Home / Transcripts / Renaissance Services SAOG (RNSS) · May 15, 2024

Renaissance Services SAOG (RNSS) Earnings Call Transcript

May 15, 2024

Muscat Securities Market OM Industrials Commercial Services and Supplies earnings 47 min

Earnings Call Speaker Segments

Stephen Thomas executive
#1

Very good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to our Quarterly Analyst Meeting for Renaissance Services SAOG. With you, as usual, as my colleague, the CFO, Raashid Ali; and myself, Stephen Thomas, the CEO. You've seen the results for the first quarter same with what we've been explaining, particularly with our Duqm project going through this hiatus period between major projects after the occupancy of building the major project of Duqm refinery finished we're now operating with a more sustainable permanent occupancy and waiting for the new projects to mobilize, which we see starting later in the year. Now in this particular quarter, it's actually the low point, where the occupancy reached 4,200 in December, it fell to 4,100 in January and has since been claiming to where it is today at 4,600. So that's the absolute [ number ] of this transition period between the major projects. And so that, of course, has had an impact when you compare it with the occupancy, which is still up in the 7,000 a year ago. And of course, we're always very happy with the holy month of Ramadan to provide the additional services during that period, but it always has a cost impact for the services and catering side of our business, and that has fallen into this quarter this year. So these are a couple of the reasons we've seen as expected. But nevertheless, the positive things happening in the slower-than-expected growth of occupancy in our PDO oilfield has come to pass and then sort of getting to the high point that we want to be at the end of the quarter, and that will sustain and grow a little during the rest of the year as well as some very strong performances in our pure services business. So combined, it has meant that we've come out with considering the impact of that Duqm hiatus with a solid result for you to question us upon and that gives us a good opportunity to open this to your questions as usual.

Stephen Thomas executive
#2

So over to the first questioner, please.

Unknown Analyst analyst
#3

So my question is, what is the number of beds you have right now in both Duqm and PAC? And what is the PAC occupancy that you have achieved in this quarter?

Stephen Thomas executive
#4

So the number of beds in Duqm on our [ current ] configuration. I mean, it could -- if we build up every single space, the potential could cross 20,000, but it's actually 18,800 is our total capacity in the configurations of 1, 2, 3 up to 6 rooms that we have. And our current occupancy is 4,600 today. It averaged, I think, 4,200 for the quarter that's just gone. In the PACs, whereas our total capacity of beds across the PACs used to be 8,000. It's now 10,126. And then we are at 87% occupancy during -- at the end of this period that we've just reported, and that is coming up 89%, 90% as we speak.

Unknown Analyst analyst
#5

Am I audible now?

Stephen Thomas executive
#6

Yes, you are, go ahead.

Unknown Analyst analyst
#7

Yes. On the services revenue, just wanted to know, is there any major change in the context, any major replacement or any increase in the major increase [Technical Difficulty]...

Stephen Thomas executive
#8

I haven't quite got that question. So on the services side, what [indiscernible] is asking, is there any major signing that has happened.

Raashid Ali executive
#9

No. So we had -- we've actually won over OMR 7 million worth of new business in this first quarter. And usually normally winning new business, of course, it will have a lot of impact in future years because it will be contracts of 1, 2 to 3 years and so on. So far, already OMR 7 million won in the first part of the year, and that includes one piece that is shorter term, I mean, say, just over a year's worth of impact, which we mentioned to you before as a variation in our utility services rolling out smart meters and so on. So that's going on to have a very positive impact during the year. We've also -- we've had some contract losses, for example, 2 of which were loss-making contracts, and we're not in the business of running loss making contracts, but it happens in the industry, where over the course of a contract period, cost of doing business has gone up and maybe the mechanisms and policies out there for -- for claiming that to need to recalibrate when you bid. We've also been looking at policies of how -- and we've seen the effect as this has been something that's been going on over the last couple of years, we've been talking to you how we're recalibrating rates as the opportunity comes around. And we're looking at the qualitative nature. How can we be remain competitive, and yet return, safe margins. Our clients know that we're a profitable contractor and yet still competitive. And as a general rule that happened, very rare, we lose contracts, but we have lost a couple, but they are mainly contracts that have been loss-making that we've sought to recalibrate. And sometimes it's a competitive market we respect whatever pricing judgments are compared to some later on those opportunities. But net, we're about OMR 7 million up.

Unknown Analyst analyst
#10

Okay. My last question is, as you have considerably improved your breakeven and margins despite all the macro ratios they have been facing, which is very commendable. So now since good times are ahead, what would be likely margin that you will be having even if you are not achieving, let's say, 100% utilization in RSVD, let's say, 50%, 60%. What kind of margins would appear?

Raashid Ali executive
#11

We've taken various measures across cost optimization, staff optimization, operational excellence, improving our processes and how we can do things better, while giving as good an experience as our clients are used to. It has thought us how to do business more efficiently and you will see that as occupancy grows, the flow through to the bottom line in terms of percentages across EBITDA, operating margins and the bottom line will be significantly higher. Now whether I can put a number to it, yes, I can, but I'd rather you see the results.

Stephen Thomas executive
#12

Amit, you see from the numbers that you physically see, we have a very healthy EBITDA margin in spite of this impact. We also have the fact that Duqm remains a bit of positive at this level. And the -- and that -- and thank you for pointing that out. There has been a lot of work done by Raashid and the team in terms of delivering those changes and the -- this level of occupancy that we're at, at the moment includes 90-odd percent of it are permanent occupancy of companies established in Duqm indeed, 1 or 2 of them have plans for growth. It doesn't include major projects. We've got some project work coming in on a small scale. We've got bigger projects coming later in the year, but the good news is that we're a bit positive there. Yes, it's had an impact on our [ PAG and FAG ] and that's reflected, you can see that to yourselves in the number. But overall, it is good news for the very reason Tom I appreciate you pointing it out. Thank you.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#13

Sorry, I joined the call a couple of minutes late. So just going to start right away. Could you mention the breakeven occupancy for Duqm, the last time we spoke, it was 4,500. Is it still the same number?

Raashid Ali executive
#14

We work very hard Bishen, and I can positively tell you that number has come down. You've seen the occupancy. We are still EBITDA positive. If I were to put a number, it's below 3,500 as we speak today.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#15

Wow. Okay. That's great to hear, Fantastic. With regards to Q1 performance, if I look at sort of on a gross level, we noticed a drop in margins, just probably the lowest over 5 quarters. If I am not mistaken, 16.5% versus your average of 18% last year. If you could just talk about what would happened over there on the gross level. I've seen a massive improvement on the G&A expense -- and so I'll come to that later. But if you could just talk about the gross margins.

Raashid Ali executive
#16

So the gross margins when you're comparing it to earlier quarters, if you actually see, what Steve mentioned in his opening statement, which you missed is we hit them that [ they are ] in terms of occupancy in Jan this year. The occupancy last year, was in the range last quarter when I say Q1 '23 was in the range of 7,200 and the current quarter is 4,200. Duqm's contribution to our margins is significantly higher. And as we go along after various initiatives that we'll take it, it's going to be higher as occupancy grows. So that has played a significant role in our margins actually dropping because the contribution from the Duqm has become really, really low compared to last year, which you probably are looking at and even the running quarters.

Stephen Thomas executive
#17

Yes. You're absolutely right. What Raashid is saying, if you look at the actual numbers a year ago. So as Raashid said, we're 4,200 average this quarter that you're looking at in Duqm. If you looked at it a year ago, we were at 7,300 at an average. And if you look at the last quarter, it went 5,400, 5,000 and 4,200. It was literally the last [indiscernible] ending of the major [ OQA ] contract. So January this year, 4,100 is literally the low point because since then, it's picked up, 4,200, 4,400, right now today is 4,600. So we're seeing the green shoots of the new [ influx ] trickling in because that's a trick that I've described to you. And we don't expect a flood until much later in the year.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#18

Okay. Noted, noted. So we're sort of -- we're past the inflection point where you feel occupancy would only improve going forward. I mean we've seen the commentary where you said it should probably improve Q3 '24 onwards. But we're fairly confident of sort of occupancy going upwards from here. And there should be no more sort of road blocks.

Stephen Thomas executive
#19

Yes. So let me put some color on that, Bishen. So those are reasonable assumptions. There's knowns and there are unknowns. I'm going to sound like a former U.S. Defense Secretary, so I'm not careful. The knowns are what's happening in the PDO oil and gas fields, where we've increased our capacity from 8,000 and where we were running at about 7,500 occupancy to above 10,000 beds. And that 10,000 beds right at the end of this quarter was 87%, but it was 73% in the first month of the quarter. So it's come up very nicely in the quarter, and we're expecting that to take over 90% during this quarter. And so that will be sustainable through the year. There's also potential additional project movement into us later in the year in the PDO oil fields, but that's an unknown. We don't know exactly when, but what we do expect is to be above 90% and cruising at the higher capacity that we have. So that's good news in that side. [indiscernible] about the Duqm occupancy, we're seeing it rise. We're waiting for actual histogram. And so for example, in one of the greenfield project is starting in this year. We already have occupancy from that project at a small level, already trickling into facility, but their actual histogram when they start really breaking ground and moving forward as anticipated later in the year, we don't have that number yet. So whether it would be Q3, whether it be Q4 is not clear yet. The other 2 greenfield projects, what is clear is they are looking to start in the first quarter of next year. So a little impact during this year. Things like the Duqm refinery expansion does seem to be on, doesn't seem likely to start until the first quarter of next year. So we might see a trickle in before that. So we're expecting occupancies, but we do need -- and then we haven't fully understand our clients are putting their efforts to get that block to get there, contractor bids in, the contractors will have differing numbers. They might be similar, but they need to get that in and see those histograms and feed that into us. And what we have got is our assurance to them, which is easy at this stage when we've got 14,000-odd beds available, we're able to commit to them that we're there for them, and they know that, that is reserved for them.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#20

Noted, noted. Yes. And the next one, like I mentioned, I mean, you've seen a tremendous improvement in G&A and kudos to Raashid and the team for sort of the measures they have taken. Now if I just simply break down your G&A, it falls on to 2 factors. One is a drop in employee expenses? And second is the other or miscellaneous expenses. So if you could just give us some sort of color in terms of this OMR 1.1 million number that I see for G&A, is this a run rate to go forward it's somewhere in the middle. Just some sort of idea in terms of what tangible benefit we can see of the cost optimization on the P&L going forward for '24 and beyond.

Raashid Ali executive
#21

So Bishen, it's a combination of 3 things. As you mentioned, we have rationalized our employment costs at a corporate level, looking at different aspects on how we can do things better with fewer people, making it a well-oiled machinery. And secondly, we are looking at each and every line item on our G&A to make sure that everything we do is efficient, while remaining sustainable as we pride ourselves on. The third thing, which is not going to be recurring over there is we've been prudent and we've taken a tax charge, and I'll give you a bit of history on that, that we made a divestment in 2019 on which the company booked a loss on divestment. And we use that as a tax shield for the years '19 till '23. On 31st December '23, we received a notification from the tax department that they were disallowing the entire loss put on that divestment. On that basis, we will filed an objection. And to our credit, we received a tax surveillance order from the authorities. The objection is still under review by the tax authorities. But in order to remain prudent, what we've done is we've gone and booked a tax charge provision, I'd call it for the current year, which is also for which we had certain provisions related to the disallowance that happened and the reversal to the extent of OMR 400,000 has come into the G&A. And then on a total P&L basis, it's absolutely neutral because we've taken that credit of the provision we had and then book the charge of tax. Does that answer your question because it's accounting jargon.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#22

Noted, noted, no. I understand. So at least what I take away from this is you have this objection on the sort of tax department's observation. But on the employee cost, there is the sort of drop in those costs.

Raashid Ali executive
#23

Employees and other costs are recurring and you will see that run rate improve. So you take out OMR 400,000 from it, and then you get to the real savings, which will be around in the range of OMR 300,000.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#24

Noted, noted. Encouraged to sort of see that. Next is just more sort of housekeeping on the Saudi expansion plans. I know it's been only a brief time, since we spoke last, any updates over there? Anything that sort of moved over there? I know that you respect privacy in these matters, but just if there's something for us to absorb as of now?

Stephen Thomas executive
#25

And Saudi, there's one movement is that we've formally registered our commercial registration of our company there. And we are moving right away in terms of getting boots on the ground. Obviously, they will start with business development colleagues on the ground, starting to feed in more opportunity back to as the constant tenders from here as well as making our presence felt and introducing ourselves in a wider way on the ground there. So that's just happened. Of course, in the background of that is the major PPP project that we described that we have already bid and there's a live bid there. And that would be a game changer because that would give us a 20-year operational platform of a very sizable contract. Of course, if it was awarded with our partners, where we have investment partners there. It would take a couple of years, to just to say, you can actually build the facilities and start to come in, but it would be a very strong Trojan Horse to go into that market with. And of course, we'd be bidding the pure services side now that we've got the company registered and pushing boots on the ground.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#26

Noted. Last couple of questions from my side, before I go back in queue. Any update on the waste management services and the UAE operations?

Raashid Ali executive
#27

So yes, go ahead.

Stephen Thomas executive
#28

So waste management, we have no new business there. But just to reiterate that our existing business continues to do well and operate profitably. And it's a business we're very happy to be in that. What is happening is cyclically some of the other opportunities are coming out for retender. In our case, we are being -- our client is talking to us about extending and re-awarding, obviously, that has to reach a conclusion to become a reality. So it's looking solid in terms of continuity of the business we have at the moment and the new opportunities are just starting to come into the market, and we have the first set out at the moment. That's all on the waste management. On UAE, Raashid, do you want to.

Raashid Ali executive
#29

Yes, so UAE as a market vision remains absolutely important to us. We have been in the process of winning new contracts looking at the business, the same way as we are looking at the business here. We are -- essentially this year is about 3 key priorities is cost optimization and rationalization, contract profitability and offset excellence across the board. Those are the 3 mottos that we've taken for the current year. We are looking at the business critically to make sure we grow, and we continue to deliver on that -- in the country. We are also looking at inorganic opportunities in order to consolidate because the market in the UAE is fiercely competitive in terms of margins and the market does require consolidation. It could work both ways. So we've kept our options open there, while we make sure that we deliver profits for the company as a whole, but we are open to both opportunities, either we go ahead and consolidate and become a bigger player in the market, or there could be a chance where another player is happy to take our business on both opportunities remain on the table.

Stephen Thomas executive
#30

One interesting thing about UAE and KSA combined is, as Raashid just described UAE, it's highly competitive, and it's highly populated by existing players in the range of services that we provide, whether you're looking at FM or you're looking at Contract Catering and so on and so forth. And our business on the ground there is a contract catering business. So there's much more that we have to offer. But when you have a market that's already well served by established players, people have the same problem when they look to Oman, they see established players like ourselves and wonder how do they unseek them and start to compete with them. We have the same problem in reverse, when we go into these other markets. And hence, the point about inorganic growth that Raashid has made, makes them restart consolidating some of that, and that gives us that additional presence on the ground. Saudi is slightly different at the moment because there is a tremendous growth spurt going on with project-driven. And even if 1/4 of the projects actually came to pause and happen, the demand for additional capacity is there, even though they have a lot of established players there. So we're seeing Saudi as hungry to get more capacity end because otherwise, one has to be looking for what is that thing that we can do that is different. And so where there is demand for things like what we do in Duqm, which is to deliver UN International Labor Organization Standard, which is what the Saudi projects are asking for on an economy of scale basis with all that experience that is a less crowded competitive market, and we've got a real competitive solution for that. Similarly, what we've done with the PPP bid and the alliance that we've made that go after that, it's a less crowded space where you're able to bring something of a USP with you to that equation. So it's a combination of fighting it out at the pure services level, where you're up against strongly entrenched incumbents and we really respect that, and you've got to bring competitive tension to that. So takes longer, less easy to do, but we're still going to attack it as well as look for those niche opportunities, and they tend to be the large ones in which we can bring our expertise, as very few players, who are all of the things at the ISM level and then also self-performing soft services and hard services, removing those margins on margins we've talked about before, so it is bringing that to play in a new competitive environment and maybe it's put more boots on the ground to get that -- those messages across and seeking the opportunities. Thank you.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#31

And one just -- sorry, one last question. We've spoken at length about breakeven occupancy and you mentioned the numbers for the group fantastic, down from 4,500, 3,500. Just to clarify this breaking occupancy on EBITDA level or net profit level?

Raashid Ali executive
#32

It's at an EBITDA level. We remain EBITDA positive. We've remained EBITDA positive throughout the quarter, and we continue to drive efficiencies.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#33

And if I were to extrapolate this to a net profit level, given the debt levels that you have, what would that number be? I'm just trying to sort of gauge something in terms of when we turn actually profitable someone adds that we can do a lot -- I just -- I hope you understand what I'm trying to -- and so, if you don't have those numbers right now. Yes.

Raashid Ali executive
#34

No. Meaning normally, we don't give individual metrics contracts, but -- but to your satisfaction, you can work it out with if 3,500 is EBITDA breakeven. And our debt level currently is approximately OMR 40 million, let's call it, 6,200 you'll start seeing a very positive bottom line.

Stephen Thomas executive
#35

And you can see the impact between PACs and [indiscernible] which will a positive impact coming from our waste management business, where we have a minority shareholding and a negative impact at that level coming from Renaissance with Duqm, where we have some great partners as well.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#36

Sure, sure. No, because one also has to factor in depreciation. So I understand on the EBITDA level. I just -- this is just for reference so we do an apple-to-apple comparison, nothing else. And yes, thank you so much once again, wish you all the best. I look forward to interacting next time.

Neetika Gupta analyst
#37

I just wanted one quick clarification. So going back to the RSVD occupancy. Last time we spoke, and I understood from what I understood that we spoke about that improving occupancy through the year, which we've already discussed. But then we also spoke that around -- it should average around 6,000 beds for 2024. So is that number any different now? Or are we looking at a similar sort of range for this year, given we are further ahead in the year. So I'm sure the management has better color on it.

Stephen Thomas executive
#38

Yes, you're right, Neetika, because we were starting the year in the 4,000s, and we envisaged at that time finishing the year at around 9,500. And the average of that would have kept us -- kept got us above 6,000. What we have as, this is confirmed and visible known histograms. If I go back to that point, then we may not reach that 6,000. We've sort of recalibrated that down a little, but it's still possible, if we get the announcement of the project. Here is the project, it is happening at this stage, et cetera. So it's not absolutely discounted, but we are planning ourselves for averaging just under that, yes.

Raashid Ali executive
#39

Looks like Steve did a great introduction, so no one has any question. We shouldn't.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#40

Since no one's utilizing this opportunity, I might also jump in. Just on the -- I understand Waste Management, I remember when we started talking about initially, you -- I think the company was still talking revenues close to OMR 1 million, and you said the market size was OMR 100 million. What's an aspiration over the next couple of years to sort of grow that share of 5 other revenue too?

Stephen Thomas executive
#41

So you're quite right in your recollection of the numbers because it's just north of OMR 100 million is the value of the collection of waste collection contracts that have been issued into the market across the country. And our -- when we picked up, first of all, [indiscernible], then [indiscernible] and then the PDL concession area, which also included an element of downside clearance, which is an additional service, and we are uniquely doing that out of there, there's all the others and the rest of our is waste collection. We -- our market share is under 7% of that. Now the good thing about that is -- and of course, we have tremendous respect for all our competitors. But when the client -- we have these sort of meetings together of all the contractors and the client shows statistics on KPIs, et cetera, because the KPIs in that business are very high, and they expect it to be north of 95%. And there's 1 -- there are 3 contracts that makes that great and they are all through. So we have a very happy client in terms of our performance ability and of course, others perform well, and there's no exception on that, talking about the top-level performance from silver and gold in terms of their top 3 performance and there are 3 contracts. So that is why I believe we've been spoken to about extension. And other -- some of the other contracts will come out for opportunity. Now we believe that we can really be a contender and that's certainly on technical performance, as I've just described, and we need to be efficient on price performance. And what's interesting of that cycle where we finally won those contracts, they were the last 3, so we gradually learned our competitiveness over the course of and remember, some of you may remember, we've changed our partner and we formed a new joint venture, et cetera, but it became competitive. So we're going to take that competitiveness into these tender opportunities. Now each of these tenders, the smallest of them can double our position. So our ambition should be we would like to see share of that market at least double, and we should at least have a first threshold of let's get to 10% of that market and so on. And remember, it's not limited to that because there are other opportunity even where we are based in Duqm that is what is the municipal collection is what we have or there are also some private sector opportunities in and around the back of that and so on. There's also what else is going to happen in the waste management sphere from waste treatment and other opportunities. So recycling a whole range of things that we do what we can in that circular economy. So our ambitions for that business are high, opportunities for doubling what we do, if we are successful in this round of tender, the opportunity is very much there.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#42

Noted. And if you could sort of give me some ballpark margin on the base management sort of segment, aspirational...

Stephen Thomas executive
#43

I don't want to do that because we are going into a competitive round of tenders. But if you look at the various distances that we're in, they do operate at different margins. Pure services are very tight margins in any sort of soft FM side hard FM, it's competitive, but the margins are higher. The way you get to our accommodation solutions because there's significant investment and the risk with that, the margins are higher. Similarly, in the utility sphere and the waste management sphere, where there are considerable challenges in operations, the margins are higher. So it's a good margin business, but you still got to be competitive with those margins. But the competitive landscape everybody expects to make those reasonable margins in that space. That's as good as I can say without wanting to give anything away as we come into a round of tendering.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#44

Noted, noted. And then sort of one last way from my side is we've seen sort of some projects being announced recently following his majesty's visit to UAE. There's a rail project that's coming up. Does this Renaissance see any opportunities from any of these projects, even though it might be sort of 2, 3 years down the line or further down the line? Do you see any opportunities from these announcements made or something that's had you excited?

Stephen Thomas executive
#45

Yes. We always do, Bishen. We see when these things are happening -- I mean, 1 of the things that has taken us time in the UAE, we've not -- we wanted to getting more M&A opportunity on the back of that. There's very little churn in the market or attractive opportunities coming up at the moment that would really change our ability, our platform to launch into those opportunities as well. But yes, we absolutely do in the whole region. We still -- whilst our Home market of Oman continues to dominate our operations portfolio, our ambitions -- to reach our ambition of what we want to do in terms of performance, we have to succeed elsewhere in the region. And that has become a much more compelling story for us this year. Hence, what we've said earlier about putting boots on the ground in KSA. As Raashid said, we're trying to rationalize what we have already in the UAE, but look at how do we launch that platform so that we're really addressing more and more opportunity. We've got so many services, even though we've just described our Waste Management, we're looking at that in that space as well.

Bishen Bhalla analyst
#46

Noted. And lastly, any updates on the school project, I was hoping somebody else would pick on this, but if there's anything at all from our last discussion on the school project?

Stephen Thomas executive
#47

On the PPP project. So in Oman, we've just submitted the best and final answer for the 42 stores project. The -- whilst it is not for us to know, we don't know any details from that. What we anticipate is we believe we've put in a very strong technical bid that we're confident would be T1, when on the technical. We analyzed our competition. We felt from the beginning that we might be L2 in terms of pricing although it's a very competitive price for the technical solution we've put down with our partners, it's not us on our own. I hate to do, I must give full credit to them as well. So that's our pitch there. If we're right, if I'm right on that, then we need our technical solution to speak louder than things often go on track. And if I'm right about the price and maybe we won't be successful. We're definitely in the last 2 that much we know. And we're hopefully, because the backlog has actually just gone in, it's just gone in this week. Hopefully, we hear something very soon. In Saudi, we're also seeing some movement in questioning coming from the client. So we -- in both cases, both clients plan to make their decisions in this year -- earlier in this year than later in the year. So hopefully, we get some results from one or the other fairly soon.

Raashid Ali executive
#48

We'll give one more minute, if anyone has any questions.

Unknown Analyst analyst
#49

Sorry, as last quarter you guided the [indiscernible] transit, but we lost it, we maintain our operating guidance with the latest development with regards to Saudi expansion process [indiscernible]?

Raashid Ali executive
#50

[ Dina ], I think you've got 2 questions. I'll answer the first one. Yes, our guidance last quarter based on no demand for RSVD was an average occupancy of 6,000 beds where we saw most of the green steel projects breaking ground and being the main awards being done. It appears that 2 out of the 3 green steel projects have been moved towards the third or fourth quarter. So we've recalibrated our occupancy from an average of 6,000. We are currently foreseeing an occupancy of approximately 5,500 plus. Having said that, it's not that we have given up, we are still running for 6,000. So that's the answer to your first question. If you have any further questions on Duqm, happy to take those. All right. And with regard to the Saudi expansion, are we facing any delays. We've also read reports that there has been some kind of resizing and rescoping of the [ NEOM ], but nothing has come to attention, whereby Saudi as a market is a very exciting market. And as Steve explained, we've recently established our company and going to get boots on the ground as soon as we can. We've identified the people on the business development side, and we will start tendering very soon. The resizing is our specific project is what we hear from what's in the public domain. Saudi as a market remains bullish. It's the only real market with a population of 35 plus million. So we remain bullish over there, and we are going to [indiscernible] all guns blazing to make sure we establish a presence similar to what we have in Oman. As Steve said, there are people who have been in that market for very long, but we are very confident with our credentials, we will be able to break through on most of the contracts.

Stephen Thomas executive
#51

And things like NEOM, when they do move forward to the next phase, one of the things they need is accommodation solutions exactly like our solution in Duqm. So that's where we feel that as those opportunities do come, and there has been delay on them that is somewhere where we can compete and be a serious contender.

Raashid Ali executive
#52

Is that answer Dina's question. So we'll give one more minute if anyone has any questions, please put your hand up or you can type it in the window as Dina has, and we're happy to take those.

Stephen Thomas executive
#53

Once again, everyone, thank you very much for your continued interest in us. We always are very pleased to see your names and your organizations showing this level of interest in us. And I think the good news from the first quarter is to see the results in the context of us having managed our way through the low point now in this quarter of that transitional period in Duqm and to already see it starting the [indiscernible] backup is reassuring. And we've got good things to come from the back occupancy in the oil fields to see through the next 3 quarters, including the current one. And so we look forward to analyzing and talking to you about that next quarter. Thank you all very much indeed.

Raashid Ali executive
#54

Thank you. Bye-bye.

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