Allegion plc

Good day and welcome to the Allegiant fourth quarter 2021 earnings call. All participants will be in listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Please note this event is being recorded. I'd now like to turn the conference over to Tom Martineau. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Jason. Good morning, everyone. Welcome and thank you for joining us for Allegiant's fourth quarter and full year 2021 earnings call. With me today are Dave Petratis, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer, and Patrick Shannon, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Allegiant. Our earnings release, which was issued earlier this morning, and the presentation, which we will refer to in today's call, are available on our website at investor.allegiant.com. This call will be recorded and archived on our website. Please go to slides two and three. Statements made in today's call that are not historical facts are considered forward-looking statements and are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of federal securities law. Please see our most recent SEC filings for description of some of the factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from our projections. The company assumes no obligation to update these forward-looking statements. Today's presentation and commentary include non-GAAP financial measures. Please refer to the reconciliation in the financial tables of our press release for further details. Dave and Patrick will now discuss our fourth quarter and full year 2021 results and provide an outlook for 2022, which will be followed by a Q&A session. For the Q&A, we would like to ask each caller to limit themselves to one question and then re-enter the queue. We would like to give everyone an opportunity given the time allotted. Now I'd like to turn the call over to Dave.

Thanks, Tom. Good morning, and thank you for joining us today. Please go to slide number four. Q4 was tough for Allegiant, and although we achieved the expected results we discussed last quarter, I was disappointed that we were unable to fully meet the market opportunity presented. The strength in demand, particularly in America's non-residential end markets, continued. And as I said last quarter, this trend began softly in Q1, accelerated in Q2, and continued throughout the back half of the year. Leading indicators like specs written for Allegiant Americas, ABI, and Dodge New Construction Indices, retail point of sales, and macroeconomic indicators in our Allegiant International segment all remain positive. These indicators suggest continued strength in all end markets for the foreseeable future. However, with supply chain challenges, we continue to experience difficulty converting that demand into revenue. Typically, we'd be able to gear up our supply base in short fashion, but the accelerated increase in demand occurred during an unprecedented time when suppliers were experiencing labor, raw material, transportation, and electronic component shortages, creating tremendous global disruption. What we typically resolve in a quarter is now taking much longer. We are making good progress on product redesigns and alternative sourcing, which should alleviate some of the supply chain pressure. But we do expect revenue to continue to be constrained in the near term. Even with the supply chain improvements we are making, it's important to note that the pressures and electronic components are expected to continue throughout 2022. Looking at price versus cost, we continue to experience high inflationary impacts from material costs, labor, and freight. The pricing that we put in place last year is currently lagging inflation. That, coupled with productivity challenges, is a major contributor to margin declines in Q4. We implemented additional price increases during the fourth quarter and have already announced another price increase for Q1 2022 that goes into effect this month. We are aggressively pursuing price across all products and in all channels to offset unprecedented inflation and expect price to exceed inflation in 2022. I do want to highlight our Allegiant International business, which had another good quarter and closed out a strong year. The segment delivered robust organic revenue growth and solid margin expansion in 2021. Looking forward, the increased demand and supply chain shortages have led to record backlogs in our American non-residential business. And coupled with the progress we are making on redesigns and alternative sourcing, we expect solid revenue growth in 2022 and into 2023. As supply chain pressures ease, operational efficiencies will improve, which along with accelerated pricing, will allow us to expand margins in 2022 and exit the year on a glide path back to peak performance. Now let's turn to the quarter performance for more details. Please go to slide five. Revenue for the fourth quarter was $709 million, a decrease of 2.5 percent compared to last year. Organic revenue declined 1.4 percent. The organic revenue decline in the quarter was driven by Allegiant Americas, which experienced continued supply chain pressures that led to electronic and other component shortages. Also embedded in the decline is a tough comparable to last year. During the fourth quarter of 2020, we had a large residential channel load-in that was necessary to catch up from the shutdowns experienced earlier that year. The Americas volume declines more than the sequential improvements in price realization and the growth that the Allegiant International segment delivered. Patrick will share more details on the business segments in a moment. Adjusted operating margin decreased by 610 basis points in the fourth quarter. Continued inflationary pressures, productivity challenges, and volume deleverage drove most of the decrease. Incremental investments for future growth caused 80 basis points of the decline. Adjusted earnings per share of $1.11 decreased 38 cents or approximately 26% versus the prior year. Lower operating income was partially offset by favorable share count, year-over-year tax rate reduction, and other income. Available cash flow for the year came in at $443 million, which was flat to 2020. Slightly lower adjusted earnings were offset by slightly lower capital expenditures. The cash flow impact of working capital was nearly neutral as well, with increased inventory offset by other components of working capital. As I think about the road ahead, I firmly believe our vision, strategy, and support of our seamless access is more relevant than ever. I also believe we have the right team and an engaged workforce that will respond to the challenges we face today. We are bullish on construction and DIY markets for 2022 and continue to expect the IoT trend of electronic adoption and smart buildings to fuel growth for many years. Allegiant's future is bright and we will return to the peak performance and profitability that you expect. Patrick will now walk you through the financial results, and I'll be back to discuss our 2022 outlook.

Thanks, Dave, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining today's call. Please go to slide number six. This slide reflects our earnings per share reconciliation for the fourth quarter. For the fourth quarter of 2020, reported earnings per share was $1.01, adjusting 48 cents for charges related to restructuring, M&A costs, impairments, as well as a loss on held for sale assets, the 2020 adjusted earnings per share was $1.49. Favorable year-over-year tax rate and share count drove another $0.04 and $0.03 increase, respectively. Interest and other income were slightly positive, as were the impact of acquisitions and divestitures, both at a penny per share. The story for the court is reflected in the operational results, which decreased earnings per share by $0.41. The inflation and productivity headwinds were predominantly driven from higher input costs, wage increases, inefficiencies from supply chain challenges, and the bounce back of variable-related costs, which were not as high in the prior year. These added costs were partially offset by price. Pricing sequentially improved in the quarter and will continue to accelerate in 2022. Investment spending increased during the quarter and reduced earnings per share by $0.06. We remain committed to investing in new product innovation and technology that will accelerate future growth and deliver solutions that enhance customer and end-user experiences and connectivity. This results in adjusted fourth quarter 2021 earnings per share of $1.11, a decrease of $0.38 or 25.5% compared to the prior year. Lastly, we have a $0.15 per share increase for the combination of a non-cash gain on a remeasurement of an Allegiant Ventures investment offset by charges related to restructuring, M&A, and debt refinancing. After a giving effect to these items, you arrive at the fourth quarter 2021 reported earnings per share of $1.26. Please go to slide number seven. This slide depicts the components of our revenue growth for the fourth quarter as well as for the full year of 2021. As indicated, we experienced a 1.4% organic revenue decline in the fourth quarter. Like Q3, the electronics and other component shortages, primarily in the Americas region, had an impact on our ability to meet continued strong demand. We achieved the highest quarter price realization in the year, which offset some of the volume decline. For the full year, you can see that total revenue was up 5.4% with organic revenue growth of 4.5%. Both segments of the business delivered organic growth for the year with the international segment at 10.4% and America's at 2.4%. As mentioned, end market demand increased considerably faster than we anticipated in 2021. And although we were able to deliver significantly more than our initial outlook, we were unable to meet the full market opportunity currently. However, our record backlogs will enable accelerated revenue in the future once the supply chain constraints are mitigated. Please go to slide number eight. Fourth quarter revenues for the Allegiant America segment were $499.5 million, down 4.2% on a reported basis and 4.3% organically. The organic decline was driven by continued supply chain pressures for both mechanical and electronic products. On the plus side, we did see sequential improvement in price, and Americas has announced another increase that goes into effect this month. We're driving price in all channels and products, and our expectation is that pricing will exceed inflation in 2022. The Americas non-residential business was up low single digits as strong price was offset by delayed volume. related to electronic allocations and other component shortages. These supply chain constraints, paired with robust market demand, slowed the pace of revenue realization and led to historic levels of backlogs at the end of the year. America's residential was down mid-teens. Similar to last quarter and mentioned previously, the main drivers of the decrease are the prior year being inflated by channel refill coming out of the pandemic shutdowns experiencing Q2 of 2020, and the shortage of electronic components that primarily impact us in the DIY space of big box retail and e-commerce. Electronics revenue was down low 20 percent, driven by continued shortages of electronic components in both the non-residential and residential businesses. The prior year residential channel refill also had an impact on year-over-year electronics performance. Legion America's adjusted operating income of $105.5 million decreased 29 percent versus the prior year period, an adjusted operating margin for the quarter was down 740 basis points. The decrease was driven by inflationary pressures, productivity challenges related to supply chain, and Volume D leverage. Incremental investments had a 90 basis point dilutive impact on adjusted margins. Although margins were down significantly in the quarter, down 370 basis points for the full year, margins will improve in 2022 compared to 2021 from increased price realization, volume leverage, and improved business mix. Please go to slide number nine. The Allegiant International segment had another solid quarter. Fourth quarter revenues were $209.7 million, up 1.7%, and up 5.8% on an organic basis. The organic growth was driven by strength in our global portable security business, along with good price realizations. Reported growth reflect the impacts of currency headwinds and divestitures. Allegiant International adjusted operating income of $29.4 million decreased 11.2% versus the prior year period. Adjusted operating margin for the quarter decreased by 200 basis points. The margin decrease was driven primarily by inflation exceeding price and productivity, along with negative product mix, which more than offset the positive volume leverage. Incremental investments reduced margins by 50 basis points. I would also note the full year performance of the international segment. Double digit organic growth and achievement of 11% operating margin. This was a record year for the segment and reflects a tremendous amount of effort and dedication by the entire team. Please go to slide number 10. Available cash flow for 2021 came in at $443 million, which is flat compared to the prior year period. The adjusted net earnings were slightly lower and was offset by slightly lower capital expenditures. In total, the working capital impact was near neutral with increased inventories offset by other components of working capital. Looking at the working capital chart, it shows working capital as a percentage of revenues, and the cash conversion cycle decreased based on a four-point quarter average. Last chart on the slide shows our net leverage. The net debt to EBITDA ratio increased from 1.5 last year to 1.7 this year. The increase in the ratio was driven primarily by reduced cash position from shareholder distributions for the year. The business continues to generate strong cash flow and conversion of net earnings. We have a healthy balance sheet, and we executed $542 million in shareholder distributions, with $413 million in share repurchases and $129 million in dividends. We also recently announced a 14% increase in our dividend coming later in March. During the quarter, we entered into a new $750 million unsecured credit agreement consisting of a $250 million term facility and a $500 million revolving facility. We obtained a rating upgrade with Moody's, and it moved to Positive Outlook by Fitch. Our capital structure is an asset of the company, and we continue to execute on a balanced capital allocation strategy that will deploy capital through incremental, high-returning organic investments, CapEx, M&A, or shareholder distributions. I'll now hand it back over to Dave for some comments on 2022. Thank you, Patrick.

Please go to slide 11. Before I get into our outlook for the year, I want to highlight actions we are taking to mitigate constraints and drive growth and profitability in 2022. Our expectation is to fully cover inflation with price. We are in the midst of executing aggressive pricing actions across the globe in all product categories and all channels. We will remain vigilant during the year, and we will not hesitate to pull the pricing lever if inflation headwinds increase further. With regard to timing, we expect net margin pressures during the first half, with the price versus cost dynamic improving sequentially throughout the year and turning positive in the middle of the year. Our product redesigns and alternative sourcing work is expected to be completed by the end of Q2. This will help alleviate the supply chain pressures related to our mechanical business and provide access to additional electronic component solutions. However, electronic chip allocations will continue to be choppy throughout the year. As the supply chain normalizes, we will continuously improve our lead times and reduce our record backlog. Our greatest strength lies in the people of Allegiant. With broad tightness in the labor market, we are protecting our labor pipeline. We have implemented pay increases and are not flexing labor to the degree we normally would. This is operationally inefficient in the short term, but when supply chain pressures ease, we want to be sure we have the labor in place to move product out of the factories and reduce backlogs. We expect return to margin expansion this year. Second half margins are anticipated to perform stronger than first half, and we will exit the year on a path back to peak margin performance. We continue to invest in R&D and software development that progresses our seamless access strategy. and to build critical talent capabilities in innovation. Please go to slide 12. For the 2022 outlook on revenue, the Americas is expected to strengthen our non-residential businesses with the continued recovery in those end markets, particularly education, healthcare, and commercial. All leading indicators are positive, and the level of institutional specification for our business have continued to be strong. Residential indicators are positive as well, and we expect that business to continue growing in 2022. The under supply of single family home continues to be corrected and the builder channel and retail point of sale has been strong for quite some time. Electronic and smart home adoption continues to be long-term growth drivers. As underscored earlier, we are aggressively pursuing pricing in all channels, products in the Americas and around the globe. Given the supply chain challenges that persist, we expect the revenue performance to be better in the second half than in the first, but still project organic revenue growth in all quarters. With the strength in non-residential construction, continued growth in residential, Our expectation for electronic chip allocation and redesign work to ease supply chain pressures, we project total organic revenue in the Americas to be up 8.5% to 10% in 2022. In the Allegiant International segment, we expect growth, but we are starting to see some electronic supply chain issues in that region as well. Currency headwinds are projected to offset organic growth. For Allegiant International, we project total revenue to be in the minus one to plus one percent range with organic growth of three to five percent. All in for Allegiant, we are projecting total revenue to be up six to seven and a half percent and organic revenue growth of seven to eight and a half percent. Our 2022 outlook for adjusted earnings per share is $5.55 to $5.75. Timing-wise, we expect to realize approximately 60 percent of the adjusted EPS in the second half of the year. As indicated, adjusted operational earnings are expected to increase 14 to 18 percent, driven by volume leverage and price exceeding inflation. Incremental investments continue to be a priority as we remain focused on accelerating electronics, and seamless access growth in support of our vision and strategy. These incremental investments predominantly relate to added R&D and engineering to further develop, enhance, and accelerate new product development and software capabilities. The combination of interest and other expenses is expected to be a headwind as some of the more favorable items that we experience in 2021 are non-recurring. Our outlook assumes a full-year adjusted effective tax rate of approximately 13 percent. It also assumes outstanding weighted average diluted shares of approximately 88 million. The outlook additionally includes approximately 5 cents per share for restructuring charges during the year. As a result, reported EPS is projected to be $5.50 to $5.70. we are expecting our available cash flow for 2022 to be in the $465 to $485 million range. Please go to slide 13. In summary, in-market demand remains strong in the fourth quarter, and we expect that to continue. The supply chain issues we are experiencing have hindered our ability to meet that demand, and as a result, we have built record backlogs, that will support growth in 2022 and 2023. The product redesigns and alternative sourcing should begin to alleviate some of the supply chain pressures by mid-year, primarily on the mechanical side of the business. We are projecting solid organic revenue growth of 7% to 8.5% in 2022, even with the expectation that chip allocations will continue to be tight. We expect year-over-year growth in electronics and acceleration in that growth throughout the year. We are aggressively going after price across the globe and in all products and channels. For the calendar year, pricing will exceed inflation. This will help Allegiant to deliver margin improvement, which we expect will progress as we go throughout the year. Please go to slide 14. A final note on some key leadership announcements before we move into Q&A. Mike Wagnus, who leads the Commercial America Strategic Business Unit, will be transitioning to the role of Chief Financial Officer on March 1st. He succeeds Patrick Shannon, who will be retiring later this year. As CFO, Mike brings significant financial experience and a deep understanding of our global business and the markets we serve. He has been with Allegiant for 15 years, and many of you know him from his time as treasurer and leading investor relations. The board of directors and I have the utmost confidence that he is the right person to step into this important role. Dave Olardi has been promoted to senior vice president of the Americas segment, effective March 1st. Dave currently leads Allegiant Home and is responsible for the flagship slag portfolio of Residential Solutions. He has been at the company for 20 years and is highly respected, an industry veteran with extensive knowledge of our customers, channel partners, and vertical markets. We are thrilled to welcome him to the senior leadership team. Allegiant is equally fortunate to have a strong bench of 10-level leaders throughout the globe. They are well prepared to execute on our strategy and capitalize on growth opportunities as we emerge from the pandemic, and I want to thank our entire team for their commitment and dedication. Last, a few remarks for Patrick Shannon. It has been a privilege to work alongside Patrick, who has been a partner, a friend for me, and an outstanding business leader. And as a founding member of the leadership team, Patrick has been instrumental in refreshing our business strategy, building a world-class finance organization, and creating a strong foundation that will serve us well in the years ahead. I speak for all of the employees of Legion when I say that it has been an honor and a pleasure to serve with Patrick Shannon. We'll now take your questions.

We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press star then one on your touchtone phone. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. To withdraw your question, please press star, then two. At this time, we'll pause momentarily to assemble our roster. Our first question comes from Brett Lindsey from Mizuho Securities. Please go ahead.

Hi, good morning, all, and congrats to Patrick. Thank you. Good. A strong outlook overall. I'm just curious, what level of price are you expecting within the guide for the full year And any directional color you can give us between how you're thinking about the residential and non-residential piece within the Americas business for 2022?

Yeah, so I would characterize as you look at price, again, good sequential improvement in Q4 of 21. You will see continued improvement as we progress throughout 2022. you know, both on the non-residential and residential side of the business. It is a large component of our overall revenue growth, kind of reaching a peak, if you will, in terms of price realization in Q3, as we realize the full implementation of all the price increases, including both list prices and surcharges on certain products. So a big part of the revenue growth, and if you kind of look at it relative to non-res res, you know, the non-res-y in terms of our guide full-year revenue growth, you'd be looking at the high-end kind of low double digits, you know, residential, you know, mid-single-digit type of growth for 2022.

Okay, great. And then just to come back to the electronics, you noted growth year-over-year on a full-year basis. I'm just curious, what's the pacing look like through the year? Is it really, you know, Q3 until that turns positive again, or does it happen earlier? Just curious what your planning process looks like there.

We spend a lot of time looking at electronic chip and component applications. And as you think about our guide, it will be it'll improve sequentially quarter to quarter in terms of the flow of electronic blocks and be strongest in the second half and as we move into 23.

Okay, great. I'll pass it along. Thanks. Thank you.

The next question comes from Julian Mitchell from Barclays. Please go ahead.

Hi, good morning, and thanks for all the help, Patrick, and wish you all the best. In terms of I think my question would be around the underperformance of sort of the volumes that are leaving the Americas relative to some of its biggest peers. That's clearly been a point of focus for investors for a few months now, so I just wondered You know, what you thought the main factors were behind that seeming share loss, particularly on the non-resi side. Is it simply a difference in kind of procurement and sourcing strategies? And is there anything else perhaps going on more on the commercial or customer-facing front as well?

I think you've got a call. Our second half, as it is, number one, market's incredibly strong. Number two, loss in opportunity by the company because of supply chain difficulties. Our supply chains tend to be in region. They perform incredibly well, giving high inventory turnover, high return on invested capital when they're working well. The pandemic, especially as we move through 22, was severely impacted by chips and labor shortages that affected our very complex supply chain within region. And when I say complex, you've heard me say, Julian, complexity is our friend at Allegiant. But when you throw that down, those challenges in the supply chain, you're really, you know, working a variety of issues, which I'd say stabilized as we, you know, ended December and we'll get sequentially better as we go on. I would also say some of the moves that we made pre pandemic to vertically integrate actually helped us. Um, and I think, uh, I'm confident, you know, that, you know, we'll get the mechanical side of the America's business straightened out. It's things like investing, investment casting that make the Von Duper and exit device what it is. And as we move through the year, the pacing item will be electronics. We built our plan based on the allocations that we believe that we will get. And I believe in the electronics. The supply chain disruptions there have pulled demand forward and will benefit, you know, in the secondary markets that will help us exceed our plan in 22 if that, in fact, impacts. So a lot into that answer. I hope that gives you some color.

Julian, I would also just add real quickly, You know, when you look at kind of the order activity on non-REZ, really strong. You know, we're kind of giving indication, you know, maybe similar to what we're seeing from our peer set. Just this inability to be able to ship and realize the revenue. So, we'll call it kind of deferred or delayed revenue. It will come. They're definitive orders. We're not seeing any cancellations. And that's why, you know, we're going to anticipate 2022 to have, you know, accelerated revenue as we progress throughout the course of the year with, you know, the resolution of some of these supply chain difficulties. The other thing is, on the residential side, you know, keep in mind we had a large channel load last year that's impacting negatively the comparisons year over year. So, that has kind of the distortion. I mean, if you look at it on a two-year stack basis, it's not as pronounced as what you saw perhaps in Q4 So just kind of keep those things in mind if you would.

Thanks a lot. That's very helpful. And then just one very quick follow-up. I just want to put a final point on sort of the price-volume split within the organic sales guide for Total Company 2022. Is this the sort of rough assumption that the organic sales growth is split sort of 50-50 price and volume?

Yeah, I'd say that's pretty much in the ballpark. You know, again, we're going to push the price lever and, you know, because right now, as the numbers would indicate, underwater relative to the inflation we've seen, but I think that's a, you know, decent assumption.

Great. Thank you. The next question comes from Joe O'Day from Wells Fargo. Please go ahead.

Hi, good morning. First, just a cadence question. You gave some helpful details in terms of how you're thinking about the back half of the year, but I think with the fluidity of the current environment, just anything that you're able to talk about in terms of the first half, I think first quarter EPS tends to be maybe a high teens percentage of the full year. You're just trying to understand, based on the visibility you have on supply chain, what kind of progression we should be thinking about as we go first quarter into second quarter, if you're able to talk about that.

I think we gave you a nugget there. Sixty percent of the EPS will be in the second half of the year. Second, you think about the labor ramp-up that's, I think, happening across the nation. are coming back to work, back into the factories. That momentum is important for us to drive the supply chain to meet this demand and backlog that we've got to drive through. The second would be chip supplies. Sequentially, they'll get better quarter to quarter, and it leads to that back happy and stronger.

You know, I would just add, seasonally, Q1, you know, normally our weakest quarter, you know, from a revenue perspective and earnings. The year-over-year decline in margin not as pronounced, obviously, as what you saw in Q4, but yet margin, you know, down relative to Q4 just from a seasonal perspective. That's kind of normal course of business. But as we progress throughout the course of the year, The price-cost dynamic, you will see continuous improvement beginning at Q1 relative to Q4, and that will progress throughout the course of the year as we get more price realization. And our assumption is on inflation that we've kind of plateaued where we are. And actually, you know, steel is, if you kind of look at it on a cold-rolled, you know, per-ton basis is, has come down a little bit, maybe a little opportunity there. But, you know, margin expansion really, you know, back-end loaded where that price-cost dynamic becomes very favorable. And obviously, we have easier comps, you know, back half of this year compared to 21. So, that's kind of how we see it playing out sequentially.

I appreciate that. And then I wanted to ask about some of the commentary, you know, 22, but also constructive on 23 in terms of, you know, the conversations that you're having with customers, I mean, the amount of, you know, backlog that's even scheduled for 23. But if you can just expand on that a little bit in terms of kind of what you're seeing to help kind of build, you know, what would be kind of a two-year constructive outlook on improving demand.

So, you know, we certainly filter through the macroeconomic indicators, which we feel all positive, all levels. I think as you travel around the country, you see the strength in construction markets. You've got stimulus coming from the top. You also are working through the backlog of work that was disrupted by the pandemic. So You know, as I think about K through 12 hospitals, multifamily, and then, you know, the overall res, which drives expansion, I feel very good about the next, you know, couple years.

You know, I would also add, you know, we've talked about this record backlog, you know, both on the mechanical electronics. We'll have an opportunity to work through a lot of the mechanical electronics backlog in 2022, there's still going to be an overhang, if you will, or excess elevated backlog associated with electronic products going into 2023. And so with that backdrop and the continued strength and market demand, would expect 23 to have a pretty robust organic revenue growth as well, you know, for the Americas region and non-res. And And, you know, really good electronics growth year over year. So would expect that to kind of continue on compared to 2022.

Thank you. The next question comes from David McGregor from Longbow. Please go ahead.

Yeah, good morning, everyone. Just a couple of quick ones. Maybe, Dave, you could talk about the backlogs. And in the past, you've indicated a disinclination to want to put through pricing on backlogs as you protect some of the spec business that you've booked. I'm just wondering if that's changing now as you think about becoming more aggressive on pricing into 2022. And then, obviously, great results from Europe under some pretty difficult circumstances there as well. Clearly Tim and his team are executing well there. Can you just talk about, you know, what are the biggest pieces of the 22-23 margin progression opportunity in Europe? Thank you.

So I'll talk about international first. I think Tim, our Allegiant home, Europe, Simon's Voss Interflex, the Australian business, great focus of execution in 21 in the face of the pandemic. The consolidation that we drove a year ago and announced in combining that did a couple things. One, simplified our structure. We cleaned up some bits of the portfolio. But, you know, Tim's knowledge of the capabilities of America accelerated capabilities that we have here into those markets. It's things like diligence. It's things like our electronic software platforms and a belief that some of the product platforms that we're having advanced development can be extended and help us compete. So I think when I think about Allegiant International, that we pulled that off in a pandemic year is a salute to some work that's been going on at Allegiant for a couple years and it came to a head and I think our best days are ahead of us. I think in terms of margin expansion, you know, I think The long-term goal would be to be at a margin equal or better than ASSA in the competitive markets. We're not apples to apples in terms of how we compete. Extremely strong in the electronics, and then you get more into the regional market forces and what those markets allow where we're competing. The second part of the question was?

Yeah, so David, on the pricing associated with the backlog. You know, keep in mind, industry standard normally to, when you give a quote on a project-based job and or you have an order in-house, you know, prior to the price going into effect, you kind of honor that. So normally there's a time lag between when you announce a price increase and the realization, and that could be, we'll call it on average 90 to 120 days type of timeframe. And so that's why, you know, relative to the price increases we've already implemented and are executing, you don't get to a full run rate realization that we'll call it Q3. But, you know, normally you don't go back and reprice quotes and backlog. Okay, that's a consistency kind of in our industry. Now, we have looked at, you know, other parts of the business and doing that, but predominantly Q3. you know, it's protected.

Is there any way you can update that 80 to 100 million of backlog number that you gave us last quarter to indicate where you think that is today?

So it exceeded or increased compared to Q3, just kind of given the surge in order activity. Now, some of that, and it's difficult to characterize, would be a pull forward from 2022 activity when customers are just trying to get their orders in and get in line for the products. But increased, and I would say, you know, if you're kind of looking at the full-year revenue impact on Allegiant north of $100 million would be how to think about it.

Thanks very much, Jonah.

Thank you.

The next question comes from Andrew Obin from Bank of America. Please go ahead. Hi, yes, good morning.

Good morning. Hey, guys. Just trying to understand how much overlap is there between your supply chain and the supply chain of your competitors, i.e., you know, just sort of ability to compensate for the fact that it sounds you underestimated the strength of the demand and sort of catch up when the competitors already have sort of slots in the line, or is that not an issue?

I don't believe there's little overlap. And you think, you know, look at a Von Dupern exit devices and look at a Sargent, whatever brand they go to market with, significant differences on the mechanical side. A different Schlage came out of San Francisco. I mean, there's just differences. I think there's also advantages, disadvantages. Also have scale, you know, something we're not shy of. a bigger electronic spends may give this some advantage. I think when I look at the performance of Avasa in 21, I'm humbled, and I would say it's a strong reflection of the opportunity out there in the marketplace for our products.

Yeah, we can take it offline. I was thinking more on the electronic side, but that makes a lot of sense. And another question, sort of, look, you guys have been fairly conservative with the balance sheets. usage, particularly on the technology side. You know, you have a lot of sort of things incubating inside. But, you know, the valuations out there are a lot more favorable than what they were a year ago. How do you think about strategic opportunities post the sell-off? And I would imagine there are more sort of desperate buyers, sellers, than there were a year ago. How does that look for you?

So I'd say, number one, on the software electronic seamless access side of this, Our software stacks that support expanding access capabilities to customers have never been stronger. We've invested through the pandemic in our ability to bring in visitor management in schools or capacity flow through a building or you know, solving problems in verticals, whether it's multifamily K through 12 hospitals, those software stacks are critical, and I believe we're in a leadership position. Two is, you know, it's the valuations are softening. We will be opportunistic on both. You've got to have one leg in the mechanical world and one, you know, foot at least in the seamless access world, and we're ready to deploy capital in both. that in areas that extend our value proposition and advance our position in seamless access around K through 12 multifamily and hospitals. And we've never been in a better position to do it, Andrew.

Great. Congratulations to Patrick.

Thanks a lot. Thanks. The next question comes from Jeff Sprague from Vertical Research. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Good morning. Just going to come back to price cost and also, Dave, your comment about kind of glide back to prior peak. When you're talking about recovering inflation fully in 2022, is that kind of the cumulative inflation burden that you've taken through this entire episode, or are we just speaking about 2022 specifically? And really the nature of my question ties back to the glide path comment, you know, your revenues here and 2022 look like there'll be 12 or 13% above 2020. And the margins are, you know, 100 bps below 2020, 100 bps below 2019. So maybe you could just kind of bridge us a little bit more back to where you think you're ultimately heading here.

Yeah. So, you know, on the price cost dynamic, the commentary relative to 2022, is margin accretive, obviously, pricing exceeding, you know, inflation, cost. And then when you add in productivity, you know, we're in the positive territory there, margin accretive. If you look at it over a two-year basis, net positive, okay, but down on margin. And you understand, obviously, the math on this. You can offset inflation, but it's not enough to kind of cover your normal margin profile, so pressure there. When I look forward to 2023, you've got continued growth in the business, so you have volume leverage there. Assuming inflation is normalized, carryover of price improvement there, plus any incremental pricing improvements would be additive. And then you just have the normal leverage on the business, and plus business mix. should be favorable as well. So kind of looking forward past 2022, glide path to peak margin performance from an overall Legion perspective. You heard Dave talk about the improvement in the international segment, leveraging corporate spend, et cetera. I think it puts Legion in a good position to be at peak margin performance and hopefully by the end of 23 and going into 24.

I'd add one other, as I think about, you know, pricing, you know, versus pre-pandemic. We are increasing product, pricing on our residential products, and we'll make sure that we true that element up of our portfolio as well.

And could you just speak to, I mean, obviously everyone is dealing with supply chain issues, but your key competitor does seem to be faring a little bit better. Is there any... you know, kind of just slippage in kind of distribution posture, you know, with key distributors or in retail where you're kind of, you know, for lack of a better term, I guess, stocking out and kind of losing shelf space?

I'd say, you know, my reaction is no, not losing shelf space. I think one is when I think about ASSA, they would run with significantly more inventory. You know, Allegiant versus AUSA, it's a different model. But if we would typically run with $400 million or $500 million worth of inventory, they are four or five times bigger than that. So you've got a bigger mass. They have to drive that on a global basis. I think their electronics position, particularly driven by HID, gives them an advantage there. With that said, we've worked extremely hard, you know, adapt our supply chain. Again, I talked about the velocity we get through that supply chain in a normal time. We were hit by the electronics, investment casting, some extrusion. The mechanical side, easier for us to go in and fix. The electronics, as we think about our guide, allocations equal to the guide if uh electronics improve which i see some breaks you know we're going to sell more electronic locks which will be good for allegiance as i think about lack of self shelf space jeff you know as well as i do if you're if a installer needs it today and you can't provide that it goes to the competition and i'm confident we we have Face some of that, I'm confident that we will regain whatever we lost.

Great. And maybe just one housekeeping question, too. Wages came up a couple times. Can you just give us a sense of kind of labor, direct labor as a percent of COGS or however you'd want to frame it for us just to have the perspective on that?

So if you look at it, you know, relative to the gross profit, you know, it's a low piece of the overall profit. product manufacturing cost. You know, wage rates have increased here. We're competitive in the marketplace. And so what you're seeing across the board, you know, we would participate in that relative to the increases, you know, to ensure we're competitive and attracting and retaining good talent.

I would just add, you know, especially in the major sites, our goal is to have Allegiant to be that shiny manufacturer on the hill, great benefits, great wages, great opportunity to develop. one of the safest workforces in the world and a place where people can engage and grow.

Great. Thanks. Patrick, congratulations. Enjoy retirement. Mike, congrats.

And just a reminder, if we could just have one question and a very short follow-up, if possible, just to make sure we get everybody in.

The next question comes from John Walsh from Credits. Please go ahead.

I good morning and congrats to Patrick and Mike both I guess just for my one question here as we think about the margins for the two segments and you know I appreciate we're not going to get kind of quarterly detail here but would you expect both of them to kind of lever at a normal type incremental back half of the year. Is there any kind of divergence between the two of them as we think about the margin growth opportunity for both segments in 2022? Thank you.

Yeah, I would say the international segment would be on a more normalized basis and obviously didn't see the pressure that America's region did in 21. And so your question is specific to the back half of the year. America's would lever more than what you would normally see, again, because of the price-cost dynamic becoming much more positive there. And the efficiencies from a manufacturing perspective, as we work through some of these supply chain constraints, now they will have much better leverage because productivity will be a lot better, and then kind of leveraging on the SG&A cost base. So higher incrementals in the back half of the year, And you would expect that just kind of given the dynamics of where we are today.

Great. I'll just leave it at the one question there. Appreciate it.

The next question comes from Josh Chan from Baird. Please go ahead.

Good morning, Dave, Patrick, Tom. Best wishes, Patrick, in your retirement.

Thanks, Josh. Thank you, Josh.

I guess my one question, based on your comments about raw materials and steel maybe coming down a little bit in your kind of how costs flow through your P&L, when do you expect to sort of hit peak raw material costs, if you will, prior to steel maybe benefiting you a bit later on?

So we're currently at peak costs right now. That will kind of carry forward. into Q1, you know, Q2, it starts to level off, you know, relative to prior year comparison. But, you know, just a quick reminder, even with the market costs being lower today than what it was, we'll say, in early Q4, we don't see the benefit of that roll into our numbers maybe, you know, three to six months later, just kind of basis of how we manage our supply chain and entering into, you know, contracts, you know, with average prices and those type of things. So, you know, kind of like the pricing dynamic, there's always a lag relative to market. And so I would expect if they retain here, you know, some of that to flow through, we'll call it in Q3.

Great. I appreciate the color and good luck in 2022.

The next question comes from Josh Pokowinski from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

Hi, good morning, guys, and congrats to Patrick and Mike both. Just maybe first question on the supply chain side. You guys have talked a lot about chip shortage, but I guess maybe just kind of zooming out, the bulk of the portfolio really is mechanical versus electrified. Any other

pieces of supply chain that are still you know kind of jump balls for 22 that we should think about or you know will a lot of that throttling really be determined by chips we have what i would describe as more control over that mechanical supply chain have been able to move faster and to develop you know alternative sources wherever that could come from the world again i'd say a lot of our u.s mechanical supply chain is based in region. And again, the mitigating moves that we made, I think, are substantially more operational, executional than the chip side of it.

Got it. And then just a quick follow-up to want to make sure I heard you right, Patrick. on the return to prior peak margins. It was an exit rate for 23, not a full year comment. I know it's sort of silly, like sitting here in early 22, but just making sure I understood you right.

So, first of all, what I did mention is exit rate 22, kind of, if you kind of go back to, we'll call it more of a normalized margin profile, Q4 this year, 22, is going to look pretty good. So feel good about that. As we progress throughout 23, you know, we could be back as a total company, a legion, peak margin. Again, you know, a lot of inputs there and factors kind of playing into that. And things could change. But so feel we're on a good trajectory for 23 for peak margin for the full year. You know, America is, you know, we'll still have some wood to chop, you know, to kind of get back to peak margins, but, you know, we're working on it.

I want to make one more comment to make sure I'm clear on the electronic side of this. The team, our engineering resources, have done a great job of adapting and developing second sources for electronic chips. Particularly in some of our newest locks, those chips are in high demand in the external market. So things like our exit devices, you know, those chips, you know, maybe more options on the market than, you know, some of the things like the ENCODE Plus that are right on the cutting edge.

Appreciate the deal, guys. Thanks.

The next question comes from Chris Snyder from UBS. Please go ahead.

Thank you. I actually just wanted to follow up on those prior comments around chip procurement. Can you maybe talk where the company is in terms of sourcing alternative suppliers? And at this point, is the chip constraint more of a revenue headwind in that you cannot get the chips, or is it more of a margin headwind in that the chips you can get from alternative suppliers are running at a higher cost?

I would say the chip constraints are a revenue headwind If we could get more, we could sell more. I'd encourage you to take a look at our new ENCODE Plus. It's the first touch-to-tap lock on the market. It's constrained. It's got some of the newest chip technologies, battery savings, or energy savings. You'll like it, but it's constrained. The second part of your question?

I think that answered it. I guess my follow-up question was actually, it would be around pricing methodology. You know, obviously in the current market where availability matters more than price, you can push pretty hard. But, you know, how do you guys determine or how do you gauge, like, what's the sustainable level? You know, how much can we put in Q122 that could sustain through 22? Because it sounds like the assumption is that availability across the supply chain improves throughout the year.

I think, you know, in the The big spec quote market, we're testing that market. We're testing that pricing every day. So two price increases in 21 in the commercial institutional, another coming out. So we're raising list prices. We're making sure we're capturing our freight. But in the quote bid order procurement phase of that, it's being tested every day by the marketplaces. Are you winning or losing? And whether it's a bit of an auction market, but we're living that every day. On the residential side, we're going to be strong and stand up for the inflationary forces that are impacting our products and not give away some of the finest products on the planet in terms of residential security.

And, Chris, I'll just add your question on the product redesign and alternative sourcing strategy making really good progress. You know, it impacts a lot of products throughout our product portfolio. The expectation is the majority of it will be completed and executed by the end of the second quarter. It's kind of phased in, you know, throughout a little bit this quarter, you know, most of it Q2. which will help us alleviate and start getting more product into the channel or customers, et cetera, and higher growth rates organically and to start working down the backlog.

Appreciate all the callers. Thank you.

The next question comes from Brian Ruttenberg from Imperial Capital. Please go ahead.

Yes, just real quick. I had a number of questions, so I'm going to hit you with maybe the easiest one. The total price increases that you had in 2021, can you give us a range? Was it on the low of 5% up to 20? Can you give us a range on where prices went in 2021 and where you anticipate those to go in 2022 overall in terms of the ranges of price increases you had on your products?

You know, I would say characterize it as a wide range. You know, different product segments get different price increases. You know, residential, non-residential is different. Even within non-residential, our hollow metal door business, for example, has surcharges attached to it, which would be higher than is specific to steel. But list price increases maybe is what you're more asking for. You know, I'd say we're competitive with the market. you know, relative to the increases we've already announced and implemented in the market. And then another increase this month as well, pretty sizable. But remember, it's list price, and there's always discounts off a list price. So the key item here is what do you end up realizing, and that number will continue to accelerate reaching a peak in Q3 of this year.

Okay, just as a follow-up to clarify that, since you didn't mention any specific numbers, the market, as I hear it, is around 15% increases. Is that the right market that I'm hearing that you're talking about?

I'd say, again, it depends what you're talking about. That, to me, sounds like there's a lot of surcharges baked into that number. That is not, in aggregate, kind of a list price on your traditional market. mechanical, electronic business. Thank you.

So let me – specifically with hollow metal steel doors, you could easily be in that zip code or more. But, you know, there's a wide range of SKUs here, and we're in a – a lot of it's bid spec where we're competing every day. But prices are up.

Thank you.

This concludes our question and answer session. I'd like to turn the conference back over to Dave Petraeus for any closing remarks.

To wrap up the main themes you heard today, demand remains robust and leading indicators are positive. We're working through the supply chain challenges, which are expected to improve, but we still see some pressure on electronics. We will get the price-cost equation back to positive this year, and we expect to deliver organic growth of 7% to 8.5%, adjusted EPS of 7% to 11%, and high cash conversion in 2022. The long-term fundamentals of the Legion remain strong, and we are well-positioned to capitalize on the opportunities and will return to peak performance as conditions normalize. Thank you, and have a great day.

The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.