Huntington Ingalls Industries, Inc.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by and welcome to the first quarter 2021 Huntington Ingalls Industries earnings conference call. At this time, all participant lines are in listen only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions. There will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you may press star then one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star then do. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the call over to Dwayne Blake, Vice President of Investor Relations. Mr. Blake, you may now begin.

Thanks. Good morning and welcome to the Huntington Ingalls Industries first quarter 2021 earnings conference call. With us today are Mike Pettis, President and Chief Executive Officer, Chris Kastner, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, and Tom Steele, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. As a reminder, statements made in today's call that are not historical facts are considered forward-looking statements and are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of federal securities law. Actual results may differ. Please refer to our SEC filings for a description of some of the factors that may cause actual results to vary materially from anticipated results. Also in their remarks today, Mike, Chris, and Tom will refer to certain non-GAAP measures. Reconciliations of these metrics to the comparable GAAP measures are included in the appendix of our earnings presentation that is posted on our website. We plan to address the posted presentation slides during the call to supplement our comments. Please access our website at HuntingtonEnglish.com and click on the investor relations link to view the presentation as well as our earnings release. With that, I'll turn the call over to our President and CEO, Mike Petters. Mike?

Thanks, Dwayne. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for joining us on today's call. I trust that everyone is staying healthy and safe. Now, let me share some highlights from the quarter starting on slide three of the presentation. Sales of $2.3 billion for the quarter were slightly higher than 2020. Diluted EPS was $3.68 for the quarter, and pension adjusted EPS was $3.56, up from $2.43 in 2020. New contract awards during the quarter were approximately $5.3 billion, resulting in a record backlog of approximately $49 billion, of which approximately $25 billion is funded. Chris will provide some color on a few of the key awards for the quarter during his remarks. Shifting to activities in Washington, we were pleased that the recently released summary of the fiscal year 2022 President's budget request affirmed that maintaining U.S. naval power is critical to reassuring allies and signaling U.S. resolve to potential adversaries. Of note, the budget summary cited continued recapitalization of the nation's strategic ballistic missile submarine fleet, investment in remotely operated and autonomous systems, and funding for the Next Generation Attack Submarine Program. And we look forward to understanding budget details for these and other national security priorities when that information becomes available, as well as funding levels requested for the Department of Energy and the Department of Homeland Security. We also look forward to working closely with the Congress as the FY22 President's Budget Request is considered during the current legislative cycle. Regarding portfolio shaping actions during the quarter, we completed the previously announced sale of our oil and gas business and also completed the contribution of the San Diego shipyard to tighten acquisition holdings in exchange for a non controlling interest in this leading provider of ship repair and fleet sustainment services. Completion of these transactions sharpens the focus of our technical solutions business into areas where we believe our unique capabilities and close customer relationships will drive strong organic revenue growth and margin expansion. And as I prepare to close, I'm very pleased with the operating rhythm the team is achieving, which led to the third consecutive quarter of solid program execution and financial results. and I am very confident that our strength, agility, and positive momentum resulting from enduring the impacts of COVID-19 will serve as key catalysts to help us leverage our historic backlog to generate strong free cash flow and create long-term sustainable value for our shareholders, customers, and employees. Now, before I turn the call over to Chris, let me make a few comments about a recent leadership change. After serving as president of Ingalls since 2014, and with more than 40 years of service, Brian Kouchis retired on April 1st. Brian's career at Ingalls has been remarkable, and HII has truly benefited from his leadership. Effective April 1st, Carrie Wilkinson succeeded Brian as the new president of Ingalls and will report to Chris. Carrie has proven herself to be a strategic and visionary leader that is focused on operational excellence, and I am extremely confident that Ingalls is in very capable hands. And now I will turn the call over to Chris for some remarks on the operations.