I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Dean Banks, Managing Director and Group Chief Executive Officer. Please go ahead.
Thank you, Ash. Good morning and welcome to everyone listening in today. Thank you for joining us for our 2024 full-year results presentation. I am Dean Banks, proud and privileged to be the Group CEO of Ventia, and I'm joined today by our CFO, Mark Fleming. Following the presentation, Mark and I will be happy to take questions. To begin, I'd like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land that we are broadcasting from today, the Cammeraygal people of the Eora Nation. We acknowledge their ancient and ongoing connection to lands, waters, and communities, and pay respect to elders past and present. We also recognize and celebrate the heritage and culture of New Zealand, where our teams engage with local iwi and communities across the country. I'd like to start our presentation with a safety moment.
Since listing, our total recordable injury frequency rate and serious injury frequency rate have significantly reduced, 24% and 75% respectively. In 2024, our performance has plateaued, with TRIFR increasing 0.6% and SIFR 18%, which equates to one additional injury in year. Over this term, one initiative that has had a positive and significant impact on our safety performance and employee behaviors is our telematics program. Driving is Ventia's highest critical risk. In 2024, we had more than 5,000 drivers who collectively traveled more than 81 million kilometers. To mitigate the risks associated with driving, we use telematics. 92% of Ventia's vehicles have telematics installed, and since 2021, this technology, alongside our education programs, has contributed to a 65% reduction in motor vehicle incidents.
This is testament to the benefits of using technology to improve driver safety, and it's just one of the ways we demonstrate our steadfast commitment to the health, safety, and well-being of our employees. 2024 was a progressive year for Ventia. We have delivered on what we said we would do from a financial perspective, generating NPATA growth of 12.8% alongside strong cash conversion. Our customer renewal rate increased to 92% from 87% in 2023, demonstrating the trust our clients place in our business and the emphasis we place on building long-term relationships. We have once again delivered improved returns for our shareholders, declaring a final dividend of $10.63% share per cents, bringing the total dividend for the year to $19.98 cents per share. This represents a 12.8% increase compared to the total dividend paid last year.
I'm also delighted to announce today our intention to conduct an on-market share buyback of up to $100 million. After careful consideration, Ventia's board and management have determined that in 2025, an on-market buyback is the most efficient strategy to distribute excess capital to investors. Moving now to our high-level financial results. Mark will add more color shortly. We achieved full-year revenue of $6.1 billion, up 7.6%. EBITDA was up 7.3% to $499.3 million, and the group margin remained stable at 8.2%. Cash conversion increased by 2.6 percentage points to 91.4%, demonstrating our focus on embedding a cash-generative model. Work in hand increased to $19.4 billion, supported by a number of new awards and renewals across the sectors, which I will speak to on the next slide. Our work in hand growth of 6.7% is the highest annual increase we've seen since listing.
The second half performance was particularly strong, with more than $4 billion of contracts awarded. We renewed three NBN on-demand module contracts worth an aggregate of $300 million, a testament to our long-standing strategic partnership with NBN. In August, we were awarded a six-year National Defence Firefighting Services contract worth $564 million. This is the first tranche of the Defence-Based Services contracts and has options for extension beyond 2030. Ventia has the largest privatized firefighting force in Australia, and we are proud to deploy this capability to work alongside defence personnel. Having enjoyed a 20-year relationship with Homes NSW, we renewed our contract for an additional five years with a value of $570 million. This means Ventia will continue to provide maintenance services to more than 28,000 homes across New South Wales.
Ventia was also awarded several new contracts during the year, including a five-year contract with Western Power, valued at approximately $178 million, which we mobilized in September 2024, and Ventia is now delivering maintenance services across their transmission and distribution network. In August, we secured a four-year contract with Seqwater, valued at $220 million, to deliver preventive and reactive maintenance across its water network in Southeast Queensland. I thought it would be worthwhile to share an update on our strategic relationship with Telstra, a partnership now spanning over 30 years. The trust and understanding of their network enabled us to agree upon a long-term contract with an initial five-year tenure. This provides Ventia with stability and predictability while facilitating operational efficiencies for Telstra. the $2 billion contract covers the design, build, and maintenance of Telstra's critical digital infrastructure, which includes nationwide lifecycle management and fixed network services.
This new collaborative arrangement commenced at the start of this year and will deliver mutually beneficial outcomes for both parties. Our strategy is to redefine service excellence, and we strive to leverage our competitive capability to promote customer focus, innovation, and sustainability. In terms of customer recognition, we are very proud that in November, Ventia was recognized as the Defence-Based Contractor of the Year, the Department of Defence referencing our true team-of-teams partnership alongside our service delivery and customer-centric approach. This is an outstanding accolade, a true testimonial for the dedication our defence team plays on delivering a premium service to the more than 100,000 Defence Force personnel we support. We recognize that success like this cannot be taken for granted, and in 2024, we launched a research program to better capture the voice of the customer so we can continually strive to exceed their expectations.
This program will expand in 2025, allowing us to track and act on their feedback. In 2024, we achieved a very high customer renewal success rate of 91.9%, delivering in excess of $3.9 billion of contract renewals and/or extensions. Our cross-selling revenue also hit a new high of $116 million, growth of 24% on the prior year. Encouragingly, our qualified cross-sell pipeline now exceeds $1 billion of opportunity. The second pillar of our strategy is innovation. Last year, we formally launched a new responsible AI framework, allowing us to leverage emerging AI capability into our business to increase knowledge, better inform decision-making, and drive efficiency benefits. We see this as just the beginning of our AI journey, and are excited about the future potential for these platforms. Our sustainability efforts remain critical to the success of Ventia and the communities we serve.
In 2025, we will adopt the new climate and sustainability reporting standards and update on our progress in pursuit of our science-based targets for 2030. In 2024, our Scope 3 emissions did grow by 12.6%, largely due to increased spending in purchasing goods and services. However, we made good progress on our Scope 1 and 2 market-based emissions, which reduced by 11.4%. In 2023, we introduced the TOMS methodology, which stands for Themes, Outcomes, and Measures, to assess our social sustainability impact. In 2024, we delivered an estimated $3.9 billion in social value benefit, which means we have captured a total of $8.2 billion of social value since we introduced the measure last year. Before I hand over to Mark, I wanted to give an update on the proceedings initiated by the ACCC in December. The Ventia board and management take these allegations very seriously.
Based on the information provided to date, we do not believe that Ventia or its employees have engaged in any misconduct. We intend to defend the allegations. Our conduct and associated governance are critical to our success. Ventia is committed to ethical business practices and seeks to uphold the highest standards of governance and risk management. I'll now hand to Mark to provide more detail on the financials.
Thanks, Dean, and welcome, everyone. Let's start by taking a look at our track record of performance. Over the last four years since Ventia listed, the business has delivered consistent growth. Group revenue has increased by 34%, and in 2024, strong results from our telecommunications and defense and social infrastructure sectors largely drove the 7.6% revenue growth. Over the last two years, EBITDA has increased by 31%, and the EBITDA margin has remained stable at 8.2% this year.
NPATA has increased by an impressive 55% since 2021 and grew by 12.8% last year due to business performance, lower amortization, and higher interest income. One further comment on NPATA for the FY25 year. Last month, we announced the novation of our Toowoomba Second Range Crossing contract. We expect to realize a one-off profit from this transaction of between $20 million and $25 million during the first half of the current financial year, and this one-off profit has been excluded from our guidance range. Our track record of consistent performance demonstrates the resilience of our portfolio, the cash-generative nature of our business, and the enduring strategic relationships we've built with our customers. Looking more closely at our financial performance for the year, EBITDA grew by 7.3%, and our margins remained stable at 8.2%. Cash conversion improved to 91.4% due to continued focus on invoicing and cash collection.
Capital expenditure increased to $67.4 million, or 1.1% of revenue. This is a little higher than we've seen in previous years, driven by investment in our core business, including plant and machinery to support contract wins in the infrastructure services and telecommunications sectors. Net finance costs have decreased due to higher cash balances. Overall, I'm very pleased with the 2024 financial performance, and we're well positioned to meet expectations for 2025. Let's now look at the sectors in more detail. Our defense and social infrastructure business had an excellent year, with strong growth in both revenue and EBITDA. Performance was driven by contract growth and new contract wins, as well as efficiency programs to improve margins. Infrastructure services had a solid last six months, with EBITDA margin improving from 7.9% in the first half to 8.7% in the second half.
This was due to the ongoing mix shift from lower margin resource and industrial projects toward higher margin energy, water, and renewables projects, and increased focus on driving efficiency across the portfolio. It's also pleasing to see new contract wins in the energy, water, and renewables segment, including Western Power and Seqwater, which positions the sector well for continued growth in 2025. Our telecommunications business continues to experience significant growth. Revenue increased by an impressive 14.6%, and EBITDA by 15.3%. Telco revenue was supported by build volumes across new and existing work programs. Work winning in telco has been exceptional this year, with more than $3 billion of work in hand added to the portfolio and a lengthening of tenure that we've not seen in telco previously. Our transport business had a weaker second half due to operational and contract award delays impacting delivery timing.
This was partially offset by new Transurban Queensland and New South Wales Smart Motorway projects. Overall, this result again demonstrates the advantage of our diversified model, delivering a more reliable and resilient result for the group as a whole. Moving to our debt and liquidity positions. In November 2024, we successfully refinanced our $1.15 billion of debt across all facilities. The second half of 2024 showed positive debt market conditions, and we took the opportunity to lengthen and diversify our funding mix while reducing margins and improving terms. Our new Asian term loan was over 2.5 times oversubscribed, which showed great support for Ventia despite being new to that market. Our first maturity is now not until November 2027, and with our term loans converted into revolvers, we now have the flexibility to repay debt at any time.
In terms of cash, as at 31 December, we had $392.8 million on hand and a $400 million undrawn revolver, resulting in total liquidity of $792.8 million. Our S&P and Moody's ratings remain stable and unchanged, reflecting the reliability and stability of our cash flow, continued improvement in credit metrics, and consistent business performance. Our net debt to EBITDA continues to decline and is now at the very bottom of our target range at one times, well within our covenants and our credit rating band guidelines. I'll discuss the buyback on the next slide, but important to note that post-buyback, our leverage will increase only slightly to around 1.1 times, still towards the bottom end of our target range. We have a healthy balance sheet, a cash-generative business model, and a proven ability to grow without substantially increasing our capital intensity.
As a result of our strong financial position and positive outlook, as Dean said earlier, we're pleased to announce today an on-market buyback of up to $100 million, subject to market conditions. The on-market share buyback is complementary and additional to the announced final dividend of $10.63 per share, which combined with the interim dividend represents a total dividend of $19.98 per share and a payout ratio of 75% of NPATA, franked to 80%. Further capital management initiatives may be considered in the future, subject to Ventia's operating performance and market conditions. At the half-year result in August last year, we laid out our capital allocation framework, and here we illustrate how we've delivered against that framework through 2024.
Firstly, our financial strength and flexibility has been maintained, delivering strong cash conversion of 91.4%, net debt to EBITDA at the bottom end of our target range, refinancing our debt facilities on favorable terms, and maintaining unchanged investment-grade credit ratings from both S&P and Moody's. Secondly, we've invested to grow the core business. We invested $67 million in capital expenditure, including growth investments in several of our businesses. We also acquired the Landscape Solutions land management business in New Zealand for $13.4 million, bringing a high-quality subcontractor in-house, thereby accessing capability and broadening relationships with key customers. Finally, we've maximized total shareholder returns through a 12.8% increase in our dividend and announcing a $100 million buyback. We will continue to focus on using shareholders' capital in a disciplined way to drive earnings growth and deliver sustainable shareholder returns over the long term. I'll now hand back to Dean.
Thank you, Mark. In financial year 25, Oxford Economics Australia estimated our addressable market will be $83.4 billion and is projected to grow to over $100 billion by full year 28, reflecting a compound annual growth rate of 6.4%. When you consider that against our circa $6 billion of revenue, the headroom and opportunity for organic growth is clear and substantial. The tailwinds in the essential services market and key demand drivers underpin our growth potential. First, the large and growing asset base. The federal government has announced a pipeline of $120 billion for infrastructure spend through to 2034. Despite spend on large new build projects reducing, this is offset by an increase in spend to maintenance and upgrade existing infrastructure.
The recent NBN announcement around the fiber upgrade paths for the remaining 622,000 homes and businesses is backed by an equity investment of up to $3 billion from the Australian Government, in addition to more than $800 million from NBN Co. Ventia currently has a market-leading position in the support and delivery of service for NBN. The investment announcement is illustrative of the quality, qualified, and emerging opportunities in our work winning pipeline. Australia's population is expected to grow by 1%-2% annually, primarily due to positive net migration. This will undoubtedly drive additional usage of public infrastructure, especially in urban centers. Thus, state and federal government are responding with significant investment commitments. For example, the Victorian Government announced a record $15 billion of health investment, while the New South Wales Government announced $28 billion of planned expenditure across the education portfolio.
Over the last decade, outsourcing has increased by 9%, with the total maintenance market expected to be up 59% outsourced by full year 2028. In 2024, there was a 33% increase in the value of contracts published on AusTender, the Commonwealth government's procurement system. This is the highest value ever reported. The energy transition is accelerating. The investment in renewable power, transmission, and distribution is increasing. The contract for both Western Power and the continued growth of our recently acquired ATC business are illustrative of the increasing opportunity for Ventia in this space. The market in front of us is sizable. The challenge for Ventia is to navigate and convert this pipeline of quality opportunities to meet, if not exceed, our future growth ambitions. We often get asked, "What differentiates Ventia?" So I wanted to spend a little time sharing and highlighting some components of our value proposition.
We have a clear strategy to redefine service excellence, delivered through a focus on customer, innovation, and sustainability, an aspiration we set prior to listing in 2021 and one that continues to guide our culture. People are at the heart of our business. We have a 35,000-strong workforce distributed across the length and breadth of Australia and New Zealand. Every day, our people bring our strategy and indeed our brand to life. We seek to build deep and long-term strategic relationships with our customers, evidenced by our high contract renewal rate. The testimonials and references of our customers are critical to our success and the gateway to achievement of our future growth ambition. We look at innovation through two lenses. Firstly, how can we leverage data to offer the latest and most informed perspective? And then, how can we leverage this knowledge base to introduce smart and efficient solutions?
Our core data infrastructure is a competitive advantage. Vensites, for example, offers a platform to monitor performance and wrap a common governance and control process across our entire enterprise. From a sustainability perspective, we're focused on meeting our targets, both environmental and social, seeking to deliver positive outcomes for the benefit of future generations. We always aspire to be a good corporate citizen, offering both tangible and intangible benefits to the communities we serve. Risk management, control, and governance is embedded throughout our gated life cycle approach. The robustness of such being fundamental to the reliability and predictability of our business. Our track record affords us the confidence to forecast future outcomes. Finally, as per my update on the previous slide, the market we operate in offers Ventia considerable headroom for organic growth.
If we grasp the market opportunity, maintain our discipline, and continue to build momentum around our strategy, we have excellent future prospects. In summary, we've built a robust platform. 2024 was another progressive year for Ventia, and we enter into 2025 with confidence around our future prospects. I'm therefore in a position today to announce our 2025 guidance range for NPATA growth of 7%-10%. Equally, our capital position is strong, and therefore we intend to return up to $100 million of surplus capital back to shareholders through an on-market buyback. Finally, I would like to offer my sincere appreciation to everybody who helps contribute to Ventia's success: our board, employees, subcontractors, suppliers, customers, and indeed our shareholders. A massive thank you from me for your continued support. I look forward to working alongside you in 2025 and beyond. I will now open the lines for any questions.
Ash, back to you.
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. If you're on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Your first question comes from Nick Daish with RBC. Please go ahead.
Good morning, guys. Thanks for the time. Congrats on the result. My first question is just on the guidance you provided for next year, 7%-10% organic growth. I realize it's a difficult number to split, but could you have a go at trying to split that number between the benefit of inflationary mechanisms that you have in your contracts, your existing contracts there, and then what you allow for from a new contract win perspective?
Just if we could try to split that 7-10 number, please?
Nick, thank you for your question. Look, from the perspective of the way we look at guidance is obviously we, first of all, evaluate risks and opportunities. And within all of our contracts, as you know, there are inflation mechanisms built into them as well, which we consider. There is variability on that. But the Oxford Economics update that says a CAGR going forward of 6.4% obviously includes inflation as well. Last year, you will see we grew by 7.6% as a business. And we have always said the aspiration is to continue to take market share by realizing quality opportunities. My expectation would be that inflation is probably somewhere between 3% and 4%, and then the balance of our growth will come from winning new opportunities and contract growth through the current market that we have got.
But I just repeat that our guidance is around NPATA. It's not about revenue growth. So the guidance is very much focused on NPATA, and that's what we've done consistently since listing in 2021.
Yeah, I might just add there, Nick. Mark here, in relation to inflation, we talk a lot about our EBITDA margin, which has been relatively stable around that 8%-8.2%. And that's the way we think about it because, as Dean says, yes, we might get inflation on the revenue line, and then we get inflation on the expense line as well. But the key is that the margin is roughly maintained.
Okay, that's very clear. Thank you. And then next one is just on this defense procurement process that you're going through at the moment, the EMOS contract. Obviously, federal elections are inbound.
I'm just interested in any role that may or may not play in that procurement process. I realize that it's been a very lengthy process, and an election playing a role in the last two to three months before an announcement would be a very late curveball. Just interested in any risk that you're allowing for there, please?
I think the first thing I would say is that Defence are a very diligent client, so they look through the procurement process professionally to try and make sure they get to the right end result. We're obviously very pleased to be a key strategic partner to Defence, and we're very proud last year to be announced Defence-Based Contractor of the Year. Indeed, last year, we won the first contract in the Defence-based services tranche of contracts, which was for firefighting.
It has obviously been a delayed procurement process, and you'll probably see on their portal, they are suggesting an outcome to the process in the second half of 2025. The current contracts run until June 25, and as today is February the 19th, my anticipation is that they will soon be talking to us, but we haven't got anything that we can give you an official update on today. In terms of the election, I've got to say candidly, I don't know their internal process, but I think there is a risk that if we move into caretaker mode, they may not be able to progress decisions around significant contracts from a governance perspective. Now, that may drive short-term extensions to the current contracting entities. But I think there's quite a few unknowns in that.
So hopefully, I've given you color and context without being particularly decisive in terms of long-term trajectory, apart from we very much believe we've offered a value proposition to Defence that will see us continue to be a long-term partner to them moving forward.
Right. Thank you. Very clear.
Thanks Nick .
The next question comes from George Stewart with JPMorgan. Please go ahead.
Hi, Dean. Congratulations on the result. I've got two questions. The first is regarding the FY25 one-off that's set outside that $20-$25 million gain you've already guided related to that tool and the contract. Given the ACCC allegations going on, are you able to provide any guidance on how much you expect the defense to cost and sort of how long?
Yeah, look, I mean, I'll add to Mark because I think they're both finance questions.
What I would say in terms of NPATA guidance, we obviously evaluate all the risks and opportunities in our portfolio, so we consider defense. Clearly, from an ACCC perspective, it is something we intend to defend. We have built some legal costs into our ongoing cost base, and therefore, that's included in the guidance. In terms of Toowoomba, I will allow Mark to give an update on that, and he might wish to also add some color on our guidance.
Yeah, hi, George. Thanks. Look, we generally like to stick to statutory numbers as much as possible. That's why we've called out Toowoomba because it was a special one-off event of a reasonable size. But otherwise, that's our intention to stick to statutory numbers.
So that being the case, as Dean said, the ACCC legal costs or the expectation of those costs has been included in our forecast and is part of our 7%-10% guidance. I'm not going to quantify what is in the forecast. I think we're probably getting into too much detail, but suffice to say that the guidance is after any of those expected costs.
Fantastic. Thanks. Very helpful. Now, onto that Toowoomba contract. With the unpayable and onerous contracts, roughly at $50 million for the full year, can we expect that balance sort of halving and what projects remain for the residual balance, and when can we expect that to unwind?
Yeah. So yes, as you will have seen, the novation consideration was $6.3 million, but we've said there'll be a $20 million-$25 million positive.
The largest component of the difference is in unfavorable contracts where we have the Toowoomba contract was in that. So yes, you will see a movement in that line in the first half. Again, I don't want to get into specific contracts for the remainder of that unfavorable provision, but they are very few, and they are in the transport sector, and they run for many years. So the remainder of the unfavorable, you'll see unwind over up to 2040. So still a long way to go there. The onerous contracts, we're now pretty much at an end to that. So that will become zero during the course of this year.
And George, I think we've said previously that we probably hope to stop talking about onerous and unfavorable contracts because it's quite a small number now in our financials and, as Mark said, does run for quite a period of time at a small level of runoff.
Yes.
Thanks. Your next question comes from Megan Kirby-Lewis with Barrenjoey. Please go ahead.
Oh, morning. A couple for me. Just firstly, just on defense assumptions built into the NPATA guidance, it would just be useful to understand how you're thinking about it into the second half.
Yeah, I think I'd repeat what I said before, Megan, and thank you for the question. That in our guidance, we have a whole portfolio of a business, defense being one of those contracts.
From our perspective, we have looked at the risks and opportunities, evaluated that, and looked at it from a guidance perspective. I think equally going back to the question earlier about the EMOS contracts and what we think is going to happen, we continue to provide services to Defence on multiple different contracts. We would anticipate to be continuing to offer services to them in the second half year, but I'm not in a position where I can give you anything more material at this point because I don't know anything more material beyond the fact that that particular contract comes to an end on June the 30th, and today is February the 19th. Either we're going to hear something very soon, and of course, if we do, we'll communicate that appropriately.
But I think the time now to mobilize those contracts is shortening, and defense will need to make sure they've got continuity of delivery of service, given it is an important service to defense personnel across the geography of Australia.
That's great. I guess I interpret that, I guess, sort of base case is an extension to discontinuation of what you're doing now into the second half, but that the guidance range would capture if we were to see any change in that contract before year-end, that the guidance range would capture some potential down or upside to that.
Yeah, I think, as I said, it's a portfolio business.
So there's opportunity going forward for us to realize upsides as well as downsides, but our guidance has taken considerations of the risk and then therefore took a balanced consideration of those to say that if there was downside on one contract, hopefully that would be mitigated by upside on another contract.
No, that's super helpful. Thank you. And then just on the NBN work, if you could just remind us sort of the current revenue at the moment, but then how much of that is still or is out for tender?
I would love to give you that information. We don't normally give specific contract or client information unless it's in the public domain.
What I can tell you is that we continue to enjoy a very good relationship with NBN, and I think that's evidenced by the fact that we won three contracts with them last year with a value of circa $300 million. There are other opportunities in the market with NBN as we move forward, and we are actively in that procurement process, and I can't give any further update at this point in time.
No, that's fine. Then just on transport, I'm just started the operational potential headwinds and then some issues around the contract award delays, just the extent to which they have been addressed and if they do or do not fall into CY25.
Yeah, thanks, Lynne. Our expectation is that we will see improvement in FY25 and that those issues in the second half were primarily of a timing nature.
So we are expecting to see improvement on the second half next year.
Megan, they were great questions, and I apologize because the biggest mistake I hope we make on this call is the fact that we got your name wrong. So sincere apologies from Mark and I.
No, no, no. All good. All good. Just one final one for me. It's just on the CapEx, so to say, it's slightly increased there. Just what sort of percentage of revenue should we assume going forward?
Yeah, so we're at 1.1%. I still consider that capital light. As I think we've said before, we're not wedded to a particular percentage number except that we want to remain capital light. So for me, the key issue is where we do invest capital, are we getting a really good return on that investment? And that's the lens through which we look at it.
So if there are opportunities to invest to grow our core business where we felt that we were going to get a return in excess of our hurdles or likewise for acquisitions, then we wouldn't feel as though we couldn't pursue those opportunities because we're trying to stick to a particular percentage of revenue. But having said that, the general orientation is a capital light model.
Very clear. Thank you.
Once again if you wish to ask a question please press star one on your telephone. Your next question comes from John Purtell with Macquarie. Please go ahead.
Good day, Dean and Mark. Hope you're both well. Just had a few questions, please? Just the first one on your revenue, obviously still in positive territory in the second half, you're up 5%, but that was a slowdown on the 11% in the first half. Obviously, transport was down.
Any other areas of softness to call out? And I appreciate your comments before, Dean. I mean, is that 5% we saw in the second half? I mean, is that a proxy for expected top-line growth in the year ahead, or are you hopeful you can do better?
Great question, John. Thank you. First of all, I would say that we never look at it really through short-term cycles. For us, it is a long-term cycle. And if I take transport as an example, over the two years, growth there of 23% on the back of a really strong year with mobilizations on Transurban Queensland, Sydney Harbour Tunnel, etc. So you're going to see changing cycles.
What I'm really encouraged by, actually, and I think has given us a good tailwind coming into 2025, is one, we talked about potentially IS being a bit of a dip as we started to transition that business from lower margin work into a growing sector around energy, water, and renewables. And we saw margins in that particular business grow from 7.9% in the first half to 8.7%, which I think gives us a good start point for 2025. And secondly, we've talked for a long time about we believe there is long-term momentum around telecommunications, and we've certainly seen the contract award with Telstra not only giving us a boost in our work in hand, but giving us a stability of a long-term contract, which, given it is one of our highest margin well, actually, our highest margin sector, I think is really important.
So my view is that the trajectory for the business is good, but I would always look at it through longer-term cycles. And my view is that I'm confident we'll continue to see growth in 2025, but we'll focus on quality opportunities rather than just drawing quantity into our business. So that selective process around work winning and governance, risks, and control will be something that we continue moving forward.
Thanks, Dean. The second one, just around the broader backdrop for government spending, obviously, we're seeing tighter fiscal positions, challenges in the likes of Victoria have been pretty well documented. I mean, what impact is that having on Ventia or expected to have?
Yeah, look, I think it's an interesting question. I've got to say, to this point in time, we actually look at it as an opportunity.
The reason we look at it as an opportunity, picking up on a couple of points in the presentation, is number one, we are seeing reduction in expenditure on new assets and commitment to new build, but that's being offset largely by requirements driven by things like population growth to upgrade or increase maintenance on current assets, which obviously, for our business as an essential services provider, is advantageous. I think the second thing is that we are seeing more inbound conversations about potential opportunities for outsourcing. I think for where there's economic challenges around budgets, maybe that's an opportunity for us going forward.
So I don't think I see anywhere where particularly there is a key challenge for us going forward, but I think equally, the value of our business is that we span the breadth and depth of Australia and New Zealand, and we have a portfolio of different capabilities. Equally, I would say that we've set ourselves up really well, given the fact that our average contract tenure with extensions is seven years, that our renewal rate really being high means the platform that we've got. And if you like, that short to medium-term revenue coverage is really good for our business. So at the minute, nothing to note. We obviously will continue to be watching brief to see if it impacts us, but at the minute, we probably see it slightly falling on the positive side rather than the negative side.
And just the last one, for Mark, just in terms of your balance sheet and how you're thinking about potential bolt-on acquisitions. Obviously, the main focus is on organic growth, but you're still, notwithstanding the buyback, you're still preserving capacity for bolt-ons by the looks, and I suppose just where that's sitting priority-wise. Thanks.
Yeah, thanks, John. You're right. And I think it's all about balance, and we're trying to follow through with the capital allocation framework where we want to maintain our financial strength, but if there are opportunities to invest to grow the core, then we want to do that. And we also want to make sure that we're being good custodians of shareholders' funds, and if we can do both of those things and still have excess capital, that we have capacity to return to shareholders as well. So it's not an either/or.
In relation to acquisitions, we've done three small ones, as you know, in the last few years. They've all been successful, and it is part of the consideration going forward that we will continue to look at those sort of bolt-on acquisitions, as we've previously said. So as I think we've said before, we'd be very cautious with anything very large or transformational, but certainly, the bolt-ons, we expect that we'll continue to occasionally make those acquisitions where it makes sense to accelerate the growth of our core business.
Thank you.
Your next question is from Nick Daish with RBC. Please go ahead.
Thanks, guys. Just one more question from me. I'm just interested in the NBN. Obviously, yesterday, we saw a tender drop out of a procurement process.
I'm not expecting you guys to comment on that process itself, but could you talk a little bit around the competitive dynamic among yourself and your peers in relation to NBN contracts at the moment and how you see that evolving as the NBN has continued to evolve and more to the point in the next three to five years with additional funding being announced by the Albanese government recently, please?
Yeah, look, I think the first thing that I would say is that we welcome strong competition because it helps as a business to become stronger ourselves, and we believe in ourselves in terms of the value propositions we can put forward to customers. So I think that's important. If you look at that landscape in telecommunications, I think it's pretty stable.
The only real change in the marketplace is probably three years ago now when ServiceStream bought Lendlease Services. And if you look at that particular announcement by BSA, clearly, they were looking to joint venture with UGL to promote credentials into telecommunications. And again, I would say there's a high entry barrier for new contestants on the basis that the clients really do want to consider risk and surety of delivery, which is really important to them. I don't know the facts behind why they were unsuccessful, and I think that there's a lot of speculation out there about what that means for the other providers. At this point in time, I can't give you any further update, but if there is news moving forward, clearly, we'll share that as and when we can.
Right. That's great detail. Thank you.
There are no further questions at this time.
And I'll hand back to Mr. Dean Banks for closing remarks.
Ash, thank you very much. Thank you for everybody joining us on the call today. I'm pleased, once again, to give you an update on the progress of the Ventia business, and I look forward to continuing to update you on our progress and our half-year results later in the year. Thank you for your questions this morning, and once again, thank you to everybody who contributes to the success of the Ventia business. Appreciate your time today.