Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. And welcome to the Corning Incorporated Second Quarter 2020 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker presentation, there will be a question and answer session. [Operator Instructions] I would now like to hand the conference to your speaker today, Ann Nicholson, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, ma’am.

Thank you, Joel and good morning. Welcome to Corning’s second quarter 2020 earnings call. With me today are Wendell Weeks, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; Tony Tripeny, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer; and Jeff Evenson, Executive Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer. I’d like to remind you that today's remarks contain forward-looking statements that fall within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Those statements involve risks, uncertainties, and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially. These factors are detailed in the company's financial reports. You should also note that we will be discussing our consolidated results using core performance measures; unless we specifically indicate our comments are related to GAAP data. Our core performance measures are non-GAAP measures used by management to analyze the business. A reconciliation of core results to the comparable GAAP value can be found in the Investor Relations section of our website at corning.com. You may also access core results on our website with downloadable financials in the Interactive Analyst Center. Supporting slides are being shown live on our webcast. We encourage you to follow along and they're also available on our website for downloading. Now, I'll turn the call over to Wendell.

Thank you, Ann, and good morning, everyone. This morning we reported second quarter 2020 results. Sales were $2.6 billion. Net income was $218 million. EPS was $0.25 and free cash flow was $285 million. All increased sequentially. I have two primary observations on the quarter. First, while we're effectively adjusting to this period of uncertainty with decisive action and operational execution, we're generating positive cash flow and maintaining a strong balance sheet. Second, even in these uncertain times our strategy to deliver for our customers and outperform our markets is working. We're continuing to lead in the capabilities that make Corning distinctive. In fact, we advanced multiple growth initiatives during the quarter. Let’s consider the first observation in more detail. In the second quarter, we completed adjustments to our operating plan and continue to execute across the board by delivering operational improvements that will generate significant cost savings through 2021. We delivered sequential growth in sales, EPS and free cash flow. We also completed the vast majority of our anticipated restructuring, including the reprioritization of R&D programs. We believe we're continuing to position Corning for strong long term and improve profitability. Turning to my second observation, our long-term strategy is sound and our growth drivers are intact. As I said before, we're not just counting on everybody buying more stuff, we're putting more Corning into the products that people already buy. This provides a mechanism for us to outperform our end markets even in challenging environments. The relevance of our focused and cohesive portfolio remains strong and is actually increasing some of the secular trends benefiting us could accelerate as consumer lifestyles continue to adapt in a world of social distancing and as healthcare companies advance solutions to end the pandemic. There is a need for expanded network capacity and…

Thank you, Wendell, and good morning. We came into this economic downturn with a balance sheet built for times like these, and we took actions during the quarter to ensure we have the financial resources needed for the duration. We generated $285 million in free cash flow, exited the quarter with $2.2 billion in cash and are on track to generate positive free cash flow for the year. Our financial position is strong. We are becoming more efficient and we have the capacity in place to meet expected growth with minimal investment. We expect improved profitability and return on invested capital as we grow sales. As the quarter progressed, demand and visibility improved. We maintained our leadership across all of our market access platforms. As a result, we expected gross sales and profits in the third quarter. As we said on our first quarter call, we've made aggressive adjustments to align our cost and operating plan with lower anticipated sales. These actions were essentially completed in the second quarter and fall into four broad categories; reducing production levels across most of our businesses, adjusting operating expenses with the majority of the savings to be realized in the second half, modifying inventory plans and reducing capital expenditures. As a result, we expect $200 million in annualized cash savings. We reduced inventory by a $120 million in the second quarter, and we reduced our CapEx by half versus Q1 to $288 million. We expect Q3 and Q4 CapEx to be consistent with the second quarter. We had strong operational performance with sequential improvement in sales, net income, EPS and free cash flow. Second quarter sales were $2.6 billion, up 2% quarter-over-quarter. Net income was $218 million, up 23% quarter-over-quarter, and EPS was $0.25, up 25% sequentially, and free cash flow was $285…

Thanks, Tony. During the second quarter, we made great strides in positioning Corning to emerge stronger from the global health crisis and resume growth. Sales, net income, EPS and free cash flow, all increased sequentially. Corning advanced multiple initiatives throughout the second quarter, including the launch of Corning Gorilla Glass Victus and continued innovation with 5G industry leaders. On the COVID-19 front, we continue to seek ways to leverage our deep technology, manufacturing, and engineering capabilities to combat the pandemic directly. We were delighted that Valor Glass was selected by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Defense to accelerate delivery of COVID-19 vaccines. Overall, our decisive action and operational execution resulted in positive free cash flow and continued leadership in the capabilities that make Corning distinctive. We're delivering for our customers, we're outperforming on markets and we're preserving our financial strength. I'll conclude with an additional important development. For nearly 170 years, our company has been dedicated to creating innovations that have a positive impact on the world, while conducting business in a way that has positive impact on our people and our communities. Now, we have an opportunity to make additional contributions. We're setting up an office to further build racial and social unity within the walls of Corning, and in our communities. Lewis Steverson, our Chief Legal and Administrative Officer will lead this office. With that, let's move to Q&A. Ann?

Thanks, Wendell. Operator, we are ready for the first question.

Thank you. [Operator instructions] Our first question comes from Samik Chatterjee with JP Morgan. Your line is now open.

Yes, thank you. Hi, good morning. Thanks for taking my question. If I can just start off with Display. You talked about kind of demand being resilient on the TV side, but as we’re looking at some of the data points from panel makers regarding to a substantial improvement in banner shipments quarter-on-quarter or going into 3Q something in the magnitude of 20%. So, wanted to get a sense of what you're seeing in terms of or hearing in terms of demand from your panel customers? And where does inventory stand? Because I think last quarter, you were a bit concerned about the inventory level going in.

Yeah, I think from Samik, from an overall standpoint the TV demand has clearly been resilient. The data points that we saw in the second quarter was the fact that the TV units were up on a year-over-year basis and that was certainly better than Q1. I mean, it was also better than well, most people were expecting as we went into the quarter. In addition to that, if you look at what happened in the preliminary data in June and July, I mean, that data was also very strong. In China, we didn't see a change in that data, though, that demand remains robust. And then North American and Europe, it was strong during the whole quarter and that continued. So yes, we think TV demand is resilient. We also think that supply chain is perfectly healthy. I mean, we ended the year in a healthy supply chain situation, of course, nobody knew exactly what was going to happen in the second quarter. But given what did happen in the second quarter and the way things are going now, we don't see any supply chain issues there.

Okay. And if I can just follow-up on the cash flow here, so you had a strong free cash flow quarter through the working capital improvements that you're driving. Just help me think about how sustainable those are as you start to kind of go through the recovery in terms of revenue, how much of that improvement is kind of something you have to get back as you go in working capital? Just trying to think about kind of how does this impact your free cash flow conversion in the long run?

Well, certainly a lot of that was by reducing inventory -- reduced inventory over $100 million during the quarter. And if you recall, over the last 18 months or so as we thought our sales were going to be more stronger than they actually turned out to be we actually built up a fair amount of inventory, so, we think there's the opportunity to continue to reduce inventory. And then just from an overall operational standpoint, one of our real focus areas of the company is on the inventory management and how to get better at that. So, I think that at least that is sustainable for at least a couple more quarters, no doubt, when we grow again, we'll have to consume working capital. The other thing that was a big improvement during the quarter, of course, was what happened on capital spending. And as you know in the first quarter, a lot of that was the expansion capital wrapping up on some of our biggest projects, such as Gen 10.5 and although we still have some of that that's going on, we've reduced it significantly in Q2. And we expect Q3 and Q4 to be at those same levels.

I think stepping back and looking at free cash flow conversion, fundamentally, when we're not in a build cycle, our free cash flow conversion is excellent. And that's where we are right now. Right, so it's less really about the specific programs and specific things we're doing. It's more just since it takes us a couple three years to build one of our major low-cost factories, but there's a cycle where we invest for the future. And it is that investment to drive down our free cash flow conversion. We're in a period right now, where we've gotten ahead of that. So, we're in a spot where we're just in a reinvestment stage. And we were like that, we're going to have really high free cash flow conversion, you can expect that to continue.

Got it. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next question comes from Steven Fox with Fox Advisors. Your line is now open.

Thanks. Good morning. Wendell, I was wondering if you could maybe step back and give us a bigger picture view on the new Optical cycle. You talked about network headroom, basically going away and sounds like site access is still an issue but not as big of an issue. So, if you wanted to think about maybe the next four to six quarters versus how you performed in the year or two before the downturn in Optical how do we think about that under the sort of new world we're living in? Thank you.

Steve, I think that's an excellent question and sort of balance of the known versus the unknown and then try to come to the conclusion. On the known side, both our cloud providers as well as our network service providers, all are experiencing very strong growth, as you heard from Tony and you've heard from me during this call. That strong growth and they see an opportunity for more revenue production going forward. And they see that fiber based networks have -- are just lower cost. And we're starting to see some commentary especially from the network providers about how they can combine and merge all the various services onto one high capacity fiber network, and therefore, open up lots of avenues towards revenue creation, all off on capital investment. So, all of that is stacking up to sort of powerful forces to put Optical Communications back in a cycle of growth. On the unknown side, real people have to install these networks. Real people have to show up to put in place these massive cloud-based data centers. And even when people are resuming putting technicians in the field, it is at a much less rate than what it would be -- what would be needed to support historical build cycles. So, we still have the pandemic here. And so that makes actual prediction just quarter-to-quarter what will happen to be difficult? But I think as you said Steve, because that's what's behind the question, the fundamentals look really strong. Our market position looks really strong. We should be entering a growth cycle. Now, we just got to see how the world deals with the pandemic.

That's helpful. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next question comes from Asiya Merchant with Citigroup. Your line is now open.

Great, thank you for taking my question and congratulations on a good quarter. A couple of questions; one is on Optical, there was commentary that the optical segment performed sort of in line with the passive optical market decline and Wendell just talked about all the labor constraints etcetera that's going on. How should we think about Corning always maintained their leadership across their end markets? When do we expect or when should we expect Corning to again resume growth that outpaces the broader market? And then I have another follow-up on capacity and margins. Thank you.

This year if we're doing our job, that's the way we think about it. We should be outpacing the market and we will get on with that post haste.

Okay, and then just on margins, if I think about obviously, you guys are making some progress here sequentially in the third quarter, that's the commentary and typically 3Q is up 5% or so on the top line and as the top line flows through the margins, etcetera. There's some investor confusion around how idling capacity should help margins. If somebody can walk us through the dynamics there typically idling capacity would lead to perhaps a hit on margins? And how should we think about the margin improvements in the back half? Thank you.

Yes, Asiya, you're correct. I think when we idle capacity that does hurt the margins, especially if you're having less production than you're actually selling because you also take down inventory, which is, of course, what we did in Q2, in Q3. On the other side, though we did a lot of cost reduction efforts, and that ends up helping margins. And so, we ended up in Q2 with margins very similar to what we had in Q1 on a gross margin level and then on an operating margin level, of course, we did better than that. So, as we look forward, the key here is to increase sales and as we create more sales through our factories and more sales for OpEx structure, we'll see expansion in margins.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you. Our next question comes from George Notter with Jefferies. Your line is now open.

Hi, there. Thanks a lot. I guess I wanted to ask about just the fundamentals in the Display business. I'm thinking more strategically, there's a lot of moving parts there, of course, you guys are pacing some of your investment in Gen 10.5. You've got pending exits of some of the LCD panel making facilities in Korea. Certainly, we hear about CVC rumored to be for sale. I mean, can you just talk about what you're seeing over there, and how that kind of plays into your dynamics strategically as you look forward? Thanks.

Thanks for the question. Once you've heard from us in the past really remains -- those fundamental drivers remain in place, which is, we have been preparing for a number of years for the ascendancy of the Chinese panel making infrastructure. And because of the particular way that economy works, that we believe, what was the strongest region in terms of production in Korea at a cost disadvantage. Once they made the decision not to go to Gen 10.5 that sort of was the die was cast. So, that's why we have been on our investment cycle in China with three quarters of the support coming from our customers or the Chinese government in one form or another. So, those trends look right, they continue to move in our direction. It all just happened a little bit faster than we were planning. Because Korea ended-up, Samsung specifically ended-up making decisions a little faster than what was their original plan. So, we don't really have all of our Gen 10.5 facilities up to support all that demand yet. And that's what we're working through. CC, of course, is a strong customer of ours. We would expect our market position to continue to grow as the trends towards China continue and the trends towards our long-term strategic partners continue.

Thank you.

Does that answer your question, George?

Very well, yeah. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next question comes from Shannon Cross with Cross Research. Your line is now open.

Thank you very much. I was just curious, given the vaccine and obviously you've gotten some funding from the government but just in general sort of this push to move manufacturing back to the U.S. and clearly a significant amount of government dollars that are out there right now, if this has changed really your thought process on timeline for Valor to provide meaningful contribution to the business? Thank you.

The simple answer Shannon is yes.

Any idea of the magnitude of the pull-in of the timeline?

We have an excellent idea. Yeah, we have an excellent idea, we’re not disclosing it yet. Here's the challenge really why we're not giving specific guidance here on that is, we are putting a significant amount of our effort behind the specific human health need that we have to protect our people and the people around the globe with the vaccine. So, that's where we're aiming our efforts. So, sort of any prediction on the specific sales as they evolve would have to involve like what is going to be the success and timing of the vaccine. So, what you can see the way to think about it is, we're now accelerating the building of our high-volume manufacturing facility. And we're in the midst of pouring concrete on the floor to inside that shell. We're in the midst of quickly ramping our equipment and we are doubling the output of our big flaps New York facility. So, we're growing very fast. But so our customer is going very fast. And it's really hard to pick winners and losers. So, I spilled up, here's why I think about it financially. I still don't think if you're primarily focused on the near term, you should worry much about Valor driving right numbers, right. If you're worried about the long term, this is an excellent sign for us. All the stuff that we bet on, which is we needed U.S. based manufacturing, that we needed a new pharmaceutical package, that we needed to have more full line capacity, that we could do that through our packaging, that we needed to make patient safer. All those bets looked like they're coming true. But that's really about the long term. It will be a big driver. Meanwhile, we just want to make you safe, and we want to do our part. Does that make sense, Shannon?

It does, it does. Can you talk a bit about any competitive moves that you've seen from some of the others out in the industry because it seems like you guys are in a really good position and I'm wondering if you've seen anything pop up recently? And then thank you.

Well, in this industry remember we’re an attacker. So historically, we haven't had much of a position in pharmaceutical packaging. And it was only when we saw significant issues with the packaging of today that we developed the Valor Innovation and decided we needed to do this to make patients safer. And we needed to bring our capabilities to that fight. So, we're really the attacker, we're just getting started. But I think you're right. I think we're off to a robust start to give our competitors a heck of a wake-up call.

Great, thank you.

Thank you. And our next question comes from Tim Long with Barclays. Your line is now open.

Hi, thanks for the opportunity. Congratulations on the quarter. I wanted to ask about the Specialty Materials outperformance. Can you talk us about how significant the impact from work from home and the strong semiconductor equipment demand was relative to smartphone premium products? And then maybe how sustainable you see that as we go into 2H?

I think from an overall standpoint, each of those items were roughly about a third of the reason for the outperformance. I mean clearly what happened the glass that we sell both the tablets and as far as we sell the notebook computers that have Gorilla Glass on them was very important to us. And we think it's a good example of the innovations that we have that cause us to perform better than the underlying market. And the semiconductor performance was also good. I mean, the demand for advanced chipsets really have made a difference there. And then from a glass standpoint, as we said, we -- as people get ready, as our customers get ready to introduce new products in the back half of the year, they of course, pull all those products early and we saw nice demand there too.

All right. Thank you.

Thank you. And our next question comes from Meta Marshall with Morgan Stanley. Your line is now open.

Great, thanks. Maybe just a question for me on the Optical segment picking up but just whether you could give us a sense of the breadth of that pickup, is it amongst kind of one or two major customers? Are you seeing it kind of across the board and any commentary on hyperscale customers in terms of their kind of optical demand?

I think from an overall standpoint, in the specialty side and the carrier market, I mean, it's certainly more than one or two customers, but it was very much driven in the carrier market and when you see our detailed numbers, you'll see that those were the numbers that were up on a sequential basis. In the enterprise market, it was a little bit more mixed, I think from a data center standpoint. That's where a lot of the labor constraint really showed up, I mean, in some data centers, less so than others. But I think that's one of the reasons that those sales were down on a quarter-over-quarter basis. But then also a lot of our enterprise customers are small and medium businesses, and also corporate spending. And we saw, those areas were clearly impacted by what's happening in the outside world. But there was a broad set, especially in the carrier business.

Got it. And then maybe just on the restructuring charge and you noted that it was due to reprioritization of some R&D projects. Are there any major projects we should consider discontinued or just any commentary there? Thanks.

Yes, I mean, it was very specifically a stealth project that we hadn't really talked a lot about externally, that had originally been initiated by a customer request. And if you recall on our 3, 4, 5 strategies, there's the 20% that’s outside of 3, 4, 5 capabilities where we put our energy and efforts into. I mean, it's one of those projects in that 20% category. And of course, in this environment, it made sense for us to go back and look at that 20%. And so that's what we did. And, we ended up restructuring impairing some of those assets.

Great, thanks.

Thank you. Our next question comes from Rod Hall with Goldman Sachs. Your line is now open.

Yeah, hi, thank you for the question. I wanted to start with the lack of guidance or the lower guidance for September and just see if I'm interpreting this correctly. It seems like your Display commentary is positive. And then, Optical have been uncertain so that leaves us with Specialty as the source of increased uncertainty in September. So, I wanted to check and see if that's accurate, or that's the right way to interpret this and then if that is right, what's driving that? Is it product timing or is it demand uncertainty; you may be double click on why the reduced guidance in September? And also maybe tell us whether you're going to continue to provide a lower level of guidance like this or is this just a one-off? And then I have a follow up.

So, let's start with your premise, okay. We're not providing lower guidance for September. Nor are we providing lower guidance for Specialty or anything like this. While this is, I think you're over thinking it. Here's the situation. Really, all lights are flashing green in our specific industries and in our performance of our units. Our financial executives, our operational executives, our strategic executives, where all four are getting more specific guidance this quarter, okay. I'm the problem. And it's not anything that we're seeing happening specifically in our industries. It's just as I look at the world, and I see the pandemic doing what it's doing. I see a very broad global recession. I see civil unrest, really across the globe. And I see an awful lot of global tensions in a geopolitical sense, and is that macro area that makes me say, I think there's just too much uncertainty just to count on what we're seeing with our own two eyes. But if we just looked at our data, I think we'd be comfortable giving specific guidance. And we would view that guidance as positive. And I'm just more worried about the uncertainty. Does that make sense to you, Rod? I know it must disappoint.

Yes.

Does it make sense to you?

No, no, no Wendell, that's very helpful color. I just -- that's very helpful. So, that answers my question. I appreciate that. And then the second thing, I wanted to drill into the working capital again Tony. One of the standouts for us was the date payable that came down quite a bit in June and wondering, is that a sustainable level? Or do you expect that to bounce back to kind of more historical average levels or and maybe, can you tell us what drove that?

Yeah. And I think from an overall standpoint, I mean, Wendell is right, I mean, we're in a period of time where our free cash flow conversion is going to be strong because we’re not doing the investment capital that we've done the last several years and so either on any given line item on the cash flow statement, there's a variety of things that happened on a month in and month out standpoint. But we're committed and we're going to deliver free cash flow for the year. And, that's what our focus is. And we’re thrilled with our performance in the second quarter. I think it really helps investors understand our ability to generate that free cash flow.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you. Our next question comes from Wamsi Mohan with Bank of America. Your line is now open.

Yes, thank you. Wendell, you noted strong free cash flow margins coming off a build cycle. I think, Tony, you just referenced that too. I was wondering how long typically these post build cycles are especially given the fact that Display has been usually a large source of that historical perspective on that would be helpful. And given COVID now, do you think that, that is extended for a longer period of time? And I have a follow up.

That's a very excellent question. In a way, what you're asking is, when will we be in our next build cycle, which usually is for revenue that's a couple of years now. I think it's really hard to answer that question Wamsi. Drove me up in the middle of the night and asked me, I'd say, I think we're going to be in a period of really staying within more of the reinvestment, repurpose pieces of our wheel, right. And pieces of our wheel for a time period that is your normal models you should be able to count on. At the same time, what we hope for is that things like successful health with the vaccine that, this the movement towards more optical networks and all those things put us in a long-term spot, those mega trends are a conversion of more value in order to be back in our build cycle. But I think we'll have plenty of warning, Wamsi. Sorry, I don't have a more specific answer for you.

No, thank you. Thanks for the color Wendell. And Tony, if I could, the funding that the government's providing the $204 million that you alluded to, to expand Valor manufacturing capacity. How should we think of that flowing through sort of your statements? Is that a -- does it get reflected in CapEx right away? Is it all in CapEx? Can you give us any color on that? Thank you.

Yeah, I think the way to think about it Wamsi is, as we spend this money, this gets reversed. And so we just get it added out into our statements I mean, most of it is for capacity and most of it is in CapEx, but there's also some operating expenses and they'll get reimbursed there too.

Okay, thank you.

Thanks, Wamsi. Operator, we've got time for one more question.

Thank you. And that question comes from Mehdi Hosseini with SIG. Your line is now open.

Yes, thanks for taking my question, two follow-ups. Tony, given all the changes going within the company and increased focus and in reducing the cost, should I expect your operating margins were to expand from here on even if revenues were to go flat just for the scenario analysis? And I have a follow up.

I mean, clearly what we've done in the second quarter is reduce our operating costs. And that will be reflected as we get into Q3 and Q4. From our overall standpoint, as we've talked about before, our real focus area is to get back to growing our sales and growing our profitability. And when our sales grow, we expect to see improved profitability too.

Okay. And then Wendell, I just want to better understand the dynamics impacting the TV industry. Can you remind me what the mix of 65-inch TV is as a percentage of the overall TV demand or shipment?

Mehdi, at the top of my head, I'm drawing a blank on that, that's clearly where a lot of the growth is going, to give example, almost 40% on a year-over-year basis. But when we have our follow up call, we'll get to the answer of that.

All right. Thank you.

Thanks.

Thanks Mehdi, and thanks everybody for joining us today. Before we close out, just want to let you know that we will attend the Jefferies Semiconductor IP Hardware and Communication Infrastructure Summit on September 2nd, and Citi 2020 Global Technology Conference on September 9th, and both will be virtual conferences. So once again, thank you and Joel, please disconnect all lines.

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.