American Superconductor Corporation

Q1 2022 Earnings Conference Call

8/4/2022

spk18: You're currently in hope for today's American Superconductor first quarter 2022 earnings call. At this time, we're assembling today's audience and plan to be underway shortly. We appreciate your patience. Please remain on the line. Please stand by. We're about to begin. Good day, everyone, and welcome to the American Superconductor First Quarter 2022 Earnings Conference call. Today's call is being recorded. And now at this time, I'd like to turn the call over to John Heilshorn of LHA Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
spk08: Thank you, April. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to American Superconductor Corporation's first quarter of Fiscal 22 earnings conference call. I am John Heilshorn of LHA Investor Relations, AMSC's Investor Relations Agency of Record. With us on today's call are Daniel McGann, Chairman, President, Chief Executive Officer, and John Kasiba, Senior Vice President, Chief Financial Officer, and Treasurer. American Superconductor issued its earnings release for the first quarter of Fiscal 22 yesterday after the market closed. For those of you who have not been able to see the release, a copy is available at the investor's page of the company's website at www.amsc.com. Before starting the call, I'd like to remind you that various remarks that management may make during today's call about American Superconductors' future expectations, including expectations regarding the company's second quarter fiscal 22 financial performance, plans and prospects constitute forward-looking statements for purposes of the State of Harvard provisions under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Actual results may differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors, including those set forth in the risk factors section of American Superconductors' annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended March 31, 2022, which the company filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on June 1, 2022, and the company's other reports filed with the SEC. These forward-looking statements represent management's expectations only as of today and should not be relied upon as representing management's views of any subsequent day to today. While the company anticipates that subsequent events and developments may cause the company's views to change, the company specifically disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements. Also on today's call, management will refer to non-GAAP net loss, a non-GAAP financial measure. The company believes that non-GAAP net loss assists management and investors in comparing the company's performance across reporting periods on a consistent basis by excluding these non-cash, non-recurring, or other charges that it does not believe are indicative of its core operating performance. The reconciliation of GAAP net loss to non-GAAP net loss can be found in the first quarter of fiscal 22 earnings press releases that the company issued and furnished to the SEC last night on Form 8K. All of American Superconductors' press releases and SEC filings can be accessed from the investor's page of its website at www.amsc.com. With that, I will now turn the call over to Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer Daniel McGann. Daniel.
spk06: Thanks, John, and good morning, everyone. I will begin today by providing an update on our grid and wind business units. John Kasiba will then provide a detailed review of our financial results for the first fiscal quarter which ended June 30, 2022, and provide guidance for the second fiscal quarter, which will end September 30, 2022. Following our comments, we'll open up the line to questions from our analysts. I'm happy to say we started a strong fiscal year 2022. We've established an order book of over $100 million. We are now selling into next fiscal year. This all happened during our first fiscal quarter. This is well ahead of our historical pace to the business. Our backlog is growing. The business is growing. We see an acceleration of bookings due to some of the tailwinds we discussed last quarter. We see a diverse set of orders from renewables to semiconductor to materials and mining to industrials. We even had some orders from the US Navy to continue some research and development work on new products. We see continued tailwinds in multiple markets and believe 2022 will be an important year in the maturation of our business. We see projected growth in the renewables market driven by the move to energy independence and carbon reduction. For example, the recently proposed US Senate Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 contains significant spending and tax breaks which are poised to boost the clean energy industry in the United States. We see investments in the semiconductor capacity increasing for the next several years to address 2030-era demand for memory and key materials for the green economy. The U.S. Chips and Science Act of 2022 is a recent example of government substantially incentivizing the growth of the sector of the economy in the United States. The tailwinds to our business seem to have become stronger just in the past few days. We see strong demand for mining, metals, and materials driven by automakers and their move to electric vehicles in response to the global pressure to reduce environmental impact. We see how current foreign policy challenges demand sustainable security. These tailwinds are expected to benefit our business. During the first quarter of fiscal 2022, we reported revenue just below $23 million. We are seeing challenges of project timelines with customers as well as the availability of parts from our supply chain. We expect a stronger third and fourth quarter. We had over $50 million of new orders booked during the first quarter of this fiscal year. You can see, and John will discuss, that we're carrying elevated inventory levels. These are all indicators of growth. Now I'll turn the call over to John Kasiba to review our financial results for the first quarter of fiscal 2022 and provide guidance for the second quarter of fiscal 2022, which will end September 30, 2022. John.
spk03: Thanks, Daniel. And good morning, everyone. AMSC generated revenues of $22.7 million for the first quarter of fiscal 2022, compared to $25.4 million in the year-ago quarter. Our grid business unit accounted for 87% of total revenues, while our wind business unit accounted for 13%. Grid business unit revenues decreased by 16% in the first quarter versus the year-ago quarter. Wind business unit revenues increased 49% in the first quarter versus the year-ago quarter. Looking at the P&L in more detail, gross margin for the first quarter of fiscal 2022 was 10% compared to 13% in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin for this quarter was adversely impacted by a particularly unfavorable product mix coupled with the continued drag on margins associated with the neotrion backlog. EVA product shipments came in below recent quarterly averages And as many of you are aware, DVAR has historically produced one of our highest contribution margins for the company. We anticipate DVAR shipments to rebound back to normalized levels for the remainder of fiscal 2022. As Daniel has mentioned, we are working our way through the required neotrend backlog. In fact, we expect to have shipped off most of that backlog by the end of this Q3 fiscal 2022. As we see DVR sales rebound and the acquired Neotran backlog become less meaningful on the overall financials, we anticipate gross margins to approach our recent historic average. We also priced in current material costs on the new orders received this quarter and anticipate those orders to have a positive impact on the overall gross margins as they ship. Now moving on to operating expenses, R&D and SG&A expenses for the first quarter of fiscal 2022 were $10.2 million, flat compared to a year ago results. Approximately 11% of R&D and SG&A expenses for the first quarter of fiscal 2022 were non-cash. Our non-gap net loss for the first quarter of fiscal 2022 was $6.8 million, or $0.25 per share, compared with $2.7 million, or $0.10 per share, in the year-ago quarter. Our net loss in the first quarter of fiscal 2022 was $8.7 million or $0.32 per share. This compares to a net loss of $5.4 million or $0.20 per share in the year-ago quarter. Included in our Q1 fiscal 2021 GAAP and non-GAAP net loss was a 2.1 tax benefit associated with the NEOTRAN acquisition. Please see our press release issued last night for a reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP results. We ended the first quarter of fiscal 2022 with 43.1 million in cash, cash equivalents, and restricted cash. This compares with 49.5 on March 31st, 2022. Our operating cash burn in the first quarter of fiscal 2022 was 5.9 million. Let me take a minute to talk about our inventory position. As Daniel mentioned earlier, we booked over 50 million in new orders during the first quarter of fiscal 2022. We have increased our inventory to support the surge in demand, particularly within our new energy product lines. We increased our inventory by over 9 million in Q1 to nearly 33 million of total inventory. Almost all of the inventory increase is earmarked for projects within our new energy product lines. This has put some strain on our working capital in Q1 and is expected to continue into the second quarter. We do not anticipate the strain on working capital less than beyond the second quarter as we expect to start to ship on this new backlog in Q3 and beyond. With all that said, we are anticipating strong revenue in the second half of fiscal 2022. I'll turn into our financial guidance for the second quarter of fiscal 2022. We expect that our revenues will be in the range of $23 to $27 million A net loss on that revenue expected not to exceed $8.5 million or $0.31 per share. A non-GAAP net loss is expected not to exceed $6.5 million or $0.23 per share. The company expects operating cash flow to be a burn of $4 to $6 million in the second quarter of fiscal 2022. We expect to end the second quarter with no less than $36 million in cash crash equivalents and restricted cash. With that, I'll turn the call back over to Daniel. Thanks, John.
spk06: Our business is strengthening and we're beginning to see the initial benefits of our recent acquisitions. We experienced a robust order booking during the first quarter of fiscal 2022. We have a diverse set of powerful tailwinds emerging in our business. The world is quickly moving towards decarbonization to slow down climate change and create a path for a more sustainable world. This transition to a low carbon economy raises demand for semiconductors as well as metals mining and critical materials. Our new energy power systems business is expected to play a central role in this transition. Our business is benefiting from the tailwinds created by global decarbonization efforts. In fact, we are seeing bookings strengthen all three of these areas, renewables, semiconductors, and materials. We anticipate the emergence of additional demand for our new energy power systems from the semiconductor and materials markets coming in the subsequent quarters. We believe we are well positioned to take advantage of these tailwinds and expect to continue to grow and diversify our business. Now turning to our ship protection systems, we delivered our SPS system for the USS Fort Lauderdale. We are focused on the successful installation of this system. We have established and demonstrated our capabilities to deliver the SPF systems. In our backlog, we have the USS Harrisburg, which is scheduled to be delivered this fiscal year, the USS Richard McCool, and the USS Pittsburgh. SPS contributed to the grid segment revenues in this first quarter of fiscal 2022 and has been a very consistent source of grid revenue for the past several quarters. Our team is very busy and focused on continuing to expand the SPS business while we deliver our initial systems. Although it is hard to predict exactly when we would see an uptick in SPS-related revenues, signs point to and what we expect to be a larger and brighter future with the Navy, hopefully in the very near future. To give you an update on our resilient electric grid or reg system in Chicago, the system continues to perform well. It's already served as a great learning experience for the utility. We continue to see strong desire for this utility, as well as others, to further deploy REG into the power grid. Turning to wind, we're supporting INOX and Doosan in the field with the initial prototype of a three megawatt class turbine and an initial wind farm of 5.5 megawatt wind turbines, respectively. During the first quarter of fiscal 2022, we shipped two megawatt electrical control systems, or ECS, to our partner in India, Inox Wind. Just yesterday, Inox Wind announced an order from a repeat customer, NTPC Renewable Energy Limited, for a 200 megawatt wind project to be commissioned in the state of Gujarat with two megawatt wind turbines. We expect demand for the three megawatt ECS sometime later this fiscal year and the demand to continue in the next fiscal year. The design certification of the three megawatt class wind turbine prototype for the Indian market is complete. We believe INOX is in a good position to start expanding its business this year with the three megawatt class wind turbine, which should translate into an expanded order book for us. The three megawatt class wind turbine is designed to be a great fit for India's robust wind market, which is expected to add 3.5 gigawatts in 2022, according to global data, going from a total cumulative wind capacity of 42 gigawatts at the end of 2021 to nearly 46 gigawatts by the end of 2022. Here at AMSC, we're preparing for INOX to transition to a larger 3-megawatt-class wind turbine for deployment in India. Doosan is now erecting their first series of production 5.5 megawatt offshore wind turbines in South Korea utilizing AMSC's ECS. We believe Southeast Asia is a geography well suited for our 5 megawatt class wind turbine and for our partner Doosan. South Korea intends to become one of the world's top five offshore wind power producers, and we believe Doosan is well positioned for a very high market share. Doosan represents a long-term prospect for the offshore wind market in South Korea, and we look forward to potentially penetrating the global offshore market with this partner. On the supply chain front, there are still effects which have impacts on our supply chain due to the global pandemic and the conflict in the Ukraine. We are seeing pressure in the supply chain due to component costs and availability. Supply chain related cost increases continue to be a drag on our business, but we expect this to stabilize. We are constantly being challenged by availability of components and the lead times for deliveries. We're working with our vendors across product lines to maintain stocks. The team is doing a great job of managing these supply chain challenges and pricing it into proposals where possible. Please be reminded, as we said in the last call, we continue to work through the acquired Nealtran backlog. Some of these projects have moved out due to customer situations, and as a result, this is expected to impact the business next quarter and into the third quarter. To conclude, our backlog grew by approximately 30% during the first quarter of fiscal 2022. Our orders outpaced revenue this first fiscal quarter, and we expect revenue to grow in the coming quarters. In fact, we had a book-to-bill ratio of over two this first fiscal quarter, meaning orders received were more than double units shipped for the quarter. This is something the team has been working on very hard to accomplish and is a testament to their work ethic and dedication, as well as the great customer service we've provided our customers. the business is performing well. We expect revenue to grow in the coming quarters with a stronger second half to fiscal 2022 driven by new energy shipments increasing in the third and fourth quarters of the fiscal year. As we experience this revenue growth in new energy shipments coupled with the working off of the acquired Neal Tran backlog, we do anticipate meaningful gross margin expansion in the quarters ahead. We have ship protection system orders for deployment on the USS Harrisburg, USS Richard McCool, and the USS Pittsburgh. We are supporting Doosan's effort to penetrate the offshore wind market with our 5.5 megawatt turbine, and we're preparing for our onshore wind partner, INOX, to transition to a larger 3 megawatt class wind turbine for deployment in India. We do see continued demand, though, for the 2 megawatt. We are executing against our goals, and that is to the credit of our employees due to their hard work. To note, we have more than three dozen open positions, mostly for direct labor to build our fantastic products, which are built into the cost of those products. I look forward to reporting back to you at the completion of our second fiscal quarter of 2022. April will now take questions from our analysts.
spk18: Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, simply press the star key followed by the digit 1 on your telephone keypad. Also, if you're using a speakerphone, please make sure your mute function is turned off to allow your signal to reach our equipment. Once again, star 1 at this time. We'll pause for a moment. And we'll first hear from Eric Stein of Craig Hallam.
spk13: Good morning, Daniel. Hi, John.
spk20: Hello there.
spk13: Hello there.
spk15: So first, maybe with the orders last week, you've got, what, $100 million or so in orders when you take those with the first quarter. Maybe if you could just break those down a little bit or talk how those break out in the various grid areas. And then just thoughts on, you know, the breakdown or your expectation, how that flows between second half 22 and 2023. Sure.
spk06: So it's a diverse set of orders, as we mentioned in the prepare remarks. So in there are renewables, semiconductor materials, general industrial, and even some orders to continue work at R&D for the Navy. So it's kind of across the board in everything that we do today in GRID. We talked about the timing, and we've said a few different things to kind of help you, but really the uptick of these new orders really started in the third quarter. We said in the announcement that most of the business is going to be within the fiscal year, which means that there's obviously a tail that's pretty substantial, but less than half that would go into the next fiscal year. I think if you look at our timing and where we've been historically, Eric, The things we're saying on the call today in August, we typically say in November. We're sold out for the year, right? The business has accelerated. We predicted it was going to accelerate, and we see that, and we're showing you all the indications of that acceleration.
spk15: Yep. No, got it. Understood. And when you think about the specifically, I guess, semiconductor, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that that's been pretty commonplace customer concentrated, maybe where that stands, and do you feel that the industry is becoming more aware of your capabilities and the value you bring for that application?
spk06: I think it's less concentrated than you imagine. We're working on multiple fabs with multiple chip makers at this point. Remember that part of the reason that we were looking to acquire these other great companies We're going to help to expand our content. It's also going to help to expand the customers and alleviate customer concentration. So we feel really good about the partners that we've worked with so far. We think there presents another further opportunity for further diversification in semi coming to the U.S. Obviously, we work with some fabs in the U.S. today. We've kind of said that directly before. But with this drive to reshore semi manufacturing here at home, It's really for the generation of chips that we serve, hopefully with the partners that we've either served before or we have marketed to. So we're really optimistic that the semi part of our business today will continue to grow and that there are these tailwinds to help bring more of that business to the U.S.
spk15: Got it. And then maybe last one for me, just on REG. I know you're limited as to what you can say, but can you just remind us I believe that was put into service, I think it was last August or September. Chicago wanted to operate it for a year at least and then would think about next steps, would think about the second project, where we stand, how close are we to that year mark. And then do you expect, do you think that the next REG project DataPoint is a follow-on with Chicago, or would it be with another utility who's watching this?
spk06: You know, to handicap it, I think where we are with Chicago is they clearly are looking to the future. I think if we look at how they behaved on the first project, it's been really, really well. The product has been very accepted at the utility. The number of people that they've gotten involved with in the utility to understand the technology, to understand the operation and maintenance of it, clearly indicates to me, in my opinion, that this is a technology that they want to see deployed all over the country, not just in their own grid. And they want to go help us do that as much as they can. The fact that we've gotten to this milestone really has reopened, re-energized, and moved forward a lot of the other conversations that have been going on in parallel. So it's hard for me today to handicap where the next one's going to come from. You can clearly hear in my tone, you know, I'm really focused in the next quarters on growing new energy. We have great indications coming from SPS. I think RAG certainly is part of our long-term future, but it's not something that we're looking to generate, you know, more revenue on, let's say, in the next few quarters. But we do think it's a big and important part of our future business.
spk14: Understood. Thanks.
spk18: And next we'll hear from Justin Clair of Roth Capital Partners.
spk09: Hey, thanks for taking our questions. Hey, Justin. Good morning. Morning. So I guess first off, you know, given the size of your order book, you talked about seeing stronger sales in the second half of this fiscal year. Just wondering, you know, are you expecting to see sequential growth in, you know, fiscal Q2, Q3, and Q4 of this fiscal year? And then does that put you on track for year-over-year growth for the full year?
spk06: To answer the first part of the question, obviously we're guiding with the second quarter for growth. So given the result from the first quarter versus the guide, we're seeing an improvement in the top line and the bottom line of the cash as well relative to the first quarter. In a lot of what we're saying today, we're talking about the third and fourth quarter I think it's hard for me where I sit today to speculate will Q3 be stronger than Q4, Q4 stronger than Q3. What we have to do is mind our knitting with our partners, make sure we're delivering our product on cost, on time to this backlog that's grown for this year to help revenue for this year but also into next year as well. So what we're trying to do is get the pace of the business now up to this new level, and that's why you see a lot of the commentary that we're coming, and you can see it in the financials. It's clear in the commentary that the business has accelerated. But it's hard for me to predict project by project definitively. And I'll be blunt. I don't worry so much quarter to quarter. What I worry about are the larger macro trends in the markets that we're serving. Do we see ourselves winning more in markets that are growing? And I say that's yes across the board.
spk09: Okay, got it. Great. And then just shifting gears to margins here, you know, with the NILTRAN backlog rolling off, I think largely in fiscal Q3, you talked about approaching kind of historic average margins. Does this suggest that you could be, you know, nearing maybe a 20% level, you know, in Q4 of this fiscal year, or is that a level that you could potentially be reach as we move into next year?
spk06: It's really going to depend on the revenue level. It's going to depend upon the mix and the quarter of the product. But I'd say kind of general directionally, if we look at our trailing gross margin over the past quarter as we've been in, say, the teens, if we go back a year or so more, kind of before we started digesting the backlog, we were in the high teens into the 20s. So that's kind of what we're trying to signal is that The potential is there, depending on our ability to have the people in the parts and execute on all the projects and programs, which we're very good at. But in this economy, I don't want to promise it because something could change with a supplier tomorrow and we start struggling.
spk09: Okay. Maybe just one more for me. The CHIPS Act was just signed into law with subsidies for domestic chip manufacturing and Just wondering what kind of potential there is for this legislation to support growth in your business and any sense for timing. Have you already had any conversations with customers about this bill driving increased order flow?
spk06: Yeah, I'll answer really only the last part, which is yes. So we saw this coming. We are very active in Washington. We kind of understood where we were headed. We've been reaching out, trying to trade on our track record, both American Superconductor and NEPSY in the semiconductor space. So we believe it will help. I think it's hard to dial in how much and when, but it certainly has shown that the sales team is having a lot more conversations, a lot more names, and really focused on the growth in America, which we think is great. On so many different levels, it's great.
spk14: Okay, great. I appreciate it.
spk18: And it's Star 1 to ask a question. We'll now hear from Colin Rush of Oppenheimer.
spk10: Thanks so much, guys. Could you talk about some of the opportunities for design cost out in some of the power management solutions that you've got, particularly those that you recently acquired?
spk06: Yeah, I think, you know, when we – Part of why the team has done a good job, Colin, in my opinion, of trying to respond to the increase in component costs, we were already working on ways to better manage those costs going forward. So I think the team has done a good job, kind of quarter by quarter, trying to price in what we know. I think that I don't want to say are lessening that doesn't necessarily mean that next year and after we get through the midterm things change again I don't really know but the first problem is just kind of keeping up with the supply chain then the second order was going to be you know what can we do to kind of change the product offering in a way to help you know continue to drive those margins up and you know I'm kind of telegraphing that we
spk04: And when things are ready to make changes in cost, we'll deliver them to the market and hopefully have the same outcomes we've had in the past with great customer success.
spk10: Thanks so much. And then just sticking with that business, can you talk a bit about the opportunity to expand the geographic footprint from a sales perspective? Obviously, power quality is going to be a substantial issue on basically everywhere going forward. and there's an opportunity for you guys to be more active, particularly in Central and South America as well as Europe. I'm just curious what your thought process is around that sales effort.
spk06: Yeah, no, it's exactly that. We have a historical business with DVAR in the U.S., in the U.K., in Australia. We've expanded that over the years into continental Europe, a little bit into Africa and South America. you know, that is ripe for the NEPC and the Ultran products as well. And I think starting, you know, more with NEPC because there's a direct path there, you know, already. So that's what I'm hoping that we'll see over time. We'll see growth coming from new energy, not only from the addition of the products, but the reach, the global reach of all of the product lines. And then, you know, kind of to go back to your previous question, we do look for ways, you know, how can we get better leverage standpoint and from a cost standpoint. So I think you got it right on where we're headed.
spk10: Okay. Thanks so much, guys.
spk14: Appreciate it. Thanks, Colin.
spk18: And it appears there are no further questions at this time. I'll turn the call back over to Daniel for any additional or closing comments. And actually, Chip Moore with EF Hutton just signaled for a question.
spk04: Oh, sure.
spk05: We'll take that from Chip.
spk16: Hey, thanks. Can you hear me?
spk05: Yeah, great. We're glad we got you.
spk16: Glad I buzzed in. So, thanks. I wanted to follow up on that very strong order flow. Great to see. You know, wondering maybe if you can help us handicap risk in the back half, whether it's supply chain or, you know, labor. I think you talked about, right, needing to hire a bunch of folks. Any risks there that somebody could push out or just how to think about that?
spk06: Yeah, there's always risk project to project that something kind of moves from, you know, a week in the one quarter, from one quarter into another. But I'll say, you know, where my mindset today with the business is I'm starting to think about a year from now, you know, and beyond there because the backlog is starting to extend that far out. So what we want to do is, you know, we think the business is accelerated. We're on kind of a different pace here. We want to make sure that we have the people and parts to be able to deliver on that pace. But it is hard to predict. You know, a customer says, we don't have access to our labor to commission. You know, if that happens, then the commissioning event's delayed, and those typically are revenue-bearing. So, you know, that we just have to manage. And we always start with the customer in mind. Whatever the customer needs, you know, we're going to focus on. And if they need us there earlier or we need us to be there later, we just want to be there when we're needed. And I think because we take that attitude with everybody, Our customers know that we're there to meet their objectives, not our own. We want everything to work well for them. We want them to come back and be a repeat customer, which we've seen a lot of in the business.
spk04: So if we're a good partner and a good service provider, we think that's going to translate into more business in the future.
spk16: Perfect. And if I could switch gears maybe on... Navy, you mentioned signs getting favorable there, a potential uptick. Can you maybe just remind us on the annuity dynamics there for those systems? And then you also mentioned an R&D order with the Navy. Would this be another shift, or are we talking about something else?
spk06: We could be talking about anything. It could be for another shift. It could be another part of the product. They're all in existing programs, so what we're trying to do is extend the capability to protect and power the fleet. So I'll leave what it's for for that. To remind you of the revenue breakout, typically for an LPD ship, the revenue profile is about $10 million per. We've delivered on the first one. We're delivering on the second one now. Remember that the revenue is a percent complete accounting audit, so it's not something that bundles up and occurs upon delivery. It really kind of finishes upon the final delivery. What our team is really focused on right now in the Navy part of our business is the successful integration of the first system into the first ship. We think if that goes well, and we've been told in no uncertain words from the Navy, if that goes well, then you guys better be ready to deliver. I like feeling that from the Navy. It makes me feel like we're doing the right thing investing in this product all along.
spk16: Got it. Thanks. And maybe just one last one. I guess INOX specifically and ECS. Any more visibility on, maybe more so near term, it sounds like you're still seeing two megawatt shipments, just particularly given the margin impact, you know, kind of think about that here in the rest of the year, and then obviously we'll wait the three megawatt.
spk06: Yeah, I'll let John talk to the margin impact. I think the thing we wanted to make sure people understood is that the two megawatt is alive and well, and they're getting orders for it, and that may not be, everybody may be just focusing on three megawatt and not realizing that demand for two could come as well.
spk03: On the wind margin, you know, again, when wind's running at scale, you know, what we've said is the wind product line and DVR product lines tend to be our highest contribution margin product lines. You know, wind's not at scale today, so it's not falling quite into that category. So, you know, as we start to see wind business ramp back up, we'll see a positive impact on margins.
spk14: Yeah, okay, great. We appreciate it. Thanks, everybody.
spk18: And there are no further questions at this time. I'll turn the call back over to Daniel for any additional or closing comments.
spk06: Thanks, April. You know, to harken back to my childhood and, you know, watching Sesame Street growing up, the word of the day, folks, is acceleration. You look at all the indicators and everything we said in the prepared remarks from hiring of people, bigger backlog, bigger inventory, and we're trying to navigate quarter to quarter what's going to happen. We're guiding the growth from Q1 to Q2. We're talking about revenue continues to strengthen throughout the rest of the year, and we're really focusing already on 2023. You have not heard this kind of enthusiasm from the team here probably in a long, long time. We felt we were trying to be As clear as we could last quarter, we're talking about the potential for the business to accelerate given the number of tailwinds that we have in the business. Those tailwinds today seem to be broader and deeper than they even were one quarter ago. We're going to work our way through being able to handle the execution as we accelerate, and we look forward to being able to talk to you guys in about a quarter's time when we have the next quarter's results ready. Thank you for your attention and support, and good day.
spk18: That does conclude today's conference. Thank you all for your participation. You may now disconnect.
spk01: Thank you. you you Thank you. Thank you.
spk18: Good day, everyone, and welcome to the American Superconductor First Quarter 2022 Earnings Conference call. Today's call is being recorded. And now at this time, I'd like to turn the call over to John Heilshorn of LHA Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
spk08: Thank you, April. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to American Superconductor Corporation's first quarter of Fiscal 22 earnings conference call. I am John Heilshorn of LHA Investor Relations, AMSC's Investor Relations Agency of Record. With us on today's call are Daniel McGann, Chairman, President, Chief Executive Officer, and John Kaseba, Senior Vice President, Chief Financial Officer, and Treasurer. American Superconductor issued its earnings release for the first quarter of Fiscal 22 yesterday after the market closed. For those of you who have not been able to see the release, a copy is available at the investor's page of the company's website at www.amsc.com. Before starting the call, I'd like to remind you that various remarks that management may make during today's call about American Superconductors' future expectations, including expectations regarding the company's second quarter fiscal 22 financial performance, plans and prospects constitute forward-looking statements for purposes of the State of Harvard provisions under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Actual results may differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors, including those set forth in the risk factors section of American Superconductors' annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended March 31, 2022, which the company filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on June 1, 2022, and the company's other reports filed with the SEC. These forward-looking statements represent management's expectations only as of today and should not be relied upon as representing management's views of any subsequent day to today. While the company anticipates that subsequent events and developments may cause the company's views to change, the company specifically disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements. Also on today's call, management will refer to non-GAAP net loss, a non-GAAP financial measure. The company believes that non-GAAP net loss assists management and investors in comparing the company's performance across reporting periods on a consistent basis by excluding these non-cash, non-recurring, or other charges that it does not believe are indicative of its core operating performance. The reconciliation of GAAP net loss to non-GAAP net loss can be found in the first quarter of fiscal 22 earnings press release that the company issued and furnished to the SEC last night on Form 8K. All of American Superconductors' press releases and SEC filings can be accessed from the investor's page of its website at www.amsc.com. With that, I will now turn the call over to Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer Daniel McGann. Daniel.
spk06: Thanks, John, and good morning, everyone. I will begin today by providing an update on our grid and wind business units. John Kasiba will then provide a detailed review of our financial results for the first fiscal quarter which ended June 30, 2022, and provide guidance for the second fiscal quarter, which will end September 30, 2022. Following our comments, we'll open up the line to questions from our analysts. I'm happy to say we started a strong fiscal year 2022. We've established an order book of over $100 million. We are now selling into next fiscal year. This all happened during our first fiscal quarter. This is well ahead of our historical pace to the business. Our backlog is growing. The business is growing. We see an acceleration of bookings due to some of the tailwinds we discussed last quarter. We see a diverse set of orders from renewables to semiconductor to materials and mining to industrials. We even had some orders from the US Navy to continue some research and development work on new products. We see continued tailwinds in multiple markets and believe 2022 will be an important year in the maturation of our business. We see projected growth in the renewables market driven by the move to energy independence and carbon reduction. For example, the recently proposed US Senate Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 contains significant spending and tax breaks which are poised to boost the clean energy industry in the United States. We see investments in the semiconductor capacity increasing for the next several years to address 2030-era demand for memory and key materials for the green economy. The U.S. Chips and Science Act of 2022 is a recent example of government substantially incentivizing the growth of the sector of the economy in the United States. The tailwinds to our business seem to have become stronger just in the past few days. We see strong demand for mining, metals, and materials driven by automakers and their move to electric vehicles in response to the global pressure to reduce environmental impact. We see how current foreign policy challenges demand sustainable security. These tailwinds are expected to benefit our business. During the first quarter of fiscal 2022, we reported revenue just below $23 million. We are seeing challenges of project timelines with customers as well as the availability of parts from our supply chain. We expect a stronger third and fourth quarter. We had over $50 million of new orders booked during the first quarter of this fiscal year. You can see, and John will discuss, that we're carrying elevated inventory levels. These are all indicators of growth. Now I'll turn the call over to John Kasiba to review our financial results for the first quarter of fiscal 2022 and provide guidance for the second quarter of fiscal 2022, which will end September 30, 2022. John.
spk03: Thanks, Daniel. And good morning, everyone. AMSE generated revenues of $22.7 million for the first quarter of fiscal 2022, compared to $25.4 million in the year-ago quarter. Our grid business unit accounted for 87% of total revenues, while our wind business unit accounted for 13%. Grid business unit revenues decreased by 16% in the first quarter versus the year-ago quarter. Wind business unit revenues increased 49% in the first quarter versus the year-ago quarter. Looking at the P&L in more detail, gross margin for the first quarter of fiscal 2022 was 10% compared to 13% in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin for this quarter was adversely impacted by a particularly unfavorable product mix coupled with the continued drag on margins associated with the neotrion backlog. EVAR product shipments came in below recent quarterly averages And as many of you are aware, DVAR has historically produced one of our highest contribution margins for the company. We anticipate DVAR shipments to rebound back to normalized levels for the remainder of fiscal 2022. As Daniel has mentioned, we are working our way through the required neotrend backlog. In fact, we expect to have shipped off most of that backlog by the end of this Q3 fiscal 2022. As we see DVR sales rebound and the acquired Neotran backlog become less meaningful on the overall financials, we anticipate gross margins to approach our recent historic average. We also priced in current material costs on the new orders received this quarter and anticipate those orders to have a positive impact on the overall gross margins as they ship. Now moving on to operating expenses, R&D and SG&A expenses for the first quarter of fiscal 2022 were $10.2 million, flat compared to a year ago results. Approximately 11% of R&D and SG&A expenses for the first quarter of fiscal 2022 were non-cash. Our non-GapNet loss for the first quarter of fiscal 2022 was $6.8 million, or $0.25 per share, compared with $2.7 million, or $0.10 per share, in the year-ago quarter. Our net loss in the first quarter of fiscal 2022 was $8.7 million, or $0.32 per share. This compares to a net loss of $5.4 million, or $0.20 per share, in the year-ago quarter. Included in our Q1 fiscal 2021 GAAP and non-GAAP net loss was a 2.1 tax benefit associated with the NEOTRAN acquisition. Please see our press release issued last night for a reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP results. We ended the first quarter of fiscal 2022 with 43.1 million in cash, cash equivalents, and restricted cash. This compares with 49.5 on March 31st, 2022. Our operating cash burn in the first quarter of fiscal 2022 was 5.9 million. Let me take a minute to talk about our inventory position. As Daniel mentioned earlier, we booked over 50 million in new orders during the first quarter of fiscal 2022. We have increased our inventory to support the surge in demand, particularly within our new energy product lines. We increased our inventory by over 9 million in Q1 to nearly 33 million of total inventory. Almost all of the inventory increase is earmarked for projects within our new energy product lines that we booked during the This has put some strain on our working capital in Q1 and is expected to continue into the second quarter. We do not anticipate the strain on working capital less than beyond the second quarter as we expect to start to ship on this new backlog in Q3 and beyond. With all that said, we are anticipating strong revenue in the second half of fiscal 2022. I'll turn into our financial guidance for the second quarter of fiscal 2022. We expect that our revenues will be in the range of $23 to $27 million A net loss on that revenue expected not to exceed $8.5 million or $0.31 per share. A non-GAAP net loss is expected not to exceed $6.5 million or $0.23 per share. The company expects operating cash flow to be a burn of $4 to $6 million in the second quarter of fiscal 2022. We expect to end the second quarter with no less than $36 million in cash crash equivalents and restricted cash. With that, I'll turn the call back over to Daniel. Thanks, John.
spk06: Our business is strengthening and we're beginning to see the initial benefits of our recent acquisitions. We experienced a robust order booking during the first quarter of fiscal 2022. We have a diverse set of powerful tailwinds emerging in our business. The world is quickly moving towards decarbonization to slow down climate change and create a path for a more sustainable world. This transition to a low carbon economy raises demand for semiconductors as well as metals mining and critical materials. Our new energy power systems business is expected to play a central role in this transition. Our business is benefiting from the tailwinds created by global decarbonization efforts. In fact, we are seeing bookings strengthen all three of these areas, renewables, semiconductors, and materials. We anticipate the emergence of additional demand for our new energy power systems from the semiconductor and materials markets coming in the subsequent quarters. We believe we are well positioned to take advantage of these tailwinds and expect to continue to grow and diversify our business. Now turning to our ship protection systems, we delivered our SPS system for the USS Fort Lauderdale. We are focused on the successful installation of this system. We have established and demonstrated our capabilities to deliver the SPF systems. In our backlog, we have the USS Harrisburg, which is scheduled to be delivered this fiscal year, the USS Richard McCool, and the USS Pittsburgh. SPS contributed to the grid segment revenues in this first quarter of fiscal 2022 and has been a very consistent source of grid revenue for the past several quarters. Our team is very busy and focused on continuing to expand the SPS business while we deliver our initial systems. Although it is hard to predict exactly when we would see an uptick in SPS related revenues, signs point to and what we expect to be a larger and brighter future with the Navy, hopefully in the very near future. To give you an update on our resilient electric grid or reg system in Chicago, the system continues to perform well. It's already served as a great learning experience for the utility. We continue to see strong desire for this utility, as well as others, to further deploy REG into the power grid. Turning to wind, we're supporting INOX and Doosan in the field with the initial prototype of a three megawatt class turbine and an initial wind farm of 5.5 megawatt wind turbines, respectively. During the first quarter of fiscal 2022, we shipped two megawatt electrical control systems, or ECS, to our partner in India, Inox Wind. Just yesterday, Inox Wind announced an order from a repeat customer, NTPC Renewable Energy Limited, for a 200 megawatt wind project to be commissioned in the state of Gujarat with two megawatt wind turbines. We expect demand for the three megawatt ECS sometime later this fiscal year and the demand to continue in the next fiscal year. The design certification of the three megawatt class wind turbine prototype for the Indian market is complete. We believe INOX is in a good position to start expanding its business this year with the three megawatt class wind turbine, which should translate into an expanded order book for us. The three megawatt class wind turbine is designed to be a great fit for India's robust wind market, which is expected to add 3.5 gigawatts in 2022, according to global data, going from a total cumulative wind capacity of 42 gigawatts at the end of 2021 to nearly 46 gigawatts by the end of 2022. Here at AMSC, we're preparing for INOX to transition to a larger three megawatt class wind turbine for deployment in India. Doosan is now erecting their first series of production 5.5 megawatt offshore wind turbines in South Korea utilizing AMSC's ECS. We believe Southeast Asia is a geography well suited for our 5 megawatt class wind turbine and for our partner Doosan. South Korea intends to become one of the world's top five offshore wind power producers, and we believe Doosan is well positioned for a very high market share. Doosan represents a long-term prospect for the offshore wind market in South Korea, and we look forward to potentially penetrating the global offshore market with this partner. On the supply chain front, there are still effects which have impacts on our supply chain due to the global pandemic and the conflict in the Ukraine. We are seeing pressure in the supply chain due to component costs and availability. Supply chain related cost increases continue to be a drag on our business, but we expect this to stabilize. We are constantly being challenged by availability of components and the lead times for deliveries. We're working with our vendors across product lines to maintain stocks. The team is doing a great job of managing these supply chain challenges and pricing it into proposals where possible. Please be reminded, as we said in the last call, we continue to work through the acquired Nealtran backlog. Some of these projects have moved out due to customer situations, and as a result, this is expected to impact the business next quarter and into the third quarter. To conclude, our backlog grew by approximately 30% during the first quarter of fiscal 2022. Our orders outpaced revenue this first fiscal quarter, and we expect revenue to grow in the coming quarters. In fact, we had a book-to-bill ratio of over two this first fiscal quarter, meaning orders received were more than double units shipped for the quarter. This is something the team has been working on very hard to accomplish and is a testament to their work ethic and dedication, as well as the great customer service we've provided our customers. the business is performing well. We expect revenue to grow in the coming quarters with a stronger second half to fiscal 2022 driven by new energy shipments increasing in the third and fourth quarters of the fiscal year. As we experience this revenue growth in new energy shipments coupled with the working off of the acquired Neal Tran backlog, we do anticipate meaningful gross margin expansion in the quarters ahead. We have ship protection system orders for deployment on the USS Harrisburg, USS Richard McCool, and the USS Pittsburgh. We are supporting Doosan's effort to penetrate the offshore wind market with our 5.5 megawatt turbine, and we're preparing for our onshore wind partner, INOX, to transition to a larger 3 megawatt class wind turbine for deployment in India. We do see continued demand, though, for the 2 megawatt. We are executing against our goals, and that is to the credit of our employees due to their hard work. To note, we have more than three dozen open positions, mostly for direct labor to build our fantastic products, which are built into the cost of those products. I look forward to reporting back to you at the completion of our second fiscal quarter of 2022. April will now take questions from our analysts.
spk18: Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, simply press the star key followed by the digit 1 on your telephone keypad. Also, if you're using a speakerphone, please make sure your mute function is turned off to allow your signal to reach our equipment. Once again, star 1 at this time. We'll pause for a moment. And we'll first hear from Eric Stein of Craig Hallam.
spk13: Good morning, Daniel. Hi, John.
spk20: Hello there.
spk15: Hello there. So first, maybe with the orders last week, you've got, what, $100 million or so in orders when you take those with the first quarter. Maybe if you could just break those down a little bit or talk how those break out in the various grid areas. And then just thoughts on the breakdown or your expectation, how that flows between second half 22 and 2023. Sure.
spk06: So it's a diverse set of orders, as we mentioned in the prepare remarks. So in there are renewables, semiconductor materials, general industrial, and even some orders to continue work at R&D for the Navy. So it's kind of across the board in everything that we do today in GRID. We talked about the timing, and we've said a few different things to kind of help you, but really the uptick of these new orders really started in the third quarter. We said in the announcement that most of the business is going to be within the fiscal year, which means that there's obviously a tail that's pretty substantial, but less than half that would go into the next fiscal year. I think if you look at our timing and where we've been historically, Eric, The things we're saying on the call today in August, we typically say in November. We're sold out for the year, right? The business has accelerated. We predicted it was going to accelerate, and we see that, and we're showing you all the indications of that acceleration.
spk15: Yep. No, got it. Understood. And when you think about the specifically, I guess, semiconductor, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that that's been pretty commonplace customer concentrated, maybe where that stands, and do you feel that the industry is becoming more aware of your capabilities and the value you bring for that application?
spk06: I think it's less concentrated than you imagine. We're working on multiple fabs with multiple chip makers at this point. Remember that part of the reason that we were looking to acquire these other great companies We're going to help to expand our content. It's also going to help to expand the customers and alleviate customer concentration. So we feel really good about the partners that we've worked with so far. We think there presents another further opportunity for further diversification in semi coming to the U.S. Obviously, we work with some fabs in the U.S. today. We've kind of said that directly before. But with this drive to reshore semi manufacturing here at home, It's really for the generation of chips that we serve, hopefully with the partners that we've either served before or we have marketed to. So we're really optimistic that the semi part of our business today will continue to grow and that there are these tailwinds to help bring more of that business to the U.S.
spk15: Got it. And then maybe last one for me, just on REG. I know you're limited as to what you can say, but can you just remind us I believe that was put into service, I think it was last August or September. Chicago wanted to operate it for a year at least and then would think about next steps, would think about the second project, where we stand, how close are we to that year mark. And then do you expect, do you think that the next REG project DataPoint is a follow-on with Chicago, or would it be with another utility who's watching this?
spk06: You know, to handicap it, I think where we are with Chicago is they clearly are looking to the future. I think if we look at how they behaved on the first project, it's been really, really well. The product has been very accepted at the utility. The number of people that they've gotten involved with in the utility to understand the technology, to understand the operation and maintenance of it, clearly indicates to me, in my opinion, that this is a technology that they want to see deployed all over the country, not just in their own grid. And they want to go help us do that as much as they can. The fact that we've gotten to this milestone really has reopened, re-energized, and moved forward a lot of the other conversations that have been going on in parallel. So it's hard for me today to handicap kind of where the next one's going to come from. You can clearly hear in my tone, you know, I'm really focused in the next quarters on growing new energy. We have great indications coming from SPS. I think RAG certainly is part of our long-term future, but it's not something that we're looking to generate, you know, more revenue on, let's say, in the next few quarters. But we do think it's a big and important part of our future business.
spk14: Understood. Thanks.
spk18: And next we'll hear from Justin Clair of Roth Capital Partners.
spk09: Hey, thanks for taking our questions. Hey, Justin. Good morning. Morning. So I guess first off, you know, given the size of your order book, you talked about seeing stronger sales in the second half of this fiscal year. Just wondering, you know, are you expecting to see sequential growth in, you know, fiscal Q2, Q3, and Q4 of this fiscal year? And then does that put you on track for year-over-year growth for the full year?
spk06: To answer the first part of the question, obviously we're guiding with the second quarter for growth, right? So given the result from the first quarter versus the guide, we're seeing an improvement in the top line and the bottom line of the cash as well relative to the first quarter. In a lot of what we're saying today, we're talking about the third and fourth quarter I think it's hard for me where I sit today to speculate will Q3 be stronger than Q4, Q4 stronger than Q3. What we have to do is mind our knitting with our partners, make sure we're delivering our product on cost, on time to this backlog that's grown for this year to help revenue for this year but also into next year as well. So what we're trying to do is get the pace of the business now up to this new level, and that's why you see a lot of the commentary that we're coming, and you can see it in the financials. It's clear in the commentary that the business has accelerated. But it's hard for me to predict project by project definitively. And I'll be blunt. I don't worry so much quarter to quarter. What I worry about are the larger macro trends in the markets that we're serving. Do we see ourselves winning more in markets that are growing? And I say that's yes across the board.
spk09: Okay, got it. Great. And then just shifting gears to margins here, you know, with the Neil Tran backlog rolling off, I think largely in fiscal Q3, you talked about approaching kind of historic average margins. Does this suggest that you could be, you know, nearing maybe a 20% level, you know, in Q4 of this fiscal year, or is that a level that you could potentially be reach as we move into next year?
spk06: It's really going to depend on the revenue level. It's going to depend upon the mix and the quarter of the project. But I'd say kind of general directionally, if we look at our trailing gross margin over the past quarter as we've been in, say, the teens, if we go back a year or so more, kind of before we started digesting the backlog, we were in the high teens into the 20s. So that's kind of what we're trying to signal is that The potential is there, you know, depending on our ability to have the people in the parts and execute on all the projects and programs, which, you know, we're very good at. But in this economy, I don't want to promise it because, you know, something could change with a supplier tomorrow and we start struggling.
spk09: Okay. Maybe just one more for me. You know, the CHIPS Act was just signed into law, you know, with subsidies for domestic chip manufacturing companies. Just wondering what kind of potential there is for this legislation to support growth in your business and any sense for timing. Have you already had any conversations with customers about this bill driving increased order flow?
spk06: Yeah, I'll answer really only the last part, which is yes. So we saw this coming. We are very active in Washington. We kind of understood where we were headed. We've been reaching out, trying to trade on our track record, both American Superconductor and NEPSY in the semiconductor space. So we believe it will help. I think it's hard to dial in how much and when, but it certainly has shown that the sales team is having a lot more conversations, a lot more names, and really focused on the growth in America, which we think is great. On so many different levels, it's great.
spk14: Okay, great. I appreciate it.
spk18: And it's Star 1 to ask a question. We'll now hear from Colin Rush of Oppenheimer.
spk10: Thanks so much, guys. Could you talk about some of the opportunities for design cost out in some of the power management solutions that you've got, particularly those that you recently acquired?
spk06: Yeah, I think, you know, when we – Part of why the team has done a good job, Colin, in my opinion, of trying to respond to the increase in component costs, we were already working on ways to better manage those costs going forward. So I think the team has done a good job, kind of quarter by quarter, trying to price in what we know. I think that I don't want to say that's all behind us, but it certainly seems quarters ago one quarter ago I'll say you're lessening that doesn't necessarily mean that next year and after we get through the midterm things change again I don't really know but the first problem is just kind of keeping up with the supply chain then the second order was going to be you know what can we do to kind of change the product offering in a way to help you know continue to drive those margins up and you know I'm kind of telegraphing that
spk04: And when things are ready to make changes in cost, we'll deliver them to the market and hopefully have the same outcomes we've had in the past with great customer success.
spk10: Thanks so much. And then just sticking with that business, can you talk a bit about the opportunity to expand the geographic footprint from a sales perspective? Obviously, power quality is going to be a substantial issue on basically everywhere going forward. And there's an opportunity for you guys to be more active, particularly in Central and South America, as well as Europe. I'm just curious what your thought process is around that sales effort.
spk06: Yeah, no, it's exactly that. We have a historical business with DVAR in the US, in the UK, in Australia. We've expanded that over the years into continental Europe, a little bit into Africa and South America. you know, that is ripe for the NEPSY and NEALTRAN products as well. And I think starting, you know, more with NEPSY because there's a direct path there, you know, already. So that's what I'm hoping that we'll see over time. We'll see growth coming from new energy, not only from the addition of the products, but the reach, the global reach of all of the product lines. And then, you know, kind of to go back to your previous question, we do look for ways, you know, how can we get better leverage between the product and from a cost standpoint. So I think you got it right on where we're headed.
spk14: Okay. Thanks so much, guys. Appreciate it. Thanks, Colin.
spk18: And it appears there are no further questions at this time. I'll turn the call back over to Daniel for any additional or closing comments. And actually, Chip Moore with EF Hutton just signaled for a question.
spk06: Oh, sure.
spk05: We'll take that from Chip.
spk16: Hey, thanks. Can you hear me?
spk05: Yeah, great. We're glad we got you.
spk16: Glad I buzzed in. So, thanks. I wanted to follow up on that very strong order flow. Great to see. You know, wondering maybe if you can help us handicap risk in the back half, whether it's supply chain or, you know, labor. I think you talked about, right, needing to hire a bunch of folks. Any risks there that some of that gets pushed out or just how to think about that?
spk06: Yeah, there's always risk project to project that something kind of moves from, you know, a week in the one quarter, from one quarter into another. But I'll say, you know, where my mindset today with the business is I'm starting to think about a year from now, you know, and beyond there because the backlog is starting to extend that far out. So what we want to do is, you know, we think the business is accelerated. We're on kind of a different pace here. We want to make sure that we have the people and parts to be able to deliver on that pace. But it is hard to predict. You know, a customer says, we don't have access to our labor to commission. You know, if that happens, then the commissioning event's delayed, and those typically are revenue-bearing. So, you know, that we just have to manage. And we always start with the customer in mind. Whatever the customer needs, you know, we're going to focus on. And if they need us there earlier or we need us to be there later, we just want to be there when we're needed. And I think because we take that attitude with everybody, Our customers know that we're there to meet their objectives, not our own. We want everything to work well for them. We want them to come back and be a repeat customer, which we've seen a lot of in the business. So if we're a good partner and a good service provider, we think that's going to translate into more business in the future.
spk16: Perfect. And if I could switch gears maybe on... Navy, you mentioned signs getting favorable there, a potential uptick. Can you maybe just remind us on the annuity dynamics there for those systems? And then you also mentioned an R&D order with the Navy. Would this be another shift, or are we talking about something else?
spk06: We could be talking about anything. It could be for another shift. It could be another part of the product. They're all in existing programs, so what we're trying to do is extend the capability to protect and power the fleet. So I'll leave what it's for for that. To remind you kind of of a revenue breakout, for typically for an LPD ship, the revenue profile is about $10 million per. We've delivered on the first one. We're delivering on the second one now. Remember that the revenue is a percent complete accounting audit, so it's not something that bundles up and occurs upon delivery. It really kind of finishes upon the final delivery. What our team is really focused on right now in the Navy part of our business is the successful integration of the first system into the first ship. We think if that goes well, and we've been told in no uncertain words from the Navy, if that goes well, then you guys better be ready to deliver. I like feeling that from the Navy. It makes me feel, you know, like we're doing the right thing investing in this product all along.
spk16: Got it. Thanks. And maybe just one last one. I guess INOX specifically and ECS. Any more visibility on many more so near term? It sounds like you're still seeing two megawatt Shipments, just particularly given the margin impact, you know, kind of think about that here in the. In the rest of the year, and then obviously we'll wait the 3 megawatt.
spk06: Yeah, let John talk to the margin impact. I think the thing we wanted to make sure people understood is that the 2 megawatt is alive and well, and they're getting orders for it. And that may not be everybody may be just focusing on 3 megawatt, not realizing that demand for 2 could come as well.
spk03: On the wind margin, you know, again, when wind's running at scale, you know, what we've said is the wind product line and DVR product lines tend to be our highest contribution margin product lines. You know, wind's not at scale today, so it's not falling quite into that category. So, you know, as we start to see wind business ramp back up, we'll see a positive impact on margins.
spk14: Yeah, okay, great. We appreciate it. Thanks, everybody.
spk18: And there are no further questions at this time. I'll turn the call back over to Daniel for any additional or closing comments.
spk06: Thanks, April. You know, to harken back to my childhood and, you know, watching Sesame Street growing up, the word of the day, folks, is acceleration. You look at all the indicators and everything we said in the prepared remarks from hiring of people, bigger backlog, bigger inventory, and we're trying to navigate quarter to quarter what's going to happen. We're guiding the growth from Q1 to Q2. We're talking about revenue continuing to strengthen throughout the rest of the year, and we're really focusing already on 2023. You have not heard this kind of enthusiasm from the team here probably in a long, long time. We felt we were trying to be As clear as we could last quarter, we're talking about the potential for the business to accelerate given the number of tailwinds that we have in the business. Those tailwinds today seem to be broader and deeper than they even were one quarter ago. We're going to work our way through being able to handle the execution as we accelerate, and we look forward to be able to talk to you guys in about a quarter's time when we have the next quarter's results ready. Thank you for your attention and support, and good day.
spk18: That does conclude today's conference. Thank you all for your participation. You may now disconnect.
Disclaimer

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