I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Harry Konstantinou, CEO. Please go ahead.
Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Viva Leisure's First Half FY2025 Results Presentation. It's great to have you with us today as we share another record-breaking period of growth and innovation. I am joined today by our CFO, Kym Gallagher. This morning, various documents, including an investor presentation, which we will be referring to today, were uploaded to the ASX. This presentation is being webcast on openbriefing.com and will be available for replay on the platform later today. Today's presentation will begin with a review of key highlights and general commentary on the first half results, followed by Kym presenting a detailed breakdown of the financial performance. After that, I will provide a trading update. Towards the end of the investor presentation, starting from page 19, you'll find an appendix containing additional information that we won't be covering in detail during this call.
The appendix includes an update on our recent strategic investments, a reconciliation of statutory profit and loss to the traditional AASB 16 figures, a more detailed breakdown of each business segment. After the presentations, there will be an opportunity for questions. A quick reminder, if you'd like to ask a question, please dial in, as questions cannot be submitted via the webcast. I'm excited to take you through Viva Leisure's impressive first half performance for FY2025 and highlight the exciting opportunities ahead. Our strong momentum, strategic growth, and innovation continue to drive success, and I look forward to sharing the key achievements and future developments that will shape the next stage of our journey. We have remained focused on executing our unique multi-segment strategy, encompassing our health clubs, expanded franchise network, and high-margin technology and payments division.
Despite broader economic challenges, our financial performance continues to strengthen, underpinned by solid growth investments made over the previous years. Viva's business model is built for resilience, and we are shaping the future of fitness and wellness through innovation, operational excellence, and strategic expansion. Our technology and payments division is performing extremely well, and with our recent franchise network investments, we anticipate even greater contributions in the coming periods. One of Viva's greatest strengths, often underestimated, is our high, stable, recurring revenue model, which accounts for over 90% of total revenue. This ensures predictable growth and long-term stability. As we move through today's presentation, you will see how this continues to drive our success. Viva is not just a gym operator. We are an ecosystem of fitness, technology, and payments.
With nearly 200 corporate locations, a growing franchise network, and an industry-first technology and payments platform, we are redefining the future of fitness through vertical integration and scalability. Our business is built on a network of interconnected divisions, each reinforcing the other to create a uniquely vertically integrated model, one that sets us apart in the global fitness industry. No other operator in the world does what we do, and for us, it's only the beginning. The first half of FY2025 has been an outstanding period for Viva, with record-breaking results across all key metrics. Our performance highlights the strength of our strategy and the resilience of our business model, even amid rising inflation and interest rates. While many industries face pressures on discretionary spending, the health club sector stands apart. Fitness is a lifestyle choice, and the demand for health and fitness remains stronger than ever.
Moving to the key financial results, I'm pleased to advise that revenue increased to AUD 99 million, up 25.2% from the PCP. EBITDA hit a record AUD 21 million for the half year, up 26.2% from PCP. NPAT also reached a record for the business at AUD 5.5 million, up 15.2% from PCP. Finally, adjusted free cash flow was up 22% to AUD 15.9 million from PCP. These results reflect strong execution from our high-quality business segments. In FY2020, our first full year as a listed company, we generated AUD 40.9 million in revenue. Fast forward to today, and we've more than doubled that in just the first half of the year, reaching AUD 99 million in the first half. EBITDA has followed a similar upward trajectory, with our AUD 21 million half-year result already representing 70% of the full-year result in FY2023.
Viva's ability to consistently achieve half-on-half growth, even amid economic challenges, is a testament to the strength and resilience of our business model. As economic conditions improve, we expect to see even greater momentum in our performance. I often emphasize the point that those who prioritize their health and regular use of health clubs understand that fitness is not a discretionary expense. These results clearly reinforce that sentiment. Moving to slide seven, operational highlights. During the half, membership at corporate locations grew by 32.5%, reaching 238,565 members. This increase of approximately 58,000 members was driven by a 4.5% like-for-like growth, adding 8,000 members, while the remaining 50,000 members came from new greenfield locations and acquisitions during the half. Our corporate and franchise membership base grew by 71.9%, reaching 593,697 members by the end of the half year. This growth was primarily driven by our strategic investment in World Gym Australia.
In terms of locations, we opened or acquired 29 new sites when compared to the PCP, bringing our total to 197 corporate locations and 476 corporate and franchise locations by the end of the year. Our expanding franchise pipeline is a key driver of Viva's future growth. We already have 118 secured and upcoming locations, including 10 corporate sites and 108 franchise locations across multiple brands. With these openings, Viva will cement its position as the largest fitness network in Australia and one of the biggest in Southeast Asia. The nature of our franchise model ensures a low capital requirement for Viva, enabling efficient expansion while leveraging our technology and payment solutions. As our franchise network grows, the increased number of franchisees will drive higher payments and technology fees, further enhancing recurring revenue, scalability, and profitability. Moving to slide eight.
I've already highlighted that we are building Australia's largest and most diversified fitness network and community. By diversified, I mean we cater to all market segments, a unique approach that allows us to deeply connect with communities. Using a data-driven analytical approach, we ensure that the right Viva product reaches the right demographic and market. This is a powerful network of members making weekly or fortnightly commitments, a generation striving to live healthier, fitter lives while embracing the social gym experience. I would now like to pass on to our CFO, Mr. Kym Gallagher, to run you through the financial results in more detail.
Thank you, Harry, and good morning, all. I'm on slide 10. As Harry has noted, Viva Leisure has delivered another strong half-year result, demonstrating the resilience of our business model and the effectiveness of our strategic growth initiatives.
Our financial performance reflects the success of our expansion strategy, strong membership growth, and continued investment into tech. Total revenue for H1 2025 increased by 25.2% compared with the prior corresponding period, reflecting the expansion of the network both organically and through acquisitions. Our EBITDA growth percentage was higher than revenue growth, demonstrating margin expansion. This is against a backdrop of opening initially low-yielding greenfield sites and embedding new acquisitions. The key offsets here are the expanding revenue of our high-yielding tech and other revenue streams. NPAT growth was also significant at over 15%. I'm on slide 11. To provide greater transparency and better insights into our operations, we are now reporting revenue under four distinct segments. This allows us to track performance more effectively and showcase the strength of our diversified business model. Health clubs. This includes all corporate-owned clubs as well as the boutique fitness offerings.
This remains our largest revenue driver, with its key component being upfront, recurring, direct debit income. Franchising. Our franchising segment includes Plus Fitness and our recent investments into Boutique Fitness Solutions and World Gym Australia. The core elements are franchise fees, sales of merchandise and equipment, and rebates from suppliers to our franchisees. With the anticipated pipeline of new franchise locations opening across our Plus Fitness network, as well as those of our new partners, we expect to see strong growth in this area. Harry said a great comment in his speech, and it's worth repeating here. As our franchise network grows, the increased number of franchisees will drive higher payments and technology fees, further enhancing recurring revenue, scalability, and profitability. Our technology and services division.
This is an exciting and high-margin segment comprising Viva Pay payments and licensing fees for our technology and other services such as our personal training licensing arrangements, vending machines, and digital offerings. It is essentially a revenue bucket consisting of our tech and other indirect revenue streams and is a key focus area for long-term growth. With the expansion of Viva Pay and other technology across our new partners, together with the release of new tech products on the horizon, we expect this to be our fastest-growing segment of the business. By segmenting our revenue streams, we will be able to provide greater clarity on the drivers of growth and profitability. This refined approach supports strategic decision-making and enhances transparency. I am on slide 12. The contributions of each of the revenue segments are shown on this slide. Health clubs.
As mentioned, this is our key contributor to overall revenue and demonstrated strong growth of 23.6% between this half and the prior corresponding period. While we acquired 17 clubs during the half, and these contributed strongly to both revenue and member growth, we're pleased to note that like-for-like revenue growth grew by 5.8%, exhibiting the continued strong organic growth of the business. Our franchises show a one-off reduction in revenue due to the cancellation of rebates from the third-party direct debit payments provider. This was obviously replaced by Viva Pay, which is a much higher margin returning business. On a normalized basis, however, this segment did show growth, and as mentioned on the previous slide, with the expanding footprint of new franchise locations opening across the Plus Fitness, Boutique Fitness Studios, and World's networks, we expect to see strong growth in this area.
This is, as I've said before, in addition to the eventual contributions to the tech and other services segment, with the rollout of Viva Pay and other technologies across these partner networks. Technology and services. Significant growth of over 124% over the prior corresponding period, driven largely by the full-period impact of Viva Pay. Other areas of growth are vending and digital signage, which now are contributing over AUD 3.5 million per annum in revenue. Personal trainer fees are also a significant contributor of over AUD 4 million per annum in license fees across our network. As mentioned, this is our most exciting division and will exhibit the strongest growth of high-margin, recurring revenue streams over the coming periods. This is the balance sheet slide.
As you can see, there was significant investment and growth during the period with a combination of 21 acquisitions and greenfield sites, together with the strategic investments in Boutique Fitness Studios and World Gym Australia funded by both available cash and debt. As part of the new debt facility, we've now also refinanced our equipment lease finance to senior debt and at a lower rate. Considerable headroom is available in the debt facilities, which are currently drawn to approximately AUD 100 million, with a AUD 130 million senior debt limit. In other words, we can maintain financial flexibility through our capital management with strong cash flow generation coupled with available debt to continue to pursue strategic acquisitions and other initiatives. I'm on slide 14.
Okay, so there's a lot of information on this page, but it is a detailed restatement of the cash flows of the business to determine free cash adjusting for the impacts of AASB16. This table shows the half-on-half-on-half cash flows of the business, and some key callouts from the page are the free cash flow number defined as operating cash flows after tax and maintenance capex. This amount for the half was AUD 15.9 million compared to AUD 13.1 million in H1 2024 and AUD 11.3 million in H1 2023. In other words, you can see the continual improvement in free cash flow over each subsequent corresponding period. The growth profile of Viva's business is such that the profit splits and cash flows naturally skew towards H2, and we expect the remainder of FY 2025 to be no different.
Moving forward, Viva anticipates a refocusing of its cash flows to a more moderate approach to greenfield site rollouts. It's worth noting that there was over AUD 10 million in cash committed to greenfield sites during the half, and while we still have designated greenfield site projects for the remainder of calendar 2025, our intention beyond that is to divert the bulk of these funds elsewhere. Viva believes it now has considerable scale with corporate-owned sites and member numbers, together with the franchise networks, to expand its tech and other initiatives to drive growth. In addition, Viva remains committed to continuing its share buyback program and is also exploring additional capital management opportunities supported by the anticipated increase in free cash flow.
As mentioned on the previous slide, our debt facility is also available to fund growth as required through strategic acquisitions and other initiatives and without the burden of significant repayment requirements. I'm on slide 15. This slide is simply the statutory cash flows for the period. As noted, there was significant M&A activity as well as expansionary growth during the period. This was funded with a mix of cash and debt. In addition, as noted, as part of our capital management strategy, we bought back approximately AUD 1.9 million in the company's shares. Thank you. I'll now hand back to Harry.
Thanks, Kym. I will now discuss current trading and outlook. While slide 17 provides a summary, I'm pleased to share that additional details for each segment can be found in the segment focus section of the appendix, starting on page 22. This section offers a comprehensive overview of each segment, outlining its current strategy, outlook, and plans for the upcoming period, providing deeper insights into our growth trajectory. We are at a truly exciting stage in Viva Leisure's growth. With significant scale across recurring revenue, free cash flow, and membership, we are well positioned for long-term success. While corporate members continue to drive both revenue and profit, our network members are a key engine for technology and payment fees, rebates, and recurring franchise revenue. As mentioned earlier, our franchise network has over 108 new franchisees across all brands, an exciting milestone for Viva.
This aligns with the strategic shift Kym outlined, where our focus will now be on optimizing the value of our existing network while moderating the pace of new greenfield site openings. This strategic pivot prioritizes free cash flow generation and aims to maximize returns from our established locations, ensuring sustainable and profitable growth. To put this into perspective, each new corporate location now requires an investment of between AUD 1 million-AUD 1.5 million, including equipment. In contrast, a franchise location within our network costs Viva almost nothing to open and, in fact, generates revenue through franchise fees, fit-out and equipment rebates, and ongoing payments, technology, and franchise royalties. This capital requirement of AUD 1 million-AUD 1.5 million per corporate site is substantial, especially considering that Viva has opened or acquired 20-30 new locations annually as part of its rollout and roll-up strategy over the past five years.
Looking ahead, we anticipate this number to reduce as our focus shifts towards leveraging the value of our existing network and expanding our capital-light franchise model, which will benefit our high-margin technology and payments business substantially. One thing to make clear here is that while this is a strategic pivot, Viva will still pursue strategic acquisitions. Let's talk about health clubs. As reported, our health club membership at the end of the half year stood at 238,565 members. Today, that number has already surpassed 250,000, demonstrating strong momentum in the half year to date. Our total network membership, which includes both corporate and franchise members, has also grown from 593,697 to over 600,000 members. This level of growth is significant and should not be underestimated. With an improving economic landscape on the horizon, we are more excited than ever about the opportunities ahead. Our franchise segment.
Our franchise segment is made up of three key parts, with the first being Plus Fitness, which is 100% wholly owned by Viva. In the first half of FY2025, our Plus Fitness team secured agreements to expand internationally, marking a major milestone for the brand. We have already sold five territories in Singapore, with additional agreements to expand executed in Hong Kong, the Philippines, and the U.K., where we expect our first location to open later this calendar year. This is in addition to our established master franchise in India, who also renewed terms for a further 10 years and has several clubs under development and ready to open imminently. These achievements are in addition to the significant domestic growth Plus Fitness continues to experience in Australia, both in membership numbers and new territory sales.
For the first time in its history, the brand is set to surpass 200 open locations in Australia in the coming month, a testament to its ongoing strength and demand. This growth is a result of Viva's strategic influence in investing and refocusing the brand and strengthening its franchise network. The new design standards introduced by Viva, along with the integration of advanced technology, have played a key role in creating a more robust and sustainable business model, delivering benefits not only to Viva but also to our franchisees. The second and third components of our franchise division are our strategic investments and joint ventures in Boutique Fitness Studios and World Gym Australia.
In October 2024, Viva acquired a 34% stake in Boutique Fitness Studios, making us the largest shareholder in the business, while our recent 25% investment in World Gym Australia further strengthens our presence in the premium fitness segment. Under both agreements, Viva holds a call option to acquire 100% of these businesses in the future. For BFS, the immediate focus is on the implementation of Viva Pay, and work is already underway. For World Gym, our priority is the deployment of Viva's proprietary door access technology, which will unlock additional opportunities, including the rollout of Viva Access apps for both members and casual users, as well as the implementation of The Hub. As mentioned at the time of acquisition, Viva Pay integration cannot commence until 2027, following the completion of the existing contract. These key initiatives will significantly accelerate the growth and performance our technology and payments division provide.
Once BFS and World Gym fully integrate into Viva Pay, our total transaction volume will exceed AUD 500,000,000 annually. This milestone highlights the power of our embedded payments model, ensuring sustainable revenue growth with every transaction processed across the network. Technology, payments, and other, our most exciting growth segment. Finally, our third and most exciting segment is technology, payments, and other. As previously highlighted, this is a high-margin division and represents the biggest growth opportunity for Viva in the coming years. What is next for our technology division? We are preparing to launch a series of unified access apps throughout the calendar year, with the first rollout just around the corner. These unified access apps will enable entry to all clubs and brands within the Viva network and eventually beyond the Viva network, creating a unique opportunity for Viva, its franchisees, and members alike.
This innovation will enhance convenience, flexibility, and engagement, further strengthening our position as a technology-driven leader in the fitness industry. Think Uber Eats for the fitness industry. In addition, we are continuing to expand our vending machine network, which now generates over AUD 250,000 in monthly sales at high margins, further enhancing our non-membership revenue streams. Our digital signage network, currently consisting of over 400 screens, is set to grow, with an additional 100 screens being added shortly. This expansion will drive increased advertising revenue, supported by a strong pipeline of advertisers eager to engage with our growing audience. Finally, our Supp Society business, while still in its infancy at just four months old, is performing well and showing strong potential as we continue to refine and scale this exciting new offering.
Moving to slide 18, Viva reaffirms the guidance issued in December 2024 regarding our Q4 forecast run rates, reflecting our confidence in sustained growth. Specifically, we expect Q4 revenue to exceed AUD 56 million, translating to a minimum annualized revenue of over AUD 224 million for FY2026. Additionally, we anticipate Q4 EBITDA to exceed AUD 12.5 million, setting us on track for an annualized EBITDA of more than AUD 50 million heading into FY2026. While we have already discussed our plans for free cash flow, we expect continued growth, though we have not provided specific guidance at this stage. This concludes the formal part of our presentation. As mentioned, the appendix from slide 19 onwards provides additional details on our new segment reporting, as well as various reconciliations. If you have any questions about that section or any other part of today's presentation, feel free to reach out to Kym or myself.
Before we move to questions, I want to reiterate a key message I've highlighted over the past five years. Viva is not a consumer discretionary business. We are a lifestyle company with a strong, secure, recurring, and contracted technology and payments division. Unlike businesses that rely on winning the next big contract, our technology and payments operations are embedded within our network of owned, controlled, and invested segments, ensuring predictable and sustained growth. While exciting technology upgrades are on the horizon, including our new app launches and over 100 new franchise locations to open in the future together with our international expansion, we are more confident than ever about what the future holds. This is incremental to our growing existing network, which now serves over 600,000 members, representing more than 3% of Australia's population aged 15 to 74.
Our investment in cutting-edge technology, data-driven solutions, and a rapidly expanding franchise network positions us as a clear leader in the space, with more exciting innovations on the horizon. We look forward to continuing this journey together and creating long-term value for our members, franchisees, and shareholders. At Viva Leisure, we are not part of the fitness industry. We are shaping its future. We appreciate your ongoing support and look forward to continuing this journey together. I'd now like to open up for questions.
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star and 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 are on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your questions. Your first question comes from Nicholas McGarrigle with Barrenjoey. Please go ahead.
Good day. Thanks for that. I just wanted to get a sense of what you meant by optimizing the existing portfolio over rolling new greenfields out. Just want to get a sense, is that kind of a view that you want to drive and show cash flow, or is it more about the network's peaks now that you need to kind of go back and reinvest in some of the older sites?
Hey, Nick, thanks for the question. It's basically concentrating on utilization in terms of going back and updating the older sites. We've done that over the last couple of years with a strong pipeline of 20-30 locations a year. Yes, that comes up, but generally, that falls under our maintenance cap limit. For us, it's about capitalizing on the network in terms of prioritizing any reviews of pricing, selling additional services such as supplements. We're looking at supplement Supp Society being installed in some of the health clubs from knowledge we've gained from the World Gym Australia acquisition. That will prioritize those existing sites and help to improve their yield. We're looking at increasing vending machines and alternative options there, as well as digital signage. All of those throughout the existing network will help to improve even more the returns there without significant capital outlay.
I think, Nick, it's Kym here.
As far as the capital outlay piece is concerned, as Harry mentioned in his speech, greenfield site locations now for a Club Lime standard size are somewhere between AUD 1 million-AUD 1.5 million a site. We could go 6 months or 12 months down the track and say, "Hey, we've got 10 more locations." We have moved from 200 corporate sites to 210, but we have burnt through AUD 15 million worth of cash to get there. Look, while these have a great ROI in years two and three, we just think that the benefits of conserving that cash and diverting it into other projects, particularly with tech development and other such things, is probably more of a priority at the moment than number of sites. Obviously, that does not mean that we are stopping greenfields altogether.
There are plenty of sites still out there which we'll consider on a case-by-case basis, but it is more along the lines of special situations. For example, we just opened one at Albion Park in New South Wales, and it opened the door with 400 members, and two months later, it's got nearly 1,200 members and is generating AUD 30,000-AUD 40,000 a month in EBITDA. If we see sites like that, we will jump straight on them. The plan is, as previously we've said, we will do 20 greenfield sites a year, 20 acquisitions, roundly growing at 30-40 sites a year. That just simply isn't the priority because we believe we've now got the scale, particularly with the addition of our franchise networks.
Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. I'll now hand the call back to Mr. Konstantinou.
That was nice. Thank you, everyone, for your time today. As you know, Kym and I are always available to take any calls directly. We thank you for your support of Viva. Have a great day.
That concludes the conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect your line.