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Transcript: GE Aerospace (GE) Q3 2026 Earnings Call  

GE Aerospace (NYSE: GE) reported strong Q3 2026 results, with orders up 49%, revenue up 18%, EPS of $2.25 up 36%, and more than $2 billion of free cash flow, prompting the company to raise its full-year 2026 guidance across the board. In this earnings call transcript, Chairman and CEO Larry Culp and CFO Rahul Ghai discuss commercial services strength, LEAP and GE9X progress, the CPP acquisition, defense wins, and the outlook for low double-digit commercial services growth in 2027.

Operator Introduction

OPERATOR: Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the GE Aerospace 3rd quarter 2026 earnings conference call.

At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. My name is Liz, and I will be your conference coordinator today. If you experience issues with the webcast slides refreshing or there appears to be delays in the slide advancement, please hit F5 on your keyboard to refresh.

As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.

I would now like to turn the program over to your host for today’s conference, Blaire Shoor, from the GE Aerospace Investor Relations team. Please proceed.

Blaire Shoor, Head of Investor Relations – GE Aerospace: Thanks, Liz. Welcome to GE Aerospace’s 3rd quarter 2026 earnings call.

I’m joined by Chairman and CEO Larry Culp and CFO Rahul Ghai.

Many of the statements we’re making are forward-looking and based on our best view of the world and our business as we see them today. As described in our SEC filings and website, those elements may change as the world changes.

Additionally, Larry and Rahul will speak to total company and corporate financial results and guidance today on a non-GAAP basis.

Now over to Larry.

CEO Larry Culp’s Opening Remarks

Larry Culp, Chairman and CEO – GE Aerospace: Blaire, thank you. And good morning, everyone.

At any moment, nearly 1 million people are flying on aircraft powered by our technology. That’s the responsibility behind everything we do at GE Aerospace. And it underscores our purpose to invent the future of flight, lift people up, and bring them home safely.

In the 3rd quarter, we delivered strong results. Demand continues to be solid across the business, even in a dynamic environment.

3rd quarter orders were up 49%. Led by Commercial Engines and Services, or CES, which was up 58%. We continue to see strength in Commercial Services with orders up 23% in the 3rd quarter and 30% year-to-date.

Combined with our backlog of over $170 billion, we’re well positioned to close out 2026 and now expect low double-digit services growth in 2027.

We had a historic Farnborough Air Show announcing commitments for more than 1,800 engines. Including an agreement with IndiGo for the largest LEAP agreement ever for more than 1,000 LEAP-1A engines to power its A320neo aircraft.

And just last week, we announced an agreement with Turkish Airlines for more than 300 LEAP-1B engines to power its 737 MAX fleet. Along with a long-term service agreement for its entire LEAP-1B fleet of over 600 engines.

In the quarter, total company revenue increased 18%. With CES up 21% and Defense and Propulsion Technologies, or DPT, up 7%.

Operating profit grew 30%. And margins of 22.5%, up 220 basis points year-over-year. EPS increased 36%. And we generated more than $2 billion of free cash flow.

These results reflect the impact of Flight Deck fundamentals. drive continued output momentum. With year-to-date commercial services revenue and total engine deliveries both up over 20%.

And we remain focused on investing to meet customer needs with our recently announced agreement to acquire Consolidated Precision Products, or CPP, to expand capacity of mission-critical castings.

At the same time, we’re advancing current and future technologies with over $3 billion in annual R&D spend.

This quarter’s performance builds on progress from the first half. With year-to-date orders now up 49%, revenue up 23%, EPS growing 28%, and 105% free cash flow conversion.

Given the strength of our results combined with our 4th quarter expectations, we’re raising our 2026 guidance.

I want to take a moment here and thank the entire GE Aerospace team and our supplier partners for their commitment to delivering for our customers.

Flight Deck and Operational Progress

Turning to slide 4, flight deck. is at the center of how we drive safety. Quality, delivery, and cost, always in that order.

We’re making meaningful progress with year-to-date commercial services revenue up 26% and total engine deliveries up 21%.

With the LEAP installed base expected to more than double between 2025 and 2030, our team focused on increasing capacity for the LEAP fan assembly. Using Flight Deck, the team reoriented the layout of the production line and developed standard work at various workstations, resulting in greater capacity with output more than doubling.

To improve F/A-18 readiness for the U.S. Navy, we partnered with a key supplier to reduce repair times for a critical F414 component. Using Flight Deck to improve the flow of parts, we doubled output, helping meet our customers’ needs.

These actions demonstrate the power of collaborative problem solving to unlock constraints, which contributed to priority supplier material input increasing double digits year-over-year again in the 3rd quarter.

Thanks to the work of our team and the partnership with our suppliers, this quarter marks the 10th consecutive quarter of sequential material input growth. Which contributed to LEAP engine deliveries growing 26% year-to-date.

The gains we’re driving with Flight Deck are further accelerated with AI. At Celma, our largest MRO site, the team developed an AI-enabled tool to automate collection of technical records required for each CFM56 shop visit. This helped decrease record processing time by around 25%.

Actions like this across our network resulted in another quarter of record internal shop visit output, with turnaround time down by over a week since the end of 2025, including the LEAP now down 2 weeks.

This progress, combined with other efforts, has reduced LEAP engine-driven grounded aircraft to nearly zero. Since the summer.

All in, while there is always more to do to meet customer expectations, we’re making meaningful progress.

Investing in Capacity and Next-Generation Technology

Shifting to slide 5, given airframe order books are full through the end of the decade, along with strong growth in aftermarket and defense, we’re continuing to invest to ensure timely delivery for our customers.

Our agreement to acquire CPP, a long-term supplier, is a significant investment to build adequate capacity of mission-critical castings for the entire aerospace industry.

Beyond increasing delivery, acquiring CPP allows us to accelerate the introduction of new engine technologies that improve cooling and enhance durability and efficiency of our current fleet and future programs.

And we’re making meaningful progress on next-generation programs while building additional capabilities through partnering with disruptors to move at pace.

It was a moment of great pride for our team this summer.