AmpliTech Group, Inc. (AMPG) Q1 2026 Earnings Report, Transcript and Summary

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to AmpliTech Group's Quarterly Investor Update Call, where the company will discuss its first quarter 2026 financial results. Present in this call, we have the executive team of AmpliTech Group, Fawad Maqbool, CEO, CTO and Board Chair; Jorge Flores, COO; Louisa Sanfratello, CFO. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the call over to AmpliTech's COO, Jorge Flores.

Thank you, Drew, and thank you for joining today's call to review AmpliTech's first quarter 2026 financial results, review of our company's outlook and to answer investor questions. Following the initial management comments, we will open the call to these questions. An archived replay of today's call will be posted to the Investor Relations section of AmpliTech's corporate website. This call is taking place on Wednesday, May 13, 2026. Remarks that follow and answers to questions may include statements that the company believes to be forward-looking within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements generally include words such as anticipate, believe, expect or words of similar importance. Likewise, statements that describe future plans, objectives or goals are also forward-looking. These forward-looking statements are subject to various risks that could cause actual results to be materially different than expected. Such risks include, among others, matters that the company has described in its press releases and in its filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Except as described in these filings, the company disclaims any obligation to update forward-looking statements, which are made as of today's date. With that, let me turn the call over to our CEO and CTO, Mr. Fawad Maqbool.

Thank you, Jorge and thank you, everyone, for joining us today. The first quarter of 2026 reflects meaningful progress across several areas of our business. We achieved substantial revenue growth year-over-year and expanded gross margin significantly, strengthened our balance sheet and continued transitioning key technologies from development into commercial deployment. What is important to note here is the trend towards reducing the losses and expanding gross margins as promised. We believe our investments in 5G O-RAN radio technologies, MMIC design capabilities and advanced RF systems are beginning to contribute more meaningfully to our operational performance. We're encouraged by the increasing demand environment for next-generation wireless infrastructure and remain focused on disciplined execution, operational scalability and long-term shareholder value creation. Before we move further into our results and outlook, I want to briefly address the broader operating environment because it is relevant to how we think about timing, delivery schedules and revenue recognition over the balance of the year. As a technology manufacturer with global suppliers and customers, we continue to monitor several external factors that are outside of our direct control, including geopolitical tensions, volatility in fuel and logistic costs, potential disruptions in international shipping lanes and broader supply chain constraints. We are also seeing areas of heightened demand across the semiconductor ecosystem, particularly in memory and related components driven by AI, data center and high-performance computing demand. These conditions can place pressure on component availability, lead times, freight costs and production scheduling. At this time, we are not changing our full-year revenue guidance. However, we believe it is prudent to acknowledge that the timing of certain shipments and revenue recognition may be influenced by these external conditions as well as by customer deployment schedules, supplier lead times and normal production cycle timing. As a result, we currently expect our revenue profile of the year to be more heavily weighted towards the later quarters and we have mentioned this in the last investor call as well. So we're on track in that respect. So also very important to mention is demand for our products and solutions remains very active and our team is focused on managing supplier relationships, planning inventory requirements, qualifying alternatives where appropriate and maintaining close communication with customers to support scheduled deliveries. While these macro factors may affect the timing of revenue recognition, they do not change our long-term confidence in the markets we serve or in the strategic opportunities ahead for AmpliTech. The company continues to believe in its full-year revenue guidance to remain achievable. We continue to receive orders related to our $40 million LOI with the North American MNO, for which shipments resumed earlier in April. Our distribution business is also experiencing an uptick in demand, contributing nicely to the over $20 million in backlog orders the company currently has. As for our operational and strategic progress, during the quarter, the company continued to advance commercialization initiatives related to 5G O-RAN radio systems, proprietary RF and microwave technologies, 5G MMIC chip design programs, satellite and defense communications applications, next-generation wireless infrastructure solutions. The company also reported lower research and development expenses year-over-year as several products transitioned from active deployment -- development into commercialization and deployment phases. This doesn't mean we will not invest in R&D for our products to stay ahead of the competition as always. We pride ourselves in providing unique solutions that differentiate us from other vendors in the industry. The company remains focused on expanding revenue scale, improving operational leverage, strengthening internal controls and infrastructure, increasing commercialization activity, supporting long-term sustainable growth. With this, I'll turn the call over to CFO, Louisa Sanfratello, to review our financial results in more detail.

Thank you, Fawad. The first quarter 2026 highlights are as follows. Revenue increased 48.6% year-over-year to $5.35 million compared to $3.6 million in the first quarter of 2025. Gross profit increased 116.1% year-over-year to $2.57 million from $1.19 million in the prior year. Gross margin improved significantly to 48% compared to 33% in the prior year period. I repeat, gross margin improved significantly to 48% compared to 33% in the prior year period. Manufacturing and engineering segment revenue increased to $3.28 million from $0.99 million in the prior year quarter. Net loss improved 17.3% year-over-year to $1.52 million. Cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities increased to approximately $18.4 million as of March 31, 2026. Working capital improved to approximately $25.4 million from $10.2 million on December 31, 2025. Current ratio, defined as current assets over current liabilities, improved to 4.25 from 1.68 on December 31, 2025. Multiple 5G and MMIC development programs advanced further into commercialization stages. Total assets to total liabilities improved approximately 47% to $48.36 million from $32.86 million on December 31, 2025. It is important to highlight that AmpliTech Group remains debt-free. Let us turn to the balance sheet and the company's liquidity. As of March 31, 2026, AmpliTech reported cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities of $18.4 million, total current assets of approximately $33.2 million and total stockholders' equity of approximately $48.4 million. During the first quarter, the company completed both a rights offering and a registered direct offering, generating aggregate net proceeds exceeding $16 million to support growth initiatives, working capital requirements and operational expansion. I'll now turn the call back to Fawad for closing remarks.

Thank you, Louisa. To close, this first quarter is nicely setting the tone for the balance of the year for the company. We increased our year-over-year revenue while also decreasing our gross margins. Business development-wise, our participation at MWC Barcelona, one of the world's largest and most influential connectivity events, was strategically important for AmpliTech because it placed us directly in front of global mobile operators, OEMs, infrastructure providers, technology partners and potential customers at a time when the industry is rapidly advancing toward Open RAN, private 5G, AI-enabled networks and future 6G architectures. We achieved additional certifications with our flagship radio, our O-RAN 64T64R Massive MIMO radio unit. Our O-RAN certification achievements continue to strengthen the market position of our radio portfolio. For mobile network operators, certifications help to reduce perceived deployment risk by demonstrating that our radios are being validated for open standards-based multi-vendor network environments. We believe this gives operators greater confidence in evaluating and adopting AmpliTech radios and positions the company to benefit from increasing demand for Open RAN solutions that support vendor diversification, network flexibility and lower total cost of ownership. These are key factors in the MNOs adopting our strategy and our products. Before we open the line for callers in the call for questions, I would like to have our COO, Jorge Flores, go over the questions previously received via e-mail.

Thank you, Fawad. I'd like to immediately start with the first question, which is, does the company still believe its full-year revenue guidance as achievable? Absolutely, yes. Based on the visibility we have today, including funded purchase orders, customer forecasts, active deployment schedules and ongoing discussions across our commercial pipeline, we continue to believe our full-year revenue outlook remains achievable. That said, investors should understand that revenue recognition in our business can be influenced by the timing of customer deployments, supply chain availability, production and scheduling, shipment timing and customer acceptance. As a result, we currently expect a greater portion of 2026 revenue to be weighted towards the later quarters of the year. Importantly, this is primarily a matter of timing, not a change in our long-term view of the opportunity. We continue to see active demand for our 5G and O-RAN radio solutions and our focus remains on converting funded orders and customer forecasts into shipments and be able to recognize the revenue. Next question. Are geopolitical tensions, fuel prices, logistic costs, or supply chain pressures affecting your outlook? Of course, we continue to monitor broader macroeconomic and geopolitical conditions, including tensions in key global regions, volatility in fuel and freight costs, potential disruptions in international shipping routes and supply chain constraints affecting the electronics and semiconductor industries. At this time, as previously stated, we are not changing our full year revenue guidance. However, these external factors may influence component availability, lead times, freight cost and production scheduling. We just believe it's prudent to acknowledge these factors because they could affect the timing of shipments and revenue recognition. But rest assured that our team is actively managing supply relationships, the inventory planning and logistic options and customer communications to reduce risk wherever possible. Next question. How do your O-RAN certifications and validations position AmpliTech with mobile network operators? This is a good question, though. Our O-RAN certification and validation work is very important because it helps reduce perceived adoption risks for mobile network operators. These certifications are not just technical milestones. They provide third-party validation that our radios are being tested against recognized Open RAN conformance, interoperability and performance expectations. And for MNO customers, that matters because it gives them greater confidence that AmpliTech radios can operate in open, standard-based multi-vendor network environments. We believe this strengthens the commercial positioning of our radio portfolio and effectively reduces evaluation cycles, support vendor diversification and increase confidence in broader deployment opportunities. In short, certification helps move the conversation from, can this technology work to how do we evaluate and deploy it at a scale. Next question. What did the MWC Barcelona mean for AmpliTech from a business development perspective? The Mobile World Congress show in Barcelona was an important strategic platform for AmpliTech. It placed us directly in front of global mobile network operators, OEMs, providers, technology partners, industry decision-makers at a time when the market is actively evaluating Open RAN, private 5G, AI-enabled network architectures and future 6G planning. All of these are at our strength right now. For us, MWC was not only about visibility. It was about strengthening awareness of AmpliTech's capability, brand name, advancing business development conversations and reinforcing our position as a U.S.-based provider of advanced wireless and 5G infrastructure solutions. We believe this event supported our long-term commercial strategy and helped expand the number and quality of conversations we are having across the global telecom ecosystem, creating multiple opportunities for us to participate in further interoperability testing efforts with different customers. Next question. What gives management confidence that demand for AmpliTech's radios can continue to grow? This confidence is based on several factors. First, we have already received meaningful funded purchase orders on the previously announced customer opportunities. Second, we are seeing continued customer interest in O-RAN, private 5G and vendor-diversified network architectures. Third, our certification and validation efforts help reduce technical risk for customers evaluating our radios. We also believe the market is moving in a direction that favors open, flexible standard-based network solution. While O-RAN is increasing -- O-RAN adoption is increasing, the regular RAN is decreasing. And we are already there with designs that are ready to be manufactured and sold to all of these MNOs and satisfy their demands for O-RAN-related products. AmpliTech's portfolio is designed to address that market need and our strategy is to continue building credibility through execution, certification, customer deployments and supply chain readiness. We want to be clear that timing can vary based on customer deployment schedules and purchase orders, but the level of engagements we are seeing supports our confidence in the long-term opportunities. Last question. How should investors think about gross margins as 5G revenue scales? Gross margin remains a major focus for management. As we discussed, the initial ramp-up of carrier-grade O-RAN radio deployments placed pressure on margins last year as we invested in customer acquisition, production readiness and early market penetration. Looking forward and actively doing it right now, we believe margins can improve as volumes increase, production processes mature, supplier trends improve and we gain efficiencies with our contract manufacturing partners. We are also focused on forecasting, material planning, cost control, pricing discipline and supply chain optimization. We do not expect margin improvement to be perfectly linear quarter-to-quarter, especially during a ramp-up phase, but improving gross margin remains one of our key operating priorities. With that said, this concludes the questions previously received into our e-mail. Operator, please open the line for callers' questions.

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from Jack Vander Aarde with Maxim Group.

Fawad, so good to see the strong year-over-year revenue growth and definitely strong gross margin expansion. It looks like Spectrum or the international sales definitely rebounded back to normalized levels. I'm wondering how much revenue from this quarter roughly was from the LOI orders.

Jorge, can you answer that?

Right now, from our 5G division, we will say that the revenues, the revenue mix from our AmpliTech 5G, it was a very high percentage of sales were attributed to the $40 million LOI. Mostly from the $40 million LOI.

So somewhere maybe between $2 million and $3 million, does that feel about right?

Yes, a little bit more than that.

Okay. And then SG&A, maybe this is a question for Louisa. SG&A expenses -- so the gross margin expanded nicely. SG&A expenses did tick up, but I did see quite a bit more of noncash stock comp. Just wondering kind of what the reason is there and if that's a normalized level going forward.

Well, we did -- normally speaking, our first quarter, our SG&A expenses are a lot higher as we incur the audit expense, we incur D&O insurance expense, we get hit with our NASDAQ fees and so forth. So typically speaking, SG&A is higher in the first quarter and we did have the stock compensation expense. We did have the trade show that ran us about $180,000 in addition to hiring a new marketing company to help us expand sales and our outreach. We can probably see an uptick with the SG&A.

Excuse me. Just one moment. This is the operator. It seems like there has been an interruption. Just a moment, please. Excuse me. This is the conference operator. There seem to have been an interruption. Ms. Sanfratello, were you still answering the question?

Well, I was just reiterating that for the first quarter, we always see an uptick in SG&A because of those expenses in the audit fees that was completed for the first quarter. The D&O insurance is always, we activate it. We reactivate it in the first quarter as well as the NASDAQ fees and so forth. So we may see a little uptick in SG&A as we expand and we -- with our revenue guidance, but it all -- it really all depends. Does that answer your question?

Yes. No, Louisa, that's great. That's great. And then maybe separately, looking at the full year outlook, so -- and maybe just for Fawad, it sounds like maybe you have limited visibility just given the geopolitical tensions in the world and a few other -- maybe some shortages in the memory market, but it sounds like the guidance is still achievable for that $50 million of revenue, just more back half loaded. But I'm wondering now that we're almost halfway through the second quarter, how is the second quarter kind of shaping up? Is there any color you can provide, maybe orders received? You just did $5.3 million of revenue in the first quarter. Any guidance or I guess, commentary you could provide would be helpful.

Well, this is Jorge. So far, we started the month of April very nicely. As I mentioned previously, we resumed the shipments on our $40 million LOI to our MNO in North America. So right now, things are looking very nicely for Q2. We continue to receive orders against that LOI as well. The supply chain is prime and ready to go. So that's as far as I can share right now due to the ongoing -- we cannot disclose stuff that is not publicly released as of yet.

Okay. Got it. I guess, could you maybe just make it more clear how many -- how much orders you've received in the second quarter or expect to receive? I mean, is there a chance that the second quarter is maybe flat or down from the first quarter, but then the back half is very strong? Just trying to get a sense of what to expect.

No, definitely not. We are projecting Q2 to be definitely much higher than Q1.

Okay. Fantastic. I appreciate that color. And then maybe just one more. This one's definitely for Fawad. Fawad, it sounds like you've had success at the trade shows. Sounds like you had a lot more discussions going on.

Yes.

Outside the 2 vendors that you've disclosed, right, we have the North American MNO that we all know who that is and then there's the other value-add reseller, I believe. Is there any other discussions that are kind of warm enough where you feel like maybe you will be able to announce another LOI in the future? Anything you could provide there, I'd be interested to hear.

Yes. So we have had very productive discussions and conversations with major MNOs and we will probably -- it's more likely that they'll go straight to POs, no LOIs. We'll be announcing those in the next quarter or so in a relatively short period of time actually because these discussions are ongoing and we're just finalizing all these. There's a demand -- increased demand and it could -- I don't know whether it's a sudden demand or not, but it is increasing in the 64Ts and Massive MIMO. There's all sorts of applications that are commercial as well as military that are now becoming more and more evident for all larger MNOs. And our success as being the largest O-RAN deployment in North America or in America, that's helping us to reach out and reach further in Europe and in other areas of the world.

Okay. Got it. And then just one last question. I'm not sure if you can provide any color on this, but the larger LOI of -- in excess of $70 million, it was my understanding that this one might be chunkier in terms of the size of the orders once you do receive them. Do you have any -- just -- is there any sign or color or just expectations of when you'll receive a substantial order under that larger LOI?

Yes. We expect that to happen later this year. And again, that's all dependent on the customer being able to deploy their original quantities in the field and that has slowed down somewhat. It slowed down due to many different factors and some of them what we mentioned already. Things are happening all over the world. So it also -- it's like a ripple effect. Fortunately, we haven't felt any tremendous impact, but the supply chain for these guys overseas, because of the locations, it slows things down. But we don't expect that to go away. It's just going to be a little bit later, as we said, later towards the year.

Okay. Great. So it sounds like you still feel very good and confident about that LOI being recognized. It's just a matter of when, just given the world environment we're in.

Right.

I appreciate the questions and the answers and look forward to watching you execute.

[Operator Instructions] The next question comes from Richard Kreger with Moody Capital.

Congratulations on the fantastic quarter. So I've got 2 questions. Given AmpliTech's gross margin has expanded dramatically from approximately 33% to 48% quarter-over-quarter, which looks like about a 1,500 basis point improvement, how sustainable is that and? And is there the possibility of that margin expanding as revenue scales?

Yes. So there's a very good chance it's expanding even more because we have been investing. As mentioned before, we have been investing in initial deployments to get our foot in the door with the larger MNOs. And I believe we have done that already and proven that we can do that. So that kind of investment is behind us. We are now acknowledged by our MNOs as being a very valid provider of these sophisticated radios and especially the higher configuration radios. So we believe that the margins will expand further. And that's the way we are planning it now. I mean, we don't have to do any more of the types of investment that we did earlier.

The second question I have is AmpliTech has been doing a lot of testing and verifications with universities such as Northeastern University. Number one, can you talk a little bit more about where you stand with all the university verifications and testing, the competitive environment for those O-RAN testing accreditation? And then secondly, do you see any orders coming from any of the universities in terms of them ordering any equipment or testing equipment further beyond what we've read in the recent press releases?

Good question. Good question. Yes, we do see -- with the universities testing our radios, we have gotten exposure to not only the Massive MIMO radios in which, by the way, we are the world's only 64T O-RAN 5G Massive MIMO radio company. So we are certified by the OTIC center. So Northeastern University through its wireless Internet of Things has certified us as an OTIC vendor for the largest configuration radio that exists today and we're the only ones in the world. So that's a unique position for us and that gives us leverage to push our other products, the lower configuration, [ 32T, 32R ] and then also the 4T4R, which are used in private 5G type applications as well as commercial MNO deployment. So we got exposure in these lower configuration radios and they're also targeting private 5G deployment in these universities, specifically in both Northeastern, we've been putting our radios in there under test. Now they are going to deploy them full across their campus as well as other universities that are looking to put our enterprise private 5G system in place in the university. So as these roll out, other universities will also take advantage of the unique position that we have for these private 5Gs. So all these sectors, like the commercial MNO, the military applications as well, we have several military applications for this as well, Department of War. They have shown large interest in these configurations. And the private 5G enterprise is growing as well. So we'll get more exposure on these private 5G systems because that is the key in Industry 4.0, where all the industries are targeting automation and monitoring using AI-based tools. And so in addition to that, we're also showcasing our fixed wireless access capabilities. Fixed wireless access means that there's no cable or no fiber, it's all wireless at very high speeds provided to the homes or businesses. So we are the only U.S.-based company that can provide everything from the tower to the home and all the IoT devices in between. That's a very unique position for us to be in to service this growing industry.

Was there a follow-up, Mr. Kreger?

No, I'm good.

That concludes the Q&A session. I will now turn the call back to Fawad Maqbool for closing remarks.

Thank you, operator and thanks to everyone who joined today's call to hear about the progress we've made and the plan we have to further our company's mission of providing the communication systems of tomorrow today. We look forward to updating you further on our second quarter financial results call sometime in August. Until then, please contact us directly should you have any questions or wish to schedule a call with management. Our Investor Relations team can be reached at the contact information listed at the bottom of our press releases. Thank you and be well.

Today's conference call has now concluded. Thank you. You may now disconnect your lines.