Eric DeMarco
Analyst · B. Riley & Co. Your line is now open. Please go ahead
Thank you, Marie. Good afternoon. Today we announce that Kratos has successfully received a Phase 1 contract on DARPA's Gremlins program, a very important strategic win for our company furthering Kratos' entry into the tactical unmanned combat aerial market. Gremlins Phase 1 is to explore different systems approach as to launch and recover in-flight multiple low cost high performance unmanned tactical aerial systems that will be networked and cooperating for electronic attack and reconnaissance missions from stand-off ranges. This exploration phase is designed to pave the way for a proof of concept flight demonstration. An important objective of the Gremlins program is for relatively inexpensive unmanned aerial vehicles that are reusable to be used in mass quantities to saturate enemy air defenses. There were four announced winners to Gremlins Phase 1, including Kratos and the others being Lockheed Martin, General Atomics and Dynetics. Phase 1 is currently scheduled to lead to a systems requirements review at the end of the first quarter of 2017 at which time DARPA plans to down-select two teams issuing contracts of approximately $20 million each for a Phase 2 preliminary system design. In the second quarter 2018, DARPA will hold a preliminary design review and one team will be selected for Phase 3 and an estimated $35 million contract, concluding with a flight test in 2020. The estimated price target for the Gremlin UAF is approximately $700,000 per aircraft, excluding payloads for 1,000 unit order quantities, once in production. Additionally, we have also just recently received and are now under contract for a second high performance tactical UAS opportunity. We are unable to provide additional information as to this new UAS contract award at this time due to specific customer confidentiality obligations, though we anticipate being able to do so in the future. We believe that the selection of Kratos for the Gremlin 1 Phase contract award and the second new high performance tactical unmanned aerial system award demonstrates our company's tactical unmanned aerial system qualifications and capabilities, our proven ability to provide high performance unmanned aerial systems that are reusable at a low cost and represents an important milestone for our company and our strategy to successfully enter this new market space. On the Gremlins program award, due to the nature of the contract and existing Kratos intellectual property positions no significant Kratos discretionary investment is expected. Also no significant Kratos discretionary investment is required or expected on the second new tactical UAS award we recently received. Additionally, the resources we have been maintaining related to the hoped-for successful award of these two opportunities are now beginning with our second quarter under contract and will not adversely impact Kratos' EBITDA going forward as they did in our first quarter. We do believe that the significant discretionary investments we have made over the past two years to develop are UTAP-22 Tornado UCAVs successfully positioned us for the Gremlin solicitation and the second U.S. UAS contract award we received as the UTAP-22 demonstrated our ability to quickly develop and produce high performance, low cost unmanned tactical systems leveraging off of our existing high performance unmanned aerial drone system aircraft. As I just mentioned and as Deanna will discuss in detail, we have been maintaining resources in anticipation of winning these awards, which related costs impacted our Q1 2016 financial performance and we will continue to maintain the resources related to the third new UAS opportunity in anticipation of successfully receiving a contract award in the very near future. In the first quarter, Kratos continued to make progress in the customer and congressional community with our UTAP-22 Tornado initiative, which is Kratos' initial tactical platform related to the unmanned combat aerial system market space. Due to competitive considerations which are increasing, I will not be providing additional information related to Kratos's UTAP-22 at this time. However, we are making no significant additional investment in the Tornado aircraft at this time. During the first quarter, we continued to support certain U.S. government agencies related to the command-and-control of swarms of unmanned aerial vehicles, related mission capabilities, tactics and also defensive capabilities against swarms of UAVs, including the use of high power directed energy and laser weapon systems. In unmanned ground systems, today we announced the Kratos and our strategic partner Royal Truck and Equipment, Inc. will be deploying Kratos' unmanned ground system technology in an autonomous impact protection vehicle program in collaboration with Colas, U.K. transportation infrastructure enterprise. The autonomous IPV, equipped with an electromechanical system and completely integrated sensor suite, has leader-follower capabilities that allow the autonomous unmanned vehicle to follow a manned lead vehicle. This unmanned drone system technology was initially deployed for the United States military and is now being customized by Kratos and Royal for the commercial highway industry and related applications, including here in the United States. Royal provided America with the first driverless unmanned TMA truck and is an industry leader in unmanned and autonomous vehicles and trucks. If successful, this technology would be deployed across the U.K. and Europe. There are few unmanned ground vehicles currently in production. However, the number of tactical UGVs will grow in the future and certain militaries are currently working on UGVs capable of carrying armaments, rockets, grenade launchers and other weapon systems. With our customers' technology and contractual relationships, we expect Kratos to be a significant player in this new and growing marketplace. Important additional Kratos first quarter bookings in our unmanned business included a $37 million firm fixed price contract on the Air Force's Subscale Aerial Target Program related to AFAST operations at Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida and the Utah Test and Training Range. We also received an $18.7 million contract award for the Lot 12 option on the previously awarded AFSAT Lots 11 through 13 production contract. Both of these contract awards are expected to contribute to our unmanned systems 2016 over 2015 growth and expected 2017 over 2016 growth. From a business development standpoint, in our unmanned systems division, we are currently in contract negotiations on a large new unmanned target drone opportunity we expect to be under contract on over the next few months. We are also in discussions on a new sole source unmanned target drone system opportunity we currently expect to be under contract on in the fourth quarter of this year. Additionally, we are in pursuit of a large new unmanned aerial drone system program opportunity with a certain government agency where we understand that tens of millions of funding is allocated over the next couple of years. This opportunity is currently expected to be awarded in late 2016 or early next year. In Q1, Kratos' unmanned systems division generated a book-to-bill ratio of approximately 2.5:1. Operationally, in Q1 our unmanned systems division came in on track and we continue to expect sequential 2016 to 2015 year-over-year growth, including growth generated by an increased number of unmanned aerial target drone systems which are currently under contract and expected new awards. In Q1, Kratos also remained on track to commence LRIP on the SSAT program later this year or in early 2017, depending on the length of any potential federal fiscal CRA and we remain under contract on a confidential program also currently estimated to begin production in early 2017. In Q1, Kratos' satellite communication, technology and training business, the largest and most profitable business of our company, had a particularly strong quarter, driven by increased demand for protected satellite communications, unmanned systems communications, overall increasing bandwidth requirements and the recently publicly disclosed space war game where U.S. Satellites in Space assets were effectively neutralized. Our satellite business is expected to continue to be strong throughout 2016 as our backlog and bid pipeline continues to strengthen. In this business, we are currently in pursuit of a new approximate $100 million opportunity and a separate new approximate $65 million opportunity, where if we are successful, these could provide us an additional growth step function beginning next year. And on the training side, we are now designed in and under contract on a new combat rescue helicopter program for multiple training system units which will be an important growth driver going forward. Kratos' satellite technology and training business is one of the crown jewels of our company and the future looks extremely promising for our largest business unit. In Q1, Kratos' microwave electronics business had a very strong quarter, including strength in the missile system, radar and communication systems area. Kratos' Israeli based microwave business is one of the most technologically advanced in our company and this business is also expected to continue to be strong throughout 2016, driven in part by our first quarter book-to-bill ratio of approximately 1.2:1 and a current near record backlog. Related to this business, the House Armed Services Committee has requested an approximate $200 million funding increase for various Israeli missile defense programs, which if sustained would be an additional positive for our business. Also a few weeks ago, it was reported that Airbus has been awarded an approximate $9 billion Kuwait fighter jet deal for Eurofighter Typhoons which is a multimillion dollar opportunity for Kratos, based on our current designed in positions on the Typhoon and shipset value and it has recently been reported that Saudi Arabia and Oman are also in discussions to acquire additional Typhoons. Microwave electronics is also in pursuit of certain potential needle mover opportunities, one of which is a missile system, which is currently expected to be awarded later this year. In Q1, Kratos' ballistic missile targets business had a solid quarter and we are just beginning a large multi-BMD target system production run we are now under contract on which is expected to continue into 2017 and should be a key driver of 2016 over 2015 year-over-year organic growth for this business. In Q1, our government services business came in on track. And based on this business' current backlog and bid pipeline, it is expected to remain stable throughout 2016. As we informed you in Kratos' fiscal 2015 year-end report, in the first quarter of 2016 we executed a restructuring, a facility consolidation and a major cost reduction in our modular systems and public safety and security business areas. These actions are expected to position these businesses for significantly improved profitability and cash flow generation beginning in the second or third quarter of 2016 on an expected reduced business and revenue base. We are affirming the full year 2016 base case financial guidance and trajectory that we previously provided with 2016 financial trajectory expected to be similar to 2015 with both second quarter 2016 revenue and EBITDA expected to sequentially increase over Q1 of 2016. Kratos' Q2 2016 adjusted EBITDA though expected to increase above Q1's will, however continue to be adversely impacted by the significant resources we are maintaining related to the third tactical UAS opportunity we are awaiting word on and excluding any future investments we may make related to this third new UAS opportunity, if we are successful. We will update our guidance once this third UAS opportunity award is made, the timing of the award, if Kratos is successful and if we are successful, the definitized contracts structure. If we are unsuccessful, we will update our guidance for the significant cost reduction we will immediately make related to the significant resources we have been maintaining in anticipation of successfully winning this opportunity. Deanna?