Good morning and welcome to Valmet's fourth quarter and financial year 2024 result publication webcast. My name is Pekka Rouhiainen. I'm the head of investor relations here at Valmet, and with me today are the presenters, President and CEO Thomas Hinnerskov and CFO Katri Hokkanen. The year can be summarized so that Valmet's orders received in 2024 increased to a new record, but net sales and comparable EBITDA did not grow. The market was challenging, especially for capital equipment, but we were, of course, very pleased to win a landmark order, which was booked to the fourth quarter. Today's agenda follows the usual routine.
Thomas will first go through the year in brief and walk us through the development of the segments and business lines, and Katri will then discuss the financial development, especially from the fourth quarter perspective. After that, Thomas will wrap up with the dividend proposal, guidance, and Valmet's short-term market outlook. With that, Thomas, handing to you.
Thank you very much, Pekka. Great to be here. I'm really pleased with that we've closed the year and now looking into a new year. Maybe just to sort of start off, I really want to thank all our 19,100 and something Valmeteers around the globe who've delivered a stunning job in a very challenging year and trying to take good care of all our customers globally. So thank you very much for that. Also, thanks to the customers for their trust during the year, in which for many customers also have been actually a challenging year, and then finally, thanks to the analysts and investors for some good discussions in Q4 or my last six months or first six months here at Valmet. Actually, that was yesterday, so we had the anniversary, which is a good way to start the new next six months.
So, as Pekka said, if we look at 2024, sort of very overall, orders received increased to a new record. An Arauco deal was obviously sort of the landmark order that was booked in Q4 with a value of more than EUR 1 billion. Overall market and the year was characterized by being sort of quite challenging, in particular in the pulp and paper industry. Also, strong order backlog of close to EUR 4.5 billion, I guess the second highest in the history of Valmet, which gives a good sort of solid starting point going into 2025. So, but despite those orders increased, as Pekka said, our net sales and comparable EBITDA did not grow in 2024, which was in line with our guidance that we indicated earlier after the Q3 results. Margin 11.4%, highest ever, driven by sales mix or favorable sales mix.
Cash flow increased to a new record for Valmet, and I have to say that's one of the things I'm really happy with for 2024. It really sort of shows good quality of earnings, something that was criticized in some of the investor and analyst meetings I had in the beginning of my tenure just after the Q3, so I'm really happy to say that good development here and Katri will talk you more through the details of that, so really happy with that. ROCE 12.7%, decent figure in our industry. However, I mean, we want to find ways to improve that. As you know, our current overall target is to be at least at 15%.
Towards the end of the year, which is honestly one of the, I think, really exciting things that we have going, is that we initiated work to renew our strategy with the aim of defining our sort of future growth areas, simplifying the ways we work and simply making Valmet a more efficient operation than what we know today. I'm very excited about that and believe that the things and the changes we are planning will enable us and Valmet to be much more faster, much more focused as an organization and as a partner for our customers, which will, yeah, be an exciting journey that we embark on. Our legacy of more than 225 years, actually 228 this year, I guess it will be, will be a solid foundation for that next chapter in the Valmet history books.
So stay tuned for more information on that later this year. Going back to overall orders and net sales, rather evenly split between the different segments, comparable EBITDA EUR 609 million came mostly from our stable business, I would almost say as usual. Service and automation together are already at EUR 585 million. So, but I think it's also despite capital businesses EUR 43 million; it is good to sort of remember and take note that that does actually fuel the future service sales and service growth. So looking at it from a life cycle perspective is important in our industry. Comparable EBITDA track record 2015 to 2021 is really strong. However, the last three years our EBITDA has sort of largely been, or the growth there has been largely driven by acquisitions. We saw tissue converting late 2023, API this year.
So yeah, you can see that it's. We're of course not really happy with that net sales are going down. Comparable EBITDA did not increase as we would like. And this is actually the first year in Valmet's history where that has not happened. So primarily I would say this clear decrease is both in revenue and profitability. We come back to that a bit later is in the process technology segment. So going forward, we do need to make sure that we have sort of an efficient operation, just like I alluded to for in our strategy work that we have initiated, that will perform also in a challenging market like we've seen the last year. So the lag of organic growth and profitability is of course something that is high on the agenda when we look into this strategic renewal of Valmet.
Orders received, yeah, clearly a record order quarter for the orders. I think that's clear to everyone, thanks to the Arauco. But overall, it was actually also a record year for orders received. So looking then, if you double click just into the sort of geographical split of that, South America and North America, orders did increase, also in Asia Pacific, whereas in China and EMEA, the overall market was soft and we saw a decrease there. In terms of the customer industry split, pulp and paper is of course still the biggest segment that we have or industry that we have with roughly EUR 4.5 billion of orders received. However, it is not insignificant. If you think about EUR 1.3 billion roughly is coming from energy and other process industries as well. So there is starting to be a good diversification of our exposure to different customer segments.
Stable business, currently close to EUR 3.4 billion. Speaking of the foundation that we are standing on, it does provide a good resilience to cycles and also has a good profitability level, which we are benefiting from also last year. Organic growth 6% over the last 10 years. However, if you look at just last year, it was a challenging market and we had an organic growth of roughly 2%-3%. Of course, something that we are working hard on to improve on and also wanted to take market share going forward. 2024 growth overall 8%, EUR 261 million. Of course, big impact from our M&A activities, like I said, tissue converting and API that we bought as a carve-out from Siemens.
We can see that stable part is almost 60% of Valmet's orders received during 2024, which actually is a very positive thing and I find provides a very good foundation for the future, but also for just the year to come. Order backlog quite strong, solid starting point for 2025, increased from 2023 and a bit higher than our previous record, which was in 2022. Capital order book backlog is almost EUR 200 million lower, however, than it was in 2021, even though it is supported by our tissue converting and also the Aauco order. This shows a little bit about that growth in the service part and the stable business part. Roughly EUR 1.3 billion is expected to be realized in 2025 as new sales. That's roughly EUR 200 million less than what we expected a year ago going into 2024.
I'll come back to our guidance later, which is actually that we would expect, despite this EUR 200 million less coming from the order book backlog, that we will have flat sales for the year. EUR 1.7 billion of the order backlog is related to stable business and increased compared to last year, which is also a good foundation for going into 2025. Let's have a little bit of a deeper dive and look into the different segments and the business lines, how they performed during 2024, that is. Process technology orders increased actually pretty strong in 2024. However, it is also, I mean, before we celebrate too much, it is good to recognize that without the Arauco, which was one order, it was actually the lowest year, I would almost say ever, but at least in the last 10 years. So the latest Valmet history.
So it does show something about that we've had a market that was overall quite challenging when it comes to process technology. Trending comparable EBITDA is also not positive, not something we're really happy about. Net sales decreased clearly and therefore also the comparable EBITDA was impacted by the lower sales. I think it's also fair to say that this lower sales did impact comparable EBITDA, including the margin, quite a bit. And that is something that we need to work on going forward to have a more efficient operation that actually will perform also in challenging markets like we just gone through. So competitiveness and driving that is key and it's going to be key going forward and we'll put even more emphasis on it in the years to come. Just want to show this slide I also showed in Q3.
Let's come back to it because it was a highlight of the year and it was booked in Q4. World's largest single phase pulp mill capacity of 3.5 million tons a year will start up production in the second half of 2027. Significant milestone showcasing Valmet's sustainable technologies, and I was actually there in December visiting the team again and the customer. It's just great to see that they're working full steam ahead, really good collaboration with the customer and we're ready to start doing the job on the site and then being ready for the second half of 2027, so important milestone and really exciting stuff. Speaking then of exciting stuff or pulp and paper at least, let's talk a little bit sort of a double click on that and look at it in more detail. They were strong due to the Arauco.
It is clear that then because of that, we become number one after having been number two in the market, second player in the market for a couple of years. What I also took note of in 2024 was that activity in energy was actually lower than 2023. A bit surprising maybe when, if we look sort of a bit on the trends and how the energy market is, and we had recently sort of, we still had an okay year with EUR 300 million in orders and we did actually win all three boiler deals that were in the market in Europe in 2024, which of course does test for a fire. I think that we do have a strong technology offering and we have a good value proposition into that market. Overall, South America dominated, North America basically close to zero.
But I think the installed base there in North America is notably old, so we could potentially see some at least sort of bigger modernization projects coming. Hopefully that will materialize in the not too distant future as well. Scope-wise, single islands products were roughly 30% of our order. Arauco was sort of the only complete mills that was, I think actually even tendered in the market last year. So it was very pleased that that went to Valmet. Paper business line or board paper and tissue business orders overall decreased. The tissue market was rather active actually and tissue converting supported our orders. So we're happy with that we went into that market in 2023 or end of 2023. And that's also why you see that's actually growing as part of our overall business in this business line.
So yeah, global leader I would say in tissue in the addressable market. Board orders were generally very weak. Market activity were low. We also saw some minor, I would say lost market share to competition. And then sort of most of the business came from new installations like in previous years. So service. Service orders increased to EUR 1.9 billion. That's actually an all-time high. It is fair to admit that the market was difficult and organic growth was only 1% to 2%. We then benefited from a bit more tissue converting Services as well. However, what I would say is that Q4 orders were strong. Great to see that our proactive sales teams are getting more mill improvement projects. So there is more appetite for customers to actually modernize and upgrade their productions, as well as fabrics also were developed well in Q4.
So net sales increased to EUR 1.9 billion. Margins were flat, but comparable EBITDA did increase due to the integration of our tissue converting business. So service segment market position continues to be number one, number two globally, depending on where you see it and how you cut it. In customer segment split, there is this change in tissue, which we talked about. It was 5% last year. Now it's 14% with tissue converting. In business split, we've consolidated the early solution in the business units, two mill improvement projects and field service. It's easier and actually also makes more meaningful data and input for investors and analysts to understand it in that way, and I actually find it easier myself as well to see it in that way. More or less the same as in 2023. We have big performance part business as well as some rolls in fabrics.
These are largely driven by customer activity or capacity utilization. So of course something we monitor quite closely and see how that develops going into the future. Mill improvement projects and field service were 35%. So automation. Orders increased to EUR 1.4 billion. Biggest reason for that was API. Organic growth was, however, sort of modest, roughly around 2%, especially in the pulp and paper packages. Orders they were low and lower than what we've seen historically as well, which is also an indication of this lower utilization rate, profitability challenges for some of our customers. But overall, orders increased in automation system and were flat in flow control. And we'll come back a bit back to that in a second. The share of other process industry other than pulp and paper are already at 60%, which is actually a positive thing to do.
It shows that we do have a strong value proposition also outside pulp and paper that does diversify our exposure to industry segments, and it's a good development, I would say. Also maybe good to note that you see the margins are slightly going down. API and the acquisition we made there did have a negative impact on margins for last year. S o flow control. Clearly leading position in the pulp and paper industry, then number one or number two in industrial gases and one of the big ones in refining and chemicals, sort of top 10 positions, I would say. Soft market in pulp and paper shows that you can see that it decreased from being 24% or to 24% from being 28% last year.
From an area perspective, market in Europe was soft in 2024 while activity in North America, also a bit in Middle East was quite much better than what we saw in some other parts of the world. Renewable energy and gases, metal and mining and other industries are growing also as a consequence of the soft pulp and paper market. MRO service 68%, a bit higher than a year ago. Nice to see that we still have a very strong foundation for our overall flow control business when this sort of operational services that we are supporting our customer with on a daily basis. So orders for projects decreased. Maybe good to note that the Arauco order, there's of course some flow control involves included in the Arauco order. They were not booked in Q4 for flow control, yet that comes later in the cycle of the project.
Automation Systems, pulp and paper 58%, energy and process 42%. API increased the share of energy and process by a 10 percentage point from last year. DCS was 52% and we'll come back to that a little bit more on the next slide, but analysis and some measurements including API, which explained the rise in that share of our business. What I would say here is automation system service basically mean all the business that we're doing to our existing Automation Systems installation base. I would maybe highlight that, Katri, and maybe Tom Skogman, you should pay extra attention. We talked about this in one of our meetings.
Automation system actually for the full year of 2024, organically, so taking out the API acquisition did grow 7% in a quite challenging market and a challenging market in particular in pulp and paper, which was 58% of the overall business. So I do think that pays testimony to strong value proposition also outside the pulp and paper, which is, I think, really a positive and something that we take pride of and also want to thank the team for that and also something that goes into the whole strategy process as well. So really good development in automation system. Just to maybe show a little bit of, we'll say, give a bit of granularity or meat on the bone. We probably noticed that back in May last year we did launch the Valmet DNAe. That was one of the highlight of 2024. Very pleased to see.
I mean, even though these are long sales cycles, it is already getting traction. We received a good amount of orders on the DNAe. Arauco was mentioned earlier, but this Mercer is also a great example, so Mercer actually selected DNAe for their digitalization journey. They are renewing one of their old pulp mills in Canada and replacing the old system with DNAe, and with this change, Mercer can increase the efficiency of their current operation. I mean, it's clear that it delivers better data utilization, stronger or strong cybersecurity, better collaboration, but also operational efficiency, not just in the exact mill, but also how you operate the mill, and it is getting harder and harder for some of our customers to actually find qualified staff for sort of operating the mills, and here DNAe can actually help reducing the need for that going forward.
so happy to see that it's gaining traction, strong value proposition I think, and very happy with Mercer being a strong reference for us and solidified that we sort of are in the leading position in automation when it comes to the pulp and paper industry, definitely as well. So exciting, looking forward to more success stories on this front. And I want to thank Mercer for their trust and being one of the sort of trailblazers on this and actually taking it on and saying, "Okay, we want to do this." So with this, handing over to Katri for the financials and a little bit more deep dive into that.
Thank you, Thomas, and thank you for the first six months together. I also want to send my big thanks to everybody who contributed for the successful closing of the year 2024. I know what it takes, so big thanks to all of you. I will go the fourth quarter in brief first. Thomas already discussed some of the full year numbers, and that's why I'm focusing here on this. In Q4, as said earlier, the orders were EUR 2.5 billion, and this was a record quarter for us and obviously impacted by the Arauco order. I used to work in pulp and energy business, and I'm super proud of the team there.
Net sales remained flat at EUR 1.5 billion, and it was the highest quarter in terms of net sales last year. This is a very typical seasonal pattern for Valmet. Comparable EBIDTA increased to EUR 192 million, and actually we were EUR 20 million behind after Q3 and needed really to catch up to reach the guidance, which we did. I'm really pleased for the performance, especially in services who made a strong Q4 with 19.8% margin. I will get back to the segment soon in my presentation. Margin was 12.6%, which is one of the best quarterly margins for us.
The margin was boosted by services and increase and the overall mix. Cash flow was EUR 178 million for the quarter, and quarterly cash flows can fluctuate a lot, and one should not look too much in a single quarter. However, of course, I'm very pleased that we made a record cash flow for the full year, as Thomas already mentioned. Gearing was 39%, coming down sequentially and from the 45% level reached during the second quarter last year. A few words about the key figures as well. Q4 orders more than doubled to all-time high, like I said earlier.
Order backlog is 12% higher than a year ago, and Q4 net sales was slightly higher than in the comparison quarter and minus 3% for the full year. Comparable EBITDA increased 5% in Q4, but the full year decreased by EUR 10 million, and of course, this is disappointing for us. And like Thomas said earlier, we need to make sure that we have an efficient operation that will perform also in the challenging market. Items affecting comparability was minus EUR 19 million for the fourth quarter and minus EUR 53 million for the full year. And IACs were mainly related to M&A and restructuring, for example, in paper that we communicated earlier. The full year operating profit decreased as depreciations and amortizations increased, and amortizations were impacted by the acquisition of tissue converting and API.
Going forward, the quarterly amortizations are expected to be roughly in similar level as in Q4 in the quarters going forward. All in all, the amortizations totaled EUR 108 million last year. Adjusted EPS and EPS both decreased, so lower operating profit like discussed and higher net financial expenses are behind the decrease. Comparable ROCE decreased 1.8 percentage points, and this was due to increase in capital employed. Cash flow increased to a new record, as said, and this really shows that our cash conversion ability continues to be strong. Net EBITDA increased, but gearing decreased. Let's take a look at the segments from the Q4 perspective, and I will start from Process Technologies. Again, mentioned record orders due to Arauco and almost double from the previous quarterly high, which was actually in Q1 2021.
Tissue converting has been developing well, and orders there were EUR 56 million, and net sales, however, decreased by EUR 78 million or 13%, and Arauco did not yet have an impact on the net sales. Comparable EBITDA was disappointing with 2.8% margin, and it was impacted by lower net sales, then moving to the services segment key figures. It was a very good quarter in terms of orders received. Headline figure is + 19%, and even without tissue converting and currencies, the growth was 16%. As Thomas already mentioned, so the mill improvement project orders were higher, and also fabrics developed favorably in the fourth quarter. Net sales also increased by 12%, and that was supporting then the comparable EBITDA, which increased quite strongly in the Q4.
And comparable EBITDA was EUR 112 million and margin just a notch below 20% threshold, and this was the best quarter ever for services in terms of margin. Then some words about the automation segment as well. The orders increased strongly to EUR 443 million, and actually this is a 39% increase. And of course, the orders were impacted by Arauco package, which was booked to automation systems. And please do note that the flow control also has a smaller package to Arauco, but that will be booked later. API was supporting the orders by EUR 43 million, and FX didn't play a role here. And automation systems orders grew double digit even without the Arauco and API impact. So while the uncertainty in pulp and paper market continues, we actually saw really nice growth, and I'm very pleased for the strong finish to the year.
Net sales increased by EUR 13 million, but this was inorganic due to API. Then in terms of comparable EBITDA, that was up by 2%, but the margin was down by 2 percentage points, and the margin decreased from the high margin in the comparison quarter, partly due to integration of API business. Here is the summary of the segment key figures. We already covered most of these numbers. Maybe worth pointing out that while the full year comparable EBITDA margin increased slightly, none of the segments' margin increased. And the expenses in other were EUR 17 million in the fourth quarter and EUR 49 million for the full year. And this was in line with last year and also with our expectations. Comparable gross profit increased to 28.2% last year, and sales mix contained about 62% stable business, which is clearly more than what we had last year.
Comparable SG&A expenses increased to 18.4% of net sales last year. Good to mention here that the net sales decreased 10% organically, which then had an impact on the percentage. All in all, when you look at the absolute number in SG&A, so the increase is mainly coming from the acquisitions. Cash flow so increased to EUR 554 million, which is a new record for us. I'm very, very pleased to see the good cash conversion, and of course, net working capital was the biggest driver behind the cash flow increase. CapEx was EUR 107 million for the year, and that was lower than a year ago. Net working capital amounted to EUR 134 million, which is 2% of the orders. I'm also pleased to see the improvement here compared to last year.
If you compare 2022, then 41% of orders were coming from stable business, and last year that was close to 60%. Maybe good to mention that stable business typically ties up more working capital, and that is then also visible in those numbers. ROCE, that has decreased to 12.7%, and capital employed has increased due to acquisitions, which then had led to lower ROCE. Adjusted EPS decreased compared with 2023, and this was mainly due to lower operating profit and higher net financial expenses. Net debt remained at the previous quarter's level, being at EUR 1 billion, and net debt has increased in the recent years due to mergers and acquisitions. Gearing was 39%, and net debt to EBITDA 1.55, and gearing decreased sequentially from the 43%.
Of course, these are higher levels than what we have had before, but good to again mention that we have much more stable business now in our portfolio. Interest rate was 4%, so some decreased sequentially from 4.4% at the end of Q3, and net financial expenses were EUR 65 million last year, and that was clearly higher than a year ago. This ends my part of the presentation, so back to you, Thomas.
Thank you very much, Katri. So from good cash to then to what to use it for, at least some of it. So let's look at the dividend proposal, also the guidance and the short-term market outlook. So dividend, our policy is to pay out at least 50% of net profit as a dividend. Here the board proposes to the AGM or the annual general meeting that the dividend is going to be on the same year or same level as last year, which means EUR 1.35 per share. This then represents a payout ratio of 89%. So payout ratio is higher as the earnings per share, Katri alluded to that, is lower, has decreased. And then sort of if you think about from overall euro perspective, that means that we will roughly pay out EUR 250 million to our shareholders as dividend next year or this year in 2025.
Like last year, we'll pay it out in two installments. First installment will be paid in April or on April 8, and the second one on October 7. So yeah, then in terms of guidance and short-term market outlook, our guidance for net sales and comparable EBITDA will remain flat for 2025 compared to 2024. Like I showed earlier, we expect roughly EUR 200 million less from the order book backlog to be recognized as sales than we did a year ago. Backlog is EUR 479 million higher, but that relates to capital business, which takes longer to turn and recognize as revenue. So comparable EBITDA guidance mainly reflects the challenging market environment, in particular in the sort of pulp and paper segment.
Then you will notice that we've simplified the short-term market outlook and aligned that more with or aligned that with our segments and how we discuss and report to you. Previously, we had a short-term market outlook composing of seven different categories, and that was just simply too complex. And we also received feedback both from analysts and investors that, you know, does this granularity really adds value to the overall discussion? So we've consolidated that and aligned it with how we report. If you just double-click a little bit on the process technology, customer activities is estimated to remain stable, of course, with some variations, overall stable, all probably on a low level as we've seen last year. Tissue market is active. There's not much activity in energy, as we talked about earlier, but there is some sign of starting to improve.
Board and paper activity continues to be low. Pulp, as you know, is very binary, sort of very few things, and it's often then what we see is mega deals in the market that can be only one, like last year, which we won, but that of course makes the swing factor quite big there. Service or services, service customers, the activity is estimated to start gradually improving. Capacity utilization rates and profitability of customers cause some concern or some, I wouldn't say concern, but uncertainty there. There's also some new startup machines coming, particularly into the European market, that will mean sort of hard to predict what the actual utilization rate will be, but we do see some sign of more demand. Area-wise, North America, South America looking positive, like last year. EMEA and China continues to be soft, and then Asia-Pacific is somewhere in there between.
Seasonally, Q1 have typically been the strongest quarters for orders, and of course, trying to make sure that that also happens this year, so overall, production volume for customers slightly up, more machines coming to market. Utilization rates is a bit sort of hard to predict currently, but we do see a little bit of a positive wind blowing in that area. Automation, we estimate customer activity remains stable. Again, some variations between areas, North America, Middle East, active markets, Europe, China, more soft, more muted, less activity. Activity is generally quite good outside pulp and paper, like we saw last year, whereas pulp and paper continues to be in a soft spot, so I guess that was all in terms of our presentations, then I'll hand back to Pekka for further instructions and Q&A, I guess.
Thank you, Thomas and Katri, for the presentations. And now it's, like Thomas indicated, time to move on to the Q&A session then next. And as a reminder, you can post the questions through the online platform, and they will come here to me, and I will read it to Thomas and Katri a nd then later on, we will also take questions with the phone line. But first, we start with the questions here that I already have in the iPad. So Thomas, firstly here, a question about the tariffs from which are now enforced in Mexico, Canada, and China from the U.S.. So what are your comments regarding those?
Yeah, that's of course, thanks Pekka. Very topical question and discussion, I think, in most boardrooms and a lot of companies. Overall, I think good to remember that Mexico and Canada are new, that sort of 25%, which we've not seen before. China is 10% additional on top of the 25% we have seen since Trump was in office last time. What I would say is, if we split it up in service, process, tech, and automation, I think that varies a little bit between. Start with services. We basically have 2,500 people in North America. Most of those are deployed in services, but also in production of parts and spare parts and materials that we sell to our customers. So there, we're actually very much in line with what Trump wants, sort of this made in America. So I'm quite sort of confident on that area. Then process tech.
I mean, none of the equipment that we are selling from a process technology perspective is being made in the U.S., also not with the competition. So there, I think we are on par with competition, and we'll see how it translates into pricing and transfer the tariffs onto that. Automation system, I think we're also on par with competition. We do have some production there as well for our flow control business in particular. So yeah, it's just a thing. It needs to be managed. It needs to be constantly monitored. We need to react on what is happening. That's clear.
All right. Thanks. Thanks for that, and then a follow-up here, maybe to the potential tariffs that might or might not come towards E.U., so what do you comment on the potential tariffs, I guess, that could be imposed by U.S. towards E.U.?
Yeah. I think, again, Pekka, I mean, important to monitor, constantly being ready, also think about what could consequences be. However, it's hard, even though it could happen, we don't know the details of what would it look like. Also, we don't know what would be the response from E.U. if it happened. So I think about being prepared, monitor, being ready, but also maybe sort of from an investor perspective, just think about that our supply chain is, in that sense, quite on par with competition. So I think that gives some, I would say, stable ground to stand on from that perspective.
All right. Thanks. Then moving on to some other questions here over the line. So Thomas mentioned at the beginning of the presentation that most of the EBITDA came from the stable businesses. We had EUR 609 million of total comparable EBITDA, and if I now recall correctly, EUR 585 million coming from the stable business. So the question here is that do you see this as the kind of a normal level going forward, and what should we expect from this business in the next couple of years?
Yeah. Good question. I think it is important to sort of note that you can't be in one business and not the other. So you need to really think about this as process technology. Yeah, we were not happy with the profitability level, very much driven by also volumes that they were lower, also driven by sort of how we've leveraged operationally. We're looking into that as well. So can we have more flexibility in our production that we had?
We're taking action on the profitability level as well. We can come back to that later as well. But I think it's important to think from a lifecycle perspective that the process technology or the orders and the projects, they actually fuel the service business later on. So you have to sort of think from a lifecycle perspective and seeing as a whole, and then it's about how do you then optimize that, right?
Thank you, Thomas. Now, as a reminder, you can post questions here, written questions as well. But now, I think for the time being, we're done with those. We will get back to these if needed and if there are more, but we will move to the questions over the phone lines. So, operator, please, I hand over to you now.
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.
Hi, Thomas, Katri and Pekka. A couple of questions for me, and maybe I'll start with the 2025 earnings guidance, which doesn't indicate a notable margin expansion. But like you said, I mean, the sales decline is from the backlog, which is mostly low margin equipment business, which you then expect to catch up during the year from the shorter cycle business, which I assume carries a much higher margin. So how should we think about the lack of margin expansion on the guidance, even if your sales mix should, I guess, improve this year?
Yeah, well, [Foreign language] Antti, and thanks for the question. I think, yes, as you said, order backlog EUR 200 million short of what we actually had last year. So of course, something else needs to come through. And of course, that is also about can we drive service business and stable business to a higher degree or shorter rotating the smaller projects that actually rotates during the year? And of course, that should come with good margins as well. I think you need to think about sort of how you see it for this year is that the volume, just like we said in the process technology, that we are challenged with, we have been challenged, been a challenging market overall. Volumes have been low. That has impacted our profitability.
There are some operational leverage in that way just drops then faster in the wrong direction when it comes to the bottom line. We have taken some actions. Paper line, I think we've announced that more than 100 people have gone out of the production. That's roughly 10%. We're doing temporary layoffs, which goes into the first half of this year. We're clearly looking at, and particularly in our sort of strategy process that we're going through on cost competitiveness.
That is key. That will be even more key in the future, but also this agility in how we set up in our whole supply chain is going to be key. We need to, as a company, sort of get used to that the market can be at a lower level than what we've seen in the past if we go back to sort of 12 years or something where we've been growing on the process technology until 2022, right?
All right. And maybe a follow-up on that one regarding kind of automation margins. And I guess the API integration has been a bit slow in a sense that it has furthered the margins a bit. So how should that trend going into 2025? Is there a strong year-over-year margin contribution on that business?
Yeah, I think API, first of all, we're very happy with the acquisition. I think it strategically fits really well into automation systems. It also opens up doors to new customer segments that we have not been so active with historically. Here, we have sort of a world leader in its solutions, which means that you then also can actually sort of you're really there with the customers and an important part of their integrated production. So what is also, and that is something I think is important to realize, is that this was a carve-out of Siemens. Carve-outs are not the easiest ones to do, but they can actually also drive quite a bit of value there. So of course, it was a difficult thing to carve it out first of Siemens and then integrate it into Valmet. And we acquired it, was it April, Katri? Sorry, April, May,
April. Yes.
So nine months within the business, both carving out of an existing business and getting into a new business. That is, of course, something that does not come without cost and without also that you then see lower profitability of the business than what we would expect going forward. So we have good ambition for the API going forward. Also clear, I visited them in Singapore last year. I'm going to Houston during this quarter as well as visiting them there. They are very happy about joining Valmet. They really sort of feel that, wow, we're not just sort of this side business, [Foreign language], as the Germans would say, but we're really sort of into core business of Valmet. So they feel energized and excited about being as part of automation systems. So very happy with it, and I think we will see more good things coming from them.
All right, and then the last question from me is on the paper business line, and I mean, it was a strong order intake compared to the previous one on Q4, and you talk about rather stable market on the PTS as a whole, but could you maybe talk about how should we reflect the Q4 and your pipeline of potential projects going into 2025 versus what it was some time ago? I mean, you clearly converted some of that on Q4, but is it also filling up kind of going into 2025, or what's the outlook?
Yeah, good question. Two things good to note in Q4. We were definitely happy with the order intake in paper business there, mainly driving by two large orders, one paper mill in Asia and one tissue in North America. Very strong value propositions there, happy to win it. There was also a little bit of, we're going to say, timing effect between Q3 and Q4, so that also impacted the strong Q4 as well. Overall, and that's, I think it's a little bit sort of, yeah, tissue, there's good activity. But overall, some of these deals, because there are fewer of them, they become a bit binary in terms of the overall market. But yeah, I think the team is having building up a good pipeline for going into this year, despite that it is a challenging market.
Yeah.
Any further on that, Katri, you think, or?
I think it was well said that you need to look at the tissue separately, but on the board and paper, as you said, the market continues to be low, and of course, it was very good to see a strong close for last year, but there are some variations, of course, always between the quarters.
The pipeline of bigger paperboard tissue deals going into 2025?
There are. Okay, I can take it. So there are some deals in the pipeline, and of course, it's our target to win the deals, but you never know the timing. And overall, good to remember that the market activity is on a low level there.
But it's a bit digital. That's sort of a binary is maybe the better word. But there are some good deals being discussed, and of course, that can come out positively. But yeah, let's see when we do our utmost to make sure we stay number one in this market.
All right. Thank you very much.
Thanks, Antti.
The next question comes from Sven Weier from UBS. Please go ahead.
Yeah, good morning. It's Sven from UBS. Thanks for taking my questions. The first one was on the process technology margin in Q4. You mentioned obviously negative sales effect, but I was also wondering if you did do kind of maybe a final cleanup on the legacy projects in Q4. That's the first question. Thank you.
I can take it anyway.
That's okay.
Okay.
Yeah, no, please go ahead.
Okay.
No, go ahead.
Okay. So as I said, it was impacted by the lower volume, and of course, very disappointing thing for us. About the cleanups, you're probably referring to what we discussed in the second quarter. So there were some closures of old projects. So this didn't happen now in the fourth quarter. So all in all, it was coming from the lower volume.
Understood. Thank you. The second question is just to follow up on the board pipeline. I mean, we all know it's a difficult market. We've now seen that Metsä is closing some capacity. I mean, what is your sense? What does it take for the market to come back eventually? Do you think that the capacity cleanup has to go further, and we have to go through a certain adjustment phase for maybe a few years before the market can recover, or do you also see material regional differences that this is maybe a problem that is just limited to Europe? So any further color would be appreciated.
I think overall, Europe and Asia are soft. Europe, mainly because from an economic perspective, Asia maybe was more from a sort of they have overcapacity in the market, so there needs to be some capacity consolidation on the, when can I put it, the least productive or efficient part of the market, which will probably eventually happen, I'm sure. So I think, I think Sven, think about it from three dimensions. One is least effective or efficient capacity needs to go out. More effective capacity could come in at a point in time. That's one. Modernization, maybe particularly in the North American market, we've got sort of older capacity installations. You see more modernization that or more modernization demand could be building up to come out at an opportunity time.
And then the last, the third part is, and that's where maybe the tariffs is sort of putting a little bit of, or potential tariffs or potential trade war, put a bit sort of cloud over the future is sort of how that's going to impact our economic growth in the world and in different parts of the world. And therefore, the overall demand of tissue and board and paper, right? Especially if you think about sort of global trade, container board, how's that going to be impacted short term by the different talks?
I mean, have you delivered now all the major board projects that you have been winning in the last years? Is that done, or are you still in the process of finally delivering some of them?
We don't comment. Do we comment on this? No. Yeah, I was just.
Typically, it takes on the board and paper side probably 18 months to complete the project. You can a little bit use that in the calculations when you estimate that.
Okay.
Yeah.
Okay. Final question was just on Arauco. I was just curious if you already received the prepayment in Q4, and that was also helping the cash flow, or is that still to come?
No, we actually received in Q4, so that was in our numbers.
But I guess you wouldn't quantify it.
You're right with that. So unfortunately, we haven't been disclosing the number, but of course, we are really happy that the project is booked and has started, as Thomas said earlier in his presentation.
Of course, the percentages of these kind of prepayments would vary from project to project as well. We always try to make sure that we are cash positive during the lifecycle of the project in order also to have no sort of credit risk.
Understood. Thank you both.
Thank you.
Anything else, Sven, or were you about to say something?
The next question comes from Johan Eliason from Kepler Cheuvreux. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hi, Thomas, Katri, and Pekka. This is Johan at Kepler Cheuvreux. Just a minor question regarding the dividend, which was flat year over year. Thomas, your predecessor, Pasi was always very proud of every year being able to add a few cents on the dividend payment. Has that sort of ambition stopped now going forward, or is there something in the pipeline ahead that makes the board a bit cautious with the balance sheet? Thank you.
I think, thanks, Johan. Overall, I think my ambition and my sort of focus is it's about total return to shareholders. It's not about really how it comes, but it's about making sure that the shareholders are getting the best possible return overall. We have then a dividend policy that's been 50%. We now kept it flat from a year perspective, but it is increased from a payout ratio perspective. So I think that sends sort of a signal. Of course, with the strategy review that we're doing, we will also review our financial targets. We will also review the dividend policy, and I think the dividend, you need to also going forward, take into consideration sort of how do we see the investment opportunities within the company, both from an M&A perspective.
So would we actually sort of prefer to retain more cash, pay less out, or also wouldn't sort of rule out that we would also have to look into would there be potential benefits from actually having share buybacks as well? So in return, additional cash to the shareholders via share buybacks instead of dividends and look at that from a very sort of international investor perspective. But of course, the board this year is recommending that we pay out the same year amount, which is a percentage payout ratio higher than last year.
Good. Looking forward to your outcome of your review and the new targets. Have you set the date when this will be communicated? I think I remember something about the Capital Markets Day ahead.
Yes. We have not sent out formal invitation, but maybe put a placeholder in your diary. So we'll organize and arrange a Capital Market Day on June 5th this year, and it will be in Finland. We'll send out formal invitations later, but fill out the date and save the date for what hopefully becomes exciting news and good discussions.
Excellent. Thank you.
So we will do it before midsummer.
The next question comes from Panu Laitinmäki from Danske Bank. Please go ahead.
Hi, thanks. I have a couple of questions. Firstly, on the process technologies margins. So I mean, it was down sequentially, and you said that it's due to lower volumes, but the revenue was not that different than what we have seen in the past few quarters. And then for the past couple of years, you have been commenting that you had some projects burdened by inflation burning margins. So I just can't kind of get to why it came down sequentially. Did you still have these projects there, or where they've gone?
So maybe just, and Katri, you can add as well, but I think just like Katri said before, there was no sort of cleaning up on the portfolio or settlement of certain challenging client situations in Q4. So it was, in that sense, a normalized Q4 that was, what can I say? Yeah, so true margins in that sense. Not that it's a great margin and not that we're happy about it. That's also why we took some actions on layoffs and temporary layoffs as well. And it's also why the talk about discussions about cost competitive, both from a product perspective, but also overall supply chain footprint perspective is a key part of our strategic discussions and review.
Okay. Then, on the guidance, so there was a question that why you're not expecting margin expansion due to mix change. So, did I understand correctly that you expect the process technologies kind of declining earnings to offset whatever kind of benefit you get from growth in services, and then you are cautious on the automation margin near-term due to the acquisition burdening it?
I'm not sure, Panu. I didn't fully follow your question. Can you just repeat again? There was a bit sort of noise on the line. Sorry for that.
On the guidance, so flat EBITDA despite what I believe is probably growth in services. So does that imply that you expect process technologies earnings to go down in 2025?
Yes. I think good question. Overall, I mean, we are guiding on top level and bottom level for the overall company, not for the specific segments and specific business parts. So yes, flat sales, flat EBITDA. Yeah, there might be mixed changes. There might be margin changes within the segments, but overall, that's how we guide. And of course, as you know, we still have the financial target of 12%-14% EBITDA margin or comparable EBITDA margin. And that's, of course, not gone away just because we're doing a strategic review of the business.
Thanks. Just a final one quickly. On the guidance, so I assume it is something that you expect to kind of reach and have some buffer in it. So I mean, what is the key uncertainty at this point of the year that you kind of don't know? Is it the service market? Is it the automation margin? Or kind of what is the key uncertainty?
I think it's maybe fair to say that, of course, our guidance is our guidance, and we strongly believe in that. That is how it is. And I think it's also fair to say that the overall market and economy is in a situation not just for Valmet, but in general, there is quite a bit of sort of fog out there, right? It looks a bit like the Finnish winter this year looking out from Keilani emi. There's been quite a lot of gray days, and sometimes it shines, and sometimes it snows, and sometimes ice is melting. A bit hard to predict. It is sort of average, average kind of thing, right? But it goes a bit sort of in different directions.
So I think it's fair to say that most companies and management teams struggle really to sort of really truly sort of have a very firm prediction of where the world is heading, and especially if they have a global business like we have. But we stand fully behind the guidance, and that's what we believe in currently.
If I just build on top of that, so just as a reminder, you mentioned it already during your presentation that going towards this year, the backlog is EUR 200 million lower. So actually, we have booked and billed in all of the segments. Maybe worth mentioning, of course, this Arauco, which we also mentioned many times. So even if it was a high or big order, but there actually the revenue is split to 2025, 2026, and 2027. So it's not going to materialize all this year. And maybe a final comment, which also I mentioned during my presentation, that actually in all of the segments, the margin didn't improve. So services was flat, and the others were down. So of course, to reach our targets, so of course, we are looking for improvement overall.
But good to see Q4 in service and stable business really coming out strong. So that, of course, gives some good feelings about going into 2025.
All right. Thank you.
Despite the fog, if I can put it that way.
The next question comes from Mikael Doepel from Nordea. Please go ahead.
Thank you and good afternoon, I guess, now everybody. I have a couple of questions on the pulp market and a bit more on Arauco, but if you can start with the market overall, how would you describe the pulp project pipeline currently? Do you expect to see any more big tenders in 2025 as well?
Yeah. Good question, Michael. I mean, it's fair to say that just like in 2024, pulp market is sort of not, what can I say, a bit soft, but also if you think from a capital project perspective, it is very, very binary, right? So there could be one. There could also be none. But it's clear that South America, it is a place where there are good opportunities in terms of if you have the right land there to establish and have some good cost in terms of producing pulp to the world there.
Of course, the world also needs to absorb all that market pulp. So that's, of course, another dimension that our customers need to relate to when they make these big investment decisions. But hard to say in terms of the timing, but I think it's clear that we will see more large pulp mills in South America in the future, but when? It's a bit hard to predict.
Okay. No, that's fair. And then just another question on pricing and maybe costs as well. So how do you see your selling prices trending into 2025 vis-à-vis costs? So I guess the question is more, how do you view the price-cost dynamics going into the year, both in terms of your order intake as well as on the revenues that you're going to book? Is it fair to assume a fairly neutral impact on that or something else?
Yeah. I think first of all, the big part of that, what we'll realize into sales in 2025, we already sort of know the pricing on that, as Katri alluded to in terms of the order backlog. So that's pretty well known. Of course, pricing, we have inflation in certain markets is much more manageable than what it was a few years ago. So that's a good thing. Then thinking about some of the markets which are quite binary, low market activity, of course, that can be a bit more price competitive than what we've seen historically. Of course, we're trying. That's also why I'm saying the thing that the cost competitiveness is really key, and it's going to be even more vital going forward.
That's what some of the things we are looking at because that demand and also making sure that you do actually have a flexible supply chain so that you can gear up and down on how much you want to produce. But also swapping between what are you delivering to an Arauco pulp project, or are you doing a board project, right? Some of these things, making sure that how can you model some of this and actually make it a bit more flexible from a production perspective. And of course, pricing is not an art. It's a science, right? So actually understanding the whole pricing dynamics in the market, having the data, looking at that is quite important.
Okay. Good. Thank you very much.
There are no more questions at this time, so I hand the conference back to the speakers.
All right. Thank you for the questions from the phones, and there are still a couple here, so actually quite a bit, but some of those have already been addressed, so maybe not going through each one of those, but first, about the items affecting comparability, so a question on the IAC side, second quarter in a row with close to EUR 20 million in IAC, so any comments?
Yeah. Thank you. Good question. Whoever sent it, I already mentioned in my presentation that they were mainly related to M&A as well as restructuring what we have done last year.
All right. Thanks, Katri. Then a question on the underlying growth, kind of organic growth without Arauko that came in. Came in nicely in services and especially in the automation systems business line in Q4. So any additional color on why the services orders in Q4 were so strong, excluding Arauko, and same for automation systems?
Yeah. I think just briefly on Q4 and services, of course, that we did get a service package from Arauco deal which did impact the services. But I think also overall, there was actually good underlying growth back to what I think what I said earlier. Great to see that our mill service teams actually managed to sell some of the mill packages we've not seen really early in the year. So we've seen more sort of customers sort of buying the consumables and the consumables part of the service business, but less so on the modernization, holding a little bit back, maybe sweating the asset a little bit, if you can say so.
But then that actually proactive sales came through in Q4, which was good to see. Automation systems without acquisitions, without the Arauco order, still the 7% organic growth for the year. Really good to see as well, right? And it finished on a strong building up our Q4 was very strong on that one. So overall, I think that back to what I said before, testimony to our strong value proposition that we do have in automation system.
Yeah. Maybe one color to add to the automation systems, which was really positive, was actually on the pulp and paper side. So they actually had a very strong order intake in the fourth quarter. There have also been some delays. Customers have been postponing some of the decisions, and the direct sales there was good, of course. One thing more, and everybody understands what the situation in the pulp and paper market is, but nevertheless, also very happy that there was such a strong close for the bookings in Q4.
Thank you. And then two more here at the moment. So looking wider into the kind of geopolitical situation, also outside of the tariffs, I guess the person here wants to know what's your view on the geopolitical situation overall and impact to Valmet?
Yeah. I think, I mean, it's probably hard to disagree with that the overall geopolitical situation is a bit sort of dynamic, to say the least, Pekka. I think the benefit for us is that we are a global business. We do have business in Australia and China and Indonesia across the globe, North America, South America. And that's also why we're benefiting from that. In certain segments, North America, South America have been going well. Europe, China has been soft. That could change depending on how the situation goes.
So you're getting a bit of that sort of global is clearly being a positive thing for us, despite that it's a dynamic situation, and you can sort of wake up in the morning and then something happened in the world. But yeah, we managed it. I think it's about, and it's also about this thing about what we talk about from the strategic review is how can we create an organization that is simpler and therefore also faster in both decision-making and managing complex situations that are locally in the different countries, right?
And that's where the work we're doing will improve on that, but also this whole leadership philosophy of empowering the organization to a larger degree than what has happened historically. That will also speed the decision up because then we do have great employees who are close to where the problem is, close to where the customer is, can make the decisions onsite, deal with it. Let's move on, right? So yeah. So agile, sort of simplifying the business, take complexity out, empower the people. Then you're in the best position to actually manage dynamic situations. Then you can talk about scenarios and so on. But at the end of the day, having great people that are empowered will do the job, right? And faster.
Thank you, Thomas. And then Johan Eliason here is still asking some housekeeping issues going probably more towards Katri's side. So about tax rates. Tax rates in 2024 and then tax rates going forward.
Yeah.
Effective tax rates. Starting with the effective tax rates.
Okay. Thank you, Johan. Good question. The ETR was actually a bit higher for Valmet. It was 26.95%, I remember correctly, and there was a one-time impact coming from Brazil, so actually, if we take that out, it would have been on this 25% level, which is more normal for us, and going forward, that is also the level that we're expecting.
And then another part of this question is, what about the CapEx plans going into 2025? Some changes to the CapEx that you are foreseeing.
Thank you. Good question again. It was EUR 107 million for the year. Actually, it was lower than what we had a year ago. At this moment, I think that we will probably land somewhere on the same level. So of course, we can give more precise estimates as the year goes forward, but I don't expect any major increase there.
All right. Thank you, Tomas and Katri, and thank you for the good discussions from the phone lines and also the activities in the online platform. So thanks for that. Next, events for Valmet are going to be the annual general meeting, of course, happens every year and also, of course, now, so March 26. Then the interim review, next one, Q1 will be April 23. And then, like Thomas already a little bit indicated, the capital markets day for Valmet will take place on June 5th. So please save the date for the CMD. And Thomas, we will follow up with more details and formal invitations later. But with this, I will now close this event. Thanks again, everybody, and have a nice, I guess it's a busy day for many who are following listed companies. So have a good active day.
Have a good one and see you out there. Thanks.
Thank you.