nVent Electric plc (NYSE:NVT) Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

So there’s some ramp-up costs associated with that, that we’ll see here in the back half. I think the last point I would just say we are beginning to lap some of those mix benefits that we’ve talked about the last couple of quarters in EFS and ECM. And so with those all included, if you look at it, it’s still saying good organic growth, good profit growth, but we are going to see a bit more of a muted margin expansion in the back half of the year versus the first half. Maybe I would just end by it’s still early in the year. So it reflects that perspective as well.

Nigel Coe: Great. Thank you.

Operator: The next question will come from Julian Mitchell with Barclays. Please go ahead.

Julian Mitchell: Hi, good morning. So I just wanted to explore perhaps a sort of price volume element a little bit more on the topline. So is it sort of fair to say that the overall organic growth guide total company is sort of split 50-50 price versus volume? And then is it fair to say that your guide is sort of embedding volumes outside of Data Solutions are kind of flattish in 2024?

Sara Zawoyski: So we would expect, Julian, more volume than price this year. So we would expect volume to be more than half versus where price is. And again, we’re going to continue to manage that price plus productivity more than offsetting inflation investments to be sure. And then from a volume perspective outside of Data Solutions, I think we talked a bit about this in our prepared remarks, but we do anticipate industrial growing with some of those positive reshoring and automation trends as well as commercial resi. Commercial resi has been strong for us and Enclosures and also a little bit more muted on the EFS side, but overall, I see growth in energy with the energy transition plus commercial resi and some of the industrial as well. So we do expect volume to be a stronger contributor to that overall organic topline of 3% to 5%.

Julian Mitchell: That’s great. Thank you. And just a follow-up around the segment sort of organic growth expectations for the year. Are we sort of thinking that Enclosures kind of lead the growth for the year as a whole as it did exiting 2023? And for Thermal Management, are we kind of assuming that can turn positive for the rest of the year after Q1 because you get through that last sort of Russia headwind.

Beth Wozniak: Yes, that’s exactly right. So we expect the stronger growth to be in Enclosures, but we expect EFS and Thermal both to have positive growth and volume growth in 2024.

Julian Mitchell: Perfect. Thank you.

Operator: The next question will come from Deane Dray with RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead.

Deane Dray: Thank you. Good morning, everyone.

Beth Wozniak: Good morning.

Sara Zawoyski: Good morning.

Deane Dray: Hey. Can we circle back on the Data Solutions business and particularly the capacity expansion in liquid cooling? Can you size for us how much capacity you will have put in place? You said it would be commissioned midyear, but size for us. And it sounds like most of that is rear door heat exchangers, that’s really where the industry has the most immediate need and it’s the fastest to retrofit. But is that fair that most of that is rear door heat exchangers?

Beth Wozniak: Well, Dean, I would – so to start with your question of the capacity, as you know, we opened up a new factory in Mexico and – as well as we opened a new distribution center here in Minnesota. And what that did is it allowed us to expand capacity in our Anoka facility. And effectively, we will have double the capacity that we have. We’re also using some of our other plants globally around the world to increase our content on liquid cooling overall. So I would say we’ve got strong growth with some of our hyperscalers in some of those solutions. And I would say that we’re also seeing our cooling distribution unit grow as well as the rear door heat exchanger. So we’ve got multiple fronts of where we’re driving an expanded portfolio and growth.

Deane Dray: Right. That’s a great opportunity. And then just second question. I guess you can take a victory lap on the new product introductions because that’s almost double what your typical 50 new products goal each year. Is this a new standard? And just where does that take your vitality index?

Beth Wozniak: Well, I – thank you. We’re really excited about new products. It’s really important. And it’s probably not so much the number as it is just the impact, right, in terms of – and we measure that with revenue as well as vitality. We’re on track to get to that 25%, which is what we set out as our midterm target at our Investor Day. And one of the things I would say is we’ve got more and more focus on velocity through our whole process, and that’s one of the reasons that you’re seeing as launch more products and faster and also our focus on platforms that allows us to configure off platforms. And those are a couple of the things that are really helping us drive our growth. But it’s really important, and we focus on new products in these high-growth verticals like liquid cooling, and we focus on margin accretion as well.

Deane Dray: Thank you.

Operator: The next question will come from Jeff Sprague with Vertical Research. Please go ahead.

Jeffrey Sprague: Hey. Good morning, everyone.

Beth Wozniak: Good morning.

Jeffrey Sprague: Good morning. I wonder if we could just come back to the tax. We’ve seen a lot of companies talking about the friction from the global minimum tax movement and some of these things going around. But this uptick is a lot more significant than we’re seeing at others. Maybe just a little more color on kind of the what, the why and the how and where we’ve moved to here and do you think we’re kind of sticky at this rate now?