Earnings Labs

RF Industries, Ltd. (RFIL)

Q3 2023 Earnings Call· Thu, Sep 14, 2023

$13.92

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Greetings. Welcome to the RF Industries Third Quarter Fiscal 2023 Financial Results Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] Please note, this conference is being recorded. I will now turn the conference over to your host Jack Drapacz. You may begin.

Jack Drapacz

Analyst

Thank you, operator. Good afternoon, and welcome to RF Industries' third quarter fiscal 2023 financial results conference call. With me on today's call are RF Industries' President and CEO, Rob Dawson. Before I turn the call over to Rob, I'd like to cover a few quick items. This afternoon, RF Industries issued a press release announcing its third quarter fiscal 2023 financial results. That release is available on the company's website at rfindustries.com. This call is also being broadcast live over the Internet for all interested parties, and the webcast will be archived on the Investor Relations page of the company's website. I want to remind everyone that during today's call, management will make forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. Please note that except for the historical statements, statements on this call today may constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. When used, the words anticipate, believe, expect, intend, future and other similar expressions identify forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements reflect management's current views with respect to future events and financial performance and are subject to risks and uncertainties, and actual results may differ materially from the outcomes contained in any forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause these forward-looking statements to differ from actual results include delays in development, marketing or sales of products and other risks and uncertainties discussed in the company's periodic reports on Form 10-K and 10-Q and other filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. RF Industries undertakes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements. Additionally, throughout this call, we will be discussing certain non-GAAP financial measures. Today's earnings release and the related current report on Form 8-K describe the differences between our GAAP and non-GAAP reporting and present the reconciliation between the two for the periods reported in the earnings release. With that said, I will now turn the conference over to Rob Dawson, President and Chief Executive Officer.

Rob Dawson

Analyst

Thank you, Jack. Good afternoon, everyone. Thanks for joining our third quarter fiscal 2023 conference call. Our CFO, Peter Yin, had to attend to a personal matter, so I'll be handling today's call solo. Our third quarter results tell the story of a very challenging quarter. As you saw in our press release, third quarter revenue was $15.7 million, down 34% year-over-year. I knew we had a tough comp against a record third quarter last year, but when I last spoke with you in June, we were seeing steady order activity and the expectation of consistent shipments of hybrid fiber cable. Overall, I thought we were seeing some decent momentum until we hit July. The pause hit hard with many of our key projects and shipment schedules put on hold. Customers were delaying delivery of their orders or freezing new orders for project-based deployments. Due to these delays, we shipped virtually no hybrid fiber cable in the quarter, along with less sales of carrier approved RF passes, and these surprising developments significantly impacted our quarter. Those of you following the industry know that the wireless carriers have greatly curtailed their capital spending over the last few quarters. Those carriers and the large neutral hosts have been restructuring their businesses to adapt to an environment of higher interest rates, overstock inventory and steep labor costs, among other things. This has included significant headcount reductions in the entire carrier ecosystem. Look across the board, and you'll see even the big players in our space, like the radio manufacturers are going through some challenging times and reporting numbers well below the prior year in the North American market. While we can't control the economic backdrop, we can control our own business, and that's what we've been focused on. We have a very strong…

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from Josh Nichols with B. Riley. Please proceed.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Hi there. This is [indiscernible] for Josh Nichols. I was just wondering if you could speak a little bit more about like carrier CapEx cycles and kind of what you're seeing in terms of when those will resume?

Rob Dawson

Analyst

Sure. Yes, good question. So I mean, look, it's not abnormal in a major build cycle, generational like this one, to have macro sites built first, then there's usually a pause while they consume that, and then they'll be the more densification build. So we think we're in that pause at the moment, at least. I think everyone that I talked to agrees that, that's what's happening. And we expect the - with what we're hearing today, we expect getting into calendar 2024 to be in a different environment. I think we're hearing that not just from the carriers, but from the neutral host and tower companies, the contractors and integrators we're hearing real site counts from people, and there's folks out walking the sites to make sure the bill of material is accurate. That's a phenomenon that typically leads to the cycle picking back up. And again, not that it couldn't happen towards the end of '23 in a broader way because we are seeing a little bit of increase there, but I think the bigger expectation is we get into '24, '25, '26, there's be some consistent spending on densification in particular.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

All right. Great. Thank you very much.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Okay. It looks like we have no further questions in queue. I'd like to turn the floor back to Robert Dawson for any closing remarks.

Rob Dawson

Analyst

Thank you, John, and thanks, everyone, for joining our call today. We look forward to sharing our fiscal fourth quarter results in December and look forward to speaking to many of you over the next few days. Have a good day.

Operator

Operator

This concludes today's conference, and you may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.