Beck Zhaoming Chen
Analyst · Deutsche Bank
Thank you, Vincent. Just a few housekeeping items before I go through the numbers. We believe year-over-year comparisons are one of the most useful ways to judge our performance. All percentage changes I’m going to give will be on that basis. Now, let’s start to review the financials. Total GMV during the quarter increased by 61% to RMB3 billion. Our focus remains on growing our non-distribution business, which saw GMV increase by 83% this quarter. We will continue to optimize our business model mix towards the non-distribution model going forward. Total net revenue increased by 20% to RMB805 million. Breaking down further, product sales revenue rose by 7% to RMB498 million. We continue to transfer portions of our distribution business towards the non-distribution model, which impacts year-over-year growth of product sales revenue. Services revenue rose by 52% to RMB307 million during the quarter. We note that this figure excludes part of the cost of purchasing media on behalf of our brand partners, which is the different accounting treatment than in previous quarters. In Q1 2017, we began adjusting how we execute these media purchases, which I will describe in more detail in a moment. And on an apple-to-apple basis, excluding the cost of media procurement from services revenue in both Q1 2017 and the Q1 2016, services revenue during the first quarter of 2017 actually grew by 63% on year-over-year basis. With regard to the change in the account treatment of media purchases, as Vincent mentioned earlier, we began migrating part of our media services this quarter towards a more asset-light model, which will decrease our inventory risk and increase our working capital efficiency. Under the previous media services model, we purchased and made a through payment for media inventory first on behalf of our brand partners. Accounting-wise, on the risk model, we recognized the cost of the media purchase and our net commissions as revenue. The cost of the media will also then be recorded as part of our selling and marketing expenses, truly offsetting the cost of the media that was recorded in revenue. The net result was that only our net commission contributed to operating profit. Starting this year, we are migrating our media services towards a more asset-light model, which removes media inventory risk from Baozun, without impacting the quality and the values that our digital marketing services bring to our brand partners. Under this new model, we negotiate with media platform on behalf of our brand partners, as we did previously, but we do not assume inventory risk any longer. When negotiations are complete payments for media inventory is the sole responsibility of our brand partners. Under this new model, we only recognized our net commission as revenue. We don’t record the cost of the media as either revenue offsetting in the marketing expenses. And please note that this change in account treatment has no impact on our operating profit. And now, turning back to our other profit and loss items for the quarter, total operating losses - the total operating expenses was RMB790 million, in particular cost of products rose to RMB439 million, primarily due to the increase in the volume of product sales from our core brand e-commerce business. Fulfillment expenses rose to RMB132 million mainly due to increases in GMV contribution from our consignment business, more orders fulfilled by a premium delivery service providers as a percentage of total orders and warehouse rental expenses. We have a best-in-class warehousing operation and fulfillment experience in the brand e-commerce industry and we believe top-tier capabilities within fulfillment are key driver of our customer and the brand satisfaction, which is the key factor to sustain our long-term growth. The sales and marketing expenses rose to RMB163 million, primarily due to an increase in operational staff, and promotional and marketing expenses associated with our online stores. The technology and content expenses rose to RMB29 million, the increase was primarily due to the increases in technology-focused staff, share-based compensation expenses and the project-based variable technological expenses from brand stores. In addition, a portion of the share-based compensation expenses were due to a one-off modification during the quarter and we don’t expect this much impact in the following quarters. G&A expenses rose to RMB27 million, the increase was primarily due to increases in administrative staff cost and share-based compensation expenses. In addition, a portion of the share-based compensation expenses were due to a one-off modification in this quarter and we also don’t expect this much impact in the following quarters. Non-GAAP income from operations was RMB34 million, a significant 139% increase compared with RMB14 million in the same quarter of last year, while non-GAAP operating margin improved due to 4.2%, compared with 2.1% in the same quarter of last year. In Q1, net income attributable to Baozun ordinary shareholders rose to RMB11 million, an increase of 157% compared with the same quarter of last year. And basic and diluted net income attributable to ordinary shareholders per ADS were RMB0.20 and RMB0.18 respectively compared to RMB0.09 and RMB0.09 respectively during the same period of last year. In Q1, non-GAAP net income attributable to Baozun ordinary shareholders rose to RMB29 million, an increase of 104% compared with the same quarter last year. Basic and diluted non-GAAP net income attributable to Baozun ordinary shareholders per ADS were RMB0.54 and RMB0.50 respectively, compared with basic and diluted non-GAAP net income attributable to Baozun ordinary shareholders per ADS of RMB0.29 and RMB0.27 respectively, for the same period of 2016. That completes the profit and loss statement for the quarter. As of March 31, 2017, the company had RMB877 million in cash, cash equivalents and the short-term investments, a decrease from RMB957 million as of December 31, 2016 due to investment in the company’s logistics space. Our business continues to grow sustainably, which increase the confidence in our business and its performance. We reiterate our previous expectation of total GMV during fiscal year 2017 to increase by over 50% on a year-over-year basis. As we further optimize our business model mix towards the non-distribution model, our [ph] distribution GMV will continue to grow at a faster rate than distribution GMV. Turning to revenue guidance for the second quarter of 2017, we expect total net revenues to be between RMB870 million and RMB890 million, representing a year-over-year growth rate of approximately 24% to 27%. Again, due to the continued strategic shift in our business model mix to optimize our margin profile, our non-distribution model will continue to grow at a more rapid pace than overall net revenues. The same is true for services revenue, which will grow at a more rapid pace than total net revenues and will increasingly contribute more to net revenues on a year-over-year basis. Our profitability that will be improved continuously, due to the migration of our media services towards a more asset-light model as I previously described. If we look at services revenue on apples-to-apples basis excluding the cost of media procurement from services revenue in the same period of last year, the growth rate of services revenue is even more higher. Before I conclude the prepared remarks, I’d like to spend a few more minutes on the company’s prospects and strategies. In the Annual Chairman’s Letter, we have released to the public in April, we shared with our investors the company’s key business developments in 2016 and our strategies and the prospects for the coming years. Over the next three years, we plan to underpin our growth in four key ways; first, through deeper services and enhanced focus on our core verticals, we plan to extend our value proposition and offerings to our brand partners; second, through global expansion by fulfilling the demand of our brand partners internationally; third, through human resources, as we plan to continue strengthening our team to sustain the company’s long-term growth, and last but not least through the fostering of our creative and entrepreneur culture. We will keep investing the technology and innovation, which will be our key competitive strength and a growth driver over the long-term. We encourage our investors to read through the letter and share the same view with us on our plans for sustainable long-term growth. This concludes our prepared remarks. Operator, we are now ready to begin the Q&A session. Thank you.