Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. I first want to thank everyone for spending the day with us. I hope it was a valuable use of your time, bringing to life our vision and giving you insights on our strategic and operational initiatives. I will conclude the day by providing you with a view of how those strategic plans come together to deliver financial outperformance and significant value to investors. On that note, I will close with some exciting news regarding our future returns to shareholders. Let me first review what we have done since 2019 to reposition SLB from a strategic and financial standpoint. This will provide you with some perspective and set the context of what is ahead of us. As you all know, we have made a number of important and impactful changes since 2019. We meaningfully refocused our portfolio.
We significantly reduced our cost base and implemented a new and leaner organization. We launched a comprehensive capital stewardship program, and we became much more effective at managing costs and cash flows, something I was obviously very happy to see. These actions have had great results, strengthening our balance sheet and creating a returns-driven culture at the company. Let me go into more details. First, we have enhanced our portfolio management process and successfully repositioned SLB as a less capital-intensive business with a much improved returns and free cash flow generation profile. We consistently evaluate our portfolio to ensure each new and existing business generates compelling returns, which enables us to focus our activities to the most value-accretive areas of our business. Let me give you some examples.
In North America, we high-graded our portfolio by divesting the margin-dilutive and capital-intensive businesses of OneStim pressure pumping and rod lift. With a more focused portfolio, we are now well-positioned in the accretive drilling value chain, complemented by an impressive offering of Production Systems and services. Our North America business is fully leveraging the ongoing upcycle and has been growing at an accelerated pace in the last 18 months, led by our well construction division, which is expected to grow by more than 50% this year. The portfolio shifts, together with overall margin enhancement actions, resulted in our North America business now generating pre-tax operating margins of approximately 18%. This is well into the double-digit target we had set back in 2019 and represents a visible improvement from the 5% margins we were generating at the time.
Of course, our work on refocusing the portfolio was not limited to North America. For example, at the end of 2019, we divested our lower-margin fishing and remedial business. We also significantly reduced future capital commitments related to our asset performance solutions or APS business. Specifically, we ceased investing in new APS projects, sold our interest in our asset in Argentina, and disengaged from several other projects. While our focus has been on pruning those parts of our business that did not meet our returns threshold or no longer align with our strategic vision, we have also been working to reposition our portfolio for resilience and long-term growth. The transaction we recently announced in the subsea market is a good example of this.
With the joint venture between SLB, Aker Solutions and Subsea 7, we will leverage a growing market outlook and offer life-of-field solutions on a significant subsea installed base, thereby building a long tail of revenue for the future. We will continue to actively manage our portfolio across our core, digital and new energy growth engines to ensure that our various businesses generate compelling returns and position us optimally in all markets where we operate. The second major action we took was to significantly lower our cost base across the company. We have taken out $1.5 billion of structural costs by removing layers of management, merging support functions, and simplifying the organization from 17 product lines to four customer-focused divisions. In our manufacturing and field operations, our performance focus and digital enablement have generated significant efficiencies, reducing our overall cost of product and service delivery.
Together, the portfolio and cost actions have allowed us to substantially improve operating leverage over the last three years. Despite a lower revenue base, our pre-tax operating margins in 2022 will be at least 500 basis points higher than they were in 2019. Our adjusted EBITDA margins will be more than 250 basis points higher. Going forward, our improved operating leverage puts us in an ideal position to continue expanding margins as activity grows across the world. Besides our focus on costs, we have become much more granular in terms of resource allocation and where we spend our capital. To achieve this, in 2019, we introduced a capital stewardship program that spans across the company. This program ensures that our assets are deployed in priority to the business units with the highest return opportunities and the most resilient markets.
As a result, we have significantly lowered our capital intensity. CapEx will represent on average 5% of revenue in 2021 and 2022. This is a substantial improvement from historical levels which averaged 10% prior to 2019. Likewise, return on capital employed, or ROC, will have improved from mid-single digits in 2019 to over 12% as we close 2022. For context, we have not reached that level since 2014. Finally, thanks to these actions, we were able to meaningfully strengthen our balance sheet. By the end of this year, we will have reduced net debt by well over $4 billion as compared to the end of 2019. We are also on track to lower our net debt to EBITDA ratio to less than 1.4x by the end of this year, a level not seen since 2015.
As we look forward, our balance sheet provides us with ample flexibility to invest for the future and further enhance returns to shareholders. Overall, we are extremely proud of the significant strides we made over the last three years. We have achieved all the financial objectives set in 2019 despite the macro headwinds caused by the global pandemic. When I look back at the heavy lifting of the last three years, I can say that SLB is now more agile, less capital intensive, and more returns focused than ever before. We have significantly strengthened the foundations of the company and are now poised to outperform financially and lead in sustainability in the years to come. Now that I have demonstrated our ability to execute and deliver on our strategy commitments, what's next? How can we leverage and build upon those achievements?
What are our financial ambitions in light of what we believe to be a very favorable industry outlook? As you heard from Olivier this morning, the combination of resilient oil and gas upstream investment, digital enablement, and accelerated investment in lower carbon energy is creating the condition for sustained growth in the energy industry now and in decades to come. In this context, we are optimally positioned with our core digital and new energy businesses, providing us with a powerful and diverse combination of growth through multiple time horizons. How does this constructive backdrop translate into our financial targets? I am sure you noticed from Olivier's talk this morning our ambition is for SLB's overall revenue to grow at an annual compound rate of more than 15% for the period 2021 through 2025.
We are off to a great start with steady momentum building through 2022, as you have seen from our recent results. Our year-on-year revenue growth rate is at the highest it's been in more than a decade. Under this top-line scenario, we will deliver a triple-double consisting of the following. Double-digit EBITDA CAGR, double-digit ROCE, and double-digit free cash flow margin. Let me give you here some more specifics. First, a double-digit EBITDA CAGR. More precisely, we expect SLB's overall EBITDA to grow at a CAGR of more than 20% for the period 2021 through 2025. What this means is that we expect both EBITDA CAGR and revenue CAGR to exceed what was achieved in the prior growth cycle of 2009 to 2014.
Much of this growth is going to be driven by our core, as well as our digital business. In our core, we believe that the attributes of the current cycle, in particular, the favorable international and offshore activity mix, all play to SLB's strength and will allow us to outperform. Digital, as highlighted earlier by Rajiv, is expected to double in size from 2021 to 2025. The fast pace of growth in digital, combined with its accretive margin profile, will provide accelerated earnings growth for the company, boosting our overall financial performance. The second leg of our triple-double ambition is to deliver sustained double-digit ROCE in line with our focus on returns and consistent with our capital stewardship program. ROCE in the next few years will certainly exceed 15%, which is what we achieved during the last growth cycle.
Finally, a double-digit free cash flow margin. We aim to deliver free cash flow margin of more than 10% over the cycle. With the strong growth we are expecting, this will clearly translate into meaningful excess cash, providing us with tremendous optionality in our capital allocation, as you will hear in a few minutes. Now, I just laid out our triple-double targets through 2025. However, the ongoing growth cycle may well extend beyond the 2025 horizon, providing further tailwinds for margin expansion and cash generation. As you can see, we are very well positioned for the future. You may wonder what will happen in the shorter term.
Specifically, for 2023, we expect revenue to grow in excess of 15% compared to 2022, supported by a continuation of the international and offshore momentum, complemented by a significant activity increase in the Middle East. As a result, year-on-year EBITDA growth should be in the mid-20s%, driven by continued margin expansion beyond the expected strong exit rate of 2022. In short, our financial performance this year was only the beginning. This is a very compelling time for SLB, and through the triple-double, we will fully seize the growth cycle to maximize earnings and cash flow generation. Your next question is probably, how are you going to use the significant cash that you will generate in the next few years? Our capital allocation framework can be boiled down to three simple principles.
Maintain a strong balance sheet, invest in accretive return growth opportunities while maintaining capital discipline, and deliver attractive returns to shareholders through sustainable dividends and share buybacks. The premise of the first principle is that we remain focused on protecting the strength of our balance sheet. This will allow us the flexibility to make smart investments in positioning SLB for the future while providing ample resources to consistently return value to shareholders. We currently have an A credit rating from both S&P and Moody's and are committed to maintaining our strong investment grade rating. In this regard, our ambition is to sustain a net debt to EBITDA leverage ratio of no higher than 1.5x over the long term. The second element of our capital allocation framework relates to investing in growth opportunities that are accretive to returns while maintaining a balanced approach to capital investments.
To start with, we expect CapEx to be maintained between 5%-7% of revenue, which we believe will support both sustained earnings growth and free cash flow generation throughout the cycle. This excludes capital deployed in our APS projects, which have their own investment and cash flow profile. In addition, as you heard throughout the day, we are looking at opportunities in the core, digital, and new energy that can expand SLB's addressable market and support our long-term growth. In the core, we are focused on investments that build resilience and address white spaces or bolt-on technology acquisitions that accelerate innovation and the decarbonization of the industry. Such as the recently announced acquisition of Gyrodata, that will significantly improve well construction efficiency while advancing SLB's autonomous drilling capabilities.
In digital, we have already made most of the key investments to create the leading platform we have today in upstream. We continue to keep our investment options open for opportunities to leverage our digital capabilities beyond upstream, in carbon management, and in the broader energy sector. Finally, we expect that new energy will drive a significant portion of the company's revenue growth in the long term. In this regard, our investment approach is focused on the five business domains which Gavin highlighted this morning, where we believe we can make a substantial contribution and generate value. I want to emphasize here how our approach to new energy is relying on partnerships and ventures, which provides exposure to the most promising technologies without the capital intensity and risks of starting new projects alone. We are also seeking to fully leverage government-sponsored financing programs to help de-risk the portfolio.
While we are setting some ambitious long-term goals for these businesses, let me assure you that investments in digital and new energy will continue to be evaluated through a robust process that ensures investments in future growth meet criteria on financial returns, adjacency to current positions, and scalability, with guidance from the New Energy and Innovation Committee of our Board of Directors. All in all, we believe our disciplined and balanced approach to investment will allow us to harness the current demand growth in our core while extending our leading position in digital and accelerating our new energy journey. The third element of our capital allocation framework is delivering sustainable and attractive returns to our shareholders. Over the next few years, we expect to return a minimum of 50% of free cash flow to our shareholders in the form of dividends and share buybacks.
We will allocate the remaining free cash flow to potential M&A opportunities, further debt reduction, and further enhancements to shareholder returns. The mix of these discretionary capital options will likely change from year to year and will be modulated based on when and what investment opportunities present themselves. How are we going to translate these principles into action? As you are aware, earlier this year, we took a first step in improving returns to shareholders by increasing our dividend by 40%. Today, I am very pleased to announce that based on our projections for growth and disciplined investment over the next few years, our board of directors has agreed to increase our quarterly dividend by 43% to $0.25 per share, effective with the dividend payment in April 2023.
In addition, and to further bolster returns to our shareholders. Commencing next quarter, we will be resuming our stock buyback program, under which we have $9 billion of remaining authorization. These actions demonstrate our confidence in the strength of the current growth cycle and in the longer term outlook across our three engines of growth. In closing, SLB is poised for continuous earnings and cash flow growth, and is focused on delivering enhanced returns to shareholders as we execute on our strategic ambition of driving energy innovation, delivering higher value and lower carbon across our core digital and new energy businesses. Thank you so much again for spending the day with us, and I will now turn it back to Mark.
Stephane, thank you so much. Stephane, we're going to set the stage here for our Q&A, but while that activity is happening, I've got two questions, and then of course, we'll open it to the floor and to pre-submitted questions too. Your capital stewardship program created a very smart approach to the expenditure program. My question though is how adaptive, how flexible will that be when conditions change in the future?
We have built flexibility into this program, for example, by adjusting returns thresholds by division and by country. If you let me, Mark, there are two additional points I have on this program.
Yeah.
First, we designed it at a time when activity was pretty much flat, and we were seeking to lower our capital intensity. Today, in a growth cycle, this program is even more important. As resources are constrained, we have to make choices, and this program allows us to allocate resources to the most value-accretive parts of our business. The second point, Mark- It's probably also very good. It's very good. That capital stewardship is not just limited to CapEx allocation. Capital stewardship is embedded into the capital allocation framework I just discussed. The three targets I just laid out on capital allocation, leverage, minimum ROCE, and the minimum 50% returns to shareholders will ensure that all the decisions we take as it relates to capital allocation will be with capital discipline in mind.
Excellent. Thank you. My second question, you mentioned a minimum of 50% return to shareholders of the free cash flow. How is that going to work?
It is a minimum. It will apply for the next three years. It will vary from year- to- year based on the investment opportunities we have and always making sure our debt is kept at the appropriate level. Now, as it relates specifically to 2023, I can already tell you that this percentage will be well above 50%. You already know our new dividend, the 43% increase, and we are going to resume stock buyback very soon under the remaining $9 billion authorization.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
You can take a seat in the panel. I'm going to also invite Olivier and ND to join us on the stage. It's time for Q&A. You have pre-submitted some questions. We're also gonna be looking for show of hands, and the rules are as they always are. If I come to you, I'll hand you the mic. If you could stand up, tell us who you are, ask your question nice and succinct, and then hand the microphone back, that would be great. ND, should we go straight away to our first question? I believe it's James West at Evercore. James, I'm going to give you the microphone, and over to you.
Thanks. James West, Evercore. I got a chance to look at the materials in the digital conference, you know, five weeks ago that you guys had. Looked very impressive. I read, you know, Ryan Lance's comments. I read Boris' comments as well, and they seem to have, you know, really embraced digital in their operations. I'd love to hear, you know, in the five to six weeks since, as you and your sales team has had conversations with all the attendees, the 1,200 attendees that were there. You know, what does the uptake look like now? Are we at an acceleration and an inflection point?
No, absolutely, James. I think for those of you who were not attending, we had indeed 1,200 customers and partners, and I think it was from their feedback, transformational moment to them, realizing the scale of what we can achieve through digital, sharing values across as peers, and realizing that there's a lot more that we can do with our digital transformation. Since then, I think we are seeing an inflection in the request, an inflection into the demand for starting to plan and execute for every customer. What could it be? Because they have seen the biggest and the smallest, the biggest plan with Chevron, that has been a two years journey to realize the full deployment. There's been also some smaller independent that have realized this in six months.
They have got a taste of what it can deliver. We are seeing this inflection, hence this is the reason why we have this confidence for the wedge which is on top of our base business, the wedge of new digital to grow at a CAGR that will be around 50% CAGR for the next five years. That's our prediction. I think it will not stop in 2025. I think there's a long tail of customers. For each customer, there's an adoption with services and then there's an expansion of the adoption on scale on the platform. These two factors are then long tail opportunity for us to really inflect our digital revenue. That's where it's heading, and that's very successful uptake.
I have a question here. ND , yes.
Yes. It's on margin expansion. It goes from the morning sessions thus far, significant growth prospects ahead along the three engines. Can you give some additional color on margin expansion?
Yeah. I think you have seen the result of margin expansion we anticipate translating to earnings, EBITDA growth, CAGR targets 20% or above from 2021 to 2025. Now if you look at what will make this happen, I think I will comment in three ways. The first is the core. You have seen the power of the core this morning. You have hopefully got a good taste of the technology differentiation we have. What I will say is that through this cycle, the core will benefit from margins cycle. I think clearly growth, but within a margin cycle. That's led by performance differentiation, technology adoption, and you have seen many of them, many type, and then pricing tailwinds. You combine these three, you have 500 basis points in years ahead of margin expansion.
Add to it digital, growing at fast pace, doubling, highly accretive. To reiterate the answer from, Rajiv, yes, we expect margin in digital to further expand. We have not reached a peak, and we expect it to further. You combine these two, you get margin expansion that translate into this commitment of minimum CAGR of 20% in earnings.
Great answer. Thank you. Our next question from this gentleman here. Sir.
Thank you. Marc Bianchi with TD Cowen. You provided some impressive targets for 2030 on the new energy business. I'm curious, that's a long ways out, how are you seeing that in the next few years? Is there an intermediate target that we could think about or a framework for that business? Along those lines, Stephane, you talked about the proportion of free cash flow that could go towards M&A for that target. Maybe talk to us a little bit more about what type of M&A we could be looking for.
No, thank you. I will start. I will let Gavin give some color on the size and scale, not the size, but the scale and the potential. I would say our ambition is to grow this across these five domains. We have made by design, on purpose, an edge across five different domains, which are a different level of maturity from technology, which have a different scale from potential and a different time horizon for upscaling. I think that's by design, so that it give us optionality to make the right decision and not force us to make decision one versus the other. That's a balanced approach to this portfolio that we want to have. Some are more mature, more adjacent. Some are more disruptive.
We take more time to de-risk before we can scale. I think you may add one or two words on the biggest and the smallest or the one you see on time.
I think in the short term, with all of the incentives, obviously carbon solutions is likely to move fast. On numbers, you know, projects have quite a lot of flexibility in timing of start and realization, and that can have a big impact on the 2025 number, which is why we've set our numbers in 2030.
Thank you for that.
I think there was. More?
Yes. There was part of the question which was on M&A, Mark. So the growth in new energy will clearly be organic, but potentially inorganic where we think it can accelerate and potentially de-risk the roadmap. Now, I will make sure, c, we stay limited to the five business domains that Gavin highlighted, and we follow the three principles he highlighted as well, technology led, adjacencies, and capital light as much as possible. All will be based on returns as usual.
All right. Our next question is Elizabeth Hiss from Brown. Elizabeth, are you in the room? Elizabeth? ND, do you have the question written?
I can read the question out.
Oh my goodness, there you are. Far, far away. I'm on my way. Apologies. Thank you. Sorry about that.
I know, ND, you have it in front of you as well. Elizabeth Hicks from Brown Advisory. Just curious, as you've now given us some color on the digital business, how are we to kind of think about the margin profile potentially of that business today and going forward?
I think the margin profile. I will reiterate that we see it highly accretive as it is today, and we see it have the potential to further expand in terms of being more accretive to our core and more accretive to the whole SLB. The sky's the limit, I will simply say, because I think the ambition we have is twofold. First to continue to transition the long tail of customers and then to expand across each customer in terms of adoption of our data solution and workflows and consumption of the cloud resource, and to expand beyond and start to go beyond in carbon management. Combination of these will give a long tail of growth. We have talked about doubling.
I think I cannot tell you, we have not set yet a timing on, or a target for 2030, but you can imagine it can be fairly high. With very attractive margin that will most likely expand from where we are today. It's quite an exciting time for digital.
Thank you. Next pre-submitted was David Anderson, and then I'll be going up there. David, over to you.
Thank you very much. Olivier, you had talked about the investment cycle in the Middle East, this growth cycle being, I don't know if you said substantially higher, but you said higher than the last cycle. The last cycle was sort of defined by a lot of big projects in the Middle East. Big projects we don't really see today. How do we get the confidence that, well, 2023 is obviously gonna be quite strong in the Middle East, but how do we get the confidence that it's gonna last, it's gonna be sustainable by multiple years? 'Cause we don't have the visibility on those big projects. Can you help us understand how we can get comfort there?
Yeah. I think I will characterize the Middle East as I quoted this morning, according to some estimates and also our perception and understanding of the market, it's likely that or very likely that the upstream spend in Middle East overall will be at a record new level. According to our study, we'll reach or exceed $100 billion per annum in the next couple of years. That's just the macro. There are three aspects to it. One is it is driven by capacity expansion on oil. Capacity expansion that several countries have made, and four of them in GCC and more, even in Libya, in Egypt, or in Algeria, that are going and making more capacity commitments. These are long cycle investments.
This will not be one year, this will not be 2023. Their target are 2026, 2028, and 2030 respectively across the different country. They are even high-grading their target to be higher and to be a bit faster from 2028 to 2026. This is certainly multi-year investment. The second is that there is a gas element in the Middle East. Qatar is the largest exporter of LNG gas, and they are committed to 127 MTPA by 2028, if I'm correct. I think they will certainly likely up this considering the structural deficit of gas. Gas is not only export, gas is also for regional consumption, for substituting oil and providing more oil capacity to the market. Gas, unconventional, conventional, you heard about what we are doing in Jafurah is the second.
Gas is here to stay. It's not a blip. It's here to stay. The third is that the oil capacity and the gas happen to be offshore for majority of the oil and for some of the gas as well. Offshore is long mobilization, long cycle. You combine these three things, capacity commitments, which is a commitment for more than one, two years. They are not looking at return to shareholders. They are looking at commitments for the nation to expand and grasp market share. You look at these three things. This is unique. We have not seen this in the past cycle in Middle East to my knowledge.
Mark, let's take this one here on the app. It's from Alexa Patrick from Goldman Sachs, and it's what will the order of commercialization be for new energy? Will carbon capture be first? Can you remind us of the revenue outlook or guidance for clean energy?
I think for the guidance, we gave a guidance on the horizon of 2030 at $3 billion or higher. Gavin even put the target higher in a longer horizon at $10 billion. We will make a decision when we believe it's material, and it's necessary to disclose the financial between now and then. From the one that we start first and the one will grow the fastest, the more adjacent, the bigger and the more mature market, and carbon is coming to that. It's likely to be the one impacting the most in the next two to five years ahead of others.
The last maybe on scale, maybe it's hydrogen, but it will be in the 2050s, most likely the biggest TAM in the clean energy business.
Thank you. A reminder, you can continue adding your questions into the app. I have multiple devices in front of me. We'll see them between me and ND. Coming to you next, but you first.
Thanks. Stephen Gengaro with Stifel. I was curious, when you're looking at capital allocation, capital spending, are the return hurdles and time frames different between the core and new energy? Add some color on how you make those decisions.
No, they are definitely. It's multiple time horizons, as we said. However, the framework we just presented to you, I mean, it does apply comprehensively to the three engines of growth. We are limited, you know, with the targets we have put, so we will have to choose at the same time between the core, digital, and new energy. They are all in the same basket as it relates to capital allocation. Now I think we will have the means with the cash flow we generate to not have to make too difficult choices, but it's. I don't think there will be any year where we have to make large investment in the three of them at the same time, you know, so.
We have a guidance on the technology to build on that beyond capital and technology, which are expense investment every year. We also have a different horizon. We have fit for basin, as Demos highlighted, very short horizon, very short return. We have some more complex platform developments in digital or in core. Then we have research, as was highlighted, for next generation capture disruptive technology for CO2 that are into our basket of investment every year. We're just making the right priority based on where we see the resilience and the returns potential. That's judgment, and that's the experience of this team that bring this to you. I trust Demos to make the arbitrage.
Thank you. I saw a hand in the middle, but right now to your right, to your far right, almost in Connecticut over here. Here's our next question.
Thank you. Neil Mehta here. Yeah, you talked to provide a lot of great color here through the end of the decade by segment. I'd love you to spend some time on risks for each of the three segments. What do you think the biggest risk is to execution, and how are you practically mitigating them?
I think first, to state the obvious, the financial target we have set are under a condition that we have laid out, that absence of a major disruption, black swan, or yet another new pandemic that will shut down the world. If this was to happen, we are fairly used to this, unfortunately, and we have a playbook for crisis management that we have used recently with some success. If this was to happen, this will be something that we execute with agility, and then most likely, it will result in a shift, but maintaining our financial target, okay, as we have laid out. Absent of that, I believe that the.
As I said, I believe the conditions are unique and represents very likely what I will reiterate as a super cycle for the entire energy industry, combining resurgence and a strong outlook for oil and gas entire, at the same time, an acceleration of clean energy. Combine this, yes, there may be some disruption based on geopolitical events that are adding risk of execution in some country, but we live with this every day. We are a global company. Every year, there is a, as I commented in the break, 30- 40 of countries where we operate, there is a change of government, and these days even 50 or 60. We deal with this. Policy change, we adapt, we rebound, and we are very resilient to those, all this.
I think absent of this macro disruption, I think I feel very positive about outlook.
Thank you for that. Chase is to my right.
Yes. Chase Mulvehill, Bank of America. Olivier, question for you. You know, when we think about some of the last cycles, I mean, the last couple of cycles, you know, for international, we really haven't seen a margin cycle. You know, 2010 through 2014, you know, increased competition, same thing kind of 2017, 2018, 2019. You know, obviously here today you're sitting and you know, you have a lot different view of the international, you know, margin cycle over the next few years. I just wanna step back and try to understand, like, what's different this time than when we look at the last two cycles that gives you confidence that we're gonna have a margin cycle on the international side?
I think three things are different in my opinion. The first is capital discipline across the industry. We have a capital stewardship program. We have been very public about it, and I think we are not the only one. I think there is a capital discipline across the players that will create the condition under stretched supply in the service industry to lift pricing, and we have seen it in North America. We are seeing it today in international basins, and our margins reflect this. Our margins that will be published, okay, at the end of January, the full year margins, you will see, we will show that our international margins are expanding and will be beyond 2019 and 2018 previous levels. The first is the capital discipline and the pricing environment is positive. The second is the mix.
The mix is coincidentally aligning with high technology needs, high integration, and high need for performance. It's offshore environments, performance matters. It's complex developments into new field of gas where performance matters. This reflects the condition of higher adoption of technology and hence premium on execution, premium on technology, premium on performance. I think Abdellah and the core team were very good at explaining this is what supports our execution. The third is digital adoption, decarbonization. This is what will create the resilience of this industry for the next 10 years. All the operators recognize that they are leading into a unique space of cash intake.
They don't want to miss the opportunity to transform today to prepare for the next decade, when maybe the market will not be as favorable, hence they are doubling down on digital and decarbonization. These are three things that are, in different way, supporting a pricing and a margin lift for us.
All right, let me read out one question from here, and it's from Connor Lynagh at Morgan Stanley. It says, "You've laid out a multi-year guidance while the world is largely anticipating a recession. Is your confidence due to conviction in oil and gas markets, in the services markets, or the areas you feel implicitly conservative on the outlook?
No, I think we have laid out the hypothesis for the cycle. We believe that over the 2021-2025, the CapEx will be double-digit and there are many factors. I think I commented quite a lot on the Middle East, and I think the Middle East is here to stay more than one year. Offshore, just to be specific, because I think we called offshore 18 months ago. We're the first to call it, and there were some feedback and there were some questions. It has happened, so I'm calling it again. We are calling offshore and saying that offshore is here to grow. There are multiple factors that are giving us this indication.
First, some data, a point by Wood Mackenzie about a stat indicates that first, this year and next year will be the first two years with more than $100 billion of FID in offshore environment, first time since 2015. Second, the 2022 to, or 2021 to 2025 or 2022 to 2025 outlook on offshore cumulative investments with 50% more than 2016 to 2019. Next year, FID is projected to be the highest since 2012. You combine all this, offshore is moving up. Offshore includes deepwater and includes shallow. It's not only deepwater, but there is many basins that benefit. You have Brazil, one of the most prolific basin, committed 15 FPSOs and new entrants in Brazil, international company. They will execute. You have Middle East GCC committing gas in Qatar and oil, particularly in Saudi.
You have Norway benefiting from tax regime that is giving unique condition for three years. Then you have Guyana. Then you have Colombia gas. You have Turkey, we are part of it. We own this one. You have Colombia offshore gas as well. You have many Namibia, just large discovery of oil. You combine all this, you have the well-established basin, big one, that are growing both shallow and deepwater, and you have a few emerging one. That mix is not one year. That mix is contracting for multiple years.
Thank you. Our next question.
Yes. Guillaume Delaby , Société Générale. The transition to my question is nearly perfect. It is about offshore. Back in 2015, 2016, there was some questions among investors following the acquisition of Cameron. You just made a JV or you are about to make a JV with Aker Solutions and Schlumberger. In your future margin profile, what is going to be the role played by Cameron?
Good, good question. Thank you. Cameron, I think, is made with more than one piece, and I think the majority of it sits today in Production Systems, where we have subsea, we have surface, and we have our valve and processing equipment, and we have also a piece of well construction equipment and control that has been integral part of our autonomous drilling vision. When you look at that and you step back, it has been very good to integrate all this piece and create integrated offering, particularly in production. In Production Systems, we have the broadest and the most comprehensive offering from connecting the reservoir with completion to the subsea, to the surface equipment, to the processing and digital on top. This is unique.
The reason why we are doubling down and investing in the JV with Aker Solutions and Subsea 7 is because first, we believe in the deepwater outlook, short and long. We believe we can create unique value because we have complementary clients and customer base, complementary portfolio, and we can create an offering that will benefit from the long cycle and benefit from life of field, reservoir optimization, reservoir recovery, full electric, as you heard from Steve, transformation, and hence create a different long-term differentiation with this Subsea venture.
Excellent. Thank you. Next question directly in front of you at the back.
Yes, Scott Gruber from Citi here. You have one last equity participation project in APS. Olivier, at first, you wanted to sell all of those, including the Canadian project, but then you decided to keep the Canadian project. My perception was oil and gas prices were recovering faster than international spending. Keeping that one project would help you de-lever the balance sheet during the recovery. Now we stand at a point where international is recovering. You guys gave your growth outlooks for the next few years, the confidence in a multi-year recovery here. Would you revisit selling that asset? If not, what conditions would you think about to revisit selling the asset? Thank you.
We'll start.
Thank you.
Look, yeah, we, you know, we look at our APS business, you know, it's a bit of a special pocket of our business, which is mostly inherited, if you want. Clearly, we don't count on our APS business to contribute to any of the growth targets we have here. Overall, the very few projects we are left with today, we are quite happy with them. You know, they generate actually very good margins and very good cash flows. We don't have an urgency to divest even on the asset you're referring to in Canada or both in Ecuador, which would be a bit more difficult actually because of our service contract. You know, we are happy with that portfolio today. It is a monetization option, particularly the one in Canada.
At the right time, the right price, we would divest it. As of today, we are quite happy with it. We are not completely fixed for the long term on the outcome, but we are maintaining that specific pocket in a confined way, if you want.
Thank you. Sam Margolin from Wolfe. Where are you, Sam? There you are. I'm on my way. Sorry. You just have to. Can we do a little bit of pass?
Some mics at least.
Thanks. Sorry. I thought ND was gonna read it.
We want to hear your voice.
Okay. I guess my question was on the emissions targets in the presentation. Scope three emissions collapse, but those aren't necessarily under your control. I was wondering what the levers are on that, and if that is really just an embedded assumption about energy mix, and if we should take away that, you know, as Paris Agreement standards get adopted and hydrocarbons shrink within the energy mix, that will determine SLB's business orientation as well.
Just for clarification, you are referring to the Scope three emission commitment that we made?
Yes.
Correct. Just for clarification as well for the way it is defined and the way it is measured, this, the Scope one and two are in our emissions, the consumption of electricity and consumption of fuel that we directly allocate to our operation. That's relatively easy, and it's about less than 2 million tons per annum. The Scope three, because these numbers are disclosed into the sustainability report, is in excess of 45 million tons per annum. The Scope three are the end use. The majority of this, you have the supply, like we are buying steel, we are buying cement, so they come with a certain carbon footprint. Changing the composition of our technology or buying from sources that have a lower carbon footprint, will change the supply income mix into our Scope three.
That's action that we already started, we are pursuing, and that can give us unique opportunity to deliver carbon free cement, for example, to our customer. That's one aspect. The second is the end user of our technology. These are technology that we sell to customer that are like the ESP pump. The ESP pump stay with the customer, consume electricity, and hence if they are more efficient or they are pump from subsea that are installed, and again, their efficiency gives the footprint of CO2 emission that we record. If we install this into a green electricity grid for a customer and/or we are differentiating in the way we consume less electricity per lifting mile, then we are gaining Scope three net emission reduction. That's our strategic approach.
We eliminate flaring to Ora, we eliminate methane in our own operation through our SEES technology. That's all that combined is the roadmap we have to reduce by 30% and then by 50% our Scope three emissions.
Great. ND, before you read the next one, if you have a question, raise your hand. I'll come and hover near you. We're ready. I'm keeping my eyes open. ND.
All right. Let me read one from the app, and it's from Don Crist with Johnson Rice. It goes, "Your core business is obviously tied to the oil and gas industry. In new energy, are you specifically targeting other industries to potentially smooth out the cycles going forward?
Obviously, you heard it. I think the definition of new energy, our ambition and strategy is to be the industrial technology company that help decarbonize the power and the industrial sector, targeting this 25 gigaton per annum of emission from the sector. Those sector includes the oil and gas in refinery, it includes oil and gas in upstream, hence we are addressing this through our emission transition technology. It includes cement, it includes steel, it includes chemistry, it includes other domain. Then we are going beyond with the investment we are doing for critical minerals, as you heard. We are going beyond to go after efficiency and not only decarbonization from industry, like geoenergy. That presents the portfolio. Obviously, we are going beyond oil and gas.
Hence, we are creating more resilience against different cycles across different time horizons. It's a resilience strategy for resilience and for growth.
Thank you. Sir.
Hi. Thanks. Roger Read, Wells Fargo. Apparently I'm too technologically challenged to figure out the app. I tried. I really tried. My question is kinda coming back to earlier question about margins and being in margin cycle. Industry, I mean, all of oil and gas went through a wrenching period, you know, really post 2014, but especially in 2020. As you think about the margins, you think about pricing, you think about mix, how much of it is also a function of capacity that's out? I think of companies that used to be a maybe major competitor, but a thorn in your side competitor that probably isn't in some of the markets that you're still in. So fewer bidders, a little less competition.
Is that also fitting into the margin assumptions, or is there something else that's just, you know, intrinsic to Schlumberger here in terms of the new products and the overall rollout?
No, I think the best way to describe it, I think is to use some of the elements that Abdellah in his core presentation highlighted. It's made of three things. That's where we generate pricing in the core and margin expansion in the core. Beyond, I would say the operating leverage, digital enablement that reduce our cost to serve. Performance matters a lot. Certainty of execution and differentiation have proven to be certainly our best cards today. I think it surprised us in the last few months that customer are coming back to us and considering negotiating on the table to accept the right, the fair price for assuring there is a flight to performance, as we call it. The second is technology.
Yes, technology, digital technology transition, technology fit for basin, highly differentiated or Ora. Okay? Some of these are unique, and I think we'll continue to deliver, develop, commercialize new technology and continue to enhance our portfolio. This is creating. Again, depending on environments, there is better pricing premium in an offshore complex on a gas field than there is in some more commoditized high volume market. Hence, the market turning to this is to our benefit. Last is the excess capacity that exists in the service industry today. I think we have made, I would say, a pledge to capital discipline. We're not the only one, and I think this has lifted up the margin of the industry, and I don't see it going away.
Let me take one here. It's from Bobby Eubank from Chevy Chase Trust, and it goes: Lots of excitement about big FIDs and calling for 15% revenue CAGR by 2025. What's the risk we end up with oversupply again in a couple years, even if demand is solid?
I think first there is a change of guard. The deck is changing with some of the macro political decisions by OPEC+ based on some risk on some of the oil supply from Russia not finding a market anymore. I think 2 million bbl at risk, at least there. We have to recognize that seven years of underinvestment have created conditions for significant declines under way. Aside from a handful of OPEC countries, the vast majority actually are struggling to meet their quotas for reasons of declining base. There's a need for investment. At least for the foreseeable short- to midterm, I don't see a risk of this oversupply to change the demand that will come back after the full recovery from the pandemic and the economic rebound.
Meanwhile, there is this one or two years that will be very, very resilient to short-term fluctuation.
Next question to your right, just over here.
Oh.
Thank you. Waqar Syed, ATB Capital Markets. First of all, congratulations to you and your team for putting up a great presentation. A lot of effort and thinking has gone into it, so congratulations on that.
Thank you.
My question is that you've got some very aggressive goals on Scope one, Scope two, and Scope three reduction. As an energy services company, the services that you provide to the client are chosen by the client themselves. Sometimes you may have a low emission solution, but they may prefer some other solution as well. To reach those targets, do you have plans to be screening your customers going forward so that you both share the same kind of goals? Does that factor into the long-term revenue growth and margin planning as well? Thank you.
Great question. I think, as Katharina said, I think, addressing the 5.2 gigaton of emission this industry has across its own operation will take a collaborative approach. First priority, methane. I think we are getting a pull from customer on the solution we can provide. How do we measure that, I think is the key question. Providing certainty, providing traceability, providing certification of even the CO2 footprint on any given technology that we deploy. If we deploy cement, cementing job, I think to have the traceability to show that this cementing job was 2.7 tons of CO2 equivalent for this 300 meter of cement that we placed. That traceability is where the digital platform, sustainability platform comes.
It's a technology offering that then can differentiate and show we can guarantee that this is the footprint of that technology, and you have choice. You can go for competition. You can go for alternative technology we also have. But if you take this one, this is the CO2 footprint. This conversation start happening with urgency in methane, and over time, through education, engagement, collaboration, and hopefully with the support of the digital sustainability platform, then traceability, transparency, as Katharina would say, to then provide a platform that we will trust and say, "Okay, I want this technology because it has a better rating on CO2, and I can drill this well with two less tons than the last well.
I will switch my supplier, and I will pay a premium, because at the end, this long-term operator will be trading their oil, their barrel, their cubic meter of gas based on their demonstrated CO2 footprint from 18 kilo to 2 kilo per BOE. The 2 kilo will sell at higher premium than the 18 kilo. This, over time, will become a new economic premium to sell this, and it will translate to the value chain on the transition technology and on the service we can provide.
Okay. I'll read one question here, and it says: Can you talk about why you think the OFS sector behavior will be different this cycle across international and offshore markets when compared to more recent cycles?
I anticipate that question relates to the discipline, I believe. I think, again, you have to look at it in two sides. First, capital discipline, I think has been first exerted by operators and has led to what we have seen in North America, has been recognized as a necessary pledge by the service industry. The ones that have been using this pledge have seen success. Moving away from it, I think it would not be a wise move. I would expect that this will stay. The second thing, again, is back to performance matters. I think, while when there was excessive equipment and the excessive investment, not every investment that operator were making were necessarily looked with the same scrutiny of return certainty of delivery. Today, they are.
They are very, very deliberate into FID, and they test the FID against different scenario at the very low. Hence they want performance assurance when they develop. Hence, they want the best, and they want the technology that will make this a certain outcome. That's. These are the two things that I think have changed from the last cycle, in my opinion.
Thank you so much. Next question from Keith Mackey.
Perfect. Hi. Thanks. Keith Mackey from RBC Capital Markets, and thank you for putting on the day. Just wanted to ask maybe about the 1.5x net debt to EBITDA target. How did you arrive at that number? Why do you believe it's the right number? If things start to trend materially above or below that number, you know, how do you think you might utilize some of the levers you have in order to bring it back in line over the longer term?
Thanks, thanks for the question. You have to look at this 1.5x net debt leverage target really as a ceiling. Of course, if you do the math, we are today below it. We'll be even more below it going into next year. We really look at this. This is one of the few targets, just to clarify, that we have set over the long term, not just over this growth cycle. We wanted to allow some room for cyclicality so that it stands over a longer time period. Really, I look at it as a complement to our minimum ROCE target of 15% and our minimum returns to shareholder targets of 50%.
When you put the three together, really, I think we have a framework that, for the lack of a better word, keeps us honest. You know? The 1.5 leverage target for me is just part of that overall framework.
Very nice. It looks like we're up to our final question, ND. Yes, it's on digital.
It was nice to see more comments about your digital business earlier today and better understand your platform strategy and monetization paths. Can it more than double, and what is its margin potential?
I think we had this question already. Let me maybe reiterate some of the guidance that we gave today so that we make sure that we align everybody on what we said and the guidance we shared during the presentation of Rajiv beyond the double. Okay? First we said at the 2020 to 2021 digital business represents approximately mid-single digit to high single digits as a total when compared to the total revenue of SLB. We will double this from that base toward 2025, and then we will reach or exceed 10% of the total SLB by 2030.
You put these three points, and you can, I think, put it as a minimum, and the uplift from that is the scale you can define as the size of the business by 2030. That's the first thing. The second is that it is today highly accretive. We have not given that number. We'll not give that number in foreseeable future because I think for competitive reason, I think it's something that we are worth keeping. But it's highly accretive to our total SLB and it's highly accretive to where we stand today. This we expect, considering the size, considering the adoption, the new weight of this will have the potential to further expand.
You project out to the end of the decade with further long-term adoption of customers and each of the early customer consuming more on our platform. You can realize that it has a huge potential to be highly accretive and to generate significant earnings in 2030.
Fantastic. Well, at this point we're going to extend our thanks to ND and to Stephane. You guys can head back. We're gonna clear the chairs off the stage, but a round of applause to ND and Stephane. Olivier, as we clear these away, I hand it over to you for final comments.
Thank you, everyone. I hope that you had a great day. It looks like you had. I want to sincerely thank you for joining us and spending the day today with us. This morning, I said that we are at a critical juncture in our industry. It's truly an inflection point unlike anything I've seen and we have seen before, I believe. Multiple market conditions are aligning over this and the next decade. They will redefine the energy ecosystem. What I hope you'll have seen today is that each of them is aligning with SLB's strengths and strategy. Firstly, I wanted to have a background to help you follow me. Firstly, I believe we have entered a multi-year oil and gas cycle that plays to international strengths and offshore breadth and capabilities.
Second, our industry is accelerating our adoption of digital and where we clearly lead with our platform, and we can drive higher margins. Third, there is a growing imperative to leverage the technology innovation for ESG leadership and decarbonization across multiple industries. Fourth, clean energy investment, as you heard, and the ability to scale those new technology will greatly expand our total addressable market. Lastly, I hope that you have realized through the session earlier today our renewed focus on technology innovation. We will leverage SLB's unmatched science and engineering DNA to drive performance and innovation. This will not only make our core more resilient, but it will help us scale and expand beyond oil and gas and further into digital and critically into new energy technology. I think you heard and you have seen the financial targets.
Our financial targets for 2021 to 2025 period include revenue growth in excess of 15% CAGR and EBITDA growth in excess of 20% CAGR, resulting in more than doubling EBITDA earnings by 2025 when compared to 2021. We have, as you have seen, an enhanced and disciplined capital allocation framework with a commitment to return a minimum of 50% free cash flow over the period to our shareholders, to you. It includes a restart of our share buyback program next quarter and an increase of our dividend by 43% effective April 2023. SLB, I think, represent a unique value proposition to investors, and we are extremely proud of it. We have an absolute commitment to continue uniquely innovating for decarbonized and digital future, for a balanced planet, for our balanced planet.
We are uniquely global and diversified across three engines of growth. Core, digital, new energy are performing today and tomorrow across multiple horizons. Thank you for joining us on this journey. As we close this event, we'd like to. I hope you had a wonderful experience today, throughout the day, and we would like to invite you to join us for a cocktail where you'll have the opportunity to continue to engage with the leadership team, with the technology team members that were there today. Again, thank you very much for being with us today. I hope you had a great, you have a great evening. Thank you very much.