Earnings Labs

Tecogen Inc. (TGEN)

Q4 2015 Earnings Call· Mon, Mar 28, 2016

$4.16

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning and welcome to the Tecogen’s Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2015 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions]. For you information, this conference is being recorded. As a reminder, a recording of this conference call will be available for playback, approximately one hour after the end of the call and will remain available until Monday, April 04, 2016. Individuals may access the recording by dialing 877-344-7529 from inside the U.S. 855-669-9658 from Canada or 412-317-0088 from outside the U.S. Enter the replay conference number of 1007-9911 followed by the pound sign. Now I would like to introduce Ariel Babcock, Tecogen’s Director of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Ariel Babcock

Analyst

Thank you, Rocco. Good day and thank you all for joining us on our fourth quarter and full year 2015 earnings conference call. On the call with me today are John Hatsopoulos and Benjamin Locke, our Co-Chief Executive Officers. Also joining us today are David Garrison, Tecogen’s Chief Financial Officer and Robert Panora our President and Chief of Operations. During the call we will be referencing slides posted on the Investor Relations section of our website at Tecogen.com. Before we begin, I’d like to remind you that this presentation includes forward-looking statements within the meaning of section 27-A of the Securities and Exchange Act of 1933 and Section 21-E of the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934. Such statements include declaration regarding the intent, belief or current expectations of the company and its management. Prospective investors are cautioned that any such forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve a number of risks and uncertainties that can materially and adversely affect the actual results as identified from time to time in the company’s SEC filings. Forward-looking statements provided herein are as of the specified date and not reaffirmed or updated at any time. I will now turn it over to John Hatsopoulos, our Co-CEO for some opening remarks. John?

John Hatsopoulos

Analyst

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you very much for listening to our story. This is an exciting period for us as some of you as shareholders for a long time know that we have spent a tremendous amount of money for technology, for new technology or combined heat and power. Also we have spent a lot of money for patents, money that I never thought, large amounts of money that I never thought would reach that kind of level, but it appears that now with our technologies moving along it looks like we are going to start getting back some of our or all of our investment and maybe more. I want to remind you that our patents are covered by Lloyd's of London which is something that it was very important for us because spending all these amounts of money without the protection of a large institution like Lloyd’s made them worthless. With that, I’d like to ask Ben who is my partner to give you an update to see how the company is doing and hopefully tell you how he sees the company in the future. Ben?

Benjamin Locke

Analyst

Thank you, John. I’d like to start off our call by reminding those who maybe new to our company with Tecogen's core business model, as shown on Slide 4. Heat, power and cooling that is cheaper, cleaner and more reliable. Our proprietary technology for improving efficiency, emissions and grid resiliency is truly disruptive to the traditional method of heating, cooling and powering buildings and infrastructure. As I’ll describe in this discussion, the combination of our unique technology, overall trends in energy supply and demand and increasing global emphasis on environmentally clean technology all favor Tecogen's continued growth. As seen from the timeline on slide four, 2015 was a very productive year for the company and we will spend some time discussing these strategic accomplishments. First, turn to slide five, I will review some of the key financial metrics for our company, revenues, margin and sales backlog. The year 2015 saw our revenues reach $21.4 million compared to $19.3 million in 2014, an increase of 11%. This was driven by a 16.6% growth in product revenue and 6.2% growth in service revenue. Gross margin for 2015 increased by 250 basis points to 35.6% compared to 33.1% in 2014. This improvement was driven by improved margins in both product revenues and service revenues, accomplishing a stated goal for 2015. And although it wasn’t one of our strongest fourth quarters, significant progress was made on key metrics that we’ll build on in 2016. First, in the fourth quarter we increased our gross margins to 37.4% exceeding our objective of achieving margins above 35% each quarter. Second, we made good progress controlling operating expenses for the quarter. We feel our expenses have leveled off and hope to make more improvement in managing them going forward. While we ended the quarter with a loss, it’s…

Robert Panora

Analyst

Thank you, Ben and good morning. I will begin my discussion with our new product launch just mentioned by Ben and announced on January 26th. As described in the press release, our main stay CHP product InVerde will be phased out over the next few quarters replaced by a significantly more advanced second generation model, the InVerde e+. This new model has been in development for a number of years and represents a large quality of upgrades and refinements that further distance us from the competition. Let me elaborate. The heart of the e+ is the new proprietary InVerde utilizing the latest in electronics; it operates at a high efficiency than its predecessor with less components and reduced noise signature. The InVerde includes on-board power electronics and control to directly accept DC power from a battery of solar PV system. We believe the battery application will be an important one especially as battery technology improves, similar to solar systems being able to be bank electricity with -- and related time has significant value. This will be for example in applications for electricity tests vary by time and day, electricity produced off peak would be expanded on peak for grid revenue and so forth. Battery storage also provides us a capability to amplify our systems on critical power applications such as UTS or uninterrupted power supply type systems. Our engine has also been upgraded to a larger, more efficient model which includes the Ultera emissions after treatment but also in the advanced features such as computer managed ignition system requiring no maintenance or adjustment, the larger engine permits us to run at a lower engine RPM which has positive impact on fuel consumption, service and noise. Its larger size provides an opportunity for higher chiller rating [ph] which we anticipate for…

David Garrison

Analyst

Thanks Bob. Reviewing the highlights from the year-over-year financial results, revenues increased with strong product revenue related to an increase in cogen unit shipments, while the heat pump unit volume increase, the decrease in chiller unit volume lead to a decrease in dollar revenue for the category. We expect this category to rebound in 2016. Installation services and service maintenance contract revenue continued its steady growth resulting in more than half of our total revenues. We are pleased with the nearly 11% growth in revenues. This growth in conjunction with consistent backlog of over $10 million meets management goal of a book-to-bill ratio in the range of 1 to 1.5. Cost of sales benefited from reaching scale as manufacturing volume continues to grow and our efficiency programs continue to yield improvement. Margins for both products and services improved with lean initiatives and continued focus on higher value added work. Management expects to continue this trend in the near future. Gross margins and expense reduction programs continue as management uses its cash resources in a thoughtful manager. On slide 15, we have our charts that we use to guide us through this process. Starting with the chart in the upper left hand corner, total revenue for the year is $21.5 million. The year-over-year growth is 11%, while the quarter to quarter revenue shows some volatility. The longer term growth trend continuous and we expect recent partnerships will yield greater growth in the near future. The chart in the upper right illustrates management success in our goal of improving consolidated gross margins of greater than 35%. This success is expected to continue into the future. In the lower right is a chart of our operating expenses. It’s our first full year been public. Managements goal to lower operating expenses have begun. We believe the current year will be our peak as a team works to tighten and decrease spending as a move forward towards profitability continues. And finally, in the lower left, the backlog chart plus our weekly backlog, currently at $12.2 million as of March 21. This backlog is ahead of management goal to exceed 10 million in product and turnkey service revenue. As a reminder, backlog does not include service contract revenue which was more than one third of our revenues in 2015. On slide 16, our targets are clear. Management continues to meet its goal of delivery improving margin in the range of 35% to 40%. Backlog has maintained above 10 million in revenue from product and installation sales. And stable operating expenses of 10 million on a 12 month basis is our target that we believe we can make. And now, I’ll turn it over to Ben for closing remarks.

Benjamin Locke

Analyst

Thanks Dave. In terms of churns in our favor, we expect demand for our CHP systems to remain strong. The fundamental economics of CHP such as high electric rates, low gas rates and great resiliency concern continue to be in our favor. The Ilios market continue to extend both geographically and in different market segments and we expect additional sales of our water source system and facilities that consistently have the need for simultaneous heating and cooling process water, such as manufacturing. And as Bob described, adapting the Ultera missions technology the gasoline vehicles represents an exciting and game changing new market for Tecogen. The prospect of vehicle fleets and passion of vehicles operating with standard engine technology but realizing fuel sale like emissions is tremendously compelling from a policy and market standpoint. Our plan is to seize on this opportunity the improvement of the Ultera technology is the best5 way to meet strict emission standards. And lastly we will continue to grow our patent and intellectual property base around this technology. In addition to the patent applications filed this year around emissions controls, new patents and trade mark applications will be filed to protect the company’s competitive position in its very promising market. In closing we have very wide prospects for growing Tecogen in 2016 and look forward to sharing developments with you as they occur. With that I’d like to thank you for joining our call and look forward to speaking with you again in our next earnings call.