Good morning, everyone, a warm welcome to Oriola's full year results audiocast. I am Tua Stenius-Örnhjelm from Oriola's Investor Relations. With me today, I have our CEO, Katarina Gabrielson, and CFO, Mats Danielsson. We have now moved to audiocast, the setup will be the same as before. After the presentation, we open up for your questions, and as a kind reminder, in the Q&A, we will first focus on questions relating to Oriola's business and financial performance. Like always, you can start posting questions to us already during the presentation through the chat. Finally, please note that we are recording this audiocast, and the recording will be available on our website later today. Before handing over to Katarina, here is our customary disclaimer that we all should be aware of. Now, without further ado, Katarina, please go ahead.
Thank you, Tua. Welcome on my behalf. The agenda is fairly as it normally is. We will start now to look at what's the 2025 years highlights. During 2025, we delivered a steady progress. The second half was particularly strong, and that's, of course, is also good for the future. We can see that we have worked a lot with our customers during the year. That has resulted in a higher customer satisfaction. By doing this, we have strengthened the partnerships. We have also onboarding new customers that we have already talked about during 2025. We have also worked more across the markets with our portfolios. Also worked more with our value-adding services, not only moving products.
Value-adding service is, for example, when we have excess stock, and that means that we are then having extra stock for our pharmaceutical companies in our warehouses, but get paid for that. We can see that we have a stronger supply chain also. In combination with the customer focus, we have higher efficiency in our all our warehouses across all sites. This has, of course, given an effect in the costs and efficiency. That means that we have like had a possibility to have a higher tote filling ratio and in combination with higher volumes, for example, in the vaccine side, this is, of course, giving a positive effect in Oriola. This means that the net sales increased by 14%.
We have also higher sales margin, and we have improved Adjusted EBITDA that was growing to EUR 35.1 million, and that is done exceeding the previous year's level. The ERP project, we have commented quite much during the year, and we have now done the first deployment in Sweden. That's completed in the end of the last year. We are now continuing with the planning the second part of the ERP project that is also then planned to go live in Sweden. In the joint venture company, Kronans Apotek, we have completed the integration. There has also been a start of a lot of new activities. For example, network adjustments. We are looking at private label parts, how we should work with that for the future. Kronans has also defined its long-term commercial strategy.
There is still some way to go to the market level, like we talked about before, that we are expecting Kronans to be at, but we are on the way, and we'll continue on that pace. Looking at our operating environment. Like last time we talked about this, there is no major changes in operating environments. We can see that the value of the pharmaceutical distribution market is continuing to grow in both countries. It's a little bit higher in Sweden and more modest in Finland, but it's still growing. Also the customer satisfaction is on the lower levels that we've also touched upon earlier during 2025.
If we then go to our segments, and let's start again with the distribution segments, that is then how we then take pharmaceuticals and distribute them from the pharmaceutical companies as a customer to the, to the pharmacies and hospitals, etc . In this segment, the net sales was growing with 11%. We can see that the growth came from both existing portfolio, but also new customers that we also touched upon earlier in 2025. We have an increase in the value-adding services that I touched earlier in this presentation. We can also really see that the vaccines has been growing a lot, especially in Sweden, with 20%.
In Finland, the dose dispensing business has performed very well, and this has also done, given efficiency initiative that we have then talked about here earlier, who is done also good for the distribution segments. All in all, Adjusted EBITDA increased to EUR 8.8 million, compared to EUR 8.1 million last year. Like I said in the beginning of this presentation, we have worked a lot on the customer centricity and customer relationship. We have had all-time high in Net Promoter Score, which is the way that we are then measuring our satisfaction with the customers. How we have done it is very much to be in closer dialogue with our customers, and we have also really shown that we are an active partner to our customers.
By doing this, when we're trying to understand the whole value chain, you will hear a little bit more about that when we come to the CMD later this spring. How we do this. We are trying then to integrate the service offering that we do and also the strong market support. One thing that we really do is to try to reduce the complexity to our customer, because we believe that if we have a profitable and successful customer, then we will also be successful in the end. When we go down to the wholesale segment, that is when the pharmacist is buying things from us, but also as well, pharmaceutical companies buying services from us. We are also working in the customer side on this one.
In the same way as we do in the distribution segment, we are doing it in the wholesale segment. Work in close connection to, together with the customers, try to get them to be successful, because then we will also be successful. This is also in this segment, given higher NPS results, Net Promoter Score results. Also on this side, we are on higher level than we have been in a lot of years. We have developed the capabilities to service also in this one cross market, and also we can see that we have, for example, started to deliver full pallets, delivery in Sweden to the e-com players, which is important for them, when they should deliver to their customers. In advisory, we have worked a lot with the digital parts.
We have mentioned that before, also during the year. For example, in the AI part, where we have AI-driven tools to enhance services, including commercial data and also medical information. In the wholesale segment, the net sales has been growing with 26%, and the growth was driven down by the wholesale business in Sweden, as well as in Finland. In Sweden, it's a lot about the parallel import, as it has been also early in 2025, and especially in the weight-loss medicines. In Finland, the strong sales was particularly coming from the veterinarians and specialized medicine. In advisory, like I said here before, data services and so on.
Adjusted EBITDA was EUR 2.8 million, a little bit better than last year. Still there is some things to be done this segment to get the profitability to the level where we want it to be. In the beginning of this year, we also announced that we are then going to have a state-of-the-art distribution center in Järvenpää. That's a modernization then of the Finnish operation that we today have in Munkkiniemi. We are doing this based on the market requirements that we see, also to be able to continue our growth for the future and improve our profitability. This distribution center is highly automated logistics center that support the growth ambitions that we have also helps us to reach our financial targets for the future. It will also strengthen our competitiveness long term.
It's financed through a lease arrangement. That means that we will have efficient use of capital and also a low upfront costs in this project. This distribution center strengthens our logistic capabilities in response to the growth of pharmaceutical markets. We're also looking at the products that our customers is, you know, like having there in their pipeline, and also, of course, e-commerce expansion, etc . This means that you see here in the slide, that the pallet storages, for example, is on the ambient side, growing with 30%, and also the cold storage capacity is growing with 80% compared to today.
If I could take the cold storage, for example, as an example, it's so that if we look at the product mix that we get from the pharmaceutical side, this is the area that is growing most. This is a response to that, what happens on the market. The pallet storage will be for over 20,000 pallets, and the pallet storage will be safeguarded by oxygen reduction system, which eliminates the risk of ignition. This will constitute the largest low-oxygen fire prevention system in Finland. It's really like a modern automation center that we then build. The Järvenpää center is also supporting our sustainability ambition and will strengthen our position as part of Finland's critical healthcare infrastructure and will ensure reliable pharmaceutical distribution for society.
The building is planned to be constructed to BREEAM excellent level standards, utilize some geothermal energy, solar panels, and also sustainable materials. It will be 50% more energy efficient and reduce our Scope one and two carbon dioxide emission in Finland. It's not only for the efficiency, it's also for the, like, environmental part that we are doing this. With this said, I will leave now the word to Mats to go through the financial review.
Thank you, Katarina. We will start from the top line and look at invoicing and net sales. If you look at this year, the growth or 2025, the growth had from invoicing and net sales have been driven both by the distribution and wholesale segment. If you look on the left-hand on the picture, we see the quarter four, 2024 and 2025, we had actually a fairly good end of last of 2024 also. We made really good numbers. We had some VAT changes in Finland and other regulatory changes that impacted the 2024 numbers, and we managed.
We managed now to grow 13% the invoicing and 14% the net sales, we are very happy with this achievement. If we look at the full year numbers, we grew 11% on invoicing and 13% on net sales. If we look at move into the sales margin, looking back at the full or the whole year 2025, we have had a steady growth in all quarters, growing the sales margin, which is really important to us. Year to date, we have an improvement of EUR 7 million. This is coming both from the distribution and the wholesale segment.
We move into EBITDA, and if we look at quarter four, both segments were improving, growing from EUR 9.4 million to EUR 9.9 million. We have had more adjusting items this year compared to last year. That's mainly the ERP project that is driving the cost. We have a lower EBITDA, reported EBITDA compared to last year, declining from EUR 7 million to EUR 5.88 million. If we look at the full year, mainly distribution-driven improvement from EUR 33.4 million to EUR 35.1 million. Here we can also see that the reported EBITDA is lower due to the ERP project cost. It's EUR 9.6 million this year and EUR 5.9 million last year. A heavy burden from the project now in 2025.
If we move into the segments, the distribution segment had a good year, steady 11% growth in invoicing, both in the quarter and year to date. Like Katarina Gabrielson said, this growth is coming both from existing and new customers. We have had a lot of value-added services. We have had higher vaccine volumes in Sweden and in general, a good market growth, especially in Sweden. If you look at Adjusted EBITDA, we can see that there was an increase from EUR 8.1 million-EUR 8.8 million in the Q4 and a five...
If we look at the year-to-date numbers, it's a EUR 5 million growth in EBITDA, supported by both growth and then an increased sales margin. The wholesale segment had an especially good traction in quarter four, both in Finland and Sweden, growing net sales by 26%. In Sweden, it was the parallel import with and mainly the weight-loss medicines. In Finland, we had a good development in veterinarians and Special Licensed Medicines. Also, the year-to-date growth was good on with the 9% increase. If we look at Adjusted EBITDA, this was actually the Q1 for the year where we improved the EBITDA in the wholesale segment from EUR 2.7 million to EUR 2.8 million. However, the full year is a bit lower.
It's EUR 2.2 million lower than last year. If we then look at the net profit, there's three main factors affecting the lower net profit. It's the ERP cost, project cost, it's the Svensk Dos impairment that we had earlier in the year, and then the impairment related to Kronans Apotek and the result from Kronans Apotek in quarter four. If we look at the waterfall, we can see that there's the EBITDA Adjusted is lower than last year. We can see also that the depreciation, amortization, and impairments, we see a higher number of EUR 17.7 million, including the EUR 5.7 million from the Svensk Dos. Then we see that Kronans share of results in joint ventures, which is minus EUR 22.8 million.
That leads us to a net profit of minus EUR 27.2 million. We look at the cash flow. We have had a good cash flow compared to last year. The EBITDA, of course, as said earlier, was lower due to the reasoning earlier. ERP cost, the big part here affecting. We have the change in working capital. We have a negative working capital, so with the growth, we should be able to increase the cash flow through the working capital, and that we can see here also now that we are improving from compared to last year. We have a free cash flow of EUR 58.4 million compared to EUR 43.4 million last year, full year.
If you look at the net debt, we have had a good cash flow and debt is -EUR 82 million. We have a cash and cash equivalents of EUR 152 million compared to EUR 113.5 last year. A clear improvement on that side. If we look at the financial position, we have a, as the gearing percentage, of course, due to the good cash flow is -81%.
We see the equity ratio going down to 10.8%, and that's due to the fact that we have the mainly due to the fact that we have now in the quarter, Kronans, and earlier this year, we have had a lot of costs with the ERP affecting the net result. If we move into Kronans Apotek, of course, for us, a disappointing result, but there are also good things. Kronans have completed the integration. They are now working in one system, having one company, and that's of course a good start for 2026.
We can see on the left side in the quarter, the EBIT, including the impairment, the result is minus EUR 39.3 million, on the same level as last year. The year to date EBIT is for minus EUR 45 million. If we look at the Adjusted EBIT, which is adjusted with the integration cost only, showing minus EUR 6.4 million compared to minus EUR 5.1 million. This is not comparable to the adjustments that we do in the group of Oriola. There's kind of a bit of a different definition on what is adjusted here in this number. The underlying business is doing better than the Adjusted EBIT.
The outlook, we repeat what we said last year, that we expect the Adjusted EBIT to increase from 2025. This is based on the growth journey. It's dependent on the efficiency initiatives that we have taken and will give result already this year, and then in general, the strategy execution that is underway. As we communicated in the beginning of January, we will go through a review our long-term plan, our financial targets, and capital allocation framework, plus our dividend policy, and communicate all those later. We have a Capital Markets Day planned for in May. We hope you to save the 12th of May in your calendars to be able to attend this event.
We are coming to the board's dividend proposal. Of course, the AGM is coming up, the board of director has then the opportunity to propose a dividend for the AGM. This year, the proposal will be 3 EUR cents to be paid for 2025. The record date will be the 27th of March, and the payment date, 15th of April, 2026. There is also an authorization or proposal to authorize the board to pay up to 4 EUR cents during November 2026. That's the proposal for the AGM to take a decision upon. If we go to the key takeaways for the full year 2025, I'm really happy to see that we have a steady progress that is in line with our expectations.
Especially the second half was particularly strong, as I said also in the beginning of this presentation. We can see that we have strong customer focus. We have improved the customer satisfactions in all our areas and has really high Net Promoter Score. We have also improved operational efficiency, and that's done in all our sites, which is done also really good for the future. I would say that this is three really strong key highlights. With that, we go down to the questions.
Great. Thank you. Thank you, Katarina and Mats, for your presentations. As a reminder, please use the chat to send in your questions. As usually, we will first take the questions that are relating to Oriola, and after that, the questions relating to Kronans Apotek. There's already a number of questions here, and I will start with the first one. This is relating to the long-term plan that Mats was talking about. Could you please explain the press release on January seventh? What does strengthening and then maintaining reasonable equity level to ensure financial resilience mean? When will Oriola pursue buybacks and divestments?
We can say that there's many questions in one question, but if you look at strengthening and maintaining a reasonable equity level, we see that we have a quite large balance sheet. We also know that we do not bear all the full risk of our inventories. Even though the balance sheet is large, we know that there's a kind of a bit of a... we have a bit of a different view on the risk in the balance sheet. We also have a fairly stable underlying business that we foresee for the next or the coming five to 10 years. We look at that when we look at the equity ratio, and we have.
A really good cash flow, which is helping us to be on the safe side on this. We have the buybacks and divestments. Well, the buybacks we have informed, as we have said, we have no buybacks ongoing, where that's part of the package or the toolbox that we have, and we have not reported on any divestments so far.
Thank you. We move on to a question about the ERP project. How much of the ERP project, in percentage about, is now in use, and how much it will be in use by the end of 2026? Has the new ERP had so far any positive impact on P&L?
I can say like this: we're not talking about percentages here, there is a small part in Sweden, but it's also an important part. For us, it's important to get SAP, that is in the ERP system, into Sweden to be able then to start to use it, because there's a different logic behind that system compared to what we do today. It's a system. The part that we do is also touching the logistic areas, so not only like services or financing and so on. What exactly we will do during 2026 is still in the planning phase to some extent, so we'll come back to this when we have a possibility and know more by ourselves.
Thank you. Moving on to the land area in Espoo. The balance value of the land area in Espoo is EUR 0.1 million. How many square meters is the land?
The total land area here is 6.5 hectares, so that's the total land plot.
Good. Following on that one is that Oriola has filed application to have the land area in Espoo rezoned to allow also residential building. What is the current situation of the-
Well, the.
application, I would assume.
We have nothing new to report on that. The process will most probably be quite long, we have filed for the rezoning. That is what we can say.
Good. We continue, with the question to Mats about the equity ratio. What is the importance of equity ratio to Oriola?
Well, I would say that for... I mean, for any company, the equity ratio is really important, that you, that you have the sufficient equity in your, in your balance sheet. But as said, I mean, we have a slightly lower equity ratio, and especially now, we have a lower equity ratio due to the fact that we have had a lot of one-off costs related to how we handle the ERP project. We do not have that in our balance sheet. It's booked as a cost, which has affected the equity. However, we see also for the future that we will not bear a cost, that high cost, after we have finalized the project. Then we have had, especially the Kronans impairments have been burdening.
As said, with the same explanation as earlier, that we are forecasting the years ahead, and we see that there will be a correction of the equity ratio when we have gone through this transformation that we are now doing.
Okay, let's continue. There's a couple more questions relating to the equity ratio. In the risks and uncertainty factors, referring to the chapter in the report, low equity ratio is not mentioned. Does this mean there are no risks related to low equity ratio?
Of course, there is always a risk. If you have no equity, you have a risk. We see also that of course, is something that we need to have a close look at all the time, and that we do. On the other hand, we have a really good cash flow, which means that we have sufficient funding from the cash flow, and we have a net debt that is negative, that we see as a very positive thing.
As another follow-up question, can you please comment on the equity level and what strengthening equity meant in the seventh January news?
In the seventh January news, I think that we are looking at this on a fairly, with a longer view than just one or two years. We see that there's a big possibility to also strengthen the equity during the coming years. We are doing major changes that will impact the profitability. We also have assets, and among us, move will have some impact on the equity and equity ratio.
Okay. Thank you. Then, a short question to Mats again. Are the sold receivables debt or not?
The sold receivables are a bit handling in a bit of a different way, so not always seen as debt in all calculation. If you look at our covenants, for example, they are not included and so on.
Okay. Let's continue with the question relating to sales margin. Sales margin grew by mere 2% year-on-year, which looks low, as Q4 had very strong net sales growth in both segments. What explains this inconsistency?
I would say that the quarter is quite the short period of time, that we need to look a bit on the more than just a quarter. A month is very short, a quarter is quite short in this business, so it's more related to the growth, the pace, and how we are doing. There's no specific explanation why the sales margin was. They were, of course, a bit dependent on the which kind of volumes do we have in each quarter and what is the value or the margin on those.
The product mix, we can say.
The product mix, yes.
Okay. Let's continue to the next question. There's quite a few questions here, sorry if it's a little bit slow this time. Anyway, let's continue. Do you see that you could continue on a track of double-digit growth on group level during this year?
I can say like this, of course, we have, like, the guidance now that we should improve, on the profitability level, and that means, of course, that we need also to grow, as I see it. If it's going to be double-digit or what it's going to be, that's not exactly what we guide on, but, of course, we are pushing our business to always grow as much as possible.
Okay, thank you. You have noted that the growth in the wholesale segment has been driven by lower margin products, and profitability has thus been affected by the sales mix, along with growth investments. What has the growth looked like for your brands during 2025? What factors should we consider in terms of margin development expectations in the segment during this year?
If it's our own brands that we are talking about here, it's a little bit hard to say because we have a lot of brands. If we focus on the brands that we have ourselves in Oriola, we can say that especially in the end of the year, we could see a positive signs in this one. Like we said before, in the wholesale segment, the assortment part of that one, that we have our own brands in, has been, like, growing slower than we have in anticipated in our strategy, because we have done also made some investments. In the end of 2025, we can see that we had more listings, we had also done more sales, both in the pharmacy, but especially in the grocery and retail area. This is, of course, good for the future.
During the year, we have also done changes in our, like, uplifts or upgradings, it's called, in the products, as well as in the, how they look for the consumer. For the future, I would say that this is a good platform to build up on.
Okay. You mentioned, during the presentation that the vaccine volume growth was strong in Sweden, so what was driving this growth?
That's, of course, a customer demand. Of course, in the autumn, we have influenza season. We also have had other vaccine parts. For us, it's more that we sell a service to deliver the vaccines that is then demanded from the customers. Overall, there has been more patients taking the vaccines in Sweden. That's the main part.
Okay, good. There's a question relating to the strategic review again. Could you, at this point, comment on what level of equity ratio you would consider, a comfortable level?
Well, like I said, we are looking a bit more long term on this question because it's still a long-term issue if there, if the, kind of the equity level. There is no specific number on that.
Okay, good. Thanks. I will see if there's any other questions before we go to those that relate to the outlook. About the ERP, the costs related to the ERP, is the 2025 level a reasonable estimate for 2026 as well?
Yeah. I mean, there's a certain amount of work and money you can spend on an ERP project, and I think we are kind of on the upper side of that. On a high level, it's close to these levels, yes.
Yeah. Okay, let's continue on the ERP and new distribution center in Finland. How will the ERP change and new logistics center ramp-up be timed in Finland? Will you change the ERP to the old center before the move?
There is no absolute decision on this. This is something we also work upon at the same time as we, of course, plan for Sweden. What we're looking for here is, of course, since we're infrastructure critical also, it's really important to do it so that it's safe for the patients, and for the whole Finland, and also, of course, have an opportunity to make, like, have as efficient implementation as possible. So that's the part. The plan is, of course, if we can avoid it, to not take the old system to the new distribution center.
Yes. All right. Thank you. Still jumping back to the strategic review and the capital allocation. When can you comment on share buybacks, and what initiatives are for shareholder value creation now?
Share buyback is, of course, an instrument and not touched like the both what I said also about the dividend and so on. It's a part of the package that the board can then do to distribute the funds to the shareholders, and that's one part. Like we said, in January, that's one of the tools that we are investigating on how to do, and for like for the future. We will come back to this also later this spring.
Yep. Following up, there is a EUR 271 million in value on the balance sheet, EUR 70 million net cash, EUR 187 million in the JV, EUR 40 million in Doktor.se. How will this value become available?
Well, if we look at the different parts here, I mean, we know that we have a quite some cash at certain points in both time. We have a high volatility in our balance sheet, in our cash. We have, as said, we have a fairly large balance sheet with the working capital and the payments are in a way, irregular, so we have dips and ups, upside on the cash position. We have the JV. The JV, of course, is also a customer to us. The JV is going through a transformation, profitability improvement. We know that that is kind of in focus on the JV.
Then we have a Doktor.se part that is in our balance sheet, but we have no further comments on directly on that right now.
Good. Thank you. Now there are a couple of questions relating to the outlook for 2026. Let's start with them. Looking at the market outlook now compared with a year ago, is the outlook now more positive or negative than then? Has there been any large changes in demand in any areas?
What we can see, of course, if you look for like I said before, in the distribution area, when it's go to or and parallel imports, when it comes to weight-loss medicines, there is, of course, a lot of new customers in that area or patients in that area. I will say that looking at the areas that is increasing most, that's one of them, and I think you can see that also from other medias around us. That's growing. That's the areas grows heavily. The market is growing. It's still so that we are supported by the strategy themes that we have with aging populations and, the other areas around us, and also more increased focus on health and wellbeing. That, that is supporting us.
There is also more focus, of course, in the surroundings about availability in the medicines, and we can see that in both Sweden and Finland, the stock levels is increasing. That is also done positive from our side. All in all, I will say that the distribution area is looking like maybe more positive in that aspect, with more volumes than we had a year ago. Not dramatically more positive, but a little bit more positive. In the wholesale area, we also touched before that the uncertainty in the environment is still. The customer confidence is not on the best, let's say it like that.
If we look at the areas where we have it, the products, we can see that customers is normally buying cheaper products when there is uncertainty in the wholesale areas combined. That is something we also had a year ago, and we can see that it's realizing. Of course, it's hard to see how the customer confidence will continue to go during this year. We are betting that we should then, the things we are doing in the wholesale area should give a result and also then be something that is positive for the outcome.
Great. Thank you. There are a couple of more questions relating to the, to the outlook, and I will ask them, and if you have something to add, just add in. Can you provide qualitative comments on expectations for 2026? I think you commented this one already. What are the key drivers or headwinds, and do you expect Adjusted EBITDA in both divisions or segments?
The short answer is yes.
Yes.
Otherwise, we would have, like, another discussion on the segments, on a business level.
Good. Thank you. Is there any drivers for acceleration of the earnings growth in 2026, 2025? I think you touched upon that. Is there anything you want to still add?
Not to add. I think maybe we should say something about advisory, because I didn't touch that one.
Mm-hmm.
Of course, advisory is also an area where we really should see growth. We can see that the customers, like we touched upon, I think especially last quarter, is increasingly positive to the services that we do. So that is also a good one to remember.
All right. A follow-up question relating to the wholesale segment. Will the softer sales mix we have seen in wholesale still weigh on profitability in 2026?
One big difference today compared to a year ago is that now we are also meeting numbers when we have already made the full year, like investment parts, as I said. We had like in, let's say, at right now, years, I think it was 2024, that we started on the investments in also more people and so on. Of course, now we are meeting these numbers. That means that the profitability in the wholesale segment should also be better. Of course, the listings and other things that I touched before is also a positive one. One thing on the outlook that we didn't touch here is also, of course, that we are more efficient right now in the sites that we have than we was a year ago.
Good. Okay, that was all the questions relating to Oriola. If you have any more questions, please send them through the chat. Now we will take questions relating to the joint venture, Kronans Apotek. Accounting of JV is kept in Swedish crowns, and therefore, the equity of JV is in Swedish crowns. The exchange rate of Swedish crown is about 7% better in EUR in at the end of last year compared with 2024. In valuation of JV, this would mean about positive EUR 50 million. Where is this positive figure shown in closing of Oriola, Mats?
We consolidate the JV as a one-line consolidation, and there we take our fair share of the net result. The value in our balance sheet is coming from the start or the acquisition of an asset, and that will not change regarding any currency changes. It's 2 different numbers.
Okay. Thank you. About the adjusting items of JV, it included EUR 1.3 million, one of costs related to integration of the two companies. Adjusted EBIT was also impacted by some other reported one-off items. Do these other one-off items include in reported adjusted items, the EUR 1.3 million or not? If not, how much were these other one-off items?
Yeah, maybe we were a bit unclear on the, with this one, but I commented already that there are additional one-off costs that are not included in the adjusted numbers. I don't have the exact... That depends, of course, a bit of how you what is an adjusting item and when that has not been considered in Kronans Apotek, so cannot comment really on that.
Okay. Then, Oriola expects Kronans Apotek to reach profitability level representing industry benchmark by 2027. Does this mean Oriola expects that EBIT of Kronans Apotek will be 2026 on this level?
What we said here also earlier is that, of course, there's still a journey to reach the market level, and there is, like I said, we are expecting more on Kronans, but we're not commenting exactly here when it will be ready, but there should be progress on Kronans during this year.
Thank you. Oriola PLC has not made any impairment on the valuation of shares of JV. What were the key factors Oriola PLC used in its impairment test, resulting in no impairment were needed to book to the valuation of JV shares?
Yeah. The JV has made their impairment. We have all those calculations, and our auditors and the JV auditors have a close contact. In Oriola, we made a test where we used exactly the same numbers as used in Kronans. We have, however, some different principles on how we have done the impairment on all the shares that we have. There we have a slightly different discount rate, which is the main part that deviates from the Kronans' calculation. Therefore, we did not have a reason to restate our numbers in the same way as Kronans did.
Okay, good. The next one. The JV profitability continues to be pushed further into the future, compared with your target of reaching industry-level profitability by 2027. Given the weak equity ratio, what concrete actions are you taking to improve JV profitability? At what level do you consider the equity ratio to be a covenant or operational risk?
If I first start and maybe Mats can take the equity part. Like I said before, there is a lot of different kind of projects or like initiatives ongoing in Kronans Apotek. It's everything from commercial areas to cost-saving parts, and also really looking at pharmaceutical network structure, where we need to have like Kronans need to have the profitable pharmacies, and also really challenge where was previous Apoteksgruppen pharmacies and where is now Kronans pharmacies. That work is ongoing. I'm expecting that we will see a result in this one coming.
Also, of course, when it come to private label, when it come to pricing, all these basic retail areas, that you have, a lot of this is still untouched, and therefore, I see that there is a huge potential in that, in Kronans Apotek.
On the, on the kind of covenant and the operational risk, I see that, I mean, the effect of the bad result in Kronans Apotek, of course, have an impact on our equity in Oriola, that is mainly affecting the equity level and our ability to pay out dividends. It's more related to that than a covenant or operational risk in Oriola.
Okay, thank you. Next one relating to Kronans integration. As Kronans integration is now done, should we expect a more clean result in 2026 and the figures representing better the operative performance?
There is most likely still some cleaning to be done, but like we said here earlier, is that the integration is now done, and that means that we have a more solid platform in Kronans Apotek to go for the future, and that's really important. I guess the next question will then be how much is then to expect from the impairments part? Honestly, I don't know right now, but I'm expecting that it should not be on the levels that it has been. We don't know right now.
Good. Thank you. We have a couple of questions still in the chat. There's a delay always, please send in your last questions if you have any, and then we take the next one. Can you comment on the clearly negative adjusted profitability of Kronans Apotek? Can we expect positive figures this year now that the integration is completed? You partly commented on that, but do you want to comment on the adjusted, the negative result?
Well, I think that Katarina already commented on the result. The integration has been executed, and there will be probably one-off costs, but not at the same level that it has been last year.
All right. Good. The last question is, going back to Oriola, regarding the distribution and strategic review: Given your good cash flows, would there be any reason to expect a lower total distribution in the short term, even if the composition through dividend or buybacks may change?
Can you take it again? I didn't follow that one.
Yeah. I assume that this refers to the distribution of profits.
Ah.
Yeah.
Yes. Regarding the distribution and strategic review, given your good cash flows, would there be any reason to expect a lower total distribution in the short term, even if the composition through dividend or buybacks may change?
I would say that, of course, it's a decision for the board of directors, directions to take, directors to take, since they are, like, the one who takes the discussion about dividend and the combination which share buybacks and so on. I don't think we should comment that in this forum. Sorry about the confusion, because I thought it was distribution, segment.
Yeah.
Yeah.
No worries. No worries. Good. I think this is all we have in the chat at the moment. Thank you everyone for joining us today. Our next event is the annual general meeting on the 25th of March. I also like to take the opportunity to wish you all welcome to join our Capital Markets Day on the 12th of May. In the meantime, if you have any questions, please don't hesitate to reach out to us. Thank you, and have a good day.
Thank you.
Thank you.