In the industrial space, we kind of talked about, it tracks with generally what we’re saying about FMT and much of FSDP overall. So it’s more modest in the low single-digit range right now. And I don’t know, Abhi, do you want to add something there?
Abhi Khandelwal: Yes. No, the only thing I’d add is I think just – look, we’ve talked about this, I think comparing it year-over-year is kind of – given what we saw last year. So, I think it’s important to kind of point out, if I look at the sequential order trend, look at the sequential order patterns from Q4 to Q1, we saw about $59 million of order uptick, $14 million of that was tied to FSDP; half of that, I’d say is blanket with our large customers that give us blanket we ship throughout 2024. The other half is normal book-to-bill. You look at FMT, we’re up about $28 million in orders sequentially. Again, half through demand that we’ve about tied to our bellwether businesses and the other half being blanket.
And lastly, FSDP is the story around emerging markets and the growth coming out of India, that’s really exciting for us. So you saw that sequentially. So again, I think the key here, the focus here is to look at it sequentially because I think that’s a better way to look at the business given where we are in the cycle.
Vlad Bystricky: Okay, that was really helpful guys. Thanks.
Operator: Our next question comes from the line of Nathan Jones with Stifel. Please proceed with your question.
Nathan Jones: Good morning everyone.
Eric Ashleman: Hey, Nathan.
Abhi Khandelwal: Hey, Nathan.
Nathan Jones: Getting back on to the HST order patterns and the sequential improvement that you’re seeing there. It’s obviously up quite a lot off the bottom from third quarter of 2023. Customers did a lot of inventory destocking out of some of those businesses. Is it your view that customer inventories have been rightsized and we’re kind of moving back to an area where your orders are pretty close to what your end customers are selling? Or is that still continued destocking going on from your customers? And do you have visibility into that?
Eric Ashleman: Well, so I’ll kind of break down HST because I think the answer varies a bit depending on the personality of the pieces. So half of it is broadly industrial, again, more like FMT and the rest of IDEX. And I think they’re – like in those other areas, I’d say the destocking trends are largely past us. And so part of that lift you’re seeing in that industrial core. And it’s because, frankly, we’re at about the levels of consumption and as those become more positive, we rise with them. So you see the same dynamic in about half of HST that you see elsewhere. I think in the other areas, it’s a little trickier and the visibility, to be fair, is a little bit murkier because of just the extension of those supply chains.
So now in life science and analytical instrumentation, of course, we can best see inventory between us and factories. And ultimately, that cleared very fast for us, so I don’t see an inventory accumulation there. End devices, which, of course, have global reach, harder for us to see. We ask about it all the time and there probably are pockets here and there of different platforms and things that are out there that we’re probably still working through. So, I’d say there may be some moderate or minor effects there, but they’re just harder to see and they’re kind of outside the four walls of where our usual experience is. And then in semicon, I think it varies as well because there’s such discrete and different pieces of semicon. So things associated with memory, as I said, for us, that’s kind of simple consignment stock and it’s starting to move off the bottom, which would indicate, okay, we cleared that inventory too.
Some of the kind of higher tech things at the other end of the spectrum, more anchored towards high-end lithography or metrology. I think – and quite honestly, we’re just waiting – the entire industry is waiting for a stronger demand catalyst there to get it moving. So figure half of the segment generally clear, looks a lot like industrial IDEX and then I’d say kind of 50-50 and the other half, depending on these two large pieces.
Nathan Jones: That’s helpful. Thanks. Maybe back on to the margin question and where it gets back to in a more normalized volume environment, I think you said 30%. Is that – first, is that an EBITDA margin target? Because historically, we’ve been talking about operating margins…
Abhi Khandelwal: EBITDA margins, Nathan.
Nathan Jones: Yes. Thanks. And I would think that during this downturn, that, that business carries a lot of very highly skilled labor that you would be really hesitant to rationalize during your downturn, particularly one that’s likely to be short and cyclical. And so that’s led to some of these pretty high decrementals that you’re seeing in that segment. But should all that result in very good operating leverage and very high incrementals as we come out of the other side. Is there any commentary you can give us on kind of what you’d expect to see out of incremental margins in HST as we see that volume project [ph]?
Abhi Khandelwal: Well, Nathan, I think the point you made is the answer, but I will say it, which is, to your point, we’ve been very, very thoughtful in terms of how we rightsize the business. Again, as Eric talks about the long-term vision, we believe in the long version of the business and expect this business to grow as we come out of the cycle. So as you think about the incrementals on the uptick, I’d say it’s 35% to 40% is the incrementals you should expect, if not north of it, depending on the investments we make in the business over the long term as we grow this business.
