Earnings Labs

Liberty Global plc (LBTYB)

Q2 2016 Earnings Call· Sat, Aug 6, 2016

$17.00

-2.02%

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to Liberty Global’s Second Quarter 2016 Results Investor Call. This call and the associated webcast are the property of Liberty Global, and any redistribution, retransmission or rebroadcast of this call or webcast in any form without the expressed written consent of Liberty Global is strictly prohibited. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Today’s formal presentation can be found under the Investor Relations section of Liberty Global’s website at www.libertyglobal.com. Following today’s formal presentation, instructions will be given for a question-and-answer session. As a reminder, this investor call is being recorded on this date, August 5, 2016. Page two of the slides details the Company’s Safe Harbor statement regarding forward-looking statements. Today’s presentation may include forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including the Company’s expectations with respect to its outlook and future growth prospects and any other information and statements that are not historical fact. These forward-looking statements involve certain risks that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by these statements. These risks include those detailed from time to time in Liberty Global’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its most recently filed forms 10-Q and 10-K. Liberty Global disclaims any obligation to update any of these forward-looking statements to reflect any change in its expectations or in the conditions on which any such statement is based. I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. Mike Fries.

Mike Fries

Management

Thank you, operator. And good morning or good afternoon, wherever you may be. I want to welcome, both our Liberty Global and LiLAC shareholders to our second quarter call. I am joined as usual by my senior leadership team across the globe and I’ll get them involved as needed here in the Q&A. Our agenda is pretty straight forward for us. I will make some brief remarks about the quarter focusing specifically on products and operations and then Bernie will provide some detail on the numbers and we will get straight to your questions. As usual, we’re speaking from slides and hopefully you can access those on our website or download them. I think it will make the presentation a lot more meaningful for you. I’m going to start on slide four with some key highlights or takeaways from the quarter. Number one, this is an important inflection point for us. We have always indicated that the first half of 2016 was really an investment period where we’d be laying groundwork for next year and 2018, and that’s reflected in our financial results where the benefits of our Liberty Go initiatives and convergence and product innovations are just now starting to emerge as we head into the second half of the year. That confidence is supported by strong subscriber growth in the quarter. We added nearly 280,000 new RGUs in the three-month period that’s double what we did last year in the second quarter and up 80% from just the first few months of the year. And it brings year-to-date net adds to 430,000 with material improvement across all our products and essentially all our markets too, a bit more detail on that in a second. By far one of the most accretive and the fundamentally sound things we’re doing…

Bernie Dvorak

Management

Thanks Mike. On following slides, I will take you through the financial results for the Liberty Global Group, which consists of our European operations including BASE since February 11, followed by an overview of the performance of the LiLAC Group, which consists of our operations in Chile and Puerto Rico, and since May 16th, Cable & Wireless. On slide 11, we present financial results for the Liberty Global Group. When adjusting for FX and the impacts of acquisitions, we grew our rebased revenue by 3% year-over-year in the first half of 2016, in line with our top line growth from the first half last year. Our rebased OCF increased 2% during the first six months. Our first half property and equipment additions in Europe were 23% of revenue above the 22% of revenue that we reported in the prior year period. The increase in absolute P&E additions on the year-to-date period especially due to increased line extension and scalable infrastructure spend related to new build upgrade activities across our footprint. In terms of the breakdown of our first half P&E additions, 46% pertain to line extensions, upgrade and rebuild and scalable infrastructure, 30% was related to CPE and 24% was related to support capital. And as shown earlier in my slides, we’re updating our full year P&E guidance now including BASE and excluding the Netherlands to range from 26% to 28% of revenue. Consistent with this guidance, our spend on new build is expected to accelerate materially in the second half of the year. From a free cash flow perspective, Liberty Global Group reported free cash flow of $412 million year-to-date. The decline in our free cash flow in the first half of 2016 as compared to the first half of 2015 is largely attributed to lower benefits from vendor…

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] And we’ll take our first question from Amy Yong with Macquarie.

Amy Yong

Analyst

Thanks and good morning. I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about some of the content investments you’ve made recently. You spent some time talking about how important the video bundle is to you in terms of Horizon and TiVo, but what about some of the investments that you are making, whether it’s All3Media and I guess Lionsgate ITV? And then my second question is on LiLAC. What changed the initial expectations of the $125 million synergies that Cable & Wireless laid out, and how quickly do you think you can talk about the synergies to the market? Thank you.

Mike Fries

Management

Thanks Amy. I think, let me start with the LiLAC question. As I think Bernie mentioned, we are on track with 125 million synergies that they represented. We don’t see any issue with those between Columbus and Cable & Wireless and thus for I think tracking exactly as planned. We have not yet disclosed the synergies, and that’s what we’re working on between Cable & Wireless, LiLAC and Liberty Global. Those numbers we think will also be substantial. But remember, during the acquisition process, we were not able to get a lot of information, because of UK takeover code. So, we didn’t really have the ability to project clear synergies between Cable & Wireless and us; that we expect to do in this quarter. And to me that’s going to have a material impact on the overall expected synergies in the next three-year timeframe. But as soon as we have that, we’ll let you know. Main point is tracking on the disclosed synergies of 125 million. I’ll also point out because I probably should have more clearly that the -- some people have noted that the EBITDA or OCF number four Cable & Wireless in the June quarter looked meaningfully different than what consensus was. We could have and should have done a slightly better job of explaining that. There were number of issues between the March quarter and the June quarter, including some definitional and policy-related matters, when we went from IFRS to GAAP, which we do provide complete detail on things related to integration costs and how GAAP requires you attribute integration costs, and revenue recognition issues , which we think is cleanup. There were some accrual releases in the March quarter, may be to be expected perhaps, when you’re anticipating closing a transaction, but no question there…

Operator

Operator

We’ll take our next question from Daniel Morris with Barclays.

Daniel Morris

Analyst · Barclays.

You showed a very interesting Lightning chart in Q1, showing the 13%, 22% and 26% penetration rates after three, six and over nine months. I just wondered if you’ve got an update on those data points or any comments around whether you’re seeing a shift in that momentum since Q1 or it’s still very similar. And then, I have a little follow-up on ARPU if I could.

Mike Fries

Management

Punch line on that -- and I’ll let Tom provide some color, is we are seeing very good penetration rates in the mid-20s after nine months, and nothing has changed our view I think the forecast that we gave around penetration ARPU and the bill cost and Lightening. Tom, do you want to provide some color on the first half or perhaps the second half?

Tom Mockridge

Analyst · Barclays.

Thanks, Mike and thanks for the question. Look, I’ll confirm the point that we’re seeing a continuation very much of what we’re seeing in the previous quarter that the penetration is very much on target, remember when we say 39% after three years. And we’re achieving 26% roughly after the first nine months at the moment, across the various types of network that we’re building. The volume is picking up. You’ve seen a further pick up in this quarter. And to give an indication, we have at the moment in the build program that is issued to our build partners, 700,000 premises, at this time last year that equivalent number was about 50,000. So, in terms of the engine that is driving this is now really getting into gear, and we continue to have a high degree of confidence that the execution is on target.

Daniel Morris

Analyst · Barclays.

That was very clear, thanks. Just the brief follow-up was just on the UK ARPU trajectory. There is obviously a bit of pressure and I wondered if that was back-end loaded customer additions, the Lightning mix or something else, so just color on the UK ARPU, if you could?

Mike Fries

Management

Go ahead, Tom.

Tom Mockridge

Analyst · Barclays.

There is one regulatory issue I think was mentioned in the release where we did lose a bit of revenue in the way we billed people on paper bills that could make a concession there. And that did impact the numbers. But fundamentally what’s happening here is that as we are ramping up the pace of the business in the last 12 months, we’ve increased gross additions for an annualized rate of over 100,000 customers, these people are inevitably coming in on promotional deals that generally go three, six, nine, 12 months. You’ve also seen in the first half of this year we have to a greater extent relied on [indiscernible] to drive the growth of the business. We’ve got good growth out of that typically Virgin Media in the UK had flat growth in the first half. You will see that swing hard to triples in the second half as it normally does with the football season, as Mike mentioned. And so, we’re very confident that we will get those people up as they come up the promotional discounts, that we’ll give more triples in the second half. But the other thing I would mention that we’re conscious of our ability to offer great product, 200-meg going to 300-meg. And so, we will be looking at our ability to take costs across the BASE. So, a combination of these things, we’re very confident about the ARPU going forward.

Operator

Operator

And we’ll take our next question from Jeff Wlodarczak with Pivotal Research Group.

Jeff Wlodarczak

Analyst · Pivotal Research Group.

I was hoping to get more color on the implied healthy EBITDA acceleration in the second half. Is that mainly Liberty Go and Project Lighting which you touched on the call or are there other things breaking your way in the second half to accelerate your growth? And then, I have got a follow-up.

Mike Fries

Management

Jeff, I think it’s a combination of things. On the top line, it’s going to be the impact of new build and I can’t just give you some numbers around the Q if you will for the pipeline of new homes coming on line, we know that’s a big part of it. Definitely going to see some benefits of the scale efficiencies I referenced. When we look at the second quarter, we think indirect costs, as we adjust them are flat year-over-year. And we’ve made that clear that that’s our goal try to keep those numbers flat. And I think you should expect that in the second quarter. The last nine to 12 months of planning are certainly going to start picking up on the cost line. But on the revenue line, it’s all the factors we’ve discussed. It’s new build for sure, in the UK it’s also selective price increases where we might take them across Europe; it’s going to be our B2B business and mobile business layering in. You’re going to start to see a turnaround slowly in places like Belgium where that integration as we’ve signaled, has impacted their numbers at least in the first half or for second quarter two. So, it’s all the main drivers we’ve identified in the past. And so far, we feel good about it. Number one, and perhaps most importantly is the subscriber growth we’ve achieved in the first half of the year, we’re 2X of what we did last year. So, there is no question that the growing RGU momentum is going to benefit us, both in the second half of the year and going into 2017. So that is the good news, I mean for sure. Not only are we seeing benefits on our new builds and B2B and mobile but also just raw customer and subscriber growth, which is of course going to drive your revenue more than anything. So, that’s where the confidence comes from.

Jeff Wlodarczak

Analyst · Pivotal Research Group.

And then I am looking for more color on Switzerland. I mean, you had the very large price increase, which you announced in fourth quarter hit in the first quarter and hit your RGU results. Are you seeing some bleed over from that in the second quarter or is that more competition related, and then what are you doing to stabilize Switzerland?

Mike Fries

Management

Well, I’ll let Eric -- Eric Tveter is on, I’ll let him talk in. But Switzerland is really an isolated issue around broadband. Do you want to address that Eric?

Eric Tveter

Analyst · Pivotal Research Group.

Sure. In the second quarter, we branded dropping the legacy Cablecom name, some of the bright spots; our mobile growth accelerating steadily; customer experience and product satisfactions as well as churn, deduction are improving, but the main competitor has been affected at the low end in the first half. And we have a competitive response for them. And I expect our sales performance to improve in the second half with the strong marketing effort and the aggressive rollout of our new Connect Box to almost 200,000 internet customers to drive internet market leadership and provide them seamlessly connectivity. So, I think the price increase had an effect. And I think in the next months we will also improve our fixed mobile convergence product and that our Mega Deal is working well which is a three plus one product. And again, confident about improved performance in the second half.

Operator

Operator

We will take our next question from Vijay Jayant with Evercore ISI.

Vijay Jayant

Analyst · Evercore ISI.

Mike, I just wanted to get some clarification that the inclusion of BASE is about a 50 basis-point drag on EBITDA and about $100 million impact on free cash flow, given that we have no sense on what that asset is doing. And second, obviously your comments and your expectations are suggesting that we are at an inflection point now with Liberty Go kicking in. And given your growth in the first half of 2.7% EBITDA for Europe and implying the new target suggests 5.5% to 6.5% EBITDA growth. So, the question really is -- I think it was asked earlier, but the confidence on the cost side that you control, is there any way you could size that for us and sort of let us understand why that’s really achievable, given that your underlying business seems to be at least 3% growth right now?

Bernie Dvorak

Management

Charlie, you might want to look up, I don’t think John is on and answer on BASE if you have it handy. I don’t know that we disclosed the specific -- or quantified the specific impact, just have to say that the business was clearly, we know what it was doing when we bought it. It was in some structural decline. And we knew that it was going to take some integration effort to get to business back into the Telenet fold. So, Charlie, you want to quantify some of that, I don’t know if disclose and make this point -- and can you talk to it? Go ahead.

Charlie Bracken

Analyst · Evercore ISI.

You are right. I mean again, [indiscernible] what has been disclosed in the Telenet, but it was certainly the Liberty level that is the what the numbers you mentioned 0.5% and broadly $100 million is about right, and clearly exchange rate dependent, blah, blah, blah. But that is right.

Mike Fries

Management

I think Vijay, on the Liberty Go side and on the cost side, we have in the past and we can do it again, explain where exactly we’re finding those benefits, but it’s not rocket science. As we brought this company together, as we change the operating model as we -- as the management team set our sights on improved efficiencies, there are a dozen work streams underway covering everything from customers, call centers to supply chain to procurement on the CapEx side to consulting cost, I’m sorry for consultants but that’s coming down to travel. There are just dozens and dozens of things we are doing as a team collectively and cooperatively to get our cost base where we think it ought to be. But it’s not just costs that are going to drive our performance, of course it’s revenue and that’s where the rubber meets the road. But we have shown in the past, and I think it is a little bit of credibility here on our ability to drive efficiencies. I don’t think we missed the synergy budget in 10 years of acquisitions. You can go back and check that. And so when we say, we think we can bring the costs in online, I think we can -- we should be trusted; revenue stuff that is where we make or break this thing. And thus far, we feel extremely like confident on things like Lightning and new build, but our work is cut out for us. So we have to work our butts off and figure out how we get the engine moving in second half. We have headwinds. Ziggo is a headwind. That deal is going to be a terrific transaction for us, we all know that, it’s going to generate cash, free cash and it’s going to be stronger business. So, we have to manage our headwinds as we do, but I feel pretty confident about it. I don’t think we will be repeating ourselves. I don’t think, we had an opportunity here. I don’t think we wouldn’t be conforming our mid-term guidance if we didn’t feel we could achieve it. So, I think that’s the best answer to your question.

Operator

Operator

We’ll take our next question from Frank Knowles with New Street Research.

Frank Knowles

Analyst · New Street Research.

Yes. I wonder if you could expand a bit more on your comments on content; I think you noted that both in the UK and the Netherlands, content costs had gone up a bit in the first half. Could you just refresh our view on the content cost per sub on your main markets and where they might be heading given your increased investments in some original content and local sports and so on?

Mike Fries

Management

Our content costs across the board are up mid single-digit, I think maybe less than that. But there is going to be puts and takes. I mean we did announce the discovery deal that required us to make good on some earlier periods. So, that comes with huge rights and also some very positive content benefits. Clearly, that was something -- that has impacted the second quarter. We don’t see anything specific on the horizon of that nature that should be impacting us. We’re still in the high single-digits on a cost per sub basis, $7, $8 more or less, and most of the increases year-over-year going into our SVOD content, same as like the production deal that I described, which I probably described we did prematurely that’s single million euro kind of dollar share. We aren’t suggesting for a second half we’re going to start spending huge amounts of money on renewal content. It is smart, clever, relatively small investment by multiple markets to get some content in our platform that’s unique to us. So, I think the content picture remains as we’ve described it in the past. The pie is shifting. We’re putting more emphasis over time in SVOD content, in the rights that drive our digital TV Everywhere platform which is performing extremely well. We’re working our tails off to manage linear costs where we can. But big, big providers like Discovery who drive huge amounts of rights onto our non-linear platform are critical for us; I mean the Olympics and other things. So, we’re going to find some of those things happening from time to time, but the picture still remains in online extremely positive. We are in the -- if you take premium out of the UK, we’re in even lower content cost on a per sub basis, more like $5 to $6. So, we’re in a very advantaged position relative to for example U.S. operators when you look at our content picture. And it’s our jobs to ensure that we are driving great product into the stuff we know customers love, TV Everywhere, non-linear rights, VOD, et cetera, and that we’re managing the fixed cost as we go or the more linear costs as we go. And I think we’ve done a good job. Bruce Mann who we hired as our new Head of Programming is working extremely well across our footprint. We just brought a new -- one of our new -- one of our core content guys into LiLAC to drive those content costs. So, I think if you look at it globally, it’s a huge priority of ours. And I think we’re going to have good success there.

Frank Knowles

Analyst · New Street Research.

If I could have a quick follow-up just on the advanced TiVo and the new EOS platform you mentioned. If you could just talk a bit about what you think the effects of those are going to be maybe in 2017 and onwards? Is it -- we going to see any sort of meaningful reduction in CPE cost; is it primarily to improve retention or ARPU by moving people up the chain in the video world?

Mike Fries

Management

Well, I’ll let Tom talk about the TiVo UI itself, but the EOS box, and Balan is on here as well, is certainly just one good example of how we’re driving scale across footprint. And it’s 4K box, it costs much less than our current Horizon boxes. It’s cloud based. It is essentially -- going to be the work horse of our video platform. It’s powerful, inexpensive with great scale benefit. And we’re going to roll that out wherever we can of course; and the faster we roll it out, the better. And that’s what we should be doing; that’s what you’d expect a company of our size to be doing. Balan, do you want to add anything on that EOS box?

Balan Nair

Analyst · New Street Research.

No, I think you’ve covered all this. This is going to be -- certainly, the box will be rolled out all across Europe and will benefit South America as well. And we’ll have a very easy way to move UIs on, so you could have TiVo one day on and you can have the Horizon UI in the same box, the next day. So, it’s a very fungible low cost high powered box.

Mike Fries

Management

And the TiVo UI, I just saw it couple of weeks ago. Tom, you can add it to it, looks beautiful, great, super. I mean it’s a terrific looking UI, I think will be state of the art in that market with exactly all the features and functionality you need to see. And there is a perfect migration path for us to not just stay relevant but to lead in the video space in the UK or were we the only guys with all the content, only guys with all the sports, only guys with that et cetera, et cetera. Anything on that Tom on the TiVo relationship.

Tom Mockridge

Analyst · New Street Research.

Well, I’ll just add on that point that the re-launch under the brand Virgin TV in the United Kingdom with the new EOS box and new interface will in addition give us a very, very significant step up in our ability to on-demand programming across multiple forms and give our customers access to a wide range of over the top applications which those of you our customers will have seen already, but we will definitely be adding to that. So, I think we’re very confident that we can structurally lift the breadth of programming and the utility of it that we give to our people in a way that certainly hasn’t happened since the TiVo box was initially launched in the United Kingdom four, or five years ago.

Operator

Operator

And, we’ll take our next question from Ben Swinburne with Morgan Stanley.

Ben Swinburne

Analyst · Morgan Stanley.

I have two questions, may be for Tom in the UK around Lightening. I think Mike said about half the customer adds roughly versus with new footprint this quarter. Wondering if you could just help us think about the homes marketed. I think we have a sense for how quickly you’re building homes in the UK, I think you said 700,000 premises sort of under construction may be, but what’s sort of the homes marketed number we should be thinking about as we track the success of that build, which is so key to your full year guide? And Mike, just on the programming cost side, if you think about your three-year guidance, is there a number kind of you have in your head either for programming or may be for direct versus indirect as we think about what you think you’re going to be investing over the three-year period annually in growth around programming costs, so we can kind of fine tune the ramp here through 2018?

Mike Fries

Management

Sure. Tom, do you want to start with Lightening?

Tom Mockridge

Analyst · Morgan Stanley.

Yes, on Lightening I think it’s the numbers we did refer to in the release that there are 85,000 additional premises released from the locking program in Q2 which was in addition to the 70,000 we did in Q1 and we have a full year target of release this calendar year of 500,000 which we have a high degree of confidence that we will achieve as the team continues to bring on these contractors, skill them up, give them the clear commitment that we’re going on with this program, so they put the resources into it. So, 500,000 plus is the number to look forward…

Mike Fries

Management

On content, I mentioned the number earlier. We’re at about 850 a month per sub; I think that on current FX includes premiums, certainly lower than that I am confident, we don’t have [indiscernible] et cetera. You should expect and we do expect, I’ll give you some basic parameters that that number in our overall content picture will grow at or above our revenue range. But that’s smart investment, that’s what we need to retain high margin, high IRR, customers across the video platform. Video is -- maybe it might only be 35%,of our revenue, but it is a critical part of our bundle of course. And we’re really pleased with our ability to compete on the video front. So, you’re going to see us of course maintain, not just relevance but I think really important superiority if we can, in our content offer. And so for the most part, I think we said this publically in the past, you’re going to see content cost grow year over year and at or above our revenue rate. But of course we have -- that’s investment we’re making to drive revenue. You will see other aspects of our expenses, in particular in direct cost, reduced. So direct cost, Ben, I look at it, our direct cost as you should expect will grow at or above or near our revenue, because that’s what’s driving that revenue, interconnect, content, things of that nature. And so want to push top line and revenue growth, that’s the number one things; drive absolute margin; and then of course, a benefit from -- longer term from a more efficient cost model below that line. So, that’s the basic way of looking at it. I think that’s probably how you’re modeling it already but...

Operator

Operator

And we’ll take our final question from David Wright with Bank of America.

David Wright

Analyst

It’s actually a couple of questions. If you could just confirm just the guidance change is just purely mechanical that there is no change to the underlying, that’s just a very simple question, mechanical from obviously the new consolidation effects. And then, my second question is just on Lightning, I just wanted to just get a bit of a view on the net add swap, sort of the percentage of triple-play apps who’ve come aboard. I think you gave some indication on the Q1 so that it was roundabout 50% or so of the net adds were coming on triple play, which was running below the blended base. Are you seeing a similar number in Q2, a number higher, number lower? I guess if it’s not higher, what level of confidence do you have in selling into triple play or is this the kind of structural change that we are a little nervous of, which is the consumer being a little more focused on the broadband pipe and maybe taking the OTT solutions?

Mike Fries

Management

Tom, do you want to start with the Lightning question?

Tom Mockridge

Analyst

I confirmed that number that number that 50% in Q1 regarding Q2, coming in on triples. But remember, this is the first half of the calendar year and the -- as I mentioned a minute ago, historically in the UK region Virgin Media has been a flat company in the first half. This year we are close enough to 85,000 customers up. And we will unquestionably lift that triple number through Q3 and Q4. Obviously the tact for us is to maintain our overall leverage in order to maintain the business in general. One point, I should make about the programming cost is that, going into Q3, we left the increase in football cost that came through at the beginning of season last year. So, there would be a year on year benefit that we see in the underlying numbers, with that being left. But sure, -- we 50%, we’ll look that number Q3, Q4…

Mike Fries

Management

I wasn’t quite sure on the -- go ahead, do you have a follow up there?

David Wright

Analyst

No, sorry; I didn’t mean to interrupt. I guess I just sort of am curious, you are adding the dual-play sub spot. What is your confidence on their not selling them into triple play, is it not the case that you might face a little more pushback now from the kind of structural OTT threat; what is the hook that’s bringing the double and triple play for the net new Lightning adds?

Tom Mockridge

Analyst

I think one of the issues there of course that when we go into these Lightening areas, we’re generally taking subscribers off an existing platform. So, some of the people haven’t been on service before but many of them do have service. And there is every reason to think we can sustain that ratio. And that we can get growth from June, we can get growth from triples and progressively we’re going to get growth from quad-play. So, I think…

Mike Fries

Management

It also has to do with how we’re offsetting sales teams, I mean there is some blocking and tackling there as well. So, we think there is -- those issues are easily sorted.

David Wright

Analyst

And if you could maybe mention on the guidance, Mike, I guess it’s just a purely simple; I guess yes effect, I guess it’s just purely….

Mike Fries

Management

I want to make sure I understand your question, maybe you could just repeat it; I didn’t quite follow the question.

David Wright

Analyst

Yes. So, you’ve changed the guidance to increase BASE and CWC. So, is the guidance purely a mechanical change from those two or can we confirm there’s no change to the guidance of any of the businesses ex-BASE and CWC?

Mike Fries

Management

If I’m following you correctly, we changed on the case of LiLAC; we did after 80 days here we have enough information around Cable & Wireless to believe that our guidance for LiLAC is confirmed, both short-term and medium-term. So, the answer is that when you include Cable & Wireless into our previous guidance, the guidance doesn’t change in LiLAC. In the case of Europe, the principal impact from BASE is what’s driving that most materially. We also have some FX headwinds. And so I think the European guidance is a bit more complex of course. There are two or three elements in there, but the one that’s most concrete of course is included in the BASE asset which was not included when we provided guidance in February. Is that fair?

David Wright

Analyst

Yes. I am just -- yes, I guess just without taking too much time, so I guess those additional impacts beyond BASE, you mentioned there was a little currency…

Mike Fries

Management

There’s a little FX, yes, and we know where we are in H2. So, we’re not breaking all that down for you. But in the end, we felt it was smarter to narrow it and certainly include assets that we now own and operate. So, I know where you are going but there is not much more detail.

David Wright

Analyst

Yes, essentially there is no downgrade essentially to the guidance ex-BASE, is that correct?

Mike Fries

Management

Well, there is a number of factors, I mean FX is clearly one of them. There is other -- we know where we are now through H2 -- through H1 and we know where need to be H2. So it’s a combination of factors and the most concrete of those is BASE, and I think we already just quantified that enough for you in the earlier question.

David Wright

Analyst

Okay, thanks guys.

Mike Fries

Management

Yes. All right. Listen, we appreciate you getting on the call. It’s as we said at the outset, an inflection point for us. And we do feel confident about the second half, not the least of which because of subscriber growth in the first half, which is twice last year. We think the cost efficiencies will start to factor in as we predicted. Some of the headwinds will tail off. So, the second half of the year is important for us. This is a journey. I want to remind you that. This is a journey for all of us. We’re not -- we’re in this for the long-term and hope you are too. And we did signal this for everybody. So, while we feel good about the trajectory, what it does, to us reflect anything but exactly what we more or less expected. On the LiLAC piece of the equation, I’ll just repeat that now with the own Cable & Wireless, we’re absolutely pleased, it’s a terrific business, strong management, tons of opportunity not just around synergies but around revenues. But as we integrated the business, it was important for us to get a level set especially around gap. And we’ll do a much better job of providing transparency to you in the second half around comparable periods prior and current, so that you can understand how we’re looking at those numbers. But, as I have indicated earlier, we do feel the second half will be a mid to high single-digit grower rebased and that the numbers will look more like what you had in your consensus. With that we’ll let you go. We hope you have a great rest of the summer, and speak to you on the next call. Thank you.