Hubbell Inc

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Hubbell Incorporated Second Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in the listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 11 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star 11 again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Dan Ennamorato, Vice President, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thanks, Shannon. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. Earlier this morning, we issued a press release announcing our results for the second quarter of 2024. The press release and slides are posted to the investor section of our website at hubble.com. Joined today by our Chairman, President, and CEO, Gerben Bacher, and our Executive Vice President, CFO, Bill Sperry. Please note our comments this morning may include statements related to the expected future results of our company. and our forward-looking statements as defined by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Please note the discussion of forward-looking statements in our press release and consider it incorporated by reference to this call. Additionally, comments may also include non-GAAP financial measures. Those measures are reconciled to the comparable GAAP measures that are included in the press release and slides. Now, let me turn the call over to Gervin. Great.

Thanks, Dan. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us to discuss Hubble's second quarter 2024 results. Hubbell delivered strong operating performance in the quarter, generating 8% year-over-year adjusted operating profit growth and 40 basis points of adjusted operating margin expansion, along with 7% year-over-year growth in adjusted earnings per share and free cash flow. Given our first half performance and continued visibility into the second half, we are raising our 2024 outlook this morning, and are confident in our ability to deliver double-digit adjusted operating profit growth on a full year basis. Performance in the quarter was highlighted by strong organic growth and margin expansion in the electrical solutions, where robust project activity drove strong growth in data center and renewables markets, and where our vertical market strategy is uniquely positioning Hubbell to serve the needs of our customers. As we highlighted at our investor day in June, HES is executing on two strategic focus areas to compete collectively in high-growth verticals while also simplifying our business to drive productivity and operating efficiencies. We are making good progress on both of these initiatives, and we also continue to benefit from our portfolio transformation efforts, which align the segment to structurally higher growth and margins over the long term. In utility solutions, while we continue to be impacted by weak telecom markets and to a lesser extent customer inventory normalization in utility distribution market as anticipated, T&D and market demand remains strong. Transmission and substation markets achieved robust double-digit growth in the quarter as utility customers invest in upgrading the grid infrastructure to interconnect new sources of renewable generation with load growth from data centers and other electrical applications. As we highlighted to you last month, our leadership across T&D markets and strong relationships with utility customers uniquely positions Hubble for sustained outperformance over an attractive long-term utility investment cycle as grid modernization and electrification megatrends accelerate. Operationally, we drove positive price-cost productivity across both segments, while continuing to invest in capacity and productivity initiatives, including another quarter of higher year-over-year restructuring and related investments. Overall, we are pleased with our operating performance in the quarter. Even while absorbing pockets of challenges in certain large, high-margin businesses, Hubbell is proving the ability to compound off of recent outperformance. This is a testament to the quality of our portfolio the attractiveness of secular trends we are exposed to, and the strength of our people and operating model. With that, let me now turn it over to Bill.