Okay. Thank you, David. Alan, thanks for being with us today. Happy to discuss with you as we've done several times at our conference this year. Appreciate your ongoing participation. You know, a bit of a stark reaction to the stock price today. Maybe get into a little bit that down the road. First and foremost, the business model's made great strides over the past several years, and just wanted to start at a high level.
Here you describe the process of OSI's emergence as the number one global position in security screening infrastructure, and, you know, the strategic positioning of the company today versus five to 10 years ago, including, you know, what you think has changed most about OSI as a company and about the served market TAM, what's changed there over the past decade.
Thanks, Chris, and nice to be with you here again. Yeah, we're really pleased with the progress that our Security division has made over those years. You know, you talk about the five or 10-year timeframe, we've gone from kind of a medium-sized player to a real market leader in security detection. Some of the things that we think have helped differentiate us from our competitors and how we've done that is the strategy we took to go to market. You know, some of our competitors focused on a single technology or a few technologies, that would be the primary thing that they could sell to the customer.
We chose an alternative path and said, "We wanna have most of the technologies, thereby we can offer and have some of the best products and solutions for those customers, and we might not need to push a particular technology on the customer, but we can see what's right for them." To that end, we did a lot of internal development. We supplemented that with some key acquisitions. We bought one of our primary competitors in the cargo space about, now it's coming up on 10 years here, I think, this summer.
What that helped us do, at that point in time, was take our strong, medium and high energy positions in cargo and vehicle inspection for screening at ports and borders and critical infrastructure, and combine it with a low energy setting, and do combinational technologies that really allowed us to move over time from a smaller player in the cargo market to today, the market leader in cargo and vehicle inspection. With that, we also challenged the business models. While the business and the industry traditionally sells products and then gets recurring revenue through service, spare parts, and maintenance, and it's a wonderful business model, we do well in that, as well as our competitors do as well.
We said, "Well, what if there's customer sets out there that either don't have the capital or the money to buy the equipment, or if they do, maybe they don't have the operational expertise? What if we did what we call a turnkey solution or our version of SaaS, meaning Security as a Service?" To that end, we became the first company to do this and won a number of contracts. From that, we developed some proprietary software called CertScan, which really helped, you know, differentiate us not just in the Security as a Service market, but even in basic product offerings as well. Through all of this, it's really allowed us to capture some significant market share in ports and borders and critical infrastructure. We're also, you know, play a major role in aviation.
From our standpoint, between the strong organic growth that we've had, driven by a lot of our R&D projects, the great sales and marketing initiatives, coupled with some of the inorganic growth that supplemented our top line and accelerated our bottom line, together, that's all allowed us to capture a very significant market share today.
Great. Skipping over to the other high-performing segment, the Optoelectronics and Manufacturing, what are the fastest growing verticals there? I know you have a range of blue-chip customers and nice verticals, A&D, healthcare, automotive, industrial. You know, it strikes one that maybe munitions and military stock depletions are creating a significant growth pipeline. You know, you kind of couple little lower growth for maybe a quarter or two with some tougher comps, but pretty solidly in a strong mid-single digits environment. Wondering if munitions replenishment tend to push this into a more accelerated phase. I don't know what your spectrum and application breadth is across defense in particular, but I think munitions is part of the story.
Yeah. Yeah, you're certainly right. The Opto business has performed, you know, extremely well for us. We've had strong double-digit growth for a number of consecutive quarters. Like you're saying, this is, you know, tends to be a kind of a more of a mid-single digit type growth market, a GDP growth that we try to turbocharge that and grow a little bit faster. We have, and it's a really nice business for us that's well diversified in those markets that you've mentioned, with customers as well. We don't have any significant customer concentration. A lot of blue-chip customers throughout these industries. Aerospace and defense has been, you know, one of the segments that's been leading the charge in terms of this faster growth.
For the areas that you mentioned, we do look into that as an opportunity. Harder to quantify for us at this point in time. As we move into our fiscal 2027, which for us starts in, you know, just under two months, you know, we think that could be a nice source of growth for us as we move forward. The Opto division, you know, in addition to selling to the third-party companies, is also a very key supplier to our sister divisions, both Security and Healthcare. Through that vertical integration, we're able to enhance the overall gross margin of OSI Systems, while at the same time being, you know, faster and more responsive to our customer needs.
Okay, great. Obviously the scaling at Security has been very good for some time now. Just looking at the stock down to 15% today, going into the call, I would've thought maybe backlog growth was the first item to look for. You had a bit of that, but maybe some rounding between $1.8 and $1.9, and Opto had, like, a $40 million order that could bridge the gap from $1.8- $1.9 with rounding itself.
It, you know, it strikes one that if the Golden Dome order had not landed in March, you know, like, maybe the regular way smaller and mid-sized project orders, there's a major lull there or something changing 'cause you know, if that was, you know, a once every two year size order for OSI, and I realize that might be changing now with DHS on the way and Golden Dome Encore and things. You know, the stock is trading today. It's in a liquid market, and we need to discuss that. It, you know, there is a reason why it's down. It might be a proprietary reason by a PM or two, you know, my job is to try to channel what's going on.
I'm working with, you know, your investors are doing the same thing. You know, my most plausible thought currently is that there's a real lull in the regular way, smaller, mid project orders for security right now.
You know, certainly hard to say. We do believe it was a solid quarter and, you know, the outlook over multi years looks, you know, continues to look very favorable for us. We were pleased with the overall results in the quarter. Surprised by the reaction as well today as the sentiment from, frankly, everybody I've talked to has been surprised because it appeared that the quarter was solid and the results and the outlook are good as well. With respect to bookings, we're very happy with the overall bookings and the book-to-bill ratio. Of course, a big part of that was the Homeland Defense order.
It's noteworthy that, you know, in the quarter, we continued to have the U.S. government shutdown, while we were anticipating significant U.S. government orders in the, in the March quarter, those shifted to the right while the, while the government was shut down. We're pleased that the government has reopened and hope over the coming months we're gonna see some very sizable U.S. CBP, U.S. Customs and Border Protection orders. During the quarter, well, a conflict broke out in the Middle East. The Middle East is very fertile territory for us for bookings and award activity.
While we think this represents, you know, significant opportunities for us as the conflict, you know, ultimately winds down, as you might imagine, you know, in the last, you know, month or so of the quarter when this broke out, you're not seeing a whole lot of new bookings activity. All of that, you know, would have impacted that. Nothing changes for the company overall, we don't believe from a timeline perspective. Again, strong book-to-bill and with the reopening of the Department of Homeland Security and ultimately the wind down of the Middle East conflict, we think it represents, you know, real significant opportunities for us.
Okay. That sounds good. You know, I know you guys announce, like, some orders, you don't announce some, that's always a negotiation with your customer and things like that. You know, and oftentimes in security, you don't announce orders probably below a certain threshold, but collectively those are important. Are you suggesting that, you know, given the activity levels in the Middle East for your business the past few years, that there's usually more of a consistent flow of those kinda, like, intra-quarter, shorter cycle type orders?
That is, that is often the case for us, yes.
Okay, great. Yeah, I just wanted to kind of flesh that out because a lot of times the discussion anchors around, you know, these big chunky orders, which are obviously for obvious reasons. You know, U.S. CBP orders on the horizon. I think they have a track record of getting to work, you know, pretty quickly too. I'm not sure about, you know, Golden Dome. Don't have a way to handicap how quickly that'll get to work. You know, could the DHS be your biggest growth or rather DHS or CBP's, you handicap one or the other as your biggest growth probability next year?
We think it can be a very significant growth opportunity for us. You know, the last several years have been really driven by international growth in our Security division. While we think international markets continue to be very robust, you know, as we look out to, you know, fiscal 2027, 2028, maybe beyond, we would anticipate that the U.S. is really gonna be sort of stepping up. You know, with orders coming from CBP through the One Big Beautiful Bill, through their existing budgets, it really does represent a tremendous growth opportunity for us. That coupled with Golden Dome also here in the United States, suggests that the U.S. growth could be quite significant for us going forward.
Vendors and investors are talking about Golden Dome concepts being replicated in other countries. I don't know if that's anything in the supply chain chatter yet, but, you know, just wondering if there's any of that on the visible horizon that you've identified yet.
You know, our RF solutions business, which is what we're using in this case, it is a global business. We have customers throughout the world. Probably wouldn't be appropriate for me in these type of sensitive topics to talk about other countries or other type of programs, the technology can be used on a global basis.
Okay. In terms of U.S. CBP, the you know, the reports on the last IDIQs and the process of the you and other competitors providing content was that the relative performance of OSI was pretty favorable. I'm wondering if you anticipate higher market share with CBP in the forthcoming project rounds versus those awarded several years ago.
Yeah. It is our understanding that we're looked upon very favorably by the U.S. CBP. I think we've done a great job delivering high quality products, on time, on schedule from when they've asked us for it. In the past, the awards that we've gotten from CBP have been a decently high % of the overall awards. You know, we would hope that we could maintain or increase that % of the overall awards. We think our track record and our service would certainly be deserving of that, of course there's always lots of factors that go into awards.
Back to the RF business a little bit, what's the competitive field like? It seems like you've been kind of limited on what you can say about it. It seems like the, you know, technology is fairly novel and current. When there's big applications like this, there's never one viable competitor. Yet, you know, maybe there is. Just kind of curious how you're seeing it. I mean, are you just, like, a shoo-in to get similar awards as Golden Dome rolls out in the next three or four years?
It'd always be nice to say we're a shoo-in. We think we're, you know, we think we're well-positioned. Our business is well-regarded by the government and by the customers. Of course, we operate in a lot of classified programs, so we're very limited in what we can say. We think we're extremely well-positioned, which is why we believe we received this initial award, and we think we're positioned for follow-on awards as well. We really like where we stand. The big picture is we hear very, very favorable things from the customers about what we provide and the service level and the quality of our products.
Okay. Understanding that I might be stepping on the line of what you can and can't ask, but with that large order, is that through to Golden Dome by a one OEM customer or a handful of customers?
This is a single customer.
Okay, great. yeah, explain beyond U.S. CBP and Golden Dome, which I guess would be Homeland Security, what's the cadence with other U.S. government agencies?
We work with a number of different U.S. government agencies. You know, the DoD or the DoW, a number of agencies within that, within the Department of State. You name the main government agency, if they need security detection, we often, you know, play with them. The U.S. government for us is fertile territory, and we would expect to, you know, continuing receiving our fair share of awards there.
Okay, great. You know, I think the aviation business is probably kind of a steady state, kind of a churn sized market presently. Correct me if I'm wrong, the kind of sort of goalpost there is as the FAA starts a scheduled, predictable kind of technology upgrade cycle across the U.S. airports. You know, in that scenario, would you characterize aviation as kind of a, you know, get your fair share, maintain share, or is that a clear share pickup opportunity?
Our hope and our goal is to pick up market share in aviation. You know, much like years ago, we were smaller in the cargo and vehicle inspection and, you know, now we're the market leader. Our hope would be in aviation that we could, you know, pick up market share as well. A big opportunity around that is in the United States., the checked baggage replacement cycle. When checked baggage machines were first installed, you know, many years ago, we didn't have a product for checked baggage, so we don't have a current install base of checked baggage machines in U.S. airports. We then developed one of the industry's first, specifically with security in mind, and have received nice market share throughout much of the rest of the world.
As the U.S. begins its replacement cycle in a few years, which will then go on for, you know, many years, starting at zero, of course, which is where we also started internationally, gives us a great opportunity to pick up market share in aviation overall. We're excited about it. We think it's gonna be a big procurement. The timing, you know, should be in a nice position for us.
Okay. You know, I think you have at least a simple majority share in cargo applications, ports and borders globally. What are the biggest challenges to defending that outside share over the long term?
Well, we don't take anything for granted. We like our market share. We like our competitive dynamic. you know, when you are the market leader, of course, others, you know, come after you as we've done also in the past. We think the strong technology position we have, the strong IP that we have, the great service organization, the great sales and marketing and relationships will allow us to continue to differentiate ourselves and still you know, maintain market leadership in this area.
Yeah, how much of the business is very concentrated, whereas like a installer or customer may integrate radiation detection from one player who, you know, I wouldn't even know to ask you about, and then you know, just other different applications might be from a hodgepodge of investors. You know, I'm just wondering how concentrated the top of the market is from the integrated players like you, Smiths, Leidos to a degree?
Yeah. You know, each customer is different. There are certain customers that will buy the whole enchilada, so to speak, from one player such as ourselves.
There are other customers who might buy a particular product from one player and another product from another one, and maybe another one from another one. I would say the majority tend to procure all from one single source if they can. It's easier to manage one relationship and have one party ultimately accountable. That's not how it is everywhere, so there are places that they'll have multiple vendors associated with a particular security solution.
Okay. Just, you know, anything on the international pipeline. I think Middle East has been one of the stronger markets there. I think, you know, out the other end, even if there's a little gating factor presently.
Yeah
I think you're suggesting it might be stronger than it would be otherwise. Just curious if you take a little bit of a trip around the world, you know, anything interesting about the pipeline, in the funnel there, project funnel?
Yeah. Without going into too much detail, of course.
For competitive sensitivities, we believe that the international pipeline, you know, remains very strong. Our teams are excited about the Middle East opportunities that you're referring to, but also in the E.U., in Latin America, in parts of Asia. Just generally speaking, unfortunately, the world's not getting a whole lot safer as we read about in the news every day. That plays well into what we do, not just here domestically, but across the world. We think the international opportunities remain quite robust for us.
Okay. Great. I'm just going to see if anyone put a question in, Alan. Let's pause for a second. I'm not sure about the system here, so I'm kind of checking to see if I can check for questions. Yeah, and people on the line may know my email as well. You can email me something. I do have an area I can check for questions. There's nothing on display presently. Okay. What have you been your main investments in people and capacity over the past year? I know the RF has been really reinforced since you bought it because the growth there has been so profound. You know, any other You know, you come up, you got an hour on the call, you talk about the questions people talk about.
Any kind of behind-the-scenes developments that, you know, while we have the time would be worth bringing up. I imagine there's a lot of diligent blocking and tackling, but, you know, new CEO, relatively new. I know he's probably Co-CEO for quite some time with Deepak, but.
You talk about investments, we continue to make significant investments in R&D. Our goal is always to obsolete ourselves and to bring out new products. The bulk of our R&D investment is in our Security division, which of course is our largest division, and we're quite excited about that. From a CapEx standpoint, we're not a highly capital-intensive business. But you're right, we did invest in some CapEx associated with increasing our capacity in some new facilities in the RF business, which has proved fortuitous 'cause not just for the business itself that was growing, but now with the new Homeland Defense and further opportunities there, that additional capacity it is extremely valuable. We think we're in a great position.
You know, our new CEO, Ajay Mehra, who's been the CEO now for about 16 months, you know, has brought, you know, tremendous energy to the operation, and we've seen, you know, significant, top line and bottom line growth over that period of time, and, you know, looking at things in different ways. Of course, he's been at the company for some time and, you know, our former CEO, who continues to be our Chairman of the Board, was instrumental in so much of the growth that we've had and Ajay has helped carry that on and taking it even to the next level.
You know, so we're quite excited, you know, as we, as we wind down our fiscal year here in the next couple of months and embark on our new fiscal year here come July 1st.
Great. Okay. I think, last one for me then we'll close it a bit early. The, you know, the RF acquisition, I think it came in with $50 million in sales or so a little over a year and a half ago, and, you know, it generates You know, it's run rating maybe 3x that now based on at least the quarterly run rate you said yesterday on earnings. You know, then the Golden Dome order is yet another sort of almost kind of exponential element, the scaling prospects of the business. Look, I imagine you had some identify all the like possibilities when you bought it, but did you think it could look like this?
We're super excited about it. Of course, when we went through our diligence, you know, we looked at things very carefully. Golden Dome wasn't even really a concept when we were looking at this, you know, a couple of years ago leading up to the acquisition. The company itself, we thought had, you know, outstanding opportunities to take their fantastic technologies, supplement their sales organization with a larger sales organization that OSI Systems has, both U.S. and internationally, utilize the source of our balance sheet, which has been extremely helpful as well. I would say we're extremely pleased with how the business has done, and I'd say the Golden Dome was frankly a little bit even on top of the already strong business that we acquired and was growing very nicely.
Okay. I forget if there were any earn-outs in that deal, but, Is there an earn-out structure to go?
There is. There was a two-year earn-out period for that. Yes.
Okay. Great. Well, Alan, thanks for your time. I think we covered a lot of ground, and we're gonna shave the last few minutes and give you a break.
Thank you very much, Chris.
Appreciate it. Bye.