Welcome to Raute's full year 2025 financial review session. My name is Mika Saariaho. I'm Raute's CEO, and together with our CFO, Ville Halttunen, we'll go through the highlights of Raute's performance in 2025, and also some more details on the last quarter performance in particular. You have a chance to ask questions at the end of this session. We'll go through the presentation first. You can post the questions if you are participating online on the chat box, and also if there's questions from the live audience here, we can use the microphone to ask questions. You can ask the questions both in English and Finnish. Okay, very good. Let's get started.
If we look at some of the highlights for Raute Q4 and overall for 2025, I think we can say that we had a very strong operational execution in, I would say, challenging market environment. We actually achieved very good financial result. Our profitability was on a very good level. This was true for the whole year, and but also in particular, actually for the last quarter of the year. This was very much due to the strong operational execution. We've done quite significant efficiency improvement in our ways of operating. We have optimized our supply chain, and of course, we keep on focusing on safety as a highest priority for us.
So we've been very successful in those areas. We see that in the net sales, there was a drop compared to 2024. This was very much due to the fact that the market environment has been very challenging. The order intake in the first part of the year, 2025 was very low. And this actually then had a consequence on the net sales that we realized in 2025. But despite this declining top line, the profitability was on a very good level. Comparable EBITDA was EUR 26.1 million, and in fact, this is the highest comparable EBITDA ever in Raute's history. The previous record was from 2024. So we've seen actually very good profitability development in Raute over the last couple of years.
The EBITDA margin on a comparable level was 14.9%, which is actually very good profitability for our type of business. Profitability was very much driven by the Wood Processing, our biggest business unit, which had a very strong year and the last quarter as well. And I would say Services did also well. Analyzers were a little bit more suffering from the low volumes, and it was a more challenging year for Analyzers in 2025. We've also had to do some tough decisions, obviously, but necessary decisions to balance our capacity throughout the year, so we had some temporary layoffs in various parts of the organization.
Obviously, something we have to do in order to secure the profitability of our company when we are operating in this quite volatile project environment. If you look at Q4 in a little more detail, net sales actually dropped quite a bit. There was a low-ish realization of the net sales from the backlog that we had. This was some of the reason: the timing of the projects. The key big projects that we are working on in our daily delivery are progressing very well. And since they are progressing very well, we were actually able to release some of the cost reservations for those projects, and therefore, the profitability actually was on a very high level.
I would almost say, and I could say that it's a little bit exceptionally high level in Q4. However, this was not exceptional items. It was truly because of the operational work that we've been doing and the savings we realized in the project work. So very good achievement in that sense. We do maintain our longer-term financial objective to have EBITDA margin over 12% average over cycle, so that remains as a key target. Then very importantly, on this challenging market environment, which we have all experienced, which is driven by the facts that we know that are there in the world, the global trade war, geopolitical tensions, downturn in the construction market.
We have anyway believed that we have now passed the lowest point from our point of view in this cycle. But we should anticipate, we should expect that the volatility will persist still for the time being. And we know that it's very volatile environment overall in the world at the moment. Some of the key figures here, I think I already mentioned Q4 net sales, EBITDA. If we look at the order intake, EUR 25 million in Q4, which is a bit lowish number, I should say. We had more than or close to EUR 40 million in Q4, which was, I would say, quite good quarter already, but I think the volatility between the quarters is also to be expected.
So, this was the result in Q4, and we'll see then what happens in the quarters to come. The order intake for the full year, EUR 91 million, is also quite low if we compare to the history, past history. We had a very strong years couple of years ago. We'll have a look at that in a bit more details in a short while. But order book, EUR 98 million, which is the starting book now for 2026 as we move forward. Very strong balance sheet and about 700 people working at Raute. Okay, looking at order intake a little bit in more details here, we see the performance during the last five years for different quarters also.
We see the very high peak we had in 2023, when we booked many of these big mill-size orders. And since that, the fact is that we've had lower in order intake. Also, the world has been very turbulent during the last couple of years, and this is the result we can see in our order intake. So EUR 91 million is low compared to this last four years. The new orders we got were actually this time coming quite from all around the world. So normally, there has been domination in Europe and North America. This time, there were also orders from Asia- Pacific regions. And if we look at the order book, EUR 98 million, of course, has been coming down from the 2023 high figures that we had.
But still, of course, on a longer term horizon, this is totally not totally unheard of as a Raute's order backlog starting the year. So this is what it is, and after these challenging years, we do believe now that the lowest point should be over, and we've seen that now in Raute's performance as well from the orders point of view. However, the quarterly fluctuations are likely to remain. Net sales EUR 176 is a quite significant drop from last year, from 2024. I mean, still this is a high level for Raute and big part of that coming from Europe.
We know that there are big delivery projects in Europe in the delivery phase, and those are progressing well and generating most of the or big part of the revenue that we have generated in 2025. Then looking at the results on the comparable EBITDA level, this is a very good performance. We are very happy with the full year profitability comparable EBITDA close to 15%, and fourth quarter, as I already mentioned, was exceptionally high, 15.8%. This is a very high number for us, and we are happy, very happy about that. Even more so, since it was not coming from exceptional items not related to operations, but this truly was an operational performance of Raute.
Operating profit, here we see the big change that has taken place in Raute during the last five, six years. We had these very challenging years, 2021, 2022. We experienced the inflation, we experienced the war in Ukraine, when we lost half of the business that Raute was active in. And then 2023, 2024, very nice turnaround. 2024 was all-time record, net sales and profitability, and now we broke the new record in profitability. Net sales came down a little bit. Personnel, roughly 700 people working at Raute at the end of the year. This has been coming down. This is partly explained, or big part is explained by the closure of our China operations in 2025.
That personnel, which is 50, around 50- 50 + people, are not in the payroll account anymore. And then there has to be some other reduction in the personnel as well, when we have streamlined and made the operations more efficient. Okay, looking at the different segments, if we start from Wood Processing, this truly has been an excellent performance for Wood Processing business unit in 2025. We are very happy about that and proud of that. The full year net sales did come down more than EUR 20 million, so it was EUR 124 million, but the comparable EBITDA for the full year was 14.8%, so close to Raute average overall.
Of course, as a biggest unit, has a big influence also on the average comparable EBITDA that we have. But this is a good margin for project-based business, and we've been able to deliver the projects better than actually anticipated in the start of those projects. Services also came down, and but I think Services has been still little bit more stable, and it's a good business for Raute. And I think on the profitability side, I'm happy also, very happy with the Q4 performance. It was a high margin for us, and for the full year, also 17.5% margin is improvement from 2024 figure. It's not yet the peak performance that we can achieve on this business.
There's clearly more potential, but this is a good achievement in this, this market conditions in particular. And the new concepts that we have on the digital Services, performance type of contracts, those are- those are getting traction and important when we move forward in, in, in this business.... And then Analyzers, this, this was the most difficult year for Analyzers. Significant drop on the net sales, 40% down, close to 40% down in Q4. And, we see that the, the profitability actually in Q4 went to negative territory, which is, of course, not at all ideal and not, not sustainable. However, full year still profitable 7.2% margin, on a sales, which was EUR 13 million.
This just proves that actually on the Analyzers, the volume is now so low that, with these volumes, unfortunately, we are not making much, much better or much money in, or profits in Analyzers business. However, there's a really significant volume lever in, in Analyzers business. When we get more volume up, it almost very significant part goes to the bottom line of, of that business. So, so I'm, I'm quite optimistic still on the, on the potential on this business, and there are very good things coming in the Analyzers. I've also said it earlier that Analyzers plays very important role for the overall success of Raute.
So many investments that we are doing in Analyzers, into research and development, which are actually then in a cost of Analyzers, are actually generating profits for Wood Processing business and then also for digital Services, as an example. So we have not really got any significant money from the research and development in this area. We believe that the volume will come back and when the market recovers. As one light in the tunnel also for Analyzers, I should say that there was actually quite good order intake for Analyzers in the fourth quarter of 2025. So the overall order intake was EUR 25 million, but there was, relatively speaking, quite significant part Analyzers orders this time in the fourth quarter, which is good sign, of course, for this business.
Okay, so this was maybe the overview of the different businesses and overall for Raute, and I hand it over to Ville to go through a little bit more details.
Right. Thank you, Mika. Right, my name is Ville Halttunen, I'm CFO for Raute, and I'll deep dive a bit into the financials of Raute in the Q4. I'll start from the earnings per share. Our strong operational execution was also reflected into EPS, which increased 19% in Q4 against last year. And primary driver is the higher operating profit in the quarter. No big events below comparable EBITDA. So, finance net and tax is broadly in line with our normal levels. For the full year, we made a comparable EPS of EUR 2.70, which is a significant increase against last year. Regarding cash flow, we ended the year with very strong cash flow close to EUR 13 million in Q4.
Clearly higher than the EBITDA of EUR 5.5 million we did. As a reminder, it's quite typical in our business that the cash flow is quite volatile, and now we had a positive impact coming from net working capital change, close to EUR 8 million in the quarter. When we look at the net working capital, we ended the year at - EUR 1.1 million, which means now that in the fourth quarter, there was close to EUR 8 million positive impact coming from the net working capital. It's quite normal changes that are. They can be quite significant, the changes in the net working capital and business.
Then for the full year, we have actually now tied close to EUR 30 million of cash into net working capital, as we started from very negative level the year. And this is obviously very much visible in our full year cash flow statement as well. Historically, overall now, the level where we are, it's close to historical average levels, but obviously big volatility is also expected as we move forward from here. Our balance sheet strengthened further. So we ended now the equity ratio over 65% at the year-end, and liquidity is more than EUR 40 million and no liabilities, if we exclude our leasing IFRS liabilities. So this enables us execution of growth strategy, as we have also highlighted earlier.
There is also now proposal of increasing dividend and share buyback program that Mika will reflect later on. Also in the report, now, we wrote now that, we have also renewed our financing facilities after the period, so we have extended the credit limits from previous EUR 5 million to EUR 50 million, which gives us further flexibility in our financing as we move forward from here. The investment level for the full year we ended the year with the EUR 4.6 million of investments in totality, clear increase against last year, and this is very much in line with our plans.
We have renewed some of our equipment in our supply chain globally, and done some other targeted investments, which we believe that are improving our efficiency in the future. And then R&D cost overall, no big events there. So, closing the year with close to EUR 5 million of R&D expenses in totality. So overall, very strong financial for Raute, and it's very solid base to move forward from financial standpoint from here. And I'll close it here and leave it back to Mika to close with the business environment and outlook.
Okay. Thank you, Ville. So if you look at the outlook for this year, for 2026, first of all, on the business environment, the business environment has been challenging in 2025, and it remains to be very volatile. And obviously, this global economic geopolitical uncertainties are affecting our customers' investment decisions. At the moment, it's not so much about the tariffs, for example, for our other business, it's really more about whether the customers have the confidence to make the investments in this market environment. We know that in the fourth quarter, looking at that, but in a little bit more detail, still this global construction industry recession sustained, I would say, globally. There are variations between different regions, but this is still the main message overall.
And of course, construction business is key customer segment for our customers. So there are expectations of improvements in the near term, but uncertainties remain. Nobody really knows. If you look at the market from a technology provider's point of view, we also see that the competition is getting more aggressive. Maybe not a big surprise because of the big volatility in the market and uncertainty, so everybody's fighting for these cases. We do have our unique competitive advantages at Raute. I don't see any changes or worsening of that position from our this point of view.
Our capabilities to really look at the overall process for the total production, delivery, integrated production line, and even mill-level projects is unique in our industry, and competitors typically focus on a specific line or parts of the solution. So we believe that in this kind of holistic approach, which is very important for our customers, in many cases, we have a unique advantage. We also see that the growing role of business as service business, and also, I would say, Analyzers opportunities there in the market, and especially when the market recovers, I think the Analyzers will be having a good opportunities to capture from the market.
However, even if this is the case and there's a lot of uncertainties, we do have active discussions with our customers in Europe, in North America. Some customers are preparing for market to recover. They are considering new capacity and then improvements in their process efficiencies, and those discussions are taking place. I would say, repeating what I said in the beginning, we believe in 2026, the market already has passed the lowest point, but the volatility will be there. For Raute, this means that, I would say, even on a quarterly basis, even a quarter is a quite short period to look at the volatility. There still can be from one quarter to another quarter, quite big volatility when it comes to our orders, or also, of course, then to realize the net sales from the backlog.
This probably will remain. Uncertainty is there. We are also very well positioned, of course, as a company, as Ville explained, now in this quite turbulent or volatile environment. We have an exceptionally strong balance sheet at the moment. We have over the last couple of years quite significantly improved our own internal operations, the delivery capabilities, our commercial capabilities, our supply chain management capabilities. So I'm very confident that we are able to weather the storm in this environment also quite nicely. This is leading to the financial guidance for 2026. We are expecting to have net sales, which is in the range of EUR 135 million-EUR 170 million.
As a reminder, in 2025, it was EUR 175.5 million, so we are expecting decline in the net sales. Not very big surprise if we look at the starting backlog, which is EUR 98 million, and a year ago, it was close to EUR 200 million. So there's a significant drop, of course, in the starting order backlog. We still have, of course, significant part coming from the new orders that are coming and are expected in 2026. That is true for especially for Services business, so that is a big variance there for Analyzers. The new orders can still come even towards the end of the year, and they would still contribute to 2025 numbers.
And then Wood Processing also, I would say, especially the first half of the year, still can significantly contribute to 2025, 2026 numbers. So not sure what years I said, but the first half 2026 still will have a big impact on the full year 2026 net sales outcome. So this is the guidance on net sales, and then on comparable EBITDA, also quite wide range, I admit that, from EUR 10 million-EUR 19 million of comparable EBITDA, when in 2025, it was EUR 26.1 million. But this is the guidance we believe that we will hit somewhere within that range, and hopefully, during the year, we are able to narrow this range then when we move forward. That was.
The tenth for last year as well, and this is the approach we try to follow. Okay, then one more comment on dividend. Of course, our policy is that we aim to pay stable and sustainable dividend over different market conditions. Our board of directors is proposing to the AGM that the dividend of EUR 0.65 per share would be paid. So this is the proposal. You can see here in the chart the dividend payouts from the previous years. 2024 it was EUR 0.55, and now the proposal is EUR 0.65. And then I would say importantly, the board has decided, and that's something the board can decide, it's not going to the AGM, but the board has just decided that we will initiate the share buyback program.
This is similar program to what we actually started in 2024 as well, so maximum 100,000 shares, maximum euro value EUR 1.5 million. So that is starting now, very, very soon and will take some time, of course, to be completed, but that, that, that is, that is, realizing now. It's also one way to pay back to our shareholders some, some value, we believe. Okay, very good. Those were the highlights of 2025. If I still summarize in one or, let's say, two sentences, I'm very happy what we, on what we accomplished in 2025. Financial results where I would I could, I dare to say, excellent in terms of financial result.
Top line, we see pressure there, obviously, and it went down, but we were able, through our own efficiency and good work, to weather the storm in that sense, the change in the top line. We are also now very, very well positioned for 2026. We believe the lowest point has. we have seen that, but the uncertainty and volatility in the market is likely to continue, and that's the environment where we are operating. Thank you very much. And now we actually have time for some questions, if there are anything online, and there is also here in the audience. Let's start from the audience here, so go ahead.
Hi, it's Antti Viljakainen from Inderes. Starting from Analyzers business and maybe also modernization segment in Services, so do you think that the recently weak revenue performance is driven only by external market conditions, or have you any kind of internal issues or, well, losing market share or anything like that?
Okay. There were two business. If we, if you look at the Services, I don't believe. Actually, the answer is true for both. I don't think there's significant change in the market in terms of our competitiveness or opportunity to offer solutions. I would rather say that we are coming up with new ideas, which are actually in this environment, like this performance type of contract, subscription type of models for us and our customers, which in this market environment, we've learned take a little bit longer time than we would hope. Let's put it that way.
We think that these are win-win concepts and, for example, in the Analyzers on subscription side, we already have some subscription type of businesses, which, which when this comes, big enough of volume, of course, will be a good for Raute. It is also good for our customers because they then have always the latest and the greatest AI software, for example, in their machines. So I think those concepts just are taking a little bit more time to realize, and that is, has been part of the reason why the volumes have been down. But mainly it's just because market is, has been difficult. Nobody has really been winning much cases last year.
About price competition, so what's your strategy regarding that? Are you looking for similar kind of margins you made with these five big, big orders that you'll be like excellent financial results? Or are you willing to give up something to drive the top line and growth?
On those big projects, I would say that we have been operationally very successful, and that's why the margin is very good. So we had this statement that we are not changing the overall long-term financial goal, which is 12% over cycle. So obviously, one could say that this was a little bit the overcycle moment now in Raute in 2025, but that 12% should be very realistically achievable, let's put it that way. But that's what we also expect to get. On the sales margin side, but we've been always doing strategic and tactical pricing, so in some areas where really the advantage we bring to the case is so significant, the value pricing also works much better, and it makes sense for us and our customers.
But we are also very tactical in some cases where the competition is then having something, or the customer needs something different. So that will continue, and that's been normal practice. But I would expect, as we said, the competition at the moment is tougher, so I would maybe say that, you know, there is some percentage point kind of pressure in the margins at the moment. However, I would also need to continue, market can also change quite fast. Normally, what has happened is that then when really the recovery starts, it's so fast that, you know, technology providers are also running out of capacity, so that will also then quite fast reflect in the pricing and the pricing position of technology providers.
Not, not one answer, but everything is open, and we'll play accordingly.
Yeah, going out of capacity would be, like, a very positive problem.
Yeah.
And then finally, on demand and order prospects, do you see any difference between plywood and LVL segment, regarding demand and order outlook?
I would say that it seems like LVL is doing overall very strong almost everywhere, LVL. So that's very strong. Then on the plywood side, it seems like Birch plywood is actually doing very well in many, many. Many of our customers are making good profits also in the Birch plywood area. So on the plywood, I would say then the Softwood plywood is really the one which is most suffering in this environment. But LVL, very strong. Birch plywood, because of the special applications that the birch plywood also has, has a quite good prospect, so.
I would say that those are good trends for us because those are the most advanced or, should I say, most difficult engineered wood products, materials to manufacture and require really the most advanced technology as well, where we are very strong in our offering.
Thank you.
Okay.
Joonas Ilvonen from Evli. Well, you already touched on this, but if I may come back to it. So obviously, you have been very successful with these in managing and delivering these Wood Processing projects. Now, you did 16% EBITDA margin, even with a relatively low sales volume. But, I mean, if I annualize this EUR 36 million sales volume, I get, like, EUR 145 million, which is actually quite close to your 2026 revenue kind of midpoint. And then your guidance basically suggest on, like, 9.5% EBITDA margin. So I was just wondering, does this reflect that when it comes to these Wood Processing projects, you have not only been very successful with the project execution and cost management, but also with higher pricing?
Like, you booked these large mill-scale projects almost three years ago, so did you also have a, like, a nice pricing tailwind back then? Because I think historically, these larger projects haven't maybe been that attractive from a margin perspective. So was there, like, a major difference there compared to historical Raute? Like you talk about this new pricing environment, so how do you see it, like, the attractiveness of larger and smaller equipment orders from your perspective, sales margin perspective? Are there, like, any differences?
Yeah. Okay, big, big, big question. So if, if I start with from this project margin, as I said, maybe, maybe you can. The one way to think about that is that we, we expect some result, obviously, as sold margin for the, for the project. Now, it's been more successful. Maybe we, we cannot really assume that we will be more successful for the, for the next phase of the projects than what we normally have been. This is not the proof enough for us to start really using the, the percentage of completion with the higher margin. We, we have there's cautiousness there. Of course, if it then happens that we are equally successful that we were in 2025, maybe there's some upside, but of course, normally there's then always downside from what we are anticipating.
So that's why the estimate is what it is. And then on the commercial development, I think, maybe I've talked also earlier, that when I joined three and a half years ago, we did actually put quite a bit effort on the commercial development. And it's really not about prices not only or necessarily on prices, it's about the terms and conditions on what we are delivering to our customers, having also very and better open discussion with the customer, what is the expectation? Because all these kind of unclarities then normally realize during the project as a cost.
When these uncertainties are minimized, I mean, that also then enables better business for us, but also actually also better business for our customers because they are then able to plan their ramp-up volumes better without the same kind of uncertainty. So I think it's a win-win. But yes, we have put quite a bit of effort into commercial side, and now also then, of course, on the operational side. But commercial side is important consideration. And now, as I said, there is some pressure overall on the price, but I said this is not only the only argument anyway. It's about terms and conditions and what we are delivering and what way. So those all matters to our customers as well.
Okay. And so you're basically saying that, I mean, so your competitive edge is in delivering these larger mill-scale projects, but these smaller equipment orders, they are still not-- Even though there is more price competition, it's still not. You have not lost competitiveness?
I don't think so. There's always been areas where we are more competitive and less competitive. If you think about just specific areas of the process. Also, it varies a little bit geographically because our competition is many times competitors are such that they operate only in certain geographical areas. So also the competitive situation is different in different areas, so. But I don't see any major changes here, this or that way. We are winning a little bit more in some areas and a little bit less in some areas, but that's, I would say, within the very normal variation of our type of business.
Okay. You already discussed the decision-making processes of your European and American, I mean, U.S. customers. What about Latin America? That can sometimes also be a pretty significant market for you. How is Latin America looking at the moment?
Yeah. At the moment, I would say Latin America, they are a little bit struggling at the moment, our customers. There are some very big producers there who are not only active in engineered products, but they are active in pulp and paper and other areas. Their business model in plywood is typically based on the assumption of exporting that into USA. So they are actually suffering a little bit at the moment. So I think that area is having, maybe relatively speaking, more difficulties than maybe the Europe or North America customers at the moment. And also Asian customers, they have a little bit different dynamics because they have also as a target market, maybe Australia or Japan, so they might have this kind of another region, not just the USA as a market.
But this USA hasn't. And that's why it's so important whatever happens there, because it impacts the whole global picture quite, quite, immediately.
Okay, thanks. That's all from me.
Okay, very good.
All right.
Any questions online?
Yes, we have a few questions here. So, Raute has guided a wide range of net sales this year. Is the lower end of guidance estimated to be without any mill-wide orders? That's one question.
I think I should maybe say that it depends on at which state this mill project comes. Because in any scenario, for example, if it happens that we get a mill-size order during the Q4, end of Q4, 2026, it will not contribute to net sales much at all. So I think that's a little bit difficult to say. Then again, if we would get something very soon, then of course it would have a impact on 2025 volume as well. So that's the consideration. Of course, the low end then assumes many of the not so nice things happen, and the high end assumes that some of the nice things happen. So it's something in between then.
Right. Then there's a question on the, on our history. Is this now longest period without new mill-wide orders in Raute's history? Do you remember?
Okay, that I can't remember, because we have 118 years of history, so maybe our CFO is able to-
Yeah, I think that is. Yeah. Not that I remember now the full history of Raute either, but I think it's already quite long. So-
Yeah
last time that we announced was the AmberBirch that happened in.
Twenty-four
2024 Q1, so that it's already now-
Two years
Two years.
Yeah.
Uh, so.
Typically, we have this rule of thumb that normally we get 1 or 1.5 mill-scale orders every year on average over a longer time. Now it's been two years without. Of course, just before that, we got 1-4, and we had EUR 315 million of orders, and it all happened almost during the 12 months. Anything can happen. It's quite volatile.
Yeah. Then it's a bit of follow-up on this same topic. Do you expect potential new mill-wide orders to provide same profitability as current, still ongoing large orders, or has the, for example, competition changed?
Competition has a little bit changed. As I explained, competition is tougher. If there's a customer who is considering a full new mill-size order, there is not many providers of that kind of thing. If customer wants it from one source, which is a fully optimized and the most modern plant, there's basically Raute. So the option for customers then to start having a piecemeal on that, so that does have an impact, of course, on how we negotiate, how we discuss about the value of this investment with our customers. So I think we are having a strong position in those cases, if those are about to realize.
All right, that's all from the chat, so no more questions.
Okay. Okay, very good. Thank you very much for all the questions. Thank you for participating and thank you for following us through 2025. And of course, 2026 has already started, so we will meet you soon when we talk about the Q1 outcome then later in the spring. Thank you very much. Goodbye.
Thank you.