CAE Inc.

Good day, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the CAE first quarter financial results for fiscal year 2025 conference call. As a reminder, all participants are in listen-only mode and the conference is being recorded. After the presentation, there will be an opportunity for analysts to ask questions. To join the question queue, you may press star then one on your telephone keypad. Should you need assistance during the conference call, you may signal an operator by pressing star then zero. I would now like to turn the conference over to Mr. Andrew Arnovitz. Please go ahead, Mr. Arnovitz.

Good morning, everyone. Thanks for joining us. Before we begin, I'd like to remind you that today's remarks, including management's outlook and answers to questions, contain forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements represent our expectations as of today, August 14, 2024, and accordingly are subject to change. Such statements are based on assumptions that may not materialize and are subject to risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially, and listeners are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these following statements. A description of the risks, factors, and assumptions that may affect future results is contained in C's annual MD&A, available on our corporate website and our filings with the Canadian Securities Administrators on CDAR+, and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on EDGAR. With the divestiture of C's healthcare business in fiscal 2024, all comparative figures discussed here and our financial results have been reclassified to reflect this continued operation. On the call with me this morning are Marc Perron, C's president and chief executive officer, and Sonia Branco, our chief financial officer. Nick Leontidis, C's chief operating officer, is on hand for the question period. After remarks from Marc and Sonia, we'll open the call to questions from financial analysts. Let me now turn the call over to Mark.

Thank you, Andrew, and good morning to everyone joining us on the call. Our performance in the first quarter reflects a continued healthy level of demand across our civil market solutions with some softness in commercial aviation training in certain regions compared to last year. Our results also demonstrate our ongoing progress to move our defense business forward from the rebase landing last year which just sets us up on a clear path to margin improvement. Testimony to our strong position in secular growth markets, we booked nearly $1.2 billion in total orders this quarter for a record $17 billion in adjusted backlogs. In civil, we delivered eight full-flight simulators to customers during the quarter, and our average training center utilization was down a percentage point from last year to 76%. We saw year-over-year growth in business aviation training, including the expected contributions from our more recent capacity additions, like our new Savannah, Georgia training center for Gulfstream pilots, which we inaugurated in June. In commercial aviation training, utilization was three percentage points lower than last year on average, which is still robust but it was lower still in the Americas where we saw some incremental pressure on initial training and pilot churn as several airlines paused pilot hiring. This was mainly the result of the supply-side constraints on new narrow-body aircraft. For example, in the U.S., there was a nearly 80% reduction in pilot hiring among notable carriers in the month of June compared to last year. That being said, recurrent training is up year over year, as the in-service fleet and pilot population continued to grow. Commercial training utilization was lower in Europe too, with seasonality being more pronounced than usual because of an extended summer flying season. This also relates to aircraft supply size constraints and special events, namely the Euro Cup and the Paris Olympics, that altered normal travel behavior this season. Training demand in Asia and the Middle East has been tracking well, and we're seeing solid growth there in line with our expectations. We continue to demonstrate our ability to win our fair share in a large secular growth market, which sees highly differentiated training and flight operations software solutions. We booked $771 million in orders with civil customers worldwide for an impressive 1.31 times book to sales ratio which is on revenue that's 9% higher than Q1 of last year. We also had strong order activity in our JVs this quarter, representing another approximate $103 million of training service orders, which are not included in the adjusted order intake figure, but are reflected in our record $6.6 billion total civil adjusted backlog. We received orders for 11 full-flight simulators in a quarter, and signed long-term training services and next-generation flight operations and crew management software solutions contracts with commercial and business jets operators worldwide. In defense, our financial performance was in line with our expectations at this point on our path towards margin improvement this year, and I'm quite pleased with the progress that our team has made to deliver on our commitments. We booked orders for $422 million for a 0.87 times book-to-sales ratio, giving us a $10.4 billion defense-adjusted backlog, which is up markedly from $8.4 billion in Q1 last year. Notably, included in the adjusted backlog, but not the defense-adjusted order intake, is C's share of the $11.2 billion 25-year contract for Canada's Future Air Crew Training Program that was awarded to the CEE Skyline Joint Venture. We're now in the process of finalizing CEE's subcontract work under the JV for simulation-based terrain solutions that will be delivered by CEE. With that, I'll now turn the call over to Sonia, who will provide additional details about our financial performance. Sonia?