Federal Signal Corporation (NYSE:FSS) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Felix Boeschen: Okay. Okay. And then maybe just my last one, and maybe this is better for Ian, but I’m curious if we could talk about free cash flow conversion into next year and maybe beyond. But obviously, CapEx is stepping down post the facility additions. Working capital is obviously been a big headwind in 2022. So I guess, a, I’m just curious, how you think about the conversion into 2023? And then just to confirm, there really wasn’t anything baked in from either a repurchase or debt pay down perspective in the guide. Is that right, Ian?

Ian Hudson: There’s a little bit of debt pay down assumed, just based on what we’re expecting from a kind of a cash generation standpoint. I think if you look at the full year, obviously, our cash conversion was impacted with some of the investments we have to make in inventory levels mainly. So our conversion was below our target. We typically target conversion of 100% on a net income basis. I think for this year, we were about 60%. We are expecting that to improve as we go into ’23. I don’t think it will be all the way back to our target because I think what we’re trying to do is balance the needs to have inventory supply chain, as Jennifer mentioned, is not solved. It’s improved, but we still are fighting through challenges kind of on a regular basis.

So I think we will be up from where we were in ’22, but maybe not all the way back to our target level because we still have record backlogs that we’re actively trying to work down those backlogs and reduce lead times. So I think we’ll still see some investment in inventory.

Jennifer Sherman: Yes. For example, Ian referenced the investments we’re making in chassis and that’s an important investment in terms of serving the needs of our customers. But our teams are focused in terms of both balancing the inventory we need to support our backlogs and supply chain challenges with some — we have inventory reduction goals at each of our businesses for ’23.

Operator: . The next question is from Greg Burns with Sidoti & Company.

Gregory Burns: What is the interest expense for next year?

Ian Hudson: So we’re guiding to between $18 million to $20 million on a full year basis.

Gregory Burns: Okay. Great. And then you mentioned production being up, I guess, I don’t know if this is in dollar or units, but up 20% sequentially. Where are you in terms of your capacity utilization? I know you’ve added a lot of — added capacity over the last year or so, but obviously, you’ve been production constrained because of the supply constraints. So how much more capacity do you have if you could produce to demand, how many more units or how much more revenue could you be generating per quarter?

Jennifer Sherman: Yes. So what we were talking about — when we were talking about the increases we saw in production that was at our Vactor and Elgin facilities. And depending on the quarter, we were running between 60% and 70% depending on the quarter last year. So there’s plenty of room for future growth.

Gregory Burns: Okay. Okay. And then with the Trackless acquisition, just so I understand the platform, do they sell those attachments solely for their own units? Or do they — are these attachments sold to other? Can someone just buy like their attachments and then attach it to their own trucks?

Jennifer Sherman: It’s — I mean, theoretically, I guess you could buy their attachments and attach it to their own trucks. But the purpose of it is for the tractors they manufacture.

Operator: Next question is from Steve Barger with KeyBanc Capital Markets.

Robert Barger: If we look at the midpoint revenue guide, it implies high-single or low double-digit unit volume growth, but the midpoint of EPS suggests about a 20% incremental margin and I know there’s still supply chain challenges. But when you think about footprint and mix, how do you think the portfolio should flex in a perfect state on volume increases?