Roper Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:ROP) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Steve Tusa: Great. Thanks, guys. Appreciate it.

Neil Hunn: Yes.

Operator: Thank you. And the next question comes from Brent Thill with Jefferies.

Unidentified Analyst: Hey, good morning, guys. This is [Dave] (ph) [Multiple Speakers] on for Brent. I appreciate you are taking some questions. Maybe just on the AI theme. I appreciate some of the color that you guys gave. I was curious, is there some sort of AI playbook that you guys are laying out for the portfolio of companies to be thinking through? Just curious how you’re approaching that across the portfolio, and I appreciate some of those one-off case studies.

Neil Hunn: Yes. So Playbook, I would say, no, accelerated education across multiple fronts, yes. So what is it? What’s are the possible? What are the risks? What are the IP ownership issues? What is how do you get productivity with — in R&D, how do you get marketing lead productivity, marketing content productivity, customer service productivity. We’re doing a series of teach-ins and learnings that is highly subscribed by our businesses. And so that’s how we’re sort of accelerating the learning across the enterprise.

Unidentified Analyst: Got it. That’s helpful. And then maybe wanted to just ask about you guys often talk about the portfolio being mostly macro insulated. I think the macro hasn’t been as bad as many have feared. But as you guys kind of think through that, have there been any companies that as things have softened a little bit that maybe have stuck out and maybe were a little surprising where you thought, hey, maybe these were a little bit more macro immune than they’ve been showing up to be?

Neil Hunn: Look, Jason, I think, to our surprise, no. I mean, obviously, the one that gets a lot of attention is our DAT business, which grew. It’s just truly exceptional the last couple of years. And then this year, it’s moderated, still growing. And we talked about that quite a bit last quarter. We — so really nothing. I mean, Neptune is solid. As we said in the prepared remarks, their customers’ budgets tend to be very fixed year-to-year and not tied to housing starts, which some people think is the case, but it generally is not. Jason, anything, so surprises?

Jason Conley: I don’t think so.

Neil Hunn: There’s really nothing surprising on the cyclical piece.

Jason Conley: Yes. I mean, Shannon has pointed out, maybe there’s a little bit around government contracting, as I mentioned earlier, on the debt ceiling. It’s not a macro point per se, but that’s not clear at Deltek.

Unidentified Analyst: I understood. Thank you, guys. Appreciate it.

Neil Hunn: Yes.

Jason Conley: Thanks.

Operator: Thank you. And the next question comes from Joe Ritchie with Goldman Sachs.

Joe Ritchie: Thanks. Good morning, guys.

Neil Hunn: Good morning.

Jason Conley: Good morning.

Joe Ritchie: Hey, so maybe just to round out that free cash flow margin point going forward now that the seasonality has maybe changed a little bit. Should we think about them like the second quarter as being kind of like a free cash flow margin around 20% going forward as you kind of think about modeling that business?

Neil Hunn: I mean it’s going to be lower. I’m not sure if I point to a specific margin for every year. But we do make 2 federal tax payments. So that obviously just drags on the second quarter. But so it’s always going to be lower than the full year. So that’s how I would model it.

Joe Ritchie: Okay. All right. Great. That’s helpful. And then I guess, lastly, we talked a little bit about technology-enabled products and the growth this quarter, tougher comps going forward. I’m just curious, is there a way to potentially quantify the supply chain easing impact that occurred this quarter? And then is that going to continue? I guess is that part of the headwind then potentially as you kind of — as you think about the second-half of the year?