Quanta Services - Q1 2024

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Greetings and welcome to the Quanta Services first quarter 2024 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Kip Rupp, Vice President Investor Relations. Thank you, you may begin.

Kip Rupp (VP of Investor Relations)

Thank you and welcome everyone to the Quanta Services first quarter 2024 earnings conference call. This morning we issue the press release announcing our first quarter 2024 results, which can be found in the Investor Relations section of our website at quantaservices.com. As highlighted in our earnings release this morning, we've recently updated our earnings call format and supplemental materials. Shortly after the release of our financial results this morning, we posted our first quarter 2024 operational and financial commentary and our 2024 outlook expectations summary on Quanta's Investor Relations website. While management will make brief introductory remarks during this morning's call, the operational and financial commentary is intended to largely replace management's prepared remarks, allowing additional time for questions from the institutional investment community.

Additionally, we no longer have a slide presentation to accompany this call, as the information that has historically been included in the presentation can now be found in our operational and financial commentary. Please remember that information reported on this call speaks only as of today, May 2nd, 2024, and therefore you are advised that any time-sensitive information may no longer be accurate as of any replay of this call. This call will include forward-looking statements intended to qualify under the Safe Harbor from liability established by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including all statements reflecting expectations, intentions, assumptions, or beliefs about future events or performance or that do not solely relate to historical or current facts.

You should not place undue reliance on these statements as they involve certain risks, uncertainties, and assumptions that are difficult to predict or beyond Quanta's control, and actual results may differ materially from those expressed or implied. We will also present certain historical and forecasted non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliations of these financial measures to their most directly comparable GAAP financial measures are included in our earnings release and operational and financial commentary. Please refer to these documents for additional information regarding our forward-looking statements and non-GAAP financial measures. Lastly, if you would like to be notified when Quanta publishes news releases and other information, please sign up for email alerts through the Investor Relations section of quantaservices.com. We also encourage investors and others interested in our company to follow Quanta IR and Quanta Services on the social media channels listed on our website.

With that, I'd like to now turn the call over to Mr. Duke Austin, Quanta's President and CEO. Duke?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Thanks, Kip. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Quanta Services first quarter 2024 earnings conference call. This morning we reported our first quarter 2024 results, which included double-digit growth in revenue, Adjusted EBITDA, and Adjusted Earnings Per Share and strong cash flow, demonstrating an overall good start to the year. Total backlog at quarter end was $29.9 billion, which we believe reflects the value of our collaborative client relationships and evidences the momentum we see for 2024. Utilities across the United States are experiencing and forecasting meaningful increases in power demand for the first time in many years, driven by the adoption of new technologies and related infrastructure, including artificial intelligence and data centers, as well as federal and state policies designed to accelerate the energy transition and policies intended to strategically reinforce domestic manufacturing and supply chain resources.

With the complexities of the power grid and the significant upgrades and enhancements required to facilitate load growth, our collaborative solution-based approach is valued by our clients more than ever. We continue to look forward to the realization of our multi-year strategic initiatives and the goals we expect to achieve in this and the coming years. We are positioning Quanta for decades of expected necessary infrastructure investment and believe our service line diversity creates platforms for growth that expand our total addressable market. Our portfolio approach and focus on craft skill labor is a strategic advantage that we believe provides us the ability to manage risk and shift resources across service lines and geographies, which is increasingly important as the energy transition accelerates.

We believe our diversity and portfolio approach has also improved our cash flow profile and positions us well to allocate resources to the opportunities we find most economically attractive and to achieve operating efficiencies and consistent financial results. I will now turn the call over to Jayshree Desai, Quanta CFO, to provide a few remarks about our results and 2024 guidance, and then we will take your questions. Thanks, Jayshree.

Jayshree Desai (CFO)

Thanks, Duke, and good morning, everyone. This morning we reported first quarter revenues of $5 billion, net income attributable to common stock of $118.4 million or $0.79 per diluted share, and adjusted diluted earnings per share of $1.41. Adjusted EBITDA was $387.3 million or 7.7% of revenues. Of note, we generated healthy cash flows in the first quarter with cash flow from operations of $238 million and free cash flow of $181.2 million, both setting first quarter records. This earnings and cash flow performance allowed us to end the first quarter with ample liquidity and a balance sheet that supports both our organic growth expectations and the opportunistic deployment of capital to generate incremental returns for our stockholders. To that end, year to date we had acquired four companies for aggregate consideration of approximately $500 million.

This morning we also provided an update to our full year 2024 financial expectations, which calls for another year of profitable growth with record revenues and opportunity for double-digit growth in Adjusted EBITDA, Adjusted Earnings Per Share, and free cash flow. We believe our expectations demonstrate the strength of our portfolio approach to the business, our commitment to our long-term strategy, favorable end-market trends, and our competitive position in the marketplace. Additional details and commentary about our 2024 financial guidance can be found in our Operational and Financial Commentary and Outlook Expectations Summary, both of which are posted on our IR website. With that, we are happy to answer your questions. Operator?

Operator (participant)

Thank you. We will now be conducting a question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate that your line is in the question queue, and you may press star two if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. In the interest of time, we ask that you please limit to one question and one follow-up and re-queue as time allows. One moment, please, while we pull for questions. Thank you. Our first question comes from the line of Jamie Cook with Credit Suisse. Please proceed with your question.

Jamie Cook (Managing Director)

Hi, good morning, and congrats on the quarter. I guess just two questions, one shorter term, one longer term. Jayshree, could you just talk a little bit about the renewable margins? I think they fell a little short relative to expectations and any color, I guess, behind that. And then I guess the second question would be for Duke, just a longer-term question. Obviously, lots of talk throughout the past couple of months on AI, data centers, etc. If you could just talk to, just because you're so close in how that impacts, I guess, grid load growth, if you could just talk to what you're hearing from your customers in terms of how they're going to approach this, how you think about CapEx trends accelerating, just any color around how Quanta would be positioned there. Thank you.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Thanks, Jamie. Welcome back. I'll take the margin question. I think from our standpoint, when we look at the renewable segment, we had some series of projects there, a series of work, call it 5% of the portfolio on the solar wind side, that just didn't perform, didn't execute to where we should have executed at and what we expect from ourselves and what our customers expect. So look, it's a small piece. We grew the business. I can make tons of excuses. I'm not. We own it. We didn't execute like we should, and the rest of the portfolio really is the vast majority of the jobs, of the projects, of everything we're doing there is exceeding expectations. We expect that to continue. Growth creates some inefficiencies, and we showed up.

So we got to fix it, and it's not something that it's later stage in the projects, and so I'm not concerned. It's just part of it. In the first quarter, seasonality and everything else, a little bit of noise shows up. But all in all, I think the segment's performing nicely. What we see in the future looks great. The backlog is certainly accelerating in the renewable segment, so we're excited about what we see going forward. We are executing for how many people we put in the field and what we've added to the segment. I feel real good about it. You do invest in growth. It has some inefficiencies as you move forward and showed up. So I think all in all, we like what we see. As far as data centers, I think the macro demand of electricity is obviously moving up.

Anytime you have demand, it's great for the business. It's great for our customers. If you go back, you roll it back, call it nine months ago, we knew some data center demand, but nothing like we saw show up in January, February, March. It caught me off guard a little bit to see the amount. You're talking one customer's talking 100 gigs. So when you start talking about one customer with 100 gigs, it's mind-blowing in my mind to think about the amount of electricity necessary and primarily wanting renewables. So both sides of the business, both T and D, and our renewable business stand to gain quite a bit, and our customers as well. But it's not easy from a rate base.

It's not easy to deal with those kind of things showing up at your doorstep when you're trying to plan for 30 years, and you build out a huge power plant, and it's gone in one day. So I think the planning piece of the business is difficult. It is certainly showing up. It's certainly pressing us, our customers, everyone, to plan better and to think longer term. We're trying to put a four-decade, three-decade-type build in 90-day windows. It doesn't work. It's a very long-term build here. I think the company's set right in the middle of it. I like where we sit from the ancillary piece of data centers. I like we're talking to hyperscalers. We're talking to all of them about how we can help benefit and collaborate with our clients and them to get power sources, and certainly in demand. It's a unique time. It's exciting.

We're excited about it. We're excited to work with our clients, and they expect a lot of us. We need to deliver and execute.

Jamie Cook (Managing Director)

Okay. Thank you. I'll get back in queue.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Andy Kaplowitz with Citi. Please proceed with your question.

Andy Kaplowitz (Managing Director and U.S. Industrial Sector Head)

Hey, good morning, everyone.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Morning.

Andy Kaplowitz (Managing Director and U.S. Industrial Sector Head)

Duke or Jayshree, can you give us a little more color into Electric Power, what happened in the quarter and going forward? Revenue was, as you know, down just a little bit, but margin was quite a bit higher than you forecast, and I think quite good for seasonally weak Q1. You didn't change your expectation for the segment for the year, but maybe you could talk about your confidence that distribution-focused revenue does improve in the second half, and does the higher margin Q1 signal the potential for margin upside in the segment?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Sure. So a little bit, I think this is something we've talked about, the portfolio and combining Electric Power and Renewables together, and so I want to go through that a little bit. If you look at the electric business, which is transmission, substation, and distribution, and you look across the segments, so the segments are delineated today, which is causing some when you print the numbers. It doesn't look like what the business is from those three things. So an electric work type, it's up over 5% in the quarter. That's because pieces of the business is over in Renewables segment, and pieces of it are in the Electric Power segment. But the business itself together is up 5.3%. So just the way the segments look, you've got to combine them. It's got to look like a portfolio. The delineations are causing some number print.

It doesn't look like where the business is at. So I wanted to explain work type, which is electric, substation, distribution, and transmission, are up 5.3% in the quarter. Our backlog is almost flat. Yes, I think the backlog of the business and what we see, there's timing. There's MSA timing. It's early. It's the first quarter. We fully expect to be at record levels. The bigger projects, the renewable projects, are complicated. It takes a long time to negotiate. We're not going to press negotiations against a 90-day print. It just doesn't make sense for us. So we'll be patient. We're not concerned. We see an outstanding we were just talking about load growth. Anytime you got more load, you got more business. It's simple when you think about it. So more demand, more business. We see more demand than we've ever seen.

I feel good about it. As far as margins, the Electric segment, we operated great even in the downturn. We've always said that you can operate in double digits. It doesn't matter what the revenue is. That's what we're really trying to drive, is that EPS and those margins. In the segment, I thought we had performed well in the segment. And like where we're going, I think there is opportunity. It's early. We're not going to change guidance in 90 days. It looks good. We have lots of opportunity. I would say we have more upside than we do downside on the go-forward basis in the segment.

Andy Kaplowitz (Managing Director and U.S. Industrial Sector Head)

Very helpful. And Duke, maybe just to follow up on your commentary, last quarter, you mentioned sort of the better visibility around large transmission projects. You just talked about MSAs and answering my question. So just the conviction level in sort of the backlog increase, again, I know it doesn't happen in a quarter. It happens over the year. But is it more base business you think that grows or larger project business that grows in 2024 or both?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Look, I think the back half of 2024, your distribution business starts to become increasingly. I would say you'd start booking more work. You start to see your MSAs, your crew counts move up again. There is some shift in the transmission versus distribution in certain areas, the Southeast and places where what's happening is you're seeing the data centers show up. You're seeing the demand show up on the transmission side, and you've already got your capital out if you're utility customers. So you have to build the transmission, and you're going to pull capital off the distribution systems a bit and move it into the transmission systems. It's fine. That's why we're diversified. That's why the company sits where it sits. We're able to be nimble and move. It's not an issue, but it does show up.

And your MSA work on the distribution side is softer than normal. And we talked about that in the fourth quarter where we're working 40-50 hours versus 70. I think that's still the case. I do believe as you move into the later part of the year, you're going to start seeing us work more. I'm inclined to say more 60-70-hour weeks. And our headcount's still almost 54,000, which is up 4,000 year-over-year. I feel highly confident that as EV starts to penetrate to the West, that's moving up already, and the EV kind of moves across. We've got to build infrastructure, and certainly, we see it showing up in certain areas.

Andy Kaplowitz (Managing Director and U.S. Industrial Sector Head)

Helpful color. Thanks, Duke.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Neil Mehta with Goldman Sachs. Please proceed with your question.

Neil Mehta (Head of Americas Natural Resources Equity Research)

Yeah. Good morning, Duke and team. I wanted you to take a few moments to talk about some of the M&A activity in the quarter, both an active quarter for bolt-on acquisitions and also some divestitures. So talk to us a little bit about what excites you about what you added to your portfolio, and how does this all fit into the strategy?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

We acquired Sherman+Reilly, which was blocks and pullers. If you're in the business, you're in the craft. You grew up with Sherman+Reilly as part of the ecosystem. It's been in business since 1927. It's something that I think, from our standpoint, our people in the field, they deserve the product. It's safe. The training that they have, what they do with the pullers and tensioners and the things that they have, the R&D that they put into it, coupled with what we're trying to accomplish, it was compelling for us. There's a lot of wire talked about being pulled. There's new conductors out. There's lots of technology that we believe we can bring to market here. And lastly, concern with the capacity. We're always concerned with supply chain capacity. It's something that I believe is very specialized. It needs to be safe.

We need to protect our people a bit and make sure it's in good hands. And a lot of our clients use the pullers as well in their internal resources. It's certainly something that we value, and we're real proud to have that piece of business. As far as the divestiture, the divestiture is basically an oil and gas legacy business that we've had since probably 2015 or before, and certainly something that we've looked at for a long time to say, "This is not something that we're going to invest in. It's better off in other people's hands." It's international. The company made the decisions not to go into international, not to go international at this point. So it's something that needs to be divested from someone. It'll do great. The management team's fantastic. The new owners will be happy with the business.

Neil Mehta (Head of Americas Natural Resources Equity Research)

Thanks, Duke. And the follow-up is just on the SunZia project. Obviously, it's a very important project for the company. Just give us the latest temperature or latest progress report there and anything we should be watching out for, whether it's some of the litigation stuff or just in terms of managing through execution challenges that inevitably happen with big projects.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

SunZia's doing great. We're doing well. I think the team had a great plan. We put it together. All I see is good things coming out of that. We're progressing nicely. No issues on permit. I didn't think there would be, but there's no issues there. Big long line. It could be noisy here or there, but I'm not seeing anything on that, but really good production. Safety's great. Clients working hand in hand with the client. So I continue to like that project. We're early in it. Opportunities to release contingencies as we go through it. So I really believe that it's going to be a nice one. I actually wish I was running it. So it's a fun one.

Neil Mehta (Head of Americas Natural Resources Equity Research)

Thank you, sir.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Brian Brophy with Stifel. Please proceed with your question.

Brian Brophy (Director of Equity Research)

Yeah. Thanks. Good morning. Just continuing the conversation on the load-growth discussion around data centers, we've seen some pretty eye-popping estimates in terms of what that may mean. You alluded to some of that earlier in your comments. Just curious how you're thinking about the industry's capacity to meet some of these demands and what that might mean ultimately for your pricing and margins.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Yeah. Again, it's more utilization and returns for us when you start looking at a pricing. When we think about it, we need to execute. We need to execute in double-digit platforms that we've talked about over time. And I think it's more of that than it is some kind of pricing pressure. But I do think what we see is it's so unique, and the tech really, really wants it now. They've got money. They want to pay for it. It's just regulatory. How do you set rates that are fair for everyone else? And you can see it's starting to get figured out across the country of how to accommodate loads that we're seeing, but it's not going to happen overnight. If you want renewable resources as well, it's another complication when you start to talk about it. We were already fuel switching.

Now we're fuel switching and doubling loads in 90 days, it seems like. But in general, I would say that load is real. It's coming, and people are paying for it. It creates demand across renewables and our electric segment. We need a robust grid. The cheapest form of generation is transmission. It always will be. So I like where we sit in. We can help. Certainly, we talk about a solution-based approach. If there's ever been a solution-based approach that it's going to work, it will be within this because it's complicated on how to get renewables to load sources. And you're seeing power plants, nuclear power plants get bought, really, with the whole power plant going towards data centers. So I never thought we would see that in my lifetime. And now we're seeing it show up. And it's creating some unique circumstances across the country.

It's not only in Virginia. It's across every single customer we have that 3 megs, 4 megs show up. And it's tomorrow. They want tomorrow, and they want it in renewable state. So I like it. I like where we sit. We can certainly help. We can certainly sit on both sides of that. And I like what we can accomplish. You just got to plan more, plan better, both on distribution and on transmission, and collaborate with the client. The better we serve the customer, the better the company will do.

Brian Brophy (Director of Equity Research)

That's great. Thanks. And I guess one other one. I think the DOE announced some permitting reform to some grid capacity, transmission lines, streamlining some of the environmental reviews here a few days ago. Curious how impactful you think that might be?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

It's incrementally helpful, especially out West. But still, state policies, state regulations, PUCs, commissions, we've got to get our head around the fact that load is significantly higher, and we've got to invest in this grid. I mean, we're late already. We're behind, I believe. And so we need to catch up, and we need to make sure that this transition doesn't sit on a track of the train coming at you. You've got to invest in infrastructure. The more modern infrastructure is, rates go down on an NPV basis when you look on a go-forward. So investment now pays off for the next generation. So you just have to invest in it. And I think that's the case today, and we need to get going.

Brian Brophy (Director of Equity Research)

That's great. Thanks. I will pass it on.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Marc Bianchi with TD Cowen. Please proceed with your question.

Marc Bianchi (Equity Research Analyst)

Hey, thanks. The first one I wanted to ask was related to this load growth outlook with the data center stuff that everybody's been talking about. What role do you see for gas-fired generation, and how is your business exposed to that if perhaps some of that occurs behind the meter at the customer site?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

I mean, I do think gas generation is going to play a role always have and to some degree here in this transition. They still want renewables. Data centers want renewables. You're going to have to balance the load. Batteries aren't coming fast enough, so you're going to have to balance the load with natural gas. The problem I see is a lot of gas-fired is coming on into play. If you talk about a gig, two gigs, three gigs, four gigs of gas-fired generation, you're still off 96 gigs. So you can't build enough generation, enough renewable generation for what we see, what we see coming. So I do believe that you need to balance the load, and it'll help. Batteries are coming along. But if you try to build a piece of pipe in this country to feed the natural gas system, therein lies the problem.

I hear it. I mean, I see it. I see 10, 12 gas-fired generation plants being proposed. I still don't know how we're going to get the piece of pipe to it to feed them.

Marc Bianchi (Equity Research Analyst)

Yep. Yep. Okay. Thanks for that, NCS. Sorry, Duke. Go ahead.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

That's it.

Marc Bianchi (Equity Research Analyst)

Okay. Thanks. The other question I had was on the renewable margin progression. So if I look at where sort of the second quarter is discussed to be maybe just below 8%, and then you're going to be double digits in the back half, can you talk about what's driving the conviction in that improvement? And then also, I think in the past, you talked about some contingency release that would come later on in the project timeline. I'm curious where you are with that in the back half of this year.

Jayshree Desai (CFO)

Yeah. Thanks for the question. Yeah, we are seeing that progression. We do believe that as these projects progress across some various risks and contingencies, we'll be able to release some of that in the back half. The segment is more than just solar wind. There's a lot of transmission substation work. All of that is going to see a big acceleration, we believe, in the back half. And so that'll fall in the margins of better cost absorption, and contingency releases can be obtained.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

And I do think the conviction is history, and the history of both companies, both segments. We've operated in double digits. We're well below that. The growth is pressing a bit. We went through the jobs. Most of when we talk about, "Well, we had some degradation of margins," the degradation, it's new people and new roles. And so some of that shows up, and we've got to do a better job making sure that we educate and train our field leadership at times. And so that said, we went through the projects. We feel good. We're 50-60 renewable-type jobs that are out there today, and they're bread and butter. So for us, we're looking at it. We're looking at backlog. We see a nice runway, decade runway here.

So I really feel comfortable that we've invested in the right spot and that year's intact, in fact, with opportunity still in it. And yes, we're not pleased with the quarter by any measures. And I can promise you the leadership in the field is not pleased. So we expect a lot out of ourselves. Our customers expect a lot out of us. And even in the good times, we're running it pretty hard. So we've made the necessary changes to make sure that not only that we perform at the double-digit type level, but also that we don't let it drag on, or it doesn't catch us by surprise or anything like that. We see it. And we saw this early, and we made some adjustments. We won't be able to operate these contingencies on a few projects.

And we're talking 5% out of the whole thing and probably like I don't know. I think it was like $15 million or something like that within the operations and have opportunities to operate through at a very, very high level on the rest of them. So I feel really good about it. I feel good about the year and next year and the next and on and on.

Marc Bianchi (Equity Research Analyst)

Great. Thanks so much.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Justin Hauke with Baird. Please proceed with your question.

Justin Hauke (VP and Senior Research Associate)

Yeah. Thanks. So the renewables margin progression is what I was going to ask about too. And I think we've covered some of the thematic questions here. So I had a couple of numeric ones. I guess first, just on the M&A, given that there's a lot of moving pieces here, both new additions and divestitures, can you give us some context of what the net kind of revenue contribution from that is for the year in terms of your guidance? And then also, is the $500 million that you talked about, is that inclusive of the proceeds from the divestitures you announced?

Jayshree Desai (CFO)

Yes. Hey, Justin. So I would say the inorganic revenue contribution from the deals we did in the second half of last year, as well as the announcements this year, contributes around $500 million-$600 million. I'd tell you the two recent acquisitions, the revenue contribution there pretty much is offset by the divestiture of the oil and gas business. So we're still around $500 million-$600 million and an EPS contribution around $0.15-$0.20.

Justin Hauke (VP and Senior Research Associate)

Okay. Great. So that's not changed in net versus what you had before. Okay. And I guess the second question, again, sorry, it's a numeric one, but we've covered some of the other grounds. Just on the other income line, it was $25 million. It seemed a little high. Yeah. What was that?

Jayshree Desai (CFO)

Yeah. So we had the sale of an investment in a pipeline, the gain on that, which we did adjust out of EBITDA and adjust the EPS. So that's the biggest factor in that $25 million. You also had some gains on our deferred comp, but that gets offset in SG&A. So the real impact is around that gain around the pipeline investment, which we've backed out in reduced EPS and EBITDA.

Justin Hauke (VP and Senior Research Associate)

Great. Okay. That's helpful. Thank you very much.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Gus Richard with Northland Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.

Gus Richard (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

Yes. Thanks for taking the question. When I think about the data centers, typically, chip companies run their roadmap until they hit a wall. Typically, it's the scale of the infrastructure or a power constraint in the chip. And AI is about to have a huge shift from training, which is very power-intensive, to inference, which basically reduces the power consumption by 10%. I've seen this over the last 30 years where these guys changed their minds like they changed their socks. And I'm just kind of wondering. Maybe I'm wrong, but if all of a sudden, the load demand from AI drops significantly and these guys change their plans, what happens?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

I mean, we had a great business prior to the AI coming in that we see fuel switching. We see EV penetration. We see renewables fuel switching from coal. This is additive.

And look, you're 24 months out, 36 months out today if you say, "Go." So no one's going to go. And that's why you're seeing exactly what you're seeing. Everyone's saying, "Why are we going to build this infrastructure? Why are we going to build the generation unless someone guarantees the load?" So yes, I agree with you. That's why every utility, every customer we have is making sure that the other side, the party on the other side, is signing up for load growth that's sustainable to pay the investment, or if not, the ratepayer pays it. I mean, that's your dilemma. And I agree with you. That's why you're stalling again instead of going forward as fast as you can because everyone's got to get that right, including tech.

Gus Richard (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

Okay. Got it. Thanks for that. I appreciate it. And then the second question I've got, I've been reading about reconductoring of transmission lines, particularly in Europe. And I was wondering, is that a way to at least mitigate some of the construction on the grid and reduce the need for new routes? Is that something people are considering, and sort of how would that impact your business?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Yeah. I mean, look, we've reconductored my career, and the new high-density wires, they run hot. They work in certain areas. It's helpful. But what I would say is what makes it easier, better, it's still a rebuild, basically. You're just in the corridors that exist today. So yes, we can. We can even do it in an energized state. We're doing 250 miles now energized while the line's hot and reconductoring, which is we're specialized in it. We train in it. So it's certainly an advantage to the company. We've spent tons of R&D here. We'd like the conductor. We certainly have installed plenty of the other high-density conductor, and we like it. So I think in general, yes, it makes sense. Technology will be a piece of this. It will.

And when you look at learning machines and you look at everything we see from a power demand, AI is a piece of it. But the onshoring, the chips, the Amazon centers that are fully electric, you can't imagine all the things that are drawing load right now. And in my mind, we talked about data centers, I don't know, four years ago and said it would be a big push. But we had no idea that AI would come in as well. And I just think as you move forward, if you haven't used Autopilot or ChatGPT, try it. That ain't going anywhere. That's fantastic. I love it. It's great. And I think the country is moving that direction, and it certainly demands there in the chips and everything else we do on any given day. Even if you reduce power, it's kind of like appliances.

We were going to get great things out of appliances. What we did for about 3, 4, 5 years, and it helped us with load growth. You had negative load growth for a long time. You have positive load growth throughout the country for the most part and just in general. And so now when data shows up, it's more significant than anyone thought, myself included.

Gus Richard (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

Got it. Thanks so much. Appreciate it.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Alex Rygiel with B. Riley Securities. Please proceed with your question.

Alex Rygiel (Senior Managing Director and Associate Director of Research)

Thank you. A very nice quarter. First question here. Cash flow in the quarter was very strong, yet I don't believe you changed your full year guide. Are you incrementally more confident with the high end of your range now? And has your view on uses of free cash flow changed at all? I have a follow-up.

Jayshree Desai (CFO)

Yeah. So free cash flow, I think just sitting here in the quarter, we did have a good free cash flow quarter. Pleased with that. But it's early. We think it's prudent given that our typical profile is the first half of the year tends to be cash flow neutral or slightly negative, with most of the free cash flow coming in in the fourth quarter. We still think that's where we need to sit right now. There is opportunity to be at the high end of that range, but I think the range where we are today is where we should be.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Yeah. Alex, too, I would say the business itself, we set out to change some of the cash flow profiles of the business. I think we've done a nice job from internal invested capital. When you look at the returns, the way we calculate them, certainly moving up. And in the business, even when the margins are a little softer, the returns are fantastic. It's certainly generating in the first quarter, typically, what we talked about was free cash looked bad. And we had growth in the business. We had growth in headcount and free cash generation. So I really like where we sit. I know everyone's hesitant to say that the business has fundamentally changed. DSO has fundamentally changed. I think they have. I think it gives us more flexibility.

We've always talked about the free cash and how we deploy it is something that we, as the team, have to make sure that we continue to deploy capital in the proper way that we have in the past to create the outcomes that we have in the past. So I think our ability to look at M&A, to look at buybacks, to look at everything that we do and be opportunistic; certainly the free cash generation gives us more opportunity.

Alex Rygiel (Senior Managing Director and Associate Director of Research)

And then secondly, I don't think we've touched on telecom or industrial on the call here. Any notable movements there, either in the quarter or for the remainder of the year?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

We also have environmental solutions provider. It's sitting in really nicely. We really like the synergies we're picking up there on the industrial side. So I like the business performing well. Telecom, we had a nice quarter at parity to the electric segment a little better. And then we also added some backlog there. I like the business long term. Certainly, the other part of the data centers is you're still going to have to put fiber in. And I see fiber data center to data center. And they can't really say, "I want to go to this hub or that hub at this point," because they're everywhere. So you're going to start building all in all fiber to feed it at some point.

Alex Rygiel (Senior Managing Director and Associate Director of Research)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Sangita Jain with KeyBanc Capital Markets. Please proceed with your question.

Sangita Jain (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Yeah. Thanks so much for taking my question. I know we've discussed data center dynamics a lot on this call, but I was just wondering, Duke, if there is a way for you to engage directly with data center companies, whether it's for substation buildout or some behind-the-meter solutions, something aside from your leverage to the grid?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Yeah. I mean, we talk to them all the time. I do think there's opportunities to help and collaborate with them. Look, our job, we support our clients, and our clients are talking to them as well. So it's something that we balance between the grid, what their demands are, try to help on both sides of that. I do believe that as we move forward, as you see the company move forward, the demand of tech on the grid and how they deploy it, where they deploy, where they build, what they build, it certainly want to be right in the middle of it. And we want to sit with them and understand what they're trying to accomplish. It allows us to facilitate it.

So, look, it's something that the company we've talked to them a lot, our PTT business, the transformer business, is certainly something that they value a lot. They want the transformer. They want to and they want them now. So, I think those things are bode well for us. And our ability to communicate and talk about power consumption with tech is something that we can help our clients with ourselves.

Sangita Jain (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Great. If I can follow up with one on MSAs, is there anything particularly different this time around on MSA timing than in past years that's causing this exceptionally slow start to the year?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

I don't know. I don't feel like it's slow. I feel like we're doing great. It's a little bouncing on distribution system, which we've said in the past. Like I said, we're up 5.3% on transmission, distribution, and substations if you don't look at the delineations of the segments as a whole. So I feel like we're starting nicely. Our backlog is down in the UI on big pipe, which is fine with me. If you take out Big Pipe and you add renewables and you add electric, you're up. Your backlog is up. So yes, there's a lot of opportunity. The negotiations are taking longer. In some cases, MSAs, you're looking at you're trying to see how many people you have on the system today and the way we calculate it. But I continue to see our MSAs get renewed. There is some timing. There always will be.

They're 5 years, 3 years, 2 years. And they cycle in and out. And you could be in year 4 of a $2 billion MSA that's going to renew for 5 years. And when it renews, you go $2 billion in the backlog. So it just takes it gets a little lumpy in some of the MSA work, and it's going to continue that way. But the overarching business and the way that we stack on the larger projects, programs, builds, when that stack starts, it continues to move on. The industry stalled a bit trying to make sure that the demand for data centers and the demand for what we're talking about is real. And so it did stall a bit on some of these larger projects because they're not big enough. So what you're doing is going, "Uh-oh. I was going to build this.

Now I've got to double the size of what we're trying to accomplish." So yes, it's taken a little bit longer. I do think the industry is going to have to think a little bigger and a little faster.

Sangita Jain (Senior Equity Research Analyst)

Great. Thank you so much.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Michael Dudas with Vertical Research Partners. Please proceed with your question.

Michael Dudas (Equity Research Analyst)

Yes. Good morning, Kip, Jayshree. Duke?

Jayshree Desai (CFO)

Good morning.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Good morning.

Michael Dudas (Equity Research Analyst)

So you mentioned in your comments during the call and your prepared remarks about the importance of investing into the business. I just wanted to get a check on relative to the growth you're seeing. We've been talking about so much demand growth here in this call, but over the next 3-5 years and where you are today on staffing, what are the challenges to kind of get the bodies and get the capacity to meet the, it seems like, sustainable and extraordinary growth over the next several years? Are you in fairly good shape, or is there a lot more work to do?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Yeah, Mike, I think the company's done a nice job investing in craft, certainly, which is what we're known for and core to us. I do think when we saw some of it show up in the solar business in the quarter where we had some growth and significant growth. And so it does, at times, that growth, you're investing in growth, you got to make sure that you can maintain your productivities. And if you move geographies, that you can maintain the type of productivities that we expect. And we expect high levels, and we got to make sure we're looking back in the operations and helping and make the young ones and the young people that are in the business go forward as far as and we are, and we have great programs, and we get them to the field.

Replacing your footprints in the field with something on a piece of paper is a fallacy. It doesn't work. So that footprint in the field, the people that mentor our management teams are paramount. And so we work hard on that. We work hard on that execution, and it continues to get better and better. So as far as getting people in the business, look, we haven't had the problem yet from a standpoint of craft, and we've done a good job. I think kind of a slowdown in distribution allows us to take a breath, and we're actually gaining market share. So I like it. I like where we sit. And sometimes what I call hard 12 months, it hone your skills. And I like it a little tough. It separates us. And I think we've done whatever's showing up today, we did 12 months ago.

Whatever shows up next year, we did 12 months ago. So I think, in general, our ability to look forward and see the business allows us to really invest in craft long-term and our people long-term. And we're doing that. We're hiring people for the future now. We're skating where the puck's going. I like it. And so I think we have no issues in craft at this point, being able to hire, train, maintain. We just got to do it at the production levels we expect.

Michael Dudas (Equity Research Analyst)

Excellent, Duke. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Chad Dillard with Bernstein. Please proceed with your question.

Chad Dillard (U.S. Machinery and Electricals Analyst)

Hi. Good morning, everyone.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Good morning.

Chad Dillard (U.S. Machinery and Electricals Analyst)

So, Duke, you were talking about how utilities are shifting CapEx from distribution to transmission. Just trying to get a better sense for how that impacts Quanta's business. I think you may have talked about better market share on transmission, but any sense on just how to think about it from a margin standpoint, from a utilization standpoint? And then secondly, based on your conversations with utilities, is it the case that some of the work that was pushed out from 2024, is that actually get stacked on to 2025 because we'll be a little bit more able to change our CapEx plan a little bit further out?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Yeah. I mean, I think we've heard most of our customers. I'll go backwards on that. Most of our customers maintain their capital guides and some increase. You got a backdrop of anything we're saying. You can look at the capital spends and what the customer's saying. I think, honestly, you'll start to see them raise capital again. I don't see any way around it. I think capital is going up, not down. Over the next whenever they talk about their next five years, you can see capital plans go up. It has to to meet the demand. And so we're talking about getting more usage out of the grid. Even if you get more usage out of the grid, capital's going up. So I do think there's some things you can do from technology, but it's incidental compared to what you see from the demand side.

So both of those things are going to happen. As far as distribution, I mean, I think it's just we're kind of it's status quo, which we expected more growth out of it. And not all customers I want to be clear on this. Not all customers are going down on distribution. Some in the Southeast, a few here or there to shift capital over into transmission. So in some areas, that's the case. Some areas, distribution's the same or moving up. You got storm hardening. You got fire hardening. You got all kinds of different things also going on. And the everyday grid depreciates every given day. Poles rot. It's always been that way. And that's still ongoing with everything else that's going on. So the maintenance of the grid stays in place.

But the capital that's required to maintain, the capital required to necessary infrastructure for electric vehicles. I mean, I think the pause and somewhat pause and delay a bit in electric vehicle penetration, although it's penetrating nicely, it's certainly something that we're watching. I think that we've always said that would be a 3-4-decade-type penetration versus overnight. It was not going to happen by 2030. We thought 2050, 2040. And I think that's the case. And the distribution's just a longer build, but it's much, much bigger even than transmission. It's just longer. And so I like them both. It's going to show up over time. And it just gives the company time it's technical. It gives the company time to really think about those resources and how do we resource these things as they come about.

Chad Dillard (U.S. Machinery and Electricals Analyst)

Got it. That's helpful. And then I wanted to go back to the two comments you made. So earlier in the Q&A, you talked about it seems like a really strong uptick on the data center side in January through March. And then you just talked about whatever you do today began 12 months ago. So just trying to think through when we should start seeing a lot of the work tied to data centers, just kind of work through if you can kind of provide us with an expected cadence on that.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

I mean, I think we see a lot of plans today on large-scale, hyperscale data centers. And that load's got to go to them. And that planning process we do a lot of system planning. And that system planning process is probably as robust today as it's ever been on the transmission load side of the business. I think we got to get the distribution business a little better. And we got to talk to regulators and talk to them about what we're seeing and making sure that the consumer's not paying for the data center demand. So I think that's the bigger thing. The affordability, natural gas is down. Interest's kind of flat. So it's helping the consumer at the build level. And so that's a good thing.

If natural gas stays down and we can get some interest kind of where it's at or even less, it bodes well. And I think you'll see the capital plans and everyone get their head around. I'm looking at the calls as well. I mean, everyone's got equity plans now. And if we didn't see that show up until this quarter or you're starting to see people issue equity and debt against the builds that are coming, it's necessary. And we start to see that show up. And I think the business you can see where the planning's coming into place and how quickly things move against equity and debt at a utility level. So we see a lot. We're excited about it.

And I do believe it's not just something that you can't go, "Oh, we're going to build this, and they're going to not pay for it." I think this is real. I do. I think the demand is real. Even if it's half what everyone's saying, it's more than we're talking about now. So that's the beauty of it. You hedge it down, and it's still huge. So I like it. And I think we sit in a really good spot here, and we're starting to see those investments show up. It'll be like what you see today, a little better. But the 24-month planning cycle's ongoing. And utilities today are planning for the future. So I think every single quarter, you'll see the progression. And it just stacks.

We always thought that these bigger programs, these bigger things would stack on the business long-term, and your base would continue to move up kind of double digits. That's what we see.

Chad Dillard (U.S. Machinery and Electricals Analyst)

Great. That's helpful. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. In the interest of time, we ask that you please limit your questions to one question. Our next question will come from the line of Brett Castelli with Morningstar. Please proceed with your question.

Brett Castelli (Equity Analyst)

Yeah. Hi. Thank you. I just wanted to ask, within renewables, can you parse out your expectations for new orders between wind and solar for the full year of 2024 and any thoughts relative to 2023 between the technologies there? Thank you.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

I mean, I would just say we've talked about growing double digits. We're growing double digits plus EV and wind and solar. I'm well beyond that. I would say we're comfortable with double-digit-type growth in those businesses.

Brett Castelli (Equity Analyst)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Avi Jaroslawicz with UBS. Please proceed with your question.

Steven Fisher (Managing Director and Research Analyst)

Hey. Good morning, guys. Thanks for taking the question. I'm Mr. Steven Fisher. So recently, we've seen some more federal support coming out for permitting, but also some lower capital intensity type of opportunities within transmission. Just how are you guys thinking about which is going to be the bigger driver for that over the next 1-2 years? And also, what kind of visibility to bookings do you have within those transmission projects?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

I want to make sure I understand the question. It's a little spotty on my side here. As far as permitting, I mean, I think state permitting, in general, is fine. It's more about the regulatory process than it is a permit in my mind. And I don't think I caught the rest of the question. Did you hear?

Jayshree Desai (CFO)

I think he's asking about the innovation around good.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

About?

Steven Fisher (Managing Director and Research Analyst)

Yeah. I was just asking about what kind of.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

You're seeing some innovation. Sorry about that. Yeah. My apologies. You're seeing some innovation throughout the year. I think you'll continue to see it. There's things going on. But it's incidental, really. I mean, it's good. It'll help. But the demand is such that you'll continue to see line build. We always go back and look at Europe and what's going on there. A lot of innovation in Europe. It's three times a quarter we have here. And the cheapest form of moving about generations transmission, you still need it's still the cheapest form today. And it will be tomorrow and the next day. So I do think that the builds and the multi-year builds are there. You have to balance the load. So you're seeing some equipment come in, synchrophasors, things like that that are coming into the business that allow some balance.

You're starting to see that show up from an equipment standpoint. We'll install it. There's software out there that's helping some on a distribution level, transmission level. But I still think, even with innovation, we got a long way to go on infrastructure.

Steven Fisher (Managing Director and Research Analyst)

Great. Appreciate it. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Kevin Gainey with Thompson Davis & Co. Please proceed with your question.

Kevin Gainey (Senior Research Analyst)

Good morning, everyone. I just wanted to maybe touch on the equity income at Electric Power and the guidance raise there. How should we think about that, what's driving that, and then maybe the cadence as we go throughout the year?

Jayshree Desai (CFO)

Yeah. The increase there was primarily driven by our Puerto Rican entity, our JV LUMA. There was a favorable tax ruling that allowed for us to be able to the tax rate has dropped significantly. And so you're seeing around a $6 million improvement over the year as a result of that ruling.

Kevin Gainey (Senior Research Analyst)

Perfect. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Jean Ramirez with D.A. Davidson. Please proceed with your question.

Jean Ramirez (Senior Research Associate of Infrastructure Services and Products)

Hi. This is Jean for Brent Thielman. I want to ask a question about the underground gas utility portion of the segment. Are you guys seeing any utilities pull back at all on network investments and reliability upgrades?

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

No. I think, to the contrary, I mean, the investment's necessary there. And methane releases, things of that nature, when you start looking at natural gas systems, they're more valuable today because you're not building as much new systems. I mean, there's a considerable amount of new systems being built. But in certain areas where you're replacing cast iron and other lines with polyethylene and more, you're building a modern network, that's certainly there and will continue to be there. We see uptick in the business, not a downtick.

Jean Ramirez (Senior Research Associate of Infrastructure Services and Products)

Thank you.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Sure.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. We have reached the end of our question-and-answer session. I would now like to turn the floor back over to management for any closing comments.

Duke Austin (President and CEO)

Yeah. I want to thank the 52,800 people out in the field that pay our paychecks and do what they do every day and inclement weather. We can't say enough about their performance and the safety and the things that they do on a daily basis. Our field leadership is the best in the world. The management team that we have here is certainly something that we're extremely proud of. We're proud of where the company's going. We thank you for participating in the call today.

Operator (participant)

This concludes today's teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.