Aaon Inc

NASDAQ:AAON

Earnings Call Analysis

AAON Reports Pleasing 2023 Results, Eyes Modest 2024 Growth

AAON experienced a satisfying 2023 with a 20.4% rise in net sales and paid down significant debt, decreasing the leverage ratio from 0.46 to 0.15. The company's operational strategy prioritizes growth through capacity expansion with Texas and Oregon projects finishing this and next year, and a state-of-the-art training facility expected by early 2025. Lead times are normalized as AAON anticipates moderate 2024 growth, with mid-single-digit sales increases from pricing strategies and low single-digit volume growth. Gross margin is projected to improve with SG&A expenses rising slightly. Anticipated 2024 capital expenditures of $125 million reflect continuous investment and capability enhancement.

Company Positioning Amidst Secular Trends

The company is set to benefit strongly from secular trends such as decarbonization, electrification, and energy efficiency, which bode well for its Alpha glass product. Supported by government regulations, these trends align with the company's strengths in delivering high-performance, energy-efficient equipment, positioning it for future success.

Financial Performance and Profitability

A significant increase in gross profit by 42.3%, from $78.5 million to $111.7 million, showcases the company's ability to capitalize on productivity gains and positions it well financially for reinvestment and value creation.

Strong Balance Sheet and Capital Allocation

The company holds a healthy balance sheet with $9 million in cash and cash equivalents, a low leverage ratio of 0.15, and a substantial working capital balance of $282.2 million. These factors, combined with a disciplined approach to capital projects—such as a forecasted $125 million in capital expenditures for 2024—underscore the company's commitment to growth and operational efficiency.

Sales, Bookings, and Market Perception

Sales bookings improved sequentially for a second quarter in a row, giving the company a slight increase in its backlog and indicating a resilient market environment. This resilience persists despite mixed signals from macroeconomic indicators and softness in some traditional markets like office buildings and retail.

Guidance and Market Outlook for 2024

The company projects a slower growth year in 2024 due to tougher year-over-year comparisons and a softer nonresidential construction sector. However, it still expects to see mid-single-digit sales growth driven by pricing and low single-digit volume growth. The gross margin is anticipated to be higher than the previous year, primarily due to a favorable comparative in Q1, while SG&A expenses as a percentage of sales will see a modest rise. Capital expenditures are projected to be approximately $125 million, reflecting ongoing investments in the company's productive capacity.

Earnings Call Transcript 2023-Q4

[Operator]

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the AAON, Inc. Fourth Quarter 2023 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] This call is being recorded on Thursday, February 29, 2024.

I would now like to turn the conference over to Joe Mondillo. Thank you. Please go ahead.

[Joseph Mondillo, executive]

Thank you, operator, and good afternoon, everyone. The press release announcing our fourth quarter financial results was issued after market closed today and can be found on our corporate website, aaon.com. The call today is accompanied with a presentation that you can also find on our website as well as on the listen-only webcast.

Please turn to Slide 2. We begin with our customary forward-looking statement policy. During the call, any statement presented dealing with information that is not historical is considered forward-looking and made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, Securities Act of 1933 and the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934 each as amended. As such, it is subject to the occurrence of many events outside of AAON's control that could cause AAON's results to differ materially from those anticipated. You are all aware of the inherent difficulties, risks and uncertainties in making predictive statements.

Our press release and Form 10-K that we filed this afternoon detail some of the important risk factors that may our cause our actual results to differ from those in our predictions. Please note that we do not have the duty to update our forward-looking statements. Our press release and portions of today's call use non-GAAP financial measures as defined in Regulation G. You can find the related reconciliations to GAAP measures in our press release and presentation.

Joining me on today's call is Gary Fields, CEO; Matt Tobolski, President and COO; and Rebecca Thompson, CFO and Treasurer. Gary will start the call off with some opening remarks. Matt will then provide some details about our operations and market trends. Rebecca will follow with a walk-through of the quarterly results and before taking questions, Gary will finish with our 2024 outlook and closing remarks.

With that, I will turn over the call to Gary.

[Gary Fields, executive]

Thanks, Joe. Thank you, everyone, for joining us on our call today. If you will, please turn with me to Slide 3. Overall, we're very pleased with our 2023 results. 2023 marked our 35th anniversary as a company, and it lined up with some outstanding achievements. Most notably, we surpassed $1 billion of sales for the first time in company history. Net sales in the year grew 31.5% and which followed a year in 2022 when we recorded organic growth of 46.8%. Over the last 2 years, organic volume was up 46.6% and including being up 14.5% in 2023. This is incredible performance for this industry. Along with the strong sales growth, we recognized solid margin expansion in 2023, reflecting not only the operating leverage from the increased volume but also significant enhancements in operational efficiencies.

Net income for the year grew over 75%. And resulting in a second straight year of record earnings. Since 2021, we have more than tripled net income. Altogether, I am very proud of how our team performed in the last calendar year. Please turn to Slide 4. We finished the year with strong results. Organic net sales in the fourth quarter was up 20.4% and and gross profit was up 42.3%. Our basics segment realized a record quarter, both in sales and profits. Net sales at the segment were up 33.6% and gross profit was up 70.3%. AAON, Oklahoma also performed very well. Net sales at this segment were up 23.4% and gross profit was up 45.3%. Gross profit margin for the company came in at 36.4%, up year-over-year nearly 560 basis points and down only modestly from the seasonally strong third quarter. Despite the impact that holidays had on productivity in the fourth quarter, we were able to further improve operational efficiencies on top of the gains we recognized in the third quarter. This resulted in our strongest fourth quarter of earnings in company history.

Bookings and backlog also trended positively in the quarter. Bookings were up quarter-over-quarter for the second straight quarter and were the strongest since the first quarter of 2022. The Bookings also outpaced production, resulting in a quarter-over-quarter increase in backlog. All around, it was a strong finish to the year.

Please turn to Slide 5. 3 years ago, our founder, Norm Asbjornson, created AAON with one mission: to manufacture the best HVAC equipment in the world for the best value. At the time, the total addressable market for premium semi-custom equipment was very small, as much of the market consisted of basic equipment. This wasn't because the commercial real estate market was not interested in more sophisticated equipment. It was because of the exorbitant price that premium equipment carried. To be competitive, Norm determined it required a revolutionary engineering and manufacturing process compared to common industry practices at the time. It has taken the company decades to perfect this unique way of manufacturing. Currently, our equipment is the most price competitive than it's ever been. At the same time, we continue to lead in innovation, performance and quality. This progression has expanded our total addressable market across the HVAC industry immensely.

Secular trends such as decarbonization, electrification driven by market demand shifts and new regulations has expanded our total addressable market even more. Not too long ago, AAON was known as a niche player in this industry. Being competitive on price has led to us being a mainstream solution. As I previously mentioned, Norm's mission 35 years ago was to provide the best HVAC equipment in the world for the best value. That mission remains true today and the value of the equipment has never been more compelling.

I'll now hand over the call to Matt Toboski, who will speak more in depth about our operational strategy.

[Matthew Tobolski, executive]

Thank you, Gary. If you turn to Slide #6. Last November, we issued a press release announcing several changes to the management structure of the company. It's been a couple of months since making those changes, and I wanted to start off by providing you with an update. Historically, AAON has had 2 locations with the vast majority of sales being generated out of our flagship Tulsa location. We now have a location in Parkville, Missouri and with the acquisition of Basics, a location in Redmond, Oregon. Over the last year or so, we began integrating common departments across all locations. The goal was to promote collaboration and the sharing of best practices with the intent of maximizing the operational sophistication of the company. These recent organizational changes will accelerate this integration process as well as improve our ability to manage the overall enterprise. Furthermore, the locations are beginning to overlap operationally. One notable example of this is allocating some basics production to our Longview, Texas facility. This began last year, but it will escalate upon the completion of our Longview manufacturing expansion project, which is expected to be complete by the end of this year. These leadership changes will be a huge benefit as production across locations further merge. 2 months into the change, I could be -- I could not be more pleased with how things have progressed. .

In a short period of time, the teams have never been more collaborative and more energized. I'm confident that these changes will have a meaningful impact in the near term under our current footprint. Although this is important, you should be aware that the intent of this is with long term in mind. These changes will better position us in the future to grow out of the current footprint in the most efficient way possible.

If you will, please turn to Slide #7. I want to touch on some of the main tranches of our operational strategy. As you can see, we have a multifaceted approach when it comes to driving growth. This includes investing profits back into the business, incrementally providing support to our sales channel developing market-leading products, leveraging secular market trends and focusing on expanding our parts business. We have several large capital outlays that we are currently in the process of making. Capacity is being increased across all 4 of our locations. The 2 main projects are at our Longview, Texas and Reden Oregon facilities. In Longview, we're increasing manufacturing square footage by roughly 50%. This is slated to be finished by the end of this year. And at Redmond, square footage will increase by approximately 15%, with is expected to be finished by the end of third quarter. Both projects will yield much larger percentage increases in sales capacity due to expected increases in productivity.

We have several other ongoing projects and 1 that I'd like to highlight is the fact that we're building an additional training academy at our Tulsa location. This will be a state-of-the-art facility that will be utilized to train and certify our reps. This is expected to be finished in early 2025.

Now let's transition to our sales channel. As we've spoken to you in the past, we have never been more aligned with our channel partners and have never provided them with as much support in resources as we do today. Building this new academy in Tulsa is a perfect example Likewise, last year, we hosted the grand opening of our exploration center, a one-of-a-kind facility at our headquarters that showcases our products alongside market alternative equipment. This is a powerful resource for our sales reps to utilize to help sell the value proposition of AAOn equipment, a value proposition that is apparent once the customer walks through that facility. Something that we're also beginning to focus on much more is what we call the complete customer experience. Historically, AAON was primarily a product development company solely focused on designing and manufacturing some of the best HVAC equipment in the world. We want to continue to hold shot of that reputation, but we want to also be known for providing a premium customer experience from day 1 of the sales process through the entire life cycle of the equipment, including installation, operation and maintenance. This is an opportunity and one that we're now addressing and adding resources to take advantage of.

We're also investing in sales and marketing. Marketing is something that AAON hasn't previously spent a lot of resources on. Although our premium equipment now offers the most compelling value than ever, AAON is still a small company in the industry within much larger players and brands. We think that small investments in marketing will go a long way for us. By getting our name and brand out there more in educating the market about the attractive value proposition of our premium equipment, we expect it will assist our sales rep success in penetrating the market quicker. This is just another example of how we're incrementally providing support to our sales channel partners.

Earlier, Gary mentioned that one of our core missions is to design and manufacture the best HVAC equipment in the world. As we enter 2024, we are leading the industry with 2 product developments. First, we have been accepting orders for new 454B refrigerant equipment since January 1. Most of the industry won't be offering new refrigerant equipment until the second half of this calendar year. Second, last year, we introduced our newly branded Alpha Class equipment. The Alpha Class and near source heat pump powered rooftop unit that is operable down to 0 degrees Fahrenheit. No other competitor in the marketplace has such an offering. Most other air source heat pumps in the market today are operable just down to 25 to 30 degrees Fahrenheit.

Giving us an advantage in is ever increasing part of the market. Sales of this equipment still make it a small percentage of the total sales, but bookings in the second half of 233 have nearly doubled when compared to the first half of the year for Alpha products. So there is solid momentum thus far. We expect our Alpha glass to fully leverage several secular trends that AAON has already been benefiting from. Again, with an increased focus on decarbonization, electrification and energy efficiency, as well as the accelerated impact from government regulations, AAON's superior performing highly energy-efficient equipment is well positioned to take advantage of such trends.

Lastly, I want to touch on AAON's parts and service. Normally, we don't talk much about service because AAON doesn't have a direct to service business. However, our reps do provide service that we indirectly benefit from. As we touch on parts, our parts business will be 1 of AAON's fastest-growing business segments going forward. It will also be our most profitable business. Parts sales grew 26.3% in 2023, and we anticipate a strong double-digit growth rate in 2024. We are making several investments to help support this growth.

In 2023, parts made up 5.8% of total sales, and we think that we can double this portion of the business in 3 to 4 years, at which time it should represent closer to 10% of sales. Now as we touch on service, as part of our initiative of improving the all around customer experience, we intend to be much more focused on making sure our reps are providing a premium level of service to our customers. Like most OEM rep firms in any other industry, our know the equipment and their customer more than anyone else in the field. As such, to provide the best customer experience, we will instill upon them to provide the best service possible in this offering. In the end, our customers and reps as well as our business and brand will benefit substantially. Before handing it off to Rebecca, I will close with this. I'm extremely proud to be part of and help lead this organization. While the growth we've realized over the last 2 years has been incredible, there is still a lot of work to be done to realize the full potential of this organization. The team has never been more energized, and I look forward to continuing to build upon what we've already accomplished.

And with that, I will hand it off to Rebecca, who will walk through financials.

[Rebecca Thompson, executive]

Thank you, Matt. I'd like to begin by discussing the comparative results of the 3 months ended December 31, 2023, versus December 31, 2022. Please turn to Slide 8. I Net sales were up 20.4% to $306.6 million from $254.6 million, along with a healthy backlog that we entered the quarter with increased productivity resulted in volume growth of 9.3%. Adjusting total sales for inflation on a per day per production employee basis, sales in the fourth quarter were the best in over 2 years, reflecting the recognized productivity gains. Pricing was largely the other contributor to growth. On a per segment basis, Basics net sales in the quarter grew 33.6%. AAON, Oklahoma grew 23.4%, while Aon coil products declined 17.9%.

Moving to Slide #9. Our gross profit increased 42.3% to $111.7 million from $78.5 million. As a percentage of sales, gross profit margin was 36.4% compared to 30.8% in 2022. The year-over-year improvement in gross profit margin was driven by incremental pricing, improved productivity and higher volumes, leveraging our fixed costs.

Please turn to Slide 10. Selling, general and administrative expenses increased 49.8% to $47.9 million from $31.9 million in 2022. As a percentage of sales, SG&A increased to 15.6% of total sales compared to 12.5% in the same period in 2022. The increase in SG&A was due to higher warranty expense and profit sharing expenses from our increased sales and earnings. Other increases are a result of increased depreciation and amortization and consulting expenses related to investments we're making in back-office technologies.

Moving to Slide 11. Diluted earnings per share increased 19.1% to $0.56 per share from $0.47 per share. This marked the strongest fourth quarter of EPS in the company's history.

Turning to Slide 12. You'll see our balance sheet remains strong. Cash, cash equivalents and restricted cash totaled $9 million at December 31, 2023, and outstanding debt on our revolver at the end of the quarter was $38.3 million. Within the quarter, we paid down approximately $40.1 million on our line of credit, lowering our leverage ratio to 0.15 from 0.33% at the end of the third quarter and down from 0.46 at the end of 2022. We had a working capital balance of $282.2 million at December 31, 2023, versus $203.5 million at December 31, 2022.

The Capital expenditures in 2023 were $104.3 million, up 93.1% from a year ago. As Matt addressed, we have several large capital projects that will increase production capacity improve productivity and support future growth. Several of the projects from 2023 will carry over into 2024. This will make for another heavy CapEx year. In 2024, we anticipate capital expenditures to be approximately $125 million. We consistently engage in a rigorous analysis of our capital projects. All the projects included in the budget will help our growth and generate very compelling returns.

With that, I'll now like to turn the call back over to Gary.

[Gary Fields, executive]

As I stated in my opening remarks, bookings in the fourth quarter improved sequentially for a second straight quarter and outpaced production in the fourth quarter. As a result, we realized a modest quarter-over-quarter increase in the backlog. Year-over-year, backlog was down modestly, but this was intentional to rightsize lead times. For several months now, our lead times have been back to normal. Conversely, much of the industry still seems to be focused on bringing lead times down from elevated levels. Overall, market environment seems to be resilient despite the headlines and some of the macroeconomic indicators have been signaling for some time now. Month-to-month, bookings have been steady and sentiment amongst our sales channel remains positive. .

Furthermore, the pipeline of large projects, particularly in our basics and Aon Coil Products segment is robust. Certain verticals such as data centers, manufacturing and education remains strong. while some of our traditional markets such as office buildings and retailer soft. The nonresidential construction market seems to be slowing as a whole, but is definitely bifurcated. In addition to a slowing construction market, there is the uncertainty of how the market -- especially the replacement market will behave related to the refrigerant transition. So far, 2 months into this year, this doesn't seem to have had an impact yet. That said, we still anticipate for at least a short period of time in the middle part of the year that some customers may choose to delay replacing their units, waiting for new refrigerant equipment. If this does happen, we have a much bigger impact to the overall market than to us as most of our equipment has been configurable with the new refrigerants since January 1 of this year. Given that, we are in an advantageous position if the market chooses to shift to new refrigerant equipment early in the year. There's also a possibility that much of that market overlooks the long-term maintenance cost of buying equipment with the old refrigerant, and we see a much more muted effect. Either way, we are prepared with respect to manufacturing capabilities and with respect to our supply chain of the new refrigerant components, all considered we anticipate 2024 will be a slower growth year than we've experienced in the last couple of years. Not only do we have tougher comps that we are facing, but the economy and the nonresidential construction sector is softer than a year ago. Turning to the outlook.

Please turn to Slide 14. For 2024, we anticipate pricing will be a mid-single-digit contributor to sales growth, and we look for volume growth to be in the low single digits. We'd expect gross margin will be up year-over-year. mainly due to the favorable comp in the first quarter. For SG&A, as a percent of sales, we look for these expenses to be modestly up compared to 2023. As Rebecca stated, CapEx will be in the $125 million range. I would also like to remind you of the seasonality that we typically see in the first quarter. We expect both sales and earnings in the first quarter will be down when compared to the fourth quarter of 2023. Year-over-year, we expect both sales and earnings in the first quarter to be up modestly. In closing, I want to finish by thanking all of our employees, sales channel partners and customers. I also want to announce that we will be attending Sidoti & Company's Virtual Small Cap Conference on March 13, Wolf Research is small and mid-cap conference in New York on June 4 and Wells Fargo's Industrials Conference in Chicago on June 12. I hope to see some of you at these events. Thank you.

And I will now open up for Q&A.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] Your first question comes from the line of Chris Moore from CJS Securities.

[Christopher Moore, analyst]

Congratulations on another incredible quarter. looks like basics is really kind of hitting on all cylinders. I wonder if maybe we can focus on the data center market a little bit. So I know you had -- in the past, you had broken out addressable market, roughly $30 billion data center cooling being about $6.5 billion of that. AI is driving data center growth rapidly over the next 5, 10 years. I wonder if Matt could you just talk about -- a little bit about what you're seeing from -- on the AI front and kind of what areas that you are especially well positioned for right now?

[Joseph Mondillo, executive]

It's a fantastic question, Chris. And certainly, data centers as a whole market is certainly driving a tremendous amount of growth within AEON -- just kind of as a data point, just above 10% of our revenue in 2023 came from the data center market, where in that same period, over 20% of our bookings for new orders came out of data centers. So strong demand being pushed from that marketplace kind of within our business. And as we look forward, we're well positioned from a product perspective and a relationship perspective, to really support the kind of broad data center market. So we are actively involved in more traditional kind of airside cooling solutions but are also very, very actively engaged in liquid cooling applications kind of being driven by that identity AI application. So as we look forward, a lot of that capital investment we talk about a lot of the -- the kind of growth we talked about within the AAON Coil Products group out of Longview is actually going to materialize kind of in the midterm is going to materialize being primarily data center products. So we're making the investments kind of across the fleet to really support this marketplace as well as kind of the product development efforts to really be well positioned from a solutions perspective.

[Christopher Moore, analyst]

Got it. Very helpful. And just -- I think Gary kind of hit on this, but from just a general visibility standpoint, when you see where you are today versus this time last year, is significantly different or similar? And anything that has changed over the last 3 to 4 months that you're seeing now you might not have seen them.

[Matthew Tobolski, executive]

Yes, I was going to say just from a kind of what's changed over the last 3 to 4 months, I mean the market dynamics, we certainly had plenty of plenty of conversation on kind of macroeconomic indicators. And we've talked about in the last 3 to 4 months and really still see it today that a lot of the trends that some of the indicators are kind of putting out their really, the market is a little bit stronger and basically resilient against some of those indicators. So we continue seeing -- we don't see the slowdown that some of those indicators are kind of alluding to. We certainly see some softness in the marketplace -- but really kind of over the last 3 to 4 months compared to today, you're still seeing that kind of strength in the market. I would say, certainly, as we talk about the data center market, in particular, the we certainly 3 to 4 months ago and really this -- compared to this time last year, for sure, are seeing an acceleration of investment. I mean we definitely are seeing the amount of investment being made in that sector continuing to accelerate and really driving a lot of growth in the overall HVAC market as a whole, which, again, we're making the investments and ensuring that we have the products that really properly position us to be successful there. But I'd say no real major changes in the overall landscape in that last kind of 3- to 4-month time frame.

[Gary Fields, executive]

I'd like to add just one AHRI furnishes data to us indicating what the overall market is and then what our market share is. The overall market has continued to soften just a little bit, but our market share continues to increase. and this has been many quarters in a row.

[Christopher Moore, analyst]

That is terrific. Any specifics that you could add there or the...

[Gary Fields, executive]

I would say that they're in the midsized tonnages and larger for unit sizes. -- the 2 through 5, 10 units is preponderance of all rooftop units manufactured as far as number of units, and we have a small percentage in that. Once you get up in above 5x, but particularly 20 to 40 tons our market share becomes very, very substantial.

[Operator]

And your next question comes from the line of Julio Romera from Sidoti & Company.

[Julio Romero, analyst]

Hey, good afternoon, everyone. You mentioned you've already begun accepting orders for equipment that can use the new refrigerant as of January 1, I believe. Can you -- when do you expect to begin delivering those orders? And how much of the sales guidance is driven by that new equipment that uses the new refrigerant.

[Joseph Mondillo, executive]

Yes, from a kind of quantity of orders received, I mean we just kind of opened up the opportunity to place orders kind of at the beginning of January. So we have certainly started to see orders being placed with the new refrigerant. Those from a delivery perspective are going to be kind of more in the end of Q2 kind of time frame just from a component availability perspective. It's a little bit more extended lead time compared to 410A products, but those will start converting to shipments in that kind of Q2 time frame. Gary mentioned kind of in the main narrative there's certainly a lot of uncertainty around exactly how the adoption or kind of timing of adoption of the new refrigerant equipment is going to kind of come into play throughout the calendar year. I think though, again, to the point, we certainly see ourselves best positioned from an ability to deliver both the 410A and 454B products kind of within that, I'll say, noisy period of kind of middle of the year. And so while we do see potential for some noise to kind of be in that mid-year order trend driven by the changeover. we certainly have the product portfolio to support it, and we expect to see increasing sales conversion, obviously, as we progress through the year. but definitely kind of in the latter half of the year, expect to see a substantial contribution from new refrigerant equipment orders.

[Gary Fields, executive]

I want to add just a little to that. Our extremely close relationship with our sales channel allows us a lot better view of what the customer is looking to do with regards to this refrigerant change. And so I feel like that we can pivot and respond very, very quickly and have the appropriate inventory of these components ready to go as a result of that.

[Julio Romero, analyst]

Okay. Understood. So deliveries begin in 2Q, the guide is kind of expecting some delayed replacement happening in the back half, but maybe orders accelerating, but that would benefit $25 million from a delivery standpoint.

[Joseph Mondillo, executive]

Yes. I mean certainly, '25 is that kind of lead up in the second half. But to your point, we do expect to see kind of that velocity really accelerating in the second half of the year from orders and really conversion to sales as well.

[Julio Romero, analyst]

Okay. Got it. That's helpful. And then Matt, you talked about the capital investment into Longview and Redmond that should be finished by 4Q and 3Q of this year. Any way to help us kind of conceptualize how much increased capacity results from those investments? .

[Matthew Tobolski, executive]

That's a great question, Julio. And I'll say it's a very product mix dependent answer to that. But the investments that are being made are being made with the ability to to really capitalize on the large volume growth within data center sales. And so I would just leave it at with the product mix potential. In other words, kind of low variability, high-volume data center solutions. There is a substantial upside potential kind of relative to the investment cost or relative to the capacity increase from a square footage perspective kind of given that product mix potential.

[Operator]

And your next question comes from the line of Brent Thielman from D.A. Davidson.

[Brent Thielman, analyst]

Great. Gary or Matt, can you just update us on the pricing strategy. I think you were out with 1% increases a month maybe where you're at to date and where you plan to go going forward?

[Gary Fields, executive]

Sure. I'll take that one real quick. So we began those -- let's see, I think it was October, October, November, December, January, February, yes. We began those October 1, and we continued through February 1. And at this point in time, we don't have any direct intent of continuing. Now we reserve the right to change our minds should something change in the world. But as we see it right now, we've secured the gross margin targets that we intend to maintain. And while our gross margin might very little because of volume and absorption of fixed cost, it's not -- we're not having any problems with labor or material costs beyond what we had already estimated recovering with those 5 centers. So at this point in time, I think we're good to go for a while.

[Brent Thielman, analyst]

Okay. Gary, any rough sense of where that kind of bridges relative to the industry from a pricing perspective? I know you talked about that in the past, but where does that sit today from where you can see?

[Gary Fields, executive]

I don't have anything different than what I've been saying that we used to be around 15%. And as a result of the 2020 energy standard, where everybody had to come up closer to us or we were still above that standard, but they had to come up very close to us, and there was cost associated with that. So that narrowed the gap to somewhere around 8% to 10%, probably closer to $10 million. Now we'll have some empirical evidence of that here very, very soon because a lot of school districts will position their bid documents such that they'll say, basis of design base bid is AAON give us an add or deduct for these other manufacturers. And that's 1 of the primary places that we pick up really empirical data on that. We get some other more subjective data from our reps. They'll say, well, we got this job and the best that anybody could align with us was x and this looks like what our premium was. But oftentimes, the bill of materials doesn't not real well. So like I say, it's a bit subjective. But we're still thinking we're around 8% to 10%.

Now with the conversion to 54 or, call it, the new refrigerant because Daikin use an R32 is my understanding. There are some manufacturers that have been very open about the fact that they're going to have to charge more money for that. We've been equally open about it that we don't see that in our materials cost or development costs or anything like that. So at this point in time, we don't have any change in price to go from 410 to 454. So if these other manufacturers have additional cost to do that, that could narrow this gap just a bit more.

[Brent Thielman, analyst]

Okay. And so the mid-single-digit price expectation for this year is reflective of what you've done to date, maybe there's upside if you decide to resume. Got it. Okay.

And then back on basics, I mean, data centers looks like it's growing very nicely. It looks like the clean room systems a little slower, just kind of parsing through the different product lines. Is that a function of you allocating more resources to the data center market right now, just given how strong it is? Is it just timing? And I guess is there any line of sight with the chipset to see that part of the business to accelerate?

[Joseph Mondillo, executive]

Yes. We certainly saw the kind of semiconductor clean room market kind of conversion of the kind of new facility construction be slower than kind of was originally expected. So we've definitely seen that investment be a little bit slower out of the gate. But certainly, on the data center side, One of the advantages of data centers kind of ability to grow from a revenue perspective is the kind of single design high repetition that allows us to really scale that production up faster. And so we're really able to kind of optimize manufacturing processes and really drive efficiency and productivity kind of with that product type. So kind of that has really helped kind of -- the combination of those 2 factors has really helped kind of the data center market really outpaced the cleanroom market within the basic segment from a growth perspective.

[Brent Thielman, analyst]

Got it. And then just the last one. The Coil Products division or Longview. I think you've had maybe some inefficiencies there just as you're sort of implementing basics obviously, you've got a huge expansion you're working on. I'm sure that's created a few things to work through. What's embedded in this outlook for this year just in terms of that division?

[Joseph Mondillo, executive]

Yes. With in, I mean, just from a very valid point from a standpoint of there's a lot of stuff going on down within the Longview facility itself. As we look at kind of converting a lot of these investment efforts, they're definitely not a flip a switch. And so as we look at bringing online the new facility expansion and moving some more basic production lines down to that facility. That really from a 2024 perspective is not going to materialize huge impacts on the numbers. that investment and that real growth is going to really materialize in 2025 revenue and sales. And so really, the 2024 outlook or at least the kind of expectation on a long view is growth, but definitely not the dynamic growth we expect, but a lot of that capacity comes online and we can really start bringing some more production capacity in the data center market and meaningfully impact the results there. .

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] there are no further questions at this time. Mr. Mondillo, please proceed.

[Joseph Mondillo, executive]

All right. Thank you, everyone, for joining on today's call. If anyone has any questions over the coming days and weeks, please feel free to reach out to myself. Have a great rest of the day, and we look forward to speaking with you in the future. Thank you. .

[Operator]

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that does conclude our conference for today. Thank you all for participating. You may all disconnect.