Bodycote H1 2026 Earnings Report

Bodycote EPS Results

• Actual EPS: GBX 18.10
• Consensus EPS: N/A
• Beat/Miss: N/A
• One Year Ago EPS: N/A

Bodycote Revenue Results

• Actual Revenue: N/A
• Expected Revenue: N/A
• Beat/Miss: N/A
• YoY Revenue Growth: N/A

Bodycote Announcement Details

• Quarter: H1 2026
• Date: 7/28/2026
• Time: Before Market Opens
• Conference Call Date: Tuesday, July 28, 2026
• Conference Call Time: 3:45AM ET

The leading provider of heat treatment and specialist thermal processing services worldwide. Heat treatment encompasses a variety of techniques and specialist engineering processes which improve the properties of metals and alloys and extend the life of components and is a vital part of any manufacturing process. Bodycote (LON:BOY) is uniquely placed via our global network and the experience and knowledge of our people to offer high quality, reliable and cost-effective services to manufacturers whatever their size or market sector.

Bodycote H1 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

Key Takeaways

• Positive Sentiment: Strong first-half performance: Core organic revenue grew 9.6%, led by Aerospace & Defense, industrial gas turbines and a recovery in medical, more than offsetting a 4.4% decline in automotive. Adjusted EPS increased 18.3% to £0.252.
• Positive Sentiment: Group operating margin improved 110 basis points to 16%, supported by the Optimise restructuring program, lower-cost operations and reduced exposure to low-margin non-core activities. Management expects further Optimise benefits and volume leverage in the second half.
• Neutral Sentiment: Optimise remains on track, with 29 of 31 planned footprint actions expected to be completed by year-end and at least £15 million of annualized benefits targeted by mid-2027. The company is evaluating a further phase focused mainly on structurally challenged automotive operations, but acknowledged that returns may be less attractive than in the initial phase.
• Neutral Sentiment: Full-year guidance was reaffirmed, although second-half growth is expected to moderate because of tougher comparisons and core margins remain subject to variable-pay normalization and new-site investment costs. Capital expenditure is expected near the lower end of the previously guided £80 million–£90 million range, while the company continues its £80 million buyback and selective M&A strategy.

Presentation

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

Thanks for joining us for our 2026 half-year results. I'm Jim Fairbairn, the CEO, and with me is our CFO, Ben Fidler. I'd like to do some brief introductory remarks. I'll set the context and give some highlights, and then I'll pass to Ben to go deeper into the financials. I'll then come back and talk about how we're continuing to make progress in executing the strategy, and then I'll end with a comment on the outlook. To start with the highlights, we are pleased with our good performance in the first half. We are on track and on plan. We've reported core organic revenue growth of just under 10%. We've seen strong demand in Aerospace & Defense and also IGT. Medical has also returned to growth. All of this has more than offset continued softness in automotive.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

As we said we would, we have delivered margin improvement on the back of volume growth and our successful Optimise repositioning and restructuring. I'll talk later about the pace of progress on Optimise and how we intend to go further. In summary, we are on track and pleased with progress in the first half, and we are happy to reconfirm our expectations for the full-year. Let's look at the growth and also the momentum across the group. Across our total core markets, revenue grew 9.6%, and this was made up as follows. Aerospace & Defense revenues grew almost 25%, reflecting the strong demand a`cross OE and also aftermarket, and this was particularly led by surface treatment on commercial engines. Industrial markets grew slightly as expected, but remains fragile. At the same time, we have continued to see softness in automotive.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

It was down 4.4%, with weakness across most areas of our portfolio, and especially Western Europe. Energy, which was up 4.7%, and within that, IGT revenues were up over 10%. Our oil and gas business has stabilized after significant contract wins in 2024. We also saw strong revenue growth in consumer medical and other. It was up 14.8%, driven by semiconductor demand and a return to growth in medical. In overall terms, you can see the strong performance of some of our end markets, more than offsetting the softness in automotive and the good sequential growth, notwithstanding the softer prior year comparator. This then gives us the confidence that we are on track for 2026. I'll talk more about this later. With that, I'll pass to Ben.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Well, thank you, Jim, and just to add my welcome to all of you. Thanks for what I understand is a reasonably busy morning this morning, good to have you with us. I'm now going to step through in a little bit more detail just some of the key elements of our financial performance for the first half. I'll also touch on some of the more detailed aspects of our technical guidance as to what you should expect for the full-year 2026. Let's start, as you can see here, with the key highlights. Overall, a good performance in the first half that was in line with our expectations.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

I think the highlights were good levels of organic revenue growth, core margins that were up despite some cost headwinds we incurred in the period, strong EPS growth, good level of cash conversion and a balance sheet that remains in good shape, and a good level of capital return to shareholders through a combination of the dividend and the ongoing GBP 80 million share buyback. Let's dive into the numbers on the next slide in a little bit more detail. Firstly, in the top table here, you can see focusing on the ongoing core business. Core revenues were up 9.6% organically, reflecting strong growth, as you heard from Jim, across aerospace, defense, industrial gas turbines, and medical markets. Core operating profit rose 11% organically to GBP 60.4 million, with core margins up 30 basis points to 16.2%.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Although underlying core margins progressed much more strongly than this, that was impacted in the first half by variable pay, which normalized after an unusually low level in 2025, as well as the cost drag on some of the new program investments that are ramping up as we've opened a number of new sites and are transferring work to those. Each of those elements, the variable pay piece and the new investment ramp-up, had about 100 basis point impact on the margin in the first half. Secondly, in the lower table, you can see the numbers looked at through the group lens, which includes our non-core business, the non-core activities that we're exiting from. Revenues at that level were up 6.5% organically to GBP 381.2 million. Group operating profit, GBP 61 million, with margins of 16%, up 110 basis points on the prior year.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

That reflected the benefits from the Optimise program, as well as the reduced revenue scale of our low-margin non-core activities. Adjusted EPS, as you can see here, rose a strong 18.3% to GBP 0.252. The interim dividend was increased by 4%, providing an increase to shareholders whilst also helping us to rebuild dividend cover. I want to look at some of the key drivers of the group's operating profit performance. I'm going to cover the details behind the divisions in a moment, as you can see here, divisional profit rose by a combined GBP 7 million from our two core divisions, reflecting that strong top-line growth in Specialist Technologies of 16%, as well as the good growth in Precision Heat Treatment of 8%.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

The benefits from Optimise ramped up further in line with our expectations, with around a GBP 2 million further profit improvement delivered in the first half of the year. You can see those optimized benefits land in both the Precision Heat Treatment division, as well as in central costs. Non-core profit, as you can see here, reduced by GBP 1 million on a GBP 23 million reduction in non-core revenues, reflecting the execution on site closures and disposals. Overall, we're pleased with what we are achieving and delivering on the Optimise program, all of which is turning Bodycote into more of a right-sized, better utilized, and more efficient group. The first half numbers, as you can see here, I think show this quite clearly. Group revenue is up 3% in total and up 6.5% organically.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

With that leaner and more efficient cost base enabling us to deliver that top-line growth, while at the same time having 1% reduced labor cost on 4% lower headcount and 2% reduced utility costs with over a 10% improvement in energy intensity. All of which combined has enabled us to deliver that group margin improvement of 110 basis points year-over-year. Let's turn to look at the performance of our two core divisions in a little bit more detail. Firstly, with Specialist Technologies you can see here, which delivered a strong performance. Revenues up 16.7% and profit up almost 17% organically. Very much led by the 37% growth in Aerospace & Defense revenues, which is now 50% of this division's revenue base. We renewed two important long-term agreements with customers in the period with two sizable U.S. Tier 1s.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Energy overall as a market was up only 2% in terms of revenue, that masked a much stronger 17% growth in industrial gas turbines, which largely offset the 15% decline we experienced in oil and gas markets. Those oil and gas declines are now easing as we work our way through the difficult prior year comps. Medical, which you also may remember was softer last year, now back to growth, up 15% in Specialist Technologies in the first half. Industrial and automotive you can see here, smaller parts of this division representing only 20% of combined divisional revenues, but these markets remain challenging in the year. Margins overall for the division, healthy at 26.1% up 10 basis points. Next, turning to Precision Heat Treatment. On an organic basis, revenues up just over 6%, led again by the strong growth in Aerospace & Defense, which was 16% in this division.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Operating profit rose just over 5% organically, with margins stable at 15%. Industrial, which represents about 25% of Precision Heat Treatment divisional revenues, was up 3.6%. That was effectively stable on an underlying basis, which was then boosted by the Optimise revenue transfers. Automotive, 26% of our Precision Heat Treatment division, remain challenging. Here, even with the benefit of some of those Optimise revenue transfers from non-core into core, the organic revenue decline here was 4%, reflecting the ongoing structural challenges that a number of our automotive markets face, particularly in Western Europe. Let's turn to cash flow, the group delivered a good level of cash performance in the first half: operating cash flow of GBP 41.6 million, up almost GBP 4 million over the prior year.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

That reflected the high level of EBITDA year-on-year, some temporary phasing effects on CapEx, which saw CapEx actually modestly lower in the first half, and a working capital outflow that reflected the strong organic revenue growth. Operating cash conversion overall was stable at 68% versus the prior year. Restructuring spend, as you can see here, increased to GBP 9.5 million as we'd expected, reflecting further execution and delivery on the Optimise program. Cash tax was up GBP 5 million versus the prior year. That reflected a lower level of tax refunds that we had benefited from in the first half of 2025, and we expect a much more balanced H1, H2 pattern to cash tax this year. Overall, left free cash flow at GBP 14.5 million, about GBP 3.5 million lower than the prior year. Let's turn to look at capital allocation.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

We ended the period with net debt of GBP 135.2 million. Leverage still low at 0.7x. We very much maintained and will maintain our balanced approach to capital allocation. In the first half, that saw us deploy GBP 33.5 million on capital expenditure, close to GBP 28 million on dividends to shareholders, and close to GBP 18 million on the share buyback, with just over GBP 12 million deployed on the new GBP 80 million buyback that we launched in March. On M&A, we closed one transaction in the first half. Not a huge acquisition at GBP 5.5 million, but Spectrum Thermal Processing is a very nice business, a nice quality addition to our U.S. aerospace footprint and capability, and it's performing very well. We continue to build the M&A pipeline, as Jim will touch on a little bit later.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Finally, an update on some of the more detailed technical guidance points for 2026. I'm not going to step through all of these, but just to flag the two or three that have changed since we last presented this to you in March. Firstly, CapEx. Continue to expect it to be high year-over-year, with a ramp-up in the second half reflecting project phasing. For the full-year, we now expect CapEx to be at or towards the lower end of our GBP 80 million-GBP 90 million previous guidance range. Secondly, finance cost. Small item and a small change, but around about GBP 10 million, a little bit lower than we previously guided. Finally, tax rate. Expect it to remain in line with the first half 23.5 percentage points level, which is about 100 basis points lower than we'd originally flagged in March.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

As a reminder, as you model margins for the second half, do bear in mind those two headwinds which we'll maintain, variable pay as well as the new investment ramp-up costs. At the same time, we expect further volume leverage and further Optimise improvements to come through in the second half of the year. With that, I'll hand back to Jim to update more on strategy and on outlook.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

Thank you, Ben. We've continued to make further good progress executing on our strategy. As you know, it's focused on three key areas. Optimise, where we have been successfully carrying out a major portfolio rationalization and are now looking to go further. Perform, where we are driving margin improvement through the deployment of Lean. Our lighthouse operational excellence sites are now up and running, and we are very much in the rollout phase. Grow, which is all about being smart with our capability and capital and a focus on commercial wins and M&A. Let's look more closely at the benefits we're getting from the Optimise program. The program delivery is on track. We expect the majority of the planned footprint actions, that's 29 out of the 31 sites, to be completed by the end of the year. We're really pleased with the results.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

The financial cost-saving benefit last year was around GBP 4 million, and we expect the same again this year, with a full run rate benefit of at least GBP 15 million by the middle of 2027. With the sale of the French sites, the net cash costs will be around GBP 10 million-GBP 15 million. We've now a successful playbook for this activity, including ensuring that we retain the revenues that we want. A lot has been done, and some of the more straightforward and obvious consolidations, where there were clear opportunities, have been done. We are exploring potential options to expand the program and go even further. This is focused on the parts of our auto business that remain in structural decline, and we'll have more to say in due course. On to Perform.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

I'm also very happy with the early successes that we're seeing, and in particular from our lighthouse sites. These are four sites that we've set up to act as intense training hubs. We've launched our EDGE Lean system and are fully deploying it in our showcase sites. People around the group can visit these sites, see what excellence looks like, absorb the key learnings, and carry best practice into the rest of the organization. Let's look at one example. In lighthouse site number one, it's a very large site. It's a U.S. HIP site. We've set ambitious two-year targets in areas such as turnaround time and also margins. After three week-long Kaizen events, already we've achieved a 30% reduction in new product introduction lead time.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

We've four of these lighthouse sites, two in the U.S. and two in Europe, and from there, we're rolling out processes to other sites. Of course, this kind of implementation leads directly to better customer experience, better productivity, more capacity, and ultimately better margins. We're continuing to execute on the strategy, and I'm very happy with the recent progress. Obviously driving these efficiencies and margin improvement is a good foundation for future growth. At the core of our strategy is our drive to improve the quality of the portfolio. We've already made significant progress over the last two years. We have prioritized areas where we see higher growth and exited lower grade, more commoditized segments, plus we have integrated two quality acquisitions. As you know, our target end markets comprise Aerospace & Defense, IGT, medical, and also electronics.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

These now account for 48% of group revenues and are seeing good growth. Two years ago, they were only 35% of group revenues. We're not finished yet, and a key priority is to go further to improve portfolio quality, setting us up for strong underlying growth with organic acceleration plus investment. It's supplemented by more M&A, together with driving further on the Optimise program. Lastly, to cover outlook, we are mindful of the geopolitical and macroeconomic situation, our full-year outlook remains unchanged. We expect to deliver core organic revenue growth, led by Aerospace & Defense, IGT, and also medical. The pace of growth will moderate in the second half due to the comparators. We also expect to increase our group operating margins as we see increasing benefits from our Optimise program.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

This success in Optimise and our focus on Perform and Grow also mean that we remain confident in the delivery of our medium-term financial targets. With that, I'll say thank you and then open up to questions. We'll start with Andy and then Jonathan.

[Analyst]

Thank you for the presentation, gents. Three questions, please. Can we start with Optimise? Clearly, we're making good progress, but you've tempted us with an opportunity for maybe some more Optimise. Can you just give us a flavor for maybe the scope of what you're thinking about for the next leg of what may come within that Optimise expansion and maybe timing and just basically how you're thinking about it, just a bit more detail. Second question is on the M&A pipeline. Clearly, Spectrum was a nice little deal. We've had activity in the market with Kittyhawk recently going. I was just wondering, your pipeline apparently is building quite nicely, but there's broader market activities. Just really a bit of a flavor for how you're seeing the M&A backdrop. Then lastly, one for Ben.

[Analyst]

We've got some variable costs coming back into the business, as you guys have discussed, in 2026. How does that flow through to 2027 and 2028? I'm assuming that you still have a bit more in 2027 and then it all kind of disappears by 2028. Or should we not get too excited about 2027 and 2028 because there'll be more greenfields, more investment in Specialist Technologies? I just want to make sure that we're not getting too carried away, or maybe we should. Thank you.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

Okay, I'll take the first two and then Ben can take the third one. In terms of Optimise, we're still doing the work and analysis. I think we're a month or two before we really decide where we're going to go with that. Two things I would say. I think the first thing is that we're responding to markets that remain structurally challenged, and I think that's a good thing. I don't think we anticipated previously the depth of that structural challenge. I think the fact that we're responding is actually positive. The other thing I would say is that with more conviction on being able to execute and Optimise, so in my prepared remarks, you would have heard that we said that we were on track. We put a lot of program management and team focus around being able to execute that.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

The model just isn't closing site. It's also about retaining revenues. We also said previously that we would remain agile, and I think that's a very important point. I think last point I'd make is that, as Ben alluded to, with a lot of the low-hanging fruit within the organization, especially within AGI, has all been done. As we look out for potential further restructuring consolidations, then it will be a bit more difficult. You shouldn't necessarily expect the same returns. At some point, Ben can update on that. On acquisitions, we continue to build our pipeline. Our preference always is not to be part of a process and build the relationships through time, through family-owned enterprises, and that's what we're doing.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

In fact, the man sitting next to your left is now responsible for M&A, and he's doing a good job about building these relationships. It is our aim every year to do several acquisitions. As you know, it's dependent on a negotiations, sometimes these are opportunistic. I think what you want to know is that we have a funnel, we've got an active funnel. All of us in the leadership team are tasked with looking at new opportunities and building these relationships, making business cases, and that is all actually happening. It needs to be aligned to the strategy as well. Acquisitions are very much a part of the strategy going forward. It's a big focus within the company, within the board. I'm confident in the short to medium-term it will do more.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

I couldn't be happier with the integration of the Spectrum and the Lake City. I think both of these are actually outperforming, which is actually true, and I think that's testament to the team who've actually taken over and also the process that we build behind them. It's the same rigorous process in identifying and nurturing the pipeline. I'm confident that we'll do more at some point.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Should I pick up the one on the new project investment costs? Your question on that, if I've understood it correctly. Firstly, just quick context set. Remember what's behind those. If you wind back to the slides that we shared in March, you've got new site in Mexico, S³P greenfield in South Korea. You've got some A&D site expansions and replacement of legacy sites in the U.S., and also some additional HIP capacity that we're putting in two sites in the U.S. and one site in Europe. There's quite a bit on our plate at the moment around some of these things, which is necessary for lots of good reasons because we want to drive more growth in the business.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

At the same time, we've also got to be mindful that financial alchemy is not entirely possible, and it means in the early years as you carry out those investments and those new sites start getting up and running, there is a cost to doing that. As we alluded, it's probably around about 100 basis points to margin headwind in the first half, stays at about that level in the second half. That clearly starts to abate as you go through 2027 and 2028. It won't all go away in 2027. Chunk of it does. Chunk of it goes away in 2028. It does depend on the second half to your question, is there more new investment coming thereafter? There will be a bit more.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

At the same time, as you go through 2027 and 2028, you've got the building elements of the drivers coming from more savings on Optimise, Perform starting to deliver, and hopefully some ongoing volume growth in the underlying markets. I'd think of it in that way.

[Analyst]

For the 2026, it'll be a hump for that investment.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

It probably is. It's the combination of a hump in those investments and the variable pay rebalancing.

[Analyst]

Yeah.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

that variable pay piece, that doesn't unwind in 2027. It's found a new base level. It's back to its normal base level, I should say, therefore, that doesn't unwind, it just hopefully doesn't get worse.

[Analyst]

Great. Good morning, guys. Three questions from me as well, please. Firstly, can I just come back to Optimise and obviously increasing the scope there? You're going to focus on the areas that are structurally challenged within industrial and also automotive. Can you just break out how much of industrial you think is structurally challenged, also how much of automotive is structurally challenged as well? Like you say, that in terms of the payback, it is going to be lower, can you just give us a feel for what kind of levels of payback we could get on the next round? That was the first one. The second one was just in terms of North America industrial. Obviously, it has lagged. It's lagged the PMIs. It isn't really picking up. I think we would've expected that to be better. I know there's a mix effect there.

[Analyst]

Can you tell us what parts of industrial in U.S. are really sort of holding you back there? Obviously the views into the second half. A third question, just in terms of one of your smaller end markets, but semicon obviously growing really well. Can you just give us a flavor for the growth of that business in H1? What can you do to really expand your exposure to semicon within Bodycote? Thanks.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

Let me take the first one then, Ben. In terms of Optimise, we're very much saying that the structurally challenged area of the business is actually automotive. Let me put some color to that, Jonathan. We're down 4.4%, as we say, it is a different picture in some regions. Hopefully this will give you some color and kind of point you to what we're thinking. North America, Eastern Europe, and Turkey showed actually modest growth there during the period. Western Europe was actually down high single-digit. That leads us to where I'd say that one of the focus areas that we are and will be looking at going forward. China was also down. Light vehicle production was actually down 5%. We were down slightly more than that, if you look at P5 and P6, there was a bit of a recovery in China.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

I think we're not really seeing in industrial, we're really focusing on auto. Ben can come back about the payback in a second. I'll take the North American Industrial. If we look at it on a kind of global basis, the sub-market, in 50% of our industrial markets is in machinery manufacturing. That was like Just flat to slightly down. Whereas tooling and tool steel and also construction and agriculture were actually slightly up. That's where we are as a total industrial market. Actually America, if we look at the kind of regional, Europe was actually slightly up. North America was actually down. Our kind of key weak spot in North America was actually heavy truck and bus equipment. That's really the industrial supply chain to that. That's really where we saw the weakness. Do you want to take the payback question?

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Yeah, semis as well.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

Semi, yeah.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Look, on the payback, as you saw on the slide that we shared on screen earlier, the payback on this program has been actually very good, I think, with around about a one for one in terms of the net cash cost to achieve and the expected profit benefit that we're still ramping up to deliver, but confident that we will deliver that at least GBP 15 million improvement by the middle of 2027. Of course, with the initial program scope, it was also helped from a net cash cost perspective by the fact we were able to package off and sell those French sites, which brought in around GBP 19 million of proceeds and would have been far more expensive had we closed those.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

I think in terms of orders of magnitude, it's hard to be too precise because at the moment, the scope of the program is still being worked out, so it'd be premature for me to sit here and come out with a number on payback. However, as Jim mentioned, it won't surprise you that the lowest hanging fruit was achieved and delivered in the first stage of the program. That's not to say it won't be attractive. If it's not attractive, we wouldn't be doing it's probably more likely to be somewhere in that arguably 2x-3x range between cash cost to benefit. Still gives an attractive payback, but just not as low hanging-ly attractive as the first stage. It gives us time to work it through.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

We need to do more work to precisely define the scope of it, precisely define the reach of it, and the execution mechanism as to how we do it, which through closures, potential disposals, combination of those. As Jim mentioned, we'll come back to you later in the year when we've done that work and when we're ready to give you some more concrete numbers on that. On semis, your question on that, Jonathan, look, it's growing nicely, not surprisingly. I think it was up about 25% or something in the first half. It is a relatively small part of the group. It's about 2% of revenues today, in semis.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

With some very niche exposures that we have there in the chip manufacturing supply chain process for equipment, capital equipment that goes into chip manufacturing, through two or three different parts of processes, a bit in S³P, little bit in Precision Heat Treatment, and little bit in Hot Isostatic Pressing. It's hard to grow dramatically organically in that, but it's probably more likely through some, if there are selective M&A opportunities, and there is one early stage 1 in that area. It's very small, but that we're looking at. The likelihood is, if it is M&A in that, it will be through pretty small bolt-ons. There is one in the pipeline at the moment that we'll see where that one gets to, that would further enhance our reach into some of the electronic components, and semis, with more of an Aerospace & Defense bias to it.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

Okay, thanks, Jonathan.

[Harry Philips, Analyst at Peel Hunt]

It's Harry Philips of Peel Hunt. Just a couple of questions, please. Just thinking about the M&A environment, you've got two sort of well-known competitors who've set out very clear agendas to expand in similar markets and what have you. Just wondering, against that backdrop, you've got a whole list of companies in the States Many of them, I was actually looking at the list the other day, I think eight of the top 15 are family-owned still and what have you. I'm sure they're also wining and dining all the same people. What's the Bodycote proposition apart from cash to get those family businesses into your portfolio rather than other people's? When you look around capital allocation and, say, you've got these competitors wanting to grow at a real rate, just do you feel you need to sort of reappraise how you execute there?

[Harry Philips, Analyst at Peel Hunt]

Secondly, just looking at the chart, which you've very nicely sum up, Jim, where I think it was 48% of revenue come from those high growth markets. Let's say those high growth markets can do you mid-high single-digits. That should mean core Bodycote grows at three, four, with no growth in industrial auto, under pressure, et cetera. If we go back to the Capital Markets Day in December 2024, that sort of puts the capital market proposition almost at low case, if you like, given if you've got short 50% of sales in higher growth markets. Is that too simplistic, or what negative headwinds am I missing in that, please?

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

Thanks, Harry. Let me take the two of them, Ben can comment on the second one as well. I think in terms of M&A, we are very selective. Kittyhawk got a mention earlier. We knew the owners of Kittyhawk. We spoke to them. We decided actually not to bid for it for different reasons. We're not going to go in there. We're building every relationship that you would expect us to build, okay, with all these family-owned companies. Then we, as a team, take our ideas to the board. We have a big debate, and it's how it should be. I think what family companies, I think, like from Bodycote is that we're the market leader. We take a real interest in the longevity of actually their asset. We talk to them.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

I always ask the question, Why are we the best buyer? Therefore, we actually articulate that to the family company. We have some good opportunities in the medium to long-term of actually working with family-owned companies because we put a lot of currency on people, talent, development, how we think operationally, service levels, make sure that we serve the customer. We spend a lot of time actually doing that. I think building that relationship is actually very important. The one thing that I've learned, been doing this for 25 years, is that you can never tell a family company when they have to sell. They'll decide. That's actually why someone early on in my career said, You've got to wear out shoe leather. That's what would Barış, who's sitting there, that's what we do. We all do trips. Ben, everyone.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

To build these relationships. I think the proposition for us is actually definitely around being the market leader, our values, our people, and being able to articulate the reason why we are the best buyer. Maybe Ben could add to that in a second. Your second question around, you know, pretty much. We said at the Capital Markets Day, mid-single-digit growth through the cycle. One way to get there is exactly what you're saying. Half the business is in higher growth markets, and through time, that will increase, so you're not missing anything. I think we will continue to pivot the portfolio through time to increase that percentage, and that's a reasonable proposition. If you want to add anything to any of these two questions.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

I think just on the medium-term growth, mid-single-digit point, the only dimension I would add, I can't fault your math, much as I'd love to. If half the business is serving markets that are growing 6%, 7%, 8% per annum long-term, let's also remember Aerospace, brilliant growth, IGT, very strong growth. If you look out 5+ years, you can't extrapolate the first half performance forever. Nonetheless, they will still be significantly higher growth in a number of the other end markets. It gets you to maybe that 3%-4% you talked about. The other dimensions just to throw into the mix is that auto, is it really going to grow?

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Certainly, this is where the Optimise expansion program that does mean you maybe need to feed into your overall mix the fact that potentially the scale of our core revenues may have a little bit of a further reduction as we put more businesses into non-core in the event of an expanded, Optimise program. That doesn't diminish the future rate of growth, it just depends on your revenue start point when you're working out where your CAGR is, that you maybe need to lower it before you then have more of that confidence around mid-single-digit, maybe even slightly higher than mid-single-digit growth in the longer-term if you had a portfolio that was even more biased towards Aerospace, IGT, medical, semis, et cetera.

[Harry Philips, Analyst at Peel Hunt]

Excuse me. The flip side to that guess is if you start to take, let's just use auto as the example, you start to take some revenue out of that, is it then the capital allocation on the other side has got to be if M&A is sort of driven by the sort of factors outside directly your control. Do things like buybacks sort of get accelerated as a consequence of that because if you raise funds through focus and concentration, leverage is obviously on demanding where you are, et cetera. The balancing item of capital allocation, does a drop in auto come with a rejigged broader capital allocation?

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Well, I think it fundamentally depends upon how we can execute an expansion of the Optimise program. Your question inherently assumes it will be through disposals that release capital. I hope it might be. As you can imagine, you're looking at selling some of these businesses with an end market mix that may not be quite as favorable from a disposal perspective as your question might allude. That doesn't mean we're not going to try damn hard. It depends how you execute the program, whether it's through disposals or whether it's through closures and consolidations. In reality, maybe a mix of the two.

[Harry Philips, Analyst at Peel Hunt]

Thank you.

[Tom Elgar, Analyst at Deutsche Numis]

Hi, guys. Tom Elgar from Deutsche Numis. I think three sort of areas, just want to ask a question on. I think starting on A&D, clearly very strong growth at the start of the year. I think it'd be great if you could touch on the pricing contribution as part of that, and whether you can disaggregate the volume into the two parts of that. I guess secondly, on A&D, thinking about any additional color you can provide on market share within the first half. Obviously very strong in the business and obviously the changes that you've made, Jim, in terms of the go-to market strategy in A&D. It'd be great to get an update on that. I'll pause there and come back.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

Okay. I'll take the second part of that, Ben. In terms of market share, what we've done in the last 18 months is actually really strengthen our Aerospace & Defense team. We've brought in a new president. She has changed probably 75% of her team. Part of that was to bring in a head of commercial that works with all her frontline, really bring a new process and talent into looking at our commercial organization and go-to-market strategy, and also how we win business. The Aerospace & Defense business had been suffering a little bit from some service-level issues. Well, they have all been resolved now. Ben referenced two major renegotiations of LTAs, both very much in our favor, and that will bring us market share.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

I'm very confident that we have the rigor in terms of commercial focus just around the Aerospace & Defense team, and it's obviously showing within the numbers. Obviously, the majority of that is actually market growth. If you think of the beginning of actually last year, there was congestion in the supply chain. Four months earlier, we had the Boeing strike. We didn't have an easy first three or four months last year. I think Aerospace & Defense during the half year last year grew at 3%. Obviously, the second half we're going to moderate as you would expect. We've actually professionalized that whole team. Clearly, the majority of that is rising with the market. Why don't you talk about pricing volume?

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

I think it's some of the similar themes in the volume versus price. I wouldn't have said there is anything particularly out of the ordinary in aerospace pricing in the first half of the year. It's in line with the normal sort of price trends you'd expect from our business, which is sort of in that low single-digit percentage, low to mid-single-digit percentage type of level. It was predominantly volume, and particularly some very strong volume growth from customers like GE, where we do a lot of the surface treatment work there. Our surface treatment and Surface Technology business in aerospace saw very, very strong growth. A lot of which was boosted by GE activity on blade throughput on programs like LEAP, which was up more than 50% in terms of GE LEAP GEnx blade volumes.

[Tom Elgar, Analyst at Deutsche Numis]

Thanks, guys. Just moving on to the IGT side, obviously really nice to see the acceleration there. Just, I guess asking more broadly in terms of what's driving the acceleration in terms of are we seeing a greater alignment to obviously the higher rates of growth within OE, within the mix of the work that you do in IGT? Or is this obviously the pressure we're seeing within the industry given the rates of growth and the end customer demand that we're seeing, that there is more outsourcing demand and therefore that trend is continuing as the new sort of greenfield/excess capacity, that debate you guys obviously are well-positioned to help your customers through with that. I guess just trying to unpack that trend within IGT.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

Yeah, I mean, we're obviously very, very happy with our IGT growth. It's growing with the demand. Primarily in the U.S., but not all, there has been some, especially second half of last year and slightly into the beginning of this year, a challenge in the supply chain. We believe that with some of our household name customers, that they had problems getting castings and a whole load of things. That has now moderated. Obviously going into the second half, we expect to continue to see really good growth, especially in some of the larger IGT models that we service in the U.S. I think there's also a lot of experimentation and change around additive manufacturing that we're also seeing in some of our sites, especially in Greenville, where we do both. It's our site really apart from Derby.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

We've got a site with a combination of technologies, and we're expanding the amount of stages that we can actually work with in the customers. We see this as one of the most exciting areas of the business, and we expect Growth isn't 50%. It's just over double-digit. That kind of thing, I think, would be a reasonable outlook for the next 6-18 months.

[Tom Elgar, Analyst at Deutsche Numis]

Yeah. Just lastly, touching on maybe a market we don't talk about very much, but nuclear, obviously, we've seen the end markets there improve. I know it's a small market for you guys, but I guess just could you remind us of your go to market, your opportunity here? I guess looking at the pipeline, has that changed? I know this is very high margin works. If you were to do some new greenfield activity, it would be reasonably contributing in terms of.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

Yeah. As you say, nuclear is very small. We work with some of the household defense nuclear people. We manage our pipeline through the commercial organization.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

I think on the nuclear power side, you're right. We do have exposure and doing a reasonable chunk of work on nuclear power plants used in naval applications. That's a nice business we serve out of the U.S. I think your question is probably more about the commercial nuclear and maybe some of the growth in small modular nuclear reactors. It's a potentially very interesting long-term, where we're working and the teams are working hard to build inroads into the developing supply chains of things like the Rolls-Royce SMR. We work with Rolls-Royce very closely. We are accredited with Rolls-Royce's submarine business, which does the nuclear power plants on the U.K. Navy submarine vessels. We're a logical partner for them to use. The reality is, I don't think your forecast model probably goes far enough out to capture the revenue potential on that.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Not being cynical or skeptical about it, the rate of ramp-up in that is very exciting on a 10-year view. Probably very limited on a 1-2 year view, and marginal on a five-year view. It'll be there, it will take time to build. We are actively pursuing it, but you've got to recognize it's long lead time stuff.

[Tom Elgar, Analyst at Deutsche Numis]

Just for quick clarity on that, so you would say that refurb work, for example, in civil nuclear, is something we probably shouldn't expect? Because obviously we've seen a significant change in refurb volumes.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Yeah. We do. We benefit a little bit of that. We have some unique assets that service some Framatome work in France on that, as an example. Is it a big part of the business? It's not a huge part of the business today. It's a nice part of the business. It's nice high margin. We've got some quite unique assets that do that. We operate under a long-term agreement for some of that stuff. Yeah, is it enough to really move the needle? Probably not.

[Tom Elgar, Analyst at Deutsche Numis]

Thanks.

[Max Ryssen, Analyst at ODDO Asset Management]

Max Ryssen from ODDO `Asset Management. In your outlook, you mentioned you're expecting to deliver group margin improvement. Would you commit also to core margin improvement for the full-year?

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Yeah. Should I pick that one up?

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

Yeah. Please.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Look, the outlook comments are clear. Core revenues will grow organically. Group margins will expand. We don't guide explicitly to core margins. You saw what happened to core margins in the first half. I would assume the level of improvement will continue to be far greater in group margins for the full-year than it will in core margins.

[Max Ryssen, Analyst at ODDO Asset Management]

Thank you.

[Jamie Murray, Analyst at Bank of America]

Hey, guys. Jamie Murray from Bank of America. On Aerospace & Defense, clearly it's grown really well, and you've provided some good color. Looking ahead, how do you see that growth evolving into H2 and in 2027? Secondly, as part of the Optimise program, do you guys or is it possible for you to convert automotive sites into Aerospace & Defense sites? If so, what are the costs associated with that?

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

I'll take the second question, Ben, you can follow on with the growth. The answer to the second part of your question, can you convert sites? The answer is actually yes. It's not always as easy as rolling up and becoming an Aerospace Defense site, and that's a good thing. We as a company can do it. We understand the accreditations, the processes, and stuff. We are actually in the process of taking a site in Athens, Georgia, which was an automotive site that was part of the Optimise, and converting it to an aerospace site so that we can serve the Huntsville, Alabama, space area and the supply chain around that. That's a 12-18-month program. It's a completely new set of assets, mainly vacuum furnaces. You have to get industry accreditation. You've got to get customer accreditation.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

I think it's quite an involved process. You've got to make an investment. The Aerospace & Defense team are actually really excited about that because they see the potential. We've also done that in other sites over the years of bringing in aerospace work. For example, Barış in Turkey has actually pivoted one of the sites Gebze to be able to take aerospace work. That takes a lot of know-how and process know-how, knowing how to get the accreditations, which is all about quality, traceability, reliability, being able to heat treat within parameters that traditionally Automotive & General Industrial heat treaters can't do. We're in the process of actually doing that now, extending that to include Specialist Technologies like, for example, HIP is even a step above that.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

I think we do have a natural moat around our Aerospace & Defense business, okay, which we're very happy with and is actually working to date.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Look, let me pick up on the Aerospace & Defense question or a commercial aerospace question. First half growth 25%, it was against a comp base that was a little low last year, particularly Q1 last year, where you had a lot of supply chain indigestion. Aerospace had been up what, 3% in the first half of last year. The comps do get significantly tougher. Just mathematically, that means I wouldn't expect that level of 25% growth to continue in aerospace through the second half. It will moderate a fair bit, but still remain good, but moderate a fair bit.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Look, it's too early for us to guide in detail to anything around 2027, but you can look at the same numbers that we look at around the improvement and increase further in OE build rates, with probably somewhere between an 8%-10% increase in build rates for narrow body and wide body programs in 2027 at Airbus and Boeing, as well as ongoing growth in aftermarket, maybe at a slightly lower level, but somewhere in the sort of mid to high single-digit percentage level, which is where aerospace then sort of hits a cadence for 2027 and 2028 at that sort of level.

[Jim Fairbairn, CEO at Bodycote]

Anyone else? No. Thanks everyone. Thanks for coming. I appreciate your being here. Thank you.

[Ben Fidler, CFO at Bodycote]

Thanks.

Participants

Executives

• Jim Fairbairn, CEO
• Ben Fidler, CFO

Analysts

• Analyst
• Analyst
• Harry Philips, Analyst at Peel Hunt
• Tom Elgar, Analyst at Deutsche Numis
• Max Ryssen, Analyst at ODDO Asset Management
• Jamie Murray, Analyst at Bank of America