NHN Corp

KRX:181710

Earnings Call Transcript 2024-Q1

[Ji Hye Kim, executive]

[Interpreted] Good morning. This is Ji Hye Kim, Head of IR team at NHN. Thank you very much for attending our 2024 first quarter earnings conference call. NHN CEO, Woojin Jeong; CFO, Hyun Shik Ahn; and CEO of NHN PAYCO, Yeon-Hun Jeong are also present. CEO, Woojin Jeong, will start with a business update, followed by CFO Hyun Shik Ahn's presentation on financial results before we take your questions.

The earnings announced today have been prepared based on IFRS consolidated financial statements and are subject to change depending on the results of the external auditor's review that is currently underway.

Also, I remind you that the conference call contains forward-looking statements, and the company's actual business results may differ materially.

Now CEO, Woojin Jeong, will address some key business topics.

[Chung U-Jin, executive]

[Interpreted] Good morning. This is Woojin Jeong, CEO of NHN. To start with the update of our game business, in Q1, while solid web-board revenue continued, there was also meaningful growth from the mobile games in Japan. LINE: Disney Tsum Tsum, Yo-kai Watch: Puni Puni and #Compass have been setting new records in the Japanese game market, which is a wonderful surprise from these long-running hits. Especially LINE: Disney Tsum Tsum, which celebrated its 10th anniversary last January, actually used 10th anniversary event to rank #1 in Japan's iOS market top-grossing chart. The game's Q1 revenue more than doubled on a Q-o-Q basis and increased by 37% Y-o-Y. Q1 2024 was the highest quarterly revenue for the game since 2018.

‘Yo-kai Watch Puni Puni and #Compass both recorded double-digit growth in revenue, both Q-o-Q and Y-o-Y in Q1, reflecting their strong popularity. New game lineup includes the global rollout of mobile SNG game, Wooparoo Odyssey, including key markets of Japan and Taiwan in July, following the Korean launch last October. Pebble City and Project G are also lined up for launch later.

Darkest Days successfully completed its first CBT last March, and we'll go through a second round of CBT around July with a larger user group before official launch.

Q1 PAYCO revenue contributing transaction volume was KRW 1.4 trillion, which is a 4% Y-o-Y growth. Due to Q1 seasonality, advertiser budget and online transactions somewhat decreased, resulting in a Q-o-Q decrease in coupon and PAYCO Point payment. However, the amount of B2B transactions, including corporate employee welfare solutions increased by 43% Q-o-Q and 27% Y-o-Y.

In late April, PAYCO launched the limited edition Joguman PAYCO Point Card, targeting the 20, 30 age group, which is the main user group for PAYCO. The Joguman physical card has a whimsical design that appeals to users and contactless payment feature for convenience, and it is expected to lead revenue growth around PAYCO Point payment.

Our commerce business continues to focus on normalizing its operations. Our Chinese commerce subsidiary changed its name to IBT and has then removed the unsustainable parts of its business and reexamining its cost structure. As a result of such aggressive business streamlining, some additional one-off expenses were recognized this quarter. But as I mentioned during the last call, we are currently refraining from transaction methods that may cause uncollected receivables, and we'll focus on delivering gradual improvement in performance.

NHN Cloud has started to recognize revenue from the Gwang-ju National AI Data Center starting from Q1. The Gwang-ju National AI Data Center provides cutting-edge infrastructure and is the foundation for collaboration with AI companies in Korea.

Meanwhile, we expect to see meaningful business improvement in public sector cloud business this year. In April, NHN Cloud was selected as the preferred bidder for zone 3 in the cloud native consulting project organized by the Korean government and plans to focus on public sector projects and win cloud migration contracts from several public institutions in the second half.

On the private sector side, the next-generation IT system of Shinhan EZ General Insurance was recently opened on NHN cloud environment. This was the first case of a Korean general insurer fully migrating its core system to a public cloud and is an excellent reference case that showcases NHN Cloud's technology and know-how and also its edge in the financial sector.

NHN Dooray!, which provides an all-in-one collaboration tool service actively participated in the SaaS support project organized by the Ministry of Science and ICT and recently won the Ministry of National Defense [ cowork ] system project. By attracting such meaningful accounts, NHN Dooray! continues to successfully expand its business.

NHN Techorus, which is the MSP business in Japan, also continues to maintain solid performance driven by high growth rates in its Amazon AWS resell business despite the weak yen.

That completes my business update. And now CFO, Hyun Shik Ahn, will take you through the financial results.

[Hyun Shik Ahn, executive]

[Interpreted] Good morning. [indiscernible] Hyun Shik Ahn. I would like to share the first quarter results. 2024 first quarter consolidated revenue was KRW 604.4 billion, which is a 10.2% Y-o-Y increase and a 1% Q-o-Q increase.

Operating profit was KRW 27.3 billion, which is a 42.8% increase Y-o-Y and a return to a quarterly operating profit.

Q1 operating profit margin was 4.5%, which is a 1 percentage point improvement Y-o-Y and a 5.8 percentage points improvement from Q4, which saw an operating loss.

Q1 game revenue was KRW 121.9 billion, which is a 4.2% Y-o-Y increase and a 9.1% increase Q-o-Q.

Total web-board game revenue increased by 5.4% Q-o-Q, thanks to the Lunar New Year holiday effect in Q1 but decreased 2.9% Y-o-Y, mainly due to decrease in PC users. As a result, PC game revenue was KRW 41.6 billion, which is a 3.6% decrease Y-o-Y but a 6.1% increase Q-o-Q.

Mobile game revenue was KRW 80.2 billion, which is an increase about 8.7% Y-o-Y and a 10.6% increase Q-o-Q. This is mainly explained by the solid mobile web-board game traffic and also significant growth in overseas mobile game revenue, including LINE: Disney Tsum Tsum.

For the payment and advertisement business, revenue was KRW 288.4 billion, which is a 15.6% increase Y-o-Y, mainly driven by the double-digit growth in NHN KCP's transaction volume. But on a Q-o-Q basis, this is a 1.6% decrease.

Some NHN PAYCO customers reduced their advertisement budget, which caused a temporary decrease in customized coupon transaction volume. However, this is believed to be seasonal and expected to recover quickly.

Commerce revenue was KRW 63.7 billion, which is a 26% increase Y-o-Y, mainly due to the consolidation of IKONIC, which started to be included from the second half of last year. However, on a Q-o-Q basis, commerce revenue decreased 13.1% due to continued restructuring of the Chinese business.

Tech business revenue was KRW 95.1 billion, which is a Y-o-Y 5% decrease but a 20.6% Q-o-Q increase. The effect of Diquest and Cloudnexa, which were sold in the second half of last year are excluded, tech business revenue grew by 6.2% Y-o-Y.

Content revenue was KRW 45 billion, which is a Y-o-Y 7.5% increase but a 9.6% Q-o-Q decrease.

NHN Comico maintained stable traffic, but Wisdomhouse's publishing revenue slightly decreased on a Q-o-Q basis because of the effect of the best-seller that was launched at the end of last year.

NHN Link's revenue decreased on a Q-o-Q basis against fourth quarter, which is the peak season for concerts and performances. But on a Y-o-Y basis, NHN Link's revenue more than doubled, thanks to the increase in baseball season ticket sales.

In other businesses, revenue was approximately KRW 12 billion, which is a 5.2% Y-o-Y increase.

Next, about the operating expenses. Total operating expense was KRW 577.1 billion, which is an increase by 9% Y-o-Y but decreased by 4.8% Q-o-Q.

Commission expense was KRW 394.1 billion, which is a 5% Q-o-Q decrease, mainly due to Q-o-Q decrease in the COGS of NHN KCP and the Chinese commerce subsidiary.

Labor cost was KRW 113.6 billion with 0.7% Q-o-Q increase.

Total headcount decreased as the China commerce business and cloud business reduced some employees and stock compensation also decreased. That said, Q1 labor cost includes the regular business of NHN KCP.

Advertisement and marketing was KRW 17 billion, which is a 10.7% decrease Q-o-Q. Marketing expense to revenue ratio in Q1 was 2.8%, which is the lowest quarterly ratio yet.

Expenses related to #Compass, which is the game service by Japan's PlayArt and PAYCO marketing expenses decreased on a Q-o-Q basis. Depreciation was KRW 24.6 billion, which is a 22.5% decrease due to change in the accounting treatment of IDC server lease last quarter. However, the sum of depreciation and communication expenses decreased by 0.2% on a Q-o-Q basis.

Other operating expenses was KRW 24 billion, a decrease of 22.8% Q-o-Q.

Bad debt expense of approximately KRW 15 billion was recognized in Q4 in connection with the Chinese commerce business. And in Q1, additional KRW 8.8 billion of bad debt was recognized as part of the business streamlining.

Our Q1 operating profit was KRW 27.3 billion, which is a 42.8% increase Y-o-Y and returning to a quarterly profit.

Q1 net loss was KRW 4.8 billion. On a Y-o-Y basis, this is a fall to a net loss from a net profit Q1 last year. But on a Q-o-Q basis, the size of net loss has significantly decreased.

Corporate income tax increased by KRW 21.6 billion Y-o-Y, mainly due to the base effect against first quarter last year when corporate income tax expenses had decreased due to the investments made by NHN Cloud.

Nonoperating P&L improved by KRW 45.2 billion Q-o-Q, reflecting the base effect against Q4 when there was intangible asset impairment loss, including goodwill impairment.

That completes the presentation on our first quarter financial results, and now we will take your question.

[Operator]

[Foreign Language] [Operator Instructions] [Foreign Language] The first question will be provided by Dong Woo Kim from Kyobo Securities.

[Dong Woo Kim, analyst]

[Interpreted] Well, my first question is about the Darkest Days. You said that the first round of CBT was conducted in March. Can you give us some responses that you've collected from the CBT? What kind of results did you see? Also, can you give us a bit more guidance on when you expect to have the official launch of Darkest Days?

Second question is about NHN Cloud and Techorus. Can you give us a bit more color into the current business situation there, both qualitatively and quantitatively? And in that same line, can you give us some guidance on revenue outlook this year?

[Chung U-Jin, executive]

[Interpreted] I'll start with your first question about the Darkest Days. Yes, we went through the first CBT in March. Actually, the main purpose of the CBT was to test the technical stability. For example, to test the server stability, robustness and our recovery in the case of crashes because we are placing emphasis on a global open of the game.

In terms of user response, about 70% of the users who participated in the CBT found the game fun, but there was also some feedback about the lock-in video and also graphics. And so we are reflecting that feedback and improving those aspects to -- and plan to complete that before we conduct the second round of CBT.

[Hyun Shik Ahn, executive]

[Interpreted] I'll answer the second question. Your audio quality on the second question was not quite clear. And so I will answer the question as we understood it, but if I missed any key points, please feel free to ask again.

You've asked about the cloud business, NHN Cloud and Techorus, including MSP business. Definitely, we are expecting our growth to be quite significant this year versus last year. We are expecting at least 20% growth on a Y-o-Y basis. And the reason why we do expect such strong growth is because, number one, revenue from the Gwang-ju AI Data Center will start to be generated this year.

Also, there is some additional service fees that we're expecting from the public institutions that we're servicing, the cloud service. Also, we have been selected as the consulting company for the first round of the cloud native project. So because of all of these opportunities, we are expecting definitely better performance from our cloud business on a Y-o-Y basis.

One reason we are a bit cautious is the fact that the budget for these public institution projects have not been 100% confirmed. But aside from that, we have a positive outlook on the public sector side of our cloud business.

While we have a positive outlook on the public sector, we also -- I am focusing on building on the private sector side of the business. As we have mentioned, we are accumulating positive progress and track record, especially on the financial sector side. But the market movements on the public -- excuse me, the market on the private sector cloud side is a bit slow in terms of movement, but we are focusing to generate growth also on the private sector.

[Operator]

[Foreign Language] [Operator Instructions]

[Hyun Shik Ahn, executive]

[Interpreted] Since there's no further questions, we will end the conference call here. If you have any further questions later on, please forward them to the IR team. Thank you very much.

[Portions of this transcript that are marked [Interpreted] were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]