Mitch Butier
Analyst · Robert W. Baird & Company. Please proceed
Let me start by thanking you, Dean, for your leadership, counsel and support over the years, not just from me personally, but on behalf of the entire organization. You have taken Avery Dennison to new heights and I am extremely honored to be able to build on your legacy as I become the next CEO and I am grateful to be able to continue to tap your vast experience in your role as Chairman. This is a great company with great people and I could not be more confident in the company’s position nor more excited by our prospects. As CEO, my focus remains the same ensuring the long-term success of the company by delivering exceptional value for our customers, our employees and our shareholders. Our two industry leading core businesses are well-positioned for profitable growth. That growth combined with our constant focus on productivity and capital discipline will enable us to continue to deliver strong returns for our shareholders. As Dean said, we are pleased to report a very good start to the year. We beat our expectations for Q1 EPS by a few cents, reflecting continued outperformance in pressure-sensitive materials. Our consistently strong performance speaks to the strategic foundations we have laid. We are focused on driving profitable growth through differentiated quality, service and innovation with the specific goal to accelerate growth in high value market segments that have above average growth and margin potential, such as tapes, graphics, RFID and emerging markets. We will continue to invest disproportionately here both organically and through bolt-on acquisitions. Over time, this will improve our portfolio mix and bolster our leadership positions in these key segments. In addition to driving growth in high value categories, we are also focused on driving more profitable growth in those that are less differentiated, such as base materials for barcode labels in pressure-sensitive and the value and contemporary segments of RBIS. We are increasing our competitiveness here by lowering our cost and tailoring our go-to-market strategies. And finally, productivity improvement remains a top priority. This has been the core strength of ours over the years and it is something we will continue to focus on through continued deployment of Lean and Six Sigma, ongoing innovations and product reengineering and investments in automation and restructuring. I want to stress that our productivity focus is not just about lowering cost and expanding margins, both of which are crucial, but also about becoming more competitive so we can grow profitably and better serve the less differentiated segments of our markets. Now, let me describe how these strategic priorities are playing out within each of our businesses. As you know, our goal in PSM is to create value by growing the top line of this high return business at 4% to 5% organically, while expanding operating margins. And I am pleased to say that the team continues to deliver on both fronts. This business has consistently generated solid organic growth for the past 4 years and Q1 was no exception, with 4% organic growth driven by emerging markets and strength in graphics and specialty label materials. We see opportunities to continue expanding in such high-value categories and are investing to support this growth, including through acquisitions. The Mactac deal is an excellent case in point. I will comment more on that in just a moment. As for the less differentiated product categories, I am pleased to say we have made good progress on this over the past year and saw a continuation of that trend in Q1. We have more to do on this front, but overall, good progress. As I said, our acquisition of Mactac Europe demonstrates the execution of our strategic priority to further penetrate high value segments as this acquisition enhances our position in both graphics and tapes. This is a classic bolt-on acquisition that meets all of our strategic and financial criteria for acquisitions. Mactac is known in Europe for its high-quality pressure-sensitive graphic materials, with products and capabilities that are complementary to our existing business. It has a loyal customer base and gives us access to new distributors. Incidentally, given the high customer loyalty and opportunity to broaden our distributor network, we intend to maintain the Mactac brand in Europe and Mactac’s manufacturing facility in Belgium adds new capacity to support growth for both graphics and tapes. Shifting now to Retail Branding and Information Solutions, the RBIS team continues to win in high value categories. Sales for radiofrequency identification products grew by more than 70% in Q1 and sales growth for the performance athletic brands was solid once again. Furthermore, the team continues to execute well on its business model transformation, which will enable this business to win in the less differentiated value and contemporary segments while driving significant margin expansion. To this end, we are executing an aggressive set of restructuring and other productivity actions designed to put RBIS back on the margin expansion trajectory necessary to achieve our long-term financial goals. Let me remind you that this multiyear transformation what it entails. We are reducing our fixed cost, localizing our material sourcing and responding more quickly to changes in our customer needs by decentralizing decision-making. In short, we are rapidly moving to a business model that is making us more competitive. We are seeing early signs of success from this change as we have realized core volume gains in the value segment. Now, volumes for core products among the department stores, what we call contemporary segment, are still down due in large part to the challenges that these customers face in their own markets. Overall, the RBIS team is making solid progress against the transformation. And we are pleased with the results on the top line and bottom line in the quarter. That said, the second quarter will be a key test for us as it is the seasonally most important quarter for this business. Turning now to Vancive Medical Technologies, first quarter results were simply disappointing with a significant drop in sales. While our long-term new product platform continues to gain traction, we have been losing ground with respect to our core product pipeline. We began taking actions mid last year that are beginning to refill that pipeline, but it will take time to recover due to the long sales cycle in this business. We are committed to achieving consistent growth in our long-term margin objectives for Vancive. Coming back to the total company view, in terms of our outlook for 2016, we have raised the midpoint of our adjusted EPS guidance by about $0.08, reflecting some relief from currency headwinds as well as the strong results we delivered in the first quarter. Even more important, we remain highly confident in our ability to consistently deliver exceptional value over the long run based on the execution of our key strategies. We plan to continue to drive outside growth in high value segments, relentlessly focus on productivity to improve our competitiveness in less differentiated segments and drive margin expansion, maintain our high degree of capital efficiency while increasing investments to support profitable growth and continue our disciplined approach to returning cash to shareholders. Now, I will turn the call over to Anne.