Garmin (NYSE:GRMN) reported third-quarter financial results on Wednesday. The transcript from the company’s third-quarter earnings call has been provided below.
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View the webcast at https://events.q4inc.com/attendee/636560046
Summary
Garmin Ltd. reported record-breaking financial results for Q3 2026, with consolidated revenue increasing by 12% to nearly $2 billion and a gross margin of 63.3%. Operating income rose by 34% to $612 million, and pro forma EPS increased by 39% to $2.76.
The company raised its full-year revenue guidance to $8.15 billion, indicating a 12% increase over the prior year, and expects a gross margin of 61% and an operating margin of 29%.
Supply chain challenges are anticipated due to increased memory costs, impacting future gross margins. The company is leveraging vertical integration and strategic mitigations to offset these headwinds.
Segment highlights include 16% revenue growth in Fitness, driven by strong demand for wearables, and 20% growth in the Outdoor segment, led by the Fenix 9 series. Maritime revenue rose by 16%, while Aviation saw a 5% increase. The Auto OEM segment saw a 20% revenue decline.
Garmin launched several new products, including the Circa Smart Band and Fenix 9 series, with strong initial demand. The company plans to continue expanding its product offerings and leveraging its strong market position.
Full Transcript
OPERATOR
Hello everyone. Thank you for joining us and welcome to the Garmin Ltd. third quarter 2026 earnings. After today’s prepared remarks, we will host a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star one again. I will now hand the conference over to Teri Seck, Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
Teri Seck (Director of Investor Relations)
Good morning. We would like to welcome you to Garmin Limited’s third quarter 2026 earnings call. Please note that the earnings press release and related slides are available at Garmin’s Investor Relations site on the internet at www.garmin.com/investors. An archive of the webcast and related transcript will also be available on our website. This earnings call includes projections and other forward-looking statements regarding Garmin Ltd. and its business. Any statements regarding our future financial position, revenues, segment growth rates, earnings, gross margins, operating margins, future dividends or share repurchases, market shares, product introductions, foreign currency, tariff impacts, future demand for our products, and plans and objectives are forward-looking statements. The forward-looking events and circumstances discussed in this earnings call may not occur and actual results could differ materially as a result of risk factors affecting Garmin.
Information concerning these risk factors is contained in our Form 10-K filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Presenting on behalf of Garmin Limited this morning are Cliff Pemble, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Doug Boessen, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer. At this time I would like to turn the call over to Cliff Pemble.
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Thank you, Teri, and good morning everyone. As announced earlier today, Garmin achieved another quarter of record-breaking financial results in a continuation of the positive trends we’ve been experiencing over the long term. Consolidated revenue increased 12% to nearly $2 billion with gross margin of 63.3%. We experienced a robust expansion in consolidated gross and operating margins, the majority of which is attributable to favorable segment mix and lower product costs. Margins also benefited from tariff refunds of $33 million recognized in the third quarter.
Even when excluding this benefit, our gross margin performance was impressive by any historical comparison, reflecting the strength of our product lines and the efficiency of our vertically integrated business model. Through strong operational execution we delivered significant leverage to the bottom line. Operating income increased 34% to $612 million and pro forma EPS increased 39% to $2.76. With most of 2026 behind us and considering the momentum we are experiencing entering the important Q4 holiday season, we anticipate delivering another record year of double-digit growth in revenue and profits. We now anticipate revenue of $8.15 billion, an increase of $100 million over the prior guidance and an increase of 12% over the prior year.
We expect gross margin of 61% for the full year, which assumes higher costs for raw materials, particularly memory, which I will expand upon in a moment. We further expect an operating margin of 29%, an expansion from our prior estimate, and a tax rate of 16.5% which is unchanged from our prior estimate. These assumptions result in pro forma EPS of $10.80, an increase of $0.80 over the prior guidance and a 26% increase over the prior year. Before covering segment highlights, I want to provide additional context on supply chain matters. As previously mentioned, our results will soon reflect the higher cost of memory and other raw materials which have increased significantly since last year driven by both high demand and limited supplies. Our results have benefited from our safety stock of memory purchased at lower prices. New supplies are being purchased at current market prices which are significantly higher than last year.
This represents a headwind going forward and drives higher inventory amounts on our balance sheet. Additionally, our inventory strategy is focused on product availability, which translates to higher inventory levels of certain critical components and from time to time we make prepayments to secure additional supplies. While it’s too early to offer a comprehensive outlook for 2027, we expect our consolidated gross margin profile will return to a historical range primarily due to higher memory costs.
We believe a return to historical gross margin levels represents impressive performance given the unusual supply chain circumstances affecting many companies. As we formulate our 2027 plan, we will look for every opportunity to offset this headwind by leaning heavily on our vertical integration and scale of operations and through strategic and selective mitigations which we have successfully used in the past. Doug will discuss our financial results in greater detail in a few minutes, but first I’ll provide a few remarks on the performance of each business segment. Starting with Fitness, revenue increased 16% to $694 million, a new third quarter record primarily driven by broad-based wearable growth. Gross and operating margins expanded to 63% and 33% respectively, resulting in operating income of $231 million. During the quarter we launched the Circa Smart Band, a screenless wearable offering rich wellness and fitness insights that expands our addressable market for wellness devices.
Initial demand for Circa has been very strong and feedback from customers has been positive. We recently announced the next generation Edge cycling computers. The Edge 1060 features a built-in microphone and speaker for hands-free voice control, and the easy-to-use Edge Explorer 3 is designed for riders of all levels. The Fitness segment has achieved outstanding performance throughout the year and we expect this trend to continue in the fourth quarter.
We are very pleased with these results and expect that the Fitness segment will be the strongest contributor to our full year consolidated growth. Moving to Outdoor, revenue increased 20% to $597 million, primarily driven by strong demand for Adventure Watches following the launch of the Fenix 9 series. Gross and operating margins expanded to 68% and 39% respectively, resulting in operating income of $233 million. During the quarter, we launched the Fenix 9 and the Fenix 9 Pro series with an all titanium watch case option and the largest available AMOLED screen in our flagship Adventure Watch lineup.
We also launched the Garmin Drive Navigators that feature high-resolution ultra-wide displays and an elevated all-new user experience. Looking forward, we expect growth momentum to continue in Q4 primarily driven by the Fenix 9 series, resulting in improved full year growth rates when compared to 2025. Looking next at Aviation, revenue increased 5% to $253 million with growth primarily driven by OEM product categories. Gross and operating margins expanded to 78% and 26% respectively, resulting in $66 million of operating income. We recently announced that the G1000 integrated flight deck for the iconic King Air aircraft has surpassed 1,000 systems in the field, marking a significant milestone as one of the most successful retrofit flight deck programs in aviation history.
We also announced that more than 2,500 aircraft are now equipped with our revolutionary Autoland system. Autoland is available in more than 15 models from piston-powered aircraft to twin-engine jets, bringing added peace of mind to a growing number of pilots and passengers across the aviation industry. Just this quarter, Pilatus Aircraft and Epic Aircraft announced the certification of Garmin Autoland on the PC-12 Pro and the E1000 airplanes. During the quarter we introduced the G2000 Prime, bringing Prime flight deck functionality to the high-performance piston and electric aircraft market.
Also during the quarter we announced the certification of an all-glass retrofit cockpit for the original Cessna Citation Jet. Finally, we made important updates to Garmin Pilot, adding Smart Charts coverage for Canada and Mexico as well as mobile clearance delivery which allows pilots to obtain clearances electronically through the Garmin Pilot app. We are pleased with the performance of Aviation during the first three quarters of the year and we expect fourth quarter year-over-year growth to be similar to that of Q3.
Turning to the Marine segment, revenue increased 16% to $310 million with broad-based growth across multiple product categories led by sonar products following the launch of LiveScope 2 sonar systems. LiveScope is widely considered to be one of the most consequential innovations in modern fishing electronics. LiveScope 2 builds on this legacy of disruptive innovation by offering improved range and unprecedented image clarity. Gross and operating margins expanded to 64% and 30% respectively, resulting in operating income of $94 million.
The primary driver of margin expansion was the tariff refund recognized during the quarter, although margins improved even when excluding this benefit. During the quarter, we expanded our sailboat product lineup with the GMI 40 instrument display and the SmartDrive steering actuator. We also launched the JL Audio 60 head unit series and the M200 speaker system. We were recently named Manufacturer of the Year by the National Marine Electronics Association for the 12th consecutive year, an honor that’s particularly meaningful because it reflects the opinions of the broader NMEA community for innovation, product quality, service, and support.
We also received six Product of Excellence awards for multiple product categories as selected by NMEA dealers, certified installers, and industry professionals. We are pleased with the performance of Marine during the first three quarters of the year and believe we are on track to achieve full year growth that is consistent with the prior year. Moving finally to the Auto OEM segment, revenue decreased 20% to $132 million primarily driven by domain controllers. Gross margin was 16% and the operating loss narrowed year over year to $12 million as we shifted R&D resources to other segments. We expect fourth quarter revenue to decrease year over year consistent with Q3 as domain controllers continue to decline as expected. We look forward to the launch of our next major domain controller program with Mercedes-Benz, which we expect will drive significant growth in 2020.
Wrapping up, I’m very proud of what our team has accomplished. We delivered strong growth, expanded profitability, we invested in future innovation, and introduced new products across nearly every segment of our business. As we look forward, our product portfolio is very strong and we are confident in the opportunities that lie ahead. We believe success is driven by our commitment to create products that are essential to our customers and supporting them with industry-leading quality, reliability, and innovation.
So that concludes my remarks. Next, Doug will walk you through additional details on our financial results.
Doug Boessen (Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer)
Doug, thanks. Cliff. Good morning, everyone. I begin by reviewing our third quarter financial results, then comments on the balance sheet, cash flow statement, taxes, and updated guidance. Total revenue was $1,986,000,000 for the third quarter, representing a 12% increase year over year. Gross margin was 63.3%, a 420 basis point increase in the prior-year quarter. The increase was primarily due to favorable segment mix, lower product costs due to weakening of the Taiwan dollar, and approximately $33 million in refunds of previously paid tariffs. Operating expense as a percentage of sales was 32.5%, an 80 basis point decrease. Operating income increased 34% to $612 million.
Operating margin expanded to 30.8%, a 500 basis point increase from the prior-year quarter. Our GAAP EPS was $2.80. Our pro forma EPS is $2.76. Next we look at our third quarter revenue by segment and geography. During the third quarter we achieved consolidated double-digit growth led by the outdoor segment with 20% growth, followed by the fitness and marine segments with 16% growth. By geography, we achieved growth in all three regions led by 15% growth in the Americas, followed by 12% growth in EMEA and 4% growth in APAC. APAC sales growth is lower than Americas due to challenging market conditions in China.
Excluding China, the APAC sales growth would have been more comparable to the other regions. Looking next at operating expenses, Research and Development expenses increased $26 million, approximately 9%, primarily driven by personnel-related expenses. SG&A expenses increased $30 million, approximately 10%, primarily driven by personnel-related expenses and advertising expenses. Highlights on the balance sheet, cash flow statement, and taxes: we ended the quarter with cash and marketable securities of approximately $4.1 billion. Accounts receivable increased year over year to approximately $1.1 billion on the strong sales in the third quarter. Inventory increased year over year and sequentially to approximately $2.3 billion. We’re executing our strategy to increase inventory of certain components to mitigate the risk of supply constraints.
Also, the cost of certain components has increased significantly year over year. During the third quarter 2026, we generated free cash flow of $293 million, a $132 million decrease from the prior quarter. The decrease is primarily due to an increase in on-hand inventory, prepayments of inventory to secure future delivery of strategic components, primarily offset by improved operating results. Capital expenditures for third quarter 2026 were $101 million, approximately $40 million higher than the prior-year quarter. We expect full year 2026 free cash flow to be approximately $1.1 billion.
Capital expenditures [are] approximately $500 million. The decrease in our free cash flow estimate compared to the previous estimate is primarily due to increase in on-hand inventory prepayments. For inventory during the third quarter 2026, we paid dividends of approximately $202 million and purchased $41 million of company stock. At quarter end we had approximately $4.7 million remaining under the share repurchase program authorized through December 2028.
Our effective tax rate was 18.1% compared to 21.2% in the prior quarter. The decrease in effective tax rate is primarily driven by an increase in U.S. deductions due to certain provisions of U.S. tax legislation enacted in 2025 which came effective in 2026. Turning next to our full year guidance, based on our performance during the first three quarters of 2026 and our positive outlook for the fourth quarter, we now estimate revenue of approximately $8.15 billion compared to our previous guidance of $8.05 billion. As a result of year-to-date performance, we have increased our gross margin to approximately 61%, which is 130 basis points higher than our previous guidance and 30 basis points higher than the full year 2025 gross margin.
We expect higher memory costs to impact the fourth quarter, which has been factored into our full year gross margin guidance. We received the majority of our expected tariff refunds, and our updated gross margin guidance only includes the benefit of tariff refunds already recorded in the year to date. We expect our operating margin to be approximately 29%, which is 200 basis points higher than our previous guidance. Also, we expect a pro forma effective tax rate of 16.5%. Consistent with our previous guidance, the expected pro forma earnings per share is approximately $10.80, per previous guidance of $10. This concludes our formal remarks. Kirsty, could you please open the line for Q&A?
OPERATOR
We will now begin the question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one to raise your hand. To withdraw your question, press star one. Again, we ask that you pick up your handset when asking a question to allow for optimum sound quality. If you are muted locally, please remember to unmute your device, and please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Your first question comes from the line of Tim Long with Barclays. Tim, your line is now open.
Tim Long (Analyst)
Thank you. Maybe two, if I could. Could you touch a little bit on some of the newer launches, the Scenix Nines and circa? Sounds like initial feedback’s positive, but could you just kind of give us a sense of how you’re viewing the ramp of those products over the next several quarters? And then second, I just did want to follow up on the gross margin. I mean, it sounds like this is largely memory and it’s hitting you a little bit later since you had some advanced buys. But, you know, maybe as we look into next year, I’m assuming you’re talking 58–59 as the more historic gross margins. If you could just clarify that and let us know the other puts and takes there. Thank you.
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Hi, Tim. Good morning. In terms of the newer launches, we believe those were very successful. We’re still catching up on some of the initial demand, especially on circa, although Fenix is also very, very strong, and so we’re working hard to fill that backlog of demand we have for those new products. And Doug, maybe you can answer the question on the gross margin.
Doug Boessen (Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer)
Yeah, so maybe I’ll talk a little about the gross margins here in the quarter, then what we expect in Q4, then in the future. So, yeah, in Q3 there are three big drivers of that year-over-year improvement: one of which was favorable segment mix, as Auto OEM is a lower percentage of our total this year versus last year; the second of which is lower product costs, primarily due to the weakening Taiwan dollar; and then we did have some benefits relating to tariff refunds, and we did receive the majority of our tariff refunds.
There’s some that we’ll hopefully receive here in Q4 next year, but we’ll record those as they’re realized or realizable. So then the other thing relating to memory costs, we did see a small impact of increased memory costs in Q3, but there will be more impact, you know, in Q4. That’s primarily due to our inventory, our inventory turns from a standpoint. You know, then as we get into 2027, you know, there’s a lot of moving parts relating to the gross margin. You know, we’ll have a segment mix situation where, you know, we have the ramp of Mercedes coming in, so therefore there’s probably some unfavorable segment mix.
We’ll have the continued higher increased costs of memory that go through there also. But then also, you know, a lot of other moving parts, you know, in our gross margin between FX, product mix, and such in there. But we’ll give you, you know, a better feel for that, you know, when we get into 2027.
Tim Long (Analyst)
Okay, thank you.
OPERATOR
The next question comes from the line of Eric Woodring with Morgan Stanley. Eric, your line is now open.
Eric Woodring (Analyst)
Great. Thank you very much for taking my question, guys. Cliff, I’d love to maybe step back from the quarterly results, and could you just maybe riff a little bit on how you’re seeing the competitive landscape evolve across the broader wearables market? You know, traditional smartwatch players kind of increasingly emphasizing fitness and performance. You have new competitors with kind of specialized health and wellness use cases. Just where is Garmin’s competitive positioning strengthening?
And then do you see any areas where you see just greater competitive pressure? And then a quick follow up, please. Thanks so much.
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Well, it is. Good morning, Eric. It is a very competitive market for sure. It’s also a market that’s been around a while now, so I think the players are fairly well entrenched in terms of their positions in the market. I think many of them are catching up to what we’ve known all along, that health and fitness are very important drivers of interest in wearables. And so we’re continuing to lead, I believe, in terms of product features and sensor capabilities and the ability to help a user on their journey, whether it’s a health and wellness focus or a fitness focus. And, you know, I believe that trend is very durable. I believe that trend is something that’s always going to be of interest to people, especially as, you know, there’s more and more focus on health and wellness across every level, whether it’s from the government side and also cohorts of generations that are more interested in their health.
So we’re very excited about it. We believe there’s lots of opportunity ahead of us.
Eric Woodring (Analyst)
Okay, awesome. No, I appreciate that, Cliff. Thank you. And then maybe, just maybe this is a Doug question, but if we take a step back, realizing that you guys, you do keep a lot of safety stock inventory, but we’re in probably the most inflationary component environment we’ve seen in a long time. That’s not just memory, but you just expanded aviation gross margins 200 basis points year over year. Marine ex tariff refunds was up 200 basis points year over year.
Outdoor and fitness both expanding very strong. When you talk about product cost reductions, can you just maybe be a little bit more specific or granular on exactly—not just what is happening but why this is happening now, why maybe you couldn’t execute on this a year or two years ago—just given we’re kind of in, like, it’s a fair counterintuitive [situation] given the environment we’re in. So just trying to understand, like, exactly what it is and why now.
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Yeah, yeah, maybe I’ll start. Doug can certainly add to it. But, you know, as I mentioned in my remarks, our vertical integration is really paying off both in terms of our flexibility and ability to bring in the right components and build the right products at the right time. But also the scale is really important. You know, our volumes have increased a lot, and so we have a lot of scale which is helping in our overall efficiency. We did get some benefit from the Taiwan dollar, so, you know, that’s part of our product cost, but also our products, many of our new ones especially, are premium in nature and have a lot of desirable features and capability.
And so we’re able to command higher margins for those products as well, which become a higher part of our mix.
Eric Woodring (Analyst)
Awesome. Thank you so much, Cliff. Best of luck, guys.
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Thank you.
OPERATOR
The next question comes from the line of Joseph Cardoso with JP Morgan. Joseph, your line is now open.
Joseph Cardoso (Analyst)
Hi, good morning, and thanks for the question here. Just wanted to start first on fitness. Obviously you had very strong growth in the quarter, maybe against you guys setting very high standards for yourselves over the last couple of quarters and maybe more robust growth. Just wanted to touch on the trends you’re seeing in 3Q and obviously into 4Q today, you know, just relative to registration, sell-through, inventory, new users, you know, that whole gambit of kind of KPIs that we all kind of like to hear about.
And how are you thinking about maybe the durability here as we’re heading into the holiday season? And then I do have a follow up.
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Yeah, I think in terms of registrations, you know, that’s something we watch very closely and it’s really a near real-time pulse on the overall market. Our registrations did outpace our sell-in, so there’s some implication there that the channel is destocking a little bit, probably because people are getting ready to bring in more stocks for the holiday season. But the demand for our products and the pull-through at the registration level is very strong in terms of durability. Again, you know what I’ve mentioned before, that there’s a lot of opportunity in this market and we’ve demonstrated over the long term that we’ve delivered strong double-digit growth rates across segments that are highly influenced by wearables, particularly fitness and outdoor.
And so looking at Q4, you know, we see more of the same of that and also the feedback from our retailers and their plans are very strong. As I mentioned, we have significant backlog we’re working to fill for the fourth quarter and so that’s our objective in the coming weeks. Connect Plus has outgrown the general rates of the underlying segments where those products can benefit from Connect Plus. Of course, that’s probably to be understood because it’s growing from a smaller base. But Connect Plus has outpaced our expectations and the renewals and the commitments after the free periods have been very strong for those people that sign up for it.
And even products that you wouldn’t suspect would be of interest for Connect Plus, particularly Circa, people are also signing up for Connect Plus to get more out of Circa. So we feel very good about Connect and we have a long-term roadmap to further expand that. In terms of just offering features of new products only through Connect, I mean, we’re already doing that today in terms of features like nutrition that’s available with Connect Plus. But in general, our approach to the market has always been to offer rich features on our products that delight our customers and satisfy them.
And if they want more, we’ll offer more with Connect Plus. Thank you.
OPERATOR
The next question comes from the line of David McGregor with Longbow Research. David, your line is now open.
David McGregor (Analyst)
Yes, good morning everyone. Thanks for taking the questions. I guess I wanted to just ask about channel inventories and the preseason sell-in. You kind of touched on this in response to a previous question. But how are you seeing that seasonal sell-in and do you sense retailers and dealers are maybe just staying lean ahead of the election or is there some other reason why maybe we’re seeing a little bit of an aberration from what’s historically been a pattern there?
Okay. Okay. I guess. Second question just on Thailand. Give me an update on the manufacturing facility there. And is production still expected to begin in 1Q27 and I guess when does the capitalization of costs end and the expensing begin?
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Yeah, I don’t think there’s any aberration at all and I certainly couldn’t figure out how to tie it to elections. But as I mentioned in some other comments, retailer interest in Q4 promotions is very strong and we’re working on filling all of their orders for the holiday season. Yeah, I’ll maybe make a comment on the timelines and Doug can respond to the capitalization, but we’re on track to open the new facility, expected to start producing new products in the first quarter of 2027. And it’s something we desperately need as our volumes have basically reached our capacity. So we’re excited to bring more capacity online.
Doug Boessen (Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer)
Yeah. As relates to when it starts hitting the P&L, when it gets into production, at that point in time it’ll flow through the goods at that point in time.
David McGregor (Analyst)
Okay, terrific. Thanks very much. Good luck with everything.
OPERATOR
The next question comes from Ivan Feinseth with Tigris Financial Partners. Ivan, your line is now open.
Ivan Feinseth (Analyst)
Thank you for taking my questions. And congratulations on another record quarter. Starting with the Fenix, what kind of take on the Fenix are you seeing from people who are new to Garmin and new to the Fenix versus people who are upgrading from existing watches? And what model have they been upgrading the most from?
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
In terms of new versus existing, as in the history of the Fenix launches, initial demand particularly is very strong from existing users who are upgrading, mostly from more than one generation old. It can vary, but the response has been very positive. And then, of course, as the product makes its way further out into the channel, we start to see more new users come to the platform.
Ivan Feinseth (Analyst)
And then, you know, based on the fact that you look for price increases on components, but I feel you have, you know, pricing power. What do you feel about your price, or how do you feel about your pricing power? Especially considering that a lot of your customers buy really based on features versus price.
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
I think we’re definitely—pricing is something that, you know, when I mentioned the mitigations that we can use, it’s one of the things that we can look at. It’s one of the tools that we have, but we don’t over-focus on one particular thing. And we try to get the best balance of all the different ways that we can mitigate cost increases in our supply chain in order to achieve an outstanding result. I would probably just remind people that, you know, a little more than a year ago now, everyone was faced with higher supply chain costs really driven by tariffs, and that was a thing that we were able to navigate successfully because of the diversity of our business and our vertical integration and our ability to create products that people want.
Ivan Feinseth (Analyst)
And then you said that you’ve had strong demand for the Circa but—and sometimes supply constrained—and only for like $50 more you could get the Lily with the screen or even $100 more for the Vivoactive. Are you seeing customers or are you getting feedback that they’re going into the store looking at the Circa and saying only for just a little bit more, I can get a lot more functionality? Do you see some upgrades there?
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Well, I think we certainly see a lot of demand for something like Vivoactive. It’s a very, very popular product. I think people that are looking at Circa are looking at it for a specific reason, which is the screenless approach, and they want the ability to have flexibility with other devices that they might wear. So we don’t necessarily have strict data points around how it’s driving people into other products. But the demand that we’ve been experiencing for Circa is very strong and definitely exceeded our expectations, which is what I like to call a happy problem. And so we’re working hard to expand our production and to fill all the orders that we have.
Ivan Feinseth (Analyst)
I just have—what kind of feedback are you getting that people are looking at the Circa and if they’re going for a screenless product that people are considering a ring, let’s say, versus a watch, where are people kind of thinking about the functionality of the two?
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
I think, again, it boils down to personal choice. We aren’t necessarily hearing people make those kind of trade-offs, at least in ways that we can really dig that signal out of the noise. But I think by offering a broad range of products, that’s really been our approach all along, to have broad ranges of products that allow people to select something that’s right for them.
Ivan Feinseth (Analyst)
I have two other quick questions. On the autoland hitting 2,500 planes, is that still just original equipment on a brand new plane or do you have now an upgrade process that you can retrofit an existing plane?
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Well, it’s really also retrofit, because our King Air line includes autoland option. And so, you know, we’re applying autoland technology to both original equipment as well as retrofit.
Ivan Feinseth (Analyst)
Okay, and then one last question. When in ’27 will we start to see the impact of Mercedes? Will that be on the ’28 models that come out in late ’27 or on the ’27 models that will start to come out next year?
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Yeah, I think in terms of precise timelines, I probably can’t really say. I would say that it will be earlier in the year than later. We are basically having to follow, of course, the Mercedes direction in terms of ramp up and supplies that they need for their new model year. So we’re expecting early in the year. But again, something that we’re following the orders of Mercedes.
Ivan Feinseth (Analyst)
Thank you very much. And hoping for a strong Q4.
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Thank you.
OPERATOR
The next question comes from the line of Noah Zatzkin with KeyBanc Capital Markets. Noah, your line is open.
Noah Zatzkin (Analyst)
Hi. Thanks for taking my questions. I guess just to circle back on tariffs, I think there were $33 million of refunds in the quarter. Would you expect to receive additional refunds in fourth quarter or beyond? And then if you could just provide any thoughts around the run-rate impact that you’re experiencing and maybe any opportunity for further offset looking to ’27. Thanks.
Doug Boessen (Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer)
Yeah, so we have received the majority of our tariff refunds. You know, we’ve applied for some of those and they find some of that. So it all depends upon, you know, how quickly the government processes those and we receive those. But we do have a smaller amount that we still haven’t received yet, which we do expect to receive either in Q4 or 2027. As to the run rate for those, you know, it really depends upon how those are processed through the system.
Noah Zatzkin (Analyst)
And then, Cliff, maybe just one on Marine, another very strong quarter now sitting in the off season. How are you feeling about the end market, the trajectory there? Just any thoughts would be helpful, thanks.
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Yeah, if I think about the end market broadly, I would say it’s probably a little bit soft right now. It’s not necessarily a concern, but the market in general is probably just a tad bit softer. We’ve still found ways to be successful and grow based on innovation, and probably some benefit from people refitting existing boats as opposed to purchasing new boats from time to time. But there’s still strong demand for the newer boat segment, particularly in the mid-range of the market, and so there are bright spots there as well. But certainly I think high fuel prices have probably had more of an impact in Marine than maybe some of the other segments, and people, you know, since it’s kind of the off season now, they’re probably in a wait-and-see mode.
Noah Zatzkin (Analyst)
Thank you.
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Thank you.
OPERATOR
Your next question comes from the line of Ben Bollen with Cleveland Research. Ben, your line is now open.
Ben Bollen (Analyst)
Thank you. Good morning everyone. I appreciate you taking the question. Cliff, you made a reference to Fenix around refresh and also talked to registration trends. Could you share any perspective on how you think about new users versus refresh opportunity outside of Fenix? When you look at Forerunner, Vivo, and even Circa, how it fits in? Just any thoughts on user expansion versus net new? And then I have a follow-up for Doug.
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Yeah, I think the new user profile outside of Fenix is very, very strong, heavily weighted towards new users, and products like Circa, products like Vivoactive, the entry-level running products like the Forerunner 70 and 170 all attract significant numbers of new users to the Garmin ecosystem.
Doug Boessen (Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer)
Yeah. Relating to the inventory prepayments, it’s really related to the memory supply constraint situation, is negotiating with those suppliers there and just basically ensuring that we’re going to be able to get, you know, the supply whenever we need that from a standpoint. So it’s kind of on a one-by-one basis depending upon that situation.
OPERATOR
The next question comes from the line of Ronald Epstein with Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Ronald, your line is now open.
Ronald Epstein (Analyst)
Hey, good morning, guys. Maybe just two quick ones. Cliff, in the avionics business, one of the things we’ve heard is there’s been issues across the industry getting printed circuit boards and other components. How have you guys been managing that and how’s it been for avionics, that that supply chain is different than your consumer supply chain out of Taiwan?
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
I think there’s definitely second-order effects driven by the memory situation and the overall AI buildout that creates both availability supply issues as well as some pricing issues in other areas. For example, you mentioned PCBs. That’s very true that there’s some concerns there as well as even things you wouldn’t think of like cabling and being able to find the cable supplies that we need. But I think that’s one of the secret sauces of Garmin’s business, is leveraging the scale and the relationships we have across the entire business in order to serve the needs of things like aviation, which are more niche and lower volume. And we’re able to successfully do that by, again, leveraging all of those things in our business to be able to create a good result for aviation.
Ronald Epstein (Analyst)
Got it. And then maybe just a follow-up on a question I asked a couple of years back that there’s been a change in the law. We can no longer import Chinese drones. Given Garmin’s expertise in navigation and aviation, is there an opportunity there for Garmin in its own market?
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Well, I think some of the drones you might be referring to are more the consumer drones, and that market is mature and kind of saturated. I think a lot of interest in drones right now, of course, is around military uses, and there’s a lot of companies focusing on that. We don’t really see that as being our area of total expertise. So we’re focused on the markets where we serve, where we feel like there’s lots of opportunity to advance technology and innovation.
Ronald Epstein (Analyst)
Thank you very much.
Cliff Pemble (President and Chief Executive Officer)
Thank you.
OPERATOR
There are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the call back to Teri Seck for closing remarks.
Teri Seck (Director of Investor Relations)
Thank you all for joining us today. As typical, Doug and I are available for callbacks and we hope you have a nice day. Bye.
OPERATOR
This concludes today’s call. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.
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