Good morning, and welcome to the Bruker Corporation's fourth quarter 2022 earnings conference call. All participants will be in listen only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star then one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star then two. Please note this event is being recorded. I would like to turn the conference over to Justin Ward, Senior Director of Investor Relations and Corporate Development. Please go ahead.
Thank you, Anthony. Good morning, everyone. I would like to welcome everyone to Bruker Corporation's fourth quarter and full year 2022 earnings conference call. My name is Justin Ward and I am Bruker's Senior Director of Investor Relations and Corporate Development. Joining me on today's call are Frank Laukien, our President and CEO, and Gerald Herman, our Executive Vice President and CFO. In addition to the earnings release we issued earlier today, during today's conference call, we will be referencing a slide presentation that can be downloaded from the Events and Presentation section of Bruker's Investor Relations website. During today's call, we will be highlighting Non-GAAP financial information. Reconciliations of our Non-GAAP to GAAP financial measures are included in our earnings release and are posted on our website at ir.bruker.com.
Before we begin, I would like to reference Bruker's Safe Harbor statement, which is shown on slide twofour of the presentation. During this call, we will make forward-looking statements regarding future events and the financial and operational performance of the company that involve risks and uncertainties, including those related to the elevated geopolitical and energy risks, the COVID-19 pandemic, and supply chain logistics and inflation challenges. The company's actual results may differ materially from such statements. Factors that might cause such differences include, but are not limited to those discussed in today's earnings release and in our Form 10-K as updated by our other SEC filings, which are available on our website and on the SEC's website. Also, note that the following information is based on current business gazette conditions and to our outlook as of today, February 9, 2023.
We do not intend to update our forward-looking statements based on new information, future events, or for other reasons, except as may be required by law, prior to the release of our first quarter 2023 financial results expected in early May 2023. You should not rely on these forward-looking statements as representing our views or outlook as of any date after today. We will begin today's call with Frank providing an overview of our business progress. Gerald will then cover the financials for the fourth quarter and full year 2022 in more detail, and he will share our fiscal year 2023 financial outlook. Now, I'd like to turn the call over to Bruker CEO, Frank Laukien.
Thank you, Justin. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us on today's earnings call. In fiscal year 2022, Bruker achieved solid operating and financial improvements with 10% organic revenue growth, 150 basis points gross margin expansion, and 11% Non-GAAP EPS growth, all with a Non-GAAP return on invested capital above 20%, while investing significantly in proteomics and spatial biology. We have made several key acquisitions and investments in the last 13 months in order to expand the breadth of our proteomics capabilities into proteomics consumables, automation software, and expert proteomics drug discovery services, also in order to enter attractive new markets in cancer research tools and neuroscience research tools and solutions.
Our teams also have been effectively navigating supply chain and geopolitical challenges, which are gradually improving but not fully resolved yet, and probably will not be fully resolved until the end of 2023, and in some areas of electronics, even into early 2024. Most importantly, we are advancing our Project Accelerate 2.0 high growth, high margin initiatives with, as you know, a particular focus on the large opportunities in proteomics and the related field of spatial biology, while also investing in operational excellence, productivity, and our capacity growth for the next 10 years. Bruker, again, has introduced key life science tools innovations in 2022, and demand for our high-value solutions and differentiated instruments is strong. In fiscal year 2022, our scientific instrument segment generated double digit year-over-year organic bookings growth and built additional backlog for good visibility into the year.
In 2023, we intend to drive strong revenue growth and another solid EPS increase while further expanding our focused strategic investments in the recently acquired additional proteomics capabilities and in our other key Project Accelerate 2.0 initiatives. Our medium-term goal is to continue to transform Bruker into a high revenue growth and consistent double-digit EPS growth company with significant further growth and operating margin expansion potential. Turning now to slide four. Bruker's solid 8.9% year-over-year organic revenue growth in the fourth quarter capped off another strong year for the company. Continued demand for our differentiated high-value solutions drove robust performance in bookings and revenues, and our Q4 2022 Scientific Instruments segment book-to-bill ratio was again greater than one.
For the full year 2022, our BEST segment organic bookings and backlog both increased in the double-digits percentage year-over-year. For the fourth quarter of 2022, the BEST segment order bookings continued to grow nicely, driven by broad-based customer demand, with demand in Europe being particularly strong. Bruker's Q4 2022 reported revenue increased 3.6% year-over-year to $708 million. This was in comparison to a strong prior year, Q4 of 2021, and with a 7% Q4 2022 headwind from FX. On an organic basis, our Q4 2022 revenues increased 8.9% year-over-year. Our Q4 2022 Non-GAAP gross margin increased 140 basis points year-over-year to 52.6%, while our Non-GAAP margin was 21.0%, the same as in the fourth quarter of 2021.
Despite inflation headwinds, our gross margin expansion is clearly benefiting from Project Accelerate 2.0 margin mix, our operational excellence productivity gains, as well as volume leverage, pricing, and currency tailwinds. In the fourth quarter of 2022, Bruker reported GAAP diluted earnings per share of $0.66, up 32% compared to $0.50 reported in the fourth quarter of 2021. On a Non-GAAP basis, fourth quarter 2022 diluted EPS was $0.74, up 25% from $0.59 in the fourth quarter of 2021. In summary, the fourth quarter of 2022 was a quarter of good execution and continued broad demand for our differentiated portfolio. Moving on to slide five, we show Bruker's performance for the full year 2022. Our revenues increased by $113 million year-over-year, or by 4.7% to $2.53 billion.
On an organic basis, fiscal year 2022 revenues grew 10.2% year-over-year. For the full year 2022, book-to-bill for Bruker's three scientific instruments group were all above 1.1. Geographically, our 2022 BSI order bookings were led by double-digit organic growth in Asia Pacific, South Asia, and Australia, New Zealand, the APAC region, as we abbreviate it, and with mid-teens% organic growth in Europe and Middle East Africa, or EMEA, and mid-single-digit% organic order bookings growth in the Americas. In fiscal year 2022, we experienced particularly strong organic growth in our proteomics, biopharma, semiconductor metrology, and industrial research markets. In fiscal year 2022, we delivered double-digit organic revenue growth, 150 basis points year-over-year gross margin expansion, 60 basis points year-over-year operating margin expansion, and double-digit% Non-GAAP EPS growth.
Our Non-GAAP return on invested capital of 24.3% was again well above our long-term target of ROIC greater than 20%. This continues to confirm our differentiated strategy and entrepreneurial management process and culture are working. Finally, we're also pleased with our 7% year-over-year Non-GAAP EBITDA growth, bringing 2022 Non-GAAP EBITDA to $547.5 million, and the related Non-GAAP EBITDA margin up 40 bps to 21.6%. Please turn to slide six and seven , where we highlight the full year 2022 performance of our three scientific instruments groups and of our BEST segment, all on a constant currency and year-over-year basis.
In 2022, BioSpin Group revenue grew in the high single digits % year-over-year to $697.7 million, with strong growth in its services and support revenues, as well as strong growth in preclinical imaging and a notable contribution from our biopharma process analytical technology software acquisition, Optimal. Bruker BioSpin recognized revenue on 4 GHz-class NMR instruments in 2022, consistent with four systems recognized in 2021. You may have seen our press release last week in which we detailed the customer acceptances of the first two, 1.0 GHz NMR systems already in the fourth quarter of 2022, one at RIKEN in Japan and one in Barcelona, Spain. These acceptances were ahead of schedule as this new compact single-story, 1.0 GHz product launch is technically going really very well.
It resulted in some hot 1.2 GHz installations, however, moving to this year, 2023. In 2023, we again expect to install 4 GHz-class NMRs. By the way, there none are expected in the first quarter of 2023. I know some of you are following that quarter by quarter. Moving on, for the full year 2022, CALID Group revenues increased in the high single digits % to $822 million, with continued growth in our life science mass spectrometry business and notable strength in proteomics applications and our timsTOF portfolio, with now more than 600 units installed in customer labs. We continue to experience some supply chain delays, however, slowing revenue execution in CALID and hence the backlog went up.
Our timsTOF platforms saw very robust demand in applications for 4D proteomics, PTMs or epiproteomics, as well as, single-cell proteomics and mass spec imaging all on the various models of the timsTOF platform. Our microbiology and molecular diagnostics revenue was up slightly year-over-year, as aftermarket strength offset modest instrument demand, which faced difficult comps and comparables from 2021. Moving on to slide seven now. Full year 2022, Bruker Nano revenues grew in the high teens. Our growth star, high teens percentage to $787 million. Nano's revenue growth in semiconductor industrial markets was particularly strong. Our Nano Surfaces division drove the Nano group's strength, while X-ray and Nano Analysis divisions also grew further versus 2021.
Nano's microelectronics and semiconductor metrology tools performed well in 2022, with strong bookings and a strong backlog that provide us with good visibility into 2023. Bruker Nano Life Science fluorescence microscopy showed strong year-over-year growth, a result of product innovation and life science research demand, that's also where we have made some additional acquisitions I'll discuss in a moment. Last but not least at all, fiscal year 2022, Best revenue grew in the mid-teens %, net of intercompany eliminations driven by contributions from big science, clean energy research, and robust demand for our MRI superconductors by our MedTech OEM customers. Best superconductor demand appears healthy, we continue to experience supply chain challenges there as well due to some material shortages. Moving to slides eight and nine now.
We continue to make good progress with our Project Accelerate 2.0 initiatives, which in 2022 now represent 56% of our total revenue. On slide eight, we highlight two recent acquisitions, Inscopix and Neurescence. Inscopix is a part of our fluorescence microscopy business, although it's a very specialized way of doing life animal, fluorescence microscopy. Inscopix has really generated and pioneered the field of fundamental neuroscience brain circuitry research. This is not molecular, and this is not just behavior. This is this crucial in between that we need to understand, brain function, in vivo brain function much better. They had about $20 million in 2022 revenues. Their, their growth margins are well above 60%.
While this year they only have a single-digit EBIT margin because they're investing a lot, and we support that, we expect them to have not only a double-digit revenue CAGR, but also to become accretive to operating margin over time and become one of our more profitable businesses over a few years. Right now, they're very much in growth and fast investment mode. Somewhat similar but also slightly different story on Biognosys, where we did go into this specialty drug discovery and development research services or CRO services. Not a general strategy for us, as you may know, but very much beneficial in the specialty proteomics services field, where by the way, biognosys also has some very key consumables, kits, and software. They're a mix of CRO drug discovery and proteomics specialty tools businesses.
They had about $15 million in 2022 revenue. We're also expecting them to have a long-term double-digit CAGR in the double digits. This year in 2023, because of significant investments that we support, including their rollout of their US facility, we do not expect them to be profitable, but over time, we think they will also then become accretive to our operating margin over time. This will take a few years, but a very key additional acquisition in proteomics.
Moving on to slide nine, just very briefly, something that you probably don't have much visibility on. We had a press release on this in December. Many of our technologies within BEST are not only used for high energy physics experiments or big science or MRI by our MRI OEM customers, but increasingly also by clean tech as clean tech technology is under development. Here are examples of contracts that we have received for over $50 million for superconducting materials from an Asian pilot plant on fusion, magnetic confinement fusion pilot plant, as well as from ITER indirectly for something that is part of the diverter.
I don't expect you to be experts in how magnetic fusion and ITER work, those are the parts of the ITER machine that have the highest heat and radiation load, and we have some very specialized materials there and got those long-term contracts. By the way, these are all multi-year contracts, this will not be all or not all be 23 or 24 revenue. Superconductors also may play an increasing role in offshore 20-megawatt and larger wind turbines. The investment in Europe, in Asia, and particularly in the U.S. that are planned for offshore wind are enormous, larger, more efficient wind turbines probably will get away from rare earth materials because it gets too heavy.
It also is only sourced in 1 country, China in this case, there may be a bright future for superconductors in offshore wind turbines. More of an outlook for some future growth areas on which you probably haven't that much visibility. Let me wrap up on slide 10, illustrates how our revenue mix continues to improve. Project Accelerate 2.0 now presents 56% of our revenues. Year by year, the changes are incremental, but if you look at this at the last pre-COVID year, not 2019, it's up from 46% to now 56%. This, along with operational excellence, obviously advances our growth and our operating margins and opens up very large new tents for us, particularly the large opportunities for this decade and the next in proteomics and spatial biology.
We're still an instruments company and proud to be that one, an instruments company, because that's where we innovate and create new markets. Our recurring revenue has advanced from the mid-20s% to 30%, as you see in the lower left. Our geographic balance has really changed dramatically with fast growth, particularly in the Americas, to where Americas and EMEA are at parity at about 33% and very similar to our broader APAC, South Asia, revenue, which is about 34% of Bruker's total global revenue. Also quite a different picture than from a few years ago. Well, let me wrap things up. In summary, during 2022, Bruker again made excellent progress. We closed several key technology and capabilities acquisitions, particularly in fluorescence microscopy, neuroscience, and proteomics in the last 13 months.
We are expanding the breadth and depth of our capabilities as well as entering new attractive markets, as I've referred to earlier. I'm very proud of the agility and responsiveness of our teams in addressing the supply chain challenges. Moving forward, our high backlog for 2023 gives us good visibility into another promising year ahead. In 2023, we intend to combine rapid revenue growth, further gross margin expansion, and solid EPS growth with additional strategic R&D and commercial investments, particularly in proteomics and spatial biology. For 2023, we expect to reach our previously announced medium-term target of R&D investment of 10% of revenues, which is a 70 basis point step-up or increase from 9.3% in 2022. We are really investing very significantly while improving our financial performance year-over-year. It's a good strategy, it's a good process.
With that, let me turn the call over to our CFO, Gerald Herman, who will review Bruker's financial performance and outlook in more detail. Gerald.
Thank you, Frank. Thank you everyone for joining us today. I'm pleased to provide more detail on Bruker's fourth quarter and full year 2022 financials. Starting on slide 12. In the fourth quarter of 2022, Bruker's reported revenue increased 3.6% to approximately $708 million, which reflects an organic revenue increase of 8.9% year-over-year. We reported GAAP EPS of $0.56 per share compared to $0.50 in the fourth quarter of 2021. On a Non-GAAP basis, the fourth quarter 2022 EPS was $0.74 per share, an increase of 25% compared to the $0.59 in the fourth quarter of 2021.
Our fourth quarter 2022 Non-GAAP operating income grew 3.5% year-over-year, with the fourth quarter 2022 Non-GAAP operating margin about flat year-over-year at 21%, as our strong gross margin expansion was offset by higher R&D and commercial investments for Project Accelerate 2.0 initiatives, as well as by inflation-related costs. We finished the fourth quarter with cash equivalents, and short-term investments of approximately $646 million. During the quarter, we used cash to fund selected Project Accelerate 2.0 investments in our key strategic opportunities, capital expenditures, and of course, our dividend program. In the fourth quarter, we purchased approximately 435,000 shares of Bruker stock for total consideration of about $26 million. For the full year of 2022, our repurchases totaled 4.2 million shares, or approximately $265 million.
We generated $159 million of operating cash flow in the fourth quarter, which after capital expenditure investments, resulted in $135 million in free cash flow for the fourth quarter of 2022. This represents a $25 million increase from the fourth quarter of 2021 due primarily to higher net income in the quarter. slide 13 shows the revenue bridge for the fourth quarter of 2022. As noted earlier, organic revenue in the quarter increased 8.9%. We had a positive revenue contribution from acquisitions of 1.7% and a foreign currency headwind of 7%.
From an organic revenue growth perspective, compared to the fourth quarter of 2021, BioSpin's fourth quarter revenue for fourth quarter 2022 increased in the high single-digit % with a notable strength in our BCI and BioSpin software businesses. Bruker Nano organic revenue grew in the low 20% on strength in semiconductor metrology and our surface materials and nanoanalysis tools divisions. CALID's performance was constrained by supply chain delays in the fourth quarter of 2022, bookings were again robust. Order bookings in CALID in the fourth quarter were significantly higher than revenues for a book-to-bill meaningfully above one. Fourth quarter 2022 BSI Systems revenue and aftermarket were both up high single-digit % organically compared to the fourth quarter of 2021. Geographically, on an organic basis, in the fourth quarter of 2022, our European revenue was down mid-single digit % year-over-year.
Americas grew in the high single-digit % range, and the APAC region grew in the 20% range year-over-year. The Rest of World fourth quarter 2022 revenue was higher year-over-year in the high teens %. slide 14 shows our fourth quarter 2022 P&L performance on a Non-GAAP basis. Fourth quarter 2022 Non-GAAP gross margin of 52.6% increased 140 basis points from 51.2% in the fourth quarter of 2021 due to increased capacity utilization, favorable revenue mix, and volume leverage. Fourth quarter 2022 Non-GAAP operating expenses were up 8.2% compared to the fourth quarter of 2021 and reflect the continuing acceleration of R&D and commercial investments in Project Accelerate 2.0, including in proteomics and spatial biology, in addition to increased costs related to inflation.
For the fourth quarter of 2022, our Non-GAAP effective tax rate was 20.6% compared to 34.4% in the fourth quarter of 2021, primarily due to a favorable U.S. tax clarification issued in the fourth quarter of 2022. Weighted average diluted shares outstanding in the fourth quarter of 2022 were 147.9 million, a reduction of approximately 4.6 million shares or 3% from the fourth quarter of 2021, resulting from our share repurchase activity over the past year. Finally, fourth quarter 2022 Non-GAAP EPS of $0.74 was up 25% compared to $0.59 in the fourth quarter of 2021. slide 15 shows the year-over-year revenue bridge for the full year of 2022.
Revenue was up $113 million or 4.7%, including organic growth of 10.2%, following a very strong 2021 organic growth comp of over 19%. Acquisitions added 1.4% to our top line, while foreign exchange was a 7% headwind for the full year of 2022. P&L results for the full year of 2022 are summarized on slide 16. For the full year, gross margin expanded 150 basis points to 52.6%, reflecting higher revenue, volume leverage, and more favorable mix from Project Accelerate 2.0, while operating margins grew 60 basis points to 20.0% for many of the same reasons. The full Non-GAAP tax rate was 27.7% compared to a 28% rate in 2021. Turning now to slide 17.
In the full year of 2022, we generated $143 million of free cash flow, approximately $47 million lower than in 2021. Full year 2022 free cash flow benefited from higher net income, more than offset by higher working capital related to our increased volume, buffer inventories, and the timing of receivables. Our capital expenditures in the year reflect our continuing investments in growth capacity and productivity as part of our operational excellence drive. Our cash conversion cycle at the end of the fourth quarter of 2022 was 229 days, an increase of 21 days compared to the fourth quarter of 2021. This increase was due to higher working capital needs to cushion supply chain risks. Turning now to slide 19.
Given our continued strong bookings growth and backlog in 2022, we expect solid growth in 2023. Our outlook for 2023 includes we are now guiding to organic revenue growth of 8%-10% year-over-year. We estimate a foreign currency tailwind of about 1.5%, with acquisitions also contributing about 1.5% to growth. This is expected to lead to reported revenue of $2.81 billion-$2.86 billion, representing growth in a range of 11%-13% compared to 2022. For 2023, we expect to reach our medium-term R&D target of approximately 10% of revenues. That's a 70 basis point step-up from the 9.3% level we delivered in 2022.
Nonetheless, we expect our innovative portfolio to continue to deliver solid gross margin expansion and operating profit growth in 2023, and we're targeting 7%-9% year-over-year Non-GAAP operating profit growth in 2023. Organic operating margins are expected to expand approximately 50 basis points in 2023, but a combined transitory headwind in 2023 of about 120 basis points from foreign exchange and dilution from our recent acquisitions is expected to decrease our Non-GAAP operating margins by approximately 70 basis points to about 19.3% for 2023. We expect operating margins to rebound from this anticipated 2023 dip in 2024, and our medium-term goal continues to be to expand our Non-GAAP operating margins well beyond our 20% level, which we achieved for the first time in 2022. As Frank mentioned, our recent acquisitions are highly synergistic and strategic.
We expect them to deliver double-digit revenue growth, rapid margin improvements, and strong shareholder returns over time. On the bottom line, we're guiding to Non-GAAP EPS for 2023 in a range of $2.52-$2.57, or Non-GAAP EPS growth of 8%-10% compared to 2022. This would also represent a 13% Non-GAAP EPS CAGR from our $1.57 pre-pandemic level in fiscal year 2019. We're projecting a Non-GAAP tax rate of approximately 28% for the full year of 2023. Other guidance assumptions are listed on the slide. Our full year 2023 ranges have been updated for foreign currency rates as of January 31, 2023. To wrap up, Bruker delivered strong bookings, backlog, and revenue growth in the fourth quarter, capping off another year of very good financial improvement.
We're carrying bookings momentum, innovative products, and a record backlog into 2023, giving us good confidence in our ability to deliver another solid financial performance in 2023. With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Justin to start the Q&A session. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Thank you, Gerald. I'd now like to turn the call over to the operator to begin the Q&A portion of the call. As a reminder, to allow everyone time for questions, we ask that you limit yourself to one question and one follow-up. Operator?
We will now begin the question-and-answer session. To ask a question, you may press star then one on your telephone keypad. If you're using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. To withdraw your question, please press star then two. At this time, we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster. Our first question will come from Puneet Souda with SVB Securities. You may now go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, Frank, Gerald. Thanks for taking my questions. First one is on just book-to-bill that came in obviously greater than one. Could you maybe elaborate on bookings? Are they skewing to one segment versus the other among the instrumentation? On CALID, you know, you said you were supply chain-constrained. We obviously have been hearing from other peer groups on instrumentations. Supply chains have been getting addressed, you know, throughout the year. Could you talk a little bit about that and what visibility you have on supply chains there and what instruments are maybe, you know, sort of impacted there? I have a follow-up.
All right, I'll start with that. The book-to-bill greater than one in the BSI segments. Strength in timsTOF for sure. BioSpin had very strong bookings. You know, it was really nothing that dropped out or something like that. Some of the applied and industrial areas remained pretty resilient. We kept an eye on that, and then geographically, a bit of a surprise is that Europe had such strong bookings in Q4. I think those are maybe the more remarkable things that, you know, that some of them may surprise you and some are as expected.
To the second point, supply chain, yes, it is getting better, but that, you know, certainly not getting worse, but there still are some things that sometimes there's just a part or, you know, a few parts that delay deliveries. We got, for instance, in the CALID Group, both the Bruker Optics molecular spectroscopy, but also our timsTOF line got delayed in some deliveries. Sometimes it's even just even the chromatography equipment and so on that can be delayed. I don't want to bore you with the details, but it's not, you know, that it's all smooth sailing. This will still take some time to sort itself out.
It is getting better, that, you know, it's not gone and so it still is a drag on revenue, which is, you know, we didn't really intend to build our backlog further in Q4. You know, that's we delivered good revenue growth. We also had, you know, delightfully better than expected perhaps, or better than feared if we were all, you know, a little concerned what's going on with the economy. We're pretty pleased that our bookings were so strong and, yes, that our backlog went up yet again. That's the bigger picture there.
Got it. Okay. Helpful. Just Gerald, on op margin, dipping here in 2023, could you talk a little bit about the, you know, R&D investments that you're talking about? How should we think about op margin kind of throughout the year? Just if I could squeeze one in for on China, Frank, we've been hearing about this one point-
Is that three, four questions, right? Sorry.
Appreciate it, but this is an important one. I would love to get your view on the CNY 1.7 trillion and $200 billion instrumentation sort of the stimulus there. I know it's a loan, but because you are obviously strong in instrumentation, so would love to get your thoughts there if that could be meaningful for Bruker. Thank you.
I'll start with that. I mean, we're obviously delighted by that prospect. As you know from announcements until this gets into specific grants and budgets and then into purchase orders takes some time. you know that along with the, you know, Inflation Reduction Act in the U.S., or the CHIPS Act in the U.S. and potential also additional stimulus that may happen in Europe, in clean tech and other energies, it, it all caters to our strengths, and we're in principle, very we're delighted and excited, but I just don't want to caution it takes some time. This probably won't show up into our revenue till 2024, 2025, but it's great to have these medium and long-term tailwinds as well. on the other.
Yeah
Q uestion, I go over to Justin or to you or.
Sure. I'm happy to respond, Puneet. Relative to the 2023 guidance, relative to the margin performance, I think as you probably heard from my prepared remarks, there's two major factors there. First of all, we posted, I think very solid, full year 2022 operating margin performance at 20%. That's a record for the company. Secondly, we do expect some combined foreign exchange and acquisition-related dilution on the operating margin for 2023. There's another factor which you've already referenced, which is the accelerated R&D spend. We do think with some stabilization on the supply chain and some of the work we're doing there, that we will be able to bring our R&D levels back up to a 10% level in 2023. All of that pulls the operating margin down slightly for 2023.
We expect to be able to rebound that back in 2024.
Importantly, we expect to expand our growth margins, our Non-GAAP growth margins in 2023. We've, even, you know, if you look at the guidance slide and we're thinking that organically our operating margin is still gonna grow about 50 basis points. Yes, we are acknowledging some transition margin headwinds from FX and the, you know, deliberate and very good acquisitions. In the first year, they're either not profitable or they have low margins. We're very glad we did these acquisitions.
I think they'll be terrific for the company, but that gives us a temporary drag on in 2023, which we're accepting and we think that only gives us more growth and operating margin expansion potential in the future years as we're positioning the company and continue to transform the company.
Got it. Appreciate it. Thank you.
Mm-hmm. Sure.
Our next question will come from Patrick Donnelly with Citi. You may now go ahead.
Taking the question. You know, Frank, I think this is the highest growth number I've seen you guys put out to start a year. You know, you guys are typically known for layering in a pretty healthy amount of conservatism. I guess, with this elevated growth numbers, is there still that typical Bruker conservatism in there? On the back of that, I guess what gives you the confidence to put out, you know, this type of number to start the year, you know, bumping it even from what you were talking about at JPM? I mean, clearly the record backlog, I assume is part of it. Does that just give you the visibility, you know, you didn't have in prior years to get to this number? Did headwinds like that China semi concern that you talked about last quarter alleviate a little bit?
It would be great to just get your perspective on kind of where we stand to start the year here.
Thanks for the question. Good question. I can give you some incremental because to your very last point, we already took out about a few orders from China Semiconductor out of our backlog because of the probability or of either significant delays or it not being feasible to export certain pieces of equipment. That's all built into our forecast, and we took care of that in Q4, if you like. No additional risk there that we can see at the time. You know, I think it's the usual balance of risks and opportunities. Yes, it is backlog. We acknowledge that. Of course, that backlog will not come to normalized levels all in one year. That'll be a two to three-year process. It's continued orders momentum.
It's also in some of the areas where we were concerned, and we're wondering ourselves whether they would get quite a bit weaker and, you know, why some of them are not growing as fast. We haven't seen any pronounced signs of weakness or any signs of real weakness. It's just coming the order momentum. You know, order momentum in BioSpin, timsTOF, a number of areas is very strong. We have. It's just, yeah, it is an unusual number early in the year for us, but I would think it's the usual good balance that we hopefully will not regret, right? We, that's a number that we hope we can deliver.
Okay. That's helpful. Then, you know, I think this quarter particularly, there's been an increased focus on kind of the 1Q and annual progression. You know, most of your life science peers have kind of guided 1Q to be a little bit light of expectations in the latest quarter as you think about kind of the growth progression throughout the year. Can you guys just give us some perspective on kind of the cadence throughout the year? How should we think about 1Q, you know, both on the organic growth side and then Gerald, maybe on the margin side, just in terms of the build as we work our way through the year, particularly again, 1Q, just given, you know, some headwinds via China and stocking and others you're seeing?
Yeah. We also expect.
Yeah, go ahead.
Sorry. We also expect Q1 to be a little lighter. Gerald, do you wanna expand there on some quarterly color? We do acknowledge that we also expect Q1 to be on the lighter side, but we still expect decent growth.
Yeah, we do. I would say from an organic growth perspective, we still expect H1 to be fairly solid. Q1 may be a little lighter, but remember, we are targeting some ultra-high field systems as we move through the year. I do think.
Not in Q1, however, Matt.
Not in Q1, right. It is clear that there'll be, you know, strength in the first half for sure. In addition, you likely know, we had some supply chain constraints. We hope to be able to release some of that as we move through the first half, including the first quarter, so.
Maybe I'll add to that for your modeling. Q1 of last year was very strong.
Yep
We're likely to be flat or down on margin.
Margin
C ompared to Q1 of last year. Q2 of last year was particularly supply chain constrained, so Q2 will be a weaker comparison for us. We expect to have a more even revenue and margin flow this year than last year. Last year, Q1, strong comparison. Q2, weaker comparison, and we expect that to even out in more be more even in 2023. For your modeling, relatively speaking, our Q1 will not be that strong because Q1 of 2022 was so strong.
Okay.
I hope that helps.
On the organic growth side, maybe 1 Q below that 8-10, maybe like mid-single, and then we build our way through the year. Is that kind of a fair ballpark?
We're not giving color, numerical color.
Okay.
We'd rather not comment because we don't give quarterly color this time. If there was something very unusual, we try to call it out, but I just wanna make sure that I'm not giving additional numerical color that we didn't intend to.
Understood. Thank you, guys.
Yep. Thank you.
Our next question will come from Jack Meehan with Nephron Research. You may now go ahead.
Thank you. Good morning. wanted to talk about Nano. 17% organic growth for the year, over 20% in the fourth quarter. Just really, you know, like an outstanding year. Can you dissect for us how much of this is coming from things like semiconductor versus the investments in spatial? How big is that business today?
Yeah. I mean, the spatial and fluorescence microscopy is still much, much smaller than the semiconductor and advanced electronics. Spatial biology and, you know, including the, the adjacent areas that we group there, which include fluorescence microscopy, but also the new spatial neuroscience businesses that we've acquired, particularly Inscopix, are going to be needle moving in 2023, but they're still quite a bit smaller than the semiconductor business. The semiconductor business is very strong backlog. We're not too exposed to the memory area where indeed there is an oversupply in some areas that are a bit commoditized. You know, we expect semiconductor orders to be weaker and revenue will not grow steeply in 2023 in that area.
You know, it's, it looks like a soft landing and more than made up or at least made up by other areas of strength in our portfolio. In 2022, semiconductor was a strong contributor margin-wise and growth-wise for sure.
Great. Then wanted to move over to BioSpin, just to ask about the single-story gigahertz NMR. Can you give us an update on how many orders you have for that at this point, and just expectations for ability to scale the manufacturing?
So far, we just have three orders, two of which we've delivered in Q4. We announced them all. They coincidentally all came in in the 2nd quarter of last year. Two of them we delivered ahead of schedule. It was just really amazing that a new product could really, you know, mature so quickly and, indeed be delivered and getting smooth customer installation. We're kind of thrilled with how that's going. Yes, it's another one that we expect to have in 2023 revenue. There is quite a bit of activity. There is quite a few opportunities and things in the pipeline where people are trying to raise funding, but no orders to report yet. No additional orders to report yet.
Super. Thank you.
Mm-hmm.
Our next question will come from Josh Waldman with Cleveland Research. You may now go ahead.
Good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. A couple for you. I guess first on the margin guide, Frank, wonder if you could provide more context on where the R&D and commercial investments are being targeted and, you know, kind of what the timeline is for when we should start to see these show up in revenue growth? I mean, it sounds like these are a bit more kind of one-time-ish investments to show up in 2023 and roll off in 2024. Is that right? I guess.
No, that's not-
I guess-
No, go ahead. Yeah.
I, Gerald, I guess a follow-up on that, and you alluded to it a bit, I think, in the prepared remarks, but curious if you're still targeting the 21.5% op margins and $3 of earnings for 2024 or has this kind of changed that target?
A number of points. Good, well, good, very good question. No, the R&D 10% investment, that's gonna be that's a medium-term target. That's not a one-time shot in 2023. We had been ramping in that, particularly in proteomics. In proteomics, as you've seen, we've added early last year, we've added sample consumables and automation. We added chromatography capabilities. All these, in addition to, of course, continuing to develop our timsTOF portfolio. We've added CRO capabilities and software and further consumables capabilities. These will all require multi-year continued strong R&D investments, and we do not want to be, you know, penny wise and pound foolish and underinvest in this very large proteomics opportunity. The 10% R&D, I don't want to predict for how many years, but that's a multiple year level, at which we want to be.
I think it would be actually a mistake, a strategic mistake if we underinvested here. The second part of that R&D investment goes heavily into spatial biology, which for us is a mix of fluorescence microscopy and neuroscience, and then the more traditional spatial single-cell proteomics, single-cell biology, particularly the epiproteomics, and then the 3D genomic spatial biology Acuity, which is a whole new area that won't have any revenue or any products this year yet, but that, you know, will begin to come out in 2024. There is very, very significant, very important R&D investments. The 10% R&D, we're not gonna drive it to 11% or 12%. I think that's just, you know, it's not. We're also doing disciplined growth investments.
But the 10% is here to stay for, not forever, but for quite a few years to come. The transitory effects, Josh, are more on the FX and the M&A, the newly acquired, especially the larger ones Inscopix, single digit margins in 2023, and then improving from there. Biognosys, in 2023 and 2024, having investments that will lead to a P&L loss for these new significant acquisitions. But we're doing that with our eyes wide open. They will grow, they will become important, they will need further investments. That's why that 120 basis points transitory effect from FX, about half FX, and half from these recent acquisitions, that is indeed transient or transitory for 2023, and may still be a bit there, but much abated probably in 2024.
The R&D investment of around 10% is very much important for our growth in proteomics and spatial biology. To your last question, Josh, we're not giving 2024 guidance on operating margin. We know we're taking a dip in an operating margin this year. We hope to recover substantially from that and grow from there. We're not giving 2024 guidance. By the way, we had a range that we've given for 2024, not just a number. We're already within our 2024 revenue in 2023, that's happening much faster. We're within...
We're on the last few yards on the few yard lines here of reaching our EPS goal for 2024 already in 2023, so we're very likely to reach that in 2024. We tend to give new multi-year medium-term goals, which we're planning to do in our June 15th investor and analyst day on June 15th of this year, where we'll probably again give three-year financial goals for the medium term.
Got it. Got it. Appreciate all the color. A follow-up, Frank. Just wondered if you could give us an update on your view of, you know, the quoting and ordering activity among university accounts in recent months. Just curious your expectations for this in market in 2023.
Very healthy.
Okay.
Yeah.
Thanks.
Our next question will come from Rachel Vatnsdal with JP Morgan. You may now go ahead.
Great. Thanks, guys, for taking the questions. Maybe we could just spend a minute on Europe here. The region was down mid-single digit in the quarter, but you noted that bookings were exceptionally strong. Can you just talk about what you're really seeing in that region? You've previously called out some of the energy headwinds and conversations with customers there. Are you seeing any pockets of weakness? Then maybe can you just point us towards what level of growth are you expecting in Europe for the year?
Right. Good questions. Yeah. I mean, I think the mood in Europe has changed a little bit. That's maybe you can see that in the currencies, right? Euro strengthening, and related currencies. The fear of a broader war in Europe rather than it being, hopefully and tragically, we understand that, but contained to eastern Ukraine. I think that fear of a broader war is probably reduced. Also, Europe had a mild winter and is not running out of gas anytime soon. In fact, the gas supply is very high, so the chances of energy blackouts and so on, you know, they're much reduced. And at least for this winter, Europe still needs to develop their energy strategies for future winters. This year Europe probably dodged a bullet and everybody's more optimistic.
Energy prices that had absolutely peaked three, four months ago or something like that, have come way down again. Not to the pre-war levels, of course. They're still quite a bit higher, but not nearly as high as the peak level. Everybody's kind of adjusting to that with energy saving measures and us making more investments, for instance, in solar power all of this year. Hopefully ready for the summer season when that's particularly beneficial and other energy saving. The mood in the European Union and, you know, also I think U.K. and Switzerland and so on, and their willingness to continue to invest in R&D or pharmaceutical discovery or into their version of having a semiconductor supply chain in Europe and not only relying on Asia or the U.S. as the U.S. is rebuilding, are all good drivers.
Yeah, I think the outlook for Europe is much more optimistic. We're not totally surprised that bookings came up in Q4, although they did that to a greater extent than even we had anticipated. I don't think Europe will be a drag anymore, maybe even the opposite 'cause it has to catch up a little bit.
It seems like it was very broad from an organic perspective on the booking side, Rachel. It seems as if it wasn't just focused in one particular area. It bodes well, I think, for the whole.
Europe is now discussing political additional stimulus in the clean tech sector and elsewhere, somewhat in response to our Inflation Reduction Act here in the U.S. That's the update there.
Perfect. Great to hear. Maybe just last one for me on pricing. You took some incremental price, especially in the back half of 2022. Can you just let us know where did pricing fully land for last year? What are you modeling for pricing increases and contribution there for 2023 as well? Thank you.
Yeah. Hey Rachel, this is Justin. Thanks for the question. For the full year of 2022, price realization was, you know, in that low single digits, as we mentioned. Again, it wasn't fully offsetting the inflation for the year. We had, call it about 100 basis points drag to operating margin from that net of price realization inflation. For next year, we do think it's gonna improve that net, you know, price realization as it's working its way through the backlog. We're expecting a little bit higher price realization next year, still in that low single digits, and we think it's gonna be a better net against the inflation, but still a little bit of a drag on inflation, maybe about 50 basis points.
As you look at our implied guidance for, and the commentary that Gerald had for 2023 on op margin, that organic op margin expansion we're expecting in 2023 does still include a bit of drag from the price versus inflation.
Thank you, Rachel.
Our next question will come from Derik De Bruin with Bank of America. You may now go ahead.
Hi. good morning, and nice quarter, Frank and company. Thanks.
Thank you, Derik.
A couple of cleanup questions and then one bigger one. Share count assumption for fiscal 2023, I mean, you do some incremental buybacks, so just want that. How should we think about FX in the first quarter? Does it sort of set the pacing for the rest of the year? Then I have a follow-up.
On the share buybacks, Derik, we don't typically comment on any future buybacks. The numbers are baked into what we have there already. Relative to foreign exchange, where we actually rerated our guidance based on the January 31st rates, you've seen, I think.
Yeah
You know, the U.S. dollar is weakened against some of the major currencies, and we factored that into our analysis, which is currently predicting, as you saw for the full year, a 1.5% foreign exchange tailwind on the revenue line from that.
Yeah.
That's what we-
I just wanted-
So today-
Just wanted the first quarter assumption on it, FX.
Yeah. Those are really the.
Yeah
... expected levels. I don't have anything.
Normally, we take year-end.
Yeah
F X rates for our planning. Since they had changed so significantly still in January, we did the unusual step of looking at of baking in January 31st rates.
Yeah
B ecause there had been quite a bit of change even in the first 30 days.
Exactly.
Got it. Can we talk a little bit about growth expectations by geographic region, Americas, EMEA, APAC in 2023, and then also on APAC, just a little bit more color on the China stimulus timing. You know, is there any preference for local companies versus, you know, outside of, outside of China, you know, political headwinds going on? Just a little bit more color on how we should sort of think about that situation. Thanks.
Yeah. You've heard on the geographic side that Europe's making a comeback, right?
Mm-hmm.
We're optimistic about Europe in bookings and this year. China's always difficult to read, right? When at some point you have zero COVID lockdowns, then you have the whole country getting a wave of infections. So far, that all seems to not have such big disruptions. Although I think China re-revenue growth was a little weaker in Q4. Is that correct?
A little bit, but we were up teens for the year. Q4 was up single digits.
Single digits. A little bit slower than the year, you know, that's probably a transition effect.
Mm-hmm.
We're excited about the stimulus, and the size of it and how much of it might go into scientific instruments. It's fantastic. I wouldn't say that at this point we have more than headline visibility into all of that.
Sure.
It's a little bit like when the first, the stimulus package or the CHIPS Act get passed. Until you then see, until the rubber hits the road and we get orders or have visibility into grants and so on, that always takes a few quarters. Often these announcements then, until they turn into our revenue and growth, is probably a 2024 effect. We're delighted to have more strong drivers in 2024. China always has a, you know, preference for local products where they are competitive. In some areas, MALDI Biotyper, preclinical and MRI, and low, lower-end X-ray systems that are local products, right? We continue to hold our ground. People sometimes want the higher performance, but sometimes they buy local. That's nothing new. For most of our product lines, there isn't, you know, a Chinese substitute.
The geopolitical risk with China around Taiwan or other things or balloons. You know, that's just very, very, very difficult to see where that's going. We have not, you know, built in any geopolitical major crisis, as that's just not predictable for us. You know, it is a concern, of course, for the next decade.
Great. Thank you very much.
Operator, we're past 9:30 AM here, so we're gonna finish up the call here.
Okay. This concludes the question and answer session. I'd like to turn it back over to Justin Ward for any closing remarks.
Great. Well, thank you everyone for joining us today. During the first quarter, Bruker will participate in several investor conferences, including the Citi Health Care Conference and the Cowen Health Care Conference. As Frank mentioned, we expect to host a Bruker Investor Day at the headquarters in Billerica, Massachusetts, on June 15th of this year. We look forward to welcoming all of you to that. Bruker's leadership team looks forward to meeting with you at one of those events or speaking with you directly during the quarter. Please feel free to reach out to me to arrange a follow-up. Have a great morning.
The conference is now concluded. Thank Sand you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.