Textron Q1 2023 Earnings Results & Report

Textron EPS Results

• Actual EPS: $1.05
• Consensus EPS: $0.95
• Beat/Miss: Beat by +$0.10
• One Year Ago EPS: $0.88
• EPS Beat Rate: 7 of last 8 quarters

Textron Revenue Results

• Actual Revenue: $3.02 billion
• Expected Revenue: $3.11 billion
• Beat/Miss: Missed by -$87.47 million
• YoY Revenue Growth: +0.80%

Textron (NYSE:TXT) (NYSE:TXT) is a diversified industrial company that develops and manufactures aircraft, helicopters, specialized vehicles, defense systems and other industrial products. Founded in 1923 by Royal Little, the company has grown through the development and acquisition of businesses serving commercial, government and consumer markets.

Textron Aviation produces business jets, turboprop aircraft and general aviation aircraft under the Cessna and Beechcraft brands. Bell designs and manufactures military and commercial helicopters, tiltrotor aircraft and related support services. Textron Systems provides unmanned aircraft, electronic systems, precision weapons and other defense and security technologies.

Through its industrial businesses, Textron also manufactures vehicles and equipment used in golf, recreation, turf maintenance and other specialized applications. Its brands and businesses include E-Z-GO, Jacobsen and Arctic Cat, among others. Textron serves customers in the United States and international markets, with products and services sold across North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, the Middle East and other regions.

Textron Q1 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Key Takeaways

• Aviation backlog growth: Backlog rose by $136 million to $6.5 billion in Q1, highlighted by a U.S. Navy contract award for 10 King Air 260 aircraft (with options for up to 64).
• Bell transition and FLRAA award: Appointed Lisa Atherton as CEO and saw the FLRAA protest denial secure the program, positioning Bell for revenue growth despite lower-margin development work.
• Industrial segment momentum: Q1 revenues up 11% to $932 million, driven by strong demand and pricing for Specialized Vehicles’ lithium products and the first order for a pentatonic composite skid plate for EV battery protection.
• Textron Systems wins: Delivered higher revenues and margins, was down­selected for the Army’s Future Tactical UAS (increment 2) and delivered the 7th craft under the U.S. Navy’s Ship-to-Shore Connector program.
• Strong capital return and guidance: Repurchased 5.2 million shares ($377 million) in Q1 and reiterated full-year targets of $5.00–$5.20 adjusted EPS and $900 million–$1 billion in manufacturing cash flow before pension contributions.

Presentation

[Operator]

Thank you for standing by and welcome to the Q1 2023 Textron Earnings Release Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question-and-answer session. If you wish to ask a question, please press one, then zero on your telephone keypad. You may withdraw your question at any time by repeating the one, then zero command. If you should require assistance during the call, please press star then zero. As a reminder, today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to your host, Mr. Eric Salander, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, sir.

[Eric Salander, VP of Investor Relations at Textron]

Thanks, Bradley, and good morning, everyone. Before we begin, I'd like to mention we will be discussing future estimates and expectations during our call today. These forward-looking statements are subject to various risk factors, which are detailed in our SEC filings and also in today's press release. On the call today, we have Scott Donnelly, Textron's Chairman and CEO, and Frank Connor, our Chief Financial Officer. Our earnings call presentation can be found in the Investor Relations section of our website. Revenues in the quarter were $3 billion, up $23 million from last year's first quarter. Segment profit in the quarter was $259 million, down $18 million from the first quarter of 2022. During this year's first quarter, we reported net income of $0.92 per share.

[Eric Salander, VP of Investor Relations at Textron]

Adjusted net income, a non-GAAP measure, was $1.05 per share compared to $0.97 per share in last year's first quarter. Manufacturing cash flow before pension contributions, a non-GAAP measure, totaled $104 million in the quarter compared to $209 million in the first quarter of 2022. With that, I'll turn the call over to Scott.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Thanks, Eric. Good morning, everyone. We had a solid first quarter. Revenues up aviation, industrial, and systems, largely offset by lower revenues at Bell, consistent with our expectations. At aviation in the quarter, we delivered 35 jets, down from 39 last year, and 34 commercial turboprops, up from 31 in last year's first quarter. Aviation continued to see solid demand across jet and turboprop products. Backlog grew $136 million, ending the first quarter at $6.5 billion. In the quarter, aviation received an initial award on the U.S. Navy Multi-Engine Training System contract for 10 King Air 260 aircraft and associated support equipment. This contract includes options for up to 64 aircraft with deliveries in 2024 through 2026.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Textron Aviation's fleet utilization remained strong in the quarter, contributing to aftermarket revenue growth of 9% as compared to last year's first quarter. Moving to Bell, we announced the appointment of Lisa Atherton as the CEO, succeeding Mitch Snyder, who will retire at the end of April. Lisa returned to Bell in January after more than five years as the President and CEO of Textron Systems. She's done an outstanding job building strong teams at Bell and Textron Systems in her 16 years with the company and has earned the confidence of our military customers. I want to thank Mitch for his leadership. During his tenure, he oversaw significant wins at Bell's military business, along with development of new technologies and product innovations. Earlier this month, the FLRAA contract protest was denied, and the U.S. Army subsequently canceled the stop work order, allowing work on the contract to proceed.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

On the commercial side of Bell, we delivered 22 helicopters, down from 25 in last year's first quarter. During the quarter, we saw solid customer activity across all our commercial products and end markets, including an order from the Polish National Police for four additional Bell four oh sevens, which will expand their fleet to seven aircraft. At Textron Systems, we saw good margin performance on higher revenues across our programs. During the quarter, Systems' Aerosonde Hybrid Quad was among five competing unmanned aerosystems that were downselected for Increment two of the Army's Future Tactical Unmanned Aircraft System competition. Also during the quarter, Systems delivered craft 105 of the U.S. Navy Ship-to-Shore Connector program. The seventh craft delivered to the Navy. There are now two craft remaining to be delivered under the detailed design and construction contract.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Moving to industrial, we saw higher revenues in the quarter, driven by higher volume, both at Specialized Vehicles and Kautex. Specialized Vehicles, the golf business continues to see strong demand in pricing for its ELiTE Lithium product. At Kautex, we announced the first Pentatonic order from an automotive OEM for a thermoplastic composite underbody battery protection skid plates. Skid plates are part of the company's new Pentatonic battery system product line, supporting battery electric vehicle production.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Moving to eAviation, during the quarter, we announced two new U.S. distribution partners on the East Coast to further expand Pipistrel's existing distribution network. In the quarter, we finalized agreement with Mesa Airlines for 25 Alpha Trainer aircraft and an option for 75 additional aircraft. At Sun 'n Fun during the quarter, we displayed the Pipistrel Panthera and Velis Electro aircraft, receiving significant customer interest in both models. With that, I'll turn the call over to Frank.

[Frank Connor, EVP and CFO at Textron]

Thank you, Scott, good morning, everyone. Let's review how each of the segments contribute, starting with Textron Aviation. Revenues at Textron Aviation of $1.1 billion were up $109 million from the first quarter of 2022, reflecting higher pricing of $58 million and higher volume of $51 million, which included higher defense and aftermarket volume. Segment profit was $125 million in the first quarter, up $15 million from a year ago, largely due to favorable pricing, net of inflation of $17 million, and the impact from the higher volume in mix, partially offset by an unfavorable impact from performance of $17 million. Backlog in the segment ended the quarter at $6.5 billion.

[Frank Connor, EVP and CFO at Textron]

Moving to Bell, revenues were $621 million, down $213 million from last year as expected on lower military revenues, reflecting lower spares and support volume in V-22 and H-1 production volume. Segment profit of $60 million was down $31 million from last year's first quarter, primarily reflecting lower volume and mix, partially offset by a favorable impact from performance of $29 million, reflecting lower research and development costs. Backlog in the segment ended the quarter at $4.6 billion. At Textron Systems, revenues were $306 million, up $33 million from last year's first quarter, largely reflecting higher volume. Segment profit of $34 million was up $6 million from a year ago, primarily due to a favorable impact from performance. Backlog in this segment ended the quarter at $2 billion.

[Frank Connor, EVP and CFO at Textron]

Industrial revenues were $932 million, up $94 million from last year's first quarter, largely due to higher volume and mix at both Textron's specialized vehicles and Kautex. Segment profit of $41 million was up $2 million from the first quarter of 2022, primarily due to higher volume and mix and a favorable impact from pricing net of inflation, principally in the specialized vehicles product line, partially offset by an unfavorable impact from performance. Textron eAviation segment revenues were $4 million, and segment loss was $9 million in the quarter, primarily reflecting research and development costs. Finance segment revenues were $12 million, and profit was $8 million.

[Frank Connor, EVP and CFO at Textron]

Moving below segment profit, corporate expenses were $39 million, net interest expense was $17 million, LIFO inventory provision was $25 million, intangible asset amortization was $10 million, and the non-service component of pension and post-retirement income were $59 million. In the quarter, we repurchased approximately 5.2 million shares, returning $377 million in cash to shareholders. To wrap up with guidance, we are reiterating our expected full-year adjusted earnings per share to be in a range of $5.00-$5.20. We also continue to expect full-year manufacturing cash flow before pension contributions of $900 million-$1 billion. That concludes our prepared remarks. Bradley, we can open the line for questions. Bradley?

[Operator]

Of course. Our first question comes from the line of Sheila Kahyaoglu with Jefferies. Please go ahead.

[Sheila Kahyaoglu, Managing Director of Equity Research at Jefferies]

Thank you, good morning, guys.

[Eric Salander, VP of Investor Relations at Textron]

Morning.

[Sheila Kahyaoglu, Managing Director of Equity Research at Jefferies]

I wanted to ask about Bell profitability. Frank, I think you mentioned some favorable performance in there, but with the FLRAA protest now cleared, how does this change the trajectory of Bell profit, and how are you thinking about the dilution just given the development work? Just thinking about the bid overall, Textron's development value was nearly 2 times Lockheed. How do we think about this in terms of revenue contribution?

[Frank Connor, EVP and CFO at Textron]

Well, I'd say that, you know, we had anticipated or we had planned basically for, you know, a delay in FLRAA when we gave our guidance. You know, FLRAA is gonna roll in consistent with how we had seen Bell in terms of the $3.3 billion of revenue and $8 a quarter to $9 a quarter NOP guidance. Obviously, we had margins above that for this quarter. You know, we do expect to be within that margin range that we had guided to. We do expect to see revenue growth. We think this will be the low quarter for Bell from a revenue standpoint. As FLRAA kicks in, you know, we talked about that being a lower contribution margin. We'll see ultimately, you know, kind of where we get in terms of booking rates on that.

[Frank Connor, EVP and CFO at Textron]

We'd expect volume growth, with some margin headwinds associated with that revenue, coming in. Overall, the team did a really nice job from a cost structure standpoint in this quarter, offsetting, you know, that decline in volume. We feel good about, you know, kind of how Bell is positioned and the performance of the business.

[Sheila Kahyaoglu, Managing Director of Equity Research at Jefferies]

Just maybe, Scott, one for you. How do we think about Aviation pricing? I think you mentioned $58 million of gross price or 5%. Is that sort of what we should expect on the growth side? How do we think about that as the dynamics of the market are changing?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

I think so, Sheila. Like, I mean, obviously, the pricing is, you know, well built into the backlog. I think we are on track in terms of our expectations on cost. I would continue to expect to see pricing, you know, net of inflation as a positive. Demand is still good in the marketplace. I think, you know, pricing is stable out there as we look out into the future bookings. You know, again, I think it's a reasonable expectation to think that we're gonna continue to see price net of inflation as a positive going forward.

[Sheila Kahyaoglu, Managing Director of Equity Research at Jefferies]

Thank you.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from the line of Doug Harned with Bernstein. Please go ahead.

[Doug Harned, Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bernstein]

Good morning. Thank you.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Morning.

[Doug Harned, Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bernstein]

When you look at the first quarter in orders in Aviation, yesterday we heard from General Dynamics that Gulfstream had some hiccups around the banking crisis that Silicon Valley Bank collapsed, that actually, you know, delayed a lot of decision-making in pushing orders through. How did you find that period at Aviation? Have you seen similar things there in terms of order flow?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Oh, look, I don't know that I would pin something specifically to Silicon Valley Bank, but, you know, when we had a positive, you know, greater than 1-to-1 book to bill in the quarter, which is good. We kind of guided to around a 1-to-1 book to bill. I think the lead time that we have right now on aircraft is in a pretty healthy place, and that's kind of what we're targeting.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

You know, I guess I would say that, you know, anytime you have financial disruption or, you know, adverse events out there in the, in the economy in general, it's certainly easy for people to say, "Hey, look, let me, let me think about it or wait a little bit." I think the, you know, the good position we have right now is we have enough backlog out there that, you know, even if you have a quarter where you're down below one to one, you know, that's not the end of the world. If, if somebody defers, you know, out there for a few months, that's not a problem. You know, that's the beauty of having a backlog.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Unlike previous periods where you had some interruption and you'd see a delay, and then that would hit you in terms of revenue and profit in the near term, I think we have sufficient backlog out there that even if you do have something where somebody waits a little bit, then, you know, that's fine.

[Doug Harned, Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bernstein]

When you look forward and you're talking about a book-to-bill in the order of 1 this year, when you look beyond that, how do you think about the aftermarket? I mean, we might look at this as the aftermarket should grow, somewhat proportionate to the fleet, do you expect other factors to give you more growth there, such as more content per airplane or pricing?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Well, look, I think it's a lot more driven around utilization, right? Flight hours is more closely correlated with the growth in the aftermarket as opposed to necessarily the fleet numbers. I mean, our fleet is so huge that, you know, even adding small numbers in any given quarter doesn't make a real impact. You know, it's primarily driven around utilization, and utilization in the fleet remains very high.

[Doug Harned, Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bernstein]

Very good. Thank you.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from the line of Seth Seifman with JPMorgan. Please go ahead.

[Seth Seifman, Senior Equity Research Analyst at JPMorgan]

Okay. Thanks very much and good morning. We saw the share repurchase amount step up nicely in the quarter. I guess, can you talk about your, you know, your thinking around that and, you know, maybe where you expect share repo to come in for the year. I guess you guys might have some additional cash coming in from a recent verdict. So, what your thoughts are on repos this year and whether maybe it's, you know, a time to step things up.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Well, I think what you did see us do is step things up, you know, here in the first quarter. You know, we've always said that that's our primary, you know, return of capital would be through share repurchase, and to do that opportunistically. We feel we've still been sort of in a good place to be buying. We've, you know, stepped up $377 million in the quarter. Our cash flow in the company, you know, continues to be strong. We have a lot of cash on the balance sheet, as you guys know. I think consistent with what we guided at the beginning of the year, we expect to probably buy back somewhere in that 5%-6% of the outstanding shares.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

The first quarter was indicative of doing that. In terms of the fact what's been out there in the media and the press around this in intellectual property verdict, obviously, you know, we're not gonna comment much on that as it goes on through the legal process, but that's not something that we would expect to see cash, you know, come in anytime in the near future. You know, there's appeal processes. You know, who knows how that's gonna play out. That doesn't factor into our thinking in terms of share repossession at this time.

[Seth Seifman, Senior Equity Research Analyst at JPMorgan]

Okay, great. I'll leave it there this morning and pass it on. Thanks very much.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Great. Thank you.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from the line of Cai von Rumohr with Cowen. Please go ahead.

[Cai von Rumohr, Managing Director of Equity Research at Cowen]

Thanks for taking the question and nice results. At Aviation, maybe give us some color in terms of relative trend you're seeing in supply chain and also what was the commercial biz jet book-to-bill because obviously you also got some defense orders there in the quarter.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

The supply chain side, Cai, is largely unchanged. I would say that, you know, kind of as we've talked about earlier, I think our labor position is in a much better place than it was. You know, we did bring a lot of resources in the third, fourth quarter last year. Obviously that does create some disruption, which as you know, it affects some of our conversion here as some of that inefficiency unwinds here in the first half of this year. You know, we're largely staffed at the levels where we wanna be. I would say on that front, things are certainly improved.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

We continue to have suppliers, you know, that have issues that are causing us to do things out of sequence and driving still some inefficiencies in how we operate the plant. I'd say it's not getting worse, but it's not necessarily getting better. Sometimes it's frustrating. You think you get one kind of resolved and another supplier, you know, becomes a problem. I, you know, look, we kind of expected that to be an ongoing issue through most of the balance of this year. I don't think there's any big surprises there, but it's still a challenge. As far as order, look, I think our book-to-bill was greater than 1. We feel good about that.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

It's, you know, we don't break it out down to the individual models or programs, but you know, certainly we're I'd say we're happy with how the demand is going in both jets and turboprops. It's I think we're in a pretty good place.

[Cai von Rumohr, Managing Director of Equity Research at Cowen]

Okay. Then a follow-up to Seth's question. You know, 5.2 million shares is like 2.5%. Essentially in one quarter you've done half of your buyback target for the year. You won FLRAA, you had this bluebird of the DJI patent suit. What's the chance that basically the 5%-6% is exceeded in terms of the repo?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Look, I think again, we're gonna continue to press on this opportunistically, Cai, and we'll see how it plays out through the balance of the year. I mean, as you know, it's not really formal guidance. We just kind of indicate to you guys how we're thinking, and there's no change in how we're thinking. It continuing to be our primary means of returning value to shareholders.

[Cai von Rumohr, Managing Director of Equity Research at Cowen]

Fabulous. Thank you very much.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure, sir.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from the line of Robert Stallard with Vertical Research. Please go ahead.

[Robert Stallard, Senior Equity Research Analyst at Vertical Research Partners]

Thanks so much. Good morning.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Morning.

[Robert Stallard, Senior Equity Research Analyst at Vertical Research Partners]

First of all, Frank, you said you were holding the EPS and cash flow guidance for the year. Are there any changes in the divisional guidance for 2023?

[Frank Connor, EVP and CFO at Textron]

No, it's roughly in line with where we had been.

[Robert Stallard, Senior Equity Research Analyst at Vertical Research Partners]

Okay. Scott, one for you. Industrial, double-digit growth, in the quarter is a pretty healthy performance. How sustainable do you think that is given the economic backdrop that we're seeing, particularly on your shorter cycle products?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Well, look, it's something to keep an eye on. I'd say that, you know, we're kind of roughly to the plan that we thought. We certainly expect to see and have seen softness in some of the short cycle consumer sided things. We're seeing strong performance still for, let's say, in some of the industrial and commercial applications. You know, when we look at our production allocations, for instance, we're, you know, we're certainly pushing some of our capacity and our volume to serve commercial industrial applications more so than on some of the consumer side. You know, that's one where, you know, obviously there's some uncertainty. We keep a close eye on it.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

You know, net of all those things, there's enough demand across all of the different markets that we serve to drive that kind of growth, and I think we'll continue to see that through the balance of the year.

[Robert Stallard, Senior Equity Research Analyst at Vertical Research Partners]

Okay, that's great. Thank you.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure.

[Operator]

Our next question goes to the line of David Strauss with Barclays. Please go ahead.

[David Strauss, Managing Director of Equity Research at Barclays]

Thanks. Good morning.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Morning.

[David Strauss, Managing Director of Equity Research at Barclays]

Scott, biz jet deliveries in the quarter, were those a little lighter than you were anticipating? Just looking at how much inventory. I know you always build some inventory in Q1, but, you know, there was a pretty big inventory build in the course. I don't know, some deliveries. You missed some deliveries or kind of where you came in relative to what you were thinking.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Dave, I mean, you know for sure, it's a couple of aircraft, right? I think it's something that's gonna pressure us all year long. You know, we also factored in, you know, in terms of our plans, what we thought we would see in terms of headwinds. I don't think we're very disconnected from what we indicated in terms of the guide for the year.

[David Strauss, Managing Director of Equity Research at Barclays]

Okay. Was that supply chain related, customer decision? What drove those delays?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Most of the delays we're gonna see through the course of the year are supply chain related, just getting parts and being able to get things sequenced and through test. We haven't seen any real change in customer behavior that's impacted anything.

[David Strauss, Managing Director of Equity Research at Barclays]

Okay. I was wondering if you could maybe give a big picture look or how we should think about Bell given all the various moving pieces, thinking beyond this year. Obviously, with FLRAA now in-house, H-1 ending, V-22, you know, rolling off. I think, you know, not sure what the outlook is for V-22 aftermarket, but how should we think about the growth profile for Bell, you know, thinking out over the next couple of years, given all these moving pieces?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Look, I think, and Frank kind of indicated this as well, we certainly expect revenues to be increasing, you know, in Bell through the balance of the year and into next year as the FLRAA program is ramping up. I think on the revenue growth side, you know, we feel very good about that. Clearly, as we bring in, you know, a higher proportion of, you know, primarily cost-plus development effort, that's gonna be at lower margins and those production program volumes on V-22 and H-1 that have been going down. You do have that mix issue. That's kind of where that led us, you know, to the guide that we have out there this year, and I think that's kind of where we would expect to be as we go forward.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

We're gonna get this thing back into a growth mode, but it is going to be heavily weighted towards, you know, a cost plus, you know, relatively lower margin, piece of the business, you know, that's gonna be offsetting lost revenue that's a higher margin. I think it stays a healthy business, but it's certainly not gonna be at the margin levels that we've seen in the past number of years.

[David Strauss, Managing Director of Equity Research at Barclays]

Okay. That's helpful. Thank you.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure.

[Operator]

Our next question comes to the line of Myles Walton with Wolfe Research. Please go ahead.

[Myles Walton, Managing Director of Equity Research at Wolfe Research]

Thanks. Good morning.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Good morning.

[Myles Walton, Managing Director of Equity Research at Wolfe Research]

Scott, in the last 12 months, I guess, or 18 months, the last 2 additions to your Board of Directors were a couple of defense executives in Richard Ambrose and Tom Kennedy. I'm curious if sort of the trend there is indicative of where you might wanna be taking the portfolio directionally more towards defense, and if so, is it indicative of the organics with FLRAA obviously being a contributor or more inorganic from an M&A interest? Thanks.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure. Look, these are both guys who have, to your point, a lot of deep experience in the aerospace and defense world. Our company has always been sort of in that, you know, 30% defense with the growth that we're expecting to see in the systems business. With the growth, obviously, we're expected to see in FLRAA and ongoing, you know, opportunities in the near future here, I think of future opportunities in Bell and systems.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

I felt like it made a lot of sense for us to, you know, to beef up a little bit more on the A&D side of the company. Both these guys are, you know, recent retirees, they're current. You know, they know acquisition, they know defense, and they know aerospace technology. I think they're two great adds on to the board. There's no real super underlying message, but obviously these are a couple of real high-quality individuals that know our space very well.

[Myles Walton, Managing Director of Equity Research at Wolfe Research]

Okay. Very good. There was just one clarification if I could. On the FLRAA disclosures from the protest, it talked about a cost-plus incentive portion and a fixed-price incentive portion. Can you just illuminate us on maybe where the fixed-price risk you've taken on is and isn't? Thanks.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

I think there's two principal pieces of fixed price. One is kind of a program management and operation layer, which I think is low risk. We sort of understand what that is, and then as you guys know, there's several deliverables under this, you know, full program. There's the EMD phase, which has about eight aircraft that are, you know, part of the development tests, limited user test for the Army. And then, there's eight craft that are sort of the LRIP, the first initial, you know, production craft, and the material that's in there is at fixed price. But it's heavily weighted towards the cost plus.

[Myles Walton, Managing Director of Equity Research at Wolfe Research]

Thanks again.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from the line of George Shapiro with Shapiro Research. Please go ahead.

[George Shapiro, Managing Director of Equity Research at Shapiro Research]

Yeah, good morning.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Good morning.

[George Shapiro, Managing Director of Equity Research at Shapiro Research]

Scott, you know, the supply chain issues, I mean, led to an incremental margin of 14% in Textron Aviation this quarter. That's the same that you had in the fourth quarter, and the performance impact, $16 million-$17 million, is similar. Do you expect that the rest of the year, or can you overcome some of the supply chain issues that you had mentioned are going to continue?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure, George. Look, I think it'll abate in the back half of the year. As we talked about, you know, a lot of those efficiencies are things that were experienced in the back half of last year. You know, a lot of that obviously goes through inventory, so that releases with the aircraft deliveries here in the first half of this year. Obviously, that anticipates that performance, you know, and disruption will be less, you know, in the first half of this year than it was in the last half of last year. I think, you know, more or less so far, we're seeing that. I think our factory is running better. That's largely, as I said, attributable to the fact that we've got the resources on board.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

You know, there's still issues, turnover is higher than we would like. There's, you know, there's still more churn than historical, but certainly, the plant is running, you know, in a more efficient way. Now, supplier issues still pop up, as I said. You know, net of all that, I think that we will see, you know, better, lower impacts of those efficiencies in the back half of the year than the first half of the year. Even with that 14%, which again is kind of where we expect it to be, I think, you know, for the total year, the overall conversion, which is sort of, you know, 24% or so, you know, which is appropriate for our business, is still something we expect to realize for the total year.

[George Shapiro, Managing Director of Equity Research at Shapiro Research]

Okay. Then have you changed anything about deliveries expectation for the year?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Nope, not really. I think we're still tracking to what we guided.

[George Shapiro, Managing Director of Equity Research at Shapiro Research]

Okay, thanks very much. Good, good report.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Perfect.

[Frank Connor, EVP and CFO at Textron]

Thanks.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from the line of Peter Arment with Baird. Please go ahead.

[Peter Arment, Managing Director of Equity Research at Robert W. Baird]

Yeah, thanks. Good morning, Scott, Frank. Nice result.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Morning.

[Peter Arment, Managing Director of Equity Research at Robert W. Baird]

Hey, Scott, you've had a lot of questions on aviation. I'll just ask one quick one. You know, there's been a slight kind of increase in used aircraft out there. I'm sure in production aircraft still remains very low. Just maybe any comments that you're watching or from your perspective on the used market?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure, Peter. Look, obviously, we watch this very carefully and, you know, you see numbers coming out, and they look like big percentages. Of course, they're big percentages on very small numbers. I think when we look at the used available, you know, when you, when you look at kind of that 0-10 years old, it's less than, you know, it's around a couple tenths of a percent of our fleet. It's a really, really small number. I mean, we're talking about nine aircraft that we know of right now that are under 10 years old versus our fleet size of over 7,000 aircraft.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

You know, look, it's a trend of the, you know, we see in the marketplace. Remember, on an absolute basis, these are very small numbers, right? The available for sale is less than a few percent, and about half of those are 20, 25+ years old aircraft. Still a very, very positive environment in terms of used aircraft available for sale.

[Peter Arment, Managing Director of Equity Research at Robert W. Baird]

Thanks so much. Appreciate the color.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from the line of Pete Skibitski with Alembic Global. Please go ahead.

[Pete Skibitski, Director of Aerospace and Defense Equity Research at Alembic Global]

Hey, good morning, Scott and Frank and Eric. Little bit of a follow-on to, I think it was Myles' question on FLRAA. You know, typically, and, you know, congrats, you get past the GAO review on FLRAA, you know, big milestone there, but now you have to kind of switch to a keep sold strategy, right? I'm just wondering, Scott, from your perspective, what your view is on the technical and schedule risk to the development contract, you know, as you kind of move from the aircraft in your configuration to the exact production configuration that the Army wants. I'm just wondering kind of how you gauge the risks and if there are any important milestones that we should be on the lookout for?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure, Peter. Look, I think the way the Army's conducted this acquisition, as you guys know, this goes back a decade, really, right? Of both guys going through a, you know, design, development, producing, you know, prototype aircraft, flying them, lots of soldier touch points, Army pilots flying them. You know, as you know, as we went even through the formalities of the formal RFP. During this whole period of time, the proposal evaluation, there was ongoing effort under the OTA for the CGRR program, which was continuing, you know, to reduce risk and finalize, you know, design activities and risk reduction, even whilst the proposal evaluation was going on.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

I think, you know, the good news here is we have a really, really solid technical baseline for the aircraft itself. We have a great team that's in place, ready to go, that, you know, that is being reassembled here to now go through execute the EMD program. Obviously, there's a lot of new stuff here around the mission systems and development of that capability and the MOSA system for the in terms of the architecture of the mission systems and how they accommodate changes over time.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

I think that we have a really, really good technical baseline. The aircraft that we're about to go design and build and fly is very, very close to the aircraft that we've already designed and built and flown. I think there's a big chunk of a risk that has been very effectively reduced, and, you know, we're ready to go get at it.

[Pete Skibitski, Director of Aerospace and Defense Equity Research at Alembic Global]

Okay. I appreciate the color.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from the line of Kristine Liwag with Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.

[Kristine Liwag, Managing Director of Equity Research at Morgan Stanley]

Hey, good morning. Scott, Frank, you know, when you look at the portfolio today, it's clearly stronger this cycle versus the last. Aviation's got a backlog. Bell secured FLRAA. Industrial is stable now. With the balance sheet pretty low, what's your appetite to expand into another vertical and tap into secular growth markets?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Look, I think that we, as we've always said, we keep an eye on things as things come to market or there's opportunities out there. But obviously, you know, our plan is still built around organic growth, investment in the businesses that we have, which I think we've been making, you know, substantial investments, and those are paying off for us in terms of what organic growth we're seeing. At this point, you know, look, I think we do have a very strong balance sheet. We have a lot of cash on hand. We have strong cash generation in the business. We'll continue to execute on our buyback programs.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

If something came along that we thought made sense, that was, you know, frankly, in the A&D space and was something that we knew could be accretive and a better value to our shareholders than just continuing share buyback, we would look at it. As I said, it would have to be something where it's a clear win and always contrasting that with what's going on with our share buyback program.

[Kristine Liwag, Managing Director of Equity Research at Morgan Stanley]

Great. Thank you.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure.

[Operator]

With that, our last question comes from the line of Ron Epstein with Bank of America. Please go ahead.

[Ron Epstein, Managing Director of Equity Research at Bank of America]

Hey, good morning, guys.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Good morning, Ron.

[Frank Connor, EVP and CFO at Textron]

Good morning.

[Ron Epstein, Managing Director of Equity Research at Bank of America]

Scott, could you kind of walk through, you mentioned earlier on the call, just kind of back to Myles' question about, you know, positioning the company for some more growth in defense and the opportunities ahead of you in Bell and Systems, if you could walk through a couple of those that maybe you find particularly interesting for the company?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure. Ron, I would say that the FLRAA win on a standalone basis is hugely important to our future. I think our guys have done a great job over, you know, the past decade in investing and positioning for that. Obviously, as you know, the FLRAA program, you know, continues. It's a few years behind the FLRAA program, but one where, again, I think our team has made the right investments. We got the right people that have developed, you know, a product that I think is gonna be a home run. As you know, we're all kind of waiting on the engine side to have that thing fly. Again, the U.S. Army activity continues in risk reduction and further definitizing that program. Clearly, I think that's a great opportunity.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

I think we have a great solution. There are activities which, again, are publicly out there in terms of the future systems that the Navy and the Marine Corps are looking at, which I think a lot of our technology, particularly in the tiltrotor space, has potential to be a great solution and can leverage off a lot of the investment that we've already made on the 280 program. Those are likely to be adaptations. Again, from a technological standpoint, I think we're in a really good place for some of those future opportunities. High speed VTOL at Bell, you know, arguably a little bit further off, but, you know, that's another step I think that leverages our fundamental core capabilities to go to even higher speed, higher performing, you know, longer range assets.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

I think Bell, in my view, Ron, I guess I would say I think we have a phenomenal franchise around tiltrotor, and I think we have a lot of opportunities to continue to grow that franchise on a number of different adaptations of that technology into the future. On the system side, you know, okay, that's a there's a lot of programs in there. I think we've, you know, the win on the Sentinel program, you know, with Northrop is a driver of growth for us going forward as that moves, you know, ultimately from EMD into its production phases here in the future. We have some great new wins on the munition side with the XM204s and XM250s. Again, a great franchise for us for a long time, which is really growing.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

I mentioned our down select on FTUAS. You know, Shadow continues to be a good program for us, but the future tactical UAS with the Army is certainly a big opportunity. There's a couple big land vehicle programs, as you know, ARV on the Marine Corps side, OMFV on the Army side. You know, I mean, I don't want to too wrap up all this stuff, but there's lots of opportunities out there for which, you know, we've either won or we've been down selected, or I think we're certainly a viable competitor. You're not gonna win all these things, but there's enough opportunity, and I think we're in a good enough place that we can see a lot of organic growth being driven out of that business as well.

[Ron Epstein, Managing Director of Equity Research at Bank of America]

Got you. Maybe one follow on, if I can. Maybe in the shorter term, are you seeing much demand being driven from, you know, the war in Ukraine? You know, are you seeing orders for stuff that maybe 18 months ago you wouldn't have expected that are now coming from?

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

No, we're really not, Ron. We're not in that sort of munition space. I mean, there has been some dialogue around, you know, some land vehicles, but they're largely EDA, you know, things that are in surplus, you know, in the Army that would come out and be refurbished and put over there. There's some talk of different, you know, UAS systems. We've had nothing so far. There's probably some, relatively speaking, smaller opportunities, you know, going forward, but it's not gonna be a material impact to us.

[Ron Epstein, Managing Director of Equity Research at Bank of America]

Got it. Thank you.

[Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO at Textron]

Sure.

[Operator]

With that, ladies and gentlemen, today's conference will be available for replay after 10:00 A.M. Eastern today through April 27th, 2024. You may access the AT&T replay system at any time by dialing the 18662071041, entering the access code 4732406. International participants may dial 4029700847. Those numbers again are 18662071041 and 4029700847. Entering the access code 4732406. That does conclude your conference for today. Thank you for your participation and for using AT&T Conferencing Service. You may now disconnect.

Participants

Executives

• Eric Salander, VP of Investor Relations
• Scott Donnelly, Chairman and CEO
• Frank Connor, EVP and CFO

Analysts

• Sheila Kahyaoglu, Managing Director of Equity Research at Jefferies
• Doug Harned, Senior Equity Research Analyst at Bernstein
• Seth Seifman, Senior Equity Research Analyst at JPMorgan
• Cai von Rumohr, Managing Director of Equity Research at Cowen
• Robert Stallard, Senior Equity Research Analyst at Vertical Research Partners
• David Strauss, Managing Director of Equity Research at Barclays
• Myles Walton, Managing Director of Equity Research at Wolfe Research
• George Shapiro, Managing Director of Equity Research at Shapiro Research
• Peter Arment, Managing Director of Equity Research at Robert W. Baird
• Pete Skibitski, Director of Aerospace and Defense Equity Research at Alembic Global
• Kristine Liwag, Managing Director of Equity Research at Morgan Stanley
• Ron Epstein, Managing Director of Equity Research at Bank of America