AeroVironment Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Quartr
Provided by Quartr
September 5, 2023

There are 3 speakers on the call.

Operator

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the AeroVironment Fiscal Year 20 24 First Quarter Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen only mode. After the speakers' presentation, there will be a question and answer Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Jonah Teeter Valen.

Operator

Please go ahead.

Speaker 1

Thanks and good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to AeroVironment's fiscal year 2024 Q1 earnings call. This is Jonette Heter Balen, Senior Director of Corporate Development and Investor Relations. Before we begin, please note that certain information presented on this call contains forward looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements involve many risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from our expectations.

Speaker 1

Further information on these risks and uncertainties contained in the company's 10 ks and other filings with the SEC, in particular in the risk factors and forward looking statement portions of such filings. Copies are available from the SEC on the AeroVironment website at www.avinc.com or from our Investor Relations team. This afternoon, we also filed a slide presentation with our earnings release and posted the presentation to the Investors section of our website under Events and presentations. The content of this conference call contains time sensitive information that is accurate only as of today, September 5, 2023. The company undertakes no obligation to make any revision to any forward looking statements contained in our remarks today or to update them to reflect the events or circumstances occurring after this conference call.

Speaker 1

Joining me today from AeroVironment are Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Wahid Nawabi and Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Kevin McDonnell. We will now begin with remarks from Wahid Nawabi. Wahid?

Speaker 1

Thank you, Jonah. Welcome everyone to our fiscal year 2024 Q1 earnings conference I'll start by summarizing our performance and recent achievements, after which Kevin will review our financial results in greater detail. I will then provide information related to the outlook for fiscal year 2024, after which Kevin, Jonah and I will take your I'm pleased to report that we are off to a very strong First, Q1 revenue rose to $152,000,000 a 40% increase year over year and our best This reflects robust demand for our market leading intelligent unmanned systems domestically and abroad. 2nd, our funded backlog rose to a new record at $540,000,000 up from $424,000,000 at the start of fiscal year 2024. This backlog reflects 2 $68,000,000 of new bookings during the Q1.

Speaker 1

3rd, we recently announced that AV will purchase privately held Tomahawk Robotics, enabling multi domain control of a wide variety of unmanned solutions from 1 user interface. And 4th, We're raising our previously issued guidance for fiscal year 2024, which I will cover later in more detail. Gross margin for the Q1 was $65,700,000 an increase of 95% versus last fiscal year's $33,700,000 And our gross margin as a percentage of sales rose to 43% from 31% in fiscal year 2023. We continue to expect gross margins to remain strong in fiscal year 2024 as our revenue mix shifts to more favorable product sales. Overall, fiscal year 2024 is off to a great start and we're squarely on track to meet our increased outlook for the full year.

Speaker 1

Global trends continue to support broader long term adoption of our solutions and we aim to take the company to new levels in both Scale and performance this year and beyond. In line with our strategy, we recently agreed to acquire Tomahawk Robotics for $120,000,000 a leader in AI enabled robotic common control systems and open standard communication technologies. We believe this transaction will enable AB to provide a deeper, broader and simpler integration between our own and other unmanned solutions, making it easier for our customers to enabling our users to achieve their missions with greater efficiency and simplicity. Tomahawk's Kinesis ecosystem provides unmatched tactical capabilities utilizing an AI enhanced open architecture control system that operating that seamlessly integrates Any unmanned asset providing a common operating picture for the operator. We expect Kinesis to enable AV's products to achieve an elevated modular open systems approach, which is in high demand by customers across the globe.

Speaker 1

In addition, combining features of AV's Chrysalis operating system with the Kinesis platform means pairing the best common controller technology with the most ubiquitous unmanned systems on the market today. AB and Tomahawk have been working together over the past Few years integrating Tomahawk's Kinesis control system with AD's small unmanned aircraft family of systems including Raven B and Puma 3AE. Through our partnership, we have gained firsthand knowledge of the solutions that Tomahawk offers and we're confident that the combined experience and expertise of our 2 teams will result in a variety of unmatched, unmanned expeditionary vehicles that meet our customers' emerging needs and exacting standards. Once the transaction closes, which we expect to occur later this quarter, Tomahawk will operate as an additional Product line reporting into our Unmanned Systems segment led by Senior Vice President and General Manager, Trey Stevenson. We expect this transaction to drive incremental revenues, adjacent market growth opportunities and product performance synergies driven by the integration of our respective technologies.

Speaker 1

All of this should drive increased shareholder value. We will provide updated guidance during our Q2 earnings call reflecting the impact of this transaction to our anticipated fiscal year 2024 performance. Before turning to the product lines results, I want to remind everyone that we're consolidating our businesses into 3 reporting segments Starting with our Unmanned Systems segment, revenue grew 45% year over year to a record $98,200,000 Shipments during the quarter were driven by strong demand across a broad range of products, particularly our Puma systems, which are urgently needed overseas. We continue to deliver Puma LE and Puma 3AE systems through last year's large Ukraine foreign military sales order, but are nearly through the $176,000,000 ceiling value with a portion to be delivered in the Q2. Looking ahead, our backlog remains robust.

Speaker 1

Moving to our Jump 20 system. We recently secured a $42,000,000 contract from the U. S. Army for the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative or USAAI. Jump 20 will be the 1st Group 3 UAS platform provided by the U.

Speaker 1

S. Department of Defense to Ukraine. This is also the largest aircraft platform that the U. S. DoD has provided to Ukraine so far.

Speaker 1

We plan to ship these systems during our Q2 of this fiscal year. We remain confident that our Jump 20 is the most We also recently finalized a 10 year tactical assistance agreement with Mexico for our Jump 20 systems, allowing Abe to continue providing UAS support and training to the government of Mexico's armed forces through the foreseeable future. The Mexican Armed Forces continue to rely upon Jump 20 as the only Group 3 UAS platform in their operations. With an unmanned ground vehicles or UGV, we recently achieved received an order from the Danish Ministry of Defense for 21 ground robot systems, a mix of Telemaque and Teodor products, which are the first for that nation. We've also delivered the initial batch 5 UGV systems to the Netherlands under a prior 30 robot contract.

Speaker 1

At the same time, we continue to mark progress providing UGV's to Ukraine on an accelerated schedule, which are performing the life saving EUD missions in the field. Given our growing backlog across the entire unmanned systems segment, we're confident we're on track for another great year. Moving to our Lloyd and Munitions segment, I'm pleased to say that growth continues with sales up 34% year over This reflects Switchblade shipments to an expanding number of Allied countries across the globe. Recent demand for Switchblade 30600 systems has been largely driven through the latest U. S.

Speaker 1

AI and the U. S. Government. The U. S.

Speaker 1

Army recently awarded us another contract for Switchblade 600 milligram munitions in support of the USAI. At the same time, we anticipate the U. S. Government will continue to backfill and increase depleted BOE stockpiles. Additionally, we are responding to a request for information or RFI related to the U.

Speaker 1

S. Marine Corps' Organic Precision Fire or OPF program. Overall, we anticipate both U. S. And international demand for our loyalty munition systems to remain strong through the rest of fiscal year 2024.

Speaker 1

It is also important to mention that the last batch of our Switch Switchblade 300 Block 20 features significantly more endurance, a tablet based fire control system and other enhanced performance capabilities. Switchblade 300 Block 20 has successfully completed the U. S. Army's safety confirmation certification and is now being delivered to customers. Moving to our MacreadyWorks segment.

Speaker 1

I'm pleased to report that segment revenues also grew 31% year over year to 23 point We're also making solid progress in our stratospheric solar HAPS program. We successfully completed further flight tests using a smaller scale version of the new Sunglider aircraft. These tests allow our team to collect and analyze large amounts of data, which could not otherwise be obtained from computer based simulations. We will now apply these learnings to our next generation call over to Kevin McDonald for a review of the Q1 financials. Kevin?

Speaker 1

Thank you, Wahid. Today, I will be reviewing the highlights of our Q1 performance, during which I will occasionally refer to both our press release and earnings presentation available on the website. Also there is an 8 ks available on our website, which to recap our historical results into the new segments. Overall, we started the Q1 extremely strong in terms of backlog revenue, adjusted gross margins Adjusted EBITDA. As Wahid mentioned in his remarks, revenue for the Q1 of fiscal 2024 was $152,300,000 an increase of 40% as compared to the $108,500,000 from the Q1 of fiscal 2023.

Speaker 1

Slide 5 of the earnings presentation The breakdown of revenue by segment for the quarter. Our largest segment during the quarter was unmanned systems or UMS, which is a combination of our small UAF, medium UAF and UGV Businesses, with revenue of $98,200,000 an increase of 45% from last year's $67,800,000 driven primarily by our small UAS business unit, which hit systems to 8 international countries during the quarter. Systems or LMS recorded revenue of $30,900,000 a 34% increase compared to the $23,000,000 last year during Q1. LMS demand continues to be driven by strong U. S.

Speaker 1

And international orders. Revenue from our CreditWorks segment came in at 23 $2,000,000 an increase of 31% compared to the $17,700,000 from the Q1 of last fiscal year. We continue to see strong demand from Services within the various agencies of the U. S. DoD and U.

Speaker 1

S. Government, in particular increasing demand for incorporation of our computer vision, autonomy and AI capabilities. In slide 5 of the earnings presentation, there's a breakdown between product and service revenue. Specifically during the Q1, product revenues accounted for 78% of total revenues, a notable increase from 53% in the corresponding quarter of the previous year due to strong product revenues from our For the remainder of fiscal 2024, we expect product sales to remain above 70% of total revenue, but expect LMS sales to increase as a percentage of product sales, which will have the impact of lowering overall product gross margins. Now turning to gross margins.

Speaker 1

Slide 6 of the earnings presentation shows the trend of adjusted product and service gross margins, while slide 12 reconciles the GAAP gross margins to adjusted Gross margins, which excludes intangible amortization and other non cash purchase accounting items. In the first quarter, Consolidated GAAP gross margins finished at 43%, up compared to 31% in the previous year. The improvement in GAAP gross margins was largely a result of improved product service mix and strong product gross margin. In addition, gross margins were favorably impacted by a decrease of $4,000,000 of depreciation on COCO ISR assets. Adjusted gross margins for the Q1 were 45% compared to 34% in the Q1 of last year.

Speaker 1

The improvement in adjusted gross margins was also driven by the improved service mix and strong product gross margins. Adjusted product gross margin for the quarter were 49% versus 44% in the Q1 of fiscal last fiscal year, again due to a higher mix of revenue from our small UAS products during the quarter. In terms of adjusted gross service gross margins, the Q1 was at 28% versus 22% during the same quarter last year, again due to the closure of the MUAS Coco operation site. We expect adjusted gross margin In terms of adjusted EBITDA, slide 13 of our earnings presentation shows the reconciliation of GAAP Net income to adjusted EBITDA. In the Q1 of fiscal 2024, adjusted EBITDA was $37,000,000 representing an increase of $24,000,000 or 54%.

Speaker 1

The main factors contributing to this increase were higher sales volume and favorable sales mix, which was partially offset by SG and A expense excluding intangible amortization And acquisition related expenses for the quarter was $23,000,000 or 15% of revenue compared to the Q1 of fiscal 2023 of $18,000,000 or 16 percent of revenue. While R and D expense increased modestly year over year in dollar terms, R and D expense as a percentage of revenue was 10% versus 14% in the corresponding quarter of last year. R R and D will run closer to 12% for the full year as we continue to invest in new products and upgrade to existing products to meet the evolving needs of our customers. Now turning to GAAP earnings. In the Q1, the company generated a net income of $21,900,000 versus a net loss of $8,400,000 recorded in the same period last year.

Speaker 1

The increase in net income of $30,300,000 can be attributed to several factors, namely $31,900,000 increase in gross margin driven by a rise in sales volume and improvement of revenue mix, a $3,400,000 decrease to intangible amortization and a $1,300,000 decrease in taxes. This was partially offset by a 1 $900,000 increase in SG and A expenses, a $400,000 increase in R and D spending and a $200,000 increase in unrealized loss equity related investments. Slide 10 shows the reconciliation of GAAP and adjusted or non GAAP diluted EPS. The company posted earnings per diluted share of $1 for the Q1 of fiscal 2024 versus $0.08 per diluted share loss for the Q1 of fiscal 2023. Turning to the balance sheet.

Speaker 1

Total cash and investments at the end of the quarter was $128,400,000 which is a decrease of $28,000,000 from the Q4 of fiscal 2023. During the quarter, we reduced Our long term debt by $5,000,000 to $130,000,000 Inventory increased $37,000,000 during the quarter of fiscal 20 Inventories will remain at these levels as we prepare for shipments in the coming quarters and carry extra inventory as a result of supply chain risk minimization. With that Said, inventory as a percentage of backlog are in line with recent historical averages and down from COVID period averages. We continue to have a strong balance sheet with over $100,000,000 of cash and investments and approximately $100,000,000 available under our working capital I'd like to conclude with some highlights of our backlog metrics. Slide 8 of the earnings presentation provides a summary of current fiscal 2024 visibility.

Speaker 1

As Wahid mentioned, our funded backlog at the end of the Q1 of fiscal 2024 was a record $540,000,000 an increase of 27% from the prior quarter. Visibility to the midpoint of our revised FR24 revenue guidance range is over 100%. With our record setting revenue and backlog, we are positioned well for another record setting growth year in fiscal 2024. Now I'd like to turn things back to Wahid. Thanks, Kevin.

Speaker 1

With a record backlog of orders and after a very Strong first quarter. We're increasing our guidance for fiscal year 2024 as follows. We anticipate revenue of between $645,000,000 $675,000,000 We anticipate non GAAP adjusted EBITDA of between $117,000,000 and $127,000,000 representing about 18% of revenue. Net income guidance remains unchanged at 51,000,000 to $59,000,000 or $1.91 to $2.21 per diluted share. This is primarily due to increased In support of our strong growth.

Speaker 1

Non GAAP earnings guidance also remains unchanged between $2.30 and $2.60 per diluted share. We expect R and D expense to be closer to 12% of revenue this fiscal year. As a reminder, we expect a more balanced revenue distribution with roughly 50% of new revenues expected to occur in each half of this fiscal year. We now have nearly 100% visibility to the midpoint of our revised revenue guidance. While we are confident in our ability to achieve our guidance, there are also numerous factors at play.

Speaker 1

This includes working with suppliers to scale their businesses to match our needs as well as securing long lead items. We remain well positioned to deliver nearly 20% growth in revenue, higher margins and overall improved bottom line results. The investments we're making this year should also position the company for continued growth in years to come. While the overall geopolitical environment as well as battlefield trends Towards significant greater use of unmanned platforms support our confidence in the future, we're mindful that the U. S.

Speaker 1

Government is nearing the end of its fiscal year. We, as with most defense contractors, now regularly assume that a continuing resolution is more likely than not, which could impact contract timing. However, I would say unequivocally that AB remains optimistic about our fiscal year 2024, given broad support for our systems and services. We believe the current administration will continue to provide the necessary budget dollars and prioritization for the type of mission critical unmanned systems we supply, particularly in contested environment operations. We are at the forefront of developing and offering in demand solutions for autonomy, automatic target recognition and tracking.

Speaker 1

In addition, the U. S. DoD is investing more in loaded munitions and small unmanned systems areas where we are well positioned to drive. Now let me once again summarize the key points from today's call. First, we delivered record first quarter results, which provides a solid start to fiscal year 2024.

Speaker 1

2nd, our record funded backlog remains at historic levels, reflecting strong global demand for our solutions. 3rd, the acquisition of Tomahawk Robotics will further improve the outlook interconnected unmanned solutions and opens new avenues for growth across our product portfolio. And 4th, Overall, the fundamentals of our business look better than ever they have in our history and we're well positioned to continue our growth trajectory as Congress begins laying the groundwork for the fiscal year 2024 budget. Before turning the call over to questions, We're also excited to welcome Admiral Phil Davidson to our Board of Directors. Admiral Phil Davidson brings We look forward to the unparalleled strategic counsel and vision he will bring to AV.

Speaker 1

I would also like to thank Catherine Marigold for her 8 years of service on our Board of Directors as she is stepping down at our upcoming annual meeting. Her passion 4, an interest in our company's future were instrumental to our success during her tenure. And as always, my appreciation to our workforce goes without saying. Without such a dedicated and talented team of professionals, We would not have the market leading position powered by the cutting edge technological advancements that we enjoy today. We appreciate all our employees every day just as we do our long standing investors and other stakeholders in the company.

Speaker 1

The future continues to look bright And we believe fiscal year 2024 will drive the company to new heights. And with that, Kevin, Jonah and I will now take

Operator

We respectfully ask that callers limit themselves to questions and return to the queue to ask additional questions. Our first question will come from the line of Gregory Konrad from Jefferies. Your line is open.

Speaker 1

Good evening and great quarter. Thank you, Greg. Thank you. Maybe just to start on the outlook, I mean, the revenue outlook. It's a pretty big raise 1 quarter in.

Speaker 1

Can you maybe just talk about what's changed since Last quarter, has there been some risk retirements? Is it orders? And just kind of what's driving that revenue outlook for the year? Sure. So we're very pleased with how great our team performed on the Q1, Greg.

Speaker 1

There are several factors why we raised out of guidance for full fiscal year 2024. One is we've had a tremendous first quarter And our Q1 this is a historic Q1 for the company. 2nd, our backlog as you saw is At a historic levels also, we have another record on top of a record that we achieved this Q1. And then our visibility to the midpoint of our revised guidance is nearly at 100%. So you can look at that and say based on our inventory position and ability for us to be able to Secure long lead items, we feel fairly strong that at this time we can achieve the revised guidance range that we provided.

Speaker 1

The demand for solutions remain very healthy both domestically and abroad. And I think the whole Aerospace and Defense Industry is in a point of inflection when it comes to small unmanned systems As a distributed architecture of warfare as well as loading munitions both categories which we have essentially invented in the marketplace over the last 2 decades. So we're positioned extremely well. The demand seems to be very strong even beyond fiscal 2024. And We felt that at this time we should raise our guidance to be able to achieve the higher levels of revenue outlook on the top line that we provided.

Speaker 1

And then maybe just a follow-up. If you can talk about Tomahawk a little bit. You had Progyny and just kind of how you view the shift from maybe Hardware to more software and integration and how you think about that kind of expanding the addressable market as you get more into Kind of control and software side versus the hardware. Sure. So I'm glad you asked that question, Greg, because it's a really important point To make here, there are several reasons why we decided to acquire Tomahawk, which we have known by the way for many, many years.

Speaker 1

We worked with them in the past as I mentioned in my remarks And we know the technology, the products and their talents very, very well. It's very similar to the Progyny systems. There's a few key reasons I want to highlight. 1, The overall customer trends are when the war fighters are overwhelmed with so many robotic systems, Small, medium, large, extra large, etcetera, etcetera, loading munitions, ground robots, etcetera. It becomes very difficult for a warfighter to be able to carry multiple ground control stations and tablets and devices to control multiple UAVs.

Speaker 1

So what Tomahawk does, it allows not only AeroVironment robotic systems, but also any other branded robotic systems to be able to simply integrate together in the battlefield to simplify the life of our customers, meaning the warfighter. In addition to that, it also enables a whole bunch of AI enabled features and technology, which we have been investing and they're investing in as So one thing that's really not well known about our offering is that we've been investing in this category of autonomy, GPS denied operations, contested Battlefield environments like the ones that we see and witness every day in Ukraine, AeroVironment has been investing in this area for several years. And we expect that to continue and we're positioned extremely well on that. So what Tomahawk does, it helps us Accelerate that deployment and adoption and to meet the customers' needs well better than anybody. So there are several reasons it's a growth Acquisition, it allows us to grow further and faster and allows us to deliver more value to our customers in order to simplify their what I call ecosystem an environment where they're operating multiple UADs.

Speaker 1

Obviously, we just signed And we're going to close that this quarter. We expect to close it this quarter and we'll provide more color on the financials at that time. Thank you. Welcome, Brett. Thank

Operator

you. And one moment for our next question. Our next question comes from the line of Peter Arment from Baird. Your line is open.

Speaker 1

Yes. Thanks so much. Good afternoon, Wahid and Kevin. Terrific results. Thank you, Peter.

Speaker 1

Wahid, I just have a question on the product mix. I don't think we've ever seen you have report 78% of the mix just kind of in the quarter for products. And I'm just wondering, just given how well your backlog It's hitting new record levels. Is this just kind of what we should expect going forward throughout this year just thinking about service versus product? Peter, as I said in my remarks, yes, we expect product mix as a percentage of revenue to be more favorable towards Products as it was in our Q1.

Speaker 1

And as you know that product sales generally because we invest R and D in our products and we sell them as Majority of them, not all of them, as a commercial item, we enjoy a higher gross margin in that regard, because we invest in it and it's justified to our customers. So for the remainder of this year, we expect the gross margin percentage and the mix of revenue to be more favorable towards product sales and services for fiscal year 2024. Yeah. That's helpful. And then just on the backlog, the record Can you maybe talk a little bit about how the FMS activity that you're seeing and just the opportunities there?

Speaker 1

I know you've Been able to expand the countries that Switchblade is available for and of course you've had a huge installed base in the small UAS category internationally. But how is FMS activity when we think about going forward? Thanks. Sure. So overall, Our backlog, as you know, as I mentioned, is at a record level again.

Speaker 1

We had a record backlog Entering Q1 of fiscal 2024, last quarter in our earnings call and we actually built Beat that or increase that by almost another $100,000,000 this quarter. It is phenomenal how well we've been performing in terms of Securing orders and working on growing our backlog. Many additional FMS cases remain Not to be in contract yet from our many allies for loading munitions. We believe that over the next several quarters and maybe even beyond fiscal 2024, We will see more countries placing orders and contracting these the demands that they have and the needs they have for The Ukraine conflict has essentially put an exclamation mark on how effective and important Small unmanned systems and loading munitions are for a near peer kind of a conflict, the one that they are facing with Russia. So our systems have been incredibly vital.

Speaker 1

And I believe that this is an inflection point as we go into multiple years beyond now. This is something that we work for very hard as a company. We've been saying this for a long time. We believe in this value proposition of our solution. And I think our customers are starting to realize that and that's accelerating their needs and requirements for acquiring those certain things.

Speaker 1

So in short, backlog is very strong for this year. We expect that to remain strong throughout the whole year. And I believe that many additional FMS cases for Switchblade 30600 remains to be not contracted yet. It could be contracted in the future. Those cycles take a little longer, but there's a very healthy pipeline that's being built as we progress throughout the fiscal year, which will help us in future Appreciate it.

Speaker 1

You're welcome, Peter.

Operator

Thank you. One moment for our next question. And our next question comes from the line of Ken Herbert from RBC. Your line is open.

Speaker 2

Hey, good

Speaker 1

afternoon. Hey, Wahid, I wanted to see if I could start out and Ask a question on the backlog again. Is it possible to parse out how much of the growth in backlog Ken, unfortunately because of customer sensitivity, I'm not able Dae, go further deeper into the colors of the backlog and what. But what I could say is that in general, Our backlog is really strong in all three of our business segments: our Unmanned Systems segment, our Lloyd and Munitions segment and our McCreadyWorks So we have seen significant growth in all of them. The backlog for Lloyd and Munition is made up primarily because we only sell those to the U.

Speaker 1

S. Government including for International opportunities. U. S. DoD has so far decided to fill those requests all through an FMS or USAI case, FMS case is coming through the U.

Speaker 1

S. Army. So really the contracting office that handles our Switchblade Family of systems for both domestic and international customers has been and remains to be the U. S. Military and U.

Speaker 1

S. Army. The mix of customers in that area is pretty broad. I'm not able to comment on a specific contract or the amounts of them because of the sensitivity of the Conflicts that we have around the world and our customers. But it's healthy across the board.

Speaker 1

And I believe that it's going to stay that way for the foreseeable Next this year and beyond hopefully as well. Because as I said, we'll continue to build on our momentum and that's one of our Fundamental goal and priority last several years to continue to build our backlog to also Level load our revenue based on a quarterly basis. And as you can see, we expect this year to be nearly fifty-fifty between first half and second half of the year, primarily because of our That's great. Thanks, Wahid. And if

Speaker 2

I could, there's been a

Speaker 1

lot of press recently around some newer starts within the United States, whether it be the LASSO program or Replicator or others. I'm not sure how much you could talk about these, but could you maybe just talk about how well you believe you're And how meaningful they can perhaps be in 2024 and fiscal 2025 for you? So Ken, I could not agree more with you in terms of the relevance of these large very high priority focus areas for the U. S. DoD.

Speaker 1

You mentioned a couple. Lasso that's been recently been announced by the U. S. Army. We're tracking all of these.

Speaker 1

We are engaged with our customers very closely. Very closely. One of the things that we pride ourselves is that we spend a lot of energy making sure that we're very, very close and intimate to our customers, So we can solve their problems the best way possible better than anybody. And some of these requirements are squarely focused around the area that we as a business are offering as a pure play player. There is no one on this So the Replicator, which was just recently announced by the U.

Speaker 1

S. DoD and Pentagon is very much Another example of the type of capabilities that our defense customers, U. S. DoD specifically is looking to Sort of acquire over the next several years that's very much focused around our system. So I think we're positioned really well.

Speaker 1

I believe we will be able to participate in these opportunities. The details of that, of course, I'm not able to disclose right now because it's quite early and sensitive to our customers' operations and business. Thanks, Yiyi. You're welcome, Ken.

Operator

And our next question comes from the line of Bryce Sandberg from William Blair. Your line is open.

Speaker 1

Wahid, Kevin and Jonah, good afternoon. Hello. Good afternoon. Hey, hi, everybody. Wahid, you referenced how the 176 $1,000,000 Ukraine Puma IDIQ is nearly fully drawn.

Speaker 1

Do you expect to be able to renew this contract? So the answer is we are already engaged on additional contracts. So the short answer is yes. Is it going to be exactly the same type of contract and the same exact amount? No.

Speaker 1

But there's definitely a lot of demand for our systems for Ukraine. As you all know, as I mentioned before, Ukraine has made many public statements that our Puma system is the workhorse in Ukraine. And our Switchblade family systems is also one of their very critical capabilities that has helped them Defender nation and defend their independence against Ukraine so far. I believe that that's going Continue. We are engaged with the U.

Speaker 1

S. U. D. In a very, very close and regular basis. There are several additional requests for our systems And the U.

Speaker 1

S. UED is working with us to be able to fulfill those needs as they see appropriate. As you can see, some of that is also in fact reflected our backlog today. So the strong backlog does include additional orders for our unmanned systems and small UAS as well as loaded munitions, But I expect that to grow and continue to expand over the next several quarters as we move forward, because I think that as I said, there's an inflection point. Many of these countries including Ukraine want to have more and more of our types of systems, which are far, far less expensive They're much more expensive other platforms and they're much more effective in what they're trying to do and how they're fighting the conflict with Russia.

Speaker 1

Great. Thanks, Wahid. You're welcome.

Operator

Thank you. And our next question will come from the line of Pete Skibitski from Alembic Global. Your line is open.

Speaker 2

Yes. Nice quarter guys. I'll echo that.

Speaker 1

Thanks, Pete. Thanks, Steve.

Speaker 2

Again, just Wahid, you touched in your opening comments, I think, Supply chain issues, can you update us on what you're seeing in terms of as you ramp in volume issues with GUIs, any other components that you're having Whose lead times are extended?

Speaker 1

So, Pete, we believe that the revised guidance we gave, we're pretty We're confident that based on our indicators today, we're going to be able to achieve the revised increased guidance on the top line. We have secured pretty much most of our long lead items. And as Kevin mentioned in the remarks, we have intentionally raised our inventory levels to some Then primarily because our systems are in high demand and sense of urgency Within our U. S. DoD as well as our allies is very high.

Speaker 1

As soon as they contract with us, they would like us to deliver the systems. So it's never a perfect situation. The supply chain is a game of a I call it a lack of a game. Every day, every week, there's some sort of a new issue. But overall, we have handled this and managed this extremely well Throughout the entire years of the COVID pandemic, the supply chain So for fiscal 2024, overall we're in a very good position.

Speaker 1

And but there's challenges that arise every day and we try to address them. And we've actually done a really good job of managing those things. Another challenge that we are also facing that we're tackling is Not only do we have to manage the supply chain and making sure the parts are there, our revenue has grown considerably over the last 2 or 3 And with this growth, we need to also make sure that we bring up the production capacity of some of our smaller suppliers. And that is something that doesn't happen overnight. And it requires effort on our part.

Speaker 1

And for them to increase capacity, they've got Scale up their production and their manufacturing and their operations and we're working with many of them that are strategic to us to make sure that we don't have any bottle And I'm very pleased with the progress that our team is making and we've made it a concerted effort and focus for ourselves as a priority as a company and as leadership team to focus on that for the last 3 to 4 years. And I think that is starting to pay dividend for us as we see the kind of growth that we've been able to achieve and deliver to our shareholders.

Speaker 2

Okay. I appreciate it. And last one for me. On the Tomahawk deal, my question is why buy this company? It's fairly young, right, only 5 Why buy them instead of maybe team with them on an ongoing basis or some other business arrangement?

Speaker 2

It's This whole area Ground Control Systems, it's I guess you would have to have a comfort level that their IP is so high that it would Other competitors would have a hard time overcoming that. Can you share your thoughts on why you pulled the trigger on this deal?

Speaker 1

Sure. So as you said, that's a very good question, Pete. 1, we've known him for many, many years. And we've known him since their The founding days in fact. So I've personally known that one of the founders through the industry of course for a long time.

Speaker 1

The reason why we did this is because it allows us to accelerate and achieve our growth objectives faster for ourselves as well as for our customers. As an independent company, while they continue to work with us, we won't be getting the level of priority and preferential treatment as we would like, because at the end of the day, it's all about the mission of our customers, the war fighters. And most of our customers have already chosen to go down the path of selecting their system, Tomahawk systems as the open architecture to connect multiple unmanned and manned devices. So think about a battlefield where there are tanks, armored vehicles, ground robots, UAVs, etcetera, USVs and You need to make sure that you provide a common operating picture for the operator, for the warfighter. And so what Tomahawk does, It brings all those things and it connects them and integrates them and also introduces a lot of predictive AI features feature set.

Speaker 1

So in order for us to deliver those capabilities to our customers faster and also integrate deeper In terms of our product roadmaps, technology investments, we felt that the acquisition was a better way to go. And lastly, I would say, We're also growing in terms of our talent. Tomahawk Robotics is primarily based out of Florida and it's an area that we like to get So there are several reasons, their talent base, their IP, their product, their progress with customers as well as ability to support our growth in the years to come. So I really feel strongly that this is a very good decision for our company or shareholders. It's also a great outcome for our customers.

Speaker 1

So far the feedback has been very positive and it positions us to basically marry the best, the most ubiquitous unmanned systems provider, which is our AirVironment with the most advanced common controller technology enabled by AI from Tomahawk to be an integrated system solution for our customers.

Speaker 2

Okay. Appreciate all the color. Thank you.

Speaker 1

You're welcome.

Operator

Thank you. And with no further questions in the queue, I'd like to turn the call back over to Joe Taylor Bailyn for any closing remarks.

Speaker 1

Great. Thank you once again for joining today's conference call and for your interest in AeroVironment. As a reminder, an archived version of this call, all SEC filings

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Earnings Conference Call
AeroVironment Q1 2024
00:00 / 00:00
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