AMETEK, Inc.

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Ametek First Quarter Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in 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 11 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, press star 11 again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to Kevin Coleman, Vice President, Investor Relations, and Treasurer. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Chris. Good morning, and thank you for joining us for Ametek's first quarter 2023 earnings conference call. With me today are Dave Zepico, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, and Bill Burke, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. During the course of today's call, we will be making forward-looking statements which are subject to change based on various risk factors and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ significantly from expectations. A detailed discussion of the risks and uncertainties that may affect our future results is contained in AMETEC's filings with the SEC. AMETEC disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements. Any references made on this call to 2022 or 2023 results or to 2023 guidance will be on an adjusted basis, excluding after-tax, acquisition-related, and tangible amortization. Reconciliations between GAAP and adjusted measures can be found in our press release and on the investor section of our website. We'll begin today's call with prepared remarks by Dave and Bill, and then we'll open it up for questions. I'll now turn the meeting over to Dave.

Thank you, Kevin, and good morning, everyone. Ametek had an excellent start to 2023 with outstanding results in the first quarter. Continued solid demand across our diverse set of end markets led to strong sales and orders growth and another record backlog. Our businesses delivered tremendous operating performance with record operating profit and robust margin expansion in the quarter. Additionally, we generated record cash flows and deployed a portion of that cash flow on our first acquisition of the year, Bison Gear and Engineering. Given these results and the outlook for the remainder of 2023, we are increasing our sales and earnings guidance for the full year. Now let me turn to our first quarter results. First quarter sales were $1.6 billion, up 10% over the same period in 2022. Organic sales growth was excellent at 9%. Acquisitions added two points while foreign currency was a slight headwind. Amatek's continued strong organic sales growth reflects the success of our organic growth initiatives and our leadership positions across diverse and attractive niche markets. Demand also remained solid with overall orders growing 6% in the quarter. Organic orders were up low single digits on a percentage basis against a difficult prior year comparison. Book-to-bill was 1.13 in the quarter, our 11th consecutive quarter of positive book-to-bill. We ended the quarter with a record backlog of $3.4 billion, an increase of over $200 million from the end of 2022. As noted, Amitek's operating performance in the first quarter was exceptional. Operating income in the quarter was a record $405.5 million. a 15% increase over the first quarter of 2022. Operating margins were a record, 25.4% in the quarter, up 120 basis points from the prior year. Core operating margins, which exclude acquisition dilution and the gain from a facility sale in the first quarter of 2022, were up an impressive 180 basis points, with strong core margin expansion in each group EBITDA on the quarter was $482 million, up 11% over the prior year, and EBITDA margins were 30.2%. This outstanding margin expansion is a testament to the strength of our operating model, the differentiation of our businesses, and the great work of our teams. This tremendous operating performance led to a high quality of earnings with diluted earnings per share of $1.49, up 12% versus the prior year. first quarter of 2022 and above our guidance range of $1.38, $1.42 per share. Now let me provide some additional details at the operating group level. First, the electronic instruments group. EIG delivered excellent sales growth and operating performance, with sales up 13% versus the prior year to $1.12 billion. Organic sales were up 11%, Acquisitions added three percentage points, with foreign currency a slight headwind in the quarter. This strong organic sales growth means a broad base across our businesses and geographies, with growth particularly strong across our aerospace and defense businesses in the quarter. EIG's operating profit was impressive, resulting in a record operating profit in the quarter. Operating income was $309.7 million, up 27% versus the prior year, while EIG margins were 27.7%, up or above 290 basis points from the prior year. The electromechanical group also delivered excellent results in the quarter, with solid organic sales growth and strong operating performance. EMG's first quarter sales were $479.9 million, up 2% versus the prior year, with organic sales growing 4% in the quarter and foreign currency a two-point headwind. Growth was notably strong across our aerospace and defense businesses in the quarter. EMG's operating income in the first quarter was $120.5 million, and operating margins were 25.1%. On a core basis, excluding acquisition dilution and the gain from a facility sale in the first quarter of 2022, EMG margins were up 50 basis points versus last year's first quarter. So overall, tremendous performance by our businesses and all Amatek colleagues. All elements of the Amatek growth model, operational excellence, mobile market expansion, new product development, and strategic acquisitions are working well. These strategies allow us to quickly react to changing market conditions, invest in our businesses for long-term growth, and deploy our capital on value-enhancing acquisitions. Now switching to our capital deployment and acquisition strategy. The primary focus for our strong cash flow remains strategic acquisitions. We are managing an active pipeline of attractive acquisition candidates, and we have a strong balance sheet and significant financial capacity to support this strategy. I'm excited to announce our most recent acquisition, Bison Gear and Engineering. Bison is an excellent strategic fit with Ametek's automation businesses, helping expand our presence within this attractive secular growth market. Bison is a leading provider of customized motion control solutions for use across a wide range of high-precision applications within the automation, food and beverage, power, and transportation markets. Bison's portfolio of linear motion control technologies is highly complementary with existing technologies. providing an expanded product offering that enables wider and deeper market participation in attractive markets and applications, including growing electrification requirements. Bison is based in St. Charles, Illinois, and has annual sales of approximately $80 million. In addition to our acquisition strategy, we remain focused on ensuring sustainable growth by investing in organic growth initiatives. This includes making strategic growth investments and driving broader adoption of growth cousins, digitalization, and new product development. For all of 2023, we now expect to invest approximately $100 million in support of these growth initiatives, including investments in research, development, and engineering, and sales and marketing. One way we celebrate and recognize the great work of our businesses new product development efforts is through the Ametek Innovation Award. This award is provided annually to the Ametek business who best demonstrates breakthrough innovation of new technology driving expanded organic growth opportunity. The most recent Innovation Award winner was our Creaform business for developing its innovative new handheld 3D metrology solution, Peel 3. Creaform, based in Levy, Canada, is a leading provider of 3D portable and automated measurement technologies for applications such as reverse engineering, quality control, product development, and non-destructive testing. The introduction of Peel 3 further expands the breadth of Preform's metrology offering and makes high-end 3D scanning accessible to professionals and small enterprises, opening up a new attractive market segment. In addition to the Peel 3, Creaform also recently added a new scanner to their HandyScan 3D platform, the HandyScan Black Elite Limited. The latest addition to Creaform's flagship metrology-grade 3D scanners set a new industry standard for handheld devices. I would like to extend my congratulations to the entire Creaform team for their innovative new products and ongoing efforts to push the boundaries of metrology. now turning into our outlook for the remainder of the year. We remain cautious in the short term due to uncertainties in the macroeconomic environment. However, given the strength of the Emetech growth model and our proven operational capabilities, we are confident in our ability to manage through these challenges. The company's record backlog and leadership positions across attractive mid and long cycle markets position us well for continued strong growth. Given our strong first quarter results then, outlook for the balance of the year, we are increasing our sales and earnings guidance. For the full year, we now expect overall sales to be up mid to high single digits versus our prior guidance of up mid single digits, with organic sales expected to be up mid single digits. Diluted earnings per share for the year are now expected to be in the range of $5.96 to $6.10, up 5% to 7% compared to last year's results. This is an increase from our previous guidance range of $5.84 to $6 per diluted share. For the second quarter, we anticipate overall sales to be up mid to high single digits with earnings of $1.49 to $1.51 per share, up 8% to 9% versus the prior year. In summary, Ametek had an excellent first quarter. we delivered strong orders and sales growth, robust margin expansion, a record backlog, record cash flows, and increased earnings guidance for the year. The company's differentiated technology solutions, market-leading positions in attractive markets, and proven operating capabilities have allowed us to navigate through challenging economic cycles. Additionally, Amitek's strong cash flows and robust balance sheet provide us meaningful flexibility to deploy capital to drive shareholder value. We remain well positioned for continued long-term growth. I will now turn it over to Bill Burke, who will cover some of the financial details of the quarter. Then we will be glad to take your questions. Bill?

Thank you, Dave. As Dave noted, Ametek had an outstanding first quarter, positioning us well to start the year. We delivered record-level operating performance and a high quality of earnings in the quarter. let me provide some additional financial highlights. First quarter general and administrative expenses were $24.7 million, up $5 million from the prior year due to higher compensation expense, as well as the return to more normal levels of discretionary spending. For 2023, general and administrative expenses are expected to be up modestly versus 2022 levels and approximately 1.4% of sales, below 2022's level of 1.5% of sales. Other income and expense was a headwind of $8 million in the quarter, due largely to lower pension income and higher due diligence costs. The effective tax rate in the first quarter was 19.5% versus 19% in the first quarter of 2022. For 2023, we continue to anticipate our effective tax rate to be between 19% and 20%. And as we stated in the past, actual quarterly tax rates can differ dramatically either positively or negatively from this full year estimated rate. Capital expenditures in the first quarter were $20 million, and we expect capital expenditures to be approximately $140 million for the full year, or about 2% of sales. Depreciation and amortization expense in the quarter was $82 million. For the full year, we expect depreciation and amortization to be approximately $335 million, including after-tax acquisition-related intangible amortization of approximately $157 million or 68 cents per diluted share. Operating working capital in the first quarter was 19.2% of sales. Cash flow was outstanding in the quarter with sizable growth versus the prior year. Operating cash flow was a record $370 million, up 92% versus the first quarter of 2022. Free cash flow was also a record at $367 million, up 110% over the prior year. While free cash flow conversion was a very strong 120% of net income. Total debt at March 31st was $2.25 billion, down from $2.4 billion at the end of 2022. Offsetting this debt is cash and cash equivalents of $400 million. Our gross debt to EBITDA ratio at the end of the first quarter was 1.1 times, and our net debt to EBITDA ratio was 0.9 times. During the first quarter, we acquired Bison Gear and Engineering, and we remain very well positioned to deploy additional capital given the strength of our balance sheet and strong cash flows. We have significant financial capacity with approximately $2.6 billion of cash in existing credit facilities to support our growth initiatives. In summary, our businesses delivered exceptional results to start the year with strong organic sales growth, robust margin expansion, and high quality earnings. Kevin?

Thank you, Bill. Chris, could we please open the lines for questions?

Thank you. At this time, we'll conduct the question and answer session. As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star 1-1 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star 1-1 again. Please stand by while we compile the Q and a roster. Our 1st question comes from Matt Somerville of Davidson and company. Your line is now open.

Thanks morning couple. A couple questions. Dave, can you remind us what you consider to be your canary-like businesses and how they may be informing your go-forward kind of view on the environment? Obviously, you sound pretty positive this morning. And then I have a follow-up.

Yeah, Matt, we have largely mid- and long-cycle businesses, so we don't have a short-cycle canary. And what used to be our canary was our cost-driven motors business in the floor care industry. market, but we've largely, that's not a part of the portfolio. So what we're looking at right now is really strength across our portfolio. So we don't see any canaries right now.

And just to follow up, Dave, can you talk about where you were in Q1 with respect to price cost, what that threat looked like, and the magnitude of absolute realization you expect in 2023 versus 2022? Thank you.

Right. Quick question, Matt. In that first quarter, our pricing continued to more than offset inflation. Our pricing was a bit more than 5% and inflation was about 4%. So we had a spread of a little more than 100 basis points. And for the full year, we expect the incremental pricing to moderate a bit. So we think we'll get 4% for the entire year. So And the results speak to the highly differentiated nature of the Emetech product portfolio and our leadership position in the niche markets that we operate in. So we're pretty positive on pricing, and we're getting value, and we're adding value to our customers also. So we think it can continue for some time. While inflation may moderate a bit, we think it's going to be here for a while, and we think we can outpace inflation with price.

Perfect. Thank you, David.

Thank you, Matt.

Thank you.

One moment for our next question. This question comes from Allison Pliniak of Wells Fargo.

Your line is open.

Hi, good morning.

Good morning, Allison.

Can you, Dave, just talk about, I know you don't really have the canary in the coal mine, but you did note, you know, a little bit more cautious view, just given the macro. I would see any noticeable trends that's driving some of that cautious view for you guys, just in terms of what you're seeing. Obviously, backlog and results were pretty solid today. Thanks.

Yeah. We're confident in our guide and for the balance of the year, but we are cautious given how early we are in the year and given the risks in a global macro environment. As I mentioned in the For a pair of remarks, our book to bill was 1.13. That's pretty strong. And if you take out the bison acquisition, it was still 1.1. It was positive in both groups. Our backlog is over 50% of annual sales is well above normal historical levels. So I think we're pretty well positioned to perform this year. you know, have mentioned that there is an expectation that we're returning to more normalized ordering patterns. And now that the supply chain is improving and we're seeing some of that play out. And we also have some difficult comps. But when you look across our portfolio, we're feeling really good. We're mid and long cycle. And it feels like the biggest part of our business, EIG, is starting to accelerate. So we're feeling pretty good.

Great. And then, you know, nice acquisition with Bison to start the year. Any color you can provide on and sort of the M&A pipeline, what you're seeing, you know, are multiples becoming more reasonable for you guys? Just any thoughts there. Thanks.

Right. That's a great question. And, you know, we really like the Bison deal. We deployed about $100 million on it, and it's an excellent fit with our automation business. We talked about expanding our capabilities there. But more broadly, we have a very, very wide and deep pipeline. And that pipeline is filled with attractive candidates. And it feels like the pricing has come in a bit. And it feels like we're in good position to continue our acquisition strategy and provide a differentiator in coming quarters and years with our strong balance sheet and Alistair Dugan- With our capability there and with our strong pipe i'm fairly optimistic that what the pricing coming in that and our strong you know we've done work for many years on developing the pipeline of deals that we're gonna have some success this year.

Alistair Dugan- Great Thank you okay.

Alistair Dugan- One moment for our next question. This question comes from Dean Dre of RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Good morning, Dean. Maybe we can take the tour of the key end markets, and maybe you can start with aero and defense, because that got called out in both segments. Thanks. Right. Right. Exactly, Dean.

Our aerospace and defense business had an excellent start to the year. overall in organic sales were up mid-20s in the first quarter. And we really saw growth across all A and D segments, but our defense and our commercial aftermarket segments were particularly strong. And given the strong start to the year and the positive end market tailwinds, we now expect our organic sales to increase and to be up 10% for the full year. with similar growth across both our commercial and defense segments. Next, I'll go to process. Overall sales for our process businesses increased 10% in the quarter. Organic sales were up 10%. We had the acquisition of Navator largely being offset by foreign currency headwinds. And similar to last year, growth was broad-based in the quarters. End market demand remains solid across key process end markets, including research, medical, oil and gas. Looking ahead, we expect to continue strong organic sales growth process and we expect to be up mid-single digits for the year. Moving to the power and industrial segment, strong results in the first quarter with overall sales up low teens. This growth was driven by low single-digit organic growth and contributions from our recent acquisition, RTDS. And we continue to expect mid-single-digit organic growth for our power and industrial businesses in 2023, with similar growth expected across both our power and industrial segments. And finally, our automation and engineering solutions, organic sales, We're flat in the first quarter and in line with our expectations, given prior comparisons and timing of customer shipments. For all of 2023, we continue to expect organic sales for our automation and engineer solutions business to be up mid-single digit, with similar growth rates across both our automation and engineer solutions business.

That's a walk around the company, Dean. That's all really helpful. Thank you. follow-up question is actually a follow-up to Allison's question around normalizing and normalization on the supply chains and maybe just expand on that you know product scarcity how is that played out and anything on the on when you said normalized order pattern so what are the customers spacing out the orders at smaller size and anything and maybe for bill Are you releasing buffer inventory because, you know, before it was, you know, recently it was just in case, now coming back a bit more to just in time. But will you be releasing any of this buffer inventory? Thanks.

Yeah, I just comment that there is a return to more normalized ordering patterns because lead times are back to normal. ordering early now that the supply chain is improved and we're seeing that dynamic play out and it plays out more in our OEM related businesses and then our end market businesses so a little more in EMG than EIG but it's what we've been communicating for several quarters we were expecting and overall we're very pleased with the order performance we're very pleased with our record backlog Our book to build was up in both groups. And, you know, the normalization is really getting back to just getting back to normal lead times.

And, Dean, from the inventory perspective, we did add a little bit in the quarter, but we'd expect as we progress through the balance of the year, you're going to see that release of inventories that we've built up over the last customers and making sure we had enough enough in the right inventory on hand and would we see that inventory release result in some higher free cash flow conversion maybe just you know above normal seasonality I think it'll be you know it's we're going to be continuing to grow the business which requires working capital but I think you will see a release in the inventories and being a being a benefit to the overall free cash flow, which we'd expect would be in that 120% area for all of 2023.

That's great to hear. Thank you. Yeah, Dean, we had record operating cash flow, record free cash flow, and 120% conversion in the first quarter. So we think as our business is getting back to normal, they're going to see benefits in the cash flow. That's great.

Thank you.

Thank you. One moment for the next question. This next question comes from Josh Brzezinski of Morgan Stanley. Your line is open.

Hey, good morning, guys. Good morning, Josh. Dave, I just want to dig in a little bit here on throughput. So you built backlog this quarter, but you had a pretty sizable revenue beat. So I guess that's the good news, but maybe the other side of that is How should we think about where you're at, I guess, particularly on EIG in terms of is there an ability to kind of ramp revenue further based on your own supply capability or your own kind of willingness to eat into the backlog? Like how should we think about, you know, your own throughput or kind of backlog conversion through the year? Is this sort of where you'd like to be or do you want to raise that high or just give them a cyclical backdrop?

Yeah, I think EIG is more of a long cycle business. And as these supply issues are solved, we're able to convert on more. And I would expect our backlog to stay strong for the balance of the year. I'd expect it to be a little bit lower at the end of the year, but it's still in excess of typical. And in my view, EIG is just starting to fire on all cylinders. I mean, it's just... really across the board. And one of the things that's happening at EIG is along with strong growth, along with solid pricing, the profit performance from the recent acquisition has been excellent. And for RTDS and Navicar, the acquisitions we did last year, they're doing well. And you're seeing Abaco also have a very strong year-over-year quarter and margin. So it feels really good for EIG. I don't think we're taking our foot off the gas.

Got it. That's helpful. And then I guess just on your automation business, you have some of the folks out there that are more in kind of the controller, mainline automation gear that are sitting on big orders, record backlogs as well. Are you seeing this torque from megaprojects and things like nearshoring the same as those folks or where you fit into that value chain, that there's something different driving the business.

No, it's similar. I mean, we're in precision motion control, so we're moving things to automate them. And we're diverse in markets. We're in medical and factor automation and a bunch of end markets. But just the business that we acquired, Bison Gear and Engineering, is a perfect example of what you're talking about. They have about a year of backlog. They're really capacity limited. That's something that we can fix in relatively quick order. It's a business that provides us a lot of cost energy, but at the same time, the growth drivers of automation and freeing up capacity to go after reshoring and electrification requirements are really on our sweet spot. While we largely have the capacity in our existing businesses, we can really improve Bison. So that's in line with what you're saying in these automation markets where there's secular growth drivers and good, strong backlogs.

Excellent. Best of luck to us to you guys.

Thank you. Thanks.

Thank you. Stand by for the next question. This question comes from Rob Wertheimer of Mellius Research. Your line is open.

Hello, Rob.

Thank you.

I'd like to say, so I wanted to circle back to M&A, where some peers have called out, you know, a very strong M&A market, including, I think, one person called it, you know, kind of one of the best ever. And your comments were very positive. They could very well be Amatek Execution developing the pipeline. So I'm curious about your general feel on the M&A markets, and if they are quite strong, if I think you indicated prices coming down, what's changing in the dynamics there?

Yeah. Yeah, the overall M&A market in the first quarter was down quite a bit. So the overall market is not that good. But what you have is a lot of buyers are cautious now, and it's because of financing capabilities. A lot of the private equity businesses are less active right now. But we're largely a self-funded acquisition strategy. And we have, as Bill said, over $2.6 billion of cash in existing credit facilities. And our pipeline of opportunities remains strong, and we're very active exploring it. And we are really a meaningful level of financing to make some headway. It's a good opportunity for us to use this aspect of our strategy to differentiate our performance in the future. And we're very excited with the companies that we've recently acquired. We're also very excited about the companies that we're working with. And we're growing our presence in attractive growth areas. And we'll stick to delivering our traditional financial hurdles. They're important thresholds for us. provide a strong level of returns on the capital we deploy. So it's the same setup, but at the same time, I think we're in an incrementally better position because we're a strategic buyer that has a strong balance sheet that has cash flow and has a viable pipeline of deals.

Great. That makes total sense. Thank you. And then just to go in a different direction, to follow up on your comment on, you mentioned pricing five, pricing four, you know, maybe pricing fades a little bit, barely, really, towards the end of the year. Is it possible to give us a sense of what's happening in the cost-based inflation? Have you seen dramatic come down in some areas or logistics or whatever? And, you know, is labor still high? I mean, just give us a little bit of a sense of breakdown there.

Right, right. As I said, our inflation was about 4%. We are seeing decreasing costs in some commodities, some logistic costs, but there's other inflationary costs and things like wages and travel. So there's net inflation for sure, and it's sticky, but we think it'll moderate a bit this year from what we're seeing. But we're well-positioned to deal with that with our pricing and our portfolio companies.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Please stand by for our next question. As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please press star 11 on your telephone and then wait for your name to be announced.

Our next question comes from Nigel Cole of Wolf Research. Your line is open.

Thanks. Good morning, everyone. Good morning, Nigel. Thanks for the question. Good morning. So if we go back to, you know, sort of late January, February, when you put together the 1Q plan, obviously it came in a lot stronger, which is not untypical, but I think the upside is a bit more than normal. So maybe just talk about, you know, what surprised you to the upside? You know, clearly A&D was a lot stronger. So I'm wondering if you saw an inflection in defense. Curious if you saw maybe China coming in a lot better than perhaps expected. Just kind of what got better? And maybe talk about was it mainly backlog conversion, supply chain driven, or customer demand driven?

Yeah, the first point with our positive book to bill in both groups and overall, it was also order driven, not just backlog driven. The second point is what really is changing is the supply chain is getting much better. So we're able to convert on more backlog. And in China in particular, you mentioned it was up about 12% for us. So it was a good grower. And as they're recovering from their COVID lockdowns, our business is developing nicely there. So it's really both. We had a good book to build. We converted on the backlog. And we were strong across all geographies.

No, no question about it. You talked about the expectation that you'd expect to burn some backlog between now and year end. You talked about all the patterns changing, which is very natural with the supply chain improvements. Have you seen that change, David, happen already? Did that sort of happen in March, April? Are we starting to burn backlog through the second quarter? I'm just curious on what you see in real time.

Yeah. We started to see it a little bit, the chip patterns, last year. We started calling it out last year, and we did see it. And it's mainly in our OEM businesses. It's not so much in we're selling directly to end users because we have customized products and they pretty much aren't going to over-order a lot of expensive things like that. But in our OEM businesses, we have been seeing it for a while and we did see it in the quarter.

Okay, great. And then it seems like I'm close to the end of the queue here, so maybe I'll throw in one more question if I can. The Bison deal – Motion control, I don't think we've seen a motion control acquisition for some time or one of this size. Is there a desire to maybe do more of these kinds of deals, maybe become a bit more of a scale player in motion control?

I think there is a desire, but we need the technology and the business has to be successful and unique, and we have to add value to it. And I think there are a few other businesses that we're looking at right now that would be very attractive to us. And Bison just fit all those characteristics. We can add substantial value. It was a fair price. It adds capability that we don't have. And we can really improve the business to address and go after more of the applications that they have been unable to go after. So it really fits in our toolkit and really adds value to our solution offerings. And there are other businesses like that we're looking at. And, you know, there are several businesses that we're looking at, but we're going to be, you know, we're going to wait for the right opportunities, and I think those opportunities are showing up. Great. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, Nigel.

One moment for the next question. This question comes from Christopher Glenn of Oppenheimer and Company, Inc.

Please go ahead.

Hey, thanks. Good morning, Dave, Bill, Kevin. Good morning, Chris. Amazing to see the 1.1X organic book to bill at this point in the supply chain and cycle. But I did want to ask about Abaco as you just kind of hit the two-year anniversary. Just curious for an overall kind of update on the past two years integrating, getting to know that business. And, you know, is it episodic or is it in a nice kind of scaling mode here, would you project?

No, it's definitely not episodic. I mean, we had – you go back after we first bought it, we got the supply chain crisis in electronics, and we had to work through all of that. And we've also augmented the management team, and I think we're really in the right gear now with that business. You know, the defense market is strong. We're in the right areas. That business is going to accelerate and be a big contributor for us going forward.

Great. And on the organic kind of mid-single-digit outlook, could you kind of parse that, how you're thinking about the two segments relative to one another? Similar kind of outperformance from the first quarter at EIG. Do we expect that to continue?

Yeah, I think both groups will. have a very good chance to grow mid-single digits for the full year organically. EIG a little bit stronger than EMG, but both groups have the potential to grow mid-single digits.

Great. Thank you.

Thank you, Chris.

One moment for the next question. Our next question comes from Andrew Olben of Bank of America.

Your line is open.

Good morning. This is David Ridley-Lane on for Andrew. A lot of commentary about improvements to supply chain. Just to go down a level, what about in your aerospace business? We've heard more mixed messages about component availability, and there could be constraints to revenue. Obviously, you had very strong revenue growth this quarter. Just an update on Aero's specific supply chains.

The Arrow specific supply chain is improving as our entire supply chain is, and we grew mid-20 organic growth in the quarter. We have a good supply chain team there, a good management team running that business, so it feels like that business is accelerating. That was our strongest area, and we took up the year on that segment. So there are always challenges in different markets. But in aerospace right now, I see us accelerating growth is what we're looking at.

Thanks for that. And then on the electronic instruments group, you know, that commentary was very interesting that you're actually seeing some sense of reacceleration in demand. Are there any secular themes that you would point to? Can you identify, you know, certain maybe reshoring-related projects, et cetera, that are helpful there?

More than the secular, there are secular opportunities driving growth. A lot of it is our approach and our niche focus. We have very flexible businesses that are aggressive. They go after where the niche opportunities are. I'll give you a couple of examples. In the semiconductor market, our semiconductor business, which is about 6% of our sales, it was actually up in the first quarter. And most semiconductor businesses aren't up in the first quarter. And the reason is that while we participate some in the memory area that was down, we also participate in semiconductor research, which is very strong now, and in the EUV optics within semiconductors, which is very strong. So at the same time, you know, there's some some weakness in the market. We're very agile and can adapt, and we've been doing that for years, and we're growing. So I think that the big thing, I think, when you look across our old businesses is there are growth opportunities for sure. We're very agile. Our distributive model lets us get after them with management teams dedicated to businesses and markets, and I don't see that stopping.

Thank you for the details.

Thank you, David.

One moment for the next question.

This question comes from Michael Anastasio of TD Cohen. Please go ahead.

Good morning.

Thank you for taking my question.

Hi, Michael. There's been some commentaries of late for de-stocking in different areas of the medical and life science related end markets. Can you just briefly describe where your portfolio specifically plays in that area in your outlook for the year? I mean, college would be appreciated.

Sure. You know, the medical market's about 15% of our sales now. And in the quarter, it was up high teens with strong growth in our Rolland business and also our engineered mechanical components business. And for the full year, we expect it to be up high single digits. So we expect to be growing in that medical space and it's much like the discussion I just had with David about we're in the right niches because in Rolland, their primary product are really to improve the efficiency of nurses. And as long as I've been alive, you have nursing shortages in the United States. And Rollins nurse call systems make nurses more efficient. So coming out of the pandemic, we see a lot of spending on dealing with the shortages. And Rollins has great products and very successful in that area. And in our EMC business, we're dealing with a lot of single procedure, single use type devices that we're building components for, and that business is accelerating. So both of those core businesses that make up the large part of our medical businesses are doing well, and we were up high teens in the quarter.

Great. Thank you.

Okay.

Thank you.

One moment for our final questions. Our last question comes from Joseph Donahue of Baird. Your line is open.

Hey, guys. I'm on for a ride. How are you doing? Good. Kind of following up on the SEMI commentary that you had earlier, could you just kind of take the temperature on R&D spending? Should we expect it to stay strong, you think, through the rest of the year?

In relation to the semiconductor, I think there's a lot happening now for R&D. We're transitioning from one technology to a new technology and smaller and smaller nodes. So I think that we're seeing the strength in semiconductor research spending, and it's one of the strongest areas of our business right now. Again, it's another area where we're in the right niche.

Gotcha. And then this could just be on our side, but EMG looked a little bit below normal seasonal growth. Is there any difference in supply improvement across the two segments going on or anything else that we should be thinking about?

I think when you look at EMG, the organic growth was up 4%. So they had a good quarter. They had some headwinds from currency. And so EIG grew faster for sure, but EMG was still really solid.

Gotcha. All right.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And thank you. That concludes our Q&A segment. I'll now turn it back over to Kevin Coleman for closing remarks.

Thank you, Chris. And thank you, everyone, for joining our conference call today. As a reminder, a replay of today's webcast can be accessed in the investor section of amatech.com. Have a great day.

And thank you all for your participation in today's conference. This does conclude the program. You may now disconnect.