Garmin Ltd. (NASDAQ: GRMN) Q1 2021 earnings call dated Apr. 28, 2021
Corporate Participants:
Teri Seck — Manager of Investor Relations
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Douglas Boessen — Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer
Analysts:
Erik Woodring — Morgan Stanley — Analyst
Nik Todorov — Longbow Research — Analyst
Paul Chung — JP Morgan — Analyst
Will Power — Baird — Analyst
Ivan Feinseth — Tigress Financial — Analyst
Ben Bollin — Cleveland Research — Analyst
Jeffrey Rand — Deutsche Bank — Analyst
Derek Soderberg — Colliers Securities — Analyst
Presentation:
Operator
Thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Garmin Limited First Quarter 2021 Earnings Call. [Operator Instructions] After the speakers’ presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions]
Please be advised that today’s call is being recorded. [Operator Instructions].
I would now like to hand the call over to Teri Seck, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
Teri Seck — Manager of Investor Relations
Good morning, everyone. We would like to welcome you to Garmin Limited’s first quarter 2021 earnings call. Please note that the earnings press release and related slides are available at Garmin’s Investor Relations site on the Internet at www.garmin.com/stock. An archive of the webcast and related transcript will be also be available on our website. This earnings call includes projections and other forward-looking statements regarding Garmin Limited and its business. Any statements regarding our future financial position, revenues, earnings, gross margins, operating margins, future dividends, market shares, product introduction, future demand for our products, and plans and objectives are forward-looking statements.
The forward-looking events and circumstances discussed in this earnings call may not occur and actual results to differ materially as a result of risk factors affecting Garmin. Information concerning these risk factors is contained in our Form 10-K filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. In particular, there is significant uncertainty about the duration and impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. This means that results could change at anytime and any statement about the impact of COVID-19 on the Company’s business results and outlook is a best estimate based on the information available as of today’s date.
Presenting on behalf of Garmin Limited this morning are Cliff Pemble, President and Chief Executive Officer; and Doug Boessen, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer. At this time, I would like to turn the call over to Cliff Pemble.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Thanks, Terry, and good morning everyone. As announced earlier today, 2021 began on a strong note, as momentum from 2020 continued into the new year. Consolidated revenue came in at nearly $1.1 billion, up 25% over the prior year with strong double-digit growth in four of our five business segments. Gross margin was strong at 59.8%. Operating margin increased to 23.3% and operating income grew 41% to $250 million. This resulted in GAAP EPS of $1.14, pro forma EPS was $1.18 up 30% over the prior year.
Before turning the call over to Doug, I’ll provide highlights by segment and a summary of what we see ahead. Starting with fitness, revenue increased 38% to $308 million, driven by strong demand for cycling products and advanced wearables. Gross and operating margins were 56% and 24% respectively. Operating income more than doubled over the prior year to $74 million. During the quarter, we introduced Lily, a fashion for smart launch with exceptional features designed specifically for women.
In the cycling market, we launched the Rally power meters including a version for off-road cycling, which is a new product category for us. Moving to outdoor, revenue increased 46% to $256 million with growth across all product categories, led by strong demand for adventure watches. The outdoor segment generated strong growth in operating margins to 67% and 36% respectively. Operating income, nearly doubled over the prior year to $93 million.
During the quarter, we launched Enduro, a new adventure watch category built specifically for athletes who demand exceptional battery life for endurance racing. We also expanded the Approach family of golf tracking devices with the launch of three new products for golfers of every skill level.
Looking next at Aviation, revenue decreased 8%, to $174 million, driven primarily by reduced contributions from ADS-B products that remained strong in the first quarter of 2020. Excluding the impact from ADS-B, revenue was relatively flat to last year, which is an encouraging signal that the underlying market has stabilized. Gross and operating margins were 73% and 26% respectively.
During the quarter, Autoland was selected as one of seven finalists for the Robert J. Collier Trophy. The Collier Trophy is a prestigious award that recognizes significant achievements in the areas of aeronautics and astronautics. In addition, we recently added several aircraft models to the list of GFC 500 and 600 autopilot certifications, which expands the addressable market for these advanced flight control systems.
Looking next at the Marine segment, revenue increased 28% to $209 million. Gross and operating margins were 58% and 29%, respectively. Operating income increased 53% over the prior year to $62 million. During the quarter, we experienced strong demand for chartplotters, and Panoptix LiveScope sonars from new boat manufacturers and users preparing their boats, for the upcoming season on the water.
Looking finally at the Auto, revenue increased 18% to $124 million and we experienced growth in both OEM and consumer categories. Gross margin was 39% and we recorded an operating loss of $24 million driven by ongoing investments in OEM programs for next generation vehicles. During the quarter, we entered the powersports market, with a full complement of products designed to help recreational off-roaders find their way, stay connected with other riders, control electrical systems on the vehicle and monitor their surroundings.
In summary, Q1 was another record-breaking quarter. We’re very pleased with what we’ve accomplished so far this year, and we continue to see strong demand for our products. Some of you are wondering how this strong performance affects our outlook for the rest of the year. We believe there are two very important factors to consider. First, much of the year remains ahead of us. Q1 is typically the lowest seasonal quarter of our financial year, it’s difficult to predict what the remainder of the year will look like based on one period, especially considering the pandemic driven dynamics of the past year.
Second, the electronics industry is experiencing high demand for and short supply of certain electrical components. So far, the impact on us has been minimal, due to our inventory strategy and vertically integrated business model. However, the situation is very dynamic, complex and long-term in nature and that’s difficult to predict how it will evolve. With these things in mind, we are maintaining the guidance issued on February 17, 2021.
So that concludes my remarks. Next, Doug will walk you through additional details on our financial results. Doug?
Douglas Boessen — Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer
Thanks, Cliff. Good morning, everyone. I’ll begin by reviewing our first quarter financial results, move to comments on the balance sheet, cash flow statement and taxes. We posted revenue of $1.72 billion for the first quarter, representing 25% increase year-over-year. Gross margin was 59.8%, a 60 basis point increase. Operating expense percentage of sales was 36.5%, 200 basis point decrease. Operating income was $250 million, 41% increase. Operating margin was 23.3%, 260 basis point increase. Our GAAP EPS was $1.14, pro forma EPS was $1.18.
Next, we’ll look our first quarter revenue by segment and geography. For the first quarter, we achieved double-digit growth in four out of our five segments, led by the outdoor segment with strong growth of 46%, followed by the fitness segment, 38% growth, and the marine segment, a 28% growth.
By geography, we achieved double-digit growth in all three segments, by strong growth of 33% EMEA, 31% growth in APAC. Americas grew 18%, it’s more heavily impacted by decline in Aviation. Excluding Aviation, market growth was more in line with other regions.
Looking next, operating expenses. First quarter operating expenses increased by $62 million up 19%. Research and development increased $38 million year-over-year primarily due to engineering personnel costs across all of our segments. Other expenses related to auto OEM programs. Our advertising expense increased approximately $4 million due to higher spend in the outdoor, fitness segments.
SG&A increased $20 million from the prior quarter a decreased percentage of sales 14.7% and 30 basis point decrease compared to the prior year. Increase in SG&A is primarily due to increase in personnel related expenses, information technology costs. Few highlights on the balance sheet, cash flow statement and taxes. In the quarter with cash, market securities, approximately $3.2 billion, accounts receivable decreased sequentially to $558 million from the seasonally strong fourth quarter.
Inventory balance increased year-over-year to $838 million. In the first quarter 2021, we generated free cash flow of $331 million, $147 million increase from the prior quarter. In our first quarter 2021 we put an effective tax rate, 12.2% compared to 9.3% in the prior quarter. The increase in effective tax rate is primarily due to larger amount of reserve releases in the prior year.
This concludes our formal remarks. Seck, can you please open the line for Q&A?
Questions and Answers:
Operator
[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Erik Woodring with Morgan Stanley, your line is open.
Erik Woodring — Morgan Stanley — Analyst
Hey, good morning everyone. Thank you for taking the call. My first question is just on the component side. I’d just like to dig in there a little bit more to understand what are the components that are potentially most impacting Garmin as a whole? And then kind of secondary to that, how are component shortages, specifically on the auto side impacting you or your partners’ ability to meet demand? And then I have a follow-up.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Okay. Yeah, I think as you have read, the situation is very widespread. So there is a lot of impact in some of these major fabs that it had some issues recently, certainly impacted broad range of components. So there isn’t any given set of components or any one component that I can highlight. It is just a general pressure across the industry. In terms of specifically for auto, we’ve been very careful with our inventory and supply chain management in auto, and as you know we’ve often talked about our strategy of using inventory as a business tool. And so that’s helped us, we’ve not had any major issues with supplying our customers. And I really can’t speak to our competitors, but we’ve been doing everything we can to keep our customers lines going.
Erik Woodring — Morgan Stanley — Analyst
Okay, that’s super helpful. And then for my follow-up for the first time in company history, you have over $3 billion of net cash. I know you historically run with a buffer to protect yourselves in times of financial hardship like the pandemic or to maintain your component safety stock, but is there a level of cash where you guys say to yourselves. We need to start putting more of this to work via X, Y or Z? And if there is, what would be the priorities in terms of reinvesting that cash? Yeah, thank you.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yes. So we don’t have a specific number that we target for cash as you can see our business is growing at a very nice rate. So as the business grows and gets more complex, of course, we feel like cash is a good thing. Our priorities on cash has remained what they’ve been for a long time. We want to be a reliable payer of attractive dividends for our investors. We’re focused also on acquisitions and reinvesting in the business that way. And then finally, investing in the business and increasing our production capacity for example our facilities, our people all of these things are priorities for the way we use our cash.
Erik Woodring — Morgan Stanley — Analyst
Super helpful. And maybe if I could just sneak in one more. Just curious on your view, how you think about kind of normalized EBIT margins for outdoor and fitness segment, as we kind of come out of COVID demand somewhat normalizes, the retail environment somewhat normalizes, how we should think about that? And that’s my last one. Thanks guys.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
And I think we don’t target a specific number around our operating margin for these segments. These are segments that have a lot of specialty products in them, and so consequently we aim to have higher levels of operating margin in those segments to fund our investments. But in general, we don’t necessarily target a number with the sales increase, as we’ve been seeing of course, we get some leverage out of that. So we’re very pleased with our performance.
Operator
Our next question comes from Nik Todorov with Longbow Research. Your line is open.
Nik Todorov — Longbow Research — Analyst
Yes, thanks and good morning everyone. Cliff, I think — congrats on doing a great job on the inventory and not being impacted on the component side. I guess related to that, I’m just wondering if you’re seeing any impact from freight costs, because I know freight costs from, particularly from Asia, Europe and North America are up substantially. Your results does not suggest so, but I wonder if you’re seeing any headwind from higher logistics costs?
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yeah, I think, freight is definitely higher, and it’s not a new situation. Actually we’ve been experiencing higher freight costs over the past year, a lot of freight providers dialed back on their capacity early in the COVID crisis and that created some constraints even a year ago. So, it’s not a new thing. Sea freight has got some additional delays. We’re actually using a higher mix of air freight right now to keep our products flowing and we’re focused on product availability.
Nik Todorov — Longbow Research — Analyst
Okay, got it. Question on fitness. Your gross margin was exceptionally strong at 56% relative to last couple of years, I think mix is helping you there with cycling being strong right now, but I just wonder if there are anything else that pushes your fitness gross margin higher relative to last few years?
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yeah, I think definitely product mix in general, we would say is helping us in fitness. And on the cost side, we’ve seen some benefit in terms of our overall cost structure on the product. So in general, we’ve had very good performance on the margin side in fitness.
Nik Todorov — Longbow Research — Analyst
Okay. And last question for Cliff — maybe for Doug. Very strong first quarter free cash flow numbers I think record for the company $300 million. How do you feel, Doug about that relative to your full year free cash flow target, is it still $725 million and capex was kind of low relative to your full year guide of $350 million last quarter. Is that unchanged?
Douglas Boessen — Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer
Yeah, so first regarding our free cash flow, at this point in time, we’re maintaining our overall guidance. So that’s a number that we feel comfortable at this point in time, we’ll actually update that progress through the year. Regarding our capex, yes, we still feel confident of the math that we basically gave our guidance for capex. We will be ramping up some of those investments that Cliff clearly talked about, we talked about during our previous call here in the latter part of the year, relating to our consumer manufacturing facilities in Taiwan. We’re expecting increased spend in Q2 and rest of the back half, as well as we’re renovating our facilities here in Olathe but actually taking some of our previous facilities that were for distribution manufacturing and renovate those for workspace. So those expenses will be ramping up in Q2 and rest of the year.
Nik Todorov — Longbow Research — Analyst
Got it. Very helpful. Thanks guys, good luck.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Thank you, Nik.
Operator
Our next question comes from Paul Chung with JP Morgan. Your line is open.
Paul Chung — JP Morgan — Analyst
Hi, thanks for taking my questions. So just on Aviation, nice recovery in 1Q, which is now exceeding kind of 1Q ’19 revenue levels, but operating margins are rebounding but they still are below the 1Q ’19 levels spike of higher revenues, any comments on the dynamics there?
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yeah I think the operating margin in Aviation, Paul is really a function of the lower sales. We’re continuing to invest in new program development and technology. So we do have higher level of R&D spend at this moment, but in general, I think that’s really the driver and as we see the market recover, we should begin to get some leverage out of that again.
Paul Chung — JP Morgan — Analyst
Got you. And then as we kind of move through the year in Aviation doing solid, solid 1Q against pre-tough comp, but you have much easier comps ahead for 2Q and beyond. Is that 5% target a bit too conservative? I assume some visibility in the segment is slightly higher than your other ones.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yeah, I think as we mentioned we’re not adjusting our numbers right now, it’s certainly true that as we go forward, there is some interesting comparables in our business compared to last year. Aviation was hit harder and longer last year than other segments, but we’re starting to see some positive signs. And as we get a clear picture after the end of Q2, we’ll be able to provide more information.
Paul Chung — JP Morgan — Analyst
Thanks. And then, Doug, another follow-up on free cash flow. Nice harvesting of accounts receivable and nice profit upside. Should we expect AR to be more of a source of funds this year and how do we think about working capital investments throughout the year? Thank you.
Douglas Boessen — Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer
Yeah, so our numbers did come in favorable as it relates to AR there. So that’s more favorable. So we may get some more, a little bit of a headwind against that rest of the year. The situation is that our customers are really demanding our product. As a result of that, they basically have certain credit limits. So, in certain cases they may be paying prior to some of their a credit terms to stand those credit limits. But that’s a good thing, as they continue to see the demand that we’re actually funding that. As well as to let other working capital, yes, probably looking at inventory, that’s an item that we will probably make some additional investments and see that increase rest of the year also.
Paul Chung — JP Morgan — Analyst
Thanks guys.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yes. Thank you.
Operator
Our next question comes from Will Power with Baird. Your line is open.
Will Power — Baird — Analyst
Oh great, yeah, a couple of questions. Maybe just a quick follow-up in case I missed it on the supply chain commentary. Any update you can provide just on current channel inventory across key product categories? Just trying to understand the ability to meet near-term demand given some of the supply chain component questions out there? And then I got additional questions.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yes. I’d really say a couple of things well on that, but we believe the channel inventory is very mean right now, there is a lot of demand out there for products and definitely that the supply chain considerations and meeting that demand are more complex when there is increased demand. So that’s why we believe that in general, we see strong demand for the products going forward.
Will Power — Baird — Analyst
Okay, all right. I also wanted to ask you, I guess as you look at auto kind of a two-part question. You noted that the consumer auto piece grew and so would love more color there on key drivers. But also just from a broader perspective, wanted to get your thoughts on the powersport opportunity, I know you’ve rolled out a couple of initial products, but how are you thinking about the opportunity there near and longer-term?
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yeah. So we were pleased to see the consumer auto segment grow. The drivers behind that really are the specialty products that we’ve been investing in over the years, things like truck and RV and cameras. In terms of powersports that’s a perfect complement to what we’re doing in the consumer auto business. The powersports market as you know has been growing a lot especially in the pandemic environment. And so there is a lot of interest in products that can help people enjoy that sport and enjoy their vehicles. And so our solution with Tread and the PowerSwitch and also the cameras is a fantastic way for us to enter that market with a really strong offering.
Will Power — Baird — Analyst
I mean, any sense for how broad that portfolio could be over time? I mean are these — is this kind of the starting point or are these kind of the key categories?
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yes, I think that it remains to be seen. I would say that there is a lot of opportunity in the powersports market and a lot of products that we can do. And so this really is our approach and our strategy in building the business, which is defined great niche categories that we can innovate in and take a strong market share, and be able to build the business that way.
Will Power — Baird — Analyst
Okay, thank you.
Operator
Our next question comes from Ivan Feinseth with Tigress Financial. Your line is open.
Ivan Feinseth — Tigress Financial — Analyst
Thank you. Thank you for taking my question and congratulations on another great quarter and a great start to the year and making it to Mars.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Thank you.
Ivan Feinseth — Tigress Financial — Analyst
So in the powersports area, are you going to — do you think — envision yourself starting to work with some of the OEM manufacturers, especially for things like the PowerSwitch?
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yeah, I think there is a good level of interest in — on the OEM side and the products that we’re offering. Already Arctic Cat has announced our product on some of their vehicles and we’re talking to others as well. But we do feel like we have a compelling offering that is of interest to the market.
Ivan Feinseth — Tigress Financial — Analyst
And how was the initial reaction or what was your thoughts on the initial reaction to things like the Tread and the Communicator?
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
I thought it was good, it was encouraging. Clearly users in that market are watching for the kinds of products that will help them enjoy the sport and so these are definitely right up their interest, [indecipherable] if you will, and it leverages all of the strength that we have across Garmin including the mapping, the communication and the rugged designs.
Ivan Feinseth — Tigress Financial — Analyst
Were there any other areas that surprised you in the quarter?
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Well, I think we’ve kind of highlighted most of those. We continue to be really excited about the growth in marine, there’s a lot of demand out there for marine products and we expect that will continue. Fitness has been fantastic of course with cycling and advanced wearables. Lily was a great new product for us as well. And Aviation, we’re excited to kind of see things stabilize and we’re getting a lot of positive feedback with trade shows and manufacturers and shops installing equipment and are all making positive remarks.
Ivan Feinseth — Tigress Financial — Analyst
What kind of attendance are you seeing in the trade shows, as we kind of go to this reopening and getting over the pandemic?
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Well, it’s early days and actually we just completed the Sun ‘n Fun Show in Florida, which was canceled last year, reopened this year, but attendance was actually I would say, reasonably strong given the conditions. It was probably what I heard maybe 70% to 80% of what it’s been in normal years. But what we saw out of that was buyers that were very interested and very serious about equipping their aircraft and interested in what we had to offer.
Ivan Feinseth — Tigress Financial — Analyst
Thank you and congratulations again.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Thanks, Ivan.
Operator
Our next question comes from Ben Bollin with Cleveland Research. Your line is open.
Ben Bollin — Cleveland Research — Analyst
Good morning, Cliff, Doug, Teri. Thank you for taking the question. Two items. The first, I’m interested in how we should think about the investments being made in the auto OEM realms, as you build out facilities and headcount? Any way to think about the linearity of investment expansion and when that starts to normalize based on what your current visibility is? And then I have a follow-up.
Douglas Boessen — Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer
Yeah. Surely to the investment in OEM, we have got perspective for 2021, so it relates to the R&D, we would expect to see a similar level of R&D spend in the remaining quarters of 2021, as we saw in 2000 or in Q1 as we continue to ramp up for our new programs there. As it relates to the capex side of things, the capex for the new facility in Europe related OEM that’s factored into our capex budget that we gave you previously. But also I should say the majority of that capex, the number in there is relating to the consumer manufacturing piece in Taiwan as well as the renovation here. And then as it relates to the OEM piece, it’s primarily relating to increasing our production lines, getting ready for production in near future.
Ben Bollin — Cleveland Research — Analyst
Okay. And then, Cliff more of a — I guess a big picture question. But when you step back and look at how Garmin has benefited throughout COVID? What are your bigger picture thoughts about how categories or the business as a whole, may be impacted as you start to see more reopening? Any of the puts and takes about point of sale, trajectory, category expansion, just some of the secular drivers and where do you think that goes into the future?
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Well, it’s early days. So, probably difficult to quantify, we do believe that the kind of lifestyle changes that we’ve seen as part of the pandemic are durable because people have made significant investments in themselves or helped their ability to be outdoors and have recreation. And so that’s what we continue to hear from our partners and what we continue to see in the industry.
Ben Bollin — Cleveland Research — Analyst
Thanks everyone. Good luck for the rest of the year.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Thank you.
Operator
Our next question comes from Jeffrey Rand with Deutsche Bank. Your line is open.
Jeffrey Rand — Deutsche Bank — Analyst
Hi, thanks for taking my call. Can you talk through some of the puts and takes for operating expenses as we move past the pandemic? I would expect there to be some lower cost related to employee safety, but also probably some increased traveling costs, I guess some details of how you’re thinking about that?
Douglas Boessen — Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer
Yeah, there are some cases, especially when you look at the Q2 over Q2 comparison, last year at this time, we did cut back on the travel, trade shows, those types of things. So I would say looking at Q2 there’ll be some increase that we’ll spend this year versus last year there, but that’s not really the big drivers — of our capex, big drivers really are the R&D section there that we have going forward.
Jeffrey Rand — Deutsche Bank — Analyst
Great. And then your marine business continues to do very well. How do you think about trends in the business longer-term? And is there any concerns of a pull-in of future purchases as boating was a good socially distant activity during the pandemic?
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yeah. I think, certainly that’s a possibility. But as I mentioned earlier, we believe that this trend is pretty durable, our boat building partners, many of them are booked out through the remainder of the year and some are even talking about 2022 now. So there is still significant pent-up demand for boating products and people who want to be out on the water and we believe that will continue to drive growth in our Marine segment.
Jeffrey Rand — Deutsche Bank — Analyst
Great, thank you.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Thank you.
Operator
[Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from Derek Soderberg with Colliers Securities. Your line is open.
Derek Soderberg — Colliers Securities — Analyst
Hi guys, thanks for taking my questions. Cliff, I want to start with you. I wonder if you can provide an update on the ADS-B opportunity in Europe. I think it’s progressing a bit slower than the US, but that mandate was pushed out I think almost a year ago. What are you seeing in that market today? Are project starting to accelerate or still sort of being pushed out? Any thoughts on the ADS-B in Europe and sort of what you’re seeing there would be great?
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yes, I think the European mandate has been pushed out probably more than once. And so, that probably wasn’t a surprise. We are starting to see customers get more interested in that. I think they realized that it won’t keep pushing out forever. And so they’re looking for solution. And I think we’re well positioned for that. I would say that Europe is probably the next biggest opportunity obviously compared to the North American opportunity. Although much smaller because the market there is generally 25% to 30% of what the total global market is.
Derek Soderberg — Colliers Securities — Analyst
Great. And then as my follow up, I guess I’m curious as to the employment environment. And I guess your ability to attract new talent sounds like labor costs might be going up. Is there anything going out there in the labor market that has changed more recently or anything you’re seeing that’s may be a concern in labor market? Thanks.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yeah, I think that labor is an interesting topic I think for a long time, engineering talent has been in strong demand and I think it’s only gotten stronger in the pandemic as many companies are looking to create new things and new products. So, we’re operating in a tight environment, that’s not only new, but it does seem to be increasing in this environment for sure. We’re focusing on having a great work culture. I think we’ve got fantastic employees at Garmin, we’re really proud of all of them, over 16,000 employees around the world now.
And our culture is very unique, and the kind of products and markets that we serve are also very unique, there are products in markets of passion where people can actually create things that interest them and not just work on something that someone else tells them to do. So, we have some advantages, but obviously it’s still a tight market and we’re doing the best we can.
Derek Soderberg — Colliers Securities — Analyst
Great, thanks guys.
Clifton Pemble — President and Chief Executive Officer
Yeah. Thank you.
Operator
There are no further questions. I’d like to turn the call back over to Teri Seck for any closing remarks.
Teri Seck — Manager of Investor Relations
Thanks everyone for your time today. And, Doug and I are available for callbacks, and we hope you have a great day. Bye.
Operator
[Operator Closing Remarks]