Ducommun Incorporated

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to do comments first quarter 2023 conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen only mode. Following management's prepared remarks, we'll hold a Q&A session. To ask a question, please press star followed by one on your touch tone phone. If anyone has difficulty hearing the conference, please press star zero for operator assistance. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded today, May 4th, 2023. I would now like to turn the conference call over to Duke Commons Senior Vice President, Chief Financial Officer, Controller, and Treasurer, Mr. Suman Luperchi.

Thank you, Jada. And welcome to Duke Commons 2023 first quarter conference call. With me today is Steve Oswald, Chairman, President, and CEO. I'm going to discuss certain limitations to any forward-looking statements regarding future events, projections or performance, that we may make during the prepared remarks or the Q&A session that follows. Certain statements today that are not historical facts, including any statements as to future market conditions, results of operations, and financial projections are forward-looking statements under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and are therefore prospective. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks, uncertainties, and other factors which could cause actual results to differ materially from the future results expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Although we believe that the expectations reflected in our forward-looking statements are reasonable, we can give no assurance that such expectations will prove to have been correct. In addition, estimates of future operating results are based on the company's current business, which is subject to change. Particular risks facing the common include, among others, the cyclicality of our end-use markets, the level of U.S. government defense spending, timing of orders from our customers, legal and regulatory risks, the cost of expansion and acquisitions, competition, economic and geopolitical developments, including supply chain issues and rising interest rates, pandemics and disasters, natural or otherwise. These risks and others are described in our annual report on Form 10-K filed with the SEC. and our forward-looking statements are subject to those risks. Statements made during this call are only as of the time made, and we do not intend to update any statements made in this presentation, except if and as required by regulatory authorities. This call also includes non-GAAP financial measures. Please refer to our filings with the SEC for a reconciliation of the GAAP to non-GAAP measures referenced on this call. We filed our Q1 2023 quarterly report on Form 10Q with the SEC today. I would now like to turn the call over to Steve Oswald for a review of the operating results. Steve.

Okay, Suman, thank you. And thanks, everyone, for joining us today for our first core conference call. Today, as usual, I'll give an update of the current situation at the company, after which, Suman, we'll review our financials in detail. Before that, though, I'd like to discuss our CFO transition and NLGS today. First, I'd like to say this transition is not related to any issues revolving the company's financial reporting. I would also like to thank Chris Wampler for his contributions and service as CFO and welcome Suman Mukherjee to the call and congratulate him on his new role. Suman and I have known each other for over 12 years, worked together at three different companies, and I have full confidence in him and his abilities. As we announced last week, I'm also delighted that we have completed the acquisition of BLR after the end of Q1 as we had a 30-day filing period that ended on July, I'm sorry, it ended on April 24th. BLR Aerospace is our fifth acquisition and largest since I joined the company in 2017, and it's 100% in line with the expectations we discussed at the Common Investor Meeting in New York in December. BLR is an industry leader and innovator, providing engineering products and aftermarket services to rotorcraft, fixed wing business aviation OEM customers, and fleet operators. I want to welcome Mike Carpenter, president, and the entire BLR team to Dukama. I'm excited to begin working with them. As to the quarter, we're off to a good start in 2023. with very strong top-line growth as the company delivered year-over-year revenue growth of 11% to $181.2 million. As mentioned in the press release, our excellent position in narrow-body aircraft was key to driving overall revenue growth, and another positive sign of recovery is in good shape and will only get better in the near and longer term. Turning to the markets, the continued recovery of commercial aerospace is once again a real bright spot in Q1. With Boeing 737 MAX business up 80% year-over-year, the Airbus A220 also having significant growth of 66% year-over-year. Overall commercial aerospace with Airbus and Boeing and others was up 35% from Q1 2022. The Commons commercial aerospace business has showed year-over-year revenue growth now for the seventh consecutive quarter, an excellent sign as the industry and bill rates recover. The company's defense business was down modestly year over year in Q1, mainly due to timing of programs such as the Apache Rotor Blade and GA UAVs, among others. But once again, Ducama delivered solid performance of roughly 96 million revenue as we prepare for increasing DOD budgets and FMS in the years ahead. The company posted solid gross profit of 20.3%, up year-over-year from 19.9%, a good result as we worked through our restructuring activities. The team also posted adjusted operating income margins of 7.5% and adjusted EBITDA was $23.1 million, an increase of $3 million year-over-year. Tacoma had adjusted EBITDA margins of 12.7% in Q1 as well. And we anticipate adjusted EBITDA to be solid this year with much stronger numbers in 2024. once the plan for 2023 are behind us. Quality of earnings was solid with GAAP diluted EPS of 42 cents a share versus 66 cents a share for Q1 2022. But with adjustments, the diluted EPS of 63 cents a share was comparable to the diluted EPS of 67 cents a share in the prior year. Some key drivers for the lower gap diluted EPS include restructuring chargers and higher Guaymas fire-related expenses. Switching to the company's backlog performance, the commercial aerospace backlog increased sequentially for the eighth consecutive quarter, from $266 million at the end of Q1 2021 to $464 million at the end of Q1 2023, and increased over 74%. This was led by the 737 MAX, Biasat for in-flight entertainment, the A320, A220, and Gulfstream, all which you would expect after a slower-than-expected recovery during 2022. The defense backlog decreased modestly sequentially from Q2 2022, but remained solid at the end of Q1 as well, and ended the quarter at $444 million. I also want to share with you some great news on the 737 MAX. We recently received our first order ever from Spirit Aerosystems for MAX fuselage skins, similar to what we make currently for the A220. This is an initial order for four skin sections, which comprise of roughly 5% of the total fuselage, so we expect this to grow as we move forward. The initial foreskin order is projected to be $4 million in revenue yearly, and we're excited about what is ahead. Keep in mind, we provide close to 100% of the skins for the A220 fuselage as a sole source or a 50-50 split with Spirit for certain areas, so you're ready to do a lot more after this initial order. The foreskin sections will be fully commercialized by year end. For offloading for defense prime, the work continues. We're expecting roughly 90 million for the full year as committed to with a great deal of that in our circuit card business for Raytheon at such sites as Appleton, Wisconsin and Tulsa, Oklahoma. The long-term run rate of these defense programs already commercialized or in development for offloading will be over 125 million for the common by 2025. One item to note is that there are lags with these types of projects. as you not only have to transfer a legacy or buy test equipment, et cetera, but we do have initial headwind on revenue with the OEM supplying material from their on-hand stock. So the numbers with these large OEMs do take some time. The company's actions and lean organizational structure are also continuing to pay dividends. Our team delivered another excellent quarter as well in Q1, managing the supply chain, and this has not only shown our financials, but also we could not be in better shape with our customers regarding our on-time delivery and quality. In addition, we were honored in Toulouse in March by Airbus with an award for being a top performing supplier for hot form and super plastic forming titanium parts. The company put out a press release on this and we are very proud of our work. For context, we did not have any business with Airbus before 2016. It has been a great success And Airbus has a very high global standard for these awards. It is a select group. For revenue guidance for the year, we're happy to update it to mid to high single digit for 2023, based on better news on commercial aerospace, along with a very successful win with BLR and the acquisition. Just a few comments on our win. These are never easy. and require a great deal of effort and excellence. I'm happy to report that the seller, due to our approach, went exclusive with Dukama early on, and this provides beneficial benefits for everyone. On the commercial aerospace side, the recovery will continue to lead the way, and revenue will be very good for the rest of 2023 as we see more and more volume return, with defense also being solid. The two plant closings later this year We'll also have some limited headwinds on revenue as we seek to prune non-strategic and low-volume business, but feel very confident in our much improved guidance for 2023 revenue. Now let me provide some additional color on our markets, products, and programs. Beginning with our military and space sector, we posted first quarter revenue of $96.4 million, a modest decrease versus Q1 2022. Despite being down, as mentioned earlier, was a solid showing for the business in Q1. We still saw increases in demand on our other military and space platforms, Mir missile, other military rotary aircraft platforms, and other military fixed-wing aircraft platforms. The first quarter military and space revenue represented 53% of the Commons revenue in the period, down from 61% last year. And this trend will continue to reflect more balance with commercial aerospace. And we like that. We also ended the first quarter with a solid backlog of $444 million, while also down modestly sequentially still represents 46% of the government's total backlog. In our commercial aerospace operations, first quarter revenue increased 35% year-over-year to $73.1 million, driven mainly by bill rate increases at Boeing, Airbus, and others. The government expects this to continue to gain momentum in 2023, And the future is very bright across our product offerings. Our delivering quality also continues to stand out as we move ahead. The backlog within our commercial aerospace sector stands at $464 million at the end of the first quarter and was $87 million higher or had a 23% increase year-over-year from Q1 2020-2022. With that, I'll have Saman review our financial results in detail. Saman?

Thank you, Steve. As a reminder, please see the company's Q1 10Q and Q1 earnings release for a further description of information mentioned on today's call. As Steve discussed, our first quarter results reflect another period of strong performance. Once again, we saw a significant increase in our commercial aerospace revenues. We remain encouraged by the continued strength in domestic and global travel, which would support higher long-term demand for aircraft and are also encouraged by the build rate outlook from our key customers that should drive continued growth in our shipments. During the quarter, we also continue to make progress on our restructuring program, and as Steve mentioned, we announced the acquisition of BLR Aerospace in Q1 and subsequently closed on the transaction on April 25th. With all this, we feel like we have laid a strong foundation to the year in the first quarter. Now turning to our first quarter results. Revenue for the first quarter of 2023 was 181.2 million versus 163.5 million for the first quarter of 2022. The year-over-year increase reflects 19 million of growth across our commercial aerospace platforms, partially offset by 2.9 million of lower revenue within the military and space sector. New Commons overall backlog at the end of the first quarter was approximately 961 million, similar to the level at the end of Q4 2022, and 18 million higher than at the end of Q1 2022. This reflects recent growth across our commercial aerospace platforms. Our defense backlog was 444 million, and we remain positioned for continued solid performance as we move through the remainder of 2023. As a reminder, we define backlog as potential revenue based on customer purchase orders and long-term agreements with firm fixed prices and expected delivery dates of 24 months or less. We posted total gross profit of $36.8 million or 20.3% of revenue for the quarter versus $32.5 million or 19.9% of revenue in the prior year period. We continue to share adjusted gross margins as we have a higher amount of non-GAAP-related cost of sales this year, mainly driven by our Guaymas fire-related impact. On an adjusted basis, our gross margins were 21.1% in Q1 2023 versus 20.8% in Q1 2022. We continue to work through a difficult operating environment with supply chain and labor. However, through our proactive efforts, including strategic buys and our inventory investments, we have been able to avoid any significant impacts on the business. New common reported operating income for the first quarter of 6.4 million or 3.5% of revenue compared to 9.1 million or 5.6% of revenue in the prior year period. Adjusted operating income was 13.6 million or 7.5% of revenue this quarter compared to 12.3 million or 7.5% of revenue in the comparable period last year. The company reported net income for the first quarter of 2023 of $5.2 million or $0.42 per diluted share compared to net income of $8.1 million or $0.66 per diluted share a year ago. On an adjusted basis, the company reported net income of $7.9 million or $0.63 per diluted share compared to net income of $8.3 million or $0.67 in Q1 2022. The lower net income relative to operating income was driven by higher interest costs during the period. Adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter of 2023 was 23.1 million or 12.7% of revenue compared to 20.1 million or 12.3% of revenue for the comparable period in 2022. Now, let me turn to our segment results. Our structural system segment posted revenue of $75.6 million in the first quarter of 2023 versus $66 million last year. The year-over-year increase reflects $14 million of higher sales across our commercial aerospace applications, partially offset by $4.4 million of lower revenue within the company's military and space markets. Structural systems operating income for the quarter was $4.7 million, or 6.3% of revenue. compared to 4.9 million or 7.4% of revenue last year. The year-over-year operating margin decrease was primarily due to higher restructuring charges. Excluding restructuring charges and other adjustments in both years, the segment operating margin was 12.9% in Q1 2023 versus 11.7% in Q1 2022. This is a solid operating performance from the structural system segment. Our electronic systems segment posted revenue of $105.6 million in the first quarter of 2023 versus $97.5 million in the prior year period. These results reflect $5 million of higher commercial aerospace revenue and $1.5 million of higher revenue across the company's military and space customers. Electronic systems operating income for the first quarter was $10 million, or 9.5% of revenue. versus $9.4 million or 9.7% of revenue in the prior year period. The lower operating income as a percentage of revenue was primarily due to higher restructuring charges. Excluding restructuring charges and other adjustments in both years, the segment operating margin was 11.6% in Q1 2023 versus 10% in Q1 2022. Now an update on our restructuring. As a reminder and as discussed previously, we commenced a restructuring initiative back in Q2 2022. These actions are being taken to accelerate the achievement of our strategic goals and to better position the company for stronger performance in both the short and long term. This includes the shutdown of our facilities in Monrovia, California and Berryville, Arkansas, and transfer of majority of that work to our low cost operation in Guaymas, Mexico, with the remainder going to other existing performance centers in the United States. We are progressing well on these transitions, both with employee retention and engagement and with customer alignment. During Q1, 2023, we incurred 4.2 million in restructuring charges. The majority of these charges were severance and benefits related. We expect to incur an additional 8 to 12 million in restructuring expenses during the rest of 2023. Upon the completion of our restructuring program, we expect to generate 11 to 13 million in annual savings from our actions. Once we wind down production at Monrovia and Berryville, we anticipate selling the associated land and building at both locations. Turning to liquidity and capital resources. We have available liquidity of 217 million at the end of the first quarter. The first quarter of each year is typically our largest net usage of cash in operations, primarily due to the payout of year-end accrued incentives. And this year, we also made an estimated tax payment of approximately $8 million to cover changes in tax rules for R&D expenses, which now need to be capitalized and amortized, and thus used $18.9 million in cash flow from operating activities during the quarter. This was similar to the prior year, which also saw net cash used in operations of $18.9 million. Our 12-month debt-to-adjusted EBITDA ratio was 2.5 and is among the lowest in the last several years. However, going forward as a result of the completion of the BLR acquisition in Q2, we expect our debt-to-adjusted EBITDA ratio to increase. While our debt refinancing during 2022 was timely and beneficial, the rising interest rate environment drove the increase in interest costs to $4.2 million in the quarter versus $2.4 million in Q1 2022. This was expected. In November 2021, we put in an interest rate hedge for $150 million, which goes into effect in January 2024 and will help with our interest costs. To conclude the financial overview, we are off to a good start in 2023, and with the BLR acquisition now completed in Q2 and the expected completion of the restructuring program later this year, There is much to look forward to for the rest of 2023 and beyond. I'll now turn it back over to Steve for his closing remarks. Steve?

Okay, thanks, Samant. In closing, it was a very good quarter to begin the year. The BL acquisition is another step in the right direction. It certainly meets the expectations we communicated on our investor day in December. In addition, all the meetings I've been attending now that we're Meeting in person again with top customers and all the industry news that I read, it just shows some great opportunities over the next several years, and the Common Team will be ready to capture the upside. My thanks, as always, to our employees and investors for the support as we embark on a new year and build momentum throughout 2023 towards an even stronger 2024. I will now open up for questions. Thank you for listening.

Thank you. At this time, we will conduct the question and answer session. As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star 11 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star 11 again. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Our first question comes from Ken Herbert of RBC. Your line is now open.

Yeah, hey, good morning, Steve, and congratulations to Mon.

Thank you.

Steve, maybe to start off, you called out some pretty significant growth in the first quarter for the MACs, and it sounds like you've taken some share on that program, which is nice, but there's been a lot of headlines recently about this program and some issues with SPIRIT Can you maybe level set us here in terms of what build rate you're currently going at on the max, maybe how you see that progressing over this year, and then maybe the revenue contribution this year, how much you expect it to grow across the full year? Because it sounds like you haven't been impacted by some of the slowdown that we're seeing at Spirits.

yeah well thanks ken good question i guess a couple things first i was up at the boeing supplier meeting uh not too long ago so stan deal and the team there uh so a couple things first you know we came out of the gate pretty much uh in a modest way at 31 a month uh but you know we do you know despite some of the issues in spirit and we wish them all the best to get that cleared up we're we're more on the front end and front end of this thing and we think that okay there'll be a little bit of a hiccup but You know, we still see things heading up from 31, you know, to 38 by the end of the year. We're further confident in that. You know, we're all capitalized for that. We've got a little bit of hiring to do, but we're optimistic. So certainly it's an issue, certainly the repairs. I mean, there's a lot of things that the spirit team has to get done there. But also, as I mentioned, you know, we have – you know, it was a major development with them on the skins. And, you know, that was a long time coming. We worked very hard on that for over, I'd say it was 16 months at least. So we got that across the finish line just recently. So, you know, we already do, we're already, for roll form and stretch form, we're already big players in fuselage skins on the A220. So we think that, you know, not only we're going to see, you know, a better race. I mean, okay, we'll have a little bit of headwind right now. But we're planning to get to 38, you know, or close, very close by the end of the year. But we're also, you know, very optimistic that, you know, to go forward with Spirit, you know, we're going to pick up more of this program share. So I think good things ahead for us.

Okay. That's helpful. Thank you. And I guess as you think about that to segue into the – the better outlook for revenues this year of mid to high single digit. Is that predominantly the BLR acquisition, or is there any assumption in there about sort of better performance out of aerospace? I mean, it looks like BLR could add, you know, maybe three to four points of growth this year.

Yeah, so it's a mix, okay? So it's certainly BLR is going to contribute. You know, we just, you know, picked them up at the end of April, right? So, you know, we're not going to get a full year. of revenue, but we're going to pick up some nice revenue. And then also, you know, again, when we started the year at low single, we're still obviously a little, I wouldn't say nervous, but just, you know, being a little more modest at the beginning of the year. But we feel better about our prospects as well as Airbus and Gulfstream and, you know, the other companies we support.

I would say BLR is kind of on the lower end of the range that you suggested, Ken, and so there is substantial organic growth in the outlook.

Okay, great. And, Suman, just finally, I think the cash use this quarter was probably consistent with expectations, but can you reset us on maybe an expectation for full year 23 free cash flow?

We expect to have a better free cash flow year this year than we did last year. There are some headwinds as we do these facility transitions and have to build up some inventory to support those moves. But we're looking at ways to offset some of those headwinds and come out net positive versus where we did. on working capital and cash flow last year.

Yeah, Ken, we got some, you know, we got the Apache back blade and we have the max spoilers, you know, so we got some major industry impact moves here. So we got to make sure we're taking care of first the customer and making sure we got enough buffer for these moves. So a little bit of that too.

Great. All right, guys. Thanks a lot.

Thanks, Ken.

One moment for our next question, please. Our next question comes from Mike Crawford of B Reilly Securities. Your line is now open.

Thank you. Just to make sure, are you not comfortable talking about the rough annual revenue run rate of BOR as well as you know, added working capital that that's going to put on in the balance sheet next time we see a print?

You know, we're going to, we'll be, we'll have more to say, I think, at the end of the Q2 call. Okay, Mike, we're just getting started here. I mean, obviously, VLR is an engineered product with aftermarket, so it's going to be accretive to the P&L and to our current business. So we're excited about it. I think earlier with Ken's comments, there's a couple of points for this year for us on the revenue side and more to come.

Okay. And then regarding the, you know, mid to high single-digit growth guidance implying, you know, some high $700 million of revenue versus your 12-month backlog, which is closer to $650 million-ish. So where is the main book and ship

business that makes up that difference so we see book and ship in a lot of our engineered product businesses and and so you know that that is a big driver of that and then we may see some of you know some incremental in our structures business as well and some drop in orders in our electronic manufacturing services businesses as well from time to time

uh though they're typically lead times are longer but mainly in our engineer product businesses is where we have more uh book and ship business okay great thank you and then um i don't know i guess the last call you weren't really prepared to talk about this but once you do get out of uh monrovia and the other factory like do you have Any more sense you can share on potential timing of the sale of the real estate underlying these facilities and perhaps what you might get from it?

Yeah, I think it's a little tricky right now because we've got some major things to move, right? And customers, they get nervous, so we have to make sure that we're doing the right things on the front end. You know, we would like to, you know, move, you know, one, if not both properties, probably by the year end, if not by Q1, Mike. So it's not something we're going to, we're in a hurry a bit here, but we got to make sure we do the right things for the market. So, but sooner than later.

Okay. All right. Thank you very much. Thanks, Mike.

Our next call comes from Michael Ciamoli of True Securities.

taking the questions. Hey, can you hear me, guys? Yes, we can hear you. We can hear you, Mike. How are you? Hey. Maybe just going back to the facility transitions, I think you talked about the max spoilers and the Apache blades. Is there any sort of requalification risk needed to shift that work or any sort of technical challenges that we should be aware of there?

No, you know, Mike, we've been making that stuff forever. So, you know, we're just going to, you know, make it somewhere else. So, you know, no issue about that. But obviously, we have to work with the customer because it's going into a new facility, right? So, you know, there's always a lag dealing with a defense crime or a major OEM on the commercial side. But, you know, we feel good about where we are. You know, the one thing I'd say, too, just for investors is that, and I give a lot of people credit at Berryville and Monrovia. I mean, we announced this in November. last year, and we still have pretty much a full workforce. So people are committed to finishing the job and getting it transferred properly. So I would say, at least on the technical side, the answer is no.

Okay. And then just back to the MAX, can you just circle back one more time on the content? You talked about the $4 million. Does that assume a specific run rate? Are you on every plane? I know the MAX was your biggest program pre-pandemic, but just trying to get a sense of how much content this adds.

Yeah. So it's, like I said, you know, I mentioned about formula. It's, you know, it's a good start. Let's put it that way. It's going to, you know, sort of increase our ship rates. It's roughly around 15 ship sets a month for those skins. So we're, you know, we're pretty happy with that.

Okay.

You know, Spirit makes it internally too, so. But we're in the game. That's the big deal. We're in the game.

Okay, perfect. That's what I was looking for. And then maybe, Suman, on the restructuring, you called out the – and I think you have done this – the annualized savings starting in the second half of 23. How should we think about that? I don't know if it's – call it $5.5 million or so of savings. How should we think about the margin? Should we expect to see – you know, a significant uptick in operating income and margins, you know, as we get into 3Q and 4Q?

I think you're going to see it more towards the end of the year. Okay. And, yeah, so I think you're going to see the benefit really more pronounced in 2024. Yeah. Okay. Got it. All good news.

All good news. Yep.

Perfect. Okay. Perfect, guys. That's all I had. Thanks. Okay.

Thanks, Michael. It's good to be with you.

There appears to be no further questions. I would now like to turn it over to Mr. Oswald for closing remarks.

Okay. Thank you very much. Look, again, I think it's a very good start to the year. We have a lot going on here, but I think all very positive for our customers, our company, and our shareholders. It should be a consequential year for Dukaman on the upside. And, again, my thanks for attending today. And I wish you a good afternoon.

Thank you for attending today's conference. This does conclude the program. You may now disconnect.