Parrot SA

PAR:PARRO

Earnings Call Transcript 2017-Q4

[Henri Seydoux, Founder, Chairman & CEO]

Thank you. Hello, hello, everyone. Thank you for being with us for this conference call. With me today are Olivier Maury, Parrot's Chief Financial Officer; and Marie Calleux, Head of Investor Relations. I'm going to present our results for 2017, and we will answer your questions together. Before we start -- before we get started, it's important to note that following the partnership agreement settled between Parrot Automotive and Faurecia, the [ total ] OEM Automotive business, in other words, the company Parrot Automotive has been consolidated on an equity basis since the second quarter. The figures for 2016 have been restated to be comparable and have not been audited. In 2016, Parrot experienced a delicate period. And in 2017, we reviewed our entire strategy and organization from top to bottom. Before taking a detailed look at our earnings and strategy, I would like to share the convictions that are behind our management decisions. An industry is emerging with civil drones. This will be a major industry within the next few years with both strategic and economic stakes illustrated, for example, by the legislation around the world that is integrating the use of drones in the civil sector. Parrot is a pioneer and major driving force behind this industry's emergence. From an innovative products launch in 2010, we have created an end-to-end drone group from [ consumers ] to professionals, from hardware to software and services, across 3 vertical markets: First, precision farming; second, 3D mapping, geomatics and inspection; and third, public safeties. Development in the consumer sector is vital at this stage of maturity for the valued users and is supporting the development of Business Solutions. All the major innovations from the past 30 years have emerged in the consumer sector. Examples include personal computers, smartphones and tablet. This is not a coincidence. Products gain their reliability and capabilities in the consumer sector. Volumes of component purchase and product sales to consumers alongside building a brand are essential prerequisites for developing expert solution. Without consolidating this consumer pillar, we would not have the same assets to succeed over the long term with commercial drones. Our competition almost exclusively comes from a Chinese company, which was still unknown 5 years ago. Parrot as the #1 European drone group has a brand that is a benchmark for its technologies, starting to be well-known worldwide. It has solid cash results, consistent with the fundraising operations that are being carried out in this sector. And lastly, Parrot has restored its agility and is totally determined to achieve its ambition to be the major drone group worldwide and to be the leading group in Europe for professionals and consumers. In 2017, to support this ambition and our business, in line with the changes in the drone market, we have reconfigured the group from end to end. Here is an overview of what has been accomplished: First of all, our technical road map has been completely rethought. We have stopped a number of projects that were no longer aligned with market developments and we have adopt an agile development approach. By realigning our R&D, we have maintained our capacity for innovation, while scaling back our R&D spending by EUR 15.8 million. We have also reviewed our commercial organization from top to bottom. From structure with local subsidiaries, we have built a sales force realigned around 3 platforms to sell Europe, America and Asia. But above all, we have opted for a selective distribution strategy and we have realigned our sales around distributors that are a better fit to adapt to change in retail distributions. This will enable us to further strengthen the quality of our partnerships and the visibility of our products at point of sale. We believe that this will -- that we will have -- sorry, we believe that we will be able to accomplish more and to do better with less partners. Alongside these retailers, we are targeting high volumes with leading e-commerce platforms. We are continuing to develop our sales on parrot.com and we are, of course, addressing the growing sector for pure player professional distributors' followers.In terms of direct sales for Business Solutions, strong teams have been positioned at strategic locations from where we will be able to address business markets more effectively. Two examples include the U.S. and Germany. To consolidate our commercial strategy, we have recruited business specialists and business developers from e-commerce to marketing, agriculture and construction. We have also overhauled our [ com ] site to highlight our 2 consumer and commercial offers. It has been relaunched and I would invite you to go and take a look online. Overall, our sales and marketing spending has been reduced by 34% and this reduction has once again focused exclusively on consumer activities, while at the same time major recruitments have been made to serve our professional client base. Our [ support ] functions, in other words, our industrialization units based in Hong Kong and Shenzhen and our administrative services have also been reconfigured, delivering a total reduction of 26%. The total savings achieved in terms of payroll represent EUR 18.7 million with EUR 6.3 million saved on technical purchases and EUR 3.3 million on other spending. The restructuring cost, the total of around EUR 11 million in 2017, significantly lower than the first estimate provided at the start of 2017. Overall, the group's operating expenditures has been reduced by EUR 49.2 million, while spending on commercial drones has been ramped up. The reorganization has been rolled out alongside the launch of a process to sell Parrot Automotive, our historical business focused on automotive connectivity for car manufacturer. This major process reflects our realignments around drones while consolidating our cash position, because in 2019, we expect to be able to benefit from the cash generated by the conversion of bonds for EUR 41 million, taking Faurecia's stake in Parrot Automotive up to over 50%. Now let's analyze the impact of our reorganization in terms of our revenues. Concerning revenues from consumer drones, I would like to remind you that we have benefit from favorable basis for comparison for the first half of the year. Our performance in 2017 also factors in our strategy to realign our sales around drones and to maintain a different approach. We have rolled out various updates for our French product, Bebop 2 and Mambo, which are still some of the best drones in the market and we manage our sales price more effectively by positioning them on the best retailers. While stocks of older products were being cleared, [Audio Gap] we missed our gross target for consumer drones by around EUR 5.5 million for 2 reasons. On the one hand, we had an opportunity to accelerate the clearance of our stock of older drone ranges, for example, the [ ideadol ] and certain mini drones. And for this, we accepted higher price cuts. On the other hand, we had a major commercial operation for the Disco which was postponed until early 2018, which I will come back to. In total, our consumer drone revenues came to EUR 78.2 million, down 6% year-on-year, but the issues faced in terms of our gross margin and inventory levels, which were affecting the business model, have been resolved. Concerning drone Business Solutions, we maintained strong growth throughout the year, plus 36%, with the following breakdown: senseFly, which supplies high-precision drone solutions for professionals in key accounts grew 43% to EUR 21.4 million. Pix4D, the global leader for 3D modeling software, grew 38% to EUR 15.6 million. Our dedicated precision farming subsidiaries, Parrot Airinov and Micasense, are up 24% to EUR 6.1 million. Parrot Air Support, launched at the end of 2016 to offer drone-based data collection services, carried out more than 300 missions in the second half of 2017. Lastly, concerning sales of our older consumer products, connected devices and automotive handsfree kits, the 38% contraction is in line with the strategy to realign our business around drones. At the end of the year, we were able to carry out various commercial operations that made it possible to clear our entire stock for the connected device ranges and there is now only the automotive handsfree kit left, business with strong revenues which we are no longer investing in. Now I would like to share with you some information concerning our gross margin. It is up 91% for the year, to represent 33.7% of revenues compared with 16.1% 1 year earlier. Over the year, the gross margin for Business Solution was still very strong, even slightly higher than 2016. In terms of the gross margin for consumer products, the gross margin on drones has been turned around, despite the age of the products and thanks to -- and thanks, in particular, to new distribution approaches. This improvement trend is set to continue. The profitability recorded of the products withdrawn from the section in 2018 has affected the group's gross margin. For instance, we have chosen to stop the consumer version of the Disco for the moment, to keep just [ the pore ] versions and we have opted to sell 100% of our stocks of connected device. These 2 factors account for the contraction in the gross margin performance in the fourth quarter, but have improved the group's visibility, focus and profitability profile for 2018. Concerning operating expenditure, we are 100% in line with our target, achieving a 31% reduction in the group's OpEx compared with the 30% targeted. I have already taken a detailed look at the change in operating expenditures at the start of this presentation. So now let's look at our cash flow and balance sheet. At December 31, 2017, we had EUR 115.4 million net cash compared with EUR 184.8 million at the end of 2016. Cash consumption representing EUR 69.4 million can be broken down as follows: EBITDA came to minus EUR 62.8 million including EUR 9.3 million on restructuring. The decrease of the dollar at the end of the year cost us minus EUR 4.8 million; and the improvement in our working capital requirements provide EUR 28 million. Net cash allocated to operations therefore represents EUR 40.9 million. Alongside this, we have invested EUR 28.9 million in our Business Solutions activity, the vast majority to exercise a put on Pix4D and EUR 7.1 million to take up additional or new interests in value start-ups, which will benefit our development across 3 vertical markets. Concerning the improvement in working capital requirements and marginally our main balance sheet headings. Inventory are down EUR 22.9 million year-on-year to EUR 23.2 million compared with EUR 46.3 million at the end of 2016. We are adopting a minimalist approach while waiting for the next innovations, to avoid recreating [ anest ] edition.Trade receivables and trade payables are in line with the level of business at the group -- in the group's invoicing and payment cycle, while cash and cash equivalents, including our various bank financing line, represent EUR 144 million. I would like to remind you that the EUR 115.4 million do not include the cash that is expected to be generated when the operations with Faurecia are completed in 2019 or 2022. This lead me to our expectations and our strategy for 2018. We will be moving forward this year with engagement and determination. Parrot exclusive ambition is now focused on developing our drone business. This is a young market and we need to manage our growth with agility. We were missing this agility in 2016 and we'll work to build it back again in 2017. As planned, we will therefore be resuming our innovation into consumer sector that you will understand that our visibility as a listed company in the highly competitive sector in which we operate, means that we are not able to tell you more about this. While waiting for these innovations to be launched, our consumer revenues and our accounts, in general, will be significantly penalized. The level of stock at the end of December is an indication of the contraction in our performance for the start of this year. This performance will be the result of a chosen strategy. When we launch our next-generation consumer drones, we will apply our selective distribution strategy and we'll deploy a more aggressive brand strategy. In this way, we aim to further strengthen our [ brand ] visibility, further strengthen our price positioning and further strengthen our image as Europe's leading drone manufacturer. Consumer deserve to have a choice and Parrot is committed to meeting their expectations. We will, of course, continue to develop our business solutions and we aim to maintain strong level of growth, which we need to be assessed over the full year. This growth will benefit from our acceleration in services and software. The combination of these 2 offers will help further improvement our gross margin and reduce our cash consumption. In 2018, Parrot is now a pure player, positioned on a high-growth market. Parrot is Europe leading drone group and the only one to currently have such in-depth expertise for commercial drones. The development of the drone market and our [ thank to one ] positioning justify our continued allocation of the resources and trust [ that was placed ] in 2015 in order to develop a leading drone group. Thank you for listening. We are now ready to answer you -- any question you may have.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] There are no questions registered on the phone line.

[Henri Seydoux, Founder, Chairman & CEO]

Okay. Thank you very much for being with us this afternoon. And of course Olivier, Marie and myself are available for any questions you may have. And have a good day. Bye-bye.