Planet MicroCap Showcase: TORONTO 2025

Oct 22, 2025

David from Omni-Lite. Good afternoon. My name is David Robbins, and I'm CEO of Omni-Lite Industries Canada Inc. I'm here today to tell you the story of Omni-Lite. So who we are, Omni-Lite is a manufacturer of precision aerospace and defense components and a consolidator of aerospace and defense technologies. We currently have a market cap of $20 million USD, on 15 million shares, an annual revenue rate of about $15 million. We generate cash debt-free. We trade under the symbol OML on the TSXV and OLNCF on OTC. The Omni-Lite timeline is anchored by its legacy of manufacturing aerospace and defense fastener components. It rebirthed itself, in a sense, in 2018 with the acquisition of Monsite Corp, expanding its technology into defense electronics, and acquired a new leadership team. That's where I became involved with the company at the end of 2018 as CEO. In 2022, we added investment casting technology to the platform through an acquisition of DPCast. Notable organic technology milestones in 2024 were qualifying complete Boeing and Airbus fastener system components, as well as a gallium nitride (GaN) switch driver with a wide range of air defense implications. In 2025, we acquired ECOMP, a distribution channel for specialized defense electronics, selling to the Department of Defense and the Defense Logistics Agency. Our basic investment thesis on Omni-Lite is built on three pillars. Number one, our legacy of positioning in the tailwinds of a healthy and robust aerospace and defense industry. Two, a leverageable platform for operating efficiency. Three, a scalable platform through acquisition. Our focus on building a reputation has been supplying niche, non-commoditized components to its customers, which leads to customer loyalty, higher margins in the aerospace and defense market, where there's really a stressed supplier base. We have developed and utilized cloud-based business systems and methodology, which provides financial quality, IT, and compliance support, delivering operating leverage. These platform competencies are an opportunity for acquisitions where a highly fragmented landscape of $1 million to $5 million EBITDA target entities exists that have an aerospace and defense technology, but suffer from a lack of what I call business systems. The commercial air transport market has rebounded beyond its 2019 pre-COVID peak and has demonstrated that people using air travel is a need and not just a desire. When I got involved with Omni-Lite Industries Canada Inc. back in 2019, I remember we were really positioning the company to be more aerospace and defense. I think I came out in Q3 of that year in 2019 saying there isn't a better commercial air transport, there isn't a better place to be. There's no headwinds, risk-free, and a robust outlook. Of course, the 737 Max crashes and the COVID kind of had a bump on the road, but it's been amazing. It was painful for a year, but I think the whole industry has been amazed at how much the commercial air transport has rebounded. It still has some bumps, but it's a pretty good market to be in. The defense market landscape is a bit different. It doesn't really have on the top line the growth potential, but there are niches, there are places to be that are well funded. If it's in line with funding priorities like security and threat deterrence, then there's a lot of growth opportunity based on the world dynamics today. We've been fortunate enough that a lot of our components are finding themselves in those kinds of systems. For us, there's an equally growth from the defense marketplace as in commercial air transport. The manufacturing landscape really is dominated by large footprint manufacturers. These manufacturers are stressed and they're having to reshore some operations and have real problems with skilled labor shortage. Our speed and agility, coupled with our focus on niche manufacturing opportunities, really drive us taking market share. I can't stress enough about our positioning versus our competition. Large manufacturers, they've been decimated by a lot of retirement, skilled labor shortages, and really an inability to retool and retrain. Just lots of policies. A small agile company, we position it to be able to attract new talent and with the skilled, more in line with the skilled workforce of the modern younger generation. That's been a real advantage for us. It's still a challenge for us too, but I think on a comparative basis compared to these big, our competition, billion dollar companies, we're taking our market share. Our basic business model is to basically qualify products on programs and platforms that have ongoing needs, usually measured in decades, either decades of support or just decades of producing the components. We like to call these annuities. They have some sort of an annual application. They don't always have a cycle within a year, but certainly within an 18 or 24 month period, you're going to get revenue and it's going to recur and recur and keep recurring. That's what our basic business model is. Again, with niche components, non-commoditized components, because in many cases, if you're not the sole source, you're the source that has been supplying it for the last, let's say, five or six years with limited competition, not no competition, but limited. If you do a good job, you successfully move from qualification to production. If you're on time, high quality, no defects, no returns, you earn the right to capture a new part to manufacture. This cycle starts with customer engagement, goes to winning in three months to winning the business. Usually, it's an engineering order and then qualification, which moves to initial production and then full scale production. That timeframe can probably at its fastest happen in six months, but it's more likely to happen in 12 months to 18 months. This becomes a bit of our flywheel. What earns the right to go around the flywheel again is you do a good job. We've had many releases I can point to in the last year and a half or two years where I mentioned that a bit of our revenue is new products. That's what I'm talking about, a new product that we captured that we booked an order for that in 18 months should end up with some revenue in production type revenue. We primarily sell to tier one and tier two system integrators. We're many market leaders themselves. We're 70% aerospace and defense, 25% industrial and automotive, and 5% other. Within the aerospace and defense, we're about 50/50 commercial aerospace and 50% defense. A little bit of that mix is based on our group. We have really the three operating groups. The metal forming group in Cerritos, California, has a little bit more disproportionate commercial aerospace versus defense just by the nature of those fastener products. On castings in Brampton, Ontario, they have the same thing. It's a little bit more weighted towards commercial air transport and a little less defense. Our electronics is almost exclusively defense. It ends up being a blended 50/50 of that mix. I would expect as we grow, we're going to attract new customers. I would say 70 to 80% of the business is going to be through our existing customers because we're dealing with most of the major tier one and tier two integrators. We look to expand. There are some, especially tier two players that are up and coming themselves that we're going to grow in that area too. Any of the industrial and automotive, it needs to pass our targets, our financial targets. Typically, if they're very niches themselves, they're in very high parts of the drive chain that operate much like an airplane. We're not really looking to build that business. Where it exists, meets our margin, we hold on to it. Certainly, any acquisition that we'd be looking at, we would expect to have probably a similar profile. Moving to that, our acquisition criterion starts with its position as a supplier of precision components to aerospace and defense, you know, with some legacy. It has to have a business model that can deliver our 25% EBITDA target. Our target size is really $2 million to $10 million in revenue and a $1 million to $5 million EBITDA range. We're a value buyer, and an ideal target has a strong reputation of delivering product that is invested in manufacturing equipment and trained personnel, but probably is not invested in business systems that are critical to extracting profitability in line with its value that it's delivering and profitable scaling the business. This profile can map to a more favorable valuation, decreases our competition level, and is likely to meet our 15% ROIC revenue target for acquisitions. We've been growing at a 20% compound annual growth rate, positive cash flow coming out of COVID and our DPCast acquisition. We have not yet attained our target growth and profitability models, but are steadily improving. A theme we operate under is you have to first operate profitably and then invest in growth. We have some significant opportunities to increase the trajectory of our profit improvement with pricing heading into 2025. Our target parameters are to double revenue every three to four years and deliver an adjusted EBITDA of 25%. These targets are somewhat aspirational, but are absolutely achievable. It is anchored in the concept that we will be successful in acquiring and growing aerospace and defense businesses, and that is what we intend to do. Thank you. Any questions? Sure. If you're setting these businesses to execute, what do you hear of technology being a new growth trajectory? Do you see that as a growth opportunity right now? You said 15% of. No business in oil and gas? Yeah, so 15% in oil and gas, do we see that as a growth potential? There is some potential there. We're going to be prudent about it. We're looking for niche applications that have the same profit margin as the aerospace and defense. Interestingly enough, in oil and gas, there are some really specialty metals and alloys that you use to reduce wear. It would not surprise me. It's not necessarily a target, but they're a customer of ours for castings, and it would not surprise me if there was some growth. Yes. In regards to your annual chip rate, could you expand a bit more on what you believe is a big pay in that? What do you value in the chip rate, and how you plan on moving it going forward? The way we look at it, to meet that 15% ROIC, there's different metrics you can look at. I would say it falls in the bin on a five times forward EBITDA multiple, which could be 7% on a trailing basis. We really build a sophisticated model based on what it can do for the organization, what it can contribute going forward. We build a model, and at a five times forward, it should meet that 15% ROIC. At a seven, which can translate to something in the order of six to eight, let's say, trailing. It's competitive. There are sellers out there or other buyers that are paying 10 times trailing, and we're not participating at that rate. We feel there's enough targets out there that meet that profile. Typically, if you're going to buy on that basis, there's a bit of hair on that type of target. As I alluded to in the presentation, if it's the type of thing that Omni-Lite can fix—business systems, put some methodology to how they price, how they engage their customer, sort of rationalize some of the low margin business—those are things we can achieve fast. There are a lot of targets out there. They've got a position in aerospace defense. Companies started in the 1980s and 1990s. The founders are getting older, and it's not big enough to really attract the TransDynes of the world or HYCO, and would be a great fit for Omni-Lite. The landscape is there's a lot of targets, hundreds. You talked about the program lifecycle. I'm curious if you have any programs that are ramping up in the next few years that are providing some growth visibility for you. Yes, early in Q1, we announced I think a $5.5 million bookings for the quarter. When we're running at $3 to $4 million revenue, that's a good book to bill. That announcement really is for tens, some double digit growth for at least that product. That's all deliverable in a year, year and a half. That'll directly translate to growth. That was interestingly enough when I mentioned in 2024 that we had qualified at Boeing and Airbus a complete fastener system. That's what I was alluding to. Qualifying in 2024 translates to a $5 million, well, it was a $2 million booking. Two out of the five that we booked for the quarter was from that booking we made in 2024, 18 months later or 12 months later, has the ability to generate about $1 million worth of revenue on that new. That's one that's hitting this year. The gallium nitride (GaN) sensor electronics is something I've mentioned in the last quarter, smaller booking, but we're qualified. That portends some growth. It's a missile defense. It's used for drone interdiction and drone detection. A lot of needs in there. It wouldn't surprise me if there's some announcements about GaN drivers and also missile defense in general. There's been announced we're on PAC-3, which is a major missile program, and the government's talking about quadrupling the size of the demand on that. Those are the types of things that we see growth opportunity. Really all of our groups, I think the thing to watch for in announcements is bookings. I refer to them as new product wins. It doesn't mean it's instant, but it means within a 12 or 18 months, you should see if it's a $50,000 booking in 2025, it translates typically maybe to a 10 times in production what it is as a new product. Those are some sort of benchmarks you could use to predict growth. Yeah, sure. You touched on lessons learned from the DPCast acquisition. What has and hasn't worked? Lessons learned from DP. I think I've answered that one quite a bit, but it doesn't hurt to answer it again. We did the acquisition of DPCast in late 2021, early 2022. It was really in the end of COVID or during COVID. In fact, I couldn't really see DPCast until October 11, I think I remember it, October 11, 2021. They opened up the borders. I was able to finally see it. We had been talking with them. I love the company in the sense that it was putting castings on jet engines. It had a nice position with Pratt & Whitney. It had some tier one, really good customers and a good legacy. What they did have is a five-year LTA, long-term pricing agreement that basically I could not get out of. I thought that it may be in my power of persuasion that I could persuade somebody like Pratt & Whitney that our parts were so important that it doesn't make sense to be underwater. What we did when we put our systems in, we found out how much underpriced those parts were. We found it out fairly quickly. I think the lesson learned was that if I had to do that again, it was under a long-term agreement with a company like Pratt & Whitney. I would build into my model that I wouldn't have the ability to change that pricing. That might even be something I would stay away from or at least take it under advisement that it may be difficult to renegotiate that. Other than that, that's a big one because that's been an overhang on our profitability profile for four years now. It's taking a little time to get them to where they were contributing because that's important. I would say for the most part, other than that, that's been the single and biggest lesson learned on the DP. I'd love to find another company like that that wasn't under any LTA, and that would be a good target. Sure. The company's already pretty diversified geographically by the nature of the manufacturing operations. When you're looking at potential M&A, do you think it makes sense to focus on a particular geography or particular castings or electronics in order to be able to get some synergies and economize on the management effort? Right. The question is, you know, we're already geographically split apart. How does that factor into our thinking going forward? The most important thing about the geography of the business is the location to their customer. There's a real advantage when you're co-located in the same geography. There's really not much geographical advantage of the different operating units unless there is a real business synergy. Today, the three businesses share the same business systems, which is all cloud-based, and geographies know the leverage is attained that way. It's possible that there is a synergistic business that would want to be co-located. Having said that, ideally adding a new technology would be geography ubiquitous, but an acquisition that had some synergy, we would look to co-locate. The fact that we're already the only missing place really in aerospace and defense is the Midwest, the two coasts, and up here, we're already sort of covering the major geographies. We feel like we're in a good spot to be able to attract the type of targets, and we're not excluding any geography. Yeah. How do tariffs affect you? Tariffs do have a small impact on our business that we sell commodities from Canada into the U.S. It's manageable through commodity coding, but it's not zero. It's not anything like the numbers you might read on the news. We do get hit a little bit. Again, it's pretty de minimis, not zero on some of the materials that we buy from the U.S. using in Canada. Because we get a pass, we're not subject to tariff because most of our business is either the aerospace or defense. There's coding that eliminates the tariff. What's a little bit more of a pain is that it does take some overhead. These things have to get watched really carefully, and it takes some time. We've been able to manage that and take very little impact from the tariffs.