Converge Technology Solutions Corp

TSX:CTS

Earnings Call Transcript 2022-Q1

[Operator]

Good morning, and welcome to the Converge Technology Solutions Corp., First Quarter 2020 Results Conference Call. [Operator instructions] Your main hosts today are Shaun Maine, Chief Executive Officer and Matt Smith, Interim Chief Financial Officer.

Before we begin, I am required to provide the forward-looking statements with respect to forward-looking information, which is made on behalf of Converge and all of its representatives that are on this call. All statements made on this call will contain forward-looking information. The actual results could differ materially from a conclusion, forecast [production] in the forward-looking information.

Certain material factors or assumptions are applied in drawing a conclusion or making a forecast or projection as reflected in the forward-looking information. Additional information about the material factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the conclusion, forecast or projection in the forward-looking information and material factors or assumptions that were applied in drawing a conclusion or making a forecast or projection, as reflected in the forward-looking information, are contained in Converge's filings with the Canadian provincial securities regulators. Converge does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements. Such statements only speak as of the date made.

Today's discussion also refers to gross revenue, adjusted EBITDA, organic growth, adjusted free cash flow and adjusted free cash flow conversion, which are non-IFRS measures and has no standardized meaning. Please refer to Converge's filing at Canadian provincial securities regulators for an explanation and reconciliation of IFRS measures.

Thank you. Mr. Shaun Maine, you may begin your conference.

[Shaun Maine, executive]

Thank you. Good morning, and thank you for attending today's Q1 earnings call. Those of you who recently participated on the 2021 full year financial results, we'll have noted that Converge exceeded Street expectations with record Q4 revenues, growing 74% year-on-year despite industry-wide backlogs.

Additionally, the company reported an annual increase in managed services revenue of 33%, as well as, 52% increase in professional and other service revenue and grew gross revenue by 9.6%.

Converge's financial success over the past few years has resulted overall in a 49% 3 year annual compound growth rate in revenue, while the 3 year adjusted EBITDA compound growth rate was 79%. We also reported adjusted EPS of $0.35 and an increase of 26% from 2020.

Over the first quarter of 2022, Converge has built upon this success, by reporting net revenue growth of 77% year-on-year, including growing its Q1 professional and other services by 70% year-on-year. The company also reported a 60.8% year-over-year growth in gross profit, alongside a 58% increase in adjusted EBITDA.

Many of you are well aware of the industry-wide backlogs as discussed on our Q4 earnings call and is widely reported by analysts across the industry. In Q4, we reported an increase in the product backlog to approximately $350 million compared to $250 million in Q3, 2021. While our reported backlog has further increased to $472 million this quarter, it is important to note that $250 million worth of that Q4 backlog was delivered this quarter and invoiced, leaving $100 million of open orders carrying forward from Q4 into Q1.

In Q1, our sales team [impressively] generated an additional $372 million in new backlog orders, which when added to the $203 million of net new invoiced orders equates to roughly $575 million of product demand generated in the first quarter of 2022.

As I've noted previously, the company remains extremely confident in its ability to manage its supply chain, and we are using our strong balance sheet and influence to ensure that we are prioritized when products become available. We continue to view our backlog as deferred revenue rather than lost revenue and expect to see further growth in higher-margin professional and other services in the next 12 months as supply chains lessen and backlog is delivered to end users. Generally, assuming that the supply chain issues normalize in line with historical levels, we anticipate that we can achieve strong double-digit organic growth.

In the meantime, our sales team continue to push high-margin business offerings least affected by supply chain constraints while working closely with our vendor partners on delivering expectations and solutions.

Converge's sales and marketing teams organized 30 client-facing events with 25 partners featured over 600 external attendees helping to drive 111 net new logos in Q1 of 2022.

Regarding acquisitions, Converge acquired $742 million of gross revenue in North America and Europe through 2021 through 9 acquisitions, which advanced the converged cybersecurity, advanced analytics and managed services practice areas.

Let me take this opportunity to remind everyone that Converge intends to add $1 billion of gross acquisition revenue in each of the next 3 years, contributing to the Phase 4 goal of over $5 billion of run rate revenue by the end of 2025. In 2022, Converge has already closed approximately $399 million of last 12 months gross revenue and $29.4 million of adjusted EBITDA.

Including recent strategic acquisitions, Converge has grown to over 300 salespeople supported by over 750 technical resources, including growing our security practice to 103 individuals and our data analytics practice to 85. In addition to our recent acquisitions, Converge recently announced the launch of a new service product, Converge Enterprise Cloud for IBM Guardium Insights, a cloud-agnostic hosted and managed solution for data security and compliance.

This new offering will allow clients to begin operations quickly, automate data compliance and security value, manage risk more effectively and transaction from standard monitoring to active threat detection. CECIGI strategically advances our mission to help companies modernize their security programs.

With that being said, I would like to pass the call to Matt Smith to discuss our Q1 financial highlights and successes in further detail.

[Matthew Smith, executive]

Thank you, Shaun. As Shaun mentioned, despite ongoing backlog challenges, we continue to generate strong revenue demand and revenue growth. In Q1, we grew net revenue 77% to $550 million compared to $310.2 million in Q1 last year. Q1 product revenue, which includes hardware and software, increased 80% to $453.3 million from $252.5 million over Q1 last year.

Our product revenue growth was driven primarily by the 10 acquisitions completed since April 1 last year, including the PDS acquisition that we closed at the beginning of the year, as well as, higher sales of devices to the Canadian government.

Q1 professional and other services, which includes the net revenue from public cloud resale and product support, increased 70% to $70.2 million from $41.3 million last year. We attribute this growth primarily to increases in professional services associated with upfront configuration and integration services for on-premise projects that were previously on hold due to COVID, as well as, continued growth in our consulting practice areas, including analytics.

In Q1, we grew our net revenue from managed services, which are long-term contracts, 61% to $26.4 million from $16.4 million in Q1 last year. On an annualized recurring basis, our ARR for managed services at the end of Q1 grew to $105.8 million compared to $65.5 million last year.

We are proud of the fact that we have achieved a milestone of $100 million in managed services ARR that we set at last year and are poised to show continued growth in this area in 2022 as backlog is delivered, and we realized revenue from managed services over end-user devices.

At the end of Q1, our total gross recurring revenue was $423.4 million, made up of $109.6 million from public cloud, $208 million from software subscription and the $106 million for managed services that I just mentioned.

And as Shaun has highlighted at the beginning of the call, despite the number of acquisitions we completed in the last 12 months, we still managed to grow gross revenue organically by 7.2% in Q1 compared to last year.

As highlighted on our Q4 call, we attribute this growth to 2 key things: one, our ability to seamlessly integrate our acquired companies; and 2, the strength and breadth of various practice areas, including our cybersecurity, which we recently bolstered with the acquisition of CBI that we announced on April 1.

As a reminder, we calculate organic growth for those companies that Converge is owned for at least 3 months at the reporting date, based on their pro forma gross revenue in the current period as compared to the same period last year. We believe that the 3 month rule provides a good representation of the acquisition under Converge ownership. And in doing so, we can begin to evaluate the acquired company from an organic growth standpoint.

For Q1, our gross profit increased 60.8% to $109 million from $67.8 million for the same period in 2021 and gross profit margin was 20% compared to 22% last year. Our gross margin percentage for Q1 is lower due to the fact that we've acquired 10 companies since April 01, that sell proportionately more hardware and initially generate margins below 20%. Plus Q1 was a device heavy quarter, both driven by higher device sales to the Canadian government and device backlog delivered to customers in Q1, which are lower margin.

Going forward, as we cross-sell higher-margin cloud and managed services to customers of these companies, including the margin lift associated with the trailing services on product backlog and increased sales for existing customers, we expect gross margin to increase.

Q1 adjusted EBITDA increased 58% to $29.6 million compared to $18.8 million last year. As a percentage of revenue, adjusted EBITDA was 5.4% compared to 6.1% in Q1 last year. As a percentage of gross profit, or GP, which we believe to be a telling indicator of the company's overall operating efficiency and profitability, adjusted EBITDA was 27.2%, in line with 27.7% in Q1 last year.

Our EBITDA margins in the interim as a direct results of the product mix highlighted above, as driven by recently acquired companies and the impact of lower-margin devices delivered in the quarter. As we integrate operations of acquired companies and cross-sell managed and cloud services to their customer base and increase our gross profit with higher margin revenue, we would expect these measures to increase over time.

Looking at our balance sheet. We finished the quarter in a strong cash position with over $217 million of cash on hand with approximately $140 million in borrowing capacity under our ABL and are well positioned to continue to execute on our acquisition targets in the balance of 2022. In Q1, we utilized the strength of our balance sheet and cash generation to purchase product directly from our OEMs in order to secure supply for customers, which, as Shaun mentioned, allowed us to invoice and deliver on $250 million in backlog from Q4 and an additional $203 million of net new orders in Q1.

This impact of purchasing direct from OEMs rather than through our typical channel partner is reflected in our uses of working capital in the quarter. However, as supply chains lessens, we will increasingly revert back to our regular channels and expect working capital to be a source of cash consistent with prior quarters.

Lastly, in Q1, our adjusted free cash flow, which we calculate as adjusted EBITDA less recurring capital expenditures and payments of lease liabilities was $24.2 million, increasing from $14.7 million in Q1 last year. Adjusted free cash flow conversion, which we expressed as a percentage of EBITDA was 82% in Q1, increasing from 78% last year.

We believe that adjusted EBITDA is a good proxy for cash generation. And as such, adjusted free cash flow conversion is a useful metric that demonstrates the rate at which the company can convert adjusted EBITDA to cash. The increase in these measures is attributable to the company's strong continued adjusted EBITDA growth and effective management of working capital, while generally maintaining low CapEx requirements.

And with that, I will turn the presentation back to Shaun.

[Shaun Maine, executive]

Thanks, Matt. Overall, the leadership team at Converge remains confident in our ability to achieve objectives outlined for the year ahead with our success in Q1 being a strong indicator of our solid trajectory. We've strategically added to the Converge leadership team to further enhance the scale and success of our company's vision, including the addition of John Teltsch as Chief Revenue Officer, who is a senior executive bringing more than 40 years of leadership and growth experience to this role. John joined Converge following a decade's long career with IBM, most recently as General Manager of Technology sales across the U.S., Canada and Latin America.

Additionally, Converge announced the appointment of Rich Lecoutre, the Global CFO in Q1, who is currently serving as a Finance Director at Softcat Plc. During his tenure at Softcat, Richard was integral to Softcat's 2015 IPO and growing their market cap to $3.1 billion. Richard will start his role at Converge on September 01, and will be a valuable asset to the company in its continued global expansion and evolution.

Touching base on some of our exemplary existing leadership, I'm extremely pleased to highlight Rochelle Manns being recognized as Ingram's first women-in-cloud Female Leader of the Year Award. Rochelle is our VP of Cloud Platforms and has driven exponential growth in our cloud business. This award recognizes Rochelle's talent and showcases one of the exceptional women who are driving Converge's growth.

At Converge, we take pride in offering resources and initiatives for employees to successfully grow together, strengthening the over company culture. Our Women for Women Empowerment Group continues to give the identified female population to Converge a time to invest in leadership development by hosting motivational speaking events, including a chat with Debra Danielson, what I learned in the path to the boardroom, book clubs and empowering discussions.

Subsequent to Q1, we launched our social ambassador program company-wide to encourage employee engagement with Converge content on social media channels with intent to generate increased visibility. And in Honor of Earth Day, we have partnered with Cisco hosting our first Green Program event, focused on how the pandemic has affected the way we work and help companies and individuals can sustainably prepare for the more permanent move to hybrid work.

Other example initiatives within Converge include our diversity and inclusion council that strives to ensure equality within the workplace offering insightful training and discussions, including our upcoming bi-standard training, see something [safe]. Along with wellness programs focused on healthy lifestyle choices for the mine and body and most recently, highlighting Maya's Mental Health Awareness month, offering creative tools to help manage stress. We believe these initiatives continue to contribute to the overall employee wellness that corresponds to a positive company culture and successful employee performance, allowing Converge to be better together.

On that note, let me open the floor to questions.

[Operator]

[Operator instructions] Our first question comes from Christian Sgro with Eight Capital.

[Christian Sgro, analyst]

For the first question, this morning, I wanted to ask on the gross margin mix. And you detailed some of the reasons why it was a little lower than previous quarters in the Q1 quarter. But outside of the hardware mix, is there anything you'd call out? And do you see this gross margin profile normalizing as soon as Q2? Or could some more devices come through are the other factors that [probably] in Q2?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

We would expect gross profit in Q2 to be kind of 2% to 3% higher than Q1, because of the stronger software sales. Q2 and Q4 tend to be much stronger software sales month. Q1, as Matt was saying, has a lot of devices. So in the hardware side, the device part is the lowest margin piece and the trailing part, as Matt indicated, is the managed services piece, which adds higher margins. So you would expect, yes Q1 historically, you've seen is always a lower kind of gross profit and particularly this year with the unlocking of the device part of the supply chain, you saw that go down to 20%, but you would expect it to be more in the 22%, 23% range for Q2.

[Christian Sgro, analyst]

And then you touched on seasonality there. But just wondering if the ordinary seasonality trends are intact so the Q2, Q4 a little stronger? Or would you say the curve or pattern could flatten a bit with the supply chain in recent M&A?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

So that's a great question. So what we're seeing now is in a normal supply chain, everything you ordered in the quarter pretty much delivered in the quarter. Now we're seeing that -- so basically, what happened in Q1, 2/7th of our supply chain didn't invoice the rest did. So that's probably a good metric to kind of use for the Q1 backlog of how much that's an invoice. Anything that was ordered in April that's outside of the kind of network and HPE probably will deliver as well. And then certain vendors haven't really been impacted vendors like IBM and also -- and of course, any software gets delivered. But you're seeing kind of what used to be a much quicker cycle, things that are now ordered in kind of May and June are more likely to be delivered in July and August. Traditionally, July and August are very light as people are on vacation. So I would expect to see as the supply chain unwinds a stronger Q3 than you saw, especially you got to remember, we bought $400 million of acquisition revenue in Q1.

We've indicated that there will be a strong Q2 [corpulent] to acquisition revenue, and that's all going to be in Q3 and Q4. So you would definitely expect a large ramp-up of revenue, gross profit and EBITDA in Q3, but particularly in Q4. And again, because of the demand in Q1 was off the chart, right? And so like $575 million of product demand. And so you're seeing an incredibly strong demand environment around digital transformation, which is kind of equating to just the unwinding of the supply chain with that demand means that Q2 is going to be strong, but Q3 and Q4 will be very strong as well.

[Christian Sgro, analyst]

I'll ask one last question, still on the product side and supply. Would you say there's any differences sourcing product in the U.S. or Europe? Is there any dynamic you've seen there? Or under the Converge sort of umbrella, have you not found any differences getting product from vendors?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

So size definitely matters. And our strong balance sheet meant that we were able to do things like go directly to the OEMs, to purchase product rather than going through distribution in order to prioritize ourselves as head of smaller players. So definitely, the size and the relationship with your vendors is incredibly important in prioritizing supply. We are obviously -- we do a lot more volume in North America than we do in Europe. But still, those vendors are international vendors and our relationships are with the top executive. So there are definitely some differences in Europe versus North America, but the fact that Converge is so large is definitely helpful.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from Rob Goff with Echelon.

[Robert Goff, analyst]

A tremendous revenue in the quarter. On that point of the tremendous revenue in the quarter, beating expectations the product demand beating expectations. Can you talk to what you might be seeing heading into Q2? And your response to the prior question left me thinking that there could be a bit of a backlog flushing coming through Q3 and a greater flushing coming through Q4?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

Yes, definitely. So again, I think when you look at what our $475 million of product revenue, I think the 2/7th rule probably is a decent one to look at what converts there. And then again, we've seen this incredible demand cycle, though. That's the key thing I would take away from the Q1, like the purchase order demand is that digital transformation demand is incredibly strong. And so, that's the combination of the flushing of the supply chain, but that renews, but you're seeing combined with that, anything -- a lot of the things that could order in May and June will end up in the backlog for the end of Q2. So high demand that you're seeing, as well as, the conversion of the backlog. So in Q1, we also invoiced $203 million of purchase orders we received in the quarter but had [$332] million added to the backlog. So those probably percentage-wise are decent proxies to use for Q2 as well.

[Robert Goff, analyst]

And if may, when you were going to the OEMs to source product, and you're basically going front of the queue going direct to OEM using your balance sheet. Is there any impact there on margins? Are you getting the product, but maybe the margin isn't quite what it would be going through your traditional vendor routes?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

No, it's not the margin. It's the terms. So you have to pay more quickly like 45-day terms rather than distribution we paid on 75-day terms. So that's -- you'll see it in the working capital numbers, which again, we'll expect to normalize later in the year. So it's not on margin, it's not terms.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from Rob Young with Canaccord.

[Robert Young, analyst]

Maybe just a little further on that last question from Rob. When you're going direct to the OEMs, it seems to me that you're giving up some of the price discount that you would get through your distributors on borrowing. So wouldn't that -- wouldn't that be a margin pressure in the short run if you're going direct to the OEMs?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

Yes, not on devices. So you don't receive the same benefit. Data center equipment is very different than the end user device market, which is traditionally lower margin as well. So yes, there hasn't been a change in either the pricing or the benefits, but the big difference is terms.

[Robert Young, analyst]

The managed service target of $200 million for the exiting the year, a long way to go. And I was just curious if you could give us a sense of how you remain confident on hitting that target?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

So we're going to spend a lot of time on our June 23 AGM call going through our model, but you'll see a lot of investments we're making in managed services. You saw the IBM Guardium security managed service announcement. There will be a lot of initiatives around our managed services that will contribute to getting there, as well as, the acquisitions that we're doing. We're very disciplined on the prices that we pay for them. But given that we're one of the few buyers in the market now, we're able to get a lot more services and managed services as part of our acquisitions than we were traditionally. So I would expect a large contributor to that $200 million managed services target will also be through acquisition.

[Robert Young, analyst]

Okay. And maybe last question. The orders that you highlighted had gone directly into the backlog, I think 370 is the number you gave. Is all of that driven by supply chain? I assume all of it is driven by supply chain, but is it -- are you seeing longer duration orders? Are customers starting to give you multi-quarter orders to try and get ahead of the demand? Or is it just really all fulfillment bottlenecks?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

Yes. That's debottlenecks. But again, it's improved from -- in Q3 was the worst last year, right? You were looking at delays of 4 to 6 months for a lot of the products. What's improved is the vendors that had some of the issues on the device side have come down in 2 to 3 months, which traditionally, that would more to be 4, 6 weeks. So that's why I'm saying that you're seeing normally, if you were in the last month of a quarter, orders that are made at the beginning of that month and say, early June would be delivered in Q2. Now you'll see things in May and June for certain vendors will end up being Q3 deliveries. But we're not seeing vendors -- we're definitely pushing them to order earlier. But these are all PO based. And so these are things that don't get canceled, they're committed to. So again, you're seeing that conversion happen. It's just a different conversion cycle than you would have seen in previous years.

[Robert Young, analyst]

And when you say PO-based, the company making the order with you is on the hook for completing that order. They can't back away from it. They can't cancel that order? Or is that...

[Shaun Maine, executive]

That's correct, yes.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from Stephanie Price, CIBC.

[Stephanie Price, analyst]

Can you talk a little bit about whether you've seen any headwinds from the general macro environment? And how we should think about the business in the context of a recessionary environment?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

So when you see companies like Accenture, CGI, Tata, Softcat [Bechtle AG] all showing incredible growth, digital transformation demand has not changed. And so, when you actually look at the sources of information on that, consumer demand is changed. So I noticed that, say, Foxconn, who produces Apple's devices has moved more production from iPhones to iPads, which has helped part of the supply chain for iPads. So -- but demand has remained very strong. Again, if you look at the numbers from Q1, demand was much larger than historical Q1. We are seeing that trend continue into Q2. And there's no reason to think that, that won't continue in a recessionary environment. Digital transformation spend is incredibly large.

[Stephanie Price, analyst]

And then sales to the government was mentioned a few times in the prepared remarks. Just wondering if there's any additional color you can give us on that?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

So our education obviously is very government focused, more provincial government or in Germany in the state government. We also have, in certain countries, healthcare is considered government. So -- but yes, so the government spending that has not changed at all. So there was some commentary out there about -- especially in Germany about the change in government last year affecting some spending patterns, that's at the federal level. We have zero exposure to the German Federal Government. All of our spend in Germany is around education, which is state demand generated. And so, yes, that has been very strong. We have seen no change at all in the ordering from our government sources. And so, yes, that has not changed at all.

[Stephanie Price, analyst]

And then just finally from me on the hardware side. Just curious about the split of the business between the networking equipment and devices?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

So data center is probably the majority of it. And when you see the part of our backlog that did not convert the $100 million, that would be primarily network in HPE. So I've say that gives you kind of a percentage, but the majority of our hardware is multi data center equipment.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from Gavin Fairweather with Cormark.

[Gavin Fairweather, analyst]

We're hearing more and more software and hardware vendors talking about increasing prices. So it certainly seems like inflation and technology spending continues to rise here. Can you just discuss how that influences both your revenue and gross profit percentage and maybe any nuances in the mid-market versus enterprise?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

Yes, Gavin, great point. So the large enterprise tends to be cost-plus. And so they feel those things more dramatically. Mid-market is more service-oriented than being price oriented. So there's much less impact in the mid-market than there is in the large enterprise around those pricing changes.

[Gavin Fairweather, analyst]

And if we look at your recent M&A, it'd be more kind of services, have kind of similar valuations to some of the hardware acquisitions you were doing before. When you look into your M&A pipeline, do you think that, that trend can continue? And anything you'd point out on valuation for private companies just given the ongoing market turbulence we've seen here?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

And Gavin, it's a great point. So CBI had 8% EBITDA margins, [IDX] at 14%. We're buying these services companies and yet we're buying them for Converge's, as I mentioned, very disciplined in what we pay. And so the kind of 5, 6x EBITDA for those kind of companies. What we're seeing now is people that have to either raise capital or issue equity as part of an acquisition are no longer in the acquisition game. And the private equity guys who needed debt in an increasing rate environment there back as well. So the amount of inbound companies that we're looking at that we're getting has definitely risen. We are one of the few -- we have a very strong balance sheet and we continue to pursue our acquisition strategy. So we're able to buy at Converge disciplined prices, companies with much more services and managed services than we would be in a more competitive environment.

[Operator]

Our next question comes from David Kwan with TD Securities.

[David Kwan, analyst]

Shaun, I was wondering just on the backlog, appreciate the color there. Do you expect -- it sounds like you expect that backlog to tail off in the second half of this year, but could we see that drop a bit in Q2?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

So what you're going to see though is, as I mentioned, orders from certain vendors that come in May and June will not convert in the quarter when in a normal year they would. So I expect to see a high conversion rate of our existing backlog, but we have this incredible demand cycle that is uncharacteristic that we're seeing in the industry now. In addition to that, when you look at Q2, it tends to be much more software-centric. Q2 and Q4 are very software-centric. And obviously, there's no backlog associated with software. So you will see those pieces get delivered, but you will see a strong addition -- so you'll see a cleansing of the backlog, but a lot of increase in the backlog from orders from certain vendors in May and June.

[David Kwan, analyst]

And then just on the M&A pipeline, if you can provide an update there. Last quarter, you talked about closing 3 in North America exiting Q1, and you got 2 of those across the finish line and then another 4 in Europe. So just curious where the sales of that pipeline is?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

Yes. You would expect, as we've said, the majority of that $1 billion of acquisition revenue that we target each year to happen in Q2, and I do [indiscernible], so you would expect to hear things soon.

[Operator]

[Operator instructions] Our next question comes from Divya Goyal with Scotia Bank.

[Divya Goyal, analyst]

So Shaun, talking about this acquisition discussion here, can you provide some more color on the EBITDA margin expectations? And you've talked about it, but if you could just provide more color, as you continue to acquire some of these high margin companies and how would Converge's EBITDA margin kind of evolve with that?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

There's 2 different types of acquisitions that we make. The PDSs of the world, which are more customer focused, and there's another large one coming as well versus the capabilities one. So CBI, which is maybe $110 million of security software and services doesn't really have a hardware component. The difference is when we do the math around when you buy 3% EBITDA companies, we had 1.5% of volume rebates and have 2% of cost removal. That's the way we get to the 6.5%. The services companies, that's more adding to the cross-selling capabilities of our existing base and the security practice, the app modernization practice, the analytics practice. So that's what those capabilities are being extended into our other customers. So there's kind of 2 categories of it. And so, you'll see like the ones that are in the kind of 3% to 4% EBITDA margins, those are -- we're buying them for customers and you get that traditional benefit, the ones that are services really it's on the cross-sell that we are receiving the benefit.

[Divya Goyal, analyst]

Moving on to slightly different product mix here. So you did mention that, obviously, a lot of backlog still includes network gear and data center equipment tends to be one of the more -- one of the bigger backlog basically is what it is. What I'm trying to get to is a lot of the world is moving towards cloud. So how do you see this particular product suite evolving and kind of moving away from the data center equipment delivery more towards the cloud-based and service-based products in the long run?

[Shaun Maine, executive]

Yes, that's what digital transformation is. We're moving people from data centers to cloud. And when you do that, there's always an increase in network spend for that, but a lot of the offerings that we're offering around managed services, so managed end user around devices and transitioning people but also the service offerings that we have. That's exactly what you see in the growth of the services and managed services that Converge offers. And while we point to our target $200 million of managed services by the end of the year, that's the real opportunity to increase those high-margin services and managed services. So we are absolutely part of that, but don't think the data center spend is all of a sudden going to disappear. So when we're providing these workload transformations to the cloud, we're also helping them provide the existing services to the data centers as well.

[Operator]

There are no further questions at this time. Please proceed.

[Shaun Maine, executive]

Yes. Thank you to everyone for your continued support and participating on the Converge first quarter's earnings call. The Converge management team look forward to your attendance at our Annual General Meeting coming up on June 23 at 11 A.M. Eastern. Thanks all.

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes your conference call for today. We thank you for participating and ask that you please disconnect your lines, and have a great day.