Good morning, everyone, and welcome to our full year results presentation for 2025. I'm Eric Lakin, CEO, and I'm joined today by our Interim CFO, Richard Webb. Very happy to be with you all again for my first full year announcement at TT. 2025 has been a year of transition for TT Electronics. It was a year where we faced clear operational challenges, but also one in which we took swift action to address them. Our focus has been on restoring operational control, strengthening our balance sheet and creating a solid platform for future growth. While there is a lot of work still to do, I'm pleased that we have delivered a stable performance and we enter 2026 with a much stronger operational and financial foundation. Let's start with a look at the headlines for the year.
Despite the macro headwinds we faced, we delivered results in line with expectations, with momentum notably strengthened in the second half. We saw improved operating profit margins and cash flow, driven by better execution and strict cost discipline across the group. Notably, our cash generation was very strong. We have significantly reduced our net debt and strengthened the balance sheet, which Richard will detail shortly. We have successfully restored operational control following the conclusive actions we took earlier in the year, particularly at the Plano and Cleveland sites, and I will cover this in more detail later. Performance was mixed by region, but for clear reasons. Europe performed strongly, driven by structural growth in aerospace and defense. Meanwhile, North America materially improved and we have ceased production at Plano as we complete the closure of that site.
Asia was impacted by softer macro-driven demand in EMS, but we view the region as better positioned operationally as we enter 2026. The next slide breaks down the specific actions taken during the year to build this stronger platform. First, Plano. Production has ceased and the site was closed according to plan. We saw a benefit in the second half from last time buy activity, but importantly, the closure removes a significant drag on our earnings going forward. Second, Cleveland optimization. We deployed specialist operational support to the site and results are clear. We have improved yield, productivity and customer service levels, including quality and on-time delivery. The site is now stabilized and on track to return to profitability. More on this shortly. Third, our components review.
We conducted a strategic review which concluded that the components business could potentially be worth more under different ownership, so we'll be testing that. We have separated its management to ensure more focus and oversight, and the board is currently evaluating a value-led disposal process. It is not a commitment to divest and it is subject to market conditions. This is a solid business and with the changes implemented, we are confident that it will be a positive contributor to the group. Finally, balance sheet stability. Working capital discipline has materially improved and we delivered strong cash conversion, in part due to successful inventory reduction initiatives in 2025. This work culminated in a significantly reduced year-end net debt and leverage positions. Focusing specifically on our Cleveland site on the next slide.
In 2025, we launched a business improvement project targeting operational performance with a focus on rework hours and productivity, and I'm pleased with the progress made. As the charts illustrate, we have seen sustained improvement with overall productivity levels now consistently above our higher target levels and rework much better than expectations. On-time delivery, yield and cost of poor quality have also all improved. Crucially, the Cleveland site is stabilized and its financial and operational performance has materially improved throughout the second half. There is still opportunity to drive further improvements, and the current focus is on the sales growth from existing and new customers to utilize the capacity available and further absorb overheads. Turning now to our next phase. As we look to the year ahead, our focus shifts from stabilizing the business in 2025 to a more proactive agenda for value creation.
On this slide, we have outlined the four clear priorities that will define this next phase. We have established a disciplined framework designed to drive sustainable growth and margin expansion built around four key pillars, which are one, a realignment of the business to focus on divisions as opposed to regions. Two, a targeted cost reduction program delivering material savings. As announced this morning, we expect to deliver approximately GBP 3 million of net benefit in 2026, an annualized savings of double this figure to deliver significant benefit in future years. Third, a sales transformation plan to upgrade our commercial capabilities. Fourth, portfolio optimization to improve synergies and margins across the group. I will take you through each of these in turn in more detail later. For now, I will hand over to Richard, who will talk you through our financial results.
Thank you, Eric, and good morning, everyone. I'll now take you through our 2025 financial results. Starting with our group performance. Against a backdrop of mixed market conditions, we have delivered a resilient financial performance that highlights the benefits of the operational actions Eric just outlined. Revenue and profit figures are presented on an organic basis. This reflects performance at a constant currency and with the impact of the Q1 2024 Project Albert divestment removed from the prior year comparative. Revenue for 2025 was GBP 481.4 million, down 2.7% organically, reflecting the strong growth in European aerospace and defense, which largely offsets the softer demand we saw in the EMS markets for North America and Asia.
Despite the lower revenue, adjusted operating profit increased by 2.2% to GBP 37.2 million, demonstrating in large part the success of the turnaround actions undertaken in North America. Consequently, our adjusted operating margin expanded by 30 basis points to 7.7%. This margin progression was driven by the turnaround in North America gaining traction, continued progress in Europe and tighter cost controls across the group, more than offsetting the decline in Asia. Adjusted profit before tax is up 5.5% to GBP 28.7 million, benefiting from the lower interest costs associated with our reduced debt levels. Adjusted EPS is 6.9 pence, down 37.3% year-on-year, reflecting the impacts of the higher effective tax rate of 57% as we cannot currently recognize a deferred tax asset for the U.S.
On a normalized basis, if we had been able to recognize a deferred tax asset, the adjusted effective tax rate would have been 25.4% and the adjusted EPS would have been 12 pence. Finally, we significantly strengthened our balance sheet, reducing leverage to 1.1x from the 1.8x this time last year, driven by net debt being reduced by almost GBP 30 million. Turning to the revenue bridge and focusing on the organic performance in the year. Europe was the standout performer, delivering robust growth. This was driven by sustained demand in aerospace and defense, where we're seeing structural shifts that are supportive to the business. This was offset by North America and Asia, where we faced volume reductions. In North America, the decline mainly reflects the EMS and components end market softness.
In Asia, the reduction was primarily due to ongoing geopolitical uncertainty impacting customer order timing, particularly for the automation and electrification sector. Now turning to operating profit. The operating profit bridge tells a positive story of execution. Despite revenue headwinds, adjusted operating profit increased to GBP 37.2 million, up 2.2% year-on-year. Overall, we delivered GBP 0.8 million of net organic profit growth. This is the result of operational gearing in Europe, where higher volumes and favorable mix dropped through to profit and the turnaround actions in North America, where the stabilization of Cleveland and the elimination of losses from Plano were critical. These actions allowed us to return the region to profitability in the second half.
Plano, which was significantly loss-making in the first half, generated around GBP 3.5 million of profit from last time buys in half two and contributed approximately GBP 1 million to the group adjusted operating profit for the full year. Revenue at the site was GBP 13 million in 2025. Production ceased at the end of the year, and this contribution will not repeat in 2026. The progress in North America helped offset the impact of lower volumes and transition costs in Asia, where we have been investing to support the transfer of production from China to Malaysia. Now I'd like to focus on the balance sheet, which is a highlight of these results. We've delivered a strong cash performance this year. Free cash flow increased to GBP 29.9 million, up 7.9%.
This was driven by a significant step up in cash conversion, achieving 150% compared to 117% last year. The primary driver here was our disciplined focus on working capital, specifically inventory reduction. We have successfully executed inventory initiatives across the group, resulting in a GBP 14.8 million contribution to cash flow. When combined with the GBP 12.8 million inventory reduction in 2024, that reflects a very pleasing GBP 27.6 million reduction over the last two years. This strong cash generation has directly strengthened our financial position as we've reduced net debt by almost GBP 30 million to GBP 50.3 million and leverage down to 1.1x . Balance sheet discipline will continue to be a key focus.
Earlier this month, we extended the expiry date of our revolving credit facility to June 2028 and reduced the size from GBP 162 million to GBP 105 million. This facility is only drawn by GBP 10 million currently, and in the next few months will be completely undrawn. Before I move into the regional performance, I will reiterate that from our next set of results, we'll be moving to a divisional reporting structure which better reflects how we manage the business. This means a realignment away from regions into three clear divisions, Power, EMS, and Components. Eric will talk about this in more detail shortly, and you can also find pro forma revenue and adjusted operating profits under this new structure for 2024 and 2025 in the appendix. Turning now to regional performance and starting with Europe.
Europe performed well during the year, continuing to be a structural growth engine for the group. Revenue grew 7.4% organically to GBP 144.4 million, driven by our sustained demand in our aerospace and defense markets. Adjusted operating profit increased 13.9% to GBP 22.1 million, with strong operational leverage expanding margins by 90 basis points to 15.3%. We are seeing strong order intake across A&D, and the trends are set to continue into 2026. Turning to North America. Revenue declined 3.7% organically to GBP 173.1 million. This reflects the volume reduction both at Cleveland and in the components businesses. However, operational performance improved during the year and the region returned to profitability. Adjusted operating profit was GBP 1.2 million compared to a loss of GBP 2.7 million in the prior year.
Margins recovered to 0.7%, a 220 basis point improvement. The operational turnaround was driven by two main factors. As Eric highlighted earlier, actions taken to stabilize Cleveland improved yield, productivity, and execution, materially reducing losses in the second half. In addition, production at the Plano site ceased at the end of 2025, removing a structurally loss-making site from the group, with last-time buy activity also supporting regional profitability during the year. We enter 2026 with a reset operational base in North America, which positions the business in this region for further improvement. Finally to Asia. Revenue declined 9.2% organically to GBP 163.9 million. This was due to ongoing reduced demand from EMS customers in the healthcare and A&D sectors, with continued geopolitical uncertainties delaying customer ordering.
Operating profit fell to GBP 21.6 million, with margins compressing to 13.2%. This performance reflects lower volumes and some transition costs as we transferred a major customer from our facility in China to Malaysia, which is now complete. Completing this transfer strengthens our resilience against geopolitical uncertainty, better positioning the region moving forward. On the next slide, we have broken down revenue by our end markets. Aerospace and Defense was the standout, growing 12% to GBP 152.8 million. This highlights our increasing exposure to structurally attractive markets where defense spending continues to rise. Automation and Electrification softened by 13%, reflecting the macro and geopolitical uncertainty that caused customers to be cautious with order placement.
Healthcare was down modestly by 4.3%, primarily reflecting reduced U.S. research grants and funding, though our pipeline in medical and life sciences is healthy and this remains an attractive market for TT. Distribution declined 4.7%, which was expected as component demand continued to normalize post-COVID. Overall, the strong growth and positive structural trends we are seeing in aerospace and defense give us confidence. Whilst other end markets have not performed as well as we would have liked, this largely relates to macro-driven softness of demand. We enter 2026 in a better, more stable position. Thank you, everyone, and I'll now hand back to Eric.
Thank you, Richard. I think we can all see there is an improving picture and a stronger financial base for TT. I will now return to the four priorities for our next phase before touching on our customer base and finally look at the outlook for 2026. First, our divisional realignment. As we have mentioned, from this year, we are shifting how we organize and present the business away from our current regional structure, managed as Europe, North America, and Asia, to a product-led divisional structure. The group will be aligned around three clear divisions, Power, EMS, and Components. Why are we doing this? It aligns us better with our customers, capabilities, and markets. It enables us to develop and deliver more coherent strategies aligned to divisions that have different technologies, characteristics, and routes to market.
It also creates clearer accountability for product development, sales, and planning. As part of this reorganization, we will devolve further responsibilities to the operating companies to enable a more agile business with faster decision-making being made by those closest to the customer. This also facilitates a simplification of the organization structure, including an element of delayering and increasing the accountability of performance to the sites. As mentioned, pro forma divisional breakdowns are available in the appendix. Second is our cost reduction program. To support this leaner operating model, we have initiated a targeted cost reset to permanently reduce our structural overheads. We expect this program to deliver around GBP 5 million of gross benefits in FY 2026, which will be a net benefit of approximately GBP 3 million after implementation costs. Looking further out, we anticipate annualized savings to be around double this year's level.
This is a program that directly supports our margin progression goals, and we will share more information as the year progresses. Third is sales transformation. We are upgrading our commercial capabilities and bench strength, particularly in North America and Asia, and investing in business development talent, tools and processes aimed at delivering improved pipeline, order intake and pricing discipline. In particular, there is a renewed focus on new customers and new product introductions, with these activities already bearing fruit as there's been a significant increase in new business wins in recent months, especially in North America. Finally, portfolio optimization. As a management team, we continue to review the group's portfolio on an ongoing basis to ensure it remains aligned with our strategic priorities and areas of competitive advantage. Our strategic review of the components business is now complete.
The board is actively evaluating a range of options, including a value-led disposal process. As mentioned earlier, we are not committed to a sale. Our current focus is on improving margin quality and returning the business to being a value-accretive part of the group. Looking further out, we have restarted early-stage prospecting activity for targeted strategic bolt-on acquisitions that strengthen our core capabilities and reach, especially in the power electronics sector in which we have developed a strong capability and market position. All in all, we see these four priorities as being key to the next stage of TT's growth and delivering value for all our stakeholders. I would like to spend a bit of time looking at some of our customer relationships.
During my first year at TT, I've been able to see our client relationships in action and understanding the significance of these relationships gives me great confidence. We serve some of the world's most respected and demanding companies across our core markets, and these companies choose us because we operate in the mission-critical space. Whatever the requirement, our customers rely on TT for precision, reliability, engineering capability, and production excellence. These are not transactional relationships. They are deep, multi-year engineering partnerships. We seek to solve customer needs, typically in regulated markets for demanding specialist applications. This diverse blue chip customer base provides us with resilience against market cycles and is a foundation upon which we will build our future growth. I want to highlight what one of our partnerships looks like in practice on the next slide.
Edwards is a customer we have supported for more than 15 years. They supply solutions to the semiconductor capital equipment market, and we provide a full tier EMS solution spanning PCB assembly through to complex high-level assemblies and specialist testing for vacuum technology. They operate in a highly demanding sector where precision and reliability are non-negotiable. By providing everything from comprehensive test development support to supply chain transparency, we give Edwards the confidence to meet their own commitments. It is this level of deep-rooted reliability that allows us to grow alongside our most specialist global clients. I recently met with a team at Edwards, and they conveyed the importance of our ongoing relationship to their success and the future growth of the business.
As this example illustrates, our partnerships with customers go well beyond the supplier-vendor dynamic, and we are deeply integrated with their processes to help create value over the longer term. Finally, turning to outlook. TT enters 2026 on a firmer operational and financial footing. We have taken swift action to improve operational performance and are aligned on a clear strategy moving forward, underpinned by the growing strength of our balance sheet. We have high exposure to the A&D market, which supports growth and margins across Europe and North America in what will now become a significant portion of our power division. While we do expect some continued softness in EMS markets, I remain mindful of the ongoing geopolitical uncertainty. Our focus is firmly on what we can control.
The operational and cost actions we have taken are expected to continue driving margin improvement and better execution across the group. The North America turnaround is now becoming a tailwind, with losses in the first half turning to profits in the second half. The significant improvement in the region, together with the cessation of production at Plano, gives us a cleaner, more stable earnings base moving forward. Cash generation also remains a key priority. We will continue to focus on working capital discipline and operational efficiency to support strong cash conversion. With leverage now reduced to 1.1x and our financing facilities extended, we have significantly strengthened the balance sheet and increased our financial flexibility.
We expect 2026 revenue and adjusted operating profit to be in line with current market consensus, and this reflects a more stable, higher quality and more resilient business following the actions taken during the year. 2026 is about consolidating the operational progress we have made, maintaining margin discipline and continuing strong cash generation as we build a stronger platform for a return to growth, better placed to capitalize on opportunities as they appear. While there is still more work to do and there remain external factors and market uncertainties, we enter the year with a more focused business, a stronger financial position, and a greater confidence in our ability to deliver further progress. Thank you very much for your time this morning. I hope you'll agree that this is an exciting time for TT, and we're looking forward to sharing our progress moving forward.
Richard and I are now very happy to take any further questions you might have.
All right. Thank you. Mark Davies Jones from Stifel. A few things, please. On the change in divisional structure, does that effectively get us back to where we were before the move to the regionals, or is there a difference in what allocation you do between those divisions? If you're devolving more responsibility to the operating units, are there implications for the divisional management teams? Are you retaining the current team or are new people coming in? The other one is the step up in sales investment. Does that consume some of the benefits of the cost savings plans? What sort of investment financially does that involve?
Great. Thanks, Mark. I'll take each of those three. The new divisions are very similar to, but not identical to the previous divisions. I don't, you know, I think, I mean, there's a couple of differences. For example, Sheffield is power, not components as it was before, and Fairford is also power, not part of EMS, which it was before, or GMS in the previous name. Broadly similar. The divisional structure we've got now was really designed to be, to put all the sites with similar characteristics together. It's much more coherent. The components division is therefore what we've separately been running internally already, but without the Plano production.
The whole scope of that is within the review currently?
Correct. Correct.
Thank you.
Correct. In terms of the impact of the regional teams, I mean, in effect, it is part of the cost reduction program. It is separate but partly facilitated or enabled by the divisional reorganization. For example, with the executive team, we've gone effectively from four regions, so three plus components, to three divisions. That's four to three. The divisional teams will be significantly smaller than what was previously regional teams. There's that, the element of delayering. It points around putting more responsibility to the site teams and leaders. Much of the saving is around what was previously the group functional costs. Support, particularly in the sort of non-primary functions, supporting the regions and the teams, those responsibilities are covered effectively by the sites.
There's been a lot of reduction in that area. Your so you-
Just the cost of the investment in the sales.
The sales, yeah. I think there is some net increase in cost for BD. Really important that, with all the short-term benefits of cost cutting, we don't forget really our mission is to grow the top line and drive profitable growth. I mean, overall, the actual change in the business development function, including sales, commercial teams, won't be materially different from prior year because we've also had some evolution of the sales team. We focus part of the sales transformation as a high performance culture, and as you expect in that culture of sales teams, there'll be some people coming in, some people going out. There'll be a net increase in heads, though.
there'll be a modest absorption of some of the net savings, but it's quite small compared to the headline savings.
Great.
It certainly should pay for itself on a. Yeah.
Yeah. Thank you.
Morning. It's Andrew Simms from Berenberg. Just a couple of questions around pricing initially.
Yeah.
I mean, you talked about sales transformation. It'd be good to get.
Yeah.
Maybe a little bit of a feel for where you're seeing the benefits of pricing coming through. Maybe some examples of how that's coming through there. That'd be great. Following on from that, in terms of new business, you know, in terms of new logos as well, how should we think about gross margins and that business coming through, how that supports medium-term operating margin ambitions? Thanks.
Okay, great. Thanks. Yeah, first, thanks, Andy. On pricing, there's two parts to it. It's existing contracts and new contracts. With the former, we've done a review of large customer and contract margins, in particular around Cleveland. We did customer product profitability analysis, covering, you know, close to 100 different contracts, and that was quite insightful. That revealed really a handful, so you can Pareto these things, a handful of opportunities where the margins are not what we'd need or expect, and some are very low, in a couple of cases, actually negative. There's a legacy there, and part of it's getting the right standard costs and rigor around bids.
We had, with the visibility we have in some of these cases, a contractual ability to increase prices with existing contracts. Some of the, particularly in the Aerospace and Defense, we've got the right to have a transparent cost review and apply appropriate margin. We've had two quite significant successful price negotiations and outcomes at the back of last year, which will have ongoing benefit this year. That's been helpful. It actually shows, you know, these aren't easy discussions to have, but the customer shows they value and need ongoing support. Going forward, it's a point around sort of bid and pricing discipline.
We've got a good rigorous bid-no-bid structure in place, so we make sure we make the right decisions. It's not just about pushing the highest prices. For components, for example, we had you know a sort of particular mandate, not accepting margins below X%, and actually we turned away some business that would've been contributing to our bottom line. In some cases, by exception, we take a different view for certain contracts where it's making a positive contribution. You certainly want to cover at least all the variable costs, direct costs, and actually and get some scale and cover the overheads. It depends on the circumstance. Overall we're tracking that as a big important part of it.
In terms of new logos and the impact on margin, I mean, it varies. I mean, I think there's typically, particularly some EMS contracts, I mean, overall, the margins will never be as high as say in other parts of the business. You'll see that come through in the new divisional structure, and that is the nature of it. I mean, you look at our peer groups typically in EMS margins, and they're typically mid- to high single-digit percent. As we get new logos, we're still pricing them to ensure we get profits from day one. We're not doing any sort of cost entries. A couple of examples.
Recently, we've got our first new logo in North America in agricultural drones, another one in data centers. We are quite well aligned to meet their needs and make profits. There is business out there we could win that we'd lose money on, and we've been very disciplined. Focus on profitable growth, not just top line.
Great. Thank you.
Good morning. Alex O'Hanlon from Panmure Liberum. Just a couple of questions from me. Firstly, just on the Cleveland productivity improvement, it's a good chart that you have in the deck, and you can see how that's progressed over the year. It's interesting to see that the improvement has tracked the, I guess, better targets throughout the year. Are we at the target level that you want to see now, or is there further progress to go? The second question is just on capital allocation. You mentioned the possibility for bolt-on acquisitions in the future. I was just wondering on the dividend, what do you still want to see in terms of progress before you reinstate it?
Okay, thanks. Thanks, Alex O'Hanlon. In terms of productivity improvements, I mean, right. It's very pleasing when, you know, when you implement initiative and you can see the evidence of that. Productivity, I mean, the way we define it is it's total hours spent on a product divided by total standard hours expected. We set it at 75%. We're in excess of that, which is good. I mean, in practice, the way that is measured, you're always gonna have some element of training time, vacation, what have you. The similar measure is efficiency, and its equivalent to that is more like 90% or so. It's where we're expected to be. Could we push it harder?
We're always trying to do more and more, and by getting higher productivity, that manifests itself in improved profits by either having more capacity to do more or we can reduce headcount. I think it's where I'd like it to be. I think, you know, and we wanna sustain at that level would be a good outcome 'cause there's many other factors as well, including quality and the ability to also. There could be a period where we have a slight impact. We bring in new product introductions, and that has an impact as we get the standard costs delivered. In terms of capital allocation, I mean, look, we. A priority last year was absolutely focus on balance sheet strength, resilience, getting the gearing down and the refinancing.
Richard and team, and Kirsty's here with us as well, head of tax and treasury, has done an excellent job resolving that. It's nice we're getting these questions now looking forward. I think we're very mindful of the, obviously, a lot of uncertainty at the moment. Very mindful of maintaining a strong balance sheet. The dividend position, the board will continue to review that going forward, and we'll have an update at the interims, and make sure we're making the right decisions in the medium to long term as well for shareholders. I mean, there's other options available, of course, whether it's share buybacks or acquisitions. You know, on the acquisition point, it's, you know, it's too early.
We need to be good stewards of the business, prove that, be more reliable and consistent in our delivery against promises, and prove we are a good owner of businesses. It's also true these, you know, cultivating targets can take a long time, so we're right to start that now. There's definitely a runway of opportunities out there that could be additive to our business. It partly depends on opportunities that arise, and then we make the best decisions at the time.
Perfect. Thank you. Sorry, can I come back for one more?
Yeah.
Which is around the moving parts of this year and the guidance you're giving, 'cause obviously there's a lot of underlying progress, but the guidance you sort of stood behind this morning, the top end of that is flat year-over-year in profit terms, and the bottom end of it is obviously a step down. You've got a 1 million GBP headwind in terms of the full year contribution from Plano?
Yeah.
You've got strong growth in Europe in the A&D business ongoing. You've got presumably better underlying performance in the U.S. we should have year-on-year, and we've done the big transfer in Asia. Can you talk through the other headwinds? Is it just volume in EMS?
Mm-hmm.
Yeah. Rich, do you wanna pick that up?
One aspect is margins in Europe now power. There is some beneficial mix within 2025 that won't repeat in 2026. There will be some softening of power margins as we go into next year. But yes, it is the ongoing softness in EMS continues to be an area where we're being cautious for the 2026 outlook. That is the kind of primary kind of driver of why you don't see 2026.
It's okay.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Any commentary by end market within that EMS?
Yeah. I mean, I'd just add, I mean, big picture, there's obviously a lot of uncertainty, and it, you know, too early to call what the impact would be with the current situation in the Middle East. There likely be some level of inflationary impact. We've not yet seen any constraints on raw material and supply chain, but they might occur, and they could have an impact. Obviously got energy price rises, which could ultimately impact some of our fabrication costs, particularly where we use furnaces and so on. It's early days. We don't know, and it's unclear what the impacts would be in terms of customer demand patterns, as well. I think there's a broader, you know, caution around inflation and the impact of that on the business, which we're obviously taking countermeasures to that with the cost reduction.
I mean, by division, I mean, there's the components business, I mean, at two months in, so it's early. We're showing signs of good resilience, which is encouraging, but the lead times there are quite short, so we don't get the visibility of that division as we get for power or EMS. In terms of end markets, we're seeing clearly ongoing strength in A&D. I think we have good growth in 2025. I think sort of continued growth in 2026. But we're not, you know. A lot of the very large contracts we won last year are multi-year contracts. Just to, you know, temper enthusiasm, we're talking single digit growth in 2026, not necessarily double digit.
Look at the various markets across EMS. Healthcare remains somewhat subdued, and we're expecting hopefully to pick up towards the second half of the year, particularly around healthcare spend, and that feeds into R&D and specific programs. Semiconductor CapEx is a very interesting one. That was down last year, which might be surprising given the trend in that sector, but there's two elements to that. One, specifically to us, there was some additional safety stock ahead of the transition from Suzhou to Kuantan, so that had an impact year-on-year for 2024-2025. Actually, our customers who provide equipment for fabrication facilities, there's a little bit of a soft market 'cause it's really about upgrade to new facilities rather than the production itself rate of semi chips.
We are seeing signs of improvement in that sector. The conversations we're having now with a couple of our customers are encouraging. We should see a pickup in that. You know, and that, obviously, it starts with pipeline, and then orders, and then that feeds into revenue. I'll be, you know, interested in how that pans out through the course of this year. Other general industrials is relative. Yeah. It's a mixed bag, whether you're looking at specialist industrials, rail, and the other sectors we serve in EMS. It's sort of a mixed bag.
Yeah.
At a key point around EMS, 'cause I think overall, we're not expecting to see growth in EMS this year. This pivot to regional supply chains and moving and investing in regional and domestic sales is looking like it will pay off, particularly China for China regional sales.
Yeah.
We'll see. Hopefully see progress of that through the year. We're sort of cautious at this point in the year.
Thank you. That's really helpful.
We've got a question from online from Joel at Investec. Can you quantify the costs associated with the customer transfer from China to Malaysia impacting the APAC division? Is that process now complete? Are there any signs that the rate of APAC revenue decline is stabilizing, or are you planning on it being lower in 2026?
Okay. Do you wanna cover the cost piece and I'll
The overall cost was around about GBP 1 million to OpEx, and then some limited CapEx investment as well, and that transfer is now complete.
Thanks for your questions, Joel. I think it's complete. We've had success. It was a crucial project last year for a large customer, and all of the first article inspections have gone through well. We're now in the process of spinning up volume production. That will be key next stage of that process this year. I think overall, we will see a reduction in the decline we saw in 2025. As I mentioned earlier, we're not expecting return to growth this year 'cause APAC is really driven by the EMS markets. We're seeing a level of stabilization and anticipating a reduced decline this year.
Crucially, the lead indicators we have is what does the order intake look like in pipeline to drive growth certainly beyond this year and potentially see that coming through in the second half. Overall, we're, you know, being conservative about around our forecast assumptions for 2026.
Thank you. There are no further questions from the webcast, so over to you for any closing remarks.
Okay. Well, look, thank you all for coming. It's great, good to see a full room. Thank you for your interest and time, and appreciate it. Look forward to seeing you all at the interims, if not before. Thanks very much. Have a good day.