NFI Group Q1 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

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Provided by Quartr
May 8, 2026

Key Takeaways

  • Positive Sentiment: Strong operating quarter — delivered 978 EUs, $842 million of revenue and $86.1 million Adjusted EBITDA (up 37% YoY) with gross margin expansion of 450 bps to 15.7% driving adjusted EPS improvement.
  • Positive Sentiment: Robust demand and backlog — backlog remains at 15,228 EUs (~$13 billion) with a 109% LTM book-to-bill, an 80% option conversion rate and ~32,500 EUs in the North American bid universe supporting future orders.
  • Negative Sentiment: Near-term cash and working-capital pressure — liquidity fell Q/Q due to seasonal inventory build, tariff-related receivables and a battery recall campaign that produced $2.5 million in cash outflows and is expected to require larger quarterly replacements through 2026.
  • Negative Sentiment: U.K. business under review — Alexander Dennis is being restructured and right-sized to restore competitiveness, creating near-term costs and uncertainty while management evaluates longer-term portfolio options for that business.
  • Neutral Sentiment: Guidance and capital plans unchanged but monitorable — management reaffirmed 2026 Adjusted EBITDA guidance of $370–$410 million, expects continued deleveraging and is evaluating options to refinance the convertible debentures maturing in January, with more detail planned at Q2.
AI Generated. May Contain Errors.
Earnings Conference Call
NFI Group Q1 2026
00:00 / 00:00

There are 10 speakers on the call.

Speaker 6

Welcome to NFI 2026 first quarter financial results conference call. I would now like to turn the conference over to your speaker for today, Stephen King. Please go ahead.

Speaker 7

Thank you, Lisa. Good morning, everyone. Joining me today are John Sapp, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Brian Dewsnup, Chief Financial Officer. On today's call, we will recap the quarter, which included a clear continuation of our operational recovery, strong margin expansion and earnings growth driven by improved manufacturing margins and our backlog conversion. John will also provide the latest details on our outlook and our reaffirmed 2026 guidance. This call is being recorded and a replay will be made available shortly. We will be referring to a presentation that can be found in the Financials and Filings section of our website. As we move through the slides via the webcast link, we will call out the slide number.

Speaker 7

On slide 2, we provide our cautionary or forward-looking statements and note that certain financial measures referenced today are not recognized earnings measures and do not have standardized meanings prescribed by International Financial Reporting Standards or IFRS. We advise listeners to view our press releases and other public filings on SEDAR+ for more details. In the appendix of this presentation, we have provided a list of key terms and definitions that will be used on today's call. A reminder that NFI statements are presented in US dollars, the company's reporting currency, and all amounts referred to are in US dollars unless otherwise noted. Slides 3 and 4 provide a brief overview of our company. NFI is a bus and coach manufacturer and total mobility solutions provider. We offer a wide range of buses and coaches on proven platforms and are North America's largest bus and coach provider.

Speaker 7

We hold market-leading positions and offer the industry's strongest aftermarket network. Slide 5 provides a brief insight into NFI's product and geographic mix and a few other milestones. I'll now pass the call over to John Sapp.

Speaker 4

Morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. I'll be picking up on slide 7. The first quarter saw a solid performance with 978 EUs delivered, $842 million in revenue, and Adjusted EBITDA of $86.1 million. This was a 37% increase from the first quarter of 2025. Our performance was primarily driven by gross margin improvement of 450 basis points to a total 15.7% as we continue to convert our strong backlog into results and improve production efficiencies. This performance supported earnings per share of $0.10 or $0.18 on an adjusted basis, with both significant improvements from last year. The demand environment remains strong as we reported a 109% book-to-bill ratio on an LTM basis and an 80% option conversion rate.

Speaker 4

The North American bid universe remains at impressive levels with roughly 32,500 EUs in total and total backlog of $13 billion, with 43% coming from firm orders and 57% in options. Liquidity saw a decrease from fourth quarter. This was primarily driven by seasonal investments in work and process inventory following significant deliveries in the fourth quarter of 2025. We also had some extended receivable balances associated with tariff recovery, plus a few other timing items. During the quarter, we successfully launched the battery recall campaign, completing full battery replacements on 12 buses, leading to cash outflows of $2.5 million. Our team has a detailed plan for the campaign that will leverage our service center network. We anticipate that quarterly replacements will be larger as we move through 2026.

Speaker 4

Moving to slide 8, we highlight the quarterly and LTM deliveries by product lines. Transit bus deliveries were down 12% in the quarter and 7% for the LTM period. This was primarily due to lower U.K. deliveries. However, average sale prices or ASPs of heavy-duty transit buses increased by 10.5% year-over-year, reflecting the conversion of stronger backlog to results, geographic and propulsion sales mix. Motor coach delivery saw a 2% increase on both a quarterly and LTM basis. This was largely driven by higher public deliveries offset by lower private deliveries. The ASP in this segment also saw growth up 4.6%. Low-floor cutaway and medium-duty remains a bright spot, with deliveries up 20% in the quarter and 24% on an LTM basis.

Speaker 4

With 794 total deliveries, this was another record performance from our ARBOC team. I'll now pass it over to Brian to go through the fourth quarter results before we get into a detailed look at our outlook.

Speaker 7

Thanks. Thanks, John. As John covered some of the key performance metrics, I'll highlight a few segment details. Turning to slide 9, manufacturing continued to drive gross margin performance with significant year-over-year improvement. Margins were down sequentially, reflecting seasonality and strong sales mix in the fourth quarter of 2025. Aftermarket remained stable with a nearly 29% gross margin. On slide 10, this margin performance helped drive a 75% increase in manufacturing Adjusted EBITDA, hitting $58 million. That's the highest first quarter in that segment since 2018. On an LTM basis, the segment is up to $258 million, representing 72% of our total EBITDA. On slide 11, quarterly free cash flow was another positive at $17.5 million.

Speaker 7

This is up $13.1 million from last year, with operational performance improvements offset by higher cash CapEx and investments in intangible assets, primarily supporting new product development. We invested approximately $68 million in working capital in the quarter, primarily increasing overall inventory balances.

Operator

Following the busier fourth quarter. In addition, we recorded the battery cell inventory received through the battery settlement into raw materials and had some tariff-related accounts receivable balances. On slide 12, we'll walk through the adjustments to achieve Adjusted Net Earnings with all amounts shown net of taxes. We commenced restructuring activities at Alexander Dennis' Scottish facilities to better match our capacity and cost structure with current demand. We also had some minor adjustments related to the battery settlement and removed the gains from our JV investment in GR Seating. I'm now on slide 13, where we'll summarize total leverage, liquidity, and return on invested capital. Total leverage, which includes all debt instruments, was at 3.46 times. Liquidity was up approximately $247 million year-over-year, reflecting the impacts of our refinancing activities in 2025.

Operator

ROIC continued its strong trajectory, ending Q1 at 12.3%. A 100 basis point improvement from the fourth quarter, reflecting positive cash generation and lower average invested capital. I'll now turn the call back to John to discuss our outlook.

Speaker 4

Thanks, Brian. Our first quarter performance positions us well for the remainder of the year and gives us increased confidence in our 2026 guidance. On slide 15, we recap the strategic value drivers that will support our continued performance this year and beyond. Operational excellence initiatives will expand margins. Our focus on product and market leadership will deliver a consistent high-quality customer experience, and these activities, combined with the conversion of our backlog and growing aftermarket business, will drive profitable growth as we continue activities to delever and strengthen our balance sheet. During the quarter, we continued to drive improvements in overall supply chain performance and rate readiness. This included activities at American Seating, where their first quarter improvements further supported our expectations that those issues will be fully behind us in the second quarter.

Speaker 4

While we are monitoring macro impacts of global conflicts, nothing material to report, we have factored in assumptions for higher freight and shipping costs into our guidance. With a focus on cost management, we took actions to improve Alexander Dennis' cost structure to improve our competitive position and to right-size production capacity to their order book. We continue to make strides in improving the overall customer experience and wanna provide sustained outperformance to customers through our delivery and acceptance processes. Rob Marion's recent appointment as president of MCI will help continue those activities in the motor coach space. Rob is a long-term NFI employee who helped drive manufacturing performance and operational excellence at both New Flyer and our internal fabrication businesses.

Speaker 4

While we were also thrilled to be recognized as a top Manitoba employer in March 2026, this award showcases that our actions to be an employer of choice are paying dividends. As Brian mentioned, leverage improved slightly, now down to 3.46 times, with expectations for more significant deleveraging throughout 2026 and into 2027. We're also advancing our work to evaluate options for refinancing the convertible debentures that mature in January, with plans to provide more details during our Q2 update. Our first quarter delivered on our drive for profitable growth as we maintained momentum from Q4 2025 and had year-over-year improvements to gross margin and our total unit economics. We remain on track to achieve our 2026 guidance range, with expectations for Adjusted EBITDA between $370 million and $410 million.

Speaker 4

Slide 16 to 18 provide the latest updates on our order demand and our backlog. I won't go through them in detail, but I will mention a few key points. The demand environment is very strong, with over 5,600 EUs and bids submitted, which will help drive order activity in 2026. The longer-term outlook is also strong, with 26,000 EUs in the expected 5-year procurement plan reflecting fleet age and customer-expected vehicle replacement plans. Our backlog remains stable at 15,228 EUs and $13 billion. I'll point out that a significant portion of our backlog is funded into 2027, and we anticipate that option conversion into firm orders will remain strong this year as customers look to confirm funding under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.

Speaker 4

The IIJA expires in September 2026, but funds can be spent in 2027 and 2028. While ZEB as a percentage of the backlog declined in the quarter, they remain an important part of our overall platform. We expect ZEBs will make up a meaningful percentage of our deliveries, but our overall goal is to ensure we serve customers' broad needs and our facilities are fully set up for all propulsion types. Average sale price of new income orders was $824,000 per EU, continuing a solid trend of price improvements in transit and coach segments, even with lower ZEB orders. Before we close, I also want to provide the latest views on the macro tariff environment. On slide 19, we have identified the major tariffs that are present and applicable to our industry.

Speaker 4

While tariff structures continue to evolve, we believe our exposure is manageable. During the quarter, there were some changes to the overall structure of 232 steel, copper, and aluminum derivative tariffs, those are not expected to have a material impact on NFI's operations. Our U.S.-based manufacturing footprint and higher domestic content position us favorably relative to some of other manufacturing peers, which is helping mitigate the impact of cross-border trade measures. We are also continuing to work on IEPA fund refunds with advisors and government departments. We will do what's right for our customers there and to meet our contractual obligations. Overall, we maintain the view that tariffs are largely a pass-through cost to customers through contractual obligations and through general price increases. For clarity, our guidance includes the current known impacts of tariffs as of today's date.

Speaker 4

It does not reflect any material changes that the tariff environment could have on demand, pricing or costs in the future. Wrapping up on slide 20, a few final comments. We delivered strong earnings growth in the first quarter, driven by improved execution, backlog conversion and margin expansion, leading to a 37% year-over-year Adjusted EBITDA growth. Demand remains robust, supported by a large backlog and active bidding environment. We're making steady progress on de-leveraging while maintaining flexibility in our capital structure. Across NFI, the team is looking forward to our continued progression as we deliver on our strategic objectives to drive operational excellence, enhance the customer experience and deliver profitable growth. With that, I'll now open up the line for questions. Operator, please provide instructions to our callers.

Speaker 6

Thank you. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star one one on your telephone. You'll hear that automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, press star one one again. We also ask that you wait for your name and company to be announced before proceeding with your question. One moment while we compile the Q&A roster. Our first question is coming from the line of Chris Murray of ATB Capital Markets. Your line is open.

Speaker 2

Yeah, thanks, folks. Good morning. The first question is on manufacturing margins. You know, we saw that the revenue in the U.K. was down pretty significantly. What we're trying to understand a little bit is what do the manufacturing margins look like on a core basis in the North American operations? You know, I'm kind of assuming that there's limited impact from the U.K., that it's either breakeven or a little bit underwater. You know, any thoughts that you can share with us about how to think about, you know, the North American transit and North American coach business in terms of margin progression would be helpful.

Speaker 4

Thanks, Chris, and thanks for the questions. First off, we'll say, overall, as you've noted here, I think relative to the performance in the quarter, that we're continuing to see, you know, strong, per EU economics. As a result, I think it's reflective of what we see around an improving backlog. As over the past few years, as this team's been able to navigate, certainly through some of the critical cost pressure, and we now see some of the benefits of that improved backlog starting to come through. It's starting to flow through in terms of different areas. I will note that in terms of our U.K. volume, the U.K. volume this quarter was down slightly versus as a comparison in terms of year-over-year.

Speaker 4

Relative to the North America side, you know, we do continue to see benefit in terms of that margin improvement that we're able to generate. Brian Dewsnup, I'll look to you too to share a few insights relative to the manufacturing margin question.

Operator

Yeah. Thanks, John. Chris, I think we've been pretty consistent over the years talking about the dynamics of North America relative to the more competitive environment in the U.K. You're picking up on that, and that's coming through in the financials relative to the mix, as you noted.

Speaker 4

Chris, the only thing I'd say, obviously fourth quarter is our busiest period. Q1 is slower, we tend to tell people to focus on an LTM number when you're thinking about either gross margin percentage or gross margin per unit or EBITDA per unit, just to help kinda normalize what a full year expectation would look like.

Speaker 2

Okay. I guess the next question, and maybe this is more for John, you know, John, now that you've had some time, you know, to kind of get settled and have a look at the business, some of the strategic directions. You know, one of the questions I've been getting a lot, and it kind of goes a little bit to the first question, is about the U.K. business. Certainly the restructuring program was started, I think, before you even got there. You know, lots of questions I've had now about the utility of even maintaining the U.K. business if it's not better or better held maybe in someone else's hands. You know, we've seen some other political changes even overnight in the U.K. right now.

Speaker 2

Just trying to think about, you know, positioning and any thoughts you may have about strategy around that business or anything else that you may have kind of picked up on as in your early days as President and CEO.

Speaker 4

Yeah. Thanks, Chris. I appreciate the question. Look, Alexander Dennis, we have a terrific product offering, certainly for our customers over there, one that has been built on decades of that business, really doing exceptional work for the end use customers. We certainly have high confidence in terms of, you know, the products, the quality that we deliver, and therefore our ability to go, you know, to continue to compete and win in this space. However, as noted, it is a much more competitive environment that has evolved in a different way over the past few years, you know, with certainly larger penetration from foreign competitors into the space. It's important for us to react.

Speaker 4

An answer to your question, how, you know, we're talking about it as a leadership team and certainly how I'm viewing it through my lens here, first and foremost is to ensure that this business is positioned to win and continue to win in the current environment. That means making some very difficult decisions. As you would have noted here over the past couple of months, and as Brian shared earlier, we had to make some difficult choices around redundancy and really getting some actions underway relative to right-sizing and some tough footprint decisions there as a result. Those are gonna continue to play through, and they are important for us in terms of ensuring the business is, as noted, you know, positioned to win in the current environment.

Speaker 4

Also, we want to ensure that there's optionality in those decisions too, because this is a market that has a lot of conversation around it within the U.K. government and between our teams as well as, you know, regulators, et cetera, in that market. That could allow for some future tailwinds, and we want to ensure that anything we do from a decision standpoint also allows for us to bring capacity back in quickly. The actions that we've taken position us to do just that.

Speaker 4

Relative to your question there, the portion of your question around the portfolio, I will say it's, this is a question that I will always ask and evaluate all of our portfolio on a regular basis to ensure it's one that is built for us and for the long term over the next three to five years. Whether or not it's Alexander Dennis or any other portion of our portfolio, that will be a constant part of our responsibility here as a team. We're gonna continue to do so. Relative to Alexander Dennis specifically, you know, this is something that the team is, as we evaluate our strategy across the entire portfolio, is really starting to dig into now as we look at what, you know, positions us for long-term growth.

Speaker 4

We'll do that here over the coming months. Right now, we're very much focused on just ensuring AD is ready to win and compete in the current environment.

Speaker 7

Okay, we'll leave it there. Thanks, folks.

Speaker 4

Thanks.

Operator

Thanks, Chris.

Speaker 6

Thank you. One moment for the next question. Our next question is coming from the line of Cameron Doerksen of National Bank. Please go ahead.

Speaker 1

Yeah, thanks. Good morning. Just wanna ask a question about the cadence of bus deliveries, particularly in the transit segment just over the next few quarters. Obviously, you know, obviously, you know, fairly low in Q1, and down year over year, but just wanna understand how it looks for Q2 and into the second half of the year.

Speaker 4

Yeah, Cameron, great question. Appreciate it. Look, there are several things to note here as we're through the first quarter, we position ourselves here in terms of the back half. I think your question is primarily focused on within the transit bus space.

Speaker 1

Yep.

Speaker 4

I will say that for Q1, there were some important steps and actions that we've taken overall as a team to really position us for what we anticipate will be continued volume growth here as we get into the back half of the year, and it's common for us to see that from a seasonality standpoint. We've taken, I think, some important measures in terms of our supply chain great readiness. I think, what you'll note from our commentary early on is some of the issues, some of the longer-term systemic issues in terms of our supply chain, you know, significant action that it worked through to address those.

Speaker 4

We've also done some key things within our four walls just to ensure that we're driving to the most efficient flow that we can have, limiting any elements, out of station work, et cetera, that can slow us down. It really positions us well in terms of EU volume increases here that we're anticipating as we get into Q2 and beyond. What I'll say is also that we're off to a very strong April, we continue to have continued confidence in terms of what we've shared relative to guidance and our ability to, you know, bring forth the needed EU and volume increases here from Q2 plus. Brian, anything you'd add?

Operator

I think you captured it well in terms of the seasonality and, you know, growing Q2 volume, or sorry, growing volume from Q1 throughout the year to support our guidance.

Speaker 1

Okay. No, that's helpful. I guess sort of related, if I look at, you know, the average selling price for transit buses in Q1, you know, up very nicely year-over-year, over 10%, I know that mix can have a fairly significant impact on that number. Just wondering what you kind of expect for average selling price in the transit segment kinda for the remainder of the year. Is the mix gonna be similar? Just any thoughts on that?

Speaker 4

Look, from a mix standpoint, we obviously continue to watch it closely as well. Certainly from a backlog standpoint, you can see in the data that we've shared where things sit relative to relative to ZEBs versus our ICE solutions. Overall, what you'll also note is the continued EU economics improve even while we may have seen a slight drop in terms of ZEB output in actually Q1, I think, which continues to demonstrate the improvement and the improving economics of our backlog overall.

Speaker 4

Our, our strategy around being a propulsion-agnostic player and being able to drive the level of profitability that we all expect regardless of those platforms is key to us, and I think Q1 continues to demonstrate that, and especially as our, you know, our improved backlog continues to play through. We certainly look at it. We may see some, you know, movements here of a couple percents relative to ZEB participation in terms of our outputs overall. Generally, we have confidence certainly in the guidance that we've shared, and confidence that the mix is going to be supportive of what we need to go deliver on the year. Brian, anything to add?

Operator

I'd just like to remind, obviously, we have geographical mix, but I'd also just remind everybody that there's a pretty big difference between an ARBOC cutaway, relative to a New Flyer vehicle or an MCI motor coach. So mix can be a big factor in this, and I really wouldn't read too much into that.

Speaker 1

Okay. That's helpful. I'll pass along. Thanks very much.

Speaker 4

Thanks, Cameron.

Operator

Thanks, Cameron.

Speaker 6

Thank you. Our next question is coming from the line of Daryl Young of Stifel. Please go ahead.

Speaker 3

Good morning, everyone. Just wanted to ask around the All-Canadian Build facility, up and running now, but doesn't sound like it's gonna achieve full capacity until later this year. I'm just wondering if there's a drag on margins at the start of the year related to this or if it's material at all. Just given you've actually had very strong EBITDA per year, this would potentially be upside to that.

Speaker 4

Yeah. Thanks, Daryl. Great question. What I would say is that we are exactly where we intended to be, if not a little bit ahead in terms of what we're seeing in terms of EU outputs out of the All-Canadian Build. We're obviously really pleased with that facility, what it's gonna mean for us in terms of additional volume growth, which is obviously critical to the investment that we made towards it. It is overall, I would say, slightly ahead of schedule from a volume standpoint in terms of what we're doing from the facility overall.

Speaker 7

The only thing I'd add, Daryl, obviously, we opened it in Q4, it's been ramping to John's point on plan through Q1. It would add a little bit impact, I think, on working capital as it's kinda ramping up and increasing the volume production. I think that's helpful for the rest of the year 'cause now as John mentioned, it's kind of exceeding plan. From Q2, Q3, Q4, that'll be supportive as we get the higher deliveries out of that facility.

Speaker 3

Got it. Okay. Second question is around ARBOC continues to be very, very strong. Obviously, it's a smaller part of your business, but just wondering if you can give us a bit of color on whether that's a function of pent-up demand or if you have some unique products that might be new to the market that are taking share or, you know, any views on how big that business can get in the next two years.

Speaker 4

Thanks, Daryl. Great question, and we're certainly very proud of the performance that we continue to see from the ARBOC team. Frankly, we do believe that we've got a very high demand product in a specific area with a low-floor cutaway that our customers find particularly valuable and beneficial to the customers that they serve. As a result, the ARBOC volumes that we saw last year and that we anticipate here as that business continues to improve for us, continues to look very strong. We would see that demand profile continue to play through as you see just recap type investments that their customers are making.

Speaker 4

I think also as the performance of the product itself and that unique customer base that it's able to serve continues to be made more aware of from a market standpoint, I would expect that we'll continue to see good growth and progress with it. We would also note too that, in terms of the medium-duty bus, the Equess bus that is launching here, it's really relaunched here this week, this year. It's a terrific product. We are seeing good interest and demand from NFI's customers for that, and obviously that is gonna continue to bring continued growth for our ARBOC business as well.

Speaker 3

Got it. That's great color. Thank you.

Speaker 7

Thanks, Daryl.

Speaker 6

Thank you. One moment for the next question. Our next question is coming from the line of Jonathan Goldman of Scotiabank. Please go ahead.

Speaker 5

Hey, good morning, team, and thanks for taking my questions. Maybe just looking at the Adjusted EBITDA, looks like there was a benefit from an add-back of restructuring costs, $7.5 million, maybe call it $8 million, you know, that benefited margins. How should we think about that in terms of go forward? Is that one-time, or could we also think about maybe a payback on that restructuring charge that could flow through margins in the subsequent quarters?

Speaker 4

Yeah. In the quarter, we saw, you know, some benefit from the gain from the GR Seating acquisition that we did. We would view that to be a one-time thing. I wouldn't anticipate that we would see that again. It was really valuation of our assets relative to even relative to the purchase price there. We wouldn't expect that to be, you know, have any effect, you know, on a go-forward basis. We did recognize some restructuring costs in Q1 reflective of the work that we're doing in Alexander Dennis, and we do believe we'll have some more of that in the balance of the year in Q2.

Speaker 7

Brian, I think it's fair to say that the overall expectation is that restructuring will generate savings in that business, help improve competitive position and margin over the longer term. You're right, there'll be some more restructuring this year.

Speaker 4

Yeah, we would see some more costs this year, of course, that'll play out in terms of, you know, better efficiencies. As we mentioned on the call, you know, rightsizing our capacity to the demand in that marketplace now, which will put us in a better cost structure position, as John mentioned. You know, we need to make sure that that business is prepared to thrive in the environment that exists today.

Speaker 5

Okay. Is it fair to say after the kind of cost actions you've taken, the restructuring U.K. margins are immediately better today than they were maybe a quarter ago?

Speaker 4

Yeah. I think what we would say is as we go forward post-restructuring, without question, this is about driving improved margin performance out of the U.K. business for sure. These are the right restructuring decisions. Certainly, they are gonna take, you know, certainly a few months here for it to continue to play through, but we do anticipate then, as a result, the margin improvement that will come from it.

Speaker 5

Okay. That makes sense. John, you talked about, you know, you might give more color on the convert coming up in the next quarter and your thoughts there. With the visibility that you guys have, the results you just put up, you know, the guidance, how would you characterize your flexibility of options to deal with the convert?

Speaker 4

Yeah. No, it's a great question. I'll lead it off and then, you know, Brian may share a few thoughts here as well. Overall, I think what we're anticipating here as we prepare towards the strategy and the decisions there that we wanna make relative to the converts, and really as we consider overall where we're at relative to our overall, you know, leverage position, we do believe we've got some good options here that are gonna emerge for us overall as a business. That's really driven by, you know, the continued improved performance of the business overall. You know, generally feel very positive about our ability to make a great decision and execute on a great strategy for us as NFI going forward. Yeah.

Operator

We've met and continue to meet with a lot of our banks and lending partners. Relative to a couple of years ago, you know, we're in a much better position. We have a lot more options today than we had a couple of years ago. You know, as John mentioned, we're really looking at positioning ourselves for the medium to long term with regards to our capital structure.

Speaker 5

Okay, thanks. Maybe just one more for me. You guys kept the guidance maintained. You know, if I'm just looking at LTM numbers, you know, $360 million of EBITDA, things are, you know, accelerating, getting better, both seasonally and operationally. Q1 was up $24 million EBITDA year-over-year. Can you give us some thoughts, you know, on why you maintain the guidance range? You know, what is the risk, you know, to the 370, you know, given that, you know, you're kind of tracking well ahead of that?

Speaker 4

Yeah. It's a great question. Certainly, we feel continued building confidence in terms of the guidance that we've put out. It is also we've just cleared April. We continue to see strong momentum. I think Q1 was obviously a great momentum for us in terms of the year. As you noted from an LTM basis, we continue to see, you know, improvement as an overall, you know, business and relative to it. You know, that said, there are still, you know, risks that are out there that we need to ensure that we are ready and that we execute against. As noted earlier, we've got a, you know, big backlog that we need to go deliver on. Continued operational growth and expansion here is a key part of us seeing that through.

Speaker 4

We've done a lot of outstanding work this year in terms of the supply chain and really ensuring that from a rate readiness standpoint, our supply base is there with us, that we've addressed the seating issue and that we bring that to full closure. Those are some of the risks certainly that have that we worked here towards mitigate. There's probably still some that potentially extend in a, in a much reduced way here as we go forward, and that's why our confidence continues to improve. We also still have some work to do relative to orders as we consider, you know, the back half of the year, not necessarily in terms of our North America space, but overseas. We've got to make sure that we're that we have accounted for those risks properly.

Speaker 4

Overall, there are certainly some that are out there, that from a risk standpoint that we've shared with you all before, nothing new that's emerging to us that would be, you know, worthy of highlighting, all things that we would consider that we need to go manage. Our confidence is building, but we still have some work to do here, and it's early in the year.

Speaker 5

Okay, fair enough. I appreciate the color. I'll get back in queue.

Speaker 4

Thanks, Jonathan.

Speaker 6

Thank you. One moment, please, for the next question. Our next question is coming from the line of Ty Collin of CIBC. Please go ahead.

Speaker 9

Hey, good morning, everyone. Thanks for taking my questions. Maybe just to start, you mentioned that some of your customers are deferring their decisions and their orders on ZEB. Are those customers switching their options to diesel, or are they just kinda deferring altogether? Does that dynamic impact your production scheduling at all through the year?

Speaker 4

Well, I'd share a couple of things. First off, on the last part of your question, in terms of our production and scheduling, we do a really good job of being able to manage through and execute. Really in terms of our master planning through the rest of this year, we feel really good. We may see a little bit of movement here and there, but nothing significant that would give us concern. Certainly, we think we have a well-understood mix as we as we go forward overall. Relative to your question in terms of conversion, you know, there's been some examples of it.

Speaker 4

The first thing I would note, though, is that relative to overall order book conversion, that we do continue to see, especially as, you know, we approach the, you know, towards the end of 2026 timeframe, that we're seeing a lot more orders that are being firmed up. Relative to the specific question on propulsion type, you know, there is the potential certainly for us to, you know, entertain a customer making a switch from a, from a ZEB to an ICE propulsion platform. It's fairly minimal when we're seeing those occurrences. Really what we see relative to the push to the right tends to be more around, you know, infrastructure establishment, other things that customers need to have in place, and they're not quite ready yet for us to be able to go receive that.

Speaker 4

Look, there's several things in there for sure. What I would say overall, we feel good about the ZEB mix that we have going forward through 26. We feel really good about what we see in terms of ZEB mix, you know, in the out years. All of it is certainly from a in terms of our performance here for this year, is definitely manageable within the guidance that we've provided. The other thing too I would note is when we're able from a production standpoint, there is less touch labor that is required for us to be able to get a internal combustion through the shop than a ZEB. When we do see a conversion, that does create that path for us to increase rates, obviously slightly, right?

Speaker 4

When you're talking about more buses, but we can get more ICE through the shop than ZEB. Overall, from an EBITDA standpoint, that is another reason that we're able to manage any kind of impact to us, and that's really by driving more volume.

Speaker 9

Okay, great. Then, just on transit deliveries in Q1, you know, obviously, the U.K. and ADL drag that down year-over-year. Can you maybe just comment on the year-over-year change in North American transit deliveries and how we should think about that within Q1?

Speaker 4

Yeah. I mean, the U.K. was certainly the big driver as noted. I think we saw a little bit of an impact in terms of North America, it would go back to, you know, to a couple things. One is, we were continuing to execute and navigate through, you know, the seating challenge to some degree in terms of the quarter. Although we have seen that improve significantly such that, it is, it really is something that we expect to not be talking about here in the very near future.

Speaker 4

Second, there were a couple of other things that I noted around just ensuring from an efficiency standpoint that we took a couple of necessary steps, you know, within our operational and manufacturing facilities to ensure that we were getting to that efficient state of flow that really positions us strong for Q2 and beyond. Out of station work can be very inefficient when it starts to propagate. Seats had been previously a driver for that. Now that we've seen that issue resolved, it's really allowing for us to see, you know, those volumes come back strong. What I would note is that we've had a really strong April.

Speaker 4

It's exactly as we anticipated based on some of those decisions made, which may have affected a little bit in terms of our Q1 outputs, but what I would really highlight is, we're positioning what we anticipate to be strong EU expansion and growth here as we get to Q2 plus.

Speaker 9

Okay, that's really helpful. Thanks. All the best.

Speaker 4

Yeah, thanks. Bye.

Speaker 9

Thanks. Bye.

Speaker 6

Thank you. One moment for the next question. Our next question is coming from the line of Tim James of TD Cowen. Please go ahead.

Speaker 8

Good morning. Thanks very much for the time. I just wanna explore one question here. Can you talk about the aftermarket as you look out over the next two years and just kind of review some of the moving parts there in terms of volumes that you expect to see kinda driving revenues and any sort of influences on margins? I know there's some different kinda services that end up hitting that aftermarket revenue line. I'm just curious as to kind of the moving parts that we should think about over the next kinda one to two years.

Speaker 4

Yeah, great. There's 3 things that I'll talk about on this question, Tim. It's a great question overall. Certainly, we continue to see very good growth relative to our core business in the aftermarket space. As you see volumes, install base, all of those things that are beneficial in terms of spare parts volume and your kind of your core business, you know, those continue to strengthen. We continue to see, certainly good action from the team relative to the needed, you know, pricing to reflect the, you know, the economics and what our end use customers, you know, need from a material standpoint. Overall, those are good tailwinds that are going to continue to support the core portion of the business.

Speaker 4

Where you do see some mix relative to profitability in the aftermarket space can be what we call our within our programs. Those will be where we're working with an end use customer around a specific reset in terms of their platform or where they need to put a new product on. When we do that, the programs, they can be a little bit lumpy 'cause you could expect as you may have a large municipality that's gonna have a program for a retrofit that comes through, and then you can see that shift or where that program comes off. You gotta go find that next one.

Speaker 4

Overall, the team's done a fantastic job in terms of building up that pipeline of programs to ensure that we continue to see, you know, good growth here for the next couple of years. The third thing I would note too is that we are, at least in some regions, also, feeling some tailwind here relative to FIFA and the World Cup, and then especially in the North America area. We would expect to see that continue slightly here in the second quarter. What I would also note too is that we're doing some things across our overall organization to ensure from an aftermarket standpoint that we evaluate the full NFI approach and how we can ensure that we're maximizing what we do as an overall group in the aftermarket space, and drive more growth.

Speaker 8

Okay. That's great. That's super helpful. Thank you.

Speaker 4

Yeah. Thank you, Tim.

Speaker 6

Thank you. There are no more questions in the queue. I would like to turn the call back over to Stephen for closing remarks. Please go ahead, Stephen.

Speaker 7

Yeah. Thanks a lot, Lisa. Thanks everybody for joining us today to get our Q1 recap. As always, please don't ever hesitate to reach out to our IR team. We'll obviously have materials posted on our website. Thanks a lot. Have a great day.

Speaker 6

This concludes today's program. Thank you so much for joining. You may now disconnect.

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