Itron, Inc.

Good day, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to ITRON's first quarter 2024 earnings release conference call. At this time, all participants are on a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1-1 on your telephone. You will then hear an automatic message advising your hand is raised. Please note that today's conference is being recorded. I will now hand the conference over to your speaker host, Sepal Vincent. Vice President of Investillations. Please go ahead, sir.

Good morning, and welcome to ITRON's first quarter 2024 earnings conference call. Tom Dietrich, ITRON's President and Chief Executive Officer, and Joan Hooper, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, will review ITRON's first quarter results and provide a general business update and outlook. Earlier today, the company issued a press release announcing its results. This release also includes details related to the conference call and webcast replay information. Accompanying today's call is a presentation that is available through the webcast and on our corporate website under the investor relations tab. Following prepared remarks, the call will open for questions using the process the operator described. Before Tom begins, a reminder that our earnings release and financial presentation include non-GAAP financial information that we believe enhances the overall understanding of our current and future performance. Reconciliations of differences between GAAP and non-GAAP financial measures are available in our earnings release and on our investor relations website. We will be making statements during this call that are forward-looking. These statements are based on current expectations and assumptions that are subject to risks and uncertainties. Actual results could differ materially from these expectations because of factors that were presented in today's earnings release and comments made during this conference call, as well as those presented in the risk factors section of our Form 10-K and other reports and filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. All company comments, estimates, or forward-looking statements are made in a good faith attempt to provide appropriate insight to our current and future operating and financial environment. Materials discussed today May 2nd, 2024, may materially change, and we do not undertake any duty to update any of our forward-looking statements. Now, please turn to page four of our presentation as our CEO, Tom Dietrich, begins his remarks.

Thank you, Paul. Good morning to everyone, and thank you for joining our call. Operational execution and market conditions improved for the sixth consecutive quarter, and our entire value chain from component supply to field installation performed better than anticipated, which increased our top and bottom line results. Market interest and adoption of our grid edge intelligence platform continue to grow, and our pipeline of opportunities is expanding as our customers accelerate their adoption of new digital technology and non-wires grid solutions. In addition to organic growth through innovation, M&A is a key strategic initiative of ours, and during the quarter, we acquired Elpis Squared. We now have added real-time power flow analysis and grid planning capabilities to our offerings, furthering our capacity to scale the outcomes segment more rapidly in the years ahead. Now looking at slide five, financial highlights for the first quarter include Year-over-year revenue grew 22% to $603 million, adjusted EBITDA of $76 million, an increase of 94% year-over-year, non-GAAP earnings per share of $1.24, an increase of 153%, and free cash flow of $34 million, an increase of approximately $40 million year-over-year. Turning to slide six, the backlog at the end of the first quarter was $4.3 billion. Bookings for the first quarter of $361 million reflects normal seasonality and the timing of new bookings. We maintain our full-year outlook for a book-to-bill ratio of one-to-one or greater. Across our customer base, engagement related to ITRON's grid edge intelligence platform continues to grow due to a variety of factors, including data center-related demand growth, reindustrialization, and production localization. and electrification of transportation and the home. Water scarcity and the automation of water infrastructure, safety applications for gas customers, and the digitalization of their operations. Notable backlog added during the quarter includes Oklahoma Gas and Electric renewed their longstanding partnership with ITRON. This agreement consolidates a comprehensive range of hardware, software, and services across OG&E's territory and enables the adoption of new technology as their needs evolve. Also during the quarter, the City of Fort Collins selected ITRON to provide a distributed energy resource management solution to manage demand response, energy efficiency, and customer engagement programs. ITRON's software solution provides a single enterprise platform to support control strategies for a range of use cases, including EV charging and battery management. Now Joan will provide details about our first quarter and our outlook for the second quarter.