Elanco Animal Health Incorporated (ELAN)
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Bank of America 2024 Animal Health Virtual Summit

Feb 29, 2024

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, the program is about to begin. Reminder that you can submit questions at any time via the Ask Questions tab on the webcast page. At this time, it is my pleasure to turn the program over to your host, Michael Ryskin. Please go ahead.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Great. Thanks for joining us. My name is Mike Ryskin. I'm on the Bank of America Life Science Tools and Diagnostics and Animal Health team, and I'm pleased to host at our next session: Todd Young from Elanco. Todd, thanks so much for being here.

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Thanks, Michael. Appreciate the opportunity, and I appreciate you hosting the Animal Health Summit. Apologies that I couldn't be there in person.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Well, it's virtual no matter what, so it's.

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Oh, i s it? I didn't realize that. I thought I was just blowing you off. I'm sorry.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

I mean, you're definitely special in our hearts, but no, it's virtual for everybody, so it makes it easier. You can be wherever you want for this. We're still bringing it to you live. It's going to be a similar format to our other sessions. It's going to be Fireside Q&A. If you've got questions, send them via the portal or via Bloomberg Chat or email, and we'll incorporate them. I guess just to start things off, Todd, I just want to ask some news today over the wires in terms of an activist investor, and you guys just put out your own press release about an hour ago in terms of your response. Anything notable you want to call out there, or just sort of how would you address that situation?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Sure, Michael. I refer everyone to the press release we put out. At Elanco, we're focused on delivering on the key elements from our IPP strategy that we've talked about. It's innovation, it's growth, it's cash. That's the focus. That's where the team is putting all their effort. We're excited for 2024. We're excited to bring our next big three through the FDA approval process and launch Zenrelia, Credelio Quattro, and Bovaer. And we'll continue to manage our expenses effectively while investing behind the best opportunities we have to drive value for shareholders going forward.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. All right. That's a fair answer. I mean, I guess maybe somewhere along those lines, let me give you sort of our standard introductory question is you reported your earnings results just I guess it was three days ago. It feels like a lifetime ago, but you reported fourth quarter results three days ago. You provided an initial 2024 outlook. Just any key points you want to highlight, sort of what do you think are the main takeaways we should be focusing on?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah. 2023 ended very positively for us on the top-line. Very pleased with 5% constant currency growth with real strength in our farm animal business as well as continued strength in the pet retail side. From an EBITDA and EPS standpoint, unfortunately, we had a few one-off items, primarily the 54% devaluation in Argentina that pushed us lower in our guidance range. But again, overall, we feel good about how the team finished with respect to both the innovation that we're investing in as well as where we are from our portfolio and top-line perspective, and are excited for what we're going to bring to the table in 2024.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. And then in terms of the guide for 2024, as you said, you're calling for a 1%-3% constant currency sales growth guide, but that's excluding the contribution from fiscal year 2024 launches. It's consistent with the framework you laid out at the end of 3Q. And then you just said, "We will see growth excluding new launches." Now you kind of quantified it a little bit more. You also talked about price 3% and then 2%-3% from existing innovation, so pre-2024 launches. Any particular areas where you're seeing the biggest price contribution? Sort of what's leading you to deliver that 3% price after solid price gains the last couple of years as well?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah. The team has really taken the need to be, I guess, a little more aggressive than the historical norm on price. Part of the reason it's a little slower in 2024 versus 2023 was we'd taken a second-half price increase in 2022 that annualized in and helped the 2023 price. So we continue to look to price to value to our portfolio. The innovation numbers and the price numbers aren't entirely mutually exclusive because those products that have been on the market, we also take price on those and just so that we're clear on how the math works. But overall, we've continued to take price in the pet retail market, though I will note that we've taken a different approach on Seresto this year with a lower average market price in general.

So if you go to the Walmarts, the Amazons, Petco, PetSmart, you'll see kind of just under $60 for a Seresto collar versus historically, that'd been at $67, $68 for an MSRP. And then there'd be lots of promotions and different discounts around it. So that will be something that's impactful on price. All the elasticity research we have done would suggest we're going to get a better overall result by having this sub-$60 price every day than how it worked previously with the promotions. As we look across the international markets, we certainly, every market is different, but yet we've got real competitive strengths, especially on the farm animal side. And we've been taking more price in those markets as a result of those complete portfolios. So overall, the places where it's the most difficult to take price is where the competitive innovation or generic launches happen.

That's certainly something that we've been managing through the last few years. We've talked about that competition in the vet clinic. But overall, we feel good about the price guidance we've given and the overarching price-for-value ways our team executes against.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. And then just on that point on Seresto, I want to make sure I understood it correctly. So in terms of net price, is it more or less the same net price, or is there a decrease in net price as well? Just the magnitude of discounts, things like that.

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah. I mean, at the end of the day, a lot of the gross-to-net investments would have come off against the sales and the like. So yeah, overall, we expect it to be pretty similar from a net pricing standpoint.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. Okay. And I'm just curious.

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

I think some may or may not recall. Last year, with our ERP integration, we had MAP pricing suspended for a big chunk of the first quarter. So I don't want anyone to get overly excited about different price dynamics and quarter to quarter because there's a lot of different things that play in there, especially on the U.S. pet side because of the MAP pricing.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. Okay. All right. Fair enough. That's a good distinction. Maybe let's pivot to what I'm pretty sure is going to be the number one topic of discussion is innovation and new products. 2024 is a major year for you. Expected to be a major year for you. We've been waiting for a lot of this innovation for a long time. You've got Zenrelia, Credelio Quattro, Bovaer. At this point in the game, sort of how much confidence do you have in that first-half approval timing and the launch timing after that? Because we're essentially in March. We're two months through the year, so you're just getting closer and closer. So what's your thought process where we stand now?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

As I think we've tried to represent here for a while, we feel good about a path to first-half approval. We've put in packages that we feel the FDA can very much approve, and we're having really good dialogue regarding all of the information in those packages with the FDA. It's regular dialogue. This isn't put something in and wait six months. It's regular good interaction to make sure we're tracking. Overall, we understand the focus from the investor side on the timing and the launches. I assure you, we have just as much focus internally to do that given how important it is to our total portfolios and the growth we're going to deliver this year.

As you know, Michael, based on our guidance of 1%-3% constant currency, we made the decision not to put the new launches in, but to make sure we assured the market that they will be accretive to EBITDA once launched. Clearly, they are accretive to sales, but there will also be upside to the EBITDA guidance we gave because the sales force investments in the U.S. to drive greater share of voice. That's in the base P&L. And a lot of the discretionary investments will happen later in the cycle as we get clinics to adopt the product. So overall, we feel very good on the base. We wanted to give that assurance with an understanding how the business was continuing to progress. And then the upside that comes from these launches, we don't want anyone to think it's a function of not having confidence in those launches coming.

But with a lot of engagement over the last year with investors, we got the clear feedback they'd rather us guide this way with upside to the numbers versus wondering what the relative risk was from a timing standpoint on the FDA.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. Fair enough. And then in terms of you'd also talked about a two- to four -month window between approval and launch, just given some of the final decisions about a label and the initial packaging and manufacturing, things like that. How much of a lever is that to squeeze that to get that closer to two months versus four months? What are the factors that could play out that would lead to one outcome versus the other just because it would end?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Okay. You froze there for a second, Michael. Hopefully, you can hear me.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Sorry. Yeah, yeah. I can. Sorry.

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

So again, we're obviously doing our best to tighten that cycle as much as possible. I think we've said back in November just in trying to shape expectations for 2024 that revenue contribution from these products would be primarily second-half. That continues to be our position, and we'll do our best to move things as long, as quickly as we can, but also need to do it well and making sure we get the most bang for our buck as we launch the products to get them off and uptake as good as we can do. So a lot of focus by the team on how to do the labeling. On the balance sheet at the end of Q4, we had products in inventory. So we do have that. We got positive cash inflow from inventory in Q4 despite building inventory for these new launches.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. And then the other angle that you discussed on the fourth Q call was sort of the ability to not just push the U.S. approvals, but some of the international approvals as well to sort of accelerate that opportunity. Anything in particular that you're doing that can drive upside there for these products?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah. I think everyone should understand. We don't expect these products to have sales outside the U.S. in 2024. We're continuing to engage and get Zenrelia has been submitted in nine other markets, and we'd love to have that as early in 2025 as possible. But again, we'll get more clarity on 2025 later on. Certainly, Credelio PLUS had a good year in 2023. It continues to grow, and it has a lot of good coverage. So the bigger focus is Zenrelia going globally. And then on Bovaer, we just have U.S. rights. So clearly, our goal there is to drive uptake in U.S. dairy.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. All right. And sorry. I mean, the other product where there's a lot of focus is Canine Parvovirus Monoclonal Antibody.

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah. We're thrilled with how Canine Parvovirus Monoclonal Antibody has gone. We noted in the call we've expanded the capacity of production so we don't have a limitation on capacity like we did in 2023. Bobby and his team are really driving it. It was a big focal point at both VMX and Orlando as well as Western Vegas last week. We've got good uptake from general practitioner clinics. It hasn't just been in specialty or shelters, it's been on a lot of GP clinics. You really get great feedback from use. We've seen a lot of use and reordering rates being very high once it got used. Because it's such a great product from an application standpoint to help puppies.

We even had some investor feedback related to a vet who was showing videos to us of how quick the response was for a puppy that had been infected with parvo, and then they're bouncing around the next day after using the parvovirus therapy. So overall, we've said about 330,000 puppies a year in the U.S. So the addressable market is certainly there. We think as we globalize this product, it does have the ability to be a $100 million-plus product in total globally. And our goal here is to penetrate and get it done inside the vet office, inside the freezer so that any puppy that comes in can be treated well, quickly, and save that puppy's life and also reduce the burden on the vet clinic. I mean, I think the palliative care, as a general matter, works, but you have to isolate the dog.

You have to, at some level, isolate the person taking care of the dog because it can just impact so many dogs so quickly inside a vet clinic. It's three to five days. It's very costly. All of those things at a time when practices are under pressure from a time and resource standpoint. Parvo just makes it easier and works so well that, again, we want it to move to standard of care, and the team's working hard to do that. As you mentioned on how does it help, it certainly opens up doors, right? We're not in every vet clinic with our products because it's a competitive marketplace. But because Parvo is unique, it does open up doors. And again, the media coverage on saving puppies' lives has been very positive as well.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. I kind of want to touch on that a little bit as well. There's a lot of focus on quantifying Parvo specifically, on quantifying Credelio Quattro specifically, and Zenrelia. But then there is the entire sort of portfolio effect. And there is the argument that a lot of vet clinics really prefer to only go with one or at most two vendors and really who has the broadest portfolio. So you take Parvo, you take Zenrelia, you take Credelio Quattro. You go back a year versus you go forward a year, your portfolio looks very different to the companion animal vet in terms of the breadth of the portfolio, how innovative it is, potentially how differentiated it is.

So, can you talk about the uplift opportunity there for the rest of the business, maybe for older products that you normally wouldn't have seen growth, maybe to get into the clinic? Are those conversations with vets ongoing now? Are they waiting to see the new products approved? Just sort of like.

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

No, I think, I guess, the benefit of being a public company is the vets have a good understanding of what you're talking about and their investors as well. So you have a lot of understanding that we're bringing these products. There's a lot of discussions. As you know, our reps can't promote something that hasn't been approved yet. So it really happens through the general knowledge and awareness. The corporate clinics, especially, are very well aware of what's coming in the portfolios you have. As we've talked, right, in the U.S., we have vaccines. We have the therapeutics like Nocita, like Bexacat, like Zorbium, Galliprant. And then we have the parasiticide portfolio with Trifexis, Credelio, Interceptor Plus, Credelio Cat. So we've got three of the four big categories. What we haven't had is Derm and either does Merck or BI.

And so when you're giving kind of volume discounts to vet clinics, to your very point of they want to be efficient in how they operate, it will be very helpful to have the dermatology side with Zenrelia and then in 2025, our IL-31 monoclonal antibody. So that then provides an alternative to Zoetis, but also puts us at a differentiated portfolio compared to Merck and BI from a competitive set. So overall, we're excited by our innovation for what it can do to treat puppies and dogs, but also what it does for that complete portfolio. We've really seen it on the farm animal side. We've mentioned growing in Q4. It's had generic competition now for a number of years. But from a feedlot operator standpoint, as Experior has been ramping, we can offer a complete portfolio that makes it very hard for the generic competition.

As a result, it's bringing back Rumensin into growth. For us, that's kind of proof that the portfolio side of our IPP Strategy is a key element to drive success going forward.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. That's really helpful. Wrapping up some of the new innovation focus, I'd really want to touch on differentiation. It's a topic you've been very adamant about for at least six months now. We've had really wide-ranging feedback from vets. And obviously, they don't know what your differentiation is. But we've had varying feedback on whether they're even looking for it, whether it's even necessary or whether it's possible. So sort of what's been your experience with that? Is there an advantage to it from a market access perspective? Is there an advantage to it from a branding and conversation perspective, right? So where's the value from differentiation come in if the vets are saying it may not even be necessary?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah. I think we've done focus groups with small groups of vet under NDA. We've gotten good feedback on that. And again, that gives us confidence that the differentiation we're talking about has value. Clearly, we haven't gotten approval yet. We've not launched yet to see how it does respond practically in the marketplace. But overall, with Zenrelia, we feel like the market research we've done has certainly helped on that front, Michael. Credelio Quattro is going to have the broadest coverage. Tapeworms are a real element as the diagnostic companies have been ramping up their diagnostics and showing more prevalence of tapeworm. We think, why would you not want the broadest coverage to protect your dog with the single pill? So we do think the differentiation and the complete portfolio will be difference makers for us. And we're happy and excited to prove that once we get launched.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. I had a couple of questions from investors come in I want to throw in here before we move on. One is on the plan of communication going forward in terms of approval with these products. I mean, the FDA usually puts out a press release, and you can find the filings on their website once there is approval. But is there a plan to provide updates inter-quarter from you, or is it really just going to be earnings calls for the next four to six months?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

From a dollar and cents perspective, it'll be on earnings calls. From the standpoint of approvals, I think we're going to be excited to share that news publicly. As you said, the FDA is going to share it. We don't want you guys to have to all be searching the FDA website to find things. We'll try to make sure we make it.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

We've all got the alerts set up, so people will know.

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

New technology.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. All right. No, that's helpful. I had another question come in I want to throw in. This is more on the livestock side, on the Bovaer and Experior side. So how has Athian been progressing? Have CPG companies and farmers been happy with participating in the inset market? Are there any competitors to Athian in North America, and how are the economics trending?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah. So it's a little early given the Bovaer will be the biggest driver. I mean, Rumensin, we have proven the protocol and that, but it's been less of an uptake there just given it's just not the same focus area for the consumer goods. Again, just recently saw a panel with the Nestlé leader on it for North America on the ESG. They're all about getting inset value. When you have the offset value, it doesn't really give you that same ability to think about it through the entire supply chain. And so the inset market is very exciting to them for that very reason of it gets towards their goals to really improve the environmental impact of all the different milk products they use and the commitments they've made to get those reductions down. They know they need to do it on the farm.

And again, we're going to provide the best product to do that. Nestlé is buying milk from cows that have used Bovaer in Europe and Brazil and other markets. So they're very familiar and excited by the technology. And the U.S. dairy is the most efficient dairy operations in the world, and that'll come with it. So we're excited. There are other platforms with carbon credits besides Athian. Athian's one that's been set up and is actively working to certify protocols and provide all the technology from an end to end for the data to make sure it's all good and validated.

And so again, it isn't the only one, but we expect it'll be the primary one that is the big item for the inset credits: Nestlé needs to be able to track it down to the milk sheds they're buying milk from in order to get those credits to be very much viewed as part of their supply chain. And so again, that's part of all the technology and the work that's been done to set it up. So very excited. It'll be great to get this over the finish line in the U.S. given it's been approved in so many markets around the world. And it's a permanent reduction. It stops methane from ever being produced versus trying to sequester it after the fact. This just stops the dairy cow from producing as much methane.

That 30% reduction and 1 cow can likely do about 1 metric ton of carbon reduction in a year.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. All right. That's really helpful. I've got a couple more come in real quick before we move on. Going back to Zenrelia, and it's very similar questions. So if Zenrelia is differentiated and the team have indicated they will price comparable to expectations on its differentiation, does that imply that Zenrelia would price at a premium to the products on the market?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

We haven't given our pricing strategy other than to say, "We're going to price per value," as the questioner asked. We're excited to get the product on and start helping dogs that need relief from the pruritus.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. All right. So we'll stay tuned for that. Again, on the new products, I wanted to ask a little bit of a clarifying question. You had talked on Monday of the fact that it's going to be accretive to revenues, but it's also going to be EBITDA additive once they come online in the second half. And I think a lot of that is tied to, as we talked about, you already have a lot of the costs invested in terms of the sales force and things like that, right? But you're also going to have relatively modest revenue contributions in the second half. And again, I'm not going to ask you to quantify it, but just thinking that products are just being launched, right? Normally, you see margins expand meaningfully as volumes ramp just from volume leverage.

So is that reasonable to assume here in this case as well? Is that as you go from $10 million to $30 million to $100 million to $200 million for some of these products, you'll have some nice margin leverage there as well?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah. It's certainly a fair assumption, Michael. I think both Zenrelia and Credelio Quattro are pretty high gross margin to begin with, even at the lower volumes, just given the nature of their production. In the case of Credelio Quattro, right, it's already something that we're essentially producing in separate parts today with volumes of API. So it's already kind of part and parcel of things we've done to improve Credelio gross margins over time by reducing the cost of the API through better chemistry and the like. So again, it will get better over time. Don't get me wrong, but it's better than the corporate average at the start. Similarly, Zenrelia and the efficiency of the JAK production makes that above our corporate gross margins from the start. Bovaer is different because we're bringing it a couple of years earlier than expected.

Given the regulatory framework and the process that is being done to make it, it'll be lower than the corporate gross margin average. But it's very efficient because of just our connection into Rumensin at the dairies already and the fact that it'll be going to dairies that are using Rumensin and getting back to our portfolio and the overall demand for the product. So again, yes, over time with scale, margins will improve, but that's sort of the expected profile at the start.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. Okay. And then pivoting a little bit to some of the capital deployment and the rest of the P&L, the other big announcement from you guys in January, I believe it was January, maybe it was February, was the Aqua sale to Merck Animal Health. So that was a little bit of a surprise move, but a lot of moving pieces to that. So could you walk us through that decision, the pros and cons, obviously, and why you think it was the right time to pull the trigger on that?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Sure. So as we looked at our overall strategic plan and started last spring, when we look across our portfolio, the biggest opportunities for us and where the biggest investments are in our pipeline are really in pet health and livestock sustainability, as well as poultry where we've got really good installed base globally. There's a lot of synergy within the manufacturing API, sales force, country management between pigs, poultry, cattle, dairy, sheep, as well as then on the pet side where dogs and cats together. Those are the big notional markets. Aqua then is the unique one. The salmon business is very concentrated for us. Almost all the revenue for salmon is in either Chile or Norway. And then on the shrimp side, it was very much part of China and Southeast Asia markets, primarily Vietnam.

So the relative connection in and the synergistic value of these portfolios, much less on the Aqua side, but very good business. I mean, we love our Aqua business, and it was not an easy decision to say, "Okay, would we sell it?" And then it became, "Well, at a price, yes, we'll be willing to sell it." So we ran a process and used your banking colleagues on the other side of that wall you guys can't talk about to help us execute on that process.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

No comment.

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah, exactly. And so we're very pleased. Merck's, obviously, a very good company in the space, understands it, has synergies in the market already there, obviously, a vaccine leader. And so they got to a price point where we said, "We'll give up this asset." Because again, just from a notional standpoint, for us, our Aqua business last year had just under $200 million in revenue on the $4.4 billion total base. So notionally, it's just not going to grow at the same level as what we can see happen from these other opportunities we have in our pipeline.

We went with greater focus, allocate capital to the places that are going to drive the biggest value over the next five, 10 years for us, and then certainly reducing our debt load and getting our leverage down faster was something that we know was appealing to shareholders and investors, and we've heard that. So you combine all that together and made the choice to pull the trigger.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. And the net impact is going to be, again, your current guide is as if the deal didn't happen. Your current guide still has Aqua in it and still has the higher debt in it. But what you said at the time of the announcement was you're going to have a $0.11 benefit from interest expense but offset by a $0.14 reduction in the operating income, correct?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah. Yeah. And that's on an annualized basis. So just based off the 2023 numbers, again. But yes, that's the part. The EPS dilution because of the higher interest rate environment is less impactful than the EBITDA reduction that comes with a good business that got the valuation it did.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

And again, it allows you to get closer to that 4.0x leverage and then eventually go back under that. What do you think is sort of the sweet point you're shooting for?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah. No. And as you saw in the CapEx increase we have in 2024, the success in our excitement in our portfolio and the additional monoclonal antibodies that'll be coming out does require us to have higher CapEx investment because we need to build that in order to sustain the pipeline that's coming. And so all of those things factor into how we look at where to invest capital in this case. Getting the debt down and then also having flexibility on investing behind our pipeline from a production standpoint is a positive as well.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. And then the other bit of news somewhat related to that or along a similar vein was the restructuring you announced, again, earlier this week, some cost savings this year, some cost savings longer term. Walk us through that. Why is that the right move now? And you've taken a number of cost actions over the last couple of years. You keep finding more. So sort of what's the thought process on moves like that going forward?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah. So I think we continue to always evaluate our returns on our investments and where we can invest to get the greatest value moving forward. I think as you're aware, Michael, and certainly all the investors are aware, we're very excited about the pet health and the opportunities that are in front of us. But it does require us to have greater investment. The sales force investment at $20 million, investing more behind AdTab and that opportunity. And then I think everyone's generally aware of the inflation, and we've got great people that we need to pay. And with that, we've got raises and comp increases that come with it. So we didn't want to have. I think we've guided 2%-4% OpEx growth in 2024. The restructuring allows it to be at 2%-4% versus being at 4%-6%.

This is not that we like to get rid of people, but we also understand the market changes. As we look at opportunities to be more B2B on swine in Europe and to look differently at the farm animal business as it evolves, it became, "All right, we can cover and not impact our revenue growth in those markets by having two to three less sales reps." The savings on that then can be invested behind pet health. At some level, in the case of those international moves, it's really taking down some fixed people cost to get discretionary dollars to invest behind our brands. Now, the downside from a timing standpoint is with European timelines, most of those savings will be in the second half of the year. The Northern Hemisphere parasiticide market, especially on retail, makes these investments now.

So that gets into some of the disconnect on the guidance pattern from Q1 through Q4 is just we'll get the savings. They just come in the second half of the year. We're making a lot of the investments here in the first half of the year. And then we finished our ERP implementation April of last year. A few dollars still being spent to finalize it all. But we've got one invoice going to customers. We've got better efficiencies. And so we're taking the opportunity to continue to look at higher-cost Western locations and opportunities to move into shared service centers in Poland and Bangalore and Kuala Lumpur and Guadalajara. So these are things we're always looking at because of the nature of the people and severance costs.

There's a cash cost to do it, but there is a return that comes with it as we don't have those jobs moving forward.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. All right. Yeah. I think that's an important point there is that these savings are being reinvested. It's just reinvested into different areas, growth areas, companion animal, things like that. Okay.

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

And again, we feel like we would have made those investments anyway because of the importance of driving those businesses. And so while yes, they're being reinvested, it's a reinvestment we would have done anyway because we think they'll drive good capital returns from those investments across the pet health franchise. And so this is a net savings relative to what I wouldn't want to have done is not eliminate certain places where we don't get a right return and then not invest in order to keep our SG&A at 2%-4%, so.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. All right. Fair point. I want to ask a little bit of a big picture question for you, if I may. Elanco has been sort of transforming itself more or less since the IPO. There was the initial post-IPO period in separation from Eli Lilly. Then there was the Bayer transaction. You talked about the ERP. And then 2023, 2024, obviously, a lot of focus on the new products coming to market. So it's been this multi-year transformation, which has made it a little bit more difficult to sort of glean what the underlying profile of the company looks like, right, because at any given year, it's meaningfully different than the last couple of years.

So where I was kind of going with that and the question on the restructuring and the cost savings there is that if we look ahead to exiting 2024 and exiting 2025, let's say these products are approved and they're on the market, you've divested Aqua, is there a point a year or two from now where Elanco is a little bit more of a steady business, or are there additional major efforts we should look for in the future, or is this sort of the last little push, and we're in the last stages of this multi-year process?

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

We're going to react to the macro environment that's in front of us. And if we need to make changes, is that environment for farming in Western Europe, for different headwinds in certain markets, volatility in emerging markets where you can't trust the stability of the currencies, we're always going to have the right to do that. I think fundamentally, the innovation from our organic work that Ellen and her team are doing is going to be what drives us as we launch those well across Ramiro, José, and Bobby's worlds. And so we will continue to work within that context of the value creation here is very much going to come from our pipeline, our ability to continue to manage expenses efficiently and capital allocate to the places we think the biggest growth is going to come from.

So that certainly is the plan, and the team is entirely behind it and feeling very good about what we're set up to do over the next few years.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Okay. All right. Well said. Yeah. I think where I was going with that, and we've had a couple of questions on this come in over time, is you did have long-term market targets out there previously. You obviously suspended them a couple of years ago because of a number of different factors, both internal and external. So there was a little bit of a question of once we're through these products and we're through the near-term market uncertainty, when would those come back and how would those come back? But again, a lot of it's probably tied to underlying market and things outside of your control.

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Yeah. I mean, again, we're going to keep delivering on what we have in front of us. I think we've been very transparent on a lot of what we have and what we expect right now as we go towards that $600 million-$700 million of innovation sales by 2025, $350 million-$400 million this year, plus the big three coming on and then continuing to scale those up. Again, we've seen it with the uptake in Experior. It had a great year in 2023. Continues to be a product that's unmatched with respect to impacting the feedlot and continuing with the cattle herds. And so that then bringing back Rumensin to growth. Those are all things that the team's looking to execute on with our strategy. And again, we'll continue to do it. We'll do our best to be as simple and easy to understand as we can.

Credit to Katy and Scott for the quality of the slides they do to make it hopefully as easy for everyone to follow the moving parts because we know with the ERP implementation last year and what Aqua will mean from an exit, it's not as clean as it might be for some others.

Michael Ryskin
Managing Director of Healthcare, Life Science Tools & Diagnostics, Bank of America

Got it. I guess that's a great place to end it. We're out of time. Thanks so much, Todd. Always a pleasure chatting with you, and hope all is well.

Todd Young
EVP and CFO, Elanco

Great, Michael. Thank you. Thanks, BofA, for the hosting of.

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