Fujitsu Ltd

TSE:6702

Earnings Call Analysis

Strong Start with Steady Growth and Future Plans

The company exceeded internal expectations in Q1, marking a steady start towards annual targets. Emphasizing the importance of reskilling, external hires, and standardization, the firm aims to react swiftly to market changes. Fujitsu Uvance, modernization, and consulting are key to improving productivity. No changes were made to initial forecasts or segment goals. Continued profitability expansion is expected from Q2 onward. The Fujitsu IR Day 2024 on September 10 will outline strategies to achieve medium-term plans and allow for direct discussions on business strategy.

Strong Start to Fiscal Year 2024

Fujitsu has kicked off fiscal year 2024 with impressive growth, particularly in its Service Solutions segment. Revenue for this segment grew by 7.8% year-over-year to JPY 501.6 billion, with an impressive 11% rise in Japan, driven by high demand for digital transformation and modernization services. The segment's adjusted operating profit saw an increase of JPY 14 billion from the previous year, totaling JPY 34.9 billion, raising the adjusted operating profit margin to 7%, up from 4.5% the previous year.

Mixed Performance Across Segments

While the Service Solutions segment shined, other segments showed varied performance. The Hardware Solutions segment saw a decline in profit due to a pullback from last year’s high-margin deals and the impact of a weak yen, despite a 5.4% rise in revenue. Contrastingly, the Device Solutions segment benefited from the weak yen, recording a 6.2% increase in revenue and a significant rise in operating profit to JPY 7 billion, up from JPY 4.7 billion last year.

Strategic Exit and Investments

Fujitsu made a strategic decision to exit low-profitability regions in Europe within their Ubiquitous Solutions segment, which, while resulting in an 18.5% drop in revenue, stabilized the operating profit at JPY 4.4 billion. This move was aimed at trimming losses and focusing on more profitable areas. Additionally, the company continues to invest proactively in the growth of their businesses, especially in Fujitsu Uvance, which saw its revenue jump by 37%.

Strong Demand in Key Markets

In Japan, Fujitsu experienced robust demand across various industries including mobility, finance, and the public sector. Revenue in Japan stood at JPY 272.6 billion, up 4% from the previous year, while the adjusted operating profit was around 1.5 times higher than last year. The improved profitability was driven by successful modernization projects and digital transformation deals, leading to a significant 4 percentage point improvement in the adjusted operating profit margin to 13.9%.

Revenue Guidance and Future Prospects

Fujitsu has set ambitious revenue targets for the fiscal year, aiming for JPY 450 billion from Fujitsu Uvance alone, up from JPY 367.9 billion in 2023. The long-term goal is to achieve JPY 700 billion by fiscal 2025, making Uvance represent 30% of total revenue in Service Solutions. The management remains optimistic as the first quarter slightly exceeded internal projections, laying a solid foundation to meet these targets.

Cash Flow and Profit Forecasts

Excluding one-time cash inflows, core free cash flow for the first quarter was JPY 167.7 billion, a reduction from the previous year due to higher accounts receivable. The full-year financial forecast remains unchanged with an expected revenue of JPY 3.760 trillion and an adjusted operating profit of JPY 330 billion. The management plans to focus on steady execution to maintain the momentum from the first quarter and achieve the annual goals.

Earnings Call Transcript 2025-Q1

[Takeshi Isobe, executive]

This is Isobe speaking.

So I would like to explain about the financial results of 2024 first quarter. Please turn to Page 3. I will start by presenting our financial highlights.

The most important segment is Service Solutions. We continued to have strongly high revenue and operating profit, building on the previous year. Revenue for the first quarter was JPY 501.6 billion, an increase of 7.8% over last year's first quarter. In particular, business in Japan continues to see a healthy demand for DX and modernization services; and revenue rose 11% over the prior year. Adjusted operating profit in Service Solutions was JPY 34.9 billion, an increase JPY 14 billion compared to the first quarter of fiscal 2023. In addition to the impact of higher revenue, there has been steady progress in profitability improvements. The adjusted operating profit margin improved to 7%, an increase of 2.5 percentage points from the prior year.

Total consolidated revenue was JPY 830 billion, an increase of 3.8% over the previous year. Revenue rose in Service Solutions, Hardware Solutions and Device Solutions. Adjusted operating profit was JPY 23.6 billion, up JPY 21 billion from the prior year; the adjusted operating profit margin 2.8%, an improvement of 2.5 percentage points from the prior year, primary from Service Solutions.

Page 4 shows an overview of the financial results for the -- each business segments. I will discuss the results for each segment, starting with the next slide, but this gives you an overview of the segments. Service Solutions, our growth driver, started the fiscal year with strong growth in both revenue and profits. In Hardware Solutions, profit fell, as there was a pullback from last year's high-profit deals and a negative impact from the weak yen. Results in Device Solutions, on the other hand, benefited from the weak yen; and both revenue and profit increased.

In intersegment eliminations and corporate, a reduction in inventories led to an improvement in unrealized gains, among other positive factors, but there has been no particular shift in our expansion in investments to achieve growth over the medium- and long-term horizon. From Page 5, I will show results for each segment.

Page 6. First, I will discuss Service Solutions. Revenue was JPY 501.6 billion, an increase of 7.8% from the prior year. Primary in Japan, there was a strong increase in demand of DX and modernization services; and revenue from Uvance continued to increase. Revenue from business in Japan rose by 11% from the prior year. Adjusted operating profit was JPY 34.9 billion, up JPY 14 billion from the prior year, enabling the segment to achieve a solid start to fiscal 2024. I will now explain the components of this profit increase using a waterfall chart.

Page 7. This chart shows the factors that caused increases or decreases in adjusted operating profit in Service Solutions compared to the prior year. On the far left: Adjusted operating profit in the first quarter of fiscal 2023 was JPY 20.9 billion, and that is the starting point for examining changes in profit during this fiscal year's first quarter.

The first factor is an increase of JPY 14.2 billion in adjusted operating profit from the impact of higher revenue. The strong growth in revenue in Japan drove an increase in gross margin. The second factor is an increase of JPY 8.1 billion from improved profitability. We continued to make progress, initiatives to improve productivity, such as the standardization in our development process. In addition, in regions, international regions, there was a positive impact from the carve-out of a low-profitability business. The gross margin improved by 2 percentage points from the previous year.

The third factor is a decline of JPY 8.3 billion from higher expenses, primarily investments in growth business. We continued to actively implement investments in the direct growth of our business, such as the development of Uvance offerings, the aggregation of knowledge to support the rapid growth in our modernization business, investments in employee training and development and enhanced security. Adding these up, adjusted operating profit for Service Solutions in the first quarter of fiscal 2024 is JPY 34.9 billion.

Page 8. I will now provide supplemental information on each of the factors in the previous waterfall chart. First is the status of orders, which led to the increase in revenue. This page shows orders in Japan. Orders in Japan fell by 3% in the first quarter compared to the previous year. I will comment on each industry segment.

First is the private enterprise business segment, in which orders were up 6% from the prior year. There was continued growth in projects related to digital transformation and sustainable transformation as well as modernization deals for mission-critical systems, with continued strength across a wide range of customers, including those in manufactured, in mobility, retailing and distribution sectors. Orders were flat in the finance business segment compared to the prior year. We were able to win large-scale deals to upgrade mission-critical systems for financial institutions, enabling us to receive a scale of orders on par with the high level of orders in last year's first quarter.

In the public and health care segment, orders fell 15%. This represents a pullback from the first quarter of last year, when we received orders for large-scale multiyear deals. Our deal pipeline for the second quarter and beyond is growing. And although the level of orders in the first quarter was below last year's level, we are not particularly concerned about the future. In the mission critical and others segments, orders were up 31% from the prior year. We received multiple large-scale deals such as upgrades for mission-critical systems.

Overall, our business in Japan is continuing a solid growth trend in deals across a wide range of customers. There was a pullback in the first quarter from the multiyear contracts we won in last year's first quarter, but the pipeline of expected orders in the second quarter and beyond is solidly expanding. And for the full year, we expect a continuation of these strong trends. In addition to the high volume of backlog from orders we had received through to the end of last year, the expansion trend in opportunities for orders remains strong. And we expect to be able to continue the steady growth in revenue.

Page 9 shows the orders in the international regions. Orders in Europe region fell 14% compared to last year. This represented a pullback from last year's large-scale deals, primarily in the Nordic areas. Orders in the Americas region increased by 4%. The solid growth in orders continued, primarily for Fujitsu Uvance; and we were able to exceed the high level of orders received in last year's first quarter. Orders for the Asia Pacific region were up by 14%. In Oceania, we were able to win a multiyear contract renewal from a finance-related customer, taking the growth in orders up a notch.

Page 10 shows the progress of Fujitsu Uvance, which we are positioning as the most vital area for the growth of our business and the transformation of our business portfolio. Overall, orders received in the first quarter sharply expanded, growing by 50% over the prior year to JPY 109.2 billion. Below that is revenue.

In the bar graph, the deep-blue portion depicts revenue from the 4 vertical areas, which are cross-industry areas that solve societal issues. The light blue presents revenues from the 3 horizontal areas, which are technology platforms that support the cross-industry areas. Overall revenue from Fujitsu Uvance in the first quarter was JPY 96.5 billion, up by 37% from the prior year. Of that, JPY 19.1 billion was from the vertical area, roughly threefolds in the scale of revenue compared to the prior year.

The ratio of revenue in Service Solutions from Fujitsu Uvance rose from 15% in the prior year to 19%.

The graph on the right-hand side shows our revenue targets for this fiscal year and next fiscal year. The revenue target for this fiscal year is JPY 450 billion, up from JPY 367.9 billion in fiscal year 2023, nearly an increase of JPY 100 billion. In the first quarter, the Uvance business got off to a good start in both orders and revenue; and our progress is on pace to slightly exceed our target for the first quarter. We are seeking to achieve our target for Uvance revenue of JPY 700 billion in fiscal 2025, the final fiscal year of our medium-term management plan, in which we seek to have Uvance's representation 30% of total revenue in Service Solutions.

For Page 11, I would like to comment on profitability improvements and the status of growth investments. The increase in profit from profitability improvement was JPY 8.1 billion. And the gross margin improved by 2 percentage points from the prior year. Starting last year, every year, we have able -- been able to improve our gross margin by roughly 2 percentage points. Productivity improvements are clearly continuing, such as through the standardization of development work, automation, the expansion of in-house work and the expansion in the utilizing of offshoring. In addition, customers have also acknowledged the quality and the value we deliver. And our progress in setting suitable pricing is another positive point. Moreover, the impact of the shift in our business portfolio implemented in international regions is already starting to materialize.

On the right-hand side. Growth investments and other expenses increased by JPY 8.3 billion. Investments have increased. We have continued to deliberately and proactively invest in areas directly related to business growth, such as the development of Fujitsu Uvance offerings, the aggregation of knowledge to support the expansion of our modernization business, investments needed to develop and recruit specialist human resources and investments to strengthen our security. We have created our 3 growth pillars of Uvance, modernization and the consulting business; and we are working hard to accelerate that growth.

Next is Page 11 (sic) [ 12 ]. I will briefly touch on the status of each subsegment in Service Solutions. First is global solutions. Revenue was JPY 129 billion, up sharply by 23.8% from the prior year. On an adjusted basis, the subsegment posted an operating loss of JPY 2.3 billion. Revenue grew strongly, primarily from Fujitsu Uvance. As for profit, however, because of stepped-up expansion in investments, in absolute terms, the subsegment ended with a loss.

We accelerated the development of offerings in Uvance, primarily in the vertical areas. And we are strengthening investments in delivery standardization, such as the expansion of the Modernization Knowledge Center. We are making progress as planned in dealing with expansion of our offerings business and the strong demand for DX and modernization services. And we expect that, through the impact of higher revenue and improvement in our gross margin, we should be able to achieve a solid level of profit for the full year.

In regions Japan, revenue was JPY 272.6 billion, up 4% from the previous year. The adjusted operating profit was JPY 37.9 billion, approximately 1.5x the level of profit of the previous year. Modernization-related demand, such as DX business and upgrades of mission-critical system, continued to increase. And revenue increased from a wide range of industries, such as mobility, finance and public sectors. In addition to the impact of higher revenue, we also continued making progress on improving profitability. The adjusted operating profit margin, therefore, have significant 4% (sic) [ 4 percentage point ] improvement from the prior year to 13.9%.

In regions international, revenue was JPY 142.2 billion, up 0.9% compared to the previous year. Adjusted operating profit was a loss of JPY 0.5 billion. Loss decreased by JPY 3 billion from the previous year. For revenue, although there were positive effects from foreign exchange movements, there was also the negative impact of the carve-out of the low-profit German private cloud business. On a net basis, revenue was essentially unchanged from the previous year. In terms of profit, the effects of the business portfolio transformation led to improved profitability.

Page 13. This page shows the other segments besides Service Solutions.

First is Hardware Solutions. Revenue was JPY 228.5 billion, up 5.4% from the previous year. There was an adjusted operating loss of JPY 3.6 billion, a deterioration of JPY 6.3 billion from the previous year.

System products, in terms of revenue, saw an increase due to foreign exchange movements, but on the other hand, in terms of profit, there was an increase in the cost of procuring components tied directly to the weak yen, which had a negative effect on profitability. In addition, on top of the impact of foreign exchange movement, there was also drop-off of the previous year's highly profitable business deals, which resulted in decrease from profit from the previous year.

Network products were -- was also similarly impacted by weakened yen. Excluding the impact of foreign exchange movement, revenue was about the same level as the previous year. The operating loss also improved slightly from the previous year. We expect the demand in and out of Japan for fiscal year 2024 will continue to be low, as the previous year. On the other hand, we are continuing our development investment for the next growth cycle, so the segment will continue to struggle with profitability.

Below is Ubiquitous Solutions. Revenue was JPY 48.7, down 18.5% from the previous year. Adjusted operating profit was JPY 4.4 billion, about the same level as the previous year. The decline in revenue was due to exiting business in Europe. As we mentioned last fiscal year, in regard to business in Europe, it was very competitive environment in which it was difficult to ensure profitability. It is for this reason that Fujitsu exited these regions in April 2024.

In terms of profit, exiting business in the low-profitability regions in Europe trimmed losses or, in other words, had a positive effect. The increase in costs from the weakened yen, however, had a negative impact. And these combined led to profit remaining essentially unchanged from previous year.

Page 14, Device Solutions. Revenue was JPY 71.6 billion, up 6.2% from the previous year. Adjusted operating profit was JPY 7 billion, an increase of JPY 4.7 billion from the previous year. The impact of foreign exchange rate movements in this segment was different from the Hardware Solutions and Ubiquitous Solutions. Excluding the impact of foreign exchange movement, the demand stopped declining. Demand is starting to recover, but a strong surge in demand are anticipated to come after second half of the fiscal year.

Below is the intersegment elimination and corporate. There was an operating loss of JPY 19.1 billion, with a decrease in expenses of JPY 8.6 billion compared to the previous year. In the first quarter, group-wide business growth investment were slightly lower. In addition, an improvement in unrealized profit due to the shipment of inventories which had -- temporarily retained in intra-group transactions at the end of the first quarter of the fiscal year positively impacted the result. The business growth investments managed by intersegment elimination and corporate include advanced cutting-edge research, mainly in the field of AI and in quantum computing; and enhancements to our overall management's foundation. We will continue the deliberate implementation of these investments for our medium- to long-term business.

We have been advancing One Fujitsu product -- project for global -- is group-based ERP deployment project, as an investment to strengthen our management foundation. We plan to launch this project in the services business in Japan in fiscal 2024. We will accelerate our digital transformation to further increase the speed and optimization of the business.

Page 15, we will talk about the status of cash flow and the balance sheet.

Page 16, cash flow. Excluding onetime cash inflows, core free cash flow was JPY 167.7 billion, a reduction of JPY 15 billion from the previous year. The main factors in the reduction of core free cash flow was a temporary increase in the balance of accounts receivable from a high level of revenue at the end of the first year (sic) [ quarter ] and the pullback from the previous year's sale of shareholdings. We anticipate core free cash flow to increase throughout the year.

Free cash flow, which is in the table, at the bottom, this page, was JPY 130.4 billion, an increase of JPY 4.8 billion from the previous year.

Page 17 shows the status of assets, liabilities and equity. I will omit an explanation of this page. This concludes my overview of the financial results for the fiscal year.

Though it is not on the slide, I will briefly comment on the progress towards our plan. Fujitsu's operating profit is skewed toward the second half of the year and the first -- fourth quarter, so although we cannot afford to be overly optimistic, results for this quarter slightly exceeded our internal start of the fiscal year.

In segments, the results for Service Solutions showed a slight improvement. Outside of this, there was some variation due to factors -- impact -- and the results were mostly in line with the plan. Demand in Service Solutions, such as orders received, was anticipated. There was also pullback for the large-scale orders won during the previous year, so orders may seem slightly weak compared to the previous year, if not -- only look in the first year (sic) [ quarter ]. On the profitability, this is exactly as planned.

So having said that, although I mentioned that this is better than planned, there is no point at which I can say it is significantly better than our plan. So although it is not a very concrete explanation, I dare say that there was very little significant failures or negative details as -- steadily expanded our business. One could say that we had a firm handle on things. We will continue working to maintain and accelerate the starting speed from the first quarter to steadily achieve the plan.

Page 18. I will now explain our financial forecast for fiscal 2024.

Page 19. This is our financial forecast for fiscal 2024. Revenue is forecasted to JPY 3.760 trillion. Adjusted operating profit is forecasted to be JPY 330 billion, and adjusted profits for fiscal 2024 is forecasted to be 26 billion (sic) [ JPY 226 billion ]. All of forecasts remain unchanged. In addition, there is also no change to the forecasts for each segment, for cash flow, starting to -- the next year. We are progressing as planned.

Lastly. I briefly touched on earlier that the results for the first quarter slightly exceeded our internal plan. We believe we are off to a good and steady start to achieve our target. On the other hand, we are still at the very beginning of this year. There are still many things that we need to address, areas in which we must further accelerate our efforts and actions that we must do to handle a strong business to deliver value to customers. We strongly believe people will be at the core.

As for deployment and change to the structure, in which the right people are in the right place, including reskilling of internal human resources, securing external human resources and the standardization of manufacturing innovation, to meet the changes to our business portfolio, it will be important that we carry this out quickly. It is also for this reason that we believe that taking firm action will be -- handle this.

We believe this initiative will deliver each of the existing system integration projects while also growing overall business, with Fujitsu Uvance, modernization and consulting as the main pillars. We will -- believe that these will be essential for steadily improving productivity. From the second quarter, onward, we will continue to gauge the steady achievement of our plan through the expanding of the business and improving the profitability.

This concludes my presentation on the overview of the financial result. Lastly, I would like to announce Fujitsu IR Day 2024. On September 10, our 5 corporate vice presidents, including myself, will explain Fujitsu's business strategies for achieving our medium-term management plan and the status of our progress towards achieving it. We believe that this event will be an important opportunity for having direct discussions between the participants and those in charge of Fujitsu's business and for understanding Fujitsu's business strategy. We will share the details and specifics related to how to participate in the event in a separate statement. We hope many will attend.

[Statements in English on this transcript were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]