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Transcript
OP
Operator
Operator
Good morning, and thank you for holding. Welcome to the Motorola Solutions First Quarter 2015 Earnings Conference Call. Today's call is being recorded. If you have any objections, please disconnect at this time. The presentation material and additional financial tables are currently posted on the Motorola Solutions Investor Relations website. In addition, a replay of this call will be available approximately three hours after the conclusion of this call over the Internet. The website address is www.motorolasolutions.com/investor. At this time, all participants have been placed in a listen-only mode, and the line will be open for your questions following the presentation. I would now like to introduce Mr. Shep Dunlap, Vice President of Investor Relations. Mr. Dunlap, you may begin your conference.
SR
Shep Dunlap - Vice President-Investor Relations
Management
Thanks, and good morning. Welcome to our 2015 First Quarter Earnings Call. With me today are Greg Brown, Chairman and CEO; Gino Bonanotte, Executive Vice President and CFO; Mark Moon, Executive Vice President and President, Sales and Product Operations; and Bob Schassler, Executive Vice President, Solutions and Services. Greg and Gino will review our results along with commentary, and Mark and Bob will join for the Q&A portion of the call. We have posted an earnings presentation and news release at motorolasolutions.com/investor. These materials include GAAP to non-GAAP reconciliations for your reference. A number of forward-looking statements will be made during this presentation and during the Q&A portion of the call. These statements are based on current expectations and assumptions that are subject to a variety of risks and uncertainties. Actual results could differ materially from these forward-looking statements. Information about factors that could cause such differences can be found in this morning's earnings news release and the comments made during this call, and the Risk Factors section of our 2014 annual report on 10-K and other Motorola Solutions reports and filings with the SEC. We do not undertake any duty to update any forward-looking statement. I'll now turn it over to Greg. Gregory Q. Brown - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thanks, Shep. Good morning, and thanks for joining us today. I'd like to make a few opening comments about the first quarter and the business overall before Gino takes us through the results and the outlook. First, Q1 was a solid quarter for us. Revenue was flat, although when adjusting for currency, the business grew 3% with growth in all regions except Latin America. Additionally, we posted double-digit profitability growth with a 24% increase in non-GAAP operating earnings and a 36% increase in non-GAAP earnings per share. Second,…
SR
Shep Dunlap - Vice President-Investor Relations
Management
Thanks, Greg. Before we begin taking questions, I would like to remind callers to limit themselves to one question and a follow-up so we can accommodate as many people as possible. Operator, would you please remind our callers on the line how to ask a question?
OP
Operator
Operator
Thank you. And we can take our first question from Tim Long with BMO Capital. Please go ahead.
TM
Tim Long - BMO Capital Markets
Analyst · BMO Capital. Please go ahead
Thank you. Two questions for me. First, on the revenue side, obviously, backlog looks strong two quarters in a row here even, ex-ing out the currency. It looks like the second half implies pretty flat year-over-year. So just wondering why that's not a little bit stronger. Is there something in the aging of the backlog or something that maybe makes us feel better about heading into next year? And then secondly, on the gross margin side, I get in the quarter that services was a little bit of a drag. Just curious on the Product side, that was down a little bit as well. Just curious, are there any measures you can take to match the strong performance you're having on the OpEx side and maybe get some more efficiencies out of the gross margin line on Products? Thank you.
Gino A. Bonanotte - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Good morning, Tim. This is Gino. I'll start with the gross margin question specifically in Product. The impact of currency is really what we're seeing from a Product gross margin perspective. It's about 50 basis points on gross margin. Actually, it's a bit larger than that, offset by strong North America Product sales. And we continue to explore and work different options to minimize, certainly, the impact of FX, as we've done in OpEx. With respect to the backlog position, nothing's really changed in the aging. It is a little bit different expectation of the in-year orders versus backlog orders for the remainder of the year, but there is no change in aging – any appreciable change in the aging of backlog.
TM
Tim Long - BMO Capital Markets
Analyst · BMO Capital. Please go ahead
Okay. Thank you.
OP
Operator
Operator
And our next question will come from Ehud Gelblum with Citi. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
EI
Ehud A. Gelblum - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.
Analyst · Citi. Please go ahead. Your line is open
Thanks, guys. Appreciate it. Very strong, stable results. A couple questions. First of all, at what point do you expect to lap Norway? And x-Norway, is Europe stable or still declining? And is it – once we get past – I assume by the end of this year, we'll certainly be past the initial decline in Norway, does Europe start growing? And then one of your competitors, Harris, obviously is having some issues. A lot of that is share gains by you guys. I'm assuming most of that is North America. Is there any way you can parse out how much of the strength you see in North America is share gains from Harris versus how much is underlying market growth? And then lastly, a comment on LTE. Obviously, LTE has had a rough quarter, both at LA-RICS and at FirstNet. What are your thoughts? We saw the guidance, the $20 million in headwinds from LA in Q2, but what are your thoughts on the $100 million for this year and for next year? And just kind of just walk us through the – your long-term thoughts on LTE. What are the different directions that can go in, both kind of in a normal bull case but also in a bear case? What could happen if LTE and FirstNet really doesn't get off the ground? What does that scenario look like for the next couple of years then for your business? Thanks. Gregory Q. Brown - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: So, Hudy, a couple of things. Let's start with – I'll start with Harris. Yes, I think clearly that the 4% growth in Q4 led by Jack Molloy and his team, as well as the 6% in Q1, really strong performance. Now, we don't expect North America to grow…
EI
Ehud A. Gelblum - Citigroup Global Markets, Inc.
Analyst · Citi. Please go ahead. Your line is open
That's very helpful. I appreciate that. Thanks
Gregory Q. Brown - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thanks, Hudy.
SR
Shep Dunlap - Vice President-Investor Relations
Management
Next question.
OP
Operator
Operator
And our next question comes from Pierre Ferragu with Bernstein. Please go ahead. Pierre C. Ferragu - Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. LLC: Hey. Thank you very much for taking my question. I'd actually like to talk a bit more about LTE because I get the feeling there has been a bit of confusion, especially in the last 24 hours, in the investment community about how LTE spending and the ramp-up of LTE could affect LMR spending on – in your client base. So I think it would be very useful to have your perspective on how LTE gets integrated with LMR, and if there is a risk of LTE, at some point, replacing LMR infrastructure, and if a ramp-up in spending in LTE could hurt spending in LMR. So your perspective on that point would be very, very helpful, I think. Gregory Q. Brown - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: So, Pierre, we – just to be clear, we absolutely view Public Safety LTE as additive, not substitutional to LMR, first and foremost. Our view is unchanged from that perspective. I mean, I can only tell you what customers are telling us and what they're doing, both domestically and internationally. And they continue to buy LMR. By the way, North America being a great example, referenced 4% in Q4, 6% in Q1. The Middle East is another good example. And in the three large projects of Public Safety LTE, they are all either have bought or are in the process of buying brand new LMR systems with multiyear services contract as well. So, look, I know there's a lot of noise about this, but at the end of the day, I feel very good about our position and investments in technology, and specifically, Pierre, mission critical voice and mission…
OP
Operator
Operator
And we'll take our next question from Rod Hall with JPMorgan. Please go ahead.
RL
Rod B. Hall - JPMorgan Securities LLC
Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead
Yeah, hi, guys. Thanks for the question, and good earnings. So I wanted to dig a little bit more into the Services line, well, I guess from a couple of angles, but it's really the same question, which is you guys are talking about the gross margin improving in the second half. I assume that, that's because the mix of installation services is reducing. But I just wanted to ask you guys if you could give us any indication what the proportion of maintenance services – or I'm sorry, of installation services in the current Services line is, so we can kind of think about how that gross margin might progress. And then the same thing from a different angle. I'm looking at your backlog, and the last two quarters, this big jump in Services backlog. I wonder, do you expect that backlog in Services to wind down in the second half? Or can you just talk about how that backlog is built up and how you expect it to move in the second half of the year? Thanks.
Gino A. Bonanotte - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Sure, Rod. This is Gino. We'll start with Services. So the – as we talked about in the last call, Services gross margin, we expect to be pressured in the first half, returning to normal growth rates in the second half. And it's really a mix within integration services, not to integration services, the projects that are deploying in the first half of the year. And the question on how much of our Services number is integration services, about 40%, 45%.
RL
Rod B. Hall - JPMorgan Securities LLC
Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead
Okay. And, Gino, do you expect – what do you think that proportion will be in the second half?
Gino A. Bonanotte - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: I think the proportion will be very similar. It will be within that 40% to 45% range. Again, it's the mix within integration services, not to integration services.
RL
Rod B. Hall - JPMorgan Securities LLC
Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead
Okay. Thanks. And then on the backlog for the Services backlog, what do you think that is going to look like as we move to the second half of the year?
Gino A. Bonanotte - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: We don't outlook backlog, but I will say that the backlog, Services backlog does include a large number of multi-year service agreements. So I would not expect that backlog to be peeling off in the second half of the year substantially.
RL
Rod B. Hall - JPMorgan Securities LLC
Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead
Do you think – or should we expect the growth to continue or do you think it more or less kind of remains stable through the year?
Gino A. Bonanotte - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: I'm not going to comment on outlooking that backlog, but I will say there – you should not expect any major movement in the Services backlog down in the second half of the year.
RL
Rod B. Hall - JPMorgan Securities LLC
Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead
Okay. Great. Thanks a lot.
Gregory Q. Brown - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: And just, Rod, one other just question about overall backlog. From an aging standpoint, total backlog, now this is both Product and Services, it's slightly better than last year. It's about $50 million at this point better than last year for aged backlog for the remainder of 2015 all in.
OP
Operator
Operator
And we can take our next question from Tavis McCourt with Raymond James. Please go ahead. Tavis C. McCourt - Raymond James & Associates, Inc.: Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my question. Gino, a couple of quick guidance questions to dig into gross margin again. Last year, I think gross margin kind of ticked up sequentially each quarter pretty steadily. Is that the pattern you would expect from just a lower base in Q1, or is there kind of a specific quarter that there would be a bigger uplift? And then on operating cost, can you kind of repeat what the OpEx guidance is for the year? Is it $150 million to $175 million decline non-GAAP versus non-GAAP 2014, or I think there was a mention of a run rate number? I just want to make sure I was clear on what that OpEx guidance was. Gino A. Bonanotte - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Sure. So I'll start with the gross margin question, Tavis. Gross margin, it's really first half to second half, although we do expect to see a slight improvement in the second quarter over the first quarter. But it's largely a first half to second half improvement. With respect to operating expenses, the guidance is down $150 million to $175 million versus 2014 full year. The run rate comment was meant to articulate that we are currently at the run rate. Exiting Q1, we are on that run rate to deliver savings of $150 million to $175 million. Tavis C. McCourt - Raymond James & Associates, Inc.: Got it. And then kind of a bigger picture question for you, Greg, you made an acquisition or two in the quarter, some venture capital investments. And I guess give us a sense of how broad you…
OP
Operator
Operator
We'll take our next question from Simona Jankowski with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead. Simona K. Jankowski - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Hi. Thanks very much. I wanted to follow up on your comment on the North America improvement. Can you just expand a little bit on the visibility you have into that, in particular your aged backlog for this year as it pertains to that? And then I think you referenced the mix of devices versus the infrastructure in the quarter. Can you just comment on how that compares to what you've seen in recent quarters? Mark Moon - Executive Vice President & President-Sales and Product Operations: So, Simona, this is Mark Moon. So when we think about North America, Greg talked about we were pleased with Q4 and Q1. By the way, coming out of that, our backlog position is better. A big piece of that backlog position improvement is in multi-year services, which is also good for future upgrades in what we do, but our Product backlog is also up, and the backlog aged in the year is actually stronger than it was at this point last year. So we're seeing the improvement that we thought we would see in North America. When you look at North America in general, overall, state and local spend and revenues are up. IT spend is up. Federal seems to be returning to a little bit more normal predictability for us. We were up slightly last year. As I talked to you about in the last call, while we were down slightly in first quarter, we still have got some good orders and we're building backlog, and we think we'll have modest growth for the full year. So we have good visibility, good activity throughout North America. I mean, we are…
OP
Operator
Operator
We'll take our next question from Paul Silverstein with Cowen & Company. Please go head.
US
Unknown Speaker
Analyst · Cowen & Company. Please go head
Hi. This is Fahad (38:19) in for Paul. I had a couple of questions. One, on your OpEx for the year, are there any benefits from the FX headwinds that you've indicated on your revenue line? Is the OpEx side being driven positively by the FX?
Gregory Q. Brown - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: So we did – just to remind you, we did $200 million – over $200 million of expense reduction last year, and we're run rating to $150 million to $175 million this year. While we clearly have a benefit from FX, the overwhelming majority of those reductions are non-FX. I'd say 75% roughly are reductions, 25% is being the beneficiary of FX. We're getting after the cost, and with the opportunity as a pure play company, we're restructuring, reconfiguring, eliminating bureaucracies and redundancies, and duplications and footprint, and I'm really proud of the team and we'll continue to move forward on that.
US
Unknown Speaker
Analyst · Cowen & Company. Please go head
All right. And then secondly, regarding this St. Louis Police Department win, it seems you indicated Real-Time Intelligence solution that you sold, can you elaborate more on these next-gen growth driver businesses that you're involved in? How does that pipeline for those kind of projects look for you?
Bob Schassler - Executive Vice President-Solutions & Services: Yeah, this is Bob Schassler. We implemented our Real Time Crime Center in St. Louis, which, as we've talked about in the past, it's about a $5 billion SAM for us, and we've got probably about 12 new deals that we've actually signed in the first quarter. And the reception by customers really continues to be positive. As Greg talked a little bit about, the video analytics, body worn cameras is really part of that overall solution.
US
Unknown Speaker
Analyst · Cowen & Company. Please go head
So in terms of, like, sales from video analytics, and if I'm not mistaken, you also provide some storage solutions as well? Or is that...
Bob Schassler - Executive Vice President-Solutions & Services: That's right. It's really our overall Smart Public Safety solutions, so storage, video analytics, our PublicEngines acquisition is part of that, data analytics as well.
Gregory Q. Brown - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: I think it's fair to say, obviously, that's relatively small today. What's important, though, is customers, many would like to do business with one provider. So while there's a variety of different products, to the extent we, if we have the land mobile radio system and we can extend the relationship, the sales resources, the technical people into the command center, and do in hardware and/or software and potentially storage, it's a logical extension of what we do that I think generally will help our growth profile.
Bob Schassler - Executive Vice President-Solutions & Services: The only other comment I'd have is that these are really software-based solutions recurring revenue models, so they go on for five years to ten years, and it's really part of our overall Public Safety LTE solution combined with our Smart Public Safety Solutions, as we've said, are very complementary to one another.
US
Unknown Speaker
Analyst · Cowen & Company. Please go head
Got it. Thank you so much.
OP
Operator
Operator
And our next question comes from Keith Housum with Northcoast Research. Please go ahead.
DL
Dominic Ruccella - Northcoast Research Partners LLC
Analyst · Northcoast Research. Please go ahead
Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my call. This is Dominic sitting in for Keith. Noticing on the – given Q2 guidance and what was reported in Q1, did you guys see any business shifts from the second quarter, happen to come in a little earlier for you guys and impact your first quarter?
Gino A. Bonanotte - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Yeah, the...
Gregory Q. Brown - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Yes.
Gino A. Bonanotte - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Yes. First half is unchanged to our prior expectations. Q1 performed a little bit better, but the first half remains unchanged.
DL
Dominic Ruccella - Northcoast Research Partners LLC
Analyst · Northcoast Research. Please go ahead
Okay. All right. And then are you guys seeing any impact on demand from FX coming from internationally?
Mark Moon - Executive Vice President & President-Sales and Product Operations: This is Mark, Dominic. We really are not. I mean, so far as we look at the piece, we've made some slight price adjustments in certain places. But in general, we're not seeing any competitive disadvantages. Certainly, the economic pressures in Latin America are putting tension on price power for them to purchase. But as far as competitive pressures on pricing, we're not really seeing any.
DL
Dominic Ruccella - Northcoast Research Partners LLC
Analyst · Northcoast Research. Please go ahead
Okay. All right. That's it for me. Thank you.
Gregory Q. Brown - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thanks, Dominic.
OP
Operator
Operator
We'll take our next question from Michael Genovese with MKM Partners. Please go ahead.
ML
Michael E. Genovese - MKM Partners LLC
Analyst · MKM Partners. Please go ahead
Yeah, thank you very much. You guys recently published an SEC document where you had some language in there about a long-term potential shift from Products to Services, and therefore, lower gross margins over time. So we saw some evidence of that in this quarter, but you're not talking about it on the call as a long-term trend. So how much should we be thinking about that as a long-term trend versus just adding another risk factor and covering your bases in an SEC document?
Gino A. Bonanotte - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Well, I mean, we – it's indicative of the backlog position we're in. We've signed multiple multi-year agreements and Services backlog has been growing, so the comment just indicated that there will be a movement to Services. It'll make up more of our revenue, and the Services margin, although operating margin is very, very similar, Services margin is a little bit lower than our Product margin. That was the entire comment.
Gregory Q. Brown - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, we think this is a good thing. It's a favorable trend. Having a higher mix of multi-year services is good. Having annuity based revenue is good. Having a long-term relationship with the customer is good because we still, irrespective of the mix, which I think is what we just are formally acknowledging over time as a future trend, we think that's a very positive thing to enable and further cement the relationships we have with our customers domestically and internationally. Having said all that, we still think that we can, with a lower cost structure, improve operating leverage, and from an operating margin standpoint, maintain or increase the operating margins and cash generation that's associated with the profile of the business in aggregate.
ML
Michael E. Genovese - MKM Partners LLC
Analyst · MKM Partners. Please go ahead
So just to follow up there, so you're not saying that there's a fundamental outlook change in the Product business, the expectations there are on track with your previous expectations, or is there a change in the Product outlook? I'm just a little bit unclear on that point.
Gregory Q. Brown - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: No. Just to clarify, as Gino said, Product margins are generally comparable. We expect them to remain comparable for the balance of the year. Gross margin pressures, Services-oriented, as expected, in Q1 and Q2, i.e., first half, i.e., largely driven by Norway and some large products. We expect the Services gross margin to increase in the second half and generally normalize in the mid 30s%.
ML
Michael E. Genovese - MKM Partners LLC
Analyst · MKM Partners. Please go ahead
Thanks very much.
Mark Moon - Executive Vice President & President-Sales and Product Operations: And then I think just to tag on just one quick second, what we have said, and Greg just said, is product profile really unchanged, but we expect our Services business to grow faster than our Product business in general. And so that would lead to this longer term trend. It's not necessarily something you're going to see in the next two quarters, three quarters or four quarters, but over time, that would be the case.
ML
Michael E. Genovese - MKM Partners LLC
Analyst · MKM Partners. Please go ahead
Okay. I appreciate the explanation. Thanks.
Gregory Q. Brown - Chairman & Chief Executive Officer: Thank you.
OP
Operator
Operator
It appears we have no further questions. I'll turn the floor back to Mr. Shep Dunlap, Vice President of Investor Relations, for any additional or closing remarks.
SR
Shep Dunlap - Vice President-Investor Relations
Management
Thanks. As mentioned at the outset, we made a number of forward-looking statements during the call. This includes outlooks on sales, gross margins, EPS, OpEx, EBITDA, other income expense and operating cash flow, as well as effective – and cash tax rates, the impact of currency, Public Safety LTE and LMR, regional growth, acquisitions, capital return and buybacks, as well as backlog. Thanks for joining us, and we'll talk to you soon.
OP
Operator
Operator
Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude today's teleconference. A replay of this call will be available over the Internet in approximately three hours. The website address is www.motorolasolutions.com/investor. We thank you for your participation, and ask that you please disconnect your lines at this time. Have a wonderful day.