KENNAMETAL INC (KMT) Business

ITEM 1 - BUSINESS

OVERVIEW With more than 85 years of materials expertise, Kennametal Inc. (the Company) is a global industrial technology leader, that helps customers across the General Engineering, Transportation, Earthworks, Energy and Aerospace & Defense end markets build their products with precision and efficiency. The Company was founded based on a tungsten carbide technology breakthrough in 1938 and was incorporated in Pennsylvania in 1943 as a manufacturer of tungsten carbide metal cutting tooling. In 1967, it was listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) with the stock ticker KMT.

The Company's core expertise includes the development and application of tungsten carbides, ceramics, super-hard materials and solutions used in metal cutting and extreme wear applications to keep customers up and running longer against conditions such as corrosion and high temperatures. We bring together material science, technical expertise, innovation and customer service in a way that allows us to anticipate customers' needs and help them overcome problems and achieve their manufacturing objectives.

Our standard and custom product offering spans metal cutting and wear applications including turning, milling, hole making, tooling systems and services, as well as specialized wear components and metallurgical powders. End users of the Company's metal cutting products include manufacturers engaged in a diverse array of industries including: transportation vehicles and components, machine tools and light and heavy machinery; airframe and aerospace components; and energy-related components for the oil and gas industry, as well as power generation. The Company’s wear and metallurgical powders are used by producers and suppliers in equipment-intensive operations such as road construction, mining, quarrying, oil and gas exploration, refining, production and supply, and for aerospace and defense.

Unless otherwise specified, any reference to a “year” refers to our fiscal year ending on June 30. Unless the context requires otherwise, the terms “we,” “our” and “us” refer to Kennametal Inc. and its subsidiaries.

BUSINESS SEGMENT REVIEW Kennametal operates in two segments: Metal Cutting and Infrastructure. The Company's reportable operating segments have been determined in accordance with the Company's internal management structure, which is organized based on operating activities, the manner in which we organize segments for making operating decisions and assessing performance and the availability of separate financial results. Sales and operating income by segment are presented in Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations set forth in Item 7 of this Annual Report (MD&A). Additional segment data is provided in Note 21 of our consolidated financial statements set forth in Item 8 of this Annual Report.

METAL CUTTING The Metal Cutting segment develops and manufactures high performance tooling and metal cutting products and services and offers an assortment of standard and custom metal cutting solutions to diverse end markets, including General Engineering, Transportation, Aerospace & Defense and Energy. The products include milling, hole making, turning, threading and toolmaking systems used in the manufacture of airframes, aero engines, trucks and automobiles, ships and various types of industrial equipment. We leverage advanced manufacturing capabilities in combination with varying levels of customization to solve our customers’ toughest challenges and deliver improved productivity for a wide range of applications. Metal Cutting markets its products under the Kennametal®, WIDIA®, WIDIA Hanita® and WIDIA GTD® brands through its direct sales force, a network of independent and national distributors, integrated supplier channels and digitally. Application engineers and technicians are critical to the sales process and directly assist our customers with specified product design, selection, application and support.

INFRASTRUCTURE Our Infrastructure segment produces engineered tungsten carbide and ceramic components, earth-cutting tools, and advanced metallurgical powders, primarily for the Earthworks, General Engineering, Energy and Aerospace & Defense end markets. These wear-resistant products include compacts, nozzles, frac seats and custom components used in oil and gas and petrochemical industries; rod blanks and abrasive water jet nozzles for general industries; earth cutting tools and systems used in underground mining, trenching and foundation drilling and road milling; tungsten carbide powders for the oil and gas, aerospace and process industries; high temperature critical wear components, tungsten penetrators and armor solutions for aerospace and defense; and ceramics used by the packaging industry for metallization of films and papers. We combine deep metallurgical and engineering expertise with advanced manufacturing capabilities, such as 3D printing, to deliver solutions that drive improved productivity for our customers. Infrastructure markets its products primarily under the Kennametal® brand and sells through a direct sales force as well as through distributors.

4

Table of Contents

INTERNATIONAL OPERATIONS During 2025, we generated 60 percent of our consolidated sales in markets outside of the United States of America (U.S.), with principal international operations in Western Europe, China and India. We also operate manufacturing and distribution facilities in Israel, Latin America, South Africa and Vietnam, while serving customers through sales offices, agents and distributors in Europe and other parts of the world. While geographic diversification helps to minimize the sales and earnings effect of demand changes in any one particular region, our international operations are subject to normal risks of doing business globally, including tariffs, fluctuations in currency exchange rates and changes in social, political and economic environments.

Our international sales and long-lived assets are presented in Note 21 of the Company’s consolidated financial statements, set forth in Item 8 of this Annual Report. Further information about the effects and risks of currency exchange rates are presented in the Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk section, set forth in Item 7A of this Annual Report.

ACQUISITIONS AND DIVESTITURES We continually evaluate new opportunities to expand into new market areas, and to introduce new and/or complementary product offerings into new or existing areas where appropriate. We expect to continue to grow our business and further enhance our market position through the investment opportunities that exist within our core businesses, including potential acquisitions in the near term. During 2025, we completed the sale of a subsidiary located in Goshen, Indiana to a Chicago-based private equity firm and recognized a loss on divestiture of $1.5 million.

RAW MATERIALS AND SUPPLIES Our major metallurgical raw materials consist of tungsten ore concentrates and scrap carbide, which are used to make tungsten oxide, as well as compounds and secondary materials such as cobalt. Although an adequate supply of these raw materials currently exists, our major sources for raw materials are located abroad and prices fluctuate at times. We exercise great care in selecting, purchasing and managing the availability of raw materials utilizing a mix of long-term supply agreements coupled with spot purchases. Additionally, our internal tungsten recycling capability provides us access to additional sources of tungsten, and therefore, helps to mitigate our reliance on third parties. We also purchase steel bars and forgings for making toolholders and other tool parts, as well as for producing mining tools, rotary cutting tools and accessories. We purchase products for use in manufacturing processes and for resale from many suppliers located in the U.S. and abroad.

RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT (R&D) Our R&D efforts focus on delivering innovations to our customers from both new product and process technology development. New product development provides solutions to our customers’ manufacturing challenges and productivity requirements. New process technology is developed and implemented in support of operational excellence to enhance product quality and efficiency at our plant sites. We use a disciplined framework, and have established “stage-gates,” or sequential tests to remove inefficiencies and accelerate commercial success. This framework is designed to accelerate and streamline development into a series of actions and decision points, integrating resource tasks to implement new and enhanced products and process technologies faster. Our stage-gate process ensures a strong linkage between verified customer requirements and corporate strategy and enables us to gain the full benefits of our investment in development work.

We hold a number of patents and trademarks which, in the aggregate, are material to the operation of our businesses. The duration of our patent protection varies throughout the world by jurisdiction.

SEASONALITY Our business is affected by seasonal variations to varying degrees by summer road construction, traditional summer vacation shutdowns of customers’ plants and holiday shutdowns that affect our sales levels during the first and second quarters of our fiscal year.

BACKLOG Our backlog of standard orders generally is not significant to our operations.

COMPETITION As one of the world’s leading producers of tooling and metal cutting products, specialty wear-resistant components and ceramics, earth cutting tools and advanced metallurgical powders, we maintain a competitive position in major markets worldwide. We actively compete in the sale of all our products with several large global competitors and with many smaller niche businesses offering various capabilities to customers around the world. While several of our competitors are divisions of larger corporations, our industry remains largely fragmented, containing several hundred fabricators, toolmakers and niche specialty coating businesses. Many of our competitors operate relatively small facilities, producing a limited selection of tools while buying cemented tungsten carbide components from original producers of cemented tungsten carbide products, including Kennametal. We also supply coated solutions and other engineered wear-resistant products to both larger corporations and smaller niche businesses. Given the fragmentation, opportunities for consolidation exist from both U.S.-based and internationally-based firms, as well as among thousands of industrial supply distributors.

5

Table of Contents

The principal competitive differentiators in our businesses include customer focused support and application expertise, custom and standard product innovation, product performance and quality, and our brand recognition. We derive competitive advantage from our premium brand positions, global presence, application expertise and ability to address unique customer needs with new and improved tools, innovative surface and wear-resistant solutions, highly engineered components, consistent quality, traditional and digital customer service and technical assistance capabilities, state-of-the-art manufacturing and multiple sales channels. With these strengths, we are able to sell products based on the value-added productivity we deliver to our customers, rather than competing solely on price.

REGULATION From time to time, we are a party to legal claims and proceedings that arise in the ordinary course of business, which may relate to our operations or assets, including real, tangible or intellectual property assets. While we currently believe that the amount of ultimate liability, if any, we may face with respect to these actions will not materially affect our financial position, results of operations or liquidity, the ultimate outcome of any litigation is uncertain. Were an unfavorable outcome to occur or if protracted litigation were to ensue, the effect on us could be material.

Compliance with government laws and regulations pertaining to the discharge of materials or pollutants into the environment or otherwise relating to the protection of the environment did not have a material effect on our capital expenditures or competitive position for the years covered by this Annual Report, nor is such compliance expected to have a material effect on us in the future.

The operation of our business has exposed us to certain liabilities and compliance costs related to environmental matters. We are involved in various environmental cleanup and remediation activities at certain sites associated with our current or former operations.

We establish and maintain accruals for estimated liabilities associated with certain environmental matters. As of June 30, 2025, the balance of these accruals was $11.0 million. These accruals represent anticipated costs associated with the remediation of these issues and are generally not discounted.

We record a loss contingency when the available information indicates it is probable that we have incurred a liability and the amount of the loss is reasonably estimable. The likelihood of a loss with respect to a particular environmental matter is often difficult to predict, and determining a meaningful estimate of the loss or a range of loss may not be practicable based on information available. When a material loss contingency is probable but a reasonable estimate cannot be made, or when a material loss contingency is at least reasonably possible, disclosure is provided. The accruals we have established for estimated environmental liabilities represent our best current estimate of the probable and reasonably estimable costs of addressing identified environmental situations, based on our review of currently available evidence, and taking into consideration our prior experience in remediation and that of other companies, as well as public information released by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA), other governmental agencies and by the Potentially Responsible Party (PRP) groups in which we are participating. The accrued liabilities for all environmental concerns could change substantially due to factors such as the nature and extent of contamination, changes in remedial requirements, technological changes, discovery of new information, the financial strength of other PRPs, the identification of new PRPs and the involvement of and direction taken by the government or the courts on these matters.

Among other environmental laws, we are subject to the Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act of 1980 (CERCLA), under which we have been identified by the USEPA or other third party as a PRP with respect to environmental remedial costs at certain Superfund sites. We have evaluated our claims and estimated liability associated with these sites based upon the best information currently available to us. We believe our environmental accruals are adequate to cover our portion of the environmental remedial costs at the sites where we have been designated a PRP, to the extent these expenses are probable and reasonably estimable.

6

Table of Contents

HUMAN CAPITAL RESOURCES

Employee Profile. We employed 8,124 people, including approximately 8,100 full-time employees, as of June 30, 2025. Approximately 2,500 employees were located in the U.S. and 5,600 were located in other parts of the world, principally Germany, India and China. As of June 30, 2025, approximately 1,900 of our employees were represented by labor unions. We consider our labor relations to be generally good.

Inclusion and Belonging. We are fully committed to inclusion and belonging (I&B) in the workplace. We continue to deploy our strategy and the supporting infrastructure to elevate and advance I&B across our global organization and instill accountability for our performance. Our I&B initiatives are guided by our I&B Steering Team, which was formed in fiscal 2023 and expanded in 2025. The Steering Team is led by five senior executives who are responsible for one of our I&B strategic pillars – awareness, acquisition, development, community and culture.

Our I&B strategy is also championed by the Global Inclusion Council, which consists of cross-functional global leaders. Four regional inclusion councils covering the Americas, Asia Pacific, EMEA and India execute the strategies and provide a global perspective. We track key metrics to monitor the progress of our I&B strategy and goals and to identify areas for improvement across all levels of the organization.

As part of our awareness initiatives in 2025, we have launched the redesign of the external career website to include a section on belonging, highlighting our culture. We continued to support our Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) to foster communication, mentorship and community among diverse groups within the Company. Additionally, throughout the year, we have incorporated educational opportunities to reinforce our ongoing commitment to employee well-being and inclusion.

Health and Safety. Safety, including the health of our employees and contractors, is one of our core values and a priority across our global operations. We are committed to developing a world-class health and safety culture aimed at achieving zero injuries and illnesses. The long-term vision to achieving our world-class health and safety culture is formalized and communicated in our Environmental, Health and Safety (EHS) Roadmap that consists of four focus areas – fatality and serious injury (FSI) prevention, incident prevention, leadership development and culture and environmental compliance and sustainability.

The Company uses our EHS Management System, including an extensive list of apps, to enable streamlined collection, tracking and dissemination of key data related to our EHS standards and requirements. Along with each standard, we have developed a self-assessment used to evaluate performance and develop action plans for advancing on the EHS Roadmap.

In 2025, we continued to achieve positive results in proactive risk identification and closure programs which drive our culture of eliminating hazards prior to potential incidents. Our total recordable incident rate (TRIR) performance was 0.42 in 2025 compared to 0.35 in 2024.

Employee Development and Training. For the Company to grow, our employees must grow and develop continuously. We offer learning and development opportunities for all employees. In 2025, this included training for senior, mid-level and emerging leaders in role- and function-specific skills, such as coaching, feedback, collaboration, performance management, process improvement and sales training. We also offered our operational employees technical training through the Kennametal Knowledge Center.

Supporting our learning and development efforts is our OneTeam learning management system (LMS). Available in multiple languages, OneTeam offers more than 20,000 online courses in an easy-to-use interface. Throughout 2025, over 4,000 employees accessed the LMS and completed over 18,800 courses. Training is offered to our employees in many different formats. Although not all training hours are tracked through OneTeam, over 12,700 hours of completed training were recorded in the system during 2025.

Compensation and Benefits. The Company offers competitive compensation and benefits packages to build a qualified and motivated workforce and to meet their health and wellness needs. Our overall executive compensation philosophy is designed to attract, incentivize and retain high-performing talent. Executive compensation includes a mix of base salary, annual cash-based incentives under our Annual Incentive Plan (AIP) and our equity-based Long-Term Incentive Plan (LTIP).

The AIP, which is largely based on the Company’s achievement of short-term financial and strategic goals, also includes a portion of non-financial metrics, including an individual performance component and a safety component for all executive leadership team members and other key senior leaders.

Employee Engagement. To measure the effectiveness of our employee engagement strategy, we track key performance indicators such as our voluntary turnover rate. Our voluntary turnover rate was 7.7 percent in 2025 compared to 7.9 percent in 2024. We also conduct annual “Be Heard” employee engagement surveys to gather input and feedback on a wide range of categories including teamwork, inclusion and belonging, health and safety, ethical behavior and decision-making. We use the survey results, which are shared with employees, to refine employee engagement programs and develop new initiatives. In our most recent survey launched in April 2025, we had a response rate of 76 percent and showed an immaterial decrease in engagement scores across our global production and professional workforce.

7

Table of Contents

AVAILABLE INFORMATION Our internet address is www.kennametal.com. On the SEC Filings page of our website, which is accessible under the "About Us" tab, under Investor Relations and then the "Financials" tab, we post the following filings as soon as reasonably practicable after they are electronically filed with or furnished to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC): our annual reports on Form 10-K, our annual proxy statements, our annual conflict minerals disclosure and reports on Form SD, our annual reports on Form 11-K, our quarterly reports on Form 10-Q, our current reports on Form 8-K and any amendments to these reports filed or furnished pursuant to Section 13(a) or 15(d) of the Exchange Act. The SEC Filings page of our website also includes Forms 3, 4 and 5 filed pursuant to Section 16(a) of the Exchange Act. All filings posted on our SEC Filings page are available to be viewed on our website free of charge. On the Corporate Governance page of our website, which is accessible under the "About Us" tab, under Investor Relations, we post the following charters and guidelines: Audit Committee Charter, Compensation and Human Capital Committee Charter, Nominating/Corporate Governance Committee Charter, Kennametal Inc. Corporate Governance Guidelines and Kennametal Inc. Stock Ownership Guidelines. On the Ethics and Compliance page of our website, which is under the "About Us" tab, we post our Code of Conduct. All charters and guidelines posted on our website are available to be viewed free of charge. Information contained on our website is not part of this Annual Report or our other filings with the SEC. Copies of this Annual Report and those items disclosed on the Corporate Governance and Ethics and Compliance pages of our website are available without charge upon written request to: Investor Relations, Kennametal Inc., 525 William Penn Place, Suite 3300, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15219-2706. The SEC maintains an internet site (www.sec.gov) that contains reports, proxy and information statements, and other information regarding issuers, including Kennametal that file electronically with the SEC.