Woodward - Earnings Call - Q3 2021

Transcript

Speaker 0

Thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Woodward Inc. Third Quarter Fiscal Year twenty twenty one Earnings Call. At this time, I would like to inform you that this call is being recorded for rebroadcast and that all participants are in a listen only mode. Following the presentation, you would you will be invited to participate in a question and answer session.

Joining us today from the company are Mr. Tom Gendron, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Mr. Bob Weber, Vice Chairman and Chief Financial Officer mister Don Guzzardo, vice president of investor relations and treasurer and Dan Provasnick, director of investor relations. I would now like to turn the call over to mister Guzzardo. Thank you.

Please go ahead, sir.

Speaker 1

Thank you, operator. We would

Speaker 2

like to welcome all of

Speaker 1

you to Woodward's third quarter fiscal year twenty twenty one earnings call. In today's call, Tom will comment on our markets and related strategies, and Bob will discuss our financial results as outlined in our earnings release. At the end of our presentation, we will take questions. For those who have not seen today's earnings release, you can find it on our website at woodward.com. We have again included some presentation materials to go along with today's call that are also accessible on our website.

An audio replay of this call will be available by phone or on our website through 08/16/2021. The phone number for the audio replay is on the press release announcing this call as well as on our website and will be repeated by the operator at the end of the call. I'd like to refer to and highlight our cautionary statement as shown on Slide three. As always, elements of this presentation are forward looking or based on our current outlook and assumptions for the global economy and our businesses more specifically, including the ongoing COVID-nineteen pandemic. Those elements can and do frequently change.

Please consider our comments in light of the risks and uncertainties surrounding those elements, including the risks we identify in our filings. In addition, Woodward is providing certain non U. S. GAAP financial measures. We direct your attention to the reconciliations of non U.

S. GAAP financial measures, which are included in today's slide presentation and our earnings release and related schedules. We believe this additional financial information will help in understanding our results. Now turning to our results for the third quarter. Net sales for the 2021 were $557,000,000 compared to $524,000,000 for the prior year quarter.

Net earnings and adjusted net earnings for the 2021 were both $49,000,000 or $0.74 per share. For the third quarter of twenty twenty, net earnings were $38,000,000 or $0.61 per share and adjusted net earnings were $31,000,000 or $0.48 per share. Net cash provided by operating activities was $318,000,000 for the first nine months of twenty twenty one compared to $212,000,000 for the same period of the prior year. Free cash flow and adjusted free cash flow for the first nine months of twenty twenty one were both $297,000,000 For the first nine months of twenty twenty, free cash flow was $173,000,000 and adjusted free cash flow was $169,000,000 Now I will turn the call over to Tom to comment further on our results, strategies and markets.

Speaker 3

Thank you, Don, and good afternoon, everyone. In the third quarter of twenty twenty one, we were pleased to deliver significantly improved performance compared to the prior year period. As our markets progress down the path of recovery, we do anticipate pandemic related volatility to continue. The ongoing global supply chain disruptions, unpredictable impact of COVID variants and the varying pace of regional economic improvement all contribute to future uncertainty. We continue to believe our markets will return to pre pandemic levels in 2023, and we will see significant growth related to our market share gains and favorable fleet dynamics.

Moving to our markets. Commercial aerospace continues to recover as airlines begin to reactivate parked fleets, aircraft build rates continue to climb and passenger traffic increases. U. S. Domestic travel is returning to near pre COVID levels, while international remains weak.

Importantly, the commercial fleet now being utilized has significantly higher Woodward content, which we believe will lead to strong aftermarket sales growth. In defense, markets overall remained favorable. However, as anticipated, the demand for guided weapons is softening. Defense aftermarket activity remains solid due to aircraft utilization and upgrade programs. Turning to our industrial markets.

In power generation, demand for gas turbines is increasing, and we expect further improvement in 2022, driven predominantly by growth in Asia and the continuing replacement of coal powered plants. Aftermarket activity is beginning to increase, with volume anticipated to come back to pre COVID levels in 2022. Back at power for data centers continues to be strong. In transportation, demand for China natural gas trucks softened significantly in the quarter as a result of the anticipated implementation of China VI diesel emission regulations, which drove short term demand for China V diesel trucks. The natural gas truck market remains strong and has grown to approximately 15% of the total truck market.

However, we do expect quarterly volatility to continue. The global marine market has seen improving ship utilization from the pandemic related lows, which will drive aftermarket activity. The oil and gas market leading indicators have improved as crude prices and energy demand have increased. In summary, we are seeing improvements in our markets year over year, and we delivered a solid quarter. However, the pace of global economic recovery and our financial results are being impacted by global supply chain disruptions, COVID related impacts and regional market fluctuations.

As has been our priority throughout this pandemic, we continue to generate robust cash flow by leveraging our operational structure and optimizing working capital, allowing us to continue investing in growth opportunities. We remain steadfast in our commitment to developing innovative products designed to enhance emissions performance, reliability and fuel efficiency, which have meaningfully contributed to a cleaner global environment. As global demand for cleaner energy, renewable fuels and greater efficiency accelerates, we will continue to invest in these opportunities in both our Aerospace and Industrial segments. Before giving the reins over to Bob for his final earnings call as Chief Financial Officer, I would like to thank Bob one more time for his tremendous contributions to the Woodward team. Over his sixteen years at Woodward, he was truly an unrivaled counselor, partner and friend.

And for that, we all wish him the best of luck in this next phase of his life. During our next call, I look forward to being joined by Mark Hartman. I'll now turn the call over to Bob.

Speaker 4

Thank you, Tom. I appreciate the kind remarks, and I very much enjoyed my time with Woodward. Mark will be an excellent CFO, and together with you and your entire senior leadership team, I know I'm leaving the company in good hands. Turning to our financial results this quarter. Woodward net sales increased to $557,000,000 compared to $524,000,000 for the prior year quarter.

Sales in the 2021 were negatively impacted by approximately $30,000,000 as a result of global supply chain constraints predominantly impacting our aerospace business. Although recovery plans are in place, we anticipate that these issues will continue beyond our fourth quarter. Accordingly, we are not providing more detailed guidance at this time. Aerospace segment sales for the 2021 were $341,000,000 an increase of 11% from the prior year quarter. Commercial OEM and aftermarket sales were up compared to the prior year by 5111% respectively, largely driven by the increasing build rates and domestic passenger traffic.

Sequentially, commercial OEM sales were down 6% and commercial aftermarket sales were down 3%, both compared to a strong second quarter. The sequential declines were primarily due to supply chain constraints and normal quarterly variability. Defense OEM sales were up 5% and defense aftermarket sales were down 17%, both as compared to the prior year period. Sequentially, defense OEM sales were down 14% and defense aftermarket sales were up 5%, both as compared to a strong second quarter. Both defense OEM and aftermarket sales in the current quarter were negatively impacted by supply chain constraints.

Defense order volume and backlog remained strong. We do anticipate a significant decline in guided weapons in fiscal twenty twenty two, more specifically JDAM. Aerospace segment earnings for the 2021 were $53,000,000 or 15.6% of segment sales compared to $41,000,000 or 13.4% of segment sales for the third quarter of twenty twenty. The increase in segment earnings was primarily the result of higher volume, predominantly in commercial OEM. The decrease in sequential earnings as a percent of segment sales was primarily due to the decline in defense OEM sales.

Turning to Industrial. Industrial segment sales for the 2021 were $216,000,000 compared to $217,000,000 in the prior year period. Excluding the renewable power systems and related businesses, which I'll refer to as RPS, industrial segment sales for the 2020 were $210,000,000 The increase in industrial sales excluding RPS was primarily due to the impact of favorable foreign currency rates, which was partially offset by softness in China natural gas engines and global supply chain constraints. The China V diesel truck pre buy negatively impacted natural gas engine sales more than we anticipated. Industrial segment earnings for the 2021 were $27,000,000 or 12.6% of segment sales, consistent with the prior year quarter.

Non segment expenses and adjusted non segment expenses were $14,000,000 for the 2021 compared to non segment expenses of $15,000,000 and adjusted non segment expenses of $17,000,000 for the same period last year. At the Woodward level, R and D for the 2021 was $30,000,000 or 5.3% of sales compared to $35,000,000 or 6.6% of sales for the prior year quarter. SG and A and adjusted SG and A for the 2021 were both $48,000,000 compared to $57,000,000 and $50,000,000 respectively for the prior year quarter. The effective tax rate and the adjusted effective tax rate were both 16.8% for the third quarter of twenty twenty one. For the third quarter of twenty twenty, the effective tax rate was 14.6% and the adjusted effective tax rate was 29.1.

Looking at cash flows. Net cash provided by operating activities for the first nine months of fiscal twenty twenty one was $318,000,000 compared to $212,000,000 for the prior year period. Capital expenditures were $21,000,000 for the first nine months of 2021 compared to $39,000,000 for the prior year period. Free cash flow and adjusted free cash flow for the first nine months of 2021 were both $297,000,000 compared to free cash flow of $173,000,000 and adjusted free cash flow of $169,000,000 for the prior year period. The increase in free cash flow and adjusted free cash flow was primarily related to effective working capital management and lower capital expenditures, partially offset by lower net earnings.

Lastly, turning to our fiscal twenty twenty one outlook. While we expect sales, earnings and free cash flow results for the fourth quarter to be higher than the third quarter, considerable uncertainty remains with respect to COVID variants, global supply chain disruptions and regional market volatility, all of which are expected to continue. Accordingly, we are not providing more detailed guidance at this time. This concludes our comments on the business and results for the third quarter of twenty twenty one. Operator, we are now ready to open the call to questions.

Speaker 0

Thank you. The questions and answer session will begin at this time. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up the handset before pressing any numbers. Should you have a question, please press star one on your push button phone. Should you wish to withdraw your question, press the pound key.

Your question will be taken in the order it is received. Please standby for your first question, sir. Our first question comes from Gautam Khanna with Cowen.

Speaker 2

Hey, guys. How are you? Good. How are doing?

Speaker 3

Hey. Good.

Speaker 2

Good. And congrats, Bob. And best of luck.

Speaker 4

Thank you very much.

Speaker 2

Hey. I wanted to ask, you know, there was this announced transaction between Parker Hannifin and Nugget. And I wondered if what your initial view is of the competitive implications, if any, to the actuation business or any other part of the Woodward business?

Speaker 3

Yes. Don't really see the acquisition, MegaByte Parker, changing anything in the competitive landscape. We have a few overlapping areas, but it's minor. Parker is a strong company, so I'm sure they're helped enhance Meggitt. But in terms of competitiveness, I don't think it will impact Woodward at all.

Speaker 2

Okay. And, you know, I'm curious, is there where are the overlaps, if you wouldn't mind, elaborating?

Speaker 3

Yeah. There's there's a little bit in the thermal management area at MEG. You know, with Parker, we we have some overlaps. I I think you're really asking about the MEG side, I believe. There's little bit on thermal management.

There's a little bit in the industrial gas turbine space, and there's some minor amount on their their sensor segments. And there's a little bit on some some air valves as well. But it's it's minor, and we don't really view them as a significant compund here.

Speaker 2

Okay. And just maybe stepping back, just sorry, go ahead. Go ahead.

Speaker 4

No, I didn't say anything.

Speaker 2

I'm sorry. I was going to ask stepping back just what your view is, in terms of just M and A and sort of how the a year ago, you were contemplating the Hexcel transaction with Woodward and what that might how the company might be different in five years. I'm wondering if you could just give us some direction on what you think how the portfolio might change, how M and A may evolve as part of Woodward strategy going forward? What are you looking at? Where are you hoping to get bigger, etcetera?

Well,

Speaker 3

first, when you look at our balance sheet and the like, I think all of you can see that we're strong. We're still we had a strong balance sheet. We're doing real well in cash flow. We're still in the pandemic, however. And that's why in the prepared remarks, said we'll recover our estimate is we'll recover to 2019 level of sales in 2023.

For the aerospace market, I think that's most people's belief is that's the time frame. During the pandemic, have really been focused on ensuring the health of the company, continue to invest in the future and ensuring that we have strong cash flow and strong balance sheet. We're in a position now where we feel highly confident of our financial position. I think what you're going see us go back to is what has been a proven track record for the company, and that's bolt on acquisitions that help sell in our system strategy, have good tie in to the direction of the company. And we've had great success with that, and I think that's the way we're going to look at it going forward.

Speaker 0

Your next question is from the line of Pete Stubitsky with Alembic Global.

Speaker 5

Yeah. Good afternoon, Tom and and Bob and Don. And and, yeah, Bob, best of luck.

Speaker 4

Thank you.

Speaker 5

I guess, on on the supply chain issues, could you give us some more color on kind of what's going on there specifically? And the $30,000,000 impact that you quantified, I can't remember if you said, was that all aerospace or split? And within aerospace, was it split between defense and commercial? I just wondering if you could give us a little more color there.

Speaker 4

Sure. It was predominantly aerospace, but we did see shortages and disruptions on both sides. We've all read about the electronics, and that's probably the predominant area that we're seeing shortages come from. But there's a variety of things. We've got plant shutdowns or at least slowdowns related to COVID and related to other issues.

So there have just been a variety of things that I think with respect to getting things back up and running and with respect to the announced shortages that we're seeing impact us going forward. We do believe our supply chain, we stay very close to them. They have plans to alleviate the issues, but it's going to continue for a while here.

Speaker 5

Okay. Would you expect kind of a similar negative headwind in the fourth quarter?

Speaker 4

Too hard to say at this time. Like I said, they have plans. We have ramps. We have anticipation of improvement. But it's very, very hard to say with everything going on, in particular with Delta and everything and all the talks about locking things down, etcetera, etcetera, too hard to say at this time.

Speaker 5

Okay. Okay. I guess last one for me on the guided weapons. Did you say or could you say how much it was down in the third quarter? And do you kind of quantify all that within the defense aftermarket or both OE and aftermarket?

And I think you said it, it was going to be down significantly in fiscal twenty twenty two. Are we talking twenty percent plus? Or maybe some more color on that.

Speaker 4

Sure. So not much aftermarket on guided weapons. It's all in defense OEM, just a little humor on that angle. But and overall, so there's more than the JDAM. So there's a mix inside of that.

We have small diameter BOM and AIM9X as well. So for the quarter, flat to slightly down. As we go forward though, and we've kind of called this out last couple of quarters, we do anticipate in 2022 that there will be a significant decline. It's very hard to quantify at this point in time, partially because, as we've said, we've had some shortages, Some of that is getting pulled or excuse me, pushed into 2022. So it will not be insignificant.

It will be sizable. But giving an exact amount at this time is very hard to do.

Speaker 5

Okay. Okay. Thanks for the color. Sure.

Speaker 0

And your next question is from the line of Christopher Glynn with Oppenheimer.

Speaker 1

Thanks. Good afternoon.

Speaker 4

Good afternoon.

Speaker 1

And, yep, Bob, thanks for working with us over the years. Appreciate So I was curious about the marine aftermarket and the IGT aftermarkets. They're just you know, what degree are you seeing them come back now? It is I mean, the marine formula seems very good. I'm just curious if the rubber

Speaker 6

you know, what degree the rubber is hitting the road there.

Speaker 4

Yeah. The the order ramp to our customers and to the things like utilization rates and so on is improving. We have not yet seen that in sales, but we are between future order discussions and so on, we're seeing a lot more optimism for 2022 in both of those areas. I think you saw some of the announcements that came out from our customers saying order volumes in IGTs, for example, were improving. And so, that's just a matter of timing in terms of the pull through on our side.

So, we are bullish on it for 2022, not seeing a tremendous amount yet.

Speaker 1

Okay. And is there anything interesting to relay in terms of industrial book to bill, anything like that?

Speaker 4

We're improving. The formal book to bill for us because of a lot of pull isn't necessarily a number that we track or publicly use because it's not that helpful. But it is definitely on the improving side of that equation in terms of the activity that we're seeing, orders in some areas. We mentioned that clearly the China natural gas impact on industrial was the most significant element this quarter.

Speaker 1

What sort of cadence do you anticipate anticipate that secular growth of China natural gas engines returning to growth? I think you still have tough comps in the first half, but maybe you override that. Just curious how you think that linearity might feel to you at this juncture.

Speaker 4

Yes. We think it's going to be challenging because of the oversized China five pie. We think that will extend somewhat into the fourth quarter. As we mentioned in terms of the size of natural gas truck market vis a vis diesels, it's been improving. And we do continue to believe in the long term secularity of that, that natural gas is considered a clean fuel in China, similar to EV.

And so we do believe that, that has longer term legs.

Speaker 0

Your next question is from the line of Matt Akers with Wells Fargo.

Speaker 3

Can you talk about A320neo? Airbus has talked about bringing rates up there kind of above what we were thinking last. Go, you just talked about, the capacity you have to kind of get to those rates. I know it's still a few years out, but, or if any other investment would be required to get there.

Speaker 4

Yes. No, as you guys know, we invested a lot in the 2016 timeframe and around those years towards the capacities. We kind of went into the COVID environment at some 60 plus for both of the narrow bodies plus seven eighty seven and so on. So we have significant capacity available. We are not at this point in time aware of any supply chain constraints directly associated with that.

Obviously, they can develop as we start to ramp up. Probably the most concerning in some cases is the electronic shortages. But plenty of capacity and no known issues with respect to ramping up in either of the narrow bodies at this time.

Speaker 3

Okay. And then I guess on aftermarket, there's another aerospace supplier that kind of commented that we saw. Maybe I guess a little bit of a pull forward to kind of demand ahead of the summer ramp. Are you guys seeing any kind of just unusual seasonality in that or any indications on how that could kind of trend going into the fall on the liquor?

Speaker 4

Yes. We never know specifically about pull forward or anything. It's kind of a flow issue in terms of when parts arrive and so forth. So we did clearly see, when you look back at the history, the second quarter was a strong quarter. We do anticipate that, that will continue.

As we've said, the aircraft that are flying have much more Woodward content and a lot of the aircraft that were parked had less content. So we do believe that we have a systemic improvement going forward. But kind of as we've mentioned, we just saw China traffic, domestic traffic drop down a little bit. It's been kind of increasing most recently. We think that kind of volatility will continue and that will probably impact what we see in terms of quarterly volatility on aftermarket.

Speaker 7

Your

Speaker 0

next question is from the line of David Stroth with Barclays.

Speaker 7

Congrats, Bob. Enjoy your retirement. Just wanted to ask where you guys are from a headcount perspective on the aerospace side. Have you started to hire back? And if so, how much?

And then maybe just an update on how much you think you've taken out

Speaker 3

in terms of structural costs through this period.

Speaker 4

Sure. Yes, we have begun to bring folks back. I don't have an exact number for you, but it is significant in terms of the folks that we've been bringing back predominantly, obviously, in the direct labor side of the equation, not so much on the indirect side. So kind of related to the cost savings, we are beginning to get ramped back up from our shift standpoint, and that will cause us to bring back indirect labor into the form of, you know, supervisors, etcetera, etcetera. So we are seeing we have seen and are seeing increases there and anticipate we'll continue to see that going forward.

And I'm sorry, the second part of your question was?

Speaker 7

How much do you think you've taken out in terms of

Speaker 4

structural Yes. Cost So we called out about $100,000,000 in total when we first went through that back in April. We believe that approximately $50,000,000 of that will be continuing. But we also believe that as many of you have seen in many of the announcements, there will be some inflationary pressures. So it will remain to be seen where we'll end up in terms of total systemic cost savings.

And then as you saw in some of the actions we took, whether it be the elimination of the annual bonus, some of the officer and director cost savings we took back, some of those will be coming back on as we go forward into 2022.

Speaker 7

Okay. Bob, And last one for you. In terms of the cash balance, can you maybe update us on how much cash you think you need to run the business? And I guess the reasoning behind why you let it you know, let that cash balance bill the size it is today?

Speaker 4

Yeah. Let me give you a little breakdown on the cash balance. So a a for the first time since I've been in this role, we actually do have a fairly significant U. S. Cash balance.

In the past, it's largely been a regional cash balance predominantly in Europe and now also in Asia. So in terms of having a significant immediately available cash balance, it may not be as significant, let's call it roughly $250,000,000 as the overall balance looks. So that gives you a little color on the way the cash is situated globally. We do not believe we're at some point where we have a lot of excess cash given our position of focus on growth. And we do believe there will be opportunities that will come forward, both organically and inorganically, to put that cash to work.

We have said that we are on a path and are back to our pre COVID 50% of net earnings being returned to shareholders, and we will continue to monitor the market. And as appropriate, probably do some share buybacks going forward. So we intend to kind of manage that on an ongoing basis and watch for both organic and inorganic opportunities as we go forward.

Speaker 7

Perfect. Thanks again, Bob. Sure.

Speaker 0

Your next question is from the line of Michael Ciarmoli with Truist Securities.

Speaker 7

Good evening, guys. Thanks for taking the questions. Bob, congrats. Thought for a while there, you might be sticking around if you guys pulled the trigger on Meggitt. So just on I mean, we've seen a number of aerospace companies report so far.

I mean, you guys seem to have experienced here an outsized disruption in supply chain. I mean, is there anything unique or specific? I mean, certainly, we've heard about electronic shortages. But I mean, this just seems the magnitude you guys are being disrupted just seems to be a little bit bigger than anybody else. I mean, anything you can point to from specific products?

I mean, we didn't hear from obviously, none of the engine guys are kind of talking about potential pressures or challenges. So presumably, it's not having a widespread impact on the supply chain yet.

Speaker 3

Yeah. Without maybe I'll answer the question a little bit. Without we don't want to name suppliers or anything. But we had a couple of suppliers that were providing our aero segment that during the pandemic, they had closed plants, did some moves, and they did not go well. And the second part was hiring people back or staffing in new locations.

And it had a major impact, on some products that go across a lot of our a lot of our other products. So it it cascaded through more of our business than just a single disruption might. That also impacted our aftermarket because we ran out of inventory, and we weren't able to service some of the aftermarket. So we as Bob highlighted earlier, we've got, you know, all hands on deck working with the supplier, working on how to how to get this back on track. But that's the type of supplier disruption.

I think we the whole industry may see more of them as we start to ramp and people had consolidated facilities or reduced workforce and they're trying to hire people back, it can hit you. And this one just happened to hit, like I said, a component that goes across many, many of our products and had an adverse impact because

Speaker 7

it. That makes sense. And obviously, if it hit your aftermarket, the more profitable. I mean, just looking at the margins, I mean, the 18.9 you did last quarter, I mean, how should we, I guess, calibrate ourselves building off this 15.6% if it sounds like these supply chain disruptions are going to I guess they're going be unpredictable. But how should we be thinking about the margin cadence going forward here?

Speaker 3

Yes. Well, one of the things that we highlighted before, Bob can jump in here, too, we also need some of the volume to come back to get to our 20% plus target. And we do see that as you go through we're almost into fiscal year twenty twenty two. So as we go through fiscal year twenty twenty two and into 2023, we're confident that we'll deliver those margins in fiscal year 'twenty three and improve as the volumes pick up during between now and then. So and as you can see, some of the markets coming back, the OEM rates are going up.

Those are positive not only for OEM but for initial provisioning. And so we're confident we'll get there. But as we've been highlighting here, there may be some volatility quarter to quarter until we stabilize the whole supply chain.

Speaker 7

Got it. Got it. And do you need the wide bodies to come all the way back to get to those margins, the 20%? No. No,

Speaker 3

we don't.

Speaker 7

Last one I had, just on the I know Pete was asking on the JDAM. I guess I think in the DoD docs volumes are down 10%. I mean, are you guys thinking you'll see more of a headwind than that than kind of the 10% planned procurement volumes in 2022? Or is that sort of the right number?

Speaker 3

What we're looking at are, you know, the various, lots that the DoD are and exactly how they flow through. And as Bob highlighted, you know, there may be some movement between fiscal years And the lot that will come into calendar year 'twenty two is at a much lower rate. And that could change with foreign military sales or other, but we're just trying to highlight to everybody that we do see something on the JDAM. Now some of the other programs are doing well and offset some of the JDAM decline. But overall, we'll have a year over year decline in 2022 on casual weapons.

Speaker 0

Your next question is from the line of Robert Spingarn with Credit Suisse.

Speaker 7

Hi. Good afternoon. Bob, I'll add my congrats to you.

Speaker 4

Thank you.

Speaker 7

Just I really just have a couple of clarification questions or or maybe a new one. We've talked a lot about aftermarket supply. How is demand trending? I think we know a little bit because you said you missed out on $30,000,000 in sales. But maybe, Tom, you can talk about what's happened since March really through July.

Speaker 3

Well, we're actually seeing all signs of demand increasing. And as you know, a big part of our aero aftermarket is associated with engines. And we monitor utilization, hours flown, the number of aircraft in the fleet back in service. We're also doing the best we can to monitor green time. And I've complimented the airlines in the past.

They did what they needed to do. And they've done an admirable job of rotating assets to keep screen time so that they could reduce near term maintenance expense. All that's going to come due here as we're seeing more fleet get back into service, more utilization. So we're optimistic about we're going to see the narrow body, in particular, pick up. The second part of that is we are seeing the MAX aircraft go back into service.

We're seeing Boeing starting to move the production rates up on newbuilds. All that's very promising for initial provisioning sales, and we anticipate that we'll see better initial provisioning sales in fiscal year 'twenty two as well. To build the right direction, and things are on a promising path, but still could be volatile.

Speaker 7

Just on that, Tom, Bob talked about capacity in a prior answer. Is there any concern or should we have any concern that you all of a sudden get high demand for aftermarket a couple of quarters from now at the exact same time you're hitting those higher rates for OE or the aftermarkets, things like CFM56 and the OE is deep and your turbofans, they don't really interfere with each other.

Speaker 3

Yeah. You know, Ron, we've been, last, fall, we we started doing we were still going down because of pandemic. But internally, we started initiative, you know, we just called preparing for the upturn. And in that, you know, we were identifying long lead parts, training, where we would need to hire, to make sure that we would be ready for the recovery. And that has worked fairly well.

Part of preparing for the upturn, I have to say, was also working and trying to anticipate any supplier disruptions. We highlighted that we have had some, but we didn't highlight how many we resolved and fixed before they became a problem. So we have had success, but we've also been hit with some that we weren't able to counter. So all that being said is we've been preparing for it. I'm confident our constraint internally is gonna be onboarding new members and training.

And we're working really hard, and we set up special training centers to bring on people. And the question was asked earlier, but we are hiring right now hundreds of direct labor members as we see things starting to ramp, and so we're bringing them on to train. So capacity in terms of equipment and the like is not there. We're ensuring long lead time parts, and we're ensuring we're bringing on new members as fast as we can in anticipation of the upturn. That's what we can do to make sure we're ready.

Speaker 7

Okay. If you can hear me past the storm behind me. Just wanted one ask one more on defense aftermarket, not so much around the discussion we've had on JDAM and so forth, which sounds like it is OE. But we saw another supplier surprised with some softness in defense aftermarket on a year over year basis. And we're wondering if that just reflects DoD perhaps backing away from some some of the behavior at the beginning of the pandemic to flush cash into the system.

Do you think defense aftermarket elsewhere may be starting to fade?

Speaker 3

We're we're not seeing that right now. So it's not not something we're anticipating. You know, we do recognize that at the moment, you know, we're looking at, you know, basic flat ZOD budgets. But in terms of where we see our our aftermarket in defense, we're we're not seeing any pullbacks at this time. Okay.

Alright. That's it for me. Thank you. Thanks, Randy. Yeah.

Thanks.

Speaker 0

And your next question is from the line of Chris Howe with Barrington Research.

Speaker 6

Good afternoon, and congrats again to Bob, and I definitely will miss our travels together.

Speaker 2

Alright. Thanks, Chris.

Speaker 6

It's been asked several different ways, so I suppose I'll ask it another way. The $30,000,000 related to supply chain, can you give any granular detail on kind of what you're seeing on a month to month basis? To be more direct, perhaps how has July fared so far compared to June as it relates to these supply chain disruptions? And following up on that, if we think about the $30,000,000 in the context of moving forward, let's say, for a hypothetical example, 10,000,000 to $20,000,000 is deferred in Q4. As this deferred backlog or deferred revenue continues to build, can you break out how you anticipate filling this?

It'll all come back in a single quarter, having started to already fill in that $30,000,000 that got disrupted in the third quarter? There's a lot there.

Speaker 3

Yes. Well, I'll start, and then Bob can The send you in as first, you asked about July. Our recovery on a couple of suppliers looks to be happening more in August, September and moving into the first quarter of Q1 fiscal 'twenty two. So we're saying

Speaker 5

bit

Speaker 3

uncertain. But all the actions we've taken with the supplier internally to adjust for that is really going to start making progress really this month and moving forward. So it's a little difficult because some of it is based on our projections and commitments from the supplier of when we can get hardware and how we move it through. The The electronics one, I'm sure all of you are well aware of, the electronics one hit both the aerospace, but it also hit our industrial business. It's a difficult one.

Mainly because in our electronic controls, lot of the ICs we use are automotive based. Basically, the automotive ICs have really good environmental capabilities. And I think you all realize how tight that market is. So that one's really hard to predict and will probably carry forward into mid-twenty two, maybe beyond. We are working that hard as well as working with our customers.

But that's not on a one- or two month solution path. So we've got a mix here that's hitting us and carrying that forward. Is why we're not being able to give you guys all precise numbers. It's just a little uncertain as to how quick. But we're doing everything in our capability to try and recover.

Speaker 4

The only thing I would add to that is we tried to kind of give you some color on this won't be a sudden push of a balloon into a certain quarter. It'll probably be a more gradual burn down as we go forward. And Tom gave you some idea. We see improvements here and there, but we're not going see all of a sudden in the first quarter, there's a big balloon related to at least we don't anticipate that at this time.

Speaker 6

Okay. That's helpful. And one last question, if I may. Tom mentioned the different recoveries that we're seeing. Domestic passenger travel looks to be healthy, returning to pre COVID levels.

And we have the other two buckets, that are lagging domestic, which are international, and business related travel. As we look at those other two buckets, let's say business comes back in mid-twenty twenty two and international comes back in the latter part of that year, can you talk about, from a top down perspective, what we should see on the business?

Speaker 3

Yes. Well, maybe I'll start, Bob, go and join in with me. We talked about positive fleet dynamics for Woodward products going forward. And as you look at when you're kind of on the international or the widebody, that's kind of how I correlate the two. Obviously, some narrow bodies are used on international.

I do like our position. And if you look, the airlines are using, I believe, seven eighty seven. Triple seven will continue. These are aircraft we have, you know, good content on. A three fifty will pick up.

And so as they're gonna be using these newer aircraft, and we're seeing that even in the current utilization. It it's more towards those. Those are good for Woodward. We we see that we would have good aftermarket coming from those as they recover. And what comes out of service, you know, are some of the the four engine wide bodies, as you guys are aware of, and some of the older widebodies.

So I think the widebodies fleet will be more oriented to those newer aircraft. And I think that's a positive long term for Woodward, but it will take a little bit of time for those international markets to recover. Bob, don't know if want to add anything on that.

Speaker 4

No, I think you covered it, Tom. Clearly, any piece of the widebody coming back is helpful. The timetable is probably pretty close to what we're hearing overall from a lot of different sources. And so that's why we're trying to highlight that we still believe 2023 is when kind of things get back to more normal across the spectrum. And until then, we anticipate we're going to see good quarters and lumpy quarters.

It's just not going to be a nice straight line into the future with everything that's going on.

Speaker 0

And your next question is from the line of Sheila Kahyaoglu with Jefferies. Hey. Good afternoon, guys.

Speaker 3

How are

Speaker 0

Hey, Bob. I don't know if

Speaker 8

I could congratulate you for the second or third time. So I'll congratulate Don since he's he's retiring, and I'm pretty sure he actually will retire.

Speaker 4

I'm not gonna write this down.

Speaker 8

Okay. In terms of the aero margins from q two to q three, can you maybe give us a, EBIT bridge walkthrough of the supply chain but also like mix with defense down? How do we kind of think from that drop down of 19% to 15% Q over Q?

Speaker 4

Yeah. It's predominantly driven by that mix element of aftermarket and defense, both being down quarter over quarter. Lots of other small items embedded in a lot of that, but those are by far the most impactful two going from Q2 to Q3. And I think 18.9% on a 20% target in the middle still of this pandemic with still at that point in time being at 60% and, no international, you know, I think that speaks to itself. It was good quarter.

It had great mix. It came through in earnings, but it was kind of hard to hold, on an ongoing basis.

Speaker 8

I guess on that point, you know, on your OE business, did you see do you have continued destocking on the 08/07 and the 08/03/1950? And how do we think about how OE impacted you guys back in 1819? And how do we think about that OEM impact as we head into your, you know, 20% target?

Speaker 4

Well, we were you know, 1819, OE was cranking. So obviously, we're just looking at the build rates, we're nowhere near where we were when we went into COVID, and we were kind of at those 60 levels for a good part of that time. So and as you know, OE is not an earnings drag for us. It's obviously nowhere near as Tom may be comment. The aftermarket is by far the most predominant.

So OE is also continues to be pressured. We're encouraged by the comments that have come out about increasing the build rates and so on and so forth, and we're encouraged that travel should support that and airline profitability as we go forward should support that. So that's what we're looking for as we go forward.

Speaker 8

And then maybe just the last one is on defense, and I know everybody has asked, but can you size the defense business for us within Aero? I think it's 40%. How big is JDAM and kind of what the normalized whether it's percentage of sales or dollar number we should expect for that business going forward?

Speaker 4

Yes. It has been around the 40 level with commercial being what it's been. It's even growing from there. And on the JDAM side, it is a significant program. I don't think we call it out specifically, but it is a good chunk within that defense business.

Speaker 0

Okay. Thank you. Thanks a lot, guys.

Speaker 3

Thank you. Your

Speaker 0

next question is from the line of Noah Poponak with Goldman Sachs.

Speaker 4

Hey, good afternoon, everyone, and congrats, Bob, on your time. Good afternoon, and thank you. So just from a pure demand perspective, putting the supply chain issue aside, was commercial aerospace aftermarket softer in June and July compared to April and May? Or has it been fairly even through that period of time? I would say it's been softer, but it's been mostly on the supply side that has been impacted.

So I think we did have a strong second quarter, both from the demand side and not seeing as many constraints, whereas in the third quarter, we saw some demand slippage in terms of that whether it's the pull ahead or not, we don't really know, but we can only assume that or push outs or whatever. But most of the impact was on the supply chain side of the equation. Okay. So it doesn't sound like you would necessarily say that there was a substantial pull forward from the airlines as they were getting ready to return aircraft to service. And now there's a substantial slowdown off of that, maybe a little bit, but doesn't sound that's what I'm trying to On get out of the demand side, I think is we mentioned quarterly variability.

I would say the demand side would be very normal, if you will, on quarterly variability comments, whereas the supply chain side was clearly outsized in relation to the quarter. So we are going to continue to see variability. As we've mentioned, we think that the longer term, medium term to longer term is very positive because of the aircraft that are flying and the content that they do have compared to the aircraft that were parked. So we're very bullish on aftermarket as we go forward. You guys have seen us some quarters put up some very high aftermarket volumes compared to some of our peers.

And you can't hold that forever. I think we've actually had that discussion off and on that eventually that some of these things catch up a little bit. And I think that's all that happened this quarter. Okay. Appreciate that.

You've mentioned the initial spares provisioning related to the seven thirty seven MAX built but not delivered inventory basically hasn't happened for you yet. Any help you can provide on sizing that and how meaningful that can be for you in the coming quarters here as those are delivered?

Speaker 3

Yes. Provisioning carries good profitability with it. And a lot of the aircraft that were parked, or I'd say most aircraft that were parked, weren't provisioned. And so we're going through and have calculated, you know, what that can look like. And I think it's a little bit of timing with airlines and their their cash situation and when those aircraft get back into service.

But we do expect a little bit of provisioning over the next two years, kind of tied to those aircraft coming back into service, but also as the build rates, at Boeing and Airbus, go up. So for those all of you that have followed us for a while, you know initial provisioning is back to saying it's lumpy quarter to quarter. It's based on airlines, the route structure they're flying, how many aircraft they're bringing on board. So we've got a pretty good handle on it, and we do see it as we go into 2022 and then on to 2023 that, that will be an increasing benefit to aftermarket. Like I said, it's a good margin part of the business.

Speaker 4

Okay. And then just last one on the industrial side. How many more quarters do you have a tough compare on the China natural gas piece? And then just looking at the margin there, the revenues have stabilized sequentially a few quarters now and the margins hasn't picked back up yet. Is there just mix in there?

And how and should we expect that to kind of remain stable until you fully annualize the China natural gas, please?

Speaker 3

I'll

Speaker 4

jump in and then you can pick up for me. The China So natural gas, the comp issue is kind of a very volatile moving target. Think as you follow us over time, there is some seasonality, there has been. But predominantly, what we've seen is each time they have a new set of regulations, the last round, I think last year, was related to natural gas engines. This one is related to diesels.

And that's really what creates the significant volatility. So I couldn't really tell you how many more tough comps we have as much as we tried to guide that we anticipate from an inventory standpoint the return of natural gas, it will probably be late in the fourth quarter going into the first quarter. But we do anticipate that it will be significant increases as we go just related to the overall systemic elements of that. Okay. Yes.

Speaker 3

Maybe a little color maybe to add to Bob's comments. You're asking like, it was kind of flat revenue, flat margins. What we do see coming as we move into 'twenty two and 'twenty three, we talked around power gen, some of the prepared remarks. We do see IGTs picking up. So year over year, we see what we call our turbomachinery controls business picking up.

One thing that has played into the mix has been industrial aftermarket. And where we were pre pandemic seeing some good aftermarket was both out of the marine as well as on the oil and gas segment. And as you guys are aware, marine utilization is picking up. It hasn't driven the aftermarket quite yet, but it will happen. Oil and gas, with the collapse of oil prices, really shut down a lot of the activity and a lot of the demand for aftermarket parts.

So that's starting to pick up. We're seeing rig counts improve and the like. So we're starting to see some areas that will help not only on the sales side but also will be positive for industrial mix in terms of margin.

Speaker 0

Your next question is from the line of Pete Skibitski with Alembic Global.

Speaker 5

Yeah. Thanks, guys. Just a couple of quick follow ups. On the defense aftermarket this quarter, I think Bobby said it was down 17%. I just wanna make sure I understand.

Was that due to the supply chain issues or or due to timing or or something else we haven't talked about?

Speaker 4

Mostly timing. Not a lot not as many supply chain issues in that area, but we did have some. Most of the supply chain were in the OEM side of the equation. So we do anticipate that that will return. To follow on that earlier question, we do not see at this point in time anything with respect to changes in the DoD's posture with respect to defense spending.

And actually some of the stuff we've seen on the budget may speak more favorably to where we play.

Speaker 5

Okay. So the supply chain issues mostly hit defense, OEM and commercial aftermarket,

Speaker 4

did I hear that right? That's right.

Speaker 5

Okay. Okay. And then you mentioned earlier also you expect revenue up sequentially in the fourth quarter. Should we think that that's true for both segments or not sure?

Speaker 4

We believe at this point in time, segments.

Speaker 5

Okay. Okay. And then last one for me. I guess just getting ahead, Tom, when we get to the fourth quarter call, would you anticipate being able to give fiscal twenty twenty two guidance at that point?

Speaker 3

Yes. We intend at this point in time, we intend to give guidance when we release earnings in November.

Speaker 5

Okay. Back to regular order.

Speaker 3

Back to regular order.

Speaker 0

Your next question is from the line of Gautam Khanna with Cowen.

Speaker 2

Yes. Just to follow-up on Pete's question. I'm curious, I mean, numbers, not that you guys haven't guided this, but consensus numbers nonetheless, looking for about $649,000,000 of Q4 sales and $1.09 Obviously, you guys said sales will be up sequentially, hopefully, at both segments. I was wondering, obviously, there's a lot of to be better than Q3, you could still be well below consensus Q4. I'm just curious, like, can you give us some framework on how you think about where numbers are now?

How quickly the $30,000,000 catches up, the $30,000,000 of supply constrained sales and over what period? Because I just wonder if we're going to have like a big an unusually large sequential pickup in maybe it's not Q4, but Q1 or something because of the catch up. Just any sort of framework on how that plays out.

Speaker 4

Thank you. Let me give you some color. So first off, let me say we do not speak to consensus or other external estimates as a matter of policy. But what we've been trying to do is to give you some sort of framework for a lot of the uncertainty and the volatility, etcetera, etcetera that are currently going on. So we mentioned, I think, couple of areas that we do not anticipate recovering fully until late in the quarter or early in FY twenty twenty two.

And so from that, you may discern that the consensus or other comments that have been made externally are a little aggressive compared to what we see going on at the moment and some of the things that we see that are systemic and progressing into the fourth quarter.

Speaker 5

Thank you.

Speaker 0

And there are no further questions.

Speaker 3

Okay. Well, thank you, everybody, for joining us today. We appreciate the interaction and the questions. But before we close, as I think most of you know, we normally have an Investor Analyst Day in December. However, going forward, we we thought it'd be better to move it, and we decided to move the event to the March time frame.

And, hopefully, we'll be able to roll out our new strategic plan for everybody, and and and I hope we'll be able to see everybody in person. So thanks again for joining us today. I'll turn the call back to the operator.

Speaker 0

Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes our conference call today. If you would like to listen to a rebroadcast of this conference call, it will be available today at 07:30 p. M. Eastern Daylight Time by dialing 505056 for a U. S.

Call or 030406 for a non U. S. Call and by entering the access code 755-1758. It will also be available at company's website, www.woodwork.com, for fourteen days. We thank you for your participation on today's conference call and ask that you please disconnect your