Mayville Engineering Company, Inc.

Hello, and welcome to today's Mayville Engineering Company fourth quarter and full year earnings call. My name is Bailey, and I will be the operator for today's call. All lines will be muted during the presentation portion of the call with an opportunity for questions and answers at the end. If you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad. I would now like to pass the conference over to Nathan Elwell, Investor Relations. Nathan, please go ahead.

Thank you, Bailey. Welcome, everyone, and thank you for joining us on today's call. A few quick items before we begin. First, please note that some of the information that you will hear during this call will consist of forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 as amended. Such statements express our expectations, anticipations, beliefs, estimates, intentions, plans, and forecasts. Because these forward-looking statements involve risks, assumptions, and uncertainties, Our actual results could differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. For more information regarding such risks and uncertainties, please see our filings with the SEC, including our filing on Form 10-K for the period ended December 31st, 2020. We assume no obligation and do not intend to update any such forward-looking statements except as required by federal security laws. Second, this call will involve discussion of certain non-GAAP financial measures Reconciliation of these measures to the closest gap financial measure is included in the earnings press release, which is available at metinc.com. Joining me on the call today are Bob Camphouse, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer, Todd Butts, Chief Financial Officer, and Ryan Raber, EVP of Strategy, Sales, and Marketing. First, Bob will provide an overview of our performance, then Todd will review our financial results and guidance. With that, I'll hand the call over to Bob. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Nathan. Good morning, everyone. Let's start with 2021. We've effectively executed throughout 21 and produced significantly better results than the previous year, despite the inflationary pressures and labor challenges that we all experienced, compounded by labor and supply chain disruptions affecting our customers' production schedules. As we look back at 2021, We are pleased with the way we navigated through these challenges and continue to see strong medium and long-term demand trends across all the end markets we serve. We have added new takeover business and new customers in the power sports end market. We look forward to delivering on the 2021 deferred customer volumes in 2022 and stand ready to successfully execute on the strong demand for our services for the current year and beyond. For the fourth quarter, we produced net sales of 113 million. The 19% increase of 17.7 million was primarily driven by contractual raw material prices and pass-throughs to customers, improved volumes, and commercial pricing increases. We delivered adjusted EBITDA of 9.2 million as supply chain disruptions impacted our customer schedules during the quarter and led to some of our volumes being deferred into 2022. Our fourth quarter performance internally was particularly impacted by significant supply changes at Class 8 truck OEMs, which stems from their supply chain issues and microchip shortages. For us, this also resulted in operational choppiness and inefficiencies impacting our profitability. As we navigated these challenges, it was important to maintain our skilled labor force so we are ready to address the strong demand as supply chain issues start to improve. Although recruiting quality employees remains a challenge, we have been able to cost-effectively grow our capacity through investments in flexible redeployable automation and process improvements. We also expect to recover general inflationary pressures on raw materials, labor, and other product content through contractual material price adjustments and increased commercial pricing. As volumes have only been deferred from 21, we are confident that our volumes will increase as the customer's supply chain issues start to subside during 2022. Additionally, MEC's supply chain is 98% concentrated in the U.S. We have maintained our supply of raw materials and components and are prepared to effectively execute as our customers step up their volumes. The end markets we serve continue to forecast strong demand outlooks over the mid and long term. More specifically, by market, the commercial vehicle market continues to show strong market demand but has seen the most impact from supply chain disruption, which is predicted to continue during 2022, particularly during the first half of the year. However, the ongoing strong freight demand and strong backlogs at the OEMs leads us to believe this will continue to be a strong market for MECC over the medium to long term. Turning to Power Sports, Power Sports continues to be a strong and growing end market for MEC with elevated volumes due to overall strength of retail demand for outdoor recreational products, coupled with low dealer inventories that we expect to be restocked over 2022. The construction and access end markets have continued to show strength in residential construction with non-res starting to see some signs of improvement. We believe that we'll continue to see further signs of volume improvement and with low dealer inventories, further demand requirements to restock fleets. The ag market continues to see low machine inventory and strengthening demand, advancements Equipment productivity combined with low global crop inventories and strong crop prices will continue to drive improving volumes over the mid to long term. Concluding with our military segment, which continues to be a stable market for us with customers having a solid backlog for U.S. government contracts, we continue to see potential for increased revenues due to vehicle updates plus new opportunities for service-related demand. While supply chain disruptions persist, pandemic-related problems have stabilized and declined somewhat and we anticipate volumes will gradually improve as 2022 progresses. Further, our new business pipeline remains very strong. We continue to build relationships and convert on new opportunities to expand our customer base and the markets we serve. During 2021, we expanded business opportunities with new and existing customers looking to expand capacity to support strong and market demands. These came through new product and new model launches, takeover business with several top power sports customers, aftermarket programs and new product line offerings by customers, as well as reshoring and outsourcing by OEMs. I'll walk through some of the more exciting and noteworthy opportunities we see today. The commercial vehicle market has continued to launch new products, which has led to market share gains for us. We have been focused on cross-selling our products during the model changeovers, and we expect to continue to grow as customers launch their next generation of products. The power sports market continues to be a very active space for us. We are growing our market share with current customers by adding new programs and with new and takeover programs with new customers, which has led to power sports accounting for 20% of our 2021 revenues. Our expansion in power sports means we now work with all the major players in the UTB power sports market. In the military and market, our market share on tactical wheeled vehicles continues to expand with our customers, launching their next generation of products, plus expansion in the service parts, demand, and new product development activities that have the potential to bolster revenues in the coming years. Overall, our new business pipeline remains robust, with numerous products being actively pursued We are excited about all of the avenues of growth with current and potential new customers and will keep you updated on the latest developments over the coming quarters. Turning to our fitness customer, as you probably saw on February 9th, we provided a business update which included commentary regarding our new customer in that fitness market. In that update, we noted that due to circumstances beyond our control, we would not go into production for this customer on the original planned date. We had, however, remained on track with the investment and build-out for this fitness customer and would have been ready to begin production when originally planned. As you saw in our earnings release from last night, there have been some new developments. On February 18th, we received an update from the customer which informed us that it does not forecast any demand for any products or parts that are subject to our agreement for the remainder of the agreement's term, which ends in March of 2026. Needless to say, we are disappointed with how this has unfolded in recent months. As such, we have taken and will continue to take steps to reduce operating costs and capital investments for this project where appropriate. From an accounting standpoint, this update also resulted in an impairment charge recorded in fourth quarter 2021 results of $16.9 million. Todd will be covering this topic in more detail in his segment. But it's important to reiterate that we remain confident in the protections provided by our agreement with the customer and will vigorously pursue this matter to ensure the terms are honored. Our new facility in Hazel Park, Michigan has other important activities going on beyond those related to the fitness customer. As mentioned in our last quarterly earnings call, we are putting in place additional state-of-the-art flexible redeployable automation and capacity to support the growth of our base business. We will be ramping up in the second half of this year and into 2023 to support meaningful volume from new projects and market growth with customers in the markets we already serve. Hazel Park will continue to be an important part of our future growth story. The location allows us to hire the technology-skilled workforce we need in an excellent location in southeast Michigan while leveraging our experience and world-class process know-how. and continuing to demonstrate MEK's agility, adaptability, and realignment for serving these market-leading customers. As we look further into 22 and beyond, we continue to see a good pipeline of M&A opportunities and focus on analyzing potential targets that could open new end markets, develop new relationships with potential new blue-chip customers, and possibly add new geographies. Strategic fit and rational valuation are the top considerations when considering opportunities, and we continue to review and pursue logical potential leads. In summary, our fourth quarter performance reflected the supply chain challenges faced by our customers, but we are seeing very positive demand signals across all end markets, and significant potential new business opportunities. And we will remain ready to increase our production volumes as needed. We've invested in the right technologies, facilities, and workforces that allow us to successfully address this demand. And our 2022 outlook, which Todd will talk through shortly, shows we are rapidly working back towards exceeding our record 2019 performance. I'd now like to turn the call over to Todd to discuss our financial results in more detail. Todd? Thanks, Bob. I'll begin with a look at our full-year financial performance and then discuss our fourth quarter before providing commentary on our balance sheet, liquidity, and thoughts on guidance. As we noted in our press release, we recorded full-year net sales of $454.8 million as compared to $357.6 million for the same prior year period. The 27% increase was driven by increased volume due to improved market conditions and commercial pricing increases implemented in the fourth quarter to combat inflationary pressures. These increases were slightly offset by customer supply chain issues and the timing lag related to contractual raw material pricing passages to our customers. Manufacturing margins were $51.4 million for the year ended December 31, 2021. as compared to $31.5 million for the same prior year period. The improvement of approximately 63% was primarily driven by production volume increases, higher scrap income, improved absorption of manufacturing overhead costs, as well as efficiencies gained from the closure of the Greenwood South Carolina facility in 2020. These favorable impacts were partially offset by the timing of raw material pricing passed through our customers and inflationary pressures on wages, benefits, materials, and other general manufacturing supplies during the year. Additionally, the company incurred approximately $2.9 million in launch costs and $700,000 in inventory write-offs related to decrement with the new fitness customer during 2021. The prior year period was impacted by customer shutdowns related to COVID-19 pandemic, along with lower demand related to stocking activities, particularly in the commercial vehicle, agricultural, construction and access equipment end markets. Manufactured margin percentages increased 250 basis points from 8.8% in 2020 to 11.3% for 2021, based upon improved operating conditions and other factors already mentioned. Profit-sharing, bonus, and deferred compensation expenses were $11.5 million for the year ended December 31, 2021, as compared to $8.3 million in the prior year. The increase of $3.2 million was principally driven by the return of normalized discretionary 401ks and bonus accruals as business activity and sales volumes improved in 2021. Other selling, general, and administrative expenses were $20.4 million for the year ended December 31, 2021, as compared to $19 million for the prior year, stemming from higher salary, travel, and entertainment expenses, which were artificially low in the prior year due to the pandemic. Inca tax benefit was $1.9 million on a pre-tax loss of $9.4 million for the full year 2021, as compared to a tax benefit of $2.1 million on a pre-tax loss of $9.2 million for the same prior year period. Our federal net operating loss to report was $18.5 million as of December 31, 2021. The NWEL does not expire and will be used to offset future pre-tax earnings. We continue to anticipate our long-term effective tax rate to be approximately 26% based on current tax regulations. 2021 adjusted EBITDA finished in line with our prior guidance at $46.2 million after adding back the recent impairment charge recorded in the fourth quarter and which was well above the prior year of $32.8 million. Adjusted EBITDA margin percent increased by 100 basis points to 10.2% in the current year. as compared to 9.2% for the same prior year period. Our adjusted even margin and margin percentages were favorably impacted by increased sales, but negatively impacted by the timing of raw material pricing pass-throughs, inflationary pressures, and loss loss in Hazel Park during the year. I will now provide an update on the financial performance of our fourth quarter. We recorded fourth quarter net sales of approximately $113 million, as compared to $95 million for the same prior year period. The 19% increase was primarily driven by contractual raw material pricing pass-throughs, improved volumes, and commercial price increases as compared to prior years. Manufacturing margins were $9.4 million for the fourth quarter of 2021 as compared to $11 million for the same prior year period. The decrease was driven by continued inflationary pressures along with the timing of contractual raw material price increases passed through to our customers in the current period. The company also incurred $2 million in launch costs and $700,000 in inventory write-offs related to the agreement with the new fitness customer during the fourth quarter. These items were moderately offset by increased production volume, commercial price increases, higher scrap income, and improved absorption of manufacturing overhead. Manufacturing margin percentages were 8.3% for the fourth quarter of 2021, as compared to 11.6% for the three months ended December 31st, 2020. Decline of 330 basis points. This decrease was due primarily to the timing of material price factors, launch and inventory costs related to the new Hazel Park facility, labor variances caused by production disruptions related to customer supply chain issues, and increases in the cost of labor. When the impact of these temporary items are removed, our normalized manufacturing margin percentage would have been 12.8%. Profit sharing, bonus, and deferred compensation expenses were $3.5 million for the fourth quarter of 2021, which was in line with the $3.4 million recorded for the same prior year period. Other selling, general, and administrative expenses were $5 million for the fourth quarter of 2021, as compared to $4.4 million for the same prior year period. The increase was principally attributed to higher salary, travel, and entertainment expenses, which were, again, artificially lower in the prior year due to the pandemic. Adjusted EBITDA after adding back the impairment finished at $9.2 million for the fourth quarter of 2021, as compared to $9.3 million for the same prior year period. Adjusted EBITDA margin percentage declined by 170 basis points to 8.1% in the quarter, as compared to 9.8% for the same prior year period. and represent a negative incremental margin of 1%. Again, if we remove the aforementioned temporary items, our adjusted EBITDA would have been approximately $12.5 million. Our incremental margins would have been in line with our historical averages of 22.5%. Now let me address our capital expenditures, balance sheet, and liquidity figures. Overall capital expenditures for 2021 were $39.3 million, as compared to $7.8 million during 2020. The increase is primarily due to the $19.7 million investment in the new Hazel Park facility, with the remainder being for the continued investment in technology and automation versus focusing on reserving cash flow during the height of the pandemic. As of the end of 2021, total outstanding debt, which includes bank debt and capital lease obligations, was $68.8 million. That's compared to $48 million at the end of 2020. The increase in debt relates to working capital increases due to rising steel prices, higher production levels, which have rebounded from the pandemic closing 2020, and increased capital expenditures related to the new Hazel Park facility. Turning to the impairment charge related to the fitness customer, given the recent communication from the customer that Bob outlined earlier, U.S. generally accepted accounting principles require us to assess whether the asset specifically purchased to meet obligations under the agreement with the customer were impaired. As a result, we recorded an impairment charge of $16.9 million. This impairment comprised $700,000 of inventory, which was recorded as the cost of goods sold, and $16.2 million of lethal improvements and equipment-related assets. Additionally, in accordance with U.S. GAAP, we have not met all the requirements at this point that are necessary to allow us to record a loss recovery or a gain contingency. It's important to reiterate that we remain confident in protections provided by our agreement with the customer and will vigorously pursue this matter to ensure that service are honored. Now I'd like to discuss 2022 guidance. As Bob stated earlier, although the supply chain uncertainty continues, we anticipate volumes will gradually improve as we go through 2022. Our new business pipeline remains strong as we continue to build relationships and convert on new opportunities with existing new and existing customers looking to expand capacity and support robust end-market demand. As a result of the end-market dynamics we currently expect, that sales between $480 million and $530 million will be generally stable in material pricing and adjusted EBITDA between $58 million and $70 million. Additionally, based on a recent event with our fitness customer, we are still assessing our full-year capital plan. and as such are not in a position to offer updated capital guidance for the year at this time. What we can say is that 2022 capital expenditures are expected to be above 2021 levels as we make the final payments for capital commitment previously made to meet contractual obligations related to our business customers, as well as our continued investment in new technology and automation for our base business. These items will enhance our production capabilities and allow us to take on more business in the years ahead. Please note this outlook assumes no revenues associated with our business customer and that our end markets remain stable. Supply chain constraints do not dramatically worsen and that business activity continues to trend positively. On a positive note, we do expect to return a record year of adjusted EBITDA performance in 2022. I will now turn the call back over to Bob. Thank you, Todd. With our solid balance sheet, ongoing operational improvements, solid customer relationships, favorable outsourcing and reshoring trends, and encouraging demand dynamics in the end markets we serve, we have a positive outlook. Our business model is strong, resilient, and agile. We are well positioned to execute our growth plans, which is demonstrated by the projected growth and record performance implied by our 2022 outlook. We believe our volumes will improve as the customer supply chain disruptions continue to subside and they work to meet the vigorous demand in their respective end markets, particularly in the second half of 2022. With that, operator, we'd like to open the calls for questions now.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad. If for any reason you would like to remove that question, please press star followed by two. As a reminder, if you are using a speakerphone, please remember to pick up your handset before asking your question. The first question today comes from Stephen Vulcan of Jefferies. Stephen, please go ahead. Your line is now open.

Great. Good morning, guys. Maybe my first question, maybe for Todd, is can you just Tell us, sorry if I missed this, it was a little hard to hear, but what was the difference in price versus volume in the fourth quarter?

Well, for the fourth quarter, we were impacted about, you know, about $400,000 when you think of material lag. We did have some commercial pricing activities that went into place during the fourth quarter that were a positive, but on the flip side, you know, those came in mid-quarter, And so we did have some inflationary pressures when you think of supplies, wages, benefits, and things of that nature that increased as well. So really, when you look at it, volumes were better than the fourth quarter, even if you strip out versus the prior year, even if you strip out the material pass-through. But again, we did have a little bit of a lag on the timing of commercial pricing and a little bit on the material pass-through. And I think the choppiness of the quarter and the commercial vehicle market also didn't help our performance.

Okay, right. I was just trying to kind of think about how much price kind of continues to help us in 22 from a top-line perspective. But maybe that's enough so I can back into it. Can you talk a little bit about the cadence of 22 in your plan? Like, is each quarter a little better than the last one from a revenue and profit perspective, or is there some other different seasonality that you view?

Well, what we can say is, you know, we come into the first quarter, you know, the markets we assume will be a little more robust than the way they finished in the fourth quarter. We're optimistic that supply chain issues will continue to get better. As you look at the rest of the year, We do expect to see, you know, second quarter with a little bit of lift, third quarter as well as the market continues to hopefully improve and the demand remains robust like it is today. And then with fourth quarter, just because of timing of days, you know, the shutdowns that are typically, you know, planned by our customers, we would expect fourth quarter to be down slightly. We think of seasonality. But otherwise, really, we come out of the first quarter, you know, probably in that 8% higher in volumes. And then we kind of stay low. We go up a little bit modestly, you know, progress during the year and then a little bit of a downturn in the fourth quarter.

Okay. All right. That's helpful. Thanks. And then my final one, I'll pass it on, is can you say anything more about the protections and recoveries that you've mentioned a couple times relative to Hazel Park and this customer that is not going to end up buying anything? And I guess I'm trying to figure out, like, you know, what types of, you know, is it like they reimburse you for some of the equipment or something or part of the building or, you know, just any color on what that might look like? And related is, is this one of those things that's going to drag out for like years? Or do you think that this is something that we can kind of wrap up at some point in 2022?

I'll answer a question on 2022 first. I believe that it will be resolved this year. But I also, obviously, we'll be in the midst of discussions with that customer. It's new news. And so new discussions taking place. But we are confident in our contract and how it protects us. So I think we have to leave it at that at this point.

Okay, thank you.

You're welcome.

Thank you, Stephen. The next question today comes from Mig Dobro from Baird. Mig, please go ahead. Your line is now open.

Good morning, everyone. Thanks for the time here. I guess I want to follow up on Steve's question. Hello. Follow up on Steve's question on the cadence of the year, and I just want to clarify here that you expect revenue to be up sequentially in Q1 relative to Q4? So you think you're going to be able to ramp production in Q1? And then, you know, also, how should we think about manufacturing margins in Q1 relative to Q4?

Well, we do expect to see improvements on that front, beginning right away in the first quarter now. It won't be... put an end to the commercial pricing activity in fourth quarter. So, as we begin the year, a lot of those inflationary things are neutral, let's call it. But, you know, we do have the material lag, meaning we purchase, you know, items during the fourth quarter at a higher steel price. As we kind of work through that inventory in the first quarter, there could be a little bit of a, you know, lag, let's say, or drag a little bit on the manufacturing margin. But I do expect, even with that, we would have improvement over the fourth quarter And as we progress throughout the year, we would expect to see that generally increase sequentially throughout the year and improve.

Okay. You know, you obviously separated commercial pricing from the material sort of pass-throughs. Can you give us a sense for what is going on with commercial pricing and how are those actions relative to the inflationary pressures that you're seeing in your business, whether it's wages or really anything else that you have to deal with?

So as I mentioned, in the fourth quarter, you know, Brian and his team implemented pricing strategies with our customers that really made up for a lot of those inflationary pressures. So as we look into 22, you know, today as we stand, assuming that, you know, when you can say it's generally stable, doesn't increase quite dramatically from this point, we should be covered in all of our commercial pricing activities for this year. And so I feel very good about those activities. Now, the material pass-through, that is, again, net neutral to EBITDA. It has a little bit of impact on the EBITDA and margin percentages. As steel prices hopefully decline this year, We shouldn't see the inverse of that. We should see positive news coming on the P&L in dollars as well as seeing that percentage increase. But that can drive the volumes to change a little bit. Even at our current guidance, if you take all of the material pass-through, we're still beneath 2019 production level when you think of the piece part level, right? The number of units we're producing, but yet you can see that we're returning a much improved bottom line. So I think a lot of the things we put in place in 2019 are operating effectively. We just got to get rid of some of the choppiness and get stable material pricing and see if inflationary pressures kind of subside a bit.

Okay. My final question is on the Hazel Park facility. It sounds like you're continuing to invest. I mean, you're not providing a... official capex guide for 22, but it sounds like you're continuing to do things in Hazel Park. And I'm kind of curious, with this customer being essentially out of the picture, this facility was sort of meant to serve them. How are you thinking about what the purpose of this facility is going to be longer term? And what sort of business is available to you within that southeastern Michigan area or customers that that you're pursuing to kind of start filling in whatever volume this facility is going to need if you're going to keep it and operate it?

I guess when we look at Hazel Park, we see a really good workforce. We see higher technology equipment on average compared to other facilities. We do have the market growth within our current customer group and market served to support a very nice growth level at that facility. Will we need all of that space? We'll be studying that and likely have some subleasing for a period of time, but that space will ultimately, I hope, allow us to even grow back and further than what we initially think here. but likely we'll be looking for other things going into this, like subletting part of that space.

I'm just curious, Bob, because you've spoken in the past about how you're locating these facilities strategically around customers, right? Because transportation of your product and freight and so on, that's a kind of strategic consideration in terms of where you're placing these facilities. And when I look at Southeast Michigan, I think automotive, right? So I'm kind of curious, are you sort of trying to pursue some of that automotive business or is there something else that you're seeing in that area that is more consistent with the end markets that you're serving today? That's it.

No, I guess logistically we have customers in Ohio, Iowa, Illinois, and the logistics from that site is not all that different on the logistics from where we are in Wisconsin. So we have spoken with our customers about these changes and these opportunities, and I think they're excited as well.

Okay, thank you.

You're welcome. Thank you, Meg. The next question today comes from Andy Kapowitz from Citigroup. Andy, please go ahead. Your line is now open. Good morning, everyone.

Good morning, Andy. Good morning. Bob, give us a breakdown of your major end markets and what you thought they would be at the end of 21, I think in that early February release. As you think about the low-teens revenue growth forecast you have for 22, would you expect the sales breakdown of any of your end markets to change significantly, meaning that you see one or multiple end markets going faster or slower than the rest?

Yeah, I'm going to ask Ryan to answer that question. done the math.

Yeah, I would say that at a macro level, Andy, nothing significant shifting year over year. We obviously see the greatest strength in commercial truck as well as construction and access. So as bottlenecks kind of get loosened up on the supply chain, there was pent-up demand for commercial vehicle that looks good for a 22 and then honestly carries into some pretty strong 2023 industry forecasts. Year-over-year access was still pretty depressed. You know, looking back into 2020, that was large growth in 21 in the fourth quarter and expected to continue to strengthen through the year, especially as non-res and some of the infrastructure stuff picks up as well. And our power sports market, you know, we expect that to continue to have constraints at the the dealer side just with the ability of the OEs to produce, but eventually there's going to be some good demand for restocking in addition to the strong retail backdrop that's already out there.

Ryan, that's good color. I appreciate it. Maybe a different way to ask the question also is, Ryan or Bob, you've got these initiatives that you've been working on, new products. Obviously, there's some restoring going on. if you think about sort of market growth versus your market share, and again, I look at that low teens, you know, forecast for 22, how much of that growth do you think is coming either from new customers or existing customers that are sort of expanding their businesses, whether it's reshoring or something else?

Yeah. I mean, I think a lot of it is existing customer expansion. We've seen really over the last year, Andy, some pretty significant model introductions and share gains, uh, For us that have occurred, we have had, as we noted, some nice wins, particularly in the power sports market, adding new customers into the mix to kind of fill out the portfolio of those we're serving. The reshoring activities and customer outsourcing, we do have some great projects that are in the quote phase and with where we're at today, maybe revenues late in the year, but A lot of the things we're working on right now that are more strategic and larger in nature would probably not lead to any real material revenues until we get into 2023. Thanks.

And then for the last question, Todd, just any more color you can give us on how to think about cash flow in 2022? I know you said we can't pin down exact capital expenditures to be higher than 2021, but maybe talk about working capital a little bit and what you see there and or if they have peak headwinds around supply chain, you know, having to keep working capital higher, they start to subside at all.

Yes, certainly, Andy. It's hard for me to comment too much on pre-cash flow yet until we've kind of, you know, finalized our plans on the capital. But I can talk about the fact that, you know, certainly in 21 working capital with rising steel prices, you know, it was a bit of a detriment to our cash flow. And as we begin this year, you know, prices are modestly coming down. We expect that to continue as supply chain hopefully stabilizes and our production, you know, schedules from our customers become more normalized. I would expect to see the flow of our inventory and our terms vastly improve this year. And just that in itself can lead to a nice, you know, boon for us when we think of free capital generation. And really, I think that will be a favorable position for this year, you know, offset by that will be what we end up spending in capital for the future. So in general, more to come on that, I guess, as we finalize the plan. I think as we complete that capital rollout, we'll certainly update you when that's complete. And with that, I can provide a little better color around free cash flow over the year.

Appreciate the color. Thank you, Andy. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad. The next question today comes from Larry DeMaria from William Blair. Larry, please go ahead. Your line is now open.

Thanks. Good morning. I know you don't want to touch too much on the financials, etc., on the investments. But with regards to recourse, are we, you know, just to level set to people understanding, are we talking about going after the $40 million that was planned expense or what was written off in the last quarter? Can you just kind of level set with what expectations should be?

Yeah, I think, Larry, with the impairment charge that was put together, things were considered around... whether there was specific use assets for the customer that they should be reimbursing us for with a return on that product. Also, we have commitments that we've made, whether it's facilities or people that need to help mitigate these costs. So it's all things you can think of that go into running a business, and the things that we believe they will have responsibilities for is how you do that evaluation. Beyond that, that's the GAAP accounting side of it. Then there's the contract side of it regarding what they pay for and what they've already agreed to pay for. So we're going to enforce that and it would appear that they're going to work with us on that. But we have to wait until that all gets resolved.

Okay, that's helpful. Thanks for that, Bob. Now, ultimately, to Hazel Park, just to clarify, is there any speculative equipment going in there to build it and they will come, or is this all, at this point, contracted?

The capacity is spoken for, I'll say. As we develop that and even with the investments that will take place this year as well as in the next year likely, the markets are in good shape and we have opportunities to fill that and beyond even. So we're optimistic about it. We're going to be very thoughtful in how we do that with regard to starting a little slower and freeing up capacities at other locations that have more complex capabilities. So we're going to be thoughtful around that and make sure that we're optimizing the business.

Okay, thanks. And the last one is related to capacity utilization. Maybe we can level set there as well. I know you guys may be thinking about it differently in terms of labor, et cetera, but now that we have a new facility and all this great footage, How do you think about capacity utilization and maybe how it ended up at 4Q and maybe where it should be at the end of the year?

Larry, we're having a little trouble hearing you. Maybe you could repeat the last part of that question.

Okay, thanks. I was just trying to understand capacity utilization with the new facility. Where was it year end and where do you expect it to be at year end 2022?

Well, obviously there won't be a fitness company capacity there, and it will be in capacities that are already in the areas that we know very well. So that will be a little bit of a shift in technology, but it will be dedicated largely to what we already have for customers and in the markets that we're already serving.

Okay, thanks. I'll take it offline. Good luck.

Thank you.

Thank you, Larry. There are no further questions waiting at the moment, so I'd like to pass the conference back over to Bob Camphouse, Chairman, President, and CEO. Bob, please go ahead.

Okay. Well, thank you, everyone, for your time today and your continued interest in Mac. We'll be keeping you updated as things develop and the business continues to grow. Thanks for your time.

That concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines.