Aptiv PLC

Good day and welcome to the Aptiv Q3 2022 earnings call. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Jessica Kirakos, Vice President of Investor Relations and ESG. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Bettina. Good morning and thank you for joining Aptiv's third quarter 2022 earnings conference call. press release and related tables, along with the slide presentation, can be found on the investor relations portion of our website at Aptiv.com. Today's review of our financials exclude amortization, restructuring, and other special items, and will address the continuing operations of Aptiv. The reconciliations between GAAP and non-GAAP measures for our Q3 financials, as well as our full year 2022 outlook, are included at the back of the slide presentation and the earnings press release. During today's call, we will be providing certain forward-looking information, which reflects Aptiv's current view of future financial performance and may be materially different for reasons that we cite in our Form 10-K and other SEC filings, including uncertainties posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, the ongoing supply chain disruptions, and the conflict between Ukraine and Russia. Joining us today will be Kevin Clark, Aptiv's Chairman and CEO, and Joe Massaro, CFO and Senior Vice President of Business Operations. Kevin will provide a strategic update on the business, and Joe will cover the financial results in more detail before we open the call to Q&A. With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Kevin Clark.

Thank you, Jessica, and thanks, everyone, for joining us this morning. Beginning on slide three, we had a strong third quarter, so let me touch on a few of the highlights. New business bookings totaled over $5 billion, bringing the year-to-date total to over $25 billion, already outpacing last year's record full-year amount of $24 billion. and cementing another record year in 2022. Revenue increased 33% to $4.6 billion, representing nine points of growth over underlying vehicle production, driven by the strength of our safe, green, and connected product portfolio. We continue to execute well despite the constrained environment and macro headwinds. EBITDA and earnings per share totaled $673 million and $1.28 respectively, reflecting flow-through on volume growth and material cost recoveries, partially offset by costs related to material inflation and supply chain disruptions. We remain on track to reach this year's target of $500 million of material cost recoveries and $100 million of cost reductions, increasing our profitability and enhancing the resiliency of our business model. And lastly, we continue to invest in growth opportunities, as reflected by our agreement to acquire InterCable Automotive Solutions, which further strengthens our high-voltage product portfolio. Turning to slide four, APTA's industry-leading portfolio of electrical architecture products and full system-level capabilities uniquely positions us to optimize vehicle architecture systems. InterCable Automotive is an industry leader in the design and manufacture of high-voltage bus bars and interconnect solutions. The company has an outstanding management team that's developed a portfolio of innovative high-voltage power solutions including their seventh-generation bus fire product that they've leveraged into very strong relationships with several leading European automotive OEMs. The partnership between Aptiv and InterCable will enhance the strength and breadth of our combined product portfolios, allow InterCable to leverage Aptiv's global scale and manufacturing footprint, especially in North America and China, further strengthen our capabilities to design and deliver fully optimized high-voltage architecture solutions that reduce vehicle weight, mass, and cost, and we can leverage these synergies to accelerate the revenue and earnings growth of our combined businesses. We look forward to closing this transaction later this year and welcoming InterCable Automotive to the Aptiv team. Turning to slide five to review our segment highlights. Our full system solutions across both the brain and nervous system are accelerating the development of the electrified software-defined vehicle of the future. In the advanced safety and user experience segment, our portfolio of technologies is helping to increase the penetration of advanced active safety solutions, including a third quarter business award from a major local Chinese OEM for our next generation ADAS platform, representing our seventh major active safety platform customer. In addition, during the quarter, we secured a high volume award with a large customer in Asia to provide our next generation integrated cockpit controller. And lastly, we continue to build a growing pipeline of software revenue opportunities with an increasing number of North American, European, and Asian OEMs, which we're confident will begin to turn into customer awards in 2023 and beyond. In the signal and power solution segment, As the demand for vehicle electrification continues to accelerate, we're experiencing significant growth in our high-voltage business, which will reach $1.2 billion in revenues this year and accounts for 25% of year-to-date new business awards in the segment. In addition, we continue to successfully leverage our vehicle architecture capabilities to drive revenue diversification and strong growth in the commercial vehicle and non-automotive markets. which increased 24% during the quarter. And lastly, our industry-leading position as a full system solution provider of high-voltage architecture, combined with our capabilities in vehicle electronics and software systems, has uniquely positioned us to expand our portfolio into power electronics solutions and battery management systems, further broadening our offerings and strengthening our position as the industry leader in vehicle architecture. Moving to slide six, how we put innovation in motion. During the quarter, Aptiv was named a 2022 PACE Award winner for our Central Vehicle Controller, which is scheduled to begin production in 2023 with a major Chinese OEM. This high-performing compute platform is a key piece of the architecture that translates software code into physical action, efficiently and securely controlling the flow of data on and off the vehicle, managing communication for current and emerging high-speed protocols. and reducing complexity by up-integrating critical body functions. This particular central vehicle controller is a first-to-market solution and a critical element of our smart vehicle architecture and is essential to enabling the software-defined vehicle. We are increasingly collaborating with our OEM customers to bring these innovative solutions to market, as evidenced by our recent participation in the ICB 2022 conference in Wolfsburg, Germany. where we showcased our portfolio of full system solutions for both hardware and software to VW CEO, Oliver Blumey, and his management team pictured here. With Aptiv's brain and nervous system capabilities, we're uniquely positioned to reduce complexity through architecture optimization while enabling the full abstraction of software from hardware. Increasingly important to automotive OEMs, our system-level design capabilities enables breakthrough levels of assembly automation increasing quality while also reducing complexity and cost. And as customers migrate to next-generation architectures capable of supporting software-defined solutions, it's important that they have the right software tools to develop the applications they support. This is why Aptiv is investing in end-to-end cloud-native software development tools, which we previewed at ITB and will unveil at CES in 2023. Feedback from IZB was overwhelmingly positive, providing an opportunity to increase our level of collaboration with OEM customers and further validate inaptive as a trusted technology partner. Turning to slide seven to provide an update on new business awards. As I mentioned, third quarter new business bookings totaled $5.1 billion, bringing our year-to-date total to $25.4 billion, surpassing our previous full-year record. further validation of the strength of our portfolio of advanced technologies and our ability to deliver exceptional value for our customers. Advanced safety and user experience bookings during the quarter totaled $1.4 billion, bringing the year-to-date total to a record $11 billion. Driven by the continued strong adoption of advanced active safety solutions, including the new business award I mentioned previously from a major local Chinese OEM for our next-gen ADAS solution, which will leverage our scalable ADAS platform to support a wide range of advanced safety features. Bookings for our signal and power solutions segment reached $3.7 billion during the quarter, including another strong quarter for high-voltage electrification awards, bringing the year-to-date total to roughly $3.5 billion. We've seen a very balanced bookings profile across our high-voltage product offerings, underscoring the strength of our industry-leading portfolio of advanced technologies. Another strong quarter of new business awards, while at the same time successfully negotiating material cost recoveries with our OEM customers, is further validation of the uniqueness of our portfolio, the strength of our customer relationships, and our flawless operating execution. Turning to slide eight, despite the constrained environment and macro headwinds, we continue to take actions to increase the underlying resiliency of our business model and deliver sustainable value creation by enhancing our portfolio of full system solutions to increase our addressable content on the electrified software-defined vehicles of the future, recovering increased material input costs and optimizing our cost structure, smartly deploying capital to further strengthen our capabilities to meet the evolving needs of our customers, and intelligently diversifying our revenue base into less cyclical non-automotive markets. We're confident that these actions will position us to continue to create value as the industry transitions to the electrified, software-defined vehicle and will be reflected in an acceleration in new business bookings, continued strong revenue growth over market, meaningful margin expansion, and strong cash flow generation. With that, I'll turn the call over to Joe to go through the financial highlights in more detail.

Thanks, Kevin, and good morning, everyone. Starting with a recap of the third quarter financials on slide 9. As Kevin noted in his opening comments, revenues of $4.6 billion were up 33%, with nine points of growth above underlying vehicle production. Adjusted EBITDA and operating income were $673 million and $525 million respectively. EBITDA margins expanded 330 basis points versus third quarter last year and grew 560 basis points sequentially. reflecting flow-through on increased volumes of approximately 32% both year-over-year and sequentially, continued progress on customer recoveries of direct material inflation, as well as other performance and cost savings actions, partially offset by a return to a more normalized price-down environment and the impact of FX commodities and non-material cost increases. EPS in the quarter was $1.28, an increase of over 150% from prior year, reflecting higher net earnings. And operating cash flow totaled $437 million, a significant improvement from the prior year in sequential quarters. As I will discuss in a moment, we will be updating our full-year cash flow guidance to reflect a higher expected investment in certain key inventories to help better navigate supply chain constraints and prepare for 2023 launch activities. Capital expenditures for the quarter were $212 million. Looking ahead at the third quarter revenues in more detail on slide 10. Adjusted revenue growth of 33% reflected both our growth over market as well as the rebound in global vehicle production from the prior year, which was heavily impacted by semiconductor shortages. Growth across all regions was led by our key product lines, including high voltage and active safety, and reflect some improvement in supply chain conditions. However, despite this relative improvement, we continue to operate in a constrained environment with both direct and indirect impacts on our customers and operations. Direct material inflation recoveries totaled $199 million, and price downs were 64 million, approximately 1.8%. The FX and commodity impact was significant, totaling $226 million, primarily related to the weaker euro and RMB. Regionally, North American revenues were up 31% or 7% above market, as production at several of our larger North American ASUX customers were impacted by supply chain constraints. In Europe, we saw outgrowth of 9%, driven by continued high voltage and active safety growth. And in China, revenues were up 42%, or 11 points over market, driven in part by a significant increase in launch activity in our signal and power segment. Moving to the segments on the next slide, advanced safety and user experience revenues rose 26% in the period or 2% over market. As previously noted, ASUX experienced lower North American growth over market as several customers experienced supply chain constraints that impacted their vehicle production in the quarter. Excluding these customers, ASUX growth over market was in line with expectations and prior periods. Segment-adjusted EBTA was $122 million, or 10.2% of revenues, reflecting strong flow-through on incremental volumes, the previously discussed material cost recoveries, improved operating performance, and the benefit of engineering credits. Signal and power solutions revenue rose 35% in the period, or 11% above market. The yield performance was driven by strength in several product lines, including high voltage. Segment EBITDA of $551 million, or 16.1% of revenues, includes strong flow-through on incremental volumes and incremental material cost recoveries, partially offset by the impact of FX and commodities. Moving to our full-year outlook on slide 12. Our outlook for revenue, operating margins, and EPS remain unchanged from the guidance provided last quarter, despite the negative impact of foreign exchange, which has increased significantly since we provided our full-year guide. We remain confident that we are well-positioned to continue to execute despite the ongoing concerns of supply chain constraints, COVID impacts in China, and disruptions in Europe. We expect revenue in the range of $17 to $17.3 billion and growth over market for the year to be within our previously communicated range of 8% to 10%. EBITDA and operating income of $2.2 billion and $1.6 billion at the midpoints, respectively. And earnings per share of $3.30, an increase of 8% over last year, despite a meaningful drag from FX and commodities. We are updating our cash flow guidance, and we now expect to finish the year at $1.35 billion versus the prior guidance of $1.5 billion. As I previously noted, the updated cash flow guidance reflects our decision to carry increased inventory of certain key components to help mitigate the impact of supply chain constraints as we begin to prepare for a number of new customer launches in early 2023. Before turning the call back to Kevin, I wanted to touch briefly on 2023 as we have started the early phases of planning for next year. Although given the ongoing macro challenges, it is too early to provide any specific guidance. However, our strategy remains unchanged and we continue to be well positioned to lead the transition to higher content and software enabled vehicles. And although we expect to benefit from overall demand for key technologies like smart vehicle architecture, high voltage and active safety, the progress we've made on material cost recoveries and operational performance, and the inclusion of the wind river and inter-cable acquisitions, we remain cautious of the lingering headwinds and believe continued supply chain tightness and deterioration in economic conditions, particularly in Europe, will negatively impact overall 2023 vehicle production levels, as well as the smoothness of vehicle production schedules. making it potentially more challenging to recapture operating leverage. And we would expect the FX commodity headwinds to persist into 2023, as the more meaningful impacts of changes in the Euro and RMB did not occur until the second half of this year. With that, I'd like to hand the call back to Kevin for his closing remarks.

Thanks, Joe. I'll wrap up on slide 13 before opening up the call to questions. Our business is built on a strong foundation and continues to gain momentum as we close out 2022. Despite the that Joe just touched on. Our strategic alignment with our OEM customers has really never been better, is reflected in our continued strong revenue growth over market and the pace of our new business bookings. We continue to make progress recovering the increases in material input costs while also further optimizing our cost structure. And we continue to smartly deploy capital both organically and inorganically to further strengthen our competitive position. These actions have translated into a significant improvement in our margins, as evidenced by this quarter's results, and are providing momentum and a strong entry point for 2023. As Joe just mentioned, in light of the current macro environment, we'll provide a detailed update on our 2023 outlook when we release fourth quarter earnings. But you can expect us to focus on delivering continued strong revenue growth over market and margin expansion in a challenging environment. With that, we can open up the line for questions.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you would like to ask a question, please signal by pressing star 1 on your telephone keypad. If you're using a speakerphone, please make sure your mute function is turned off to allow your signal to reach our equipment. Please restrict yourself to one question and one follow-up question. Again, press star 1 to ask a question. We will pause for just a moment to allow everyone an opportunity to signal for questions. Our first question today comes from Rod Lash of Wolf Research.

Good morning, everybody. I was hoping first to just maybe... better understand the year-over-year earnings bridge that you had this quarter. So you did, on an adjusted basis, $256 million of EBIT, and you're getting to $525 million this year. You mentioned 32% conversion on the billion of volume, which obviously that would be more than accounting for that growth. Could you just talk to the net impact of commodities, that $199 million tailwind, what was the net effect netting that out, and were there any out-of-period benefits in that number?

Yeah, Ron, it's Joe. Let me start. So FX, we mentioned the revenue number is about 226 on the year-over-year. On the OI, that flow-through is about $20 million round numbers on FX and commodities. So obviously picking up – lower Euro, and then the, you know, really the start of the RMB weakening at the end of the third quarter, although that, you know, obviously it picked up in the fourth quarter as well. It will pick up in the fourth quarter based on everything we're seeing. Listen, from an out-of-period perspective, you know, a lot of puts and takes with, Customer recoveries, inflation, some premium freight that we'll get reimbursed for for next quarter, but nothing overly material from a net perspective. You know, really just, you know, again, there's a lot going on in the quarter, so you've got a few things going in different directions. But if you've got the volume through and through and the FX impact, you've really got sort of the net, you know, the net there.

Okay. So it sounds like mostly FX in that area. in that number, and that recovery was mostly offset by higher costs, if I understand that correctly. Yeah.

Yeah, the only other thing I'd say, and I mentioned in my prepared remarks, you know, we're seeing a return to a more normalized price down environment, so we've got price downs of 1.7%. You know, that had been – we've been holding off on, you know, price downs until we got through all the customer recovery. So as we communicated, you know, last quarter, we expected to return to sort of more of a normal operating cadence with our – So you've got that price down at 1.7% as well.

Okay. And you opened the door to 2023, and I know you can't really give a lot of detail yet, but last quarter you mentioned that on a seasonally adjusted basis, we should be thinking that margins are around 10% in the back half. And it seems like you're kind of tracking to that. You're at an $18 billion run rate of revenue, so that's about $1.8 billion of EBIT. Is it still correct that there's around $100 million of additional kind of unrecovered cost that you need to go after for next year?

I'm not sure. We talked about a 10% and 10.5% jumping off point.

I think that's generally holding operationally from everything we're seeing. We're sort of tracking to that. My only caution there would be I think we're going to have to evaluate or one should evaluate sort of the FX impact. There could be about a half a point of headwind to that range if these FX rates hold going into next year. But operationally, I'd say things are happening as we had expected.

Yeah, Rod, maybe if I can just chime in on price recoveries. The team's done an excellent job as it relates to recapturing material cost increases in transit. POs with our OEM customers. So we feel good about heading into 2023 with respect to that particular category. Obviously, what we need to go after next year is partly influenced by what we see from a material inflation standpoint, if there's some incremental increases going into 2023. So we're well positioned as it relates to what we've translated into POs this year heading into next year. If there's more material inflation, We'll go back to OEM customers with increased prices. The OEM customers are aware of that. And then secondly, just to Joe's point on FX, I think Joe highlighted it in his comments a couple times. When you look at the recent movement in the euro and the RMB, we've seen a significant change over the last month or two. So I think there's a question there as really, you know, what's the trend in currency? what sort of movements do we see.

Great, thank you. And just lastly, Kevin, any updated thoughts on investment in Motional, just in light of what we've heard from Ford and just elsewhere in the market?

Yeah, listen, Motional continues to be, you know, very successful in terms of advancing the technology roadmap. I'm sure you saw the announcement as it relates to Uber. And the plan to integrate the emotional solution or emotional vehicles in the Uber network in the United States. As it relates to the Ford announcement, as it relates to Argo, I think there's an element of our perspective on autonomy has probably been a bit different than most OEMs that are out there. When we originally made our investments in Automatica, and new autonomy, a big piece of our strategy was with respect to how do we take those technologies that are utilized for vehicle autonomy and how do we pull those forward into active safety solutions, which is what we're doing today, which is, you know, that technology, a portion of that technology, a portion of that know-how is embedded in our current generation ADAS platform. In addition, you know, Motional is a customer of Aptis. When you think about perception systems and other items, they're actually a customer. So, you know, we've always viewed, right, I think we've talked about it in the past, we've always viewed autonomy as kind of the far end of the spectrum as it relates to active safety. So from a strategic standpoint, a business standpoint, you know, it's fairly well integrated into what we're doing operationally today.

Okay. All right. Thank you.

Our next question comes from Etai Mishali of Citi. Please go ahead.

Great. Thank you. Good morning, everybody. Just two quick ones. First, on the Q4 guide, just hoping you can maybe share your latest LVP views for the year and maybe any particular bias of the low or high end of the confirmed range for 2022. And then, Joe, going back to 2023, any early thoughts of how we should be thinking or how you're thinking about global LVP for next year?

Yeah, Etan, let me start with 2023.

It's just there. You know, we're still working through that. There's a tremendous amount of puts and takes at the customer levels. We haven't seen schedules, so it's really too early for us to have a view on the numbers or the direction. Elizabeth, as it relates to Q4 – You know, we're basically holding the guide. I think if we were to look at it, there's certainly some potential for upside, particularly with China production, although more recently we've seen probably more pullbacks in some China production schedules versus increases. But I understand there is a desire in that market to build more vehicles. You know, the way I'd view the guide at the moment, we're certainly confident in the midpoint to the extent there's Bias to the top end of the range, I think it's going to be a trade-off between vehicle production increases in China, Europe holding steady, and then just how big an FX impact that sort of offsets on the top line. So that's really what we're looking at and really sort of the driver of holding the guide is to the extent you pick up some revenue on upside in China, which we'd admit is possible. We don't quite see it yet in schedules, but understand the bias there from customers. we are mindful of just the revenue impact from the FX perspective.

Yitai, if I can just qualitatively, I just want to reiterate Joe's point. Although supply chains seem to be improving, the reality is we're seeing, you know, continued volatility in customer schedules, right, week to week. And maybe more recently, more volatility in to the downside on the China production schedule, which we did not see in Q3.

Got it. That's all very helpful. Thank you. Thank you.

Our next question comes from Joe Spack of RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Thanks so much, everyone. Good morning. Joe, maybe just... A little bit more on this decision to build inventory. It sounds like it's pretty customer or launch specific. I want to get a little bit more understanding of your thinking because we just saw a competitor, at least on the connector side, they had built prior inventory and they're letting some of their inventory go down now because they feel better about supply chain. Is this just you being extra cautious in terms of building your own stock? Is that a new normal, or should we expect that to come down over the course of a year or so?

Yeah, listen, I think it is, broadly speaking, Joe, in the electronics space, passive electronics, semiconductors, obviously a big part of that. I'd say it's, you know, it is specific around some heavy launch activity we expect in the first half of next year, wanting to make sure we've got adequate supply, sort of getting the supply when we can. There's also an element, and, you know, my ASUX comments around growth over market sort of speak to it. You know, we are still seeing customers impacted by lack of availability. So, you know, I understand the comments you're referring to from TEL, but, you know, broadly speaking across that electronics supply chain, I don't think this is just an active issue because some of the impacts we're seeing on customers we were not the one for. you're still seeing some constraints on semis and passive electronics. So it's making sure we're running into, you know, the decision was basically not to take inventory down as much as we originally planned in the fourth quarter and hold on to what we have, continuing to order to make sure we've protected next year. And I would say from an unwind, it's very hard to call at the moment. I don't think this is a new normal, you know, multiple years, could we sort of be running at higher levels for, you know, the bulk of 2023? I think that's possible depending on how we see things improve.

If I can add, I think we should be really, really clear. Sorry, Joe. It relates to specific programs that we're launching in 2023, relates to specific vendors who've been challenged from an overall supply chain standpoint, And to Joe's point, it's not the new normal to the extent their capabilities or their capacity increases. We have the ability to ratchet down orders during 2023. So we're doing what we can to protect our customers and, quite frankly, protect ourselves from a supply chain standpoint.

Okay. Okay. One, maybe just a question on sort of probing 2023 a little. I understand you mentioned that FX could weigh on that 10% to 10.5% jumping point you previously mentioned. But I guess I just – if most of the cost recoveries you talked about in this third quarter were in period in response to sort of the prior question, it would seem like that alone sort of weighed by – So is that an offset? I mean, I guess we don't really know. Like, maybe the recoveries continue, and that's going to sort of continue to be a drag our next year. I guess I just want to understand, like, what sort of assumption on recoveries was in that 10 to 10.5 starting point.

Yeah, it was the half million and sort of, you know, it was the half million and basically getting that, you know, round numbers, and that's happening. And then we'd roll that into piece price next year. So that is on track. That's really not connected to the FX or the 10 to 10.5 discussion. Like I said, operationally, I think we're hitting the things we need to do. Again, it's a caution. The FX number significant in Q3 is going to be significant in Q4. And if you look at just where, you know, some of those key rates were the first half of 2022 versus, you know, if we were to ever end at sort of current spot levels, there is going to be an impact there.

Okay. Maybe just one quick one. You mentioned Wind River for 23. I think it's been 10 months since you made that announcement. Any update?

Yeah, we're just, we continue through the regulatory process point in time. So it's where we stand. Okay, thank you. Thanks, Joe.

Our next question today comes from Adam Jonas of Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

Thanks, everybody. First question is on commoditization of ADAS. You have this pretty dominant Tier 2 supplier of ADAS system on a chip that's looking to become a Tier 1. Qualcomm announced this monster auto backlog integrating ADAS into infotainment. Apple's reportedly specking out a 10-camera passive optical system and expanding CarPlay. So how fast is ADAS becoming commoditized, in your opinion, and what does this mean for the ASUX business?

Yeah, Adam, I'll take that. Listen, we don't view it as becoming commoditized. We have, as I mentioned, we want another full-platform program in China. in addition to the large European program that we were awarded earlier this year. It's important that, you know, as a supplier, whether you're a Tier 1 or you allude to the Tier 2s, that you have the ability from a perception system standpoint across multiple perception systems. You have the ability to do sensor fusion. You have the ability to do, you know, integration and any of the ability to build, you know, domain controllers, hardware. And with respect to the players that you're referencing, I'm not aware of any of them that have had the experience or the capability across each one of those areas. So, you know, we view ADAS as an important area. We don't view it as an area that will become commoditized, as we've talked about in the past. It's obviously an important feature for our customers. It's obviously a feature that helps them sell cars. And it's a feature that they make a lot of money on. And, you know, we continue to be very well positioned in it. We continue to invest to further enhance and strengthen our position in space.

Thanks, Kevin. Just a follow-up on decelerating EV penetration or the risk of decelerating penetration. I mean, we're still going to have growth from a low base of EVs, but we're seeing battery cost inflation in geopolitics increase. at least at the margin, work against affordability, the affordability argument of EVs, and many legacy OEMs still struggling to get accessible, affordable models out. I'm thinking, do you agree that this is a risk that could flatten, at the margin, flatten that EV adoption curve? And if the pace of EV growth is slower and we sell more ICE architectures for longer, can you remind us, is that a positive, negative, or neutral approach to your SPS margin? Thanks.

Well, it's a great question. I'd say kind of two things on it. I think what you reference as a potential risk to EV adoption, it is a possibility that it slows EV adoption. Our view is that it doesn't flatline EV adoption. With respect to our position From a high voltage electrification standpoint, we're effectively the only player that can provide the full vehicle architecture solution. What we're finding is more and more customers coming to us to take more of the overall content to provide the cable management, the wire harness, the connector, and now with inter-cable automotive, the bus bar content as well. you know, regardless if we see slowing, we think there is a huge opportunity for us to capture more content. And then, as I mentioned in my comments, in addition, we're investing in capabilities in and around power electronics as well as battery management systems. We're in discussions with customers as it relates to both products as we speak, and we'd expect customer awards to be forthcoming. So, We believe it will be a continued high-growth area, and we feel as though we're well-positioned, quite frankly, to expand our share of wallet, Adam, in that space. When you look at content differential, to get to the last part of your question, high-voltage electrification, especially battery electric vehicles, it's probably what you're alluding to, that content opportunity for Aptiv is significant. Internal combustion engine typically has content. vehicle architecture content of about $500 per vehicle. When you move to a fully battery electric vehicle, that's closer to $1,500. So it's a meaningful, meaningful uptick in content opportunity.

Thanks, Kevin.

Our next question comes from Chris McNally of Evercore. Please go ahead.

Hi. Thanks so much, team. Joe, I appreciate the added color on maybe some of the bias to the middle or the upper end of the range with production still a little bit unclear. FX, obviously, a drain as the quarter went on in terms of spot rates. But can we dive in a little bit more to your China comments and some of the volatility around schedules? I think one of the obvious questions for people is, You know, what is the baseline for that comment? I guess, you know, your Q2 outlook was minus 4%. It seems the volatility now or the question is some range of China up five to maybe China up nine. So it's obviously, is it better, a lot better than what you had previously maybe, you know, adding to the organic growth? And then some of the questions is more around the last two months. and what that means to 23.

Yeah, Chris, I think you're right. That original full-year guide was down four. It's obviously strengthened. I think for us, that's exactly the point I was trying to make, is how much higher could it be? And then relative to, you know, as it relates to that guide, just how much of that gets sucked back in by – by FX. I'd say right now, you know, again, I think something north of five, at least what we're seeing from customers, would be tough to achieve. But, no, our bias to the upside within the guide is, you know, is related to China production. That's fair.

Okay. Super, super clear. And, Joe, do you think right now the base for how customers are ordering is assuming that that the VAT stimulus, you know, the tax stimulus will not be renewed. You know, sort of typical China, we won't find out until January 3rd. But, you know, the history here is like 16 and 17 is that you typically get two years. So do you have a view on whether we'll have this stimulus renewed into next year? And could we see a pickup in the China order rates, you know, once that happens in Q1?

I would say what we're seeing, there's a lot of noise in that market. I think it's hard to pull out, you know, incentives and sort of the puts and takes, pull aheads at the moment. They're obviously, I think, coming out of that party Congress. There's some discussions there around sort of market, you know, and how friendly the market gets over the coming couple of quarters. You know, there is some heightened concern around COVID lockdowns that we're hearing. Certainly not to the extent we saw in Q2, but renewed concern about that. So I think it's hard to pull out sort of one particular facet of that at the moment, Chris. Kevin, I don't know if you have a... No, I think you covered it.

That's perfect. And if I could just sneak in one for the 2023, is it also, I'm not sure if you mentioned this, should we use the 8% to 10% as sort of a base for the outgrowth, whatever production ends up being?

Yeah. Yeah, that's fair. Thanks, Tim. Thank you, Chris.

We will now take a question from Emanuel Rosner of Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.

Thank you very much. I guess in some of the words of caution that you were expressing earlier for 2023, one piece is very clearly the FX headwinds, which is understandable. The other piece seems to be supply chain tightness, which I think you said could make it more challenging to recapture offering leverage. Are you thinking that this is the sort of volatility that would result into lower incremental margins than usual?

Yeah, what I was referring to, Emmanuel, there, and we've talked about it really for different reasons for the past couple years, right? I mean, one of the big benefits to our customers, ourselves, and I'm sure it's just not us from a supplier perspective, You know, it's the smoothness of production. Even if you're at a lower number, the ability to sort of set up and run without these stop starts from supply chain disruptions just make for greater efficiency. And I think we'll be better year over year. But obviously, just cautioning that the extent we continue to see some of these disruptions, particularly in the first half of the year, Again, as an industry, I mean, the disruptions we saw in North America in Q3 were not related to our supply chain, but our customers were impacted. So it's just speaking to the abruptness of shutdowns and restarts. It does hurt from an operating leverage perspective.

Okay. And I'm also curious, how are you thinking about cost trajectory exiting the year and into next year? I found it interesting that – you're back to, you know, more normalized price down, obviously, you know, you would sort of like need a more stable cost base to sort of like, you know, be able to continue like this. So how should we think about it in terms of additional, you know, going forward cost trajectory and any additional actions that would be needed? Is your question around price downs, Emmanuel, or input costs? The question is mostly around input costs, but I was wondering if, you know, going back to normal price stands, sort of like suggest that you're saying costs are stabilizing or not.

Yeah, so maybe I'll take a shot at, and going back to Joe's, you know, last answer to your question, I think what you're hearing from us as a management team is although Q3 obviously improved results for our general view that the supply chain is improving, all the challenges aren't behind us. And we continue to see inflation. We continue to see volatility in schedules, which translates into volatility in production. That translates into a higher cost load as it relates to manning in our facilities, as it relates to transporting goods, so inbound and outbound freight. that to a certain extent is built into our current run rate so that we have an element of flexibility to continue to support our customers. Now, our customers are, you know, we've been aggressively going to our customers and pushing through that price, those cost increases to our customers. Our customers have been supportive of that. We would expect that there's an element of that that continues into 2023, certainly in the, at least in the first half of the year. And just given the volatility in the overall macro headwinds, you know, at this point in time, you know, we're planning that some of that doesn't go away. We're pushing through as much of it as we can. But it's, you know, it's difficult to be precise as it relates to your predictions. on what you think margin expansion and other items are going to be in the early part of 2023. Okay.

Thank you for the call. Thanks, Manuel.

We will now take a question from David Kelly of Jefferies. Please go ahead.

Good morning, and thanks for taking my question. Maybe want to follow up on InterCable. I was hoping you could talk a bit more about their product portfolio and your opportunity to leverage their expertise within your platform. And then how should we think about their potential contribution to that $1,500 BEV content opportunity you referenced earlier?

Yeah, intercable, strong position, obviously, in high-voltage electrification. I mentioned in my comments, they're on their seventh-generation bus bar technology, so clearly the industry leader from an overall technology standpoint. When you look at, they have other products as well, interconnect high-voltage we do. A very strong position as it relates to bus bars, a stronger position than what Aptiv currently has. So when you look at that product portfolio, certainly additive to the overall solution that we can bring to market. I think when you look at the overall bus bar market, it's a little over a billion dollars today. I think by 2026, it's expected to grow at about a 30% compounded rate. So that's 2026, 2027, IT GETS NORTH OF $4 BILLION. SO SIGNIFICANT REVENUE OPPORTUNITY. CONTENT FOR VEHICLE, IT'S DEPENDING ON THE NATURE OF THE BUS BAR SOLUTION AND THE NATURE OF THE VEHICLE, IT'S ANYWHERE BETWEEN LOW END, CALL IT $100 TO HIGH END, CLOSE TO $200 OF VEHICLE CONTENT. SO IT'S CERTAINLY MEANINGFUL. They have a very strong position in Europe with European OEMs, a very strong manufacturing position in Europe, a manufacturing footprint in China. We think there's an opportunity given our footprint in Asia, given our footprint in North America, to expand their manufacturing footprint and introduce them to additional customers. So we view it as really a great opportunity to generate significant synergies. Joe, did I miss anything?

No, I think that covers it.

Okay, got it. Really helpful, Culler. Thank you. And just more broadly, realizing Wind River still pending, but can you talk about your approach to acquisitions into 2023, given what feels like a shifting macro here?

Yeah, David, it's Joe. I'll start that one. Listen, I think, you know, we continue to obviously –

Well, to grow the portfolio both organically and inorganically, I think from an M&A perspective, you know, obviously you've got to be mindful of valuations as the macros are challenging for us to forecast or obviously, you know, as challenging to sort of potentially value other businesses. And on the private side, it usually takes, you know, a few quarters for valuations to catch up to public markets. So, you know, we'll proceed cautiously, but we're still very much interested in the types of transactions like intercable and you know, that strengthen bolt-on transactions, larger bolt-on transactions that strengthen the SPS portfolio around key growth areas. And then mindful of software opportunities that, you know, can help accelerate sort of the organic plan around SVA and the software-defined vehicle. As we've always said, though, we're very careful to make sure, you know, we're building our strategy and building our plan to hit from an organic perspective, And that M&A, the added capabilities or added product lines that come with M&A would be in addition to that. But, you know, obviously a market where you need to be a little bit more careful around valuations, but, you know, continue to execute on that strategy.

Got it. Thank you.

We will now move to John Murphy of Bank of America. Please go ahead.

Good morning, guys. Just two quick ones here. First, just on the volatility in schedules, I understand that it's depressing, obviously, the potential for incremental margins, but this is something that's been going on for almost two years now, and it just seems like we keep hearing the echo of this, and it seems like it's getting better, but then it's not, and that's certainly not your purview. It's outside of what you can control. What are the signs that you're looking for that we get some stability in schedules? Because, I mean, it sounds like it's just kind of popping up week to week and month to month, and it's very difficult to understand when it actually will start smoothing out.

Yeah, John, I'll start. Listen, it does start week to week and day to day, to be honest with you. I'd say what we're seeing now are the swings are smaller. So with respect to you know, peak to valley, you're seeing, you know, a much tighter curve. So that aspect is better. But there is still an element of when you think about manning from a manufacturing standpoint, when you think about inbound, outbound freight, those sorts of expenses, you're continuing to incur it, you know, certainly at a higher level than sort of normal run rate. I'd say we feel like, you know, We're very close connected with our strategic semiconductor suppliers. We're very closely connected with our customers. Our supply chain and manufacturing teams are integrating, are talking to them and integrating with them on a day-to-day basis. So we have our arms around it and are able to react faster when we see swings, but they're still occurring. Q3 supply chain was better than Q2. We expect Q4 to improve over Q3. But again, we're still seeing the supply chain tightness, and if there's any sort of event that occurs during a given day, week, or month, you seem to have a boomerang effect in terms of the overall supply you know, the overall outcome on ultimately vehicle production. And it's just something we're trying to stay close to. It's something that we're trying to manage through. And we just want to make sure that you guys understand it's still going on. It's not completely behind us. And we wish it were, but it's not. And, you know, we're doing our best to manage through it.

Okay. And then just a second question. As we look at slide seven, obviously the bookings are pretty remarkable this year. About $13.5 billion are what you're hiding here in active safety, high voltage, and SVA. There's almost $12 billion that's outside of those three technologies. I'm just curious if you can give us some color on those. And as we think about those rolling on, maybe they roll on faster because they're sort of less leading-edge technology, but they might come on faster at higher margins and higher returns. So any color around that, almost $12 billion, it's outside of those three high-voltage technologies.

Yeah, well, yeah, it ranges for areas like user experience, like our traditional connector solutions, our traditional cable management solutions. You know, they go on low-voltage vehicles, our traditional vehicle architecture on low-voltage solutions. I mentioned user experience, so infotainment systems, in-cabin sensing systems, body and security systems. So there's a whole, you know, there's a number of different products, number of different product lines that fill the balance of those bookings.

Is it fair to say, Kevin, though, that those come on at higher margins and returns in the near term potentially? So those are important to watch as well?

Yeah, I think it depends on what the product line is. I'd say most are basically in line with what our traditional margin structure is across all of our product lines. Some of those that are higher volume, it may be a little bit higher.

Okay, great. Thank you very much, guys. Thanks, sir.

Our final question today comes from Mark Delaney of Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Yes, good morning. Thank you very much for taking my questions. First, on the implied 4Q revenue guidance, I think it's down sequentially relative to 3Q, even if we assume the company is coming in at the high end of the four-year revenue outlook. Could you help us bridge what's going on with 4Q revenue compared to the third quarter, and how much it maybe affects as opposed to other factors?

Yeah, listen, I think, you know, sequentially it is down a little bit. Launch activity in Q3, you know, the answer to Chris's question, Mark, you know, obviously we are, you know, potentially looking at additional volumes in China and balancing the FX impact of that. You know, year over year, and there's just some ebb and flows here as you think about the year over year as well, right? Year over year we're still up 9%. If you recall, Q4 last year had some – was rebounding a bit from Q3 of last year, which was very depressed. So you've got a little bit of the ins and outs. But it really comes back to how much upside is from China and what the offset is with the FX. I think if you're looking at that sort of revenue top line number.

Okay. And then specifically on Europe, last quarter the company spoke of some weakness with some of the OEMs in Europe relative to reductions to their schedule forecast. Could you elaborate a little bit more on what you've seen transpire in Europe relative to the last update you gave 90 days ago, and has the magnitude or breadth of OEM schedule reductions in Europe changed at all? Thanks.

Yeah, no, good question. No, listen, I think Europe, for the most part, has sort of held the schedules. It's what we've seen. I realize we're lower than sort of a lot of other folks out there. I think some of those other forecasts have come in not necessarily right to where we were, but have come in a lot sort of closer to us than maybe where they started. So I'd say European customer schedules, again, we're tracking. I think there's, you know, remains concern around, you know, economic disruptions in Europe. And obviously, you know, there's, you know, potential impact from energy shortages, although I would say the customers are a little bit more confident that they won't be impacted in Q4 than they were when we spoke in August. But no, as I mentioned my comments in 2023, I think Europe remains a challenging environment for the foreseeable future, just given everything going on there.

Thank you.

Thanks. That concludes today's question and answer session. I would now like to turn the call back to Kevin Clark for any additional or closing remarks.

Great. Thank you, Operator. Thanks to everyone for joining us today.

We really appreciate you taking the time. Take care.

That will conclude today's call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.