WASHINGTON, Jan. 27, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Danaher Corporation (NYSE: DHR) (the "Company") today announced results for the fourth quarter and full year 2021. All results in this release reflect only continuing operations unless otherwise noted.

For the quarter ended December 31, 2021, net earnings were $1.8 billion, or $2.39 per diluted common share which represents a 44.0% year-over-year increase from the comparable 2020 period.

Non-GAAP adjusted diluted net earnings per common share were $2.69 which represents a 29.0% increase over the comparable 2020 period. For the fourth quarter 2021, revenues increased 20.5% year-over-year to $8.1 billion, with 19.5% non-GAAP core revenue growth.

For the full year 2021, net earnings were $6.3 billion, or $8.50 per diluted common share which represents a 74.0% year-over-year increase. Non-GAAP adjusted diluted net earnings per common share for 2021 were $10.05 per share, which represents a 59.0% increase over the comparable 2020 amount. Revenues for the full year 2021 increased 32.0% to $29.5 billion, with 25.0% non-GAAP core revenue growth including Cytiva.

Operating cash flow for the full year 2021 was $8.4 billion, representing a 34.5% increase year-over-year, and non-GAAP free cash flow was $7.1 billion, representing a 30.5% increase year-over-year.

Rainer M. Blair, President and Chief Executive Officer, stated, "2021 was a tremendous year for Danaher. Our team successfully executed through a challenging environment to deliver outstanding financial results — including 25% core revenue growth, nearly 60% adjusted earnings per share growth and over $7 billion of free cash flow. We were particularly pleased with the performance in our base business, which grew low-double digits, and believe we gained market share across our portfolio. We also continued to build for the future, deploying $11 billion on strategic acquisitions while accelerating innovation and capacity investments."

Blair continued, "Over the last several years, our portfolio has undergone a significant, purpose-driven transformation. We're a better, stronger company today, comprised of high-quality, market-leading franchises in attractive end-markets. We believe the combination of our exceptional portfolio, talented team and the Danaher Business System provides a strong foundation for 2022 and beyond."

Starting with the first quarter 2022, in addition to presenting GAAP revenue growth, the Company will present base business core revenue growth that includes the impact of COVID-19 vaccine and therapeutic related revenue and excludes the impact of COVID-19 testing revenue.

For both the first quarter and full year 2022, the Company anticipates that non-GAAP core revenue growth in the base business will be in the high-single digit percent range.

Danaher will discuss its results during its quarterly investor conference call today starting at 8:00 a.m. ET.  The call and an accompanying slide presentation will be webcast on the "Investors" section of Danaher's website, www.danaher.com, under the subheading "Events & Presentations."  A replay of the webcast will be available in the same section of Danaher's website shortly after the conclusion of the presentation and will remain available until the next quarterly earnings call.

The conference call can be accessed by dialing 800-895-3361 within the U.S. or by dialing +1-785-424-1062 outside the U.S. a few minutes before the 8:00 a.m. ET start and telling the operator that you are dialing in for Danaher's earnings conference call (conference ID: DHRQ421). A replay of the conference call will be available shortly after the conclusion of the call and until February 10, 2022. You can access the replay dial-in information on the "Investors" section of Danaher's website under the subheading "Events & Presentations."  In addition, presentation materials relating to Danaher's results have been posted to the "Investors" section of Danaher's website under the subheading "Quarterly Earnings."

ABOUT DANAHER

Danaher is a global science and technology innovator committed to helping its customers solve complex challenges and improving quality of life around the world. Its family of world class brands has leadership positions in the demanding and attractive health care, environmental and applied end-markets. With more than 20 operating companies, Danaher's globally diverse team of approximately 80,000 associates is united by a common culture and operating system, the Danaher Business System, and its Shared Purpose, Helping Realize Life's Potential. For more information, please visit www.danaher.com.

NON-GAAP MEASURES

In addition to the financial measures prepared in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP), this earnings release also contains non-GAAP financial measures. Calculations of these measures, the reasons why we believe these measures provide useful information to investors, a reconciliation of these measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures, as applicable, and other information relating to these non-GAAP measures are included in the supplemental reconciliation schedule attached.

FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

Statements in this release that are not strictly historical, including the statements regarding the Company's expected financial performance for the first quarter and full year 2022, the Company's positioning and prospects for the future and any other statements regarding events or developments that we believe or anticipate will or may occur in the future are "forward-looking" statements within the meaning of the federal securities laws. There are a number of important factors that could cause actual results, developments and business decisions to differ materially from those suggested or indicated by such forward-looking statements and you should not place undue reliance on any such forward-looking statements. These factors include, among other things, the highly uncertain and unpredictable severity, magnitude and duration of the COVID-19 pandemic (and the related governmental, business and community responses thereto) on our business, results of operations and financial condition, the impact of our debt obligations (including the debt incurred to finance the acquisitions of Cytiva and Aldevron) on our operations and liquidity, deterioration of or instability in the economy, the markets we serve and the financial markets (including as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic), uncertainties relating to U.S. laws or policies, including potential changes in U.S. trade policies and tariffs and the reaction of other countries thereto, contractions or growth rates and cyclicality of markets we serve, competition, our ability to develop and successfully market new products and technologies and expand into new markets, the potential for improper conduct by our employees, agents or business partners, our compliance with applicable laws and regulations (including rules relating to off-label marketing and other regulations relating to medical devices and the health care industry), the results of our clinical trials and perceptions thereof, our ability to effectively address cost reductions and other changes in the health care industry, our ability to successfully identify and consummate appropriate acquisitions and strategic investments and successfully complete divestitures and other dispositions, our ability to integrate the businesses we acquire and achieve the anticipated benefits of such acquisitions (including with respect to the acquisition of Aldevron), our ability to realize anticipated growth, synergies and other benefits of the Aldevron acquisition, Aldevron's performance and maintenance of important business relationships, contingent liabilities and other risks relating to acquisitions, investments, strategic relationships and divestitures (including tax-related and other contingent liabilities relating to past and future IPOs, split-offs or spin-offs), security breaches or other disruptions of our information technology systems or violations of data privacy laws, the impact of our restructuring activities on our ability to grow, risks relating to potential impairment of goodwill and other intangible assets, currency exchange rates, tax audits and changes in our tax rate and income tax liabilities, changes in tax laws applicable to multinational companies, litigation and other contingent liabilities including intellectual property and environmental, health and safety matters, the rights of the United States government to use, disclose and license certain intellectual property we license if we fail to commercialize it, risks relating to product, service or software defects, product liability and recalls, risks relating to product manufacturing, our relationships with and the performance of our channel partners, uncertainties relating to collaboration arrangements with third-parties, commodity costs and surcharges, our ability to adjust purchases and manufacturing capacity to reflect market conditions, reliance on sole sources of supply, the impact of deregulation on demand for our products and services, labor matters, international economic, political, legal, compliance, social and business factors (including the impact of the United Kingdom's separation from the EU), disruptions relating to man-made and natural disasters (including pandemics such as COVID-19) and pension plan costs.  Additional information regarding the factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from these forward-looking statements is available in our SEC filings, including our 2020 Annual Report on Form 10-K and Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the third quarter of 2021. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this release and except to the extent required by applicable law, the Company does not assume any obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events and developments or otherwise.

See the accompanying Notes to Reconciliation of GAAP to Non-GAAP Financial Measures

See the accompanying Notes to Reconciliation of GAAP to Non-GAAP Financial Measures

See the accompanying Notes to Reconciliation of GAAP to Non-GAAP Financial Measures

Statement Regarding Non-GAAP Measures

Each of the non-GAAP measures set forth above should be considered in addition to, and not as a replacement for or superior to, the comparable GAAP measure, and may not be comparable to similarly titled measures reported by other companies.  Management believes that these measures provide useful information to investors by offering additional ways of viewing Danaher Corporation's ("Danaher" or the "Company") results that, when reconciled to the corresponding GAAP measure, help our investors to:

• with respect to Adjusted Diluted Net Earnings Per Common Share from Continuing Operations, understand the long-term profitability trends of our business and compare our profitability to prior and future periods and to our peers;
  
  
• with respect to core sales and related sales measures, identify underlying growth trends in our business and compare our sales performance with prior and future periods and to our peers; and
  
  
• with respect to free cash flow from continuing operations and related cash flow measures (the "FCF Measure"), understand Danaher's ability to generate cash without external financings, strengthen its balance sheet, invest in its business and grow its business through acquisitions and other strategic opportunities (although a limitation of free cash flow is that it does not take into account the Company's debt service requirements and other non-discretionary expenditures, and as a result the entire free cash flow amount is not necessarily available for discretionary expenditures).

We also present core sales on a basis that includes sales attributable to Cytiva (formerly the Biopharma Business of General Electric Company's ("GE") Life Sciences business), which Danaher acquired from GE on March 31, 2020.  Historically Danaher has calculated core sales solely on a basis that excludes sales from acquired businesses recorded prior to the first anniversary of the acquisition.  However, given Cytiva's significant size and historical core sales growth rate, in each case compared to Danaher's existing businesses, management believes it is appropriate to also present core sales on a basis that includes Cytiva sales.  Management believes this presentation provides useful information to investors by demonstrating beginning immediately after the acquisition Cytiva's impact on the Company's growth profile, rather than waiting to demonstrate such impact 12 months after the acquisition when Cytiva would normally have been included in Danaher's core sales calculation.  Danaher calculates period-to-period core sales growth including Cytiva by adding to the baseline period sales Cytiva's historical sales from such period (when it was owned by GE), net of the sales of the Company product lines divested in 2020 to obtain regulatory approval to acquire Cytiva ("Cytiva sales") and also adding the Cytiva sales to the current period.  Beginning in the second quarter of 2021, Cytiva sales are included in core sales, and therefore we no longer provide the measure "core sales including Cytiva" for quarterly periods beginning with the second quarter of 2021.  We also present "base business" core revenue growth to demonstrate our core revenue growth and our core revenue growth including Cytiva excluding core sales growth directly attributable to COVID-19 and its impact.

While we expect overall demand for the Company's COVID-19 related products to moderate as and to the extent the pandemic subsides, as the pandemic evolves toward endemic status we believe a level of demand for the Company's products that support COVID-19 related vaccines and therapeutics (including initiatives that seek to prevent or mitigate similar, future pandemics) and COVID-19 testing will continue.  However, on a relative basis, we expect the level of ongoing demand for products supporting COVID-19 testing will be subject to more fluctuations in demand than the level of demand for products supporting COVID-19 related vaccines and therapeutics.  Therefore, beginning with the first quarter of 2022, in addition to disclosing core revenue growth (as defined below), we will also disclose "base business core revenue growth" on a basis that excludes revenues related to COVID-19 testing and includes revenues from products that support COVID-19 related vaccines and therapeutics.  We believe this additional measure will provide useful information to investors by facilitating period-to-period comparisons of our financial performance and identifying underlying growth trends in the Company's business that otherwise may be obscured by fluctuations in demand for COVID-19 testing as a result of the pandemic. 

Management uses these non-GAAP measures to measure the Company's operating and financial performance, and uses core sales and non-GAAP measures similar to Adjusted Diluted Net Earnings Per Common Share from Continuing Operations and the FCF Measure in the Company's executive compensation program.

The items excluded from the non-GAAP measures set forth above have been excluded for the following reasons:

• With respect to Adjusted Diluted Net Earnings Per Common Share from Continuing Operations:
• Amortization of Intangible Assets. We exclude the amortization of acquisition-related intangible assets because the amount and timing of such charges are significantly impacted by the timing, size, number and nature of the acquisitions we consummate. While we have a history of significant acquisition activity we do not acquire businesses on a predictable cycle, and the amount of an acquisition's purchase price allocated to intangible assets and related amortization term are unique to each acquisition and can vary significantly from acquisition to acquisition. Exclusion of this amortization expense facilitates more consistent comparisons of operating results over time between our newly acquired and long-held businesses, and with both acquisitive and non-acquisitive peer companies. We believe however that it is important for investors to understand that such intangible assets contribute to sales generation and that intangible asset amortization related to past acquisitions will recur in future periods until such intangible assets have been fully amortized.
  
  
• Restructuring Charges. We exclude costs incurred pursuant to discrete restructuring plans that are fundamentally different (in terms of the size, strategic nature and planning requirements, as well as the inconsistent frequency, of such plans) from the ongoing productivity improvements that result from application of the Danaher Business System. Because these restructuring plans are incremental to the core activities that arise in the ordinary course of our business and we believe are not indicative of Danaher's ongoing operating costs in a given period, we exclude these costs to facilitate a more consistent comparison of operating results over time.
  
  
• Other Adjustments. With respect to the other items excluded from Adjusted Diluted Net Earnings Per Common Share from Continuing Operations, we exclude these items because they are of a nature and/or size that occur with inconsistent frequency, occur for reasons that may be unrelated to Danaher's commercial performance during the period and/or we believe that such items may obscure underlying business trends and make comparisons of long-term performance difficult.
• With respect to adjusted average common stock and common equivalent shares outstanding, Danaher's Mandatory Convertible Preferred Stock ("MCPS") will mandatorily convert into Danaher common stock on the mandatory conversion date, which is expected to be April 15, 2022 and April 15, 2023 for the Series A and Series B MCPS, respectively, (unless converted or redeemed earlier in accordance with the terms of the applicable certificate of designations). With respect to the calculation of Adjusted Diluted Net Earnings Per Common Share from Continuing Operations, we apply the "if converted" method of share dilution to the MCPS Series A and B in all applicable periods irrespective of whether such preferred shares would be dilutive or anti-dilutive in the period. We believe this presentation provides useful information to investors by helping them understand what the net impact will be on Danaher's earnings per share-related measures once the MCPS convert into Danaher common stock.
  
  
• With respect to core sales related measures, (1) we exclude the impact of currency translation because it is not under management's control, is subject to volatility and can obscure underlying business trends, and (2) we exclude the effect of acquisitions (other than Cytiva, in the case of core sales including Cytiva and base business core sales) and divested product lines because the timing, size, number and nature of such transactions can vary significantly from period-to-period and between us and our peers, which we believe may obscure underlying business trends and make comparisons of long-term performance difficult.
  
  
• With respect to the FCF Measure, we exclude payments for additions to property, plant and equipment (net of the proceeds from capital disposals) to demonstrate the amount of operating cash flow for the period that remains after accounting for the Company's capital expenditure requirements.

With respect to forecasted core sales related measures, we do not reconcile these measures to the comparable GAAP measure because of the inherent difficulty in predicting and estimating the future impact and timing of currency translation, acquisitions and divested product lines, which would be reflected in any forecasted GAAP revenue.

SOURCE Danaher Corporation