JBT Marel Corporation

At this time, all lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, again, press star and one. I'll now turn the call over to JBT Morrell, Senior Director of Investor Relations, Marlee Spangler, to begin today's conference.

Thank you, Bailey. Welcome, everyone, and thank you for joining our conference call. With me on the call today is our Chief Executive Officer, Brian Deck, President Arne Sigurdsson, and Chief Financial Officer, Matt Meister. In today's call, we will use forward-looking statements that are subject to the Safe Harbor language in today's press release and 8-K filing. JBT-MARL's periodic SEC filings also contain information regarding risk factors that may have an impact on our results. These documents are available in the investor relations section of our website. Also, our discussion today includes references to certain non-GAAP measures. A reconciliation of these measures to the most comparable GAAP measures can be found in the investor relations section of our website. With that, I'll turn the call over to Brian.

Thanks, Marlee. We are very pleased with JBT Morrell's performance in the first quarter, highlighted by better than anticipated revenue, adjusted EBITDA, and margins versus our guidance. We also enjoyed strong year-over-year improvement in margins and orders. Our top line benefited from strength in recurring revenue as well as solid operational execution on the equipment side. In terms of our margin performance, we enjoyed the flow through from the higher volume and good expense control. We were equally pleased with the order flow with another solid quarter of demand up 12% year over year following record fourth quarter levels. We experienced increased demand from the poultry industry continuing a recovery we enjoyed over the last few quarters as we benefit from the industry's robust fundamentals. We also benefited from our diversified end market participation with healthy orders in meat, beverage, pharma, and pet food. In terms of geography, we saw fairly broad base strength across global regions. While we are excited about the financial performance and the continued order strength, We are even more enthused about the company we have created as JBT Murrell, highlighted by our more comprehensive product offerings, enhanced service capabilities, increased scale, and even greater value proposition in our customer partnerships. On the integration front, we are making excellent progress. Arne will provide some color on that in a few moments. We understand that the impact of U.S. tariff policy and the macroeconomic uncertainty it has created is top of mind for investors. While the situation is fluid, we believe in the short term, J.B. Timorel is at least as well positioned to manage the near term impacts as our peers. On an intermediate to longer term basis, we believe that we are in better position given our global footprint and available capacity in the U.S., Europe, Brazil that provides the flexibility to reposition where we assemble equipment and source and manufacture parts. However, any long-term actions involve time and resources to implement and therefore require more clarity on the trade environment. As you read in our earnings release, we have temporarily suspended our full-year financial guidance and moved to providing second quarter guidance only. While our first quarter results and second quarter guidance reflect the company's strong competitive position, healthy end markets, and good execution, we have less visibility for the back half of the year due to the difficult predicting the potential impact of slower economic growth, higher prices, and uncertainty on our customers' investment decisions. While we have not seen widespread changes in customer behavior to date, we have had a handful of lost or delayed orders. We are monitoring customer behavior closely as the spectrum of tariffs becomes real and as uncertainty continues, including reciprocal tariffs and how that manifests to changes in order flow. As we get greater certainty on tariff rates, especially as they impact the European Union, we hope to reinstate full-year guidance. On the cost side, we have done a thorough analysis of the geographic origins of equipment and components, calculating the impact of today's tariff rates on cost of goods sold. We currently estimate the annualized cost impact of approximately $50 to $60 million or $12 to $15 million per quarter before any mitigating actions. This includes costs associated with buying parts, as well as the higher cost of importing equipment manufacturing at JBT Morrell non-U.S. sites to serve our U.S. customers. Of course, we are taking actions to mitigate the impact of tariffs as we look to secure concessions from suppliers and implement select pricing actions. Given the timing of tariff enactment, our inventory on hand and our mitigating actions For the remainder of 2025, we believe the negative cost impact of 12 to 15 per quarter could be reduced by more than half. While we look for greater clarity in the macroeconomic environment, the fact that roughly half of JBT Morrell's top line comes from resilient recurring revenue is a particular asset to our business in uncertain times. Looking past tariffs, We are more confident than ever in the benefits of the JBT Morel combination and our ability to better collaborate with our customers on the commercial side, capture cost synergies, and bring even greater value to our customers as we transform the future of food. Now, let me turn the call to Arne to discuss our integration progress.