Operator
Operator
Hello and welcome to BD's fourth fiscal quarter and full fiscal year 2016 earnings call. At the request of BD today's call is being recorded. It will be available for replay through November 10, 2016, on the Investors page of the BD.com web site or by phone at 800-585-8367 for domestic calls and area code 404-537-3406 for international calls, using confirmation number 94169710. Beginning today's call is Ms. Monique Dolecki, Vice President of Investor Relations. Ms. Dolecki, you may begin. Monique N. Dolecki - Becton, Dickinson & Co.: Thank you, Christy. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us to review our fourth fiscal quarter results. As we referenced in our press release, we are presenting a set of slides to accompany our remarks on this call. The presentation is posted on the Investor Relations page of our website at BD.com. During today's call we will make forward-looking statements, and it is possible that actual results could differ from our expectations. Factors that could cause such differences appear in our fourth fiscal quarter press release and in the MD&A sections of our recent SEC filings. We will also discuss some non-GAAP financial measures with respect to our performance. A reconciliation to GAAP measures can be found in our press release and its related financial schedules and in the slides. A copy of the release, including the financial schedules, is posted on the BD.com website. As a reminder, we annualized the acquisition of CareFusion in March, and as such, our fourth quarter results reflect the new BD in both the current and prior year periods. In addition, comparable prior year revenues are adjusted to exclude the sales related to the terminated agreement with CareFusion for the sale of SMP's respiratory care products. The impact to the bottom line was not material. Comparable organic revenues are adjusted to further exclude the impact of non-annualized acquisitions and closed divestitures. The fiscal 2017 comparable revenue guidance provided today will exclude revenues of closed divestitures, most notably the Respiratory Solutions business that was divested in October of 2016, just after our fiscal year end. In the fourth quarter the company recorded a non-cash impairment charge for capitalized internal use IT software assets. This charge, along with the details of the purchase accounting and other smaller adjustments and the comparable basis revenue results can be found in the reconciliations to GAAP measures in the financial schedules in our press release or the appendix of the Investor Relations slides. Leading the call this morning is Vince Forlenza, Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President. Also joining us are Chris Reidy, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Administrative Officer; Tom Polen, Executive Vice President and President of the Medical Segment; and Alberto Mas, Executive Vice President and President of the Life Sciences Segment. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to Vince. Vincent A. Forlenza - Becton, Dickinson & Co.: Thank you, Monique, and good morning, everyone. First, congratulations to the Cub fans out there, especially the BD associates in Chicago. In the words of Brian Weinstein, go Cubs! Moving on to my presentation. As we stated in our press release, we are extremely proud of our accomplishments in our first full fiscal year as the new BD. As you already know, the acquisition of CareFusion 18 months ago significantly accelerated our strategy. And the powerful combination of BD and CareFusion continues to deliver positive results. We've seen significant benefits as a result of this transaction from a customer, employee, and shareholder standpoint. And we think there's more to come. Turning to Slide 4, I'd like to highlight some key achievements in fiscal year 2016. First, our results reflect our consistent performance and the benefit of our diverse geographic and product portfolio. Legacy BD remains solid. And the CareFusion portfolio has performed in line with our expectations. Second, emerging markets continue to be a key growth driver for the company. We experienced some headwinds this year, particularly in the Middle East and Africa, but remain confident that emerging markets are well positioned for continued growth. We also continue to create new growth opportunities for CareFusion products in these markets and expand their global reach by leveraging BD's international infrastructure. We're on track with our new product approval and submission plans and look forward to providing more color at our analyst meeting later this month. Developed markets continued to show stabilization. And growth has accelerated over the past year. Third, we made key strategic decisions to optimize our portfolio. This included the divestitures of BD Rx and the Spine business in conjunction with the joint venture for the Respiratory business, which we just completed in October. These actions further enable the organization to prioritize and invest in the most important opportunities for future growth. We were deliberate in increasing our R&D investment in targeted high growth areas and fully utilized the benefit of the medical device tax suspension. Fourth, we remain focused on our operating effectiveness and efficiency initiatives, which have generated significant margin expansion. This year, we drove approximately 200 basis points of underlying margin expansion, which includes approximately $120 million in cost synergies. We also delivered robust earnings growth of almost 30%, which is greater than our initial expectations. Lastly, we closed our first full year as the new BD, having achieved all important milestones. And also demonstrated that we are successfully executing on our acquisition of CareFusion. As we look forward, we continue to build on our solid foundation and look to fiscal year 2017 and beyond with confidence. Moving to Slide 5, you will see the guidance for fiscal year 2017 on a currency neutral basis. For the fiscal year 2017, we expect currency neutral revenue growth of 4.5% to 5%, based on our current view of the environment and various macroeconomic factors. There are a number of items that could bring us to the top or bottom end of that range, including a stronger or weaker flu season than expected, the performance of new product launches, emerging market growth, and pricing. On the bottom line we will continue to deliver high quality earnings growth. For fiscal year 2017 we expect EPS of $9.45 to $9.55, or $9.62 to $9.72 currency neutral, which reflects growth of 12% to 13%. Now I'd like to turn the call over to Chris who will walk you through our financial performance in the fourth quarter and full year, along with the additional details about our fiscal year 2017 guidance. Christopher R. Reidy - Becton, Dickinson & Co.: Thanks, Vince, and good morning, everyone. Moving on to Slide 7, I'd like to begin by discussing our fourth quarter revenue and EPS results, as well as the key financial highlights for the quarter and the total year. Total fourth quarter revenues of approximately $3.2 billion grew 6.4% on a comparable basis. Fully diluted adjusted EPS came in ahead of our expectations at $2.12, growing at 16.5% over the prior year. As Vince mentioned earlier, we are very pleased with our solid finish to the year, as the first full year as a combined entity with CareFusion. For the total year revenues grew 4.3%. We significantly expanded our margins and captured approximately $120 million in synergy cost savings. Adjusted EPS of $8.59 exceeded our expectations, driven by solid revenues, margin expansion, and an improved tax rate. In addition to the cost synergies, tax synergies have materialized sooner and have exceeded the benefits we anticipated in the early days of the transaction. We are also pleased to announce that we have continued to delever, as we reduce the debt associated with the acquisition of CareFusion. We are currently at 3.3 times gross leverage and remain on track to achieve our commitment of 3 times gross leverage by March of 2017. On Slide 8 I'll review our revenue growth by segment on a currency neutral basis. Fourth quarter revenue growth was 6.4% for the total company. In the quarter pricing was about flat. BD Medical fourth quarter revenues increased 7.9%. Medication and Procedural Solutions growth was 6.6%, which reflects strength in Flush [PosiFlush], ChloraPrep, and safety engineered products. Revenues in Medication Management Solutions, or MMS, grew 12.8%. This was driven by double digit growth in both dispensing and infusion sales. Respiratory Solution revenues increased 12.7%, as expected. This reflects strong capital installations and a favorable comparison to the prior year period. Growth in Diabetes Care was 3.6%. This reflects solid growth in pen needles which was partially offset by an unfavorable comparison to the prior year period. Pharmaceutical Systems growth of 5.1% reflects strength in our self-injection platform. For the total year, BD Medical grew 4.7%. BD Life Sciences fourth quarter revenues increased 2.7%, primarily driven by growth in Preanalytical Systems and Biosciences. Diagnostic System revenues were about flat compared to the prior year. This reflects continued strength in core microbiology in BD MAX, which grew double-digits in the quarter. This growth was offset by the timing of Kiestra installations outside the U.S., which I will speak to in just a moment. For the total year we are extremely pleased with our Microbiology business with Kiestra growing at about 19%. Preanalytical Systems growth of 4% was driven by safety engineered products and growth in the U.S. and emerging markets. BD Biosciences growth of 4% was driven by continued strong research instrument placements in the U.S., and reagent sales. For the total year Life Sciences grew 3.4%. The headwinds we experienced in Africa negatively impacted segment results by 60 basis points, bringing underlying growth to 4% for the total year. Moving to slide 9, I'll walk you through our geographic revenues for the fourth quarter on a currency neutral basis. U.S. growth was very strong at 7.2%. This was comprised of BD Medical growing at 7.7% and BD Life Sciences growing at 5.8%. BD Medical's performance reflects strong growth in capital placements and a wide range of infusion disposable products in our Medication and Procedural Solutions business. Growth was also driven by our Pharmaceutical Systems business. BD Life Sciences growth reflects strong performance across the segment in the U.S. The growth in our Biosciences business was driven by high parameter research instruments, including FACSymphony, our FACSCelesta midlevel analyzer and the launch of the FACSMelody. Our U.S. Diagnostics business saw continued growth in Microbiology, including Kiestra and the BD MAX molecular platform. The Preanalytical Systems business grew 5%, driven by safety engineered products. Moving on to international, revenues grew 5.2%. This is below our normal growth rate, which is primarily related to the Life Sciences segment. The Medical segment grew 8.2%. This was driven by strong performance from infusion disposable products in the MPS business and strong performance in China. Growth was also driven by medication management, reflecting double-digit growth in both dispensing and infusion. Growth in the Life Science segment was about flat compared to the prior year. We experienced a decline in Diagnostic Systems due to the timing of Kiestra installations. Increased installations in the third fiscal quarter negatively impacted the fourth fiscal quarter in conjunction with a tough comparison to the prior year fourth quarter. Biosciences growth was slower in the quarter due to continued declines in Africa, as we anticipated. The Preanalytical Systems business grew 2.9%, driven by strength in China, which was partially offset by a tough comparison to the prior year period. On slide 10, Developed Markets grew a healthy 5.8%, bringing the total year growth to 4.1%. Emerging Market revenues grew 8.5%, currency neutral, bringing our year-to-date growth rate to 5.3%. China growth for the fourth quarter was 17.7%, bringing the total year growth rate to 10.1%. Growth in Emerging Markets this fiscal year was slower than initially expected in the Middle East and Africa. And we believe those challenges are largely behind us after we exit the first quarter of fiscal year 2017. Emerging Markets remain an important growth driver. And given our robust international footprint, we are well positioned to drive growth well into the future. Looking into fiscal year 2017, we expect Emerging Markets to grow high single digits, driven by a diversified base, with China growing low double digits, continued strength in Latin America, and fewer headwinds in EMA and Africa. In terms of Developed Markets we believe the stability we have seen in the market over the past 12 to 18 months will continue, yielding a growth rate of about 4%. Moving to Global Safety on slide 11. Currency neutral sales increased 5.9% and grew to $783 million in the quarter. Safety revenues in the U.S. grew 5.7%. This reflects continued strength of safety catheters, as well as a benefit from the timing of orders across our hypodermic products. International sales grew 6.2% currency neutral. International performance in the Medical segment was driven by continued strength in China. And safety revenues grew 13.8% in emerging markets. Medical Safety sales grew 7%, driven by infusion disposables, catheters, and a range of safety engineered products. Life Sciences Safety sales, which were driven by our Preanalytical Systems unit, grew 4% in the quarter. Slide 12 recaps the fourth quarter income statement and highlights our currency neutral results. Revenues grew a strong 6.4% in the quarter. Gross profit was strong, growing faster than revenues at 7.9%. And I'll provide more details on gross profit in just a moment. SSG&A as a percentage of revenue was 24.4%. We are very pleased with the leverage we are getting, which is masked in this quarter by key strategic investments in product launches in both segments. R&D as a percentage of revenues was 7.8%, which is higher than normal due to the timing of spend, as anticipated. As a result of the medical device tax suspension, we were able to make additional investments in a number of high growth areas. After normalizing for the significant additional investment in R&D, underlying operating income would have grown about 10% in the quarter. Our tax rate declined to 16.2% in the quarter, due to the reinstatement of the R&D tax credit, tax synergies materializing earlier than expected, and continued favorable geographic mix. In the quarter adjusted earnings per share were $2.12, which is a 16.5% increase versus the prior year. Turning to slide 13 and our gross profit and operating margins for the fourth quarter. On a performance basis gross profit margin improved by 90 basis points, driven by continuous improvement initiatives. This was more than offset by significant currency headwinds of 110 basis points. On an operating margin basis we're extremely pleased to have delivered about 100 basis points of underlying margin expansion. As I mentioned on the previous slide, the leverage we are getting in SSG&A as we continue to drive cost synergies is being masked in the quarter by investments in key product launches. In addition, margin expansion was partially offset by significant R&D investments, as expected, and unfavorable currency. I'd like to take a moment on slide 14 to highlight some of our key operational achievements for fiscal year 2016. The acquisition of CareFusion provided BD a unique opportunity to leverage the transaction to optimize the combined organization through functional transformations. And we have made significant progress in this area. All of our efforts have yielded results, and we are on track to deliver continued synergies. In aggregate we have achieved over $170 million in total cost synergies to date. We have also driven significant margin expansion on a multi-year trajectory. Starting with fiscal year 2015, we delivered 100 basis points of operating margin expansion. This year we achieved another 200 basis points. And we believe we are well positioned to deliver another 175 to 225 basis points in fiscal year 2017. Over those 3 years we will have driven over 500 basis points of cumulative margin expansion. And I believe that we continue to drive robust performance with additional synergies in conjunction with continuous improvement going forward. We are extremely proud of the organization's ability to continue improving on our skills and expertise by executing against our synergy commitment initiatives through these transformations. Moving on to slide 15. I'd like to highlight our robust EPS growth, which exceeded our expectations this year. Starting with 2015 EPS of $7.16, we had communicated last November that we would grow EPS 22% to 23% on a currency neutral basis. Beyond our initial expectations, we delivered an incremental 400 basis points from margin improvement. We also realized incremental benefits from our tax rate improvement, which yielded 300 basis points, bringing EPS to $9.24. Unfavorable currency headwinds impacted earnings per share by 900 basis points. Despite that significant headwind, we were still able to deliver $8.59 of earnings. On a currency neutral basis earnings grew 29.1%, which we believe demonstrates our ability to deliver on our commitments. Moving on to slide 17. There are a number of factors to consider when discussing our earnings per share in fiscal year 2017. For modeling purposes and to ensure consistency, I'd like to provide more color on our EPS guidance. First, as I mentioned, we are extremely pleased with strong EPS growth this year. Looking forward, we expect currency neutral EPS to grow between 12% and 13%. This is partially muted by the impact of the Respiratory JV, as we have previously communicated. Pension also presents a headwind next year of approximately 100 basis points. Contributing to EPS growth is approximately 200 basis points from the adoption of a new accounting standard related to the tax accounting on our stock compensation programs. In addition, we estimate that currency will once again present a headwind. Our guidance assumes a euro to dollar exchange rate of $1.10. On an adjusted basis we expect to achieve very strong earnings of $9.45 to $9.55. Turning to slide 18, I'd like to walk you through the balance of our guidance expectations for the full fiscal year 2017. As Vince mentioned earlier in the presentation, we expect revenue growth of 4.5% to 5%, with BD Medical growing 4.5% to 5% and Life Sciences growing between 4% to 5%. Growth in both segments contemplates a small amount of pricing pressure. From a phasing perspective we expect currency neutral revenue growth in the first quarter to be below this range. This is primarily due to some lingering softness in the EMA region and the timing of tenders in our Biosciences business. This will result in a currency neutral revenue growth of about 4% in the first fiscal quarter. We expect revenue growth to return back to our guidance range in the second fiscal quarter with continued acceleration over the back half of the year. We expect gross profit margin to be between 53% and 54%, which is a significant milestone for BD. SSG&A as a percentage of sales is expected to be between 23.5% and 24%. Our guidance also reflects continued investments in emerging markets as well as costs related to new product launches and registration cost. We expect our R&D investments to be in line with fiscal year 2016, at about 6% to 6.5% of revenues, as we continue to invest in new products and platforms. As a result of the items I just detailed, operating margin is expected to be between 23% and 24% of revenues, up from 20.8% (sic) [21.8%] this year. Excluding the unfavorable impact of foreign currency, we expect our underlying operating margin to improve by 175 to 225 basis points. This also excludes slight pension headwinds. We expect our tax rate to be between 17% and 19%, driven by tax synergies, favorable geographic mix, and a benefit from accounting change in our stock compensation program. For fiscal year 2017 we anticipate our average fully diluted share count to be approximately 219 million. Cash flow is expected to remain strong with operating cash flow of about $2.7 billion in fiscal year 2017. Capital expenditures are expected to be about $700 million. In summary, we have good momentum exiting this fiscal year. And looking forward into 2017 we are building off a solid foundation. I'm confident that fiscal year 2017 will be another strong year of performance, positioning us well for continued success. Now I'd like to turn the call back over to Vince, who will provide you with our concluding remarks. Vincent A. Forlenza - Becton, Dickinson & Co.: Thank you, Chris. Moving on to slide 20. We are pleased with the progress we continue to make on our pipeline and believe we have the most robust pipeline in the company's history. We have recently obtained a number of approvals. I'll touch on just a few. On the Medical side of the business we are pleased that our partner, Fresenius, received their first FDA approval for IV solution products. Additional approvals are expected. And we are on track to start shipping these products late in the first half of the year. Last quarter we received our first orders for FlowSmart, our new insulin infusion set, where Medtronic serves as our distribution partner. Early patient feedback has been extremely positive. On the Life Science side of the business, we are pleased that the FDA has approved the BD MAX vaginal panel and also the GC/CT/TV [CT/GC/TV] assay. We launched our new Phoenix ID/AST instrument. We launched the FACSMelody and received approval for Barricor in the U.S. We plan to share more about our pipeline on November 17 at our upcoming analyst day. Also on analyst day we will discuss the company's strategy and vision for the future and how we are helping to address healthcare's most pressing challenges. The segment leaders will do a deep dive into our business units, which will include some key product launches that we will be unveiling for the first time. We will conclude the day with a financial framework that will outline our plans for sustainable revenue growth, continued margin expansion, strong cash flow generation, and capital deployment. And ultimately demonstrate how all of those things will drive long-term value not only for our customers and patients they serve, but also for our employees and our shareholders. Moving on to slide 21, I would like to reiterate the key messages from our presentation today. First, we're extremely pleased with our first fiscal year as the new BD. We believe that we have demonstrated that we can successfully execute on the integration of our – of the largest transaction in the company's history. Second, the diversity of our portfolio from a product and geographic perspective provides consistent and reliable earnings growth. Third, we continue to invest in key strategic areas and at the same time deliver significant margin expansion and double digit earnings growth. We're looking forward to sharing more details about our pipeline at our analyst day in 2 weeks. We believe we have the most robust pipeline in the company's history. And we look to fiscal year 2017 and beyond with confidence. Finally, I would like to say thank you to all of our associates around the world for our successful first full fiscal year as a combined company with CareFusion. It's a testament to the hard work of all of our employees that we delivered on our commitments. I believe we have a tremendous opportunity to create a true industry leader, as we continue to advance the world of health. So with that, thank you. We will now open the call to questions.