Earnings Labs

Sealed Air Corporation (SEE)

Q4 2021 Earnings Call· Thu, Feb 17, 2022

$42.15

+0.02%

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Sealed Air Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2021 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participant lines are in listen-only mode. After the presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] Please be advised today’s conference may be recorded. [Operator Instructions] I’d now like to hand the conference over to Lori Chaitman, Vice President of Investor Relations.

Lori Chaitman

Analyst

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. With me today are Ted Doheny, our CEO; and Chris Stephens, our CFO. Before we begin our call, I would like to note that we have provided a slide presentation to help guide our discussion. In addition to our results and outlook, Ted will go through a deep dive on SEE Automation. Please visit our website where today’s webcast and presentation can be downloaded from our IR website at sealedair.com. Statements made during this call stating management’s outlook or predictions for future periods are forward looking statements. These statements are based solely on information that is now available to us. We encourage you to review the information in the section entitled Forward Looking Statements in our earnings release and slide presentation which applies to this call. Additionally, our future performance may differ due to a number of factors. Many of these factors are listed in our most recent annual report on Form 10-K and as revised and updated on our quarterly reports on Form 10-Q and current reports on Form 8-K, which you can also find on our website or on the SEC’s website. We discussed financial measures that do not conform to U.S. GAAP. You will find important information on our use of these measures and their reconciliation to U.S. GAAP in our earnings release. Including the appendix of today’s presentation, you will find U.S. GAAP financial results that correspond to the non-U.S. GAAP measures we referenced throughout the presentation. I will now turn the call over to Ted. Operator, please turn to slide three. Ted?

Ted Doheny

Analyst

Thank you, Lori. And thank all of you for joining our fourth quarter and year-end earnings call. Chris and I will discuss our Q4 and year-end results, our 2022 outlook and we will be introducing a deep dive into our SEE Automation three-year plan. On slide three, you can see our vision to become a world class, digitally driven company, automating sustainable packaging solutions and we will show you how we are getting it done. Now let’s turn to slide four. In 2021, we delivered strong sales and earnings, overcoming dramatic inflationary supply and COVID challenges. Our results are a testament to our culture, people and powerful SEE Operating Engine. We are building a world class digitally empowered company acting like a startup to disrupt the markets we serve, our industry and ourselves. These are exciting times for us. We are taking bold steps, investing in our people, operations and customers to create significant value for our stakeholders. You can see how our SEE Operating Engine performed in the fourth quarter. Net sales were up 14% to $1.5 billion and adjusted EBITDA was up 18% to $330 million. For the full year, we generated free cash flow of $497 million. As part of our strategic portfolio realignment, we successfully completed the divestiture of Reflectix, a maker of insulating materials for the construction market and generated additional after tax proceeds of $65 million. On slide five, we are raising our SEE Operating Model growth goals for sales and adjusted EBITDA by 200 basis points. Our higher above market growth goals are led by our confidence in our strategy, disruptive innovations and investments, and our execution across markets and geographies. Through M&A and SEE Ventures, we are looking to expand into attractive markets, technologies and disruptive business models to accelerate our speed…

Chris Stephens

Analyst

Thank you, Ted, and good morning, everyone. Let’s start on slide 11 to review our quarterly and year-end net sales growth by segment and by region. In Q4, net sales were up 14% to $1.5 billion. In constant dollars, net sales were up 15%, with 17% growth in food and 13% growth in protective. The Americas and EMEA were both up double digits, with Americas up 19% and EMEA up 13%, while APAC was up 4% versus last year. In 2021 net sales were up 13% to $5.5 billion. In constant dollars, net sales were up 11%, with 9% growth in food and 15% in protective. Growth was led by the Americas and EMEA, which were up 13% and 12%, respectively, with APAC up 6% versus last year. On slide 12 you can see organic sales volumes and pricing trends by segment and by region. In Q4, overall volume growth was up 4%, with favorable price of 12%. In 2021, volume growth and favorable price were both 6%. Let’s start with volume trends and focus on Q4 performance and 2021 trends. In the quarter, food vines were up 6%, with growth across all regions, Americas up 5%, EMEA up 10% and APAC up 6%. Protective volumes were up 1%, led by EMEA with 7% growth, flattened Americas and APAC declined 4%. We experienced accelerating volume in food in the second half, with higher sales in Automation and growth in materials, as food service continued to recover and retail demand remained strong. Protective volume surged in the first half of 2021 on the heels of 2020 industrial shutdowns, and growth and fulfillment around the world, particularly in EMEA. We face tougher comps in the second half of 2021. However, fulfillment automation sales were up and industrial demand was favorable. Starting in…

Ted Doheny

Analyst

Thanks, Chris. Let’s turn to slide 20, where we have our Purpose Statement. This is how we are making our vision a reality. Our SEE Operating Engine is performing and gaining momentum. We will continue to invest in our four Ps of Reinvent SEE. Next quarter we will provide a deep dive on digital. We are creating long-term value for our stakeholders and making our world better than we find it. With that, I will now open up the call for questions. Operator, we would like to begin the Q&A session.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Anthony Pettinari with Citi.

Bryan Brokmeier

Analyst

Hi. This is actually Bryan Brokmeier sitting in for Anthony. Can you provide some detail on the cost assumptions included in your 2022 guidance such as rising freight and wage inflation? And do you expect to be price cost positive again in 1Q and throughout 2022?

Chris Stephens

Analyst

Sure, Bryan. This is Chris. Thanks for your question. So, my opening remarks, we talked about just the inflationary pressures that we are seeing. I think, just to comment in terms of the positive game, we will have to now be favorable on our price cost spread heading into the year. We expect that to continue clearly through the first half of the year. But the inflationary pressures beyond just material from what we are seeing on the non-material side is causing us to take action relative to price. But when you bring it up a level, that cost side, the material side is roughly $200 million in our guidance is the assumption. And on the inflationary being all non-material related items, everything else, if you will, is about $100 million. So we got $300 million that we are managing through at least that we expect to see this year. And again, I will just comment that we feel good about the price cost spread turning positive, we expect that to continue. But we are managing not only our pricing, but also the productivity actions across the organization to be able to deliver on our commitments.

Ted Doheny

Analyst

Okay. Next question.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Larry De Maria with William Blair.

Larry De Maria

Analyst · William Blair.

Hey. Thanks. Good morning, everybody.

Ted Doheny

Analyst · William Blair.

Good morning. Hi, Larry.

Larry De Maria

Analyst · William Blair.

Ted -- hi, guys. As it relate to Automation, obviously, we are seeing trends clearly accelerating across all Automation on the food side, especially. Can you talk about your visibility backlog, and how much your solutions gain more toward the end of the line are being prioritized versus other Automation in what they secondary processing, because labor challenge is there. So in other words, where are you in the order and what kind of visibility backlog are you thinking about?

Ted Doheny

Analyst · William Blair.

Okay. Good. Hi, Larry. And it’s great having an expert on Automation asking me the questions. So, break it up in two parts. So what’s in our backlog? If you look at slide seven, we kind of gave you that picture, and especially as an Automation company talks about their business, they talk about backlog, so you can kind of see what’s out there, the backlog is up pretty significant, much higher than sales. So to your question, we are seeing that much higher. The second part of your question, how does that compare to the other part of the process? I am sure I will get the question, but we put the full detail process and what we are going after on another slide. But for where we are, if you went and looked at a meat plant and/or protein plant, you would see lots of Automation upfront in the processing. But when you get to the actual packaging of actually putting the meat into a package, you see lots of people. You even see it on the news when you have had some of the COVID scares with some of our large customers, that’s where the labor intensity is. So where we fit in the Automation is right now we are actually a key part for our customers to help them right now, with availability, labor, they can’t get it, driving some efficiency. So the direct answer, we are probably first in line and the spot that they are spending money on to get that Automation and to break some bottlenecks. This is the most labor intensive piece of food packaging plant. Hope that helps with the description there. Next question.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Angel Castillo with Morgan Stanley.

Angel Castillo

Analyst · Morgan Stanley.

Hi. Good morning and thanks for taking my question. Just I was wondering if you could give us a little bit more color as to the EBITDA guide, the low-end and the high-end, you noted volume of 2% and price 6% kind of at the midpoint. But how should we think about kind of the two bookends and what kind of assumptions are embedded in that, if it’s not that? Thank you.

Chris Stephens

Analyst · Morgan Stanley.

Sure. Good questions. So, maybe just a few items, I want to -- definitely want to highlight the fact that we have got some headwinds on the FX side just concern where the currencies currently are. So FX impact on our adjusted EBITDA is roughly 2%. Small item, but we did -- we talked about the divestiture of Reflectix that occurred this past year. So that’s a little bit -- in terms of the contribution that it made, which is pretty much consistent with the company. But the other notable item to highlight is that, the investments that we plan to make and are making in our business, mainly driven on capacity needs, as well as on the expense side, thinking through the R&D piece, the innovation, as we move forward, we are increasing those investments heading into 2022. And if I put a number around, it’s roughly $40 million to $45 million incremental is what we expect to spend in 2022 versus 2021. So all of that is not flowing through the bottom line given that volume and price assumptions heading into 2022. So that’s a conscious investment back in ourselves for future returns that were not as you can see in 2022. And then if you look at our ability to generate returns on those investments, industry-leading ROI ending the year up to 16%. So we are very much driven on longer-term investments that we are making and not going to make that short-term pause, if you will, to let all of that dropped to the bottom line. So in our guide, roughly like I mentioned before, as $40 million to $45 million of incremental investments we are making in ourselves, consistent with our strategy, where we are going.

Ted Doheny

Analyst · Morgan Stanley.

Just a little bit color as we looked at those bookends of what’s going on in the business. And time to Larry’s question really is Automation driving. So if you look at the high end, what we really looked at very carefully though, even though the bookings are up significantly, we still have operational issues that we got to deal with in the market. Everybody knows what’s going on with the supply chain and the disruptions. So as we knock out some of those bottlenecks, that’s so we are looking at, could we push that up even higher. So let’s go make that happen, but we definitely see there’s some opportunity. Again to Chris’s point, to make some of that stuff happen, we are investing heavily in the automation, digital, and sustainability. And so we are investing to make that happen. So we do think knocking out some of those bottlenecks, knocking through these issues, and by the way, this is our third year of the same thing, supply chain, COVID, inflation. So we think the engine can power through that right now. And, but right now, the guidance there we think is doable, and that’s what -- that’s what we are going after and to get it done. Okay. Next question, please?

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Phil Ng with Jefferies.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst · Jefferies.

Good morning, Ted. Chris, this is John [ph] on for Phil. Hope you are doing well. I wanted to start off with...

Ted Doheny

Analyst · Jefferies.

Must be something exciting going on and we are getting the...

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst · Jefferies.

Nothing more exciting. For the protective volumes. Coming through 2021 protective obviously growth decelerated on the tougher comps in the pandemic restrictions easing. Can you give us your thoughts on how Protective will do through 2022 in terms of volumes? And where you are seeing strength with some of the COVID restrictions easing up?

Chris Stephens

Analyst · Jefferies.

Sure. And our guidance kind of implies that the organic side, roughly 3% as well as price approximately 6%, and if you break that down between Food and Protective, as it relates to the organic piece of it, roughly 3%. It can be a little bit higher on the Food kind of thinking 3% to 4% on the Protective a little bit lower 2% to 3%. And from a geography point of view, it is certain areas that we would expect to come back better than others, but just low single-digit growth that we are anticipating in our guidance kind of what we are looking at. Hopefully, as things do open up faster things kind of settle the markets are a little bit more favorable than we view it, but for right now that caution is there, to your point specifically on the Protective side. But, Ted, there’s anything else to add?

Ted Doheny

Analyst · Jefferies.

Yeah. A little color focusing on Protective. If you look at slide six, John, we are trying to give you a picture to tell what the story is going on here. Again, we are moving to be market-driven from our products. So the markets in 2021, we had some, Chris, you have been used this language. We had some surge with what was going on in the e-commerce space and actually the COVID-related stuff, we shifted that portfolio really fast. And so we are anticipating that shift in different areas, so one of the areas in 2021 that didn’t grow as fast for us was actually our Mailer business. We are changing that out, driving Automation, so that opportunity was actually down last year. We think is an upside potential and that was driving that lower number there in the fourth quarter was the Mailer business, which we think that is an upside opportunity this year on Protective again driving Automation. Also, if you look at the slide, we are bringing out the example of taking Automation into this industry, this is a whole new market for us. That’s a $2 million piece of equipment there with the tires wrapping that, about the Auto Wrap system that simple. So we are taking Automation that’s taking the Protective business to new areas, and we think we can move that pretty quickly if the markets continue to move pretty significantly. So we feel that will recover that, and Protective, we don’t see as an issue for us in growth in 2022. Okay. Next question, please?

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Ghansham Panjabi with Baird.

Ghansham Panjabi

Analyst · Baird.

Hi, guys. Good morning. On your Automation ambitions of one plus -

Ted Doheny

Analyst · Baird.

Ghansham, I am excited that you made our call. This is great.

Ghansham Panjabi

Analyst · Baird.

This was the excitement for the week. This was the excitement. I guess going back to one of the slides where you have the Automation ambitions of one plus billion by 2025 inclusive of acquisitions. Just curious, how do you resourcing internally to position for that organic growth relative to the baseline for 2022? And I guess the question is that the existing solutions that you are expanding with current and new customers or the incremental technologies which will require some level of outside expertise to complement what you already have? And then the second question related to that on your comment to double equipment production capacity over the next three years, is that investment weighted towards one segment, in particular? Or is it commensurate with the sales split? Thanks.

Ted Doheny

Analyst · Baird.

Okay. Let me try to go last first, Ghansham, and Chris will try to make sure I get to it. So let’s go to the last on the investment. Where we have been transparent that we shared earlier, in the middle of last year, we actually increased the capacity, the CapEx, and EPS. And we went public that on a price increase because we saw the volumes and that we are going to double that on EPS to get the capacity up in three years. We are actually ahead of schedule on that, that’s working. So the same thing there, the team has been working a little bit of your timing question, we have been working on that. We are just being declared of there, but that’s part of that CapEx, we are obviously doubling internal CapEx. So that we can make that Automation happen. The other piece I am going backward on your question, go to slide 10. This is our bathtub or the circular world that we are living in here. This it’s a mixture of the technology if you look at the left piece there, that’s -- those are actual pictures of our operations. Where we are bringing Automation in, where I talked about cobots and robots and automated processes by the way a cobot get asked that question a lot of cobot is a robot working actually with the human. So today just rough number we have hundreds of these in our operations. We are going to take that to thousands in the next five years. We are going to be reducing the touch-points of our facilities by over 50%, which by the way is millions, and behind all of that is driving that 30% productivity that we have been talking to you about in our…

Ghansham Panjabi

Analyst · Baird.

Yeah.

Ted Doheny

Analyst · Baird.

Yeah. To the next point of this question.

Ghansham Panjabi

Analyst · Baird.

That’s good.

Ted Doheny

Analyst · Baird.

Okay. Next question, please?

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Josh Spector with UBS.

Josh Spector

Analyst · UBS.

Yeah. Hi guys, thanks for taking my question. Just curious if you could update us on where you are -- good morning. In terms of equipment profitability, if you can give us some context, maybe where you were a couple of years ago versus what you are thinking 2022 looks like? Also thinking about in the context of the higher investment that you guys are highlighting? Do you need to scale further get to your 2025 goals that to become meaningfully more profitable? Or you seeing incremental improvement there already that’s flowing through to your EBITDA?

Chris Stephens

Analyst · UBS.

Yeah. I will let, Ted, go ahead. I wanted to jump in. Only because we don’t disclose EBITDA margins at that level. But the good news is that we clearly are focused on profitability in the equipment side. So we are getting some improvements. Clearly, it’s happening -- it’s a part of our overall adjusted EBITDA margin. Bet I will let Ted answer strategically.

Ted Doheny

Analyst · UBS.

Josh, great question. And then Chris was jumping in to make sure this is exactly, your question is exactly where why this is so exciting. Not just is it growth, but actually the profitability. But before we talk about us, and again I just want to be repetitive, it’s about our customers, it’s about creating the demand. And so in this slide, if you look at slide seven, we put something out there in the gray, we put the bar that’s driving this is our customer savings. We are focused as a solutions provider is an Automation company focused on how we can save our customers the most money and we are sizing, pricing, our solutions on the right -- the customers getting their three-year payback. So why is that so important, because then it drives to, if you look at the fourth bullet on this slide, we are accelerating innovation while improving EBITDA margin. So, yes, we have a few hundred basis points improvement coming through on the equipment side for many different reasons, but the number one reason is, we are moving the conversation from how much does it cost to how much does it save and the savings are significant. But, yes, there is significant margin improvement on our equipment offerings of today driving to where we are going. So as you are thinking about modeling and where it goes, that’s where we look at our whole business to say that we have that leverage out there, all through our journey of reinventing the company, we are driving greater than 30% operating leverage. So this growth is going to fit in that targets and we are going to have margin expansion as we do this. The third element of this, that is so important and why we use the word inevitable, if you can go to the solution slide on slide nine. So, slide nine is there. So we are going to put equipment, which is our core turning the model upside down. So this is going to be profitable part of our business, not a subsidy. The second part is, we are going to be driving service element here, significantly more profitable than equipment. But in customers’ eyes, the service is what differentiates us. We have had our service technicians embedded into our customers’ operations. We are going to do more of that than the integration of the other technology that we talked about how do you pay for that? Savings, and then we get to the really cool part of our model is we are pulling through the Cryovac materials, the BUBBLE WRAP materials that inimitable solution we are wrapping these really special packages with our materials. And that’s what’s driving the Solutions Multiplier. So, great question. It’s behind this whole model, not we are going to grow the business faster, we are going to do it more profitably. Next question, please?

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Arun Viswanathan with RBC Capital.

Arun Viswanathan

Analyst · RBC Capital.

Great. Thanks for taking my question. We have seen quite a few declines in resin prices in the last couple of months. Although the tight seems to be switching a little bit in the last couple of weeks. And then we also have increased feedstock costs on the energy side. I guess when you think about all of that, maybe you can just help us understand how the formula price pricing will be affected? And is there any unusual impact on your European operations? Thanks.

Chris Stephens

Analyst · RBC Capital.

Yeah. Thanks for your question. So, yes, I guess the volatility continues. I think we are on top of it relative to the pricing actions we have talked about the best three quarters now. But what we are seeing is, you are right, there are certain improvements in some of that resin pricing, but we get, we have specialty resins. So it’s not just on one, it’s on many. So you are talking about the other resins that are increasing as well as chemicals. So we look at all of the raw material and just get a good sense of what we are anticipating for this year heading into it, making sure our pricing is as close as possible to that. Your point on formula-based pricing is that we are in the middle of that, we would expect that to continue somewhat. And it takes about six months for that to kick in, and the same effect has when it does come down, we will get the benefits over a six-month period. So we consider this year in our guide to be favorable as it relates to pricing cost spread. I think I comment on that earlier. And then maybe the other point I did want to make just thinking about the year is we are roughly looking at just like we entered last year roughly 45%, 55%. This year, we are entering into kind of this 48%, 52%. I just wanted to add some color in terms of our guidance between that first half and the second half. So bottom line, formula-based pricing is intact. We don’t expect an immediate change anytime in the near future as it relates to that even if there is improvement in that resin pricing. And again we buy multiple different grades of that and specialty types of resins that are embedded in our formulas. But, Ted, maybe some other comments?

Ted Doheny

Analyst · RBC Capital.

Yeah. I will just add a little bit of color because obviously now four years with the business, the questions I have trying to guide that we are much more than our resin converter business. So, but, let’s understand what’s going on because this is a major source of our business. So, as Chris said, the resin markets with inflation, resins hit us really hard. So it took us to the end of the year to get ahead of that on the price cost mix, but we still see pressure on that in the first half of the year. Especially on the commodity type resins, we think will go up in the first half, but actually down in the first half and maybe down for the whole year. So underneath that, though, the specialty resins and that’s what we do the magic with especially our Cryovac material, we see that still going up year-over-year. So we have that balance going in, where we have the commodities going down a little bit. We see that flattening which is good. The specialty, those are still going up. But we also want to take us a little bit beyond just the resins were also into paper. So the paper, especially in Europe is we are moving our portfolio to be material agnostic. We are seeing that there is significant inflation on the paper. Again, because paper very simply it’s wood plus energy, the energy costs as we all know around the world are driving. So with paper, now with resin this solution is still the same. How do we drive Automation? And how do we drive Automation to power through this with our customers? As Chris said, that we have disciplined pricing actions still in place with care, working with our customers to handle it. And one last comment is beyond resins, beyond its everything on this inflation, freight, all the materials, labor, et cetera, et cetera. So we really, really the inflation issue is not over for us but we can handle it and we are attacking it, and we have to do it with care on pricing with our customers. Next question, please?

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Adam Josephson with KeyBanc.

Adam Josephson

Analyst · KeyBanc.

Good morning, everyone. Hope you are well. Chris, on free cash flow, seeing your conversion last year was 44%. It seems like you are expecting something similar maybe a touch lower in 2022. Your target long term is 50% plus. And I know last year working capital was a bit of a drag. And this year CapEx is going to be elevated, cash taxes will be elevated for a couple of reasons. So can you help me think about beyond 2022, perhaps you are expecting CapEx to normalize? Cash taxes to normalize? What gets you back to that algorithm post 2022?

Chris Stephens

Analyst · KeyBanc.

Yeah. Good question. So I’d start with just overall improvement and the performance of the business. Meaning the earnings power based on these investments given the return profile of what we are able to generate. It first starts there, yes, we are around 21% EBITDA margin business clearly got aspirations to drive it to a mid-20% over time. So I’d start, which is the earnings power of what we are able to do, getting the return on those investments as we make them. As we comment internally, we don’t starve capital of the CapEx need is there, and the return on investment makes a lot of sense. We are going to do that, we have elevated CapEx going into this year, and on a couple of that also with the investments back in the business as I commented earlier, mainly around the R&D space. So then you get to working capital, large next lever, and the efficiencies, and you can see our DSO, DPO, DLH, et cetera. I mean, really, really strong performance in working capital as it relates to those metrics. However, I would comment that if inventories are available, we are going to get it and that’s especially in this environment. So working through these supply challenges, I would say we are taking on certain elements, we are taking on more inventory to see that future demand, which is good. But once things open up stabilize, we expect to be able to get inventory down over, and that’s considerably, but we expect to get more velocity, if you will, in terms of getting that inventory down. And then you get into the other part of the area is just the income tax payments and I made those tax payment comments on my prepared remarks, specifically because we are seeing a roughly $100 million increase year-over-year, and I kind of explained in my prepared remarks with what they were. We will see how that takes shape, of course, we are always looking for opportunities to take advantage of, I will call it tax incentives if you will, we are a global company, are there opportunities that we can get benefits in the countries we operate based on the investments we make. So we are going to continue to look at cash taxes in terms of being able to get that down. So maybe just to summarize, I just -- I look at is the earnings power. The earnings power of our business is looked at what we are driving for in terms of that improvement to greater than 50%.

Ted Doheny

Analyst · KeyBanc.

And Adam, the only thing to add to what Chris said, good summary there. It’s especially, Chris, congratulations, now been here a year that as we have been driving. We took that number up when we first looked at the engine over history. We took it -- we looked at 30, 40, and to 50. And so, as we are the engines revving is we are going forward what came in as Chris described with the working capital, those volumes are going up. So the volumes when they spike up, will there be a consumption of the cash, but to the model, we looked at it and we said with those volumes going up, let’s go sustain those volumes in the real, the second key there is to drive earnings even higher to producing more cash and that’s part of the engines. So those are the two areas there that we feel confident that’s the model and that’s where we are going to take the business and pretty confident we are going to get there. So, next question, please?

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Anojja Shah with BMO Capital Markets.

Anojja Shah

Analyst · BMO Capital Markets.

Hi. Good morning. I know you are going…

Ted Doheny

Analyst · BMO Capital Markets.

Good morning, Anojja.

Anojja Shah

Analyst · BMO Capital Markets.

… to talk more about digital printing next quarter. But you mentioned the FoxPak acquisition, and I was wondering, do you envision more M&A and digital printing or will it be more of an internally built focus?

Chris Stephens

Analyst · BMO Capital Markets.

Yeah. I will let you go with that.

Ted Doheny

Analyst · BMO Capital Markets.

Yeah. No. It’s a good question. So if you look at slide 10 and you see the digital printing on both sides, It’s a good question. We actually started our digital journey in this part of SEE Ventures, we have had that we have invested some, but we think it’s game-changing technology. So I don’t want to put a little bit of a buzz out there for next quarter, but that technology that we have invested in is exceeding expectations. So it’s right now it’s mostly in the operations, enabling us to get some significant productivity. We are now putting some of the technology out with our customers actually putting the digital printing in our Automation packages and what FoxPak is really is a pioneer in that space. It’s helped us with its European footprint, how do we get to more places faster, especially their expertise on the presentation and the speed to market that they produce the outcomes, really impressive. So, as Chris said, the answer is, yes. We are investing internally because now we have our own internal capability but we are looking at other opportunities on the M&A space to move that faster because the secret to the future, it is digital. And we got to be digitally connected in everything we do, and more coming. We might necessarily have to buy at all because we have some pretty impressive digital partners that are working with us behind the scenes, and we will share some of that with you again in the next quarter when we did the deep dive on digital. Great question and that’s what we are excited about.

Chris Stephens

Analyst · BMO Capital Markets.

And then, the last question please, Operator. Last question.

Operator

Operator

Our last question comes from Adam Samuelson with Goldman Sachs.

Adam Samuelson

Analyst

Yeah. Thank you. Good morning, everyone.

Chris Stephens

Analyst

Good morning.

Adam Samuelson

Analyst

I was hoping, maybe dig into this point on the Automation Solutions Multiplier. And I am looking at the materials and hearing kind of the framing properly. This is the first time you have talked about up to 10 times multiplayer online some solutions offerings, which is considerably higher than what you framed it previously. And maybe just trying to get a sense of what proportion of the equipment business might be reaching kind of that kind of threshold. And if that’s a big driver of the more optimistic longer-term growth outlook for the company where the equipment growth outlook itself doesn’t seem to change dramatically?

Ted Doheny

Analyst

Yeah. Hi, Adam. Yeah. So the answer is, yes. It’s there, it’s we are turning. If you go back to slide -- before we go to slide nine, Just to give you a framework. So if you look at slide 10, and slide 10 is our model of the circular where we are taking this. I call this our bathtub. We are turning an aircraft carrier in a bathtub and you can see we are recharging it, rewiring it, re-powering it. So then if you go to the next slide on the Solutions Multiplier, we did talk about this and with our acquisition of APS. And being an ex-equipment person and those, even the new sell-side analysts that we are talking to that are Automation based, they get this Solutions Multiplier very well. Because this is what an Automation company does. And so you have the equipment, you don’t give the equipment away, you charge the equipment, you connected with service and then you bring what we are different than an equipment company and that’s why we use the word inimitable is that we not only do the equipment, we do the materials. That’s the special part of this model. So linking that together with, I shared with you, we have well over 100,000 pieces of equipment, we got to get that connected, get that moving fairly quickly. But, so yes that multiplier is big. So if you look at one specific example to show you how do you get to 10 times because your comment was very appropriate, if you looked at our model, we use greater than 3 times. This slide is showing you if we really do and get connected to the equipment to service and materials, like that visual example of bag in a box for…

Operator

Operator

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