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EARNINGS CALL TRANSCRIPT
EARNINGS CALL TRANSCRIPT 2016 - Q1
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Executives

Monica Gupta - Assistant Vice President, Alpha IR Group LLC Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President.

Analysts

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc. Larry Robert Pfeffer - Avondale Partners LLC.

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Quarter One 2016 RBC Bearings Earnings Conference Call. My name is Matthew and I'll be your operator for today. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. We will conduct a question-and-answer session towards the end of this conference.

As a reminder, this call is being recorded for replay purposes. And now, I'd like to turn the call over to Monica Gupta, Alpha IR Group. Please proceed, ma'am..

Monica Gupta - Assistant Vice President, Alpha IR Group LLC

Good morning and thank you for joining us for RBC Bearings' fiscal 2016 first quarter earnings conference call. On the call today will be Dr. Michael J. Hartnett, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer; and Daniel A. Bergeron, Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.

Before beginning today's call, let me remind you that some of the statements made today will be forward-looking and are made under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Actual results may differ materially from those projected or implied due to a variety of factors.

We refer you to RBC Bearings' recent filings with the SEC for a more detailed discussion of the risks that could impact the company's future operating results and financial condition. These factors are also described in greater detail in the press release and on the company's website.

In addition, reconciliation between GAAP and non-GAAP financial information is included as part of the release and is available on the company's website. Now, I would like to turn the call over to Dr. Hartnett..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Thank you and good morning. Net sales for the first fiscal quarter of 2016 were $142.3 million versus $113 million last year, up 26% from a year ago. Adjusted operating income was 20.7% or $29.5 million, resulting in an adjusted EPS of $0.78 per share versus $0.69 per share last year.

This quarter, we had approximately two months of contribution from the Sargent Aerospace & Defense. The breakdown of revenue components this period were 63% were aerospace revenues, 37% were industrial revenues. We're trending to a 70/30 breakdown between aerospace being the 70 and industrial being the 30 going forward.

Adjusted EBITDA of $37.3 million was generated during the period. Adjusted gross margin came in at 38.7% versus 38.8% last year. Pre-Sargent RBC margins were 39.8% versus 38.8% last year. Consolidated aerospace sales were up 45% for the quarter. On RBC aerospace revenues pre-Sargent, let's refer to them as RBC classic revenues, these were down 3.4%.

This was driven mainly by defense. Last year, defense was unusually strong in the first quarter. The timing of orders this year versus last year played a role here, plus a small impact from currency.

Looking ahead, we see this sector strengthening each quarter this year as both the major plant OEMs have announced a step-up in production rates in calendar 2016. And demand from defense customers normalizes, and actually, that demand will increase.

RBC classic aerospace OEM revenues were up a few percentage points and the aftermarket revenues were 11% better than last year. Turning to our industrial markets, sales expanded 2.9%. Net of the contribution of the Sargent acquisition, sales were down 5%.

Industrial distribution sales were off 8% – 8.1%, driven principally by lower demand from our Swiss business. Demand for Swiss industrial products are off nationally as a result of the currency strengthening last January and the effect overall on industrial demand in Switzerland. Industrial demand for us is steady, but it's off.

Lower requirements for bearings from the oil aftermarket was also a contributor to the decline. And finally, currency played about a 1% role in this equation. Total industrial OEM products were up 9.3%. Net of the Sargent contribution, sales were down 3.2%, with currency playing a small role and mining OEMs contributing to most of the decline.

As you remember last year, our mining sales were strong in the first quarter as OEM recovered inventory positions that had been depleted, and that's no longer happening. Integration of the Sargent acquisition has begun with no surprises to report. We expect to see this business realignment as we integrate this business with RBC.

Some of the units will be more efficiently aligned with RBC management strengths, markets or geography and will fall more with the RBC management alignment than the historical Sargent management alignment. Sargent has become a very active participant in the RBC of today.

Early benefits are increased penetration at core accounts with additional products, new account introductions with immediate critical mass, a long list of product in-sourcing opportunities that fall well within our production competencies, design and testing expertise in important markets such as aerospace and defense that are well complemented by RBC's manufacturing skill base, and substantial new contracts at early stages of startup that will be important contributors to the future.

I'll now turn the call over to Dan who will provide more color on the quarter..

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

Thanks, Mike. SG&A for the first quarter of fiscal 2016 was $23.7 million compared to $19 million for the same period last year. As a percentage of net sales, SG&A was 16.7% for the first quarter of fiscal 2016 compared to 16.8% for the same period last year.

Excluding the impact of the Sargent acquisition of $3.7 million, SG&A year-over-year increased $1 million, which was mainly due to $0.4 million of stock compensation expense, personnel-related expenses of $0.4 million and other expenses of $0.2 million.

Other operating expense for the first quarter of fiscal 2016 was expense of $6.7 million compared to expense of $0.6 million for the same period last year.

For the first quarter of fiscal 2016, other operating expense was comprised mainly of $4 million in acquisition-related cost, $0.8 million in integration and restructuring costs, and $1.8 million in amortization of intangibles, and $0.1 million in other items.

Operating income was $22.4 million for the first quarter fiscal 2016 compared to operating income of $24.2 million for the same period in fiscal 2015. On an adjusted basis, operating income would have been $29.5 million for the first quarter of fiscal 2016 compared to $24.2 million for the same period last year.

Adjusted operating income as a percentage of net sales would have been 20.7% for the first quarter of fiscal 2016 compared to 21.4% for the same period last year. For the first quarter fiscal 2016, the company reported net income of $13.4 million compared to net income of $16 million for the same period last year.

On an adjusted basis, net income would have been $18.5 million for the first quarter of fiscal 2016 compared to net income of $16 million for the same period last year, a growth rate of around 15.3%. Diluted earnings per share was $0.57 per share for the first quarter of fiscal 2016 compared to $0.69 per share for the same period last year.

On an adjusted basis, diluted earnings per share for the first quarter of fiscal 2016 would have been $0.78 per share compared to diluted earnings per share of $0.69 for the same period last year, a growth rate of 13%.

Turning to cash flow, the company generated $22.2 million in cash from operating activities in the first quarter of fiscal 2016 compared to $26.9 million for the same period last year. Capital expenditures were $5.3 million in the first quarter fiscal 2016 compared to $3.5 million for the same period last year.

In the first quarter fiscal 2016, the company entered into a new senior credit facility and borrowed $425 million to finance the acquisition of Sargent. The company ended first quarter fiscal 2016 with $61.6 million of cash on the balance sheet. I'd now like to turn the call back to the operator to begin the Q&A session..

Operator

Thank you. And your first question comes from the line of Walter Liptak of Hunter (10:17). Please go ahead..

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

Hi, thanks. Good morning, guys..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Good morning, Walt..

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

Want to ask about the classic aerospace trends, the growth in aftermarket double-digits, was there any sort of channel build there? Or is that a sustainable growth rate?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

No, I don't think it's sustainable. I think it's one of these things that those aftermarket folks sort of deplete their inventories and then seem to all build them back up in the same quarter. So, I think it's usually been steady. It's surprising to see it up that strong..

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

Okay.

In this aftermarket, how are the margins on that? Is that above the where the OE margins are?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Not really. They're about the same. I mean, some of the OEs are better; some of the aftermarkets are better. It's a mix..

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

Okay. And if I could ask about the OE trend of plus $2 million, I wonder how OE classic trended for you during the quarter.

Were there any supply chain issues or disruptions that you care to comment about?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

For which sector? Just in general?.

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

For the classic aerospace OE..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

For the classic....

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

Yeah..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

In the classic RBC business, it's been steady and there's no snags or bottlenecks or logistics holdups anywhere. In the Sargent business, there are constraints in some of our vendor base that inhibits the ability to produce the product efficiently. And so, we're in-sourcing some of that work.

And I think in on the Sargent Aerospace business, we have some pretty large contracts and we're at the very early stages of those contracts. And there's specification protocols that are being worked out between us and the end customers that are important to maintain production and improve production rates.

And so there has been a delay in the Sargent business as a result of a delay in resolving those production protocol issues and I think those will be resolved this quarter..

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

Okay.

And I guess with those production rates going up, are you expecting that you'll have a better shipment period for the Sargent business I guess on a monthly basis?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. I think it will build all year. Yeah, I think so. I'm pretty confident about it..

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

Okay. Okay, good.

Now, if I could switch gears to the mining and oil and gas, I wonder if you've got the – I'm sure the percentage of sales is much lower now with Sargent, but can you refresh us on what oil and gas is now as a percentage of ROLL's revenue, and mining?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. Dan is kind of running some numbers here. While he's doing his calculations, I think those sectors are off and they're going to be off. I mean, if you look at oil and you divide oil into two components, recovery and exploration, recovery is fairly steady for us. I mean, the U.S.

is still using 10 million barrels of oil a day and so there's still a certain amount of wells being cracked to recover the oil that's needed. And so on the consumption of our product in the recovery side of the business is steady. In the exploration side of the business, it's down.

Certainly from what industry folks are saying, it's going to be down as long as oil is less than $60 a barrel. So, how long the Saudis can hold out is anybody's guess. Their national budget breaks even at $90 a barrel.

And at 10 million barrels a day at $50 a barrel, you can calculate what it's costing them today against their national budget, so how long can they hold out is anybody's guess. So it'll be some time, I'm sure. We're not expecting much from the exploration side. We're expecting the mining side to be down, but steady going forward.

It's just OEM builds are down, but MRO usage is a reasonably steady. I think net-net, the impact on our revenues per quarter going forward is about $2 million..

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

Okay. Whilst we're waiting for Dan on the percentage numbers, are you seeing any pricing pressure on the production side? I think a lot of the producers are trying to reduce their cost per barrel and they're asking suppliers to drop prices.

Is that something that you do or do you push back on pricing?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

It's the guys on the exploration side that are having those discussions. It's hard for them to have those discussions when they don't have any volume to offer right now and you have existing contracts in place. So we're trying to work with these guys, but there's nothing material has been achieved yet..

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

Okay. Fair enough..

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

And then, Walt, on oil and gas based on a full year run rate at these levels, it's probably around 3% of total..

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

Oh, that's great. 3% both from oil and gas and mining..

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

No, just oil and gas..

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

Okay..

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

Mining is probably another 5% at this level..

Walter Scott Liptak - Global Hunter Securities

Okay. Thanks. Okay..

Operator

Thank you for your question. Your next question comes from the line of Kristine Liwag of Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Please proceed..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

Hi. Good morning. Mike, you brushed upon this on your prepared remarks earlier, but I just wanted to clarify.

What were the organic growth rates for industrial and aerospace in the quarter? And as a follow-up to that, what was the organic growth in your backlog?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Okay. Well, so the organic growth rates for the industrial for combined or RBC alone, the original RBC business..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

Both..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Both. Okay..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

If I could have both numbers..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Okay. So for the industrial – I got the aerospace here. The industrial markets with the Sargent addition for the quarter expanded 2.9% net of the contribution of that Sargent acquisition, we were down 5%.

Industrial distribution sales, there's not much industrial distribution sales coming from Sargent the way we classify things, so we were down 8.1% there and that was driven principally by a lower demand rate in our Swiss business..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

And for aerospace?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

And for aerospace, the sales were up 45% for the quarter with Sargent. Without Sargent, the revenues were down 3.4%, driven mainly by the timing of defense orders..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

And then your backlog without Sargent?.

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

It was around $205 million..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

And I guess, in this past quarter, we've seen more signs of global macroeconomic weakness.

How should we think about the base case for your industrial business for the full year fiscal year 2016? And which end markets are you more particularly worried about? And as a follow-on to that, can you offset some of this revenue decline with better performance and margins?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. Well, take them one at a time. One of our largest sectors here, Kristine, is just the general industrial sector that is smaller OEMs and hard to categorize them into any particular market, and the aftermarket. There's really steady demand there.

We're seeing the businesses that don't have the mining and the oil exposure growing at a 2 times GDP kind of rate. And we see interesting new business coming into those sectors. So I think our general industrial business is fine, outside of mining and oil..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

And another question from me. This quarter, we also saw some weakness from Sikorsky because of, I guess, weakness from their customers from oil and gas-generated wealth.

Can you quantify what percent of your sales are from commercial helicopters and how you think that kind of weakness will affect you?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, a very small amount of our sales are from commercial helicopters. It's just not a big factor in our revenues. I mean maybe 1% or 2%. It's a number like that..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

And lastly, for Sargent, is your aerospace exposure in Sargent pretty similar to the aircraft exposure that you have from legacy RBC Bearings aerospace and defense, like by aircraft type and also ship set type?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. It's the 737s, 747s, 767s, 777s, the A350s, the A320s. That's the bulk of the aerospace exposure at Sargent. And then there's sort of the whole aftermarket sector that services airframes and engines across that same commercial fleet. From an aerospace point of view, that's Sargent's principal business.

From a marine point of view or defense marine point of view, which is sort of a different market, that's a very strong sector for them also. And defense aerospace, which is mainly hydraulics, is a very promising market for them..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

Great. Thank you very much..

Operator

Thank you for your question. And your next question comes from the line of Edward Marshall of Sidoti & Company..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

Hey, guys..

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

Ed..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Good morning, Ed..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

Hey, how are you? So down 3.4% in aerospace for the core RBC, I'm curious if you can break out the components of commercial and defense there.

I know you said there was defense kind of timing that led to that decline, but was it flat commercial down 3% defense? Or was it up 10% commercial down – or rather down 10% defense and up 7% commercial? What do those core products look like underneath?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Well, the underlying exposure for commercial aerospace is fine. It was strong. So that was up. Defense was really strong. We had some really strong orders out of one of our divisions last year that were in last year's numbers.

And we had some big contracts that came in last year for that same division that are commercial aerospace contracts, which will probably flow into our fourth quarter this year and not our first quarter this year. So those are the sort of offsetting factors there..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

If I look at the June quarter, I mean it's roughly, I guess, $61 million or so from core aerospace sales, which I look back over the last trailing 12 months with the exception of the December quarter, which I guess is the seasonally weakest, it is the weakest result of those four quarters. But you're saying commercial was up and strong.

What was the growth rate on the commercial side of the businesses?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Well, if I look at the businesses that are commercial aerospace only on my sheet here, they were up 3% to 5% in total..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

Okay, 3% to 5%. And I heard earlier when you were talking about the industrial business, you talked about Sargent. And then I thought it was 100% aerospace.

Is it ground defense that's in that, that you're including in the industrial side?.

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

Marine and ground defense..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

Okay. And what is the contribution of those two businesses in total from a percentage of revenue maybe at the....

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Total dollars were $4 million in the quarter..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

$4 million, okay. Okay. When I look at in the 8-K that was filed regarding Sargent and you look at the decline in aerospace in the revenue year-over-year of roughly 10%, I'm wondering if you can kind – and more importantly, I guess, aftermarket being down 23%. I'm wondering if you can kind of walk me through what happened in the prior year.

I know you didn't own the business then, but obviously you must have dived into those results. I'm just kind of curious as to what occurred then and then maybe what the growth rate you saw in the quarter from just Sargent alone..

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

I think the biggest item is they're in between two programs on the marine business for the Virginia Sub. The old program was ending and there's no volume really flowing through.

And now the new program is just starting, and that's what Michael was talking about on getting the timing on this new program up and running to be a nice contributor to the business this year, plus a little bit of their aerospace business on the defense side was down during that period of time also..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

Well, is the Virginia Sub in the aftermarket?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

No..

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

No..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

So what happened in the aftermarket business? I mean that was down, what, about 26%..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. Well, that's the commercial aircraft aftermarket business. And the commercial aircraft aftermarket business did not perform well for Dover and so, for us, it's a turnaround..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

It's a turnaround for you guys to just – you're just going to – you need to spend some time and some money to kind of repair it..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Well, yeah. It isn't contributing to the overall profitability of the company nor was it before we bought it. So the question is, can we make it a contributing citizen. And so that's the puzzle that we're trying to solve right now..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

Got you.

I mean, are you prepared to be able to talk about maybe what are some of the needs of that business and then maybe the steps necessary to kind of right size it?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Someday, I will be, but that's not today..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

I understand. Okay. Okay, guys, thanks. Appreciate it..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Okay, Ed..

Operator

Thank you for your question. Your next question comes from Steve Barger of KeyBanc Capital Markets. Please go ahead..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Hey. Good morning, guys..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Morning, Steve..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Just want to talk about the sequential change in revenue. I think for the last quarter, you guided to $140 million or so, which is basically what we got.

Thinking about how Sargent flows through sequentially, do we add in another $10 million or $15 million given the extra months? And given what you see on organic growth rate, is that kind of the best way to think about it?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

It would be under normal circumstances, Steve. I think in this case, it's not because when I was talking about the new contracts, new programs, specification protocols, I don't believe those specification protocols will be resolved to the point that we can have good revenue recovery this quarter..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Okay..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Okay. So I do think that the revenues that should be in this quarter will be in our third quarter and fourth quarter. I think we have plenty of people and our customers are working on resolving it.

And basically, our customers are overloaded with demand from other suppliers to get all the purchase orders out, all the specifications right, and all of the designs updated that need to be updated in order to produce these additional subs. It's just there's a long queue and I think we're at the head of the queue now..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

So does that mean that 2Q looks more or like 1Q from a revenue standpoint?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

It'll be better. It'll be better. I think the second quarter is going to be in the $150 million to $155 million range..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Okay.

And given the puts and takes you're talking about, is it reasonable to think that you maintain margin or do you get some of the – or the extra expense without the revenue, is that going to be a drag on the margin line?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

I don't think so. I think we'll be fine there..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Okay.

Now that you've had Sargent for a few months and you've obviously been able to get in there and see what things look like, what's been surprising either positive or negative versus the call you had a couple months ago when you first announced it?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

I think it's pretty much. I don't remember the call perfectly, but we didn't probably discuss in great detail the Sargent makeup or the issues. And certainly, we've been into the issues quite deeply since. There's really been no surprises that we didn't discover during our diligence period.

What we saw when we made that acquisition was Sargent is a – it's a mix of different companies and those different companies align really well for the most part with RBC's markets. But because they're different companies when Dover acquired them, they have different business models.

And some of the business models are somewhat similar to RBC's where they're sort of vertically integrated, and they start with products from raw material source and they finish it. They bring it through to completion.

In some of their business models, which are some of their larger businesses, are sort of design, subcontract manufacturing and assembly and then back to Sargent for assembly. And some of those larger businesses that they have, they don't have a strong manufacturing skill base.

Now, RBC has a very strong manufacturing skill base and it really complements well Sargent's design and testing skill base. So RBC is going to be able to in-source a lot of product into our existing plants that currently are outsourced to subcontractors in many different states.

So, I think there's going to be really, really good absorption in the RBC plants, as you know, over time as we sort of integrate those product needs into our manufacturing base. So, I think that's going to be significant.

And I think it's going to be significant for Sargent on the other side because in some markets, it's been very difficult for them to compete with that business model because their subcontractors – that's where the money is made. And there's not much left in some of those product lines after you sell it to a Boeing or an Airbus or one of those people.

We know how to do that, so we can make them much more competitive in some other important markets where they don't participate to the extent that they should participate today.

So we see that as a good alignment with our marketing and sales side of our business, as well as the manufacturing side of our business and to have acquired their design and testing expertise, it's really going to be a magical..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

So, yeah. I mean, it's a great comment. As I think back to your FY 2011, FY 2012 and FY 2013, you averaged about 200 basis points per year of gross margin expansion. Some of that or maybe a lot of it was you pursuing those same kind of things. I think you were in-sourcing a lot of expensive outsourced activities.

Do you think you can drive that same level of gross margin expansion at Sargent in those businesses that are structured that way?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

I think Sargent's business is, in many cases, is more proprietary ability than some of RBC's bearing businesses. So we ought to be able to get to better margins in RBC..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Wow. Okay. Good. Switching gears a little bit, you alluded to this on the distributors stocking and destocking within quarters. Any more color on what's going on in the distribution channel? Because we've seen some choppiness in other companies that have reported as well.

Why is this happening and how long do you expect it to go on?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

We're talking now about aerospace distribution, not industrial distribution?.

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Yeah..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Right..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Right. Right..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Industrial distribution normally doesn't act like this, but aerospace distribution in our businesses does act like this. And for our case, it's maybe outside the norm because it's such a small population of distributors that they can distort behavior quite a bit.

In one case, there was a management change and it was such a change in management that, believe it or not, they forgot to order bearings. And so, when we reminded them that they were going to run out of bearings, they figured out that we were right. And so, they ordered a lot of bearings. So, I mean, that's just how this thing works.

And there's been major management changes at all of our major distributors and there's been ownership changes at at least one of them. So, to some extent, you're working with the new guard and you're kind of training them on what they ought to have in stock in order to service their markets.

And once you convince them of that, then the situation changes..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Right..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

And that's what's happened this quarter..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Okay. So that should diminish as you go forward, as you just kind of get people on the right track again..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. Right, it should normalize. It's not going to expand like that every quarter..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Right. Okay. And then one kind of more forward-looking question. We should get a JLTV decision at some point fairly soon.

That program obviously won't get into production run rates for a couple years, but do you expect that you'll have content on JLTV?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yes. Yes, we will..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Is it similar to what you had on some of the MRAP M-ATV programs on a content per unit basis?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

It should be, depending upon who gets the award..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

Right. Okay. So, probably too much to ask for you to say who you're skewed more to from a producer standpoint..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. Well, there are some guys that we're hoping for more than others, let's put it that way..

Steve Barger - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc.

I got you. Okay. Thanks very much for the time..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Okay..

Operator

Thank you. Your next question comes from the line of Kristine Liwag of Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Please go ahead..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

You've mentioned how Sargent margins lead better than legacy RBC Bearings' margins.

Can you provide timing on when we should this materialize in your earnings results?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. Kristine, we should see a point of gross margin expansion every quarter for the next five years. Now don't work that into your model, I was just – it's really hard to say. But again, it's going to – it's one of the exciting things for me about the acquisition, when I was doing the diligence.

There's just so many things that we can do to improve their margins. It gave me goose bumps. I can't really give you timing, but it'll be sort of a steady but maybe jerky flow..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

And I guess for modeling purposes, right, historically legacy RBC was more like 1% gross margin improvement. So would it be, say – per year, not per quarter.

So would it be prudent to say that if we look at Sargent and we look at the gross margins there, that gross margins for that business should increase more than 1% gross margins per year? Is that a fair statement? Maybe 1% to 2%, something like that?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, I think you can use 1%. I don't know if you can use 2%. It's a sizable acquisition given our scale. And there's five different business units, so there's a lot to do to get there. But 1% should be modest..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

And then when we think about the cadence of revenue for the full year, you already mentioned your $150 million to $155 million range for 2Q.

Should we think about 3Q and 4Q to have that same cadence in growth rate with Q2 versus 1Q?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Well, I think 3Q – we have a plan but I'm sure you could kind of march up to the threshold of the quarter. It's hard to say that the plan is executable, so we're pretty careful on that. And the third quarter is usually a short quarter. But between the third and the fourth, we should see some pretty nice revenue expansions.

And particularly in the marine defense business and RBC's classical aerospace business, I think everybody has a pretty common outlook of building revenue in succeeding quarters here..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

And lastly from me, and I promise it's really the last one, if you look at Boeing's production rate, you got T-737, announced production rates going to 47 a month from 42 for 2017 and then 52 in 2018.

When do you think you'll start seeing that increase in production rate pulling your numbers? Is it still a six months lead time, nine months lead time? Can you just give us some sort of outlook there?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. We always sort of use the rule of thumb that the offset for Bearings is six months. So, I mean, we would expect to have to deliver bearings to Boeings' subcontractors or Boeing itself six months ahead of that step-up. And as it applies to Sargent, those lead times are extraordinarily long. I mean it's like a year.

So that's one of the things that we're talking to Boeing about is how to shorten lead times for Sargent's products because it is such a long – that's the way the industry works. And it's a gas pain for Boeing. So we're talking to Boeing now and gave them some ideas on how lead times could be reduced, but right now it's a year..

Kristine Tan Liwag - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

Great. Thank you very much..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah..

Operator

Thank you for your question. Our next question comes from the line of Larry Pfeffer of Avondale & Partners. Please go ahead..

Larry Robert Pfeffer - Avondale Partners LLC

Good morning, gentlemen..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Morning, Larry..

Larry Robert Pfeffer - Avondale Partners LLC

So I know there's a lot of moving parts right now, but just looking at kind of the second half of the fiscal year, would you look at aerospace and defense all-in being kind of a mid single-digit year-over-year growth rate and the diversified industrial's piece being down low single-digit?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Is that including the Sargent?.

Larry Robert Pfeffer - Avondale Partners LLC

So ex-Sargent, kind of an organic trend growth rate..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah.

Could you ask that question again?.

Larry Robert Pfeffer - Avondale Partners LLC

So, is aerospace and defense kind of mid single-digit in the back half of the fiscal year, excluding Sargent, and then diversified industrial's down low single-digit, excluding Sargent?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. I think that'll be fair..

Larry Robert Pfeffer - Avondale Partners LLC

Okay. That's all I had. Thank you, guys..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah..

Operator

Thank you for your question. Your next question comes from the line of Edward Marshall of Sidoti & Company. Please proceed..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

Just two quick follow-ups.

Dan, any chance that you have an idea of what consolidated business on a SG&A line would look on a quarterly run rate if you were to do $150 million to $155 million in revenue?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. It would be about 16.5%..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

16.5% of sales. Okay. And just listening to your comments, Mike, throughout the year and as I kind of parse that into the model, does it make sense to – about $620 million in revenue? And I'm not – I guess I'm asking for guidance, but with the acquisition of Sargent, it's kind of hard – there's a lot of moving pieces.

So, I'm just kind of wondering if directionally, that's the appropriate direction..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Well, I'll let Dan answer that question..

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

Ed, we just don't give full-year guidance, right?.

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

Sure..

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

And so that's the answer for the question..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

Do you have any idea what you expect from maybe Sargent this year from a revenue perspective?.

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

Yeah. I've seen that $180 million to $190 million range....

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

So....

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

...in 11 months. So....

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

11 months, okay. Okay..

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

Yeah..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

All right, guys. So really no improvement of the core business from the prior year. Maybe modest, if anything..

Daniel A. Bergeron - Chief Financial Officer, Director & Vice President

Yeah. I think industrial will be down a few percentage points on the core business, the core RBC business, and I haven't really put the two years together for the rest of the year relative to aerospace.

But all of the aerospace units are feeling pretty good about the rest of their years, so I would think we're going to be up to the high single-digits on the rest of the year for aerospace..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

I see. I was referring I guess to the core Sargent business. I mean, Dan, your comments were $180 million to $190 million. And so, if I think that – to that, it's probably what – if the math is right, it's kind of flat up 5% year-over-year based on kind of what they did last year..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. Well, I think there's a couple of things going on here and I think one is we're trying to get this, the marine business, producing and we have to work our way through those specification protocols that I talked about. That would definitely make a big difference to the year.

The other thing that we're doing is we have one business in California which is a Sargent business, which really has so much demand on that business. It can't produce at all.

So we have products flowing into several of the local RBC plants to sort of complement their production capacity and we should start to see how all that's going to come together and work from a revenue standpoint, but there's definitely upside here..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

In the California business, is that a function of maybe efficiencies that RBC can go in and use the secret sauce and improve or is this a capacity issue?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

It's efficiencies. It's definitely efficiencies, and yes, we're going to improve that business..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

I see.

And the specifications on the marines – I'm sorry, the marine contract, how big is that for you? Not the contract, but how big is the issue for you? And I guess, how far along are we?.

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

How do you put a frame around scale? I mean, it's a large contract. It probably amounts to something, when it's running steady state, something like $20 million a year and it's flowing now at $2 million a quarter now or less. So that's the scale of the issue. And as far as how far along are we, I think we're pretty far.

I think it's a matter of bureaucracy..

Edward Marshall - Sidoti & Co. LLC

Okay. All right. Thank you..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Yes..

Operator

Thank you for your questions, ladies and gentlemen. I'd now like to turn the call over to Mike Hartnett for the closing remarks..

Michael J. Hartnett - Chairman, President & Chief Executive Officer

Okay. Well, I appreciate everybody – everyone's participation today and hope we were able to answer most of your questions satisfactorily, and we will expect more questions in our October call. Thank you very much..

Operator

Thank you for joining in today's conference, ladies and gentlemen. This concludes the presentation. You may now disconnect. Good day..

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