If you've never heard of Varex Imaging (VREX 1.41%) before, you've come to the right place. In this segment of Backstage Pass, recorded on Nov. 22, Fool contributors Rachel Warren and Brian Withers discuss the history of the X-ray imaging company and its most recent earnings report.
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Rachel Warren: Varex Imaging is a independent supplier of medical X-ray tubes and image processing solutions. The company's headquartered in Salt Lake City, has long-standing relationships with partners like GE and Toshiba. Companies use Varex Imaging's X-ray resources and digital detectors and imaging software all over the globe.
Varex Imaging, as we know it, was created in 2017. But this company history spans all the way back to the 1930s to a company that was called Eimac Products. Varex Imaging was spun off of a company called Varian Medical Systems a few years ago. So, it has a pretty lengthy company history that goes back now almost 100 years.
Shares of this company, it's interesting. You will see here in a second. The stock over the last five or so years has very much trailed the market.
But year-to-date shares of the company last I checked are up about 77%. I think there was definitely an impact to its business from the COVID pandemic. If you look over the last several years, this has not been a stock that has performed super well in the context of the market's returns.
But year-to-date so far, if you look at that stock movements, it's had a pretty robust year. This was another company that reported its fourth quarter and full year 2021. You can see here management's forecast for revenue between $205 and $225 million for the fourth quarter.
The company beat that coming in with revenue of $226 million, a 33% year-over-year jump. It also came in at GAAP net earnings of $0.20 cents per diluted share. Non-GAAP net earnings of $0.45 cents per diluted share, which was a little bit above management's guidance.
The company reported net income positive of $8.8 million in the fourth quarter compared to a net loss of $26.2 million in the fourth quarter of 2020. I think some of that was most definitely due to impact from the COVID pandemic, probably a big slowdown in orders there. Just real quick, for the full-year 2021, Varex Imaging reported revenue of $818 million. That was 11% increase compared to 2020.
GAAP gross margin of 33%. GAAP net earnings per diluted share of $0.43 cents, notably net income of $17.9 million. Whereas in full-year 2020, it reported a pretty steep net loss of $57.4 million.
Closed out the period with cash and cash equivalents of $144.6 million. I think this is an interesting company. It's not one of those super-exciting stocks, but it provides a very valuable service and its products are used in so many different types of equipment by companies all over the world.
Brian Withers: It's not just medical. Think of industrial applications as well. Any place you'd need to see inside something, they shared a picture on their earnings presentation of looking into an oil pipeline for example. There's certainly other applications besides in the hospitals that they are doing well.
But I look back at the rec from 2017 and it talks about some of Peter Lynch's favorites are boring names operating in a boring industry. There you go. [laughs]
Rachel Warren: It's a good one to look at. I like it.