Mark Mondello
Analyst · Cross Research
Thanks, Beth, good afternoon. I appreciate everyone taking time to join our call today. As always, I'd like to thank our people here at Jabil and offer my sincere appreciation for their continued focus on keeping our employees safe, while serving our customers with the utmost dedication and care. Now I'll begin today by addressing our first quarter results. The execution by our team was exceptional during the quarter as they delivered $0.69 of core earnings per share and $5.1 billion in revenue. Our financial results were strong than management anticipated, reflecting the second best quarter in Jabil's 50 year history in terms of both revenue and core operating income. The core operating margin for the first quarter was squarely in line with management's expectation of 4.1%. Throughout the quarter certain product volumes in our mobility sector were softer than expected. While the balance of our business performed at or above plan. I'm pleased with the results and believe they accurately reflect the potential and overall effectiveness of our strategy. A strategy grounded by increasing the diversification of our core earnings. Lastly we remain highly confident in our ability to deliver $3 in core earnings per share for fiscal year '19. Our management commitment communicated by Forbes during our Investor Day back in September. Forbes will speak more in detail to our business outlook and provide more color around our first quarter results during his prepared remarks. I'll now offer some thoughts as to what's driving our business as we look into the second half of the fiscal year and beyond. Let me start with some key businesses within our DMS segment. Our healthcare and packaging businesses are extremely well positioned to prosper in coming years, as our aptitude and approach solidly align with positive market trends. These businesses are advancing beautifully becoming more and more material in coming quarters. They exhibit a true growth story as margins expand, while moving from early adoption investment periods to large scale well established business sectors. We expect these combined businesses to accelerate and grow our earnings at a compounded annual growth rate of 20% or greater from fiscal year '16 through fiscal year '19. Next our consumer lifestyles business is delivering above plan. Our team serves companies poised to change the way in which we capture, interpret and process the world around us. The team has done a masterful job integrating specialized assembly, embedded camera solutions and interkit [ph] tooling delivering solutions to growth markets. Areas such as augmented reality and high-tech connected devices. This business leverages deep and discrete capability investments giving us true differentiation and positioning Jabil to realize millions of dollars of incremental core earnings within our DMS segment as we move beyond fiscal year '17. Lastly within DMS, our mobility business remains well aligned with Apple. Our team is executing flawlessly at the moment controlling what they can control. With that said I'll remind you that Jabil's DMS financial results are dependent on our overall product demand in the handset marketplace as leverage and utilization of our existing asset base is critical to our success. Let me now move to our EMS segment. The EMS team continues to assist customers as they navigate rapid change. The solutions and services we now offer continue to increase in terms of relevancy for the wonderful OEM brands the team serves. As our EMS business moves from legacy build to print activities to build the spec and build the function models. Our team continues to extend their value proposition as customers delegate more and more control of hardware content to Jabil. During our September call I suggested that our EMS segment would likely grow 5% to 6% in terms of core earnings for the full year, fiscal ‘16 to fiscal ‘17. While core operating margins for the MS segment would be approximately 3.5% for the year. As I sit here today 90 days later, I am pleased to communicate that our core operating margins for the back half of fiscal ‘17 will likely approach 4% for our EMS segment, while I anticipate core earnings to actually grow 10% to 12% year-on-year. Our EMS segment continues to maintain great momentum and I firmly believe this new margins structure is secular in nature. I’d say it’s the new normal. Let me now take a minute and move from our DMS and EMS segments to addressing the company as a whole. In an effort to help you think about the business in the back half of this year, if you start with the midpoint of our guidance we provided today, for Q2 ‘17. I’d assume that 25% to 30% decline, when thinking Jabil’s third quarter in terms of core operating income. This sequential quarter-on-quarter decline reflects the typical OpEx investment required in our mobility space. As we prepare for product ramps, resulting in what we believe will be a very bullish, in fact unusually strong outlook for our fourth fiscal quarter. Finally, I’d like to comment on our previously communicated capital allocation framework. The news is quite positive for shareholders, as we remain on track to return upwards of $900 million to $1 billion to shareholders through share repurchases and dividends. The capital being return to shareholders is underpinned by our intense cost management, confidence in future cash flows and our commitment to shareholders. The balance of our capital, capital not being returned to shareholders, will be thoughtfully directed towards initiatives and investments that drive new and well diversified business opportunities for Jabil. In closing and before I turn the call over to Forbes, a few parting comments. Jabil has evolved into a proud owner of a diverse set of outstanding businesses. Businesses that offer services and solutions with specialized and differentiated capabilities to a broad range of end markets. Our divisional approach allows for speed and agility to occur where it matters most at the customer. We are the brand behind the world’s best brands. As a management team, we have a lofty goal for Jabil’s brand; a goal to become the world’s most advanced manufacturing solutions company. And in doing so, we’ll keep our people safe, while always respect the environment, we’ll conduct ourselves with perfect integrity and we’ll look to make a difference in the world. With that, I’d like to wish everyone a safe and peaceful holiday season. Thank you and I’ll now turn the call over to Forbes.