With a combined revenue of $21 trillion and $2.1 trillion in profits, the 2026 Fortune 500 is the definitive list of America's largest companies.

Fortune 500

Almost $20 trillion in revenue—and a record-breaking $1.87 trillion in profits. Introducing the 2025 Fortune 500, the definitive list of the biggest companies in America.

Industries included in the sector are electrical equipment and industrial machinery.

Fortune Sector Leaders: Industrials

The Fortune 500, in its 70th year in 2024, ranks the biggest U.S. companies by revenue.

The Fortune 500, in its 69th year in 2023, ranks the biggest U.S. companies by revenue.

This year’s Fortune 500 marks the 68th running of the list.

This year’s Fortune 500 marks the 67th running of the list.

F500-2021-384-Westinghouse Air Brake Technologies

Also known as Wabtec Corporation, the company's roots date to the 19th century, when its namesake—George Westinghouse, Jr.—invented and patented a compressed air brake system for trains. Today, the company is a diversified technology provider for rail industries.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 66th running of the list.

Also known as Wabtec, the Pittsburgh-based company provides products and services for locomotives, freight cars, and other elements of the global rail industry.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 65th running of the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 64th running of the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 63rd running of the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 62nd running of the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 61st running of the list. Wal-Mart claims the top spot again. See who made the list.

Wal-Mart stayed on top as its sales crept closer to half-a-trillion dollars. Apple moved into the top five. And UnitedHealth Group continued its steady climb. 

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Westinghouse Air Brake Technologies Corporation, commonly known as Wabtec, provides services for the freight rail and passenger transit industries around the world. The company builds and sells diesel-electric and liquid natural gas-powered locomotives, along with freight cars and a wide range of other railways products. Wabtec was formed after a merger in 1991 between Westinghouse Air Brake Company and MotivePower.

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Westinghouse Air Brake (WAB): Company Profile, Stock Price, News, Rankings

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Westinghouse Air Brake

westinghouse air brake

Today, and welcome to the Wabtec Third Quarter 2025 earnings conference call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star, then one, on a touch-tone telephone. To withdraw your question, please press star, then two. Please note, today's event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Ms. Kyra Yates, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Operator. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Wabtec Corporation's Third Quarter 2025 earnings call. With us today are President and CEO Rafael Santana, CFO John Olin, and Senior Vice President of Finance, John Mastalerz. Today's slide presentation, along with our earnings release and financial disclosures, were posted to our website earlier today and can be accessed on the Investor Relations tab. Some statements we are making are forward-looking and based on our best view of the world and our business today. For more detailed risks, uncertainties, and assumptions relating to our forward-looking statements, please see the disclosures in our earnings release and presentation. We will also discuss non-GAAP financial metrics and encourage you to read our disclosures and reconciliation tables carefully as you consider these metrics. I will now turn the call over to Rafael.

Thanks, Kyra, and good morning, everyone. Let's move to slide four. I'll start with an update on our business, my perspectives on the quarter, and progress against our long-term value creation framework, and then John will cover the financials. We delivered a very strong quarter, evidenced by continued growth in our backlog, sales, margin, and earnings. Sales in the third quarter were USD 2.9 billion, which was up 8% versus prior year. Revenue growth was driven by both the freight and transit segments, including the acquisition of Inspection Technologies, which we closed at the beginning of the third quarter. Adjusted EPS was up 16%, driven by increased sales and margin expansion. Total cash flow from operations for the quarter was USD 367 million. The 12-month backlog was USD 8.3 billion, representing an increase of 8.4%, while the multi-year backlog achieved an all-time high.

These results demonstrate sustained revenue and earnings momentum and provide enhanced visibility for the fourth quarter and into the future. Shifting our focus to slide five, let's talk about our 2025 end market expectations in more detail. While key metrics across our freight business remain mixed, we are encouraged by the underlying momentum of our business and the continued strength of our pipeline of opportunities across the globe. Despite the strong momentum that we're experiencing, we're continuing to exercise caution to navigate a volatile and uncertain economic landscape as we move into the final quarter of the year. North America traffic was up 1.4% in the quarter. Despite this traffic growth, Wabtec's active locomotive fleets were down slightly when compared to last year's third quarter, however, up sequentially. During the quarter, Wabtec outperformed the industry in terms of share of active locomotives running.

Looking at the North American railcar builds last quarter, we discussed the industry outlook for 2025, which was for approximately 29,000 cars to be delivered, and which has again been reduced by the industry sources to approximately 28,000 cars. These forecasts represent a 34% reduction from last year's car build. Internationally, activity is strong across core markets such as Asia, India, Brazil, and CIS. Significant investments to expand and upgrade infrastructure are supporting a robust international locomotive backlog and orders pipeline. In mining, an aging fleet continues to support activity to refresh and to upgrade the truck fleet. Finally, moving to the transit sector, we continue to see underlying indicators for growth. Ridership levels are increasing in key geographies along with fleet expansion and renewals. Next, let's turn to slide six to discuss a few business highlights.

International demand for our products and services remains strong, highlighted in the quarter by the USD 4.2 billion order secured with Kazakhstan’s National Railway, the largest single rail order in history. This historic agreement embodies Kazakhstan’s National Railway’s visionary approach for the country's rail network as the primary link between Europe and Asia, which is supporting the growth momentum that we're continuing to see in the region. By delivering advanced locomotives and long-term service solutions, Wabtec is a proud partner in Kazakhstan's progress, helping to unlock the region's enormous potential and developing the engineering competencies in the country's rail industry. Moving to mining, we secured a USD 125 million multi-year agreement for ultra-class straddle systems. In transit, we secured a USD 140 million transit brake orders driven by increased activity in India. Also in the quarter, the first four Siemens locomotives arrived in Guinea.

This event marked the first order of heavy haul locomotives assembled and exported at our Marhowra, India locomotive plant. This milestone is a tribute to a global team that designed and built these locomotives specifically tailored to meet the customer demand of the largest untapped iron ore reserve in the world. All of this demonstrates the underlying strength across our businesses and the strong pipeline of opportunities which we continue to execute on. Moving to slide seven, before turning it over to John, I want to take a few minutes here to highlight the transit segment's attractive value creation framework. Transit's sustained orders growth is supported by unprecedented backlogs at car builders, rising passenger growth in key markets like Europe and India, and ongoing public investment in rail infrastructure around the world.

Similar to the car builders, our transit backlog has been growing, and along with the consistent growth, we are experiencing increased quality and margin expansion with our backlog, reflecting our commitment to deliver value and innovation. The team also remains focused on enhancing competitiveness and driving innovation. Through our integration initiatives, we are streamlining operations and achieving significant cost efficiencies, all while maintaining excellence in execution of our orders. We target leadership positions in segments where we offer clear differentiation, which positions us for long-term success. This is not only an organic story; our ongoing efforts in portfolio optimization, alongside the creative bolt-on acquisitions, are further strengthening our business and expanding our capabilities. This disciplined strategy is delivering tangible financial results. We are executing on our commitments with our value creation framework, driving both top-line growth and margin expansion.

Year to date, our revenue is up 7.5%, and our operating margins have grown to the mid-teens. Given this momentum, we're confident that we will continue to expand our margins into the high teens of our planning horizon. With that, I'll turn the call over to John to review the quarter segment results and our overall financial performance. John?

Thanks, Rafael, and hello, everyone. Turning to slide eight, I will review our third quarter results in more detail. Our third quarter played out largely as we planned with revenue and with slightly better than expected operating margins. As we discussed in our last quarter call, we expected second-half new locomotive deliveries to provide robust growth while being partially offset by lower mod production in the second half. This is exactly how the third quarter played out, and we expect the fourth quarter's revenue cadence to be similar to the third quarter, but at a higher growth rate in the fourth quarter. Sales for the third quarter were USD 2.89 billion, which reflects an 8.4% increase versus the prior year. Sales growth in the quarter was driven by both the freight segment, including Inspection Technologies, and the transit segment. Our operating margin expansion came in slightly better than expected.

For the quarter, GAAP operating income was USD 491 million. The increase versus prior year was driven by higher sales, improved gross margin, and proactive cost management. Adjusted operating margin in Q3 was 21.0%, up 1.3 percentage points versus the prior year. This increase was driven by improved gross margins of 2.3 percentage points, which were partially offset by operating expenses, which grew at a higher rate than revenue. GAAP earnings per diluted share was USD 1.81, which was up 11.0% versus the year-ago quarter. During the quarter, we had net pretax charges of USD 6 million for restructuring, which were primarily related to our integration and portfolio optimization initiatives, as well as USD 33 million of charges related to M&A activity. In the quarter, adjusted earnings per diluted share was USD 2.32, up 16.0% versus the prior year. Overall, Wabtec delivered a very strong quarter, demonstrating the underlying strength of the business.

Now, turning to slide nine, let's review our product lines in more detail. Third quarter consolidated sales were up 8.4%. Our quarter results were driven by growth in our equipment, digital, and transit businesses, partially offset by our service business. Services revenue was down 11.6% from last year's third quarter. This decline was planned and driven by the timing of modernization deliveries, which we expected to be down in the second half. As mentioned earlier, we expect services revenue to be down again in Q4 as a result of lower mod deliveries on a year-over-year basis. Services' lower mod deliveries are expected to be offset by significant growth in new locomotive deliveries. Equipment sales were up 32% from last year's third quarter.

This robust sales growth was driven by higher year-over-year new locomotive deliveries, as well as the partial catch-up of delivering the new locomotives that were delayed from last quarter. We also expect this double-digit growth rate to continue in the fourth quarter as well. Component sales were up 1.1% versus last year due to growth seen in industrial products, offsetting the impact from significantly lower North American railcar build and lower revenue associated with our portfolio optimization initiative. Digital intelligence sales were up 45.6% from last year. This was driven by the Inspection Technologies acquisition. When excluding Inspection Technologies, digital continues to see growth internationally with continued softness in the North America market. In our transit segment, sales were up 8.2% in the quarter, driven by our products and services businesses. Foreign currency exchange had a favorable impact on sales of 3.0 percentage points.

As a key to our value creation strategy, we have been focused on optimizing our portfolio by divesting and exiting low-margin, non-strategic businesses. We believe portfolio transformation will lead to improved growth resiliency. When we adjust the third quarter's revenue for these divestitures and exits that we have executed, our revenues are up roughly an additional half a percentage point of growth to 8.9%. Moving to slide 10, GAAP gross margin was 34.7%, which was up 1.7 percentage points from third quarter last year. Adjusted gross margin was also up 2.3 percentage points during the quarter. In addition to higher sales, gross margin benefited from cost recovery through contract escalation and the addition of Inspection Technologies, while mix was a headwind in the freight segment as expected. Raw materials were unfavorable due to higher material costs, largely due to increased tariffs.

Foreign currency exchange was a benefit to revenue in the quarter, as well as to gross profit and a marginal impact on operating margin. During the quarter, we also benefited from favorable manufacturing costs. Turning to slide 11, for the third quarter, GAAP operating margin was 17.0%, which was up 0.7 percentage points versus last year. Adjusted operating margin improved 1.3 percentage points to 21.0%. GAAP and adjusted SG&A expenses were higher versus prior year. Both GAAP and adjusted SG&A expenses were impacted by the addition of Inspection Technologies, while GAAP SG&A also experienced increased transaction costs related to the acquisition. Engineering expense was USD 59 million, which was up USD 9 million versus last year as a result of the addition of Inspection Technologies.

We are committed to allocating engineering resources toward existing business opportunities with high returns, and we prioritize strategic investments that position us as an industry leader in fuel efficiency and digital technologies. These advancements are designed to enhance our customers' productivity, capacity utilization, and safety. Now let's take a look at segment results on slide 12, starting with the freight segment. As I already discussed, freight segment sales were up 8.4% during the quarter. GAAP segment operating income was USD 414 million, driving an operating margin of 19.8%, down 0.4 percentage points versus last year. GAAP earnings were adversely impacted by purchase accounting charges resulting from our acquisition of Inspection Technologies. Adjusted operating income for the freight segment was USD 513 million, up 9.9% versus the prior year. Adjusted operating margin in the freight segment was 24.5%, up 0.4 percentage points from prior year.

The increase was driven by improved gross margin behind contract escalation and the addition of Inspection Technologies, partially offset by unfavorable mix between services and equipment businesses. Finally, segment 12-month backlog was USD 6.09 billion. Our 12-month backlog was up 9.5% on a constant currency basis, while the multi-year backlog reached a record level of USD 20.91 billion, was up 18.4% on a constant currency basis. Turning to slide 13, transit segment sales were up 8.2% at USD 793 million. When adjusting for foreign currency, transit sales were up 5.2%. GAAP operating income was USD 115 million. Restructuring costs related to integration and portfolio optimization were USD 3 million in Q3. Adjusted segment operating income was USD 123 million. Adjusted operating income as a percent of revenue was 15.5%, up 2.7 percentage points. The increase was driven by higher adjusted gross margin behind integration and portfolio optimization efforts, as well as strong operational execution.

Over the past couple of quarters, the transit team has focused on more appropriately balancing production across the year, and as such, we do not expect the typical lift that we have seen in the fourth quarter. We expect fourth quarter adjusted margins to be relatively flat versus prior year. Additionally, we expect adjusted margins to expand to the mid-teens on a full-year basis. Finally, transit segment 12-month backlog for the quarter was USD 2.18 billion, which was up 3.9% on a constant currency basis. The multi-year backlog was up 1.0% on a constant currency basis. Now let's turn to our financial position on slide 14. Third quarter operating cash flow generation was USD 367 million, which was lower on a year-over-year basis, resulting from higher tariffs and increased working capital. We continue to expect greater than 90% cash conversion for the full year.

Our balance sheet and financial position continue to be strong, as evidenced by first our liquidity position, which ended the quarter at USD 2.75 billion, and our net debt leverage ratio, which ended the third quarter at 2.0 times after the funding of the purchase of Inspection Technologies for approximately USD 1.8 billion. We expect our leverage ratio to remain in our stated range of 2-2.5 times upon closing of both the Delner and Frauscher sensor technology acquisitions, which we believe will close within the next couple of quarters. We continue to allocate capital in a disciplined and balanced way to maximize return for our shareholders. With that, I'd like to turn the call back over to Rafael to talk about our 2025 financial guidance.

Thanks, John. Now let's turn to slide 15 to discuss our 2025 outlook and guidance. As you heard today, our team delivered a very strong quarter while continuing to navigate through a challenging environment. Our global pipeline remains strong, and our 12-month and multi-year backlogs provide visibility for profitable growth ahead. We remain encouraged by the pipeline of opportunities that remains ahead of us. Our team's commitment to product innovation, disciplined cost management, and partnership with our customers has been instrumental in driving our ongoing success. As we look to the fourth quarter, in light of our strong third-quarter results and our ongoing underlying momentum, we are raising our full-year adjusted EPS guidance. We now expect adjusted EPS to be between USD 8.85 to USD 9.05, up 18% at the midpoint. Looking ahead, I'm confident that Wabtec is well-positioned to drive profitable growth to close out 2025 and beyond.

Now let's wrap up on slide 16. As you heard today, our team continues to deliver on our value creation framework, thanks in large part to our resilient install base, world-class team, innovative technologies, and our continued focus on our customers. As we move into the final quarter of the year, we remain focused on our commitment to creating value for our stakeholders and maintaining the momentum we have generated. Our team's dedication positions us to continue driving Wabtec's success, even in a dynamic and uncertain economic environment. With that, I want to thank you for your time this morning, and I'll now turn the call over to Kyra to begin the Q&A portion of our discussion. Kyra?

Thank you, Rafael. We will now move on to questions. Before we do, and out of consideration for others on the call, I ask that you limit yourself to one question and one follow-up question. If you have additional questions, please rejoin the queue. Operator, we are now ready for our first question.

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press star, then one, on your touch-tone telephone. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. If at any time your question has been addressed and you would like to withdraw your question, please press star, then two. At this time, we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster. First question is from Angel Castillo, Morgan Stanley.

Hi, good morning, and congrats on another strong quarter here. Just one introduction on one of the primary concerns that we sometimes hear from investors, I think. This year, your organic growth has been in the low single digits versus your algorithm of kind of mid-single digits here. Rafael, could you just talk about maybe why you don't share this concern by unpacking kind of two key things that I think are important here? First, maybe can you give us more color on the strong pipeline of opportunities that you talked about and just kind of what that tells you about the magnitude or the pace of ultimately orders that you anticipate, particularly in North America freight? Then, your backlog itself already seems to imply a reacceleration in organic growth, I think next year toward kind of high single digits range. Is that correct?

Any preliminary thoughts you can share on just kind of organic growth expectations for 2026 and just the kind of the shape across your businesses?

As you speak here, I mean, you've got to look into the pipeline dynamics, and it continues to be strong. I think one of the elements is the 12-month backlog. The growth in the 12-month backlog has outpaced the growth we saw last year, and with that, we have a stronger coverage right now this year than we had a year ago. That's a positive right there, and it's stronger coverage as we look into 2026. I think the other element is the total backlog, which even though it reached an all-time high in the third quarter, our pipeline of opportunities remains strong, and we actually expect further growth moving to the fourth quarter. The reason for that is really tied to, I'll start first. I mean, we're bullish across some key international markets. Kazakhstan continues to see strong demand, and that's driven not just by volume growth.

I mean, they've got new rail lines, you've got fleet renewal, and we're seeing similar momentum. If you look across CIS countries in East Asia, you take, for instance, Brazil. We're seeing the same things on fleet renewal in iron ore. We are seeing volume growth in agriculture, which remains strong. In Africa, we continue to see opportunities to expand the revenues in the continent. In mining, demand for ultra classes is another bright spot, and it's right where we play. On transit, you see we continue to grow profitably, and we're continuing to enhance the competitiveness of the business. All in all, I think there's the elements of the pipeline, which continues to be strong. Our total active fleet is running harder, and we're continuing to expand our fleets around the world.

We now expect combined volumes for both new locomotives and mods to keep growing as we head into 2026, and backlog numbers support it. I think you continue to see international outpace North America, and I think with that, they're both positive.

That's very helpful. Thank you. Maybe just a quick follow-up on the services side. Can you just unpack what core services versus maybe the mods are in kind of second half 2025? As you look at, I think you just mentioned for 2026, you expect mods and equipment to grow, or locomotives to grow next year. Do you expect mods to grow within that as well next year?

The variation you see there on the results in the quarter for services is exactly tied to mods, and we expect that to continue to vary. It's going to be really a function here of where CapEx is allocated, if it's more towards new or some elements of modernizations. You asked about the core of services. We continue to see that growth in the 5% to 7% range as we look forwards. I think we continue to have the fundamentals that drive that, which is ultimately connected to the age of the fleet, the innovation that allows customers to have a return on those investments. We're continuing to win a share of wallets with customers. Even when fleets are down, we see us last down the overall market. I think the dynamics and the fleet dynamics don't change.

International continues to expand, and in the North America market, the fleets continue to run hard.

Next question is from Ken Hoekster, Bank of America.

Hey, great. Good morning. Concur, great job on the quarter and the 8.5% growth in sales and backlog. I guess similar questions, just want to focus on that backlog and thoughts on what we have in this upcoming, I guess, 12-month process. How should we think about the two upcoming acquisitions and then organic growth after that? Maybe talk about your near-term backlog a little bit or your view on organic growth there?

I'll start with John commenting on the specifics here. As I said, as we stand here today, we've got stronger coverage for 2026 than we did a year ago coming to 2025. That's a positive. I think we're seeing stronger momentum. You asked about acquisitions in that regard. Evident it's really more of a flow business, so minimum impact in terms of the total backlog. With that, let me pass it on to John.

Yeah, Ken, with regards to the acquisitions, when we look at, well, evident, obviously, we built in, the first quarter has, the first quarter of our ownership, the third quarter has progressed on track. Volumes are right where we expected them to be, and we're seeing in the first quarter of ownership, both accretive margin to the overall company as well as slightly accretive EPS. Things are checking there really well through one quarter of ownership. We've got two more to go, as you know, Ken. With regards to Frauscher, we'd expect by the end of the year, and Delner, sometime prior to the, or within the first half of 2026. Neither of those are in our guidance today. We will include those when we close on them. That will provide, obviously, inorganic growth as we move into 2026.

I also expect those two to be accretive from a margin standpoint as well as slightly accretive from EPS. Everything is tracking well on the three acquisitions.

For my follow-up, you talked about the shift to builds versus mods. You telegraphed that well. Obviously, we're not seeing maybe as much of the margin impact, John. You kind of mentioned that in your prepared remarks. Was that more a cost offset in the cost programs? Was it something else in terms of better margin out, you know, on pricing that you can walk us through? I think you noted more muted margin expectation for fourth quarter. I don't know if that was just for freight or overall. I don't know if you want to dig into the margin view thought.

A couple of things, Ken. Number one is, as we certainly felt the impact of unfavorable mix in the third quarter, we had a lot of other things going well, which we had anticipated overall. From our expectations, we came in slightly favorable in terms of margin in the third quarter, but largely on track. That was driven by running the business very well. Operational excellence was very strong in the quarter. We had some unfavorable timing with regard to price escalation, and then the integration programs are dropping a fair amount of favorability. That was offset by that unfavorable mix. As we look to the fourth quarter, very similar as we talked about last quarter, Ken, we expect margin, margins to expand, the margin growth to expand in the fourth quarter from what we've seen in the third quarter.

Now, on an absolute basis, as you know, margins will be down on an absolute basis as our fourth quarter is seasonally lower, largely because of fewer production days and the absorption that goes along with that. We're tracking to where we expected for the fourth quarter. We've raised guidance a little bit this period, and that was for the fact that we're coming in a little bit favorable on margins in the third quarter. We'd expect that to carry forward.

Next question is from Bascome Majors, Susquehanna.

Thanks for taking my questions. Rafael and John, the release and the deck talk a bit about tariff pressure on cash flow as it seems to be flowing into inventory. Can you talk about where we are on your net offset and just as that flows into the P&L over the coming quarters? How should we think about the impact on both the top line, gross profit, and ultimately the bottom line of the business? Thank you.

Sure, Bascome. Let's kind of talk about the cadence of the tariffs coming in. When a product comes across the border, the tariff is owed, right? That hits cash first. We're certainly seeing pressure on overall cash as that increased expense comes through. What that does is that gets inventoried and flows through our regular inventory. It being a long cycle product as we are, or a fair amount of our products are, it typically is going to take two to four quarters for that to come through the P&L. In the third quarter, we are starting, we are seeing the financial impact of tariffs, and certainly have seen the cash impact. That's the gross impact, right? The net impact is couched with what we're doing to offset those tariffs or to mitigate them.

We've talked, Bascome, in the past, and worth repeating, I think, today, there's a four-pronged approach that we're spending a lot of time on and working very hard on all facets. The first one is to get all the exemptions that we're entitled to. I think the best example of that, Bascome, is the USMCA. This is for Canada and Mexico tariffs and qualifying our products. I think our team's done an extraordinary job of getting off and getting that done. We got a very high percentage that qualify there. The second area is on the supply chain, right? We can move products around, not always easy, not always cheap, but we're looking at those opportunities given the shifting landscape of tariffs, should we be sourcing in other jurisdictions? That's going on, and that will continue to go on as we move through the next several quarters.

The third area is sharing costs with our customers. We've been doing a fair amount of that as well. The fourth area, Bascome, I'd call it kind of a wraparound, is we are taking the entire enterprise and making sure that we make our commitments, and we're being incredibly prudent on the spending that we do and very cost-focused on everything across the company to again assure that we can do our best to cover the tariffs that are coming at us.

Thank you for that comprehensive answer, John. Just to clarify something from earlier, Rafael, you said new locos and mods, you expect units to be up again next year. Was that a North America comment or a global comment? As you roll out the new mod product, I think, later next year in North America, do you think that mix kind of shifts more balanced back into mods as that grows? Thank you.

It was a comment with regards to total. If you look at the combination of mods and new units, and with that, I mean, the stronger variation we see between those dynamics between new and mods is in North America in that regard. The dynamics are positive as we look at the total, and the backlog certainly supports it from both a 12-month backlog and special, as some of those products have longer lead times.

Next question is from Rob Wertheimer, Melius Research.

Hi, thanks. Good morning. There's a lot that went well in the quarter. To me, I guess the gross margin was maybe the most impressive. I know you touched on it. John just mentioned some of the contract issues in your prepared remarks. It seemed like you had some headwinds on mix and material. I wonder if you could just expand on what went right in gross margin. Is that, I don't know, contract escalation a steady thing that continues over the years? Was there a lumpiness to it? Maybe just comment on that. Thank you.

Yeah, in terms of the escalation, exactly what it means is it's recovering our costs. There's no net benefit, but the timing of it does have an impact, Rob, right? These are typically annual escalators, and there's differences sometimes between when the costs hit and when we recover that money. There's typically a lag, but we saw a little bit of positive there. The other thing that you're seeing in gross margin is a favorable mix as we bring Inspection Technologies in. Inspection Technologies comes at a significantly higher gross margin than the rest, so we're seeing a little bit of a mixed favorability with Inspection Technologies. Again, the biggest piece of all of this, Rob, is just the company is running well.

Everyone in the company is focused on cost, and, you know, the momentum that we've got is we continue to see, and it's coming out of the first and second quarter, seeing it in the third quarter, and we'd expect that to continue into the fourth quarter and into 2026.

Next question is from Scott Group, Wolfe Research.

Hey, thanks. Good morning. John, I thought that last answer on tariff was really helpful. I just had a follow-up. When you think about the gross impact of tariff and the timing issues, what quarter would you say is the peak gross impact of tariff? Given all the mitigation efforts, is the quarter of the biggest net impact any different? Meaning, is the net impact sooner or later if you understand what I'm trying to figure out?

Yeah, I do, Scott. I don't think we're that precise, to start with. I think the highest gross and the highest net would be very similar. Certainly, the gross part of the tariffs is a driver of the movement, right? It's hard to tell exactly what quarter that's going to be because it's how everything's flowing through inventories. We're focused on doing everything we can to mitigate them, and the entire company is working hard at doing that.

Maybe just ask a little differently. Do you think we've seen the biggest impact yet? I know last quarter you said you think the net impact of tariff after mitigation is sort of immaterial. Do you still feel that way?

No, I don't think we've seen the largest, gross or net, impact on tariffs. I think that's still in front of us over the next couple of quarters.

We are continuing to work on a lot of our cost-out plans and the elements in terms of supplier mitigation as John described. Make no mistake, pricing is a key element of that too.

Makes sense. If I could just ask one last one, you've done such a good job getting these transit margins better. Where do you think those can go over the next couple of years? As you know, I know you've got long-term margin guidance for the consolidated business. Should we think about similar sort of upside in terms of a couple hundred basis points more to go in transit? Is that the right way to think about it?

We see it as continuous improvement. You go back four or five years ago, we had given, really, a direction of heading to mid-teens. We're now heading to high-teens. I think it's really not just a function of running the business better, which we'll continue to do. The other piece is also how you continue to rethink the portfolio. As John has highlighted, we've exited also some businesses. We're starting the process of acquiring better businesses into that portfolio. We look at this as continuous improvement. We look at this as an evolution of the portfolio.

All right. Good stuff. Thank you, guys. Appreciate it.

Next question is from Saree Boroditsky, Jefferies.

Good morning. This is James from Forseri. Thanks for taking questions. You gave great color on international pipeline, but you also kind of talked about a strong pipeline in North America. Can you kind of talk about what you're seeing in terms of customer activity, order trends, or any key drivers in the North America pipeline?

I think, I'm not going to make any comments with regards to specific customers. What I'll tell you is the view that the fundamentals of the fleet remain the same. Customers are running aged fleets. If you look at the fleet running in North America right now, over 25% of that fleet is over 20 years old. That's excluding the 2,000 modernizations we've done since 2015. That's a significant element. The other one is if you think about the fleet that's running, also a similar amount of over 25% are still DC locomotives. You know, you can replace here, for every three locomotives, you could have two AC running. The sense of modernizing units to AC, upgrading control systems, that actually allows the Class Ones to cut fleet sizes. It not just addresses things like obsolescence. It improves asset productivity. It improves reliability.

If you think about services, it lowers maintenance cost. The way we look at it, I don't see fleet renewal. It's not discretionary. I think it's actually a key lever for how they improve their operating ratio, how they improve quality in terms of the service, and the overall competitiveness. I think we see this very much aligned, and those dynamics have not changed.

Great. That's a great caller. I guess kind of on the international side, it's great to see like USD 4.2 billion Kazakhstan contract win. Can you kind of talk about what exactly is included in that contract, and when do you expect it to kind of begin to convert into revenue?

I won't go into the specifics of each contract, but the way we look at it, very much, this is providing us coverage for a region that continues to grow. It's not just an element of volume that's growing. There are new projects and new lines that will accelerate that growth further. There are elements of just fleet renewal, fleet that continues to age in that context. I think those are all positive. Most importantly, we also have the service agreements where we ultimately support those fleets from an availability and reliability perspective.

Yeah. Jason, the deal with Kazakhstan is made up of several contracts. One is for locomotives, for 300 locomotives over a 10-year period of time. The other contracts are for the service, as Rafael had just mentioned. What we've done is re-up the service for all the existing, re-upped it and extended it for all the existing locomotives that we're currently servicing there. We've also added a new service contract for all those 300 that will be coming in. Those will average over a 15-year period of time.

Next question is from Bascome Majors, Stephens.

Thanks. Morning, everyone. Rafael, you know, recently we've seen a change in FRA leadership, and I wondered if you could give us an update on the regulatory environment. Are you seeing any increased momentum or desire from your customers to implement some of these advanced technologies Wabtec has worked to develop? I think of Zero2Zero as a great example. Is that something we could see implemented here in 2025 or 2026, or is there more wood to chop on the regulatory front?

I think, yes, we are. It's good to see that momentum, and you pointed absolutely right. I think Zero2Zero is the first one, but we've got other digital tools that we've been working with customers. It's great to see the new leadership with the new incoming administrator. I think the support is there to focus on really advancing what I'll call both rail safety and the supporting innovation there. Dynamics are positive, and that certainly will contribute to the digital business here as we gain momentum in North America.

Thanks. Maybe just as a quick follow-up, you know, you've had a full quarter with Inspection Technologies now. Can you just talk about how integration has gone so far and maybe any customer feedback? Are you seeing kind of signs of cross-selling momentum, or is it a little too early for that?

I think it's been a positive. I mean, it's early days still, but it's a positive. I think we've described how we knew some of the leadership team, and the leadership team knew some of us. I think it's been a good process and fluid in a lot of ways. There's a lot of what the teams are working on right now, but it's good to see the first quarter, the first results, which are really, I'll call, very much aligned, a bit ahead, but aligned to what we touched. I think it's a testament to the quality of really the acquisitions we've looked into and the quality of the leadership teams that are involved in this.

Next question is from Ben Moore, Citigroup.

Yes, good morning. Thanks for taking our questions and congrats on a great quarter. Going back to the gross margin discussion, very strong beat there above consensus and year-over-year. Appreciate your color on the contract escalation and adding Inspection Technologies, and mix was a headwind along with the unfavorable materials on the higher tariffs. Can we maybe hone in on how pricing is trending as part of that gross margin growth? You're working together with your customers on kind of sharing the tariffs. Would love to hear any color you could share on how pricing is trending.

Yes. Ben, we are working all of those four levers. Certainly, pricing is one of them. With that, in the third quarter, we are seeing a marginal amount of pricing that's included in the revenue side. Again, it's still work to be done ahead of us. I would not say that's a core driver of what we're seeing in the third quarter, but pricing is certainly included in the results.

Really appreciate that. Maybe as a next one, you raised your EPS guide with a hold on your revenue guide, implying more opportunity on the cost side. The guide slide in your presentation mentioned adjusted operating margin up, but the implied 4Q EPS would be at USD 2.08, below consensus at USD 2.12. Is that due to below-the-line items?

Number one, Ben, typically don't comment on consensus. What we've talked about is where what we've said versus what we've said. We feel better about the fourth quarter and have raised our consensus by USD 0.10. With that, we would expect, when you look at it, kind of the implied fourth quarter, we expect a very strong fourth quarter. Matter of fact, when you look at what's implied, it is a midpoint of 11.25% in terms of revenue growth. We'll see very strong organic growth during that period of time. On a bottom line, we're looking at about, geez, about 24% on EPS growth.

Hey, really appreciate that. Maybe if I could squeeze in just one last one. With the UPNS proposed merger progressing, can you comment on your experience with CPKC as they merged in 2023 and increased their locomotives and active service in their first year, combined winning volume from truck? How might your experience with a potential UPNS or BNCSX be similar as they potentially increase their locomotives and active service as they grow volume from truck in their first year combined?

A couple of comments. First, I'm not going to comment on any specific mergers here, but we continue to see these as a significant opportunity for what I'll call increased car loads and rail volumes over time, which would be a positive for us. I'll start there first. I think what's most important is, as you look into any consolidation, the sense that temporarily you could see fleet reductions and pacing of near-term investments misses that bigger picture view, which is the one I gave you on the fleet dynamics, which is both associated with the age of the fleet. It's associated with the fact that you still have a lot of DC locomotives and customers can actually gain from those investments. As I said before, I don't see fleet renewal as discretionary. It's actually a core lever.

Ultimately, you're bringing those units that are 25 years of age or older, and they're running hard. It becomes highly costly to maintain those units. That's what really triggers the elements of modernizing and sometimes really having to shift more towards the acquisition of new.

Really appreciate your time and insights.

Next question is from Tami Zakaria, J.P. Morgan.

Hi, good morning. Thank you so much. I wanted to touch on the component segment. It's great to see it inflected to growth in the third quarter. Should we expect this growth to accelerate in the fourth quarter and maybe build momentum in 2026? Or asked another way, how should we think about components growth on a normalized basis, if you could comment?

I think, Tami, a couple of things. I mean, as you're looking to the year, I'd say our businesses are largely really tracking to plan in terms of growth. I think the notable exception has been the railcar builds, which is really roughly, what, a USD 100 million impact for us versus last year, which, I mean, it was kind of expected, but it got worse since the beginning of the year. I think that's one of the elements to keep in mind. Overall, business, we continue to be pleased with the progress. I think the team has continued to take action here to adjust operations to new volume realities. We're doing very well internationally on that business, and the team is finding opportunities here to continue to grow in that. I think the other element of the components business is the dynamics you see on industrial.

They're positive, and that's really a function of demand that comes from especially the heat exchanger business. That's both for mining, if you look at the L&M acquisition we did, but it's also from power generation with more demand for heat exchangers in that context. That's, to a large extent, AI-driven.

Understood. Thank you. If I may ask one more, the Kazakhstan deal, very impressive, definitely boosted the backlog, total backlog. I'm just curious, the 300 locomotives under that contract, is that also over the next 15 years, or could the delivery of those be more front-end loaded?

I think the way we look at the contracts and the way it has played out, even with the previous agreement, it provides us more coverage to support. The previous agreement, we ended up exhausting it a lot sooner. It's really a function of the continued growth you see in Kazakhstan, which is threefold. One is the volume growth on the existing lines. You've got new lines and new projects that are being built, and you've got some locomotives that are quite old. I mean, some of the first locomotives we worked in Kazakhstan, they're like early 2000. Those were modernizations, and they've really exhausted their lives. It's really threefold, what we see in the dynamics. It's a market we continue to expect acceleration into.

Tammy, the 300 are for 10 years. As Rafael had mentioned, the last contract ended prior to its natural end because they exhausted those. Right now, this is kind of a, think of it as a baseload over the next 10 years.

Westinghouse Air Brake (WAB) Q3 2025 Earnings Call Transcript

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