Call highlights
Ducommun reported record Q2 2026 revenue of $224.5 million (up 12% year-over-year), record gross margin of 28.0% (+160 bps), and an all-time high RPO of $1.2 billion, with strength in commercial aerospace (+16%) and missile programs, though management flagged continued destocking headwinds expected through the rest of 2026.
“Our defense business RPO grew 197 million year-over-year and commercial aerospace grew 54 million. We closed on 310 million of bookings in Q2 and have closed on $1.1 billion in the past 12 months.”
“On the outlook for the second half of 2026, we expect to see continued growth from both our defense and commercial aerospace businesses, but at more muted levels versus the first half. We reiterate our previous guidance of mid to high single revenue growth for the full year, and that holds.”
- Record Q2 net revenue of $224.5 million, up 12% year-over-year, marking the 21st consecutive quarter of year-over-year growth
- Record gross margin of 28.0%, up 160 bps year-over-year; adjusted EBITDA margin expanded 130 bps to 17.1%
- RPO reached an all-time high of $1.16 billion, over $250 million higher than prior year, with a 1.4x book-to-bill in Q2
- Commercial aerospace revenue grew 16% year-over-year, driven by Boeing 737 MAX and Airbus A320 ramp and new aftermarket retrofit content
- Net income increased 60% year-over-year to $20.4 million, or $1.31 per diluted share; non-GAAP adjusted net income up 35% to $1.18 per diluted share
- Defense RPO grew $197 million year-over-year, with missile programs (Tomahawk, PAC-3, SM-3, SM-6) expected to grow several-fold in coming years
- Management expects destocking headwinds to continue as a headwind through the end of 2026
- Military and space growth of 7% was partially offset by temporary weakness in radar, space, and naval revenues
- Q2 results were partly aided by pulling ahead production activity and associated revenues from the second half of 2026
- Missile framework agreements with defense primes are still being negotiated by RTX and the government, delaying potential order flow
- Forward-looking statements highlight risks including U.S. government defense spending levels, supply chain issues, tariffs, elevated interest rates, and potential prolonged U.S. federal government shutdown impacts
Welcome to the Duke Common Second Quarter 2026 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1-1 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, press star 1-1 again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker, Mr. Suman Mukherjee, Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Please go ahead.
Thank you, and welcome to DueCommon's 2026 Second Quarter Conference Call. With me today is Steve Oswald, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer. I'm going to discuss certain limitations to any forward-looking statements regarding future events, projections, or performance that we may make during the prepared remarks or the Q&A session that follows. Certain statements today that are not historical facts, including any statements as to the company's progress and value creation opportunity for shareholders under our Vision 2027 game plan for investors, beliefs about the company's Vision 2032 strategic plan, potential destalking headwinds and their impact on the company's business for the remainder of 2026, expectations related to the U.S. Department of War's long-term framework agreements for key missile programs with defense primes our share of potential orders from those primes the increase in production on many of those missile programs and their impact on the growth of our defense business estimated synergies to be realized under the company's facility consolidation project and the outlook for the company's revenue and commercial aerospace and defense businesses for the full year 2026 are forward-looking statements under the private securities litigation reform act of 1995 and are therefore perspective. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks, uncertainties, and other factors which could cause actual results to differ materially from the future results expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Although we believe that the expectations reflected in our forward-looking statements are reasonable, we can give no assurance that such expectations will prove to have been correct. In addition, estimates of future operating results are based on the company's current business, which is subject to change. Particular risks facing due common include, amongst others, the cyclicality of our end-use market, the level of U.S. government defense spending, our customers may experience changes in production rates or delays in the launch and certification of new product, timing of orders from our customers which are subject to cancellation, modification, or rescheduling, our ability to obtain additional financing and service existing debt to fund capital expenditures and meet our working capital needs, legal and regulatory risks, including pending litigation matters generally, and as well as any potential losses arising from third-party subrogation claims related to the government's performance under fire that may become material, the cost of expansion, consolidation, and acquisitions, competition, economic, and geopolitical development, including supply chain issues, our ability to successfully implement restructuring, realignment, and cost reduction activities that could adversely affect our ability to achieve our strategic objectives, international trade restrictions, and our ability to obtain necessary U.S. government approvals for proposed sales to certain foreign customers, the impact of tariffs and elevated interest rates, risks associated with a prolonged partial or total U.S. federal government shutdown, the ability to attract and retain key personnel and avoid labor disruptions, the ability to adequately protect and enforce intellectual property rights, pandemics, disasters, natural or otherwise, and risk of cybersecurity attacks. Please refer to our annual report on Form 10-K-A, quarterly report on Form 10-Q, and other reports filed from time to time with the SEC, as well as the press release issued today for a detailed discussion of the risks. Our forward-looking statements are subject to those risks. Statements made during this call are only as of the time made. we do not intend to update any statements made in this presentation except if and as required by regulatory authorities. This call also includes non-GAAP financial measures. Please refer to our filings with the SEC for a reconciliation of the GAAP to non-GAAP measures referenced on this call. We filed our Q2 2026 quarterly report on Form 10Q with the SEC today. I would now like to turn the call over to Steve Oswald for a review of the operating results.
Okay, thank you, Siman. Thanks, everyone, for joining us today for our second quarter conference call. Today, and as usual, I'll give an update of the current situation at the company, after which, Siman, will review our financials in detail. Let me start off again on this quarterly call with the Commons Vision 2027 Game Plan for Investors as we continue to make great progress in our fourth year of the plan, heading into the final year of the Vision starting this January. The strategy and vision were developed out of the COVID pandemic over the summer and fall of 2022, unanimously approved by the Common Board in November 2022, and then presented the following month in New York to investors where we had excellent feedback. Since that time, the Commons managers have been executing the strategy by increasing the revenue percentage of engineered product content, which is at 23% over the past year and up from 15% in 2022, consolidating our rooftop footprint in contract manufacturing, continuing our focused acquisition program, executing the offloading strategy with defense primes in high-growth segments, driving value-added pricing, and expanding content on key commercial aerospace platforms. All of us here, as well as my fellow board members, continue to have a high level of conviction in the Vision 2027 strategy and financial goals, and believe the market catalysts ahead present a unique value creation opportunity for our shareholders. The Q2 2026 results show again that strategy initiatives are working, with gross and adjusted EBITDA margins continuing to stay on track to meet and exceed our Vision 2027 goals, along with revenues and the level of engineered products and aftermarket at the company. For Q2, I'm very happy to report that revenues reached the new quarterly record of $224 million, 12% growth over last year, our fifth consecutive quarter of over $200 million in revenue, and our 21st consecutive quarter with year-over-year revenue growth. We had strong growth across all our end markets, with commercial aerospace in particular showing continued strength this year with 16% year-over-year growth, a very positive sign. We saw production and deliveries continue to ramp, driven by higher OEM production rates and a gradual easing of the de-stocking impact. In addition, we benefited from new aftermarket content that drove incremental retrofit revenues on the 737 MAX. We still expect some of these stockings to remain as a headwind through the end of this year, but the situation is improving. Military and space revenues grew 7% with continued strength in our missile portfolio and fixed-wing aircraft, partially offset by temporary weakness in our radar, space, and naval revenues. During the quarter, we also pulled ahead some production activity and associated revenues from the second half to level low production at our plants ahead of higher delivery commitments in the second half of this year. Another major highlight in Q2 was the company's remaining performance obligations continued growth, reaching a record $1.16 billion, which is over $250 million higher than prior year and $85 million higher than just last quarter. This represents a book-to-build ratio of 1.4 times in the quarter and 1.3 times over the last 12 months. We added more than a quarter's worth of revenue to our backlog in the last year, which is fantastic. Our defense business RPO grew 197 million year-over-year and commercial aerospace grew 54 million. We closed on 310 million of bookings in Q2 and have closed on $1.1 billion in the past 12 months. This is great work for our business development team, and it still does not include our share of potential orders from defense primes under the seven-year missile framework agreements, which are still being negotiated by RTX and the government, but also happy to see it is now completed as of last month for the PAC-3 and FAD at Lockheed and L3-Iris. We continue to have discussions with the defense primes to support them on these major agreements and are well positioned as the incumbent supplier of many of the programs, which is great news for DCO and its shareholders. Production on many of these missile programs, such as the Tomahawk, Pac-3, and Standard Missile 3 and 6, are expected to grow several-fold, and this will be a big driver of growth for the DCO defense business over the next few years. Our performance centers are prepared for this increase in production, with most capacity already in place, and we will hit the ground running once the orders begin to flow. Gross margin grew by $9.9 million in the second quarter to 28%, a 160 basis point improvement from 26.4% last year in Q2. We continue to see the benefits of our Vision 2027 strategy and gross margin expansion due to DCO's engineered product portfolio with aftermarket, strategic value pricing initiatives, restructuring actions, and productivity improvements reading through to the P&L. Our cost-saving expectations of $13 million annually from our facility consolidation program has almost been mostly realized at this time. For adjusted operating income margins in Q2, the team delivered 11.9%, well above the prior year of 10.2%. This was supported by growth in adjusted operating income margins in both our operating segments. Adjusted EBITDA continues to improve towards our Vision 2027 goal of 18% in 2027 from 13% in 2022. DCO achieved 17.1% in the quarter, or $38.4 million, up $6.7 million from Q2 2025. We're also in great shape for 18% in 2027. Gap EPS was $1.31 per diluted share in Q2-2026 versus $0.84 for Q2-2025. With the adjustments, diluted EPS was $1.18 a share in Q2 versus $0.90 in the prior year quarter. A higher gap in adjusted diluted EPS during the quarter was driven by higher operating income. GAAP, net income, and EPS also benefit from a one-time clawback of executive compensation as a result of a restatement published earlier this year. As I mentioned earlier, we closed on over $1.1 billion in bookings over the past 12 months, a trailing 12-month book-to-bill of 1.3 times. With increased defense spending and positive momentum in commercial aerospace, we have strong tailwinds in both our primary and markets. On the outlook for the second half of 2026, we expect to see continued growth from both our defense and commercial aerospace businesses, but at more muted levels versus the first half. We reiterate our previous guidance of mid to high single revenue growth for the full year, and that holds. As I mentioned earlier, we pulled some forward production-related revenue recognition into the first half to level load our facilities and to support high levels of delivery commitments in the second half. This is expected to unwind in the second half, resulting in low- to mid-single-digit growth in Q3 and Q4 and keeping our full-year expectations unchanged. Now let me provide some additional color on our markets, products, and programs. Beginning with our military and space sector, we saw revenues of $124 million compared to $116 million in Q2 2025. This represents 7% growth and was driven by another quarter of strong performance in our missile franchise, that was up significantly we also had nice growth in fixed wing aircraft which was offset by year over year temporary declines in radar naval and space platforms and this was due to timing of orders i want to briefly expand on our missile business dco's missile business grew 68 in q2 and is now up 29 over the past 12 months i mentioned before that rtx our largest customer and Lockheed are expected to significantly increase production on many programs, including the PAC-3, SM-3, SM-6, Tomahawk, THAAD, AMRAN, and we are in discussions on multiple opportunities. DCO is well-positioned on all these programs and in great shape with capacity at our operations to fully support the required ramp-up. DCO is a key supplier in these programs, and as the orders for missile replenishment begin to work their way from announcement to firm orders, the Commerer lays a focus on capturing as much of this content as we can. This is an exceptional time to be operating in this segment. We're not only fortunate, but also excited for the opportunity to drive much higher levels of shareholder value from this growth. Within our commercial aerospace operations, second quarter revenue increased 16% year-over-year to $89 million, with strong growth in production and deliveries on single aisle platforms from both Boeing and Airbus. Our 737 MAX platform also benefit from an aftermarket retrofit order. This is an incremental content of engineered products for us on the 737 MAX, and the retrofit demands expected to sustain for the next few years for an opportunity for line fit revenues as well in the future. This growth in our large commercial aerospace business helped offset declines in our business jet and commercial rotorcraft business during the quarter. We continue to be optimistic on the commercial aerospace outlook. Boeing just last week announced her continuing to make progress on increasing the 37 MAX build from 42 to 47, and the new production line in Everett is now up and running. It was also great to see the MAX 7 recently certified after more than a six-year delay. The MAX 10 is next. It'll be another big lift for our second-largest customer, BA. We see the impact of internal and external destocking coming to an end in the next couple of quarters with a glide path for growth going into 2027. We continue to monitor closely the supply chain challenges at Airbus with engines and note their expecting rate increases in 2027 as well. In summary, the outlook for the next few years is the best I've seen since joining Dukamen and the future is very exciting for the company and its shareholders. We like the balance of defense and commercial aerospace businesses that we have as well and are strongly positioned to take advantage of the overall industry talents. With that, I'll have Sumaan review our financials in detail.
Sumaan. Thank you, Steve. As a reminder, please see the company's 10Q and Q2 earnings release for a further description of information mentioned on today's call. As Steve discussed, our second quarter results reflect another strong quarter of revenue with continued recovery in commercial aerospace along with growth in our military and markets. Gross margins and EBITDA margins both continue to show improvement on a year-over-year basis, and the synergies from our facility consolidation projects completed last year are now at the expected run rate. These actions, along with our strategic pricing initiatives, growth continued margin expansion in Q2 and keeps us on pace to achieve our Vision 2027 goal of 18% adjusted EBITDA percentage of sales. Now turning to our second quarter results. Revenue for the second quarter of 2026 was $224.5 million versus $200.8 million for the second quarter of 2025. The year-over-year increase of 12% reflects strong growth in commercial aerospace of 16%, driven by growth on single-aisle platforms, including the 737 MAX and A320, as well as growth on wide-body platforms. The strength in the commercial aerospace business was supported by higher production and deliveries for OEM customers and aftermarket retrofit work on the max. We continue to see the stocking in our commercial aerospace business and expect it to be largely caught up by the end of 2026. Our defense business grew 7% year-over-year with continued strength in missiles and fixed-wing platforms, partially offset by temporary declines in radar, naval, and space platforms. The growth in our missile franchise was broad-based with strength on several different programs, including PAC-3, SM-6, MIR, Tomahawk, and the Naval Strike Missile. As Steve mentioned earlier, our missile business grew by 68% during the quarter and 29% over the past 12 months. And with that, our missiles, radar, and electronic warfare programs combined now represent approximately 35% of our LTM defense revenues and more than 20% of total DCO revenue. It's a strong franchise with great platforms to drive significant upside for Decommon in 2027 and beyond as we see an uptick in OEM production activity on the various missile platforms. Overall, Q2 was a very strong revenue quarter for us, but did also benefit from some pull forward of production and related revenue from the second half as we look to level load activity in anticipation of higher deliveries in Q3 and Q4. We posted total gross profit of $62.9 million, or 28% of revenue for the quarter, versus $53 million, or 26.4% of revenue in the prior year period. The record gross margin was driven by realization of our planned synergies from the facility consolidation program, which are now at their full run rate, along with the benefit of higher manufacturing volume. Operating income for the second quarter was $28.3 million, or 12.6% of revenue, compared to operating income of $17.7 million, or 8.8% of revenue in the prior year period. The year-over-year increase of $10.6 million was primarily due to higher gross profit and flat SG&A, with the latter benefiting from the one-time compensation clawback. Adjusted operating income was $26.7 million, or 11.9% of revenue this quarter, compared to $20.6 million, or 10.2% of revenue in the comparable period last year. The adjusted operating income excluded the one-time benefit of compensation clawback and was up 170 basis points versus prior year. The company reported net income for the second quarter of $20.4 million, or $1.31 per diluted share, compared to $12.8 million, or $0.84 per diluted share, a year ago. On an adjusted basis, the company reported net income of $18.4 million, or $1.18 per diluted share compared to adjusted net income of $13.6 million or 90 cents in Q2 2025. The higher net income and adjusted net income during the quarter were driven by the higher adjusted operating income. Now let me turn to our segment results. Our structural systems segment posted revenue of $93 million in the second quarter of 2026 versus $91 million last year. The year-over-year change reflected $4 million higher revenue in our commercial aerospace business driven by single aisle platforms including the MAX and the A320 as well as wide-body platforms. The military and space business within this segment was down $2 million on a year-over-year basis with temporary weakness in military rotorcraft partially offset by growth in missiles. Structural systems operating income for the quarter was $12.8 million or 13.7% of revenue compared to $9.3 million, or 10.2% of revenue for the prior year quarter. Excluding restructuring charges and other adjustments in both years, the segment operating margin was 15.7% in Q2 2026 versus 12.8% in Q2 2025. The increase in year-over-year margin was driven by savings from the facility consolidation program and higher manufacturing volume. Our electronic systems segment posted revenue of $131 million in the second quarter of 2026 versus $110 million in the prior year period, an increase of 20%. The year-over-year change reflected $10 million in higher revenues in military and space applications driven by strong growth in missiles and military fixed-wing aircraft, partially offset by temporary weakness in our radar and space business. Commercial aerospace in the quarter grew $8 million, driven by growth on Boeing platforms. Our industrial business also grew $3.8 million during Q2 due to timing of production orders. Electronic systems operating income for the second quarter was $25.5 million, or 19.4% of revenue, versus $20.5 million, or 18.6% of revenue in the prior year period. Excluding restructuring charges and other adjustments in both years, the segment operating margin was 19.7% in Q2 2026 versus 19.1% in Q2 2025. The year-over-year increase was driven by higher manufacturing volume. Turning to liquidity and capital resources. In Q2 2026, we generated $33.5 million in cash flow from operating activities compared to $22.4 million in Q2 of last year. Our strong cash generation was driven by higher net income, partially offset by higher working capital during the quarter. Year-to-date cash flow from operating activities was $44.8 million, and year-to-date free cash flow was $38.3 million, representing free cash flow conversion against adjusted net income of 127%. In Q4 of last year, the company amended its credit agreement, which now included a $200 million term loan and a $450 million revolver. This new $650 million facility lowers our cost of capital and gives us incremental capacity to execute on our acquisition strategy. As of the end of the second quarter, we had available liquidity of $410 million comprising of the unutilized portion of our revolver and cash on hand. Interest expense in Q2 was $3.5 million compared to $3 million in Q2 of 2025. The year over year increase in interest cost was primarily due to higher debt balances, offset by lower interest rates on our debt due to more favorable terms in our new credit agreement. Also, as a reminder, in November 2021, we had put in place an interest rate hedge that went into effect for a seven-year period starting January 24 and pegs the one-month term so for at 170 basis points for $150 million of our debt. The hedge is still in place and will continue to drive significant interest cost savings in 26 and beyond. To conclude the financial overview, I would like to say that the second quarter results continue to affirm that our Vision 2027 strategy is working and that we are well positioned to achieve our Vision 2027 goals. I'll now turn it back to Steve for his closing remarks. Steve?
Okay, thanks, Shimon. In closing, Q2 was another record quarter for DCO. I could not be happier. We ended the first half as well with record revenue and even margins. I'm seeing strong talons across our primary end markets. It was also our fifth consecutive quarter of revenue over $200 million. Gross margin and adjusted even margins were at 28% and 17.1% respectively. Wonderful news, and I'll track to meet our Vision 2027 goals. In addition, the company's engineered product revenues over the past 12 months was 23%, in excellent shape as we drive higher OEM and aftermarket products through the P&L. As everyone knows, driving this percentage as high as possible is our number one strategic focus with 100% commitment. Finally, I look forward to sharing the next chapter of Ducana, California's oldest company, still operating today when we unveil our Vision 2032 on September 17th and our Investor Day in New York. We cannot be more positive about the future of DCO over the next six years and are excited to share the strategy and game plan with all of you next month. With that now, let's go to questions.
Thank you. As a reminder to ask a question, please press star 11 on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, press star 1-1 again. One moment while we compile the Q&A roster. Our first question will come from the line of John Gooden with Citi. Your line is open.
Hey, guys. Thanks for taking my question. I wanted to just hone in on a couple things from the prepared remarks and then maybe ask a bigger picture one. But in the prepared remarks, the missile growth number, I think I heard 68%. That was a very large acceleration from last quarter. I would love, you know, obviously there's a theme there, but I would love a little bit more color on kind of, you know, whatever you're willing to share on the large inflection And then separately, you mentioned a large retrofit order, which I thought was very interesting and perhaps offering a little bit more color there would be useful as well.
Great to be with you. Thank you for the question or the questions. I'll handle the first one. You know, yeah, we're thrilled with the 68%. You know, a lot of it is Pac-3. So, you know, great job by our team, our whole group that supports the Pac-3. Lockheed, in general, is on this replenishment, even though this order was not for the seven-year. Obviously, seven-year was just done last month in July. They are, you know, very focused on Pac-3. We are a major supplier for cards for the PAC-3, and so that was a big part of the 68%. And Suman, do you want to handle the other one?
Yeah, and John, just to make sure, the second part outside of the missile growth. It's the Carson. Yes, the Carson business. The retrofit. Yeah, so that really is a great win for us with engineered products. So Carson is an engineered product business. We own the design IP in the revenues that come out of that performance center, and they were able to design a switch which is going to be retrofitted on the max, and that was a big win, and eventually we expect that we'll also be part of the line fit and will drive recurring revenue for us. But even prior to that, the retrofit order is a large fleet out there and is going to drive revenue for us for the next few years, just the retrofit alone. So it's a big win, and that helped with the max.
Absolutely. John, that's a home run for us, that retrofit.
Excellent. And maybe if we just take a step back, and I'm sure we're going to hear more at the investor day, but just taking a step back on the margin outlook, I think sometimes the pushback that we hear from investors is on contract manufacturing exposure and the margins that that kind of generates. I think you've demonstrated that you're able to generate higher than normal margins on contract manufacturing. And, you know, Steve, maybe there's something to kind of dig in there a little bit and just shed some light on how your contract manufacturing is a little bit different, maybe a little bit more specialized in how it's generating that margin profile.
Yeah, it's a great question. And I think I'm happy to have this answer is that, you know, contract manufacturing is a challenging business, but if you find the right niches, you can make good money and, you know, have some pricing power. And that's a good example. That is our titanium business. You know, we do super plastic forming and hot forming of titanium in the structures, which is, you know, a contract manufacturing built to print business. And there's only a few folks that do that in the entire world. And, you know, outside of Toulouse, which Airbus has, even though they're a customer, they also have their own internal titanium operation, we're the largest. And there's very, very few that can do the work we do. So that's one example. The other example I'll give you is our Joplin facility, which makes harnesses, all types of ruggedized harnesses, all types of applications for high heat, for pressure, for all types of environments. And very few people can do that, too. So when you're looking to come in a contract manufacturer, you can't look at us as, you know, we're just doing, like, machining with five- and six-axis machines, and there's 100 companies that can do that worldwide, okay? You really got to think about our CM business. It's just really things that are really hard to make, and there's few people doing it in the world.
Excellent. Thanks for the color, guys. All right, John.
One moment for our next question. And that will come from the line of Mike Crawford with B-Riley Securities. Your line is open.
Thank you. So we know you're embedded on these large traditional prime missile and munitions programs, but what are you doing to address all the opportunities coming with affordable masks and emerging new primes such as, like, Anduril?
Well, first of all, great question. Again, we are engaged. We're engaged with AeroVironment. We're engaged with Andorong. You know, obviously somewhat as well with Kratos. So we are absolutely on top of this, you know, as far as trying to find areas where we can drive value. Do I see us on a $5,000 drone? You know, I'm not sure. But, you know, I do see us being able to provide value in different areas, such as composites, possibly RF, antennas, those type of things. So we are actively quoting, actively engaged. We have high levels of relationship now with their management, and, you know, we continue to move forward. So we're right on top of it, Mike.
All right. Thanks, Steve. And just for one follow-up question. We know you've been super patient on M&A, I mean, super successful as well and patient in recent years to not do anything that's not good for shareholders. But do you have a good temper to look at larger, more transformation mobiles and related any other updates on the existing pipeline?
Mike, you're a great straight man. Okay, look forward to talking to you in September. Well, that's some good news for you. I do mean that, but that's my – will you jump in real quick?
Yeah, no, we continue to remain active in the market in terms of looking at opportunities. We've beefed up the team, and so we are absolutely looking at a number of things, and we're going to do – we're going to pull the trigger when we think the opportunity is right, and there is – we have the ability to create value for our shareholders. So we – you know, stay tuned, and I think you asked another good question, which, as Steve said, we'll be in a better position to answer.
Yeah, more to come next month, Mike.
I'll be there. All right, thank you.
Great, I look forward to seeing you. Thanks for coming all that way.
One moment for our next question. And that will come from the line of Ken Herbert with RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.
Yeah, hey, Steve and Shuman. I just wanted to follow up on the margin question, again, without getting too far ahead of potential September news. But, you know, you've done a lot from a restructuring standpoint, you know, facility, your manufacturing footprint. As we think about gross margins moving forward, obviously volume would be an important tailwind. Sounds like you're getting better price. Is there anything else we should think about from a – just an organizational structure standpoint, anything else that could be a tailwind of margins beyond volume and price as we think about sort of the potential over the next few years?
Ken, great question. We certainly believe there is a lot of margin runway ahead of the company. Again, more color to be provided on investor day. You noted a couple of key drivers. I would say the other big driver for us is going to be the continued shift to engineered products. That's been an important part of our story over the last four or five years. Well, ever since Steve Tugan leadership of the company, and it's going to continue to be part of our story going forward, and that will help improve our margin, moving to higher IP products which are more engineered where we're able to make better margins.
Yeah, Ken, the other answer we just, and just at the top, the next level down, is that our engineering, Ken, on the engineering product side is just so much better.
So a great example is this retrofit, you know, with the Mac. now are you so yeah sorry steve i was just going to ask is most of the missile exposure engineered products because it just seems like you've got phenomenal opportunity there but but they you know significant mixed benefit is just going to face headwinds from growth in a lot of the non-engineered products parts of the portfolio no that's a good point as well and uh that's where kind of acceleration in M&A is going to play a factor as well.
Again, more to come at Investor Day. But we are growing our engineered products organically too. If you look at the performance over the last four years in revision 2027, with the one acquisition which contributed maybe 300 basis points to the mixed shift, we have gone from 15% to 23% of revenue from engineered products. So that's reflective of the strong organic growth in the business. And there is an expectation with the investments made in that business that we will continue to see strong organic growth. And that supplemented with M&A will help keep moving the shift. I think the other question you had around missiles, a lot of the missile work is these ruggedized interconnects or cables, which are not, in our definition, engineered product, but they are highly proprietary in terms of the process capability that we have. But they aren't technically part of engineering.
Yeah, it leads more to CM on the missile, Ken. But, again, we're working to obviously build out more engineered products, and we're really happy where we are. I think we're going to have a really nice story for you guys next month on that.
No, it sounds great. If I could, just one final question. Where are you from a capacity standpoint? I mean, as you're seeing the growth, like in the rugged interconnects in these areas, do you have sufficient capacity in Joplin and these other, you know, centers of excellence to drive that? Or are you looking at maybe more CapEx or hiring to really support that?
Yeah, hiring for sure, Ken. Thankfully, on the capital side and footprint side, we're in really good shape. Obviously, we're going to have to make some investments over the next few years. But, you know, Joplin, for instance, the guy's doing a great job. We just opened up another part of the building that was really not being used for another 25,000, 30,000 square feet. You know, the Tomahawk is going to go in there, and that's being lined out. It's going to be a world-class facility. But, you know, we're hiring, you know, quite a bit at Joplin, for instance. You know, I think we've probably hired over 80 or 90 people since January. So that's a lot for us. So we're moving forward, and I think we'll be in good shape.
Thanks, Steve.
All right, Ken.
Thank you. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star 11. Our next question will come from Alexandra Mandary with Truist Securities. your line is open.
Hey, nice results and thanks for taking my question. In relation to missiles, have you started taking a look at your supply chain there to secure components to align with the demand and what might those pinch points be?
Yeah, it's a good question. You know, look, it's always a concern. I think, you know, we have a really effective supply chain group. We've been doing this game for a long time. As you know, this is a big part of our business. So we know how to look at the market we know is you know we certainly do some buffer stock when needed you know we feel overall that with the capacity and the footprint that we still are is which is still underutilized right which is going to start you know going way up as far and the hiring which is obviously ongoing right now you know we obviously have to monitor but we feel good about supply chain we're not uptight about really any kind of components other than you just we need to manage it, and, you know, and we do that right now, so I think it's all green light.
Great.
Thank you.
Thank you for the question.
Thank you. I'm showing no further questions in the queue at this time. I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. Steve Oswald for any closing remarks.
Okay, great. Well, let me just wrap it up. First, thank you again for joining us for the Q2 call. As I said in my press release, which I do, you You know, which I did over the past few days, the first sentences, I cannot be happier, and that's true. You know, the first six months in this quarter has been wonderful for DCO, wonderful for our employees and our customers, and obviously our shareholders as equally important. So we're looking forward to another great second half in 2026. We're also very excited about our investor day next month. we hope you can join us again thank you for being with us today and have a safe day this concludes today's program thank you all for participating you may now disconnect