Ashland Inc.

Thank you for standing by. My name is Hermione and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to Ashland Incorporated 4th Quarter 2024 Earnings Call. All hands have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After this speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press star followed by the number 1 on your telephone keypad. If you would like to return a question, press star 1 again.

Thank you. I would now like to turn the call over to William Whistaker. Please go ahead.

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Ashland's fourth quarter fiscal year 2024 earnings conference call and webcast. My name is William Whitaker, Vice President of Finance and Director of Relations. Joining me on the call today are Guillermo Noble, Ashland Chair and Chief Executive Officer, and Kevin Willis, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. In addition, I want to welcome our three general managers, which will cover the performance of their respective business units. Alessandra Fasine, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Life Sciences and Intermediates. Jen Minacucci, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Personal Care. Dago Casares, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Specialty Additives. Ashland release results for the quarter ended September 30, 2024, at approximately 5 p.m. Eastern Time yesterday, November 6. The news release issued last night was furnished to the SEC in a Form 8K. During today's call, we will reference slides that are currently being webcast on our website, Ashland.com, under the Investor Relations section. We encourage you to follow along with the webcast during the call. Please turn to slide two. As a reminder, during today's call, we'll be making forward-looking statements on several matters, including our financial outlook for full-year fiscal 2025. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause future results or events to differ materially from today's projections. We believe any such statements are based on reasonable assumptions that cannot assure that expectations will be achieved. Please refer to slide two of the presentation for an explanation of those risks and uncertainties and the limits applicable to forward-looking statements. You can also review our most recent form 10K under Item 1A for a comprehensive discussion of the risk factors impacting our business. Please also note that we'll be referring to certain actual and projected financial metrics of Ashland on an adjusted basis, which are non-GAAP financial measures. We will refer to these measures as adjusted and present them to supplement your understanding and assessment of the financial performance of our ongoing business. Non-GAAP measures should not be considered a substitute for or superior to financial measures calculated in accordance with GAAP. The most directly comparable GAAP measures as well as reconciliation of those non-GAAP measures to those GAAP measures are available on our website and in the appendix of today's slide presentation. Please turn to slide four. Guillermo will begin the call this morning with an overview of Ashland's performance for the quarter and year. Next, Kevin and the general managers will provide a more detailed review of financial results for the quarter, followed by a portfolio optimization update. Guillermo will then provide an update on Ashland's financial outlook and priorities for the years ahead. We will then open the line for your questions. And I'll turn the call over to Guillermo for his opening comments. Guillermo?