Visteon Corporation (NASDAQ:VC) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

I want to also be clear in communicating that that disruption was – and that issue was addressed by the supplier, and so production is back, up but it created an air bubble that we felt in Q2, and we may have some lingering effects of that in Q3 and Q4. So what we have decided to do to be prudent is to undertake some redesigns not to put ourselves at any risk, especially because we see continued growth of our digital clusters business even extending into next year. So our approach at being proactive and quick about redesigns I think is pretty unique, and our ability to then capture more of the customer demand, and this is the same thing we are doing in this particular case. So my expectation is, for second half, supply will improve modestly.

We can then expect that the industry, from a semiconductor supply chain perspective, improve 10% to 15% year-over-year, and that’s going to be the case this year as well. And our demand is a little bit higher than that. So the redesigns are also very key in terms of us being able to address the gaps. So we feel pretty good. We are on track with what we have stated earlier.

Jerome Rouquet: And I would add as well that all these improvements translate into much less open-market purchases. We’ve seen a fairly sizable decline from Q4 levels into Q1 of this year. And even in Q2 this quarter, we had less than $10 million of open-market purchase recoveries. So, it’s a good indicator of the improvement that we’re seeing in supply.

James Picariello: Thanks.

Operator: And we’ll take our next question from Ron Jewsikow with Guggenheim Securities. Your line is open.

Ronald Jewsikow: Great job on the name. Good morning and thanks for taking my questions. Appreciate the color on the power electronics business and the ability to move beyond the luxury designation of that OEM over time. Just remind us on the junction box and maybe other power electronics, does that have a similar CPV shift like we see with BMS, based on the size of the battery pack? Or is that a bit more agnostic?

Sachin Lawande: Yes. And I would say the junction box CPV is determined more by the 400/800 volt capability unlike in the case of the BMS, which is driven more by the size of the battery. The size determines the number of cells that need to be monitored, and that’s what drives the CPV on the BMS. In the case of the junction box, 400 volt to 800 volt transition and being able to switch drives the higher CPV.

Ronald Jewsikow: That’s helpful color. And with GM announcing the extension of life on the Chevy Bolt, is there a benefit to Visteon there? I guess conversely, if the Bolt takes a larger share of the overall GM electrification pie going forward, would that be a headwind to your BMS assumptions?

Sachin Lawande: Yes. So, the way to think about our business with GM is really driven by the production and uptake of the Ultium batteries. So in the near term, our Battery Management Systems with them is directly dependent on how they do with respect to the Ultium battery usage. So, it’s hard for us to say exactly what that volt – battery configuration might look like. If it is Ultium and part of what we supply, clearly that will be a benefit to us. Having said that, all of our discussions with the customer indicate a steady ramp-up of the battery management products from us to them that will continue for this year and into next year. So, it has been delayed a little bit in terms of the timing, as we discussed in our prepared remarks. But by no means we think that this is something that is coming lower than our initial expectations. We do fully expect it to keep up in terms of demand and production as we go forward.