CACI International Inc (CACI) Q4 2026 Earnings Report, Transcript and Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to the CACI International Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2026 Earnings Conference Call. Today's call is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] At this time, I would like to turn the conference call over to George Price, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations for CACI International. Please go ahead, sir.

Thanks, Audra, and good morning, everyone. I'm George Price, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations for CACI International. Thank you for joining us this morning. We're providing presentation slides, so let's move to Slide 2, please. There will be statements in this call that do not address historical fact and as such, constitute forward-looking statements under current law. These statements reflect our views as of today and are subject to important factors that could cause our actual results to differ materially from anticipated. Those factors are listed at the bottom of last night's press release and are described in the company's SEC filings. Our safe harbor statement is included on this exhibit and should be incorporated as part of any transcript of this call. I would also like to point out that our presentation will include discussion of non-GAAP financial measures. These should not be considered in isolation or as a substitute for performance measures prepared in accordance with GAAP. Let's turn to Slide 3, please. To open our discussion this morning, here's John Mengucci, President and Chief Executive Officer of CACI International. John?

Thanks, George, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us to discuss our fourth quarter and fiscal year 2026 results as well as our fiscal 2027 guidance. With me this morning is Jeff MacLauchlan, our Chief Financial Officer. Slide four, please. Before getting to our results, I want to start by reminding everyone of the technology-first national security company CACI has become and the key elements of the strategy that produce these results. First, we utilize our deep mission knowledge in the markets we serve to truly understand what our customers need. We focus on enduring national security priorities with narrow deep funding streams. We deliver software-defined technology to address critical needs with the speed, agility and efficiency our customers demand, invest ahead of customer need, we deploy capital in a flexible and opportunistic manner to create value for our customers and our shareholders. Our financial results in fiscal '26 are the latest evidence that our strategy is working. Slide five, please. Our strong fourth quarter performance capped another exceptional year in which we exceeded all of our expectations. For full year fiscal '26, we delivered revenue growth of 11%, EBITDA margin of 12.3% and free cash flow of $735 million. We also won more than $10 billion in contract awards, representing a book-to-bill of 1.1x. These results demonstrate the earnings power, cash generation potential and durability of the company we have built. Our focus on national security priorities, differentiated capabilities and long-duration work enables us to grow and execute even in slower war environments. Slide six, please. Let me highlight several fiscal '26 accomplishments that demonstrate the successful execution of our strategy, many of which are drivers of growth in fiscal '27. First, our Electronic Warfare business is helping customers dominate the electromagnetic spectrum, a critical enabler of modern warfare. Our Spectral program achieved Milestone-C is moving into low rate initial production with deployment to begin in the second half of fiscal '27. This milestone also positions us for additional opportunities across the Department of War and internationally. Our SkyValor counter-UAS system was selected by the Department of War to help strengthen homeland defense on the southern border. And just last week, we received a separate $500 million award for the Domestic Shield program. We invested ahead of need in SkyValor, moving from concept to deployment in 12 months, and we are seeing strong demand and expanding backlog for this and other counter-UAS offerings. And we expanded our tactical EW footprint with initial orders from the Air Force, which provides for future Department award growth. These fiscal '26 EW accomplishments are also great examples of the repeatable growth engine we've built. Mission knowledge informs investment, investment produces differentiated technology and disciplined delivery generates customer value and contributes to increasing financial returns. Next, our Space business is benefiting from surging customer demand in this critical and increasingly contested domain. We completed the integration of ARKA, combining its sensing and AI-enabled analytics with CACI's existing technology and customer presence to create a leader in delivering actionable multisource intelligence. We were recently notified of an award to help the U.S. Space Force defend against adversarial threats, our first award leveraging the combined strengths of CACI and ARKA. We won a significant classified counter-space program that combines adaptable software with our purpose-built mission hardware. Like Spectral was in EW, this is a statement win for CACI and counter-space, winning against traditional large defense primes. Together with our Space Force RMT program, this new win positions us as a leader in next-generation counter-space technology, which is a significant opportunity for future growth. We also advanced to Phase 3 of the Space Force's Enterprise Space Terminal program, reinforcing our leadership in delivering resilient mission-ready communications across all orbits. EST is the optical communications terminal expected to be proliferated across multiple orbits as part of the Space Force's Space Data Network. We provide a critical technology that supported NASA's historic Artemis II mission, positioning CACI for additional growth opportunities supporting both manned and unmanned space flight. In our digital and network technology business, we are delivering enterprise scale technology and network deployments to secure the digital backbone for national security. We are ramping up the Joint Transportation Management System modernization program for USTRANSCOM, replacing fragmented logistics and financial systems with an integrated solution in partnership with SAP and AWS. We are partnering with Oracle to deliver an integrated HR shared service solution to the Office of Personnel Management that will support 2 million users across 96 federal agencies. We are modernizing critical national security networks to improve cyber resiliency, efficiency and mission performance through our base infrastructure modernization awards with the Air Force and ongoing programs for the Army and DIA. Our mission-aligned operational support business is also central to our technology-first model. More than 1,400 CACI employees are embedded across combatant commands globally, providing intelligence analysis, mission planning and operations support every day. They are involved in every operational headline you read as well as the many operations you will never read about. Their proximity to the mission gives us differentiated insight into customer needs, informs where we invest and helps us deliver relevant technology faster. Finally, across our entire business, we continue to advance the use of AI to deliver better outcomes to our customers faster. We are leveraging AI tools across our full software development life cycle to reduce development time, improve quality, increase the amount of capability we deliver and strengthen program profitability. And importantly, where we deliver savings to our customers, we are consistently seeing them deploy these savings back to CACI to address additional mission priorities. We are also extending ARKA-developed Agentic AI solutions to additional national security missions with the speed of processing and analyzing massive amounts of sensitive data is critical. This approach using AI to enhance both how we work and the outcomes we deliver to our customers creates measurable value and competitive differentiation. These results prove that AI is a multiplier aligned with our strategy and is actively scaling our technology portfolio and growing our business. Slide seven, please. As we scale this technology-first business, we are also strengthening our leadership team in several areas that are central to our next phase of growth. During the past few months, we have added significant executive leadership in key areas of our business. First, Dr. Dave Young has joined CACI as our Chief Operating Officer. Dave has recently led a $7 billion national security space business at Lockheed Martin and will lead cross-business initiatives to drive engineering excellence, program performance and growth. Next, Tom Kirkland rejoined CACI to lead our Electronic Warfare business. Tom most recently served as President of Targeting and Sensor Systems at L3Harris and is also a combat veteran of the United States Army. Tom will be responsible for the growth and delivery of technology and support across all EW customers and programs. Next, Chris Monoski joined CACI as our EVP of Manufacturing, a critical function as we scale the production and delivery of technology across the company. Chris brings nearly 3 decades of experience in manufacturing and supply chain management, most recently as VP of Operations for L3Harris. We also combined our existing space capabilities with those of ARKA under Andreas Nonnenmacher. Andreas is the former CEO of ARKA and a proven leader of technology businesses in the national security space domain. These executives add the operational experience that will enable CACI to convert growing customer demand into even stronger revenue growth, profitability and free cash flow. Slide eight, please. We continue to see strong customer budgets and demand signals across our markets. Our total addressable market exceeds $300 billion, and our portfolio is concentrated on enduring well-funded national security priorities that give us significant room to grow without depending on top line budget expansion. Customers are also moving to acquire our technology faster through nontraditional procurement methods, including CSOs, OTAs and FAR Part 12 commercial acquisitions. This shift plays directly to CACI's model of investing ahead of need and delivering adaptable mission-focused technology quickly. We anticipated this change and have been executing our commercial delivery strategy for years, demonstrated by the fact that our OTA award value in fiscal '26 was more than double the values of fiscal '24 and fiscal '25 combined. Our differentiated capabilities and strong past performance position us to win new business, expand existing programs and successfully defend recompetes. Award activity is beginning to improve, which is evident in our pipeline metrics and our consistent growth in funded backlog illustrates the importance of the mission outcomes we are delivering. Slide nine, please. Looking ahead, we are setting up to deliver another outstanding year in fiscal '27 based on our accomplishments in fiscal '26. We've developed the technology, won the programs and strengthened the leadership team needed to scale our business in several key areas. With this in mind, in fiscal '27, we expect to deliver revenue growth of 12.4% at the midpoint, EBITDA margin in the high 12% range and free cash flow per share growth of approximately 22%. This outlook also puts us on track to meet or exceed the 3-year targets we established at our Investor Day in November 2024. Jeff will provide more detail on our guidance and our progress against our 3-year commitments. With that, I'll turn the call over to Jeff.

Thank you, John. Good morning, everyone. Please turn to Slide 10. We are extremely pleased with our fourth quarter and fiscal '26 performance in which we delivered record levels of revenue, EBITDA margin and free cash flow. This exceptional performance underscores our portfolio evolution and the financial results of our strategy. In the fourth quarter, we delivered the double-digit year-over-year and sequential growth as we committed with revenue of $2.7 billion, representing 17.6% year-over-year growth, of which 11.6% was organic. EBITDA margin in the quarter was 13%, 150 basis points higher than last year, driven by strong program performance, a greater mix of higher-margin technology and the gain on a minor divestiture in our U.K. business unit, which added approximately 30 basis points. Fourth quarter adjusted diluted earnings per share of $8.91 were 6.1% higher than a year ago, driven by excellent operating performance more than offsetting a much lower tax provision last year. Finally, free cash flow of $233 million for the quarter was driven by strong profitability and solid working capital management. Slide 11, please. For the year, we generated $9.6 billion of revenue, representing 10.9% growth, of which 7.2% was organic. EBITDA margin of 12.3% for the year, which includes 10 basis points from the U.K. divestiture gain, represents a 110 basis point increase over the prior year. Notably, CACI is now delivering nearly $1.2 billion of EBITDA annually. Adjusted diluted earnings per share increased 12.7% to $29.83 despite $120 million in additional interest and tax expense, demonstrating our robust operational execution and the continued strength of the business. Fiscal '26 free cash flow of $735 million reflects our strong profitability and working capital management and represents a 68% increase in free cash flow per share. We exceeded our initial guidance even after considering additional CapEx investment, ARKA-related costs and the delay in the $40 million tax refund into FY '27. These results show that our strategy is producing stronger growth, higher margins and increasing free cash flow per share. Slide 12, please. Turning our attention to the balance sheet and capital structure. We've also made rapid progress reducing leverage following the ARKA acquisition. Pro-forma leverage ended the quarter at 3.7x, representing a 0.5 turn reduction in just 1 quarter. This is consistent with our track record of successfully deleveraging after major acquisitions. We now expect to return to leverage in the low 3s by June of 2027, a quarter sooner than we had originally communicated. Slide 13, please. For fiscal '27, we anticipate another year of strong financial performance. We expect revenue between $10.65 billion and $10.85 billion, representing growth of 11.3% to 13.4%, including approximately $500 million of acquired revenue. We expect EBITDA margins in the high 12% range, an increase of 50 basis points at the midpoint and about 250 basis points over the last 5 years. We expect adjusted net income to be between $735 million and $755 million, which translates into adjusted diluted earnings per share between $32.96 and $33.86. And finally, we expect fiscal '27 free cash flow of at least $900 million, representing free cash flow per share growth of approximately 22% and the second straight year where adjusted net income conversion would be at least 100%. Fiscal '27 free cash flow includes the delayed $40 million tax refund as well as $115 million of cash benefit from the Section 174 R&D tax credit changes. The Section 174 benefit is larger than previously discussed as it has become more advantageous with the ARKA acquisition to utilize the accelerated tax deduction. We provided a table in the appendix outlining these details. As always, while we are focused on full year results rather than any particular quarter, we provided additional details on the slide to assist with modeling, including information regarding timing trends we expect in fiscal '27. In addition to our expectation of stronger organic growth in the second half versus the first half, we expect first quarter organic growth to be in the low single digits. Slide 14, please. Our fiscal '25 and '26 results and the fiscal '27 outlook put us on track to substantially beat our 3-year free cash flow target of $1.6 billion by 31%, generating free cash flow of at least $2.1 billion for the 3-year period. This performance is driven by exceeding our 3-year EBITDA margin target of mid-11%, now expected to be 11.9% to 12% and meeting or exceeding the high end of our 3-year revenue target of high single-digit compound annual growth rate. These 3-year performance estimates exclude the benefit from ARKA, which was the basis on which we provided the targets. Accordingly, when including the benefit of ARKA, our 3-year results on a reported basis will be even stronger. These financial results are particularly notable given the dynamic environment of the past few years. Our consistently strong performance is a testament to our strategy, differentiation and the evolution of our business as well as the superior execution of the entire CACI team. Slide 15, please. Turning to our forward indicators. As we enter fiscal '27, we expect approximately 83% of revenue to come from existing programs, 9% from recompetes and 8% from new business. Fiscal '26 awards were $10 billion, representing a healthy mix of new work and strong recompete performance. The weighted average duration of these awards was nearly 6 years, providing us with strong visibility into the long-term strength and cash generation capacity of our business. I'd also like to expand on John's comments about seeing an increase in customers using nontraditional acquisition methods. While these methods continue to be very beneficial to CACI, metrics like book-to-bill, contract duration and pipeline may need to be considered differently as these methods become more prevalent. Total backlog of more than $32 billion grew 2% year-over-year, while funded backlog increased by 29%. This represents the sixth time in the last 7 quarters that we have delivered double-digit year-over-year growth in funded backlog. underscoring the critical national security priorities we address and the superior execution we deliver. We continue to see a healthy pipeline of new opportunities with nearly $11 billion of bids under evaluation, about 75% of these being for new business. We also expect to submit another $22 billion in bids over the next 2 quarters with about 80% of these being for new business. The significant increase in bids under evaluation, while sustaining the level of expected submissions is another indicator that the acquisition process is returning to a more normalized cadence and demonstrates that CACI is positioned in the right markets, focused on enduring priorities with narrow deep funding streams. In summary, fiscal '26 was an outstanding year. We exceeded our commitments in a challenging environment, demonstrating the strength of our business and the effectiveness of our strategy. Our fiscal '27 outlook, substantial backlog and strong market position give us confidence in continued growth, increasing free cash flow per share and delivering additional shareholder value. And with that, I'll turn the call back over to John.

Thank you, Jeff. Let's go to Slide 16, please. Before we open the call for questions, I want to take you back to November 8, 2024, when we held our Investor Day at the New York Stock Exchange and provided our 3-year financial targets. It was 3 days after the presidential election and 4 days before the incoming administration announced DOGE and an ambitious effort to reduce federal spending, regulations and bureaucracy. What followed was a period of significant change and uncertainty across the government market. Since then, we've seen multiple lengthy government shutdowns, a multitude of executive orders and changes to the government acquisition process and extended slower award environment and numerous other dynamics. Against that backdrop, we remain focused on delivering the 3-year financial targets we presented at Investor Day. We did not build our commitments around the expectation of an easy operating environment. We built them based on our long-term strategy around serving enduring national security priorities, delivering differentiated technology, executing a disciplined and invest ahead of need model, consistently executing and all the while taking our customer where we knew they needed to go. Now over 2 years into our 3-year targets, our results speak for themselves. We have delivered on our commitments and our fiscal '27 guidance puts us on track to outperform the 3-year plan we established. This is the key takeaway from today's call. Strategy has always been a place where we come from. Core principles of that strategy are resilient today. We've proven again and again that regardless of the larger macro environment changes we face, our strategy is working. Our business is stronger, our resolve unwavering. We are well positioned to continue delivering value for our customers and our shareholders. As is always the case, our success is driven by our 27,000 employees who are ever vigilant in expanding the limits of national security. To everyone on our CACI team, I'm extremely proud of what you do every day for our company and our nation. And to our shareholders, I thank you for your continued support of CACI. With that, Audra, let's open the call for questions.

[Operator Instructions] We'll take our first question from Gavin Parsons at UBS.

John, I mean, at risk of asking to sound a bit like a broken record. But if I go back 10 years, CACI organic growth has kind of more or less been in line with the industry average. But in 2024, it kind of really started to pick up steam. I mean, you grew even faster in '25. And I mean, in '26, you grew just that much faster than the industry. I mean, is there anything you can point to in the last few years that's allowed that really to accelerate or diverge?

Yes. And Gavin, look, thanks much for that question. Look, it all starts with a clear strategic plan, right? We put a very new road ahead in 2019. We spent a lot of time talking about the expertise in tech and the interplay between those two -- we did a complete business development reset. You all heard me talk about bid less and win more and bid longer in larger programs. We really doubled down on focusing on our customers' needs, really gaining unique mission understandings. We talked about the 1,400 people we have embedded. That didn't happen by accident. That was a well-orchestrated strategy for us to build those teams out. We invested ahead of need in markets that mattered. And then most importantly, Gavin, if you look at the '19 to '23 time frame, we spent a lot of time and treasure creating a differentiated software-based tech portfolio that was really aimed at the real needs of the DoD and the intelligence community. We were able to take all the knowledge that we learned from our embedded workforce at all the COCOMs around the world and really build some world-class commercial priced and commercially deliverable products. So if you think about it, if I look back and I realize it was a good 10 years. In '19 through '23, I think we're a little bit ahead of our time, and we were sort of priming the pump. In '24, everything really came together. We've talked about the programs we put in backlog were 6 years of duration versus 3. We had a strong tech portfolio that was commercially available. We reshaped our workforce. We obtained a lot of talent. And frankly, '27 is going to be the next year of exceptional growth. It's all around differentiating. It's all around, unfortunately, continually being compared against companies we have very little in common with. I've always said that when I hear somebody say, "Hey, we're going to move to technology from where we are today". I probably say you just had your best day because there's a long number of years and a large moat for you to go build what it means to deliver technology to this new age battles. Again, pace of change in battle needs to equal pace of change in the tech. And I think where we've come and where we've been and connecting where customers are buying today, I think it's why you can focus on '25 -- '24, '25, '26, and you're all going to see exactly the same kind of performance in '27.

I think that's the real takeaway. You don't just say this and do it. I mean once you identify this path, it takes a couple of years of concerted focused energy for it to start to bear fruit.

We'll move next to Scott Mikus at Melius Research.

Very nice results. John, since you've been at CACI, you've really transformed the portfolio and made it much more of a defense tech hardware business. You talked about the executives that you recently brought on board. And I noticed a lot of them have backgrounds in hardware and also space. So should we take that as the company is going to increase its acceleration to becoming even more of a software-defined hardware company? And could that possibly lead towards deemphasizing the expertise side of the business?

Yes. Look, let me talk a little bit about the talent that we brought on board. Yes. I mean, look, Dave has a lot of space background. He has a lot of networks background. He's been in both PE held companies as well as publicly traded companies. Chris definitely -- you've heard me talk about what we've done on the manufacturing side. I mean, Chris is going to move us from good to awesome and just by bypassing great. Tom is back into CACI running our EW business. So there's no doubt that we brought tremendous talent in. Look, we all set those terms expertise and technology out there really as markers. -- to really say, look, we're going to transform this company. And for those fortunate investors who up to this point have been by our side, who are buying our stock in 2015, '16, all the way through '19 and '23 when we were average growth and now where we're we are now, they've seen -- they've been able to bear the fruits. So where do we go next? We're always going to have expertise in this company, okay? We like to call it operational support. We like to call it deeply embedded with the mission because at the end of the day, folks, you want us to have the knowledge of where the mission is going long ahead of where everybody else does. And that's what it takes and that's what we get when we have 1,400 people forwardly deployed all around this globe. We know the issues that are out there. We understand uniquely how the mission has changed and how the battlefield tactics have changed. And that's why it makes investing in our software-based tech that much more safe, safe, meaning that a lot of our investments and our bets do come in, and we're able to continue to grow. So I don't think you'll ever see a day that we don't have expertise within our business. What I think you're seeing is that whether it's digital and network tech or whether it's EW or cyber or space, we're that company that customers are now beginning to really come to, to have us build the software-based technology as well as the support that they need to fight an ever-changing battlefield. So thanks for the question.

We'll move to our next question from Colin Canfield at Cantor Fitzgerald.

Total book-to-bill is not the right metric. Maybe if you could talk about your funded booking expectations contemplated in the guide? And then if you're able to talk about funded bookings quarter to date.

Yes. Thanks for the question, Colin. I think there are a couple of related statistics that you have to think about to get a holistic view of this of the nature of the core of your question. The first one is the increase in funded backlog. And I commented in my prepared remarks about this being the sixth of the last 7 quarters that we've had double-digit increases. That, combined with the size of the overall backlog tells you that customers are laser-focused on what we do and the criticality of the positions, and they're doing what they need to do for us to grow and prosecute that part of the strategy. The second factor that I would point to is the size of the bids under evaluation. So that's grown in a quarter from $4 billion to nearly $11 billion, 2.5x or so larger, while at the same time, the $22 billion pipeline of proposals we expect to submit over the next 6 months is relatively stable. So I think you get a sense of 2 things from those 2 statistics. One is the customer priority on the positions that we're holding and executing on. And the second is the continued opportunity-rich environment that we see for the things that we do. And I think the awards per se in any particular quarter have a lot of kind of administrative month-to-month kind of changes. But the durable statistics that I just referenced, I think, are at least as important to thinking about where we stand on that matter.

Colin, let me add one other piece of information as well. During my prepared remarks, I was talking about CSOs and OTAs. Look, strong OTA content will beginning now and in the future, that's going to influence award values like the actual dollars of awards that we book. So in the near term, these year-over-year comparisons, they're not going to work forever because the ground under us all is starting to move forward. It's moving at a pretty rapid pace. $500 million of OTA work last year alone, which is more than double what we did the prior 2 years. That has a near-term impact on all of us watching numbers, but has an awesome maximum impact on company value as you go forward because those lower dollar OTAs turn into larger dollar production programs much, much faster. So we all have to watch that. We're watching that internally as well to make certain that we've got the right book of business to continue to grow the company. And frankly, this management team wouldn't put the guidance we have in '27 if we were sitting here [ nervous nelling ] dollars of business awarded in '26.

Got it. Got it. And then maybe if we can talk about remaining gaps in the CACI portfolio, specifically within electromagnetic superiority space and cyber. How does the team think about kind of I guess, expanding the manufacturing kind of acquiring more manufacturing work over time versus the profitability that you get from kind of, let's say, approaching or developing, investing in new phenomenology for intelligence, like notably like it's electro-optical imagery now, RF, which has already been a significant franchise. But assume there's other things that you want to chase over time that are part of the portfolio?

Yes, Colin, thanks. So let me take a part of that. I may hand part of that off to Jeff as well. Look, our M&A program has been quite discriminating within the sector, and I would say, within the broader industry at large. We're always looking for gaps. And admittedly, the number of gaps clearly over the last 15 or so years have gotten smaller over -- and I think our investors have been extremely well rewarded with the organic growth that we've built building on those acquisitions. But we're sort of doing both, right? First of all, we do have an all-inspiring technology portfolio. We're always looking to see how do we advance it, how do we add capabilities to it? And then how do we take AI and everything that AI gives us, right? And how do we push our software-based tech to do more so we can process more information and provide much more battlefield effects. Every time we do that, where we don't change the base unit, but we add new software to those units, we increase capabilities out there, and that makes us even more sticky. But if we look at the gaps, yes, we do have gaps, and we're always -- we have a live M&A pipeline always. But I think at the heart of your question is now it's not about trying to fill gaps. It's about enhancing everything that we have. And frankly, Chris Monoski on the manufacturing side, we build software-based tech and unique integrated solutions at 10 to 12 different places around the U.S. And we are deeply studying how do we build production centers of excellence, whether it's defense electronics, space-based solutions, integrated solutions, where does the best workforce live for that kind of work, then how do we bring solutions to our war fighters sooner?

Yes. And Colin, let me remind you that before we get to acquire, we run through the possibilities around investing and partnering first. So we don't have -- obviously, we're serial acquirers and M&A is an important part of our strategy, but that's not always the first place that we look when we identify a gap. So having said that, obviously, John's characterization of what we're doing is consistent with what we've said and aligned with the pipeline that we continue to manage and look for. As we grow, the nature of some of the gaps is changing and it becomes less sometimes about specific little pockets of technology and sort of is morphing into being a little more maybe capability and market access. But nevertheless, still a gap-driven strategy. And we're not going to talk about that for obvious reasons with any real specificity, but we do -- we are always on the prowl.

We'll now take a question from Peter Arment at Baird.

Nice results. John, so fixed price revenue surge, and I'm sure some of that's tied to ARKA, but up to almost 35% of your mix. I was wondering if you expect that to kind of continue to climb going forward? And then as a follow-up, Jeff, could you just talk a little bit about fiscal '27 kind of cadence, how you're expecting EBITDA? I know you guys have always been kind of a little second half weighted. Just if you could walk us through a little bit of that.

Yes. Thanks, Peter. So fixed price, right? -- hey, more sooner is better. Look, we've -- we're really comfortable with fixed price work, and we regularly advocate for it with our customers across the portfolio. It aligns really well with our invest ahead of customer need, right? It aligns with our agile software development work, where, frankly, customers procure software now in a fixed unit price manner based on the size of development and that deployment effort. So on the other side, we're really mindful of terms and when fixed price is used. And if there's a lot of scope that has to be defined or it's uncertain, there's probably areas where cost plus is more appropriate. I mean, clearly, now we're a larger space business. If we need to bend the laws of physics, that probably isn't good work for the customer or us to want to do fixed price. But look, we built out a far part 12 commercial part of our business. We're already developing and selling commercially, which is code for firm fixed price. You can see the results and how quickly that moves EBITDA margins year-over-year growth. I think we're at -- if you look at the high 12s now versus where we were just last year, which was another remarkable movement in margin. I honestly believe that firm fixed price works fantastically for our customer, and it works just as equally fantastic for us. So if you look at OTAs, that's what's going to continue to drive that work. So I don't think quarter 4 is an anomaly. I think we're just hitting our stride. I think back to Gavin's comment earlier. we're hitting our stride and then maybe the firm fixed price in the '27, '28, '29 window is going to be driving either even greater margins, better revenue growth, which to me is all about free cash flow growth. Jeff?

Yes. Related to the first half, second half part of your question, Peter, you obviously -- the answer to your question is in your question. We obviously have a pretty clear established cadence of having a heavier back half depending on whether you look at revenue or cash flow or margin progression, the patterns are slightly different. The ranges are slightly different, but the pattern is the same. And you ought to think about kind of a 45-55 first half, second half revenue distribution -- in terms of cash flow, that's kind of 1/3 in the first half, 2/3 in the back half, which again is -- if you look at the last several years, you'll see ample evidence of that pattern. And probably the more pronounced progression, though, among those key metrics that we talk to you about regularly is margin. And the margin variability is an artifact of the portfolio. It's an artifact in the sense that it represents mix of different programs and contracts and customers and different buying patterns. And you'll see over time, it's not unusual for us to have 150, 200 bps of margin variability in the course of the year. And this year is not going to be any different we expect from the most recent couple of years. So we said mid-11s on our way to high 12s. And I think if you look at some of the recent patterns, you'll see those interior quarters kind of shape up separately. But I don't know if that answers all of your question, but clearly, the first half, second half pattern you note is an artifact of the portfolio and where we are.

We'll move next to Gautam Khanna at TD Cowen.

I was wondering if you could talk about your expectations for contract awards given you had a big uptick in bids awaiting decision and kept the to be submitted flat, which is pretty impressive. So I'm just curious, what are your expectations into the September quarter? And if we have an extended CR in the December quarter just based on your idiosyncratic submissions and pipeline?

Well, yes, that's a lovely question. Look, let me -- let's start off with where the budget is, right? And whether we're in a CR or not. I think the most helpful way to answer that is as follows. we've extended the duration of contracts we put in our backlog from 3 to 6 years over the last 8 to 10 years. We clearly, in the earlier question, talked through the fact that we're very comfortable with the guidance that we put out there based on the current awards environment. Jeff shared some metrics of things improving. We've talked about the impact of OTAs, which is a positive impact for us, should be seen as a negative one. And then beyond that, we see the reconciliation funding starting to flow in areas like budget border security, our intelligence programs, space, absolutely, as you think through Golden Dome, modernization of a lot of different logistics systems out there. And then the entire counter-UAS market. So the other thing that I would share is if you look at the new business content, increasingly the new business content that we share in our metrics, a lot of that is by new software-based product sales. And those sort of turn and burn in the same year and some even in the same quarter. So again, even those metrics are starting to be skewed as we're becoming more of a technology company and less of the traditional government services side, where a lot of that 8% or 9% of new business is going to be filled in with a uberly rich pipeline of high-margin software-based tech programs. So the dynamics are changing. What you should hear from Jeff and I is that we don't see any issues in achieving '27 guidance and future growth in '28 and the years out because we're in a small period of time where things are taking a little bit longer to award.

And you won't be surprised, Gautam, to know that kind of in line with our practice. Our development of the guidance range can accommodate some amount of variability around assumptions there. And we have opportunities for on contract growth and other things that factor into the range as well in addition to just the new business. It's not -- so it's not all new business. John mentioned a couple of things that could contribute to growth here that aren't necessarily ever visible in the awards number. I'd also point to our continued success in growth in the funded part of the backlog. So there's a lot of moving parts here that we're processing to come up with kind of a high confidence range to tell you where we're going to end up. There's a lot of knobs and levers here to manage.

And if I could follow up, I'm just curious if you're seeing customers move to procure things that licenses and other pass-throughs directly and if that's factored into the guidance as well.

Yes. I guess the most talked about part of that. So I guess, quickly, yes, it is factored into our guidance. If you look at some of the enterprise software platform providers, yes, we're seeing U.S. government customers go directly to those folks or known as OEMs. We overuse that term, but I'll stick with that one for now. Look, we're absolutely fine with that model. While that might mean revenue is reduced by the value of the licenses that at one time passed to our books, that revenue came with little to no margin. So actually, you should see this as margin accretive to us. So that's -- those are a couple of thumbs up, small revenue impact, more positive margins. And on top of that, customers traditionally repurpose those savings right back to CACI that gives us an ability to deliver additional capabilities. We've had a couple of press announcements out there, whether it's with SAP or AWS or Oracle and others. What the OEMs don't want and generally aren't able to deliver is the full implementation. So the fact that the government is going to them for the licensing first and then we are partnering with those folks. They're phenomenal companies. We've built tremendous relationships. We've been in partnerships with them over the last 8 to 10 years for a lot of those large enterprise tech jobs that we've put out there. So look, over time, maybe that pendulum swings back, maybe it doesn't. We're able to win either way. We've got a really strong track record of execution and past performance. And we frankly do this work very differently than others in the space. We're faster, we're more efficient. We're software-defined. We're bringing in AI, and that's why we win, and that's why our customers come back to us and recommend us to others. So a minor fact of who buys a license and who gets to be the prime is pretty much irrelevant to where we're going. But again, I'll say we've got all that factored in '27 guidance.

We'll move next to Jon Siegmann at Stifel.

I was excited to hear about that statement win counter-space program that you guys won. I understand you're not going to be able to say much, but we'll ask about it anyways. What does it leverage? Is it legacy ARKA? Is it -- or is it CACI coming together? Just any more details you can talk about that? And how many more opportunities are there in that domain that could be relevant to you?

Yes, Jon, thanks. So yes, we -- you're definitely right in your question. We probably can't talk a lot about it, but Yes, we were recently notified of an award to assist Space Force and in preparing to respond to adversaries threats to our national space capabilities. It is the first pursuit that leverage the combined capabilities of our legacy space business and ARKA. So if you remember, when we did the ARKA deal, Jeff mentioned that all of our financials and fiscal outlooks were not -- we didn't have any cost synergies or revenue synergies in our model. You can check the box that we're beginning the days of moving forward. There is a program out there that we are able to use the hardware and software solutions that we deliver across the space portfolio. ARKA brought prior calls for space systems, which means vehicles, and payload development and integration. CACI brought the [ quals ] for a ground system software development and integration of on-orbit spacecraft and missions. As you put those 2 things together, it gave a great 1-2 punch to winning this NITE-STAR program. I'll also tell you, while I'm on this question, ARKA has also seen an uptick in activity and strong customer demand signals, which is going to be supported by increased classified space funding. So you can imagine as that relates to Golden Dome and all. So we've checked the box on winning a really nice program that allows both companies to work together. And then we've also done a lot more in the classified counter-space world, which is another win that really builds on our RMT program.

Next, we'll go to Seth Seifman at JPMorgan.

This is Rocco on for Seth. There have been a bunch of awards recently in the C-UAS business. Should we be thinking about it as being a primary driver of the strong growth that we saw last year and the strong growth that we expect to see again next year?

Yes, Rocco, you should see it as all of the above. As we've been talking about counter-UAS for quite a long time and doing it for a couple of decades. Look, we've now got 5 program awards, some with 6 systems, some with 4, some with 10, some with 12. So we're beginning to build this backlog out. This -- the most recent win was the $500 million Domestic Shield win. 50 competitors came out with a first task order for around 6 systems more than just SkyValor, those IDIQ vehicles, which are single award, by the way, will include some of our mobile systems like BEAM and other ground-based products that we build. Yes, you should definitely see where we're going in the counter-UAS area as just the very tip of a multiyear, decade-long franchise build-out of software-based mission tech. A couple of things that I want to make sure I use this call to push out to our investors. What differentiates us and why have I been saying for the last 5 to 7 years that this is about to explode. We -- our systems that we deliver, it's a family trailer truck and tower fixed versions, exactly what the mission asked us for full range of threats, group 1 through 5 drones, not just 1 and 2s, exactly what the customers are asking for. Longest detection range versus the other systems that are out there. We provide 18 minutes of response time. Those 1 to 3 kilometer systems provide 6 seconds of response time. You tell me the system you want to be guarded by. We're going to see that over the next 3 to 4 quarters, the nation is going to decide that they're going to want to be covered by the longer range, more efficient system that can either non-kinetically defeat. So as you're all hearing about reconciliation and protection of the homeland, I don't care if it's infrastructure protection, base defense, border surveillance, border protection, a system that sees all the threats all the time in a non-kinetic manner. And every time we learn something new in the RF spectrum, we push updates just like your iPhone gets for every single thing that is different to every single deployed system that are out there. So we sort of mass connect all these systems together to make certain they all have the latest detection software and latest set of non-kinetic defeat. So yes, I think this is just the beginning. Again, it takes some time to prime the pump, but very happy with what the team has done, and there is nobody better in this nation than CACI when it comes to protecting the nation against drone threats.

Right. Then as a quick follow-up, have you received export approval for the majority or all of the systems?

We have export approval for the majority and all of our systems. We've already delivered different variations to 17 different countries. I shared with you all last quarter, we were looking at getting into the Middle East and putting [ BAR ] agreements in place and expanding our sales sales teams reach into areas like Kuwait and Qatar and other areas. We have -- you can check all those boxes. We've done all of that. We're having really good discussions there. And as part of what JIATF-401 has put in, also with that $500 million win comes the opportunity to get -- to be a part of the Secretary of the Army's sort of expedited export for us to be able to sell this system globally. So we're part of that Fast path program as well. So yes, yes and yes, and we're looking for that to grow 2027 over the next decade.

Our next question comes from Tobey Sommer at Truist.

Thank you for the quarterly update. I wanted to ask a multiyear question. As we look at your EW and space businesses collectively, and you can add any others you think are sort of in that high-margin rapid growth bucket. Is it fair to assume a mix shift in that direction as they grow more quickly organically such that they'll represent low to mid-single digits more of revenue and profit annually over the next handful of years?

Yes. Tobey, I'm not sure we're ready to quantify that, but the condition you identify is true. I mean the things that we're talking about that are growing more quickly are generally strong demand areas and generally better margin positions. So that makes us -- that gives us some confidence in continued modest margin expansion. I would encourage you to think about modulating that expectation relative to investment to kind of grow more quickly. And I would remind you that we run the enterprise here looking at free cash flow. So if we can modulate investment with growth and solve for cash, that's the decision-making framework that we use.

And that concludes our Q&A session. I will now turn the conference back over to John Mengucci for closing remarks.

Thanks, Audra, and thank you for your help on today's call. We'd like to thank everyone who dialed in or listened to the webcast for their participation. We know that many of you have follow-up questions. So Jeff MacLauchlan, George Price, Jim Sullivan, and we've added Lisa Parkinson to that team as well are available after today's call. Stay healthy. All my best to you and your families. Operator, this concludes our call. Everyone, thank you, and have an outstanding day.

And again, this does conclude today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.