Earnings Labs

Tucows Inc. (TCX)

Q2 2020 Earnings Call· Fri, Aug 7, 2020

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Transcript

Monica Webb

Operator

Welcome to Tucows’ Second Quarter 2020 Management Commentary. We have pre-recorded prepared remarks regarding the quarter and outlook for the company. A transcript of these remarks is also available on the company’s website. In lieu of a live question-and-answer period following the remarks, shareholders, analysts and prospective investors are invited to submit their questions to Tucows’ management via email at ir@tucows.com until Wednesday, August 12th. I will note that the Q&A from this call will be combined with the Q&A from the call this past Monday, August 3rd on the DISH acquisition of Ting Mobile assets. Management will address your questions directly, or in a recorded audio response and transcript that will be posted to the Tucows’ website on Monday, August 17th at approximately 4 P.M. Eastern Time. We would also like to advise that the updated Tucows Quarterly KPI Summary, which provides key metrics for all of our businesses for the last five quarters, as well as 2018, 2019, and year-to-date, is available in the Investors section of the website, along with the updated Ting Build Scorecard and Investor Deck. Now for management’s prepared remarks. On Thursday, August 6th, Tucows issued a news release reporting its financial results for the second quarter ending June 30th, 2020. That news release, and the company’s financial statements are available on the company’s website at tucows.com, under the Investors section. Please note that the following discussion may include forward-looking statements, which, as such, are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. These risk factors are described in detail in the company’s documents filed with the SEC, specifically the most recent reports on the Forms 10-K and 10-Q. The company urges you to read its security filings for a full description of the risk factors applicable for its business. I would now like to turn the call over to Tucows’ President and Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Elliot Noss.

Elliot Noss

Analyst

Thanks, Monica. Q2 2020 was another strong quarter of performance, marked by a post-quarter change in a changing world. Starting with the high-level results for the quarter, total revenue for Q2 2020 was $82.1 million, a decline of 2% from the same period last year, with a strong increase in Ting Internet being offset by a decrease in Ting Mobile. Gross margin dollars before network expenses increased by 4%, with increases in both Domains and Ting Internet being partially offset by a decline in Ting Mobile. Net income, which included two non-cash, non-recurring items specific to Q2 that Dave will discuss in more detail, was $0.2 million or $0.01 per share. Excluding these two items, net income was $2.5 million or $0.23 per share. This compares with net income for Q2 of last year of $2.6 million or $0.25 a share. Adjusted EBITDA for Q2 increased 6% to $12.2 million. Finally, cash flow from operations was $8.9 million, up 28% from the second quarter of last year, and brings total cash flow from operations for the year-to-date to $23 million. Turning to Domains, Q2 was yet another solid quarter for our Domains business, underpinned by the consistency and profitability of this business, as we continue to reap the benefits of the economic transition to online commerce in response to the pandemic. Total gross margin dollars for the Domains business increased 7% year-over-year on a 1% decrease in revenue, as our focus on driving gross margin within this business continues to yield the intended results. Our Wholesale Domains channel saw year-over-year growth in gross margin of 11%. Gross margin for the Domain Services component of Wholesale increased 14%, driven in part by higher total wholesale registrations, which increased 7% year-over-year to 4.3 million, from 4 million, with new registrations up a…

Dave Singh

Analyst

Thanks, Elliot. Total net revenue for the second quarter of 2020 was $82.1 million, a decrease of 2% from $84.1 million for the second quarter of last year. Strong growth in Ting Internet revenue was more than offset by a decrease in Ting Mobile revenue. Cost of revenues before network costs decreased 6% to $51.8 million, from $54.9 million for Q2 of last year, with the decline primarily due to the lower revenue. As a percentage of revenue, however, cost of revenues before network costs declined by more than 200 basis points, to 63% from just over 65%, primarily due to an improved margin mix for the Domains business. Gross margin before network costs for the second quarter increased 4% to $30.3 million, from $29.2 million or as a percentage of revenue, increased to 37% from 35% for Q2 of last year. I’ll now review gross margin for each of the Domain Services and Network Access businesses. Starting with Domain Services, gross margin for the second quarter increased 8% year-on-year to $18.7 million, from $17.4 million in Q2 last year. As a percentage of revenue, gross margin for Domain Services increased to 31% from 29%. Within the Domain Services business, gross margin for the Wholesale Channel increased 11% to $14.1 million, from $12.7 million for the second quarter last year. As a percentage of revenue, gross margin for Wholesale increased to 28% from 25%. Again this quarter, the increase, on both an absolute dollar and margin basis, was primarily the result of our continued success in managing the Domains business for gross margin, in particular, our focus on high quality customers. Gross margin for Retail Domain Services decreased by less than 1% to $4.3 million, from $4.4 million in Q2 last year but, as a percentage of revenue, increased slightly…

Elliot Noss

Analyst

Thanks, Dave. I noted in our commentary published concurrently with the Ting-DISH announcement that we expect the deal to be neutral to slightly negative for 2020 EBITDA and are therefore leaving our guidance for the year unchanged at $50 million. With the Ting Mobile-DISH transaction announced earlier this week, we can start to better see how our three businesses fit together. From the time we announced our entry into the mobile phone market nearly ten years ago, we have been explaining the connection between our roots in domain registration and our entry into the billing business. In both spaces, we were doing excellent work in billing, provisioning and customer experience. Mobile was attractive as it has much higher margins and was a much larger market. Today, we have, in some sense, three distinct businesses: domains, mobile and fixed Internet. But they are all built on one common set of competencies, billing, provisioning and customer experience. We just apply them to different problems. I noted in my opening remarks that we are now deploying the new Domains infrastructure, and I referenced benefits across all three of our businesses. We were moving from somewhat monolithic architecture to a more modern, event-driven approach. And in deploying that new Domains infrastructure, we also teased out functional elements, like payments, that were common across all three platforms. It is also the case that the transition in mobile from retail to MSE will lead to a further separation of functions both between mobile and fixed Internet and between those service platforms and the set of services shared across all platforms. Many long-time investors know that we have a small ISP billing business tucked inside of our Internet business. And many of you know that I have always harbored a desire to provide that functionality, billing, provisioning…

Q -

Analyst