Haijian He
Analyst · Elsie Cheng from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead
Thank you, Yulin, and Nicole. Hello, everyone. I will now discuss our financial performance of the third quarter. Please be reminded that, all the numbers quoted here are in RMB. Please also refer to our earnings release for our detailed financial results. To begin with, I would like to highlight the following points. First of all, our previous revenue guidance was from RMB1.67 billion to RMB1.74 billion. We are pleased to report that our total revenue of RMB1.73 billion of this quarter arrived at the top end of our guidance. More importantly, it represents acceleration of revenue growth at 72.6% on a year-over-year basis, which makes us one of the fastest-growing players in the cloud industry in China. Number two, enterprise cloud services remains as one of the key drivers of our top line growth. Our enterprise cloud services revenue this quarter was RMB409.1 million representing an increase of 257.3% year-over-year and 66.2% sequentially. It contributes 23.7% of the total revenue of this quarter compared with 11.4% in the same quarter last year. Number three, we are seeing continuous margin improvement. Our adjusted EBITDA margin has now improved for nine consecutive quarters, and our adjusted gross profit has been positive for five consecutive quarters. To be specific, our adjusted EBITDA margin increased to negative 1.5% this quarter from negative 10.2% in the same period last year, representing an improvement of 8.7 percentage points. Our net loss is also narrowed to RMB169.1 million this quarter from RMB241.9 million of Q3 last year. Number four, our business is sufficiently funded at this moment. As of September 30, 2020, our cash position is RMB6.8 billion. We reached RMB1.63 billion of net proceeds in our follow-up offering in September. Our public growth is 22.2% of our total outstanding shares, up from 14.8% immediately after the IPO. We are happy with the higher public growth rates, better liquidity, and strengthened high-quality shareholder base. And lastly, based on a recent announcement from MSCI, we are going to be included in the MSCI China Index, which will be implemented after market close of November 30, 2020. We are also recently included in a number of technology-related indices by Dow and S&P. Now, I will go through the details of financial results. Our public cloud services, revenue increased by 48.1% year-over-year to RMB1.3 billion. Thanks to the fast revenue growth of premium customers, the usage from our public cloud customer continued to grow on both year-over-year and sequential basis. We have successfully attracted several important customers in education and diversified internet sub verticals, who have already used multi-cloud vendors. Enterprise cloud service revenue increased by 257.3% to RMB409.1 million, contributing 23.7% of our total revenue in the third quarter this year increased significantly from 11.4% in the same period of last year. With the fast growth of enterprise cloud service revenue, while improving our overall revenue mix and increasing the recurring portion of our revenue. Cost of revenue increased by 40 -- 60 -- 64.4% year-over-year to RMB1.62 billion. IDC costs increased by 51.2% year-over-year to RMB1.06 billion, but as a percentage of total revenue decreased from 70% of Q3 last year to 61.3% this quarter. We are achieving greater economies of scale and improving efficiency of resources. Depreciation and amortization costs maintained relatively stable at RMB156.5 million on a year-over-year basis. We review the useful life of equipment on an ongoing basis and effective July 1st, 2020; we changed our estimate of useful life for our certain electronic equipment from three years to four years which is commonly adopted by the industry in general. The longer use of life is due to increasing purchase of high-end equipments continuous improvement of our software and enhancement in our capability of operations. Other costs consist of third-party software purchase, outsourcing cost, and channel costs associated with both public cloud and enterprise cloud as well as other equipment costs catered to enterprise services. Other costs were RMB388.2 million and staff costs were RMB11.2 million. As we continue to expand revenue scale and improving efficiency of our resources, we expect IDC and D&A costs as a percentage of total revenue will gradually decrease. Adjusted gross profit was RMB114.8 million compared with RMB20.6 million in Q3 last year. The adjusted gross margin was 6.6% in the third quarter this year which is sixth consecutive quarter with a positive gross margin, thanks to the economies of scale and operating leverage. Total operating expenses increased to RMB355.7 million, up 19.1% in Q3 last year. The increase was mainly due to the increase in share-based compensations, expenses of legal accounting and other administrative and compliance costs as a public company. Excluding share-based compensation, adjusted R&D expenses as a percentage of total revenue decreased from 15% in Q3 last year to 8.9% this quarter. Adjusted selling and marketing expenses as a percent of revenue decreased from 7.9% in Q3 last year to 4.8% this quarter. Adjusted G&A expenses as a percentage of revenue decreased from 4.8% in Q3 last year to 3.7% this quarter. Our adjusted EBITDA is negative RMB26.3 million compared with negative RMB102.0 million in Q3 last year. Adjusted EBITDA margin also improved from negative 10.2% of Q3 last year to negative 1.5% of Q3 this year. As of September 30, 2020, we had cash, cash equivalents, and short-term investments of RMB6.8 billion. During this quarter, our capital expenditure was RMB473 million. We have sufficient liquidity and will continue to be prudent in managing capital expenditures into infrastructure and technology research, maintaining a healthy balance sheet. Moving to the outlook. We are currently expecting net revenue for the fourth quarter of 2020 to be between RMB1.88 billion and RMB1.95 billion. However, this outlook is based on current market conditions and reflects the company's preliminary estimates, which are all subject to change. This concludes our prepared remarks and thank you for your attention, and we are now happy to take your questions. Operator, please go ahead.