Operator
Operator
Hello and welcome to BD's Third Fiscal Quarter 2017 Earnings Call. At the request of BD, today's call is being recorded. It will be available for replay through August 10th, 2017, on the Investor's page of the bd.com website or by phone at 800-585-8367 for domestic, and area code 404-537-3406 for international calls using confirmation number 50820826. 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, Crystal. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us to review our third 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 third 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. The third quarter comparable revenue growth rates and fiscal year 2017 comparable revenue guidance provided today excludes the revenues of divestitures, most notably, the Respiratory Solutions business that was divested in October of 2016, just after our 2016 fiscal year-end. The details of 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. As a result of previously communicated changes related to the transformation of our U.S. dispensing business model, we recorded a one-time non-cash charge of approximately $495 million net of tax during the third fiscal quarter of 2017. We continue to expect the impact of the change to be a headwind of approximately $50 million to $60 million to revenues, and 2% to 3% to EPS in fiscal year 2017. The impact to revenues and EPS is ratable across the third and fourth fiscal quarters of 2017. As a reminder, this change results in a difficult comparison which is limited to the second half of this fiscal year and the first half of fiscal year 2018, but it creates a more predictable revenue stream going forward. More complete details can be found in our 10Q, which will be filed later today. Please note that all fiscal year 2017 guidance provided is on a BD stand-alone basis. Regarding the Bard transaction, all strategic and financial parameters remain unchanged from the deal announcement. After closing, we will provide more explicit guidance for the combined company. Leading the call this morning is Vince Forlenza, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. Also joining us are Chris Reidy, Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Administration Officer; Tom Polen, President; 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. As you read in this morning's press release, we are pleased with our performance this quarter. Our core remains strong and we continued to deliver consistent solid results. As we take you through the results, there are a number of puts and takes within the year, but the sum of it is that our performance is strong. Year-to-date, adjusting for the Respiratory Solutions divestiture, we are growing 4.5% on the top line, with high-single digit operating income growth and strong mid-teens EPS growth as we are overcoming the impact of the U.S. dispensing change with strong underlying performance. In the quarter, China and the broader emerging markets posted strong double-digit growth reflecting our momentum in these important markets. Total revenue growth was slightly lower than expected, which Chris will touch upon in just a few moments. We continue to make excellent progress and are on track to achieve our CareFusion cost and revenue synergies. Our fiscal 2017 revenue synergies are being driven by international registrations of consumable products in MPS, along with dispensing in MMS. We now have 225 approved or in-process product registrations in new markets, with an ultimate target of over 250 registrations. The strategic transformation of the U.S. dispensing business model that we communicated last quarter has been successfully implemented, and customer reception has been overwhelmingly positive. As we look to the total year, we are very confident in our outlook. The strength of our year-to-date performance allows us to reaffirm our currency-neutral revenue and earnings guidance. Also, as a result of favorable foreign currency movement, we are raising our adjusted earnings guidance. Turning to slide 5, our pending acquisition of C.R. Bard remains on track, with an expected closing date in the fourth calendar quarter of 2017, subject to regulatory and Bard shareholder approvals. Upon announcement, we communicated a fall 2017 closing timeframe. That remains unchanged, and our continued expectation is that we will close in the November to December 2017 timeframe. Overall, things are progressing quite nicely. We are also pleased that Bard's business performance to date is strong and in-line with our expectations, as evidenced by their recently-recorded quarterly earnings. From an integration standpoint, we should receive regulatory approval sooner – if we receive regulatory approval sooner, we'll be ready. We have been able to leverage our experience from the CareFusion acquisition to lay the plans for another successful integration, and we have made excellent progress to date. We've created a detailed execution plan that builds upon our CareFusion experience, and are very pleased that we are well ahead of where we were at this time with CareFusion. In terms of talent, we have retained key Bard leadership, including John Groetelaars, who will serve as President of the new Interventional segment; John DeFord, who has been named SVP Research and Development for the Interventional segment; and Betty Larson, who has been named SVP, Human Resources for the new segment. In addition, John Groetelaars' full leadership team has been established, with all regional and business presidents in place. We're thrilled with the number of exceptional Bard leaders dedicated to making the combined company a success as we move forward together. We will share more information about the new company structure as we progress towards the closing. As you are aware, shortly after announcing the Bard acquisition, we went to market and successfully issued approximately $5 billion dollars in common and preferred shares. We also launched nearly $10 billion dollars in senior notes. All offerings were over-subscribed by a multiple of over three times. As a combined company, we believe we will further accelerate and broaden our strategy, create new growth opportunities for both companies, and deliver meaningful long-term value for shareholders. Together, we will be uniquely positioned to deliver innovative healthcare solutions that improve both the process of care and the treatment of disease. So now I'll turn things over to Chris for a more detailed discussion of our third quarter financial performance and our fiscal year 2017 guidance. Christopher R. Reidy - Becton, Dickinson & Co.: Thanks, Vince, and good morning everyone. Like Vince, I'm also pleased by the progress we are making with our integration planning for the Bard acquisition, and the value the combination will create for our customers, patients, and shareholders globally. Moving on to slide 7, I'll review our third quarter revenue and EPS results, which I'll speak to on a currency-neutral basis. Total third quarter revenues of approximately $3 billion dollars grew 2.4% on a comparable basis, which was slightly below our expectations. We estimate that the U.S. dispensing change lowered total company revenue growth by approximately 100 basis points, in line with our previously-communicated expectations. As Vince mentioned, our underlying performance is strong. Accounting for the dispensing change and the timing of items within the year, our third quarter results would have been in the low end of our full-year guidance range of 4.5% to 5%. I'll provide more color on revenue growth in the quarter in a moment, when I take you through the results by segment and geography. Adjusted EPS of $2.46 grew 7.7%. As expected, EPS was impacted by the divestiture of the Respiratory Solutions business, as well as the U.S. Dispensing business model change, which resulted in a combined headwind of approximately 600 basis points to EPS growth. We're very pleased with our performance year-to-date. Revenue growth is strong at 4.5%. Accounting for the approximate 40-basis-point impact from the U.S. dispensing change, we estimate that the revenue growth year-to-date would have been near the high end of our 4.5%-to-5% guidance range. Year-to-date EPS growth of 13.1% reflects our ability to grow over the dilution from the Respiratory divestiture and the U.S. dispensing change. Moving on to slide 8, I'll review our revenue growth by segment on a comparable currency-neutral basis. In the quarter, pricing declined about 20 basis points. BD Medical third quarter revenues increased 1.3%. Revenues in the Medical segment was slightly below our expectations in the quarter. Year-to-date, Medical revenues grew a strong 4.5%, which includes an estimated 50-basis-point headwind from the U.S. Dispensing change. Medication and Procedural Solutions, or MPS, growth was 3.7%, which reflects strength in infusion-related disposables and infection prevention. Growth in MPS in the U.S. was below our expectations, due to the normalization of inventory levels across several major distributors. Revenues in Medication Management Solutions, or MMS, declined 4.2%. We estimate that the U.S. dispensing change lowered MMS revenue growth by approximately 550 basis points. MMS revenue growth was also impacted by strong capital insulations in dispensing in the first half of the fiscal year, as previously communicated. In addition, within our International Infusion business, certain customer orders planned for the third quarter are now expected to occur in the fourth fiscal quarter. On an underlying basis that accounts for these items, we estimate that MMS would have grown in the mid-single digits. We continue to be pleased as we gain momentum in the market in our MMS business. Diabetes Care revenue growth of 2.7% was driven by 4.2% growth in the U.S. and double-digit growth in emerging markets. International growth was impacted by some softness in Europe, primarily in the U.K., where we are seeing increasing pressure from government payers as part of austerity measures. Pharmaceutical Systems revenues grew 3.9%. Results were impacted by the timing of customer orders that benefited growth in the first quarter. Year-to-date, Pharmaceutical Systems grew 6.1%. BD Life Sciences third quarter revenues grew – increased 4.8%. Growth was driven by strong performance in Biosciences and solid growth in Diagnostic Systems and Preanalytical Systems. Revenues in Diagnostics Systems grew 3.8%. Strength in Core Microbiology was driven by blood culture and IDAST partially offset by the timing of BD Kiestra installations which we expect to occur in the fourth quarter. In addition, we saw strong accelerated growth in our BD MAX molecular platform driven by the recent introduction of new enteric's and women's health assays. Preanalytical Systems growth of 3.9% was driven by strength in wing sets, including the recently-introduced BD UltraTouch. Biosciences revenues grew a strong 7.1%. This reflects continued strength in research reagents driven by our Sirigen dyes and growth from new recently-launched research instruments such as the FACSMelody. Moving on to slide nine I'll walk you through our geographic revenues for the third quarter on a comparable currency-neutral basis. U.S. growth was about flat with BD Life Sciences growing at 5.2% and BD Medical declining 1.3%. We estimate the U.S. dispensing change lowered BD Medical U.S. revenue growth by approximately 270 basis points and total company U.S. growth by approximately 200 basis points. Performance in BD Medical in the U.S. reflects growth in the MPS and Diabetes Care units. This growth was offset by the timing and geography of orders in Pharmaceutical Systems and the U.S. dispensing change. Performance in the Medication Management Solution unit also reflects the timing of capital placements that occurred earlier in the fiscal year, revenues in MPS were driven by strength across a wide range of infusion disposables and infection prevention, partially offset by the normalization of inventory levels. BD Life Sciences growth reflects strong performance in Biosciences and Preanalytical Systems. Growth in our U.S. Diagnostics business was driven by strong core Microbiology and BD MAX partially offset by the timing of revenues in some platforms. Revenues in Preanalytical Systems were driven by growth in wing sets and also reflect strong performance across all product platforms. Revenues in our Biosciences business in the U.S. were driven by strength in research reagents and growth from research instruments such as the FACSMelody and the FACSymphony. Moving on to International, revenues grew 4.7%. The Medical segment grew 4.9%. Growth was driven by customer ordering patterns in Pharmaceutical Systems and by performance from infusion-related disposables in the MPS business. Diabetes care revenues reflect strength in emerging markets partially offset by softness in Europe, as previously discussed. Performance in MMS reflects the impact of strong capital insulations in the first half of the fiscal year as well as certain customer orders planned for the third quarter within our infusion business that are now expected to occur in the fourth fiscal quarter. Growth in the Life Sciences segment of 4.4% was driven by performance in Diagnostic Systems and Biosciences. The Diagnostic Systems growth reflects strong sales in Core Microbiology including IDAST where we continue to see demand from the recently-launched Phoenix M50 and strength in BD MAX. Biosciences revenues reflect strong research instrument sales that partially benefited from an easy comparison due to the prior-year funding delays in certain geographies. On slide 10, developed markets revenues grew 0.9% and emerging markets revenues grew 10.9%. We estimate the U.S. dispensing change lowered developed markets revenue growth by approximately 130 basis points. The third quarter growth rate in emerging markets reflects double-digit growth across the Medical segment and also in Diagnostic Systems. By geography, China, greater Asia and EMA grew double-digits and sales in Eastern Europe and Latin America were up high-single digits. China growth for the third quarter was strong at 12%. Revenue growth was driven by continued strong demand for consumables in both segments as well as the Phoenix M50 and MALDI-IDAST instruments and diagnostic systems, and research instruments in Biosciences. For the total year, we continue to expect China to grow in the low double-digit range. With year-to-date growth of 9.1%, we are confident in our high single-digit emerging market growth outlook for the full fiscal year. Now, moving on to Global Safety on slide 11. Currency-neutral sales were flat year-over-year. Tough comparisons to the prior year in both segments and across all geographies were the primary driver of lower Safety growth across the portfolio. By geography, Safety revenues in the U.S. grew 1.5% and international sales declined 2% currency-neutral. Emerging Market Safety revenues were about flat due to a tough comparison to the prior year in which EM Safety grew approximately 20%. By segment, Medical Safety sales declined 2.1% and Life Sciences grew 3.7%. In addition to the tough comparisons to the prior year, U.S. and Medical Safety growth this quarter was impacted by distributor inventory levels in MPS as discussed earlier. International and Medical growth were also impacted by customer orders, planned for the third quarter within our infusion business that are now expected to occur in the fourth fiscal quarter as mentioned previously. Slide 12 recaps the third quarter income statement and highlights our currency-neutral results. As discussed, revenues grew 2.4% in the quarter on a comparable currency-neutral basis, including approximately 100 basis points negative impact from the U.S. dispensing change. As we move down the P&L, I'd like to point out that similar to prior quarters our results in the prior-year period include the Respiratory Solutions business, while the current period does not as the business was divested in October of 2016. Starting with gross profit, the decline of 1.3% year-over-year reflects the loss of gross profit from the Respiratory Solutions business and the U.S. dispensing business model change. On a comparable basis that accounts for these items, gross profit would have grown over 100 basis points faster than revenue growth. I'll provide additional details on gross profit in just a moment. SSG&A as a percentage of revenues was 23.7%, and we are very pleased with the leverage we are getting year-to-date. R&D as a percentage of revenues was 6.1% as we continue to invest in innovation to drive future growth. The decline in R&D spending year-over-year is due to the divestiture of Respiratory Solutions business, as well as the comparison to prior year where we ramped R&D spend in the third quarter as a result of the medical device tax suspension. Our tax rate declined to 16.5% in the quarter, which is in line with our full-year guidance. In the quarter, operating income was flat and adjusted earnings per share grew 7.7% compared to the prior year. Both operating income and EPS include 600 basis points of negative impact from the Respiratory Solutions divestiture and the U.S. dispensing change. Now, turning to slide 13 and our gross profit and operating margins for the third quarter. On a performance basis, gross profit margin improved by 150 basis points as continuous improvement initiatives, cost synergies and favorable mix, which includes the positive impact of divestitures, were partially offset by a slight decline in pricing. On an operating margin basis, we delivered 100 basis points of margin expansion. Year-to-date, we have achieved approximately 160 basis points of underlying margin expansion. We expect the fourth quarter margin performance to significantly improve, largely driven by the comparison to the high level of R&D spend in the prior year. We remain confident in our ability to drive 200 to 225 basis points of margin expansion for fiscal year 2017. Moving on to slide 15 and our full fiscal year 2017 EPS guidance. We are particularly pleased that the strength of our performance year-to-date is driving our ability to offset headwinds from the Respiratory Solutions divestiture, the U.S. dispensing change, and FX pressure. As a result, we are reaffirming our full-year fiscal 2017 currency-neutral adjusted EPS guidance of $9.70 to $9.80, which represents underlying growth of 15% to 17% and a 2% to 3% headwind from the U.S. dispensing change. As you're aware, foreign exchange rates have moved since we last provided guidance in May, and the foreign currency headwind has moderated slightly with one quarter to go. As such, we are raising our adjusted EPS guidance to $9.42 to $9.47. Our guidance assumes a euro-to-dollar exchange rate of $1.15. Turning to slide 16, I'd like to walk through the balance of our guidance expectations for the full fiscal year 2017. As we discussed, there are a number of puts and takes within the year, but our underlying performance is strong. Despite a headwind of approximately 50 basis points from the U.S. dispensing change, we continue to expect total company revenue growth of 4.5% to 5% on a comparable currency-neutral basis. This was comprised of growth of 4.5% to 5% in BD Medical and 4% to 5% in Life Sciences. Based on our current view of the environment, we continue to expect a small amount of pricing pressure for the year. All other P&L guidance from May remains unchanged. Now I'd like to turn the call back over to Vince, who will provide you with an update on our key initiatives and product portfolio. Vincent A. Forlenza - Becton, Dickinson & Co.: Thank you Chris. Moving on to slide 18, I will walk you through our updates on new product innovation and strategic and business initiatives. Starting with the new production innovations within our Life Science business, we continued to expand the BD MAX system menu of unique, clinically-relevant panels. We recently received 510(k) clearance from the U.S. FDA for our newly-developed molecular test for detecting harmful intestinal bacteria. The BD MAX Extended Enteric Bacterial Panel is the latest offering in the suite of BD MAX Enteric assays. We also recently received 510(k) clearance from the U.S. FDA for the BD FACSLyric flow cytometer system. The BD FACSLyric system strengthens BD's portfolio of clinical flow cytometry solutions available in the U.S. with an easy-to-use in vitro diagnostic system for use with assays for immunological assessment of individuals and patients having or suspected of having immune deficiency. Within strategic and business initiatives, we recently released our 2016 sustainability report. One full year after announcing our 2020 sustainability goals, we are already making notable progress across our four focus areas of innovation, access, efficiency and empowerment. We believe that aligning our relevant environmental, social and governance factors with our capabilities will help BD continue to generate differentiated results for all of our stakeholders from shareholders to society. Moving on to our business update on slide 19. We continued to make progress with our cost synergy capture through our G&A functional transformation. We continued to remain focused on our functional transformations as we leverage our shared service centers and continued to build out our Centers of Excellence. In addition, our manufacturing-related synergies remain on track and we continue to expect the majority of these to be achieved in fiscal year 2018. We also continue to expect $325 million to $350 million in total cost synergies related to the CareFusion acquisition as we exit fiscal year 2018. Turning to operating margin expansion. As you can see, we continue to drive significant operating margin expansion over a multi-year period. The consistent performance of our businesses, combined with operating efficiencies, cost leverage, and cost synergy capture, is driving continued underlying operating margin expansion. We continue to expect to deliver over 500 basis points of cumulative margin expansion over the three-year period through fiscal year 2017. Moving on to slide 20, I would like to reiterate the key messages from our presentation today. First, while there were some timing items within the year that impacted the quarter, our core business remains strong across both segments. We're pleased with our continued solid performance year-to-date and our ability to drive performance to offset divestitures, the U.S. dispensing change, and foreign-currency headwinds year-to-date. Second, our operating performance, cost leverage, and cost synergy capture continued to generate operating margin improvement and drive double-digit earnings growth. Third, as we look to the total year, we're confident in our increased outlook for the full fiscal year. Finally, we're very excited about the powerful combination of BD and Bard, and our ability to deliver innovative solutions that position us to improve both the process of care and the treatment of disease. We're very pleased with the excellent progress we are making with the Bard integration, and look forward to the future with confidence. Thank you. We will now open the call to questions.