Brian Shore
Analyst · Needham & Company. Your line is open
Okay. Thank you, Matt. This is Brian again. So, let me go through some additional comments about the quarter and also about the business. So, the revenue and bottom line shortfall, it’s all electronics, it’s an electronic story, so let’s talk about electronics first, what the problem is, and what we are doing about it. The electronics revenues, as you know, were off even from the first quarter which was weak. So, the market is not great, programs are falling off, and the problem is we’re replacing those items by getting on new programs as quickly as we need to. And there’s really two answers for electronics, one is in Asia; the other one is in North America. So, we have to break it down, because the markets are quite different and the answers are quite different for us. In Asia, we’ve talked about this, I think last call or call before, there was -- let’s call a contest, very well-publicized contest in Asia of all the leading materials in the world. Our entry was Meteorwave 4000, which is the top of our line, and we won; we’re the only one who passed the test the first time, it’s called CAF 1,000 hour; we won. Now some others I think were given a second chance, maybe they were able to pass the test the second or third time. But this is all of top materials in the world. So, we felt -- and that’s very publicized, well publicized, everyone knows about it. So, we felt okay, this is really good, this is what we wanted. We wanted to develop the best products that would give us something different, something unique which I always felt was needed for Park, which we didn’t want to be like everybody else. But the harsh realization for us in Asia is that Asia is very different and the culture is very different, and it's all about making deals, let's make a deal. And we’ve been told number of times and it's obvious, not just by what we have been told but also by the actions that followed that we can have the best product in the world but unless we're willing to make the deals and play the game, it's not going to go so well for us. So, even though this came -- this realization came with a lot of difficulty and a lot of pain, we decided, okay, fine, we have to recognize reality. Denying reality is not going to help us and could hurt us badly. So, now, we're making deals as well. We are trying to be very disciplined about it; we don't want to be wild. But we realize in Asia that it's a necessary part of playing the game, a theory that if we had the best products that that would be enough, is probably not panning out. And like I said, it's difficult for us because we always wanted to carve out something different for us. And now the question is for electronics with the future in Asia, how are we different than others, hard question to answer because we're playing the game now and making deals, we have made some deals with some significant OEMs already; not what we wanted but that's what we're doing. And we feel it's just necessary. We don't feel there is any option for us other than doing that; not we wanted but if you deny reality, you do that at your own peril of course. So, that's the Asia story, really. We could talk about it more but that's the Asia story. Like I said, I just want to say it again, we are trying to be disciplined and not wild about this but we already have made some deals and I guess we're talking to some other people as well. I don't think that there is any issue with our product. I think our product is -- well, it's not just what I say, it's this objective test or contest, if you will, that says our products are pretty darn good. And I am sure that it's not service or responsiveness or anything like that. I think that that's another area where Park does quite well. So, in U.S., it's quite a different story. The U.S. for us is more of a niche market; Asia is the volume market, for electronics. And in the U.S., it's really a matter of sizing our operations to the market opportunity. So, we have a restructuring that has been worked on for probably a couple of months, that's pretty much all planned and ready to go. But we are holding off from pulling the trigger because of recent -- sorry, I have a cold and cough a little bit; sear with me please, recent developments. We have some opportunities that have come our way just in the last I'd say month, partly through the help of one of our really great circuit board customers. And these opportunities are large but we want to see how they play out. One actually is with one of these private space companies, significant and a couple other military aerospace type opportunities now. I always have to be careful; when I say aerospace, I am still talking about electronics segment, I'm not talking about our aerospace activities. This is circuit board materials sold to aerospace or in military markets. So, we are going to hold off and see how these things pan out. If we are premature in pulling the trigger, it could be a mistake. It's very hard to reverse these things. Restructurings, once you do it, you move quickly. That's how it's done; we've done this before. But the problem is that if we can't reverse it, we may not be able to take advantage of these opportunities; that's the issue. So, we need to sit tight for a little while, maybe a few months and see how these things play out. Okay. So, that's the news in electronics, not good. And like I said, the whole story with our top line and bottom line in Parks is electronics. Aerospace, very positive news, all good that I know of; there are a number of items that I want to go over with you. First, a detail but it's an important one. We spoke I think in the last couple of quarters, at least last quarter, about the fact that there was an inventory issue at GE. And just to clarify it, I saw a report that was not quite correct. That's our inventory, too much of our inventory, not somebody else's inventory. And I don't want to go into the reasons or how it happened; that's not really that important but it was recognized. And as we've communicated, calendar year 2016 and 2017 are supposed to be dramatically off with GE Aviation. I think in last fiscal year, it was about $12 million. That's not ramped up to the new levels of course that we expect under the agreement but that's current operating, and this year much less. But the good news is we’ve been told by GE Aviation that the remaining inventory is going to be scrapped by the end of this year and that means next year that overhang will be gone. And we expect about $13 million next calendar year, $17 million which is much more than we originally were expecting, about $13 million. That's for the MRAS portion of GE, Middle River Aircraft. That's the main activity for us. That's the volume activity which relates to the cells and thrust reversers, a lot of material. That does not include the other GE Aviation activities which are still in development. So, actually that's not totally true, some programs we started on, but they're much more difficult to quantify than the MRAS portion of what we do with GE Aviation. So, $13 million plus, plus what, I don't know. The forecast is a pretty nice number but I'm not going to share it with you because I think that’s optimistic, the non-$13 million portion of -- the $13 million I feel pretty confident that's a good number. The rest of it, like I said, I am not going to share with you because I think the number is optimistic, but it will be in the millions I suspect. Okay. That's a detail but an important detail. Another thing, last time we spoke we talked about the fact that we're working on a long-term agreement with GE Aviation. It’s been something that's been in the works for a long, long time. We mentioned that our commitment to build this extra factory is based upon signing up this long-term agreement. I think we described it as a 10-year agreement. That was what was given to us in our last proposal which we responded to. But GE has come back and they said well, they want a life of program agreement. That's a long time. That could be 30 years depending upon what program. So, that's something that they've done before -- my understanding is they've done this before but not too often. So, we are back to drawing board and reengaging on working through the terms and conditions, the contract language because that's a little bit of a change for us. That's obviously very good news and must be some indication that GE likes doing business with us. We didn't ask for it; it wasn't from us; they said they want it. We would have been happy with a 10-year deal. But that's still in the works. As we've talked about before, GE being a large company, things don't move that quickly, but that is an important development. Another one, we've talked, I don't know remember how many times, once, twice, maybe three times about another very large aerospace company where we had given an RFQ to which we responded. We indicated that I think as we indicated that if we were given 100% of business, which is probably unlikely, we committed to building factory, which would cost over $50 million and also financing qualifications about $10 million. Probably unlikely that we’d be given 100% but I think we made that comment before. But the big news is that the screening has been complete and we passed. We met with them very recently. They say they want to go ahead with us. Next step is in a few weeks, a multi-day meeting to go over the detail of technical qualification plan, this is now serious but also review the terms and conditions of the long-term agreement. So, this is no longer preliminary; this is now serious stuff. I just want to give you some perspective about aerospace and where we’re going. We did a little math, and I have a whole spreadsheet here, I'm not going to go through the details. But, here's the assumption. We take the base aerospace revenues without GE from last year, fiscal 2016, take the revenues, subtract GE. That's our base. We assume we never grow that base, which obviously is not a good assumption. We assume we never grow that base. Then we add GE based upon their forecast and we add 25% of the forecast from this other company; 25% is an arbitrary number, could be more, could be less, could be nothing I guess, we don't have that business yet. But I think that it's that serious, let me put it that way. 25% I think it's a conservative assumption. So, you get to the -- let me look at the spreadsheet just to make sure I get the right numbers, right years. Yes, 2020, mid-90 to 100 million for aerospace revenues per year, mid-90s to 100. I think 2020 is aggressive; I don't think that's realistic. Maybe think more 2021. Okay? Again the assumptions, no growth of our base business, just taking the forecast we got, adding it up, simple math; no growth. Also no growth at GE Aviation of new programs, like we mentioned before, we have a joint development agreement we're working on with GE Aviation, going well. We're dealing with GE scientists, very smart people. That agreement -- I mean that program, if successful and we think it's going well, no guarantees, but GE's counting on it being successful, I'll tell you that much, leads to more revenue of consequence quickly. Not in the forecast. That's just an example. And there are other opportunities that seem to come our way with GE fairly often. So, mid-90s to 100 million a year that assumes no growth at all of our base business just doing the math. So, I thought you should know that. Let’s see -- oh, and assuming -- yes, talk about no growth. We are in the process of getting qualified with one of the major aircraft companies of the world on one of their specifications. That's a pretty big deal. That's millions of dollars of revenue per year. And I’m told that there's another one behind it which is even bigger. So, again, the assumption no growth base business; we hope that doesn't end up being a correct assumption, and of course, it's not our intention that it would be a correct assumption. This is new, this thing I just mentioned; we never discussed it before. This is one of the major aircraft companies of the world. That's important for us, big deal, I would say. Other thing I want to mention, which I'm very pleased about -- this is maybe one of those intangibles they talk about. I feel we have a real solid team in aerospace now, based in Kansas. I'm very pleased about that. It's been a real struggle since we started and I think we broke ground in 2007 or something like that, 2008. It's been a struggle, it's been very difficult, every step of the way. And I am not saying we are there by any stretch but we have a very solid team in place now, 'm very pleased about that. I feel that bodes very well for Park's future. We continue to work on the other programs, like Scorpion that we've mentioned before. Those things continue and I won't spend any time going through those in detail at this point. I just want to let you know those things continue and they are going fine. And in closing with my remarks, I want to make a suggestion to the analysts and institutions, which is something I rarely do but when I do it’s not casual. I suggest that the focus for Park for the future should be really more in aerospace. I think that's a reality that needs to be accepted. That's what Park's future is all about. And to really understand Park and where it's going, I think the focus for Park really needs to be on aerospace or should be, doesn't need to be, that's my opinion, should be for our analysts and institutional investors. I know that's a shift because we were -- until 2007 or 2008 we were not in aerospace at all. But I think at this point the right way to look at Park would be to look at aerospace for Park's future. And I think that's it from my introductory remarks. So, operator, can we go to questions now?