Good morning, everyone, welcome to IMI's 2025 full year results presentation. I am joined here today by our CFO, Luke Grant. Together, we will take you through another year of strong strategic and financial progress. I would like to begin by thanking all of our people for their tremendous contribution. The execution of our growth strategy is creating significant value for shareholders, and it was another strong performance in 2025. We have now delivered five consecutive years of mid-single- digit organic revenue growth. Supported by the delivery of our financial framework, we are compounding earnings growth. We delivered 5% organic sales growth and 8% organic adjusted operating profit in 2025 and achieved a 20% operating margin for the first time.
It was another year of strong cash generation, and we are committed to deploying this capital for growth and to enhance shareholder returns. Organic investment is at record levels. I am pleased to be announcing a GBP 500 million share buyback alongside a proposed 10% increase to the final dividend. We expect to deliver our sixth consecutive year of mid-single- digit organic growth in 2026. Based on current market conditions, full year adjusted basic EPS is expected to be between GBP 1.36 and GBP 1.42. IMI has been fundamentally transformed since our growth strategy was launched in 2019. With our world-class engineering expertise and our relentless focus on commercial excellence, we are well-placed to address our customers' needs for bespoke, high-value add, fluid and motion control systems.
Supported by three long-term mega trends: energy, automation, and healthcare, and our focus on the attractive aftermarket, we are compounding EPS growth.
Thank you, Roy, and good morning. I'm pleased to be able to take you through our 2025 performance today. Our One IMI operating model continues to drive consistent compounding results, and 2025 was another strong year. Revenue increased by 5% organically. Adjusted operating profit increased 8% organically, and our adjusted operating margin increased by 30 basis points to 20%. Adjusted basic EPS was up 8% year-over-year. Cash conversion remains strong, and we are proposing a further 10% increase in the final dividend, reflecting our confidence in the business. As Roy mentioned, we delivered our fifth consecutive year of mid-single- digit organic revenue growth in 2025. Organic revenue grew by 5%, partly offset by the impact of foreign exchange and recent disposals.
Adjusted operating profit increased to GBP 460 million, with organic operating profit up 8% year-over-year. We have made significant progress delivering sustainable improvements in our margins since launching our strategy in 2019. Our margins are now at 20%, which is 580 basis points higher than 2019, alongside the record levels of investment we are making in our business. This is an important milestone. We expect to deliver further progress over the coming years, driven by growth in our attractive end markets, strong pricing power, and continued progress in the high-margin aftermarket. While we will be making the previously communicated cybersecurity investments in 2026 to further enhance the resilience of the business, our strong operating leverage means we still expect to deliver a drop through of around 30% over the medium term.
Turning to the income statement, we saw strong organic revenue and profit growth in the year. The net interest charge was GBP 17.7 million, the tax rate increased to 25.4% in line with our guidance. As you may be aware, IMI's multi-year restructuring program completed in 2024. This program transformed the business, streamlining our global footprint and laying the foundations for future growth. Our focus is now on continuous improvement, while we continue to look for efficiency opportunities, the costs associated with our current business are now being taken into our underlying results rather than as an adjusting item. Adjusted basic EPS increased by 8% to 132.3 pence in the year. Looking at the performance of the platforms and sectors which was in line with expectations.
Automation delivered strong growth with revenue up 8% organically. Process Automation had an excellent year, delivering strong order intake, as shown at the bottom of the slide. Adjusting for the planned disposal of Truflo Marine orders were up 5% organically with particular strength in conventional power and nuclear, which Roy will cover later on. We made further progress in the high margin aftermarket, where after a very strong fourth quarter, full year orders were 11% higher than 2024 and 9% higher after adjusting for Truflo Marine. The order book was up another 2%. Industrial Automation delivered a resilient performance despite uncertain markets. Organic revenue was 1% lower year-on-year. Turning to LIFE TECHNOLOGY , where organic revenue was 1% higher than 2024.
Climate Control delivered another good performance, with revenue up 5% on an organic basis. We saw continued demand for our products that reduce energy consumption in buildings and benefited from our growing portfolio of smart connected products, including those supporting advanced cooling technologies in data centers. Life Science & Fluid Control was flat organically in 2025 as the global life science device market began to stabilize. Transport organic revenue was 6% lower than 2024, in line with the global heavy duty truck market. Continuing to the cash flow, where we delivered further improvements during the year, supported by our strong profit performance and great working capital management. I am incredibly proud of our operational and commercial teams delivering a GBP 3 million working capital inflow in the year whilst driving another year of mid-single- digit organic revenue growth.
With debtor and creditor increases in line with growth more than offset by a GBP 31 million reduction in inventory. With the restructuring program now completed, we are making good progress reducing safety stocks across IMI. Inventory reduction also benefited from the ongoing strategic review of Transport, where we are delivering significant operational improvements in line with our plan. The review of Transport is progressing well. We are clear that any outcome must deliver compelling long-term value for shareholders, and in the current market environment, continue to see further opportunities to strengthen performance within the group while continuing to assess all strategic options. Capital expenditure remains at record levels as we continue to invest right across IMI for future growth. We expect CapEx to depreciation to be around 1x-1.2x over the medium term.
Free cash flow increased to GBP 290 million. We returned GBP 281 million of this to shareholders through dividends and our share buyback program. Our net debt has reduced to GBP 533 million at year-end. Net debt to EBITDA at 1x is at the bottom of our target range. I am also very pleased to report that after a tremendous amount of hard work from our team over the last decade, we have now completed the final buyout of our U.K. pension scheme. This is an important milestone for IMI. I would like to thank everyone involved for their significant efforts. IMI is a highly cash generative business with a clear and disciplined approach to capital allocation, prioritizing investments in our people, processes and operations that accelerates organic growth.
We remain committed to a progressive dividend and as mentioned, are very pleased to be recommending a 10% increase to the final dividend. We will also pursue bolt-on acquisitions that enhance our positions in attractive long term growth markets. We have deployed over GBP 400 million in bolt-on acquisitions since 2019, while increasing our fully burdened ROIC by 260 basis points to 14%. TWTG, a leading sensor solutions provider acquired for EUR 25 million in October 2024, is now integrated into IMI. TWTG's differentiated product portfolio has greatly expanded our asset monitoring offering, providing us with the opportunity to accelerate aftermarket growth even further. Our M&A pipeline remains strong. We will continue to seek attractive bolt-on acquisitions that accelerate organic growth and expand our capabilities while delivering returns in line with our strict financial criteria.
Finally, we will look to return surplus capital to our shareholders should net debt to adjusted EBITDA fall sustainably below our 1x-2x target range. We completed a GBP 200 million share buyback in July, are pleased to be announcing a further GBP 500 million share buyback today. By deploying our growing free cash flow into organic growth opportunities, attractive acquisitions and value enhancing share buybacks, we are confident we can continue our track record of compounding EPS growth. We are very excited about the opportunities for growth at IMI, expect to deliver our sixth consecutive year of mid-single- digit organic revenue growth in 2026. Based on current market conditions, we expect adjusted EPS to be between GBP 1.36 and GBP 1.42.
This guidance assumes that Process Automation will grow mid to high single- digits supported by the record order book. Industrial Automation is expected to deliver another resilient year with organic revenue flat to modestly higher. We see continued good demand in Climate Control and stability within Life Science & Fluid Control with some growth in our Life Science business. Transport is expected to be broadly flat in line with the global heavy duty truck market. We expect the adjusted operating margin to be flat to slightly up with strong operating leverage offsetting the previously communicated cybersecurity investments. Our guidance assumes that the disposal of Truflo Marine will complete in mid 2026.
We are assuming a net interest charge of GBP 20 million, that our tax rate will increase to 26.3% and our weighted average number of shares of 238 million following a GBP 500 million share buyback. Foreign exchange rates are not currently expected to have a material impact on sales or profits. With that, I'm going to hand over to Roy who will talk you through the strategy update.
Over the last six years, we have focused on aligning our business to three long-term mega trends: energy, automation, and healthcare. These structural drivers provide us with significant opportunities to create long-term value and will underpin the delivery of profitable growth in the years to come. IMI is a global leader in fluid and motion control with a compelling value proposition. Our solutions typically represent a small part of the total system cost, but have a significant positive impact on end customer outcomes. This drives growth, customer loyalty, and strong pricing power. We are well-placed to support our customers in the attractive aftermarket, which represents around 45% of IMI sales. Our business is aligned to long-term mega trends and is built on the strength of our One IMI operating model.
By applying a consistent approach rooted in commercial excellence, market-led innovation, and continuous improvement, we are creating significant value for shareholders. Our people and performance culture are the foundation of the One IMI operating model, and we have worked hard to build a culture of ownership, of customer focus, and of innovation. We are making significant investments in our people to help them grow, help them develop, and create value for customers. Adopting artificial intelligence has been a key priority, and we are rolling out exciting new tools and platforms across IMI. I'm pleased to report that over 2,000 of our colleagues have now completed our AI training. These investments are delivering tangible benefits. Employee engagement remains very high, and our productivity continues to improve and has increased by 31% since 2019.
Over half of IMI sales are directly supported by rising energy demand and energy efficiency. I wanted to share a few examples of how this long-term mega trend is supporting sustainable, profitable growth. As many of you may be aware, IMI is a key supplier to the large gas turbine OEMs. We benefited from very strong demand in conventional power during the year. Order intake in the high margin aftermarket was up 16% organically. New construction was up 32% with strong momentum driven by widespread electrification and the need for stable, reliable energy to power data centers. Our customers now have significant multi-year order books. We feel positive about the opportunities for further growth. We also saw a resurgence in demand for our solutions for the nuclear market during 2025.
Plant life extensions present a significant opportunity for IMI, and we saw very strong growth in the aftermarket, where orders were up 33% organically year-on-year. Thirdly, LNG. While IMI's fluid control solutions play a key role across the LNG value chain, we are particularly excited about the significant opportunity to support the liquefaction capacity additions in North America. We have strong customer relationships, leading technology, and we see a clear opportunity to deliver growth. Finally, how the rapid expansion of data centers is not only driving energy but demand, but it is also presenting an exciting opportunity for climate controls, energy efficient fluid control products.
Our innovative solutions can play a direct and key role in the liquid cooling systems, and we more than doubled our order intake to GBP 18 million in 2025 with a global pipeline of opportunities that continues to expand. We have an outstanding culture of customer-led, market-driven innovation at IMI, grounded in deep customer insight and executed through our entrepreneurial Growth Hub model. Our innovations solve complex engineering challenges. Our teams utilize a disciplined test-and-learn approach to quickly validate solutions and validate market potential. Through this process, we maximize our return on investment by bringing products to market once customer endorsement has been secured. Our methodology continues to evolve, and I am particularly proud of how we are now using artificial intelligence to help identify and validate Growth Hub opportunities even faster and with greater precision.
We launched Growth Hub across IMI in 2019, and delivered a record GBP 206 million of orders in 2025, up 38% on 2024. I also wanted to spend some time this morning highlighting the key role that Process Automation looks set to play in the energy transition. Process Automation represents about 40% of our revenue, and overall orders have grown at 8% CAGR since 2020. New construction represents about 40% of Process Automation, and as you have seen earlier in this presentation, there is renewed momentum across our end markets, principally driven by electrification and data center investments. Adjusting for the disposal of Truflo Marine, over half of our new construction business is directly exposed to gas, power, nuclear, and hydrogen. We are very encouraged by the outlook for these markets.
They support our medium-term growth ambitions and, importantly, expand our installed base, driving the aftermarket and supporting long-term profitable growth. Aftermarket orders now represent over 60% of Process Automation, and as you can see on this slide, orders have grown at an 11% CAGR since 2020. We actively track over 200,000 severe service valves in our own installed base, where our parts, upgrades, and services are absolutely mission-critical to plant safety, efficiency, and profitability. By working closely with customers to maximize uptime in their most critical applications, we build long-term relationships and secure recurring high-margin revenue. IMI has been fundamentally transformed over the last six years as we built a track record of compounding EPS growth.
We have delivered average organic growth of 5% over the last five years, supported by our leading positions in attractive long-term growth markets and our success in driving commercial excellence and market-led innovation. Our adjusted operating margin is now at 20%, 580 basis points higher than in 2019. This continued progress reflects our strong operating leverage, our focus on the high-margin aftermarket, and the final benefits from our restructuring program. We aim to deliver further margin progression in the medium term, supported by the growth in our attractive markets. Cash conversion remains high at 96%. As Luke has outlined, we are committed to deploying this cash to accelerate growth and enhance our shareholder returns. Our fully burdened return on invested capital has now increased to 14%, significantly higher than our 12% underpin and our weighted average cost of capital.
To summarize, we are very proud of the achievements in 2025. Organic revenue grew by 5%, the operating margin is now at 20%, Our organic operating profit grew by 8% with strong cash conversion. The key takeaways are, firstly, our growth strategy is compounding earnings growth. Second, in line with our disciplined approach to capital allocation and commitment to value creation, we are announcing a GBP 500 million share buyback in addition to the 10% increase in the final dividend. Thirdly, we are targeting a sixth consecutive year of mid-single- digit organic revenue growth in 2026. Based on current market conditions, we expect this year's full year adjusted EPS to be between 136 pence and 142 pence.
Finally, I would really like to take a moment to thank all of our people for another great year. We are looking forward to another year of progress in 2026. Thank you. I'm now gonna hand over to the moderator for the Q&A.
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad now. If you feel your question has been answered or for any reason you would like to remove yourself, please press star followed by two. When preparing to ask your question, please ensure your device is unmuted locally. Our first question comes from Lush Mahendrarajah from JP Morgan. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Morning, guys, and thanks for taking my questions. I've got two, I think, both on Process. The first is just a clarification on Q4. It looks like you saw quite steep acceleration in order momentum. Could you just quantify that, particularly what you saw in new construction and in aftermarket? Just within that, I mean, I'm guessing it's power, nuclear, et cetera, but just the key drivers. If there's any big orders in there, that'd be helpful. The second question is on power and nuclear and just how we think about lead times when you get an order both for new construction and aftermarket. Obviously, some of your customers are taking orders throughout the years.
Just trying to think about are not those orders for delivery in the coming 12-18 months or do we have to think longer than that? Thank you.
Yeah. Thanks, Lush. I think I've got those questions. The line wasn't brilliant. I think the first question was on Q4 Process Automation orders. Yeah, as you said, they were really strong. Overall Q4 Process Automation orders were up 26%. When you break that down, new construction was up 36%. I always say this is not really a quarterly business. Within that new construction orders increase, there was a big nuclear order. As you know, nuclear new construction, you get a big order. This was a big order for strainers, fluid control strainers that go into an installation in the U.K. Great news that we won it, but they are lumpy at the moment.
I do expect over time, over the next few years, nuclear new construction to increase, but it will take time. On the aftermarket side, yeah, really good news because orders were up 20% as well in the, in the aftermarket in Q4. I think again, the way I look at that is aftermarket orders for last year as a whole were up 11% again. That of course is great news and really testament to Jackie, Roby and the teams and the investments we're making to drive that aftermarket higher. I think you fully understand, Lush, our upgrade valve strategy, and that's paying dividends again. Once we get those upgrade valves, the long stream of that beautiful parts business recurring revenues that we get from that. Yeah, good strong quarter.
I would say for Process Automation, again, we said in the presentation that if you take Truflo Marine out and we still expect to sell that as we said by the half year, get that completed, then last year's orders were 5% up for Process Automation, and we're guiding this year for sales to be mid-single- digit to high- single- digit up. You know, something around 6%-7%, something like that we think is sensible for sales for Process Automation for this year. Yeah, good news on Q4. In terms of power was very strong for us last year. The power segment was up to just under GBP 300 million of orders for Process Automation. 75% aftermarket.
That whole segment was up 20% on the year before. The new construction part of power was actually up 32%, Lush, last year. Yeah, we're seeing an increase coming through for orders on those gas turbines you talked about in particular. That's obviously great news. What I would say is ultimately the order rate though is gonna be defined by how quickly the OEMs, those big OEMs you're talking about, the big gas turbines, can actually build these power stations. We see how that goes over time. Typically, our lead time, typically was about six months afterwards they give us an order. I expect that'll probably go out, Lush, because they've got multi-year order books now. You know, it's great news for the longer term.
Yeah, 32% up last year. I'm not sure we'll repeat that or anything close to it this year, we still expect growth obviously. Did that cover your questions, Lush?
Yeah. No, it did. Appreciate the color. Thanks, guys.
Thanks, Lush.
Thanks, Lush.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Christian Hinderaker from Goldman Sachs. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Morning, Roy. Morning, Luke. I want to start on Process Automation. I think you had GBP 102 million of LNG orders. That's about 9.5% of order intake overall. I wonder how we think about your oil and gas exposure in the context of the recent price spikes and obviously geopolitical challenges. Appreciate it might be an initial view, but how are you impacted there and is any of your installed base directly affected by recent events? That's the first one.
Nice one, Christian. Good speech. Good question. LNG, you're absolutely right. It was up again last year to GBP 100 million. 40% of that is aftermarket. More broadly, oil and gas, upstream, midstream was up 12% to about GBP 130 million. 40% of that is aftermarket as well, Christian. In terms of the Middle East, in total it represents about 6% of IMI's sales, and the vast majority of that is, as you'd expect, is in Process Automation. I think, we're gonna see a bit of short-term volatility. Obviously, the good news about Process Automation is the order book, and particularly the aftermarket order book that's underpinning, where we think it'll be this year. We do expect a bit of midterm volatility.
Obviously our thoughts go to everybody in the Middle East and everybody that's affected. As you can expect, we've put maximum security protocols in place and we're in touch. We've got about 60 people there. We're in touch straight away over the weekend. Aside from that, short-term volatility in terms of the business, normally, people's minds turn to energy security and if you look at other recent events, you would expect that will lead to further investment at some point, Christian. Clearly we know that all takes time. Yeah, we're happy with where we are with our guidance, clearly we're watching closely for the effects that, you know, of what happens in the Middle East.
Thank you, Roy. Maybe on LIFE TECH then, if we can look at the drivers in the bridge, particularly in H2. I appreciate year-on-year revenues were flat and the margin accordingly. How do we think about the margin here? 'Cause I guess consensus was a little out in front relative to the 18% or so. Are there any incremental savings we can expect for the segment, or is it all about growth in 2026?
It's mainly about investment and growth, Christian, is where we are. If you think about the constituents of that, we expect another year of good growth within Climate Control. We grew at 4% in the second half of last year. You know, seems a reasonable place to start. Probably a little bit second half loaded in Climate Control this year. O verall, we expect another good year driven by the need for the energy-saving products and of course the demand for the data center products as well. I think Climate Control is in good shape. Margins are coming through nicely. Life Science & Fluid Control, I think Life Sciences is starting to show a little bit of growth, which is good. The Fluid Control part is more into industrial markets.
You know, we are not expecting anything fantastic out of industrial markets this year. Of course, we've all seen PMIs going up a bit. Normally, IA and F luid Control will follow PMIs three to six months later. I think that, Christian. W e're just making sure that we wanna see that in our orders before we start committing that in our outlook. Overall, Life Science, Fluid Control, we probably carve out a little bit of growth this year. Transport we put basically in line with the global heavy duty truck markets that we serve and think that's gonna be about flat.
I think, in terms of again, as I said earlier, the transport team, the passenger car team that came in 18 months ago, doing a great job of leaning that up, driving, stock turns up, getting the cash out of the business. I think I wouldn't expect anything stellar on margins across IMI this year because of the extra investments we're putting in place, and I flagged those back in November. We're investing in the business, and we're investing particularly, we're upping our investment in cybersecurity, which we see our base case is that will step up in terms of investment. It started in the second half of last year actually, but go through this year. Then we would expect that to be the new run rate.
Unless of course, the bad guys get increased tech and we're forced to invest incrementally again. Our base case is not that, Christian. Our base case is this year profits move more or less in line with sales, organic sales. We get back to our sort of 30% drop through in the years beyond that and margins start to accrete again. That's our base case, Christian.
Thank you, Roy.
Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Jonathan Hurn from Barclays. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Hey, guys. Good morning. Just a few questions from me, please. The first one is on process. Just in terms of the pricing within that business, and particularly for nuclear and conventional power, and focusing on gas. I mean, what are we seeing there? Like you say, strong demand. Are you also seeing positive pricing? Are you getting better pricing for that? That was the first question. Maybe we start there.
Yeah. Well, thanks, Jonathan. Yeah. On the new construction side on pricing, I would say margins are reasonable. You know, they're slightly above where they were last year on our new construction side, but nothing. No real move yet. What tends to happen, Jonathan, I'm just thinking the last time we saw this, when, particularly oil and gas at the time really took off. Once capacity in the industry fills up and we're still away from that, I would say. I mean, certainly we've got plenty of capacity, which is the good news. We're still away from the capacity of the industry filling up. I would say, yeah, I mean, if it continues at this rate and they find a way to accelerate, really accelerate the production of these plants, that could well happen.
I'd say pricing is slightly better across new construction for us in the order book, but nothing huge at the moment, Jonathan.
Okay. Very clear. Second one was just on Transport. Like you say, the guys are delivering in terms of the turnaround. Just in terms of your view there, is there anything you can say you're more inclined to keep that business going forward? Any comment there would be helpful.
I think Transport, as I said, very much an internal focus at the moment. Really pleased with what the team are doing. As I said on the last call, Jonathan, we've really focused around getting the return on capital employed in that sector in line with IMI's on average. I think if they can do that, yes, it will mean the margins are slightly lower, but we have to be a bit realistic about this. What they're doing in terms of driving working capital turns is really quite exciting, the plan hasn't changed. It's all around driving the new product introduction, driving the lean initiatives, continuous improvement really, really hard. Exiting some of the lower margin business, that basically on a risk reward basis doesn't make sense for us. Overall really improving the position of that business.
Very much focused on that. As you know, the North America market in particular has been very difficult for heavy duty trucks in the second half of last year. There's some early signs that might be improving, but, t wo months don't make a spring or certainly don't make a summer. Until we see a sustained improvement, we're very much focused internally, and we'll make the right decision for shareholders in the medium term if things improve in that market.
Very clear. Then maybe just one last question. Just in terms of M&A, obviously in your presentation, you talked about it quite a lot, but if we kind of look back, there really hasn't been a big deal since Q4 2022. I mean, can you just talk about what's happening there? I mean, you normally do a reasonably sized large acquisition, probably every two years, but obviously that hasn't happened. You know, just comments there why we haven't seen more M&A coming through.
Yeah, I mean, it comes down to our discipline really, Jonathan. We've always said that the number one priority is organic growth, right? We, you know, you understood right from the beginning the strategy and growth avenue. I'm just so pleased with, where our innovation was creating minimal growth last year to get GBP 200 million, over GBP 200 million of orders from business that we didn't even have pre-2019. It's just been a marvelous result from the Growth Hub teams, and we're just taking that to another level now. We're doing these completely cross IMI multi-sector sprint team pitches. We've just had one in Asia. We're gonna have another one in the U.S.
It's just a joy to behold how much validation of customer problems, customer willingness to pay, very fast test and learn solution development, including, as I said in the video, we're now using an AI agent as the fifth dragon. I hate calling us dragons, actually, but the dragons at the pitch are really helping the thinking of the teams to really try and create the most robust business case that we can as early as possible before we've invested much money to really test the market, test product market pool.
That, as you know, that's all part of the overall game plan of saying, right, how do we really consolidate organic growth around mid-single- digit, drive earnings growth and make sure we compound every year as we have done for the last five years, and as we wanna do for the next years and beyond that, right? Hopefully for many, many years to come. That's been the overall game plan. What we've done is say, okay, some nice bolt-on acquisitions and TWTG, as Luke said in the presentation, is a great example of where we've added sensing capability, which in the long term will help us drive Process Automation aftermarket growth even more, right? It's a great acquisition of fantastic technology, and we're really excited about where that's going.
Yeah, when the Growth Hub team say, "Here's a customer problem that will be enhanced through a bolt-on," exactly as TWTG was, that was found through the Growth Hub capability, and we can buy it at a sensible valuation. Remember, we're looking to get above our cost of capital within three years, and then we're not looking to be materially diluted to IMI's underpin, the 12% ROIC, which is a harsh ROIC measure with everything in the denominator within five years, right? That's easy to say, but that's not easy to do, right? That's what we're looking for on acquisitions. Last year we walked away from several. Our acquisition pipeline looks good. I have to say there's some interesting things in there, but we're not gonna overpay to the point that we can't get decent shareholder returns.
We're very proud of our returns track record, and we certainly wanna maintain it, Jonathan. That's where we are on acquisitions.
Very clear. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Great questions.
Thank you. In the interest of time, we are kindly asking that you keep to one question per person today. Our next question comes from Mark Fielding from RBC. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Morning. Thanks for taking the question. In terms of... I want to talk a bit more, you touched on pricing, can we take a wider comment on how you see pricing across the business? In that context, cost inflation, I suppose I'm thinking about some of the metal prices rises, how that might in fact impact businesses like Climate, but also probably equally thinking about how IA last year probably had positive pricing, so volumes were even a bit lower and just how you think about these things evolving into 2026. Thank you.
Yeah. I don't mind taking that one. I think across IMI last year, pricing versus volume was about half and half. We won't go into all the different specifics within the sectors, but I think we did a good job of winning the price inflation equation, as we look back into last year. I think as we look ahead into this year, we would think about a similar ratio. Clearly, if inflation pushes up on things like copper, our track record, our history of being able to push pricing through the market in high inflationary environments has been good. That always comes down to that fact that we're usually that single- digit percentage cost of a system, but a key component in the system.
We're just watching the inflation on things like copper and, yeah, anything that might come out of the conflict in the Middle East, and we'll go to the market if we need to on price later in the year.
Great. Thank you. I'm gonna really cheekily ask a really short second question, despite your nice lady just asking me to ask one. Can you just clarify in terms of your EPS guide, does that assume the full GBP 500 million buyback completes in the year? Or just so we understand what we're thinking there?
It's right. As we said, we assume in the Truflo Marine disposal completes in about the middle of the year, we assume the GBP 500 million share buyback, I think, completes towards the end of the year.
Thanks, Mark.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Kulwinder Rajpal from AlphaValue. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Good morning, everyone, and thank you for taking the question. Just wanted to clarify a bit on the power business within PA. I apologize if I missed it. When we think about the power business is it entirely combined gas cycle business for you or are there other components in it as well? When we think about the cyclicality or the lag of orders that is coming in the new construction, is it fairly current that there is no lag or is there a certain amount of lead time that is there in that business?
Yeah. Thanks, Kulwinder. Your line's not great either. I think what you said is, can you describe a bit more about the power business within Process Automation, how much of it's combined cycle, and then talk a bit about the lead times. Is that right?
Yeah.
Yeah. Okay, Kulwinder. Yeah, got it.
Yeah.
Yeah. As I said, the power segment was just under GBP 300 million last year. 75% of that is aftermarket. Of the new construction part, over half is combined cycle gas. There's other things in there as well. There's things like molten salt the solar systems. There's some coal-fired power in there, which is still reasonably strong in places like China and India as well, Kulwinder, on the new construction side and on the aftermarket side. As I said earlier, Kulwinder, the lead time typically is about a six-month lag. It has been historically from when we would see the orders from the OEMs, right?
That is likely to be going out now because they've gone from, let's say a normal demand level or even a low demand level to a very high demand level, and their order books have gone to multi-year order books now. I'm sure that time will go out now. Historically, it's been about six months.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Harry Philips from Peel Hunt. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Good morning, everyone. Just a question on Growth Hub and broader new product development, please. Just thinking about how more rapidly, if you like, the time to market Growth Hub is, given it's more customer focused. Given that collaboration with the customer and margins therefore a little bit higher than they would be on a more traditional new product launch. Just I missed the Truflo ex or Process ex Truflo orders, so on the organic basis. Just repeating those, Luke, would be very helpful, please.
Thanks, Harry. Great. Luke, if you wanna do the Truflo, ex Truflo.
Overall, ex Truflo orders are up 5%. New construction was flat, and aftermarket was up 9%. All excluding Truflo last year on orders.
Yeah. Again, I'd say our typical profile really over the last few years, very strong aftermarket. Holding our own on the OE side. That's that. Growth Hub, Harry, I think, I can talk for a very long time on Growth Hub. I'll try and keep it short. You're absolutely right on both things, but the fundamental thing about the spirit and the culture of Growth Hub is, number one, proper customer intimacy. In other words, really understand the acute customer problems that the customer's prepared to pay to solve, what their willingness to pay is. Let's say that you can make a customer's process go faster, you can make it more reliable. You know, what is that value worth?
How much of that value can we capture, and therefore what's the business case? To do that very, very early. All of that work to come up with a rough cut business case, we try and do it in 12 weeks, Harry. To give you an idea, that will be a much better business case than we would have done 10 years ago in terms of customer buy-in. Often to get to the next 12 weeks of Growth Hub, once you've done that first 12 weeks, we will be looking for some customer commitment because we know that you can spend a lot of money and customers will say, "Yeah, that'd be great if you can solve that problem." What we're really looking for is something.
It could be a letter of intent, it could be an order, it could be actually some joint investment. You know, there's a whole range of things that could signal that intent. What we're looking for is much more certainty that when we do develop that product, it will have genuine market pull, and it will achieve the sales. To give you a rough idea, 10 years ago, we were achieving only half the sales that we expected to in our new product plans. That meant that, IMI, and we try and think of IMI, okay, so how do we make sure, and we check this about three or four ways, how do we really try and make sure we are gonna grow mid-single- digit?
We think, okay, in a normal year, that would be 1% or 2% from our markets, 1% or 2% from price, 1% or 2% now from innovation. That's what we've been getting. In fact, last year, if you look at the incremental growth, it was closer to 3% from innovation, right? Which is fantastic. Remember, all the time you've got products coming to end of life as well.
Right.
Harry, you have to take that into your model to genuinely go mid-single- digit. I'd say Growth Hub has tremendously reduced the time to an effective product that will actually sell. That's really the most important thing because those products genuinely solve customer problems. You know, we've got about nine projects now that are delivering significant orders. Those products are things like Retrofit3D, where the power station is having trip outs because of the circuit that we're involved in, right? As you know, we're very strong in things like turbine bypass valves, which are very much at the heart of that process. They're at the severe part of that process.
Because we came up with a way of being able to retrofit and de-risk, you don't always have to cut the valve out of the circuit to upgrade the whole valve, you can upgrade the innards of the valve to our track design because we managed to do it through 3D printing and shrink the size of that technology. It goes in other people's valves as well as our own valves. What that means is that business has gone from something like literally zero to something like GBP 26 million. What it does for the customer is de-risk the decision, stop the trip outs that they got, which is tremendously high value. Exactly as you say, that is good margin business for us, accretive margin business. That's really what Growth Hub is doing for us.
One, give us more certainty that the product will sell in the numbers that we think it will. Two, give us more certainty that we are actually solving a customer problem and creating real value that we can then capture a decent amount of that value, Harry. You're absolutely right on both. But I actually think, Harry, if you think about it across IMI, we're still only at early stage. We've been in this for six years. There's still plenty of opportunity. If I look at the next set of projects coming through, I mean, some of them are really exciting. Obviously, not all of them will work. We have to accept that or you're not gonna innovate.
You're gonna end up with a culture where if you can't fail and you can't fail fast, people stop innovating, right? I think some of them have got tremendous potential for the next five, 10 years. They won't necessarily gain traction really quickly because they're in some of the customers' very critical processes, and that of course has got its advantages. In terms of innovation, it doesn't necessarily mean we get a very fast uptake, but it means we get long-term, sustainable, profitable growth, Harry, that's what we're trying to generate. Hopefully that answers your question.
That's excellent. Thanks very much indeed.
Thank you, Harry.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Stephan Klepp from BNP Paribas. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, good morning, everyone. I don't wanna bore you with orders too much in Process Automation, but I still have another one there. If we bear in mind that hydrogen was very strong in 2024 and very weak in 2025 because the drop of subsidies, isn't the order picture the 5% underlying ex-marine a little bit too conservative because we had an extraordinary driver in 2024 and then that was dropping in 2025? Is the conclusion that the orders that you see in Process Automation, having heard what you said about power, should start to rather accelerate because the low base effect is now gone? Sorry, the high base effect is now gone.
Yeah. Depends which way you look at it, doesn't it, Stephan? W e try to be careful with what we strip out and what we don't strip out because there's always a reason, right? We, Truflo Marine, I think we can strip out because that should complete around the half year. I think, there's ups and downs elsewhere. Yes, as I said, power is super strong. You know, really, really good for us. Last year overall up 20%, that whole segment to GBP 300 million. Great news. But a lso don't forget you got downstream, midstream, which is tough for everybody right now. Downstream, midstream was down for us, refining and petrochem down 22%, right? It's all, you know... You gotta take the whole thing into account.
You know me, Stephan, I certainly don't wanna oversell anything or overpromise anything. I think you're right, though. W e're saying, well, 5% underlying orders. We do expect sales this year to be more like 6%-7% up than 5% up. We do expect growth in that area. Let's see how the whole year shakes out. Clearly right now, as I said earlier, there's gonna be some volatility, right, because of what's happening in the Middle East. To offset that, we've got a very strong order book, as you can see, from what happened in the fourth quarter in Process Automation. In the round, we think as a base case, Stephan, 6%-7% growth, something like that to Process Automation in sales is about right this year.
Okay. Thank you. Then on the margins again. You said margins flat to slightly up because of the cyber investments. Is it as easy as understanding it this way that with the normal 30% drop-through, you would increase your margin 50 basis points? They're not coming through this year, and that 50 basis points you invest in cybersecurity. Is that how we should read it?
I mean, when I did the math, and I went through this on the last call, effectively over five years, on average, of course it's gonna change a bit with mix and things like that, but you're absolutely right. On average, we expect about a 30% drop-through from our mid-single-digit organic growth. If you do the math over five years, that moves you more towards 22% margins than where we are today, Stephan. You right way to think about it. As I said earlier, we really feel these investments in cybersecurity are vital. So far I have to say I'm really pleased with them. I think, we're going to a different level. It does not mean we cannot get attacked. Anybody can get attacked.
This is a race between the bad guys and the good guys, I think the good guys that we've got on board now are very, very impressive. We just wanna be the hardest door to knock on out there. That's our ambition.
Yeah, thank you.
Thank you, Stephan.
Thank you. We have time for one final question. Our next question comes from Richard Paige from Deutsche Numis. Your line is now open. Please go ahead.
Morning, all. Few of them made the cut, just about. I'll try and switch the focus from Process Automation to Climate Control, and obviously that big growth in orders, it looks like it's accelerated in the second half in data center cooling. Just wondering, I assume a reasonable chunk of that is to U.S. customers. I know there are technology constraints here, but does it make you think about U.S. as an opportunity slightly differently at all? Thank you.
I think, we were asked this question on the Q3 call, and I think it was slightly less than half of the orders were to North America. Actually, as we ended the year, we had a really strong fourth quarter of North American orders, and it's now over half. It's really focusing on that North American growth market. I think key is that understanding that a lot of the smaller data centers in the all installed base at the moment are all air-based systems. All of the newer, bigger data centers that are coming in are water-based systems, which is really in our sweet spot.
I think, yes, we are definitely investing, and some of that investment that we talked about earlier in LIFE TECHNOLOGY is specifically in North America for Climate Control to support growth there.
Okay. Thank you.
Thanks, Rich.
Thanks, Rich.
Thank you. This concludes our Q&A session, so I will now hand back over to Roy for some closing remarks.
Yeah. Well, thank you. Thanks everybody for joining the call. Thanks to everybody in IMI. Thanks to all our people. Number one, for a great year in 2025, I really appreciate that. Very strong finish, great cash flow. number two, for everything we're setting out to achieve this year. As I said, this will be, if everything comes as we expect it to come, our sixth consecutive year of mid-single-digit organic growth, and we're really proud of that, compounding track record. Thanks, everybody.
Thank you.