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Huron Consulting Group Inc. (HURN)

Q1 2009 Earnings Call· Fri, May 1, 2009

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Huron Consulting Group's webcast to discuss results for the first quarter 2009. At this time all conference lines are in a listen-only mode. Later we will conduct a question-and-answer session for conference call participants and instructions will follow at that time. As a reminder this conference call is being recorded. And now, I would like to turn the call over to Gary Holdren, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Huron Consulting Group. Mr. Holdren, please go ahead.

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Good morning. And thank you for joining us for today's webcast to discuss Huron Consulting Group's first quarter 2009 results. Before we begin, I would like to point all of you to the disclosure at the end of our news release for information about any forward-looking statements that may be made or discussed on this call. We have posted a news release on our Web site. Please review that information along with our filings with the SEC for disclosure of factors that may impact subjects discussed in this morning's webcast. Today we will be discussing one or more non-GAAP financial measures. Please look at our earnings release and on our Web site for all disclosures required by the SEC including reconciliation to the most comparable GAAP numbers. Joining me on the earnings Call today in Chicago, are Gary Burge, our Chief Financial Officer; and Mary Sawall, our Vice President of Human Resources. This morning, Gary Burge will start by covering our first quarter results as well as our 2009 guidance. Then I will provide some thoughts on where we are today and what the balance of the year holds for Huron. In February, we gave you our outlook for Huron's full year performance. And Gary Burge will tell you shortly why we believe the forecast is still solid. After Gary's remarks, I'm going to give you our outlook on the demand for each of our segments. I will also tell you how we are going to manage the business, so we can deliver results that will benefit our clients, our employees and our shareholders. Gary?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

Thanks, Gary, and good morning, everyone. While on an overall basis, this quarter was not a strong one from a pure financial metrics point of view. We can tell you that we've seen progress being made in each of our segments over the first four months, which gives us reasons to be optimistic as we proceed through the second quarter and move into the second half of the year. Key financial results for the quarter included the following. Revenues of $163 million were up approximately 17% compared to the first quarter of last year, while our top line results excluding Stockamp reflect an overall negative organic growth rate of approximately 6%. Gary and I will be giving you some color on why we see our Health and Education and Corporate Consulting segments being able to continue to grow their businesses over the balance of the year and why we continue to see some recent disappointing revenue trends in Accounting and Financial Consulting and Legal Consulting beginning to reverse themselves here in the second quarter. This supports our improved outlook for both of these segments over the remainder of the year. EBITDA increased nearly 14% to 29.3 million for the first quarter, and our adjusted EBITDA rose more than 11% to 35.9 million. Our adjusted EBITDA margin was 22% of revenues here in the first quarter of 2009 compared to approximately 23%, a year ago. Excluding severance costs for both years, adjusted EBITDA margins would have been relatively flat compared to the year ago quarter. Operating income increased nearly 6% to 21.8 million for the quarter, up from 20.6 million last year. Our operating margin was nearly 13.5% compared to last year's nearly 15%, reflecting once again the higher severance cost of $1.1 million as well as higher amortization cost of…

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Thank you, Gary. Now that you've heard the details of our first quarter results and our reiteration of our 2009 guidance. I'm going to take a few minutes to talk about the market demands for each of our segments. We are being cautious, but at the same time, we are incrementally more comfortable with our guidance range than we were at the end of February. That's because of backlog firming up, plus some encouraging trends in the pipeline of new opportunities for Health and Education Consulting, Legal Consulting, and Accounting and Financial Consulting. Let me start with our Health and Education Consulting segment, which accounted for 57% of Huron's revenues in the first quarter. This business will deliver significant organic growth in 2009. And as I have said many times, the Health and Education Consulting segment has solid visibility because of its hard backlog of work and a very specific pipeline of new opportunities that are being pursued. Huron experience tells us that the need for our services is at a high level right now and increasing. And recent third-party research confirms the strength of our healthcare consulting business despite the current economic conditions. Healthcare is a capital intensive industry with significant cash needs. Today's credit market and Wall Street issues come at a time when hospitals are facing Medicare cuts, increased labor costs and decreased donations. In addition, many hospitals will be required to increase their pension reserves to offset the losses on retirement investments. So it is essential that hospitals continue to find ways to improve their cash from operations. They can do that by minimizing revenue leakage and accelerating cash collections through improvements to the revenue cycle. That is one of our key healthcare competencies. We also help hospitals improve its efficiencies from operations through increased labor…

Operator

Operator

(Operator instructions) The first question comes from the line of Tim McHugh with William Blair and Company. Please proceed. Tim McHugh – William Blair and Company: Yes. Just want to touch on some of the comments you made about the improvement you've seen in the Financial Consulting segment. I know you said you're at the midpoint of your guidance still assumes flat year-over-year, at the low point, what would that assume? As well as can you give us any sense for the magnitude of the improvement that you've seen going into the second quarter here?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Yes, I think, Tim, the magnitude that we see now, if we didn't see any more, we probably would be somewhere, maybe still $10 million short or so. I think if we see somewhere, if we just got what we see now, maybe $120 million, we'd still be short. But we've seen some substantial improvement. Tim McHugh – William Blair and Company: So if you based on the projects you've won so far, and if you didn't win anything else, you'd feel comfortable with the $120 million annual run rate?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Well, we still got to replace and just like the Consulting business, this is a sort of win and-replace, but based on what we feel that we see in the improvement in pickup of jobs we know we've won. We still need to win more work to get to the midpoint. Tim McHugh – William Blair and Company: Okay. And then within the Legal Consulting, I know in the past, you've talked about for the V3locity product specifically, kind of $90 million or so as a rough annual run rate that you're hoping for this year. To get to that at this point, you would need essentially three quarters that were similar to the very strong third quarter you had last year. Is that still a range that you're thinking about for that segment? And can 2Q rebound that quickly to a level like that given the wins you've had?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Well, Q2 will rebound. We still do believe that we've got people in seats today. And based on what everything we've seen, Tim, and then we reforecast the business; we still believe that we can come close to hitting that number. Tim McHugh – William Blair Company: Okay. And then lastly, the strength in Stockamp, can you talk about, were there any large engagements or large incentive fees or are they just continuing to grow the number of engagements given the demand in the firm?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Well, one of the things we should make sure of is when we say healthcare; it includes both Wellspring and Stockamp. And they are winning assignments together, and they're winning bigger ones. And it's both more assignments, bigger ones and bigger assignments give you more opportunity for more success fees. So it's just a combination of winning more work, bigger engagements together collectively the two units. Tim McHugh – William Blair and Company: Okay. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Paul Ginocchio from Deutsche Bank. Please proceed. Paul Ginocchio – Deutsche Bank: Thanks. Just wondering if I could ask about the financial, the insurance business you've won in Finance and Accounting. Any way to size that in how much that's going to potentially impact the second quarter versus the first, just we can sort of Q on Q sort of development? Thanks.

Gary Holdren

Chairman

I think the improvement will be more in Q3 and Q4 than it will be in Q2. Those assignments probably won't start until sometime in May. And I think they ramp up and they're typically 12 months to 18 months. So you'll see more improvement in those in Q3 and Q4 and probably into '010. But they should be nice sized jobs. They're not whales, but they're good backlog, and they're good work. Paul Ginocchio – Deutsche Bank: Okay, thank you.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Andrew Fones with UBS. Please proceed. Andrew Fones – UBS: Yes, thank you. I just wanted to touch on the Legal Consulting division. And within there, you mentioned you've seen a pickup in demand for V3locity. Has some of the work that's been previously been deferred? Have your seen a release there or can you kind of describe what's driven these pickup in demand? Thanks.

Gary Holdren

Chairman

One of them is we've got a very large second review for a major client, that's taken quite a few seats. I think we're deferring, for whatever reason, Andrew, they still have to have the work done. And I think if you could move stuff out for three months, and move it into next year; you've reduced your costs three quarters. So I think we just saw sort of a movement of people. We've still got our master service agreements; we've still got clients telling us how much they need us to do this year. And we got a very large assignment in there right now for a second request. Andrew Fones – UBS: Okay, thanks. And then in terms of the Corporate division, you've seen a nice pick-up there. It appears as though you've actually seen more than just the revenue drop to bottom line. Obviously, you closed down that one business in Q3, the Operational Consulting business. Could you comment at all in terms of what we might see in terms of margin improvement in that business over the balance of year or do you think we've kind of reached a level you're comfortable with?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

Andrew, Gary Burge here. Yes, margins in the high 30s right now certainly meet our expectations. I wouldn't expect that those would continue to ramp up over that existing level. But it's a real solid performer right now, and we're very pleased with their results. And we think they can continue to work strong here through the remainder of the year based on existing backlog. Andrew Fones – UBS: Thanks. And then, just finally, in terms of the charge you took it looks as though about half of it was in the Financial Consulting group, and the rest was spread around the other areas. Can you kind of detail where the rest of that was and perhaps when in the quarter you took the charge, and so what the impact was in Q1 if you saw any kind of cost savings at all and how those cost savings, what we might see in terms of cost savings for the full year? Thanks.

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

Right. Andrew, the two areas that absorbed the bulk of the severance charges were, roughly half of it in Financial Consulting and the other half basically in higher education and healthcare consulting. Those terminations took place throughout the quarter, but in general, probably more in the second half. And there will be savings associated with this on a go-forward basis. But we caution people to try to do the math and say, well, there's significant savings coming on a go-forward basis here, because we're continuing to hire into the Health and Education segment. And we're even hiring in Accounting and Financial Consulting, where we see good resources that can help us move the needle going forward. Andrew Fones – UBS: But the quarter end headcount was fully adjusted for the severance?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

Yes. Andrew Fones – UBS: Thanks.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Tobey Sommer with SunTrust Robinson Humphrey. Please proceed. Frank – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Good morning. This is Frank [ph] in for Tobey. Had a quick question, kind of following the prior question. Do you expect any kind of charges related to severance or any other charges in 2Q?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

I think this is an ongoing thing for us. We're continuing to evaluate resources. And we'd say that positively or negatively that there would not necessarily charges going forward, but we're continuing to look at that. And we've always had some level of severance charges in any quarter. Frank – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Okay, great. And could you remind us the breakdown between restructuring and turnaround and strategy within the Corporate Consulting group?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

In general, the strategy and restructuring and turnaround businesses are about the same size. And then the utilities and Japan operations each are something, somewhere in the neighborhood of $10 million to $12 million of revenues on an annual basis. Frank – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Okay. And finally, you talked about several new products, projects in the core component of the Legal Consulting business. As far as the ramp-up horizon for those projects, would we expect to see most of that in the back half of the year or it's pretty early?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Well, the projects that you're going to see the improvement in you're going to see them in Q2 and probably Q3. So we haven't sold the whole year through, but we have sold. We had sort of a rough January, rough February, March improved, April improved, and we're seeing continued improvement both in the revenue run rate and in the fees sold. But we still don't have the whole year sold. But we should see substantial improvement in Q2 and Q3 from the work sold recently. Frank – SunTrust Robinson Humphrey: Okay, great. Thanks so much.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Jim Janesky from Stifel Nicolaus. Please proceed. Jim Janesky – Stifel Nicolaus: Yes, thank you. Gary Holdren, on the last call, you had spoken about questioning whether there would ever be a big ramp-up in what we referred to as regulatory activity coming out of at least the federal government. And you said so far, you still have not seen that. It sounds like your expectation now for a ramp-up is a bit higher. Can you tell me what that's based upon please?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Yes, it's based on work in the financial services sector, it's based on work on international arbitration, we're really going and getting, winning in the marketplace, lot of other jobs, other than big investigations coming out of regulatory bodies. So we still don't have any, really, very high, we still need a little bit of that. We'd like to get it. But we've won a lot of things recently that's going to help our run rates, that aren't related to that yet. Jim Janesky – Stifel Nicolaus: Okay. But do you feel more confident now than at the beginning of this year that the government is going to get more active on the regulatory front in the back half of the year? And if so, why?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Yes, right now, I don't think we have any reason to have any optimism about that. Jim Janesky – Stifel Nicolaus: Okay. Okay, fair enough. Gary Burge, when you look at percent of revenues, you mentioned 55% of revenues would be back-end loaded. What percent of operating profits or EBITDA, however you want to look at it, would you expect to be in the back half of the year as well?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

Probably slightly more, because we're expecting the back half of the year will have more contingent fees than we had in the first half. We would also expect that as the year goes on that our utilizations in Financial Consulting and Legal Consulting would improve. And that certainly helps margins as that happens. Jim Janesky – Stifel Nicolaus: Sure. Sure.

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

So I'd say it'll be something better than 55% of the EBITDA, maybe something 60%-ish, if I had to guess. Jim Janesky – Stifel Nicolaus: Okay, makes sense. And when you look at the accounting for contingent fees, when you first acquired Stockamp, and that percentage went up, you said you were going to try to smooth it out a little bit more. Then in conversations with your folks you had said there has been some pushback from your clients on that. Has there been any change to the expectation that for right now, we should expect that these are all going to be back-end loaded?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

No, not entirely. We had a meaningful amount of contingent fees in the first quarter. About 9% of our revenues in the first quarter were contingent fee-related. And so we're working real hard to get those recognized as we go. But just the facts are there are going to be more opportunities to recognize contingent fees in the second half than there was in the first half. But we'll try to do our best to keep those coming through each quarter. Jim Janesky – Stifel Nicolaus: Because last time, on the last quarter call, you did say about 60% of the profits would be in the back half of the year. Since we did get some contingencies in the first half of the year, it is all the ramp-up in Financial and Legal, right?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

Yes, there's ramp-up in Financial and Legal that will help us get to that 55%. But also, our Health and Education segment, they're moving into implementation phase as opposed to assessment phase. Basically, the revenues will climb slowly and our costs are going to stay relatively flat. So that helps margins as well. Jim Janesky – Stifel Nicolaus: Okay. Last question, I think that unless I missed something that some reductions in the headcount in the Healthcare and Education segment was somewhat of a surprise, considering the trends there. When was that decision made and why?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

The decision was made because every business should look at performers who don't meet expectations and move on them, regardless if they're hot or not. It was just part of our yearend process as we went through our evaluations of people. Jim Janesky – Stifel Nicolaus: Okay. Alright. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from the line of Dan Leben from Robert W. Baird. Please proceed. Dan Leben – Robert W. Baird: Great. Could you guys talk a little bit about where you see the margins in Financial and Legal Consulting getting to for the year? Obviously, very depressed in the first quarter?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

Yes, Dan, Gary Burge here. Certainly the margins, where they stand right now, are not where we need them to be and want them to be. And so as the year progresses, we could get something in the 30% range is where we would want to be as far as a run rate in the second half of the year. Dan Leben – Robert W. Baird: Okay, great. And then last quarter, you mentioned that the severance in this quarter was baked into the guidance. Does the guidance currently bake in any additional severance for the rest of the year?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

We'll be prepared to deal with that in those guidance ranges we gave you.

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Yes, we'll cover all the severance in those guidance numbers. Dan Leben – Robert W. Baird: Okay. And then lastly, just the wins in Financial Consulting in the insurance, financial services space, were those attributable to the new hires you brought in this quarter? Or were those from elsewhere?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

We have not got any wins from the new people yet. So those were from embedded resources. So we still have substantial hope that we're going to get more wins from our new people in those service offerings, because we think they're really good people. And we really think there's huge opportunities in the financial sector. Dan Leben – Robert W. Baird: Great. Thanks, guys.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from the line of David Gold with Sidoti. David Gold – Sidoti & Company: Hi, good morning. Gary, wanted to ask if you could delve a little bit for us the improved outlook, particularly on the legal side, with pretty aggregate cuts of late at the law firms, and the trouble they're having. And as part of that, I was curious if you can just sort of fill out, basis to thesis on why things are picking up there. Is it more an ease of spend? Or is it they've gotten to a point that they just can't hold back anymore on litigation in the legal work, and it just has to come through?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Yes, well, I think the one of the things Shisad Visher [ph] and his managing directors have been really out in the marketplace. And they've been focusing on information management and cost reduction. And clearly, that's what every general counsel wants now. So we really are sort of hitting some sweet spots with what they want. So I think there was a little bit of let's wait, and let's try not to sort of reduce our costs, but at the same time, knowing if we're going to reduce costs and improve things, we've got to do that. And the same thing, I think, in some of these V3locity matters people just have to get stuff done, and they were deferring it. So new MSAs, new work in Legal Consulting. And I think the financial services industry is going to need a lot of review work done for V3locity, just because of how many matters are out there and how much pent-up demand there is. David Gold – Sidoti & Company: Yes. Okay, that's helpful. Then, the headcount guidance, presumably, on an average basis at least, is down a little bit from where we are. At the same time, we're hiring in some of the practices. So is it safe, then, to assume that in certain practices, perhaps legal, there might be more improvement to be done?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Yes, I think what you're going to see in all of our practices, as we go through the year, is we've got to make sure that we're as efficient as possible on all the utilization of all of our resources. And we're going to try to get the utilization up, give more of our people more experiences, get more out of our existing resources, and go lean for a little bit as we continue to see what happens for the rest of 2009. David Gold – Sidoti & Company: Okay, perfect. Thank you so much.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from the line of Sean Jackson from Avondale Partners. Sean Jackson – Avondale Partners: Yes, good morning. You mentioned about some of the strength in V3locity was due to the second review of a major client. Can you just comment on exactly when did that take place, when did it start? And also, how long do you expect that to continue?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

It's a pretty large project. I think it started in April. And it's got a 60 or 90-day fuse on it. Sean Jackson – Avondale Partners: Okay. Alright, thanks. And also, the new people wins you had, or the new people that you had in the financial sector what's the typical ramp-up for those? And is new business wins from them included in your guidance?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Well, no. You want it to be quicker than it is. But I think if you ask people to do much better than 12 months, you probably will basically get disappointed. So we've got the cost built in, but we've asked. We basically haven't built anything into what we're expecting of them. But we would like to have some. Sean Jackson – Avondale Partners: Okay. And also, you've talked about reallocating some of your resources internally that go toward the hot areas restructuring and so forth. Can you just repeat exactly where are you taking those people from, and what projects are you bringing them to?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

Okay, bankruptcy has a lot of different things that you can do in very large bankruptcies. One of the things that needs to be done in every bankruptcy is that you have something called statements and schedules. So it's a lot of detailed work that needs to be done and needs to be filed. So that's right as the bankruptcy's being filed, a lot of detailed accounting work, and question of whether that's the highest value work. And then you've got claims that have to be reconciled from the time what someone thinks they're owed versus what you owe them, until you can emerge from bankruptcy. Again, very accounting-intensified. So with our CFO on demands resources and some of our young people that have accounting type, we're helping going to market together, and even selling those services to some clients in the bankruptcy market, to basically take resources from our AFC business and put them over into the restructuring business. Sean Jackson – Avondale Partners: Okay. Alright, thank you.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from the line of Kevane Wong from JMP Securities. Kevane Wong – JMP Securities: Hey, guys. First – touched on a little bit, but just trying to get a little better clarification on the V3locity pick back up. It sounds like it's not really a snap-back that you're looking for, the June quarter. It sounds like it's sort of midpoint between where you may have been before and where you expect to sort of be. Is that a good way to think of it? Or are there other things ahead, like this big project, that are going to make it snap back a lot more to where it was? Depends on speed for pickup, right?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Yes, I think what we'd like to do is like be a little cautious right now because of the lumpiness. But we would hope that you would see a good quarter out of V3locity in Q2 and for the rest of the year. We've got high hopes for it, but we've had some high hopes before. So I would say put it somewhere between its high point and – Kevane Wong – JMP Securities: And the current one.

Gary Holdren

Chairman

It's going to have a pretty good Q2. Kevane Wong – JMP Securities: Okay. And maybe a little more conceptual thing about that, like you mentioned, it does tend to be a lumpy business. Sort of the nature of the pricing model, et cetera, makes this more of a high volume, required kind of business. How long do you think it takes or what do you need to have happen before this becomes more of a steady performer?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

We got 1,000 seats now and we need to have 70%, 75% of those seats filled on an ongoing basis. So we got to have more sales, so when slippage happens, that you basically can keep a steady volume going through that pipeline. Kevane Wong – JMP Securities: Okay.

Gary Holdren

Chairman

And with this economy right now, and us basically only, this business only being sort of a year old for us, the two of them together have not made it the most natural thing to happen. Kevane Wong – JMP Securities: Okay, so it sounds like really in the current economy, it's simply going to be affected more by the lumpiness maybe? And once that improves, it'll get more smooth as far as its performance?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Clearly, that's what our business plan is, is to get it smoother, more volume in there, and not have it have 50% or 40% utilization, have sort of the low point always be; and not build any more seats until we get a steady performance out of that business. Kevane Wong – JMP Securities: Got you. Two other hopefully quick ones here, and I'll hop off. First, Health and Education, I know you talk a lot about the backlog giving confidence. Is there any kind of figure that you can sort of give us? For example, this next 12 months, how much revenue sort of in backlog, just something we can sort of get a sense on the visibility and to look at when we're looking at our modeling?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

I would just tell you that this is not one business you should worry much about. Kevane Wong – JMP Securities: Okay. Fine. And then the last one, the overall company organic growth guidance you're talking about 10% to 11%, if I heard you right, is your guidance before. After fourth quarter, you're looking at mid to high teens. And you did have an acquisition since then. Is that sort of edging down on that guidance just being a little more conservative? When you're looking at it as a whole, are you simply find more issue to be cautious and you're using the acquisition that you had to sort of balance that out? How should we view that?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

Yes, Kevane, Gary Burge here. Yes, probably, looking back on it, that mid teens was maybe a little aggressive in our point of view. But as you know, we haven't changed our guidance for the full year. Recalibrated ourselves a little bit. Stockamp's off to a good start, so that doesn't go into that organic number on a year-over-year basis. So, 10%, 11% seems to be about the right number, but it's all subject to how each of the segments performs between now and the end of the year.

Gary Holdren

Chairman

If we get a real good Q2 out of Stockamp, it won't show good organic growth. Kevane Wong – JMP Securities: Got you. Okay, no, it's fine. Thanks, guys.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Bill Sutherland with Boenning & Scattergood. Bill Sutherland – Boenning & Scattergood: Hey, good morning. Gary Burge, one clarification, on that percentage of revenue you said was contingent fee in the first quarter, 9% –

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

Yes. Bill Sutherland – Boenning & Scattergood: Was that the total revenue or Healthcare revenue?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

That's consolidated revenue. Bill Sutherland – Boenning & Scattergood: Consolidated?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

Yes. As a percentage of consolidated revenue, yes. Bill Sutherland – Boenning & Scattergood: But the only place where you recognize contingent fees is healthcare?

Gary Burge

Chief Financial Officer

We can add a little bit in legal and elsewhere. But the majority of it is in healthcare, yes. Bill Sutherland – Boenning & Scattergood: Okay. Gary Holdren, well, first of all, where your focus is most acute in the business-development areas in terms of acquisitions, and then kind of what you're seeing as far as that being the viable alternative right now.

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Right now, we clearly would like to add to our products in the healthcare space. We would look in any of our segments, particularly if we could find something in AFC or Legal. But right now, I can just tell you the pipeline is not very full for us and there's nothing really even close to being something would happen in '09. So if something happened in '09, it would have to kind of pop up pretty quickly. And I don't see anything out there that's of any size that's happening. So '09s probably not going to be a year of acquisitions. People want very high prices. Surprisingly and right now, we don't want to use our stock at this price. And we don't have a lot of excess cash. So we're probably going to be on the sidelines in '09. Bill Sutherland – Boenning & Scattergood: Okay. One last one, in the strategy practice, can you give us one or two examples of the kind of work that's particularly in demand there? Thanks.

Gary Holdren

Chairman

So you have a CEO of a major corporation that all of a sudden, their volumes are falling off like crazy. And those volumes falling off I am not sure when it'll come back. So you've got a $30 billion company, and your share price is dropping like a rock and your volumes are dropping like a rock. How do you find out how to go in and assess, by product, by division, by capital, how you should basically make decisions versus make just pinpoint decisions on reducing cost? So CEOs who believe in capital allocation want to find deep-dives into their business find that this product is very attractive right now and in very high demand. We don't have enough resources to serve the marketplace. Bill Sutherland – Boenning & Scattergood: So when you call it a product, Gary, is it a methodology you bring to bear in most cases?

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Yes. The people have developed a deep-dive into how they look at companies and how they do it in a process. And it's, yes. Bill Sutherland – Boenning & Scattergood: Yes. Okay. Thanks, guys.

Operator

Operator

(Operator instructions). At this time, Mr. Holdren, we have concluded the allotted time for this call. I'd like to turn the conference back over to you.

Gary Holdren

Chairman

Thank you. In closing, I just want to thank all of our employees of Huron who are at our clients every day, and the people who work in our internal operations for just everything you do, and how much you mean to all of us here. And we're going to go after this real hard and really try to produce something really good for all of our employees and all of our clients. And hopefully, we'll be able to give you more news on the progress of that when we talk with you in July, after our second quarter. Thanks.

Operator

Operator

That concludes today's Conference Call, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you, everyone for your participation. Thank you. And you now may disconnect.