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Expro Group Holdings N.V. (XPRO)

Q4 2016 Earnings Call· Thu, Feb 23, 2017

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning and welcome to Frank's International Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2016 Earnings Conference Call. My name is Vanessa, and I'll be your operator for today's call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question-and-answer session. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I will now turn the call over to Mr. Blake Holcomb. You may begin, sir.

Blake Holcomb - Frank's International NV

Management

Thanks, Vanessa. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the Frank's International conference call to discuss the fourth quarter and full year 2016 earnings. I'm Blake Holcomb, Director of Investor Relations. Joining me on the call today are Douglas Stephens, President and Chief Executive Officer; Jeff Bird, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer; and Kyle McClure, Senior Vice President of Finance, Treasurer and soon-to-be Interim CFO. We have posted a presentation on our website that we will refer to throughout this call. If you'd like to view this presentation, please go to the Investors section of our website at franksinternational.com. Before we begin commenting on our 2016 results, there are a few legal items I'd like to begin to cover on page 3. First, remarks and answers to questions by company representatives on today's call may refer to or contain forward-looking statements. Such remarks or answers are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such statements. Such statements speak only as of today's date or, if different, as of the date specified. The company assumes no responsibility to update any forward-looking statements as of any future date. The company has included in its SEC filings cautionary language identifying important factors that could cause actual results to be materially different from those set forth in any forward-looking statements. A more complete discussion of the risk is included in the company's SEC filings which may be accessed on the SEC's website, or on the website at franksinternational.com. You may also access both the fourth quarter and full year earnings press release and a replay of this call. Please note that any non-GAAP financial measures discussed during this call are defined and reconciled to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measure in the fourth quarter and full year earnings release, which was issued earlier today by the company. I will now turn the call over to Douglas for his comments.

Douglas Gray Stephens - Frank's International NV

Management

Thank you, Blake, and good morning to everyone on the call. I'd like to begin with a brief introduction to those on the call, I've not had the opportunity to meet yet during my little over three months at Frank's International. So throughout my more than 25 years in oilfield services, I've had the opportunity to work in a variety of roles and with a diverse set of customers around the globe. And in many of these locations, I've had the opportunity to see Frank's deliver quality service to satisfied customers. In fact, one of the reasons I was drawn to accept this position was this company, or the company's strong reputation for quality, technological expertise and of course our global extensive footprint. Although the current environment has presented challenges we've not seen in decades, Frank's has not only proven its ability to endure, but to continue to set the standard for complex well construction. And I'm confident that we will not only weather this storm, but we will come out as a stronger, more efficient organization than we entered. The first point I'd like to highlight is the successful acquisition of Blackhawk in Q4. This is a provider of specialty tools in the well construction space. And this is the largest acquisition in the history of our company. And our focus now is on the execution of this integration. So despite a difficult 2016, we achieved two technical industry milestones for tubular running services. In September, Frank's International established a global record in casing while drilling operations. Through modifying our existing technology and close collaboration with a large integrated service provider, we were able to complete the first 30-inch casing while drilling job, saving the customer more than a day of rig time. We also played a critical role…

Jeffrey J. Bird - Frank's International NV

Management

Thank you, Douglas. It's been privilege to play a part in helping Frank's make the transition from a private to public company. We've been able to accomplish a lot in a relatively short time, and I believe the company is well positioned for the future. Since this is my last time on the earnings call, as a member of the management team, I would like to introduce Kyle McClure, who will be serving as Interim CFO, following my departure March 1. Kyle and I have worked together for the past four years at Frank's and our previous company. As Senior Vice President of Finance and Treasurer, he served as a financial lead for the Western Hemisphere and we have worked closely together on many of the initiatives we have implemented during my tenure at Frank's. Douglas and I are confident he will make my transition out a smooth and seamless process. Kyle?

Kyle F. McClure - Frank's International NV

Management

Thanks, Jeff. Turning to page 7, I will begin providing additional detail on changes in the global offshore mobile rig markets that we saw during the quarter. Overall market share was flat versus Q3 at 17% as we saw the addressable market decline by 12 rigs during the quarter. Continuing themes from Q3, Latin America, Canada and Middle East were all bright spots during the quarter which we were able to grow our revenue and share. In the Middle East, specifically, we're finally gaining traction in the local market as we are now fully operational and saw revenues increase roughly 25% Q-on-Q. West Africa saw a decline in share and revenue, as work pushes out or was canceled altogether. Mobile rig count is down by almost 50% in this region in 2016 and likely will continue to be challenged in the near-term time horizon. In our largest market, the Gulf of Mexico, we saw revenues decline but share was higher as the average rig count remains relatively flat. Rigs and revenue in Europe fell in the quarter, but in line with our market share in the region. Finally, Asia-Pacific saw declines in revenue and share as new work in the region was slower to start up than expected. Continuing on to the quarterly financial results on page 8. Given the nature of the current environment, we would look at Q4 revenue declines of the core Frank's business as mostly a price story. As mentioned previously, offshore mobile rig count was down slightly during the quarter. And we did see many delays in Asia-Pacific and Europe. But pricing continues to be challenging in most regions, as we see a variety of pressures, from competition to customers looking to retender for lower prices, all having pressures on top-line revenue. That being said,…

Douglas Gray Stephens - Frank's International NV

Management

Thank you, Kyle, and moving to page 12 and before opening the line for questions, let me offer some thoughts on our strategy and goals as we progress through 2017. So we've said that our strategy consists of three primary components: one, maintain our dominant position in our core TRS markets; two, grow in underrepresented markets on international, land, shelf, and deepwater; and three, become a more complete well construction company through a broader product and service offering. In 2017, our top priority will be to continue to execute on this strategy. We will accomplish this first by providing safe and efficient operations to our customers. Second, we will increase our value proposition by bundling well construction offerings that are designed to meet our customers' needs. We've identified the top 10 Frank's core technologies and another four from Blackhawk that we plan to commercialize throughout 2017. These offerings are the most complementary to serve customers facing challenging environments including depths, temperatures, pressures, and corrosive environments. The combination of these well construction products will provide customers the convenience to benefit in more than one area of Frank's value proposition. As safety, efficiency, and well integrity come into greater focus for the industry, the opportunity to save a customer time and money while increasing our share of the well construction spend represents a win-win scenario. For example, a customer drilling in a challenging formation with a deviated well bore and corrosive gas can have a package offering that meets their well performance objectives. Using the industry's only true non-marking casing running technology and installing our proprietary drill string torque reduction tool that prevents potentially hazardous casing abrasion during the drilling process, can improve the integrity and ultimately the life of the well. Furthermore, adding the ability to manage the cement head and…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And we have our first question from Ian Macpherson with Simmons & Company. Please go ahead. Your line is open. Ian Macpherson - Simmons & Company International: Hey, good morning. Thank you. Lot of moving parts with your U.S. Services margins, and I think that was the Q4 result, that was where the big positive surprise was, with your margin improvement. And I understand there were some one-off benefits, and I understand the guidance for Q1 to trend a little bit lower. But it sounds like, in general, if my back of the envelope math is right, that your Gulf of Mexico margins probably stayed above 35%, maybe 40% for the fourth quarter, which is better than we had feared. And I wonder if I could fact check that with you when you also just get the sense of your normalized margin expectations for the Gulf of Mexico business for 2017?

Kyle F. McClure - Frank's International NV

Management

Yeah, Ian, this is Kyle. So, yeah, you're spot on there with your analysis of the Gulf of Mexico margins within the quarter. A lot going on in U.S. Services. Obviously we have our corporate and other component there as well, which we talked about was down $3 million sequentially, and of the net, sort of $2 million good guys I talked about, an abnormal amount were kind of sitting in U.S. Services, if you will. So looking out into 2017, I think the Gulf of Mexico business will continue to be challenged as we continue to see more rigs come offline and impacting our rig count there. So it'll continue to be a struggle for us, I think to kind of maintain that 40% margin as we move through kind of Q1 and Q2 here. We talked about it somewhat in the prepared commentary, but we do see some headwinds in Gulf of Mexico here in the first couple quarters of the year as there's competition out that's pretty fierce right now and things on the bidding side are getting a bit more challenging, I think than we had hoped. So I think the Gulf of Mexico and U.S. Services margins will probably likely be challenged in the first half of 2017. Ian Macpherson - Simmons & Company International: Okay. But then, given the improvements that are unfolding with onshore pricing, where would you say your margins, EBITDA margins for U.S. land are today, and where could they be in the second half of the year?

Kyle F. McClure - Frank's International NV

Management

I don't know if we've historically given out the EBITDA margins for U.S. land. I would say they're probably right now in the 20% range as we exited the quarter. And we're looking at Q1 as potential uptick to that number as well. So I would say that business itself is getting healthier right now. We've talked about the base closures and the price increases we talked about in the quarter, we raised prices across the board, I think roughly 20%, 25%. That was nicely received by our customer base. There's a lot of, obviously, the rig count increasing people are willing to pay-up for right now. And we were losing money in that business and decided not to do that anymore. So we got the cost structure right. Got the pricing correct. I would say heading forward, we're looking for that business to be north of 20%. Ian Macpherson - Simmons & Company International: Very helpful. All right. Thank you.

Kyle F. McClure - Frank's International NV

Management

Thanks.

Operator

Operator

And thank you. And I'm sorry, speakers, it appears that we have no further questions at this time. I will now turn the call over to Mr. Douglas Stephens for closing remarks.

Douglas Gray Stephens - Frank's International NV

Management

Okay. Thank you all for your time and your interest in Frank's International, and we hope to hear from you next quarter. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

And thank you, ladies and gentlemen. This concludes today's conference. We thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.