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Veru Inc. (VERU)

Q4 2013 Earnings Call· Tue, Dec 3, 2013

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Hello, and welcome to the Female Health Company Fourth Quarter Fiscal Year 2013 Conference Call. All participants will be in listen-only mode. (Operator Instructions) After today’s presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. Please note this event is being recorded. The statements made on this conference call, which are not historical facts are forward-looking statements based on the company’s current plan and strategies and reflect the company’s current assessment of the risks and uncertainties related to its business, including such things as product demand and market acceptance, the economic and business environment, and the impact of government pressures, currency risks, capacity, efficiency and supply constraints, and other risks detailed in the company’s press releases, shareholder communication, and Securities and Exchange Commission filings. For additional information, the company urges you to consider reviewing its 10-Q and 10-K SEC filings. I would now like to turn the conference over to Mr. O.B. Parrish. Please go ahead.

O.B. Parrish

Management

Thank you, Amy. Good morning and welcome to The Female Health Company’s fourth quarter and fiscal 2013 conference call. Michele Greco, our Vice President and CFO is here with me in Chicago, and Mike Pope, our VP, U.K. and Malaysian Operations, is participating from our London office. First I’ll cover the financial results for the fourth quarter 2013, then address key events and long-term demand factors that may impact future results, then I’ll cover the outlook and then, we will take some questions. As usual, when I refer to years, I am referring to the company’s fiscal year, which ends September 30 unless otherwise noted. After six consecutive record quarters of growth, results for the third and fourth quarters of 2013 decreased from the prior year, resulting in a modest decrease for the year, but it's important to note that the quarterly and annual decreases were against record prior year periods. As we've previously experienced, discussed and reported in our filings, the decrease reflects public sector purchasing patterns not any change in –(inaudible) or long-term outlook. We've always (inaudible) will probably continue to vary, demand continues to increase. The ongoing increase of demand is directly reflected by the fact that the average annual compound unit sales growth for the last eight years through periods of volatility has been 19%. As a result, we believe demand will continue, we have had these experiences previously when there has been a dip in demand due to different purchasing patterns and then followed by an upswing reflecting the increase in demand and I expect that that will [occur again]. Turning to the fourth quarter, full fourth quarter unit sales decreased 52% over the prior year. Revenues also decreased 52% to 4.8 million. Our gross margin totaled $2.3 million or 48% sales, a decrease of…

Operator

Operator

(Operator Instructions) And our first question comes from Jack Wallace of Sidoti & Company. Jack Wallace - Sidoti & Company: O.B. and Michele, good morning to you both.

O.B. Parrish

Management

Good morning, Jack. Jack Wallace - Sidoti & Company: Question here in regards to Brazil and South Africa that's traditionally been large customers of yours. Understand as a little bit below here in between orders. Do we have any -- and I understand you talked about large tenders outstanding and some of those are more public and others do we have any idea as what's going on in South Africa? Are things still tied up there and is there any I guess since you gave us on Brazil?

O.B. Parrish

Management

All I can say is that we -- I can't identify any outstanding (inaudible) public at this point, but there are some significant tenders that are outstanding. In South Africa, there has been some similar activity in terms of tender awards and we see some business there [competitive] product -- see some -- and that will play out in terms of who can actually deliver the products and the quality needed and we believe that we will be able to meet all of the standards and deliver a quantity in Northern and South Africa and we are currently having some substantial business during the next 12 months. Jack Wallace - Sidoti & Company: Thank you there. In previous reports we have discussed there is a large order that was being segregated from the inventory level rising above I guess what would be considered normal, do you have any update on how that order has been progressing? Is that a...

O.B. Parrish

Management

(inaudible) keeping those inventory of their own for us. Jack Wallace - Sidoti & Company: I believe that was the case, yes.

O.B. Parrish

Management

I will explain that. They came to us and they said, they have a number of small orders that the United Nations' population found there were number of smaller orders that come in and like to be able to fill them quickly and they ask if we would establish an inventory for them, they would pay for that inventory and we would hold the inventory for them and make a draw (inaudible) they wish and we see that -- you will a slight increase in our inventory and even though we have down year and that's going to increase (inaudible) principally to set that up and that is in place. Jack Wallace - Sidoti & Company: Great. Thank you all. I'll hop back in queue.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from John Gaye a private investor.

Unidentified Analyst

Analyst

Hi, O.B. and Michele. I think the question that I was going to ask is always going to asked by the previous questionnaire (inaudible)? Thank you.

O.B. Parrish

Management

Can you repeat that?

Michele Greco

Analyst

His question was already asked. His question was already asked.

O.B. Parrish

Management

Okay, good.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from George Whiteside at SWS Financial. George Whiteside – SWS Financial: Good morning and congratulations on a continuing good performance.

O.B. Parrish

Management

Thanks George. George Whiteside – SWS Financial: My question is in relationship to some of the developments and attempts to come up with vaccines etcetera. Could you describe what you see as a competition to the FC2?

O.B. Parrish

Management

Yes, I think that there has been a number of attempts to evolve vaccines. To date they’ve been unsuccessful and that is in the last couple of months or the articles that have come out, some are outlining the difficulties and accomplishing that. There is additional money that's going to go into it. In fact Obama just recently announced an additional $100 million basically for a new approach to obtaining the vaccines. The approaches to date in sales and this is the fundamental approach to try to do it, but if it's successful and nobody knows whether it will be or not, it's going to be a number of years we work something like that would become broadly available. So I wouldn't expect over the next three or four years to see anything of that nature and it's got an impact on us. George Whiteside – SWS Financial: You mentioned the name of competitors in terms of female condoms, what is…

O.B. Parrish

Management

There are two Cupid and the other is (inaudible). The Cupid product does have clearance from WHO. We got that clearance in June of 2012. Since that time, they’ve had very little in a way of business. We believe they certainly have problems in terms of capacity and delivering large scale quantities. They are not attempting to get FDA approval. To date has not -- we've seen very central orders around the world in order they have the clearances. George Whiteside – SWS Financial: Now my second question has to do with your tax benefit. I presume that that is in relationship to your NOL year in the States both federal and state.

O.B. Parrish

Management

That's true. The tax benefit on the (inaudible) personally through the NOLs and it also is in part being led to the ratio of FC2. The sales of that type of nature and we think that initially that will continue, over 50% household, so those are pretax on (inaudible). George Whiteside – SWS Financial: Excellent. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Jack Wallace of Sidoti. Jack Wallace - Sidoti & Company: Follow-up here in regards to funding from the U.K. government, we heard back in the second quarter that there is a good amount of money earmarked for female condoms or I believe [additional from sectors] please correct me if I am wrong, have we seen those funds trickle through UNFDA to believe the purchasing agent and was there an impact with that order in this quarter?

O.B. Parrish

Management

There is very significant impact. In fact, there are two different pieces of U.K. funds that are involved here. One was a year ago, the Family Planning by the Gates Foundation in the U.K. Government made the commitment of £500 million for 2020 program. Small pieces of that started to flow through and then more recently and within about two, three months ago, the U.K. government made a conversion of $1.5 billion to our HIV/AIDS, TB and Malaria treatment prevention and to-date, we haven't seen any of that flow through at this point. So there is substantial funding out there for both of these programs at least through the year 2020. Jack Wallace - Sidoti & Company: Okay. Thank you. And then just wanted to talk a little about the SG&A line item down significantly from last year in the previous three quarters and the comments there in the press release it was just discussed basically incentive compensation. Should we read into this that the majority of SG&A under normal circumstances and a non-down lumpy quarter is going to predominantly incentive bonuses and…

O.B. Parrish

Management

Yes, we -- our incentive program is very largely tied to achieving certain results and so if we have a down period of that nature, the incentive is going to be radically down and as in 2012, we got a great year the incentive was up. We think it's a pretty good way to manage making the cash and expense consistent with the results and the capacity to pay each year. Jack Wallace - Sidoti & Company: I certainly agree with you there and then also just trying to figure out how much was also spent on education and training in the quarter because...

O.B. Parrish

Management

We've spent about -- yes I can tell you, we spent a little bit better than $1.5 million in 2013 on education and training and this year we expect to spend about $2.1 million to almost $2.5 million. Jack Wallace - Sidoti & Company: Okay. Thank you. And then lastly here just wanted to talk about the competitive landscape again I understand you have mentioned that in your Q today, the U.S. and the FDA approval they've struggle with those manufacturing capacity, but are you seeing from governments and health organizations on the ground that there is preference for more than one female condom and if so, is that at least a minor headwind in light of all the tailwinds that you spoke earlier about in the call?

O.B. Parrish

Management

I think that the people will probably like also some of the choices of female condoms, the question for (inaudible), as I mentioned there are two. So both of the products share different designs than each other and they are obviously two and so what the question will be that the product-specific training that we provide for our product in terms of its [used] one is unapplicable for the other two products in terms of the design wins they have. Today, they have not been providing any product specific training that is going to require for them to gain acceptance and I think substantial businesses as we require (inaudible) product specific training and that will settle the question of all the required being accepted and to what degree will it be accepted once people learn how to use it. Jack Wallace - Sidoti & Company: Okay. Thank you. That will be all for me.

Operator

Operator

(Operator Instructions) This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Mr. Parrish for any closing remarks.

O.B. Parrish

Management

Okay. Thank you for your interest and support and we will be on again in one quarter. Bye.

Operator

Operator

To access the digital replay of this conference, you may dial 1877-344-7529 or 1412-317-0088 beginning at 12:30 Eastern today. You will be prompted to enter the conference number, which will be 10037276. Please record your name and company when joining. The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.