Liza Sabol - TransDigm Group, Inc. Nick Howley - TransDigm Group, Inc. Terrance M. Paradie - TransDigm Group, Inc..

Robert M. Spingarn - Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC (Broker) Carter Copeland - Barclays Capital, Inc. Michael F. Ciarmoli - KeyBanc Capital Markets, Inc. Ken Herbert - Canaccord Genuity, Inc. Robert Stallard - RBC Capital Markets LLC Gautam J. Khanna - Cowen & Co. LLC David E. Strauss - UBS Securities LLC Seth M.

Seifman - JPMorgan Securities LLC Noah Poponak - Goldman Sachs & Co. Ronald Jay Epstein - Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Q3 2015 TransDigm Group, Incorporated, Earnings Conference Call. My name is Steve, and I'll be the operator for today. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. We will conduct a question-and-answer session towards the end of the conference.

As a reminder, this conference is being recorded for replay purposes. I would now like to turn the call over to Liza Sabol, Investor Relations. Please proceed..

Thank you, and welcome to TransDigm's fiscal 2015 third quarter earnings conference call. With me on the call this morning are TransDigm's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Nick Howley; Chief Financial Officer, Terry Paradie; Chief Operating Officer of our Power Group, Kevin Stein; and our Executive Vice President, Greg Rufus.

A replay of today's broadcast will be available for two weeks, and details are contained in this morning's press release and on our website at transdigm.com. Before we begin, we would like to remind you that the statements made during this call, which are not historical in fact, are forward-looking statements.

For further information about important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in the forward-looking statements, please refer to the company's latest filings with the SEC and are available through our Investors section of our website or at sec.gov.

The company would also like to advise you that during the course of the call we will be referring to EBITDA, specifically EBITDA As Defined, adjusted net income, adjusted earnings per share, all of which are non-GAAP financial measures.

Please see the tables and related footnotes in the earnings release for a presentation of the most directly comparable GAAP measures and a reconciliation of EBITDA and EBITDA As Defined, adjusted net income and adjusted earnings per share to those measures. With that, let me now turn the call over to Nick..

Commercial OEM, mid single-digit growth, this is unchanged from prior guidance; commercial aftermarket, mid-single growth, this is unchanged from our prior guidance, but could be a little tight; defense, mid-single growth, as you can see we're stuck on mid-single growth here, but this is up modestly from our prior guidance and we may have some upside here.

All in all, a good quarter. Our operating results were strong. We closed on two solid acquisitions and we expect PneuDraulics will close soon. Assuming PneuDraulics closes, we will have invested about $1.6 billion in high-quality aero businesses with strong value generation prospects over about a 180-day period. It's been a busy few quarters.

And with that, I'm going to pass this on to Terry Paradie, our new CFO, for his first at-bat with TransDigm..

$0.06 from the dividend equivalent payments, $0.22 from refinancing cost, $0.41 from non-cash stock option expense, and $0.49 of acquisition-related expenses and other. Our full year depreciation and amortization, including backlog, is now expected to total approximately $98 million. Now, I'll hand it back to Liza to kick off the Q&A..

Thank you, Terry. In order to give everyone the opportunity to ask questions, I'd ask that you limit your questions to two per caller. If you've further questions, please re-insert yourself back into the queue. Operator, we are now ready to open the line..

Thank you. Stand by from your first question, which comes from the line of Robert Spingarn from Credit Suisse. Please go ahead..

Good morning..

Good morning..

Good morning..

So, Nick, if you're able to answer this, it would be very helpful, but do you have the organic growth in your EBITDA As Defined in the quarter.

I think you did 13% total, but do you have the organic equivalent to that?.

About half of that is organic..

Yeah, yeah. I don't know the exact number, but I....

About 6.5% of it..

Okay. You hear that, about half..

Okay. Okay, that's good. And then a question – a high-level question, Nick, on commercial aftermarket. I think when you parsed it out, the air transport sounded a little better than it looked..

Yeah, not a lot. I don't want to be – it's the lion's share, so it can't be way different..

Well. So, at the risk of just treading right into the heart of the matter, I think aftermarket's confused or confounded people over the past couple of weeks as it has all year, it's come in softer than we thought it might, especially given what traffic is supposedly doing.

And I'm wondering if you can shed some light on how we have – I understand it was a tougher comp and so on, but how we have aftermarket trending at like half of RPMs?.

No. I get that, Rob, and I must admit it's a little baffling to us too. And we look at everything and read everybody else's numbers as they come out. So I don't think we're unique in this.

I don't honestly, Rob, I – other than airlines aren't buying as much (27:17) or some mix of inventory drawdown or deferrals of some discretionary items, I don't know that I can give you any other particular insight into it. I will say, if you look across our operating units, it isn't a clear picture. They're sort of all over the map.

It isn't that discretionary ones are up and nondiscretionary are down or vice versa. It's just not a clear picture and frankly it's lower than we expected..

Well, I mean, are we seeing just a real sea change in the way airlines think about aftermarket and overhauls and that this is just a new disciplined world? I guess, the U.S.

airlines are driving this and maybe it spreads and that they're just figuring out how to work just in time or something that's a little bit more permanent rather than a soft patch?.

The real is, I don't know, obviously. I would say on the fundamental demand, like use of our product, there isn't any change. So to the extent that there is inventory adjustments going on and rippling around the place, it would seem to me that that should settle out eventually.

Though honestly, it has been more volatile for the last three years, four years than I would have expected. If I look back, Rob, over any extended period of time, two years, three years, four years, it seems to kind of all cancel itself out as you average that out and the numbers still look about what you expect.

But I will admit it's bouncing around more than I would have expected..

Okay. And then just a clarification on your comment – I think it was yours, Nick; maybe it was yours, Terry.

On the debt and rates, if I understood you correctly, you threw out a very large 8% increase in, did you say, LIBOR?.

Yeah, I did. I said that..

And you're talking about 800 basis points, I want to make sure I understand what 8% increase?.

8% increase. Rob, I would say that is, I'm only trying to show how much – how well we're hedged against that. I have no reason to believe rates are going to go up 8%..

So, again, 8%....

Essentially, LIBOR today is zero..

Right. Right. Okay..

And what I was trying to say is, if it went from effectively zero – I think it's 0.2% or 0.3%....

0.19% (29:48).

If it went from that up to 8%, a far greater move than anyone anticipates or anything like that over the next four years or five years, our after-tax rate would move about 1.25% or 1.5%, I forget....

Yeah, 1.25%.

1.25%. And the pre-tax would be a little higher than that. I was just trying to give you a sense that we think we've gotten ourselves reasonably well hedged here for the next four years or five years..

Okay.

And then just to tie the loop and put some math to that, that would be going from, I think, a blended rate right now of like 5% and change, 5.3% up to about 6.5%?.

I don't have the calculation in front of me. Well, yes....

That's after ....

Well now we're getting pre-tax in it – this is again an 8% – I want to be clear to everybody..

Well, 5.3% pre-tax and 6.5% is pre-tax. And when you do the math in the tax, when we're done, it's about $1.30 clip to earnings – if it happened..

Yeah, I'm not sure how you're doing the math..

Rob, I've lost track of the math. Remember, all the debt doesn't move with LIBOR..

Okay, fair enough. But I was applying the new interest rate to all of the debt based on the way you phrased it..

Yeah, Rob, Maybe we can take this....

Yeah..

...one offline. We'll do the math with you..

Half of that is fixed..

Yeah..

Remember that..

Understood..

Yeah. So essentially, you can think of it as half is fixed, and half can move with the LIBOR, but we've significantly hedged half of that..

Okay..

Right..

So I don't think I'm following your numbers and I don't want to try and parse them out on the fly..

Yeah. It just....

No, I was applying the new rate to the whole thing. And if that's wrong, we'll just do it offline..

Yeah. I think Nick used 1.25%, but on a pre-tax basis the interest rate, if it went up to 8%, LIBOR increased to 8%, it was about a 2% impact pre-tax to our interest rate..

Yeah..

So I don't know if that helps..

Yeah..

Okay. All right..

Yeah, yeah..

Okay..

And again, Rob, I want to be clear, I am not suggesting that we anticipate an 8% increase in LIBOR..

No, you're trying to show that you're fairly resilient here if it starts to move....

Yes..

Yes..

...to move against you. I fully appreciate that. That's why I wanted to have the discussion online....

Yeah..

...and take it the full distance. Okay. Thanks, Nick..

Yeah..

And your next question comes from the line of Carter Copeland from Barclays. Please go ahead..

Hey, good morning, guys..

Hey, Carter..

Good morning..

I was going to go with a financial riddle, but my head's spinning now, so we'll skip that one. Nick, two questions for you. The first is, obviously you closed or announced a lot of deals in the last 180 days, I guess, you put it.

We've seen these waves in the past at points in the cycle that I think most industry observers would call late, and as we get sellers who are sort of eager to not hang on too long and sell before the risk of a downturn kind of come to pass.

Is there any of that driving the uptick in the number of transactions you've announced or is this just sheer coincidence that you've come across four of them that really seem to fit the power alley of what you're looking for out there?.

Yeah. I mean that's hard. It's always hard to speculate on why someone's selling. I wouldn't surprise me if it contributes somewhat to it. I mean, if you just run back through them, we bought one from AAR. They were going through – they're going through a fair amount of restructuring.

Whether the market cycle is the precipitating event, I think they were going through the restructuring anyway. It's hard for me to tell exactly why the timing was. I think the Franke one is pretty well something we've been working for a while and I think that just kind of hit when it hit. Pexco is a PE sale.

And so I think a PE seller surely doesn't want to try and sell something right at the top of the cycle and they don't want to risk getting stuck having to hold for three years or four years. So I suspect that's a contributor on that one. And PneuDraulics is a family business and it's always hard to sort out the politics or rationale for a family sale.

But I can't imagine the fact that the cycle's pretty good was a negative on their thought process..

Yeah. I guess what it gets at is just are you seeing more motivation, I guess, among sellers and is this a trend we should look to continue or is the pipeline as it's been for the past couple of years, I guess is the way I'd ask it..

It surely seems more active to me, but I don't know how that predicts and we surely have not bought a bunch here in the last, whatever it is, 150 days or 180 days. I'm quite comfortable, Carter, we're not going keep that pace up..

Yeah. And just to follow up on cash flow. I know, for at least one of these transactions, you said you were going to go through a facility relocation. Now that you've done a couple of them, I'm not sure what all the aggregate plans are, but just wondering if there's an inventory build of significance associated with facility rationalization..

I don't think these were any – I don't know what percent most of you use in your model for working capital, by which I mean receivables inventory, receivables inventory amounts payables 25%, 27%, 28% something like that. I don't think there's anything that'll move it outside of that range.

A little, but I don't think materially I don't think anything that shows or makes any impact on the model..

On the cash flow, great..

Yeah. Yeah, sorry..

All right. Thank you, gentlemen, and welcome Terry..

Thank you..

Your next question comes from Michael Ciarmoli from KeyBanc Capital Markets. Please go ahead..

Hey. Good morning, guys. Thanks for taking my questions. Nick, maybe just back to the overall aftermarket, we saw some suppliers get caught off guard with 787 provisioning.

Have you seen any changes in 787 provisioning, how are you sort of baking that into the model going forward? And also how are you thinking about the A350 provisioning as that starts to happen?.

We tend to not plan on much provisioning for our products.

And when it comes along, we sort of look at it as a – I was going to say the bird flew over and got us on the head, but I'll say a nice hurricane, a nice upswing, because our experience has been one, our products aren't hugely amenable to provisioning, amenable is maybe the wrong word, but they tend to not provision big quantities of it.

And we've also found it to be very unpredictable, so we tend to not count on it. And you know what you're all really is doing is you're pulling shipments forward that you would get eventually out in another year or two, and we'll probably look at, Mike, we'll probably look at the A350 the same way..

Okay..

I wouldn't count on much. And we may get some, but we wouldn't count on it..

Okay. And then just you guys used to break down sort of your revenue exposure by platform. I mean just getting back to Rob's question around aftermarket growing half of RPMs.

Are you guys seeing notable changes when you maybe slice up the data by the older generation of platforms, 757, 767s, 747s? Is that creating the headwind or do you guys not have that visibility?.

I can't answer that. But I just don't know the answer, Mike. Not that I'm not willing to answer it, I just don't know the answer. I would say we are pretty well market-weighted with all the group of parts and businesses we have.

And I can't say it's been obvious to us the one class of airframe has been disproportionately either buying or not buying versus what we would have expected. That's my general impression just from business reviews and things like that, but I can't give you an exact number..

Okay. Okay, perfect. I'll jump back in the queue. Thanks, guys..

And your next question comes from the line of Ken Herbert from Canaccord. Please go ahead..

Hi. Good morning..

Good morning..

Good morning..

Hey, Nick, I just wanted to follow up on the original equipment side of the business. And I'm just curious, in prior calls you've provided detail on sort of your step-up in content on major platforms and if I go back to the Investor Day last year, when you gave some specifics around the 787, A350 et cetera.

I'm just curious organically in two acquisitions.

Are you able to provide any sort of refresh on maybe specifically for the 787 or the new narrow-bodies or the A350? Are you still capturing content organically and maybe what some of the recent acquisitions do to some of your exposure by some of these major programs just purely on a relative basis as you've talked about it in the past?.

Liza, don't we once a year update in our website in our formal presentation the top 10 platforms and the next 10 platforms and the like?.

We did. It doesn't have all the acquisitions..

Doesn't have all the acquisitions in it. Yeah. I would say, in general, and I can't recall each one of the every acquisition, but our content on the new platforms continues to improve. The 787, Pexco is a big supplier on the 787, it's a big part of their program and the content substantially stepped up.

At Telair, the A350, they have the cargo handling system, which is a big cargo handling system for them. Whom I'm missing? Franke is relatively small, but – so it's not going to move it much. But in general, we think we are continuing to move up.

We know that if you look at on a pro forma basis that same-store basis, we know our content is moving up on the – is up significantly on the 787 and the A350 – by pro forma I mean same-store basis..

And organic -.

And if we didn't make it same-store that's – I mean same-store and organic is the same. And if you didn't – if you did it on a GAAP basis, it's going up very substantively..

Okay. Okay. That's helpful..

Yeah..

And then if I could on the defense market, it sounds like obviously your – you had maybe a little upside, your mid single-digit or it sounds like if there is any opportunity to maybe outperform on the guidance it's in that market.

Can you just provide a little bit more color on where you're seeing the bookings and the strength and if there is maybe any near-term risk to the subside or it sounds like it continues to surprise to the upside? But anymore detail on the defense markets would be helpful..

Well, I think I gave you – I gave you some detail on it. It is – I don't think there is near-term – much near-term risk, by near-term, I mean the balance of the year here. I mean that's stuff pretty well locked and loaded at this point in the year. The upside has been a relatively few programs. It's been a relatively few programs.

If you pull them out, the rest of the businesses are flattish. But it's been the A400 shipments and I think we told primarily Telair. I think we told you and we bought that, they were going to be way up which is one of the reasons we expected maybe a little flattening in that next year.

The parachute shipments both personnel and cargo, mostly outside the United States and our Airborne business have been just exploding this year. And the other is the C-130, we have a fair amount of content on that, particularly in the cargo handling at our AeroControlex and CEF businesses.

And Lockheed last year had been drawing the inventory down, primarily because they've build inventory for a higher rate and drew it down substantively last year and this year are now behind back up to the rate, which has a – means a year-over-year it's a significant step up. So those are the three big drivers of it..

Okay.

So, ex those three you say, it sounds like you're running flat?.

I'd say you are modestly up, modestly down, flattish kind of number across all the rest of the business as an aggregate..

Okay. Great. That's helpful. Well, thank you very much..

Your next question comes from the line of Robert Stallard from Royal Bank of Canada. Please go ahead..

Thanks so much. Good morning..

Good morning..

Good morning..

Nick, just to carryon on the aftermarket trend here.

Have you seen any change in your pricing strategy impacts in the quarter and have you seen any impact in terms of regional trends because of foreign exchange?.

Well, we surely have seen foreign exchange adjustments, but we price in dollars and we have not changed our pricing history pattern strategy, et cetera at all..

Yeah. And the foreign exchange impacts have been pretty minor for us for the quarter..

Yeah.

Have you seen any airlines maybe buying fewer spares, because of the foreign exchange pressures that they are dealing with?.

Well, we surely have seen some buying fewer spares obviously. If you see across the industry, I don't know that I can attribute it to that, I surely haven't heard anyone say that..

Okay. Then, Terry, just a couple of quick ones for you. Can you reconfirm the interest guidance, I missed that? And also how does the PneuDraulics tax impact flow through over the next couple of years? Thank you..

Yeah. So the interest guidance for the full year this year was $420 million and what we'll have, from a PneuDraulics standpoint is we will get a tax benefit of just over $100 million taken over the next 15 years, that won't impact the rate, it will impact our cash taxes.

So from a GAAP standpoint, the tax rate will be sort of our normal effective rate, which right now is around 32%. We've lowered it for this year down to 31% because of discrete items but our normal rate's around 32% going forward..

Thanks so much..

Yeah..

Your next question comes from the line of Gautam Khanna from Cowen & Company. Please go ahead..

Yes. Good morning..

Good morning..

Nick, I was wondering if you could refresh us, last year in the quarter you just reported ....

You're breaking up. You're breaking up..

Okay.

Can you hear me better now?.

Yes..

Okay, great.

Last June and September, you had very strong aftermarket sales growth and was there anything looking back by region or by product that made the compare much tougher this time around? I mean, was there any geography that stood out when you looked back, and so maybe on a year-on-year basis that would explain some difference?.

Not that is obvious to me. It could be, but I don't recall it and I don't know the answer to that question, is the real answer. I would say the big spike ups in those two quarters came after probably a two or three quarter period where there was very low growth.

Once again, that we and everybody in the industry were trying to figure out what was happening and then all of sudden we get two huge quarters of orders, which looks like what was happening was people were deferring and drawing maintenance down..

Right.

And could you remind us with Franke and Telair and Pexco, how quickly – or what contractual barriers there may be to your value-based pricing strategy coming into play? I mean, is it going to be a several quarter kind of ramp or how should we think about the phase-in there?.

I think Pexco will move relatively quickly. I think Franke will move relatively quickly though it's pretty small. Telair, I think we gave you some guidance on that, that one will move more slowly..

Okay.

And last one, if you could just comment on the amortization we should anticipate going forward on a quarterly run rate basis?.

Yeah. We said for the full year around $91 million. So, I'm assuming it would be probably in that $20 million to $25 million a quarter going forward – excuse me, $98 million,.

$98 million..

... excuse me, $98 million..

$98 million....

That's including backlog..

Including backlog..

You'll get it in our guidance actually....

And that does include depreciation, you've got depreciation and amortization..

Yes, depreciation, amortization and including backlog at $98 million for the full year. So, you can probably model $25 a quarter..

Okay.

And the actual amortization of intangibles?.

That's all of it..

That's all of it. Okay, all right. Thank you very much..

And your next question is from the line of David Strauss from UBS. Please go ahead..

Good morning..

Good morning..

Nick, I might have missed it but did you give what order activity looked like for the aftermarket in the quarter?.

I did not. I said that it was running slightly ahead year-to-date. And I would say for the quarter, it was roughly flat. The orders were roughly flat. By orders I mean bookings quarter-to-quarter sequentially..

Okay..

But I would say – I'm trying to figure out this big jumble of numbers here sitting in front of me. The – yeah, up some over the previous Q3..

So up a little bit year-over-year and flat sequentially?.

Yeah, flat sequentially and up a little bit yeah, year-over-year in the quarter..

Okay. All right.

The acquisitions, the couple you've completed here and the one still to go, how should we think about the margin potential of those businesses? I know the past couple of acquisitions you've done prior to this you talked about there wasn't a chance to get kind of the TransDigm average but how should we think about these recent acquisitions?.

I don't know where – let me run back through them, I'm not sure where we're starting with recent, but let's say the ones over the last 100 maybe days, which I presume that's what you mean, David..

Yeah..

Franke, I think a very good possibility. Pexco, I think very good possibility. Telair, probably not all the way there, but – for a number of reasons, but good growth but not – the margins won't get all the way there, I don't think. And PneuDraulics, since we don't own it, I'd rather not talk about it yet..

Okay. That's helpful. And going back to the aftermarket volume versus price.

I mean, is it right to think about it, Nick, based on, looks like about 5%, 5-or-so percent pro forma aftermarket growth for the year that volumes have been relatively flat?.

Yeah. We don't disclose the price, but it sure isn't very robust growth..

Okay..

And I think you got it pretty well..

Okay. And, Terry, you talked about cash taxes, it looks like this year you're going to be kind of in the 20% cash tax range with the cash benefits – tax benefits from these two deals.

Is that the right way to think about cash taxes going forward, probably in the 20% or so range beyond this year?.

Yeah. I'm not sure. We'd like to forecast – give you that guidance out next year. What we have done is changed our guidance for this year down from last quarter. And the main reason for that is being driven by the timing of actually getting our refund from – we just filed our tax return.

We expected it'd take a lot longer than we had planned in the forecast last quarter and we actually received it already and that makes up half the – approximately half the change from last quarter this year in cash taxes.

We also had the foreign tax credit which we weren't expecting help reduce cash taxes and then the rate probably makes up a difference..

All right. Thanks, guys..

Your next question comes from the line of Seth Seifman from JPMorgan. Please go ahead..

Hey, thanks. Good morning, everyone. Another question on the aftermarket and maybe the answer to this question is obvious just looking at the words.

But I just want to clarify, when you say proprietary and sole source, for each of those, does that mean that there is zero chance for competition from, let's say, retired aircraft or parts coming out of the secondary market or PMA or any alternative sources?.

Well, there is proprietary and sole source that somewhat could clearly chop up an old airplane, take the part out, fix it up, and try and resell it.

We don't see much of that, we don't believe primarily because the price points of what our parts tend to be, they tend to be lower than the food chain in pricing and usually not 100%, but usually not worth that. PMA activity is – I don't believe has changed much. It's quite modest.

It's a very, very low percent of a penetration in our aftermarket, well down in the single-digits, and I don't think it's changed much over the last six years, seven years, eight years or 10 years..

Okay. And then maybe as a follow-up. I know we're probably a little early here to talk about next year. But if you roll up all your end markets and you think about a typical year with kind of typical economic growth, maybe it's 4% or 5% organic growth, and I think that's probably the assumption that you have based in your kind of return calculation.

Is there any reason to think at this point that 2016 should be any different than that?.

I just don't want get into speculating on 2016 yet. We'll give the guidance when we give it. And we hate to sort of paint ourselves in corners..

Understand. Thank you..

Your next question comes from the line of Noah Poponak from Goldman Sachs..

Hi. Good morning, everyone..

How're you doing?.

I'm doing well.

How are you, Nick?.

Fine..

On the $24 million change at the midpoints of the revenue outlook, is that just purely what Pexco gives you in 4.5 months of contributing or is there some negative offset to that?.

I don't – it is primarily Pexco.

How many months that we have them?.

It would be 4.5 months..

4.5 months. There may be some offset, Noah, but it's not significant..

Okay.

Because if I just reverse engineer that – I mean, I don't know, I guess...?.

You're not dividing by 4.5 months, all right, because that's far too complicated for us..

What's that?.

You're not going to divide by 4.5 multiplied times 12, right, because that's far too complicated for us..

Well, I know, I mean, if you do that, I mean, I guess, it – maybe you could walk us through how it works with taking the tax benefit out of the purchase price.

Because if I do take that number and apply it to – or make it a monthly number and multiply it by 12, it would imply you paid a pretty high revenue multiple for the business?.

Well, I guess, that depends how you adjust for the tax benefit, right?.

So how should I do that?.

That depends how you adjust it for the tax benefit, I think..

Yeah. I mean, I'd just – so if I just take the 4.5 months....

One sort of discount rate. And I know, Noah, you guys are investment bankers and you know a lot about discount rate..

Okay.

So is it fair to say you didn't pay a substantially different multiple than your historical range for this year?.

Yes, when you adjust for the – make whatever adjustment you want to make for the tax benefit by however you want to discount that, the way we end up, we know we did not. We did not pay a significantly unusual. We do not pay particularly high multiple for it. We paid what we generally pay..

And the $24 million is almost entirely Pexco, maybe some rounding somewhere else?.

Well, everybody is waving their hands at me now. There's some other round and some other things in there..

Okay.

Are you specifically saying that you do see airlines destocking inventory right now for any specific reason or are you more just saying that what have to be the logical conclusion given...?.

No, we'd have to value deferrals of things – or the logical conclusion to me. I cannot – Noah, as you know, it's always tough to get us particular partner, particular group of airlines and say how many parts did you have last quarter and how many you got this quarter..

Okay.

It's more – I'm drawing logical conclusion..

I mean, if you do aggregate that globally, you can see in the first quarter that inventory has actually declined, so the trend line seem lower. I guess, I was hoping to ask you guys why, but it sounds like it's a bit of a mystery..

Yeah, it is. And the answer is I don't know. But I look across almost what everyone's reporting and I see the same thing..

Yeah. Okay.

And then, would you be willing to quantify what you expect the tax rate to be in the fourth quarter?.

No, I think what we've guided to the full year tax rate just under 31%, you can use that as your full year estimate and that's our guidance at this point in time..

Okay. Thank you..

Yeah..

Your next question comes from the line of Ron Epstein from Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Please go ahead..

Hey, good morning, guys..

Good morning..

Just a quick follow-on to maybe other couple of questions that were asked before. But kind of broadly speaking, Nick, some of the more recent acquisitions that you've made have had a higher OE content versus aftermarket content.

How do you think about that and how do you think about that in terms of just the portfolio programs you're on and just broadly when you think about doing M&A?.

Well, our rule is always the same. We're looking for proprietary aerospace businesses with significant aftermarket. Now, we don't stick a stake in the ground and say exactly what significant means, but it has to be a meaningful part of the business and, more importantly, a meaningful part of the EBITDA that we think we can move.

Our EBITDA content is somewhere around little over 50% now. I'd say most of the businesses we have bought have been in that range, or businesses that are somewhere in that range where we think we have a chance of getting them somewhere in that range..

Okay. Okay. And then maybe just one, change gears just a little bit, and these questions aren't coming up quite as frequently, but just curious.

How has the Partnering for Success program at Boeing played out for you guys at this point?.

So far fine. As you know, it's – this question has been asked before, we have the confidentiality agreement, so I can't talk about the details of it. But as I've also said that we're very value-driven. If we didn't think it was either even or somewhat value-accretive, we wouldn't do it..

Okay. Okay. Yeah. Fair enough. Thanks..

I'd now like to turn the call back over to Liza for closing remarks..

Thank you, again, for participating in today's call and please look for our 10-Q that we expect to file some time tomorrow..

Thank you for your participation in today's conference. This concludes the presentation. You may now disconnect. Thank you very much and have a very good day..