Biosyent Inc

XTSX:RX

Earnings Call Transcript 2022-Q4

[René Goehrum, executive]

Hello, and welcome to the BioSyent, Inc. Q4 and Full Year Fiscal 2022 Results Presentation. My name is René Goehrum, and I'm the President and CEO of the company. Before I start the presentation, I want to bring your attention to our disclaimer on forward-looking statements. And I'll jump right into the presentation by looking at the Q4 revenue, EBITDA and net income after tax.

So you can see sales were just short of $7.5 million for the quarter. That was up 3% to the year ago. And I want to go into a little bit of detail to help you follow the moving parts on revenue. So in the quarter, the Canadian Pharmaceutical business was up 13% to the year ago. The International Pharma business down 63%, and the Legacy Business down 87% in the quarter. You'll recall that late last year, we discontinued products effective the beginning of 2022, I should say late last year as in 2021, the comparable period. And so when we're looking at revenue for Canada and overall, it is useful to also compare to a continuing business basis. And that would be both for Canadian Pharma business and overall. So the Canadian Pharma business brands was up 27% measured in dollars, excluding the discontinued products from '22 January on forward.

Quarter itself represented our 50th consecutive profitable quarter that now goes back 12.5 years. Over that period of time, our revenue has increased by over 16x, and we've delivered profit throughout that process. Our EBITDA for the quarter was just under $1.6 million, down 41% to the year ago, and our net income after tax was $1.2 million, down 36% to the year ago. Affecting our quarter profit performance was a 61% increase in selling and marketing expenses in Q4 '22 versus '21, and this was made up primarily of pre-launch expenditure on products that were being prepared for launch in 2023. And subsequent, obviously, to that process, we have announced the launch of new FeraMAX Pd 45. I will talk about that product in a while. And we also increased our capacity with an increase in field sales force in the quarter, and that also represented an increase of 35% versus the year ago in spend.

Let's take a look at how that worked out for the full year. On a full year basis, sales were essentially flat, down 2%. The Canadian Pharmaceutical business, up 2%. But adjusting for discontinued products, Canadian Pharma brands were up 11% versus the year ago on a full year basis. The International Pharmaceutical business was down 58%. You'll recall in the year ago period, we had a very large order to an international customer. That order, the business with that customer was not replicated in fiscal 2022. And our Legacy Business was down 18%. We also had a large export order in the 2021 comparable period there. It was an order for a Canadian exporter destined for markets outside of Canada. And because of geopolitical and currency issues, that order was not replicated in the 2022 period. Overall, for the year, we had an increase in selling and marketing expenses of 13%, and that flowed through to impact our EBITDA of just over $7.4 million, down 15% to the year ago. Our net income after tax was just less than $5.5 million, down 13% to the year ago.

A couple of things I just want to point out here. Obviously, the spend in promoting our products has increased somewhat. And obviously, the P&L has been impacted by those large export orders that we did not have in 2022. If we look at the business going back to 2020 and then compare how are we performing on revenue growth and profitability, the optics there are much stronger, and we expect to see a curve like that as we move the business forward into time. We will continue to invest in promotion of products. I'm going to be speaking in a couple of slides on our investment in selling and marketing and portfolio expansion, but we expect that as our top line grows, our profitability will follow over time.

So how did this all flow through to earnings per share in the quarter? We earned $0.09. That compares to $0.15 in the year ago. I think I've already spoken to the impacts there with respect to the comps on revenue and on investments in selling and promotion expenses. On a full year basis, we earned $0.44 compared to $0.49 in the year ago. So the big change there really is the impact of the fourth quarter on a year-over-year basis.

So let's do a slightly deeper dive into our unit sales in the Canadian business. And you can see both for the quarter and for the full year that our existing, more mature products, FeraMAX, RepaGyn, Cathejell performed positively in units, both in the quarter and the full year basis. Our launch products, our growth products, Tibella and Combogesic, had significant unit sales growth. And you'll see here the -- I mentioned and then I think it will be the last mention of our discontinued products. I don't think we need to be talking about that going forward, but it's important when you're comparing on a year-ago basis.

I mentioned earlier that the business has performed well in Canada. We have made up about $2 million in revenue that was represented by discontinued products. So that was made up and then added to as well on a revenue basis as you can see for the Canadian Pharmaceutical business. The inconsistency of our business for International Pharma, namely being FeraMAX exports, continues to be lumpy, inconsistent, and we expect that to be the case going forward. And the Legacy Business is just that. It's a contributor to revenue and profit over time, but certainly isn't the focus of our company.

I've been speaking now for a few years about a strategy that we've got around FeraMAX and life cycle management. And I just wanted to update you on where we are with that process. As you know, FeraMAX has been in the Canadian market now for over a decade for the last 7 years, ending 2022. It was the #1 recommended oral iron supplement amongst both pharmacists and physicians and gives the company a great platform to innovate, which we have been doing. And I fully expect though we have not got a formal confirmation from the organization that does these surveys that I expect that we'll be reporting, at some point in time soon, an eighth consecutive year.

So a couple of years ago, in Q4 of 2020, we initiated a formulation change for FeraMAX and introduced the FeraMAX Pd, a patented delivery system for iron. And that formulation forms the basis for innovation that we've initiated shortly thereafter with the new FeraMAX Pd Therapeutic 150. That product was launched in November of 2020. A year later, we launched FeraMAX Pd Powder 15. And just earlier this month, we announced new FeraMAX Pd Maintenance 45. And these are all part of a life cycle strategy to expand the leadership of FeraMAX in the Canadian market and then also to spin off product innovation that we can leverage for international markets. And the new products, both FeraMAX 45 and another product that we've got in the development queue, are designed to drive incremental market share and revenue. They're not meant to cannibalize existing base of business that we have.

So let me take a couple of moments and just talk about FeraMAX 45. You saw a press release a couple of weeks ago on this product, was developed and funded by BioSyent. As I mentioned, it's our third product that incorporates the polydextrose iron complex formulation. It's a unique chewable tablet that contains 45 milligrams of elemental iron, 75 milligrams of vitamin C and 1 milligram of vitamin B12. Those other components are designed to maintain normal healthy iron levels, support the formation of red blood cells and to help the body metabolize nutrients and energy and to support the immune system.

This product was designed to fill an unmet need. So we've been doing research amongst health care professionals and consumers and patients for a number of years, and we identified a gap, a treatment gap in the management of iron health. The graphic that you see on the right-hand side of your screen shows you how we've got FeraMAX 15 for prevention of iron deficiency and iron deficiency anemia; FeraMAX 45 is designed to sit between Powder 15, which is essentially an infant and pediatric children's product, though it is used somewhat by adults; and FeraMAX 150 which is designed as a therapeutic treatment of iron deficiency and iron deficiency anemia.

But our market research has indicated to us that relapses in iron deficiency and iron deficient anemia are common, that 1 in 4 patients have been diagnosed at least 4 times with iron deficiency or iron-deficient anemia. And our research indicated that health care professionals were looking for a solution that could fit between products that are used as a supplement and that are found in the front shop amongst the self-medication products and a product like FeraMAX 150, which is really designed for the treatment of iron deficiency and iron deficient anemia.

So we're excited about the potential for this product. It's definitely a unique formulation to have a product with these ingredients and to be chewable and to taste as pleasant as it does and to be as convenient to take on a daily basis, is a great achievement for the company, and we see great potential for this to contribute incremental revenue and profit over time.

So as we look forward to growing our business, our revenue, the base of about $28 million in sales, where do we see growth coming from? We see more coming from the FeraMAX franchise, obviously, with the addition of FeraMAX 45. There's a clear positioning on how there's differentiation and where FeraMAX 45 fits and our sales force is out now detailing to health care professional and the pharmacist. We started shipping that product earlier this month. And starting in March, it will contribute incremental revenue to the company.

We think there's more growth to come in Tibella and Combogesic. We've been talking about those products for a couple of years. We have a new women's health product that is being prepared for launch. It's approved by Health Canada, and it will see market by midyear this year. In December, we announced a new oncology supportive care product that was in-licensed, and that is making its way through the Health Canada approval process. And we are optimistic that late this year or early next, it will see market. And if you take all of that innovation and these new products and expansion to our portfolio in aggregate, over time, that is since the fourth quarter of 2020, we will have introduced 7 new products if we include the oncology supportive care product that will come within the next 12 months.

We have an ongoing program to identify and diligence and negotiate new in-licensing transactions. That continues. It's the lifeblood of a company like ours that has modest in-house product development. And we are also working on some acquisition transactions. The way I view those is we're always looking, and we're working on it. There's a couple there that we've got right now that justify our business development and our finance team to do some work on them. Whether they occur or we can find a common ground on valuation with the vending party is another question. But it's very rare that we won't take a look at an acquisition opportunity. So that's part of our work. And it's good for you to know that, that is part of the work that we do as well, not just in-licensing.

So how has our revenue and profit performance then kind of translated to cash generation. In 2022, we generated $4.9 million in cash from operations. We bought back $3.4 million worth of shares. We have a little bit more detail on that in a couple of slides. We returned capital to shareholders in the form of a dividend of $0.5 million last year. That was in December. And on December 31, we had working capital of over $31 million. So the continued execution of our strategy has driven a return on equity of 17%. Yes, it's down from prior year. I think I've explained our investment in growth assets and new product launches and preparing products for launch and also the fact that we did have some profit generation from discontinued products. Those contribution came out of the mix during the course of last year.

But one useful measure is to look at the business or return on equity ex cash. And I suppose one could look at it on an enterprise value basis. And I believe that the quick calculation is our P/E multiple on an enterprise value basis is about 11x. So probably good value and a good opportunity for us with our NCIB. We do have $29 million in cash on December 31, 2022, and I do get asked about our intention, how to use that capital. I think the slide was introduced about a year ago to better explain our intention around capital allocation. And fundamentally, it's linked to our strategy, and our strategy is to grow the business, diversify our portfolio and to think about our business over the long term.

And so our first use of capital is to generate revenue growth and portfolio diversification, always best in first use, and we ensure that we always have the capital to execute against those opportunities. We have done that in the context of our NCIB and dividend program. So don't think of us as having given up on growing the business. We are as committed to that as we've ever been, but we are respectful that the capital in the business is -- it belongs to shareholders, and shareholders want us to grow the business. They want us to diversify our portfolio. But if we have excess capital, we should return that to shareholders.

So we did buy back about 425,000 shares last year. As I mentioned before, that was $3.4 million. The Board announced a dividend policy and initiation of a dividend in the fourth quarter last year. We paid it on December 15, a $0.04 per share dividend. And just this month, on March 15, we paid a quarterly dividend of $0.04. So that works out to about $1 million return to shareholders. So those 2 in aggregate, about $4.4 million returned to shareholders over the last just over 12 months, 14 months. And we see opportunities to continue to grow our business, expand our portfolio. We're going to invest in that growth and portfolio expansion and continue with our program to pay dividends and look for opportunities to buy back shares at good value in the marketplace.

A little bit of a deeper dive on the NCIB. There's a lot of data on this slide. The key things that I want to leave you with is just over 4 years ago in December of 2018, we initiated an NCIB. Since we started with that, we repurchased just over 2.2 million shares. We've reduced our fully diluted shares outstanding to just over 12.5 million. We renewed our NCIB and got it approved by the TSX Venture Exchange in December. And if we go back to when we commenced the program, we've reduced our fully diluted shares by 15%. This represents an 18% EPS enhancement to remaining shareholders. That's on a go-forward basis. The $14.3 million that we've deployed buying back shares works out to $6.48 a share. And if you just did the straight math, time adjusted, our EPS of $0.44 would have been $0.38 if we have not been buying back our shares since 2018.

One thing I'd like to add here is that we have moved away from use of equity stock options as a form of equity compensation for management, employees and directors in the company, and move to restricted share units. And we've been deploying capital that we've -- our strong balance sheet in buying shares and holding them in trust. And in essence, all of our RSU obligations are fully funded and with shares held in trust.

So I mentioned earlier that one could look at our P/E ratio on an enterprise value basis. I believe that number that you see here, this would have been the market close as of Friday, the 17th of March. It shows a P/E ratio of 16.6. And on an enterprise basis, so stripping cash out, that shows somewhere around 11. And rather than be one of those CEOs who moans and complains about it, we're just going to take advantage of it and buy back shares in the market and just position ourselves as we are now.

We feel we've got a strong business. We're cash-generating, profitable. We're well capitalized. We've got growth assets in the business. And while there is a lot of turmoil in equity markets and interest rates through debt markets, we feel that we can sleep at night given the state of our balance sheet. And we see some modest uptick in opportunities being presented to us, and we think that there's still some period of time where those opportunities will present.

We're optimistic about growth in our existing portfolio. That would be all of those assets that I've talked about in this presentation that have either been launched or about to be launched or have recently been in-licensed. So we think that there's a significant growth in the portfolio, well over 50% growth, and we expect to execute against that and return to look for opportunities to return capital to shareholders and deliver long-term growth and return to shareholders.

We thank you very much for your continued interest and support and look forward to reporting further progress to you.