Brady Corporation ($BRC)

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Brady Corporation Third Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions]. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I'd now like to hand the call over to Ann Thornton, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good morning, and welcome to the Brady Corporation Fiscal 2026 Third Quarter Earnings Conference Call. The slides for this morning's call are located on our website at www.bradycorp.com/investors. We will begin our prepared remarks on Slide #3. Please note that during this call, we may make comments about forward-looking information. . Words such as expect, will, may, believe, forecast and anticipate are just a few examples of words identifying a forward-looking statement. It's important to note that forward-looking information is subject to various risk factors and uncertainties which could significantly impact expected results. Risk factors were noted in our news release this morning and in Brady's fiscal 2025 Form 10-K, which was filed with the SEC in September. Also, please note that this teleconference is copyrighted by Brady Corporation and may not be rebroadcast without the consent of Brady. We will be recording this call and broadcasting it on the Internet. As such, your participation in the Q&A session will constitute your consent to being recorded. I'll now turn the call over to Brady's President and Chief Executive Officer, Russell Shaller. Russell?

Thanks, Ann, and thank you all for joining today. I'm pleased to announce a fantastic quarter. We reported a new record high adjusted earnings per share of $1.50, an increase of 23% versus the third quarter of last year. Organic sales grew 8.2% and gross profit margin was nearly 52% while both regions reported significant growth in operating income and profitability. We're growing in our key product lines in both of our regions, and we continue to see positive response to the new products that we've introduced over the last several years. . Launched in February, our I-4311 is a 4-inch portable printer, which is tailored for plant safety manufacturing professionals, and it's selling well above expectations. Our development team worked with a wide variety of users to create this product and customer feedback has been fantastic. And we're seeing continued growth in wire and Identification this quarter, particularly in data centers, which is a key end market for this highly critical identification solution. Our top priorities are profitable sales growth and a constant focus on cash generation and this quarter absolutely delivered both. In addition to 23% adjusted earnings per share growth in the quarter, our cash generation was nearly $80 million. Operating cash flow is up 35% so far this fiscal year. Last month, we announced that we entered into an agreement to acquire Honeywell's Productivity Solutions and Services business. This marked an exciting moment in Brady's history, and we're looking forward to combining our highly engineered durable labels, printers and software with the data and devices powering the entire supply chain. This is an exciting moment in our company's history. Over the past several years, Brady has carefully evaluated the competitive landscape while identifying new growth opportunities that expand our addressable market. With this acquisition, the PSS more than doubles the market's Brady can serve. At the same time, we believe emerging marking and identification standards including GS1 and Europe's digital product Passport initiatives, along with new applications for RFID-based product identification will support a long runway for future growth. Additionally, our early work with AI augmented products points the way to exciting new use cases to improve our customer safety and efficiency. We see ESS as a unique opportunity to expand our portfolio into leading-edge mobility and scanning solutions trusted by some of the world's largest transportation warehousing and logistics companies. By combining Brady's high-performance printers, software and specialty adhesive materials with PFS' full suite of mobility and scanning solutions, we will be able to offer a single source solution to a broader set of customers. The PSS business has an incredible product portfolio, a talented R&D team with deep technical expertise and critical sales and support functions who know their business extremely well. We're looking forward to closing the transaction and to bringing our businesses together. We have a bright future ahead of us, and we know this is an opportunity to drive a significant amount of long-term value for our shareholders. I'll turn the call over to Ann to provide details on our financial results, and then I'll return to discuss our regional results and to share some additional thoughts regarding the PSS transaction. Ann?

Thanks, [indiscernible]. Our record adjusted earnings per share results this quarter were the result of strong organic sales growth, improved gross profit margin, efficiencies throughout SG&A and growth in operating income through our global businesses. Organic sales grew 8.2%, which was driven by both of our regions. The Americas and Asia grew 10.1% and Europe and Australia grew 4.5%. We also funded a significant increase in research and development. We reduced our SG&A expense as a percentage of sales, and we increased our net cash position to $148.6 million. Our financial position allows us to continue to invest in our organic business and it puts us in an incredibly strong position to finance the PSS transaction, all while remaining committed to our dividend and to opportunistic share buybacks. Slide #4 details our quarterly sales trends. Organic sales grew 8.2% this quarter. Acquisitions added 2.1% and foreign currency translation increased sales by 3.5% and for total sales growth of 13.8% in the quarter. Turning to Slide #5. This details our quarterly gross margin trending. Our gross profit margin was 51.8% this quarter compared to 51% in the second quarter of last year. Last year, we took actions to streamline our cost structure, and we closed manufacturing facilities in Beijing, China and in Buffalo, New York. These actions reduced gross profit margin by 30 basis points approximately last year. So we're seeing the gross profit margin benefit from cost reduction actions taken last year, along with our sales growth led by our highly engineered products. all of which resulted in the 50 basis point improvement in our gross profit margin this quarter. Slide #6 details our SG&A expense trending. SG&A was $128.7 million this quarter compared to $108.7 million in the third quarter of last year. As a percent of sales, SG&A was 29.6% compared to 28.4% last year. If you exclude amortization expense and acquisition-related expenses from the current year, and exclude amortization expense and facility closure and other reorganization costs incurred last year, then SG&A was 25.3% of sales compared to 26.5% of sales last third quarter, which is a reduction of 120 basis points. We continue to invest in growth through targeted additions to our sales force, and we're realizing the benefits of our facility closure and other cost structure actions that we took last year. Turning to Slide #7, you'll find the trending of our investments in research and development. We continue to increase our investment in new product development throughout our key product lines, and we're seeing these multiyear investments paying off in our organic sales growth. Printer unit sales are up nearly 8% this quarter compared to last year's third quarter, which is exactly what we're looking for because the consumable revenue will follow. R&D expense was $23.5 million or 5.4% of sales this quarter, which was an increase from $19.2 million or 5% of sales in last year's third quarter. We funded a 23% increase in R&D in the quarter while improving our profitability and reporting record adjusted EPS. Slide #8 details the trending of our pretax earnings. Pretax earnings on a GAAP basis increased 11.6% from $65.7 million to $73.4 million in the quarter. If you exclude amortization and acquisition-related expenses in the current period, and exclude amortization and the facility closure and other reorganization charges we incurred last year, pretax earnings increased 23.8% from $74.4 million to $92.1 million. Moving to Slide #9. This outlines the trending of our net income and earnings per share. Net income increased 10.6% from $52.3 million to $57.8 million. Adjusted net income increased 22.3% from $58.8 million to $71.9 million. GAAP diluted earnings per share was $1.21 compared to $1.09 last year. and our adjusted GAAP diluted earnings per share was $1.50 compared to $1.22 last year, which was 23% growth and a new quarterly record. Our investments in R&D and in our sales force are paying off, and we're growing in all of our major product lines and improving our profitability. Cash generation is detailed on Slide #10. We Operating cash flow increased 30.7% to $78.2 million in the quarter from $59.9 million in the third quarter of last year. And free cash flow increased 20.8% to $67.2 million this quarter compared to $55.6 million in last year's third quarter. Year-to-date, our operating cash flow was up nearly 35% versus last year, which shows our consistent focus on cash-based decision-making and our high-quality earnings. Slide #11 details the impact that our cash generation has had on our balance sheet. As of April 30, we were in a net cash position of $148.6 million, which is more than triple our net cash position from a year ago. We're in an excellent position to finance the acquisition of the PSS business. We plan to structure our financing with $500 million in term loan bank debt and $800 million of private placement debt. And our expectation is that our interest rate will be below 6%. Our net leverage ratio will be approximately 2.5x at the time of closing the transaction. and we expect to delever quickly to below 2x within 2 years of the close. Our financial strength and our ability to generate a significant amount of cash allows us to service our debt and delever quickly. while always investing in our business through R&D and our sales force, and we're focused on consistently increasing our dividends. At the beginning of this fiscal year, we announced our 40th consecutive annual dividend increase, which is a milestone that we're very proud of. Our strong balance sheet also gives us the ability to buy back shares when the opportunity arises. And this quarter, we bought 63,000 shares for $5.2 million, which was an average price of $81.59 per share. This fiscal year, we bought 184,000 shares or $14.1 million, which was an average price of $76.76 per share. Slide #12 details our fiscal 2026 guidance. We're raising our full year adjusted EPS guidance range from $4.95 to $5.15 per share to $5.20 to $5.30 per share. And we're raising our GAAP EPS guidance range from $4.62 to $4.82 per share to $4.66 to $4.76 per share. Our adjusted EPS guidance range represents a range of growth of between 13% to 15.2% compared to 2025. We expect organic sales growth in mid-single-digit percentages for the full year ending July 31, 2026. Other elements of our guidance include depreciation and amortization expense of approximately $44 million capital expenditures of approximately $45 million and a full year income tax rate of approximately 21%. Our income tax rate generally tends to be slightly lower in the fourth quarter compared to our full year expectation based upon our historical profit mix and the expected timing of our discrete adjustments. Potential risks to our guidance, among others, include potential strengthening of the U.S. dollar, inflationary pressures that were unable to offset in a timely enough manner or an overall slowdown in economic activity. With that, I'll turn it back over to Russell to cover our regional results and to share additional information about the PSS transaction announcement before Q&A. Russell?

Thanks, Anne. Slide 13 shows the financial results of our Americas and Asia region. Organic sales growth was excellent at 10.1% in the quarter, ending at a record high $290.1 million. Acquisitions added 3.1% and and foreign currency translation increased sales 1.2% for total sales growth of 14.4%. We grew sales in all our key product lines with another fantastic result in Wire ID Data centers are making a meaningful impact in our growth in this product category this year. Wire ID represents 20% of our revenue in Americas and Asia and sales were up 19% this quarter. We're also seeing strong sales of our portable benchtop and automated printer units driving sales growth in Wire ID as well as product ID and Safety and Facility ID Globally, printer sales were up 7.8% in the third quarter. Breaking down the region further. Organic sales in Americas grew 9.7% and organic sales in Asia grew 11.9%. We were pleased to see Americas bounce back after a slower second quarter of this year. We finished the quarter with momentum, and we feel positive about a strong finish of the year. Our reported segment profit in the Americas and Asia region increased 20.2% to $68.7 million, and segment profit as a percentage of sales increased from 22.5% to 23.7% in the third quarter. If you exclude the impact of amortization in both the current quarter and last year's Q3 as well as the facility closure and other reorganization activities from last year Segment profit increased 16.4% and segment profit as a percentage of sales increased from 24.3% to 24.7%. And Sales growth in our engineered products along with cost reduction activities from last year are driving our improvement in both profit and profitability. Slide 14 details the financial results of our Europe and Australia region. We returned to growth in Europe and Australia with strong sales results in this quarter. in light of the weak manufacturing environment in Europe in particular, it makes our sales results even more impressive. I'm happy with the team's ability to navigate the weak macro conditions as well as the conflict in Middle East and still grow sales 4.5% organically in the quarter. Foreign currency increased sales 8.1% for total sales growth of 12.6% and to $145.2 million in Q3. We grew in all of our major product lines in Europe and Australia this quarter. Data centers are a key end market in Europe and Australia as well Wire ID represents 13% of our sales in Europe and Australia, and this product line grew 13% in the quarter. We're monitoring the conflict in the Middle East and modifying our own approach to procurement in targeted areas where it makes sense. We also evaluate the buying pattern of our customers and channel partners, and we don't believe there were meaningful changes in the quarter that could indicate sales may have been brought forward due to customers' concerns about supply chain or energy constraints. Segment profit significantly improved again this quarter. Our reported segment profit in Europe and Australia increased 22.8% in the quarter to $21.5 million. and segment profit as a percentage of sales increased from 13.6% to 14.8%. If you exclude the impact of amortization in both the current quarter and last year's Q3 as well as the facility closure and other reorganization activities from last year, segment profit increased 15.5% compared to last year. We took several actions last year to reduce our cost structure in Europe and Australia, and now we're seeing the benefits in our results this year. We finished the quarter with momentum in Europe and Australia, and we feel positive about finishing the year on a high note. Turning to the future. We're excited about the growth potential from our announced acquisition of Honeywell's Productivity Solutions and Services business. Radius' strong foundation in identification and safety and PSS adds a critical third pillar enterprise-level workforce productivity to the value we bring our customers today. Today, Brady and PSS represent a meaningful shift in the AIDC competitive landscape, a broader portfolio, a more complete solution set for enterprise customers and the scale to invest behind the differentiated road map. Just as important as the products are the people and partnerships PSS has built. The global reseller network and the dedicated enterprise accounts that have built deep, long-standing customer relationships are central to what makes this combination compelling, and our intent is to preserve those relationships and build on them. Customers and channel partners should expect continuity in the teams they work with today, a sustained investment in R&D and in software offerings including operational intelligence, voice and Swift decoder that are increasingly embedded in customer workflows and continued commitment to the resilient vertically integrated supply chain that has long differentiated PSS in the market. We see the combination of Brady's resources and PSS' customer-facing strengths as a clear opportunity to accelerate investment in these areas once the transaction closes. I'd also like to provide some additional background on the recent financial performance of the PSS business as well as our expectations for the first year post close. The PSS business was operated as a portion of a larger segment within Honeywell Several years ago, PSS was part of the Safety and Productivity Solutions segment, which was abbreviated SPS. In 2024, the PSS business was moved into Honeywell's New Industrial Automation segment were continued to be operated as a portion of a larger business unit. So to provide clarity around recent sales results specific to PSS PSS sales declined slightly by just under 2% in the calendar year 2025 compared to calendar year 2024. And in the first quarter of calendar year 2026 PSS sales grew nearly 5%. Last month, we announced that we expect the PSS business to be immediately accretive. We expect the business will add approximately $0.80 of adjusted EPS accretion in the first year. The business is highly complementary to Brady, and we expect it will deliver significant long-term value to our shareholders. With that, I'd like to turn it over for Q&A. Operator, would you please provide instructions to our listeners?

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Steve Ferazani with Sidoti.

Obviously, very positively surprised about the organic growth this quarter. I mean I'm looking back at the numbers, you were under 5% organic growth or it looks like almost 10 straight quarters, under 3% for 5. This quarter, over 8% I know you talked about printers, but that was only 8%. So the strength here was broader than just the new product development. Can you give us a little bit better sense of what got you here. And also given that you raised guidance, it had to have slightly surprised you as well?

Yes. So I think a couple of things went on. Q2 was definitely a little weaker than we had anticipated. And there were some timing issues of some small contracts. The net result was that a little bit of our growth, not to diminish it, but a little of our growth fill in, I'm going to say maybe 1% or 2% was fill in from what we thought was a slightly weaker Q2 than we expected. Now with that said, clearly, Q3 came in very strong. Data centers, if you do the math, it's 20% of our business and it grew at almost 20%. And so if you do the math, that was a 4% uplift in the Americas and Asia and then less in Europe. So if you take those into account and you take the -- what we felt was just generally strong environment for Brady's products, you get to the organic results that we posted, which again, we're hoping to continue through the rest of the fiscal year.

How much of a difference maker is the I-4311? Is that a share taker?

It's not only -- I wouldn't even say it's a share taker. It's literally new to the world. There is no equivalent product to a portable 4-inch printer. We're up 50% over what we normally expect for a printer launch, which is both surprising and we think, quite frankly, awesome because we're very good traditionally at predicting printer placements because we've been doing this for a very long time. . Again, I want to remind everybody that no one product in Brady is super significant, but they also create. And I think the this new printer also creates a little bit of a halo where it's pulling along other products as well because it is truly unique out in the industry of being able to go to a location without having to go back to a printer station and still be able to print a 4-inch which is comparatively large format thermal transfer product. So we're excited about the product. We're excited about what's happened so far. Is that meaningful to our growth? Not really. But will it be, we think so.

Got it. Very helpful. Russell, I think you make sure I heard you right. You said, the -- in year 1, the acquisition would add $0.80 to adjusted EPS. I think you were more. I think you had said double digits before.

Correct. Correct. As time goes on, of course, we're going to hone into exact answers. And we're still in the integration phase and understanding the complete cost structures and the add backs and what have you [indiscernible] So directionally, we feel comfortable with $0.80, that going to move up a little or move down a little bit as we get closer to close, certainly. And then we'll continue to unpack more detailed numbers as we get to the next quarter. .

Is the expectation that there's some synergy realization with that? Or is that without synergies?

The first quarter -- or excuse me, the first year is no synergies.

Wow. Okay. And timing on the deal? Any change?

August 1 is our best estimate pending regulatory filings and some other things. But if we miss the August 1 date, it will likely be due to external factors, not Honeywell or breed. .

Our next question comes from Keith Housum with Northcoast Research.

One I want to echo, congratulations on a great quarter. Great to see. Russell, in terms of the data center business, obviously, a [indiscernible] business, 3% to 4% overall. Do you guys have any increased visibility there? Obviously, we all see the same headline and data centers are expected to grow some incredible amounts over the next several years, even more than what we've seen. Any visibility that you guys have that you guys will be partaking in that as well? Spend several quarters now that we've seen this as a growth driver for you guys.

Yes. So far, the data centers are keeping pace. We neither see an acceleration from the current trend or a deceleration on the backlog in data centers from our perspective, the physical building of data centers seems to be at a virtual capacity limit. So while there's announced data centers, and there's a huge 1 just up the road from the Brady plant. In the end, there is some limit to how fast the infrastructure can be put in place, which frankly, we see as a good thing because that ensures that we'll see a tailwind for this product category for several years as opposed to, I'll say, a data center sugar high, which I'm hoping turns out not to be true.

And when in the process of the data center being built, are you guys -- your product being used? Is it toward the completion of the data center? Is it earlier? Or maybe any context you can provide there?

Yes. So I'm going to say it's kind of all along the way, depending on how the data center itself is put together. So in some cases, there's a lot of pre-wiring that happens before the data center is actually fully built. In that case, we would be a little bit earlier. And then sometimes it's on-premises. But even from the -- taking from the very beginning, once they break ground, they are Brady products showing up in safety and facility all the way through to full commissioning. So the biggest part tends to be when they install the racks themselves, and they're doing that wiring between them, and that's where we would see the single biggest slug of work. But from Brady's perspective, we like it all along the way because until the plant is fully operational we're seeing revenue from groundbreaking all the way through. And then at some point, we believe in the 3-year to potentially 4-year time frame, they'll do block upgrades of the data centers to get them to the next generation, and that we'll see a recurring revenue when that happens as well. So Fundamentally, we just see this as an awesome opportunity for the company and being able to identify products within data centers.

And last question on data centers for me. And who is the buyer of this? Is it the builder of the data center themselves? Is it the server company who's the buyer?

So I would say depending on the region of location, a whole host of people have their fingers in it. So sometimes it's actually the cable manufacturers themselves. Sometimes it is the data center integrator. Sometimes it is the on-prem data center I'm going to say, Hooker Upper, which is not really a scientific term. So I'm going to say there is -- it depends. And we've seen just so many permutations. As you can imagine, this this whole field has exploded so quickly. There isn't necessarily a single optimal way of doing anything. And so a lot of people have sprung up at different points in the value chain, and we're selling to a variety of different people depending on who it is, whether it's AWS or somebody else on data center. They all tend to do this a little bit differently. .

Okay. I appreciate that. Gross margins, benefiting obviously from data centers, but it sounds like also with the printer growth there, you're going to be benefiting from consumables great number this quarter, the 51.8%. As we kind of think about going forward, how are you thinking about gross margins? Is 50 no longer the floor? Or are we thinking maybe 51, 52 is possible here as we look forward?

Yes. So we -- just to remind everyone, we never target gross margin. We target area under the curve because in some of our product categories, we could clearly push up pricing and we could get even much higher gross margin than we stand right now. But we know that would come at the point of demand destruction. [indiscernible] a lot of our products are used as a labor savings or is a way to do something different or more professional than say, picking up a sharp beat. So we're always very careful to look at the market and look at market update. Our goal is long-term growth and product placement as opposed to, say, pushing margins to 52% or 53%. I think given our mix today and the tariff regime as it exists today, 2% is a good place for us. You don't know where tariffs are going and mix could go slightly 1 way or another. But I do think it's important to realize our #1 goal is long-term profitable growth, not hitting some particular profit margin -- excuse me, gross margin.

I appreciate that. In terms of the $0.80 number that you gave for the Honeywell PSS acquisition, the first full year, what is included in that context? I mean, I've been an opinion that they've under-invested R&D and sales and marketing over the years. you're obviously close to the numbers than I am. Perhaps, can you any thoughts on what that includes in terms of any additional investment above what they were doing? .

So I'll give a little bit, and then I'll turn it over to Ann to give you a better unpacking of the number. So they have actually in the last couple of years, rebuilt much of their R&D infrastructure. I would say the '22-'23 marked a low point of R&D investment for the PSS business. But fortunately, even they realized that they needed to add back R&D, most of which has happened, I think at the margins, we know there are some things that we can do. But at this point, it's not a significant build back. Will we add another $5 million potentially $10 million in R&D. I think that is possible. Will we add some to the sales force? Absolutely. And some of their customer-facing supply chain, Absolutely. But is it I would say it's really significant in the scheme of things, no. So the business is -- I think there are things we can do kind of nip and tuck. But as I told everybody, it's a fantastic business with a fantastic portfolio, and I think it's got a great home in Brady, but I'll let Anne talk about some of the details.

That's perfect. So Keith, in addition to those items that Russell mentioned that, yes, this does include some bit of potential additional investment in R&D and in the sales force. What our estimate that we provided of $0.80 of adjusted EPS would exclude would be any truly onetime integration costs related to truly integrating the business, standing it up and all of that. And then that would also include our expectations for interest expense, which we provided a little bit of clarity around what -- how we're expecting that to shape up. and we'll provide full clarity. We'll disclose that post close, we'll provide the visibility into those puts and takes.

Okay. Appreciate it. And I guess last question for me guys. And I don't usually ask questions on Board resonation but I don't think much about -- we're timing here, obviously, the stock being down last week. You had 2 Board members resigned a little bit over a week ago, you announced on the right afternoon. Stock was down 10%. Obviously, you made the Honeywell acquisition announcement about less than a month ago. Maybe any clarity you can give there in terms of the board thought process on this? And any relationship? And maybe you're limited what you can speak, but I've got to ask that question.

Of course, Keith. And frankly, I would have answered it even if you hadn't. So let's turn back the clock a little bit about Brady and my appreciation for the Board we have and what they've had to go through for the last several months. So if you were to take Brady pre Christmas time, we were, I would say, a very, very stable not this earnings grower and cash flow generator that required of course, require input from our Board, but let's be frank. It was a very stable business, and our Board was perfectly capable of meeting once a quarter and giving us our steering and guidance and working with management. over the last -- really the last, I would say, 4, 5 months, I feel like I owe our Board over time, pay because we've gone from once a quarter pretty regular cadence meetings to at 1 point as we are working through the acquisition and working through all of the details, we were meeting on a weekly basis. And sometimes on the weekend, this was a significant and frankly unexpected from most of our Board members level of commitment that was never anticipated as we constituted our Board. I mean, if you can imagine going from once a quarter to now you have to call in every single week, sometimes for hours, and be directly engaged in a whole host of workflows. And the same amount of work is actually going to continue because, again, our Board is very involved, very professional can't say enough about their participation in the amount of time they've had to spend. But this is going to go through at least our fiscal year and likely through the rest of the calendar year, a very significant involvement. And so some of our Board members simply said, I cannot commit to that level of engagement. I can't I have a regular calendar. I have other board commitments. I can't be on the call weekly continuously for all of these different work streams. And I can understand it. I recognize the optics are awful. And I can say anything in the world and people can decide how much they believe or how much they don't. But the fact of the matter is the Board members who were there for the Honeywell acquisition, although did affirmatively, there was no decent. There was actually no question that the deal was an awesome deal for Brady, but the level of time commitment was and will be staggering. And again, I'm going to give tremendous credit to the Board members that we do have for sticking through all this and being available for significant amounts of time to make this deal happen. Thanks for asking the question.

That concludes today's question-and-answer session. I'd like to turn the call back to Russell Shaller for closing remarks.

That's great. Thank you all for your time this morning. We reported an excellent quarter. I'm proud of our entire team globally with our ability to deliver 8.2% organic sales growth in this disruptive geopolitical environment is impressive. We're growing in all of our major geographies. Our investment in R&D is paying off. Our new products are performing well, and we finished the quarter with momentum. We're in a great spot to finish the year on a high note. Thank you for your time this morning. Operator, you may disconnect the call. .

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.