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Good morning. We'll go through the presentation, and then as ever an opportunity for Q&A at the end.
But to start off, I will hand over to Trond.
Thank you, Hannah, and good afternoon to all of you, and welcome to this year-end financial year '22 presentation for us in Benchmark Holdings.
As [ announcing ], I'm Trond Williksen, I'm the CEO of Benchmark. And as usual, I have with me Septima Maguire, who is our CFO. And we are here to give you insight into our last financial year, covering financials, main events as well as outlook for the company.
As some of you might have seen this morning, we have issued 2 important announcements, one is on the results for financial year '22, and one is us now moving on with the listing at Euronext Growth in Oslo, both of them will be covered in this presentation.
But let me start with some highlights from our last financial year, financial year '22. We are, of course, happy to announce that we have ended a financial year with good strategic operational and financial progress for Benchmark. The last quarter of the financial year was not an exception to what we have shown in the quarters earlier in the year. Q4 was a good quarter for us, ending what we see as being a strong year.
The main numbers, they speak for themselves. We have managed to lift our top line by 27% for the year, reflecting strong growth in all our three business areas. Even more important, we have grown our earnings from operations even more for financial year '22, in totality, we have lifted our adjusted EBITDA with 60% compared to last financial year, ending at an EBITDA of GBP 31.2 million full year. This corresponds to an EBITDA margin of 20% for the group, an increase from 16% in '21.
Q4 strong quarter represented a continuation of the consistent growth and improvement of operational results quarter-by-quarter and that we have shown since we financed the restructuring at the end of financial year '20. This consistency was what we set out to achieve, and this has been what we have delivered on, and this is what we aim to continue to deliver on in the time to come.
Even if the financial results from our operations shows a very strong development, and we have improved our cash conversion, our operational cash flow and free cash flow compared to last year, we are still not where we aim to be from a P&L perspective, reflected in an operational loss of GBP 7.9 million for the year.
This loss is heavily influenced by the increased depreciation related to the commercial launch of Ectosan Vet and CleanTreat, our solution in the health business area, a launch that we did last year.
In the very first year of the introduction of this solution to the salmon industry, the activities have not been sufficient to cover the burden of 10 years of development now coming through into our P&L as depreciation. This is not a large surprise to us as management, but nevertheless, it's not the situation that we intend to stay into long.
Financial year '22 has been a very busy year on many, many fronts, and I'm really proud of the whole organization that has really responded very well and worked incredibly hard to meet our targets. One of the milestones achieved is the successful refinancing of the group with a NOK 750 million green bond. And we are also -- after the year-end closing, we have refinanced our RCF.
We managed to do this refinancing in a market that everybody knows has turned to the difficult side, now having this refinancing in place means that the group remains in a very strong financial position, ending the financial year with cash of GBP 36.4 million and available liquidity of GBP 45.8 million.
The fact that we managed to qualify for a green bond financing also reflects the strong efforts that we have had over the last 2 years to live our vision of being a company with strong ESG credentials. We have undergone a strong transformation from talking about sustainability to actually living it.
Systematically working on a range of areas from natural commitment, sustainable sourcing, animal health and welfare through real engagement in the societies that we are part of. This is a way of operating. This is a way of thinking that is embedded in the organization, and it will be further strengthened in the years to come.
A main topic of the year has been the listing in Oslo, the world's leading aquaculture and seafood listing value. As we have announced in a separate earnings this morning, we are now moving ahead with this listing in the first instance, with a listing at Euronext Growth.
Connected to this listing, we are doing a limited placing and retail offer of shares to fill the listing and free float requirements at Euronext Growth. The placing is limited to 5% of the issued share capital. Books will be opened from December 1 to December 6, and we intend to have our first day of trading at Euronext Growth on or about December 15.
As previously stated, our intention is to uplift at offer both within the first half of the coming year, calendar year '23, and the Board will also consult with the shareholders on the lever to maintain its current AIM listing.
Moving on to -- to give more granularity on the performance in the quarter in our 3 business areas. Starting out with Genetics, where we have had a very strong year, a year where we really have seen growth from invested infrastructure come true.
For the financial year in totality, we have seen growth of revenues of 24%, up to GBP 58 million. At the same time, we have seen earnings from operations or adjusted EBITDA grew by 76% compared to last financial year to GBP 14.4 million, excluding fair value uplift.
The driver behind the strong growth in revenues and earnings is a strong development within salmon genetics where we have seen record high sales of salmon eggs out of Norway and Iceland and especially Iceland has had particularly strong development.
On the back of the investment, that we did in a new incubation center there, we have been able to take advantage of the strong demand for our salmon eggs, giving us better utilization of the new facility than we actually expected.
The new incubation center has really been a good and timely investment for us, both from more quality but also from a volume perspective and that we have utilized. Given the experience under supply of local salmon eggs in Norway, close to 50 million eggs were sold from that facility on Iceland to supply the Norwegian market in the financial year.
Our Chilean salmon egg business has had its first year of operation. The operation is going well, with a number of egg sold are still at the low end as we would have expected. Our effort to penetrate this market in a responsible way continues, and it's now helped by us also having the organic certification in place.
Like our salmon eggs business in Chile, our SPR Shrimp Genetics program and our Genetics program on Tilapia remains growth vectors for us in the future. In our Shrimp Genetics program, we have seen good commercial progress over the year, exceeding our sales targets for the first full year in commercial operation.
We continue our efforts here to tailor the genetics to the different conditions in the different markets, being on a journey where we aim for a significant position in the market -- total market over time. Both for our Shrimp Genetics program and our Tilapia Genetics program, we have completed the investment in needed infrastructure for the next phase in the commercial development and growth.
Key for us as a leading genetics company in agriculture is to make sure that we are in front in terms of science. This is also why we are focusing on strengthening the genetic scientific team with new world-leading resources. The recruitment of Dr. Ross Houston to lead our genetics R&D activity is part of this and further high-caliber resources is now being added to complete our scientific team in this area in the time to come.
Moving over to our largest business area, Advanced Nutrition, where we have seen a continuation of very strong commercial performance throughout the year. Our top line growth within this area ended up 40% for the full year, while our adjusted EBITDA grew by 38% to GBP 19 million. I would also like to remind everybody that in this business area, we have been able to triple our adjusted EBITDA over the last 2 years.
A dominant part of the progress that we have experienced is in our view a consequence of enhanced operations and sharpened commercial effort by our excellent team in INVE and yes, we have been helped by improved market conditions in shrimp markets since the early days of COVID, but the growth we have experienced also this year outperforms the underlying growth rate that we have seen in the market in general.
All in all, our Advanced Nutrition business has ended financial year with growth in all their 3 product categories. We are also especially happy with the rebound in growth that we've seen in Ecuador, which is a key production region for shrimp. But we've also seen good developments and progress in other markets not only in the shrimp industry but also in the marine fin fish industry.
Key to us over the last 2 years has been to optimize our operation and strengthen our commercial efforts and team. We've also been working on streamlining our R&D activities. The efforts we have done on these areas have given good results and will be of course, a strategic priority also for us in the time to come. As well our efforts to launch new technologies as well as developing our activities to become more sustainable in our operations.
Finally, on to the last business area, our health business. Where we saw good progress in adoption of the Ectosan Vet and CleanTreat solution in the last quarter of the year. Coming out of June, July with very long utilization for our 2 vessels that we have deployed, the picture has really changed considerably entering into that, what is the main r sea lice season in Norway and that starts at the beginning of August.
Since then, the uptake on the solution has been good. One of the 2 vessels we have deployed is on a charter with our main salmon producers. While the other vessel is utilized in the spot market during treatment for an increasing number of 7 farmers in the Norwegian market.
Given that we had very low utilization of the vessels in July, the financials for Q4 does not reflect the increase in adoption that we have experienced from the early fall onwards. The financials for the financial year is also -- in total, also mirrored that we have been through a first year of operation after the introduction of the solution.
Even if we obviously are not satisfied with the financial performance in our health business area for the full financial year. We are very conscious that we have used the year well on work on investment necessary to increase the efficiency and adoption of the solution.
We are also satisfied that we have gotten confirmation that we have a unique solution that is on its way to become an important tool for the industry in solving the sea lice issue as all the fundamentals of the solution that we told the industry the result has been confirmed.
As stated, when we did our Q2 and Q2 presentations, we are on a journey towards making the solution less costly, more adaptable, less capital intensive in the future. Key is integration of the CleanTreat technology in the infrastructure of the farmers, taking down cost, risk and CapEx both for us, but also for the farmers.
This work is ongoing every day and will do so also in the time to come in close dialogue with our -- with the farmers, but also with partners that could play a role in ensuring we enable to take out the potential of the solution in the future.
Finally, a few words on the development of the group as a whole. Financial year '22 has been a year of significant strategic and operational progress and another year with very strong commercial focus, to drive the financial progress in all the 3 business areas.
This is what you have seen from us so far, and this is what you should expect to see from us also in the time to go. Will the commercial progress gain be a straight line development, probably not that we are very determined on the direction of travel for the group?
Taking out synergies from being one group, one Benchmark has very much been on our mind over the last financial year. Tangible changes that has been made over the last year is alignment of resources across the group on commercial, marketing, sustainability, R&D and people.
This is key to take out operational efficiencies in the group and something we will do even more in the time to come. We also continue our work to drive cultural teach as well as driving performance to our well-defined -- very well-defined performance framework based on clear strategic priorities. These are strong, very efficient for us in order to drive performance.
And finally, our work to deliver on our commitment on sustainability in ESG has been and will be a strong priority for us. In financial year '22, we have made good progress towards our net 0 commitments as well as a number of other areas crucial to re-improve our standing as an ESG company. It's needless to say that this will still be a key focus for us in the year and years ahead.
With those comments, I will now leave it up to Septima to take us through the financials in more granularity. So over to you, Septima.
Thank you, Trond. So financial year '22 has been a year where we've made significant progress. We now have 3 business areas where we're fully commercially launched. And this shows through in the numbers. With strong revenue growth driven improved adjusted EBITDA, up 60% to GBP 31.2 million.
And from a quality of earnings perspective, adjusted EBITDA, excluding the noncash our value uplift, rose 83% to GBP 29.6 million in the year. As Trond noted, our operating profit was impacted by higher depreciation and amortization charges associated with the rollout of Ectosan Vet and CleanTreat.
Additionally, during the year, we also refinanced our NOK bond, and this resulted in significant noncash movement on the hedges, and a write-off of the deferred financing costs associated with the old bond.
In addition, we incurred a one-off penalty with the early termination of the old bond of GBP 1.6 million. But we're really pleased to have this refinancing in place as we look towards the future.
So moving on to the next slide, where we can look at revenue. We've had a year with a continuation of the consistent delivery theme that we've seen in the business since the restructuring with continued revenue growth in all business areas.
We've made steady progress in all business areas with growth in Nutrition and Genetics, driven by the well-established core businesses. And with the newly launched Ectosan Vet and CleanTreat, health has also seeing good growth in the year. This has driven growth from financial year '20, which was the year of the restructuring to financial year '22 at a rate of 50% of the 2 financial years combined. We see this as a very strong step in the right direction.
Moving on to the next slide, where we look at EBITDA. So the growth in sales has driven strong growth in our gross profit. And with good cost control, this has resulted in growth in adjusted EBITDA at an absolute level, but also, we've delivered strong on growing our adjusted EBITDA margin, moving from the 14% in 2020 to end this year at 20%.
We've delivered a strong set of results in each business area. Nutrition came out with strong commercial and cost focus. Genetics delivered excellent growth in the core businesses in Norway and Iceland, which continued to fund the growth areas and health moving from a loss of GBP 2.7 million last year to a positive contribution of GBP 0.1 million.
In addition, from a quality of earnings perspective, net exceptionals were nill during the period, with the income from previous disposals offsetting costs associated with Oslo listing.
Moving to the next slide. So halfway through the year, we communicated our medium- and long-term financial objectives to aid investors understanding as to how we are moving the business forward.
As you can see, we've progressed towards our financial objectives in financial year '22, delivering strong revenue growth of 27%, which has driven good margin expansion, bringing our adjusted EBITDA margin of 20% towards the target margin of 25% to 30%. And with stronger cash conversion 35%, we've been able to move the free cash flow in the right direction towards our target free cash flow.
And how does that translate into our business areas? So moving to the next slide. With strong objectives of revenue growth, good cost control and cash control, taking the business towards profitability and cash generation.
In Genetics, the levers for growth are, of course, expanded into the invested capacity of Norway and Iceland and penetrating the market in Chile for our salmon eggs. In addition, growth will be supported by the newly launched shrimp and incrementally by our tilapia sales.
In Nutrition, we expect to grow ahead of the market, which has been supported by our results within financial year '22, and then health as we gain traction in the market for Ectosan Vet and CleanTreat, we're getting better profitability and cash generation from this business area.
So moving on to focus on to Genetics. So Genetics had an excellent year, with revenue growth of 21%. Solid gross margin and good cost control, taking the adjusted EBITDA margin to 28% on an adjusted EBITDA of GBP 16 million. Even excluding fair value, adjusted EBITDA was GBP 14.4 million in the year, a growth of 76%.
This result was linked to our ability to meet the increased market demand for salmon eggs, which we were able to supply from the newly invested incubation house in Iceland. Once the new incubation has only officially opened in August '22, we were able to start ramping up capacity and utilizing it before that. And this resulted in the total number of eggs sold increasing by 24% to GBP 291 million in the year.
In other salmon revenue streams, harvest revenues were higher, benefiting from the high salmon prices during the year. And newly launched salmon Chile has moved to the commercial phase, and we continue to focus our efforts on penetrating that market.
On shrimp, we commercially launched during the first quarter of this calendar year, and we continue to focus our efforts to grow that market, as we've now commercially launched to exceed capitalizing costs and the all costs of flowing into adjusted EBITDA.
In terms of tilapia, the tilapia expansion was delayed due to COVID issues. And therefore, we did not complete it to have it in place for the full year, albeit we should see the effect of it come through in financial year '23.
Moving on to the next slide, where we focus on our genetics growth areas. So as I mentioned, Genetics had an excellent year with the core salmon business of Norway and Iceland delivering over GBP 22 million of adjusted EBITDA. This momentum allows us to support our newly launched businesses, which aren't yet profitable, but represent opportunities for future growth.
In total, we invested a combined adjusted EBITDA loss of GBP 6.5 million in these areas, driven by the full year of commercial costs of Chile and half year for shrimp. Tilapia's expansion, as I noted, was delayed, so we weren't able to achieve the full year's production during this financial year.
In terms of CapEx for these areas, now that we've closed out the large CapEx to grow these growth areas, the focus is on driving profitability and cash generation in these areas.
So moving on to look at Nutrition. Nutrition is an important part of our business from profitability and cash generation perspective. Nutrition continued to deliver good progress during the year with revenue growth in all product areas, showing the continuation of sharpened commercial focus.
This growth was supported by strong currency tailwinds as the US dollar was strong throughout the year, but increased revenue also drove better manufacturing volumes and resulted in gross margin increasing from 51% to 53% in the year overall.
This, coupled with excellent cost control, even as we invested into the commercial products, drove adjusted EBITDA growth to GBP EUR 19 million and adjusted EBITDA margin to GBP 24 million -- to 24%, a very strong result.
Moving on to health. So health has made significant progress in the year with the first full year of Ectosan Vet and CleanTreat. During the year, with one vessel with a CleanTreat unit aboard operational for the full year and the second unit came online in December '22 -- '21.
Combined, they delivered revenue of GBP 14.8 million, of which GBP 2.5 million related to revenue from vessel-related costs. The gross profit increased by GBP 4.6 million to GBP 8.3 million, which offset an increase in operating costs of 1.9, and ultimately move to the business area from being loss-making in financial year '21 with an adjusted EBITDA loss of 2.7 to an adjusted EBITDA profit of 0.1, albeit marginal.
But we still have progress to make in this business area to move towards the target margin. But for the full year's operations completed, focus will be on improving profitability and cash generation in this business area.
Moving on to the next slide. So operating costs grew at an absolute level, but reduced as a percentage of sales. Growth at an absolute level was driven by increased activity in the core business and costs associated with the newly launched commercial areas, such as Health, SPR shrimp in Chile.
Whilst OpEx increased, R&D decreased in the period as we ceased capitalizing costs associated with the development projects. Our main focus is in ongoing R&D now surrounds the breeding nucleus in Genetics and our ongoing development project in our Nutrition business area.
Moving on. So as you can see, as part of the restructuring, we invested significantly in the business in both the core established businesses to get them caught up from an investment perspective, and then invested in the development areas to allow them to commercially launch.
We're now sitting with 3 areas, which have all of their development projects fully launched. With this new commercial phase, we can expect that our operating cash flow, which became positive in financial year '21, will continue to grow and the quality of earnings will support this. This, of course, will then, with more moderate CapEx, as we move forward, allow us to grow our overall cash flow generation and become cash flow positive.
So moving on to look at working capital, a key part of our operations. This is an area of significant focus for us as we move forward. As you can see, working capital grew at an absolute level, but remained stable as a percentage of sales. We want to focus on this, taking it down in the coming year and thereafter as we grow the business to ultimately unwind some of the working capital.
In health, the working capital increased through, of course, the ramp-up of Ectosan, CleanTreat, but also as we move the third CleanTreat unit into inventory, given the intention to move to a new operating model, where we sell the unit directly to the customer, we used within our infrastructure.
Genetics inventory increased due to increased biological assets. We've got more fish and also more eggs due to ramping up our facilities in Norway and Iceland. And in Nutrition, with increased inventory of Artemia, but also higher overall inventories due to increased safety stocks in place to combat logistical challenges.
So moving on to look at net financial expenses. As you can see, there's a number of moving parts within the finance costs. But there are 2 main items to note, the closeout of the old bond resulted in the early settlement penalty, and the increase in amortization as we roll off the remaining deferred financing costs associated with the old bond.
Additionally, you can see the significant swing of GBP 9.4 million, the noncash movement on the cash flow hedges, as the old hedges were closed out and newer hedges were put in place. In terms of interest on bond debt, we expect that this will remain at the current levels in the next financial year based on the financing cost of the new NOK bond. The interest on finance leases increased in the year due to the leases associated with the PSVs as part of the increased operation.
Moving on to look at our cash flow and our net debt position. So as you can see, with improved trading in better cash generation with cash from operations after working capital of 18.3. Within the CapEx figure of 12.7, we had the CapEx to complete the incubation house and also the core cost of a third clean treatment.
As we've previously noted, CleanTreat moving to a customer infrastructure and low lower overall CapEx within the rest of the business, we expect the CapEx burden to be more moderate going forward, which is an important tool in moving us to positive cash flow.
Trond and I have both noted our desire to move the business towards positive cash flow. And we have a number of levers we can use to support this. Better trading, of course. Strong trading supported by good cost control is very important, unwinding some of the working capital, as we've noted before, and of course, moderating the CapEx for burden with our core businesses having been invested in over the last number of years, now is the time to get better asset utilization out of the business and moderate the CapEx. And this will allow us to push forward towards cash flow posted in the coming year.
Moving to the next slide. We've made significant progress this year. We're not just in moving the business in the right direction, but also with respect to ensuring that we've got the right foundations for the future. And of course, an important part of [ business ] our financing.
During the year, we refinanced our old, secured NOK 850 million bond, replaced it with an unsecured green NOK 750 million bond with a maturity of September '25. In addition, we also refinanced our debt associated with Salten, consolidating our facilities and extending the term at by 5 years.
And finally, we refinanced a $15 million RCF and replaced with a GBP 20 million RCF with a maturity of June 2025. Having these facilities in place allows us the flexibility to focus on the business and cash generation now that we're well financed as we move towards the future.
Back to you, Trond.
Thank you, Septima. And on to the outlook. After ending financial year with very good and strong progress. We are, of course, very happy to be able to state that we have also had a good start of the new financial year. Where we are right now, we see good momentum in all of our 3 business areas when we are now started on our new financial year '23.
I think it's obvious to everyone that we are living in more onshore -- in a more onshore world at the moment with numerous issues that could impact any business, not only ours. Our focus, given these surroundings, is to do whatever we can to optimize the performance in our business and not allowing ourselves to be too distracted by uncertainties outside of our control.
I would also like to remind you that we are a very well-diversified business. We are a very well-positioned business. And what we deliver is mission-critical solutions, solutions that is needed anyway for our farmers around in the global aquaculture industry. If you couple that with a proactive commercial approach, strong commercial focus. This creates resilience and mitigate potential impact from ongoing cost inflation and macroeconomic pressures.
One of the topics that I know has been discussed is also the recently proposed change in tax regime for the salmon producers in Norway. This is a proposal that has been given by the government is going to be -- it's on a hearing now. It's going to be implemented throughout the next year.
The way we see it, we expect that this new proposal will have just a marginal direct effect on our business. To the extent that we will see implication, it will be related to the growth rate of the salmon production in Norway in the years to come.
Some fare that it will take down the growth rate. Again, the tax proposal that is proposed is designed in a way and it's stated to be in a way that it's not supposed to take down the growth of the industry, it's to take a fair share of the high profitability in the salmon farming core activity and share that with the society.
Given this morning's announcement, I also mentioned in the beginning of the presentation, it should be needless to say that we continue to progress towards a listing at Euronext Growth in Oslo. We strongly believe this will be beneficial for the company and its shareholders, mainly placing the company in the center of the strong world-leading aquaculture culture that is surrounding Oslo Børs.
On a final note, let me end our presentation reminding you why Benchmark is such a unique company, such a unique value proposition and such a unique investment opportunity.
Next slide. We are in the aquaculture industry, and we are very happy to be in this industry. It's a young industry. It's a prosperous industry. It's a growing industry, supported by global megatrends. It is an industry that will play an important role in feeding the world in the time to come. This is an industry that will give structural growth for those companies who are well positioned in the space.
And this is all about what Benchmark is. We are very well positioned holding market-leading positions in all the 3 business areas in everything we are doing and holding market-leading positions within the leading species within aquaculture.
In some what we are is a unique, mature, biotech platform, well invested, well prepped for growth, well prepped to develop in the years to come. We've been through the development stages. We now have a strategy and a financial framework that should drive growth and returns to the investors.
And finally, we are more than just an ordinary company. We are really a purpose-driven company, strong organization, strong ESG credentials that makes it -- that creates another dimension on top of our commercial focus.
So with those words, Hannah, I'll leave it up to you to take us through some questions.
Thank you. Well, I think you've touched on this already, just on your closing comments, but is there anything you want to add on the impact to the business from the proposed salmon tax increases? And I guess, have you run any sensitive analysis that you can share with us?
Yes. I can just comment a little bit more on it, because it's a question that we -- it's really raised a lot of times.
We think that we are sure that the direct implications of the tax proposal, if it's going through as it is proposed, will be limited. We see that there is a production tax. As part of this, that is currently at NOK 0.4 that is proposed to go up to NOK 1.2. That will hit the small portion of our incomes that come from a slaughtered fish within Genetics. So it's a marginal. That's the only direct indication we see.
We don't see any changes in behavior or demand for salmon eggs. We don't see any changes in behavior and demand for Ectosan Vet and CleanTreat are the main product here. And the key to understand our position in this is that unlike other companies, we are a company that only provides mission-critical solutions and products. They need to have eggs. They need to have some sea lice treatments -- sea lice treatment is not taxed. So they need to buy it anyway, and that's reflected also in the demand pattern that we see.
Total income from the group from Norway is 32%. So you see that we are well diversified. Yes, it could have an impact on the growth of the Norwegian salmon industry. But again, this model of taxation is taken from the Norwegian oil industry, and it's supposed to be investment neutral. It's supposed to be a growth neutral for the industry.
So see how it lands, but I think, unlike other companies providing, for instance, CapEx goods into the industry, we are very well positioned Hannah. That was a long answer.
Yes. It was a thorough answer. Thank you.
On to CleanTreat. Where did the idea to move from the investment in ships to doing it perhaps outsourcing? The epiphany obviously came after the investment in a couple of boats. So what changed?
It's a good question. It's really a relevant question also. But you also -- when you're starting it, you always have to have a starting point and our starting point in order to get to the solution to launch at all was that we needed to provide the medicine, we needed to provide a platform for a CleanTreat because that's one solution. You don't use it -- you cannot use medicine if you don't have the CleanTreat system. It's not allowed, and we will never allow it.
So we needed to have a platform for a CleanTreat system. At the time, there were at a launch, there were no big wellboats that we could place it on, there were no other platforms that we could place it on. So we ended up placing it on a PSV. And in order to get started, just needed to do the investment installing them on time-chartered PSV to time charter PSVs.
It has been obvious to us all the way that that's a costly and to large around the solution. But as again, we need to start somewhere, and we started there. So since then, we have been focusing on, of course, getting our traction as we can out of the current setup, but we have always been conscious that this needs to be moved to a situation where it becomes leaner, less capital expensive, more adaptable for the customers and less risky for us. So that's a journey that we have taken since it started.
Well, perhaps moving on then, obviously, the investment that you have made to date is sitting there on the books. Is there an opportunity then as you move on to this new model that you can sell those boats even to customers or a, and other? And I think there was a big focus there in the presentation set on working capital. This perhaps might be one of the levers that you will pull.
Yes. And the short answer on that is yes. And this is what we are aiming for. We don't need to own the CleanTreat system. We can sell it with the right to use. We would like other farmers or other service providers to hold the business model around the CleanTreat going forward because our business model is to be a provider of very efficacious medicines.
Okay. I think you've sort of covered this in your previous answer, but perhaps just a little more comfort. Is it correct that existing salmon farmers and can dump their wastewater into the sea, and thus do not need to buy CleanTreat. Is a legislation that forces them?
No. When it when it comes to access on that, it's only a load. It's only load, and we will never, never allow anything else that it needs to go through a CleanTreat system to clean out the medicine and release clean sea back to the seabed. I've been some from myself. I know the history of it, I'm strongly believe that this is the future of using medicines in aquaculture, and we are frontrunner of that. That's why we're driving sustainability in aquaculture.
Okay. And then just back to CleanTreat, briefly. The third vessel, obviously, you mentioned this Septima in your part of the presentation and it's available to be used. So what is the plan there specifically?
So I made reference to the fact that we have moved the CleanTreat unit into inventory because the intention is to sell directly to a customer and ultimately put it on a bespoke platform, be it a wellboat, be it a barge and to allow them to have their own CleanTreat system in place within their own platforms, within their infrastructure.
What that does is it reduces the capital-intensive nature for us because we take out the need for the PSV, but it also removes the capital-intensive nature for the customer because they don't have to pay the additional cost for the PSV. So it's a very balanced approach to sharing value in terms of the new business model.
We all benefit out of -- this sort of more evolved approach in terms of that. So that CleanTreat unit has been coming into the inventory and to the docs effectively over the last number of months. And the last part of it will be coming in over the next quarter or so.
Thank you. What's the plan for CleanTreat and Ectosan in terms of new territories and market approval?
Norway is more than 50% of the global salmon production market. So we've always been very clear that we need to make a success there, and that's the starting point. We now know that we and we have a launch that we got marketing authorization of Faroe Island. That's very close by. It's a farming region.
Then we had Iceland, then we have Scotland, then we have Canada, then we have Chile. And probably in that order, we will look at the opportunities going forward, but we are very focused on not running ahead of ourselves in Benchmark. Now we are ticking off boxes. That's what they are doing.
So we are very focused on ticking off the boxes, getting the learnings, getting the traction, getting the earnings out on the Norwegian market. And then we are, of course, ready to move into the other territories to really take out the potential solution globally.
Thank you. Well, that's it for questions from the floor. So thank you to both the time you committed, and thanks to the rest of you for attending, and we'll look forward to an update in end of Feb.
Wonderful. Thank you, Hannah.
Thank you. Thank you all.