Good morning, everyone, and welcome to CSAM's presentation of the Q4 financial report 2021. I'm happy to talk about the Q4 and our previous year. Actually, we are celebrating something. This is the first time we have a complete year behind us after we got listed. So I'm looking forward to go through it with you. But let's start the usual way, remind us all about our strategy and where we are. First of all, the strategy we chose, being the focused vendor within the specialized healthcare has been a very good journey for us for many, many years. We're going to stick to that strategy and focus only on that type of software.
That has also created a position for us that didn't exist before, being the leading player within that segment, and also now, with much more growth outside the Nordics as well. It's a good place to be, and you might say in these times when there is so much uncertainty, even war going on in Europe, it's a good thing, a good business, a stable business to be in 2021 and 2022. When we look at the reason for our customer side, why are they actually using CSAM as the vendor? Most of the hospitals in the Nordics are actually having CSAM as a vendor, and a growing number also outside. Well, the reason is simple. The same reason as many of our employees actually are here.
Most of our systems, they are not only being important for society, but for big healthcare providers, for the hospitals, for users inside hospitals and acute care sector that actually helps the patient. The ultimate thing here, obviously, that we're doing something good while the business is doing good as well. I think that is a good way to describe us in general. Talking about the business, obviously we have put together a portfolio of business areas, and those are important. They are different in many ways, but they're also very similar. Similar in that sense that they are used over many, many years, often decades, these systems, and they support complex healthcare processes. That also means the business we have behind all these are long-term recurring revenue businesses. That is the similarity.
If you look at the very different things here, obviously you will see that they support the types of processes that are not the same, and also some outside hospitals like in acute care. If you look at the states at the moment, I cannot go through all of these business areas in detail, but I would like this time to focus on important things that has happened, especially in the Q4 . Then we can look at the bottom part of this slide. You will see that we have to the left and the one in the middle a very huge difference in size.
That is also a very important thing to understand about CSAM, because if you look at Health Analytics today, 3% and a NOK 15 million, roughly, turnover business, you can say that that is very small, while the other one, a bigger one, more than NOK 150 million, what is the difference really? Well, a few years ago, the Public Safety part of CSAM was the same. It was only NOK 15 million. Now it's 10 times that big. I think you should think about us exactly that way. That is the value creation behind our plan, is actually to make those smaller ones, the bigger ones. If you look at the whole picture here, it's a platform of stable recurring revenue businesses, different in size, and then we grow them through M&A.
That is the successful way we've created the leading position. Specifically, I'm going to go through especially Public Safety and also the blood management area, because since we're talking about the Q4 2021, things are going on that is relevant for you to understand the performance of the business. I think it's a great position now, a great place after our first full year after we got listed to actually look at our KPIs. What did we say and what's the status today? I would like to go through that deeper later today and also go through the numbers.
When I speak about the numbers, of course, feel free to pose any questions, whenever during the session, and I'll get back to that, and we can try to answer all the questions, or give you an answer after the session if we're not able to answer them all. Let's then go on to what happened in the Q4 . I think this is a time for celebration if you look at how we can measure what we have achieved, because this first year being listed and have a full year, that we were able actually to grow, and passing the 300 mark, and have sales of NOK 330 million is obviously something good.
I think if you compare to 2020, one thing is that the growth of NOK 100 million added revenue. If you look at just our plan we presented, as you remember, the 2025 NOK 1 billion plan, we have repeatedly said that to all of our stakeholders. That plan is the most important thing for our management and our most important KPI. At that point in time when we got listed, we had a year behind us, about NOK 200 million revenue, and that means it had to be 5 times that to reach NOK 1 billion. Now we reached NOK 330 million closing to three times to get to the same target. We really think that's something to celebrate, and it's a good place to be according to our plan.
That's the most important thing, I guess. If you calculate and see what is the pace we have to grow to succeed with our plan, it is about 40%, and that means we also here are a bit ahead of the plan, which is good. Also we are getting bigger outside the Nordics. That is really good because as many of those specialized systems and all of these specialized components, they are supporting processes that are really not a local thing. It's good, important things for healthcare processes that are global. The way we can do this is a combination of the acquisition strategy, but also package together components and add-on components so that we can grow organically in the Nordics and beyond in the future as well. That is a good thing for us.
Also I mentioned that we should focus a bit on what happened in the Q4 . I think our focus in the Q4 was definitely two of the business areas because of a very strong development. To begin with the Public Safety part, obviously we have in Public Safety, it's our biggest business area and not only the size itself, because size matters, has driven a growth there. Especially in the Q4 , we had to make sure that all the customers, of course, get what they want, and that requires a ramp-up for us.
I think the coming organic growth, most of that, is definitely coming from activities in the Q4 this year, because we have added new contracts, and it's not only the Nordic contracts we've had in Sweden, we've had in Spain, we've had in the U.K., and also in the U.S. I think that is a very important fact to understand when you look at the Q4 numbers, and obviously I will go more deeply into those. This is a strong thing, and it's generating growth going forward. That means we had to make some measures during Q4 .
If you look at the ProSang part, which is the blood management system that we are the leading player in the Nordics, delivering that to many hospitals and providers in the Nordics. We also, as we published last year, won a NOK 100 million contract. To win a NOK 100 million contract, what does that mean? The good thing with our business, the recurring revenue business, it's taking a long time to replace things, but that also means it takes a long time to implement things. It's even if you look at a NOK 100 million contract, how much did we get in 2021 of that? Well, it's about NOK 700,000. And why is that?
Well, we have to ramp up plan, creating projects, discuss with the customer before we implement and get the booked income. It's important for you when you look at our numbers to understand what we have to do to secure this income going forward after the Q4 . Also, the NOK 100 million contract is one thing, but on the back of that contract, we of course create new functionality, and that functionality is relevant not only to this contract, but also to all of the other customers. That means it's piling up a bit when it comes to the need for new deliveries, new functionality, and that is a good thing, obviously. On the other hand, it's demanding when it comes to how do you plan, how do you prepare before you get the income.
It's not a problem, it's just a challenge, and we've solved that. Through the Q4 , we have obviously worked to solve that through a ramp-up when it comes to resources. We have recruitment that has been going on for a while, and successfully we have at least got on board now 15 people. This recruitment is important to actually solve or to handle the growth going forward. Of course, that impacts, as you all see when you look at our numbers, and some of you might think, "Well, this is not good." I can respect that, if you see a minus 3% EBITDA for the Q4 , isolated, you can say this is not a good number.
On the other hand, if I go through it with you, which I will, you probably see that I would never make another decision than to use these costs in the Q4 2021 to secure the success of the new contracts. Also if you look into our numbers, you will see that the income quality is also increasing, and so is the gross margin. I think that is the most important thing when it comes to value creation. As the call out there says. Obviously, I will go through the numbers in more detail so that you understand how we have been doing this and why. Other good news, obviously the quality of income is actually increasing as well.
77% of our income in the Q4 is actually recurring. As recurring revenues within eHealth, specialized eHealth, are there for many, many years, sometimes decades. I think all of you, even whether it's bondholders, shareholders, would see that this is a very, very strong development for CSAM. If you look at the growth of recurring revenue, we are growing faster, the recurring revenue side than the top line, which is also good. That is a KPI showing that we are doing what we are saying we're going to do, when we acquire companies. Because when you acquire a company, normally they would have a mix of consulting and recurring revenue businesses.
We are very good at converting that and make sure that we do it the CSAM way and create more recurring revenue streams. It's a good thing for us in the value creation, but it's also a good thing for the customer because they get a more industrial, structured way of receiving the services and have an annual predictable payment, which we also want. It's a good thing, and I think these KPIs are the critical things to measure CSAM's real value creation. Then, of course, what happens in a year like 2021 when you acquire companies? I think you have to take into consideration if you look at our numbers that obviously we acquire four companies that are not performing well, if you look at how we want our business to perform.
On the other hand, why are we acquiring them? We are acquiring them because the income side, the customer core competence in these companies are really good. We have the methodology to make sure that these businesses can perform, but we have to do the work. This is how you have to measure CSAM. You have to look at what is actually going on and not only focus on one quarter, because then you will not see the complete picture. That means I have to go through the details of the quarter, but also what is actually going on with these acquisitions. Because if you don't do that, you won't see the value creation picture. That's one thing. Also, I think it's fair to say, are you sure you can do that?
Are you sure you can make sure that the value creation and the margin expansion is happening? Well, if you look at our history, what has CSAM actually been doing? That is what we have been doing all the time, and we have trained, we have a methodology. We also showed you before that we can go from one year in 2019 to 2020 and restore the margin. That's what we do. We plan to continue to do that. This slide shows you the simplicity of our history and our future. We're going to do exactly the same. We are the leading one in Nordics, we are growing in Europe, and we're going to continue. There's a lot of targets in the world, or even in the Nordics and Europe as well.
We see that the future of CSAM, we're going to be exactly as the history. We're going to grow through M&A, and we're going to integrate them and restore margins back to 30% as we grow. That's the recipe, and we're going to continue doing that. We have also shown that we actually grow outside the Nordics. I think this is not only about growth, but it's also about diversification. It's diversified the right way if you look at CSAM in a Nordic perspective with a very heavy part of our business now in Sweden. It's also, if you look at the diversification outside in the rest of the world, it's different countries like Spain, U.K., U.S.
I think this way, and all of them focusing on these smaller recurring revenue streams and put together, it's a very, very strong package for the future. I think also that shows that our ambition to grow outside the Nordics is also there, and the Q4 proves that. Let's talk about the numbers. The reported revenue in the Q4 was NOK 87.9 million. That is a growth, if you look at the quarter, and compare it to the Q4 in 2020, it's 42%. Then 44% is the whole year compared to 2020, which is very good. Then recurring revenue part, as mentioned, it's NOK 67.4 million, and it represents a growth of 51%. Those things put together, I think is the most important thing.
The reported EBITDA is -NOK 2.8. However, the gross margin is improving. I don't think this is a negative thing, and I'll explain in detail why we have chosen to do measures in the Q4 to secure growth. I'll go through that, and I'm sure you will agree that we have made the right decision. You see the capital expenditure itself is a bit lower, 6%, which is partly because, of course, we get some advantages being bigger, that we can be more efficient and share some of the development components. But on the other hand, it's also we acquire immature businesses that really doesn't have, you might say, a business-oriented focus on how to create business cases for their development projects.
Until we have done that, we will stay low with new acquisitions on the CapEx side. Obviously, the CapEx side also reduces the EBITDA in percentage also, obviously. That is the main highlights of the report. Then let me go through the income side and the cost side. If you look at the development here, obviously, the recurring revenue, which is the most important and valuable income for us, is growing fast. That is the most important KPI seen from the management side. If you look at the growth in other income types, well, it's as it is. It's a small amount of the licenses this quarter.
It's however a change with a lot of recurring revenues because some customers prefer not to have a CapEx contract and buy licenses, but rather increase recurring revenues. In that sense, it's not a negative thing. In total, with the turnover for the quarter and the part of recurring revenue is actually the KPI that matters on the income side. You'll probably see that from 72% in the Q4 , 2020 to 77% in the Q4 , 2021 is a very good development. I think that it will be in my head the most important thing. Then to dive into the actual development of the recurring revenue. Well, as you see, if you see rolling quarters, it's a very strong development.
It has been that all the way. As you all know, seeing on the right side of this slide, that obviously the strong customer structures that are behind that type of recurring revenue is also a very good safety for us and a platform for us. If you see the quarter billion actually now, Q4 , rolling quarter, but NOK 250 million. If you look at the speed into 2022, you will see that it's two hundred and seventy million already. It's growing strongly. I think we can say that both for our bondholders and shareholders, that this is a platform that is safe and predictable.
On the cost side, here we get a more busy slide, and I'm sure many of you want to understand how is actually this EBITDA happening, what is actually going on. If you look at it here, what happened in the Q4 2020 with the NOK 52 million cost, and then in the Q4 2021 is NOK 90 million. What's going on? Obviously, there are M&As that are important represents most of that, obviously. Of course, what is the action we have taken that also impacts the EBITDA? Start on the top there. First of all, the gross margin is very important. The gross margin is of course representing or showing you that we are actually focusing on selling the most important things with our business, the software.
That means there are less COGS, and that is an important, most actually when it comes to income quality development we have in that quarter. The cost, the one-off cost, you might adjust for that. We haven't done any adjustments, and we don't like that because our business is driven by M&As and heavy changes and heavy integration projects. We think since that is what we're doing, let's just report the numbers. We don't do any adjustments. I really want to explain to you anyway that there are obviously one-offs and let me go through it and why they are there. If you see here, of course, our BIB framework, buy, integrate, and build. We know that when we acquire things that the EBITDA margin will be diluted. That is completely obvious.
Then again, we have a structured model to actually handle that. We also had to, when we acquire so much and so big companies, when we add, like we did in 2021, around NOK 100 million in sales, it's obviously quite big compared to the business itself. We have obviously more things to do. In addition, I told you that these developments within the Public Safety and the LIMS blood management sector gives us also the possibility to grow further, in next year and the years ahead, and that need, we needed to ramp up the organization. That is the other part. The combination of one-offs and the expansion itself is of course hitting the margin. If you ask me, should we do it that way or not?
Yes, I have to do it that way to follow the KPI that we're really here for, to do the value creation and the growth, going forward as well. That's why it looks like it. Let me go through a bit more details as well. This is how it looks now, in the Q4 . Well, last year we had 16% EBITDA. Now it's -3%. Yes, it looks bad. On the other hand, if you look at the capitalized R&D, adjust for that, well, looking a bit better. The real thing here, we have actually one-off costs and what are they? What do you do when you buy, integrate and build?
Well, you have to off-board, you have to recruit, you have to change things in the operations of these companies. You have to integrate and then you do all of these things. Obviously, there are things you have to do one time. It could be accounting in an acquired company, you have to maybe have a parallel run in a quarter like the Q4 . You're taking over the financials and then into our systems. In this period, you will get a double cost, things you do one time. The summary of all that obviously is about NOK 13 million. If you wanted me to create a more nice Q4 , to put it that way, we could of course adjust for these one-offs, and also and talk about reduced CapEx, et cetera.
If we'd done that, obviously they will look differently. The combination of these two things is obviously then creating a picture as it is with a -3% for the quarter, isolated, seen. I see that if you put together these one-offs, well, maybe then we would look about the same we did Q4 2020, about 16% instead. It's, in the long run, it doesn't matter so much, but I think it's also based on the fact that this is a decision we are making, the growth decisions, making sure that we do the right thing, that we integrate the right way, and we have to do it like this. In a sense, it doesn't look that nice, but it's the right thing to do. That is our conclusion.
To all of you, I'll try to answer questions about these results, and how are we actually going then to restore it back to 30% EBITDA margin, which is our target margin, because that is exactly what we're doing. We are on par. The plan we have, the buy, integrate, and build plan, implies that we take these integrated acquisition targets for this year, 2021, integrate them, and we have a plan to do that. That is more important for you to understand this KPI, rather than specifically in the Q4 . That's why I'm going to explain to you how are we actually going to restore from a 13% margin, 2021 margin back to 30%. That would be the most important thing. We called it buy, integrate and build.
It's just the BIB. Well, what is it? It's actually what we've been doing for 10 years. It's a methodology and it's working, and we have shown that it works. I think it's very important that you measure CSAM, and by looking at these milestones, how are we actually going to do this? If you look at these milestones in the specific picture of CSAM per the Q4 2021, how does that look? This is how it looks actually. Why, when we now exited the Q4 2021, why is the margin 13%? Why can't it be much higher? Well, it could be. We could have done different things, but we had to do something to meet the growth coming up. We had to do that.
We had to do integration activities. We had to off-board the people to secure the growth and the margin expansion over time. We had to do that. What are these milestones then for these four objects? As you see, we are specifically and in a structure doing these activities per company to make sure that they are fully integrated into CSAM's organization. If you look at that, those M's are the actual parameters we use when we are using our management KPIs. When I measure our people, it's based on these milestones and not the quarters, obviously. That means if you put together the portfolio integration to secure the value creation and to restore back to 30% margin, then you will see this timeline.
We'll follow that timeline, and it's exactly how we said it's going to be, using 24 months per object, to actually restore the margin. On top of this slide, you see we did it before. If you look at the 2020 numbers, you'll see that we came from below 20% in 2019 and restored it back to 25%. If you adjust for the IPO cost we had in 2020, you're back to 30%. I think we don't adjust, we don't want to do that. As long as we've integrated all of those, our goal is to have, initially in the H2 of 2023, a running current operational business with 30% margin. That is how we do it.
You could ask me, in the Q4 , couldn't that be much better? It should be 13, it should be 20. Well, yes, it's possible, but I think the measures we made, the decisions we made, is based on actual growth, activity on the customer side. In this business, you have to ramp up first and get the money afterwards. It's not the opposite way. It's impossible. That's why we, why we're going to continue to doing it exactly this way. That's how we do it. That's how we measure the CSAM business and the management going forward. I would like to summarize a bit around the promises we have made, how we presented CSAM.
I think it's time to do that based on the fact that this is our first full year, our first presentation that you have a full year after we got listed. I think I want to repeat to you exactly what our communication had been and see where are we now. I think that will be relevant for us and for our stakeholders. To start with the growth, we have said all the time in 2020 when we IPO'd and also repeatedly in our quarterly presentations, that we will grow to NOK 1 billion in 2025. That requires the 40% growth annually. This is the first full year annual measurement and obviously 44% growth in 2021. I think it's fair to say this is really good delivery and according to what you should expect.
You should expect that going forward as well. That is what we think, and that's what we said. When it comes to organic growth, I know you want us to split organic growth. We've got a lot of questions, and if I get one today, I will answer the same today that we have had between 5%-10% organic growth back in time, the last five years. I know that the growth going forward has to be measured and presented. We got that feedback, and we will listen to you. We are not going to do that for the Q4 , but we are going to do that starting the Q1 , 2022. It is not because we are unwilling. It's simply because it's complex. The success of our model is actually full integration.
That means it's not easy to say, is this actually an acquired growth or is it an organic growth? When we cross-pollinate both the people, products, common customers, so in that sense, the success is really not measured as a separate thing. On the other hand, we can create some rules, some specifics. This is how we're going to measure it and then do it systematically the same way all over. That will be our idea for 2022 and the years to come. We will quarterly report organic growth and of course then acquired growth, and that is what we're going to do. Starting the Q1 , we will do that. We will not do it during the numbers now for the Q4 , for the reason I mentioned. That's organic growth.
Profitability. We have said 30% margin, but then again, we also said, which is very important for you to understand, obviously, you acquire these companies without an EBITDA, maybe some with negative results, put them together with a mature business that are stable and running, then of course, you dilute the margin. We will continue to do that. However, of course, each target will go through, be integrated with the same KPI, 30% growth margin after those 24 months. It is 24 months. It is not a quarter. We have to do it this way to secure the value creation, and we've said we're going to do that. Based on the 13% status we have now, to bring that back to 30%, that is what we're going to do in 24 months.
It's not something different than we did before, as we did the years before and also from 2019 to 2020. The same process, the same methodology, even the same people running these internal projects. That is the profitability. That is what we have promised, and that is what we're going to do. The same with the capital expenditure and the business cases on the software side. Of course, we have had more than 10% over the years. Now it's a bit lower. We would like also to be around 10% because obviously these are business cases. We create something and get money for it. On the other hand, we don't want it to be too high. I think it will be around 10% and 7% is a bit low.
We promised you around 10, it's a bit lower. What I think is very important with our status, with our promises and status today, we are a growing company, and we grow through acquisitions primarily. That is very important. We have to do that to get these recurring revenue streams. Otherwise, we have to wait for years. The tenders are few. They come up sometime, maybe once every third year, fourth year. With few type tenders like that, you have to get these recurring revenue streams through M&As. Within specialized healthcare, that is what has made the success. That has made it possible for us to pass the NOK 300 million mark in 2021 and with 77% in the Q4 recurring revenue streams of those. That is the combination of these M&As.
Now we have numerous pipelines targets in the pipeline, and we see that the negative trends in the market that are there is also good things. We see more incoming. I think the climate itself now makes it easier for us actually to acquire companies that are good for CSAM, fits very well into CSAM, but also with fair prices. Because we have been good at acquiring companies within one to two times sales, which is a good track record, and we will continue to acquire along those lines. I think we will also continue to acquire obviously in 2022 because that's what we're doing. That shouldn't be a secret. That should in a way summarize I think our promises versus where we are.
In my head, I'm actually proud to summarize this because we told you this and the status is this and, by all means, it could have always been better. But in a way, I think we have delivered what we said we're going to deliver, and we will continue doing that. I will also use this slide as a summary slide, and I will do that today as well. We have said that these five dimension in this slide is showing you something. One thing in the bottom here, the green thing is always important to remember with CSAM. The structural thing within healthcare, it's strong. It's not even the pandemic doesn't do anything negative with those other types of healthcare processes.
Also on top of that, when we chose this blue thing, it gives us a very, very strong special position. That is because these specialized components are there for many, many years. That has created the gray box. That is also a very important thing to make sure that you have a predictability in the business, a long-term predictability. Then if you look at on top of that, then you see the actions we're taking on the business side, which are completely simple in a way, is this organic growth that normally are between 5%-10%. Then you have the acquired growth. This is what we said we're going to do.
As I mentioned, in 2020 when we IPO'd, we had a turnover about NOK 200 million and said we're going to go to NOK 1 billion. We are now NOK 330 million. We are on our way, actually exactly, even a bit small bit ahead, the plan we presented to you all. I think, in summary, we are proud of the performance the last year. We are aware of that the EBITDA looks a bit negative for the Q4 , more than some expected probably. I hope that the explanation of the actual measures we're taking would explain why we did it. And we think it's the right thing to do. That is our summary of the quarter.
Obviously, we have some time to answer some of the questions, and I will try to go through them and maybe I can answer most of them. I'll see. Before that, just make sure if you want to follow us that you go into our website and that you register there to get news. I'll recommend that so you can follow the important milestone ahead, CSAM. Then let me try to look at this. Here is one. The BIB process means reported EBITDA margin always been ranged 10%-20%. That is a good question. It's not. It's depending on the situation when we acquire companies. If you looked at the slide I had, maybe I should bring it back here to explain that.
If you look at that picture, if we don't acquire anything in 2022 and the H1 year of 2023, then I will make sure that we have 30% margin. That is. Your question, does it mean that we're always in the range of 10%-20%? Yes, in a way, it's probably right because if I acquire something and the acquisition object would be a zero-performing business, for instance, for a NOK 100 million run rate. If I add that, obviously it will be diluted immediately. You have to get it back again. Obviously that is the obvious thing, mathematically.
On the other hand, if you look at the real value creation, if we stopped growing, it's not 30% that will be the target because then you can continue after you're fully integrated, then you can continue actually to trim it. You probably know since it's software with recurring revenues, that if you stop growing and create this much slimmer organization, that the EBITDA will be higher than 30%, obviously. But then again, yes, the BIB process is like this slide, and it's going to be that going forward as well. I'll try to find another here. Here's one from Ola. We can find you on your webpage. Is that not on the webpage? That is strange. It should be there, 8:05 A.M.
Maybe it's something in your cache. I'm sure it should be published, but, of course, we'll check that. That I'm obviously not able to check that while sitting here, but, we'll make sure it's there. It's definitely on the news web anyway. Here's one from Eddie. Yeah. Here's the link. Thank you, Eddie. That's good. We got one here. What is that? There's another one not able to download it. Well, I can't help you there. Hopefully, Eddie sent you a link. Yeah, you can use that one. Here we have another question. In your model, do the founder usually go for the next opportunity or are there cases where the founders stay? That is a very good question, and an important question actually.
If you look to use those examples we had in 2021, which are fresh ones, you will see that when we acquire like bigger carve-out projects like Carmenta, which is carved out from a much bigger structure, then it's a different thing. Obviously we try to keep the most important resources there, but then they are not normally the owners. We stick to the fact that we want people to move on, and they also done that in that case, where the management is there, but not owners being the fact that this is a financially owned structure.
On the other hand, like MedSciNet, which created our new niche Health Analytics, then you have people that are more than 70, so when they sell to us, it's more like a retirement situation than it's not so relevant to us. On the other hand, you had a CEO in MedSciNet and she's still with us leading the Health Analytics. We're taking care of the management and I think that is the most important, I think. Similarly with the last acquisition within Public Safety, Optima, we also had earlier owners and entrepreneurs being part of the company for some time. After a while, if they don't wanna be there, we also find solutions for those that don't wanna continue working.
Normally, for us the most important thing, key persons knowing the systems and key persons in the management will be the priority. There are different situation based on different types of projects. We have Oliver here. What kind of organic growth do you expect for 2022? Should it accelerate? You want me to answer that obviously. That's, I won't answer specifically. What I can say which is obvious. I've said we grow between five and 10% and those areas that I'm looking at the growth potential in those are obviously on the upper side and even sometimes over. It has to do with our general average growth in total. That's why I've said between five and 10%. I think it's going to grow.
It's not at least not going down now, obviously based on these actions that I explained in the Q4 because I see some of those areas will grow maybe over 10% and some between 5%-10%. It's different between the business areas, but those I mentioned are very strong and I see it's going to be growth not only 2022 but also the years to come because you have to remember it's important when you analyze organic growth which you do. When we get a contract like the one in Denmark, what is the organic growth based on that?
Well, as I mentioned, if I got NOK 700,000 out of NOK 100 million contract in the year I sign it's obvious that something is coming, and it's obvious that things are taking time. The good thing here is it's growing and it's also growing more over time. I think that's why we had to recruit as well because we have order reserves now that will take us, if we don't ramp up, it will take years to fulfill because project might take 12-24 months to actually implement. These are very complex software. That's why they are there for many years but this also takes time to implement them. It's high activity, it's supporting high growth and for some areas it will be around 10%, some of them may be over.
On average, I would say, it's still between 5%-10%. We don't wanna say anything else. We've succeeded with that for five years. We think that is what we're going to go for, but not on the lower side rather on the upper side of the interval this time, Oliver. Oliver is here again. I missed that one. Sorry about that. Maybe you have to post that again, Oliver. It slipped. What kind of organic growth do you expect for 2022? That was the one. Should it be accelerate? The other. That was the old one. This one I got it here. There you are. Revenue 2021 increased NOK 100 million, low, in light of the M&A and 5% organic growth.
Did you lose any business? No, we didn't lose any business at all. But as sometimes these businesses don't have things that we or have things that we don't wanna have. You saw a small thing in January, for instance, which is a scanner business that we divested. We don't want things like that. Sometimes we also have to get rid of other types of non-core businesses and non-core aspects. That's why I think that this is one of the reasons why I think it's important for you to understand when we want and you want to measure us on organic growth, which you will do from the Q1 , that we explain exactly and create those rules, what are organic growth.
Because if I then get rid of something I don't want, is that a negative organic growth or is it not? We have to look at that because the income quality is not, or is probably the most important aspect of organic growth. As long as the organic growth within recurring revenue are around 10%, that will be, in my head, the most important thing. On the other hand, obviously, we should measure everything, but the reason when we do things like that in the buy, integrate, and build phase, it will be like that, something will be discontinued as well. It's always a mix of things. It's also that part of these organic growth projects are also taken over time. It's not only selling something in a quarter and getting the result a quarter after.
It is a more complex thing. In a sense, I would say you see the organic growth we had when it comes to recurring revenue in the Q4 compared to 2020, which is very good, and I think that is what it's all about. Looking forward to report from the Q1 , and then you'll measure more specifically, going forward. Let's see. We got any more here? There's one anonymous one. There's another one. Here's Eddie. Yeah, closer to 20 or 30. I think I've always said that this business, the strong thing with this business is always that it, the recurring revenue streams are there almost forever in business terms. That makes it difficult to have a very, very strong organic growth.
However, it's possible to grow more than 10%, but in our business plan to 2025, we stick to the fact that we will measure around 10% as what we can go for because there are lags in the time to implement, etc. We will stick to that although it's obviously possible. As I mentioned, some of these areas will perform better than others and obviously be over, some will be a bit under 10. It's going to be. Again, I stick to what I said in our plan, 5%-10%, that is what we measure because the most important thing to me is obviously 40% growth and recurring revenues. That's what we have to do.
Whether it's 7% one year or 11, and it will change a bit within these different business areas, that's not my main priority, but I understand the question, and we will show you from the Q1 and onwards how it goes. JK, is there upper limit to how many companies you can integrate at once? No, not really. It's a good question. No, we can acquire faster, more than we did this year and grow with 40%. Because what we do is actually put those integration projects into the business areas. That means that, Johan Hedensiö, which is the Executive VP of the Public Safety sector, he got two integration targets this year or 2021 to put together and to fulfill the integration process.
While the Health Analytics is a new niche, which is also able to then integrate new Health Analytics targets into that business. That will be run separately. We have, of course, obviously the margin expansion portfolio approach to follow all the projects. Yes, we can run many, and that's the good thing with the model. This one, I'll just take it as sequenced as I can. Almost NOK 30 million higher compared to accounts receivables. I cannot answer that question while sitting here. I'm not able. That's too financial for me, but I can get back to you on that. I see your name. Is the BIB model the same regardless of size of acquire? If not, what is the main difference? Well, it's exactly the same actually.
Even if we acquire some small company, a NOK 10 million-NOK 15 million company, or we acquire something with a NOK 100 million, it's actually exactly the same. There are different elements of the process, but the three milestones, the integration projects are extremely important, and the same because we see that we have to do it the same way. We have to integrate everything. That means we have to have the same accounting principles, the same corporate governance, quality management systems, development methodology. We have to integrate. We do exactly the same. Obviously, it's easier to work a bit faster with smaller company. That's the only difference actually. Trying to continue here. How is the M&A landscape changing with regards to drop in listed public markets?
I think, as I mentioned, it has been more incoming to see some lately, based on the fact that it's harder, especially for smaller companies that have been our main focus to acquire and get more of those. It's not a good thing for equity companies, et cetera, to invest in those small companies. To us, they are valuable, to others, they're not. I think that is at the moment changing in our favor, actually, measured on the incoming calls we get, actually. Christian, when do you define the... Does this mean they will not affect Q1 2022? Yes. It means that.
Obviously, the Q1 2022, we will have a higher salary cost in general because you also get the acquisitions we got from the last year into the Q1 . Please remember when we report NOK 330 million for the Q4 2021, the Q1 2022, and the complete 2022 mathematics will be that our Q4 times four will equate to about NOK 360 million, to put it that way. Then if you look at that Q1 , obviously, that has a higher salary cost in general. It's based on the ramp up we've done. On the other hand, one-offs, yes. The one-offs are one-offs. That's the answer to that.
Oliver, I'm running out of time soon, but the NOK 100 million contract was part of your business. Well, the ramp up is really not the contract itself, as I mentioned in that slide. The ramp up here is much more, it's much bigger. This contract is more like, it initiated something because we have huge customer, many huge customers other than the national and the regions in Denmark. On the back of that contract, there's a lot of things happening here because the functionality driven by the national thing in Denmark is also functionality and newer, fresher technology that our other customers want as well. The queue of customers is actually a problem. We are not able to deliver fast enough, and that is not only the contract.
The contract is more an initiator and also part of it. That's the answer to that. That's a good thing for us, and that's the reason why we had to ramp up. What was this one? There is no report on the news. I hope that is not right. That would be very strange. I hope my people check that immediately. Can you talk about acquisition criteria? What areas are you looking for in a target? Well, yes. The criteria is important, and what we look for is customer base and competence, recurring revenues, highly specialized companies within eHealth. If that's it and we can take over that, it doesn't matter how they perform. That's the real criteria. I see I'm running out of time. Sorry about that.
Hopefully, I was able to answer most of your questions. I'll get back to the one I couldn't answer. Thank you for watching this time. I really hope that you feel that we performed well according to our promises and looking forward to seeing you soon again.