Sara Zawoyski
Analyst · Barclays
Thank you, Beth. Let's begin on Slide 5 with our first quarter results. We are off to a strong start to the year with outstanding margin performance and robust free cash flow. Sales of $741 million were up 7% relative to last year or 8% organically. Volumes were up modestly compared to last year on top of 13% a year ago, and price added 8 points to growth. Foreign exchange was a 2-point headwind. First quarter segment income was $148 million, up 34%. Return on sales was 20%, up 410 basis points year-over-year. Better price-cost and positive productivity drove the outperformance versus our expectations. Price more than offset the impact from inflation of roughly $30 million. Our supply chain continued to improve, resulting in sequential and year-over-year productivity improvement. Q1 adjusted EPS was $0.67, up 34% and above the high end of our guidance range. We generated robust free cash flow in the quarter of $52 million compared to a usage of $3 million a year ago, reflecting our strong operational performance. This also includes significant CapEx investments for growth and capacity. Now please turn to Slide 6 for a discussion of our first quarter segment performance. Starting with Enclosures. Sales of $391 million increased 11% organically, with both price and volume contributing. Sales growth was broad-based with all verticals growing, industrial-led, driven by continued trends in automation. Infrastructure was also a standout contributor with continued strength in data solutions up 20%. Geographically, North America led, up double digits, followed by Europe. Enclosures first quarter segment income was $82 million, up 64%. Return on sales of 21.1% increased an impressive 710 basis points year-over-year, driven by strong execution. We also continue to see margin improvements from our simplification efforts. We are investing in added capacity and expansion of our data solutions business and expect this to ramp in Q2 and second half. Moving to Electrical & Fastening. Sales of $206 million increased 11% organically, driven by strong price. All verticals grew with commercial up modestly and infrastructure up over 20% organically with strength in power utilities and data solutions. Geographically, sales growth was led by North America and Europe. Electrical & Fastening segment income was $61 million, up 30%. Return on sales was a notable 29.8%, up 470 basis points relative to last year on strong execution. Turning to Thermal Management. Sales of $144 million were flat organically. Price contributed 4 points to growth, while volumes were negative. Energy and infrastructure both grew double digits organically with a solid pipeline of energy transition projects in LNG, biofuels, hydrogen and carbon capture. Industrial MRO demand remained strong. Commercial and residential declined with residential down double digits. Geographically, growth was led by North America with declines in China. Thermal Management segment income of $31 million was down 5%. Return on sales of 21.5% was down 40 basis points year-over-year, primarily due to mix. On Slide 7, titled Balance Sheet and Cash Flow, we ended the quarter with $303 million of cash on hand and $600 million available on our revolver. This week, we announced our financing for the pending ECM Industries acquisition, including pricing $500 million of 10-year senior notes and a new prepayable $300 million term loan facility. The balance will be funded through a combination of cash on hand and our existing revolver. So turning to Slide 8, where we will outline our capital allocation priorities. We believe our robust balance sheet and cash generation puts us in a great position to continue to invest in growth, return cash to shareholders and deliver great returns. We exited Q1 with a net debt to adjusted EBITDA ratio of 1.3x. On a pro forma basis, we forecast our net debt to adjusted EBITDA to now be 2.7x at the closing of the ECM acquisition. With our strong cash flow generation, we plan to delever quickly and be within our targeted range of 2 to 2.5x within the next 12 to 18 months. In the quarter, we returned approximately $44 million to shareholders including dividends and $15 million of share repurchases. Moving to Slide 9. We are raising our full year guidance, reflecting our strong performance. We continue to expect organic sales to grow 4% to 6%. We now expect adjusted EPS to be in the range of $2.65 to $2.73, up 10% to 14% versus our original guidance of $2.51 to $2.61. This new guidance reflects the strong start to the year, solid price-cost execution and better productivity. It also continues to reflect the uncertainties in the second half. It's important to note that our guidance does not yet include the impact of ECM Industries. We expect ECM's adjusted EBITDA margins of 25% to be accretive to overall nVent margins. and we expect cost synergies of $10 million to $15 million by year 3 with benefits starting in 2024. We continue to expect the deal to be accretive to adjusted EPS in 2023 excluding purchase price accounting and onetime deal-related costs. A couple of modeling assumptions to note. First, foreign exchange is expected to have a neutral impact to sales versus a previous 1-point headwind. And second, we now expect our tax rate to be approximately 18.5%. Looking at our second quarter outlook on Slide 10, we expect organic sales to be up 3% to 5%. We expect our distribution partners to continue to adjust their inventories and destock with improved supply chains. We expect adjusted EPS to be between $0.66 and $0.68, which at the midpoint reflects 18% growth relative to last year. Wrapping up, I'm pleased with our first quarter performance. We delivered strong margins, robust cash flow and are well positioned for another great year. This concludes my remarks, and I will now turn the call back over to Beth.