Commercial Vehicle Group Inc. (NASDAQ:CVGI) has reported first-quarter 2024 net sales of $232 million alongside an adjusted EBITDA of $12.7 million. The company is undergoing restructuring initiatives to improve operational efficiency in response to challenging market conditions.
Despite these challenges, CVGI is confident in its business transformation strategy, aiming to strengthen profitability and is reaffirming its full-year 2024 revenue guidance of $915 million to $1.015 billion, with adjusted EBITDA projected between $60 million and $73 million.
Key Takeaways
- CVGI reported Q1 2024 net sales of $232 million and adjusted EBITDA of $12.7 million.
- The company is executing restructuring initiatives and recorded $45 million in new business wins.
- CVGI's UNITY Seat product line is expanding globally.
- Full-year 2024 revenue guidance is reaffirmed at $915 million to $1.015 billion, with adjusted EBITDA of $60 million to $73 million.
- CVGI expects positive free cash flow and improved profitability through operational cost efficiency.
- The company's new plants in Morocco and Mexico are ramping up well, with expansion expected to benefit European and aftermarket sales.
- Efforts to improve aftermarket sales include new processes, increased communication, and incentive programs for sales reps.
- CVGI is managing cost pressures, including labor inflation and the strengthening of the Mexican peso, aiming for a similar $30 million cost-out activity as last year.
Company Outlook
- CVGI maintains a positive outlook despite market headwinds, with a focus on business transformation.
- Positive free cash flow is anticipated, allowing for potential debt reduction or growth opportunities.
- Strategic sourcing decisions and better working capital management are expected to increase cash generation.
Bearish Highlights
- Slower revenue growth in the electrical segment due to supply chain challenges.
- Decline in demand in the Con Ag markets influenced by the economic situation in China, Europe, and North America.
Bullish Highlights
- Expectation to achieve $100 million in new business wins for the year.
- Expansion in Europe and aftermarket sales is expected to yield benefits.
Misses
- No specific misses were mentioned in the provided context of the earnings call.
Q&A Highlights
- The company discussed cost reduction measures and restructuring efforts to right-size the business.
- They are hopeful that the ACT truck bill and improved market conditions will support their outlook.
Commercial Vehicle Group's efforts to navigate the softer market conditions while maintaining their full-year guidance demonstrate the company's commitment to operational efficiency and profitability.
With new business wins and global expansion of their product lines, CVGI is positioning itself for future growth despite current economic challenges.
The company's proactive approach to managing earnings and cost pressures, alongside their optimism for improved market conditions, signals a strategic focus on long-term success.
InvestingPro Insights
Commercial Vehicle Group Inc. (CVGI) is taking significant steps to navigate through a challenging market, as reflected in their recent earnings report and forward-looking statements. To add further context to the company's financial health and stock performance, here are insights based on real-time data from InvestingPro and InvestingPro Tips:
InvestingPro Data:
- Market Cap: With a market capitalization of $180.55 million, CVGI is a smaller player in the industry, which may affect its market influence and stability.
- P/E Ratio: CVGI's P/E ratio stands at a low 4.23, suggesting that the stock may be undervalued relative to its earnings.
- Revenue Growth: The company has seen a modest revenue growth of 1.34% over the last twelve months as of Q4 2023, indicating a slow but positive upward trend in sales.
InvestingPro Tips:
- Analysts' Sentiment: A couple of analysts have revised their earnings expectations downwards for the upcoming period, indicating potential concerns about the company's future profitability.
- Stock Volatility: Investors should note that CVGI's stock price has been quite volatile, which may influence investment decisions depending on individual risk tolerance.
As Commercial Vehicle Group continues its efforts to improve operational efficiency and expand globally, these metrics and insights can help investors better understand the company's current position and future potential. For those looking to delve deeper into CVGI's financials and stock performance, InvestingPro offers additional tips and metrics. Use the coupon code PRONEWS24 to get an additional 10% off a yearly or biyearly Pro and Pro+ subscription, and discover the 6 additional InvestingPro Tips that can further inform your investment strategy.
Full transcript - Commercial Vehicl (CVGI) Q1 2024:
Operator: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the CVGI Q1 2024 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all lines are in a listen-only mode. Following the presentation, we will conduct the question and answer session. [Operator Instructions]. This call is being recorded on Tuesday, May 7, 2024. I would now like to turn the conference over to Mr. Andy Cheung, Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead sir.
Andy Cheung: Thank you, operator, and welcome everyone to our conference call. Joining me on the call today is James Ray, President and CEO of CVG. This morning, we will provide a brief company update as well as commentary regarding our first quarter 2024 results, after which we will open the call for questions. As a reminder, this conference call is being webcast and the Q1 2024 earnings call presentation, which we will refer to during this call, is available on our website. Both may contain forward-looking statements, including, but not limited to, expectations for future periods regarding market trends, cost-saving initiatives, and new product initiatives, among others. Actual results may differ from anticipated results because of certain risks and uncertainties. These risks and uncertainties may include, but are not limited to economic conditions in the market in which CVG operates, fluctuations in the production volumes of vehicles for which CVG is a supplier, financial covenants compliance and liquidity, risks associated with conducting business in foreign countries and currencies, and other risks as detailed in our SEC filings. I will now turn the call over to James to provide a company update.
James Ray: Thank you, Andy. I'd like to turn your attention to the supplemental earnings presentation, starting on Slide 3. As we discussed in last quarter's call, we launched restructuring initiatives comprehending softer market conditions that were expected and we continue to expect in the year. These softer conditions, as well as a strong quarter in the prior year period, made for a tough comparison versus the prior year across most metrics. We reported net sales of $232 million in the quarter and adjusted EBITDA of $12.7 million. We remain focused on driving further operational efficiency improvements, strengthening our vehicle solution segment, and growing our electrical system segment to be our largest business. We fully executed restructuring initiatives in the first quarter and combined with additional efforts I'll discuss later, underpin our financial guidance for 2024. Despite a net use of cash in the quarter, our net leverage ratio remained strong at 1.8 times. We also continue driving new business wins, recording approximately $45 million in new wins so far this year on a fully ramped basis. Consistent with our strategy, these wins continue to be focused within our electrical system segment and support the product ramp up at our two new plants and additional Morocco facility, which are focused on meeting the demand growth in electrical systems. Turning to Slide 4, I'd like to take this opportunity to highlight some recent strategic actions we've taken, which all serve as a reminder of our continued goal to align cost and improve margins at CVG. First, we continue to make significant strides in our organizational efficiency improvements. As our restructuring actions to reduce costs and align resources with our growth product lines remain underway. In line with that, we announced last quarter the consolidation of products manufactured in our facility in Chillicothe, Ohio. We now have a signed purchase agreement for the sale of the Chillicothe facility, with the transaction expected to close in Q3. Second, our operational excellence emphasis supports our ongoing cost out program, which focuses on productivity, materials, and conversion costs. Finally, we are persistent in our efforts to increase engagement by prioritizing customer satisfaction across the organization. Our collaboration across business segments will help introduce new products, foster stronger customer relationships, and help us manage inflationary price recoveries. Collectively, these efforts are targeted to improve profitability, increase enterprise wide efficiency, and support our outlook for the full year 2024. Now, moving to Slide 5, I'd like to highlight the expansion of our new UNITY Seat product line within our vehicle solution segment. The UNITY Seat line has many product features that are helping us win business globally, including powered full seat tilt and lever recline, decreased free play, and performance above market requirements. Importantly, the UNITY line has achieved safety compliance across all our strategic regions and market segments. This expansion is a strong example of how we are strengthening our core vehicle solutions business through customer focus, solutions, and technology. We look forward to growing our UNITY sales globally and sharing our successes with you in future quarters. With that, I'd like to turn the call back to Andy for a more detailed review of our financial results.
Andy Cheung: Thank you, James, and good morning, everyone. If you are following along in the presentation, please turn to Slide 6. Consolidated first quarter 2024 revenues was $232 million as compared to $263 million in the prior year period. The decrease in revenues is due primarily to a softening in customer demand globally. The anticipated wind down of certain programs in our vehicle solution segment, and a decline in our aftermarket and industrial automation segments, which more than offset an increase in electrical systems revenues. Adjusted EBITDA was $12.7 million for the first quarter compared to $19.8 million in the prior year. Adjusted EBITDA margins were 5.5%, down 200 basis points as compared to adjusted EBITDA margins of 7.5% in the first quarter of 2023, driven primarily by lower volumes and inflationary impacts, partially offset by lower SG&A expenses. Interest expense was $2.3 million as compared to $2.9 million in the first quarter of 2023. The decrease in interest expense was primarily related to lower average debt balances during the respective periods. Net income for the quarter was $2.9 million or $0.09 per diluted share as compared to a net income of $8.7 million or $0.26 per diluted share in the prior year. Adjusted net income for the quarter was $4.4 million or $0.13 per diluted share as compared to $9.2 million or $0.28 per diluted share in the prior year. Moving to the segment results beginning Slide 7. Our electrical system segment achieved revenues of $55.8 million, an increase of 1.9% as compared to the year-ago quarter. With the increase resulting primarily from increased pricing, sales volume with legacy customers saw a slight decline as a result of softening construction and agriculture end markets. Recent comments from OEMs in these end markets have indicated weakening demand and we will continue to proactively adjust our cost structure as these trends continue. We have also seen customer delays in the ramp-up of new business wins, resulting in total sales volume being largely flat year-over-year. Adjusted operating income was $3.1 million, a decrease of $3 million compared to the first quarter of 2023. Operating income was negatively impacted at our Mexico facilities by the strengthening of the peso and the government-mandated wage increases that took effect on January 1st. We are continuing to work with our customers to offset these headwinds. However, negotiations remain ongoing. Construction on our second Morocco facility remains on track and is expected to be complete by the fourth quarter of 2024. We will remain focused on driving operational improvements and optimizing margins even as additional new wins flow through. Turning to Slide 8, our vehicle solutions segment's first quarter revenues decreased 14% to $137.9 million compared to the year-ago quarter, due primarily to lower customer demand, including the impact of supply shortages at a key customer that negatively impacted our schedules. Additionally, the anticipated wind-down of certain unfavorable programs in the segment weighed on revenues in the quarter. Adjusted operating income for the first quarter was $10.9 million, a decrease of $2.6 million compared to the prior year period, as lower market demand was partially offset by operational improvements and lower SG&A. We remain focused on strengthening our core business in vehicle solutions, and this segment remains a key focus for our team in terms of reducing costs, driving further operational improvements, as well as winning business on new platforms, all with the goal of driving improved margins. Moving to Slide 9, our aftermarket and accessory segment's revenues in the first quarter decreased 9.5% to $34.1 million compared to the year-ago quarter, primarily resulting from decreased sales volume on lower customer demand and the drawdown of backlog in the prior year period. Adjusted operating income for the first quarter was $4.6 million, a decrease of $1 million compared to the prior year period. The decrease is primarily attributable to lower sales volumes. On a sequential basis, results in this segment increased in terms of revenue and adjusted operating income as our operational improvements elicited by effort. Turning to Slide 10, our Industrial Automation segment produced first quarter revenues of $4.3 million, a decrease of 56% as compared to $9.7 million in the first quarter of 2023 due to ongoing challenging market conditions and reduced demand from legacy customers. Adjusted operating income was a loss of $1.9 million compared to a loss of $0.2 million in the prior year period. We continue to take actions to right-size this business. We are focused on strengthening our both commercial excellence and operational execution to improve order intake. In parallel with these activities, we are actively exploring new end markets and developing new highly engineered products. An example of this is the development of a new product named Stack, which was showcased at the MODEX Trade Show in March. This concludes my financial overview. I will now turn the call back over to James to discuss our updated 2024 outlook.
James Ray: Thank you, Andy. Turning to Slide 11, I'll share several thoughts on our outlook for 2024. Following the introduction of our quantitative annual guidance at the revenue and adjusted EBITDA level in March 2024, we are reaffirming our previously announced guidance ranges for both metrics. Industry forecasts currently project a decline in North American Class A truck bills of approximately 10% for the year, a slightly positive revision from the previous estimate of a 16% decline. This favorable revised Class A outlook is being offset by weakening in the construction and agriculture end markets, which we expect to be flat to down 10% in 2024. Notwithstanding these market changes, we are reaffirming our guidance range of $915 million to $1.015 billion in full year 2024 revenues. We believe our business will continue to be resilient as we benefit from the diversification strategy and forward-looking resource allocation. Given the aforementioned truck bill estimates, construction and agriculture market outlooks, and the expectation for further electrical system segment growth, we expect adjusted EBITDA to be solidly in the previously provided guidance range of $60 million to $73 million for 2024. We believe that the actions being taken to consolidate operations, rescale our labor force, together with continued discussions with our customers to manage headwinds, will serve to underpin the guidance. We continue to expect that we will generate positive free cash flow, providing us with optionality to pursue either debt pay down or inorganic growth efforts should we find an attractive opportunity. We continue to see multiple opportunities to improve profitability through operational cost efficiency and making strategic sourcing decisions, and expect all of this to lead to improved working capital management and increased cash generation. Collectively, our business transformation is expected to drive a stronger business mix and make CVG a stronger and more profitable company in the coming years. With that, I will now turn the call back over to the operator to open the line up for questions. Operator?
Operator: Thank you, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from the line of John Franzreb from Sidoti and Company. Go ahead, please.
John Franzreb: Good morning, everybody, and thanks for taking the questions.
James Ray: Good morning, John.
Andy Cheung: Good morning, John.
John Franzreb: I'd like to start with the vehicle solutions segment and the wind down of certain programs. I'm curious how much of that impacted the revenue line year-over-year? And are those program wind downs complete or are they continuing to the second quarter and beyond?
Andy Cheung: Yes. so, John, thanks for the question. So, the majority of the wind down has been completed. So, right now we see for the quarter, we'll call it a single digit million level of impact. But you will remember this is anticipated wind down that we talked about a few quarters ago at, I'll call it maybe during the time when we negotiated pricing. Last round, we decided that there's certain programs that are not favorable for us, and we decided to exit them. So, you can see the impact actually showing up now in Q1. So, it's something that we've been working through quite a while ago, and it took some time for us to work through the final production, and now Q1 you can see the numbers.
John Franzreb: Got it. Got it. And, Andy, is it safe to say that all the repricing actions and everything related to that is now in the, no pun intended, rear view mirror?
Andy Cheung: Yes, yes, you're right.
John Franzreb: Okay. Regarding the restructuring actions, can you kind of quantify how much of restructuring actions that you're going to take maybe collectively? Do you have an idea for calendar 2024 and what your anticipated annualized savings rate will be from these actions?
Andy Cheung: Yes, so, a couple of things. We announced last quarter that we were doing a few restructuring mainly here in North America. During the quarter in Q1, we executed about $2 million of restructuring costs. I'll call it maybe two-thirds of it related to headcount reductions, and then one-third of it related to facility closing. We are, I will call it, more than halfway through our restructuring program. We will still have some activity going on in Q2, and most of this should be wrapped up by Q3. So, both in terms of our facility manufacturing as well as SG&A. So, that's where we are right now.
John Franzreb: And you anticipated net savings annualized when you've done this process?
Andy Cheung: Yes, so it depends really on the different type of the projects. We obviously have a mixed bag of multiple kind of projects, SG&A and manufacturing. Normally, we target about two years of payback in our saving projects, but it will be depends on the type of the actions within the restructuring program.
John Franzreb: Okay. I guess last thing I'll get back into Q. The industrial automation business took a real step down as far as revenue compared to the second half of last year. I was under, I guess, the anticipation we were kind of troughing at that high 30, low 40 revenue level. And actually, it was also an impression that maybe that business had to potentially get better in the year ahead. Has something fundamentally changed? Can you kind of talk about what's going on there?
James Ray: Hi, John, this is James. Yes, we're in the middle of the transformation of that business. We talked about on the last call, we're shifting from more of a contract manufacturing PO-based business to a more engineered product, serialized production business with longer term contracts. So part of this was anticipated. However, the PO business is very cyclical and it's very lumpy as it comes in. So, several of our customers are in the government space. And when they have year-end spend toward the end of the third quarter, typically for government, that's when we tend to see a pickup. So that's been lighter than it was in prior year. And as we invest in SG&A to go to the engineered products, like we mentioned the stack product, we added engineers and SG&A to participate in the MODEX show, but also that's for the Stack product, but also other new products with other new customers that are much more technical and engineering heavy. So we're in the midst of this transformation and we have seen a recent improvement in our order inbound as well as contracts where we'll be shipping product in Q3 and Q4. So the leading indicators are giving us some level of confidence that we'll be continuing to turn this around going on the upside.
John Franzreb: Okay. So James, it's fair to say you think this is a revenue trough that we're in as we're in that transition period?
James Ray: Yes. So yes, to a certain degree, yes. But it can depend on the sharp rebound on whether or not we get near-term contracts on these new products. We could see more of a spike back up or maybe a longer recovery depending on the new products. These new products require prototypes and alpha and beta testing of prototypes in customer facilities and also in their customer facilities as well when you're into a full fulfillment center ecosystem. There's a double level of beta and alpha testing. So the timeline for the new products from a revenue standpoint, the prototype revenue as well as NRE is in the three to six month range and then full scale production, we foresee that being in the six to nine month range on these new products which in many cases have a higher SKU price than some of our existing contract manufacturing products.
John Franzreb: Got it. Thank you. So, I'll get back into queue.
James Ray: Thank you.
Operator: Our next question comes from the line of Gary Prestopino from Barrington Research. Go ahead, please.
Gary Prestopino: Hi. Good morning, James and Andy. My questions also revolve around what you're doing on the restructuring side. I guess given the fluidness of the changes you're seeing in some of your markets, particularly I think you said some of the electrical systems areas starting to see some weakness in construction and ag. Have you -- you've identified most of what you want to do in 2024 in terms of restructuring or is this kind of more or less a fluid process that's really going to be ongoing?
James Ray: It's really going to -- this is James and hi. Thank you for the question. It's really going to depend on how this market recovery tracks. So in this construction ag segment of the market, our business is primarily with legacy long-term customers. They're not like new startups. So we do need to be prepared for a recovery in the market. So we will continue to adjust both up and down depending on the signals we get from that customer segment and those market segments. In the fall last year, indications from -- or outlooks from those customers led to a low single-digit year-over-year improvement in what they had communicated, but they've since communicated a flat to down 10% outlook for the year. So we had plans in place to comprehend a low single-digit increase in market, and now we're in the pivot mode to scale things back for a flat to down 10 percent. So it was a pretty significant swing. A number of macro items influenced that in different regions, both Europe and North America. But that is what we're doing to flex to try and maintain as much margin, but also make sure we have the appropriate amount of capacity in place. When they do come back, we're not left short of capacity and not able to fulfill the contracts we signed up for and lose market share. So it's quite a delicate balance to do that, but our outlook remains very positive in these markets as they are somewhat cyclical in nature.
Gary Prestopino: Okay. And then in terms of your guidance, $60 million to $73 million for EBITDA, would it be more or less the electrical segment that would have to do an unexpected downturn for you to be at the -- below that $60 million?
James Ray: It could be a number of providers. It could be deterioration back in Class A. So if you recall, the Class A forecast by ACT has been somewhat volatile over the last six months of up, down, up, down. Now we're back up a little. And because the larger portion of our revenue stream is in the vehicle solutions segment tied to Class A truck, we saw a reversal of this positive trend back down to the minus 16% or more percent down. That could influence where we end up in the range. On the electrical segment, because we have more programs that are launching, and some of those launches have been delayed, which is some of the headwinds we see, but they will be coming, and a rebound in the construction ag market, I would say that, we still are confident that we'll be in that range unless something very significant happens.
Andy Cheung: And Gary, if I may add to it, one thing that we see some uncertainties in volatility is really still the supply chain disruption that pop up here and there. You probably remember last quarter there was some labor disruption at our customers, and those labor issues are still happening from places to places at different customers. We saw this quarter also some of our suppliers of our customers also have supply issues impacting our customers. And of course, we all know that the Suez Canal issue affecting logistics. So those are the things probably I'll see potentially a downside risk if something continues to happen throughout the year. So the last couple of quarters we've seen some of them happening.
Gary Prestopino: Okay. Thank you.
Operator: Thank you. [Operator Instructions] We have our next question coming from the line of Joe Gomes from Noble Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Joshua Zoepfel: Hi, good morning. This is Joshua Zoepfel filling in for Joe.
Andy Cheung: Hi, Josh. Good morning.
Joshua Zoepfel: Hi, so just a quick question. Just on the electrical side of business, it kind of looked to have this kind of a bit of a slower revenue growth than kind of we expected just given the kind of recent contract wins there. Was there really something behind that like slower growth rate?
Andy Cheung: Yes. So, Joshua, so as James already mentioned, so the legacy customer is mostly construction and agriculture. So as we explained that does make up the majority of the end markets of the electrical segments. So that we are seeing a slight decline. So at the same time, if you look back into the last couple quarters, the growth of the segment, it comes from continual ramping our new wins over the years. As we described, this year we saw a slowdown of those ramps. So mostly because of customers seeing logistical and supply chain challenges. So they were not able to ramp up their production. So in turn, obviously, we don't get the revenues to supply to them. So that's the combination that impacting this quarter. Overall, the volume is still up. So meaning that we're still seeing some level of new revenues, but not as fast as we would like. But we're hopefully that our customer can overcome their challenges and continue to ramp their new businesses.
James Ray: Yes, Joshua, I'll just add to that point. We are not seeing any lost business from new wins we've booked. So that gives us a leading indicator that the market will come back at some point. We don't have any leakage of lost business. So we still feel confident that we're going to have longer term tailwind from all these new business wins. And in addition to construction and ag, it's also infrastructure customers, as well as in electrification applications within legacy and new OEM startups. So it's a very diverse set of segments we serve into. But to Andy's point, the largest two segments in the electrical business are Con Ag, both in North America and Europe.
Joshua Zoepfel: Okay. That's helpful. And then just as for the Con Ag markets, is there really a big driver in that this deterioration of those industries that you guys noticed?
Andy Cheung: There are a few things that we heard from our OEM customers. One, as, China is in a bad spot right now. So the Asia Pacific activity is pretty low at this point. Europe, we also see some reduction in demand overall. Again, it's the economy over there. And then I think the most recent development is here in North America. So compared to a few months ago, the market is low and our customers also publicly mentioned that in their own earnings calls that they're seeing some reduced activities. So it's mostly demand driven based on what we heard from our customers.
Joshua Zoepfel: Okay. Perfect. And last one from me, I'll get back in queue. I guess with the first quarter over, is the new business wins of $45 million just in line with your goals for the quarter? Are we still really expecting $100 million range for the year?
James Ray: Yes, for the year we're still expecting $100 million. The $45 million is tracking well. When you look at our pending awards that we've quoted as well as our funnel of opportunities that we're pursuing, not just within electrical but also in our vehicle solutions group and aftermarket and accessories and also in industrial automation, we have a good funnel in each one of those businesses. We just need to bring home the awards that are pending and then on the pursuit opportunities, we have ample capacity in our outlook to be aggressive on winning those opportunities in the pursuit funnel too. So we feel confident at this point that we will achieve that $100 million on an annualized basis that we have mentioned before in prior calls.
Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Steven Martin from Slater. Go ahead, please.
Steven Martin: Hi, guys.
James Ray: Hi, Steve.
Andy Cheung: Hi, Steve.
Steven Martin: You said the second Moroccan plant would be completed by the end of the first quarter. Well, that was 40 days ago. So I guess my question is, was it completed and is it producing?
James Ray: So we have an initial Morocco facility that we're currently producing in that was completed in Q4. The second facility was started in Q1 this year. It will be complete by the end of Q4 this year with beneficial occupancy Q1 of 2025.
Steven Martin: Got it. I misheard that. And how is the new Moroccan plant and the new Mexican plant doing?
James Ray: They're both ramping up very well. We are able to actually improve our funnel of opportunities with the North African Morocco footprint for the European market. So we're seeing good customer response from our expansion of our European footprint. As you may know, we have facilities in the Ukraine as well as Czech Republic for the electrical systems business. So this expansion in the North Africa is positioning us well from a value proposition on new opportunities in Europe. And for Mexico, the Aldama facility, which is outside of Chihuahua, is ramping up very well. Our main facility in Mexico was in Agua Prieta. So the team that's managing those facilities is based in Chihuahua and Agua Prieta, and we're somewhat running those two in parallel. And we have a ramp schedule that will continue to ramp throughout the year and early next year with some of the North American new business wins that we've booked over the past 12 to 18 months.
Steven Martin: Okay. And to follow-up someone's earlier question about your guidance, if I were to choose the midpoint of this year's guidance, and given how you've done in the first quarter, that would imply that the first, I'm sorry, the back half would have to be up 10% to 12% to make the mid, maybe 10% to 15% percent to make the midpoint of your guidance. What gives you that level of comfort? All four businesses were down this first quarter. What businesses are going to swing enough to make that midpoint?
Andy Cheung: Yes. So, Steve, if you look at our guidance, you clearly see there's a little bit of a wider range that we communicated. James already mentioned, so there's the upside of potentially the ACT truck bill, and depends on how the contract market goes, or maybe the decline is not as severe, so there's some upside opportunity. But at the same time, there's also the downside risk that we mentioned about supply chain and logistics and the continued depressed in the demand on the customer side. So I think right now it's hard to say where the final year is going to land. We believe that our range is pretty well covered in case of those scenarios. But we probably have more confidence in our ability to manage our earnings. So as we mentioned that we've been taking proactive actions about right-sizing the business, anticipating the customer demand changes. So there's a few more levers for us to pull. So we're pretty confident in terms of our EBITDA guidance that the range that we produce.
James Ray: Yes. An additional point, too, Steve, is the restructuring benefits will start to ramp higher in the second half after some of the efforts we took in the first. In addition to that, as we have mentioned in prior calls, our cost out program, some of those savings items will kick in higher as volume ramps up on new projects that were implemented in Q4 and Q1, and we continue to implement in Q2. So on the cost side, we see opportunities to help mitigate some of the downside of lost top line or lower top line through the cost out process that we're doing. And that, to Andy's point, it helps us manage the earnings a little better, especially in the second half. And we're hopeful that the ACT and the Class 8 market will continue to strengthen in the outlook. We're not banking on it, but we're hoping that that happens. And then Con Ag, I do think that it's volatile right now. I'm not really sure where it's going to end up, but I don't have any indication it's going to get much worse than flat to down 10%. So we're planning for the worst and putting things in place to try and mitigate pressure on the EBITDA outlook.
Steven Martin: Okay. Follow up to that. ACT expects that 2025 -- so first of all, as I said on the last call, 2023 ACT was not as bad as everybody expected at the beginning of the year. 2024 ACT looks to be plus or minus, as you said, maybe a little better. 2025 is supposed to be a new cycle. When do you expect that you're going to see or we will start to see the benefits of that new cycle?
James Ray: Yes, so that's a very good question, Steve. It's interesting because, as you know, the 27 calendar year are new federal emissions for Class 8 vehicles. And I've seen ranges and estimates of potentially 30% higher engine costs than all of the emissions. So the 2025 and 2026 outlook from ACT is pretty much factoring in a pre-buy. So you'll see a larger drop in 2027 because the buy was pulled ahead. And we would expect to see -- a 2025 model year would start the summer of -- or to the latter part of 2024, okay, as the new models come on and they ramp up new production. A lot of the vehicle manufacturers have a model change mid to late prior year of the stated year model. So that's given us some indication that -- I think to another question earlier, what gives us a little more confidence in the back half of the year? Even though ACT's forecast is showing a decline in Q4 compared to the prior quarters, we still see – depends on when those customers start their next model and how fast they ramp up. So we have to be somewhat flexible and agile so that we can respond to those ramps both on the high side and the low side.
Steven Martin: Okay. And ACT predicted a bad Q4 in 2023, and it ended up being a lot better. One last question. I would assume that aftermarket is sort of the yin to new truck yang in the sense that if somebody doesn't replace a truck, they have to buy some more stuff in the aftermarket to keep the existing truck on the road. Should we see aftermarket benefit, or until you get it righted, we're just not going to see that benefit?
James Ray: We should see some benefit. And based on our portfolio, the majority of our aftermarket business is in -- so we focused -- we kind of took an 80-20 approach since I came into the role to figure out how we can win in aftermarket seating. And there's some pretty solid players out there that we're going up against. And it comes down to two or three different things. One is how easy it is to do business with us. And as you know, we had a website that launched. It really didn't hit that well, and it's because we didn't leverage our field sales reps that I mentioned in our last earnings call. Then the second thing is, what does the customer really want, and how does that fit into our ability to carry inventory and have quick turnaround within 48, 72 hours of when they want a seat. And that's what we've been working on in Q1 with our factory in Piedmont, Alabama, which makes our aftermarket seats. So we've put in some new processes for scheduling. We've put in a different inventory profile monitor. We have a more regular touch point with our field sales reps. We have recently seen an increase in our inbound orders for aftermarket seating. So I think the opportunity is out there for us to take advantage of capturing share that's existing with other competitors out there. As long as we focus our offering and we do a much better job of advertising and having the right inventory fulfillment model. The other activity we started in Q1 was an incentive program for our field sales reps. So this is, I think, that was the leading behavior that's driving the trail as a result of increased inbound orders for aftermarket seats. So hopefully we'll continue to see positive momentum in that. But we're looking at all different angles and being contemporary in our approach on how we're driving aftermarket sales. It had been somewhat of a legacy business that was really focused on OE service for the major truck manufacturers. And now we're taking a more retail type approach with our field sales reps to have a more contemporary go at it. So, proof's in the pudding. But right now we have some good early indicators that we should see some uplift, which is also helping us put a better pencil on the second half of the year overall in the aggregate level of revenue. So we hope to see more aftermarket performance.
Steven Martin: All right. Thank you very much.
James Ray: Thank you.
Andy Cheung: Thanks, Steve.
Operator: Thank you. We have a follow-up question coming from the line of Joe Gomes from Noble Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Joshua Zoepfel: Hi, guys. Just a quick follow-up for me. Just a couple of quick questions. Like you guys mentioned, the additional cost actions and the press release. Can you provide just a little bit of detail what you guys are doing to offset inflation and foreign exchange headwinds? And then kind of how much more of the previous cost actions need to be completed before the full savings are kind of realized? Thank you.
Andy Cheung: Yes. Let me answer you on a few areas. So one is a large part of the cost action that we have is to make sure that we right-size our businesses so that we can offset the impact of the softer demand of our businesses, mostly in vehicle solutions as well as electrical. So electrical, as you can see, margin pressure for the quarter came from really two main things. One is there's labor increases in Mexico, and many of us are aware that there's some government mandate of labor cost increase in the border region of Mexico up to about 20%-ish. So it's really impacting some of our locations in our electrical business. And then the other one that is also creating some cost pressure for us is the strengthening of the Mexican peso. Which compared to a year ago is a double-digit increase in terms of the cost of Mexican peso denominated cost for us. So we're working on both ends. One is continue to do reduction in our cost structure. We're taking our labor, right-sizing the overhead. At the same time, and more importantly, we're also working with our customers commercially to resolve some of this cost pressure. I would say that we have made some progress already in terms of offsetting some of the labor inflation. But we're still working through offsetting some of the peso-strengthening cost pressure for us. So we'll continue those efforts in Q2, but we believe that we should be able to work with our customers to find some solutions.
James Ray: And referencing the other part of your question, last year we said we achieved approximately $30 million of cost-out activity at a gross level, gross projects. And then obviously the net, once you roll inflation in and other things, it brings numbers down. But we're on track to a similar number this year, both in supply chain as well as direct material. And we're taking a fresh look at indirect spend as well to achieve that same level. So we are leaning in, I would say, more specifically this year in other areas in addition to direct material. Some of our direct material is directed by, from our customers. We have a little less opportunity there than the spend that we have where we select our own suppliers and drive savings. So the framework that was put in place last year to drive the focus on direct material is still there. The framework that was put in place last year to have a specific cost-out deck per manufacturing facility on conversion costs is still in place. We're pursuing that. More emphasis now this year, pretty much driven by some macro items. So freight and logistics is one area with the disruption in the Suez Canal and some of our supply chains that go across region. That has caused us to take a more specific look at our freight and logistics and supply chain costs and see what opportunity we can get there. Also looking at on-shoring or near-shoring to reduce long supply chains, which have both FX risk as well as supply chain risk. So there are a number of items we're looking at to achieve that similar level of savings at a gross level that we achieved last year for this year, which is helping us further solidify our range on the EBITDA margin line.
Joshua Zoepfel: Thank you. I appreciate it.
Operator: Thank you. There seems to be no further questions at this time. I'd now like to turn the call back over to Mr. Ray for final closing comments.
James Ray: I'd like to thank you all for joining today's call. We remain excited for the prospects that we see for CVG as we continue to execute our forward-looking strategy of resource alignment, cost management, and customer engagement. We reaffirm our business outlook, and we look forward to continuing to drive growth at CVG. I hope you all have a great day and a safe day. Thank you very much for joining the call.
Operator: Thank you, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes your conference call for today. We thank you for participating and ask that you please disconnect your lines. Have a lovely day.
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