Woodward beats revenue expectations despite coronavirus’ late-quarter damage
FORT COLLINS — Woodward Inc. (Nasdaq: WWD), after a turbulent several weeks in the aerospace industry forced it to abandon a $6 billion merger opportunity and lay off 11% of its staff, has beat Wall Street estimates in its first quarter.
The Fort Collins-based power control supplier posted revenues of $720 million and earnings per share of $1.41, beating Wall Street consensus estimates of $692.41 million and $1.04 per share, according to data from Seeking Alpha.
The quarter’s revenue was down about 5% from the same period last year.
SPONSORED CONTENT
In a prepared statement, CEO Tom Gendron said while the results were broadly in line with projections, the economic fallout of coronavirus started to manifest in the latter portion of the quarter.
“As a result, we have already taken significant actions to protect the health and safety of our global employee base, preserve our financial strength and flexibility, strictly manage our cash flow, and maintain our longer-term growth position within the aerospace and Industrial markets,” he said.
Gendron later said the company expects significant weakness in the second half of the year while on a conference call with analysts.
The ongoing coronavirus pandemic around the world has grounded non-essential flights across the commercial airline industry, leading to financial woes for planemakers Boeing Inc. (NYSE: BA) and Airbus SE, along with engine makers like the aviation division of General Electric Inc. (NYSE: GE). GE is cutting 13,000 jobs from its jet engine factories alone, accounting for about a quarter of that employee count.
Those financial troubles are being passed on to suppliers like Woodward and advanced materials maker Hexcel Corp. (NYSE: HXL), which forced the two to axe their $6.3 billion tie-up and focus on themselves.
Days later, Woodward said it would immediately lay off 11% of its North American workforce, including 123 in Colorado, with plans to cut an additional 4% of its employees by the end of 2020.
© 2020 BizWest Media LLC
