Neo Performance Materials Inc.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to Neo Performance Materials' first quarter 2020 earnings announcement. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. To ask a question during the session, you'll need to press star 1 on your telephone. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. If you require any further assistance, please press star 0. I would now like to hand the conference over to your first speaker today, Ali Madhavi, Capital Markets and Investment Relations, Thank you. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Operator. Good morning, everyone. Apologies for starting a few minutes late. As a reminder, today's call is being recorded, and a replay will be available starting tomorrow in the Investor Center on our website at neomaterials.com. Speaking first today will be NEO's President and CEO, Jeff Bedford. Following Jeff's commentary, NEO's CFO, Rayne Sullivan, will review the company's financial performance during the first quarter. Then we will open the call to questions from analysts. Please note that some of the information you will hear during today's presentation and discussion will consist of forward-looking statements including, without limitation, those regarding revenue, EBITDA, and adjusted EBITDA, product volumes, gross margin, other income and expense measures, ROCE, cash returns, and future business outlook. Actual results or trends could differ materially from those discussed today. For more information, please refer to the risk factors discussed in NEO's most recent financial filings, which were filed on CDAR earlier today and are also available on our website. NEO assumes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements or information, which speak as of their respective dates. Financial amounts presented today will be in U.S. dollars. Non-IFRS financial measures will be used during this conference call. Further information regarding NEO's use of non-IFRS measures is available in NEO's Q1 2020 earnings press release, which is available on CDAR and on our website at neomaterials.com. Let me now turn the call over to Jeff Bedford for opening remarks. Jeff?

Thanks, Ali. Good morning, everyone. While the first quarter of this year was impacted by slower economic activity, primarily in China and primarily due to the COVID-19 pandemic, NIO was able to generate consolidated revenue of $90.7 million, with adjusted EBITDA of $9.6 million. Importantly, in this current economic environment, our balance sheet remains strong, closing the quarter with $76 million in cash and cash equivalents and minimal debt. Nearly all markets in the advanced materials space and the vast majority of our customers' industries have been impacted by the pandemic. Fortunately, NIO's strong and flexible economic model positions us well for the uncertainty ahead. Let me first express on today's call how extraordinarily proud I am of the job that NEO team members around the world have done in managing through this pandemic thus far. Protecting the health and safety of our team members and their families has always been a priority at NEO, and our teams embrace this culture. In response to the coronavirus, we very quickly adopted and shared best practice globally, and we've deployed precautionary health and safety protocols. At all our manufacturing facilities across our global footprint, we instituted strict measures, including mandated infrared temperature screening for all employees and visitors, full-time use of masks, strong restrictions on visitors entering the facility, anti-epidemic and personal hygiene training, quarantine precautions for people who are not feeling well who have just traveled, innovative social distancing precautions, and planned disinfection protocols. In addition to suspending all non-essential travel, we also shifted operations at our office locations to 100% remote work. Neo employees around the world stepped up and went the extra mile. And as a result of the measures taken, we're able to keep our employees safe and keep our manufacturing facilities operational to meet the needs of our customers. We expect we'll be facing extraordinary pressures through the remainder of the year. Many of these market demand forces are out of our control. What is in our control is our ability to maintain a disciplined approach to all daily operations and to deliberately utilize our balance sheet and manage our capital to emerge at the top of the industry when markets and the global economy rebound as they undoubtedly will. Our cash position remains strong and we continue to focus on returning significant capital back to our shareholders. 74.8 million of net cash we reported at the close of the quarter included returning 2.8 million in dividends to shareholders, $2.3 million to non-controlling interest partners, and repurchasing $1 million of stock under our NCID program. Let me be clear. We fully anticipate significant volatility in our markets for the balance of this year. We also feel confident in our ability to maintain our approach to capital allocation. NEO has a strong balance sheet and no material debt. Our economic model and operational discipline helps to deliver robust free cash flow conversions particularly as we developed global manufacturing operations in low-cost jurisdictions. That allows us to remain focused on strategic, long-term execution of our business plan, even during this pandemic. It also positions us to keep a close eye on potential growth opportunities that may avail themselves. The global pandemic has impacted daily life in nearly every corner of the world. What we knew two months ago and discussed in our year-end call was that our visibility into this year would be limited to say the least. True to form, our customer's outlook continue to evolve on an almost weekly basis. We're all reading the same headlines, particularly those related to automotive OEM sales slowdowns, auto production rates shuttering to near zero in recent months in certain geographies, and a decline in air travel. The disruption to markets for these products and services is impacting all segments of the supply chain. Raw material suppliers, to value-added material processors like NEO, to OEM manufacturers, to retail consumers. This is an unprecedented set of market conditions. However, long-term drivers within our customers' industries for lower emissions and novel uses of materials to improve productivity are not being shelved. We fully expect market demand for advanced materials that enable sustainable technologies will continue to grow, as it has for the past several decades. End market demand for applications that reduced air and water pollution is strong and will continue to accelerate in our view. Government regulations and performance mandates aimed at increasing sustainability and reducing pollution are almost certain to continue to expand. NEO is prepared to meet that growing demand. Our innovative advanced materials help control vehicle emissions, increase fuel economy and surface and air transportation systems, capture pollutants in wastewater treatment plants, and reduce energy consumption in home appliances and factory assembly lines. Because of their ability to increase and enhance sustainability throughout the economy and help protect the quality of our environment, we see these as very good long-term growth markets. If anything, a crisis like this highlights why advanced industrial materials and the powerful benefits they can deliver to society are needed. Across each of our business units, we are looking for new applications and opportunities for our materials as a result of the immediate and longer-term impact of COVID. We have a long history of being able to employ our expertise and innovation in performance materials and help apply them in novel applications, almost always in close coordination with our customers. Of course, in times like this, a disciplined approach to operations is needed to ensure we maintain a position of strength in the face of headwinds. Over the past eight weeks, we have been actively taking steps to right-size production plans as needed, reduce our overhead spending, manage working capital, and re-examine our growth capital plan. We continue to maintain regular communications with our consumers and have been able to commit to serve their needs in an uncertain environment. We have seen some minor interruptions in obtaining raw materials, and we continue to monitor our key suppliers closely. But to date, these have been isolated and temporary occurrences. Investors have heard me say this before, and it bears repeating. NEO's strategic approach has been to focus on doing three things better than anyone else in the advanced materials space. First, build world-class technical know-how. Second, maintain strong and long-lasting customer relationships and development partnerships. And third, invest in the global cost-competitive manufacturing footprint. NEO's business model is one that has successfully weathered many downturns over the past 25-plus years. While the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic may have been larger than many forecasts, the NEO team has been through such trying times before. Each time, we have emerged a stronger and more resilient company. I fully expect that will be the case following this pandemic. With that, let me turn it over to Rahim to go over the details of our first quarter results, and then we'll open the call to questions. Rahim.