Earnings Labs

ATA Creativity Global (AACG)

Q1 2017 Earnings Call· Fri, Aug 12, 2016

$1.20

+0.00%

Key Takeaways · AI generated
AI summary not yet generated for this transcript. Generation in progress for older transcripts; check back soon, or browse the full transcript below.

Same-Day

-0.73%

1 Week

-4.15%

1 Month

+14.88%

vs S&P

+17.31%

Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentleman and welcome to ATA. Inc, Fiscal Year 2017 First Quarter Financial Results Conference Call. My name is Sandra and I’m your operator today. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. We will conduct question-and-answer session towards the end of the conference [Operator Instructions]. As a reminder, this call is being recorded for replay purposes. And now, I would like to hand the call over to Katherine Yao of the Equity Group. Please go ahead.

Katherine Yao

Analyst

Thanks Sandra and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us. Copies of the press release announcing ATA’s fiscal 2017 first quarter results are available at IR section of company’s website at www.atai.net.cn. As part of this conference call, the company’s slide presentation available on the company’s website. You are also welcome to contact our office at 212-836-9600 and we will be happy to send you a copy. In addition, a replay of this broadcast will be made available at ATA’s website for the next 90 days. Before we get started, I would like to remind everyone that this conference call and any accompanying information discussed herein contains certain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the safe harbor provision of the Private [Audio Gap] its forward-looking statements are reasonable as of today, those statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause the actual results to differ dramatically from those projected. There can be no assurance that those expectations will prove to be correct. Information about the risks associated with investing ATA is included a filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which we encourage you to review before making any investment decision. The company does not assume any obligation to update any forward-looking statements as a result of new information, future events, and changes in market conditions or otherwise, except as required by law. Regarding the disclaimer language, I would also like to refer you to slide number two of the conference call presentation for further information. All U.S. dollar amounts in this conference call relating to financial results for the company’s most recent quarter ended June, 30, 2016 are converted from RMB using an exchange rate of RMB6.6459 to US$1.00 the non-buying rate as of June 30, 2016. All historical conversions are accurate as of the time reported unless otherwise noted. The company reports its financial results under US GAAP in RMB and all percentages calculated in the presentation are based on RMB, unless otherwise noted. For those of you following along with the accompanying PowerPoint presentation, there is an overview of the company on Slide 3. The company’s Interim CFO, Ms. Shelly Jiang will provide an overview of the operational and financial highlights for first quarter 2017 on slide number 3. The company’s Chairman and CEO, Mr. Kevin Ma, will then discuss ATA’s outlook and the growth strategy for fiscal year 2017, before opening the floor for questions. With that I’ll turn the call over to ATA’s Interim CFO, Ms. Shelly Jiang. Please go ahead Shelly.

Shelly Jiang

Analyst

Thank you, Katherine and welcome everyone. Today, I will provide an overview of our operating and financial highlights and then briefly provide an update on our outlook for fiscal year 2017. I will begin on Slide 5 which leads to some of our operating highlights for the first of quarter. The first quarter was an excellent one for ATA as we exhibit our previously announced guidance range for quarterly revenue and a continued pushing forward on new business development efforts that we believe will have a lasting impact throughout fiscal year 2017. In yesterday’s press release we announced that ATA was recently selected by the China National Tourism administration to be the service provider for the national tour guide [Technical Difficulty] exam, which we expect to deliver in November 2016. In June the company was also chosen by four well known Chinese universities in closing Northwest University and Zhongnan University of Economics and Law to deliver exams and or to develop certain exam content for now. During the first quarter 2017, ATA successfully delivered a new exam Tito, the qualification exam for housing and urban rural construction field professionals of Sichuan Province and the Ningxia Autonomous region. We worked closely when capital sponsors to convert this exam from its original computer-based formats to ATA’s technology based platforms and look forward to continuing this relationship in the quarters to come. Overall, ATA delivered approximately 2.6 million billable exams during first quarter 2017, compared to 2.6 million billable exams in the first quarter of 2016. Exam volume for the period were relatively flat despite of the loss of the security appreciation of China exam for calendar year 2016 through 2017, which was mostly offset by volumes from new exams such as the Fund Practitioners Certification Exam. We have been working closely with…

Kevin Xiaofeng Ma

Analyst

Thank you Jiang. The company’s primary growth drivers in the coming quarters will be [indiscernible] development and more entice new business and relationships with a focus on improving our core testing services business in fiscal year 2017. On Slide 13 of our presentation, is a list of some of our overall growth strategies. We have made some strong progress on this fronts, being first quarter 2017 with a successful conversion and the delivery of the qualification exam for housing and urban and rural construction fill the professions for Sichuan and the Ningxia province as well as the other more recent new clients wings that Shelly touched on. We continue to have a positive outlook of fiscal year 2017, particularly given the strong first quarter 2017 results, ATA was able to achieve. One was a [indiscernible] ACS exam in calendar year 2016 to 2017to the helps and the impact on our business during the period and we continue to have impact on the remaining quarters of this fiscal year. We are confident that our new business efforts will offset the majority, if not all of any negative impact. We believe that by leveraging our increased brand recognition following ATA Online’s [New Third Board] (Ph) listing reputable organizations will increase recognize ATA as a number one provider of advance testing technologies in China, which we are [indiscernible] to increased our continues new business pipeline. Over the course of the past few months, ATA Inc. and ATA Online have made strategy investments in a number of [indiscernible] educating companies. We believe, we will help accelerating growth of our core testing service business. We recently announced ATA strategic investments in online English language education and company in China. This investment allows that to continue exploring growth opportunities in China’s online education market. As our…

Katherine Yao

Analyst

With that operator, let’s open it up for any questions.

Operator

Operator

Kevin Xiaofeng Ma

Analyst

Thanks again to all of you for joining us. If anyone has questions for us please feel free to reach out directly to us on our investor relations firm Equity Group. We look forward to speaking with you all again during our second quarter 2017 fiscal financial results call. As always, we welcome anyway to our office in Beijing. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen that concludes your conference call for today. You may now disconnect. Thank you for joining and enjoy the rest of your day.