BLOOMFIELD, Conn. — Kaman Corp. reported financial results for the first fiscal quarter ended April 2, 2021.
Ian K. Walsh, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer, commented, “We begin the year with a solid quarter and confidence in our end-market recovery seeing significant sequential improvements in our Medical and Industrial end markets with strong order rates for these products. Sales for our Defense and Commercial, Business and General Aviation products declined both year-over-year and sequentially due to lower JPF volume and the impact of COVID-19, respectively. Looking to the remainder of the year, our JPF program remains on track and we anticipate a significant ramp up in sales for our Commercial, Business and General Aviation products in the second half of the year and are encouraged by increased air traffic and vaccination rates in the United States.”
“Our cost control efforts carried forward into the first quarter where we achieved Adjusted EBITDA* margin of 10.0%. This result demonstrates our ability to maintain profitability despite the year-over-year and sequential sales declines we experienced. We remain focused on implementing our operational excellence model that is designed to improve EBITDA Margin, Free Cash Flow, and Return on Invested Capital and we are starting to see positive results.”
“New product development remains an important part of our future growth and we have made significant progress on a number of these initiatives, including the opening of our first production cell for highly engineered products utilizing our proprietary Titanium Diffusion Hardening process and the successful test flight for our new unmanned K-MAX TITAN TM system. This test flight is a significant milestone in enabling us to meet the future unmanned logistics requirements of our commercial and defense customers. As we look to the remainder of the year, we anticipate sequential organic growth and continued progress on our new product development efforts and our strategic acquisitions priorities.”
Management’s Commentary on First Quarter Results:
Net sales for the quarter decreased 17.2% when compared to the first quarter of 2020 and 7.4% sequentially. Organic sales*, which excludes sales from our former U.K. composite operations, decreased 14.5% from the first quarter of 2020 and decreased 5.6% from the fourth quarter of 2020. Sales declines were due to lower sales volume of our Defense products and our Commercial, Business and General Aviation products, partially offset by increased sales for our Medical and Industrial products.
Sales for our Defense products decreased 20.2% when compared to the first quarter of 2020 and 10.7% when compared to the fourth quarter of 2020. The sequential decrease was due in large part to lower volume for our Joint Programmable Fuze program offset by a modest increase in our other defense offerings. During the quarter we delivered 8,090 fuzes and we continue to expect to deliver 30,000 to 35,000 Joint Programmable Fuzes in the year.
Sales for our Commercial, Business and General Aviation products decreased 24.2% from the first quarter of 2020 and 14.8% from the fourth quarter of 2020. This sequential decrease was due to a 19.9% decrease in sales for our commercial aviation products and a 12.7% decrease in general and business aviation products. As we look to the remainder of the year we expect sales for these products to improve with a more significant increase in sales in the second half of the year.
Sales for our Medical products were relatively flat with the first quarter of 2020 and increased 22.8% when compared to the fourth quarter of 2020. This is our third straight quarter with improved sales for these product offerings and we saw very strong order intake in the first quarter for our medical miniature bearings, seals, springs, and contacts. Finally, our Industrial products also saw strong order activity in the quarter and delivered a 9.5% increase in sales over the first quarter of 2020 and 5.8% increase in sales over the fourth quarter of last year.
Commenting on the quarter, Chief Financial Officer, Robert D. Starr, stated, “First quarter diluted earnings per share was $0.29 on a GAAP and adjusted* basis. This result was led by solid gross margin in excess of 30% and, despite a sequential sales decline, selling, general, and administration expense as a percentage of sales remained flat with the fourth quarter of 2020 as we continued to focus on our cost control efforts. During the quarter, Net cash used in operating activities from continuing operations was $2.4 million and included a $25.1 million payment for the acquired retention plans at Bal Seal. Adjusted Free Cash Flow* for the period was $18.0 million and benefited from improved collections in the quarter. We are maintaining our previous full year outlook as we continue to anticipate a strong recovery in our Commercial Business and General Aviation products in the second half of the year.”
First Quarter Highlights:
- Net sales from continuing operations of $171.6 million, down 17.2% over prior year period
- Gross profit from continuing operations of $52.9 million; Gross margin of 30.8%
- Earnings from continuing operations of $8.0 million, up $8.4 million over the prior year period
- Diluted earnings per share from continuing operations of $0.29
- Adjusted EBITDA from continuing operations* of $17.1 million decreased from the first quarter of 2020 but flat with the fourth quarter of 2020 on lower sales
- Net cash used in operating activities of $2.4 million; Adjusted Free Cash Flow* of $18.0 million
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