Very much. Welcome to this recorded conversation where we try to summarize the past year in White Pearl Technology Group and take a quick look at what lies ahead. My name is Pieter Nelmul and with me on this call I have our CEO Marco Marangoni and our founder and strategic advisor, Ibrahim Laher. Let me first turn to Marco. How would you briefly summarize all that has taken place in White Pearl this year?
I think we had a really good and excellent year in terms of results, in terms of improvements. We made a really great change in our organization. But to be honest, it's not the first time. We are having overachievement every quarter. Basically it's if I don't mind, in the last two or three years. In the last three years, in every quarter we had overachievement. So it's just to close my consideration, I think we made a really good job even for the next years. This is what I think, so great result and good start for the next few years. This is my.
What would you say are the key strengths of this group, and in your view, what are the main weaknesses?
Okay, well, the strength is our people. Our people are the strength. Because without our people we couldn't in any way achieve what we did, what we had, our results, our performance. So my main consideration, my main gratitude, my main thought is on our people. We are here because our people. So this is the big strength point. Of course.
We are a pretty young company thinking in the listing, so we needed to learn a little bit more. But we also need to work in increasing, improving better and better different areas in our organization. There is a work in progress so we can do better. This is what I think. So it's just the time to finalize our work improving our organization.
Is there a moment from this year that made you especially proud of your team and what feedback from clients in this year mattered most to you as CEO?
Well. I think I'm really happy. This is not a moment, a real moment, a period because during every quarter we had really good results and we did a good job with our customers. We received definite good signals, good signs from our customers, and I think the main sign is the upselling. If the customer is willing, is asking us for providing them more services, it means that this is the best feedback we could have from our customers. This is what I think.
Thank you. Let me turn to Ibrahim, who is not only our founder and strategic advisor, but also our prime driver. Acquisitions, I think, is fair to say, and Ibrahim, 12 acquisitions in 2025. Is this the pace that we can expect going forward, and with this pace, how do you ensure that integration does not become a bottleneck?
Yeah, I mean, look, I think no, we should not be expecting this pace. I think 2025 has been pretty unique and almost an acceleration phase, not a permanent run rate. We believe that this year reflects several factors coming together at once. A strong pipeline that we've built over time in many different geographies. I think favorable valuations in our target segments, which I think is a very, very important point.
There's certain areas in the world where the valuations are currently favorable for IT companies and then also I think internal readiness to integrate multiple businesses together. We've been building a platform in White Pearl for many, many years to, I mean, be able to scale acquisitions, to be able to scale organic growth, and I think that's what's come together this year. I believe going forward, Peter, the pace will be selective and opportunity driven, not volume driven.
As we have communicated, there is a specific focus on Sweden and Europe going forward. Is this the right next step and is it not a distraction from the profitable emerging market base that we have?
Look, yeah, I mean Europe is not a replacement for emerging market base. It's a multiplier. What do I mean? I think Sweden and Europe, the Nordics, offers us higher multiple revenue streams, stronger enterprise and government clients, I think credibility with institutional investors as well as then a natural home market for us. We are a Swedish company, but at the same time our emerging market platforms remain highly cash generative delivery hubs and growth engines. And I like making this point. That White Pearl has been profitable from the first month that we've been in existence, March 2019, and we continue to be profitable month after month hence. I don't believe it's a shift away from what works already, but rather a front office in Europe within a delivery and scalability globally.
With the recently announced loan facility from Fenja Capital, our available capital for investment has increased. But the loan facility costs roughly 12% per year. If it's going to be fully utilized, why take expensive capital instead of slowing down acquisition rate or raising equity?
Sure. I mean, good question, right? I think because firstly, speed and flexibility matter more than sometimes headline cost. Also, you need to know that we operate in emerging markets and the cost of capital in those markets is significantly higher than what they are in Sweden. So whereas the Fenja loan may then seem a little bit expensive from a Nordic perspective, if you look at where White Pearl earns money, and I mean our return on equity, definitely the facility is non-dilutive. Okay. If we draw allows us to act decisively and on time with time sensitive acquisitions. And I think ultimately equity still remains a very expensive currency when issued. So hence taking all of that into account. Peter, we believe that the loan facility with Fenja Capital is very good from a shareholder perspective and ultimately will help us continue growing. White Pearl.
We have seen that we have already utilized SEK 25 million from Fenja and we have another SEK 25 million to be utilized if we would choose so. How do you see these? Can you give some indication on where this money, you believe this money will be deployed?
I think the majority or the whole Fenja facility is designed to be used for acquisitions only. The company is very profitable. Like I've said, we are generating cash in our existing core businesses, core markets. That money is historically. Those profits have historically been used to drive our growth, both organic and inorganic. What the Fenja Capital loan does now is that it allows us to target acquisitions in markets such as the Nordics and Europe, where upfront consideration of cash becomes more and more important. What this means is that the current profits that we are materializing in our existing operations can then be used to grow our business organically and to actually accelerate growing our platform.
Okay, thank you very much. And back to Marco. In the light of the 2025 performance, how do you see this group over the next, the coming, next five years?
I think the projection is pretty much interesting because we are analyzing all the opportunities coming from the different markets where we are currently working.
And.
We have a different, and the reality is every market has a different kind of opportunity. If we are thinking in Europe, we can see my view. We can absolutely in the next few.
Years.
We can raise, increase our ranking of the best consultant and software and developers and product developers in the region. We can absolutely. We are already able to provide interesting services in the artificial intelligence sector where definitely we had a really big growth during this year. So I think and thinking in the other markets where we have a more mature presence, such as in Saudi Arabia, KSA, South Africa, Emirates, in other places there are another kind of needs. These are economies that they are growing really faster than other economies. So their budget is increased and we are there in order to support them and provide them the right services and products according to these needs. So I see a really huge development of our revenue in the next few years.
I'm sure that we will absolutely achieve the targets that we announced, we forecasted in the press release we shared with our investors.
In the near term for the upcoming year. Is it the AI and intelligence layer rollout that we call branded as Nexus? Is that the biggest opportunity near term?
I think so, I think so. I think it's one of the, of the main opportunity we absolutely are able, we will provide that we will develop in the next few years, but I think we have more and more because we have also the opportunity. We have developers working in the artificial intelligence area and we can also provide customized projects also for our customers. My opinion is we are, we will provide more solutions related to safety, data related, analytics related, predictive, so we will do a really nice integration with older technology currently adopted by different customers in the world and of course in the territories where we have presence.
Thank you very much. Ibrahim, you founded White Pearl in 2019 and listed the company on Nasdaq Stockholm in 2023. How in broad terms have the organization evolved from 2023 up until now in terms of skills, culture or leadership perspectives? And
I look,
yeah, please go.
Yeah, I mean look, I think that it's been an amazing journey. You know, Marco, myself, the management, we always striving to build a business that then I mean we would be excited to work in. Since 2023, I think we've moved from an entrepreneurial rollup kind of mindset to a platform builder mindset. We see White Pearl as a platform now for IT businesses. IT solutions, IT entrepreneurs skills have shifted towards integration, governance, capital allocation culture has matured, I believe from being more opportunistic to disciplined and repeatable. And lastly leadership I think has become more institutional in how decisions are framed, documented made, where the rights of the shareholder and the interest of the small shareholder is the one that we work towards protecting. So I believe we still value speed in White Pearl, but now it's backed by structure.
Has there been any assumptions that you had when you listed a company that you had to rethink or abandon since listing?
Yeah, I think that's a very interesting question. I mean if I think about it, two in particular come to mind. The first one that we need to integrate faster to unlock value. I think that has changed this year where sometimes you need to leave the assets, let them bed into the company whilst we then work on integration. And I think the second one for me has been that scale alone would automatically improve investor understanding. I think this year as we've seen, investors are more discerning, they need to understand more about the company, what we do. So I think we've learned this year that timing and sequencing matter and I think forcing integration too early or over communicating growth sometimes can then create focus issues.
Investors have noted that we have changed from having zero senior management based in Sweden at the beginning of this year to now six persons in the management group that is based in Stockholm. Why is this important?
Yeah, I mean look, I think firstly now we've got five operating businesses in Sweden. So we have many Swedish businesses I think over and above that. Local senior leadership I believe improves investor credibility and communication, regulatory and governance oversight, deal sourcing as well. I mean as we've discussed, we are now targeting Nordic European businesses as well as then in market decision speed. We believe that our expansion into the Nordic through our home base in Sweden is not symbolic, it's operational, it's strategic and it's a logical step for us as White Pearl.
Talking about investors, why should our shareholders believe that White Pearl will create value per share, not just grow bigger? What would you say to a long-term shareholder who is impatient today?
Okay. I think that acquisitions are structured to be accretive, i.e., add value to earnings per share. I think dilution has been very much controlled and intentional as we've seen through the years, and I mean as will continue to do into the future. Most important for us is cash generation as well as then revenue growth.
Okay.
I think management is fully aligned to long term ownership, long term leadership and long term value creation for our shareholders. And I think size without per share value would absolutely be a failure for us. And hence we basically measure ourselves on that in terms of long term shareholders being impatient. I mean my answer to that would be we understand the impatience, but compounding rarely feels comfortable. I believe in real time value creation is not linear. We'll have periods like we've had of consolidation. Investment complexity sometimes precedes inflection points. Our job as White Pearl, as a management team is to build something durable, something that continues generating shareholder value, not to optimize for short term sentiment, I'm afraid.
How do you think about downside protection for shareholders if capital markets tighten or sentiment turns against small and micro cap companies?
From day one when we've built White Pearl, White Pearl has been a diversified company and it's diversified on revenue, it's diversified on technology, diversified on geographies. Okay, we've got, we've got significant profitable operations which means that we not dependent on external funding or other matters to basically grow the company, run the company. We still very conservative in terms of how we do deal structures. We don't buy non-profitable or non-cash generative businesses, and I think we are pretty nimble and flexible when it comes to capital deployment. I believe all of this ensures that the group is designed to survive tougher moments in the markets. Because for us, growth is optional and survival not so. Hence, that's our focus.
One final question. If we meet again one year from now, what do you believe will be the biggest difference compared to today?
I think that integration in the businesses that have joined the group over the last years, specifically this year, I think is where you'll see the biggest, biggest difference, the biggest, biggest change. I mean you'll see White Pearl being more effective in those markets where we are now present, providing solutions, having more people as well as then being able to generate value for both our people, our customers and most importantly our shareholders.
So 2025 was the acquisition year and 2026 is going to be the integration year. Is that simplified way to describe it?
I think that's a very good summary, Peter.
Thank you. Thank you very much, Marco and Ibrahim. With this, we conclude this conversation and wish you all a fantastic holiday season. As always. If you have further questions, please do not hesitate to get in touch through ir@whitepearltech.com. Thank you very much. Thank you.
Thank you.