Good morning, everyone. This is Jim Sims with IBC Advanced Alloys. Thanks for joining us on our call this morning. I've had a little technical difficulty, so I can't share my screen, and you can't see the slides, but we have Mark Smith and Toni Wendel on, and so let's get started. We'll do this by audio, and then we'll provide the slide deck to everyone afterwards. I apologize for that inconvenience. Let's get started. Good day, everyone, and welcome to this IBC Advanced Alloys webcast and conference call on the company's financial results for the quarter and the year ended June 30, 2023. I'm Jim Sims. I'm Director of Investor and Public Relations with IBC. Before we begin the webcast, just a couple reminders. We will have slides from today's presentation.
I'm sorry I can't show those to you live, but we will send those out to everybody after our webcast, and after the formal presentation, we'll go to Q&A with all of our participants. We're gonna make forward-looking statements today, and viewers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on any such forward-looking information and statements. Additional information that are identifying risks and uncertainties is contained in IBC's public filings, available at sedar.com and on our company website at ibcadvancedalloys.com. Today, we'll have Mark Smith, who is IBC's Chairman and CEO, along with Toni Wendel, IBC's Chief Financial Officer. Mark, let me ask you to go ahead and begin the presentation.
Thank you, Jim, and good, good day to everyone. For those of you who are new to the IBC story, we manufacture copper and beryllium aluminum alloys for customers in the commercial and defense sectors. These include companies in semiconductor manufacturing, aerospace, automotive, marine defense, electronics, industrial equipment, oil and gas, and others. With 80 employees, we are headquartered in Franklin, Indiana. We operate two plants, one in Indiana and one in Wilmington, Massachusetts. In addition to casting, forging, heat treating, and fabrication of many different copper and beryllium alloys, we also provide customers with a full range of tolling and engineering consulting services. You can't see the slide, but when you do see the slides, you'll see a summary of IBC by the numbers in terms of everything I just mentioned, as well as some share price information and share structure information.
Again, you can't see this slide, but we do provide a list of select customers, and as you will see when you see the slide, IBC has served some of the world's leading companies across multiple industry sectors, including NASA, Caterpillar, Honeywell, Schlumberger, General Dynamics, Honda, BAE Systems, Raytheon, Siemens, Lockheed Martin, Kingsbury, just to name a few. The next slide that you'll see when we get it up and online is a relative revenue generation by each of our divisions. This is led by our Copper Alloys Division, which contributes approximately 75% of the consolidated revenue, and EMC contributing about 25% of the consolidated revenue. One of the most significant achievements of the past several years at IBC was our successful consolidation and vertical integration of our copper alloys division.
That investment has expanded our production capacity, improved lead times to support higher sales, delivered substantial variable cost savings through better labor utilization and increased production efficiencies. As many of you saw, we released our fiscal year 2023 results last week. Consolidated sales grew by 15% in the year over the prior year period and increased in the quarter by 6% over the prior year. Copper alloy sales rose by 51.3% quarter-on-quarter and by 57.1% year-over-year. Those gains were offset by lower sales in our Engineered Materials Division. For the year, IBC booked a loss of $5.9 million, which compares to a loss of $1.1 million in fiscal year 2022.
Taking a closer look at copper alloy and their performance, revenue was primarily driven by increased demand from customers in the electronic sector, power generation, clean energy, and marine defense. The division's gross margin also strengthened in the year to 23.1% from 14.9% in the prior year. Operating performance has remained strong as the division continues to take advantage of lower costs and greater efficiencies resulting from its consolidated foundry and forge operations. Our engineered materials division has had a difficult year, driven largely by an extremely sharp drop-off in orders from the semiconductor chip manufacturing sector. While the prospects for long-term growth in this sector are very good, given the ever-increasing demand for computer chips and the Internet of Things, IBC has been subject to relatively wide swings in demand from our customers. This is often challenging to manage.
Demand for beryllium aluminum products in defense markets remains robust, as evidenced by our recent purchase order from Lockheed Martin for $7.38 million for components for the F-35 aircraft. However, as I noted in previous calls, we continue to face challenges with yields in some of our more geometrically complex parts. Our team continues to work on this, and yields have improved somewhat, but they remain suboptimal. As we announced previously, we are exploring strategic options regarding the engineered materials division with potential partners, investors, and others, including potential joint ventures, a restructuring, a sale, or other options.... Looking ahead, as you'll see in the slides when you get them, we provide a high-level summary of our primary strategic growth initiatives.
First to note is the fact that we successfully consolidated three copper alloy facilities into one vertically integrated production facility in Franklin, Indiana. That continues to deliver benefits to the company in terms of higher sales, lower costs, efficiency gains, and gross margin improvement that we expected to achieve through this vertical integration. We're actively pursuing new markets for our copper alloys products and are in fact, selling products into several markets that are new to us. While these sales and customer applications are still in the developmental stage, they do promise significant revenue growth in the future. Finally, we're continuing our product development, development efforts in our Engineered Materials Division with beryllium aluminum materials. To close, let me reiterate a few of the longer-term macro growth trends that are continuing to drive demand for our products.
Defense applications are increasingly looking for lighter weight alloys and other chemistries that help them accomplish specific emissions with greater effectiveness and less environmental impact. Production of specialty alloys to meet these need is exactly what we do best at IBC. As markets for electric vehicles and hybrid vehicles expand around the world, all forecasts see significantly higher demand for copper and copper alloys. That's very bullish for IBC's Copper Alloys Division. Our Copper Alloys Division is producing specialty alloys for several advanced energy and defense applications. While we cannot disclose much about those applications at this point for competitive reasons, we are pretty excited about the future growth in these markets. Finally, the rapidly growing use of microsatellites and other space applications presents very significant opportunities for our Engineered Materials Division, which has been producing beryllium aluminum components for satellites for some years now.
Now, with that, Toni and I would be happy to take questions from the audience.
Hey, thank you, Mark. And again, this is Jim Sims, folks. I'm sorry, we're not able to show the slides. Not sure why that's the case, but we will send the slides to this deck and a recording of the audio presentation out to all of the attendees once we get done. Let's move on to questions. We have a series of questions that investors have sent in in the last few days. So Mark and Tony, let me start with those. The first question we got comes from Harry, an investor, who asks: What are some of the strategic alternatives that you are considering for your beryllium aluminum business? Could it include a sale? And if so, what do you think the valuation of that business might be?
Yeah, great question. I think we've kind of answered the question in terms of all the options that we're looking at, but it does include the possibility of a sale, and in doing so, we would have to value the business. So there's two components to that that I think are important. The first is just your basic economic evaluation, and of course, that's not going to turn out very robust because of the financial performance that we realized in the division. However, having said that, I strongly believe to this day that we have extremely good value in that business because of the trade secrets and the know-how that we have developed over the years in casting beryllium aluminum alloys.
So I don't know what the exact numbers will look like, but I'm sure that as we look at that possibility of a sale, the buying party and the selling party, as always, will do their own evaluations, and we will certainly take into account the trade secret and other intellectual property that we have at the facility, which I think is very valuable.
Okay, our next question is: Supply of copper could become a problem in the future, so copper prices, are they going to soar? Could that be an issue for IBC?
Yeah, again, it's a very astute observation and one that we are certainly conscious of and looking at and evaluating constantly. As we take a look at just the electric vehicle revolution that's occurring right now, we're looking at the copper demand in vehicles going from less than 400 pounds per vehicle to well over 500, close to 600 pounds of copper per vehicle. Our current worldwide supply of copper in its present form is not going to be sufficient to handle that by itself. So as China gets through its economic doldrums and the world economy picks up again, which it always does, we're going to see increased demand for copper coming, and I strongly believe we will see increased prices as a result.
We do two things at IBC to control that issue. The first one is, we make sure that we have provisions in some of our contracts that allow for the price of the material that we're producing or the part that we're producing, to escalate or decrease as well, based on the price of copper. There are certain thresholds that have to be exceeded one way or the other, and then, it's a very fair contract between the parties and IBC under that situation, does not assume or assumes very little risk in terms of the price of copper.
The second form of protection that we provide or risk mitigation we provide is we do try to make sure that when we have a copper sale, that we buy that copper material where it's not protected by contract. We buy that copper material very close in time to when the actual sale occurs to our customer. With that close proximity and time, we can actually do very well in terms of protecting the company and mitigating that risk of copper prices escalating. So those are the two things that we do. Toni, did you want to add anything to that?
I would just say that the copper division is very conscious of the market. They twice a day, if not more, go out and check the market, and they do adjust their prices on every single PO as need be to protect the company, so.
Something we watch very closely.
Yes.
Okay, here's a question: will IBC still play a role in the plans of NioCorp in terms of producing aluminum scandium alloy ingots at the Elk Creek project if IBC only has a copper division, assuming something we sell or move on with the EM division? How do you see those synergies potentially?
Yeah, again, a very, very good question, and one that I get quite often. I don't see the Engineered Materials Division or Copper Division situations impacting any relationship that we have with NioCorp. It's a very strong relationship, and it's the overall metallurgical expertise that IBC brings to the table, and they have that expertise in both the EMC Division and the Copper Division. And so I don't see that impacting, you know, that relationship at all. And we've actually been in discussions with some of the metallurgists at EMC as we're developing the master alloy business over at NioCorp.
So, that has worked out very well, and again, it's the metallurgical expertise that IBC brings to the table, and they have a couple of metallurgists over in the copper side that are extremely helpful in that regard as well. So that will remain a strong relationship, and we wanna take advantage of the experience that they bring to the table.
Here's another question on copper. You have discussed in the past that the Copper Division sees enhanced opportunities in defense sales. Can you comment on what the Copper Division is currently doing for the military and any prospective growth?
Yeah, and I have to—again, great, great question, 'cause we have talked about that, and it's one of those things that we talk about, and then we can't really answer many of the specifics and questions because it does involve defense work. But where we're highly focused is areas in the Department of Defense, where copper, lightweight copper, corrosion-resistant copper, which would include copper beryllium alloys, by the way, where those things are important, that's where we're working. And so, you know, you can go onto multiple DoD websites and figure that out pretty quick, that it's the marine defense sector that it is largely looking at the copper alloys, including copper beryllium alloys, to meet their specifications with various vehicles and applications that they have.
Hopefully, that helps a little bit.
Yeah, I'll add, Mark, there is a lot we'd like to talk about in this area, and we hope to in the future. We just can't quite do that yet, but it's kinda exciting. Another question is, what is the reaction of management on the potential OSHA fines in respect to beryllium exposure?
Yeah, again, it's nothing that anyone likes to have in terms of OSHA penalties or findings of non-compliance. But I can assure everyone that this is taken very seriously at the highest level. In fact, Tony and I were both engaged in all of the phone calls and settlement conferences with OSHA to resolve this matter. And we do have some things that we do need to fix, and we are in the process of fixing as we speak.
I think the key thing that I keep in the back of my mind as we go through this is that although there were some what they call permissible exposure limits that were exceeded in the work area, you know, we protect our employees with personal protective equipment, and we follow up on that by doing blood tests of all of our employees on a very frequent basis, and we don't have one non-compliance with employee blood levels for beryllium. So we are protecting our employees. We will continue to protect our employees, and I think the real issue that we have to resolve between OSHA and IBC is OSHA would like to see more engineering, administrative controls, and less personal protective equipment.
So we're working with OSHA in a cooperative manner, and we will make sure that we explore all of the engineering and administrative solutions. But certainly, in the meantime, we will continue to use personal protective equipment to make sure that our employees are protected at all times. But, you know, I welcome the OSHA audits. It's another set of eyes that really helps us take a look at things that we kind of gloss over because we're there every day. And I really welcome their attention, and they really worked with us in a cooperative way. So that's our culture. You know, again, never proud to get any notice of non-compliance, but I feel very good about how protected our employees are, and we will work cooperatively with OSHA to resolve any and all of those issues.
All right. I've got several questions, Mark and Toni, along the same path, so I'll kind of combine these three or four. It's basically, how do you see the path to cash flow positive quarters or earnings? How long do you expect this to take, and what are your assumptions for the Engineered Materials Division under these circumstances?
Tony, I'll start out and then ask that you, you help fill in any of the blanks, but, you know, our, our, our method moving forward here has been to take a very hard look at the Copper Alloys Division with the multiple advantages that they can provide as a result of the investment we made in that business. And that is a business that I consider foundational to the company. It's steady. The growth that we can realize there with the expansion and consolidation that we've done is being realized, and we will continue to realize additional growth. So I really think copper is in a good situation.
We just need to make sure that we always have enough cash in the treasury so that we can purchase the raw materials and feedstock materials that they need to serve their customers. We've really turned that corner, and I think are seeing a better situation in allowing copper to grow the way that we all wanted them to grow. Not particularly worried about copper. EMC, on the other hand, has been very, very complicated for us. We had a commercial chip sector customer that went from $9 million of revenue to less than $500,000 of revenue in less than a year. That is very, very difficult to manage, and we did as best we could.
We have gotten price increases across the board for all of the products that we sell at EMC. We have definitely, as a result of those price increases, put EMC in a better position. But we need to take a hard look at that business and either continue to get price increases that warrant keeping that business open or take a look at all these different options. Selling the division, partnering with somebody else, you know, the whole gamut of positions that we put out there. But I am happy with what we've done, particularly on the defense side at EMC and the price increases that we realized there, and that does put EMC in a much better position financially, but not good enough yet, and so we've got to keep working on price increases.
Toni, anything you want to add?
I'll just add a little bit. It is great to be in front of this group and to have a chance to talk to all of you. I just wanna say thank you to everyone for all of your support. I know it's been a very trying couple years that we've had here, and you've stuck with us. Believe me, we take this very seriously, and we take you very seriously. As you can imagine, it's been a tricky road the last year, and it will continue to be that for a while. Because we're trying to support the copper division with the capital that they need and the material they need, while at the same time supporting the EM division with their needs. So, it's working.
We believe we've got a path and we'll see what the next year brings.
Thanks, Toni. I'll recognize one question we just can't answer, and that is, but I'll say this: Can you elaborate in some more detail on the above-mentioned strategic options? And I think we've addressed that. Apologies, Matthias, we can't really go any further than what we said so far, but stay tuned. And I'll finish with one more question. Given the ridiculously low share price, we all agree with that, is the company or management looking at buying more at these prices?
Within the confines of what and when we can buy, there is nothing I'd like to do more than own more of the company. So the answer is yes, but the rules and regulations governing what a CEO and a CFO can do for purchasing shares is very restrictive, so it does create multiple problems for us.
Good way of answering that. All right, we're gonna wrap up, folks. I really apologize for not showing the slides, but what I will do is send out, in the next couple of hours, a recording of this call with the audio, and then I will line those up with the slides that Zoom wouldn't let us show, so you'll be able to see the presentation. And then again, if you didn't get a question that you were able to pose or we weren't able to get to it, there are a couple more here that I don't think we can get to, I will get back to you. Jim will get back to you, directly on those questions. Some we'll be able to answer, some I won't, but we'll give our best shot.
For those of you who have anything else, we'll talk to you very shortly. Thank you for joining us this morning. We sure appreciate it. Take care.
Yeah. Thanks, everybody.