Dear shareholders, I'd like to welcome you to ALK, and our ordinary annual general meeting, and thank you for taking the time to join us, to listen to us, to put questions to us, and generally hear what we have to tell you about our business. We also, besides the physical presence, have people following us via the webcast. We've been looking forward to discussing with you and talking to you about the developments of ALK. But before we get to that stage, we need to deal with the formalities, and according to our Articles of Association, it's the board that appoints the chairman of the meeting. This year, we have asked Emil Denker-Steenberg, Attorney at Law with law firm Bech-Bruun, and I will now hand over the meeting to him.
Thank you very much. Thank you for appointing me chairman of the meeting of ALK. I hope we will have a good meeting and a good discussion. My first job is to check whether the meeting has been duly and lawfully convened and is quorate. Before the meeting, I found that the convening notice was issued at the, the right notice, and that it complies with the requirements put in the Articles of Association and Danish legislation. If there are no objections, I find that the meeting has been duly and lawfully convened and is quorate, also according to the agenda, and if there are no objections to this, I will now find that this is so. Thank you very much. I can also inform you that the access control, just before we started the meeting, found that there are a total of 88 people present in the room.
46 are shareholders, and 42 are guests, reporters, advisors, et cetera. I can also tell you that just before we started the meeting, it was registered that 85% of the votes are represented at the meeting. This is less treasury shares, and that approximately 73% of the share capital is represented, and that number is also less treasury shares. Also, the board has received proxies and postal votes corresponding to about 96% of the represented votes, and about 93% of the represented capital, and the final numbers will be available in the protocol. As was also mentioned at previous AGMs of ALK, we have a provision in Danish company law that explains that there must be a full statement concerning votes, made at the AGM, even if it's fairly clear.
I propose that we do, as we have done in previous years, that we waive the right to this complete explanation or statement of the outcome of the votes. If that is okay with you, I will enter this into the protocol. Thank you very much. If you wish to take the floor under the different items on the agenda, I would ask you to contact me, show me your admission card, and I wish you also to speak from the rostrum with the microphone. That is important so that we can all hear you. Then we have the agenda that has been sent out with a convening notice and also appears on the screen behind me.
We have report about the company's business, approval of annual report, and discharge of members of board and management, decision about distribution of profit, approval of remuneration report 2022, approval of remuneration to the board for the present year, election of chairman of the board, election of vice chair of the board, election of other members of the board, election of auditor, and then 10 proposals from the board of directors. There are 4 this year. 10A is indemnification of members of board and management. B, amendments to the articles because of the indemnification scheme, then approval of the remuneration policy, and D is authorization to the chairman, and then any other business, item 11. We will now go to the first item.
As also always and standard to this AGM, we will deal with items one to four in one go, and we will also discuss them jointly after we have heard the report from the chairman, and we have had presented the annual report. I will now hand over to the chairman of the board. You have the floor.
Thank you. 2023 was a turbulent year, but also a very good year for ALK. We had a solid strategic, strategic and financial progress, but there were also challenges. Let me deal with those first. We were hit by an extraordinary discount increase in the German market, and we've also seen increased inflation and rising costs. Most importantly, we saw in the first half, a stagnant sale of tablets in Europe. These matters raised, particularly the tablet sale, raised great doubt as to ALK's ability to deliver on, to deliver on the stated targets, and the market reacted very negatively.
... This was then further affected by our change of leadership in the middle of the year. In this light, despite of the challenges we've seen, I would say we can be quite pleased with the results of the year. Our turnover, our revenue, rose by 9%. Local currency is just over DKK 4.8 billion. We saw growth in all sales regions and in the major product lines, the injection-based vaccines and the tablets. I mean, all the growth that we had was organic, and there was growth everywhere. The operating profit increased by 50% in local currencies to DKK 666 million, driven by a top line growth, better margins, and efficiency improvements. This increased the operating margin to 14%. In that perspective, it's worth noting that just 4 years ago, it was negative.
We delivered on the expectations we had set out, and 2023 was the fifth consecutive year of improvements on both the top line and the bottom line. So I think there's good reason to thank our many managers and employees for the commitment and perseverance they've shown over the past year. Thanks to their efforts, ALK managed to make its way through the challenges of the market. Our thanks come here with photos from our celebration of our 100th anniversary on the ninth of June. This really was a day of celebration, but it was also a reminder of why we are here. What's our purpose? We've been here for a hundred years. We are here to help millions of people with allergy to live a better life. That is our purpose. This is what drives us forward.
For more almost 101 years now, we've been pioneers in research, development, manufacture, and marketing of allergy medicines. We'll continue to lead the way. Every day, we will focus on helping even more people based on strong scientific insights and continued clinical advantage. We must help people get a better life. So we've dealt with, we've treated 2.4 million people with moderate to severe allergies last year, and still, we're only touching the tip of the iceberg here. In this report, I'd like to take a closer look at some of the most important efforts we've made to reach more people who live with allergies. Let me start with sales in Europe. As I said before, for our shareholders, this was very important, but certainly also internally in ALK.
This was natural because, European tablet sales have, for a number of years, been the biggest growth engine for ALK. In the first half, there were stagnant sales of tablets, and that created doubts. In the months leading up to that, we had sort of... This was the autumn of 2022, right? We had seen that, the pollen season, the initiation season, in the autumn and the winter, there were fewer new patients, than what we had expected, and we had more patients who, completed their three-year tablet treatment. There was the, ITULAZAX that we had launched three years before against three allergies. So we responded. We took a number of initiatives operationally to get growth back on track. We did it through intensive dialogue with doctors who prescribed tablets.
We also strengthened our dialogue with opinion formers, public and private payers, and we made a number of activities, and we were helped by a better pollen season in the summer of 2023. The efforts paid off. After zero growth in the first half year, European sales grew in the second half. Even if the initiation season has only recently ended, it's already clear that we have entered 2024 with significantly more new patients than we had last year. This bodes well for this year. In Japan, we are helping more and more patients with our partner, Torii. Torii has the commercial rights in Japan. They sell our tablets against house dust mite, house dust mite allergy, and allergies to Japanese cedar, cedar trees. But many Japanese are allergic to those, so it's also part of our portfolio in Japan.
Japan is already a success story, and the story seems to be getting better and better. Our sales, Torii sales of tablets, grew last year by 17%, and we also saw double-digit growth in our revenue from the partnership. Our revenue comes partly from the supply of tablets that Torii sells, but also from royalties. Torii is experiencing strong demand. They're actually now building a new factory to produce active ingredients for the cedar pollen tablet. The new factory will be ready in 2025. Until then, in 2023, I mean 2024, we must expect slightly slower growth in Japan, but still good progress. Torii expects 10% growth in sales this year, and ALK also expects growth in revenue from Japan. We've also recently expanded our collaboration with Torii, it now also includes our grass tablet, GRAZAX. Our partner in Japan is very committed.
ALK's tablets are at the center of their new strategy. There is also a massive public focus on allergy immunotherapy in Japan, all the way into the government offices, so we are confident that Japan will contribute to ALK's growth for many years to come. Another important effort has been China for ALK. In China, we are building up, we're building to expand our market coverage. We now have 185 employees serving nearly 700 hospital-based clinics. The sales of our injection-based product, Alutard, their sales continue to show solid double-digit growth. We are building, not only because of Alutard, but also to prepare for ACARIZAX, the house dust mite tablet. The Chinese authorities, they are currently processing our registration application, and we hope to get approval later this year, so as to be able to launch next year.
You really have to respect China, because this is a huge and very complex market. But the number of people with house dust mite allergy is over 100 million, and China is well underway to become one of the biggest markets for the treatment of house dust mite allergy. There's a great potential there, and we intend to take part in that. In North America, we saw last year growth in all product lines. Total sales in the region reached DKK 900 million. But our focus is very much on tablets, because they have the greatest growth potential. Tablet sales in North America increased last year by 26%. In Canada, doctors and other healthcare professionals agreed our tablets with acceptance and recognition. The Canadian market is very much like the European market. It's a solid double-digit growth we've seen.
Outside Europe, Canada today is our second-largest tablet market. In the U.S., as we all know, it's a little more difficult. Many allergologists will not prescribe the tablets. They mix their own treatment for patients. So we have adjusted our approach. We now focus more on pediatricians and commercial partnerships that we've already tested. So we hope that our new tablet vaccine will gradually get a greater impact in the U.S. We've seen the first fruits of the new approach. We will continue testing different approaches, but we are still, we have not unlocked the full potential in the U.S. Meanwhile, we are pleased to see that tablet sales are growing in the U.S., also because we increased our approval to cover teenagers also. Children and adolescents are a priority area for ALK.
Last year, we completed a couple of phase 3 trials with good results. House dust mite tablet and tree pollen tablet both confirmed the benefits of treating allergies with our tablets. We are now undergoing the regulatory process so we can get approval with our tablets for children. If things go as we expect, the house dust mite tablet will be authorized for children in Europe by the end of 2024, and in the U.S. in the course of 2025, while the tree pollen tablet is expected to be approved for children in both Europe and Canada in 2025. This could potentially be a paradigm shift for treatment of children with allergies. Globally, around 10 million children between 5 and 11 have controlled respiratory allergies, and the number is rising rapidly.
Early intervention and symptom control are vital if we are to stop the progression of these allergies to asthma and other conditions. As we've seen before, the biggest share of our patients in Japan is children, and we hope that with an initiative in Europe and the U.S., we hope to be able to gain bigger growth rates than we've seen before. We work intensively in our market organization to prepare for these launches, both in the U.S. and in Europe. New horizons. This has been one of the initiatives that we've been going for, and there are a number of initiatives, but let me just mention just a couple here. We have two parallel projects: the developing next generation adrenaline pens for the U.S. market. We have our own Genesis project with an external project with a U.S. partner.
But there's so much happening in the anaphylaxis market that we have decided right now to take a small timeout and to consider how to adapt best to the market dynamics before we spend too many resources. We also have a development of a peanut allergy tablet. It's on track. This is the first time in the development of new standardized treatments for potentially life-threatening food allergies. The first part of the clinical study has been completed. The second part is ongoing. In the autumn of 2025, we will decide whether to move to a phase 1/2 study. We also test the efficacy of the tablet. So far, we have tested its side effect profile at different doses.
Let me conclude this tour of our activities and strategic activities by talking about what we've done in sustainability, including the climate, obviously. As a company, ALK is responsible to provide a sustainable workplace for our employees to play our part in ensuring we have sustainable plan for the future. We take this responsibility seriously every day. That's why we have decided to go for the Science Based Targets initiative. We're joining that. It's a nonprofit initiative, focuses on promoting close cooperation between companies and climate experts to ensure that our climate targets are aligned with science. This organization helps companies assess how quickly we can reduce our CO2 emissions, and how much is needed to live up to the Paris Agreement. The target in the Paris Agreement, as we know, is to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees.
This climate organization recently approved our CO2 reduction targets. At ALK, we have committed to reducing the so-called Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 42% by 2030, based on our 2022 emissions. Scope 1 covers the direct emissions from our own sources, such as transport. Scope 2 covers our indirect emissions, such as purchased electricity or district heating. ALK, ALK has also made an undertaking that 80% of the Scope 3 emissions will come from suppliers, who, like ourselves, have committed themselves to science-based targets. This must happen by 2028. Scope 3 is the indirect emissions from our value chain, so these are also emissions from our suppliers. With these goals in mind, it may seem a paradox that in 2023, there was a small increase in our own CO2 emissions.
This was because of improved reporting on the use of refrigerant chemicals and a high level of activity in the business, such as longer journeys in company vehicles. This small increase also emphasizes the fact that we really need to move to reach the 2030 climate goals, not least because we intend to grow. We have already planned a number of actions to reach our 2030 targets. We must have more renewable energy as our primary energy source. For instance, our steam generators need to be electrically driven instead of running on natural gas. We need to phase out certain refrigerants for the factories. We need to implement other initiatives to increase energy efficiency. This is a high priority for us throughout the organization. You can read more about our goals in the published sustainability report, which you can find on our website.
At the AGM last year, we welcomed two new members to the Board of Management. Henriette Mersebach took up office on first of March as new EVP of Research and Development, and Claus Steensen Sølje joined us on the first of June as new CFO. This year, we are introducing another new face, Peter Halling, who took over as CEO of ALK on November the first. Peter came from a position as CEO of Fertin Pharma, a contract development and manufacturing company specializing in oral delivery technologies. And before that, he had a number of management positions at Novozymes, Ingredion, and the Döhler Group in the U.S. and Germany, among other places, where he also lived. Peter is an experienced international manager with a strong track record of strategic execution and commercial results.
He's a man with the right values and the right mindset to be at the helm of ALK for many years to come. Welcome to you, Peter. He's only been here since the first of November, but already now I can tell you that we have a very fruitful and constructive dialogue between Board of Management and Board of Directors. It was in June that we announced that Peter would take over as CEO after Carsten Hellmann. As mentioned earlier, there was some uncertainty at the time about ALK in connection with the stagnation of tablet sales in Europe, and the change of CEO raised further doubts as to how able we were to maintain growth. The board has a duty to make the right decisions for ALK, even though it may be inconvenient at the point in time.
We had been working for some time on future-proofing ALK's Board of Management, and we'd been screening potential candidates, and we were convinced that Peter Halling was the right person to take over as CEO of ALK, and that's why we acted when we did. ALK now has a strong Board of Management with Peter, Henriette, Claus, and Søren as head of sales and marketing. They make up the Board of Management, along with the heads of production, global quality, and HR. They are Christian Houghton, Jan Engel, and Lika Thiesen, and they constitute a very strong team with a broad senior management experience and also many years of experience from the pharmaceutical industry. So let me round off this topic by saying thank you to Carsten Hellmann for his contribution to ALK over a period of seven years.
I also have a couple of words I'd like to say about corporate governance and the work done by the Board. Last year, the Board held 11 meetings. The meeting in November was a strategy seminar, and then there were 5 meetings of the Audit Committee, 6 meetings of the Remuneration and Nomination Committee, and 6 meetings of the Scientific Committee. The number of meetings were on the increase, both for the Board and the committees, and there were also regular meetings between the respective chairs and the Board of Management. True to tradition, we conducted a self-assessment of the Board of Directors, assisted by an external facilitator. It showed that we have the necessary skills and competencies, and we also have an open dialogue, which enables us to address the topics that are of relevance to ALK.
Meetings and processes are efficient, and the interaction between the Board of Directors and the Board of Management works very well. And of course, since we got new members on board at the top level, we have put extra effort into onboarding them in order to make things more flexible. Priority areas going forward are, of course, the development of tablets and the change of management, but we also want to look much closer at sustainability. There are initiatives and a transition to Science-Based Targets, and it has taken time and resources. We've also spent a lot of time on discussing the USA and our research and development activities in order to find out how we can ensure that we have a pipeline in the long term. Read more about our self-assessment in our Corporate Governance report on our website.
There, you will also find our review of the guidelines issued by the Committee on Corporate Governance. You will find that we actually live up to all four guidelines issued by that committee. On the website, you can also see our remuneration report, which gives a detailed description of remuneration to the board of directors and the board of management. Remuneration to the board consists of a fixed fee, which is determined by the general meeting, and we'll go back to this later today in the agenda under item five, where we propose that the fee remain unchanged from 2023 to 2024. Remuneration to the board of management is determined by the board of directors on the basis of our remuneration policy. The main points are summarized on the slide behind me.
Because of the changes in the Board of Management, however, you need to be extremely cautious if you wish to compare 2023 and 2022 figures. But let me give you a few of the key figures anyway. The base salary to members of the Board of Management increased by 3.5%, which is in keeping with the general salary increase for ALK's employees in Denmark. The total fixed salary paid to directors, including those who stepped down during the year, came to DKK 20.7 million, including pension and usual benefits, with the variable remuneration coming to DKK 11.8 million. The variable element is made up of a short-term cash bonus and long-term incentives in the form of performance shares and share options.
The amount paid in total ordinary remuneration came to DKK 32.5 million, compared to DKK 38.7 million the year before. There was special circumstances in 2023. In keeping with his contract, Carsten Hellmann received a severance payment of just under DKK 23 million. Also, ALK made accession payments to the 3 newly appointed directors, partly in the form of small cash amounts and partly in the form of share options. This was to compensate them for the incentive pay they missed out on because they had accrued incentive pay amounts in their previous jobs, which they left to take up office with us. It's common practice today when recruiting managers for top positions that you do this. An important task for the Board of Management and the Board of Directors in the coming months is to review our business strategy.
Our current strategy dates from 2017, and we are getting close to fulfilling the targets stated in it, so we need now to take stock of how far we've come. Our current strategy, as I said, is from 2017, and it has, as I also said, basically remained unchanged since then, except for the addition of China and the New Horizons initiatives. I will not try to prejudge the outcome of the review that we will undertake, but I'd like to share some particular issues with you. We have many opportunities now to strengthen our market position and create prosperity and growth. But we also need to be careful not to spread ourselves too thin, not to want to do too much at the same time, and never really getting things done.
So through careful prioritization, we must ensure that we pursue the opportunities that hold the greatest potential for ALK. This means that there are other things that need to be deprioritized. We also need to pursue opportunities in the right order, at the right pace, and with the right allocation of resources. We will also look at how best to streamline our business platform to make it more scalable. For instance, are there things that we can actually do smarter or simpler? Are there economies of scale that we are not currently making full use of? This is the type of thing that we are looking at. ... In the second quarter, and we will also tell you then about our new ambitions towards 2030. However, I wish to emphasize that the strategic review does not change the long-term ambitions that we have already announced. On the contrary!...
The strategic review is meant to support our long-term ambitions, and we will continue to strive for profitable growth with the aim of raising our operating margin to the level around 25% by 2025. So 25 and 2025 was an ambitious goal when we announced it years ago. Well, back then, none of us could have imagined that the world would enter a high inflation era, which increased costs, so it hasn't been made easier, but we still believe in the ambition, and our strategic review will tell us how to get there. In 2018, we introduced a temporary freeze with regard to the payment of dividend. We did this in order to enable us to invest all of our profit in growth and development.
Since then, the Board of Directors has revisited our dividend policy every year to assess when we can start paying dividends again. We have decided to propose to this AGM that we extend the dividend freeze for one more year. Until we pay dividends again, share price increases must provide returns to our 40,000 shareholders. But unfortunately, value creation has been lagging lately. After Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine and rising interest rates, many expectation-driven growth stocks in 2022 suffered price losses, and that also applies to us. In the first half of 2023, our share price fell further as the market was skeptical about whether we could maintain the growth in tablet sales. But in the second half of the year, the shares recovered, and this year the price has risen by almost 30%.
This has happened as the market realizes that we are once again delivering double-digit tablet growth in Europe, and we're delivering, delivering on the other expectations we have announced. We know that the dividend freeze draws on your patience, but as our performance improves, we're confident that we can reward your patience with sustained long-term value creation. In 2024, we expect to continue our value creation, and we intend to take the positive trend to the next level. We expect organic revenue growth of between 9% and 12% in local currencies, and we expect increasing sales in all regions and also in all product groups. Growth will be fueled, in particular, by tablets, especially in Europe. We expect to increase our operating margin from 8%-14% last year to between 17% and 19%.
We have some inflationary cost increases in production, but they will be compensated for by top line growth, efficiency improvements, and moderate growth in other costs. We will spend less money on research and development because we have completed some big clinical trials with the tablets, and we also expect a slight to flat decrease in administrative costs. On the other hand, we expect single-digit growth in sales and marketing expenses, which means that 2022 looks as if it'll be the sixth consecutive year of increasing revenue and improved earnings. We are definitely on the right track. And with these words, I ask you to approve the annual report and the allocation of profit, and to adopt the report submitted by the Board of Directors and Board of Management, and give discharge of responsibility to the members of these two fora. Thank you.
Thank you to the chairman for the report for 2023, the presentation of the annual report, the remuneration report also for 2023, and the proposal concerning the appropriation of profits. Before I open up for the discussion, I can tell you that the annual report has been signed by the Board of Directors and Board of Management. It's been endorsed by the company's auditor in a so-called unqualified opinion. You can check it on pages 55-59 in the annual report for 2023. As mentioned, we just heard that no dividend is to be paid for the 2023 financial year. So the debate is now open. We already have one person asking for the floor, Claus Berner Moller from ATP. So I give the floor to C laus Berner Moller from ATP, the Labor Market Supplementary Pension Fund.
Thank you. So, I'm Claus Berner Moller.
I represent ATP. I'd like to start by thanking you for the report and the review of the financial statements. 2023 was a very tumultuous year for ALK, not least for shareholders. The first wasn't until the first quarter came out, it was a disappointment, and there was an ongoing replacement in the management group. On the nineteenth of June, we were told that Carsten Hellmann was to be replaced by Peter Halling. All this meant that the share price fell to just over 70 DKK in the middle of the year. Now, after we've seen the financial statements for 2023, we can see that 2023 actually ended up okay, 9% top line growth and an EBIT result that went up by more than 40%. The share price is now back at around 130....
So it's gone up by more than 80% from when it was lowest. The annual result we can be pleased with, but when a non-cyclical share with relatively constant growth can fall and increase so much, there is a reason to think twice. The varying report concerning tablet growth in Europe, leaving investors about growth doubts. This was a very difficult period, 3 out of 4 people in the top management group, and that was something that left shareholders with too much uncertainty. I understand the board cannot master everything that's happened at ALK, but I would like for you to give me a feedback as to how you are going to reduce the risk that something similar could happen again.
I'd like to say that this is from an investor who has stayed in the share, who believes in the company and the future of the company. In ESG, you focus on gender diversity. ALK is a company in which 62% of the employees are women, so it's important that women should also form a great part of the top management. In ALK, women in top management, and those that refer to them, is 42%. This is actually quite high, also compared with many other companies. I'd like to hear from you what the company has done to achieve such a high proportion of women, and whether the company wants the women to be even better represented, better represented in top management layers. Next year, ALK needs to report after the CSRD, the new sustainability reporting system of the European Union.
This is an extensive piece of work with up to 1,200 different data points in under 10 themes. The ESG report will also become part of the annual report. It's, it's gonna grow and get even bigger. So my question is: How is ALK working to ensure they focus on the most significant metrics as in the sustainability reporting, so that we readers are not completely overwhelmed? Finally, I just wish the management and the employees all the best with the challenges in 2024. Thank you for your attention. Thank you, Claus Berner Møller from ATP. There were a few questions. I believe the chairman will respond.
Thank you for your trust in the company and for your questions.
As regards to the increased reporting in ESG and the 12,000 different data points we need to report on, there is a risk, obviously, that we will lose our broad overview. If you look at ALK's annual report today, it is quite lengthy. Our ESG team is also well underway, looking at the reporting for 2024. We are working with auditors and other advisors to find out how to structure this in such a way that we meet the requirements, ensure readability, and a broad overview. And, so we need to focus on what's important. We are aware of that, and, so next year, you'll have to see whether we lived up to what is expected. You also asked what we have done to ensure that the many women in the system that we have can advance.
It is true that 42% of our managerial jobs are filled by women today. The brief answer is that for a number of years, we have been working with a broad range of initiatives, ensuring diversity and inclusion in our recruitment, talent development, and succession planning. This is an element that forms part when we select people in the process. We have a good talent pool among our female employees, and when we make a targeted effort with the different training and selection criteria, I think we've done quite well. I think as you if you look back 50 years, this was really a dominant workplace dominated by women. So, yeah. If you look higher up, we have today 29% women on the board of those elected by the AGM, so we do live up to that goal.
It doesn't mean we have to stop there, but we have no specific plans. You can see it from our recommendation of new board members. We have no plans to change the composition of the board right now. Your first question was my... It's gonna be my last reply, has to do with the ups and downs that we saw in the year under review. I think it's important to distinguish here and, I mean, your question is, how you think about that? And if you look at the first bit, the one that had to do with the varied report we gave concerning the tablet. If you look at what specifically went wrong in the market, the initiation season, the pollen season, was poor. We got fewer patients.
At the same time, it was a period in which other airborne infections became a bottleneck for doctors. It was the third year after we had launched ITULAZAX, so there was now a greater number of patients who completed their three-year treatment compared with how many came in. So these things affected our start. Well, yeah, should we have predicted that? Yeah, we should probably have been better at seeing that coming. We have discussed on the Board of Management what we can do to handle this issue better. This is not new for a 100-year-old company, that the policy is various. It's not rocket science, is it? But, you know, this is a matter of paying attention to things in your everyday work. We do that, but we could have done better, could have been clearer in our reporting.
So we do understand we didn't do very well there. About the change of management, it is true, we had three changes, but also have to say that these are three events that are completely independent of each other. The first thing was a person who had been there for 23 years, who said, "Now it's time for me to do something different." Fortunately, we were able to find a very competent person early in the year. The CFO, yeah, he found another job, and this is what happens. Fortunately, we were able to replace him also with another good person. It is quite true that where we have been in charge, where the board has controlled this process from beginning to end, that time and timing was really not fortunate, but it wasn't timing we could do much about, really.
We had a succession planning going for a number of months, with the knowledge of the then CEO, and we ended up as we did when we had the right candidate. That kind of thing, you have to strike when the right person turns up, right? So we had to act. I went out and explained to investors, we're not changing our objective, we're not changing what we've said before, what was the reason for the decline in tablet sales? It doesn't change our focus. I also said back then that in 2023, if we had been able to deliver on our targets for the tablet in Europe, we would have maintained 25, 25. We did deliver, and our organization made a huge effort trying to ensure that new patients that came in the...
That we actually got them, and that therefore, we had a good end to the year. Yeah, now we'll have to see how it develops this year, but at least we're off to a good start. So a number of different explanations there to your question. It's not a yes or no, but I hope I've been able to explain at least partially what happened. Thank you.
Thank you. I'd like to hear if there are other requests for the floor. Yes, we have someone here. You can introduce yourself because the name, I think, has been deleted, but it's fine. It's fine.
I am John Aagaard. Good afternoon. I'm a private investor, and I have owned stock in this company for about 10 years. I bought my first share about 10 years ago, and slowly, I have gradually expanded a small portfolio. First of all, thank you to the chairman of the board for a good report, which describes the positive development of the company and the future opportunities. They look interesting, I find. I took the floor last year at the AGM, because of the stagnation of the share price. I'm not going to talk about the share price this year. Over the past 3 or 4 months, it has certainly developed in a very fortunate direction, and it also looks very well now. What I want to address now is the question of dividend, or rather, not dividend.
It's been seven years since we got dividend as shareholders the last time. At the time, it was DKK 5 per share, and for a period of seven years, nothing has happened. We haven't received nothing. If we look at the developments of the share price and the company for the past three to four years, I think you will find that it's been a positive development, and there are several factors that I think justify me proposing that you really ought to consider resuming paying dividend to this group of impatient shareholders. We have heard that you have strong organic growth and revenue, sales has risen by DKK 1.4 billion from 2023 to 2024, which is a 40% increase in sales.
Costs have developed with a modest figure from DKK 2 billion in 2020 to now, in 2023, DKK 3 billion, which is approximately 50%. Running costs used to be DKK 1.9 billion, this was in 2020. They've increased to DKK 2.4 billion, 26% or DKK 500 million, which means that we have now results that have developed very well. So we have seen a result that has doubled 6 times from 2020 to 2023. You will find the background for everything I'm saying here in the figures in the documents that are available. In 2021, the profit was 20%, and in 2022 it was 10%, and this year it's 13%. So a fine increase in the profit before tax delivered by every kroner earned in revenue.
This all goes to show that there is good reason for you to consider the possibility of including the considerable group of shareholders paying a dividend to them. So I think you should discuss this on the board, and perhaps you then have a nice surprise for us for the next AGM. It's not a question I'm putting to you, it's merely a comment. I think it's important that you start considering the large circle of shareholders. We are an impatient group. Thank you very much, and all the best for the future with the company.
Thank you very much, Mr. Aagaard. There were several comments in particular to the payment of dividend, and the chairman will now reply.
Thank you. Thank you for the kind words, and you very eloquently described the situation. We are looking into this.
This is as far as I am willing to go here and now, but we are looking into it.
Thank you. Are there any other requests for the floor? This is concerning items one to four on the agenda. That doesn't seem to be the case. I hereby declare the debate for closed, and I find that the meeting has taken account of the report, that we have approved the annual report, and we have given discharge to members of Board of Directors and Board of Management, and the decision concerning the distribution of profit. We have approved the remuneration report, so this will all be reflected in the protocol. We will now embark on item five on the agenda, which has to do with approval of the remuneration to the Board of Directors.
The Board of Directors proposes that remuneration to the Board of Directors, as also mentioned by the chairman, remain unchanged in 2024. Which means that for the present year, which is 2024, board members will get a base fee of DKK 350 thousand. The Vice Chair will get double that, DKK 700 thousand, and the Chair will get three times the basic fee, which is DKK 1.05 million. The Board of Directors also proposes that the supplementary fees to board members who are members of the Remuneration and Nomination Committee and the Scientific Committee should remain unchanged at DKK 100 thousand. This is also the fee level applicable in 2023, and that supplementary fees to the chairs of these two committees should remain unchanged at DKK 150 thousand. That, too, is what is paid for 2023.
And then the Board of Directors has also proposed that supplementary fees to members of the Audit Committee remain unchanged at DKK 125,000, and that supplementary fees to the chair of the Audit Committee should also be unchanged at DKK 187,500. Would anyone like to speak to this? That doesn't seem to be the case. I find then that the proposal has been approved.
That brings us to item six on the agenda. This is the election of chairman of the board. The board is proposing to re-elect Anders Hedegaard as chairman of the board, and his competencies and fiduciary positions can be seen in the convening notice. Are there any other candidates? That is not the case, so I find that Anders Hedegaard has been re-elected as chairman of the board. Congratulations!
...Brings us to item 7 on the agenda, election of vice chair. We prepare, Lene Skole should be re-elected as vice chair. You can see that also in exhibit from the convening notice. Since then, she has been elected as chairperson for ALK, and she has left Falck in the meantime. Are there any other candidates? Does not seem to be the case. So Lene Skole has also been duly elected as vice chair of the Board of Directors. Brings us to item 8 on the agenda, election of other members of the Board of Directors. I give the floor to the chairman, who will explain the candidates.
Thank you. According to our Articles of Association, all members of the Board of Directors are elected at the AGM each year. You've been kind enough to re-elect me and Lene Skole. Thank you for that.
We propose to re-elect the other five members, Gitte Aabo, Lars Holmqvist, Jesper Høiland, Bertil Lindmark, and Alan Main. All the candidates are presented in the appendices to the convening notice and on pages 50 to 52 in the annual report with their positions, skills, positions of trust, et cetera. We believe the proposed candidates have the skills required to ensure that the board can serve the interests of ALK and your interests. We look particularly at the candidates having international management experience from multiple industries, and that they have particular insight into the management and globalization of a research-driven company. Including the chair and vice chair, seven of us are elected at the AGM. Five members are independent, while two are non-independent in a corporate governance sense, because they are linked to our main shareholder, the Lundbeck Foundation. Two of the seven members are women.
That's 29%. This is in line with our target. Three members have a nationality other than Danish, Lars Holmqvist, Bertil Lindmark, and Alan Main. On this basis, we believe there is appropriate diversity and inclusion on the board. We believe that diversity and inclusion at all levels, they can produce better results, which is why we have ensured. We believe we have ensured the best possible running of ALK.
So I believe that I have the floor again. Thank you for explaining the candidates. Again, I'd like to know if there are other candidates. Does not seem to be the case, so these candidates have been duly re-elected as members of the board of directors. Congratulations to you. Brings us to item nine on the agenda, election of auditor.
The board proposes to re-elect PwC, and as you can see, the appointment applies this year, both to auditing and sustainability reporting. This is the auditor's regulation that says that this proposal is in line with the recommendation from the Audit Committee, and that the Audit Committee has not been influenced by any third party, has not any agreement with third parties that would restrict the AGM's choice of auditor. Are there other candidates? And normally, that's not the case, so I find that PwC has been re-elected as the company's auditor. Item ten on the agenda is a sort of permanent item proposal from the Board of Directors. There are four proposals this year. 10A, concerning identification of members of the Board of Directors. 10B, that's changing the articles.
10C, that's the approval of the remuneration policy, and 10D is the authorization to the chair of the meeting. On 10A, 10B, 10C, they all concern the indemnification scheme proposed under 10A, so we are dealing with those three jointly, and we will be voting on them and having the debate on them jointly. The proposal under 10A, as I mentioned, concerns the indemnification scheme for members of board and management. This scheme is a supplement to the indemnification policy that the company has. As you can see in the convening notice, this is because the Danish Business Authority has said something that has meant that the company had to revisit its scheme that applies today. Against that basis, the board proposes that we adopt an updated scheme, indemnification scheme. I refer you to the convening notice, which describes the proposal in detail.
It consists mainly of the thing that the AGM adopted in 2021. In 10B, that's a change of the articles of association. The articles will now reflect the indemnification scheme. There's a new item 10 that comes in to the articles, and the numbering of the subsequent provisions are then changed as a consequence. I refer you again to the convening notice that has the wording of the newer article 10. In the article, as you can see on the screen here, 10C. This is the approval of the remuneration policy. Specifically, this means that the remuneration policy is changed, so that in line with the articles, it reflects the indemnification scheme. The updated version here has been available on the company's website prior to the AGM.
With these, this presentation of these three items, I'd like to hear if there are any comments or queries concerning this item.
That doesn't seem to be the case. Yes. We have one person requesting the floor, Jens Frederik Demant. As you approach, I can say that we need only a simple majority for ten A, C, and D, whereas ten B requires two-thirds of the votes present to be approved. It all follows from Danish legislation, Danish company law, and the articles of association of ALK.
Yeah, Jens Frederik- I am Jens Frederik Demant. This proposal concerning indemnification as it stands in the convening notice... Well, we get a very fine rationale, but in terms of principles, we are sort of moving on the fringe, because it means that you ease the liability and responsibility of members of board and management. If they become too bold or show a lack of judgment, what do...
Why do you want to add to the insurance cover already arranged? I brought up my elf hat from Christmas, but Father Christmas definitely wouldn't want to have to foot the bill in case something went wrong.
Thank you very much. The comment has been taken note of. I'd like to hear if anyone else requests the floor in relation to these proposals from the board. That doesn't seem to be the case. I find that the proposals have been approved, and I will enter this into the protocol. Which means that we have arrived at proposal 10 D.
This is about the proposal from the Board of Directors, which is that the general meeting authorizes the chair with power delegation to make changes in and additions to the resolutions adopted, and to make sure that this is all registered with the Danish Business Authority. No request for the floor. Thank you very much. I find that we have approved this proposal. Which brings us to the last item on the agenda, which is item 11, any other business. Again, I'd like to hear if there are any requests for the floor under any other business. That doesn't seem to be the case. Right. We have now exhausted the business on the agenda. Thank you very much for good order and discipline.
I will now hand over the meeting to the chairman of the board, who will give his concluding remarks.
Thank you, and thank you for good order and discipline, as the chairman of the meeting said. Before I close the meeting, I must admit I made a mistake. I left the rostrum a bit prematurely before. This is outside sort of the more formal matters to be transacted at the meeting, but we do have additional board members, because we have four board members who have been elected by the employees, and who attend all meetings, and also contribute to the work done by us. So thank you very much. They are not elected by the AGM, these four people. They are elected by the employees, and they contribute across all the themes, issues, and problems that we discuss on the board.
So I look forward to continue the good work and cooperation with them.
Right. Thank you very much for coming. Thank you for your questions. Thank you for taking an interest in the company and taking the time to come here today. We will invite you to join us outside for refreshments, and we will be there if you wish to talk to us about this, that, or the other. Thank you very much. The meeting is adjourned.