Commercial Vehicle Group Inc

NASDAQ:CVGI

Earnings Call Transcript 2024-Q2

[Operator]

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the CVG Q2 2024 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] . I would now like to turn the conference over to Andy Cheung, CFO. Please go ahead.

[Andy Cheung, executive]

Thank you, operator, and welcome, everyone, to our conference call. Joining me on the call today is James Ray, President and CEO of CVG. This morning, we will provide a brief company update as well as commentary regarding our second quarter 2024 results. After which, we will open the call for questions. As a reminder, this conference call is being webcast in the Q2 2024 earnings call presentation, which we will refer to during this call is available on our website. Both may contain forward-looking statements, including, but not limited to, expectations for future periods regarding market trends, cost-saving initiatives and new product initiatives, among others. Actual results may differ from anticipated results because of certain risks and uncertainties. These risks and uncertainties may include, but are not limited to, economic conditions in the markets in which CVG operates, fluctuations in the product volumes of vehicles for which CVG is a supplier, financial covenant compliance and liquidity, associated with conducting business in foreign countries and currencies and other risks as detailed in our SEC filings. I will now turn the call over to James to provide a company update.

[James Ray, executive]

Thank you, Andy. I'd like to turn your attention to the supplemental earnings presentation, starting on Slide 3. Our second quarter results fell short of expectations with year-over-year declines in revenue and profitability, as multiple factors, both internal and external, impacted our performance. Specific to our Electrical Systems segment, construction and agriculture markets, a key driver of growth for that segment have continued to soften. This is a continuation of the market weakness we experienced in the first quarter of this year as higher interest rates and lower agricultural commodity prices continue to weigh on the majority of our key customers in this segment. Business margins continue to have FX headwinds and unrecovered economics from several major customers. Additionally, we have also experienced operational inefficiencies within our Vehicle Solutions segment as we have incurred disruptions during the execution of a significant product launch with a large customer across multiple sites, coupled with activities to optimize our cab structures facility in Kings Mountain, North Carolina as we progress through the sale process. I'll dive deeper into the actions we're taking to strengthen our Vehicle Solutions segment shortly. Despite the challenges we experienced in the second quarter, we took multiple corrective actions to stabilize the losses and position CVG for future success and advanced several key strategic initiatives. First, we executed an agreement for the profitable sale of our cab structures business in Kings Mountain, North Carolina. This transaction will serve to streamline and focus our product portfolio. I will cover this in more detail in a moment. We also made progress on our ongoing cost reduction and business optimization efforts. Year-to-date, we have deployed almost $7 million in restructuring expenses to optimize our cost structure, and we are reducing our headcount by more than 10%. We also continued to drive new business wins in the quarter with approximately $32 million in awards. This brings our year-to-date total to approximately $80 million across all segments. We are updating our 2024 guidance, which we will cover later in the presentation. Turning to Slide 4. I will highlight the recently announced agreement to sell our cab structures business in King's Mount, North Carolina. The sale of cab structures is strategic in nature and marks another milestone in our mission to evolve our business towards the higher-growth products and markets, in line with our ongoing strategic transformation plan while simultaneously generating shareholder value. Of note, the sale price of $40 million will help further our debt paydown. In line with our long-term strategy, the sale of cash structures reduces our exposure to the cyclical Class 8 market. Lowers our customer concentration, removes complexity from our business and improves our overall return profile. We will continue to take the best actions to position CVG for future success. Now moving to Slide 5. I'd like to highlight our key focus areas for 2024. As I mentioned previously, we are highly focused on proactively continuing to lower our cost structure and improving our operational execution as we navigate a lower demand environment. Our priorities for the remainder of this year are to enhance our electrical systems operational efficiency and cost profile, complete the strategic evaluation of our Industrial Automation segment and strengthen our Vehicle Solutions segment, closing on the sale of our cab structures business and by stabilizing and improving operational execution. As it relates to Electrical Systems, we are actively executing a restructuring program as our key end markets, particularly construction and agriculture continue to soften. We have also experienced delayed and slower customer ramp volumes of new business originally scheduled for production launch in 2024. This includes actions such as further reducing headcount and optimizing plant capacity utilization to stabilize margins and rightsize our plant production to match current demand conditions. Our 2 new low-cost manufacturing sites in Adama, Mexico and Tangier Morocco provide options to lower our costs in electrical systems. Also, I would like to highlight our efforts within our aftermarket segment. While we have been facing lower customer demand in recent quarters, we are working to refine our production processes to improve our seat delivery performance and reduce lead times to customers. These efforts should help CVG's wallet share with customers as our aftermarket segment remains a key focus area for the company. Finally, within Vehicle Solutions, we are focused on executing a smooth transition of our cash structures business and making required improvements as we prepare to finalize the transaction. We have increased oversight and resources to stabilize the vehicle solutions business and offset inefficiencies resulting from program launches, supply chain issues and unexpected volume changes. To help address the issues in our Vehicle Solutions segment, our team is deploying multiple internal and external support teams to the affected facilities. While this was a significant expense in the quarter, we expect these actions to provide greater stability for the balance of this year as we appropriately position our cost structure for a market rebound in 2025 and beyond. Now moving to Slide 6, I'd like to briefly highlight the Navistar Supplier Excellence Award, which CVG received in June of this year. Annually, Navistar recognizes 4 of its top-performing suppliers based on quality, delivery, cost and continuous improvement. Navistar is a key CVG customer, and we are delighted to receive the award and will continue to strive to retain this achievement. As a focal point of our customer value proposition, our focus remains on delivering operational excellence and growing together with our business partners and customers. Our team's passion for cultivating strong customer relationships creates an ongoing dividend that is reflected in our new program wins. With that, I'd like to turn the call back to Andy for a more detailed review of our financial results.

[Andy Cheung, executive]

Thank you, James, and good morning, everyone. If you are following along in the presentation, please turn to Slide 7. Consolidated first quarter 2024 revenue was $230 million as compared to $262 million in the prior year period. The decrease in revenues is due primarily to a softening in customer demand impacting all segments and the anticipated wind down of certain programs in our Vehicle Solutions segment. Adjusted EBITDA was $10 million for the second quarter compared to $20.8 million in the prior year. Adjusted EBITDA margins were 4.3%, down 360 basis points as compared to adjusted EBITDA margin of 7.9% in the second quarter of 2023, driven primarily by lower volumes, inflationary impacts and the operational inefficiencies we experienced in vehicle solutions. Interest expense was $2.5 million as compared to $2.8 million in the second quarter of 2023. The decrease in interest expense was primarily related to lower average debt balances, offset by higher interest rates on variable rate debt during the respective periods. Net loss for the quarter was $1.6 million or $0.05 per diluted share as compared to a net loss income of $10.1 million or $0.30 per diluted share in the prior year. Adjusted net income for the quarter was $2.1 million or $0.06 per diluted share as compared to $10.7 million or $0.32 per diluted share in the prior year. Moving to the segment results beginning on Slide 8. Our Electrical Systems segment achieved revenues of $50.2 million, a decrease of 21.2% as compared to the year ago quarter. with the decrease resulting primarily from lower customer demand and the phaseout of lower-margin business that commenced in the second quarter. We maintain our goal of making electrical systems our largest segment and still hold our view of this segment as our area of focused growth. Commentary from OEMs in the end markets we sell into primarily construction and agriculture has remained sour as the construction and agriculture markets continue to forecast a steep decline globally for the full year. Still, we continue to achieve new business wins, putting the company in a position to capitalize when end market demand within construction and agriculture markets demand. Adjusted operating income was $1.9 million, a decrease of $5.8 million compared to the second quarter of 2023. Operating income was negatively impacted by lower customer demand, restructuring costs, labor inflation and unfavorable foreign exchange impacts. Turning to Slide 9. Our Vehicle Solutions segment second quarter revenues decreased 8% to $140.9 million compared to the year ago quarter, due primarily to lower customer demand and the wind down of certain programs within the segment. In addition, we experienced elevated program launch costs for significant new product with a major customer that impacted multiple sites. We also saw full-purchallenges in our cab structures business, increased freight costs, negative foreign exchange impacts and labor inflation. As a result of these factors, adjusted operating income for the second quarter was $8.3 million, a decrease of $6.2 million compared to the prior year period. As James mentioned earlier, we have reached an agreement for the sale of our cab structure business, although preparing for the sale resulted in additional expense in the second quarter. We also expect the consolidation of our Chile coffee facility to be completed in the third quarter of this year. We continue to view vehicle solutions as a core business, and it remains a focus for our team as we continue to reduce cost, drive further operational improvements and win new business at higher margins to strengthen our profile. Moving to Slide 10. Our aftermarket and accessory segment revenues in the second quarter decreased 8.1% to $33.9 million compared to the year ago quarter, primarily resulting from decreased sales volume on lower customer demand and the drawdown of backlog in the prior year period. Adjusted operating income for the second quarter was $4.7 million, a decrease of $0.8 million compared to the prior year period. The decrease is primarily attributable to lower sales volumes, product mix and higher labor and benefit costs. On a sequential basis, results in this segment increased in terms of adjusted operating income for the second quarter in a row as we continue to apply our restructuring efforts in this business. Turning to Slide 11. Our Industrial Automation segment produced second quarter revenues of $5 million, a decrease of 45% as compared to $9 million in the second quarter of 2023 due to lower sales volume resulting from reduced customer demand. Adjusted operating income was a loss of $0.9 million compared to a loss of $1.7 million in the prior year period. We are in the middle of due diligence process of evaluating strategic alternatives with multiple interested parties. As James already mentioned, we see this process culminating in the second half of 2024. We are quickly acting to balance our sales through restructuring and headcount reduction efforts to improve our profitability in the face of end markets and operational challenges. To date, we have invested $6.8 million in restructuring expenses and have a 10% lower headcount, coinciding with our progress in the strategic evaluation of our Industrial Automation segment. Full taking these efforts, we aim to become a more efficient, agile and profitable company. On Slide 12, we have highlighted CVG's key end markets as well as commentary related to the Class 8 heavy truck and construction and agriculture sectors, which when combined, represent almost 2/3 of our company's revenues. Excluding our cab structures in Industrial Automation businesses, our end market exposures are ordered with increased exposure to the construction and agriculture markets and increased exposure to the Class 8 markets. Despite the near-term market dynamics, we believe that this exposure focuses on the point of our transformation strategy, which is to strengthen our core vehicle solutions business, while focusing on the high-growth electrical system business. Shifting now to our key market outlook. As it relates to ACT's Class 8 heavy truck build forecast, 2024 estimates have remained relatively unchanged, with Class 8 truck orders estimated to be down 9%. We continue to expect modestly lower second half production for Class 8 trucks in line with ACT projections and expect an acceleration of growth in 2025 and 2026 as the industry is preparing for a substantial 2027 emission regulations. On a 6-month sequential basis, ACT is projecting double-digit percentage point growth in classic bills each half year from second half 2024 to second half 2025. Then as it relates to construction and agriculture markets, our electrical systems business suffer from further deterioration as the majority of our key customers in the space have seen declines ranging from 15% to 20% compared to last year. As a result, the new business that we have won is ramping slower with the majority of new programs delayed or running at a lower volume. Despite this weakness, we remain focused on pursuing new business and calibrating our current footprint to current conditions. Turning to Slide 13. I'll share several thoughts on our updated outlook for 2024. Accounting for recent CVG developments and current market conditions, we are adjusting our quantitative annual guidance at the revenue and adjusted EBITDA level. Industry forecasts are still projecting a decline in North America Class 8 truck builds by approximately 9%, better than the prior projection of a 16% decline. This positive revision is still offset by a weakening in our construction and agriculture end markets, which is consistent with the commentary we've seen from large OEMs in those industries. Given the confluence of end market demand pressures, we are adjusting our guidance range to $900 million to $960 million in full year 2024 revenues. We are also providing an adjusted guidance scenario in which we exclude contributions from our cab structure business and the potential industrial automation transaction, a scenario in which we expect a range of $730 million to $780 million in full year 2024 revenues. We believe these strategic actions will position us to benefit as our end markets rebound and streamlined our organization. Given the previously mentioned truck build and construction and agriculture market outlook, combined with execution challenges, we have also ordered our adjusted EBITDA guidance expectations to the range of $42 million to $52 million for 2024. Our adjusted EBITDA guidance range is $28 million to $36 million, assuming both transactions are finalized. We believe that the alignment of our organization and our internal efforts we have taken to reduce cost and increase efficiencies going forward will allow us to achieve our revenue and adjusted EBITDA goals. This financial position will also allow us to manage our debt levels. We still maintain our goal of improving profitability through restructuring efforts to cut costs and heightened efficiency while making other strategic decisions to streamline our organization and rightsize our businesses. We anticipate all of these actions stir working capital improvements and increased free cash flow as we continue to execute our strategy. That concludes my financial overview and outlook commentary. I will now turn the call back over to James for some additional thoughts on the expected benefits of the key actions we are taking in 2024.

[James Ray, executive]

Thank you, Andy. Turning to Slide 14. I'll reiterate our short-term plan to simultaneously generate our end market demand declines and improve our operating model. Within vehicle solutions, we're counteracting headwinds associated with the key customer product launch and operational inefficiencies that impacted multiple sites through several dedicated actions. These include the consolidation of our Chile coffee facility, which we expect to complete in Q3 of this year, the sale of our cab structures business and deploying both internal and external teams to improve productivity going forward. These efforts should result in the streamlined vehicle solutions business with increased operating leverage moving forward. Within Electrical Systems, the significant dislocation and construction and agriculture end markets, and corresponding slower ramp of new business wins is being offset by our efforts to reduce headcount, rightsize production and allocate utilization to our lower-cost facilities. These efforts should result in a new operating model that positions CVG as a beneficiary once these end markets recover with improved economics as our new business wins ramp up with a lower cost structure than they would have had previously. Within aftermarket, as we mentioned earlier, we remain diligent in our actions to take steps that optimize our internal processes, including seat delivery performance and reduced lead times. Taking these productive actions ahead of an improved customer demand environment should prove to be fruitful, similar to actions taken across the company. Our collective efforts are poised to effectively transform our business through our strategic refocusing of our efforts toward our core vehicle business and our high-growth segment electrical systems. We look forward to reshaping CVG to be a more profitable industry leader and a partner of choice for our customers. With that, I will now turn the call back over to the operator to open up the line for questions. Operator?

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions]. Your first question comes from John Franzreb with Sidoti.

[John Franzreb, analyst]

I'd actually like to start with the delays and deferred revenue that you're experiencing. Can you kind of put that in context? And when would you expect that to catch up?

[James Ray, executive]

Yes, John, this is James. Thanks for the question. Thanks for calling in. Several customers that we both do business with modify their start production days as well as their ramp schedules. As you may have noticed with several of the EV OEMs, they have significant delayed ramp-up schedules, some of the major nonelectrical vehicle OEMs that have electrical vehicle platforms as well as electric vehicle OEMs in both light-duty, medium-duty, heavy-duty truck markets and other delivery van in markets like that. So we don't know for sure when they will get to the original volume that they had telegraphed when we won the business. But we expect as markets recover, that their ramp schedules will go up. But they don't give us any indication exactly what volumes will hit in what time period post when we are awarded the business. They expect us to have capacity in place and be able to respond to the awarded quoted volume that we won the business at. So we make adjustments when their volumes don't materialize or when they're delayed or slowed with our cost structure, but we still have to be ready whenever they ramp up to a point where they're closer to the awarded volumes.

[John Franzreb, analyst]

Okay. And then a similar vein, you mentioned that there's program wind downs. How much in revenue was hurt by that process? And is that process completed? And if not, when will it be?

[James Ray, executive]

Yes. So each year, when we win new business, some of it is replacing business that's ending. And also we have programs that we have exited contracts with because it's a different configuration or we didn't win the replacement business or it was a nonprofitable revenue stream for us. So we intentionally allow that program to end without continuing our work with our customers and OEMs to make sure that we have alignment on a reasonable and consistent exit strategy there in it. We might be able to share a little more from Andy's perspective on quantifying the impact on that.

[Andy Cheung, executive]

Yes. So John, it's Andy. So the one that I think you are asking about is what we noted in our electrical system segment this quarter as we indeed have one program related to passenger vehicles in Europe that back a year ago, when we remember, we have a lot of price negotiations with our customers. And when we discussed that when we saw business that's not profitable, we will walk away from them. So as you know, that the passenger vehicles tend to have lower profitability. And that's one program that we exited in Europe. It's not so big in terms of the overall company's revenue is the low single digit million dollars. But nevertheless, that's something that we committed to not to maintain an unprofitable business.

[John Franzreb, analyst]

And I got to say, guys, that slide about the bridge to the new guidelance and the old guidelance, it was very helpful. And I'm kind of curious about 2 things that -- on that slide. One, when you're talking about in the slide before, can you talk about the softening in the ag and the construction markets of 10% and 15%, are you signaling to us that you expect your business to be down in lockstep with global market declines? Or will you be different from that because the new program wins?

[Andy Cheung, executive]

John, I would say, overall, our legacy business will tend to follow our OEM schedules. So we saw them talking about 15% to 20% declines in different subsegments of the overall construction and agriculture markets. We clearly have some offset with new programs. And as you can see our end market exposures in electrical systems, we have the majority of our exposure to the construction and agriculture market, but we also started to have medium-duty trucks and other end markets as well. So those would be a little bit of an offset to the current dynamics.

[John Franzreb, analyst]

Okay. I was just trying to get a sense of that. And I don't want to hog this, but just -- I mean, I am curious about how this changes your CapEx budget for the full year and what you're looking to spend for 2024?

[Andy Cheung, executive]

Yes. So as we look towards the next couple of quarters as the company will remain a business portfolio with on the cab business and industrial automation. Our PoS forecast of 2% to 3% CapEx of revenues will apply. So meaning that as the revenues come down, we'll also see CapEx coming down in a similar fashion.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions]. We do not have any questions at this time. I will turn the call back over to Mr. James Ray for closing comments.

[James Ray, executive]

Thank you, operator, and I would like to thank you all for joining today's call. I want to thank the entire CVG team for their hard work and continued focus on executing our long-term growth strategy. We are working aggressively to position CVG as a more durable business. We look forward to executing our transformation strategy, and we are confident we can improve our operating model and sustain a profitable business in the future. Thank you very much.

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes your conference call for today. We thank you for participating and ask that you please disconnect your lines.