Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to Albany International’s Fourth Quarter 2023 Earnings Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker’s presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] Please be advised that today’s conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to your speaker for today, John Hobbs, Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Lisa, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to Albany International’s fourth quarter earnings conference call. As a reminder for those listening on the call, please refer to our press release issued last night detailing our quarterly financial results. Contained in the text of the release is a notice regarding our forward-looking statements and the use of certain non-GAAP financial measures and their reconciliation to GAAP. For the purposes of the conference call, those same statements apply to our verbal remarks this morning. Today, we will make statements that are forward-looking and contain a number of risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ from those expressed or implied. For a full discussion of these risks and uncertainties, please refer to both our earnings release of February 26th, as well as our SEC filings, including our 10-K. Now, I turn the call over to Gunnar Kleveland, President and Chief Executive Officer, who will provide opening remarks. Gunnar?

Thank you, John. Good morning and welcome, everyone. Thank you for joining our fourth quarter earnings call. Before we begin this call, I want to take a moment and acknowledge John Hobbs, who’s been leading our Investor Relations functions for the past five years. John has been instrumental in communicating our story to the investment community and has taken the IR function at Albany to the next level. After a long career with nearly three decades in Investor Relations, John is retiring and he will transition his responsibilities to JC Chetnani. We wish John and his wife the best in his retirement and we welcome JC to his new role. Moving to our 2023 performance, I continue to be impressed with our operations and remain confident about the strengths of our company and our long-term growth potential. Technological innovation, material science knowhow, operational execution, customer satisfaction and capital discipline are all key to the long-term success of Albany. I’ll provide an overview of 2023’s financial performance. Rob will later discuss our fourth quarter results in detail and provide our outlook for 2024. In 2023, our businesses remain focused on operational execution and delivered outstanding financial performance. This is a testament to the strong management team at Albany, who have stayed a step ahead of global macroeconomic issues and allowed us to deliver our high-quality products on time with excellent financial results. We close the year with consolidated revenue of $1.15 billion, up 11%, primarily driven by 12% topline growth in our Engineered Composites business, along with 10% topline revenue growth in Machine Clothing, largely resulting from our recent Heimbach acquisition. Importantly, we grew adjusted EBITDA to $265 million, up 5% over the prior year. Adjusted EBITDA margins came in just over 23% versus the prior year of 24.5%. The margin…

Thank you, Gunnar, and good morning, everyone. I will review our fourth quarter results of 2023 and then provide our outlook for 2024. During the quarter, a number of factors resulted in us delivering a result well ahead of our earlier expectations. At Machine Clothing, we successfully executed on a number of consumer orders, resulting in drawing down our backlog to more normalized levels. We also saw accelerated procurement savings as a result of the team’s efforts to optimize our supply chain, a nice early win from our Heimbach integration. Additionally, Heimbach’s standalone results were better than expected for the quarter. Corporate expenses came in lower than expected as we were managing controllable expenses. Our favorable effective tax rate for the quarter is due to the impact of a few discrete items. For the fourth quarter, we reported net sales of $324 million, up 20.4% from the fourth quarter last year and 19.6% versus the prior year period on a currency neutral basis. The growth was primarily driven by Heimbach. Fourth quarter Machine Clothing net sales, excluding Heimbach, increased 2.8% on a currency neutral basis versus the fourth quarter of the prior year. Higher sales to the packaging and tissue industries were partially offset by contraction in our other end markets, most notably engineered fabrics. In terms of geography, markets in the Americas are stronger year-over-year, Asian markets are slightly positive, while European markets remain soft. Engineered Composites net sales of $132 million increased 10.6% on a currency neutral basis compared to the fourth quarter of 2022. Our growth was driven by strength across our commercial and space programs, partially offset by our defense programs. I would like to highlight that our recurring production revenues on the defense programs increased year-over-year, driven by both CH-53K and JASSM. During the fourth…

Thank you. [Operator Instructions] Our first question today is coming from Steve Tusa of J.P. Morgan. Your line is open.

Hey. Good morning. How are you?

Hi. How are you, Steve?

Good morning.

John, nice working with you. Congrats on retirement.

Thank you very much.

Just maybe a little bit of color on the quarterly cadence for the year on sales and margins by segment for 2024?

Yeah. So, Steve, we haven’t provided a quarterly guidance. I think, if you look historically, we tend to be a little bit lighter in Q1, but I would just say that, when you look at the nature of our business, there really isn’t a seasonality that is really significant. So I wouldn’t overweight one quarter significantly over another at this point.

Okay. And then just maybe your latest color on what’s happening at Boeing and how you guys are kind of aligning with their production, which seems a little more volatile than expected maybe a few months ago.

Yeah. Obviously, we’re watching that with high interest, Steve. But our contract and relationship is with Safran, and they said it very succinctly in their earnings call that they are -- they have a plan for the year and will continue on that until there are changes coming from Boeing. And that’s kind of our position as well. We have a plan. We recognize there might be a reduction in that. That’ll have some revenue impact, but mostly revenue impact. So, we’ll wait and see. It will be -- the first quarter will probably be indicative to where the year goes with the LEAP going to Boeing.

And then just one more quick one, just cash conversion for 2024. Thanks a lot for the details.

Great. Thank you. I’m sorry, say that again, Steve?

Cash conversion.

Cash…

Oh! Cash conversion…

Cash conversation. Yeah.

So cash conversation will be an improvement over this year. That is what we’re expecting. We haven’t provided that level of detail, but we are -- if you look at our prior Investor Day materials, our long-term goal is to get net income conversion just like near net income. So, we’re not there yet. We’re still in growth mode. So we still are ramping up on a number of programs, Steve, but it should be higher than this year for sure.

Great. Thanks a lot, guys.

Thank you. One moment for the next question. Our next question will be coming from Jan-Frans Engelbrecht of Baird. Your line is open.

Thanks. Good morning, John, Rob and Gunnar. Congrats on a good quarter. I guess, I’ll start with, can you just give us a sense if there’s been any communication with Safran on the LEAP contract pricing structure? And could you see this transition from a cost-plus to a fixed price in the near-term? I would imagine that fixed price would be quite attractive for your margin profile?

Yeah. We -- the structure remains the same. It is a cost-plus program. And coming into this role, I can tell you that I’m surprised to see that that is the way the contract is constructed. And as we go forward, our goal -- our joint goal is to reduce the cost of 3D woven products so that it becomes more attractive in the market beyond LEAP and some of the other projects that we’re doing. So we’re looking at that structure and we will update when we’re ready.

Perfect. Thanks. That’s helpful. Just a quick follow-up. On the integration of Heimbach, are there any additional lessons that you’ve maybe learned in terms of pricing that you could incorporate in the existing business or vice versa that you could just share with us?

Yeah. You learn -- you always learn something when you get into the details of a new company. I’ve spent quite a bit of time there. I’ve been to four of the sites getting into the detail. I think the best way to describe this is, we have a very strong Machine Clothing business. They’re very good at what they do. What we’re doing with the Machine Clothing business is what you should expect to see from the Heimbach integration. The bonus here is that we’re getting new technology, we’re getting a stronger presence both in Asia and in Europe, and technology that is complementing. So we’re seeing that. We’re very confident with where we’re going with this integration. It’s a very good acquisition.

Perfect. Thank you. I’ll jump back in the queue. Thanks.

Thank you. One moment for the next question. And our next question will be coming from Pete Osterland of Truist Securities. Your line is open.

Hey. Good morning. I’m on for Mike Ciarmoli this morning. Thanks for taking our questions. First, on Machine Clothing…

Good morning.

Good morning. On Machine Clothing segment, what is your outlook for growth for the Heimbach business in 2024? Is there any meaningful difference between the growth you’re expecting for the year there relative to your legacy Machine Clothing business?

No. I think we look at the whole business as a GDP growth business. We expect Heimbach to be relatively flat based on the concentration of European businesses, but they also have a business in Asia. So, with that, we think the first year will be flat.

Great. Thanks. And then just as a follow-up, with the step-up for capital expenditures in your guidance this year, if you could just provide some more detail there, how much of the year-over-year increase is related to the acquisition and are there any areas within AEC you could talk about where you’re targeting increased capital spending this year to drive future growth? Thank you.

Sure. This is Rob. We are going to see a higher level just with the addition of Heimbach. They are investing in their capacity as well and capabilities. So, that’s definitely an impact. As it relates to AEC, we continue to be in ramp mode in a number of programs, plus we’ve got some other wins that we’re going to need to make some investment in this year to support the growth. With 10% growth, I mean, that’s really just fundamental as we’re going to see some level of elevated CapEx for a little bit of time here. However, I would just say that, the other piece where we’re investing and it shows up with purchase software is, we do have some CMMC and other requirements. But overall, the investment level that we’re reflecting for this year really just reflects the topline growth -- double-digit topline.

Great. Thanks for the color.

Thank you. [Operator Instructions] One moment for the next question. And our next question will be coming from Jordan Lane of Bank of America. Your line is open.

Hey. Good morning. Thank you for taking the question. I know you guys said that you’re aligning with Safran and CFM’s guide. Are you seeing any changes from their ability to take on excess inventory, and then also, too, for your production schedule this year? Are you doing anything different to avoid the excess inventory that they held through 2023?

Our plan with Safran has been set for the year. We’ve not seen any changes. There was some buildup of inventory last year because we kept it flat through the end of the year, but with a higher consumption expected this year, that inventory, both with us, Safran, will slowly be reduced. So our plan is -- on the program is relatively flat for the year, which will impact with a lower inventory.

Okay. Got it. And then just one follow-up, too. On M&A, could you guys talk a little bit about the pipeline right now? Is there any specific area you guys are looking to increase exposure?

Yeah. We -- there’s a lot of activity. I think it’s picked up. We get new opportunities in front of us on a weekly basis. So we are assessing everything that makes sense for us. The -- we just want to make sure that it’s a good fit for us and also that the multiple makes sense. We’ve seen some of the multiples be pretty high and with the cost of capital right now, we want to make sure that we make the right acquisition. We’re also looking at internal where do we spend, as the last caller said, we have relatively high capital expenditure and that’s because we see the opportunities there with the returns being very accretive. But we’ll continue to look and the market is active.

Thank you guys so much.

Thank you.

Thank you. One moment for the next question. The next question is coming from Gautam Khanna of TD Cowen. Your line is open.

Thanks for taking the question. This is Spencer Breitzke on for Gautam Khanna. Could you talk about your assumptions for CH-53K and F-35 for 2024? Thank you.

So CH-53K continues to grow in line with the plan from Sikorsky and the Marines. Good program, good growth, lots of work. We’re actually here in Salt Lake City today doing the call and we’ll be spending time later this week with Sikorsky. On the Joint Strike Fighter, I think, we should expect to see some growth to relatively flat. We know what Lockheed Martin is saying that they will build and will support the build. We’re ready to support that build, but last year it remained below 100. We’re hoping to see that it goes above 100, but we have planned for a rate right around the 100 in our numbers.

Thank you. Could you also talk about Europe demand for Machine Clothing and what you’re saying regarding destocking? Thank you.

Yeah. We’ve seen Europe being soft. We don’t see it becoming softer, but we’re keeping our eyes on Europe and the latest expectations of GDP growth there. Are you still on?

Spencer, are you there.

Yeah. Thank you. That’s all for me.

Okay.

Thank you. That concludes today’s Q&A session. I will now turn the call back over to Gunnar Kleveland for closing remarks. Please go ahead.

All right. Thank you and thank you everyone for joining us on the call today. We appreciate your continued interest in Albany International. Thank you and have a good day.

This concludes today’s conference call. You may all disconnect.