Even though I'm as guilty as anyone of lumping Danaher (NYSE:DHR) into the "industrial conglomerate" pool with others like United Technologies (NYSE:UTX), Parker-Hannifin (NYSE:PH), and so on, there's a fair bit more to it than that. What's more, since the company is looking to grow in areas like water and medical technology, I think it's positioning itself for growth of a more lasting nature.
Much as I continue to admire this company, I found a few blemishes with this quarter's financial report. Reported sales growth of more than 17% was fine, as was the "core" growth of 7.5% (though less than 5% including currency impacts). Operating margin, though, slipped a little, in large part because of the Leica acquisition, and so operating earnings grew just 9%. And while earnings per share were up 20% on a pro forma basis, operating cash flow growth was not so robust (though quarter-by-quarter cash flow analysis can be very misleading).
Still, the two larger business units (professional instrumentation and industrial technologies) did pretty well. In the tools/components business, though, changes at Sears (NASDAQ:SHLD) are hurting the retail side. Nothing else about the individual businesses really jumped out at me, other than the strong electronic test and product ID businesses.
As I discussed just last week, the company is making a rather big acquisition -- buying dental equipment and supplies company Sybron (NYSE:SYD) for about $2 billion in cash. Now, Danaher does a lot of deals. It added four companies this quarter for about $128 million in cash, but this is a big one, even for them. Still, it's a good, dependable, and noncyclical business that should produce a lot of cash flow.
And that's the overall name of the game here. While there may not be a tremendous amount of synergy between the discrete businesses, these are all generally markets with solid opportunities. And as an above average return on capital might suggest, management knows how to run them well as a productive whole.
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Fool contributor Stephen Simpson has no financial interest in any stocks mentioned (that means he's neither long nor short the shares).
