Powell Industries, Inc.POWLNASDAQ
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Operator: Good day, and welcome to the Powell Industries Fiscal First Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] This event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Ryan Coleman of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
Ryan Coleman: Thank you, operator, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us for Powell Industries conference call today to review fiscal year 2026 1st quarter results. With me on the call are Brett Cope, Powell's Chairman and CEO; and Mike Metcalf, Powell's CFO. There will be a replay of today's call, and it will be available via webcast by going to the company's website, powellind.com, or a telephonic replay will be available until February 11. The information on how to access the replay was provided in yesterday's earnings release. Please note that the information reported on this call speaks only as of today, February 4, 2026, and therefore, you are advised that any time-sensitive information may no longer be accurate at the time of replay listening or transcript reading. This conference call includes certain statements, including statements related to the company's expectations of its future operating results that may be considered forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Investors are cautioned that such forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties and that actual results may differ materially from those projected in these forward-looking statements. These risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, competition and competitive pressures, sensitivity to general economic and industry conditions, international, political and economic risks, availability and price of raw materials and execution of business strategies. For more information, please refer to the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. With that, I'll now turn the call over to Brett.
Brett Cope: Thank you, Ryan. Good morning. Thank you for joining us today to review Powell's fiscal 2026 1st quarter results. I will make a few comments and then turn the call over to Mike for more financial commentary before we take your questions. Our fiscal year is off to a strong start. As our first quarter results continue to demonstrate Powell's unique and advantaged position against a backdrop of what are secular and increasingly durable growth trends, the growing and broad investment in power generation and grid modernization to support data center and AI capacity growth, domestic manufacturing, electrification and the nationally important export of energy resources like LNG, are validating our now nearly decade-long strategic effort to transform Powell into a more diversified manufacturer of electrical distribution products and systems. During the first quarter, we saw revenue grow 4% compared to the prior year. And as a reminder, our first fiscal quarter typically exhibits some level of seasonal disruptions associated with fewer working days. While ongoing high levels of project execution drove improved profitability compared to the prior year. Gross profit expanded 20% to drive a gross margin of 28.4%, an improvement of 380 basis points year-over-year. We recorded $439 million of new orders, the highest quarterly total in over 2 years, as activity was widespread across oil and gas, specifically LNG, data centers and the electric utilities markets. Within our total bookings number, we were awarded a contract for a large LNG project that exceeds $100 million to support gas liquefaction and export along the U.S. Gulf Coast. As the permitting process for LNG restarted a year ago, activity in support of new greenfield and brownfield trains resumed and Powell has and continues to support this strategic market. We anticipate activity within the LNG market to continue in 2026 relative to the more modest activity levels throughout 2024 and most of 2025. Commercial dynamics within our commercial and other industrial markets have accelerated in recent quarters as we continue to see increased demand within the data center market. During the first quarter, our commercial and other industrial market accounted for nearly 1/2 of the order total and included our first mega project order for a single data center, which totaled roughly $75 million. Our commercial and other industrial market now comprises 22% of our backlog as of quarter end, with data centers accounting for roughly 15% of our total backlog, both of which are record levels for Powell. Over the past few quarters, we have continued to experience increasing levels of interest among a growing list of data center customers. The increasing power demand driving greater compute power and the desire to expedite construction time lines creates a value proposition that is well aligned to an increasing portfolio of Powell's electrical distribution products and automation solutions, including our first orders in the United States for our newest team members at Remsdaq Limited in the U.K. In response to the growing market demand, we continue to take measures to expand productive capacity, including adding additional leased facilities to support the expansion of production lines, increased inventory needs, broader collaboration with our supply base to ramp supply and improve cycle times as well as rebalancing and reallocating the manufacture of select products across our facilities in North America to further optimize capacity. Meanwhile, order trends in our Electric Utilities segment remained very encouraging as we experienced another solid quarter of award activity from this end market. Overall, the oil and gas and petrochemical business remains healthy. We are experiencing some degree of divergence across markets and geographies that we compete with some performing very well and others exhibiting softer activity levels in areas such as refineries and polyethylene and polypropylene facilities. We finished the quarter with a backlog of $1.6 billion which was sequential growth of 14% compared to the September quarter and is the highest in Powell's history. The growth in our backlog over the past year has been primarily driven by booking trends in the electric utility and commercial and other industrial markets as these 2 markets now account for the majority of our backlog for the first time ever. Overall, our backlog is well balanced across the markets we serve, and we continue to benefit from a healthy mix of large projects as well as small and medium-sized core projects that help maximize productivity across our manufacturing plants. We also benefit from project visibility that now extends into our fiscal 2028. The expansion of our Jacintoport facility is progressing on schedule and remains on track to be completed during the second half of our fiscal 2026. This incremental capacity will be critical to ensuring our ability to support all of our end markets, but specifically, our oil and gas customers as we anticipate the wave of LNG project development work that is projected to come to market over the next 3 to 5 years, and this investment ensures that we continue to advance our industry-leading role in the fabrication of engineered to order power distribution solutions for critical applications. We continue to actively review and evaluate our total manufacturing capacity to ensure the delivery and execution of our project backlog. This includes the potential for future investments in plant and equipment, along with actions noted earlier in my comments, where we are now adding lease properties to support near and midterm growth in our medium voltage distribution products. As we look ahead through the remainder of 2026, the commercial environment for each of our major end markets remains positive. We continue to have robust activity in support of the North American gas market. The fundamentals of the U.S. natural gas market continue to support investments in LNG and the funnel of projects that we are tracking compares favorably to past cycles in terms of the total number of projects moving forward. The outlook for our electric utility market remains robust and balanced across the customers and geographies that we serve. The growing wave of investment in electrical infrastructure to meet growing demand levels is broad and durable and we expect another strong year of activity in 2026. Lastly, we are increasingly encouraged by order trends and demand levels within our commercial and other industrial markets. The acceleration of order activity driven by data centers leaves us confident in our ability to continue to grow our presence in this dynamic market. Overall, we are very pleased with our first quarter performance and our outlook for fiscal 2026. Demand trends remain robust, and we are well positioned to execute our backlog and grow within our targeted markets. With that, I'd like to turn the call over to Mike to walk us through our financial results in greater detail.
Michael Metcalf: Thank you, Brett, and good morning, everyone. In the first quarter of fiscal 2026, we reported net revenue of $251 million compared to $241 million or 4% higher versus the same period in fiscal 2025. New orders booked in the first fiscal quarter of 2026 were $439 million, which was 63% higher than the same period 1 year ago and included 2 mega orders. The first mega orders for a large domestic liquefied natural gas project valued at greater than $100 million, which is being constructed on the Gulf Coast. In addition to this LNG mega order, the business also secured a number of orders during the quarter, supporting the electrical infrastructure for various data center projects. Collectively, these data center orders totaled more than $100 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2026. These data center orders booked in our commercial and other industrial sector included a notable mega order for electrical distribution equipment and was valued at approximately $75 million that will be deployed at a single data center. Notwithstanding these significant wins, the orders cadence across most of our reported market sectors continues to be active, particularly across our domestic end markets. As a result of this commercial activity, the book-to-bill ratio in the period was 1.7x. Reported backlog at the end of the first quarter of fiscal 2026 was $1.6 billion, $219 million higher than 1 year ago and $191 million higher sequentially and continued strength across the oil and gas, utility and commercial and other industrial sectors. As we exited the first fiscal quarter, backlog across our oil and gas and utility sectors, each represent roughly 30% of the total backlog while the commercial and other industrial sector has grown to 22% of the backlog, increasing substantially on both a sequential and year-over-year basis. Compared to the first quarter of fiscal 2025, domestic revenues were slightly lower by 1% or $3 million to $195 million while international revenues were up 29% or $13 million to $44 million in the current fiscal quarter. The increase in our international revenues during the quarter was driven in large part through the projects that we're currently executing in the Middle East and Africa, Asia Pacific and Europe regions. From a market sector perspective, revenues across our utility sector marked the most substantial increase during the quarter, higher by 35% compared to the same period 1 year ago, while revenues from the oil and gas sector increased by 2%, offset to some degree by the petrochemical sector, lower by 31% versus the first quarter of fiscal 2025. Lower revenue in the petrochemical sector was mainly driven by the completion of a large project booked in fiscal 2023, coupled with softer commercial activity in this market. In addition, the commercial and other industrial sector was 8% lower on project timing, while the light rail traction power sector was 5% higher on a relatively small revenue base. Gross profit in the current period increased by $12 million to $71 million in the first fiscal quarter versus the same period 1 year ago. Gross profit as a percentage of revenue was higher by 380 basis points versus the same period 1 year ago at 28.4% of revenues primarily driven by strong project execution, generating a higher level of project closeouts versus the prior year. Sequentially, gross profit was lower by 300 basis points on the predicted seasonal softness. As we noted in our fourth quarter release, we anticipated a challenging sequential comparison considering that our first fiscal quarter is historically the softest quarter across our fiscal year due to the holiday period. Selling, general and administrative expenses were $25.2 million in the current period and were higher by $3.7 million on increased compensation expenses across the business versus the same period a year ago. SG&A as a percentage of revenue increased 110 basis points to 10% in the current fiscal quarter. In the first quarter of fiscal 2026, we reported net income of $41.4 million, generating $3.40 per diluted share which is a 19% increase compared to a net income of $34.8 million or $2.86 per diluted share in the same period of fiscal 2025. During the first quarter of fiscal 2026, we generated $43.6 million of operating cash flow on favorable income generation through the period. Investments in property, plant and equipment totaled $2 million in the quarter, with the capital deployed primarily to address capacity and productivity initiatives. At December 31, 2025, we had cash and short-term investments of $501 million compared to $476 million at September 30, 2025, and the company does not hold any debt. As we look ahead to the remainder of fiscal 2026, we remain encouraged by the commercial tailwinds across all of our end markets. Given the current market conditions, coupled with a stable pricing environment, we are optimistic that we can sustain the quantity and the quality of our backlog throughout fiscal 2026. Combined with our ongoing focus on optimizing margin levels, increasing product throughput and the overall strength of our balance sheet, Powell is well positioned to deliver strong revenue and earnings throughout the rest of fiscal 2026. At this point, we'll be happy to answer your questions.
Operator: [Operator Instructions]. Our first question comes from John Franzreb with Sidoti & Company.
John Franzreb: Congratulations on another great quarter. I'd like to start with the comments on the gross margin that you can -- that based on what your current backlog looks like that you can sustain the 2025 gross margin profile. I wonder, does that consider potential change orders or short-cycle business? Or is that just based on the backlog configuration?
Michael Metcalf: John, this is Mike. I'll address that question. So we had a very strong quarter with respect to project closeouts as I noted in my prepared comments, 380 basis points overall on reported margin versus prior year. Of that $300 million was attributable to project closeouts, which was favorable to last year and that was really driven by strong execution and risk management and our ability to recover costs via change orders, et cetera, in the project environment. The remainder of that upside was just playing productivity and operating leverage across the business. As a barometer of level of margin levels over time, I would point to the trailing 12-month performance. If you took a look at the trailing 12 months in the business, our reported margins are running about 30% and of this, there's approximately 175 basis points of project closeout gains, again, which includes change orders and the like changes in estimates. So maintaining a base level margin in the upper 20s while continuing to drive for 150 to 200 basis point upside resulting from favorable closeouts is a reasonable assumption. And that reflects what we see that base assumption is what we see in our backlog.
John Franzreb: Got it. Got it. That's very helpful, Mike. And I'm actually kind of curious about the record backlog, it's great to have. It's wonderful to see. But I'm wondering if there's any concerns that customers are just buying to get in line and that the backlog might not be firm in use past given maybe the new customer shift. And just any thoughts about that?
Brett Cope: John, it's Brett. It's a good question. We've talked about that in the past, and we -- are we open to cancellations, what would that potentially do? I don't think -- yes, I think the 1.6% is very durable. Some of the new market growth in the commercial and other is, if you look at the timing and our understanding of the project, I feel very good about it. I think as we look out what's going on in that space, are people talking to us and others about reservations and locking capacity, yes, those conversations are happening. And Mike and I and the management team are discussing what that might look like in the next couple of quarters, the next couple of fiscal years as the demand looks like it continues how to best handle that risk potential. So that -- I think that's a future concern that's on our radar, and we're taking it quarter by quarter, but not currently in the backlog. I feel pretty good with what we've got here today.
Operator: Our next question comes from Chip Moore with ROTH MKM.
Alfred Moore: I wanted to ask drilling on data center, maybe a little bit more. I think you're talking about larger and more numerous opportunities and obviously, that megaproject great to see. Maybe just -- can you expand, Brett, maybe on cadence of deliveries in data center? And then I believe many of these facilities are being built in phases, just potential for follow-on orders at some of these sites. And capacity questions. You mentioned adding some leased facilities, just how quickly you can ramp and get the switchgear supply going up.
Brett Cope: Yes, I could have probably done a whole script on the data centers when you look at us in the broader market out there that's involved in the space because we are admittedly learning a lot as it's growing quickly in Powell. First of all, on the cadence of the activity that's ongoing. There is an interesting dynamic. It is project work, but still, a lot of our backlog that we just shared in the prepared comments is still outside the data center, even this large mega project. It is a large amount of work for a project to handle a lot of the outside of the work. And it's a lot of design one, build many. So it is supporting more of a product strategy. It's a project as we look at it as Powell. And so -- but it's going to create a lot of -- a lot more flow down production lines. We think there is a lot of opportunity there that we're working through over the -- and we will be working through in the next couple of quarters about efficiency, productivity and delivery. So we spent a lot of time last quarter, quarter before, working on supply chain, doing the blocking and tackling on the production line. The prepared comment, we added a 50,000 lease square foot lease facility, which we're just taking ownership now. During the quarter to support this product line flow to store the inventory that needs to ramp to match. But it's going to be a lot of that repetitive product build down the line, and we anticipate more of that in the next quarter or 2. We're evaluating -- we're under evaluation right now, some additional facilities. We're challenging whether or not we should go larger and along with even investment in our model. We like to own our PPE. But right now, the lease makes sense. As we better understand and become more confident, we'll build out more permanent investments, I think, to match, not just this, but of course, the things we've been doing organically to drive growth in all of our 3 verticals.
Alfred Moore: Very helpful. I appreciate the color there, Brett. And if I could ask one more. Supply-demand environment, I guess, more broadly to the point on margins, a lot of announcements around capacity expansion from a number of equipment suppliers floating out there? Just maybe it sounds like things are quite stable right now, but just how you think about the future several years out, what might take place?
Brett Cope: Every quarter, I'm getting more confident. The -- notwithstanding John Franzreb's question about the concern on this massive demand environment. I mean the number of customers were having more thoughtful strategic discussions with is increasing, and they're engaging Powell in a way that fits us well. And so I talked early on, maybe a year ago about finding alignment with clients that meet well with what we do culturally and how we do it, we'll learn from that and we'll grow. So we're not going to stay static as to who we were. We want to build a part of the company that is quicker on the cycle, can meet the need. There is a lot of demand. We understand the urgency and the return on their capital. But at the same time, we want to make sure we're hitting the dates for all 3 verticals that we're serving. So the number of customers is increasing. It is going out further in time and the programmatic approach about your comment about phasing, yes, we see the initial on the initial design and the potential train -- I'll call it, train expansion, but the size of the data center potential that could be added on to it is definitely part of the conversation. So that fits our model, right? If we execute and deliver for our client. We absolutely want these relationships to be sticky, just like there are other verticals, and we're very open with them in that approach. And so we use that as a an early-on engagement sort of screening discussion of, hey, we'd like to help all of you, but we want to align with those that really match us well.
Operator: Next question comes from Manish Somaiya with Cantor.
Manish Somaiya: Michael and Brett, it's Manish Somaiya. Just a couple of questions. One is on pricing. Perhaps if you can just give us some comment on what you're seeing as far as pricing in your end markets, the intensity of competition pertaining to that? And then related, how should we think about raw material prices and how they get passed along and what you absorbed? Perhaps if you can just give us a sense as to how you protect yourself in this ad of rising commodity prices.
Brett Cope: Manish, thank you for joining today. I'll take the first part of that. Mike can add some color and jump into the input cost side. On the pricing environment, we've been asked that last couple of quarters. No real change. I think everything is holding pretty steady in all our verticals in terms of the competitive status of the market, if you will. The one dynamic that I would point to that we are learning, and I touched on this with Chip in the last call -- last question a little bit, is that on these data center jobs, they are with how we price in the market. I would say, that said, the way we're going to build these lines, I anticipate we have some potential upside because in the long cycle project -- when we build a project and they're large full of products and integrated scope in their year, 2 years, 3 years, these have a much quicker cycle on average compared to some of those on their demand curve to meet the need. And so when we get up to speed and build these products over and over and over, I think that the efficiency factor, something that we don't largely do as Powell today, and we're building out that product side of the company. I think there's -- I think we'll see some potential upside in there. I don't know how much yet. But I do think that we see the potential for it. So that in a sense would be price. If you back calculate it in the next couple of quarters, I think that will become more apparent to our to our understanding.
Michael Metcalf: And following on that, Manish, this is Mike. Regarding the input costs, clearly, we watch this very closely. We kind of bifurcate it into 2 buckets. The raw materials, as you noted, copper, steel, very volatile. The metals market is very, very volatile today. We do hedge our copper to some extent and any drastic increases that we see, we roll those into our pricing models internally. The second bucket, I would note, are we buy a lot of engineered components, things that we don't make, HVAC, fire systems, things of that nature. And as you know, our projects could range from 1 year to 3 years. So we lock those not those commodities, those engineered components, in when we signed the contract. So we're locked into the engineered components and we watch the commodities very closely and roll those into the pricing model. So that's how we manage those businesses -- those elements of the business to mitigate the risk.
Manish Somaiya: And then just as a follow-up, how should we think about the lead times on specific components like switchgear, for example, obviously, you have a significant backlog at this moment. What are sort of the potential constraints on the component side that could impact revenues?
Brett Cope: That's a discussion we have every day and along with per couple of comments on the capacity additions that we're working through. I think we're in a good spot. If you look at the mix of products that we make and if you just kind of go back to data centers, Manish, the power levels have increased coming off utility or if they're doing GTG, self-generation on site or any kind of multifuel, there's a lot going into the 38 kV line, and that is ramping quickly. That's a product that we're rarely adept at. It actually fits Powell really well. But when you look at the 5 and 15 different product levels, they're not as robust. We actually have capacity. And so some designs of data centers out there, if you look at how they're doing their data halls, not all of them are just massive 1 gigawatt or 3x 300 gigawatts. There's new designs coming out that are 90 or 100 or 150-megawatt data halls that we still have really good capacity running 35 to 40 weeks on gear, which is very competitive in the market for 15 kb. So when you get into the mix of how they're doing their power design, we are driving future capacity for those higher levels that are really under demand, but then there are other designs that we still have opportunity to fill out that will benefit the back half of this year and into the early part of '27. So those are the really thoughtful conversations we're having with those clients that engage us that way. We can fate, we can build, we can invest meet their needs and then we can phase our deliveries to really make a win for both parties.
Operator: Our next question comes from John Braatz with Kansas City Capital.
Jon Braatz: Brett, you've spoken a lot about doing things to increase capacity and product flow and so on and so forth. And I guess, 2 questions. Number one, how much might you have to ramp up your CapEx spending to achieve that? And then secondly, when you think about your capacity now and what you want to bring on board in the future, if your top line, if you could do, let's say, if your top line growth was x percent, what might that new capacity be able to drive revenue growth in the future? Are we talking about mid-teens then? Or what kind of new growth -- new top line expectations might there be with this new capacity?
Brett Cope: Well, that's a really good question, John. First, on the CapEx side, yes, we've been evaluating for the better part of the year a new facility owned by Powell. A lot of that started off in support of our organic investment in R&D and some of the products we aspire to bring to market to pursue more share of wallet and utility spend. I really like the utility vertical for Powell long term, and we've done really well in there. And I really think the team is -- what we've done is really driving value for our client in the utility space and vice versa. And so we don't want to lose focus on that. So add to that what's going on in the market in this newer dynamic, we're considering right now something on the order of another $100 million type facility. We've not pulled the trigger on that. Really active discussions with the Board. Meanwhile, we saw an opportunity on the lease side. When you look at both in terms of how they could potentially drive revenue, yes, I think double digits is possible. We got to get a few more products organically out like I noted earlier, if we -- and maybe a little bit more -- I'd hedge a little to say when, given how many data center companies are engaging us get inside the data center, -- it will be a pretty chunky add. The low-voltage content, even on the AC designs that are going on now and the momentum that's built because there's a lot of talk on the future DC designs, which we're also involved with but it will be a step change. And some of that with that -- with the investment we did last year at the breaker plant here in Houston, the 50,000 square foot, we're already prepped for some of that. Well, we could quickly need some additional facilities beyond that just to hold the inventory. So we can see out there some potential nice steps to add to the growth of the company.
Jon Braatz: Okay. And Brett, on the LNG market, obviously, it's a little bit different today than it was 3 years ago when sort of the initial construction rollout began. Is the competitive environment a little bit different today than 4 or 5 years ago?
Brett Cope: It's different, but it's no less intense. And my color comment on that would be, if you go back 4 or 5 years ago and you look at the players that were in the market from the international people that we compete with, along with some of the local building makers and integrated partners at the -- our competition would use, there was a set of competitors that was x. If you look at today, 5 years on and you look at like in our investor deck, we present who we think about every day when we get up to compete on the electrical side. What's changed is their strategy, I think. Our core strategy around industrial oil and gas utility, which we've been working at for the better part of a dozen years. And now this latest piece, we're not going to forget who we are in these first 2 verticals. And we really enjoy that complex industrial hard to do job. And so there's still competition, it's still intense, but there are some new players because of changes on the other side that happened from 5 years ago, maybe the focus is different, I don't know. You have to listen to their calls. But for us, we're still focused on that. And we really like that business, and we're very engaged on it. And the investment we've made in offshore is built for that, and we're out trying to earn all that business that's potentially coming through FID in the next couple of quarters.
Jon Braatz: Okay. So Brett, if you -- when you look at the margin that you achieved a couple of years ago on the new projects, new LNG projects, do you think you can see similar margins going forward?
Brett Cope: I think so. I mean, there's -- all the segments, that's the one that is given the size of the capital investment in these facilities. There's still a lot of focus on the return of the facilities. And so it's good, but I -- you got to be careful to be fair and what you're really looking to do. And so if there's something that's unique or there's time elements that we can provide, that's unique to our model, for instance, using our offshore facility for large single piece that will help reduce cost at site. We just asked a rare value in return for that for the site, but not to be silly about it.
Operator: Our next question comes from John Franzreb from Sidoti & Company.
John Franzreb: Brett, I'm just curious about the opportunity pipeline. It seems phenomenal. I wanted to kind of look at it and say, listen, we're going to have an exit book-to-bill ratio of above 1 point for the next coming 2 years. Is that something reasonable to expect?
Brett Cope: I think it's reasonable, John. I mean there's no guarantee of future results. You know the phrase -- the amount of conversations we're having across all 3 verticals. I think it's a reasonable expectation, which is why we had chats with the Board, and we had the change in some of the metrics that we're driving the company for. And so the volume potential is definitely there. And as a team, we've got to solve that. And I feel good that we've got the right team and the right environment to make that happen for all the stakeholders.
John Franzreb: Got it. And I was wondering, has the Board considered a stock spread at this level? I mean, compared to historic levels, it's fairly impressive.
Brett Cope: Yes. We have -- some of the color on that really is more, if you think about our team and the growth of the employees as just critical to the success of all the stakeholders' interests using equity within our structure has become very much more of the forefront discussion with the Board and Mike and I and our CHRO. And so yes, the stock split from a math standpoint about making sure it's a tool that we use for our team to support their engagement in the process here is definitely very active.
John Franzreb: Got it. And I guess kind of just one last one. How should we think about the cash on the balance sheet, over $500 million when does that number start to get drawn down a little bit as you use more working capital as these larger projects come on board?
Brett Cope: Well, let me just make a couple of comments there and let Mike jump in. As I noted, already this morning, I definitely think we're thinking about allocating some of that to some new facilities. I can't really pin down the timing yet. We've got a board here, 2 weeks. It will be in the discussion -- and then we're not slowing down on the M&A side, even though we did the one with Remsdaq in last summer. There are still some ideas out there that when we can get out in the market and do the strategic work. There's still some really nice potential out there. So there's that. And then I think the capital needs, Mike.
Michael Metcalf: Yes. As a follow-up on that, John. From a working capital perspective, roughly 40% to 50% of that balance will be deployed at some point in the future to that $1.6 billion backlog number. But that said, when you look at what's the free cash available for the capital deployment in some way, shape or form, it's probably $200 million to $225 million mentioned that we're thinking about capacity requirements across the business. So I'm sure some of it will get deployed in that fashion.
Operator: Our next question comes from Chip Moore with ROTH MKM.
Alfred Moore: Just one more for me on Remsdaq, I think you called out getting some traction here in the U.S. So just an update there now that you've had them for not too long, but a little longer -- and then service more opportunity, I guess, more specifically around data center, in particular, just talk to that.
Brett Cope: Well, thank you for the question. Yes, Remsdaq, great strategic add, great set of folks in the U.K. We -- when you have these dynamic times in the market, Chip, you -- every market has an approved approach, the way they bring in technology. Remsdaq was so experienced in their market in the utility space. That was one of the things that attracted us to them initially plus their technology road map. The data center market, the commercial and other industrial has definitely opened the door to allow us to get that technology in quicker than we anticipated into the U.S. market. So we've had some technical meetings with some of the customers that have come to us on applying this technology to the powertrain that speeds in the data center for some protective and control logic and it's opened the door. And it's created new opportunities for us even on the high-voltage side. We just took our first order for a high-voltage control protection substation the utility connect, if you will, the high voltage into the medium voltage, which would be a new space for Powell. And again, that was underscored by our ability with having Remsdaq and their technology as an enabler. So super exciting time. I have high expectation for the growth of this business. It is accretive to margin significantly, and Powell has a long history of success here. Service. yes. Thank you, Mike. On the service piece, yes, there is clearly opportunity on the data center front, the commercial and industrial. We haven't taken anything significant yet. But over the last quarter I've been involved myself in some of the discussions where we do see an opportunity for service to come in. On the build side, quite frankly, initially, we've not entered on the OpEx side after. I think that will come. Still a new market for us. And as these assets get installed, I think we'll see some installation and long-term support work. But we right now are developing some ideas with clients on how our team can help the constructability, the timing, given our know-how on the skid and the integration of the mechanical side of these solutions with how they're trying to speed up the time line. And so our service team is engaged and we're actually out providing some quotes for what we think we can do. We haven't closed anything yet, but it would be -- we do see it as a big opportunity as we go forward.
Operator: Our next question comes from Manish Somaiya with Cantor.
Manish Somaiya: Mike, I'm not sure if you mentioned the next 12 months backlog. Would you mind giving that to us?
Michael Metcalf: Manish, you'll see that in the Q that we submit later today. Of the $1.6 billion backlog, roughly 60% of that is convertible over the next 12 months , I think in the Q, you'll see $933 million. And on top of that, we refresh what the book and bill rates been on average over the last 12 months. And that's running $65 million to $70 million cadence every quarter. So those are 2 of the key metrics as you look forward.
Manish Somaiya: Okay. Wonderful. And then, Brett, you talked about strong demand across the board, strong activity, strong backlog my big question is the shortage of skilled labor in this country. And is that going to be a constraint as far as your growth ambitions are concerned?
Brett Cope: Well, it's always a concern, Manish. It has been the entire 15 years I've been at Powell through any cycle. Is it a concern today? Absolutely. The management team discusses it routinely. On the variable side, there's always a time where there's a skill set within the company that has a need. On the variable side, we're doing fairly well. In fact, I'd say in the last couple of quarters, we've solved some problems. As I sit here today on the fixed side, we do have some needs that are challenging us with this step change in -- especially on the commercial side. The growth in this segment is challenging some growth needs today on engineering. So that's a problem that we're out working and I feel confident in the next 90 days or so, we'll figure out how to solve that one. But it's not unique or new to us. We -- because we are a long-cycle project company by historical sense, we've been here before, and I'm confident the team will find a way to solve the need. But given the growth of the backlog, yes, we've got some needs right now, and we're going to go out and solve them.
Manish Somaiya: Well, thank you again, and congrats on the quarter.
Operator: This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the call back over to Brett Cope, CEO, for any closing remarks.
Brett Cope: Thank you, Bailey. Our first quarter delivered solid performance with improvements in our top and bottom line. Powell's employees consistently embrace the challenge while keeping our core focus on executing the most complex of industrial electrical distribution projects, our team is responding to meet new and growing market opportunities, which underscore our ability to secure future business and drive new strategies to improve productivity and profitability. I would like to thank our valued customers and our supplier partners for their continued trust and support Apollo. We're very pleased with our first quarter, and we expect another strong year for Powell. Mike and I look forward to updating you all next quarter.
Operator: The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.