Chief Financial Officer, Principal Financial Officer & Treasurer, Bel Fuse
Search every verified Farouq Tuweiq interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Farouq Tuweiq, Chief Financial Officer of Bel Fuse, has participated in several media appearances in late 2024. In a NASDAQ Small Cap Forum session, he discussed the company's transition from a micro-cap to a SMID-cap company, stating that the company had focused on improving margins and paying down debt. He said that Bel Fuse had revamped its finance structure, increased its investor outreach from two to three conferences per year to 13 to 14 in 2022, and implemented its first stock buyback. Tuweiq also described the company's focus on long design cycle businesses such as defense and commercial aerospace. In a separate NASDAQ Amplify Spotlight and an interview with TD Ameritrade (Schwab Network), Tuweiq discussed Bel Fuse's 75-year history, its global operations with 7,000 employees, and its presence in end markets including commercial air, defense, e-mobility, and data centers. He noted that the company had made three acquisitions since he joined, including one in the EV space, and had reduced its debt to $60 million at a fixed interest rate. Tuweiq stated that the company was seeing strong demand in commercial air, defense, and e-mobility, and described AI as a "new theme" that would create demand for data center and networking products. He also said that supply chain issues were easing, though some concerns remained around certain components, and that the company had not yet seen a recession despite predictions.
“Our stock price really is simply an output of all the efforts that went in and to your point our stock we've been fortunate we've been on a nice run despite some of the market challenges quite frankly that were happening.”
“We were four times leverage initially and wanted to pay down our debt and get that under control in a rising interest rate environment. Once we accomplished that, our priorities started shifting a little bit.”
“We implemented our first stock buyback earlier this year and we're doubling down on investing in strategic and exciting growth areas.”
“We revamped our entire finance structure, standardized processes instead of relying on people, introduced commonality of language and mindset to reduce redundancy and increase resiliency within our business.”
“When we were $180 million market cap, we were not getting out there; historically we would do two to three conferences a year, that's not going to cut it in a crowded field. In 2022, we did 13 to 14 conferences and four to five non-deal roadshows to build investor credibility and awareness.”
“We were over-levered with low EBITDA margin and our cash flow wasn't there. Our focus was to improve the P&L to generate cash flow and pay down our four times leverage business, which opened optionality for facility consolidation and capex.”
“We had to be transparent to build credibility with investors, sharing the good, the bad, and the ugly, and listening to their feedback to add value for everyone.”
“As we scaled, we changed about 50% of our independent directors to infuse new perspectives and diversity, updated committee structures, and revamped executive compensation with clear targets and metrics.”
“We focus on long design cycle businesses like defense and commercial aerospace, which means investors understand our growth is measured over one or two design cycles before revenue impact.”
“Key financial KPIs we focus on include revenue growth, gross margin as the first line of defense for managing SG&A, networking capital, inventory turns, free cash flow, and return on invested capital.”
“We feel that we have an exciting story; we've been around for 70 years but have been really busy the last couple years focusing on driving shareholder value through improving our margins.”
“We've been aided a lot by the mega trend tailwinds in our sector, and the team of 7,000 employees worldwide has been heads down trying to improve our margins to better align them to the market and our peers.”
“We've made three acquisitions since I joined, the most recent one in the EV space, a company in Germany, especially on the industrial side. We've also paid down our debt, now down to $60 million, very under-levered at 2.5% fixed interest rate.”
“Lowering our debt obligation has obviously been great; it allows us to invest in R&D and other areas.”
“We compete globally across Asia, Europe, and North America in a competitive environment, and we win because of our engineer-to-engineer relationship and legacy reliability.”
Farouq Tuwieq, CFO, discussed Bel's Journey from Micro-Cap to SMID Cap with Adam Epstein, Founder of Third Creek Advisors, ...
Bel's CFO, Farouq Tuwieq, visited the New York Stock Exchange to sit down with TD Ameritrade (Schwab Network) for one of their ...
Farouq Tuwieq, CFO, discussed Bel's 40-year NASDAQ listing history with Michael Spector in an Amplify Spotlight. They reflected ...
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