Hexcel Corp Q1 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

Note: This is a preliminary transcript and may contain inaccuracies. It will be updated with a final, fully-reviewed version soon.

Hexcel Corp (NYSE: HXL) Q1 2026 Earnings Call dated Apr. 23, 2026

Presentation

Operator

Good morning and welcome to Hexel’s first quarter 2026 earnings call. All participants are in a listen only mode. After the speaker’s remarks, we will conduct a question and answer session. To ask a question at this time, you’ll need to press STAR followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. I would now like to turn the call over to Curt Goddard, Vice President of Investor Relations. Thank you. Please go ahead, sir.

Kurt Goddard — Vice President, Investor Relations

Hello everyone and welcome to Hexcel Corporation’s first quarter earnings conference call. Before beginning, let me cover the formalities. I would like to remind everyone about the safe harbor provisions related to any forward looking statements we may make during the course of this call. Certain statements contained in this call may constitute forward looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform act of 1995. They involve estimates, assumptions, judgments and uncertainties caused by a variety of factors that could cause future actual results or outcomes to differ materially from our forward looking statements today.

Such factors are detailed in the company’s SEC filings and earnings release. A replay of this call will be available on the investor relations page of our website. Lastly, this call is being recorded by Hexcel Corporation and is copyrighted material. It cannot be recorded or rebroadcast without our express permission. Your participation on this call constitutes your consent to that request. With me today are Tom Gentile, our Chairman, CEO and President, and Mike Lenz, Interim Chief Financial Officer.

The purpose of the call is to review our first quarter 2026 results detailed in our news release issued yesterday. Now let me turn the call over to Tom. Tom.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Thanks Kurt. Hello everyone and thank you for joining us today for Hexcel’s first quarter 2026 earnings call. Our first quarter results were in line with our expectations in terms of an improving commercial market with higher production levels and channel inventory levels. Normalizing following the destocking we experienced in 2025 quarter reflects strong execution across the business in a very dynamic environment which is creating the operating leverage we predicted as production rates continue to increase.

Also, these results for the first quarter further demonstrate the long term value Hexcel brings to our customers. As a global leader in the development and manufacturing of advanced lightweight material solutions. Our market position benefits from our deep technical expertise, vertical integration at scale and long standing customer relationships. With a uniquely broad portfolio of lightweight composite solutions, Xcel is well positioned for returning to growth as commercial aerospace production recovers back to pre pandemic levels and higher.

Before turning to our first quarter results in more detail, I want to briefly address the environment. With the current situation in the Middle east, we are monitoring developments closely and remain in regular contact with our customers and suppliers as the situation evolves. Xcel constantly maintains a focus on taking actions to protect our business from near term cost volatility. While some of the inputs to our products are petroleum based, most of what we buy is under long term contracts. We also hedge Propylene, a petroleum derivative, for eight quarters.

These mechanisms mitigate much of the near term impact from higher oil prices for our feedstocks, energy and logistics costs as much as possible. Our focus is on managing near term impacts and maintaining flexibility in our operations along with a disciplined approach. Managing the Business Jet fuel is one of the largest operating costs for airlines, which reinforces the importance of efficiency and lightweighting. Recent Consumer Price Index data shows that air prices for airfare have risen almost 15% year over year as airlines grapple with higher fuel costs.

Newer aircraft deliver improved fuel efficiency, which in a higher priced fuel environment makes lightweighting even more critical. This renewed emphasis on fuel efficiency directly benefits Xcel. Turning to our first quarter results, XLT sales of $502 million, a 10% increase compared to the same period last year. Adjusted earnings per share were $0.59. Rising Commercial Aerospace demand drove earnings, which enhanced our operating leverage as we grow back into our existing capacity. Gross margins also improved compared to last year.

These results reflect improved capacity utilization and strong operating performance across our operations. In our commercial aerospace segment, sales were $334 million in the first quarter, an 18.8% increase in the same period. In 2025. Sales increased across all four major programs, the Airbus A350, the A320, and the Boeing 787 and 737 Max. Other commercial aerospace sales increased 15.6% over the same quarter in 2025 on the strength of regional and business jets. As we have discussed in prior quarters, the commercial aerospace recovery has taken longer than initially expected.

In our previous call, we highlighted our growing confidence that a sustained increase for commercial production rates at the OEMs was taking hold. We continue to see that production rate ramp materialize. Our first quarter results align with our expected outlook for growing commercial aerospace volumes entering 2026 and continuing over the next few years. Remember that as a materials provider, the various supply chain partners keep different levels of inventory and there is also scrap and waste, so production rates we provide are approximate.

Also, Xcel is typically four to six months ahead of the OE aircraft assembly, so our assumptions are based on production, not OE delivery. Here is How We See the Outlook for the major commercial programs first, the A320 based on recent public announcements regarding A320 engine availability, we now expect our volumes on the A320 to be at the lower end of our guidance of low 700 for the year rather than low to mid-700s. We remain confident in the overall catalyst for increased OEM production rates on the A320 to continue going forward.

On the A350 program, we are seeing increasing alignment between our production rates and and the Airbus build rates. With channel destocking largely behind us, we remain confident in our outlook for 80 units in 2026. Perhaps even with some upside on Boeing programs, we see tangible evidence of progress in the ramp up of both the 737 and the 787, which includes investments to expand manufacturing capacity in Charleston for the 787 and in Everett for the Max. While we continue to lag the Boeing production rate for the max, the year over year first quarter sales growth was particularly noteworthy.

Q1 was our best quarter on the max in years, with production at around 40 aircraft per month. Our forecast on the MAX for 2026 was mid-4002 and it looks like Boeing will exceed that. On the 787. Our forecast was 90 to 100 units and that continues to be our expectation. As commercial production rates at the OEMs recover, we expect to see continuing ongoing benefits to our operations from increased operating leverage. At the same time, we are taking a measured approach to bringing PAC capacity online to ensure incremental costs are aligned with that sustained demand and that the benefits of higher production rates are not diluted.

Throughout this process, our priority remains on meeting increasing production requirements while maintaining the highest standards of safety and quality. On balance, we see the puts and takes for this year canceling each other out and we are maintaining our full year guidance. Turning to the defense based and other segment, our first quarter sales of 169 million were impacted by the divestment of our Austrian facility which led to a decrease in sales volume overall in the segment compared to the same quarter last year.

Looking at just defense and space, our sales increased low single digits compared to the same period last year. We saw an increase in our volume for our European fighter programs and for both US and European military rotorcraft programs. This was offset by lower volumes for launchers and rocket motors in space. First quarter volumes for this segment also reflect the inherently uneven nature of defense program funding and spending which can vary from quarter to quarter. We expect to see the impact of increased defense spending in areas such as missiles begin to impact us favorably later this year.

As we have discussed in previous calls, the organic growth in the defense and space market is a strategic priority for Hexcel and we remain confident in the long term opportunity Defense spending trends for procurement of new platforms by the US and Western aligned countries continue to indicate increased multi year defense spending underscoring the durability and scale of the current rearmament cycle. This increased defense and space spending highlights opportunity for Hexcel is Our advanced composite materials enable greater range, increased payload and enhanced performance characteristics such as low observability for military and space platforms.

All these are areas that differentiate Xcel in terms of our balance sheet. At the end of Q1 we refinanced our $750 million revolver extending its maturity to 2031. This refinancing terminated our previous Revolution Revolver that was set to mature in 2028. This action further reinforces our strong liquidity position as part of our ongoing work to streamline Hexcel’s portfolio towards markets that value our high performance aerospace Carbon fiber. We remain on track with the transition of our Leicester UK business from industrial applications to aerospace development.

The restructuring costs from our transformation at Lester impacted our results this quarter quarter. To recap, our first quarter results reflected the forecasted rise in commercial volumes we anticipated and our expectations that operating leverage will be beneficial. Our operations typically use cash in the first quarter of the year and this quarter cash usage was low and noticeably favorable compared to past history. This gives us confidence in the 2026 full year guidance that we provided in our previous earnings call.

Despite the macroeconomic challenges. While uncertainty in the global environment remains elevated, the market fundamentals support sustained demand for Hexcel’s lightweight composite material across commercial defense and space markets. With our broad product portfolio, market leading position and continued operational discipline, we are well positioned to navigate near term uncertainty and deliver long term value for our shareholders and other stakeholders. With that, I’ll turn the call over to Mike to walk through the first quarter financial results.

More detail Mike

Michael Lenz — Interim Chief Financial Officer

Thank you Tom. Sales growth was Strong in the first quarter of 2026 as commercial aerospace platforms ramped and the higher volume drove margin expansion from operating leverage. Total first quarter 2026 sales of $502 million increased 8.8% in constant currency, reflecting strong growth in the commercial aerospace market. This commercial aerospace growth was partially offset by lower defense space and other sales following the divestment of The Austrian Industri. September 30, 202025 By Market Commercial Aerospace first quarter 2026 sales were $333 million, increasing 19% compared to the first quarter of 2025.

Commercial Aerospace comprised approximately 66% of the total quarterly sales. Sales increased for all four of the major platforms including the Airbus A350 and A320 and the Boeing 787 and 737. Sales growth for the two Boeing platforms was particularly strong, which was admittedly an easier year over year comparison as our first quarter 2025 sales to Boeing were light. Sales for other commercial Aerospace in the first quarter increased 15.6% year over year with strength in both business jets and regional jets.

Defense Space and other first quarter sales of $169 million represented approximately 34% of total sales. First quarter sales decreased 6.9% on lower industrial sales following the divestment of the Austrian industrial business last year. Year over year comparisons will be influenced through the third quarter of this year due to this previous divestment and further as we proceed with the ceasing industrial operations of our Lester UK site as disclosed last quarter, that will add an additional decrement to year over year comparisons as the Leicester site annual sales have been around $15 million annually.

In terms of the defense and space business, international military sales were strong in the fourth quarter including the Rafale and Typhoon fighter aircraft as well as European military helicopter programs. Domestically, the CH53K and Black Hawk sales were strong in the quarter. Base sales were softer year over year for launchers and rocket motors. Gross margin of 26.9% for the first quarter of 2026 increased from 22.4% in the first quarter of 2025 on volume mix and price realization. Rising carbon fiber sales support asset utilization which drives margin expansion from improved cost absorption.

In addition, we had a non recurring favorable effect from the timing of inventory utilized as a percentage of sales. Operating expenses including selling, general and administrative expenses and R and D expenses were 13.4% in the first quarter of 2026 compared to 12.5% in the comparable prior year period, with the increase primarily reflecting R and D expenses. A portion of this was the timing of R and D activities as we continue to invest in innovation to secure a position on the next generation.

Aircraft Adjusted operating income in the first quarter was $68 million or 13.5% of sales compared to $45 million or 9.9% of sales in the comparable prior year period. Foreign exchange has become a headwind as the impact of a weaker dollar is now being felt following a lag resulting from our hedging program. First quarter 2026 operating margin was negative, impacted by approximately 80 basis points from foreign exchange. In contrast, first quarter of 2025 had a favorable impact of approximately 60 basis points from foreign exchange.

Now turning to our two segments. The Composite Materials segment represented 80% of total first quarter sales and generated an adjusted operating margin of 17.6%. This compares to an adjusted operating margin of 14.2% in the prior year period. The engineered products segment, which is comprised of our structures and engineered core businesses, represented 20% of total sales and generated an adjusted operating margin of 14.6%. This compares to an adjusted operating margin of 6.8% in the prior year period.

Net cash provided by operating activities in the first quarter 26 was $19 million compared to a use of $29 million last year. Working capital was a cash use of $63 million compared to a cash use of $98 million last year. Capital expenditures on an accrual basis were $18 million in the first quarter of 2026 compared to $17 million in the comparable prior year period. Free cash flow in the first quarter of 2026 was a use of $6 million compared to a use of $55 million in the first quarter of 2025. Q1 is historically a cash use quarter.

This year was less than typical as the timing considerations we highlighted regarding four Q25 cash flow normalized in Q1. In addition to the improved EBITDA result, adjusted EBITDA totaled $107 million in the three months of 2026 compared to $85 million in the first three months of 2025 or an increase of 26%. We refinanced our $750 million syndicated revolver at the end of March, extending the maturity to 2031 from 2028 with a slight improvement to pricing. There were no substantive changes to covenants and this maturity extension enhances our medium term liquidity and improves our debt maturity profile.

Leverage defined as net debt to last 12 months. Adjusted EBITDA was 2.6 times that March 31, 2026 and our leverage remains elevated following our Revolver borrowing in October 2025 to finance an accelerated share repurchase. We remain committed to a disciplined financial policy and to returning leverage to the targeted range of 1.5x to 2x during 2026. The accelerated share repurchase concluded in early March with approximately 4.5 million shares repurchased or almost 6% of our outstanding float.

Since the beginning of 2024, we have returned over $800 million to stockholders through dividends and share repurchases. The Company did not repurchase any shares of common stock in the first quarter of 2026, and the remaining authorization under the share repurchase program at quarter end was $381 million. The board of directors declared an 18 cent quarterly dividend yesterday and the dividend is payable to stockholders of record as of May 4th with a payment date of May 11th. In closing, we had a solid first quarter and as Tom mentioned, we have reaffirmed our 2026 guidance including adjusted EPS of $2.10 to $2.30.

Our expectation remains for a roughly even split between the first and second half of 2026, consistent with normalized historical seasonality. There remain a number of potential puts and takes with uncertainty from the Middle east conflict and higher oil prices a potential headwind, whereas the possibility of faster customer rate ramp could become a tailwind as the year progresses Before I turn it back to Tom, I want to state how much I’ve valued my time as CFO and the privilege of working with an exceptional team producing such differentiated products for our customers.

And with that, back to you Tom.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Thank you Mike. Before we open the call for questions, I want to thank Mike for his leadership and contributions as our Interim Chief Financial Officer. Mike stepped into this role at an important time for Hexcel, providing steady leadership while we conducted a search for Hexcel’s next CFO. Mike worked with us to close out 2025, assisted with executing the accelerated share repurchase, built a plan for 2026, participated and led the finance sections in two board meetings, refinanced our revolver and participated in two earnings calls.

Quite a set of accomplishments for an interim CFO. With the hiring of Jamie Coogan, who starts May 1 as Hexcel’s next CFO, Mike will finish out his tenure and support Jamie in his transition into the new role. Mike came into this role and was not just a caretaker. He brought new perspectives and helped us get better in a variety of financial areas. On behalf of the Hexcel Board and the entire management team, I want to thank Mike for his commitment and the impact he made during his time with Hexcel.

Thank you very much Mike. To close out our first quarter performance reinforces our confidence in the direction of the business and Hexcel’s value proposition. As commercial aerospace production continues to recover, we will benefit from improving operating leverage supported by our disciplined approach to bring capacity back online, control costs and focus on safety and quality. The long term fundamentals across Commercial defense and space remain strong and Hexcel’s differentiated portfolio, technical capabilities and customer relationships position us well to deliver growth and value over the long term.

With that, Julianne, we’ll take some questions.

Question & Answers

Operator

Thank you. As a reminder to ask a question, please press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. In the interest of time, we ask that you please limit yourselves to one question and one follow up question. Thank you. Our first question will come from David Strauss from Wells Fargo. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

David Strauss

Thanks. Good morning, Tom. Is there any change in your, you know, I think you had forecast commercial up low to mid double digits for the year. Is there any change there given, you know, the potential upside you’re talking about on rates? And then second question, on the composite materials margin, it looks like, you know, the incrementals there were north of 40%. I think you’re absorbing a decent kind of FX headwind, you know, kind of how did you get there this quarter? And you know how you’re, how you’re thinking about incrementals from here.

Thanks.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Great. So in terms of the outlook on commercial, we’re basically saying that we’re going to hold to our guidance and our overall plan with some puts and takes. So we do see a little bit of upside on the A350 from the 80 based on the Airbus master schedule, based on our bottoms up forecasting and Based on the POS that we already have, the firm POS, we see upside on the 737 as I mentioned, and 787 is about flat, but we do see some pressure on the A320 as I said, our original forecast was 700 to 750, so low 7 hundreds to mid 700.

And now we’re saying it’s going to be at the low end of that range because Airbus has highlighted that with the engine situation, they’re expecting to deliver fewer A320s this year. So net net, we see basically a flat outcome for the year in terms of our plan, but substantially up from last year. So again higher on a 350, flat on a 7 and a little down on the 320 in terms of the margins. This quarter really benefited from a few things. One, we had strong volume performance. Secondly, we did get some price on a couple of contracts with customers that customers didn’t do in the normal course of events and we were able to capture that.

We also benefited, as Mike mentioned in his, his remarks from inventory that was built last year and was on the books at a Lower cost. And so when we sold it, we got the benefit from that. And then it was just a lot of operational discipline, holding the line on cost, driving productivity in the factories. And that helped improve our margins. And so overall, we were very pleased with that outcome.

David Strauss

All right, thank you.

Operator

Our next question comes from Sheila Kiaglu from Jefferies. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Sheila Kahyaoglu — Analyst, Jefferies

Good morning and thank you, Tom. Maybe. Thanks. Thanks for all the color, you know, just given. And clearly the volume incrementals are dropping through really nicely. Maybe on just the A350 where the mix can be particularly helpful. It sounds like you’re feeling better about the destocking trend there. And it’s only the A320 that’s an issue. So you mentioned favorable inventory sales timing in Q1. How does this, how does the A350 ultimately flow through to the top line and, and margin profile as we move through the year?

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Right. Well, what we, we see typically, Sheila, is when our volume goes up, we get better operating leverage because we’re using more of our capacity. And so that drives the operating leverage for improved margins. And when I say capacity, we have 14 carbon fiber lines in Salt Lake City. We had four of those mothballs during most of the pandemic. We brought one on at the end of last year. We’ll bring on another one this year. And so as we go through the year and rates increase, particularly on the A350, using that additional capacity will create more operating leverage for us.

And as we bring the next line on, that will create even further operating leverage. And so that’s really the way it translates. Increased volume allows us to utilize more of the capacity that absorbs more fixed costs and increases the operating leverage, which drives margin. And as I mentioned, we expect to see the rates continue to increase. As Airbus has said, they’re at 7. They’re planning to go to 8. We may see 9 before the end of the year. And that’s why we feel comfortable right now with our outlook of 80 and maybe a little bit of upside to that as we go through the year.

Unidentified Participant

Got it. And then just the volume on defense. When do you expect that to really accelerate, given some of the opportunities you have in your portfolio and how we see the budget come through?

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Right. Well, defense is sometimes it’s lumpy, like on space launchers and satellites. We do see lumpiness on that. We saw that this quarter. For example, there was one program that we supply, the Vulcan, which has been paused. And so that was a pretty good number last year. And in the first quarter it was fairly negligible. And so that’s an example of the lumpiness. We saw the same in Europe with some launch systems, but on missiles, for example, we’re at a very good rate right now. But that gets better and we start to see it really jump in the third and fourth quarter of this year because there have been a lot of new orders for missiles and that started to flow through, but it hasn’t flowed through yet.

It’ll flow through later in the year. And then on some of the other programs that we’re on, I would say they’re still in the EMD phase in terms of engineering, manufacturing, development, going into lrip, low rate initial production. And so over time, as those rates start to ramp up from low rate initial production into port rate production, we’ll start to see the benefit of that. So it’s a slow build, but. But we are starting to see it. And it’ll become more material in the third and fourth quarter this year.

Operator

Got it. Thank you.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Thanks, Julie.

Operator

Our next question comes from Scott Mikas from Melius Research. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Scott Mikus — Analyst, Melius Research

Morning, Tom and Mike. Very nice numbers, Tom. If the numbers in my model are correct, I think the 281 million of commercial arrow sales of composite materials is the highest for any quarter since the first quarter of 2020, which wasn’t really impacted by Covid. Wide body production rates are still below pre Covid levels. So I’m just curious, was there a restocking benefit? And then on the pricing comments, was there any specific end market or program that was particularly strong from a pricing perspective?

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Right, okay, I’ll do the first one. Yeah, commercial Aero sales were high and even though wide body production is still below where it was in 2019 and we expect it to be be below for a couple years, we are seeing the benefits of that increased production. We didn’t see the restocking that we saw last year. We saw that our deliveries were more in line with the OEM production rates. And so that suggests to us that that’s normalizing and we’re not seeing the destocking. So that’s a positive. In terms of the pricing, it was not in any particular area.

It was just several contracts that came up for renewal in the normal course of events. And as I’ve said before, whenever that happens, we do try to align current market conditions with pricing on those contracts. And we got the benefit of that in Q1. And so we’ll continue to see that on a regular basis as we go forward. And Our contracts tend to be five to seven years. So every year between 15 and 20% of our contracts come up for renewal and we renegotiate them. And we have been getting better prices to align with some of the inflation and the higher cost and labor, material, utilities and logistics that we’ve seen in recent years.

Scott Mikus — Analyst, Melius Research

Okay, great. And then you sounded upbeat on the A350 outlook for this year. Airbus is owned Kinston now for over five months. Based on your conversations with Airbus, is that facility no longer an issue when it comes to a 350 production? And mainly that ramp just comes down to business class seats and to a lesser extent engines.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Well, I’ll let them speak to the specifics of it, but certainly they now have full control of it and they’re able to control their own destiny. They’ve been fairly optimistic in terms of their schedules. And what we look at is our bottoms up demand estimate where we talk to every plant, including Kinston, and that’s been very strong. And then we look at the firm pos. So our POS are generally firm five months out into the future. So we’re starting to see the POS already for September, which is post the August shutdown, and those are very strong as well.

So it’s on the basis of that that we’re optimistic on the outlook for the year.

Scott Mikus — Analyst, Melius Research

Okay, thanks for taking the questions.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Thanks guys.

Operator

Our next question comes from Miles Walton from Wolff Research. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Myles Walton — Analyst, Wolff Research

Thanks. Mike, you mentioned guidance split roughly in half, first half versus second half. Were you referring to sales EPS or both?

Michael Lenz — Interim Chief Financial Officer

I was referring to EPS. That was in the context of the 210 to 230. Yes,

Myles Walton — Analyst, Wolff Research

Got it. And so that 10 cent or so decline that you’re pointing to at the midpoint, is that mostly based on margins being lower within CM because of the lack of benefit from the inventory you had in the first quarter?

Michael Lenz — Interim Chief Financial Officer

Well, okay, so a couple of things. If you think about margins and trajectory going forward, certainly that was a non recurring benefit of relatively significant or I wouldn’t have mentioned it. There are other considerations as we move through the year. You know, Tom mentioned about lines coming back on, which is great because we’re carrying the depreciation and get the leverage for that. But you’ll also have some startup costs when you open up a new line and the phasing of hiring and that. So you know, there’s always an ebb and flow along the way.

So as we look at the balance of everything, like Tom said, being pretty good through September we’ll see what the Q4 comes in later down the road. We saw that as the right balance of conservatism as well as looking at the potential opportunity later in the year as well.

Myles Walton — Analyst, Wolff Research

And then, Tom, anything you want to comment on the M and A pipeline or outlook for in organic growth?

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Right. Well, right now, Miles, our focus is really 100% on executing on the production ramp, then also making sure we’re driving our R and D and innovation to get on the next generation aircraft and then focusing on organic growth in our core businesses and in defense in particular. As you know, we did the ASR last year in October and we took $350 million out of our revolving credit facility and we committed that we would pay that back and get our leverage down back below 2. So Mike said we’re at 2.627 right now.

Our goal is to get back under 2 by the end of this year. And so we’re not really planning on any M and A until we get to that point. But in the future, the focus for M and A will be looking at things that are advanced material science and have an ROIC of 15% or greater. And in the absence of that, we will continue to repurchase shares in the future, but not until we get back below 2 times our net debt to EBITDA leverage.

Myles Walton — Analyst, Wolff Research

Thank you.

Operator

Our next question comes from Ken Herbert from RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Ken Herbert — Analyst, RBC Capital Markets

Yeah. Hey, Tom, good morning. Nice results. I wanted to see if you can provide a little more detail as to how you’re managing risk on specifically European, your European manufacturing footprint. I know you went through some of this detail on the call and we’ve had a number of questions on this over the last month. As we’ve seen, you know, greater volatility obviously in input costs. Can you just help framing the risk that and, and help with confidence that you won’t see any sort of uptick or inflated risk as a result of what’s happening with energy prices or other input costs globally, but in particular with your European footprint.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

So a couple of things. First of all, most of what we buy for production in the US and Europe comes from the US and Europe over 90%. So we have that sort of natural edge. In Europe in particular, we do have a forward buying program on things like natural gas that give us a little bit more stability in the energy outlook. Now, of course, if things persist for a very long period of time, we’ll see the impact of that in out years. But for the next couple years we feel very confident with our hedging program and our forward buying program that will help mitigate some of those costs and the fact that most of what we buy for European production comes from Europe and not from outside of Europe or from some of the regions that are more impacted by the current event.

Michael Lenz — Interim Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, Ken, as Tom said, we layer in sort of sequentially as you go out over several quarters, both the hedging of the propylene as well as the pre buy. So in the near term you’re the most covered, as it were, and then that obviously fades off as you go out into later periods. But again, none of us have a precise crystal ball as to what exactly how events will unfold here over the next

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Right, and in Paris too is most of our production of carbon fiber is in the U.S. So we’ve got 14 lines in the U.S. Two in Europe, one pan line in Europe and seven in the U.S. So again, we tilt a little bit more toward U.S. Production. Now prepreg is mostly in Europe, which is near the Airbus plants, but the carbon fiber production is tilted toward the U.S.

Ken Herbert — Analyst, RBC Capital Markets

Great, thanks for that color. And if I could, Tom, you, you’ve mentioned a few times again spending to support, you know, next generation aircraft. Do you have any updated thinking in your spending as to when we could hear about announcements from your customers? And not that you’d get in front of anything they might say, but. But is the timing accelerating? Has your timing on this changed at all as you think about sort of next generation clean sheet aircraft?

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

No, it hasn’t changed. We’re still consistent with what the OEMs have both declared publicly, which is that they wouldn’t make a decision for another couple years, maybe launch a program by the 2030 timeframe with an entry into service in the late 30s. And so nothing has changed on that, but there’s a lot of discussions that are going on right now for all different parts of the aircraft looking at not only what type of carbon fiber and resin system, but also what type of production process. And so we’re deeply engaged in those discussions with both airframe Air OEMs, Airbus and Boeing, but also with the engine OEMs.

And so those discussions are continuing and I expect that they’ll stick to their timeframe that they’ve announced publicly.

Ken Herbert — Analyst, RBC Capital Markets

Thank you.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Thanks.

Operator

Our next question comes from Gautam Khanna from TD Cowan. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Gautam Khanna — Analyst, TD Cowan

Hey, thanks. Good morning, guys.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Morning.

Gautam Khanna — Analyst, TD Cowan

Wanted to ask you just if you could. Sorry, something just fell. I wanted to ask you if, if you could Quantify what you think your A350 shipment rate was in the first quarter and maybe if you could give it for some of the other programs as well.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Okay. Just Roughly, I’d say a 350 was at about 7, a little bit underneath 7. 787 was a little bit above 7. Both of them are talking about going to 8 later this year. Boeing is talking about going above that. And Airbus is the same for its A350. As I said, we think we could see nine before the end of the year. On the A320, we were just under 60ish. So, you know, kind of in line with where Airbus is. But that’s good. And as I said, we’re usually ahead of the OEMs and our production is a little bit more of an estimate because we’re looking at the quantity of material and we’re also about six months ahead of them in terms of where they are.

So it’s not deliveries that we’re looking at so much as production on the max. As I said, we’re in the 40 range, which is consistent with where Boeing has said they are. They’ve been tracking very nicely and they’re expecting to go to 47 later in the year. So we will be prepared for that. And on the 787, as I said, we were a little bit ahead of seven, and they’re tracking nicely to the 90 to the 100 that they indicated last year. That still seems to be a good number. So that’s how we look at each of the rates.

Gautam Khanna — Analyst, TD Cowan

Perfect. Thank you very much. Appreciate it.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Welcome.

Operator

Our next question comes from Jordan Lyonnaise from Bank of America. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Unidentified Participant

Hey, good morning. Thank you for taking the question. Last quarter you guys talked about selective hiring for the A350 ramp up. Could you just give us a sense of where you are in the hiring and then two, how you’re thinking about hiring for everything else that is also ramping up,

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Right? Well, because our production is fungible across all of the programs, our hiring is kind of aggregate. So I’ll give you the overall. So as we said, we were a little bit heavy last year in terms of staffing because we had expected higher rates. We hired people that income, so we ended up hired, but there was no point in obviously laying them off. We knew we had to hire them back this year and train them. So we held onto that. And that impacted some of our margins last year. This year we expect to hire around 400 people direct labor to help support the Production and through March, we hired about 200, about half of them.

So because we saw the rates going up a little bit, we were expecting to not start hiring in bulk until the middle of the year. But with the higher rates, we started a little bit earlier. So we had about 200 in the first quarter. We expect 400 for the year to support the plan that we have in place in front of us.

Unidentified Participant

Got it. Thank you so much.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Thanks.

Operator

Our last question will come from Scott Duchel from Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Scott Deuschle

Hey, good morning, Mike or Tom. Is this step up in RMD likely to continue over the rest of the year or should it normalize back down from these levels?

Michael Lenz — Interim Chief Financial Officer

Yeah. Hey, Scott. So a couple considerations at play here. Just broadly, our overall R and D headcount is actually down year. But remember, R and D spending involves other activities as well. So we had a degree of increase in Q1 just with the timing of certain activities related to that as well. As, you know, if you start any fiscal year, you look at and revisit where your costs are flowing. And there was a couple items that were in the factory cost centers that we identified would be that are really dedicated and related to R and D.

So there was a little bit of a bucket shift there. Nothing drastic or radical. So I would just give you that context for that.

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Yeah, well, and that’s exactly right. So when we are doing testing of new carbon fibers to increase tensile strength and modulus and compression, we have to produce batches of test material. And those batches historically just stayed in it with the plant because they’re picking up now, they’re a little bit more material. We’re allocating them more properly to R and D. So you’ll see some of that. And that’s the bucket shift that Mike mentioned. But in general, we are stepping up R and D to make sure that we have the right products in front of our customers as they make their decisions in the next generation product.

So you will see a slightly elevated R and D as we go forward, some of it being the bucket shift and some of it just being. We are stepping it up to be right in line with where the OEMs are, both the airframers and the engine makers for the next generation aircraft.

Scott Deuschle

Okay, great. And then, Tom, the high end of guidance implies the average EPS over the next three quarters is about in line or actually even slightly lower than this $0.59 you printed this quarter. I understand you had the inventory sale benefit, but unless that was really big, it would seem there’d be pressure to grow EPS off this first quarter base given the build rate increases. And so just curious if you could just clarify the puts and takes as you go into 2Q. As Mike

Tom C. Gentile — Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President

Said, we’re going to be about half and half on EPS over the course of the year. The first half, second half. This was a strong start to the year. Obviously we’re going to continue to drive forward on production rate efficiencies, holding the line on costs, driving productivity in the factories. And so we feel comfortable with the outlook. It’s about balance, as I said, first half, second half, and with all the uncertainty with regard to production rates in the trade and oil, we feel it’s prudent right now to just hold the line and maintain guidance.

But we’ll certainly try to drive productivity and improve on it. But for right now, as we said, about half and half, half in the first half, half in the second half.

Michael Lenz — Interim Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, and Scott, as we mentioned, we’re very well mitigating all of the various cost increases here in the near term, but not completely 100%. So we’re just being thoughtful about that. You see it, you know, everybody focuses on oil per se and those inputs just as it is within the broader economy. A prolonged elevation of that type of situation. You see that in a lot of other things such as shipping costs and others. So again it’s just being prudent and balanced as we think about the full year. And as I mentioned earlier, there’s the phasing of these startup of the lines with startup costs and you got to bring the hiring on before you realize the the business and the flow through of it.

So again, just taking all those into consideration there, we felt this was the balanced outlook and like Tom said, hopefully we see some further acceleration and that could lead to potential upside.

Scott Deuschle

Understood, thank you.

Operator

We have no further questions. This will conclude today’s conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.