Stuart Miller
Analyst · Raymond James
Thank you. As Matt indicated we're pleased with our results for the fourth quarter in the full year. I will talk about our non-GAAP results which are before stock-based compensation. Please refer to our press release for reconciliation of our non-GAAP and GAAP results. I'll begin by reviewing our fourth quarter of the fiscal year 2015 results, and then I will comment on our first quarter and full year 2016 financial outlook. Thereafter we'll open up the call to your questions. We generated total revenue in the fourth quarter of $39.9 million, an increase of 32.4% from the fourth of last year. In addition, our non-GAAP operating margin improved 10.7% points compared to the fourth quarter last year. Breaking out revenue by reporting line item; subscription and support revenue was $32.1million, up 28.4% from Q4 of 2014. 47.6% of the S&S revenue increase in Q4 came from new customers added in the last 12 months. The remaining 52.4% of the increase came from deeper penetration of our existing customer base. The average contract value on subscription and support from all customers continued to rise. Professional services revenue was $7.8 million, an increase of 52% from the fourth quarter of 2014. Higher customer count in services from non-SEC use cases particularly stocks and regulatory risk accounted for the majority of growth in services revenue in the fourth quarter. Turning to our supplemental metrics – we finished the fourth quarter with 2,524 customers, a net increase of 263 customers from Q4 of 2014 and a net increase of 56 from Q4 of 2015. Our subscription and support revenue retention rate was 95.8% at December 2015 measurement date, down slightly from 96.4% at September 2015. Customers being acquired or ceasing to file SEC reports once again accounted for over half of our revenue attrition. Including add-ons, our subscription and support revenue retention rate was 112.5% as of December 2015 measurement date, up from 107.7% in September 2015. Consistent with mass comments earlier, increase subscription bookings from existing customers on non-SEC use cases with the primary driver of the inquiries in the add-on revenue retention rate. Moving down the income statement. Gross profit was $29.1 million for the fourth quarter, up 42.8% from the same quarter a year ago representing a gross margin of 72.9% compared to a gross margin of 67.5% in the fourth quarter of 2014. Now breaking out gross profit; subscription and support gross profit was $26.4 million, equating to a gross margin of 82.2% on S&S revenue; compared to $19 million or 76% gross margin in the fourth quarter of 2014. Improved efficiency of our customer success team and higher subscription prices accounted for the margin expansion. Professional services gross profit in the fourth quarter was $2.7 million, equating to a 34.1% gross margin, compared to $1.3 million or 25.9% gross margin in the same period last year. Better utilization of capacity compared to Q4 last year accounted for the higher margin. Turning to operating expenses; research and development expense in the fourth quarter was $12.9 million, an increase of 10.9% from $11.6 million in the prior year's fourth quarter due to higher compensation and additional staff as we've been dedicated more resources to building the next generation of Wdesk. Our R&D expense as a percentage of revenue this quarter declined to 32.2%, compared to 38.5% in Q4 last year. Sales and marketing expense increased 32.4% over Q4 of 2014, to $18.1 million, driven primarily by additional headcount and cash incentive compensation in line with our expectations. Expanded marketing programs accounted for the remaining part of the increase. General and administrative expenses were $6.7 million in Q4, an increase of 40%, compared with $4.8 million in the fourth quarter of 2014, driven by the cost of being a public company, together with increased compensation, software and support fees. Operating loss was $8.7 million in the fourth quarter of 2015, compared to $9.8 million in the same period last year. Net loss was $7.2 million for the fourth quarter of 2015 compared to a net loss of $10.8 million in the fourth quarter of 2014. We posted a net loss per share of $0.18 in the fourth quarter of 2015 compared to a net loss per share of $0.33 in the same quarter a year ago. Now I'll recap our full fiscal year 2015 results. Total revenue was $145.3 million, up 29% year-over-year. Subscription and support revenue was $116.3 million, increasing 27% over 2014. Professional services revenue was $29 million, up 36% from the prior year. So our revenue mix was 80% subscription and support and 20% professional services in 2015. Moving down the P&L and again focusing on non-GAAP expenses, gross profit was $105.8 million, rising 32.8% year-over-year, representing a 72.8% gross margin. Operating loss was $32.7 million, compared with a loss of $31.2 million in the prior year. Net loss was $32.4 million in 2015 and net loss per share was $0.81 which compares to a net loss of $33.8 million in 2014 or $1.05 per share. Turning to our balance sheet in our statement of cash flows; at December 31, 2015, we had cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities of $76.2 million, a decrease of $5.6 million compared with the balance at September 30, 2015. In the fourth quarter of 2015, net cash used in operating activities was $5 million, compared to $4.6 million in the same quarter a year ago. As you may recall from previous calls, we cut incentives for long-term prepayments from customers in order to capture more margin and we continue to implement that plan. As a result, our long-term preferred revenue declined almost a $1 million in the fourth quarter of 2015. Offsetting this decline was an increase in current deferred revenue of $4.7 million, which was comprised of a $3.9 million rise in subscription and support deferred revenue and a $800,000 increase in professional services deferred revenue. Before I address guidance, I want to review the seasonality of our business model. Seasonality affects three dimensions of our financials; revenue, expenses and cash flow. Let's talk about revenue first. The first quarter is the seasonal peak for our professional services revenue because many of our SEC customers file their 10-K in the first quarter and hire Workiva to help them with XBRL tagging. The utilization rate for our professional services team runs close to 100% in the first quarter every year. We typically run lower utilization rates in the other quarters but professional services revenue has been rising the last few quarters due to the growth of our non-SEC use cases. The secondary seasonality I want to mention relates to expenses. Our sales and marketing expenses peaked in the third quarter since we hold our annual user conference in September. Third area of seasonality I want to highlight is cash flow. Workiva typically takes cash bonuses in the first quarter which has been a significant use of cash. Also as we deliver professional services in the first quarter, we burn off short-term deferred revenue related to services that were invoiced during the prior year which shows us as a use of cash on that line item in Q1, at the end of Q1. Turning to our guidance for 2016, our guidance on non-GAAP loss from operations and non-GAAP loss for basic share, excludes the impact of stock-based compensation; please refer to our press release for a reconciliation of our non-GAAP and GAAP guidance. For the first quarter of 2016, we expect total revenue to range from $42.3 million to $42.8 million. We expect a year-over-year growth rate in our subscription revenue to outpace the growth rate in professional services in the first quarter. Since the utilization rate for our professional services team typically runs close to 100% in the first quarter, Q1 growth and services revenue is limited to a function of headcount and billing rates. We anticipate non-GAAP operating loss to range from $10.4 million to $10.9 million. We expect GAAP operating loss in the range of $13.9 million to $14.4 million. As Matt indicated, we plan to continue to invest in sales and marketing and research and development. We anticipate non-GAAP net loss per share to range from $0.26 to $0.28, with GAAP loss per share in the range of $0.35 to $0.37. Our loss-per-share guidance assumes 40.5 million basic and diluted shares outstanding. Our guidance for the full fiscal year 2016 is as follows; we expect total revenue to range from $177 million to $180 million. Based on the midpoint of that range we are expecting revenue growth to 23% in 2016. We expect non-GAAP operating loss to be in the range of $46 million to $49 million and anticipate GAAP operating loss to range from $60.8 million to $63.8 million. Workiva's operating cash flow was a negative $21.6 million in 2015. We operating cash flow to improve for the full year 2016 and then again in 2017 as Matt indicated. We anticipate most of the expected cash used in each year to occur in the first quarter, heavily impacted by seasonality for the reasons I discussed earlier. Also based on our projections, including our expected ability to convert some quarterly contracts to annual contracts, we believe operating cash flow for the fourth quarter of 2016 will be breakeven or better. We continue to believe that we raised enough money at our IPO to get the positive annual operating cash flow without needing to return to the equity market. We expect non-GAAP net loss per share to be in the range of $1.16 to $1.23 in 2016 and we expect GAAP net loss per share in the same year to range from $1.52 to $1.59 per share. Our loss-per-share guidance for the full year assumes 41 million basic and diluted shares outstanding. In summary, Workiva posted another strong quarter. Demand remains robust for our solutions. We remain focused on executing our growth plan to capitalize on our multi-billion dollar market opportunity. And we will now take your questions. Operator Mike, we're ready to begin the Q&A session.