Earnings Labs

LiveRamp Holdings, Inc. (RAMP)

Q2 2010 Earnings Call· Wed, Oct 28, 2009

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

John Adams

Management

Thank you. Good afternoon and welcome. Thank you for joining us to discuss our fiscal 2010 second quarter results. With me today are John Meyer, our CEO and President, and Chris Wolf, our CFO. Today’s press release and this call may contain forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. For a detailed description of these risks, please read the Risk Factors section of our public filings and the press release. Acxiom undertakes no obligation to release publicly any revisions to any of our forward-looking statements. A copy of our press release and financial schedules, including any reconciliation of non-GAAP financial measures, is available at acxiom.com. At this time, I will turn the call over to John Meyer. John?

John Meyer

Management

Great. Thank you, John. And thank you, everyone, for joining us at Acxiom’s second quarter earnings call. Today I’ll share a few remarks about our financial results and then add additional color around our four key focus areas; insight, integration, international, and incubator. Then I’ll close with a few comments summarizing what we are seeing in the marketplace and how this plays to our historical strength. As you saw in our earnings release, we are still experiencing revenue challenges as far as a year-over-year revenue growth comparison. However, quarter-to-quarter revenue was up 6%. And more importantly than the number itself is that each of our industry groups, even financial services and retail, saw revenue growth. Now, this holds true for our key growth lines of business; multi-channel marketing, consumer insight products, and information management. Q2 also brought several new logo wins to include United Airlines, Symantec Interactive and NetSpend; and key incremental deals, including Dun & Bradstreet, Rodale and E-Trade. Now as the results show, we are beginning to see the benefits to the bottom line of being able to better leverage our expense base. Our continued focus on cost management and changing the way that we are doing the work allow us to carry more of that growth to the bottom line. That is evident from our earnings per share for the September quarter being up 140% over the June quarter. One area that is still a concern is our European business, especially the UK, where our product business remains under pressure. We are seeing many UK customers cut back or delay campaigns causing several of our smaller competitors to go out of our business, and all of this being made worse by a protracted postal strike. But on a more positive note, the services business there is holding…

Chris Wolf

Operator

Thank you, John. I’ll be reviewing selected financial highlights for the quarter. I direct you to our website for the supporting financial schedule to assist you with your own analysis. Let me begin with consolidated figures. For the three months ended September 30th, total revenue was $271.1 million compared to $307.4 million, excluding the $21.5 million of revenue from a pass-through data contract in the same period last year. As we have discussed with you previously, the company now recognizes revenue on a net basis on this data contract. Total operating expenses for the quarter decreased 9.3% to $149.9 million compared to $275.5 million, excluding expenses related to the pass-through contract for the same three-month period last year. Operating income was $21.2 million this quarter and $34.3 million a year ago. And net income was $9.4 million compared to $15.9 million last year. Fully diluted earnings per share were $0.12, down from $0.18 before the effect of unusual gain items in the second quarter of last year. GAAP diluted earnings per share in the prior year were $0.20. I would also like to comment on our second quarter results as compared to our first quarter. Total revenue was up by $15.1 million or 5.9%, and operating income was up by $8.8 million or 70%. Operating margin improved to 7.8 % in the second quarter from 4.9% in the first. Turning to revenue. As I previously mentioned, revenue for the quarter was $271.1 million, down from $328.9 million in the same quarter last year. $25.3 million of the decrease was due to a change in revenue recognition on the previously mentioned pass-through data contract and the unfavorable impact of foreign exchange rate. Excluding these items, total revenue was down by $32.5 million or 10.7%. Services revenue for the quarter ended September…

Operator

Operator

(Operator instructions) We’ll go first to Todd Van Fleet with First Analysis. Todd Van Fleet – First Analysis: Hi, good afternoon, guys. Nice quarter.

John Meyer

Management

Hi, Todd, thanks. Todd Van Fleet – First Analysis: September is generally – from a seasonality point of view, isn’t it generally a little bit stronger quarter than December quarter? I’m just trying to refresh my memory here on the different service or the different lines of business.

John Meyer

Management

Are you saying – you're talking about second quarter –? Todd Van Fleet – First Analysis: Yes. Yes, the September quarter, as I recall, is generally a little bit stronger from a seasonal point of view than the December quarter from a revenue perspective. Is that right?

John Meyer

Management

No. No, I don’t think that’s the case. I think it’s the other way around. Todd Van Fleet – First Analysis: The other way around.

John Meyer

Management

Yes. Historically, Todd, the third quarter, our December quarter, is stronger. The only difference was last year we did go down sequentially, but I would consider last year an anomaly. Todd Van Fleet – First Analysis: Okay. So the holiday purchases are generally made in the December quarter than in terms of the –?

John Meyer

Management

The holiday purchase is probably another thing (inaudible) a lot of people’s fiscal year ends. And so pricing and campaigns and stuff at the last bit of budget that they may have where we help them spend it. Todd Van Fleet – First Analysis: Okay. How should we think about the impact of the Saudi Arabian acquisition then in the December quarter? Is there a way you can help us kind of understand what the magnitude of the impact is there?

John Meyer

Management

It’s not a giant revenue producer. And we haven’t closed yet, but it won’t be significant to our results in the quarter. Todd Van Fleet – First Analysis: Yes. Okay. Just thinking about the next quarter or two, which – well, from a – would you say that visibility now is better than it was maybe a quarter or two quarters ago in terms of the desire to spend, it’s not actually writing the check to spend?

John Meyer

Management

I think that’s a fair characterization. We are seeing people who had plans to do things, actually starting to free up the budget, and it appears that they are planning on spending it. And the timing of when they spend it is still under question, but there is the optimism that you see in the market space. Marketers are looking at this and saying, this is a time for me to be prepared to do the marketing campaigns. It will take advantage of the revenue opportunities towards the remaining part of the year and the beginning of next year. Todd Van Fleet – First Analysis: Okay. Do you anticipate – John, over the course of the next couple quarters, given what you see in the marketplace, do you anticipate making maybe some additions here and there personnel-wise, maybe sales-wise to capitalize on certain opportunities or just to understand how you feel about the company, where it’s at from a staffing point of view in terms of meeting the market demand?

John Meyer

Management

I mean, as far as staffing, I think we are okay as far as delivering the results that we expect for the next couple quarters. We will be making probably some investments, as we look at new markets to move into, like new industries that we decided we have an opportunity to penetrate. We did make some changes that I talked about in Europe with personnel. Those were more of a replacement people than they were augmentation. And we are going through a process of evaluating account managers, and it’s a good time for us to pick up great talent on the market space that has relationships with our existing and potential clients. And we can – we are looking at upgrading the talent in that area. Todd Van Fleet – First Analysis: Okay. One more before I jump out. What was the – what a digital do in the quarter maybe on a sequential basis as probably more –?

John Meyer

Management

We kind of lumped it together in multi-channel, and so you will see that it actually increased just like the rest of the industry groups plus our consumer information group and our information management group, as I said. So it went up. Todd Van Fleet – First Analysis: Okay. Thanks, guys.

Operator

Operator

We’ll go next to Carter Malloy with Stephens. Carter Malloy – Stephens: Hey, guys, thanks for taking my questions. On the pass-through revenue, I’m just trying to clear up in my model. And so I think you had $29 million last year and $21.5 million this quarter. There is $7.5 million to $8.0 million in easing comp sequentially. And I’m just – looking forward, should I expect that same type of movement for the next quarter or two?

John Meyer

Management

Yes. I don’t – we don’t have an issue – I mean, I think that was public.

Chris Wolf

Operator

Yes. We just want to confirm the amount. Carter, it’s Chris, that you are right. For Q3 in December, you would see number of that kind of scale, which Q4 will taper off because the contract was renegotiated in February of last year. So that’s where you will see a decrease.

John Meyer

Management

And we only have two months out of the three in that last fourth quarter. So – Carter Malloy – Stephens: Okay. So I shouldn’t see a sequential – I don’t want to call it a benefit, but easing of comps maybe on the pass-through that we did.

John Meyer

Management

Right. You’ll see something in the neighborhood of plus $20 million, again just as you did in this quarter. Carter Malloy – Stephens: Okay. And then on the DMV contract, I don’t know if you can quantify how much is in the quarter, but can you maybe tell us if you are up to speed now or if you’re close to or at a full run rate on that?

John Meyer

Management

We are not up to the full run rate in this quarter, but we did get a portion of the revenue in this quarter. So next quarter, we expect to be at full speed. Carter Malloy – Stephens: So, of that, call it, $7 million or $8 million sequential improvement outside of the pass-through data can – is it fair to say that DMV was a good piece of that?

John Meyer

Management

Yes, it would be fair to say that DMV was a piece of that.

Chris Wolf

Operator

And it’s a good piece, but I think the thing we are trying to stress is we saw each of the industry group improve a little bit (inaudible) John’s comments around little green shoots (inaudible) going on these days. So it wasn’t just in DMV, but it was modestly in all the other industry groups as well. Carter Malloy – Stephens: Okay. That’s good to hear. And then, Chris, just a couple housekeeping – can you – I'm sorry, I missed the FX as a whole for the company in the quarter?

Chris Wolf

Operator

Yes. It was about, I would say, $3.2 million for the quarter. Carter Malloy – Stephens: Okay.

Chris Wolf

Operator

I’m sorry. $3.8 million, Carter. Carter Malloy – Stephens: Okay, thanks. And looking at your operating margins, I know you guys aren’t giving guidance, but I’m just curious what your long-term thinking is on that as far as target, a goal to get to.

Chris Wolf

Operator

I think I quoted a couple of times that we’d like to get up in the mid-teens.

John Meyer

Management

And to be fair, I mean, with the revenue challenges that we had in the short run, the margins have been compressed in the near-term. But we do believe we have tremendous operating leverage once we return to previous revenue levels. Carter Malloy – Stephens: Okay. And then this is probably too detail of a question, but can you explain a little more on the Symantec Interactive? What are you doing for those guys?

John Meyer

Management

Sorry, I don’t know. Carter Malloy – Stephens: Okay, that’s fine.

John Meyer

Management

We’ll get back to you. Carter Malloy – Stephens: Okay, thanks.

Operator

Operator

We will go next to Dan Leben with Robert W. Baird. Dan Leben – Robert W. Baird: Great, thank you. Just looking at the sequential increase in revenues versus the cost ticking up, could you help us understand in terms of as we start going forward into revenue growth, how we should think about kind of pull-through margins on the bulk of the business? Are there any mix issues that we should be aware of?

John Meyer

Management

We have talked in the past two quarters the importance or the belief the economic leverage is going to pay dividend as the revenue kick up. And I think this is the first example of you seeing that in a quarter. We would expect – and I’ve talked to many of you and said that I think we could go 10% to 15% more revenue depending on what type of revenue it is, without adding any additional expense. And so you can draw your own conclusions off of that statement.

Chris Wolf

Operator

Just one thing I would add is DMV was a product as it’s in its early stages. There is not much profitability in that contract in the early stages. So we would expect to see margin expansion in that area.

John Meyer

Management

Yes, sure. That’s a good point. Dan Leben – Robert W. Baird: Okay. So you didn’t see any issues in the quarter where there was a mix to less profitable products or any of those types of things?

Chris Wolf

Operator

I don’t think we did. I mean, the issue is always around the volume of the pure product business because (inaudible) more profitable with other threshold of basic expense (inaudible) nothing in any particular area. And I think it’s been a lot of time talking about absolute cost reduction. So what we’ve really been trying to do is essentially reengineer the way we deliver so that we understand that leverage model, which John was talking about a little bit earlier, rather better. So we have some flexibility as we grow. We see it somewhat fixed – not originally [ph], but somewhat fixed our expense base. But it will give us flexibility the other way where we can verbalize it on the downward side [ph]. So we’ve spent a lot of time focused on how as well as the cost of delivery. Dan Leben – Robert W. Baird: Okay, great. And John, you talked a little bit about seeing some – from some customers’ budgets picking up or at least talking about it picking up. Could you give us an idea of kind of the ways you are looking at doing it? Is it more in terms of spending more on the digital? Is it kind of across the board? Could you give us some color there, please?

John Meyer

Management

It really depends on the customer and what the customer is trying to achieve, because there are certain customers that still view direct mail as a great way to acquire customers because of the pinpoint nature of being able to send a mail through the person that they are trying to reach. I’d say in the retention space, we see a lot of opportunity in growing that, but that’s mostly (inaudible) directive where they are opting (inaudible) and then we manage those campaigns on behalf of the customer. Especially in the publishing space, we see a lot of movement in that area. And then across probably the one big thing that I’d like to leave you with is we’re seeing clients play across those channels and that we think that puts us in the unique position of being, yes, we have the customer database, which is a critical core to everything. But sometimes they want to use that customer base and information to do mail. Sometimes they wanted to use email. Sometimes they want to run it through banner ads and multiple different channels. And the investments that we’ve made over the past 18 months give us the opportunity to do that customer recognition regardless of the channel that they want to deliver the message on. Dan Leben – Robert W. Baird: Great. And then just one last one for me, just a follow-up on Todd’s question about the seasonality going to the third quarter, looking back over the last several years, last year excluded, it looks like the seasonal uptick is only kind of maybe 1% of revenue or so. Is that the right magnitude to think about it? Just wanted to make sure we don’t get out in front of the skis on this.

John Meyer

Management

Is that a guidance question? Dan Leben – Robert W. Baird: Well, it’s not guidance. I mean, just in terms of when you’re thinking seasonality, just that we don’t model in a 10% uptick or something crazy and set the bar too high. It’s a modest seasonal uptick, but it’s not like we are going to see a huge kind of technology spending fourth quarter where it’s twice as high as the third quarter.

John Meyer

Management

Yes, but that – you know, that uptick or that 1% that you’re talking about, that was probably after normal run rate. I would look at the past couple quarters and say that those weren’t normal times. And so you’d have to draw your own conclusion, but I think if we return to some semblance of normality in Q3, 1% uptick will be enough. Dan Leben – Robert W. Baird: Okay, great. Thanks, guys.

Operator

Operator

And that does conclude our question-and-answer session. I’d now like to turn the call back over to Mr. John Meyer for any additional or closing remarks.

John Meyer

Management

Great. Thank you, Jay. And once again, thanks to all of you for showing up on the call. I’ll close with a few comments on how we view the current marketplace conditions and how those marketplace conditions play to our historical strengths. More and more the marketplace is recognizing the need to leverage all the channels to present a coordinated cohesive message through a more discerning consumer base. As we celebrate our 40th anniversary of our founding, which was on October of 1969, Acxiom is uniquely positioned to bring all these efforts into play, either on a hosted solution or in a completely outsourced offer like the client engagement I talked about earlier. Our customer database expertise paired with our unique ability to recognize the individual while preserving privacy is entering the needs of regardless the channel our clients want to use and how they want to use them. We are creating a 360 view of that customer across all these channels, reflecting our belief that traditional separate, both digital and direct channels are now essentially one and the same and they are multi-channel. Acxiom’s traditional consumer database insights combined with our multi-channel expertise allow our clients to achieve what is truly now a personalized marketing. All of this gives us a reason for confidence on positive results in the second half. So, thank you for joining us and look forward to talking to you throughout the next quarter.

Operator

Operator

That does conclude today’s conference. We thank you for your participation.