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Research Frontiers Incorporated (REFR)

Q2 2014 Earnings Call· Sat, Aug 9, 2014

$0.96

+0.55%

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the Research Frontiers Investor Conference Call to discuss results for the Second Quarter of 2014. During today’s presentation, all parties will be in a listen-only mode. (Operator Instructions) This conference is being recorded today. A replay of this conference call will be available starting at 12 o’clock PM on August 8, 2014 in the Investors Section of Research Frontiers website at www.smartglass.com and will be available for replay for the next 90 days. Please note that some of the comments made today may contain forward-looking information. The words expect, anticipate, plans, forecasts and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Statements that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements that are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions that are part of the Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements reflect the Company’s current beliefs and a number of important factors could cause actual results for future periods to differ materially from those expressed. Significant factors that could cause results to differ from those anticipated are described in our filings with the SEC. Research Frontiers undertakes no obligation to update or revise these forward-looking statements to reflect new events or uncertainties. The Company will be answering many of the questions that were e-mailed to it prior to this conference call, either in their presentation or as part of the Q&A session at the end (Operator Instructions). I would now like to turn the conference over to Joseph Harary, President and Chief Executive Officer of Research Frontiers. Please go ahead, sir.

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Thank you, Dana, and good afternoon everyone. Joining me today is our CFO and Vice President of Business Development, Seth Van Voorhees. Seth and I will answer any questions that we didn’t already cover in today’s presentation. The 10-Q that we filed on Monday marks an important step forward and when analyzed contains some welcome news for our shareholders. Today, we will talk specifically about estimated production volumes, vehicle introduction dates, revenue potential and data regarding cost reductions and our technology. Our shareholders have seen our company go from doing things only in the lab to a first generation SPD-Smartglass product to full commercial production of the second generation SPD product by Hitachi on a dedicated factory line that has the largest production capacity and best performance of any smart window technology in the world. Then in 2011, we saw the first major commercial milestone on the end product side. The introduction of the newly designed SLK roadster by Mercedes-Benz offering the Magic Sky Control, SPD-Smartglass panoramic roof. This marked an inflection point for us, because it was the first car in the world to put any SmartGlass technology into high volume serial production. Equally important I believe is that there is still not even one reported problem from customers with the Magic Sky Control roof, even though many thousands of these cars have been on the road and exposed to extreme weather conditions for years. This is a tribute to our licensees and Mercedes fine engineering, rigorous long-term durability testing and drive to the best performing SmartGlass technology in the world for their vehicles. I think the MD&A section explains in good detail fee income, operating expenses and our investment in R&D as well. So, let’s talk about the specifics and what this means for your company going forward.…

Operator

Operator

(Operator Instructions) Our first question comes from Mr. Greg Palm with Craig-Hallum Capital Group. Greg W. Palm – Craig-Hallum Capital Group LLC: Hi, good afternoon, guys its Greg on for Steve.

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Hi, Greg. How are you? Greg W. Palm – Craig-Hallum Capital Group LLC: Good thanks. Can you just maybe give us an idea of current production expectations for S-Class Coupe and kind of how that’s compares to current production levels of the SL and SLK?

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Sure. Right now, the total estimated production of the SL and SLK combined on the Bremen line is about 30,000 vehicles per year. The S-Class Coupe is estimated to have between 10,000 to 15,000 units a year produced. Greg W. Palm – Craig-Hallum Capital Group LLC: Okay. So given the higher take rate expectations and higher amount of glass do you think its sort of an equal opportunity?

Joseph M. Harary

Management

At least in equal opportunity to both combined and that’s a good point, because that’s one of the lowest volume variance of the S-Class yet, it gives you an idea of how big the higher volume ones could be when they are introduced in the middle of next year. Because we expect both a higher take rate and the higher royalty per car. Greg W. Palm – Craig-Hallum Capital Group LLC: Perfect. One more for us you talked about sort of the production for the higher volume S-Class Sedan starting in mid-year 2015. When do you think that you’ll see sort of the full effect of that hitting royalty recognition, or it will be just a big acceleration in Q2 or just kind of more of a steady increase throughout 2015, kind of how should we think about that ramp?

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Well typically, with the car coming out, I believe in July of next year, we could start to see increased revenues from the long wheelbase and standard wheelbase variance of the S-Class in the second quarter. I think that given the dramatically larger number of vehicles you’re talking about 80,000 to 100,000 of just the long wheelbase and another 15,000 to 20,000 I believe of the standard wheelbase. You’re talking about just the vastly larger number of cars. So yes, I think you’ll start to see things really start to move, starting or beginning in the second quarter of next year from the long wheelbase and the standard wheelbase and then really just move up from there. And of course yes, the other variants that come out before than that will also contribute to revenue. One thing also is, as early as the third quarter, which is our current quarter, based on what we’ve seen, we expect that Asahi will have exceeded their minimum royalties to us. So any revenue from the S-Class starting in the third quarter will be accretive. Greg W. Palm – Craig-Hallum Capital Group LLC: Perfect, thanks for all the color guys.

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Thanks

Operator

Operator

Our next question is from (indiscernible) with Victoria Group.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

(Inaudible)

Joseph M. Harary

Management

We are having a little trouble hearing you.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Can you hear me now?

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Much better, thank you.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Thank you I’m sorry about that. I have two questions for you. Number one, per car you since 14, just about 14 square foot per car.

Joseph M. Harary

Management

It varies depending on the Coupe it’s about 14 square feet and its over 18 square feet for the long wheelbase.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay, per square foot what is your cost?

Joseph M. Harary

Management

We don’t disclose that, because that’s the price that Mercedes pays Asahi. But what we’ve done and maybe this can help you kind of back into that number is we’ve given a range of between $150 and $250 per car as the estimated royalty and we get 10% royalty from our automotive glass licensees. So while we can’t describe an exact number, I can give you a range and part of that range is I had question so that were not revealing the exact number that Mercedes pays, but also the range is because you have such a large amount of glass and a large variation from 14 square feet to 18 square feet. So that’s why the royalty is also a range.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

And that’s a per foot number you just gave me?

Joseph M. Harary

Management

That’s per car, per car.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Per car?

Joseph M. Harary

Management

$150 to $250 per car in royalty income. So what that implies is that the Daimler is buying the sunroofs between $1,500 and $2,500 at the B2B level, which is what we get a royalty on.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay. I guess it would be of great interest to you, if you could get the glass for about $8 or $9 a square foot? I …

Joseph M. Harary

Management

That would be lower than regular glass, so.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Why not.

Joseph M. Harary

Management

But you know you touch on an interesting point, which is there have been like it’s typical with many technology base products actually a substantial reduction in the cost of the glass per square foot. And as I mentioned earlier in the call, even in the SL and SLK which are half a square meter only and have relatively lower volumes, you’re talking about double-digit decreases in cost percentage decrease.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

We have a technology available it of might be of interest you.

Joseph M. Harary

Management

(Indiscernible)

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

And I plan on it this evening. One other question…

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Offline, but I think we need to move on to the next call. So thank you very much.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Sure, sure.

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Our next question is from Michael Kay with Kay Associates. Michael Kay – Kay Associates: Hello, Joe. You were quite specific regarding estimates of our production of the various versions of the Mercedes-Benz cars. Given that those actually come to fruition, does Hitachi have the capacity to be able to deal into the deal with the estimates that you indicated.

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Yes. Michael Kay – Kay Associates: And related to that since we know a major goal of the company has been to get the licensee fee that space in the United States that will may have to do as the film, what progress of any has been made on that since doing so would may be more attractive to potential OEMs.

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Okay, I will answer your second question first. It’s always been part of our plan and I just can’t reveal the specifics yet to have both geographic and exchange rate diversity among our filmmakers and also to have a second source of supply. And I’m very optimistic that our initial plans in that area will be very successful. Regarding your second question about does Hitachi have the production capacity to handle these numbers, absolutely their current factory line can produced 400,000 square meters of SPD film a year. And they tell me that if they needed to build another factory line, they probably need only about 10 months advance notice to get that up and running. So that’s not going to be an issue. Michael Kay – Kay Associates: And is volume increases do you anticipate further cost reductions in SPD to ask which they would result in more companies and consumers being amenable to having that installed?

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Absolutely, absolutely and you know one of the things that we benefit from that I must say no other smart glass company out there benefits from. Is the fact that we do have the high volume automotive production pretty much to our self. And that really can drive down cost has been shown times and time again about the introduction of new technology based product. So we’re very fortunate that we don’t have to rely like some of our competitors on 1Gs and 2Gs in their backyard to in the architecture market alone. But that we can actually generate substantial volumes that bring down the cost and achieve economies of scale. Michael Kay – Kay Associates: And this should be very positive for the architectural market too because I know they are very price sensitive of the effective model?

Joseph M. Harary

Management

This is good for all of the markets, which should why were so excited. And I think our shareholder should be excited about the content of the current 10-Q. Michael Kay – Kay Associates: Thank you, Joe.

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Thanks a lot.

Operator

Operator

This concludes our question-and-answer session. I will like to turn the conference back over to Mr. Harary for any closing remarks. Mr. Harary?

Joseph M. Harary

Management

Thanks. First I want to thank everyone for taking their time to participate on today’s conference call. Research Frontiers was founded with the belief that are focused in determine group of individuals have the ability to change the world. We believe that we can help the world save energy ,and make the world to better place, to make people safer, more comfortable and more secure. We believe that people should have greater control over their surroundings, how they live, how they drive and the quality of their life. And we believe that providing people with the best performing technology to do all of this, is the best way to be successful. Along the way we have attracted licensees that share this vision. We have attracted customers such as Mercedes and others that believe in the same thing. The automakers we spoke about today, Mercedes, Jaguar, Land Rover, BMW including their Rolls-Royce division, Volkswagen with their Porsche, Audi, Bentley and other brands, Lexus and others have all shown that they not only share this vision, but have build successful and enduring businesses doing just this. We are truly fortunate that over the years we have had the resources, dedication, focus and support of partners both at our licensees and their customers, as well as with our shareholders to make the world a better place. Our technology is the unchallenged performance leader and the most widely used smart window technology in the world. We have resources to continue and increase our efforts with strong and liquid capital resources, no debt, a strong patent portfolio and balance sheet and about a $100 investment already under our belt. We look forward with great anticipation to the start of revenue this quarter from the S-Class on the successful flagship of the Mercedes Empire and the continued expansion of our business as products using our technology become more affordable for a wider group of customers in all industries. Thank you all very much for listening in today.

Operator

Operator

The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today’s presentation. You may now disconnect.