Atlas Copco AB

STO:ATCO A

Earnings Call Transcript 2020-Q4

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Atlas Copco Q4 2020 report. Today, I'm pleased to present CEO, Mats Rahmström; and CFO, Hans Ola Meyer. [Operator Instructions] Mr. Ola, please begin.

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

Thank you very much, and let me also welcome everybody to this call. We will talk about the fourth quarter results of 2020, and we will do it in the usual format, which means that Mats will soon give his comments to the quarter, and then we will open up for the questions-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions]So with that, I think I hand over to Mats right away. Please.

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

Thank you, Hans Ola. We will start then the presentation with Slide #2. We said it's a solid finish to quite the challenging year, and we were quite pleased with the outcome of the month. And in certain areas, we came in above our own expectations. And of course, we still operate in quite an uncertain market. So orders received at SEK 26 billion, 7% organic growth. We can see that CT, Compressor Technique, being very strong at 5% organic. And they've been fairly strong throughout the year. Very positive with Vacuum Technique coming in at 90%. And of course, they benefit from the digitalization of industrial applications and also society. I can also see a positive shift in Industrial and Power Technique. So I think it's a step forward there as well. And as you can see then, we have growth -- organic growth in 3 out of 4 business areas. Happy to say then that the operating margin is principally back on prepandemic levels, 20.9%. To get to this point, the agility and speed has been essential, cost control and the resilient business model that we operate in. And operating cash flow then at SEK 6.5 billion, which is one of the best quarters that we have had. Take the next slide, which is Slide #3. If you look at the graph, we can see then that the, of course, weakest quarter was Q2. And there was a lot of debate about V-shaped or U-shaped recoveries. And as now at least, we can see that from that focal standpoint, it's been quite V-shaped. And looking at the bars for this quarter, you can see that they are almost in par with some of the better quarters that we have had over a number of years. The adjustment you have on operating margin is the revaluation of option programs of SEK 29 million. And return on capital employed, of course, will be impacted by the recent acquisitions that we have done, so that's an impact. And of course, we have a certain part of volume in there as well. Take Slide #4. Looking at the year, I think we were -- I said in the beginning of the year, internally, that we probably would spend a lot of time on our opportunities but also said that there will for sure be challenges going ahead. And for sure, we have been challenged. And I think it's been almost like a crash course in learning new ways. That comes, of course, down to how we operate in sales; product introductions; trainings; digital fares; and of course, the connectivity of products; all these things, I think, that has been quite beneficial that we've been up and running with many of these. And we see now that many of these things -- the way we have learned to do things is a better way and will stay after the situation with COVID as well. At the same time, we see that the hands-on experience to sell to new customers is more complicated in a digital way and the transformation sell when you're selling something more value-creating can also be challenged. So we hope that we can get back to a more normalized situation, but many of the things that we have learned will, of course, stay. The demand suffered significantly with the exception in vicinity of Vacuum, which I said benefit from the digitalization, like we are doing today and in many other areas as well. Then there was a handful of segments, of course, that was stronger: medical, water treatment and food, for example. And part of the model of the resilience is, of course, the service. And I can see that service stayed flat. And we had the lockdown situation, which was very difficult for service, but the connectivity helped. And now I think we have better access to customers. But it's not over yet, it's still difficult in parts of the world. We completed 12 acquisitions throughout the year. And one of the things that we have committed to is to reduce our CO2 platform. And we said that we will make a reduction with 50% until 2030. And this year then, we managed to reduce it to 12%. And from the base year, which is 2018, we have actual a reduction already now of 28%. We are a little bit ahead of our plan there. The proposed dividend from the Board is SEK 7.30, so a slight increase, pointing in one direction that we have a solid financial model here at Atlas Copco. And the next Slide #5. Here, you see the summary of the year. And of course, when we were at the Q2, we could not expect that the recovery would be this quick. The best year we have had was 2019. Then we had SEK 104 billion in revenues. And now we are at SEK 100 billion, so it's quite a remarkable recovery in the last couple of quarters to get back to this level. And as you can see that adjusted operating margin for the year is 20%, which, once again, point in the direction of a business model that we can act and adjust to a new scenario pretty quickly. And can I say record cash flow for the year? Yes. We take next slide. On the positive side here, you can see that the quarterly numbers to the right that we have green numbers in most areas with the exception of North America. North America, they have, of course, their challenges, and it's still minus 2% for us. And I would say it's negative for 3 out of 4 business areas in this region. And the positive surprise with similar challenges, of course, in Europe, a positive on 8%. There, it's the other way around. It's 3 out of 4 that is positive for that region. South America continue in local currencies to be very beneficial, and it's between -- it's only Industrial Technique that have a decline linked to the car industry there. Strong Middle East, 20%. Main driver here is Compressor Technique and Vacuum. And the star performance, I think, would be Asia, 4% for the year and, of course, 14%. And there, we have growth in all business areas. You take the next Slide, #7, just to confirm then the organic growth of 7%. Take the next Slide #8. And here, you can see in the bridge for orders received and the same for revenues, how they changed. Strengthening of the Swedish krona, weakening of the U.S. dollars impacts us with minus 8% for the quarter. Take Slide #9 where you can see the split between the different business areas, and also we have added organic order growth. And the main difference for the year is the strengthening of Vacuum Technique that continue to be a bigger part of the Atlas Copco business. But we can also see then that 3 out of 4 then had organic growth for that quarter. We come down to Compressor Technique, Slide #10. Looking at the graph first, we can see they were not as severe hit in Q2 as some of the other so that we really see the resilience in the business being present geographically and it's also a money segment. This month, we had growth in all the different products, with the exception of gas and process, and continued service growth. So very strong performance, and the top months -- top quarter in terms of operating margin at 23.8%.I also promised my team to mention something about this new oil-free gas screw compressors. It's for use in the LNG gas engines. It's actually only approved the approved oil-free machine. It -- well, it has approved, as I said. So for the LNG, which is the low-pressure engine for future marine applications, it's a very interesting product. We go to Vacuum. Of course, quite impressive orders received, graph on the right, the 19%, but also the other businesses are growing. And also saw a really good month, slight decrease on revenue versus last year and operating margin at 22.9%. We continue to invest in this business both in terms of digital, both in terms of R&D and also in the organization. And there is dilution, of course, from the acquisition as well. Slide 12, Industrial Technique. Here, you can see, of course, the huge drop in Q2, and then a more stable business. So orders declined then 1% and revenues continue to be down at 12% and the margin at 17.6%. If you would take away then the acquisition, you can add 2% on that margin. And internal capital is, of course, impacted by the acquisitions that they have done recently. Also here, a really cool product. It's a tool developed for robot applications. It's easy to adjust. You have the controller on board. So it's something for the automated and flexibility in our industry as well. I didn't mention that, but it was in the report, the ISRA acquisition, they had the year-on-year growth on 5%, still negative on revenues. So they have built up a pool of installations that they will do in the coming quarters. They are suffering somewhat more from the COVID situation that they have difficulties to have access to all the sites where they need to be as well. Power Technique on Slide 13. Bending the trend here with order growth, both equipment and service. A little bit lower utilization of the specialty rental business, revenue decrease, of course. Still a good job on the margin. It wouldn't be on this level without a good cost control. Of course, they are suffering from the volume here as well. And also here, a new innovation, putting the stage 5 engines into this. So it's a little bit more environmentally friendly products. Slide 14, yes, confirming the margin here, and you can see the graph as well. And now I will get some help from my friend, Hans Ola.

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

Thank you, Mats. Yes, why don't we start from almost the bottom this time. And you have seen in Mats' slides on the business areas, of course, and in the report, the numbers. But if we look at the return on capital employed, it has a pretty severe drop, a little bit unusual for Atlas Copco in 1 year. And the explanations Mats touched upon can say that the impact of acquisition, I mean a big new capital cost versus the operating profit additions that we get, is hurting, if I use that word, return on capital employed with about 5%. So that is the -- absolutely the main explanation of it. And you saw that Industrial Technique was the worst hit on that one. Currency is, of course, also taking its toll on the return just as on operating profit. If we move up a little bit from there on the tax, this effective tax rate of 20.7% was a bit flattered by some positives in the quarter, not a lot. So I would say that we believe that 21.5-ish effective tax rate is the underlying run rate for the time being that we use. Of course, there are uncertainties on that. We don't know what the new administration in the U.S. will do later on. But at least in the near-term future, that's what we expect to see. And on the financial net, it was actually only some financial exchange differences that was negative in the quarter. The underlying interest rate cost is still very low, actually, somewhat lower than last year even. And as Mats said initially, if we take an adjusted operating margin, it would be 21% flat this quarter versus 21.6% last year. So that's a little bit just summing up the totals. If we move to the next one, on the profit bridge, you see that the currency column is negative, of course, both on revenues and on operating profit, and that hurts the margin about 0.5 percentage point, you could say. If we look at the absolute value of that SEK 590 million that we compared to the same quarter last year, given today's rate, I would expect something similar in the relation between Q1 and Q1 2020, looking forward, that is. So that's a little bit of a guide into the first quarter. The -- and the other components you see there, so the net of the organic contribution is positive on the margin. And we can appreciate that on the next slide. If we look at the various business areas, the one that stands out is, of course, a very nice both absolute growth in CT and also affecting the margin positively because currency is negative also for CT. The reason why we have this nice and strong flow-through of profit, I would say, it's thanks to the volume growth, of course, but also significant savings that has stayed following the worst part of the year of COVID effects. So that has been positive. The other main comment is probably on Vacuum Technique where Mats showed a drop on the margin. It's actually here quite a lot of costs that -- partly it's related to COVID. We see the transports cost, not only for VT, of course, but it has been most severe in their case, it has driven up tariffs, and that has hurt. There is still, in the year, also some costs related to Brexit. But also, what Mats also commented upon, that here is an area with strong growth of the business. It's just that the volume of revenue was slightly down compared to last year. So of course, there is investment in the organization and in various projects that need to happen. So hence, it looks a little bit worse from profit generation compared to the drop of revenue in this case. On the other two, the -- I think it's a pretty expected result. If you lose volume of that magnitude, it will also hurt your profit. On the balance sheet, I actually don't have so much to say. The bottom line, if I call it like that, is that the financial position of the group is still very strong. It's 0.7 net debt-to-EBITDA in spite of some significant acquisitions in the year. So that's a healthy, strong financial position. If we move on yet another slide, we come to the cash flow. And as Matt said, SEK 18.9 billion for the year is actually a slight record at least, even compared to a year when we still had Epiroc as part of the group, so that's very comforting. Of course, you can all see that the main contributing factor is that when business is not growing, we release a lot of cash from the working capital, and that's exactly what has happened in this quarter as well. Next slide is just summarizing a longer trend over the last 10 years, how the development of dividend. And I just want to point out that of -- between 2017 and '18, we, of course, had the distribution of the Mining and Rock business, nowadays called Epiroc, and then we start to see a slight steady increase on dividend again. The proposal from the Board was SEK 7.30, as Mats explained earlier. With that, I think I'll leave it back to you, Mats, to talk about the near-term future.

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

Yes. In the near-term future then, difficult to look into the future, as we have learned over and over again. Business remain uncertain. And as we can follow, the COVID situation is not over by far, but it seems that a lot of the activities is more directed to society versus industry. But on the risk side, we still see renewed lockdown. If that would happen, of course, that could be a negative. Lack of stimulus, let's see if these packages really help the economy to get started again. And if we would see escalating protectionist, that's not good for the decision-making either, of course. And if you have vaccine setbacks, it can also turn this around to say deescalate in a protectionist. So it's an environment where we can see that decision-making is easier for industries. That would be positive for us and the faster execution of the vaccine programs around the world. Let me say that this is -- remain on the current level. And considering then that we saw high activity levels in Q4, so this forward-looking statement is then on a higher level than what we said in the past. And we see that many industries have during Q4, semi being one of them, of course, moving in a positive way. And that's why we have said that it remains on current level, which we believe is a rather high level. And this is to guide you between Q4 and Q1 in terms of activities among our customers. I think that ends the presentation.

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

Thank you, Mats. Then I will just ask the operator to repeat the procedure for the questions, and then we will carry on right away with them.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from the line of Klas Bergelind from Citi.

[Klas Henrik Bergelind, Director]

So one question. So let's focus on semis and capacities. So you have 2 relatively new factories there in the U.S. and China. And in the context not of bottlenecks across the supply chain, I sort of sense that you're in a quite good position here. We have obviously TSMC with the new fab coming onstream in the U.S. this year, but you have new capacity. Or should we be concerned about bottlenecks for VT as well? It obviously depends on how strong demand is going forward, but interested in your thoughts.

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

No, but just to confirm that we have a strong position in all key accounts around the world. So if we will see an increased demand, which we have seen in Q4 as well, of course, we will have part of that. You know, Klas, that we always in semi keep our utilization lower than in other, have the gap to be able to deliver on the expected delivery times. Of course, with the impact of the 19% growth now will limit that capacity, of course, but everyone is on board to try to meet the expectation from customers. And so far, I haven't had any shortages of components. But it's all hands on deck, of course, to make sure that we can satisfy our customers.

[Operator]

And the next question comes from the line of Guillermo Peigneux from UBS.

[Guillermo Peigneux-Lojo]

Guillermo from UBS. Maybe a follow-up question to Klas and a question related to IT. On the semis front, given the shortages to the auto industry, I was wondering whether the natural way of seeing that in your business is through the aftermarket revenues at some point. As you know, the semiconductor players are trying to catch up in order to meet demands from the automotive industry. So that's the follow-up question. And then regarding IT, I was very interested to understand a little bit the sequential growth coming from the auto sector but from a regional perspective. Is it all driven by Asia Pacific or China? Or have you seen those maybe tentative spending pattens also improving in Europe and the U.S.A.?

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

That's a smart way to get 2 questions in. The semi part, of course, as you have read in the news, there are even shutdowns in the auto industry. We are not an expert on this in any way. But the way I read it is that during Q2, probably there were cancellations of orders and now they're trying to ramp up again. On the other side then, we see that utilization among the semi manufacturer is around 90%. And then also they have a big demand from other customers in the electronics and the digital world. So I think they need to balance a little bit deliveries. And of course, over time, that's positive for CapEx investment if the utilization stays on such a high level.The IT question, I'm looking, you asked for the geographical. What we have seen on that, Guillermo, is a little bit more activities around the dispensing equipment versus the tools, and that's probably a little bit earlier in the cycle that we can read as a positive. But activities right now is -- a lot of the activity is related to electric vehicles. And so when you see the electric vehicle programs, which is then strong in China, you can see the expansion of Tesla to Europe accordingly, and you can see the European brands also stepping up quite significantly from Volkswagen Group, et cetera. So going forward, reading the insight a little bit, you can see that CapEx is probably going to be on a lower level for a number of years, and it's going to be shifted over to more of the electric vehicles. To follow the where we will sell is a case a bit of where you see the successful electric vehicle manufacturers around the world. And that is also linked to the new engine, which is the batteries, where we have applications for Compressors, we have for Vacuum and Industrial Technique.

[Operator]

And the next question comes from the line of Maddy Singh from Bank of America.

[Madhvendra Singh, Research Analyst]

In -- my question is on Compressor Technique division. Very strong performance in the quarter. So what do you say about the activity levels within Compressor Technique in Q4? And as well as looking ahead at Q1, do you think the worst is behind in this space? And shouldn't -- or should we expect further acceleration actually in the growth rates in the division?

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

Thank you for commenting on the nice performance on Compressor Technique. We do see and have over a couple of quarters now seeing good activity in the industrial compressors, so that's more the general industry applications. In last quarter, it was somewhat slower on the project business, which we see in the big oil-free machines and gas. And of course, in this quarter then, we had also growth on the oil-free machines, but a slight decrease on the gas and process business. Going forward, considering that we don't give guidance per business area, but considering that we say to continue on this level, and Compressor Technique is 47% for the group, which you can read as it needs to be -- continue to be on a high activity level if this is going to -- we be able to deliver on that.So -- but increased, not so sure if it's going to be increased. But it will remain on the same level, at least, this is what we believe.

[Madhvendra Singh, Research Analyst]

And just a follow-up there. I remember from the Capital Market Day, the focus on the low-pressure compressors. And so I was wondering how much of the growth in Q4 has actually come from traction within that space? Is that a meaningful contribution yet? Or that is still something which is not showing up in the numbers yet and maybe will come later on in quarters ahead?

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

I have not checked specifically for this quarter. But looking over a number of quarters, you can see that the low pressure, when they arranged with very competitive products, energy-efficient products, that this has been growing more than the other compressors in the division. So we see it as a success with a higher growth rate. So we are very positive.

[Operator]

And the next question comes from the line of Daniela Costa from Goldman Sachs.

[Daniela C. R. de Carvalho e Costa]

I wanted to ask regarding sort of how should we think about Compressor and the margin going forward. You've mentioned a lot of those discretionary actions that you did during the COVID year will -- would still stay. And you -- and also, I guess, there's still some pent-up demand maybe on service that couldn't get done. Shall we think about this margin in Compressor now has kind of floored? Or what are the puts and takes?

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

On our strategy then, of course, we look at becoming more efficient, trying to use different tools. It could be digital tools, how we do modelization in operations, how we work with logistics. But delivering them as we did this quarter then, 23.8%, and a very strong return on capital employed. I must say that most of our effort is to finding growth opportunities, top line opportunities, like you talked about the low pressure, and find an adjacent applications. We spend much more time. So if there is -- spending more on R&D as well. So it's not really that we are discussing how could we increase the 23% and upwards, it's more like how can we use our position then to gain more market share in profitable profit goal. So I would say that, that has been the priority, and we continue with that, considering the financial performance.

[Daniela C. R. de Carvalho e Costa]

And sorry, just on the pent-up, is there -- is it fair to say there's still pent-up service demand in Compressors? Or that has eliminated throughout the second half?

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

Well, I don't think they normally see this type of big swings between a trough and a peak in terms of pent-up demand on service. As you know, there is a healthy portion of service contracts business in Compressor Technique. So it's more of an ongoing gradual grinding way of becoming bigger and bigger and maintaining a thorough and good profitability rather than seeing that next year could be the catch-up year type of thing. We don't recognize that from the past even.

[Operator]

And the next question comes from the line of Andreas Koski from Nordea.

[Andreas Juhani Koski, Analyst]

Can I follow up on that discussion around the discretionary savings or temporary savings? Can you give us some sort of indication how much less you have spent on travelings and attending trade fairs, et cetera, due to COVID-19 now in Q4 and for the full year?

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

No. I mean it's true that we are proud that all savings from Q2, when the uncertainty was huge about the future, to a large extent have been able to be kept -- been kept. I wouldn't emphasize that travel expense is a huge component of normal spend, but it contributes, obviously. I think that when we analyze where the result comes from, it's, of course, helpful, but we still have pain from the dramatic drop that we saw in parts of the year and the ramp-up and the transport costs that have come with it. So I would more see that it helps us to balance that effect rather than saying we have a boosted margin thanks to temporary cost savings. The subsidies, for example, from governments that we have enjoyed, as many others, for short-term work throughout the year is much less, of course, and it's approaching very insignificant numbers at the end of the year, whereas it was more meaningful in the second quarter, for example, as you recall.

[Andreas Juhani Koski, Analyst]

Yes. I am, of course, trying to think about 2021 and what will happen there if we are going to see a big headwind from temporary savings this year coming back on the P&L as costs next year, and that would mean that the drop-through from the organic growth that we will probably see next year would be lower than in a normal situation. But do you think that we will see normal drop-throughs in 2021? Or will we see lower drop-throughs because of the headwind from temporary savings fading?

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

I don't think that we see any dramatic difference. I'd rather like to carry on what Mats said that when we are at this level of profitability that CT is, we want the spending to go on in order to sort of safeguard the future growth. So it's very difficult to pin. But we should also remember, of course, that some of the savings will not come back immediately because we are still in a pandemic, and we will not go back to sort of a 2018 type of situation in -- over a fortnight, so to speak. It will take time.

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

I was just thinking about that, that it's very unlikely with the situation as it is globally right now. We still have a travel ban for all our employees. And I mean, Q1, absolutely not, and it's unlikely that it will be tons of traveling in Q2 either.On the other side, I believe that traveling would be something positive. That means that the world has opened up and we can access accounts in a completely different way as well. So if that happens, we will get a little bit extra cost, but I think the positives are significantly more important from a decision like this.

[Andreas Juhani Koski, Analyst]

Understood. Can I just squeeze a very short one on ISRA Vision in?

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

Please do.

[Andreas Juhani Koski, Analyst]

Yes? Because it looks like ISRA VISION had revenues of SEK 270 million in Q4, down from around SEK 420 million in Q3. So they clearly suffer from not being able to access customer sites, it looks like. But can you give us an indication of the order intake number because you said orders grew by 5% year-over-year for ISRA VISION. So was the book-to-bill very strong?

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

Yes. The -- first of all, you're right. As Mats said, the orders were growing compared to the same quarter last year by about 5%, so that's correct. But in this case, to track, let's say, book-to-bill is, of course, pretty difficult as an indicator since the low invoicing, if I call it like that, in comparison, is very much due to the difficulties in the market and the problems of getting closure on the invoicing on the right level in the quarter. So perhaps it's not like with very diverse business like CT where you can sort of follow the order intake versus the revenue in the same way.We should also perhaps say that the -- there is a certain difference in the numbers that you picked up very rightly that there has been -- between the quarters in ISRA, there has been quite significant discrepancy between, let's say, the final quarter of their accounting year and another quarter. So it's better to look at, let's say, year-over-year comparisons right now, I say -- I would say.

[Operator]

And the next question comes from the line of Rizk Maidi from Jefferies.

[Rizk Maidi, Equity Analyst]

Just a quick one on China, please. Just what's your assessment there in terms of industrial demand? And were you surprised to see your industrial compressors demand in Asia being flat on a year-over-year basis?

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

I think China has been the region that after Q2 been -- probably the region that's been most stable in terms of activities. And when we refer to Asia and compressors in this quarterly report, it's more outside China than in China. So in China, it was actually quite positive. We don't foresee decreased activity in China. Hopefully, the COVID situation will be better there as well. So -- but I think that's the region that has performed more stable throughout the year for us.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from the line of Alasdair Leslie from Societe Generale.

[Alasdair Leslie, Equity Analyst]

Sorry, can you hear me now?

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

We can hear you.

[Alasdair Leslie, Equity Analyst]

Sorry about that. Yes, so a year ago, I think you were highlighting that you were starting to see investments being made by customers that were kind of motivated really by environmental paybacks, not just economic ones. I think you talked about specific focus on reducing carbon emissions. I was just wondering to what extent you've seen that trend accelerate over the past year. And then linked to that, I know you've had a long-standing focus on energy efficiency. But I was just wondering how well equipped your sales guys perhaps are in terms of going out and convincing your customers now more directly of the sort of direct CO2 savings that your kind of solutions and portfolio can deliver for the customers.

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

It's -- I think you're right. If you take the Compressor business, it's always been about energy efficiency and quality of the products, and that has shown the payback to the customer. But adding to that is, of course, the CO2 footprint, as you can also sell that. And I'm sure we can continue to train our sales team to be even better. I think they can make the connection between the energy efficiency and the CO2, but that can probably be strengthened. And I think it's a movement principally among investors but also among our customers to make sure that they be part of the solutions for the planet. So we believe that it's a huge benefit for a company like Atlas Copco with leading products and having direct sales that we actually can talk to customers about these things. So it's something that we don't see as a threat. It's more of an opportunity, and that also goes for many of the other business areas, but I think -- to use Compressor Technique as an example. But I'm sure we will continue to give them tools to talk about this even more. And you can see from our own analysis of the CO2 footprint that minorities from the value chain, we can see from our suppliers to transport to our own manufacturing versus the user phase. So the real impact for us is the electrification that we have on our products using renewable energies and working with efficiency on our product. So -- and we are in a good position, and I'm sure we can continue to train our teams even better to make that correlation between efficiency and CO2.

[Operator]

And the next question comes from the line of Andrew Wilson from JPMorgan.

[Andrew J. Wilson, Analyst]

I just wanted to ask a broader question around pricing and just how it's been developing, I guess, over probably the last couple of quarters. Appreciate that it's not always like-for-like and that you'll obviously be innovating in new products, et cetera, to drive that. But on an underlying in terms of the types of conversations you're having with customers and also just interested in if we are seeing a bit of inflation. I appreciate, while that is not a big number for you guys, but how that's helping or kind of instructing some of the pricing discussions you're having?

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

Well, it's exactly as you allude to yourself that it's not a huge question in Atlas Copco normally, specifically starting from the raw material prices, for example, or even the other types of components prices that either it's a natural to be -- to signal that the economy in general is doing better. And then it will also reflect on our business, so we will be able to cope with that in those cases normally. So -- but -- and on pricing, just as you also, I think, alluded to, we look at exactly the same product or service offer 1 year and compare it with the next year. That's the only thing -- that's the price that we indicate in -- when we talk about price. So it's very marginal in this type of pricing environment. What we do see is, of course, that we -- whenever we launch a new product, which has better or more features for the customer application, we can also charge a higher price. But that is a new offer in our way of looking at pricing, if you see what I mean. It's not that volume is one thing, and then we increase prices, list prices by 3%, and that makes up. It's not our world, selling these type of normally sophisticated solutions and to various demanding applications. I don't know if it's a good answer. So in -- if it was 0 a year ago, it might be -- point something positive in pricing today, but it's not a big thing due to what I said about the innovative product launches. That's -- I don't know if that answers your question.

[Andrew J. Wilson, Analyst]

No, it absolutely does. It's kind of, I guess, what I was expecting. Maybe a similar question, but just specifically on service and thinking about the service agreements, which obviously has kind of been a growing part of the service portfolio. Have you had any pushback from customers on service pricing during 2020? Just thinking about there obviously will be periods to some customers where they may have had sites closed or some kind of restrictions? Or has that not really been a feature of what you've seen?

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

I think the customers we work with, mainly you have the auto, you have the semi customers are some of the biggest customers in the world. There's always a pressure on us to perform better. In some cases, in very few cases when they have had capacity on their own, they might even have said we'd like to do this by ourselves, and we have seen that in slowdown of businesses, many times insignificant on our business, but it can happen in the auto industry, for example. I believe that 99% of our customers know that we can keep the uptime on products more efficiently and more effectively for them, and that's a matter of how to come to that situation for many of them. And I think that's also what we see in the numbers that we have continued growth and having a flat for the year. Considering that Q2 was extremely difficult, I think, it's a strength. That's a point in the direction -- the benefit from the services that we give them. But for all these customers, there's always a price discussion, but there is much more discussion about value creation.

[Operator]

And the next question comes from the line of Joel Spungin from Berenberg.

[Joel Adam Spungin, Analyst]

I just have a quick question on BT and BT margins. I just want to pick up on something you were talking about earlier about investing in that business. I was just wondering if you can maybe sort of talk about that in a bit more detail. Is it the level of investment that you're putting into BT at the moment is unusually high and might come down, say, in 2021? Or is it that you sort of accelerated investment and you expect it to remain at that sort of level for the foreseeable future?

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

Perhaps the word investment can be not misunderstood but can be too much focused on, let's say, CapEx type of investment, which also is a factor, of course. But what we meant by the comment is really that with a long-term perspective of growth, that we definitely have, and with the current growth, as you can see from the order intake, we need to invest in the organization. We need to invest in better tools. We need to do even more perhaps than some of the other businesses that don't have that favorable external demand right now, the other businesses, not [indiscernible] I mean. So that's what we meant that, that is going on, and it's not stopping in 2020 because it was a COVID year. As you have seen from the numbers, this business area has continued to grow. And that drives, let's say, investing in the organization, investing in people and competence and training and so on and so forth. So that's more what we mean. It's not a peak type of level. That's not what we mean. But when -- as you see, sometimes the timing between a good order intake quarter and a very strong revenue quarter isn't just there, it -- and in this case, it was exactly that. The activity level is very, very high. The revenue was even slightly lower than a year ago, looking organically. So then it creates those type of situations, I would say.

[Joel Adam Spungin, Analyst]

Okay. That's very helpful. If I can just ask a quick follow-up. Just I mean if we look at where the margins in BT were a few years ago and where we are today, do you sort of feel, given the level of growth in the business at the moment, it's going to be hard to get back to that level? Or is that still an aspiration over the longer term?

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

So just to make sure that it was Vacuum Technique you meant or Power Technique?

[Joel Adam Spungin, Analyst]

Yes, sorry, Vacuum. Vacuum.

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

Vacuum Technique still. Well, I mean, it's a little bit like answers on CT margin over the last decade or 2, that it's -- in our book, it's a high level. Whether it's 23% or 24%, it's a very high level. And the whole focus is on growing the business and securing that we have a profitable growth also going forward in the next 5 or 10 years. That's what it is. We're not trying to, let's say, boost the margin per se. So I think there are different currency exposures that happened when we did the highest operating margin numbers. You have to go back to late '17 and during 2018 and beginning of '19 perhaps, it was during a period where the ramp-up was tremendous. And of course, we did then need to invest in the organization and the facilities a little bit more. And -- but it's not a negative to do that once you have the growth, of course.So we don't look necessarily at, let's say, when do we reach higher margins than historically.

[Operator]

And the last question comes from the line of Sébastien Gruter from Redburn.

[Sébastien Gruter, Research Analyst]

Just coming back on your outlook for demand on a high level, we know that Vacuum Technique demand can be quite lumpy, especially, I mean, in the semiconductor. So when we thought about the guidance, you thought about potential other end markets, which can improve if semi demand is not in line with the Q4 level? Or you have a very strong conviction that semi demand is likely to stay at this very high level in the near term?

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

Look, we haven't confirmed any numbers, of course, which we don't know, but if you look at the industry as such in semi, there is a shortage, of course, in the auto industry. And there's a big demand from, if I call it, electronic digitalization. So over time, we're still very positive to be in that segment. And then we operate with 20 accounts, and now we had tons of business in Q4.Overall for the year, I still see it as a positive. And how much will end up in Q1, Q2, it's -- but we still expect a high level of activity among our customers on the semi side. But we don't confirm specific numbers.

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

And if I understood what you asked about specific pockets of demand in that, we don't see any major drive. It's all type of applications within the semi and within industrial that we see.

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

No, I think it's the -- we don't see the end customer. I think we see the manufacturer. It's the technology level and the number of processes that determines how much vacuum they will need. And we don't see if a certain ship will go to a certain industry or not. But of course, 5G mobile sets is something that will increase. And that's one area where I think there is a demand in the coming years, for example. But I'm certain that more -- gaming is up there on the top demand as well.

[Sébastien Gruter, Research Analyst]

So I mean…

[Mats Rahmström, President, CEO & Director]

I don't have any detailed information on that.

[Sébastien Gruter, Research Analyst]

Yes. No, but the question was more about the stable outlook from a very high level of demand in semiconductor. And we know, I mean, that's always been lumpy, this order intake for the fleet. So I was just thinking whether you see rental companies are doing more in Q1 to give you comfort to call overall stable demand even if semi is at a very high level.

[Hans Ola Meyer, Senior VP & CFO]

No. I think we just go back to Mats' initial comment on the outlook there that thanks to these positives that refers to the pull effect from the auto for chips, et cetera, the lack of supply, et cetera, we are positive that this level will not drop in the very short perspective, let's say. We believe -- well, then, as you know, with 20-ish big key accounts in the industry, we cannot predict the specific quarter very effectively. You saw that we underestimated the Q4 demand level, and that will always be there. But generally speaking, we believe that the favorable level will continue.Good. Thank you very much. I then might -- there are popping up perhaps a few questions, but we have ended the month. And I -- as always, I refer to anyone that felt they missed opportunity to put the question that we have an excellent IR department that can also forward questions to management, if you like, after the call. With that, I'd like to end this hour and just remind everybody that there is an opportunity to dig a little bit deeper into the world of Atlas Copco in -- on the 27th of May when we have the Capital Markets Day. You will get more information when we come closer in what shape and format, but at least you could make a note in your calendar about that. So with that thank you very much, and see you in April for the release of the first quarter 2021. Bye-bye.

[Operator]

This concludes our conference call. Thank you all for attending. You may now disconnect your lines.