Vertiv Holdings

Good morning. My name is Daisy and I'll be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to Vertiv's first quarter 2023 earnings conference call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. Please note this call is being recorded. I would now like to turn the program over to your host for today's conference call, Lynne McFerner, Vice President of Investor Relations to begin. So Lynne, please go ahead.

Great, thank you. And good morning and welcome to Virta's first quarter 2023 earnings conference call. Joining me today are Virta's Executive Chairman, Dave Cody, Chief Executive Officer, Giordano Albertazzi, and Chief Financial Officer, David Fallon. Before we begin, I'd like to point out that during the course of this call, we will make forward-looking statements regarding future events, including the future financial and operating performance of Virta. These forward-looking statements are subject to material risk and uncertainties, that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. We refer you to the cautionary language included in today's earnings release, and you can learn more about these risks in our annual and quarterly reports and other filings made with the SEC. Any forward-looking statements that we make today are based on assumptions that we believe to be reasonable as of this date. We undertake no obligation to update these statements as a result of new information or future events. During this call, we will also present both GAAP and non-GAAP financial measures Our gap results and gap to non-gap reconciliations can be found in our earnings press release and in the investor slide deck found on our website at investors.vertive.com. With that, I'll turn the call over to Executive Chairman Dave Cody.

Well, it's one hell of a debut for our new CEO's first quarter, isn't it? I am very pleased with the results we've delivered in the first quarter and our ongoing progress. GEO's first quarter as CEO is under his belt, and his operational focus on delivering results and creating a high-performance culture is particularly noticeable, especially in the Americas. We over-delivered in the first quarter compared to guidance, and we increased the midpoint of our AOP guidance by $25 million, and cash flow was terrific. We entered the year with a very strong backlog. We were able to secure needed parts. and we had capacity in place to deliver a high Q1 sales level. Order rates will be another metric that looks different this year. Gio has some detail and has prepared remarks to explain that. We are constantly focused on the orders rate, and we are encouraged both by the pipeline activity and the pace of investment in our end markets. I've said this for a number of years. There is a true secular growth story at Vertiv, and the work we have done positioning the company for growth and being able to leverage that growth in a meaningful way by getting after margin opportunities while still protecting growth investment makes Vertiv uniquely positioned to create substantial value in the years ahead. It is what attracted me to this asset four years ago, and I'm even more excited today with the runway ahead. So with that, I'll turn the call over to Gio.