Operator
Operator
Good afternoon and welcome to Harris Corporation Conference Call. This call is being recorded. Beginning today's meeting is Pamela Padgett, Vice President of Investor Relations and Corporate Communications. Please go ahead.
L3Harris Technologies, Inc. (LHX)
Q3 2009 Earnings Call· Tue, May 5, 2009
$324.86
+1.37%
Same-Day
-8.02%
1 Week
-6.52%
1 Month
-1.05%
vs S&P
-5.45%
Operator
Operator
Good afternoon and welcome to Harris Corporation Conference Call. This call is being recorded. Beginning today's meeting is Pamela Padgett, Vice President of Investor Relations and Corporate Communications. Please go ahead.
Pamela Padgett
Management
Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to our third quarter fiscal 2009 conference call. I'm Pamela Padgett, Vice President of Investor Relations and Corporate Communications. Also on the call is Howard Lance, Chairman, President and CEO; Gary MacArthur, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. A few words about forward-looking statements. In the course of this teleconference management may make forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve assumptions, risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those statements. For more information on a discussion of such assumptions, risks and uncertainties please see the press release and filings made by Harris with the SEC. In addition, in our press release and on this teleconference we will discuss certain financial measures and information that are non-GAAP financial measures. A reconciliation to the comparable GAAP measures is included in the tables of our press release and are on the investor relations section of our website, which is www.harris.com. A replay of this call will also be available on the investor relations section of our website. With that, Howard, I'll turn the call over to you.
Howard Lance
Management
Thank you, Pam, and welcome to the Harris third quarter fiscal 2009 earnings call. I'm pleased to report we posted another good quarter of financial results in spite of the challenges and continuing uncertainties in some of our U.S. and global markets. We continue to expect the planned spinoff of Harris Stratex Networks later this month. So all of my comments today will exclude the results of Harris Stratex which beginning in our fiscal fourth quarter will be included as discontinued operations. Consolidated revenue was $1.21 billion in the third quarter, 5% higher than the prior year. Net income was $136 million and EPS was $1.02 per share up significantly compared to the prior year EPS of $0.78 per share. Although revenue and earnings were at strong levels for the quarter, new orders were weak declining 27% compared to the prior year quarter. While business performance continued to be solid at the government communications systems segment, orders at both the RF Communications and Broadcast Communications segments were sharply lower and are expected to remain below prior year levels for the next few quarters. Orders at RF improved sequentially in the third quarter compared to the second quarter but are running well below plan. Our guidance for fiscal 2010 now projects organic revenue at RF Communications to be well below fiscal 2009 as a result of slowing, near-term Department of Defense orders momentum and the stretching out of orders by the Iraq Ministry of Defense. The economic crisis and deficit spending has put tremendous pressure on DoD budgets. Combine that with other more immediate spending priorities and a lack of contract vehicles to procure our new Falcon III PRC 117G manpack and what results is DoD procurements that have slowed significantly. I'll spend a fair amount of time later in the…
Gary MacArthur
Management
Thank you, Howard. Q3 was another very solid balance sheet quarter for Harris. Excluding Harris Stratex Networks we ended the quarter with $340 million of cash, cash equivalents and marketable equity securities. Cash flow from operations was up by $50 million and capital expenditures were down by over $10 million as compared to the third quarter of the prior year. During the quarter we repurchased $50 million of our outstanding stock at an average price of $39.95 per share. Excluding Harris Stratex Networks return on invested capital increased 3% to 20% and return on equity increased by approximately 4% to 24% as compared with the 12 months ended the third quarter of 2008. Further, we have our entire $750 million revolving credit facility available to us with no long-term debt maturities coming due until October of 2015. Subsequent to the quarter end we announced that we completed the acquisition of Crucial Security for $33 million entered into an agreement to acquire Tyco Electronics' Wireless Systems business for $675 million. We continue to expect to close the Wireless Systems business acquisition by the end of our fiscal year and will fund this acquisition with a combination of cash on hand, funds available under our revolver and long-term debt. Let me now move to some of the details of the quarter. Cash flow generated from operating activities was $250 million as compared to $165 million in the third quarter of fiscal 2008 and all four operating segments generated positive operating cash flow. Our expectation for cash flow from operations for fiscal year 2009 continues to be in the range of $575 million to $625 million. Depreciation and amortization for the third quarter was $44 million as compared to $43 million for the third quarter of 2008. Our expectation for depreciation and amortization…
Howard Lance
Management
Thanks, Gary. Let me conclude with the outlook discussion for fiscal 2009 and go into some detail about our initial guidance for fiscal 2010. In fiscal 2009 we now expect non-GAAP earnings per share from continuing operations, excluding acquisition costs, to be at the low end of our previous guidance range of $3.93 to $4.03 per share which still represents an EPS increase of 17% compared to last year. Revenue is expected to be about $4.9 billion, an increase of 7% compared to last year. RF Communications revenue is expected in a range from $1.7 billion to $1.75 billion with operating margin of about 34%. Government communication systems revenue is expected to be approximately $2.65 billion with operating margin in a range from 11% to 11.5% and Broadcast Communications revenue is expected to be in a range from $590 million to $600 million with operating margin of 4% to 5%. For fiscal 2010 we're providing our initial non-GAAP earnings per share guidance, excluding acquisition-related expenses, in a range from $3.10 to $3.40 per share with revenue in a range from $4.9 billion to $5.1 billion. RF Communications revenue is expected to be in a range from $1.8 billion to $1.9 billion with operating margin in a range from 25% to 26% and this includes the contribution from the acquisition of Tyco Electronics' Wireless Systems business. RF Communications revenue, excluding Tyco Electronics' Wireless Systems acquisition, is expected to be in a range from $1.3 billion to $1.4 billion with operating margin in a range from 32% to 33%. Please remember this is our initial RF estimates based heavily upon the recent order cancellations and delays which we've just encountered. Government communications systems revenue is expected in a range from $2.55 billion to $2.65 billion with operating margin in a range from 11.5% to 12%. Revenue from the FDCA program at the Census Bureau is expected to decrease from $350 million in fiscal 2009 to $120 million to $130 million in fiscal 2010, as our work on the 2010 decennial census nears completion. Government communication systems revenue guidance in fiscal 2010 if we exclude the FDCA program revenue in both years represents an increase of about 6% to 8%, higher than fiscal 2009. Finally Broadcast Communications revenue in fiscal 2010 is expected in a range from $565 million to $585 million with operating margins of 5% to 6%. So those are all the details in the guidance. At this point I'll ask the operator to open the line and we'll take your questions.
Operator
Operator
Thank you. (Operator Instructions). We will go first to Jim McIlree of Collins Stewart.
Jim McIlree - Collins Stewart
Management
Yes, thank you and good evening. Howard, on the RF outlook for fiscal '10, actually not fiscal '10 but beyond that. You say you're looking for growth beyond that. So I'm assuming you are thinking that would get the 117G Army issue cleared up by that point. Actually the first part of that question is what did the Army find unacceptable that they canceled that order? What's going to make it and what gives you confidence that they're going to find it acceptable at some point?
Howard Lance
Management
Well, let me deal with that and then I'll go back to your other question, Jim. The original contract justification was done for the 117F. The Army believed that they had enough flexibility when they placed the order with us to include the 117G. After review the contracts organization changed their mind and so they canceled the order. It's a delay. It's not anything more than that. I'm very confident based on the feedback we've been receiving not only at the command level with all of our people with customer forces around the world, but at the senior levels of the Army that they are very committed to utilizing the capabilities of the 117G. It really is significantly more capable than any legacy multiband manpack radios including our own Falcon II 117F. So it's really just a question of timing. We're obviously going to do everything we can to recapture not only the original order, but the entire $500 million contract ceiling just as soon as we can. At this point given that order cancellation we just didn't feel we could count on that in our guidance and were either forced to delay providing guidance or to provide guidance at a relatively lower level. As a result of that and the stretching out of the Iraq Ministry of Defense orders. Does that make sense?
Jim McIlree - Collins Stewart
Management
Yes, it does. So when you look at the fiscal '10 numbers, you're taking it sounds like maybe a couple of hundred million out for the 117G Army and then I am just ballparking like 100 million or so for Iraq. Would that be round numbers, about right?
Howard Lance
Management
I think so. I think the way I would articulate it is three months ago we said we thought we would struggle to get to a one-to-one book-to-bill, especially if that Iraq order moved but at that time we were still feeling pretty good about growth in fiscal '10. So if you take our guidance range now for '09 and compare that to our guidance range for '10, I would hang essentially all of our reduction to these two factors in terms of what changed in our point of view over the last 90 days.
Operator
Operator
We'll go next to Jason Kupferberg, UBS.
Jason Kupferberg - UBS
Management
Thanks. Just a follow-up on RF Comm. Did you indicate what your forecasted book-to-bill would be in that segment for fiscal '10? I mean obviously we got the revenue piece.
Gary McArthur
Management
No, I didn't specify, but I think it's fair to say given our current view of order rates that I provided for fiscal '09 we're going to end the year with a relatively low backlog. So one would expect in the year following that, Jason, that your book-to-bill would be at or above one regardless of what kind of guidance you gave for orders. The backlog when we exit this year will be let's say, $550 million approximately and that's about the lowest level of backlog that we operate with in a business of this size.
Jason Kupferberg - UBS
Management
Okay. Then for fiscal '09 the order outlook for RF Comm I guess seems to imply a pretty big June quarter spike if my math is right. What's driving that?
Gary McArthur
Management
There are lots of orders in the queue. We talked about year-to-date orders of about 800 million and we're providing guidance of 1.2 billion to 1.3 billion for orders in '09. So that suggests we're looking at 400 million to 500 million from lots of different sources, both U.S. DoD, various services as well as international.
Jason Kupferberg - UBS
Management
Okay. I mean is there visibility pretty high on that? I mean I guess there would be no reason for you to be overly optimistic just given everything else that's going on. So I mean have you closed a fair amount already in the June quarter?
Gary McArthur
Management
We talked about several orders that we got after the quarter ended. So we have some momentum. All I can tell you, it's our best estimate based on where we sit on, May the 5th. We still got orders to book obviously to reach the 1.2 billion to 1.3 billion for the year.
Jason Kupferberg - UBS
Management
Okay. And sorry, just one follow-up on the 117G question with the IDIQ. I know you said the Army contracts organization determined that the vehicle could not be used. I mean, I guess it sounds like there's some kind of technicality here essentially that blew up this order. I mean do they have to go back and create a whole new IDIQ specific to the 117G or are they going to try and issue the order under some other more flexible contract vehicle that the Army currently has? What's the procurement strategy there?
Howard Lance
Management
The Army has lots of options available to them including both the ones you mentioned, as well as putting a completely new vehicle in place. So I think they're looking at alternatives. At this point we don't know what they'll decide to do, but it's very clear that they are being asked to go find a procurement vehicle to buy these radios because of the capabilities and we think that support is important. We're disappointed obviously about the timing.
Operator
Operator
We'll go next to Myles Walton, Oppenheimer & Co. Myles Walton - Oppenheimer & Co.: Thanks. Good afternoon. I was hoping, Howard, you could comment on the Army's long range tactical radio strategy, your report that came out in the last couple of weeks. Can you kind of provide us your insights as to as you read it and as you kind of think about it what it meant for Harris? Anything incremental that you took away from the report and the strategic direction they're looking to go?
Howard Lance
Management
Well, I was encouraged, Myles, by several aspects of it, especially what I would refer to as the strong commitment to fielding wideband tactical networking capabilities throughout the force. Obviously that report at this point is still looking towards the two programs of record to provide that. We obviously represent a real immediate immediately available alternative to those and our strategy continues to be to position ourselves as a better value alternative. I think this plays directly into Secretary Gates view of what he's referred to as the 70% solution as it relates to Falcon III and JTRS. I think it's more like a 90% solution as we continue to add capabilities and functionality to the radio such as the work we're doing on the MUOS Waveform for tactical satellite capabilities. So I view this as a positive report because it absolutely reaffirmed the path they're on. Now our challenge is going to be to work with the Army to do two things. Number one, to convince them that we are a more viable alternative and number two, to accelerate some of the fielding and the funding that would allow that as opposed to the current schedule that's underway. So I think it helped to really clarify our challenges, but I thought it was very positive in reaffirming the need for these kinds of radio capabilities to serve the mission requirements of the Army. Myles Walton - Oppenheimer & Co.: Okay. Now that's helpful and then I guess to clarify on the guidance for fiscal '10, what is the GAAP guidance for fiscal '10? How much of acquisition expense is included or excluded from the number?
Howard Lance
Management
At this point we're still trying to finalize those numbers. Gary, do you have that?
Gary McArthur
Management
Yes. It's ballpark, it's around $50 million which includes R&D and process write-off, inventory step up, the cash amount isn't nearly that high, but it hasn't been finalized yet and that's why we've preferred not to go out with an exact number at the moment. Ballpark was $50 million in total expenses relating to those types of items plus whatever other items we were going to do with regards to restructuring the guidance.
Howard Lance
Management
We're just making it clear that the acquisition-related costs are excluded from our non-GAAP guidance but that's it.
Operator
Operator
We'll go next to Gautam Khanna, Cowen and Company.
Gautam Khanna - Cowen and Co.
Management
Hi, thanks. You mentioned on the RF side some timing delays. Can you help us interpret the '09 supplemental request which, if you add the radio budget, accounts are down substantially from '08, why we should think it's just timing and not maybe a [diminished] drop?
Howard Lance
Management
Well, again I'll repeat what we've said before on that front, that if you go looking for a line item that says Harris tactical radios in any DoD budget supplemental or the core palm, you're not going to find that. There are multiple locations throughout the DoD's billions of dollars of procurements that allow them to buy tactical. We certainly have talked in depth in my prepared statement about pressure on the budget. So there's no question that that is also a force that's at work here, but I described earlier our change in view from today versus 90 days ago can be squarely attached to those two changes in the DoD and the Iraq Ministry of Defense orders. Whether our outlook [in up] turns out to be correct or not, I don't know but I think it's fair to say based on our comments today that we have tried to be relatively pessimistic based on recent events in setting a core RF Comm revenue target next year of 1.3 billion to 1.4 billion. In that number we're assuming continued growth in the international revenue side. So we've obviously set the bar quite low as it relates to DoD procurement of tactical radios and I'm obviously hopeful and our team will work hard to beat these numbers. I'm hopeful that this will turn out to be too pessimistic as we go through the year, but that's kind of the current views and it's a combination of specific orders, budget pressure as well as the inability to have enough contract vehicles in place to advance the Falcon III manpack at the rate that we want. If you looked at again 90 days ago view versus now, principally our reductions have been in the Falcon III manpack with a small reduction in the Falcon III hand-held based on a competitive procurement that was lost.
Gautam Khanna - Cowen and Co.
Management
Agreed. Maybe I don't understand, but are you suggesting that we should look at the radio HF cost line item in the supplemental and the marine radio systems line item and interpret nothing from it? I mean what [increment is] down 70% year-on-year and I'm just curious are you suggesting we should interpret that that is not a proxy for some of the funding lines that drive your business in RF?
Gary McArthur
Management
No. Clearly they are two of the funding lines, but they are not all of the funding lines that drive the DoD portion of the RF business. That's all I'm saying. Clearly we expect and again I've been about as clear as we can be and transparent that we expect DoD revenue to be down significantly next year compared to this year. Those are a fraction, Gautam, of the total dollars that will be spent with Harris by the DoD.
Gautam Khanna - Cowen and Co.
Management
I appreciate that. Could you maybe quantify the split of what your expectations are for DoD in your RF assumptions next year after the Tyco acquisition and what the international piece is in terms of percentage of sales? Any sort of color would be useful, DoD, international.
Gary McArthur
Management
The DoD is expected to be less than 50% and international would be greater than 50% on a revenue basis based on our current guidance.
Gautam Khanna - Cowen and Co.
Management
Okay. And may I ask a follow-up just the margins in RF have been, are very good, very strong and with the lower volumes should we expect some absorption issues as we take down or I mean how sensitive are your incremental margins to production rates if indeed volume is coming off next year?
Gary McArthur
Management
Our guidance indicates margins going from about 34% this year to 32% to 33% next year given the magnitude of the revenue drop. I think that's a very good performance by our team and will require them to certainly implement additional cost reduction actions as well as manage their operations very closely. So with this kind of a drop to only lose one to two points in operating margin I think is excellent performance.
Gautam Khanna - Cowen and Co.
Management
Is there something about the mixture with international? Do they command higher prices or something that provides you with an offset on the top line?
Gary McArthur
Management
Generally speaking we've said international margins are usually a little bit higher. It's also a function of the mix of products as we said before. So I suspect we're getting a little bit of favorable mix but not a huge amount in achieving this forecast.
Operator
Operator
We'll go next to Chris Donaghey, SunTrust Robinson Humphrey.
Chris Donaghey - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
Management
Hi, good evening, Howard. This may be a little bit of a sensitive question to answer, but I wonder if you can help us with understanding how the Army was anticipating using these Falcon III radios? Can you just give us a sense for where they were going to go? I know we're talking now about some early spinout type of activities for some of the [brigade] combat teams. To the extent you can talk about it can you walk us through the usage scenarios for the $148 million order?
Howard Lance
Management
I'm sorry, Chris, I probably don't have enough background to do that. I certainly know that there's a lot of activity related to ongoing operations in Iraq and new expanded operations in Afghanistan. A lot of activity around intelligence surveillance, reconnaissance and the ability for our radios to be used to download video as we talked about using this ROVER Waveform that we've ported to it. Beyond that in terms of which specific, you know, divisions are going to be receiving this first tranche I'm sorry, I just don't know that. Presumably it's going to go, in the harm's way into those areas where they can get the greatest benefit from it.
Chris Donaghey - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
Management
Okay, great. Obviously you have some pretty optimistic expectations for the pipeline as it stands right now. Are there any particular large orders that you're tracking in the international market? What do the concentrations look like for that new orders you're expecting?
Howard Lance
Management
Well, there are a number of orders I would say in the $50 million to $100 million range I think for competitive purposes. They're sensitive and I won't be able to talk about individual countries, but there are a number and again in the longer term we still believe there's $750 million of total opportunities to the Iraq government both the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Interior. We've gotten some MoI orders. We've been disappointed in the stretching out of the MoD orders, but lots of opportunities there. You look around the globe. You continue to see opportunities in Pakistan, Central Asia, the Middle East, Northern Africa, Latin America. Our international team has I think the broadest list in terms of just this year number of different countries and programs that we've ever had. I'm also very pleased with the progress we're making in going beyond just selling radios and into the more integrated communication systems. We highlighted the UAE project and we have a number of those like that on the books. So lots of opportunity, but, balanced with certainly some near-term slowing and disappointment in the DoD space.
Chris Donaghey - SunTrust Robinson Humphrey
Management
Okay. And one last question. Do you see the new MATV vehicle program as a significant opportunity for you as well? Thanks.
Howard Lance
Management
Well, I think we would expect to do very well on that program in the same way that we did on the MRAP programs. We were standardized on the MRAP with the Navy, with the Marine Corps, with the Air Force and had very high penetration in the Army vehicles. So I believe we're going to do very well on that positive more all terrain vehicle as they spin that up and quickly try and deploy it.
Operator
Operator
We'll go next to Ted Wheeler, Buckingham Research.
Ted Wheeler - Buckingham Research
Management
There was an announcement, I guess, three or four weeks ago about another Falcon III order from the Army that's been protested and I'm just wondering is that order in any of your thinking in guidance and if you could add some color to the issues surrounding that issue?
Howard Lance
Management
I'm not aware of any other issues with orders, Ted, other than the order under the $500 million IDIQ contract that I've referred to here.
Ted Wheeler - Buckingham Research
Management
That's not an order that was under protest from a competitor. That's an order that's been held up because the Army is finding a contract vehicle to proceed?
Howard Lance
Management
It's my understanding that a competitive protest may have prompted the Army to look at that contract and ultimately change their mind on it, but that's really all I know about it, but there's not another one that I'm aware of.
Ted Wheeler - Buckingham Research
Management
What would be sort of the timetable for that issue to move toward conclusion one way or the other?
Howard Lance
Management
Well, the protest has been withdrawn and the Army presumably concluded that they had gone too far in the procurement and releasing the order to us and that's why they canceled it. So how long it will take for us to rebook that order through another means, I don't know. We've assumed again we hope conservatively that it's six to nine months and again, it's not just that order, but then it's the rest of the $350 million to get up to the whole contract ceiling.
Ted Wheeler - Buckingham Research
Management
Right, right. How much of that thinking is in this thought that perhaps a positive book-to-bill ratio next year? Do you need, the restoration of that order? Do you need movement toward the $500 million? Where does that fit into the idea of a positive book-to-bill ratio for '10?
Howard Lance
Management
So we have a process where we look at the entire funnel of opportunities and go through them and make various judgments about the probability of them coming through the funnel and our receiving orders. Between the process 90 days ago and now we have placed a much bigger discount on that entire $500 million IDIQ contract. I couldn't tell you exactly what number is in our outlook for a given order, but we have discounted it significantly in our view that we're giving today for expected guidance for next year at 1.3 billion to 1.4 billion in revenue. Going forward in '10, new orders essentially will be over revenue because again we're starting with a level of backlog which can't go down. It's really kind of as low as you can operate at. So they'll be that relationship at a minimum of one-to-one next year. Obviously we're very hopeful it's well above one-to-one and we can start driving growth then in '11 and '12 as we've indicated. I still think there are lots of opportunities in this market, so we view this as a delay. Again we haven't lost any business. Maybe that's the source of greatest frustration for us is this really is bureaucracy. Here you have a customer that wants to buy this very advanced radio. The government didn't spend a penny to develop it and the contracts process isn't allowing that. So such is life and we've had to adjust our expectations but our teams will be working very hard to support the customer to find another way for them to procure the radios from us.
Ted Wheeler - Buckingham Research
Management
I know it's very early days but on the M/A-COM business is there any feeling about book-to-bill over the next 12 months? Do you think it will be plus one, minus one or just how do you think that business is shaping up? I assume you're starting to work pretty hard on it.
Howard Lance
Management
Yes, we're doing what we can. Of course, we haven't closed, so all we can do is plan at this point. We have in our guidance essentially indicated that we are expecting about $500 million of revenue from the acquisition in the fiscal '10 segment guidance. With regard to book-to-bill, I don't really have anything on that for you other than some color that says that orders continue to be booked at a very good rate during this calendar year. Their last quarter it's my understanding was another good quarter for new orders and it's a data point and it's subjective. The level of phone calls that we've had from existing customers and potential customers reaching out to us with very, very positive feelings about the combination of Harris and M/A-COM, I think has made us feel very good about this move and the potential. We have to deliver and certainly as we said when we announced the acquisition, there are some headwinds with regard to state and local budgets. Having said that, the stimulus bill has a lot of money for state and local in it. We hope some of that flows to rebuilding and enhancing public safety communications. You can certainly expect going forward we'll spend hopefully a fair amount of time on these calls and in our investor briefings talking about the public safety business. We certainly have very high expectations for what we can do with the business over the next three to five years. We have to realize we are not going to change the competitive dynamics in a quarter, but in the long run we think this is exactly the right place for us to be investing.
Operator
Operator
We'll go next to Steve Ferranti, Stephens, Inc.
Steve Ferranti - Stephens, Inc.
Management
Thank you, good evening. Howard, wondered if you could give us a sense of your view of when you think the official JTRS program of record manpack radio might get fielded. I guess to what extent, do these delays potentially start pushing you into an area where, potentially you're not the only JTRS compliant manpack solution on the market?
Howard Lance
Management
I'm probably not aware of any specific production dates, but I still believe there's no production of any real quantities planned for manpack radios before 2012. So yes, if this delay were to go on for several years, you could have a point, but it's not like we're fielding zero radios. We're still fielding radios and it's just not at this high level of engagement. I feel like we will be successful in getting large quantities fielded with the Army and that is going to have a significant long-term impact on the balance of future procurements between the programs of record and the Harris COTS radios. My view is that if there are competitors taking actions and protesting something when they do not have a product to supply that implies to me someone is very concerned about our products and about the competitive advantage we've established in the market. Time will tell but while I don't like the result, to me it just simply reinforces that we're absolutely on the right track.
Steve Ferranti - Stephens, Inc.
Management
You referred to the Falcon III as a 90% solution I think before. Can you walk us through perhaps, what the 10% gap is to get you to a full solution? Perhaps also, where do you see advantages of Falcon III either in terms of cost or size? I think that would be helpful.
Howard Lance
Management
Again I'm probably, I don't have a level of expertise to get into too much technical detail, Steve, but probably the most single differentiation right now would be the number of channels. So ours is a single channel radio. The requirements under the HMS program is a two-channel radio and the requirements under the GMR program is a four-channel radio. So that's the biggest requirement. My view is that the other capabilities related to the porting of things like the MUOS Waveform, the SRW Waveform which is not fully released yet and the WNW, wideband networking waveform which is not close to being released, those would all be specs as well under the programs of record. There's no reason why we won't be able to port those waveforms into our radios once they are finalized and available. So that's why I talk about it in terms of the 90%. We'll keep adding capability and functionality to it and ultimately if the customer wants, we certainly can develop a multi-channel radio. There are we believe inherent lower costs. We'll have an inherently lower cost to deliver these radios than the programs of record and I think we have illustrated that already with what you could pay for four Falcon III manpacks compared to one four-channel GMR radio under the program of record. So there are significant advantages that we have in costs. You know, we're a commercial company and we have commercial manufacturing processes and mindsets. The RF team has taken significant costs out of our products over the last several years and again I think that that puts us well ahead on the cost experience curve that will be very difficult for others to catch up. At the same time we have pretty high expectations for profitability and that's the reason we'll keep driving down those costs so that we can also deliver high levels of cash, cash income to the business.
Pamela Padgett
Management
Operator, we'll just take one more question. I know there's quite a few people in the queue and I'm sorry to cut it off, but we're going on over an hour. We will see you on Monday, May 11th, in New York at the Essex house at 1:30. So we can certainly answer your questions then. Operator?
Howard Lance
Management
We'll have others on the management team who obviously can answer some of the more detailed questions that you've asked about the Falcon III and other features.
Operator
Operator
We'll take our final question from Chris Quilty, Raymond James.
Chris Quilty - Raymond James
Management
Thanks. Just a clarification on the guidance you provided for fiscal '10 RF Comms. If kind of back into the blended operating margins of 25 to 26. It seems to imply about a 5% to 10% operating margin for the acquired Wireless Systems business unless I ran those numbers wrong. Is that just the impact of amortization on the business or is there something else?
Howard Lance
Management
You got it about right, Chris. It's about 8% to 10% income. There's around $25 million, $26 million of amortization of intangibles assumed in that number, so that's about five points. So that would put you in the 13% to 15% cash earnings and we talked about our belief that this can be a 20% kind of EBITDA business as we get up and get our cost reductions and synergies in place over the next couple of years. The other way to triangulate in on this is we said on the acquisition call that this acquisition would be only slightly accretive and if you look at that kind of margin and compare it with our costs on the debt for the deal, you get a few pennies, maybe $0.03 to $0.04 or so of contribution next year at the GAAP line. Obviously on a cash basis it's more profitable and will contribute to cash flow and again we're going to work very hard to try and accelerate cost reductions and synergies and perhaps we'll be able to do better than that. This guidance is consistent with our previous guidance on profitability in year one for the acquisition.
Chris Quilty - Raymond James
Management
Okay. Just wanted to make sure there wasn't any change in there. The 50 basis point improvement range for the government business operating margins 11.5 to 12 up from about 11 to 11.5 this year, is that just lower margin FDCA falling off?
Howard Lance
Management
No. It's predominantly the expectation that we don't have any more new commercial reflectors coming into the equation. The commercial reflector pipeline is relatively dry at this point as a lot of those companies are not able to get funding to do additional launches. We think it will come back, but we don't see much in the next 12 months. So that's the primary item that's allowing that improvement is the improved execution of the rest of the programs.
Pamela Padgett
Management
Thank you, everyone, for joining us today.
Operator
Operator
And that concludes today's conference. Thank you for your participation.