DSW Capital (LSE:DSW) — Half Year Results for the six months ended 30 September 2025

0:01 Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the DSW CAPITAL PLC Half Year Results Investor Presentation. On the right hand corner of your screen. Please just simply type in your questions and press send. The company may not be in a position to answer every question it receives during the meeting itself. However, the company can review all questions submitted today and we'll publish our responses where it's appropriate to do so on the Investor Meet company platform. Before we begin, we would just like to submit the following poll. And if you could give that your kind attention, I'm sure the company would be most grateful. And I would now like to hand you over to the executive management team from DSW CAPITAL PLC. Shrew, Pete, good afternoon. Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Welcome, everybody. I'm Shrew Morris, CEO of DSW CAPITAL. Delighted to be here today. Thank you for joining.

0:55 Just by way of background, I have been at DSW for just over a year. I'm a chartered accountant by trade. So I've worked professional services for over twenty years. I spent seven years in practice at what was Baker Tilly, now RSM, and went on to hold senior roles in other professional services firms within law, construction, and private equity backed businesses. Most notably, I was chief exec of a large regional law firm, where I led the firm through significant growth and change, to success across the Northwest. I'm immensely proud to have taken over from our founder, James Dow, who, led the business through success for over twenty years up until 04/01/2025. So, I'll just hand over to my colleague, Pete, to introduce himself. Thanks, Drew. So I am Pete Vendel, the chief finance and operating officer for DSW CAPITAL.

1:46 I joined DSW just over four years ago, just before our IPO. So I joined in September 2021, and we IPO ed in December 2021. Before joining DSW, I spent eight years at Deloitte where I, trained in audits and got my ACA qualification and then saw the opportunity at DSW to get involved just before the IPO. It was a bit of a baptism of fire for me, but a great opportunity and fantastic journey. Since the IPO, I've been working with all of our licensees really to drive the value that they get in exchange for the license fee. So working on various initiatives across the business, including our future leaders program, generating that next generation of talent and those partners coming through in our individual licensee businesses, looking at things like our ESG strategy, and also looking at ways that we implement, new technologies across the group.

2:33 Okay. Thanks, Pete. So, our vision is to absolutely empower ambitious and and professionals to start and grow their own business. We are very much challenger brand, and our model gives those individuals the freedom to choose their destiny and shape their practice without the constraints of a traditional larger firm, but with all the benefits. So DSW was established over twenty years ago by three former, Big four CF partners who built a very successful CF practice and a very strong brand in Dasco Field Box. And and they thought there must be others out there who want to run their own business within professional services and set up the license model, which I'll talk about in a minute, and to to enable other professionals to start their own businesses. And and we've been doing that for a number of years and for a number of partners and and set up a number of businesses as well.

3:23 Most recently, the business went on to acquire a legal platform, DSW in November 2024 to expand our offering to entrepreneurial legal teams as well and build on the consultancy model, which, Doctor solicitors set up over twenty years ago. So just to recap on the license model. So as I said, it's all about empowering pioneers and to build and grow their own businesses. So typically, mean, we we recruit sort of highly quality talented individuals. And typically, we have two or three partners who come together. They set up the a new LLP and a high margin sort of niche advisory services and corporate finance, tax, DD, etcetera. Set up a new LLP.

4:08 We provide them with the startup funding. And we underwrite their drawings. We provide them with back office infrastructure and a very strong brand in Dowsco field lots. This structure really enables them to hit the ground running and focus on what they do best. And in return for that, we take we have a license fee model which is a percentage of their billings, is about up to 22%. But effectively, they are free and have the autonomy to run their own business in the way that they want to run it. The key benefits of this model is around that freedom and autonomy, but for somebody who is perhaps in another firm, perhaps associate director level, director level, they can go on to significantly enhance their earnings potential by keeping that higher percentage of the billings of the work that they bring in themselves.

4:56 Just to recap on the Doctor solicitors model, historically that has been a consultancy model and that's around individuals who are in, again, in larger law larger law firms who want to do high quality technical work and but aren't necessarily rainmakers themselves. Doctor solicitors actually win the work for those individuals, and they're effectively the sales engine. And those consultants deliver the work in return for a feature. Again, in some you know, in in many instances, they're able to have that freedom, autonomy, but significantly enhance their earning potential as well. So this is really what the DSW platform looks like today, and it it does represent a unique integrated professional services network spanning now across legal and financial advisory divisions.

5:41 So you can see at the core of that, I guess, that that platform is the brand, the DSW CAPITAL Watts brand. And we provide the infrastructure and the operational excellence to help those fee owners do what they do best. So we provide marketing support, finance, recruitment, and technology, talent development, and as I said before, start up funding as well. The types of work that we currently that we currently have on our platform or the or the service lines that we have on our platform span across our legal divisions, so commercial property, litigation, disputes, commercial, corporate, primarily to the health care sector at the moment, but there are future opportunities to expand that as well. On the financial advisory side, we have deal advisory, so corporate finance, transaction services, debt advisory, investment, early stage and long term businesses, tax and business recovery.

6:36 So you can see from there, there's a lot of opportunities for cross referrals and and the the complimentary service lines mean they can sometimes be client and joint client engagement and joint client arrangements as well. And we haven't we also have LCDR Solicitors is a brand that we acquired in November 2024. And we also have the global Pandya network, which enables us to do cross border transactions on the corporate finance side as well. So just to, I guess, to illustrate really our roots into DSW. As I said earlier, the the core of what DSW has done and the entrepreneurial spirit in which DSW is built is around that sort of startup pathway. We help people launch their businesses on the DSW platform, and we've now opened that up to the legal sector as well to try and encourage entrepreneurial legal teams who want to build their own business.

7:30 Those businesses now go on to scale their business and start to employ their own staff as well, and that's really on the associate path. So we've got a number of businesses now, Pete will talk about this in a minute, that have grown over the years and we've helped them scale with the brand and the the back office infrastructure support behind them. We also invite established businesses to join the platform as well. So we've done this in a a a number of instances where established businesses either want an exit route for the founders or the shareholders, and they want to go on to enfranchise the the new management team, and they want to scale up their business and thrive under the DSW platform. And and that's our succession route. And we also have DSW businesses that may go on to do that as well.

8:16 And just to recap on the consultant model, that's through the the Doctor side of the business where we've got consultants and who deliver the work for the work that we generate for them. We've now opened up that model to consultants to bring their own work as well. So there is a home for their clients and with the same back office and operational excellence that Doctor solicitors offer them. And a new initiative or a new pathway that we've launched this year is the pathway to partner. And this is really to give people even more opportunities to help them start their own business. So again, if they if you're an individual in a professional services firm, don't quite have the confidence or feel you need more mentorship and and technical guidance and softer skills guidance, pathway to partner is an employed role and is a program for up to two years whereby we give you all the support, as I say, mentorship from some of our technical teams, mentorship by our talent development team to really get you ready for business ownership and give you the best chance of succeeding in that startup phase.

9:22 So what differentiates DSW? This is really around our investment thesis. And we believe we've got a large market right for disruption. And and now more than ever, professional services is changing, has changed a lot over the last eighteen months. There are a number of professionals which we feel there's an opportunity for them to join DSW. And and and also from a client side as as well as the other professional services firms and maybe are not servicing the mid market clients as well as a partner led service by our teams. There is a huge amount of opportunity for DSW. We've proven that we're a scalable and still continue to be an innovative platform model. We're probably one of the very few platform models that has both legal and financial advisory services as well. And we started to get that operational leverage, so we still have relatively low fixed costs and obviously we grow as our license fees grow and our businesses grow as well.

10:16 That comes back to the strong growth in fee earners. So we've again, Pete will demonstrate how we've grown our fee earners since IPO, which is over about 15% in compound annual growth. And we understand that that really will help to build value in DSW and increase capacity and help us service more clients as well. We continue to be capital light and we've got high quality of earnings. We're less dependent on M and A now with the acquisition of Doctor and we're incredibly cash generative, which we'll demonstrate in the figures later on. So we're very much an established scalable advisory platform now with a proven growth model. More importantly, we really are a premium brand offering autonomy, flexibility, and earnings potentials for our partners. So I'll just hand over to Pete now who's gonna talk about the sort of KPIs and the the financials for DSW.

11:08 Thanks, Drew. So this slide basically sets out where we see the the network today and gives you a bit of a feel for the scale of the overall DSW network. So we're currently at the end of the fund the half year, we had a 144 Fiones. Now if I look back to when we IPO ed back in December 2021, we had around 82 Fiones. So in the time post IPO, we have increased headcount by sixty two sixty two heads, which is equivalent to 76% growth in that period. We've seen our partner numbers grow. So we're now at 49 partners, at the end of, September. That is a a stat which we saw grow quite significantly back in f y twenty four. As And those partners have begun to establish their business over the last eighteen months, they have in turn begun to recruit the junior members within their team, and that is where we've seen the number the average number of fee earners per business has increased. So we're at six fee earners per business now.

12:00 And, if I look back to where we were when we IPO ed, we were near the the 3.2 fee earners per business. So really considerable growth. We see that growth as a bit of a a lead indicator and a bit of a a test of the market in terms of how our businesses feel they're performing and what their views are in the short to medium term, future. As they tend to recruit a little bit late, and therefore, when they are recruiting, they have confidence in the short to medium term pipeline. We've got 26 consultants as of the end of the period, so that's increased from 20 when we acquired Doctor back in November 2024. Again, with Doctor consultants, there is an opportunity there for us to recruit more as the platform model is more known in the legal sector. However, our model is still very unique. We do generate the work for our consultants as as Shrug mentioned before. So that means that we recruit when we have the work to continue to provide and feed the consultants that what they need what they'd like to deliver and reflect the earnings that they'd like to achieve. So, again, it gives us that, balance in terms of recruitment on the Doctor side. We have the capacity and the ability to recruit, but, again, we're we've been focusing very much on the, the sales engine and making sure we have increased, outputs and increased inflow of work coming into the business.

13:12 That's reflective in our, award nominations. We've worked very hard over the last twelve months with a new PR agency, which has gone really, really well. We're really delighted to have seen 36 award nominations in 2025, which is a record for us, and that's across many regions across The UK, and lots of our different service lines have picked up those nominations. So, again, we're we're seeing a lot of, direct impact of the investment we've made in marketing and PR over the last twelve months. This slide just sets out some of our financial highlights. So top left, we have, our network revenue. So that is the revenue from all of our licensees that they build out their clients and also the revenue from Doctor Solicitors as well, which is consolidated into our network revenue figure. Doctor solicitors has obviously only been with us since November last year, so a large proportion of the growth that you're seeing in network revenue is a result of the fact we have Doctor solicitors consolidating there this year. However, if you strip Doctor's solicitors out, which represents about 1,500,000 of our network revenue, the underlying businesses, had a like for like revenue growth of around 13%.

14:16 So, again, shows that, real stability in the core DSW offering that, that we've they've continued to grow, and that supports again that fee on a headcount growth we just talked about on the previous slide. If we then look at total income, so that is the statutory revenue of the DSW CAPITAL PLC. That has grown by a 156%, which is a bit of a nuanced figure because, obviously, you've got to remember that we have acquired Doctor Solicitors as a wholly owned subsidiary. So within that figure, we have the license income from our DSW licensees, but also the statutory revenue of the Doctor Solicitors subsidiary. So that's why you see the 156%. The the other figure which is really important to note is that like for like figure. So stripping out Doctor, we can see that there's been an 18% like for like increase in total income within DSW CAPITAL, and that is more than the increase we've seen in the underlying businesses when it looks at a network revenue level. And the reason for that difference is the fact that our average effective license fee has remained at 14.5%, and that compares to 14.1% in the prior period.

15:19 14.5% was also the effective license fee for the end of f y twenty five, and therefore, we're particularly pleased that we've been able to maintain that license fee from the end of, the financial year all the way through the half year, and we're reporting the same figure. And the reason that's important is because an a component of our effective license fee is the profit share elements that we get from some of our licensee businesses. The profit share element, does not kick in till h two, so we've had no contribution from, profit share in the first half of the year or very, very minimal contribution. And therefore, there's the potential for that license fee to increase as we see out the rest of the second half of the year. LTM revenue per Fiona is around £207,000, so that has increased from a £151,000 in the prior period. Again, showing the increased utilization across the businesses, that growth we've seen, and showing that the headcounts that, that people have increased in their own businesses has started to return and generate more revenue across the board.

16:16 We are slightly down on where we were at the end of f y twenty five where we had 214,000 at the end of the financial year, and the reason for that is largely due to timing. So in terms of recruitment, obviously, we can see that we've also increased the numbers from a 136 at the end of the financial year to a 144. Four recruits in the Doctor solicitors business, they did only join us in September. So their contribution to that revenue per Fierna figure has not yet been felt. That will obviously materialize in the second half of the year, which means we should be comfortable to keep our revenue per Fierna around that 200 k mark. Adjusted EBITDA is naught 700,000 for the period, and that is split between DSW, naught 300,000 and DSLIST is naught 400,000. The naught 300,000 from DSW is comparable to the prior year where we'd generated naught 100,000.

17:05 So in the year, we've effectively tripled our adjusted EBITDA within the DSW underlying businesses. And now that has been achieved because of our fixed cost base. So when we've seen that revenue growth on the top line, that has begun to trickle straight down to the bottom line from an a EBITDA perspective because we do not have variable costs on that side of the business. Our adjusted EBITDA margin is around 24.1%, and, again, that is a significant improvement on f y twenty five h one, which was 13.1%. It is slightly down on f y twenty five, which was 38.3%. And the the reason for that is the the profit share element, as I mentioned before, that is a h two item, so not impact not reflected in that 24.1% figure. But also in f y twenty five, as we reported at the end of the financial year, we saw a a spike in revenue in October 2024 and is what we're calling the the beat the budget activity.

17:56 That was a in heightened period of m and a activity with a lot of deals being completed ahead of the the budget last year, which drove activity levels up and gave us that approximately 3,000,000 additional contribution in network revenue. Obviously, since that, budget activity, we've not seen, m and a m and a activity at the same level. We have seen it obviously stabilize at a more normalized level, which is again reflected in the, in the results that we've seen and the growth that we've seen in the underlying businesses. Operating cash conversion is around a 133%. I'll talk to you a little bit more about that in a couple of slides where we have a a good graph that illustrates, how that's made up of. And then dividend per share. So we've declared a 1.2p dividend per share for the interims, and that compares to one p last year. And that dividend gets paid out in January 2026.

18:49 This slide just sets out the summary income statement. So I think the important point to make on this is that those two graphs on the top right hand side around our revenue portfolio. A key part of our strategy since IPO has been to diversify our revenue stream away from m and a. It is our core business. However, obviously, it's very, lumpy, and it has been under a lot of pressure over recent years with quite subdued m and a activity. We're obviously in a much better place now, from an m and a activity perspective, and we've seen that constant, trickle of deals being done over the period. But last year, we were 66% weighted towards m and a. We are now, this year, only 32% weighted towards m and a, and that is a result of the Doctor acquisition and growth in some of our underlying businesses as well. So you can see from that graph that for in h one f y twenty six, Doctor sisters represents around 55% of the, PLC's income.

19:41 So, again, we are coming out of, this financial year or coming out of this period a far more resilient business, and less dependent on m and a. It should be noted that m and a is obviously still a considerable part of the business. As I mentioned, it's where we started. It is a very high margin area of the business as well with, some lumpy revenues, so we are still slightly exposed on that, but far less than we were in the previous years. On the p other things to note on the p and l, so cost of sales, that looks to be a new feature of comparing September 25 to September 24. That is in relation to the our solicitors and is purely the consultant fees attributable. So the consultants, their time, and what they get paid for for the work that they do. Looking down at admin expenses, so that has increased within the period. That is solely in relation to the costs at Doctor solicitors as the cost across the DSW business has remained broadly in line with the prior period.

20:36 We've obviously within that, we have consolidated additional heads. So there's a a team of eight individuals down in Guildford who contributes to that figure, But, also, there's other costs in there around, professional indemnity insurance, which is a new feature for the group, because what historically, our licensees have borne that cost, whereas now with Doctor, there is an element that we need to bear. And, also, there's obviously costs in there around practice management systems and legal support and resources to support the legal services side and the consultants with their work. Looking at some of our performance highlights then, the top graph on the left hand side is our network revenue. So you can see from f y twenty one to f y twenty five, we saw around a 13.9% compound annual growth rate. This graph illustrates quite clearly the the h two weighting of our business. So in every single year, can see that h two has always been outperformed h one. The exception to that is f y twenty three, where we had the list trust budget, which unfortunately, destabilized m and a activity in the second half of f y twenty three.

21:39 Things did recover slowly as you can see. And if you look at f y twenty four, f y twenty five, and f y twenty six and the h one performance in each of those years, you can see that we've continually shown growth in our underlying businesses. Even in f y twenty six, if you strip out the 1,500,000 from DSW, that again still shows that trajectory of growth on the underlying businesses as well. So it's not all three acquisition. The graph top right is our number of. So since IPO, we've had got a compound annual growth rate of around 15.5%. One thing to notice that whilst we've had some, obviously, some lumpy revenues in relation to m and a activity over the period, we've continually been able to add heads on every single year. And that is because sometimes when the, when there is subdued M and A activity, that is actually a driver for recruitment for us. So it enables us to be able to to target those professionals at, other firms where they're perhaps disappointed with the the pay the pay reviews or the, promote lack of promotion. And therefore, look for alternative models such as ours where you can really take control of your own career and work and take a direct cut of the billings that you are generating.

22:45 As I said before, the average fee per has grown over the years. So in the last eighteen months alone, we've gone from 4.7 to 5.2 at the end of f y twenty five and now six per business, again, showing that confidence our businesses, have in the short to medium term outlook. Looking at the graph on the bottom right, you have operating cash conversion. So we show this in two different ways. We show this, first of all, just the the pure operating cash conversion, which is taking into consideration loans to new businesses and new start ups. So that is the gold line on that graph. You can see that in FY twenty four, that is when we saw a record number of new businesses and you welcomed a record number of new partners. That in equivalent that led to about a 700 k outflow in terms of investment in new startup businesses.

23:34 In f four twenty five, we've seen, obviously, those loans come back in and indeed in h one of f four twenty six, which is why the operating cash conversion line goes up above a 100% to around 113% at the end of f y twenty five and now a 133% at the end of f h one of f y twenty six. Stripping out those low movements, the underlying operating cash conversion is hovering around a 100%, and it has done so since f y twenty three. And that enables us to have high levels of cash generation. So in h one of f y twenty six, we generated 898 k of cash generated from operations, and that compares to an outflow in the prior period of a 179 k. What that has enabled us to do is enabled us to repay a million pounds of the RCF facility, which we secured to fund the acquisition of Doctor Solicitors.

24:22 Now that was drawn down a fall in November last year. And in June this earlier this year, we've repaid a million pounds of that. So we currently have 2,000,000, drawn down on the RCF facility. That gives us looking at the balance sheet an overall net cash position of no point 4,000,000. So we remain highly cash generative and in a good net cash position at the end of the period. And I'll pass back to Shrew to take us through some of the opportunities for growth. Thanks, Pete. So, yeah, we're we're really delighted with the how the first half of the year has gone. So it's really what's next, and and we wanna build on that and build on some of the opportunities for growth in the medium term. So we, you know, fully appreciate that partner recruitment is is the core of what DSW is about. So we have recruited a new head of recruitment to help us on that journey, really. So the first round is really new licensees and trying to you know, we wanna continue with that vision of empowering professionals to set set their own business up. And expanding that into legal services is key to us as well. So our recruitment drive is around both legal services and financial services to generate new licensees, which is a key key strength of growth for us. Organic growth, this will very much come from, our existing businesses scaling up as we talked about before and have continued to do so over the last couple of years. And and that consultant growth as well. So we've seen strong consultant growth in Doctor solicitors and opening the platform up to consultants who bring their own work as well. Again, it's a it's a good stream

25:52 of revenue for us and expands our client base as well. Collaborations is a is a new area that we are starting to look at where we maybe don't have a service line, but a need for a client. We often refer that work outside of the network. We do see an opportunity to collaborate or have partnerships with some of those organizations, areas such as wealth management, yeah, HR, and other areas where we maybe don't have the capacity or those service lines within DSW and trying to generate revenue whilst getting that referral into a trusted partner. Acquisitions, we will still look at acquisitions where they're a good strategic fit or a complementary service line over the next few years.

26:38 And, you know, we we we will look at sort of straightforward acquisitions. But most typically, we do, you know, acquisition of license fees. So there have been a couple of examples of this, which I talked about on our succession pathway. This is where we may fund an MBO and an exit route for founders or shareholders. New management team comes in and they're enfranchised to grow the business under the DSW platform in an area of strategic importance for us or a complementary service line or even a new listing in return for a license fee. And there are a number of opportunities and an alternative exit route for people who want to pass on the business to their management team as well. So we do see a lot of opportunities and build on the on on the success of this year. Some of the service lines that we want what we are focusing on are, you know, continue on the advisory work and that high margin niche advisory work.

27:30 We don't want to do audit and tax compliance and those sorts of areas. We want to do the, you know, much more of the advisory work. Tax is a significant strategic priority for us as well. We've got a number of fee earners in deal advisory. We do a number of work across that, and we have relatively few fee earners in that area. Building on the health care sector that we have in Dios listers, we recently recruited a dental and pharmacy corporate legal team, which again helps us on that sales engine and that building on that health care brand within Dios listers. So there are particular areas of importance to us that we feel will complement the platform. So just to summarize, we are we're pleased with the we feel we've got resilient results in h one FY twenty six. We're we're a much stronger, more resilient business.

28:21 As Pete mentioned and and I've mentioned as well, our dependency is less on m and a, but still remains an important part of what we do and an important part of our brand some of those client success stories as well. But we've reduced that down to a third. We have much more touch points with clients within within Doctor, so that mitigates our exposure to lumpy revenue as well. And we want to build on the opportunities with Doctor solicitors as well and, as I say, expand the healthcare proposition, attract new talent through the consultant model both with delivery only model, but also inviting consultants to bring their own work. And again, as I mentioned before, attracting entrepreneurial legal teams who want something different and want to shape their own practice as well.

29:06 So our recruitment focus remains around building building partners and helping people set their own businesses up. Pathway to partner program is a really, really important initiative for us and will help us to attract professionals in this sort of ever changing landscape at the moment. So we do remain cautiously optimistic in our FY twenty six outlook, and there are still a number of market conditions that that we need to be aware of and macroeconomic factors as well. But we want to balance our confidence with a prudent outlook. So I will hand over to we'll have some questions now. Thank you for listening. Perfect. Absolutely, guys. If I may just jump back in there and thank you very much indeed for your presentation this afternoon.

29:53 Ladies and gentlemen, please do continue to submit your questions just by using the Q and A tab that's situated on the right hand corner of your screen. But just while the team take a few moments to review those questions that have been submitted already, just like to remind you that a recording of this presentation along with a copy of the slides and the published q and a can all be accessed via your investor dashboards. Guys, as you can see there, we have received a number of questions throughout your presentation this afternoon. So if I may just ask you just to read out those questions and give your responses where it's appropriate to do so. And if I pick up from you at the end, that'd be great. Thank you. Thank you. So first question we've got in is where would you ideally like to deploy capital in the next twelve months? So probably comes back to our the opportunities for growth.

30:39 It's very much around continuing to help those teams set up their own business. So teams in the, you know, legal sector who want to have something different and join our legal platform. That would be where we give them start up funding and as I say, the back office support there. We really want to continue on supporting two or three licensees coming into the business this year. I'd also look at, as I say, complementary service lines and maybe an acquisition of license fee deal as well if it was in the right complementary service line. And as as I mentioned before, areas like tax and unemployment law are of of key strategic importance to us as well. Okay. So next one we've got is given the recent news from Grant Thornton about their partner recruitment drive, how does this impact DSW, if at all?

31:32 So I think the phrase partner is probably becoming quite interchangeable depending on which firm you're at. So my my view is a partner in Grant Thornton in today's world is probably quite different than being a partner in DSW. Often, it can be akin to still being an employee and not really having your voice at the table or true equity in the business, which private equity has obviously may have shifted that somewhat. My my view is it it is a bit of an opportunity for us to recruit individuals who maybe want that different side of being a partner, an equity partner, whereby they do make the decisions, they do have the freedom, they can act for the clients they want, and they can keep a significant percentage of their profits as well. So I think that it presents a bit of an opportunity for us if people want a different type of partnership.

32:27 Thank you. Next one we've got is what is the h two m and a pipeline trajectory looking like, and are you pursuing more Doctor style acquisitions? If so, how would you fund them? Do you want to take this one? Yeah. I can do. So we're always in lots of dialogue with with potential new new new licensees and potential new acquisitions as well. We obviously have made considerable cash generation in the first half of the year, enabling us to repay a million pounds of that facility that we have with our bank. We have an accordion facility on top of that of allowing us to draw down potentially in up to 2,000,000 on top, which would enable us to fund a potential acquisition again. So they're very much on the pipeline, but we're looking for things that are very complementary to the network and will add value in terms of those synergies and those opportunities for cross referrals.

33:23 So the next one we have is is the platform model scalable enough to support material international expansion, or is the focus primarily UK based? It's something that we have thought about, and we have obviously an international network work. So we we can tap into some of the the the, I guess, the opinions and feedback of whether or not this this could work really. And I think it can because ultimately, we don't run those businesses for them. So the nuances internationally, you know, we don't necessarily need to staff up for centrally. Obviously, from a scale perspective, you know, we we we always have to look at our fixed cost and whether we can provide the service internationally. But I think it is actually easier route to international expansion. Again, especially because we've got the PANDEA network and with relatively low fixed costs. So I think it is definitely scalable to do that.

34:21 Thank you. Next one we have is, will AI dilute the services required by fairness creating downward pressure on the feed centers to remain competitive? So I think AI is an interesting one in terms of where we stand at the moment across both DSW and Doctor. So I think we're at a point where we we have I like to see it as 25 individual businesses who are able to, test those new new AI and really find out what is the best out there on the market and implement it quite quickly. I think AI can have two roles. So there will be, the ability to increase efficiencies within across the business, allowing us to potentially take on additional work, particularly on on the Doctor side of things. But I also see it as a significant value enhancer in terms of being able to get to the answers far quicker for all of our clients and be able to deliver even more value and greater value. So I think then there is the potential for, somewhat down some downward pressure on on cost on the lower level admin, less value adds parts of the service that small business provide, particularly in some of the the transactions. There's some lower level elements of that, which I think we'll be able to speed up, but it'll enable us to get to that value add size. So I think and in the round, I think we'll be we should be okay on that one.

35:37 Thank you. So the next question we have is, it seems Doctor Sisters did around 900 k EBITDA since acquisition, eleven months contribution versus about 1,200,000 profit before tax in the twelve months to March 03/31/2024. What's your view on the profitability of Doctor, and is there any seasonality in this business? I'll I'll I'll maybe start. Yeah. So the profitability of Doctor, I mean, does does remain strong. And there are always pricing pressures with law firms that we come up against. But overall, because we have a consistent approach to retaining that fee share model, We've been able to maintain the profitability with, again, relatively low fixed costs. We have made some investment in technology, but that will only help with efficiency of that sort of central services team, really.

36:32 In terms of seasonality, really, it it tends to circulate around tax year end or, obviously, any budget changes that that may come through in terms of tax. So we tend to see a bit of a spike towards the end of the tax year, so your March 31 deadlines where there are there just tend to be a lot more property transactions and things like that. But, obviously, changes in legislation that can lead to spikes as well. Changes in policy around primary care can again lead to wanting to transact, particularly on property transactions, again, before the tax year end. But it tends to be fairly stable and fairly normalized a a little like on that m and a. But, yeah, the tax year end can can sometimes lead to a bit of a spike. Do you have anything to add? No.

37:21 I think I'd just reiterate the the investments, obviously, we've we've just alluded to around particularly on technology and marketing. Those are two areas where we've seen as a small bit of investment and made a considerable impact on our ability to scale up and prepare the business for future growth. So that that's where we've obviously focused some of our time as well in the last twelve to eighteen months. And, also, the figures you're that I've posted in the question around thirty first of March twenty twenty four, that is obviously, pre pre acquisition, and there are some, some post acquisition costs that are, obviously, in the business as a result of the acquisition. So looks like last question we have are any thoughts from today's budget? We we shouldn't do this on budget, though, really, should we? But yeah. I mean, I I think it it seems to it doesn't seem to have had quite the impact on business that it did last year, and, obviously, in in the m and a space that, you know, everyone was waiting for a hiking capital gains tax. So it seems to be a few things and and and quite smaller things that have not quite impacted SMEs. It's it's a bit early to tell. I think my only observation would be and is an opportunity perhaps for for Doctor is around investing in 250 GP neighborhoods, is a you know, can lead to property work, can lead to incorporations.

38:46 The devil is always in the detail, but it does present an opportunity both from a a primary care and patient service point of view, but also from DSW advising on that supporting our clients, really. Thanks, Shrew. We've actually had a small flurry of questions coming in as well, which is always good. So question we've got here is could you provide more color on how loans to licensees work, typical terms from payback period, etcetera? So, typically, when we are speaking to a potential new licensee, we will work with them on building a business case for for the for their DSW business. With that, we'll work out what's their required funding facility is and how much they're gonna need to get that off the ground and what their recruitment recruitment plans are. Typically, our average investment's around up to 250 k for for a team.

39:37 They those are usually interest free loans for a period of two years. We see most of our businesses will pay those back within the two year period as there are some restrictions in place while those loans are outstanding on on partner drawings. So, typically, they they come back well within that two year period, although there's always some exceptions. And the next one we have is, would you consider reporting the churn in fee earnings? So that is a stat which we're we're very happy with. We we have a churn of around 15.5% in terms of just attrition rate in fee earnings across the board. That is much lower than some of our peers in the big four, particularly. And, again, it sort of reflects the the quality experience that we have for both employees and partners here. So partners wanna carry on because they they generally earn much more than they do elsewhere as we've alluded to before.

40:23 But then employees get that real real experience with, like, partner led training and development. So, again, we're we're very good at being able to to keep our keep our employees engaged. And then we have another final question here. Where do you see the business in three years? So well, we're very excited about the medium term prospects, and that's what I should say. I think we are as I say, we're a stronger platform now. And I think, you know, we'll be a much more an even more recognized brand and that alternative credible alternative to for professionals both across legal and financial services to become equity partners in their own business. And I think for the reviews we've been selling the concept, now it's around driving that brand loyalty and that brand awareness that this is this works for people. And, you know, you can be very, very successful and do it, you know, after the clients that you want to.

41:20 I think just coming on to the clients, I think having a platform whereby clients can be serviced at every stage of their journey. So having those service lines where we have a number of joint client engagements, a number of cross referrals, and much more recurring revenue in the business, which means, again, that the platform becomes more scalable. And as I say, the, you know, the businesses can refer to each other, and it becomes a a another compelling proposition for new businesses to come and join the platform. And and the final thing I would say, I think the the legal side of business will become even stronger as we build on that d r d r solicitors opportunity, not just on the consultancy side, but being that credible alternative for entrepreneurial talent.

42:12 Thanks, Shoop. So I think that brings us to the end of questions. Okay. Absolute oh, sorry. Sorry, guys. Absolutely. If I may just jump back in there. Thank you very much indeed for being so generous of your time and addressing all of those questions that came in for investors this afternoon. And, of course, if there are any further questions that do come through, we'll make these available to you immediately after the presentation has ended. But, Shri, perhaps before really now just looking to redirect those on the call to provide you with their feedback, which I know is particularly important to yourself and the company. If I could please just ask you for a few closing comments just to wrap up with, that'd be great. Yeah. It's really just to say a big thank you to to for everyone taking time out to listen to us. We are excited about the business. We've got a really unique platform in DSW and, you know, a large market to go out.

43:01 So and we really enjoy talking about it as well. So thank you very thank you very much, and we're looking forward to the future. Yeah. Perfect, guys. That's great. And thank you once again for updating investors this afternoon. Could I please ask investors not to close this session as you'll now be automatically redirected for the opportunity to provide your feedback in order that the management team can really better understand your views and expectations? This will only take a few moments to complete, but I'm sure it'll be greatly valued by the company. On behalf of the management team of DSW CAPITAL PLC, we would like to thank you for attending today's presentation. That now concludes today's session. So good afternoon to you all.