Good morning, everybody. Thank you for attending the Jefferies Industrials Conference this year, 2023. I wanna introduce Brian Schopfer, who's the CFO of Mirion Technologies. He's gonna be running through some commentary on the company and the format today. We'll follow up with some Q&A. I'll be moderating. I'll ask Brian a few questions. You guys can also ask questions as well. So, look forward to the discussion.
Thanks, Steve. Can you guys hear me? All right, perfect. So I'll keep my intro commentary brief, I think. Okay. Look, Mirion is an interesting company. We specialize today in radiation measurement in ionizing radiation, and our real focus is about protecting people. The company's been public for about 18 months, and we are the global leader in our space. Our mission is to harness our unrivaled knowledge of ionizing radiation for the greater good of humanity. And, you know, as you think about the company, well, I'll talk to you about the end markets in a minute. Everything we do is about detection and measurement from nuclear power through cancer therapies.
And we've spent, we've done something like 15 acquisitions over the last 7 years, to get to the portfolio that we have today. Today, the company is very focused on continuing to organically grow in the spaces we play in. Small, bolt-on, tuck-in acquisitions, margin expansion, and free cash flow. These are the things that the company today is focused on. So as you can see, the business has been around for 20 years. The CEO founded the company back in 2005. It has grown from basically a $20 million business focused on our dosimetry badge business today to, you know, a mid-$700 million company with mid-20% EBITDA margins.
I think, this year, our forecast is 23.5% EBITDA margins, good free cash flow generation, and, we're a diversified player in our space, like we talked about. We are a technology leader in our space. I think this is super important. The people we compete against most often are larger companies, so think of Fortive, Thermo Fisher, et cetera, but they have smaller portfolios compared to the breadth that Mirion brings. Our technology definitely crosses our medical and technology business boundaries, and we can talk about that in a few minutes. We've long customer relations, we are very global, and we continue to enjoy the end markets that are growing today, and we'll talk about those in a second.
So if you think about our medical business, this business has been a double-digit grower for us for the last five quarters. We here, we play in everything from the RTQA space, so radiation therapy, quality assurance, so think linear accelerators, think proton beam therapy, et cetera. We are very excited about our nuclear medicine position and continuing to build out that position. Today, that business is much more. You know, we're one of the biggest things we are working on, and I think as we think about our investments, this is something we're very focused on: How do we, how do we continue to enjoy the benefits that this space is growing? And how do we connect our products to procedural growth?
And this is something that we are very constructive on as we move forward. And then our legacy business, which is where the company started, you know, 20 years ago, was our dosimetry badge business. So here, we're a number 2 player against Landauer. And our story here is really about technology and technology enablement from a product standpoint, to drive market share growth and push into new markets for us. This business has, you know, grown significantly again over the last couple of quarters, has high gross margins, very good EBITDA margins, and we continue to like where we're positioned, and we like the end markets the most here. Really about helping people get cured from cancer.
So the technologies business, again, 2/3 of this business is nuclear power-focused. Most of that nuclear power business is recurring and repeat revenue, replacement, recurring, and repeat revenue business. Although we do have a small project-based business as well. That project-based business continues to be robust for us. Although we have not booked any new backlog on larger projects in the last few quarters, we are very constructive of the outlook that is to come here. It's worth noting that our backlog has grown the last 4 quarters consecutively, which is something that you know shows the robustness of our end markets. The other businesses we play in here are the defense business and the labs and research business.
That labs and research business has been, from an order standpoint, fantastic for us over the last couple of quarters. If you go back to nuclear power, just for one second. This is, it is here that our end markets are, they're really coming alive, right? We have state sponsorship is at an all-time high, specifically in Europe, and mainly around energy security. And, you know, then at the back end of as you think farther out, and I was just talking to somebody about this, you know, you have that SMR, that small modular reactor, business that's, you know, starting to really come alive. And it's definitely coming a bit faster than what we would've even thought. We've booked a few orders this year in that space.
I think we just press released one, a couple of weeks ago with, with one of the larger players there. We continue to believe that, that space will be exciting, but, but more on the back end of a-- any planning horizon would, would envision. So we, we continue to like this business a lot, on the nuclear power space, the labs and research space, and, and the defense business, including in the-- I think it was the Q2, we booked a, a large defense order in Europe. We continue to see good momentum in the defense space. You know, it's taken a bit longer than what we would've thought, say, 12 months ago, but we feel very good about our positioning across all 3 of these end markets.
This is just a bit about the the investment thesis, right? Innovation leader, high recurring revenue business, something we've talked a lot about across our both of our end markets, candidly. Big moats, a lot of regulatory need for our products. It's a resilient business model. If you look back over our history, in some of the toughest of times, we've actually had some of our highest growth years, right? We've grew high single digits during the Great Recession back in 2007, 2008, and then the mini recession, the same in 2014, 2015, 2016. So, you know, very resilient business. You know, I think we think about this more in an acyclical manner than anything else. We're very focused on operational excellence.
I think the last 12 months, you know, we have seen a little bit of margin compression as we've taken more price than cost, but on a rate basis, we have not been able to keep pace. As we think about the back end of the year, and as we go into 2024, margin improvement and free cash flow are the 2 biggest operating things Tom and I are focused on with the company. We're very diversified, as we've talked about in our 2 end markets. We play in a lot of different segments. We are technology-focused, and we're disciplined capital allocators, right? We're very focused on continuing to deleverage, but having a balanced M&A program that really revolves more around, you know, the smaller tuck-in deals.
You know, but we're focused right now on generating free cash flow and deleveraging. So with that, maybe we'll do some Q&A.
Sure. So I'm gonna start out with a few questions for Brian, and then, as folks see appropriate, please, raise your hand and ask away. But, well, you know, one of the key questions, given the journey the business has been on in the past couple of years, that I have is: Where do you see the longer-term balance of the business headed in terms of end market application, whether-
Yeah
... medical versus, you know, rest of the, rest of the applications, defensive, that sort of thing?
Yeah, you know, as we became public, we talked a lot about, you know, getting the medical end market up to 50%. I think that's still something we continue to look at and strive for. But I think, you know, we're-- as we think about, you know, this question's really focused on inorganic growth. And as we think about our M&A strategy, you know, I, we continue to have a funnel that's tilted more towards medical. I would say we continue to tilt the funnel kinda to more bolt-on, smaller bolt-on type deals, easily digestible, high synergi- high synergies. You know, software is definitely something that we continue to, to want to expand in. But I would tell you, there's a number of things on the technology side that, that are of interest to us.
And I think 12 or 18 months ago, we would have told you, we're pretty exclusively focused on medical. I think as we think about and continue to look at things and continue to keep our funnel updated, I think it's definitely still medical-heavy, but there's more stuff on the nuclear power and technology side that's definitely of interest. But again, I mean, capital is the key for us. We need to continue to deleverage, where we continue to be focused on getting down to 3.1 times by the end of the year. And you know, right now, that is where we're focused.
Great. You'd mentioned a bit of a reemergence in nuclear power. I mean, regionally, where are you seeing that? And is that from new builds or the restart of certain facilities around the world, given some of the crisis we saw in energy last winter or beginning of last winter?
Yeah, I think it's a little bit of both, honestly, Steve. I mean, if you look at our order rates, you know, last year we had, you know, off-the-charts nuclear power orders. This year, we comped those numbers with, you know, pretty good comps. So I think we feel very constructive about what we're seeing out there. I think it's a mix of that installed base. We haven't booked any new builds, so new construction, big new construction projects, you know, through the end of June. But I think we expect to see some more activity here, whether it's in the back half of next year or this year or in the next year.
Those are always things we don't really like to commit to because, you know, things move quarter to-
Sure
... quarter, month-to-month. They're big projects, lots of complexity. The reality is, the energy security side in Europe is, is very important. You've seen many of the major big markets, whether it's France, the UK, I think you'll see, I think you'll see a number of other markets, and make announcements in, in their investment in nuclear power. I think France announced 14 or 16 new, new ones over the next couple of decades. Obviously, the U.K. continues to invest, whether it's Hinkley Point or right behind that will likely be Sizewell C. I think there'll be more in there as well. I think it's, it's, it's definitely a mix. Then the, the SMR side, we talked a bit about, as well. Smaller numbers today, right?
But I think what's neat about SMRs is this, our view is it will be additive to the global landscape. It won't detract from some of the other bigger projects that are going on. I think the U.S. is further ahead on the SMR side than Europe. Europe, we're continuing to see bigger new builds take place.
Just to stay on the M&A topic a bit as well. I mean, do you? You guys did a wonderful job of what we characterize as programmatic M&A. You know, kind of-
Yep.
- continuing these tuck-ins. Will that be... You know, do you envision that's the ongoing plan, or will you start to sprinkle in some larger transactions as they arise?
Yeah, I mean, look, like I said, our focus right now is free cash flow. It's probably more smaller type stuff, but we continue to be committed to our 3 times leverage goal, getting to that. And then we'll, you know, we'll assess where we're at in general as we turn the page into next year. But I think, you know, leverage is really important in the markets today. It's something that we've had to structurally fix here over the last nine months. We're super excited about what we were able to do. But now it's about operating and generating free cash flow to continue that journey. That's our focus, and will continue to be our focus.
Great. At this point, I'd be happy to take any questions for Brian from the audience.
Your end markets opportunities sound exciting, but and a lot of growth, one seems much lumpier than the other, and sporadic potentially. What do you see in the competitive landscape? You know, when you were talking about different jurisdictions building nuclear power, different solutions or requirements that typically you can't play in certain markets because of, you know, your company here versus some in Asia and such.
Sure. Yeah, I— You know, first off, to your comments on the lumpiness, I think what you're actually starting to see, specifically on the technology side, where we've had 2 bigger. You know, historically, we've had 2 larger quarters, the June and December quarter, and 2 smaller quarters, the March and September quarter. You're starting to see that change a little bit ratably as we've changed our year-end. So you're starting to see a bit more of a smoothing out in those 3 quarters. I think that'll continue to take time. The Q4 continues to tend to be our largest quarter for various reasons. As you think about competition, though, you know, look, we haven't been shy.
I mean, over the 2 decades Tom's run the company, you know, we've definitely lost wallet in China. That's. That was inevitable. I think what we have left there from a wallet standpoint is very robust. You know, we are the player that provides an international standard solution. We did just win, back in December of 2021, 4 nuclear reactor orders in our radiation monitoring business at almost $10 million a reactor. So, you know, what's left is good business. It's profitable. It's very profitable, and it can be of size. I think we continue to assess what we're doing and able to do in Asia, but also the Indian market as well.
And I think you'll continue to see us, you know, do things to make sure we stay very relevant in those markets. But, you know, outside of the candidly, the Russian local market, right? I mean, we still play in, you know, most of the other markets we're able to play in that aren't, you know, that aren't, you know, we're not excluded from. But I think from a competitive standpoint, we're very well positioned. We are the leader in, I think it's 15 of 17 or 16 and 18. I think we just added one with Collins of our product categories. There are high barriers of entry and big moats here, and, you know, that has always been a strong position for us.
The one thing, you know, we didn't talk about, Steve, that maybe is just worth mentioning is one of the things the company continues to invest in on both sides. This kind of goes to your competition, is digital. And, you know, historically, we've talked about our software and digital platforms on the medical side. With the Collins acquisition we did last year, which was a very good deal for us, I think we bought that, we bought about $35 million of revenue for $7 million. Now, it's a bit of a fix-it story on the bottom line, which we're aggressively getting after, but we feel like we have a good roadmap there, is investing on the digital side, on the technologies business.
You know, I think we're early days in that journey, but the hardware, software kind of attachment rates and the growth, the pull-through that we've seen on the hardware side from our software business on the medical side, I think gives us good opportunities to do some of the same things on the technology side. I think we're still, you know, a year, a couple of years out here, but we are beginning to make investments in this area, and we think this is a good growth area for us in the future.
Well, one other quick one for you, Brian. It may, it may not be a quick one, but you know, as we're in a period with the market where, you know, I think there's some heavy debate as whether we're going to have a hard landing or soft landing. But you know, with respect to your product portfolio, I would imagine that the mission criticality nature of your products, you know, your business should continue to perform generally speaking, regardless of the market conditions. Can you comment on that at all?
Yeah. I mean, I'm not going to comment on the hard landings, soft landing side.
Yeah.
We're focused on running our business. But, you know, look, if you look at the history, and there's a chart that we've published, historically, that shows kind of the 20-year history of the company, and it's one of resilience. It's also one of kind of, you know, weather resistance, I think is a word we've used before. Where during some of these harder economic times that the country or the world has seen, this company has performed well with, you know, whether it was, you know, with high single-digit growth in both of those periods over the last 20 years. So we may be new to the markets or the public markets, but this company's been around a long time. We've seen cycles.
We have a CEO that's been in the seat for, you know, for its entire 20-year history. He's very invested in the company personally as well. I think, you know, this is a business that is performs well when things maybe aren't going so well more globally. I think you're seeing that, right? I mean, our order trends, our backlog build over the last few quarters, I think continues to be strong and a bit of an outlier, you know, in a lot of respects.
Re-open it up for the floor for any other questions. If not, we appreciate everybody attending. Thank you for joining the Jefferies Industrials Conference, and look forward to seeing you today.
Thanks.