AECOM

Thank you for standing by. My name is JL and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the ACOM first quarter 2026 earnings conference call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, simply press star one again. Now, let's turn the conference over to Will Gabrielski, Senior Vice President, Finance Investor Relations. You may begin.

Thank you, Operator. I would like to direct your attention to the safe harbor statement on page one of today's presentation. Today's discussion contains forward-looking statements about future business and financial expectations. Actual results may differ significantly from those projected in today's forward-looking statements due to various risks and uncertainties, including the risks described in our periodic reports filed with the SEC. Except as required by law, we undertake no obligation to update our forward-looking statements. We use certain non-GAAP financial measures in our presentation. The appropriate GAAP reconciliations are incorporated into our materials, which are posted to our website. Growth rates are presented on a year-over-year basis and less otherwise noted. Any references to segment margins or segment-adjusted operating margins will reflect the performance for the Americas and international segments. When discussing revenue and revenue growth, we will refer to net service revenue, or NSR, which is defined as revenue excluding pass-through revenue. NSR and growth rates are presented on a constant currency basis and less otherwise noted. Today's remarks will focus on continuing operations. This morning, we announced the completion of the review of strategic alternatives for the construction management business. We have concluded that we will continue to own and operate the business. Both our reported results and financial guidance are inclusive of construction management. Also, as a reminder, our year-over-year growth rates were impacted by fewer work days compared to the prior year's first quarter. Accordingly, our discussion will include adjustments to improve comparability of results. On today's call, Troy Rudd, our Chief Executive Officer, will review our key accomplishments, our strategy, and our outlook for the business. Laura Filoni, our president, will discuss key operational successes and priorities. And Gaurav Kapoor, our chief financial and operations officer, will review our financial performance and outlook in greater detail. We will conclude with a question and answer session. With that, I will turn the call over to Troy. Troy?

Thank you, Will, and thank you all for joining us today. As our first quarter results demonstrate, we are off to an exceptional start to the year. We exceeded expectations across every key financial metric, including record first quarter NSR, adjusted EBITDA, margins, and backlog. Backlog increased 9% to a new all-time high, fueled by a 1.5 book-to-burn ratio, even while managing through an unprecedented 43-day U.S. federal government shutdown. I should note that we expect award activity in the U.S. to pick up with the recent passage of all critical federal funding bills. As a result, our visibility is high, and we are increasing our full-year financial guidance, which I will discuss shortly. Across the business, our focus remains on extending our competitive advantages. We have a strong moat that is built on our scale, technical leadership, trusted client relationships, and domain expertise. Our target investments in program management, advisory services, AI, and technology position us to unlock greater value for our clients and deliver on our multi-year financial targets. Underscoring our confidence in the long-term value creation opportunity, today we also announced an increased share repurchase authorization to $1 billion. We repurchased more than $300 million in the first quarter and expect to continue to deploy our strong free cash flow to deliver greater value to our shareholders over time. Turning to financial performance, net service revenue increased by 5% when adjusted for fewer billable days in the period. The segment adjusted operating margin increased by 100 basis points to 16.4%. This is a new first quarter record and reflects the ongoing benefits of our strategy and high returning investments. These investments include key hires to drive growth in our advisory business, to build on our technology teams and capabilities, and in business development to capitalize on strong demand. Reflecting this outperformance, both adjusted EVA of $287 million and adjusted EPS of $1.29 exceed our expectations. As I mentioned earlier, we entered the quarter with a record backlog, and our book-to-burn ratio has been above one for 21 consecutive quarters. This consistent performance is a function of the value we bring to our clients. Our win rate remains strong in this quarter, especially on large pursuits. I would like to highlight two key wins that provide greater insight into how we are advantaged in the marketplace. First, we were selected as a delivery partner for the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games in Brisbane, Australia. Our selection is a testament to the trust and credibility we've built with clients in delivering complex infrastructure projects on a worldwide stage. It also underscores the benefits of combining our leading technical expertise with programmatic delivery capabilities. Further, this win builds on our proud history as a critical infrastructure partner to the Olympic Games across the globe, including our ongoing role as the infrastructure delivery partner for the LA28 Games. Another great example is our selection to provide the engineering services for Scottish Water's multi-year capital investments program, which represents one of the largest capital programs in the world. This win demonstrates several key advantages. For one, we're the world's number one ranked water firm. In addition, our rapidly expanding technology roadmap was key to our selection as we were able to demonstrate a tangible value opportunity from AI and technology over time. Our emphasis on bringing best-in-class technology-led solutions and the overwhelmingly positive client response is a growing trend in our business, and we believe this win serves as a blueprint for the value we expect to deliver from our investments. Turning to a discussion of our end markets, in the U.S., Market conditions are strong. The recent passage of all key federal funding bills for fiscal 26 provides greater certainty for our clients and for us. Additionally, over half of the IIJA funding remains to be spent, and progress is accelerating for the multi-year surface transportation authorization. Our expectation is for another sizable investment that will build on this momentum and support a growing U.S. economy. Investment in the private sector is also gaining momentum. This is evident in the booming data center market where we benefit both directly and indirectly from the infrastructure opportunities. This includes water, facilities, energy, and environmental services, all sectors where we lead our industry. Additionally, incentives in the One Big Beautiful Bill and ongoing reassuring initiatives are creating new opportunities with several years of visibility ahead. Starting to international, near-term trends remain varied. but strong long-term demand for infrastructure investment is undeniable. In the UK, we had the significant Scottish water wind and the AMP8 water cycle is underway. In the Middle East, we are successfully navigating the reprioritization of funding with substantial wins in the first quarter that underpin our outlook for this year and beyond. This includes our new leading design role on the Dubai Metro and ongoing growth opportunities in the UAE and across Saudi Arabia. In Australia, our backlog reached a new multi-year high and included strong winds in the quarter, notably in the transportation sector. Offsetting this in the near term are pockets of weakness resulting from geopolitical and funding uncertainties. Importantly, our efforts to reposition across international markets are paying off, as our 25% backlog growth and record pipeline demonstrate. As a result, we expect revenue trends to improve as the year progresses and into fiscal 27. Globally, national defense budgets are meaningfully increasing. This is a key driver for our business as defense represents approximately 10% of our NSR. The U.S. Department of War is our largest client, and spending is set to increase for the next several years. Further, our other key clients are also ramping investment, including the U.S. Coast Guard and the broader DHS. President Trump also reaffirmed the U.S. commitment to the AUKUS trilateral defense pact with Australia and the U.K., and we are pursuing a substantial pipeline. Before turning the call to Laura, I want to provide an update on two strategic initiatives. Beginning with technology and AI, we've completed the integration of our September acquisition. We've already doubled the size of our team, and engineers are deeply engaged and collaborating to extend our capabilities. The technology is now live on our projects, and the initial performance results achieved have matched our expectations. Our confidence in these investments and the potential positive benefits is getting stronger. Every day we're uncovering fresh use cases and new opportunities. We're deploying our resources to tackle new problems, and in doing so, we are creating significantly more value for our clients. All this rests on the foundation we've built, namely our technical leadership, the deep trust we've earned with our clients over many years, and the domain expertise we have at scale. As it relates to the construction management business, We've completed our comprehensive review of strategic alternatives. We concluded we will continue to own and operate the business and believe it is exceptionally well positioned for the future. Backlog is strong, and the pipeline continues to reflect a robust set of opportunities. As we look ahead, our confidence is underpinned by our successes and growing backlog. We increased our adjusted EBITDA and EPS expectations for fiscal 26, which includes operational performance in the first quarter, and the benefits from capital allocation. We also reaffirmed our long-term value creation algorithm, which includes expectations for annual revenue growth of 5% to 8%, achieving a 20% margin exit rate by fiscal 28, and delivering mid-teens compounded earnings and free cash flow growth per share. With that, I will turn the call over to Laura.