Good day, and welcome to the KVH Industries, Inc. Q4 YE 2020 Earnings Conference Call. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I'd like to turn the conference over to Brent Bruun, CFO. Please go ahead.

Thank you, operator. Good morning, everyone. Thanks for joining us today to discuss KVH Industries fourth quarter and full year results, which are included in the earnings release we published this morning. With me on this call is Martin Kits van Heyningen, the company's Chief Executive Officer. The earnings release is available on our website and through our Investor Relations department. If you would like to listen to a recording of today's call, you can access a webcast replay on our website. [Operator Instructions] This conference call will contain certain forward-looking statements that are subject to many assumptions and uncertainties that may cause our actual results to differ materially from those expressed in these statements. We undertake no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements. We will also discuss certain non-GAAP financial measures, and you'll find definitions of these measures in our press release as well as reconciliations of these non-GAAP measures to comparable GAAP measures. We encourage you to review the cautionary statements made on our SEC filings, specifically those under heading Risk -- under the heading Risk Factors in our third quarter Form 10-Q filed on October 29, 2020, and our 2020 Form 10-K, which we expect to file tomorrow. The company's other SEC filings are available directly from the Investor Information section of our website. At this time, I'd like to turn the call over to Martin. Martin?

Thanks, Brent. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Let's get started. Like many businesses around the world, we continue to face challenges from the pandemic in Q4. However, we ended 2020 on a very positive note, and we have a number of reasons to be optimistic about the future. We built on our strong third quarter and reported fourth quarter revenue of $44.1 million, an increase of $1.7 million or 4% versus the fourth quarter of last year. We also increased our fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA to $3.5 million, up from $700,000 in the prior year. For the full year, we increased revenue to $158.7 million, up almost $1 million from last year and reported total adjusted EBITDA of $3.1 million, and that's a $7 million improvement compared to the fiscal 2019. I'm really proud of our team's continued ability to deliver for our shareholders and customers despite the challenging environment. Our core business remains strong. In Q4 of 2020, we delivered one of the most robust fourth quarter results from continuing operations in the past 5 years. We recorded very strong TACNAV revenues, record VSAT unit bookings and record VSAT shipments. From an operations perspective, we continued our cost containment efforts in Q4, achieving OpEx well below the prior year and our budget. While restrictions on travel and trade shows pose challenges for sales visits and pipeline development, it has also reduced our travel and marketing costs. As these restrictions begin to ease, we expect to see expense reductions normalize in the second half of the year. So against the backdrop of economic uncertainty, we're pleased with our overall financial results for the year and with the positive momentum we carried into the first quarter of 2021. Our strategy of diversification and focusing on innovative…

Thank you, Martin. First, to echo some Martin sentiments, we believe our fourth quarter, full year 2020 results related to COVID 2019 pandemic -- I'm sorry, COVID-19 pandemic that continues to impact many areas of our business are quite encouraging. Despite the challenges we faced, we reported our strongest fourth quarter in quite some time, and we are entering 2021 with a solid tailwind. Let's look at our fourth quarter in a bit more detail. As Martin mentioned earlier, our fourth quarter revenue came in at $44.1 million. This compares to $42.5 million recorded in the fourth quarter of 2019. Revenue from our inertial navigation segment increased $1.7 million, and our mobile connectivity segment remained flat compared to the prior year fourth quarter. Product revenue for the fourth quarter was $20.9 million, an increase of $2.2 million or 12% from $18.7 million in the fourth quarter of 2019. By segment, product revenue for inertial navigation increased $2.4 million or about 22% primarily due to a $3.7 million increase in TACNAV product sales, partially offset by a $1.3 million decrease in FOG and OEM product sales compared to the fourth quarter of 2019. Product revenue in our mobile connectivity segment decreased $0.2 million or 3%, driven by a $0.3 million decrease in TracVision product sales and a $0.2 million decrease in land mobile product sales, partially offset by a $0.2 million increase in VSAT product sales and accessories. Service revenue for the fourth quarter was $23.2 million, a decrease of $0.6 million or 2% from $23.8 million in the fourth quarter of the prior year. By segment, service revenue for inertial navigation decreased $0.8 million, primarily due to a reduction in contract engineering service revenue. In our mobile connectivity segment, service revenue increased by $0.2 million or 1%, primarily due to…

Thanks, Brent. But before we get to the questions, I do want to just point out the press release from this morning. And that mentioned that Roger Kuebel will be joining KVH next week as our new CFO. Roger is an accomplished financial executive, having served as CFO of Seaborn Networks and Treasurer at Aspen Technology, amongst others. He has great expertise across financial planning, reporting, capital markets and strategic transactions, has industry experience as well in telecom, including subsea fiber optic networks as well as software and services. So Roger joins us at an important moment for KVH as our financial performance has real positive momentum, and we focus on building our business through innovation and market leadership while containing cost. And we're all very excited to have him aboard. And I also want to thank Brent Bruun for taking over as CFO for the last 6 months, done a great job, put together 2 solid quarters. So you're setting a high bar for Roger to come in. But on behalf of myself and the Board, we just want to thank you for doing that. So operator, I think we're ready to take questions now.

[Operator Instructions] Okay. And it looks like we have a question on the phone line from Rich Valera with Needham & Company.

Martin, it makes sense that you're going to be migrating your base over to your HTS network this year. And it looks like some nice, long-term savings from that. Could you give us a sense of what you expect those incremental costs to be this year to migrate your existing base over -- the remainder of your existing base over to the HTS network?

Well, what -- we've been doing it for 2 years now. So we're basically accelerating what we have been doing. So we'll be offering some incentives in terms of hardware discounts and things like that, installation support. So it would be -- some of that cost might be capitalized if they move over to AgilePlans, but some of it would show up in the -- in product discounts and installation credits.

Got it. And then just wanted to try to understand the potential impact of incorporating the PIC into all of your commercial products and I guess, eventually, probably your defense-related products. Could you talk about how you're thinking about incorporating the PIC in the commercial products affecting your gross margins and your ability to compete more effectively and maybe drive incremental revenue in that category?

Yes. We -- you've actually hit the nail on the head. There's both a margin benefit and there's a product performance and size benefit. So what I mentioned in the past is that we've essentially designed PIC into sort of our high-end use just to show how good it is. And now we're rolling it into all the other products. So during the fourth quarter, we did the engineering work to design it into our standard products. And we're now -- all of those products are going into production. So the cost savings will happen when we are able to wind down the current method of fabrication, which involves couplers and polarizers and the fiber manufacturing, which has significant cost and overhead. So as all of that is completely stopped, then we'll have significant margin improvement and manufacture and overhead improvement, which will translate directly into gross margin. So right now, we expect that starting really in April, we'll be ramping that up. We've ordered a second precision assembly system, which will then allow us to move everything over to this new -- to new automated manufacturing. And at that point, realistically, I think by the end of June, we'll be looking at switching over completely.

That's really helpful. I just wanted to follow up on the autonomous opportunity. A couple of years back, I think you've provided at least samples of your FOG products at the time to a number of players in that autonomous market. And just wanted to understand sort of where things stand there and how you're thinking about that opportunity today, particularly now that you've got the pick in production?

Yes. So we're in over 20 different platforms. So we continue to do well. And as all of these platforms are in testing and prototyping, it doesn't generate a lot of revenue yet. But as you know, this is an enormous opportunity, and we've been focused on it, which is why I wanted to point that out in the script. We've been focused on this market for 15 years, so from -- when DARPA first sponsored the original Grand Challenge. So we've been working with these companies for a very long time. So we feel that we have the precision. We have the experience. We've literally been in millions of miles of autonomous driving on roads today through our customers. And some of these markets, we think, are going to develop faster than others. And we think autonomous trucking, for example, will develop faster than a fully autonomous consumer vehicle. And the reasons for that are both economic and that these are more expensive platforms and they deliver an economic value to the people who are operating the trucks as well as the opportunity is to run them in more contained environments. So level 5 doesn't mean that level 5 is on every single road that you could possibly drive on, but it might be level 5 on the Interstate Highway System. So we think things like trucking and autonomous vehicles for public transport and people movers, which are, again, are in more defined geosense areas, this will happen faster. And we're already seeing customers in those areas.

[Operator Instructions] We'll take our next question from Ric Prentiss with Raymond James.

A couple of questions. Following up on the migration conversion -- finishing up conversion. How should we think about -- are you thinking about any of the revenue side, where people not converting over, did I hear you right that exit '21, there would be a $4 million to $5 million OpEx save then on the network side?

Yes.

Well, it wouldn't be OpEx, but savings, the cost of sales.

Cost of sales, you're right. Yes.

That was $4 million to $5 million at the kind of exit '21 into '22?

Right. So reduced bandwidth costs, so we're not running 2 networks. So in other words, we're spending more than that now, of course, on the old network, but this would be the incremental part because as we migrate people over, we put the bandwidth on the new network. But the net savings, we estimate is $4 million to $5 million.

Right. And any concerns on the subscriber side? You think you'll get everybody switched over, so it's really more just a...

Well, you know how people are, they -- yes -- no, that's definitely a concern. And for us, this is an enormous priority to get this done. But you know how people are, they always wait until the last minute. So we're giving people incentives to do it early and to get switched over. So really, we don't anticipate this being a risk to revenue in 2021. If anything, some people may defer until 2022 and then realize that they forgot to do it and have to do it in January. But what we've also seen, Ric, is that the high-value customers, the people who are more modern customers have all switched already. So the people who are left are sort of the stragglers, the low ARPU customers who aren't really prioritizing this, whereas our big fleets have mostly all converted already.

Right. And obviously, [ it could ] also be some Agile sales. How should we think about CapEx in '20 and what this final process might do to that?

I'll let Brent answer that. It'll be...

Can you ask the question again? I'm sorry.

He's asking about CapEx. You're a little hard to hear there, Ric. I think he's asking about CapEx for 2021 for casual related.

Yes. Well, CapEx for 2021, real generally -- the more CapEx, the better when it comes to AgilePlans as far as we're concerned. We will be -- total CapEx will be somewhere in the neighborhood of $15 million to $20 million. But what -- and as I said a moment ago, if we get some significant Agile orders, which move more subscribers on our network and more revenue and more airtime revenue, it could be higher. So a very fluid number. The amount of CapEx that we have budgeted for that's not revenue-generating CapEx, such as the Agile, is relatively low.

Got you. Okay. And obviously, we've got a new president, a new administration there. Can you talk a little bit about how you see it affecting orders and also international orders?

It's a question on the defense side, Ric?

Yes, defense side and also just any [ thoughts on the administration and your view ] of the business.

Well, too early to tell. I think that it's clear that this administration is probably going to be less focused on defense spending. So what that means to future budgets, we'll have to wait and see. Also, depending on what happens politically with the Middle East, that could impact some potential TACNAV business if there's embargoes or bans on exports and things like that. So hopefully, that doesn't happen. So...

Okay. And any thoughts that you could -- obviously, still strong, [ good to be asked for the pandemic, hopefully looking ] on the other side of it...

Ric, I'm having trouble hearing you. Ric, if you could maybe...

I'm sorry. I'm on a -- can you hear me any better now?

Yes. That's perfect. Yes.

Okay. Very good. Yes, obviously, balance sheet does the cash position negative net debt. Any thoughts on M&A or what else might be out there that you might want to tuck in?

We're not a super acquisitive company, but we've done some 4 or 5 deals over the last 10 years. So we are -- we'll always look. I think that some of the things that we've seen that have come out have been really troubled and very difficult to justify doing. So if we were to do something, it would have to be something that's very compelling and doesn't put pressure on us with a lot of debt or anything like that. So we kind of like where we are. We've got some new products coming. We think we're going to be very, very competitive this year. I think we see a lot of upside in the airtime business. So overall, we feel pretty good about our position.

[Operator Instructions] It does look like we have another question from Chris Quilty with Quilty Analytics.

I think Brent may have given this in the script, but he was talking too fast. What was the gross margin for the mini-VSAT Broadband service specifically?

34 and change?

Oh, you -- the gross margin for the mobile connectivity business unit was 33.8%.

So yes, that's about a 4-point increase over Q4 last year, I believe.

Right. And where do you expect that to go this year, assuming you don't get the $4 million to $5 million of savings this year?

Well, the savings won't -- is not this year. We're talking about the savings in 2022. We're still running 2 networks to the end of the year. And it does put a bit of pressure on the gross margin percentages, in particular for our airtime business. But coming out of the year, when we're down to 1 network, we're anticipating seeing improvement.

Got you. So the -- for the full year in 2021, will they remain in sort of the mid-30s? And by next year, they kind of push back up to the 40% goal you long talked about?

I think that's a good estimate. I think this should be increasing this year. So it would be winding down costs on the old network and ramping up costs on the new network, but incrementally, it will be better. And it's a little bit tricky, Chris, because it's sort of the pace of the migration. If the migration happens evenly throughout the year, then that's one thing. But if it's all back-end loaded, we're carrying the cost throughout. More subscribers on the old network, perversely, is actually better because you're not needed to add bandwidth on the new one, so it's a little bit tricky to forecast. But we do -- in our models, we do have the margins generally where they are to slightly increasing.

Okay. And a follow-up on the CapEx. Of the $15 million to $20 million, how much of that ballpark might come from AgilePlans? And also, are you seeing a significant CapEx contribution developing for KVH Watch?

Well, the -- I'll answer the watch part. But not yet for watch, but we expect that to take on a similar business model that we saw with the AgilePlans plans, so -- where that compounds over time. But the vast majority -- the business right now is not very capital-intensive outside of the AgilePlans. So some of this new equipment that we're talking about is for -- the photonic chip is -- it's fairly pricey for machine and maybe $0.5 million kind of thing to get that installed and set up. But the vast majority of the CapEx budget is for AgilePlans.

Great. And where are you seeing the strongest demand for AgilePlans, either amongst your higher-end customers, lower-end geographically or by application? And has that changed over the course of last year?

Well, the geographic split hasn't changed. It's sort of evenly distributed between Americas, APAC and Asia. So it's actually a pretty nice distribution geographically. The one big change that we saw in Q4 is V7, V11 continue to do extremely well, but V3, which was not offered in an AgilePlan service, V3 was purchased only in the past, that really took off in Q4. And that's -- as I mentioned in my script, the unit sales for V3-HTS was up 175% in Q4. And that's a product that had been on the market for 3 years. So really -- and that was driven by AgilePlans where we're addressing a new market, which is smaller fishing boats, countries like Indonesia and Vietnam and parts of Africa, it was a lot of fishing. So it's a -- it's really a new market for us, so it's incremental.

And what does that lift in V3 do to the overall ARPUs? Presumably it will mix it down to -- but independent of that, what have you seen happen with the trends for AgilePlans?

So ARPUs have been very, very constant, so it's surprisingly stable over the years. AgilePlans very stable. V3 is at a lower price point, both for the hardware sale and for the airtime and for Agile. So going forward, we may report ARPU sort of by product, if this becomes -- if this continues to take off. But it -- I just want to point out, it's incremental. So it's not dragging down ARPU in the traditional sense, it's adding a new category, which is at a lower price point.

Got you. And I guess the other question with AgilePlans, how has the churn changed over the course of the year?

Churn has been very low in Agile.

Yes, very low.

I wish all our products were like Agile. So it's our lowest churn of any product we offer. So -- and that's another thing. It's that speaking about the old network or the legacy network has very high churn compared to the HTS network. The vast majority of the churn is on the old network. So these are old products, old network, a lot of these boats are getting sold or laid up. So we also expect that as a result, starting next year or as we progress throughout the year, we should see a significant reduction in churn, simply because we're getting people off that old network.

Great. And final question just on the government defense markets. You've got a couple of big programs with a better plan for a rollout. Are any of those schedules being impacted by the change in administration? Or does everything look generally on time with AT&T and AMPV and others?

Yes. The U.S. programs are all budgeted and moving forward. So we don't see any impact in U.S. programs, where our big one is with the AMPV program of BAE, that program is on track, at least as far as funding goes and all of that. So I think the risk would be more -- some international. What's going to happen in the Middle East? Who knows?

Speaking of which, I think you had a $10 million TACNAV that was supposed to ship in the fourth quarter. Presumably, only a portion of that shipped, and we should see the balance in Q1?

You're right. Some of it shipped in January. So some of it -- you're absolutely right. Yes. So -- but it's all been shipped and it's all been paid for and cash has been received. So that program is complete.

Great. And I think you had talked previously about 2 to 3 potential orders going into 2021 and you hope to win 1 or 2. And I assume all of that is still on track?

Yes. And we've got -- as Brent mentioned, we've got around $20 million in backlog, $19 million of that is for inertial nav. So we expect strong growth in our FOG business this year. In TACNAV, we try not to forecast that aggressively. So in TACNAV, we're always very conservative on our forecast until it's in backlog. So that's not built into our guidance at this point.

[Operator Instructions] And it would appear that there are no further questions on the phone lines at this time.

That's great. So this wraps it up. And as always, feel free to reach out to us directly for any follow-ups. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

And this concludes today's call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.