Innovative Solutions & Support - Earnings Call - Q3 2019
August 8, 2019
Transcript
Speaker 0
Good day, and welcome to Innovative Solutions and Support's Third Quarter twenty nineteen Earnings Conference Call. All participants today will be in listen only mode. Please note, today's event is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Jeffrey Hedrick, Chairman and CEO. Please proceed.
Speaker 1
Good morning. This is Jeff Hedrick. I'd like to welcome you this morning to our conference call to discuss our performance for the 2019, current business conditions and our outlook for
Speaker 2
the coming year. Joining me today are Sharon Mascupur, our President and Rell Ann Wenan, our CFO. Before I begin, I'd like Rell to read the Safe Harbor message. Rell? Thank you, Jeff, and good morning, everyone.
I would remind our listeners that certain matters discussed in the conference call today, including new products and operational and financial results for future periods, are forward looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially, either better or worse, from those discussed, including other risks and uncertainties reflected in our company's 10 ks, which is also on file with the SEC and other public filings. Now I'll turn the call back to Jeff.
Speaker 1
Thank you, Ralph. The company's third quarter results continue to reflect the cost controls and marketing refocus initiated at the end of the last fiscal year. The revenue increased this quarter and we were profitable for the third consecutive quarter. Profits were also up sequentially and we generated 28% of our revenue in cash, dollars 1,300,000.0. Once again, each of the three market segments we serve, commercial air transport, general aviation and military contribute to our third quarter results.
In addition, customer service revenue remains strong. The company's ability to have products that provide access to these markets remains the core strength of the company. Substantial revenues in the third quarter were generated from our general aviation PC-twenty four production and the retrofit programs for commercial air transport. In the military market, we continue production for the KC -forty six program and the Navy continues to evaluate our new air data computer for the company and we have developed for the F-five. We believe that these programs along with our steady maintenance activities will provide a solid base of revenues over the coming quarters.
In addition, the revenue and development expenses have been relatively constant at approximately 15% of revenues, a historical sweet spot. The company continues to implement its strategy of investing in fewer, but more promising technologies and products. At the same time, we continue our optimistic outlook for our patented ThrustSense autothrottle, especially now that we've added a twin turboprop STC to our portfolio. Just recently, our new ThrustSense autothrottle on the Beechcraft King Air twin engine turbocrop was the subject of an Aviation International news feature. They found the autothrottle safety benefits compelling and noted how the engine bay are especially during takeoff.
They went on to further remark that many of the benefits of the autothrottling concluding that great tool to help pilots concentrate on the flying of the airplane airplane without worrying about power control. So industry authorities clearly understand its advantages. I believe the Autothrottle provides the same level of protection in many cases as the FEDEC engine. It offers engine protection from over temperature and similar costly maintenance issues. With the AutoThrottle system fully operational and certified, we've chosen to spend a little extra time refocusing on perfecting the installation procedures to make sure that it is simple and efficient.
We want to support the marketplace starting with the first installation, minimizing aircraft downtime. With this extra preparation, it does allow us to allow owners and operators to install the autothrottle quickly and at a lower cost and at the same time strengthening our market penetration. Let me turn it over to Ralph for a discussion of the financials.
Speaker 2
Thank you, Jeff, and thank you all for joining us this morning. Revenue for the 2019 was up 35% from a year ago to $4,600,000 our third consecutive quarter of revenue growth. We were also profitable for the third consecutive quarter. Revenues were primarily comprised of product sales, which includes approximately $1,000,000 of customer service revenue, which has steadily increased over the last three quarters. The balance of the quarter's revenue was for Engineering Services.
Gross margins for the 2019 were 55%, an increase from 47% from in the same quarter last year. Margins in the quarter were essentially consistent with the 2019. We believe the improvement in gross margin primarily reflects better leverage from increased revenues and the benefit of the workforce reduction implemented in the 2018. Total operating expenses for the 2019 were $2,100,000 down approximately $500,000 compared to approximately $2,700,000 in the third quarter a year ago. Research and development expenditures were down $300,000 for this quarter compared to the same quarter last year, while selling, general and administrative expenses were down approximately $200,000 for the 2019 as compared to the same quarter last year.
Each of these decreases reflect the impact of the third quarter fiscal twenty eighteen workforce reduction. While R and D spending is down from a year ago, a shift in our strategy has enabled us to improve the productivity of our spending by investing in fewer, but what we believe are more promising new technologies. In the quarter, we earned $124,000 of other income, primarily interest from our cash balances. We did not recognize any income tax expense in the 2019 due to the utilization of tax loss carryforwards. We reported quarterly net income of $511,000 for the 2019 or $03 per share compared to more than a $1,000,000 loss or $06 per share loss in the same quarter a year ago.
We believe that the company remains in a strong financial position. We generated positive cash flow of $1,300,000 in the quarter. And at June 3039, we had $22,600,000 of cash on hand with no debt. We believe the company has sufficient cash to fund operations for the foreseeable future. Now I'd like to turn the call over to Sharon.
Speaker 3
Thank you, Rael. Good morning, everyone. We achieved steady progress in the third quarter both financially and strategically. It was our most profitable quarter of the year and it was a period where we made significant strides in strengthening our position in all our end markets. As we continue to increase our organizational efficiency, we witnessed the result of our actions through increased strengthening of our cash position.
Let me provide a little more detail on some of our ongoing programs that Jeff briefly reviewed. On PC-twenty four program, production continues to grow as demand for the utility management system is supplied Pilatus, is keeping pace with the sale of what is one of the most successful new aircraft launches in the industry. Keep in mind that we believe Pilatus will be ordering a significant quantity of shipsets per year. However, we include only a small portion of this future revenue in our backlog. And we continued discussions with other aircraft manufacturers who have expressed interest in this UMS product.
In our commercial air transport market, revenues continue to be generated from our Boeing seven thirty seven, seven fifty seven and seven sixty seven portfolio of caustic technology, both from existing and new customers domestically and internationally. There has been a little tailwind here because we anticipate that by end of next year, support for existing CRT based displays will end, making it more attractive for these airplanes to get our cockpit upgrades. And this is where our MRO channels are becoming more valuable as we continue to have new service centers signing up as installation sites for our commercial and business aviation products. Relying on our dealer network to perform individual sales allows our internal sales force to focus on more lucrative opportunities. Since we have been manufacturing many of our commercial aviation products for years, they require little additional engineering and are therefore quite frequently our most profitable products.
In the military market, our production KC-forty six program continues forward. Our engineering contract developed a new air data computer for the Navy It's in the aircraft installation and flight test support phase. The basic product is derived from the successful air data computer we developed for the A-ten, and we believe this versatile product to have opportunities on other platforms in The U. S. And international military markets.
In general aviation market, we remain excited about the potential of our ThrustSense autothrottle where we now have single and twin engine STCs. Our strategy is to add optional features for the basic STCs where each feature is essentially a new technology. More importantly, in contrast to the base autothrottle, the addition of these optional features is strategically designed to substantially enhance the autothrottle's appeal. As we progress with additional certifications of our King Air oral throttle, we will expand the certification base to allow us to take advantage of the full market potential for all King Air molecules. And as Jeff mentioned, we are also refining the installation process to reduce the cost and critical downtime of the aircraft.
This is a deliberately planned and disciplined way to ensure a successful launch and to improve our long term opportunities with this revolutionary product. On the PC-twelve, we're seeing increased interest in both full cockpit autothrottle configuration as well as individual stand alone installation. We've done deliveries and we've completed installation of both configurations, not just within The U. S. But also internationally, which is very promising.
The revenue growth and increased profits realized over the past several quarters are providing the time and resources we need to carefully plan and meticulously execute our autothrottle market entry strategy. Progress is being made. The endorsements we have received from industry authorities like Aerospace International News and the welcome reception we are seeing from manufacturers, dealers and operators, has us confident there is a large market for autothrottle that our constant cultivation will bring to fruition. Let me turn the call back to Jeff for some closing remarks.
Speaker 1
Thanks, Sharon. Another quarter of consistent performance has enabled us to advance our autothrottle strategy at a pace to yield the greatest return. We are in some respects creating a whole new market. I am confident that we have the right product, a sound strategy and a strong team that will enable SpreadSense to achieve widespread adoption and we believe that it deserves. We recently heard that the certification authorities had completed a two year review of our unique safety feature that can prevent catastrophic loss of control of the aircraft when an engine with the loss of an engine.
This is a breakthrough and this prudent review by the FAA and other agencies has resulted in, I believe, an approval and an STC of this new feature. I emphasize new does not exist anywhere in the world today. This feature within the next couple of months. So it's an optimistic output and we'll be happy to answer any questions you have. I'll turn it back over to the operator.
Speaker 0
At this time, we will begin the question and answer session. Today's first question comes from David Campbell of Thompson Davis and Company. Please proceed.
Speaker 4
Yes. Good morning, everybody.
Speaker 1
Good morning. Good to hear from you.
Speaker 4
Thanks for having a good quarter. You almost made my estimate. You were close.
Speaker 1
We worked hard at it, but I needed a new car.
Speaker 4
Well, you got one. You deserve one.
Speaker 1
We're trying to do it in a sort of a disciplined way, as you know. Appreciate your interest. Keep going.
Speaker 4
Well, I wanted to ask you a little bit more about the revenue. First of all, the revenue in the quarter does not include anything from the Auto throttle. Is that correct?
Speaker 1
It does. It does. Yes.
Speaker 4
It does have revenue from the
Speaker 2
Small amount.
Speaker 4
Yes. Okay. And you mentioned something about service revenue. I'm a little confused. Is that the same thing as product revenue?
What exactly?
Speaker 1
It's repair and overhaul. We have equipment that's been out in the field for twenty years now. And some of that equipment is being set back in for refurbishment or repair. And the revenue from that has now become significant because the amount of equipment has grown. There's a significant amount in service for a long period of time.
And that provides a significant revenue to the company, continues to grow. And we've hired a new manager of that department who's done an outstanding job. He had experience with OEMs like Dassault and other international OEMs. So he's doing I think the operation is getting better and more productive.
Speaker 4
Is it likely to be sustainable? I mean, is it something that's gonna happen every quarter or just
Speaker 1
It tends to grow because as you build more equipment, the support of that equipment grows. For most companies that have been around for a while, that's a significant part of their profits. When I was at Smiths, we had a significant repair and overhaul facility that generated a significant amount of our revenue. And to let you
Speaker 3
know, it's in so when you
Speaker 2
look at production, it's in in that number. Okay? It's the production number, but
Speaker 1
It tends to be almost $1,000,000 a quarter.
Speaker 4
It's in the production number.
Speaker 3
Pardon me?
Speaker 4
It's in the production number.
Speaker 1
Yes. Yeah. Because there hasn't
Speaker 4
been any there wasn't any engineering business in the revenue in the quarter.
Speaker 2
Yeah. There were some.
Speaker 4
There was some, but you didn't you didn't
Speaker 1
primarily, I think, to the FBI Right. Program where we're still doing we're we're getting funded for modifications to our existing design.
Speaker 4
Uh-huh. So it wasn't as long as it wasn't it's it was smaller than the previous quarters?
Speaker 2
Yes. That's correct.
Speaker 1
Our engineering is now more focused towards our own development of our own products now.
Speaker 4
Mhmm. Right. So but it sounds like Autothrottle is going to have more revenue in the future based upon your optimism.
Speaker 1
We're talking to a number of sources that have expressed interest in us supplying them autothrottles. Obviously, we don't want to discuss who they are or what they are, but it's premature. But we're chucked and we're excited about the recent FAA decision, which was a landmark decision. They did a great job. It was a tough analysis but it's a profound change.
If we can implement this, it has a as they have pointed out, it has the ability to save lives, and that's exciting in itself.
Speaker 4
Right. Right. Now do you sell do you sell the autothrottle? Are you selling that through service centers, fixed base operators? Sell we
Speaker 1
it through FBOs. We expect to be selling it through OEMs as well. So if we to market, the thing that has everybody's been waiting for has been this decision from the FAA, and it looks like it's imminent. So I I'm I'm I'm excited about after two years of of review, it's nice to see them finally finish up.
Speaker 4
But but they've given you the certification to to install it.
Speaker 1
We have we have it's multiple certifications. But the thing that I'm talking about specifically is this loss of control. If the engine fails and the speed gets too slow, airplane just flips on its back and kills everybody on board. We we've seen some examples of that recently, by the way. So the the thought is that this system will prevent that from happening.
Speaker 4
Okay. And
Speaker 1
the different certification the fundamental certification for the autothrottle. The fundamental certification for the autothrottle is simply an is somebody a system that controls the speed, the power to the engines, and protects the engines from over temperature and over powered.
Speaker 4
And and the FAA is is working on this this certification.
Speaker 1
Approved that. That that's already approved.
Speaker 4
Right. But but the other
Speaker 1
feature, this loss of control feature has never been done before. And so there was no certification background for them to certify it under. So they had to develop all the background and extensive review to make sure that it was safe. And it appears that they've completed that review and we expect momentarily some kind of the approval of the of the the approach, and then and then we have to fly it and prove it. That's all.
But we've been waiting two years to fly. Mhmm.
Speaker 4
Well, you still have your King Air. You can use yours to practice on it.
Speaker 1
Oh, and we've and we've tested it already. I mean, we've run a lot of tests, and it's they've been very successful, very promising. But and we're we now have to test it for the FAA, obviously. FAA has shown it would have been more than cooperative, but they're being very prudently very prudent. I mean, this is caution, and it's appropriate for new technology, especially this is trying to mitigate a catastrophic event, an event that you really don't have much chance to recover from.
Speaker 4
Alright. The only problem is the King Air is not big enough to hold your new car.
Speaker 1
You got that right. The guy that works for me that bought a a trailer truck for And on the trailer truck, he had a a a smart car tucked in the back of the the tractor so he could drive around when he stopped.
Speaker 4
I must
Speaker 1
have paid him too much money. I don't know.
Speaker 4
Anyway, Thanks I'm talking to for the good news. I'll turn it over.
Speaker 1
All right. Thanks.
Speaker 0
Our next question comes from Irwin Goldman, a Private Investor. Please proceed.
Speaker 5
Hi, Jeff. Morning. Hello. Good morning, Jeff. You may remember me.
I'm old guy at the annual meeting, 96 years old. Remember
Speaker 1
I also remember you moved faster than I did.
Speaker 4
All right. I had a
Speaker 5
lot of questions then. I have a lot of questions now. I'd like to start off with your employees. Number one, how many did we add in the quarter? And number two, are we hiring now?
Speaker 1
We still continue to hire a few number of a few people. Because we don't have this this urgent need, we're doing it in a in a in a carefully carefully planned better way, hopefully getting better quality people. It's a tough environment around it. It's good. Unemployment is near an all time low.
So there aren't a lot of people looking for jobs. So recruiting the right people is difficult. But there are we still find them. And we've had a few remarkable successes recently, Ed.
Speaker 5
Okay. How many employees do we have right now?
Speaker 1
65, roughly seven.
Speaker 5
All right. You had 49, so you added six. Okay. And
Speaker 1
some we consultants that we use. We use a lot of specialized consultants as well.
Speaker 5
Okay. Next question is about Pilatus. Is that a public company? And if so, what's its name?
Speaker 1
It isn't a public company, and it's a Swiss company.
Speaker 5
I know it's Swiss. Okay. All right.
Speaker 1
And it's not public.
Speaker 5
Okay. Now about the Pilatus, what percentage about the sales to them, I'd like to know the sales in the latest quarter and what percentage of our total sales that is, one would depend on the other, how many dollars and how many units?
Speaker 1
Well, honestly, we don't make any of that public. But we can tell you that it represented significant portion of our revenue. Significant,
Speaker 5
meaning more than 25%?
Speaker 1
More or less. It's in the range. That's a little high, but
Speaker 5
I can't hear you.
Speaker 2
At the range, yes. It's approximate.
Speaker 1
And we can't tell you exactly what it is because we don't release that.
Speaker 5
Okay. Are your July sales to Pilatus more than they were in June?
Speaker 2
We're not prepared to go into I mean, that's fourth quarter thing.
Speaker 1
That's a detail we don't address directly. The good news is we are on every production Pilatus PC-twenty four. So the rates at which we deliver it during the year are not only dependent on what they deliver, but depending on how they stage their material. So there's periods of it's bumpy. You'll have a lump and then you'll have nothing.
So we don't define it because it's not representative of what the consumption. What we do know is every airplane that's built and delivered were on airplane. A couple of
Speaker 3
things which is public on that is that is that they plan on delivering 40 aircraft in 02/2019.
Speaker 5
How many?
Speaker 1
40. 40,000 and '19 and 50 in 2020. Their production is gonna go up by 25% next year. A couple of years ago,
Speaker 3
they opened the books. They took order for 84 PC-24s at $9,200,000 And back in May, they reopened the book at the E PACE in Switzerland. They increased the price from €9,200,000 I believe, to $10,700,000 Approximately. And they took a whole bunch more orders. So it's a very, very successful product that's being marketed by.
Speaker 5
Okay. The next question relative to Palladis is how are they on paying their bills and do they have a credit limit?
Speaker 3
No. They're owned by Swiss banks.
Speaker 5
Owned by Swiss bank?
Speaker 2
They pay on time. They pay on time. No issue.
Speaker 5
Okay. I'm sure it's a corporation that stands on its own feet. Do you have a credit limit on them or a credit guarantee?
Speaker 1
No. No credit limit.
Speaker 5
No. Okay. And they've been paying their bills promptly?
Speaker 2
Absolutely.
Speaker 5
And
Speaker 1
their revenues are over $1,000,000,000
Speaker 5
Okay. Oh, really? Okay. Good. All right.
Could you tell us something about the KC-forty six? That's military, isn't it?
Speaker 1
Yes. That's correct. We can't tell you much about the KC-forty six because it's military.
Speaker 5
Okay. So besides those two, do you have any other customer who is over 10 of your sales in the last quarter?
Speaker 2
No. No single one.
Speaker 1
And we expect to get more OEM business. We are talking to a number of OEMs for different products. So we want to get a nice distribution. We're looking at expanding our OEM business that will provide stability in our revenues, more stability in our revenues while we pursue retrofits.
Speaker 5
Okay. The last question I have is, tell us all about whatever you can about sales efforts and interest on the Autothrottle.
Speaker 1
We can tell you that the industry, all the press has raved about the product. People that have installed it rave about the product. Our issue is simply trying to implement all of the technology that we developed but need to get approved the additional features. And we're getting close to that and we're refining as we explained the installation procedures to minimize downtime, which is if you own an airplane, don't like your airplane to be down. So anyway, don't expect to have any program in the near future that represents individually a very large percentage of our revenue.
We will expect to have that distributed over a broad range of people. And the retrofit, Murray.
Speaker 5
You said something about the people who have had it installed. I didn't know there were any. How many installations have you made?
Speaker 1
About five.
Speaker 5
Okay. That's good. Thank you.
Speaker 1
We have five and they're working fine. And bringing it up slowly because we don't want to have problems and we haven't had any problems to date. We're optimizing installation, which is critical. We're normalizing that installation. We're actually we're going into building harnesses that we never had initially anticipated, but now we're doing it to provide consistency of installation.
It's those kind of refinements that we're in the process of doing it. We're making improvements next.
Speaker 5
All right. Thank you, Jeff. That takes care of the questions. I'll probably think of some later on, but that's Thank for you very much.
Speaker 0
The next question comes from Charlie Pine of Van Clemens and Company. Please proceed.
Speaker 6
Good morning, gentlemen, and congratulations on another good quarter.
Speaker 1
Thank you. Well, thank you. We got we're working on it.
Speaker 6
Well, keep it up. Yeah. Most of my questions have been answered. So the last one, I guess, I would have would be probably for you, Jeff, and that would pertain to your discussion and the information that you had provided regarding what you're doing to, I guess, simplify the process for the auto thrust installs. How many man hours?
I thought I'd read somewhere in in one of the an article that it discussed, what approximate man hours of of time it took to, to install the thrust into a King Air. What what do you anticipate? What are you trying to get that number? What's your goal as far as getting that number to as far as, you know, the the amount of man hours to to do a to do a typical kind of normal install for the auto for the ThrustNet?
Speaker 1
It depends on the airplane, but for Pilatus, it's less than a because it's a single engine. It's less than a than a a King Air.
Speaker 6
Well, I guess I was referring to I I would I wanted to, you know I I wanted to address the King Airs.
Speaker 1
Okay. Well, the King Airs, we started out at 50. We believe we're down we could get it down to 30. So that's what we're we're working at. We wanna keep it as low as possible.
Now that's that's give you that's about that's 10% or 15% of what an auto throttle installation normally takes. So it's pretty remarkable. We we wanna get it down simply so that so that a a person can bring their airplane in and get it back within a couple of days completely updated and and ready to fly away. Because anybody that owns an airplane hates to hates
Speaker 3
to put it
Speaker 1
down, myself included. So
Speaker 6
Got it. So just to just to just so that I heard I I heard that right over these kind of scratchy phone lines, you said it's you're currently at around 50, and your goal is to get it to about thirty hours?
Speaker 1
That's correct. Alright. And
Speaker 6
then with the these additional features that you're referring to above and beyond this, you know, certification for loss of control. Could you could you elucidate one or two of these? And these additional features, what's what's the approval process involved in on on those, you know, for those types of situations? What's the
Speaker 3
Well kind of lead times?
Speaker 1
The summary is true. The the loss of control, obviously, I discussed is a major feature, and it requires FAA certification and review. And it's a long procedure for this because it was it had never been it still hasn't been done before. But the ones we're talking about now are minor modifications. And in some cases, we can refer to them as a minor modification and simply submit the data to the FAA.
But there's no test flying other than our own that's necessary. So these are primarily, in fact, without exception right now, features that will enhance the operator's experience, but are not certify are not distinct certification issues.
Speaker 6
Okay. And lastly, can you refresh my memory again on what you you expect? So just sort of the the for a, you know, kind of a plain vanilla cost of of an install of the of the on a stand alone basis without all the extra utility stuff, utility management systems, but just the the drop in thrust sense into a King Air, you know, what what you will be receiving on that again?
Speaker 1
So so right now in the
Speaker 3
King what what what would ISNS receive?
Speaker 5
Yes.
Speaker 1
No. No. It's just the installation cost. The the the m the MSRP at the at the dealer. The guy who's selling it.
Speaker 3
For a flyaway, it's about 75 k on the King Air. Okay. And it's about 65 k on a Exactly. $60.12 roughly.
Speaker 1
That's that's what the That's what and then the price of the day
Speaker 3
is installed to a dealer.
Speaker 6
Okay. Wait. Repeat please repeat that again. You said the MSRP on a for for a dealer will be about 75,000?
Speaker 3
No. Not for the dealer. For the end user.
Speaker 1
End user MSRP installed is $75.
Speaker 6
Installed. Okay. Alright. Thank thank you for the king. Right.
Right. Roughly. Okay. Okay. Roughly.
Great. Okay. Thank you for clarifying that to me. That's that's all I have, and congratulations again. And looking forward to more to come, and hopefully, you get that that next FAA decision as soon as as soon as you're alluding to.
Speaker 1
It's a it's a it's a really a breakthrough breakthrough technology. It's never been done before.
Speaker 6
Okay. Well, great. We appreciate it. Keep it up. Thank you.
Speaker 1
Thank you.
Speaker 0
The next question comes from George Morema of Pareto Ventures. Please proceed.
Speaker 7
Hi. Good morning. Thanks for taking my call, Jeff. Had a couple more questions on auto throttle. Most of my questions have been answered, but, I want to drill down a little more on the way I understand this is you can sell the autothrottle by itself for the, you know, $75 sort of number, or you could buy it as a package with your your whole, flight deck upgrade.
Is that is that correct?
Speaker 1
That's correct.
Speaker 7
And then what would be your your ballpark guess on on percentages? Like, would a quarter of people go for the whole upgrade or 75% or 10%? Or what what sort of expectations do you guys have for the stand alone versus a complete upgrade?
Speaker 1
It depends on the aircraft. But I would say initially that the vast majority would just buy the autothrottle. We are finding strangely enough that the autothrottle attracts people into the dealer. They're getting to the dealer and saying, Gee, I'd like to do the whole cockpit. So we're getting people that are doing especially in the Pilates', we're getting cockpit upgrades.
The King Air autothrottle that we now presently provide is only certified in more advanced cockpits that people aren't going to tear out and put a new cockpit in. These are later generation cockpits, advanced generation cockpits and probably far more expensive airplanes, but there's thousands of them out there. So and in those cases, we're going to do not as many cockpits. We're going to do primarily the autothrottle. But understand the autothrottle consists of also providing a standby instrument, which is combination instrument and an autothrottle.
So we do provide some features, additional features in the cockpit.
Speaker 7
And and currently, are your demand signals for this primarily coming on retrofits, or do you also have a demand pipeline for putting it in new new planes on the assembly line?
Speaker 1
We're we're negotiating that right now.
Speaker 7
And is is given your new breakthrough on the safety features of this, is there any discussion at all with the FAA or about a mandate for this in in small planes?
Speaker 1
The the FAA doesn't issue mandates, remember. They they FAA their responsibility is fundamentally to make sure that whatever equipment is in the airplane is safe. So they they do nothing more than evaluate how safe the design and implementation is. I will say that we got comments from one person at the FAA who commented that they lost a a person every four days and the things that we were doing was gonna save lives. I was I was surprised that he said that very appreciative that he said that.
At any rate, that's the good news. The cockpit upgrades right now are primarily in the Pilatus. We made you a King Air. But right now, we're focused on equipment that will go into existing installations.
Speaker 7
K. And one more. Given the demand signals you're getting currently, can you help to give a little color or frame up the magnitude of this opportunity for 2020 and beyond just to give some some ballpark idea how to think about this?
Speaker 1
Well, I I don't wanna speculate on that, but I will tell you that there are multiple thousands of aircraft as opportunities. If it's successful, we continue to work at it, try to keep the installation costs down, manufacturing costs down. And we would expect excellent penetration, especially if there's a life saving safety feature potential, which we're not sure of yet, but we believe there's an opportunity for that as well.
Speaker 7
So it sounds like you feel like given all the articles over the years and and and the big news about this, that there's probably a lot of pent up demand or something like this, I would assume.
Speaker 1
Well, I don't know yet. But it's you know, as I say, don't don't get too enthusiastic until you until you cash the check for the equipment.
Speaker 7
Understood. Okay. Thank you.
Speaker 1
Thank you.
Speaker 0
Our next question comes from Rick Teller, a Private Investor. Please proceed.
Speaker 8
Just two questions here. One is since, I guess, the last conference call, there there have been a couple of crashes of King Airs. There was one out in Hawaii and I think one down in Texas. Obviously, they there's no reports yet probably from the National Transportation Safety people. But as far as you can tell, are either of those things that perhaps might have been prevented with, your auto throttle?
Speaker 1
Honestly, really wouldn't wanna speculate. I I don't wanna speculate on something that killed twenty one people. I really don't. It it it is if we're fortunate enough to be able to do something, that's great. But I don't know the details of either of those crashes.
I only have it third hand and wouldn't wanna speculate on on how our equipment would work.
Speaker 8
Right. Okay.
Speaker 1
I'm sorry. I don't I'm obviously evasive, but it's just I think it's appropriate that we don't we still don't have MTS B analysis of what happened. So for me to speculate whether we could do anything would be inappropriate.
Speaker 8
Right. Okay. Understood. No problem. The other question is this.
A lot of King Air owners are using them for various commercial purposes rather than just as a private plane. I'm sure that the insurance expense for them is probably fairly high. I'm wondering whether you have yet made any attempts or plan to be in touch with aviation insurers to see if they would give a discount to King Airs that have Autothrottle installed with with the extra safety feature of options.
Speaker 1
Your comments are very appropriate and and well pointed. But, yes, we have contacted some of the insurance Anything that reduces pilot workload is terrific. And yes, insurance is very expensive. So I think clearly that's a feature that insurance companies would like I think. But ultimately anything you can do to especially in a more complex airplane, anything you can do to reduce the pilot's workload is important.
And we see this in a broad range of applications, not only in the King Air, but in a the same system is applicable to regional jets and there are a large variety of literally tens of thousands of aircraft that have no autothrottle that we work with. So we see a large market. But look, it's very early in the stage. When our production rates are up, I can be a lot more bullish. And right now, I'm being a little circumspect.
Speaker 8
Okay, great. Thanks.
Speaker 1
Thank you for your interest. I appreciate your interest. Thanks. We'll shut off today and look forward to having you join us next week.
Speaker 0
The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.