These uncertainties include economic conditions, market demands and competitive factors.
Net sales for the year were $898 million and adjusted earnings per share was $6.14.
In addition, we delivered record cash from operations of $161 million and strong free cash flow of $110 million for the year.
For the fourth quarter, net sales were $194 million and below our guidance range, primarily due to a greater than anticipated pause in the 5G build out and lower 4G demand.
Q4 adjusted earnings per share was $1.14, which was near the high-end of our guidance range.
Recent estimates from third party experts project that nearly 4 million 5G base stations will be installed globally by 2023 with around 880,000 deployed in 2020.
With these changes, we expect that our opportunity for 5G content will be around three times that of 4G or approximately $175 to $225 per base station.
Industry experts project that through 2024 sales of EVs and HEVs will continue at a compounded annual growth rate of approximately 30%.
In 2019, ACS net sales were $317 million, an increase of 8% compared to 2018, or 10% on a constant currency basis.
Wireless Infrastructure as highlighted on slide five, accounted for about 14% of total Rogers revenue in 2019.
Aerospace and Defence grew at double digit rates in 2019 and has delivered consistent growth over the past three years, with a compounded annual growth rate of about 10%.
ADAS grew at a solid rate in 2019 and has also demonstrated a strong multi-year growth profile with a three year compounded annual growth rate of more than 15%.
EMS net sales were $362 million, an increase of 6% versus 2018 or 8% on a constant currency basis.
This growth was partially offset by weakness in general industrial and traditional automotive markets.
2019 PES net sales were $199 million, a decrease of 11% as compared to 2018 or 7% on a constant currency basis, double-digit growth in mass transit, power interconnects and power semiconductor substrates for EV/HEV were areas of strength.
With the business environment remaining challenging and near term uncertainty related to the impact of the coronavirus, we see the timing of attaining these financial targets as being extended beyond this year.
However, as a company we remain committed to achieving annual revenue growth of 15% driven by both organic and synergistic M&A opportunities.
We also remain committed to achieving a greater than 20% adjusted operating margin as we drive top line growth and continue to execute on operational improvements.
Turning to slide 12, fourth quarter revenues as previously noted, were $193.8 million, below our Q4 guidance range of $200 million to $210 million.
A slowdown in demand for products serving the Wireless Infrastructure market for both 4G and 5G applications and seasonal weakness in the portable electronics market were the primary drivers of the lower revenues in Q4.
Gross margin for the fourth quarter was 33.1%.
The gross margin was within our guidance range of 33% to 34% despite the lower revenues, as we took steps to reduce our manufacturing spending in all business segments to compensate for the adverse impact of significantly lower volumes.
Adjusted operating income for Q4 2019 was $22.5 million or 11.6% of revenues, down sequentially due to the lower revenues in the quarter.
The company had a GAAP loss in the fourth quarter of $28.8 million or $1.55 per share, that included a $43.9 million or $2.35 per share non-cash after tax charge, which resulted from terminating a pension plan in the fourth quarter.
On an adjusted basis, the company delivered earnings per share of $1.14 per fully diluted share within our guidance range of $1 to $1.15.
The company generated $32.9 million of free cash flow in the fourth quarter and $109.7 million for all of 2019 compared to $19.7 million in 2018.
Turning to slide 13, revenues for calendar year 2019 of $898.3 million were 2% higher than 2018 due to organic growth of just under 3% on a constant currency basis.
Acquisitions added approximately 2% and currency had a negative impact of just over 2%.
Adjusted operating income for 2019 of $141.4 million or 15.7% of revenues was 10 basis points lower than 2018, the lower adjusted operating margin resulted from a 40 basis point decline in 2019 gross margin versus 2018 due primarily to operational challenges to add capacity and wrap new products in our PES business throughout the year and incremental costs for integration of EMS acquisitions in the first half of 2019.
In addition, trade tensions between U.S. and China resulted in tariffs that decreased gross margin by 66 basis points in 2019.
EPS for 2019 was $2.43 per fully diluted share compared to $4.70 per fully diluted share in 2018.
Adjusted earnings per share per fully diluted share of 2019 of $6.14 was $0.37 higher than 2018, due primarily to a decrease in the effective tax rate to 14.2% in 2019 from 20.7% in 2018.
Adjusted EBITDA of $188.2 million or 21% of revenues in 2019 was slightly higher than the $184.8 million or 21% of revenues in 2018.
Returning to the fourth quarter on slide 14, our Q4 2019 revenues of $193.8 million decreased 13% compared to the third quarter of 2019.
The sequential decrease was experienced in our ACS business segment down 18% and our EMS business segment down 16% while the PES business segment saw its revenues increase 2% over the third quarter.
Currency exchange rates negatively impacted fourth quarter revenues by $1.1 million compared to Q3.
As a result, our Wireless Infrastructure revenues declined 34% sequentially.
4G revenues ended the year 23% below 2018 revenues.
The 5G revenues for the year 2019 resulted in Wireless Infrastructure revenues growing 10% over 2018 levels.
Fourth quarter revenues from Aerospace and Defense programs grew 4% sequentially over a strong third quarter and increased 16% for the year.
ADAS revenues were down 8% sequentially but are up 7% annually compared to 2018 in the face of a weak auto market.
Revenues in our EMS segment decreased sequentially due to weakness in our end user applications in all markets led by an expected seasonal softness in portable electronics, which declined 19% in the fourth quarter.
Despite the fourth quarter demand decline revenues for portable electronics, which comprised greater than 27% of the segment revenues grew 16% in 2019 compared to 2018 due to our strong product portfolio, which led to share gains in new handset and tablet designs.
General industrial application revenues, which comprise approximately 40% of the business segment's revenues were down 9% compared to the third quarter and down 5% annually compared to 2018 reflecting ongoing weakness in certain industrial markets.
These revenues which represent close to 20% of the segment revenues increased 42% compared to the third quarter and grew 14% annually.
Power semiconductor substrates, for general industrial applications, which comprise over 30% of the segment revenues grew 2% in the fourth quarter, principally from the completion of inventory corrections in the quarter.
For the year revenues from general industrial applications were down 16% as demand for factory automation capital was weak, particularly in the second half of 2019.
Revenues from conventional vehicle electrification applications showed continued weakness in the fourth quarter, declining 11% sequentially and 21% for the year as a result of weak auto sales, particularly in Europe.
In our power interconnect business revenues for mass transit applications grew nicely in 2019 due to strong first half demand from a couple of key customers increasing 35% for the year.
Turning to slide 15, our gross margin for Q4 2019 was $64.2 million or 33.1% of revenues, significantly lower than our third quarter gross margin.
Tariffs were $1.6 million lower in the quarter due primarily to reduced Wireless Infrastructure production.
The improvements led to a significant progress on the business segment profitability, increasing PES gross margins by over 600 basis points resulting in over 100 basis point improvement to the company gross margin.
While encouraged, we still have significant work to realize the additional expected improvement and incremental 600 basis points improvement at PES driven primarily from increased yields and continue to believe it will take us through the first half of 2020 to realize the majority of the remaining improvements.
The impact to gross margins was approximately $0.8 million or 41 basis points, a decrease of 65 basis points sequentially.
Slide 16 details the changes to adjusted net income for Q4 2019 of $21.3 million compared to adjusted net income for Q3 of $28.2 million.
Adjusted operating expenses for Q4 of $41.7 million or 21.5% of revenues were $1 million lower than Q3 adjusted operating expenses, 19.2% of revenues.
The company had lower interest expense in the fourth quarter as a result of paying down $65 million of debt in the third quarter.
Rogers effective tax rate for 2019 was 14.2% compared to 20.7% in 2018.
Turning to slide 17, we ended 2019 with a cash position of $166.8 million, an increase of $26.1 million from September 30 and a decrease of $0.9 million from December 31, 2018.
In Q4 the company spent $12.8 million on capital expenditures, we spent $51.6 million in 2019 with significant expenditures to increase capacity at both ACS and PES.
The company paid down $7.5 million if debt in the quarter and paid down $105.5 million of debt in 2019 and ended the year in a net cash position of $43.8 million.
The company generated $45.7 million from operating activities in Q4, including a decrease in working capital of $17.4 million.
For 2019, the company generated a record $161.3 million from operating activities including $13.4 million from a decrease in working capital.
Cash generation in 2019 compares favorably to the cash generation in 2018 of $66.8 million from operating activities, net of the $46.2 million used for increases in working capital and $25 million to fund a pension plan.
As a result, we believe the coronavirus will reduce our revenues in the first quarter by approximately 7% to 10%.
Therefore, revenues for Q1 are estimated to be in the range of $185 million to $200 million.
As a result, we are guiding gross margin in the range of 32.5% to 33.5% for Q1.
We guide a GAAP Q1 earnings in the range of $0.50 to $0.70 per fully diluted share.
On an adjusted basis we guide fully diluted earnings in the range of $0.75 to $0.95 per share for the first quarter.
In 2020, we expect the effective tax rate to be 20% to 21% excluding the impact of discrete items, which have historically lowered the effective rate.
Lastly, we expect to spend $40 million to $45 million on capital expenditures in 2020.

Summary:
These uncertainties include economic conditions, market demands and competitive factors.
Q4 adjusted earnings per share was $1.14, which was near the high-end of our guidance range.
This growth was partially offset by weakness in general industrial and traditional automotive markets.
With the business environment remaining challenging and near term uncertainty related to the impact of the coronavirus, we see the timing of attaining these financial targets as being extended beyond this year.
A slowdown in demand for products serving the Wireless Infrastructure market for both 4G and 5G applications and seasonal weakness in the portable electronics market were the primary drivers of the lower revenues in Q4.
The company had a GAAP loss in the fourth quarter of $28.8 million or $1.55 per share, that included a $43.9 million or $2.35 per share non-cash after tax charge, which resulted from terminating a pension plan in the fourth quarter.
On an adjusted basis, the company delivered earnings per share of $1.14 per fully diluted share within our guidance range of $1 to $1.15.
Returning to the fourth quarter on slide 14, our Q4 2019 revenues of $193.8 million decreased 13% compared to the third quarter of 2019.
As a result, we believe the coronavirus will reduce our revenues in the first quarter by approximately 7% to 10%.
Therefore, revenues for Q1 are estimated to be in the range of $185 million to $200 million.
We guide a GAAP Q1 earnings in the range of $0.50 to $0.70 per fully diluted share.
On an adjusted basis we guide fully diluted earnings in the range of $0.75 to $0.95 per share for the first quarter.
Lastly, we expect to spend $40 million to $45 million on capital expenditures in 2020.