James Dennedy
Analyst · Sidoti & Company
Thank you, Vince, and good morning, everyone. We appreciate you joining us on the call today to review our fiscal 2016 first quarter results. Joining me today is our Chief Financial Officer, Janine Seebeck.
Before we get started, just a quick reminder that on the call today we'll be discussing some non-GAAP metrics, primarily adjusted cash from operations and adjusted EBITDA, which eliminates the effect of restructuring and other items that are either noncash or nonrecurring. Reconciliations to GAAP metrics are provided in the financial section of the press release issued earlier today.
Starting with a brief overview of our financial results, total net revenue for the first quarter was $27.5 million compared to total net revenue of $23.7 million in the comparable prior year period, representing a 16% increase. As we have highlighted on prior calls, it is important to focus on recurring revenues, which are comprised of support, maintenance and subscription services, which reached a quarterly record of $14.9 million in the fiscal first quarter compared to $13.8 million for the same period in fiscal '15, an 8% improvement over the prior year period.
Our subscription revenues increased 23% year-over-year and comprise 15.5% of total recurring revenues compared to 13.6% of total recurring revenues in the first quarter of fiscal 2015. Gross margin was 60% in the fiscal 2016 first quarter compared with 62% in the prior year period. On a sequential basis, gross margin improved by 900 basis points from 51% in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2015.
Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was $1.2 million compared to an adjusted EBITDA of $500,000 in the same period last year. We had a net loss in the fiscal 2016 first quarter of $200,000 or a loss of $0.01 per diluted share, which compares to a net loss of $2.2 million or a loss of $0.10 per diluted share in the prior year period. Janine will provide a more extensive review of our financial results, including the income statement and balance sheet as well as our expectations for the balance of fiscal 2016.
In fiscal 2015, we implemented several important changes to help us better align our business and strategic goals with the needs of the end markets we serve and to improve the value proposition to the customers in those markets. The changes we implemented favorably impacted our first quarter results for fiscal 2016. We experienced improved product revenue growth from our installed base, increased the number of new customers doing business with our company, experienced more multiple solution sales, sold more new rGuest platform-based solution and increased the percentage of subscription-based sales in the current quarter versus the comparable prior year period.
The trend in the business reflects our emphasis on transitioning to a subscription-based business model from a license- and maintenance-reliant business. We believe this transition will generate greater long-term value for shareholders through growth in higher margin recurring revenues.
With respect to our sales force, we ended the first quarter of fiscal 2016 with 27 quota-carrying sales people, 13 of which are focused on new customer acquisition. Of our 27 salespeople, 15 joined Agilysys within the last year, and of the addition, all have been sales executives covering the hospitality industry, directly selling subscription solutions or both. We expect to add approximately 10 additional sales executives in the balance of fiscal 2016. And our focus remains on adding executives that have direct subscription selling experience.
We are making consistent progress towards our goals around simplifying our business, evolving our offering and delivering against the milestones of rGuest, our next generation platform. The progress is evident in the number of new business wins, 45 in the first quarter of fiscal 2016, doubling the number of new business wins in the comparable prior year period. The markets and our customers recognize this for delivering peer leading deployment and support services, performance stability with key innovations and taking a leadership position in the effective use of cloud-enabled solution, specifically tailored towards the needs of the hospitality industry.
Our new business wins have not only increased in number, but they have also increased across a diverse array of solutions, including InfoGenesis, Visual One, rGuest Pay and Eatec, as well as the sectors in which our customers operate, including casinos, hotels, resorts, restaurants and universities.
Turning more specifically to each of our business sectors, starting with commercial and tribal gaming, this sector represents over 50% of our total revenues. Agilysys is the market leader in both commercial and tribal gaming. Our solutions address the needs of casino operators better than competing solutions in the market. Our solutions address the importance of mobility to help operators better engage their guests.
During the quarter, we announced that Croc's Casino Resort in Jaco, Costa Rica, selected a comprehensive solution suite, including systems for property management, point of sale and inventory procurement, to optimize efficiency and enhance guest service throughout the new Vegas-style, luxury hotel, condominium and casino.
An existing gaming customer with 22 properties in 8 states upgraded to the latest release of our lodging management system, LMS, while adding rGuest Pay to the portfolio solutions they use in their business. A new customer in El Paso, Texas offering world-class live entertainment acquired a bundled solution, including InfoGenesis, rGuest Pay, analytics and IG Flex to deliver a comprehensive guest experience at this exciting new venue.
In addition, we are very excited to announce the Akwesasne Mohawk Casino Resort in Upstate New York as a new customer. They will be using our InfoGenesis and rGuest Pay solutions after switching from using a competitor's point-of-sale solution.
In then hotels, resorts and cruise sector representing almost 28% of our revenue, we are confident that we have the right solution offerings to help lodging operators achieve added scalability, operational efficiency, reduced technology footprint and expense, while providing their guests with more personalized services.
New wins in the hotel, resort and cruise sector include heritage hospitality in York, Pennsylvania, the owner of Heritage Hills Golf Resort and Heritage Hotel, selected a comprehensive restaurant solutions package, including both fixed and mobile point-of-sale requirements, comprehensive table management capabilities, payment processing and restaurant reservations that would easily integrate with his existing infrastructure to deliver a rapid return on investment.
Earlier in the quarter, Hotel Granduca, a boutique hotel in Austin, Texas, which has received the exclusive -- the Leading Hotels of the World designation, selected Visual One, InfoGenesis and Eatec to streamline operations and deliver exceptional guest service. Other new business wins within this sector include the world-renowned Fisher Island Club in Florida. This world-class resort chose a suite of Agilysys solutions to manage their property, including InfoGenesis, InfoGenesis Flex and Visual One, including club membership, spa and sales and catering. As well as L'Horizon Resort & Spa, a high-end Palm Springs boutique property, a Steve Hermann hotel and member of the Leading Hotels of the World collection that will be using both rGuest Stay and rGuest Pay.
Recently, Drury Hotels Company, which has been recognized with the J.D. Power North American Hotel Guest Satisfaction Study Award in its class for the 10th consecutive year, agreed to conduct a pilot evaluation of rGuest Stay at select Drury properties.
Pending the successful completion of the pilot, Drury intends to integrate rGuest Stay with rGuest Pay to deploy a seamless PMS and payment Gateway solution. Drury Hotels operate over 130 hotels across 21 states under such brand as Drury Inn & Suites, Drury Inn, Drury Plaza Hotel and Pear Tree Inn by Drury as well as other hotels in the mid-price segment. We are very excited about our partnership with Drury Hotels and the impact our solutions can have on their business.
In the food service management sector, we are pleased to have engaged Samsung Semiconductor, a new InfoGenesis subscription service customer, for their corporate cafeteria.
And finally, moving to Restaurants, Universities, Stadia and Healthcare, or RUSH, we see continued new openings and an increased need for more sophisticated dining experience, including online ordering and reservation, mobile service and a higher level of customer interaction. New businesses' wins in the sector include The Walker Inn, the high-end Los Angeles cocktail lounge, that chose the rGuest seat solution to streamline operation and enable the staff and management of The Walker Inn to provide superior service.
More recently, Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vermont, selected Eatec, InfoGenesis and rGuest Pay to manage all their campus food service locations, including 3 dining halls, retail operations as well as catering for campus-wide events and private functions.
These customer wins illustrate our traditional products remain relevant in the marketplace while fully integrating with the rGuest platform-based solution. As we transition our complete solutions portfolio and customers to the rGuest platform. Customers have clearly embraced our vision and long-term strategy, and we believe our ongoing product development work will allow customers to leverage their existing investments to enhance the guest experience over time.
Fiscal first quarter of 2016 was a productive period on the product front as well, as we continued to evolve the scope and sophistication of our offerings and prepare existing and new customers for the rGuest platform transition.
We are confident we have the vision, strategy, reach, integration and the ability to execute to meet the needs of the market and deliver on our business plan to grow shareholder value. We recently announced the general availability of InfoGenesis point-of-sale version 4.4.7 and InfoGenesis Flex version 4.4.7, the latest versions of our industry-leading point-of-sale software. These new versions include enhancements that boost efficiency, help increase revenue and improve the guest experience, as well as deliver key integrations with rGuest Seat and rGuest Analyze.
Our investment in the rGuest platform continues to experience success in bringing solutions to market, including rGuest Pay, rGuest Seat, rGuest Analyze and rGuest Stay. All these newly introduced solutions integrate with and leverage all Agilysys and most non-Agilysys products. We expect the ongoing rollout of our additional rGuest platform-based solution, such as enhancements to rGuest Stay and rGuest Buy, will help us address the evolving needs of the end markets we serve and to open new market opportunities as we focus on growing our already strong market share in the gaming and managed food service verticals, while enabling us to expand our presence in the hotels, resorts and cruise and RUSH hospitality sectors.
Our products have received recognition from industry thought leaders, including the Business Intelligence Group, which recently named Agilysys as a 2015 Stratus Award finalist for our groundbreaking mobile point-of-sale system InfoGenesis Flex. The Stratus Awards recognized cloud offerings that are truly differentiated in the market. The theme for this year's awards program was Operational Excellence, and companies were required to demonstrate how innovation and executive strategies led to superior customer experiences and business efficiency.
Our continued focus of maintaining strong capital and operating discipline, while pursuing the highest value growth opportunities, continues to provide evidence of success. We continue to make progress in evolving our solutions portfolio to better address our customers' needs, transform our sales efforts and improve our organization to better promote our solutions and serve our customers. We remain confident that we will continue to make consistent progress and see added growth in future periods. We believe smartly investing in our people, our solutions and our customers is the most reliable way to create greater and lasting value for our shareholders.
With that, I would now like to turn the call over to our CFO, Janine Seebeck, who will review our financial results before opening the lines for questions. Janine?