Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Columbus Interim Report Q3 2024 webcast. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star one and one on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star one and one again. Alternatively, you may submit your question via the webcast. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Søren Krogh Knudsen, CEO. Please go ahead.
Thank you, operator, and good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining today's webcast. My name is Søren Krogh Knudsen, and I'm the CEO of Columbus. I'm accompanied today by Brian Iversen, our Group CEO, sorry, CFO. Otherwise, there'll be two of us. At today's call, I will walk you through our financial and operational highlights for Q3 and our financial guidance for 2024 full year. Brian will cover the details of our financial performance in Q3, and we will end the session with a brief Q&A segment. Let's go to slide four to begin the presentation. As you can see, in Q3, we grew our revenue by 8%, reaching DKK 371 million.
The growth was primarily driven by continued progress in our Dynamics, in our CXE, and our D ata and AI business lines, as well as strong performance in our Danish and U.K. market units, if you look at it from a geographic perspective, and that then totals up to that in the first nine months, we grew revenue by 10%. The EBITDA result for Q3 2024 amounted to DKK 29 million, reflecting a growth of 42% and an EBITDA margin of 7.9%. This is an increase of 1.9 percentage points compared to the last year's third quarter, so same quarter last year. For the first nine months, EBITDA increased by 47%, and that actually means that year to date, now for the first nine months, we are almost at the same level in terms of EBITDA produced as for the full year last year.
If we look at the efficiency in Q3, we reached 60%, and that is at the same level as it was in Q3 2023. And it actually is an improvement. Some of you that attended the previous calls will know that in Q1 and Q2 in this year, we struggled a little bit with low efficiency, so we had to do some adjustments. We're now back to being on the same level as we were on last year, and we expect a further improvement on this parameter going into Q4. Our recurring revenue increased by 15%, amounting to DKK 59 million. So that's a slightly higher growth rate than the project and time and material-based part of the business. And that's a development we strive to continue.
And we are investing, as I've said in previous calls, in sort of strengthening our commercial footprint in the Care side of the business, or as we call it, Evolve. And that's the one that drives the recurring revenue primarily. Our profit before tax increased by DKK 3.8 million, and that was mainly driven by the improved EBITDA. Cash flow from the operating activities continued to be strong, ending at DKK 57 million. And the improvement here is mainly due to a positive development in our trade receivables. So I would say, in conclusion, while we're satisfied with the results in Q3 2024, our focus, of course, remains on improving the EBITDA margin. As we've discussed previously, we are on this EBITDA 15 journey that goes all the way into and including 2026.
So we've made some really good progress, I think, despite slightly difficult market conditions, especially in some markets, as Brian will shortly allude to in Sweden. We're making good progress. The plan is proving itself, and we continue to focus on that development going forward. Next slide, please. So to start with, we do experience an increased focus on improving efficiency and business insights to stay competitive in this dynamic and challenging market, so something our customers are still willing to invest in. When it comes to the core systems, ERP, having that strong digital core is a key driver to ensure access to critical data and also to adopt new technologies such as generative AI. We continue to have a high win rate when we focus on the larger customers, the larger projects within our four industry verticals that we focus on.
And we can also see that our focus on improving the project margin, so the direct margin generated from the projects, is working. So we have good progress. And again, there's a strong correlation or connection between working for the right customers on the right size project in the right industries and us achieving a stronger project margin. On the people side, we've just pointed out that Beatrice Silow has joined us as our new Chief Marketing Officer. She comes with a background from the Nexer Group in Sweden, and we're very fortunate and happy to have her on board. And she will focus on strengthening our brand as being a premier strategic digital advisor and executor, and also our efforts in increasing customer engagement and sales. Also, when it comes to the people side, we welcomed 40 new talents in what we call our accelerator program.
The accelerator program means they're typically a couple of years out of university. They have perhaps some business experience, but they're still early in their careers. We have previously run a very successful program for them. We invest in further education so that they can fit into Columbus. This is the largest group that we've brought on so far, and we're also pleased that we've achieved a gender diversity rate, which has 40% women. Ideally, of course, we would like it to be even better, but in the segment that we search, that takes quite an effort from us. So that's an improving one that we will continue to improve on. It is also, of course, a key initiative to feed our organization in the years to come to have these accelerators that then develop their careers within Columbus. Lastly, a few highlights from collaboration with our technology partners.
These strategic partnerships are really essential to deliver innovative solutions, and ultimately, they are very essential to our commercial success. Highlight here would be that we were acknowledged by Optimizely, a key commerce platform provider, as the partner of the year, and I also had the pleasure of attending Infor, that is the parent company, I would say, of the M3 solution, which is our second largest business unit. They hosted a summit in Las Vegas and one in Amsterdam, where they launched a new approach to their partner programs, and we've been fortunate enough to be part of designing that new program, and that has brought our collaboration level with Infor on an even higher level, which we consider very important for us, so those were the highlights, and then, Brian, it's over to you for the financial details.
Yes. Thank you, Søren. Let me start with the slide showing our business line revenue split, and again, Q3 came out with the 8% growth on the service business sales and total 8% as well for the combined group. Again, our major business lines, Dynamics and M3, showed a solid growth in the quarter. Year to date, they are both in double digits, 14% and 10%, so we are very happy to see this stable and continuous growth, especially looking into the general market conditions as we speak. Dynamics had a strong start to the year and continued that 8% for the quarter, driven with high growth in both U.K. and Denmark, and they really continue to implement core digital solutions to some of our major customers in the different markets. M3 saw a 3% growth in Q3, slightly slowed down compared to the first quarters of the year.
They are finishing off some major projects during the first half and are waiting due to a slightly slower signing of new projects or startup of new projects, especially in Sweden, so there is a bit of lag in the growth in the Q3 compared to expectations. Digital Commerce, as you can see, is now at least in a positive growth scenario, 2% for the quarter. 60% of their business is conducted in Sweden, which we definitely see some headwinds, but again, they are, after the restructuring, as we talked about in Q2, slowly getting back on track, as Søren also mentioned. Data and AI and CXE, both growing with 23% quarter over quarter and double digits for the year to date, is both seeing solid and strong growth, and again, we are very happy to see that in the current market conditions.
Product sales is up 12% for the quarter year to date. It's flattish, 0%, also as we expect it to be. Actually, I think we have said early on that we do expect a slight decline over the years, so overall, we are happy with the growth. Again, as I mentioned, compared to the market conditions, compared to our colleagues out in the market as well, we actually definitely see this quarter as a proof on the top line. Let's move into the profitability in our business lines. A key KPI, also in connection with New Heights strategy, it's important that we can develop and see a general growth in our profitability on business line level. Overall, we grew the quarter from 21%- 23% contribution margin, as you can see at the bottom on the page.
And if we dig into each business line, Dynamics continues really healthy and strong growth on the profitability as well. And again, this is by other things due to strong project management, and we also see bigger projects in the pipeline that last for a longer time and where we can add on more services. This is, again, key parts in our New Heights strategy that we see evolve over time. M3, as I mentioned, saw a slowdown in the quarter on the profitability. And again, this is mainly due to low efficiency for M3. As I mentioned, we see a shift in major projects, and sometimes you do experience people sitting a bit longer on the bench than you prefer. But when you have good people and you see a stronger pipeline, you definitely continue. You keep the good guys there. So that also impacts the profitability.
Year to date, they're still on par with last year, but no doubt that this is one of the business lines that we would like to see an increased profitability over time. Digital Commerce started to improve from 4% the first half of the year to now 12% contribution margin in Q3, and this is a development that we expect to continue over the quarters after the restructuring we carried through during Q1 and primarily Q2 this year. Data and AI had a slow start due to also a weak revenue development in the beginning of the year, but are now delivering 20% compared to 12% last year, and that is definitely approved and is in the right direction. CXE, which have had a tremendous growth over the years, and is continuing that.
And there we do invest in a strong consultant pool, and then we do still see some mismatch between the number of consultants, efficiency, and getting out on real projects. But we are confident that they will get back on track from the fairly low contribution margin we see here in Q3 of 8%. So overall, as I mentioned, an uplift of 2 percentage points from last year, Q over Q, and 1% if you look year to date. And this is a key and important factor in moving towards EBITDA 15. All right, let's move to the next page briefly on efficiency. Søren mentioned we are at least on par with last year for Q3, which is, in general, a lower quarter due to the holiday season and often difficult startup after the holiday seasons during August, beginning of September, depending on the country we are in.
But we see the development is increasing, and they expect that to continue in the coming quarter. Below the number for the group, there is, of course, major deviations between the business lines. And for example, Dynamics did see a strong 65%, some areas pocket 68% efficiency during the quarter, where M3, as I mentioned, slightly disappointing, but also some timing and some headwind in Sweden were down to 50% in some areas of their business during the quarter. But combined, okay. But still, this is a key factor we are constantly looking at to manage the business the right way. Recurring revenue, as we report on, is now constituting around 16% of the total revenue, up 1% from last year. As mentioned, we have a high focus on our recurring revenue. We see a big potential in this area.
Q over Q, we actually saw a growth of 18%, 17% year to date. That is also, again, in line with our New Heights strategy that we would like to have an even bigger part of our business coming from our recurring revenue. Good. Let's move to the, or to my last page, service revenue split by our market units or countries. I think Søren already mentioned in the beginning. Sweden is the country where we see the biggest headwind. Sweden is still our biggest market, 27% of our total revenue. Actually, all the business lines saw a slowdown in Sweden, M3 minus 8%, and Digital Commerce minus 26%. We are hit. That said, we do start to see some light at the end of the tunnel.
We also still see some delays in starting up new projects, hitting M3, for example, in this quarter. And that means, of course, that we do see too many people sitting on the bench for some weeks, at least, before we can start up new projects, pending on approvals from boards and executives in our customers' management teams. Denmark and U.K. take on the one, continue a strong growth. We definitely take a big chunk of market share in Denmark, and we're happy to see that. Business Dynamics, business line grew by 38% in Denmark during the quarter. And we're happy to see that our focused strategy in our market segments is definitely paying off. U.K., growth of 35%, 27% organic compared with the quarter last year. Again, here, Dynamics is a big stake in the growth.
And Dynamics accounts for around 62% of our U.K. market, and they came out with a 17% growth in the Q3. Even though, as we all know, the U.K. do see some headwinds on the general economy situation, we continue to have a good foot in the market over there. Norway, flattish development, continue reluctant within our major customers to release investments in the current business environment up there. But again, we start to see some spring signs from Norway, but we are looking closely on how it's going up there. So overall, we're quite satisfied or very satisfied with the growth in our market, especially, as I mentioned earlier, in the light of the general market conditions out there. And so I would like to thank all our 1,600 good employees for that. Tough times, but we are moving very well ahead.
And with this word, I will give the word over to you, Søren Knudsen.
Thank you, Brian. Outlook. Thank you. Thank you. And I will now cover the outlook for the full year of 2024. And as always, the outlook is subject to the general uncertainties in our markets, such as the current macroeconomic conditions, exchange rate volatility, and the continuous geopolitical situation that may impact the general business environment. Although we continue to see a strong demand for our digital advisory and services, we do anticipate that some reluctance in IT investments and the need for our customers to divide projects up into slightly smaller investment chunks will continue throughout 2024. If this general uncertainty will worsen during 2024, it may impact the group's growth and margin negatively.
Based on the financial performance in Q3 and the current order book and pipeline forecast, our full year guidance for 2024 is as follows: organic revenue growth of 8%-10% and EBITDA margin 9%-10%. That is, we maintain our outlook for 2024. Yes. With that, I would like the operator to open up for questions. I can see we already have one on the web from Mikael. Let's see. Other IT consultants have been struggling with tough market conditions in Q3. Could you please comment a bit more on how you see current trading conditions, perhaps in particular the Dynamics in Sweden, and perhaps also some comments on the competitive situation, any changes here? Being a partner to Microsoft, will the end of support of Windows 10 in October 2024 have any material? Okay. Great. Thank you, Mikael.
I will try to cover that one. So let's start with the market conditions. So I would start with a blanket statement of saying that there is no party going on anywhere at the moment. So in general, market conditions are a little bit muted. But that being said, there are clear differences. And I would consider that the Swedish market conditions, in general, are more difficult than particularly Denmark, but perhaps also a little bit more difficult than the U.K. And Norway, I would rank approximately at the same level as in Sweden. So more reluctance in Sweden and Norway. Sweden, being our biggest one, we'll focus a bit more on. Brian said that we see some spring signs coming, and I'll try to sort of say what we base that on.
We've now seen, I believe it's three interest rate cuts for the Swedish markets or the Swedish rate. And we expect to see a few more this year. We do expect that to have a positive impact. It is traditionally an economy that responds well to this measure. So that's sort of the external input that we see. We notice that inflation seems to be fairly well under control, so we can continue this path that's obviously outside of our control. And then what we look at is primarily early-stage pipeline. So what indications do we have of the early-stage pipeline increasing? And early-stage pipeline means sales dialogues from the very early beginning. It can mean small pre-projects. So they are actually paid projects, but they're meant as preparation projects for larger projects, which is typically a very positive sign.
It can also be participation in very formal and very big RFPs. How many of them have we? They tend to be quite long-stretching, these processes. How much is going on, and that's where we see a clear indication of an increase, and that's what we now need to turn into materialized business during Q4 and particularly Q1 next year, so that is what I would say on the Swedish dynamic. I think also there's a little bit of a proof point that we're monitoring closely. If we look at the efficiency rate that Brian was running through before, a quarter obviously consists of three months. We see September being stronger than the average, meaning that the exit velocity is higher than the average. We now have a picture of our efficiency a little bit in October, which is the first one of Q4.
So we can sort of gauge a little bit on the velocity and see where that takes us. So there are some positive signs, but I would say we're still very focused on turning this into real business. And for us, it's both making it come through and how much of it can we make come through in Q4, how much of it will push into Q1 of next year. Second part, I don't think I'll answer very short on that one. The end of support on Windows 10 has no impact on us. Good. So I continue to the next question. How much of the growth in Q3 and year to date is organic? Maybe you just prepared for that. I think I know it by heart, Brian, but just okay. Yeah. So it's six that's organic in Q3 and nine that's organic year to date.
So that was the first one. How do you calculate your efficiency rate? Okay. So let's try to make that one short. So the efficiency rate is; it's easy to explain. From all hours available for customer-facing and build work, how much of that do we succeed in billing? And since I joined, we've changed that quite a lot because the easiest way of having a high efficiency rate is to have a lot of overhead, which you just define as being non-sellable. So it goes out of the equation. So we've added a lot of hours to this equation over the years, which, unless all other things being even, means that your efficiency rate drops until you start selling those hours.
So that has been part of the improvement path that Columbus has been on, is to make sure that we define as many hours as possible as customer-facing. And when we do that, they become part of the efficiency calculation, how many of them they do sell. So they have to be sold. They cannot be free work. They cannot be customer work hours that are not sold. They have to be sold hours. That's how we calculate our efficiency rate. Next one. How has Q4 started in terms of efficiency? So we'll not go into that one in detail, but I think I said just before that we came out of Q3 with a slight upswing. And so far, we see that continued into Q4. Have you started to see pressure on pricing? So there's two sides to that answer.
There is pressure on pricing, which means that we stick very much to our strategy. We work for the customers where we know we can bring the value. It means the big customers. It means the big projects. It means within our core industries. That makes us less prone to price pressure and even though we've seen this price pressure, I can see that our average hourly rate, which we do not report on, but has gone up. Are you seeing any signs of things getting better in Sweden? I think I covered that one to the extent we can so far. Yes. Okay, so going on to the next question, what has been the development of prices this year? S o I will go as far.
We don't report on our average prices, but it has increased, and it has increased by more than our increase in staff costs, which is, of course, an important parameter for us because otherwise we have an erosion of margins. Do you need an improvement in the market to make increases from 9%- 10% towards 15%? So very good question. So that would make it a lot easier. I mean, let's be clear about that. So having a market like Sweden, which is still marginally, although now it's marginally our largest market, but it is, being as challenged as it has been makes that journey more difficult. So I think that's the first thing to just say, that having slightly better market conditions would make this journey a lot easier.
But that being said, we can improve further even under the current market conditions, and we are still in the process of improving our margins. So we've not done a detailed calculation of how the current market conditions will fall into it, but we can still go towards the 15% without the market improving. Market improvement would both accelerate the process and bring higher assurance of reaching 15%. I think an important thing here to mention is considering not the market conditions, but the number of small investment business units we have in some of our countries. Those are good future growth drivers. Some of them are already fast-growing. Some of them are just being established and are ready to grow. But they all, almost all of them, have in common that they are not yet able to deliver 15% of their EBITDA.
So as we continue, if we struggle a little bit with the market improving, we might combine some of these or change the structure a little bit because we need to make them into bigger business units to generate 15%. And we have plans that can help us there, but I don't see that as necessary yet. All right. I think that takes us to the half hour. Those were very good questions. Thank you. Do we have any more? All right. So I thank you all for your time, and I hope you will follow us next time again where we will present our full year results to you. Thank you.