Good afternoon, thank those who have made the trip here to join us. Ladies and gentlemen, it's 1:00 P.M., the 2023 annual shareholders meeting of Becton, Dickinson and Company is called to order. I am Tom Polen, BD's Chairman, Chief Executive Officer, and President. I am pleased to welcome you on behalf of our directors and officers. To my right, I'd like to introduce Gary DeFazio, BD's Senior Vice President and Corporate Secretary. Elisa Zegarra and Kathleen Whelpley of Computershare Trust Company, our inspector of the election. Welcome. Next, I'd like to introduce the other board members who are standing for election at this meeting. A biographical information for each director appears in our proxy statement.
William A. Brown, Catherine M. Burzik, R. Andrew Eckert, Claire M. Fraser, Jeffrey W. Henderson, Christopher Jones, Marshall O. Larsen, Timothy M. Ring, Bertram L. Scott, and Carrie L. Byington was unable to attend today due to a personal matter. I would now like to introduce the executive officers of BD who are here with us today. We'll start with Mr. Samrat Khichi, Executive Vice President, Corporate Development, Public Policy, Regulatory Affairs, and General Counsel. Shana Neal, Executive Vice President, Chief People Officer. Christopher DelOrefice, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. I'd also like to introduce Michelle Quinn, who will become BD's Acting General Counsel upon Sam's departure next month.
As a reminder, we will not address any questions or permit any commentary that are irrelevant to the business of the company, derogatory to individuals, or that are otherwise in bad taste or that are related to personal grievances, or a matter of individual concern that is not a matter of interest to shareholders generally. Additionally, we will defer any questions about the company's current business results or full fiscal year outlook until our upcoming first quarter earnings call. The corporate secretary of the company will now report on matters related to the meeting. I'll turn it over to you, Gary.
Mr. Chairman, the board has appointed Computershare Trust Company as Inspector of Election, and Ms. Whelpley and Ms. Zegarra have taken the inspector's oath. I have proof of notice of this meeting in the form of an affidavit executed on behalf of Computershare Trust Company, which will be filed with the minutes of this meeting. The inspectors have informed me that approximately 89% of the shares entitled to vote at this meeting are present, either in person or represented by proxy. A quorum is therefore present, and we may proceed with the business of this meeting.
The minutes of the 2022 annual meeting are available for inspection. I recommend that we dispense with the readings of the minutes. Hearing no objection, we'll move to the proposals included in the proxy statement. Each item will be discussed after it has been moved and seconded. Please hold all comments and questions that do not relate to the proposal under consideration until later in the meeting. If you wish to speak, please move to the closest microphone and give your name and the number of shares you own or represent. To ensure enough time for all those who wish to speak, please limit your question and comments to 3 minutes. Proposal 1, election of directors. The first proposal is the election of the nominees for director listed in the proxy statement to serve for a term of 1 year.
I will entertain a motion and a second to put this proposal to a vote.
Moved.
Second.
Is there any discussion of the nominees? If there's no further discussion, we will move to our next item of business. Proposal 2, which is ratification of auditors. The second proposal is to ratify the selection of Ernst & Young as the independent registered public accounting firm of the company for fiscal 2023. I will entertain a motion and second to put this proposal to vote.
Moved.
Second.
Ms. Jolly, Ms. Molly Jolly and Mr. Lee Van Horn of Ernst & Young are here to respond to questions. Are there any questions for them or any discussion of this proposal? If there's no further discussion, we will move to our next item of business. Proposal 3 is an advisory vote to approve named executive officer compensation, also known as say on pay. I will entertain a motion and a second to put this proposal to a vote.
Moved.
Second.
Is there any discussion of the proposal? If there's no discussion, we will move to our next item of business. Proposal 4, frequency of say on pay. Proposal 4 is an advisory vote to approve the frequency of say on pay votes. I will entertain a motion and a second to put this proposal to a vote.
Moved.
Second.
Is there any discussion of this proposal? If there's no discussion, we will move to our next item of business. Proposal 5, 2004 Employee and Director Equity-Based Compensation Plan . The next item is the approval of amendments to BD's 2004 Employee and Director Equity-Based Compensation Plan, which is described in our proxy statement. I will entertain a motion and second to put this proposal to a vote.
Moved.
Second.
Is there any discussion of this proposal? If not, there is no further discussion. We will move to our next item of business. Proposal 6, shareholder proposal. The next item is a shareholder proposal for Mr. Kenneth Steiner requiring prior shareholder approval of certain termination payments. Is Mr. Steiner or his representative here to move the proposal?
Sorry.
Oh, just a statement. Thank you. Please.
Okay. Proposal 6, shareholder rectification of termination pay, sponsored by Kenneth Steiner. Shareholders request that the board seek shareholder approval of any senior manager's new or renewed pay package that provides for severance or termination payments with an estimated value exceeding $2.99 times the sum of the executive's base salary plus target short-term bonus. Severance or termination payments include cash, equity, or other pay that is paid out or vests due to a senior executive termination for any reason. Payments include those provided under employment agreements, severance plans, and change in control clauses in long-term equity plans, but not life insurance, pension benefits, or deferred compensation earned and vested prior to termination.
Estimated total value includes lump sum payments offsetting tax liabilities, perquisites or benefits not vested under a plan generally available to management employees, post-employment consulting fees or office expense and equity awards if vesting is accelerated or a performance condition waived due to termination. The board shall retain the option to seek shareholder approval after material terms are agreed upon. Generous performance-based pay can sometimes be justified by shareholders' rectification of golden parachute severance packages with a total cost exceeding 2.99 times base salary plus target short-term bonus, better alliance management pay with shareholders' interests. It is in the best interest of Becton Dickinson shareholders and the morality of Becton Dickinson's employees to be protected from such lavish management termination pay for one person.
It is important to have this policy in place so that Becton Dickinson management stays focused on improving company performance as opposed to seeking a business combination to primarily trigger a management golden parachute windfall. This proposal topic received between 51% and 65% support at FedEx, Spirit AeroSystems, Alaska Air, Fiserv. Please vote yes.
Thank you very much for your comments. Could I get a second?
Second.
Okay. Thank you. Is there any other discussion of this proposal? Okay, if there's no further discussion, I now declare the polls open for voting.
Shareholders who have already voted by proxy need not cast ballots unless they wish to change their votes. Shareholders who are not shareholders of record, but instead hold, excuse me, their shares in street name, must present a valid proxy from their bank, broker, or other nominee in order to vote. If anybody needs a ballot, please raise your hand.
Okay. While the vote is being tallied, we will have a presentation on the operations of BD. I'll move to the microphone here. Okay. Thank you, Gary. Before I get started, I wanna remind you that I will be making some forward-looking statements. I encourage you to read the disclaimers in today's presentation slides and the disclosures in our SEC filings, which are both available on the investor relations website. With that, let's turn to slide 3 in today's presentation. BD has always had a central role in global healthcare, driven by our purpose of advancing the world of health. Our solutions are concentrated in discovery and diagnosis and the treatment of disease, either through the delivery of medication or interventionally through medical devices. 2022 marked an important milestone as we celebrated our 125th year anniversary.
It's a testament to our history of innovation and our leadership in healthcare. As an innovative med tech leader, we generated approximately $19 billion in worldwide sales. Our 77,000 global associates deliver products that are known as the backbone of healthcare. We make over 37 billion devices a year and serve patients in more than 190 countries, touching more patients than any other med tech company in the world. Our contributions to advancing healthcare are enabled by our customer-focused innovation, world-class manufacturing capabilities, outstanding quality, and unmatched global scale. Through our 2025 strategy, we are developing bold, innovative solutions that are transforming the future of healthcare. I'm thankful to our associates around the world who are focused on executing our strategy and delivered another strong year for BD.
At Investor Day in 2021, we outlined our plan for sustained shareholder value creation in five key focused areas. Execution of all five pillars is well underway and is on track. We are strengthening our long-term targeted growth profile of 5.5%+ by reshaping our innovation pipeline and tuck-in M&A strategy towards higher growth end markets. Our simplification programs include simplification of our manufacturing network, our portfolio, and our recently initiated operating model simplification program. We are creating a more agile and focused organization that is delivering on our margin expansion goals while continuing our disciplined capital allocation strategy and ultimately delivering shareholder value. Over the next few minutes, I will share more details on how we're executing against this plan. We closed the year with excellent momentum, having delivered strong and consistent growth in our base business.
Our performance reflects our strategy in action and the dedication of our global teams who are reliably serving our customers, controlling costs, and through foresight, focus, and agility, enabled our enhanced and differentiated performance during a very challenging environment. With base revenue growth of over 9%, we exceeded our revenue and earnings guidance and achieved our margin expansion goals. Additionally, we achieved our margin expansion goals in an increasingly inflationary environment by both leveraging our revenue performance and realizing savings and efficiencies from several of our multi-year simplification and cost improvement initiatives. We also continued to transform our innovation pipeline with about 60% of our new product development invested in 3 market spaces that are reshaping healthcare and are helping to fuel our growth. That's smart connected care, enabling the shift to new care settings, and improving chronic disease outcomes.
We believe our current pipeline is the most exciting in the history of the company. We executed our simplification programs and managed our cost structure through the spin of Embecta, as well as exiting more than 2,500 SKUs as we accelerated our Project RECODE initiative. As a result, in fiscal 22, we were able to absorb significant increases in inflation during the year and improve our margin profile back towards BD's pre-pandemic level of 25% in FY 25. We have maintained a disciplined and balanced capital deployment strategy that's allowed us to advance our framework and support growth-enhancing investments in capital, R&D, and tuck-in M&A. Finally, our strong teams continue to execute and create value even during uncertain times. All of these results confirm that our BD 2025 strategy is the right strategy and that it's working.
This execution is largely driven by our disciplined capital allocation strategy, which is focused on continuous value-creating opportunities. Our capital allocation strategy is categorized into four main buckets. First, we will invest in organic growth with an emphasis on R&D. In fiscal 22, we invested over 6% of sales in R&D to advance our pipeline of innovative programs. Second, we're gonna deploy capital expenditures efficiently with about $1 billion annually to acquire key technologies and build capacity to support our growth. Third, we return value in the form of dividends. In November, we announced our 51st consecutive year of dividend increases, continuing our long-standing recognition as a member of the S&P 500 Dividend Aristocrats Index, a distinction that reflects the consistency and the reliability of our dividend policy. Fourth, the remaining capital will support both tuck-in acquisitions and share repurchases.
In fiscal 2022, we invested over $2 billion in six tuck-in acquisitions across our businesses that support our strong growth profile in 2023 and beyond. This includes Parata, which is our largest acquisition since Bard and is aligned to our focus on smart connected care and enabling new care settings. Parata makes BD a leading provider in the fast-growing pharmacy automation market and enables us to provide solutions to help pharmacies address rising costs and increasing labor shortages. In connection with the April spin of our diabetes business, now known as Embecta, and consistent with what we shared regarding the planned use of associated proceeds, we paid down $500 million in long-term debt this year, and we returned $1.6 billion in capital to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases.
In fiscal 22, we saw evidence of the power of our capital allocation strategy at work. We've been able to execute on our R&D and M&A strategies while also paying down debt and returning capital to our shareholders. We're gonna continue to execute against this proven strategy. It is also important to remember that our purpose as a company extends beyond the products we manufacture. Our company's impact on human health, communities, and the planet is at the forefront of every decision that we make. ESG is central to our identity as a good corporate citizen. Our strategy serves as a framework through which we address the most relevant ESG issues for BD and for our stakeholders. In July, we published our 2021 ESG report, which provides details about our ESG strategy and progress against our 2030 ESG goals.
Highlights include the launch of our Sustainable Medical Technology Institute, efforts to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, which include joining the UN Race to Zero, and increasing our investments in on-site renewable energy. In December, we published our second annual Inclusion, Diversity, and Equity Report, highlighting the journey to elevate our strong culture to even higher levels, seeking to become best-in-class as a more empowered and innovative workforce. We're making great strides there. ID&E is integrated into everything that we do, from setting goals to creating strategies, making decisions, and ensuring accountability. Our efforts are not only being celebrated within the company. We're also very proud and appreciative to receive continued external recognition of our ESG efforts. In summary, I'm extremely proud of our organization. Fiscal 22 was another outstanding year with impactful results that confirm the effectiveness of our BD 2025 strategy.
We delivered reliable, consistent performance that reflects our team's unwavering commitment to our purpose and the execution of our growth strategy, all while navigating the challenging macro environment that all companies are facing. BD's future is very bright and our opportunity to make an impact has never been greater. Looking forward, our strong performance and momentum increases our confidence to continue to create substantial, sustained value for all stakeholders. Thank you again for joining us today, and I hope that you have a good day. At this time, I declare that the polls are closed. We will now take questions from the floor. Please give your name and the number of shares you own or represent, and please also limit your question and comments to three minutes to allow sufficient time for all those who may wish to participate. Open it up for any questions. Okay.
Looks like there's no questions, and so I will ask the inspector to report the preliminary voting results.
Mr. Chairman, on the election of directors, each director nominee received the affirmative vote of a majority of the votes cast. Proposal two, to ratify the selection of the independent registered public accounting firm, received the affirmative vote of 94% of the votes cast. Proposal three, the advisory vote to approve named executive officer compensation, received the affirmative vote of 92% of the votes cast. Proposal four, the advisory vote to approve the frequency of say on pay votes option 1 year, received the most support with the affirmative vote of 98% of the votes cast. Proposal five, to amend BD's 2004 plan, received the affirmative vote of 95% of the votes cast. Proposal six, the shareholder proposal to require prior shareholder approval of certain termination payments, 61% of the shares cast were voted for, and 38% were voted against.
That concludes our report.
Okay. Thank you. Based on the report of the inspectors, I declare that the nominees for directors named in the company's proxy statement have been elected to serve for a term of one year. The selection of Ernst & Young as the independent registered public accounting firm of the company for fiscal 23 has been ratified. The advisory vote on named executive officer compensation has been approved. Regarding the advisory vote on the frequency of say on pay votes, one year has received the most votes. The board intends to hold such votes in accordance with this vote. The amendments to the company's 2004 plan has been approved, the shareholder proposal to require prior shareholder approval of certain termination payments has passed. These are preliminary voting results, final results will be available after the votes have been certified by the inspectors.
With that, I will entertain a motion to adjourn. Okay. Hearing no objections, the meeting is now ended, and thank you very much for coming. We are dismissed. Thank you.