American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:AXL) Q1 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Operator: And our next question comes from Adam Jonas from Morgan Stanley.

Adam Jonas: Hey, guys. So first, just a housekeeping. What percentage or portion of your CapEx spend this year, and let’s say near term is devoted to EV pure BEV products?

Christopher May : Just pure BEV this year, Adam, it’s not real just, think of it probably like a third as you’re starting to launch some of these components that are near term, some of the AMG product, but we’re still launching a fair amount of our conventional product, especially this year. That’s driving some of our larger backlog. But that’s a rough estimate at this point.

Adam Jonas: Yes. When do we hit like half or when does that flip?

Christopher May : Well, it’s going to transition over the next couple of years because half of our backlog is associated with or nearly half right is associated with EV product on the component side, as well as some additional EV wins. And then this announcement we had here today is the latter part of the decade. So it’s just going to continue to step up.

David Dauch: Yes, Adam, this is David. I mean, 40% of our backlog is electrification based today. That backlog covering the ‘23 through ‘25 period of time. What we’re quoting on is about a $1.5 billion of new and incremental opportunities that 75% or more electrification base. So to Chris’s comments, it’s going to be the latter part of the decade that we’ll start seeing that, but as we’ll grow into it each year as we win new EV business. And that backlog grows on the EV space.

Adam Jonas: Thanks. Just a follow up. I mean, let me word this carefully. Some of your OEM customers set these volume targets a year or so ago when the outlook for EVs, when there was like a year waiting list for a Tesla and Tesla was the most profitable car company in the world and there was just a ton of hype, frankly. And I look at those volume targets now that they’re still clinging to and I’m thinking, there’s just no way. Like not even close. Now that’s just my opinion, and I think some people on this call may have different opinions. But how do you remain flexible when you’re planning for this radically different type of architectures and products? Can you tell us when it’s delivered by people that just may not be setting price or cost in the industry and the gap between the checks that their CFOs wrote and then what can actually get cashed?

How do you stay nimble and kind of what’s baked into the contractor? Just help us out here because I’m thinking there’s this reckoning and I think it’s going to happen kind of soon, guys.

David Dauch: Well again, Adam, this is David. First and foremost, from a manufacturing standpoint, we’re going to try to design our operations to be as flexible as possible and to utilize as much equipment from ICE converting over to EV. But as we’ve talked in the past before, there is some dedicated equipment towards EV related technologies. So we just need to be smart as to how we invest. We need to be sensitive to your point in regards to volumes. All the volumes right now are forecast other than what some of the EV producers are generating today, especially Tesla. So we’ve got to be smart about that because there’s still a lot of uncertainty in regards to the adoption rates for electrification. And the other part of that is we’re balanced in regards to our commercial approach with our customers here so that we can share and mitigate the risk and address any concerns that come up on fixed cost absorption issues and things along those lines.