Roper Technologies Inc (ROP) 2024 Q3 法說會逐字稿

Good morning. The Roper Technologies conference call will now begin. Today's call is being recorded. (Operator Instructions)

早安.Roper Technologies 電話會議現在開始。今天的通話正在錄音。（操作員說明）

I would now like to turn the call over to Zack Moxcey, Vice President and Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

我現在想將電話轉給兼投資者關係副總裁 Zack Moxcey。請繼續。

Good morning and thank you all for joining us as we discuss the third quarter 2024 financial results for Roper Technologies. Joining me on the call this morning are Neil Hunn, President and Chief Executive Officer; Jason Conley, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer; Brandon Cross, Vice President and Principal Accounting Officer; and Shannon O'Callaghan, Senior Vice President of Finance.

早安，感謝大家加入我們，我們將討論 Roper Technologies 2024 年第三季的財務表現。今天早上與我一起參加電話會議的還有總裁兼執行長 Neil Hunn； Jason Conley，執行副總裁兼財務長； Brandon Cross，副總裁兼首席會計長；香農‧奧卡拉漢 (Shannon O'Callaghan)，財務資深副總裁。

Earlier this morning, we issued a press release announcing our financial results. The press release also includes replay information for today's call. We have prepared slides to accompany today's call, which are available through the webcast and are also available on our website. And now if you please turn to page 2.

今天早些時候，我們發布了一份新聞稿，宣布了我們的財務表現。新聞稿還包括今天電話會議的重播資訊。我們準備了伴隨今天電話會議的幻燈片，這些幻燈片可以透過網路廣播獲取，也可以在我們的網站上取得。現在請翻到第 2 頁。

We begin with our safe harbor statement. During the course of today's call, we will make forward-looking statements, which are subject to risks and uncertainties as described on this page, in our press release and in our SEC filings. You should listen to today's call in the context of that information.

我們從安全港聲明開始。在今天的電話會議期間，我們將做出前瞻性聲明，這些聲明受到本頁、我們的新聞稿和 SEC 文件中所述的風險和不確定性的影響。您應該在該資訊的背景下收聽今天的電話會議。

And now please turn to page 3. Today, we will discuss our results primarily on adjusted non-GAAP and continuing operations basis. For the third quarter, the difference between our GAAP results and adjusted results consists of the following items: amortization of acquisition-related intangible assets, the financial impacts associated with minority investments; and lastly, transaction and restructuring-related expenses associated with the completed acquisition of Transact Campus. Reconciliations can be found in our press release and in the appendix of this presentation on our website.

現在請翻到第 3 頁。今天，我們將主要在調整後的非公認會計原則和持續經營的基礎上討論我們的表現。第三季度，我們的 GAAP 業績與調整後業績之間的差異包括以下項目：與收購相關的無形資產攤銷、與少數股權投資相關的財務影響；最後，與完成收購 Transact Campus 相關的交易和重組相關費用。調節表可以在我們的新聞稿和我們網站上的本簡報的附錄中找到。

And now please turn to page 4. I'll hand the call over to Neil. After our prepared remarks, we will take questions from our telephone participants. Neil?

現在請翻到第 4 頁。我會把電話轉給尼爾。在我們準備好的發言之後，我們將回答電話參與者的問題。尼爾？

Thank you, Zack, and thanks to everyone for joining our call. We're looking forward to sharing our third quarter results with you this morning. As we turn to page 4, we'll see the topics we'll cover today. I'll start by highlighting our third quarter financial performance. Jason will then go through our financial results in greater detail, review our balance sheet, including our M&A capacity, and discuss our very strong cash flow performance.

謝謝你，扎克，也謝謝大家加入我們的電話會議。我們期待今天早上與您分享我們的第三季業績。當我們翻到第 4 頁時，我們將看到今天要討論的主題。我首先強調我們第三季的財務表現。然後，傑森將更詳細地介紹我們的財務業績，審查我們的資產負債表，包括我們的併購能力，並討論我們非常強勁的現金流表現。

Then I'll walk everyone through a summary of our most recent acquisition, Transact Campus, then discuss our segment highlights and review our increased guidance for the full year. After our closing remarks, we'll open the call for your questions. So let's go ahead and get started.

然後我將向大家介紹我們最近收購的 Transact Campus 的摘要，然後討論我們的細分市場亮點並回顧我們增加的全年指導。結束語結束後，我們將開始電話詢問您的問題。那麼就讓我們開始吧。

Next slide, please. As we turn to page 5, the 4 key takeaways for today's call are, first, we again delivered another solid quarter results and expect an acceleration in sequential organic revenue growth heading into Q4. Second, we completed the Transact Campus acquisition, a very attractive business at a very attractive net purchase price. Third, we're raising our full year guidance to the high end of our range. And fourth, we continue to be very well positioned relative to executing on our capital deployment strategy.

請下一張投影片。當我們翻到第 5 頁時，今天電話會議的 4 個關鍵要點是，首先，我們再次交付了另一個穩健的季度業績，並預計進入第四季度後有機收入將加速增長。其次，我們完成了對 Transact Campus 的收購，這是一項非常有吸引力的業務，淨購買價格也非常有吸引力。第三，我們將全年指導提高到範圍的高端。第四，我們在執行資本部署策略方面仍然處於非常有利的位置。

Now digging a bit deeper into these four key takeaways. We grew total revenue by 13%, organic revenue by 4% and EBITDA by 10%. Importantly, we grew free cash flow by 15% in the quarter and by 20% on a TTM basis. Operationally, in the quarter, Neptune performed slightly better than our expectations as a result of last quarter's mechanical meter production challenges. And also importantly, we're encouraged to see strong organic enterprise software bookings momentum continue this quarter, growing in the double-digit area, up from last quarter's high single-digits bookings growth.

現在更深入地研究這四個關鍵要點。我們的總收入成長了 13%，有機收入成長了 4%，EBITDA 成長了 10%。重要的是，我們本季的自由現金流成長了 15%，以 TTM 計算成長了 20%。從營運角度來看，由於上季機械儀表生產面臨挑戰，海王星本季的表現略優於我們的預期。同樣重要的是，我們很高興看到本季度企業軟體預訂量持續保持強勁的勢頭，以兩位數的速度增長，高於上季度高個位數的預訂量增長。

Also in the quarter, we completed the acquisition of Transact Campus. Our CBORD business is being combined with Transact, and the integration activities are well underway. This is yet another very compelling value-creation opportunity for our shareholders, which we'll discuss in a bit.

同樣在本季度，我們完成了對 Transact Campus 的收購。我們的 CBORD 業務正在與 Transact 合併，整合活動正在順利進行中。對於我們的股東來說，這是另一個非常引人注目的價值創造機會，我們將在稍後討論。

Based on strong enterprise margin performance, we're increasing our full year 2024 DEPS guidance to the high end of our range. In addition, we're increasing our outlook for total revenue growth to be 13% plus, given the addition of our most recent acquisition, Transact Campus. Finally, we're maintaining our approximate 6% organic revenue outlook for the year.

基於強勁的企業利潤率表現，我們將 2024 年全年 DEPS 指引提高至範圍的高端。此外，考慮到我們最近收購的 Transact Campus，我們將總營收成長預期提高到 13% 以上。最後，我們維持今年約 6% 的有機收入預期。

If we step back a bit, we recognize we just posted back-to-back 4% organic growth quarters, although not unexpected, without question, unsatisfying. That said, we do see quarterly organic growth momentum improving and expect our Q4 organic growth to sequentially improve, given back-to-back quarters of strong enterprise bookings growth; stabilizing freight market conditions, albeit at the bottom; a resolved Neptune operational issue; and NDI returning to growth in Q4. So with this mostly behind us, we're confident we're seeing a reacceleration of our growth.

如果我們退後一步，我們會發現我們剛剛連續兩個季度實現了 4% 的有機增長，儘管這並不出乎意料，但毫無疑問，也令人不滿意。也就是說，我們確實看到季度有機成長勢頭有所改善，並預計我們的第四季度有機成長將連續改善，因為企業預訂量連續幾季強勁成長；貨運市場狀況雖然處於底部，但仍趨於穩定；已解決的海王星運作問題； NDI 在第四季恢復成長。因此，隨著這一切基本上過去，我們有信心看到我們的成長重新加速。

And finally, we continue to be very active on the M&A market, an environment that continues to improve and one where we have a very large pipeline of highly attractive opportunities. We continue to be quite bullish about our ability to be active on the M&A front. So with that, Jason, let me turn the call over to you so you can walk through our quarterly and full year financial results as well as our very strong financial position. Jason?

最後，我們繼續在併購市場上非常活躍，這個環境不斷改善，我們擁有大量極具吸引力的機會。我們仍然非常看好我們在併購領域的活躍能力。因此，傑森，讓我將電話轉給您，以便您可以了解我們的季度和全年財務業績以及我們非常強勁的財務狀況。傑森？

Thanks, Neil, and good morning, everyone. Let's take a look at slide 6. Revenue was $1.76 billion and up 13% over prior year. Acquisitions contributed 9% led by Procare and Transact Campus, and organic growth was 4%.

謝謝尼爾，大家早安。讓我們看一下投影片 6。營收為 17.6 億美元，比上年增長 13%。以 Procare 和 Transact Campus 為首的收購貢獻了 9%，有機成長為 4%。

Just unpacking organic growth a bit. In application software, revenue grew over 5%, with recurring and reoccurring growth in the high single-digit area. Nonrecurring revenue was down low single digits, led by declines in new license sales. New business activity for enterprise software continues to lean towards SaaS, which ultimately creates higher customer lifetime value while yielding a slight drag on near-term nonrecurring revenue.

只是稍微解釋一下有機成長。在應用軟體方面，收入成長超過 5%，並且不斷出現高個位數成長。由於新許可證銷售下降，非經常性收入下降了低個位數。企業軟體的新業務活動繼續傾向於 SaaS，最終將創造更高的客戶終身價值，同時對近期非經常性收入產生輕微拖累。

In network software, recurring revenue growth of 1% includes temporary headwinds at DAT, link and foundry. The balance of the segment saw growth in the mid-single-digit area. As Neil will discuss later, we see stabilization in freight markets and expect some improvement in Q4. TEP organic growth of 4% was underpinned by strength at Verathon and prior year comp challenges at NDI, Inovonics and rf IDEAS. As we discussed last quarter, NDI had a very significant customer program in 2023 that created year-to-date comparison challenges. However, we expect a return to growth in Q4. Separately and importantly, Neptune rapidly resolved its mechanical meter production challenges in the quarter. EBITDA of $717 million was 10% over prior year. And EBITDA margin came in at 40.7%.

在網路軟體方面，1% 的經常性收入成長包括 DAT、連結和鑄造廠的暫時阻力。該細分市場的其餘部分實現了中個位數成長。正如尼爾稍後將討論的那樣，我們看到貨運市場趨於穩定，並預計第四季會有所改善。TEP 4% 的有機成長得益於 Verathon 的實力以及 NDI、Inovonics 和 rf IDEAS 上一年的競爭挑戰。正如我們上季度討論的那樣，NDI 在 2023 年有一個非常重要的客戶計劃，這給年初至今的比較帶來了挑戰。然而，我們預計第四季將恢復成長。另外，重要的是，Neptune 在本季度迅速解決了機械儀表生產挑戰。EBITDA 為 7.17 億美元，比上年成長 10%。EBITDA 利潤率為 40.7%。

On DEPS, we posted $4.62, which was above our guidance range of $4.50 to $4.54. Of note, the Transact acquisition contributed $0.03 in the stub period as the third quarter is seasonally the highest driven by fees from annual tuition payments and annual renewals of term licenses. Excluding Transact, our guidance beat came from strong, over-margin performance in our application software segment.

對於 DEPS，我們發布了 4.62 美元，高於我們 4.50 美元至 4.54 美元的指導範圍。值得注意的是，Transact 收購在存根期間貢獻了 0.03 美元，因為第三季是季節性最高的，並且受到年度學費支付和定期許可證年度續約費用的推動。不包括 Transact，我們的業績指引來自於應用軟體領域強勁的超利潤表現。

Turning to free cash flow. We had our highest-ever quarter, with free cash flow of $719 million, up 15% over prior year. Transact was cash accretive in the stub period of ownership and off to a fast start, with Q3 being, once again, seasonally strong for this business.

轉向自由現金流。我們迎來了有史以來最高的季度，自由現金流為 7.19 億美元，比上年增長 15%。Transact 在所有權存續期間實現了現金增值，並快速啟動，第三季度該業務再次呈現季節性強勁勢頭。

We also had simply great execution across our software and tech product businesses. Of note, net working capital as a percent of revenue, excluding acquisitions, was negative 19%, a new Q3 record. A special thanks to our world-class finance teams across the Roper family, who are laser-focused on cash returns and cash flow growth, tremendous job.

我們的軟體和技術產品業務也擁有出色的執行力。值得注意的是，淨營運資本佔營收（不包括收購）的百分比為負 19%，創第三季新紀錄。特別感謝 Roper 家族世界一流的財務團隊，他們專注於現金回報和現金流成長，這是一項艱鉅的工作。

The bottom-right chart provides a trailing 12-month view of free cash flow over a four-year period. The CAGR from the corresponding 2021 period is 12%. We adjust for the Section 174 that went into effect in 2022, we've compounded cash flow in the mid-teens area. The strong Q3 results places our year-to-date cash flow at 31% as a percentage of revenue. And with renewal season at many of our software businesses in Q4, we expect free cash flow margin to be north of 30% for the year.

右下角的圖表提供了四年期間過去 12 個月的自由現金流視圖。2021 年同期的複合年增長率為 12%。我們對 2022 年生效的第 174 條進行了調整，我們將現金流量複合到了十幾歲左右。第三季的強勁業績使我們今年迄今的現金流佔營收的比例達到 31%。隨著第四季度我們許多軟體業務的更新季節到來，我們預計今年的自由現金流利潤率將超過 30%。

Turning to slide 7, I'll now discuss our balance sheet. So net debt of $8.1 billion on trailing EBITDA of $2.75 billion yields leverage of 3 times at the end of the quarter and a bit lower if we pro forma for the recent acquisitions.

轉向投影片 7，我現在將討論我們的資產負債表。因此，81 億美元的淨債務加上 27.5 億美元的往績 EBITDA，在本季度末的槓桿率是 3 倍，如果我們對最近的收購進行預估的話，槓桿率會低一些。

In the quarter, we entered the bond market and issued $2 billion across 5, 7 and 10-year tenors for a blended rate of 4.8%. This was used to fund the Transact deal and partially pay down the revolver, which has a quarter end balance of $925 million. As we move forward, our strong cash flow and use of investment-grade leverage provides us with $4 billion or more of capacity to deploy towards high-quality acquisitions.

本季度，我們進入債券市場，發行了 20 億美元的 5 年期、7 年期和 10 年期債券，混合利率為 4.8%。這筆資金用於為 Transact 交易提供資金並部分支付左輪手槍的費用，該公司季度末餘額為 9.25 億美元。隨著我們的前進，我們強大的現金流和投資等級槓桿的使用為我們提供了 40 億美元或更多的能力來部署高品質的收購。

With that end, I'll turn it over to Neil to talk about the Transact deal and its compelling combination with our CBORD business. Neil?

最後，我將把它交給 Neil 來討論 Transact 交易及其與我們的 CBORD 業務的引人注目的結合。尼爾？

Thanks, Jason. Let's turn to our most recent acquisition overview. Transact Campus is another fantastic addition to the Roper portfolio. Let's start with the investment highlights. We paid $1.5 billion net of a $100 million tax benefit for the business. We expect Transact to deliver about $325 million of revenue and $105 million of EBITDA next year, which means we paid about 14 times EBITDA we expect this business to contribute next year. Transact is adjusted DEPS breakeven this year, be accretive to our adjusted DEPS next year and is immediately cash flow accretive. And we will report Transact as combined with CBORD at our application software segment.

謝謝，傑森。讓我們回顧一下最近的收購概述。Transact Campus 是 Roper 產品組合的另一個精彩補充。讓我們從投資亮點開始。我們為該企業支付了 1 億美元的稅收優惠，淨額為 15 億美元。我們預計 Transact 明年將實現約 3.25 億美元的收入和 1.05 億美元的 EBITDA，這意味著我們支付的 EBITDA 約為我們預計該業務明年貢獻的 EBITDA 的 14 倍。Transact 今年調整後的 DEPS 損益平衡，將增加我們明年調整後的 DEPS，並立即增加現金流。我們將在我們的應用軟體部門報告 Transact 與 CBORD 的結合。

On a standalone basis, Transact meets all our long-standing acquisition criteria: leader in the niche market; delivers mission-critical, verticalized software solutions; competes based on customer intimacy; operates an asset-light business model; and is led by a skilled, passionate leadership team.

就獨立而言，Transact 滿足我們所有長期收購標準：利基市場的領導者；提供任務關鍵型垂直化軟體解決方案；基於客戶親密度競爭；營運輕資產的商業模式；由一支技術精湛、充滿熱情的領導團隊領導。

Let's talk about what the company does. Transact is a leading provider of mission-critical and purpose-built software and integrated payments to higher education institutions in two focused areas: first, in campus identity management; and second, related to tuition management. The market itself is quite attractive and in the midst of the long-term secular tailwind of universities working to improve the on-campus experience required to attract and retain the next generation of students. We estimate the combined market size to be in the $1.5 billion range and growing 6% to 8% per annum.

我們來談談公司是做什麼的。Transact 是一家領先的供應商，為高等教育機構提供任務關鍵型和專用軟體以及整合支付服務，主要涉及兩個重點領域：第一，校園身分管理；第二，與學費管理有關。這個市場本​​身相當有吸引力，並且處於大學致力於改善吸引和留住下一代學生所需的校園體驗的長期長期順風之中。我們估計綜合市場規模將在 15 億美元範圍內，並且每年增長 6% 至 8%。

As previously mentioned, we're integrating our CBORD business with Transact. CBORD will combine its university campus ID business with that of Transact's, creating a leading provider of these solutions. We expect a long-term organic growth rate of the combined business to be in the high single-digits area.

如前所述，我們正在將 CBORD 業務與 Transact 整合。CBORD 將把其大學校園 ID 業務與 Transact 的業務合併起來，打造這些解決方案的領先供應商。我們預計合併後業務的長期有機成長率將處於高個位數區域。

The go-forward leadership team has been announced, the 2025 $20 million cost synergy plan is well underway, and the initial set of customer feedback has been quite positive. As you can see, Transact is a highly compelling value creation opportunity for Roper and our shareholders.

前進的領導團隊已經宣布，2025 年 2000 萬美元的成本協同計劃正在順利進行，並且最初的客戶回饋非常積極。正如您所看到的，Transact 對於羅博和我們的股東來說是一個極具吸引力的價值創造機會。

As we turn to page 10, let's review our application software segment results. Revenue here grew by 23% in total, and organic revenue grew by 5.5%. EBITDA margins were 43.6%, and core margins improved 20 basis points in the quarter.

當我們翻到第 10 頁時，讓我們回顧一下我們的應用軟體細分市場的結果。這裡的總收入成長了 23%，有機收入成長了 5.5%。本季 EBITDA 利潤率為 43.6%，核心利潤率提高了 20 個基點。

Before getting into the business-specific details, I would like to share a few macro trends we're seeing across this segment. First, we continue to see improving organic enterprise bookings performance, growing in the double-digit area in the quarter following HSD growth in Q2.

在討論具體業務細節之前，我想先分享一下我們在該領域看到的一些宏觀趨勢。首先，我們繼續看到有機企業預訂業績不斷改善，繼第二季度 HSD 成長之後，本季實現兩位數成長。

Importantly, the enterprise-class customer sluggishness we saw during 2023, and the first quarter of this year appears to be waning. Finally, we continue to see strong growth in recurring and reoccurring revenue in this segment growing in the high single-digit area in the quarter.

重要的是，我們在 2023 年和今年第一季看到的企業級客戶低迷似乎正在減弱。最後，我們繼續看到該領域的經常性收入和經常性收入在本季以高個位數成長。

Turning to our business unit-specific commentary, we'll start with Aderant, our software business focused on the needs of large law firms. Aderant continues to perform incredibly well in the market and had another great quarter. Over the past few quarters, we have highlighted Aderant's improved product development velocity and, in particular, with GenAI-powered features. Now this innovation activity is adding to their already strong bookings momentum, including very nice new customer additions and continued progress in adding new and expanded products within their existing customer base.

談到我們針對特定業務部門的評論，我們將從 Aderant 開始，我們的軟體業務專注於大型律師事務所的需求。安德蘭繼續在市場上表現出色，並迎來了另一個出色的季度。在過去的幾個季度中，我們強調了 Aderant 產品開發速度的提高，特別是 GenAI 支援的功能。現在，這項創新活動正在增加他們本已強勁的預訂勢頭，包括非常好的新客戶增加以及在現有客戶群中添加新的和擴展的產品方面的持續進展。

Deltek, our software business serving government contracting, architecture, engineering and construction markets, was strong in the quarter as well. In particular, Deltek's enterprise-class government contracting customer activity improved in the quarter, which is encouraging to see. Also, and as a reminder, Deltek continued their ongoing cloud-based software momentum and expanded their GenAI-embedded functionality.

Deltek 是我們為政府承包、建築、工程和施工市場提供服務的軟體業務，本季也表現強勁。特別是，Deltek 的企業級政府簽約客戶活動在本季有所改善，令人鼓舞。此外，作為提醒，Deltek 繼續其持續的基於雲端的軟體勢頭，並擴展了其 GenAI 嵌入式功能。

PowerPlan, our financial planning and tax software business serving heavy fixed asset industries, continues to impress with their operating and financial results. PowerPlan has done a tremendous job over the last three or four years on improving their customer experience, accelerating their software innovation velocity and improving upsell, cross-sell activity. Great job by Joe and his team in Atlanta.

PowerPlan 是我們服務於重型固定資產行業的財務規劃和稅務軟體業務，其營運和財務表現繼續令人印象深刻。過去三、四年來，PowerPlan 在改善客戶體驗、加快軟體創新速度以及改善追加銷售和交叉銷售活動方面做出了巨大的工作。喬和他的亞特蘭大團隊做得很好。

Frontline continues to perform nicely and had strong renewal activity and delivered excellent seasonally high cash flow. Of note, we're excited to announce Matt Strazza as Frontline's new CEO. As some of you may recall, Matt joined Roper as Deltek's go-to market leader, then was promoted to be the CEO of ConstructConnect. Matt did a wonderful job at ConstructConnect, and we're excited about having this growth-oriented leader at the helm at Frontline.

Frontline 繼續表現良好，並進行了強勁的更新活動，並提供了出色的季節性高現金流。值得注意的是，我們很高興宣布 Matt Strazza 擔任 Frontline 的新任執行長。你們有些人可能還記得，Matt 加入 Roper 擔任 Deltek 的市場領導者，然後晉升為 ConstructConnect 的執行長。Matt 在 ConstructConnect 做得非常出色，我們很高興能有這位以成長為導向的領導者來掌舵 Frontline。

Also of note, we promoted Buck Brody, ConstructConnect's CFO, to assume the CEO role. Buck has been on the Roper ecosystem mostly as a CFO over the past 13 years. This is one of the first, though certainly not the last, time we'll promote leaders across and within Roper. We continue to remain quite bullish about the future for Frontline. Our healthcare IT businesses led by Strata and Data Innovations were also strong in the quarter and delivered excellent growth.

另外值得注意的是，我們提拔 ConstructConnect 財務長巴克‧布羅迪 (Buck Brody) 擔任執行長。過去 13 年來，Buck 在 Roper 生態系統中主要擔任財務長。這是我們第一次（但肯定不是最後一次）在羅珀內部和內部提拔領導者。我們仍然對 Frontline 的未來保持相當樂觀。由 Strata 和 Data Innovations 領導的醫療保健 IT 業務在本季度也表現強勁，並實現了出色的成長。

Finally, Procare continues to execute well. Importantly, as part of our evolving governance processes tied to faster growth or maturing leader nature of our portfolio, Procare is working to improve its go-to-market capabilities from lead generation to deal execution as well as go-to-market leadership. We really like what we're seeing here, although it's early days. As it relates to the guidance for the final quarter of the year, we expect to see mid-single-digit organic revenue growth.

最後，Procare 繼續表現良好。重要的是，作為與我們投資組合的更快成長或成熟的領導者性質相關的不斷發展的治理流程的一部分，Procare 正在努力提高其進入市場的能力，從潛在客戶開發到交易執行以及進入市場的領導力。我們真的很喜歡在這裡看到的一切，儘管現在還處於早期階段。由於它與今年最後一個季度的指導相關，我們預計有機收入將實現中個位數成長。

Please turn to page 11. Organic revenue in our network software segment grew 1% in the quarter and was impacted by the fact we continue to experience pressure with our freight matching businesses and work through the impact on foundry from the recent actors' and writers' strikes. Excluding our freight matching businesses and foundry, the segment grew in the mid-singles area, which demonstrates the underlying quality of this group of businesses. EBITDA margins continue to be strong at 56.2%.

請翻到第11頁。我們的網路軟體部門的有機收入在本季度增長了 1%，這是由於我們的貨運匹配業務繼續面臨壓力，並努力克服最近演員和作家罷工對鑄造廠的影響，從而受到影響。不包括我們的貨運匹配業務和代工業務，該細分市場在中單領域增長，這表明了該業務組的潛在品質。EBITDA 利潤率持續保持強勁，達到 56.2%。

Let's dig into the details and start with our freight matching businesses, DAT and Loadlink, which declined slightly as expected due to the continuing challenging freight market conditions that adversely impact both businesses. That said, we continue to see further signs of market stabilization for both carriers and brokers. During this softer period, DAT continues to invest to accelerate new product development velocity.

讓我們深入了解細節，首先從我們的貨運匹配業務 DAT 和 Loadlink 開始，由於貨運市場環境持續充滿挑戰，對這兩項業務產生了不利影響，該業務的業績如預期略有下降。也就是說，我們繼續看到營運商和經紀商市場穩定的進一步跡象。在此疲軟時期，DAT 繼續投資以加快新產品開發速度。

Now let's turn to foundry, our postproduction media and entertainment software business. Foundry continued to roll out innovative product updates and ML-powered functionality this quarter, meaningfully enhancing the creative process for high-quality postproduction visual effects. Given the continued impacts related to the recent industry strikes, foundry declined in the quarter as expected. We now expect the hangover from the strikes to carry into next year as foundry's customers continue to navigate through tight economic conditions until their creative pipelines matriculate to the postproduction phase, which we expect to be sometime during 2025.

現在讓我們轉向鑄造廠，我們的後製媒體和娛樂軟體業務。Foundry 本季持續推出創新產品更新和 ML 驅動的功能，有意義地增強了高品質後製視覺效果的創意流程。鑑於近期行業罷工的持續影響，代工在本季出現了預期的下滑。我們現在預計罷工的後遺症將持續到明年，因為代工廠的客戶將繼續應對緊張的經濟狀況，直到他們的創意管道進入後期製作階段，我們預計這一階段將在 2025 年的某個時候進行。

As mentioned, the balance of this segment grew mid-singles organically in the quarter, with solid execution across this portfolio. In particular, ConstructConnect continued its solid march of improved financial results and bookings momentum. In addition, ConstructConnect continues to lead the market with their GenAI-powered takeoff and estimating solutions.

如前所述，該細分市場的餘額在本季度實現了中單有機成長，整個投資組合執行力紮實。尤其值得一提的是，ConstructConnect 持續穩定地推動財務表現和預訂動能的改善。此外，ConstructConnect 憑藉其 GenAI 驅動的起飛和估算解決方案繼續引領市場。

Finally, our alternate site healthcare businesses performed well, led by our software solutions at MHA, SoftWriters and SHP, and further benefited from improved senior care occupancy. Turning to the final quarter of the year, we expect organic revenue to improve a bit but remain in the low single-digit area as we continue to experience stable but muted freight market conditions.

最後，在 MHA、SoftWriters 和 SHP 的軟體解決方案的帶動下，我們的備用站點醫療保健業務表現良好，並進一步受益於高級護理入住率的提高。談到今年最後一個季度，我們預計有機收入將略有改善，但仍處於較低的個位數區域，因為我們繼續經歷穩定但溫和的貨運市場狀況。

Now please turn to page 12 and let's review our TEP segment's results. Revenue here grew 4% in total and on organic basis, and EBITDA margins came in at 35.4%.

現在請翻到第 12 頁，讓我們回顧一下 TEP 部分的結果。這裡的總收入和有機收入成長了 4%，EBITDA 利潤率為 35.4%。

We'll start with Neptune. Neptune rapidly resolved their mechanical meter production issue within the quarter, performing slightly better than we anticipated. Importantly, during the short-term bespoke manufacturing challenge, Neptune was able to deliver on all their customer commitments. In addition, Neptune continues to see solid demand for both mechanical and static meters, positioning Neptune very well for the foreseeable future.

我們將從海王星開始。海王星在本季內迅速解決了機械儀表生產問題，表現略優於我們的預期。重要的是，在短期客製化製造挑戰期間，Neptune 能夠兌現所有客戶承諾。此外，Neptune 繼續看到對機械和靜態儀表的強勁需求，這使得 Neptune 在可預見的未來處於非常有利的地位。

Next, we'll turn to Verathon. Verathon continues to perform exceptionally well, with solid growth across our GlideScope and BFlex product offerings. Of particular note, we're pleased to report that Verathon is the market share leader in the US for single-use bronchoscopes. Five years ago, we entered this market with a strong belief that we had a high right to win given our incumbent GlideScope position, and now we have claimed the market share leadership position, and Verathon is not done. Great job by Team Verathon.

接下來，我們將轉向 Verathon。Verathon 繼續表現出色，我們的 GlideScope 和 BFlex 產品系列穩步成長。特別值得注意的是，我們很高興地報告，Verathon 是美國一次性支氣管鏡市場份額的領導者。五年前，我們進入這個市場時堅信，鑑於我們目前的 GlideScope 地位，我們有很大的獲勝機會，現在我們已經佔據了市場份額的領導地位，而 Verathon 還沒有結束。Verathon 團隊幹得好。

Northern Digital, or NDI, declined as we expected in the quarter based on customer program timing that led to a very difficult comp. That said, OEM order activity remained strong in the quarter. Finally, Inovonics and rf IDEAS each declined against difficult prior year comps. As a reminder, these businesses started recovering from supply chain challenges last year. For the fourth quarter, we expect to improve to high single-digit growth given Neptune is back on track operationally and NDI's customer program timing began to normalize.

Northern Digital（NDI）的業績下滑符合我們的預期，因為客戶規劃的時間表導致了非常困難的競爭。儘管如此，本季 OEM 訂單活動依然強勁。最後，Inovonics 和 rf IDEAS 與去年困難的比較相比均出現下滑。提醒一下，這些企業去年開始從供應鏈挑戰中恢復過來。鑑於 Neptune 的營運重回正​​軌且 NDI 的客戶規劃時間開始正常化，我們預計第四季將實現高個位數成長。

With that, please turn us to page 14. Now let's review our full year 2024 guidance and discuss our fourth quarter outlook. Based on strong application segment margin performance and the addition of Transact Campus, we're increasing our total year growth outlook to be north of 13%, and we expect full year organic growth to remain consistent in the 6% area.

請翻到第 14 頁。現在讓我們回顧一下我們的 2024 年全年指引並討論我們的第四季度展望。基於強勁的應用程式細分市場利潤率表現以及 Transact Campus 的加入，我們將全年總成長預期提高到 13% 以上，並且預計全年有機成長將保持在 6% 的水平。

In addition, we're raising our full year guidance to be in the range of $18.21 and $18.25, the high end of our previous range, an increase of $0.06 at the midpoint. Please note, we expect Transact to be DEPS neutral for the full year. Our guidance continues to assume a full year effective tax rate in the 21% to 22% range.

此外，我們將全年指引上調至 18.21 美元至 18.25 美元之間，這是我們之前區間的上限，中點增加了 0.06 美元。請注意，我們預計 Transact 全年 DEPS 保持中性。我們的指導繼續假設全年有效稅率在 21% 至 22% 範圍內。

For the fourth quarter, we expect adjusted DEPS to be between $4.70 and $4.74. Please note, our newest acquisition, Transact, will be about $0.03 dilutive in the quarter. Also, as a reminder, the impact of our $20 million synergy plan meaningfully skews to 2025.

對於第四季度，我們預計調整後的 DEPS 將在 4.70 美元至 4.74 美元之間。請注意，我們最新收購的 Transact 將在本季攤薄約 0.03 美元。另外，提醒一下，我們 2000 萬美元的協同計劃的影響有意義地偏向 2025 年。

Now please turn us to page 15, and then we'll open it up for your questions. We'll conclude with the same key takeaways with which we started. First, we delivered a solid quarter of financial results and expect an acceleration in sequential organic revenue growth heading into Q4. Second, we completed the acquisition of Transact Campus and commenced the integration with CBORD. Third, we're increasing our outlook for the full year. And finally, we are fairly well positioned relative to our capital deployment strategy.

現在請翻到第 15 頁，然後我們將打開它回答您的問題。我們將以與開始時相同的關鍵要點作為結束語。首先，我們交付了穩健的季度財務業績，並預計進入第四季度後有機收入將加速成長。其次，我們完成了Transact Campus的收購，並開始與CBORD的整合。第三，我們提高了全年的預期。最後，相對於我們的資本部署策略，我們處於相當有利的位置。

For the quarter, we delivered 13% total revenue and 4% organic revenue growth while increasing our EBITDA 10%. Of note, we grew our enterprise software bookings in a double-digit area and continue to see high single-digit ARR growth. Importantly, free cash flow was impressive, growing 15% in the quarter and 20% on a TTM basis.

本季度，我們的總營收成長了 13%，有機收入成長了 4%，同時 EBITDA 成長了 10%。值得注意的是，我們的企業軟體預訂量以兩位數成長，且 ARR 繼續保持高個位數成長。重要的是，自由現金流令人印象深刻，本季成長 15%，以 TTM 計算成長 20%。

Next, we completed a compelling acquisition of Transact Campus. The combination with CBORD creates a leading software and integrated payments business that helps universities solve the pressing issue of making the student campus experience more compelling. The cost synergy execution risk here is quite low, most of which has already been actioned, leading to a very attractive shareholder return.

接下來，我們完成了對 Transact Campus 的引人注目的收購。與 CBORD 的合併創建了領先的軟體和整合支付業務，幫助大學解決讓學生校園體驗更具吸引力的緊迫問題。這裡的成本協同執行風險相當低，其中大部分已經採取行動，從而帶來非常有吸引力的股東回報。

Next, we're increasing our full year outlook for total revenue to be north of 13% and maintaining our approximate 6% organic revenue growth outlook. In addition, we're increasing our full year DEPS outlook to the high end of our prior guidance.

接下來，我們將全年總收入預期提高到 13% 以上，並維持約 6% 的有機收入成長預期。此外，我們也將全年 DEPS 展望上調至先前指引的上限。

Finally, we continue to maintain a strong financial position, with over $4 billion of capacity for capital deployment. The M&A markets continue to be very active. We have a robust pipeline of attractive acquisition opportunities that we're excited to pursue with our unbiased and disciplined approach. We remain quite bullish about our ability to execute this part of our strategy.

最後，我們持續保持強勁的財務狀況，擁有超過 40 億美元的資本部署能力。併購市場持續非常活躍。我們擁有大量有吸引力的收購機會，我們很高興能夠透過公正和嚴格的方法來追求這些機會。我們仍然非常看好我們執行這部分策略的能力。

Now as we turn to your questions, and if you could flip to the final slide, our strategic compounding flywheel. We'd like to remind everyone that what we do at Roper is simple. We compound cash flow over a long arc of time by operating a portfolio of market-leading, application-specific and vertically oriented businesses.

現在，當我們轉向您的問題時，請您翻到最後一張投影片，也就是我們的策略複合飛輪。我們想提醒大家，我們在羅珀所做的事情很簡單。我們透過經營市場領先、特定應用和垂直導向的業務組合，在很長一段時間內複合現金流。

Once a company is part of Roper, we operate a decentralized environment so our businesses can compete and win based on customer intimacy. We coach our businesses on how to structurally improve their long-term and sustained organic growth rates and underlying business quality.

一旦一家公司成為儒博的一部分，我們就會經營一個去中心化的環境，這樣我們的企業就可以根據客戶的親密度來競爭並獲勝。我們指導我們的企業如何從結構上提高其長期、持續的有機成長率和基本業務品質。

Finally, we run a centralized process-driven capital deployment strategy that focuses in a deliberate and disciplined manner on finding the next great business to add to our cash flow compounding flywheel. Taken together, we compound our cash flow over a long arc of time in the mid-teens area.

最後，我們運行一個集中的流程驅動的資本部署策略，該策略以深思熟慮和有紀律的方式專注於尋找下一個偉大的業務，以添加到我們的現金流複合飛輪中。總的來說，我們的現金流在很長一段時間內都在十幾歲左右。

With that, we'd like to thank you for your continued interest and support and open the floor for your questions. Please go ahead, Operator.

在此，我們要感謝您一直以來的關注與支持，並歡迎您提出問題。請繼續，接線生。

(Operator Instructions) Deane Dray, RBC.

（操作員說明）Deane Dray，RBC。

Maybe we can start with the strategy around Transact Campus, and I note that CBORD is being combined with the business right way. And historically, Roper really never clustered the application software businesses, preferring more standalone, siloed businesses. You never talked about scale, and I don't think I've seen a cost synergy estimate coming out of a transaction in a long time.

也許我們可以從圍繞 Transact Campus 的策略開始，我注意到 CBORD 正在以正確的方式與業務相結合。從歷史上看，羅珀實際上從未聚集過應用軟體業務，而是更喜歡更獨立、孤立的業務。您從未談論過規模，而且我認為我已經很長時間沒有看到交易中產生的成本協同效應估算了。

Does this -- is this more of an opportunistic acquisition? You've done it before. You've combined medical purchasing. You've done some insurance business, back-office clustering. So we've seen this before, but this is right off of the -- out of the blocks. It's being combined, and the synergies look obvious. But just maybe is there a subtle difference here, more willingness to look at these attractive growth areas? Maybe start there.

這更像是機會主義收購嗎？你以前已經做過了。您已合併醫療採購。你做過一些保險業務、後台集群。我們以前已經見過這種情況，但這是直接發生的。它正在被合併，協同效應看起來很明顯。但也許這裡存在著微妙的差異，是否更願意關注這些有吸引力的成長領域？也許從那裡開始。

Yeah. I appreciate the opportunity to talk about that, Deane. The short answer is yeah. So even going back to our Investor Day 18 months or so ago, we outlined, I think, there a modest evolution of our capital deployment strategy to focus on a bit more of what we call bolt-on activity and then also businesses that are a bit faster-growing, call it, matured leaders.

是的。我很高興有機會談論這個問題，迪恩。簡短的回答是肯定的。因此，即使回到 18 個月左右前的投資者日，我認為我們概述了我們的資本部署策略的適度演變，以更多地關注我們所謂的補充活動，然後也關注那些屬於成長得更快一點，稱之為成熟的領導者。

And so since then -- if you look at our acquisitions we've done since then, we've done Strata, Syntellis -- or Syntellis and combined it with Strata. That was an archetype that is very similar to Transact. We bought Procare, which was our first maturing leader, slightly faster-growing business and then Transact.

從那時起，如果你看看我們自那時以來所做的收購，我們已經完成了 Strata、Syntellis，或者 Syntellis 並將其與 Strata 結合。這是一個與 Transact 非常相似的原型。我們收購了 Procare，這是我們第一個成熟的領導者，成長速度稍快一些，然後是 Transact。

If you go back to 2019, I think we've done 26-ish acquisitions, and there'd be a handful of platforms out of that. So we have leaned into a fair number of bolt-ons. I would say on the bolt-ons, the driving -- the principal driving reason for that is to buy businesses where we have a high right to win and adjacencies that are close to ours that we think increases the likelihood for accelerated organic growth once the bolt-on turns organic.

如果你回到 2019 年，我認為我們已經完成了 26 次左右的收購，其中會出現一些平台。因此，我們傾向於使用相當數量的螺栓。我想說的是，關於補充，驅動——其主要驅動原因是購買我們有很高獲勝權的企業以及與我們接近的鄰近企業，我們認為一旦這些企業加速有機增長的可能性就會增加。固定變成有機的。

So yeah, it's very much part of our strategy, and we've tooled up the capital deployment team that Janet has. We've got folks that are focused on partnering with our businesses and doing a lot of the development work in the marketplace. So yes, it's a strategic intent, and we've started the execution pathway.

所以，是的，這是我們策略的重要組成部分，我們已經組建了珍妮特擁有的資本部署團隊。我們的人員專注於與我們的企業合作並在市場上進行大量開發工作。所以，是的，這是一個策略意圖，我們已經啟動了執行路徑。

That's great to hear. And maybe for Jason, and I appreciate you guys putting the spotlight on the free cash flow compounding flywheel because it seems like that's what you got this quarter with free cash flow up 15% and DEPS up 7%. So just talk about that spread. And was there any sort of seasonal contribution to free cash flow this quarter? Frontline typically has -- that's a higher contribution in the third quarter. Just any dynamics there.

很高興聽到這個消息。也許對傑森來說，我很感謝你們把焦點放在自由現金流複合飛輪上，因為看起來這就是你們本季度得到的，自由現金流增長了 15%，DEPS 增長了 7%。那麼就談談傳播吧。本季自由現金流是否受到季節性影響？Frontline 通常在第三季做出了更高的貢獻。只是那裡的任何動態。

Yeah. So I mean Q3 is now our strongest cash flow quarter. I mean since we acquired Frontline a couple of years ago and now with the addition of Transact, it's definitely our strongest quarter. Transact thumps a little bit, maybe a couple of points of growth in the quarter. It's, as I mentioned, seasonally strong for them. But aside from that, we just had tremendous execution through the renewal seasons, which is Q3 and Q4 for us. So Q4 is expected to be strong as well. And I would just say DSO improved almost across the board for a number of our businesses. And so just good old-fashioned execution, I think, is what that drove that outsized growth relative to DEPS.

是的。所以我的意思是第三季現在是我們現金流最強的季度。我的意思是，自從我們幾年前收購了 Frontline，現在又增加了 Transact，這絕對是我們最強勁的季度。本季交易量略有成長，可能成長數個百分點。正如我所提到的，這對他們來說季節性很強。但除此之外，我們在續約季節（對我們來說是第三季和第四季）取得了巨大的執行力。因此，預計第四季也將表現強勁。我只想說，我們的許多業務的 DSO 幾乎全面改善。因此，我認為，正是良好的老式執行力推動了相對於 DEPS 的超額成長。

Brent Thill, Jefferies.

布倫特·希爾，杰弗里斯。

Neil, you mentioned some of these macro headwinds seem like they're turning a bit. I'm curious if you can just dig into what you're seeing in some of the tone in some of the buyers. And then just maybe for Jason, just -- if you can just speak to Neptune and how confident that you think we're through some of the challenges that we saw. And what are the reasons why you're confident in that recovery?

尼爾，你提到一些宏觀逆風似乎正在發生一些變化。我很好奇你能否深入了解一些買家的語氣。然後，也許對傑森來說，如果你能和海王星談談，以及你認為我們已經克服了我們所看到的一些挑戰的信心有多大。您對復甦充滿信心的原因是什麼？

Sure. So I'll just -- I'll take the first one. Jason will certainly take the second one. So first, and just to remind everybody, we worked hard over the last handful of years to really beat a lot of the cyclicality and macro out of what we do. If you think about end markets we serve, there's education, there's legal, there's government contracting, there's healthcare, insurance. And what we sell and what we deliver is mission-critical software. So we're generally not turned on and off based on the macro. And then most of our pricing is subscription oriented versus transactional.

當然。所以我會——我會選第一個。傑森肯定會選擇第二個。首先，只是提醒大家，我們在過去幾年裡努力工作，真正克服了我們所做的許多週期性和宏觀因素。如果你考慮我們服務的終端市場，有教育、有法律、有政府合約、有醫療保健、保險。我們銷售和提供的是關鍵任務軟體。所以我們一般不會根據巨集來開啟和關閉。然後我們的大部分定價都是訂閱製而非交易。

So there's sort of 3 levels of muting in that regard. But still, we're not immune to the macro, but we muted it. I would highlight a couple that we've been talking about really since the beginning of last year. First, we're talking this time or even, call it, six quarters ago, it was about the interest rates and economic slowdown. It was, I think, the most anticipated economic slowdown in modern history, and the psychology of that just slowed down, to some extent, the enterprise-class buying activity across software.

因此，在這方面有 3 個等級的靜音。但是，我們仍然無法免受宏觀影響，但我們將其靜音。我想強調一些我們自去年初以來一直在討論的問題。首先，我們這次談論的，甚至是六個季度前，是關於利率和經濟放緩的。我認為，這是近代史上最令人期待的經濟放緩，其心理在某種程度上減緩了企業級軟體購買活動。

We're cautiously optimistic based on the last couple of quarters of enterprise software bookings activity last quarter in the high single-digit area growth, this quarter, in the double-digit area growth. Pipelines look very robust heading into the end of the year. So we need to execute that -- on those pipelines. So we're encouraged by that.

基於過去幾季的企業軟體預訂活動，我們持謹慎樂觀的態度，上季企業軟體預訂活動呈現高個位數成長，而本季則是兩位數成長。到今年年底，管道看起來非常強勁。所以我們需要在這些管道上執行該操作。所以我們對此感到鼓舞。

The second macro factor certainly that takes the headline for us is the transportation macro with our DAT & Loadlink businesses. They're subscription oriented on both sides of the network, both the carrier and the broker, but the number of carriers in the market loosely follows the amount of tonnage that flows over the roads. And so as the tonnage has come down, so as a number of carriers that are participants in the network, which could put pressure on that.

第二個成為我們關注焦點的宏觀因素當然是我們的 DAT 和 Loadlink 業務的運輸宏觀因素。它們在網路雙方（承運商和經紀人）上都是面向訂閱的，但市場上承運商的數量大致取決於道路上流動的噸位量。因此，隨著噸位的下降，參與該網路的許多業者也會下降，這可能會帶來壓力。

We've just seen -- there's probably been 20 to 25 weeks of negative brokerage loads compared to prior year. That actually, in the last handful of weeks, is more normalized to last year. So we're very much seeing a stabilizing in the freight market. So those would be the macros that have impacted our business. Jason?

我們剛剛看到——與去年相比，可能有 20 到 25 週的經紀業務負數。實際上，在過去幾周里，這與去年相比更加正常化。因此，我們非常看到貨運市場趨於穩定。所以這些都會是影響我們業務的宏。傑森？

Yeah. And just to talk about Neptune a little bit. So if you recall, we stood up the ultrasonic or static line last quarter, the second line. And so we had some constraints in our mechanical meter production. And so happy to report that the root causes were identified, corrective actions implemented. We had some yield issues on plastic molding that got corrected. Some of the machines were creating some constraints as well. That's been remedied.

是的。簡單談談海王星。所以，如果你還記得的話，我們在上個季度豎起了超音波或靜態線，也就是第二條線。因此，我們的機械儀表生產受到了一些限制。很高興地報告根本原因已確定，糾正措施已實施。我們在塑膠成型方面遇到了一些產量問題，並已修正。一些機器也造成了一些限制。這已得到補救。

We really like the trends we saw through September, and those trends pretty much inform the production output for the fourth quarter and beyond. So we feel good about -- demand is really strong there, so it's really just getting through this mechanical meter production issue, and we feel good based on what we saw in Q3 and the confidence the teams have in Q4.

我們真的很喜歡九月看到的趨勢，這些趨勢很大程度上影響了第四季及以後的產量。因此，我們感覺良好 - 那裡的需求非常強勁，所以它實際上只是解決了機械儀表生產問題，並且基於我們在第三季度看到的情況以及團隊對第四季度的信心，我們感覺良好。

Only thing I'd add to Jason on Neptune, as I said in the prepared remarks, Neptune is able to deliver 100% on a customer commitment. So this was -- there's no issue there. The kaizens continue to improve and gain -- get even further improvements, and Don and the team did a great job just going again on the shop floor and getting to root cause.

關於 Neptune，我唯一要向 Jason 補充的一點是，正如我在準備好的演講中所說，Neptune 能夠 100% 兌現客戶承諾。所以這是——沒有問題。改善措施不斷改進和收穫——獲得進一步的改進，唐和團隊做得很好，只是再次回到車間並找到根本原因。

Julian Mitchell, Barclays.

朱利安米切爾，巴克萊銀行。

Maybe just one to follow up on the sort of the macro context as it pertains to network software specifically. As we're thinking out sort of beyond this quarter trying to gauge how you're thinking about the recovery slope at network software, you cautioned that foundry, in aggregate, next year may not see much growth because of the ongoing sort of strikes hangover.

也許只是跟進宏觀背景，因為它特別涉及網路軟體。當我們思考本季之後的情況，試圖衡量您對網路軟體復甦斜率的看法時，您警告說，由於持續的罷工後遺症，代工廠明年可能不會出現太大增長。

Just wondered on sort of DAT & Loadlink, that portion, what the expectation is. Do you think it's plausible we could just keep moving sideways sort of sequentially for some time? And maybe just frame as you see it now, how much are foundry and the freight match businesses down in 2024?

只是想知道 DAT 和 Loadlink 的類型，這部分的期望是什麼。你認為我們可以在一段時間內繼續橫向移動嗎？也許正如您現在所看到的那樣，到 2024 年，鑄造廠和貨運匹配業務會下降多少？

So I'll take the first part. So on DAT & Loadlink, it was intentional that we changed our word choice this call to be stabilizing. So it was very much a stabilized market. We anticipate for -- until we see anything other than stabilized, we're going to be in this position from just a tonnage or load volumes that are going over the roads and into the network.

所以我將採取第一部分。因此，在 DAT 和 Loadlink 上，我們有意將我們的用詞更改為「穩定」。所以這是一個非常穩定的市場。我們預計，在我們看到穩定以外的情況之前，我們將處於這種狀態，因為只有通過道路和進入網路的噸位或負載量。

That said, DAT does have a pathway and a plan, a high confidence plan to return to some modest levels of growth next year with no assumed improvement in carrier network participation through packaging price. And so we'll have, like I said, some modest growth at DAT next year that we have a pretty high degree of confidence heading into our AOP sessions that come -- that will occur next month.

也就是說，DAT 確實有一個途徑和計劃，一個高度自信的計劃，明年將恢復到一定的適度增長水平，並且不會通過套餐價格來提高運營商網絡參與度。因此，就像我說的那樣，明年的 DAT 將會有一些適度的增長，我們對即將到來的 AOP 會議有相當高的信心——這將在下個月舉行。

And then on foundry, it's just the waiting for the postproduction employment to return to its historical levels. I think we're about 15% below prepandemic or prestrike, I should say, employment levels of postproduction, and we just need -- the content is being produced. This is then matriculated through the pipeline, so that will be sometime in 2025. So it's definitely taken a few quarters longer than we anticipated earlier in the year. Jason?

然後在代工方面，只是等待後期生產就業恢復到歷史水準。我認為我們的後期製作就業水平比大流行前或罷工前低約 15%，而我們只需要 - 正在製作內容。然後透過管道進行錄取，預計將在 2025 年的某個時候進行。因此，這肯定比我們今年早些時候的預期要長幾個季度。傑森？

Yeah. So freight match is down sort of low singles for this year. I think we definitely think for NS, in general, that Q3 is the low point for us. And that will start to trend up, as Neil said, for the fourth quarter and then into next year, and the pacing is just dependent on sort of the market momentum there.

是的。因此，今年的貨運量下降了一些。我認為我們絕對認為對於 NS 來說，總的來說，第三季對我們來說是最低點。正如尼爾所說，這一數字將在第四季度開始呈上升趨勢，然後進入明年，其節奏僅取決於那裡的市場動力。

On foundry, it's been down double digits this year, and that's been pretty consistent throughout the year. So we expected a little bit of more of a recovery in the second half of this year. But as Neil said, it's taken a little bit longer. So as we think about the trends for next year, I think the first quarter, just to remind you, we had -- we called out an MHA sort of onetime item this year. So beyond that, though, we expect steady growth in the next year for the segment.

在代工方面，今年的下降幅度達到了兩位數，而且全年的情況相當穩定。因此，我們預計今年下半年會出現更多復甦。但正如尼爾所說，花了更長的時間。因此，當我們考慮明年的趨勢時，我想在第一季度，只是提醒您，我們今年推出了 MHA 的一次性專案。但除此之外，我們預計該領域明年將穩定成長。

And then just my follow-up, switching back maybe to the EBITDA margins at TEP. So those have been sort of down year-on-year for a few quarters. You've mentioned the production issues, and there are clearly supply chain inefficiencies sort of moving around. As we look ahead at TEP, kind of what's the confidence maybe that margins can return to year-on-year expansion in the coming quarters?

然後是我的後續行動，可能會轉回 TEP 的 EBITDA 利潤率。因此，幾個季度以來，這些數字比去年同期有所下降。您提到了生產問題，顯然供應鏈效率低下的問題正在發生。當我們展望 TEP 時，對未來幾季利潤率恢復年比擴張的信心有多大？

Yeah. No, you're, right. I mean the second and third quarter, we had -- if you recall, last year, we had some big supply chain liberation for our med product businesses and our product businesses. This year, we're down a little bit. NDI is down, had a little bit of negative mix, and we're obviously investing for growth there just because it's always been a consistent double-digit grower for us. So we're continuing to invest in NDI. But I think for the year, just thinking broadly, we're going to be flat EBITDA margin. And so it should inflect back up in the fourth quarter.

是的。不，你是對的。我的意思是，在第二和第三季度，我們——如果你還記得的話，去年，我們的醫療產品業務和產品業務的供應鏈得到了一些重大的解放。今年，我們的業績有所下降。NDI 下降了，有一些負面影響，我們顯然在那裡投資成長，只是因為它對我們來說一直是穩定的兩位數成長。因此，我們將繼續投資 NDI。但我認為，從廣泛的角度來看，今年我們的 EBITDA 利潤率將持平。因此，它應該會在第四季回升。

Terry Tillman, Truist Securities.

特里·蒂爾曼，Truist 證券公司。

My primary question is actually on the enterprise software bookings. I think you said double digits, up from high single digits. I don't know what you could share in terms of what kind of budget flush you're looking for, for Q4. I assume there is some of that.

我的主要問題實際上是關於企業軟體預訂。我想你說的是兩位數，高於個位數。我不知道您在尋求第四季度的預算充裕方面可以分享什麼。我想有一些這樣的情況。

So if you can make either a comment on that. Or just more importantly, if the bookings are picking up, do you think there's potentially an inflection in the first half next year or second half, just depending on how some of that activates to revenue? And then I have a follow-up.

那麼您是否可以對此發表評論。或者更重要的是，如果預訂量增加，您認為明年上半年或下半年是否可能會發生變化，這取決於其中一些如何啟動收入？然後我有一個後續行動。

Yeah. To provide some color there, Terry, I mean, I think you're right. The fourth quarter for us is not necessarily a budget flush. It's probably just more customer behavior. It's typically our biggest quarter. So we're obviously keen to see how that plays out. You're right. The last couple of quarters have been strong. I think just a little bit of color.

是的。為了提供一些顏色，特里，我的意思是，我認為你是對的。對我們來說，第四季不一定是預算充裕的時期。這可能只是更多的客戶行為。這通常是我們最大的季度。所以我們顯然很想看看結果如何。你說得對。過去幾季表現強勁。我覺得只要一點點顏色就可以了。

You mentioned that Deltek, GovCon enterprise got a little bit better. So if you think about what happened from Q2 to Q3, that was a little bit of the delta. Also, Vertafore was really strong, specifically in the carrier space. Also had good broker expansions, but carriers has been an area that has been a focus for them. So good to see some new logo wins there.

您提到Deltek、GovCon 企業的情況有所改善。因此，如果您考慮第二季到第三季發生的情況，您會發現這只是一點點增量。此外，Vertafore 確實很強大，特別是在航空母艦領域。經紀商也有良好的擴張，但營運商一直是他們關注的領域。很高興看到一些新標誌在那裡獲勝。

And then Aderant has been really strong, as we've mentioned, but it's really good to see the balance of both expansion of existing customers and then some new logo wins with their Sierra Cloud products. So it's good to see that they're continuing to win in the market with new logos.

正如我們所提到的，Aderant 非常強大，但很高興看到現有客戶擴張和一些新徽標憑藉其 Sierra Cloud 產品贏得勝利之間的平衡。因此，很高興看到他們繼續以新標誌贏得市場。

And then we think about the -- the fourth quarter is going to be important, as I mentioned, in terms of how that plays into next year and sort of how that will matriculate into revenue, but we're encouraged with what we saw in the last couple of quarters.

然後我們考慮 - 正如我所提到的，第四季度將很重要，就其如何影響明年以及如何計入收入而言，但我們對我們所看到的情況感到鼓舞最後幾個季度。

Yeah. We are -- obviously, we continue to have enterprise bookings momentum that will matriculate into revenue in next year, the timing of which depends on implementation time frames and customer go-lives. But yes, I mean, it's definitely a trend that we're watching carefully.

是的。顯然，我們繼續保持企業預訂勢頭，並將計入明年的收入，其時間取決於實施時間表和客戶上線。但是，是的，我的意思是，這絕對是我們正在仔細觀察的趨勢。

That's good to hear. And just my secondary question, Neil, you commented earlier when you get into kind of business-level commentary and kind of talent management moves you make, I think you talked about Procare and Frontline. I guess kind of what drove kind of some changes there, and I think you said go-to-market is the idea that, hey, they're doing well, but they could be doing even better or just maybe you could double-click a little bit into Procare and Frontline and what to expect with some of those leadership changes.

很高興聽到這個消息。我的第二個問題是，尼爾，您之前在進行業務層面的評論和人才管理舉措時發表過評論，我認為您談到了 Procare 和 Frontline。我想是什麼推動了那裡的一些變化，我想你說的進入市場是這樣的想法，嘿，他們做得很好，但他們可以做得更好，或者也許你可以雙擊稍微了解一下Procare 和Frontline ，以及對其中一些領導層變動的預期。

Sure. So there are two different things. I'll start with Procare. So Procare, we identified in our diligence process that there's an opportunity to improve, modernize, whatever word choice you want to pick, the go-to-market function. And so within a couple of months of ownership -- by the way, we shared those diligence finding and value-creation lever with the leadership team at Procare. They agreed with that. We made a leadership change. Like what's happening there, obviously, with the leadership change in go-to-market for Procare, which, by the way, is an internal promote to somebody from within the company.

當然。所以有兩個不同的事情。我將從 Procare 開始。因此，Procare，我們在盡職調查過程中發現，無論您選擇什麼詞，都有機會改進、現代化，即進入市場功能。因此，在擁有所有權的幾個月內，順便說一句，我們與 Procare 的領導團隊分享了這些勤奮發現和價值創造槓桿。他們同意這一點。我們進行了領導層變動。顯然，就像那裡發生的事情一樣，Procare 進入市場的領導層發生了變化，順便說一句，這是對公司內部某人的內部晉升。

Then you can start attacking the underlying opportunities, which was there's some lead generation opportunity. There's a way they actually staff the calls between inbound, outbound, between business development and closures. There's a compensation angle. There's call scripts around attach rates and upselling. So all that is happening. And we're -- it's very early days, but starting to gain some encouragement and starting to yield some fruit. So again, a diligence finding where we thought there was a value-creation lever attached to it, and the team sort of attacked it pretty quickly.

然後你就可以開始攻擊潛在的機會，也就是一些潛在客戶開發的機會。他們實際上有一種方法來為呼入、呼出、業務開發和關閉之間的呼叫配備人員。有個補償角。有關於附加費率和追加銷售的通話腳本。所以這一切正在發生。我們現在還處於早期階段，但已經開始獲得一些鼓勵並開始結出一些果實。再說一遍，我們認為這是一個勤奮的發現，其中存在一個價值創造槓桿，團隊很快就對其進行了攻擊。

Frontline is [certainly] different. So our existing leader retired or indicated he wanted to retire. So we had an opportunity with Matt Strazza that we have a long history with, as I mentioned, hired and came into the organization as a go-to-market leader at Deltek, did a wonderful job there. Then his first CEO opportunity was at ConstructConnect.

前線[當然]是不同的。所以我們現有的領導人退休了或表示他想退休。因此，我們有機會與馬特·斯特拉扎（Matt Strazza）合作，正如我所提到的，我們與馬特·斯特拉扎（Matt Strazza）合作有著悠久的歷史，被聘用並進入該組織，擔任Deltek 的市場領導者，在那裡做得非常出色。然後，他的第一個執行長機會是在 ConstructConnect。

Just did a terrific job in terms of the way the business is run, which is very much run in a Roper style, and he's a very growth-oriented leader. And so given that Frontline is one of our more attractive growth assets, we want a growth leader there. And it's very early days. I mean he's two months into the job or something like that at Frontline.

就業務運作方式而言，他做得非常出色，這在很大程度上是按照羅珀風格運作的，而且他是一位非常注重成長的領導者。因此，鑑於 Frontline 是我們更具吸引力的成長資產之一，我們希望那裡有一個成長領導者。現在還為時過早。我的意思是，他在前線工作或類似的工作已經兩個月了。

And then the knock-on effect of that is the CFO of ConstructConnect, Buck Brody, became the CEO of ConstructConnect and then the Head of FP&A became the CFO of ConstructConnect. So from an enterprise risk perspective, we're able to sort of promote and rotate leaders inside of Roper. Essentially, the outside hire is an FP&A leader at the business versus the CEO of one of our larger businesses. So it's a win-win for the organization and the individuals.

隨之而來的連鎖反應是 ConstructConnect 的財務長 Buck Brody 成為 ConstructConnect 的首席執行官，然後 FP&A 負責人成為 ConstructConnect 的財務長。因此，從企業風險的角度來看，我們能夠在羅博內部晉升和輪調領導者。從本質上講，外部聘用的是企業的 FP&A 領導者，而不是我們較大企業的執行長。因此，這對組織和個人來說​​是雙贏的。

Scott Davis, Melius Research.

斯科特·戴維斯，Melius 研究公司。

Wanted just to -- it's a little bit of a high-level question, but there was a lot of price in the last couple of years, not just you guys, pretty much everybody out there. But have you found any harder to get price incrementally? Are we back to kind of more normal -- when we walk into 2025, for example, would be back to kind of the more normal price increase cadence, particularly in software, obviously? But just high-level picture, what do you see there?

只是想——這是一個有點高級的問題，但在過去幾年裡，價格上漲了很多，不僅僅是你們，幾乎是所有人。但您是否發現逐步獲得價格變得更加困難？我們是否會回到更正常的狀態——例如，當我們進入 2025 年時，是否會回到更正常的價格上漲節奏，尤其是在軟體領域？但這只是高層次的圖片，你在那裡看到了什麼？

I would say just -- I would -- I seem to recall you asking a price question a few years ago as well. So for us, on software, we have always had a pricing mechanism in the ARR snowball, right? As a general matter, we attrit it. We have 95%-or-so gross retention. So we're going to attrit 5%-or-so. We're going to offset the vast majority of that at each business unit level with price. It's just in the algorithm. It's in the price expectation with the customers. It's in what we do from a new product feature point of view with the R&D and efforts we support. Then obviously a cross-sell and upsell from there to get you net retention in the 105-ish range across the blended enterprise, and we have net new on top of that.

我想說的是──我會──我似乎記得幾年前你也問過價格問題。所以對我們來說，在軟體方面，我們一直都有一個 ARR 滾雪球式的定價機制，對嗎？一般來說，我們會磨損它。我們的總留存率約為 95%。所以我們要消耗 5% 左右。我們將透過價格來抵銷每個業務部門層級的絕大多數。這只是在演算法中。這是客戶的價格預期。這是我們從新產品功能的角度所做的事情以及我們支持的研發和努力。然後，顯然，從那裡進行交叉銷售和追加銷售，可以使整個混合企業的淨留存率達到 105 左右的範圍，除此之外，我們還有淨新的。

That, I would say, it's a muscle that is very well understood and built. We obviously get better, an example we've gotten better with that over the last few years is PowerPlan. Like, they didn't have that muscle built. Now it is built. But I would say we did get outsized pricing in software and so -- in the past, and so it's just reverting to normal.

我想說，這是一種非常容易理解和建構的肌肉。顯然我們已經變得更好了，過去幾年我們在這方面做得更好的一個例子是 PowerPlan。就像，他們沒有那樣的肌肉。現在已經建成了。但我想說的是，我們確實在軟體方面獲得了過高的定價，所以——在過去，所以它只是恢復正常。

On the TEP businesses, I would say, that's a little different. Most of the businesses would take price when they launch a new product. Now there's just a more normalized inflationary every year or 18 months or so opportunity to pass, the regular way, inflation across.

我想說，在 TEP 業務上，情況有些不同。大多數企業在推出新產品時都會考慮價格。現在，每年或每 18 個月左右就有一次更正常化的通膨機會，以常規方式渡過通膨。

Yeah. Typically, in medical products, you -- it's all about new products versus price just because you're sort of bound by some of the customer contracts with hospitals and the like. But yes, I think Neil's point on software, it's been part of the rhythm for a long time. A lot of what we've done in strategic plan reviews is understand key purchasing criteria and really unpacking that at a more detailed level for each of our businesses, and that's helped them -- it's provided some confidence or just some insight into what the customer thinks about the value proposition, and that's been helpful as well.

是的。通常，在醫療產品中，一切都與新產品與價格有關，只是因為您受到與醫院等的一些客戶合約的約束。但是，是的，我認為尼爾關於軟體的觀點很長一段時間以來一直是節奏的一部分。我們在策略計畫審查中所做的許多工作都是了解關鍵的採購標準，並真正為我們的每個業務更詳細地解開這些標準，這對他們很有幫助——它提供了一些信心，或者只是對顧客的需求有了一些了解。

Okay. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And it's consistent with what you said a couple of years ago. But guys, there's just a lot of debate as it relates to software around AI, generative AI, but I just wonder kind of your view now that you've got a chance to dig more into this and spend more time on it, it's certainly in your slide decks and your -- you're launching products.

好的。是的，這很有意義。這與你幾年前所說的一致。但是夥計們，關於人工智慧、生成人工智慧的軟體有很多爭論，但我只是想知道你現在有什麼看法，因為你有機會深入研究這個問題並花更多的時間，這當然是在你的幻燈片和你正在推出的產品。

But does generative AI essentially raise the barrier to entry because you have the relationship with the customer already and you can shorten your time to market on product innovation? Or is it the opposite and people can come in with a lower-priced product easier because just the development cycles are somewhat shorter? How do you guys think about that?

但是，生成式人工智慧本質上是否會提高進入壁壘，因為你已經與客戶建立了關係，並且可以縮短產品創新的上市時間？或者情況恰恰相反，人們可以更容易獲得價格較低的產品，因為只是開發週期稍微短一些？你們對此有何看法？

I think it's very much the former, the first. I mean it is -- if you think about what we're doing, first of all, just the highest level, I mean it's a real thing. We're definitely -- I think the whole market is in sort of the trough of disillusionment, if you will. I mean the hype is -- the reality is starting to catch up with the hype.

我認為這很大程度是前者，第一個。我的意思是，如果你考慮我們正在做的事情，首先，只是最高水平，我的意思是這是真實的事情。如果你願意的話，我認為整個市場確實正處於幻滅的低谷。我的意思是炒作是——現實開始趕上炒作。

I would say the number of new use cases that are being created, I think, just not only inside Roper, but what we read externally is slowing, but we're very much advancing the existing use cases, whether it's internal productivity or customer-facing product stuff.

我想說的是，我認為正在創建的新用例數量不僅在 Roper 內部，而且我們從外部讀取的數據都在放緩，但我們正在大力推進現有用例，無論是內部生產力還是客戶 -面對產品的東西。

I would remind you and everybody that from a -- while we think this is an accelerator and it sort of raises the barriers to entry is, to do generative AI, I think you have to have two things well, right? And our client software businesses are naturally positioned better than others in regards to these two questions. The first is you need to have -- or elements, I should say, versus questions. You need to have the data that is very, very specific to what the question is you're answering, but then you also need to know what question to ask. And the more nuanced the question, the better the generative tools are.

我想提醒大家，雖然我們認為這是一個加速器，並且有點提高了進入壁壘，但要做生成式人工智慧，我認為你必須做好兩件事，對嗎？在這兩個問題上，我們的客戶端軟體業務自然比其他業務處於更好的位置。首先是你需要擁有──或者我應該說的元素，而不是問題。您需要擁有與您要回答的問題非常非常具體的數據，但您還需要知道要問什麼問題。問題越細緻，生成工具越好。

And I'll give you a very simple example. We have a legal software business that is the ERP backbone for large law firms, right? It's professional services, project-based billing. The question is not how you create a professional-based bill? It's how do you create a -- how does law firm A create a compliant bill for Roper Technologies, right? And so the very specific, bespoke question, the nuanced question is where the generative tools really, really shine. So unless you have the incumbency really matters in that regard.

我會給你一個很簡單的例子。我們有一個法律軟體業務，它是大型律師事務所的 ERP 骨幹，對吧？它是專業服務、基於專案的計費。問題不在於如何創建基於專業的帳單？這就是你如何創建 - A 律師事務所如何為 Roper Technologies 創建合規賬單，對嗎？因此，非常具體、客製化的問題，微妙的問題是生成工具真正真正發揮作用的地方。因此，除非你在職，否則在這方面確實很重要。

So it's not about the -- we can develop software as fast or faster than any startup can build software from a generative point of view, but we have the incumbency and the data. I'll probably say verticalized software businesses generally have the incumbency and the data and the specific questions of which to sort of -- to ask, if you will.

所以這不是關於——我們可以像任何新創公司從生成的角度建立軟體一樣快或更快地開發軟體，而是我們有在職人員和數據。我可能會說，垂直化軟體企業通常擁有職責、數據和具體問題，可以詢問，如果你願意的話。

Steve Tusa, JPMorgan.

史蒂夫圖薩，摩根大通。

Just on the -- following up on Julian's question on the NSS business for next year. So which businesses are accelerating? And how much of a headwind is that MHA benefit in the first quarter? And then will you be able to kind of get into that mid-single-digit range for that business next year?

就朱利安關於明年 NSS 業務的問題進行跟進。那麼哪些業務正在加速發展呢？MHA 第一季的收益有多少阻力？那麼明年你的業務能否達到中個位數的水平？

I think, Steve, I think we want to stop short of even implying any guidance in the next year. What I would say, just broadly, across the enterprise is we like the momentum we're seeing in enterprise offer bookings and the fact that it was normalized, a pretty normalized 2024 year from which to grow. You've seen a reacceleration heading into Q4. We expect those Q4 trends to carry into '25, but I think we want to just sort of stop there short of issuing guidance next quarter.

我想，史蒂夫，我想我們不想在明年暗示任何指導。我想說的是，從廣義上講，在整個企業中，我們喜歡我們在企業報價預訂中看到的勢頭，以及它已經標準化的事實，這是一個相當標準化的 2024 年增長年。您已經看到進入第四季的重新加速。我們預計這些第四季度的趨勢將延續到 25 年，但我認為我們希望就此止步，而不是在下個季度發布指導。

That's right. I think on MHA, we can call that out as a -- MHA in Q1 is a couple of points of drag in Q1.

這是正確的。我認為就 MHA 而言，我們可以稱之為——第一季的 MHA 是第一季的幾個阻力點。

Got it. Okay. And then just lastly on cash. Obviously, really strong result here. Seasonally, it steps up. How does it now behave seasonally in Q4? Last year, you were down but not by much, like basically kind of flat to down. Is that kind of the new seasonality? Or was there something unusual in Q4? Maybe just help us with the seasonality because it's definitely different than it's been in the past given the Frontline.

知道了。好的。最後是現金。顯然，這裡的結果非常強勁。隨著季節的變化，它會增加。現在第四季的季節性表現如何？去年，你的業績有所下降，但幅度不大，基本上是持平到下降。這是新的季節性嗎？或者第四季有什麼不尋常的事情嗎？也許只是幫助我們解決季節性問題，因為前線的情況絕對與過去不同。

Yeah. Q4 used to be our strongest, and now like I said, Q3 is our strongest. I think it will be -- we won't see quite the same increase in the fourth quarter as we did the third. Obviously, we got -- Transact came in. So that was helpful, but that's obviously the strongest collections quarter as well. So it will be up but not as much as Q3 in the fourth quarter.

是的。Q4曾經是我們最強的，現在就像我說的，Q3是我們最強的。我認為第四季我們不會看到與第三季完全相同的成長。顯然，我們得到了——Transact 的加入。所以這很有幫助，但這顯然也是最強勁的收藏季度。所以第四季會有所上升，但幅度不會達到第三季。

Got it. Sorry, one more, just on Vertafore. I didn't see it in the slides. Any updates there?

知道了。抱歉，還有一封，就在 Vertafore。我在幻燈片中沒有看到它。有更新嗎？

So Vertafore had -- I think Jason mentioned in his prepared remarks, they had a couple of very, very nice wins in the quarter. We can't really talk about them quite yet, but we will be able to. Also, they had a very impactful product release. And they have a product called BenefitPoint, which is the leading product for sort of managing the medical health insurance book.

所以維塔福——我想傑森在他準備好的演講中提到過，他們在本季度取得了幾場非常非常好的勝利。我們現在還不能真正談論它們，但我們一定可以的。此外，他們還發布了非常有影響力的產品。他們有一個名為 BenefitPoint 的產品，這是管理醫療健康保險簿的領先產品。

And they have an automation feature that saves like 45 minutes per customer per benefit plan. So this is tens of thousands of hours of productivity that were sort of given to our customers. It's a huge release. They worked on this for quite a bit. So like what's happening in the new product development point of view, a couple of nice exciting wins and steady as she goes.

他們擁有自動化功能，可以為每位客戶的每個福利計劃節省 45 分鐘的時間。因此，這是我們為客戶提供的數萬小時的生產力。這是一個巨大的釋放。他們為此做了相當多的工作。因此，就像新產品開發的角度所發生的事情一樣，她取得了一些令人興奮的勝利並保持穩定。

Joe Giordano, TD Cowen.

喬·佐丹奴，TD·考恩。

So on Neptune, just good to hear the production issues have been fixed. Just curious, like we've been hearing some kind of mix, I guess, about order patterns in that business. Like I know almost everyone in that sector had like huge orders for a multiyear period, and backlogs are really high. Are you getting any sense of like change in like the incoming flow from like a new booking standpoint for Neptune?

因此，在海王星上，很高興聽到生產問題已解決。我只是好奇，就像我們聽過某種關於該行業訂單模式的混合說法一樣。據我所知，該行業的幾乎每個人都在多年的時間內收到了巨額訂單，而且積壓訂單非常高。從海王星的新預訂角度來看，您是否感覺到流入流量改變了？

I would say, it's what we -- very much what we expect and what you just described. So during the pandemic, I mean prepandemic, this was a four to eight-week lead time business. Very much a book and ship type business. During COVID, we got our lead times gapped out to maybe 12 or 14 weeks, but we had 12 to 18 months of backlog order -- the order activity. And now that order duration is compressing. But the number -- the order volume, if you will, the repeat orders are not.

我想說，這正是我們所期望的，也是您剛才所描述的。因此，在大流行期間，我的意思是大流行前，這是一項為期四到八週的交貨時間業務。很大程度上是一種書籍和船舶類型的業務。在新冠疫情期間，我們的交貨時間可能會延長至 12 或 14 週，但我們有 12 到 18 個月的積壓訂單——即訂單活動。現在訂單持續時間正在壓縮。但數量——訂單量，如果你願意的話，重複訂單不是。

So we're not -- it's just a -- instead of booking a year out, they're booking whatever -- the customers are booking six or nine months out. So that order and duration is coming in as expected. But nothing, again -- for repetitive purposes, nothing from a -- the number of meters that are being shipped to an account-by-account basis, that is all healthy.

所以我們不是——這只是——他們不是預訂一年，而是預訂任何東西——客戶預訂六到九個月。因此，訂單和持續時間將按預期進行。但同樣，出於重複的目的，從逐個帳戶運送的米數來看，一切都不是健康的。

Yeah. That makes sense. Just curious if any of your businesses, like if you -- when you talk to the leaders, are any of them like super excited or super nervous one way or another about the election outcome? Like I'm thinking maybe is Deltek get excited about a potential like inflationary kind of spending spree from the government? Like just, I guess, across the portfolio, is anything that you call out one way or the other?

是的。這是有道理的。只是好奇你們的企業是否會像你們一樣——當你們與領導人交談時，他們中的任何人是否對選舉結果感到超級興奮或超級緊張？就像我在想的那樣，Deltek 是否對政府可能出現的通貨膨脹式支出狂潮感到興奮？就像，我想，在整個投資組合中，有什麼是你以某種方式提出的嗎？

As a general matter, I'd say, we're apolitical and no. I mean, we're not really impacted positively, negative by either administration. Relative to Deltek, I want to remind you and others is that the government always spends. The administration determines the nature of the spend. So if you go way back in the Bush area was defense, and Obama was education, health care.

總的來說，我想說，我們不關心政治，而且不。我的意思是，我們並沒有真正受到任何一屆政府的正面或負面影響。相對於Deltek，我想提醒大家和其他人的是，政府總是在花錢。政府決定支出的性質。因此，如果你回顧布希時代的領域是國防，奧巴馬時代的領域是教育和醫療保健。

So the spend flow changes when the government contracts are just positioned for capabilities where the flow of the federal spending is going. And so that's relatively -- that's just what their business is. I would say for '25, the '25 appropriations are actually pretty well understood at this stage and aren't going to change based on the election. That's why I think we're starting to see some of the enterprise government contracting activity starting to fall a little bit, at least for the 1-meter target, if you will. It's relatively well understood.

因此，當政府合約恰好定位於聯邦支出流向的能力時，支出流就會改變。所以這是相對的——這就是他們的業務。我想說，對於“25”，“25”撥款實際上在現階段已經很好理解，並且不會根據選舉而改變。這就是為什麼我認為我們開始看到一些企業政府承包活動開始略有下降，至少對於 1 公尺目標而言，如果你願意的話。相對來說還是比較好理解的。

Joe Ritchie, Goldman Sachs.

喬·里奇，高盛。

So my first question, just a little bit longer term. Neil, as you have these ambitions to grow the portfolio at a faster clip over the longer-term period, do you think you have the right portfolio in place? Or is there maybe some addition by subtraction to help you kind of achieve the ambitions of maybe more of like a high single-digit type organic number going forward?

所以我的第一個問題是，從長遠來看。尼爾，由於您有在較長時期內以更快的速度成長投資組合的雄心，您認為您是否擁有合適的投資組合？或者是否有一些加減法可以幫助您實現未來可能更像是高個位數類型有機數字的雄心壯志？

I think we -- the portfolio we like -- we think that there is some -- we have high confidence there's opportunity for every business inside of Roper to do better. No company has reached its full potential relative to its organic growth. What we like about our approach to organic growth is it tends to be quite sticky and sustainable.

我認為我們——我們喜歡的投資組合——我們認為有一些——我們非常有信心羅珀內部的每個企業都有機會做得更好。相對於有機成長，沒有一家公司能夠充分發揮潛力。我們喜歡有機成長的方法是它往往具有相當的黏性和可持續性。

The downside is it takes time, right? There's no -- that doesn't happen in a year. And we cited it at our Investor Day, and I'll cite it here again. I mean a great example for us in TEP is our Verathon business. Eight or nine years ago, it was a low single-digit growth business. Now it's a low teens, maybe higher-growth business, we think, sustainably for quite some time.

缺點是需要時間，對嗎？不，一年之內不會發生這種情況。我們在投資者日引用了它，我將在這裡再次引用它。我的意思是，對於我們 TEP 來說，我們的 Verathon 業務就是一個很好的例子。八、九年前，這是一項低個位數成長的業務。我們認為，現在它是一個低十幾歲、也許是高速成長的業務，並且在相當長的一段時間內可持續發展。

It takes -- just unfortunately, it takes time to get the strategy right, to enable the strategy to build the talent offense, to seed in deeply a culture of continuous improvement. We're 4 or 5 years in across the portfolio for that. And so we're definitely gaining some traction, but we like our odds in terms of being able to improve organic growth.

不幸的是，需要時間來制定正確的策略，使策略能夠建立人才進攻，並深深植入持續改進的文化。為此，我們在整個產品組合中投入了 4 到 5 年的時間。因此，我們肯定會獲得一些吸引力，但我們希望能夠改善有機成長。

And in addition, as I mentioned, I think, in one of the -- definitely one of the, I think, first question today is as we deploy our capital, we're definitely tilting towards slightly higher-growth businesses like the Transact combined with CBORD, high singles; Procare, mid-teens. So there's going to be a little bit of mix up over time in terms of the portfolio mix.

此外，正如我所提到的，我認為，今天的第一個問題是，當我們部署我們的資本時，我們肯定會傾向於增長稍高的業務，例如 Transact 聯合公司與CBORD，高單打；普羅卡雷，十幾歲。因此，隨著時間的推移，投資組合將會出現一些混亂。

Got it. That makes a lot of sense. And maybe just following up on that last point, with your leverage now around 3 times net leverage, I recognize that the pipeline is still strong. Do you expect to see any pause in M&A activity as you delever and then start to get a little bit more opportunistic? Or could you see yourself doing transactions in the next -- in the near term, call it, the next three to six months?

知道了。這很有意義。也許只是跟進最後一點，現在你的槓桿約為淨槓桿的 3 倍，我認識到管道仍然強大。當您去槓桿化並開始變得更加投機時，您是否預期併購活動會出現暫停？或者您可以預見自己在接下來的時間內進行交易——在短期內，稱之為未來三到六個月？

Yeah. I mean the -- as Jason alluded, we've got $4 billion plus of M&A capacity as we sit today over the course of the next 12 months or so. We're very active in the M&A market. It's a very attractive market. There's lots of sellers. One of the largest sponsors in the world, European sponsors on CNBC earlier this week and asked about what's the mantra. Is it sell, sell, sell?

是的。我的意思是——正如傑森所提到的，我們今天在未來 12 個月左右的時間內擁有超過 40 億美元的併購能力。我們在併購市場非常活躍。這是一個非常有吸引力的市場。有很多賣家。世界上最大的贊助商之一、歐洲贊助商本週早些時候在 CNBC 上詢問了這個口號是什麼。是賣、賣還是賣？

So there's a lot of LP pressure. DPI matters a lot. And so there's essentially three or four years' worth of deals that are compressing here in the next year or two. And so it's a very attractive market, and we plan to be active in that.

所以LP壓力很大。DPI 非常重要。因此，基本上三、四年的交易量將在未來一兩年內壓縮。因此，這是一個非常有吸引力的市場，我們計劃積極參與其中。

Christopher Glynn, Oppenheimer.

克里斯托弗·格林，奧本海默。

I was going to ask also about the deal dynamics out there. You answered the supply side. On the demand side, is that still very favorable to where you're seeing diluted buyer activity per deal?

我還想問一下那裡的交易動態。你回答的是供應方。在需求方面，這是否仍然非常有利於您看到每筆交易的買家活動被稀釋？

In terms of the competitive intensity on a per deal basis, that's the question. It's hard to ultimately know. I mean I would call out that we did the Transact deal on a proprietary basis. I would say that our M&A teams are engaged and engaging in more proprietary or quasi-proprietary opportunities than I can recall quite sometime.

就每筆交易的競爭強度而言，這就是問題所在。最終很難知道。我的意思是，我要指出的是，我們是在專有的基礎上進行交易的。我想說的是，我們的併購團隊正在參與並參與比我記憶中更多的專有或準專有機會。

But yeah, I think it's -- so we know those are facts. I think where I would speculate a little bit -- with so many opportunities that are going to be coming in the pipeline, I think all buyers are going to be a little more discerning early in processes, which might lead to a little bit lower competitive intensity, but hard to know that to be an absolute case.

但是，是的，我認為這是——所以我們知道這些都是事實。我想我會推測一下 - 由於即將出現如此多的機會，我認為所有買家都會在流程的早期變得更加挑剔，這可能會導致競爭力稍微降低強度，但很難知道這是絕對的情況。

Okay. And then in terms of Deltek and the general GovCon exposure, a lot of the stimulus in megaprojects, a lot of compliance hurdles are gating that process. Are you seeing any increased letting or momentum in that? And what's the implication for those platforms in '25?

好的。然後就 Deltek 和一般 GovCon 曝光而言，大型專案中的大量刺激措施、許多合規障礙正在限制此過程。您是否看到這方面的出租或動能增加？對 25 年這些平台有何影響？

I would say, the -- I would just refer back to what we're talking about before with GovCon. It has been, for six quarters, slowish based on the uncertainty, about four to six quarters slow based on the uncertainty of the government spending, the operation of the government.

我想說的是，我只想回顧一下我們之前在 GovCon 上討論的內容。由於不確定性，它已經連續六個季度放緩，由於政府支出和政府運作的不確定性，大約四到六個季度放緩。

We saw some green shoots here in the last quarter or two relative to -- especially in the enterprise class, some of the larger customers are starting to be acquisitive again of Deltek. The exact underpinnings of the drivers, some of that might be infrastructure, but some of it might be other things. That's not in our specific purview.

我們在過去一兩個季度看到了一些萌芽，特別是在企業級，一些較大的客戶開始再次收購 Deltek。驅動因素的確切基礎，其中一些可能是基礎設施，但其中一些可能是其他東西。這不屬於我們的具體權限範圍。

This concludes our question-and-answer session. We will now return back to Zack Moxcey for any closing remarks.

我們的問答環節到此結束。現在我們將回到 Zack Moxcey 進行閉幕致詞。

Thank you, everyone, for joining us today. We look forward to speaking with you during our next earnings call.

謝謝大家今天加入我們。我們期待在下次財報電話會議上與您交談。

The conference has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.

會議現已結束。感謝您參加今天的演講。您現在可以斷開連線。