TE Connectivity - Q3 2018

Transcript

Operator (participant)

As a reminder, today's call is being recorded. I'll now turn the conference call over to your host, Vice President of Investor Relations, Sujal Shah. Please go ahead.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Good morning, and thank you for joining our conference call to discuss TE Connectivity's third quarter 2018 results. With me today are Chief Executive Officer Terrence Curtin and Chief Financial Officer Heath Mitts. During this call, we will be providing certain forward-looking information, and we ask you to review the forward-looking cautionary statements included in today's press release. In addition, we will use certain non-GAAP measures in our discussion this morning, and we ask you to review the sections of our press release and the accompanying slide presentation that address the use of these items. The press release and related tables, along with the slide presentation, can be found on the investor relations portion of our website at te.com.

Finally, due to the increasing number of participants on the Q&A portion of today's call, we're asking everyone to limit themselves to one question to make sure we can give everyone an opportunity to ask questions during the allotted time. We are happy to take follow-up questions, but ask that you rejoin the queue if you have a second question. Now, let me turn the call over to Terrence for opening comments.

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

Thanks, Sujal, and thank you everyone for joining us today to cover our third quarter results and updated outlook for 2018. Before I get into the earnings slides, let me briefly recap our quarterly results and full year guide against the elements of our strategy and business model. Our results in the quarter demonstrate successful execution with ongoing investments to support an attractive and growing demand pipeline, and another quarter of growth above the markets in which we serve. On the top line, we delivered 6% organic growth in the third quarter, and we also expect 6% organic growth at our midpoint for the full year, and this is at the upper end of our 4%-6% long-term organic growth target.

Our revenue growth continues to be driven by secular trends and our focus on co-creating with our customers by leveraging our leading global position in this increasingly connected world. This is enabling TE to consistently outgrow our end markets. On the bottom line, adjusted earnings per share increased by 15%, and we're raising the midpoint of our full-year adjusted earnings per share guidance, which also reflects 15% growth over the prior year. This growth is consistent with our annual double-digit earnings growth target and our business model. From a capital perspective, our strategy remains balanced through share buybacks, dividends, as well as a disciplined approach on acquisitions, and we continue to invest to support the organic growth opportunities in our business while maintaining ROIC levels in the mid-teens.

So if you could, let's look at the slides, and I'll start with slide 3 to review the highlights from our third quarter. We did deliver performance above our guidance, with double-digit growth in revenue as well as adjusted earnings per share. Sales were $3.8 billion, representing 12% reported growth and 6% organic growth year-over-year. We saw organic growth across all TE's businesses, with the exception of SubCom. In Transportation, we grew 12% organically, well above our markets, with growth in each of our three businesses in the segment, as well as in all regions. In Industrial Solutions, we grew 5% organically, with growth across all businesses and also in all regions. And our Communications segment declined 6% organically, as we expected.

We did have 10% combined organic growth in Data & Devices and our Appliances business, and this was more than offset by SubCom year-over-year declines. On the earnings side, from a margin perspective, in quarter three, we delivered 16.7% adjusted operating margins, with margin expansion in both the Transportation Solutions and Industrial Solutions segments. One of the key highlights of the quarter was that our Industrial Solutions segment margins were up a strong 150 basis points year-over-year. In the Communications Solutions segment, margins declined as we expected due to SubCom, where we had a tough year-over-year comparison versus very strong revenue in the third quarter last year, along with the margin impact from the program delay that we highlighted back in our first quarter earnings call.

The SubCom dynamics negatively impacted our adjusted operating margin by 90 basis points year-over-year in the quarter. And when I look at our overall earnings, I'm very proud that we delivered 15% adjusted earnings per share growth, even with this headwind. Earnings per share growth was an adjusted $0.43, and when you look at it, it's driven primarily by operational performance as well as the benefit from a favorable impact of currency translation. Turning to the full year, we are raising our revenue and earnings per share guidance, reflecting stronger third quarter results, offset by incremental headwinds that are primarily due to foreign currency exchange rates, which changed from being a tailwind in the first three quarters to a headwind in our fourth quarter versus the prior year.

For the full year, we expect sales to be up 12% on a reported basis and 6% organically, with adjusted earnings per share of $5.57, which is up 15% at midpoint, which looks a lot like the quarter three results we just delivered. When I think about this year and the progress that we've made in perspective, the guide we gave back at the beginning of the year, back in November, was 4% organic growth and $5.23 of adjusted earnings per share... versus the 6% organic growth and 15% EPS growth that I just talked about. Let's turn to slide four, and I'll cover our order trends in detail.

As you can see when you look at the slide, we continue to see broad-based growth in orders across our three segments, which reinforce our growth outlook. Total orders, excluding SubCom, were $3.75 billion, and our book-to-bill was 1.05. Orders were up 15% year-over-year on a reported basis, and 9% organically. We continue to see growth globally, with increases in organic orders in all regions. And by region, we had 16% order growth in the Americas, 8% in Asia, and 4% in Europe. Turning to orders by segment. In transportation, orders increased 8% organically, with growth in all regions, led by double-digit increases in both Asia and the Americas.

In Industrial, our orders grew a strong 12% organically year-over-year, with momentum in our Aerospace, Defense, and Marine business, and strong order growth in our Medical business. In our Communication segment, excluding SubCom, we saw year-over-year organic orders growth of 8%, with growth across all regions and in both of the businesses. So if you could please turn to slide 5, let me get into segment results, and we'll start with Transportation. Transportation sales grew 12% organically year-over-year, with strong growth in each of our three businesses. Our auto sales were up 10% organically on 4% global auto production growth in the quarter. Our strong growth above market continues to illustrate the positive impact of content growth in our Auto business, along with the benefits of our global leadership position.

We had 16% organic growth in the Americas, 11% growth in China, and 9% growth in Europe, as we continue to benefit from our new project launch titles, as well as share gains. Our performance continues to reflect content growth from the secular trends in this market, and we expect to benefit as adoption increases for both connected and electric vehicles. We continue to increase our investment to support TE's momentum in these emerging growth applications, and we're extremely well positioned with leading-edge solutions and an increasing pipeline of design wins across our global OEMs. In our Commercial Transportation business, we continued to outperform the market with organic revenue growth of 22% year-over-year, with balanced growth across all regions and strong growth within each sub-market. We continue to see momentum in the heavy truck area, as well as growth in the agriculture, mining, and construction markets.

In Sensors, our business grew 8% organically year-over-year, with growth across auto, Commercial Transportation, and industrial applications. This growth is driven by the design wins we've been discussing over the past two years, and we continue to see strong design win momentum, particularly in auto applications. In fiscal 2018, our year-to-date, we've generated $600 million of new sensor design wins in auto applications. This brings the total design win value to $1.8 billion since the beginning of 2016 across a broad spectrum of auto sensor technologies and applications, which will certainly set the business up for strong growth, as we've talked to you about. Turning to operating margin for the segment.

Margins were in line with expectations at 19.3%, and they were up 20 basis points year-over-year and reflect investments to capitalize on our strong design win momentum in both connectors and sensors. Please turn to slide six, and we'll discuss our Industrial Solutions segment. Segment sales grew 9% on a reported basis and 5% organically, as we expected. Adjusted operating margins were 14.4% and expanded 150 basis points year-over-year from operating leverage on higher revenue. As we've talked to you about, we are on a multiyear journey to optimize our factory footprint and lower expenses to expand adjusted operating margins into the high teens in this segment. I really feel the results you see in this quarter show the progress that we're making on this journey.

So let me move to highlight the performance by business in the segment. In Industrial Equipment, organic growth was 6%, which is in line with our mid-single digit targeted long-term growth rate. We saw growth across all regions and strength in both factory automation and medical applications. In our AD&M business, we saw 6% organic growth, driven by commercial aerospace and defense, and we continue to see growth in both of these markets as defense continues to improve. In Energy, our business grew 2% on an organic basis, and this was driven by strength in the Americas, offset by weakness outside the United States. So please turn to slide 7, and I'll discuss our Communications Solutions segment. As I said earlier, the segment declined 6%, which was in line with our expectations and driven by the year-over-year declines in our SubCom business.

Our momentum in our Data, Device, and Applications businesses remained strong, and they had above-company organic growth of 10% on a combined basis. In Data and Devices, we grew 11% organically, with growth across all regions, driven by high-speed connectivity and data center applications, and content growth from electronification trends, where TE is providing integrated solutions. In our Appliances business, we continued our strong performance with 9% organic growth, with growth in all regions and continued share gains. We continue to benefit from the secular trends that include safety, efficiency, and miniaturization in the appliance market, as well as leveraging our leading global position. And in SubCom, our revenue declined to $184 million.

The primary contributor to the year-over-year decline in SubCom was a tough comparison versus the third quarter last year, which we had revenue of $270 million in the quarter. Overall, this market remains in the healthy elongated cycle we've been talking about, and our backlog remains at $1 billion. For the segment and an adjusted operating margins were 11.9%, and as we discussed over the past couple of quarters, segment margins are running below our targeted mid-teen operating margins due to the delayed SubCom program ramp and the project accounting nature of this business. With that, I'll turn it over to Heath to get into the financials.

Heath Mitts (CFO)

Thank you, Terrence, and good morning, everyone. Please turn to slide 8, where I will provide more details on the Q3 financials. Adjusted operating income was $628 million, with an adjusted operating margin of 16.7%, leveraging the strong growth of 6%. GAAP operating income was $558 million and included $65 million of restructuring and other charges, and $5 million of acquisition charges. For the full year, I continue to expect the restructuring charges of approximately $150 million, driven primarily by activity in our Industrial Solutions segment as we optimize our footprint and make structural improvements in SG&A across the company. This is consistent with what we've talked about in the past.

Adjusted EPS of $1.43, up a very strong 15% year-over-year, was driven by sales growth as well as the benefit from currency translation. GAAP EPS was $1.29 for the quarter, including restructuring and other charges of $0.13, as well as acquisition-related charges of $0.01. The adjusted effective tax rate in Q3 was 16.9%. Looking ahead, we do expect a sequential increase in rates in Q4, resulting in a full year adjusted tax rate in the 18%-19% range. Longer term, you should continue to view our tax rate at approximately 20%. Now, if I can get you to turn to slide 9. Adjusted gross margin in the quarter was 32.4%, with year-over-year decline, driven primarily by SubCom, where Terrence outlined the moving pieces earlier.

Given the relative strength of the rest of our portfolio, I am pleased that we were able to offset the SubCom-driven margin pressure and maintain our overall adjusted operating margins of 16.7%. In the quarter, cash from operations was a strong $800 million, and free cash flow was $504 million. On a year-to-date basis, cash from operations is up 5% versus last year, and year-to-date free cash flow reflects the impact from increased capital investments. As I mentioned last quarter, given the rich pipeline of organic opportunities, we are increasing our capital investment this year to be approximately 6% of sales. And as you know, this investment to support growth has the highest return on investment for the company. We continue to target mid-teens adjusted ROIC and have seen nice improvement year over year in our ROIC.

I'm pleased with those results. We also returned $382 million to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases, and we've included a balance sheet and cash flow summary in the appendix for additional details. So before I turn this back to Terrence, let me just share our perspective on trade policy and tariffs, as there are obviously many questions. While some of our products are directly affected by recently implemented U.S. tariffs, only a very small percentage of TE products are actually impacted. Our strategy has always been to manufacture close to our customers to be aligned with our customers' supply chain strategies. Our global position and footprint helps mitigate TE from tariffs impacts.

However, for those products that are impacted, we are committed to working closely with our customers to minimize the impact, and we are proactively looking at a combination of actions, including further optimizing current supply chains, continuing to leverage our global manufacturing footprint, and in some cases, implementing surcharges to customers. I want to reiterate that as a global company, TE is a proponent of free and open trade. Tariffs and restrictive trade policies create friction, uncertainty, and added costs for businesses engaged in global markets. We'll provide an update on any future impacts when we issue our fiscal 2019 guidance later this year, and give you a sense for any impact that it would have in terms of future year guidance. With that, I'm going to turn it back over to Mr. Curtin.

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

Thanks, Heath. Let me get into guidance, and we'll start with the fourth quarter on slide 10. When you look at the fourth quarter, we expect fourth quarter revenue of $3.59 billion-$3.69 billion, and adjusted earnings per share of $1.31-$1.33. At the midpoint, this represents reported and organic sales growth of 5% and adjusted earnings per share growth of 6%. We do expect our fourth quarter look like a lot like our third quarter, with the exception of currency and tax impacts. When you think about the recent strengthening of the US dollar, we now expect a year-over-year currency exchange headwind of approximately $50 million and 2 cents in the quarter. Currency has been a tailwind for the first three quarters a year, so that is going to flip.

In addition, our expected tax rate is a headwind of $0.02 versus the prior year. So operationally, quarter four looks pretty similar to quarter three. If you move by segment, we expect Transportation Solutions to grow high single digits on both a reported and organic basis, driven by all three businesses. In Industrial Solutions, we expect to grow mid-single digits organically, with growth across all businesses in line with our long-term model. And in Communications Solutions, we expect to be down low single digits, with continued above-market growth in both Data and Devices and Appliances, and we expect SubCom revenue being at similar revenue levels as we just had in the third quarter. So let me turn to the full year, and if you could move to slide 11, please.

For the full year, we now expect full-year revenue of $14.58 billion-$14.68 billion, representing $1.5 billion of increased revenue year over year. At our midpoint, this represents 12% reported and 6% organic growth. If you take the $1.5 billion of increased revenue and break it down, this is about $850 million due to organic growth. We're also benefiting $250 million from mergers and acquisitions, and the benefit of about $400 million in currency translation. From an adjusted earnings per share, our growth is expected to be up 15% at midpoint, driven by the flow-through from our sales growth as well as the benefit of currency translation.

Versus our prior guidance, we're increasing revenue slightly at the midpoint, and adjusted earnings per share is up $0.02-$5.57. We expect our strong performance that we had in quarter three to be partially offset by the stronger dollar and a slightly weaker outlook for SubCom. So let me get into color by our segments and our full year guidance. We expect our Transportation Solutions segment to be up in the high teens on a reported basis and up low double digits organically on assumption of approximately 2% global auto production growth in 2018. Our outperformance continues to reflect the content growth and share gains that we talked to you about and the momentum that we have.

In Commercial Transportation, we expect to continue to outperform our end market, and we expect continued growth in Sensors based upon the pipeline wins that I highlighted for you earlier. In Industrial Solutions, it's essentially unchanged from our prior guidance, with reported growth expected to be up high single digits and organic growth up mid-single digits. The primary growth drivers remain Industrial Equipment, commercial air, as well as defense. And in Communications, we continue to expect Communications to be down low single digits on both a reported and an organic basis, with growth in Data & Devices and Appliances being more than offset by declines in SubCom. We continue to expect strong combined organic growth in Data & Devices and Appliances for the year. So before we go into questions, I just want to highlight some key takeaways as I think about the call.

I think we continue to execute very well against our strategy and business model, and expect to deliver 6% organic growth and 15% adjusted EPS growth for the full year, which is in line with our business model. We continue to benefit broadly from global secular trends and consistently driving growth ahead of other markets we serve, and you see that through the broad growth we have in the business and the businesses that I highlighted today. We continue to look at increasing our investments to support organic growth and our attractive and growing pipeline of design wins, particularly in auto. It's going to continue to support future organic growth, and, you know, Heath talked about the increase in capital up to 6%, and that's the key indicator as we continue to make that be our best investment.

For the full year, we expect our transportation margins to be at our target level of approximately 20%, and the strong margin expansion year-over-year that we demonstrated in industrial, I think is a really good step of where we're going with the margin in that segment. The communication segment, it's going to be a drag on TE margin in 2018 due to the program delay that we talked about in SubCom. Also, I think it's key that we're generating strong cash flow, and we're maintaining a balanced capital strategy, and we're improving our ROIC about a point this year. The multiple levers that we continually review with you remain intact to drive continued double-digit earnings growth that will drive further value creation for our owners.

So as we close, the one last thing I want to do is I do want to thank our employees around the world for their execution in the third quarter, as well as their continued commitment to our customers in making sure we create a future that's safer, sustainable, productive, and connected. So Sujal, with that, let's open up. Alan, can you give the instructions for the Q&A session?

Operator (participant)

Absolutely. Ladies and gentlemen, if you do have a question, please press star then one on your touch-tone phone. You'll hear a tone indicating you've been placed in queue, and you may remove yourself from queue by pressing the pound key. Also, we do remind you to please, to please limit yourself to one question per queue.

... Our first question will come from the line of Craig Hettenbach with Morgan Stanley. Go ahead, please.

Speaker 14

Yes, thank you. Question for Heath on the industrial margins. The 150 basis point year-over-year increase looks like mostly probably operating leverage in the business, yet you're talking about, you know, some of the restructuring activities on, on more of a forward look in terms of footprint. So can you just talk about what you're seeing today, and then how you envision the industrial margins going forward?

Heath Mitts (CFO)

Craig, thanks for the question. You know, honestly, the improvement that you've seen, not just in this quarter, but for the full year outlook for 2018, for our industrial margins, there is some belt-tightening in there, and but largely, we're seeing the benefit of the organic flow, the organic growth flow-through, as the business is, you know, we've got all business units growing in that segment. I would tell you that the charges that we're incurring today relative to restructuring, generally have about a 2-year payback. Some of these are outside the U.S., which tends to lengthen the payback period, as you know.

So, you know, the restructuring activity and the benefit from those, which we've talked pretty extensively about, to all of you, really starts to kick in more in 2019 and much more pointedly in 2020, as some of these big facility moves are completed. So, you know, keep in mind that what we've talked externally about is about 300 basis point journey on operating margin expansion there. Certainly, we attributed about two-thirds of that towards footprint optimization and about a third of that through the flow-through on the growth side. We're seeing the growth side of it now, and the restructuring piece is yet to come. But we're pleased with the team's progress there. There's been a real heightened focus.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Okay, thank you, Craig.

Operator (participant)

Next, we'll go to the line of George, pardon me, Joe Giordano with Cowen. Go ahead.

Speaker 14

Hey, guys, good morning. This is Tristan in for Joe. You had a very strong operational results that was somewhat, I guess, masked by, by the SubCom business. It was expected, but still an upset. Are you looking to maybe be a bit more proactive on a potential divestment there?

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

Thank you for your question. And as you all know, that while it's a good question, it's not a new question. You know, our SubCom business is a unique asset that I've always told you about. While it's a good business, it is a business that is unique. So it's a business we feel as long as we own it, we have to operate it. But it is something, you know, we always look at, if there were offers on it. Clearly, we've said this for a long time, there hasn't been. But as we own it, it needs to be run. And you know, when you look at this year, we expected the business to be down overall, going from a very healthy level of $1 billion.

And we told you earlier, $700 million-$800 million, certainly it's at the low end of that range. We feel good about the cycle that we're in. It is a healthy cycle, and you see that in our backlog. But clearly, the disappointment this year in that business is the program delay that we teed up early in the year. That is impacting our margin. It's also, you know, slowed things down. We do expect that program to wrap up in 2019, and we feel, as we go forward, it'll be performing more like it has performed in the past than it is this year. So feel good about where the business is positioned to where it is in the cycle.

Certainly, this program delay that we've had around new technology has created a headwind that I'm very proud that the rest of the business has been able to make up for, as we've had margin expansion in both transportation and the strong stuff that Heath talked about to the prior question.

So, we'll continue to work through it. We always look at alternatives for SubCom, but I've been saying that since I've been CFO here for 10 years. So thanks for the question.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Thank you, Tristan. Can we have the next question, please?

Operator (participant)

We'll now go to the line of David Leiker with Baird. Go ahead.

Joe Vruwink (Senior Research Analyst)

Hi, good morning. This is Joe Vruwink for David Leiker.

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

Good morning.

Joe Vruwink (Senior Research Analyst)

When we look at transportation organic growth and try to reconcile what that is relative to end market production, it looks like your above-market growth is gonna be around 9% this year. It was 9% last year. So just relative to the guidance of 4%-6% content growth, it certainly seems like it has been better than that. It can sustainably be better than that. Why can TE sustain a high single-digit level of outgrowth above and beyond this 4%-6% target?

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

Thank you for your question. And when we look at it, you know, as we just shared with you, back in our Investor Day, we think long term, that 4-6 is right above production. When you look at this quarter, production was a little bit stronger this quarter. It was up about 400 basis points in the quarter, and we grew about 10% in automotive. I think the key is we continue to invest in the design wins that we have. You're gonna continue to see, and, you know, when even if we think about like next year, we still view the world gonna have about a 2% production environment.

So when you sit there and you think about that 2% production environment, similar to this year, I think you would be in the high single digits in that type of production environment, based upon the momentum we have in the design wins, and that we're investing behind. So when we look at it, we feel that the momentum we have, not only from what we do and the wins we have, but also where we're globally positioned to capitalize for any little moves that happen on global production, it's one of the great things about our business is our global deployment and our customer breadth.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Okay, thank you, Joe. Can we have the next question, please?

Operator (participant)

That will come from the line of Christopher Glynn with Oppenheimer. Go ahead.

Christopher Glynn (Managing Director and Senior Analyst)

... Yeah, thanks. Good morning. So, back to SubCom, I think, the production and approval process has been resolved relative to that project. So just wondering how the visibility is shaping up for magnitude, degree, and certainty around margin tailwind for that segment into next year, you know, maybe on a neutral rev basis, and then separately, view to backlog converting to some revenue lift there.

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

So a couple of things. The backlog is strong, as I mentioned, around $1 billion. So I think when you look at next year, I think it's fair to say, to your assumption, it looks a lot like this year at the top line. And what we expect that you'll see is as this program works off, it is a program that will work off in 2019, you will get the margin lift, and I think you need to think about it as the communications segment, and you'll see segment margin move up from what are right now, sub-12, back up into the mid-teens that we talked about for the segment. And you'll see that in the next year.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Okay. Thank you, Chris. Can we have the next question, please?

Operator (participant)

That will come from the line of Wamsi Mohan with Bank of America.

Speaker 14

Hi, thank you. Good morning. Terrence, can you address what some of the puts and takes were in the transportation segment as it pertains to margins? They did take down a bit in the quarter. You called out some of the investments to drive future growth. I was wondering if you can help be a little more specific on what those are and any color on the magnitude of those investments, and possibility of ongoing higher pace of investments. Thanks.

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

Yeah, thanks, Wamsi. I guess first of all, I want to be clear, our margin in transportation came in where we expected. So I don't believe it was a surprise to us where the margin came in at, and we do expect for the year it'll be at that 20%, which we've always told you, plus or minus a point, where it would be. So I feel actually good about the margin in the business. There are investments that, you know, we've talked to you about. Heath talked about CapEx increasing up to 6%. That's primarily in our Transportation business, and clearly, when we spend capital, that goes in, you know, to gross margin. But I want to go back maybe to the question that was asked earlier.

The organic engine that we've had in automotive is very significant. Certainly, we talk about it in percentages, but just to frame it a little bit, we grew organically our Transportation business by $700 million last year. We're doing it by $800 million this year, and that's really a north of 20% increase in that one business over the past two years, if you really go back. And, you know, we are having to make sure we keep up with those type of demand profiles and also putting the capacity in for the pipelines we have. So we have increased up CapEx, we have increased up R&D, and, and now you'll see that in quarters.

You'll have timing off a little bit, but we are completely committed to the 20% ±, and, you know, we're gonna continue to make the investments for what is the best return, which is organic growth. And we've been doing that, and, we're gonna continue to highlight that for you. So thank you for the question.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Thank you, Wamsi. Can we have the next question, please?

Operator (participant)

That will come from the line of Shawn Harrison with Longbow Research. Go ahead, please.

Shawn Harrison (Analyst)

Hi, morning, everybody.

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

Hey, Shawn.

Shawn Harrison (Analyst)

Just on kind of the third quarter versus fourth quarter dynamic, particularly maybe in transportation, but in any of the other businesses, do you feel as if there was any maybe pull forward of demand? The reason I ask that is it feels like seasonality is coming back into the business, maybe that we haven't seen over the past 12-24 months.

Heath Mitts (CFO)

Shawn, this is Heath. There is some typical seasonality, specifically in auto, that generally, you know, makes Q4 a little bit lower than Q3. But generally, you know, as we look at it, our third quarter and our fourth quarter look pretty similar in terms of our outlook. The challenge is, in terms of the earnings side, is that FX turns on us and goes from being a tailwind to a headwind, and then tax is significantly higher in the fourth quarter. So the two of those together are worth about $0.10 sequentially in terms of the third quarter versus the fourth quarter. Otherwise, when you kind of look around the other businesses, they look pretty similar, and we're just battling some of the, I'll say, non-operational pieces.

Obviously, you know, some of the things from SubCom that Terrence has already highlighted.

Okay. Thank you, Shawn.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Can we have the next question, please?

Operator (participant)

Yes, sir, that will come from the line of Amit Daryanani with RBC Capital Markets.

Amit Daryanani (Analyst)

Yep, thanks a lot. Good morning, guys. I just-

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

Hey, Amit.

Amit Daryanani (Analyst)

Terrence, you know, I think you talked about $1.8 billion of total design wins you've had, and I think there was a comment around sensors specifically. What's the cadence you think of that revenue starting to ramp over time? And, you know, I realize you've had really good growth in our sensors. It's been 7%-8% for a few quarters, but do you see that stepping up to maybe double digits as you go next year, given the backlog and the design wins you're sitting at?

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

Yeah, when you look at it, Amit, thanks for the question, and, you know, I think it's very similar to what we've been telling you. What's great is, you know, the amount I'm talking about is in automotive only. So we also, you saw in the growth outside of automotive and sensors was very strong as well. But in automotive, you know how these programs come in. We start winning them, they take two, three years to actually start coming to production, and they ramp. And so as we told you back in Investor Day, is we do expect you're going to start seeing double-digit growth in our automotive as these layer in. They will layer in many ways, it supports how are we gonna get north of $5 per vehicle in sensor content that we talked to you about?

So I think the momentum that we've had just continues to be that the pipeline that we built, the technologies that we acquired with MEAS, are we're able to get to our commercial teams and really make sure we're creating value. And, you know, that's layering in, and I feel very good about the momentum to really make sure that sensors in automotive, you're gonna continue to see nice growth as these things come into production and get built to our customers.

Operator (participant)

Okay, thank you, Amit. Can we have the next question, please? We'll go now to the line of Jim Suva with Citi. Go ahead.

Jim Suva (Analyst)

Thank you very much.

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

Hey, Jim.

Jim Suva (Analyst)

I know you gave some nice comments on the global tariff and M&A, but I wanted to see if you had any actual discussions or any actual actions with some of your customers. I know, like in the industrial segment, there's been some recent news of some industrial companies talking about higher cost of goods sold, like, you know, steel and aluminum tariffs. Are they talking to you about changing the location of manufacturing, supply relationships, or, or anything going on actively on that front? Thank you.

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

Yeah, Jim, thanks for the question, and, to give some examples, so number one, we are not a big steel user. You know, as you all know, we start from base metals, typically copper, and gold, and certainly resins that we use, and, you know, certainly that's what our engineers use as a lot of our basic building blocks. So on the input cost, while we have a little bit of tariffs, it's not that big. Really, the discussions we have with our customers, and you know our model. Our model is to design close to our customers and then they align to their supply chain. So in regard to where we serve our customers directly, there is lots of discussions around supply chain.

Do we need to be moving some of production to certain parts as they look at their supply chain, as well as just the whole logistics flow? So there are logistic flows that I think people are trying to understand. Is there a way to work the tariffs that way. So they are real live discussions. As you know, it's very fluid. In areas where it is unavoidable that we have tariffs or things that we go through our channel partners, you know, there will be surcharges for tariffs that we cannot mitigate through manufacturing moves or supply chain moves, and that will be a surcharge that we would do out where it's unavoidable. So that's where it is right now. As you can imagine, with somebody that sells more than 500,000 discrete SKUs, it is very tactical right now.

It's very much, a lot of engagement with our customers, which I feel very fortunate with our close business model with our customers. We're gonna work with them to make sure that they can stay competitive, and if we have to move some things around for the long term, we will. So thanks, Jim.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Thank you, Jim. Can we have the next question, please?

Operator (participant)

We'll go to the line of Matt Sheerin with Stifel. Go ahead.

Matt Sheerin (Analyst)

Yes, thanks, and good morning. So a question on regarding some of the supply chain issues that we're hearing about, specifically, component shortages, capacitor shortages, whether seem to be hitting some of the EMS companies. Are you seeing any rescheduling or, any mismatch of parts that customers that may be affecting your business?

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

No, Matt. So as you know, we don't do those passives.

Matt Sheerin (Analyst)

Yeah.

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

So we've not seen any rescheduling. Clearly, there is shortages in certain areas. You know, capacity is sold out. We've not seen any impact, and you can see it on our orders, we've not seen demand impacts. As we told you before, our lead time overall has remained relatively stable, but we do have some pockets in certain product categories that we are extended, just due to how the demand has increased. But I would say that's a minor part of our business, but we have not seen any demand changes where a customer has told us because they can't get a capacitor or another type of passive, that they want us to stop shipping or slow down. We have not seen that in any material way.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Okay. Thank you, Matt. Can we have the next question, please?

Operator (participant)

We'll go to the line of Mark Delaney with Goldman Sachs. Go ahead, please.

Mark Delaney (Analyst)

Yes, good morning. Thanks for taking the question. A question on Subsea. I think it had been a 50 basis points drag to the corporate margin, last quarter, and if I heard correctly, Terrence, you said it's about 90 basis points, this past quarter. So try to better understand the reason that's maybe a bit larger of an impact now, and just to clarify on how we should think about that improving. Should we think about the magnitude of the impact abating on a somewhat linear basis as we move through fiscal 2019, or does the magnitude stay at this kind of a level, and it's not until the program's done that it then goes away?

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

Mark, Mark, let me add some color. Thanks for your question. The difference between the 90 basis points and the 50 basis points is really... Our SubCom business had a great quarter last third quarter. It had $270 million of revenue. So that 90 basis points I referenced was really a year-over-year reference of what it did in TE's margin year-over-year. So that's what that 90 is. The 50, you're right, that's the program delay impact that we've been seeing at the total company level, what the impact's been. So the 90 basis points is a very high volume last year, certainly good flow-through on it. It's just getting the volume more normalized, but the 50 basis points is correct on the program delay.

Non-linearity, I think when you look at it, it's gonna be as the program wraps up, and that program will wrap up, and, you know, what you'll have is, as that program wraps up, you'll see margin increase and work its way up back to where we expect the segment to be, and that'll be through 2019.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

... Okay, thanks, Mark. Thanks, Mark. Can we have the next question, please?

Operator (participant)

Pardon me. We'll go to the line of William Stein with SunTrust. Your line is open.

William Stein (Analyst)

Great, thanks for taking my questions. Two quick ones. First, I think you mentioned resins a moment ago. Our contacts have indicated that costs for these and maybe some other input materials have been rising. So I'm not talking about, you know, shortages of caps that would be sort of a not related to your supply chain. This is related to your supply chain, and I'm wondering if that's impacting margins at all and whether you're adjusting prices in response to that through the channel. Thank you.

Heath Mitts (CFO)

William, this is Heath. You know, when, when we went out with our, our original guidance for the year, we talked some about, you know, what was embedded in our guidance. And we, and that was about $0.10 a share of pressure on our earnings relative to commodity inflation. And as you know, we have hedging programs in place and everything, so you don't see a ton of volatility up or down, but based on the way it kind of smooths into our cost structure. However, your point is valid. There is some pressure out there on some of the commodities, metals and resins. And we're – it's impacting us. That $0.10 has probably grown to closer to $0.12, and as you see it reflected in our results.

You know, we've got productivity programs in place, and we're going after it. But there's a little bit of additional headwind, especially as we exit the year on that. But the team is focused. We've got a world-class supply chain organization that's going after it and challenging some of those things. And where we do have more of those types of pressures that we have to realize, certainly our commercial teams are in sync on that relative to price increases. And you would expect pricing to stay pretty similar, where we have opportunities to raise price, especially through our distribution channel, those types of things, those are proactively being done. Some of it in context of the commodities inflation, the input side.

Then on where we have direct relationships, certainly those are fluid dialogues, but it's not lost on our customers either, in terms of, of how we recover their way and/or share in some of the, some of the pinch points. But, you know, we're geared up pretty well to handle these types of pieces. And, as we get closer to 2019, William, what I would say is, certainly we'll quantify that again, but you shouldn't expect us to be using this as a major excuse, 'cause we're gonna be ramping up our material sourcing programs as well to offset some of those pressures. But I appreciate your question.

William Stein (Analyst)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

We'll go next to the line of Deepa Raghavan with Wells Fargo. Go ahead.

Deepa Raghavan (Analyst)

Good morning,

Heath Mitts (CFO)

Hey, Deepa.

Deepa Raghavan (Analyst)

Hey, good cost control on the SG&A line. Just curious if those are from some of the structural changes you were targeting, or was there something temporary this quarter, example, you know, belt-tightening, just given Forex headwinds, et cetera?

Heath Mitts (CFO)

Deepa, I appreciate the question. This is Heath. You know, if you're looking at our operating expenses in general, whether that's SG&A component of that or in total, certainly we're tightening the belt, and we've talked about some of the activity that we've done to reduce structurally our SG&A. That still is in place, and that will continue forward as we're looking at a lot of different opportunities, and there's a heightened focus on that. Having said that, I think the quarter came in a little bit lighter than what I thought. I would look at it more on a full year basis and the relative improvement, you know, that we're targeting. We've talked about taking a full 100 and change basis points out of our operating expense structure.

Certainly we're ahead of that in the quarter, but I'd say that when you look at a more normal full year normalized basis, we're. That's still part of the journey.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Okay, thank you, Deepa. Can we have the next question, please?

Operator (participant)

We'll go to the line of Sherri Scribner with Deutsche Bank. Go ahead.

Sherri Scribner (Analyst)

Hi, good morning.

Heath Mitts (CFO)

Hi, Sherri.

Sherri Scribner (Analyst)

Can I ask if you, if you look at the business environment, we've been in a relatively strong business environment, and we've seen some benefits for TE in the transportation and industrial segments. I guess when we think about the fourth quarter guidance, there's a bit of a deceleration in organic growth expectations. Can you maybe talk to what's driving that slight deceleration? Is it related to the business environment? Maybe some commentary on what you're seeing on demand trends and what's driving that. Thanks.

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

No, actually, Sherri, thanks for the question. Honestly, I don't see that we're seeing deceleration. I think one of the things, while our organic growth has changed, I think one of the things is SubCom also had a very strong fourth quarter last year, as well as third. You really take our organic growth without SubCom, we would have told you 9% this quarter instead of 6%, and 8% in the fourth quarter versus 5%. So we will still have SubCom having a strong fourth quarter last year. So when we look across, and it goes back to my order activity, what we see is, while auto production, you know, has been bouncing around 2%, the content wins that we see clearly are staying where they're at.

Markets that we see continuing to have very strong momentum in addition to auto, sensors we talked about during the call, as well as commercial aerospace, defense, medical. We really see strength in those markets, and certainly in where we're affected by the cloud, like in our data devices, we continue to see strong momentum, and we would expect that to continue. I think the markets we continually talk to you about, that we would say believe they have to get more to a more normalized growth, certainly our Industrial Transportation business, our Appliances business. Our Industrial Factory Automation business looks like it's getting there, you know, sort of where we are. You saw the growth this quarter, it's good.

So they're the only three that when we look at and we say we're waiting for them to get to more normalized growth because we are benefiting from some, some supply chain bump ups. And I think as we look going forward, we expect they'll get to a more normalized growth pattern. But net-net, I would say it's very healthy. You saw it in the book-to-bill, you saw it in our order rates being double-digit. You saw the broad-based nature of it, that it's still a very constructive economic environment, but in some of our businesses, you know, we're not gonna grow 20% a year for four years. It has to normalize.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Thank you, Sherri. We have the next question, please.

Operator (participant)

That will come from the line of Mark Delaney with Goldman Sachs. Go ahead, please.

Mark Delaney (Analyst)

Thanks for taking the follow-up question. The follow-up question was on the automotive end market. You realize TE had very good results in the quarter. Some of the supply chain, like Daimler and OSRAM, had lowered their guidance. So I'm curious, did TE see any impact and was just able to overcome it, or did you not see an impact at all?

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

No, we really didn't see an impact because of our global position. So no different than we told you throughout the year, 2% auto production. And while certain customers may have had some things they talked about, our revenue's been staying pretty steady. And if you look at us operationally, versus even 90 days ago, our transportation top line is gonna be pretty similar for 2018 than we told you 90 days ago. So and it's broad-based, it's broad-based across regions. So I feel very good about where we position ourselves. Certainly, we have something that's unique with the content and where we play both into the connected car and the electric vehicle trends. Not everybody in the supply base has that opportunity, so maybe they have some of those impacts.

But I feel, you know, the content momentum we've had, as well as our global position, always gives us an opportunity to be isolated from one-off small events.

Mark Delaney (Analyst)

Got it. Thank you.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Thank you, Mark. We have the next question, please.

Operator (participant)

We'll go to Deepa Raghavan's line from Wells Fargo for a follow-up question.

Deepa Raghavan (Analyst)

Oh, thanks for the follow-up from me, too. Heath, Terrence, could you size up some of the possible Forex headwinds into fiscal 2019? And is there a sensitivity we should be thinking about, so we can rightsize our models, just given the inflection point here? Thank you.

Heath Mitts (CFO)

Thanks, Deepa, and it's a fair question. We're obviously working in real time. You know, if you, if you look at the basket of currencies that we have, you know, you've got to kind of look at, you know, when, when those kicked in, in terms of the weakening and the strengthening dollar against that basket. Certainly at this point, you know, it turns into a year-over-year headwind in our fourth quarter, which is the quarter we're sitting in today. And then as we get into next year, it has a little bit less of a pointed impact at today's rates, in, in our early part of fiscal 19, and then it starts to kick in as a much more pointed headwind in the, in, in the latter part of our, our second and third quarter.

Again, as rates get today, we're, you know, we're not economists, we're not trying to predict what the US dollar is gonna do, but, you know, we'll quantify that as part of the guidance. I would tell you, though, that it will be a net headwind for the full year 2019. We are not at the point to quantify that externally yet, though, but and we'll keep an eye on what the US dollar does.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

Okay. Thank you, Deepa. Can we have the next question, please?

Operator (participant)

Another follow-up question from the line of Amit Daryanani with DB- with RBC Capital Markets. Go ahead.

Amit Daryanani (Analyst)

Yep, thanks. Heath, I guess when I look at the total restructuring initiative, I think $150 million is the number you guys have talked about. How do I think about the payback and when do you get the savings from that into your model? And very specifically on the industrial side, you know, let's say revenues are flat in 2019, how much cost do you think you're taking out of the model to margins? I'm trying to figure out how much could margins go up in industrial specifically, even if you don't have revenue tailwind from the cost reduction initiative.

Heath Mitts (CFO)

Well, Amit, good question. The dollars that you see us incurring now relative to restructuring are for things that have been announced in terms of facility consolidations, largely. And there's still, you know, a couple more of those to come that you would expect to see in our fourth quarter results and into the early part of 2019. However, just because those are announced and we record the charge, doesn't mean that the costs come out instantaneously. Those tend to be more on an operational timeline that continues to, you know, support our customers and everything else, and those types of transitions. So it can be a couple of years, depending upon where the facilities are.

You know, I would tell you that, you know, we're still targeting high teens margin- mid- to high-teens margins for the segment, similar to what we talked about at our Analyst Day. But it's gonna take us a couple of years to get there. 2019 actually is quite a big year operationally for our industrial segment, as some of these announced restructuring programs and site consolidations are being worked real time. Some of that is captured in the charges that we took. Largely, though, that's around severance costs and so forth, or any asset impairments. And then there's real operational costs that are rolled through our results in 2019 relative to parallel production and these types of things in terms of move costs.

You know, I wouldn't want to oversell that you're gonna see another 100 basis points improvement in 2019 in Industrial, but I do think we'll continue to push the peanut forward on that. And then as you get into certainly 2020, when some of these sites officially go offline-

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

... Okay, thank you, Amit. I think we have one last question.

Operator (participant)

That will come through the line of Shawn Harrison with Longbow Research. Go ahead, please.

Shawn Harrison (Analyst)

Hi, thanks for taking the follow-up. Wanted to just get your thoughts on the M&A environment. And the reason I ask is, maybe two weeks ago, one of your quasi competitors paid, I think, a pretty healthy multiple, at least on a sales basis, for an industrial connector company. And so are you seeing, for TE and M&A, higher valuations out there in the market, or do you think this is maybe just kind of a one-off transaction?

Terrence Curtin (CEO)

No, Shawn, thanks for the question. You know, I think like we, we shared with you when we talked to you back in the fall, it is an expensive environment, and it's been an expensive environment. I don't think that's changed. It hasn't decreased from where we've been. I think the key when you think about TE is, you know, how we talk to you about where bolt-ons play in and where we, they kind of add strategic value. And I think our strategy has stayed consistent, as well as, you know, how do we make sure we get return for our owners from an ROIC over time. So net-net, I would say the environment still is frothy. And I think we're staying disciplined during that environment because we have something I think is pretty special in the organic growth opportunities we have.

So, I don't feel we need to be compelled to do something like we told you on Investor Day. It's how do we continue to strengthen our portfolio long term and create value for the investors. So I think it is a balance with organic first and inorganic supporting it. And, you know, we're gonna be looking at how we invest our incremental dollars of free cash flow. And like Heath and I have been talking about, we have taken it up on the organic side here this year to really, you know, make sure we get the organic opportunities, which is the best return.

Sujal Shah (VP of Investor Relations)

All right. Well, I want to thank everybody for joining us on the call this morning, and if you have further questions, please contact Investor Relations at TE. Thank you, and have a great day.

Operator (participant)

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