Littelfuse, Inc. (LFUS) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Okay. Thank you, [ Efrain ]. Welcome to our Littelfuse presentation session today at Oppenheimer's 2024 Industrial Conference. Happy to have CFO, Meenal Sethna, here, again, returning. So Meenal, thanks for being a mainstay at the conference. And Meenal is going to start us out with a few slides, and then we'll move into the fireside format with Q&A. I do have a screen where people can submit questions. I think that works best in these formats. So let's go with that. Also, there should be time, I'll pause here and there, see if someone wants to jump in straight up with a question and skip the virtual middle man there. So Meenal, all yours. Thank you.

Great. Thank you, Chris. Good morning. First of all, Chris, thank you very much for having us back again as part of that mainstay as you call it, and always happy to be back joining the Oppenheimer Group. And then also to audience members. Thank you also for joining us today and appreciate your interest in Littelfuse. I thought what I would do is start with just a few summary slides. I think for those who may be a little newer to our story, and then happy to take questions from there. So this first slide, this is what we affectionately call strategy on a page for us. Our typical process is we go through a process about every 4 or 5 years to do a deep dive into our strategy, make some tweaks around the edges and then continue with what we're doing. In the past, I'd say, 15 years or so, our strategy has largely remained the same, which is when you look at the structural growth themes, are really the foundation that we consider as we think about what's going to help drive and create content and share gain opportunities for us. In this case, we've been talking about these areas of sustainability, connectivity and safety. I can share some different examples but whether you're talking about electric vehicles, renewable energy. You talk about, I think, about connectivity, connecting your office to your home, to your automobile, and all the streaming is an example that goes on. You now talk AI and data centers. And then safety has really been a foundation for us as a company. We work with customers where electrical energy tends to be a pretty key component and so safety, especially as you get into higher and higher voltages becomes a concern. When you think about our growth drivers, I talked about the fact that there's numerous content opportunities for us in an increasing electrified and electronified world. As we continue to grow share gain opportunities, especially as we make acquisitions, which I'll come back to, we tend to focus on higher growth end markets and geographies gives us an opportunity to really think about outsized content and share gain opportunities. And for us, we are a combination of both an organic grower. I'll come back to all those metrics as well as focus on how do I add to the portfolio to drive additional future organic growth through strategic acquisitions that align with what we're doing and continue to build on that. Our summary financials really focus on over the long term, double-digit revenue growth, profitability that grows stronger than our revenue growth and top-tier shareholder returns. And on the next slide, let me talk briefly about our financial goals. I talked a little bit about revenue and mentioned that we both grow organically. Our expectation is an average of 5% to 7% through market cycles that I'm sure that's going to be a series of questions that we're going to cover today as well as an average of 5% to 7% annually from acquisitions. And I'm happy to talk about a number of acquisitions we've done, they are deploying about $1.4 billion in capital over the past 3, 4 years. We talked about earnings growing in excess of revenue, strong operating margins in the upper teens, EBITDA margins in the low 20s. And I'd say, moving on to cash flow. Cash flow is really a hallmark for us as a company. We target 100% free cash flow conversion, and we've been highly successful in driving that as well. I think that consider ourselves a CapEx-light kind of business. Strong ROIC goals really focused on getting into the high teens, on occasion, acquisitions come in, drop us down into the mid-teens, maybe we're going through a cycle at that time, but our general goal is high teens there. And really, the bulk of our capital allocation focuses on acquisitions. As I mentioned, strategic acquisitions that add to the long-term growth opportunities for us. But then we also return cash flow to shareholders through our annual dividend, which has been around close to 15 years now as well as through some periodic share buyback. And then the last thing I just wanted to share is when you take a look at the next slide, the 15-year view, as we think about how has your framework been successful, on the next slide and you take a look at yet what have been our revenue growth, what does that look like? What has been our earnings growth? I'm not sure if the rest of you can see it. I can't see the slide, but I know it from memory. But really, when you think about a 10% revenue growth over 15 years, as well as an earnings growth of 18%. And even though we go through market cycles, we go through inventory destocking cycles with some of the businesses we're in, we tend to take a look at our growth, our profitability, our cash generation through these cycles, and we've been quite successful and are really pleased with our strategy but know that this is something we want to take forward and continue this trajectory. And so with that, I think I'll take a pause and answer questions that Chris and the audience may have.

Thanks, Meenal. So yes, I think you pretty much covered my first table set of questions. So let me point to number two, which is much more specific and less general. Has to do with the transportation margins, which turned the corner in the first quarter, and the level indicated a pretty concerted directional pivot towards your goal of double-digit or low teens margin levels. Perhaps some further choppiness will mix in or perhaps you have a new line in the sand there, but the improved profitability quarter was fairly abrupt. So curious if any lever kind of overdrove there or just dive it in a little deeper.

Sure. Yes. So first of all, Chris is referring to our Transportation segment about 25% to 30% of our business, a combination of both passenger vehicle and commercial vehicle applications that we're selling into. We are very pleased with the progress that we're making now on our margin profile for transportation. It had been a bit challenging with a number of, I'd say, volume dynamics, especially on the Automotive side, the passenger vehicle side, and then just the levels of inflation -- cost inflation, et cetera, that have been going on. Most recently, we've really gone after 4 or 5 different levers really to drive profitability and our expectation is a continued trajectory forward back into the double digits into our mid-teens operating margin target. One is a focus around pricing. We've been in a lot of discussions in the past 3, 4 years around pricing given the inflation levels. In the case of our transportation segment and the customers, we have a lot of longer-term contracts that have been going on. And so rather than our philosophy was not to break the contracts, but as contracts are coming up, we negotiate, I'd say we sort of amped that up in the past couple of quarters and really talked about either we get pricing to levels where the profitability makes sense or we're going to look at exiting product wise. And that's the pruning that many of you may have seen that I talked about in the past couple of earnings calls. The good news is our pricing has proven to be sticky. So that's been a good area for us, a good positive momentum from a margin perspective. Cost reductions that really goes through really sizing our -- not only our internal operations but also, I'll call it, the rooftops as well, both with -- from a manufacturing perspective, supply chain as well as administrative offices. So that's been another big area as well. And then really the third has been volume starting to come back. We went through some periods of destocking and some lower car build production numbers that were on there. That's starting to come back and pick up. And so between that and mix, you may see the occasional movement around in margins, but we've got some good momentum now. We're pretty pleased with and expect to continue.

Okay. Great. And then the passenger vehicle market seem very stable overall, the kind of quarterly and annual build rates have been within a very narrow range, I believe. So kind of curious if you could discuss the mix shift across drive trains? I think hybrids get lost in the middle, so to speak, sometimes, but maybe they're gaining some structural momentum within overall electrification, given consumer preferences not keeping pace with the policy aspirations for EV.

Yes. So we've been -- if I step back here, we've been in the passenger vehicle side of the business now for several decades. So the good news is we've got a lot of long-lived customer relationships on a global basis. So that's been a real positive for us. I'd say, secondly, when we think about where we play, we tend to play in the electrical infrastructure vehicles, that's really where we've started, and that does really well when we think about movement from low voltage to high voltage, as well. And then over time, we've also grown our content in other areas around small and medium-sized motor protection, infotainment applications, ADAS, different things. For us, the good news is we are, in many respects, powertrain agnostic in that whether it's low voltage vehicles or hybrid EVs, you still have a low-voltage content that's necessary there. And with the partnerships that we've built up over a long time, that content growth is there for us, and it continues. We recognize that there may be mixes. And Chris, you alluded to maybe consumers are shying a little away from EVs, let's do provide us some greater content and maybe there's more -- a little bit more hybrid, plug-in hybrid, but we still had a content uplift when we think about those applications as well. So I think that's been a second benefit for us, whether it's EV more or a step back. And then the third is, there's been a lot of discussion out there about China. And really, when you think about where EVs are still continuing to grow. And by the way, even in the Western regions, it's not that EVs are not growing. They are continuing to grow. It's just that they're growing at a lesser rate than maybe what we've seen in the past couple of years. China's growth continues to be strong. We continue to have a good set of relationships there. That continues in the low voltage areas. And it also continues when we think about content and feature opportunities where Chinese vehicles have now grown in -- to look more like Western vehicles, and that's been a benefit for us. So overall, we are still seeing the growth opportunities that we want, where the -- I'll call that a little bit of a step back on EVs, while something will navigate through, but it doesn't really change the number of different growth options and growth opportunities that we have in the passenger vehicle side.

Okay. And just kind of wrapping up on the transportation segment. I think it's about half of it is in the commercial vehicle space. I'm curious if you could talk about the mix in geographies, the largest subcategories and general market conditions, including if you see channel adjustments and destocking is really in the final stages presently?

Yes. So our commercial vehicle business, a number of different end markets, I'd say, heavier in the heavy-duty truck and bus, but still a number of applications, number of customers in the construction, agriculture, material handling areas as well. So a pretty broad-based set of customers and set of end markets that we have. I know -- Chris, I'll throw in maybe an answer to one of your other questions in there. We basically -- we more than doubled the size of our commercial vehicle business in the past few years with an acquisition that we've made called Carling Technologies. And so some nice complementary customers, complementary end markets that came with Carling. And I'd say you take the Littelfuse brand, you take the Carling brand, 2 very well-known brands across a -- oftentimes fragmented commercial vehicle businesses, and we are very well known on the space. Our end market exposure, I talked about, the types of end markets where our geographic exposure varies as well. I'd say heavier North America, very good presence in Europe. And I'd say growing presence in Asia. Again, we added on the map with the Carling acquisition as well. And in a lot of cases, we're selling switches something that both companies are well known for areas like power distribution modules and in a number of other areas as well. And I'd say most recently, your question around the destocking. We saw that a bit with some OEMs, which seems to be past us now, but still continuing a bit with distributors where they were carrying a little bit more inventory that was -- everybody was concerned about their ability to get parts and components when they needed it. So there was a little bit of excess inventory that's out there that we're working through and hope to see that diminish in the next few quarters.

Okay. Great. And then switching over to Electronics. It was kind of a nice message on the last quarter with the extended channel correction and end market resets appearing in the final stages there. So I wanted to dive into the broad operating and strategic positioning priorities behind the scenes, interesting challenges and successes, not visible in the P&L as Littelfuse positions for the eventual next up cycle. And I think you did some acquisitions during the boom times and typically, you do a nice job positioning them in advance of the next up cycle. So it gets to kind of escape velocity potential a little bit, I think. But yes, kind of an open-ended question on Electronics.

Sure. Yes. So the Electronics segment for us is, in some respects, I call it a microcosm of the company. It's the largest segment in the company, but it's diverse in every way you can imagine. It's diverse in technology, ranging from passive components to what we call protection semiconductors that are a little passive like, but then also power semiconductors. And with the breadth of technologies that we have across those categories, we are in a number of different end markets and applications across various electronics applications, across various transportation applications as well as industrial applications and then also very global in nature as well. So it's a great business from that perspective. We've spent, I'd say, the past 3, 4, 5 years or so, really, as we've added a few acquisitions, and I'll come back to that, but really working on how do I work on improving the profitability as we go through market cycles. Because with these technologies and end markets, we invariably are going through periodic cycles. But what do we do to improve the floor? How do we diversify the end markets that we're in, diversify the technologies, diversify the applications that we're participating in. And we think we've been pretty successful with that broad diversity between adding in an acquisition, what we call the IXYS acquisition from 2018, which was really the platform for our power semiconductor business. In 2022, we acquired a company called C&K Switches, love the business because similar to a lot of businesses that we have in the portfolio, we work directly with customers around designing in a lot of product. There's also an element where we're leveraging our distribution partners to continue to grow that business. So those have been some great areas that we've added in as well. And then I'd call it the other work behind the scenes. We did a lot of work around pricing. During the past 3, 4 years, the inflationary environment, we did a lot of work around footprint to really streamline that and really, as I call it, put more production through a smaller footprint, did a lot of work around automation. So I'd say as we think about getting through this current cycle that we've been in now, for us, it's really a return to growth, the readiness for growth, and we know we're there and really getting ourselves ready. We think the groundwork has been laid also not only with what we've been doing internally, but also working with our customers, even though we've been in a bit of a down cycle for a while. There's been a lot of work going on around new design activity. So we know when we do come out of this destocking, which is where we -- a lot of what we're seeing, we expect some really robust growth going forward with all the activity that's in motion.

Great. And you brought up C&K, that's your largest acquisition to date, I believe. And obviously, that came in just ahead of a significant market correction. So hard to evaluate the strategic thesis at present for us. But -- other than your track record, but how would you describe the long-term returns profile and the strategic fit there if we could just kind of double-click on C&K?

Sure. Yes. So if I step back on C&K, I think I mentioned a couple of comments in there, really well-known brand in the Switches area when we did a lot of work during diligence and some of that includes confidential surveys around brands and industries, and C&K was one of those. So we're really pleased as part of -- with C&K in the portfolio. We think there are a number of opportunities for us around growth. We've talked about the fact that around diversifying end markets and applications, there's areas that C&K plays in, of course, in areas like medical, as an example, a little bit around aerospace and defense. So that's an area. So we think there's maybe some opportunities of growth there. We have a great presence with our distribution partners. So we think a growth -- a good set of growth opportunities as we start that growth trajectory again. We think there's some good opportunities there. And when we talk about profitability and returns not necessarily specific to C&K, but overall, when we think about acquisitions, we're looking for acquisitions that align to our strategy, acquisitions that have great teams, that have great brand names and brand recognition in the market that we can put in under a Littelfuse umbrella, but still carry that -- those names forward with us. We -- the profitability levels will vary depending on the type of business, but we're looking at profitability levels that align to where we are today as a company. And as we think about returns, we're looking at eventually as we think about 5 years out, looking at something in that double-digit area, definitely above our cost of capital. But of course, we're going to work on synergies and growth opportunities well in advance of 5 years out. And that's what we're doing with C&K today as well as a number of other acquisitions that we've made.

Okay. Great. I'll pause there for a second to see if anyone's got a question in the queue. Otherwise, I can continue. Pause, three, two, one. Similarly, for Carling, please, Meenal, do you view Carling as kind of the anchor brand here for the CB portfolio? Yes, how do you view the overall CB facing business and Carling in particular, in that context to get, that was one of your -- maybe your second or third or fourth largest deal ever?

Yes. So similar to a couple of comments that I made in the past few minutes, I'd put Carling in that same category of the kind of acquisition that we look for, right? How does it fit with our strategy? We think there's a lot of great growth opportunities in that broad commercial vehicle space. I won't go through that again when Chris asked an earlier question, but there's a nice breadth of different end markets that we think we can be quite successful in. We looked at Carling, again, as another great brand name in the industry. And again, when we did some surveys as we were going through diligence. I mean Carling rose to the top in terms of brand recognition, loyal customers and really a loyal following around Carling. So we're really happy that the Carling business is part of our portfolio, and we think the brand recognition across Littelfuse coupled with Carling really, for us, presents a lot of growth opportunities, a broader portfolio for us as well as a nice mix of different customers, a nice mix of different distribution partners and an increasingly global footprint for our commercial vehicle business. So we've been very, very happy with having currently join our broader Littelfuse portfolio, again, have similar profitability and return metrics that we've talked about, where when we talk about double-digit mid-teens targets for -- a mid-teen margin profile target for our transportation segment that we put Carling in that category as well. And then same sort of return metrics around double-digit returns over our cost of capital by years.

Okay. Great. And I just want to move back to Electronics. With the idea that the channel destocking is done here, like most companies you're saying, a little lower visibility into OEM inventories. But maybe what signals do you look for or maybe you're starting to see some that speak most clearly to you guys about when this headwind clears up both for traditional protection and for the power semi piece?

Sure. Yes. So the practicality for us is we know we're in cyclical businesses, but because of that, we spend a lot of time making sure we understand what drives the cyclicality, what are the markers that we look for going into a cycle and coming out of the cycle as well as how to manage our business through cycles. With that, we talked about in the past couple of quarters and especially just last week on our first quarter earnings call, the fact that we see an inflection point coming, right? We see -- we feel like we're in the trough. We see the inflection point. The combination of the inventory destocking. We get a lot of information, a lot of data from our distribution partners. So we know that our estimate is there about 85% of the way through from a destocking perspective. So that's a really good sign. We're starting to see book-to-bills on our passive component side of the business, which went into the destocking first. Book-to-bills are now coming in over one. That's also a good sign as well. It feels like, from just the context that we're getting that OEMs and EMS' are also working through their inventory levels and they're making good progress there. So I'd say that's a third. And then in certain areas, we typically find because we are selling into areas like consumer and personal electronics. Taiwan seems to be known for that a bit. And so when we start to see a little recovery coming there, they seem to be the first to recover, and we're starting to see that as well. So I'd say that's -- those are really the signs that we're looking for, and I think they're all trending in the right direction. And then I'll just add on the overlay of the design activity continues. It's pretty robust in a broad set of end markets. And I think that gives us the comfort of the conviction that, boy, when -- as a destocking completes and the end markets start to recover, we expect a really strong growth trajectory coming back.

Okay. And I think characteristically, when up cycle gains real momentum, you guys have historically positioned your capacity and fulfillment capabilities for share pickup and it feels like we've seen that repeatedly. I don't want to take it for granted. And I assume you have to be proactive to maintain that. But any reason that would remain a fundamental characteristic of the Littelfuse execution model in an up cycle?

Yes. No, great question and great point, Chris. Absolutely for us. We look at capacity and readiness as we know how to manage through a down cycle, but it's just as important that you've got to manage to the up cycle. So a couple of things we always talk about. For us, we always make sure we have a little bit of additional capacity going into up cycles for us, the cost of that capacity isn't that significant, but making sure you're ready for that gives us an opportunity to grow rapidly and also take share. Sometimes a little bit of that share is [ permanent ], sometimes it's interim, but regardless, we want to be ready for that. That includes making sure our manufacturing supply chain has that readiness as well. Working with our customers as well as our distribution partners to make sure that they're -- in the case of distributors, making sure they're well stocked, making sure the design activity and product releases are going well with end customers. So absolutely, we're focused on that readiness, and we're ready to go.

Okay. And I'll do another quick pause to the audience and then I've got a final question. But is there anyone in the audience, speak right up if you've got a question for Meenal, please. I'll do another little count down, three, two, one. Okay. Meenal, a little more of a niche question, but I believe you guys have some exposure to telecom and general communications and data infrastructure that really hits all 3 segments. So curious if you could discuss your overall positioning in these markets. And given I think capital spending in those has been one of the more acute cycles in the past year. But it's maybe not showing signs of turning at the current stage like for some of the Electronics metrics. But curious if you could kind of size and explain your exposure across the segments to that and if my end market characterizations are about accurate.

Yes. So we're really pleased that we've got -- with the breadth of the end markets we have, as you mentioned, datacom, telecom, is definitely a portion of that. It's not -- like many of the end markets that we're in, it's not an outsized portion of any one particular end market or -- and it tends to be pretty broad. As you mentioned, we're selling from our Electronics segment into that space. And actually, with our Carling acquisition, there were some products that we acquired that we're also selling into that space as well as on the Industrial side. So for us, it is a growth opportunity. It's one of the many growth opportunities we have. In some areas, we see some activity picking up. In other cases, as you mentioned, maybe a little moderated, and we're going to start seeing that pick up hopefully soon. But yes, it's -- again, our focus is diversification of portfolio in a lot of different ways, technologies, end markets applications. We're pleased that this is one of them, and it's a focus area for us.

Okay. And that includes infrastructure, not just components, right?

Absolutely. Absolutely.

Right. Okay. Great. Well, thanks for answering all my questions. And good luck with the one-on-ones today.

Thank you. Thanks for your time today. Chris, Oppenheimer and the audience as well. Look forward to seeing everybody soon.

See you soon.