Integer Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Quartr
Provided by Quartr
April 25, 2024

There are 9 speakers on the call.

Operator

Thank you for standing by. My name is Kathleen, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the First Quarter 2024 Integer Holdings Corporation Earnings Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers' remarks, there will be a question and answer Thank you.

Operator

I would now like to turn the call over to Anderson, Senior Vice President, Strategy, Business Development and Investor Relations.

Speaker 1

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us, and welcome to Integer's Q1 2024 earnings conference call. With me today are Joe Dzieczyk, President and Chief Executive Officer and Dyrin Smith, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. As a reminder, the results and the data we discuss today reflect the consolidated results of Integer for the periods indicated. During our call, we will discuss some non GAAP financial measures.

Speaker 1

For reconciliation of these non GAAP financial measures, please refer to the appendix of today's presentation, today's earnings press release and the trending schedules, which are available on our website at integer.net. Please note that today's presentation includes forward looking statements. Please refer to the company's SEC filings for a discussion of the risk factors that could cause our actual results to differ materially. On today's call, Joe will provide his opening comments and Dyeran will then review our adjusted financial results for the Q1 2024 and provide an update on our full year 2024 outlook. Joe will come back to provide his closing remarks and then we'll open up the call for questions.

Speaker 1

With that, I'll turn the call over to Joe.

Speaker 2

Thank you, Andrew, and thank you to everyone for joining the call today. We appreciate the sell side analysts who have initiated coverage on Integer over the past year and welcome Kristen Stewart from C. L. King who initiated coverage of Integer last month. We had a strong start to 2024 with sales growing 10% year over year and adjusted operating income of 26% or 2.7 times the rate of sales growth compared to the Q1 of 2023.

Speaker 2

In addition, our adjusted earnings per share grew 31% year over year and gross margin expanded 120 basis points versus Q1 2023, primarily due to the execution of our manufacturing excellence initiatives and an improved supply chain and direct labor environment. We are reiterating our full year outlook. We continue to expect sales growth of 9% to 11% and adjusted operating income growth of 13% to 20% versus 2023, a strong year over year increase. We are also confirming 2024 adjusted earnings per share of $5.01 to $5.43 and free cash flow of $85,000,000 to $105,000,000 The strategy that we developed in 2017 and began implementing in 2018 is now producing sustained above market sales growth and margin expansion. We also continue to manage our debt leverage within the range of 2.5 times to 3.5 times trailing 4 quarter adjusted EBITDA, while executing our inorganic growth strategy.

Speaker 2

It is an exciting time at Integer because we have a strong pipeline of new products concentrated in faster growing end markets. Our margins are expanding as a result of our manufacturing excellence initiatives and we continue to acquire and integrate tuck in acquisitions that add or compound differentiated capabilities. I am grateful for our associates around the world that are delivering for our customers and making a difference for patients. I'll now turn the call over to Diren.

Speaker 3

Thank you, Joe. Good morning, everyone, and thank you again for joining our discussion today. I'll provide more details on our first quarter 2024 financial results and provide an update on our 2024 outlook. We started 2024 with a strong Q1. Sales of $415,000,000 delivered 10% year over year growth on a reported basis and 6% on an organic basis, which excludes the impact of our recent Inuraco and Pulse acquisitions, the strategic exit of the portable medical market and foreign currency fluctuations.

Speaker 3

We delivered $81,000,000 of adjusted EBITDA, up $15,000,000 compared to the prior year or an increase of 22%. Adjusted operating income grew 26% versus last year, more than 2.5 times the rate of sales growth. We continue to make progress on our year over year margin expansion. Q1 2024 adjusted operating income as a percent of sales was 15.2%, which represents approximately 200 basis points of improvement versus a year ago. Adjusted net income for the Q1 of 2024 is $39,000,000 delivering $1.14 of adjusted diluted earnings per share, up $0.27 or 31% from the Q1 2023.

Speaker 3

C and V and CRM and N product line sales, which represent approximately 91% of our total sales, continued strong year over year growth on a trailing 4 quarter basis in the Q1 of 2024. For our cardio and vascular product line, trailing 4 quarter sales increased 18% year over year with double digit growth across all CMB markets, driven by strong customer demand and sales from the Inuerto and Pulse acquisitions. Cardiac Rhythm Management and neuromodulation's trailing 4 quarter sales increased 12% year over year, primarily driven by double digit CRM growth from strong customer demand and double digit neuromodulation growth from emerging PMA customers. Further product line details are included in the appendix the presentation on our website at integer.net. To provide more insight into our Q1 2024 performance, we delivered $39,000,000 of adjusted net income, up $10,000,000 versus a year ago.

Speaker 3

Operational improvements, which include improved manufacturing efficiencies and operating cost leverage, delivered $10,000,000 versus Q1 2023, while improvements in our adjusted effective tax rate were more than offset by higher interest expense and slightly unfavorable foreign exchange. On a tax affected basis, adjusted total interest expense was approximately $1,000,000 higher than last year. This is primarily due to a higher average debt balance during the period, driven by funding for the acquisitions of Inuraco and Pulse Technologies using our available revolver capacity. Our adjusted effective tax rate was 18.1 percent for the Q1 of 2024 compared to 19.8% in the prior year. Our lower adjusted effective tax rate compared to the prior year was primarily due to discrete tax benefits recognized upon vesting of to be between 19% to 21% for 2024.

Speaker 3

As discussed in our previous earnings call, this is mostly driven by the recent adoption of the OECD Pillar 2 framework by the EU member states establishing a minimum effective tax rate of 15% as well as the residual effect of the Malaysian tax holiday expiration. In the Q1 of 2024, we generated $23,000,000 in cash flow from operations, up $17,000,000 from a year ago. The improvement driven by higher sales volumes, improving margins and effective management of working capital was partially offset by higher annual bonus payments, which are made in the Q1 of every year. Our CapEx spend of $29,000,000 in the Q1 is on track to our expected full year spend of $90,000,000 to $110,000,000 As a result, free cash flow in the Q1 was a usage of $6,000,000 Net total debt ended at $1,100,000,000 for the Q1 of 2024, an increase of $162,000,000 compared to the Q4 2023 ending balance. This increase was driven by the approximate $140,000,000 acquisition of Pulse Technologies in January of this year.

Speaker 3

Net total debt leverage at the end of the Q1 2024 was 3.4x trailing 4 quarter adjusted EBITDA, which is within our strategic target range of 2.5x to 3.5x. As Joe mentioned in his opening remarks, we are reiterating our 2024 outlook for sales, profit and cash. We expect to deliver sales in the range of $1,735,000,000 to $1,770,000,000 an increase of 9% to 11% versus last year, with organic growth of 6% to 8%, which is 200 basis points above our underlying market growth rate estimate of 4% to 6%. In addition to our organic growth, we expect the Inuraco and Pulse acquisitions, partially offset by the Portable Medical market exit to contribute 3% inorganic growth. We anticipate adjusted EBITDA between $355,000,000 to $375,000,000 reflecting growth of 15% to 21%.

Speaker 3

Similarly, we expected adjusted operating income to grow 13% to 20% to between $272,000,000 $290,000,000 At $281,000,000 which is the midpoint, adjusted operating income as a percent of sales is expected to grow 91 basis points compared to the full year 2023. We expect adjusted net income between $171,000,000 $185,000,000 which is growth of 8% to 18% compared to the prior year with adjusted earnings per share of $5.01 to $5.43 which is growth of $0.34 to $0.76 versus 2023. Q1 2024 results were in line with our expectations. We further expect the first half of twenty twenty four sales to grow high single digit year over year with sales continuing to increase throughout 2024 from new product introductions and emerging PMA customer growth. We expect adjusted operating income as a percent of sales to expand throughout the remainder of 2024, driven by continued improvement in manufacturing efficiency and sales growth outpacing our growth in operating cost.

Speaker 3

Similar to our outlook on profit and loss, we also reiterate our cash flow outlook and net total debt projections for 2024. We expect cash flow from operations between $185,000,000 to $205,000,000 which represents an 8% year over year increase at midpoint of outlook. Our outlook for capital expenditures remains at $90,000,000 to $110,000,000 as we continue to invest in organic capabilities and capacity. As a result, we expect to generate free cash flow between $85,000,000 $105,000,000 Inclusive of our approximate 100 and $40,000,000 acquisition of Pulse Technologies in January of this year, we expect our 2024 year end net total debt to be between $10,000,000,000 $10,000,000 $1,301,000,000 which is up $60,000,000 to $80,000,000 year over year. We expect to end the year with our leverage ratio within our target range of 2.5x to 3.5x trailing 4 quarter adjusted EBITDA.

Speaker 3

With that, I'll turn the call back to Joe. Thank you.

Speaker 2

Thanks, Diren. With our strong start to 2024, we are reiterating our outlook of 9 percent to 11% sales growth and 13% to 20% increase in adjusted operating income. The execution of our strategy, both organically and inorganically is producing results as we continue to demonstrate above market sales growth with expanding margins. We remain focused on executing our strategy to create a premium valuation for our shareholders. We will now turn the call over to our moderator for the Q and A portion of the call.

Operator

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. Your first question comes from the line of Brett Fishbein of KeyBanc Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Speaker 4

Hey guys. Thank you very much Just wanted to start off quickly on the revenue growth trend in the first quarter. Like one topic that came up a bunch of conversations was just the potential impact of maybe some inventory build at customers that they were looking to reduce or take down. So just curious if looking across the different product areas, you might have seen some pockets where customers needed to actually take down their inventory before some of the ordering activity returned more than mine with underlying trends that we're seeing?

Speaker 2

Good morning, Brett. Thanks for the question. I guess my immediate answer is we have an order book that's $900 ish million. It gives us really good visibility where our customers' demand is. We have really good visibility, particularly in the Q2 and in the Q3.

Speaker 2

And so our guidance is based upon what customers are telling us they need in the near term based on actual orders. We highlighted last year on the Q3 earnings call and the year end earnings call that last summer we saw customers adjusting what we thought were adjusting inventory levels. We got some of the Dear supplier letters on inventory adjustments that they do and when they oftentimes do mass adjustments. And we believe what we're seeing and experiencing now is normal inventory management by our customers. I think it's clear our customers, many of them have said that they are working to reduce their inventory levels.

Speaker 2

We've got all of that factored into our guidance. We think we started off the year with a strong Q1 of 10% and for the full year we're confident in our 9% to 11% sales growth.

Speaker 4

All right. Certainly. Very helpful. And then maybe on the other side in terms of potential tailwinds, a lot of conversation around emerging PFA products. So I'm just curious if there's any way that you could frame maybe the contribution of some of those products to the trends we're seeing in cardio and vascular?

Speaker 4

And then maybe just around the broader electrophysiology sub segment and the contribution to the quarter and how you're thinking about it for the rest of the year as contemplated in the guidance? Thank you very much.

Speaker 2

Certainly. So we've talked a lot about our we have a very strong position in electrophysiology, everything from access devices through diagnostics as well as the ablation therapy itself. We're highly vertically integrated. We're on a number of new programs and we're excited to support our customers in bringing new and innovative therapies in that space in particular to the marketplace. We've experienced very strong electrophysiology growth.

Speaker 2

Last year, we had very strong growth in electrophysiology that continued into the Q1. We expect that to continue throughout the year. We have our best estimate factored into our guidance and that's what we built in based upon our customers' ramp programs and their launch programs. I would highlight our emerging PMA customers. We increased the growth forecast for those customers at the end of last year or beginning of this year, which we had done in the previous year as well.

Speaker 2

We're excited about those new programs. Many of them are in emerging neuromodulation therapies and applications. We have structural heart programs that are launching that we're excited about. So we're excited about a lot of the new products that we're launching with our customers and it's a result of the focus we've had on getting designed into the faster growing end markets and into the therapies that our customers are counting on to drive their growth. So we're excited about last year's strong top line growth at 16%.

Speaker 2

And this year, we think 9% to 11% on top of that continues to demonstrate the success of our strategy of partnering with our customers.

Speaker 4

Maybe if I could just sneak in on more last question. Just one other thing that stood out, you quantified the 2 biggest segments now over 90% of sales. But just given the magnitude of the decline in non medical, just curious maybe if you could touch on what the key driver of that was? And if we should think about it getting

Speaker 5

a little bit more toward,

Speaker 4

I mean, I guess, really it's how to think about it for the rest of the year maybe sequentially compared to like the baseline from 1Q?

Speaker 2

Sure. So we've given guidance on Electrochem, the non medical segment that we expect $32,000,000 to $36,000,000 of sales for the year, which will be a drag of 50 to 75 basis points for total Integer. You can do the math on a year over year basis. In the Q1, it was a drag of about $7,000,000 so almost 200 basis points in the non medical segment. So medical segment in the Q1 was actually up 8.5% organically.

Speaker 2

You can see that in our press release and when we filed the Q3, we provide that level of detail. In particular, the Q1 and what we expect the first half to be down on a year over year basis, Electrochem had a couple of significant supply chain disruptions that suppressed their sales back in the 2021, 2022 time period. And we recovered from those supply chain challenges and had a bolus of backlog orders that we fulfilled in late 2022 and the early part of 2023. And so what we're seeing is we're seeing that normalize to what we expect to be a run rate for that business of $32,000,000 to $36,000,000 for 2024. And then we would expect that to grow mid single digits going forward.

Speaker 5

All right.

Speaker 4

Thanks again so much for taking the questions.

Speaker 2

Thanks, Brett.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Matthew O'Brien from Piper Sandler. Please go ahead.

Speaker 1

Good morning. Thanks for taking

Speaker 6

the questions. Just to follow-up a little bit more on the electrophysiology side

Speaker 3

of things. Joe, are you guys

Speaker 6

would you say you have the most exposure of any of your competitors to this growing PFA dynamic that we're seeing in the market? And then then

Speaker 3

do you have exposure across the board? Because I know there's a bunch of different companies developing products here. So are you going to be able to supply everybody? Or is it just focused on

Speaker 6

a couple of companies? And sorry for the long winded question, but is it like the full catheter that you're going to be able to supply or just components of individual catheters?

Speaker 2

So thanks for the question, Matt. Unfortunately, you know how much we would love to be able to tell you about the details of who we're supporting and what exactly we're doing for them. But I can't provide that level of granularity. Our customers don't want us getting in front of them talking about their most exciting programs and products that are driving their growth. What I can say is we're highly vertically integrated.

Speaker 2

We do everything from components to finished device delivery. It's obviously we're not we don't have the same content on every device in the market and every device that's coming into the market. But given the breadth and depth of our capability, we can do anything for everyone. But it is different customer to customer. And so there absolutely is the variable of who wins and who wins in the short, medium and long term does affect us.

Speaker 2

But we have such a broad portfolio both in access. So think guide wires and guiding sheets, think the diagnostic catheters that are necessary as well as the ablation catheters. And so we are very strong in access and diagnostics that oftentimes can be more agnostic to the therapy itself. And so as the overall market grows, we grow with that. And then on the therapy in particular, what we're designed into and doing for customers can have a bit more of the impact of who wins based upon what dollars per unit, what content on the bill of material we have with that specific customers.

Speaker 2

But as electrophysiology grows, we'll win because of our access delivery and diagnostic capabilities and how we're serving the market. And I'll just reinforce, we had very strong growth in electrophysiology last year. That continued into the Q1 and we expect that to continue throughout the year.

Speaker 6

Got it. And then a follow-up question on C and B specifically. You had a tough comp here in Q1, but still put up pretty good growth. But I think it may be just a little bit below what some folks were expecting. And so I'm just wondering with all these new PMA products that are coming, do you anticipate a lot more contribution from those products here in kind of the last three quarters of the year and really strong performance out of that C and V business for

Speaker 3

the remainder of 'twenty four?

Speaker 2

Sure. So C and V grew a reported 16% for the Q1. We think that's pretty strong result given the broad mix of products and markets that we serve. 18% on a rolling 4 quarter basis. We also have the acquisitions in there that are helping that.

Speaker 2

So obviously, that includes the benefit of those acquisitions. But even without that on an organic basis, CMV still grew high single digits. So very strong results for the CMV business and we would expect CMV to continue to grow throughout the year and continue to as new programs launch across structural art and electrophysiology. And as we get the commercial synergies from the Pulse and the Neuroco acquisitions, although that won't necessarily be organic this year because of the timing of the acquisition, but that will fuel organic growth when we get into 'twenty five and beyond.

Speaker 6

Got it. Thank you.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Craig Biyu from Bank of America. Please go ahead.

Speaker 7

Good morning, guys. Thanks for taking the question. So another one on the EP business and recognize that you guys don't provide a lot of color on customers. But if you look at the business that you have today in the aggregate, I mean, is there any way to quantify or directionally give some color on the portion of the business that's components versus full catheters today? And then how does that change with the new PFA launches?

Speaker 7

I believe you guys have said that you could see more content in the aggregate on PFA devices versus your existing portfolio.

Speaker 2

Yes, great question. Thank you. So I would start with we're strong in components and assembly. And assembly, you can think of that from a few components to a significant number. We do have finished device capability.

Speaker 2

We do finished devices today. But the majority of our business is going to be in components subassembly of those components. Our customers oftentimes want final device assembly. We've said that consistently. But there are absolutely finished devices that we're doing today.

Speaker 2

But as we move into new programs, we are always working to take advantage of our vertical integration to help customers accelerate their speed to market, give them the synergies of having more of the device under 1 company, 1 roof, 1 supplier, so that they have fewer people to work with, which is the benefits and strategic advantage of vertical integration. So we are always working to get a higher percentage of the bill of material and have more components on the device. And so that's our strategy is with every next generation device to get a higher percentage of the bill of material.

Speaker 7

Great. That's helpful. And on operating income growth, obviously, it was pretty strong at 26% in Q1, but you didn't change the guide for the year, which implies a bit of a slowdown or less leverage, if you will. So is that simply conservatism? Or are there other things that we should be considering as you're moving throughout the year that may affect the amount of leverage you guys can deliver?

Speaker 2

Sure. Thanks for noting. 26% is a very strong quarter. Last year, it will start with 2023. We got progressively better throughout the year on the margin rate.

Speaker 2

You can see the adjusted operating income grew every quarter on a sequential basis. And so if you look at 2023 by quarter, the first quarter was the lowest, the Q4 was the highest. We would expect that pattern and that trend to repeat itself throughout 2024. I'll point to the supply chain environment has continued to improve. If you compare where we are today to where we were last year, we are significantly better.

Speaker 2

The number of disruptions has reduced significantly and the impact of those has reduced significantly. We've talked about the direct labor turnover that we had some significant turnover challenges in 2022 in particular. We got better throughout the year 2023. That trend has continued into 2024. Our direct labor turnover continues to improve and that has helped us to drive that margin expansion.

Speaker 2

And so we would expect throughout 2024 to be able to sequentially grow both sales and profit on a sequential basis, which is consistent with the pattern last year. So the comps obviously as you get better sequentially, the comps get tougher as the year goes. So I would just point to look at the quarter splits last year and think about the pattern of growth. And at the high end of our guidance, we're growing profit 1.9 times the rate of sales, midpoint 1.7. We think 13% to 20% profit growth for the year is very strong.

Speaker 2

We're excited to get off to a great start in the Q1 with 26% growth in the Q1.

Speaker 3

Got it.

Speaker 7

Helpful. And if I could just squeeze one more in on PFA. I think you said that it's included that you've included your best estimates in your guidance. What would have to happen from PFA or in PFA for you guys to see upside to your guide this year?

Speaker 2

Yes. Maybe I'll answer that by saying, if you think about what we do for our customers, we manufacture components, sub assemblies and finished devices. And if it's a component or sub assembly, it gets shipped to one of our customers' manufacturing plants. They didn't build that into a product. They didn't put that into their distribution channel and then it goes into a procedure.

Speaker 2

And so what would have to happen is our customers would have to place significantly more orders into our order book and increase their manufacturing plans to drive incremental volume on us. And so you think about when we build a product in the Q2 of 2024, that's not going into a procedure until the second half of twenty twenty four and maybe even not until early 2025. And so you just got to think about the demand on us relative to procedure volume timing. And so if customers increase their manufacturing and they increase their orders on us, then we'll deliver that for them. And given our primarily sole source nature, we ultimately get whatever their end market demand is.

Speaker 7

Got it. Thanks, guys.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Kristen Stewart from CL King. Please go ahead.

Speaker 8

Hi, congratulations on a good quarter and thanks for taking my question. I was wondering if you could just share a little bit more further details on in Neuro and Pulse Technologies, how they performed in the quarter and expectations for the year? And then any update on your thinking on the M and A perspective?

Speaker 2

Certainly. So Enerco and Pulse are off to great start. They both had strong first quarters. It's always good when they come out and meet or exceed the plans that you have for them in the 1st couple of quarters. We're seeing operational synergies.

Speaker 2

There are benefits and things we've a two way sharing and we believe we're going to see synergies, operational synergies in the year. From a commercial standpoint, we have a strong pipeline of conversations and activities with customers that we believe is going to help us accelerate those businesses and we're very excited about having them be part of Integer. The integration expect to see organic growth accelerate from those two businesses when we get into 2025.

Speaker 8

And then just thoughts on the M and A landscape?

Speaker 2

Yes, great, great. Sorry, I missed your second part. We continue to curate a number of opportunities in our pipeline. We never stopped that process. The variable really is when do we have the debt leverage capacity to be able to do an acquisition.

Speaker 2

We ended the Q1 at 3.4 times leverage and that's after the 2 acquisitions in October of last year and January of this year. So we're well within our strategic range of 2.5x to 3.5x. Based on cash flow and EBITDA growth, we would expect to have more capacity in the second half of the year to continue to do the tuck in acquisitions while maintaining that leverage. We think we've got a competitive advantage in being able to curate the opportunities for these tuck ins with founder led or individual owned businesses and we'll continue to execute the strategy that we think has been working well for us.

Speaker 8

Great. Thanks very much.

Speaker 2

Thanks, Kristen.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Nathan Trabek of Wells Fargo. Please go ahead.

Speaker 3

Hi. Thanks for taking the question. Joe, just a high level question. How are you thinking about your long term outlook of 4% to 6% market growth plus 200 basis points above this? You had said this framework several years ago and it seems maybe this could have changed with the new industry developments like PSA and the tricuspid therapies.

Speaker 3

Could this potentially mean a higher structural growth rate for your business? Thanks.

Speaker 2

That's a great question, Nathan. And I would say absolutely. Ultimately, over time, as the mix of the business shifts into a higher percentage in the faster growing end markets that we've been targeting, we would absolutely expect the WAMGR, if you will, the weighted average market growth rate of our sales mix to increase the market growth because when we define market growth, we use our sales mix. So I absolutely would expect over time as the amount of sales we have in electrophysiology and structural heart, neuromodulation, neurovascular would absolutely increase our WAMGR. Having 80% of our development programs that we're working with customers on in those targeted growth markets will absolutely lead to that faster WAMGR.

Speaker 2

What it will also do is it will continue that pipeline of new programs that allow us to stay at least 200 basis points above that WAMGR because that's our ultimate measure of success is, are we growing faster than the market? That's how we know that we're winning. So it's a great point. And yes, over time, the mix of sales will absolutely lift the LAMGR of the business, which will lift the total organic sales growth rate.

Speaker 3

Okay. Thanks for that. And how are you thinking about gross margin in 2024? Can you talk about the cadence relative to the 28% in Q1? You previously talked about pricing being flattish in 2024, but are you able to take price to offset any lingering inflation?

Speaker 3

Thanks.

Speaker 2

So our pricing for the year is largely established, but there still will be some pockets of opportunity as the year progresses. But we're comfortable with where we are on the flattish pricing for 2024. And we would expect to see some continued gross margin improvement throughout the rest of the year. We're at midpoint, we're at 91 basis points of operating margin, adjusted operating income margin improvement and we would expect some of that to come from gross margins, but we also work very hard to control the operating expense, SG and A and the R and D expense that we keep after recovering some from our customers. We'll work to get that operating expense leverage as well.

Speaker 2

So we would expect it to come from both gross margin and operating leverage.

Speaker 3

Okay. Thank you. Thanks, Nathan.

Operator

And your next question comes from the line of Joanne Wuensch of Citigroup. Please go ahead.

Speaker 5

Hi, this is Felipe Lamar on for Joanne. Just quickly, I was wondering if you could just touch on like just how like internal and external investments are that you're making to build up the portfolio. I guess how you're seeing consolidation of share across your customers as you kind of expand your portfolio? Thank you.

Speaker 2

Certainly, if the question is about internal and external investment, I'd point to the CapEx investments that we're spending this year, which is still at a slightly elevated level because of the 2 Irish facility expansions that we've talked about. Maybe from a CapEx timing, I would expect the first half CapEx to be high and the second half to step down because we take possession of those two facilities middle of this year. And so we will have finished the build out of those facilities. So CapEx from a run rate standpoint will step down in the second half. You can see the Q1 is at a higher than average level.

Speaker 2

From an external investment, if you mean the acquisition or inorganic, the 2 acquisitions we just closed, we're very excited about. And we would expect to have more of that capacity as we get into the second half of the year. And maybe the question about what we're seeing with customer supplier consolidation, we continue to see our customers and hear from them that they want fewer, stronger, more strategic partner suppliers. We think that plays to our strength. We think we're incredibly well positioned to help them consolidate the supply chain, whether it's through the acquisitions or whether it's through continued vertical integration.

Speaker 2

Even if we're not doing a finished device vertically integrate, integrating components and doing some assemblies or significant portion of the device from an assembly standpoint gives us vertical integration capabilities that are we view a competitive advantage and we think it enables us to accelerate our top line while helping our customers execute their

Speaker 3

strategies. Great. And then on operating margins,

Speaker 5

I mean, you were able to expand margins about 200 bps in the quarter. I'm just wondering like where did you have the most success and where do you see the most room for opportunity for the rest of the year? Thank you.

Speaker 2

Certainly. Well, it was a combination of the improving supply chain and direct rate return over enabled us to recover some of the inefficiencies while also now annualizing some of the price that pass through the inflation pass through that we did last year. And as the supply chain and labor environment continues to stabilize, we're working some of those inefficiencies out. I would also just point out that we don't expect to have 26% growth in operating profit for the year. The 13% to 20 percent remains our estimate for the year.

Speaker 2

And it's really every quarter in 2023 on a sequential basis, we improved on our operating profit and our margin rate and we would expect to see that continuous improvement throughout 2024 as well. So we're working on that steady continuous improvement approach and would expect 2024 to follow a similar pattern.

Speaker 6

Thank you.

Speaker 2

Thanks for the questions.

Operator

There are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the conference back over to Anderson for closing remarks.

Speaker 1

Okay, great. Thank you everyone for joining the call today. As always, you can access the replay of this call on our website as well as the presentation that we just covered. Thank you for your interest in Integer and that concludes our call.

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes today's call. Thank you all for joining. You may now disconnect.

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