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IMAX Corporation (IMAX)

Q4 2015 Earnings Call· Wed, Feb 24, 2016

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day, and welcome to the IMAX Corporation Fourth Quarter 2015 Conference Call. All participants are currently in listen-only mode. Following the presentation, we will conduct a question-and-answer session. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Ms. Jessica Kourakos. Please go ahead, Ms. Kourakos.

Jessica Kourakos - Senior Vice President-Investor Relations

Management

Thank you, operator. Good afternoon, and thanks for joining us on today's fourth quarter and full year 2015 earnings conference call. Joining me today in our New York office is our CEO, Rich Gelfond and our CFO, Joe Sparacio, who will have prepared remarks. Greg Foster, our Head of Entertainment, is also with us and will be available for Q&A. Also joining us is Rob Lister, Chief Legal Officer and Head of Business Development. I would like to remind you of the following information regarding forward-looking statements. Our comments and answers to your questions on this call may include statements that are forward-looking and that they pertain to future results or outcomes. Actual future results or occurrences may differ materially from these forward-looking statements. Please refer to our SEC filings for more detailed discussion of some of the factors that could affect our future results and outcomes. During today's call, references may be made to certain non-GAAP financial measures as defined by Regulation G of the Securities and Exchange Commission. Discussion of management's use of these measures and the definition of these measures, as well as reconciliations to adjusted net income, adjusted EPS and adjusted EBITDA as defined by our credit facility, are contained in this morning's press release – pardon, excuse me, in this afternoon's press release. The full text of our fourth quarter and full year earnings release along with supporting financial tables are available on our website at, imax.com. Today's conference call is being webcast in its entirety on our website. We are also hosting a separate conference call at 7:00 PM Eastern Time to review IMAX China's full year 2015 results. The webcast to this call can also be located in the Investor Relations section of the imax.com website. With that, let me now turn the…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. The first question comes from Ben Mogil from Stifel. Please go ahead. Benjamin Mogil - Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., Inc.: Hi. Good afternoon and thank you for taking the question. So on the screen guidance for the year, can you maybe give us a sense geographically. I know you talked about the incremental 20 screens being JRSAs in China. Maybe you can give us a sense geographically of where the rest of the screens are, both sort of maybe even EMEA and North America, et cetera, and sort of anything you wanted to highlight geographically that you thought was interesting or worth calling out? Richard L. Gelfond - Chief Executive Officer & Director: So I think what's really worth calling out, Ben is, some of the territories we've made a lot of progress in in the last couple of years. So Japan, we had 15 theatres two years ago. Now, if you look at the backlog and what we've installed since then, we're closing in on close to 40 theatres. And if you remember, that's a zone that we modeled out at 90 theatres, but has a way to go. The Middle East has also been a market that's grown very rapidly for us. I don't remember the numbers off hand, but a lot of additional activity there. India, which is a market you guys have tried to get me to talk about for years, and there really hasn't been a lot of promise, but for the first time we've opened a couple of theatres there that are doing very well, and that's showing some promise. I think, when you look at Western Europe, the deals we announced this week in France and in Germany, we finally have some activity. France and Switzerland, I'm sorry. We finally have…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. The next question comes from the Alexia Quadrani from JPMorgan. Please go ahead.

Julia Yue - JPMorgan Securities LLC

Management

Hi. This is Julia Yue on for Alexia. I have two questions. First, we previously heard that premium large format screens are more of an add-on offering at the ticket window and not necessarily direct competition with IMAX. And I know it's still early, but how much do you think the rollout of other standalone premium format offerings, such as Dolby in the U.S. and in China, could affect IMAX? And then second, with such strong performance of local language Chinese films, with the Chinese industry box office forecasted to be become the largest in the world in 2017. Do you expect that the mix of films in China could skew increasingly towards local language films instead of Hollywood films, even in periods that aren't blacked-out? Richard L. Gelfond - Chief Executive Officer & Director: So I'll answer the first part of your question, how we're affected by PLTs and other sorts of large screen rollouts. The answer is empirically, we haven't been affected. If you look at the percentage of a multiplex that IMAX does before PLTs ever existed and where it is today, our percentage of the multiplex has actually been better and better and here is kind of an anomalous finding which is in Canada with Cineplex in multiplexes where they put in an IMAX and a PLT, the IMAX performs better. And I think part of their strategy is really, as there's more competition from the home and as there is differences of windows and more blockbuster movies, the same kind of things that are fueling our growth worldwide, they are kind of remaking a lot of their infrastructure and they're looking at it to provide the consumer with a broad array of offerings, so whether it's moving seats or it's their PLT, that's the way…

Julia Yue - JPMorgan Securities LLC

Management

Thanks, Greg. Thank you so much.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. The next question comes from Steven Frankel from Dougherty. Please go ahead. Steven Frankel - Dougherty & Co. LLC: Good afternoon. A couple of more China questions, if I may. Where is Wanda today in terms of the number of screens rolled out and what's left in their current commitment? Richard L. Gelfond - Chief Executive Officer & Director: So Steve, if they roll out this year what they've told us they're going to roll out, they would have fulfilled the current commitment. And in fact, they should remind everyone that those leases are for 12 years. However, we started preliminary discussions about additional commitments; and again while I can't promise anything, I personally would be surprised if they accelerated the roll out this year and then said see you later, we haven't heard anything like that. Steven Frankel - Dougherty & Co. LLC: And again how many are open today? Richard L. Gelfond - Chief Executive Officer & Director: I don't know. Do you know, Joe? Joseph Sparacio - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: It would be – I think, the total commitment was 195 theatres. So it's probably around, I'm going to call it, 140 to 150 theatres. I don't have the numbers exactly in front of me, but that's my gut on it. Steven Frankel - Dougherty & Co. LLC: And then the... Joseph Sparacio - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: And that's out of the JV pool. They also have some sales-type leases. Steven Frankel - Dougherty & Co. LLC: And the follow up on Greg's last comment. Could you give us just some feel for what the PSA looks like in a Tier 3 city in China versus Tier 1 city? Greg Foster - Senior Executive Vice President -…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. The next question comes from Eric Handler from MKM Partners. Please go ahead.

Eric O. Handler - MKM Partners LLC

Management

Yes. Thanks a lot for taking my questions. A lot of good data that you provided there and just a couple of follow-up questions. So in terms of your installs, is using 80 screens in China that seem to be a reasonable number for 2016? And then secondly, are you getting any type of pushback from exhibitors at this point about concerns about an economic slowdown, is that influencing how many deals are getting done at the moment? And then last, when you're looking at alternative content, you know, you talked about documentaries, are you looking at other types of live events, or what could those events or content sort of take the form of? Richard L. Gelfond - Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, so Steve, I'll take the middle one first, in terms of the tone of our business. We beat our signings budget by a significant amount last year and the first quarter has gotten off to a really good start. There's just lots of leads that won't shock you coming off of Star Wars and Deadpool, and you look at the exhibitor returns and you can even look at the results of the exhibitors that have IMAX theatres and those that don't, and you can see the results in their fourth quarter financials, you can back it out and see how it affects them. So our interest on a worldwide basis is extremely robust, extremely strong. The first part Steve I'm sorry I hit the three or four part question.

Eric O. Handler - MKM Partners LLC

Management

That's all right. It's Eric. But that's okay. Richard L. Gelfond - Chief Executive Officer & Director: (47:33).

Eric O. Handler - MKM Partners LLC

Management

Yes sir. Looking at your install guidance for the year, is it safe... Richard L. Gelfond - Chief Executive Officer & Director: Right, I remember. So typically we don't give guidance by region, because just so how we prepare our install guidance for the year as we look at our backlog, we have unsigned which we estimate based on past practice and then we have a reserve, a general reserve, we take against that because of slippage in past years. So I'm hesitant to say a certain number is going to come from a certain region. However, I do think that your number of 80, probably higher than that.

Eric O. Handler - MKM Partners LLC

Management

Great. And then the content investments, what form that might take place, you did mentioned documentaries, you're looking at some live events, you're looking at other – what could that encompass? Greg Foster - Senior Executive Vice President - IMAX Corp. & Chief Executive Officer - IMAX Entertainment: So Eric, its Greg. So the goal of, let's put quotes around it, alternative content is really code for providing 52 weeks of compelling content. That's all we're looking to do. And that can be in the form of live events, if need to be. They're compelling enough back that be in the form of content like we talked about, original content, let's call it cinematic episodes that can be in the form of anything that moviegoers want to see, and anything that exhibitors want, our goal again is to have 52 weeks of compelling content, the documentary fund is working out very well, we have several movies that we've used that capital for. But for the commercial side, for moviegoers who go to the typical multiplex, we want to provide 52 weeks of compelling content, any way that they want to see it and exhibitors want it as well. Richard L. Gelfond - Chief Executive Officer & Director: And so, Steve, I have to – just to add a little more color to it. There are a number of really live discussions going on. So, Game of Thrones in IMAX which we did is one example of something we've done in the past. The China Film Fund we're investing in, in content, pari passu with studios in China, where we release things in the IMAX network, that's another form of it. And these are relatively low-risk disproportionate return investments. But I think as the year goes by, and we get closer to Investor Day, we'll be able to provide you – which will probably be towards the fall, we'll be able to provide you more detail on that. But there is lots of weeks a year that there isn't the kind of content that we want to provide. And we think we can both provide it and make money doing it.

Eric O. Handler - MKM Partners LLC

Management

Thank you very much.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. The next question comes from Eric Wold from B. Riley. Please go ahead. Eric Wold - B. Riley & Co. LLC: Thanks. Just a couple of questions. I guess one, I know you talked about, Rich, at the beginning of the call about tough comp, and everyone's talking about tough comps (50:48) Star Wars and all that. But kind of following up on comments you made the other day at a conference, do you think about the start to the year, with Star Wars bleeding into this year, Deadpool, the slate you've announced so far, the slate you probably haven't announced so far, along with projected growth in the circuit this year. What are your thoughts around the ability to at least keep flattish box office this year, if not potentially grow it in 2016? Richard L. Gelfond - Chief Executive Officer & Director: So, Eric, I tend to think the question the way (51:18) doesn't matter, because if you look at what I said about the $1.1 million, we've been within 5% of that virtually every year for the last seven years, sometimes we've been way over it. This year, we're a little over it. So I feel – start by saying, I feel very confident that we'll be within that booking. And when you run the model, as you know, being $50,000 more or $50,000, yes, it does make a difference, but not to the overall story. It makes a small difference. On the other hand, IMAX, you heard the numbers I said at the beginning, we're up 65% year-over-year for the first six weeks. And I think this year has less potential home runs than last year, where we had Episode VII, and we had Jurassic World, and we had Avengers; 2017 has those again.…

Operator

Operator

Thank you. The next question comes from Jim Goss from Barrington Research. Please go ahead.

James Charles Goss - Barrington Research Associates, Inc.

Management

Good evening. I was wondering, how many DMR movies are you doing in China local language this year? And how many are you likely to do in other regions outside of the U.S. and China, start with that? Richard L. Gelfond - Chief Executive Officer & Director: So Jim, we'll do between eight movies and 10 movies, as I mentioned this year in China, and we also have films in the four biggest territories that we have. We have a Japanese title that we'll be doing. We have a couple of Russian titles that we'll be doing, and there's some other markets that we're seriously exploring. We're very careful about when we do a local language movie, that it appeals above and beyond just that singular market. But at the same time, we're seeing that the local language business is a very thriving business. And again, our goal is to provide 52 weeks of compelling content to all of our theatres, and if there's particular markets that rely on local language films, we have to provide it for them.

James Charles Goss - Barrington Research Associates, Inc.

Management

Okay. And Greg, how many openings in the 2016 slate exist at this stage of the year? Greg Foster - Senior Executive Vice President - IMAX Corp. & Chief Executive Officer - IMAX Entertainment: That you know about, or I know about? That I know about...

James Charles Goss - Barrington Research Associates, Inc.

Management

That you know about. Greg Foster - Senior Executive Vice President - IMAX Corp. & Chief Executive Officer - IMAX Entertainment: Very few, maybe two. That's it.

James Charles Goss - Barrington Research Associates, Inc.

Management

Okay. So things could we moved a little bit. Greg Foster - Senior Executive Vice President - IMAX Corp. & Chief Executive Officer - IMAX Entertainment: I think we've announced 26 titles and you can plan on putting my two hands out about ten more on the Hollywood side if you will. And then again, there's the local language stuff, but somewhere in that range. We'll be right about where we were last year, give or take three or four either way.

James Charles Goss - Barrington Research Associates, Inc.

Management

Okay. And then lastly, just in terms of managing growth, I mean China has been such a success. Do you remain laser-focused on China, and I know you mentioned Japan, Middle East, Western Europe earlier in the discussion. But is there any shifting of more serious attention to those other areas, or do those sort of wait and move along slowly while you continue to with the foot on the pedal on China given the returns you've been getting there? Richard L. Gelfond - Chief Executive Officer & Director: Jim, I'm very cognizant of the fact that China has had a certain growth rate and the rest of the world has had another growth rate. I'm very cognizant of the fact that there are two public companies and you need to tell stories in both. So I'd say we are going to keep our foot to the metal on China, but we're also going to put it to the metal more in the rest of the world. And we've actually made some management changes recently. So the person who ran sales for Asia, including China, is going to run sales for the world. So we hope he brings his magic dust that he did there to other regions. And we've invested a lot in Europe as you know several years ago, we hired the former president of Paramount International to boost that effort, and we're very committed to laser focus throughout the world.

James Charles Goss - Barrington Research Associates, Inc.

Management

All right. Thanks very much.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. So that concludes today's question-and-answer session. Mr. Gelfond, at this time, I would like to turn the conference back to you for any additional or closing remarks. Richard L. Gelfond - Chief Executive Officer & Director: Thank you. As you can see, we feel very good about our results and where our business is headed right now. Again, I haven't felt better about our business in the 22 years I've been here. When you add up the brand, the network, our positioning in the ecosystem, our cash position, our debt position, the value of our brand, I think it's all there in a way that I would never imagine even five years ago. So I'd like to thank you for joining us today and I'd like to extend my appreciation to all the employees at IMAX around the world to make this happen. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's call. Thank you for your participation.