Earnings Labs

Honeywell International Inc. (HON)

Q3 2014 Earnings Call· Fri, Oct 17, 2014

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Honeywell’s Q3 2014 Earnings Conference Call. (Operator instructions.) As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. I would now like to introduce your host for today’s conference, Elena Doom, Vice President of Investor Relations.

Elena Doom

President

Thank you, Leo. Good morning and welcome to Honeywell’s Q3 2014 Earnings Conference Call. Here with me today are Chairman and CEO Dave Cote and Senior Vice President and CFO Tom Szlosek. Today’s call and webcast, including any non-GAAP reconciliations are available on our website at www.honeywell.com/investor. Note that elements of today’s presentation do contain forward-looking statements that are based on our best view of the world and of our businesses we see them today. Those elements can change and we would ask that you interpret them in that light. We identify the principle risks and uncertainties that affect our performance in our Form 10(k) and other SEC filings. This morning we will review our financial results for Q3, share with you our outlook for Q4 and provide an initial framework for 2015. And finally we leave time for your questions. So with that I’ll turn the call over to Dave Cote.

Dave Cote

CEO

Good morning, all. As I’m sure you’ve seen by now Honeywell had another terrific quarter with better-than-expected operational performance, and sales, margins and earnings all exceeding our guidance. In the quarter our organic sales growth accelerated to 5%, a continuation of the positive trend we’ve seen throughout the year; and even more encouraging was the fact that we saw organic sales growth broadly across the portfolio in all our segments. It truly was a balanced contribution highlighting great positions in good industries. Our short-cycle order rates continue to trend positive as we saw strong quarters from Energy, Safety and Security, and Transportation Systems, as well as continued improvement in Advanced Materials. Our long cycle businesses are maintaining robust backlogs with strong orders and sales growth this quarter from UOP, Process Solutions and Aerospace, giving us confidence in our outlook beyond this year. Geographically where as you know we are well diversified, we are seeing strength in the US particularly in our residential and industrial markets. As you know we’ve been conservative over the years in our planning assumptions for Europe and I think that’s been a good call. China continues to be a strong market for us both on the short- and long-cycle sides of the portfolio, and we saw double-digit increases this quarter in both the Middle East and India – reinforcing that our focus in high-growth regions is paying off. EPS of $1.47 increased 19% year-over-year or 14% normalized for tax. So another quarter with double-digit EPS growth with earnings coming in above the high end of our guidance range. Our continued progress on the Honeywell operating system or HOS and other key process initiatives are delivering meaningful growth and productivity benefits. We’re seed planting all the time to drive top and bottom line growth. Complementing the balanced…

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Okay, thanks Dave and good morning. On Slide 4 let me walk you through the financial results for Q3 – as you can see, some very strong numbers and every metric came in at or above the guidance we provided in July. Sales of $10.1 billion were up 5% on a reported and organic basis and the growth was pervasive throughout the portfolio. We’ll dive into some of the business specifics in a moment but we’re encouraged by the improvement in organic sales growth as we’ve progressed throughout the year. Remember, it was 1% in Q1, 3% in Q2 and now 5% in Q3. On a regional basis organic sales were up 5% in the US, 1% in Europe, 4% in China and double digits in a number of our other high-growth regions. In Europe we have experienced stable growth rates in the first three quarters of the year, modest growth rates which are very consistent with what we saw in 2012 and 2013. We are planning more of the same for Europe in Q4 and into 2015. As for China, the growth was impacted by our deliberate shift of resins and chemicals exports to other parts of Southeast Asia, so excluding that our China sales would have been up 7% in the quarter. On a similar basis, we expect China to grow sales faster than GDP for the full year. Segment profit growth and margin expansion were both strong in the quarter. Segment profit increased 9% while segment margins expanded 70 basis points to 17.4%, which by the way is 20 basis points more than our guidance. We had profit growth and margin expansion in each of our three SBGs, so again, a balanced contribution across the portfolio. The businesses benefited from higher volume in the quarter, and productivity…

Elena Doom

Operator

Thanks, Tom. Leo, we will now take our first question.

Operator

Operator

Very good. The floor is now open for questions. (Operator instructions.) Our first question is coming from Scott Davis of Barclays. Scott Davis – Barclays : Hi, good morning guys. Thanks for helping the market go up today. We needed it.

Dave Cote

CEO

[laughs] Yeah, I agree. Scott Davis – Barclays : I’ve got to give you crap about something, Dave – you know I can’t go a conference call without criticizing you. But 16 slides and not a word on M&A or buybacks or any cash reinvestment. You’ve had a nice pull back here – what’s holding you back from buying back some shares?

Dave Cote

CEO

Well, first of all I don’t think that we ever provide a chart commenting on that so it’s not unusual. Scott Davis – Barclays : No, I know. [laughter]

Dave Cote

CEO

I guess 19%, 14% depending upon how you want to look at it doesn’t suffice so I understand. But at the end of the day our strategy’s still the same – it’s to stay opportunistic on both the M&A side and the share repurchase side, and I think M&A conditions are starting to improve with the kind of pull back we’ve seen. So who knows how things develop, I’m not promising anything. You never know where things are going to go but at the end of the day times are getting better to buy so we’ll see what happens. Scott Davis – Barclays : Dave, what is the ideal size of transactions? I mean in the past you’ve done some pretty interesting deals and some of them a little bit big. Would you be willing to go a little larger in size where there’s some value now?

Dave Cote

CEO

Well you know, I’ve always said I never say never on doing anything large, so we’ll say I don’t know, $5 billion to $10 billion. But at this date we’ve never done it either – it doesn’t mean we won’t but I’ve never done it. We still continue to maintain a very active pipeline of projects from small stuff to big stuff and we’re going to keep doing that, and who knows? Maybe someday something bigger strikes. In the meantime we still keep looking at stuff that’s more bite-size, more manageable. And it’s tough to predict where these things go. As [Ann Madden] keeps reminding us you kiss 100 frogs to find, I guess in my case the princess. So it’s just one of those things that we’re going to keep looking at and keep working. Scott Davis – Barclays : And just lastly non-res has been a bit of a mystery this year but it looks like you made some positive commentary there. I mean do you see projects as finally breaking ground where you’ve got some visibility that we can make some shipments? And this quarter was pretty good, actually.

Dave Cote

CEO

Yeah, I would say you’ve been hearing me say now for over a year I think that we’ve been seeing increased quote activity but no results from it. We’re finally starting to see some slight improvements in growth rates from what we’ve seen in some of our other businesses. I’d like to think that that portends a trend. I’m not ready to declare that yet but I do believe the time has come. And for me part of this is just the aftermath of the recession. We said at the time how you went in was likely how you were going to come out, and it was stuff that went in quickly, like aircraft spares came out quickly. Stuff that went in slowly like non-res construction has been slow to come out, and I think we’re finally at that point where we’re in the kind of slow-to-come-out range. I don’t expect a boom but I still think it’s going to be a tailwind for us. Scott Davis – Barclays : Good. Well, well done, guys. Thanks and I’ll pass it on.

Dave Cote

CEO

I’m sorry, Scott, what was that? [laughter]

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Steve Tusa of JPMorgan. Steve Tusa – JPMorgan : Hi, good morning. So just on UOP I think people are obviously a little bit worried about what’s happened with oil prices here. Can you maybe just get into specifics on what percentage of UOP specifically is kind of oil price exposed if you will? I mean I know maybe there’s some offshore projects that they may be involved in, FPSOs, I’m not sure – just want to get some further clarity on that. And I totally understand the positive long-term trends but UOP is obviously one that people worry about every day. So just maybe if you can give us a little bit of color there.

Dave Cote

CEO

Steve, the last thing I’d ever expect from you is a bouquet but not even a flower or a rose petal or something? [laughter] Not even a little bit? Steve Tusa – JPMorgan : Solid quarter I guess. [laughter]

Dave Cote

CEO

Well thank you, I’ll take what I can get. Steve Tusa – JPMorgan : You’re doing okay. I never worry about you, you’re doing fine.

Dave Cote

CEO

[laughs] Here’s a reasonable way to think about it, is if we take a look at our overall sales about 15% of it is represented by oil & gas in total. So it’s not just UOP but it includes Process. If you broke out that 15 points, 12 points of it are in the mid- to downstream segments so yeah, there is some upstream but not a huge amount. And when we think about oil prices, Tom was talking about some of this – that pump prices tend to be sticky in both directions and when oil prices are going down that’s a good thing for refiners. So all of those projects, especially if the money’s already been spent, we really don’t see it having that much of an impact over the next two or three years. Most of those projects are still going to get done. We also think over the long term there’s some natural floors here that exist and there’s been a big increase in oil production over the past year. It’s up something like 3% in total with a big chunk of it driven by the US. But there’s a natural floor that occurs at about $80 when you look at shale oil production where a lot of capacity just goes offline so it gets supply and demand much more balanced. So overall I really don’t see it having that much of an impact to UOP. It might have some; there might be some projects that go a little bit sideways. But overall very manageable is the way I’d think about it. Tom, I don’t know if there’s anything you want to add?

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Just there’s discussion of cancellations and we’ve thoroughly assessed our backlog and we’re really not seeing anything. As Dave said there’s a natural floor, and maybe if you get significantly below that you might see more activity. But the only impacts are minor delays in project financing but it really hasn’t shown any impact on the backlog. Steve Tusa – JPMorgan : And then Dave, one last question following up on Scott’s question about buybacks: when you think about kind of the reticence to buy stock back at this stage given the prior experience and just worried about buying closer to peak, I mean how do we think about that in terms of your relative valuation and the relative attractiveness of your stock? Because I mean it doesn’t seem like the stock is holding up as well as it should in these pull backs, and so does the mindset change if they’re not giving you – even though we’re kind of in a tough economic time if people aren’t giving you the relative credit, does the mindset change?

Dave Cote

CEO

No, not really. I would say, going back to what I said before we’re going to stay opportunistic. We have a lot of faith in our ability to continue growing and I think we certainly demonstrated that again this quarter. And when it comes to both repurchases and M&A we’re going to stay opportunistic, and having money gives you opportunities. Once the money’s gone the opportunities aren’t there anymore. So we’re going to continue to drive really strong earnings growth especially versus our peers with or without a buyback. And it’s always an opportunity for us. Steve Tusa – JPMorgan : Great, thanks.

Dave Cote

CEO

You’re welcome.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Nigel Coe of Morgan Stanley. Nigel Coe – Morgan Stanley : Thanks, good morning. It sounds like buybacks are a hot topic this morning. [laughter] So I won’t go there but I do want to switch to the ’15 framework if you’d like, and thanks for the detail – it’s really helpful. And I guess the top line will be what it’ll be to what extent by the macro, but as we think about your margin expansion and doing what you can control – and obviously this year is very strong with a 30-weekish top line year-to-date. But next year, based on the construction pipeline, do you think you can be in line with the 70 bps long-term framework or do you think you can do better than that? Or how should we think about the OM next year?

Dave Cote

CEO

Well first of all, Nigel, same thing – not even a rose petal? Nigel Coe – Morgan Stanley : No, no, Dave – great quarter.

Dave Cote

CEO

[laughter] Not even a splash of toilet water, something? Nigel Coe – Morgan Stanley : I’m splashing away here.

Dave Cote

CEO

[laughter] Well first off it’s too early for us to declare. We’re in the middle of a planning cycle and we just don’t do that. So in December is when we talk about it, but overall I think you can expect something that’s consistent with our five-year plan because as you recall, in the five-year plan we were pretty conservative on what we expected over five years from the global economy. I guess fortunately and unfortunately – the fortunate side is we planned for it that way so we’re prepared. The unfortunate part is it’s turning out that way. We kind of hoped that there might be a nice surprise at some point. But we’ll talk a lot more about it in December on Tom’s call. What date is that call?

Tom Szlosek

CFO

December 16th.

Dave Cote

CEO

December 16th and we’ll talk about it more then. But you can expect something that’s consistent with our five-year plan where you’ll look at it and go “Oh, they’re still on track.” Nigel Coe – Morgan Stanley : Okay, that’s fair, thanks Dave. And then one of the real hallmarks of Honeywell over the past decade has been growing top line while keeping fixed costs flat or in some cases down. This year SG&A’s been growing quite a bit ahead of sales and I’m wondering, there’s obviously a lot of moving parts in SG&A and COGS but how much of that increase in SG&A is driven – and I’m thinking here about initiatives like HUE?

Dave Cote

CEO

Well quite honestly I don’t really look at the SG&A line all that much so I should describe it more as how I do look at it. On the sales side we have been adding feet on the street when you look at high-growth regions and that’s one of the reasons that you’re seeing such good performance there, because if you have great products and services and one guy covering a country you’re just not going to sell as much. You’ve got to have somebody who can be out there and represent. I do know on the G&A side, that’s going down because a lot of that is part of our functional transformation – so you think about Legal, Finance, IT, HR. All that stuff is going down consistent with functional transformation. So all the stuff that we’ve talked about is continuing to happen and I suppose we can get a better SG&A answer for you.

Elena Doom

Operator

I’m happy to help out with that. Nigel Coe – Morgan Stanley : Okay, thanks. And just a quick one for Tom perhaps: the hedge on TS for next year, I believe that’s new. I don’t think you’ve hedged in the past so number one, is that new? And second, is there anything we need to think about in terms of hedge accounting and sensitivity to certain rates?

Dave Cote

CEO

You are correct – it is new. And I’ll turn it over to Tom to discuss further.

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Yeah, I mean it’s at or around current rates now, Nigel. That’s essentially the way to think of it. So if you think about the current exchange rates for TS it essentially locks us in to what you see.

Dave Cote

CEO

But there’s no mark to market impact.

Tom Szlosek

CFO

No, it’s pure hedge accounting. If the mark on the hedge goes to [below translation] or goes below the line outside of operating profits it serves to offset that.

Dave Cote

CEO

Because at the end of the day the change in the thought process has been, historically I’ve been pretty adamant about never hedging on translation just because I think over the course of twenty years you’re basically out the cost of hedging. This year I’d say well, there’s always the possibility it could go the other way because these things are unpredictable. The prospects of it going to $1.10, $1.20 I think is very real and we looked at it and said it’s better to say, protect ourselves on half or so of our exposure and forego a bit of that upside just to protect ourselves on the downside in what could be a tougher macro again. And that was the thought process behind it and we were able to do it with a very good understanding of what the impact was month by month. So we were able to avoid having to use that marked to market approach. Nigel Coe – Morgan Stanley : Great, thanks guys.

Dave Cote

CEO

You’re welcome.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Steve Winoker of Bernstein Research. Steve Winoker – Bernstein Research : Hey, thanks, good morning. And Dave, I’m going to save you the pain of soliciting another compliment and just say good quarter to all the guys inside the SBGs, okay? We’ll leave it there.

Dave Cote

CEO

Thank you, Steve. As you’ve probably noticed I’m a very needy person. Steve Winoker – Bernstein Research : I do and as long as that makes you keep delivering I have no problem with that.

Dave Cote

CEO

[laughs] It helps, it helps. Steve Winoker – Bernstein Research : So a few questions here. I guess one, I hate to keep coming back to the capital deployment but I also remember you often talking about telling investors “Now that we’ve gone through the turnaround some years ago what are we going to do with the cash? Don’t worry, we’re not going to blow the cash.” To the extent that you are ramping up M&A and Roger’s out there looking pretty aggressively I’m sure as well, what are kind of the minimum financial hurdles we should still think about for kind of mid- to large-size deals that you’re thinking about in terms of return on capital or otherwise – the stuff that Ann would actually let pass through, for example?

Dave Cote

CEO

Our hurdles are not going to change and they’re the same ones that we’ve used for 13 years, and that’s accretive in the second year, IRR clearly above the cost of capital – so think of it in the 11%, 12% range; and ROI above 10% in the fifth year and that’s all-in, so that includes all the amortization and everything else so it’s a more difficult hurdle than people might think. And at the end of the day regardless of the size we’ll be able to demonstrate 6% to 8% of sales as cost synergies because I don’t want to count on any sales synergies as you know, and I want to make sure that we stay disciplined as hell in terms of our deployment so we’re never going to panic. And the nice thing about it is we have a terrific organic growth prospect. So it’s not like I have to do M&A in order [deliver] and that’s why we construct our five-year plan the way we do, so that you would look at it and go “Geez, these numbers are awfully good whether they do M&A or not.” But I never want to feel panicked and we don’t. So you can expect that whatever we do, whatever we do end up doing – whether it’s a bunch of small stuff, something big, various big things depending on how you want to classify it – it’s all going to meet that criteria. Steve Winoker – Bernstein Research : Okay. And Tom, a little bit about how you’re starting to think about pension. I’m sure you’ll go into more detail in December but given rates, direction and all of that, how should we think about sensitivities in the current accounting structure?

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Yeah, good question, Steve. If you drew the line today for pension expense considering even the most recent market developments and the low interest rate environment, we’d be about flat year-over-year for pension expense. As I said right now no foreseeable contributions from a cash perspective in the next couple periods. Marked to market-wise for 2014 as you know, if there is one we would do it in Q4. Right now again based on the assumptions as we understand them today, at least for our major plans – the US plans – they would not be a marked to market. Steve Winoker – Bernstein Research : Okay. And if I can just sneak one more in, which is in UOP those CAPEX investments, how do you see those continuing to play out through the next year?

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Well in terms of the quantity of the CAPEX, we peak in 2015 in terms of the expenditure level. But as you know starting in the second half of this year we’ve got some of that capacity coming online this year mostly for the Solstice product portfolio and a little bit in the UOP catalyst. But those plants as we’ve said over and over again have pretty much hit the ground running at full capacity and so when you look at the growth rates you’re seeing in PMT, that 7%, that’s a reflection of being able to put that capacity to work right away. Steve Winoker – Bernstein Research : Okay great, thanks.

Dave Cote

CEO

And the projects are on track which is always a great place to be when you’ve got full plants. Steve Winoker – Bernstein Research : Okay, thanks a lot.

Dave Cote

CEO

See you, Steve.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Jeff Sprague of Vertical Research. Jeff Sprague – Vertical Research : Good morning. I’ve been brushing up on my accent – Dave, I think it was a pretty good “quah-tah.”

Dave Cote

CEO

[laughs] I think it was wicked good myself. Jeff Sprague – Vertical Research : [laughs] Just a couple little clean-up things: on UOP can you give us a sense, just following up on that last comment from Tom, what type of top line benefit do you foresee next year as those plants come on? I guess the question is kind of the key noted revenue weight of that capacity as it turns on.

Dave Cote

CEO

I would say it’s still a little too early to declare on any of that – we’ll do more of that in December. I’d say you can expect that UOP’s going to continue to do well.

Elena Doom

Operator

And I’d add it’s a big driver for this incremental growth in UOP versus the growth rate we’re seeing in 2014. Jeff Sprague – Vertical Research : And then on international defense where you’re seeing some acceleration it sounds like, can you give a little color on countries or programs where that’s actually happening?

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Yeah, Middle East, Israel, Turkey, some of the regions that you might expect to have the funding and where there’s activity; a little bit in India as well. Jeff Sprague – Vertical Research : And this one might be a little bit in the weeds but kind of getting into fluorines and the like, with your transition coming in the US here really at the beginning of the year do you see any noise in Q4 around that? Do you see signs that people are prebuilding, just anything to be aware of there?

Tom Szlosek

CFO

No. I mean we’re really excited about fluorines overall and the transition that we’ve got going, but nothing significant from that perspective. Jeff Sprague – Vertical Research : Yeah, and then just a quick one and I’ll jump off: Tom, you did end your remarks by saying accelerated organic growth in 2015. Obviously you’ve also hedged the macro and everything but are you suggesting you do have line of sight at least of being inside that 4% to 6% kind of organic growth going forward, which is kind of the compound goal up to 2018?

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Yeah, I think Dave is telling me not to share anything until December 16th, which I’m going to follow my boss’ orders. [laughter] Jeff Sprague – Vertical Research : Alright, sounds good. Thanks, guys.

Dave Cote

CEO

See you, Jeff.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Andrew Obin of Bank of America. Andrew Obin – Bank of America : Yes, hi, how are you guys? Just to clarify on Advanced Materials, so why is it not growing faster in ’15 versus ’14 given this is where the CAPEX is going and Solstice is ramping up? Sorry, and congratulations by the way.

Dave Cote

CEO

Ah, thank you – I thought I was going to have to beg again. Andrew Obin – Bank of America : No. [laughter]

Elena Doom

Operator

So we are seeing good growth in Advanced Materials, Andrew. I mean in the quarter Advanced Materials grew 7% organically so I think what we’re saying is at this point the continuation of that type of mid-single-digit growth rate is what we’re expecting for next year given it’s still early days.

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Yeah, just a reminder on how to read that chart: the side arrows mean the growth rates themselves for ’15 compared to the growth rates for 2014. So as Elena points out we’ve seen really decent growth especially in the second half in the Advanced Materials portfolio including fluorine or led by fluorine. So we’re expecting that trend to continue in 2015. So I think it’s a good story.

Dave Cote

CEO

Besides if we had a whole page of green arrows you’d be asking how could we possibly believe the environment to be that good. Andrew Obin – Bank of America : I appreciate that. And just a comment on BSD, you sort of commented that you’re seeing non-res accelerating. Could you just give more color on what specifically you’re saying, what areas because it would be really good news if we are seeing non-res cycle pickup.

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Yeah, I think it’s been moderate. I don’t want to overplay the pickup on the commercial piece of the non-res but we are seeing a significant amount of quotation activity in the US and particularly on the federal side of the energy vertical. The municipalities and other institutions are also coming along but overall the orders are starting to pick up. We’re expecting good orders, [a story of performance] in Q4 that should serve us well in 2015. Andrew Obin – Bank of America : Terrific, thank you.

Dave Cote

CEO

Thanks, Andrew.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Howard Rubel of Jefferies. Howard Rubel – Jefferies & Co. : Good morning. Thank you very much.

Dave Cote

CEO

Hey Howard, thank you. Howard Rubel – Jefferies & Co. : Well no, thank you, Dave. I mean numbers like this, you know, only come from Honeywell.

Dave Cote

CEO

Now that’s what I’m talking about, Howard, thank you! Howard Rubel – Jefferies & Co. : Boy this is really amazing, the suck-ups we’re doing here but anyhow…

Dave Cote

CEO

Only if it’s deserved. [laughter] Howard Rubel – Jefferies & Co. : Exactly, you know that. But to talk about a couple of business fundamentals, talk about what you’ve done to make Intermec work right. It looks like it had a very nice top line contribution. The US Postal Service piece of business looks like it’s market share pickup and when I walk into Starbucks I see a Honeywell logo. So what’s gone there that’s set you apart because this is a difficult market?

Dave Cote

CEO

I was going to say we appreciate you picking up on that one because we’re quite proud of everything we’ve done there, not just by Intermec but by really pulling together several players in the industry and creating a “One Honeywell” approach that’s really made a difference. And they all brought different technologies and perspectives whether it was Hand-Held, Metrologic or Intermec. And I think our guys, starting with Darius the leader originally and then John [Waldren] who’s in there now have done a great job pulling all that together and rationalizing it so that we expanded our offerings, pushed the technology more so than others have, including what we’ve been able to do with Voice or Vocollect coming out of the Intermec acquisition; and getting better coverage – just being out there and being able to tell our story with feet on the street in a way that we weren’t able to before. So it’s really just a matter of running it better and taking advantage of the technologies that we brought together and running it better. Howard Rubel – Jefferies & Co. : So when we look at the Intermec numbers year-on-year they’re up, it’s hard to totally tell but it looks like high single digits. I know that’s only one part of everything you’re doing there.

Tom Szlosek

CFO

That’s right, Howard. And I know we’re getting the, as Dave said the technologies are very strong and they’re complementary to what exists in the Scanning Mobility business. We didn’t have printing; we didn’t have voice. We did have mobile computers but Intermec had a very strong platform and so we’ve been able to integrate all three of those product lines nicely and to accelerate the growth there. And as you alluded to the performance against what our expectations were has been tremendous and when we look at the headline multiple versus where we are today it’s quite remarkable.

Dave Cote

CEO

It’s also good, Howard, you know how we never count on sales synergies which always provides a nice upside. And we’ve gotten a pile of them here. Howard Rubel – Jefferies & Co. : Thank you. And then one just final question, sort of I’m not sure if I’m going to ask it right, but as you look at new products that you’re introducing with the R&D spend – because in each of the business units you’ve talked about there being, I’ll call it growth investments. How are you sort of measuring the premium you’re getting on the new products relative to the spend you’re making? How fast do you decide that gee, this is working really well, let’s put more in; or no, it’s not working very well and let’s scale it back?

Dave Cote

CEO

That’s something that we defer to each of the businesses to make those kinds of decisions, and each of them has their kind of kiss-or-kill approach to all of these projects. And some of it’s by country, some of it’s by business so they’re constantly looking at making sure that we get the biggest bang for the R&D buck. And I would say it’s one of the things that I look at and say across the company we still have opportunity for. Sometimes we’ll have a project that we’ll look at and say “Geez, this is going to cause sales to grow 8%, that’s great, let’s do it,” but we really don’t push ourselves because it might be a business that could be growing 20% - we’re just not thinking big enough for it. On the other side there’s still projects that we linger with too long or we focus on little stuff when we should be conglomerating some of that and focusing on something bigger. So I’d say we do a good job overall, certainly a hell of a lot better than we used to, but I still see more upside to being more disciplined on that in every business. Howard Rubel – Jefferies & Co. : Thank you for your help today.

Dave Cote

CEO

We hope. We’ll see what 4:00 shows. Howard Rubel – Jefferies & Co. : [laughs] Thank you, Dave.

Operator

Operator

Our final question comes from John Inch of Deutsche Bank. John Inch – Deutsche Bank: Thank you. Last but not least, hi guys. So congrats, Dave.

Dave Cote

CEO

Oh, thank you. John Inch – Deutsche Bank: You’re welcome. So Tom, you gave us the ’15 I think restructuring tailwinds of $125 million. Just to try and make sure we have the framework could you tell us what, remind us what your spending expectations are for ’14 and then savings that would have been from ’13 and ’14; and then what you expect to spend in ’15 that dovetails with the $125 million?

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Yeah, I believe the actual savings from ’13 to ’14 is similar – it’s in that $125 million, $150 million range for 2015. In terms of the cash spend I think for 2014 it’d be about $200 million.

Elena Doom

Operator

We had an elevated Q1 restructuring charge obviously with the sale of the B/E Aero shares. But it’s probably, maybe for just the repositioning portion only it’s maybe more in the $140 million, $150 million range in terms of spend. Tom, do you want to comment on next year?

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Yeah, I think for next year I would expect, I mean our unspent backlog as of the end of Q3 is about $350 million, a little less than that. And I would expect that we would spend $150 million to $200 million of that (inaudible). John Inch – Deutsche Bank: Yeah, I mean that’s where I was going with the B/E Aerospace share gains. I mean is this, all else equal are we going to see some sort of a spending tailwind if you will, or absence of spending that could be actually material or impactful? Or perhaps you’re thinking about some other offset because you guys are pretty good at you know, doing some matching opportunistically.

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Yeah, so John, I thought you were asking about cash before. John Inch – Deutsche Bank: Well, I was kind of asking about both, yeah.

Tom Szlosek

CFO

Okay. So right now as I said our expense, our P&L expense of restructuring is about $120 million and we spent the cash that we had indicated. We’re always looking at opportunities. Every quarter we review with Dave; every business reviews a portfolio of restructuring opportunities just like we do for M&A opportunities. And we look at them in a disciplined way. We look at the paybacks, we look at the ROIs and so forth, and yes, it’s true – we tend to look for opportunities to fund those restructuring, and yes, it’s also true that we have some potential funding capacity as we look out. But I don’t think we’ve come to any conclusions at this point on what we’re going to do in 2015. We’ll take it opportunistically as we go through the year like we normally do. John Inch – Deutsche Bank: That’s fair. And then can I just follow up: you guys are a very large aerospace company and your commentary around aerospace and aftermarket is still pretty constructive kind of heading into next year. You do have this sort of Ebola thing that’s kind of in the background and I’m trying to understand, would the analogy be perhaps to what happened during SARS and the possible impact on flight hours? I’m just trying to understand at this juncture how are you thinking about the planning process for the business next year as it pertains to flight hours perhaps based on past experience? Or is it should we just not really be concerned about this?

Dave Cote

CEO

As usual you can expect us to plan for some of the worst just so that we know what our downside is. I don’t think that’s what’s going to happen here, though, just based upon what you read about Ebola. In terms of its actual impact on the US in terms of how many people actually get ill, at least from the best I’ve been able to glean, we don’t expect much of an impact there. The thing you can’t predict is what that fear quotient is going to do, and as people just start to become afraid and as media has something new to talk about it’s tough to predict where that will go. So I’d say overall I don’t expect the actual impact in terms of illness to be consistent with what we saw with SARS. You still need to start to factor in what that fear quotient could do and that we’re not really going to know except over the next two to three months I would say. And we’re going to plan, make sure that we have a plan to address it in the most conservative way possible just so that we’re prepared. John Inch – Deutsche Bank: Okay, thanks very much, I appreciate it.

Dave Cote

CEO

You’re welcome.

Elena Doom

Operator

So I want to hand the call back over to Dave Cote for some closing remarks.

Dave Cote

CEO

Over the last few years we’d have to say the global macro economy really hasn’t provided much help, and we expect it’s going to continue that way as we outlined in our five-year plan back in March. As Tom and I both mentioned conservative sales planning has been the way to go and we’re going to continue that approach. It’s probably obvious by now that we’re pleased with our outperformance this quarter and this year and for that matter over the last few years, and we intend to continue outperforming consistent with our five-year plan. Within a slow global economy we will get all the sales we can because of our great positions in good industries, our high-growth region presence and focus, and new products. With that sales growth we’ll continue to drive cost and process discipline through our focus on HOS goals. So said more simply, we intend to continue outperforming. So thanks for listening and of course thank you to all our owners. I promise we won’t disappoint you, thanks.