are up 10%, and we have 21% more ANPR sites in the estate on average this quarter compared to the first quarter last year. We closed the quarter with 1,799 sites under management.
I'll close this slide on the improvement in our ticket yield and the average PBN value. Despite lower PBN issuance in some areas, the average PBN value in Q1 was up 17% on the quarter. This is significant. To achieve this, we've upgraded and enhanced our debt resolution processes in the U.K., which is delivering a higher recovery rate. We look forward to that continuing process into H2 and beyond. If we touch on the performance across our markets now for the first quarter, the U.K. had a good quarter with average value per PBN increasing by 19%. Site installations also increased by 18% with a strong pipeline for further growth. In the U.S.A., we made good progress with conversion of Peak sites or some of Peak sites to our ANPR technology. Ten sites have now been installed and eight are issuing PBNs to date.
The pipeline is growing and the local team are busy executing the plan. New Zealand delivered a very pleasing result. We saw 48% growth in PBNs versus the PCP. Total site installations were up 47%, and like the U.K., there is a good pipeline in place. Germany is tracking well to turning profitable. PBNs increased by 34% with 65% growth in site installations. In Denmark, we now have over 50 sites installed. The changes in regulation since we commenced have delayed our profitability timeline, but the market remains attractive due to the high PBN values and exceptional payment rates. We aim to use Denmark as an operating base and a growth base to go across Scandinavia in the future. We started operating in Switzerland in July, and the recruitment of the team is now complete. We're building the sales pipeline and expect to commence revenue generation shortly.
Finally, on this slide, as I highlighted earlier in the call, during the first quarter, we removed all 71 ANPR locations from our Queensland customer base and shipped the technology to New Zealand for redeployment. Whilst this is an unusual churn event, it will be listed as churn. However, usual churn can be broken into three areas. The first one, the largest one, being voluntary. This is where we remove the sites for our reasons if it's not performing in order to optimize the return on capital. This represents around 50% of all churn events. The second point could be seen as change of operation or change of use. This is where the location may be sold for redevelopment or the site's operations change. This will account for around 30% of churn events.
Finally, there's also the customer churn, which is where the customer may exit contracts towards the end of their life. This accounts for around 20% of the events. It's worth noting that in FY2025, the total churn for the group was 62 sites, which is 3.5% of the total installation base. It's clear to me that we're totally focused on customer service and delivery, and this is demonstrated with the low exit rate from customers. I'll now move to the last slide and talk about the year ahead. Having started the year well, FY2026 promises to be another successful year of growth and record results for SPZ. We've expanded our pipeline of opportunities across all our major markets and enhanced sales capability to convert interest into new partnerships.
will continue to drive growth across our markets and have years of growth ahead of us in the U.K., Germany, New Zealand, Denmark, Switzerland, and the U.S.A., We will continue to deploy capital carefully as we invest in growth and make further disciplined acquisitions to build on our scale and strengths. With this growth and momentum, we confidently reaffirm our long-term organic site growth target. By December 2028, we expect to have 3,000 ANPR sites under management. It took 10 years to reach 1,500 sites under management, and we expect to take only three years to effectively double the business again. In short, Smart Parking is accelerating. In growing to this new target, we will continue to focus on the disciplined execution of our growth strategy, which has served Smart Parking, our shareholders, our employees, and our customers so well. Thank you. That now concludes my presentation.
We can open the line for some questions. I'll hand back to you, Chris, if there's anything the Chairman wants to add. You're on mute, Chris. You're on mute. Thank you, Chris. Are you still on mute? Can you unmute him? I'm still on mute.
Sorry, I was on mute. Thank you, Paul. Richard, can you sort of manage your questions, Simon?
Yeah, sure. Thanks. Yep, yep. Question from Angus Robertson. SPZ claims to offer customers differentiated and superior service. Could you please explain and expand on this to shareholders?
Claims. As to claims, I think we do. I don't claim to say we do. We actually do. We have obviously, we can go back to slide number eight, please, Stacey. Can everyone see the slides? I can't. They disappeared from me. Okay. We can see them. Can you just move that to the left?
Thank you. Angus, what we have here is obviously we've highlighted the activity system on which Smart Parking delivers. If we compare what we provide, particularly our technology, and we've built everything around the Smart Cloud solution, our Smart Cloud solution essentially runs the business, and of course we have the front-facing customer portal. These types of solutions are very unique in our industry. Very few of our competitors have this type of technology. Some may outsource a customer portal to another technology provider who are not an operator, but the majority of our competing people in the competitive environment do not have this level of technology, do not have the ability to scale the way we do. That offers us something very, very different.
What differentiates us with the customer in particular is the portal, allowing the customer to see exactly what is going on on their location at any time, whether it be the number of cars that come and go from the location, whether it be the average stay time of that particular car, whether it be what is the busiest time of day, managing their own whitelisting, canceling breaches. That is something quite unique. It is very different. That is a differentiating factor in our customer base, if you like. Very few of our competitors have that. That is a key reason.
Okay. Next question from John. Thank you for page nine, how it works. In the eleven years I have been a shareholder, that page reveals the most about how our company generates revenue and ultimately profit.
My question is, could you expand on that page a little further with details of what is the average number of car park spaces for each added site, say, on a quarterly basis, and approximate the historical or expected number of PBNs per site per annum going forward and the difference in each country?
I think the average space, we don't tend to focus on what the average spaces are, John, because it doesn't really matter. To us, the service we're providing is all about generating footfall through the estates.
Now, whether that be a 10-space car park outside of a chemist or something, or to a 2,000-space car park at a train station, it is really about how do you ensure that the right people are parking there, you get the footfall going through the estate for the customer, and also you ensure there is always a place to park for genuine customers. Of course, a lot of what we do is removing the parking abuse, removing the people who are not genuine customers. That is really the key thing. The number of spaces is kind of irrelevant. In terms of the historical or expected number of PBNs per site, I guess we have highlighted it on this page.
Yeah. I guess when we report half-year results and full-year results, you will be aware there is a slide that has the flags on them.
For each country, we report sites, PBNs issued, revenue, and even data. We do that already. Question two. Does the board now consider Australia a no-go zone for Smart Parking's technology?
Who is this from?
John.
This is John. The answer to that question at the moment is yes, because we cannot access the regulatory environment in Australia. It is challenging, particularly Victoria, New South Wales, and Queensland. Accessing the keeper details at the driver vehicle license agency database is challenging. You can actually access the details in Western Australia and South Australia via a court order, which is interesting, but unfortunately, we do not see that as a positive to us. It is hard to generate the same levels of revenue, the payback on the locations with that type of process because it takes two months to get those details.
We would see that as a very challenging environment and something there's no point investing our capital in. There are many more countries out there that are far more interesting to invest in at the moment.
Just related, how do Wilson Parking send out breaches?
They do so manually, and they do so via a court order, like I say. If you were to dig into their numbers, which you can't because they're a private company, you would see that their payment ratio is very, very low, so the low 20%. The way I would look at it is if I drove to a shopping center on a Monday and overstayed or breached the terms and conditions, and I get a parking breach sent to me by the Friday, the chance of me paying it is quite high.
Whereas if I do that on a Monday, Monday the 1st of September, and I do not get the breach until Monday the 1st of November, then the chance of me paying it is incredibly low because a lot of time has passed. The data tells us that the longer it takes a breach to get to you, the lower the payment ratio would be. It is not a we will not see the return on investment.
I think the next question was covered as part of your script. The exchange last year was 3.5%, and obviously, half of that was voluntary.
Yep.
Okay. From Simon. With the target 5-700 new sites in FY27, what is the target by country? Also, is this the expected rate of install we should expect for FY26? In FY27? Yeah.
In the presentation, we said it's 5-700 sites for FY27. Just how does that break down?
Okay. Obviously, we're still looking at sort of the U.K. will be 300 locations. Last year, we installed 437 new gross new additions or gross new sites. We're looking at 300 for the U.K. We're looking at 100 for New Zealand. We're looking at 100 for Germany. Obviously, the U.S., was still in our building phase, but we are looking at somewhere between 30-50 ANPR locations by year-end this year as a financial year-end. Denmark, clearly, we're still winning locations, but we're obviously operating them slightly differently from where we were before. They won't be added to the ANPR locations. That'll be the new manual sites. Of course, Switzerland, we're very close to signing our first locations there.
I'm pleased to say the team has been built. We've got all the operations in place. The technologies, the back office are all being run by the German team, which is part of the DACH region strategy. As a result, we will see some sites out of Switzerland, but the 20-30 locations. In excess of 500 is what we're obviously still very confident of achieving, and that's the way to break down. Yep.
Okay. From Stella. Thanks. Regarding slide nine on the side of economics, have these key metrics changed over the last five to six years? If so, what has changed and why?
I guess that they represent the long-run averages. I mean, when we take on a new site, there's always a bit of a spike in issuance, and then it tends to settle down.
But the numbers we've reported are the long-run averages.
Okay. There's a second point there. Excuse me. All right. Keep going.
Yeah. Is there any regulatory update on Denmark and will Germany turn a profit in FY26?
I think I gave that during the prezzo, Stella. I'll read Denmark, so I won't repeat myself. Germany, we're very confident of being profitable in FY26, yes.
Okay. From Mark, what percentage of PBNs is written off as bad debts or not paid? We effectively, at the end of every month, look at the book of unpaid tickets, and we estimate based on historical trends what we'll get collected in the future. Collection rates do vary by country. For instance, for the likes of New Zealand and the U.K., it's around 55%. For the likes of Denmark and Germany, it's anywhere between 70-85%.
Clients learn from past behavior. Do PBNs decrease over time? Does gradually over time. We have sites that we have had for over 10 years where we still issue between GBP 8,000 and GBP 9,000 every single month. It depends on the location of the car park, whether it is near a transport hub, etc.
I think it is important to really highlight that because there was another question earlier about the number of bays. It comes back to the location. Where is it? What is the reason why that location is abused or has high abuse? Is the footfall high there? What would drive the PCN or the PBN issuance clearly is volume of footfall and reasons for these things to happen. Once, as Richard mentioned, it is based in North London. We have had it for 10, 11 years.
We deliver every month somewhere between GBP 7,000-8,000 in receipts every single month. The reason for that is it is very close to main arterial routes into London. It is very close to high-footfall retail areas. It is not far from large football grounds in North London. There are many reasons there. It is also just outside the congestion charging zone. All these things add up to reasons why there might be a parking abuse there, and it is also a transient area. That is what drives the PBN issuance. I think we focus and spend a lot of time when we are winning these locations on going through a survey procedure, a survey process with the local team.
In every area we operate, we go through the same process to understand that site, understand the location, understand the reasons for the parking abuse or why it may occur. I think that's quite an important point to get across because it's come up twice now.
Okay. As a recent shareholder, I'm curious to know, with a 55% margin for incremental sites, what is the EBITDA margin expectations for FY26 and FY27? Okay. For FY25, the group margin was up 110 basis points, and we would expect to see margins continue to improve as we add new sites, which have a higher incremental margin, but also the likes of Germany that move from being loss-making into profit-making. Okay. Question from Shar. With the first 10 U.S.A., ANPR sites, have these sites signed longer-term contracts? As I understand, the traditional Peak Parking sites do not have locked-in contracts.
Do these ANPR sites still pay any management service fee after the conversion, or is the revenue purely from PBNs?
Good question, Shan. The sites, obviously, we've converted some of those locations that are existing customers. So we have changes to contracts there. Some we've signed one longer term. In most cases in the U.S., where the customer wants to own the technology or own the cameras and the signage, clearly, they maintain the same contract terms or same contract tenure, which is short because we're not making that initial investment. Where we are making the initial investment, we do sign up for three to five years, which is the same as U.K., New Zealand, and so on. Of course, it's very early days in the U.S.
I think it's very important to stress that we've taken our time to do this because there's a number of things to step through in the U.S., Each state, county, city might have different regulatory environments. The signage needs to be different in each location. We take time to make sure that's right. What we're seeing now from the sites that are issuing breaches is they're being paid, right, which is obviously one positive thing. Also, the appeals we're managing are nothing that we weren't expecting. Right now, it's looking incredibly positive from the U.S., perspective in how we're actually issuing those tickets, how we're managing appeals, and how they're being paid.
Now, of course, if a customer does want to own that technology, own essentially the hardware, if we were to leave sites and they keep them, really, they've got nothing else to do, right? Because the technology, the clever piece of what we do is Smart Cloud. That's what's driving the solution. That's what's driving the issuance. We don't leave that behind. That's always ours. It is sort of this is where we believe we're changing the dynamic with that marketplace in that we will be providing a capital or a CapEx-free solution to the customer. That's what's going to drive our growth over the next few years in the U.S., as well as the traditional sites, which is a fantastic business. As you highlight here, revenue per site per annum is around about $100,000. These are good quality contracts.
We want to keep winning those and supplement it with our growth of ANPR technology.
We will retain the management revenue on those existing sites. We do not lose that. We still get that. Yeah. Okay. Ashwin, you report a 19% increase in yield per PBN due to an enhanced debt recovery process. Can you break down how much of the uplift comes from operational improvements versus increased debt collection of older invoices? How does the average PBN compare to bringing out this enhanced debt recovery?
I think the debt recovery process has been there. We have always had a debt resolution process. Let's not forget that, right? In the U.K., the way it works is we issue the breach, and it gets issued at GBP 100 in most cases. You have 14 days to pay. In that 14-day period, it gets reduced to GBP 60.
It's a 40% discount. After 14 days, it goes back to GBP 100. At 28 days, we pass it to a debt recovery provider or a debt resolution provider. What we have changed is the management of that initial debt resolution provider, as in who we work with. We have had a long-standing contract with them. They have done a great job. Unfortunately, they have been through some ownership change. They have also been through leadership change, which led to a number of questions being asked around their contract. We felt that they were not delivering for us. We did manage to renegotiate that positively. We have also managed to then, after 12 months of leaving the cases with that particular provider, pass it to two new providers on what you call a second placement process. This is basically additional letters, additional legal process.
We tend to only go legal with five breaches or more with a recidivist offender. From that perspective, that's had a positive impact and allowed us to increase the yield. I think it's important to note that when we talked about this at the full year, there were a number of questions around whether or not this was a one-off solution because we're hitting the old backbook. Of course, we are absolutely going to be going through that backbook, but you cannot do that in one go. It's not a one-off. The backbook continually grows. Let's not forget that because every month, we're issuing 60,000-70,000 new PBNs. They're going through the first process, and then they're going through the second process. It's an enhanced process. It's not a one-off sugar hit, so to speak. That's not what's happening.
It's very much an enhanced debt recovery process to keep growing our business.
Okay. Question from Michael. Can you explain more fully how you are using technology to overcome the regulatory ruling in Denmark? And how do you serve the physical PBN? Is there a way to grow this business profitably?
I'll answer your last question first. Is there a way to grow this profitably? Absolutely, yes. We want to be in Denmark because there are high ticket values or high breach values, as well as high payment ratio. These are two things we look at. If we compare that with, say, New Zealand, for example, the actual breach value there is a bit lower, AUD 85 versus DKK 720, which is about AUD 120.
I think when you get high ticket values and then you get a high payment ratio, clearly, it's profitable. Now, the challenge we're facing at the moment is because we've been operating as an ANPR operator exclusively, the majority of the locations are around Denmark. They're a bit more spread out. Versus if you put them all in a much tighter location around Copenhagen and not far out, it's easier to get around them with a manual team. That is currently being driven by our ANPR technology that's on the sites today. That's what I'm talking about around technology. We also have a handheld solution that can, which is very quick at issuing those breaches.
When the attendant is there, they can do a very quick sweep of the car park, understand where the breaches are, and issue fast, which is a good health and safety or HNS feature as well. I think, number one, we absolutely want to be there. We definitely can grow that as a manual business and be very profitable. We also see it as a launch pad for the rest of Scandinavia. We know we can access keeper details in Sweden, in Norway, and also in Finland. As a result, in time, we will be looking at expanding those, but utilizing Copenhagen as the hub, as the processing environment that will drive all of Scandinavia.
Okay. Question from Angus. What happens if somebody doesn't pay the PBN? I think we just talked about the process in the U.K.
Shar, if you had to allocate capital to another acquisition, how would you rank each regional country, your first to last choice?
Shar, you're taking up all the questions, Sam. We've got three of them coming through. Okay. How would we look at acquisitions today?
The answer to that question is we look at them all on their own merits, right? It's very important that we look at each deal or each potential acquisition strategically. Is this the right thing for our business? Does it make us better, give us further scale, expand our addressable market, give us new talent, different types of technologies? Does it do those things? Do we make it better? If you answer those, as in with our technology and our people, our know-how, and so on, if we can answer yes to those questions, we should absolutely look closer.
Clearly, the U.S., is a very interesting environment for us because we've managed to get the first acquisition done with Peak Parking. We're very pleased with the team there, very pleased with how they're delivering, very pleased with how we're going against our own act, which is on track at the moment for the end of this calendar year, which I'm pleased about. Clearly, the U.S., is a big growth market for us because it's the biggest market we're in today. The U.K. still represents a good opportunity for us because we're still very early in the growth phase. Germany, clearly, is a massive market, is a great opportunity.
I think it is difficult to rank them to say, yeah, we only want to look at U.S., one, Germany two, and so on, because as the opportunities come up, you evaluate each opportunity on its merits and make sure you go back to your first principles of your strategy. Does it meet our strategy? If it does, can we make it better? Yes. Can it make us better? Yes. Right. Let's have a good look at it and then actually invest some time and effort into understanding the asset. Yeah, it is on every deal on its merits, Shar.
Okay. Two more questions from Shar. The timing of the U.K. parking code review and how might you deal with decoration fees?
The code of practice or the latest consultation was closed in September.
What I've heard actually since then has been a record number of responses from the industry, from parking operators, which is fantastic, but also from landowners. A big process we went through, we've done this a couple of times now, is to get as many of our customers, the landowner customers, to respond to the consultation on our behalf. That has happened with a number of competitors. Those things are positive. Also, in terms of what happens next, I mean, we've been through this many times, Shars, as you know, and we do not really expect to hear anything probably for another three months, I would imagine, three to four months. Even then, it will be a, okay, this is what our findings are. I suspect there will be another call for evidence, and there will be more information required in time.
In terms of debt collection fees, I mean, nothing has changed. I mean, there's a lot of talk about debt recovery or debt resolution in the consultation document. I think we've covered that incredibly well in our response. The industry as well, we've got together a number of the key players and built a response, which included a document from an economic think tank about how the government should approach debt recovery. Of course, what they're saying is very much in the industry's favor and very positive about how we operate debt recovery versus other industries and how the comparatives should only be local government. Those are very positive things. Again, we don't have a clear understanding of when there'll be a response from the government. This process has been running for six years, as you know. I believe that the latest code of practice is incredibly positive.
It's raising standards, and we completely support the raising standards. The higher the standards we have, the more bureaucracy, red tape we have to go through as a company, is good for people like us because we have already invested in people. We've already invested in technology, and we've already invested in our process. The vast majority of our competitors have not done that. I see this as positive. The more standards can go up and go north is positive for us, and it only really increases our moat around our business. I see the code as a positive thing.
Okay. That deals with all of the questions. I'm not sure whether either you or Chris have any closing comments.
Chris, did you have anything else you want to say?
Not for me. Anybody call?
I guess I would just highlight that clearly we've had a good year. Clearly, we've started the FY 2026 year well. We are clearly still working incredibly hard on a daily basis to deliver against our objectives, to deliver and keep executing our growth strategy. I would highlight a number of tailwinds that are coming through the business, in particular around our U.S., business and starting to really roll out that ANPR technology. Whilst we are conservative about our approach and we are going to be diligent and discipline our approach, there's still some good tailwinds from that perspective. The U.K. debt resolution process, we still are working on that particular process and trying to refine it a bit further to try and keep growing the business from that part of the operation. I do see some additional upside for that in going into the new financial year.
Clearly, Germany for us is very important, and we're very close to a break-even environment there. I am excited by what we'll see in the second half. Of course, New Zealand just keeps kicking goals. That is an area that's a growth for us. There are a number of tailwinds going into the second half. There are lots of reasons to be excited about Smart Parking.
One thing I'd like to do is congratulate Paul and Richard, and in fact, all the staff of SPZ. We had a conference in the U.K. where we had all the managers from around the world. The enthusiasm and excitement about the company was just magnificent. I think that's what's driving it. I've probably got a problem now because I remember 10 years ago, I said SPZ is going to be one cent or one dollar.
I have to have a new one now, well over a dollar. Anyway, I'd like to thank all the shareholders. I know there are a lot there that have been there for a long time, share price down to AUD 0.04 and everything else. Finally, it all happened. It just shows you if you're really focused, and I think so many companies these days are very short-sighted. We have a long-term plan, and you can see how Paul and Richard have really guided the company, and we're executing. We've had some ups and downs on the way. Few times we all wondered whether we were going to get here, but it's really great. It's great to see shareholders finally sort of rewarded for their patience and staying with the business. Thank you, everyone, for attending today, and talk to you again in a year's time.
Thank you. Thank you. All right. Bye-bye. Cheerio. Bye-bye. Thanks.