Comfort Systems USA Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Quartr
Provided by Quartr
February 23, 2024

There are 8 speakers on the call.

Operator

Good day and thank you for standing by and welcome to the Q4 2023 Comfort Systems USA Earnings 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, Julie Schaff, Chief Accounting Officer. Please go ahead.

Speaker 1

Thanks, Justin. Good morning. Welcome to Comfort Systems USA's 4th quarter and full year 2023 earnings call. Our comments today as well as our press releases contain forward looking statements within the meaning of the applicable securities laws and regulations. What we will say today is based on the current plans and expectations of Comfort Systems USA.

Speaker 1

Those plans and expectations include risks and uncertainties that might cause actual future activities and results of our operations to be materially different from those set forth in our comments. You can read a detailed listing and commentary concerning our specific risk factors in our most recent Form 10 ks

Speaker 2

as well as

Speaker 1

in our press release covering these earnings. A slide presentation has been provided as a companion to our remarks. The presentation is posted on the Investor Relations section of the company's website found at comfortsystemsusa.com.

Speaker 2

Joining me on the call today are Brian Lane, President and Chief Executive Officer Trent McKenna, Chief Operating Officer and Bill George, Chief Financial Officer. Brian will open our remarks. All right. Thank you, Julie. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us on the call today.

Speaker 2

Our teams achieved an amazing finish to 2023 with exceptional results including unprecedented growth, earnings and cash flow, as well as a surge in new bookings. We earned $2.55 per share this quarter compared to $1.54 a year ago. Current quarter revenue was $1,400,000,000 with same store growth of 18%. During the Q4, both our mechanical and electrical businesses grew and increased margins to drive our annual results to new heights. Construction finished an already strong year on an up note, including notable profit and activity increases in our modular business.

Speaker 2

Service also continued to grow as we continue to benefit from ongoing service investments. Backlog is $5,200,000,000 up by more than $1,000,000,000 from last year and we had a remarkable sequential increase of $870,000,000 even with strong revenue. Demand remains supportive and is especially robust in our industrial sector. We are carefully selecting work that has good margins and good working conditions for our valuable workforce. Cash flow for the quarter was superb at $149,000,000 and we finished 2023 with an extraordinary $550,000,000 in free cash flow.

Speaker 2

Earlier this month, we closed 2 acquisitions Summit Industrial and J&S Mechanical. Summit is a specialty industrial mechanical contractor serving the advanced technology, power and industrial sectors. Summit performed off-site and site based construction, including process piping, equipment setting and large pipe rack trestles. Summit is a trusted supplier to some of the world's largest advanced technology, power and industrial companies and is currently deployed on several major chip fabrication projects. JNS provides mechanical construction services to commercial and industrial sectors across the Mountain West region of the United States and works on many of the largest and most technical construction projects in their area.

Speaker 2

We are thrilled to have both of these companies as part of the Comfort Systems USA family welcome. I will discuss our business and outlook in a few minutes, but first I'll turn this call over to Bill to review our financial performance. Bill? Thanks, Brian. Good morning, everyone.

Speaker 2

Revenue for the Q4 of 2023 was $1,400,000,000 a 22% increase, while same store revenue increased by 18% or $195,000,000 Full year revenue for 2023 increased by 26% compared to 2022 to $5,200,000,000 For the full year, our Mechanical segment revenue increased by 24%, including a big contribution from our modular business. Our Electrical segment increased by an even larger 31% and we now have a $1,300,000,000 electrical business. Overall, our same store revenue increased by 23% or $931,000,000 We are facing tough comparables. However, our best estimate is that we will achieve same store revenue growth in 2024 in the mid teens with growth weighted a bit more heavily to the first half of the year. Gross profit was $280,000,000 for the Q4 of 2023, a $68,000,000 improvement compared to a year ago.

Speaker 2

Our gross profit percentage improved to 20.6% this quarter compared to 18.9% for the Q4 of 2022, driven by improved Electrical margins. The quarterly gross profit percentage in our Electrical segment improved to 22.9% this year as compared to 18.2% last year. Margins in our Mechanical segment also increased in the quarter to 19.8% as compared to 19.1% in the Q4 of 2022. Our Mechanical segment includes our modular business, which operates at notably lower margins than our remaining businesses. For the full year 2023, gross profit increased $249,000,000 and our annual gross profit margin was 19.0% in 2023 as compared to 17.9% in 2022.

Speaker 2

For the full year, segment margins were similar with mechanical gross margins of 19.0 percent for the full year, while electrical was 19.1%. 4th quarter EBITDA increased 42 percent to $141,000,000 Our full year 2023 EBITDA increased by an even greater 48% as our full year EBITDA was 499,000,000 dollars As we look to 2024, we are optimistic that overall EBITDA margins will continue to trend in the strong ranges that we achieved in 2023. Gross margins will also continue to be strong, but gross margin percentage may be more variable in 2024 in light of the effect of amortization and certain purchase adjustments arising from our 2 large acquisitions. SG and A expense for the quarter was $160,000,000 compared to $132,000,000 in the prior year. And as a percentage of revenue, SG and A expense was consistent again at 11.8%.

Speaker 2

On a same store basis, SG and A was up approximately $22,000,000 due to inflation and ongoing investments to support much higher activity levels. For the full year, SG and A expense as a percentage of revenue was 11.0% in 2023, that's down from 11.8% for 2022. 4th quarter operating income increased by 50% from last year from $80,000,000 in 4Q 2022 to $120,000,000 for the Q4 of 2023. With improved gross profit margins, our operating income percentage increased to 8.9% this quarter from 7.2% for the prior year. Our full year operating income was $418,000,000 a remarkable increase of 165,000,000 dollars OI margin increased from 6.1% in 2022 to 8.0% in 2023.

Speaker 2

Our year to date tax rate of 16.7% included an incremental benefit of $10,000,000 or $0.27 of tax gains that related to prior years. Although individual items have affected our tax rate lately, we estimate that a normalized tax rate for us is approximately 20% to 22%. After considering all these factors, net income for the Q4 of 2023 was 92,000,000 dollars or $2.55 per share. This compares to net income for the Q4 of 2022 of $55,000,000 or $1.54 per share. Our full year earnings per share for 2023 was 9.01%.

Speaker 2

Excluding prior year tax gains in both periods, earnings per share increased to $8.74 per share from $5.29 per share in the prior year and that's an increase of 65%. Full year 2023 free cash flow was a remarkable $551,000,000 We continue to benefit from advanced payments for work that we will fund and complete in upcoming quarters. 2023 operating cash flow exceeded our earnings by an astounding $300,000,000 Over the coming quarters, we expect pre bookings and equipment advances will normalize creating some cash flow headwinds. In the meantime, these early collections have allowed us to invest heavily and fund acquisitions from current cash flows while at the same time significantly lowering our debt and interest costs. During 2023, we spent $95,000,000 on capital expenditures, almost double the amount we had spent the prior year.

Speaker 2

The increase includes the build out of 3 vast new modular production facilities and the purchase of many vehicles to catch up from COVID. In 2024, we estimate that our CapEx spend may be roughly $65,000,000 to $75,000,000 around the midpoint of the spending levels over the past 2 years. Our substantial cash flow allowed us to pay down our revolving credit facility to 0 and to reduce our overall debt by $212,000,000 over the course of 2023, again, while investing in unprecedented levels of CapEx, buying back shares, increasing our dividend and fully funding both of our acquisitions, the purchases of Eldeco and Deco from cash flow. In 2023, we purchased 139 shares of our common stock at an average price of $153 Finally, as Brian mentioned, we acquired Summit Industrial and J and S Mechanical $400,000,000 dollars and EBITDA of $35,000,000 to $40,000,000 We also estimate J and S will have annualized revenues in the range of $145,000,000 to 100 and $60,000,000 and EBITDA of $12,000,000 to $15,000,000 In light of amortization expense, these acquisitions are expected to make a neutral to segment. That's all I've got, Brian.

Speaker 2

All right. Thanks, Bill. I'm going to discuss our business and outlook. Our backlog surged at the end of 2023 to a record $5,200,000,000 Since last year at this time, our same store backlog has increased by $913,000,000 around 23% and the increases were broad based. During the recently completed Q4, our sequential backlog increased by 870,000,000 and virtually all of the increase was same store.

Speaker 2

Our pipelines remain strong. Our revenue mix continues to trend towards data centers, life science, food, chip fabs and battery plants. Those industrial customers accounted for 55% of total revenue in 2023 and they are major drivers of pipeline and backlog. Technology, which is included in industrial, was 21% of our revenue, a substantial increase from 13% in the prior year. The technology sector will continue to grow with the recent acquisition of Summit Industrial as they have several ongoing and large semiconductor projects.

Speaker 2

Institutional markets, which include education, healthcare and government are also strong and represent 26% of our revenue. The commercial sector remains active, but it is now a small part of our business at about 19% of revenue. Majority of our service revenue is for commercial customers. So the proportion of our overall construction revenue from commercial has become relatively small. Construction was 80% of our full year 2023 revenue with projects for new buildings at 55% while existing building construction was 25%.

Speaker 2

For the first time in 2023, Comfort Systems USA achieved $1,000,000,000 of annual service revenue. Service was 20% of our total revenue with service projects providing 9% of total revenue and pure service including hourly work providing 11% of revenue. 2023 service revenue is up by 11% and with our continuing strong margins, service is a great source of profit and cash flow for us. At Comfort Systems USA, our core purpose is to build legacies with our people, customers and the companies who join us. To accomplish this, we strive every day to be the best organization in the world for a craft worker to build a successful career, for construction, service and administrative professionals to grow and thrive, for customers to meet their crucial building and service needs, and for any company in our industry to join with the assurance that their people will be respected and nurtured and that their legacy will be perpetuated and built upon.

Speaker 2

We believe that our commitment to those principles to our people and their legacies has been and continues to be the linchpin of our success. Safety, quality and innovation remain at the forefront of our operations. We constantly strive to improve and grow our operations to enable sustainable and efficient building environments to improve the productivity of our diverse workforce and to acquire great complementary businesses. Thanks to our careful and relentless investments in existing and newly acquired businesses, we have the crucial skills and capabilities to help meet our country's surging needs for mechanical and electrical experts and to build and service buildings, including to grow data capacity for artificial intelligence, to increase our nation's capacity to build its own chips, manufacture its own medicines, supply its batteries and provide healthcare resources for our aging population. As we look ahead, we remain optimistic about prospects for service and construction across our vast markets.

Speaker 2

With our backlog over 20% higher than even the robust levels of the prior year and with persistent strength across our markets, we believe that we can continue to grow and invest in 2024. Our number one priority is to preserve and grow the best workforce in our industry. And so as always, I want to close by thanking our over 15,000 employees for their hard work and dedication. I'll now turn the call back over to Justin for questions. Thank you.

Operator

And thank And our first question comes from Alex Dwyer from KeyBanc Capital Markets. Your line is now open.

Speaker 3

Hi, guys. Thanks for taking my question.

Speaker 2

Good morning, Alex.

Speaker 3

Hi. So I wanted to ask about the backlog increase in the quarter and specifically the modular orders. And was that one order or multiple orders? Was it one customer or multiple customers? And do you think there's the opportunity to see more of these larger modular orders as we go into 2024?

Speaker 2

Alex, the way that so if you look at the sequential backlog increase, about a little over 60% of that was an increase in modular. So that was $800 and something million. If you look at the year over year increase in backlog, about 20% of it was modular. So we have a situation where we had some big bookings in the Q4 of last year, which was actually last year was more than all of our sequential increase and then big bookings in the Q4 of this year. And of course, over the course of the year, we burned down, we performed a lot of that modular.

Speaker 2

We're back to higher than ever levels of modular backlog with these new bookings. But 80% of our year over year backlog increase is broad based. So we just honestly, we just couldn't be happier with the breadth, the composition, etcetera. And as far as additional bookings, absolutely, right now, we're taking as much as we can, but the people who are buying these services from us tell us they would like to give us more.

Speaker 3

Got it. And then the press release mentions an increase in modular profitability. I don't think we get the disclosures for this, but how was the margin performance this year in modular? And should we expect continued margin expansion in that business this year?

Speaker 2

So modular margins for the full year were just a little higher than the prior year, but they're at very, very good levels. You may have heard in my script that I mentioned the gross profit for modular is lower than it is for any of our other businesses. And that's a combination of it. It does have a high component of materials and pass that pass through. It's also performed the work we do in the field is performed with licensed electricians and certified medical gas technicians.

Speaker 2

The work that we perform in our plants is highly skilled, but it isn't as difficult to find that labor. So we're very happy with those margins. As far as margin expansion in modular, we'll be thrilled if it stays the same. Of course, we're always working for modular for margin expansion. But man, when you after a quarter like this, it's pretty hard to talk about doing better.

Speaker 2

We're really happy with the Magglet business, Al. Yes.

Speaker 3

Got it. And then just last one on the margin outlook for 2024. I think we're talking EBITDA margins more so this year than gross margin. There's the deal amortization. I think inflation could be a tailwind to margins this year.

Speaker 3

And then maybe like the mix versus the early stage versus the later stage jobs could be like a swing factor. Can we just talk about like the puts and takes in margins this year?

Speaker 2

Yes. So if you look at this overall, I just want to comment on the margin performance we've been getting over really since 2016. We've been pretty consistently having 18% to 20%, leaving the amortization aside for a minute. So I am personally thrilled with the level of performance we're getting and executing our work. I mean, if I was running this work, I'd be really happy myself.

Speaker 2

So I consider that we'll keep going. So if you want to add on I think you made all the right points. The one thing I'll just refine a little bit for everyone. So if you think about it, so amortization is always big at Comfort because we buy companies on a fairly regular basis. And the companies we buy come with a lot of backlog.

Speaker 2

So for example, Summit will roll into Comfort with something like $400,000,000 of backlog. And the accounting rules require us to put a value on that backlog and amortize it as an expense. In addition to things like customer list and trade name that all businesses have, our amortization is higher than most. Obviously, it's non cash. The money is gone.

Speaker 2

It's never coming back. So in a way, it's not sensible to worry about it, because you own what you own today and it's going to earn what it earns. But we're required to reduce the sort of the earnings that we present to you the margins we present to you guys for that. And the reason we wanted to call it out is, last year we had less acquisitions than we have had over the last 3 or 4 years proportionate to the size of Comfort Systems. So amortization was probably the lowest and definitely the lowest proportionate to the size of the company that it's been in a long time.

Speaker 2

Well, on February 1, we did our biggest deal ever. We did another top 5 or 6 deal ever. And so amortization is going to come back very in a very notable way over the next 18 months. And so obviously that pushes down gross margins because it's an expense. You put tens of 1,000,000 of dollars, many tens of 1,000,000 of dollars of expense through your cost of goods sold and it's all non cash, so the cash flow still does great.

Speaker 2

EBITDA really is what I'd look at, still looks good. So we're comfortable with the cadence of our EBITDA margins. We are going to have choppiness in the gross profit margins. So sorry, that's a little bit longer, but it's just I think it bears given the size of the deals we just did and the fact that we were at a low Feb last year, I just wanted to mention all of that.

Speaker 3

Thank you.

Operator

And our next question comes from Julio Romero from Sidoti and Company. Your line is now open.

Speaker 4

Hey, good morning guys. Good morning, everyone. Hey, morning. So staying on gross margins for a second. You mentioned the same store revenue for the year should be looking like first half weighted.

Speaker 4

How about the gross margin cadence? Should that also be first half weighted? Or how would you have us think about that?

Speaker 2

No, I mean, if I'm excluding what Bill just went through, just in terms of purely operational, I think we'll be pretty consistent at the gross margin level that we've been at. They'll fluctuate up and down quarter to quarter, but I think we'll be in that 18% to 20% range for sure. I mean the effects on gross margin from like backlog amortization will be immediate. And then there's also a chance of purchase adjustments later in the year that could make it could be a little lumpy in a quarter here or there. But if you just the business is going to earn us a lot of it's going to do well.

Speaker 2

Yes. But there will just be a little more noise in those gross margin lines.

Speaker 4

Okay, got

Speaker 2

it. What does your capacity look like? The noise can go either direction just for the record. That noise can go either direction. You shouldn't just hear it's all bad.

Speaker 2

Now the amortization will always be an expense. But anyway, go ahead. I'm sorry.

Speaker 4

No, no. Great point. I'm just thinking about there's also a lot of cost pass through in modular too and how that could depending on whether you do it first half weighted or second half weighted, it would affect kind of the cadence of things. Maybe just turning to capacity, how does that look for you guys? Can you continue to take on orders?

Speaker 4

And how far out are you booked these days?

Speaker 2

Well, in terms of our capacity, we're in good shape right now. The backlog, the projects are a little bit bigger. So we're in good shape for this year for sure. We're winning a fair amount of work, about 30% of our backlogs into 2025. So in terms of the work we have, obviously, we're spending a lot of time making sure we can execute properly, selecting the right work, etcetera.

Speaker 2

But in terms of capacity, the workload we have, the workload we see, we're in good shape right now.

Speaker 4

Okay. That's helpful. And then last one for me is a little bit of a broader question, but industrial and institutional are making up a bigger portion of new construction, as you said earlier, Brian. And I would imagine a good majority of those are owner occupied buildings, not necessarily spec buildings. So what are you hearing from those customers in regards to cost?

Speaker 4

Are these kind of owner occupied projects just having to swallow a higher cost of capital and tougher project economics just to get comfort to take on the project?

Speaker 2

So I don't think they're worried about the cost of capital. Our we're talking the big tech companies, right? The big pharma companies, they have capital. They frankly, they want to deploy capital. As far as pricing, pricing is up.

Speaker 2

It is and it's not a we have to charge people more because we pay our guys. We need to pay our workers very, very well right now. They deserve it. They've worked for us, many of them for generations in some cases, but for decades. And that's what it takes to get the work done.

Speaker 2

So I would say pricing is definitely up. We're making sure that we get we're taking more in a sense, we're taking more risk, right, because we're promising to do something at a time when we're already full. We have to make sure that we get pricing that compensates us for that risk and allows us to do a good job for our customers. But for sure, if you thought if you started planning a building 2 years ago and you're building it today, it is costing you a lot more than you were budgeting 2 years ago. And that's by the way that's true in a lot of parts of the economy, but I think it's especially true in anything that's using skilled labor.

Speaker 4

Helpful. Thanks very much.

Speaker 2

Thanks.

Operator

And thank you. And one moment for our next question. And our next question comes from Adam Thalhimer from Thompson Davis. Your line is now open.

Speaker 2

Hey, good morning guys. Great quarter. Thanks Adam.

Speaker 5

Just since there's so much interest, do you mind just talking high level about data center demand?

Speaker 2

Well, I'll go first and Bill can comment, but data center demand is still strong. Everything you read or hear, Adam, it still have a lot of legs to it. So right now, we see no let up and the stuff we're looking at are the opportunities presenting themselves. And I think it's going to be good for a number of years. So you look at TechWhip from 13% to 21% of our revenue.

Speaker 2

Really, we're doing a lot of chip and some other stuff, but that is overwhelmingly data centers. We're seeing data centers not just in our modular business, right? They're very big in Texas and our electrical business. They're very big in like sort of the mid Atlantic, Virginia. And we're turning we're not we're disappointing people, right.

Speaker 2

We're favoring people who've given us been partners with us for a long time. But we just the demand for data centers is going to force the build to be pushed out over time. And that's one of the great things about modular. Modular is if you're a big data hyperscale especially data center provider, you really people say, well, which modality of building data centers is going to work, is going to win? And the answer is, it's an all of the above world right now.

Speaker 2

They want to do it modular. They want to do it stick built. They want to do 3rd party. They want to do repurposing. They want to do up adding reconfiguring buildings to support more.

Speaker 2

Every way that they can do it is how they're doing it. It reminds me of the way we people say, how do you hire people? And the answer is we hire people every possible way we can think of. They're building data centers every possible way they can think of. And for the foreseeable future, if you can help them meet those needs and especially if you can do a really good job, demand, there just seems to be no end to that demand.

Speaker 2

The demand was big even before artificial intelligence, right? Artificial intelligence isn't data center demand, it's incremental data center demand.

Speaker 6

Right.

Speaker 5

And then you said 3 new modular facilities last year. That was higher than I didn't realize that. I thought it was 1. But what would be your thoughts about expanding modular capacity further?

Speaker 2

You have to see what the demand is and see what kind of commitments we get from our customers. We've got the 3 up and running now. So and we will see how I think it would plays out, which customers would want us to do it. Yes. So round numbers, we did about a 400,000 square foot facility in North Carolina and we did a 400,000 and a 200,000 square foot facility here in Houston.

Speaker 2

And it's even those sizes are great, but these are also buildings that are much bigger have much bigger volume. They're taller. So you can build you have the option sometimes of building at levels because remember these are this is volumetric. You're building buildings that get stacked on top of each other. So this new space is really, really great for our guys.

Speaker 2

We had an opportunity when we came into this space to really take the lessons we had learned in deploying robots and robotic arms and the kind of equipment that can make robotic arms more efficient and faster. And so far, it's doing it's going very, very well. As far as increasing the space, I think we certainly have conversations with existing and new customers about what would get us to do that. I think we're probably not going to make serious decisions about that before the middle of the year. But the opportunity is for certain it's out there right now.

Speaker 2

But one of the things about Comfort is we really want to do a good job for people. And one thing we never want to do is promise more than we can really deliver at an absolutely industry standard level. And so our number one consideration in taking work is can we do it and do it right. Our number and almost similar almost the same level of consideration is, is this work that will be good for our workforce, with people who will treat them fairly and work with them where there will be good efficiency so that they can be successful? Is the geography onerous for them or good for them?

Speaker 2

I mean, in construction right now, a huge consideration is retaining your workforce and you retain your workforce by considering the things that are going to be important to your workforce. So that's actually a very important consideration right now with our best operators.

Speaker 5

Okay. Super helpful. Last one, backlog expectations. I'm just curious if could backlog continue to build in Q1 or are you basically I would imagine you're kind of full for the 2024 construction season?

Speaker 2

Yes, we're in really good shape of backlog this year for sure. You can still grow it because projects are getting let longer. But back to what Bill just said, if the works good with our good customers, we're going to see what we can do to fill it in, but there's still plenty stuff to look at, Adam, no shortage of opportunities. Great update. Thanks, guys.

Speaker 2

Thanks.

Operator

And thank you. And one moment for our next question. And our next question comes from Josh Chan from UBS. Your line is now open.

Speaker 6

Hi, good morning, Brian, Bill and Julie. Thanks for taking my questions. Maybe could we contextualize your margin strength in the quarter for a quick minute here? I appreciate the guidance that you gave into next year. So what are some of the factors that drove kind of the margins this quarter?

Speaker 6

And can those factors pretty much continue into

Speaker 2

2024? So the factors were remarkably broad based, remarkably diffuse. It's really just good execution, good work at fair prices and our guys doing a great job of performing it. There is very it is not like sometimes historically when you see stuff like this, it's 2 or 3 drivers, right? And certainly every month and every quarter there are companies that have an especially good month or quarter, but it's really remarkable right now how broad based this is.

Speaker 2

So I think that makes you more optimistic that it can continue. And also, right, our service business is up to $1,000,000,000 So we continue to grow that with higher margins too, which is helping our margins as well to us.

Speaker 6

Okay. Yes, that's helpful. Thank you for

Speaker 5

the color there. And then

Speaker 6

on the growth, same store growth that you're projecting for next year, I guess if it's mid teens for the full year and stronger in the first half, could your growth kind of accelerate in Q1 beyond what you achieved in Q4? Just kind of wanted to get the shape right versus what you're thinking in terms of how you get to that full year of mid teens?

Speaker 2

So it's lumpier than you think. So it's harder to answer that question than you think because the range, you might think we're within we can narrow it to a percent or 2, but it's really to get to 1.5 standard deviations, you might go from 14% to 23% or something. So I would say it is certainly the case that if you made me if you said copper was going to grow 15%, if you made me quarterize that, I'd put a percent or 2% more in the 1st 2 quarters than I put in the last 2 quarters. But I will also say all of the factors that drove us to do better are still in evidence. Our guys are really killing it.

Speaker 2

It's honestly one of the reasons we say it's weighted more heavily towards the first half is we just have more visibility on the first half, right? So we can promise something.

Speaker 6

Okay. Yes, that's really helpful. Thank you for that. And maybe last one for me. Beyond what's in the backlog now, could you kind of talk about what opportunities you see in terms of things that you're bidding on, you're working on trying to get to the backlog, like the early part of the bidding process, what are you seeing on that front?

Speaker 6

Thank you.

Speaker 2

Well, we're seeing still a tremendous amount of activity. We're being very selective as we've spoken about and it's heavy and a lot of manufacturing, a lot of industrial, a lot of technology. We're also seeing education backlog in that is the highest it's been in years, particularly university work some K through 12. And also healthcare, medical, new build hospitals, we're seeing come up. So just a wide range of opportunities in addition to the food, life science, farmer, etcetera that we've talked about.

Speaker 2

So pretty broad based, Josh.

Speaker 6

That's great to hear. Congrats on a great quarter and great year. Thanks.

Operator

And our next question comes from Jaeme Ramirez from D. A. Davidson. Your line is now open.

Speaker 7

Hi, this is John Ramirez for Brent Thielman. Congrats on the quarter by the way.

Speaker 2

Thank you, John.

Speaker 7

As a percentage of revenue, what was Modular's contribution for the year?

Speaker 2

20%? 2018%, I believe.

Speaker 7

18%, is that correct?

Speaker 2

18%, yes. Great. There's a pipeline in our investment presentation.

Speaker 6

Perfect. Yes, sorry if I missed that.

Speaker 7

And just continuing on the conversation around backlog, is there any concerns or any major concerns around your markets near term or perhaps maybe just taking a look at your capacity or labor or any other inputs, is

Speaker 2

there anything to share there? Yes. In terms of backlog in the markets, I don't have any concerns. Of course, commercial in terms of office buildings, you obviously not seeing a new lot of office buildings. We still have a lot of service, small project worth.

Speaker 2

The exception of Dallas and the Wall Street Journal earlier this week, Dallas is still pretty busy on office buildings. But in terms of the sectors themselves, I don't have any real concern at all. Just about labor capacity, we're hiring all the time. We increased our workforce in the Q4 as well. We brought a couple of new companies on that brings us more resources to and then we have a temporary labor organization that we have.

Speaker 2

So in terms of capacity and the backlog, we feel pretty confident about us doing the work and doing the work that we like and that we can do well. So just one correction, modular was for the full year was 15%, getting a quarterly number mixed up. So 15% of our total revenue came through our 2 modular operations.

Speaker 7

Perfect. Thank you. Appreciate that. And just one more for me. Could you discuss from the latest acquisition, the Summit Industrial Construction, what are the opportunities the company sees to grow this business beyond the revenues range we've discussed?

Speaker 2

Well, it's productive capacity. Both of those two companies have more work available if they can take it. The revenue ranges we put in is the amount that's supported by their current backlog. It wouldn't be surprising if they did a little more. They can't do orders of magnitude more because there's a time space mass problem with the number of people.

Speaker 2

But certainly virtually every acquisition we've done within a couple of years was bigger. So we're hoping that happens again. But they're really good companies.

Speaker 7

Understood. Thank you.

Speaker 2

One of the things, we don't push people revenue, right? We have a Schimpffer. They could do frankly close to half the time as of a year or 2 ago, I took a look. Companies shrunk the 1st full year we owned them, close to half the time they were smaller, the first full year we owned them. But without with almost I don't think with any exception, the 3rd full year we owned them, they're noticeably bigger.

Speaker 2

So hopefully that can keep happening.

Speaker 7

Got it. Thank you so much for the additional comments there. Appreciate it.

Speaker 2

Thank

Operator

you. And thank you. And one moment, we have a follow-up question. And our follow-up question comes from Alex Dwyer from KeyBanc Capital Markets. Your line is now open.

Speaker 3

Hi, guys. Just one more if I can squeeze one in. So the free cash flow conversion in 2023, I'm just doing the math, it was 175% to net income. Do you have any sense of like where this could shake out in 2024? Like should we be expecting something lower than 100% or just any thoughts on visibility and cash flow conversion this

Speaker 2

year? So that's a really hard question because you have to predict the timing. So we have 2 things going on. 1, we have really, really good payment terms on almost all of our work. And that is we're overbilled at unprecedented levels, etcetera, etcetera.

Speaker 2

But the big different thing that's going on right now is this, when we take these modular orders, we have the right to receive advanced payments when we accept the order. So we have significant amounts of money that are being paid to us sometimes a year in advance of when the work will be done. So it's very, very hard to predict when those orders will come in. I will say we just had big orders in the Q4. So some of that money was collected in the Q4.

Speaker 2

Some of that money will be still be collected in the Q1. So we'll start the year off in a good position. And then I believe sometime maybe later this year in the 3rd, 4th or Q1 of the next year, we'll have a quarter or 2 where our cash flows are less than our earnings. But I will say this time last year I thought the same thing and the orders kept coming and we stayed ahead. So that's why it's so hard to predict because when my Board asked me that, I just tell them let's just enjoy this.

Speaker 2

Go ahead.

Operator

And I am showing no further questions. I would now like turn the call over to Brian Lane for closing remarks.

Speaker 2

All right. Thanks, Justin. I really want to once again thanks all our amazing employees. It's a great industry and we really appreciate everything everybody does in this organization. Thank you all for your interest in Comfort Systems.

Speaker 2

Hope everyone has a terrific weekend and look forward to everybody soon, seeing everybody soon. Thank you. Thanks everybody.

Operator

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.

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Earnings Conference Call
Comfort Systems USA Q4 2023
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