Welcome back, everybody. Thanks for coming. Next up, we have Lear. It's one of the top global seating suppliers and a great player in vehicle electronics. It's a great business that typically generates a ton of cash, which is part of the reason we like it so much. It pays a good dividend, buys back a ton of shares, and I think we'll get into this in the Q&A, makes some very interesting creative strategic acquisitions that often fly below the radar screen for most investors. We're very happy to have Ray Scott, President and CEO here today, and Jason Cardew, SVP and CFO, of Lear. So guys, thanks so much for joining us.
It's great to be here.
We really appreciate you guys making the trip.
Yeah, thanks, man. Thanks.
There's a lot going on here, you know, to start the year. There's always a lot going on in the auto industry. But I was wondering if you could just give us, you know, a quick update on business conditions as we're kicking off this year. It seems things are going pretty well, but love to hear your perspective of things and, you know, how it relates to your outlook for the year.
Yeah. Well, I think every year, especially over the last five years, brings its unique challenges. This year's no different, but you know, we're very optimistic. Like you mentioned, we've done some, I think some great work over the last five years, you know, really going after strategic acquisitions. In seating, we've positioned ourselves as the most vertically integrated seat company in the world. And really, in last, last year, midyear, finalized the IGB acquisition, so it really rounded out our complete capabilities for thermal comfort systems and solutions. And since that point, we've won the majority of all of our business has been sourced with our ability to self-source ourselves, those components. And so, you know, it's been a short period of time since that acquisition, but we've really made some, I think, significant steps moving forward.
In seating, we've done a really nice job of continuing to improve our market share. You know, last year I talked about this unprecedented award with the Grand Wagoneer, Wagoneer business. That's a program that's never been sourced mid-cycle like that before. We were extremely successful for a lot of different reasons. One is the automation and capital that we put in the facility, but also our ability to really focus on operational excellence. And these systems, you know, we've really capabilities that really didn't make sense for us. So we really honed in the product focus around business that we could really make a fair return on. And I think we've had a $1 billion of backlog in that business. And so our focus was to diversify.
You know, the majority of our business was with Ford, even though we still want to grow with Ford. We're really diversifying our customer base. We're growing the business in very selective areas where we can get a fair return. We just recently, just last week, got another nice... The diversification continues to play out. The last part of our operational excellence is with these acquisitions, like you said. I think have been overlooked in some respects. I mean, ASI was a great acquisition. Thagora, InTouch, these are really helping our operations be very unique for Lear Corporation. I think why we're so successful with the Grand Wagoneer and Wagoneer was because of our operational success in what we're doing as far as implementing capital in our plants is superior.
You know, even though there are challenges, we've all have been dealing with them. I think where we're at and the position we've put ourselves in is very solid going forward.
In terms of the financial outlook, John, you asked about the year kind of started out in line with what we had expected. Production's basically in line in North America, Europe, and China with our expectations and our guidance. First quarter, sort of similar to, you know, the historical pattern, where you're gonna see a little bit lower operating margin in the first quarter as you deal with the customer LTAs and another slog of wage inflation, and throughout the year, we'll offset that. We do expect revenues to be up about 2.5% year-over-year in the first quarter, so modest growth, a little more growth in these systems than seating in the first quarter, just given the way the production volumes have played out by car line.
In terms of margins, sort of flattish with the first quarter of last year, up slightly with E-Systems higher and seating, you know, in line with the prior year or maybe just slightly lower. So overall, though, everything that we had anticipated happening in the first quarter is sort of playing out in line with those expectations and in the full year is still intact based on what we've experienced so far. Now, we have seen, you know, some modest improvement in the production environment. You know, the last year, in the second half, there was a gradual improvement, but there are still disruptions with software issues with certain customers and the Red Sea, you know, disruptions in Europe. But you know, as Ray said at the beginning, this is automotive.
You're always gonna have some challenges, so I wouldn't say it's particularly, you know, an owner's environment overall.
Yeah, and one of the things, and I think we kind of asked about this on the last quarterly call, but I just wanted to go back to this. You know, EV volumes are being, you know, pulled back, you know, expectations. And in some cases, ICE volume is going up a little bit in response to that. But I mean, in the schedules that you guys are seeing, is there a one-for-one replacement, or as we go through the year, if EVs are not 10% or 7%, that there might be some upside in, not total volumes, but, you know, replacement on the ICE side, which might be good for, you know, for the business as other programs run out? I mean, what's your kind of take on that?
Well, we started seating it in September of last year and really started pulling back our own capital in respect to... And it was based on platform, car lines, and regions because we are seeing significant differences between the regions. And that they continued to reinforce, but it's the pace of the rollouts is what we're looking at right now. They've been very mindful of what they're looking at strategically. I still-
Yeah, I mean, I would say that ICE volumes, in particular, have held up, well. Again, we don't want to get out in front of our customers, but I think that they are rethinking the cadence of launches of programs on the EV side, maybe the volumes related to that. And I expect there will be a trade-off where maybe ICE programs get extended, or volumes are a little bit higher. I think that's maybe more of a 2025 phenomenon than 2024, though.
You know, one of the things you guys have talked about more and more lately is the potential for automation. And I think in the seating business, there's kind of been a view that it's a little bit more labor, labor intensive, cut and sew, you know, assembly, sub-assembly, assembly, you know, of seats is, would be a hard thing to, you know, truly automate. But, I mean, where do you stand on automation, and what's the potential for you guys over time?
John, this is where I get excited.
Well, let's get you excited.
This is where I love this. I mentioned the acquisitions that we've gone after. They're very strategic, and we're gonna have some more talk in acquisitions, probably to be announced, later this year, because I think this is really where you differentiate yourself. You know, we've been on this path, you know, operational excellence for well over 10 years, and the way we're looking at it, this year alone, you can look at some of the challenges that we're faced with, with you know, labor inflation, double what it was, what the traditional wage increases have been over the last several years, so you have to solve this problem. And how we're getting at this thing is very specific to core operations within our facilities.
And, you know, you look at trim covers, for example, 35% of our overall labor is in trim covers within seating. 90% of it, of wiring, or E-Systems, is in wiring. And so we're right now automating those areas within our facilities. I've been fortunate enough to be out traveling to China and to Mexico and to Europe, Eastern Europe, looking at our facilities and what we're doing, and what used to be the impossible is now becoming the possible. And these companies that we're acquiring, like ASI or InTouch or Thagora, or our own organic technologies or capabilities, we're keeping in-house. And so these companies were selling their products externally. We're immediately reversing that and keeping those capabilities with visual systems, camera systems, laser systems, the ability to automate from...
Right now, we're gonna implement a system within our seat plants that from really finesse all the way to installation within the customer's facility, there won't be a human being touching it. And so all these different ideas and concepts that we have in different facilities, we're pulling together. And what that does is, I think the first question is, okay, you're gonna be capital heavy. No, it's not. It's really the amazing part about this is we're actually getting capital numbers lower. If you look at our historical capital numbers, we were lower last year with the investments we're making. We're planning on being at the same pace of last year's number, which is historically lower than the previous year.
So we're getting at this through agility, flexibility with our capital numbers, and it gives us an enormous amount of success within our operations. I think what was great about the Wagoneer, Grand Wagoneer, that was unprecedented. To launch that in eight months, it was primarily because of the people we have. We have great people, but it was the capital we installed. Stellantis was able to increase their output significantly, helping them from a revenue dollar. I mean, they were limited in what they could produce as far as the seats. That was what was slowing them down. And then the minute we took that over, our output increased significantly, and I'm convinced it was the capital we had on the ground.
So when you have that as a differentiator, when you can walk a customer through a plant and say, "I don't want any of that old capital, I'm not gonna take it, doesn't work for us, we're gonna install what we have as far as new technology capabilities, that is much superior," that's the output you get. So we have a living example that this pays off. And then when we talk about trim covers and wiring, we're seeing reductions of 10%-20% in labor at the facilities with the technology that we're putting in place.
In terms of, you know, the capital intensity of the business, you know, we really focused our through our Lear Forward program last year on improving capacity utilization, buying more efficiently, and then leveraging these acquisitions, as Ray described, to lower our capital spending. What we did is poured some of that back into automation, and we're able to sort of hold our level of capital intensity flat. If you look at our guidance for this year, we're again below 3%. So we think we can step up our automation investment while maintaining sort of that 3% or less CapEx as we look out over the next several years.
We just had an operational summit where we pulled all leaders from around the world to share all best practices and how we can do this much quicker, think a little bit differently, and drive accountability within our company, because we have incredible ideas coming from the plant floor. In addition to what we're doing from a strategy perspective overall, we introduced what is called IDEA by Lear, which is innovation, it's digital, it's engineered, and automation. And those are kind of the pillars that we're gonna run to. Is that getting at that? I do believe will differentiate all companies, you know, or companies that have it. I think there's gonna be the have and the have-nots, and the companies that have and are very successful will be the winners.
Yeah, and one of the things that sounds like it's happening with the acquisitions and sort of this, you know, mass improvement in process through automation is it sounds like you're able to more vertically integrate, and it sounds like the automakers are more open to you self-sourcing all sorts of parts and showing up with almost complete, you know, seating system, you know, at their, at their-
Yeah.
... assembly plants. I mean, has that really changed that much, where you can actually really control the entire process, whether you're doing it all yourself or, you know, sourcing it directly so you can, you can save money and save them money, you know, over time? I mean, what is, what is, what is changing there? Because it does seem like there's a toggle that's just starting to ... be pulled here, and there might be an even greater opportunity?
You know, for all of our best efforts in having a strategy that we've been working on for a long period of time, timing is everything. And there isn't a customer meeting I don't walk into right now because of the deployment of EVs and the cost that it's costing our customers; they're looking for all solutions. And I think there was a time when they'd be much more risk averse and less, "Okay, I hear you, but that's not necessarily what we're looking for." Modularity is, like, the buzzword. And when we have a seat system, we talk about thermal comfort systems, and I've seen a lot of different strategies on thermal comfort systems.
But the solution that we came up with was with the intention to go to a modular seat system that could be, in some respects, agnostic to any other facility, and you could have this spoke-and-hub concept. And what that does is, obviously, it lowers the overall cost, it lowers the parts that we're producing. It's much more efficient because we're putting it at the surface. And so the vision was: How do you get to a modular concept? The seat itself has been designed for the ability to leverage components. That was the single reason. And then it's, you know, thrown over to the JIT or supplier and asked to put it together.
Well, what we're doing is we're solving that problem, and so I think the timing could be better. So the customers I'm meeting with, when we talk modularity, they, they just perk up and they say, "Okay, so what does this mean?" It means that we can take out significant cost out of the operations. One, from a labor perspective. Two, it gives you enormous amount of flexibility, and it's a better system. And so I think some of it is fortunate that the timing is, that every customer I walk into says, "How can you help me with cost?" Here's how I can do it. And then we talk about the vertical integration and what we can do with different modular solutions within the system. They're much more receptive. And that, I think that's why we've seen this change.
When we acquired IGB, having the manufacturing and engineering capabilities gave us enormous amount of credibility immediately. It wasn't like, "Okay, you can go work with any supplier, another new supplier." That's gone. And so we've quickly been able to adapt to this idea of creating value through just reduction of components, getting a much better system out there, and make it much more focused on a modular concept. And so the vision is that these components then will be integrated into the trim cover itself. And so having all the components with foam, all the thermal comfort solution components, and then the trim cover is the answer. And so it's just they're more receptive.
I—like I said, timing is everything, and we're pushing it hard, because I think they need solutions, and they need help.
So in the short run, you know, you're talking about volumes globally being, you know, flat, and I think you're actually almost flat to slightly down, using, you know, leaning on IHS or S&P, whatever you want to call them as far as forecasters. They're both. But you're talking about margin expansion. Are these the kind of efforts where you know that these are coming through fast enough that they're driving, you know, some of the margin expansion that we're expecting this year? Or are these the long-term targets and potentially even above what you've talked about?
Yeah, I think in terms of the margin impact of what Ray was describing, it's a little bit longer term. The near-term driver of higher margins this year is really our backlog rolling on at margins that are accretive in both segments, converting $1 billion to backlog at about 11.5%-12%. So that's the biggest catalyst for higher margins for us in the near term. We also do see what we call, you know, positive net performance.
So every year, the equation that we're trying to solve is you have customer price reductions, you have wage inflation, offsetting that through our cost reduction programs, purchasing negotiations, and that is a net positive for us, this year, about 15 basis points, more so in E-Systems than seating, sort of building on the margin improvement momentum from last year. As we look out to next year, we do see automation in 2025 and 2026, eventually reaching a point where that, by itself, can offset the full impact of wage inflation. That's the objective that we're pursuing. You know, so relying less maybe on customer recovery and more on our own efforts to take cost out of our factories through automation.
Long term, that will be a catalyst for margin expansion in both businesses.
If we were thinking about sort of dumb guys modeling, just, you know, very simply, incremental margins, let's say, you know, volumes are, you know, 2%-3% higher than we're all expecting this year, and you get, you get a flow through on revenue. I mean, on, on core, you know, ongoing business, what, what should we think of on, on, on the operating edge front?
Yeah, so 15%-20% conversion in seating, a little bit higher than that in these systems. And we did, you know, guide to lower production volumes on our existing platforms this year overall. And so that's sort of the downward conversion and upward conversion if it comes back.
Yeah. I mean, our call is that it might be a little bit better than that, but that's-
I hope you're right.
Yeah.
I hope you're right, too.
Okay, China's is obviously a big topic from a homeland perspective or domestic market perspective, but then potentially exports. You know, as you see that market shifting and heading more towards domestics, you know, locally, and then domestics, you know, at your exposure, what you're seeing in the market and, you know, what kind of opportunity there is there over time?
Yeah, we... Actually, I was just there three weeks ago, meeting with some of our partners, and, it's shifted over the last several years. I think 60% of the vehicles on the road were EVs, a very diversified product on the road, of growing relationships with the domestics on the ground. Jason, I don't know if you want to talk a little about-
Yeah, I mean, we have a strong business in China. In seating, we're either number one or number two. It's really kind of Lear, yeah, Yanfeng and adding similar market positions in these systems. On the wire side, we've got about 7% of the markets on the low-voltage wire, so similar to our global market position. So we have a strong business in both segments in China. We have seen a dramatic shift from the traditional multinational OEMs to the Chinese domestics. And, you know, our business initially was largely driven by the multinational traditional OEMs in China. Historically, it was about 80% multinational, 20% Chinese domestics. This year, it's 70%, 30%. Our backlog is kind of the inverse of that.
Over the next three years, two-thirds of our backlog is with the Chinese domestics, so over time, you will see a pretty significant shift, and our revenue will better reflect the market overall. Maybe more so in seating than E-Systems, but both businesses have pretty good exposure to the Chinese domestics. BYD is a really important customer for us. I think we've got about 30% of their seat business. If you look out to 2026, they will be our, I think, second-largest customer in seating in China in that time frame. We're also growing with BYD outside of China. They awarded a seat program in Thailand. We're working with them in Hungary and in Brazil.
Haven't been awarded the business, but we feel like we're gonna win something in one of those markets as well. So as the Chinese domestics expand outside of China, we expect to participate in that as well.
So, one question on that is, I mean, one thing that we've heard that it's somewhat logical is that the Chinese OEMs may go global with their domestic, you know, supplier partners. I mean, we saw the D3 do it.
Yeah.
We've seen the Europeans do it, the Koreans, Japanese do it, right? But, I mean, given your presence with the domestics in China as they're going global, do they... Do you think they would prefer Yanfeng or other, you know, local suppliers, or they view you as the local supplier that's going with them to the other market?
We've had some very good-
It seems like it could go both ways.
Yeah, well, we've had some very successful reviews already with the domestics outside of China, where they've visited our facilities, where they're seeing what innovation technology we have. I think one thing that is important in out of all, you know, the polypropylene within foam pad. Foam pads are very dirty, so they're looking for innovative technologies. ReNewKnit's another one that's 100% re- you know, recyclable material on the seat covers, you know? ICBs and BDU, so it's where you can bring that innovation to, where you can actually offer a value proposition that helps them. And so I think being and having that vertical integration layer really helps us establish a really good relationship with the domestics outside of China.
We've had some outstanding reviews with our customers outside of China, you know, and so we're hopeful that we'll make some really positive announcements here outside of China, too, with these domestic players.
So from their perspective, you're not raising it, you're not flying the American flag, you're flying the multinational flag, and you kind of fly under that radar screen-
Yeah.
of like, you know what?
Yeah.
It seems like it's a-
Yeah, we have a Chinese national team that runs the business and works with them very closely.
Yeah, seems like it's a huge opportunity for you guys.
Mm-hmm.
On seating specifically, I think you guys have talked about four points about growth above our market from 2023 to 2027, right? We're now in 2024.
You know, how much does... You know, there's opportunity with the Chinese play into it. You know, and how much do other factors play into it? Because, I mean, that clearly indicates you're gaining some market share from somebody somewhere, you know, over time. Is that, you know, how is that being driven?
Yeah, so we still are benefiting from the conquest awards that took place in seating over that kind of 2019, with a European luxury OEM that we have, we haven't announced, that will kind of continue that market share shift. So that's one catalyst to growth. The second catalyst is, you know, the thermal comfort capabilities and being able to deliver a lower-cost system to our customers is helping us on the seat side. It's just another factor that can help sway a decision on the seat program sourcing decision by our customer. And then the component business itself is going to be a growth driver towards the tail end of that four-year period, and then really more beyond that.
Both the components themselves, you know, we're winning, for example, on thermal comfort, on the IGB and Kongsberg award pace, compared to what happened post-acquisition, we're winning 25% more than those businesses were able to win on their own, so those businesses are growing faster than they would have had they remained private or in separate hands. And not just thermal comfort, but also, as Ray described, FlexAir as a catalyst for growth for us. You know, foam is a $4.5 billion market. We have less than 10% of that today. We see an opportunity, you know, for FlexAir to displace a significant amount of traditional foam over time, and we're the only ones that can produce that product.
It's launching this year with Hyundai and the Santa Fe in a small-scale application, but we're working on development programs with customers globally there, so that will be another catalyst.
I think, well, the timing on that one is just the, it's the validation. You know, Hyundai jumped on it early, and I think they have aspirations to continue that across more product lines within their vehicles. But, you know, we're starting to see use for it in headliners, door panels, not just seats, but in other applications that really reduce the need for oil-based products. And so, you know, it seems like a no-brainer, you know, when you walk in and everyone's talking about sustainability, you know, environmental, be smart with what we're producing within the vehicle, and it's one of those products that just takes some time with validation. And so, like Jason mentioned, it's being tested in other applications within the vehicle.
It's just that, you know, being a little bit risk-averse at this time until they get it completely validated, but we're seeing a tremendous pull on that product line. The last catalyst for growth in seating is modularity. And so what we envision over time is selling modules to our competitors that are sourced by our customers. And we're on the cusp of our first award of a true module to one of our largest global customers on a program where we have the JIT. But it is a common system that can be applied to other programs that we don't have the JIT on.
And so that's kind of the next area of focus to drive revenue growth in seating is winning modules that would include the trim cover, the thermal comfort components, the foam or FlexAir as the seat cushioning material. And really, you know, that I think is the long-term path to continuing to generate that four points of growth above market.
So that four points sounds a little conservative, but we'll see how the years unroll.
Yeah.
Doug, you had a question?
Yeah, very impressive business in China that you've been winning. As we think about seats, we have a kind of more of a myopic view here in the U.S. than what a seat should be. As China, you know, unveils a lot of this very competitive EV, kind of like low price points, how do they look at seats as far as the totality of the vehicle? Do they look at it as a competitive advantage to have a very, you know, sexy, comfortable seat, or is it more stripped down relative to... Because that's a very big market.
You know, Doug, that's, like I said, I was there just three weeks ago, and it's amazing the quality and the craftsmanship and the cushioning force.
Yeah.
The consumers within China are starving for more content, more features, more connectivity within the vehicles. What I walked away with was the impression of, damn, these things are nice.
Yeah.
The quality is incredible, the content is unbelievable. And so, you know, they're looking for that upgrade, that premium type segment too, and the customers are demanding it.
Okay.
It's a significant shift from where I think the new products coming on, and their ability to launch products in a very short period of time. And so they're just constantly churning out new content within these vehicles to attract customers. And so I think that's gonna only increase. And, you know, one of the reasons why we've talked about thermal comfort was, you have limitations on how you can package content in because of how it's in a lower weight, lower cost feature. That opens up to not just a front row, but to a second row or a third row, where they're definitely looking for heating elements or lumbar systems within the second row, and those have been somewhat limited because of how you can package it.
Right.
The design was always with the concept of how you take it from here, and much more efficient when you talk about the customer's needs. When you bring it to the surface, you know, we're all customers, and we can appreciate when you're bringing that actual sensation to the surface for the customer, it's dramatically different for, from a preference standpoint.
Good to know.
Yeah.
Even some of these vehicles, they're putting a lot of content in. I mean, it's what it sounds like. It's really, it's really interesting.
Yeah, at least the ones they showed me. Now, there's the lower level ones. We saw some of the BYD ones that, you know, they're talking about producing, but still, the quality was incredible. Really-
Skews more to the luxury end of the-
Yeah.
... of the spectrum. Even within the BYD awards, it's the higher end vehicles typically where we're succeeding.
So on the E-Systems side, we haven't heard as much sort of granularity on sort of growth above market and the targets there. I mean, how do you think about that business? And can you just remind us how, you know, you think that's gonna play out over the next, you know, three to four years for you?
Yeah, we have a strong backlog in these systems. You know, we've had three straight years of winning $1 billion of business, which has supported our backlog, which is our three-year backlog, is $1 billion of new business rolling on over the next three years. That is a key catalyst to restoring margins to the target levels that we've established. Electrification has played a big part in that growth, dramatically over the last several years. It's now north of $750 million business within E-Systems, both the high-voltage wire connection systems, and then the electronics products like the BDU, ICB, and other products. And electrification are a key, you know, driver of growth in E-Systems.
That's not the only way to grow in E-Systems, though we are, as Ray mentioned at the beginning, we just won a second wire program with BMW. Last year, we won our first global wire program with BMW, so we've now won our second. That's an important kind of driver of long-term growth in the wire business and in improvement in the risk profile of that business. Historically, it's been a business that was very reliant on Ford. It was our largest customer, still is our largest customer, but over time, we have grown with GM on the wire side in Asia and here in North America. Now we're growing with BMW as well.
Low voltage market share gains is another key element of the growth plan in E-Systems, and we've grown that business at six points above market for the last four years, and that's, that's our long-term objective as well.
Okay, that's helpful. And then on both these businesses, and you just kind of alluded to this on sort of some of the growth in the East that's being driven by EVs. You know, if we see this, you know, this slowdown or this relative slowdown continue, you know, hybrids backfill to some degree, and ICE vehicles potentially backfill to some degree, you know, I'd imagine on the Seating business, you're somewhat powertrain agnostic, but I'd love to hear your kind of take on that. And then on the E-Systems side, particularly if we see swapping from EVs to hybrids, you know, what that actually means. It might not actually, might actually be a good guy for you. I mean, just curious on both segments, how you-
Yeah, I mean, I would say both segments are powertrain agnostic. Now, clearly, there's higher CPV in an electric vehicle in E-Systems than in an ICE vehicle. So, you know, it would impact growth if there's a dramatic change in the long-term trajectory of the industry's transition from ICE to EV. But, you know, in the interim, as you mentioned, hybrids or plug-in hybrids take on a greater share of the market, there's more content in both of those powertrain types than in an ICE vehicle. So that's also helpful on the E-Systems side. Seating is truly powertrain agnostic. It doesn't matter to us which powertrain is going to be produced.
There may be some longer term benefits of some of the things we're doing with thermal comfort that could help, particularly with range, on an electric vehicle, but largely it's powertrain agnostic.
Got it. I got a couple of lightning round questions. We got a few minutes left. I just want to check if there's any questions in the audience. We got one right there.
So you're in seating, you're placing a large emphasis on becoming vertically integrated. A key supplier, you're gaining share in a consolidated market. Can you talk about whether your pricing power with your customers improving and that the annual price downs that maybe you realize when you were just an assembly person is declining?
Yeah, I would say that the pricing environment has always been super competitive in seating, and one of the reasons for vertical integration is to give us more levers to pull, to create value for our customers, you know, more ways to offset the annual price reduction expectations that they have. I would say over time, you know, the annual price reductions have moderated a little bit, particularly in this environment, where we've dealt with commodity costs increasing now, wage inflation running higher than it has historically, maybe slightly lower customer price reductions.
As the OEMs are figuring out paths to profitability with the transition from ICE to EVs, you know, they are looking for design cost reduction ideas, and our vertical integration capabilities in seating, I think, really uniquely positions us to develop those ideas for our customers.
Yeah. I think, like I mentioned earlier, you know, I'm not seeing a change in what is the productivity request. It's more of the change in how they can get engineering change or VAVE, whatever you, you know, you wanna call it, out of their overall systems. So they're much more willing if it's proliferation or how you're going to take part numbers out or get at costing. That's why I said timing's everything. You know, when you can go in and talk about a thermal comfort system where you've designed it around a modular concept that reduces parts by 50%, weights down, and time to sensation for the customer is significantly better, you know, it's one of these, you know, solutions that: "Okay, here you go. You really want to test what you're talking about. Let's, let's go, let's get to work.
Right. So just historically, if price cost was flat, you gave back 2, and you found productivity of two, right? Going forward, is it, you know, is that price cost positive now?
Yeah, I mean, we have you know, recent history of generating what I call positive net performance. Maybe more so in E-Systems. Of late, they had more room for improvement, but we do expect to generate positive net performance in both businesses this year. It's 75 basis points in E-Systems, and I think 15, or a little bit less than that in Seating, maybe 10 basis points of net performance. But looking out to next year, I think it's reasonable to target 50 basis points-100 basis points of net performance improvement in the business overall, over the next several years.
I think we have time for one more here, and it's a high-class issue that you face. Balance sheet's in great shape, leverage is, you know, at the-
Low.
You know, at the right level or on the low side. I think you're looking for $600 million-$750 million in free cash flow this year. You know, Bank of America, we'd love if you take it to the bank, but I think investors want you to put it someplace else. So, I mean, where are the sort of priorities for capital? You're highlighting all these opportunities. You know, I mean, if you think about it, internal capital, external capital, you know, dividend and share buybacks or even some of these great strategic acquisitions, how are you thinking about all this?
Let me lead. I think strategically, especially the acquisitions we've made in Seating and E-Systems, we're in a really good position. I think if there's gonna be any more of these tuck-in acquisitions, it'd be around this Industry 4.0 or how we accelerate IDEA by Lear. And so that's an area that I think we have to continue to differentiate our company and continue to separate ourselves from our competitors. And so that's an area that I'm really focused on. Jason knows that I'm personally traveling to every single plant, it seems like every single week, getting out, seeing these ideas, but how we accelerate that. But it's nothing, I would say, that's transformative or major. It's these smaller tuck-in acquisitions that we're doing a great job of just accelerating across our company.
Yeah, through our Lear Forward program, we really focused on free cash flow generation last year, and we saw a significant improvement there. Improved capacity utilization, lower capital spending, and that free cash flow generation, we have used that to fuel our share repurchase program. The board just approved an extension and increase of our share repurchase authorization to $1.5 billion out to 2026. We bought back about 4% of our shares last year. Based on our outlook for this year, we'd like to do something similar to that. We've continued buying back stock here in the first quarter, and so our priorities haven't changed. We'll continue to invest first organically in the business, tuck-in acquisitions, as Ray described, you know, Thagora, InTouch, ASI.
Those are $15 million -$25 million deals. They're very manageable and still allow us to return a significant amount of cash to shareholders through our share repurchase program.
That's a great note to end on. Ray and Jason, thank you so much.
Yeah, thank you.
Yeah.
Really, really appreciate it. Thanks so much for coming in.
Thanks.
Thank you.
Thank you.