Belden Inc

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to this morning's Belden Reports second quarter 2024 results call. Just a reminder, this call is being recorded. At this time, you are in a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your touchtone phone. If you are in the question queue and would like to withdraw your question, simply press star 2. I would now like to turn the call over to Aaron Reddington, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us for Belden's second quarter 2024 earnings conference call. With me today are Belden's President and CEO, Ashish Chand, and Senior Vice President and CFO, Jeremy Parks. Ashish will provide a strategic overview of our business, and then Jeremy will provide a detailed review of our financial and operating results, followed by Q&A. We issued our earnings release earlier this morning, and have prepared a slide presentation that we will reference on this call. The press release, presentation, and transcript of these prepared remarks are currently available online at investor.belden.com. Turning to slide two in the presentation. During this call, management will make certain forward-looking statements in reliance upon the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. For more information, please review today's press release and our most recent annual report on Form 10-K. Additionally, during today's call, management will reference adjusted or non-GAAP financial information. In accordance with Regulation G, The appendix to our presentation in the investor relations section of our website contains a reconciliation of the most closely associated GAAP financial information to the non-GAAP financial information we communicate. I will now turn the call over to our President and CEO, Ashish Chand. Thank you, Aaron, and good morning, everyone.

We really appreciate you joining us today. Let's turn to slide four for a summary of the major accomplishments we achieved in the second quarter and key messages I would like to highlight. As a reminder, I will be referring to adjusted results today. First, let me start by congratulating our team on another solid quarter in light of this dynamic environment. Inventory destocking continues in our markets. However, our performance was stable. For the second quarter, our revenue and EPS Both exceeded the high end of our guidance as our solutions transformation continues to push forward. Revenue totaled $604 million, and EPS came in at $1.51. Second, I am pleased to report steady demand for the quarter, similar to what we saw in the prior period. Orders in the second quarter were up 9% sequentially, marking the third consecutive quarter of orders growth. We ended the order with a book-to-bill of 1.0 times, up from 0.9 during the same period last year. Our markets continue to experience headwinds, and I'm encouraged to see steady execution resulting in performance exceeding our expectations. Finally, Our business continues to generate meaningful cash flow and we are deploying capital consistent with our capital allocation priorities. Trailing 12-month free cash flow was strong at $234 million, roughly in line with recent performance. With ample free cash flow, our team continues to reinvest in high return opportunities beneficial to shareholders. As we announced previously, we closed the acquisition of precision optical technologies during the quarter, providing new product capabilities to further enhance our solution opportunities in the broadband market. Post-transaction completion, our performer leverage remains reasonable at 2.1 times. With ample free cash flow in the second half of the year, we have the opportunity to bring our leverage down closer to a long-term target Net leverage ratio 1.5 times as the air progresses. Now please turn to slide five for a summary of our broadband solutions business after closing the precision optical acquisition. Let me take a moment to reiterate why we think the broadband and fiber markets are so attractive. Then I will highlight some recent initiatives we have taken to strengthen our position in this key vertical. The broadband markets in the U.S. have experienced tremendous growth. with broadband data consumption more than doubling over the past five years. Many secular trends are supporting and driving that growth, including increased reliance on home network for work and entertainment, advancements in technology to increase both access and speeds, and heightened competition between providers to gain customers and market share for broadband services. These trends are expected to continue, further driving data growth and consequently requiring our customers to make significant capital investments. Fortunately for the industry, there are multiple government stimulus programs designed to support the expansion of broadband access. The most meaningful over the next few years is anticipated to be the broadband equity access and deployment, or BEAT, program. As time passes and allocations are granted, we are learning more and more about the timing of the massive $42.5 billion BEAD funding initiative. Our best estimates now show the majority of that funding hitting the market between 2025 and 2030, with our business squarely positioned to participate in the development. Further, we see similar dynamics playing out in key markets globally, including in Western Europe. Now to share about the steps we've taken to strengthen our broadband solutions business. and how we are positioned to capitalize on the massive increase in broadband infrastructure spending just over the horizon. As you recall, we've been on a multi-year path to broaden our fiber portfolio and grow our broadband business. Our focus has been on expanding into high-growth applications in the broadband network through strategic token acquisitions combined with organic growth initiatives. To date, We have acquired several businesses in the broadband market with our most recent acquisitions of ZShirt in 2023 and Precision Optical Technologies in the second quarter. These acquisitions helped us build a valuable portfolio of fiber products focused on the last mile of broadband networks and gained share with major MSOs as a trusted partner for the upgrade and expansion plans. We've invested internally in new products and expanded our capacity, most notably with the Fiber Technology Center opened earlier this year in Tucson, Arizona. The new facility serves as a multifunctional hub where we house R&D, manufacturing, and distribution functions focused on advancing our leadership position and improving our optical fiber capabilities. Today, I'm happy to report that our broadband solutions business has grown considerably and a product portfolio is positioned for high growth. On a performer basis, our broadband solutions business has revenues of approximately $660 million, of which half comes from fiber and fiber-related products. With our acquisitions and solutions framework, our business is much better positioned to win in the marketplace. As customers seek ways to quickly expand and upgrade their networks supported by massive government stimulus, companies like Belden, who can rapidly provide comprehensive solutions, will gain market share. I will now request Jeremy to provide additional insight into our second quarter financial performance.