grepcent / static financial knowledge base

ROCKWELL AUTOMATION, INC (ROK)

CIK: 0001024478. SIC: 3829 Measuring & Controlling Devices, NEC. Latest 10-K as of: 2025-11-12.

SIC breadcrumb: Manufacturing > SIC Major Group 38 > SIC 3829 Measuring & Controlling Devices, NEC

SEC company page: https://www.sec.gov/edgar/browse/?CIK=1024478. Latest filing source: 0001024478-25-000116.

Informational only - descriptive public-record data, not investment advice.

Selected Fundamentals

MetricValueUnitFYFiled
Revenue8,342,000,000USD20252025-11-12
Net income869,000,000USD20252025-11-12
Assets11,219,000,000USD20252025-11-12

Financials

Annual standardized facts from SEC companyfacts as of latest extracted filing date 2025-11-12. Source: https://data.sec.gov/api/xbrl/companyfacts/CIK0001024478.json. Derived margins, ratios, and free cash flow are computed from the extracted annual SEC facts.

Flow metrics use full-year FY periods from 10-K/10-K/A filings; balance-sheet metrics use FY-end instants. Free cash flow = operating cash flow - capital expenditures. Missing metrics are omitted rather than fabricated.

Metric2016201720182019202020212022202320242025
Revenue6,311,300,0006,666,000,0006,694,800,0006,329,800,0006,997,400,0007,760,400,0009,058,000,0008,264,000,0008,342,000,000
Net income729,700,000825,700,000535,500,000695,800,0001,023,400,0001,358,100,000932,200,0001,387,000,000953,000,000869,000,000
Operating income1,929,000,0001,595,000,0001,703,000,000
Gross profit2,475,500,0002,667,900,0002,884,900,0002,900,100,0002,595,200,0002,897,700,0003,102,000,0004,423,000,0003,851,000,0004,016,000,000
Diluted EPS5.566.354.215.838.7711.587.9711.958.287.67
Operating cash flow1,034,000,0001,300,000,0001,182,000,0001,120,500,0001,261,000,000823,100,0001,374,000,000864,000,0001,544,000,000
Capital expenditures141,100,000161,000,000225,000,000186,000,000
Dividends paid378,200,000390,700,000440,800,000459,800,000472,800,000497,100,000519,400,000542,000,000571,000,000591,000,000
Share buybacks507,600,000342,600,0001,482,300,0001,009,000,000264,200,000299,700,000301,300,000312,000,000595,000,000425,000,000
Assets7,101,200,0007,161,700,0006,262,000,0006,113,000,0007,264,700,00010,701,600,00010,758,700,00011,304,000,00011,232,000,00011,219,000,000
Stockholders' equity1,990,100,0002,663,600,0001,617,500,000404,200,0001,027,800,0002,389,600,0002,725,600,0003,561,600,0003,498,000,0003,654,000,000
Cash and cash equivalents1,526,400,0001,410,900,000618,800,0001,018,400,000704,600,000662,200,000490,700,0001,072,000,000471,000,000468,000,000
Free cash flow682,000,0001,213,000,000639,000,0001,358,000,000

Ratios

ROE and ROA use period-end equity/assets. Liabilities / equity uses total liabilities divided by stockholders' equity. Current ratio uses current assets divided by current liabilities when both are reported.

Metric2016201720182019202020212022202320242025
Net margin13.08%8.03%10.39%16.17%19.41%12.01%15.31%11.53%10.42%
Operating margin21.30%19.30%20.41%
Return on equity36.67%31.00%33.11%172.14%99.57%56.83%34.20%38.94%27.24%23.78%
Return on assets10.28%11.53%8.55%11.38%14.09%12.69%8.66%12.27%8.48%7.75%
Current ratio2.122.061.271.541.481.021.011.461.081.14

Financial Charts

Quarterly

Quarterly standardized facts from SEC companyfacts as of latest extracted filing date 2026-05-05. Source: https://data.sec.gov/api/xbrl/companyfacts/CIK0001024478.json.

Flow metrics use discrete quarter-length periods from 10-Q/10-Q/A filings. Q4 revenue and net income are derived only when annual FY and nine-month YTD facts exist for the same fiscal year; derived Q4 values are labeled. EPS Q4 is not derived.

QuarterEnd DateRevenueNet IncomeDiluted EPSMethod
2022-Q32022-06-302.55reported discrete quarter
2023-Q12022-12-313.31reported discrete quarter
2023-Q22023-03-312.59reported discrete quarter
2023-Q32023-06-302,238,700,000400,200,0003.45reported discrete quarter
2023-Q42023-09-302,562,900,000302,900,000derived Q4 = FY annual - nine-month YTD
2024-Q12023-12-312,052,100,000215,200,0001.86reported discrete quarter
2024-Q22024-03-312,126,000,000266,200,0002.31reported discrete quarter
2024-Q32024-06-302,050,600,000232,000,0002.02reported discrete quarter
2024-Q42024-09-302,035,500,000239,100,000derived Q4 = FY annual - nine-month YTD
2025-Q12024-12-311,881,000,000184,000,0001.61reported discrete quarter
2025-Q22025-03-312,001,000,000252,000,0002.22reported discrete quarter
2025-Q32025-06-302,144,000,000295,000,0002.60reported discrete quarter
2025-Q42025-09-302,316,000,000138,000,000derived Q4 = FY annual - nine-month YTD
2026-Q12025-12-312,105,000,000305,000,0002.69reported discrete quarter
2026-Q22026-03-312,239,000,000350,000,0003.10reported discrete quarter

Quarterly Charts

Macro Cross-References

Latest quarter (10-Q)

Latest 10-Q source: 0001024478-26-000022.

Extracted structurally from real Item 2 body heading to real Item 3/4 boundary. Published MD&A gate trimmed front/tail over-capture. Confidence: high. Filing date: 2026-05-05. Report date: 2026-03-31.

Item 2. Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations

Results of Operations

Forward-Looking Statements

This Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q contains statements (including certain projections and business trends) that are “forward-looking statements” as defined in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Words such as “believe”, “estimate”, “project”, “plan”, “expect”, “anticipate”, “will”, “intend”, and other similar expressions may identify forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially from those projected as a result of certain risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond our control, including but not limited to:

•macroeconomic factors, including inflation, global and regional business conditions (including adverse impacts in certain markets, such as Oil & Gas), commodity prices, currency exchange rates, the cyclical nature of our customers’ capital spending, and sovereign debt concerns;

•laws, regulations, and governmental policies affecting our activities in the countries where we do business, including those related to trade policies, including tariffs, taxation, trade controls, cybersecurity, and climate change;

•the severity and duration of disruptions to our business due to natural disasters (including those as a result of climate change), pandemics, acts of war, strikes, terrorism, social unrest or other causes;

•the availability and price of components and materials;

•our ability to manage and mitigate the risk related to security vulnerabilities and breaches of our hardware and software products, solutions, and services;

•the availability, effectiveness, and security of our information technology systems;

•the successful execution of our cost productivity and margin expansion initiatives;

•our ability to attract, develop, and retain qualified employees;

•the successful integration and management of strategic transactions and achievement of the expected benefits of these transactions;

•the successful development of advanced technologies and demand for and market acceptance of new and existing hardware and software products;

•our ability to manage and mitigate the risks associated with our solutions and services businesses;

•competitive hardware and software products, solutions, and services, pricing pressures, and our ability to provide high quality products, solutions, and services;

•the availability and cost of capital;

•disruptions to our distribution channels or the failure of distributors to develop and maintain capabilities to sell our products;

•intellectual property infringement claims by others and the ability to protect our intellectual property;

•the uncertainty of claims by taxing authorities in the various jurisdictions where we do business;

•the uncertainties of litigation, including liabilities related to the safety and security of the hardware and software products, solutions, and services we sell;

•our ability to manage costs related to employee retirement and health care benefits; and

•other risks and uncertainties, including but not limited to those detailed from time to time in our Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings.

These forward-looking statements reflect our beliefs as of the date of filing this report. We undertake no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise. See Item 1A. Risk Factors, of our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended September 30, 2025, and Item 1A. Risk Factors, of this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for more information.

Non-GAAP Measures

The following discussion includes organic sales, Enterprise operating profit, Enterprise operating margin, Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, Adjusted Effective Tax Rate, and free cash flow, which are non-GAAP measures. See Supplemental Sales Information for a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales and a discussion of why we believe this non-GAAP measure is useful to investors. See Summary of Results of Operations for a reconciliation of Income before income taxes and pre-tax margin to Enterprise operating profit and Enterprise operating margin and a discussion of why we believe these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors. See Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation for a reconciliation of Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate to Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate, respectively, and a discussion of why we believe these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors. See Financial Condition for a reconciliation of Cash provided by operating activities to free cash flow and a discussion of why we believe this non-GAAP measure is useful to investors.

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Overview

Rockwell Automation, Inc. is the world’s largest company dedicated to industrial automation and digital transformation. Overall demand for our hardware and software products, solutions, and services is driven by:

•investments in manufacturing, including new facilities or production lines, upgrades, modifications and expansions of existing facilities or production lines;

•investments in basic materials production capacity, which may be related to commodity pricing levels;

•our customers’ needs for faster time to market, agility to address evolving consumer preferences, operational productivity, asset management and reliability, and business resilience, including security and enterprise risk management;

•our customers’ needs to continuously improve quality, safety, and sustainability;

•industry factors that include our customers’ new product introductions, demand for our customers’ products or services, and the regulatory and competitive environments in which our customers operate;

•levels of global industrial production and capacity utilization;

•regional factors that include local political, social, regulatory, and economic circumstances; and

•the spending patterns of our customers due to their annual budgeting processes and their working schedules.

Long-term Strategy

As the world’s largest company dedicated to industrial automation and digital transformation, our strategy is to bring the Connected Enterprise® to life. We understand and simplify our customers’ complex production challenges and deliver the most valued solutions that combine technology and industry expertise. As a result, we make our customers more resilient, agile, and sustainable, creating more ways to win. We deliver value by helping our customers optimize production, build resilience, empower people, become more sustainable, and accelerate transformation.

Rockwell Automation stands at the intersection of the technological and societal trends that are shaping the future of industrial operations. We see converging megatrends including digitization and artificial intelligence, energy transition and sustainability, shifting demographics, and an increased need for resiliency.

Our long-term profitable growth framework outlines how we will deliver accelerated growth while we continue to transform our company to meet stakeholder expectations over the longer term:

•achieve faster secular growth in traditional markets due to customer needs for resiliency (including cybersecurity), agility, sustainability, and mitigating impacts of labor shortages;

•grow share and create new ways to win through technology differentiation, industry focus, go to market acceleration, expanded offerings and new markets;

•add 1% average annual growth from annual recurring revenue;

•add 1% average annual growth from acquisitions; and

•deliver profitable growth within a disciplined financial framework.

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U.S. Economic Trends

In the second quarter of 2026, sales in the U.S. accounted for over half of our total sales. The various indicators we use to gauge the direction and momentum of our served U.S. markets include:

•The Industrial Production (IP) Index, published by the Federal Reserve, which measures the real output of manufacturing, mining, and electric and gas utilities. The Manufacturing IP Index shown in the chart below is expressed as a percentage of real output in a base year, currently 2017.

•The Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI), published by the Institute for Supply Management (ISM), which indicates the current and near-term state of manufacturing activity in the U.S. According to the ISM, a PMI measure above 50 indicates that the U.S. manufacturing economy is generally expanding while a measure below 50 indicates that it is generally contracting.

The table below depicts trends in these indicators since the quarter ended September 2024. These figures are as of May 5, 2026, and are subject to revision by the issuing organizations. Through March, the IP index increased versus the first quarter of fiscal 2026. Manufacturing PMI results increased as well during the second quarter of fiscal 2026, with January, February, and March registering readings above 50 and the highest levels in over three years.

Manufacturing IP IndexPMI
Fiscal 2026 quarter ended:
March 202697.352.7
December 202596.547.9
Fiscal 2025 quarter ended:
September 202597.348.9
June 202596.949.0
March 202596.848.9
December 202495.549.2
Fiscal 2024 quarter ended:
September 202495.647.5

Inflation in the U.S. has also had an impact on our input costs and pricing. The Producer Price Index (PPI), published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, measures the average change over time in the selling prices received by domestic producers for their output. PPI growth did not significantly change from the first quarter of 2026, and remains in the low single digits.

Non-U.S. Economic Trends

In the second quarter of 2026, sales to customers outside the U.S. accounted for less than half of our total sales. These customers include both indigenous companies and multinational companies with a global presence. In addition to the global factors previously mentioned in the Overview section, international demand, particularly in emerging markets, has historically been driven by the strength of the industrial economy in each region, investments in infrastructure, and expanding consumer markets. We use changes in key countries' gross domestic product (GDP), IP, and PMI as indicators of the growth opportunities in each region where we do business. Industrial output outside the U.S. was mostly positive in the second quarter of fiscal 2026. Manufacturing PMI readings outside the U.S were mostly positive as well except for Mexico and Brazil where readings remained below 50.

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Outlook

We continue to manage the impact of tariffs through actions including pricing and the use of alternative sources of materials and redundant manufacturing locations. Resiliency actions we took in recent years enable us to build certain high value product lines in more than one geographic location. We are still expecting that pricing actions will recover all tariff costs this year.

As a result of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling issued in February 2026, the Company may be entitled to a refund of tariffs previously paid on imported products under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). As of March 31, 2026, the Company has not recognized an asset related to the potential refund. The Company will continue to monitor developments and will recognize a refund when realizable in accordance with ASC 450, Contingencies. If tariff amounts are ultimately refunded, the Company expects to implement a refund process for qualified customers.

During the second half of the fiscal year, we expect continued inflationary pressures to affect certain cost categories, driven by strong market demand fo

[Excerpt truncated for page length; source filing is linked above.]

Latest 10-K MD&A

Extracted structurally from real Item 7 body heading to real Item 7A/8 boundary. Confidence: high. Filing date: 2025-11-12. Report date: 2025-09-30.

Item 7. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations

Results of Operations

Non-GAAP Measures

The following discussion includes organic sales, total segment operating earnings and margin, Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, Adjusted Effective Tax Rate, and free cash flow, which are non-GAAP measures. See Supplemental Sales Information for a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales and a discussion of why we believe this non-GAAP measure is useful to investors. See Summary of Results of Operations for a reconciliation of Income before income taxes to total segment operating earnings and margin and a discussion of why we believe these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors. See Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation for a reconciliation of Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate to Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate, respectively, and a discussion of why we believe these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors. See Financial Condition for a reconciliation of Cash provided by operating activities to free cash flow and a discussion of why we believe this non-GAAP measure is useful to investors.

Overview

Rockwell Automation, Inc. is the world’s largest company dedicated to industrial automation and digital transformation. Overall demand for our hardware and software products, solutions, and services is driven by:

•investments in manufacturing, including new facilities or production lines, upgrades, modifications and expansions of existing facilities or production lines;

•investments in basic materials production capacity, which may be related to commodity pricing levels;

•our customers’ needs for faster time to market, agility to address evolving consumer preferences, operational productivity, asset management and reliability, and business resilience, including security and enterprise risk management;

•our customers’ needs to continuously improve quality, safety, and sustainability;

•industry factors that include our customers’ new product introductions, demand for our customers’ products or services, and the regulatory and competitive environments in which our customers operate;

•levels of global industrial production and capacity utilization;

•regional factors that include local political, social, regulatory, and economic circumstances; and

•the spending patterns of our customers due to their annual budgeting processes and their working schedules.

Long-term Strategy

As the world’s largest company dedicated to industrial automation and digital transformation, our strategy is to bring the Connected Enterprise® to life. We understand and simplify our customers’ complex production challenges and deliver the most valued solutions that combine technology and industry expertise. As a result, we make our customers more resilient, agile, and sustainable, creating more ways to win. We deliver value by helping our customers optimize production, build resilience, empower people, become more sustainable, and accelerate transformation.

Rockwell Automation stands at the intersection of the technological and societal trends that are shaping the future of industrial operations. We see converging megatrends including digitization and AI, energy transition and sustainability, shifting demographics, and an increased need for resiliency.

Our long-term profitable growth framework outlines how we will deliver accelerated growth while we continue to transform our company to meet stakeholder expectations over the longer term:

•achieve faster secular growth in traditional markets due to customer needs for resiliency (including cybersecurity), agility, sustainability, and mitigating impacts of labor shortages;

•grow share and create new ways to win through technology differentiation, industry focus, go to market acceleration, expanded offerings and new markets;

•continue double-digit growth in annual recurring revenue;

•add 1% average annual growth from acquisitions; and

•deliver profitable growth within a disciplined financial framework.

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Sustainability

Our 2024 Sustainability Report highlights our sustainability strategy and outcomes. Our sustainability priorities are focused on three outcomes:

•Sustainable Customers - enable our customers to achieve their own sustainability goals, making a positive impact on the world;

•Sustainable Company - create innovative, sustainable products and solutions and foster a culture that empowers employees to operate safely, sustainably, and responsibly; and

•Sustainable Communities - support the communities in which we live and work, having an impact that extends beyond our own organization.

We will meet our customers where they are on their sustainability journey. Whether they are just starting or leading the way, we help them translate insights into impacts across energy, water, and waste. Our technologies provide data transparency across value chains and enable our partners to scale innovative and often industry-first sustainable solutions.

•Energy - contemporary industrial energy management software solutions that put energy data in context to production data, to reduce energy use across the value chain.

•Water - smart water solutions leverage modern software and analytics to improve operations visibility, system reliability, and worker productivity while supporting security needs and meeting regulatory obligations.

•Waste - enabling the circular economy for managing automation assets. Focus on developing solutions to automate industry-specific processes.

Differentiation through Technology Innovation and Domain Expertise

We have an industry leading portfolio of hardware, software, and services to give customers the flexibility to choose on-premises, edge, and cloud-native solutions.

Our integrated control and information architecture, with Logix at its core, is an important differentiator. We are the only automation provider that can support many production disciplines, including discrete, process, batch, safety, security, motion, robotics, and power control, in a single hardware and software environment, helping customers increase the speed of deployment and reduce their total cost of ownership.

Our open architecture and strong partner ecosystem allow customers to work with best-in-class partners across the technology stack and leverage existing infrastructure with new solutions.

Complementing our strong technology differentiation is our own domain expertise. Domain expertise refers to the industry and application knowledge required to deliver solutions and services that support customers through the entire lifecycle of their automation investment. The combination of industry-specific domain expertise of our people with our innovative technologies enables us to help our customers automate and transform their manufacturing processes and solve their business challenges. Our digital services business has a deep understanding of customers’ biggest digital transformation challenges and opportunities for further productivity and growth.

Market Access and Expansion

Over the past decade, our investments in technology and globalization have enabled us to expand our addressed market to approximately $120 billion. With our focus on innovation and growth, we expect to continue to expand our addressed market over our long-term planning horizon. All of our markets are expected to grow over our long-term planning horizon. Our domestic market projections reflect the opportunity to localize our customers’ supply chain and production operations. Our international market projections reflect higher levels of infrastructure investment and the growing middle-class population. We believe that increased demand for consumer products in our addressed markets will lead to manufacturing investment and provide us with additional growth opportunities in the future.

We have developed a powerful partner ecosystem that acts as an amplifier to our internal capabilities and enables us to serve our customers’ evolving needs around the world.

In most countries, our direct sales force works with Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) or machine builders, system integrators, technology partners, and end users in conjunction with independent distributors. Approximately 65 percent of our global sales are transacted through independent distributors. Sales to our two largest distributors in 2025, 2024, and 2023, which are attributable to all three segments, were approximately 20 percent of our total sales.

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Machine builders continue to represent an important growth opportunity. To remain competitive, machine builders need to find the optimal balance of machine cost and performance while reducing their time to market. Our scalable technology, leading design productivity tools, and recent acquisitions support machine builders in addressing these business needs.

Acquisitions and Investments

Our acquisition and investment strategy focuses on hardware and software products, solutions, and services that will be catalytic to the organic growth of our core offerings.

Our key priorities for inorganic investments include:

•industrial AI applications;

•market access in Europe and Asia; and

•product portfolio expansion.

In addition, we make venture investments that enable access to leading-edge and complementary technologies aligned with our strategic priorities, accelerate internal development efforts, reduce time to market, and provide insights into disruptive technologies.

We believe these acquisitions and venture investments will help our served market and deliver value to our customers. See Note 4 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on our recent acquisitions.

Attracting, Developing, and Retaining Highly Qualified Employees

Our talent management practices are focused on ensuring we can attract, develop, and retain the talent we need to deliver our business strategy. We work to deliver a cohesive and consistent experience throughout the employee lifecycle that aligns with our four culture principles:

•Strengthen our commitment to integrity, diversity and inclusion;

•Be willing to compare ourselves to the best alternatives;

•Increase the speed of decision making;

•Have a steady stream of fresh ideas.

Our programs and processes are designed to enable and inspire great employees to do their best work and to make Rockwell Automation a place where the best want to be.

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There are several ways in which we attract, develop, and retain highly qualified employees, including:

•We make the safety and health of our employees a top priority. We strive for zero workplace injuries and illnesses and operate in a manner that recognizes safety as fundamental to Rockwell Automation being a great place to work. In fiscal 2025, we achieved 0.24 recordable cases per 100 employees.

•We capture and act upon employee feedback through our annual employee engagement survey. It measures several employee experience indicators and drivers and provides an overall employee engagement index (EEI) with external benchmark comparison. The latest survey, conducted in March 2025, showed a resilient EEI of 70 and a global inclusion index score of 74. Additionally, our intent to stay index was 71.

•We invest in growth and development of our employees. As the pace of change increases, it is important we provide re-skilling and upskilling opportunities for our technical talent, along with soft skills and leadership development for all. We offer a portfolio of all employee, managerial, and leader training that spans on-demand, virtual, and live instructor-led formats. Our programs focus on basic as well as transformational skills. Furthermore, our culture is the foundation for everything we do, and it is built on integrity and a shared commitment to innovation and growth. As such, we take great care in ensuring our employees understand our culture and how to activate it through dedicated workshops during our new employee onboarding. In fiscal 2025, the majority of our employees completed one or more of our training programs representing approximately one million learning hours.

•We offer employee assistance and work life benefits to all global employees. Our comprehensive benefits include healthcare benefits, disability and life insurance benefits, paid time off, and leave programs. Rockwell offers plans and resources to help employees meet future savings goals through defined benefit and retirement savings plans. We believe that face to face interaction is critical for our culture, innovation, people development, and engagement, and that flexible, virtual work arrangements help employees be more productive and engaged. During fiscal 2025, we saw strong participation in our Hybrid Workplace Program, which combines the values of both physical workspaces and virtual work options, both of which are important for attracting, retaining, and developing employees and facilitating innovation, engagement, and productivity. We offer flextime, remote work, and part-time arrangements whenever business conditions permit.

We monitor employee retention and attrition rates by several factors. For non-manufacturing roles, we generally experienced flat attrition rates in fiscal 2025 as compared to fiscal 2024. For manufacturing roles, we experienced a significant reduction in attrition rates in fiscal 2025 as compared to fiscal 2024. We believe these rates are favorable to market trends experienced broadly across labor markets in fiscal 2025. We use attrition rate information to identify and address unfavorable trends to mitigate risk to our business. See Item 1A. Risk Factors for a discussion of risks relating to our inability to attract, develop, and retain highly qualified employees.

At September 30, 2025, our employees, including those employed by consolidated subsidiaries, by region were approximately:

North America9,000
Europe, Middle East and Africa5,000
Asia Pacific7,000
Latin America5,000
Total employees26,000

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Our employees had the following global gender demographics based on voluntary disclosure:

September 30, 2025
WomenMenUndisclosed
All employees33%67%—%
Individual Contributors34%66%—%
People Managers27%73%—%
Technical Talent20%80%—%
Manufacturing Associates46%54%—%

Our U.S. employees had the following race and ethnicity demographics based on voluntary disclosure:

September 30, 2025
Black / African AmericanAsianHispanic / LatinxWhiteMultiracial, Native American and Pacific IslanderUndisclosed
All U.S. Employees7%11%5%70%2%5%
Individual Contributors8%12%5%69%2%4%
People Managers6%7%5%75%1%6%
Technical Talent6%13%6%69%2%4%
Manufacturing Associates15%17%3%56%2%7%

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U.S. Economic Trends

In 2025, sales in the U.S. accounted for over half of our total sales. The various indicators we use to gauge the direction and momentum of our served U.S. markets include:

•The Industrial Production (IP) Index, published by the Federal Reserve, which measures the real output of manufacturing, mining, and electric and gas utilities. The Manufacturing IP Index shown in the chart below is expressed as a percentage of real output in a base year, currently 2017.

•The Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI), published by the Institute for Supply Management (ISM), which indicates the current and near-term state of manufacturing activity in the U.S. According to the ISM, a PMI measure above 50 indicates that the U.S. manufacturing economy is generally expanding while a measure below 50 indicates that it is generally contracting.

The table below depicts the trends in these indicators from fiscal 2023 to 2025. These figures are as of November 12, 2025, and are subject to revision by the issuing organizations. Through August, the IP Index did not significantly change from the third quarter of fiscal 2025. Manufacturing PMI results remained below 50 for each of the months in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025.

Manufacturing IP IndexPMI
Fiscal 2025 quarter ended:
September 2025 (1)49.1
June 2025100.149.0
March 2025100.249.0
December 202498.949.2
Fiscal 2024 quarter ended:
September 202499.047.5
June 202499.448.5
March 202499.550.3
December 202399.247.1
Fiscal 2023 quarter ended:
September 202399.649.0
June 202399.246.0
March 202399.246.3
December 202298.148.4

(1) The September 2025 Manufacturing IP Index has not been published as of November 12, 2025. The Manufacturing IP Index was 100.3 for the month ended August 2025.

Inflation in the U.S. has also had an impact on our input costs and pricing. The Producer Price Index (PPI), published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, measures the average change over time in the selling prices received by domestic producers for their output. September 2025 PPI has not been published as of November 12, 2025. Through August 2025, PPI growth did not significantly change from the third quarter of 2025. After observing double-digit PPI growth through most of 2022, we have now observed PPI growth in the low single digits for the last nine quarters. Producer prices remain elevated, however, year over year increases remain decelerated from the surges in 2023 and 2022.

Non-U.S. Economic Trends

In 2025, sales to customers outside the U.S. accounted for less than half of our total sales. These customers include both indigenous companies and multinational companies with a global presence. In addition to the global factors previously mentioned in the Overview section, international demand, particularly in emerging markets, has historically been driven by the strength of the industrial economy in each region, investments in infrastructure, and expanding consumer markets. We use changes in key countries' gross domestic product (GDP), IP, and PMI as indicators of the growth opportunities in each region where we do business. Industrial production outside the U.S. was mixed in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025. Manufacturing PMI readings outside the U.S were also mixed with readings in Asia Pacific generally better than readings in Europe, Canada, Mexico, and Brazil.

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Outlook

We continue to manage the impact of tariffs through actions including pricing and the use of alternative sources of materials and redundant manufacturing locations. Resiliency actions we took in recent years enable us to build certain high value product lines in more than one geographic location. In consideration of these mitigating actions, tariff costs are expected to be neutral to EPS in fiscal 2026.

Backlog

Our total order backlog consists of (in millions):

September 30,
20252024
Intelligent Devices$704$737
Software & Control654653
Lifecycle Services1,5201,701
Total Company$2,878$3,091

See Note 2 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on the nature of our products and services and revenue recognition.

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Summary of Results of Operations

The following table reflects our sales and operating results (in millions, except per share amounts and percentages):

Year Ended September 30,
202520242023
Sales
Intelligent Devices (a)$3,756$3,804$4,098
Software & Control (b)2,3832,1872,886
Lifecycle Services (c)2,2032,2732,074
Total sales (d)$8,342$8,264$9,058
Segment operating earnings (1)
Intelligent Devices (e)$676$700$828
Software & Control (f)708530953
Lifecycle Services (g)319365148
Total segment operating earnings (2) (h)1,7031,5951,929
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment(365)(144)(264)
Corporate and other (3)(125)(114)(110)
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (cost) credit(1)20(83)
Net legacy asbestos and environmental charges (3)(154)(21)(18)
Change in fair value of investments(3)279
Restructuring charges5(97)
Interest expense, net(143)(139)(125)
Income before income taxes (i)9171,1001,608
Income tax provision(168)(152)(330)
Net income7499481,278
Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests(120)(5)(109)
Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation$869$953$1,387
Diluted EPS$7.67$8.28$11.95
Adjusted EPS (4)$10.53$9.85$12.25
Diluted weighted average outstanding shares113.1114.5115.6
Pre-tax margin (i/d)11.0%13.3%17.8%
Intelligent Devices segment operating margin (e/a)18.0%18.4%20.2%
Software & Control segment operating margin (f/b)29.7%24.2%33.0%
Lifecycle Services segment operating margin (g/c)14.5%16.1%7.1%
Total segment operating margin (2) (h/d)20.4%19.3%21.3%

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(1) See Note 20 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for the definition of segment operating earnings.

(2) Total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin are non-GAAP financial measures. We exclude purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment, corporate and other, non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (cost) credit, net legacy asbestos and environmental charges, change in fair value of investments, restructuring charges aligned with enterprise-wide strategic initiatives, and interest expense, net because we do not consider these items to be directly related to the operating performance of our segments. We believe total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin are useful to investors as measures of operating performance. We use these measures to monitor and evaluate the profitability of our operating segments. Our measures of total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin may be different from measures used by other companies.

(3) Legacy asbestos and environmental charges were previously included in Corporate and other. All periods have been recast to conform with current year presentation.

(4) Adjusted EPS is a non-GAAP earnings measure. See Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation for more information on this non-GAAP measure.

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2025 Compared to 2024

Sales

Reported and organic sales in fiscal 2025 increased 1 percent compared to 2024, as currency had no material effect. Pricing increased total company sales by approximately 3 percentage points year over year, realized in the Intelligent Devices and Software & Control segments. Volume decreased total company sales by approximately 2 percentage points year over year driven by the Intelligent Devices segment.

The table below presents our sales for the year ended September 30, 2025, attributed to the geographic regions based upon country of destination, and the percentage change from the same period in 2024 (in millions, except percentages).

Change vs.Change in Organic Sales (1) vs.
Year Ended September 30, 2025Year Ended September 30, 2024Year Ended September 30, 2024
North America$5,2704%4%
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,488(1)%(3)%
Asia Pacific1,024(5)%(4)%
Latin America560(12)%(6)%
Total Company Sales$8,3421%1%

(1) Organic sales and organic sales growth exclude the effect of acquisitions, changes in currency exchange rates, and divestitures. See Supplemental Sales Information for information on these non-GAAP measures.

Corporate and Other

Corporate and other expenses were $125 million in fiscal 2025 compared to $114 million in fiscal 2024. Legacy asbestos and environmental charges were previously included in Corporate and other. All periods have been recast to conform with current year presentation.

Purchase Accounting Depreciation and Amortization, and Impairment

Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment expense was $365 million in fiscal 2025 compared to $144 million in fiscal 2024. The increase was primarily due to a $224 million non-cash impairment charge related to the Sensia joint venture, or $110 million including the impact of non-controlling interest and tax effects.

Restructuring Charges

During 2025, we reversed $5 million of restructuring accruals primarily due to attrition without payment of severance. Restructuring charges were $97 million in fiscal 2024, which relate to actions in conjunction with an enterprise-wide comprehensive program to optimize cost structure and expand margins. See Note 18 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information on our restructuring charges.

Legacy Asbestos and Environmental Charges

In the fourth quarter of 2025, we elected to change our method of accounting for net legacy asbestos-related defense costs from expensing as incurred to accruing for all future defense costs for both known and unknown claims, similar to how we account for indemnity costs. We recorded pre-tax expense in Other (expense) income in the Consolidated Statement of Operations of $136 million in the fourth quarter of 2025 ($103 million after tax or $0.91 per share), which includes charges for a change in accounting method of $91 million and indemnity accrual increase of $45 million. See Notes 1 and 17 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information. Amounts were previously recorded in Corporate and other. All periods have been recast to conform with current year presentation.

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Income before Income Taxes

Income before income taxes decreased to $917 million in 2025 from $1,100 million in 2024. The decrease was primarily due to higher compensation, the non-cash impairment charge related to the Sensia joint venture, and an accounting change and accrual increase for legacy asbestos liabilities, partially offset by productivity, price realization, and prior year restructuring charges. Total segment operating earnings increased to $1,703 million from $1,595 million in 2024, primarily due to productivity, higher sales driven by price realization, and favorable mix, partially offset by higher compensation and unfavorable net currency.

Income Taxes

The effective tax rate in 2025 was 18.3 percent compared to 13.8 percent in 2024. The increase in the effective tax rate is related to valuation allowances and tax effects from the non-cash impairment charge for the Sensia joint venture and higher discrete tax benefits in 2024 as compared to 2025. The Adjusted Effective Tax Rate in 2025 was 17.1 percent compared to 15.3 percent in 2024. The increase in the Adjusted Effective Tax Rate was primarily due to higher discrete tax benefits in 2024 as compared to 2025.

See Note 16 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for a complete reconciliation of the United States statutory tax rate to the effective tax rate and additional information on tax events in 2025 and 2024 affecting each year’s respective tax rates.

In October 2021, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and G20 Finance Ministers reached an agreement, known as Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) Pillar Two, that, among other things, ensures that income earned in each jurisdiction that qualifying multinational enterprises operate in is subject to a minimum corporate income tax rate of at least 15 percent. Discussions related to the formal implementation and enactment of this agreement, including within the tax law of each member jurisdiction including the United States, are ongoing. Certain countries have enacted the Pillar Two framework, including Singapore, which is expected to result in the greatest impact to the Company. Enactment of this regulation in its current form would generally apply to the Company beginning in fiscal year 2026, resulting in an approximate increase in our effective tax rate of 3 percent as well as in the amount of global corporate income tax paid.

In addition to BEPS Pillar Two, other items could also affect our effective tax rate, many of which are outside of our control,

including:

•changes in the valuation of our deferred tax assets and liabilities, and in deferred tax valuation allowances;

•changes in the relative proportions of revenue and income before taxes in the various jurisdictions in which we operate that have differing statutory tax rates;

•changing tax laws, regulations, rates and interpretations in multiple jurisdictions in which we operate;

•changes to the financial accounting rules for income taxes;

•the tax effects of acquisitions; and

•the resolution and timing of issues arising from tax audits.

On July 4, 2025, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (“OBBBA”) was enacted in the U.S. The OBBBA includes significant tax related provisions, such as the permanent extension of certain expiring provisions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (Tax Act), modifications to the international tax framework, and the restoration of favorable tax treatment for certain business provisions. The OBBBA has multiple effective dates with the earliest provisions taking effect in fiscal 2025 and others beginning in fiscal 2026 and beyond. ASC 740, “Income Taxes”, requires the effects of changes in tax rates and laws on deferred tax balances to be recognized in the period in which the legislation is enacted. We have reflected the impact in our deferred balances for the year ended September 30, 2025, and will monitor future effects as new guidance emerges. Based on our evaluation of the guidance available to date we believe the provisions will have an overall neutral impact.

Net Loss Attributable to Noncontrolling Interests

Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests was $120 million in 2025 compared to $5 million in 2024. The increase was driven by $107 million of the accounting charge for goodwill and intangibles impairment and related tax effects including tax asset valuation allowances that is attributable to noncontrolling interests.

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Diluted EPS and Adjusted EPS

Fiscal 2025 Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation was $869 million or $7.67 per share, compared to $953 million or $8.28 per share in fiscal 2024. The decreases in Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation and diluted EPS were primarily due to lower pre-tax margin and a higher effective tax rate. Pre-tax margin was 11.0% in 2025 compared to 13.3% in 2024. The decrease was primarily due to higher compensation, the non-cash impairment charge related to the Sensia joint venture, and an accounting change and accrual increase for legacy asbestos liabilities, partially offset by productivity, price realization, and prior year restructuring charges. Adjusted EPS was $10.53 in fiscal 2025, up 7 percent compared to $9.85 in fiscal 2024, primarily due to higher segment operating margin. Total segment operating margin was 20.4% in 2025 compared to 19.3% in 2024. The increase in total segment operating margin was primarily due to productivity, higher sales driven by price realization, and favorable mix, partially offset by higher compensation and unfavorable net currency.

Intelligent Devices

Sales

Intelligent Devices reported and organic sales decreased 1 percent in 2025 compared to 2024. All regions experienced reported sales decreases. All regions except Latin America experienced organic sales decreases.

Segment Operating Margin

Intelligent Devices segment operating earnings decreased 3 percent year over year. Segment operating margin decreased to 18.0 percent in 2025 from 18.4 percent in 2024, primarily due to higher compensation, lower sales volume, and a prior year earnout accrual adjustment, partially offset by productivity and price realization.

Software & Control

Sales

Software & Control reported and organic sales increased 9 percent in 2025 compared to 2024. All regions except North America experienced reported and organic sales decreases.

Segment Operating Margin

Software & Control segment operating earnings increased 34 percent year over year. Segment operating margin increased to 29.7 percent in 2025 from 24.2 percent in 2024, primarily due to productivity, higher sales volume, and the positive impact of price realization, partially offset by higher compensation.

Lifecycle Services

Sales

Lifecycle Services reported and organic sales decreased 3 percent in 2025 compared to 2024. All regions except Europe, Middle East, and Africa experienced reported sales decreases. All regions experienced organic sales decreases.

Segment Operating Margin

Lifecycle Services segment operating earnings decreased 13 percent year over year. Segment operating margin decreased to 14.5 percent in 2025 from 16.1 percent in 2024, primarily due to higher compensation, partially offset by strong project execution and productivity.

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2024 Compared to 2023

For a discussion of the Company’s fiscal 2024 results compared to fiscal 2023, see Item 7. MD&A of the Company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended September 30, 2024, filed on November 12, 2024.

Supplemental Segment Information

Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment, non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost, and restructuring charges are not allocated to our operating segments because these costs are excluded from our measurement of each segment’s operating performance for internal purposes. If we were to allocate these costs, we would attribute them to each of our segments as follows (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202520242023
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment
Intelligent Devices$37$38$5
Software & Control666869
Lifecycle Services26238190
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost
Intelligent Devices$(2)$(7)$21
Software & Control(1)(7)21
Lifecycle Services(2)(10)28
Restructuring charges
Intelligent Devices$(2)$44$
Software & Control(2)33
Lifecycle Services(1)20

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Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation

Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate are non-GAAP earnings measures that exclude non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit), purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation, net legacy asbestos and environmental charges, change in fair value of investments, and restructuring charges aligned with enterprise-wide strategic initiatives, including their respective tax effects and related valuation allowances.

In 2025, we updated the definition of our non-GAAP earnings measures to exclude net legacy asbestos and environmental charges. We believe the change to our definition provides a more useful presentation of our operating performance to investors as the charges are not reflective of our core operational performance and relate to products sold many years ago including products from divested businesses and environmental matters at previously owned properties. All previously reported amounts within this report have been recast to conform to this new definition. In the fourth quarter of 2025, we elected to change our method of accounting for net legacy asbestos-related defense costs from expensing as incurred to accruing for all future defense costs and a related receivable for insurance recoveries for both known and unknown claims, similar to how we account for indemnity costs. See Notes 1 and 17 for more information related to our legacy asbestos claims and environmental matters.

Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation includes a non-cash accounting charge related to goodwill and intangible asset impairment for the year ended September 30, 2025, and goodwill impairment for the year ended September 30, 2023, for the Sensia joint venture. See Note 3 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information on our goodwill and intangible asset impairment charges. The tax effect of the purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation includes the tax effects on the Sensia joint venture impairments and related Sensia tax asset valuation allowances. We recognized restructuring charges in conjunction with an enterprise-wide comprehensive program to optimize cost structure and expand margins in the year ended September 30, 2024. See Note 18 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information on our restructuring charges. Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit) is defined as all components of our net periodic pension and postretirement benefit cost except for service cost. See Note 14 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information on our net periodic pension and postretirement benefit cost.

We believe that Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate provide useful information to our investors about our operating performance and allow management and investors to compare our operating performance period over period. Adjusted EPS is also used as a financial measure of performance for our annual incentive compensation. Our measures of Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate may be different from measures used by other companies. These non-GAAP measures should not be considered a substitute for Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate.

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The following are reconciliations of Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate to Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate, respectively (in millions, except per share amounts and percentages):

Year Ended September 30,
202520242023
Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation$869$953$1,387
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit)1(20)83
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit)(1)4(21)
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation (1)249133178
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation (1)(38)(25)(9)
Net legacy asbestos and environmental charges (2)1542118
Tax effect of net legacy asbestos and environmental charges (2)(37)(5)(4)
Change in fair value of investments3(279)
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments(1)68
Restructuring charges(5)97
Tax effect of restructuring charges1(25)
Adjusted Income (2)$1,195$1,133$1,421
Diluted EPS$7.67$8.28$11.95
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit)0.01(0.17)0.72
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit)(0.01)0.03(0.18)
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation2.201.161.54
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation(0.34)(0.22)(0.08)
Net legacy asbestos and environmental charges1.360.180.16
Tax effect of net legacy asbestos and environmental charges(0.33)(0.04)(0.03)
Change in fair value of investments0.02(2.42)
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments(0.01)(0.01)0.59
Restructuring charges(0.05)0.85
Tax effect of restructuring charges0.01(0.21)
Adjusted EPS$10.53$9.85$12.25
Effective tax rate18.3%13.8%20.5%
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit)0.1%(0.1)%0.3%
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation(2.5)%0.4%(3.7)%
Tax effect of net legacy asbestos and environmental charges1.1%0.2%0.1%
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments0.1%0.1%(0.7)%
Tax effect of restructuring charges%0.9%%
Adjusted Effective Tax Rate17.1%15.3%16.5%

(1) 2025 includes $110 million net expense from a $224 million goodwill and intangible asset non-cash impairment charge included in Income before income taxes, ($7) million tax effect including related valuation allowances recorded in the Income tax provision, and ($107) million Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests. 2023 includes $98 million net expense from a $158 million goodwill impairment charge included in Income before income taxes, $33 million tax effect including related valuation allowances recorded in the Income tax provision, and ($93) million Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests.

(2) All periods have been recast to conform with current year presentation.

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Financial Condition

The following is a summary of our cash flows from operating, investing, and financing activities, as reflected in the Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202520242023
Cash provided by (used for)
Operating activities$1,544$864$1,374
Investing activities(216)(982)854
Financing activities(1,335)(503)(1,676)
Effect of exchange rate changes on cash41220
(Decrease) increase in cash, cash equivalents, and restricted cash$(3)$(609)$572

The following table summarizes free cash flow, which is a non-GAAP financial measure (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202520242023
Cash provided by operating activities$1,544$864$1,374
Capital expenditures(186)(225)(161)
Free cash flow$1,358$639$1,213

Our definition of free cash flow takes into consideration capital investments required to maintain the operations of our businesses and execute our strategy. Cash provided by operating activities adds back non-cash depreciation expense to earnings but does not reflect a charge for necessary capital expenditures. Our definition of free cash flow excludes the operating cash flows and capital expenditures related to our discontinued operations, if any. Operating, investing, and financing cash flows of our discontinued operations, if any, are presented separately in our Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows. In our opinion, free cash flow provides useful information to investors regarding our ability to generate cash from business operations that is available for acquisitions and other investments, service of debt principal, dividends, and share repurchases. We use free cash flow, as defined, as one measure to monitor and evaluate our performance, including as a financial measure for our annual incentive compensation. Our definition of free cash flow may be different from definitions used by other companies.

Cash provided by operating activities was $1,544 million for the year ended September 30, 2025, compared to $864 million for the year ended September 30, 2024. Free cash flow was $1,358 million for the year ended September 30, 2025, compared to $639 million for the year ended September 30, 2024. The year-over-year increases in cash provided by operating activities and free cash flow were primarily due to cost reduction and other margin expansion initiatives, no payout of incentive compensation in the first quarter of fiscal 2025 related to fiscal 2024 performance, and lower tax payments, partially offset by a voluntary pre-tax contribution of $70 million to the company's U.S. pension plan.

Our Short-term debt as of September 30, 2025 and 2024, includes commercial paper borrowings of $522 million and $657 million, with a weighted average interest rate of 4.24 percent and 5.14 percent, and a weighted average maturity period of 16 days and 24 days, respectively. In December 2022, Sensia entered into an unsecured $75 million line of credit. As of September 30, 2025 and 2024, included in Short-term debt was $70 million borrowed against the line of credit with an interest rate of 5.18 percent and 6.17 percent, respectively. Also included in Short-term debt as of September 30, 2025, and September 30, 2024, was $14 million and $42 million, respectively, of interest-bearing loans from Schlumberger (SLB) to Sensia. In April 2025, $14 million of new interest-bearing loans from SLB to Sensia were entered into, and in October 2025, these loans were extended to January 15, 2026. The loans outstanding as of September 30, 2024, were extended to October 15, 2026, and are included in Long-term debt as of September 30, 2025.

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We repurchased approximately 1.5 million shares of our common stock under our share repurchase program in 2025 at a total cost of $419 million and an average cost of $279.43 per share. In 2024, we repurchased approximately 2.2 million shares of our common stock under our share repurchase program at a total cost of $594 million and an average cost of $272.97 per share. At September 30, 2025, there were $1 million of outstanding common stock share repurchases recorded in Accounts payable that do not settle until 2026. At September 30, 2024, there was no significant outstanding common stock share repurchases recorded in Accounts payable that did not settle until 2025. Our decision to repurchase shares in 2026 will depend on business conditions, free cash flow generation, other cash requirements, and stock price. At September 30, 2025, we had approximately $927 million remaining for share repurchases under our existing board authorizations. See Item 5. Market for Registrant’s Common Equity, Related Stockholder Matters and Issuer Purchases of Equity Securities, for additional information regarding share repurchases.

We expect future uses of cash to include working capital requirements, capital expenditures, dividends to shareowners, repurchases of common stock, repayments of debt, additional contributions to our retirement plans, and acquisitions of businesses and other inorganic investments. We expect capital expenditures in 2026 to be approximately $270 million. Significant long-term uses of cash include the following (in millions):

Payments by Period
Total20262027202820292030Thereafter
Long-term debt and interest (1)4,712$102$102$344$503$71$3,590
Minimum lease payments (Note 19)47911296765340102
Postretirement benefits (2)416655415
Pension funding contribution (3)2323
Net legacy asbestos liabilities (4)151121513121089
Transition tax (5)9797
Total$5,503$352$219$438$573$125$3,796

(1) The amounts for Long-term debt assume that the respective debt instruments will be outstanding until their scheduled maturity dates and include interest but exclude unamortized discount. See Note 7 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information regarding our Long-term debt.

(2) Our postretirement benefit plans are unfunded and are subject to change. Amounts reported are estimates of future benefit payments, to the extent estimable.

(3) Amounts reported for pension funding contributions reflect current estimates. Contributions to our pension plans beyond 2026 will depend on future investment performance of our pension plan assets, changes in discount rate assumptions, and governmental regulations in effect at the time. Amounts subsequent to 2026 are excluded from the summary above, as we are unable to make a reasonably reliable estimate of these amounts. The minimum contribution for our U.S. pension plan as required by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) is currently zero. We may make additional contributions to this plan at the discretion of management.

(4) Amounts reflect current estimates of net annual payments to resolve claims and will vary based on settlement rates and values, changes in state and national laws, defense strategies, and insurance recoveries.

(5) Under the Tax Act, the Company elected to pay the transition tax interest-free over eight years, with 8% paid in each of the first five years, 15% in year six, 20% in year seven, and 25% in year eight.

We expect to fund future uses of cash with a combination of existing cash balances, cash generated by operating activities, commercial paper borrowings, or new issuances of debt or other securities. In addition, we have access to unsecured credit facilities with various banks.

At September 30, 2025, the majority of our Cash and cash equivalents were held by non-U.S. subsidiaries. We use a global cash pooling arrangement to efficiently manage liquidity among our entities. As a result of the broad changes to the U.S. international tax system under the Tax Act, the Company accounts for taxes on earnings of substantially all of its non-U.S. subsidiaries including both non-U.S. and U.S. taxes. The Company has concluded that earnings of a limited number of its non-U.S. subsidiaries are indefinitely reinvested.

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In May 2025, we entered into a $500 million senior unsecured 364-day term loan credit agreement and were advanced the full loan amount. In August and September 2025, we repaid the loan amount. The credit agreement remains available until May 2026. This agreement was in addition to our existing $1.5 billion unsecured revolving credit facility expiring in June 2027, which remains outstanding and undrawn as of September 30, 2025. Both the credit facility and credit agreement use the secured overnight funding rate (SOFR) as the primary basis for determining interest payments. We can increase the aggregate amount of our credit facility by up to $750 million, subject to the consent of the banks in the credit facility. We did not borrow against the credit facility during the periods ended September 30, 2025, or September 30, 2024. The term loan agreement contains covenants similar to those under our credit facility, in which we agree to maintain an EBITDA-to-interest ratio of at least 3.0 to 1.0. The EBITDA-to-interest ratio is defined in the credit facility as the ratio of consolidated EBITDA for the preceding four quarters to consolidated interest expense for the same period. We were in compliance with all covenants under our credit agreement and credit facilities at September 30, 2025, and September 30, 2024.

Among other uses, we can draw on our credit facility as a standby liquidity facility to repay our outstanding commercial paper as it matures. This access to funds to repay maturing commercial paper is an important factor in maintaining the short-term credit ratings set forth in the table below. Under our current policy with respect to these ratings, we expect to limit our other borrowings under our credit facility, if any, to amounts that would leave enough credit available under the facility so that we could borrow, if needed, to repay all of our then outstanding commercial paper as it matures.

Separate short-term unsecured credit facilities of approximately $275 million at September 30, 2025, were available to non-U.S. subsidiaries, of which approximately $34 million was committed under letters of credit. Borrowings under our non-U.S. credit facilities at September 30, 2025 and 2024, were not significant. There are no significant commitment fees or compensating balance requirements under our credit facilities.

The following is a summary of our credit ratings as of November 12, 2025:

Credit Rating AgencyShort Term RatingLong Term RatingOutlook
Standard & Poor’sA-2A-Stable
Moody’sP-2A3Stable
Fitch RatingsF1AStable

Our ability to access the commercial paper market, and the related costs of these borrowings, is affected by the strength of our credit ratings and market conditions. We have not experienced any difficulty in accessing the commercial paper market. If our access to the commercial paper market is adversely affected due to a change in market conditions or otherwise, we would expect to rely on a combination of available cash and our unsecured committed credit facility to provide short-term funding. In such event, the cost of borrowings under our unsecured committed credit facility could be higher than the cost of commercial paper borrowings.

We regularly monitor the third-party depository institutions that hold our cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments. We diversify our cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments among counterparties to minimize exposure to any one of these entities.

We use foreign currency forward exchange contracts to manage certain foreign currency risks. We enter into these contracts to hedge our exposure to foreign currency exchange rate variability in the expected future cash flows associated with certain third-party and intercompany transactions denominated in foreign currencies forecasted to occur within the next two years. We also may use these contracts to hedge portions of our net investments in certain non-U.S. subsidiaries against the effect of exchange rate fluctuations on the translation of foreign currency balances to the U.S. dollar. In 2025 we entered into cross-currency swaps that we designated as a partial hedge of our net investment in certain Euro, Swiss franc, and Chinese yuan functional currency denominated subsidiaries. There were no net investment hedges as of September 30, 2024. In addition, we use foreign currency forward exchange contracts that are not designated as hedges to offset transaction gains or losses associated with some of our assets and liabilities resulting from intercompany loans or other transactions with third parties that are denominated in currencies other than our entities’ functional currencies. Our foreign currency forward exchange contracts are denominated in currencies of major industrial countries. We diversify our foreign currency forward exchange contracts among counterparties to minimize exposure to any one of these entities.

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Cash dividends declared to shareowners were $593 million in 2025 ($5.24 per common share), $573 million in 2024 ($5.00 per common share), and $544 million in 2023 ($4.72 per common share). Our quarterly dividend rate as of September 30, 2025, is $1.31 per common share ($5.24 per common share annually), which is determined at the sole discretion of our Board of Directors.

Supplemental Sales Information

We translate sales of subsidiaries operating outside of the United States using exchange rates effective during the respective period. Therefore, changes in currency exchange rates affect our reported sales. Sales by acquired businesses also affect our reported sales. We believe that organic sales, defined as sales excluding the effects of acquisitions and changes in currency exchange rates, which is a non-GAAP financial measure, provides useful information to investors because it reflects regional and operating segment performance from the activities of our businesses without the effect of acquisitions and changes in currency exchange rates. We use organic sales as one measure to monitor and evaluate our regional and operating segment performance. When we acquire businesses, we exclude sales in the current period for which there are no comparable sales in the prior period. We determine the effect of changes in currency exchange rates by translating the respective period’s sales using the same currency exchange rates that were in effect during the prior year. When we divest a business, we exclude sales in the prior period for which there are no comparable sales in the current period. Organic sales growth is calculated by comparing organic sales to reported sales in the prior year, excluding divestitures. We attribute sales to the geographic regions based on the country of destination.

The following is a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales by geographic region (in millions):

Year Ended September 30, 2025Year Ended September 30, 2024
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
North America$5,270$2$(12)$5,280$5,053
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,488291,4591,504
Asia Pacific1,024(8)1,0321,073
Latin America560(38)598634
Total Company Sales$8,342$2$(29)$8,369$8,264
Year Ended September 30, 2024Year Ended September 30, 2023
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
North America$5,053$82$(4)$4,975$5,224
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,5049211,4741,871
Asia Pacific1,0735(18)1,0861,358
Latin America6345629605
Total Company Sales$8,264$96$4$8,164$9,058

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The following is a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales by operating segment (in millions):

Year Ended September 30, 2025Year Ended September 30, 2024
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
Intelligent Devices$3,756$$(16)$3,772$3,804
Software & Control2,383(9)2,3922,187
Lifecycle Services2,2032(4)2,2052,273
Total Company Sales$8,342$2$(29)$8,369$8,264
Year Ended September 30, 2024Year Ended September 30, 2023
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
Intelligent Devices$3,804$69$3$3,732$4,098
Software & Control2,18722,1852,886
Lifecycle Services2,27327(1)2,2472,074
Total Company Sales$8,264$96$4$8,164$9,058

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Critical Accounting Estimates

We believe the following accounting estimates are the most critical to the understanding of our financial statements as they could have the most significant effect on our reported results and require subjective or complex judgments by management. Accounting principles generally accepted in the United States require us to make estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amounts of assets and liabilities at the date of the consolidated financial statements and revenues and expenses during the periods reported. These estimates are based on our best judgment about current and future conditions, but actual results could differ from those estimates. Refer to Note 1 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for information regarding our significant accounting policies.

Goodwill and Intangibles Valuation - Sensia Reporting Unit

We monitor adverse events, conditions or changes in circumstances that would indicate impairment of intangible assets that are subject to amortization. When such events, conditions or changes in circumstances occur, we assess the recoverability of the assets by comparing the undiscounted future cash flows attributable to the intangible assets to their carrying amount. If the undiscounted future cash flows are less than the carrying amount, an impairment charge based on the excess of the carrying amount over the fair value of the assets, is recorded.

As a result of the historical financial performance of the Sensia joint venture not achieving expectations, during the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025, a strategic review by the partners resulted in a decision to pursue an orderly dissolution. This decision to dissolve resulted in downward revisions to growth and profitability projections. The decision by the joint partners to pursue dissolution of the joint venture is a triggering event for impairment testing. For the Sensia reporting unit identifiable intangible assets subject to amortization within the Lifecycle Services operating segment, we believed these changes that occurred during the fourth quarter of 2025 would indicate a potential impairment. The estimated undiscounted future cash flows attributable to the reporting unit were less than the carrying value; therefore, we determined the fair value for Sensia identifiable intangible assets as of September 30, 2025. We engaged an independent third-party valuation specialist to assist with the fair value determination of the identifiable intangible assets, primarily customer relationships, using a multi-period excess earnings model. We compared the fair value of $58 million to the carrying value, which resulted in a pre-tax, non-cash intangible asset impairment charge of $63 million during the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025. Subsequent to the impairment, our consolidated intangible asset balance as of September 30, 2025, is $864 million, including $58 million of identifiable intangible assets within the Sensia reporting unit.

Following the intangible asset impairment analysis, we estimated the fair value of the Sensia reporting unit using an income approach derived from discounted cash flows. As of September 30, 2025, the carrying value of the Sensia reporting unit, after consideration of the fourth quarter intangible asset impairment, was determined to be in excess of the reporting unit’s fair value, resulting in a $161 million pre-tax, non-cash goodwill impairment charge recorded in the Consolidated Statement of Operations. Subsequent to the impairment, our consolidated goodwill balance as of September 30, 2025, is $3,839 million and there is no remaining goodwill within the Sensia reporting unit.

Critical assumptions used in this approach included estimated future revenue growth rates and Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization (“EBITDA”) margins, and a discount rate. Estimated future revenue and EBITDA margins are based on our best estimate about current and future conditions. The forecasted near-term growth rate projections take into account recent revenue performance and the order backlog. Margin assumptions reflect volume, mix, productivity and price estimates. These estimates and assumptions are based on a number of factors, including historical experience, reference to external product available market and industry growth publications, and analysis of peer group projections. Actual results and forecasts of revenue growth and margins for the Sensia reporting unit may be impacted by its concentration within the Oil & Gas industry and with its customer base. Demand for Sensia hardware and software products, solutions, and services is sensitive to industry volatility and risks, including those related to commodity prices, supply and demand dynamics, production costs, geological activity, and political activities. We determined the discount rate using a weighted average cost of capital adjusted for risk factors.

Subsequent to September 30, 2025, and prior to the issuance of these financial statements, the joint venture parents have signed a term sheet that details the distribution of assets and related terms and conditions for the dissolution. As a result, the assets and liabilities to be distributed have met the requirements as held for sale and will be reported as such in our first fiscal quarter. The transaction is expected to close in the first half of fiscal 2026 subject to customary closing conditions.

We performed our annual quantitative impairment test for the Sensia reporting unit during the second quarter of fiscal 2025 and concluded that the goodwill balance within the reporting unit of $161 million was not impaired.

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More information regarding goodwill impairment testing is contained in Note 1 and Note 3 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Retirement Benefits - Pension

Pension costs and obligations are actuarially determined and are influenced by assumptions used to estimate these amounts, including the discount rate. Changes in any of the assumptions and the amortization of differences between the assumptions and actual experience will affect the amount of pension expense in future periods.

Our global pension expense was $38 million, $13 million and $122 million in 2025, 2024, and 2023, respectively. Global pension expense in 2023 included $123 million of settlement charges. Approximately all of our 2025 global pension expense and 69 percent of our global projected benefit obligation relate to our U.S. pension plan. The discount rate used to determine our 2025 U.S. pension expense was 5.10 percent, compared to 6.10 percent for 2024.

For 2026, our U.S. discount rate will increase to 5.35 percent from 5.10 percent in 2025. The discount rate was set as of our September 30 measurement date and was determined by modeling a portfolio of bonds that match the expected cash flow of our benefit plans.

The changes in our discount rate have an inverse relationship with our net periodic benefit cost and projected benefit obligation. The following chart illustrates the estimated change in projected benefit obligation and annual net periodic benefit cost assuming a change of 25 basis points in the discount rate for our U.S. pension plans (in millions):

Pension Benefits
Change in Projected Benefit ObligationChange in Net Periodic Benefit Cost (1)
Discount rate$56$6

(1) Change includes both operating and non-operating pension costs.

More information regarding pension benefits is contained in Note 14 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Revenue Recognition - Customer Incentives

We offer various incentive programs that provide distributors and direct sale customers with cash rebates, account credits, or additional hardware and software products, solutions, and services based on meeting specified program criteria. Customer incentives are recognized as a reduction of sales if distributed in cash or customer account credits. We record accruals at the time of revenue recognition as a current liability within Customer returns, rebates, and incentives in our Consolidated Balance Sheet or, where a right of setoff exists, as a reduction of Receivables. Customer incentives for additional hardware and software products, solutions, and services to be provided are considered distinct performance obligations. As such, we allocate revenue to them based on relative standalone selling price. Until the incentive is redeemed, the revenue is recorded as a contract liability.

Our primary incentive program provides distributors with cash rebates or account credits based on agreed amounts that vary depending on the customer to whom our distributor ultimately sells the product. A critical assumption used in estimating the accrual for this program is the time period from when revenue is recognized to when the rebate is processed. Our estimate is based primarily on historical experience. If the time period were to change by 10 percent, the effect would be an adjustment to the accrual of approximately $24 million.

More information regarding our revenue recognition and returns, rebates, and incentives policies are contained in Note 1 and Note 2 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Legacy Asbestos-related Matters

We (including our subsidiaries) have been named as a defendant in lawsuits alleging personal injury as a result of exposure to asbestos that was used in certain components of our products many years ago, including products from divested businesses for which we have agreed to defend and indemnify claims. Additionally, we have maintained insurance coverage that includes indemnity and defense costs, over and above self-insured retentions, for many of these claims. See Notes 1 and 17 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information.

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We accrue for net legacy asbestos-related matters based upon an assessment of the ultimate liability for claims incurred, whether filed or not, including estimates of both future claim resolution costs and defense costs. We utilize historical claim and defense costs trends as well as a third-party actuarial valuation in determining estimated reserves and related insurance recoveries which we believe are probable and reasonably estimable through a 2060 terminal year. Accruals total $441 million at September 30, 2025, and are included in the Consolidated Balance Sheet in Other current liabilities and Other liabilities, with insurance recoveries related to these matters of $290 million recorded in Receivables and Other assets.

The valuation of the accrual is based on several critical assumptions, including projections of future claims, dismissal rates, average settlement values, inflation rates, and the ratio of defense costs to indemnity payments. We typically rely on a five-year historical average for dismissal rates, settlement values, and defense-to-indemnity ratios, adjusted to exclude outlier data and informed by input from national counsel regarding the current docket and jurisdictional trends. Future claims estimates are developed using actuarial models grounded in widely accepted industry studies, and inflation assumptions are aligned with long-term, broadly recognized economic indicators. The aggregate impact of these assumptions reflects estimated payments for approximately 12,130 claims and projected dismissals of approximately 24,340 claims through the 2060 terminal year.

Acquisitions - Clearpath Intangible Assets Valuation

We account for business acquisitions by allocating the purchase price to tangible and intangible assets acquired and liabilities assumed at their fair values; the excess of the purchase price over the allocated amount is recorded as goodwill. We engaged an independent third-party valuation specialist to assist with the fair value allocation of the intangible assets assumed through the Clearpath Robotics, Inc. acquisition including its industrial division OTTO Motors (Clearpath). The intangible assets were valued using income approaches, specifically the relief from royalty method and multi-period excess earnings method. This required the use of several assumptions and estimates including forecasted revenue growth rates, margin, and cash flows attributable to existing customers, obsolescence factor, royalty rate, contributory asset charges, customer attrition rate, and discount rates. Although we believe the assumptions and estimates made were reasonable and appropriate, these estimates require judgment and are based in part on historical experience and information obtained from Clearpath management.

The key assumption requiring the use of judgement in the valuation of the $270 million technology asset was the obsolescence factor. The obsolescence factor of 12 years was calculated based on the depletion of existing technology using a variety of factors including research and development spend toward new product development and scheduled patent expiration. A two-year change in this assumption would result in a change of approximately $82 million in intangible assets. The key assumption requiring the use of judgement in the valuation of the $41 million trademark intangible asset was the weighted average royalty rate of 2.05 percent. This rate was based on royalty market data. A 100 basis point change in the royalty rate would result in a change of $20 million in intangible assets.

More information regarding this business combination is contained in Note 4 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Recent Accounting Pronouncements

See Note 1 in the Consolidated Financial Statements regarding recent accounting pronouncements.

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MD&A history

Prior-year 10-K MD&A spans are extracted from SEC filings with the same bounded parser used for the latest filing. The latest 10-K appears above; prior years are below.

FY 2024 10-K MD&A

SEC filing source: 0001024478-24-000107.

Extracted structurally from real Item 7 body heading to real Item 7A/8 boundary. Confidence: high. Filing date: 2024-11-12. Report date: 2024-09-30.

Item 7. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations

Results of Operations

Non-GAAP Measures

The following discussion includes organic sales, total segment operating earnings and margin, adjusted income, adjusted EPS, adjusted effective tax rate, and free cash flow, which are non-GAAP measures. See Supplemental Sales Information for a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales and a discussion of why we believe this non-GAAP measure is useful to investors. See Summary of Results of Operations for a reconciliation of Income before income taxes to total segment operating earnings and margin and a discussion of why we believe these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors. See Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation for a reconciliation of Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate to adjusted income, adjusted EPS, and adjusted effective tax rate, respectively, and a discussion of why we believe these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors. See Financial Condition for a reconciliation of Cash provided by operating activities to free cash flow and a discussion of why we believe this non-GAAP measure is useful to investors.

Overview

Rockwell Automation, Inc. is the world’s largest company dedicated to industrial automation and digital transformation. Overall demand for our hardware and software products, solutions, and services is driven by:

•investments in manufacturing, including new facilities or production lines, upgrades, modifications and expansions of existing facilities or production lines;

•investments in basic materials production capacity, which may be related to commodity pricing levels;

•our customers’ needs for faster time to market, agility to address evolving consumer preferences, operational productivity, asset management and reliability, and business resilience, including security and enterprise risk management;

•our customers’ needs to continuously improve quality, safety, and sustainability;

•industry factors that include our customers’ new product introductions, demand for our customers’ products or services, and the regulatory and competitive environments in which our customers operate;

•levels of global industrial production and capacity utilization;

•regional factors that include local political, social, regulatory, and economic circumstances; and

•the spending patterns of our customers due to their annual budgeting processes and their working schedules.

Long-term Strategy

As the world’s largest company dedicated to industrial automation and digital transformation, our strategy is to bring the Connected Enterprise® to life. We understand and simplify our customers’ complex production challenges and deliver the most valued solutions that combine technology and industry expertise. As a result, we make our customers more resilient, agile, and sustainable, creating more ways to win. We deliver value by helping our customers optimize production, build resilience, empower people, become more sustainable, and accelerate transformation.

Rockwell Automation stands at the intersection of the technological and societal trends that are shaping the future of industrial operations. We see converging megatrends including digitization and artificial intelligence, energy transition and sustainability, shifting demographics, and an increased need for resiliency.

Our long-term profitable growth framework outlines how we will deliver accelerated growth while we continue to transform our company to meet stakeholder expectations over the longer term:

•achieve faster secular growth in traditional markets due to customer needs for resiliency (including cybersecurity), agility, sustainability, and mitigating impacts of labor shortages;

•grow share and create new ways to win through technology differentiation, industry focus, go to market acceleration, expanded offerings and new markets;

•continue double-digit growth in annual recurring revenue;

•add 1% average annual growth from acquisitions; and

•deliver profitable growth within a disciplined financial framework.

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Sustainability

Our 2023 Sustainability Report highlights our sustainability strategy and outcomes. Our sustainability priorities are focused on three outcomes:

•Sustainable Customers - enable our customers to achieve their own sustainability goals, making a positive impact on the world;

•Sustainable Company - create innovative, sustainable products and solutions and foster a culture that empowers employees to operate safely, sustainably, and responsibly; and

•Sustainable Communities - support the communities in which we live and work, having an impact that extends beyond our own organization.

We will meet our customers where they are on their sustainability journey. Whether they are just starting or leading the way, we help them translate insights into impacts across energy, water, and waste. Our technologies provide data transparency across value chains and enable our partners to scale innovative and often industry-first sustainable solutions.

•Energy - contemporary industrial energy management software solutions that put energy data in context to production data, to reduce energy use across the value chain.

•Water - smart water solutions leverage modern software and analytics to improve operations visibility, system reliability, and worker productivity while supporting security needs and meeting regulatory obligations.

•Waste - enabling the circular economy for managing automation assets. Focus on developing solutions to automate industry-specific processes.

Differentiation through Technology Innovation and Domain Expertise

We have an industry leading portfolio of hardware, software, and services to give customers the flexibility to choose on-premises, edge, and cloud-native solutions.

Our integrated control and information architecture, with Logix at its core, is an important differentiator. We are the only automation provider that can support many production disciplines, including discrete, process, batch, safety, security, motion, robotics, and power control, in a single hardware and software environment, helping customers increase the speed of deployment and reduce their total cost of ownership.

Our open architecture and strong partner ecosystem allow customers to work with best-in-class partners across the technology stack and leverage existing infrastructure with new solutions.

Complementing our strong technology differentiation is our own domain expertise. Domain expertise refers to the industry and application knowledge required to deliver solutions and services that support customers through the entire lifecycle of their automation investment. The combination of industry-specific domain expertise of our people with our innovative technologies enables us to help our customers automate and transform their manufacturing processes and solve their business challenges. Our digital services business has a deep understanding of customers’ biggest digital transformation challenges and opportunities for further productivity and growth.

Market Access and Expansion

Over the past decade, our investments in technology and globalization have enabled us to expand our addressed market to approximately $130 billion. With our focus on innovation and growth, we expect to continue to expand our addressed market over our long-term planning horizon. All of our markets are expected to grow over our long-term planning horizon. Our domestic market projections reflect the opportunity to localize our customers’ supply chain and production operations. Our international market projections reflect higher levels of infrastructure investment and the growing middle-class population. We believe that increased demand for consumer products in our addressed markets will lead to manufacturing investment and provide us with additional growth opportunities in the future.

We have developed a powerful partner ecosystem that acts as an amplifier to our internal capabilities and enables us to serve our customers’ evolving needs around the world.

In most countries, our direct sales force works with Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) or machine builders, system integrators, technology partners, and end users in conjunction with independent distributors. Approximately 65 percent of our global sales are transacted through independent distributors. Sales to our two largest distributors in 2024, 2023, and 2022, which are attributable to all three segments, were approximately 20 percent of our total sales.

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Machine builders continue to represent an important growth opportunity. To remain competitive, machine builders need to find the optimal balance of machine cost and performance while reducing their time to market. Our scalable technology, leading design productivity tools, and recent acquisitions support machine builders in addressing these business needs.

Acquisitions and Investments

Our acquisition and investment strategy focuses on hardware and software products, solutions, and services that will be catalytic to the organic growth of our core offerings.

Our key priorities for inorganic investments include:

•annual recurring revenue;

•market expansion in Europe and Asia; and

•application-specific technology in focus industries.

In addition, we make venture investments that enable access to leading-edge and complementary technologies aligned with our strategic priorities, accelerate internal development efforts, reduce time to market, and provide insights into disruptive technologies.

We believe these acquisitions and venture investments will help our served market and deliver value to our customers. See Note 4 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on our recent acquisitions.

Attracting, Developing, and Retaining Highly Qualified Employees

Our talent management practices are focused on ensuring we can attract, develop, and retain the talent we need to deliver our business strategy. We work to deliver a cohesive and consistent experience throughout the employee lifecycle that aligns with our four culture principles:

•Strengthen our commitment to integrity, diversity and inclusion;

•Be willing to compare ourselves to the best alternatives;

•Increase the speed of decision making;

•Have a steady stream of fresh ideas.

Our programs and processes are designed to enable and inspire great employees to do their best work and to make Rockwell Automation a place where the best want to be.

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There are several ways in which we attract, develop, and retain highly qualified employees, including:

•We make the safety and health of our employees a top priority. We strive for zero workplace injuries and illnesses and operate in a manner that recognizes safety as fundamental to Rockwell Automation being a great place to work. In fiscal 2024, we achieved 0.27 recordable cases per 100 employees.

•We capture and act upon employee feedback through our annual employee engagement survey. It measures several engagement indicators and drivers and provides an overall employee engagement index (EEI) with external benchmark comparison. The latest survey, conducted in February 2024, showed an EEI of 76, which was eight points higher than the industry norm of 68 for this index. Our global inclusion index score was 79, five points higher than the industry norm of 74.

•We invest in growth and development of our employees. As the pace of change increases, it is important we provide re-skilling and upskilling opportunities for our technical talent, along with soft skills and leadership development for all. We offer a portfolio of all employee, managerial, and leader training that spans on-demand, virtual, and live instructor-led formats. Our programs focus on basic as well as transformational skills. We take pride in our culture and in fiscal 2021 created an opportunity for our employees to participate in team-based culture workshops that have evolved into a standard during new employee onboarding. In fiscal 2024, the majority of our employees completed one or more of our training programs representing over 1.1 million learning hours.

•We offer employee assistance and work life benefits to all global employees. Our comprehensive benefits include healthcare benefits, disability and life insurance benefits, paid time off, and leave programs. Rockwell offers plans and resources to help employees meet future savings goals through defined benefit and retirement savings plans. We believe that face to face interaction is critical for our culture, innovation, people development, and engagement, and that flexible, virtual work arrangements help employees be more productive and engaged. During fiscal 2024, we updated our Hybrid Workplace Program, which combines the values of both physical workspaces and virtual work options, both of which are important for attracting, retaining, and developing employees and facilitating innovation, engagement, and productivity. We offer flextime, remote work, and part-time arrangements whenever business conditions permit.

We monitor employee retention and attrition rates by demographic factors including by gender, ethnicity, generation, years of service, career role, region, business, and function. We generally experienced flat attrition rates in fiscal 2024 as compared to fiscal 2023. We believe this is consistent with market trends experienced broadly across labor markets in fiscal 2024. We use attrition rate information to identify and address unfavorable trends to mitigate risk to our business. See Item 1A. Risk Factors for a discussion of risks relating to our inability to attract, develop, and retain highly qualified employees.

At September 30, 2024, our employees, including those employed by consolidated subsidiaries, by region were approximately:

North America9,500
Europe, Middle East and Africa5,500
Asia Pacific7,000
Latin America5,000
Total employees27,000

Our employees had the following global gender demographics based on voluntary disclosure:

September 30, 2024
WomenMenUndisclosed
All employees32%68%—%
Individual Contributors33%67%—%
People Managers27%73%—%
Technical Talent19%81%—%
Manufacturing Associates45%55%—%

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Our U.S. employees had the following race and ethnicity demographics based on voluntary disclosure:

September 30, 2024
Black / African AmericanAsianHispanic / LatinxWhiteMultiracial, Native American and Pacific IslanderUndisclosed
All U.S. Employees7%10%6%70%2%5%
Individual Contributors8%11%5%69%2%5%
People Managers6%8%6%74%1%5%
Technical Talent5%13%6%69%2%5%
Manufacturing Associates14%16%4%55%2%9%

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U.S. Economic Trends

In 2024, sales in the U.S. accounted for over half of our total sales. The various indicators we use to gauge the direction and momentum of our served U.S. markets include:

•The Industrial Production (IP) Index, published by the Federal Reserve, which measures the real output of manufacturing, mining, and electric and gas utilities. The Manufacturing IP Index is expressed as a percentage of real output in a base year, currently 2017.

•The Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI), published by the Institute for Supply Management (ISM), which indicates the current and near-term state of manufacturing activity in the U.S. According to the ISM, a PMI measure above 50 indicates that the U.S. manufacturing economy is generally expanding while a measure below 50 indicates that it is generally contracting.

The table below depicts the trends in these indicators from fiscal 2022 to 2024. These figures are as of November 12, 2024, and are subject to revision by the issuing organizations. The IP Index declined in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2024 versus the third quarter of fiscal 2024. Manufacturing PMI results continued to soften in the fourth quarter of 2024. The Manufacturing PMI reading in the month of September was the highest of the quarter, however it still remains below 50.

Manufacturing IP IndexPMI
Fiscal 2024 quarter ended:
September 202499.147.2
June 202499.548.5
March 202499.550.3
December 202399.247.1
Fiscal 2023 quarter ended:
September 202399.649.0
June 202399.246.0
March 202399.246.3
December 202298.148.4
Fiscal 2022 quarter ended:
September 2022100.650.9
June 2022100.053.0
March 2022100.657.1
December 2021100.158.8

Inflation in the U.S. has also had an impact on our input costs and pricing. We used the Producer Price Index (PPI), published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which measures the average change over time in the selling prices received by domestic producers for their output. After observing double-digit PPI growth through most of 2022, we have now observed PPI growth in the low single digits for the last four quarters. Producer prices remain elevated, however, year over year increases continued to decelerate following the last two years' surges in prices.

Non-U.S. Economic Trends

In 2024, sales to customers outside the U.S. accounted for less than half of our total sales. These customers include both indigenous companies and multinational companies with a global presence. In addition to the global factors previously mentioned in the Overview section, international demand, particularly in emerging markets, has historically been driven by the strength of the industrial economy in each region, investments in infrastructure, and expanding consumer markets. We use changes in key countries' gross domestic product (GDP), IP, and PMI as indicators of the growth opportunities in each region where we do business. Industrial output outside the U.S. was mixed in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2024. Manufacturing PMI readings outside the U.S were also mixed with results reported above and below 50 and readings improving in some countries during the quarter and softening in others.

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Backlog

Our total order backlog consists of (in millions):

September 30,
20242023
Intelligent Devices$736.8$1,464.1
Software & Control652.8897.5
Lifecycle Services1,701.01,747.3
Total Company$3,090.6$4,108.9

See Note 2 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on the nature of our products and services and revenue recognition.

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Summary of Results of Operations

The following table reflects our sales and operating results (in millions, except per share amounts and percentages):

Year Ended September 30,
202420232022
Sales
Intelligent Devices (a)$3,804.1$4,098.2$3,544.6
Software & Control (b)2,187.42,886.02,312.9
Lifecycle Services (c)2,272.72,073.81,902.9
Total sales (d)$8,264.2$9,058.0$7,760.4
Segment operating earnings (1)
Intelligent Devices (e)$700.0$828.2$717.6
Software & Control (f)529.7953.2666.7
Lifecycle Services (g)365.6148.4158.3
Total segment operating earnings (2) (h)1,595.31,929.81,542.6
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment(143.9)(264.4)(103.9)
Corporate and other(135.8)(127.9)(104.7)
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit credit (cost)19.8(82.7)(4.7)
Change in fair value of investments0.1279.3(136.9)
Restructuring charges(97.4)
Interest expense, net(139.0)(125.6)(118.8)
Income before income taxes (i)1,099.11,608.51,073.6
Income tax provision(151.8)(330.5)(154.5)
Net income947.31,278.0919.1
Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests(5.2)(109.4)(13.1)
Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation$952.5$1,387.4$932.2
Diluted EPS$8.28$11.95$7.97
Adjusted EPS (3)$9.71$12.12$9.49
Diluted weighted average outstanding shares114.5115.6116.7
Pre-tax margin (i/d)13.3%17.8%13.8%
Intelligent Devices segment operating margin (e/a)18.4%20.2%20.2%
Software & Control segment operating margin (f/b)24.2%33.0%28.8%
Lifecycle Services segment operating margin (g/c)16.1%7.2%8.3%
Total segment operating margin (2) (h/d)19.3%21.3%19.9%

(1) See Note 20 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for the definition of segment operating earnings.

(2) Total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin are non-GAAP financial measures. We exclude purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, impairment, corporate and other, non-operating pension and postretirement benefit credit (cost), change in fair value of investments, restructuring charges aligned with enterprise-wide strategic initiatives, interest expense, net, and income tax provision because we do not consider these items to be directly related to the operating performance of our segments. We believe total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin are useful to investors as measures of operating performance. We use these measures to monitor and evaluate the profitability of our operating segments. Our measures of total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin may be different from measures used by other companies.

(3) Adjusted EPS is a non-GAAP earnings measure. See Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation for more information on this non-GAAP measure.

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2024 Compared to 2023

Sales

Sales in fiscal 2024 decreased 9 percent compared to 2023. Organic sales decreased 10 percent. Acquisitions increased sales by 1 percentage point. Total annual recurring revenue at September 30, 2024, grew approximately 16 percent compared to September 30, 2023. Organic annual recurring revenue at September 30, 2024 grew approximately 14 percent compared to September 30, 2023. See Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) for information on this measure. Pricing increased total company sales by approximately 2 percentage points, realized in the Intelligent Devices and Software & Control segments. Volume decreased total company sales by approximately 12 percentage points year over year driven by the Software & Control and Intelligent Devices segments, partially offset by the Lifecycle Services segment.

The table below presents our sales for the year ended September 30, 2024, attributed to the geographic regions based upon country of destination, and the percentage change from the same period in 2023 (in millions, except percentages).

Change vs.Change in Organic Sales (1) vs.
Year Ended September 30, 2024Year Ended September 30, 2023Year Ended September 30, 2023
North America$5,052.8(3)%(5)%
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,504.5(20)%(21)%
Asia Pacific1,072.8(21)%(20)%
Latin America634.15%4%
Total Company Sales$8,264.2(9)%(10)%

(1) Organic sales and organic sales growth exclude the effect of acquisitions, changes in currency exchange rates, and divestitures. See Supplemental Sales Information for information on these non-GAAP measures.

Corporate and Other

Corporate and other expenses were $135.8 million in fiscal 2024 compared to $127.9 million in fiscal 2023.

Restructuring Charges

Restructuring charges were $97.4 million in fiscal 2024, which relate to actions in conjunction with an enterprise-wide comprehensive program to optimize cost structure and expand margins. See Note 18 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information on our restructuring charges.

Income before Income Taxes

Income before income taxes decreased to $1,099.1 million in 2024 from $1,608.5 million in 2023. The decrease was primarily due to lower segment operating earnings in the Software & Control and Intelligent Devices operating segments and the fair value adjustments recognized in the prior year in connection with our previous investment in PTC, Inc. (PTC), partially offset by a $157.5 million accounting charge in 2023 for impairment of goodwill for our Sensia joint venture (goodwill impairment). Total segment operating earnings decreased to $1,595.3 million from $1,929.8 million in 2023, primarily due to lower sales volume and unfavorable mix, partially offset by lower incentive compensation and the positive impact of price realization exceeding input costs.

Income Taxes

The effective tax rate in 2024 was 13.8 percent compared to 20.5 percent in 2023. The decrease in the effective tax rate was primarily due to a valuation allowance established in 2023 on certain deferred tax assets of our Sensia joint venture and tax effects of the related goodwill impairment totaling $33.1 million, and higher discrete tax benefits in 2024 compared to 2023. The adjusted effective tax rate in 2024 was 15.1 percent compared to 16.4 percent in 2023. The decrease in the adjusted effective tax rate was primarily due to higher discrete tax benefits in 2024 compared to 2023.

See Note 16 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for a complete reconciliation of the United States statutory tax rate to the effective tax rate and additional information on tax events in 2024 and 2023 affecting each year’s respective tax rates.

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In October 2021, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and G20 Finance Ministers reached an agreement, known as Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) Pillar Two, that, among other things, ensures that income earned in each jurisdiction that qualifying multinational enterprises operate in is subject to a minimum corporate income tax rate of at least 15%. Discussions related to the formal implementation and enactment of this agreement, including within the tax law of each member jurisdiction including the United States, are ongoing. Certain countries have enacted the Pillar Two framework, including Singapore, which is expected to result in the greatest impact to the Company. Enactment of this regulation in its current form would generally apply to the Company beginning in fiscal year 2026, resulting in an increase in our effective tax rate as well as in the amount of global corporate income tax paid.

Net Loss Attributable to Noncontrolling Interests

Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests was $5.2 million in 2024 compared to $109.4 million in 2023. The decrease was driven by the prior year $93.3 million goodwill impairment and related tax effects including tax asset valuation allowances that are attributable to noncontrolling interests.

Diluted EPS and Adjusted EPS

Fiscal 2024 Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation was $952.5 million or $8.28 per share, compared to $1,387.4 million or $11.95 per share in fiscal 2023. The decreases in Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation and diluted EPS were primarily due to lower sales and lower pre-tax margin. Pre-tax margin was 13.3% compared to 17.8% in fiscal 2023. The decrease in pre-tax margin was primarily due to lower sales volume, fair value adjustments recognized in the prior year in connection with our previous investment in PTC, and restructuring charges, partially offset by lower incentive compensation, the prior year goodwill impairment, and the benefits from cost reduction actions. Adjusted EPS was $9.71 in fiscal 2024, down 20 percent compared to $12.12 in fiscal 2023, primarily due to lower sales and lower segment operating margin. Total segment operating margin was 19.3% compared to 21.3% in fiscal 2023. The decrease in total segment operating margin was primarily due to lower sales volume and unfavorable mix, partially offset by lower incentive compensation and the benefits from cost reduction actions.

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Intelligent Devices

Sales

Intelligent Devices sales decreased 7 percent in 2024 compared to 2023. Organic sales decreased 9 percent. Acquisitions increased sales by 2 percentage points. All regions except North America experienced reported and organic sales decreases.

Segment Operating Margin

Intelligent Devices segment operating earnings decreased 15 percent year over year. Segment operating margins decreased to 18.4 percent in 2024 from 20.2 percent in 2023, primarily due to lower sales volume, partially offset by lower incentive compensation, the positive impact of price realization exceeding input costs, and an adjustment to an earnout accrual tied to achievement of the seller’s revenue target on our Clearpath Robotics, Inc. acquisition including its industrial division OTTO Motors (Clearpath).

Software & Control

Sales

Software & Control reported and organic sales decreased 24 percent in 2024 compared to 2023. All regions experienced reported and organic sales decreases.

Segment Operating Margin

Software & Control segment operating earnings decreased 44 percent year over year. Segment operating margin decreased to 24.2 percent in 2024 from 33.0 percent in 2023, primarily due to lower sales volume, partially offset by lower incentive compensation and the positive impact of price realization exceeding input costs.

Lifecycle Services

Sales

Lifecycle Services sales increased 10 percent in 2024 compared to 2023. Organic sales increased 8 percent. Acquisitions increased sales by 2 percentage points. All regions experienced reported sales increases. All regions except Asia Pacific experienced organic sales increases.

Segment Operating Margin

Lifecycle Services segment operating earnings increased 146 percent year over year. Segment operating margin increased to 16.1 percent in 2024 from 7.2 percent in 2023, primarily due to lower incentive compensation, higher sales volume, strong project execution, higher margins in Sensia, and ongoing savings from the prior year structural actions.

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2023 Compared to 2022

For a discussion of the Company’s fiscal 2023 results compared to fiscal 2022, see the Company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended September 30, 2023, filed on November 8, 2023.

Supplemental Segment Information

Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment, non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost, and restructuring charges are not allocated to our operating segments because these costs are excluded from our measurement of each segment’s operating performance for internal purposes. If we were to allocate these costs, we would attribute them to each of our segments as follows (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202420232022
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment
Intelligent Devices$37.9$4.7$2.5
Software & Control67.468.569.0
Lifecycle Services37.6190.231.4
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost
Intelligent Devices$(7.2)$21.2$(3.5)
Software & Control(7.2)21.2(3.5)
Lifecycle Services(9.5)28.3(4.8)
Restructuring Charges
Intelligent Devices$44.4$$
Software & Control32.6
Lifecycle Services19.4

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Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation

Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate are non-GAAP earnings measures that exclude non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost, purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation, change in fair value of investments, restructuring charges aligned with enterprise-wide strategic initiatives, and Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests, including their respective tax effects. In 2024, we updated the definition of our non-GAAP earnings measures to exclude significant restructuring charges aligned with enterprise-wide strategic initiatives. In the year ended September 30, 2024, we recognized these restructuring charges in conjunction with an enterprise-wide comprehensive program to optimize cost structure and expand margins. We believe the change to our definition provides a more useful presentation of our operating performance to investors as these restructuring charges are significant and enterprise-wide severance actions and not reflective of our ongoing operations. We did not revise prior years because there were no similar restructuring actions with significant costs. See Note 18 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information on our restructuring charges.

Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation includes an accounting charge related to goodwill impairment for our Sensia joint venture in the year ended September 30, 2023. The tax effect of the purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation includes the tax effects on the Sensia joint venture goodwill impairment and related Sensia tax asset valuation allowances. Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost is defined as all components of our net periodic pension and postretirement benefit cost except for service cost. See Note 14 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information on our net periodic pension and postretirement benefit cost.

We believe that Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate provide useful information to our investors about our operating performance and allow management and investors to compare our operating performance period over period. Adjusted EPS is also used as a financial measure of performance for our annual incentive compensation. Our measures of Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate may be different from measures used by other companies. These non-GAAP measures should not be considered a substitute for Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate.

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The following are reconciliations of Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate to Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate, respectively (in millions, except per share amounts and percentages):

Year Ended September 30,
202420232022
Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation$952.5$1,387.4$932.2
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost(19.8)82.74.7
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost4.0(20.6)(1.9)
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation (1)132.8178.391.9
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation (1)(24.6)(9.4)(22.3)
Change in fair value of investments (2)(0.1)(279.3)136.9
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments (2)(0.7)67.6(30.8)
Restructuring charges (3)97.4
Tax effect of restructuring charges (3)(24.3)
Adjusted Income$1,117.2$1,406.7$1,110.7
Diluted EPS$8.28$11.95$7.97
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost(0.17)0.720.04
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost0.03(0.18)(0.02)
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation1.161.540.78
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation(0.22)(0.08)(0.19)
Change in fair value of investments (2)(2.42)1.17
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments (2)(0.01)0.59(0.26)
Restructuring charges0.85
Tax effect of restructuring charges(0.21)
Adjusted EPS$9.71$12.12$9.49
Effective tax rate13.8%20.5%14.4%
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost(0.1)%0.3%0.1%
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation0.4%(3.7)%0.6%
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments (2)0.1%(0.7)%0.9%
Tax effect of restructuring charges0.9%%%
Adjusted Effective Tax Rate15.1%16.4%16.0%

(1) 2023 includes $97.3 million net expense from $157.5 million goodwill impairment charge included in Income before income taxes, $33.1 tax effect from goodwill impairment and related valuation allowances recorded in Income tax provision, and ($93.3) million Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests.

(2) Primarily relates to the change in fair value of our previous investment in PTC.

(3) Restructuring charges include $92.3 million for severance benefits and $5.1 million for strategic advisory services related to the enterprise-wide severance actions.

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Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR)

Total ARR is a key metric that enables measurement of progress in growing our recurring revenue business. It represents the annual contract value of all active recurring revenue contracts at any point in time. Recurring revenue is defined as a revenue stream that is contractual, typically for a period of 12 months or more, and has a high probability of renewal. The probability of renewal is based on historical renewal experience of the individual revenue streams, or management's best estimates if historical renewal experience is not available. Total ARR growth is calculated as the dollar change in ARR, adjusted to exclude the effects of currency, divided by ARR as of the prior period. The effects of currency translation are excluded by calculating Total ARR on a constant currency basis. Total ARR includes acquisitions even if there was no comparable ARR in the prior period. We believe that Total ARR provides useful information to investors because it reflects our recurring revenue performance period over period including the effect of acquisitions. Our measure of ARR may be different from measures used by other companies. Because ARR is based on annual contract value, it does not represent revenue recognized during a particular reporting period or revenue to be recognized in future reporting periods and is not intended to be a substitute for revenue, contract liabilities, or backlog.

Organic ARR growth is calculated as the dollar change in ARR, adjusted to exclude the effects of currency translation and acquisitions, divided by ARR as of the prior period. The effects of currency translation are excluded by calculating Organic ARR on a constant currency basis. When we acquire businesses, we exclude the effect of ARR in the current period for which there was no comparable ARR in the prior period. We believe that Organic ARR provides useful information to investors because it reflects our recurring revenue performance period over period without the effect of acquisitions and changes in currency exchange rates. Organic ARR growth is also used as a financial measure of performance for our annual incentive compensation.

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Financial Condition

The following is a summary of our cash flows from operating, investing, and financing activities, as reflected in the Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202420232022
Cash provided by (used for)
Operating activities$863.8$1,374.6$823.1
Investing activities(982.5)854.3(7.8)
Financing activities(502.8)(1,675.6)(934.2)
Effect of exchange rate changes on cash12.119.2(52.6)
(Decrease) increase in cash, cash equivalents, and restricted cash$(609.4)$572.5$(171.5)

The following table summarizes free cash flow, which is a non-GAAP financial measure (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202420232022
Cash provided by operating activities$863.8$1,374.6$823.1
Capital expenditures(224.7)(160.5)(141.1)
Free cash flow$639.1$1,214.1$682.0

Our definition of free cash flow takes into consideration capital investments required to maintain the operations of our businesses and execute our strategy. Cash provided by operating activities adds back non-cash depreciation expense to earnings but does not reflect a charge for necessary capital expenditures. Our definition of free cash flow excludes the operating cash flows and capital expenditures related to our discontinued operations, if any. Operating, investing, and financing cash flows of our discontinued operations, if any, are presented separately in our Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows. In our opinion, free cash flow provides useful information to investors regarding our ability to generate cash from business operations that is available for acquisitions and other investments, service of debt principal, dividends, and share repurchases. We use free cash flow, as defined, as one measure to monitor and evaluate our performance, including as a financial measure for our annual incentive compensation. Our definition of free cash flow may be different from definitions used by other companies.

Cash provided by operating activities was $863.8 million for the year ended September 30, 2024, compared to $1,374.6 million for the year ended September 30, 2023. Free cash flow was $639.1 million for the year ended September 30, 2024, compared to $1,214.1 million for the year ended September 30, 2023. The year-over-year decreases in cash provided by operating activities and free cash flow were primarily due to lower pre-tax income, higher incentive compensation payments in 2024 related to fiscal 2023 performance, and higher tax payments, partially offset by decreases in working capital. Free cash flow for the year ended September 30, 2024, also includes $64.2 million of higher capital expenditures. Taxes paid in the year ended September 30, 2024, include $58.4 million of U.S. transition tax under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (the Tax Act) and $67.4 million for capital gains from the sale of shares of PTC common stock.

Our Short-term debt as of September 30, 2024, includes commercial paper borrowings of $657.0 million with a weighted average interest rate of 5.14 percent and a weighted average maturity period of 24 days. We had no commercial paper borrowings as of September 30, 2023. In December 2022, Sensia entered into an unsecured $75.0 million line of credit. As of September 30, 2024 and 2023, included in Short-term debt was $70.0 million borrowed against the line of credit with an interest rate of 6.17 percent and 6.29 percent, respectively. Also included in Short-term debt as of September 30, 2024 and September 30, 2023 was $23.5 million of interest-bearing loans from Schlumberger (SLB) to Sensia, due April 2025. In April 2024, $18.8 million of new interest-bearing loans from SLB to Sensia were entered into and were due August 2024, extended to April 2025.

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We repurchased approximately 2.2 million shares of our common stock under our share repurchase program in 2024 at a total cost of $594.2 million and an average cost of $272.97 per share. In 2023, we repurchased approximately 1.2 million shares of our common stock under our share repurchase program at a total cost of $311.0 million and an average cost of $265.48 per share. At September 30, 2024, there were $0.4 million of outstanding common stock share repurchases recorded in Accounts payable that do not settle until 2025. At September 30, 2023, there were $1.1 million of outstanding common stock share repurchases recorded in Accounts payable that did not settle until 2024. Our decision to repurchase shares in 2025 will depend on business conditions, free cash flow generation, other cash requirements, and stock price. At September 30, 2024, we had approximately $1,346.1 million remaining for share repurchases under our existing board authorizations. See Item 5. Market for Registrant’s Common Equity, Related Stockholder Matters and Issuer Purchases of Equity Securities, for additional information regarding share repurchases.

We expect future uses of cash to include working capital requirements, capital expenditures, dividends to shareowners, repurchases of common stock, repayments of debt, additional contributions to our retirement plans, and acquisitions of businesses and other inorganic investments. We expect capital expenditures in 2025 to be approximately $250 million. Significant long-term uses of cash include the following (in millions):

Payments by Period
Total20252026202720282029Thereafter
Long-term debt and interest (1)$5,119.4$407.8$102.3$102.3$343.9$503.1$3,660.0
Minimum lease payments (Note 19)518.6111.097.280.659.741.3128.8
Postretirement benefits (2)44.66.76.35.75.24.716.0
Pension funding contribution (3)19.019.0
Transition tax (4)175.377.997.4
Total$5,876.9$622.4$303.2$188.6$408.8$549.1$3,804.8

(1) The amounts for Long-term debt assume that the respective debt instruments will be outstanding until their scheduled maturity dates and include interest but exclude unamortized discount. See Note 7 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information regarding our Long-term debt.

(2) Our postretirement benefit plans are unfunded and are subject to change. Amounts reported are estimates of future benefit payments, to the extent estimable.

(3) Amounts reported for pension funding contributions reflect current estimates. Contributions to our pension plans beyond 2025 will depend on future investment performance of our pension plan assets, changes in discount rate assumptions, and governmental regulations in effect at the time. Amounts subsequent to 2025 are excluded from the summary above, as we are unable to make a reasonably reliable estimate of these amounts. The minimum contribution for our U.S. pension plan as required by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) is currently zero. We may make additional contributions to this plan at the discretion of management.

(4) Under the Tax Act, the Company may elect to pay the transition tax interest-free over eight years, with 8% due in each of the first five years, 15% in year six, 20% in year seven, and 25% in year eight.

We expect to fund future uses of cash with a combination of existing cash balances, cash generated by operating activities, commercial paper borrowings, or a new issuance of debt or other securities. In addition, we have access to unsecured credit facilities with various banks.

At September 30, 2024, the majority of our Cash and cash equivalents were held by non-U.S. subsidiaries. We use a global cash pooling arrangement to allocate capital resources among our entities. As a result of the broad changes to the U.S. international tax system under the Tax Act, the Company accounts for taxes on earnings of substantially all of its non-U.S. subsidiaries including both non-U.S. and U.S. taxes. The Company has concluded that earnings of a limited number of its non-U.S. subsidiaries are indefinitely reinvested.

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In June 2022, we replaced our former $1.25 billion unsecured revolving credit facility with a new five-year $1.5 billion unsecured revolving credit facility, expiring in June 2027. This credit facility uses the secured overnight funding rate (SOFR) as the primary basis for determining interest payments. We can increase the aggregate amount of this credit facility by up to $750.0 million, subject to the consent of the banks in the credit facility. We did not borrow against this credit facility during the periods ended September 30, 2024, or September 30, 2023. Borrowings under this credit facility bear interest based on short-term money market rates in effect during the period the borrowings are outstanding. The terms of this credit facility contain covenants under which we agree to maintain an EBITDA-to-interest ratio of at least 3.0 to 1.0. The EBITDA-to-interest ratio is defined in the credit facility as the ratio of consolidated EBITDA (as defined in the facility) for the preceding four quarters to consolidated interest expense for the same period.

Among other uses, we can draw on our credit facility as a standby liquidity facility to repay our outstanding commercial paper as it matures. This access to funds to repay maturing commercial paper is an important factor in maintaining the short-term credit ratings set forth in the table below. Under our current policy with respect to these ratings, we expect to limit our other borrowings under our credit facility, if any, to amounts that would leave enough credit available under the facility so that we could borrow, if needed, to repay all of our then outstanding commercial paper as it matures.

Separate short-term unsecured credit facilities of approximately $248.5 million at September 30, 2024, were available to non-U.S. subsidiaries, of which approximately $34.6 million was committed under letters of credit. Borrowings under our non-U.S. credit facilities at September 30, 2024 and 2023, were not significant. We were in compliance with all covenants under our credit facilities at September 30, 2024 and 2023. There are no significant commitment fees or compensating balance requirements under our credit facilities.

In July 2024, Standard & Poor’s downgraded our short-term rating from A-1 to A-2 and our long-term rating from A to A- and also changed our outlook from negative to stable. No changes were made to existing ratings by Moody’s or Fitch. The following is a summary of our credit ratings as of November 12, 2024:

Credit Rating AgencyShort Term RatingLong Term RatingOutlook
Standard & Poor’sA-2A-Stable
Moody’sP-2A3Stable
Fitch RatingsF1AStable

Our ability to access the commercial paper market, and the related costs of these borrowings, is affected by the strength of our credit ratings and market conditions. We have not experienced any difficulty in accessing the commercial paper market. If our access to the commercial paper market is adversely affected due to a change in market conditions or otherwise, we would expect to rely on a combination of available cash and our unsecured committed credit facility to provide short-term funding. In such event, the cost of borrowings under our unsecured committed credit facility could be higher than the cost of commercial paper borrowings.

We regularly monitor the third-party depository institutions that hold our cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments. We diversify our cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments among counterparties to minimize exposure to any one of these entities.

We use foreign currency forward exchange contracts to manage certain foreign currency risks. We enter into these contracts to hedge our exposure to foreign currency exchange rate variability in the expected future cash flows associated with certain third-party and intercompany transactions denominated in foreign currencies forecasted to occur within the next two years. We also may use these contracts to hedge portions of our net investments in certain non-U.S. subsidiaries against the effect of exchange rate fluctuations on the translation of foreign currency balances to the U.S. dollar. In addition, we use foreign currency forward exchange contracts that are not designated as hedges to offset transaction gains or losses associated with some of our assets and liabilities resulting from intercompany loans or other transactions with third parties that are denominated in currencies other than our entities’ functional currencies. Our foreign currency forward exchange contracts are usually denominated in currencies of major industrial countries. We diversify our foreign currency forward exchange contracts among counterparties to minimize exposure to any one of these entities.

Cash dividends declared to shareowners were $572.8 million in 2024 ($5.00 per common share), $544.0 million in 2023 ($4.72 per common share), and $520.8 million in 2022 ($4.48 per common share). Our quarterly dividend rate as of September 30, 2024, is $1.25 per common share ($5.00 per common share annually), which is determined at the sole discretion of our Board of Directors.

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Supplemental Sales Information

We translate sales of subsidiaries operating outside of the United States using exchange rates effective during the respective period. Therefore, changes in currency exchange rates affect our reported sales. Sales by acquired businesses also affect our reported sales. We believe that organic sales, defined as sales excluding the effects of acquisitions and changes in currency exchange rates, which is a non-GAAP financial measure, provides useful information to investors because it reflects regional and operating segment performance from the activities of our businesses without the effect of acquisitions and changes in currency exchange rates. We use organic sales as one measure to monitor and evaluate our regional and operating segment performance. When we acquire businesses, we exclude sales in the current period for which there are no comparable sales in the prior period. We determine the effect of changes in currency exchange rates by translating the respective period’s sales using the same currency exchange rates that were in effect during the prior year. When we divest a business, we exclude sales in the prior period for which there are no comparable sales in the current period. Organic sales growth is calculated by comparing organic sales to reported sales in the prior year, excluding divestitures. We attribute sales to the geographic regions based on the country of destination.

The following is a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales by geographic region (in millions):

Year Ended September 30, 2024Year Ended September 30, 2023
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
North America$5,052.8$81.8$(3.4)$4,974.4$5,224.0
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,504.59.021.61,473.91,870.6
Asia Pacific1,072.84.8(18.2)1,086.21,358.0
Latin America634.10.44.5629.2605.4
Total Company Sales$8,264.2$96.0$4.5$8,163.7$9,058.0
Year Ended September 30, 2023Year Ended September 30, 2022
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
North America$5,224.0$15.6$(23.9)$5,232.3$4,722.0
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,870.657.5(26.3)1,839.41,437.6
Asia Pacific1,358.018.2(80.5)1,420.31,088.0
Latin America605.40.122.8582.5512.8
Total Company Sales$9,058.0$91.4$(107.9)$9,074.5$7,760.4

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The following is a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales by operating segment (in millions):

Year Ended September 30, 2024Year Ended September 30, 2023
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
Intelligent Devices$3,804.1$68.5$3.7$3,731.9$4,098.2
Software & Control2,187.42.22,185.22,886.0
Lifecycle Services2,272.727.5(1.4)2,246.62,073.8
Total Company Sales$8,264.2$96.0$4.5$8,163.7$9,058.0
Year Ended September 30, 2023Year Ended September 30, 2022
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
Intelligent Devices$4,098.2$80.6$(46.4)$4,064.0$3,544.6
Software & Control2,886.0(30.7)2,916.72,312.9
Lifecycle Services2,073.810.8(30.8)2,093.81,902.9
Total Company Sales$9,058.0$91.4$(107.9)$9,074.5$7,760.4

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Critical Accounting Estimates

We believe the following accounting estimates are the most critical to the understanding of our financial statements as they could have the most significant effect on our reported results and require subjective or complex judgments by management. Accounting principles generally accepted in the United States require us to make estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amounts of assets and liabilities at the date of the consolidated financial statements and revenues and expenses during the periods reported. These estimates are based on our best judgment about current and future conditions, but actual results could differ from those estimates. Refer to Note 1 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for information regarding our significant accounting policies.

Goodwill - Sensia Reporting Unit

The quantitative test of goodwill for impairment requires us to estimate the fair value of our reporting units. During the second quarter of fiscal 2024, we performed our annual quantitative impairment test for our Sensia reporting unit. As a result of that quantitative test, we concluded that the second quarter Goodwill balance within the Sensia reporting unit of $160.7 million was not impaired, as the fair value of the Sensia reporting unit was determined to exceed its carrying value by approximately 25 percent.

Critical assumptions used in this approach included management’s estimated future revenue growth rates and margins, a discount rate, and a market multiple. Estimated future revenue growth and margins are based on management’s best estimate about current and future conditions. The revenue growth rate assumption reflects above market growth over the next five years before moderating back to a growth rate approximating longer term average inflationary rates. The forecasted near-term growth rate projections take into account recent revenue performance and the orders backlog. Margin assumptions reflect volume and mix, productivity to offset cost inflation, and price used to fund investments. The assumptions and estimates made are based on a number of factors, including historical experience, reference to external product available market and industry growth publications, analysis of peer group projections, and information obtained from the management team, including backlog. Actual results and forecasts of revenue growth and margins for our Sensia reporting unit may be impacted by its concentration within the Oil & Gas industry and with its customer base. Demand for Sensia hardware and software products, solutions, and services is sensitive to industry volatility and risks, including those related to commodity prices, supply and demand dynamics, production costs, geological activity, and political activities. If such factors impact our ability to achieve forecasted revenue growth rates and margins, the fair value of the reporting unit could decrease, which may result in an impairment. We determined the discount rate using our weighted average cost of capital adjusted for risk factors including risk associated with our above market revenue growth assumptions, historical performance, and industry-specific and economic factors. Also, industry-specific and economic factors that increase the discount rate or decrease the market multiple can decrease the fair value of the Sensia reporting unit, which may result in an impairment.

More information regarding goodwill impairment testing is contained in Note 1 and Note 3 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

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Retirement Benefits - Pension

Pension costs and obligations are actuarially determined and are influenced by assumptions used to estimate these amounts, including the discount rate. Changes in any of the assumptions and the amortization of differences between the assumptions and actual experience will affect the amount of pension expense in future periods.

Our global pension expense in 2024 was $13.2 million compared to $122.0 million in 2023; global pension expense in 2023 included $123.4 million of settlement charges. Approximately all of our 2024 global pension expense and 70 percent of our global projected benefit obligation relate to our U.S. pension plan. The discount rate used to determine our 2024 U.S. pension expense was 6.10 percent, compared to 5.65 percent for 2023.

For 2025, our U.S. discount rate will decrease to 5.10 percent from 6.10 percent in 2024. The discount rate was set as of our September 30 measurement date and was determined by modeling a portfolio of bonds that match the expected cash flow of our benefit plans.

The changes in our discount rate have an inverse relationship with our net periodic benefit cost and projected benefit obligation. The following chart illustrates the estimated change in projected benefit obligation and annual net periodic benefit cost assuming a change of 25 basis points in the discount rate for our U.S. pension plans (in millions):

Pension Benefits
Change in Projected Benefit ObligationChange in Net Periodic Benefit Cost (1)
Discount rate$64.9$6.9

(1) Change includes both operating and non-operating pension costs.

More information regarding pension benefits is contained in Note 14 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Revenue Recognition - Customer Incentives

We offer various incentive programs that provide distributors and direct sale customers with cash rebates, account credits, or additional hardware and software products, solutions, and services based on meeting specified program criteria. Customer incentives are recognized as a reduction of sales if distributed in cash or customer account credits. We record accruals at the time of revenue recognition as a current liability within Customer returns, rebates, and incentives in our Consolidated Balance Sheet or, where a right of setoff exists, as a reduction of Receivables. Customer incentives for additional hardware and software products, solutions, and services to be provided are considered distinct performance obligations. As such, we allocate revenue to them based on relative standalone selling price. Until the incentive is redeemed, the revenue is recorded as a contract liability.

Our primary incentive program provides distributors with cash rebates or account credits based on agreed amounts that vary depending on the customer to whom our distributor ultimately sells the product. A critical assumption used in estimating the accrual for this program is the time period from when revenue is recognized to when the rebate is processed. Our estimate is based primarily on historical experience. If the time period were to change by 10 percent, the effect would be an adjustment to the accrual of approximately $20.7 million.

More information regarding our revenue recognition and returns, rebates, and incentives policies are contained in Note 1 and Note 2 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

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Acquisitions - Clearpath Intangible Assets Valuation

We account for business acquisitions by allocating the purchase price to tangible and intangible assets acquired and liabilities assumed at their fair values; the excess of the purchase price over the allocated amount is recorded as goodwill. We engaged an independent third-party valuation specialist to assist with the fair value allocation of the intangible assets assumed through the acquisition of Clearpath. The intangible assets were valued using income approaches, specifically the relief from royalty method and multi-period excess earnings method. This required the use of several assumptions and estimates including forecasted revenue growth rates, margin, and cash flows attributable to existing customers, obsolescence factor, royalty rate, contributory asset charges, customer attrition rate, and discount rates. Although we believe the assumptions and estimates made were reasonable and appropriate, these estimates require judgment and are based in part on historical experience and information obtained from Clearpath management.

The key assumption requiring the use of judgement in the valuation of the $269.9 million technology asset was the obsolescence factor. The obsolescence factor of 12 years was calculated based on the depletion of existing technology using a variety of factors including research and development spend toward new product development and scheduled patent expiration. A two-year change in this assumption would result in a change of approximately $82 million in intangible assets. The key assumption requiring the use of judgement in the valuation of the $41.6 million trademark intangible asset was the weighted average royalty rate of 2.05 percent. This rate was based on royalty market data. A 100 basis point change in the royalty rate would result in a change of $20 million in intangible assets.

More information regarding this business combination is contained in Note 4 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Recent Accounting Pronouncements

See Note 1 in the Consolidated Financial Statements regarding recent accounting pronouncements.

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FY 2023 10-K MD&A

SEC filing source: 0001024478-23-000126.

Extracted structurally from real Item 7 body heading to real Item 7A/8 boundary. Confidence: high. Filing date: 2023-11-08. Report date: 2023-09-30.

Item 7. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations

Results of Operations

Non-GAAP Measures

The following discussion includes organic sales, total segment operating earnings and margin, adjusted income, adjusted EPS, adjusted effective tax rate, and free cash flow, which are non-GAAP measures. See Supplemental Sales Information for a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales and a discussion of why we believe this non-GAAP measure is useful to investors. See Summary of Results of Operations for a reconciliation of Income before income taxes to total segment operating earnings and margin and a discussion of why we believe these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors. See Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation for a reconciliation of Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate to adjusted income, adjusted EPS, and adjusted effective tax rate, respectively, and a discussion of why we believe these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors. See Financial Condition for a reconciliation of Cash provided by operating activities to free cash flow and a discussion of why we believe this non-GAAP measure is useful to investors.

Overview

Rockwell Automation, Inc. is the world’s largest company dedicated to industrial automation and digital transformation. Overall demand for our hardware and software products, solutions, and services is driven by:

•investments in manufacturing, including new facilities or production lines, upgrades, modifications and expansions of existing facilities or production lines;

•investments in basic materials production capacity, which may be related to commodity pricing levels;

•our customers’ needs for faster time to market, agility to address evolving consumer preferences, operational productivity, asset management and reliability, and business resilience, including security and enterprise risk management;

•our customers’ needs to continuously improve quality, safety, and sustainability;

•industry factors that include our customers’ new product introductions, demand for our customers’ products or services, and the regulatory and competitive environments in which our customers operate;

•levels of global industrial production and capacity utilization;

•regional factors that include local political, social, regulatory, and economic circumstances; and

•the spending patterns of our customers due to their annual budgeting processes and their working schedules.

Long-term Strategy

Our strategy is to expand human possibility. Our vision is to create the future of industrial operations. As the world’s largest company dedicated to industrial automation and digital transformation, our strategy is to bring the Connected Enterprise® to life. We understand and simplify our customers’ complex production challenges and deliver the most valued solutions that combine technology and industry expertise. As a result, we make our customers more resilient, agile, and sustainable, creating more ways to win. We deliver value by helping our customers optimize production, build resilience, empower people, become more sustainable, and accelerate transformation.

Rockwell Automation stands at the intersection of the technological and societal trends that are shaping the future of industrial operations. We see converging megatrends including digitization and artificial intelligence, energy transition and sustainability, shifting demographics, and an increased need for resiliency.

Our long-term profitable growth framework outlines how we will deliver accelerated growth while we continue to transform our company to meet stakeholder expectations over the longer term:

•achieve faster secular growth in traditional markets due to customer needs for resiliency (including cybersecurity), agility, sustainability, and mitigating impacts of labor shortages;

•grow share and create new ways to win through technology differentiation, industry focus, go to market acceleration, expanded offerings and new markets;

•accelerate growth in annual recurring revenue;

•add 1% growth from acquisitions annually; and

•deliver profitable growth within a disciplined financial framework.

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Sustainability

Our 2022 Sustainability Report highlights our sustainability strategy and outcomes. Our sustainability priorities are focused on three outcomes:

•Sustainable Customers - enable our customers to achieve their own sustainability goals, making a positive impact on the world;

•Sustainable Company - create innovative, sustainable products and solutions and foster a culture that empowers employees to operate safely, sustainably, and responsibly; and

•Sustainable Communities - support the communities in which we live and work, having an impact that extends beyond our own organization.

We will meet our customers where they are on their sustainability journey. Whether they are just starting or leading the way, we help them translate insights into impacts across energy, water, and waste. Our technologies provide data transparency across value chains and enable our partners to scale innovative and often industry-first sustainable solutions.

•Energy - contemporary industrial energy management software solutions that put energy data in context to production data, to reduce energy use across the value chain.

•Water - smart water solutions leverage modern software and analytics to improve operations visibility, system reliability, and worker productivity while supporting security needs and meeting regulatory obligations.

•Waste - enabling the circular economy for managing automation assets. Focus on developing solutions to automate industry-specific processes.

Differentiation through Technology Innovation and Domain Expertise

We have an industry leading portfolio of hardware, software, and services to give customers the flexibility to choose on-premises, edge, and cloud-native solutions.

Our integrated control and information architecture, with Logix at its core, is an important differentiator. We are the only automation provider that can support many production disciplines, including discrete, process, batch, safety, security, motion, robotics, and power control, in a single hardware and software environment, helping customers increase the speed of deployment and reduce their total cost of ownership.

Our open architecture and strong partner ecosystem allow customers to work with best-in-class partners across the technology stack and leverage existing infrastructure with new solutions.

Complementing our strong technology differentiation is our own domain expertise. Domain expertise refers to the industry and application knowledge required to deliver solutions and services that support customers through the entire lifecycle of their automation investment. The combination of industry-specific domain expertise of our people with our innovative technologies enables us to help our customers automate and transform their manufacturing processes and solve their business challenges. Our digital services business has a deep understanding of customers’ biggest digital transformation challenges and opportunities for further productivity and growth.

Market Access and Expansion

Over the past decade, our investments in technology and globalization have enabled us to expand our addressed market to over $120 billion. With our focus on innovation and growth, we expect to continue to expand our addressed market over our long-term planning horizon.

In most counties, our direct sales force works with Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), system integrators, technology partners, and end users in conjunction with independent distributors. Approximately 70 percent of our global sales are transacted through independent distributors. Sales to our two largest distributors in 2023, 2022, and 2021, which are attributable to all three segments, were approximately 20 percent of our total sales.

OEMs represent an important growth opportunity. To remain competitive, OEMs need to find the optimal balance of machine cost and performance while reducing their time to market. Our scalable technology, leading design productivity tools, and recent acquisitions in our Intelligent Devices and Software & Control businesses support OEMs in addressing these business needs.

The emerging markets of Asia Pacific and Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) are projected to be the fastest growing over our long-term planning horizon, due to higher levels of infrastructure investment and the growing middle-class population.

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We believe that increased demand for consumer products in these markets will lead to manufacturing investment and provide us with additional growth opportunities in the future.

We have developed a powerful partner ecosystem that acts as an amplifier to our internal capabilities and enables us to serve our customers’ evolving needs around the world.

Acquisitions and Investments

Our acquisition and investment strategy focuses on hardware and software products, solutions, and services that will be catalytic to the organic growth of our core offerings.

Our key priorities for inorganic investments include:

•annual recurring revenue;

•market expansion in Europe and Asia; and

•application-specific differentiated technology in focus industries.

In addition, we make venture investments that enable access to leading-edge and complementary technologies aligned with our strategic priorities, accelerate internal development efforts, reduce time to market, and provide insights into disruptive technologies.

We believe these acquisitions and venture investments will help our served market and deliver value to our customers. See Note 4 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on our recent acquisitions.

Attracting, Developing, and Retaining Highly Qualified Employees

At Rockwell Automation, we promise to expand human possibility within our company and throughout the world of industrial production, and we work to attract and develop highly engaged people who can and want to do their best work.

Our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion starts at the top. Our 11 board members include four female and two African American directors. In fiscal 2021, we hired our first chief diversity officer and made investments to accelerate our efforts to increase diversity, equity, and inclusion across the company.

A culture of integrity is fundamental to Rockwell’s core values, including a formal ethics and compliance organization and an Ombuds office that investigates ethical and legal concerns brought forth by employees. Our code of conduct, along with our partner code of conduct and supplier code of conduct prohibits corrupt acts, bribery, and anticompetitive behavior. Employee training is used to reinforce our values companywide, with participation in trainings related to ethics, environment, health and safety, and emergency responses at or near 100%.

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There are several ways in which we attract, develop, and retain highly qualified employees, including:

•We make the safety and health of our employees a top priority. We strive for zero workplace injuries and illnesses and operate in a manner that recognizes safety as fundamental to Rockwell Automation being a great place to work. In fiscal 2023, we achieved 0.27 recordable cases per 100 employees.

•We capture and act upon employee feedback through our annual employee engagement survey. It measures several engagement indicators and drivers and provides an overall employee engagement index (EEI) with external benchmark comparison. The latest survey, conducted in February 2023, showed an EEI of 76, which was eight points higher than the industry norm of 68 for this index. Our global inclusion index score was 81, six points higher than the industry norm of 75.

•We invest in growth and development of our employees. As the pace of change increases, it is important we provide re-skilling and upskilling opportunities for our technical talent, along with soft skills and leadership development for all. We offer a portfolio of all employee, managerial, and leader training that spans on-demand, virtual, and live instructor-led formats. Our programs focus on basic as well as transformational skills. We take pride in our culture and in fiscal 2021 created an opportunity for our employees to participate in team-based culture workshops that have evolved into a standard during new employee onboarding. In fiscal 2023, the majority of our employees completed one or more of our training programs representing over 650,000 learning hours.

•We offer employee assistance and work life benefits to all global employees. Our comprehensive benefits include healthcare benefits, disability and life insurance benefits, paid time off, and leave programs. Rockwell offers plans and resources to help employees meet future savings goals through defined benefit and retirement savings plans. We offer flextime, remote work, and part-time arrangements whenever business conditions permit. We believe that face to face interaction is critical for our culture, innovation, people development, and engagement, and that flexible, virtual work arrangements help employees be more productive and engaged. During fiscal 2022, we launched our Hybrid Workplace Program, which combines the values of both physical workspaces and virtual work options, both of which are important for attracting, retaining, and developing employees and facilitating innovation, engagement, and productivity.

We monitor employee retention and attrition rates by demographic factors including by gender, ethnicity, generation, years of service, career role, region, business, and function. We generally experienced lower attrition rates in fiscal 2023 as compared to fiscal 2022. We believe the decrease is consistent with market trends experienced broadly across labor markets in fiscal 2023. We use attrition rate information to identify and address unfavorable trends to mitigate risk to our business. See Item 1A. Risk Factors for a discussion of risks relating to our inability to attract, develop, and retain highly qualified employees.

At September 30, 2023, our employees, including those employed by consolidated subsidiaries, by region were approximately:

North America10,000
Europe, Middle East and Africa5,500
Asia Pacific7,500
Latin America6,000
Total employees29,000

Our employees had the following global gender demographics based on voluntary disclosure:

September 30, 2023
WomenMenUndisclosed
All employees33%67%—%
Individual Contributors34%66%—%
People Managers27%73%—%
Technical Talent19%81%—%
Manufacturing Associates46%53%1%

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Our U.S. employees had the following race and ethnicity demographics based on voluntary disclosure:

September 30, 2023
Black / African AmericanAsianHispanic / LatinxWhiteMultiracial, Native American and Pacific IslanderUndisclosed
All U.S. Employees8%11%5%70%2%4%
Individual Contributors9%11%5%69%2%4%
People Managers6%8%6%76%1%3%
Technical Talent6%13%5%72%2%2%
Manufacturing Associates19%15%4%50%2%10%

Continuous Improvement

Productivity and continuous improvement are important components of our culture. We have programs in place that drive ongoing process improvement, functional streamlining, material cost savings, and manufacturing productivity. These are intended to improve profitability that can be used to fund investments in growth and to offset inflation. Our ongoing productivity initiatives target both cost reduction and improved asset utilization. Charges for workforce reductions and facility rationalization may be required in order to effectively execute our productivity programs.

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U.S. Economic Trends

In 2023, sales in the U.S. accounted for over half of our total sales. The various indicators we use to gauge the direction and momentum of our served U.S. markets include:

•The Industrial Production (IP) Index, published by the Federal Reserve, which measures the real output of manufacturing, mining, and electric and gas utilities. The IP Index is expressed as a percentage of real output in a base year, currently 2017.

•The Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI), published by the Institute for Supply Management (ISM), which indicates the current and near-term state of manufacturing activity in the U.S. According to the ISM, a PMI measure above 50 indicates that the U.S. manufacturing economy is generally expanding while a measure below 50 indicates that it is generally contracting.

The table below depicts the trends in these indicators from fiscal 2021 to 2023. These figures are as of November 8, 2023, and are subject to revision by the issuing organizations. The IP Index remains constant in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2023 versus the third quarter of fiscal 2023. Manufacturing PMI results continued to be soft in the fourth quarter of 2023. The Manufacturing PMI reading in the month of September was the highest of the quarter, however it still remains below 50.

IP IndexPMI
Fiscal 2023 quarter ended:
September 202399.649.0
June 202399.646.0
March 202399.546.3
December 202299.648.4
Fiscal 2022 quarter ended:
September 2022102.450.9
June 2022101.953.0
March 2022101.157.1
December 2021100.158.8
Fiscal 2021 quarter ended:
September 202198.860.5
June 202197.960.9
March 202196.763.7
December 202096.160.5

Inflation in the U.S. has also had an impact on our input costs and pricing. We used the Producer Price Index (PPI), published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which measures the average change over time in the selling prices received by domestic producers for their output. After observing double-digit PPI growth through most of 2022, we have now observed PPI growth in the low single digits for the last three quarters. Producer prices remain elevated, however, year over year increases continued to decelerate following last years' surge in prices.

Non-U.S. Economic Trends

In 2023, sales to customers outside the U.S. accounted for less than half of our total sales. These customers include both indigenous companies and multinational companies with a global presence. In addition to the global factors previously mentioned in the Overview section, international demand, particularly in emerging markets, has historically been driven by the strength of the industrial economy in each region, investments in infrastructure, and expanding consumer markets. We use changes in key countries' gross domestic product (GDP), IP, and PMI as indicators of the growth opportunities in each region where we do business. Industrial output outside the U.S. was mixed in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2023.

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Supply Chain

We have a global supply chain, including a network of suppliers and distribution and manufacturing facilities. The supply chain has been stressed by increased demand, along with pandemic-related and other global events that have put additional pressures on manufacturing output. Although there has been a continued gradual improvement in the supply chain environment, this has resulted in and could continue to result in:

•challenges in our supply chain;

•difficulty in procuring or inability to procure components and materials necessary for our hardware and software products, solutions, and services;

•increased costs for commodities and components; and

•delays in delivering, or an inability to deliver, our hardware and software products, solutions, and services.

Our total order backlog consists of (in millions):

September 30,
20232022
Intelligent Devices$1,464.1$2,086.1
Software & Control897.51,456.8
Lifecycle Services1,747.31,654.1
Total Company$4,108.9$5,197.0

See Note 2 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on the nature of our products and services and revenue recognition.

We are closely managing our end-to-end supply chain, from sourcing to production to customer delivery, with a particular focus on all critical and at-risk suppliers and supplier locations globally. We have made large-scale investments to increase capacity across our network in support of our orders growth. Additional actions we are taking include:

•extending order visibility to our supply base to ensure we are appropriately planning for extended component lead times;

•securing longer-term supply agreements with critical partners;

•re-engineering of existing products to increase component supply resiliency;

•capacity investments, including redundant manufacturing lines and additional electronic assembly equipment; and

•qualification of additional suppliers to diversify our supplier base.

We believe these and other actions we are taking are enabling us to normalize our product lead times and reduce our backlog.

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Summary of Results of Operations

The following table reflects our sales and operating results (in millions, except per share amounts and percentages):

Year Ended September 30,
202320222021
Sales
Intelligent Devices (a)$4,098.2$3,544.6$3,311.9
Software & Control (b)2,886.02,312.91,947.0
Lifecycle Services (c)2,073.81,902.91,738.5
Total sales (d)$9,058.0$7,760.4$6,997.4
Segment operating earnings (1)
Intelligent Devices (e)$828.2$717.6$702.1
Software & Control (f)953.2666.7531.0
Lifecycle Services (g)148.4158.3158.2
Total segment operating earnings (2) (h)1,929.81,542.61,391.3
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment(264.4)(103.9)(55.1)
Corporate and other(127.9)(104.7)(120.6)
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost(82.7)(4.7)(63.8)
Change in fair value of investments279.3(136.9)397.4
Legal settlement70.0
Interest expense, net(125.6)(118.8)(93.0)
Income before income taxes (i)1,608.51,073.61,526.2
Income tax provision(330.5)(154.5)(181.9)
Net income1,278.0919.11,344.3
Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests(109.4)(13.1)(13.8)
Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation$1,387.4$932.2$1,358.1
Diluted EPS$11.95$7.97$11.58
Adjusted EPS (3)$12.12$9.49$9.43
Diluted weighted average outstanding shares115.6116.7117.1
Pre-tax margin (i/d)17.8%13.8%21.8%
Intelligent Devices segment operating margin (e/a)20.2%20.2%21.2%
Software & Control segment operating margin (f/b)33.0%28.8%27.3%
Lifecycle Services segment operating margin (g/c)7.2%8.3%9.1%
Total segment operating margin (2) (h/d)21.3%19.9%19.9%

(1) See Note 19 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for the definition of segment operating earnings.

(2) Total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin are non-GAAP financial measures. We exclude purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, impairment, corporate and other, non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost, change in fair value of investments, the $70 million legal settlement in fiscal 2021, interest expense, net, and income tax provision because we do not consider these items to be directly related to the operating performance of our segments. We believe total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin are useful to investors as measures of operating performance. We use these measures to monitor and evaluate the profitability of our operating segments. Our measures of total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin may be different from measures used by other companies.

(3) Adjusted EPS is a non-GAAP earnings measure. See Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation for more information on this non-GAAP measure.

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2023 Compared to 2022

Sales

Sales in fiscal 2023 increased 16.7 percent compared to 2022. Organic sales increased 16.9 percent. Currency translation decreased sales by 1.4 percentage points. Acquisitions increased sales by 1.2 percentage points. Total and organic annual recurring revenue at September 30, 2023, grew approximately 16 percent compared to September 30, 2022. See Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) for information on this measure. Pricing increased total company sales by approximately 5.5 percentage points, realized in the Intelligent Devices and Software & Control segments.

The table below presents our sales for the year ended September 30, 2023, attributed to the geographic regions based upon country of destination, and the percentage change from the same period in 2022 (in millions, except percentages). The results by region and segment were primarily impacted by the composition of backlog versus underlying demand.

Change vs.Change in Organic Sales (1) vs.
Year Ended September 30, 2023Year Ended September 30, 2022Year Ended September 30, 2022
North America$5,224.010.6%10.8%
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,870.630.1%27.9%
Asia Pacific1,358.024.8%30.5%
Latin America605.418.1%13.6%
Total Company Sales$9,058.016.7%16.9%

(1) Organic sales and organic sales growth exclude the effect of acquisitions, changes in currency exchange rates, and divestitures. See Supplemental Sales Information for information on these non-GAAP measures.

Corporate and Other

Corporate and other expenses were $127.9 million in fiscal 2023 compared to $104.7 million in fiscal 2022. The increase was primarily due to the year over year impact of mark-to-market adjustments related to our deferred and non-qualified compensation plans.

Income before Income Taxes

Income before income taxes increased to $1,608.5 million in 2023 from $1,073.6 million in 2022. The increase was primarily due to higher sales and fair value adjustments in connection with our previous investment in PTC (the PTC adjustments), partially offset by a $157.5 million accounting charge for impairment of goodwill for our Sensia joint venture (goodwill impairment) recognized in 2023, compared to 2022. Total segment operating earnings increased to $1,929.8 million from $1,542.6 million in 2022, due to higher sales, partially offset by higher investment spend and higher incentive compensation.

See Critical Accounting Estimates and Note 3 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for further discussion of the goodwill impairment.

Income Taxes

The effective tax rate in 2023 was 20.5 percent compared to 14.4 percent in 2022. The increase in the effective tax rate was primarily due to a valuation allowance established on certain deferred tax assets of our Sensia joint venture and tax effects of the related goodwill impairment, totaling $33.1 million. The Adjusted Effective Tax Rate in 2023 was 16.4 percent compared to 16.0 percent in 2022.

See Note 16 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for a complete reconciliation of the United States statutory tax rate to the effective tax rate and additional information on tax events in 2023 and 2022 affecting each year’s respective tax rates.

Net Loss Attributable to Noncontrolling Interests

Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests was $109.4 million in 2023 compared to $13.1 million in 2022. The increase was driven by $93.3 million of the accounting charge for goodwill impairment and related tax effects including tax asset valuation allowances that is attributable to noncontrolling interests.

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Diluted EPS and Adjusted EPS

Fiscal 2023 Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation was $1,387.4 million or $11.95 per share, compared to $932.2 million or $7.97 per share in fiscal 2022. The increases in Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation and diluted EPS were primarily due to higher total segment operating earnings and the PTC adjustments, partially offset by $97.3 million of expense for the goodwill impairment net of its related tax and noncontrolling interest effects. Adjusted EPS was $12.12 in fiscal 2023, up 27.7 percent compared to $9.49 in fiscal 2022, primarily due to higher sales, partially offset by higher investment spend and higher incentive compensation.

Intelligent Devices

Sales

Intelligent Devices sales increased 15.6 percent in 2023 compared to 2022. Organic sales increased 14.6 percent. The effects of currency translation decreased sales by 1.3 percentage points and acquisitions increased sales by 2.3 percentage points. All regions experienced reported and organic sales increases.

Segment Operating Margin

Intelligent Devices segment operating earnings increased 15.4 percent year over year. Segment operating margin was 20.2 percent in 2023, unchanged from a year ago.

Software & Control

Sales

Software & Control sales increased 24.8 percent in 2023 compared to 2022. Organic sales increased 26.1 percent. The effects of currency translation decreased sales by 1.3 percentage points. All regions experienced reported and organic sales increases.

Segment Operating Margin

Software & Control segment operating earnings increased 43.0 percent year over year. Segment operating margin increased to 33.0 percent in 2023 from 28.8 percent in 2022, primarily due to higher sales, partially offset by higher investment spend and higher incentive compensation.

Lifecycle Services

Sales

Lifecycle Services sales increased 9.0 percent in 2023 compared to 2022. Organic sales increased 10.0 percent. The effects of currency translation decreased sales by 1.6 percentage points and acquisitions increased sales by 0.6 percentage points. All regions experienced reported and organic sales increases.

Segment Operating Margin

Lifecycle Services segment operating earnings decreased 6.3 percent year over year. Segment operating margin decreased to 7.2 percent in 2023 from 8.3 percent in 2022, as the benefit of higher sales was more than offset by higher incentive compensation costs and one-time expenses to expand future profitability.

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2022 Compared to 2021

For a discussion of the Company’s fiscal 2022 results compared to fiscal 2021, see the Company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended September 30, 2022, filed on November 8, 2022.

Supplemental Segment Information

Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment and non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit) are not allocated to our operating segments because these costs are excluded from our measurement of each segment’s operating performance for internal purposes. If we were to allocate these costs, we would attribute them to each of our segments as follows (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202320222021
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment
Intelligent Devices$4.7$2.5$2.7
Software & Control68.569.019.2
Lifecycle Services190.231.432.1
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit)
Intelligent Devices$21.2$(3.5)$14.1
Software & Control21.2(3.5)14.1
Lifecycle Services28.3(4.8)18.8

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Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation

Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate are non-GAAP earnings measures that exclude non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost, purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation, change in fair value of investments, and Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests, including their respective tax effects. Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation includes an accounting charge related to goodwill impairment for our Sensia joint venture. The tax effect of the purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation includes the tax effects on the Sensia joint venture goodwill impairment and related Sensia tax asset valuation allowances. Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost is defined as all components of our net periodic pension and postretirement benefit cost except for service cost. See Note 14 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information on our net periodic pension and postretirement benefit cost.

We believe that Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate provide useful information to our investors about our operating performance and allow management and investors to compare our operating performance period over period. Adjusted EPS is also used as a financial measure of performance for our annual incentive compensation. Our measures of Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate may be different from measures used by other companies. These non-GAAP measures should not be considered a substitute for Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate.

The following are reconciliations of Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate to Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate, respectively (in millions, except per share amounts and percentages):

Year Ended September 30,
202320222021
Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation$1,387.4$932.2$1,358.1
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost82.74.763.8
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost(20.6)(1.9)(16.0)
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation (1)178.391.943.2
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation (1)(9.4)(22.3)(10.5)
Change in fair value of investments (2)(279.3)136.9(397.4)
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments (2)67.6(30.8)64.7
Adjusted Income$1,406.7$1,110.7$1,105.9
Diluted EPS$11.95$7.97$11.58
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost0.720.040.55
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost(0.18)(0.02)(0.14)
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation1.540.780.37
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation(0.08)(0.19)(0.09)
Change in fair value of investments (2)(2.42)1.17(3.39)
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments (2)0.59(0.26)0.55
Adjusted EPS$12.12$9.49$9.43
Effective tax rate20.5%14.4%11.9%
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost0.3%0.1%0.5%
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, and impairment attributable to Rockwell Automation(3.7)%0.6%0.4%
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments (2)(0.7)%0.9%(1.2)%
Adjusted Effective Tax Rate16.4%16.0%11.6%

(1) Includes $97.3 million net expense from $157.5 million goodwill impairment charge included in Income before income taxes, $33.1 tax effect from goodwill impairment and related valuation allowances recorded in Income tax provision, and ($93.3) million Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests.

(2) Primarily relates to the change in fair value of our previous investment in PTC.

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Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR)

Organic ARR is a key metric that enables measurement of progress in growing our recurring revenue business. It represents the annual contract value of all active recurring revenue contracts at any point in time. Recurring revenue is defined as a revenue stream that is contractual, typically for a period of 12 months or more, and has a high probability of renewal. The probability of renewal is based on historical renewal experience of the individual revenue streams, or management's best estimates if historical renewal experience is not available. Organic ARR growth is calculated as the dollar change in ARR, adjusted to exclude the effects of currency translation and acquisitions, divided by ARR as of the prior period. The effects of currency translation are excluded by calculating Organic ARR on a constant currency basis. When we acquire businesses, we exclude the effect of ARR in the current period for which there was no comparable ARR in the prior period. We believe that Organic ARR provides useful information to investors because it reflects our recurring revenue performance period over period without the effect of acquisitions and changes in currency exchange rates. Organic ARR growth is also used as a financial measure of performance for our annual incentive compensation. Because ARR is based on annual contract value, it does not represent revenue recognized during a particular reporting period or revenue to be recognized in future reporting periods and is not intended to be a substitute for revenue, contract liabilities, or backlog.

Total ARR growth is calculated as the dollar change in ARR, adjusted to exclude the effects of currency. The effects of currency translation are excluded by calculating Total ARR on a constant currency basis. Total ARR includes acquisitions even if there was no comparable ARR in the prior period. We believe that Total ARR provides useful information to investors because it reflects our recurring revenue performance period over period including the effect of acquisitions.

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Financial Condition

The following is a summary of our cash flows from operating, investing, and financing activities, as reflected in the Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202320222021
Cash provided by (used for)
Operating activities$1,374.6$823.1$1,261.0
Investing activities854.3(7.8)(2,626.6)
Financing activities(1,675.6)(934.2)1,297.8
Effect of exchange rate changes on cash19.2(52.6)16.8
Increase (decrease) in cash, cash equivalents, and restricted cash$572.5$(171.5)$(51.0)

The following table summarizes free cash flow, which is a non-GAAP financial measure (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202320222021
Cash provided by operating activities$1,374.6$823.1$1,261.0
Capital expenditures(160.5)(141.1)(120.3)
Free cash flow$1,214.1$682.0$1,140.7

Our definition of free cash flow takes into consideration capital investments required to maintain the operations of our businesses and execute our strategy. Cash provided by operating activities adds back non-cash depreciation expense to earnings but does not reflect a charge for necessary capital expenditures. Our definition of free cash flow excludes the operating cash flows and capital expenditures related to our discontinued operations, if any. Operating, investing, and financing cash flows of our discontinued operations, if any, are presented separately in our Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows. In our opinion, free cash flow provides useful information to investors regarding our ability to generate cash from business operations that is available for acquisitions and other investments, service of debt principal, dividends, and share repurchases. We use free cash flow, as defined, as one measure to monitor and evaluate our performance, including as a financial measure for our annual incentive compensation. Our definition of free cash flow may be different from definitions used by other companies.

Cash provided by operating activities was $1,374.6 million for the year ended September 30, 2023, compared to $823.1 million for the year ended September 30, 2022. Free cash flow was $1,214.1 million for the year ended September 30, 2023, compared to $682.0 million for the year ended September 30, 2022. The year-over-year increases in cash provided by operating activities and free cash flow were primarily due to higher pre-tax income.

As of September 30, 2023, all of our remaining PTC Inc. (PTC) common stock (PTC Shares) have been sold. We began selling our shares in fiscal 2022 utilizing both open market and 10b5-1 plan transactions. As of September 30, 2023 and 2022, the fiscal year sales of our PTC shares under our 10b5-1 plan and open market sales resulted in a gross inflow of $1,210.4 million and $210.2 million, respectively. This excludes any tax liability related to the realized gain on sale of the investment. These proceeds will support our future uses of cash. All of our sales of PTC Shares are consistent with the transfer restrictions in the securities purchase agreement, as amended, with PTC.

Our Short-term debt as of September 30, 2023 and 2022, includes $23.5 million and $42.3 million, respectively, of interest-bearing loans from SLB to Sensia, due December 29, 2023. In December 2022, Sensia entered into an unsecured $75.0 million line of credit. As of September 30, 2023, included in Short-term debt was $70.0 million borrowed against the line of credit with an interest rate of 6.29 percent. Also included in Short-term debt as of September 30, 2022 was commercial paper borrowings of $317.0 million with a weighted average interest rate of 3.03 percent and a weighted average maturity period of 22 days.

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We repurchased approximately 1.2 million shares of our common stock under our share repurchase program in 2023 at a total cost of $311.0 million and an average cost of $265.48 per share. In 2022, we repurchased approximately 1.3 million shares of our common stock under our share repurchase program at a total cost of $301.1 million and an average cost of $223.05 per share. At September 30, 2023, there were $1.1 million of outstanding common stock share repurchases recorded in Accounts payable that did not settle until 2024. At September 30, 2022, there were $1.6 million of outstanding common stock share repurchases recorded in Accounts payable that did not settle until 2023. Our decision to repurchase shares in 2024 will depend on business conditions, free cash flow generation, other cash requirements, and stock price. At September 30, 2023, we had approximately $940.3 million remaining for share repurchases under our existing board authorizations. See Item 5. Market for Registrant’s Common Equity, Related Stockholder Matters, and Issuer Purchases of Equity Securities, for additional information regarding share repurchases.

We expect future uses of cash to include working capital requirements, capital expenditures, acquisitions of businesses and other inorganic investments, dividends to shareowners, repurchases of common stock, additional contributions to our retirement plans and repayments of debt. We expect capital expenditures in 2024 to be approximately $220 million. Significant long-term uses of cash include the following (in millions):

Payments by Period
Total20242025202620272028Thereafter
Long-term debt and interest (1)$5,229.1$110.9$406.6$102.3$102.3$343.9$4,163.1
Minimum lease payments (Note 18)409.6100.586.364.449.135.473.9
Postretirement benefits (2)46.47.36.86.25.65.015.5
Pension funding contribution (3)26.626.6
Transition tax (4)233.758.477.997.4
Capital gains tax on sale of PTC Shares67.467.4
Total$5,945.4$303.7$577.6$270.3$157.0$384.3$4,252.5

(1) The amounts for Long-term debt assume that the respective debt instruments will be outstanding until their scheduled maturity dates and include interest but exclude unamortized discount. See Note 7 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information regarding our Long-term debt.

(2) Our postretirement benefit plans are unfunded and are subject to change. Amounts reported are estimates of future benefit payments, to the extent estimable.

(3) Amounts reported for pension funding contributions reflect current estimates. Contributions to our pension plans beyond 2024 will depend on future investment performance of our pension plan assets, changes in discount rate assumptions, and governmental regulations in effect at the time. Amounts subsequent to 2024 are excluded from the summary above, as we are unable to make a reasonably reliable estimate of these amounts. The minimum contribution for our U.S. pension plan as required by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) is currently zero. We may make additional contributions to this plan at the discretion of management.

(4) Under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (the Tax Act), the Company may elect to pay the transition tax interest-free over eight years, with 8% due in each of the first five years, 15% in year six, 20% in year seven, and 25% in year eight.

We expect to fund future uses of cash with a combination of existing cash balances, cash generated by operating activities, commercial paper borrowings, or a new issuance of debt or other securities. In addition, we have access to unsecured credit facilities with various banks.

At September 30, 2023, approximately half of our Cash and cash equivalents were held by non-U.S. subsidiaries. As a result of the broad changes to the U.S. international tax system under the Tax Act, we account for taxes on earnings of substantially all of our non-U.S. subsidiaries including both non-U.S. and U.S. taxes. We have concluded that earnings of a limited number of our non-U.S. subsidiaries are indefinitely reinvested.

In August 2021, we issued $1.5 billion aggregate principal amount of long-term notes in a registered public offering. The offering consisted of $600.0 million of 0.35% notes due in August 2023, $450.0 million of 1.75% notes due in August 2031, and $450.0 million of 2.80% notes due in August 2061, all issued at a discount. Net proceeds to the Company from the debt offering were $1,485.6 million. We used these net proceeds primarily to fund the acquisition of Plex. Refer to Note 4 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on this acquisition.

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In March 2019, we issued $1.0 billion aggregate principal amount of long-term notes in a registered public offering. The offering consisted of $425.0 million of 3.50% notes due in March 2029 and $575.0 million of 4.20% notes due in March 2049, both issued at a discount. Net proceeds to the Company from the debt offering were $987.6 million. We used these net proceeds primarily to repay our outstanding commercial paper, with the remaining proceeds used for general corporate purposes.

We entered into treasury locks to manage the potential change in interest rates in anticipation of the issuance of the $1.5 billion aggregate notes in August 2021 and the $1.0 billion of fixed rate debt in March 2019. These treasury locks were designated as and accounted for as cash flow hedges. The effective differentials paid on these treasury locks was initially recorded in Accumulated other comprehensive loss, net of tax effect. As a result of the changes in the interest rates on the treasury locks between the time we entered into the treasury locks and the time we priced and issued the notes, the Company made a net payment of $28.0 million to the counterparties from the August 2021 issuance and $35.7 million to the counterparty from the March 2019 issuance. The $28.0 million and $35.7 million net losses on the settlement of the treasury locks were recorded in Accumulated other comprehensive loss, net of tax effect, and are being amortized over the term of the corresponding notes, and recognized as an adjustment to Interest expense in the Consolidated Statement of Operations.

On June 29, 2022, we replaced our former $1.25 billion unsecured revolving credit facility with a new five-year $1.5 billion unsecured revolving credit facility, expiring in June 2027. We can increase the aggregate amount of this credit facility by up to $750.0 million, subject to the consent of the banks in the credit facility. We did not borrow against this credit facility or the former credit facility during the periods ended September 30, 2023 and 2022. Borrowings under our new $1.5 billion credit facility bear interest based on short-term money market rates in effect during the period the borrowings are outstanding. The terms of this credit facility contain covenants under which we agree to maintain an EBITDA-to-interest ratio of at least 3.0 to 1.0. The EBITDA-to-interest ratio is defined in the credit facility as the ratio of consolidated EBITDA (as defined in the facility) for the preceding four quarters to consolidated interest expense for the same period.

LIBOR was the primary basis for determining interest payments on borrowings under our former $1.25 billion credit facility. Our new $1.5 billion credit facility uses the secured overnight funding rate (SOFR) as the primary basis for determining interest payments.

Among other uses, we can draw on our credit facility as a standby liquidity facility to repay our outstanding commercial paper as it matures. This access to funds to repay maturing commercial paper is an important factor in maintaining the short-term credit ratings set forth in the table below. Under our current policy with respect to these ratings, we expect to limit our other borrowings under our credit facility, if any, to amounts that would leave enough credit available under the facility so that we could borrow, if needed, to repay all of our then outstanding commercial paper as it matures.

Separate short-term unsecured credit facilities of approximately $225.8 million at September 30, 2023, were available to non-U.S. subsidiaries, of which approximately $32.0 million was committed under letters of credit. Borrowings under our non-U.S. credit facilities at September 30, 2023 and 2022, were not significant. We were in compliance with all covenants under our credit facilities at September 30, 2023 and 2022. There are no significant commitment fees or compensating balance requirements under our credit facilities.

During the fourth quarter of fiscal 2021, as a result of the additional leverage added to fund the Plex acquisition, Standard & Poor’s elected to downgrade our Outlook from “Stable” to “Negative”. No changes were made to existing ratings by Moody’s or Fitch. The following is a summary of our credit ratings as of September 30, 2023:

Credit Rating AgencyShort Term RatingLong Term RatingOutlook
Standard & Poor’sA-1ANegative
Moody’sP-2A3Stable
Fitch RatingsF1AStable

Our ability to access the commercial paper market, and the related costs of these borrowings, is affected by the strength of our credit ratings and market conditions. We have not experienced any difficulty in accessing the commercial paper market. If our access to the commercial paper market is adversely affected due to a change in market conditions or otherwise, we would expect to rely on a combination of available cash and our unsecured committed credit facility to provide short-term funding. In such event, the cost of borrowings under our unsecured committed credit facility could be higher than the cost of commercial paper borrowings.

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We regularly monitor the third-party depository institutions that hold our cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments. We diversify our cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments among counterparties to minimize exposure to any one of these entities.

We use foreign currency forward exchange contracts to manage certain foreign currency risks. We enter into these contracts to hedge our exposure to foreign currency exchange rate variability in the expected future cash flows associated with certain third-party and intercompany transactions denominated in foreign currencies forecasted to occur within the next two years. We also use these contracts to hedge portions of our net investments in certain non-U.S. subsidiaries against the effect of exchange rate fluctuations on the translation of foreign currency balances to the U.S. dollar. In addition, we use foreign currency forward exchange contracts that are not designated as hedges to offset transaction gains or losses associated with some of our assets and liabilities resulting from intercompany loans or other transactions with third parties that are denominated in currencies other than our entities’ functional currencies. Our foreign currency forward exchange contracts are usually denominated in currencies of major industrial countries. We diversify our foreign currency forward exchange contracts among counterparties to minimize exposure to any one of these entities.

Cash dividends declared to shareowners were $544.0 million in 2023 ($4.72 per common share), $520.8 million in 2022 ($4.48 per common share), and $497.5 million in 2021 ($4.28 per common share). Our quarterly dividend rate as of September 30, 2023, is $1.18 per common share ($4.72 per common share annually), which is determined at the sole discretion of our Board of Directors.

Supplemental Sales Information

We translate sales of subsidiaries operating outside of the United States using exchange rates effective during the respective period. Therefore, changes in currency exchange rates affect our reported sales. Sales by acquired businesses also affect our reported sales. We believe that organic sales, defined as sales excluding the effects of acquisitions and changes in currency exchange rates, which is a non-GAAP financial measure, provides useful information to investors because it reflects regional and operating segment performance from the activities of our businesses without the effect of acquisitions and changes in currency exchange rates. We use organic sales as one measure to monitor and evaluate our regional and operating segment performance. When we acquire businesses, we exclude sales in the current period for which there are no comparable sales in the prior period. We determine the effect of changes in currency exchange rates by translating the respective period’s sales using the same currency exchange rates that were in effect during the prior year. When we divest a business, we exclude sales in the prior period for which there are no comparable sales in the current period. Organic sales growth is calculated by comparing organic sales to reported sales in the prior year, excluding divestitures. We attribute sales to the geographic regions based on the country of destination.

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The following is a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales by geographic region (in millions):

Year Ended September 30, 2023Year Ended September 30, 2022
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
North America$5,224.0$15.6$(23.9)$5,232.3$4,722.0
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,870.657.5(26.3)1,839.41,437.6
Asia Pacific1,358.018.2(80.5)1,420.31,088.0
Latin America605.40.122.8582.5512.8
Total Company Sales$9,058.0$91.4$(107.9)$9,074.5$7,760.4
Year Ended September 30, 2022Year Ended September 30, 2021
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
North America$4,722.0$152.0$(6.5)$4,576.5$4,132.8
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,437.66.8(140.5)1,571.31,405.7
Asia Pacific1,088.00.4(34.4)1,122.01,012.2
Latin America512.82.3(6.6)517.1446.7
Total Company Sales$7,760.4$161.5$(188.0)$7,786.9$6,997.4

The following is a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales by operating segment (in millions):

Year Ended September 30, 2023Year Ended September 30, 2022
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
Intelligent Devices$4,098.2$80.6$(46.4)$4,064.0$3,544.6
Software & Control2,886.0(30.7)2,916.72,312.9
Lifecycle Services2,073.810.8(30.8)2,093.81,902.9
Total Company Sales$9,058.0$91.4$(107.9)$9,074.5$7,760.4
Year Ended September 30, 2022Year Ended September 30, 2021
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
Intelligent Devices$3,544.6$$(89.8)$3,634.4$3,311.9
Software & Control2,312.9150.6(52.7)2,215.01,947.0
Lifecycle Services1,902.910.9(45.5)1,937.51,738.5
Total Company Sales$7,760.4$161.5$(188.0)$7,786.9$6,997.4

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Critical Accounting Estimates

We believe the following accounting estimates are the most critical to the understanding of our financial statements as they could have the most significant effect on our reported results and require subjective or complex judgments by management. Accounting principles generally accepted in the United States require us to make estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amounts of assets and liabilities at the date of the consolidated financial statements and revenues and expenses during the periods reported. These estimates are based on our best judgment about current and future conditions, but actual results could differ from those estimates. Refer to Note 1 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for information regarding our significant accounting policies.

Goodwill - Sensia Reporting Unit

The quantitative test of goodwill for impairment requires us to estimate the fair value of our reporting units. Since formation in October 2019, our Sensia joint venture operations have been challenged by the global pandemic, geopolitical activities, volatility in commodity prices, and supply chain dynamics. The cumulative historical growth and profitability below plan have resulted in a declining cushion between carrying value and fair value in previous impairment tests.

During the second quarter of fiscal 2023, we performed our annual quantitative impairment test for our Sensia reporting unit. As a result of that quantitative test, we concluded that the second quarter Goodwill balance within the Sensia reporting unit of $317.5 million was not impaired, as the fair value of the Sensia reporting unit was determined to exceed its carrying value by approximately 10 percent.

The joint venture partners appointed a new management team in 2023 and have updated the strategy of Sensia, which included downward revisions to growth and profitability projections for 2024 and future years. Lower sales growth reflects historical performance and an updated outlook of market conditions. Lower profitability reflects an updated view of mix and volume. Based upon the update of Sensia’s strategy and projections in the fourth quarter, we determined that it was more likely than not that the fair value of Sensia was below its carrying value. As a result of this triggering event, we performed an interim quantitative analysis, using a combination of an income approach derived from discounted cash flows and a market multiples approach using selected comparable public companies, consistent with our annual impairment testing. As of the fourth quarter testing date, the carrying value of our Sensia reporting unit of $665.1 million was determined to be in excess of the reporting unit’s fair value, resulting in a $157.5 million goodwill impairment charge recorded in the Consolidated Statement of Operations. Subsequent to the impairment, $160.3 million of goodwill remains within the Sensia reporting unit.

Critical assumptions used in this approach included management’s estimated future revenue growth rates and margins, a discount rate, and a market multiple. Estimated future revenue growth and margins are based on management’s best estimate about current and future conditions. The revenue growth rate assumption reflects above market growth over the next five years before moderating back to a growth rate approximating longer term average inflationary rates. The forecasted near-term growth rate projections take into account recent revenue performance and the orders backlog. Margin assumptions reflect volume and mix, productivity to offset cost inflation, and price used to fund investments. The assumptions and estimates made are based on a number of factors, including historical experience, reference to external product available market and industry growth publications, analysis of peer group projections, and information obtained from the new management team, including backlog. Actual results and forecasts of revenue growth and margins for our Sensia reporting unit may be impacted by its concentration within the Oil & Gas industry and with its customer base. Demand for Sensia hardware and software products, solutions, and services is sensitive to industry volatility and risks, including those related to commodity prices, supply and demand dynamics, production costs, geological activity, and political activities. If such factors impact our ability to achieve forecasted revenue growth rates and margins, the fair value of the reporting unit could decrease, which may result in an additional impairment of the remaining goodwill balance. We determined the discount rate using our weighted average cost of capital adjusted for risk factors including risk associated with our above market revenue growth assumptions, historical performance, and industry-specific and economic factors. Also, industry-specific and economic factors that increase the discount rate or decrease the market multiple can decrease the fair value of the Sensia reporting unit, which may result in an additional future impairment.

More information regarding goodwill impairment testing is contained in Note 1 and Note 3 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

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Retirement Benefits - Pension

Pension costs and obligations are actuarially determined and are influenced by assumptions used to estimate these amounts, including the discount rate. Changes in any of the assumptions and the amortization of differences between the assumptions and actual experience will affect the amount of pension expense in future periods.

Our global pension expense in 2023 was $122.0 million compared to $74.4 million in 2022. Approximately all of our 2023 global pension expense and 70 percent of our global projected benefit obligation relate to our U.S. pension plan. The discount rate used to determine our 2023 U.S. pension expense was 5.65 percent, compared to 3.86 percent for 2022.

For 2024, our U.S. discount rate will increase to 6.10 percent from 5.65 percent in 2023. The discount rate was set as of our September 30 measurement date and was determined by modeling a portfolio of bonds that match the expected cash flow of our benefit plans.

The changes in our discount rate have an inverse relationship with our net periodic benefit cost and projected benefit obligation. The following chart illustrates the estimated change in projected benefit obligation and annual net periodic benefit cost assuming a change of 25 basis points in the discount rate for our U.S. pension plans (in millions):

Pension Benefits
Change in Projected Benefit ObligationChange in Net Periodic Benefit Cost (1)
Discount rate$52.4$0.2

(1) Change includes both operating and non-operating pension costs.

More information regarding pension benefits is contained in Note 14 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Revenue Recognition - Customer Incentives

We offer various incentive programs that provide distributors and direct sale customers with cash rebates, account credits, or additional hardware and software products, solutions, and services based on meeting specified program criteria. Customer incentives are recognized as a reduction of sales if distributed in cash or customer account credits. We record accruals at the time of revenue recognition as a current liability within Customer returns, rebates, and incentives in our Consolidated Balance Sheet or, where a right of setoff exists, as a reduction of Receivables. Customer incentives for additional hardware and software products, solutions, and services to be provided are considered distinct performance obligations. As such, we allocate revenue to them based on relative standalone selling price. Until the incentive is redeemed, the revenue is recorded as a contract liability.

Our primary incentive program provides distributors with cash rebates or account credits based on agreed amounts that vary depending on the customer to whom our distributor ultimately sells the product. A critical assumption used in estimating the accrual for this program is the time period from when revenue is recognized to when the rebate is processed. Our estimate is based primarily on historical experience. If the time period were to change by 10 percent, the effect would be an adjustment to the accrual of approximately $24.9 million.

More information regarding our revenue recognition and returns, rebates, and incentives policies are contained in Note 1 and Note 2 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Acquisitions - Plex Intangible Assets Valuation

We account for business acquisitions by allocating the purchase price to tangible and intangible assets acquired and liabilities assumed at their fair values; the excess of the purchase price over the allocated amount is recorded as goodwill. We engaged an independent third-party valuation specialist to assist with the fair value allocation of the purchase price paid for the acquisition of Plex to intangible assets. This required the use of several assumptions and estimates including the customer attrition rate, forecasted cash flows attributable to existing customers, and the discount rate for the customer relationship intangible asset and the royalty rate, forecasted revenue growth rates, and the discount rate for the technology intangible asset. Although we believe the assumptions and estimates made were reasonable and appropriate, these estimates require judgment and are based in part on historical experience and information obtained from Plex management.

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The key assumption requiring the use of judgement in the valuation of the customer relationship intangible asset was the customer attrition rate of 5 percent. This rate was selected based on historical experience and information obtained from Plex management. A change in the customer attrition rate of 250 basis points would result in a change of $63 million in intangible assets. The key assumptions requiring the use of judgement in the valuation of the technology intangible asset were the royalty rate of 25 percent and the obsolescence factor. The royalty rate was based on a detailed analysis considering the importance of the technology to the overall enterprise and market royalty data. A change in the royalty rate of 500 basis points would result in a change of $47 million in intangible assets. The obsolescence factor was calculated assuming phase out over ten years based on discussions with Plex management, the nature of the technology, its integration into customers’ manufacturing systems, and other third-party information for similar transactions. A two-year change in this assumption would result in a change of $52 million in intangible assets.

More information regarding this business combination is contained in Note 4 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Recent Accounting Pronouncements

See Note 1 in the Consolidated Financial Statements regarding recent accounting pronouncements.

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FY 2022 10-K MD&A

SEC filing source: 0001024478-22-000093.

Extracted structurally from real Item 7 body heading to real Item 7A/8 boundary. Confidence: high. Filing date: 2022-11-08. Report date: 2022-09-30.

Item 7. Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations

Results of Operations

Non-GAAP Measures

The following discussion includes organic sales, total segment operating earnings and margin, Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, Adjusted Effective Tax Rate and free cash flow, which are non-GAAP measures. See Supplemental Sales Information for a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales and a discussion of why we believe this non-GAAP measure is useful to investors. See Summary of Results of Operations for a reconciliation of Income before income taxes to total segment operating earnings and margin and a discussion of why we believe these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors. See Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation for a reconciliation of Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate to Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate, respectively, and a discussion of why we believe these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors. See Financial Condition for a reconciliation of cash flows from operating activities to free cash flow and a discussion of why we believe this non-GAAP measure is useful to investors.

Overview

Rockwell Automation, Inc. is a global leader in industrial automation and digital transformation. We connect the imaginations of people with the potential of technology to expand what is humanly possible, making the world more productive and more sustainable. Overall demand for our hardware and software products, solutions, and services is driven by:

•investments in manufacturing, including upgrades, modifications and expansions of existing facilities or production lines, and new facilities or production lines;

•investments in basic materials production capacity, which may be related to commodity pricing levels;

•our customers’ needs for faster time to market, operational productivity, asset management and reliability, and enterprise risk management;

•our customers’ needs to continuously improve quality, safety, and sustainability;

•industry factors that include our customers’ new product introductions, demand for our customers’ products or services, and the regulatory and competitive environments in which our customers operate;

•levels of global industrial production and capacity utilization;

•regional factors that include local political, social, regulatory, and economic circumstances; and

•the spending patterns of our customers due to their annual budgeting processes and their working schedules.

Long-term Strategy

Our strategy is to bring The Connected Enterprise to life by integrating control and information across the enterprise. We deliver customer outcomes by combining advanced industrial automation with the latest information technology. Our growth and performance strategy seeks to:

•achieve organic sales growth in excess of the automation market by expanding our served market and strengthening our competitive differentiation;

•grow market share of our core platforms;

•drive double digit growth in information solutions and connected services;

•drive double digit growth in annual recurring revenue (ARR);

•acquire companies that serve as catalysts to organic growth by increasing our information solutions and high-value services offerings and capabilities, expanding our global presence, or enhancing our process expertise;

•enhance our market access by building our channel capability and partner network;

•deploy human and financial resources to strengthen our technology leadership and our intellectual capital business model;

•continuously improve quality and customer experience; and

•drive annual cost productivity.

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By implementing the above strategy, we seek to achieve our long-term financial goals, including above-market organic sales growth, increasing the portion of our total revenue that is recurring in nature, EPS growth above sales growth, return on invested capital in excess of 20 percent, and free cash flow equal to about 100 percent of Adjusted Income. We expect acquisitions to add a percentage point or more per year to long-term sales growth.

Our customers face the challenge of remaining globally cost competitive and automation can help them achieve their productivity and sustainability objectives. Our value proposition is to help our customers reduce time to market, lower total cost of ownership, improve asset utilization and manage enterprise risks.

Differentiation through Technology Innovation and Domain Expertise

Our integrated control and information architecture, with Logix at its core, is an important differentiator. We are the only automation provider that can support discrete, process, batch, safety, motion, and power control on the same hardware platform with the same software programming environment. Our integrated architecture is scalable with standard open communications protocols making it easier for customers to implement it more cost effectively. Our information software portfolio, combined with the software made available as a result of our strategic alliance with PTC, is the most comprehensive and flexible information platform in the industry. Through the combination of this technology and our domain expertise we help customers to achieve additional productivity benefits, such as reduced unplanned downtime, improved energy efficiency, higher quality, and increased throughput yield.

Intelligent motor control is one of our core competencies and an important aspect of an automation system. These hardware and software products and solutions enhance the availability, efficiency and safe operation of our customers’ critical and most energy-intensive plant assets. Our intelligent motor control offering can be integrated seamlessly with the Logix architecture.

Domain expertise refers to the industry and application knowledge required to deliver solutions and services that support customers through the entire life cycle of their automation investment. The combination of industry-specific domain expertise of our people with our innovative technologies enables us to help our customers solve their manufacturing and business challenges.

Global Expansion

As the manufacturing world continues to expand, we must be able to meet our customers’ needs around the world. Approximately 66 percent of our employees and less than half of our total sales are outside the U.S. We continue to expand our footprint in emerging markets.

As we expand in markets with considerable growth potential and shift our global footprint, we expect to continue to broaden the portfolio of hardware and software products, solutions, and services that we provide to our customers in these regions. We have made significant investments to globalize our manufacturing, product development and customer-facing resources in order to be closer to our customers throughout the world. The emerging markets of Asia Pacific, including China and India, Latin America, Central and Eastern Europe and Africa are projected to be the fastest growing over the long term, due to higher levels of infrastructure investment and the growing middle-class population. We believe that increased demand for consumer products in these markets will lead to manufacturing investment and provide us with additional growth opportunities in the future.

Enhanced Market Access

Over the past decade, our investments in technology and globalization have enabled us to expand our addressed market to over $100 billion. Our process initiative has been the most important contributor to this expansion and remains our largest growth opportunity.

Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) represent another area of addressed market expansion and an important growth opportunity. To remain competitive, OEMs need to find the optimal balance of machine cost and performance while reducing their time to market. Our scalable integrated architecture and intelligent motor control offerings, along with design productivity tools and our motion and safety products, can assist OEMs in addressing these business needs.

We have developed a powerful network of channel partners, technology partners and commercial partners that act as amplifiers to our internal capabilities and enable us to serve our customers’ needs around the world.

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Broad Range of Industries Served

We apply our knowledge of manufacturing applications to help customers solve their business challenges. We serve customers in a wide range of industries, which we group into three broad categories: discrete, hybrid, and process.

DiscreteHybridProcess
AutomotiveFood & BeverageOil & Gas
SemiconductorLife SciencesMining
Warehousing & E-commerceHousehold & Personal CareMetals
General IndustriesTireChemicals
Printing & PublishingEco IndustrialPulp & Paper
MarineWater / WastewaterOther Process
GlassWaste Management
Fiber & TextilesMass Transit
AirportsRenewable Energy
Aerospace
Other Discrete

Outsourcing and Sustainability Trends

Demand for our hardware and software products, solutions, and services across all industries benefits from the outsourcing and sustainability needs of our customers. Customers increasingly desire to outsource engineering services to achieve a more flexible cost base. Our manufacturing application knowledge enables us to serve these customers globally.

We help our customers meet their sustainability needs pertaining to energy efficiency, environmental, and safety goals. Customers across all industries are investing in more energy-efficient manufacturing processes and technologies, such as intelligent motor control, and energy-efficient solutions and services. In addition, environmental and safety objectives, including those related to combating climate change, often spur customers to invest to ensure compliance and implement sustainable business practices. As customers seek to be more sustainable, our offering of hardware and software products provide strategic opportunities to appeal to their changing needs and preferences.

Acquisitions and Investments

Our acquisition and investment strategy focuses on hardware and software products, solutions, and services that will be catalytic to the organic growth of our core offerings.

In March 2022, we, through our Sensia affiliate, acquired Swinton Technology, a provider of meeting supervisory systems and measurement expertise in the Oil & Gas industry.

In November 2021, we acquired AVATA, a services provider for supply chain management, enterprise resource planning, and enterprise performance management solutions.

In August 2021, we acquired Plex Systems, a cloud-native smart manufacturing platform. Plex offers a single-instance, multi-tenant Software-as-a-Service manufacturing platform, including advanced manufacturing execution systems, quality, and supply chain management capabilities.

In December 2020, we acquired Fiix Inc., a privately-held, artificial intelligence enabled computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) company based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Fiix’s cloud-native CMMS creates workflows for the scheduling, organizing, and tracking of equipment maintenance; connects seamlessly to business systems; and drives data-driven decisions.

In October 2020, we acquired Oylo, a privately-held industrial cybersecurity services provider based in Barcelona, Spain. Oylo provides a broad range of industrial control system cybersecurity services and solutions including assessments, turnkey implementations, managed services and incident response.

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In April 2020, we acquired ASEM, S.p.A., a provider of digital automation technologies based in Italy. ASEM’s products will allow us to provide customers with a high degree of configurability for their industrial computing needs, allow them to achieve faster time to market, lower their cost of ownership, improve asset utilization, and better manage enterprise risk.

In April 2020, we also acquired Kalypso, LP, a privately-held U.S.-based software delivery and consulting firm specializing in the digital transformation of industrial companies with a strong client base in life sciences, consumer products and industrial high-tech.

In January 2020, we acquired Avnet Data Security, LTD, an Israel-based cybersecurity provider with over 20 years of experience. Avnet’s combination of service delivery, training, research, and managed services enables us to serve more customers and accelerate our portfolio development.

In October 2019, we completed the formation of a joint venture, Sensia, a fully integrated digital oilfield automation solutions provider, with SLB. The joint venture leverages SLB’s oil and gas domain knowledge and our automation and information expertise. Rockwell Automation owns 53% of Sensia and SLB owns 47% of Sensia.

In October 2019, we also acquired MESTECH Services, a global provider of Manufacturing Execution Systems / Manufacturing Operations Management, digital solutions consulting, and systems integration services. The acquisition of MESTECH expands our capabilities to profitably grow information solutions and connected services globally and accelerate our ability to help our customers execute digital transformation initiatives.

In January 2019, we acquired Emulate3D, an innovative engineering software developer whose products digitally simulate and emulate industrial automation systems. This acquisition enables our customers to virtually test machine and system designs before incurring manufacturing and automation costs and committing to a final design.

In addition, we make venture investments that enable access to complementary and leading edge technologies aligned with our strategic priorities, accelerating internal development efforts, reducing time to market, and as a hedge against disruptive technologies.

We believe these acquisitions and investments will help us expand our served market and deliver value to our customers.

Attracting, Developing, and Retaining Highly Qualified Talent

At Rockwell Automation, we promise to expand human possibility within our company and throughout the world of industrial production, and we work to attract and develop highly engaged people who can and want to do their best work.

Our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion starts at the top. Our 11 board members include three female and two African American directors. In fiscal 2021, we hired our first chief diversity officer and made investments to accelerate our efforts to increase diversity, equity, and inclusion across the company.

A culture of integrity is fundamental to Rockwell’s core values, including a formal ethics and compliance organization and an Ombuds office that investigates ethical and legal concerns brought forth by employees. Our code of conduct, along with our partner code of conduct and supplier code of conduct prohibits corrupt acts, bribery, and anticompetitive behavior. Employee training is used to reinforce our values companywide, with participation in trainings related to ethics, environment, health and safety, and emergency responses at or near 100%.

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There are several ways in which we attract, develop, and retain highly qualified talent, including:

•we make the safety and health of our employees a top priority. We strive for zero workplace injuries and illnesses and operate in a manner that recognizes safety as fundamental to Rockwell Automation being a great place to work. In fiscal 2022, we achieved 0.38 recordable cases per 100 employees.

•we capture and act upon employee feedback through our annual employee engagement survey. It measures several engagement indicators and drivers and provides an overall employee engagement index (EEI) with external benchmark comparison. The latest survey, conducted in March 2022, showed an EEI of 76, which was equal to a global norm for this index. Our global inclusion index score was 77, two points higher than the global benchmark of 75.

•we invest in growth and development of our employees. As the pace of change increases, it is important we provide re-skilling and upskilling opportunities for our technical talent, along with soft skills and leadership development for all. We offer a portfolio of all employee, managerial, and leader training that spans on-demand, virtual, and live instructor-led formats. Our programs focus on basic as well as transformational skills. We take pride in our culture and in fiscal 2021 created an opportunity for our employees to participate in team-based culture workshops. In fiscal 2022, the majority of our employees completed one or more of our training programs representing over 500,000 learning hours.

•we offer employee assistance and work life benefits to all global employees. Our comprehensive benefits include healthcare benefits, disability and life insurance benefits, paid time off, and leave programs. Rockwell offers plans and resources to help employees meet future savings goals through defined benefit and retirement savings plans. We offer flextime, remote work, and part-time arrangements whenever business conditions permit. We believe that face to face interaction is critical for our culture, innovation, people development, and engagement, and that flexible, virtual work arrangements help employees be more productive and engaged. During fiscal 2022, we launched our Hybrid Workplace Program, which combines the values of both physical workspaces and virtual work options, both of which are important for attracting, retaining, and developing talent and facilitating innovation, engagement, and productivity.

We monitor employee retention and attrition rates by demographic factors including by gender, ethnicity, generation, years of service, career role, region, business, and function. We generally experienced higher attrition rates in fiscal 2022 as compared to fiscal 2021. We believe the increase is consistent with market trends experienced broadly across labor markets in fiscal 2022. We use attrition rate information to identify and address unfavorable trends to mitigate risk to our business. See Item 1A. Risk Factors for a discussion of risks relating to our inability to attract, develop, and retain highly qualified talent.

At September 30, 2022, our employees, including those employed by consolidated subsidiaries, by region were approximately:

North America10,000
Europe, Middle East and Africa5,500
Asia Pacific6,000
Latin America4,500
Total employees26,000

Our employees had the following global gender demographics based on voluntary disclosure:

September 30, 2022
WomenMen
All employees32%68%
Individual Contributors33%67%
People Managers26%74%
Technical Talent17%83%
Manufacturing Associates48%52%

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Our U.S. employees had the following race and ethnicity demographics based on voluntary disclosure:

September 30, 2022
Black / African AmericanAsianHispanic / LatinxWhiteMultiracial, Native American and Pacific IslanderUndisclosed
All U.S. Employees7%9%5%73%2%4%
Individual Contributors7%10%5%72%2%4%
People Managers6%7%5%78%1%3%
Technical Talent6%12%6%72%2%2%
Manufacturing Associates14%13%3%54%2%14%

Continuous Improvement

Productivity and continuous improvement are important components of our culture. We have programs in place that drive ongoing process improvement, functional streamlining, material cost savings, and manufacturing productivity. These are intended to improve profitability that can be used to fund investments in growth and to offset inflation. Our ongoing productivity initiatives target both cost reduction and improved asset utilization. Charges for workforce reductions and facility rationalization may be required in order to effectively execute our productivity programs.

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U.S. Economic Trends

In 2022, sales in the U.S. accounted for over half of our total sales. The various indicators we use to gauge the direction and momentum of our served U.S. markets include:

•the Industrial Production (IP) Index, published by the Federal Reserve, which measures the real output of manufacturing, mining, and electric and gas utilities. The IP Index is expressed as a percentage of real output in a base year, currently 2017. Historically, there has been a meaningful correlation between the changes in the IP Index and the level of automation investment made by our U.S. customers in their manufacturing base.

•the Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI), published by the Institute for Supply Management (ISM), which indicates the current and near-term state of manufacturing activity in the U.S. According to the ISM, a PMI measure above 50 indicates that the U.S. manufacturing economy is generally expanding while a measure below 50 indicates that it is generally contracting.

The table below depicts the trends in these indicators from fiscal 2020 to 2022. These figures are as of November 8, 2022, and are subject to revision by the issuing organizations. The IP index rose 0.5, a slower rate of acceleration, in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2022 versus the third quarter of fiscal 2022. The U.S. manufacturing sector continued to expand in the fourth quarter with PMI remaining above 50, however, this is the lowest rate since the pandemic recovery began, reflecting an easing of demand.

IP IndexPMI
Fiscal 2022 quarter ended:
September 2022102.450.9
June 2022101.953.0
March 2022101.157.1
December 2021100.158.8
Fiscal 2021 quarter ended:
September 202198.860.5
June 202197.960.9
March 202196.763.7
December 202096.160.5
Fiscal 2020 quarter ended:
September 202094.155.7
June 202084.652.2
March 202097.549.7
December 2019101.747.8

During 2022, inflation in the U.S. has had an impact on our input costs and pricing. The Producer Price Index (PPI), published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, measures the average change over time in the selling prices received by domestic producers for their output. PPI for September 30, 2022, June 30, 2022, March 31, 2022, and December 31, 2021, increased 8.5 percent, 11.3 percent, 11.7 percent, and 10.0 percent, respectively, compared to September 30, 2021, June 30, 2021, March 31, 2021, and December 31, 2020. These figures are as of November 8, 2022, and are subject to revision by the issuing organization.

Non-U.S. Economic Trends

In 2022, sales to customers outside the U.S. accounted for less than half of our total sales. These customers include both indigenous companies and multinational companies with a global presence. In addition to the global factors previously mentioned in the Overview section, international demand, particularly in emerging markets, has historically been driven by the strength of the industrial economy in each region, investments in infrastructure, and expanding consumer markets. We use changes in key countries' gross domestic product (GDP), IP, and PMI as indicators of the growth opportunities in each region where we do business. Industrial output outside the U.S. was mixed in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2022.

Global GDP forecasts are mixed, with Europe, Middle East, and Africa and Latin America projected to see slowing growth from 2022 to 2023 and Asia projected to see flat to slightly higher growth. Supply chain disruptions, labor shortages, and global inflation are expected to remain persistent in 2023, along with elevated geopolitical instability.

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Supply Chain

We have a global supply chain, including a network of suppliers and manufacturing and distribution facilities. The supply chain is stressed by increased demand, along with pandemic-related and other global events that have put additional pressures on manufacturing output and freight lanes. This has resulted in and could continue to result in:

•disruptions in our supply chain;

•difficulty in procuring or inability to procure components and materials necessary for our hardware and software products, solutions, and services;

•increased costs for commodities, components, and freight services; and

•delays in delivering, or an inability to deliver, our hardware and software products, solutions, and services.

Our total order backlog consists of (in millions):

September 30,
20222021
Intelligent Devices$2,086.1$1,052.8
Software & Control1,456.8618.2
Lifecycle Services1,654.11,239.5
Total Company$5,197.0$2,910.5

See Note 2 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on the nature of our products and services and revenue recognition.

We are closely managing our end-to-end supply chain, from sourcing to production to customer delivery, with a particular focus on all critical and at-risk suppliers and supplier locations globally. We have made large-scale investments to increase capacity across our network in support of our orders growth. Additional actions we are taking include:

•extending order visibility to our supply base to ensure we are appropriately planning for extended component lead times;

•securing longer-term supply agreements with critical partners;

•re-engineering of existing products to increase component supply resiliency;

•capacity investments, including redundant manufacturing lines and additional electronic assembly equipment; and

•qualification of additional suppliers to diversify our supplier base.

We believe these and other actions we are taking will over time normalize our product lead times and reduce our backlog.

COVID-19 Pandemic

We continue to monitor the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on all aspects of our business and geographies. Uncertainty on the duration and severity of those impacts remains due to the evolving nature of the pandemic, government responses to it, and regulations across the geographies in which our business operates. We are continuously responding to the changing conditions created by the pandemic and evolving regulations and remain focused on our priorities including employee health and safety, our customer needs, and protecting critical investments to drive long-term differentiation.

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Outlook

The table below provides guidance for sales growth and earnings per share for fiscal 2023 as of November 8, 2022. Our guidance reflects record backlog and assumes continued supply chain stabilization.

Sales Growth GuidanceEPS Guidance
Reported sales growth7.5% - 11.5%Diluted EPS$9.54 - $10.34
Organic sales growth (1)9.0% - 13.0%Adjusted EPS (1)$10.20 - $11.00
Inorganic sales growth~ 1.0%
Currency translation~ (2.5)%

(1) Organic sales growth and Adjusted EPS are non-GAAP measures. See Supplemental Sales Information and Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation for more information on these non-GAAP measures.

Note: Guidance includes estimated impact of CUBIC acquisition in fiscal year 2023.

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Summary of Results of Operations

The following table reflects our sales and operating results (in millions, except per share amounts and percentages):

Year Ended September 30,
202220212020
Sales
Intelligent Devices (a)$3,544.6$3,311.9$2,956.0
Software & Control (b)2,312.91,947.01,681.3
Lifecycle Services (c)1,902.91,738.51,692.5
Total sales (d)$7,760.4$6,997.4$6,329.8
Segment operating earnings (1)
Intelligent Devices (e)$717.6$702.1$587.8
Software & Control (f)666.7531.0473.8
Lifecycle Services (g)158.3158.2196.3
Total segment operating earnings (2) (h)1,542.61,391.31,257.9
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization(103.9)(55.1)(41.4)
Corporate and other(104.7)(120.6)(98.9)
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost(4.7)(63.8)(37.4)
Change in fair value of investments(136.9)397.4153.9
Legal settlement70.0
Interest expense, net(118.8)(93.0)(98.0)
Income before income taxes (i)1,073.61,526.21,136.1
Income tax provision(154.5)(181.9)(112.9)
Net income919.11,344.31,023.2
Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests(13.1)(13.8)(0.2)
Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation$932.2$1,358.1$1,023.4
Diluted EPS$7.97$11.58$8.77
Adjusted EPS (3)$9.49$9.43$7.87
Diluted weighted average outstanding shares116.7117.1116.6
Pre-tax margin (i/d)13.8%21.8%17.9%
Intelligent Devices segment operating margin (e/a)20.2%21.2%19.9%
Software & Control segment operating margin (f/b)28.8%27.3%28.2%
Lifecycle Services segment operating margin (g/c)8.3%9.1%11.6%
Total segment operating margin (2) (h/d)19.9%19.9%19.9%

(1) See Note 19 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for the definition of segment operating earnings.

(2) Total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin are non-GAAP financial measures. We exclude purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, corporate and other, non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost, change in fair value of investments, the $70 million legal settlement in fiscal 2021, interest expense, net, and income tax provision because we do not consider these items to be directly related to the operating performance of our segments. We believe total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin are useful to investors as measures of operating performance. We use these measures to monitor and evaluate the profitability of our operating segments. Our measures of total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin may be different from measures used by other companies.

(3) Adjusted EPS is a non-GAAP earnings measure. See Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation for more information on this non-GAAP measure.

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2022 Compared to 2021

Sales

Sales in fiscal 2022 increased 10.9 percent compared to 2021. Organic sales increased 11.3 percent. Currency translation decreased sales by 2.7 percentage points. Acquisitions increased sales by 2.3 percentage points. Organic annual recurring revenue at September 30, 2022, grew approximately 14 percent compared to September 30, 2021. See Organic Annual Recurring Revenue for information on this measure. Pricing increased sales in our Intelligent Devices and Software & Control operating segments by approximately 3.3 percentage points.

The table below presents our sales for the year ended September 30, 2022, attributed to the geographic regions based upon country of destination, and the percentage change from the same period in 2021 (in millions, except percentages). The results by region, segment, and industry were primarily driven by component availability rather than the underlying demand.

Change vs.Change in Organic Sales (1) vs.
Year Ended September 30, 2022Year Ended September 30, 2021Year Ended September 30, 2021
North America$4,722.014.3%10.7%
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,437.62.3%11.8%
Asia Pacific1,088.07.5%10.8%
Latin America512.814.8%15.8%
Total Company Sales$7,760.410.9%11.3%

(1) Organic sales and organic sales growth exclude the effect of acquisitions, changes in currency exchange rates, and divestitures. See Supplemental Sales Information for information on these non-GAAP measures.

Corporate and Other

Corporate and other expenses were $104.7 million in fiscal 2022 compared to $120.6 million in fiscal 2021. The prior year includes deal costs associated with the acquisition of Plex Systems.

Income before Income Taxes

Income before income taxes decreased to $1,073.6 million in 2022 from $1,526.2 million in 2021, primarily due to fair-value adjustments recognized in connection with our investment in PTC (the “PTC adjustments”) and a $70 million pre-tax favorable legal settlement in the first quarter of fiscal 2021, partially offset by higher operating earnings. Total segment operating earnings increased to $1,542.6 million from $1,391.3 million in 2021, primarily due to higher sales, including price increases, and lower incentive compensation, partially offset by higher input costs and higher investment spend.

Income Taxes

The effective tax rate in 2022 was 14.4 percent compared to 11.9 percent in 2021. The Adjusted Effective Tax Rate in 2022 was 16.0 percent compared to 11.6 percent in 2021. The increases in the effective tax rate and the Adjusted Effective Tax Rate were primarily due to higher discrete benefits in the prior year.

See Note 16 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for a complete reconciliation of the United States statutory tax rate to the effective tax rate and more information on tax events in 2022 and 2021 affecting each year’s respective tax rates.

Diluted EPS and Adjusted EPS

Fiscal 2022 Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation was $932.2 million or $7.97 per share, compared to $1,358.1 million or $11.58 per share in fiscal 2021. The decreases in Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation and diluted EPS were primarily due to the PTC adjustments and a $70 million pre-tax favorable legal settlement in the first quarter of fiscal 2021, partially offset by higher operating earnings. Adjusted EPS was $9.49 in fiscal 2022, up 0.6 percent compared to $9.43 in fiscal 2021, primarily due to higher sales, including price increases, and lower incentive compensation, partially offset by higher input costs, higher investment spend, higher tax rate, and the prior year favorable legal settlement.

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Intelligent Devices

Sales

Intelligent Devices sales increased 7.0 percent in 2022 compared to 2021. Organic sales increased 9.7 percent. The effects of currency translation decreased sales by 2.7 percentage points. All regions experienced sales increases.

Segment Operating Margin

Intelligent Devices segment operating earnings increased 2.2 percent year over year. Segment operating margin decreased to 20.2 percent in 2022 from 21.2 percent in 2021, primarily driven by higher input costs and higher investment spend, partially offset by higher sales, including pricing increases, and lower incentive compensation.

Software & Control

Sales

Software & Control sales increased 18.8 percent in 2022 compared to 2021. Organic sales increased 13.8 percent. The effects of currency translation decreased sales by 2.7 percentage points and acquisitions increased sales by 7.7 percentage points. All regions experienced reported and organic sales increases, except for EMEA where organic sales increased but unfavorable currency translation reduced reported sales.

Segment Operating Margin

Software & Control segment operating earnings increased 25.6 percent year over year. Segment operating margin increased to 28.8 percent in 2022 from 27.3 percent in 2021, primarily due to higher sales, including pricing increases, and lower incentive compensation, partially offset by higher input costs, higher investment spend, and the impact of acquisitions.

Lifecycle Services

Sales

Lifecycle Services sales increased 9.5 percent in 2022 compared to 2021. Organic sales increased 11.4 percent. The effects of currency translation decreased sales by 2.5 percentage points and acquisitions increased sales by 0.6 percentage points. All regions experienced sales increases.

Segment Operating Margin

Lifecycle Services segment operating earnings increased 0.1 percent year over year. Segment operating margin decreased to 8.3 percent in 2022 from 9.1 percent in 2021, driven by supply chain constraints and higher investment spend, partially offset by higher sales and lower incentive compensation.

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2021 Compared to 2020

Sales

Sales in fiscal 2021 increased 10.5 percent compared to 2020. Organic sales increased 6.7 percent of which pricing increased sales by approximately 1 percent. Currency translation increased sales by 2.3 percentage points. Acquisitions increased sales by 1.5 percentage points. Organic annual recurring revenue (ARR) at September 30, 2021 grew approximately 18 percent compared to September 30, 2020. See Organic Annual Recurring Revenue for information on this measure.

The table below presents our sales for the year ended September 30, 2021, attributed to the geographic regions based upon country of destination, and the percentage change from the same period a year ago (in millions, except percentages):

Change vs.Change in Organic Sales (1) vs.
Year Ended September 30, 2021Year Ended September 30, 2020Year Ended September 30, 2020
North America$4,132.89.9%8.0%
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,405.712.5%2.8%
Asia Pacific1,012.216.5%10.3%
Latin America446.7(1.1)%(0.1)%
Total Company Sales$6,997.410.5%6.7%

(1) Organic sales and organic sales growth exclude the effect of acquisitions, changes in currency exchange rates, and divestitures. See Supplemental Sales Information for information on these non-GAAP measures.

•Reported and organic sales in North America increased in discrete and hybrid industries, partially offset by weakness in process industries, particularly Oil & Gas.

•EMEA reported and organic sales increased primarily due to strength in Food & Beverage and Tire. Reported sales also increased due to currency translation and sales from acquisitions.

•Asia Pacific reported and organic sales increased year over year, primarily due to strength in Semiconductor, Life Sciences, and Tire. Reported sales also increased due to favorable currency translation.

•Reported and organic sales in Latin America decreased year over year, primarily due to weakness in Mining and Oil & Gas, partially offset by growth in Food & Beverage.

Corporate and other

Corporate and other expenses were $120.6 million in fiscal 2021 compared to $98.9 million in fiscal 2020. The increase was primarily driven by deal costs associated with the acquisition of Plex Systems.

Income before Income Taxes

Income before income taxes increased 34 percent from $1,136.1 million in 2020 to $1,526.2 million in 2021, primarily due to the PTC adjustments recognized in 2021 and 2020, higher operating earnings, and a $70 million pre-tax favorable legal settlement in the first quarter of fiscal 2021. Total segment operating earnings increased 11 percent year over year from $1,257.9 million in 2020 to $1,391.3 million in 2021, primarily due to higher sales, partially offset by the reinstatement of incentive compensation and the reversal of temporary pay actions taken in fiscal 2020.

Income Taxes

The effective tax rate in 2021 was 11.9 percent compared to 9.9 percent in 2020. The increase in the effective tax rate was primarily due to the effect of tax benefits recognized upon the formation of the Sensia joint venture in fiscal 2020 and other discrete items. The Adjusted Effective Tax Rate in 2021 was 11.6 percent compared to 12.4 percent in 2020. The decrease in the Adjusted Effective Tax Rate was primarily due to higher discrete benefits in the current year.

See Note 16 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for a complete reconciliation of the United States statutory tax rate to the effective tax rate and more information on tax events in 2021 and 2020 affecting each year’s respective tax rates.

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Diluted EPS and Adjusted EPS

Fiscal 2021 Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation was $1,358.1 million or $11.58 per share, compared to $1,023.4 million or $8.77 per share in fiscal 2020. The increase in Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation and diluted EPS were primarily due to higher sales and the PTC adjustments, partially offset by the reinstatement of incentive compensation and the reversal of temporary pay actions taken in fiscal 2020. Fiscal 2021 Adjusted EPS was $9.43, up 19.8% percent compared to $7.87 in fiscal 2020, primarily due to higher sales, partially offset by the reinstatement of incentive compensation and the reversal of temporary pay actions taken in fiscal 2020.

Operating Segments

The following is a discussion of our results by operating segment. See Note 19 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on each segment and our definition of segment operating earnings.

Intelligent Devices

Sales

Intelligent Devices sales increased 12.0 percent in 2021 compared to 2020. Organic sales increased 9.7 percent and the effect of currency translation increased sales by 2.3 percentage points. All regions experienced sales increases.

Segment Operating Margin

Intelligent Devices segment operating earnings increased 19.4 percent. Operating margin was 21.2% percent in 2021 compared to 19.9% percent in 2020, primarily due to higher sales, partially offset by the reinstatement of incentive compensation.

Software & Control

Sales

Software & Control sales increased 15.8 percent in 2021 compared to 2020. Organic sales increased 10.0 percent, the effect of currency translation increased sales by 2.5 percentage points, and acquisitions increased sales by 3.3 percentage points. All regions experienced sales increases.

Segment Operating Margin

Software & Control segment operating earnings increased 12.1 percent year over year. Segment operating margin was 27.3 percent in 2021 compared to 28.2 percent a year ago, primarily due to higher planned investment spend and the reinstatement of incentive compensation, partially offset by higher sales.

Lifecycle Services

Sales

Lifecycle Services sales increased 2.7 percent in 2021 compared to 2020. Organic sales decreased 1.8 percent. The effects of currency translation increased sales by 2.2 percentage points, and acquisitions increased sales by 2.3 percentage points. Reported sales increased in EMEA and Asia Pacific, were flat in North America, and decreased in Latin America. Organic sales decreased in all regions except Asia Pacific.

Segment Operating Margin

Lifecycle Services segment operating earnings decreased 19.4 percent year over year. Segment operating margin was 9.1 percent in 2021 compared to 11.6 percent a year ago, primarily due to the reinstatement of incentive compensation.

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Supplemental Segment Information

Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization and non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost are not allocated to our operating segments because these costs are excluded from our measurement of each segment’s operating performance for internal purposes. If we were to allocate these costs, we would attribute them to each of our segments as follows (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202220212020
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization
Intelligent Devices$2.5$2.7$2.9
Software & Control69.019.26.7
Lifecycle Services31.432.130.8
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost
Intelligent Devices$(3.5)$14.1$7.4
Software & Control(3.5)14.17.4
Lifecycle Services(4.8)18.89.9

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Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation

Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate are non-GAAP earnings measures that exclude non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost, purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation, change in fair value of investments, and Net loss attributable to noncontrolling interests, including their respective tax effects. Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost is defined as all components of our net periodic pension and postretirement benefit cost except for service cost. See Note 14 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information on our net periodic pension and postretirement benefit cost.

We believe that Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate provide useful information to our investors about our operating performance and allow management and investors to compare our operating performance period over period. Adjusted EPS is also used as a financial measure of performance for our annual incentive compensation. Our measures of Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate may be different from measures used by other companies. These non-GAAP measures should not be considered a substitute for Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate.

The following are reconciliations of Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS, and effective tax rate to Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate, respectively (in millions, except per share amounts and percentages):

Year Ended September 30,
202220212020
Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation$932.2$1,358.1$1,023.4
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost4.763.837.4
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost(1.9)(16.0)(10.1)
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation91.943.229.4
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation(22.3)(10.5)(7.0)
Change in fair value of investments (1)136.9(397.4)(153.9)
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments (1)(30.8)64.7
Adjusted Income$1,110.7$1,105.9$919.2
Diluted EPS$7.97$11.58$8.77
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost0.040.550.32
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost(0.02)(0.14)(0.09)
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation0.780.370.25
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation(0.19)(0.09)(0.06)
Change in fair value of investments (1)1.17(3.39)(1.32)
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments (1)(0.26)0.55
Adjusted EPS$9.49$9.43$7.87
Effective tax rate14.4%11.9%9.9%
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost0.1%0.5%0.6%
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation0.6%0.4%0.4%
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments (1)0.9%(1.2)%1.5%
Adjusted Effective Tax Rate16.0%11.6%12.4%

(1) Primarily relates to the change in fair value of investment in PTC.

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Fiscal 2023 Guidance
Diluted EPS$9.54 - $10.34
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost0.05
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost(0.01)
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation0.81
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation(0.19)
Change in fair value of investments (1)
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments (1)
Adjusted EPS (2)$10.20 - $11.00
Effective tax rate~ 17.7%
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost~ —%
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation~ 0.3%
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments (1)~ —%
Adjusted Effective Tax Rate~ 18.0%

(1) The year ended September 30, 2022, included a loss on investment of $136.9 million primarily due to the change in fair value of investment in PTC. Fiscal 2023 guidance excludes estimates of these adjustments on a forward-looking basis due to variability, complexity, and limited visibility of these items.

(2) Fiscal 2023 guidance based on Adjusted Income attributable to Rockwell, which includes an adjustment for SLB's non-controlling interest in Sensia.

Organic Annual Recurring Revenue

ARR is a key metric that enables measurement of progress in growing our recurring revenue business. It represents the annual contract value of all active recurring revenue contracts at any point in time. Recurring revenue is defined as a revenue stream that is contractual, typically for a period of 12 months or more, and has a high probability of renewal. The probability of renewal is based on historical renewal experience of the individual revenue streams, or management's best estimates if historical renewal experience is not available. Organic ARR growth is calculated as the dollar change in ARR, adjusted to exclude the effects of currency translation and acquisitions, divided by ARR as of the prior period. The effects of currency translation are excluded by calculating Organic ARR on a constant currency basis. When we acquire businesses, we exclude the effect of ARR in the current period for which there was no comparable ARR in the prior period. Organic ARR growth is also used as a financial measure of performance for our annual incentive compensation. Because ARR is based on annual contract value, it does not represent revenue recognized during a particular reporting period or revenue to be recognized in future reporting periods and is not intended to be a substitute for revenue, contract liabilities, or backlog.

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Financial Condition

The following is a summary of our cash flows from operating, investing, and financing activities, as reflected in the Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202220212020
Cash provided by (used for)
Operating activities$823.1$1,261.0$1,120.5
Investing activities(7.8)(2,626.6)(618.0)
Financing activities(934.2)1,297.8(798.9)
Effect of exchange rate changes on cash(52.6)16.88.4
Decrease in cash, cash equivalents, and restricted cash$(171.5)$(51.0)$(288.0)

The following table summarizes free cash flow, which is a non-GAAP financial measure (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202220212020
Cash provided by operating activities$823.1$1,261.0$1,120.5
Capital expenditures(141.1)(120.3)(113.9)
Free cash flow$682.0$1,140.7$1,006.6

Our definition of free cash flow takes into consideration capital investments required to maintain the operations of our businesses and execute our strategy. Cash provided by operating activities adds back non-cash depreciation expense to earnings but does not reflect a charge for necessary capital expenditures. Our definition of free cash flow excludes the operating cash flows and capital expenditures related to our discontinued operations, if any. Operating, investing, and financing cash flows of our discontinued operations, if any, are presented separately in our Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows. In our opinion, free cash flow provides useful information to investors regarding our ability to generate cash from business operations that is available for acquisitions and other investments, service of debt principal, dividends, and share repurchases. We use free cash flow, as defined, as one measure to monitor and evaluate our performance, including as a financial measure for our annual incentive compensation. Our definition of free cash flow may be different from definitions used by other companies.

Cash provided by operating activities was $823.1 million for the year ended September 30, 2022, compared to $1,261.0 million for the year ended September 30, 2021. Free cash flow was $682.0 million for the year ended September 30, 2022, compared to $1,140.7 million for the year ended September 30, 2021. The year-over-year decreases in cash provided by operating activities and free cash flow were primarily due to increases in working capital, including higher receivables and inventory to support business growth, and higher incentive compensation payments in fiscal 2022 compared to fiscal 2021. Supply chain constraints have also negatively impacted our working capital efficiency.

We repurchased approximately 1.3 million shares of our common stock under our share repurchase program in 2022 at a total cost of $301.1 million and an average cost of $223.05 per share. In 2021, we repurchased approximately 1.1 million shares of our common stock under our share repurchase program at a total cost of $301.4 million and an average cost of $263.43 per share. At September 30, 2022, there were $1.6 million of outstanding common stock share repurchases recorded in Accounts payable that did not settle until 2023. At September 30, 2021, there were $1.8 million of outstanding common stock share repurchases recorded in Accounts payable that did not settle until 2022. Our decision to repurchase shares in 2023 will depend on business conditions, free cash flow generation, other cash requirements, and stock price. On both July 24, 2019, and May 2, 2022, the Board of Directors authorized us to expend an additional $1.0 billion to repurchase shares of our common stock. At September 30, 2022, we had approximately $1,251.3 million remaining for share repurchases under our existing board authorizations. See Item 5. Market for Registrant’s Common Equity, Related Stockholder Matters, and Issuer Purchases of Equity Securities, for additional information regarding share repurchases.

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We expect future uses of cash to include working capital requirements, capital expenditures, additional contributions to our retirement plans, acquisitions of businesses and other inorganic investments, dividends to shareowners, repurchases of common stock, and repayments of debt. We expect capital expenditures in 2023 to be approximately $190 million. Significant long-term uses of cash include the following (in millions):

Payments by Period
Total20232024202520262027Thereafter
Long-term debt and interest (1)$5,942.1$713.0$110.9$406.6$102.3$102.3$4,507.0
Minimum lease payments (Note 18)395.898.882.859.640.729.884.1
Postretirement benefits (2)44.26.66.15.55.04.516.5
Pension funding contribution (3)26.126.1
Transition tax (4)264.831.158.477.997.4
Total$6,673.0$875.6$258.2$549.6$245.4$136.6$4,607.6

(1) The amounts for Long-term debt assume that the respective debt instruments will be outstanding until their scheduled maturity dates and include interest but exclude unamortized discount. See Note 7 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information regarding our Long-term debt.

(2) Our postretirement benefit plans are unfunded and are subject to change. Amounts reported are estimates of future benefit payments, to the extent estimable.

(3) Amounts reported for pension funding contributions reflect current estimates. Contributions to our pension plans beyond 2023 will depend on future investment performance of our pension plan assets, changes in discount rate assumptions, and governmental regulations in effect at the time. Amounts subsequent to 2023 are excluded from the summary above, as we are unable to make a reasonably reliable estimate of these amounts. The minimum contribution for our U.S. pension plan as required by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) is currently zero. We may make additional contributions to this plan at the discretion of management.

(4) Under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (the “Tax Act”), the Company may elect to pay the transition tax interest-free over eight years, with 8% due in each of the first five years, 15% in year six, 20% in year seven, and 25% in year eight.

We expect to fund future uses of cash with a combination of existing cash balances, cash generated by operating activities, commercial paper borrowings, or a new issuance of debt or other securities. In addition, we have access to unsecured credit facilities with various banks.

At September 30, 2022, the majority of our Cash and cash equivalents were held by non-U.S. subsidiaries. As a result of the broad changes to the U.S. international tax system under the Tax Act, we account for taxes on earnings of substantially all of our non-U.S. subsidiaries including both non-U.S. and U.S. taxes. We have concluded that earnings of a limited number of our non-U.S. subsidiaries are indefinitely reinvested.

Our Short-term debt as of September 30, 2022 and 2021, includes commercial paper borrowings of $317.0 million and $484.0 million, respectively, with weighted average interest rates of 3.03 percent and 0.18 percent, respectively, and weighted average maturity periods of 22 days and 90 days, respectively. Also included in Short-term debt as of September 30, 2022 and 2021, are $42.3 million and 23.5 million, respectively, of interest-bearing loans from SLB to Sensia, due in December 2022.

In August 2021, we issued $1.5 billion aggregate principal amount of long-term notes in a registered public offering. The offering consisted of $600.0 million of 0.35% notes due in August 2023, $450.0 million of 1.75% notes due in August 2031, and $450.0 million of 2.80% notes due in August 2061, all issued at a discount. Net proceeds to the Company from the debt offering were $1,485.6 million. We used these net proceeds primarily to fund the acquisition of Plex. Refer to Note 4 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on this acquisition.

In March 2019, we issued $1.0 billion aggregate principal amount of long-term notes in a registered public offering. The offering consisted of $425.0 million of 3.50% notes due in March 2029 and $575.0 million of 4.20% notes due in March 2049, both issued at a discount. Net proceeds to the Company from the debt offering were $987.6 million. We used these net proceeds primarily to repay our outstanding commercial paper, with the remaining proceeds used for general corporate purposes.

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We entered into treasury locks to manage the potential change in interest rates in anticipation of the issuance of the $1.5 billion aggregate notes in August 2021 and the $1.0 billion of fixed rate debt in March 2019. These treasury locks were designated as and accounted for as cash flow hedges. The effective differentials paid on these treasury locks was initially recorded in Accumulated other comprehensive loss, net of tax effect. As a result of the changes in the interest rates on the treasury locks between the time we entered into the treasury locks and the time we priced and issued the notes, the Company made a net payment of $28.0 million to the counterparties from the August 2021 issuance and $35.7 million to the counterparty from the March 2019 issuance. The $28.0 million and $35.7 million net losses on the settlement of the treasury locks were recorded in Accumulated other comprehensive loss, net of tax effect, and are being amortized over the term of the corresponding notes, and recognized as an adjustment to Interest expense in the Consolidated Statement of Operations.

In April 2020, we entered into a $400.0 million senior unsecured 364-day term loan credit agreement and were advanced the full loan amount. Interest on these borrowings was based on short-term money market rates in effect during the period the borrowings were outstanding. We repaid the $400.0 million term loan in September 2020.

On June 29, 2022, we replaced our former $1.25 billion unsecured revolving credit facility with a new five-year $1.5 billion unsecured revolving credit facility, expiring in June 2027. We can increase the aggregate amount of this credit facility by up to $750.0 million, subject to the consent of the banks in the credit facility. We did not borrow against this credit facility or the former credit facility during the periods ended September 30, 2022 and 2021. Borrowings under our new $1.5 billion credit facility bear interest based on short-term money market rates in effect during the period the borrowings are outstanding. The terms of this credit facility contain covenants under which we agree to maintain an EBITDA-to-interest ratio of at least 3.0 to 1.0. The EBITDA-to-interest ratio is defined in the credit facility as the ratio of consolidated EBITDA (as defined in the facility) for the preceding four quarters to consolidated interest expense for the same period.

LIBOR was the primary basis for determining interest payments on borrowings under our former $1.25 billion credit facility. Our new $1.5 billion credit facility uses the secured overnight funding rate (SOFR) as the primary basis for determining interest payments.

Among other uses, we can draw on our credit facility as a standby liquidity facility to repay our outstanding commercial paper as it matures. This access to funds to repay maturing commercial paper is an important factor in maintaining the short-term credit ratings set forth in the table below. Under our current policy with respect to these ratings, we expect to limit our other borrowings under our credit facility, if any, to amounts that would leave enough credit available under the facility so that we could borrow, if needed, to repay all of our then outstanding commercial paper as it matures.

Separate short-term unsecured credit facilities of approximately $214.1 million at September 30, 2022, were available to non-U.S. subsidiaries, of which approximately $30.0 million was committed under letters of credit. Borrowings under our non-U.S. credit facilities at September 30, 2022 and 2021, were not significant. We were in compliance with all covenants under our credit facilities at September 30, 2022 and 2021. There are no significant commitment fees or compensating balance requirements under our credit facilities.

During the fourth quarter of fiscal 2021, as a result of the additional leverage added to fund the Plex acquisition, Standard & Poor’s elected to downgrade our Outlook from “Stable” to “Negative”. No changes were made to existing ratings by Moody’s or Fitch. The following is a summary of our credit ratings as of September 30, 2022:

Credit Rating AgencyShort Term RatingLong Term RatingOutlook
Standard & Poor’sA-1ANegative
Moody’sP-2A3Stable
Fitch RatingsF1AStable

Our ability to access the commercial paper market, and the related costs of these borrowings, is affected by the strength of our credit ratings and market conditions. We have not experienced any difficulty in accessing the commercial paper market. If our access to the commercial paper market is adversely affected due to a change in market conditions or otherwise, we would expect to rely on a combination of available cash and our unsecured committed credit facility to provide short-term funding. In such event, the cost of borrowings under our unsecured committed credit facility could be higher than the cost of commercial paper borrowings.

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We regularly monitor the third-party depository institutions that hold our cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments. We diversify our cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments among counterparties to minimize exposure to any one of these entities.

On December 10, 2021, the Company entered a 10b5-1 plan related to our PTC Shares, pursuant to which a broker will make periodic sales of some of our PTC Shares on behalf of the Company, subject to the terms of the plan. Starting in June 2022, the Company made periodic sales of our PTC Shares in the open market, outside of the parameters of the existing 10b5-1 plan. All of our sales of PTC are consistent with the transfer restrictions in the securities purchase agreement, as amended, with PTC. As of September 30, 2022, the fiscal year-to-date sales of our PTC shares under our 10b5-1 plan and open market sales resulted in a gross inflow of $202.4 million. This excludes any tax liability related to the realized gain on investment. These proceeds, and any proceeds from future sales, will support our future uses of cash.

We use foreign currency forward exchange contracts to manage certain foreign currency risks. We enter into these contracts to hedge our exposure to foreign currency exchange rate variability in the expected future cash flows associated with certain third-party and intercompany transactions denominated in foreign currencies forecasted to occur within the next two years. We also use these contracts to hedge portions of our net investments in certain non-U.S. subsidiaries against the effect of exchange rate fluctuations on the translation of foreign currency balances to the U.S. dollar. In addition, we use foreign currency forward exchange contracts that are not designated as hedges to offset transaction gains or losses associated with some of our assets and liabilities resulting from intercompany loans or other transactions with third parties that are denominated in currencies other than our entities’ functional currencies. Our foreign currency forward exchange contracts are usually denominated in currencies of major industrial countries. We diversify our foreign currency forward exchange contracts among counterparties to minimize exposure to any one of these entities.

Cash dividends declared to shareowners were $520.8 million in 2022 ($4.48 per common share), $497.5 million in 2021 ($4.28 per common share), and $472.8 million in 2020 ($4.08 per common share). Our quarterly dividend rate as of September 30, 2022, is $1.12 per common share ($4.48 per common share annually), which is determined at the sole discretion of our Board of Directors.

Supplemental Sales Information

We translate sales of subsidiaries operating outside of the United States using exchange rates effective during the respective period. Therefore, changes in currency exchange rates affect our reported sales. Sales by acquired businesses also affect our reported sales. We believe that organic sales, defined as sales excluding the effects of acquisitions and changes in currency exchange rates, which is a non-GAAP financial measure, provides useful information to investors because it reflects regional and operating segment performance from the activities of our businesses without the effect of acquisitions and changes in currency exchange rates. We use organic sales as one measure to monitor and evaluate our regional and operating segment performance. When we acquire businesses, we exclude sales in the current period for which there are no comparable sales in the prior period. We determine the effect of changes in currency exchange rates by translating the respective period’s sales using the same currency exchange rates that were in effect during the prior year. When we divest a business, we exclude sales in the prior period for which there are no comparable sales in the current period. Organic sales growth is calculated by comparing organic sales to reported sales in the prior year, excluding divestitures. We attribute sales to the geographic regions based on the country of destination.

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The following is a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales by geographic region (in millions):

Year Ended September 30, 2022Year Ended September 30, 2021
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
North America$4,722.0$152.0$(6.5)$4,576.5$4,132.8
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,437.66.8(140.5)1,571.31,405.7
Asia Pacific1,088.00.4(34.4)1,122.01,012.2
Latin America512.82.3(6.6)517.1446.7
Total Company Sales$7,760.4$161.5$(188.0)$7,786.9$6,997.4
Year Ended September 30, 2021Year Ended September 30, 2020
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
North America$4,132.8$48.1$24.6$4,060.1$3,760.2
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,405.744.976.91,283.91,249.3
Asia Pacific1,012.20.653.1958.5868.7
Latin America446.70.3(4.7)451.1451.6
Total Company Sales$6,997.4$93.9$149.9$6,753.6$6,329.8

The following is a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales by operating segment (in millions):

Year Ended September 30, 2022Year Ended September 30, 2021
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
Intelligent Devices$3,544.6$$(89.8)$3,634.4$3,311.9
Software & Control2,312.9150.6(52.7)2,215.01,947.0
Lifecycle Services1,902.910.9(45.5)1,937.51,738.5
Total Company Sales$7,760.4$161.5$(188.0)$7,786.9$6,997.4
Year Ended September 30, 2021Year Ended September 30, 2020
Reported SalesLess: Effect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesReported Sales
Intelligent Devices$3,311.9$$70.5$3,241.4$2,956.0
Software & Control1,947.054.842.11,850.11,681.3
Lifecycle Services1,738.539.137.31,662.11,692.5
Total Company Sales$6,997.4$93.9$149.9$6,753.6$6,329.8

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Critical Accounting Estimates

We believe the following accounting estimates are the most critical to the understanding of our financial statements as they could have the most significant effect on our reported results and require subjective or complex judgments by management. Accounting principles generally accepted in the United States require us to make estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amounts of assets and liabilities at the date of the consolidated financial statements and revenues and expenses during the periods reported. These estimates are based on our best judgment about current and future conditions, but actual results could differ from those estimates. Refer to Note 1 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for information regarding our significant accounting policies.

Goodwill - Sensia Reporting Unit

The quantitative test of goodwill for impairment requires us to estimate the fair value of our reporting units. During the second quarter of fiscal 2022, we performed our annual quantitative impairment test for our Sensia reporting unit. As a result of ongoing supply chain constraints and market volatility, we identified a triggering event in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2022 for our Sensia reporting unit, which required an interim quantitative impairment test. We determined the fair value of the reporting unit for both tests under a combination of an income approach derived from discounted cash flows and a market multiples approach using selected comparable public companies.

Critical assumptions used in this approach included management’s estimated future revenue growth rates, estimated future margins, and discount rate. Estimated future revenue growth and margins are based on management’s best estimate about current and future conditions. The revenue growth rate assumption reflects significant growth over the next five years before moderating back to a growth rate approximating longer term average inflationary rates. The forecasted near-term growth rate assumes that revenue will return to pre-pandemic levels due to the abatement of pandemic-related disruptions. Margin assumptions reflect that the cost pressure in the current year related to inflation and supply chain challenges will be compensated through pricing achieved on future orders. We believe the assumptions and estimates made were reasonable and appropriate, which are based on a number of factors, including historical experience, reference to external product available market and industry growth publications, analysis of peer group projections, and information obtained from reporting unit management, including backlog. Actual results and forecasts of revenue growth and margins for our Sensia reporting unit may be impacted by its concentration within the Oil & Gas industry and with its customer base. Demand for Sensia hardware and software products, solutions, and services is sensitive to industry volatility and risks, including those related to commodity prices, supply and demand dynamics, production costs, geological activity, and political activities. If such factors impact our ability to achieve forecasted revenue growth rates and margins, the fair value of the reporting unit could decrease, which may result in an impairment. We determined the discount rate using our weighted average cost of capital adjusted for risk factors including risk associated with our above market revenue growth assumptions, historical performance, and industry-specific and economic factors.

Based on these assumptions and estimates, the fair value of the Sensia reporting unit exceeded its carrying value by approximately 20 percent in the second quarter and approximately 15 percent in the fourth quarter. Therefore, we deemed that no impairment existed during the year ended September 30, 2022, on $315.9 million of Goodwill allocated to the Sensia reporting unit.

More information regarding goodwill impairment testing is contained in Note 1 and Note 3 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Retirement Benefits - Pension

Pension costs and obligations are actuarially determined and are influenced by assumptions used to estimate these amounts, including the discount rate. Changes in any of the assumptions and the amortization of differences between the assumptions and actual experience will affect the amount of pension expense in future periods.

Our global pension expense in 2022 was $74.4 million compared to $157.0 million in 2021. Approximately all of our 2022 global pension expense and 76 percent of our global projected benefit obligation relate to our U.S. pension plan. The discount rate used to determine our 2022 U.S. pension expense was 3.86 percent, compared to 2.90 percent for 2021.

For 2023, our U.S. discount rate will increase to 5.65 percent from 3.86 percent in 2022. The discount rate was set as of our September 30 measurement date and was determined by modeling a portfolio of bonds that match the expected cash flow of our benefit plans.

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The changes in our discount rate has an inverse relationship with our net periodic benefit cost and projected benefit obligation. The following chart illustrates the estimated change in projected benefit obligation and annual net periodic benefit cost assuming a change of 25 basis points in the discount rate for our U.S. pension plans (in millions):

Pension Benefits
Change in Projected Benefit ObligationChange in Net Periodic Benefit Cost (1)
Discount rate$69.0$5.3

(1) Change includes both operating and non-operating pension costs.

More information regarding pension benefits is contained in Note 14 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Revenue Recognition - Customer Incentives

We offer various incentive programs that provide distributors and direct sale customers with cash rebates, account credits, or additional hardware and software products, solutions, and services based on meeting specified program criteria. Customer incentives are recognized as a reduction of sales if distributed in cash or customer account credits. We record accruals at the time of revenue recognition as a current liability within Customer returns, rebates and incentives in our Consolidated Balance Sheet or, where a right of setoff exists, as a reduction of Receivables. Customer incentives for additional hardware and software products, solutions, and services to be provided are considered distinct performance obligations. As such, we allocate revenue to them based on relative standalone selling price. Until the incentive is redeemed, the revenue is recorded as a contract liability.

Our primary incentive program provides distributors with cash rebates or account credits based on agreed amounts that vary depending on the customer to whom our distributor ultimately sells the product. A critical assumption used in estimating the accrual for this program is the time period from when revenue is recognized to when the rebate is processed. Our estimate is based primarily on historical experience. If the time period were to change by 10 percent, the effect would be an adjustment to the accrual of approximately $25.7 million.

More information regarding our revenue recognition and returns, rebates and incentives policies are contained in Note 1 and Note 2 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Acquisitions - Plex Intangible Assets Valuation

The accounting for a business combination requires the excess of the purchase price for the acquisition over the net book value of assets acquired to be allocated to the identifiable assets of the acquired entity. Any unallocated portion is recognized as goodwill. We engaged an independent third-party valuation specialist to assist with the fair value allocation of the purchase price paid for the acquisition of Plex to intangible assets. This required the use of several assumptions and estimates including the customer attrition rate, forecasted cash flows attributable to existing customers, and the discount rate for the customer relationship intangible asset and the royalty rate, forecasted revenue growth rates, and the discount rate for the technology intangible asset. Although we believe the assumptions and estimates made were reasonable and appropriate, these estimates require judgment and are based in part on historical experience and information obtained from Plex management.

The key assumption requiring the use of judgement in the valuation of the customer relationship intangible asset was the customer attrition rate of 5 percent. This rate was selected based on historical experience and information obtained from Plex management. A change in the customer attrition rate of 250 basis points would result in a change of $63 million in intangible assets. The key assumptions requiring the use of judgement in the valuation of the technology intangible asset were the royalty rate of 25 percent and the obsolescence factor. The royalty rate was based on a detailed analysis considering the importance of the technology to the overall enterprise and market royalty data. A change in the royalty rate of 500 basis points would result in a change of $47 million in intangible assets. The obsolescence factor was calculated assuming phase out over ten years based on discussions with Plex management, the nature of the technology, its integration into customers’ manufacturing systems, and other third-party information for similar transactions. A two-year change in this assumption would result in a change of $52 million in intangible assets.

More information regarding this business combination is contained in Note 4 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

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Acquisitions - Sensia Joint Venture Intangible Assets Valuation

We recorded assets acquired and liabilities assumed in connection with the formation of Sensia based on their estimated fair values as of the acquisition date of October 1, 2019. The accounting for a business combination requires the excess of the purchase price for the acquisition over the net book value of assets acquired to be allocated to the identifiable assets of the acquired entity. Any unallocated portion is recognized as goodwill. We engaged an independent third-party valuation specialist to assist with the fair value allocation of the purchase price paid in connection with formation of the Sensia joint venture to intangible assets, which required the use of several assumptions and estimates. Although we believe the assumptions and estimates made were reasonable and appropriate, these estimates are based on historical experience and information obtained from Sensia management. The key assumption requiring the use of judgment was the customer attrition rates ranging from 7.5 percent to 25 percent. A change in the customer attrition rate of 250 basis points would result in a change of $40.4 million in intangible assets.

Recent Accounting Pronouncements

See Note 1 in the Consolidated Financial Statements regarding recent accounting pronouncements.

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FY 2021 10-K MD&A

SEC filing source: 0001024478-21-000083.

Extracted structurally from real Item 7 body heading to real Item 7A/8 boundary. Confidence: high. Filing date: 2021-11-09. Report date: 2021-09-30.

Item 7.    Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations

Results of Operations

Non-GAAP Measures

The following discussion includes organic sales, total segment operating earnings and margin, Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS, Adjusted Effective Tax Rate and free cash flow, which are non-GAAP measures. See Supplemental Sales Information for a reconciliation of reported sales to organic sales and a discussion of why we believe this non-GAAP measure is useful to investors. See Results of Operations for a reconciliation of income before income taxes to total segment operating earnings and margin and a discussion of why we believe these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors. See Results of Operations for a reconciliation of income from continuing operations, diluted EPS from continuing operations and effective tax rate to Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate, respectively, and a discussion of why we believe these non-GAAP measures are useful to investors. See Financial Condition for a reconciliation of cash flows from operating activities to free cash flow and a discussion of why we believe this non-GAAP measure is useful to investors.

Overview

Rockwell Automation, Inc. is a global leader in industrial automation and digital transformation. We connect the imaginations of people with the potential of technology to expand what is humanly possible, making the world more productive and more sustainable. Overall demand for our hardware and software products, solutions and services is driven by:

•investments in manufacturing, including upgrades, modifications and expansions of existing facilities or production lines and new facilities or production lines;

•investments in basic materials production capacity, which may be related to commodity pricing levels;

•our customers’ needs for faster time to market, operational productivity, asset management and reliability, and enterprise risk management;

•our customers’ needs to continuously improve quality, safety and sustainability;

•industry factors that include our customers’ new product introductions, demand for our customers’ products or services and the regulatory and competitive environments in which our customers operate;

•levels of global industrial production and capacity utilization;

•regional factors that include local political, social, regulatory and economic circumstances; and

•the spending patterns of our customers due to their annual budgeting processes and their working schedules.

Long-term Strategy

Our strategy is to bring The Connected Enterprise to life by integrating control and information across the enterprise. We deliver customer outcomes by combining advanced industrial automation with the latest information technology. Our growth and performance strategy seeks to:

•achieve organic sales growth in excess of the automation market by expanding our served market and strengthening our competitive differentiation;

•grow market share of our core platforms;

•drive double digit growth in information solutions and connected services;

•drive double digit growth in annual recurring revenue;

•acquire companies that serve as catalysts to organic growth by increasing our information solutions and high-value services offerings and capabilities, expanding our global presence, or enhancing our process expertise;

•enhance our market access by building our channel capability and partner network;

•deploy human and financial resources to strengthen our technology leadership and our intellectual capital business model;

•continuously improve quality and customer experience; and

•drive annual cost productivity.

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By implementing the above strategy, we seek to achieve our long-term financial goals, including above-market organic sales growth, increasing the portion of our total revenue that is recurring in nature, EPS growth above sales growth, return on invested capital in excess of 20 percent and free cash flow equal to about 100 percent of Adjusted Income. We expect acquisitions to add a percentage point or more per year to long-term sales growth.

Our customers face the challenge of remaining globally cost competitive and automation can help them achieve their productivity and sustainability objectives. Our value proposition is to help our customers reduce time to market, lower total cost of ownership, improve asset utilization and manage enterprise risks.

Differentiation through Technology Innovation and Domain Expertise

Our integrated control and information architecture, with Logix at its core, is an important differentiator. We are the only automation provider that can support discrete, process, batch, safety, motion and power control on the same hardware platform with the same software programming environment. Our integrated architecture is scalable with standard open communications protocols making it easier for customers to implement it more cost effectively. Our information software portfolio, combined with the software made available as a result of our strategic alliance with PTC, is the most comprehensive and flexible information platform in the industry. Through the combination of this technology and our domain expertise we help customers to achieve additional productivity benefits, such as reduced unplanned downtime, improved energy efficiency, higher quality and increased throughput yield.

Intelligent motor control is one of our core competencies and an important aspect of an automation system. These hardware and software products and solutions enhance the availability, efficiency and safe operation of our customers’ critical and most energy-intensive plant assets. Our intelligent motor control offering can be integrated seamlessly with the Logix architecture.

Domain expertise refers to the industry and application knowledge required to deliver solutions and services that support customers through the entire life cycle of their automation investment. The combination of industry-specific domain expertise of our people with our innovative technologies enables us to help our customers solve their manufacturing and business challenges.

Global Expansion

As the manufacturing world continues to expand, we must be able to meet our customers’ needs around the world. Approximately 66 percent of our employees and less than half of our total sales are outside the U.S. We continue to expand our footprint in emerging markets.

As we expand in markets with considerable growth potential and shift our global footprint, we expect to continue to broaden the portfolio of hardware and software products, solutions and services that we provide to our customers in these regions. We have made significant investments to globalize our manufacturing, product development and customer-facing resources in order to be closer to our customers throughout the world. The emerging markets of Asia Pacific, including China and India, Latin America, Central and Eastern Europe and Africa are projected to be the fastest growing over the long term, due to higher levels of infrastructure investment and the growing middle-class population. We believe that increased demand for consumer products in these markets will lead to manufacturing investment and provide us with additional growth opportunities in the future.

Enhanced Market Access

Over the past decade, our investments in technology and globalization have enabled us to expand our addressed market to over $90 billion. Our process initiative has been the most important contributor to this expansion and remains our largest growth opportunity.

Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) represent another area of addressed market expansion and an important growth opportunity. To remain competitive, OEMs need to find the optimal balance of machine cost and performance while reducing their time to market. Our scalable integrated architecture and intelligent motor control offerings, along with design productivity tools and our motion and safety products, can assist OEMs in addressing these business needs.

We have developed a powerful network of channel partners, technology partners and commercial partners that act as amplifiers to our internal capabilities and enable us to serve our customers’ needs around the world.

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Broad Range of Industries Served

We apply our knowledge of manufacturing applications to help customers solve their business challenges. We serve customers in a wide range of industries, which we group into three broad categories: discrete, hybrid, and process.

DiscreteHybridProcess
AutomotiveFood & BeverageOil & Gas
SemiconductorLife SciencesMining
Warehousing & E-commerceHousehold & Personal CareMetals
General IndustriesTireChemicals
Printing & PublishingEco IndustrialPulp & Paper
MarineWater / WastewaterOther Process
GlassWaste Management
Fiber & TextilesMass Transit
AirportsRenewable Energy
Aerospace
Other Discrete

Outsourcing and Sustainability Trends

Demand for our hardware and software products, solutions and services across all industries benefits from the outsourcing and sustainability needs of our customers. Customers increasingly desire to outsource engineering services to achieve a more flexible cost base. Our manufacturing application knowledge enables us to serve these customers globally.

We help our customers meet their sustainability needs pertaining to energy efficiency, environmental, and safety goals. Customers across all industries are investing in more energy-efficient manufacturing processes and technologies, such as intelligent motor control, and energy-efficient solutions and services. In addition, environmental and safety objectives, including those related to combating climate change, often spur customers to invest to ensure compliance and implement sustainable business practices. As customers seek to be more sustainable, our offering of hardware and software products provide strategic opportunities to appeal to their changing needs and preferences.

Acquisitions and Investments

Our acquisition and investment strategy focuses on hardware and software products, solutions and services that will be catalytic to the organic growth of our core offerings.

In August 2021, we acquired Plex Systems (Plex), a cloud-native smart manufacturing platform. Plex offers a single-instance, multi-tenant Software-as-a-Service manufacturing platform operating at scale, including advanced manufacturing execution systems, quality, and supply chain management capabilities.

In December 2020, we acquired Fiix Inc., a privately-held, artificial intelligence enabled computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) company based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Fiix’s cloud-native CMMS creates workflows for the scheduling, organizing, and tracking of equipment maintenance; connects seamlessly to business systems; and drives data-driven decisions.

In October 2020, we acquired Oylo, a privately-held industrial cybersecurity services provider based in Barcelona, Spain. Oylo is dedicated to providing a broad range of industrial control system cybersecurity services and solutions including assessments, turnkey implementations, managed services and incident response.

In April 2020, we acquired ASEM, S.p.A. (ASEM), a provider of digital automation technologies. ASEM’s products will allow us to provide customers with a high degree of configurability for their industrial computing needs, allow them to achieve faster time to market, lower their cost of ownership, improve asset utilization, and better manage enterprise risk.

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In April 2020, we also acquired Kalypso, LP (Kalypso), a privately-held US-based software delivery and consulting firm specializing in the digital transformation of industrial companies with a strong client base in life sciences, consumer products and industrial high-tech. This acquisition enhances our ability to implement and deploy technology and deliver even greater value to our customers.

In January 2020, we acquired Avnet Data Security, LTD (Avnet), an Israel-based cybersecurity provider with over 20 years of experience providing cybersecurity services. Avnet’s combination of service delivery, training, research, and managed services enables us to service a much larger set of customers globally while also continuing to accelerate our portfolio development in this market.

On October 1, 2019, we completed the formation of a joint venture, Sensia, a fully integrated digital oilfield automation solutions provider. The joint venture leverages Schlumberger’s oil and gas domain knowledge and our automation and information expertise. Rockwell Automation owns 53% of Sensia and Schlumberger owns 47% of Sensia.

In October 2019, we also acquired MESTECH Services (MESTECH), a global provider of Manufacturing Execution Systems / Manufacturing Operations Management, digital solutions consulting, and systems integration services. The acquisition of MESTECH expands our capabilities to profitably grow information solutions and connected services globally and accelerate our ability to help our customers execute digital transformation initiatives.

In January 2019, we acquired Emulate3D, an innovative engineering software developer whose products digitally simulate and emulate industrial automation systems. This acquisition enables our customers to virtually test machine and system designs before incurring manufacturing and automation costs and committing to a final design.

In 2018, we made several investments, including in shares of PTC common stock (the “PTC Shares”). PTC is the leader in the Industrial Internet of Things and augmented reality. Our investment in and alliance with PTC is accelerating growth for both companies and enabling us to be the partner of choice for customers around the world who want to transform their physical operations with digital technology in order to achieve increased productivity, heightened plant efficiency, reduced operational risk and better system interoperability.

We believe these acquisitions and investments will help us expand our served market and deliver value to our customers.

Attracting, Developing, and Retaining Highly Qualified Talent

At Rockwell Automation, we promise to expand human possibility within our company and throughout the world of industrial production, and we work to attract and develop highly engaged people who can and want to do their best work.

Our commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion starts at the top. Our 11 board members, 10 of whom are independent, include three female and two African American directors. In fiscal year 2021, we hired our first chief diversity officer and made investments to accelerate our efforts to increase diversity, equity, and inclusion across the company.

A culture of integrity is fundamental to Rockwell’s core values, including a formal ethics and compliance organization and an Ombuds office that investigates ethical and legal concerns brought forth by employees. In fiscal year 2020, we refreshed our code of conduct that along with our partner code of conduct and supplier code of conduct prohibits corrupt acts, bribery and anticompetitive behavior. Employee training is used to reinforce our values companywide, with participation in trainings related to ethics, environment, health and safety, and emergency responses at or near 100%.

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There are several ways in which we attract, develop, and retain highly qualified talent, including:

•We make the safety and health of our employees a top priority. We strive for zero workplace injuries and illnesses and operate in a manner that recognizes safety as fundamental to Rockwell Automation being a great place to work. In fiscal year 2021, we achieved 0.27 recordable cases per 100 employees.

•We capture and act upon employee feedback through our annual employee engagement survey. It measures several engagement indicators and drivers and provides an overall employee engagement index (EEI) with external benchmark comparison. The latest survey, conducted in February 2021, showed an EEI of 74, which was equal to a global norm for this index. Our global inclusion index score was 76, three points higher than the global benchmark of 73.

•We invest in growth and development of our employees. As the pace of change increases, it is important we provide re-skilling and upskilling opportunities for our technical talent, along with soft skills and leadership development for all. We offer a portfolio of all employee, managerial and leader training that spans on-demand self-paced and virtual live instructor-led formats. Our programs focus on basic as well as transformational skills. We take pride in our culture and in fiscal year 2021 created an opportunity for our employees to participate in team-based culture workshops. In fiscal 2021, the majority of our employees completed one or more of our training programs representing over 100,000 learning hours.

•We offer employee assistance and work life benefits to all global employees. Our comprehensive benefits include healthcare benefits, disability and life insurance benefits, paid time off, and leave programs. Rockwell offers plans and resources to help employees meet future savings goals through defined benefit and retirement savings plans. We offer flextime, remote work, and part-time arrangements whenever business conditions permit.

We monitor employee retention and attrition rates by demographic factors including by gender, ethnicity, generation, years of service, career role, region, business, and function. We generally experienced higher attrition rates in fiscal year 2021 as compared to fiscal year 2020. We believe the increase is consistent with market trends experienced broadly across labor markets in fiscal 2021. We use attrition rate information to identify and address unfavorable trends to mitigate risk to our business. See Item 1A. Risk Factors for a discussion of risks relating to our inability to attract, develop, and retain highly qualified talent.

At September 30, 2021, our employees, including those employed by consolidated subsidiaries, by region were approximately:

North America9,500
Europe, Middle East and Africa5,000
Asia Pacific5,500
Latin America4,500
Total employees24,500

Our employees had the following global gender demographics:

September 30, 2021
WomenMen
All employees32%68%
Engineers15%85%
Manufacturing Associates49%51%
Individual Contributors36%64%
People Managers25%75%

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Our U.S. employees had the following race and ethnicity demographics based on voluntary disclosure:

September 30, 2021
All U.S. EmployeesEngineersManufacturing AssociatesIndividual ContributorsPeople Managers
Black / African American7%4%14%6%6%
Asian10%12%14%6%8%
Hispanic / Latinx5%5%4%6%5%
White75%77%56%79%80%
Multiracial, Native American and Pacific Islander1%1%2%2%1%
Undisclosed2%1%10%1%—%

Continuous Improvement

Productivity and continuous improvement are important components of our culture. We have programs in place that drive ongoing process improvement, functional streamlining, material cost savings and manufacturing productivity. These are intended to improve profitability that can be used to fund investments in growth and to offset inflation. Our ongoing productivity initiatives target both cost reduction and improved asset utilization. Charges for workforce reductions and facility rationalization may be required in order to effectively execute our productivity programs.

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U. S. Industrial Economic Trends

In 2021, sales in the U.S. accounted for over half of our total sales. The various indicators we use to gauge the direction and momentum of our served U.S. markets include:

•The Industrial Production (IP) Index, published by the Federal Reserve, which measures the real output of manufacturing, mining, and electric and gas utilities. The IP Index is expressed as a percentage of real output in a base year, currently 2017. Historically, there has been a meaningful correlation between the changes in the IP Index and the level of automation investment made by our U.S. customers in their manufacturing base.

•The Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI), published by the Institute for Supply Management (ISM), which indicates the current and near-term state of manufacturing activity in the U.S. According to the ISM, a PMI measure above 50 indicates that the U.S. manufacturing economy is generally expanding while a measure below 50 indicates that it is generally contracting.

The table below depicts the trends in these indicators from fiscal 2019 to 2021. These figures are as of the date of this filing and are subject to revision by the issuing organizations. The IP index continued to improve during the quarter, reaching the pre-pandemic level in August before declining below that level again in September. In the fourth quarter of fiscal 2021, PMI continues to be well above 50. The September PMI represents the sixteenth consecutive month of expansion in the overall economy.

IP IndexPMI
Fiscal 2021 quarter ended:
September 2021100.961.1
June 202199.960.6
March 202198.364.7
December 202097.460.5
Fiscal 2020 quarter ended:
September 202095.555.4
June 202087.152.6
March 2020100.049.1
December 2019101.747.8
Fiscal 2019 quarter ended:
September 2019102.448.2
June 2019102.451.6
March 2019103.054.6
December 2018103.954.3

Non-U.S. Economic Trends

In 2021, sales to customers outside the U.S. accounted for less than half of our total sales. These customers include both indigenous companies and multinational companies with a global presence. In addition to the global factors previously mentioned in the “Overview” section, international demand, particularly in emerging markets, has historically been driven by the strength of the industrial economy in each region, investments in infrastructure and expanding consumer markets. We use changes in key countries' gross domestic product and IP as indicators of the growth opportunities in each region where we do business.

Industrial output and PMI outside the U.S. was mixed in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2021. Industrial output projections for the first quarter of fiscal 2022 are varied with some regions projected to grow sequentially and others projected to contract.

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Supply Chain

We have a global supply chain, including a network of suppliers and distribution and manufacturing facilities. The supply chain is stressed by increased demand, along with pandemic-related and other global events that have put additional pressures on manufacturing output and freight lanes. This has resulted in and could continue to result in:

•disruptions in our supply chain;

•difficulty in procuring or inability to procure components and materials necessary for our hardware and software products, solutions and services;

•increased costs for commodities, components, and freight services; and

•delays in delivering, or an inability to deliver, our hardware and software products, solutions, and services.

We are closely managing our end-to-end supply chain, from sourcing to production to customer delivery, with a particular focus on all critical and at-risk suppliers and supplier locations globally.

COVID-19 Pandemic

In fiscal 2020, we experienced a significant disruption to our business as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic which impacted demand for our hardware and software products, services and solutions. In response to the pandemic we implemented enhanced policies and procedures for employee safety and we implemented temporary cost reduction actions and other adjustments to our cost structure. Restrictions on physical access to customer, manufacturing and office facilities has created and continues to create inefficiencies and execution delays.

We continue to monitor the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on all aspects of our business and geographies. Uncertainty on the duration and severity of those impacts remain as new variants of the virus have emerged and the evolving nature of vaccine roll-outs and regulations. New regulations for vaccines and COVID-19 testing and health and safety requirements have been announced and additional regulations may be announced in the jurisdictions in which our business operates. We are continuously responding to the changing conditions created by the pandemic and evolving regulations and remain focused on our priorities including employee health and safety, our customer needs, and protecting critical investments to drive long-term differentiation.

We have seen a recovery in demand for our hardware and software products, services, and solutions during fiscal 2021, allowing us to reverse our temporary cost reduction actions, and we expect this to continue into fiscal 2022. We continue to monitor and to respond to the impacts on our businesses from macroeconomic effects including the ongoing impacts of the pandemic, supply chain constraints, and materials and labor shortages.

Outlook

The table below provides guidance for sales growth and earnings per share for fiscal 2022. Our guidance reflects strong demand as well as record backlog entering into fiscal year 2022. Supply chain challenges remain dynamic, and our projections assume gradual improvement over the course of the year.

Sales Growth GuidanceEPS Guidance
Reported sales growth16% - 19%Diluted EPS$9.91 - $10.51
Organic sales growth114% - 17%Adjusted EPS1$10.50 - $11.10
Inorganic sales growth2~ 2%
Currency translation~ 0%

1Organic sales growth and Adjusted EPS are non-GAAP measures. See Supplemental Sales Information and Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation for more information on these non-GAAP measures.

2Estimate for incremental sales resulting from businesses acquired in fiscal year 2021.

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Summary of Results of Operations

The following table reflects our sales and operating results (in millions, except per share amounts):

Year Ended September 30,
202120202019
Sales
Intelligent Devices (a)$3,311.9$2,956.0$3,279.7
Software & Control (b)1,947.01,681.31,790.0
Lifecycle Services (c)1,738.51,692.51,625.1
Total sales (d)$6,997.4$6,329.8$6,694.8
Segment operating earnings1
Intelligent Devices (e)$702.1$587.8$697.0
Software & Control (f)531.0473.8531.2
Lifecycle Services (g)158.2196.3245.4
Total segment operating earnings2 (h)1,391.31,257.91,473.6
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization(55.1)(41.4)(16.6)
Corporate and other(120.6)(98.9)(108.8)
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (cost) credit(63.8)(37.4)8.4
Gain (loss) on investments397.4153.9(402.2)
Valuation adjustments related to the registration of PTC Shares33.7
Legal settlement70.0
Interest (expense) income, net(93.0)(98.0)(87.1)
Income before income taxes (i)1,526.21,136.1901.0
Income tax provision(181.9)(112.9)(205.2)
Net income1,344.31,023.2695.8
Net (loss) attributable to noncontrolling interests(13.8)(0.2)
Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation$1,358.1$1,023.4$695.8
Diluted EPS$11.58$8.77$5.83
Adjusted EPS3$9.43$7.87$8.78
Diluted weighted average outstanding shares117.1116.6119.3
Pre-tax margin (i/d)21.8%17.9%13.5%
Intelligent Devices segment operating margin (e/a)21.2%19.9%21.3%
Software & Control segment operating margin (f/b)27.3%28.2%29.7%
Lifecycle Services segment operating margin (g/c)9.1%11.6%15.1%
Total segment operating margin2 (h/d)19.9%19.9%22.0%

(1)See Note 19 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for the definition of segment operating earnings.

(2)Total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin are non-GAAP financial measures. We exclude purchase accounting depreciation and amortization, corporate and other, non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (cost) credit, gains and losses on investments, the $70 million legal settlement in fiscal 2021, valuation adjustments related to the registration of the PTC Shares in fiscal 2019, interest (expense) income - net, and income tax provision because we do not consider these costs to be directly related to the operating performance of our segments. We believe total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin are useful to investors as measures of operating performance. We use these measures to monitor and evaluate the profitability of our operating segments. Our measures of total segment operating earnings and total segment operating margin may be different from measures used by other companies.

(3)Adjusted EPS is a non-GAAP earnings measure. See Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation for more information on this non-GAAP measure.

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2021 Compared to 2020

Sales

Sales in fiscal 2021 increased 10.5 percent compared to 2020. Organic sales increased 6.7 percent of which approximately 1 percent was due to pricing. Currency translation increased sales by 2.3 percentage points. Acquisitions increased sales by 1.5 percentage points. Organic annual recurring revenue (ARR) at September 30, 2021 grew approximately 18 percent compared to September 30, 2020. See Organic Annual Recurring Revenue for information on this measure.

The table below presents our sales, attributed to the geographic regions based upon country of destination, for the year ended September 30, 2021, and the percentage change from the same period a year ago (in millions, except percentages):

Change vs.Change in Organic Sales(1) vs.
Year Ended September 30, 2021Year Ended September 30, 2020Year Ended September 30, 2020
North America$4,132.89.9%8.0%
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,405.712.5%2.8%
Asia Pacific1,012.216.5%10.3%
Latin America446.7(1.1)%(0.1)%
Total sales$6,997.410.5%6.7%

(1)Organic sales and organic sales growth exclude the effect of acquisitions, changes in currency exchange rates, and divestitures. See Supplemental Sales Information for information on these non-GAAP measures.

•Reported and organic sales in North America increased in discrete and hybrid industries, partially offset by weakness in process industries, particularly Oil & Gas.

•EMEA reported and organic sales increased primarily due to strength in Food & Beverage and Tire. Reported sales also increased due to currency translation and sales from acquisitions.

•Asia Pacific reported and organic sales increased year over year, primarily due to strength in Semiconductor, Life Sciences, and Tire. Reported sales also increased due to favorable currency translation.

•Reported and organic sales in Latin America decreased year over year, primarily due to weakness in Mining and Oil & Gas, partially offset by growth in Food & Beverage.

Corporate and Other

Corporate and other expenses were $120.6 million in fiscal 2021 compared to $98.9 million in fiscal 2020. The increase was primarily driven by deal costs associated with the acquisition of Plex Systems.

Income before Income Taxes

Income before income taxes increased to $1,526.2 million in 2021 from $1,136.1 million in 2020, primarily due to fair-value adjustments recognized in 2021 and 2020 in connection with our investment in PTC (the “PTC adjustments”), higher operating earnings, and a $70 million pre-tax favorable legal settlement in the first quarter of fiscal 2021. Total segment operating earnings increased to $1,391.3 million from $1,257.9 million in 2020, primarily due to higher sales, partially offset by the reinstatement of incentive compensation and the reversal of temporary pay actions taken in fiscal 2020.

Income Taxes

The effective tax rate in 2021 was 11.9 percent compared to 9.9 percent in 2020. The increase in the effective tax rate was primarily due to the effect of tax benefits recognized upon the formation of the Sensia joint venture in fiscal 2020 and other discrete items. The Adjusted Effective Tax Rate in 2021 was 11.6 percent compared to 12.4 percent in 2020. The decrease in the Adjusted Effective Tax Rate was primarily due to higher discrete benefits in the current year.

See Note 16 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for a complete reconciliation of the United States statutory tax rate to the effective tax rate and more information on tax events in 2021 and 2020 affecting each year’s respective tax rates.

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Diluted EPS and Adjusted EPS

Fiscal 2021 net income attributable to Rockwell Automation was $1,358.1 million or $11.58 per share, compared to $1,023.4 million or $8.77 per share in fiscal 2020. The increase in net income attributable to Rockwell Automation and diluted EPS were primarily due to higher sales and the PTC adjustments, partially offset by the reinstatement of incentive compensation and the reversal of temporary pay actions taken in fiscal 2020. Adjusted EPS was $9.43 in fiscal 2021, up 19.8 percent compared to $7.87 in fiscal 2020, primarily due to higher sales, partially offset by the reinstatement of incentive compensation and the reversal of temporary pay actions taken in fiscal 2020.

Operating Segments

The following is a discussion of our results by operating segment. See Note 19 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on each segment and our definition of segment operating earnings.

Intelligent Devices

Sales

Intelligent Devices sales increased 12.0 percent in 2021 compared to 2020. Organic sales increased 9.7 percent. The effects of currency translation increased sales by 2.3 percentage points. All regions experienced sales increases.

Segment Operating Margin

Intelligent Devices segment operating earnings increased 19.4 percent. Segment operating margin increased to 21.2% in 2021 from 19.9% in 2020, primarily due to higher sales, partially offset by the reinstatement of incentive compensation.

Software & Control

Sales

Software & Control sales increased 15.8 percent in 2021 compared to 2020. Organic sales increased 10.0 percent. The effects of currency translation increased sales by 2.5 percentage points and acquisitions increased sales by 3.3 percentage points. All regions experienced sales increases.

Segment Operating Margin

Software & Control segment operating earnings increased 12.1 percent year over year. Segment operating margin decreased to 27.3% in 2021 from 28.2% percent a year ago, primarily due to higher planned investment spend and the reinstatement of incentive compensation, partially offset by higher sales.

Lifecycle Services

Sales

Lifecycle Services sales increased 2.7 percent in 2021 compared to 2020. Organic sales decreased 1.8 percent. The effects of currency translation increased sales by 2.2 percentage points and acquisitions increased sales by 2.3 percentage points. Reported sales increased in EMEA and Asia Pacific, were flat in North America, and decreased in Latin America. Organic sales decreased in all regions except Asia Pacific.

Segment Operating Margin

Lifecycle Services segment operating earnings decreased 19.4 percent year over year. Segment operating margin decreased to 9.1% in 2021 from 11.6% percent a year ago, primarily due to the reinstatement of incentive compensation.

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2020 Compared to 2019

Sales

Sales in fiscal 2020 decreased 5.5 percent compared to 2019. Organic sales decreased 7.8 percent of which pricing increased sales by approximately 1 percentage point. Currency translation decreased sales by 1.2 percentage points. Acquisitions increased sales by 3.5 percentage points.

The table below presents our sales, attributed to the geographic regions based upon country of destination, for the year ended September 30, 2020, and the percentage change from the same period a year ago:

Change vs.Change in Organic Sales(1) vs.
(in millions, except percentages)Year Ended September 30, 2020Year Ended September 30, 2019Year Ended September 30, 2019
North America$3,760.2(6.3)%(8.5)%
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,249.3%(6.5)%
Asia Pacific868.7(4.4)%(5.3)%
Latin America451.6(13.5)%(9.5)%
Total sales$6,329.8(5.5)%(7.8)%

(1)Organic sales and organic sales growth exclude the effect of acquisitions, changes in currency exchange rates, and divestitures. See Supplemental Sales Information for information on these non-GAAP measures.

•Sales in North America decreased year over year, led by weakness in Oil & Gas, Metals, and Pulp & Paper.

•EMEA sales remained flat year over year. Organic sales decreased, driven by weak process industries and Tire.

•Asia Pacific sales decreased year over year, due to weakness in Oil & Gas and Food & Beverage.

•Sales in Latin America decreased year over year, primarily due to Oil & Gas, Automotive, and Mining.

Corporate and other

Corporate and other expenses were $98.9 million in fiscal 2020 compared to $108.8 million in fiscal 2019.

Income before Income Taxes

Income before income taxes increased 26 percent from $901.0 million in 2019 to $1,136.1 million in 2020, primarily due to the PTC adjustments, partially offset by lower sales. Total segment operating earnings decreased 15 percent year over year from $1,473.6 million in 2019 to $1,257.9 million in 2020, primarily due to lower sales, partially offset by a combination of temporary and structural cost actions.

Income Taxes

The effective tax rate in 2020 was 9.9 percent compared to 22.8 percent in 2019. The decrease in the effective tax rate was primarily due to the PTC adjustments, tax benefits recognizable upon the formation of the Sensia joint venture, and other discrete items. The Adjusted Effective Tax Rate in 2020 was 12.4 percent compared to 17.9 percent in 2019. The decrease in the Adjusted Effective Tax Rate was primarily due to our benefit from non-U.S. tax rates, tax benefits recognizable upon the formation of the Sensia joint venture, and other discrete items.

See Note 16 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for a complete reconciliation of the United States statutory tax rate to the effective tax rate and more information on tax events in 2020 and 2019 affecting each year’s respective tax rates.

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Diluted EPS and Adjusted EPS

Fiscal 2020 net income attributable to Rockwell Automation was $1,023.4 million or $8.77 per share, compared to $695.8 million or $5.83 per share in fiscal 2019. The increase in net income attributable to Rockwell Automation and diluted EPS were primarily due to the PTC adjustments, partially offset by lower sales. Fiscal 2020 Adjusted EPS was $7.87, down 10.4 percent compared to $8.78 in fiscal 2019, primarily due to lower sales, partially offset by a combination of temporary and structural cost actions.

Operating Segments

The following is a discussion of our results by operating segment. See Note 19 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on each segment and our definition of segment operating earnings.

Intelligent Devices

Sales

Intelligent Devices sales decreased 9.9 percent in 2020 compared to 2019. Organic sales decreased 8.8 percent and the effect of currency translation decreased sales by 1.1 percentage points. All regions experienced sales declines.

Segment Operating Margin

Intelligent Devices segment operating earnings decreased 15.7 percent. Operating margin was 19.9% percent in 2020 compared to 21.3% percent in 2019, primarily due to lower sales, partially offset by a combination of temporary and structural cost actions.

Software & Control

Sales

Software & Control sales decreased 6.1 percent in 2020 compared to 2019. Organic sales decreased 5.9 percent, the effect of currency translation decreased sales by 1.2 percentage points, and acquisitions increased sales by 1.0 percentage points. All regions experienced sales declines.

Segment Operating Margin

Software & Control segment operating earnings decreased 10.8 percent year over year. Segment operating margin was 28.2 percent in 2020 compared to 29.7 percent a year ago, primarily due to lower sales, partially offset by a combination of temporary and structural cost actions.

Lifecycle Services

Sales

Lifecycle Services sales increased 4.1 percent in 2020 compared to 2019. Organic sales decreased 7.8 percent, the effect of currency translation decreased sales by 1.4 percentage points, and acquisitions increased sales by 13.3 percentage points. Reported sales increased in all regions except Latin America, and all regions experienced organic sales declines.

Segment Operating Margin

Lifecycle Services segment operating earnings decreased 20.0 percent year over year. Segment operating margin was 11.6 percent in 2020 compared to 15.1 percent a year ago, primarily due to lower organic sales and the impact of acquisitions, partially offset by a combination of temporary and structural cost actions.

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Supplemental Segment Information

Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization and non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit) are not allocated to our operating segments because these costs are excluded from our measurement of each segment’s operating performance for internal purposes. If we were to allocate these costs, we would attribute them to each of our segments as follows (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202120202019
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization
Intelligent Devices$2.7$2.9$3.3
Software & Control19.26.74.8
Lifecycle Services32.130.87.4
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit)
Intelligent Devices$14.1$7.4$(4.2)
Software & Control14.17.4(4.2)
Lifecycle Services18.89.9(5.5)

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Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate Reconciliation

Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate are non-GAAP earnings measures that exclude non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit), purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation, net income (loss) attributable to noncontrolling interests, and gains and losses on investments, including their respective tax effects. Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit) is defined as all components of our net periodic pension and postretirement benefit cost except for service cost. See Note 14 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information on our net periodic pension and postretirement benefit cost.

Beginning in fiscal 2021, we changed our definition of Adjusted Income and Adjusted EPS to exclude the impact of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation, including the related tax effects. The definition of Adjusted Effective Tax Rate also changed to correspond to the purchase accounting items now being excluded from Adjusted Income. We believe these new definitions provide more useful information about our operating performance and allow management and investors to better compare our operating performance period over period, compared to our prior definitions of these measures given our increased inorganic investments. All previously reported amounts within this filing have been recast to conform to this new definition. Adjusted EPS is also used as a financial measure of performance for our annual incentive compensation. Our measures of Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate may be different from measures used by other companies. These non-GAAP measures should not be considered a substitute for net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS and effective tax rate.

The following are reconciliations of net income attributable to Rockwell Automation, diluted EPS and effective tax rate to Adjusted Income, Adjusted EPS and Adjusted Effective Tax Rate, respectively (in millions, except per share amounts and percentages):

Year Ended September 30,
202120202019
Net income attributable to Rockwell Automation$1,358.1$1,023.4$695.8
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit)63.837.4(8.4)
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit)(16.0)(10.1)1.0
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation43.229.416.6
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation(10.5)(7.0)(3.2)
Change in fair value of investments1(397.4)(153.9)368.5
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments164.7(21.7)
Adjusted Income$1,105.9$919.2$1,048.6
Diluted EPS$11.58$8.77$5.83
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit)0.550.32(0.07)
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit)(0.14)(0.09)0.01
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation0.370.250.14
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation(0.09)(0.06)(0.03)
Change in fair value of investments1(3.39)(1.32)3.08
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments10.55(0.18)
Adjusted EPS$9.43$7.87$8.78
Effective tax rate11.9%9.9%22.8%
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit cost (credit)0.5%0.6%0.1%
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation0.4%0.4%%
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments1(1.2)%1.5%(5.0)%
Adjusted Effective Tax Rate11.6%12.4%17.9%

1Includes (gain) loss on investments and valuation adjustments related to the registration of PTC Shares.

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Fiscal 2022 Guidance
Diluted EPS$9.91 - $10.51
Purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation0.87
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation(0.21)
Non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost(0.08)
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost0.01
Change in fair value of investments1
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments1
Adjusted EPS2$10.50 - $11.10
Effective tax rate~ 16.5%
Tax effect of purchase accounting depreciation and amortization attributable to Rockwell Automation~ 0.5%
Tax effect of non-operating pension and postretirement benefit (credit) cost~ —%
Tax effect of change in fair value of investments1~ —%
Adjusted Effective Tax Rate~ 17.0%

1Fiscal 2022 guidance excludes estimates of changes in fair value of investments on a forward-looking basis due to variability, complexity, and limited visibility of these items.

2Fiscal 2022 guidance based on Adjusted Income attributable to Rockwell, which includes an adjustment for Schlumberger's non-controlling interest in Sensia.

Organic Annual Recurring Revenue

ARR is a key metric that enables measurement of progress in growing our recurring revenue business. It represents the annual contract value of all active recurring revenue contracts at any point in time. Recurring revenue is defined as a revenue stream that is contractual, typically for a period of 12 months or more, and has a high probability of renewal. The probability of renewal is based on historical renewal experience of the individual revenue streams, or management's best estimates if historical renewal experience is not available. Organic ARR growth is calculated as the dollar change in ARR, adjusted to exclude the effects of currency translation and acquisitions, divided by ARR as of the prior period. The effects of currency translation are excluded by calculating Organic ARR on a constant currency basis. When we acquire businesses, we exclude the effect of ARR in the current period for which there was no comparable ARR in the prior period. Organic ARR growth is also used as a financial measure of performance for our annual incentive compensation. Because ARR is based on annual contract value, it does not represent revenue recognized during a particular reporting period or revenue to be recognized in future reporting periods and is not intended to be a substitute for revenue, contract liabilities, or backlog.

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Financial Condition

The following is a summary of our cash flows from operating, investing and financing activities, as reflected in the Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202120202019
Cash provided by (used for):
Operating activities$1,261.0$1,120.5$1,182.0
Investing activities(2,626.6)(618.0)225.0
Financing activities1,297.8(798.9)(985.9)
Effect of exchange rate changes on cash16.88.4(21.5)
Cash (used for) provided by continuing operations$(51.0)$(288.0)$399.6

The following table summarizes free cash flow, which is a non-GAAP financial measure (in millions):

Year Ended September 30,
202120202019
Cash provided by continuing operating activities$1,261.0$1,120.5$1,182.0
Capital expenditures(120.3)(113.9)(132.8)
Free cash flow$1,140.7$1,006.6$1,049.2

Our definition of free cash flow takes into consideration capital investments required to maintain our businesses’ operations and execute our strategy. Cash provided by continuing operating activities adds back non-cash depreciation expense to earnings but does not reflect a charge for necessary capital expenditures. Our definition of free cash flow excludes the operating cash flows and capital expenditures related to our discontinued operations, if any. Operating, investing and financing cash flows of our discontinued operations, if any, are presented separately in our Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows. In our opinion, free cash flow provides useful information to investors regarding our ability to generate cash from business operations that is available for acquisitions and other investments, service of debt principal, dividends and share repurchases. We use free cash flow, as defined, as one measure to monitor and evaluate our performance, including as a financial measure for our annual incentive compensation. Our definition of free cash flow may differ from definitions used by other companies.

Cash provided by operating activities was $1,261.0 million for the year ended September 30, 2021, compared to $1,120.5 million for the year ended September 30, 2020. Free cash flow was $1,140.7 million for the year ended September 30, 2021, compared to $1,006.6 million for the year ended September 30, 2020. The year-over-year increase in cash provided by operating activities and free cash flow were primarily due to higher pre-tax income, including the $70 million favorable legal settlement in the first quarter of fiscal 2021, and a decrease in incentive compensation payments, partially offset by higher working capital and income tax payments in fiscal 2021 compared to fiscal 2020.

We repurchased approximately 1.1 million shares of our common stock under our share repurchase program in 2021 at a total cost of $301.4 million and an average cost of $263.43 per share. In 2020, we repurchased approximately 1.4 million shares of our common stock under our share repurchase program at a total cost of $254.7 million and an average cost of $182.18 per share. At September 30, 2021, there were $1.8 million of outstanding common stock share repurchases recorded in accounts payable that did not settle until 2022. At September 30, 2020, there were no outstanding common stock share repurchases recorded in accounts payable. Our decision to repurchase shares in 2022 will depend on business conditions, free cash flow generation, other cash requirements and stock price. On both September 6, 2018 and July 24, 2019, the Board of Directors authorized us to expend $1.0 billion to repurchase shares of our common stock. At September 30, 2021, we had approximately $552.3 million remaining for share repurchases under our existing board authorizations. See Item 5. Market for Registrant’s Common Equity, Related Stockholder Matters and Issuer Purchases of Equity Securities, for additional information regarding share repurchases.

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We expect future uses of cash to include working capital requirements, capital expenditures, additional contributions to our retirement plans, acquisitions of businesses and other inorganic investments, dividends to shareowners, repurchases of common stock and repayments of debt. We expect capital expenditures in 2022 to be approximately $165 million. Significant long-term uses of cash include the following (in millions):

Payments by Period
Total20222023202420252026Thereafter
Long-term debt and interest (a)$6,051.1$113.0$713.0$110.9$405.9$102.3$4,606.0
Minimum lease payments (Note 18)446.0101.884.864.847.134.6112.9
Postretirement benefits (b)51.55.85.55.14.84.525.8
Pension funding contribution (c)57.457.4
Transition tax (d)296.031.231.158.477.997.4
Total$6,902.0$309.2$834.4$239.2$535.7$238.8$4,744.7

(a)The amounts for long-term debt assume that the respective debt instruments will be outstanding until their scheduled maturity dates and include interest but exclude unamortized discount. See Note 7 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for more information regarding our long-term debt.

(b)Our postretirement benefit plans are unfunded and are subject to change. Amounts reported are estimates of future benefit payments, to the extent estimable.

(c)Amounts reported for pension funding contributions reflect current estimates. Contributions to our pension plans beyond 2022 will depend on future investment performance of our pension plan assets, changes in discount rate assumptions and governmental regulations in effect at the time. Amounts subsequent to 2022 are excluded from the summary above, as we are unable to make a reasonably reliable estimate of these amounts. The minimum contribution for our U.S. pension plan as required by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) is currently zero. We may make additional contributions to this plan at the discretion of management.

(d)Under the Tax Act, the Company may elect to pay the transition tax interest-free over eight years, with 8% due in each of the first five years, 15% in year six, 20% in year seven, and 25% in year eight.

We expect to fund future uses of cash with a combination of existing cash balances, cash generated by operating activities, commercial paper borrowings or a new issuance of debt or other securities. In addition, we have access to unsecured credit facilities with various banks.

At September 30, 2021, the majority of our cash and cash equivalents were held by non-U.S. subsidiaries. As a result of the broad changes to the U.S. international tax system under the Tax Act, in fiscal year 2018 we began to account for substantially all of our non-U.S. subsidiaries as being immediately subject to tax, while still concluding that earnings are indefinitely reinvested for a limited number of subsidiaries.

Our short-term debt as of September 30, 2021, includes $484.0 million of commercial paper borrowings with a weighted average interest rate of 0.18 percent and weighted average maturity period of 90 days. There were no commercial paper borrowings outstanding as of September 30, 2020. Also included in short-term debt as of September 30, 2021 and 2020 are $23.5 million of interest-bearing loans from Schlumberger to Sensia which were originally due September 30, 2020, and are now due December 31, 2021. The short-term loans from Schlumberger were entered into following formation of Sensia in fiscal 2020.

In August 2021, we issued $1.5 billion aggregate principal amount of long-term notes in a registered public offering. The offering consisted of $600.0 million of 0.35% notes due in August 2023, $450.0 million of 1.75% notes due in August 2031, and $450.0 million of 2.80% notes due in August 2061, all issued at a discount. Net proceeds to the Company from the debt offering were $1,485.6 million. We used these net proceeds primarily to fund the acquisition of Plex. Refer to Note 4 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for additional information on this acquisition.

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We entered into treasury locks to manage the potential change in interest rates in anticipation of the issuance of the $1.5 billion aggregate notes in August 2021. These treasury locks were designated as and accounted for as cash flow hedges. As a result of the changes in the interest rates on the treasury locks between the time we entered into the treasury locks and the time we priced and issued the notes, the Company made a net payment of $28.0 million to the counterparties. The $28.0 million net loss on the settlement of the treasury locks was recorded in Accumulated Other Comprehensive Loss, net of tax effect and is being amortized over the term of the corresponding notes as an adjustment to interest expense in the Consolidated Statement of Operations.

In April 2020, we entered into a $400.0 million senior unsecured 364-day term loan credit agreement and were advanced the full loan amount. Interest on these borrowings was based on short-term money market rates in effect during the period the borrowings were outstanding. We repaid the $400.0 million term loan in September 2020.

In March 2019, we issued $1 billion aggregate principal amount of long-term notes in a registered public offering. The offering consisted of $425.0 million of 3.50% notes due in March 2029 (“2029 Notes”) and $575.0 million of 4.20% notes due in March 2049 (“2049 Notes”), both issued at a discount. Net proceeds to the Company from the debt offering were $987.6 million. We used these net proceeds primarily to repay our outstanding commercial paper, with the remaining proceeds used for general corporate purposes.

We entered into treasury locks to manage the potential change in interest rates in anticipation of the issuance of $1.0 billion of fixed rate debt in March 2019. Treasury locks are accounted for as cash flow hedges. The effective differentials paid on these treasury locks was initially recorded in Accumulated Other Comprehensive Loss, net of tax effect.

As a result of the changes in the interest rates on the treasury locks between the time we entered into the treasury locks and the time we priced and issued the 2029 Notes and 2049 Notes, the Company made a payment of $35.7 million to the counterparty on March 1, 2019. The $35.7 million loss on the settlement of the treasury locks was recorded in Accumulated Other Comprehensive Loss and is being amortized over the term of the 2029 Notes and 2049 Notes, and recognized as an adjustment to interest expense in the Consolidated Statement of Operations.

On November 13, 2018, we replaced our former five-year $1.0 billion unsecured revolving credit facility with a new five-year $1.25 billion unsecured revolving credit facility expiring in November 2023. We can increase the aggregate amount of this credit facility by up to $750.0 million, subject to the consent of the banks in the credit facility. We did not incur early termination penalties in connection with the termination of the former credit facility. We did not borrow against the facility during the periods ended September 30, 2021 or 2020. Borrowings under the new credit facility bear interest based on short-term money market rates in effect during the period the borrowings are outstanding. This credit facility contains covenants under which we agree to maintain an EBITDA-to-interest ratio of at least 3.0 to 1.0. The EBITDA-to-interest ratio is defined in the credit facility as the ratio of consolidated EBITDA (as defined in the facility) for the preceding four quarters to consolidated interest expense for the same period.

LIBOR is the primary basis for determining interest payments on borrowings under our $1.25 billion credit facility. Banks currently reporting information used to set U.S dollar LIBOR are currently expected to stop doing so during 2023. Various parties, including government agencies, are seeking to identify an alternative rate to replace LIBOR. We are monitoring their efforts, and we will likely seek to amend contracts to accommodate any replacement rate where one is not already provided.

Separate short-term unsecured credit facilities of approximately $230.8 million at September 30, 2021, were available to non-U.S. subsidiaries. Borrowings under our non-U.S. credit facilities at September 30, 2021 and 2020, were not significant. We were in compliance with all covenants under our credit facilities at September 30, 2021 and 2020. There are no significant commitment fees or compensating balance requirements under our credit facilities.

Among other uses, we can draw on our credit facility as a standby liquidity facility to repay our outstanding commercial paper as it matures. This access to funds to repay maturing commercial paper is an important factor in maintaining the short-term credit ratings set forth in the table below. Under our current policy with respect to these ratings, we expect to limit our other borrowings under our credit facility, if any, to amounts that would leave enough credit available under the facility so that we could borrow, if needed, to repay all of our then outstanding commercial paper as it matures.

During the fourth quarter of fiscal 2021, as a result of the additional leverage added to fund the Plex acquisition, Standard & Poor’s elected to downgrade our Outlook from “Stable” to “Negative”. No changes were made to existing ratings by Moody’s or Fitch. The following is a summary of our credit ratings as of September 30, 2021:

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Credit Rating AgencyShort Term RatingLong Term RatingOutlook
Standard & Poor’sA-1ANegative
Moody’sP-2A3Stable
Fitch RatingsF1AStable

Our ability to access the commercial paper market, and the related costs of these borrowings, is affected by the strength of our credit ratings and market conditions. Conditions in the commercial paper market have improved since the COVID-19 pandemic negatively affected this market in March and April 2020, and we have not experienced any difficulty in accessing the commercial paper market. If our access to the commercial paper market is adversely affected due to a change in market conditions or otherwise, we would expect to rely on a combination of available cash and our unsecured committed credit facility to provide short-term funding. In such event, the cost of borrowings under our unsecured committed credit facility could be higher than the cost of commercial paper borrowings.

We regularly monitor the third-party depository institutions that hold our cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments. We diversify our cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments among counterparties to minimize exposure to any one of these entities.

We use foreign currency forward exchange contracts to manage certain foreign currency risks. We enter into these contracts to hedge our exposure to foreign currency exchange rate variability in the expected future cash flows associated with certain third-party and intercompany transactions denominated in foreign currencies forecasted to occur within the next two years. We also use these contracts to hedge portions of our net investments in certain non-U.S. subsidiaries against the effect of exchange rate fluctuations on the translation of foreign currency balances to the U.S. dollar. In addition, we use foreign currency forward exchange contracts that are not designated as hedges to offset transaction gains or losses associated with some of our assets and liabilities resulting from intercompany loans or other transactions with third parties that are denominated in currencies other than our entities’ functional currencies. Our foreign currency forward exchange contracts are usually denominated in currencies of major industrial countries. We diversify our foreign currency forward exchange contracts among counterparties to minimize exposure to any one of these entities.

Cash dividends declared to shareowners were $497.5 million in 2021 ($4.28 per common share), $472.8 million in 2020 ($4.08 per common share) and $459.8 million in 2019 ($3.88 per common share). Our quarterly dividend rate as of September 30, 2021 is $1.07 per common share ($4.28 per common share annually), which is determined at the sole discretion of our Board of Directors.

Supplemental Sales Information

We translate sales of subsidiaries operating outside of the United States using exchange rates effective during the respective period. Therefore, changes in currency exchange rates affect our reported sales. Sales by acquired businesses also affect our reported sales. We believe that organic sales, defined as sales excluding the effects of acquisitions and changes in currency exchange rates, which is a non-GAAP financial measure, provides useful information to investors because it reflects regional and operating segment performance from the activities of our businesses without the effect of acquisitions and changes in currency exchange rates. We use organic sales as one measure to monitor and evaluate our regional and operating segment performance. When we acquire businesses, we exclude sales in the current period for which there are no comparable sales in the prior period. We determine the effect of changes in currency exchange rates by translating the respective period’s sales using the same currency exchange rates that were in effect during the prior year. When we divest a business, we exclude sales in the prior period for which there are no comparable sales in the current period. Organic sales growth is calculated by comparing organic sales to reported sales in the prior year, excluding divestitures. We attribute sales to the geographic regions based on the country of destination.

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The following is a reconciliation of our reported sales by geographic region to organic sales (in millions):

Year Ended September 30, 2021Year Ended September 30, 2020
SalesEffect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesSales
North America$4,132.8$(48.1)$(24.6)$4,060.1$3,760.2
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,405.7(44.9)(76.9)1,283.91,249.3
Asia Pacific1,012.2(0.6)(53.1)958.5868.7
Latin America446.7(0.3)4.7451.1451.6
Total Company Sales$6,997.4$(93.9)$(149.9)$6,753.6$6,329.8
Year Ended September 30, 2020Year Ended September 30, 2019
SalesEffect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesSales
North America$3,760.2$(91.5)$4.0$3,672.7$4,014.3
Europe, Middle East and Africa1,249.3(97.0)16.71,169.01,249.8
Asia Pacific868.7(22.3)13.7860.1908.6
Latin America451.6(23.1)43.8472.3522.1
Total Company Sales$6,329.8$(233.9)$78.2$6,174.1$6,694.8

The following is a reconciliation of our reported sales by operating segment to organic sales (in millions):

Year Ended September 30, 2021Year Ended September 30, 2020
SalesEffect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesSales
Intelligent Devices$3,311.9$$(70.5)$3,241.4$2,956.0
Software & Control1,947.0(54.8)(42.1)1,850.11,681.3
Lifecycle Services1,738.5(39.1)(37.3)1,662.11,692.5
Total Company Sales$6,997.4$(93.9)$(149.9)$6,753.6$6,329.8
Year Ended September 30, 2020Year Ended September 30, 2019
SalesEffect of AcquisitionsEffect of Changes in CurrencyOrganic SalesSales
Intelligent Devices$2,956.0$$36.2$2,992.2$3,279.7
Software & Control1,681.3(17.1)19.41,683.61,790.0
Lifecycle Services1,692.5(216.8)22.61,498.31,625.1
Total Company Sales$6,329.8$(233.9)$78.2$6,174.1$6,694.8

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Critical Accounting Estimates

We believe the following accounting estimates are the most critical to the understanding of our financial statements as they could have the most significant effect on our reported results and require subjective or complex judgments by management. Accounting principles generally accepted in the United States require us to make estimates and assumptions that affect the reported amounts of assets and liabilities at the date of the consolidated financial statements and revenues and expenses during the periods reported. These estimates are based on our best judgment about current and future conditions, but actual results could differ from those estimates. Refer to Note 1 in the Consolidated Financial Statements for information regarding our significant accounting policies.

Goodwill - Sensia Reporting Unit

The quantitative test of goodwill for impairment requires us to estimate the fair value of our reporting units. During the second quarter of 2021, we performed a quantitative impairment test for our Sensia reporting unit. We determined the fair value of the reporting unit under a combination of an income approach derived from discounted cash flows and a market multiples approach using selected comparable public companies.

Critical assumptions used in this approach included management’s estimated future revenue growth rates, estimated future margins, and discount rate. Estimated future revenue growth and margins are based on management’s best estimate about current and future conditions. Although we believe the assumptions and estimates made were reasonable and appropriate, these estimates are based on a number of factors, including historical experience and information obtained from reporting unit management. Actual results and forecasts of revenue growth and margins for our Sensia reporting unit may be impacted by its concentration within the Oil & Gas industry and with its customer base. Demand for Sensia hardware and software products, solutions and services is sensitive to industry volatility and risks, including those related to commodity prices, supply and demand dynamics, production costs, geological activity, and political activities. We determined the discount rate using our weighted average cost of capital adjusted for risk factors specific to the reporting unit, with comparison to market and industry data. A hypothetical 10 percent decrease in the fair value of this reporting unit would not impact our conclusion that goodwill was not impaired.

More information regarding goodwill impairment testing is contained in Note 1 and Note 3 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Acquisitions - Plex Intangible Assets Valuation

The accounting for a business combination requires the excess of the purchase price for the acquisition over the net book value of assets acquired to be allocated to the identifiable assets of the acquired entity. Any unallocated portion is recognized as goodwill. We engaged an independent third-party valuation specialist to assist with the fair value allocation of the purchase price paid for the acquisition of Plex to intangible assets. This required the use of several assumptions and estimates including the customer attrition rate, forecasted cash flows attributable to existing customers, and the discount rate for the customer relationship intangible asset and the royalty rate, forecasted revenue growth rates, and the discount rate for the technology intangible asset. Although we believe the assumptions and estimates made were reasonable and appropriate, these estimates require judgment and are based in part on historical experience and information obtained from Plex management.

The key assumption requiring the use of judgement in the valuation of the customer relationship intangible asset was the customer attrition rate of 5 percent. This rate was selected based on historical experience and information obtained from Plex management. A change in the customer attrition rate of 250 basis points would result in a change of $63 million in intangible assets. The key assumptions requiring the use of judgement in the valuation of the technology intangible asset were the royalty rate of 25 percent and the obsolescence factor. The royalty rate was based on a detailed analysis considering the importance of the technology to the overall enterprise and market royalty data. A change in the royalty rate of 500 basis points would result in a change of $47 million in intangible assets. The obsolescence factor was calculated assuming phase out over ten years based on discussions with Plex management, the nature of the technology, its integration into customers’ manufacturing systems, and other third-party information for similar transactions. A two-year change in this assumption would result in a change of $52 million in intangible assets.

More information regarding this business combination is contained in Note 4 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

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Retirement Benefits — Pension

Pension costs and obligations are actuarially determined and are influenced by assumptions used to estimate these amounts, including the discount rate. Changes in any of the assumptions and the amortization of differences between the assumptions and actual experience will affect the amount of pension expense in future periods.

Our global pension expense in 2021 was $157.0 million compared to $130.9 million in 2020. Approximately 88 percent of our 2021 global pension expense and 75 percent of our global projected benefit obligation relate to our U.S. pension plan. The discount rate used to determine our 2021 U.S. pension expense was 2.90 percent, compared to 3.30 percent for 2020.

For 2022, our U.S. discount rate will increase to 3.10 percent from 2.90 percent in 2021. The discount rate was set as of our September 30 measurement date and was determined by modeling a portfolio of bonds that match the expected cash flow of our benefit plans.

The changes in our discount rate has an inverse relationship with our net periodic benefit cost and projected benefit obligation. The following chart illustrates the estimated change in projected benefit obligation and annual net periodic benefit cost assuming a change of 25 basis points in the discount rate for our U.S. pension plans (in millions):

Pension Benefits
Change in Projected Benefit ObligationChange in Net Periodic Benefit Cost(1)
Discount rate$129.7$13.3

(1) Change includes both operating and non-operating pension costs.

More information regarding pension benefits is contained in Note 14 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Revenue Recognition — Customer Incentives

We offer various incentive programs that provide distributors and direct sale customers with cash rebates, account credits or additional hardware and software products, solutions and services based on meeting specified program criteria. Customer incentives are recognized as a reduction of sales if distributed in cash or customer account credits. We record accruals at the time of revenue recognition as a current liability within Customer returns, rebates and incentives in our Consolidated Balance Sheet or, where a right of setoff exists, as a reduction of Receivables. Customer incentives for additional hardware and software products, solutions and services to be provided are considered distinct performance obligations. As such, we allocate revenue to them based on relative standalone selling price. Until the incentive is redeemed, the revenue is recorded as a contract liability.

Our primary incentive program provides distributors with cash rebates or account credits based on agreed amounts that vary depending on the customer to whom our distributor ultimately sells the product. A critical assumption used in estimating the accrual for this program is the time period from when revenue is recognized to when the rebate is processed. Our estimate is based primarily on historical experience. If the time period were to change by 10 percent, the effect would be an adjustment to the accrual of approximately $14.2 million.

More information regarding our revenue recognition and returns, rebates and incentives policies are contained in Note 1 and Note 2 in the Consolidated Financial Statements.

Acquisitions - Sensia Joint Venture Intangible Assets Valuation

We recorded assets acquired and liabilities assumed in connection with the formation of Sensia based on their estimated fair values as of the acquisition date of October 1, 2019. The accounting for a business combination requires the excess of the purchase price for the acquisition over the net book value of assets acquired to be allocated to the identifiable assets of the acquired entity. Any unallocated portion is recognized as goodwill. We engaged an independent third-party valuation specialist to assist with the fair value allocation of the purchase price paid in connection with formation of the Sensia joint venture to intangible assets, which required the use of several assumptions and estimates. Although we believe the assumptions and estimates made were reasonable and appropriate, these estimates are based on historical experience and information obtained from Sensia management. The key assumption requiring the use of judgment was the customer attrition rates ranging from 7.5 percent to 25 percent. A change in the customer attrition rate of 250 basis points would result in a change of $40.4 million in intangible assets.

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Acquisitions - Consolidation of Sensia Joint Venture

On October 1, 2019, we completed the formation of a joint venture, Sensia, a fully integrated digital oilfield automation solutions provider. Rockwell Automation owns 53 percent of Sensia and Schlumberger owns 47 percent of Sensia. We control Sensia and, as of October 1, 2019, have consolidated Sensia in our financial results. In determining whether to consolidate Sensia, U.S. GAAP requires that we evaluate our ability to control the significant financial and operating decisions of the joint venture. Determining the nature and extent of the noncontrolling interest holder's rights involves management judgment. We have evaluated the noncontrolling interest holder's rights and determined that we control and should consolidate Sensia in our financial results.

Recent Accounting Pronouncements

See Note 1 in the Consolidated Financial Statements regarding recent accounting pronouncements.

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