Welcome to ITT Inc.'s 2026 Annual Meeting of Shareholders. I will now turn the call over to Tim Powers, Chair of the Board of ITT Inc. Please go ahead.
Thank you and good morning. On behalf of ITT's Board of Directors and management, welcome to our 2026 Annual Meeting of Shareholders. Like last year, this year's meeting is virtual, which allows our shareholders to participate remotely. Joining me today is Luca Savi. Risks and Uncertainties, including those described in our 2025 Annual Report on Form 10-K and our quarterly report on our first quarter of 2026, Form 10-Q, and other recent Securities and Exchange Commission filings. ITT is not under, and expressly disclaims, any obligation to update forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise. In addition, the results we present this morning include certain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliation of these measures to the most comparable GAAP figures are detailed in our earnings release dated May 6th and related presentation deck, both of which are available on our website.
Now I will turn it over to [Taimoor] to address certain procedural matters. [Taimoor]?
Thank you, Tim. I now submit the affidavit of Broadridge Financial Solutions, Inc., certifying that each shareholder of record at the close of business as of March 25th, 2026, the record date for this meeting, received either a notice of today's meeting and related proxy materials or a notice of Internet availability of proxy materials, in each case commencing on or about April 3rd, 2026. John Merva of American Election Services and Will Rao, ITT's Assistant General Counsel, have been appointed and sworn in to act as our two inspectors of election, and they are participating in today's virtual meeting. Mr. Merva reports that over a majority of the outstanding shares of ITT common stock eligible to vote are represented either in person or by proxy at this meeting, which constitutes a quorum.
In terms of voting procedures, any shareholder who hasn't yet voted or wishes to change his or her vote may do so when the polls are open by clicking on the voting button on the web portal and following the instructions there. If you previously submitted a valid proxy by mail or voted by Internet or phone, your votes will be cast as indicated in your submission. You do not need to vote again at this meeting unless you wish to change your prior vote. I will now turn it back over to you, Tim.
Thank you, [Taimoor]. I hereby call to order the 2026 Annual Meeting of Shareholders of ITT Inc. and declare this meeting to be properly convened. We are meeting today to vote on three proposals submitted by the board of directors, each of which is described in the company's proxy statement. [Taimoor], will you please describe each of the proposals to be voted on today?
The first proposal is the election of each of the 10 nominees for director to serve until the next annual election or until his or her successor is duly elected and qualified. As indicated in the proxy statement, the following individuals have been nominated by the board of directors for election: Kevin Berryman, Maggie Chu, Donald DeFosset Jr., Douglas Del Grosso, Mary Laschinger, Nazzic Keene, Rebecca McDonald, Christopher O'Shea, Luca Savi, and Sharon Szafranski. All of the nominees are currently members of ITT's board of directors. The second proposal is the ratification of the appointment of Deloitte & Touche LLP as the independent registered public accounting firm of the company for the 2026 fiscal year. The third proposal is a resolution to approve, on a non-binding basis, the compensation of the company's named executive officers.
There are no other matters to be presented at this meeting, and I turn it back over to you, Tim.
Thank you, [Taimoor]. Given that all of the proposals have been presented, we will now consider questions related to the proposals. If any shareholder has a question regarding any of the proposals, I invite him or her to submit a question via the meeting portal now. As a reminder, there will be time later for general questions. Questions at this time are limited to the three proposals just presented. We will pause briefly to give shareholders a moment to submit any questions about these proposals. [Taimoor], do we have any questions relevant to the three proposals submitted at this time?
There are no questions, Tim.
Thank you, [Taimoor]. We proceed to vote on the proposals that have been properly presented at the meeting. The polls are now open. Any shareholder who has not yet voted or wishes to change his or her vote may do so by clicking the voting button on the web portal and following the instructions there. As a reminder, shareholders who have previously sent in proxies, voted by telephone or Internet, and do not wish to change their vote, do not need to take any further action. Now that everyone has had an opportunity to vote, I declare the polls closed. [Taimoor], please report the preliminary voting results.
I have the preliminary vote report of the Inspectors of Election at the start of the meeting. This report shows that each of the 10 nominees for director has been elected by a majority of the votes cast to the board of directors. The two other proposals, specifically the ratification of Deloitte & Touche LLP as the independent registered public accounting firm for the company for 2026, and the advisory vote on executive compensation, have been approved. We will be reporting the detailed final vote results on a Form 8-K to be filed with the SEC within four business days. Back to you, Tim.
Thank you, [Taimoor]. The official business of the meeting is concluded, and ITT's 2026 annual meeting of shareholders is hereby adjourned. It is now my pleasure to introduce Luca Savi, Chief Executive and President of ITT, who's going to provide some brief remarks regarding the business performance. Luca?
Thank you, Tim, and good morning. On behalf of the entire leadership team, I want to welcome you to ITT's 2026 Annual Shareholders meeting and thank everyone for your continued support of ITT. Our teams around the world continue to work tirelessly to deliver for all our stakeholders. This morning, I will provide some highlights from 2025 and the first quarter of 2026, which we announced on May 6th. First, in 2025, we delivered growth across every metric outlined at our Capital Markets Day. A few highlights to note: We drove double-digit growth in orders and high single-digit growth in revenue. Going forward, ITT will exclude intangible amortization expenses related to acquisitions. On this basis, 2025 adjusted operating margin reached 19.4%, resulting in adjusted EPS of $7.19 in 2025. In 2025, we grew free cash flow to over $550 million, up 27%.
We put this cash to work investing in productivity, growth, and innovation, as well as deploying $500 million to share repurchases. On M&A, we closed our largest acquisition to date, SPX FLOW. We completed an equity offering in December 2025 and closed the acquisition on the 2nd of March 2026. We expect SPX FLOW to compound organic growth with low teens net adjusted EPS accretion in 2026. We executed on all fronts, delivering strong growth, higher profitability, and making strategic use of our capital. We're starting the next chapter strong and are well-positioned for continued value creation. Now moving to 2026. In the first quarter, we demonstrated solid momentum across the portfolio, thanks to flawless and relentless execution and the tangible benefits of our M&A strategy.
We established the Flow Technologies segment, which boasts nearly $3 billion in annual revenue, following the combination of Industrial Process and SPX FLOW, a global leader with premier brands in pumps, valves, mixers, and other process solutions. We delivered outstanding order growth of 26%, of 8% organically, and revenue growth of 33%, or 11% organically. Our SPX FLOW acquisition contributed 17 points of revenue growth in Q1, and in month one, added accretive net earnings on an adjusted basis, partially offset by higher interest expense and tax, as well as dilution from higher share count. We ended the quarter with a book-to-bill well above one and a backlog of $2.5 billion. Excluding SPX FLOW, this has nearly doubled in the last three years, highlighting the strength of our future growth outlook.
Moreover, we expanded adjusted operating income 42%, fueled by our rigor and relentless execution, and our adjusted operating margin reached 20.3%. This performance drove adjusted EPS to $1.98, up 25%, including $0.04 of net accretion from SPX FLOW. We strategically repurchased $100 million of ITT shares, while our priority for the remainder of the year will be debt paydown. Our strong balance sheet, coupled with a leverage ratio under 3 x, gives us the flexibility for strategic share repurchases and smaller bolt-on deals that we continue to cultivate. This is the impact of our strategy in action. Organic value creation through market share gains and relentless execution, driving sustained margin expansion compounded by M&A. This is a commitment we made during our Capital Markets Day, and it remains our commitment today.
Before taking questions from our shareholders, I want to take a minute to welcome Nazzic Keene into her new role as our next Independent Board Chair following this annual meeting. Nazzic brings extensive public company leadership experience, including a distinguished tenure as a CEO and a strong track record of driving growth and transformational change. We look forward to working closely with her and are confident that her leadership will help guide ITT through its next chapter and support continued long-term value creation for our shareholders. Last, I would like to extend our deepest gratitude to Tim Powers for his exceptional service and leadership as a member of ITT's Board since 2015. As we have previously announced, Tim will be retiring from our Board at the conclusion of this meeting. Over the past decade, Tim has brought thoughtful counsel and unwavering integrity and a steadfast commitment to ITT's long-term success.
His guidance has helped shape our strategy, strengthen our governance, and support ITT's journey towards the high-performance company we are today. As chair of the board, he has been a trusted advisor and valued partner to me personally and to the entire leadership team. He consistently fostered a culture of accountability, transparency, and collaboration while keeping the interest of our shareholders, customers, and employees at the center of every discussion. His leadership during periods of significant growth and change has been instrumental in positioning ITT for continued success. While we will certainly miss Tim's perspective and steady leadership in the boardroom, we are profoundly grateful for his many contributions and lasting impact on our company. We wish him and his family all the very best in this next chapter and thank him sincerely for his years of dedicated service to ITT. Thank you, Tim.
Thank you.
With that, it has been my pleasure speaking with you today. Now we'd like to open the floor to answer questions that pertain to the company business. [Taimoor], are there any questions from our shareholders?
Thank you, Luca. We have one question. The question is: What are the limits to age and required retirement for the Board of Director candidates? Our corporate governance principles specify that directors cannot stand for election in the year that they turn 75 without a waiver from the Board.
There are no further questions, Luca.
The meeting is concluded. If you didn't get your question addressed or if you have additional questions, please contact ITT's Investor Relations department. Contact information is listed on our company website. Thank you again for attending today's meeting, and we appreciate your ongoing support of ITT.
The call has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation.