Earnings Labs

Napco Security Technologies, Inc. (NSSC)

Q3 2015 Earnings Call· Mon, May 11, 2015

$45.62

-1.02%

Key Takeaways · AI generated
AI summary not yet generated for this transcript. Generation in progress for older transcripts; check back soon, or browse the full transcript below.

Same-Day

+3.14%

1 Week

+3.14%

1 Month

+9.02%

vs S&P

+8.54%

Transcript

Operator

Operator

Greetings, and welcome to the NAPCO Security Technologies Third Quarter Fiscal 2015 Financial Results Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A brief question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Todd Fromer, Managing Partner of KCSA, Strategic Communications. Thank you, sir. You may begin.

Todd Fromer

Analyst

Thank you. Good morning and thank you all for joining us for today’s conference call to discuss NAPCO’s financial results for the third quarter ended March 31, 2015. By now, all of you should have had the opportunity to review the press release discussing the results. If you have not, please call our office, KCSA, at 212-682-6300. We will immediately send it to you by either fax or e-mail. On the call today is Richard Soloway, President and Chairman of NAPCO Security Technologies and Kevin Buchel, Senior VP of Operations and Finance. Before we begin, let me take a moment to read the following forward-looking statement. This conference call may contain forward-looking statements that involve numerous risks and uncertainties. Actual results, performance or achievements may differ materially from those anticipated in such forward-looking statements as a result of certain factors, including those set forth in the company’s filings with the SEC. With that out of the way, let me turn the call over to Richard Soloway, President and Chairman of NAPCO Security Technologies. Dick, the floor is yours.

Richard Soloway

Analyst

Thanks, Todd. Good morning, everyone and thank you for joining us. This morning, NAPCO reported results for the third fiscal quarter of 2015. We are pleased with our performance in what was a challenging environment for the company. As many of you experienced firsthand, the months of January, February and March put record cold temperatures, ferocious winds and plenty of snow. This is especially true in the Northeast, where a large number of NAPCO’s 10,000 plus dealers are located. The unreasonably brutal winter made it difficult for our dealers to conduct sales calls, which are critical in an industry, where business is done face-to-face. It also made it difficult for them to install the NAPCO products that provided recurring revenue streams. Despite the challenges, our financial results were solid and we continue to grow our top line and sales of recurring revenue products. More importantly, we emerge from the winter with continued excitement about the company’s trajectory. In April, NAPCO was a featured exhibitor at ISC West, the security industry’s largest U.S. tradeshow. Across all of our divisions, our products were met with a warm reception, including our StarLink fire communicators, architect network designer wireless access control locks, and LifeSaver healthcare locking solutions. Our strong showing at ISC West underscored NAPCO’s position as one of the most dynamic companies in the security industry. The positive reaction also demonstrated that the investments we have made in our business to develop our product line are paying off. One of the things we focused on is keeping our capital expenditures and R&D spend constant on a quarterly basis. Since our business is seasonal that along with our fixed cost structure results in margins being lower in the beginning of the year. When you take into consideration that we are entering the fourth quarter,…

Kevin Buchel

Analyst

Thank you, Dick and good morning everybody. Revenues for the three months ended March 31, 2015 increased 4% to $17.9 million compared to $17.3 million in the same period a year ago. The increase in sales for the three months was due primarily to increased sales of the company’s door locking products, increased recurring revenue and partially offset by decreased sales of intrusion and access control products. For the nine months, revenues increased 4% to $54.8 million from $52.9 million for the same period 1 year ago. The increase in sales for the nine months was due primarily to an increase in door locking, intrusion and access control products as well as increased recurring revenue. Gross profit for the three months ended March 31, 2015 is roughly flat at $5.3 million or 29.9% of sales compared to $5.3 million or 30.8% of sales for the same period a year ago. Gross profit for the nine months increased approximately 8% to $16.7 million, or 30.5% of sales compared to $15.4 million, or 29.2% of sales in the same period a year ago. The increase in gross profit for the nine months was primarily due to increased sales and a positive shift in product mix to higher margin products. This also demonstrates the impact of increased recurring revenues as well as our overall efficiency as our sales volume increases. Selling, general and administrative expenses for the quarter increased $301,000, or 7% to $4.9 million, or 27.2% of sales compared to $4.6 million, or 26.4% of sales for the same period last year. Selling, general and administrative expenses for the nine months increased by $941,000 or approximately 7% to $14.9 million, or 27.2% of sales compared to $13.9 million, or 26.4% of sales a year ago. The increase in selling, general, and administrative…

Richard Soloway

Analyst

Okay. Thanks Kevin. In conclusion, our commitment to enhancing shareholder value remains steadfast. As part of that commitment, we continues to roll out new recurring revenue products while growing revenues from existing ones, as well as making the opportunistic repurchase of shares in the open market. We are excited about the positive developments in our business and believe we are well-positioned to deliver strong results to round out the year and demonstrate the leverage in our business model. That concludes our formal remarks. Kevin and I would like to open the call for questions. Operator, please proceed.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. We will now be conducting the question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from the line of Joshua Reilly with Northland Securities. Please proceed with your question.

Joshua Reilly

Analyst

Thank you, guys. So I guess my first question is, could you give us an update on the pipeline here for the spring or the school LockDown product. And what are you seeing overall in the spending environment on the school side, is there a budget out there for new products?

Richard Soloway

Analyst

Hi, Josh. The school business has been picking up nicely both K-12 and colleges and universities. We have a full line of products that do that. We have in the – we are in the midst of producing some customized versions of our locking to match the architectural requirements by the schools. We are very versatile in being able to do that because Marks makes architectural hardware and alarm lock makes the customized electronics. We don’t really break down the amount of school business, but it is a little lumpy. It comes typically at a time when the schools are out. That’s when the orders come through so that the locks can be replaced when there are no students in the schools. But we have high hopes our rep organization, our sales organization is out visiting all kinds of schools and there is a whole list of schools that we have closed on our website. So you might want to refer to that. And we believe that the lumpiness will kind of smooth out as legislation seems to be being discussed around the country about having the school LockDown and with our SAVI report in our product line, we feel very, very positive about it.

Joshua Reilly

Analyst

Okay. I think you mentioned the intrusion and access control wasn’t as strong as you might have hoped, was the main driver of that weather in the quarter would you say or was there something else there?

Richard Soloway

Analyst

I think that the weather was a dampening factor because the dealers all told us that nobody was going out, they weren’t making any calls, people weren’t really installing alarms. So it kind of put a quenching effect on things. Historically, we always had a very strong fourth and we have – we expect that, that history will continue. We have kept our expenses level throughout the quarters, so when the volume comes in, in the fourth that should trough a lot of revenue and profitability.

Joshua Reilly

Analyst

Okay. And then my last question is the gross margin was down slightly year-over-year when the growing percentage of recurring revenue business should be bringing that up, it might take away – what’s driving that in the quarter that locking business was stronger than you expected and kind of have the lower than company average gross margin just wanted to confirm that?

Kevin Buchel

Analyst

Roughly, the locking GP is very good and that helped the GP. The thing that hurt the GP for the quarter is if you are spending more money than you were last year than we are – the GP is going to go down. So, we are spending more R&D. We are not stopping the R&D just because the weather is bad. We continue to spend – we are trying to get products to market as fast as we can. We are also spending more money on the SG&A line to get it to market as fast as we can, because we want to hit our goals that we talked about in 2017. We expect to be at a much higher level than we are now. And in order to do that, we have to spend money. And so when you spend the money, then you have a quarter where their sales get hurt by weather or whatever, it looks worse than it was say in the prior year. But to us, it’s just a small measure of time, it doesn’t mean much in the big picture and in the fourth quarter, which is where we are now, it’s going to come roaring back.

Joshua Reilly

Analyst

Alright. Thanks guys.

Kevin Buchel

Analyst

Okay, Josh.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from the line of Kara Anderson with B. Riley. Please proceed with your question.

Kara Anderson

Analyst · B. Riley. Please proceed with your question.

Hi, guys. Good morning. Just to sort of piggyback off of Joshua’s comments, can you quantify the impact from weather on the quarter’s revenues?

Richard Soloway

Analyst · B. Riley. Please proceed with your question.

It’s hard for us to do that, Kara, because remember how we sell. We are selling through distribution, but what we see and what we hear is that the distributors, inventory levels weren’t so low, because nobody was out selling, dealers weren’t out-selling. So, it’s hard for us to exactly quantify, but what we felt was it was worse than even as it was last year. Last year, the weather wasn’t great either. This year, it was even worse. Records would be set in many cities for snowfall and such. So, it’s hard for us not only to quantify it, it’s also hard for us to tell you for sure it’s going to come back in this quarter. We think we are going to get a bunch of it back in Q4, but that’s also hard to quantify.

Kara Anderson

Analyst · B. Riley. Please proceed with your question.

Okay. And then also, you mentioned 2017 goals, can you update us on your longer term revenue and gross margin expectations and sort of the timeframe for achieving those?

Richard Soloway

Analyst · B. Riley. Please proceed with your question.

Well, nothing has really changed as far as our expectations. For 2017, we expect the recurring revenue to be at a $10 million clip. So that we are doing a lot of things, a lot of promotions, spending money to get that number up as fast as we can, because that’s high GP business. Recurring revenue, as many of you know, is 80% plus GP. So, it’s important that we get that and recurring revenue is the gift that keeps on giving. So, we are spending a lot of money and promotions to get recurring up. So, that goal is still the same. And we also with all of our products and promotions, etcetera, our goal is also to be at a much higher clip by ‘17. We have set at $100 million run-rate. Nothing has changed just because of a quarter that had some bad weather. So, our goals are the same.

Kara Anderson

Analyst · B. Riley. Please proceed with your question.

Great, thank you.

Richard Soloway

Analyst · B. Riley. Please proceed with your question.

You are welcome, Kara.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our next question comes from the line of Leon Semonian, a Private Investor. Please proceed with your question.

Leon Semonian

Analyst

I am distracted you are buying back. Is that being retired out on the treasury?

Kevin Buchel

Analyst

Out in the treasury, Leon.

Leon Semonian

Analyst

Thank you. Bye-bye.

Operator

Operator

Mr. Soloway, it appears we have no further questions at this time – I am sorry, we did get another question. Our question is from [indiscernible] Partners. Please proceed with your question.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Hi, good morning. I was wondering if you could give me a sense – give us a sense of how the quarter is progressing that we are in right now? You have been able to see I guess about a month and a half of the quarter, could you give us some insight?

Richard Soloway

Analyst

We really can’t give any predictions on how the quarter will be and how it’s progressing. We can just tell you historically for more than 10 years, the fourth is by far the strongest quarter and we would expect the same type of thing this year. A lot of the business comes through in the very, very end of the quarter. So we expect there would be expenses that we have been spending for sales, marketing and engineering that our profitability will bounce back to higher level once the volume is completed by the end of June.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay. Can you give us a sense of what kind of gross margin you are expecting for this quarter?

Richard Soloway

Analyst

Well, what we could say up is if we have the kind of quarter that we had last year and the year before, in each case it was a $21.5 million, $21.8 million a quarter, $21.5 million last year, $21.8 million the year before. In each of those years, the gross margin was 38% plus. We know when we get over 20, that’s when the action starts. You get over 21, you are going to be over 35, to be close to 38. So while we can’t predict that the sales for the quarter is going to be exactly $21 million, $22 million, $23 million, we do believe it’s going to be over $20 million, and once it’s over $20 million, you get what we call the hockey stick leverage. So we feel very confident about that leverage. Just hard for us to tell you right here and now how high over the $20 million is it going to be.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay. And just the balance sheet, are you slowing down the debt pay down, is this a level you are going to hold this debt or do you want to get it to zero?

Richard Soloway

Analyst

Well, right now what we have been doing with the buyback is just paying as required as opposed to paying extra. So depending upon how we handle the buyback, we will slow the buyback. We will pay more towards the debt. Once it got below $10 million, we got very comfortable. And at that point, we feel like we did what we have to do as long as we make our payments that are due will do. So we don’t have to get to zero. The debt level is comfortable for us and the interest cost is very low. We pay LIBOR plus 1.5%. So it’s almost like free money in a sense.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay. And just finally, you made some new hires in terms of sales I was wondering if you could comment on how those new hires have been going?

Richard Soloway

Analyst

We have hired people in the sales area of most of our divisions. We have also put on sales reps in greater quantity than ever before and it takes a little bit of time for them to bring in the business. But we can feel and see from the feedback that we get from these people that there is going to be a lot of business generated. You back that up with the new products that we have got going on that are coming out, fire and LockDown and lots of recurring revenue products, more feet on the street is what the name of the game is for us with the reps and with the salespeople and it makes for a very bright scenario.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay. Do you guys – in order to get that number in 2017, will this require you to do any sort of acquisitions?

Richard Soloway

Analyst

No, that’s organic growth.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay. Because when we look at the estimates out there, we are looking at around $80 million this year, $84 million next year. So to get to that number, I believe you have to do about $100 million if I am correct?

Richard Soloway

Analyst

At a run rate of.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay. And so that would require some serious growth from 2016 to 2017?

Richard Soloway

Analyst

Yes, but a run rate of means $25 million type quarters. So yes, we have a lot of work to do and I think we have the products to get there.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay. Do you think that at this point you flat lined in terms of costs or are you going to be adding more costs in order to build up the SG&A?

Richard Soloway

Analyst

I don’t think we are going to have to increase it beyond the new spend rate that we are. Right now we are spending at say $1 million more than we have spent in the past. The only thing that we think is variable is the sales commission part. So as those sales grow, there is going to be additional commission costs. And as those sales grow, there will be additional freight costs. So, other than those two costs, we don’t see any major additions to the selling costs. It might be promotions also. We pick our spots in order to get those sales to grow fast like we have to have it happen. There might be some selling promotions here and there. So, I don’t think it’s going to be millions of dollars more, but it might be a little bit more here and there.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Okay, perfect. Thanks guys. Thank you.

Richard Soloway

Analyst

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Mr. Soloway, we have no further questions at this time. I would now like to turn the floor back over to you for closing comments.

Richard Soloway

Analyst

Okay, thank you everyone for participating in today’s conference call. As always, if you have any further questions, please feel free to call KCSA, Kevin or me. We thank you for your interest and support and we look forward to speaking to all of you again in a few months to discuss NAPCO’s fiscal 2015 fourth quarter and full year results. Bye-bye.

Operator

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude today’s teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation and have a wonderful day.