International Paper Co (IP) 2024 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Good morning, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to International Paper's fourth quarter 2024 earnings call. (Operator Instructions)

早安，感謝您的支持。歡迎參加國際紙業 2024 年第四季財報電話會議。（操作員指令）

And it is now my pleasure to turn the call over to Jose Maria Rodrigues Mace, Vice President, Investor Relations. Sir, the floor is yours.

現在我很高興將電話轉給投資人關係副總裁 Jose Maria Rodrigues Mace。先生，現在請您發言。

Thank you, Krista. Good morning and good afternoon, and thank you for joining International Paper's fourth quarter and full year 2024 earnings call. Our speakers this morning are Andrew Silvernail, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; and stepping in today for our Chief Financial Officer, Tim Nicholls, who is in London for DS Smith day one is Finance Vice President, Mark Nellessen.

謝謝你，克里斯塔。早上好，下午好，感謝您參加國際紙業 2024 年第四季和全年財報電話會議。今天早上的發言者是董事長兼執行長 Andrew Silvernail；今天，取代財務長 Tim Nicholls（他第一天在倫敦參加 DS Smith 會議的是財務副總裁 Mark Nellessen）。

There is important information at the beginning of our presentation, including certain legal disclaimers. For example, during this call, we will make forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties. These and other factors that could cause or contribute to actual results differing materially from such forward-looking statements can be found in our press releases and reports filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

我們的簡報開始時包含一些重要訊息，其中包括某些法律免責聲明。例如，在本次電話會議中，我們將做出受風險和不確定性影響的前瞻性陳述。這些因素和其他可能導致或促成實際結果與此類前瞻性陳述有重大差異的因素可在我們向美國證券交易委員會提交的新聞稿和報告中找到。

We will also present certain non-US GAAP financial information. A reconciliation of those figures to US GAAP financial measures is available on our website. Our website also contains copies of the fourth quarter and full year earnings press release and today's presentation slides. And finally, I would like to note that all financial materials in this presentation reflect only the current IP portfolio.

我們還將提供某些非美國 GAAP 財務資訊。這些數據與美國 GAAP 財務指標的對帳表可在我們的網站上查看。我們的網站還包含第四季度和全年收益新聞稿以及今天的簡報幻燈片的副本。最後，我想指出的是，本簡報中的所有財務資料僅反映當前的 IP 組合。

I will now turn the call over to Andy.

現在我將電話轉給安迪。

Thank you, Jose, and congratulations on your new role as Vice President of Investor Relations. And congratulations to Mark Nellessen, who's moving from IR to the lead finance role in our North American Packaging Solutions business. And Mark, thanks for pitching in for Tim as he's getting us ready here for day one with the DS Smith.

謝謝你，何塞，恭喜你出任投資人關係副總裁的新職務。並祝賀馬克·內爾森 (Mark Nellessen)，他從投資者關係部 (IR) 調任我們北美包裝解決方案業務的財務長。還有馬克，謝謝你幫助蒂姆，讓他為我們與 DS Smith 的第一天合作做好準備。

With that, good morning, and good afternoon, everybody. I'm going to begin on slide 3. I'm excited to share that today, DS Smith appear before the court in the UK to get final approval, and we officially expect to close the DS Smith transaction at the end of the day tomorrow, US time Friday, January 31. As you know, last week, the competition authorities of the European Commission approved the proposed acquisition of DS Smith by International Paper with conditions.

好了，大家早安，下午好。我將從第 3 張投影片開始。我很高興地告訴大家，今天，DS Smith 已在英國法庭出庭獲取最終批准，我們正式預計將在明天（美國時間 1 月 31 日星期五）結束時完成 DS Smith 交易。眾所周知，上週歐盟委員會競爭管理部門有條件地批准了國際紙業對 DS Smith 的收購提案。

The EC identified minimal concerns about the acquisitions impact on competition in certain areas. To resolve those concerns, we have agreed to divest five box plants in Northern France, Northern Spain and Portugal within the next 6 months. We would have preferred to retain all facilities in the IP family, and we truly appreciate the contributions for the team and the team members of these five plants. We're committed to identifying suitable buyers who can offer a viable future for these teams.

歐盟委員會表示，對於此次收購對某些領域競爭的影響，人們的擔憂很小。為了解決這些問題，我們同意在未來六個月內剝離位於法國北部、西班牙北部和葡萄牙的五家箱式工廠。我們本來希望保留 IP 家族的所有設施，我們非常感謝這五家工廠的團隊和團隊成員所做的貢獻。我們致力於尋找能夠為這些球隊提供可行未來的合適買家。

Each of these locations is attractive, and we expect significant interest from potential buyers. I'm looking forward to welcoming DS Smith to IP on Monday, February 3. Together with our customers, we're creating the global leader of sustainable packaging solutions, and we're focused on the attractive and growing markets in North America and EMEA. I'm excited about the potential to unlock value for our stakeholders. We'll do a deep dive on the path forward for DS Smith at our Investor Day in March.

每個地點都很有吸引力，我們預計潛在買家會對此產生濃厚興趣。我期待著 2 月 3 日星期一歡迎 DS Smith 加入 IP。我們與客戶一起打造永續包裝解決方案的全球領導者，並專注於北美和歐洲、中東和非洲地區具有吸引力且不斷成長的市場。我對為我們的利害關係人釋放價值的潛力感到非常興奮。我們將在三月的投資者日深入探討 DS Smith 的未來發展道路。

Now transitioning to slide 4. We are building a performance-driven customer-centric culture at IP to fulfill our purpose a culture that will enable us to create significant value for our employees, customers and shareholders. That work begins with a strong alignment around a very clear and compelling strategy and that strategy stems for our mission and our values of safety, ethics and excellence.

現在轉換到幻燈片 4。為了實現我們的目標，我們正在 IP 建立以績效為導向、以客戶為中心的文化，這種文化將使我們能夠為員工、客戶和股東創造巨大價值。這項工作始於圍繞著一個非常明確和令人信服的策略的強有力協調，該策略源於我們的使命以及我們的安全、道德和卓越的價值觀。

Most importantly, our teams will put safety above all else. We will drive profitable market share growth by being the low-cost producer and the most reliable and innovative sustainable packaging provider in North America to EMEA. A disciplined 80/20 mindset will permit everything we do. By focusing on the vertical view, we are aligning resources, reducing complexity, removing costs and delighting customers. These efforts are all focused to deliver superior value for all of our stakeholders.

最重要的是，我們的團隊將把安全放在第一位。我們將成為北美至歐洲、中東和非洲地區低成本生產商和最可靠、最具創新性的可持續包裝供應商，從而推動盈利市場份額的成長。嚴謹的 80/20 思維模式將使我們能做好每一件事。透過專注於垂直視角，我們可以協調資源、降低複雜性、消除成本並取悅客戶。這些努力都是為了為我們所有的利害關係人提供卓越的價值。

I'm now moving to slide 5. We're making progress and taking actions on our path to achieve $4 billion of EBITDA medium term. This does not include the DS Smith base earnings or synergies. Again, we're going to talk about those things in detail at our Investor Day in March. As I've shared in the past, roughly $1.2 billion of the improvement that we are targeting is going to come from cost out. This number is net of inflation. So the way to think about it is that we have to take out roughly $1.6 billion of cost.

我現在轉到投影片 5。我們不斷取得進展並採取行動，努力實現中期 40 億美元的 EBITDA。這不包括 DS Smith 基本收益或協同效應。再次，我們將在三月的投資者日詳細討論這些事情。正如我過去所分享的，我們設定的約 12 億美元的改善目標將來自成本支出。這個數字已經扣除通貨膨脹因素。所以我們應該考慮一下，我們必須拿出大約 16 億美元的成本。

As we talked about on the third quarter call, we started to do the heavy lifting, and we're making the right choices to take cost out of the system. Those impacts will ramp up through the year with actions already announced and more to come. We've zeroed up the corporate organization. We're aligning resources to the businesses, and we're having a lean, effective and efficient corporate staff. As a result, we expect our costs will be reduced by $120 million annually. We have taken the difficult actions to close five box plants in our Global Cellulose Fibers mill in Georgetown, we estimate that these combined will remove roughly another $110 million of cost from our run rate.

正如我們在第三季電話會議上所討論的那樣，我們開始做繁重的工作，並且我們正在做出正確的選擇來降低系統成本。隨著已經宣布的行動和即將採取的更多行動，這些影響將在今年逐漸顯現。我們已經將公司組織結構歸零。我們正在將資源與業務結合，並擁有精簡、有效和高效的公司員工。因此，我們預計每年將減少 1.2 億美元成本。我們已採取艱難措施，關閉位於喬治敦的全球纖維素纖維廠的五個箱體工廠，我們估計，這些措施加起來將從我們的運作率中再減少約 1.1 億美元的成本。

As I mentioned last quarter, our other -- there are two regions where we're doing 80/20 pilots. We're now calling these lighthouses. We have delivered 20% plus productivity gains, and we will scale that optimization method to another 22 box plants in 2025. We -- as we look into 2025 and beyond, we'll continue to be laser-focused on improving reliability at our mills and optimizing our mill and box systems, so we deliver structural cost reduction.

正如我上個季度提到的，我們在另外兩個地區進行 80/20 試點。我們現在稱這些為燈塔。我們的生產率已提高 20% 以上，到 2025 年，我們將把這種優化方法擴展到另外 22 個箱式工廠。展望 2025 年及以後，我們將繼續專注於提高工廠的可靠性並優化我們的工廠和裝箱系統，從而實現結構性成本降低。

In 2024, our operating performance and lack of productivity cost us $350 million. Unlocking this performance will free resources allow us to optimize our overall structure and drive profitable growth. We are also speeding up capital investment opportunities that we believe will deliver significant cost reduction. And to that extent, we have initiated a complete overhaul of our capital investment process to simplify and significantly reduce from time from idea to execution.

2024年，我們的營運績效和生產力缺乏給我們造成了3.5億美元的損失。釋放這項績效將釋放資源，使我們能夠優化整體結構並推動獲利成長。我們也正在加快資本投資機會，相信這將大幅降低成本。為此，我們已開始全面改革我們的資本投資流程，以簡化並大幅縮短從構思到執行的時間。

If we turn to the commercial improvements, we expect these commercial improvements to contribute roughly $800 million to our $4 billion target. Our go-to-market value over volume reset is essentially complete. We expect the final unfavorable impact to volume to be behind us later this year. Volume has tracked to our plan for the past three quarters and since we started looking at January, and we have a clear pipeline forward. We have developed a new compensation plan for our sales force to better align incentives to strategy. This plan will also support our goal of attracting and retaining the best commercial talent in the industry. We continue to add new sales associates as we enhance our commercial capabilities and move to a customer-centric culture.

如果我們轉向商業改進，我們預計這些商業改進將為我們 40 億美元的目標貢獻約 8 億美元。我們的市場價值與銷售重置基本完成。我們預計，對銷售量造成的最終不利影響將在今年稍後消失。過去三個季度，銷量一直按照我們的計劃進行，自從我們開始關註一月份以來，我們就有了明確的前進方向。我們為銷售人員制定了新的薪酬計劃，以便更好地將激勵措施與策略結合。該計劃還將支持我們吸引和留住業界最優秀的商業人才的目標。隨著我們商業能力的增強和以客戶為中心的文化的轉變，我們將繼續增加新的銷售人員。

This renewed focus on customer experience has already resulted in significant quality and on-time delivery improvements in our packaging business, which is validated by both internal and external data. This is true in general across the overall business and specifically at our 80/20 lighthouses. We also have an ambitious pipeline of capital projects to both facilitate the original optimization of our box system and deliver profitable market share growth.

這種對客戶體驗的重新關注已經使我們的包裝業務的品質和準時交貨率顯著提高，這已得到內部和外部數據的驗證。總體而言，這確實適用於整個業務，特別是我們的 80/20 燈塔。我們還擁有一系列雄心勃勃的資本項目，旨在促進我們盒子系統的原始優化並實現有利可圖的市場份額成長。

And I'll share an example here on the coming slides. Before we move on, let me say that I'm proud of our team and the solid progress we're making. We have a lot of work to do. There's absolutely no doubt about that, but the fundamentals are in place for our performance-driven customer-centric culture and those things starting to show. We have the right strategy and execution road map.

我將在接下來幻燈片中分享一個例子。在我們繼續之前，請允許我說我為我們的團隊和我們所取得的堅實進展感到自豪。我們還有很多工作要做。對此毫無疑問，但我們以績效為導向、以客戶為中心的文化的基礎已經到位，而這些事情開始顯現。我們有正確的策略和執行路線圖。

Now comes the hard part, and it will not be linear. We need to demonstrate the ability to execute with excellence. Our success and our destiny lie in our control. Our actions are aimed to drive transformational improvements at IP and create significant value for our shareholders.

現在到了困難的部分，而且它並不是直線性的。我們需要展現卓越執行的能力。我們的成功和命運掌握在我們自己的手中。我們的行動旨在推動知識產權的轉型改進並為我們的股東創造重大價值。

I'm now on to slide 6. I I'm excited to share we are investing in a greenfield state-of-the-art corrugated box facility in Waterloo, Iowa. This is a great example of the investments we're making as we continue with our ambitious plans to optimize our mill-to-box system and generate attractive returns. This worldwide box plant is designed to deliver on our strategy, 20% lower cost, designed in product quality and just-in-time service.

我現在講的是第 6 張投影片。我很高興地告訴大家，我們正在愛荷華州滑鐵盧投資一個最先進的綠地瓦楞紙箱工廠。這是我們正在進行的投資的一個很好的例子，我們將繼續實施我們的雄心勃勃的計劃，以優化我們的從磨到箱的系統並產生可觀的回報。這個全球性的紙箱工廠旨在實現我們的策略，即降低20%的成本，設計優質的產品品質和及時的服務。

All of this is aligned to a geography and end markets where we are positioned to win. The facility will be strategically located close to some of our best customers, specifically in the protein segment, while being in a freight advantage distance from one of our mills. The plan is to start construction this year and targeting for a start-up in 2026. So again, it's a best-in-class facility designed specifically to delight our customers, achieve a low-cost position to drive profitable growth.

所有這些都與我們有望獲勝的地理位置和終端市場一致。該工廠將策略性地選址在我們一些最好的客戶附近，特別是在蛋白質領域，同時與我們的其中一個工廠具有貨運優勢。該計劃於今年開始建設，目標是在 2026 年建成投產。再次強調，這是一流的設施，專為取悅我們的客戶而設計，實現低成本，推動獲利成長。

In addition to Waterloo, we're also acquiring a bulk plant in West Monroe, Louisiana. This additional capacity and expanded capabilities will allow us to grow our specialty business in an attractive market. As you know, bulk is a business where we are differentiated and have a very good performance track record. We anticipate closing this deal tomorrow.

除了滑鐵盧之外，我們還收購了位於路易斯安那州西門羅的一家散裝工廠。這種額外的產能和擴展的能力將使我們能夠在有吸引力的市場中發展我們的專業業務。如您所知，散裝業務是我們差異化的業務，並且擁有非常好的業績記錄。我們預計明天完成這筆交易。

So now let's turn to our full year performance. First, I'll share some highlights, and then I'll turn it over to Mark to walk you through the details. I'm now on slide 8. Our full year results came in line with our outlook. Relative to prior year performance, higher pricing was more than offset by higher costs than expected volume losses from our commercial strategy, just as we expected. We have seen significant price improvements in our North American packaging business from our go-to-market execution and favorable price index moves. Volume came in lower, but very much in line with our expectations.

現在讓我們來看看我們的全年業績。首先，我將分享一些亮點，然後我將交給馬克向您介紹詳細資訊。我現在講的是第 8 張投影片。我們的全年業績符合我們的預期。相對於去年同期的表現，正如我們預期的那樣，更高的定價被高於我們商業策略預期的銷售損失所抵消。透過我們的市場執行和有利的價格指數變動，我們看到北美包裝業務的價格顯著改善。交易量有所下降，但仍符合我們的預期。

And again, we're seeing that in January. This period-over-period volume declines from our packaging contract restructuring is playing out in line with our predictions, which is giving us good line of sight along [we will] see an inflection point to profitable market share growth. Costs were higher due to employee incentive compensation and were impacted by reliability issues at some of our mills. As I shared before, we are laser-focused on improving reliability and taking cost out of the system.

我們在一月份再次看到了這種情況。由於我們的包裝合約重組而導致的期內銷量下降與我們的預測一致，這讓我們有很好的預見性，我們將看到盈利市場份額增長的拐點。由於員工激勵薪酬導致成本較高，並且受到部分工廠可靠性問題的影響。正如我之前所說，我們專注於提高可靠性和降低系統成本。

As we look to 2025, I want to note that we're not going to go into detail on the outlook for this year. As you may recall, while our combination with DS Smith remains pending, certain UK rules constrain our ability to provide a profit forecast. Even though we are looking forward to closing the transaction tomorrow, today, we are still subject to those rules, which limit what I can say. Our plan is to provide you with our outlook and a detailed road map at our Investor Day coming up in March.

展望 2025 年，我想指出的是，我們不會詳細討論今年的前景。您可能還記得，雖然我們與 DS Smith 的合併仍未完成，但英國的某些規則限制了我們提供利潤預測的能力。儘管我們期待明天完成交易，但今天我們仍然受制於那些規則，這些規則限制了我能說的話。我們計劃在三月的投資者日向您提供我們的展望和詳細的路線圖。

But at a high level, 2025 is expected to be a transformational year. During the first few months, we anticipate earnings will continue with the stabilization trend and then we expect our earnings to progressively ramp from a combination of the cost actions already announced further improvements throughout the year, sequentially improving commercial wins and overall benefits of our 80/20 implementation.

但從高層次來看，2025 年預計將是一個轉型之年。在最初的幾個月裡，我們預計收益將繼續保持穩定趨勢，然後我們預計我們的收益將透過已經宣布的成本行動和全年的進一步改善逐步上升，從而依次提高商業收益和我們 80/20 實施的整體效益。

With that, I'm going to turn it over to Mark, who's going to provide more details on our fourth quarter performance and outlook.

接下來，我將把時間交給馬克，他將提供有關我們第四季度業績和展望的更多詳細資訊。

Thank you, Andy. So turning to our fourth quarter key financials on slide 9. Operating earnings per share came in slightly better than the outlook we provided last quarter. Our EBITDA margin came in slightly better sequentially and overall, we see stable to improving results on a sequential basis. Our free cash flow was impacted primarily by changes in working capital as well as sequentially higher capital spending and DS Smith related transaction costs.

謝謝你，安迪。因此，請看第 9 頁的第四季度主要財務數據。每股營業收益略優於我們上個季度提供的預期。我們的 EBITDA 利潤率較上季略有好轉，整體而言，我們預期業績較上季穩定或有所改善。我們的自由現金流主要受到營運資本變動以及持續增加的資本支出和 DS Smith 相關交易成本的影響。

We could turn to slide 10, and I can provide more details about the fourth quarter as we walk through the sequential earnings bridges. Fourth quarter adjusted operating earnings per share was negative $0.02 as compared to $0.44 in the third quarter. As expected, accelerated depreciation expense was a significant impact in the fourth quarter due to previously announced facility closures, accounting for $0.56 per share.

我們可以翻到第 10 張投影片，在我們回顧連續獲利情況時，我可以提供有關第四季度的更多詳細資訊。第四季調整後每股營業收益為負 0.02 美元，而第三季為 0.44 美元。正如預期的那樣，由於先前宣布的工廠關閉，加速折舊費用在第四季度產生了重大影響，佔每股 0.56 美元。

Price and mix was higher by $0.12 per share, driven by the flow-through of prior price index movements and mix benefits in our packaging business. Volume was unfavorable by $0.08 per share due to two fewer shipping days in North America box as well as some volume trade-offs related to commercial contract restructuring actions. Deploying our commercial strategies across the portfolio continue to impact volumes as we closed out the year as we expected.

價格和組合上漲了 0.12 美元/股，這得益於先前價格指數變動的傳導和我們包裝業務的組合效益。由於北美貨箱運輸天數減少兩天，以及商業合約重組行動導致運輸量有所損失，導致每股運輸量下降 0.08 美元。正如我們預期的那樣，我們在投資組合中部署商業策略繼續對銷售產生影響。

Operations at cost was unfavorable by $0.11 per share sequentially. This is largely the impact of seasonally higher costs as well as a step down in insurance recovery related to the [X-Tack] box plant fire and some reliability events in our mill system across both businesses. Maintenance outages were higher by $6 million or $0.01 per share in the fourth quarter and input costs were favorable by $0.06 per share sequentially, mainly driven by lower cost for OCC and wood. And finally, corporate items favorably impacted earnings by $0.12 per share sequentially, primarily due to lower taxes.

成本經營業務每股收益比上一季下降 0.11 美元。這主要是受季節性成本上漲、[X-Tack] 箱式工廠火災相關的保險追償額下降以及我們兩家企業的工廠系統的一些可靠性事件的影響。第四季維護停機費用增加了 600 萬美元，即每股 0.01 美元，投入成本環比下降 0.06 美元/股，主要由於 OCC 和木材成本下降。最後，公司專案對每股盈餘產生了 0.12 美元的正面影響，這主要由於稅率降低。

Turning to the segments and starting with the Industrial Packaging's fourth quarter results on slide 11. Price and mix was higher by $63 million due to the realization of approximately $40 million of benefits from prior index movement along with additional benefits from our Containerboard export and open market sales. We saw a mix improvement in both North America and Europe. Volume was lower by $24 million sequentially due to two fewer shipping days in the fourth quarter. In addition, we made choices based on our box go-to-market strategy that negatively impacted our volume as expected, but this will allow us to improve our margins and mix over the long term.

轉向各部門，從第 11 張投影片上的工業包裝第四季業績開始。價格和產品組合上漲了 6,300 萬美元，因為從先前的指數變動中獲得了約 4,000 萬美元的收益，以及從我們的箱板紙出口和公開市場銷售中獲得了額外收益。我們看到北美和歐洲的混合改善。由於第四季運輸天數減少兩天，因此銷售量環比下降 2,400 萬美元。此外，我們根據盒子進入市場策略做出的選擇對我們的銷售產生了負面影響，但從長遠來看，這將使我們能夠提高利潤率和產品組合。

Operations cost was $22 million unfavorable sequentially primarily due to the impact of seasonally higher costs, a step down in the X-Tack insurance proceeds, which we received $25 million in the third quarter to $12 million in the fourth quarter and some reliability events in our mill system. Planned maintenance outages were lower by $22 million sequentially and input costs were $20 million favorable, primarily due to lower OCC and wood costs. And accelerated depreciation decreased earnings by $9 million due to the five packaging facility closures in the fourth quarter.

營運成本季減 2,200 萬美元，主要原因是受季節性成本上漲的影響，X-Tack 保險收益減少（第三季收到 2,500 萬美元，第四季收到 1,200 萬美元），以及工廠系統發生的一些可靠性事件。計畫維護停工費用比上一季減少了 2,200 萬美元，投入成本減少了 2,000 萬美元，主要歸因於 OCC 和木材成本的降低。由於第四季關閉五家包裝工廠，加速折舊導致收益減少 900 萬美元。

Moving on to fourth quarter results for Global Cellulose Fibers on slide 12. Price and mix was sequentially lower by $13 million due to price index movement. Volume sequentially was lower by $8 million in the quarter due to the Georgetown mill closure in early December as well as a pull-forward of orders in the prior quarter as customers anticipated a potential port strike.

繼續查看幻燈片 12 上的全球纖維素纖維第四季業績。由於物價指數變動，價格和產品組合連續下降 1,300 萬美元。由於喬治城工廠於 12 月初關閉，以及客戶預計可能出現港口罷工而導致上一季度訂單提前，本季銷量環比下降 800 萬美元。

Operations and cost was unfavorable sequentially by $23 million which includes unabsorbed fix costs from the Georgetown mill closure, some reliability issues and higher seasonal costs. Planned maintenance outages were higher in the fourth quarter by $28 million, and input costs were $4 million favorable, primarily driven by lower wood costs. And finally, accelerated depreciation decreased earnings by $222 million, mostly due to the Georgetown mill closure in the fourth quarter.

營運和成本環比下降 2,300 萬美元，其中包括喬治敦工廠關閉所產生的未吸收修復成本、一些可靠性問題以及更高的季節性成本。第四季計畫維護停工費用增加了 2,800 萬美元，投入成本有利 400 萬美元，主要得益於木材成本下降。最後，加速折舊導致收益減少 2.22 億美元，主要原因是喬治城工廠在第四季度關閉。

Turning to slide 13. Before we get into the details, I would remind everyone that accelerated depreciation is included in operating earnings and is called out for each business -- and sorry, adjusted earnings for our Industrial Packaging segment are expected to be higher sequentially by $52 million. This includes a non-repeat of accelerated D&A expense. Adjusted earnings for Global Cellulose Fibers are expected to be higher specially by approximately $220 million, and this also includes a non-repeat of accelerated depreciation expense in the prior quarter.

翻到第 13 張投影片。在我們討論細節之前，我想提醒大家，加速折舊包含在營業收入中，並且針對每個業務都進行了說明 - 抱歉，我們工業包裝部門的調整後收益預計將比上一季度增長 5200 萬美元。這包括不重複的加速 D&A 費用。全球纖維素纖維業務的調整後收益預計將特別高出約 2.2 億美元，這還包括上一季未重複的加速折舊費用。

Now let me give you a breakdown by business segment. I'll start with Industrial Packaging. We expect price and mix to decrease earnings by $5 million sequentially from lower export pricing to date and unfavorable seasonal mix impact. Volume is expected to increase earnings by $10 million due to two more shipping days primarily. We expect operations and costs to increase earnings by $30 million. This includes benefits from our box plant optimization as well as non-repeats related to incentive compensation and other items from the prior quarter. It also includes the unfavorable impact of wage inflation.

現在讓我按業務部門給您細分。我將從工業包裝開始。我們預計，由於迄今為止的出口價格較低以及不利的季節性組合影響，價格和產品組合將導致收益連續減少 500 萬美元。預計銷量將增加 1000 萬美元，這主要歸因於增加了兩天的運輸時間。我們預計營運和成本將增加 3000 萬美元的收益。這包括我們的箱體工廠優化帶來的收益以及與激勵薪酬和上一季其他項目相關的非重複收益。其中還包括工資上漲的不利影響。

We expect accelerated depreciation will increase earnings for the packaging business by approximately $11 million because of the expense related to the five packaging facility closures that occurred in the fourth quarter. Lower maintenance outage expense is expected to increase earnings by $6 million. And lastly, we expect input costs to remain flat overall with higher energy costs offsetting lower OCC prices.

我們預計，由於第四季度關閉五家包裝工廠相關的費用，加速折舊將使包裝業務的收益增加約 1,100 萬美元。降低維護停機費用預計將使收益增加 600 萬美元。最後，我們預期投入成本整體將保持平穩，較高的能源成本將抵消較低的 OCC 價格。

Switching to Global Cellulose Fibers, we expect price and mix to decrease earnings by approximately $10 million as a result of prior index movement. Volume is expected to be stable and we expect operations to cost to increase earnings by approximately $35 million. This includes improved performance and reliability as well as non-repeats related to incentive compensation and other items from the prior quarter.

轉向全球纖維素纖維，我們預計，由於先前的指數變動，價格和組合將導致收益減少約 1000 萬美元。預計銷售量將保持穩定，我們預計營運成本將增加收益約 3,500 萬美元。這包括提高性能和可靠性，以及與激勵薪酬和上一季其他項目相關的非重複性情況。

We expect accelerated depreciation will increase earnings for the pulp business by approximately $222 million because of the expense related to the closure of Georgetown mill in the fourth quarter. Higher planned maintenance outage expense is expected to decrease earnings in the fourth quarter by approximately [$26 million]. And lastly, input costs are expected to be stable.

我們預計，由於第四季度關閉喬治敦工廠的相關費用，加速折舊將使紙漿業務的收益增加約 2.22 億美元。計劃內維護停機費用增加預計將導致第四季度收益減少約[2600 萬美元]。最後，預計投入成本將保持穩定。

With that, let me turn it back over to Andy.

說完這些，讓我把話題轉回給安迪。

Thanks, Mark. We'll now turn to slide 14. I'm excited to remind everybody that we'll be hosting our Investor Day in New York on March 25, we will provide an in-depth review of our strategy business and financial objectives for the new IP. We'll share our progress on DS Smith integration and outlook, the detailed plan for North American packaging and how 80/20 deployment across the company will help drive profitable growth. Our goal is to provide a very detailed, clear and time-based path forward.

謝謝，馬克。我們現在翻到第 14 張投影片。我很高興地提醒大家，我們將於 3 月 25 日在紐約舉辦投資者日，我們將深入審查新 IP 的策略業務和財務目標。我們將分享 DS Smith 整合和前景的進展、北美包裝的詳細計劃以及如何在整個公司範圍內進行 80/20 部署以推動盈利增長。我們的目標是提供一條非常詳細、清晰且基於時間的前進道路。

With that, operator, let's now pause and take questions.

接線員，現在讓我們暫停一下並回答問題。

(Operator Instructions)

（操作員指令）

Mark Weintraub, Seaport Research Partners.

馬克‧溫特勞布 (Mark Weintraub)，海港研究夥伴。

I appreciate in the comments you made it clear that the volumes in the fourth quarter were pretty much in line with what you had expected. Obviously, they were pretty big year-over-year decline. And I think that in the past, you've talked about that there would still be negative year-over-year for the -- maybe through the middle of next year and then things stabilize and potentially move positive in the second half. Is that still kind of a reasonable game plan?

我很欣賞您在評論中明確表示第四季度的交易量與您的預期基本一致。顯然，與去年同期相比，下降幅度相當大。我認為，您過去曾談到，也許到明年年中，全球經濟仍將出現同比負增長，但下半年情況將趨於穩定，並有可能轉為正增長。這仍然是合理的比賽計劃嗎？

Yeah, Mark, first of all, absolutely. So we certainly don't like the reality of the results in the fourth quarter. It is exactly what we had expected. And so when I -- when you look at the volume drops off on year-over-year, it is -- when you net out kind of wins and losses, 100% of what we're seeing is the expected from the contract process that we've been going through in the last 18 months to two years.

是的，馬克，首先，絕對是如此。所以我們當然不喜歡第四季的業績現實。這正是我們所期望的。因此，當我看到交易量逐年下降時，當你扣除盈利和虧損後，我們看到的 100％ 是我們在過去 18 個月到兩年內經歷的合約流程所預期的結果。

And so it's right on track. I think importantly, right, if we look at January, January is right on track in terms of what we're seeing for day rates and so what you should expect to see is that bottom of the third quarter and fourth quarter, it will step up. We need a less year-over-year loss in the first quarter, less year-over-year loss again sequentially in the second quarter. And then as we get into the back half, when exactly we break that 0 point. I don't know if it's going to be exactly the third quarter or not, but it's somewhere in there. But in that second half, we expect it to crest these choices. So I'm going to knock on wood, but that feels good.

因此一切都進展順利。我認為重要的是，如果我們看一下一月份，就我們所看到的一月份的日費率而言，它是完全按照軌道運行的，因此你應該預見到的是，在第三季度和第四季度的底部，它將會上升。我們希望第一季的年比虧損減少，第二季的年比虧損再次減少。然後當我們進入後半段時，我們恰好打破了0分的局面。我不知道它是否確實會在第三季度出現，但它應該在某個時候。但在下半場，我們預計這些選擇將達到頂峰。所以我要敲木頭，但感覺很好。

The other thing I'd add to that, Mark, is if you look at the investments that we've been making on the box plant side for reliability, I think very importantly, that is now showing up in internal and external data. So if you look at the data from our on-time delivery metrics our service metrics and then you also look at -- we do a third-party validated NPS, I also saw another third-party benchmark last week. We have clearly moved very significantly from a service perspective in the minds of our customer.

馬克，我想補充的另一件事是，如果你看看我們在整車廠方面為了可靠性而進行的投資，我認為非常重要的是，這現在已在內部和外部數據中得到體現。因此，如果您查看我們的準時交付指標、服務指標的數據，然後您也會查看——我們進行了第三方驗證的 NPS，我上週還看到了另一個第三方基準測試。在客戶心目中，我們從服務角度顯然已經取得了很大的進展。

And the reason that's important is we're now starting to quote pieces of business that we didn't have the opportunity to quote a year ago. And so we've got some pretty decent-sized chunks of business. Not much of it is baked into our expectations for the year, but we've got some pretty desized chunks of contracts that are now rolling off where we think we're putting a very attractive value proposition.

這很重要，因為我們現在開始對一年前沒有機會報價的業務進行報價。因此，我們獲得了一些相當可觀的業務量。其中大部分內容並未包含在我們今年的預期中，但我們已經獲得了一些相當大的合同，我們認為這些合約提出了非常有吸引力的價值主張。

So we're moving from a very defensive posture relative to the commercial side of the business to slowly moving to an offensive posture. And I want to say slowly because we still have to finish (inaudible) as a whole. And we've got to win some of these businesses. But where we are relative to our plan, when you look into our sales pipeline, that pipeline and what's happening on a day basis is now showing signs of congruity, and I like the fact that we're starting to quote some business that we didn't have the opportunity in the last year or two.

因此，我們正從相對於商業業務的非常防禦的姿態逐漸轉向進攻的姿態。我想說慢慢來，因為我們還必須整體完成（聽不清楚）。我們必須贏得其中一些業務。但是，相對於我們的計劃，當您查看我們的銷售管道時，該管道和每天發生的事情現在顯示出一致的跡象，而且我喜歡這樣一個事實，即我們開始引用一些我們在過去一兩年內沒有機會的業務。

Great. And maybe kind of following up along the lines of the response to the question. I think you also mentioned like a $350 million lack of productivity, reliability type of things. Can you maybe provide more color on specifically what you meant by that? And do we get that back? And what are the actions that are being taken currently?

偉大的。並且可能會按照問題的答案進行後續跟進。我想您也提到了 3.5 億美元的生產力和可靠性方面的缺失。您能否更詳細地解釋一下您這樣說的具體意義？我們能把它拿回來嗎？目前正在採取哪些行動？

Yes. So Mark, actually, I think this is a linchpin, right? So going back to my days at Danaher running a sub-plant, sub-manufacturing plant, right? You're always looking for the bottlenecks to the key of your strategy or the key of your execution. And so it took me a little while to get in and understand kind of exactly what was going on, but I'll simplify two ways. One is we've been living in a world of less capacity for too long. And because of that, and it makes you soft, it's kind of like an athlete who sits on the couch for a couple of years. It makes you soft. And so as we have started to push part of our operations.

是的。所以馬克，實際上，我認為這是關鍵，對吧？那麼回到我在丹納赫經營分廠、分廠的日子，對嗎？您總是在尋找戰略關鍵或執行關鍵的瓶頸。因此，我花了一段時間才明白到底發生了什麼，但我會用兩種方式來簡化。一是我們已經在一個容量越來越小的世界生活太久了。正因為如此，它會讓你變得柔軟，就像一個在沙發上坐了幾年的運動員。它使你變得柔軟。因此，我們已經開始推動部分業務運作。

And when I say that, pushing them in terms of moving volume to assets that we need to have be A+. We're pushing that. And so -- and what that's showing is it's showing the mill capability. And we've got a few mills that we've got some serious work to do. And when you add that up, that's down near a couple of hundred million dollars a year in potential, right?

當我這麼說的時候，我們會推動他們將資產轉移到我們需要的 A+ 級資產。我們正在推動這一點。所以 — — 這顯示了工廠的能力。我們有幾家工廠需要認真開展工作。如果你把這些加起來，每年的潛在收益就接近幾億美元，對嗎？

So you're having to keep way too much cost in your system because, frankly, when you go back and you do the root cause analysis, which we have, it comes back to two things. It comes back to underspending for a very long period of time. It's not a year or two, right? It's underspending on basic reliability stuff in the mills. And so as you can imagine, right, your kind of -- your plan is constantly changing the bogeys teams for those teams, and they're having to run rush on.

因此，您必須在系統中保留太多的成本，因為坦白說，當您回過頭來做根本原因分析時（我們已經做過了），它會回到兩件事。它又回到了長期支出不足的問題。這不是一年兩年的事了，對吧？工廠在基本可靠性方面的支出不足。所以你可以想像，對吧，你的計畫是不斷改變那些球隊的對手，他們必須加快腳步。

And the second thing, right, we are -- we have experienced and everybody in our industry and everybody in manufacturing is experiencing is a pretty significant change over of people. And so as you -- as experience starts to change in those mills, and you combine those two things together, it can make it a less reliable day to day. And so our focus is very much on maintenance investment and reliability spend, capital and expense and it is on rapid training for leaders who are new to a position.

第二件事，對的，我們——我們經歷過，我們行業中的每個人，製造業中的每個人都經歷了相當重大的人員變動。所以，隨著這些工廠的經驗開始發生變化，並且將這兩件事結合在一起，每天的工作就會變得不那麼可靠。因此，我們的重點是維護投資和可靠性支出、資本和費用，以及對新領導者的快速培訓。

And so you really got a focus there. And the good part about that, right, is you can count this -- and what I mean by that, you can see the amount of -- if you think of kind of mill performance as the benchmark of where you are in terms of your ability to absorb the overhead and produce, we can see this pretty tightly. And so making those investments, and that's a linchpin to the rest of our strategy of getting costs out of the system.

所以你確實把焦點放在那裡。而這樣做的好處是，對吧，你可以計算這個——我的意思是，你可以看到數量——如果你把工廠績效看作是你吸收間接費用和生產能力的基準，我們就可以相當準確地看到這一點。因此，進行這些投資是我們其餘的策略的關鍵，即降低系統成本。

The second part to it really comes around productivity. And what I mean by that is in any manufacturing world, the goal should be to offset your, what I'll call, internal productivity. So I don't mean input costs, right? I'm talking about the wage, maintenance, those pieces of normal inflation, you've got to drive to offset that. And in my experience, we've been able to do that in the companies that I worked for.

第二部分實際上涉及生產力。我的意思是，在任何製造業中，目標都應該是抵銷我所說的內部生產力。所以我的意思不是指投入成本，對嗎？我指的是工資，生活費，這些是正常通貨膨脹的部分，你必須努力抵消它們。根據我的經驗，在我工作過的公司裡我們能夠做到這一點。

We're seeing it already in some of the very focused work that we're doing. I'll use the box plant lighthouses, now we call them pilots or I'll call them lighthouses as the example. But as you know, this is a very high contribution margin business. And so as you drive productivity, you can take significant cost out in or as you move volume over a different set of assets, the contribution margins are just really high.

我們在正在進行的一些非常有針對性的工作中已經看到了這一點。我將使用箱形植物燈塔（現在我們稱之為領航員或我將稱之為燈塔）作為例子。但正如你所知，這是一項貢獻利潤率非常高的業務。因此，當您提高生產力時，您可以節省大量成本，或者當您將產量轉移到不同的資產組時，貢獻利潤率就會非常高。

That's something we haven't done. Again, that's when you think about keeping too much capacity that ends up as EBT, that's how it shows up. And so we believe that absolutely can go after that. You don't -- look, you're not going to get it overnight. But in the time frames that we're talking about in terms of both driving the day-to-day excellence of execution and then having the productivity flywheel moving. It's $300 million to $400 million. It's a lot of money. And so yeah, we can get it back.

這是我們還沒做過的事。再說一遍，當你考慮保留過多的容量而最終變成 EBT 時，它就會這樣出現。因此我們相信，這絕對可以實現。你不需要——你看，你不可能在一夜之間就得到它。但在我們談論的時間範圍內，既要推動日常執行的卓越性，又要讓生產力飛輪運轉起來。大約是 3 億到 4 億美元。這是一大筆錢。是的，我們可以把它拿回來。

Phil Ng, Jefferies.

傑富瑞 (Jefferies) 的 Phil Ng。

Andy, I appreciate all the great color. I thought slide deck was pretty awesome. I had a lot of great color in terms of things that you guys have done already on the cost of commercial action side of things. You also gave us a look at what's still to come more on to-do list with items like mill and box system structural cost-out efforts, reducing organizational complexity and expanding the self-source. So (inaudible) 1Q is kind of a stabilization period.

安迪，我欣賞所有美麗的色彩。我認為幻燈片非常棒。就商業行動成本方面來說，你們已經做了許多出色的事情，我對此有很多看法。您還讓我們了解了待辦事項清單上尚待完成的工作，例如工廠和箱子系統結構成本削減工作、降低組織複雜性和擴大自有資源等。因此（聽不清楚）第一季是一種穩定期。

And you kind of pointed out earnings momentum, transformation 2025, kind of help us think through how that could kind of layer through this year, some of these actions, whether it's all in the cost or commercial side, and think about the earnings momentum as the year progresses. You talked about the $300 million to $400 million that you -- was a drag. I mean, how quickly can we get to that back, I guess?

您指出了盈利勢頭、2025 年轉型，這些有助於我們思考如何在今年實現這些目標，這些行動無論是在成本方面還是商業方面，並思考隨著時間的推移盈利勢頭。您剛剛談到了 3 億到 4 億美元，這對您來說是一個拖累。我的意思是，我們多久才能回到那個狀態？

Yeah. So Phil, great question. I think as we think about this year playing out, that the cost out that we announced last quarter, as you can imagine, right, making that real through the fourth quarter of the year that then starts to layer in throughout the year. And so you should see that kind of sequentially ramp as people who are no longer going to be with the company assets that have been closed. As you know, you don't just close an asset and all the cost go away, there's a tail to that until we have to move into that tail.

是的。菲爾，這個問題問得真好。我認為，當我們思考今年的進展時，我們上個季度宣布的成本，正如你可以想像的，將在今年第四季度實現，然後開始在全年累積。因此，您應該會看到，隨著人們不再持有已關閉的公司資產，這種現象會逐漸增加。如你所知，你不可能只關閉一項資產，所有成本就都消失了，這背後還有一條尾巴，直到我們必須進入那條尾巴。

That gets better as the year goes on. And then we have an expectation that we're going to continue to drive cost aggressively as we go through the year. And you should expect us -- the thing that I would be looking for (inaudible) me is a quarterly drumbeat of actions, right? That's what you're seeing. Obviously, it needs to show up in the P&L and in the balance sheet and ultimately, cash flow. And so on the cost side, right, we've got a road map that we've laid out.

隨著時間的推移，情況會越來越好。然後我們預計，我們將繼續在今年大幅降低成本。您應該期待我們 - 我所期待的（聽不清楚）是每季的行動鼓點，對嗎？這就是你所看到的。顯然，它需要出現在損益表和資產負債表中，並最終出現在現金流中。因此在成本方面，我們已經制定了路線圖。

We've had to be pretty selective about how we could talk about that with all of you because of the DS Smith process. That restraint comes off. And so at the Investor Day, the intention is to show a much more clear road map, obviously, being respectful of all of our stakeholders in the process. So you should expect to see that ramp and then on the commercial side, really, if you look at what's baked in right now on the commercial side, is the pricing that we have today, right?

由於 DS Smith 流程，我們必須非常謹慎地選擇如何與大家討論問題。那種克制消失了。因此，在投資者日，我們的目的是展示一個更清晰的路線圖，顯然，我們會尊重這個過程中的所有利害關係人。因此，您應該期待看到這種增長，然後在商業方面，實際上，如果您看看現在商業方面的情況，這就是我們今天的定價，對嗎？

We haven't adjusted for any future index changes. We have no idea, right, what's going to happen with that. So we don't have any expectation there. So it's the prices that we're going to market with today, plus if you kind of think through our expected pipeline. So there is no kind of major expectation of giant wins that's in our outlook for this year, so just to be clear.

我們尚未針對任何未來的指數變化做出調整。我們不知道會發生什麼事。所以我們對此不抱任何期望。所以這是我們今天要推向市場的價格，另外如果你仔細想想我們預期的管道。因此，我們需要明確一點，我們對今年的展望並不抱持任何巨大的期望。

So the reality of that, and you guys know this as well as anybody, turnarounds take time. and they're not linear. And so if you think of it as a run chart, right, as you go into one of our mills and you see process run charts all the time, right? The tolerances are wide right now. There's a lot of variation. And our job is to squeeze that variation in every way, right?

所以現實情況是，你們和其他人都清楚這一點，轉變需要時間。而且它們不是線性的。因此，如果您將其視為運行圖表，對嗎？目前容忍度很大。存在著多種變化。我們的工作就是想辦法壓縮這種變化，對嗎？

We're trying to squeeze the variation in what causes kind of these wild changes to -- in parts of our business that, frankly, we don't think should be as volatile. We're making changes to those things and then you've got to execute. And when I said in my prepared remarks, this is where the hard work begins. I mean this is where you are in the muck. You have to be, these things happen at a box plant, at a mill, right? They don't happen in the ether.

我們正在嘗試壓縮導致這些劇烈變化的各種因素，坦白說，我們認為部分業務不應該如此劇烈波動。我們正在對這些事情做出改變，然後你必須執行。正如我在準備好的演講中所說，艱苦的工作就是從這裡開始的。我的意思是，這就是你所處的泥淖。你一定知道，這些事情是在紙箱工廠、工廠裡發生的，對吧？它們不會在以太中發生。

And so really getting to incredibly disciplined cause and effect where I'm pulling a certain lever, and that is going to take a cost out or it's going to win a customer. That's where we are. And so we certainly have a plan for how that ramps throughout the year. I'm very aware -- I've looked at hundreds of businesses and business plans over years. And whenever you see an aggressive track like this, you have to discount it, right? You have to be smart about that. So we have to make consistent progress quarter-over-quarter. We need to exit this year substantially better than where we ran last year and where we ran this year.

因此，真正得到非常有紀律的因果關係，我拉動某個槓桿，這將節省成本，或贏得客戶。這正是我們所處的情況。所以我們當然有一個計劃，用於確定全年如何實現這一目標。我非常清楚——多年來我已經研究過數百家企業和商業計劃。每當你看到像這樣的激進的賽道時，你都必須忽視它，對嗎？你必須聰明地對待這件事。因此，我們必須每季都取得持續的進步。我們今年的成績需要比去年和今年的成績好得多。

A couple of things that I see is really encouraging. So if you look at the North American Packaging Solutions business exclusively, and you look at where they're tracking relative to where Tom Hamic and team said they would be tracking on the commercial side, we feel really good, on the investments that we've made into the box plant business and the expected improvements on service improvements has absolutely shown up.

我看到的一些事情確實令人鼓舞。因此，如果您專門看北美包裝解決方案業務，並看看他們相對於湯姆·哈米克和團隊所說的商業方面的跟踪情況，我們對我們對紙箱廠業務的投資以及服務改進的預期改進感到非常滿意。

And we have moved the entire standard deviation in performance and customer service performance in the last year. And that is a big deal. And so we've seen that. And we've also seen what that means to specific customers. I'm spending time with specific customers talking about their experience with us. We're now getting on site with customers and doing joint innovation sessions, but we're pushing -- we're starting to push those envelopes, more than we have in the past. But this is where, look, this is where it's a nice flight. At the end of the day, that's what this is, and we're in execution mode now.

去年，我們的績效和客戶服務績效已經發生了整體標準差的變化。這是一件大事。我們已經看到了這一點。我們也看到了這對特定客戶意味著什麼。我花時間與特定客戶談論他們與我們合作的經驗。我們現在正與客戶一起進行現場聯合創新會議，但我們正在推動——我們開始比過去更加突破這些界限。但這就是，你看，這是一次愉快的飛行。歸根結底，這就是事實，我們現在處於執行模式。

Okay. That's super helpful. I guess you gave us the road map today in terms of CapEx spend. It's great you're reinvesting in growth product or box plants. You're stepping up maintenance and reliability, doing great things on the sales board front. Is this a level in terms of capital spend and maintenance operating spend that could be steady state from here? Or should we kind of accept that to step up the next few years as you kind of move forward? Or how should we talk about these moving pieces.

好的。這非常有幫助。我想您今天為我們提供了資本支出方面的路線圖。您對成長產品或箱型工廠進行再投資是件好事。您正在加強維護和可靠性，在銷售委員會方面做得非常出色。就資本支出和維護營運支出而言，這個水準是否可以維持穩定？或者我們是否應該接受這一點，並在接下來的幾年裡繼續前進？或者我們該如何談論這些移動的部分。

Phil, if I had a magic wand, meaning I had the ability to spend it, meaning the performance of the business was where I wanted it to be and we had the capability to effectively spend money. I would spend more, I would. And the reason we're targeting this $1.2 billion as it matches what we think the organization can actually effectively execute and where we are relative to the turnaround of the business. But look, I think as we perform, we will address aggressively -- we will invest aggressively over the next few years. it's really kind of a combination of things, Phil.

菲爾，如果我有一根魔杖，那就意味著我有能力花掉它，這意味著業務表現達到我想要的水平，我們有能力有效地花錢。我會花更多的錢，我會的。我們之所以設定 12 億美元的目標是因為，這符合我們認為組織實際上能夠有效執行的目標，也符合我們目前在業務轉型方面所處的位置。但是，我認為，隨著我們的表現，我們將積極應對——我們將在未來幾年積極投資。這確實是一種多種因素的綜合，菲爾。

One is we got to close the gap on a number of things that we've had. When you make decisions around nonstrategic assets, and you incrementally increase spending, right? So if you think of both those things happen at the same time, what happens is you radically increase the spending on the strategic assets. It's not a small change. It's -- you're not talking about 5% and 10% and 20%, you're talking about 20%, 30%, 40%, 50% in some areas.

一是我們必須縮小現有的許多面向的差距。當您圍繞非策略資產做出決策時，您會逐步增加支出，對嗎？因此，如果你認為這兩件事同時發生，那麼你就會大幅增加對戰略資產的支出。這不是一個小變化。您說的並不是 5%、10% 和 20%，而是某些領域的 20%、30%、40%、50%。

And we're going to have to do that for a few years because look, we dug a hole over a decade. We're not going to fill it in a quarter. And so we've got to make those choices and visual and maybe this will help folks is a visual that I've been using is think of the demand of the packaging business over a cycle. So if you just think of it as what does demand really look like of a packaging business over a cycle. It's about 1%, 1.5% volume increase through a cycle. And that changes kind of a plus 2 -- plus 2 points to that, so call it plus to 3 minus 1 or so or minus 2 or so, somewhere in that range.

而且我們必須這樣做幾年，因為你看，我們十多年來已經挖了一個坑。我們不會在一個季度內就填滿它。因此，我們必須做出這些選擇並進行視覺化，也許這會對人們有所幫助，我一直在使用的視覺化方法是思考一個週期內包裝業務的需求。所以如果你只是把它想像成一個週期內包裝業務的實際需求是什麼樣的。一個週期內體積大約增加 1%、1.5%。這會變成一種加 2 —— 加 2 分，所以稱之為加 3 減 1 左右或減 2 左右，在這個範圍內的某個地方。

That's kind of the range in any given year of actual consumer demand and when I say consumer, consumer and industrial demand of our product, but investment trends, profit trends historically have been highly low, right? And then people react to that and they make the investment trends even more [low]. So if you think in a very simple way of what we're trying to do right here, is we're trying to cut off volatility, we're trying to sand the board on the top side and on the bottom side, right?

這在某種程度上是任何一年的實際消費者需求範圍，當我說消費者、消費者和工業對我們產品的需求時，但投資趨勢、利潤趨勢在歷史上一直非常低，對嗎？然後人們對此做出反應，使投資趨勢更加[低的]。因此，如果您以非常簡單的方式思考我們現在要做的事情，那就是我們試圖消除波動性，我們試圖打磨木板的頂部和底部，對嗎？

Take volatility out when you look at GCF as an example, I love the GCF business, but it's volatile. It just -- it's more volatile than our core packaging business. There are other parts of our business that are relatively low profit that are pretty volatile. And as you start to move towards your core integrated packaging business, that volatility goes down.

以 GCF 為例，除去波動性，我喜歡 GCF 業務，但它的波動性很大。只是——它比我們的核心包裝業務更不穩定。我們業務的其他部分利潤相對較低，而且波動很大。當您開始轉向核心整合包裝業務時，這種波動性就會降低。

And then if you match your investment plan with what your real trend line looks like, you take out more volatility. When you chase the trend line with investments, you -- our box plant managers, our mill managers, they can't plan to be successful if they're reacting in quarters, they've got to have 18 months or so on the maintenance side or probably three years plus on the capital side. And that's got to be consistent, and we haven't allowed them to put them in a position to be successful.

然後，如果你的投資計畫與實際趨勢線相匹配，你就能消除更多的波動。當你追逐投資趨勢線時，我們的紙箱工廠經理、工廠經理，如果他們按季度做出反應，就無法制定成功的計劃，他們必須在維護方面有 18 個月左右的時間，或者在資本方面可能有三年以上的時間。這必須保持一致，我們不允許他們把自己置於成功的境地。

And I apologize for the length of this answer, but I can't tell you how passionate I am of this. We have to consistently invest in being great, we have a hole to fill. We're going to fill that hole, and we are going to be much more consistent in our capital investment. And everything flows with capital investment in this business. And what I mean by that, look, I spent three days last week, personally three days and a Kaizen event, looking at our capital investment process.

對於我的回答太長，我深感抱歉，但我無法表達我對此有多熱情。我們必須持續不斷地投資，才能變得卓越，我們還有一個空缺需要填補。我們將填補這個漏洞，我們將更持續地進行資本投資。這項業務的一切都隨著資本投入而順利進行。我的意思是，你看，上週我花了三天時間，我個人花了三天時間參加了一次 Kaizen 活動，研究我們的資本投資流程。

And I look, no offense to anybody, it's a ludicrous process. that we have right now. And we are radically changing it in terms of time, in terms of responsibility, in terms of who has authority and signing responsibility and we will dramatically change that timeline. And then changing that timeline, we take the handcuffs off of our people.

我認為，沒有冒犯任何人的意思，這是一個荒謬的過程。我們現在擁有的。我們正在從時間、責任、權力主體和簽署責任等方面進行徹底改變，我們將徹底改變這個時間表。然後改變這個時間表，我們就把人民的手銬解除了。

And it's not just the dollars invested, right? It's because everybody is attached to that. You've got literally thousands of people who are chasing things that are unproductive and those people could be working with our customers on innovation. They could be working on productivity, right? And we need to take the handcuffs off our people and allow them to freaking run. And so -- I'm sorry, I think that one gets me worked up. So I'm pretty passionate about it.

這不僅僅是投資的美元，對嗎？因為每個人都執著於此。事實上，有成千上萬的人在追求沒有成效的事情，而這些人本來可以與我們的客戶一起進行創新。他們可能正在努力提高生產力，對嗎？我們需要解除人民的枷鎖，讓他們自由地奔跑。所以 — — 很抱歉，我覺得這件事讓我很興奮。所以我對此非常熱衷。

Mike Roxland, Truist Securities.

Truist Securities 的 Mike Roxland。

Thank you, Andy, Mark, for taking my questions and congrats on all the progress, and obviously, in a congrats on the passion as well. And Mark, Jose, congrats on your new role. Just wanted to quickly follow up on what (inaudible) mentioned in terms of the regular portfolio coming up from a different angle. You mentioned in the press release what are your objectives for 2025 is to balance capacity to your demand, so wondering can you help us obviously, maybe just speaking to a generality if you can, what type of capacity you have in mind? Is it more of what you've mentioned in previous responses in terms of transporting production? Is it a matter of maybe closing mills that are higher cost in an efficient way, where require too much capital to fix at this point? Can you help us plan like what kind of capacity realignment you're in (inaudible).

謝謝安迪、馬克回答我的問題，並祝賀你們所取得的所有進步，當然，也祝賀你們所表現出的熱情。馬克、何塞，恭喜你們獲得新的職位。只是想從不同角度快速跟進（聽不清楚）提到的有關常規投資組合的問題。您在新聞稿中提到，您 2025 年的目標是平衡產能和需求，所以很想知道您能否幫助我們，如果可以的話，也許只是泛泛地講一下，您考慮的是什麼類型的產能？在運輸生產方面，這是否與您先前的回覆中提到的更加相似？這是否是一個以有效的方式關閉成本較高的工廠的問題，因為目前需要太多的資金來解決這個問題？你能幫我們規劃一下你正在進行的產能調整嗎（聽不清楚）。

Yeah. So Mike, I'm going to give you an answer that's only going to be partially satisfying because of the two things. One, we do have some minimal restrictions and also I think as we talk about assets and locations, we need to do that the right way at the right time. So I have to be a little bit opaque around that. So I apologize if that's just the right thing to do.

是的。所以麥克，我將給你一個只能部分令人滿意的答案，因為有兩件事。首先，我們確實有一些最低限度的限制，而且我認為，當我們談論資產和位置時，我們需要在正確的時間以正確的方式去做。所以我必須對此保持一點不透明的態度。如果這是正確的做法，我深表歉意。

So I want to say don't just step back for a second and think of it as you think of our entire business and you think of the quality of earnings across the spectrum of that business, right, it's pretty wide from one market segment and one product to another market segment and another product. That -- those core earnings is a pretty wide band on that.

所以我想說，不要只是退後一步，而是要思考我們的整個業務，思考整個業務範圍內的盈利質量，對吧，從一個細分市場、一個產品到另一個細分市場、另一個產品，它的跨度相當大。這些核心收益的範圍相當廣泛。

When you look at the portion of our business that isn't as profitable or frankly, may be negative, and then you align that against assets that really have pretty poor returns. When you put those two things together, that's -- those are tough chunks of things to look at, right? And when you put them together, there's no path to that being super successful. And so you've got to move your investment to the customers, the products and the assets and the people who are going to allow you to win. And that's the process that we've been going before. And when we talked about kind of a whole (inaudible) of that in the third quarter. That's what that was all about.

當你看到我們業務中盈利能力不那麼強或坦率地說可能是負面的部分時，你就會將其與那些回報率確實很差的資產進行比較。當你把這兩件事放在一起時，那就是——它們是很難看清的事物，對吧？當你把它們放在一起時，就沒有辦法獲得巨大的成功。所以你必須將你的投資轉移到客戶、產品、資產和能幫助你成功的人身上。這就是我們之前一直在經歷的進程。當我們在第三季談論整個（聽不清楚）這個問題時。這就是全部內容。

As we move through this year, we will absolutely continue to move down that path. And we've got to do it in both the box system and in the mill system. And we just kind of think about the ability to do what I would just kind of got fired up about a few moments ago, to do that, you can't be peanut butter spread investments. right? You have to move investment. It's 80/20 thinking at its most foundational, which is you've got to move your resources, your money, your people, your energy towards those things where you can have a differentiated position.

隨著今年的到來，我們絕對會繼續沿著這條道路前進。我們必須在箱子系統和工廠系統中完成此操作。我們只是在思考，要做到這一點，我不能只是進行花生醬塗抹投資。正確的？你必須轉移投資。最基礎的就是 80/20 思維，也就是你必須將你的資源、金錢、人力、精力投入在那些你可以獲得差異化地位的事物上。

And the cool part is if you look at our box network in the United States and throughout North America, and you look at where we are positioned across the country and then you compare that to the competitive set, we feel really good about that. Now we know we have to change that because we have places that frankly have too much capacity and there's too much to -- it's got a crazy marketplace, right? And you got too much there and you got places where you don't have enough.

最酷的是，如果你看看我們在美國和整個北美的盒子網絡，看看我們在全國的位置，然後將其與競爭對手進行比較，我們對此感到非常滿意。現在我們知道我們必須改變這種狀況，因為坦白說，我們有些地方的容量太大了，而且有太多的東西——市場太瘋狂了，對吧？有些地方供給太多，有些地方供給不足。

And so in the places where you don't have enough like Waterloo, Iowa, we're going to be super aggressive. So greenfield, brownfield, the lighthouses that we're talking about, the demand is there, and we can't satisfy the demand because we don't have enough capacity and in some other places where it's not, we need to first focus in on niches of subniches of markets where we're really good, and we can win and we can win in that subniche and have a great sustainable competitive position that subniche. And then in places where, frankly, it doesn't make economic sense, we need to make up the decisions.

因此，在愛荷華州滑鐵盧等資金不足的地方，我們將採取極為積極的措施。因此，我們談論的綠地、棕地、燈塔，都有需求，而我們無法滿足需求，因為我們沒有足夠的產能，而在其他一些產能不足的地方，我們需要首先專注於我們真正擅長的細分市場的子細分市場，我們可以獲勝，並且可以在那個子細分市場中擁有良好的可持續競爭地位。然後，坦白說，在那些不符合經濟效益的地方，我們需要做出決定。

On the mill side, when you think about the mills, I grew up and as you guys know, I grew up in a mill town. And so these conversations have been in my blood since I was eight years old. And you have to invest, right? You have to invest on a consistent basis in mills. And of course, the older they get, you have to make sure you keep them primed. And for those of anyone who is interested in cars, look, there are 40- and 50-year old cars that run great, but they're not as competitive as the car you're going to buy off the lot tomorrow. And so you're constantly looking at where that is, when do I continue to invest and when do I not?

在工廠方面，當你想到工廠時，我就長大了，正如你們所知，我在一個工廠鎮長大。所以自從我八歲起，這些對話就已經融入我的血液了。而且你必須投資，對嗎？您必須持續不斷地對工廠進行投資。當然，隨著他們年齡的增長，你必須確保讓他們保持良好的狀態。對於那些對汽車感興趣的人來說，雖然有 40 年或 50 年歷史的汽車運作良好，但它們並不像你明天要從停車場購買的汽車那樣具有競爭力。所以你要時時關注投資在哪裡，什麼時候該繼續投資，什麼時候不該投資？

And you have to be able to do that in a very clear mature way because all of our stakeholders require, right? So if you think about our people, our customers and our shareholders as the three principal stakeholders, I'm a big believer that none of them can win over the others in any long period of time before it damages all of them. And so to make those investments in the business, it absolutely makes our business competitive. It creates very stable, attractive jobs for our people.

而且你必須能夠以非常明確成熟的方式做到這一點，因為我們所有的利害關係人需要它，對嗎？因此，如果你將我們的員工、客戶和股東視為三大主要利益相關者，我堅信，在損害所有人的利益之前，他們中沒有一個人能夠在很長一段時間內贏得其他人的支持。因此，在業務上進行這些投資絕對會提高我們業務的競爭力。它為我們的人民創造了非常穩定、有吸引力的就業機會。

We win with our customers because we offer them the kind of service and reliability and innovation they want at a fair price. We take the cost out of the system, which gives us the margin to reinvest back to ultimately, right, that turns into profitable growth for our owners. And so that highly dependent system of stakeholders is what were driving it.

我們贏得客戶的信任，是因為我們以合理的價格為他們提供他們想要的服務、可靠性和創新。我們從系統中剔除成本，這為我們提供了再投資的利潤空間，最終為我們的業主帶來獲利成長。因此，高度依賴利害關係人的系統正是推動這項進程的因素。

Got it. And just my quick follow-up. Just obviously, a lot of changes in a very short period of time that -- it's interesting for a company that has had a really entrenched corporate culture. Just trying to get a sense for you whether is there any pushback, any resistance? And what are you maybe to sort of like grease the wheel to encourage bias?

知道了。這只是我的快速跟進。顯然，在很短的時間內發生了很多變化——對於一家擁有根深蒂固的企業文化的公司來說，這是很有趣的。只是想了解您是否有任何阻力或抵抗？您是否可以採取一些類似潤滑劑的方式來鼓勵偏見？

Yeah, great question. Look, I have been thoroughly impressed with how people have grabbed on to the change. There was an enormous pent-up demand in this company for change. And look, the people are great. To be candid, right, when I was considering this role, one of the thoughts I had to myself is is, wow, how good can the people be with the performance we've had and I have been absolutely delighted. We have smart, capable-driven people who want to win.

是的，很好的問題。瞧，人們如何抓住這項改變給我留下了深刻的印象。該公司內部存在著巨大的、被壓抑的變革需求。你看，那裡的人都很棒。坦白說，當我考慮這個角色時，我心裡想到的一個詞是，哇，我們的表演能有多精彩，我感到非常高興。我們擁有聰明、能幹、有幹勁、渴望勝利的員工。

That being said, right, in a business like ours, there are a handful of very, very big decisions that get made that either enable or disable the organization, capital is a huge one, right? When you are spreading your capital thin, you are basically telling your people to play whackable, they don't have another choice. So when you make -- you don't make the courageous decisions, that's what happens. When you have capital decisions that take an ungodly long period of time, it ties up thousands of people in non-value-added processes. If you grab any one of our mill managers and you were to ask her or him, what does it take to win? They know, they know.

話雖如此，在像我們這樣的企業中，需要做出一些非常非常重大的決定，這些決定可以成就或毀滅組織，而資本就是其中龐大的一個，對吧？當你的資本分散時，你基本上就是在告訴你的員工要謹慎行事，他們沒有其他選擇。所以當你做出──你沒有做出勇敢的決定時，就會發生這樣的事情。當你的資本決策需要花費極長的時間時，它會讓成千上萬的人陷入非增值流程。如果您抓住我們的任何工廠經理並問她或他，要怎樣才能獲勝？他們知道，他們知道。

And we have, in many ways, handcuffed them with decisions on capital investment, with decisions that are very bureaucratic and frankly, not setting and upholding very high expectations, right? The reality is, is one of the things that I'm trying to do with this call as an example, is I believe there ought to be perfect alignment between our owners, our Board, the management team and everybody who works in this company. There should be no daylight between the expectations of action and the expectations of performance between anybody.

而且，我們在很多方面都限制了他們做出資本投資決策，這些決策非常官僚主義，坦白說，沒有設定和維持很高的期望，對嗎？事實上，我透過這通通話試圖說明的一件事就是，我相信我們的所有者、董事會、管理團隊以及公司中所有員工之間應該保持完美的協調。任何人對行動的期望和對錶現的期望之間都不應存在差距。

And look, a lot of people complain about having to do these kind of things and do quarterly calls. I think they're great. I grew up getting a report card, you get a report card and you got to go home and you got to talk about why you got an A or why you got a D? And there's no hiding. And I love it, I grew up playing sports. Scoreboards are great, right? You are what the scoreboard says you are. There is no confusion in this organization about what the scoreboard says. We have no confusion at all. And our goal is to be one heck of a lot better.

瞧，很多人都抱怨必須做這些事情和進行季度電話會議。我認為他們很棒。我從小就收到成績單，你拿到成績單然後回家討論為什麼你得了 A 或為什麼得了 D？並且無處可藏。我非常喜歡運動，從小就喜歡運動。記分板很棒，對吧？記分板上顯示的就是你。該組織對於記分板上顯示的內容沒有任何困惑。我們一點兒也不困惑。我們的目標是變得更好。

Matthew McKellar, RBC Capital Markets.

加拿大皇家銀行資本市場 (RBC Capital Markets) 的馬修麥凱勒 (Matthew McKellar)。

I'd like to start asking about the Waterloo greenfield box plant, are you able to provide any additional color on what kind of CapEx you're anticipating for that plant? And then how you would think about an attractive return for this type of project, please?

我想開始詢問有關滑鐵盧綠地箱式工廠的情況，您能否提供有關該工廠預計的資本支出類型的更多詳細資訊？那麼請問您認為這種類型的項目的回報吸引力有多大？

Yeah. So we're not -- we haven't disclosed anything today. We'll put a lot more color to that. This will be an item that we'll talk about certainly at the Investor Day. Obviously, it's a very large investment. It's by far the largest box plant investment we have ever made. And my expectation is this is going to be something that we should be driving cash-on-cash returns of about 20%, right? That's the kind of thing. And I mean the total cost, not just on the investment purely for that thing.

是的。所以我們今天沒有披露任何消息。我們將為其添加更多色彩。這肯定會是我們在投資者日上討論的一個議題。顯然，這是一項非常大的投資。這是迄今為止我們最大的紙箱廠投資。我的預期是，這將推動現金回報率達到 20% 左右，對嗎？就是這樣的事情。我指的是總成本，而不僅僅是針對某件事的投資。

But if you look at through the value chain from an integrated perspective, that's the kind of value that we should be able to add from a kind of investment like this. And what I love about this investment. And we also see, as we've got some more that we're looking at that are like this, obviously, not a ton of them, but some more that makes sense, and we're looking at some brownfields. And if you look at the pilots. What I like about these kind of things is they bring all the elements of our strategy together, right?

但如果從綜合的角度來看價值鏈，這就是我們應該能夠透過這樣的投資來增加的價值。這就是我喜歡這項投資的原因。我們也看到，我們正在研究一些類似的項目，顯然，它們數量不多，但有些是有意義的，我們正在研究一些棕地。如果你看看飛行員。我喜歡這類事情，因為它們將我們策略的所有要素整合在一起，對嗎？

So in our world, we absolutely -- our goal is not to be the low-priced player, but our goal absolutely is to be the low-cost player. And we think that we have scale in the footprint that gives us license to do that, but we have to make different choices. And a plant like Waterloo dramatically changes that. If you look at our two lighthouses that we have actual regional lighthouses, the gains that we're getting and we're seeing encourage a heck out of us and that's why we're going to roll it out to 22 more box plants here at 2025 and then we'll keep going, right? The goal is over the next few years, it's a completely reconfigure our box plant network. And look, this is a harsh thing to say, but for a long time, we thought of our box plants as kind of a dumping ground for paper. That's kind of how we treated it.

因此在我們的世界中，我們的目標絕對不是成為低價玩家，但我們的目標絕對是成為低成本玩家。我們認為，我們的足跡已經具備了規模，這給了我們這樣做的許可，但我們必須做出不同的選擇。而像 Waterloo 這樣的工廠徹底改變了現狀。如果您看看我們的兩座燈塔，我們擁有實際的區域燈塔，我們所獲得的收益和看到的收益對我們有很大的鼓舞，這就是為什麼我們要在 2025 年將其推廣到另外 22 個箱式工廠，然後我們會繼續前進，對吧？我們的目標是在未來幾年內徹底重新配置我們的箱體工廠網路。聽著，這樣說可能有點刺耳，但長期以來，我們都認為我們的箱型工廠是紙張的垃圾場。我們就是這樣對待它的。

And the bottom line is it is the front end of our business. It's more like a retail shop than other things, right, where you want to be super great service levels, very reactive to customers and make sure that we're employing our 80/20 mindset as close to the customers as possible. And so we're super excited about Waterloo. We'll give you more detail here at the Investor Day of it. And we're also excited about the both plants, right? So that's another example of a different type of strategic thought that's unlocking one of the pieces of great value that we see in the company, which is in specialty. And we're excited about that acquisition. It fits us well. It's small, but it enables us in a great way, and it also helps us move fast which is a great enabler.

最重要的是，這是我們業務的前端。它更像是一個零售店，而不是其他東西，對吧，在那裡你想要提供超級優質的服務水平，對客戶做出積極的反應，並確保我們盡可能貼近客戶，運用我們的 80/20 思維模式。因此，我們對滑鐵盧感到非常興奮。我們將在投資者日向您提供更多詳細資訊。我們也對這兩家工廠感到興奮，對吧？所以，這是另一種不同類型的策略思維的例子，它釋放了我們在公司中看到的一個非常有價值的部分，那就是專業。我們對此次收購感到非常興奮。它很適合我們。它雖小，卻能帶給我們很大的幫助，而且還能幫助我們快速行動，這是一個很大的推動力。

That's helpful. If I could just follow up with one more on the box plants. As you sort of scale your approach from your first two lighthouses to the incremental 22 in 2025, are you anticipating pretty similar improvements in productivity? Does that change at all versus the first what you achieved at the first [couple] and then does that change at all again as you kind of target the next batch in '26 and beyond?

這很有幫助。如果我可以再跟進一下箱裝植物的問題的話。當您將您的方法從前兩座燈塔擴展到 2025 年的 22 座時，您是否預計生產力也會有相當類似的提高？與您在第一批 [幾批] 中取得的成績相比，這是否會發生變化？

I do expect the same kind of results, right? And I think it's important to note that the results that we're seeing are really -- are not being driven by dramatic capital investment, right? The results we're getting in these two places so far are really around what I think of it is the volume mix matrix, right? So as you think about complexity, the key to what we're doing is isolating complexity, right? So we're putting a lot of complexity in a few box plants where they become experts at that complex product customer configuration.

我確實期待同樣的結果，對嗎？我認為值得注意的是，我們看到的結果並不是由大量的資本投資所推動的，對嗎？到目前為止我們在這兩個地方得到的結果確實與我所認為的音量混合矩陣有關，對嗎？因此，當您考慮複雜性時，我們所做的事情的關鍵就是隔離複雜性，對嗎？因此，我們在一些箱體工廠中投入了大量的複雜性，他們成為了複雜產品客戶配置的專家。

And then other places where you can almost run this out, it's really -- it's those two -- it's that combination that we're getting the kind of productivity that we're seeing. When you enable it with CapEx, there's more to come. That being said, the gains will not be -- again, I use the term linear meaning we're not going to get the exact same kind of gains everywhere. There will be places that we get more, and you want to enable it with more CapEx in the places where you won't get the 20% or 30% because you don't have the same configuration in a geography, right?

在其他地方你幾乎可以做到這一點，真的——正是這兩者——正是這種結合才使我們獲得了我們所看到的那種生產力。當您使用 CapEx 啟用它時，還會有更多的事情發生。話雖如此，收益不會——我再次使用線性術語，意思是我們不會在所有地方都獲得完全相同的收益。在某些地方我們會獲得更多，而你想在那些你無法獲得 20% 或 30% 的地方投入更多的資本支出，因為你在某個地理位置沒有相同的配置，對嗎？

So I think we're going to get really substantial productivity improvements. We also -- I want to -- I'd like to roll this out, light and speed, but you got to be mindful of it, right? You can't just throw ideas at folks, you've got to go hand in hand with them, make the changes, right? So you have to make the volume mix changes. You've got to make those changes where you want to consolidate a box plant and then have the remaining box plants to take that on and people who want to move over to those things to the [box plants] can, you want to be able to do that. If you want to install daily management and make sure that, that's working. And before you kind of write off to the sunset to another thing. So it's kind of the old saying, go slow, you're in a hurry because you want it to stick.

所以我認為我們的生產力將會大幅提高。我們也 - 我想要 - 我想輕鬆快速地推出這個產品，但你必須注意這一點，對嗎？你不能只是向人們提出想法，你必須與他們攜手並進，做出改變，對嗎？因此，您必須進行音量混合變更。你必須做出那些改變，你想要合併一個箱式工廠，然後讓剩餘的箱式工廠來接手這個工作，而那些想把這些東西轉移到[箱式工廠]的人也可以，你希望能夠做到這一點。如果您想安裝日常管理並確保它有效。在你把日落和其他事情拋在一邊之前。所以，這有點像那句老話，慢慢來，你很著急，因為你想讓它堅持下去。

Charlie Muir-Sands, BNP Paribas.

法國巴黎銀行的 Charlie Muir-Sands。

Just sticking with the rollout of the lighthouse strategy for a minute. So can I just clarify, does that is the one that you think can unlock around $300 million to $400 million of cost activity?

只要堅持推出燈塔策略一分鐘。所以我能否澄清一下，您是否認為這可以解鎖約 3 億至 4 億美元的成本活動？

No. I think we -- that was not the main focus of that. That was really around -- I think you've got, call it, $175 million to $200 million of just, I'm going to call it mill reliability, right? So that's just -- that's very much in the mill. And then the balance is productivity. A lot in the mills, but also in the box points. And what I'm talking about there, Charlie, is my experience has been as you get a productivity engine humming to be able to offset things like wage inflation benefits and other, what I'll call it, internal inflation, so not your input cost.

不。我認為——這不是重點。那真的是——我想你大概知道，大概是 1.75 億到 2 億美元，我稱之為工廠可靠性，對嗎？所以這只是 — — 這是非常有可能的。然後平衡就是生產力。工廠裡有很多，但箱子點裡也有很多。查理，我在這裡談論的是，我的經驗是，當你讓生產力引擎嗡嗡作響時，它能夠抵消諸如工資通膨福利和其他我稱之為內部通膨的東西，所以不是你的投入成本。

We don't do that well, right? And if you look at our financials and you go back over five or 10 years, and you actually look at the destruction of value, the two big linchpins you see are, I'm going to call it, reliability that showed up at the customer, which then had become a headwind from a volume perspective, but also it ends up driving a lot of cost. So I looked at some analytics over the last couple of weeks, if you look in our mill system as an example, and you follow long-term maintenance spend relative to replacement asset value.

我們做得不太好，對吧？如果你看看我們的財務狀況，回顧過去五年或十年，你會發現價值的破壞，你會看到兩個關鍵點，我稱之為客戶所面臨的可靠性，從數量的角度來看，這成為了阻力，但最終也導致了大量成本的增加。因此，我查看了過去幾週的一些分析數據，如果您以我們的工廠系統為例，您會發現長期維護支出相對於替換資產價值。

So if you just kind of follow that, what you see is a building gap over time. But that does mean that your costs went down because what ends up happening is your cost shift from being capital to be in expense. And so if you actually stack capital expense together, we're actually spending more combined today than we were five or 10 years ago because of that choice.

因此，如果你只是遵循這一點，你會看到差距隨著時間的推移而不斷擴大。但這確實意味著您的成本下降了，因為最終發生的情況是您的成本從資本轉移到費用。因此，如果你實際上將資本支出加在一起，你會發現由於這種選擇，我們今天的總支出實際上比五年或十年前要多。

And that kind of comes down to that car analogy. If I don't change my oil, I'm going to eventually going to lose my engine and that losing your engine cost hell a lot more than changing the oil and that's kind of what we run into. And so now we're doing some pretty rapid engine rebuilds. That's the way to think about it. But the productivity engine is something that's going to be going all the time, right?

這有點類似於汽車的類比。如果我不換油，最終我的引擎就會報廢，而引擎報廢的代價比換油大得多，這就是我們所遇到的情況。所以現在我們正在進行一些相當快速的引擎重建。這就是思考這個問題的方法。但生產力引擎會一直運轉下去，對嗎？

And if you think of just the math on it, you're talking about 2% to 3% per year is what you got to get. You got to get 2% to 3% per year, and that will offset your internal inflation. And that -- I know in a world where people talk about I need 5% year-over-year. Well, you guys know the truth. Very few people get 5% year-over-year. What you really do is you liberate capacity, right?

如果你只考慮數學，你就會知道每年的收益大約是 2% 到 3%。你每年必須獲得 2% 到 3% 的收益，這將抵消你的內部通貨膨脹。而且 — — 我知道在這個世界上人們都在談論我需要同比增長 5%。好吧，你們知道真相了。很少有人能獲得年年成長 5% 的收益。你真正做的是釋放能力，對嗎？

Yeah, I can shut nonstrategic assets, you get a benefit from that. But then you liberate capacity. And in our world, when you liberate capacity and you get volume growth of any kind, it flows through a ridiculously high levels. And so the early stages of this are actually the cost coming out. And as you think of this kind of a couple of years from now, what you want is that engine of productivity that our mill managers, our box plant leaders are thinking about that and they're thinking of productivity on a two- to three-year rolling cycle, not I'm showing up in December, and I've got a budget for next year, I got to figure it out. Those are very different approaches.

是的，我可以關閉非策略性資產，你會從中受益。但這樣你就釋放了能力。在我們的世界中，當你釋放產能並獲得任何類型的產量成長時，它都會流經一個極高的水平。因此，這項工作的早期階段實際上是成本的顯現。而當你想到從現在起的幾年後，你想要的是生產力引擎，我們的工廠經理、我們的箱子工廠領導正在考慮這個問題，他們正在考慮以兩到三年的滾動週期為單位的生產力，而不是我在 12 月出現，我有明年的預算，我必須弄清楚。這些是截然不同的方法。

So the rollout of the Lighthouse strategy doesn't necessarily deliver immediate P&L benefits (inaudible) volumes will actually absorb that extra capacity or you can put a dollar value against that as well.

因此，燈塔策略的推出並不一定能帶來即時的損益（聽不清楚），交易量實際上會吸收這些額外的容量，或者你也可以用美元來衡量。

Yeah. If you look at what we've done in the two lighthouse regions that we've been in, we have closed 2 box plants, right? We've actually closed two live plants and consolidated the volume into the other lighthouses while taking on-time delivery and service levels meaningfully up. So when you look at the actual, it's real productivity, it's real dollars, right?

是的。如果你看看我們在兩個燈塔地區所做的事情，我們已經關閉了 2 個箱式工廠，對嗎？實際上，我們已經關閉了兩家現有工廠，並將產量整合到其他燈塔工廠，同時大幅提高準時交貨和服務水準。所以當你看實際情況時，它是真正的生產力，它是真正的美元，對嗎？

And so you get it first because you're taking out the overhead of the stranded capacity. And then you're also driving continuous improvement as you bring that volume in. And so it kind of starts off with a big bang. If you think of us -- think of IP in a micro (inaudible) in one of these regions, that's exactly what we're talking about, right? You're taking out cost that effectively stranded cost, unneeded cost, you're matching the volume mix matrix correctly. So those businesses are coming more effective.

因此，您可以首先獲得它，因為您正在消除擱淺容量的開銷。然後，當您引入該數量時，您也在推動持續改進。所以一切都是從一場大爆炸開始的。如果您想到我們——想想這些區域之一中的微型 IP（聽不清楚），這正是我們正在談論的，對嗎？您正在消除實際上擱淺的成本、不必要的成本，您正在正確匹配體積組合矩陣。因此這些企業的效率將會提高。

And then over time, you're driving that drumbeat of productivity, right? So it's a big bolus that we have to get in the box plant side and in the mill side and then you have to build the muscle of ongoing productivity going forward.

然後隨著時間的推移，你就會推動生產力的進步，對嗎？因此，我們必須在裝箱廠和工廠方面投入大量資金，然後才能增強未來持續的生產力。

Right. And sorry, just one more question. I think historically, you've guided annual corporate expense. I know that there has been a big restructuring and cost savings, you've devolved a lot of the staff headcount to the segments, but I just wondered what we should understand as being the figure now for 2025.

正確的。抱歉，我還有一個問題。我認為從歷史上看，您已經指導了年度企業開支。我知道你們進行了大規模的重組和成本節約，將大量員工下放至各部門，但我只是想知道我們應該如何理解 2025 年的數字。

Yeah. So I don't think we're calling it out very specifically. But the way you should think about it is as we go into 2025, you're going to see the reallocated -- cost reallocations as appropriate back to the businesses of where they actually sit. So you'll see some ups and downs. So as an example, you'll see the North American packaging business was not probably getting enough of the load, where more of it was being pushed to other DCF in our EMEA business and we'll get that balance right. But in total, right, the central costs are going down precipitously, right? They're going to go down by $120 million from the actions that we've outlined.

是的。因此我認為我們並沒有非常具體地指出這一點。但你應該這樣想：當我們進入 2025 年時，你會看到成本重新分配，並適當地回到企業實際所在地。所以你會看到一些起伏。舉個例子，你會看到北美包裝業務可能沒有承擔足夠的負荷，更多的負荷被推到了我們 EMEA 業務中的其他 DCF，我們會正確平衡這一負荷。但整體來說，中央成本正在急劇下降，對嗎？根據我們概述的行動，它們將減少 1.2 億美元。

Gabe Hajde, Wells Fargo Securities.

富國證券的 Gabe Hajde。

I want to try to put some numbers to what we're talking about and go back to the presentation that you gave us on the Q2 call. I think in that presentation, you indicated that you underspent sort of a peer group by 1.5% on CapEx and maintenance, I think it was $0.40 per 1,000 square feet.

我想嘗試用一些數字來解釋我們正在討論的內容，並回到您在第二季度電話會議上向我們所做的演示。我認為在那次演示中，您表示在資本支出和維護方面，您的支出比同行少 1.5%，我認為是每 1,000 平方英尺 0.40 美元。

Yeah, not in front of me, but that sounds right, yeah.

是的，雖然不是在我面前，但聽起來是對的，是的。

Okay. And you're talking a lot about mill reliability and some underinvestment over time. And I sort of -- I like your analogy. So I'm thinking about running a 0.25 mile -- or 1-mile race and I'm a quarter mile behind, it's really tough to catch up. So the number, I think, that we saw thrown out there was $260 million for this new investment and from local government agencies, et cetera, so Waterloo that is. So this year, you're going to spend about another $1 billion, maybe a little bit less. When should we expect that IP starts to catch up that $1.2 billion of underspend? And do you feel like, as you look across these metrics that you're talking about that you're falling further behind.

好的。您談論了很多關於工廠可靠性和長期投資不足的問題。我有點——我喜歡你的比喻。所以我正在考慮跑 0.25 英里——或者 1 英里的比賽，而我落後了四分之一英里，要趕上真的很難。所以我認為，我們看到的數字是 2.6 億美元用於這項新投資，來自地方政府機構等等，這就是滑鐵盧。所以今年你又要花大約 10 億美元，可能少一點。我們什麼時候可以預期 IP 能夠開始彌補這 12 億美元的支出缺口？當您回顧您談到的這些指標時，您是否覺得自己落後了？

No, I don't think we're falling further behind, right, because of the choices that we're making on reallocation of where that other money is going is a big change, right? So if you just took a peanut butter spread, I would agree with what I think I want to call it your concern, right, which is if you were just going to leave it the same, yes, that would be 100% to freight. I just did Waterloo, and I did everything the way I did it in the past, that would be true. But you can see from the actions we've already announced that is not the intention and you can expect to see us make some other choices here readily around that.

不，我不認為我們會進一步落後，對吧，因為我們對其他資金的去向的重新分配所做的選擇是一個很大的變化，對吧？因此，如果您只是拿了花生醬塗抹，我會同意我認為我想要稱之為您的擔憂，對吧，也就是說，如果您只是保持原樣，是的，那將是 100％ 的運費。我剛剛經歷了滑鐵盧，我所做的一切都和過去一樣，這是真的。但從我們已經宣布的行動中你可以看出，這並不是我們的本意，你可以預料到我們會就此做出其他選擇。

And so as we think about that application, so you got to think of it as you're going to move your investment towards your strategic assets, that's already started. And that's a good sized number. So the total time frame to make up the whole, I think, is about three years to make up the whole. That's -- and look, again, I do it faster, but I don't think we could spend it faster effectively, right? And if you just look at lead times in terms of equipment and whatnot, I think it's a three-year March. That's my opinion, Mark, any thoughts there.

因此，當我們考慮該應用程式時，您必須將其視為將投資轉移到戰略資產上，這已經開始了。這是一個相當大的數字。因此，我認為完成整個過程的總時間大約是三年。那是——再看一次，我做得更快，但我不認為我們能夠更快更有效地花掉它，對嗎？如果你只看設備和其他方面的交貨時間，我認為這是一個三年的行軍過程。這是我的看法，馬克，您有什麼想法嗎？

I would agree with that. Yeah.

我同意這一點。是的。

I appreciate that. I mean it's sometimes like pushing on a string if have the resources to enable it. Understood.

我很感激。我的意思是，如果有資源來實現這一點，有時就像推一根繩子一樣。明白了。

Maybe it's really -- before you go, what's really important, though, right, is this dynamic resource allocation is really, really important, right, moving it away from places that don't deserve it, that don't make money that you're not going to win in to places where that is true, right? They do deserve it, you can win there. And the difference in returns on capital are gigantic in those choices. And so if you think of a bell curve of ROIC for these investments, right?

也許真的是——在你離開之前，真正重要的是，對吧，這種動態資源分配真的非常重要，對吧，將其從不值得的地方、不賺錢的地方、你不會贏的地方轉移到真正如此的地方，對吧？他們確實值得，你們可以獲勝。在這些選擇中，資本報酬率的差異是巨大的。因此，如果您考慮這些投資的 ROIC 的鐘形曲線，對嗎？

Oftentimes, people think about things like safety investment or maintenance investment as on the left-hand side, meaning not very attractive, right? And I look at it completely the opposite. There on the far right-hand side of that. They are everything. And so you have to have stability before you can have improvement. And so, so much of the work that we did last year, and we're still doing today is around stability and then that gives you a chance to drive improvement.

很多時候，人們會把安全投資、維護投資等放在左邊，這代表不太有吸引力，對嗎？而我的看法則完全相反。就在那裡最右邊。他們就是一切。因此，你必須先有穩定，然後才能有進步。所以，我們去年做了很多工作，而且我們今天仍在做的工作都是為了穩定，這給了你推動改進的機會。

Got it. I want to be respectful of everyone's time. The last one, you talked about report cards, work cards. Near term, just to be clear, Mark, it wasn't in the Q1 industrial Packaging view, you are not including any price as it relates to the January increases because it was not reflected in (inaudible) or how should we think about that?

知道了。我想尊重每個人的時間。最後一個，你談到了成績單和工作卡。近期，需要明確的是，馬克，它不在第一季度的工業包裝視圖中，您沒有包括與 1 月份增長相關的任何價格，因為它沒有反映在（聽不清楚）中，或者我們應該如何考慮這一點？

No, we are not including that.

不，我們不包括這個。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Thank you very much. Well, thank you, everybody. Appreciate your time today. Appreciate your interest in IP. I want to thank the teams for just a herculean effort that they are putting in and the commitment that people are showing to grabbing on to doing these tough things. right? Doing hard things is what we have to do. That should be our motto, do hard things. And that's what the team is doing. So I'm very proud of how we're tackling that. And I appreciate your interest. So I look forward to seeing you on March 25, at the Investor Day and laying out a lot more detail. So take care, everybody.

非常感謝。好吧，謝謝大家。感謝您今天抽出時間。感謝您對 IP 的關注。我要感謝各團隊所付出的巨大努力以及人們為完成這些艱難任務所展現的決心。正確的？做困難的事是我們必須做的事。這應該是我們的座右銘：做困難的事。這正是團隊正在做的事。因此我對於我們解決這個問題的方法感到非常自豪。我非常感謝您的關注。因此，我期待在 3 月 25 日的投資者日見到您並討論更多細節。所以大家要保重。

Once again, we'd like to thank you for participating in International Paper's fourth quarter 2024 earnings call. You may now disconnect.

再次感謝您參加國際紙業 2024 年第四季財報電話會議。您現在可以斷開連線。