Good morning, everyone, welcome to SThree's Financial Year 2022 trading update. Thank you for joining us today. I'm here, as usual, with our CFO, Andrew Beach, who will take us through the numbers in a moment. We have delivered an exceptional performance throughout the year, materially ahead of initial expectations, with full-year net fee growth of 19% year-on-year. In line with our strategic focus on flexible talent, our contract business grew 23%, with perm showing a 6% increase. This growth reflects the strong performance across our key markets and STEM disciplines. Our deep STEM expertise and broad networks mean we can deliver quality at speed for both our clients and candidates. In doing so, we deliver our purpose of bringing skilled people together to build future, which underpins our vision to be the number one STEM talent provider in the best STEM markets.
After my first year as CEO, it is clear that our well-established strategy focused on STEM and flexible talent puts us in a unique position to win. Over the last 12 months, the wider group has been strongly engaged in building a really clear execution plan based on our analytical approach. We are truly excited and energized to capitalize on future opportunities as a team. During the year, we continued to make progress in the implementation of our wider strategy with targeted investments in our people, talent acquisition, and digital infrastructure moving forward as planned. These investments are designed to underpin our long-term sustainable growth, with most of the year's cost incurred in the second half as planned. We will have more on our technology investment program at our second investor briefing session on the 30th of January.
Aligned with our focus of being in the markets where we are best positioned to win, we're always assessing which regions represent the best STEM market for us and present the best opportunities to grow and accelerate our success. As part of this, we have chosen to restructure our operations in Singapore and Ireland. We remain committed to APAC and see Japan as an important growth market. We continue to be guided by our focus and disciplined approach. We are actively optimizing and investing in those markets where we can generate the strongest returns. With that, I'll hand over to Andy, who will take us through the numbers. Andy, over to you.
Thank you very much, Timo. Good morning, everyone. FY22 has been a very strong year, we've seen exceptional growth, with net fees up 19%. Pleasingly, this growth is across both contract, which was up 23%, and permanent, up 6%, as well as across all regions and all STEM disciplines. We've delivered year-over-year growth in our three largest markets, with Germany up 14%, U.S. up 13%, and the Netherlands up 34%. Together, these markets represent 73% of group net fees. We saw growth across all skill verticals as we maintain our strong and unique position in providing STEM talent. Technology, our largest discipline, grew by 23% year-over-year. As a reminder, when we talk about technology, we're referring to placing people with skills in technology across multiple industries.
Engineering grew 27%, while life sciences continued to grow, up 6% against a very strong prior year comparator. Turning now to each region, starting with DACH, which delivered a strong performance in the year with net fees up 17%. Germany, our largest country in the region, which accounts for 89% of DACH, saw net fee growth of 14%, driven by technology, with higher demand for roles within cybersecurity and open-source software development, and engineering, with demand for construction roles. EMEAR excluding DACH, net fees growth was up 24%. The Netherlands, our largest country in the region representing 47%, delivered an increase in net fees of 34%, driven by technology, with increased demand for project managers, ERP consultants, and data science roles, and engineering due to demand for process engineers, electrical engineers, and health and safety advisors.
The U.K.'s performance has continued, with net fees growing for seven consecutive quarters. Full-year net fees were up 23%, this was driven by technology as demand increased for roles within IT leadership, software development, and data analysis. In the U.S., we saw net fees grow by 13%, driven by growth in contract up 19% year-on-year. This was partially offset by a decline in permanent of 8%, which was unsurprising given our strategic shift towards contract in the U.S., together with strong prior year comparatives in life sciences, with a high number of vaccine-related roles in FY21. The overall growth in the U.S. was driven by engineering, with demand for roles within electrical engineering and project management, and technology, with a particular focus on roles within software developers and mobile applications. Finally, in APAC, net fees were up 42%.
Japan, our largest country in the region, saw net fees grow 47%, driven by technology as demand increased for software engineer roles. Average headcount for the year was up 12% year-on-year. We are continuing to target our investments towards contracts in the market and skill verticals that provide the best growth opportunities and where we can generate the strongest returns. As a result of this discipline and focus, headcount still remains slightly below the pre-pandemic levels. Due to record net fee growth, which has outpaced our headcount growth, we continue to see productivity well above historic levels, with FY22 productivity up 7% year-on-year. As previously guided, we expect productivity to remain above pre-pandemic levels, though it will reduce over time from the current exceptional levels.
The contract order book is up 19% year on year, reflecting the high demand for skilled contractors that we have seen across our markets and providing good visibility going into FY23. We have a strong balance sheet with net cash of GBP 65 million at the end of November. This, together with the recently refinanced credit facility, which runs until 2025, with an option to extend to 2027, provides us with the firepower for continued growth. I'll hand back to Timo.
Thanks, Andy. Our group has delivered an exceptional year with a second consecutive record performance. Towards the end of the year, we started to see a softer trading environment reflecting the uncertain macroeconomic conditions, and we continue to monitor these trends across our regions as we enter the new financial year. The strengths of our contract order book, robust balance sheet, and a diverse customer base underpins our business. We are confident the mega trends of digitalisation, decarbonisation, research-led healthcare, demographic change, and shifting attitudes towards work are the underlying driving factors behind the demand for STEM roles. This will continue to drive growth, albeit at different rates for many years from now. The continued demand for STEM workers, in particular, together with a shortage of skilled people, provides a unique structural opportunity. To illustrate, a recent McKinsey report this year highlighted some staggering statistics.
In Germany, for example, 780,000 additional tech specialists are needed by 2026 to meet the economy's demand. Globally, more than 3 million cybersecurity positions were unfilled as of 2022. The opportunity is large. We are confident that we have the right vision with a unique and resilient business model to deliver over the mid to long term. Wish you all a nice holiday season and a happy new year, and we will see us again the 30th of January for our full year results. In the afternoon, please have in mind we have our second investor briefing to cover our technology investment program and give you, as promised, a little bit more light on that one.