Hi, once again, I'm Ryan Brinkman. We're going to get going now with our first presentation. Very happy to have with us marquee auto parts supplier Aptiv, including their Chair and Chief Executive Officer. To my right, Kevin Clark, and on the end, Varun Laroyia, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Kevin and Varun, thanks so much for coming to the conference.
Thanks for having us. It's been a pleasure.
Maybe to start, coming off a strong second quarter, you commented that your reinstated 2025 outlook contains some elements of conservatism around the second half, industry builds, etc. You're sitting on a really strong balance sheet, $1.4 billion cash. How do you think about capital allocation in light of your performance year to date, your expectations for the remainder of the year, and the market backdrop that arguably remains a bit uncertain?
Sure. I'll start, and Varun can certainly chime in on it. The second quarter was very strong for us. From a backdrop standpoint, vehicle production was stronger than what we'd expected in Q2. We thought there would be some tariff impact beginning to affect vehicle production in Q2. We didn't see it. Production was much stronger. We think there may have been a little bit of pull ahead into Q2, just from a consumer demand standpoint that resulted in our OEMs increasing vehicle production. We continue to see strength in July, so it gives us incremental confidence in our Q3 outlook.
As Ryan had said, we'd basically, we've been presuming that we were going to see some softening at some point in time during 2025 as a result of tariffs, under the presumption that at some point OEMs would be pushing price increases through or reducing sales incentives, and that ultimately would impact end consumer demand and therefore vehicle production. We haven't seen it yet. We have baked some of that into our back half outlook. We do see a, or our forecast assumes some slowing principally in Q4. We'll see how that plays out. If it doesn't play out, quite frankly, there'll be upside to our guidance, which is a positive. The second quarter, first half of the year, I do want to add to my response to Ryan's question. The business performed extremely well.
In addition to getting the benefit of vehicle production, when you look at what we've delivered from a manufacturing efficiency, from an engineering productivity standpoint, from an SG&A productivity standpoint, operationally, we executed extremely well. I'd say we're back to and even better than where we were pre-COVID from an overall, the factory operating and connecting the full integrated supply chain. It's translated into strong margin expansion, although we've had this year significant FX headwinds, principally the peso, but very strong operating productivity, very strong cash flow generation. I think to answer the last part of Ryan's question, our real focus is how do we continue to take our existing portfolio, expand into industrial markets. We've obviously made a lot of progress in our Engineered Components Group business. We're making progress in our Advanced Safety and User Experience business as well as our Electrical Distribution Systems business.
We'll continue to push that organically, as well as inorganically, in an intelligent way. Given where we sit today from a cash generation standpoint, we've made a decision we will be back in the market, repurchasing stock in the back half of this year, just given where our stock sits today, which I think is important for you as investors in our view that we can quite easily do smart M&A while at the same time we can return cash to shareholders, especially when we're in situations like we are today where our view is our stock's significantly undervalued.
Great, thanks. You referenced tariffs. How have you managed the direct impact on your company? How are you thinking about the indirect impact going forward in terms of the potential for demand destruction as automakers raise prices? Have you changed your estimate of the normalized level of U.S. light vehicle sales or North America production as a result?
Yeah, that's the question. The indirect piece is tough to give a precise answer to. I think it's implied in our back half guidance from a vehicle production standpoint that there is some impact. We haven't seen it yet, but I think it's reasonable to assume that there will be some impact over the long term. As it relates to direct impact, for us, it's been de minimis. I mean, literally, it's been de minimis. Part of that is we've been very focused over the last, really since the first Trump administration, from a supply chain management standpoint, really focused on regionalizing our supply chain. In region, for region, our supply chain visibility on a global basis, I would say, is the best in the industry.
We have a digital twin of our global supply chain where we have the ability to go down multiple levels in terms of where we source and, quite frankly, where we don't source from so that we have visibility for alternatives. A long time ago, we made the decision to really push towards regionalization where we've had potential direct impacts. We've already made shifts in terms of who we're sourcing from and where that's located. There have been a few areas where we weren't able to address from a supply chain standpoint, and we've been able to pass that on to our customers with agreements, with contractual agreements, but also with a commitment that we're going to work jointly together to find alternatives to reduce that pressure on them. That amount is relatively small.
I'd say the one area that we're focused on and watching, we just don't know enough about it yet. There's not enough clarity, is the potentially proposed semiconductor tariffs and how that plays out. Obviously, a big part of what we do is reliant upon advanced compute, reliant upon semiconductor chips. That's something that we're watching closely.
Thanks. As far as how the tariff backdrop may evolve going forward, we've seen a trend of tariff rates coming down, with the UK getting a 10% rate, Japan 12.5%, EU and Korea 15%. Yet Canada and Mexico remain at 25%. How do you see that maybe evolving? Any look ahead to the six-year joint review of USMCA scheduled for July 2026 and the potential impact to Aptiv given your large operations in Mexico, particularly for EDS?
Yeah, 95% of what comes into the U.S. for Aptiv comes in through Mexico, and of that, over 99% is USMCA compliant. USMCA is very, very important. Our view, based on our discussions with the administration here in the U.S. as well as in Mexico, importantly where we have strong relationships as well, is USMCA will stay in place. The U.S. administration will be pushing for more U.S. content, that their real focus is vehicle assembly in the United States. When you think about the nature of those jobs and the pay associated with those jobs, when you look at it from a parts standpoint, other than engine parts, really, things will stay in place as they are, as they operate today. We used to get a lot of questions, for example, about our EDS wire harness business.
That's one where the administration and the industries work very closely together, that there's no situation where that's going to move to the U.S., and there's no situation where that's going to be subject to tariffs. Between the U.S., Mexico, and Canada, you're going to see more driving as well, more content across the three countries. Those standards will go up, but we think it's going to be actually very manageable. Mexico has played this very well. They're very supportive of the U.S. administration and are willing to do, I'd say, just about anything to make sure USMCA stays in place, given the importance of USMCA and job creation in Mexico, as you can imagine. So far, things look like they're going to play out reasonably well.
As it relates to tariffs overall, tariff rates, I think it's reasonable to assume that with the exception of China, you're going to see tariffs stay in place and they're going to drift around 10% - 15% depending. That's going to be kind of the lowest level and virtually every country will be subject to tariffs.
That's helpful. Thank you. Next, I wanted to ask what your very latest outlook is for vehicle electrification, including in light of the recent changes to the regulatory backdrop, such as the elimination of the $7,500 U.S. federal consumer tax credit and the relaxed enforcement of greenhouse gas and corporate average fuel economy standards. How has your outlook evolved and in what ways might you be running the business or allocating capital any differently as a result?
Yeah, so our view, maybe for people here, IHS still has a forecast where by 2030, EV penetration, which would be BEVs, plug-in hybrids, hybrids, would represent basically 70% of vehicles produced globally. That's their general outlook. Our outlook is closer to 50%. Our view is you're going to continue to see very strong adoption in China. That will continue. In Europe, you'll see stronger commitment or we're seeing stronger commitment to EV and BEV adoption than what we certainly have here in the U.S. Although, as you all know, the targets have been moved out a couple of years and the EU is still working with the member countries in terms of how do they settle with a more holistic sort of CO2 targets and how do they support member states in terms of achieving those targets.
As you know, a number of the OEMs are working directly with them. Here in the U.S., our view is EV adoption is basically flat. You're not going to see growth. You'll see growth in some growth in hybrid, plug-in hybrid. Having said that, we'd tell you virtually all of our OEM customers are working on BEV platforms. You saw the announcement from Ford as an example. The way I would explain that to you is all of them believe that if they need, if they're going to be competitive globally, they need an EV vehicle. All of them are working on those sorts of solutions that it'll be very low volume here in the U.S. for the foreseeable future for the reasons that the long list that Ryan went through. EVs are very beneficial to Aptiv when we talk about content opportunities.
BEVs, it presents a two and a half times content opportunity relative to a nice vehicle on plug-in hybrids. It's almost two. It's good for us from a growth standpoint. Our general view is where we'll see opportunity is in Europe, slower than what people were anticipating previously. It'll continue to move very quickly in China. In North America, it will be fairly flat.
Great, thank you. The next question relates to your approach to adapting to the rapid growth of domestic Chinese automakers. At the conference last year, we asked each of the suppliers to update us on their current exposure to Chinese automakers and to outline any plans to increase that exposure going forward. The answer that I think investors were looking for was that suppliers were doing absolutely everything and anything they could to hitch their wagon to that star. I wanted to check in a year later after Chinese automakers probably grew even more quickly than was imagined, took even more share. At the same time, there are these headlines about them commanding very favorable pricing and payment terms with suppliers. The government even recently encouraged automakers to sign a pledge to please pay suppliers on time.
What's your sense of the dynamic there and what is your approach to balancing the opportunity for growth with commercial discipline?
Yeah, so I was going to say you have to define star, right? At the end of the day, for us, it's profitability. Now, the China market, we've been there for almost four decades and we've been in China for China. For us, it never was a source for other countries. It's actually the perfect market as you think about technology development and advancement. It's, quite frankly, ideal given the pace of change. We use that. The market is competitive. Our real focus is on the top 10 OEMs. In reality, given growth in market share, it's really the top five that for us really, really matter in terms of market share penetration and true revenue growth. Being with BYD, being with Geely, being with Chang’an, being with Chery and Great Wall, that's where our most significant focus is.
The other is, you know, the next five, it's a bit more opportunistic. We're really focused on those that are taking vehicles overseas. We're working with BYD in terms of their plans in Europe, what they're doing in South America as an example, because we can bring incremental value. Although we're making progress from a booking standpoint to match our revenues with a mix of local versus non-local, we're not going to be a slave to it at the cost of cash flow and profitability. We're not. We'll continue to gain in terms from a market share standpoint with that mix of customers, but our real focus is how do we continue to generate profits in China that are, you know, that have acceptable returns, right? Quite frankly, I don't know.
No, I think that's comprehensive, Kevin. Yeah. Great, thanks. Moving to the EDS spin, could you discuss the ways in which the spin can enhance value creation through optimizing capital allocation going forward? For example, have there been, or do you anticipate that there could be potential acquisitions that would be financially or strategically attractive to EDS to pursue on its own, but which might not meet the parent company's hurdle rates for margin or growth? Conversely, will new Aptiv be freer now to pursue higher growth or higher margin targets that might have been deemed too dilutive to valuation inclusive of EDS? Of the various motivating factors for the acquisition, where does capital allocation optimization rank? Just how large is the opportunity, do you think, for value creation in this area on both the EDS and new Aptiv sides?
I guess for us, factored into capital allocation is capital returns, and I think that was the primary focus, right? I should start with the EDS business is a great business. Competitively, it's the number one or number two player in literally every market it operates in. It's on one of every four or five vehicles produced globally. The market position of EDS is significant. When you look at the margin profile of EDS, it's almost 2X any of its competitors in the global wire harness business. The reason for that is the bulk of their business is, we refer to it as full service. They design, manufacture, and supply. In doing so, they're able to drive more value to customers and higher margins.
They operate in an industry today where there are a number of players that do build to print items like that, which is reflected in their margins. Our view is there's opportunity to consolidate within automotive in that space. We'll see if that plays out. The reality is, virtually everything you think about has a wire harness, right? Whether it's a drone, it's a robot, it's a humanoid, we can go through the whole list. It has a wire harness. One of their big focus areas is going to be how do they, in an intelligent way, take the technology that they develop and deliver today in a very demanding environment and apply that to other markets in an intelligent way. Being standalone will give them a lot more flexibility to do it.
In fact, today we have a customer who's taken us into satellite space, energy infrastructure, robotics as a start, and we think we can leverage that know-how. On the RemainCo side, you think about our Engineered Components Group, similar to what I was talking about in terms of EDS, everything has an interconnect. To the extent you see more cameras, more radar, more lidar, more sensors, you need interconnect solutions. You need high-speed cable assemblies. You need all that. There's tremendous opportunity that remains in automotive as more content goes on the car, as well as opportunities outside of automotive. It'll be a very big focus area. On the Advanced Safety and User Experience side, as you think about M&A, I would say it's more partnering, more investments with technology partners than it is straight out M&A from a software standpoint. Those will be areas of focus as well.
Our view is given the focus, given the more focused portfolio, given the capital structures and businesses that generate cash flow, there's all sorts of opportunities to grow and generate returns for shareholders. Quite frankly, in both businesses at the same time, return cash to shareholders.
Yeah, you know, the benefits of the EDS spin, they do seem obvious. As a financial analyst, I also think there's a tremendous, you know, sum of parts valuation opportunity there. At the same time, I also found quite compelling the earlier proposition of there being significant benefits to supplying both the brain and the nervous system of the vehicle, perhaps that by designing them closely in conjunction under the same roof, that maybe they would work more harmoniously together, enabling simplification, cost reduction by pursuing a whole systems approach. Do you see any potential for revenue disynergies or how can you mitigate that risk? How do you plan to go to market? How would it work for highly integrated solutions such as smart vehicle architecture? Would Aptiv's Engineered Components Group serve as a tier two supplier to EDS or would they be officially allied?
Would they be a preferred partner? How's that going to work?
Yeah, so our view is because of the transaction, there should be no revenue disynergy. Let me start with that. The second piece, just backdrop on how we run our businesses. Our businesses are global standalone P&Ls. We have very little overlap. We have no overlap from a manufacturing standpoint. We have very little overlap from a technical or engineering footprint standpoint. We have some overlap when you think about G&A overhead, right? From a facility standpoint, not from a management standpoint. Those businesses are global. They're managed at regional levels with regional MDs. They all have P&Ls, balance sheets, cash flow statements. The relationship between our sister companies is arm's length. It's commercial. It's not driven by, you know, tax planning in terms of where we put profits. It's truly a commercial sort of negotiation.
Where we develop full system solutions is where the business leaders get together and decide we have a particular edge in an area or a relationship. You have a particular capability. How do we come together to do that? The reality is we do that with outside suppliers too. That's something that we'll just continue to do. In a weird way, for those of you that haven't operated in industrial companies, sometimes it's easier when you don't have a brother-sister company in terms of how they get along and how do they work together. We think there's tremendous opportunity that will continue. Engineered Components Group operates today as a tier two to Electrical Distribution Systems. Just like TE operates as a tier two to Electrical Distribution Systems. Just like Molex operates or Amphenol. I can go through the list. That will continue.
We think the separation will have really no impact on those relationships and hopefully drives accelerated revenue growth that they all can benefit from.
Okay. You mentioned non-automotive in response to one of the earlier questions as an opportunity on the M&A side for new Aptiv. Could you talk about the non-automotive business more broadly? It's been rising as a percentage of sales. For a long time, you targeted getting to 20% non-automotive revenue. Actually, new Aptiv's already at 22% or will be post-spin. I'm just curious if you might set a new target after the spin.
I'm not sure we'll establish a specific target.
30%.
I would say for investors, and we'll talk about this more at our investor day in late November, it needs to be meaningful, but it needs to be done in an intelligent way, right? That's both organic and inorganic. We understand that from a framework standpoint. To get a more balanced revenue mix, a view from a multiple standpoint that we have exposure to high growth markets like A&D, like telco, like a data center, like other, it needs to be certainly higher than where it is today at 22%. Organically, our industrial market's growing north of 10% this year. It'll be our fastest growing revenue sector on a revenue base that's roughly $1.8 billion. The team's doing a great job to really move the needle. We're going to have to do M&A. That's a part of our overall plan.
We'll figure out whether we give a specific number or target.
Thank you. Maybe turning to award activity. Where are you with regard to new business bookings? Are the awards that you're booking now sufficient, do you think, to support the medium-term growth you've targeted for the two segments? A lot of suppliers have reported an industry-wide slowdown in requests for proposals with automakers as they paused plans amidst regulatory uncertainty with regard to emissions, fuel efficiency, tariffs, etc. With the increased clarity that we've gotten recently around some of these factors, do you expect now that there could be a flurry of activity? How is Aptiv positioned to capitalize upon any such rebound in industry bidding?
Yeah, so I think what, you know, we've talked about this previously with Ryan, I wouldn't say we've seen a slowdown in the activity. We've seen an elongated award cycle. The number of opportunities that are being presented and our OEMs are calling out, that hasn't changed at all. The time from start of the process to actual award has lengthened. It is purely the purchasing organizations who are dealing with the weekly announcements as it relates to trade and tariff, what it means from a supply chain standpoint. Striking that balance, you know, I think it's been difficult. Having said that, every OEM is focused on how do they put new vehicles with new content out on the road. The only way they're able to meet their schedules or their strategic plans from a product planning standpoint is to award the business.
Otherwise, suppliers, the engineering organizations within those OEMs are unable to start working on those programs, and you run into issues as it relates to delay. I think you'll see a flurry of activity in the back half of this year. We'll see how big the flurry is. I would say every OEM is focused on introducing new solutions.
Thank you. You know, one of the products it seems you might have found particular traction with in awards recently is your Gen 6 ADAS product, with two such awards in 2Q, including one with Leapmotor in China that utilizes a Wind River real-time operating system. You mentioned the cost pressure from tariffs as a potential catalyst for automakers seeking this product. Maybe you could just unpack that a bit for us. What role does Wind River have to play here? Can you explain that further?
Sure. Leapmotor, our relationship with Leapmotor originally was vis-à-vis actually Stellantis and their work with Leapmotor. That was the initial focus. Stellantis is a large customer as it relates to ADAS for Aptiv and has been for a long period of time. When you think about a Gen 6 ADAS solution, it's really focused on, it's an open architected platform. It gives customers choice from a vision standpoint, from a radar standpoint, from a feature development standpoint. If you have an OEM who's developed certain features that they want incorporated into a vehicle or another supplier, we can do that. It's fairly chip agnostic. It's not as easy as you can just shift, but we can operate on different power sources for ADAS controllers. It gives them a lot of flexibility.
When you look at our reference platform that is based off a StradVision vision solution, our most advanced radar solution, relative to the standard comparable system, it's a 20%, 25% cost savings at equal performance. Given everything that OEMs are going through, including tariff costs, tariff expenses being pushed onto them, concern about vehicle production and their cost structure, there's a lot of interest, especially given that it's open architected. They're not locked in by a supplier on a given solution. They have choice. They have flexibility. We're seeing a lot of pull from both traditional legacy OEMs as well as, we've had a couple of awards in China, some of the China local OEMs as well. What does Wind River play? Wind River's RTOS and Linux layer, that allows a way Wind River's architected an easier separation between the software stack and the hardware stack.
It's architected in a way where it's much more efficient than the traditional solutions used in the industry. There's an engineering tool chain that goes with it that for those OEMs who want to develop some of the software, it's fully connected with the ecosystem of suppliers that are contributing to the platform. It's more efficient, drives productivity. You've heard us talk about in our ASUX business, roughly 80% of our programs today utilize Wind River Studio Developer. We've experienced 20% productivity from an engineering standpoint, software development standpoint. It's massive from a quality standpoint, connectivity standpoint. We're trying to bring value like that to our customers, a more holistic approach, but again, give them flexibility.
Thank you. I know growth over market performance has been closely watched by investors, including after a softer performance in 2024, in which you fell short of your expectation at the start of the year, given vastly different performance at certain customers and the EV slowdown generally. This year, though, you continue to look for the same five points of global growth over market as at the start of the year, about 2% organic growth on minus 3% industry production. That's an improvement versus last year, both in absolute terms and versus your expectation. What have been the main drivers of the improvement?
While I understand that you haven't guided it 2026, what would you say are the high-level puts and takes on growth over market as we head into next year, including as it might relate to cycling past in 2026, the rolloff of any legacy programs or underperformance of certain customers?
2024 and to a certain extent 2025, 2024's significant impact from customer mix, EV and non-EV. The big players were a U.S.-based global EV company, a German automotive OEM with a BEV platform, a French-based global OEM who all of the production came down significantly, EV and non-EV. Those, for us, were the biggest headwinds. I would say when you look at that mix this year, it's really principally isolated to that global EV manufacturer. We have been talking about this now for a year, and the headwind will end in the fourth quarter of this year. There's a large User Experience program, legacy User Experience program that has been running off for the last two years that has been, I don't know, worth about two points of overall growth when you think about revenue growth. That's been the headwind. That'll go away.
I think you see a more normalized sort of growth relative to vehicle production. I think the dynamics in the China market, especially today, and then the mix of platforms between BEVs, plug-in hybrids, ICE vehicles make the predictability of growth over market much more difficult. I think it's a reference point that investors should look at. I think it's worth looking at it. When the world was principally built on ICE platforms where there was more predictability as a guidepost, it was more useful. It's something that we're, from a communication standpoint, going to continue to provide the information to investors. We'll de-emphasize it as a priority. How do we make sure that we provide you with information where you can see where are we gaining share, how are we gaining share, who are we gaining share with?
Okay, I have some more questions, but why don't I pause to see if there's any in the audience? As they're thinking of their next question, I will sneak in one on copper tariffs. Can you explain what's going on there? I think that there's not an EBITDA dollar impact apart from timing differences, right? There is an EBITDA margin impact. Is that the way to think about it? You gave your outlook for how Section 232 automotive sectoral tariffs may evolve. How do you think the copper tariffs might evolve? The steel and the aluminum tariffs are not stackable on top of the automotive tariffs, but copper is, and that just seems sort of, you know, odd. I'm curious if it might get addressed.
Yeah, first, thank you for having us here. On the copper piece specifically, if you kind of go back to when we gave guidance at the start of the year, what we had thought about from a guidance perspective, revenue, and then also OI, we had not anticipated the level of FX and commodities pressures. What has come through, obviously, has been stronger production, and you've kind of seen the print in the first half of the year. Now you have some conservatism at the back half of the year. Specifically to FX, as we've called out, our single biggest exposure is the Mexican peso, where we do not have a natural hedge. From a commodities perspective, it's essentially copper. Right? From a copper perspective, essentially within our EDS business, the wire harness business is where we have.
With regards to the revenue side, commodity prices being higher certainly helps from a revenue perspective, but then from an OI perspective, as you rightly pointed out, Ryan, less so. The FX impact is bigger because 70% of our copper is essentially passed through. Right? That's indexed through our contracts in any case. The remaining we typically hedge up to a certain point. That one is more manageable. Again, this is more a case about risk mitigation rather than trying to make an incremental turn, I think, from that perspective. With regards to the Section 232 tariffs, in terms of when the proclamation was made and as things continue to get clarified, we see that our specific exposure is de minimis. Given the digital twin that Kevin mentioned earlier, we have good insight into the level of copper content within our products.
Again, from a sourcing perspective, we obviously will try and mitigate as much of that as we can, but we do not see that to be a big exposure to us.
Great, thank you. Question in the audience, microphone on the way to the webcast. Thank you.
One thing, if I can just augment what Varun was talking about. The Mexican peso, we talked about naturally. You think about it, we have 75,000 employees in Mexico. We pay in pesos. Our business generates dollars, right? To the extent the peso strengthens, which it has significantly, it's in the 18s at this point in time. Obviously, that's a headwind from a cash flow standpoint, from an earning standpoint.
Good morning, Neil Patel. Thank you for your time. How will your capital structure evolve post the separation?
Yeah, I certainly can. Listen, as Kevin mentioned, and one of the questions Ryan you'd asked was, what are the kind of priorities and as to what drove the EDS separation? Apart from just the strategic and operating focus between the two businesses, resources and investments, capital allocation is also an element associated with that. Just making sure that we align the right shareholder bases with the two separate businesses. As you think more specifically about the two businesses, EDS-grade businesses Kevin mentioned, which are really more of a lower growth but very steady and high cash flow generating business. As we think about the cap structure for that business, great dynamics, but essentially we would set it up as a high sub-investment grade cap structure. Call it, you know, two times levered or less than that. Right? That's how we're thinking about the EDS business.
From a new Aptiv RemainCo perspective specifically, higher margin, higher growth, investment grade, that remains a priority for us. Given the prodigious free cash flow generation from both parts of the businesses, we think it certainly aligns better from a capital allocation but also from a cap structure perspective. In summary, EDS high sub-investment grade and new Aptiv RemainCo will remain investment grade.
If I can just say, I think the important thing for us is capital structure that provides us flexibility to do M&A and return cash to shareholders. That's our focus. I think given the margin profile, growth profile of RemainCo, it's obviously investment grade. On the EDS side, just given the size of the business and nature of it, it's likely very high sub-investment grade. We're very sensitive to over-leveraging that business, quite frankly, so that it has the flexibility to execute on its strategy.
That is all the time we have. Please join me in thanking Kevin and Varun for all the great color and insight.
Thank you.
Okay, once again, I'm Ryan Brinkman, US Automotive Equity Research Analyst at JPMorgan. Very happy to get going with our next presentation, which has supporting slides, but it's a fireside chat with Jerome Dorlach, Adient President and Chief Executive Officer. This is the largest seating supplier in the world, and Mark Oswald, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Jerome and Mark, thank you so much for coming to the conference.
Thank you, Ryan.
You know, my first question is on the impact of tariffs. For the industry overall and for your company in particular, how have you managed the direct impact so far? How are you thinking about the indirect impact going forward in terms of the potential for demand destruction as automakers raise prices? Not so much so far, but you know, how have you maybe changed your estimate of normalized demand for sales or production in the U.S. or North America as a result of tariffs?
Yeah, I'll start and then I'll hand it over to Mark for comments. I think, you know, if you look at our Q2 call, we had published kind of a number of an annual, or not an annual, sorry, a monthly impact of about $12 million. From that time to when we had our Q3 call, the teams working both internally, but then more importantly with our customers, we were able to whittle that down to a monthly impact of around $4 million. That's really a testament to what we can do when we put the collective might of this industry to bear, both working with our global footprint, able to move things from high tariff regions to low tariff regions, requalifying things for USMCA, going through looking at adding more value in the USMCA region, resourcing things very quickly, and then working with our customers on recovery activities.
Generally, we've been able to manage through the tariff issue and take it to a level that is manageable. Again, that's on a gross level, not on a net level. We've talked about getting to levels of recovery with our customers on average, that's north of 85% from that standpoint. I think if you then talk about demand destruction and what it means, they just before this meeting had the print of the inflation numbers for the U.S., and that's right around 2.75%. I think demand destruction generally seems to be holding up well. The July SAR was north of 16 million. How much of that's pull ahead because consumers are worried about what pricing will do, I think remains to be an unknown. The question around demand destruction really is yet to be seen. I know you have, I think, GM later today and Ford later today as well.
I'd be curious to see what they say, how they're viewing MSRP and their pricing schemes. I think Toyota's already come out with some of their 2026 pricing with really de minimis impacts somewhere in the $200 to $300 range, knowing that as ATPs creep up for the industry wide, once we kind of crest that $50,000 mark, that becomes a psychological impact for the consumer. Are they going to manage that through lower level trims and pushing more lower level trims out there to try and keep the demand catalyst going? I think that remains to be an unseen. I think what's important for us is managing the things that we can manage. I think we've demonstrated through the 2025 fiscal year, you know, we've got almost now $115 million of business performance. Coming into the year, we thought it'd be somewhere around $90 million.
We've been able to step up business performance, and that includes the tariff impact. We've been able to do that while still having the bottom line compressing, you know, by our side of the top line compressing by about $200 million on an FX-adjusted basis. It shows that the Aptiv operating model really does allow us to drive business performance even with volume challenges. I think when we think about how 2026 is shaping up for us, it's really controlling the things we can control, controlling business performance, managing through tariffs, and then taking a wait-and-see approach to see how North American demand shapes up.
Thank you. My second question is to ask what your very latest outlook is for vehicle electrification, including in light of some of the recent changes to the regulatory backdrop, such as the elimination of the $7,500 U.S. federal consumer tax credit, the relaxed enforcement of greenhouse gas and corporate average fuel economy regulations. How has your outlook evolved, and in what ways might you be running the business or allocating capital any differently as a result?
Yeah, I think I'll take the back half first, and then I'll turn it over to Mark for the first half of the question. I think what we've done is when we look at how we allocate capital, and when I talk about capital, it's not just dollar capital. I mean, it's both human capital and dollar capital. It's looking at every program and saying, you know, for that program, do we have the ability to sweat assets we have in-house today? For us, when we run a JET program as an example, and we do that for certain customers, can we run it on an existing JET line in an existing JET facility such that if that program doesn't run at volume, we're not stuck with stranded assets?
If we have the ability to do that, then that comes with a certain set of contractual conditions that we then have the discussion with the customer about. If we can't, we have a different set of discussion with the customer that comes with commercial backstops. Given the uncertainty around EVs, and we now know it's very policy-driven, we need a different set of recovery boundary conditions such that if the volumes don't come to fruition, we have backstops around it. I think so far, whether that is certain Korean programs, certain domestic programs, almost all of those have run on existing capital or an existing JET plant. As volumes have ebbed and flowed, we haven't been struck with stranded resources or stranded capital from that standpoint. I think that's how we've really looked at capital allocation. Mark, maybe you want to touch on the first point.
Yeah, I'd say that's right, Jerome. And Ryan, when we look at this, we look at it from a capital allocation perspective. We don't want to invest new buildings, right, for EV programs. For example, we're taking a conservative approach. When you ask the question in terms of where is EV demand going to be or where the sales are going to be, I don't want to say we're agnostic to it, but it doesn't impact it as it would if we were actually building out plants and facilities for that. We feel very comfortable in terms of what our planning assumptions are. We always take what our customers tell us. We'll trim a little bit, be a little bit conservative. We'll use asset reuse. We'll not use dedicated facilities.
In the end, whether or not EV volumes are down 10% or 15% year on year, it really doesn't have that much of an impact to us and how we're running the business.
Very helpful. Thank you. Next question relates to how you are adapting to the rapid growth of domestic Chinese automakers. At the conference last year, we asked each of the suppliers to update us on what they were doing to increase their current exposure. I think the investors wanted to hear anything and everything. I wanted to check in again this year, though. The Chinese automakers have arguably grown even more quickly. Because of some of the headlines about payment terms that they're commanding and pricing, because everybody wants to align with all that growth, we're asking each of the suppliers to please comment on how they are balancing the opportunity for growth with these customers with maintaining commercial discipline at the same time.
Yeah, maybe I'll start there and then, you know, Jerome can follow up there. Similar to what we said last year when we were here sitting with you, we had indicated that, obviously, we were looking at growing with the Chinese domestics. At that time last year, I think our mix between what I'd call Chinese domestics versus foreign, we were 60% foreign, 40% Chinese domestics. We said over the course of the next couple of years, we're going to be swapping that, right? We're going to be 60% Chinese domestics, 40% foreign. We've actually seen that play out with our wins, right? If I look at our wins so far this year, it's been mixed out at 70% Chinese domestics, 40% foreign, right? Which gives us confidence as we look out over 2027, 2028 as those programs start to roll on, that's what the mix is going to be.
When we look at it from a commercial standpoint, we look at who we're winning that business with. We're making sure those commercial terms take into consideration if there's certain risk, if there's volume risk that we think with those customers coming to market. Again, it's really with those commercial terms, what we're doing from collecting the engineering payments, recoveries in advance, et cetera. It's really that balanced approach and again, not driving any new, what I'd say, capacity to grow with those people.
Yeah. I would just add on to that. I think one thing that we don't always talk a lot about, I think you get the benefit of it because you spend time with our team in China, is not only do we have our direct business in China, but we also have a very attractive non-consolidated business in China.
We have our joint venture with Kaiper, that's now approaching almost $1 billion. It spits off a very nice dividend. Then we also have our non-consolidated business with CFAA that's almost approaching $2 billion. That also is a very attractive dividend for us. We have two other joint ventures, one in the south and then a smaller one in the north that are both unconsolidated. We get exposure both through our consolidated business there that's now approaching again almost $2 billion, but then also through our network of non-consolidated joint ventures that's going to reach close to $3 billion here. Through that, we have the ability to manage how much exposure we want through the payment terms, through the commercial avenues to both the domestic and non-domestic customers there.
We have the ability to kind of toggle the exposure that we get through these, what I'd call joint ventures and through our consolidated sales network. The focus of James and the team out there has been managing and toggling through this through the customer selection process. In addition to that, we've talked a lot about on the last couple earnings calls growing the business, especially with BYD and some of the other, maybe more aggressive customers in terms of payment terms through the component sales. We've been very successful now on the trim business, on the foaming business with BYD, where you don't necessarily get some of the flashy top line figures, but you do get more attractive payment terms, more attractive commercial terms through the component sales, which has been a very successful avenue in for us.
Thank you. Maybe moving to your European operations, where do you think you are in terms of the turnaround and the path to get to mid-single-digit EBITDA margin from the sort of 2%- 3% type today? How much of the improvement do you expect to come from restructuring, savings, footprint optimization, or other cost-cutting actions versus how much is more contingent upon, you know, top line improvements, whether within your control, such as the intentional runoff of certain unprofitable programs or the conquesting of others, or potentially outside your control, you know, such as market factors like industry production growth, etc.?
Yeah, I think, you know, when we think about where we are today, I'd say it's a multi-year plan, right? We've indicated that that region's not going to turn around overnight. We've announced restructuring actions last year. This year we've called out, you know, call it $130 million of cash restructuring for that region. We've indicated that for 2026 it's going to be elevated again. I think the drivers to get us to what I'd say that mid-single-digit margin, call it 5%, 5.5%, really comes from a couple of different buckets. One, it's the balance in balance out that you were talking about, the non-performing metals business rolling off. We have a line of sight into that in 2026 and 2027. On the last earnings call last week, we did call out some key program wins in that region, right?
Again, recognizing that we are a volume business, we are going to have to start growing in there. Some of those wins were conquest wins. That'll start coming in in 2027, 2028. A portion of that will be the restructuring. As you know, restructuring over in Europe is pretty tight. It's not good restructuring, right? For every dollar we spend over there, that full dollar isn't accretive to margins, right? I'd say a smaller piece is the restructuring, but again, it helps stabilize the business. It's the balance in balance out, and it's the growth in 2027, 2028 that really get us to where we need to be. Again, when I think about that region, it used to be a $7 billion revenue business.
If we can get that to a $5 billion to $5.5 billion and print a 5% to 5.5% margin, generating cash flow over there, sustaining that business, that's really where we want to get to.
Thank you. What about the potential for M&A to be part of the solution in Europe? You've spoken before about the pronounced overcapacity problems in the region, both at the automaker and supplier level, and a willingness too for Adient to be part of the solution. What are your latest thoughts regarding this topic?
Yeah, I don't think our thoughts have changed. I think in Europe, if you just again look at the market, there used to be a need for somewhere, just call it 20 million units of seating capacity. If you look going forward, that need is going to be somewhere called 14 to 15 million units of seating capacity. Fundamentally, we believe you're either going to be a consolidator or a consolidatee in that region. I think we're willing to be part of the solution on either end of that. Consolidation for consolidation's sake or M&A for M&A's sake doesn't really make sense. There has to be an economic outcome to it. As of yet, there hasn't been anything brought forward that makes a reasonable economic outcome from that standpoint. We'll continue to drive performance into the region.
We'll continue to execute, do what we need to do, and be good stewards of capital in the region as we have been and perform as we should be performing.
Perhaps moving back to the China region, where your operations have a great track record of strong growth, margin, and returns. Although in the fiscal third quarter, you did demonstrate a fairly material revenue underperformance versus the change in industry production. Most of the suppliers we cover are not growing nearly as quickly as the industry because just like you, they have less leverage to the faster growing domestic Chinese. They're working to change that. You've also pointed to progress in bookings, including tracks with BYD and content per vehicle tailwinds such as zero gravity seats. How do you see your top line performance versus the industry in China maybe trending going forward after F3Q?
Yeah, maybe I'll start and then I'll hand it over to Mark. I think you almost alluded to it a little bit in your question. You almost kind of have to bifurcate the China region to BYD and then everyone else. If you take China less BYD, I mean, we grew, call it at par, maybe just a little bit below par within the region. A lot of that was driven by delayed launches with two of our key customers as they work on getting some of their programs right and their underlying software correct. As we then think about how that shapes up for the out years without going into any kind of 2026 guidance, I think a lot of that will just come down to our customers' launch cadence. Do they get some of these launches on track, the Chinese domestics I'm referring to?
If they're able to correct their launches, correct their launch cadence, we'll see 2026 returning back to a growth year, how that shapes up relative to market. A lot of that will just come down to how does BYD grow in 2026. We've been very vocal. We're under-indexed to BYD. We have components business, no JET business. That probably won't change as they've gone back to a two-supplier strategy on JET and their in-house business along with their joint venture. Less BYD, I think, will be at market, maybe slightly above market. Again, it'll come back to how do these customers launch within the 2026 calendar and fiscal year.
Yeah, and I'll just go back to my earlier comments. You know, if I look at the bookings that we've won so far this year, 70% Chinese domestics, right? Clearly, as that starts coming out in 2027 and 2028, we should be at or above market growth over there again. Now, offsetting the underperformance versus industry production in China within your Asia-Pac operations has been strong outperformance in Asia outside of China. Can you remind us of your key customer exposures there or market exposures, you know, in Asia outside of China? You know, what has been driving that outperformance and how would you rate its sustainability?
Yeah, I mean, our key customer base in Asia, ex-China, is really driven. We're very strong with Toyota. We're very strong with Nissan. Very strong with Ford of Thailand, Mitsubishi in Thailand. Very strong with HKMC as well. What really drives that, and we talked a lot about this in 2025, we just had a lot of launches in 2025. We were launching the Armada, what would be the QX80 program, launching significant business with HKMC. We're going through significant launches in Thailand. When you just look at the year-on-year comparables, as that business then starts to ramp up, you get a lot of nice growth coming out of it. We also made significant investments, especially in our Japan operation, as we looked at putting a very sustainable investment into that in order to nearshore or onshore a footprint there, especially around our metals operation.
We were exporting significant content out of China from what would have been our legacy Yangfang at the time, adding Yangfang seating. As that separation really concluded, we wanted to nearshore that or onshore that into Japan. We took that decision, and that's really paid dividends with significant new bookings. Same thing for us in Thailand, where we've stood up our own mechanisms business in Thailand, which has led to incremental growth there, and it's paid off in new business wins.
Okay, and I think your largest customer in Asia outside of China is Nissan. They recently announced a restructuring and closure of some plants in Japan. The vehicles that you happen to supply to, though, I think were not impacted by this. What is your exposure to Nissan there, and what is the outlook for the vehicles that you do supply? Do they even benefit because they're a larger portion of the remaining Nissan portfolio? I'm not sure.
I mean, so in Japan, Nissan would be our largest customer. In Asia as a whole, it actually would probably be Ford in Thailand from that standpoint. In Japan, yeah, it'd be Nissan. Their announcement to close does not impact us. The plant that they've decided to shutter, we don't supply content into. No, you know, no direct impact from that standpoint. Where they'll pivot production into or plants they'll look to fill, we actually see that as being a net benefit to us, especially with the programs that we're ramping up in fiscal year 2025 and in fiscal year 2026. We'll probably see that as a net benefit.
Great, thank you. Moving to North America, I was curious about the reference on the most recent earnings call about expecting to potentially benefit from onshoring as automakers move production to the United States, including because of the relative weighting of your North America footprint to the U.S. What are your thoughts on some of the recent onshoring announcements by automakers as a result of tariffs? We've seen GM invest $4 billion to bring back a number of body-on-frame pickups and SUVs, crossovers, BEVs from Mexico to Michigan, Kansas, and Tennessee. Nissan is bringing more Rogue crossovers from Japan to Tennessee. Honda is moving the CR-V from Canada to, they haven't said, but, you know, Indiana, Ohio. Looks like a lot of your facilities are kind of clustered around those more Midwestern U.S. states versus in Canada or Mexico. Is that in a position to benefit from this onshoring trend?
Have you maybe had any preliminary discussions about supporting automakers with their onshoring activities?
Yeah, so I think we've said there's about 600,000 units so far that have been announced to come back. We've already booked about 150,000 of those units. The rogue business coming from Japan to the U.S., that's a net win for us. We have the Smyrna footprint out of our Murfreesboro, Tennessee facility. There will be a piece of business that will come from Canada into the U.S. We've booked that as well. We haven't said which customer it is. We'll keep that anonymous for now. In addition to that, we think out of the other announcements that have come forward, we feel confident that there's 100,000 units in there that will be a net win for us. What's important to differentiate between maybe us and some of our competitors is that when we talk about this, given our footprint, and because it is so heavily U.S.
weighted with 75% of our production being in the U.S., these are net incremental wins for us. Whereas maybe for some of our competitors, if they're going to move production from a body-on-frame facility in Mexico to a body-on-frame facility in the U.S., that's just going to be a net neutral for them. That's going to require more investment, more engineering, and it's not really going to be incremental volume. For us, with that business going from Japan to the U.S., that's incrementally positive. With the business coming from Canada to the U.S., we don't have the business in Canada, so that's going to be incrementally positive for us. The other 100,000 units that are going to come from Mexico to the U.S., that will come from a competitor to us. That'll be incrementally positive.
We do see, and we've talked about it, with this onshoring, nearshoring, there's going to be winners and losers. We think given our footprint, given our capabilities, more importantly, given our execution and our intimacy with the customer, we really do see Aptiv in position to be a winner coming out of this.
Great to hear, thanks. Maybe next, could you describe your innovative modular approach to seat component and seat system assembly? Is this most interesting to you from the ability to improve your own margin, or is it that the advantage is in helping the customer improve their margin by simplifying the steps of final assembly, reducing, you know, jet hours, et cetera? Is it a competitive advantage for you, which could lead to higher market share, or what's the right way to think about, you know, modular assembly opportunity at Adient?
I think it's both. I think we've offered our customers really a menu of solutions at this point. The practical example is, as we went through the USMCA activity, we were able to deploy Adient's modular assembly as a solution to requalify components by adding more modular assembly content in the USMCA zone and actually working with one of our partners, Gentherm, in order to accomplish this and take parts that were not USMCA qualified, qualify them for USMCA, saving one of our Japanese customers almost $2 million a month. That pays significant dividends for them. That's an example where we're actually just taking what otherwise would have been waste out of the system using Adient's modular assembly process. A knock-on benefit of that is not only do you get USMCA qualification, but we're also then able to take labor out of a high-content zone. You demonstrate benefits both ways.
I think some of the solutions that we're working on with some of our European customers where they have a desire to look at potentially what I would call jet assembly in-house because they already have the assembly in-house is how do we make their process more efficient using Adient's modular assembly process and conquesting business from our peers. We'll take over components by using a modular assembly approach, and we'll conquest components business that we don't have today by giving them a modular assembly process for the trim and foam that makes their end-item assembly more efficient. It really is a menu-based approach to how we can accomplish these types of solutions. It'll benefit us, it will benefit them, but it's really working jointly with them on the solutions approach. I know, Mark, you've been part of these discussions as well. Any comments from your side?
No, again, I think it helps out them. Obviously, it saves them. It helps us efficiencies at the plant. We're saving labor costs at the plant, right? It's really a win-win as we look to partner with the customers and have that relationship with the customers.
Thank you. I wanted to follow up by asking how unique or differentiated you think your approach to modular assembly may be, given that some of the competition, BYD, for example, has told investors that they can also offer customers the same type of benefits. I am just curious if the benefits might get competed away and passed along to the customers without the seating industry necessarily benefiting.
Yeah, I don't know how different or unique it is. I think one thing that differentiates Adient's solution versus our competitor's solution is our flexibility to integrate others' value chain offerings. We're willing to work with, you know, whether that's a Lear comfort system, a Gentherm comfort system, you know, a Camaco metal structure, a Fisher's metal structure, an Adient metal structure. At the end of the day, what we want to do is provide a sustainable solution that ensures our customers have the most value-added efficient process for the long run. That's what we're focused on doing, where I think some of our competitors have a laser focus on looking at, I want the entire value stack. I want a solution that takes my comfort system with my trim, my foam, and this is what I want to put into the value stream.
We just want to make sure our customers are getting a sustainable value solution at the end of the day that makes them credible for the long term. I think that's what we've been able to differentiate with.
Thank you. Continuing with the theme of the competitive environment, but maybe specifically as it relates to full-size truck seating in North America, where you are the incumbent supplier for the Ford F-Series, you have been for a long time. Lear is the incumbent on GM full-size trucks. They have been for a long time. We don't usually see frequent switching between tier ones for these programs, I think because the switching costs would just be so high. Lear has mentioned wanting to conquest your F-Series business. At the same time, you may be in the running for conquesting their GM truck business. What is your confidence that you'll be sourced on at least one of these programs? Do either you or Lear really have the capacity to service both of them if the awards went that way?
What would be the financial implications of going from currently one to either both or none of these two programs? Given the switching costs, would both companies maybe lose somewhat if you swapped programs with each other, with Lear conquesting the F-Series from you, you conquesting GM trucks from them? How should investors be thinking about all of this? When do you expect that they may learn more in terms of how it's likely to play out?
That may hold the record for the highest number of questions in a single question. I'll try to start and then I'll hand it over to Mark. In terms of how do we feel about kind of the F-Series booking, as we said on the earnings call, we're focused on adding and putting in front of Ford a value package that makes us the supplier of choice to them. We give them a solution that they can't walk away from in terms of how we can add value to them and, more importantly, to the end consumer for the world's best-selling truck. That's what we're focused on doing. I think we've been able to do that. In the end, they'll make a sourcing decision that represents that. We'll see what happens and what comes from that.
In terms of the GM full-size truck, I think we're working to do the same. There is a high barrier to entry there. GM will, I think, make a sourcing decision accordingly, based on how they make their sourcing patterns. A lot of that will come down now to how they're going through some of their onshoring activities and where some of that shakes out. As you asked the questions, you pointed out some of the hurdles that go along with it. There are high switching costs. There's a lot of capital investment that goes with it. We've made clear to both General Motors and Ford, they're some of our most favored customers and there are no hurdles in terms of capital deployment. We'll be smart about it from that standpoint. We pour more foam than anyone does in the world and certainly more than anyone does in the U.S.
We have jet capacity. We have jet footprint to be able to service them. I don't think there'd be a capacity hurdle from that standpoint. Maybe Mark, if you want to touch on any other financial implications.
Your implement, I think it was last November and we were talking about this. We've been talking about this for quite some time now. I think I remember, you know, talking about we don't want to give them a reason to switch, right? We've been very much partnering with Ford. We've been providing them with solutions for their seating today as well as into tomorrow, right? Our manufacturing, our quality, our launch, you know, has been nothing but flawless, right? It's really going back to the operations, making sure that the team is performing, not to give them a reason. For Jerome's point, all the points that he just made, right? They do value us as a valued partner. They want us as a supplier of choice, right? We have strong confidence there. We'll hear from them, you know, in the coming weeks, right?
Just in terms of the decision they make. We haven't given them a reason not to come with us.
Thank you. I wanted to ask on the bidding process for ZF LifeTech airbag business to which Adient has been connected in the media. The most recent articles suggest that private equity firm FountainVest Partners may be the sole remaining bidder in that process. I'm not sure the extent to which you can or would like to comment on this particular potential transaction. If you can, that's great. I'm still interested in your appetite for M&A generally and what it might say about it. I've sort of gotten the sense in recent years that something transformative or outside of your core product area likely wasn't on the agenda as you focus on execution, simplification, cash conversion, etc.
Also, given some of the comments that you've shared around not needing to be vertically integrated on the seat heating, lumbar, and massage side in the same way that Lear has with Kongsberg, with both you and Gentherm speaking to the potential revenue dis-synergies associated with a tier one vertically integrated in such a manner, I thought maybe the same logic might apply to airbags that are sometimes affixed to seats. At the same time, maybe there's something to be said about vertically integrating airbags given all the excitement around zero gravity seats, robotaxis, etc. How should investors be thinking about this generally and what can you share?
Yeah, maybe I'll start and then I'll turn it over to Jerome. Obviously, we can't talk about specifics in terms of if there was anything under consideration, right? It's not what we do. I would say from an overall M&A activity, it really gets into capital allocation, right? What do we want to do with our capital? Jerome and I recognize what separates good management teams from great management teams is really capital allocation. When you think about that capital allocation, you've seen us buying back shares. You've seen us nibbling away at some debt repurchases. The other piece of that that we've always said all along is we'd like to have some dry powder for some inorganic M&A activities, right? That said, we also recognize that the hurdle rate to do M&A is very high, right?
If you think about where that threshold was, let's just say 12 months ago, 18 months ago, versus where it is today, it's that much higher today only because the uncertainty with tariffs, what's happening from a macroeconomy perspective. Also looking at adding some stock price, right? I mean, it's hard to argue that buying our shares back right now isn't the best use of our cash. Again, that's the way we look at M&A holistically, in terms of how we're thinking about it. In terms of where we might want to play or what we might want to look at, clearly we'd look at where we could add value to our customers because if we could add value to our customers, obviously that's going to drive value to our shareholders. Jerome?
Yeah, no, I mean, I think Mark hit the nail on the head. It's, you know, how we really look at M&A. It's not a point-in-time type of metric. I mean, you know, we may look at what the returns on capital of that acquisition have to be 12 months ago are very different than what they are now. It's a sliding scale given where our next best alternative is, where the market is, what the dynamics are, what the uncertainty is associated with that, what the uncertainty is in the macro environment. As Mark said, today, the hurdle rate for any acquisition is very high, just given where the macroeconomy sits, where our shares are, and what some of the next best alternatives are.
Great, thank you. I have more questions for these guys, but shall I stop and see if there are any maybe in the audience? The audience is thinking, let me ask one about bidding activity and what's happening with your awards. We talked about a big one, obviously, but you know, a number of suppliers have reported an industry-wide slowdown in requests for proposals from automakers as they pause plans at first amidst changing consumer preferences with regard to EVs and then, you know, regulatory uncertainty with regard to emissions, fuel efficiency, tariffs. We've gotten some increased clarity recently around some of these factors. Curious if you think there now may be a flurry of activity in the back half or into next year and how Aptiv may be positioned to capitalize upon any such rebound.
Yeah, I mean, I would say we were highly encouraged with the last six months. We booked more business the last six months, in particular in our European operations, than we did in the prior 18 months. If you look at our bookings out of our China operations, they're as strong this year, if not stronger than they were last year. We don't give a backlog number. If you look at our America's operations and what's happened with the onshoring activities, we've talked about the F-Series, but certainly from a booking standpoint, we haven't seen a slowdown consistent with the rest of the industry. If anything, I think we've seen an acceleration in the last six to eight months, really driven by the strong execution, driven by the relationship, the partnership that we have with our customers, and the value proposition we've been able to put in front of them.
As we look forward over the next six months or the next 12 months, as the industry kind of comes out of what has been, I think, some of the unknowns, we would expect that to continue.
That's very encouraging to hear. Thank you. We are out of time, so please join me in thanking Jerome and Mark for all the great color and insight they shared.