Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Join Talenom's Q3 Review 2026. My name is Juho Ahosola, and I am the CEO of Talenom. And with me here today is, as usually, our CFO, Matti Säkkinen.
Good morning, everyone, and welcome also on my behalf.
Thank you. Okay. Let's kick off. Here is the agenda for this today's review. I will start with a short brief about Talenom if we have some new investors online, and then I will comment highlights of review period as well as our development during this review period, Q3. After me, Matti will comment financial performance in a bit more detailed level as well as outlook and guidance. At the end of this session, there is time for questions as well. Okay, let's then start. So, a couple of comments about Talenom if we have some new investors online. So comments about post-demerger Talenom. First of all, what is Talenom and what do we do? We are a service company. First of all, we are providing financial management services such as accounting, payroll, and consulting services, and our mission is to help entrepreneurs succeed.
We are operating in three countries, in Finland, Sweden, and Spain as well. We combine in our growth both organic growth and selective acquisitions. Our approach as a company is to combine strong local expertise, strong local ownership with scalable ONE Talenom concept. We also want to use best-in-class digital solutions, technologies, software, and AI as well. That is our way to create value for our clients and also for owners. Then if we look briefly in our products or services or revenue streams from investor perspective, starting from our core services. Our core services are accounting, payroll, and accounts receivable management services, and these services are almost completely recurring. So revenue that comes from these services is recurring. In addition to these core services, we also have different kind of value-added services, quite large range of these.
There we could mention, for example, HR services or legal services or BI services. These value-added services, they are important also for two reasons. Basically, from revenue perspective, we see there are a lot growth opportunities, then they are also supporting our customer experience. In all our operating countries, we have also industry-specific teams and solutions for our clients. That is our service portfolio. A short comment about markets that we operate. Basically, the market structure in all our operating countries is pretty similar. There is high fragmentation, a lot of small companies, small players, then we can also recognize this consolidation trend in all our operating countries. If we look into our market shares in these three countries, starting from Finland, our market share is roughly 5% and market size EUR 1.4 billion.
In Sweden, slightly bigger market and our market share is roughly 1%. In Spain, as we can see this size of the bubble illustrates the size of the market, massive market and then market share 0.1%, so quite remarkable growth opportunities. We are not looking to expand to new countries in the near future and basically reason is here that in all countries, including Finland where we have a long history, we have really massive growth opportunities. That is what we do, that is our services summarized and markets where we operate. Let us then move into this review period and comments about that. First of all, a couple of highlights about Q3. First of all, this was quite solid performance from Talenom team. I would like to say we progressed well with our strategy and things are going pretty much as planned right now.
When it comes to figures, our group sales, that grew a bit and then comparable EBITDA improved in all our operating countries, which is really positive. Short comments about countries starting from Finland. From Finnish team, really good performance, especially profitability-wise, strong profitability. This Finland strong profitability and cash flow creates really solid foundation for the whole group as we know. In Sweden, our most important goal for this year is to improve profitability, create profitability turnaround, and as we can see from figures, it is going to the right direction and progressing as planned. We are really happy with development profitability-wise in Sweden and Team Sweden has done really good work here. In Spain, we have continued our acquisition-driven growth, and profitability is also now step by step developing into right direction.
Also worth mentioning that during the review period and also here in Q4, we are really focusing on AI, and we can see that that creates a lot of good opportunities for us to create even more client value. I will comment that a bit later. Overall, quite solid performance from the team, I would like to say. Comments about our focus areas. We have named three focus areas for this year 2026. First of all, implementation of the new strategy. As we have finalized this demerger with Easor in early March. Since then, we have been working as an independent company and implementing our strategy in all our countries. Also, super important, improving profitability in Sweden and Spain. That is our second focus area. Third one is implementation of growth strategy. Working with growth in all countries.
Comments about these areas. First, starting from strategy implementation, I would like to say that no big news from here. We are making good progress with strategy. Two main components basically here is ONE Talenom concept. We are implementing that across all teams at Talenom, and we are also working a lot around this, our software-neutral strategy in all countries. No big news this time. Things are going pretty much as planned strategy-wise. When it comes to profitability in Sweden and Spain, starting from Sweden, profitability trend is right and we have continued actions with profitability, and it is developing definitely to the right direction. Our Swedish team has done really good job around this.
Overall, the situation is that churn-wise, we are really happy with the development, and churn is now reaching or is at sustainable level, and we are happy with that. Now we want to focus more on sales and creating growth through sales. We have also made some organizational changes there to support our growth. Overall, we are happy with this profitability development and with growth. We are working extremely hard in Sweden. Spain, we are going to the right direction. Profitability improved slightly. What is challenging us is still this integration cost and higher software cost for 2026. We have a plan how to reduce these integration costs. As we know the history in Spain, we have conducted quite many acquisitions in short period of time. Because of that, we have a lot of these integration costs in.
We have a plan how to reduce those, and we are working with that. Now we can see that development profitability-wise is right. Also want to highlight that we see a really great potential in Spanish market over time, as well as in Sweden, of course. Third point, implementation of growth strategies. A couple of comments from here. First of all, of course, we have been working a lot around systematic sales and marketing efforts and also leveraging AI in marketing and sales. Also this software strategy that is pretty important for us. We can see, I would like to say that quite promising results there with this new software-neutral strategy. These are basically the main elements that we are working with growth right now.
Overall, this strategy progress or how it is going with these three components, I would like to say that pretty much as planned and no big news this time from strategy field. Last comment when it comes to our operations and actions is about AI. We were thinking that this is important to open for investors as well, how we think in terms of AI. Talenom has a long history as a digital front-runner in our field, and we have always used best tools, technologies, software, and we have a long history in this digital front-runnership, so to say. Of course, AI is important for Talenom and important part of our strategy. We can see that we can leverage in multiple ways. First of all, in our everyday work, we have quite many people at Talenom helping our clients.
In our everyday work, we can use it in multiple different ways. Secondly, as we know, there are different processes in this work, and we can use AI there as well in pretty many ways. Last but not least, creating new customer value, like how we prepare meetings, what kind of reporting we can do for our clients. There are several ways to use AI in good ways and to create customer value. What is the important thing or most crucial element when it comes to AI is that our customer need has not changed. For a long time, our clients have not been paying for this routine work or manual accounting or payroll work. It is about that peace of mind. Someone takes care, someone takes responsibility, anticipation when it comes to future elements like that.
It is not about manual work, and this is why our clients choose us. When we are acquiring new clients, they come to Talenom because of this, not because of that manual work. We believe that this need will remain the same and our clients need someone who really looks after, helps them, looks towards the future, and creates with that service that peace of mind. AI can support us in this customer need. Then a short comment about our financial figures. When it comes to net sales, that increased a bit, 3.6%. EBITDA, it was relatively strong during this review period. That increased 19.6% and as well as this operating profit improved to the right direction. Matti will comment now financial figures in a bit more detailed level, and then it is time for questions. Thank you at this point.
Thanks, Juho . Let us jump to financial key figures, and I will focus on comparable figures and also the continuing operations. Let us start with the group's comparable net sales. Our net sales was EUR 25.4 million, and growth was 3.6%. We had positive growth in Finland and Spain, and in Sweden we had negative growth. Our comparable EBITDA was EUR 5.8 million, and this improvement was almost 20%. The quarter's profitability was strong, and I am happy to say that we improved this profitability in all our operating countries. Operating profit development was in line with the EBITDA development.
We had only small increase in our depreciation level. Operating profit was EUR 2.2 million and improvement there was 55%. Now with some new country-specific key figures, and we start with Finland. In Finland, our growth was 2% and net sales was EUR 16.2 million. This growth was totally organic.
During Q3, we did not see any significant changes in this general economic environment compared to the previous quarter. We still see positive news for this market overall, and we hope that this will impact also to the activity level of the companies. Of course, it would open more growth opportunities for us also in the future. Despite this low revenue growth in Finland, our comparable EBITDA increased. It was EUR 5.4 million and improvement was over 10%. During the year, we have actively managed our cost level with this challenging growth environment. Of course, happy to see this strong profitability in Finland in Q3. Then we go to Sweden. In Sweden, our growth was -10.4% and it was approximately at the same level with H1. Net sales was EUR 3.9 million. This high churn level in 2025 is still impacting to this our net sales development.
And this good thing is that, as Juho said, we have now stabilized our customer churn in the acceptable level. Now we are more and more focusing to sales activities, and we expect that it will support our growth in the future. Despite negative growth in Sweden, our comparable EBITDA improved well. It was EUR 0.1 million. This has been one of our high priority in Sweden during this year, and very happy to see this positive trend is continuing at the moment. We still are on the track to achieve positive EBITDA this year in Sweden. And Spain. In Spain, we had the strongest growth. It was 23%, and we ended up to EUR 5.4 million net sales. We have made five acquisitions after the comparison period, and this growth came mainly from these acquisitions.
New customer acquisitions continued also steady performance, and it will support our growth in the future. Spain's comparable EBITDA was EUR 0.3 million, and it went forward slightly. These integration costs and also higher software costs are slowing down our profitability improvement, but we continue our efforts around these profitability improvement actions and also implement this ONE Talenom concept. We expect that we can improve our profitability step by step in the future. Now let's look at our outlook and guidance. Our guidance for 2026 is unchanged. We expect that net sales will be between EUR 110 million and EUR 120 million, and comparable EBITDA will be between EUR 18 million and EUR 22 million. Now it's time for the questions.
Hi, and for the start, I kindly inform you that I'm combining the similar questions so we don't ask those twice. So Juho and Matti, the first question, how has AI increased competition, lowered prices, or changed pricing models in accounting?
That's a good question. I think here it's important where the client value comes from. So basically, for those accounting offices who are invoicing hourly based from manual work and manual accounting, manual payroll, it's not about service. I think those players will be in quite remarkable challenges with AI. But for us, I think it's about the client value that we create, and I want to emphasize that now when clients choose us, they are not thinking about how we do or what is the way to do that manual work. It's about that client value anticipation, future orientation, basically the value that we create for our clients. And of course, when it comes to this manual work, there will be price pressures in this industry, and it's more shifting towards what kind of value we create.
Yeah
for our clients. We believe that we, as a digital front runner, have a really good and solid position here. At the same time, we have already for quite many years been going to this direction, and it is not new for us that way.
Yeah.
But yes, answer to question for manual work, definitely.
Then we go to Sweden. Have you considered leaving Sweden if the growth does not improve?
No, we do not have such plans now, and we are working hard around growth. As we can see from the figures, profitability is definitely going the right direction, and we are happy with that. Churn-wise, we are in good position, and team has done really good work.
Yeah.
Now we are focusing more and more on sales, and we have made some changes also around that to support that future growth.
Including the same question, would it make sense to invest in Spain and Finland instead of Sweden because there are many more opportunities here and more growth?
Good question. I could comment and maybe you could then combine. If we are looking our investments recently or during couple of past years, we have invested most in Spain with acquisitions, basically. I think we are not that massively investing in Sweden. We are more running that business there, and those costs are mostly in P&L, but maybe, Matti, you could
Yes, of course, we are all the time estimating what are the best country to invest in, and also where are the best profit for our investments.
Yeah.
Yeah. That's what we are doing all the time, thinking what kind of investments create most value for our owners in the long run.
Yeah.
Exactly.
How much free cash flow can Talenom generate annually after all investments and lease payments?
Good question, and we will report our cash flow in the final financial statement release.
Yes. In Sweden, does the planned focus on growth in Sweden require meaningful investments? Are you spending new sales and marketing in the country currently?
Yeah, I think we are doing sales, and of course, we are investing that way in sales and marketing. We also, in the future, want it to be that way that we have a foundation where we can grow. Of course, we are doing things around sales and marketing
Yeah
in all our operating countries because we want that over time we are having organic growth in all countries.
Yeah.
Yes. Then we go to Spain. Could you provide a concrete example of a Spanish accounting firm acquired two or three years ago? What was the EBITDA margin at the acquisition time, and what is today, and what drove the improvement?
Big picture, I could comment first. Because we are integrating those to Talenom, we have centralized support functions. It's a bit challenging to say it that way. But Matti, do you have something?
Yeah. As we have commented that we have a little bit some double costs after these integrations. We are all the time going forward with this cost level, and all the time we believe that with this hard work around this ONE Talenom concept, we will also improving our profitability in all units and offices.
Definitely. Still for us, Spain is super attractive market because of this low digitalization, and we see a lot of potential there. We can also see that these elements that we are working with, they are working in team level. That said, of course, because we have these centralized functions and then we have these integration costs, it's a bit hard to answer that specific question.
Yeah. We stay in Spain. Credit control may be the main topic here. Have you fixed the credit control issues in Spain? Can we be confident that there won't be any other big write-off, like we have different GUI or that kind of stuff coming? Are we sure?
Yep.
Yeah.
Good question. We have improved our processes in Spain, and we really believe that we have good trust for the future in terms of accounts receivable management.
Yeah.
Yeah. Overall in Spain, of course, as we have been integrating, we have at the same time building multiple processes. This work that we are now doing in terms of integrations and building these processes, it creates a solid foundation for the future, which is important as we want to grow in Spain.
Yeah. Same asker is asking that are we mainly buying revenue rather than profitable growth in Spain?
I think we have been doing selective acquisitions, so we want always to find good acquisition targets, and it's also important that we are selective, so we have said no also multiple times. That's important. Good companies with good people and good local management, that's what we are acquiring. Then also this growth orientation. We want to have offices which are growing in the future as well. Answer what we are buying is good accounting offices.
Yeah. One last question. What was the organic growth rate in Spain?
Yeah, good question. We have not reported the exact figures in organic growth. But as we commented, the main part of this growth came via acquisitions, but there was also small organic growth.
Thanks, Juho and Matti, and I hope we have all the questions answered now. Thank you so much.
Thank you very much. Thank you.
Thank you very much.