Avnet, Inc.

Please stand by, our presentation will begin now. Welcome to the Avnet fourth quarter fiscal year 2020 earnings conference call. I would now like to turn the floor over to your host, Joe Burke, Vice President, Treasurer, and Investor Relations for Avnet. Thank you, you may begin.

Thank you, operator. Earlier this afternoon, Avnet released financial results for the fourth fiscal quarter of 2020. The release is available on the Investor Relations section of the company's website. A copy of the slide presentation that will accompany today's remarks can be found via the link in the earnings release as well as on the IR section of AVNET's website. Lastly, some of the information contained in the news release and on this conference call contain forward-looking statements that involve risk, uncertainties, and assumptions that are difficult to predict. In particular, the scope and duration of the COVID-19 outbreak and its impact on global economic systems, and our operations, employees, customers and supply chain. Such forward-looking statements are not the guarantee of performance, and the company's actual results could differ materially from those contained in such statements. Several factors that could cause or contribute to such differences are described in detail in ABNET's most recent form, 10-Q and 10-K, and subsequent filings with the SEC. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this presentation, and the company undertakes no obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statements or supply new information regarding the circumstances after the date of this presentation. Today's call will be led by Phil Gallagher, Avnet's Interim CEO, and Tom Liguori, Avnet's CFO. With that, I'm pleased to turn the call over to Phil Gallagher. Phil?

Thank you, Joe, and thanks to everyone for joining us for our fourth quarter and fiscal year 2020 earnings call. Before we begin discussing earnings, we want to start by thanking Bill Emilio for the many contributions he made while serving as ADNET's CEO for the past four years. We are grateful for Bill's hard work during his time at ADNET, and we wish him the best in his future endeavors. Next, we want to thank our 15,000 employees for their continued dedication and support during the pandemic, as well as during this leadership transition. I know I'm not alone when I say that I believe AdNet has a solid foundation from which to grow with valuable assets and some of those talented people in our industry. Finally, I want to say that I've been at AdNet long enough to know what we do well and what we need to do better. One of my immediate priorities as interim CEO would be to lay the groundwork to truly reinvigorate our business. It's a new fiscal year. and a new chapter for Adnet and you will see we have a renewed focus. We will build on our 100-year history in distribution while continuing to accelerate the profitable growth of Farnell, IoT and our ecosystem. We will show our suppliers and customers that our commitment to them has never been stronger. We will relentlessly pursue superior execution. Put simply, we will work harder than ever before I'm truly excited, and I hope you are too. Now, turning to our fourth quarter and fiscal year 2020 results. Similar to other companies, we spent the quarter continuing to navigate the COVID-19 operating environment. On our last earnings call in April, we told you that the macroeconomic headwinds resulting from the pandemic, as well as other factors, would likely impact our fiscal fourth quarter financial results. We also told you we were taking numerous steps to prepare for a significant downturn to ensure financial stability for Avnet during these uncertain times. Although we did not give quantitative guidance for the fourth quarter, the qualitative expectations we provided in April were in line with our fourth quarter results. This included our expectations for performance in Asia, EMEA, and the Americas, as well as for Farnell. Importantly, our actions during the quarter were consistent with the commitment we made to ensure financial stability for our company. Looking at our overall performance for the fourth quarter, our revenues were down sequentially and year-over-year. Our adjusted, diluted EPS was up sequentially and down year-over-year. Software demand, particularly in EMEA, impacted our quarterly results. as well as softer pricing and some additional costs related to the impact of the COVID-19 on our logistics operation. Similar to last quarter, we focused on conserving cash and managing our debt. We generated positive operating cash flow for the seventh consecutive quarter. Looking at our electronic components business, revenues and operating margins were down both sequentially and year over year in the June quarter. The region that was most negatively impacted was EMEA, while Asia's showed signs of recovery and continues to. Our book-to-bill ratio at the end of the fourth quarter was slightly below parity, but has shown signs of improvement in July. Since our book-to-bill is based on lower quarterly revenue base, we are primarily focused on our rate of bookings and backlogs to ensure the integrity of our supply chain. In terms of vertical segments, as you've likely heard from other companies this quarter, weakness was driven primarily by auto and commercial air transportation. However, we saw some strength in the industrial, communications, defense, and technology segments. Notably, a bright spot during the quarter was that our global demand creation trends and design wins are remaining steady. Turning to Fornell, Both sales and operating income margins in the fourth quarter were down sequentially and year-over-year, which is what we expected, as we indicated on our last earnings call. This, again, was primarily impacted by the slowness in EMEA. In the quarter, Farnell's new customer acquisitions rose around 13% year-over-year, largely driven by products supporting COVID-19 safety requirements. We also added multiple new suppliers to Farnell's line card globally. While we've adapted our near-term priorities to respond to the pandemic, we're still executing against our five long-term strategic priorities as outlined on this slide. In fact, we've brought our distribution, traditional demand creation, design services, and IoT strategies closer together in a way that will enable us to scale faster and drive better results for AdNet overall. Our customers, suppliers, and investors are recognizing how IoT solutions are an extension of our key capabilities, driving more demand creation. Our suppliers are particularly excited about this direction because it's creating significant component demand for them. As we think about what's ahead, it's important to note that we are reviewing some of the lessons we've learned during the COVID-19 and how we can apply them to improve our business. For example, We have seen that many of our roughly 15,000 employees around the world can work effectively from home. We have also seen how productive our meetings can be over video conferencing. So we are assessing opportunities for cost rationalization that could benefit our business in the future from decreased travel spend to decreased real estate costs. We are confident that identifying these areas now and reviewing our potential options can allow us to operate more efficiently in the future. As we mentioned last quarter, we are doing everything we can to ensure the safety and health of all of our employees while keeping our business running as smoothly as possible. And as I mentioned earlier, we are so grateful for our employees' continued dedication through this pandemic, a period that has been challenging and filled with uncertainty. We are truly proud of how Adnet's team members are collaborating across our businesses and around the world to support our customers, and some fire partners in the fight against COVID-19. In closing, we acknowledge that this past year has had obstacles for us and for many other companies. We have adapted our business in response to the operating environment and will continue to do so. We are focused on increasing our profitability by building on our century-long foundation and distribution. We are diversifying and growing our revenue streams with comprehensive solutions that will equip our customers and suppliers to succeed in an evolving world of connected technology. With that, I'll turn the call over to Tom to report on the financials for the quarter. Tom?