Good morning and welcome to Ventia's half-year 2025 results presentation. I'm Dean Banks, proud and privileged to be the Group CEO at Ventia. I'm joined today by our CFO, Mark Fleming. Together, we'll take you through our performance for the half, provide an update on our strategic progress and outlook, and then take questions. To begin, I would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land that we are speaking from today, the Camaragal 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.
Over the past six months, our total recordable injury frequency rate dropped by 8.7%, reflecting the impact of our focus on education and collaboration to drive best practice. Our serious injury frequency rate, while still low, increased slightly from 0.07 to 0.21 per million hours worked. In response, we've strengthened our safety efforts through targeted training and awareness programs to build capability, reinforce accountability, and embed safer behaviors. Early intervention programs continue to support physical and mental health, ideally before an injury occurs. These practices help prevent incidents, speed up recovery, and reduce workers' compensation claims. Our safety record shows that investing in safety and wellbeing protects our people and delivers measurable business outcomes. Since listing, we've maintained our focus on delivering what we say we'll do, aligning our performance to stakeholders' expectations.
We have continued to build strong foundations for long-term value creation, illustrated by the delivery of 11.9% NPATA growth, alongside continued and increasing cash conversion to 93.2%. We are realizing sustainable growth with an exceptional half in work winning. Work in hand increased to AUD 20.6 billion, supported by a contract renewal rate of 95%. This provides a strong underlying platform for longer-term performance. In terms of delivering for our shareholders, our dividend has grown each period since listing, increasing by 43.4% since the first half of 2022. In addition, the share buyback of AUD 82.5 million has further supplemented return to investors. We have strong foundations, a consistent track record of progressive financial results, and we continue to build momentum as we align our people and processes behind our strategy to redefine service excellence. Mark will cover the financials in greater detail shortly, and I will run through the headline result.
Before I start, all numbers we reference today are underlying financials unless otherwise stated. These exclude the one-off positive impact of the Toowoomba innovation, which is included in our statutory financials. Demand for essential services remains robust. During the period, group revenue reduced slightly to just over AUD 3 billion, down 1.5%, primarily due to lower defense and social infrastructure revenue. Importantly, EBITDA was up 2.8%, with margin expanded to 8.3%, up 0.3 percentage points due to mix and continued focus on improving margins. Our NPATA was AUD 119.4 million, an increase of 11.9% year-on-year. Cash conversion increased by a material 2.5 percentage points to 93.2%, illustrating our relentless focus on efficient cash management. We closed the half with record work in hand of AUD 20.6 billion, up 19.4%.
This milestone not only reflects the strength of our pipeline, but also underscores the confidence our customers place in Ventia's capability to deliver. It was and is a key highlight for the half. Over the half, we've secured AUD 4.3 billion of new or renewed contracts. This is up from AUD 1.5 billion in the same period last year, an increase of over 180%. These rewards underpin our growth ambition. The renewal rate of 95% demonstrates the importance of building trust and mutually beneficial partnerships with our clients. I'd like to share more detail on a few of our largest contract awards this half. The nbn Field Module contract was signed in February, which will see Ventia deliver maintenance and customer activation services across the nbn network in Queensland, New South Wales, ACT, and Tasmania. The contract is valued at circa AUD 2.1 billion over a five-year contract term.
In March, we awarded a seven-month extension on the current Defence Base Services contract through to the 31st of January 2026, with associated revenue of circa AUD 270 million. As per previous updates, we anticipate communication of the long-term contract outcome by the end of quarter three. Transgrid awarded us a new three-year panel contract in April, which will deliver projects across their transmission network, including upgrades to power lines and substations, alongside testing and commissioning work. It is estimated this new arrangement would deliver approximately AUD 240 million in revenue over the initial term. In June, nbn awarded Ventia an AUD 800 million Fibre to Node contract with a 3.5-year tenure. The contract will see Ventia deploy infrastructure to enable 175,000 premises to transition to Fiber-to-the-Premise technology across six states. We also secured another telecommunications contract in June, a circa AUD 100 million agreement with Tuatahi First Fibre for an initial term of five years.
Ventia is now their primary service partner, delivering fiber build, customer connections, and maintenance across New Zealand. Not only is our work in hand a record result, it's backed up by a robust pipeline with several large opportunities now progressing through the final stages of procurement. These contract awards give us confidence in our value proposition and support our growth ambitions. At Ventia, customer focus is a key pillar of our strategy to redefine service excellence. This year, we conducted an enterprise-wide Voice of the Customer survey, a structured approach to capture insights directly from those we serve. 85% of those invited to participate shared their feedback, resulting in an 86% satisfaction rating. Alongside the headline data, we received detailed commentary that offered valuable opportunities for us to reflect upon and respond to.
We've begun engaging with respondents to thank them for their insights and work collaboratively to elevate their experience. Overall, feedback highlighted our strengths in collaboration, transparency, responsiveness, and innovation, reinforcing Ventia's role as a trusted partner. At the same time, areas for improvement were identified, including subcontractor management, planning, and communication. This baseline survey will now be used to measure progress as we continue to differentiate ourselves through a strong service focus. I'll now hand over to our CFO, Mark Fleming, for a detailed update on our financial performance.
Thanks, Dean, and welcome everyone. Ventia has established an impressive track record of earnings growth. Our revenue is up by 21% since the first half of 2022, showing strong growth over time. During the last six months, we saw reduced volumes in certain contracts in DSI and some timing issues in telco and transport, resulting in a modest 1.5% decline in revenue compared to the same period last year. We expect a rebound to positive revenue growth in the second half as these timing issues unwind. Despite the revenue decline, EBITDA rose by 2.8% this half, and our EBITDA margin expanded to 8.3%. This uplift was driven by improving mix towards higher margin work. Our EBITDA is up by 24% since HY 2022, underscoring the strength and resilience of our business over time. NPATA increased by 11.9%, assisted by lower depreciation, amortization, and net finance costs.
This result reflects our capital-light model and improving cash conversion. NPATA is up by 40% since HY 2022, reinforcing the strength of our strategy and the stability of our earnings growth. Our consistent track record is driven by portfolio diversification, a disciplined approach to work winning, operational excellence, and sound capital management. On slide 10, we've set out our statutory P&L. As previously announced, in January 2025, we novated our Toowoomba Second Range Crossing contract, which resulted in a one-off gain of AUD 24.9 million due to consideration received and the unwind of provisions associated with that contract, which can be seen through the other income line on this slide. Depreciation and amortization expenses declined, reflecting our relatively low level of capital expenditure over recent years.
We expect the CapEx will gradually increase in coming years as we continue to invest to grow our core business, where we can achieve strong returns on investment in excess of our cost of capital. Net finance costs have also decreased, assisted by the refinancing completed late last year and higher average cash balances. Looking forward, we expect that net finance costs are likely to increase as we continue to execute on our share buyback and invest to grow our business in a disciplined way. On this slide, you can also start to see the benefit of our buyback program on earnings per share growth. While NPATA increased by 11.9%, earnings per share increased by 16.5% due to less shares on issue. This, in turn, supports dividend per share growth and ultimately our share price. I'll now explain in a bit more detail our sector-level performance highlights.
In Defence and Social Infrastructure, we experienced a revenue decline of 6% compared to the same period last year. This decline was due to lower defence-based services project work, a revised scope on a housing and community contract, and some lower margin contracts that we have now completed or exited. EBITDA margin improved by 1.4 percentage points to 8.1% as a result of winning some higher margin contracts and the exit of those lower margin contracts. Infrastructure Services has continued its improving trend this half, with revenue up by 9.6%, EBITDA up by 21.4%, and EBITDA margin improving to 8.8%. The performance was underpinned by new higher margin contract wins in energy and water. Our Telecommunications sector had a slight dip in revenue and EBITDA this half due to the mobilisation phase of new contracts won over the last 12 months.
We expensed both the bid and mobilisation costs during the period. We expect the ramp-up of these contracts to be a key contributor to revenue growth in the second half. In Transport, both revenue and EBITDA declined marginally due to timing delays in existing and new contracts and the completion of some lower margin contracts. On slide 12, we illustrate our performance against our capital allocation framework. We've seen good progress in each of our three focus areas. In relation to financial strength and flexibility, our cash conversion ratio has continued to improve, supported by strong focus on cash collection, and our net debt to EBITDA ratio remains at the bottom end of our range despite the buyback. At the same time, we continue to invest to grow our business.
Net CapEx was AUD 41 million, or 1.4% of revenue this half, with the majority of that spend being on continuing to uplift our digital capabilities and investments in rigs and wells assets, where we see strong return on investment. In addition, we completed another bolt-on acquisition of PowerNet, which I'll talk about more shortly. Finally, we've delivered strong returns to our shareholders. We increased our dividend per share by 14.5% to AUD 0.1071 per share and completed 82.5% of our buyback, making strong progress against the AUD 100 million target that we announced in February this year. Our liquidity position remains healthy, with AUD 724.4 million of cash and undrawn facilities as at 30 June 2025. Net debt of AUD 576.9 million represents 1.1 x EBITDA toward the bottom end of our range, including the buyback. Our S&P and Moody's ratings remain stable and unchanged, with material headroom in our covenants.
We have a healthy balance sheet, a cash-generative business model, and a proven ability to grow without substantially increasing our capital intensity. On 1 July , Ventia acquired PowerNet, a specialist electrical services business focused on the design, build, and installation of complex high-voltage infrastructure. This acquisition delivers strategic positioning for Ventia in the energy transition market, bolstering our ability to support upgrades to Australia's power network and meet growing demand for skilled high-voltage services. PowerNet brings a strong regional footprint in Southeast New South Wales, Victoria, and South Australia, underpinned by deep customer relationships and a reputation for high-quality delivery. The team of 32 employees adds significant expertise to Ventia's energy networks and renewables business, with key personnel highly respected across the industry. The acquisition also opens up access to transmission and distribution sector opportunities, better positioning Ventia to capture growth in a rapidly evolving market.
We understand that dividends are important for many of our investors, and we're committed to providing a sustainable and growing dividend profile. Today, we announced an interim dividend of AUD 0.1071 per share, which will be paid on October 8. This dividend represents a 75% payout ratio of NPATA within our policy range of 60% to 80% of NPATA. Our franked percentage is now at 90%, and we expect this level to be sustainable until we achieve 100% in the next few years. In addition to the dividend, this half we've delivered AUD 82.5 million in shares bought back, which translates roughly to AUD 0.0964 per share return to investors. This is a disciplined way to return excess capital while supporting long-term value creation for shareholders.
As a result of our strong financial position and business outlook, we today announced an increase in our buyback target to AUD 150 million, with the intention to complete that before the end of this calendar year. The share buyback reflects management's confidence in the outlook for the business and our commitment to delivering shareholder value. Further capital management initiatives may be considered in the future, depending on Ventia's operating performance and market conditions. I'll now hand back to Dean for the outlook.
Thank you, Mark. We've again partnered with Oxford Economics to refresh our analysis of the total addressable market. The updated analysis points to continued growth over the next five years, with sector-level insights that reinforce our strategic focus. Our addressable market is forecast to expand from AUD 86.8 billion in full year 2025 to AUD 104.4 billion by full year 2029, a compound annual growth rate of 4.7%. While this rate is slightly lower than our previous update, it reflects a more moderate inflation outlook. Importantly, the long-term outlook remains strong, supported by four tailwinds: defense and government spending, the energy transition, digitization and data demand, and population growth. Looking at defense and government spending, the Australian government's plan to lift defense investment above 2.3% of GDP by 2033, alongside a circa 4% growth in federal and state budgets, is advantageous to Ventia.
With 77% of our revenue already linked to government-related entities, Ventia is positioned to benefit from the forecast AUD 80 billion outsourced services market by 2030. On the energy transition, our proven capabilities in electrical and transmission and distribution services position us well to support the shift to a lower carbon economy. The high-voltage market is expected to exceed AUD 5 billion annually over the next five years, more than double the spend in the previous five-year period, with over 10,000 km of transmission lines to be built by 2050. Digital infrastructure needs are evolving rapidly. Our market-leading telco capability is well placed to support ongoing demand for data and connectivity, including through the continued nbn network build. Australia and New Zealand's population is expected to grow by 1%- 2% annually, and therefore the need for operations and maintenance of public infrastructure will remain strong across urban, regional, and rural communities.
In summary, our pipeline is resilient, and Ventia has the capacity to support this forecast growth in demand for essential services. Over the past six months, Ventia has secured approximately AUD 3.2 billion in new work with nbn, reinforcing a partnership that spans more than 15 years. This includes the AUD 2.1 billion Field Module contract, along with AUD 1.1 billion in fiber upgrade works, which includes the recent AUD 280 million expansion into the ACT, marking Ventia's entry into a new region for this program. The Northern ACT scope was awarded in July, shortly after the close of H1, and will run over a 3.5-year term. Similar to the Telstra contract award at the end of 2024, the five-year tenure of the Field Module contract agreement provides stability and the opportunity to develop a collaborative long-term work plan. Under this contract, Ventia will deliver maintenance and customer activation services across four states.
We're incredibly proud of our role as a trusted strategic partner to nbn, a relationship built on shared values, delivery excellence, and a commitment to supporting Australia's digital infrastructure. We're often asked, what is Ventia's competitive advantage? As an industry leader, there are many factors that are fundamental to our success. Our people are at the heart of our organization. They make us stand out. Their passion and pride align to our purpose of making infrastructure work for the communities we serve. Importantly, they are what brings our strategy to redefine service excellence to life. Our strategy is anchored around three core priorities: customer focus, innovation, and a commitment to sustainability. Our ambition is to offer industry-leading performance, to be recognized, if you like, for delivering celebrity service.
In order to truly differentiate Ventia versus our competition, our culture is about improving every day, shaping an environment where we encourage each other to continually raise the bar. Add to this our industry expertise and national reach, and we have a compelling value proposition. Our service footprint is vast, from Esperance at the tip of Western Australia to Invercargill at the tip in New Zealand. We support countless customers delivering end-to-end services ranging from the maintenance of maritime assets, power networks, and transport infrastructure. Add to these capabilities the governance control we wrap across our portfolio to help promote best practice and mitigate risk. We're always seeking to standardize and simplify our business so our brand delivers a consistent level of performance for all our customers. Finally, we have humility and a thirst for learning and recognize the need to be continually curious.
Artificial intelligence is one such great example of how we need to embrace a changing landscape, with new ways of working emerging every day. Our ambition remains consistent. We'll maintain a disciplined approach to deliver consistent financial performance, strong cash generation, and sustainable returns. On the back of our solid first half performance, I'm pleased to announce an upgrade to our full year 2025 guidance. We now expect underlined NPATA growth of 10%- 12% compared to full year 2024. This uplift reflects not only the strength of our portfolio, but also the momentum we are building through recent contract wins, which will yield an increase in telecommunications revenue in H2, alongside a strategic focus on cost and margin improvement across the portfolio. We are confident in our ability to deliver on expectations and maintain long-term value creation for our investors.
Finally, I want to extend my sincere appreciation to everybody who contributes to Ventia's success: our Board, employees, subcontractors, suppliers, customers, and shareholders. Thank you for your continued support. Amy, I will now open the lines for any questions.
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 speaker phone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Your first question comes from Nick Daish at RBC.
Thanks, Mark. Thanks, Dean, for the upcoming result. I'm just, as a starting point, I'm just curious about guidance. At the midpoint of that 10%- 12% guidance, the empire growth guidance, that empires AUD 25 million increase the empire. I know it's been the first half D&A built by about AUD 13 million, so analyzing that gets you close to AUD 26 million. I'm just curious about what other key contributors there are to that 10%- 12% guidance because on those numbers alone, I think you can get nearby D&A in isolation, but it sounds like you're in the process or in a number of procurement processes at the moment that might yield success. I'm just curious about the pluses and minuses to that 10%- 12%, please.
Yeah, look, we are expecting a combination of things to contribute to the second half performance. We are expecting an uplift in revenue and an uplift in EBITDA margin, and the key drivers of that are firstly in the telco sector, where the recent contract wins with Telstra and nbn are expected to ramp up in the second half, and obviously telco is our highest margin segment, so that will certainly assist. We're expecting to see continuing improvement in our IS business as we continue to grow in the energy and water space. That will also contribute. There is, if you like, operational EBITDA and revenue improvements. Below the line, depreciation and amortization is likely to creep a little bit lower again in the second half, which will assist. That'll be partly offset by an increase in net finance costs.
On that DNA, is that half on half or year-on-year in the second half?
A bit of both. I'm expecting that D&A will be slightly lower in the second half than it was in the first half, which also means it'll be slightly lower than the second half last year because the second half last year and the first half this year were pretty similar in terms of D&A. Slightly lower again.
Nick, if I may, just the only thing I would add is that you sort of said that we're expecting some large contract awards in the second half. Indeed, that's what we expect, and we hope that'll be a positive result for Ventia, but I would say that nearly all of those are about 2026 and beyond. The position in terms of revenue we expect to achieve this year is largely locked in now.
Yeah, very clear. Thank you. The other one was just around the nbn. I'm curious how the station contract wins during the period, which is a very significant contract win. Trying to get an understanding of the pipeline of work that you see, you know, on a three to five-year view, so essentially the market, and then curious about how other contractors in the space are participating. Just trying to get a feel for market shares alongside the market side of the telcos.
Yeah, look, from our perspective, first of all, we've had a really good period at the back end of 2024 and into 2025 of securing work with the major telco carriers, and we're really pleased with that. I think the result in the first half is probably not reflective of that work-winning opportunity, and I think, as Mark said, we would expect to see revenue in telco grow in the second half as we've obviously mobilized contracts in H1, and we're also mobilizing contracts in H2. We set to see some full run rate benefit in 2026, but we'll start to see the impact of that in the second half of 2025. In terms of market share, I think we've been very successful on those particular opportunities.
There's been some consolidation, which also means we've got a larger portion, and I think, as I did in the presentation, we obviously cover a number of states and probably have about 50% of the market share from nbn. You have to be a little bit careful with that because, you know, it depends on volume of work in territory, but I would say we're now the primary partner in that space to nbn. Very proud to be so. As I said, you know, I've been a partner with them for over 15 years and see a long track record of opportunity in front of us, but the contract tenures now being five years for nbn and Telstra give us a lot more stability because historically those contract awards have been about 18 months.
Again, from a mixed perspective around margin, you know, clearly we see a little bit of margin depreciation in telco in this period, but actually it's still our highest margin sector given the type of work we do, and that's going to help us from a mixed perspective moving forward.
Very last question, if I can, just around the work in hand profile. I think you've referred to AUD 11 billion work in hand between the second half 2025 and end of 2027. The market expectations for that period are about AUD 17 billion, so that's a huge bill to win during that period. I just want to check you're careful with that position. I know you do win work on a shorter timeframe or shorter outlook from time to time, and I'm just making sure that that is in line with what you would send us and what you would expect with it.
Look, I think in terms of a direct number to get there, I don't think we look at a direct number. I think the things I would say, first of all, is we got a record work in hand at half year, and we anticipate growth in the work in hand by full year. We have to win some major contract awards in the second half of the year, and we really focus on a couple of things. Work in hand renewal rate, which is very high in this period, and we forecast it to continue to be very high. Probably our focus for the future years immediately in front of us is, as we start now to enter into the second half of the year, how much revenue in hand we have as we do our budgets in sort of November time.
Normally we carry over about 75% of work in hand, so revenue in hand from year to year, which illustrates about 25% of work needs to be won in year, which is those lower value opportunities, contract growth, contracts that have come to an end that need to be demobilized and remobilized. I think generally, as we enter the year, we're about 25% of revenue to secure. As I said, at this point in the year, we're now in excess of 95% of revenue secured, so we're in a very good place.
Got it. Great. Thank you very much for your time. Appreciate that.
Thanks, Nick.
The next question comes from Megan Kirby-Lewis from Barrenjoey .
Morning, guys. First question for me, just on the telco segment, are you able to quantify those mobilization costs from the first half?
No, look, we don't go into that level of detail, so I don't want to get into that. It's a combination of things there. One is, as I said, the mobilisation costs. The other is just the ramp-up of those new contracts. As always said, at the early phase of those contracts, you know, the EBITDA generation can be a bit lower, but we are expecting that to reverse in the second half. I don't want to get into the specific breakdown if that's okay.
I think the other thing to say, Megan, on that, is I think it illustrates the transparency of the business that we take bid costs as they occur, right? I think that's really important because we've got a number of large bids that are trading through the business at the minute, and we've clearly needed to invest in that as well. Hopefully that investment will pay off not just in the short term, but over the medium and long term also.
I guess my sort of follow-up question, and more for the group, I just am picking up on, I guess, slightly more positive margin commentary today across the segments and then for the group as well, which I guess historically have always talked to flat margins. Just how should we be thinking about that sort of by the segment level and then what that means for the group second half and beyond as those revenue growth trends improve?
Yeah, look, I think from our perspective, we've always talked about a range between 8% and 8.5%. This is the first time we've brought out a result at 8.3%, so I think that illustrates, you know, strengthening of margin. We actually see opportunity to grow the margin in the second half. Some of that is just mixed because the two improving sectors in the second half we think will continue to be telecommunications and IS, which obviously give higher margin returns than other parts of the business. The second thing is that we just continually drive in operational efficiencies across all of our projects, and we can see some of the benefit of that. Equally, as contracts come to an end, we have to look at whether they are contracts that are delivering value to our business.
I think in prior years and this year, there are contracts that we don't think are adding value to our business, and we've decided not to bid on the current terms or not to bid at all because the client is probably more minded to look at it as a commodity rather than a service. From our perspective, there is always going to be a little bit of modification, but I think we are now feeling a lot more positive about margin outlook moving forward.
That's really helpful, thanks. Just the D&A comments that it will be lower in the second half. Can I just clarify that you mean that the lower is driven by the roll-off of the amortization, or is that the asset depreciation coming down again?
Look, it's more likely to be in amortization, and there's two reasons for that. Firstly, the client contracts amortization, which is the reason that we have MPA, is at an end now, so those are fully amortized, and we had AUD 3.3 million of amortization of client contracts this half that won't repeat next half. Secondly, amortization of software is also expected to come down. It's mostly A-driven rather than D-driven. Having said that, I think as we look forward, and as I said in the speech, we are anticipating that we will continue to increase our investment both in digital and in other parts of our business, and therefore I don't expect this declining D&A to be an ongoing trend as we look forward to FY 2026, FY 2027. We do expect that D&A will start to increase again
That's clear, thanks. I'll pass it on.
Thanks, Megan.
The next question comes from Nicholas Robertson of Williams.
Hi Dean and Mark, thanks for taking my question. Just on the lower spenders in defense space, could I just ask, was that driven by the election or budgeting or something like that? Is there anything you'd like to flesh that out a bit like that?
Look, I don't think I can give you a specific answer because I don't know the answer from defense. I mean, our view from the outside in many ways would be that they have spent a lot of money on hardware in recent times, and that's probably put a bit more pressure on budgets in other areas. These things are cyclic and it will go up and down, but certainly there's probably a bit more pressure on budgets around particularly defense-based services that we've seen in this period. If you remember, of course, they'd come to the end of their budgetary cycle in May and June, which historically have been quite high periods. They weren't as high this year.
Okay, thanks. That's helpful. Just on telco, you talked about a return to growth in the second half, but I was just wondering if we could get some more commentary from you guys on the margins. You mentioned some more mobilisation costs will still come through in that second half, but obviously those mobilisation costs that you wore in the first half, those projects will be sufficiently ramped. They're just trying to reconcile those two factors and sort of how you're thinking about margins half on half.
Look, from our perspectives, I mean the margin, when you actually look at it as a %, they've reduced slightly from 12.8% to 12.6%, but clearly there's been some additional costs in this period we need to take, and some of those contracts have only been awarded in H1, so they are mobilizing in H2. We think the margin broadly for telecommunications will stay consistent around that sort of 12.5%+ sort of range. We're looking at it positively. Clearly, there are cost pressures that we've got to manage as part of moving into those contract awards, and we're working collaboratively with our partners to try and find the best way of delivering those services for the best total cost. Thank you very much.
The next question is from John Pretel at Macquarie.
Good day, Dean and Mark. Hope you're well. I just had a couple of questions, if I could. In terms of that telco revenue, in the second half, can you provide some further color in terms of potential quantum? I mean, are we talking sort of broadly mid-single digit type of improvement that you'd be expecting?
Look, we've never given guidance on individual sectors, but I think you can start to do some calculations on expectations, and you know, if we're going to drive that from the contracts that we've won and the benefits we've got from those contracts, it's going to start to play out in the second year. We think it is significant. We're not talking small numbers. We are talking a significant number, and as I said, we won't actually see the full year benefit until 2026, but we'll start to see a sort of better run rate at the back end of 2025, which is obviously advantageous to us as a group.
I've got to say, it is fantastic the awards that telco have won over the last six months and the confidence placed in us by those telco carriers is real testimonial to the work that our team do, and I'm very, very proud and privileged to see us as a strategic partner to the key players in that space.
Got it. In terms of the defense and social interest segment, and thanks for some of the color there, just the variability of the revenue there, there are a few moving parts. Maybe just in terms of some of the other drivers outside of the defense project work there, and probably just the second part to that, those segment margins were very strong, notwithstanding that revenue weakness. Do you think you could sustain those types of margins in that, you know, moving forward?
Yeah, look, I mean, in defence and social infrastructure, there are probably three major components. As you said, we've talked about defence, so I won't mention that again. The second one was a contract that we inherited from the Broad Spectrum acquisition that came to an end, and we didn't feel that it was something that was going to add value to us moving forward. We exited that contract. That obviously was at low margin, but also meant the margin for the rest of the group went up, but of course we lose the revenue as a consequence of that. We also won a contract the prior year that was probably higher in revenue in the last year of the old contract and lower revenue in the first year of the new contract.
There's probably a few factors playing out there, but that drove the 6% reduction in revenue in that area. In terms of margin, we feel that we're getting a much better balance now in terms of distribution of contracts across the margins we would expect in defence and social infrastructure, and therefore we believe that we can hold the margin levels we've achieved in H1.
Thank you. Just the last one, just for Mark, in terms of the lower DNA, we've spoken about the analysts, but just what's driving the lower depreciation? I obviously note that the second half of 2024 was lower as well, but what's the driver of that?
Yeah, look, it's fundamentally, John, that we've had very low CapEx in our first three years as a listed company. Last year we were down at 0.8% of revenue, and it's the consequence of that playing through. As I said, we expect that that will start to tick up in future years. We're spending 1.4% of revenue this half in CapEx, so as that starts to flow through in future years, you will start to see the depreciation creep up again.
Thank you.
Thanks, John.
The next question comes from Katerina Diemar at Alstom. She is no longer in the question queue.
I had a brilliant answer for that question as well, Amy.
There are no further questions at this time. I'll now hand back to Mr. Banks for closing remarks.
Amy, thank you. Thank you for everybody who's joined us today. We really appreciate your interest in our business. We do believe that we've got a positive second half coming towards us, and therefore we've obviously upgraded our guidance. I'd also recognize that we've upgraded the share buyback, and we've also increased our franking for those retail clients. We believe the second half is going to be a very good one for Ventia. We believe we've got really strong foundations, and we're going to continue to deliver boring reliability to the market. Thank you very much for your time. We appreciate your support, and we look forward to talking to you again soon.
That does conclude our comments for today, and thank you for participating in our announcement tonight.