AeroVironment Quarterly Earnings, Revenue Unexpectedly Increase; Maintains Full-Year Outlook

07:15 AM EDT, 09/10/2026 (MT Newswires) -- AeroVironment (AVAV) shares rose early Thursday after its fiscal first-quarter earnings and revenue unexpectedly increased year over year, while the drone maker reiterated its full-year outlook. The company posted adjusted earnings of $0.59 per share for the quarter ended Aug. 1, up from $0.32 the year before, it said late Wednesday. The consensus on FactSet was for a decrease to $0.22. Revenue increased to $480.5 million from $454.7 million, beating the Street's view for a decline to $451.9 million. The stock rose 6.6% in the most recent premarket activity. "We secured solid bookings of $683 million and ended the quarter with record funded backlog of $1.5 billion, up 23% from the prior quarter and higher by 37% from the same period last year," Chief Financial Officer Sean Woodward said during an earnings call, according to a FactSet transcript. "We made significant progress on our capacity expansion initiative that we expect will allow the company to quickly scale to meet expected increased global demand." AeroVironment continues to project adjusted EPS to come in between $3.02 and $3.34 on a revenue range of $2.13 billion to $2.23 billion for fiscal 2027. The Street is looking for non-GAAP EPS of $3.26 and sales of $2.2 billion. "Based on our strong (first-quarter) performance, record funded backlog position and capacity investments underway, we remain confident in our full year outlook," Woodward said on the call. "We continue to expect revenue to be stronger in the second half of fiscal year 2027." Chief Executive Wahid Nawabi told analysts that uncertainty remains over the timing of the final budget approval by the US Congress, but the company currently doesn't expect it to be a "significant risk" to its outlook. By segment, autonomous systems recorded revenue of $346 million in the first quarter, up from $285.3 million in the prior-year period. The space, cyber and directed energy division contributed revenue of $134.5 million, down 21% year over year, reflecting revenue loss from the Satellite Communications Augmentation Resource contract termination in March and other discontinued government programs, according to Woodward. In an emailed client note in July, RBC Capital Markets said the issues facing AeroVironment, such as flat top-line defense spending and potential capacity expansion risk, will keep investors on the sidelines until upside visibility improves. The brokerage at the time said that the company remains well positioned in industry growth markets, while competition concerns are exaggerated. Defense contractors Lockheed Martin (LMT) and Northrop Grumman (NOC) raised their full-year guidance in July following upbeat second-quarter results.