Earnings Labs

Clean Energy Fuels Corp. (CLNE)

Q4 2014 Earnings Call· Thu, Feb 26, 2015

$2.21

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Greetings, and welcome to the Clean Energy Fourth Quarter 2014 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only-mode. A question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to your host, Mr. Tony Kritzer, Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Tony Kritzer - Director-Investor Relations

Management

Thank you, operator. Earlier this afternoon, Clean Energy released financial results for the fourth quarter and full year ending December 31, 2014. If you did not receive the release, it is available on the Investor Relations section of the company's website at www.cleanenergyfuels.com, where the call is also being webcast. There will be a replay available on the website for 30 days. Before we begin, we'd like to remind you that some of the information contained in the news release and on this conference call contains forward-looking statements that involve risks, uncertainties, and assumptions that are difficult to predict. Words of expression reflecting optimism, satisfaction with current prospects, as well as words such as believe, intend, expect, plan, should, anticipate, and similar variations, identify forward-looking statements. But their absence does not mean that the statement is not forward-looking. Such forward-looking statements are not a guarantee of performance, and the company's actual results could differ materially from those contained in such statements. Several factors that could cause or contribute to such differences are described in detail in the Risk Factors section of Clean Energy's Form 10-K, filed February 26, 2015. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date of this release. The company undertakes no obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statements or supply new information regarding the circumstances after the date of this release. The company's non-GAAP EPS and adjusted EBITDA will be reviewed on this call, and exclude certain expenses that the company's management does not believe are indicative of the company's core business operating results. Non-GAAP financial measures should be considered in addition to results prepared in accordance with GAAP, and should not be considered as a substitute for, or superior to, GAAP results. The directly comparable GAAP information, reasons why management uses non-GAAP information, a definition…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, at this time we will conduct our question-and-answer session. Our first question comes from Eric Stine with Craig-Hallum. Please state your question.

Aaron M. Spychalla - Craig-Hallum Capital Group LLC

Analyst

Yeah. Hi, guys. It's Aaron Spychalla. Congrats on the quarter. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Thanks, Aaron.

Aaron M. Spychalla - Craig-Hallum Capital Group LLC

Analyst

Yeah, maybe first on the Agility partnership, can you give us a sense for maybe some of the expected improvements in systems costs, and improvements in payback periods that you guys might be targeting from this? And just comment a little bit on some of the early traction you might be having there. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yes, thanks. And we've seen this, as you know, Aaron, we just a signed that deal with Agility. Of course, we've been working with Agility for a long time. But on this tank deal with CNG cylinder packages, we've just launched that, and we are seeing some good traction. I mean, the bottom line here is we're able to reduce the cost of the tanks substantially. I don't know that I want to give you exact number, but it's substantial. It can reduce, depending on the tank package, a truck cost by as much as $10,000. So it's very important in the – as we're trying to reduce the cost of the incremental cost of these trucks. We've already seen great success in that, which would be somewhat similar on the LNG tank packages that we've done with Chart. And of course, our customers are the beneficiaries of this, and it's – I think, it really beginning to provide some traction.

Aaron M. Spychalla - Craig-Hallum Capital Group LLC

Analyst

Very good. Thanks. And then maybe secondly on IMW. Could you just give us an update there? I know you mentioned maybe it will be down a little bit in Q1 to start the year. But could you just talk about the outlook there, maybe particularly in China? I saw at the end of the year, last year, that they – China Gas secured some funding for a station build-out. So a little color there, please. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, they did. You're right. We've got an $8 million purchase order towards the end of the year, so we continue there. I would say, though, it's been a bit slower in China than we'd like. We still have a very good customer in China Gas. And as you say that in the fourth quarter, we did receive an order for about another 35 compressor equivalent blocks, the way we think of it. So that continues. Though we are working hard on sales around the world with IMW, we've a new sales force in place. We're beginning to see the pipeline improve. We're continuing to work on our production and quality there. I think there is still some things we need to do to bring to the market a package that is – we are working hard, Aaron, to see if we can't have a package that we can really turn out that's less customized. And so, we've been working diligently to reduce the options and wring some cost out of that. And that's ongoing. We believe, though, in the second and third quarters we'll see that help. But I think sometimes the first quarter can be a bit slow for IMW. And I think we'll be a little bit challenged here in this current quarter.

Aaron M. Spychalla - Craig-Hallum Capital Group LLC

Analyst

Okay. Thanks for the color, and again, congrats on the quarter. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Okay. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from Rob Brown with Lake Street Capital Markets. Please state your question.

Rob Brown - Lake Street Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · Lake Street Capital Markets. Please state your question.

Good afternoon. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Hi, Rob.

Rob Brown - Lake Street Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · Lake Street Capital Markets. Please state your question.

Could you just kind of go over the current payback scenarios right now in the current oil and natural gas price environment? Where is it at in terms of months, or how do you kind of lay it out at this point? Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, it's different with (29:28) every customer depending on how much fuel they use. But of course obviously our national truck team is targeting (29:33) really the highest mileage trucks. And so, often they use 20,000 gallons a year. In fact, I was with two customers last week, and one of them uses 35,000 gallons a year, so we focus on those who use a lot of fuel. Before we had the oil move down, it was – often we could provide the customers as much as $1.50 discount between – somewhere between $1 and $1.50 between that and diesel – natural gas and diesel, on a diesel gallon equivalent. That's come in some. I was looking this morning at the Port of Los Angeles for our good customers down there that have volume discounts, they're still getting about $0.85 to $0.90. And so it's come in some, so it's pushed that payout some. That's why we're working so hard on the incremental cost. And obviously if we can take $10,000 out, that's significant. So it's pushed it out some, but I think it's important for people to realize that we still have an economic advantage. And in the alternative fuel game, not many people can say that. So we're still able to offer the customer now anywhere between $0.75 to a little over $1 a gallon. So if you're using 20,000, 30,000 gallons and the incremental cost is $35,000, you could see anywhere between a year and a year and a half payback for the highest mileage users.

Rob Brown - Lake Street Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · Lake Street Capital Markets. Please state your question.

Okay, great. Thank you. That's a good overview. And then on CapEx, I think you gave a couple figures. Is that basically a total of about $59 million for the year? And maybe just go into what kind of – is that the total? And second is the kind of what could step that up or what could bring that down? Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Well, we can always move it down, if we don't like to see the – if we don't like the business environment or if something changes. Just like last year, we had an initial capital plan of $135 million, and we brought it in to $86 million. So that, as you know, as we build these stations, that's really incremental. So we don't have any big projects that we're hugely committed. Those are spread out throughout the year. You're right; it's $59 million, $21 million of that is at NG Advantage. I think it's important though on this $38 million for our kind of core station construction and even the $21 million in NG Advantage, this is really for contracted load and contracted customers. So there isn't any spec station spending in here. We've done some of that, and we have those stations in place, we're opening those. So this is for anchor tenants and customers. So what could drive it up – and sort of a good thing, is we have some very large customers that are circling around at NG Advantage that would require a big station, so that could be incremental to that. And we're seeing some new trucking deals that would require some new LNG and CNG stations that would be on top of what we already have in place. But I think, generally, that's probably a pretty good number that we're going to try to work toward. And as I mentioned in my remarks, Rob, of that $21 million at NG Advantage, I don't want to give the exact percentage, but a good portion of that we're going to finance.

Rob Brown - Lake Street Capital Markets LLC

Analyst · Lake Street Capital Markets. Please state your question.

Okay. Thank you for the color. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Jeffrey Schnell with Jefferies & Company. Please state your question.

Jeffrey Schnell - Jefferies LLC

Analyst · Jefferies & Company. Please state your question.

Good afternoon. Andrew, you mentioned a quarter or two that the competitive dynamics have tilted in your favor, and that many others with aggressive station plans have scaled back or left the industry. Would you mind commenting or giving an update on the competitive advantage (33:22) you're seeing today? Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, I don't know. That sounds maybe like me. I'm not sure that a whole bunch of them have left the industry. I know that this is a very difficult environment, though, for very small regional players. And you, like us, have watched these announcements or people (33:38) announcing a couple stations, maybe at a Circle K. We've been there, and this is a difficult environment to build a million dollar station kind of focused on light-duty customers. I wish them all success in that, but I know that's difficult right now. So, we've seen some – it appears to us that we've seen some competitors kind of pull back. I don't know that droves of them have left the industry. I just know that this is a difficult environment for smaller players. And we've seen this before. I've been in this long enough to see this spike happen two times or three times and it washes out some of the smaller players. It's just, it's difficult if you really don't have the size and capability and the customer base. That's one of the things that I like to remind people, we have a really big customer base with recurring – these people spent millions of dollars in investments and vehicles, and they are buying fuel and will buy fuel on an ongoing basis for years to come.

Jeffrey Schnell - Jefferies LLC

Analyst · Jefferies & Company. Please state your question.

Great. And then could you give us an update or any color on how the discussions with new contracts have evolved, given the decline in oil? And also the stations you decided against building, what was the thought process there? Was it regional issues, or you couldn't find a base tenant? Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah. Let me – the first is, of course, as the price of oil has come in and diesel has come down, they all look at it. And I would say those people that are on the fence or that were wanting – maybe skeptical, this gives them a pause. But I think sort of on a good note is that I don't think many of our customers believe that this low price oil environment is here for a long time. I think we'd be having a different discussion today if we all thought oil was going to be at $48 for the next two years or three years. Then, I think it would be different. But most of our customers have seen this volatility on the oil side before. And I think most of them believe you're going to have a higher oil price a year from now then you do today. And as I said in my remarks, and to me this is really key, is we really only have one – and I am not going to name them, but they were in response to a big company that asked their people to use natural gas into their haulers. And in the final throes of that discussion, they were permitted to (36:06). That's the only one out of a big pipeline that we have. And then, on the other hand, of our existing customers, we haven't lost a single one. We haven't had anybody say, you know what, I did this thing, and this just doesn't make sense any more. The second part of your question, I kind of forget, it was --

Jeffrey Schnell - Jefferies LLC

Analyst · Jefferies & Company. Please state your question.

It was the stations you decided against. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yes, okay. No, good, thank you. A lot of those were stations that we started looking at really in 2013, and in 2014 toward the end of the year, as we began to kind of rationalize what we're doing forward, wouldn't say it was – they weren't canceled because of regional problems (36:46). It's really we were doing exploratory work and feasibility studies, but we were doing it on quite a few, as we have to, to keep the pipeline up. And these were just (36:58) other places where we just felt like, with our existing heavy-duty truck – we have about 100 – over, now, 100 truck-friendly locations. We felt like, unless we had an anchor tenant and really contracted volumes, now was not the time to be -- there may be a time for it, but right now we felt like just the best thing to do is just kind of pull that in. And that is one of the reasons why we're able to – we had to take that charge on it, but we were able to bring in the CapEx, too, for 2015.

Jeffrey Schnell - Jefferies LLC

Analyst · Jefferies & Company. Please state your question.

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Our next question comes from Rob Bennett with Dougherty & Company. Please state your question. Rob Bennett - Dougherty & Company: Hi, this is Rob Bennett on for Andrea James. Thanks for taking my question. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah. Rob Bennett - Dougherty & Company: What are the most relevant engines you are seeing coming to market, and when do you expect to see them? And then the follow-up is you mentioned you had about 600 fleets, and only one have put any plans on hold. I'm just wondering if there's any change in the development plans because of the current market – the oil market. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Well, obviously, the most relevant engines, I think the first part of your question, Rob, is it's the 9-liter, which we see in the transit buses. It's the Cummins Westport 9-liter we see in the transit buses and the refuse. And of course, in the heavy-duty market, it's really the 12-liter. Volvo has slowed down, or sidelined for now, their entry with the 13-liter. And I think the next engine that obviously we would like to see, and I think some in the market are kind of pushing for, is maybe a little bit bigger engines, perhaps, or a more higher horsepower offering of the 12-liter, but it would be a 13-liter. And I would say, as our discussion here over the last couple questions, well, what's changed? As you know, these guys that make engines, they have long product cycles, and this kind of thing, staring at the face of $50 oil, I'm sure that that gives them pause, too, to come out with new engines. But we've seen this in a time – I was just at a dinner last night with some Cummins executives, and I recalled that in 2001, they stopped making a natural gas engine, and then they came back into the market after things had changed with the market. So, we see these offerings kind of come and go. We need more engines. And I would think the next couple that you'll see will maybe be a little bit higher horsepower. Rob Bennett - Dougherty & Company: Great. Thank you. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Noah Kaye with Northland Capital Markets. Please state your question.

Colin W. Rusch - Northland Securities, Inc.

Analyst · Northland Capital Markets. Please state your question.

Thanks so much guys. This is Colin Rusch just filling in for Noah this afternoon. Can you talk a little bit about the opportunity to potentially roll up some distressed assets in the industry? Clearly, you guys have a lot of expertise in operating these stations more effectively than other folks. And if you've got a bunch of little investors pulling off single-digit or small double-digit system – or stations, can you buy these things up and add to the portfolio in an effective way? Or are the economy is just not there? Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, we have to watch that, right? As Boone always used to tell me, you can go broke buying bargains, right. So a lot of these stations would be a station that will be underutilized, and would be perhaps light-duty in nature, light-duty fleets. And so some of them, I think, we would find just don't really fit. Now, having said that, there will be opportunities, and we'll get a chance to look at a lot of them. We've had some discussions with some that have a little bit larger footprints that I think may come to the market. We just have to look at how they're organized and how they fit with our markets in trucking. There will be locations we're going to like, and then there will be some that just won't really fit us. Over the years, though, we've done this, right? So we bought stations in New Mexico and in Texas, and all the Brooklyn Union National Grid (41:11) stations. So we've done this before, and we'll look at it again. We obviously are going to balance that with our capital and with our cash. And so we'll have to put that all in the mix. But I would think, in 2015, you're going to see some of these – there's going to be some consolidation. And some of it, you're going to find attractive, and some of it, you might just have to pass on.

Colin W. Rusch - Northland Securities, Inc.

Analyst · Northland Capital Markets. Please state your question.

Great. And then when you're negotiating on new deals, I have to imagine that you're in a better position relative to other fuel providers, even though you've had a lead for a number of years. How much are you able to press your advantage on that in terms of taking share of the spread at this point with customers? Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Well, one of the things I think is our biggest advantage is that we're really one of the only fuel providers out there that can provide LNG and CNG, and frankly, in RNG, renewable natural gas. We're really the only ones that have that capability. And so we really are an honest broker when we're going to the customer, and we're able to give the customer the kind of fuel they really need. We're not having to push. People thought perhaps we were pushing just LNG, but we sell more CNG than we do LNG, and we've built more CNG stations than just anybody in the business. We've 244 stations, and operate 293 others, with 549 stations. So we've experience. The other thing that helps us is having IMW. While IMW has been giving us a little bit of a challenge, when you look at those 80 other people in this business that are out there buying compressors, many of them buy from one other company. And we just don't want – are fortunate, I think that we don't, and some of our big customers like Waste and Republic and others, where we provide them the stations and design and build and operate them for them, and sell them the station, we have our own compressor manufacturer. And it gives us really a leg up to be able to use that effectively. So, it's that we have a big network of stations, we're able to also – I think maybe you're correctly getting this is that we're able to work with these national fleets, we have a national network, and we're in 45 states. And we have these big heavy-duty truck stops now really up and down the Interstate. So we could really respond to those big fleets that we will begin to move this way. So I think it's that we have all the different kinds of fuel that the customers want. We've build a lot of stations that have the experience, and we have IMW. So that gives us, I think, really an advantage over some of our other competitors.

Colin W. Rusch - Northland Securities, Inc.

Analyst · Northland Capital Markets. Please state your question.

Great. Thanks a lot, guys. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Okay.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, operator, is that it?

Operator

Operator

Yes, sir. Andrew J. Littlefair - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Okay. Well, thank you, everyone, for listening this afternoon. We look forward to updating you on all of our progress next quarter.