Okay, let's get started. I'm Doug Harned, Bernstein's Global Aerospace Analyst, and I am very excited to have back with us again Kathy Warden, the Chairman and CEO of Northrop Grumman. I know Kathy's got a few things to say here first, so I'm gonna turn it over to her. As if you have questions, you can put them in through the pigeonhole link in there, but then we'll go straight into a fireside chat. So, Kathy?
Thanks, Doug. Great to be back with you. Good morning. Wanted to share a few opening comments, but before I do that, just remind you that we might make forward-looking statements today, and with those forward-looking statements, there are risks and uncertainties. You can find a full disclosure of those risks and uncertainties in our SEC filings. As we come into this year, it has been a dynamic time, but we as a company are coming from a position of strength. We have a backlog of nearly $93 billion. We have continued to see our programs be well supported in the U.S. budget and reconciliation bill, and I'm sure we'll talk a bit more about that as we get into the conversation today. We also are seeing incredibly strong international demand for our products.
I've talked before about having expanded our exportable product portfolio, having about three times the number of products that we can export today as we did just seven years ago when I stepped into this role, and that's providing us strong tailwinds as well. There are a couple of recent announcements that I just want to draw to your attention. One is that our board approved a 12% dividend increase last week. That is our 22nd annual increase. We also just yesterday announced the divestiture of our training services business, and we outlined the expected benefit of that in our first quarter call, so I'll refer you back to that, but just wanted to let you know that it indeed did close. Doug, I will turn it to you. You have a lot of questions, and we'll get into the meat of what's happening in Washington.
Okay, great. Thanks, Kathy. And just to start, can you take us through when you take an overall look at Northrop Grumman today, you know, what are you seeing as the biggest opportunities and the biggest challenges?
The largest opportunities we have, as I just noted, are the strong backlog that we have as a result of having a technology portfolio that is in high demand both within the U.S. and globally. We also have a significant set of opportunities to expand with our current backlog programs that run 20-30 years into the future, like B-21 and Sentinel, as good examples of being in the early stage of developing game-changing technology for the U.S., and the opportunities still sit ahead of us to move those programs into production and generate strong earnings and cash flow. I also look at the strength of our portfolio in terms of its alignment to new and emerging opportunities. I talked about the strength of international.
I was just on the President's trip to the Middle East two weeks ago, and we see these opportunities emerging as additive to what we saw coming into the year. Of course, Golden Dome, which I'm sure we'll talk about a bit more, is a new opportunity in the U.S. that has significant alignment with Northrop Grumman products that we can offer as part of that focus area as well.
If you starting out with the budget, because one thing we've seen, we have, you know, the, this, the skinny budget, the president's 2026 sort of framework, which we don't have a lot of detail in that. Then we have this reconciliation bill, which adds a lot, but a lot of what's in there doesn't have to be obligated for four years and spendings over a very long period of time. First, can you comment on how you see this budget coming together, timing of when we may know more, and implications for you all?
As you know, we don't have a lot of detail on the 2026 budget. The skinny budget provides some areas of focus for spending in the Department of Defense, and those align well to what's in our portfolio, things like the nuclear modernization, munitions, and missiles, as well as space. As we see the details programmatically, we believe our programs will be well supported, but that will come when the Congress receives that president's budget, which we expect shortly. That said, the skinny budget plus what's in the reconciliation bill, the numbers that are being discussed would represent a 12% increase for our 2025 budget. It is a significant increase, if indeed the reconciliation bill is passed and a significant portion of that four-year funding is used in 2026 and aligned in the way that the Congress has outlined in the bill.
Yeah, because it's just, it's been somewhat challenging to try and understand the timing of when many of those initiatives in that reconciliation bill would play out. Are you, when you look at this, you and you try and apply that to the 2026 skinny budget, I mean, you're still seeing significant growth. I guess that's my question here.
We are. Even though there are four years under which those funds could be appropriated, if the intent is that those be front-end loaded, which is what has been discussed by the president when the administration has talked about spending over $1 trillion on defense, that would suggest that much of that reconciliation funding would get utilized in the earlier phases. That is indeed what we're hearing. All of that is yet to play out, as I said. When you look at specific elements in the reconciliation, there is significant funding for programs like B-21 and Sentinel. We have more insight into what the government is thinking about how those funds would be used than we do others like Golden Dome.
That's a large pot of money, but the government has yet to define how that money will be spent in the acquisition strategy specifically to put that on contract.
Now, you were just on the trip in the Middle East. I guess two things. Can you give us a sense of, on the defense side and what, in terms of possible things that Northrop Grumman might be able to contribute to within the umbrella of what was described as a very positive trip in terms of U.S. defense exports? First part. And then the second part, have you gotten any additional insight into tariffs? I know it's not the biggest issue for Northrop Grumman, but it's still there.
Let me start with my trip to the Middle East, which was a trip where we were really confirming demand on a number of things that we were already discussing with the Saudis, the Qataris, and the Emiratis. This is areas like integrated air and missile defense. I've talked at length about our IBCS program and the global demand that we have seen emerge for that product offering. In each of those three nations, there is interest in that product. Of course, we already are selling munitions. There's great interest in tactical missiles like AARGM, and those areas were discussed. In each country, some unique areas, sensors and radars in Saudi, for instance. All in total, multi-billion dollars of opportunity in each of those three countries.
This is a function of continuing to build on what was already expressed demand from these countries, but showing the U.S. support to export those products to them and a sense of urgency about moving forward on these opportunities. Real tailwind to our business development efforts in the Middle East. You asked about tariffs. We certainly are understanding tariff risks that as they exist in our portfolio, they are less than most companies just because we do not acquire much outside the United States, as you would expect. Some of that is contractual based on the types of systems that we work on. We have requirements to buy U.S. I shared in our first quarter earnings call that we have about 5% of our supply chain, which is less than $1 billion that we acquire outside the United States.
Now, of course, we look beyond just what we're buying. It's how does that fit into our supply chain and our product offerings and what impact could it have if we didn't have access or if the costs went up, and we have done that. Largely across our product portfolio, we do not see a risk of significant disruption. Where we have seen risks that we needed to mitigate, we've done so well into 2026. In other cases, we were already working on second sources. For each program, it's a slightly different mitigation strategy, but all of those are underway, and we incorporate the risks as we see them today. We've made no updates to our guidance based on tariffs, and we don't believe that we need to.
I'm curious. When you said multi-billion dollar opportunities in each of those countries, are you referring to opportunities for Northrop Grumman of that scale?
Yes. In the areas that I articulated.
Yeah. And when you, when you think about that, and you put that kind of all together with your other international opportunities, are you expecting a higher growth rate now? You, you talked before about international, how strong international growth appears to be, but how's that look now compared to your overall growth?
I would say that our international demand has continued to expand, including as we have progressed through this year. We have articulated that we expect international through the decade to grow, double-digit, and that we do believe that international will continue to, our international growth will continue to outpace our domestic growth, although that's a competition that we, we like to have. We wanna see both grow, and we are. As we look at the pipeline now, the pipeline is stronger, but it does take time to convert these opportunities into awards. We do not expect a significant change in our 2025 outlook, but as we look toward the end of the decade, this is just bolstering our strength of pipeline for sales in that period of time.
Yeah. I wanna, I wanna turn over to Aeronautics and talk a little bit about the B-21. That's obviously been a, you know, it's a very important program for you. You know, in the last earnings call, you talked about this additional, this charge has to do with different processes, has to do with some of the costs on the supplier side. Can you give us a little more detail on how you're thinking about that situation right now and what it means for margins on the B-21?
As we think about margins, let me just address that up front. We take the charge, and we had already been booking at zero on the low-rate initial production lots. It does not change our margin outlook on a go-forward basis, just to clarify that. In terms of the charge itself, we have characterized it in two buckets, the first being the increase in cost and usage of what we call procured items. This is not so much in items that a supplier delivers. This is materials that we utilize in the production of the aircraft, and we saw inflation continue to make those costs increase, and we also are utilizing more of it. We outlined that in our Q1 call. The second, as you noted, we made some process changes that would allow us to accelerate the rate at which we build the B-21.
This is ongoing conversations that we've been having with the government that we believed made sense to make these process changes. We continue to work with the government to outline the merits of moving faster in the build process as they contemplate what they would like that plan to be on a go-forward basis. We've taken the cost associated with making that change in the first quarter. The program continues to obviously have opportunities and risks that we evaluate every quarter. We've been quite transparent about that, and we will continue to do so. As we move through the program, we are progressively retiring risks associated with performance because we are just further along in the build process. Not only do we have more actuals behind us in that build process, but we have more learning and experience upon which to base our forward estimates.
You know, and I'm sure you know this well, but when you look at the history of major military aircraft programs, I honestly can't think of one in the last 30 years that didn't have substantial issues: cost, timeline, performance. The B-21's been interesting because that so far, at least what we've heard from the Air Force and from congressional committees, is that the program has actually proceeded quite well in terms of timing and performance. When I think many of us see a charge like this, you start to wonder, you know, we're not in production yet, really, and, you know, is there a risk that this could go the way of some of those others? How do you get confident in the outlook for the B-21 from here?
As I have described in the past, there are a couple of things that we look at, and certainly our investors can as well, and that is how is the aircraft progressing through the test program? Because testing is the time in which you would discover any challenges that need to be rectified in the aircraft. The Air Force and we are providing regular updates on how the jet is progressing through test. It is not only progressing through on a timely basis, meeting its scheduled milestones, but it is also performing to test expectations, and the Air Force has reiterated that. We do each quarter as we update you as well. The second area to look at is how are we progressing through the build process?
Of course, the change that we talked about in the first quarter and the charge that resulted was part of the build process learning that we had. As we get further along in that build process, those risks become better understood, retired, or incorporated. That is continuing to be what we will look at as we progress through the program. As I've said, while those risks and opportunities exist, there is uncertainty that we are projecting into the future. The greatest challenge we've had so far, by far, has been our inflation assumptions.
When we did the program back in 2016, we had built a financial deal construct around inflation assumptions over the period of time that we would be executing, and they indeed ended up being higher, largely as a result of the inflation that we all experienced in the early part of this decade that was unanticipated. It, I know it's hard to reconcile how can we hear a program is doing so well and yet the financial outcomes would not indicate that. That is largely the disconnect between those two items. We try to be very clear and transparent about those risks associated with performance, those risks associated with macroeconomics, and both still exist, but are lessened over time as we execute and get actuals behind us.
Now, moving on within Aeronautics, I mean, as large as con subcontractor on F-35, still a, you know, very important program. We're looking at, depending on how budgets go, but assuming you can fill in any gaps with international deliveries, pretty flat production outlook over the next few years. When you think of F-35 for Northrop Grumman, there's obviously upgrades, there is sustainment work, that you participate in. How do you see the revenue trajectory going for F-35?
We expect the revenue to be approximately 10% of company sales as it has been for the last couple of years, over the next several as well. It is a combination of multiple moving parts. There is the production of the aircraft, and they are in aeronautics, which is the bigger driver of our revenue. We are at our max capacity of 156 aircraft a year. That is what that modeling is based on. We also are working on modernization with Block 4 upgrades. That is primarily in our mission systems business, and that is driving some growth on the program. Sustainment has been a key driver of growth on a percentage basis. It is a much smaller percentage of our total revenue today, but growing at double-digit rates. It is contributing some upside to our overall growth profile for the program.
If we switch over to unmanned systems, when you've seen some of the more mature programs kind of come down, like Global Hawk, Triton is clearly a very important program. You know, we've seen funding kind of come into the U.S. budget, which is obviously Australia, opportunities potentially in Europe. Can you talk about that and what you see as a trajectory for that program?
Yes. First of all, Triton is a platform that is highly relevant in theaters where you need long endurance. That's actually, it's called a HAL platform, high altitude, long endurance, because it can actually give you days of coverage. Being an unmanned aircraft, you don't have to worry about a pilot being able to be out on a mission for those long periods of time. Also, high altitude gives it a resiliency. It's not easily observable or targeted. When you think about why was the platform developed in the first place and what's needed in the world today, it is a highly relevant platform. That's why we're seeing international partners seek it now, that it is in production and more certain cost profile. We expect it to continue to have growth.
We have a production line that is secured with orders through the decade and are looking to expand upon that. As we think about its role in the world today, it is primarily a surveillance platform, and it is a relatively low-cost alternative for the missions that it provides. We expect it to continue to be operated and maintained well into the future.
When you put all of this together, I know if we go back a couple of years, you know, you had a lot of mature programs that were ramping down. It was still, you were still in the process of kind of ramping up on B-21 revenues. When you look at the outlook today for Aeronautics, you know, I, I'm assuming we're out of that valley, but what kind of growth should we expect in total?
We have forecasted in our outlook a mid-single-digit growth rate for Aeronautics this year, and that incorporates the factors that you were just talking about: some programs declining, others steady state, and then, of course, programs like B-21 and a couple of others that are growing over the next several years. We expect that that mix to continue to result in similar growth trajectory for AS beyond this year. Right now, we've just provided an outlook for, or guidance for 2025 in that mid-single-digit.
When you think about margins now, you know, because the B-21 will be booking at zero margin here for a while, should we be thinking of this as kind of a 9%-ish type margin business when you add that in?
Again, for this year, we're looking at high nines, and that's coming off of a year last year where we performed around 10%, which was higher than we expected and higher than we had guided. The team continues to perform very well on our mature production programs in Aeronautics, which is helping from a mixed standpoint to offset some of the B-21 pressure and margin rate. In addition, as we are more successful in international pursuits, that backlog comes with a higher expected margin rate as well. Those factors allow us to, you know, feel confident in what we've projected this year is high nine.
If we go over to defense systems, you know, Sentinel currently costs less program, so relatively low margins. And, you know, you've had the issues here with the Air Force pushing out IOC, into the little farther into the 2030s. What are the implications of those, the Air Force delay on Northrop Grumman?
Last year, you may recall I spoke about that change in the Sentinel program profile that the government was going to be doing a restructure. Based on what we knew about the timeline coming out of the Nunn-McCurdy review, we had changed our estimate complete, our view of the program to reflect that flattening, that slowing of growth on the program. That is what was incorporated into our updates last year for the program and our guidance this year. Now what you see in the budget is the government will be doing the same. The budget will reflect that different annual profile, but we do not expect that to change at all. What we have laid in, they are expected to fully fund the program for the industrial-based needs to continue on the program that we have laid out.
Because it's interesting too, and you mentioned this at the beginning, when you look at the priorities of the Trump administration, clearly nuclear deterrence is right up at the top. Are there any opportunities, sort of when you sort through what might be in these bills to expedite some of what the Air Force is doing?
Yes. I think that's what you see reflected from the Congress as well in the reconciliation bill, adding funding to programs where they see the opportunity for additional resources to accelerate delivery. It's a conversation we're having on B-21. As I spoke about earlier, we are having the same conversation with the Congress and the Air Force around Sentinel as what additional funding could be applied to both risk-reduce the program, but also accelerate our ability to field the capability in the 2030s and what could we be doing today to make that happen. We are collaborating with the Air Force to identify those opportunities and then bring them forward for funding.
Since it's a very large program for you, when you look forward, do you have a sense of when you might start to move into an LRIP situation where you would then start to get higher margins on this?
We have said late this decade into early next decade is when you would see us move into production. Yet there will be long lead, just like there is on any program of this type that starts to lay in later this decade.
Okay. So AARGM, big program in Defense Systems. Can you talk about where your opportunities are, particularly internationally? I know Poland is an important customer. Where can this go?
For AARGM, we are really excited about how that program is delivering. AARGM-ER, which provides an even more capable missile, is also moving toward production. As we have both of those systems qualified for multiple fighter aircraft, we have seen our international pipeline expand dramatically, dozens of countries that have been approved for export for those missiles. The focus for our team is ramping up so that we can produce faster. Right now, the demand is there. We have to be able to ramp supply. That has been the focus of our capacity expansion at facilities like our Allegheny Ballistics Lab, where we have invested significant resources to expand our capacity of solid rocket motor production.
We have also there built an integration facility where we can expand our capacity to build AARGM. And so as we do that, it will help us to be able to fulfill these international orders as they come.
Because you've guided to, you know, double-digit organic sales growth in defense systems. Certainly you have Sentinel, but it seems like it's these other programs that are really kind of pushing your top line up there. Another one's clearly IBCS. I know you've described something on the order of $10 billion in potential opportunities. You know, I think you've now had discussions in Japan as well. Can you take us through how large IBCS can be? I understand that the opportunities are out there, but what could we see in terms of revenue and growth in the next few years?
We expect IBCS to be a significant growth driver for us internationally. We have, as I've shared before, over a dozen countries, a significant number of NATO countries, but as you noted, also Japan. As I was visiting the Middle East, I mentioned all three nations expressing interest in integrated air and missile defense and the IBCS product specifically. We are seeing a broad-based demand signal for that product. The reason is it allows you to provide integrated air and missile defense in a way that reduces your need for sensors and kinetic effectors, driving down your overall ownership costs of a complete system to do the integrated air and missile defense mission.
It really is a program that we believe is going to continue to have value in each of the individual nations, but also it becomes a global franchise where it supports the interoperability of nations who are engaged together to either protect a particular area of operation or to share information coming off of your sensors. This, in many ways, is beyond just the value that a single country's system can provide as it integrates with others who are operating the similar integrated air and missile defense architecture.
If we look at this, double-digit growth for defense systems, I mean, how can you help us kind of break down that a little bit in terms of what the highest growth pieces are? Because there are several things in here.
It is a factor of all of the elements of the portfolio that you just talked about are contributing nicely to growth above the mid-single digit that we have talked about for the company as a whole. The DS portfolio is benefiting more from international growth through IBCS and the missile systems that we just talked about. Tactical weapons, not only our own, we spoke about AARGM and AARGM-ER. There is also Stand and Attack Weapon where we are a prime integrator, and that program is growing, but we also are expanding our supply agreements for solid rocket motors for other people's tactical missile programs, think GMLRS, Hellfire, et cetera. We are also on the front end of areas of growth like hypersonics and the work that we are doing specifically on the HACM program, which also is out of our defense systems portfolio. Of course, Sentinel.
When you add all of that up, there is growth coming from each of those areas and, significantly, outpacing what we see as market growth across the portfolio.
I believe in something else in there, which maybe it's harder to talk about, hypersonic defense.
Yes, that's actually in our space portfolio. The Glide Phase Interceptor program is a program designed for intercepting glide phase, hypersonic weapons. We are very pleased to have started execution on that program as well. We think that it has relevance directly to Golden Dome, but it is a collaborative piece of work with the Missile Defense Agency in the U.S. and our Japanese partners. It is obviously intended for our allies as well, as we develop and begin to produce that capability.
Yeah. With that, I want to transition over to space. When you look at the Golden Dome concept, you have the hypersonic defense, you also have clearly a lot of participation in space-based systems that are relevant here. How are you thinking about the opportunities associated with Golden Dome?
We clearly believe that Golden Dome will be an architecture that includes many different systems and will be acquired through many different programs, some of which exist today and just will need to have more capacity and others which will be new. I just spoke about Glide Phase Interceptor, and that is a hypersonic interceptor, as I noted. We also have for decades been a leader in the missile warning and tracking space within Northrop Grumman. We are on multiple programs today that provide a space layer for missile tracking and warning, including the Space Development Agency's Track Tranche One for the tracking layer, the HPTSS satellite prototype that we build, and then, of course, more traditional, like our OPIR next-generation polar satellites. We understand how to do that missile track and warning from space. We also do the mission management.
The ground-based, taking all of that information, making sense of it to inform the operators. In addition, when I think of what that mission management scope looks like, it's not just about space. It includes things like we were just discussing with integrated air and missile defense, more, underlayer, if you will, for tracking of close-in missiles. We expect that to be part of Golden Dome and IBCS providing a starting point for such an architecture there. Space-based interceptors themselves, we are the largest propulsion provider for interceptors, today. We expect that would be a market for us going forward on programs that include build-out of more space-based interceptors. It's really a broad-based approach. We expect in some of these areas, we would be a prime provider in others, a supplier.
We see it as mini captures inside of a set of opportunities that are emerging now, but likely will be coming to fruition over a number of years.
When you think of this, obviously a huge complex system we're talking about, we've had in the past, there've been a lot of complex systems. You know, we've had JADC2, Future Combat Systems, even called GMD would even be one of those. When you look at this, what are your thoughts in terms of what do you think the best way to go would be in terms of really a technical, technical, you've had national teams, you've had like company-led teams. What do you think the right answer is for a technical solution and for an acquisition solution?
General Gutlein has been selected to be the government program manager, and I have a lot of confidence in his understanding of how to define an architecture, but then acquire pieces of that architecture in a coordinated, but separate way. I believe that is what makes most sense here. Because as I said, there are some programs where you just need more of it. The easiest and fastest thing to do is to add resources to either move faster or buy more quantity of the things that are already being contracted that fit nicely within the architecture. There are other areas where you will need to develop new capability. That takes a little more time. You'll run competitions and you will engage new industry players to do that. That whole ecosystem means an industrial base that is broad.
I think you want to use all the players on the field because this is a lot of resource and schedule that requires the government to move very fast. I do not think it makes sense for this to be viewed as a single acquisition, but instead an architecture and a framework for buying that includes many different pathways to get there.
Okay. Very complex road ahead. If, continuing though on space, so, you know, after the loss of NGI, you had the classified contracts, so your space revenues came down some. Can you talk about now what your outlook is in terms of growth in space and where it's most likely to come from?
The growth in space will continue to be broad-based up until this point. It has included growth drivers like restricted space, which continues to be a growth opportunity for us in the future. It has included the propulsion systems that I spoke of, particularly as we look forward, the highest growth area we expect there is actually space launch for programs like Kuiper, where we would provide the propulsion systems for Amazon to launch its satellites. We also see that our space business has been mostly for the U.S. government. There is some opportunity for international expansion in space, which would be forward growth. It has not been a key contributor up until this point. Those would be the growth drivers.
The area that we're looking at that we don't expect to contribute to growth going forward is NASA, based on what we're hearing about NASA budgets. That is a relatively small portion of our space portfolio today.
Yeah. I'm curious on that. Yeah. We've seen changes in the NASA budget. I mean, that I guess becomes, does that become a lower priority for you or is it, how are you thinking about NASA now in the whole scheme of things?
Yeah. It's not that it's a low priority, but it has been a relatively small portion of our portfolio even now. We expect, as I said, that it will not be a growth driver for us. In that regard, it's not an area that we would invest significantly in, but it is an area we'll continue to support because NASA has an important mission, always has, and we think it will continue to. It's just not going to be as well resourced in this foreseeable future based on what we're hearing.
Now, on the SDA tracking layer, you did not go into Tranche Two. How are you thinking about that? How should we think of the tracking layer and the transport layer? How do you look at those in terms of the evolution of those systems and your participation?
Yeah. We look at how well we're positioned and where to compete. There are so many opportunities that we do, we are selective and disciplined. We had bid and won and are executing on Tranche One. We were maturing that capability now in production. We have that experience behind us to inform future bids like Tranche Three. At the same time, we were also executing and maturing our payloads on HBTSS, which is similar technology. We were doing that for the Missile Defense Agency. You know, we just make sure that we have a pathway through government-funded work to progress the technology, which we did on both of those, and that then we use that as the basis for competitively bidding in ways that we have assurance we can execute. That's what we've done here.
I feel good about how we're positioned, continuing to position in missile track and warning.
Because one of the, not just here, but one of the things we're seeing more broadly is the participation by a number of new entrants. And that's certainly been true with some of the SDA programs. We saw it on CCA with Anduril. You know, how are you thinking about these new competitors here and what implications are there for you all?
Look, we embrace competition. It makes us better to have competitors who are driving the technology base forward. Yet we feel well positioned with the talent that we have, the experience that we have, the capacity that we have invested in so that we can scale our offerings. We, of course, as you would expect, have looked across our portfolio at our win rates, even in areas where the government has chosen to use their OTAs and non-FAR-based acquisition models. We are very comfortable with where our win rate is. It is very good. That leads me to believe it is not about the contract type. It is not about who you are competing against. It is about how good your offering is. That is what we focus on as a company. That is what we will continue to focus on.
I feel like we have all the ingredients within the company to continue to bid and win in those environments. We also partner. When we see a company, big or small, that's bringing a novel technology or a capability that we don't have, but we still have the expertise and the mission knowledge, we partner with them and we work together. That's another way to market for us.
If we go over to mission systems, mission systems is a very hard one from the outside to model in detail. There are so many programs in there. Can you give us a sense of what the most important programs for growth in that business are today?
Mission systems is difficult to model because it is a lot of programs that are in that billion-dollar class. It is technology that goes into a platform usually. You cannot see it and touch it the way you can an aircraft or a spacecraft, but it is what sits inside those platforms that help them provide the mission. That is why we call the business mission systems. In many ways, it drives more value in the total system than just the revenue it produces. It is why it is our highest margin business because that technology innovation is reflected in the margins that we can get for the work that we do in that portfolio. Where we have traditionally focused is in sensing, warning, that is radars, managing the electronic spectrum, that is electronic warfare, sensors and capabilities, and then also in the computing itself.
You have heard me talk about how in that business we have two foundries and we are developing our own chip technology, often that is providing performance better than what you have commercially because it needs to be there. It is a requirement that you would not know what to do with that kind of power in your smartphone. It would be beyond the capacity you could utilize. We are off developing our own technology to go into systems like that and enable government applications in form factors that are very, very small. We focus on things like power for energy consumption, the same kinds of things other tech companies are doing, but it is a different set of requirements. I think a lot of people just do not appreciate that that kind of innovation is coming not out of Silicon Valley, but out of a defense company.
It has for several decades.
As you say, I mean, the margins have been very good. You've had margins sort of generally in the 14% range for some time. You know, international sales have been growing. It's now up to, I think, 19%-ish level. Should we expect to see margins move up? Can they go to at least 15%-type margins if that mix shift occurs?
We have talked about that there are two tailwinds to margins that are mixed related in mission systems. One you just noted, which is as we grow international, as the percentage of sales, which in mission systems has been up in the mid-20s at times, and as you know, today is about 19%. There is definitely some room to move there. We see that based on the pipeline that we have built for mission systems internationally. The second is we are at a high watermark historically for cost plus development work in mission systems. These are where we are building the first of, and once we get through that, we will move into production. Production, obviously, has historically been significantly higher margins. As that shift occurs and we move out of development into production, that is also a tailwind to mission systems margins.
Yes, is the short answer to your question. We believe both of those dynamics lead to better margins at MS.
Okay. Very good. If we put this all together, so you've maintained your free cash flow outlook, which is going to about $4 billion in 2028. And that's even with the B-21 charge, which will be some hit on cash. Can you talk about, you know, what's enabled you to stay with that guidance even in the face of this one issue?
We build our ranges based on a number of factors. One is assumptions about the growth environment that we expect over a multi-year period. Another is the margins that we anticipate. The third is the investment levels that we will have in the business. There are some non-operating items as well that contribute to free cash flow. As we have stepped back and looked at all of those elements and the things that are inside of our control, but also externally, what we believe those factors are, and revisited what those ranges were that we put in place out through 2028 for free cash flow, we see a path to still execute those. We have not made any changes.
And then when you look at the cash, can you describe your cash deployment priorities?
Yes. Our cash deployment priorities have not changed. They have been consistent and remain consistent. We see a strong opportunity environment. Our first priority is to invest in the business and realize that long-term potential in our business by making the investment in both capabilities and capacities needed to go after and successfully prosecute against the opportunity space that we see both domestically and internationally. Our second priority has been to pay a competitive dividend. As I indicated at the beginning of this discussion, having just done our 22nd annual increase and a double-digit increase at that, with this one being 12%, showing that we are moving, continually to return through dividends, cash to our shareholders. The final is we selectively also have been using share repurchase as a way to return cash to shareholders.
This year we've committed to 100% free cash flow return to our shareholders. We will make up that delta above the dividend with share repurchase.
Just related to that, when you look at your portfolio, you have the exit of the services and training business. You've made some changes over some, you know, in the past you made a couple of other divestitures. How are you thinking about your portfolio today? Is it where you want it to be? Are there areas that you could think of adding or maybe are not, if something might be non-core?
We are very pleased with the portfolio that we have, both the breadth and depth. We're able to lead on large opportunities and be a prime that can execute and deliver. We also are a supplier in many areas because we are one of few technology providers in key technologies that are needed across the defense industrial base. We can do that at scale. We are pleased with the portfolio we have. We are working on a number of areas of expansion, international, I've noted. We continue to mostly drive through partnerships, the ability to build that same scale and presence where needed outside the United States to execute on that international portfolio. That's something we'll continue to look at. We also make selective investments in partners where we're co-developing technology. We have done some of that.
Right now, M&A does not fit into our strategy as something that we need to do to expand the portfolio. We've been able to execute successfully with what we have internally and the partnerships that we have built and investments that we've made in our partners outside the company. We continue to be quite active. As you have noted, we have done some divestitures where we wanted to free up our capacity, both time and attention of management and resources to invest in other places. We will continue to do that where it makes sense as well.
Good. So just to finish up, you know, over the next 12 months, what are your priorities? Where are you going to be focusing your time?
I will be helping the team to navigate in this dynamic environment to do what we do best. That, you know, is first execute and deliver for our customers because that positions us to continue to win and capture the opportunity that I've talked about. I will continue to work with the team to make sure that we are capturing those opportunities in a disciplined way, both domestically and internationally. We will continue to make smart choices about where to invest in capability and capacity for the long run of the company and position ourselves not just for the rest of this decade, but into the 2030s. I feel really positive about how we have grown this company and its backlog in the areas in which we have been successful doing that and how that positions us into the future.
Finally, focused on continuing in the long term to build the talent that we need in the company to execute as we scale and continue to compete, deliver, and win.
Great. Again, thank you very much for joining us here, Kathy.
Thank you. It's great to be back.