Specialty drives growth for Ashtead
17 June 2025
Photo: Sunbelt Rentals
Ashtead Group, owner of Sunbelt Rentals, has reported a 4% increase in rental revenues for its 2025 financial year, despite subdued growth in some areas.
Rental revenues for the period reached $9.9 billion, while total Group revenue declined by 1% year-on-year to $10.8 billion.
Elsewhere, the company reported profits after tax of $2.1 billion.
Ashtead Group now reports results across three segments: General Tool and Specialty in North America, and the UK.
Its North American General Tool business remained broadly flat, posting a 1% increase to $4.9 billion.
Specialty, the company’s fastest-growing segment, continued its strong momentum, generating $2.3 billion in rental-only revenue, up 11% on the previous year.
Revenues for Sunbelt Rentals UK rose by 2% to $599 million, supported by improvements in both rental rates and volume, according to the company.
CapEx and acquisitions
Ashtead’s Specialty segment, which includes power & HVAC, facilities management, and film & TV rentals, benefited from the acquisitions of JLLive, JLLighting, and DigiSet.
These were complemented by generalist purchases such as RentalMax, Wave Equipment, Hawkeye, and RNL Rental Network. In total, Ashtead invested $137 million in acquisitions during the year.
Capital expenditure, which has been historically high, totalled $2.4 billion, down from $4.3 billion the previous year.
Similarly, proceeds from equipment disposals fell to $1.8 billion from $3.4 billion.
The company cited a 46% drop in used equipment sales, which fell from $858 million to $467 million, as a key factor in the Group revenue decline.
Future outlook
Ashtead’s chief executive, Brendan Horgan, said he is proud of the results which positions the company for “even more success.”
He said, “We continue to take advantage of strong secular tailwinds and structural progression, within our $87bn and growing industry.
“While completions continue to outpace starts in local non-residential construction, mega project activity continues to be robust, particularly in the data centre, semiconductor and LNG space, with the pipeline projected to grow from c. $840bn in the FY23 – FY25 timeframe, to more than $1.3 trillion in the FY26 – FY28 timeframe.”
Looking ahead, he said the company remains focused on delivering its Sunbelt 4.0 growth strategy, with which it aims to achieve compound annual growth rates in revenue of 6 to 9% in the USA, 9-12% in Canada and 2-5% in the UK over the five year period to 2029.
“Our 401 locations added during Sunbelt 3.0 delivered an incremental $1.9bn in revenue, growing c. 20% in the year, and c. $900m in EBITDA,” he said.
“We continue to invest in our businesses’ secular growth opportunities, and in our first year of Sunbelt 4.0, we added an additional 61 locations.”
Horgan added that the company remains on course to move the Group’s primary listing to the US in the first quarter of calendar year 2026, which it announced in December 2024.
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