Welcome to Hiab's first quarter 2026 results call. My name is Aki Vesikallio. I'm from the investor relations team. Today's results will be presented by CEO Scott Phillips and CFO Mikko Puolakka. As a reminder, please pay attention to the disclaimer in the presentation as we will be making forward-looking statements. Before handing over to Scott and Mikko, let's take a look at the highlights of the quarter. Book-to-bill was positive in all three geographical areas. Our sales were still impacted by low order intake in the U.S. during the previous three quarters. However, our comparable operating profit margin increased sequentially to 13.5%, and we continued to deliver strong cash flow. The new operating model announced in January was successfully implemented in the beginning of April. We also specified our outlook for full-year comparable operating profit margin from above 13 to above 13.5. Let's then view today's agenda.
First, Scott will present the group-level topics. Mikko will go through reporting segments, financials in more detail, and the outlook. After Mikko, Scott will join the stage for key takeaways before the Q&A session. With that, over to you, Scott.
Thank you, Aki. Greetings, everyone, and a warm welcome to our first earnings report for 2026. I would like to start out sharing three developments highlighting our execution of our profitable growth strategy. During third-quarter earnings report, as you'll recall, we shared our plans to reduce our cost by EUR 20 million within this year as a result of the increased uncertainty that has led to a more challenging demand environment in the U.S., as well as the overall development of the order backlog. Consequently, we have announced plans during quarter to evolve our organizational structure and our operating model, targeting to create three positive outcomes. Number one, to evolve to further clarity on our end-to-end accountability through further decentralization by reducing layers of complexity within our overall organizational design.
That should help us to attend to a few issues that occasionally come to light in terms of suboptimal customer support. Then third, overall, it'll allow us and enable us to reduce our fixed cost in line with our plans, which should create much more improvement in our value creation resiliency. Core to our strategy is our aim to lead the sustainability transition for on-road load-handling industry. I'm really pleased to share the second development here in the execution of our strategy, and that's the fact that we have validation in our Science-Based Targets to achieve our commitment to be net zero by 2050.
The third development I would like to share with pride is another example of a key outcome-based innovation co-created with our distribution partner, MYCSA, together with key customers in Spain, aiming to optimize productivity for dump-over column lift tippers by developing a new DEL brand lightweight liftgate. Another great example of our focus on developing new innovations together with our customers and our partners that's purpose-built to solve our customers' most challenging problems. Let's get into the headline results of our group financials for the quarter. Starting off with our order intake development, I'm pleased to see that our organic order intake increased by 7% in constant currencies versus the comparison period. In actual exchange rates, order intake reached a level of EUR 402 million, or EUR 419 million in constant currencies, for an 11% positive variance.
ING contributed EUR 15 million in the quarter, so in line with our business plan. All regions contributed a solidly positive book-to-bill, increasing our backlog sequentially. Unlike prior periods, we didn't get the advantage of large lumpy orders as myself and Mikko and Aki have talked about in the past, but rather resulting from a number of increased activities that manifested in smaller order intake or mid-size order intake. No real large orders of note to report within the period. Overall, a good start to the year despite the uncertainty in the macro environment. Let me turn your attention to the regional breakdown of our order intake profile for the quarter. As you can see from the table, we had a growth in all regions with the exception of Asia-Pacific.
Europe, Middle East, and Africa increasing from EUR 203 million- EUR 207 million or two percentage points. The Americas grew by 15% from EUR 145 million- EUR 166 million. Asia remained relatively flat at EUR 29 million compared to EUR 30 million in the comparison period. Now, Europe continues to show signs of steady demand growth, which we do see in all businesses, but most notably our Lifting Solutions. The growth in the Americas was primarily driven by ING Cranes acquisition, but at the same time, we certainly did not see further declines in the U.S. Now overall, the environment remains highly uncertain, with ongoing trade tensions in the U.S. and heightened geopolitical tensions in the Middle East.
Let's turn our attention to the revenue results for the quarter. Now revenues were down 7% year-over-year due to the EUR 114 million lower order book we started the period with. Now in line with our expectations that revenues were on the level of EUR 383 million. As you can see on the table on the left-hand side, our rolling 12-month revenues are now converging towards our order intake level of prior periods at EUR 1.528 billion. Now our share of services at actual exchange rates increased a percentage point due to the decline in equipment sales. However, as Mikko will explain, we had a nice increase in service sales in constant currencies, and ING contributed EUR 13 million in sales or 3%. Currencies overall had a negative impact of 4% on group results.
Now geographically, our share of sales were impacted by the positive order intake development in the second half of 2025 in Europe. While the Americas was negatively impacted by the decline in the U.S., partially offset by ING. Now, in addition to the increase in Europe, our Asia Pacific region was also slightly up, improving to EUR 26 million or 7% year-over-year. I'm pleased to see the development of our Eco portfolio sales as they increased by 23% to EUR 176 million or 46% of sales overall. Now with our year-over-year decline in sales, our comparable operating profit was negatively impacted, so I'll guide you through the numbers. For the period, we delivered EUR 52 million on sales of EUR 383 million, which is 22% decline versus the comparison period, all in all a good start to the year.
On a relative basis, the group was on a level of 13.5% versus 16% last year. Now the factors most impacting comparability were lower sales in the U.S., lower indirect cost affecting gross profit, and lower fixed cost affecting operating profit. Now consequently, our operative return on capital employed declined due to the reduction of profit, items affecting comparability, and the ING acquisition. Now Mikko will further guide you through the bridge. Now wrapping up on our quarterly check-in for how we are performing versus our long-range targets. Our 10-year CAGR is now at 5% versus our long-range targets of 16% comparable operating profit. Our last 12 months is at 13%. Versus our long-range target of greater than 25%, we're in line at 27%, albeit a decline sequentially for the factors that I shared earlier.
With that, I would like to turn the stage over to Mikko to share the results for the reporting segments.
Thank you, Scott, and good morning also from my side. Let's start first with the equipment segment's performance in quarter one. The equipment orders were EUR 284 million during the quarter. This is 10% increase year-over-year. If we exclude the currency impact, the growth would have been 14%, so in constant currencies. Lifting equipment grew very nicely. Growth came mainly from Americas, like elaborated already by Scott, very much driven by the ING Cranes acquisitions. The delivery equipment orders were flat year-over-year. I would say that taking into account the market situation in the U.S. and the fact that we did not book any major key account or defense orders during the quarter, I would say that the equipment segment performed well in terms of orders during quarter one. Sales were EUR 266 million. This is -9% year-over-year.
Again, if we exclude the currency impact, the decline would have been -6%. Lifting equipment actually grew in all three geographies. The decline in sales is coming solely from our delivery equipment, especially in the U.S. market. The U.S. decline is very much due to the past quarters below one book-to-bill caused by the volatile tariff environment and the delayed decision-making by the U.S. customers. Equipment comparable operating profit was EUR 32 million, or the margin 12.1%. The biggest driver for the lower profitability was the decline in the delivery equipment sales in the U.S. Like I mentioned earlier, equipment profitability was very much impacted by the lower sales, as can be seen in the bridge on the right-hand side. Lower sales affected the gross profit margin, as the gross profit margin includes also fixed production overheads, so the factory overheads.
We had a slight positive impact coming from the lower SG&A costs. I would say that the cost savings from the early announced EUR 20 million cost savings program are not yet visible in our quarter one results. Let's have a look on service performance. I would say that currencies had a significant impact on services orders and sales during quarter one. Service orders were EUR 119 million. With constant currencies, actually service orders would have grown 4%. Sales was EUR 117 million, and again, with constant currencies, growth would be +5%. In absolute terms and in constant currency services, quarter one revenues would be EUR 123 million. Really nice development in our recurring services like spare parts and maintenance. Those sales grew in quarter one. However, installation services sales declined.
I would say that the recurring services growth was able to offset really nicely both the currency headwinds as well as the decline in the installation services. The number of connected equipment and maintenance contracts also continued to grow in quarter one. Really nice performance in executing also the services strategy. Services profitability was stable at EUR 28 million or the margin 23.6%. If we look at the services bridge on the right-hand side, services sales growth would have been actually EUR 6 million with constant currencies instead of the EUR 1 million decline as we have reported. Recurring services growth very much offsetting the decline in installation services, and then the negative FX impact mainly coming from the weak U.S. dollar offsets the volume growth. Next, let's have a look on Hiab's total financials.
The overall Hiab profitability decline came from equipment volumes, as you were able to see from the previous bridges. Lower volumes affected the gross profit margin as the gross profit includes fixed production overheads. Our SG&A costs were stable in constant currencies. Like mentioned, the cost savings program effects are not yet visible in quarter one. Those start to be more visible in the second half of this year. Currencies had a notable impact on quarter one profitability, mostly stemming from the weak U.S. dollar. We booked EUR 11 million restructuring costs during quarter one as items affecting comparability, so this is below the comparable operating profit. These items affecting comparability, they are related to the ongoing EUR 20 million cost savings program, headcount reduction, including also the ZEPRO tail lift production move from Sweden to Poland. Our quarter one tax rate was 26%.
Our cash generation continued on a very good level, in total, EUR 75 million in quarter one. The cash conversion was really high, 186%. Our inventories decreased slightly, but I would say that the main contribution to our cash flow was coming from the working capital like accounts receivable decline and the VAT receivables collection. Those were the main contributors to quarter one cash flow. Hiab has a very, very strong balance sheet with the net cash of EUR 219 million at the end of March. Our gearing was stable at -23% and given the target to keep our gearing below the 50% threshold, this would allow us to raise more than EUR 700 million euros debt. Really strong balance sheet to execute the inorganic growth strategy. We paid the EUR 75 million dividend in April 2nd.
The dividend payment is not yet visible in our quarter one numbers. On the right-hand side chart, you can see that we have only one major debt item. That's the EUR 150 million bond, which is maturing in quarter three this year. Today, we have also revised or specified our outlook for the 2026 based on a very good start for the year. We estimate that the comparable operating profit margin for this year exceeds 13.5%. This is up from the earlier above 13% what we announced in February. The key assumptions behind this outlook are more or less unchanged what we said in February. We expect EMEA to continue to grow. We expect USA not further declining from the previous quarters. However, the customer decision-making continues to be still slow and difficult to predict. 2026 has started with a EUR 114 million lower order book.
Also, the March 2026 order book was almost EUR 40 million lower than what we had a year ago. We have factored in the outlook also, the EUR 20 million cost savings materializing in 2026, as mentioned, mainly effective from second half onwards. Our group admin underlying costs would be more or less on 2025 level, plus then approximately EUR 5 million investments in process and systems development, mostly in the second half this year. With those words then I would hand the word back to Scott, please.
Thank you, Mikko. Just closing with a few key takeaways summarizing the quarter. I'd say first and foremost, we certainly continue to see a gradual recovery in lifting equipment in Europe, Middle East, Africa, which is great to see. Our delivery equipment market in the U.S. is expected to be in a cyclical trough. Third key takeaway is we are on track to achieve our EUR 20 million lower cost level in 2026 versus the prior year. We continue to nicely execute on our profitable growth strategy with a keen focus on where we can take advantage of opportunistic growth. As Mikko mentioned, our strong cash flow and balance sheet position us nicely to catalyze growth in the coming periods, and we're really pleased to see the solid, good start to the year in 2026. With that, I'll turn it back over to Aki.
Thank you, Scott. Thank you, Mikko. With that, we are ready to start the Q&A session. Please.
If you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key five on your telephone keypad to enter the queue. If you wish to withdraw your question, please dial pound key six on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Antti Kansanen from SEB. Please go ahead.
Good morning, gentlemen, and thanks for taking my questions. I'll start with a bit of a long-winded one on the U.S. demand. Backing out kind of your Americas orders, the FX impacts, and the acquisition impact, it still looks quite good. Organic order growth for the quarter. Again, if we look at kind of the quarter, you flag increased geopolitical uncertainties. There was a bit of a back and forth on the Section 232 tariffs and things like that. How would you kind of describe the demand environment that you saw on the first quarter? Did you start to see a gradual recovery in some sense, or is it kind of the heightened uncertainties adding kind of an extra layer of slower decision-making versus what you kind of saw going into the quarter?
Yeah. Hey, good morning, Antti, and thank you for the question. Just starting that one off. In the U.S., I think one of the key factors to note is that there was a bigger impact towards the second half of Q1 last year, impacting both of our at-scale Delivery Solutions business within the U.S. We're coming off of, I'd call it, a relatively low comp. Therefore, I'd say that was a driver in terms of the positive variance that you see slightly in the U.S. year-over-year.
On the other hand, I'd say from the combination of still the factors that existed prior to the trade tensions and then subsequent to the trade tensions, and even with the geopolitical unrest notwithstanding, we are seeing a bit of stability, albeit as Aki characterized and Mikko as well, that the decision-making is still on a similar level in terms of customers being cautious. Having said that, I think it boded quite nicely for us in the quarter that, similar to what we saw here in EMEA, the composition of the order profile in the period was more skewed towards smaller midsize-type orders. The overall activity level was quite strong. I'd characterize the sales funnel within the quarter also nicely positive variance compared to last year. Having said that, we still have the same level of uncertainty.
We have the added variable of geopolitical unrest, so therefore we're trying to stay quite balanced in terms of managing expectations that. Which is why we made the note of we think we're in a situation where we don't see it imminently getting worse. Therefore, I think there's a potential to be stable to slightly improving. Certainly, you see that supported nicely in some of the reports from the truck OEMs. As has been noted in some of the analyst reports, there will be a bit of a lag in terms of the impact for our business compared to what you see at the truck OEM. The factors at least are lining up to be, I think, skewed more positive versus negative.
All right. Then specifically on the changes on the Section 232 tariffs start of April, what's your analysis on are there any impacts on your clients in terms of truck prices or truck costs? Also what's the direct impact to you all specifically?
Yeah. The impact to the change in the tariff code certainly has a negative impact from the customer perspective in that the cost level goes up somewhat. We've run through all the analytics and the math, and we've revised our price model vis-à-vis the surcharge as a consequence. Our customers will certainly see that.
I don't see it at a level where there would be an imminent negative impact compared to the current demand environment, but certainly an additional factor to consider on behalf of our customers in terms of deploying the budgeted capital within the year. As we have highlighted in some of the past periods, one of the key changes that we did see in the U.S. was a tendency to move away from providing longer term view of demand and capital allocation, and rather going to more shorter demand horizons, if you will, in terms of quarter by quarter or biannual, if you will. We still see that trend continuing.
Sure. Kind of talking about pricing and surcharges, how much would you say that the U.S. orders in Q1 benefited from pricing in terms of year-over-year basis?
Yeah. The U.S. orders benefited approximately EUR 10 million from the surcharges during quarter one.
All right. That's very clear. Then just a housekeeping question on the savings program on the EUR 20 million. Would I model it correctly if I kind of add a full run rate impact for Q4? It's a little bit of a benefit on Q3, and then in a similar fashion, first half of next year as well on a year-over-year basis.
Yeah.
Yeah, I'd say that's about right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
All right. Thanks so much.
Yeah.
The next question comes from Panu Laitinmäki from Danske Bank. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thanks for taking my questions. I would have two questions around the guidance. Firstly, what kind of triggered the upgrade? Is it that you have now more visibility towards the end of the year, or was Q1, or what you see in the market better than you were expecting? Then the second one is, what are you expecting for the U.S. market for the rest of the year, in your guidance assumptions?
Do you want to take the first part? I'll take the second part.
I can take it.
Yeah.
Yeah. Basically what triggered the specified new outlook is that we had of course, a solid start for the year, and we have now basically three months better visibility for the year. We don't see any change in customers' behavior at the moment, so those are basically the elements which basically made us to slightly specify the outlook from above 13 to above 13.5.
Yeah, just adding one more to that one, Panu, is also the view that Europe continues on the positive glide path that we've seen. Better visibility to the order-
Okay
... to the order book now as we have an additional three months coverage, positive variance to the start of the year versus expectation or plan, and then the continued good development in Europe and offset, of course, by a more or less stable situation in the U.S.
Oh, okay.
You had the second part of your question was with regards to the U.S. demand, yes?
Yeah.
Yeah. In terms of the U.S. demand, just to reiterate prior comments, we certainly see the similar factors coming into the year that we did for the second half of last year, where you had the environment where there was already a bit of a slower level of decision making, or let's say a longer time horizon to deploy capital based on changes in the cost levels and the inability of our customers to know, let's say, upon the time of taking possession of the equipment, what their forward-looking cost curves would look like. Naturally you would, if you could, delay the decision making until you had better visibility there. We see that continuing within the year.
Having said that, we did see a bit of recovery, of course, in the Delivery Solutions business in the U.S., and activity level bodes well as the composition of the order intake was, again, rather than being skewed towards a few lumpy key account orders, but rather, a number of small to mid-size orders. The key account orders are also still in the pipeline. Overall, we see a situation where we feel a bit more comfortable given that we still have a lack of coverage to the end of the year, which then will further clarify potentially in line with our Q2 earnings report.
For now, given those three factors that I talked about earlier and this U.S. situation that we think is on quite a stable level, or we don't see it imminently declining, supported by the data that we're seeing with the truck OEMs, key factor for us to be able to bump up the outlook for the year slightly.
Okay. Thank you. My final question is on the European market. It continues to recover, but could you kind of tell a bit more like which segments are looking better for you and what about construction, which I understood has been still slow, but do you see any pickup there?
Yeah. For us, the quick answer on the construction side is not yet. What we do see is we see a pickup on special logistics, a bit of infrastructure, a little bit of retail last mile, but significantly, of course, in our waste and recycling segment, somewhat offset by a slight decline in the defense logistics, as that's a consequence of timing of fulfilling past very large orders that were won in the past, and then the fulfillment schedule is starting to wind down a bit. Overall picture, with the exception of construction, is all moving somewhat in the positive direction and somewhat steady. We're not seeing big swings period-over-period or sequentially within the quarter, but rather a nice steady improvement.
All right. Thank you.
The next question comes from Mikael Doepel from Nordea. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thank you. Good morning, everybody.
Good morning.
Just starting off, following up on the EMEA question there. Any specific countries you would like to flag here that are looking particularly strong or seeing some kind of improvement, maybe some early signs into Q2, or any specifics you could add there?
Yeah. If you think about our demand environment in Europe, it very much follows along with the countries that have the highest or the most at-scale GDPs, and those were certainly the countries that had the most positive variance for us within the Europe, Middle East, Africa region. Of course, U.K., France, Germany, Benelux, France, Spain, all were nicely positive.
Okay. No, that's clear. Also coming back what you mentioned on defense, how would you describe the pipeline there currently and also maybe a specification, did you book any orders there in Q1? The pipeline and potential, how you see it going forward?
Mikael, was your question concerning Middle East? Because the line was a bit-
No.
Defense?
Sorry. No. On defense. Yes. I was asking, did you book any orders related to that segment in Q1? And also, how would you describe the pipeline and potential here going forward?
Yeah. Quick answer, yes, we did. Albeit, I'd say overall, there was a slight negative variance on the defense orders from the comparison period. Pipeline looks really healthy, and as we've called out in the past, it's challenging to call the timing of converting the orders. Hermanni, Frank, the team are doing a great job managing the pipeline, and we feel really good about how we're positioned to convert the pipeline. Question is around the timing.
The defense orders were roughly 4% of the total order intake in quarter one. As we have said earlier, they are a bit lumpier than the kind of typical commercial orders. From quarter to quarter, it might fluctuate a bit, but like Scott said, a solid pipeline and something to come most probably later this year. Yeah.
Okay. No, that's fair. Just finally on the M&A, I think you, Mikko, mentioned the EUR 700 million firepower here. How would you describe the pipeline? Which regions would you say are most active right now, and what are the key hurdles to get the deals done?
Yeah. Let me start. I'll take that question. Pipeline is quite active, as we have consistently called out in the past. Of course, it's always all a matter of timing. Our focus is in line with our focus segments. Similarly, from a geographic perspective, I'd say there's an active pipeline, of course, in both of our core markets, both within Europe as well as the Americas. Of course, that's a critical area of focus for us. At the same time, we continue to look for opportunities to help us scale quicker in regions where we're subscale. We still like the APAC region and are investing a lot of time and expense in analyzing and understanding the opportunities in that part of the world. Similarly, we still see opportunities in Latin America as well.
Okay. Just to follow up, what would you say are kind of the key hurdles to get the deals done? Is it that evaluation question more, or is something else that's kind of the key kind of things being discussed there?
Yeah. Sorry. Just to give you a bit of context and around the history. The first key factor was just needing to work our way through the merger and then the de-merger process, as we were certainly constrained for good reasons to take actions during those years. Post-completion of the de-merger, then the key constraint really has just been a matter of timing of working the processes.
Okay. That's great. Thank you very much.
Yeah.
As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please dial pound key five on your telephone keypad. The next question comes from Antti Kansanen from SEB. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Thanks for taking my follow-up, which would be on the U.S. distributor. Scott, maybe could you talk a little bit about where you are with this kind of a growth strategy, adding the distributor network or expanding the distributor network in the U.S. and expanding geographically? What type of a revenue potential should we think about from these actions in the next, let's say, 12 months- 24 months? If the demand in the U.S. is starting to bottom out, I guess the fact that you have a wider distributor network today than, let's say, a year ago, would add a little bit of a bigger potential for you going forward.
Yeah. Thank you very much for the follow-up question, Antti. I'd love to provide some color on this follow-up. Quite pleased with where we are relative to executing on our growth strategy in North America vis-a-vis activating a hybrid model, whereas in the past we were almost entirely direct with the exception of our Princeton branded truck mounted forklifts. Over the past two years, we've activated 16 new dealers, of course, very much back-end loaded towards that time period. Great companies at scale. For the first time, it gives us real coverage in all 48 contiguous United States. Then I'd say number two, and I couldn't emphasize this one enough, that the quality and capability within these dealers is extremely good and proud that they've elected to work together with us as real partners.
They're going to certainly help our overall growth strategy, as well as to develop the overall Hiab brand in the U.S. Now, having said that, we're in the mode of developing and going through the training and activating the dealers, and so that's a bit of a step-by-step process. Hard to exactly characterize the amount of positive variance certainly within this year, but we expect some positive variance to our order intake development in the U.S. as a consequence. Over the time series of, I think, about 2027, 2028 and beyond, then that should steadily pick up. We believe that we'll end up somewhere around 20 distributors-22 distributors overall.
We still are in the process also of adding new dealers in areas where either we're under-covered and/or we're looking for the capability, be it for a lifting solution or a delivery solution, as some of our dealers are quite specialized and others are more generalists covering the whole portfolio.
Is there any way for me to compare from revenue potential-wise, say, 20 distributors- 22 distributors versus your prior direct model, how much does it expand the addressable market? Or how much dollar revenue potential would it give you down the road when all are fully activated and selling your equipment?
Yeah.
Difficult.
Yeah. On the spot, no, probably. However, as we progress through subsequent periods and, of course, as we certainly have touch points with all of you that cover our business, we certainly would be able to start to give better and better color on just that point.
All right. Looking forward to that. Thank you.
Yeah.
There are no more questions at this time, so I hand the conference back to the speakers.
Okay, thank you for the telephone conference questions. We have at least one question from the iPad. This one is related to the German infrastructure package. Did we see any impacts in the quarter? How would you characterize the situation or the stimulus money from the German infrastructure package? Is it visibility better, the same, or worse than in the beginning of the year?
Well, certainly better visibility compared to the beginning of the year. Timing-wise, I'd say too early yet. We do anticipate having nice opportunities in the future, and we're starting to get visibility in the opportunity funnel.
Great. How about the supply chain? Do we see any constraints, especially in the hydraulics or electronics? I think this must be related to the Middle East situation.
Honestly, a great question, and gives me an opportunity to put the spotlight for a second on our supply chain teams. I think they've done a great job, both in terms of our factories and in collaboration with our sourcing team. Really pleased to share that. No impact. Now, that picture, of course, looks a lot like the duck on top of the water, but of course, below the surface, there's a lot of activity behind the scenes, both internal to Hiab, but also in our partner network vis-a-vis our suppliers as well as the logistic shipping companies. Overall, no negative impact within the quarter, but a lot of organizational bandwidth that's been redirected to make sure that we secure and stabilize the overall supply chain.
Indeed. The next one here is that, do we see any potential considering new trade agreements between Europe and South America? Or then potentially, how about India, do we see any potential there? Will this lead to higher uptake new equipment products and service units in the medium term impacting sales year-on-year growth rate in these regions? Any color you could provide?
Yeah. We haven't seen yet any impact at this point as a consequence of the new trade agreements. However, I would say that markets such as India are a great example of those that we are constantly pulsing and checking for what's the right opportunity for us to better participate in the market. Is that an import opportunity or is it a produce local opportunity? Certainly, I anticipate that markets such as this will play a key and ever increasingly important role in the future of our business.
Okay, thanks. I think we have still some more questions from the telephone line, so let's turn back to the moderator.
The next question comes from Mikael Doepel from Nordea. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thank you. Just very briefly, a question around your service business. Just could you talk a bit about how you see the environment there and the dynamics there? Where are we currently on the spare parts capture rate? And how do you see the overall growth here going forward?
Yeah. Thanks for the question, Mikael. In terms of the services business, what I would still say is that Mikael and his team are progressively working towards better and better partnership, training, and development of how to, one, make sure that as a result of having new or current activated connected units, that that gives us great control then over the installed base, which is the first key factor, and that's why that's one of the critical KPIs that we track relentlessly each period. Then that enables to have the dialogue of converting the management of the assets in the installed base wrapped around ProCare contracts that we do both for direct as well as through indirect. We know that we have a significantly different outcome of capture rate and revenue per unit on those units that are captured in ProCare.
The good news is that our Net Promoter Score and feedback from the customers are on a significantly higher level as well. The team is doing a good job getting better and better control of the overall installed base. It'll take time, as given the top-line split between what we sell direct versus indirect. The biggest opportunity for us is to continue to increase the share of capture on the indirect sales side. A lot of good progress is being made there. Overall, in terms of the capture rate versus what we shared in 2024, we continue to step by step make good improvements sequentially and throughout each period. The limiting factor so far, potentially, and this is a bit of opinion as it's quite variable, is then around the utilization rates of the equipment.
We have seen a lot of variability through the period where some periods, some geographies is up and some within the same geographies may be down, and that might have a bit of a factor if I think about the past two years. Moving forward, our expectation is that given the age of the installed base, the replacement rate should continue to increase. At the same time, the level of service events or the frequency of the service events should get slightly increasing as well, which bodes well for our recurring revenue business. Overall, good progress there. When we come back on our next Capital Markets Day, we'll give a lot more color on how we're progressing relative to the three KPIs that we shared in 2024, as well as the overall capture rate.
I'd say the last comment I would add is, I think I did share in either Q3 or even in February in the Q4 earnings, our share of recurring revenue is now on quite a good level at around 75%-76% level.
All right. That's a great comment. Thank you very much.
Yeah.
The next question comes from Tom Skogman from DNB Carnegie. Please go ahead.
Yes, good morning. I know you have sensors installed in your equipment. Can you open up a bit on what you see, how customers are using the equipment sequentially year-on-year and between different geographies? What can you read about your customers from this?
Yeah. Hey, good morning, Tom. We get quite a lot of data-driven insights off of our connected equipment. Really pleased by the fact that we are able to provide condition-based monitoring services so we can see any number of data points from the amount of how they're being utilized, the time under load, the type of loads, whether it's overload, underload, time in idle, even if an operator's not buckled the seatbelt and attended to some of the basic requirements around safe operations. A whole host of variables that we're able to see relative to most of the units that we have connected. Then quite pleased to tell you that, at least before the end of the year, you'll start to also see quite a nice uptick in connected units in our tail lift business as well.
What do you see in customer activity, like in the U.S. where we have this kind of both uncertain demand situation?
Yeah.
Do you see positive signs in how customer equipment is used, for instance?
Sorry. Now I understand a little better than what you're getting at there, Tom. In terms of utilization, we see quite a lot of variability. I'd say overall, we don't see any real negative or positive trends, but some periods, utilization or activity levels are up, and then in the next period it might be down. Overall, I'd call it quite stable. I'd say the same roughly applies here in Europe as well. In some periods, it's trending more positive, and then in another period, it'll trend slightly negative.
All right. About your M&A pipeline, do you have any targets you would like to share? How many companies you would like to acquire this year or how much sales you would like to add in through an M&A in one year or three years period or so?
Yeah. I'll stick to my same answer as before. I think that given we're a business configured of six divisions and a number of business units, I would love to get to a steady state where we're able to do a bolt-on at least one per year per division, per business unit. Similarly, if you think about then the composition of our business, managing one or two more transformative or let's say, business unit or division size acquisitions per year would be a great steady state to get to. To go from where we are to that steady state, then it's going to take some time as we now are what, nine months or so into being able to now action opportunities that we were constrained to action until we completed the de-merger.
We'll also share a lot more color on that as we progress towards our next Capital Markets Day.
When is the next Capital Markets Day?
We haven't set the date yet, but we will share that as soon as we do.
It's for already this year you plan to have it or?
We will-
Yeah. My sense is that it's likely to be in 2027.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Not yet decided then.
Yeah.
Yeah. Perhaps, a bit more on this service sales target. You have EUR 700 million as a target. I realize this downturn probably was a bit steeper and longer than you expected, but just, on a general level, how do you feel about this? Because that would really demand exceptional sales CAGR to reach that number.
Yeah, you're exactly right. There is that element if you think about the, especially on the non-recurring revenue piece, there is a significant element there of when does the equipment demand recover relative to the way we modeled the demand curve in Q4 2023 when we established the current target or strategy period. A lot will be understood depending upon how the balance of this year and the beginning of 2027 plays out of course.
Of course, one should still if we think quarter one service development, so sales up by 5% with constant currencies. At the same time, we saw a decline in the installation services.
Yeah.
If the installation services, i.e. new equipment sales, then attached with the installation sales would improve, then that would of course have had in this quarter a nice further addition to service revenues.
Yeah.
Finally, these new U.S. distributors, do they wish that you would expand your product portfolio to some certain direction?
I think at this point it's too early to tell. They're still in the mode of getting themselves up and running on understanding the full scope of the portfolio that they're responsible for, how to work within our processes and systems and with the support staff that's available to them. I am confident that as we look forward, they will certainly and frequently share insights where they see that we have opportunities to fill gaps within the portfolio. At this point, I'd say it's too early.
Okay. Thank you.
Yeah.
The next question comes from Antti Kansanen from SEB. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, thanks. Just a quick follow-up on the U.S. order side. I just wanted to get a reminder, like last year, your Americas orders declined by 14% on euro basis, but I'm sure that there was a pricing contributor on a positive side. How much did the volumes last year decline or how much your pricing was up with the surcharges and all of that during 2025?
The surcharge impact, if I recall correctly, was something like between EUR 20 million-EUR 30 million for last year.
Yeah.
A bit less than EUR 30 million.
Yeah.
Around EUR 25 miliion.
Okay.
Yeah.
Do you have any view kind of how much the volumes are currently, or the order volumes are below, let's say, what you booked on 2024, which was kind of the previous peak?
Yeah. You mean in the U.S.?
In the U.S., just trying to kind of think about that if there's a recovery on the market, what is kind of the upside in terms of your order intake, given that your prices are quite much higher now than they were a few years back?
Of course, it's good to remember that the surcharges are something which they change all the time as tariffs change. Of course, it depends on the tariff landscape whether one can use that as a, let's say, permanent price increase or we have communicated to the customers that if the tariffs change, then the surcharge will change.
Correct.
All in all, last year.
Sure.
Roughly that EUR 25 million, let's say, impact in the order intake. It's a bit difficult too because there are so many different products in the U.S. market. There are tail lifts, loader cranes, truck-mounted forklifts, so one cannot count those together. It's like calculating apples and bananas together. From that point of view, it's a bit difficult to say the kind of volume impact there.
Sure. I mean, it's a simplification, but it seems like the pricing had a mid-single-digit impact, and then that would kind of suggest.
Correct.
Yeah.
Almost 20% down on volume.
Correct.
Okay.
That's the right way to think about it. Yeah.
Overall, the biggest impact is coming from the customers' overall demand, the pricing having a quite small impact.
Absolutely. Thank you.
There are no more questions at this time, so I hand the conference back to the speakers.
Yeah. Let's still take a couple of questions from the iPad. Firstly, on the services, so do we always nowadays offer a service agreement when we sell a new piece of equipment? What is our hit ratio with the service agreements with new equipment sales?
A quick answer to that is, that's certainly our expectation that it's one of our key strengths. Certainly if I think about the 50 or 60 customer meetings I have a year, that's usually the first topic of conversation is services and the availability of the services, proximity to installed base, and the high need to secure uptime as most of our customers are understanding that they're paying a premium on the margin in order to secure the service outcomes that they need to keep them going. Therefore, it's critical for us to offer the services concurrent with the opportunity to sell a new piece of equipment. The hit rate or let's say the attachment rate of the services contract varies depending upon region. I would kind of come back to Mikko's comment earlier.
It's not a great metric if you just aggregate it all together and say, "Here's our percentage of attachment," because it's much higher in certain areas depending upon how we're configured with our own organization and the personnel that we have, but it varies. I'd say that overall, I can say that that's one of the key opportunities for us to continue to not only drive our services business, but more importantly, a key factor for us to increase our Net Promoter Score customer satisfaction. The teams are working quite diligently together and with our partners to ensure that we feel like we have all the tools, processes, and capability and training in order to not only offer the services, but then, most importantly, to execute successfully in delivering against those service contracts.
We have two more questions. I think these are quite quick ones. The first one is on the M&A, any preferences in geographical regions? I think you, Scott, already mentioned that we like EMEA, Americas, our key regions, but we also seek for opportunities in the APAC region.
Yeah.
That was the answer already. The final one, which one of you remembers the numbers? How large proportion is the U.S. out of our Americas sales? Of course, we provide that on annual basis to North American sales, but we don't split the U.S. separately. Of course, it's a significant share.
Yeah.
Out of the Americas and also on the North American side.
Yeah. I don't remember now the exact percentage, but I would say U.S. is the majority of the Americas' revenues.
Exactly.
Yes. Yeah. A very high percentage.
Yeah. Of course, for this year, the rest of the Americas is somewhat higher due to the ING acquisition impact, so the Brazil market is proportionally higher than last year.
Yep.
Okay. That then concludes our Q&A session. Thank you for the great questions and for the great answers. We will be back with our second quarter results in 22nd of July. Stay tuned. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.