Aon Aktie

All right. Good morning, everybody. We're honored to have Edmund Reese, the CFO of Aon to join us today. Thank you, Edmund, for taking your time. This is actually a very exciting time to talk about insurance in general, especially the brokers.

Yes.

So maybe with that, let's get started. So maybe the first thing, if we want to look at the broader environment, right, this is your second year at Aon. And it's probably 2 of the most exciting years in recent memory. So from that perspective, maybe can you help us talk about what -- going forward, what are the things that you're most excited about for Aon and also the brokerage industry in general?

Yes. Well, first, let me just thank you for having me this morning. This is always a very high-quality conference with great investors. So thanks for having me, Bob.

Yes, it has been an exciting 2 years, and there's a lot to look forward to moving forward. When I stepped into the CFO role of Aon 2 years ago, almost exactly, today, the company was lagging prior to '24, lagging on organic growth relative to the other peers. It had just done an acquisition as a percentage of its market cap, the largest of all time. And of course, that had an impact on capital as well.

So those were the 3 priorities: organic revenue growth, re-underwriting that large acquisition NFP and focusing on capital. And where are we now? Organic revenue growth has been accelerating in the most recent data point, it's 150 basis points better than the industry average. Commercial risk itself is 440 basis points better than the industry average. So the decisions that we've been making, the investments that we've been making really have us in a strong position in terms of accelerating and leading the industry in organic revenue growth.

NFP, that acquisition, you noticed at the end of the fourth quarter, we made the call to accelerate the integration into ABS. We've learned how to drive the revenue synergies, how to integrate retention is better than it was when we first acquired the company, and we're executing on the inorganic component as well. We brought in over $42 million in EBITDA last year.

And then from a capital standpoint, I joined -- or I looked at this company, it was over 30% ROIC leading the industry. That was obviously impacted by the acquisition, but a year, certainly 2 years later, we're again from an ROIC level at the top of the industry. Those are the priorities. That's what we've been focused on, and that's what the progress has been.

Now we really are just executing on the 3x3 Plan. You asked about moving forward. And it's showing up in the results. These are differentiated results relative to the peers right now. The balance sheet is stronger than ever with free cash flow back at a double-digit level with leverage actually below the objectives that we set. And I am sure we will talk about AI right now, but the industry itself, I would say, with the increasing risk, the increasing demand and the investments that we've been making in our capabilities, like it's a great outlook for us moving forward.

And so I would just say that we've just become much more relevant to the client given our Aon United model and then the investments that we've been making, I think, make the business much more valuable going forward. So an exciting 2 years, but we're really excited about what comes next.

Okay. Yes, that's pretty amazing. And also for what it's worth, right, organic growth, you have one of the best organic growth thus far within the industry. And maybe actually on that point, one of the key debate within a lot of -- in the investment community is the fact that we have a softer market environment and then the growth potentially slowing down for the industry. That seems to be less of a case for you guys so far. But maybe can you help us think about just the impact of organic growth going forward in various segments? And how can you kind of arrive to that mid-single-digit or greater organic growth?

Yes. You're right. It has been less of a case for us. We did 6% top line organic growth for the last 2 years, both in '24 and '25. And as I just said, the most recent data point was another quarter of strong organic with 7% in commercial risk. So that means for us that the business is resilient. That means that the drivers of growth are stable. And your question is about what those drivers of growth are. For us, it begins with new business. And we've been trending at very healthy levels relative to the objectives that we've set. We've said 9 to 11 points of contribution from new business.

We were at 10 points of contribution in the last 2 years, 9 in this most recent quarter. The things that are driving that are the investments that we've been making in revenue-generating hires in priority areas like data center, construction, energy, health. I mentioned last quarter, in fact, that the contribution from those priority hires was 75 basis points to overall revenue growth. So that's helping drive the new business.

Our Aon Client Leadership program is driving that new business. The pipeline and the new business growth where we have Aon Client Leaders, particularly on our large global accounts is now at a double-digit level. So that's driving that new business as well. And we continue to see this contribution from middle market as well on the new business. So that's one big driver. New business growth from existing and new clients is the largest contributor for us. That's where we've been focused, and that's what's been driving it.

But I'd also mentioned as a second item, retention. That's been up 50 basis points last year, 20 basis points in this most recent quarter and a couple of contributors there. One, the analytics, we present them, we win more. RFP rates are up over 40%. And so presenting that. What we've been doing in Aon Client Leadership that means we have the relationships with the CHROs, with the CFOs, these higher-level relationships, which make the relationship with the company stickier and the client service through ABS has been helping there.

Lastly, I'll just say the net market impact pricing and exposure. Again, what we've been doing to help clients take advantage of this opportunity has led to 1 point contribution from pricing exposure as well. On top of those things, there's some tailwinds that further support the business. The tailwind in M&A, acquisitions by company, it was up over 25% in the first quarter. The data center spend by the hyperscalers, that's a big tailwind for us as well.

And I'd also mention specialty, the MGA, the MGU business, we've been seeing growth. We have a specialty business in NFP and one in our legacy business, and we've been seeing strong growth there.

You asked about the trends, and I'll end on that. I look at our solution lines in commercial risk, you might have lower property rates, but growth in the core, growth in M&A and construction, those things are helping commercial risk. In reinsurance, again, rate pressure there, but our international facultative business is strong. Our STG business is strong. In health, global benefits from new accounts has been big. And then the regulatory environment in wealth has been strong again. So the plans are clear for us. The business is resilient. The plans are clear. We're executing on that. That's what allows us to have this continued type of growth, and we continue to feel confident in it.

Really just firing all cylinders basically.

And they're compounding. I mean it is -- we're very specific about the areas where we're going to invest, and we're seeing results from each one of them, so they should compound and lead to that kind of growth.

Excellent. Yes, I really appreciate that. So one thing you did touch on is the pricing environment for property is softening. And for casualty, it seems decelerating. If you look at your carrier partners, would you say that like have their appetite between property and casualty changed? Are they more willing to perhaps focus on casualty side? Curious as your view on how the -- your partners on the carrier side are reacting to the current pricing environment.

Yes. I mean pricing -- remember, I have to just step back and say pricing impact us, and then I'll talk about the carriers impact for us as well. It is just low correlation and a low explanation of variance. We shared a stat during Investor Day that said that the R-squared of pricing to our organic growth was 0.1%. Nominal GDP on the other hand, is 0.67. That's more important to us.

And you're right, we do -- we don't look at pricing as sort of like one cycle. We look at it as a collection of micro markets, really that vary by geography, that vary by product, which is what you're asking about now when you ask about property and pricing and vary by client segment as well. So I think you are seeing more underwriting focus driving less aggressive price competition as well.

I think you are seeing the structural trends that are impacting these underwriters, primarily loss severity arguing against an extended and prolonged pricing environment. And really, even coming back to these micro markets, you think about them, property to your specific question, that is where you see, particularly, large property. That's where you've seen over the last 5 years, the highest increases. And therefore, you're now seeing 15% decline in rate in that area for the large market. It's more muted to my point earlier about being different in client segments is more muted in the middle market.

Casualty, you might see some decelerating, but it's still growing at a high single-digit rate. So I think you're still seeing the underwriters, to your question, lean in on that. And it varies by the other products as well. For us, it really is -- the value is not in the rate for us. The value is in placing complex insurance and designing the solutions for us. And that's why we've still been able to drive results that are 1 point of contribution from this environment, and why we feel good that we'll be able to continue our mid-single-digit growth in all pricing environments.

Okay. No, that's very helpful. I think one thing you talked about that's very interesting is the value add on the brokers, right?

Yes.

And this wouldn't be a financial conference if you don't talk about AI and tech. So from that perspective, one of the things that people tend to talk about is that AI could potentially be a disintermediating force within the broker space. Can you maybe talk about is that one sensible? And then maybe to the folks that feel that AI is a disintermediating for -- what would be your messaging of those folks -- for brokers? Well, for AI specifically, actually.

Yes. I'm going to break it up into two. I hear two parts in your question. One is the question on disintermediation. The other part that I heard in your question is the naysayers, those who think that the impact is going to be negative. So first, when I think about the disintermediation point, this is an insurance and insurance brokerage for sure is a network business in my mind. And in network businesses, there's always this fear that technology will disrupt it, were disintermediated or disrupted. I -- what we've actually seen is fragmented point solutions that come in and impact a slice of the process, disrupt that or actually even amplify a slice of the process.

The strongest players, the most resilient players own or play across the entire end-to-end process. That's an important point. They own or play across the entire end-to-end process. And in insurance, that means onboarding, that means placement, policy management, invoicing, cash and collections, claims, servicing and the policy renewal. That's the -- if I were to try to summarize the process, that's the entire process.

In addition to owning that process or playing across that entire process, there are advantages that protect against disintermediation for the large brokers. We know what they are. They're very obvious. The proprietary data, the scale and the negotiating leverage with the carrier relationships, the claims advocacy and resolution. And for some of us, given the investments that we've made, the analytics that support bringing capital into the market. Those are obvious advantages. So playing across the process with these sort of advantages here. I would say those things protect against disintermediation.

But I'd also add that there's a less obvious advantage that is unique to Aon as well, and that is our organizational structure. We've been transforming the organization for the last 15 years to be more client, more centered on the client. And so that means Aon United in 2010 bringing together our geographies and our solutions, no boundaries. That means 2018 Aon Business Services or ABS bringing together our operations and technology. And by the way, we amplified that with $1.3 billion investment in technology and in the organizational structure.

What that means is that we are ready to embrace the technology. So not disintermediate. We see AI as a strategic enabler. And in an AI-enabled world, value accrues to the network integrator, integrating those processes. So that's my point on the disintermediation piece.

In terms of the disproving the negative, the naysayers here. The first thing, I mean, we are less focused on the if scenario, will it destroy the industry or not, but more focused on the scenario outcomes and the assumptions within those outcomes that drive growth or drive productivity in there.

When I think about the top line, you want to consider what's the client segment you're playing in, what's the consulting percentage of your business and how that's impacted. But very importantly, and what I think a lot of folks miss is what is the opportunity to increase the addressable market. And data center is a great example of that because that is a capital-constrained market. There's not enough in traditional insurance, and we're bringing in other players like PE. So what can you do to increase the addressable market? That's a key assumption. And then are you making the investments to increase your share in an expanding market on the revenue side.

On the productivity and efficiency side, we're already seeing tangible proof of the benefits there across the workflows in claims, invoicing, policy management, those things are already coming through. So we believe, for those who have a question about it, focus on the companies that have the right organizational structure in place that have started to make the investments in the technology capabilities that drive revenue. You do those things, and we believe you'll have an expanding addressable market, then the content, the structure that we have in place and the investments that we've been making will help us expand our share in that market. That means a more valuable company, a more durable company, a more scalable company when you think about it.

Yes. That's actually a very interesting point, right? Would you say that within the AI opportunities, which you kind of laid out right there, are they different between the Commercial Risk Solutions, the Health or the Wealth? Or would you say they're kind of similar in that regard? Just curious of your long-term opportunities there within each division.

Well, there's opportunities that are AI-driven that we're taking advantage of now across those solution lines, and there's a longer-term opportunity as well and hit them both. In the immediate term, as I just mentioned, we are already seeing benefits in construction and in particular, data center, right? Companies are spending over $800 billion in CapEx on this. That, as I've just mentioned, is a capital-constrained opportunity that if we don't bring in other capital, it really will bypass insurance and make us less relevant. As I mentioned, we've been bringing in other forms of capital for that. That's on the commercial risk side.

We had a facility for data centers that was $1 billion less than a year ago. It's now $3.5 billion, and we expect to expand that even more as we bring in more capital associated with the traditional and nontraditional. That's in commercial risk to your question.

In health, the workforce opportunity is a big driver of growth for us now and that we expect moving forward as companies look to upskill and reskill their employee base as they transition and adopt AI that's happening right now. And then I'd also call out one other area because you asked about construction and health, but I'd call out the middle market as well. The opportunity is big for us to use our capabilities for the middle markets who really don't have risk management teams in place. They look for us to come and be their risk manager, talk to their CFO. So we're diagnosing the risk, understanding their exposure, understanding the P&L impact. Those things are benefiting us today, and I would say is being largely being driven by this environment.

As we move forward, though, it is all about embedding AI in our capabilities to scale innovation across our suite of analyzers, both in commercial risk and health. to increase sort of client service and retention and to continue to get the productivity and efficiency benefits as well. We see that as a huge opportunity for us moving forward. We're making the investment in that. It is what gives us confidence that this is an opportunity and not a risk moving forward for us.

It's really, like as long as we're continuously investing in these opportunities.

And really focus on those companies that are structurally set up and making the investment in the technology capabilities that don't just help productivity, but drive top line revenue growth as well.

That was like a very great detail in terms of how you think about this. Really appreciate it. If we pivot a little bit to capital allocation, you have a very strong balance sheet, right, $7 billion of available capacity.

Now that being said, the broader brokers valuation have come down because of all the things we talked about before. And -- but at the same time, you have a very strong pipeline on the M&A side as well. Could you maybe give us an update on capital priorities? And what do you think is the most attractive use of capital right now?

Yes. I mean whether you're thinking about share repurchases or acquisitions, for us, the capital model begins with free cash flow generation. So I have to start there because we've had very strong, double digit. In the quarter, it was over 332%. That is what has enabled us to execute our capital allocation model. So leverage, as I just mentioned, is actually at the -- in a very strong position relative to our objectives. It was 2.6x. We again increased the dividend at a double-digit level here.

And if you look at Q1, it is a great demonstration of our disciplined model, right? We deployed $349 million towards tuck-in M&A in the middle market, primarily through our NFP platform. But to the question you asked, the largest deployment of capital was actually share repurchases where we deployed over -- we deployed $500 million. That's twice what it's been over the last 8 quarters, and that's because we definitely think that the market does not currently recognize the intrinsic value of the firm. So we take advantage of that.

So this trade-off between a market that is dislocated right now and below the intrinsic value of the firm, and M&A opportunities that might not yet reflect public market valuations is what we're constantly balancing, but we'll continue to be disciplined on that. When you look at our M&A over the last 10 years, the acquisitions that we've made, roughly 150 of them, after the first year of ownership, they're over 10% growth. The IRRs are over 20%. And as I said at the beginning of this conversation, our ROIC continues to lead the industry. Those are our objectives.

And when I think about those objectives, the pipeline is still strong, though I don't think the valuations fully reflect the current market. But we are focused on middle market, particularly in commercial risk in the U.S., tuck-in and further. We're focused on some of the international countries, places like France, Germany, Japan, and even some of the countries in Latin America, I think, have some opportunities for us. And increasingly, we brought together our specialty business that we purchased as part of NFP in our legacy business. And there are some MGA, MGU opportunities for us as well.

But again, it really is about the highest return for shareholders here. We're very disciplined about that. That means balancing investment for growth with capital return to shareholders. And we're just in a great position to do it with the strength of our balance sheet and the flexibility we have.

It sounds like a wonderful time to have a strong balance sheet. So -- and another thing you kind of touched on earlier on the strategy side, right? This is the final year of the 3x3 Plan. And the program is obviously successful. But what's next? Can you give us a little bit of a preview of how we should think about this going forward?

I think our CEO, Greg said this best that the 3x3 Plan was never a destination for us. It was never a destination. The goal was to exit 2026, the final year of our 3x3 Plan with momentum. And that's exactly what we're doing here. We have the ABS foundation, that growth engine in place, which allows us to have operating leverage to both invest and drive margin expansion through our core operating business, through the core business here. That's very important for us as we move next.

We have the suite of analyzers across commercial risk and human capital and reinsurance that's always been in place, really helping us with win rates and with retention. And so as we go into the next phase after the 3x3, which, again, is an evolution, not a reset, it's an evolution, not a reset. We want to scale those analyzers, make sure that they're presented in every client interaction because we see stronger results when they are presented.

Aon Client Leadership, I mentioned that earlier. When we have an Aon Client Leader on the account, which we now have for nearly 750 global accounts, we see the best retention in the portfolio. We see product penetration that's twice what it is for accounts that don't have it. We see higher new business, and we see the highest retention in the portfolio as well. So we want to get these Aon Client Leaders across the other client segments as well. We want to continue doing that. And we now have this beachhead in middle market. We know how to attack the middle market when it comes to integrating when it comes to going after the revenue synergies is there that's there as well.

So as we get into this next phase, we're going to focus more and more on that. But the organization is set up. We're making the investments in our technology capabilities that's helping us win. And so that means that we are in a great place coming out of the 3x3 Plan to really scale and enhance and have these decisions that we've been making compound and potentially be at the right end of our overall objectives here.

All right. So it's really expanding into your existing advantage and then really having technology also enable a lot of that.

Enabling that.

Yes. So maybe that's actually an interesting point on the technology side, right? Like when a lot of people talk about AI, they feel like it's a miracle drug, but people kind of ignore the cost aspect of this. AI is a variable cost. It's not a fixed cost based on our understanding and someone can spend a lot of money on that. With today's capability, how do you think about the ROI of the technology you're implementing? And how do you think about cost measures overall for all the capabilities that you're introducing to the firm?

Yes, it's an interesting question and one that me and our COO, who leads our technology and AI team connect on and discuss constantly. First thing that I'd say is, I don't look at the cost of AI as this high-risk, high visibility separate line item bet. We really look at it as part of our ongoing tech-dev investment and product innovation. We look at it as part -- increasingly as part of our day-to-day workflows as well. As I said, we use AI as a strategic enabler to scale our innovation. That's our suite of analyzers to drive client service better, enhance service and retention, and to drive productivity and efficiency.

And so we measure those things in terms of the contribution to revenue growth from the products that have it embedded in it. We measure it on the contribution to margin expansion from the productivity and efficiency that we have as well. So that's overall how we discuss the measurement.

But specifically on the cost side of it, this is again a place where I think our organizational structure and how we think about it is helping us. We've tiered the organization. It's just our terminology, where Tier 1 is broad tools that's primarily a licensing fixed cost. Tier 2 is more of a hybrid model, but Tier 3 is the high consumption, high variable cost expert outcomes. And we're really looking at measurable outcomes from those. That structure, Tier 1, 2 and 3 that have different tools with different cost structures, fixed versus variable in them is how we think about it. That allows us to have discipline on the cost, not stifle the innovation as we move forward and be balanced about the overall cost of it moving forward. And we'll just continue to monitor the innovation as the technology as it continues to evolve here.

Okay. So it's very much a balanced approach.

Yes, it's balanced approach.

Got it. No, very helpful. We do have some time for questions. If anybody have any questions, we have a mic around. So anybody want to raise their hand and go ahead. If not, maybe I can squeeze one more.

Let's go for it.

Sure. Sure. GDP, obviously, one of the bigger components in when we think about growth, right? Now obviously, there has been a lot of volatility globally. If you think about the U.S. business and the international business, curious as how you feel the opportunities between inflation, between GDP growth and then various parts of the world. Curious if you have a view on that.

Yes. I mean, certainly, in the U.S., the levels of inflation has increased property and asset values. That means more exposure. That's a benefit for insurance and insurance brokers as well. In the international regions, I would say the inflation is more uneven, but that's not disruptive to our business at all. It's not disruptive because the regulatory environment, the geopolitical environment, that increases risk and increases the demand, which is a benefit to our business.

I'd also say that our global footprint, which means a diversified portfolio, we're operating in over 120 countries, really moderates the impact from any individual region. And when we look at our international business right now, particularly EMEA and Lat Am, we have seen strong contribution to our overall growth.

You asked about inflation in GDP. If you look in EMEA, our specialty business and commercial risk, the move from public to private markets in health, the regulatory environment impacting wealth and health, the global benefit expansion from our existing clients. Those are things that in this macro environment are actually bolstering risk and the demand for our services and driving the contribution in EMEA.

In Lat Am, GDP, I would say, is lower but more stable, but foreign direct investment is growing at multiples of the GDP in those markets. That is a benefit to the overall industry and to us as well. There, you see medical inflation being impacted by the pressure on the private health care systems. And the big countries for us, places like Mexico, the last 3 years has been growing at a double-digit level for us as well. And so these international markets might have more uneven macro environments, but they've been resilient and strong contributors to our overall growth as well.

So really a very strong diversified portfolio across geographies.

Yes. Diversified portfolio.

Okay. Well, I think we're -- anybody have any questions here? If not, I think, Edmund, thank you for your time. I really appreciate it. It's very enlightening. Thank you.

Thank you.

Good morning, and thank you for holding. Welcome to Aon plc's First Quarter 2026 Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] I would also like to remind all parties that this call is being recorded. If anyone has an objection, you may disconnect your line at this time.

It is important to note that some of the comments in today's call may constitute certain statements that are forward-looking in nature as defined by the Private Securities Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from historical results or those anticipated. For information concerning these risk factors, please refer to our earnings release for this quarter and to our most recent quarterly or annual SEC filings, all of which are available on our website.

Now it is my pleasure to turn the call over to Greg Case, President and CEO of Aon plc. Please go ahead.

Thank you, and good morning, and I appreciate you attending our first quarter earnings call. I'm joined today by Edmund Reese, our CFO. The presentation, which Edmund will reference during his remarks is available on our website.

We started 2026, the final year of our 3x3 Plan, with strong momentum. Our first quarter results reflect continued strong performance, consistent execution and progress against the strategic priorities we defined more than 2 years ago. We're operating with discipline, investing deliberately and delivering differentiated value for clients, reinforcing confidence in our ability to produce sustained organic growth, margin expansion and long-term value creation.

Today, I will focus on three areas. First, I will describe the external landscape and the forces shaping client demand. Second, I will highlight how our execution of the 3x3 Plan is translating into performance, including how advanced analytics and AI are increasing value and opportunity. Finally, I will highlight our results and share some perspectives on our outlook and how we see the year unfolding as we continue to build momentum.

Let's start with the external landscape. Now more than ever, our clients are operating in an environment defined by volatility, complexity and rising stakes. Geopolitical uncertainty, economic pressures and cyber risk are converging with rapid technological change. These dynamics are increasing interconnection across risk, capital and workforce planning. With the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, we're working closely with clients, both in region and globally to help them build resilience and continue to operate and grow in a highly uncertain market.

In this environment, the value of making better decisions has never been more evident or urgent. Capital is more selective. Boards and regulators are demanding stronger governance, transparency and resilience, and management teams are focused on protecting against downside risk while enabling growth, improving capital efficiency and supporting workforce sustainability. As a result, clients demand outcome-based advice in addition to transactional solutions, and they're looking for partners who can help them understand the risk and people challenges, design bespoke programs and execute consistently across geographies.

This environment increasingly rewards firms that can integrate data, analytics and deep expertise to help clients make decisions with clarity and confidence. These trends align directly with Aon's strategic investments, client mix and innovative capabilities.

On the topic of strategic execution and the 3x3 Plan. Execution against our strategy remains strong and disciplined. The 3x3 Plan continues to sharpen focus, align investment and drive accountability across the firm. It accelerates progress behind Aon United, integrating capabilities across Risk Capital and Human Capital and scaling them through Aon Business Services, or ABS. Through ABS, technology and advanced analytics are embedded enablers of our strategy, combining proprietary data, advanced analytics and expertise to design, place and govern bespoke risk and capital solutions.

This combination creates a strong competitive advantage that technology alone cannot replicate. We established ABS nearly a decade ago and deliberately stepped up our investment beginning in 2024 to embed AI and advanced analytics across the firm. These investments are delivering results, materially improving productivity and execution for clients. By year-end, we expect to have invested approximately $1.3 billion in talent and technology, enhancing productivity and strengthening our ability to better diagnose risk, design integrated solutions, access capital efficiently and execute consistently for our clients.

There are several proof points and performance milestones worth highlighting. First, on client segmentation and revenue quality. We compete on client outcomes, resilience, capital efficiency and workforce effectiveness, not transactions. The vast majority of our business serves global, large and middle-market clients with complex risk, capital and workforce needs. In these segments, value is created through expertise, proprietary insight and seamless execution.

Meanwhile, less than 2% of our revenue is derived from SME and Personal Lines segments. This client mix translates into strong revenue quality, with the majority of our revenues recurring and embedded in ongoing client needs. Our Health and Wealth businesses together account for approximately 34% of firm revenue. Within those businesses, roughly 80% is highly recurring and anchored in regulatory and mission-critical activities, including annual valuations, pension administration and asset-linked revenue in wealth and annual benefits, broking and advisory and health.

Project-based consulting, where our advice is differentiated by proprietary data and technology is less than 10% of firm-wide revenues. Our continued investment to enhance these capabilities, including in our Radford McLagan Compensation Database, instrumental in supporting workforce transformation, reinforces how deep expertise and proprietary data translate into higher value outcomes for clients.

Second, on expanding the addressable market. We previously highlighted insured risk as a percent of GDP declining over the last 3 decades. Embedding AI into advanced analytics and modeling are making insurance more relevant by accessing new capital. This narrows the gap between economic loss and insured loss and increases the importance of firms that can design, place and govern complex programs.

A clear example of this dynamic is digital infrastructure, where AI computing is driving unprecedented global investment in data centers. These assets introduce complex construction, operational, catastrophe and cyber risk that exceed traditional insurance solutions. Our data center life cycle insurance program, which we recently increased capacity by another $1 billion to $3.5 billion, allows our firm to lead as a market maker, bringing together the sort of coverage, large-scale capacity and capital solutions across the full life cycle of these assets.

This is a growing source of demand directly linked to AI adoption, where our integration, data and expertise create a meaningful advantage, positioning Aon as a strategic partner of the clients, leading to opportunities to win new business and deepen relationships. Here, again, our investment and progress in AI-embedded analytics is allowing us to expand beyond the $4.6 trillion of traditional reinsurance capital to access the $250 trillion capital pool that includes private equity, sovereign wealth and pension funds.

Third, on innovation embedded within our core brokerage model, Aon Broker Copilot illustrates how, through large language models and predictive capabilities, we can more efficiently embed advanced analytics directly into revenue-generating workflows and transform the manual placement process. The platform draws on decades of proprietary quoting, pricing and trading data to provide real-time insights to brokers as they negotiate complex placements.

Further, we're extending these capabilities across the value chain. Aon Claims Copilot improves claims advocacy by consolidating data across geographies and lines of business, enabling better preparation, monitoring and negotiation. As a result of our advocacy over the last decade, we've been able to overturn and partially recover nearly $10 billion of financial value for claims that were initially denied. Claims Copilot strengthens our advocacy efforts and leads to even better outcomes for clients. This represents outcome-driven application of data analytics and expertise, not automation for its own sake.

In addition to supporting revenue growth, our investments are improving how the firm operates. For example, we're seeing substantial productivity gains across invoicing, certificates of insurance and policy administration. And these gains are increasingly measurable. For example, a 50% reduction in cycle time from 22 to 11 days for invoicing and 70% reduction in invoicing work, a 95% reduction in handle time and certificates of insurance from hours to less than 5 minutes and a 95% reduction in time in policy checks from 48 hours to 30 minutes.

As a result of these improvements, colleague capacity is being redeployed toward higher-value advisory and client-facing activities, fully reflecting our belief that winners in the application of AI will lead with a world-class people strategy to grow today and into the future. Critically, AI-driven productivity creates operating leverage. By lowering unit costs and reinvesting those gains into differentiation and growth, we're expanding margins while increasing the value we deliver to clients.

Consistent with our long-term philosophy, productivity gains are intentionally reinvested to strengthen differentiation, accelerate innovation and deepen client relationships while still supporting margin expansion. This flywheel of higher value growth, operating leverage and disciplined reinvestment underpins our confidence in durable value creation for shareholders.

Turning briefly to results. Our first quarter performance reflects strong execution across the firm. We delivered 5% organic revenue growth, continued to expand adjusted operating margin, realized strong growth in adjusted earnings per share and generated significant free cash flow. In particular, Q1 highlights the fourth consecutive quarter at or above 6% organic growth in Commercial Risk, reinforcing the impact of deliberate investments we've made and the value delivered through our innovative solutions.

Additionally, our balance sheet remains strong and flexible. As Edmund will discuss in more detail, we continue to execute a balanced capital allocation strategy in the first quarter with programmatic M&A and substantial capital return to shareholders through stepped-up share repurchases and our dividend. Finally, we recently announced a double-digit dividend increase for the sixth consecutive year.

Looking ahead, we are reaffirming our guidance for 2026 and remain confident in our long-term outlook. The external environment continues to reinforce demand for our solutions. Our strategic priorities are clear and our execution remains constant. We believe the net effect of technology adoption is an expansion of our addressable market. Insurance and risk management becomes more relevant as analytics improve decision-making, alternative and private capital expand available capacity and clients seek integrated outcome-based solutions.

Because Aon is uniquely positioned to source capital, integrate capabilities and govern in complex risk and human capital issues for clients across the globe, we expect to grow faster than the market and increase share over time. In closing, Aon is well positioned strategically, operationally and financially. We're delivering differentiated value for clients in an increasingly complex world and translating that value into strong performance and long-term shareholder returns.

To our 60,000 colleagues around the world, thank you. Thank you for your continued commitment to our clients, each other and our Aon United strategy.

Now I'm pleased to turn the call over to Edmund for his comments and perspective. Edmund?

Thank you, Greg, and good morning, everyone. Before getting into the details of our first quarter results, I want to clearly anchor today's discussion on the fundamentals that define our performance and momentum as we advance through the final year of the 3x3 Plan. Over the past several quarters, we've been very intentional. First, establishing strategic clarity through our communication, then demonstrating disciplined execution, reflecting in consistently strong financial performance.

As we move through 2026, our message remains consistent. The fundamentals of our business are strong, resilient and evident in our results. First, we have high confidence in the structural advantages of our business, exceptionally deep client and industry relationships, proprietary data and analytics and integrated service and global capabilities, all of which are difficult to replicate and, importantly, position us to deliver increasing value over time, particularly as AI accelerates the shift from transaction-based models towards insight-led decision-making.

These advantages support sustained economics tied to value delivered, high retention and recurring revenue streams, existing and new, and they underpin our ability to sustain mid-single-digit or greater organic growth and generate returns through the cycle.

Second, our confidence is substantiated by our consistent execution. Quarter after quarter, we continue to deliver sustainable organic revenue growth, expand margins through operating leverage and convert earnings into strong free cash flow. The choices we've made, investing in revenue-generating talent, scaling Aon Business Services, expanding Aon client leadership and building a leading middle-market platform, are collectively working together to generate higher-quality growth that is capital-light, margin accretive and resilient across market conditions.

Third, our strong execution positions us with significant financial capacity and flexibility. During the quarter, we recognized the unique market conditions and opportunistically deployed $500 million to repurchase shares at prices we believe represent a compelling discount to intrinsic value. With consistent free cash flow generation, a disciplined balance sheet and leverage within our target range, we also remain well positioned to supplement organic growth with high return inorganic investments, ensuring that capital allocation continues to enhance long-term shareholder value.

And finally, when you step back and collectively connect these attributes, durable competitive advantages, consistent execution, differentiated performance and disciplined capital allocation with significant financial flexibility, the implication is clear. These are the characteristics that, over time, result in value creation. Our focus remains on the inputs we control: strategy, including growth investment in AI-embedded tools, execution and disciplined capital allocation. As we deliver, we look forward to the outputs, including market recognition of the quality and durability of our financial model.

With that context, let's turn to our first quarter results. On Slide 5, you see the first quarter results. Organic revenue growth was 5% for the quarter and total revenue increased 6% year-over-year to $5 billion. Adjusted operating margin expanded by 70 basis points and reached 39.1%. Adjusted EPS was up 14% to $6.48. And finally, we generated $363 million in free cash flow, up 332%.

Let's get into the details of these results, starting with organic revenue growth on Slide 6. Organic revenue growth was 5% in the quarter, in line with our mid-single-digit or better guidance. This performance reflects the impact of our strategic investments in hiring across priority growth areas, combined with the increasing contribution from our analytical and advisory capabilities.

In Commercial Risk, organic revenue growth of 7% marked the fourth consecutive quarter of growth at 6% or higher. Results reflected meaningful contributions from both North America, where growth was double digit, and EMEA as well as strong performance in our core P&C business. M&A closed deal activity accelerated during the quarter, and M&A services provided an incremental lift to organic revenue growth.

In addition, our MGA businesses across both large and middle-market clients contributed positively, supported by continued client demand for specialized underwriting solutions. Finally, construction grew at a double-digit rate and remains a contributor to growth as our data center revenue pipeline is on pace to be 3x higher than last year, reinforcing our confidence in sustained mid-single-digit or greater growth in 2026.

In Reinsurance, 4% organic revenue growth was driven by growth in treaty placements and double-digit growth in facultative placements. Treaty growth reflected 10% to 15% rate pressure that was more than offset by continued strong new business activity, including the addition of new logos. Insurance-linked securities were a smaller contributor in the quarter but continued to grow at a double-digit rate with outstanding volumes reaching $61 billion.

Looking ahead to the second quarter, our data points to further rate pressure at April 1 renewals with rates down 15% to 20% in both the U.S. and Japan, partially offset by roughly 10% higher demand. Importantly, we continue to expect full year organic revenue growth in line with our mid-single-digit or greater growth objective, supported by a strong second half, driven by continued growth in international facultative placements and growing demand in our Strategy and Technology Group Solutions.

Health Solutions grew 4% in the quarter. Our core Health and Benefits business, representing approximately 75% of the Health revenue delivered strong mid-single-digit growth across both EMEA and APAC, partially offset by slower discretionary spend in Talent Solutions, reflecting ongoing pressure that extended through the first quarter of 2026.

Looking ahead, the demand for our analytics and advisory capabilities is increasing as employers navigate rising health care costs, manage transitioning workforces and focus on delivering better outcomes for their employees. With that demand building and the core business performing well, we continue to expect full year organic growth in Health to be within our mid-single-digit or greater objective.

And finally, Wealth generated 1% growth driven by regulatory and valuation-related work in EMEA and market performance impact on NFP asset-based revenue, partially offset by softer advisory demand in the U.S. We expect mid-single-digit growth in Wealth for Q2 as the pension risk transfer market in the U.K. remains strong with Aon as the market leader.

Turning to the key components of our Q1 organic revenue growth on Slide 7. Aon has a consistent track record of generating new business that contributes 9 to 11 points to organic revenue growth, and that continued in Q1. In the quarter, new business contributed 9 points to organic revenue growth, supported by both new client acquisitions and expanding mandates with existing clients.

Our investment in revenue-generating talent in high-growth areas like construction and energy continue to deliver measurable impact. Our 2024 and 2025 cohorts contributed 75 basis points to Q1 organic revenue growth, and we expect momentum to build as these cohorts season. We've noted in the past that our data analytics and capabilities make us a destination of choice. And despite ongoing competitive pressures for talent, we continue to expect to expand our revenue-generating population by 4% to 8% in 2026.

Q1 '26 retention remains strong in the mid-90s, improving 20 basis points over last year, led by Commercial Risk and Reinsurance as deeper Enterprise Client Group engagement and ABS-driven insights enhance client value and relationship depth. Net new business contributed 5 points to organic revenue growth in the quarter. Net market impact, which captures the impact of rate and exposure, contributed 1 point to organic revenue growth and was delivered in line with estimates despite a softer pricing environment in P&C and Reinsurance.

Rate-driven pressure in Reinsurance following 1/1 renewals was offset with higher limit and expanded coverage in Commercial Risk, further reinforcing that growth is primarily driven by business investment and client demand and remains largely uncorrelated with pricing cycles. And one final point on revenue. First quarter fiduciary investment income was $55 million, down 18% from the prior year, as higher average balances were more than offset by the lower interest rates.

On Slide 8. Q1 adjusted operating income was up 8% to $2 billion, and adjusted operating margins expanded 70 basis points to 39.1%. Through ABS, we are structurally lowering our cost base by reducing technology costs, standardizing and automating processes, including the integration of NFP and embedding AI into our development and operational workflows. These actions are not only driving margin expansion but also creating durable capacity for investments that support sustainable top line growth.

Restructuring savings were $25 million in the quarter, contributing 50 basis points to adjusted operating margin. We remain on track to deliver $100 million of savings in 2026, advancing toward our goal of $450 million in total savings by 2027, with 2026 marking the final year of our restructuring investment.

Moving to interest, other income and taxes on Slide 9. Interest income was $12 million in the first quarter and up $7 million over last year, driven by interest earned on proceeds from the sale of NFP Wealth. Interest expense came in at $179 million, $26 million lower than last year, primarily due to lower average debt balances. We expect Q2 '26 interest expense to be approximately $180 million.

Other expense was $15 million lower than last year, driven by lower noncash pension expense and the remeasurement of balance sheet items. We estimate Q2 '26 other expense to range between $15 million and $20 million. Finally, the Q1 effective tax rate was 20.3%, 60 basis points lower than Q1 '25, reflecting the geographic mix of income growth and the favorable impact of discrete items. Our full year tax outlook remains unchanged at 19.5% to 20.5%.

Turning now to free cash flow and capital allocation on Slide 10. We generated $363 million of free cash flow in the first quarter, reflecting strong operating income growth. This is a strong start to the year, and we continue to expect double-digit free cash flow growth in 2026.

Turning to capital on the right-hand side of the slide. Our strong free cash flow growth enabled us to continue to execute our disciplined capital allocation model, balancing investment for growth with capital return to shareholders. As Greg mentioned, in April, we increased our quarterly dividend by 10% to $0.82 per share, marking the sixth consecutive year of double-digit dividend increases and reflecting the cash-generating strength and durability of our business and financial model.

We also remained active in M&A and allocated $349 million toward high-growth tuck-in acquisitions in middle market that align with our strategic priorities and return thresholds.

The largest use of capital in the quarter was shareholder return. In total, we returned $662 million to shareholders, including $500 million in share repurchases, a significant step-up from the average $250 million per quarter over the prior 8 quarters. As I noted earlier, we were proactive and leaned in the market conditions, repurchasing shares at prices well below the firm's intrinsic value.

And that conviction is grounded in the fundamentals of the business, driving strong performance today and also informed by the investments we are making to drive future growth in talent, AI-embedded analytics and scalable platforms, which we believe increase the long-term earnings power and terminal value of the firm.

Taken together, these actions reflect the consistent application of our balanced capital allocation model, maintaining our leverage objective, consistently growing the dividend and executing our disciplined approach to high-return M&A and returning excess capital to shareholders, ensuring capital allocation continues to enhance long-term shareholder value.

I'll conclude my prepared remarks on Slide 11 with a few thoughts on our financial objectives and 2026 guidance. The first quarter 2026 performance reflects a start to the year that is right in line with our expectations and reinforces the strategic choices we have made to drive sustainable growth. Accordingly, we are reaffirming our 2026 full year guidance for mid-single-digit or greater organic revenue growth, supported by continued new business wins, the compounding contributions from our revenue-generating hires and accretive growth in middle market.

We delivered 70 basis points of margin expansion in Q1, and we are seeing the benefits of efficiency gains from our scalable ABS platform and continued progress on our restructuring objectives. As a result, we are reaffirming our expectations for 70 to 80 basis points of margin expansion for the full year. The combination of organic growth and margin expansion supports our outlook for strong earnings growth in 2026, and with high conversion of those earnings into cash, positions us to deliver double-digit free cash flow growth for the year.

Our strong capital position affords us the financial flexibility to actively deploy capital across multiple avenues, supplementing organic growth with strategic M&A while also executing opportunistic share repurchases. We have substantial financial capacity to pursue our high-quality M&A pipeline, and we remain firmly on track to deliver at least $1 billion in share repurchases for the year.

As we move to Q&A, I want to emphasize that the performance you are seeing is the result of deliberate decisions. Our organic investments as part of the 3x3 Plan, $1.3 billion in talent and the AI-embedded capabilities that enable that talent to bring faster, deeper insight to clients as well as our inorganic actions are all intentionally aligned to deliver consistent earnings and free cash flow growth.

We are already realizing productivity improvements today, and we are reinvesting those gains back into capabilities that both expand what we can deliver for clients and how efficiently we deliver it. In a world where technology increasingly enables and amplifies differentiated insight, advice and outcomes, this reinvestment cycle is critical.

When executed well, it expands the addressable market by making risk transfer more relevant and increasing insured risk as a percentage of GDP, while also unlocking incremental AI-enabled opportunities to gain share with existing and prospective clients. Our investment leadership here strengthens our long-term growth profile, reinforces our conviction in the firm's growing terminal value and supports long-term value creation for shareholders.

So with that, let's open up the line for questions. Kerry, back to you.

[Operator Instructions] And our first question will come from Elyse Greenspan with Wells Fargo.

My first question, I was hoping if you could just provide a little bit more color on just the contributions from data centers to organic growth in the quarter. I know Edmund said, I think it was 3x the level this year than last year. But hoping just to size it a little bit to get a sense of the contribution to organic in Q1 and expectations for the next few quarters of the year.

Elyse, thanks for joining. Great question. I will hit data center in particular, but the important point in this question is our Commercial Risk business and how broad-based the growth was. Data center, just real pointedly, was a part of the double-digit construction in our business. But again, the growth in Commercial Risk was broad-based. So I just have to highlight that in a lower rate environment, Commercial Risk has been 6% or better for the last 4 quarters. And we're not surprised with the strength in Commercial Risk because the results reflect what I just said in the script there, our intentional strategic decisions.

So it was broad-based with strength in the U.S. double digit, with EMEA achieving strong growth in the core P&C business. New business itself in Commercial Risk was over 12 points of contribution. That's very much supported by the priority growth hires in construction, where data center shows up as a component of that. Retention was 50 basis points higher in Commercial Risk for the quarter. That's our analyzers helping with RFPs. We have a whole suite of them now rolled out in the U.S. and EMEA. And again, the net market contribution in Commercial Risk was still positive despite pricing pressure in property.

And I'll also emphasize just again, to your point, the priority growth areas. Double-digit growth in construction, that's wins and pipeline in data centers. So we had wins that were higher this year and a pipeline that is giving us confidence in the outlook for the year, but it wasn't the key driver of growth. I also mentioned M&A in that. Again, the growth was strong there as well, but we still would have been at these fourth consecutive quarters of 6% growth with or without that, just again, emphasizing how broad-based the growth was.

And I'll just point out one other item, Elyse, that the synergies that we are getting from NFP, particularly as we utilize our facilities like Aon Client Treaty in London, is just another contributor to the growth here. So we're going to continue to focus and invest in these drivers of growth, our talent and our technology. We believe those investments, including in construction and data center hires, hires who are focused on that, those are the things that will sustain new business growth and continue the strong retention that we have.

And I think really, Elyse, what Edmund, I think summarized there very, very well is the broad-based piece. And we remain incredibly excited about the data centers. But it's really very much we're at the beginning of the beginning with tremendous promise ahead, and we're very well positioned.

And then my follow-up question is on capital. I recognize you guys leaned into a buybacks in the Q1, but you left the target for the year at $1 billion plus. You obviously could have raised it. Is it just -- are you waiting to see how the M&A pipeline develops? Is it a function of what happens to your stock price? Obviously, there's been more volatility, right, within the brokers subsequent to the end of the Q1. So just trying to understand the desire to lean into buyback and also continue to pursue your M&A strategy.

Yes. Another important topic, Elyse, so thank you for raising it again. And even on this one, I have to step back as well because I have to begin with just reiterating how pleased we are with the free cash flow generation in the quarter and the continued execution of the capital allocation model, right? I mentioned in the script that we're right in line with our leverage objective, actually a little bit better in this quarter. I think we came out at 2.7. Our objective is at least 2.9 there. We announced a double-digit increase in the dividend. We're investing in middle market. And as you just mentioned, we're taking advantage of the market opportunity as well and returning capital to shareholders.

So the question just really has me come back and anchor in our capital allocation model, which we're executing with discipline here. As we go through '26, I mean, you hit on a few things there. We are going to continue to look at the pipeline for M&A. I mentioned earlier that we have strong criteria and thresholds that have to be met strategically, financially. You know that we look at M&A that can be above 10% revenue after owning it for a year, that have IRRs that are at least 20% and allow us to continue to have our market-leading ROIC in it.

That's what we evaluate, and there continue to be opportunities in middle market and select international markets like Japan and EMEA and even LatAm that we are looking at. So we have the flexibility with our strong balance sheet to pursue those M&A. If they don't meet the criteria, then we won't have a lazy balance sheet. I continue to use that terminology, and we'll return the excess capital to shareholders.

So for now, I think it is prudent for us to stick with our at least $1 billion in the year. Obviously, $500 million in the first quarter is a great start that gives us confidence in that number, and we'll see how the year plays out.

And our next question will come from Andrew Andersen with Jefferies.

On expanding mandates versus truly new logos, can you maybe just talk about what the mix was this quarter and how that has been trending versus last year? I would think expanding mandates is better for margins near term, but perhaps that's not the case, and would be particularly interested in CRS.

Yes. This is a key, key topic, new business growth. I mentioned in the script there, 9 to 11 points, as we've shown in the Investor Day and continue to produce, is what the objective is. So another quarter of 9 points. And it's a great question. If you look back over '25 or even '24, I mentioned during Investor Day that it's been split about half and half between new logos and expanding with existing clients. And you see some movement quarter-over-quarter in the different solution lines, but it's about equal.

And then Commercial Risk, in particular, on your question, 12 points of contribution in the quarter from Commercial Risk. That's a strong item. That was both, again, an equal mix between the new logos and expanding with our existing clients there in the quarter. So it's typically going to be balanced across each, and we're looking to pursue each as we deploy Enterprise Client Group, right? We have a whole focus on this, and Greg can speak up on the Enterprise Client Group, really expanding with our existing clients, increasing the relationship with the senior executives, the HR leads, the CFOs of the organization.

That allows us to deepen the relationships and retain those clients. So we're seeing that in both. New logos, I called out in the script also, was a strong driver for Reinsurance as it helped us offset some of the rate pressure there as well. So I think a strong quarter from that standpoint.

And there's been some broader industry discussion around broker commissions and fee levels. How are you thinking about this dynamic in the context of the value that you're delivering? And where do you see these trending?

Let me say, Andrew, just step back and think about kind of what's going on in the market overall, we see real opportunity. When you think about sort of how this plays into AI and all that we might talk about further on this call potentially as questions come up, but real opportunity. By the way, this is opportunity based on client need. It is interesting how the question gets positioned sometimes, and it takes a view of a zero-sum game between insurance markets and advisers. But really, we should be asking the question on whether the risk industry overall is going to be led greater value for clients.

And if we can meet this ever-increasing, ever-higher bar, it suggests a positive movement, and that's exactly where we are. In a world where risks are increasing, volatility is getting greater, the need for better solutions is very high, we are incredibly well positioned to deliver not just insights, but access to capital, which includes the traditional markets and alternative markets. So from our standpoint, we see a meaningful opportunity ahead with AI as a catalyst, driving and enhancing our strategy. Again, AI is not a strategy. Our strategy has been unbelievably strong and well proven. AI is a catalyst for it.

And we do what Edmund described in his comments. We expand addressable markets. We've got greater access to those markets. We've got the ability to add even greater value as those markets expand, and that suggests stronger performance. But really, Andrew, to be clear, the ultimate arbiter of truth here is clients. They decide. And we're really well positioned to add greater value. And in doing that, it creates greater opportunity for operational improvement.

And moving next to Rob Cox with Goldman Sachs.

First question just on the Middle East. Can you just talk about how the Middle East conflict showed up in Aon's results this quarter? And maybe if you have any ideas you could talk about the potential to see claims inflation from the conflict later on this year?

Maybe to start overall, Rob, just a general view on the Middle East. Generally, and how it's impacting kind of our clients around the world and certainly, obviously, in region. And I want Edmund to talk specifically about the results in the Middle East and sort of how that's played into the overall performance in the quarter. Listen, our first and foremost focus is on our colleagues and our clients sort of in region and supporting them and reinforcing all that they're going through.

As we think about broad-based, obviously, the Middle East is not a tremendously substantial part of our business, but it's important for clients around the world. It will have overall implications. And from our standpoint, we'll see how things evolve. But right now, uncertainty is what we work toward on behalf of clients. It's how we serve and support them. And so whatever form that takes, however long this lasts, we'll be there, and it will have implications on overall operating performance. But so far, it's very much in development mode. But specifically in the quarter, Edmund, do you want to comment on that?

Yes. Greg, I actually just want to start with what you just said, like our focus is on the colleagues and clients. But if I do move to the performance there. The headline growth for us, Rob, in the region was actually double-digit growth. You got to keep in mind that our Middle East business, as Greg just said, not a substantial part of our overall business, but over 50% of it is Health. Those renewals happened actually before the conflict and that escalation -- before the conflict escalated. So it's pretty locked in.

Commercial Risk in the Middle East was one of the largest growers in our portfolio. You can imagine, with increasing risk in the region, that actually creates more demand for us to be able to help clients, as Greg said in his opening remarks, move through that. And the Reinsurance business in that region, 70% of it is done on 1/1 renewals. So again, we had strong growth there as well.

Greg's point is the right one. It's a small part of our portfolio. We're very diversified. And as you heard me say, our strength is broad-based. Now if we continue to see an escalation or a prolonged conflict, that could have some impact that seeps into the broader impact on economy. But again, if that happens, our clients actually need more of our services. So we'll continue to monitor development closely, but we remain focused now on our clients and colleagues.

That's super helpful. And I just wanted to follow up on the risk analyzers. Edmund, I think you attributed some of the retention gains in Commercial Risk to the risk analyzers. I'd imagine it's also contributing to new business. How are you actually measuring the benefits from the risk analyzers? And can you just give us some color on adoption usage compared to the past in the various businesses?

Yes. We've -- our team, led by our COO and our business partners have really been rolling out our risk analyzers. And Greg said it earlier, and I'm sure he will emphasize that. Where we started here was with Commercial Risk. And we've started to roll some of this out into Health, and we're starting to see some of that benefit in core health and benefits. But the Commercial Risk area is where we're seeing the business. And what I talked about, as I said, we've rolled it out. We're on later versions in the U.S., sort of mid-game in EMEA and rolling out in the other regions as well.

But it is very clear and measurable to look at the impact of when we use the analyzers and when we don't use the analyzers. And we look at win rates, we look at renewals, and we look at new business from it. Again, it is the first place. The priority hires and the analyzers, if I had to boil it down the 12 points of contribution in Commercial Risk to two things, talent and technology, our hires in the priority growth areas and the analyzers coming through across property, across D&O, across cyber.

And now Greg in his script mentioned us rolling out Broker Copilot as well, which is helping us bring insights on pricing, trading data to our clients very quickly as well. So if I had to attribute that new business to two things, it would be those two items. And we're able to measure it very well. But Greg, any comments from you on that?

No, I think you've covered it well. I do want to -- just for context, Rob, back up, and it isn't just the analyzers, right? This is a very measured approach we've taken over a number of years to answer a very straightforward question. How do we address increasing client need. And so the analyzers are a direct response to that, driven by client need.

We can do the analyzers because we've got the raw data, the quantity, the quality, how we've ingested it and curated it. We've got the analytic capability, and then we have an organizational structure. When you think about Risk Capital, Human Capital, it doesn't exist anywhere else. And that allows us to take very high-quality talent, the best in the world, as Edmund described, and really make sure we're aligned to deliver this. And so it's not just the analyzers. It's also the service component, what we do on certificates and ad hoc certificates, a whole range of things, invoices.

So it is revenue driven and service driven. And then, obviously, it creates -- we have efficiency then that Edmund described before, which means we can reinvest back into that capability. And the reason that's important is it highlights the versions. Don't miss that point. We're on like Version 10 or more of the property analyzer. And across the suite of analyzers, we continue to evolve them. We're about to attend the RIMS Conference. We're going to come away with 15 ideas that are go into a next iteration, and we've got the machine that can just keep innovating to do that.

But the real punchline here is we're making a difference, and they're making a difference because they matter to clients on revenue, how they help build their businesses and make decisions and how they run their businesses around service.

And our next question will come from Mike Zaremski with BMO Capital Markets.

First question, focusing on the really nice commercial risk organic. Just want to make sure we shouldn't get over our skis given we know that 2Q is one of the biggest property quarters in the industry. So when you think about the net market impact, Edmund for 2Q, in the last 2Q it decelerated fairly materially from 1Q. Should we be kind of keeping that in mind as we think about the rest of the year or just the near-term 2Q is maybe a governor on how excited we should be?

Well, there's two parts to your question that are important to highlight. One is, you're right. We are running this firm on an annual basis, and not on a quarterly basis. And so we think about the guidance as full year annual guidance because there could be movement within the quarters.

Setting that aside, on net market impact, the second part of your question, which I think is important, the guidance, as you know, is 0 to 2 points of contribution from that as the quarters have moved through the end of '25 and into this quarter, despite the pressure that we see, whether we're talking about Commercial Risk in P&C or even in Reinsurance. We've been at roughly 1 point or slightly higher, and that continued in this quarter. That's what we expect throughout the rest of the year, including Q2.

It's just important to highlight here that it's not -- that could have an impact, 0 to 2 is still how you should be thinking about it. But more importantly is the growth in GDP, the business investment that we're having right now because that's the pricing piece that we're talking about in the net market impact. And the diversity of the products, the diversity of the geographies, I just talked about the broad-based growth in Commercial Risk. Those are the things that allow us to grow at mid-single digit or better in any pricing environment, and that's where we focus on.

So even in this quarter, it's not new, right? Property was down 15% in this quarter. Casualty, like mid-single-digit growth. D&O, a little bit of an uptick in price there. Cyber at low single-digit rates. We have these micro markets on pricing, but we take actions to help our clients take advantage of these markets, help them increase their limit, increase their coverages. And those are the things that allow us to still have the mid-single-digit growth. Greg?

And Mike, I don't miss -- I hear your point on over our skis. We've taken in a very measured, methodical approach year-over-year-over-year period. But you would observe the 4 quarters that Edmund described in Commercial Risk, observe the fact that we, in our 3x3 Plan, have really laid out a series of capabilities defined by clients, driven by serious, serious industrial strength content and content behind them. And we focused initially on Commercial Risk and across the U.S. And what Edmund just described is a very broad-based 7% organic against whatever pricing environment. We didn't qualify it on that. It doesn't matter. It's helping clients succeed, winning more clients, doing more with them, keeping them longer, all those things with it.

And the team was phenomenal. They delivered 7%. I think you described double-digit North America. And so this is a pretty unique progress. We don't get excited about it. We just stay focused on client need, and we've got to deliver for the year. But you ask yourself, did we increase probability of the mid-single digit or greater, you should feel good about that progress with that context.

Yes. Definitely, even seeing the net margin impact not move much over the last many quarters has been a great result. Just lastly, real quick. In your prepared remarks, you talked about driving productivity improvements. Clearly, a lot of GenAI technology adoption that's being accelerated across your firm. Do you envision a future where Aon's productivity per employee could accelerate to much higher levels than historical levels? Or too soon to know? I guess I asked because one of your broker peers did offer kind of a very long-term North Star about productivity improvements that could be fairly material.

Yes. Listen, this is probably worth a little bit of time since it's come up so much. And I'd really like to offer a couple of thoughts, and then, Edmund, I want you to jump in here, too. This is so fundamental to our firm. Look, on this whole topic of kind of the impact of AI, is it productivity? Is it -- what is it going to be? And how is it going to play out?

First, we want to be clear on our position here. We're incredibly excited about the possibilities of AI to reinforce, and we mean reinforce our strategy. It's not our strategy, reinforce our strategy, accelerate it and strengthen it. And we mean over the next 5 years, and we mean equally important over the long term. And we also want to be clear, the capability, we've been doing this for multiple years now. It's already being seen. You saw it in the quarter. And it's going to be seen more over time. And we're going to deliver for clients now and increase long-term value for Aon.

And again, our view has developed over time. I mean, we restructured our firm over many years to address this Risk Capital, Human Capital, ABS, how we deliver from an integrated client standpoint. And we also were clear on, look, this comes from our -- how do we do this? How can we pull it off? People can talk about it. We can pull it off because of the data, the raw quantity, the quality, how we've ingested it, how we changed that over time, how we curate it. The analytics, Mike, that come with it and how we model and what we do with it. The analytics are interesting.

But when they become a suite of analyzers with the sort of service capabilities that have been introduced and refined 10 or 15x, that's when it becomes powerful. That can only happen with Risk Capital and Human Capital, which is why we're pretty excited about this. And I will come back to look, it's all driven by a few principles. One is literally what do clients need? How is it changing over time?

And these responses that we've driven are all around revenue enhancement and driving that piece first and foremost, service enhancement second, and then productivity, which is why we've said, listen, you're not going to get success here in AI without an absolutely world-class people strategy out in front driving this. And that's what we're seeing. And the analyzers from client demand have actually changed the way clients think about what their businesses -- how they evolve, their risks in their business.

What we've done on the service side as well. But if that's the client piece, the other piece to your question is really around value and what are the economics of that, the operating results of that. And frankly, greater value, as I described before, is greater margin potential. But then it also has to be continuous. So that's got to be durable. So I would just say, look, from our standpoint, we have our North Star. We're driving toward it. It's really delivering. And we see greater, greater opportunity to have an impact. To go back to Elyse's first question, one of them are in areas that are on the net new, which is data centers. Just beginning. But we're positioned unbelievably well because of all the work we've done.

So we're pretty excited about the potential here and see it developing over time and see real opportunity. We don't see this as a defend the house. We see this as a true build the house opportunity. But Edmund, I'd love you to talk a little bit about the value part of this and the durability part of this.

Yes, absolutely. And your question, Mike, is on the value part and the impact on the economics. Greg just talked about the demand of it. There's the economics, which I think have an impact today. And the third part is the durability of it, the ongoing benefit, how we will perform better. And that's the compelling part of it. We are operating and you're seeing it in our results, today. It's not just margin, though. It's in the new business growth. And I think our compensation there is tied to the outcomes, as Greg talked about earlier, as we help clients with capital, so we help them with workforce, as we help them improve their resilience. It shows up in retention. We had NPS up 10 points, something that I don't think I mentioned earlier here. And the analyzers I have mentioned are improving the RFP rates. And then it's showing up in your question, the margin improvement.

Greg gave some stats earlier on claims, certificates of insurance, invoicing, policy management, all those things are lowering our unit costs, and we had talked earlier about 5% to 15% productivity improvements. Those things are happening right now, and we're doing it in a way that still allows us to bring value to our clients. So that's number one. The economics of it are showing up top line and bottom line and in our results today. The important point is that the performance builds over the coming years, right?

Like you see multiyear tailwinds from this. Our work in data center is a great example of that. Our work on workforce solutions is a great example of that as well. So our insights and our capabilities are going to help us expand this market. Our content and the investments are going to help us gain share in this expanding market. And as we continue to lead in the investment and get these productivity improvements, we will reinvest, which creates this virtuous circle loop, which at the end of the day, just means that more durable business, a more scalable business and a more valuable business, more valuable business over the long term as we bring this value to clients.

And we'll go next to Bob Huang with Morgan Stanley.

So my question is really also related to the Middle East, but not really Middle East. As we think about the Middle East conflict, the elevated energy price should have a fairly notable impact on GDP in Asia. I understand the Middle East contribution to you is probably small, but the Asia contribution probably is not.

As we think about Asia growth slowdown due to energy prices, can you maybe help us understand the impact on organic growth guidance throughout the year, think about the inflation impact and things of that nature?

I'll start overall, Bob. We want to come back and, again, governing thought, reaffirm exactly where we are on mid-single digit or greater from a growth standpoint. We're looking now across the world, see all that you're looking at as best we can. And our view has been single digit or greater. So start with that overall governing thought.

And then I just want to highlight a point that Edmund alluded to earlier around ambiguity and uncertainty. Pieces that create challenges in one area create opportunities in other areas. We've seen it countlessly. I mean, I think about even now in the Middle East, which, again, as Edmund described, is not a big part of our business, has done unbelievably well, helping clients understand the situation and really protect themselves as they also think about growth.

APAC, Asia, tremendously important for us, still, on a relative basis, not a massive part of the overall firm, but fairly important. And we get your point on the energy side, but frankly, it's going to create other opportunities. Clients trying to decide how to navigate that environment. And that's what we do. We're going to help them do that, which is why you kind of come back to the form might change. The form might change. What we do might change. It may evolve. But our ability to help clients succeed in an uncertain environment has never been greater and is continuing to strengthen, and it's why we come back to that affirmation. But what else could you add to that, Edmund?

Greg, I don't have much to add to that except like that shows up in the results, right? Our international markets are really leading the growth in many of our individual solution lines. And as that mix changes, we feel good that, that continues to be the opportunity where we can help the clients, which shows up in our results. So not much to add to that.

Okay. Really appreciate it. My last question is about the AI expense, right? So on your press release, you talked about, there's an $8 million increase in IT expense. As we think about AI expense, it's variable expenses, it's token-driven, prompt-driven on the input cost side. Going forward, like as you build out more AI capabilities, how should we think about that overall expense? Is that all essentially factored into the margin guidance? Is it -- as you have a higher and increased utilization of AI, can you just help us with that a little bit?

It's a great question. And the short answer is yes. It is factored into the margin guidance. Again, me and our COO, our Chief Operating Officer and I talk about this all the time. We are model agnostic. We're building our own models, Broker and Claims Copilots are great examples of that, but we're also working with all the big names you know in the space. And in fact, that comes back to our organizational readiness. Me, Greg and the leadership team just spent some time actually tiering our organization from who needs the basic tools that have less need for tokenization and who needs the tools that are experts. Zone 1, 2 and 3 is sort of how we frame it.

So we're super focused on who's going to be using it. Again, our focus is top line growth and productivity. So we want to equip the organization on both of those areas to build the things that help us with top line growth and get the productivity while being conscious of the cost.

When I come to the cost, clearly, we have it baked into the $1.3 billion investment that we did as part of the 3x3 Plan. And you've astutely and rightfully called out the tech development part of our income statement, where I would say probably half of what you saw, nearly $600 million in 2025, is connected to AI as well. Obviously, there's a tech infrastructure part of that, but a significant component is the tech dev completely focused on AI.

But again, it's our commitment to those investments that highlight our leadership in the space. We factor that in, those costs and the reinvestment of productivity improvements from that in our overall guidance here.

And maybe one observation I'll just add to that, Bob. As you think about the mechanics of literally how we thought about the investment, the cost, as Edmund described it, maybe Simon, our COO and how they discussed it, and it is really an intricate discussion. These are all critically important. So understand sort of how we look at that. But the real breakthrough here is not just cost efficiency, right? The real breakthrough is delivering client value. Literally, it's the revenue part of this and the service part of this. So it's more revenue, better retention of that revenue, all these things factor in. And this is where we want to absolutely -- this is where we've got to get yield to get return, not just efficiency.

So again, back to some of the earlier questions on the call around sort of the zero-sum game that everything boils down and gets smaller and smaller. For us, it's bigger and bigger with opportunities. That is a revenue conversation. That's a productivity conversation that's beyond efficiency. And this is where we have seen some breakthroughs. This is really what's led to a lot of our work to accelerate not just taking cost out. We've done that before and continue to do that. But we're truly helping clients do things they couldn't have done before.

And we'll go next to Cave Montazeri with Deutsche Bank.

So you started investing in ABS over 10 years ago. And I think until recently from the outside, really felt like it was primarily a margin expansion story. But now, and you've mentioned that several times on the call today, it really looks like we're seeing the tangible impact on organic as well, and we can really see the flywheel effect that you guys are talking about.

Now others have noticed and everyone now wants to be a bit more like you guys, can build their own version of ABS. How important is it for you to have that first-mover advantage? Because as more of your peers implement their own version of ABS, will those efficiencies and better analytical tools become commoditized? Or is there like a real moat to being early and that others will always be playing catch-up because you keep on investing and getting better at ABS?

Listen, I really appreciate the question, and it is the question of the day in terms of sort of when you think about some of the evolution, I would really start and emphasize, again, this starts with client need, how it's evolving over time and how we respond to it. We're responding to client need. That's the strategy. Again, AI is not a strategy. Serving clients in a more effective way as their risk increase, that's the strategy.

And if you think about what's required to do that, this is where we come back to -- we have been -- it's taken a long time. It's hard to pull this together. And it isn't just the analytics and the data. By the way, that's critical. You don't have the raw quantity and then turn it into quality in a way you can ingest it, curate it, you don't have anything. So that's taken a long time. By the way, ABS was doing cost and that for us, so important. We had great Reinsurance data. We had great Commercial Risk data, great Health data. But they weren't connected. Now we've got them connected in a way that we've not ever seen before.

The analytics of that result in these capabilities. But also to be clear, this isn't about analytics. At one level, it's about organization. It's about alignment, Risk Capital and Human Capital. We broke our firm down organizationally and rebuilt it to connect the dots around Risk Capital. This is Reinsurance and Commercial Risk. So imagine Reinsurance contend and insight ingested into a Commercial Risk decision process. This is a massive, massive change in terms of sort of insight for clients. So for us, the organizational change, absolutely important. The analytics and ABS, absolutely important.

And then the way we go to market. Edmund described it before around Enterprise Client and a connected global firm, that sounds trivial, but it's powerful. Clients should not be negotiating or trying to understand Aon. We should understand them and bring the integrated firm. If we bring the integrated firm, Aon client leadership with capabilities that never existed before, Aon Business Services, driven by a set of analytics not seen before. That's what for us is the wow. And if we can do that, that's a revenue-driven engine. And we're just going to keep investing in that engine and driving that engine.

And the outcome, and don't miss this part that Edmund described. This is about not just in the next 5 years' performance. This is as you think about our terminal value, if you want to look at it that way, this is a bigger market. Data centers are a bigger market. Solving cyber is a bigger market. And then the way to serve that market requires real expertise, new expertise, which means if you've got it, you're going to win more share. And if you win more share, you're going to create more value. And value means you have the opportunity to deliver for clients and for shareholders on margin. You can do both. So that's our mission. That's our view. And we feel fortunate we made progress.

But to be clear, we got to hammer down. We see the opportunity here for the clients, and we're going to keep driving it.

And then my follow-up question was on the personal lines exposure that you said was less than, I think, 2% of premium. Could you kind of remind us like how that came about? Is that something that kind of you want to keep, that's core to Aon or that your clients ask for?

Just a quick overview. Just first of all, personal lines, this is complex at some level. The piece we serve, this is higher net worth individuals, sometimes tied into businesses, really trying to think about what they're up to. We're working hard to support that. So I don't want to dismiss that as not complex, but it's a very small part of what we do. It's less than 2%. Sometimes it comes with the businesses overall. So put it in context, I understand it's not priority, but it's also important. Yes, Edmund, go ahead.

Yes. And the way that we've sort of -- the majority of our personal lines business has come as part of the acquisitions that we've been doing over the past decade, right? We've done over 150 acquisitions. And you actually see us continue to have active portfolio management where we look to focus on our core, the higher-growth core businesses.

You've actually seen us have cash from dispositions. It was over $730 million in 2024. That comes from the disposition of the personal lines business as we continue to go through our portfolio hygiene here. So that's why it's at that percentage, and I would say, continuing to shrink as we move forward here because we're super focused on our core Risk Capital and Human Capital business.

And thank you. I would now like to turn the call back over to Greg Case for closing remarks.

I just wanted to say thank you to everyone for joining the call. We appreciate it, and look forward to the next quarter.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your participation. This does conclude today's teleconference. You may disconnect your lines, and have a wonderful day.

Good morning, and thank you for holding. Welcome to Aon plc's Fourth Quarter 2025 Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] I'd also like to remind all parties that this call is being recorded. If anyone has an objection, you may disconnect your line at this time.

It is important to note that some of the comments in today's call may constitute certain statements that are forward-looking in nature as defined by the Private Securities Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from historical results of those anticipated. For information concerning these risk factors, please refer to our earnings release for this quarter and to our most recent quarterly or annual SEC filings, all of which are available on our website.

Now it's my pleasure to turn the call over to Greg Case, President and CEO of Aon plc.

Good morning, and welcome to our fourth quarter and full year earnings call. I'm joined by Edmund Reese, our CFO, and the financial presentation, which Edmond will reference in his remarks, is posted on our website. 2025 was a year of great strategic progress and performance milestones for Aon.

Among the highlights, we advanced the disciplined execution of our 3x3 plan, which continues to accelerate our Aon United strategy by further integrating risk capital and human capital, expanding Aon client leadership and leveraging Aon Business Services to drive greater capability, innovation and efficiency. This work is enhancing our relevance and delivery capability to meet rising client demand amid increasing complexity. We outlined this momentum at our first Investor Day in 2 decades where we demonstrated the strength of Aon United and the central role of the 3x3 plan, including the power of ABS.

We believe our performance this year is proof that our strategy is working, producing tangible sustainable results today and positioning us for long-term success. We continue to innovate. ABS provides the foundation to deliver innovative solutions and deploy AI where it drives real value across our business. We expanded our risk analyzers, launched Aon Broker Copilot and more recently launched Claims Copilot. In addition, we help clients access alternative forms of capital through cat bonds, which may include parametric triggers, where market issuance rose more than 40% in 2025 and Aon's issuance increased more than 50%. And we continue to innovate in population health by helping employers manage health care costs through GLP-1 strategies.

We also launched our data center life cycle Insurance Protection Program, DCLP, which provides coverage for data centers from construction through operational readiness under a single integrated facility. This solution continues to gain traction, and we recently announced a $1 billion expansion, increasing total capacity to $2.5 billion. We substantially advanced our middle market strategy, including great progress in building upon our independent and connected strategy with NFP. The business is performing well with strong producer retention as we build upon NFP's strong client relationships with the full breadth of Aon's capabilities.

We're also accelerating the connection of NFP onto our ABS platform, which we believe will further enhance performance over time, highlighting our even greater conviction in the power of ABS to onboard middle market companies. And we continued our very effective tuck-in M&A strategy, further accessing a large $31 billion North American addressable market.

As we close 2025, we entered the final year of our 3x3 plan with strong momentum, fueled by our client-centric strategy and integrated capabilities that enable us to win more opportunities, deepen client relationships and deliver more value in an increasingly complex macro environment. Turning to our results.

We finished the year strong with continued momentum in the fourth quarter and delivered on our full year objectives, including 6% organic revenue growth for the second straight year, 90 basis points of adjusted operating margin expansion, strong adjusted EPS growth and double-digit free cash flow growth. These results demonstrate the consistency and durability of our business model and the impact of our Aon United strategy. They also reflect investments in revenue-generating talent and the impact of our solutions.

To set the context for our results, I will highlight 4 representative examples that are driving results and fueling momentum into 2026. First, a client story, which shows how our teams are trusted strategic advisers to clients and how we bring the best of Aon to the market. After partnering with a large international construction client for several years, the company needed a dedicated broker to support the full life cycle of a new data center project. We combined our role as a trusted adviser with a united global team, bringing together account leadership with construction, data center, energy and cyber specialists to deliver an integrated proposal.

Our winning response showed the full capabilities of AON, including DCLP, advanced climate analytics and proprietary risk analyzers, all aligned to the client's long-term growth strategy. We demonstrated distinctive ability to support both construction and operations, leveraging data and insights to improve capital efficiency and resilience. The client credited our team's expertise and our global connectivity and capabilities as central to the win, reinforcing our strength in leveraging trusted relationships and leading analytics to create high-quality growth opportunities.

Second, we continue to innovate and lead in the data center opportunity. In addition to our DCLP capacity increase and the client story I just referenced, our reinsurance team recently designed and placed the first ever data center-specific treaty, delivering a solution that aligns up to $5 billion of capital to the insurance value chain behind a single leading insurer, and we're actively engaged with several others to help them expand and strengthen their capabilities to provide capacity for clients.

Our advisory capabilities around site selection, design and engineering as well as tremendous data and advanced analytics are critical to informing effective capital protection decisions in the face of extreme weather, supply chain and cyber risk. And while we're still in the very early days of this generational opportunity with data centers, we have some exciting wins under our belt, and our leadership in this space is another factor that supports sustainable organic revenue growth. It's also another impressive example of Aon innovating to solve client problems.

Third, talent continues to be a critical driver of our success and ability to achieve sustainable growth. Our client-centric strategy remains focused on attracting, developing and retaining top performers who see the value they can bring to clients and grow their business with our best-in-class analytics and capabilities. We continue to hire in high-growth priority areas and revenue-generating talent increased a net 6% this past year. We're also expanding with existing clients through Aon client leadership and seeing higher new business and better retention with ACL covered clients.

Finally, our capital position, which Edmund will detail further, puts us in a position of strength and flexibility. This year, we continue to generate strong free cash flow and further strengthened our capital position through disciplined portfolio management, including the sale of NFP Wealth. Our enhanced capital position will remain focused and balanced on investments in high-growth opportunities and capital return to maximize shareholder value.

In summary, as we head into 2026, the final year of our 3x 3 plan, we're well positioned to continue our strong execution. The 4 megatrends we've highlighted, trade, technology, weather and workforce are as relevant as ever. We're building momentum with clients as our globally connected team is equipped to deliver data-driven insights and better outcomes for our clients. At the same time, we're committed to delivering strong performance, including sustainable organic revenue growth, supported by our investments in ABS and talent. It's inspiring to see all that our colleagues have accomplished on behalf of our clients to achieve greater resilience and growth over the last year.

Our conviction and level of excitement as we execute our strategic vision has never been greater. Aon United is more than just delivering on our objectives in any given year. It's about delivering for our clients, colleagues and shareholders over the long term. And in an increasingly complex world, AON is better positioned than ever strategically, operationally and financially to achieve this mission. Finally, to our over 60,000 colleagues around the world, thank you. Thank you for your relentless commitment to our clients, each other and our Aon United strategy. Now let me turn the call over to Edmund for his comments and insight. Edmund?

Thank you, Greg, and good morning, everyone. I am energized to be here discussing Q4 2025, a quarter that delivered results within our guidance expectations and capped off strong full year performance that continues to reflect our disciplined execution of the 3x3 plan, the power of our financial model and the momentum we have built across the firm even in this macro environment. Throughout the year, we've been focused on communicating our strategy and the consistency of our delivery. Our team is executing, and it is reflected in our results.

Before diving into the quarter's results and our outlook for 2026, I want to take a moment, consistent with how we frame this section each year. to underscore the core growth drivers that are underpinning our momentum. These drivers reflect the intentional choices we've made over the first 2 years of the 3 x 3 plan and are not only delivering in the current period, but also fortifying our ability to sustain performance through 2026 and beyond.

First, with 2 consecutive years of 6% organic revenue growth, we have more conviction than ever in our ability to deliver sustainable top line growth. This conviction is grounded in the strength of our 3x3 plan now in its maturity phase and in the deliberate investments we've made to support long-term growth. We continue to add revenue-generating talent, strengthen Aon client leadership and accelerate our presence in the middle market where demand signals remain robust and clients continue to benefit from our broad capabilities. These investments are contributing to top line growth today, and they have a cumulative and compounding impact that benefits the years ahead.

Second, we achieved critical milestones by integrating NFP and delivering double-digit free cash flow growth in 2025. These results are the product of disciplined prioritization and execution. And third, our strong operating cash generation, coupled with our disciplined portfolio management, including the sale of the NFP Wealth business, brings our total capital available in 2026 to $7 billion. This means that in addition to our organic revenue growth, we are in an even stronger position from which to execute our balanced capital allocation model, including the pursuit of high-return inorganic investments that amplify our organic growth momentum.

Overall, our performance this quarter and for the year demonstrates the power of our disciplined execution and the strength of the strategic choices we've made to drive the durable growth reflected in our results. With that context, let's turn to the detailed results. Our full year performance is right in line with our guidance for mid-single-digit or greater organic revenue growth, adjusted operating margin expansion, strong earnings and double-digit free cash flow growth.

Organic revenue growth was 6% and total revenue increased 9% year-over-year to $17 billion. Adjusted operating margin expanded by 90 basis points over last year and reached 32.4%. Adjusted EPS was $17.07, up 9% year-over-year. And finally, free cash flow increased 14% over 2024. For the fourth quarter, organic revenue growth was 5% and total revenue impacted by the wealth and Straws dispositions increased 4% year-over-year to $4.3 billion. Adjusted operating margin expanded by 220 basis points over last year and reached 35.5%. Adjusted EPS was up 10% to $4.85. And finally, free cash flow increased 16%.

Let's get into the details of these results, starting with organic revenue growth on Slide 6. Organic revenue growth was 5% in the quarter with both Commercial Risk and Reinsurance delivering 6% or better growth on the back of new business and continued strong retention. This performance reflects the importance of hiring in priority growth areas and the strength of our analytical and advisory capabilities, which are helping clients capitalize on favorable pricing conditions. In Commercial Risk, 6% growth reflected continued strength in our core P&C business globally, including strong growth in the U.S., EMEA and Latin America.

Additionally, construction delivered another quarter of double-digit growth driven by ongoing demand for large global infrastructure projects, including data center construction for major technology clients. I'll also note that while the lift from M&A services was modest, we remain well positioned in this space and expect M&A activities to support our mid-single-digit or greater growth as we enter 2026. Reinsurance delivered 8% growth, driven by double-digit growth in both insurance-linked securities and our strategy and technology group as well as continued strength in facultative placements.

Insurance-linked securities benefited from record cat bond issuances, which reached $59 billion outstanding as investors increasingly see uncorrelated asset classes. STG also saw elevated demand for our analytics, which help clients access alternative forms of capital. Looking ahead, our data indicates softer Jan 1 property renewals with rate declines of 15% to 20%. Even with this market headwind, we continue to expect full year 2026 organic revenue growth in line with our mid-single-digit or greater objective, supported by higher limits, ongoing strength in international facultative placements, record activity in insurance-linked securities and growing demand for STG analytics.

We are uniquely positioned at the intersection of insurance and capital markets, helping clients access alternative capital at scale. This positioning becomes even more valuable in a softer rate environment where innovation matters as much as price. Health Solutions grew 2% this quarter, and this growth reflects mid-single-digit growth in our core health and benefits offerings across the U.S. and EMEA, partially offset by delayed closed sales moving into Q1 '26 and slower discretionary spend in talent solutions. While consulting services in areas like talent may experience short-term deferrals, these needs are structural and demand typically rebalance as conditions normalize.

We continue to expect health to remain an area of strength and well within our mid-single-digit or greater objective. Wealth generated 2% growth, in line with the 1% to 2% we guided to last quarter. Performance for the quarter and the full year was led by strong advisory demand in the U.K. and EMEA related to ongoing regulatory change. Importantly, for the full year, all for of our solution lines were in line with our mid-single-digit or greater objective. Growth was broad-based with commercial risk and reinsurance at 6% and each of our human capital solutions delivering 5%.

Let me walk through the components of our Q4 organic revenue growth on Slide 7. We extended our consistent track record of strong new business generation in Q4. New business contributed 9 points to organic revenue growth, supported by steady new client acquisition and expanded mandates with existing clients. Our investment in revenue-generating talent particularly in high-growth sectors like construction and energy has supported the 10-point new business contribution to organic revenue growth for the year.

In 2025, despite intense competitive pressure for talent, revenue-generating hires were up 6%, firmly within our 4% to 8% objective. The 2024 and 2025 cohorts for tracking to similar seasoning curves for both incremental revenue and timing and together contributed approximately 50 basis points to 2025 organic revenue growth. We expect continued momentum in compounding benefit from the seasoning of the 2024 and 2025 cohorts. We plan to continue investing in growth and to expand this population by an additional 4% to 8% in 2026. And again, this is because we see specific opportunities in high-growth priority areas.

Q4 '25 retention remains strong at the mid-90s rate, supported by continued improvement in commercial risk and reinsurance. Increased engagement through our enterprise client group and enhanced service delivery from our ABS capabilities are playing a meaningful role in sustaining and strengthening client relationships. Net new business contributed 3 points to organic revenue growth in the quarter.

Net market impact, which captures the impact of rate and exposure contributed 1 point to organic revenue growth, consistent with each quarter this year, and within our 0 to 2-point estimated range. Reinsurance was down primarily from rate declines of 101 renewals, and that impact was offset by limit and coverage increases across cyber and commercial risk, supporting clients managing rising health care costs and health as well as rate benefits in wealth. And one final point on revenue. Fourth quarter fiduciary investment income was $63 million, down 17% versus the prior year as higher average balances were more than offset by lower interest rates.

Our full year 2025 results underscore why we have high conviction in our durable mid-single-digit or greater organic revenue growth model. we are executing on each component of the model. First, delivering 9 to 11 points of growth from new business. We delivered 10 points with significant contribution from our investment hires and NFP revenue synergies. Second, maintaining a mid-90s high retention rate, we improved 50 basis points over last year. Finally, achieving a 0 to 2-point net market contribution in this macro environment. We consistently delivered 1 point in each quarter this year.

Turning now to margins on Slide 8. Q4 adjusted operating income increased 11% to $1.5 billion and adjusted operating margin expanded 220 basis points to 35.5%. For the full year, adjusted operating margin was 32.4%, and we delivered 90 basis points of margin expansion. We continue to expand margins primarily due ABS-enabled scale improvements ongoing disciplined expense management, including the NFP OpEx synergies and the benefits from the restructuring initiative to accelerate our 3x3 plan.

We ended the year with $160 million in restructuring savings, $10 million ahead of our plan, supported by $50 million of savings in Q4. Restructuring savings contributed approximately 115 basis points to adjusted operating margin in Q4 and approximately 90 basis points of full year margin expansion. As we enter the final year of the accelerating Aon United AAU restructuring program, we have identified additional opportunity to accelerate the NFP integration into ABS, leveraging our global capability centers and deepening integration across our technology platforms.

We now expect to complete the AAU investment at $1.3 billion, and we are firmly on pace to deliver $450 million in total savings. We have used the AAU program to strengthen our foundation for ongoing margin expansion within our core business operations, and we have clear visibility to growth and higher profit margins driven by continued operating leverage through ABS.

Within the interest, other income and taxes on Slide 9. Interest income was $14 million in the fourth quarter and up $10 million over last year, driven by interest earned on proceeds from the sale of NFP Wealth. Interest expense came in at $191 million, $16 million lower than last year, primarily due to lower average debt balances. We expect Q1 '26 interest expense to be approximately $185 million. Other expense was $21 million compared to a $2 million benefit last year, driven by gains from balance sheet currency exposure gains from the divestment of our noncore personal lines business and our hedging program. We estimate Q1 '26 other expense to range between $20 million and $25 million. Finally, the Q4 tax rate was 20%, bringing the full year tax rate to 19.5%, 60 bps better than last year and in line with our estimate of 19.5% to 20.5%.

Turning now to free cash flow and capital allocation on Slide 10. We generated $1.3 billion of free cash flow in the fourth quarter, bringing our full year free cash flow to billion, an increase of 14% compared to 2024. As we expected, our double-digit free cash flow was driven by strong adjusted operating income including contributions from NFP as integration costs wound down.

Turning to capital on the right-hand side of the page, our strong free cash flow growth enabled us to continue to execute our capital allocation model. We paid down $1.9 billion of debt in 2025 and coupled with strong earnings growth lowered our leverage ratio to 2.9x. Both the level and the timing are consistent with the 2.8x to 3x Q4 2025 objective established when we announced the NFP acquisition, again, reflecting our disciplined execution. Additionally, we remained active in M&A.

Continuing our programmatic tuck-in acquisitions across high-growth priority areas, including middle market acquisitions through NFP, which required $42 million of EBITDA for the full year, in line with our expectations. And finally, in 2025, we returned $1.6 billion in capital to shareholders, including $1 billion in share repurchases. The strength of our results in 2025 and demonstrate commitment to our balanced capital allocation model, prioritizing our leverage objective, consistently growing the dividend and executing our disciplined approach to high-return M&A and capital return.

I will conclude my prepared remarks on Slide 11 with our 2026 guidance and some forward-looking perspective on our growth objectives. As we enter the final year of our 3x3 plan, the drivers of growth are stable, and we are executing on both our strategy and the financial model with precision. We carry substantial momentum in the 2026. And in summary, our full year '26 guidance includes mid-single-digit or greater organic revenue growth 70 to 80 basis points of adjusted operating margin expansion, strong adjusted EPS growth and double-digit free cash flow growth.

And let me walk through the key drivers of each guidance points starting first with organic revenue growth. We expect mid-single-digit or greater organic revenue growth, fueled by recurring new business wins with both existing and new clients, the compounding contribution from revenue-generating hires and priority areas and within the Enterprise Client Group in accretive growth in the middle market, including revenue synergies from MFP. We also expect continued mid-90s retention and 0 to 2 points from the net market impact which assumes we continue to offset rate pressure in property and treaty.

On adjusted operating margin, we expect 70 to 80 basis points of expansion driven by 3 key components: First, the impact of lower interest rates on investment income from fiduciary balances is expected to dilute margins by 20 basis points. Second, we expect $180 million in restructuring savings over '26 and '27, including additional savings from accelerating the NFP integration. From 2026, $100 million of savings will contribute approximately 50 basis points of margin expansion. Third and most important, we expect 40 to 50 basis points on margin expansion from the operating leverage in the scalable ABS platform.

Our ABS growth engine continues to deliver scale benefits, capacity for growth investments and margin expansion that drives earnings growth. Our expectations for mid-single-digit or greater organic revenue growth and 70 to 80 basis points of adjusted operating margin expansion, support a strong adjusted EPS growth outlook for 2026. I Embedded in this earnings guidance is a 2-point EPS tailwind from FX based on today's FX rates remaining stable, a 2-point headwind from the sale of the NFP wealth business, an expected tax rate of 19.5% to 20.5%, excluding any extraordinary discrete items and a noncash pension expense of $80 million.

Our financial model is built on sustainable top line growth, consistent strong earnings and reliably converting those earnings in the double-digit free cash flow growth. In 2026, we expect $4.3 billion of free cash flow generation from operating income and working capital improvements. The tax impact from the over $2 billion in proceeds generated from the NFP well sale will be reflected in operating cash flows and will reduce free cash flow by approximately $300 million prior to any benefit from the usage of those proceeds. Of course, with over $2 billion in proceeds we have significantly strengthened our capital position with approximately $7 billion of available capital and substantial strategic flexibility.

In 2026, we will remain committed to disciplined capital allocation, balancing investment for growth with capital return to shareholders. We plan to return at least $1 billion in share repurchases while continuing to evaluate our inorganic pipeline for high-margin, high-growth areas across risk capital and human capital. In closing, our performance in 2025 demonstrates the resilience of the firm and the precision with which we are managing the business, executing the 3x3 plan delivering on our financial model in allocating capital with a sharp focus on returns.

Our disciplined execution is evident in our organic revenue growth, margin expansion and enhanced earnings power. This consistency gives us confidence that what you're seeing today is not episodic. It is the result of our strategy and financial model producing durable outcomes and gives us even greater conviction in our ability to continue creating long-term value for shareholders.

So with that, let's open up the line for questions. Kevin, back to you.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question is coming from Bob Wang from Morgan Stanley.

Congratulations on the quarter. Maybe if I can just ask a question to follow up on talent and retention in today's environment. Obviously, net hire has been a strength to your growth. But can you maybe give us a little bit more color in terms of what competition for Cal looks like today. Obviously, there are some brokers that are extremely aggressive out there, does that significantly impact you in terms of talent retention and hires especially in key growth areas like data centers, energy infrastructure, things of that nature. Just curious about attrition and retention and things of that nature.

Thanks for that question. I appreciate it. And I'll throw a couple of thoughts and Edmund jump on in here. First of all, for us, talent is fundamental. You know this, Bob, we've talked about this pretty much on every call. And what you see us doing is continue to invest not just in additional talent in priority areas. We've talked about construction and energy and health and mid-market and data centers, et cetera, but helping that talent be more effective. literally, the tour to force investment around Aon Business Services is really around content capability.

So not only our existing colleagues but new colleagues who come into the firm I have an opportunity to do things with clients they've never done before. As such, Bob, we are uniquely positioned to bring talent into the firm. That's why in the current environment, as Edmund described, we're well up on a net basis. from a talent standpoint. And we're going to continue to make investments to support our mission and our efforts here and look forward to it. And the reaction we're getting as colleagues come in is incredibly positive. But it's met and exceeded by the reaction of our existing colleagues who see the opportunity that we bring to their to their backdoor on be out clients that really no 1 else can bring.

So for us, it's always been competitive out there will continue to be, and we're going to enter the freight with a lot of confidence and excited on behalf of our colleagues and clients. But Edmund, what else would you add to that?

I'll just emphasize the 1 point that you have and then talk a little bit about the contribution on that point. I mean, clearly, it's an aggressive and competitive intense environment right now. And as you just said, Greg, our talent, the attractiveness of it. We're not immune to that. But the point you made about being up 6% net in revenue-generating hires for the year means that not only were we in line with our objectives, but we're on our front foot, and this continues to your point, to be a high area of focus for us right now.

I mentioned in the prepared remarks that the '24 and the '25 cohorts, 5 are contributing to strong growth contribution, and that means that the 24 cohort was right in line with what we guided to earlier. We said 30 to 35 basis points for the full year. They're tracking in line with that and so is the 25%. And that's showing up to your question in the priority areas, I mentioned double-digit growth in construction, strong growth in energy and in our core Health and Benefits business, also showing up a new business where we finished the year with 10 points of contribution from new business. Those things are being impacted by our hiring in those priority areas.

So we expect, again, to Greg's point, we have the capacity through ABS to continue making this investment. Our objective, again, going into '26 is another 4% to 8%. We're going to stay focused on creating this capacity, building the capabilities that Greg just mentioned to attract them and retain them. That's part of our strategy for growth moving forward.

Got it. I really appreciate that. It sounds like the talent is strong, benches in core areas. Maybe the other question is really on acquisition and inorganic growth. You're obviously very optimistic in the middle market environment. Just given the broader market volatility, pricing deceleration, do you foresee more attractive valuation for M&A? Or do you -- in other words, do you see more opportunities for organic growth? Or is it something that just given the current environment, how do you think about -- is there a way to think about it, are you stepping on the gas, so to speak? Or is it something more of its time to dial back a little bit on that side?

Well, let's first, just -- because this is an important question, and we should just take our time and make sure that we understand this just talk about the capital allocation first and maybe Greg and I both can make a comment on your question about valuations. But I think the first part is capital allocation. I just first need to reiterate that we are just really pleased First, with the free cash flow generation in '25 and then the execution of our capital allocation model over '25, paying down $2 billion of debt and meeting the leverage objective paying a dividend that was 10% higher, over $40 million to the question that you're asking of middle market acquired EBITDA, primarily through NFP and $1 billion in capital return versus share repurchases, that means we continue our track record of disciplined execution on this capital allocation model.

As we go into this new environment into 2026, we're focused on continuing that. The strong free cash flow generation and we're in a position of strength with $7 billion in available capital. So what does it look like? How do we allocate that? First, I think now that we've met the leverage objective focused on paying that again, increasing dividend. But M&A is going to be a key part of the capital allocation model.

As I said in the prepared remarks, it complements the organic revenue growth, and we've been a great acquirer. It is important to highlight the point we made at Investor Day that our acquisitions over the last decade have generated 12% of revenue growth after we've owned them for a year that the portfolio IRR of acquisitions over the last decade have been above 20%. And we continue to lead the industry in ROIC. So we evaluate opportunities for that strategic fit for that type of financial profile.

When we look at the environment, getting to your point now, getting to your question, the portfolio of pipeline opportunities to unlock growth. We've got a robust pipeline. But again, we're going to be focused on the high-margin, high-growth areas across both risk capital and human capital. We're going to continue to scale in middle market to NFP, particularly in North America commercial risk. And there are some geographic areas of priority for us where we think there's specific opportunities. So that will be a part of it. I think the market is attractive. We have a strong pipeline. But again, they have to meet the criteria financially and strategically.

And finally, I'll just say the share repurchases will continue to be a part of the balanced capital allocation model as well. We hit the commitment that we made for 2025 sitting here in January, we feel very comfortable about at least $1 billion in share repurchase says and any changes of that will be dependent on the pipeline opportunities, meeting the criteria that I just talked about. So we won't let any excess cash on the balance sheet. And all this, I would just say, is the continuation of our capital allocation model. That's about balancing investment for growth in capital return to shareholders. That's a discipline that we've had that I think benefit shareholders and allowed us to maintain industry-leading ROIC.

On valuations, I'll make my final point. I think there's always a lag. Sellers anchor and trailing EBITDA and prior transaction comps, so you don't necessarily see sort of lower valuations in this market right now. I think debt costs drives the lag here. The quality assets, the type of assets that we're looking at remain resilient. They're high growth, high-margin assets. So I think you see strong valuations there. The bid-ask spreads are changing in these markets.

But look, we will continue to have our criteria for assessment and evaluation and we'll make decisions for high return things that allow us to continue to leading ROIC. That's more of a comprehensive answer than you asked. So I think this is an important topic, and I wanted to hit on all of that.

Our next question today is coming from Elyse Greenspan from Wells Fargo.

I guess my first question, I'm going to follow up on Bob's question on capital, right? So Edwin, you outlined -- or you said you have $7 billion of total capital available in 26 the buyback was set at $1 billion. So I guess from a timing perspective, do you guys have line of sight on a deal or potentially deals for the first half of the year that will consume a lot of that $7 billion. And is that why you only expect to buy back the $1 billion?

Elyse, first, it's important to add 2 words before $1 billion, at least $1 billion. We want to have the strategic flexibility given the pipeline right now, there's not a specific deal or asset that we're looking at. We, as I just said, have a robust pipeline of opportunities in some of the spaces that we talked about. They have to meet the strategic criteria, they have to meet the financial criteria and we want to make that decision. We think that we've been very good at balancing the investments for inorganic growth and capital return. In fact, we put up a slide during Investor Day that showed roughly a 55-45 balance.

And ultimately, and over time, we expect to have a balance like that. So we want to make sure that we have the strategic flexibility to make the right decisions on behalf of the investors here. But Greg, let me let you comment on that.

Listen, I mean, I think you've covered it well, but at least, listen, answer to the prior question was really a layout of how we think about capital allocation. It's exactly consistent with what we've done historically. And the ethic around that is high. We went through all the different aspects. I would add on to that. we are so dedicated to actually generating capital that gets the maximum possible return to shareholders. We also executed a very the divestitures. NFD Wealth really required our NFP teams to come together.

Our Aon teams to come together. And in the context of bringing NFP into the hold, we actually executed a divestiture to generate additional capital so we prioritize what I'm trying to do here for you at least is highlight this is how strongly we feel about the principles that Edmond laid out. So we're essentially applying those in the current environment. The environment is moving around. It will be what it will be. but watch us do what we do. And that's another proof point on how focused we are on the highest possible return on capital allocation we can get.

And then my follow-up is on the data center opportunity. I appreciate some of the comments in the prepared remarks, but I guess I was hoping just give us a little bit more color how much of a contributor were data centers to organic in the Q4? And how would you expect, I guess, the tailwind from that opportunity to benefit your organic growth in 2026?

Well, first of all, Elyse, the data center opportunity, let me just offer a couple of thoughts, and Evan can really just talk about the mechanics of how we're thinking about it for '26 and '27. But remember, the data center opportunity, it is unique. It has never been seen before. It is monumental. It also requires a level of response and complexity that's beyond what the traditional industry has ever accomplished, just be clear about that. This requires real new net new innovation around alternative forms of capital, how we think about risk, how we pool risk all those pieces.

All I'm trying to highlight is -- and while I think we probably do 1/3 or more of the data centers that are out there now, we're incredibly well positioned, and we're having the dialogues no one else is having, but we're at the beginning of this process. So if you think about it, there are lots of data centers out there, thousands of them. But as we think about the build that's going on now, last week at Davos, this was one of the primary discussion points and it was really this in AI and how they fit together, this race is just beginning.

The opportunity is just beginning. So I would characterize it, Ed I want to get your input here as well. This is another proof point on both our ability to innovate and drive net new insight into the market. And second, it just reinforces mid-single-digit or greater organic revenue growth. That's really all we're trying to do. And so that's what I would factor in. It's another weight on the scale if you think about sort of what's going to drive that over time. And we'll see how it plays. But it's a unique opportunity, and we're very well positioned it. But Edmund what else would you add?

Great. You hit that so thoroughly. The only thing that I'll add is just backing it up to our commercial risk business, where we see this contribution showing up. We've now had for the year in commercial risk and 6% or better for the last 3 quarters, again, very much in line with what we've been talking about, and I highlighted earlier global strength in core P&C, the contribution from net new business retention, but the priority growth areas, construction, which is where we see our data center contributions show up being at a double-digit growth and contributing to that.

I think in addition to the innovation that you just mentioned on the data center, we also sort of have the tailwind some potential pickup in M&A to support that growth in commercial risk as well. So to your point, Greg, we just feel very much confident in the mid-single digit or greater growth for commercial risk that will be supported by us leading in this data center space.

Next question today is coming from Matthew Heimermann from Citigroup.

I wanted to follow up on your comment to that last question, Greg. And one of the things I'm trying to understand is, given there's a totally different set of constituents really driving a lot of this investment, I'm curious whether or not we should think about market share in this new opportunity correlating all the historical market share in historical data center builds.

Matthew, you love the question. Apologies. You're reflecting the overall integrated challenge here. And this is why, in some respects, it's so profound, but almost amusing on sort of how the different constituents now approach the market. Past is not prologue. This is net new innovation. By the way, the constituents here are the hyperscalers, they're the builders. They're the asset gatherers who want to create investment into this category. They're the banks who rice think they're doing primary credit sort of in the middle of all this.

There's an entire consistency that lays out here. And the response is, as we talk about mid-single digit or greater and Elyse's question is really around -- it isn't just commercial risk, it's reinsurance. It's why for us, Matthew, risk capital matters so much. As we described, this is -- we didn't show up and say, well, we need to cord so we can actually meet client demand here. We didn't just coordinate we changed structure, risk capital. It's connecting reinsurance into the commercial risk environment in a way that's never been connected before.

So for us, we don't take anything for granted. Our view is we need net new innovation. And no matter where we are in our current position, lean or not, this race is just beginning. It is not in mid-game, it's not in endgame. It's profound, but it is beginning. And so for us, our obligation on behalf of clients, all categories I just described is massively more innovation. This is why we -- I must say, you go back to 2023. We doubled down on an integrated AI embedded capability and we doubled down on risk capital and human capital. We changed the organization, and we applied it through Enterprise client. We did that 2.5 years ago.

In some respects, we're preparing for what we need now in order to deliver against this marketplace. So we're feeling good about that progress. It's one of the reasons we spent $1 billion to accelerate it. So for us, we like our position. We love the demand profile. We see opportunity that's very, very unique. We see a level of investment players who have capital that no one's ever seen before with an absolute focus to drive. So for us, we think this, by the way, is an industry opportunity. So it's not any one single player. The question is, can the industry respond and make a difference and be relevant. If our industry can respond and make a difference to be relevant, this is profound for everyone. And we certainly think if we can serve a primary role in the tip of the sphere here, we're thrilled to do it on behalf of our clients.

I guess relationships matter, too. So I'm just curious with respect to the M&A practice you have given the asset owners or financing parties, how big an advantage that is, if at all?

Listen, being able to sit down with the primary players here at the top of the house and help them understand that in the end, is it just brute force investment. This is very much around an integrated risk management strategy will change the economics of how these play out over time. beyond just the build, but also the operations. When you think about business interruption measured $1 million a minute now, there's a way to think about this differently and you have to think about it differently.

So you're right, being able to actually access the pivotal is fundamental. And we are in a very privileged position to do this. It's one of the aspects of our M&A services business and with financial sponsors that puts us in a unique position. In addition to the work we do with it scalers in addition to the work we do with the asset gatherers in addition to the work we do with the constructors, the builders because matting about it, they're in a very unique position. They're being called on to do things they've never done before, and they're being asked to take on risk on behalf of the scalers that is also uncomfortable.

So how one thinks about that risk management profile and how we deliver against it. And then remember, Matthew, this only matters if our analytics could convince capital to come in and buy down the volatility. Otherwise, we don't have a transaction. So we have to get the capital to work to do this. This is why in the end, this is tour to force analytics, the analyzers and the capability. It's tour to force reinsurance, access markets, and it's tour to force commercial risk.

And then to be clear, one other piece here I just have to throw in. And this is -- man, this is front and center at Davos last week. The human capital application of this is going to be massive. And everyone was is going to talk about AI and job reduction, we don't think about it that way. We think about it as how we amplify the capability we've got and help our clients navigate the path the from 2 on as you embed this kind of capability into their firms, not just hyperscale, we're talking about the users now. The human capital opportunity here, we think, is profound as well. So I know that's maybe more than you wanted, but we're pretty optimistic about this opportunity. And for Aon, certainly, but equally for our industry.

Your next question today is coming from Charles Lederer from BM Online.

Maybe I'll move off of data centers. Can you maybe put a finer point on the incremental opportunities you identified with the upsizing of the AU savings and with I guess what's the pacing of these savings? And how much of the 50 basis points you laid out for this year.

Well, maybe Charles, I just -- we do want to start with just maybe a quick overview but literally, the discipline at which we undertaken this is really sort of at the helm of admin, and I really want to describe exactly the discipline and the approach and the progress. But remember, let me provide a quick overview. What got us here? What drove this was our initial investment and incredible progress we've actually made so far against it. And now what we're talking about doing is taking this proven progress and applying it into the middle market. So that's in exactly the same time frame that we had before.

But remember, I alluded to it in the prior discussion with Matthew, what we did in '23 has made a decision to double down on AI business services connected to the rest of the firm. By the way, embedded in AI Business Services is an AI platform. I mean, I kid you not, literally on Monday, 2 days from now, we're literally going to show up in Orlando. There will be literally 1,600 clients and markets and the property suppose and casualty symposium of Aon. The entire world is going to shut down on property casualty for the most part for 3 days. And that will be driven by a set of analyzers and content and capability that's come out of the investment that we've made. That's why we're so excited about it, the power of it.

And now we see that opportunity. This is, by the way, an AI platform at scale globally that no one else has, we've spent 2.5 years working on that. And now we're going to finish in the third year. And what Edmund highlighted was in addition to what we've done in the core business and the work we began with NFP, the success of NFP for the last now coming on first full year of 2 years, 2.5 years in this effort together has truly proven the opportunity inside the middle market. We always had high expectations. Now we see them even greater than ever before. And that's what we're talking about the additional spend on in the current time frame.

But Edmund, how else would you describe it?

I mean I think the key -- I'm just excited about our opportunity here, what we've accomplished in the opportunity, Greg. The key is that we are staying consistent with completing the AAU program this year in 2026 and the savings have moved from $350 million to $450 million. And I said back, look, we started this program in 2023 when we announced it, and we've accomplished a lot. Mindy and I have both been talking about our applications going down 25% about the applications going into the cloud, 80% of them by the end of this year here. We now, to help drive revenue, have a full suite of analyzers in EMEA and U.S., given the investment that we've made as part of AAU. And we are continuing to move our colleagues but have 1/4 of them today in our global capability centers, standardizing our operations and creating operating leverage.

So -- and we knew that building this foundation was sort of a catalyst that allowed us to continue to bring on these middle market platforms. right, you know that me and the NFP team, we went to our global capability centers over the past months in many different countries. And the NFP team saw that they could standardize their operations to your specific questions, they can integrate their technology platforms and innovate and drive product development that was applicable to the middle market. given that we're so focused on this $31 billion middle market opportunity, we think this is a significant opportunity for us in Aon.

So as opposed to doing this over multiple years, we'll accelerate this into 2026, we'll see revenue growth and synergies from it. And it's all because ABS is the scalable foundation that enables us to do this and expand margins in the near term and over the medium and long term. So we're quite excited about this.

For my follow-up, this is dovetailed to that question and also sort of Elyse's capital question. On the free cash flow guide, you laid out you're committed to the $4.3 billion. You at Investor Day. I guess if I just look at the adjusted earnings growth, you're implicitly kind of forecasting in your guide and factoring in these upside costs and the tax payment, you mentioned on the NFT Wealth sale, can you help us think about the moving pieces, how you're going to get to that $4.3 billion in '26.

And to clarify, the $4.3 billion is prior to the tax impact from NFP Wealth is driven by the same items that have allowed us to drive double-digit free cash flow over the last 10 years to drive it in 2024 as well the operating cash flows that we have and the continued working capital improvement. And right now, what we're experiencing is the completion of the AAU program that we just talked about in the last question, and the wind down of the original integration costs that we have here.

So I think about going into 2026 with an outlook for double-digit free cash flow growth in line with our history. I think that's anchored in completing the restructuring program, including the acceleration of NFP, the operating income growth, the working capital improvements offset by the tax on the NFP wealth proceeds here. So that momentum going into '26 and confident in the double-digit growth for 2026.

Our final question today is coming from David Motemaden from Evercore ISI.

I also just wanted to clarify just on the $7 billion of available capital in 2026. Do you guys expect to deploy all of that in 2026? And then relatedly, in the past, you guys have given an acquired EBITDA target. Is that something you guys can share for 2026?

On the first 2 questions there, in terms of the deployment, of course, in that is the capacity that we have maintaining our leverage objectives as well. So if there's acquisition, of course, we would use debt capacity associated with that. But outside of it, we would either return just as we do each year any excess capital through share repurchases and not allow excess cash to be sitting on the balance sheet here, just as we've done in all the other -- in the past years. As we think about the pipeline of opportunities, again, we're very pleased with the $42 million in acquired EBITDA.

After selling NFP Wealth, we said $35 million to $40 million expectations for the year coming in at 42%. We feel very pleased with that. We have a pipeline in the desire for high capital deployment in NFP, but we'll continue to balance that with the other opportunities in the pipeline as well and think about using capital for the entire pipeline as opposed to just one component of the business, given that we have strong opportunities across all of risk capital in human capital.

We reached the end of our question-and-answer session. I'd like to turn the floor back over for any further closing comments.

I think we are good. Thank you for joining us today. We're very excited for our results in 2025 and the momentum that we have going into 2026. I just want to end the call with exactly what Greg said an appreciation in the shelf to our over 60,000 colleagues around the world. We thank you for all that you're doing each day, and we look forward to going into 2026. With that, Kevin, I think we should end the call.

Certainly. That does conclude today's teleconference. Webcast. You may disconnect your line at this time, and have a wonderful day. We thank you for your participation today.

All right. Well, I think we're just about at time here. So we'll get started. Very happy to be joined up here on stage with Edmund Reese, CFO of Aon. Thanks for joining us, Edmund.

Thank you for having me, Rob. It's always good to participate in this conference.

Yes. And so Edmund, maybe we just start off with some background. You've got some unique insights coming to Aon with a fresh perspective about 1.5 years ago. Can you give us some insight into where Aon's business stands today versus when you joined? And maybe just walk us through the key strategic priorities for the firm?

Yes. Yes. Remember, you're right, it was just about 1.5 years ago. I remember, I was coming in to Aon after we just exited the 20-year period of what I'd call financial outperformance. TSR was at 16%. That was above the S&P, that was above the industry. I met with a lot of investors as I was coming in the door. And I think investors were wondering if we were -- if we had reached an inflection point, and they wanted stronger conviction, I'd say, in 3 key areas. One was, were we going to be able to continue to drive organic revenue growth at industry levels; two, were we going to be able to continue to expand margins? And I'm sure we'll get into what our history has been there, but were we going to be able to continue to expand margins given our already industry-leading 32% margins; and three, were we going to see a capital -- see a return on our capital investment, our inorganic investment that still allowed us to be at industry-leading ROIC.

So we came out and had an Investor Day 6 months after I joined. It was the first one that we had in 2 decades. And the objective there was, first, to talk about how our 3x3 Plan because you asked about our strategic priorities, how our 3x3 Plan was helping to accelerate our Aon United growth strategy primarily in 3 areas: bringing together our content and capabilities, this is the strategy part; in risk capital, in human capital; enhancing our client-centric model, so expanding across geographies, expanding across solutions through Aon client leadership and Enterprise Client Group within that; and all of that being powered by ABS. That's the strategy. Those 3 items over 3 years, '24, '25 and '26. So you ask today, where are we and after sitting here?

Now I think we're past the strategy point. And the key word, the key discussion that I have with investors is execution. And I think we have been executing. '24 was 6% organic growth, 10% earnings growth. We're now 9 months into '25 and very similar results through 9 months, 6% and 9% on those 2 metrics, but very importantly, double-digit free cash flow growth. Again, we're 13% year-to-date, and we continue to have the active portfolio management. So that means that we are in a position of strength from a capital standpoint.

So when I think about that, I think that we are inflecting up in growth, delivering results today, but have a foundation that gives us momentum as we move forward here. So position of strong financial performance, but momentum executing on our strategy today.

That's super helpful. Thanks for all that background. If we could set the stage for the market environment, I know you guys talked about these 4 megatrends over the long term, it's trade, technology, weather and workforce, and you all outlined that very well. How does the current environment in 2026 fit into that? And are there any headwinds to capitalizing on those megatrends? Or is this full steam ahead?

Yes. The short answer would be full steam ahead, but a little context on it. Our corporate clients are facing increased complexity, increased volatility from these trends that you just talked about, the 4 megatrends, but more importantly, the interconnected risk and people challenges that are connected with those trends. There's interconnectivity there. And so they look to Aon with our data analytical capabilities to be able to provide solutions to help them protect and grow their businesses. And if you think about those trends, the extreme weather events continue. As an example, our insurance-linked securities business has nearly doubled this year. That's the business that captures like catastrophe bonds, which are up 20%, nearly a $54 billion market right now. We're the leader in catastrophe bonds. We have over 135 catastrophe models in 90 countries. So weather continues to be an issue that impacts our corporate clients here.

The technology boom with the AI boom within that, obviously, I'm sure we will talk about data centers. Everyone is asking about that. Our construction business has grown at a double-digit level over the last 3 quarters that captures like that data center, but we are seeing now, and I think as we look further out, increases in cybersecurity coverage, as you think about resiliency associated with it. The health care costs. Premiums for employees and employers have gone up over 4x over the last 5 years. Employees are spending nearly $7,000 in premiums, employers $20,000 per person they've gone up. And so our global scale and insights help corporations and clients with benefits, with health coverage to help them maintain their workforce.

And then I'm sure you -- I don't have to say anything about trade and the continued uncertainty in that environment, how that disrupts global supply chains and our supply diagnostics help with them. So look, the short answer is, those things continue to be -- drive complexity. We think our analytics capabilities help clients protect and grow their businesses. This is a $4.6 trillion industry right now. It's a great time to be in it as we use our capabilities to help clients and drive our revenue growth.

Great. And maybe somewhat related, but the market impact, I know since you joined the firm, you've been talking about the 0 to 2-point net market impact on growth. How should we be thinking about that going forward? Is there any differences between the Risk Capital and the Human Capital businesses when you think about that? And does a changing outlook on that potentially drive any difference in the sort of mid-single-digit or greater organic...

So that's a really relevant question. First, just to define for some of the folks in the audience who may not be as familiar. Risk Capital and Human Capital, just to be clear, those businesses, through the first 9 months, are growing well within that mid-single-digit or greater level of growth that we've been talking about. Risk Capital is 6% through the first 9 months, Human Capital is 5%. So we feel very confident in our performance there.

Your question is about net market impact, and to define that for the audience here, that is both the impact of pricing and exposures, pricing and exposures. And you rightfully pointed out that we guided at the beginning of the year to 0 to 2 points of contribution from the net impact of pricing and exposures. In every quarter throughout this year, it's been about a 1 point contribution. It was quite strong in Q3 as well. But your question astutely points out that Risk Capital, I would say, has had less of a contribution from the net market impact. If you think about the impact of 10% to 20% declines in price in property or you think about the treaty business being down 5% to 15% because it's reinsurance and commercial risk that make up that business.

So the contribution has still been positive, but just under 1 point from that. Human Capital, and as you think further because that's what your question is about, think further out, and of course, we'll give specific guidance at a later point. But as you think about Human Capital, the contribution has been greater, nearly 2 points as you continue to see medical cost increase, we help clients with that, as you continue to see us price for the value of our retirement solutions as well. It's wealth and health that make up that Human Capital business. And on the flip side, we have a client-centric model. So the reason why I think we will still be able to perform is because we are helping clients in this environment, in this pricing environment. We think it's an opportunity for our clients to future-proof their risk program. So that means more limit as the values at risk increase. That means more lines of coverage.

I just talked about cyber as another line of coverage. And we're also innovating. We came out earlier in this year. My IR team is here. I don't know if it was Q1 or Q2 when we introduced a stop-loss surge program really to help with cyber events that might go on over longer time periods and might hit multiple things. That was innovation in our space that clients are taking advantage of in this environment. We recently launched the data center life cycle program. And again, I'm sure we'll get into that. But those things are innovation that still allow us to be able to perform despite the net market impact and the pricing environment that we're in.

So we certainly feel comfortable in '25. And we'll give guidance on '24 as we get -- on '26 as we come to our Q4 call. But for me, I always bring it back to this, you and I have talked before. Your question is about net market impact. The thing -- the drivers of our growth have been new business. I've talked about a range of 9 to 11 points. We are at 11 points of contribution from new business over the past 2 quarters and retention has continued to hold up. We estimated that, we talked about at Investor Day, a 4% to 6% impact from retention, and we've continued to have our Enterprise Client Group and ABS increased service, strengthen the relationships. So those drivers of growth are strong. That's what gives us confidence in the mid-single-digit or greater growth that you're asking about here.

That's super helpful. And if we could think about just geographically, Aon is a global business. Your brokering insurance and advising clients globally. How do you think about the different areas around the globe right now? Are there any areas that you're particularly excited about or have unique opportunities?

Yes, I suspect you won't be fulfilled by my answer here. I mean we are operating in 120 different countries. So that means we're bringing our local expertise in those countries and combining it with our global capabilities. And you think about our business, all the geographies are performing well right now. The U.S. is up over 5%. Our international businesses are well. Both EMEA and LatAm are over 7% through the first 9 months of the year. So we feel good about the business globally.

If I were to highlight some pockets for you, in the U.S., the commercial P&C business, particularly in middle market, and we continue to drive organic and inorganic growth in that space, is a focus of ours. Global benefits in EMEA like France and Germany, we see a lot of activity in that space. Construction all over the globe, but I'll call out the Middle East is a place for us. The Japan market is opening up to moving from in-house to our carriers. We're partnering with firms to help our positioning in LatAm markets as well.

So that answer sort of signifies to you that the growth today is broad-based across our countries and solutions and the opportunity is broad-based across our solutions and countries, both inorganic and organic. So we're excited to be in this large and growing industry. We're expanding geographically. And again, that's what we think helps support our mid-single-digit or greater growth guidance here.

Sticking with the topic of growth, one thing Aon has been doing is investing in talent in key revenue-generating areas. Can you talk about the hiring trends? What type of strategic impact they're having in key focus markets? And how to think about it more quantitatively going forward?

Sure. Yes. The -- we've been focused -- you said an important thing in there on priority areas. We've been focused on areas that we think there is high client demand, that we think are growing faster than GDP and that we -- places where we think we have -- are well positioned to win and right to win. And when we think about our hiring, that's where it's been. So think things like infrastructure projects and construction an area of hiring, things like energy, that's renewables, that's oil and gas or fossil fuels, but also nuclear, as you think about things like powering data centers, hiring in that space. Also in health, I just talked a moment ago about our -- the global nature of our business helps multinational companies and global companies in their health. So our hiring has been focused in those priority areas because we think they outpace GDP growth. We think they're areas of high demand.

Without a doubt, you pick up the headlines on this industry and what's been going on, the competition on hiring has been increasing. I think it's always there, but as of late, it's been increasing. I still think Aon is on its front foot though. I communicated at Investor Day, increasing our revenue-generating hires by over 4%. Through the first 9 months of this year, we've increased by over 6%. So again, I think we're faring well. It's hard work day to day. I've mentioned 11 points of contribution from new business. I would say these hires focused on these priority areas are contributing to that new business growth. And to your point or question about quantifying it, we talked about the '24 cohort, that 4% increase contributing -- ramping up over time, but contributing 30 to 35 basis points to organic growth in 2025. And that was a ramp where the fourth quarter was over 40 to 45 basis points.

We now have the '25 cohort on, which has a modest contribution to '25 as well. But the cumulative impact of those hires, plus our continued focus on investing in talent, I think will continue to be a benefit for us as we move forward into '26. So we're a growth company. That means investing for that growth in talent and capabilities is where we're going to be focused. And that's how I think about quantifying it.

And then I think it's pretty similar, but you talked about construction and energy. I think those are 2 lines of business that might help you with the data center opportunity. Can we talk about data centers? And can you help contextualize the $10 billion premium number...

We got our CEO through the call is what you're referencing. Yes.

Yes. And the opportunity just for Aon specifically?

Yes. I mean we -- I think it's important to have the context that we've either advised or brokered capital on roughly 1/3 of U.S. data centers thus far. And when you think about data centers in the U.S., estimates vary, but think about 5,500 data centers in the U.S. today. They're just not fit for purpose when you think about AI. What needs to be in them aren't fit for purpose, and that means that companies are spending $400 billion to $500 billion today on infrastructure and construction of these data centers. And that number is estimated to be $2 trillion 5 years from now and just on the construction part and maybe another [ 5 ] show you when you think about the operations in the technology part.

So we have some expertise in this space given how we've been involved thus far. We have the engineering expertise. So that means we can help with what site, what's the design of that site? And as I mentioned earlier, we actually put in a facility recently called -- we call it the data center life cycle program facility. So that's helping with the construction component of it, so think builders risk or delay in start-up. That's helping with the operations part of it, so think general liability. That's helping with the resiliency component of it, so cyber as well.

So the $10 billion number, I just gave you a sense about what we think our share has been thus far, and you can estimate a premium, a fee or a yield on that amount, and we think we're going to be strong participants. And the key point for me though is that this data center opportunity is just another one of those places where Aon has the expertise and is leading in providing the facilities to help clients, no different from pooled employer plans, where we're leading and brought that to the table, no different from master trust. These are areas where our analytics, our capabilities and expertise and experience allow us to lead for the industry, bring in new sources of capital and ideas to help transfer risk.

And by the way, these are large construction -- these are large numbers. So the risk cannot be concentrated. So the need to be able to bring in alternate sources of capital, reinsurance and alternate sources of capital, that's an area where we've been focused and we think we excel as well. So again, it's another one of these spaces where we think we have an advantage and will help support our mid-single-digit or greater growth.

Yes. It's a super interesting space. How about something you guys talked a lot about more at your Investor Day, about the Enterprise Client Group. I wanted to ask about the expansion there, and I think it focuses on some of your largest clients. Can you talk about how that model differentiates Aon from competitors? And what are you seeing from benefits from that model?

I'll hit the differentiation point first. I'd call it Aon client leadership of which Enterprise Client Group is a component of it. We have enterprise clients. We have large clients, middle-market clients, et cetera. So Enterprise Client Group is a component of our Aon client leadership. But the differentiating point is the fact that it is a client-centric model instead of a broker-centric model. That means you're bringing -- your going to the client as opposed to the client trying to find who in Aon they need to talk to. You're going to the client and bringing the integrated solutions across the entire workspace as opposed to having a siloed and transactional conversation broker to clients here. You need both of those things.

If you have Aon client leadership, that means you have more client loyalty because they have more solutions, and likely higher lifetime value from the clients as well. So this point about differentiation, I think, is probably unique for this industry, not unique for other industries, but we've had great success. We see the success in the second part of your question.

When you think about our Enterprise Client Group in '24, we've seen 97% retention. We've seen those clients have over 2.5x the number of products and solutions that nonenterprise clients have. We've seen growth across the geographies they hold. 50% of their revenue is international. And we've seen the contribution to new business from existing clients because new business is from existing clients and new clients from ECG increase year-over-year. So there's no doubt that we are seeing tangible economic benefit from having this as a part of the 3x3 Plan, and we're driving it. We're looking to scale it. Anne Corona came up on stage, the person who leads that for us, during Investor Day and saying that we are looking to expand our Aon client leaders across the 500 enterprise clients and the next 1,500 large clients as well. And we want to go as fast as possible on that.

The thing is hiring the right client leaders who know the business and training them to know all of our solutions because we see the types of benefits that I just mentioned there.

How about artificial intelligence. Aon has, I think, a significant amount of data you've been collecting for years, supported by Aon Business Services. Can you talk about the revenue and expense opportunities you're seeing from leveraging AI? And what's the magnitude of investment?

Yes. So I've heard this question. My view, Rob, as the CFO of the company, I don't view AI as like a separate line item or a high-risk bet in the corner of the room. For us, we are embedding AI into all of our solutions, and I'll talk a little bit about it. And so that means it's embedded in our CapEx, which -- look at the financial statements, and you'd see it has been roughly 1.5% to 2% of our revenue. It's embedded in our tech development as well because we embed AI at scale across our suite of analyzers, the model risk, the model volatility and determine how much you should retain versus transfer. And when we evaluate those analyzers, the contribution to revenue growth, the products themselves, the AI analysis is embedded in that.

We also think that there's a margin opportunity associated with it as we embedded across our back office workflows -- our back office and our workflows, things like Aon Broker Copilot, our proprietary Copilot, the Bloomberg for insurance, I would say, as you think about the data that we see on pricing in that system, or as we embedded in things like claims or policy management or certificates of insurance. And in fact, I talked at Investor Day about having 5% to 10% productivity improvement from back office workflow and co-development as well.

So look, I think with our bespoke data, reinsurance and commercial risk data, human capital data with over 40 million in our database, with no silos cut across our geographies, we think we embed AI at scale and that differentiates us in terms of players in the insurance brokerage industry here.

Maybe that's a good segue into margin discussion. You've got guidance about, I think it adds up to 80, 90 basis points of overall margin expansion this year, and you all highlighted at Investor Day, 70 to 100 basis points of ongoing adjusted operating margin expansion. Is that the right way we should be thinking about the next couple of years? And can you kind of walk us through the core building blocks?

The answer is yes, and I'll walk you through the building blocks. And I'll give you a little bit more context. So we just had 120 basis points per year of average margin expansion through the 10 years through '24. '24 itself, against the adjusted NFP baseline, 90 basis points in this year to the point that you just made, 80 to 90 basis points, as you said, is the expectation. So we have a long history of being able to drive margin expansion.

It is important to note, though, that we see margin expansion not as the end, but justification for what we're trying to drive, which is strong earnings growth that we can translate into free -- double-digit free cash flow growth. And we think we now have, through Aon business services, a foundation in place that when our organic revenue growth is over 4%, it allows us to receive scale benefits. And I talked about some of those scale benefits at Investor Day like reducing our applications, like moving to the cloud. And importantly, and as we think out into the future, continuing to move to our target operating model into global capability centers and doing that offshore in ABS. And we quantified that as we thought about this overall 70 to 100 basis points. We said that would drive 100 to 120 basis points is sort of step 1 of our model.

The second component of it is we talk about these building blocks is what I would just call the ongoing expense discipline and management. And I highlighted items like the 16% reduction that we've had since the beginning of the 3x3 Plan in real estate, or savings from managing our supplier management program, those things collectively have contributed, and we think on an ongoing basis, should contribute 10 to 20 basis points more. So that's 100 to 120, 10 to 20 from that. We continue to manage the portfolio, things that we may need to dispose of so that we become a higher growth, higher margin business. The impact of that has been 0 to 10 basis points. You add that up, and the important point is that we have capacity to invest in the business 40 to 60 basis points. And all of those numbers, the net of all of those numbers is 70 to 100 basis points.

So we do have margin expansion. So that means that the scale in our business gives us the capacity to invest in medium- and long-term growth, investment capacity for medium, long-term growth, that's the flywheel, that's the growth engine that we're after. And we think we have a long runway to be able to continue at those levels given where we are. It's early innings for the movement in ABS.

And you mentioned the double-digit free cash flow growth there. I know you've recently announced NFP Wealth deal. How should we just overall be thinking about the trajectory of free cash flow? You also have, I think, restructuring spending winding down. So what's the trajectory look like?

I mean we committed to '25 being double-digit free cash flow and the 3-year double-digit CAGR from '24 through '26 as well, and we're right on track for that. '25 is 13% year-to-date. I might have said that earlier. And the drivers of that -- we're in a strong position for free cash flow. The drivers are our continued strong operating income performance, so that includes NFP. We continuously push on days -- DSO and day sales outstanding in our supplier program that drives working capital improvements for us. And we're now starting to complete the integration of NFP, so transaction and integration costs that impacted '24 free cash flow is winding down, and to your point, going into '26 is our final year of the accelerating Aon United restructuring program.

So to your point, we have line of sight on the conclusion of that as well. And so double digit in '25 is right in line of sight. We'll be specific about '26 as we again come on to the Q4 call, but the drivers of double-digit free cash flow are very clear to us as those items.

And I did want to touch on NFP, which you mentioned there. Can you just talk about the strategic rationale of that deal and sort of the early results that you've seen? And maybe more specifically, I think you guys talked about a 50-basis-point revenue synergy going forward on an annual basis or so. Is that still all on track?

Yes, it's on track. And at the very beginning of the conversation here, I talked about the return on our capital as being an area where investors wanted more conviction. One of the first priorities that I had, and I've shared this with many of the investors in the room, I used these words, was reunderwriting the NFP acquisition. And there's no doubt in my mind that Aon made the right decision to get into this fast-growing $31 billion middle market space. To be able to combine our capabilities with the NFP distribution is a smart call for us. And as I think about the financial commitments, I -- you're asking about revenue synergies. We committed to $80 million in '25, $175 million by '26 in OpEx as well, I'd add to that at $30 million and $50 million for those 2 time periods. Those things are on track. But I'd normally begin the answer to this question with what's really important, and that's producer retention.

The engagement from these producers from the sales force because of the access to the capabilities and their synergies has been beyond expectations, beyond what was happening in terms of retention prior to the acquisition as well. So we feel very good about the financial performance of the business. And we feel very good about the acquisition as well, the continued tuck-in acquisition where we did $36 million last year and are already up $32 million through 9 months this year as well. So I think about NFP and the engagement from the producers, the integration, the financial performance and the acquisition are all performing well.

What we're focused on right now is -- I was actually in India 2 or 3 weeks ago and the NFP team was there with me. So we think there's opportunity to move even faster and move more into our ABS target operating model, and that's what we're assessing as we close out the year right now. And by the way, I will say that it sets us up for a comprehensive middle-market strategy. Having globally consistent technology platforms and policy management systems in ABS right now gives us the scale to look at middle market and do it in a way that doesn't dilute our margins and still allows us to have the type of growth that we've had.

I think we're coming up on time here, but maybe just to ask you, finish up with capital management. I think at Investor Day, you all highlighted a pretty strong number for capital available for M&A and share repurchases in 2026. Since then, you've closed the sale of the majority of the NFP Wealth business. So how are you thinking about balancing the capital deployment priorities?

The important -- the number that we said during Investor Day available for those 2 items, M&A and share repurchases, is $5.6 billion at that time. And we announced, obviously, with the NFP Wealth sale proceeds over $2 billion as well. So needless to say that we are in a position of capital strength with flexibility to execute our capital allocation model. And you know the priorities right now is to get the debt leverage back down to levels that we think are acceptable and that we committed to prior to the acquisition 2.8 to 3x by the end of this year. We're at 3.2 at the end of Q3. We've again increased the dividend. We're doing the tuck-in acquisitions through NFP. And we have flexibility to look at acquisitions if they meet our strategic criteria. During Investor Day, I talked about IRRs above 20% still getting to industry-leading ROICs. So they have to meet the strategic criteria. They need to meet the financial criteria as well.

If not, we will continue to return capital to shareholders. We've returned $750 million in share repurchases alone this year. So right on track for the $1 billion commitment that we've had, $1.4 billion, I think, including the dividends in it. So for us, it's all about balancing investment for growth with capital returned to shareholders. That's been quite balanced for us when you look across our history, and we're even more diligent about it as we move forward in the strong position that we're in.

Fantastic. Thanks for sharing all your insights, Edmund.

Thank you. Thank you.

Good morning, and thank you for holding. Welcome to Aon plc's Third Quarter 2025 Conference Call. I would also like to remind all parties that this call is being recorded. If anyone has an objection, you may disconnect your line at this time.

It is important to note that some of the comments in today's call may constitute certain statements that are forward-looking in nature as defined by the Private Securities Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that can cause actual results to differ materially from historical results or those anticipated. For information concerning these risk factors, please refer to our earnings release for this quarter and to our most recent quarterly or annual SEC filings, all of which are available on our website. Now it is my pleasure to turn the call over to Greg Case, President and CEO of Aon plc.

Thank you, and good morning, and welcome to our third quarter earnings call. I'm joined today by Edmund Reese, our CFO. The financial presentation, which Edmond will reference in his remarks is posted on our website. To begin today, we want to recognize the great trauma and suffering resulting from Hurricane Melissa.

We're thinking about everyone affected by this terrible catastrophe, and we feel very, very humble and hopeful, but the work Aon undertook with the World Bank to arrange a cap on for the government of Jamaica will accelerate in support recovery. .

Turning now to AOP. Our third quarter results reflect another quarter defined by continued acceleration of our Aon United strategy, great progress executing on our 3x3 plan and financial model and ongoing momentum as we head into the final months of the year. Our focus on execution is translating into value delivery to our clients, while at the same time producing results for our firm and strong financial performance.

We're winning more in the core by deepening relationships with existing clients through data-led solutions, capturing demand in existing markets by developing new capabilities for emerging risks and creating demand in new categories by innovating unique capital solutions. And we're strengthening our clients' insurance programs to ensure they are positioned well for the future with enhanced coverage and limits. Let's start with a look at our third quarter highlights. We delivered another strong quarter of financial results. highlighted by 7% organic revenue growth, a 26.3% adjusted operating margin and 12% adjusted EPS growth, which keeps us on track to achieve our full year objectives. Our continued success in winning new business and deepening client relationships reflects the strength of our risk capital and human capital capabilities powered by ABS.

Simply put, our analytic capabilities enable smarter and faster decisions for clients, which when coupled with our advisory expertise, helps clients capture greater opportunity. And while any firm can point to client wins, 2 highlights from this quarter truly demonstrate the impact of our differentiated strategy. The first example demonstrates how our advanced analytic capabilities were critical in securing our appointment as the captive insurance partner for a leading global logistics company. replacing a competitive relationship that span decades.

Our ability to deliver global expertise with local leadership provided the client with relevant insights into captive management and the risk capital structure, making Aon the clear choice. And as an example, by demonstrating our distinctive client service and enterprise mindset to the enterprise client group, we not only retained but expanded our benefits work with a long-standing financial services client in an intensely competitive process.

We leverage deep industry knowledge and governance, risk management and employee experience. And this resulted in securing global benefits across new, existing geographies, U.S. H&B and Total Benefits Administration. Our proactive approach combining innovation, analytics and advisory continues to deliver measurable impact and position us for sustained success as our solutions have never been more relevant for clients.

Our latest 2025 Global Risk Management survey revealed a significant shift in the risk landscape and how decision-makers are thinking about risk. Trade and geopolitical volatility entered the top 10 global risk for the first time in nearly 2 decades, reflecting growing global uncertainty.

At the same time, climate risk and natural disasters also reached their highest ever rankings, underscoring the need of resilience in a world where severe weather events are driving up costs. and workforce-related risks continue to have a growing impact on how employers manage affordability, access and productivity. In addition, investments in AI are surge in demand for cloud infrastructure and are fueling unprecedented investment in data center construction with CapEx estimated to exceed $2 trillion globally over the next several years. These technological developments are not only reshaping physical infrastructure but also amplifying cyber and operational risk.

Active risk management in this area has become a strategic necessity and traditional approaches alone unsufficient to cover this risk. With connected risk capital and human capital capabilities we're truly uniquely positioned to guide clients through a complex environment, access capital, unlock value and build resilience. As we review our performance this quarter, several strategic milestones demonstrate progress on our 3x3 plan. These achievements are the direct result of our team's dedication, collaboration and focus on advancing priorities.

First, Talent remains a significant driver of sustained growth. And the competitive environment for attracting and retaining top performance is as intense as ever. No company is immune, which makes it essential to stay focused and deliberate in our approach. In this environment, our platform is a unique advantage in attracting talent and helping client-facing talent win more business and retain clients, especially in priority areas like construction, energy and health.

Revenue-generating talent is up 6% net year-to-date, reflecting our strong position and differentiated capabilities. We have a great team, and we remain focused on continuing to strengthen it. Second, our enhanced capital strength gives us greater flexibility to execute our capital allocation strategy with discipline and precision. We divested the NFP Wealth business, an asset better suited to an owner prepared to make the capital investment required for long-term growth.

At the same time, we remain highly committed to our core wealth and retirement offerings, which represent key components of our human capital value proposition. Also during the quarter, NFP closed more than $10 million in acquired EBITDA as part of programmatic M&A. We have a great pipeline of high-return middle market opportunities and our improved capital position reinforces our commitment to long-term strategic investment and shareholder returns. And finally, equipped with better data and analytics built from years of investment. We're mobilizing capital into the industry, particularly to address the rapid expansion of data center construction driven by AI and cloud infrastructure adoption.

As highlighted earlier, the opportunity here is monumental. Data center CapEx increased 50% in 2024 and is expected to increase significantly over the next several years as trillions of dollars of CapEx go into the construction of these facilities. Near term, we estimate data center demand could generate over $10 billion in new premium volume in 2026 alone.

Our globally aligned risk capital and human capital teams are helping clients navigate this transformation and support stakeholders across the value chain, from technology companies to contractors and operators to capital providers, each with unique insurance needs, given the role in the data center development. While still early days, we're excited by the specific accomplishments that showcase our ability to help clients navigate this transformational opportunity. We recently became the risk partner for a leading global engineering focus insurer with a mission to work with them to build significantly greater level of insurance capacity. This work complements the launch of our data center life cycle insurance program a proprietary multiline insurance facility that consolidates coverage for construction, cargo, cyber and operational exposures and offers clients end-to-end risk management and insurance solutions.

We're also working to support resilient design and engineering from the outset of these projects to optimize the industry's ability to provide the limits necessary for hyperscaler data center development and management of accumulation risk. Another example of our global distribution analytics and expertise in both traditional and alternative risk transfer is already delivering results is a recent client win or replaced nearly $30 billion in coverage for a top global hyperscaler data center developer for operational data centers and data centers under construction.

And this is just the beginning. Overall, we accomplished a lot this quarter, and there's a lot to be energized by going forward. Our results and the momentum we have going into the final months of the year give us confidence in reaffirming our 2025 guidance. Let me conclude with 2 points. First, our -- and United strategy accelerated through the 3x3 plan and the strength of our financial model are generating strong results today and building momentum for future success. Our unique capabilities and integrated solutions have never been more relevant to clients as we help them reduce volatility, protect their assets and grow their businesses.

We're attracting exceptional talent to strengthen our great team. delivering innovative new solutions with unmatched data and insights and building and deepening client relationships. And we're winning more in core markets, capturing new demand in existing markets and creating new demand in new categories.

And finally and most important, to our over 60,000 colleagues around the world, thank you. Thank you for your commitment to our clients, to each other and to our Aon United strategy. Your dedication is the driving force of our firm.

Now let me turn the call over to Edmund for his resections on the quarter and outlook for the year. Edmun?

Thank you, Greg, and good morning, everyone. I'm excited to be here to discuss our third quarter results, which marked another quarter of disciplined execution on our 3x3 plan and financial model. To frame our discussion, let me highlight the most important factors shaping our third quarter performance. First, our Q3 performance demonstrates continued momentum across the key drivers of sustainable top line growth.

Our investment in revenue-generating talent enhanced by ABS and our continued expansion in the middle market is translating into strong organic growth. Organic revenue growth of 7% in Q3 serves as another proof point in our ability to execute on each of these drivers, keeping us in line with or ahead of industry performance.

Second, we continue to deliver scale improvements in operating leverage through ABS while also investing in talent and capabilities that deepen client engagement and drive new business. We again delivered in Q3, expanding margins over 100 basis points and increasing our revenue-generating hires by 6%. Third, our enhanced earnings power disciplined portfolio management and strong free cash flow generation, up 13% in the quarter have strengthened our capital position. Through 3 quarters in 2025, we have reduce debt and remain on track to achieve our leverage objectives, closed $32 million in EBITDA from Middle acquisition, and returned $1.2 billion in capital to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases. Our strong capital position empowers us to pursue high-return inorganic investments further accelerating and supplementing our organic growth momentum.

Collectively, these 3 components: momentum on the growth drivers, accelerated scale benefits through ABS and a robust capital position are delivering growth today and setting the foundation for future performance. We continue to invest in capabilities and innovate capital solutions that create even greater value for our clients. And this gives us confidence not only in achieving our 2025 guidance but also in the upside potential of sustaining top line growth and delivering double-digit free cash flow beyond 2025.

Turning to the quarter's results. Organic revenue growth was 7% and total revenue increased 7% year-over-year to $4 billion. Adjusted operating margin expanded by 170 basis points over last year and reached 26.3%. Adjusted EPS was $3.05, and finally, free cash flow increased 13%. Let's get into the details of these results, starting with organic revenue growth on Slide 6. Organic revenue growth was 7% in the quarter, in line with our mid-single digit or greater guidance range. Growth was broad-based, 5% or better in each solution line with 2 of our solution lines delivering 7% or greater, a strong result achieved despite pricing pressure in certain products and geographies, underscoring the contribution from new business and continued high retention.

In commercial risk, 7% organic revenue growth reflected strong performance in our core P&C business globally, including double-digit growth in the U.S. with meaningful contribution from the middle market through NFP and continued strength in EMEA. M&A services continued to grow at a double-digit level, and this contribution provided an incremental lift. Construction also delivered double-digit growth. driven by demand from large-scale global infrastructure projects, including data center builds for major tech companies, reinforcing this category as a strategic priority.

Reinsurance delivered 8% growth driven by treaty placements and double-digit growth in facultative placements and the Strategy and Technology group. Insurance-linked securities also had significant growth, but off a smaller baseline. While July 1 treaty property renewal rates were softer, this was balanced by higher limits and ongoing strength in international facultative markets, especially in EMEA. Demand for STG analytics remain high, underscoring our platform's increasing importance in supporting clients as they navigate volatility and match capital to risk. Health Solutions grew 6% this quarter, befitting from data analytics-driven sales in our talent business and new business in our core health and benefits offerings across the U.S. and EMEA.

As Greg mentioned, we continue to leverage our analytics and advisory capabilities to support employers as they navigate rising health care costs and achieve better outcomes for their workforces. And finally, wealth generated 5% growth. The performance reflects strength in advisory work in the U.K. and EMEA related to ongoing regulatory change, partially offset by softer advisory demand in the U.S. Additionally, the NFP contribution was meaningful, driven by asset inflows and market performance.

Importantly, for modeling purposes, I will add that we expect wealth growth in Q4 to be 1% to 2%, impacted by delays in U.S. advisory work and the sale of the faster-growing MFP Wealth business, which closed yesterday. Let me take a moment to walk through the key components of our Q3 organic revenue growth on Slide 7. In Q3, we extended our consistent track record of strong new business generation to drive organic growth. For the second consecutive quarter, new business contributed 11 points to organic revenue growth with balanced contributions from both expansion with existing clients and new client wins. Our investments in revenue-generating talent, particularly in high-growth sectors like construction and energy continue to deliver measurable impact. We remain proactive and on the front split in attracting top talent. Our revenue-generating hires are up 6% year-to-date.

Importantly, we're already seeing these new colleagues make contributions to new business growth. As the 2024 hiring cohort continues to ramp, we are confident this group will contribute 30 to 35 basis points to full year organic revenue growth, leveraging advanced analytics and client engagement tools through Aon Business Services. The 11-point contribution from new business this quarter underscores the effectiveness of our investment in client-facing talent, and we expect continued momentum as the 2024 cohort seasons and the 2025 hires continue to on board. Q3 25 retention remained strong year-over-year, reflecting the continued strength and stability of our client relationships supported by investments in enhanced service delivery, innovative capabilities and Aon client leadership.

Net new business contributed 5 points to organic revenue growth in the quarter. net market impact, which captures the impact of rate and exposure contributed just over 1 point to organic revenue growth, consistent with our 0 to 2-point estimated range. rate pressure on property within commercial risk was offset with limit and coverage increases across cyber and other financial lines. Reinsurance net market impact was flat as rate declines and higher retentions were mitigated by increased limits and facultative growth. Health Solutions continued to benefit from our ability to support clients managing rising health care costs, providing a significant contribution to net market impact.

And one final point on revenue Third quarter fiduciary investment income was $75 million, down 12% versus the prior year. While average balances increase, lower interest rates more than offset that benefit. On Slide 8, adjusted operating income increased 15% to $1.1 billion and adjusted operating margin expanded 170 basis points to 26.3%. These results reflect strong top line growth and the operating leverage in our business, powered by ABS, giving us capacity to fund growth investments in client-facing talent and middle market while still expanding margins.

When we provided full year guidance, we highlighted 4 components that would impact 2025 margin expansion. NFP, fiduciary investment income, restructuring and operating leverage, all 4 remain fully in line with our expectations. We have now fully lapped the headwind on margin from NFP, and we are on track to meet our $30 million OpEx synergies target, resulting in a net 20 basis point headwind from NFP for the year. while the outlook for U.S. interest rate cuts has shifted from 2 at the start of the year to 3 in the latest top plot, the delayed timing of the first rate cut from June to September effectively offsets the additional reduction in the margin impact from fiduciary investment income remains unchanged at 20 basis points.

Restructuring savings totaled $35 million in the quarter contributing approximately 90 basis points to adjusted operating margin. We remain firmly on track to deliver $150 million in restructuring saves for the full year. and advancing toward our $350 million run rate savings target by 2026. With ABS driven scale improvements and strong execution year-to-date, we remain confident in delivering full year margin expansion of 80 to 90 basis points aligned with our long-term financial model. Moving to interest, other income and taxes on Slide 9. Interest income was negligible in the third quarter and $4 million lower than last year. Interest expense came in at $206 million, $7 million lower than last year, primarily due to lower average debt balances. We expect Q4 interest expense to be approximately $200 million. Other expense was $13 million versus a $33 million benefit in Q3 '24, which included gains from the divestment of [indiscernible] lines and real estate advisory assets partially offset by the remeasurement of balance sheet items in nonfunctional currencies.

We estimate Q4 '25 other expense to range between $25 million and $30 million. And finally, the Q3 tax rate was 19.2%. Our full year tax outlook remains unchanged at 19.5% to 20.5%. Turning now to free cash flow and capital allocation on Slide 10. We generated $1.1 billion of free cash flow in the third quarter. And year-to-date, free cash flow of $1.9 billion is up 13% year-over-year.

As we complete the NFP integration, we continue to expect strong adjusted operating income, including contributions from NFP and ongoing working capital improvements to drive double-digit free cash flow growth in 2025. And turning to capital on the right-hand side of the page. I noted earlier that we closed the sale of NFP Wealth. And with over $2 billion in proceeds, the transaction significantly strengthens our capital position and we approach the final months of the year in an even greater position of capital strength with enhanced flexibility.

Importantly, we remain disciplined in allocating capital, balancing opportunities that meet our strategic and financial growth priorities with capital return to shareholders. This discipline reinforces our commitment to creating long-term shareholder value. And we continue to execute our capital allocation model in Q3 '25.

We reduced our leverage ratio to 3.2x in Q3, remaining on track to reach 2.8x 3.0x by the fourth quarter of 2025, consistent with our stated objective. We continued our programmatic tuck-in acquisitions, including middle market deals through MFP. Through 9 months, NFP has closed $32 million of EBITDA. And following the NFP wealth sale, we expect to close $35 million to $40 million in acquired EBITDA by year-end. The pipeline remains strong primarily composed of U.S. P&C opportunities. And finally, we returned $411 million to shareholders in the quarter, including $250 million in share repurchases. With $750 million repurchased year-to-date, we remain on track for $1 billion in capital return through share repurchases for full year 2025. I enabled by our high free cash flow generation.

These actions demonstrate our disciplined capital allocation, reducing leverage, investing in high-return growth opportunities in delivering meaningful capital return to shareholders. I will conclude my prepared remarks on Slide 11 with our 2025 guidance and some forward-looking perspective on our growth objectives.

We are reaffirming our full year 2025 guidance, including organic revenue growth, mid-single digit or greater capturing the impact of our growth investments. Second, margin expansion, 80 to 90 basis points, including $260 million in cumulative annual savings from our Aon United restructuring initiative. Next, strong earnings growth, supported by the scale improvements from ABS. I'll also note 2 additional points related to earnings. First, the sale of NFP Wealth is expected to have an immaterial impact on 2025 earnings growth. Second, we continue to expect an effective tax rate of 19.5% to 20.5% for the full year.

For modeling purposes, we are estimating 7% to 9% adjusted EPS growth in Q4 '25. Finally, free cash flow. Double-digit growth in 2025, demonstrating our ability to consistently convert our strong earnings into capital for investment and shareholder return. We entered the final stretch of the year with strong momentum, executing our 3x3 plan and financial model to deliver results today.

At the same time, scale improvements enabled by ABS, the cumulative impact of our growth investments and our capital capacity are strengthening the foundation for future performance, positioning us for sustainable top line growth and consistently strong earnings growth. This powerful combination gives us high conviction in our ability to create long-term value for shareholders. So with that, let's open the line for questions.

Darryl, I'll turn it back to you.

[Operator Instructions]

Our first questions come from the line of Robert Cox with Goldman Sachs.

Just first question on talent. The revenue-generating hires were up 6%, and it sounds like you're executing on that 40 basis points contribution to organic growth during the back half of the year. if we start thinking about stacking the benefits from the 2024 hiring in 2025 cohorts, does that get us to something like roughly 80 basis points in 2026?

Rob, thank you for the question. Well, before even getting directly to the answer, the first thing, and Greg may comment on this is that you see the headlines across our industry. It's clear that competitors are aggressive in their recruiting efforts. And given the expertise and attractiveness of our talent, we're not immune to that. So we continue to be super high focused on the investments right now.

And as I said in my prepared remarks, I think we're on the right. But through 9 months, 6% increase in revenue-generating hires. That's right in line with the 4% to 8% that we communicated during investment days. And to your question, they are contributing right in line with our expectations on the full year 30 to 35 basis points there will be a cumulative impact when these 24 cohorts ramp up.

And as I said in my prepared remarks, the 2025 hires are also coming on board. We'll give specific guidance on the contribution from those hires when we come back into Q4 and talk about 2026. But the key point for us right now is that, that is a significant contributor to the 11 points of the new business contribution to organic revenue growth, they're performing right in line with our expectation in terms of incremental revenue and ramp-up time, and there will be a cumulative impact.

We'll give the results of that and an outlook on that when we get into 2026 guidance on Q4. But make no doubt about it. The investments in these client-facing talent is a key part of the growth strategy, particularly in the market that we have now. That's helpful. And then I just wanted to follow up on commercial risk, specifically in the U.S. business, core P&C, it feels like the double-digit growth is significantly in excess of what some of your peers are reporting. So I just wanted to flesh out what you might attribute that excess growth too. I know you talked about data center construction and talent. And also, I just wanted to ask if that result was flattered at all by multiyear policies.

Robert. Appreciate the question. And listen, we think about the growth result. This is continued progress. continued progress. We're halfway through the 3x3 plan fully executed against it. When you think about what we bring to the table with risk capital and having capital and then Barry substantially reinforced with the on Business Services. Remember, these are the sort of analyzers, risk tools that help clients make better decisions by driving revenue, also retention. Obviously, you have some benefits from the cost side, too, but really is around client impact. And you're seeing these results. And although you're not just seeing it in the U.S., it's really globally, and contributes to Edmond's commitment around what we're going to be able to achieve each and every year around mid-single digit or greater. And so this is really what you're seeing. And I want to be clear, it really is just -- it's part of the day-to-day. There really isn't anything that we would highlight. We talk about M&A services. It's [indiscernible] progress, but it did not drive the results. The results were driven fundamentally by what we're doing day-to-day with clients.

And we did it. I would just also highlight in the face of all that's going on in the overall marketplace. So we talked time and time again about the fact that we're -- this is not about unit pricing in specific areas, and I'm sure we'll talk about pricing before we end the call today. It's not about that. It's really about a client by client impact and our ability to take analytics with our great team in place and do things that really have a meaningful impact. And that's really what's driving growth has driven the growth in the U.S., but also driving growth in the same respect around the world.

Greg is exactly right, Rob. We're pleased but not surprised by the strength in the commercial risk growth in Q3 because it's being driven by specific actions that we're taking durable growth drivers. We talked about 11 points of contribution at the company level, but within commercial risk itself, it was 11 points of contribution from new business and the retention was better year-over-year.

That's driven by what Greg just talked about, the analyzers helping us win RFPs by ECG, our enterprise client group and the tools that we have in ABS. The outlook and the results in this quarter remains strong as we continue to have the hires in construction and energy as clients increase limit and add coverages. So we're going to continue to be focused on net new business plus retention and the investment in the specialty hires and giving them, equipping them with analytical tools that help them win new business. That's what drove it in Q3 within the U.S., but as Greg said, globally, and that's what gives us confidence in our mid-single-digit guidance going forward.

Our next questions come from the line of Andrew Anderson with Jefferies.

Just look at Health Solutions, 6% organic , really strong and has been for a couple of years now. You listed a few drivers there of the organic input positive market impact kind of last there. But I would think that is one of the bigger drivers. Maybe you could just help us breakdown between net new business, retention and market impact?

Yes. I mean you're right, there was an impact from networked impact as you continue to see health care costs rising, but make no doubt about it. Health is actually 1 of the largest parts of our portfolio when it comes to new business contribution, expansion with existing customers.

Greg actually called out an example on the call of expansion with existing customers coming in through new business. So in the quarter, you had the strength from our talent analytics business. Data continues to be seeing high demand. our core health business had strong growth in EMEA and U.S. as well. The market is attractive right now for these solutions and the macro factors are having an impact. So you are seeing a positive and net market impact. But without a doubt, I highlight that it is new business driving this primarily expansion with existing customers.

And Andrew, I just want to add, if you think about where we are in terms of the continued progression as we began the 3x3 program and thought about the areas we compete in, each one of them had a set of characteristics, which for us, suggested our ability to grow, and those are going to be very, very strong. Health is exactly in that wheelhouse. Think about it. this is 20-plus percent of the U.S. economy as an example, and growing at 9% to 10% a year. It's a tremendous burden on companies as they think about supporting their employees and their families from a health standpoint.

And what we bring to the table is unique in content and capability. Just look at -- we recently published a set of analytics never been seen before around overall population health and the impact of medications in that context, demonstrating that you might be able to see something we've never been able to save before, which is we can potentially improve population health and bend the curve. And so that kind of opportunity for us, we're incredibly excited about -- and we're just beginning to sort of tap that thread. And so for us, we love this category like we do across the risk side as well and the retirement side. But you're right, a lot of progress here, and we'll continue to take steps to build the business.

And then reinsurance, just as we -- I realize 3Q is a little bit of a later quarter, but as we kind of shift towards 26%, how are you kind of seeing the reinsurance pricing environment? And maybe just some color on demand changes?

Listen, overall, [indiscernible] can comment on the '26 a little bit from that standpoint. But listen, again, think about overall demand and supply. Demand -- when you think about what's going on in the world these days, greater and greater risk. There is absolute pressure on a unit price basis, as we've talked about, particularly on the property side, and you're seeing that really across the board. But think about how we react. We react on a client level, and we're essentially helping clients understand how to mitigate risk on a much broader -- even a much broader scale.

So this has been just traditional treaty and facultative think about interns securities. I started off with the obvious tragedy in the catastrophe in Jamaica and then talked about how we brought capital in to try to do something about that. We've done now we're going to do well over close to 150 or greater cap bonds or parametric instruments for companies in addition to insurers. So this is really the opportunity to bring more capital in to support an environment which is demanding it. What we described on the hyperscalers.

This is an opportunity to truly address a level of opportunity that we haven't seen before. it's truly unique. Think about $2 trillion of investment, and that's just the operating investment. And sorry, the build investment doesn't even get to the operating investment or the innovation investment, which happens over time. So for us, the content capability we have in such an extraordinary group on the reinsurance side in the context of reinsurance and risk capital with our commercial risk capabilities is extraordinary, and we see a great opportunity over time. Anything else you'd add to that?

Look, the only thing I'd add is we are seeing pressure on the rate side today. reinsurance, the net market impact there was flat in the quarter. Clearly, we're seeing pressure in the property side of it. But to Greg's point, the demand is high. clients are buying more sideways coverage to cover payrolls, we are seeing a focus on our facultative placements growth in our STG businesses. So again, we'll come back in '26 to your question in Q4 and talk about 26 specifically. But these pressures come today, and we still are in 2025, growing at a mid-single-digit level Because of the demand and the solutions that we're providing for our clients here.

Our next questions come from the line of Bob Wang with Morgan Stanley.

So my first question comes around the thoughts on capital deployment. Obviously, free cash flow increased significantly year-on-year, but your buyback slowed down. I know that we talked about this a little bit. Just curious capital deployment going forward between the acquisitions that NFP is going to make versus how you think about buybacks versus dividends?

Yes. So appreciate the question on the capital. It's an important point for us. You said back slowed down. I wanted to just highlight that we a criteria by which we evaluate the options. We started talking about that previously and emphasized it during Investor Day as well. Those criteria are focused on long-term shareholder value creation. And so we're going to remain committed to balancing investment for growth with capital returns to shareholders.

And for us, that means paying down the debt meeting our leverage objective, obviously, consistently paying the dividend. We're very pleased with what we deploy towards middle market acquisitions this year and will be even and a stronger position to do that next year, particularly given the proceeds that we have from the NFP Wealth sale. But those acquisitions will have to meet, as I said during the prepared remarks, our strategic criteria and our financial criteria as well is worth emphasizing, I showed some information during Investor Day that showed over 20% IRRs and over 10% revenue growth after owning these acquisitions for 1 year.

So that gives you some sense about how we think about the financial return. Of course, we balance that with returning capital to shareholders. So we feel very good about the position of strength were in and our ability to evaluate the options moving forward. But let me turn it to you, Greg, to add some color to that.

Listen, I think you captured it exceptionally well. maybe one observation I would just add. Even just went through a whole series of actions whole series of activities. Bob, hopefully, what comes through clearly is our absolute focus on long-term shareholder value creation. And we're taking specific actions on the balance sheet side, the capital side, the capital deployment side to make that happen, acquisitions and divestitures. These are difficult things to do. And if you think about just even in the last 18 months, bringing in NP, which has been phenomenal, but by itself, a mimental effort.

The decision to divest of a specific piece of NFP, which good business, but really not one we're going to invest in and double down from a capital deployment standpoint. So you make the decision to divest against that. That's a hard thing to do, a lot to cover on our finance side with our NFP colleagues, and it went exceptionally well, closed yesterday. The pay down of debt, the buyback, all the different pieces. What I'm trying to highlight here is we have an absolute commitment, and it's not just something we say. You see it in our actions, which is an active management of our balance sheet and our capital position. which happens to be currently the strongest it's ever been against the criteria on long-term shareholder value creation.

And the team has done a remarkable job actively managing this, just like we do on the operational side.

Really helpful. And also, apologies for carry fresh question here. Yes, you're absolutely right. My second question is going back to the data centers a little bit. Obviously, is a huge momentum for you and it's likely to be very long tailed. But just curious to how you think about the competitive environment now that data center is very much in the front and center of discussions for insurance, do you see large competitors coming in? Like how should you think about your market share in this expanding pie, so to speak?

So first of all, I really appreciate you asking the question. This is the wheelhouse, right? When you think about sort of what we have been built to do think about levels of innovation. What we did on Aon Client Treaty when it first came out. What we did on the GLP-1s, I just described. what we've done in multiple other environments. What we did on the -- on retirement on the employment plan, trying to bring 401(k) economics to the middle market from large companies. All these things are innovations that we have driven over time. And they come, Bob, with from the standpoint of truly require integrated capability, risk capital and unit capital and the ability to bring capital from in the industry and outside the industry to bear on behalf of these [indiscernible]. All that's true, and that's a proof point how we approach the market. This happens to be bigger than anything you've ever seen, $2 trillion, right? By the way, $2 trillion is only the bills. It's not the operating or the innovation that comes over time. So it's just the tip of the iceberg. This isn't really about competitive position. By the way, from our standpoint, we have taken a very, very hard, hard look at this, and we've taken a very much an engineering-driven approach.

I referenced the partnership we've got with a very unique firm -- it will be clear over time on how you take an engineering-driven position around where do you position these things? How do you think about where you build them, by the way, how do you think about the actual building, not the core technology. We'll leave that to the technology companies, but literally how do you do this in a way in which you can create better business continuity and business resilience. When you think about business interruption in the context of a data center in this world is giving me measured in the millions of dollars per minute, and it's going to be a completely different scale.

So for us, what we want to do is bring a set of solutions, which may be copied by others. It will be difficult that they might be. And there's an approved for everyone here. The question is how we can increase relevance of our industry to help reduce the volatility of the operating -- building and operating these data centers. And for us, it's a massive, it really is unique. It's a massive opportunity for our industry to make a difference in a way that's going to really matter globally and get bigger and bigger over time. But the scale is quite -- we've just never seen it before. We're pretty excited about it.

Our next question comes from the line of Mike Zaremski with BMO Capital Markets.

Sticking to the exciting data center conversation, Tayo gave us some great color potentially over $10 billion in new premiums in 26 alone for the industry. Any color is that -- are those premiums more of like a if you do the math and then it was commission based, there'd be a lot of growth. Is this mostly fee-based. And is AM getting a disproportionate share of this, you think? Or is it most of it going to the E&S market? Just any other color would just be great, clearly a great opportunity?

Yes. Listen, from our standpoint, it's still very early sort of in the process. So let's don't -- this is not a mid-game or even end game. This is like the beginning of the game. This is all beginning to sort of develop over time. And think about Mike, from the standpoint of this is around how you build these things, how you operate them and then they evolve and they innovate on a time frame that's measured in a few years. So you're going to continue to iterate this.

And for us, this is about accessing capital to connect with risk. Whatever market it goes through, primary admitted E&S or frankly, alternative markets, we're accessing all that capital. And by the way, it's going to require access to all that capital. And then literally, how -- from our standpoint, we're looking to provide value for clients. We always find a way we do fine on compensation when we provide value for clients. And ours is always a value-added approach in terms of how we think about it. And so we're, again, excited about the opportunity to make a difference, and we already are. As I mentioned before, we've already done some major programs underway. But we see potential to do substantially, substantially more. And by the way, this isn't just a U.S. opportunity. This is a global opportunity. And for us, again, we see great opportunity.

But really the issue, Mike, is is convincing the capital to come in and actually provide the coverage and do what we need to do on behalf of the hyperscalers. And really, it isn't just the hyperscalers. It's also the builders. And then the money as well because if you think about sort of funds that are being created, opportunities there as well. So for us, this really cuts across the ecosystem and represents a very unique opportunity.

Interesting. And my follow-up is probably for Edmond. On the accelerating Aon United app program, can you give us a flavor of how much cash spend remains? And is that kind of evenly spread out over the next 5 quarters?

Yes, you should be able to -- we'll -- in the 10-Q, you can see what the cash spend has been over the time, we're just over $600 million in cash spend thus far or later this evening, you'll be able to see them getting a signal when the 10-Q comes out. But the key thing about that is we're right on track for what we expected to spend there.

We'll continue to assess that as we go into 2026. And more importantly for us, the savings. We did $110 million last last year and on track for another $150 million this year. So we continue to feel good about setting ourselves up for ongoing scale improvements and capacity through that and capacity to invest in our capabilities and in our folks moving forward. So that's where we are in terms of spend and savings.

Our next questions come from the line of Jimmy Bhullar with JPMorgan.

So I had a question first just on organic growth. in commercial risk. If you look at your results, they've accelerated over the course of the year, 5% in 1Q to 6% in 2Q, 7% in 3Q. And the change has been more than hiring the hiring tailwind ramping up alone. So maybe if you could give us some key drivers of the improvement, things that actually help in 3Q that might not have been there in 1Q and just trying to assess which of these factors are sustainable versus might not sustain at the just what do the ramp-up in growth.

Yes, I appreciate the question, Jimmy. Maybe I'll just start at an overall high-level strategic approach to what we've done and then how we've operationalized it. And Ed and I know we'll add a lot of color on some of the detail here. But listen, we came into 2024 with a 3x3 plant. We architected plotted it put it in place, locked it down in '23 and announced it and drove it in '24.

We said 24, 25 and 26, very straightforward. We talked about this on Investor Day. What are we bringing that's different? What are you doing that's different? Well, risk capital is different. Human capital is different. We're connecting the dots in ways they've never been connected before. Not because it's a nice thing to do because we can actually take the data that cuts across these theaters and pull it together under Aon Business Services and create better data fidelity so we can actually inject it into our analytics. That drove a set of analyzers. We're going to kick off the property symposium early next year. And when we bring our 1,000 clients into the room, we're going to start with our property analyzer and what's going on. They're going to see things they haven't seen before with better data than ever before. For us, this is a revenue driver. This is a driver of attracting clients. They see that opportunity. It's also an opportunity to change the retention profile, already a very strong retention business, but really the opportunity to win more clients, do more with them and keep them longer. And that's really all the efforts around the 3x3.

And then if you think about risk capital and human capital, really [indiscernible] [indiscernible] we just continue to build momentum on this and then delivered to enterprise clients and all the things we're doing on client leadership. So it's one voice that actually brings the content of on behalf of the client. So that's the 3x3. So Jimmy, we're halfway through that, and we're happy when they progress. but we have high expectations, and we're going to continue to make progress on the -- against the 3x3 against that specific piece. And then step back and think about NFP we've accessed the $31 billion market with a great asset and a great set of capability. And it turns out the content and insight for making our business services is highly applicable in the middle market. You think a CFO and a middle market company doesn't want to see opportunities to change the cyber risk profile they've got or do something about the -- how -- what they pay for their 401(k) on behalf of their employees, all these things sort of come into play that really are part of the 3x3. So what you're seeing here is the progress on the 3x3 and what we laid out in the Investor Day, and we're working diligently to provide as much energy behind that as we can.

And we call it basically industrial strength execution. And then you're right, we added on top of that priority hires, and Edmonds describing these priority hires, I think, exceptionally well, and they will continue to build on that chassis that I just described. That's -- it isn't complex, hard to do, but not complex. That's exactly what we're trying to accomplish with the 3x3, we're halfway through, and you're seeing some progress. And we'll keep working the ball, but a long way to go here.

Our next questions come from the line of Tracy Benguigui with Wolfe Research.

I'm going to stick with the theme of the data centers. Just 1 quick one. You mentioned a recent client win that replaced nearly $30 billion in coverage for a top global data center developer. Does that represent any one-offs for the quarter?

It really doesn't. It's really just part of the ongoing piece. All I really wanted to do, Tracy, there. and Ivan commented on this as well. I'll just give you an example that this isn't conceptual. It's happening now. It's also an interesting observation. We have an opportunity as an industry to step up and really make a difference here. But irrespective of what we do, these are happening. The investments are being made, and it's quite substantial. So I just wanted to provide a very concrete example of where it's where something is sort of ongoing. But also think about the data center that we actually provide coverage of in that specific example.

That was, by the way, part build. And in part, they have ongoing data centers and which actually help them understand how to think about the business continuity differently. And so for us, that is an ongoing effort. Again, back to why this is so unique. It's not just the build, it's the ongoing operation and then the innovation, and that means this is not just a monumental opportunity. This is a sustained monumental opportunity, which is one of the reasons we're so excited about it.

Yes. And Tracy, the only thing I'll just add to it. I'll just be very direct that our growth in this quarter, in particular, is not because of one-off items or nonrecurring business, it really are the durable ongoing sustainable drivers that Greg just talked about. Our data to risk capital and human capital, the middle market growth the analyzers through Aon Business Services? And then on top of that, the cumulative impact of the hiring that we're doing right now. So your question is an important one. I just want to make the capacity here we're describing.

Has never been seen before real time and they're happening, being able to step up to any share of that is going to be meaningful in the conversation we just had about our performance. And then we see tremendous potential.

So yes, we believe we've got a unique perspective. I'm not saying it's the best. They're the perfect ones but very unique. And by the way, they are integrated risk capital, human capital. By the way, the talent aspects of this embedded in it as well. All these things would come together, and we think put us in a unique position to both attract capital into this game on behalf of the hyperscalers, but also help the hyperscalers understand that beyond the technology, there are ways to conduct business with 1 of these data centers that actually might reduce cost over time. and certainly could reduce volatility. So this isn't the core technology, but it's everything around it that sort of makes it more attractive. And so for us, this is just the beginning.

Okay. And also just 1 quick clarification. So when you talk about revenue-generating talent up 6%. I'm assuming that's a gross number. Could you put context over maybe some talent exits and what the net number would look like?

It's actually a net number because this question has come up, Tracy. So we've just been very explicit about warning to ensure that we give all the information that consumers to be transparent on it. So the 6% you should think of that as a net number. Four of those hires in the categories that we talked about previously, producers, brokers, account executives, health and benefit consultants. .

Our next questions come from the line of Andrew Kligerman with TD Cowen.

Amazing quarter across a lot of metrics. Focusing on the organic revenue growth, 2 areas. Edmond at Investor Day, you talked about 4% gross net talent growth. Is that something you think that you could do going forward into 28 -- '26. And then you've touched a lot on this call about middle market opportunities. Is that coming from an SP people? Is it coming from prior Aon talent. Where is it coming from? I suspect it's your investments in analytics and human capital as you've addressed all one. But I'm kind of curious where in the company it's coming from?

Yes. So let me hit the first part, Andrew, and thank you for the question because it's an important one, and then maybe I'll turn the second on middle market to Greg as well. On the first one, I will sort of direct you back to what you and I have specifically discussed our engine in ABS that allows us to get scale improvements up to 120 basis points the expense discipline that we have, that gives us the capacity to make investments.

And I think I sort of quantify up to 60 basis points in investments. Those investments right now are focused on revenue-generating hires in priority strategic growth areas. They're focused on some of our capabilities within ABS, but the model itself is intended to be able to drive capacity to both invest and have margin expansion. We talked about 70 to 100 basis points as a sort of ongoing model over time here. And so we feel good about continuing to drive that growth engine and having the capacity. It's not a onetime thing for us. We think a continued focus on this, making this ongoing in the right areas because that changes over time as well. the growth areas. We're focused on making this an ongoing part of our strategic growth model here. And Greg, maybe the or the middle markets.

Yes. And listen, before I get to middle market to, again, Andrew, I appreciate the question. Remember back to Investor Day, we talked about the 3x3 and all we are going to accomplish risk capital, human capital ABS delivered to enterprise client all the pieces around that and the investments we're making behind that. And then Edmond described what really is the growth algorithm and what we're trying to do. that piece, go back to the math behind that, really, it truly does kind of capture everything we're doing operationally to a financial outcome, which is really the capacity to improve margin and invest and invest on an ongoing basis. This is a very -- for us.

Now the very powerful construct, and that's why we were so committed and that's why we made the investment on the building to kind of make that really happen and bring that to life. So I don't want to lose that. That's so important in sort of your question. And then fundamentally, middle market is one aspect of that. It's the $31 billion North America and U.S. market that we didn't have access to in the way we do now.

NFP, high expectations, as we described at Investor Day, exceeded in so many ways in terms of what we've been able to accomplish, not just as the middle market segment, but also what we can bring to the middle market with our content and capability and what NFPs brought to Aon in their view. So and perspectives and their client leadership. So for us, it was one aspect of the entire growth algorithm that's sort of being brought to bear here, but an important 1 and an exciting one. And we're very pleased to have brought the end of the panel to do this.

Got it. And as we kind of approach the end of the year, it seems like with that divestiture of the NFP Wealth business, you've kind of met your leverage objective. So as you do look at M&A and you cost about $32 million of EBITDA for NFP deals in the quarter. Are there potentially big ones out there that you could do? Is that something you're thinking about? And do you feel like 1.5 years in you're ready to do it, the NFP is assimilated enough that you could do a bigger middle market type deal?

So Andrew, I think Edmond might have answered this earlier in the call. I'll answer it again. He'll do it better than me. No doubt. Listen, you know where we are. We are absolutely focused on long-term shareholder value creation, making the decisions to sort of drive that. That's the capital allocation piece. And as you highlighted, we actively manage this. This is not something we leave the chance, and we'll take the hard decisions, the difficult ones. The divestitures are hard, but they're important because they create capacity to do what we need to do.

And then we'll make calls based on based on what really is the best answer from a long-term shareholder value creation opportunity for Aon. So you're right, we've got great flexibility based on the terrific work of our teams around the world from a balance sheet standpoint and anticipate we're going to do our level best to make sure we're making the right calls on behalf of long-term value creation.

Thank you. I would now like to turn the call back over to Greg Case for closing remarks.

Just want to say thanks again for joining us, and we look forward to an opportunity to job with you in the next quarter. Take care.

Thank you. This does conclude today's teleconference. We appreciate your participation. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Enjoy the rest of your day. .

Good day. Thank you for joining us as we present the results for the Q3 Labor Market Study. A couple of housekeeping items before we begin. [Operator Instructions]

With that said, I'd like to introduce Jeff Rieder, Head of STG Performance Benchmarking with Aon. Jeff?

All right, Thanks. And good to be with everybody today. We're excited to present the latest findings of the Labor outlook study. There's a lot of very interesting trends coming through here. And as -- for those that aren't as familiar with the Ward and STG Performance Benchmarking. We're a division within Aon's Strategy and Technology Group, providing benchmarking and consulting services around really all aspects of the insurance industry, focusing predominantly on staffing levels, compensation, business practices and other areas. If you like more information, feel free to visit us on our website.

And Jeff Blair, I'll hand it off to you.

Thank you, Jeff. Welcome, everybody, to our twice-a-year Labor Study review. A little bit about Jacobson Group. Jacobson has been the leading talent provider for the insurance industry for over the past 50 years. We support virtually any human capital need you could have, including executive search, services, professional recruiting, temporary staffing and interim experts. Feel free to visit our website at jacobsongroup.com, if you'd like to learn more.

Okay. So at a high level, the objectives of our study is to provide an analysis of the labor trends and staffing expectations of the insurance market in the U.S., provide some insights into some of the staffing challenges that we're seeing by discipline and provide commentary on the insurance labor market.

A little bit about our participant profile. As you can see, we have a mix of different carrier sizes, expertise and also what markets. And to give you an idea of scope and scale. Through this process, we are covering almost 15% of the insurance market by employees.

For those that may be interested too, you'll see the average number of companies or employees, I should say, is approximately 2,212, and that would loosely translate on average to companies of approximately $2.5 billion to $3 billion in premium range as well. And one thing you'll note that as in prior studies, it's a bit more heavily emphasis on the property and casualty market, representing about 84% of the participants here as well. So as we go through, we may skew a little bit towards commentary as it relates to the P&C market just because of the profile participant group there. But we'll be sure to call out there are some unique and notable difference that we're seeing between the P&C and the Life and Health market as well.

Okay. So where we can start is if we take a look at the overall unemployment rates, as you can see, the national average, is at 4.2% and the unemployment rate within the insurance sector is 2.3%. To give you an idea of how that compares insurance is down from a 3.1% unemployment at the beginning of the year and the overall, which was at 4%, has gone up to 4.2%. So the stability of the employment market within insurance has remained strong.

There are challenges that come with the low unemployment. It does increase difficulty for recruiting and retaining employees and it can drive up wage costs. Additionally, it can also limit the industry's ability to grow organically if we don't have enough people in the industry to support the growth.

So if we look at total carrier employment, it has remained fairly flat. I mean it's down 0.5% since January and has remained flat and below the pre-pandemic results. To give you an idea where some of the growth is coming from some of the largest growth is coming from the producers, agents and brokers. And over this last few months, we have seen Life and Health go down by 1%. P&C is up slightly. But overall, the industry is fairly flat when it comes to total number of jobs available.

As we look at the staffing plans versus revenue expectations over the next 12-month period, we can see that on a good side that the number or percentage of companies expecting to grow revenue is at 81%, with really only a 5% expecting to decrease revenue. But in past years, we'd see that the growth in staffing expectations were largely aligned. And now we're starting to see for a sustained period now for at least 18 months that there has been somewhat of a divergence in terms of the companies expecting to grow staff relative to revenue expectations, with only about 53% expected to increase staff.

So as we look at the trend graph, this gives us a bit of a perspective. And I can't believe it's already been now our 16th year of conducting the study. We started this just as we were kind of going through the recession back in 2008. And back then, we saw that the market conditions in terms of overall economic performance relative to industry here kind of synced up a lot.

Then we went through that cycle from 2011 through 2020, which was relatively stable before the pandemic in 2020, which then we saw a spike in the percentage of companies expecting to decrease employees nearing 20%.

Now as we look at the last 3 -- really 4 cycles that the percentage of company is expecting to increase staff, going back to July of 2023, has stayed right around that 50 to 55 percentage mark.

The one thing that is interesting is noting the percentage of companies that are expected to decrease employees during that same period. So hovering at 14%, we've not seen that kind of sustained level near the mid-teen level since the emergence of the pandemic back in 2010 -- or not but the recession. So it's very interesting. There are certainly a lot of color commentary that we can make about this. Again, for the P&C industry, in particular, we had, in total, very strong sustained growth in premium, not only over the last 4-year period, but last 5-year period where many organizations grew anywhere from 20% to 40% in premium in many cases.

But I think what this is showing is that, one, that premium was very much driven off of rate growth rather than true organic growth in policy count or even there was some expansion in the overall underlying coverages. But companies now are a bit more cautious in terms of their hiring expectations, knowing that the growth was driven off of rate versus true underlying policy growth.

And then in the last -- certainly the last 6 months, the -- I'll say, uncertainty around tariffs and the impact that, that was going to have on the business has made companies perhaps a bit more cautious as well. We do know that for many companies, they have been exposed to severe catastrophes, convective storms, the wildfires that impacted California in the first month or 2 of this year as well. And when we couple that with the backdrop of artificial intelligence and technology gains, we're seeing that in many cases, this is perhaps tempering the staffing plans and staffing outlook.

As we look at some of the larger life insurance companies, we've also noted that many organizations have begun to offshore certain activities, whether it's some of the core Accounting activities or other activities like that. There has been a shift in larger organizations to offshoring or outsourcing some of those key activities as well. So I think as we look at the staffing plans, all of this is coming together to perhaps keep smaller growth in staffing expected.

And Jeff, I'll let you kind of talk more about these trends here, too.

Sure. Sure. So it is interesting that 81% of the companies expect an increase in revenue growth, and this is an increase from our previous 2 surveys. So I think people -- I think our respondents in the market are seeing positive opportunities. But I think based on what Jeff was sharing, it is not necessarily aligning with significant staff increases. Now 57% are assuming the primary drivers expected to be revenue changes through market share increase, and that varies a bit by product line. Life and Health growth is almost entirely being predicted due to market share increase as opposed to getting any sort of pricing increase, which does make sense given the current state of the market.

Additionally to the factors that Jeff laid out, and I think this applies quite strongly in the health space is it feels like every day, different health care carriers are exiting certain markets, which can definitely impact staffing going forward. Regional and commercial P&C carriers are higher than average in looking to reduce staff, and I think it does tie into some of our other results around investments in operational efficiencies and things in automation is having an impact, particularly at the lower levels in the organization.

So if we take a look at the 12-month staffing plan versus actual, the level of gains. And in the areas that we expected to add staff, we tended to be a little bit more than we expected. Now it's more in the moderate growth but we are seeing that. And also the reduction levels also in the last 12 months were lower than expected. And I think tying back to something Jeff said earlier, coming off such a strong premium growth year and combined ratio year, it's not surprising that the potential reductions may have not occurred because of the financial improvements and the financial results for the year. But I also think that we're seeing coming in towards the end of the year that maybe there was some concerns going into this calendar year, which may have pared back some of the more aggressive staff increase plans.

This is given a comparison now against the P&C and the Life/Health industry. And what's interesting, you can see on the Life/Health side, significantly more percentage of the companies, I should say, that are expecting to increase employees relative to the P&C side. The dark blue shows the kind of actual staffing plan that happened over the prior 12-month period compared to the light blue, which has shown with the plan from a year ago. And so what we'll see is that on the P&C side, the higher percentage of companies last year at this time, 16%. We're expecting to decrease employees, and that only translated into about 9%.

But in terms of the expectations to increase, that was pretty consistent on both the P&C and the life side. But we did see on the actual staffing for life, about 30% of the organization actually did report a decrease in staff as well.

So there have been, particularly on the life side, the annuity production that has been a challenge for many organizations while it has grown, whereas on life side for companies that were focused on life seeing very strong productions in life premium. So some of this may also be influenced by the product focus within those organizations as well.

And then as we look at the job openings in finance, here, we can also see that there has been a notable decrease since the kind of reemergence from the pandemic in 2021, 2022, where we peaked at 393,000 job openings in finance and insurance. The BLS does not break this out for insurance specifically. But I think this is indicative of what we're seeing in our data here with a small decrease, particularly over the last 1-year period, dropping from 327,000 to 307,000. So -- and this is an annualized average. As we look at the position where we were reported from the BLS, that was 246,000 in June specifically.

So all the trends are really kind of pointing out to perhaps very modest expectations for growth in headcount, particularly as there's fewer job openings, roughly 10% fewer than what we saw at this time 2 years ago.

Then as we look at the staffing plans, the dark blue is showing July '25 compared to a year ago with light blue. Not a whole lot of notable changes between the 2 other than we'll see that both now and a year ago, about 33% expecting to stay flat in total headcount, whereas when we see the percentage of companies expecting to decrease employees here, we're only seeing 9% expecting less than 2% and 4%, 2% to 4%.

So what that's telling us is that perhaps a lot of the large reduction in force that had occurred through many organizations over the prior 2- or 3-year period are perhaps not going to be as pronounced. There has been recent news from some large national carriers about staffing reductions. But when we see the reductions in staff, oftentimes, it's fewer than 200 employees or maybe 100 employees or 50 employees here and there. So these are significantly smaller reduction in force. And in a lot of cases, they tend to be areas that are back-office support functions, whether that's finance or occupancy as a return to work has limited the need for maintenance staff.

And then when we look at the growth in areas, what's interesting here is that we'll see a higher percentage of companies that are just expecting to grow staff in that 2% to 4% range, representing about 33% of the respondents here growing in those ranges as well.

A couple of points to note here, too, is that we did see the Commercial Lines, P&C companies, in particular, were noting a greater growth in headcount, which translated to about 12 and 9 points higher than Personal Lines and the Balanced Lines companies, respectively. And in particular, we'll see more -- we'll talk more about some of the changes that we're seeing in the Commercial Lines sector relative to Personal Lines as well. But it does appear to be more optimistic for growth in Commercial Lines, and that may be due to the sustained levels of profitability in that sector relative to the Personal Lines sector as well.

And then as we look at the -- then quick staffing plans on P&C versus life. So this is a forward-looking outlook, just to kind of summarize the numbers we just looked at 54% expecting to increase staff on the P&C side compared to 51% a year ago. And then just a slight dip in the life sector at 60%, expecting growing compared to 69% a year ago. So just general themes there, you can see just a bit more growth on the life side relative to -- in terms of number of companies expecting to grow relative to P&C.

And then the -- how this compared by employee size is also notable that we see some very large discrepancies particularly around the companies that we're expecting to decrease employees there on the far right. So here, we're breaking out by employee size, small being under 300 employees, medium being 300 to 1,000 and then large over 1,000 employees, and a very notable difference there in the decreasing staff that smaller organizations, only 3% were expected to decrease, whereas you can see, 20% to 25% of the medium- and large-sized companies.

And again, that references to some extent, organizations that are shifting their business profile, for example, those that might be deemphasizing Personal Lines or perhaps shrinking their footprint for Personal Lines operations or, in some cases, companies that are that may have both a life and P&C operations focusing on one or the other. So some of that is really more of an emphasis on core -- focusing on core operations. And then lastly is also to note that the impact of a bit of the outsourcing and offshoring is also coming through in particularly larger organizations as well.

Okay. If we take a look at the use of temporary employees during the next 12 months, as you can see, 84% are going to maintain, 5% are going to increase and 11% are going to decrease. To give you some perspective, there is -- we are seeing some differences by industry sector within insurance, Life and Health actually has the largest -- has a higher percentage increase in temp staff usage and P&C carriers and the P&C portion are driving the increase in sort of -- or the reduction in the number of companies that are increasing their temp staffing levels.

So the idea of a 5% increase out of the companies that we've -- in the survey, this is the lowest level of increase we've seen since 2016. And while overall, it's -- directionally, that follows with what we're seeing in the market. Automation can be impacting temp usage. And also, as Jeff mentioned, offshoring could also be replacing some of the areas that temps are being used, and we can see some of the lack of increase and more decreasing of temps. But overall, still 89% are planning to increase or maintain their current levels.

So voluntary and involuntary turnover percentage, and we're seeing an increase in both voluntary and involuntary at both the 12- and 6-month window. And while these numbers are a little bit higher than we had in the past, they're still well below the professional and financial services benchmarks.

When we look and break this out a little bit between industry sector, Life/Health is driving the increase and P&C is relatively flat from a turnover standpoint. Within P&C, Personal Lines has the highest voluntary turnover. Now a voluntary turnover can also be a result of confidence in the market, employee sentiment and more willingness to change companies.

We saw the largest turnover figures in the larger companies also. And again, still within a pretty reasonable range. I think the involuntary, I think there's a combination of things we're seeing. There have been some reorganizations that have driven that. And also as we're in more of a comfortable area from an economic standpoint. I think there's been an increase in performance management, and getting back to basics at a lot of insurance companies, which could also be impacting involuntary turnover.

So if we take a look at some notable survey trends, the insurance carrier employment expectations increased over the past year. The total headcount grew by 1.37% compared to what we anticipated at 0.58%. One of the things we noticed is there's more volatility in the Personal Lines, which definitely can make sense, given the combination of premium growth and expansion, but also exiting markets. And so I think the combination has both higher voluntary and involuntary percentages.

At the same time that the headcount is growing. So while we're growing, we also are experiencing turnover. So essentially, we are seeing some change here, sorry.

Now when we start looking at different jobs and job families, overall, if we look at this, the difficulty as it was rated in these different areas, is down in the last 6 months -- or last 12 months, I should say, in 9 out of the 12 categories. But the majority remaining above the 5%, which is where we see difficulty. I think that there is more market stability which does increase employees' willingness to move, which can create some openings, can create turnover. But at the same time, there is -- depending on the type of role, there are definitely some significant challenges. Difficulty in recruiting is particularly high for executives in Life and Health and in Personal Lines and with regional carriers and Actuarial and Technology are of a particular challenge in the Personal Lines.

This is just looking at the ability to hire talent now compared to a year ago. And a good thing here is that we see only 11% of companies responding that it was moderately worse and 1% significantly worse. So I think this really just kind of reemphasize what we're just seeing a moment ago on the difficulty in recruiting challenges. Most of those areas were coming in lower, and this reflects this as well. Compared to a year ago, the number was about 11% for the companies that were anticipating that or saying that it was more difficult to hire. So that's essentially staying about flat. But really good to see that as we remember back during the pandemic, we were seeing that many companies, more than half reporting the difficulty in the very challenging labor times.

The one thing that will kind of reflect as it relates to compensation levels that all of these trends are also resulting in more stable compensation programs, if you will.

And what I mean by that is in 2022 and 2023, we were seeing significant challenges as it related to companies that maintain competitive compensation levels. Many organizations had to make significant increases in pay levels. In some cases, it was for whole job families at the times. In particular, we were seeing areas like Claims, workers' compensation claims in particular, but just Claims in general. Then we saw spikes in Underwriting and business development staff, where companies were needing to make significant mid-market cycle changes and things like that.

That has leveled off significantly over the last year, where -- while companies are certainly maintaining competitive compensation programs, it's not like they're chasing the market the way it was perhaps 2 years ago.

Jeff, I think -- isn't this one yours?

Okay. Yes. That's okay. Sorry about that. Yes, this is just looking at the level of difficulty to recruit by staff, and -- or likely to increase by staff. And really interesting here, 2 trends that pop out significantly. One is you'll see Technology, while it ranked as the #1 function, the life organizations marked by that gray bar, were responding as the #1 area that they were likely to increase staff. If we transpose that to the P&C industry, though, you'll see the Underwriting function would have actually ranked #1 with the Balanced and Commercial Lines-focused companies expecting to grow there.

And process not too surprising as we've pointed out, some of the changes in Commercial Lines, there has been an emphasis on companies that -- and may not necessarily just carrier but a growth in MGA and MGU carrier, or I should say, Underwriting staff appointments. And then as companies are looking to expand their Underwriting footprint. In some cases, it is new product lines, but we've also seen a growth in the specialty and excess and surplus line space, where traditional carriers are now entering that market. In some cases, it has been through acquisition. But in other cases, it's -- and by acquisition, I mean, a company acquisition, whereas now companies are also looking to build those teams organically.

And certainly, in Personal Lines, we wouldn't expect that where that is a -- the Underwriting function is highly automated. And on the life side, certainly, that wouldn't have much of an impact for annuity writers. We're also seeing the expansion of accelerated Underwriting programs which is why perhaps we're seeing more of that investments in Technology to offset that.

The other piece I'd add with technology for the life sector, we have noted that there has been a significant uptick, particularly in the last 2-year period for core system replacements. And the P&C industry really expanded on all those kind of core systems starting back in the late 2000s, but through the 2000 to 2010 cycles is where heavy core system replacements went into place to replace those legacy systems. And now we're seeing that on the life side.

Another component that does stand out here as a bit of a surprise is the Sales and Marketing, where for a few cycles, we were seeing that business development activity spiking up and that has now dropped to the #6 function offsetting that has been the Analytics and Actuarial activities. So these would be, as you would expect, your business intelligence, actuarial sciences for pricing and product development activities to some extent, but that's more in Product Management. But also now as companies are investing in artificial intelligence and the applications there that tends to fall within this analytics function as well. So we should expect to see a high growth in -- or not high growth, but high emphasis on the need for staff and analytics.

And then just one last piece is Claims kind of sticking there in that #3 spot. That has been historically kind of back and forth between 2 and 3 in many of the cycle iterations. But it's pretty consistent across all levels of -- or I should say, all product focus, if you will. And many of you may recall that certainly Claims frequency dropped significantly in the 2020 and '21 cycle as business and broader economic activity was slowed during the pandemic recovery stages.

In most cases, now we're seeing that Claims frequency has rebounded back to normal levels or even slightly higher as well. And so what's been interesting is for many carriers is there had been a reduction in Claims staff during that time period, and they lost many individuals, which is now requiring some organizations to rely more heavily on third-party adjusters to meet the Claims demand. We're also seeing that with the growth in wildfire, severe convective storms, et cetera, that the organization companies that have property -- large property exposures are building out their catastrophe teams again. And those had, to some extent, been reduced in size or scope significantly over the prior 15-year period, whereas now those property catastrophe teams are being a heavy focus as well. So that can also be impacting some of those Claims staffing levels, too.

Okay. Jeff, one of the things I wanted to add here, too, when we're looking at increasing staff, it's also what level of staff and what I thought was interesting, is there seems to be some consistency by sector where, for instance, the vast majority of the tech staff that people are looking to recruit or to add is at the experience level, less than 10% is entry level. So essentially competing for all the same resources.

And then if we look at Underwriting, 75% are looking to only add experienced underwriters. But where I saw a little bit of the difference was Life/Health and Personal Lines are looking to -- almost 50% of their hiring is entry level, which is interesting given a lot being invested in the technology, but also points to sort of a shortage of enough experienced underwriters. So that I think, particularly in the Health/Life and Personal Lines, there is some increase in bringing in entry-level underwriters.

Okay. So if we look at the likelihood that we're going to be increasing staff, our results are saying 10 out of 12 categories where we -- our survey shows that companies are going to be increasing staff. P&C, the largest increases from 2024 are both in Operations and Executives from a percentage standpoint. And for P&C, the largest decreases are in Loss Control and Claims to give you an idea of where, from a broad picture.

Interestingly enough, apparently, Accounting has popped up on the Life/Health for the largest increase in needs, and there are some decreases in overall Underwriting and Sales and Marketing.

So while across the board, we're not at levels that we were at in previous years. We have seen a slight increase in comparing year-over-year.

This kind of speaks to your comment, too, Jeff, regarding the level of employee coming in. And overall, we can see that companies were expecting to increase or I should say, add employees 20% at that entry-level position. And this is up a little bit over the last -- certainly since our January cycle, but you can see Operations folks, which makes sense. Those are our call center, typically your entry-level type positions. 44% would be entry-level. Claims due to some of the challenges in labor, 29% are expected to be entry in terms of the competitive environment there. But what's interesting as we look at the areas that were more focused on entry levels, including the Underwriting, Actuarial and Accounting functions. The flip side of that for Technology only 8% of rules are expected to be filled by entry-level positions.

And so some of these areas around whether it's Technology, Compliance or Product Management as companies are looking to add experienced staff that oftentimes will have an impact on the compensation levels there as well, meaning that in some cases, they'll be filling positions with incumbents that might be coming in at a higher level than the outgoing individual as well.

So I think it's good to see that there's more of an emphasis on those entry-level positions that may require companies to invest more in their training programs as well to support that as well. And typically, training is one of those areas that when time gets tough in terms of meeting financial projections and growth, training tends to fall a little bit to the wayside. So hopefully, this means that there will be more investments in training programs as well.

And then as we look at the reasons for companies as they are increasing staff, and this will add up to more than 100 because companies could respond to multiple responses here. But 35% of those organizations that will be increasing. So again, this is 35% of the roughly 50% expansion into new markets or new business compared to 32%, showing an increase in business volume and 23% reflecting that the area was currently understaffed.

One thing that came out loud and clear as we look at the individual results, though, by a company, the Commercial Lines sector, in particular, was responding at a significantly higher level of the expansion into new business or new business markets. And that is, again, not surprising, again, reflecting on the specialty, E&S and some of those other market spaces that have been significantly more profitable. I believe now the E&S space represents more than 25% or roughly 25% of the overall Commercial Lines premium, which has more than tripled over the last 20 years in terms of the percentage of business there.

The other piece that, as we look for the Personal Lines side, it has taken a good solid 2 years for companies to implement their new rating and pricing programs to reflect the -- essentially to meet their profitability targets. And now that we're seeing the Personal Lines sector back to historical profitability levels we are starting to see some of those Personal Lines companies responding that they're expecting to grow business, and that will be through policy count growth and things like that as well. But that tends to be right now more focused on the larger direct and captive agency organizations that are focusing on growth in Personal Lines, whereas with many of the independent agency companies, there's not as much growth that we're seeing there relative to the direct and captive peers.

Then looking at the staff decreases here. While there were fewer, again, only about 14% of companies expecting to decrease staff. Many of the primary reasons given were automation requiring fewer staff and staffing reorganization. So -- and you can see 7% also overstaffed, which may be due to the improvement in automation as well. But again, fewer companies expecting to decrease staff but those were the leading reasons as well.

In terms of flexible work hours that are being offered, we can see that the vast majority, we'll say, 85% are offering flexible work hours. And just more broadly, flexibility and work, no surprise, has expanded significantly. But only 15% of respondents here have that they do not offer flexible work hours. And while it's not a direct compensation element, Jeff, I think you can particularly speak to the impact of flexible work hours and remote and hybrid work environment, the impact that, that has on recruiting and retaining staff.

Yes. I mean it's -- I feel like I'm saying this on a regular basis, but the genie is out of the bottle. And it is a real factor depending on what the environment, the candidate is coming from and what the environment is at the recruiting company. And if we are moving from a hybrid or remote to in-office all the time, that can be a significant challenge. There are people who want to be in an office, and that is not an issue. But for those that have already moved out and have this sort of flexibility and I'm counseling clients that this does have a compensation impact. It's viewed as a perk or a benefit that could be taken away. But it's also in the other direction, can be viewed as something that provides more flexibility if you move into -- move from a more restrictive to less restrictive.

I think the other piece too is, I think if there is a broad range of solutions, we have -- it is a smaller percentage of the market that requires all their employees to be in the office 5 days a week. And there are companies that are very successful with that. But as we're seeing that the majority offers some sort of flexibility. And part of it is really to be able to open yourself up to a larger job market. And that is increasingly important when we're looking at current employment levels, the needs we need in specific areas. This flexibility goes a long way in finding good candidates.

Yes. I think the next slide also kind of gives that view on the in-office expectations. It was a little bit surprised to see the increase there on the far right, in terms of 8% of organizations, expecting to require every day full-time office environment versus the number of -- or percentage of companies that are in 1 to 2 days versus 3 to 4 days has still been kind of hovering right around that 70% mark, here actually coming a little bit above that at 78%.

And the -- what's interesting is I'll be curious over time, if this changes a bit based on the experience of the employee or the tenure of the employee. And Jeff, I don't know if you have any market intelligence of what you're seeing there, if companies are moderating that by experience. I know for some organizations, they are doing it at the executive level, where they're requiring executives to be in office at least 4 days a week, if not 5. But have you seen any changes in how companies are adopting that?

Yes. I mean we -- I have seen an increase as we move back that at least the top team is expected to be in the office, 4 or 5 days a week, relocation, if that's required. And then there's likely either an equal or a little bit less expectation at lower levels. I think the challenge is there are exceptions and some companies have taken a very hard line on exceptions. But there is still some movement in this direction.

I guess, Jeff, one of the things I'm -- I'd be interested in your view on is, is this -- are we reaching the end of this part of the transformation. We had this jolt with COVID and then in pandemic. And then we've -- there was a push to get back into the office then it slowed, but are we reaching the end of the transition? Or do you think this is the new normal and companies are going to move across this spectrum?

Yes. I think -- personally, I actually do think we're probably near the end of that. There is, in fact, an article that came out today with a large national organization that has kind of -- was pushing for in-office and had to retract a little bit. And I've seen that from a handful of companies. I'd say the biggest difference is it's easier for smaller and rural companies to adopt the in-office experience. And they'll often always make an exception for key positions where they're trying to get, say, an actuary or underwriter or even a nurse case manager as an example, where they're looking for specific skills that will require them to look on a national basis.

But at least at this point, I think that we're probably closer to stabilization of where companies are going to land on this issue in particular. And the other piece is there are some real cost benefits that can't be ignored. I joked around about the occupancy and maintenance are kind of commented about that. It wasn't too long ago, 10, 12 years ago that for most organizations, they were spending about 1.5% of premium just on their occupancy or footprint for that specifically.

And that number has dropped drastically to where most organizations are now spending less than 0.5% and sometimes even only 0.3% of their premium on occupancy costs. So that does translate into real savings, real benefits to the policyholder in terms of providing some pricing competition as well.

Right. Right. And I think the other thing, too, and you had mentioned like the home offices that are in smaller locations. I mean these are -- they're essentially they could be like company towns. And even when people were working at home, they weren't hiring nationally. So they -- for the most part, they stayed local. And it is a different transition to bring employees that were specifically in the office, back into the office and they're all local. I think what we've seen is quite a bit of the industry use this opportunity to do more national hiring or regional hiring. And then it becomes much more difficult to put the genie back in the bottle at that point.

Yes. And then the last piece here, as we're looking at the expectations going forward, only 6% of companies are expecting to see employees in the office more, whereas kind of 93% expect the model to be about the same. So I think this speaks to our earlier conversation that we're probably closer to where we'll end up just based on these expectations as well.

I do want to talk to the companies that are going to require people to be in there less. I'd like to know a little bit more about that.

Okay. So in summary, 53% of companies plan to increase staff in the next 12 months. And as Jeff pointed out earlier, Life/Health is at the highest level, and 14% are planning to reduce the number of employees. And this is the same total. It's relatively flat. 66% of small companies, so the smaller plan to add staff in the next 12 months. And this is higher -- this is 10% and 29% higher than medium-sized companies, respectively. So that is sort of from a staffing standpoint.

From a revenue standpoint, as we said earlier, 81% are expected growth, and that is a higher expectation than seeing last July and personalized -- Personal Lines company -- Personal Lines P&C are the most optimistic, and 94% expect growth compared to -- in the 80s and into the 70s for other P&C lines of insurance. And I think that also tracks with what we're seeing in the market, what we've seen with rate relief and what's going on the Personal Lines.

And 89% of the Life/Health companies expect an increase in revenue. And as I mentioned earlier, coming mostly from -- more from market share increases.

The primary reasons the companies are looking to expand staff is business at new markets and an increase in expected business volume. So the higher premium and then drive -- the higher premiums, raising appetite, driving more business in. And automation, as we would expect, is the most common reason companies plan to reduce headcount in the next 12 months. And I think the conversations that I've been having and the things that I've been seeing, the automation -- a significant amount of the automation is not wide scale. It is more scaled for specific tasks, jobs. And so you're not seeing double-digit reductions in headcount because the smaller investment automation improvements are getting their ROI, but on a smaller percentage of employees.

Additionally, looking at overstaffing that, again, could be automation. But also I think there is still a little bit of a post-pandemic hangover, where there was so much hiring. And now even as results have become strong. There are instances where it's out of line with staffing and adjustments are being made.

As we look at the areas for growth, Technology, Underwriting and Claims roles will be expected to have the largest growth levels over the next 12 months. And Compliance, Product Management and Technology are areas where companies are most likely to add experienced staff compared to Operation and Claims roles having more likely to add entry-level positions. The Actuarial, Executive and Analytics functions remain the top 3 most difficult areas for companies to recruit for and that is now the fourth consecutive survey period where those have all been consistent there.

In total, 12% of companies feel the ability to hire talent has become more difficult compared to the prior year, and that is up from 11%. So very, very negligible increase there.

The 6-month turnover was 6%, which was 3.2% lower than the 12-month average turnover of 9.2%. And then again, the average involuntary turnover was also just slightly lower at 4.2% compared to 4.3% at the 12-month cycle.

During the next 6 months, 85% of companies are expected to, for most of their employees to be -- work a hybrid schedule. And then after the next 6 months, only 6% are expecting to change their approach, requiring employees to be in the office more. And then lastly, 8% of companies will require their staff to be in the office every day expected, and that is up from 4% in July last year.

So as we aggregate all the information here, and we look at the staffing expectations over the next 12-month period. This would translate into an anticipated increase of 1.03% in industry employment over the next 12 months, creating more jobs.

And as we look at that by sector, not a whole lot of difference between the life versus P&C, both hovering right around 1%. But we did note that the P&C balanced organizations, in particular, we're expecting to grow 2.4%. And balanced, -- or I should say, Commercial Lines, up about 1% compared to about 0.75% in the Personal Line space.

So we will be conducting this survey again next January, and we'll likely have those results ready for publication in the first or second week of February. If you like more information about how to participate feel free to contact Vincent Albers at [email protected].

We did get a couple of questions and have some time for those as well.

There was a question that came through on, do you have information on salary difference between Personal and Commercial Lines, specifically for Claims and Underwriting positions.

It's a good question. What's been interesting. We have seen those salary differences narrow over the time. Historically, going back 10 or 15 years, the Commercial Lines Underwriting and Claims positions for that matter, often have commanded higher levels. There has been less of a difference. Commercial Lines still does typically have a slightly higher level in the total increases in salary but not quite to the degree that it had been many years.

And in part of the reason for that is Personal Lines Underwriting has been very much automated, but the positions now that are being recruited for are sometimes more complex that it's a portfolio manager or a territory manager require more skills around the broader aspect of Personal Lines versus individual underwriting -- individual account underwriting aspects.

But Claims, the more of the notable difference has been particularly around workers' compensation claims where that role has been, in particular, in demand in the past couple of years, but not as much of a difference as what we've seen in the past.

And then there was a question, we unfortunately didn't have enough information on the health sector, specifically to track projected growth levels there. But we do not have that piece.

The question also came through in terms of retirement expectations within the insurance industry.

And what's interesting is the level of retirement for -- and Jeff, I'll let you comment if you've seen anything different. But we've seen the percentage of employees, we do a separate study, the percent of employees over the age of 60 and over the age of 70 have continued to increase and has become a large proportion of the employee population. But we have noted that for most companies, when they track the retirement levels on their turnover levels, it typically now is 2% to 3% for retiree turnover, which is significantly larger than historical levels.

We do anticipate with the still increasing of the Baby Boomer, which has become a smaller and smaller portion of the workforce. We'll likely see that retirement specifically will likely be 2% to 3% in terms of affecting employee turnover over the next year or probably in the next 2- to 3-year cycles as well.

And Jeff, I don't know if you've seen anything different from that as well.

No, no. It's an interesting topic because I think there's been identified a challenge in the insurance industry of we have the senior leaders and experts and people with significant experience and then there's a gap and how are we going to close that gap. And I think we've avoided the issue a little bit in that people are working longer, especially over the last couple of years, where there was maybe retirements weren't as likely, it wasn't financially as sound and people have hung on.

And now the question is, are we going to start to see an increase or a catch-up on people that maybe would have retired previously, but held on. I mean I feel like that let's watch the 401(k)s and that's going to -- when people are able to retire. But I do -- one of the things that we talk about with our clients quite a bit is this potential expertise gap. And how do we make sure that the individuals that are getting close to leaving the organization -- leaving the industry or getting ready to retire or people that are in that frame. How are we getting the best development of successors, knowledge transfer because I think the reality is we're not going to be able to solve this problem by recruiting people from other companies. There's going to be a shortage in this group.

And I'm hopeful my generation, the Gen X can step in for the Boomers that are leaving, but I think that is a challenge.

All right. Well, I know we are at time, and I appreciate everybody for participating, your information and your responses provide great content. And we hope this is informative for you as you think about staffing plans and models there.

So on behalf of Aon, we'd like to thank you very much for participating. And Jeff, I'll let you close it.

Yes. And also thank you, everyone, for taking the time and filling out those surveys. Looking forward to a going connecting with you again. We're going to send out the materials. And please feel free to reach out if you have any questions. Thank you, Vince for your help and Jeff, and look forward to our next webinar. Have a great rest of the day, everyone.

Good morning, and thank you for holding. Welcome to Aon plc's Second Quarter 2025 Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] I would also like to remind all parties that this call is being recorded. [Operator Instructions].

It is important to note that some of the comments in today's call may constitute certain statements that are forward-looking in nature, as defined by the Private Securities Reform Act of 1995. Such statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from historical results, or those anticipated. For information concerning these risk factors, please refer to our earnings release for this quarter and to our most recent quarterly or annual SEC filings, all of which are available on our website.

It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to Greg Case, CEO of Aon plc. Thank you. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Donna. Good morning, and welcome to our second quarter earnings call. I'm joined today by Edmund Reese, our CFO. And as always, we posted a detailed financial presentation on our website which Edmond will reference in his remarks.

To begin, we want to take a moment to reflect on the momentum coming out of our Investor Day, where we detailed why and how our client-centric Aon United strategy drive sustainable top line growth and exceptional free cash flow per share growth. Aon United, operationalized and accelerated by the 3x3 plan is driving meaningful performance demonstrated in our Q2 results, with continued momentum as we enter the second half of 2025, and look ahead to 2026.

Let's start with some Q2 highlights. We delivered a strong quarter, in line with our expectations, including 6% organic revenue growth, 19% adjusted EPS growth, and 59% free cash flow growth. For clients, facing an increasingly complex operating environment, our work to deliver for them has never been more essential, and we remain confident in our ability to meet their evolving needs, both now and over the long term.

At Investor Day, we discussed how market reality shaping the current operating landscape are complex and constantly evolving. Clients of all sizes, industries and geographies are challenged with how to address and respond to the interconnected megatrends of trade, technology, weather and workforce. And the pressure is only growing. In the weeks following Investor Day alone, we've seen several major developments but demonstrate the impact and connectivity of these megatrends.

The enactment of U.S. tax legislation and continued shifts in the global tariff landscape. Severe flooding in convective storms across the U.S., alongside record-breaking heat waves in both the U.S. and Europe. Events that have given historic first half catastrophe losses, disrupted supply chains, displaced workforces and caused widespread property damage. And significant workforce changes announced by some of the world's largest technology companies, citing the accelerated impact of AI on roles and responsibilities. These events, and many others, reinforce the importance of our Aon United strategy as we help clients make better decisions, and achieve better outcomes, in what is arguably the most complex operating environment they've ever faced.

Our strategy is working. As we detailed on Investor Day, the industrial strength foundation powering Aon United and driving sustainable top line growth and margin expansion is Aon Business Services. With ABS fully operationalized, we're winning more share in core markets, capturing demand in existing markets, and creating new demand in new categories. Let me highlight a few specific examples from the second quarter.

We are winning more in the core by deepening relationships with existing clients. One of the world's largest investment firms who previously engaged us solely on risk capital topics recently awarded us their U.S. and Global Benefits Advisory business. This win was driven by two key factors.

First, our integrated risk capital and human capital structure is unique in our industry and allows clients to employ a holistic risk strategy across their full business. Leveraging our scale and analytics, this leading global company could see their business differently across their own internal silos.

And second, our differentiated human capital analytics provide globally comparable insights that help them make better data-driven decisions.

We are also capturing demand in existing markets by developing new capabilities. In the second quarter, we launched [ Aon Broker CoPilot ], and placed our first client program, a game changer for our brokers, advisers and clients. This capability leverages Aon's global scale, proprietary data and embedded AI to provide an enhanced view into how the global insurance market is pricing risk, arming our team with insight into [indiscernible] of time market behavior.

Broker copilot augments predictive broking, enabling Aon brokers to match capital to risk in an unparalleled manner. And another example of how ABS assets support our colleagues to capture new demand and serve clients with superior solutions. And finally, we're creating new demand in new ways by innovating on the health of clients in categories like cyber, an expected area to drive outsized growth for Aon as sourcing sufficient and tailored cyber insurance remains a pressing concern for clients.

In Q2, we developed and placed a first-of-its-kind cyber reinsurance offering. [ Aon surge stop-loss ], which enables enhanced protection against cumulative cyber losses. Unlike traditional reinsurance products that require a specific event-driven -- event to trigger coverage, [ Aon surge stop loss ] triggers based on aggregate loss thresholds, resulting in broader, more flexible protection, an important evolution in the cyber reinsurance market, given the ever increasing risk of cyber attacks.

We also continue to invest in client-facing talent across high-growth areas, and our revenue-generating [indiscernible] are up 6% through June 30. Colleagues come to Aon because they recognize the competitive advantage of Aon's differentiated platform, and how it enables them to deliver superior client outcomes.

Finally, the $31 billion North American middle market remains a significant growth opportunity. Our integration of NFP continues to progress very well, and we're making meaningful progress toward our $80 million net revenue synergy target for 2025, as our combined team continues to unlock value by leveraging complementary capabilities and deep client relationships.

It's clear our Aon United strategy, powered by ABS continues to drive innovation, deliver actionable insights and match client risk with new sources of capital. Our strong first half performance and continued progress against the commitments to the 3x3 plan reinforce that we have the right strategy and plan in place to deliver long-term value. And as a result, we reaffirm our 2025 full year guidance, and our commitment to deliver double-digit free cash flow growth over the '23 to '26 3x3 plan period.

To conclude, I will highlight three points. First, as the global environment continues to evolve, Aon's capability and integrated solutions are mission critical for clients, to [ mitigate ] complexity, protect assets and grow their businesses. Second, our team is confident in our ability to capitalize on the compelling opportunities ahead and deliver long-term shareholder value. And the results today are just another proof point of the strength of our strategy. And third, we have momentum across our businesses. We are attracting great talent. We are capturing the growing middle market opportunity, and we are winning more with both new and existing clients.

Finally, to our over 60,000 colleagues around the world, thank you. Thank you for your commitment to our clients, each other, and our Aon United strategy, their dedication to driving force of our firm.

Now I'll turn the call over to Edmund for his thoughts on our financial performance and long-term opportunity to drive shareholder value creation. Edmund, over to you.

Thank you, Greg, and good morning, everyone. I'm excited to be here to discuss our second quarter results, which reflect both execution and the growing momentum of our 3x3 plan. And before we get into the details of our second quarter results, I want to take a moment to elevate what matters most.

There are three key proof points that best capture the momentum behind our strategy and the strength of our performance. These highlights provide the right context for the details that follow and underscore how our execution on the 3x3 plan is translating into tangible results.

First, we see clear evidence that our financial model is delivering is designed. Our investments in revenue-generating hires equipped with the analytical tools and client experience enhancements enabled by Aon Business Services, or ABS, are translating into sustainable mid-single-digit or greater organic revenue growth. Organic revenue growth was 6% for the quarter and we are winning new business, expanding our relationships with existing clients and doing so with greater client engagement.

Second, these Q2 results are not just about top line performance. They reflect our ability to invest in growth and expand margins, not through cost cutting, but through operating leverage. The scale improvements powered by ABS, along with our restructuring program savings, created capacity to fund growth investments while still expanding margins by 80 basis points over last year, in line with our long-term model.

Third, the top line strength, coupled with the operating leverage drove 19% adjusted EPS growth year-over-year, and we converted those earnings into 59% free cash flow growth in the quarter, a clear demonstration of the strength of our earnings power and capital position. This performance reinforces our conviction in delivering double-digit free cash flow growth, for the full year, and it gives us the flexibility to execute across all dimensions of our capital allocation strategy. We remain on track to meet our leverage objective, continue our disciplined middle-market M&A strategy, and returned $1 billion in capital to shareholders via share repurchases this year.

Taken together, our first half performance, 5% organic revenue growth and 8% adjusted EPS growth, reflects the strength and resilience of our business and financial model and the discipline of our execution. In the macro environment that remains uncertain, we are delivering results by deepening client relationships and creating more value for clients through data insights and innovative capital solutions. We are driving growth through our investments and data capabilities, expanding margins through ABS, and converting earnings into strong free cash flow. This gives us confidence in achieving our full year 2025 guidance.

So now turning to the second quarter results in the financial summary on Slide 5. You see that we delivered 6% organic revenue growth in the second quarter, and total revenue increased 11% to $4.2 billion. Adjusted operating margin was 28.2%, up 80 basis points for the quarter, in line with our expectations. And this includes the impact from NFP, as we lap the anniversary of the acquisition at the end of April, resulting in a more normalized margin profile going forward. Adjusted EPS was $3.49. And finally, free cash flow increased to $732 million, reflecting strong adjusted operating income growth and continued improvement in days sales outstanding.

Let's get into the details of these results, starting with organic revenue growth on Slide 6. Organic revenue growth in Q2 '25 was in line with our mid-single digit or greater guidance range. Growth was broad-based with 3 of our 4 solution lines, Commercial Risk, Reinsurance and Health, each delivering 6% organic revenue growth, reflecting strong new business performance and high retention.

In Commercial Risk, the 6% organic revenue growth in Q2 reflected strong performance in our core P&C business with meaningful contributions from both North America and EMEA, as well as strength in M&A services relative to prior year, and double-digit growth in construction. Notably, construction and renewable energy projects remain key areas of focus for us with activity levels continuing to be robust.

In Reinsurance, organic revenue growth was 6%, driven by double-digit growth in our insurance-linked securities business, where we continue to lead the market in cat bond placements, now totaling $50 billion outstanding. We saw double-digit growth in facultative placements in EMEA and Asia Pacific, which helped offset softer April 1 property renewals where rates declined 5% to 20%. Looking ahead, we continue to expect full year organic revenue growth in line with our mid-single-digit or greater objective. Supported by higher limits at July 1 renewals, continued momentum in international facultative placements and strong demand for analytics from our strategy and technology group.

Health Solutions also delivered 6% growth in the quarter and benefited from continued strength in our core Health and Benefits business, especially across international markets. Growth was fueled by net new business and market dynamics that continue to drive rising health care costs. We also saw a strong contribution from NFP, most notably in executive benefits and pharmacy solutions, where demand remains elevated.

And finally, Wealth generated 3% organic revenue growth on top of 9% growth in the prior year period. The performance this quarter was driven by regulatory work across the U.K. and EMEA. We also saw a meaningful contribution from NFP asset inflows and market performance.

So let me take a moment now to walk through the components of our Q2 organic revenue growth on Slide 7. As I shared at Investor Day, Aon has a consistent track record of generating new business, and that continued in Q2. In the quarter, new business powered organic revenue growth and contributed 11 points, with an equal contribution from both new clients and expansion with existing clients. Our investments in revenue-generating talent, in high-growth areas like construction and energy are delivering measurable impact.

Revenue-generating head count is up 6% through the first half, and these colleagues are equipped with advanced data analytics and capabilities from ABS, enabling them to win more business. We continue to expect these investments to support sustainable organic revenue growth, with the 2024 cohort projected to contribute 30 to 35 basis points to full year organic revenue growth.

Q2 '25 retention improved by 1 point year-over-year, driven by continued gains in commercial risk, as we expand enterprise client leader coverage and deploy our Risk Capital Analyzer. Net new business contributed 5 points to organic revenue growth in the quarter. Net market impact, which captures the impact of rate and exposure, contributed approximately 1 point to organic revenue growth, consistent with our 0 to 2-point estimated range. Reinsurance was down from rate declines and higher retentions, and rate pressure in Commercial Risk was offset with limit and coverage increases across our book. Health and Wealth both benefited from positive net market impact with rising health care costs and favorable asset performance supporting growth.

And one final point on revenue. Second quarter fiduciary investment income was $66 million in the quarter, down 12% versus the prior year, while average balances increased lower interest rates more than offset that benefit.

On Slide 8, adjusted operating income was up 14% year-over-year to $1.2 billion, and adjusted operating margin was up 80 basis points to 28.2%. This margin expansion reflects the impact of the four components that we highlighted when we provided full year guidance. NFP, fiduciary investment income, restructuring and operating leverage, all of which are in line with our expectations.

While we absorbed a 1-month margin headwind from NFP given the April 2024 closing, our margin continued to benefit from the scale improvement driven by ABS and the savings from our restructuring program. Specifically, restructuring savings totaled $35 million in the quarter, contributing approximately 83 basis points to adjusted operating margin. We remain on track to deliver $150 million in restructuring savings for the full year, and are progressing well toward our goal of $350 million in run rate savings by 2026. Given our strong progress in the first half of the year, we remain confident and our ability to drive full year adjusted operating margin expansion of 80 to 90 basis points, consistent with our long-term model.

Moving to interest, other income and taxes on Slide 9. As we indicated last quarter, interest income was negligible in the second quarter, and $31 million lower than last year when we earned interest on funds held ahead of the NFP acquisition. Interest expense of $212 million was lower by $13 million versus the prior year, primarily due to lower average debt balances. We expect interest expense to be approximately $210 million in Q3 '25.

Other expense rose by $17 million year-over-year to $32 million, primarily due to the remeasurement of balance sheet items in nonfunctional currencies and higher noncash pension expense. We estimate Q3 '25 other expense to range between $25 million and $32 million. And finally, the Q2 tax rate was 16.5%, reflecting a favorable impact related to discrete items. While we expect variability in the quarterly rate, our year-to-date rate of 19.3% is in line with our expectations, and our full year tax outlook remains unchanged at 19.5% to 20.5%.

Turning now to free cash flow on Slide 10. We generated $732 million in free cash flow in the second quarter, up 59% year-over-year. On a year-to-date basis, free cash flow is up 13%, and this growth reflects strong adjusted operating income, including contributions from NFP, and continued improvements in days sales outstanding. This free cash flow performance gives us the flexibility to execute across all dimensions of our capital allocation strategy, and we continue to expect double-digit free cash flow growth in 2025.

Turning to capital allocation. On the right side of the page, we remain focused on executing our disciplined and balanced capital allocation. We continue to make progress on deleveraging, lowering our leverage ratio to 3.4x in the second quarter. We remain on track to achieve our target range of 2.8x to 3.0x by the fourth quarter of 2025, consistent with the objective we set when we announced the NFP acquisition.

We also remained active in M&A, continuing our targeted tuck-in acquisitions across priority areas, including middle market deals to NFP. Through June, NFP closed 8 acquisitions representing $20 million of EBITDA, with 80% of the EBITDA connected to P&C deals. Finally, we returned $411 million in capital to shareholders this quarter, due to dividend, and $250 million in share repurchases, keeping us on track for $1 billion in capital return through share repurchases for the full year. Each of these actions underpinned by strong free cash flow generation reflects our disciplined capital allocation model in action. Reducing leverage, investing in high-return growth and returning capital to shareholders.

So I'll conclude my prepared remarks on Slide 11 with some thoughts on our financial objectives and 2025 guidance. Our second quarter results, and our performance through the first half of 2025, reflect the strength of our financial model and our execution on our 3x3 plan. We are delivering sustainable organic revenue growth by investing in the capabilities that fuel growth. Client-facing talent, differentiated analytics, and seamless client experience through ABS.

Our organic revenue growth, combined with the initiatives we are executing across ABS to standardize operations and integrate platforms is creating capacity to fund our growth investments, while strengthening the foundation for ongoing margin expansion. This combination is enhancing our earnings power and positioning us to deliver on our full year commitments and long-term financial objectives. As a result, we are reaffirming our full year guidance, including mid-single-digit or greater organic revenue growth, 80 to 90 basis points of margin expansion, including $260 million in cumulative annual savings from our Aon United restructuring initiative, strong earnings growth, and double-digit free cash flow growth in 2025, and a double-digit 3-year CAGR for 2023 to 2026. We are executing with focus. We have momentum, and we remain confident in our ability to deliver long-term value for our shareholders.

So with that, let's jump into your questions. Donna, back to you.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question this morning is coming from Jimmy Bhullar of JPMorgan.

So first, just a question for Greg on the contribution to growth from capital markets activities and new hires. On new hires, I think Edmund had outlined at Investor Day that the contribution should pick up as you go through this year. So assuming that hasn't changed and -- but you could comment if it has?

And then on Capital Markets, not sure if you're seeing, or expecting a greater impact in the third and the fourth quarters versus what you've seen in the first half, given that it looks like M&A IPO activity across the board is picking up in several industries?

First of all, Jimmy, appreciate the questions. We'll start with M&A services and then maybe go to talent when you're asking your second question.

Listen, M&A services. You know this story well from our side. We love this space. We're unbelievably well positioned to win. We've been investing behind this capability because we know how important it is from a client standpoint, and we've been investing behind it in times when it wasn't doing so well. We have not -- we've said to you before on calls, we're going to [ quit ] projecting, and we're going to talk to you about the rearview mirror. [ As this ] has impact, you will see it have impact, and we've made progress in the quarter. Maybe describe it as better but not back. You certainly see the pipelines pick up, as you've heard the investment banks describe. But there's a tremendous amount of dry powder still out there on the sidelines, and we made progress.

And as Edmond described it was a tailwind in the quarter, but literally, the overall impact in our growth, in performance in the quarter was really very broad-based as Edmund described. So generally, very positive, good prospects, but I describe it as progress.

But Edmund, what else would you add before we go to talent?

Yes, just on the M&A point, Greg, just reiterating your point. It strengthened in Q1, Jimmy, and in Q2, that was modest, growing over a low base. There's modest growth in our second half outlook for M&A, and we still expect to maintain our mid-single-digit growth levels despite that. If it comes in stronger, then that will be a tailwind for us.

The point I want to emphasize is the point that Greg made about broad-based growth. M&A falls into our Commercial Risk segment, which was at 6% for the quarter, again, right in line with our expectations. We weren't surprised by that. That was strength driven by -- what I mentioned in my prepared remarks, our core P&C business in North America. Double-digit growth in construction. That means the priority hires. What you -- the next part of your question is contributing right in line with our expectations. M&A was a tailwind, but not the key driver.

I'll also point out in construction or international markets, particularly in EMEA and LatAm. And again, there, the growth was driven by new business and the impact of us hiring in those markets. So the growth was broad-based across our different solution lines, coming from new business and new hires.

And on your second question, Greg, do you want to -- should I start there? On the second question, you're right. We did -- I think the first thing, you heard me say it in the remarks, I'd point out is that through 6 months, were up 6% in revenue generating higher. So right in line with the 4% to 8% that we communicated at Investor Day. That is strong growth in the priority areas. We saw growth in energy. Again, I'll mention double-digit growth in construction. So those are areas that we think are outpacing GDP growth, what we're doubling down on.

Contribution at 11 points of contribution from new business to our organic revenue growth. That's broad-based, but there's a significant component of that as we start to see the new [ hires ] pickup in their contribution. So we still remain confident in what we said at Investor Day of 30 to 35 basis points of contribution from the [ '24 ] cohort of new hires.

And the last point I'll make on it is that we're just going to stay focused on this. We're a growth company. So we'll remain committed to investing in talent, in the tools that we talked about on the calls and the capabilities through ABS as well.

And maybe just a question on your preferred uses of free cash flow. You mentioned deleveraging as you had outlined at the end with the NFP deal. But just maybe comment on your interest in large M&A. It seems like the antitrust environment better than it was before, and some of your peers have done larger deals since you did the NFP acquisition. But just your interest in large-scale M&A as a use of capital?

Yes. Maybe I'll make a few points about where we are in our position, which is strength -- a position of strength. And then I'll turn it to Greg to talk a little bit broader about the environment.

But I start -- the answer to this question, which is the free cash flow growth? 59% in the quarter, 13% in the quarter -- 13% year-to-date coming from our operating income, coming from NFP, coming from integration and transaction costs winding down as we called out due at Investor Day. And so the confidence in double-digit free cash flow is very high, and that means that we are in a position of strength with flexibility.

And on that point about flexibility, the priority, of course, is giving that leverage ratio down. We're well on track to be able to do that. We're paying the dividend. But we will continue to evaluate assets that meet our strategic and financial criteria. We're very diligent on ensuring that our M&A decisions are accretive to returns.

I put up a slide during the Investor Day that said, 12% revenue growth after 1 year of ownership over 20% of IRR and industry-leading ROIC. So my point is that we are in a position of strength with the free cash flow. We have the flexibility. We're going to use the right criteria to evaluate, as we continue to invest for growth.

But Greg, maybe a little bit on the environment?

Yes. And listen, you captured it very well. Edmund. Jimmy, you get the point here. This is an underlying foundation that's driven our capital allocation decisions for a long time, just fully reinforced by Edmund. This is operating on strength with flexibility, but go back in time. Return on invested capital, cash-on-cash return, true evaluation across the spectrum.

And also remember, we're buying and selling, right? We are managing capital in a way in which we are absolutely focused on it. And we'll take steps to focus the portfolio if it's going to be helpful, and [ add to the ] portfolio in any way, it's going to support us as well, from dividend to buyback to acquisition in every way, shape or form. So I appreciate the question, but we're excited about the potential here.

The next question is coming from Elyse Greenspan of Wells Fargo.

My first question is also on the M&A transactional book. I was just wondering, is it overweight any geography, or industry vertical? Or is it pretty diversified?

And then directionally, is the margin better or worse than the core P&C margin within the Commercial Risk segment?

Appreciate the question, Elyse. Listen, we're happy to talk about M&A services all day long. So I just love the questions.

For us, remember, we have truly invested in world-class capability and content here. And we continue to do it when it wasn't as robust. The demand wasn't as robust for all the reasons that we all know. We described at the time that we have expanded our capability. So we expanded it both geographically, as well as beyond just sort of the classic [ PE ] focus. So it really is to the corporate world, too.

If you think about sort of the uses of M&A services, they've predominantly been directed towards the PE world, but equally compelling in the context of overall -- the overall corporate world. So from our standpoint, what we've got is broad-based capability and what we believe will be with time, very broad-based demand across the world, and now even broader in terms of sort of how it's going to be applied.

So again, we're excited about the potential. We've always has been. Nothing's changed there. But as Edmund and I both tried to describe better, not bad, right? There's a long way to go here with a lot of dry powder, and we're going to continue to see it evolve over time.

On the margin question, Edmund, can you maybe comment on that?

Yes. And I think, first, on the first question, your operative word there is broad-based. So at least the growth is a tailwind, but modest, but we saw that growth across all of our regions. EMEA was strong. Asia Pacific was strong, just like U.S. as well in the M&A space.

On the margin, I think your question is about margins in the components of Commercial Risk versus the other areas. I think the key thing for us is that Commercial Risk has a slightly higher margins, but the margins are in line. I don't pay too much attention to a particular -- we're an annual company. So the margin in a particular quarter isn't where I'd focus.

But most importantly, the key area of focus should be the expansion in both margins on the commercial risk side and on the human capital side, and we're seeing that expansion across both the segments, because it's driven by the operating leverage and the scale improvements that we get through ABS. And we're seeing it across our solutions.

And then my second question. I was hoping you could spend a little bit more time on what drove the pretty strong free cash flow growth in the quarter? And then I know the full year guide is for $300 million from NFP free cash flow. Where do we sit through the first half of the year?

Yes. So I caught that -- I mean, again, you're answering the question within the question there. Those are the drivers.

Like I think there are four areas to keep your eyes on when you think about our free cash flow growth and how we get to double digit. One is the operating income growth and within that NFP. Both of those items were a contributor for us in the quarter. So we feel very good about the $300 million in 2025 free cash flow contribution from NFP on that question.

The second area for us is the continued working capital improvements, in particular days sales outstanding. I called that out in the prepared remarks that we continue to focus on that by region, within our procurement teams. So we continue to see benefit from that as well.

The third area that I'd focus on is restructure -- the Aon United restructuring program. That continues to be a degradation of free cash flow as we go through 2026, in line with our plans on that. The benefit that we saw in addition to those three items in the quarter was through was through the lower NFP transaction and integration costs, just as I said at Investor Day.

So operating income, including NFP, the working capital improvements, and the lower transaction and integration costs from NFP. That is what are -- those are the drivers for 13% year-to-date and just continued strength in those drivers is what will have us on track for double digits in 2025.

But it's -- at least I just want to add one point here, an important one because you touched on the key note for us, which is free cash flow and free cash flow growth. So Edmund just described very well kind of what's happening in the year, what's happening year-to-date, all exactly on point.

Step back. Remember, we are all about revenue and revenue enhancement and then the translation of free cash flow from revenue, period. And we look at that in every angle, every shape. You can imagine. And you look at our history, we've done double-digit free cash flow growth for a long period of time.

And then we add the 3x3 plan. And the 3x3 plan with Aon Business Services is again, it's a leverage to revenue, its a leverage on capability, driving revenue, you're seeing that opportunity. And then it is a leverage to operate improvement, operating efficiency. So for us, we did double digit without Aon Business Services. Now Aon Business Services continuing to come on fully online and what we're now underscoring and reinforcing our ability to deliver that, and you're seeing that come to fruition.

So for us, we absolutely want you to stay focused on free cash flow. We are as well. And the opportunity here for us, we think, is substantial, which is why we're reinforcing guidance around this. But understand the mechanics of this isn't about just a '25 result. It's about '25, '26 and ongoing well beyond the 3x3 plan period.

The next question is coming from Andrew Kligerman of TD Cowen.

So back when you closed on the NFP deal about a year -- a year plus, the talk was of the expectation of generating about [ $175 million ] [indiscernible] synergies, coupled with about $60 million in cost synergies. And I think, Edmund, you mentioned that this year, you're on track for $80 million in revenue synergies.

So looking out to 2026, how are you progressing there? What can we expect along these numbers? Maybe -- any specific numbers you could provide around these metrics as we look to the incremental upside in 2026?

Andrew, thanks for the question. Maybe just a bit of context around NFP overall and the progress because then it sets up the specifics and sort of how they've continued to strengthen and evolve, which Edmund can take us through.

Listen, step back. We talked about this in Investor Day. High expectations as NFP came into the Aon world, and they have been exceeded. It's been truly been terrific for us to sort of get a chance to work with this team. Support them and they support Aon. It's actually been a great combination. And you've seen this show up on the revenue side and the organic revenue side, and what we've been able to do. As well as on the operating side, which showed up sort of -- in the quarter [indiscernible] showing up throughout the overall year.

So for us, this is exactly what we hoped it would be, a platform. [indiscernible] the platform also upon which we can add the programmatic M&A that Edmund talked about as well. And really, a lot of this driven as you think about NFP overall on the idea of independent and connected. Independent and connected has made a huge difference as we think about adding capability to NFP, [indiscernible] from the producer front but also from an M&A front, us more attractive to others who want to be part of the overall Aon world.

So I just want to set context as you think about sort of NFP and the progress we've made. And then against that, absolutely, you're seeing it show up in the outcome. So maybe Edmund, a little comment on that?

Yes. Andrew, on this question, the first thing that Greg and I have both highlight is producer retention. That's -- because without that, you're not going to have any of the revenue synergies come through. It's better than it was pre-acquisition. And in 2025, we continue to be as strong as we were in '24 on producer retention as well. And that's driven by the independent and connected strategy that Greg was just talking about. So first step is minimizing any revenue leakage.

To date, you're right with the numbers that you mentioned, $80 million in 2025, $175 million in synergies due 2026. To date, we balanced several million in new business from joint activity across the business units. But as we think about specific areas that we're focused on as we look at the pipeline, of what we've accomplished to date and what's going to help us meet that $80 million number, and $175 million number. Maybe highlight two or three things for you.

One is transitioning from third-party wholesale to Aon expertise capability that we have. That was exactly what we thought when we thought about opening up the Aon Store to the NFP population. Two is using our Aon Global Broking center for international placements and specialized placements. That has been an area of growth and strength, and NFP is taking advantage of and contributing to the synergies thus far. And then we have middle-market panels in place in places like marine, and terrorism, and builders risk. Places that are even -- certainly relevant in the macro environment that we're in right now.

So those are areas that we're focused on to be able to meet the $80 million commitment in 2025, and $175 million in 2026, which we continue to be confident in

Got it. And then just second question is around Reinsurance Solutions. You talked about double-digit increases in ILS and facultative placements. How should we think about the dynamic with [ treaty ]? Is that kind of taking from [ treaty ]? Or do you see kind of an uplift in both? Like how should we think about that dynamic between the two product areas ILS and [ treaty ]?

Andrew, I love the question. We suggest you step back a little bit and think about this isn't really from a product orientation. It's from a client orientation. I mean we're literally stepping and asking the question, how can we help clients both defend the house, think about their balance sheet and what they're doing, but also grow it, and actually build capability.

And for us, whether [indiscernible], all of these things sort of come into play as you think about helping the client do that. So in many respects, not competing, but complementary. And for us, it's been -- it's really been a great story from a Reinsurance standpoint. We've just got such a remarkable capability, remarkable global capability that continues to get stronger. And now with a 3x3 plan, and the investment behind it in analytics, absolutely tremendous.

And we highlighted -- I highlighted one of the examples that we came up with the surge stop-loss opportunity. This is a net new ad that comes into the fray that helps us to actually be better from a reinsurance standpoint. And then Andrew step back and understand, this capability as part of risk capital is then an amplifier, a big amplifier. So you've got Reinsurance in and of itself tremendously positive, continuing to progress with increasing demand, great opportunity. And within Risk Capital, now we're talking about how to take this capability and really embed it into the Commercial Risk decision process as well, very complementary.

Now we're talking about the largest companies in the world, trillion dollar balance sheets, asking the question around how do I understand volatility? And the answer to that is not a product. It's not an individual solution [ line ]. It is Global Aon. If you think about just ILS and what we've done for commercial companies, emanating from Reinsurance. In 2021 we did basically no deals. [ 2020 ] nothing. In '24, we did 109. And year-to-date '25, we're already at roughly 100. I mean this is truly remarkable in terms of what the opportunity is here.

So for us, this is the -- this is the wheelhouse in terms of sort of net new demand as it evolves over time that we're going after. And so pretty excited about the opportunities here as they connect Reinsurance and Commercial Risk. And the same story on the Commercial Risk side, we can talk about as well.

The next question is coming from Rob Cox of Goldman Sachs.

Just a question first on talent. The revenue-generating head count seems like it's up 6% year-to-date, and this push has been successful. I'm curious, has this changed your mind at all about the sort of run rate future investments in talent? And is this 4% to 8% increase annually sort of the right level to think about going forward?

Maybe, Rob, if I could. I want to start with an overview, but Edmund can really dig in on this. This talent question is important. It really is part of the conversation we had on the Investor Day around adding content and capability. But I really want to touch on this for a bit.

But when we think about talent, remember, the mission of our firm is client-obsessed. I mean it literally is helping clients make better decisions and get to better outcomes. Because of that, not because for financial leverage, and not because we're going to move people around, our industry does a lot of that, we're adding talent to deliver an outcome. That's why we focus on priority areas. Construction, energy help in our priority areas.

But remember, our commitment is add talent, better capability, but we've got to help them be better at Aon. So somebody coming over to Aon without the analyzers is not a net add. Somebody come in without sort of the improvements in service and what we do with search, et cetera, is not an add. So for us, Rob, this is -- this is talent in the right areas and then it's reinforced by Aon, by what we do, by Aon Business Services.

And so -- and then we basically made the point, and Edmund made it as well on Investor Day. I'd love him to comment on it more now, is this is about continuous improvement. It's continuous improvement in terms of what we're trying to do on their behalf to support clients, but also continuous investment. And the machine we're talking about here is a machine that is that is -- drives top line improves operating performance, but also invest back into the business on an ongoing basis.

So for us, we're going to continuously look at this. We're going to evaluate it. We're going to make the right calls by [indiscernible] capital allocation. We're going to make the right calls in terms of what we're trying to do, and we see more and more potential to bring talent in, particularly because we can amplify the talent that comes in.

That's also why they come. They're excited to do something, to wow a client. To do something with their clients they haven't been able to do before. And that's what makes us attractive. And that's the commitment we have to them. So I want to offer that view at a macro level. And then Edmund, talk about where we are in the year and what we're expecting over the plan period?

And I'll start by emphasizing your point, Greg. This is about meeting client needs -- meeting client needs. If you do that, then you -- and we're very specific about this word, Rob, sustainable organic revenue growth. If you meet the client need, then you can drive the sustainable organic revenue growth. You do that by making these hires. We have the capacity to make the hires, primarily because of the Aon Business Services, ABS and the scale improvements that we get there. I'll refer you back to the slide at Investor Day on margin expansion and growth -- and investment in growth.

Where we drive this margin expansion through Aon Business Services. We get some benefit from expense discipline. And then we invest 40 to 60 basis points in revenue-generating hires and other capabilities. The objective there is to meet our near-term objectives, double-digit free cash flow growth in the current year here, and invest for ongoing sustainable top line growth.

If we can get more from the scale improvements, then we'll invest more if we can deliver in the current year and are outperforming, then we'll invest more. If we find the investments in the right areas, in areas that we think are growth. Its not about quantity. We keep saying here, it's about quality talent in the growth area. So that is the model for us is to create the capacity to both grow and expand margins, and allow us to hit our immediate near-term financial objectives, but have sustainable growth in the long term as well. And if we can create more opportunities to invest more, then we're going to do that, with that in mind.

That's great. And if I could just follow up on maybe a broader question on the economy. Broad strokes, what are you hearing from clients? And how are you thinking about growth in exposures in the back half of the year?

Well, listen, again, back to kind of what we talked about sort of in the Investor Day context. Look, these four megatrends we've talked about, trade, technology, [indiscernible] workforce, they just continue to be reinforced. As we said at the Investor Day, we were talking about trade a year before the Liberation Day, and now it's been intensified massively. And we're seeing that.

I would observe, though. Listen, the 3x3 plan and the investments we're making, again, not something we've created. It's something we listened to clients and we responded to. We just responded to at an industrial strength level. And it is true. There is more volatility. We've been talking about that for a decade. More risk. And there's a need for real capability to respond to that.

But if you think about it, there's no denying the complexity, no denying to volatility. Unmanaged by the way, what happens. Complexity creates uncertainty and ambiguity, and it slows everything down, action stops, investment stops. So that's what everybody is worried about. Look, we think about it as complexity. Again, no denying it. But if you could help a client understand options, real options, and then you've got solutions behind the options, they see advantage and they see speed. And be clear, our clients want to take action. But if pandemic taught us nothing else. It was -- inaction is not a great outcome. Hope is not a strategy. They came to realize that. They're looking for actions. And I'm just trying to think.

One example I'll share with you because it resonated very strongly for me. I've been having conversations, ongoing conversations we have across the firm with the CEO of one of the largest [ builders ] in the world. And we've been talking about in this over the last 3 months. And they've been talking about their portfolio of major infrastructure projects, and these are mega, around the world, and they're open for bid. And they're massive, as I said. But they're also complex, and the geography is complex, and the geopolitics are complex.

And 3 months ago, they're talking about a pullback. I mean literally, maybe a no [ bid ] on a number of them, and they're just taking a hugely reserve position. We spent time over the last 3 months on a set of analytics that help them understand ways to reduce aspects of volatility. I mean we're not going to change the operating underlying aspects, but all the things that surround those projects. And now they've got a brand-new prioritization around what they're going to go after, real offense. And in their mind, they've got great conviction around the subset of these, they think is a greater opportunity.

And so what I'm trying to highlight for you is all that you read, all that's out there is real, but understand clients want to take action and they want the content to be able to take action with conviction, and that's us. I mean this is the analyzers. This is the capability that we bring to the table. This is the matching of capital with risk and matching beyond just insurance capital, but really pension capital and sovereign fund capital and PE capital. And so it really is in that context for us a -- an opportunity to help clients take a step ahead with conviction, and that's a real opportunity, recognizing the complexity that's out there. So hopefully, that wasn't too much, but it gives you a sense on sort of literally what's happening in the market day to day.

The next question is coming from David Motemaden of Evercore ISI.

Edmund, I was wondering if you could just size the tailwind to organic growth from the M&A services for both the total company and then specifically within commercial risk?

And then maybe help us think about it. I understand it's not back yet, but if it were back, how much of a contribution could it have?

Yes, David, thanks for the question. I mean there certainly is a ton of emphasis on M&A right now. I'd prefer to stay focused on what the drivers are today here. And M&A is providing a tailwind for you.

I've said before, growing off of the base that we have for M&A right now we have objectives of mid-single-digit or greater. You would need M&A to be multiples of that. You would need it to be 4, 5x that before it becomes a significant contribution to the overall organic growth rate that we have. The items that are driving it right now really is the core P&C business, the investment hires that we're making, the double-digit growth in construction. Those investment hires driving new business right now. And so we're going to continue to be focused on new business and retention.

The other big thing in Commercial Risk. We talked about retention being up 1 point year-over-year. And this is an opportunity to even call it our North American retention and Commercial Risk, which was up substantially, given what we're doing with our priority accounts premier accounts, what we're doing in terms of expanding coverage. So M&A, I get the focus on that. Right now, it's a bit of a tailwind. I think our outlook is for it to be modest in the second half of the year. If it comes in higher, then that gives us more confidence in being at the mid-single digit or greater levels in our balance.

We're not dependent on that. We are more focused on recurring organic revenue growth. We'll maintain our fair share, as Greg said earlier, of M&A services, particularly with PE, and we're focusing on expanding with corporates, but our focus is on recurring revenue growth, and those are the drivers.

And David, we're not trying to hedge here at all, but I understand M&A services is intertwined. It connects with all of our aspects of our business. So it isn't just a transaction liability placement. It really is around the runoff discussion, or it's around a whole series of other things related to the P&L. So it's very interconnected. And I think Edmund characterized it perfectly.

And you'll see it play out as it plays out, and it looks like it may be a little more positive. But again, very connected to what we do across the firm. That's why we're not going to really break it out as an individual piece, because it's really very supported by colleagues around the [indiscernible]

Understood. And I totally understand. On -- just a follow-up on the 6% increase in revenue-generating roles through the first half, already at halfway through the full year -- the midpoint of the full year goal.

Maybe you could just talk about the talent pipeline and if you think there's maybe the potential to get above that 8% growth in revenue-generating roles that you guys had targeted for this year?

And listen, Edmund described it very, very well. We're making calls on capability to help serve and support our clients. We're identifying capability to come in, in these priority areas and with a game plan on how they can actually come in with high conviction and excitement about how they can do more than they've done before. Not the same. More than they've done before. And so when we see those opportunities, we will take advantage of them.

This is not a specific target. Edmund describing exactly kind of what's come about. And we anticipate just continuing to maintain momentum. But listen, the analyzers matter. The -- what we're doing on the client experience, we described on Investor Day, next-generation client experience. As the world understands what that really means at a micro level, sitting across the table from a client, we become more -- it's more interesting.

When you can actually help a client understand they don't have to actually deal with certificate proof of insurance, because we've actually digitized it and created an outcome with AI that literally makes it real time that a client could do themselves. They go, wow, I get to talk to my client about being able to do that. They couldn't have done that before. These capabilities matter and people see that producers see that they want to be part of Aon, and we invite that and we're going to nourish that as best we can. But it will play out as it plays out, and we'll push it as the opportunity is there versus just pushing it to push it.

Our final question today is coming from Meyer Shields of KBW.

I was hoping to get an update on how sensitive clients of different sizes are to elevated social inflation, or legal risk in the U.S? I know on the insurance side, obviously, it's a major concern, but I'm wondering whether it's penetrating the broader [ consciousness ]?

Meyer, thanks for the question. Listen, again, client orientation. Yes, it penetrates everywhere. Everyone reads and clients understand that in many respects, this is -- this is focused ultimately on them in terms of sort of what it really means, absolutely focused on them. And they're concerned about it. Therefore, we're concerned about it.

You saw in October of last year, the first to basically say we're not going to support this because it really doesn't support our clients, period. We just said no. Especially focused on the North American and the U.S. theater. So yes, it's an area of concern, and we're taking action to explicitly not support it. We made that public. Others have now joined the fray, which is terrific, and we believe it's the right answer. But yes, it's absolutely known outcome across the board, some more acute than others depending on the industry you're in and the size, but make no mistake, it's a big deal.

Okay. Fantastic. That's very helpful. And I want to go back to the talent question, just one more time because we've gone through, I think, these many waves in the industry where company X is hiring and so on. I think it's great.

But I'm wondering what's Aon doing to not so much recruit talent as to train it from scratch, or to grow it from scratch?

Meyer, this is -- we would love to spend any and all time with you on this. This is what I was trying to allude to before, as our highlight before with Edmund as well. This is it. Moving bodies around doesn't matter. I mean how do you get better choice when you just move people around?

You bring colleagues in and you -- and by the way, they want this, they drive this. This is a colleague. I mean this is all about people. And they want more capability. They want a better answer. They want -- I mean an example I was given before on the construction company. This is all about. They got some insight they didn't have before, provided by our colleagues, provided by a producer. And just taking someone and helping them be better. So they're phenomenal. They're driving it.

But now with the 7 analyzers, they're better. They're a property analyzer embedded with reinsurance content. So literally a commercial company making decisions about global property placement at a structure level with literally the information that was there from Reinsurance. Driven off of impact forecasting is like, wow. And a producer gets to see that, they're better. Broker copilot, literally, we're capturing information never been captured before in a comparable way, ingested so you can actually compare it real time. Our colleagues get a chance to see that and they're like, wow. And so for us, if we can help a producer be better in real time with a client, and then with solutions and then as they interact with the market, this is a big deal.

And on the insurance side, if we can help them in the reinsurance market, do the same. This is a big deal. So for us, talent is about better client solutions. Talent has got to be about better client solutions. We fall short of that, we don't succeed and our -- because the clients are better off. So for us, we're not trying to opine on what everybody else does. And you're absolutely right. It's been tried and true. It's important for us that you understand we are different. We're not saying we're better, although we like our chances there. But we are absolutely different in how we're approaching the market and approaching talent, and it's resonating. And it's resonating and independent and connected, when you talk about connected with NFP and it's resonating an Aon broadly in terms of how we're bringing talent in. So hopefully, that's a little bit of color commentary on how we're thinking about it, very different.

Thank you. At this time, I'd like to turn the floor back over to Mr. Case for closing comments.

Just wanted to say thanks, everyone, for joining and look forward to talking to you next quarter.

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's event. You may disconnect your lines and log off at this time, and enjoy the rest of your day.

Hello, and welcome to the 2025 Annual General Meeting of Shareholders of Aon. It is now my pleasure to turn today's meeting over to Lester Knight, Chairman of the company's Board of Directors. Mr. Knight, the floor is yours.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'm Lester Knight, Chairman of Aon's Board of Directors. At this time, it's my pleasure to welcome all of you to Aon's 2025 Annual General Meeting of Shareholders, which is being held in Dublin, Ireland.

We also have shareholders who are joining us virtually through our meeting center website. We're joined by a representative of Computershare Investor Services, who has been appointed to serve as Inspector of Election at today's meeting and representatives of Ernst & Young LLP, our independent registered public accounting firm.

In accordance with the notice of the meeting, given that it is now past 8:30 a.m. local Dublin time, and I'm informed that there is a quorum present, I declare that the Annual General Meeting is open. There are 8 items of business on today's agenda on which a vote will be taken. These agenda items are as set forth in the proxy materials sent to shareholders on or about April 28, 2025.

Furthermore, we are formally laying before the meeting for consideration by the shareholders, the company's statutory financial statements under Irish law for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2024, including the reports of directors and the Irish statutory auditor thereon. Copies of these statutory financial statements have been mailed to shareholders of record and are also available in hard copy form at the meeting venue as well as on the Financial Reports section of our website.

There is no requirement under Irish law that these financial statements be approved by the shareholders, and we're not seeking any such approval at today's meeting. In addition, we will present a business review of Aon's 2024 affairs. There will be an opportunity for shareholders to ask questions. Shareholders attending in person in Dublin can ask questions by raising their hand during the question-and-answer period. Those attending virtually can submit their questions at any time by clicking the message icon on the meeting center website.

I'm joined in Dublin by Aon's CEO, Greg Case; and CFO, Edmund Reese. Mr. Case and other members of our Board of Directors are either with us in Dublin or participating virtually and are available to answer any shareholder questions.

Now it is my pleasure to introduce Darren Zeidel, the Company's Secretary, who will provide the Secretary's report.

Thank you, Lester. Notice of this Annual General Meeting, together with Aon's proxy statement, annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2024, and Irish statutory financial statements for the year ended December 31, 2024, were made available beginning April 28, 2025, to shareholders of record as of the close of business on April 11, 2025.

Aon has appointed Jennifer Naughton of Computershare as Inspector of Election for the voting at the Annual General Meeting. And in accordance with our Articles of Association, voting today will be conducted by way of a poll on each of the resolutions put to the meeting. This is seen as best practice as it gives all shareholders the opportunity to participate in the decision-making of the company and have their votes recorded.

Based on a preliminary report from the Inspector of Election, of the 216,034,583 shares entitled to vote at the meeting, approximately 90% of the total voting rights of the shareholders entitled to vote are present in person or by proxy at the meeting. As a result, I declare that a quorum is present, and we will proceed with the meeting.

I'd now like to turn the meeting over to Greg Case.

Thank you, Darren. On behalf of the management team, we would like to thank our shareholders for their continued partnership and investment in Aon as well as our Board of Directors for their continued support and valuable insight.

2024 was a year of strong achievement for Aon. We delivered outstanding execution across all aspects of our strategy, resulting in another year of strong financial and operational performance. We achieved this performance while also taking several bold and transformational steps to position Aon for long-term sustainable growth.

We made tremendous progress on the first year of the 3x3 plan, our 3-year initiative to operationalize our Aon United strategy. Our strategy continues to be a differentiator, enabling us to serve clients as one globally connected firm, powered by advanced analytics and innovative solutions that help them navigate an increasingly complex and volatile world.

Our strong execution is translating into tangible results. We're winning more clients, expanding existing relationships and improving retention. Through our 3x3 plan, we are further enhancing our ability to deliver industry-defining content, capabilities and service, reinforcing our strong foundation for exceptional client service and long-term shareholder value creation.

We delivered strong financial results across each of our key financial metrics in line with our objectives and guidance. For the full year 2024, we achieved 6% organic revenue growth and 10% adjusted earnings per share growth, extending our decades-plus track record of consistent performance.

We also completed the acquisition of NFP, meaningfully expanding our presence in the fast-growing middle market segment. In addition, we returned $1.6 billion to shareholders through share repurchases and dividends, highlighting our strong free cash flow generation and disciplined capital allocation model.

Our 2024 results reinforce Aon's long-term track record of consistent financial performance. Now at the midpoint of our 3x3 plan, we are confident in our ability to sustain this momentum and deliver results that build on our strong track record of financial performance. Aon's financial model is designed to drive total shareholder returns, and we are well positioned to drive long-term value creation for our colleagues, clients and shareholders.

Now I'd like to turn the meeting back to Lester.

Thank you, Greg, for the update. Now we're ready to take your questions. Please direct any questions to Greg, Edmund or me or any other member of the Board of Directors. Any shareholder who wishes to ask a question should please raise their hand. You're attending in person in Dublin. If you're attending virtually, please enter your question online via our meeting center website.

Please give me your name or the name of the person you represent and ask your questions. I kindly remind you that questions must be confined to the business of the meeting. There being no questions, I would now like to turn the meeting back to Darren for the resolutions to be considered at today's Annual General Meeting.

Thank you. The following individuals have been nominated for reelection as directors of the company, and each will be proposed for election by way of a separate ordinary resolution of the company: Lester B. Knight; Gregory C. Case; Jose Antonio Álvarez; Jin-Yong Cai; Cheryl A. Francis; Adriana Karaboutis; Richard C. Notebaert; Gloria Santona; Sarah Smith; Byron O. Spruell; and Admiral James Stavridis.

There are 7 additional matters scheduled to be acted upon at this meeting. In accordance with the recommendation of the Board of Directors, I move the following proposals in addition to the election of these nominees for approval. As an ordinary resolution, an advisory vote to approve the compensation of named executive officers as set forth in Aon's proxy statement.

As an ordinary resolution, the ratification of the appointment of Ernst & Young LLP as Aon's independent registered public accounting firm for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2025. As an ordinary resolution, the reappointment of Ernst & Young chartered accountants as Aon's statutory auditor under Irish law to hold office until the conclusion of the next Annual General Meeting.

As an ordinary resolution, the authorization of the Board of Directors or the Audit Committee of the Board to determine the remuneration of Ernst & Young chartered accountants in its capacity as statutory auditor under Irish law. As an ordinary resolution, the authorization of the Board to issue Class A ordinary shares under Irish law for a period expiring on the date, which is 18 months from the date of this meeting.

As a special resolution, the authorization of the Board to opt out of statutory preemption rights under Irish law for the period expiring on the date, which is 18 months from the date of this meeting. And as an ordinary resolution, the approval of the amendment and restatement of the Aon plc 2011 Incentive Plan as amended and restated to increase the number of shares available for issuance thereunder.

The full text of each of the resolutions is set out in the proxy statement. As required by our Articles of Association, the vote will be taken on a poll. As a result, each person represented in person or by proxy is entitled to 1 vote for every Class A ordinary share held. The voting standard required for each resolution to pass is set forth in Aon's proxy statement.

And I'll now turn the meeting back over to Lester.

Thank you. We will now conduct the official business of the meeting. It is now 8:40 a.m. local Dublin time. I formally propose that each of the resolutions set out in the notice of meeting are put to the meeting, and I declare the polls open for voting on all the resolutions.

Let me spend a moment reviewing the voting procedures. Proxy statements and proxy voting cards were mailed or made available to all shareholders prior to this meeting. Those of you who returned proxies prior to this meeting authorized the persons named in the proxy to vote on all proposals coming before the meeting.

Similarly, if you granted your proxy over the phone or Internet, you do not need to vote during the meeting. Any shareholder attending physically in person who has not submitted a proxy or wishes to change his or her vote, please stand and you will be given a ballot.

[Voting]

All the ballots are in. I now declare the polls closed. The Inspector of Election is requested to tabulate the proxies and ballots and report the final voting results to the company's Secretary. Darren will announce the provisional results as soon as possible.

I want to take a moment, please join me in thanking all of our directors for all the time and effort they devote on behalf of Aon and its shareholders. I'd also like to thank Greg Case and the entire management team for their efforts on behalf of Aon.

Now I'd like to ask Darren to report the provisional voting results.

Following a review of proxies received and tabulated, each nominee for election as director received a majority of votes cast at this meeting. Further, the advisory resolution to approve the compensation of the company's named executive officers and each other proposed ordinary resolution has been approved by at least a majority of votes cast.

In the case of the special resolution to authorize the Board to opt out of statutory preemption rights under Irish law, the resolution was approved by at least 75% of the votes cast. These results are provisional. The Inspector of Election will furnish a written report of the final vote count, which will be attached as an exhibit to the minutes of this meeting reported in a filing made by Aon with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission and made available on the company's website.

I'll now turn the meeting back to Lester for closing remarks.

Thank you, Darren. That now concludes the business of the meeting. I'd like to express our sincere appreciation to all shareholders. I now declare this meeting closed. Thank you.

This concludes the meeting. You may now disconnect.

Good morning, and welcome to Aon's 2025 Investor Day. [Operator Instructions] Please welcome Nicole Hendry, Senior Director, Investor Relations, on to the stage.

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Aon's 2025 Investor Day. It is a pleasure to have you all with us, whether you're joining us here in the room or you're tuning in virtually from around the world. First, I want to take a moment to thank our investors and our analyst community. Your insights, your questions, your continued engagement have truly been essential in shaping the agenda and content for today.

Before we start, of course, I have a few housekeeping items that my legal colleagues would like for me to cover. First, we will be making forward-looking statements today regarding Aon that involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual outcomes to differ materially from those we anticipated. A summary of these risks and uncertainties can be found in the presentation slides posted on the Investor Relations section of our website. Second, we will be referencing certain non-GAAP measures today, including, but not limited to, organic revenue growth, adjusted operating margin, adjusted earnings per share and free cash flow. References to all financial metrics today refer to the non-GAAP counterparts unless stated otherwise, and an explanation of these non-GAAP measures and the reconciliations to their comparable GAAP measures can also be found in the presentation slides posted on our website.

Now that my legal colleagues are happy, on to the exciting part of the day. We are thrilled to share with you all how our Aon United strategy is a unique and powerful asset, enabling us to address our clients' increasingly complex needs and drive sustainable, profitable growth and shareholder value creation. As you can see from the agenda here, we've got a terrific morning plan for you all with a full lineup of presentations from Aon's senior leaders. We are going to take a 20-minute break around 10:10 a.m. And after our second round of sessions, we will wrap with Q&A.

During the break, we do invite you to step into our Better Decisions Lab, which some of you might have seen already, and it's located just outside here in the Atrium. You are going to hear us reference this space throughout the day, and that is for good reason. This interactive space is a window into some of our most innovative capabilities, including our risk analyzers, which I know many of you have been eager to see. Each of these stations is hosted by an Aon senior leader, who will demonstrate for you how these tools are helping us to deliver deeper insights and greater value to our clients. So we really encourage you to explore, ask questions and see these game-changing innovations in action.

And finally, after the formal program concludes, we invite you to grab a takeaway lunch, also take an AI gift bag, really great phone chargers in those, and take another opportunity to engage in the Better Decisions Lab.

And with that, I am so excited to turn the stage over to Greg Case, our President and CEO, who, after a short video, will kick off the day for us.

[Presentation]

Talking about all the things we're doing to continue to strengthen our firm on behalf of our clients, I get a chance to kick us off. I will set the stage and go over the agenda a bit. I'd like to cover 4 points that I want you to hopefully take away from the day. But then you're going to hear from my colleagues. I'm really excited as they will take you through step-by-step what we're working on, and what we're working on to deliver a next-generation client experience. We're incredibly excited about it.

And we are now midway through our 3x3 Plan, midway through. Every part of that plan is on track, working as we thought it would work, and we're incredibly excited about the momentum that's being built around it. And don't just take it from us. You're going to hear from our clients today, too. We've got an incredible client panel who are going to talk specifically about what they're experiencing in terms of sort of what we're doing on their behalf and how it's different than what they've seen before.

Our theme, Aon United, a powerful platform for growth. We hope you understand the level of conviction, deep conviction we have when you think about the importance of a connected global firm that permeates everything we do. And a piece you, again, will hopefully take away from the day is, in the 15 years we've worked to construct this platform, this track, the track we've laid down, in many respects, has created the ability to make the bold moves that we're going to describe today. But let's get started.

I'd like to deliver 4 messages. Message one. Message one is we launched the 3x3 on an incredibly strong platform. We had an incredibly strong foundation. And it's a foundation built off of the industry we operate in, which is fantastic, and Aon's position in that, the work we've done in the industry. So we start the 3x3, incredibly strong foundation.

Second, the 3x3. The 3x3 is fully about how we're operationalizing what we're doing, operationalizing Aon United. It has also given us tremendous capacity to invest back into the firm, as you've seen with a number of talent hires we've made, and in sector investments like NFP.

Third, watch carefully. Every move we're making in the 3x3 is making us a more client-driven, client-centric firm. It draws from history and the producer world and the broker world, phenomenal, but it strengthens it substantially and goes well beyond it.

Fourth message, important one. We're going to spend our time mostly on clients and colleagues today. How we're serving clients more effectively, how we're opening the game, changing the game, how we're supporting colleagues to do it. But make no mistake about it. The connection between great client service and superior value creation is a hard line from our standpoint. We've watched this over the years. We are absolutely believers and you're going to see us connect the 3x3 directly to the drivers of long-term shareholder value, mid-single-digit or greater organic growth, annual margin improvement, double-digit free cash flow. So these are the 4 messages I'd like to start you with today.

So let's go to the first one, the foundation. First, let's go to the industry. So think about our industry. This is a large, attractive and growing industry. Whether you measure it in premiums, think about that in terms of commercial risk, reinsurance, health, $4.6 trillion and growing. Measure it in assets, in wealth, $56.5 trillion and growing. Equally compelling is not just the platform we've got, but the platform we can reach into. There's additional capacity and capability we can draw in to support our clients. It's not trivial. It's $250 trillion when you think about what we do with pension funds and sovereign funds and private equity. So the opportunity in a large industry that's growing is even larger when you think about client need we're going to talk about.

In addition, think about some market realities which underpin demand in our business. There are many. I picked 4. First one, $145 billion. When you think about the global insured loss from natural catastrophes, $145 billion. Health, understand from a health standpoint, I'm going to pick U.S., picking on the U.S. here. Health cost as a percent of U.S. GDP, 20%, amazing. Think about overall compensation, all we do to bring employees in, cost of benefits in the context of that, 20%. And then retirement. Retirement, the world is thinking about how I retire, how I protect my family, 20% feels prepared. That means 80% is worried about what's going to happen from a retirement standpoint. These market realities underpin further demand in a strong industry.

Maybe though, the most interesting is resilience over time. So we're going to go back 20 years. This is a 20-year picture. This 20-year picture essentially lays out looking at the S&P 500 and looking at the broker index. And what you see is really almost every year over that 20-year period, broker index beats the S&P 500. Times of good, beats; times of challenge, recessions, beats; high inflation, low inflation; high interest rates, low interest rates. And root cause is not that surprising. You think about what we do on behalf of clients, we're supporting them on the insurance side, the health side, the retirement side through regulatory challenges. These things are all required. This is a great privilege, puts us in an incredibly strong position. And you see this resilience. This is an incredibly resilient industry. S&P 500, 650, and change, broker index, twice that number, twice that number over a 20-year period.

Now you have to forgive me. I did throw another little dot point on there for you to look at. That top line is another little company. It's a single company. We're going to talk more about it in a second when we get to the second part of the foundation on our performance. But obviously, Aon has done much better than even the broker index, which has done much better than the S&P 500.

Final point on the industry is not only big, not only growing, not only great -- more potential to do more in the industry, draw from other sources of capital, not only resilient, but it's massively underpenetrated. So the $145 billion I described to you before was part of $368 billion, which means we're talking about share here of 40%. So this is -- if you think about it, the reason our platform, our foundation was so strong is we started in an incredibly strong industry. So Aon in that strong industry is the second part of that foundation.

Aon, $16 billion in revenue. Think about where we are. We have worked our firm over the years, over 120 countries, incredibly strong and connected. We can stand and deliver in any environment, incredibly durable. Think about what we do across 4 solution lines that are in 2 reportable segments, Risk Capital and Human Capital. We are also a firm that is incredibly diversified. A little over half of our revenue is outside the U.S.

Risk Capital. Risk Capital is commercial risk and reinsurance, and Risk Capital is what we do when we help clients understand, measure and mitigate risk. In the process of that, we move a little premium. Look at the number, $185 billion in premium across Risk Capital.

Human capital. This is our health business and our wealth business, underpinned by all the things we do in talent and support. And this is a great business. This is a wonderful business. This is a business in which we help our clients protect maybe their most important asset, their people in all aspects. And in this business, $190 billion in place premium, $190 billion, and we advise on $5 trillion in assets in the global economy, Risk Capital and Human Capital. That's Aon.

How have we done? What's it look like in terms of performance? We want you to understand as you come away from the day, this is a team that's very focused on delivering long-term shareholder value and fully recognizes that's an interesting objective until you can actually execute year after year after year to make that happen. If you think about Aon, let's pick a 10-year time period. That's the -- left-hand side of the chart shows a 10-year time period. What have we done? Organic revenue growth, 5% adjusted margin expansion, 1,300 basis points, 130 basis points a year. Adjusted EPS growth, 11%. Free cash flow per share growth, 12%. Total return to shareholders, 15%. And we've also had a very balanced approach as we think about capital allocation. Tremendous discipline.

And again, remember, investments back into the business during this period of time. I called out before, margin-accretive investments in talent, more and more and more in the high priority areas. And then, of course, NFP, as we brought NFP into the Aon family. By the way, NFP has been tremendous. High expectations, exceeded everything we hoped it would be. It's fantastic, a great platform.

So this is how we've done in performance. So I would stop here and say, maybe we're done. We're good. We're just going to tell you how we're going to keep doing this, great industry, performance, all set, all good. But we're not going to do that. Now we're not going to do that because of you, because we want to deliver for shareholders, but we're not going to do that because of our clients and how their demands and their needs are changing. It's so important.

The topic of the day is about the future, full stop. Now the history matters. The history matters because it's an indication for you on our level of commitment around performance. So don't mistake that. But what we're really talking about today, our entire focus today is how we're going to increase what we do on behalf of clients, win in the core business and how we are uniquely and powerfully positioned to support our clients as their needs change and grow over time. That's what this is all about. The work of the 3x3 reflects this in every way, and it reflects a real understanding of client demand and how it's changed over time. It's fundamental.

And our team would tell you the catalyst for today is, of course, you, critically important, but the catalyst for the day, the cause for the day is really client demand change and how we've reacted to it. That's fundamentally what we're going to be talking about. And I want to spend some time now on literally client demand and what's going on. And I'm going to preface this by saying we did a report in May of '24. If you don't have it, we'll make sure it's available to all of you. It's called the megatrends report.

And the megatrends report is an outcome from a tremendous amount of analysis, which is excellent, but a huge amount of time with clients, listening, understanding around the world, what's driving their business? What are they worried about? What are they concerned about? And 4 megatrends come, trade, technology, weather, workforce. Myriad of things are happening to our clients, but these 4 megatrends came through. And the reason they're so compelling is, it wasn't just in one place or one sector, it was every geography in the world. It was all sizes of clients, large, medium and small, across all areas. These 4 megatrends, huge. I'm just going to quickly touch on them.

Remember, this was May in '24, okay, before any elections and things like that. We're talking trade with our clients. And by the way, it's a big deal. We're talking supply chain, supply chain volatility, resilience. Do I like my supply chain? What do we do? How do I reduce the volatility? Massive. And then a little event happened on April 2. You might be aware of it. It involves something called tariffs. And then we're seriously having supply chain and trade conversations around all things tariff and what happens.

I mean, I can stand up here and talk to you about the importance of it. I wish you could hear from our clients. I will tell you, we did a webinar on April 11, just a few days after. I said to my colleague, it's a few days after, nobody is going to come to this thing. Webinar, 6,000 show up, clients and participants, 6,000. This is a big deal. It is massive in terms of sort of this megatrend. Technology, equally, equally provocative and compelling here. Pace of change, huge. Is it going to be helpful to me? Is it going to hurt? If it's going to hurt, how do I reduce the volatility? Well, how expensive is it? This is a massive thing, dealing with our clients on this in terms of where they're thinking about it.

Weather, this is not about just enduring it anymore. This is about literally understanding it, predicting it, and doing something about it. You might change the way you shape your business around literally a projected view on climate change over the next 10 years or 15 years. How do I get my arms around it?

And finally, on workforce. And my gosh, has this changed? I mean, think about where we were during COVID, post-COVID, how that's evolved. This is about locating, it's about recruiting, it's about bringing in, it's about training, it's about development, it's about retention. And every aspect of this has been now a source of volatility. It's a source of opportunity, but it's a big source of volatility. And I have to tell you, I spent a lot of time with this report. And really, I could hear it in the clients' voices. I heard it someplace else, too, and I was like, woah.

I participated in something called the Business Roundtable. And if you haven't heard of it, it's a couple of hundred CEOs who meet quarterly and talk about sort of the state of the world and what's happening. And I kid you not, last business roundtable sounded like a risk management meeting, right? It was unbelievable. And it was these megatrends permeating everything in terms of what they do and how they react to it. And the questions were not trivial. They were what do we do? And when they turn your attention and say, what am I doing on this? What are we saying? What are we saying?

And I will tell you, just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water, we did another report, updating the megatrends, megatrends '24, updating '25, Massively validated each of the megatrends, but something more insidious evolved, something more corrosive, something more challenging. And that is the interconnectivity of these megatrends. And now the conversation with clients is very operational on something that's driving volatility in their business that they don't know how to react to, and it makes a massive difference.

And just look at the right-hand side of the chart, I'm going to pick a couple here around workforce. Let's do technology and workforce and let's do weather and workforce. Technology and workforce, you're having a conversation and you realize that 39%, call it, 40% of the skills that exist are going to need to be upgraded by 2030. Let that sink in a second. 40%. That means we're all changing, reskilling, doing things we haven't done before. And we put our -- the business reacts, what does that mean? Does that help productivity? Does that hurt productivity? Is that more costly, less costly? Am I in business? Am I not in business? This is massive, this interconnectivity.

Weather and workforce. Weather and workforce, think about the idea that 2% of the workforce is lost due to extreme events over the course of the year, 2%. That's 80 million jobs. 80 million. I'm sitting with the CEO of a large contractor. You would know it well, one of the biggest in the world. We end up having a conversation around the bid process that's driving what they do. And it makes perfect sense when you hear it, but it scares the living daylights out of you in terms of implications.

How do we think about our bid process? I got a 10-year bid. It's multiple billions. By the way, if I change the way I put people on the field above 120 degrees, I can't field workers. What does that mean for me? How do I change my bid process? Should I not bid there? Should I actually think about the globe differently and bid differently, completely reposition my business. Point being, interconnectivity of these megatrends and risk is massive. And to be clear, we don't respond with a linear answer. It doesn't exist. If you respond with a silo -- let me give you a product example. No, no. I need integrated understanding to address this integrated challenge. Big difference. This is a big difference.

Now last point on demand. How have we done? I'll take you back to the business roundtable. You are 200 CEOs sitting in the room, and I'm asking you how do we do? Are we helping you? Do what you need to do, understand volatility, reduce volatility, help you grow? How do we do? And I want to show you a 50-year view of how we did. And what you see here is time across the bottom, and on the vertical axis is the measure of risk as a percent of GDP. Ways to think about this around premium loss as a risk as a percent of GDP. Think about it as literally how we impact the global economy.

Look from the '70s basically to the '90s, early '90s. It's an amazing 2 decades. It's 2 decades of increase. This means when the economy is getting bigger, our proportional share of that is actually going up. That's an amazing thing, amazing. But then look at the red line and look to the right of the red line. For 3 decades, 3 decades, this has gone down. That means risk as a percent of GDP is going down. That means as the economy is becoming more complicated, i.e., technology, as companies get bigger, literally, trillion market cap companies, what we're doing as a percent of the overall economy is going down. This is not a -- it doesn't mean we're bad. We're doing great work. It's growing, but the footprint is less relative to what's going on in the world. This is a big deal. This is a big deal.

Listen, there's a lot of stress over this. I've shown this in a couple of places. It creates lots of stress. Is this about relevance, Greg? Are you telling me -- no, no. We see this as opportunity. At a time of maybe the highest risk we've ever seen is now the highest opportunity we've ever seen. This is a serious call to action. It's a serious call to action. If you can react to this and make a difference in that group of 200 CEOs, you make a difference in the world. How do we do that?

And it turns out we know how to do it. We've seen it in a very bespoke way, one-off way. We know the capabilities required to do this. Seriously, we know. We know how to react to that CEO of the construction company. We know. You have to have data, but the data has got to be meaningful and comparable and durable. We don't have that. We have tons of data. We have less information. You've got to have, in addition to the data, a forward-looking set of insights, not just looking in the rearview mirror in terms of what's going to happen. You don't have the rearview mirror in this situation. It doesn't exist. You've got to have a greater ability to not just come up with an answer, but to come up with an answer that's continuous. You've got to keep iterating, because these change. If you don't change faster than they change, you're behind, that means you're less relevant.

And then you absolutely have to have more capital. Call it, $5 trillion, I want to use for the industry. That's an awesome number. I love it. These are incredibly important partners. I love them all. But $5 trillion, climate; $5 trillion, pandemic; $5 trillion, cyber; $5 trillion -- not enough. We have to move money out of the $250 trillion into the $5 trillion to make this work. You've got to have capital movement. We know what you need. But the bar is high. From an industry standpoint, it's hard to make the move. We know that. Everyone's got silos. Is it your data? Is it my data? Can I share it with you? Is it your client? Is it my client? Can you have it? Whose P&L? All kinds of baggage. And sort of to get durable data, you have to have a common architecture. That's hard. You've got to be able to get the data, do what you need to do with it and drive it. You've got to actually have a way to compare models and do things that aren't done.

We know what to do. The bar is high. But be clear, the need is high. And be clear, our clients are clear about what they do and their expectations. And their tolerance for our history is going down. They don't care about our organizational baggage. They care about whether we can help them succeed. And what I love about this, and we have clients here, you can talk to them as well, when you get it right for a client, it's like the coolest thing ever. Really, it's amazing. When you wow a client with an answer that helps them change the way they do their business, like this is gold. Our colleagues go nuts over.

One of the reasons you're going to hear about an 86% engagement at Aon is because of this. It's powerful. And it's there for us. The demand is there for us. The expectation is there for us. Clients want better service and they need better service, but they're calling and asking why? What do you need to do to make a difference. And now I come to an incredibly strong industry in which we have a privileged position, fantastic, a great platform. I come to a set of demands and needs that are real. That means, by the way, the core is great, still there, but the opportunity beyond the core is massive. And the call has been made. And by the way, it's been made for 30 years, and it keeps getting louder. And if we sit here in 10 years, you tell me where it's going to be. You tell me, I know where we want it to be on behalf of our clients. And that's what the day is about. That's what the day is about.

The day is about our answer to the call. And we want you to dig in and understand that answer to the call. We like it from the standpoint, it's pretty unique. Be clear, this is not strategy. We're way past strategy. We know what we need to do. We know the client piece cold. We're way past strategy. What we're about to talk about with the 3x3 is a straight up massive tour de force effort around acceleration, around scale. It is industrial strength execution. And it's industrial strength execution to drive an outcome on behalf of clients that we know is going to make a difference, because we've seen it. It's just how do you scale it inside the organization. This is scaling a proven concept.

Our view is we get this right in '24, '25 and '26. We set the stage, by the way, not as an end game. We finished '26 with tremendous performance, great. But what we really want is momentum coming out of '26 for '27, '28, '29 and beyond, that's the greatest in our history. And we can see that. That's there. That's what this is all about. It's winning in the core, no doubt, but it's also winning beyond the core, as client need evolves and our ability to deal with that evolves. So there are 3 commitments we're making, 3, in terms of what's going on. The first is Risk Capital and Human Capital. Think about this as the innovation engine.

And let me tell you why this is so important organizationally. And this is after years of working this, after years of working innovation. It's so clear and obvious, but so doggone hard. You need the content, you need data. You need data, by the way, that's ingested, scrubbed, comparable, renewing. I think I'm getting them all right, Mindy, but you'll go through that. ABS, this is what this is about. Seriously, you don't have that, you've got nothing. You've got a nice little conversation. You don't know how to action. Data and the content is enough. You need a set of models and analytics that actually is not just in property and in casualty and in D&O, it cuts across them. You don't cut across with the right models, you don't move. It doesn't work.

That's not enough. You need to have a way to get the right people in the room to make a difference. You can have all the content you want, but if you don't actually have the right people in the room and your firm, you cannot make a difference. And to be clear, this can't be a project. We've done many projects. We did the project on the CEO, on what to do with his workforce and heat. This has got to be part of the organization, part of the mission of what we're trying to do. And that's what Risk Capital is about. The right colleagues in the room, the right data, the right models, continuous improvement, scaled globally.

This is the other piece. Watch ABS today when I get to that. This is so critical in being able to take this and scale it globally. A great answer for some individual client who doesn't scale. If it doesn't scale, we can't innovate. It doesn't innovate, you don't break the trend. So Risk Capital and Human Capital are absolutely fundamental to the execution required to get to an outcome that matters for a client in a way they can see it, experience it and it drives an outcome. Risk Capital, Human Capital. Without it, you can't make progress. Anybody who says they can, I don't see it. It's impossible.

How do you communicate to clients once you've got that kind of capability? This is what we do on Aon Client Leadership. Again, should the client be coordinating all of Aon? Everybody goes and talks to the client individually? I'm going to coordinate some of the clients -- my responsibility is to coordinate Aon for you? No. We should be coordinating Aon on their behalf based on our understanding of them. That is Aon Client Leadership. My colleague is going to talk about this as it relates to the enterprise part of it, but that's how we deliver. If you don't have that, then it's completely dispersed.

So commitment one, Risk Capital, Human Capital; commitment two, Aon Client Leadership, fully delivered. This is the experience part, massive. Commitment three, accelerating Aon Business Services. We've been working in Aon Business Services for 7 years. We've seen this movie. We know what works and what doesn't work.

When Mindy Simon and team came in and worked with the team we have, we got acceleration like we've never seen it before. This is a world-class operating engine. It's a machine. It's the technology core, but it's more than that. It's our ability to get the data right. The suggestion issue is massive. We all know we have huge amounts of data in our industry. We have much less information, and we have much less information that changes client behavior. That's unacceptable. And the ingestion, the scrubbing, the comparability, all the different pieces between commercial risk and reinsurance and health, all critical. You don't get that right, nothing. That's Aon Business Services, and the ability to drive that is huge.

Also remember, Aon Business Services is a dual mission. Everything I just described is about winning with clients. It's all revenue. It's revenue. It's amazing. It's a dual mission. It's top line and OI. When we initially drove it, it was more OI. So the dual mission of improve organic and improve margin is fully embedded into Aon Business Services and the challenges around it, fully embedded. And by the way, Aon Business Services, as you're going to hear, is part of Aon. It's not Aon Business Services and Aon, it's Aon's DNA.

So 3 items: Risk Capital, Human Capital, massive, have to have it. Without it, you can't get movement. Got to deliver for clients, next generation, that is Aon Client Leadership. And we have to have an engine, must understand what we're doing on Aon Business Services. That is truly going to drive this on behalf of what we do inside of Aon for our clients over time. You're about to look at the Better Decisions Lab. Spend time there and ask where did that data come from? How do you have that data? How do you update that data? Do you make it global? Who looks at this? By the way, ask our colleagues where they're from, what part of Aon? You got all of global Aon out there. They're all talking to each other. That's never happened before. That's new insight. That's why the 3x3 matters. That's why it's tour de force massive execution. And we love it because we're executing on proven concepts. If I'm an investor, that's a cool thing. I'm not waiting for cold fusion. We got our version of that. We just have to go execute. That's the program.

And listen, it's working. We're winning more share. We'll talk about that. We're capturing new demand in areas like cyber, where it's a $15 billion market against $1 trillion loss potential. Give me a break. It needs to be a lot bigger than that. We're working on that and creating new areas. And the new areas are going to be cool, too. You're going to hear about some of these. We're going to talk about things like, believe it or not, a parametric solution to help a client solve a talent resilience problem. Let that sink in for a second. My colleague is going to talk about that.

We're going to talk about the opportunity to do something that has been done exactly never, which is improve population health and bend the cost curve. And we've done the analytics to show that's possible, unbelievable. And we're going to tie it straight back to exactly what drives shareholder value. Full stop. Growth, margin, EPS, free cash flow, every way you can see it, absolutely core. And again, remember, superior client leadership, exceptional shareholder value creation. That's the link we want you to sort of understand.

And what I'm most excited about, I want to get to now is I want you to hear from my colleagues. This is a phenomenal leadership team who's driven so much, and they're going to each take a piece as we go through. We're going to start with Lisa Stevens, our CAO, who oversees our people responsibilities, marketing communications and public affairs, does so much across Aon, but truly is the heart and soul of when we think about Aon United and how it's evolved. You'll take away very specific aspects of Aon United that are leverageable as we've taken these bold steps, and then pay particular attention to our engagement as part of this.

This affects 60,000 colleagues. And you go, whoa, what's going to happen? The answer is, they're on fire about this. Why not? You're wowing a client. That's a pretty good gig. And this is the opportunity to keep doing that more and more. Following Lisa will be Andy Marcell. Andy Marcell is newly appointed CEO of Global Solutions. Absolutely awesome. He's going to talk about what it really means to have an organizational construct that creates alignment and momentum and why that matters and why the content is better. And if you've got better content and better data, you've got a better outcome and you can deliver it.

Following Andy, back to the content is, again, Aon Client Leadership, how we deliver it. And Anne Corona, who leads our efforts around Aon Client Leadership and Enterprise Client is going to come and talk about sort of how we've done that and how we're going to scale it over time. And then an awesome session we're going to have. Lori Goltermann, CEO of our Regions & North America, is hosting a client panel, and it's going to be a great set of clients. And you'll hear from them. There's good stuff. I hope they talk about that, but listen for what's different in terms of where they are.

And I just want to take a minute. Oliver, thank you so much, from Veolia, for being here. Truly appreciate it. And Brandon, appreciate it, fantastic, from Federal Express. And Axel, of course, from Danone, or Danone, as we will say in the U.S. for today. So anyway, thank you so much for being here. Absolutely fantastic.

And then Mindy Simon, our Global COO. She leads all of our efforts around Aon Business Services. This is the leader that truly has grabbed a hold of the possibilities here, linked them into the firm, insisted they be connected to the firm, insisted that it's part of the DNA. And we've got so much traction. And she'll talk about what it means sort of to drive innovation, scaled innovation, and all the things that are required to do that.

And then to bring it all home, connect all the dots, is our own Edmund Reese, our CFO, who's going to bring this all together. And listen carefully, as Edmund, he will drive the financials unbelievably well, but he's also going to connect the dots on the operating side, which is absolutely huge in terms of what we're trying to do.

So listen, we started from an incredibly strong platform, but we're really talking about what's possible now. And what's possible is sitting here in front of us. It's sitting here in front of us. All it requires is a little sweat and action and movement, tour de force execution. We know where, we know how, and we know the impact it's going to have on our clients. And we are absolutely focused on doing that. And don't be confused on the date. We didn't do this at the beginning. We did this right in the middle of the 3x3. We're not talking about getting ready to get ready. We're past that. We're talking about 18 months in, halfway through where we are. We're talking about action, and the impact that it's having. And then we're going to give you a way to foreshadow what that might look like over the coming years to complete the 3x3 and then build the momentum we know is there as it relates to '27 and beyond.

So thank you for the time today, but please now join me in welcoming Lisa Stevens to the stage. Lisa?

Good morning, everyone, and Greg, thank you so much for kicking off this morning. I'm so pleased to have the opportunity to share with you how Aon has evolved to meet our clients' needs in ways no one else can. And underpinning all of this is the power of Aon United strategy, which creates immense value for our clients, our colleagues and our shareholders.

There's 4 key points that I want to make sure you take away from today. First, we've done the work to unify our firm through Aon United, changing the way we operate structurally. Second, Aon United is a differentiator in how we show up for our clients as they face new challenges and complexity, as Greg has just talked about. Third, we are operationalizing and accelerating our Aon United strategy through our 3x3 Plan, allowing us to provide integrated solutions for clients backed by advanced data, enhanced by analytics and guided by deep expertise. And finally, we have an incredible engaging talent strategy that ensures we attract, develop, and retain the absolute best talent, I think, in the world. And this is all to better serve our clients.

So today, I'm going to walk you through how we built the foundation to lead through Aon United and to accelerate our 3x3 Plan. So let's get started. First of all, let's talk a little bit about Aon and our history. It's been an evolution driven by one focus to help our clients wherever they are with the solutions that they need. Founded in 1982 as an insurance broker. In 1987, we became Aon. Aon, which means one in Gaelic, reflects an ambition to build a unified global firm. We expanded rapidly, broadening our capabilities into reinsurance, human capital, advisory and professional services. Our transformation into a fully integrated platform with global scale and strength has been intentional, sustained and rooted in client need. This evolution required strategic discipline, cultural alignment and long-term commitment.

Aon United has been our true north, guiding how we bring the full strength to every client interaction. And in 2018, we consolidated under one single global brand and introduced a shared leadership and governance model. We built essential enablers to help us with all of our performance. And as Greg mentioned, and so important, and the key to so much of what we do, Aon Business Services. It's our global delivery platform, providing operational excellence, efficiency and client service at scale. And the enterprise client group. Our enterprise client leaders are the absolute best as they deepen relationships and deliver the full power of Aon United to our largest clients. And in 2021, we formalized our Aon United framework to deliver advisory, broking, analytics and execution in an integrated way.

Importantly, this evolution was client demand. As clients' needs grew more complex and incredibly interconnected, we shaped our business model to meet them, realigning incentives, restructuring our business lines and removing silos, removing silos to enhance our ability to scale our solutions and meet their needs. And in 2022, we introduced Better Decisions, a unifying purpose and a promise of our brand, which continues to define how we create value. This enables clients to navigate complexity, make more informed decisions, drive measurable results and unlock new growth.

And finally, in 2024, we launched our 3x3 Plan to operationalize Aon United. It was an absolute pivotal moment, and the progress against it for our strategy went far beyond anything we had expected. Aon United is our core strength. It reflects a connected global model deliberately built through bold structural change and consistent investment in alignment and simplification. It's an enhanced differentiated business model, better for clients, driving innovation, and better for our colleagues. When we operate as one Aon, we show up differently, more connected, more capable and more committed. It means we win more clients, we do more with them and we keep them longer. With innovation at scale, we deliver client-focused solutions that directly address their needs. And for our colleagues, it's why top talent joins. They see the tangible impact that they can have.

So let's talk about why this really matters. First, Aon United is better for our clients. We've developed a platform able to deliver the full power of our global capabilities through trusted relationships no longer anchored to single transactions. Our colleagues have access to a full suite of solutions backed by enhanced data and analytics, allowing them to engage with clients with greater insight and impact. And Mindy is going to spend some time talking about this, because as a result, our client relationships are expanding across solution lines, industries and geographies, and the collaboration across regions has deepened. This could never have happened without the power of ABS behind it. And the consistency is so clear for all of us and for our clients and for our firm.

Aon United is not just how we operate, it's how we differentiate, and it's a driver of our stronger performance as we continue to scale and grow. By executing with discipline, we're delivering meaningful impact, reshaping how we serve clients, innovate and lead. Second, Aon United is better for innovation, as we've talked about, and as you'll see, if you go out and spend some time with our colleagues on the Better Decision Labs. By operating as one connected global firm, Aon delivers innovation with unmatched scale. We've broken down silos across the business so that Aon Business Services can do their magic and scale access to data and insight. What this allows is for the development of better, more tech-enabled capabilities and experiences for our clients and colleagues that are bar none.

The foundation enables us to turn ideas into enterprise-wide capabilities like Risk Capital and Human Capital capabilities and digital service platforms. Andy is going to come up after me, and he is going to give you real true examples of what Greg and I have been talking about with Human Capital and Risk Capital. I can't wait for you to hear it. And then Lori is going to bring it to life a little bit later in the morning with our clients. And finally, Aon United is better for our colleagues.

We've built a performance culture that supports growth, enables mobility and amplifies contribution. Colleagues come to Aon not just to achieve individual excellence, but for the brand, the market leadership, data capabilities and the opportunity to work alongside exceptional talent. Our talent attracts talent. And at Aon, our colleagues are more relevant. They're more relevant because they want to lead in the market. And Aon gives them the tools, the capabilities and the talent network to sharpen their edge. They're more connected with ways of working that enable agility and real-time collaboration and access to a global network of experts. And our colleagues are more valued. They're helping to shape and drive the capabilities and solutions to help our clients succeed. And this is part of the key of what Mindy has done is that loop of our colleagues being able to talk and the agility has been just amazing. Thank you.

Our most recent colleague engagement survey shows that 86%, as Greg already mentioned, 86% of our workforce is engaged. This is evidence that our people strategy is working well, resonating and creating alignment. Aon United has given us a cultural and an organizational advantage that enable us to lead in the industry. All of this leads to the 3x3 Plan. To scale the full power of Aon United and move faster than the pace of change, we launched the 3x3 Plan, a 3-year $1 billion investment designed to accelerate our strategy and amplify our impact. The plan builds on our foundation to drive greater reach, speed and consistency across Aon. It amplifies the unique capabilities developed through the work that we've done to unify our company. We saw an opportunity to go further faster, building on our strong foundation.

Our 3x3 Plan focuses on 3 core commitments: integrated solutions, helping clients make better decisions on increasingly interconnected issues through data and analytics, aligned teams and collaboration across our risk capital and human capital capabilities. Client leadership at scale, deploying our Aon Client Leadership model across all client segments. This model starts with the client need and brings the best of Aon to every relationship.

Digitally enabled delivery, transforming data into real-time actionable insights using AI and advanced analytics, again, delivered through Aon Business Services to ensure consistency, quality and scale. Execution is absolutely fundamental, and we're just halfway into our 3-year mission. We've identified key leaders responsible for driving the 3x3 Plan forward. We come together regularly for working sessions. We align our goals and we tie our incentives directly to measurable outcomes. We've committed to driving strong outcomes for all our stakeholders. Clients benefit from deeper expertise, more integrated solutions and a consistently high standard of service. Colleagues, they gain access to next-generation tools and capabilities, strengthening engagement, productivity and enabling a new generation of client leadership. And shareholders win as we generate sustainable growth, continued margin expansion and free cash flow growth. And Edmund is going to talk a lot more about that later.

Our 3x3 Plan is not a pivot. It's an acceleration of our Aon United strategy and the mechanism through which we enhance our capabilities to drive greater long-term performance. And at the heart of both Aon United and our 3x3 Plan is people, talent, foundational to our strategy and one of the most important long-term investments. As we move into the second half of our 3x3 journey, we've created an environment that attracts exceptional people and empowers them to grow, lead and collaborate. And in 2025, it's already been a marquee year for us in attracting new talent, as we continue to expand our base with new hires aligned to areas of market opportunity, client need and long-term growth.

Our investments reflect deliberate choices to deepen our capabilities and enhance our differentiation. We've expanded in key areas of high-demand sectors, construction, energy and health, where Aon's ability to bring insight to complex risk is especially valued. We've added experienced producers, brokers, account executives and human capital advisers to strengthen local delivery and broaden access. And in areas like climate and reinsurance, we're reinforcing our bench with globally recognized experts. We're equally focused on developing our talent that we have and have retained 92% of our high potential colleagues. Now this is a testament to the alignment between our culture, our people and our strategy. We continue to invest in capability, building digital fluency and developing highly skilled client leaders who can bring together one full suite of Risk Capital and Human Capital capabilities to support our largest global clients. These relationships are deeper and more valuable, and you're going to get to hear a lot more about this from Anne in a little bit.

Equally important and at the heart of it all is our culture. Starting with our values. We are united through trust as one inclusive and dynamic team, committed to our purpose. And we are so passionate about making our colleagues and clients successful. A culture where 9 out of 10 of our colleagues understand how they contribute to Aon United. This is a structural advantage that we've built while maintaining margin discipline and improving colleague engagement. That is a powerful combination. Through Aon United, we've created something truly powerful, a connected global firm that reflects our established culture, years of client-led innovation and operational alignment. We've aligned and simplified our operating structure so that we are moving all towards the same purpose, and that is to deliver the best possible service to our clients.

We've broken down silos, restructured how we engage with our clients and created an environment where the best of our firm comes together seamlessly. We've scaled our solutions so that all client leaders have access to our products no matter where they are in the world. And we've reshaped compensation, unified leadership and built a platform that strengthens relationships across solution lines. This is developing now, and it will continue to build well into the future. By seamlessly combining world-class broking, expert advisory and market-leading analytics, Aon is uniquely positioned to help clients stay ahead, helping them make better decisions in the face of uncertainty and build resilience with clarity and confidence.

Let me close with this. We've done the hard work. In a world where clients' needs are shifting, where risk is more interconnected than ever before and where trust is earned, Aon United is our differentiator. It's our catalyst, and no competitor can replicate what we have. Our 3x3 Plan pushes us to move faster than the market, embed relevance into every interaction, and anticipate what's next. We have a highly engaging talent strategy. And our colleagues, they're embracing complexity and the new ways to serve our clients. By bringing together insights, expertise and exceptional client service, we help clients make better decisions and drive stronger performance.

Aon United is how Aon leads with purpose by helping clients navigate a dynamic landscape and shape a more resilient future. And now I just want to say one last thing. You are going to have the opportunity for the rest of today to get to hear from the amazing team that I get to work with every single day as they bring to life what I've just shared with you. And with that, it is such a pleasure, such a pleasure to have come to the stage our CEO of Global Solutions, Andy Marcell. Thank you.

Wow. Thank you, Lisa. Good morning, everybody. I'm Andy Marcell, CEO of Global Solutions. And I just want to reflect on one thing that she was talking about. I've been in the risk industry for 35 years, and Aon United is truly unique to Aon. And it's the power that enables us to work across silos, build product, deliver to clients in ways that we would not be able to do without that level of collaboration. So I just want you to hold on to that thought.

So I'm going to take you through today the construct of Risk Capital and Human Capital. And it's a construct that hardwires our brokers, our account executives to the front line, our clients, in ways that's unique. And it's the engine of the 3x3 that Greg referred to, and it's critical in achieving 3 things: innovation at scale, delivering greater value to clients, and creating better data and forward-looking analytics. So ultimately, we can mobilize capital into the industry.

So let me start by covering 4 key points. One, Risk Capital and Human Capital are exceptionally strong and well positioned for growth. Two, meeting increasing client demand requires the best of what we have now and much more. Three, the move to Risk Capital and Human Capital is fundamental to deliver the next level of advice and the new capital to meet client demand. And four, which I'll come to at the end, client results after only 18 months are powerful.

So now I'm going to move into a description of what Risk Capital is, what Human Capital is, where we're investing. So let me start with a Risk Capital overview. It's commercial risk and reinsurance. It has $10.5 billion of revenue. And as Greg said earlier, $185 billion of subject premium. What do we do? Insurance broking, reinsurance broking and advisory capabilities that run through both businesses. They have strong records of performance, strong track records. They're powerful businesses. They have highly recurring revenue streams, and they have industry-leading margins. And so when we think about these businesses, we want to double down and invest in them, and we call it investing in the core. Internally, we call it amplifying the core, do more, sell more, get more clients. That's what we do. So I'm now going to go in each one of these, a bit more of a description as commercial risk and reinsurance and where our growth priorities are.

Commercial Risk Solutions, Commercial Risk Broking, Risk Consulting and Affinity Programs. We have $7.9 billion in revenue, a 5% 10-year average organic growth. We're a world-leading captive manager with 1,000 captives under management and $125 billion of subject premium through our annual bound treaty affinity and captive premiums. We have an exceptionally strong geographic footprint all over the world, and it's powered by industry product and broking expertise. We manage clients of all complexity from the large globals to the middle market to the SMEs to our affinity business, where we reached 23 million customers. But what's great about commercial risk is the demand in commercial risk continues to grow, and it continues to grow because of the things that Greg talked about, the megatrends, and also some things that are associated with secular like energy transition.

So when we think about where we're investing, we're investing in what we call our high-growth verticals. So think construction, natural resources. So construction, I'm assuming you will travel all over the world, either for work or with your families and you go into a hotel room and you open up the window and you're like, wow, there's a crane. Everywhere you look, there's a crane. There's one right here, right behind me, right? And so construction is everywhere and it's global. Natural resources, wind farms, solar farms, battery factories, you know it's happening, and it changes between the categories, but it's happening all the time. And so we are leaning in and investing there. We are attracting talent to our firm. We are doubling down in our analytical capability in these categories where we will drive growth.

In capital solutions, what is that? There's a couple of things. One, we continue to facilitize our business such as the creation of the Aon Client Treaty, which is in London, 10 years in the making. What we're trying to do here with other facilities like that is to create as much automatic capacity to serve our clients as we can in the most efficient way, drawing in capital. But equally important is our parametric. We have connected globally, under Joe Peiser, our parametric business around the world. And so if I think back to 2 or 3 years ago, we probably did 20 to 30 parametric transactions for corporate clients. Now we're doing excess of 100 plus, and it's accelerating.

And in the trailing 12 months, I think we've bound $3 billion of limit in that category. So that's an important area for us. And last, but certainly not least, is the U.S. middle market. Post the acquisition of NFP, we continue to grow there organically and inorganically. Given our market share, we see tremendous opportunity for expansion. So overall, Commercial Risk is exceptionally well positioned to continue to drive mid-single-digit growth or greater.

Moving on to reinsurance, which is where I started my career. We're the largest and world's best reinsurance broker. I would say that because that was me. What do we do? Treaty and facultative broking, capital markets, advisory and consulting. We have $2.7 billion in revenue, a 6% 10-year average organic growth and $60 billion or so in subject premium. But what makes us unique and differentiated is our investment in analytics. Let me give you an example. Impact forecasting, which you can see on the break in the Better Decisions Lab, if I get that right. It is our natural catastrophe model. It has 135 individual models, individual perils in 90 different countries. And it's critical for us because it's a category in which we lead, property cat, in an area with surging demand from climate change. So it positions us extremely, extremely well.

So beyond our core treaty business, we have spent considerable time in diversifying our revenue flows from facultative to capital markets and our advisory, which now represent those 3 categories, 25% of our revenue. Like commercial risk, reinsurance also has strong demand, driven by climate change and driven by the social inflation in the United States around casualty. We believe in it. Others believe in it, too, so much so that we actually recently hired John Neal, who was the former CEO of Lloyd's of London to come and lead that for us, and he'll start sometime in the beginning of September. So we're super excited about that. In terms of our growth priorities, we're going to double down in our treaty capabilities, particularly property, where we lead, but also casualty and cyber, where there's growing demand in our facultative capabilities, where over the last 8 to 10 years, we've seen high single-digit growth to double-digit growth. And so we're going to continue to invest in that.

Insurance-linked securities, so I think cat bonds, where we've been the market leader for some time, demand and our position in that is accelerating all the time. So we're going to put more resources into that category. And last but not least, our U.S. regional insurers. We want to grow our market share there where we have a lot of headroom to grow. So in reinsurance, we will continue to drive mid-single-digit growth or greater in reinsurance.

Now moving on to human capital. This is a new area of responsibility for me. And this is an amazing business. It really is an amazing business. So I think all things workforce, which is a massive category. It's especially important given it's a significant investment for all our clients. So what is it? It's health and wealth. We do health benefits broking, retirement advisory and talent advisory. It has $5.2 billion in revenue. It's a massive, massive, massive addressable market, fueled by the challenge to better understand the return on people investment where the costs continue to rise.

So let me go into Health Solutions. Health Benefits Broking Talent Advisory has $3.3 billion in revenue, a 7% 10-year organic growth, and $190 billion of annual premium placed. We have some unique records, 33 million unique compensation database is pretty powerful. But like our other solution lines, health is powered by investment in analytics and data, which we believe is differentiating. Let me give you a couple of examples in health. We have the health risk analyzer, which looks at critical illness and its contribution to health costs for individual companies and help companies predict the future severity of that cost, and therefore, they can reduce their severity and create greater certainty. Or the workforce absence analyzer, which combines risk capital data, workers' comp data with health data to be predictive of workforce absence and ultimately reduce volatility for the clients and also make safer, healthier workplaces.

In talent, we also have proprietary databases like our industry-leading Radford McLagan Compensation Database, which has over 30 million employee records, so huge scale and total rewards benchmarking to assess the total cost of people. So this is some great businesses. But like our other businesses, health is also -- the demand profile for health is massive. Think the U.S. health care cost is now 20% of GDP and rising. There's rising wealth around the world, which is fueling demand globally for private health. So when we think of where we want to invest, I think of it as sort of across the categories of global benefits. So all things health, but we come together with our large and complex clients and others to think about their workforce.

So we want to advise them on health. We want to advise them on talent, and we want to advise them on retirement. And we do that together, which is what human capital enables us to do. So underpinning that, we need to continue to invest in data and analytics. And in the last category in population health, where we've done considerable work on GLP-1s and the benefits to break the cost curve there, and I'll come back to that later on. So we remain confident in mid-single-digit growth or greater across health.

Wealth Solutions. What we do, retirement and advisory solutions, but we have an amazing, amazing, amazing investment footprint. We have $1.9 billion in revenue, 3% 10-year average organic growth, $245 billion of assets under management and $5 trillion of assets under advisory. We're organized globally. We have a strong presence in the U.K. and the U.S., 2 of the largest retirement markets in the world. We're known for our particular specialties such as the pension risk transfer, where we are responsible for 60% of U.S. deal premium advised in 2024, and in the U.K. in the Master Trust, where we're the market leader. And we're proud of our reputation for innovation and market fund outperformance. But when it comes to our growth priorities, we like to think of it as across workforce. So as I said before, and the health, coming together as pension with talent, with health to solve complex issues for clients.

But within those categories, in pension, there's further opportunity in the defined benefit space to continue to advise clients on plan design, giving ongoing trends and regulatory forces. And in the defined contribution space, there's opportunities to expand what we do there with the broad employee trust. So we're going to do some of that. But when we get to the end, recognizing our history, we remain focused on mid-single-digit growth or greater.

So hopefully, you have a better understanding of our solution lines and that they're well positioned for growth, and they have tremendous capability. The challenges and the opportunity for Aon is that our clients are asking us to do more. And they're asking us to do more because their costs are rising. And their costs are rising driven by the things that Greg talked about at the beginning, the megatrends. So think of weather, think of U.S. cat losses, severe convective storm losses in the U.S. have increased by 90%, 90% in the last 10 years. Think of it, in the last month of all the tornadic activity in the middle part of the U.S. and the South that hasn't been seen with that intensity before, or the $145 billion of natural catastrophe losses in 2024. So this is driving up the cost for our clients.

But also these megatrends, as Greg said, are interconnected, which is driving complexity. What does that mean? So I'm trying to bring it to life for you. If you think about the L.A. wildfires, and you can picture that on the television, the newspapers, some horrific scenes there. And you think of the property damage, but actually, it was more than that. So you think of the smoke pollution and the adverse health implications for thousands of people. And we think of the uninsured or underinsured properties causing a destruction in wealth. And we think of all the people that were displaced and the workforce interruption that impacted businesses and therefore, business resiliency. So this is hugely complicated. What is the total economic loss of the L.A. wildfires, that total economic loss and how much was insured?

So to extend complexity, I could talk about tariffs and supply chains, but think of staying with the wildfires. Think of the Canadian wildfires. There was so much smoke that drifted south that it impacted the energy output of solar farms in the Northeast United States. This is an interconnected unexpected risk. This is what Greg is talking about. This is the rise in complexity.

So how do we draw capital in to meet that demand? Well, insurance exists, right, to transfer volatility. If you want to transfer volatility, it has to be measurable. You're all investors -- I hope you're all investors. You're all investors. To invest in something where you can't estimate a return, you're not going to do that. So we have to be able to quantify the return and create measurable outcomes. You can't do this, right, unless you integrate all your assets in your firm to solve the problems, not just the problems of the capital assets, but the problems of the human capital assets and the total economic cost to our clients. So we have to change the way that we fundamentally operate, and that's what we have done, and that's what we are doing. The industry has been struggling with this for 30 years.

If we go back one slide. Thank you. This is a slide that Greg showed earlier, and it's profound. In many ways, it talks to the lack of relevance of the industry over time, but we really see it as an opportunity at Aon. The 3x3 Plan exists to break this trend. Let me be clear, the 3x3 Plan exists to break this trend. And we know what it takes to break the trend. It takes better data and analytics. It takes innovation that drives better solutions, and it takes access to more capital.

So in order to accomplish this, you need to work outside of your silos and bring your company together. If you don't, you end up with this picture. If you do what we're doing, you can actually capture the opportunity. So we recognize that we needed to come together and organize differently, organize ourselves around risk capital and human capital, and that's what we've done. We knew that we needed certain conditions. We needed the right colleagues, the right data, the right models, continuous improvement and global scale. When we talk about continuous improvement, what do we mean? We mean that working on these solutions and delivering for our clients is not a project, it's the way that we operate. We have to align across our business on a global basis, and that's what we are doing. And that's what risk capital does. It aligns reinsurance with commercial risk. It's what human capital does. It aligns health, wealth and talent. If we can do this, which we have done, you will create an engine to drive innovation.

Let me give you an example of this. The property risk analyzer, which you can also see in the Better Decisions Lab. So 18 months ago, our commercial risk colleagues were trying to solve for their clients the demand issue, the rising costs, the lack of capacity, the increasing complexity. And we set about trying to create an analyzer to help assist in this venture. So in the room, there was me, there was Mindy Simon, our COO; Joe Peiser, our Head of Commercial Risk; Paul Shedden, our Head of Analytics. And we set about trying to accomplish this together. And in 4 months, we had a workable and phenomenal model that we presented in January to -- about 5 months later, we presented to 1,000 clients at our Property Symposium. And at that, we had preloaded the exposures for 400 of those clients.

And where are we now? Now we're on version 4 or 5. We are accelerating a way in those versions has climate change, has our severe convective storm model that's proprietary to us, has our wildfire model. And we are answering questions for clients and growing our business as a consequence of this engagement. That's what risk capital does, right people, right analytics, right data, continuous improvement and global scale. The property risk analyzer is not just in the U.S., it's in every country in the world.

So our mission has been to redefine the client experience. And we recognize that organizing around human capital and risk capital was the only path. And so halfway through the 3x3, where are we? We have a whole suite of analyzers, some of which I mentioned on the health side, on the risk capital side, apart from property, casualty, cyber, the list is endless, and we're growing. Additionally, we're investing in our client service platforms to improve the client experience and the broker experience, whether it's broker Copilot or the ad hoc certificate center. We think these are so compelling and it's reshaping the client experience that we've filed 2 patents and have 4 more pending, right, to protect and invest in this area. And we're going to continue to build our analyzers in every geography and every industry in the world.

So reshaping the way that we go to market, reshaping the way that we interact with our clients, it requires ABS, but it also requires Aon Client Leadership. It requires Lori Goltermann in the Regions to come together, and you're going to hear from Lori and the client panel. You're going to hear from Anne Corona about how we're doing this and the experience that clients are having and how it's changed for them over the last 18 months.

But for now, let's hear from Mars, from Chris de Wolfe, VP of Corporate Risk Management.

[Presentation]

Wow, thank you, Chris. Can you say thank you to a video? I did. He's a really important client, by the way. He might be watching. So thank you.

So we're trying -- we are leading, not trying to. We are leading with innovation, and we're leading from the front line. So I want to give you a couple of examples of this so that you can get a better understanding.

So the first example is in next-generation population health and the second example is the one that Greg referred to in his opening around a parametric solution for talent resiliency and how we -- that came together to give you a picture of how Aon operates today.

So in the first example, imagine that you're the chief people officer of a major company, that's Lisa, that spent millions and millions of dollars on GLP-1 therapy. And you have to go to the CEO and explain to them whether you should continue spending this money and what the return on that investment looks like.

So on May 3, our human capital, risk capital colleagues got together, and they issued a report based on 50 million insured Americans, medically insured Americans, which is about 1/3 of the total population. And in that were 139,000 GLP-1 users. And so the study was over 24 months. And the conclusions, the outcomes were profound.

In the first instance, there was a lot of broader health benefits, whether it was the reduction of cardiovascular events, respiratory disease, hospitalizations, et cetera. But also the medical inflation, the cost was shown to decline over time because of the reduction in those critical illnesses and other things.

So think about that. You can reduce the cost curve and you can improve the health of your employees. Who doesn't want those 2 outcomes? So when we applied that, reducing the cost curve to the total database, we would think -- think of 135 million -- 165 million insured Americans. That's on as a $42 billion annual saving.

So we presented this at the Milken Conference, and the response was like electric. They were amazed. And our client interactions and our pipeline of activity is fantastic. So we're really excited about that.

In the second example, we have a client in California that was asking us the question about their talent resiliency. Post an extreme event, in this case, earthquake, what was the vulnerability to their talent? And how would they get back to operations, business resiliency? And that actually was brought to us by our talent colleagues, and it came to our commercial risk and reinsurance colleagues for a solution.

So we mapped out where all geocoded where all their talent was, what the aggregation of that population was, in particular, earthquake zones, describe how much limit you needed to buy to offset that, right? And so we bought a parametric bond. And so when an event happens that triggers that bond, cash will be immediately paid out and then distributed by the client to its employees in the form of an employee benefit, getting them back on their feet, back to work. It helps business resiliency. It helps employee engagement. It was fantastic.

But when we really think about what really went on there is you had Aon in operation. You had an opportunity delivered by another part of the firm by Talent to Risk Capital, engaging Reinsurance modeling, placing the business into the parametric market, into the bond market. And who's investing in the bond market? ILS funds, pension funds, hedge funds.

This is very similar to what's been happening in the cat bond market where we lead, where billions of dollars has been flowing into that market over time, and it's accelerating. So think back to what Greg said about the $250 trillion of capital that's out there that we want to bring into the business. We want to bring into the business to solve our clients' need. That's what we need to do to break the trend. And that's what we're doing. Real examples, and we're doing this every day.

But of course, you know all this and I told you about all these crazy, wonderful analyzers in everything that we do, the way that we go to work, and Edmund says to me, well, what's my return on investment, Andy? Is there measurable outcomes? And I can say, yes, Edmund, there are.

So when the analyzers are used in RFPs, our win rate in commercial risk and health increases by 40%, a 40% increase. When the property analyzer is used, clients are often buying more limit. Let me give you an example. The severing convective storm losses in the South, we have put in our new severe convective storm model into the property risk analyzer, and our brokers and account executives went to their clients 6 months ago with our new technology and showed them how severity and frequency has shifted and what they should do to protect their firms.

And what did they do? They didn't say, no, no, no, no. We go to the CFO or the CEO and they bought more limit. And we bought a considerable limit from the commercial market, but we had to also go to the parametric market. So again, more demand, more complexity. Aon answers the need with analytics. They buy more, right, and we have to draw in new capital.

And then the last category here, retention. We are keeping clients longer. Since we've been on this journey, our retention has increased by 100 basis points, 1% increase in retention. So that is a great outcome.

So coming to the end, I'll finish where I started. The 4 points. Risk capital and human capital are exceptionally strong and well positioned for growth. Two, meeting increasing client demand requires the best of what we have now and much more. Three, the move to risk capital and human capital is fundamental to deliver the next level of advice and the new capital required to meet client demand. And four, after only 18 months, client results are powerful.

But getting this into the hands of our clients, particularly our large global and complex clients in a consistent way, in a really effective way, we created different delivery mechanisms, enterprise client group. And I'm not going to tell you about that because I'm now going to bring Anne to the stage, and she's going to tell you all the accomplishments that they have. But thank you very much.

Thank you and greetings. My name is Anne Corona, and I'm thrilled to be talking to you today about how we bring the best of Aon to our clients through Aon Client Leadership and show you what that means through what we are doing today with the Enterprise Client Group.

During my 25-year tenure at Aon, I've held several roles, most recently serving as the CEO of the Asia Pacific region. I have been on the front lines, engaging with clients, listening to what they need, and delivering. I spent years as a broker in our Commercial Risk Solutions lines, helping clients address complex cyber and directors and officers' liability risk transfer needs and advising global clients on optimal capital access. Most critically, recovering billions of dollars in claims payments for our clients.

At the end of my discussion, I want you to come away with 4 key points. First, we are realizing the full potential of our client-centric approach in a way that is differentiated and difficult to replicate. Second, our clients demand comprehensive data-driven solutions on a global scale, and we are uniquely positioned to meet those needs. Third, Aon Client Leadership is contributing meaningfully to Aon's performance, driving greater client penetration and higher retention.

And importantly, we are just getting started. We have proved the concept and are driving tangible impact for clients and for Aon. We see significant runway to scale this model, reinforcing our confidence in delivering sustainable mid-single-digit or greater growth over the long term.

So what is Aon Client Leadership? Simply put, it is our commitment to deeply understand our clients in a holistic manner and bring the full strength of the firm to address their needs. As Andy just discussed, it's risk capital and human capital, enabled by the tools and capabilities created by Aon Business Services.

But this is not just about retention or new business from existing clients. This is about creating long-term value by anticipating clients' needs and delivering integrated solutions to address them. Doing so strengthens client loyalty and lifetime value, enabling Aon to scale confidently and sustainably.

As Chief Commercial Officer, I am excited to apply our learnings from the Enterprise Client Group more broadly. We began our Aon Client Leadership commitment with our Enterprise Client Group, a dedicated team of leading professionals serving our largest and most complex global clients. These clients face uncertainty on a global scale. By successfully executing for these clients, we are proving the Aon client leadership model and scaling it across other client segments.

Our industry was built as a broker-centric model focused on selling products locally. The industry experience for clients is siloed and transactional. Aon Client Leadership rejects this as the optimal approach for clients. Clients need a more strategic and connected approach in today's world because risks are more threatening and complex than ever. We structurally changed Aon to put the client at the center of all that we do to solve for their needs.

Next-generation client experience is defined by taking the best from the historic model and adding to it. This is Aon Client Leadership.

I have spent my career listening to clients speak about their challenges and the capabilities that they need to make better decisions. Our clients are looking for unique analytics and insights supported by data. While that data and insight need to be global in scale, clients also want advisers with local market expertise who can deliver locally. They are looking for holistic solutions to address complex challenges.

Our client leaders are spearheading a transformation from transactional engagement to strategic partnership. This shift enhances the client experience and consistently delivers outstanding results.

When the Enterprise Client Group was established, our priority was to build a robust infrastructure and organization. We completed this and successfully proved the hypothesis that by changing our firm to have one enterprise client leader holistically serve the client, we generate significantly greater engagement.

In 2024, the Enterprise Client Group contribution to new business from existing clients was 3 points higher than the prior year. Global penetration is stronger with about 50% of revenue earned outside the clients headquartered region. And we are enhancing client retention with enterprise client retention reaching 97% in 2024.

Now is about accelerating growth, going further faster. To understand how, let us take a close look at the companies that we serve in the Enterprise Client Group. These are our largest and most complex clients with global needs.

Generally, enterprise clients have more than $10 billion in annual revenue, have more than 10,000 employees and operate in more than 10 countries. The median market cap for an enterprise client is $77 billion. We have approximately 100 enterprise client leaders serving 500 clients and their needs in over 120 countries.

Enterprise client leaders are enabled with the content and capability to deliver the best client experience. We have specialized industry leaders for financial services, natural resources, technology and more, providing greater focus with industry-specific thought leadership, market trends and events. Only Aon has connectivity across risk capital and human capital on a global scale. And we are delivering impactful data-led results that no one else in the industry can provide.

In addition, innovative tools built by Aon Business Services such as relationship maps, penetration grids, all sitting on global client dashboards with real-time client data enable our enterprise client leaders to serve our enterprise clients differently.

So what makes Aon different? It begins with Aon United and the competitive -- significant competitive advantage it has created. Everything we have done has been for our clients. Structuring ourselves around client needs and serving them with the one firm mindset is a powerful competitive differentiator. We made the investments and structural changes necessary to operationalize this strategy. This work enables us to deliver the Aon Client Leadership model.

Enterprise client leaders are integrators for our firm, and more importantly, for our clients. One enterprise client leader enables all the capabilities: the innovation, data, analytics, global insights, expertise to the client. Our deep strategic relationships with enterprise clients are integral to our innovation initiatives.

We listen to our clients' needs and solve for them. Enterprise clients are the first to experience our newest tools, analytics, proprietary data and capabilities. And their feedback informs faster iteration and refinement of these solutions for all of our clients.

Our Enterprise Client Group proves that Aon Client Leadership results in winning more clients, doing more with clients and keeping the clients for longer. We are doing more with the clients. Covered enterprise clients' product density increased over 20% last year. Our average likelihood to recommend is 9 out of 10. Our Net Promoter Score is 67, up from 62 last year. And for those unfamiliar with Net Promoter Scores, this is world-class.

As a tangible example, I recently met with a retailer headquartered in Europe, with disparate operations in Europe, Africa and South America. The CFO commented that historically, each part of her organization had separate insurance programs managed by different advisers. Now imagine the complexity and challenges of expanding its global operations under that construct.

She shared the important role that Aon plays unifying their teams and their operations, and how Aon uses market-leading analytics to model exposures and provide unique advice that supports their global growth. The Aon team educated the clients' leadership team on risk financing and then creating a more efficient program that optimize use of capital, retention and coverage, which then effectively -- more effectively delivered for claims at the time of loss.

I frequently hear stories like this, how Aon is showing up differently. We connect client teams to solve risk and people challenges and drive outcomes. You will hear from 3 great clients on Lori's panel discussion in a little bit. The way we serve enterprise clients is a differentiator, so is how we attract and retain our client leaders. You heard from Lisa about our strategy and culture. Colleagues choose Aon because of our tools and capabilities, empower them to better serve clients.

The Enterprise Client Group is a destination for choice for top talent from the broader professional services industry. And we build this talent through our enterprise client development program and Aon Client Leadership Academy. Every enterprise client leader participates in a 100-hour program over 9 months with direct coaching on Aon United global standards, Aon IQ development, business acumen and client planning.

Let's take a minute to hear directly from clients about how our enterprise client leaders are solving for them differently.

[Presentation]

That video demonstrates how our enterprise client leaders are making a difference to clients. But do not forget, I also showed you the meaningful financial impact of Aon Client Leadership.

As we look ahead, there is significant untapped opportunity for us to further expand our enterprise client segment as well as penetrate our large corporate client segment. This growth opportunity is the focus in my Chief Commercial Officer role.

Our team of 100 enterprise clients serve approximately 500 clients globally. We are investing to grow the Enterprise Client Group through recruitment and internal development. By 2026, we expect to reach 125 enterprise client leaders covering approximately 750 clients.

We have already begun to extend into the large corporate segment. The opportunity is substantial. We provide over 2.5x as many solutions to our enterprise clients as we do to our roughly 1,500 large corporate clients. Modest product density gains in the large corporate segment will provide outsized incremental revenue opportunity.

We see equal potential in the massive $31 billion U.S. middle market segment for the Aon Client Leadership model, where clients often have a more centralized purchasing structure, which makes for our consultative client-focused approach to be even more compelling.

While our clients are segmented, our capabilities are not. With Aon Business Services, we are scaling our approach while driving efficiency and client impact. We are running differently and running smarter. By listening to clients and leveraging our unique capabilities, we are driving growth and exceptional client value. The opportunity ahead and the impact that we can make as we scale Aon Client Leadership is substantial.

To conclude, Aon Client Leadership is a game changer for Aon because it is changing the game for clients. We understand clients' needs better and are uniquely positioned to address them with comprehensive data-driven solutions delivered globally. We are delivering more value. We are scaling massively, delivering consistently against our growth plans and responding to client demand with unmatched capability.

The results are clearly visible in the Enterprise Client Group and its impact on penetration, retention and growth. We have proven the concept, and there is now significant runway for future growth. We are positioned for continued success with the Enterprise Client Group and will scale to large corporates and the middle market.

With clients at the center of everything we do, we are delivering 2 key outcomes. First, more value for our clients, by serving as integrators and strategic partners, and more growth and confidence in Aon's trajectory as we win more, do more and keep clients longer.

Thank you. We'll now take a 20-minute break and be back for an exciting panel with 3 of our esteemed clients.

[Break]

And now please welcome Lori Goltermann, CEO, Regions and North America, to the stage to begin the second half of our program.

Thank you so much. Welcome back from the break. I hope you got a chance to look at some of the analyzer tools out there in our Better Decisions Lab. I'm Lori Goltermann, CEO of our Global Regions and North America. And I've got the unique privilege of leading our regional teams that are delivering Aon's risk capital and human capital capabilities and expertise powered by Aon Business Services to our clients all across the world, all segments and all industries.

And everything we do at Aon is in service to our client needs. And we have a saying that defines our culture at Aon: you're either helping a client or helping a colleague help a client. So I couldn't be more excited to bring Aon's strategy to life through these 3 phenomenal clients in this wonderful conversation today.

And to set up the discussion and to reinforce some of my colleagues before me, I want to recap what clients are looking for today. First, a strategic partner, one who leads with data and analytics to make decisions across complex risk and people issues, a partner who can also bring innovation and expertise across risk and human capital with no P&L barriers or silos in how we work and how we address the interconnected nature of the megatrends that Greg kicked us off the day with.

And finally, our clients are looking for a technology-led service delivery platform to enable outcomes and drive more impact to our client strategy as well as finding time to focus on more strategic priorities. So our panelists are all enterprise clients. You've heard a lot about that today. And they all have an Aon client leader. So they will be able to uniquely talk about our 3x3 Plan and what's different at Aon today.

So let's get started with some introductions of who is on our panel. First, we have Oliver Wild, who is our Group Chief Risk and Insurance Officer at Veolia. Veolia is a leader in ecological transformation through a focus on waste, water and energy management. And they've been an Aon client for more than a decade. They have 215,000 employees and operate in over 50 countries, with exciting plans for growth. Welcome, Oliver.

Next is Brandon Waits at FedEx Corporation, Global Head of Total Rewards. FedEx has been an Aon client for over 35 years, employing more than 500,000 people and operating the world's most extensive transportation network, moving 17 million packages a day. Super impressive. Brandon, welcome.

And Axel de Billy, who's Senior Vice President of Total Rewards and Global HR governance at Danone, or as we say in the U.S., Danone, we might say Danone today. And Danone's mission is bringing health through food to as many people as possible with 3 main fast-growing categories: essential dairy and plant-based products, waters and specialized nutrition. They have over 90,000 employees and operate in products sold in 120 markets. Danone has been an Aon client for 3 decades.

So each of these clients will be able to share the Aon's 3x3 plan and have been long-standing clients. And on behalf of my colleagues at Aon, it's such a privilege to serve all of you and to serve your company. So thanks for enriching our day today. And I'd love to get started. Oliver, if I could kick it over to you, you've been Veolia for 10 years, leading the enterprise risk management strategy at Veolia. Can you talk about some of the challenges you were facing in the marketplace and Aon's role in helping you create an innovative capital solution?

Sure. Well, first, thank you, Lori, and thanks for inviting me to the Investor Day. It's a fantastic opportunity. And really happy to share the exciting journey that we've been on.

So when I took on the role, it's very strongly based on enterprise risk management and looking at identifying our risks and opportunities for growth. And on the insurance perspective, although we had a captive and we had strong risk appetite to carry that, we also had a strong drive on understanding our risk and investing a lot in prevention, fire risk being a big risk in the waste, obviously, industry.

And so we made those investments. But we weren't getting the response that we wanted from the market. And so with the Aon team, looking at our data, looking at our claims history, looking at the investments that we made, we were able to reanalyze what our real risk profile was and challenge the market. And better than that, rather than just buying insurance with the Aon team, the Aon team came up with some great innovation where we had access to alternative capital, alternative risk transfer. And that has been fantastic.

So it was really the next step for us in our risk management strategy is understanding our risk, retaining risk, having access to new capital and then only then looking at the traditional market. And so that generated savings, better risk culture within our organization at the operational level and, obviously, great savings for our clients as well. So fantastic opportunity there.

It's a wonderful example of how you really leverage that risk capital structure that Andy and we've talked about earlier today and turning insurance from a cost really to that strategic lever. So it's excellent.

And Brandon, how about you? You are on a journey of One FedEx, merging global employees from several different operating units into one. And can you share a bit more on your journey to build a global benefits program across 100 countries?

Yes, absolutely. Thanks for having me, Lori. And as you mentioned earlier, the relationship between Aon and FedEx spans 35 years. And really what started as a risk capital adviser for our aviation and captive needs really was a source of confidence when we look to Aon for our human capital needs.

And as you mentioned, in 2023, we announced the start of our One FedEx journey, which included bringing employees across our 7 operating companies into our One FedEx global enterprise. And at the beginning of that journey, I was appointed the Global Head of Total Rewards. And the challenge that I had was centralizing our global benefits into one single global broker. And this involved the plans outside of the U.S., the non-ERISA plans.

And my goal was, and our goal was, to solve for some of the immediate pain points that we had, but also build a strong foundation for the future. This was no small task. It involved about 127,000 employees across 100 countries. And so, our previous solution, it served about half of our markets, but it was very disparate, it was locally served, and it was really a market-by-market approach. So we lacked a centralized view in what we had, and we didn't know the broker or benefits or cost or compliance that were achieved market to market. We didn't have that centralized view.

So we were already doing business with a lot of your competitors, but there was a unique value that Aon was able to bring that we could not get elsewhere. And so that really served the strategy that we were having.

And so the Aon team came in with really supporting us across all of those geographies. They helped clear those pain points. They helped us in our transformation journey. And Aon came forward with very unique data and analytics approach that helped us, and we were able to create a centralized platform across those 100 countries that we serve. And we were able to touch every country with that, and it gave us clear insights into our renewals, our offerings, our design, our oversight, compliance, reporting. We could see all of that in a centralized way leveraging the Aon technology.

So this benefits management model was supported with that global data insights that Aon provides. And really our next phase is to leverage the data to look at the design in country by country to enhance those offerings and help us better serve our employees around the world.

So we've also done some work together on our executive mobility program. That allows us to seamlessly move and promote executives around the world from country to country and backed up foundationally with strong insights into compensation and benefits practices that helps us be competitive and dial that in correctly.

And so this all supports our centralized vision for Total Rewards at FedEx. It helps us optimize our ROI across Total Rewards, accelerate our strategic outcomes. And really, this all started with the transformational global benefit strategy that we began this journey on.

What I love about that story, you think about 100-plus countries, and I can envision this data lake coming into that one platform, I know outside in the Aon Analytics Hub, you get a chance to see that, and Mindy. I know you'll describe that later, but that foundation is what you can really now use to build your true global talent strategy. So that's super exciting.

Axel, let's turn to you and Danone. We've had a relationship for a very long time, starting on the risk capital side of our business, expanding through our enterprise approach. And you were trying to solve really 2 big challenges, unsustainable rising health care costs as well as your company was going through a business transformation and a cultural change that you call Renew Danone. So could you share a little bit more about Aon's journey with you on building your strategy around these challenges?

Sure. And first, I want to say also that it's a pleasure to be here. You said that we have a long-standing relationship. Being here is a way of also giving back to Aon. So I think it was important for me to be here.

So indeed, in 2021, we had a CEO transition in the company who introduced a new business strategy called Renew Danone. In the way we structured it, we wanted also just to be compelling, innovative, forward-looking, but we wanted just to stay true to our roots, to our DNA, which is basically really just to bring health through food to as many people as possible.

In that framework, my job as Head of Total Rewards was also just to take care about the health care costs. which is -- which was and still is expanding in all our geographies, while also supporting the business strategy, which was to make one Danone, one company. We were very scattered. So my job also just to support business and people strategy by embarking on one culture, one company.

So this is basically what Aon supported us, coming with a broad idea just to leverage the existing captive we had for P&Cs for employee benefits. And they helped us with that. We didn't think about it. It was quite bold, quite scary move maybe for us. But you helped us just to be not too so scared.

We built the feasibility study together. I went to the CFO to the CEO and to CHRO just to ask their support and their sponsorship. And based on the feasibility study we built together, we managed to get that sponsorship. It was not only a success for us because it was a great project and it delivered a lot of value and maybe we'll speak later about it, but it was also a way of showing the business that HR and finance can work together.

So Aon really helped us to be this kind of aggregator, the 2 functions, at least in Danone, who were not enemies, but challengers sometimes, managed just to work together to deliver great value. So this was a true success for us.

That connector that even Ben talked about in the video earlier and thinking of something outside of the box, but what you sort of really brings to life is that Aon United connection across risk and human capital, bringing HR and finance together with that bold idea. So super exciting.

And now for all of you, what I'd really like to do is to dive a little bit deeper about your unique experience. What was really different at Aon? I think everyone this morning has described our strategy really well, but I'd love for you to bring that to life in how we serve your businesses.

And Oliver, if I could start with you, we're really proud of turning insurance from a cost into a real strategic lever without question. But can you talk about Aon service and capabilities and what's really been different and transformative to you and to Veolia?

Yes, sure. So I mean there are many areas, but we'll keep it short. So if I name 3, I think the fact that with the enterprise client model that was being referred to this morning, I have a single point in contact, [ William White ], and he gives me access in a very timely fashion to all the expertise and the capabilities that exist within the Aon group. And that is fantastic. There are no silos. I come up with a question and the solution comes from diverse capabilities as well. It's not just -- so -- and I have a recent example.

Last Wednesday, I was in Montreal with my North American teams. We have M&A projects, quite a few at the moment because growth is definitely on the front of the agenda. And in less than 24 hours, we had a call set up on some really tricky topics on acquisition in the U.S. So clear demonstration that it works. That's just a recent example and that's working really well.

The second aspect is the fact that we've created a hub. So as you said earlier, Veolia is in over 50 countries around the globe. And we have a strong global strategy, but we obviously have to have local solutions adapted as well or the support from Aon to explain what the global strategy is. And for a decentralized organizations such as ourselves, I think that Aon United approach with the hubs, with the local and the global approach works really, really well for us. So that's fantastic.

And then the last aspect that I would highlight is ABS. The solutions that you come up with through data, and I think we've only just started. It's -- everyone's talking about data and the value and the power of data. We've already realized the power of data through recreating our insurance model on the property program with that block structure. We've engaged in more conversations on other areas, other risks such as climate risk and the modeling capacity that you bring to us is really a true fit solutions that we need to bring to ourselves with our clients as well. So that's been a fantastic experience.

And then just to maybe wrap everything up, I think you're probably the only service -- financial services company that I've seen that's managed to crack the code of that P&L silo where usually you talk to an organization, they say, oh, but that revenue is going to go here and that revenue is going to go there. There we've got a central point of contact, global solutions. There's a bill at the end. I'm not saying it's free. But there's no issue on where it originates from and where it has to go to, that you manage that. And I've never seen anyone do that. So thank you. Makes my life a lot easier.

Unlocking the international P&L to really serve your clients to deliver and drive outcomes is one of our proudest outcomes, I think, from the strategy we described all day. And that enterprise role, marshaling the full set of resources and the block structure is interesting because it really is a combination of commercial risk and many of the alternative structures that Andy mentioned. So we're proud of that. You should patent that block structure.

Brandon, let's move over to you. We've had a long relationship across our 2 companies, but I'd love if you could dive a little bit deeper on what was unique and maybe even some of the data and analytics that have helped with your strategy.

Yes, absolutely. Well, I would say we definitely feel we get a differentiated service from Aon, and it helped to have a partner who understood what we were trying to do from a building a new vision and strategy for our Total Rewards. And the Aon team was quick to share their insights from your Aon United journey, which was helpful.

But I think at the end of the day, it's been, I would say, 2 things that have really differentiated our experience with Aon. The first is around the technology and the data and insights that we received through that partnership. And the second is the partnership model itself.

So when I think about the technology and the data and insights, the light bulb moment for us and for me was when you came in and said, hey, we can centralize these benefit programs across the 100 countries where you have employees outside of the United States. And that was a light bulb moment. It was enormous. I didn't even realize that was going to be possible.

So what we were able to get was the technology that you provide with the data and insights through a global platform, we leverage your greater insights platform. And we're able to use that data to make better decisions. Now we're using it about -- using better decisions around our benefit admin, our job architecture. And it gives us enhanced visibility country by country into what we're offering. And it's a single source of data, everything across the countries where we operate. And I think Aon is very unique in that single source of data that you provide to us.

The second thing is the partnership. That is a clear differentiation. You make it very easy for me. I have one enterprise client leader, Holly, who's here today. And I go to her. And she works with me on anything around the world on a diverse set of needs. And she's able to source the expertise within Aon to support whatever strategy or things that we're talking about. And you back that up with global capabilities.

And so you have a global presence with local representation and -- but the access for me is my global client leader. It's very easy and it's a very strategic conversation to leverage the assets within Aon. So it's a combination of that, the data, the technology, the analytics and the partnership model that allows me to have access to a full-service team around the globe. And that's what really makes the difference, I think, with Aon.

Thank you, Brandon, so much for that. It's the human capital story of the data and analytics hub that we talked about and the enterprise client leadership -- partnership. So it's exciting to be working with you on this project.

Axel, if I could come over to you and would love to hear a bit more about what were some of the factors, the key milestones and moments that have been different in how you're working with Aon today with Danone.

Sure. And I think it's really similar to what Brandon said better than me with my French accent. But basically, really for me, 2 moments was really important, stood out in the relationship.

First, it's -- we have a long history with Aon. You said that we work more than 3 decades together. But at one moment, our enterprise client leader identified that basically HR was underserved basically. We were historically more a risk client, but there was an untapped opportunity on the HR side. So this client leader, his name is Gary, he's in the room, and like you, actually is really being the single point of contact for me just to go to Aon, making sure that also he gets the best of Aon to us.

I worked in financial services before, and I make a parallel basically with private banking, where you have one trusted adviser and you can completely trust. You know that he will put you in contact with the best people fit for you, not one-stop shop, but something which is really tailor-made to your needs to make sure that you succeed as a company. And this is tremendously helpful.

In that example is basically the captive one you described, actually. Gary identified that basically we had this opportunity. He reached out proactively. We worked together, and we made it a great success. So it helped really much to develop the people transformation we were embarked together.

The second thing is really the data. Because all of what I described is very good. But if it's not backed up by data and hard things, then basically we don't deliver meaningful and concrete results. And basically, the platform you put -- we were available just to access was really a game-changer for us because it was a way of showing that HR can also be a data-driven function. And it gave us a massive load of credibility in a strategic and quite bold move, moving employee benefits to a captive, which was not so close to our own traditional operating model.

Yes. I mean the analytics hub really helped push that bold decision and determine what risk should flow through the captive and where should you transfer them into the insurance marketplace. And that enterprise model, as Anne described earlier, is really focusing a lot on that training and education so that we are matching the right capabilities with your need anywhere from around the world.

So I want to come down the home stretch here and ask each of you a question about the future of what may be on the road map between Aon and your companies. And Axel, if I could start with you, we're always trying to make sure we are current on your strategy and every client and then bringing the latest and greatest. So what's on the road map with Aon and Danone?

Yes, I'm very excited about the future of Danone, actually. Danone, it's basically we plan to double in size in the next 5 years. It's a bold move. It's something our leadership is saying also to the market. This is exciting. It's also a little bit challenging because we need to make sure that we have the right talent inside. We don't need the same talents when you're a $27 billion company or a $50 billion company. We need to attract top talent. We need just to nurture existing ones and scale HR for that transformation. So this is where we are like looking at Aon. You helped us just to manage health care costs through the captive but also other initiatives. Now that we are transforming also the people strategy globally just to reach that ambition. We need just to understand what do we need to do to better serve our employees and the business strategy, being by unlocking the power of diversity, making sure that we have skills, the right skills, and we equipped our Danoners, our employees with the right skills of the future. So it's really where the partnership with Aon will be a game changer for us, I believe.

To -- you talked about the skills of the employees. That's such a fundamental part of so many client strategy. How do you make sure you've got the right talent to meet that high-growth strategy of your Danoners. So that will be great. Brandon, how about FedEx and Aon? What's on the road map and your total rewards responsibilities? What's next?

Sure. Well, we've done a lot together. We have a lot more planned. There's more work to do. So I think because of what we've done so far, we're having a lot more strategic discussions internally about how we support our people and how we build our talent strategy. And what's exciting is by building this foundation and our talent strategy you mentioned earlier, then we can continue to evolve and build on top of that strong foundation. And at FedEx, our people are our most important asset, and Aon is really helping us to serve our people better. And it's changed the game for us in that we can better attract and retain talent where we need them globally.

And so now I'm turning my attention to our global job architecture for One FedEx and Aon is helping us with that. We're leveraging some of the tools and services of Aon, and we're engaged with a very skilled talent advisory team to do that. And some of your proprietary platforms are very valuable in this work. I think about the Radford compensation database that we leverage, the skills graph platform, the job link, all of those are tools that are helping us with our global job architecture. And so this is helping us accelerate our global workforce planning and even helping us with challenges like complying with the EU pay directive. And so all in all, I'm very excited about what we've done, but also where we're going together.

The Analytics Hub has about 9 modules. I think we're tapping 2, but quickly moving down that road map with compensation from Radford McLagan as Total Rewards and the regulatory changes, but also capturing that claim data that we can help you with predictive analytics for population health of your employees. So it's super exciting.

And Oliver, you've been on the front end of our 3x 3 plan and really co-creating, shaping our strategy on these analyzers, but a lot with Aon Business Services. So what's on the road map with Aon and Veolia?

Yes. So we've had a number of discussions with Mindy and her teams, very exciting. We've tested some of the tools. I even had some colleagues test locally in North America saying, what are you getting us into -- and after half an hour, thanking me that I made the meeting. So no, great. We're seeing the whole opportunity unlock of being smarter, more efficient, spending less time on admin, which is important admin in the terms of [ certs ] being produced and all that moving -- all those moving parts for a large group, which can be very, very time consuming. And I can see how we're going to release more time on more strategic and more co-construction together with Aon on other more strategic topics. So -- but Broker Copilot, for instance, being one of them.

I think the most interesting was a few weeks ago, we had our Digital Chief Officer meet with Mindy and they got along like a house on fire. I mean they've got -- I didn't understand most of the conversation, but it sounded like it was good anyway. And then more recently, more detailed discussions on the data team. So I think we've only just looked at the tip of the iceberg on data. We all know that there's a lot of power to unlock there. It will make us a lot smarter. I think it will make us better service providers for our customers as well, more efficient, so more efficient cost savings that we can reinvest in other areas. So I think that's the critical path for us. And the 2 Veolia digital strategy and the Aon strategy service is very much aligned. So it's very exciting.

Well, this is a great place for us to end it, and I want to thank Oliver you and everyone on the panel. It's a privilege to partner with all of you. And before I bring up Mindy Simon, who's the COO of our Aon Business Services, I really want to thank the panel and your voice is truly shaping our 3x3 plan. All the iterations that Andy talked about Mindy is because we keep changing and improving based on your feedback. But what I really want to reflect on as well, what you just heard from the clients is that we truly have operationalized our Aon United strategy, allowing us to serve clients differently in 3 distinct ways.

First, as we started off the panel, our clients are looking for a strategic partner, empowered to bring the full breadth of Aon's capabilities with no P&L barriers to serve our clients' greatest needs. This is our enterprise client leader model, [ Anne, ] that you described so well. Our client leaders wake up every day motivated to enable, address and solve our clients' greatest needs. And second, you heard from Andy on the challenges that we face today in a complex risk market need stronger data and analytics to support how our clients think about transferring risk with access to global agnostic capital.

And by bringing together our reinsurance capabilities, our data lakes, our data scientists alongside of all the deep commercial risk capabilities, we are truly uniquely able to unlock innovative solutions that no other competitor can match. And our human capital capabilities are absolutely unique in that we can deliver global benefit insights, data and analytics and a technology platform. So undoubtedly, this cannot be executed without Aon's structure of integrating health, wealth and talent to deliver global capabilities through local solutions. And third and finally is the interconnected nature and structure of our firm that's helping connect differently inside of our clients' organizations as well.

In addition to how we're connecting across our 2 firms, we're also helping to connect the data and do different things with it to drive outcomes. There truly has never been a more engaging time for our colleagues to serve our clients with differentiated capability supported by our integrated structure and our Aon United culture. And I've been with Aon over 30 years, always in a client-serving role. And I can honestly say we have something different here at Aon today. There's nothing more engaging than being able to bring the full global enterprise capabilities of our organization to help our clients solve their greatest needs. It's that wow moment, Greg, you described earlier. And our colleague voice is also shaping every element of our strategy. So it's a wonderful time.

I'm excited and inspired that we're only in our second year of our 3x 3 plan, and I couldn't be more motivated to see what's ahead with this momentum. And I want to truly thank each of you and on behalf of all of our colleagues around the world to serve your companies and to serve all of our clients. And none of this happens without Aon Business Services. So it's with my great pleasure to introduce Mindy Simon, the COO of our Aon Business Services. Thank you again.

Good morning. And Lori, thank you for a terrific panel. And Oliver, Axel and Brandon, thank you for the incredible partnership. We are just getting started. I'm Mindy Simon, and I'm delighted to discuss Aon Business Services with you today. I joined Aon in late 2022 from Conagra Brands, where I spent 22 years in a variety of leadership roles spanning finance and technology, eventually becoming CIO, where I oversaw global business services, technology and cybersecurity. Over that time, I was part of an incredible transformation journey from hundreds of independent operating companies, also known as silos that were part of a global agricultural conglomerate to a fully integrated and optimized branded food company.

Here at Aon, I have the incredible privilege of partnering with our colleagues and our clients to provide an end-to-end client journey, delivering the next generation of client experience driving growth. As we move into Aon Business Services, I'd like you to walk away with the following key points. ABS is a unique platform. We've built ABS over several years, and it is allowing us to operationalize the execution of our Aon United strategy at scale. ABS has evolved. What began as an optimization effort has evolved into a proven revenue-generating engine to support our clients through globally connected end-to-end client experiences.

These capabilities are supported by Aon's unique structure and commitment to driving innovation at scale, positioning us to fully leverage the opportunity of AI. And as a result, ABS drives our top and bottom line performance, supporting our sales growth while also creating operational efficiencies, contributing to our consistent expansion of our best-in-class margins. And with a proven concept, with proven impact, we still have a long runway with a strong pipeline of opportunities to support our growth. So with that, let me tell you about how we've done that and where we're going. Aon Business Services is a combination of operations and technology. And as you heard from Greg and Lisa earlier, we have worked for 15 years to become a truly connected global firm.

7 years ago, we started the journey of combining operations and technology across our 120 countries into a single organization. ABS. This includes functions like finance, procurement and real estate and client-facing services like policy management and benefits administration and technology, including cloud services, application management and data and analytics. When you look at this slide, think of all the work that no one really likes to manage until someone comes to take it away. This required partnering country by country, identifying each piece of technology and each person doing operations work and bringing them together to a single organization. The result, ABS. 15,000 colleagues serving our solution lines and regions, providing an end-to-end client experience with technology at the core.

Following best practices and other industries playbooks, we've evolved from a centralized reporting structure with decentralized locations to global capability centers with regional hubs. These centers specialize in tech like AI, analytics and automation as well as our service capabilities, including engineering and actuarial across each of our solution lines. This is the result of years of investment in a proprietary model, resulting in seamless coordination, serving our clients across geographies, industries and providing our clients with better insights both quickly and efficiently. This was not easy to do and it is certainly not easy to replicate.

ABS' foundation was to enable margin by centralization, optimization, automation and standardization. ABS has centralized about 25% of our colleagues with about 50% of those in our global capability centers. Roughly 20% of our savings is coming from automation. And we've reduced our total applications by 20% from 2,500 to 2,000. We've also migrated 40% of our workloads to the cloud, providing cost savings and scalability. We've rationalized our real estate locations, creating over $30 million in savings and utilize best-in-class procurement to optimize our spend across our suppliers, delivering $150 million of value creation per year.

This has been a key element in Aon delivering an average of approximately 120 points of yearly margin expansion over the last 10 years. ABS' success has enabled margin growth throughout our history and will continue to deliver equivalent margin improvement for the foreseeable future. I would broadly think about our future margin expansion in 2 buckets. First, we will continue to utilize the historical levers, location, automation, process standardization to drive incremental efficiencies. But second, we will amplify those levers and pursue additional levers through modernization, simplifying our legacy tech and leveraging AI. For example, over the remainder of the 3x3 plan, we expect total applications in use to decline from 2,000 to 1,500 and workloads in the cloud to increase from 40% to 80%.

These efforts are in addition to our continued progress and are propelling us towards our goal of $350 million of savings for the 3x 3 plan and unlocks our next phase of margin growth. And because we know ABS works and our progress to date has proven the model, we invested $1 billion to accelerate and support our growth. This frees up capacity for key revenue-generating hires, growing Aon client leadership like you heard from Anne and our middle market expansion, which Edmund will cover in a moment. We are doing this through adding new products at scale, designing end-to-end client experiences with AI at the core and modernizing platforms across the ecosystem, accelerating standardization of our operations.

This investment is an acceleration of the progress we had already started. So let me show you how we're doing that. ABS drives sustainable growth through an end-to-end client-focused experience. Our industry has focused a lot on broker and producer capabilities, which are indeed essential, but we're taking a different approach. We start with the client experience and design end-to-end capabilities across analytics, broking and advisory and service while also transforming our colleague experience. While it sounds simple, this could not be done without our Aon United structure.

ABS curates the data, builds the analytical engine and develops user interface. But most importantly, we partner with our clients and our colleagues to build the equivalent of what has been available in other industries for decades. An AI-powered enterprise resource planning like platform for risk and human capital, like seen in financial services and manufacturing, where I came from. And we brought in people with deep expertise from these industries to ensure we're approaching this the right way. This enables us to do more, win more and keep clients longer, but also provides a foundation for sustainable, profitable growth. Our capabilities are being built on a global integrated architecture, enabled by Aon United and powered by Aon Business Services. Each layer, which you will see in a moment, builds on the next, and I'll highlight the architecture and go into some examples.

First, you've heard it all morning. Data is the foundation. And as you think about the opportunities of AI, this is a crucial foundation. Next, our global analytics serving both risk capital and human capital sits on top of the data lake, followed by our global broking platforms. Next, we have an internally developed copilot capability to support both our brokers and our advisers. And while we have multiple partners, including a deep partnership with Microsoft, this is a bespoke capability developed by Aon. Lastly, our end-to-end client experience sits at the top. This has been designed, one, to be global; and two, highly integrated and not just within risk capital and human capital, but between risk capital and human capital and would not be possible to architect without our Aon United structure.

And when I say that, I say that because I know having come from an organization where there was hundreds of independent operating companies with deep pride and autonomy that transformed into a highly integrated and optimized firm, you cannot do this without culture and structure. The next few slides are going to keep the architecture on the left for visual wayfinding. As we think of points of difference, our global data lake is building difference in 2 ways. We have boundaryless scale. And while we absolutely respect and comply with data privacy and residency laws around the world and as required by our clients, what we are not bound by is internal barriers. By not having silos across our organization and by combining our operations and technology teams into ABS, we don't have the challenges of regions or P&Ls not sharing data.

It's opened possibilities to serve clients that we never could have previously. Example you heard from Andy is our Workforce absence Analyzer, which combines health claims, human capital data with workers' compensation claims, risk capital data to predict employee absences, enabling our clients to evaluate trade-offs on both how they structure their benefits plans, but most importantly, prevent workers' injuries and compensation claims, having healthier employees and lower costs. Second, we have bespoke data assets and partnerships that have been developed over decades. An example is our proprietary catastrophe modeling that Andy referenced, impact forecasting, which you've seen outside. Impact forecasting does not just fill in the gaps of other models. As Andy said, it allows us to develop bespoke models for our clients.

Boundaryless scale, combined with bespoke data assets, lets our clients see their business globally across their silos as you heard from FedEx. What does this all mean? We have better data than any peer because we have risk capital, human capital and ABS. Next, built on the foundation of our differentiated data are our analytical solutions. They are designed to empower our clients to make better decisions through data. The solutions fall into 3 categories. First, our analyzers. They use forward-looking analytics to deliver technical insights, ultimately helping our clients drive value. Our suite of analyzers and risk capital evaluates risk exposure and model risk retention versus risk transfer considerations while modeling financial impacts of the scenarios. Examples you've seen today are the property risk analyzer and the Human Capital Health Risk Analyzer.

Next is diagnostics. Diagnostics identify issues and areas of improvement. Think of analyzers as the what and diagnostics as the so what. By examining historical data, they uncover underlying problems and trends, and they help our Aon advisers leverage these insights to enable our clients to reduce negative impacts and improve positive results. The health equity and affordability diagnostic in human capital is a terrific example of this. Looking at employee access to health care and then layering on the cost of that care compared to their compensation, it lets our clients see where there may be planned gaps or challenges with affordability by employee.

Next, our benchmarks help organizations understand their position relative to others, be they industry peers or across industries. This includes best practices and historical trends, supporting our clients to make more informed decisions. As you heard this morning, Radford McLagan Compensation Benchmark. It's a terrific example where clients can compare compensation by role, both within and across industries, ensuring they are offering competitive compensation globally in real time, as you heard from both [ Danon and Danone. ] And foundation to our analytical solutions is AI. We are uniquely positioned to leverage the potential of AI because at its core, AI is fueled by high fidelity data. So think of ABS as the AI factory powering risk capital, human capital and Aon client leadership.

A foundation of our AI strategy is what we call embedded AI at scale. This builds AI directly into the core of our capabilities, directly in the core. Because of our unique Aon United structure and our unique data sets built over the last 15 years, we are the only bet on embedded AI at scale in our industry. Following analytics, broking and advisory is the next step in the client journey. Our broking solutions are powered by 2 tremendous assets, global platforms enabling scale and simplicity. Risk Capital and Human Capital each have a platform that's been developed over a decade. The platform provides Aon with differentiated data, including deep insights into the reinsurance market and global benefits serving clients not just in a region but across regions.

The platforms are automating what was previously done through e-mail and provides visibility to clients on where we are in the process, providing a scorecard of quotes, making it easy to evaluate trade-offs across both price and coverage. But most importantly, it will ultimately provide visibility to how the market is pricing risk across all lines globally in real time. Think of that in terms of the value creation our brokers can provide our clients by having visibility to how the market is pricing risk globally in real time. That is incredible. AI is at the core, enabling digitization that previously would not have been possible, increasing the value we bring our clients in ways our peers cannot. Finally, service, designed to bring a seamless client experience, giving clients and colleagues time to focus on business outcomes.

By focusing on removing significant points of friction across the client experience, we've tackled one of the industry's biggest challenges, proof of insurance. And to be specific, ad hoc certificates of insurance. I know, who knew? The easiest way to think about the value of a certificate is it is a single document that when not available or done right, instantly shuts a construction site down. And often when done late or wrong is the difference between retaining and losing a client. The certificate center, which you saw in the Better Decisions Lab is built on the foundation of a large language model. And what previously took hours, if not days, to complete, is now fully automated and available on your mobile device.

This is an example of innovation at scale, removing points of friction across the client and colleague journey and providing tremendous value to clients like Lori highlighted and Oliver mentioned with Veolia. Bringing it all together, our differentiated end-to-end client experience is only possible on a common architecture of risk capital and human capital powered by ABS. Clients start with experiencing our analyzer solutions, as Andy mentioned, analyzers, diagnostics and benchmarks. Then we leverage our broking and advisory expertise to transfer, retain and manage risk and provide human capital solutions.

Lastly, they experience an innovative service designed to resolve significant points of friction, making us easy to do business with. This experience is not just designed for our clients and colleagues. It is designed by our clients and colleagues with both having direct access into our incredible leaders and teams in ABS who are architecting and building these capabilities. Leveraging an Aon United architecture powered by ABS, our structure enables us to bring client capabilities and experiences together across human capital, risk capital and Aon client leadership. All to help our clients make better decisions, optimize their performance and provide them with operational efficiencies by connecting what was previously disconnected and designing our clients and colleagues at the core of what we do.

As you heard from Greg and Anne earlier, the opportunity for impact is not just with our large clients. We are scaling the same capabilities for middle market, which often have the same buyer for risk capital and human capital. We enable significant value by providing capabilities that are affordable and bring differentiated value to middle market firms. The magic of ABS' focus on growth and margin ensures that we are designing for value not just for Aon, but for our clients as well. So what does that mean in terms of tangible outcomes? We are building solutions that drive growth. As you've seen throughout the morning, we've leveraged the $1 billion investment to accelerate capabilities for clients and colleagues, and they are already having impact.

In doing more with clients, we've already used the analyzers across both risk and human capital with 1,000 clients. In winning more, 40% greater win rate when the analyzers are used in RFPs. And in keeping clients longer, retention is up 1 point on an already strong mid-90s retention rate in U.S. commercial risk following the release of the analyzers in market. And while we have a lot of great momentum, what we're not doing is sitting still. The opportunity for future impact is significant. So let me leave you with the messages I began with. In ABS, we have built a unique, hard-to-replicate asset that is powering our performance.

We have delivered significant operational efficiencies that contributed to our margin performance and are increasingly supporting our top line by changing how we engage with clients. Supported by our Aon United structure, we drive innovation at scale and are positioned to leverage AI in our client and colleague capabilities. Looking ahead, we see continued opportunities to drive margin and growth-enabling capabilities, and we'll continue to release additional features. As Andy said, these are all living capabilities with releases coming all the time based on both client and colleague feedback. Most importantly, we have only just begun and scratched the surface on our ability to drive margin and growth at scale.

With that, I'd like to welcome Edmund to the stage.

Thank you, Mindy. That was great. And Lori, I have to say a special thank you to you. It really is always a very special and a privilege to hear from our clients. So thank you for that. It's still morning, so good morning, everyone. I am super energized to be here this morning truly. And why am I so excited? Because our 3x 3 plan isn't just a clever catch phrase, it is a blueprint for sustainable top line growth with significant upside potential. Additionally, our robust business and financial model empowers us to invest for growth while simultaneously driving margin expansion. And that's on top of our already industry-leading 32% margins.

Further, our exceptional free cash flow enables us to make high-return 20% plus IRR inorganic investments for the medium and long term while returning significant capital to shareholders. Throughout my first year with Aon, I've had hundreds of conversations with investors, many of whom I've spoken to and I see here in the room today. And a clear theme has been emerging. Investors are seeking stronger conviction in the 3 key areas that I just mentioned in order to more confidently position Aon as the premier GARP insurance brokerage holding in their portfolio.

So my goal today is to take what you just heard on our 3x3 plan and help you translate that into tangible results for your valuation model, enabling you to accurately assess Aon's potential for sustained growth. You should walk away from today with 4 items. One, Aon is a global market leader and our resilient business and financial model has a proven track record of delivering strong financial results. Two, through the 3x3 plan, we've established a foundation for investment and margin expansion, positioning us to deliver industry or better organic revenue growth while expanding our industry-leading margins. Three, we recognize and agree that cash is king. And through the Aon growth algorithm, our focus is on delivering strong earnings, converting those earnings to free cash flow, high free cash flow, ultimately driving industry-leading free cash flow yield.

And our balanced capital allocation model allows us to make high-return growth-oriented investments and return significant capital to shareholders, leading to compounding total shareholder returns. Finally, we're well positioned to meet our 2025 guidance and deliver a 3-year double-digit CAGR on free cash flow from 2023 through 2026. And remember, it was a while ago, but Greg's comment, and to exit 2026 with momentum for continued growth.

Now why are we so confident in these outcomes? Let me start with the market opportunity. Aon is well positioned to benefit from several secular growth trends that are reshaping our industry. You heard Greg and Andy and others talk about today how these growth -- these interconnected growth trends are driving demand for our solution lines and creating a long-term tailwind for our business. The addressable market for risk transfer is substantial with companies transferring nearly $4.6 trillion of risk to insurers. And the market opportunity in each solution line is increasing as higher risk and exposures is driving each solution line to a mid-single-digit or greater level of growth. And Andy talked about Clients asking us to help them unlock additional sources of capital. That's increasing the addressable market and expanding it to private equity firms, sovereign wealth funds and pensions.

You also heard my colleagues mentioned Aon client treaty, Lori and Andy both mentioned that, pooled employer plans. These are examples of increased relevance within our industry, and we're taking advantage of that. The Aon United strategy and our investment in analytics have positioned us to capitalize on these ongoing secular growth trends. As a result, we are winning more share in existing markets, leading with our data-led advice and our capabilities and solutions. We are creating new demand in existing markets like in cyber, as you just heard from Greg. And we're creating new demand in new categories like Parametrics for corporate clients.

So for Aon, historical performance is a strong indicator of future projections. And when you look at our history over the last decade, over the last 10 years through 2023 prior to the 3x3 plan, organic revenue growth has grown at 5% over that time period on average. That's in line with the industry performance. Importantly, margin, free cash flow per share and ROIC have all consistently outperformed the industry, both in absolute terms and at growth. At 32% adjusted operating margins, roughly 6 points above the industry, Aon is converting more revenue, effectively converting more revenue into earnings. And at 130 basis points of margin expansion per year, we've maintained our margin premium relative to peers in the industry.

Over that same time period, we've had a double-digit growth on both EPS and free cash flow per share, underscoring our ability to generate consistent growth and return for shareholders. That combination of double-digit per share growth, both EPS and free cash flow plus consistent capital return to investors has resulted in annualized total shareholder returns of 15% over the last 10 years. That level of performance outpaces -- Greg showed a slide, outpaces the S&P 500 over both short-term time periods and long-term time periods. And as Greg mentioned earlier, even in periods of heightened uncertainty and volatility like the Great Recession, defensive nature of this industry with recurring, highly recurring and nondiscretionary revenue, coupled with Aon's resilient business and financial model, the company has delivered strong financial returns through the cycle.

So our history and our objective as a growth company is very important. But equally important is executing on the Aon United Strategy, which, as you've heard from all of my colleagues today, we're operationalizing through the 3x 3 plan. And that will allow us to accelerate the next phase of growth. It's execution to accelerate that growth. So we have high confidence in our enhanced earnings power, high confidence in our enhanced earnings power. To better understand that, over the last 10 years, organic revenue growth has been driven by new sales from new clients and expanding coverage with existing clients. They both have had a remarkably consistent contribution to organic revenue growth.

In 2024, new sales contributed 5 points to our organic revenue growth and expanding across solution lines and geographies. I love your example, Brandon, at FedEx, has contributed another 5 points. The enhanced earnings power as we move forward is driven by the same components of growth, primarily new business, but it is now bolstered by the $1 billion investment in Aon Business Services to help support or increase our growth, specifically through revenue-generating hires that are client-facing, expanding Aon client leadership that you heard from A and the middle market expansion.

Thank you, Mindy, that was great. And Lori, you know I have to say a special thank you to you. It really is always a very special and a privilege to hear from our clients. So thank you for that. It's still morning, so good morning, everyone. I am super energized to be here this morning, truly.

And why am I so excited? Because our 3x3 Plan isn't just a clever catchphrase. It is a blueprint for sustainable top line growth with significant upside potential. Additionally, our robust business and financial model empowers us to invest for growth while simultaneously driving margin expansion. And that's on top of our already industry-leading 32% margins.

Further, our exceptional free cash flow enables us to make high return, 20% plus IRR inorganic investments for the medium and long term while returning significant capital to shareholders. Throughout my first year with Aon, I've had hundreds of conversations with investors, many of whom I've spoken to and I see here in the room today.

And a clear theme has been emerging. Investors are seeking stronger conviction in the 3 key areas that I just mentioned in order to more confidently position Aon as the premier [ GARP ] insurance brokerage holding in their portfolio. So my goal today is to take what you just heard on our 3x3 Plan and help you translate that into tangible results for your valuation model, enabling you to accurately assess Aon's potential for sustained growth.

You should walk away from today with 4 items. One, Aon is a global market leader, and our resilient business and financial model has a proven track record of delivering strong financial results. Two, through the 3x3 Plan, we've established a foundation for investment and margin expansion, positioning us to deliver industry or better organic revenue growth while expanding our industry-leading margins.

Three, we recognize and agree that cash is king. And through the Aon growth algorithm, our focus is on delivering strong earnings, converting those earnings to free cash flow, high free cash flow, ultimately driving industry-leading free cash flow yield. And our balanced capital allocation model allows us to make high-return, growth-oriented investments and return significant capital to shareholders, leading to compounding total shareholder returns. Finally, we're well positioned to meet our 2025 guidance and deliver a 3-year double-digit CAGR on free cash flow from 2023 to 2026. And remember, it was a while ago, but Greg's comment, Aon to exit 2026 with momentum for continued growth.

Now why are we so confident in these outcomes? Let me start with the market opportunity. Aon is well positioned to benefit from several secular growth trends that are reshaping our industry. You heard Greg and Andy and others talk about today, how these growth these interconnected growth trends are driving demand for our solution lines and creating a long-term tailwind for our business. The addressable market for risk transfer is substantial, with companies transferring nearly $4.6 trillion of risk to insurers. And the market opportunity in each solution line is increasing as higher risk and exposures is driving each solution line to a mid-single-digit or greater level of growth.

And Andy talked about clients asking us to help them unlock additional sources of capital. That's increasing the addressable market and expanding it to private equity firms, sovereign wealth funds and pensions. You also heard my colleagues, [ Mitch ] Aon [ client treaty ], Lori and Andy both mentioned that, pooled employer plans. These are examples of increased relevance within our industry, and we're taking advantage of that.

The Aon United strategy and our investment in analytics have positioned us to capitalize on these ongoing secular growth trends. As a result, we are winning more share in existing markets, leading with our data-led advice and our capabilities and solutions. We are creating new demand in existing markets like in cyber, as you just heard from Greg. And we're creating new demand in new categories like [ parametrics ] for corporate clients.

So for Aon, historical performance is a strong indicator of future projections. And when you look at our history over the last decade, over the last 10 years through 2023, prior to the 3x3 Plan, organic revenue growth has grown at 5% over that time period on average. That's in line with the industry performance. Importantly, margin free cash flow per share and ROIC have all consistently outperformed the industry, both in absolute terms and at growth. At 32% adjusted operating margins, roughly 6 points above the industry, Aon is converting more revenue, effectively converting more revenue into earnings. And that 130 basis points of margin expansion per year, we've maintained our margin premium relative to peers in the industry. Over that same time period, we've had a double-digit growth on both EPS and free cash flow per share, underscoring our ability to generate consistent growth and return for shareholders.

That combination of double-digit per share growth, both EPS and free cash flow, plus consistent capital return to investors, has resulted in annualized total shareholder returns of 15% over the last 10 years. That level of performance outpaces -- Greg showed the slide -- outpaces the S&P 500 over both short-term time periods and long-term time periods. And as Greg mentioned earlier, even in periods of heightened uncertainty and volatility like the Great Recession.

The defensive nature of this industry with recurring, highly recurring and nondiscretionary revenue, coupled with Aon's resilient business and financial model, the company has delivered strong financial returns through the cycle. So our history and our objective as a growth company is very important. But equally important is executing on the Aon United strategy, which, as you've heard from all of my colleagues today, we're operationalizing through the 3x3 Plan. And that will allow us to accelerate the next phase of growth, this execution to accelerate that growth.

So we have high confidence in our enhanced earnings power, high confidence in our enhanced earnings power. To better understand that, over the last 10 years, organic revenue growth has been driven by new sales from new clients and expanding coverage with existing clients. They both have had a remarkably consistent contribution to organic revenue growth.

In 2024, new sales contributed 5 points to our organic revenue growth and expanding across solution lines and geographies. I love your example, [ Brandon ], at FedEx. It's contributed another 5 points. The enhanced earnings power as we move forward is driven by the same components of growth, primarily new business, but it is now bolstered by the $1 billion investment in Aon Business Services to help support or increase our growth. Specifically, through revenue-generating hires that are client-facing, expanding Aon client leadership that you heard from Anne and the middle market expansion.

So let me start with revenue generating hires. To further support our risk capital and human capital new business and in particular, new business from new clients, like Andy was just talking about, we're investing in revenue-generating client-facing talent. And that includes, as you've heard, brokers, producers, account executives and health and benefit consultants. The focus there has been on -- has not -- and we said this before in the last earnings call that the focus there is not quantity. But instead, it is hiring in high-growth priority areas like construction, in energy and health. You heard my colleague, Lisa mention, the prospects are eager to join our team because we give them the insights and the capabilities to help them win new business. And the operating leverage in our business enables us to make these investment hires.

In 2024, we increased the population of revenue-generating hires by 4%. And our plans in 2025 is to further expand that population by another 4% to 8%, and the early data is suggesting that this is very promising. We are seeing that revenue generating hires typically generate $300,000 to $350,000 incremental revenue per year, incremental new business per year. And we're very pleased to see that the Q1 '24 cohorts is reaching 55% of the full run rate production in month 18, which is where we stand today. We now anticipate that they'll reach a run rate level of production by month 24 or month 30. That's the Q1 '24 cohort. The full year '24 cohort is now expected to contribute 40 to 45 basis points to organic revenue growth in Q4 '24 and another 30 to 35 basis points for the full year 2024.

So you see why we have high conviction and remain committed to making these investment hires that support our future growth. That's the investment hires. Additionally, you heard Anne come and speak about Aon client leadership. Having a client leader in place for our enterprise clients and our large clients significantly benefits our performance. Specifically for enterprise clients in 2024 we saw those clients with a 20% increase in product penetration. They are now over 2x higher, hold more than 2x the number of products that our large clients have. And those same clients have 50% of their revenue outside of their home country, that's over 10 times, actually 11 points higher than other large clients here. We're capitalizing on this opportunity, and we've now, as you heard in Anne's slide, designated 500 enterprise clients and we're expanding that model to the next 1,500 large clients by the end of 2025, with the goal of increasing our share of wallet with these large global relationships.

We confidently believe that our investment in enterprise client, expanding that model translates into tangible incremental new business. In fact, when you look at the ECG contribution to new business from new clients, it was 3 points higher in 2024 than it was in the prior year.

Finally, the $31 billion middle market opportunity is a significant opportunity for Aon, and we're committed to making substantial inorganic and organic investments to capture this opportunity. The globally integrated platforms that Mindy talked about in our policy management systems have allowed us to have a comprehensive strategy for middle market onboarding. We can now bring these clients onboard without impacting our high margins. In fact, our investment in scale was a catalyst for the NFP acquisition and their middle market engine.

In 2024, we were able to onboard $36 million in EBITDA due to the NFP middle market engine. And we expect -- continue to expect to onboard another $45 million to $60 million in 2025. And we're also making targeted organic investments in talent to further strengthen the team and capture this opportunity as well. So again, we are very excited about this opportunity here. And I should probably pause because I sometimes go fast through this, and this is an important point to get. Through Aon Business Services, we have established a foundation that enhances our earnings power. That foundation gives us the capacity to make strategic investment hires that are client-facing and revenue generating and expand Aon client leadership. The scale in our operations allows us to acquire and grow in the middle market space without a proportional increase in costs, avoiding margin dilution.

We, therefore, had increased confidence in the duration and the sustainability of ongoing revenue growth, organic revenue growth, by winning more clients, doing more with them. And as you heard my colleagues say, keeping them longer. We've historically had a retention rate that was in the mid-90s level across each of our solution lines. After a modest decline in 2023, retention was flat in 2024. And we actually saw a 1 point benefit in Q1 '25, these improvements are a result of our efforts to redefine the client experience. Through ABS, we are delivering service with greater speed and efficiency, creating a seamless and consistent experience for our clients across geographies. At the same time, through Aon client leadership, these were Anne's words, we are increasing the engagement in elevating the strategic partnerships with the risk managers, with human resource officers and with CFOs.

As a result, we are increasing client loyalty, and you saw this stat earlier, so I'll repeat it. Retention with ECG clients reached 97% in 2024. So by prioritizing exceptional service delivery through ABS, and the elevated client partnerships that we have through Aon Client Leadership, we're able to build on our retention gains from '24 in Q1 '25 further supporting our long-term organic revenue growth.

Now in addition to our efforts to drive sustainable organic revenue growth nominal GDP is the macro factor that impacts our business most. And specifically, I'll highlight business investment in property, equipment, other assets as well as health care costs. When you look over the last 10 years, business investment has grown at over 3%. And you heard this stat earlier as well that health costs have now risen to be approximately 20% of U.S. GDP. The result of that is higher risk and values at risk, higher exposures and values at risk, which translate into increased limits in coverage and ultimately higher premiums, a tailwind for our business.

Pricing on the right-hand side of this chart has less a correlation. Lower pricing benefits our clients, a great thing that we support. It does impact our revenue, it's mitigated by the diversity in our solution lines. The 2/3 of our revenue that is impacted by commissions varies by product, by geography, by client segment. So any rate impact upward or downward is mitigated by the diversity in our solution lines, the geographic mix of our revenue were 50% is in international markets, where I showed that slide earlier. And are waiting towards fee-based large clients, which is a meaningful share of our business.

We summarize exposures and pricing together, 2 items that I just had on that chart. Exposures and pricing together is net market impact, and in the hard market, we've seen 3 to 4 points of impact, in this current environment we expect 0 to 2 points of impact. So that's organic revenue growth, but let me bring all of those components together to make it crystal clear. Over the last decade, the largest contributor to organic revenue growth has been new business. We're confident that we can drive 9 to 11 points of growth from ongoing new business. Specifically, because we're committed to ongoing investments in revenue-generating hires in ACL, Aon Client Leadership and in the middle market.

Additionally, our enhanced service delivery through ABS and the elevated strategic partnerships to Aon client leadership will allow us to maintain or improve our mid-90s retention rate. And in this current environment, we expect 0 to 2 points continue, to expect what we said in our guidance, 0 to 2 points of net market impact. That reflects pricing pressure offset by coverage and limit increases in our commercial and reinsurance book. And positive net market impacts in our health and wealth book. Together, this gives us high confidence in mid-single-digit or greater organic revenue growth.

Additionally, these drivers have resulted in broad-based growth across our solution line, though the contribution from each varies, the contribution from net new business retention in net market varies by each of the solution lines. And commercial risk, where we've seen 5% growth over the last 10 years, new business is critical as clients depend on Aon's analytics and access to capital particularly in an increasingly complex risk environment. Additionally, we are heavily focused on improving retention to help maintain our mid-single digit or greater organic revenue growth.

Reinsurance, both one of the highest retention rates in our portfolio. And while pricing can have an impact, growth there has also been stable at 6% over the last 10 years. There, as Andy said earlier, we're helping clients unlock additional sources of capital. And through our strategy and technology products, they're highly sought after from financial services firms and other insurers. Health, you can see up on the screen has grown at 7% over the last 10 years. And the macro tailwinds, medical inflation, workforce preferences, regulatory pressures those macro factors are driving demand and growth in our core health and benefits solutions. There, we're focused on outsized net new business in areas that are impacted by those factors.

And finally, wealth. Retention is high there as well, we've seen 3% growth over the last 10 years. New business is less of a contributor there as pensions are more averse to moving. So here, we're focused on providing clients with our expertise and data to drive value for them, articulating that value and pricing for it, particularly in pension risk transfer and their response to regulatory pressure.

So what have I said, I'll pause here as well. The financial model is focused on investment in the business to drive top line growth, but it continues with adjusted operating margins, and we have a long history of being able to deliver operating margins. When you look over the last 10 years, we've expanded adjusted operating margins by 1,300 basis points. And the expectation is to continue to drive margins by 80 to 90 basis points in 2025. And we have a clear line of sight to continued margin expansion in line with our historical performance. So some detail on that.

The operating leverage in our business, driven by the scale benefits that we've talked about before, allows expansion when organic revenue growth is above 4%, and we're driving continued scale improvements in the areas that Mindy mentioned earlier. First, we are reducing our tech debt in lowering the cost of technologies we integrate our platforms. In 2024, Mindy said, we reduced the applications by 12%, and our plans call for another 12% reduction in applications in 2025. By 2026, we will have 80% of our applications and workload in the cloud, that's up from 19% in 2023. Those actions are expected to contribute to $100 million in cost reduction by 2026 with further opportunity to reduce our applications and move more to the cloud.

Second thing that she mentioned, standardizing and automating our client-facing processes for claims, for invoicing, for policy management. We now have 15,000 colleagues in Aon Business Services, and we're moving many of them into global capability centers, some of which are in offshore locations. There is a meaningful incremental opportunity as less than half of our colleagues today are in those global capability centers.

Finally, we are embedding AI as we innovate, we're embedding AI in all of our code development, for new products and into our internal work workflows, ultimately driving a 5% to 10% productivity gain in our tech development costs. The impact of all of that, 100 to 120 basis points in scale benefits each year from ABS. In addition to the scale benefits in our portfolio, continued disciplined expense management also supports our margin expansion. Since launching the 3x3 plan, we reduced our real estate footprint by 16%, and we are optimizing our supplier portfolio to drive $60 million in hard dollar savings. These are ongoing actions that support offsetting inflation impacts and mitigate adverse FX impacts and they typically contribute 10 to 20 basis points of margin expansion per year.

In addition to the margin expansion, we continue with our active portfolio management, divesting noncore assets that have low margin but high capital intensity. In fact, in 2024, we divested 16 noncore assets, and drove $732 million in cash, generated $732 million in cash. The ongoing portfolio optimization is typically have a 20 basis point impact on our margin expenses per year as we shift to a higher margin, higher growth mix of business. So these levers, scale in ABS, the continued expense management, our active portfolio management allow us to make growth-oriented investments while still expanding margins by 70 to 100 basis points per year. So you see why investment for growth is a key part of our business and financial model and why we will remain committed to that.

So to wrap up my comments on margin expansion, what you should take away is that we've invested $1 billion of the accelerated -- Accelerating Aon United Program to drive margin expansion on an ongoing business as part of our core business operations. And we have great line of sight to continued margin expansion and growing at higher profit margins. This investment in ABS, time, culture, dollars may be imitated but it is incredibly difficult to replicate making it a meaningful competitive advantage for Aon. So the Aon growth algorithm enables this investment for organic growth, it allows us to expand margins and deliver earnings that convert to double-digit free cash flow growth. And when you look over the last 12 years, we've -- over the last 10 years, I just got the 10 confused with the 12 there. We've expanded free cash flow per share by 12% at double-digit rate over the last 10 years.

In 2024, our free cash flow was impacted by restructuring charges and integration and transaction costs associated with NFP. In 2025, the strong operating performance in our business, plus working capital improvements primarily through day sales outstanding or DSO and a $300 million contribution from NFP will drive double-digit free cash flow growth in 2025. And with restructuring winding down in '26 in integration and transaction costs winding down in 2026, we expect a minimum of $4.3 billion of free cash flow in 2026, the result a double-digit free cash flow rate from '23 through 2026. That cash flow generation allows us to execute our balanced capital allocation model, where we're focused on paying down debt and meeting our leverage objective, consistently growing the dividend and executing our disciplined strategy for M&A and capital return to shareholders.

So let me begin with paying down debt. We continue to reduce our leverage, including paying down $2 billion in 2024, and we anticipate another $1.9 billion in 2025. $4 billion of debt pay down plus the increased leverage that you get from driving EBITDA growth has us well on pace to meet our 2.8 to 3x leverage ratio in Q4 2025. That's consistent with what we said when we made the NFP acquisition. After debt, we are focused on growing the dividend. Earlier this year, we announced a 10% increase in our quarterly dividend. And when you look at this chart, you can see that we've grown the dividend at a double-digit level in 8 of the last 10 years. We remain committed to growing the dividend as we grow, reflecting the strength of our business model and our confidence in double-digit free cash flow growth.

After the dividend, our capital allocation model is focused on M&A, in capital return to shareholders. And when you look at this slide, you see a few things. M&A complements our organic revenue growth, and we've been a great acquirer. Our acquisitions have generated 12% revenue growth after 1 year of ownership. And the portfolio IRR is above 12%, some say is above 20%. The portfolio IRR is above 20%. When you look back, we had an ROIC that was industry leading and now just a little over a year of owning NFP, our ROIC is back at a level that's far above our cost of capital. And again, as an industry-leading level.

So you can see that we have stringent criteria when evaluating M&A to ensure that we drive accretive return for shareholders. Acquisition will continue to be a part of our capital allocation models as we look at high growth, high-margin businesses that can be a part of our core business, both risk capital and human capital. And that includes continued acquisition in the middle market space utilizing our NFP engine.

We're -- on the right hand side of this page, we're also committed to returning excess capital to shareholders through share repurchases. You look at the history and we've returned just over $2 billion a year to shareholders through share repurchases. And the capital deployment has been quite balanced with 45% going to M&A and another -- the remaining 55% in share repurchases. In Q1 '25, we repurchased $250 million in shares, that keeps us right on track to meet the $1 billion share repurchases commitment that we made for the full year 2025. Looking further ahead, once we reduce the leverage ratio we expect to maintain our balanced capital deployment.

So let me use 2026 to bring it all together, showing the strength of our capital position and where we are. A double-digit CAGR on free cash flow from 2023 to 2026 implies a minimum of $4.3 billion in capital. Assuming a 2.9 leverage ratio, the midpoint of our 2.8 to 3x leverage objective, we have capacity for an incremental $2 billion in capital, bringing the total available capital to $6 billion. If we assume that we continue to grow the dividend, we can estimate approximately $700 million being returned to shareholders, and that leaves over $5.6 billion for M&A to support growth and share repurchases in line with our historical levels. Good place to be in.

So turning to the outlook. After Q1 that was right in line with our expectations, we are on track to achieve our 2025 guidance. Now more than 2 months, into the quarter, we are reaffirming our 2025 guidance and outlook. We now -- we continue to expect mid-single-digit or greater organic revenue growth. And given the scale benefits in ABS and our continued execution on the restructuring charge, margin expansion for the full year, in fact, at an 80 to 90 basis points level, as I just mentioned. We also continue to expect strong adjusted EPS growth for the full year. And I'll remind you that included in that is 15% to 18% adjusted EPS growth in Q2 '25. The combination of those items gives us confidence in double-digit free cash flow growth for 2025.

And as we reaffirm our 2025 guidance, we do so with a strong conviction that communicating and consistently delivering organic revenue growth in line or above industry levels, along with continued margin expansion will drive greater market recognition that is more aligned with the strength of our financial model and the discipline of our execution.

So before we turn to your questions, let me elevate what matters most about our financial model, in the messages that you heard today. First, executing on our 3x3 plan has given us great conviction in delivering sustainable organic revenue growth at a mid-single-digit level or greater, mid-single-digit or greater level. In our investments in revenue-generating hires, ACL and middle market, will further support that growth and give us momentum going into 2026 and beyond.

Second, the foundation that we have built and continue to strengthen within ABS gives us operating leverage and enables the capacity for us to continue to drive investment and margin expansion in line with our historical levels. The combination of those items lead to higher earnings power, and we have line of sight to continued strong adjusted EPS growth.

Finally, we expect that adjusted EPS growth to convert to double-digit free cash flow growth, and we'll maintain our balanced capital allocation discipline, making investments for growth and returning capital to shareholders. They should sound familiar because the financial model isn't new, it was designed to drive total shareholder returns. And we're focused on executing for the next level of value creation for shareholders.

So in closing my messages, you've heard them already. Sustainable organic revenue growth, driven by our investments. Margin expansion continuing, converting to double-digit free cash flow growth, that should build your confidence that our growth will continue to inflect up and accelerate over the medium term. So it should be unmistakably clear why I began with so much conviction in my comments. As the CFO, I see momentum, I clearly see momentum and a powerful inflection point. This is Aon's moment, and I am super energized to help drive us forward.

So with that, let me bring my colleagues back up to stage as we get ready for the Q&A session.

We will now kick off our Q&A session. Before we dive in, I'm going to cover the ground rules. [Operator Instructions]

So with that, let's go ahead and have Andrew Kligerman.

Sure. Great, great. Yes, it sounds like you're doing some truly impressive things with ABS and 3x3 and Aon United. And so the question is, as you kind of wrap up on ABS and I was kind of struck by Mindy's comment that we've only just begun with ABS. As we move past 2026, do you envision needing to make additional investment? Or is it just kind of running by itself now?

And then secondly, Greg, in the past, you've talked about this 40% invested operating margin. And now it looks like we're in striking distance, maybe within 10 years. Is that right?

Well, first of all, thank you very much for the question, and thanks for being here today. Maybe just to touch on sort of the overall model and where we are but maybe you talk about kind of where we are in the investment side, next piece. Look, what you heard today, what you heard today was the machine coming together. The pieces have been, as we worked them for 15 years, the pieces around organic growth, what we're doing pieces on margin enhancement, what we're doing, what we're doing on free cash flow. And what you're seeing is them come together. Risk cap and human capital is a connection. And by the way, again, as we said before, this is not about new, this is about due to force execution, connectivity.

By the way, it turns out the economic leverage of alignment is huge. It's not trivial here because alignment is better data, better content, better models and better solutions. And so you're seeing that and Aon Business Services is also seeing that. And Aon Business Services, again, for the first time ever, that alignment allows us to do, you heard many say it, it's just it's better data. The fidelity of the data is stronger, the connection of the analytics is better. And that's driven by our colleagues who are sitting in the room together, as Andy Marcell described. That combination Andrew sort of what give us we're feeling good about that progress in terms of sort of where we are. And again, we're thinking top line operating margin and bottom line performance. So that's the machine. But Edmund, you should talk about this idea. The question is do we have to do to keep more and more and where are we on that?

Andrew, thanks for that question, you asked me when I was sitting there. Let me make some comments on the specific point, but I also want Mindy to talk about what we're doing, where we're investing in ABS now and when we move forward. The first part of your question was is investment -- are you still going to need to do it? We view -- we were very specific about this, investments are an ongoing part of the financial model. And ABS is in place for 2 reasons, one, to build the tools and the capabilities, Mindy's words were exactly right that help us win with clients. Build those tools and capabilities with the insights that we use with our risk capital and human capital data to win with clients. That's where the investment goes.

And the second part of ABS is what Greg just said, creating the capacity. I just talked about 100 to 120 basis points of margin expansion, creating the capacity so we can continue that ongoing investments. In the revenue-generating hires that are client facing right now that's focused on construction, health and benefits, the areas of growth that Andy talked about, who knows what that is as we continue to move forward. Then ACL, we're excited about 1,500, but we're not done when we get those clients done. And in the middle market space as well organically. So it's ongoing, it's in those areas.

This is an important point. It is not about a terminal margin rate. It is about we ask ourselves, do we have the model in place that allows us to sustain growth on an ongoing basis. And for that, you need the model. We think the answer to that is yes. It's ABS, the model that allows you to create that investment capacity and grow moving forward. That's what we have. But Mindy, maybe talk a little bit about where we invest.

Yes. I mean, to Greg's point, it's a 2-part mission. So growth as well as margin. By doing that, you can clearly align the investments on what's best for clients. And the scale of having that Aon United structure means that when we invest, we invest across analytics, broking advisory and service. And that's true regardless of what solution line you're in. So the efficiency of that investment on how we serve our clients has high scalability. And then in terms of how we continue, as Edmund mentioned, reducing the tech debt. And as we invest in AI, we're investing in the core. It isn't on the side. It's in the core of what we do, which also enables us to make sure that we're investing most efficiently to have the highest value impact driving growth.

Rob?

This is Rob Cox from Goldman Sachs. So I want to go to the benefits from talent. It seems like the talent benefits and quantified into organic growth seem to increase every quarter as we look ahead. How should we be thinking about that into 2026 and beyond, particularly when you guys are increasing the level of priority higher here in 2025?

Well, I really appreciate the question. This -- again, you stand back and sort of understand what we're trying to do from a mid-single-digit or greater organic growth and the investments we're making to do that. This is just one piece. Again, the idea is there are some priority areas when we step back and said, where can we add content capability to the firm that would be helpful. And there are some priority areas driven by client need and what we're hearing sort of from the market. So you're seeing us do that.

It's important you understand the capacity that Edmund just described to do that and drive the firm forward, maintain the model, top line, OI, free cash flow. Also remember, these colleagues are coming for a reason. They're excited about what the potential looks like. Again, sitting across the table from a client and providing something they haven't seen before, they didn't expect to get is pretty exciting. It's pretty compelling. And we're seeing that more and more. So this is how we don't think about just more talent, it's talent and better. It's great leaders, and then we are providing capability in the context of that.

Elyse?

Elyse Greenspan, Wells Fargo. I guess my question picks up on that talent topic. You guys mentioned that you want to hire, I think, 4% to 8% more in client-facing producers. So what's the base of producers within your 60,000, employees? And then over what time frame are you looking to add this 4% to 8%?

Listen, Elyse, as you know, we haven't really essentially sort of laid it out sort of that level of detail. We're essentially looking at it every year, stepping back and saying, as we think about investment, as we always do, again, return on invested capital, return -- cash-on-cash return, thinking about where we invest to sort of support the firm, we'll have a set of priorities every year. I can assure you it's Aon. So it will be triple the amount that's out there, maybe quadruple that, I think it's how it plays out over time.

And then we really are pushing the best ones that will actually help us take the firm forward. So Elyse, we're going to have ongoing investments in talent to strengthen the firm. And look for the -- by the way, those are going to be traditional. They're going to be nontraditional. Some of the talent aspects that Anne was describing on enterprise client were really from a varied level of sources in terms of sort of capability coming into the firm. So you'll see us do that. It will be part of the ongoing investment in the firm, again, within the parameters of the model we've got going forward and overall improvement.

Yes. Elyse, I'll just add to Greg's comment that it is -- as we've continued to say, it's not about the quantity, it's about the true growth opportunity in the priority areas. And I thought with the modeling that we provided, some of the detail that we provided that showed you what the impact of a 4% increase can be in 2024, it gives you an anchor for how you think about your valuation model at your assumptions on what the increase will be going forward.

So we're giving you 4% to 8% for 2025. You have a sense about what the contribution can be on a full year basis from that, and we'll continue to update you as we go forward. We wouldn't want to commit to a number there, just given the war for talent in this model, but we're very comfortable about what we set aside in dollars for investment so that we can attack those opportunities that help support our growth moving forward.

Meyer?

Meyer Shields, KBW. I guess a question that came out when you showed the organic growth by the individual segments. So wealth have had over a 10-year period, 3% organic growth. And I'm trying to see how that model fits into the overall focus on faster-growing businesses.

So listen, I think it was 3%, but 2%, 3%, whatever the number was over time. I was keeping track, maybe. But anyway, listen, fundamentals. 20% of the world is ready for retirement. That's an amazing. I mean think about what that really is going to mean for the fabric of companies. Families are retiring, they're not ready, what happens in the context of that. Also remember, when you spend 30% of the total compensation pool on benefits and you're splitting that between I'm funding retirement for my employees or I'm investing in health care. But we know there's a reality. And the reality is we're overspending on health. People are becoming less healthy and still overspending on health on the benefit dollar, and we're underspending on retirement.

The economic leverage of getting that right, literally thinking about that dollar investment, unbelievably powerful. What is the return, by the way, on that 30% spend on all of compensation. We don't really know. That's what we're working on. That's why we have risk capital and human capital as they come together. That's what we're trying to get accomplished to get that return and think about where it goes. Getting that right could be tremendous. So we see wealth as a real opportunity.

By the way, the core business we've got is phenomenal and the capability we've got is phenomenal. And we've got a set of objectives in place to sort of take that business in exactly the same direction that we've got all the other solution lines, and we're confident we can do it. And part of it's going to be excellence in health, but it's also going to be excellence in human capital as you think across both risk capital and human capital.

It's also important to come back. Your question is specifically on wealth, and Greg just showed you why there's the opportunity there. I'd ask you to have in your mind's eye that chart that we showed on the components of organic revenue growth. We have a diverse business. We have drivers in each of the components, new business and retention. We've given you an estimate of what the market impact is. So for us, it is about the continued focus on mid-single-digit or greater revenue growth, and we can do that in totality across the enterprise with increased confidence in the sustainability of that level. So I suspect we'll hear questions about the individual areas. I want us to keep in mind what we're talking about at the company level of mid-single-digit or greater.

Mike?

Mike Zaremski from Bank of Montreal. Margin expansion question related to ABS. So in Mindy's slides, it showed that there was about 15,000 employees in ABS and of that, about half were in global centers. I'm curious, is that 2,500 employees, are those kind of lower cost employees that work in offshoring areas? And if so, will the proportion of employees and Aon employees in those centers grow over time, enabling margin expansion?

Yes. Let me maybe make a comment just about the margin expansion in total, including that piece and then Mindy can talk to you a little bit about the specific activities that we're doing there. But you picked up on the right items, right, getting the tech -- Mindy called it modernization, both the tech development and the AI the operating leverage in our business, but also this movement to our global capability centers right now. So we have a strong population of folks that are in the international low-cost environments like Krakow in Poland, [ Krakow ] in India and those. But we continue to have that opportunity, and that is what will give us confidence in hitting 70 to 100 basis points of margin expansion ongoing. But you can talk a little bit about our locations today and some of the plans that we have to continue to move to global capability centers.

Yes. What I would say is when you look at the type of work, if you remember the one slide I started with in terms of you have operations as well as technology, those roles span everything from people who are doing data entry into individuals who are coding AI. So the span across that is pretty vast. But when we look at in terms of the number of colleagues in ABS, we're moving more and more into ABS all the time. And that's really the value of the end-to-end processes and mapping it across the client journey because that gives scale and it gives connectivity. And then by having tech and ops integrated, it enables you to do the value of the automation and optimization because they're co-located in those centers. So that's why when I started with, we've only just begun is because that potential continues as you continue to work across that journey.

Greg?

Greg Peters with Raymond James. Hopefully, we don't have to wait for another 20 years for an Investor Day. So thank you for doing this. Andy, in your comments, you talked about growth in treaty and facultative on the reinsurance side. And Greg, you spoke about the increasing views about risk on a worldwide basis. So maybe you could spend a minute and bridge the gap between how reinsurance clients are expanding their views of risk that are going to offset potentially moderating price increases in that marketplace.

Well, first of all, thank you for the question. And it really relates again back to the overall issue on the underlying demand and how we react to underlying demand and what we do. And on the reinsurance side, the commercial risk side, all the different pieces, we're unbelievably well positioned to react to demand. That means if you're a reinsurer, tremendous opportunity. Andy talked about the number of bonds we're now doing in the commercial environment, and you talked a little bit more about that in terms of where you see that going. We talked about 150 plus. We're just getting started in that category.

Now we're doing a parametric that involves talent. that's not been seen before. Think about the application across countries, not been seen before. So the opportunity in reinsurance and all the pieces around that are long term, massive, high. You're now a reinsurance colleagues sitting across the table in some of the biggest companies in the world, helping them think about volatility, not just the insurers. It's unbelievable opportunity from a reinsurance standpoint. And the trading environment as it relates to prices is what it is. And for us, it's all about the value we can provide in the environment, and that kind of wipes away all the other noise because addressing that is actually quite powerful. So we see opportunity tremendous there and in commercial risk and as it cuts across the solution lines. But maybe, Andy, you can talk about the core.

Thanks, Greg. So in the treaty reinsurance market, we're seeing an increase in demand, particularly from our larger clients and buying more limit, which has an offsetting implications on -- in the rate impact. But it's an opportunity for them to buy more limit, but they're actually growing their underlying businesses as the total insured values increase. So the sums at risk are increasing and they're trying to mitigate that. And so we're seeing that simultaneously.

When you get this change in market pricing, it's an opportunity. It's an opportunity for those customers to actually protect lower down and stabilize some of their earnings. So we're seeing both. But in the past 2 to 3 years where retentions for our clients in reinsurance have increased, the facultative buying around that has also increased as they look to protect their net retentions by buying specific sort of facultative reinsurance protections. And we've accelerated that with some of our digital distribution on the facultative side. So that's had the sort of the balancing implications there.

As the clients buy more limit on the treaty side, the use of cat bonds has expanded mostly because in the tail is where the risk is, although rare is most predictable. So as they say in England, the cat bonds do what it says on the tin when the big loss comes, it's there to pay. And so capital has been drawn into that because of its predictable nature and its ability to do secondary trading, and we expect more and more of that to expand. Last year was -- we thought was a record year. This year, we'll exceed it.

David?

David Motemaden, Evercore ISI. I have a question on retention. And Edmund, I think it was you who mentioned that retention dipped a little bit in 2023 compared to 2022. It stabilized in 2024, ticked up a bit here in 2025. Could you talk about -- is that back to where it was in 2022? What happened there? And within the outlook, how you're thinking about upside there as you put in some of these risk analyzers and the Aon client leadership and whatnot?

That's an important part of the organic revenue growth model. So I'll make a couple of comments and then maybe turn it to Lori just to talk about all the actions she's been doing in North America and leading our regions to help drive that retention up. Let me be clear, I was very -- I don't know if nervous is the right word, but I pause on even saying that putting it there because let me be clear that we are at a high mid-90s retention rate across each of our solution lines. And so there isn't a huge amount of improvement that we can drive in there. But I got to give it to my colleagues on the stage here, Mindy, what she's doing to improve the client experience and what Anne is doing as well has helped us drive improvement in there.

And as we prep for this, folks were laughing at 100 basis points for Q1 '25. That's meaningful for us. I think it comes -- it's still high across each of the solution lines to your specific question. I think we had pockets where because of the continued competition in this industry, there were some pressures in '22 and '23. But I know we've given Lori even more responsibility, and she's been putting a lot in place to help drive improvement in that space.

Yes. I mean, retention is so tied to client satisfaction. And when you think about the complexity of the world that we're in today, they're looking for more analytics, more tools. And so we launched a lot of the analyzers, Andy, at that first Property Symposium that we talked about in early '24. So when we think about how we're serving our clients and how we're taking more data and analytics to help them make complex decisions, that's where we've seen the improvement in retention, attraction of more talent and also spending a lot of time training our people, tying it back to the tools Aon talked about.

And the training is a combination of building their skill set to understand everything that Aon can offer, but also the technology tools that Aon Business Services have built so that we can connect how we're serving these clients around the world across solution lines. So we're really proud of that retention and expect it to see it at least where it is. Even higher, Edmund.

Jeff?

Jeff Muscatello from Douglass Winthrop Advisors. It's clear how the -- not having regional or P&L barriers benefits clients. But I'm curious how you all are managing and structuring compensation for producers internally so that they're not duplicating efforts, reducing internal competition, but also maintaining a high level of accountability throughout the enterprise.

This is absolutely fundamental. I really appreciate you raising the question. You've highlighted the rationale as to why it's impossible to do and one shouldn't think about it, right? Seriously. It's the baggage. It's like "don't touch me. I'm important. Don't touch me". And that's compelling at some level. But at the other level, you have a set of clients. And the clients are asking for better content, better insight. Every single time we connect our global firm, we deliver a better answer.

By the way, not across some new area. We're talking in property. We're talking literally in the certificate center. This is literally certificates around the world. We have clients signing up for Aon now because we have a certificate ad hoc certificate center. And we had a European client, I recall this conversation very well, who signs up because of their U.S. holdings because we connect with the firm. So let's be clear, it is no, no one can stand up and essentially say, if I act on my own, I'm better. And if you add up the silos, you get a better answer. Andy Marcell just highlighted. You add up the silos, you get the chart. That is absolutely 100% fact.

Now the question is, "okay, can we manage?" Okay. That's risk capital and human capital. Can we manage? That's Aon client leadership and enterprise client. Every one of the enterprise clients who just -- who are attached to the examples here today, literally had their work through, they're delivering the firm. They're calling the best brokers in the world. And, by the way, you think our colleagues don't want to show up and serve those clients? They never solve them before they show up and see some of the most interesting problems in the world they're helping to solve. All we have to do is figure out how people get paid.

Guess what? Pie is getting bigger. We're doing more clients, more with them, keeping them longer. So can we figure out -- this is a little group here. Can we figure out when the pool -- we get more money, probably because the value is greater, that we can divide it in a way that people trust it, and we create accountability around it. That's the challenge of a connected global firm. That's why it's 15 years to Aon United. I could have a better CEO and we have been faster, but it takes a long time. But the content and payoff is massive.

And the reason we're sitting here doing the 3x3 is because we figured that out. And what we have decided to do is not blink. We are doubling down on that. And so I just want to put it in context, can you create accountability? Yes, no problem. Can you create outcomes based on performance? Yes, no problem. Can you create better content with their input? Yes, no problem. You can do that. Can you do it at scale? That's harder. We can do that. Now we have ABS, which is the kind of content no one's ever seen before in our industry. So we like that problem. I just want to call that out. That is absolutely the challenge.

It's also why this is hard to duplicate because think about what we've gone through, single brand, single opco, single P&L, now risk capital, human capital, what we're doing on ABS. And all that's worth it because you've got a set of clients going, man, we haven't seen that before, and they're wowed by that. And it gets to the entire thesis around sort of what we're about and what we're trying to get accomplished. I would just ask, I think, Lisa, you said we had a reasonably high engagement, because the question is, is everybody going, "Oh my God, I don't like this." And right now, what's happening today is exactly the opposite is happening. Maybe just talk about our engagement.

Well, I would say it's something that Edmund and I are both very, very excited about is that our engagement is at an all-time high, and it's increased at 86% while maintaining margin discipline, which is a phenomenal combination. But I would just reiterate, this is hard work. Like this has been hard work to get to where we are. Our colleagues are staying -- 92% of our high potential colleagues are staying with us, and they stay because of Aon United. And there's so many people joining because of Aon United, including some of us on the stage that saw the possibilities of what you could do with an integrated organization that's showing up for the client to build relationships and build trust versus transactions. And that's the difference. It's huge, hard to do.

One other piece I just have to highlight, and this is on the soapbox, I apologize a little bit, but it's that important. The work we're doing on behalf of clients, this innovation, Mindy described this, but I'd really like maybe, Andy, you could talk a bit about it, too, is this is our brokers, our producers. When we talk about getting the right people in the room, you're not sitting in the room in a vacuum. You're sitting in the room with the folks who would sit across the table from clients every day. And it's a different dynamic. They're the ones -- they're the most proud of that decision lab, better decisions lab you were going through. Those -- our colleagues think that's the coolest thing ever. Our producers, our brokers, like, oh, I got something I didn't have before. And they grab the client and say, come look at this. But it was a different dynamic in terms of how it works.

No, completely. And also the starting with the property risk analyzers, we sort of went down the full suite globally, the engagement from the colleagues was tremendous and the excitement because when they go into clients and you actually have an answer to a problem, it's pretty empowering. I mean you can actually sell more and do more to your customer, that's pretty empowering. And then when you're in the market trying to attract talent to your firm, that's empowering because they want to come because the -- in terms of how you compensate people, it is what it is. But I mean, our producer commissions are competitive.

So if you come to Aon, you can bring your clients, you can do more for your clients, and you can get the appropriate compensation. You can work in a team, and this is an iterative process, so it's constantly improving. And our connectivity through Joe Peiser and the commercial risk team all the way to the human capital team means that you can bring a broad swath of solutions to the same customer and working in partnership with Anne's team, that is empowering. That's a different way to do business that I said is now hard wired in our firm. It's a different way that we operate and colleague engagement as a consequence is at an all-time high. So it's fantastic.

[indiscernible].

I got two questions, if it's okay. The first one is a follow-up on the first answer you gave. I appreciate there's going to be ongoing investment in ABS going forward. But it was also a big initial investment that you have to make to just build the platform and say, 10, 15 years of investment into it. Are we at some kind of a tipping point where maybe a lot of the investment has happened already and now you may be more at the harvesting phase for ABS?

And my second question is the trade-off between growth and margins. Trying to understand, is Aon a growth first, margin second company or a margin first and growth second company? And more specifically, the flow chart, let's assume that Mindy outperforms in the ABS, delivering more than 100 to 125 basis points of margin expansion. Would you use that to just invest more in growth initiative and keep the net margin at around 85 basis points? Or are you going to keep the growth initiative at 40 to 60 and just let that flow to a higher net margin expansion?

So I think I just have to offer a quick thought. I think you asked about 14 questions. There's multiple. So Ed and I are going to tag team that, and then we're going to...

Our colleagues see if we got them all.

Paradigm first, are we growth or margin? Let's think about that for a little bit. Anybody want to show hands? Yes. That will be yes. Straight up, yes. Every day, yes. Remember also margin is a function of value for us. Margin is not some number we're going for. If we can add more value and more content, then you create more value for their client, you get compensated for it. That's the entire piece. And what you're hearing describe up here is something that we think is a set of capabilities that win in the core as it exists now, but also win as complex needs change over time.

And so literally, what's the right number on margin? There's no theoretic number. It will increase as it increases. And it really is about value more than anything else. So just be clear, how much room do we have on margin? We get asked that all the time. The answer is, listen, for the foreseeable future, Edmund is telling you exactly what we're going to be. Where is it going to be 15 years? I don't know. We'll see what the value we can provide.

I will tell you one thing just to don't miss. We start moving more capital from the $250 trillion. Like, who gets to do that? That's called real value add. And so we have so many places we're looking in terms to do that. So I just would start with a paradigm called, can we grow at mid-single-digit? Yes. Look at the demand profile in the world. And can we do it on increased margins? Yes. And then what Edmund has brought, an insight that he brought, don't miss it, is we have embedded in the model, the next-generation value creation model, an investment pool that lets us fund where we want to fund. So I thought maybe if that's sort of the answer to the first question, are we revenue or are we margin? The answer is yes. And then maybe you can talk about sort of how that paradigm shifts.

I do want to just -- I think your -- around your third or fourth question, you asked about -- I'm forgetting at this point. The onetime or ongoing investment, the onetime upfront thing. There was a sentence. Hopefully, I got it right in there that was very intentional, which is that through ABS, we've built this foundation for ongoing margin expansion in the core business operations, ongoing margin expansion in the core business operations, not the need for continued onetime investments to be able to get there. We've created the foundation to be able to do it moving forward. I captured that one. That was one that I wanted to hit specifically.

The second thing, back to what Greg is saying, summarizing what Greg just said, I view this flywheel or growth engine that drives scale and efficiency through ABS that gives you capacity to invest and drives earning growth, scale and efficiency through ABS capacity to invest to drive earnings growth. That is the growth engine that we think leads to two things, if I were to summarize sort of what we said in the financial section, sustainable organic revenue growth and enhanced earnings power on an ongoing basis. That's the objective. Margin is a means to an end, not the end itself. We want sustainable organic revenue growth and enhanced earnings power. We get it through the foundation that we've just set up that has scale and efficiency, drives the investment, drives the earnings growth. We feel very good. We feel very good about the next generation of value creation as a result of that.

There's a place too on ABS that we want to make sure you take away from the day. This is -- we drove margin improvement for a long time, right? We do it well before ABS. And then 7 years ago, we do ABS and it starts to drive efficiency. Three years ago, Mindy shows up with her team and then with our team together, and this is the unlock. And we're -- as Mindy described, we're at the beginning of the stage in terms of sort of where we are. And this machine is unique. And again, we're not rocket scientists here, but what does this machine have? It's got embedded AI. We've been -- generative AI. We've been doing AI for a while, embedded generative AI. It's in the core process of what we do. And we don't know where that's going to go. We just know there's tremendous promise in the foreseeable future, it could be more than that. So there's -- that's part of the machine.

The second part of the machine then is what it's doing from a revenue standpoint and the scale capability with the data and the analytics. Seriously, getting common data in our industry that you can actually move from data to information to a client changes their action, that doesn't happen that often. The data when it's really good is in silos, and that means it's limited, and it's not scrubbed. I mean, Mindy brought colleagues in who looked at us and we convince them to come.

Why do you come to Aon from a Google? Why do you do that? Well, come to Aon, we'll help you understand volatility. You can reduce the volatility in the world and change the world. That's cool. And we can do it because we have data. And they show up and go, you've got some of the most amazing data in the world, but where did this come from. Gumball machines, what is this? Fax machines? I can't -- they have pushed us on ingestion in a way that we've never seen before. How do you bring data in? How do you scrub it? How do you make it comparable? That's part of the gift that Mindy is bringing forward as it relates to ABS that makes it more durable and more enduring.

So understand where does that take us? We'll see. We're not going to get out in front of ourselves, but we see the machine, and we drove margin well before that. We've never had this dual purpose of both margin and top line. And now we've got this dual mission that -- again, we're -- 18 months in, that's the reason we're here today. We're not here at the beginning. We wanted to be 18 months in to tell you exactly where we are, this progress report in terms of what it looks like. And so we see possibilities, and they're both top line and bottom line. I got maybe 6 of your questions.

I'm going to take one from our virtual audience. You talked a lot about the attractiveness of the middle market and that it's a priority area. Can you talk about NFP in the first year, your overall growth strategy, including organic and inorganic strategy in this segment?

We love to chat about NFP. This is fantastic. And maybe just offer a couple of thoughts. Lori maybe come to you on NFP, but also, I think Edmund, just on how it fits into the overall engine continues to be incredibly important. So I think there was one line I hope you picked up on NFP. High expectations exceeded. It's been great. It's been a phenomenal year. We really saw a tremendous opportunity as NFP was coming into the Aon world, opportunity for us to support with content and capability. And we hope -- we're in process of doing that. We're making great progress from that standpoint. But my gosh, what an amazing set of client leaders. They just are absolutely phenomenal, and we are learning a lot. So it really is back and forth in terms of sort of what we're up to and what we're doing. But it certainly has proved our thesis on the middle market, and we're excited about it. Lori, what else you've got?

Yes, I'd start with culture. There's an incredible client-first culture that is natural and comes through in NFP and fits so well with Aon United culture. And there's an eager collaboration happening across our colleagues where we're learning about what is exclusive and unique at NFP and how can we bring the Aon capabilities to NFP's client base as well. So if you think about their strong relationship-led work -- team, we're taking some of our tools in health, like the health equity affordability tool, Andy, that you talked about, or the Aon Architect, which is actuarial based to help their larger clients understand how to model and take risk in health. And we have a tremendous amount of revenue synergies that we've identified where we're matching capabilities of Aon with the client base at NFP.

And then we're also looking at where they have relationships and if we can add Aon capabilities, how we can broaden how they serve those clients, which has been incredible with some of our larger industry verticals like private equity or our professional services group. And then both sides, Greg, I would say we're really taking some of our facilities that we've built like Aon Client Treaty, Andy, where we've got 19 products. It's in its 10th year, over $1 billion in premium and how can we bring that capital into NFP's client base. So we're 1 year in, I think we just hit our 1-year anniversary and tremendous upside, outstanding organization, and you could say more of...

Well, it's I mean the summary is -- and I thought of NFP when we had that question on compensation because for us, it begins with retention with NFP. And we continue to have retention that's higher right now where we sit here relative to '24, which was higher relative to pre-NFP as well. So we're retaining this population. As a result of retaining them, we're on track with the rest of the business case. Lori is just talking about the revenue synergies. We committed to $175 million by '26, $80 million this year. We talked about $30 million in OpEx synergies and our plans for 2025 right on track.

With that, you heard me talk on stage about contribution from free cash flow, $300 million, which, by the way, implies that the earnings are in line with the business case or actually performing a little bit better right now. So Lori, you're right, a year and a month in next week, and we feel very confident in the contribution from NFP relative to our thesis when we brought it on board. And I see further opportunity as we drive the revenue synergies here.

We'll take our final question. Josh Shanker?

It's always good to see clients like FedEx and Danone. And clearly, they understand the value that you're providing them. And I think the enterprise group, I mean, Aon is second to none in delivering that. This isn't a comment about Aon or NFP, but in general, the middle market. Sometimes it's hard when you talk to middle market customers to understand what they're getting out of the advice they're getting from their insurance agents and whatnot. Is there a need for education that middle market clients need to understand the value they're being provided? Or do you think that they already know that information? And given that situation, are the revenues from the middle market is durable as those from enterprise clients? Or is there more sense for this to be commoditized over time?

Listen, I really appreciate the question. This isn't about education. They know their business incredibly well, every aspect, every angle. Really, it is us making sure we're helping them understand the value we can bring. And it's not a middle market phenomenon. It's a large corporate phenomenon. It's an enterprise client phenomenon. It's how do we come in and help them understand what we can do on their behalf. That's our responsibility, not theirs. But we see massive opportunity. And in fact, if you think about the middle market, the same issues hold. They all hold. The megatrends, they all hold.

And in many respects, Anne described this, in the middle market, it is often a single person, a senior person in the company who's actually making all the decisions that cut across. So in many respects, what we do in enterprise client actually has a psychological resonance sort of into the middle market. It fits. But our colleagues, we are excited about the opportunity in the middle market massively to bring additional insight and content just like we are for large corporate and enterprise client. We see tremendous opportunity. And in many respects, we're enabling them to not just protect the house, but build the house. We're creating growth opportunity. And for them, nothing like that. So yes, for us, we think it's powerful and durable. And yes, we're up for the task of helping them understand what the possibilities are.

We'll turn it back to you for closing remarks.

Closing remarks. Let's see. Maybe I will offer -- I'll be very brief. First, I want to start. On behalf of Global Aon, thank you to our investors who are here today and are participating online around the world. We truly appreciate the investment and time and energy you've put in Aon over the last few hours. It was huge and massively appreciated. I also want to thank my colleagues. This has been so much -- it's such a joy as we pull this together to sort of help you understand us, our firm a little bit better. But what they're doing on behalf of our clients in support of our colleagues, in my humble opinion, is truly epic. It's groundbreaking. It's a shot to make a difference in the world that can be well beyond Aon. So I really appreciate all -- what my colleagues are doing.

I hope you all took away some pretty simple straightforward perspectives. Look, the opportunity is big and getting bigger. The addressing of the opportunity is not for the faint of heart, but it's known, and we know it. And we spent years working in it, and now we're accelerating it. And the acceleration is, again, not rocket science, risk capital, human capital, Aon client leadership, Aon Business Services. understandable, trackable, leverageable, you can do all those things. We'll do them with you.

We're now 18 months, straight up, 18 months, halfway through a period of time, which we think will bring a great acceleration for our firm, acceleration to move well beyond 2026. We're not doing this for next week. We're doing this for the long term. But in the medium term, win in the core, win in the core, win in the core and win as our clients' needs evolve. That's '24, check, '25 in the middle of '26. and that will go over time. So we hope you take away a sense of real tangible steps we're taking to accelerate progress in our firm. And now 18 months in, you see the progress we've made.

And then finally, I hope you get a chance, you're seeing the broader leadership team in a way you haven't before and you see the capability and content we have. And then equally important, the unified passion we have to make this work, and it is. And again, our gig is always going to come back to clients. And if they see the value and understand the value and they're wowed by the value, we're good. We'll take that all day long, and that will translate. It's Investor Day, for God's sake, into massive shareholder value return.

But by the way, you heard a lot of operations from Edmund too. I don't think we've ever shown literally the class of hires the way he did, which is awesome. So in any event, I hope you enjoyed the day and understand the direction we're taking. And to the extent you have questions or comments, don't hold back. We're here for you. We want you full transparency in what we're doing. We think the more you see, the more you're going to like. So dig in. And thank you very much for being part of the day.