Operator
Operator
Good day and welcome to the MIND C.T.I Q4 2011 Earnings Conference Call. Today's conference is begin recorded. At this time I would like to turn the conference over to your Andrea Dray. Please go ahead Ms. Dray.
MIND C.T.I. Ltd (MNDO)
Q4 2011 Earnings Call· Thu, Mar 1, 2012
$1.06
-0.93%
Same-Day
+1.33%
1 Week
+8.44%
1 Month
-16.44%
vs S&P
-19.43%
Operator
Operator
Good day and welcome to the MIND C.T.I Q4 2011 Earnings Conference Call. Today's conference is begin recorded. At this time I would like to turn the conference over to your Andrea Dray. Please go ahead Ms. Dray.
Andrea Dray
Management
Thank you, Rovina. Thank you and good morning everyone and welcome to MIND’s conference call. Before we begin I would like to point out that this call includes information that constitutes forward-looking statements. Although we believe that expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are based upon reasonable assumptions, we can give no assurance that our expectations will be obtained or that any deviations will not be material. Such statements involve risks and uncertainties that may cause future results to differ from those anticipated. These risks include, but are not limited to, the effects of general economic conditions and such other risks as discussed in our earnings release and at greater length in the Company's filings with the SEC. MIND may elect to update these forward-looking statements at some point in the future. However, the Company specifically disclaims any obligation to do so. Yesterday, MIND reported the results of its fourth quarter and full year 2011. The full financials can be found in our Form 6-K and on our website. On the call today from MIND is Ms. Monica Iancu, MIND’s CEO, who will summarize our major achievements in 2011 and discuss our business. I would now like to turn the call over to Monica. Monica, please go ahead.
Monica Iancu
Management
Thank you, Andrea. Good day ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for your interest in MIND and for joining us today. I would like to start the call today with a short reminder of MIND’s history, business strategy and goals. MIND was incorporated in Israel in 1995 and starting providing our call accounting solutions in that year. In 1997, we introduced our billing and customer care software for voice over IP. We have enhanced our billing solutions since then to support all types of service providers. We make three acquisitions through the years. In 2001, 2005 and 2007. We supply billing and customer care solutions for tier 2 and tier 3 carriers around the world, enabling them to offer all types of wireless, wireline, voice over IP and broadband services. Our convergent billing and customer care solutions supports multiple services, including voice, data and content services, as well as both prepaid and postpaid payment models in a single platform. Prepaid subscribers can enjoy the full range of services offered by the provider with their special bundles, rating plans and limits. The prepaid solution authorizes its service and controls each session in real-time taking care that the balance is not exceeded. Postpaid subscribers, whether retail or business customers including credit limited and unlimited are fully supported in one single system from the sale of the services and collection. All services used by a postpaid customer appear in a single bill which consists of all charges. Our solution uniqueness is driven by the fact that the rating real time engine is one engine for both postpaid and prepaid. And because it includes not only the expected customer care and billing but also additional modules developed on the same platform. These modules include our own integrated real-time mediation product that provides interfaces with IP,…
Operator
Operator
(Operator Instructions) And we will take our first question from [James Lee from Potroreel Capital Research]. Please go ahead.
Unidentified Analyst
Analyst
Great. Thanks for taking the questions. On the customer loss, how much revenue contribution were they in 2011?
Monica Iancu
Management
The different maintenance agreements -- you are asking about the maintenance agreements that have no....
Unidentified Analyst
Analyst
Right. (inaudible) to lose.
Monica Iancu
Management
I can't tell you a definite number because there were small ones and on the other hand maybe there was one or two larger ones. But on the other hand the reasons are clear cut. Like it’s not that is going to end January 1, so I can't give a real number but we really hope that the new projects will compensate for those losses.
Unidentified Analyst
Analyst
But in aggregate, were they more like 5% of revenue, were they 10% of revenue? What’s the range -- you know I understand you may not have the exact number, but is it more like 5% or 10%?
Monica Iancu
Management
I would say that somewhere between 5% and 10% but closer to the 5%.
Unidentified Analyst
Analyst
And that you expect those to be eventually they’ll be gone. May not be happening January 1 but it will be -- maybe gone, those revenues?
Monica Iancu
Management
This is how things looks at this point in time.
Unidentified Analyst
Analyst
Okay. And then in terms of increasing the size of the company. How much operating expenses are you planning to bring on and how many employees to do -- or is it more operating expenses, are you planning to add on in 2012?
Monica Iancu
Management
We plan to add around 10%. So if we are now at 320 people, we will take that, gradually will enlarge the workforce with -- hopefully we will find those experts that we are looking for, but we expect to add something like 20 people by the end of Q2 and maybe ten more during Q3, something like this.
Unidentified Analyst
Analyst
Okay. So 10%, (inaudible) about 10% increase in OpEx in 2012?
Monica Iancu
Management
Not exactly. Because OpEx is not only salaries, it’s also third party hardware or software or services, and travel and offices and so on. So, again, we plan to increase but we do not think that we will have -- it will be less than 10%.
Unidentified Analyst
Analyst
Okay. And these increases, obviously you guys are anticipating increase in revenue, right. So that given the, both the positive factors and the negative factors you talked about, what's the overall impact you think on your revenue, your operating margin and cash flow in 2012?
Monica Iancu
Management
First of all we always plan for the future. So if we see now that there is more interest in our solutions, if we see that there are prospects that are moving forward to the next steps, even if they are not deals that closed already or if we get from our existing customer base the budgets that they project for 2012. And in order to enable, to maintain our reputation of on time delivery and excellent support, we need to increase both the professional team and the development team in order to be able to support those needs of both existing customers and customers that we expect to close. I am not going to give you any real, exact kind of expected number. But I think that even the fact that we talk about planning to increase the company, because we expect more action.
Unidentified Analyst
Analyst
But do you, on a directional basis, you anticipate revenue and cash flow to be up this year versus last year?
Monica Iancu
Management
I will not give any estimates.
Unidentified Analyst
Analyst
Okay. And lastly, on gross margins, it looks like in Q4 it was a bit lower than what you guys typically have done. Is there anything between there or is it the new gross margin level we should expect or is there -- do you anticipate it to be able to turn back to what you guys typically had in the past?
Monica Iancu
Management
We think that the normal -- you are talking about gross margin or operational...?
Unidentified Analyst
Analyst
Yeah, gross margin, your gross margin. I believe it’s 53% this quarter versus I believe 73% a year ago.
Monica Iancu
Management
I think that’s somewhere between 60% and 70%, is the range that we expect to be.
Unidentified Analyst
Analyst
Okay. All right, thank you.
Monica Iancu
Management
Thank you.
Operator
Operator
(Operator Instructions) Ms. Iancu, we currently do not have any questions in the queue.
Monica Iancu
Management
Okay. So, I, thank you.
Operator
Operator
That will conclude today's conference call. Thank you for your participation, ladies and gentlemen you many now disconnect.