Triumph shares fall as new boss digs in
"We're not a broken company" says boss Crowley
Shares of Triumph Group, the $4 billion (yearly sales) Chesterbrook-based aircraft parts and construction company serving Boeing, Airbus, Gulfstream and other big manufacturers, dropped nearly 12 percent today, closing below $30 for the first time since 2010, after reporting a quarterly loss and a small drop in sales. Financial report here.
New chief executive Daniel J. Crowley, who joined Triumph from Raytheon last month, told investors he's making progress on a reorganization plan to cut costs and boost sales. Triumph reported an $88 million fourth-quarter loss after writing off $229 million of the $1.4 billion it paid Carlyle Group for Boeing supplier Vought Aircraft Industries in 2010, and cited weaker jet construction revenues.
"What went wrong?" asked analyst Ron Epstein of Bank of America Merrill Lynch in a conference call with Crowley. "We're not a broken company," Crowley said (corrected). But "there hasn't been enough replacement" of old contracts with new deals in recent years.
The company expects the share of its business focused on high-end private jets will nearly double, to 19 percent, over the next year. In an interview, Crowley told me that part of the business has proved recession-resistant, and cited new contracts with Bombardier, Embraer and Gulfstream. "The fashionable aircraft market continues to be robust," he said.
Crowley said he's met with most of the company's customers and is crunching business data with a team of insiders and outsiders before bringing a reorganization plan to his board in the Spring. He also said he'd met with investors, including Atlantic Investment Management, the company's largest outside shareholder. "I'm on track," Crowley added.
