Mettler-Toledo International, Inc.

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the third quarter 2020 Medway Toledo International Earnings Conference call. My name is Jamaria, and I will be your audio coordinator for today. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1 in your telephone. I would now like to turn our presentation over to your hostess for today's call, Ms. Mary Finnegan. Please proceed, ma'am.

Thank you, and good evening, everyone. I'm Mary Finnegan. I'm responsible for investor relations at Mettler Toledo and happy that you're joining us. I'm on the call today with Olivier Filio, our CEO, and Sean Videla, our chief financial officer. Let me cover just a couple of financial or administrative matters. This call is being webcast and is available on our website. a copy of the press release and the presentation is also available on our website. Let me summarize the Safe Harbor language which is outlined on page two of the presentation. Statements in this presentation which are not historical facts constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the U.S. Securities Act of 1933 and the U.S. Securities Exchange Act of 1934. These statements involve risks uncertainties, and other factors that may cause our actual results, level of activity, performance, or achievements to be materially different from those expressed or implied by any forward-looking statements. For a discussion of these risks and uncertainties, please see our recent Form 10-K and other reports filed with the SEC from time to time. All of our forward-looking statements are qualified in their entirety by reference to the factors discussed under the captions, factors affecting our future operating results, and in the business and management discussion and analysis of financial condition and results of operations sections of our filings. Just one other item. On today's call, we may use non-GAAP financial measures. More detailed information with respect to the use of and the differences between non-GAAP financial measures and the most directly comparable gap measure is provided in our form 8K. Let me now turn the call over to Olivier.

Thank you, Mary, and good evening, everyone. I hope this continues to find you safe and well. I'm calling in from Switzerland tonight while Sean and Mary are in Columbus, Ohio. I will start with the summary of the quarter, and then Sean will provide details on our financials. I will then add some additional comments and we will open the lines for Q&A. The highlights for the quarter are on page 3 of the presentation. Local currency sales increased 6% in the third quarter, which was much better than we expected. Demand in our end markets continues to be negatively impacted by COVID-19. However, we had excellent growth in China and the performance of our lab business was very strong. With our strong product portfolio and innovative sales and marketing strategies, which we have successfully adapted to the challenges of this new environment, we believe we are gaining share. We have very strong growth in operating margins due to the benefits of some of our temporary cost action, as well as our ongoing margin and productivity initiatives. Growth in adjusted EPS and cash flow was excellent in the quarter. Overall, we are very pleased with our performance in the quarter given all the ongoing challenges of COVID. As we look to finish this year and into next year, we remain cautious on the global economy. The impact of COVID on different regions of the world continues to evolve and change quickly, and the ultimate repercussions to the global economy are still to be determined. Our strategy is to remain focused on those items we can control, namely keep our employees safe and continue to serve our customers, the majority of which are in essential end markets of life sciences and food manufacturing. We have been successful in continuing to launch new products while at the same time ensuring our go-to-market approach is most effective given current customer dynamics. Our adjusted go-to-market model and full leverage of Spinnaker have proved to be exceptionally powerful in this environment. This includes incorporating digital tools and techniques to engage with customers in remote settings. Versus our darkest competition, We believe this has provided a very strong advantage and has reinforced the leadership positions that we hold in the vast majority of our product lines. Based on market conditions today, we believe we can continue to gain share and deliver solid results in 2020 and 2021. I will have some additional comments on this topic shortly, but let me first turn it to Sean to cover the financials.