ATLANTA, Oct. 05, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Acuity Brands, Inc. (AYI) (“Company”) today announced record fourth quarter and full-year results for net sales, net income, and diluted earnings per share (“EPS”). Fiscal 2016 fourth quarter net sales of $925.5 million increased $166 million, or 22 percent, compared with the year-ago period. Operating profit for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2016 was $135.1 million, an increase of $23.3 million, or 21 percent, over the year-ago period. Net income for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2016 was $82.9 million, an increase of 38 percent compared with the prior-year period. Fiscal 2016 fourth quarter diluted EPS of $1.89 increased 38 percent compared with $1.37 for the year-ago period.
Adjusted diluted EPS for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2016 increased 27 percent to $2.21 compared with adjusted diluted EPS of $1.74 for the year-ago period. Adjusted operating profit for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2016 increased $32.9 million, or 27 percent, to $156.5 million, or 16.9 percent of net sales, compared with the year-ago period adjusted operating profit of $123.6 million, or 16.3 percent of net sales. Adjusted results for both periods exclude the impact of amortization expense for acquired intangible assets, share-based compensation expense, acquisition-related items (including acquired profit in inventory and professional fees), net loss on financial instruments, special charge for streamlining activities, and impairment of intangible asset. Management believes these items impacted the comparability of the Company’s results and that adjusted financial measures enhance the reader’s overall understanding of the Company’s current financial performance by making results comparable between periods. A reconciliation of adjusted financial measures to the most directly comparable U.S. GAAP measure is provided in the tables at the end of this release.
Vernon J. Nagel, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer of Acuity Brands, commented, “We were very pleased with our achievement of record fourth quarter and full-year results. These results are even more impressive when one considers that we continued to invest in our strong sales growth and areas with significant future growth potential, including the expansion of our solid state luminaire and controls portfolio as well as our building management, software, and Internet of Things solutions. Fourth quarter’s adjusted gross profit margin of 43.5 percent represented an increase of 120 basis points over prior year’s fourth quarter, while adjusted operating profit margin of 16.9 percent increased 60 basis points over last year’s fourth quarter. We believe our record fourth quarter and full-year results reflect our ability to provide customers with truly differentiated value from our industry-leading portfolio of innovative lighting and building management solutions along with superior service.”
Mr. Nagel continued, “During the fourth quarter, we made the decision to accelerate certain actions to streamline our supply chain, enhance our customer service and drive productivity. These actions included, among others, the closure of a manufacturing facility and the transfer of certain production to alternate locations in order to free up additional capacity for future growth and to better leverage our overall supply chain. These actions overlapped with the ramping-up of a new manufacturing facility and the addition of a new paint line. The combination of these actions created labor shortages in certain locations which negatively impacted production and shipments and resulted in cancelled orders as well as added costs. We estimate these short-term labor issues resulted in cancelled orders and lost contribution margin on more than $25 million of net sales and caused us to incur additional overtime and other costs in excess of $2 million in the quarter. The actions implemented during the fourth quarter are expected to have significant benefits to our business as we go forward. While the impact of these labor issues is mostly behind us, we may experience some modest carry over effect into our first quarter although we do not expect it to have a material impact on our results.”