Techtronic Industries Company Limited (669) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Techtronic Industries 2020 Annual Results Announcement, Analyst and Investor Webcast. In this annual results webcast, TTI will share the updated performance for the financial year that ended December 31, 2020. Before we begin, let me introduce to you the key management of TTI with us today. They are Mr. Horst Pudwill, Group Chairman; Mr. Joe Galli, Group CEO; and Mr. Frank Chan, Group CFO. Mr. Horst Pudwill will first give us an opening remark, then Mr. Frank Chan will walk us through the full year 2020 financial results, followed by the business overview and strategy by Mr. Joe Galli. Without further ado, let me pass the time to our Chairman for the opening remarks. Mr. Pudwill, please?

I would like to thank you for attending TTI's 2020 Annual Result Announcement. Given the continuous public health concern and requirement for social distancing, we are presenting our annual results announcement via webcast. I'm pleased to announce that 2020 was another outstanding year with record revenue and profit. We delivered exceptional sales growth of 42.3% for the second half and 28% for the full year of 2020. TTI continued to strengthen its global leadership position with robust sales growth in every business unit and all geographic regions. Operations continued to run safely, delivering product to our businesses around the globe during this challenging time. We are well positioned to continue outperforming the market with a strong balance sheet and disciplined working capital management. I'm excited about 2021 and the many growth opportunities we have identified for the months and years ahead. Frank Chan, our group CFO, will now provide you with the 2020 financial overview; and Joe Galli, our Group CEO, will cover the business overview and strategy. I will now hand you over to Frank Chan and Joe Galli for the presentation. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As Chairman stated, TTI delivered outstanding results for the year 2020 with organic revenue growth of 28% to USD 9.8 billion, an increase of USD 2.1 billion over 2019. As Chairman also highlighted, our second half revenue grew an exceptional 42.3%, dramatically outpacing the market. Our revenue growth is mainly driven by our increased strategic investments in new products, manufacturing capacity, geographic expansion and in-field marketing initiatives. Gross profit increased by 29.7% to USD 3.8 billion. The gross profit margin increased for the 12th consecutive year by 52 basis points to 38.3%. This gross margin improvement was a direct result of the launching of high-margin new products, disciplined mix management, productivity gains, volume leverage and our focus on operational excellence, generating high level of cost efficiencies throughout our operations. One of our primary financial objectives set is our EBIT and net profit increase must outperform sales growth. This objective once again is achieved in 2020 with EBIT increased by 29% with a 10 basis points margin improvement and net profit increased by 30.2% to USD 801 million, a 20 basis point margin increase. Earnings per share increased by 30.1% to USD 43.8 per share. The Board recommended a final dividend of HKD 0.82 per share, representing an increase of 41.4% over last year. Together with the HKD 0.53 per share interim dividend paid, subject to shareholders' approval to the final dividend, total dividend for the year will be HKD 1.35, an increase of 31.1% and a payout ratio of 39.8%, a ninth consecutive year increase. As mentioned, it is our financial goal that EBIT and net profit increase must outperform sales growth. We again have been able to deliver this in 2020 with a 12-year CAGR of sales growth of 11%, while EBIT increased by 19% and net profit 26%. Power Equipment division account for 89% of the group's total revenue, delivered a growth of 28.5% to USD 8.7 billion. MILWAUKEE Professional, RYOBI DIY and RYOBI Outdoor business all delivered impressive double-digit growth, with our flagship MILWAUKEE continues to deliver over 20% growth for the seventh consecutive year, a growth of 25.8% in 2020. Operating profits of this division grew 27.3% to USD 844 million, as we aggressively invest in new products, technology, end-user conversion and strong commercial execution. Floor Care division representing 11% of the group's turnover delivered an outstanding growth of 23.6% to USD 1.1 billion with operating margins increased by 110 basis points to 2.3%. These results reflect our successful transition from legacy products to our key strategic partners in carpet cleaning category. We are confident that this division is now well positioned to continue with the growth momentum and performance to be further improved. From a geographic perspective, all regions delivered double-digit growth as we continue to strengthen our global leadership position. North America account for 78% of the group's revenue grew by 29.5%, while EMEA delivered a 19.1% increase and rest of the world, an impressive 30.6% growth. We have continued with our proven, very successful strategy and further invested in strategic SG&A for revenue growth and margin expansion. Total SG&A as a percentage to sales was at 29.5%, a 40 basis points increase versus last year, as we accelerated our investments in technology, new products, strategic selling and marketing expenses, while leveraging our volume and delivered a 24 basis point savings on nonstrategic administrative expenses. R&D spend account for 3.2% of revenue as compared to 3% last year. Net finance costs were lower than last year by 38.6% despite the sales growth of 28% as we've been able to leverage our very strong cash flow, healthy balance sheet together with diligent financial and cash management. We believe we can continue to deliver very effective and efficient finance costs going forward. Effective tax rate remained comparable to that of last year at 7%. We will continue to study the latest global tax developments and make appropriate and timing changes to our tax plans to ensure this low effective tax rate to be sustainable going forward. Our balance sheet remains strong and very healthy with shareholders' equity increased by 15% to USD 3.9 billion. Net current assets increased by 25.1% to close to USD 2.3 billion. As of December 31, 2020, we are in a net cash position as compared to a 0.5% gearing in 2019. With our very disciplined working capital and financial management, together with the strong cash flow generated from operations, we are confident that our gearing, if any, will be at a very low level, if not net cash position by end of 2021. Managing working capital effectively and efficiently has always been our key focus. Working capital as a percentage to sales was at 14% as compared to 14.3% in 2019, remaining best-in-class in the industry. To support our above-market growth level anticipated, we have continued to strategically build up our inventory. Inventory days increased by 19 days, but we've been able to leverage the volume increase and extended our payable days by 13 days to 117 days. We've also been able to improve our receivable days by 7 days. Receivable was at 48 days at the end of 2020. Again, we believe that our working capital will remain very efficient and continue to be below our target level going forward. CapEx for the year was at USD 459 million as we accelerated our investments in the second half of the year by investing in additional capacity expansion, new product developments and new facilities in Vietnam, Mexico and in the United States. We project our 2021 CapEx will be at similar level for the full year. We have been restructuring and optimizing our debt portfolio in 2020 to support our long-term growth. Last year, we increased our long-term debt by 24.6%, now representing 71% of our total debt portfolio. Capturing this very low interest rate environment, we've also secured very cost-effective fixed rates for our long-term debt, while continuing to maintain very flexible and low cost for short-term working capital financing needs. The current structure at 70% long-term and 50% in fixed rates, we believe, is the optimal structure for now, but, of course, we will continue to take a prudent approach and follow closely the financial market. We will continue to review our current portfolio to deliver the best optimal structure with the best cost efficiencies to support our very exciting future growth. Now I would like to pass the presentation to our CEO, Mr. Joe Galli.

2020 was clearly a breakout year for TTI. Here's a quote that sums up the year: fate whispers to the warrior, "you cannot withstand the storm" and the warrior whispers back, "I am the storm," and make no mistake, TTI is the storm. And 2020 was the year where we seized control of the global tool market. In fact, our second half results demonstrate, without question, our leadership position, our momentum and our potential in the massive global tool market that we pursue. We were able to grow last year in the second half 42%, which gave us a cool 28% growth rate for the year. And you have to put this in perspective, our largest competitor was boasting about taking market share last year, while they grew their business, 0.6% or 6/10th of 1%. We grew 28%. So if 6/10th of 1% represents market share gains, imagine what 28% represents. We grew our company last year, $2.1 billion in sales. So in 1 year, we added $2.1 billion in sales. That's all organic growth. No acquisition growth. And I can assure you that this is just the beginning. The momentum level in this company, reflected by these growth levels, is astounding. And we are incredibly excited about 2021 and beyond. Last year as a result of our bold, aggressive investments in market share gains and new product development, we were able to now break through and reach a level that I feel is reflective of our commanding leadership position in the global tool market. So last year, for the first time, the MILWAUKEE brand became the #1 professional tool brand in the world, and it's also the fastest-growing professional tool brand. And the RYOBI brand, which has been for a decade, the largest DIY brand of tools in the world, solidified its leadership position and became even a more dominant #1 in the global DIY tool market. So think about TTI. We now have the largest and fastest-growing professional tool brand in the world and the largest and fastest-growing DIY tool brand in the world. And we're just getting started because the new product we have on the way is going to clearly amplify our leadership position in the 2 segments of tools. Last year, even our Floor Care business delivered exceptional results. In fact, Floor Care was up 23.6%, which clearly demonstrates that we have now reached the point where we've turned this business around. We're excited about our future in Floor Care. We have a long way to go, but up 23.6% is a nice step and a great example of the turnaround success we've achieved in global floor care. When you look at our P&L last year, with that 28% sales growth, we were able to deliver a 52 basis point improvement in gross margin. And we invested a lot of that gross margin back in our future with a 43 bps investment in SG&A. And as we have guided for years, our plan is to always grow EBIT at a faster rate than sales. We did that again last year. So EBIT was up 29%, reflecting the leverage that we generated. And our net profit was up a cool 30%, again reflecting additional leverage on the net line. We continue to relentlessly invest in what we call strategic SG&A, while we are ruthlessly reducing spending in what we consider nonstrategic SG&A. What is strategic? And this is the same chart you've seen and the same chart you'll continue to see. What is strategic is research and development, new product development, product management, end-user conversion, activities in the field, field marketing, internal marketing, sales rep coverage, in-store sales coverage, geographic expansion and, importantly, our leadership development program where we hire literally hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of high potential graduates off campuses all over the world, to feed our growth machine and to enable us to develop future leadership to drive this company in the months and years ahead. Because of those investments in strategic SG&A, what you saw last year is yet another year of outstanding gross margin improvement. We added 52 basis points of improvement to gross margin. We finished up -- we finished at 38.3%. And what you need to take from this gross margin excellence is that we are growing our sales at levels the industry has never seen but not on price. We are growing because we are launching an onslaught, a continuous stream of innovative, demonstrably better, technologically advanced new products that blow away our competitors and allow us to grow our sales, to capture market share, while we improve gross margin. We, in fact, have been growing gross margin, as we consistently say, every year, we will do. We've consistently grown gross margin for the 12th consecutive year. And I can tell you, we plan on growing our gross margin around 50 basis points a year over the next 3 years. And I believe the plans we have in place with the new products we have with our amazing global supply chain system that we built, I believe that those numbers are attainable, and we can do it while we continue to grow our sales well above market levels of growth. There's a lot of misinformation in the investment community about e-commerce situation in the power tool market -- in the overall tool market. Let me just clear this up. We are clearly a global leader in e-commerce in this tool industry. We are very strategic, very thoughtful and very focused on developing the right kind of e-commerce that will not cannibalize existing important customer and distribution channels, but rather enhance. For example, last year, the largest e-commerce tool seller in the world is called Home Depot. And last year, we were awarded the Home Depot Omnichannel Interconnected Partner of the Year award because of our partnership with Home Depot in overall e-commerce, which includes BOPIS, which is buy online and pickup in the store, includes the straight e-commerce, and it includes the activities at the store level that we engage in with where we help drive sales to the e-commerce platform where it makes sense. We have hundreds of e-commerce partners around the world. We are very careful to select and cultivate e-commerce partners that enhance our strategy and support our long-term direction. And you need to be clear as an investment community that we are, yes, leaders in e-commerce when it comes to selling tools around the planet. Our working capital performance last year is a clear demonstration and a bold example of how our strategy is so much different than many of our competitors, including the leading competitor. Our inventory, for example, we finished up last year at 120 days, well up over 2019. Historically, conventional wisdom said that the well-managed company would finish the year with the lowest possible number of days in inventory. And that we think that's foolhardy in the environment we're in today. Our goal with our inventory is to support our customers' amazing sales growth and to have inventory in place when our customers and the end users need it. And if you think about it, year-end December is the worst time to cut inventory because you should be building inventory to support the spring rollout of outdoor products and power tool products. And so our largest competitor actually has finished the year with far less inventory than TTI. And if you talk to our customers, they will tell you that our service level, our ability to serve the customer on time with the best service levels in the world, is vastly superior to our competitors. And so we intend to continue to invest in inventory where it makes sense, to continue to capture market share and support our customers and our end users. Now our receivables management is world-class. We don't sell customers accounts. Retailers or distributors that can't pay their bills are going to have credit risk. That's why we continue to grind down these receivables days. And we do think we're in a world-class position of excellence when it comes to managing our receivables. At the same time, our suppliers and suppliers around the world are racing to support TTI, why because we're the fastest-growing tool company in the world by far, and suppliers are looking at our future and saying, wow, we want to team up with you. So suppliers have actually helped -- funded our ability to build inventory. And our DPO hit a new all-time high, and it does reflect the fact that we are a coveted partner for our supply base, which really helps us get through the massive growth plans that we intend to continue to deploy. So we -- TTI is also highly committed to ESG. We will announce a thorough update in our annual report in terms of the TTI ESG performance. Our obsession throughout the company is that we will be global leaders just like we are in every other facet of our business. We will be global leaders when it comes to ESG. We think it's the right thing to do. And it starts with our obsession with cordless. And you have to think about this. In our industry, we still have competitors that are perpetuating gas or petrol-powered sales and TTI's -- our mission is to eradicate the world from gas and petrol-powered products and to move people into cordless ESG-friendly solutions for end users, anywhere we possibly can. And there are literally thousands of examples of this process inside the company. So again, we will have a thorough update in our annual report, and I believe the investment community will be delighted with the progress we've made and with our future plans here to be leaders in ESG. We -- throughout 2020, we were implementing a very different approach to the global tool market than our competitors. We decided rather than shutting down investment through the virus and the challenges of 2020, we got very bold and very aggressive. And we built out a vast amount of additional manufacturing capacity, which really helped our amazing results in 2020. But more importantly, it sets TTI up for a long-term run to continue to control and be leaders in the global tool industry. So in addition to our world-class manufacturing complex in China, which is doing an amazing job today and where we have averted the challenges of virus and kept that factory running beautifully throughout the year and on into 2021, we have built out a fabulous manufacturing campus in Vietnam, where we have achieved already outstanding quality levels and cost levels. And this Vietnam facility really helps us feed the growth levels that we achieved last year and that we are going to achieve on into future. And then importantly, we have built out a North American manufacturing system that will enable us to produce products for the large U.S. market and for the Canadian market, but it will allow us to able to produce products close to where the products are consumed. So we have a campus that we built, and we're building out in Mexico, which is doing great. And we have a whole series of existing and new facilities, manufacturing facilities in the U.S. that we are investing in like crazy, so that we can have more and more product for the U.S. market built in the USA. This will -- this bodes well for our future. This bodes well for ESG. When we manufacture large cube products in the U.S. and eliminate ocean shipping, this is a good example of trying to focus on the right kind of ESG initiatives. So anyhow, our new manufacturing sites represent again the aggressive investments that we made throughout 2020 to set this company up, not only for a good year but for a good decade of market share gains and outsized market growth. If you look at Floor Care, as I mentioned, we grew the Floor Care business nicely, 23.6%, and that allowed us to drive our profit levels up a respectable $15 million to $25 million. Our Floor Care profit is not where it will be 3 years from now, but we now have Floor Care positioned to deliver consistent, excellent sales and profit improvement results as we -- as the next 3 years unfold. Our new product flow in Floor Care is now on track. Consumers love the products. Our retail partners are supporting our line. And yes, Floor Care will be a positive part of the TTI story in the months and years to come. The carpet washing program in Floor Care is a real highlight. So one of the areas we decide to focus on in Floor Care is to develop a world-class range of carpet cleaning and corresponding formulas. This is a category where we have captured significant market share throughout North America and in the U.K. And the beauty of carpet cleaning products is not only do you sell the carpet cleaner but also the formulas, the aftermarket of formulas, which have wildly accretive gross margins. This element of Floor Care is also now beginning to gain real traction. And of course, we've also previously announced and have seen great success with our first ever cordless platform of floor care products. This is a range of products with a detachable first ever floor care detachable battery that works in a wide range of terrific products, and it is now seeing excellent momentum in the U.S. And as you look at the European theater, our U.K. business for VAX is also growing nicely with our carpet washing leadership and our cordless leadership. So we now are at a point where Floor Care, again, becomes an exciting part of the future of TTI. And you will see excellent results in Floor Care, not only 2021 but we really believe for the years to come, the long term. We are in a great position in Floor Care to deliver these results. Okay. Let's shift gears and talk about Outdoor. Last year was a breakthrough year for TTI in Outdoor. Our global Outdoor RYOBI business grew 46.3% last year. These are exciting numbers. Why? Because we are obsessed with growing the battery-powered cordless part of the outdoor market, where we are global leaders today, and we intend to amplify our global leadership here in 2021 and over the next 5 years. Now we got some help here because our largest competitor actually is in the process of buying a gas mower company in the U.S., and we believe that the gas market will be obsolete. It will be extinct at the end of the decade, and we believe investing in gas at this point is a bad idea. So we are hyper-focused on cordless outdoor, featuring our leadership line of cordless mowers. We have now have a fleet of 19 different battery-powered cordless mowers that will outperform the other cordless mowers that exist around the world and actually deliver gas run time and actually superior other performance elements versus gas. And this is an incredibly exciting initiative for the company. We want to be the Tesla of lawnmowers globally. And that will include riders, where we are already the global leader in nongas, nonpetrol riding mowers, and we intend to explore this range in the years to come with a very exciting product road that features one battery-powered superior riding mower after another. So when you combine our cordless leadership in push mowers, along with riders, it puts TTI RYOBI in a position of global leadership. And again, we are not going to divert our resource or attention to looking at -- to developing gas products here. We're not going to have the wait time trying to adapt the gas mower and turn into something cordless. We're building these cordless motors from scratch. We are designing one demonstrably better, technologically advanced cordless mower after another, and the results speak for themselves. We actually are so bullish on our cordless mower range that we decided to move cordless mower manufacturing from Asia to the United States. And actually, we are now ramping up production on cordless mowers in South Carolina, and we are actually building a world-class manufacturing facility dedicated to cordless lawnmowers in the United States. This -- we believe this facility will be the largest cordless mower factory in the world. It will be the best cordless mower factory in the world and will enable us to serve our U.S. customers even faster by producing the products right there in the USA. In addition to the mowers, our cordless outdoor product range is now exploding. We will bring to market an onslaught of leadership, 18-volt and 40-volt cordless outdoor products. And the range of products here is breathtaking. Yes, we have world-class string trimmers, hedge trimmers, blower vacs, chainsaws on the way. We have the world-leading line of cordless sprayers that we're rolling out this year. But even products that you would never imagine being cordless, like large-diameter post hole diggers, we are rolling these post hole diggers out. And if you've ever used one, you'll know that using a manual version of these things is a nightmare, and gas is also a nightmare for -- beyond the fact that gas pollutes and makes too much noise and needs maintenance and is hard to start. So these cordless post hole diggers are a really cool example of how you can take cordless technology and turn it and develop products that can eradicate the whole notion of petrol handheld outdoor products in the years to come. We are very fortunate to have tremendous support from our key retail partners around the world when it comes to outdoor. We're getting ready for the season now. And here's an example. This is a Home Depot store in Orlando, Florida. And this shows the inventory commitment that we made and the Home Depot has made to gear up for the season when it comes to outdoor. Remember what I said about inventory earlier in my remarks, we -- the only way you get this kind of support from a leading retail partner like Home Depot is to have the inventory. That's why we built inventory in the fourth quarter last year, and that's why we are able to roll out displays like this in the stores in -- here in the early part of 2021. We're very proud of this. And again, we're incredibly close to the Home Depot, and we're trying to support their requirements for their aggressive growth targets with our inventory levels here for the first quarter and really throughout the year. Okay. Shifting gears. One of the highlights of TTI is the unbelievable energized new range of RYOBI CPT or consumer power tools that we've rolled out throughout 2020 and now on into 2021. So we believe we have reenergized the global leading RYOBI DIY power tool line with a range of what we call high-performance brushless cordless. So our new RYOBI high-performance products set a new standard of performance, power, run time and features when it comes to DIY cordless power tools. We are rolling out 18 new of these high-performance brushless terrific RYOBI-branded consumer power tools. And this allows us to complement our existing range of RYOBI and offer a premium-priced, higher performance, really professional-grade tools priced at a DIY level. And the reaction to these new high-performance CPT products has been spectacular. We are -- it's hard to keep these on the shelves. They're selling so well. We are incredibly excited about the reaction here. And we intend to feed this high-performance range of RYOBI going forward with one new cool high-performance product after another. We also have many, many verticals that we're building out in our DIY program. For example, hobby and craft is an area that we think is dormant, that we think is an incredible opportunity. And so we're developing a whole family of hobby, craft products. This is a cool one. Cordless glue gun. This is a category that has lacked innovation for years. And we -- you can now use your RYOBI ONE+ battery to power your glue gun along with a variety of other hobby and craft products. And this is a good example of how our RYOBI team is looking at the DIY market and identifying and attacking DIY verticals that really have, we think, vast potential globally in the months and years to come. The retail support we are getting now for RYOBI even versus 3 years ago is breathtaking. This is a good example. In Sweden, there's a retail partner we have called BAUHAUS and they have built a RYOBI store within their store. And let me assure you that this kind of retail support is what we're seeing with -- now with RYOBI DIY tools in Australia and New Zealand, throughout the European theater, throughout Canada and the U.S. If you walk in a store that we're a partner with, you will be amazed at the kind of support we get at store level. And remember, this support is a function of us having the inventory, us having the exciting new products. It's a function of us having people in the stores that demonstrate and help our retail partners sell the products. And this is allowing us to gobble up market share from our competitors around the world in the DIY tool space. And we are capturing market share like crazy. If you look at the RYOBI ONE+ cordless platform today, remember, this platform has existed for decades. We have never changed the battery interface. So we don't abandon any historic customer. So every RYOBI ONE+ power tool and outdoor product and cleaning product works with all the batteries we've ever sold. And we intend to take the 182-tool platform that we have in place today and expand this aggressively over the next 5 years. You will be amazed when you see the kind of innovation our team has on the way when it comes to 18 RYOBI DIY tools, outdoor products, cleaning products and a host of other labor-saving devices or lifestyle-enhancing devices that we have in our product plan. No other competitor is remotely close to the range of cordless DIY products that TTI offers today. And one of the inherent strengths of our offering is that we have this overarching platform, where the battery drives all these different kind of products. So if you buy a RYOBI string trimmer, that battery can work in your drill and then your vacuum cleaner. And as consumers realize this, it really locks them into the RYOBI system, and it becomes a very sticky thing. So that we believe as we launch more and more RYOBI ONE+ products that we will control even more market share and will make it even more difficult for any of our competitors to gain any kind of traction here when it comes to the most important part of the global tool market, which is cordless. Okay. As we turn toward MILWAUKEE, there's a lot of misinformation, again, in the investment community about the professional tool market, what happened last year. And the fact is our professional industrial tool business grew 25.8% last year, and you'll find many, many competitors comment on how difficult last year was with the virus and how the tool market, the professional part of the market was challenged and wiped out. And look, the coronavirus doesn't discriminate. All competitors have the same environment to operate in. It's just we believe that our strategy of bringing new product to market is demonstrably better than competition. And our strategy of having inventory in place to serve our end users, our retail partners, our distributors, we believe this has paid off like crazy and 25.8% is an exciting MILWAUKEE performance. And remember, we say, and we have said for years, and I will continue to say, we will grow the MILWAUKEE tool business 20% a year like clockwork. No matter what the macroeconomic environment is, no matter what excuses you hear from our competitors, we intend to grow MILWAUKEE 20% a year. And 2021 will be no exception, and I feel like our internal goals of growing MILWAUKEE 20% over the next 5 years are attainable, while our gross margin continues to go up. This is not going to change. The great news on MILWAUKEE is the global consistency of our success. So yes, of course, North America had a remarkable year last year, up 25.5%. But Europe, with all the challenges you hear about with the virus, Europe was up 24.6% last year in MILWAUKEE. And look at the rest of the world, our ROW business, up 31%. And a big part of this is we don't sell in areas where the customers can't pay their bills. We're very careful about highly volatile currency environments, and we're incredibly selective and strategic when we build out -- when we develop our geographic expansion and build out new sales marketing companies. Make no mistake, we are building up MILWAUKEE sales and marketing companies throughout Eastern Europe, throughout the Asian theater, and we're continuing to invest like crazy in our existing markets. And the results speak for themselves here. Our overall sales growth was vastly superior to all of our competitors. We intend this year to have an outstanding year in MILWAUKEE. We will bring to market this year more new products than all our competitors combined, featuring breakthrough cordless new products, one new item after another. So let me give you a couple of examples. We -- [ Chris Milwaukee ] invented the concept of SAWZALL, a reciprocating saw, which is used for all sorts of demo applications and all sorts of other installation applications. We are now bringing to market an even more advanced cordless SAWZALL. It's the fastest cordless recip saw in the world. It's Bluetooth connected, and it's got -- the life of this will blow away our competitors. And it's -- this is a big volume category that we're going to take even more market share as we roll this out. We have launched a brand-new concrete drilling product with a unique and superior dust extraction feature. The dust extraction is a big deal when it comes to our focus on job site safety. And this product -- this is the fastest concrete drilling product available to -- the cordless concrete drilling product available around the world today. We are rolling out a blind rivet tool that is, by far, the most effective blind rivet tool available that's cordless. And you think about historic riveting, riveting tools historically have been driven with a pneumatic -- with a hose. They've been pneumatic. They're unwieldy. They're tethered. They're noisy. And this really sets the rivet tool user free with an outstanding cordless solution. The angle grinder -- the new cordless angle grinder that we're launching is very exciting. These angle grinders are more powerful. The run time is superior to our competitors. These grinders will be the fastest and most powerful cordless angle grinders available in the world today. And we now have electric brakes on these grinders and other features that make the MILWAUKEE the obvious choice when it comes to the high-end industrial user of grinders. We have now, as we move into 2021, 216 tools, cordless tools, that work off our RYOBI -- I'm sorry, our MILWAUKEE M18 platform. So one battery powers 216 different superior cordless products. And that number, don't write it down because it's going to change because we are going to continue adding a myriad of additional innovative breakthrough products to this platform, like we do with all of our cordless platforms. One of the highlights of the MILWAUKEE success in 2020 and one of the most exciting areas for MILWAUKEE over the next 5 years is the cordless nailer range. And this nailer range, of course, includes 18-volt products and super compact 12-volt products. We were thrilled last year with the incredible immediate adoption of our new cordless nailers, one of our nailers after another. And this year, we're going to just pour more gasoline on the fire here with the addition of our new pin nailers. This is a revolutionary, cordless subcompact pin nailer ail that allows you to fasten 2 pieces of extensive hardwood together faster, more conveniently, more reliably than any other solutions today. So you can abandon your pneumatic pin nailing solution. And the pneumatic nailer is hooked up to a compressor, which is often hooked up to a generator, which makes more noise than you can imagine. And now you just have this featherlight pin nailer that is super precise and delivers outstanding performance and run time. And there's no other cordless product remotely close to the performance of this product. We also in MILWAUKEE in our subcompact range have reinvented the ratchet. So we have been pioneering cordless versus manual or pneumatic ratchet. We've been pioneering cordless ratchets for the last 5 years. And if you think about it, what we're excited about with the ratchet is not only are we liberating people from the old vintage technology of pneumatic ratchets connected to a compressor, whether it's in a workshop or on the job site, but we also are taking people who only use manual ratchets in the past and now we give them a much more productive way and a much more environmentally -- a much more friendly way on the arms to work on the ratcheting activities in jobs that you have around various transportation products, whether it's a plane, train, automobile, boat, these ratchets are used in all these applications. And what we've launched now is the fastest high-speed ratcheting, cordless ratcheting products in existence. This will complement our existing leadership range of cordless ratchets. It puts us in a very strong position. And what I love about these ratchets is that it allows us also to sell the corresponding sockets and other mechanic hand tools, where we are capturing significant market share as we speak with these cordless ratchets being the Trojan horse that gets us in the door of these many auto shops around the world. Another product that we launched that's super cool is -- are these tire buffers. So this is a cordless tire buffer that allows you, for the first time for the cordless product to repair a flat tire. So you use these on inside of the tire to smooth it out before you apply a patch. And these products exist today but they're all pneumatic. They're all noisy. They're incredibly inconvenient if you have to go to a remote location. And these are particularly important when you look at high-value tires for trucks and other high-end vehicles or transportation products. So it's a first-ever cordless version, and it will really strengthen our leadership position in the transportation arena, where we have pioneered cordless over the last 5 years. Another new product we have is the next-generation subcompact bandsaw. These products -- this is a cordless bandsaw, subcompact level, that is faster, lighter, easier to use than any competitive product in its class. The new ProPEX expander is another breakthrough product. So there's a revolution going on in plumbing around the world. And it's -- this PVC plumbing solution is only able to be installed with these -- with a ProPEX expander. Ours is the best cordless version available, and it's our second-generation and this will enable the plumber to install these PEX products faster with more effectiveness. Our 12-volt subcompact platform as we roll into 2021 now features 130 products. So this is our only -- this is our subcompact platform. We are -- well, we are the clear global leader in this space. And again, don't write this number down because we will bring an onslaught of new, super cool, subcompact MILWAUKEE -- subcompact products to propagate the system in the months and years to come. I am so pleased with the reaction we've seen with our new line of MILWAUKEE lasers. This is a category where we've been late to come to the market. But we now have a range of lasers with the best visibility, the longest run time. And reaction so far has been outstanding. We will be capturing a lot of market share in the space that we haven't competed in as of yet. And this will only enhance the overall MILWAUKEE momentum on all sorts of job sites all over the world. Our MX MILWAUKEE program, which we rolled out last year, is a range that attacks the equipment arena, which we think is massive. Equipment is today powered by petrol or pneumatic or hydraulic products. And we intend to liberate these applications and these users from those dated power sources to our lithium battery-powered solution. Now there was question last year in the midst of the coronavirus that demonstrating these tools on job sites was a challenge, so the rollout of MX last year was slower than what we originally planned. However, as we roll into 2021, our team has been incredibly creative, staying safe and adhering to all coronavirus safety protocols, of course. And we've done a really good job of that. But we have figured out ways to demonstrate these tools to our target customers and the momentum we now have in MX FUEL platform in 2021 is really exciting. And we will continue to roll out additional MX equipment products in this family over the course of 2021 and over the next 5 years. And again, we see equipment as a staggering opportunity, massive opportunity that's full of old-fashioned power sources that are not friendly to the environment, and it gives us an opportunity to build out the MILWAUKEE cordless platform in a brand-new space. One of the fastest-growing parts of our company is our MILWAUKEE PPE, personal protective equipment line. Now make no mistake, we were working on developing a global leadership range of personal protective equipment long before the coronavirus hit. The virus has made job site safety even more important all over the world. We intend to be a global leader in PPE. The range we have today is incredibly exciting, and the adoption with the target user has been beyond our initial expectations. We're very excited about what we can achieve in this safety arena or the PPE product range. We also are incredibly pleased to see the traction we have achieved in our global leading storage, mobile storage and stationary storage system called PACKOUT. The MILWAUKEE PACKOUT family has taken off like loud fire. There's almost a cult following around MILWAUKEE PACKOUT. And there are many, many -- as you can imagine, many, many of the other mobile storage solutions available today to the end user. We intend to be the leading range of high-end mobile and stationary or vehicular-based storage in the MILWAUKEE PACKOUT family. What you see here is the growing range of PACKOUT as it exists today. I can tell you, though, that we are working on dozens and dozens of additions to our PACKOUT family, which will propagate the system and make it even more compelling to a user who's trying to decide how to store many, many different tools, whether it's power tools, hand tools or the parts or accessories or other products. We are giving users a solution that is vastly superior to the competitive set that's out there today. We also are pleased to see the momentum in our power tool accessory business. A great example of this is the rollout of our SHOCKWAVE line of impact-duty sockets. And these products are small diameter sockets and even large diameter for the really high-end applications for large vehicles and other large fastening needs. This is a new range for us. It makes perfect sense for us to be the leaders in impact-ready sockets since we are now the global leader in cordless impact drivers, impact wrenches. And so it's a perfect complement and a great example of our power tool accessory team capitalizing on a massive opportunity where we had zero market share in the past. So as I sum up our 2020 performance and look at 2021, here's what I'd like to reinforce. Yes, we had an astounding year in 2021 with growth rates that nobody in the industry ever thought they would see. In no way, shape or form, though, is 2020 an anomaly for TTI. We intend over the next 5 years and the next 10 years to continue to seize control of the global tool market, power tools, hand tools, accessories, safety equipment, storage and many other areas that we covet and will attack. And we intend to do that the right way by bringing the market a continuous stream of innovative, technologically advanced, demonstrably better products versus the competitive set that exists out there today. We have so much new product on the way that if I told you everything that's coming, first of all, I would need 2 days to do this review and, secondly, you would accuse me of exaggerating. We are investing like crazy in new product development, specifically high-end technology in cordless. And because of that, we feel like that, again, 2020 was not an anomaly. Now the growth levels last year were extraordinary. But let's remember what we always share about our future, and this is not going to change, we intend to grow at an above-market level. The company will grow strong single-digit. That's the range we always focus on. If we're good, we'll beat it. We certainly blew it away last year. But when you look at growth rate, I can assure you that we will outgrow all of our competitors for sure, and we will outgrow the market. That is a mandate we -- and obsession within our company. We will continue to improve our gross margin roughly 50 basis points a year over the next 3 years. We feel very good about that. Our MILWAUKEE flagship industrial tool business will grow at a 20% clip or better this year and on into the future. And we demonstrated last year in the midst of this coronavirus, which challenged the professional markets all over the world, we still broke through and grew well over 20%. And I think what's most exciting is the team that we have at TTI is on fire. It's -- first of all, we have an amazing leadership team in our company. We have an incredible stream of talented, high potential graduates coming into the company from campuses all over the world. We are investing like crazy in our people. We're hiring so many engineers that would blow your mind. We think that we need to continue to feed this company's growth machine with the right kind of talent and that starts with engineering, but it includes all sorts of areas in our leadership development program, which is a program specifically designed not only to drive growth today but to build and mentor people in our company to be leaders of the future. And so we really appreciate your interest in supporting TTI, and let me be very clear, this is just the beginning. The best is yet to come. Thank you so much.

Thank you for your participation. And this concludes today's annual results announcement, analyst and investor webcast. You may now disconnect.