Concentrix Corporation
Q4 2020 Earnings Call Transcript

Published: 12 Jan 2021

[Operator:]

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Concentrix Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2020 Financial Results Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speakers' presentation, there will be question-and-answer session. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to one of your speakers today, Mr. David Stein, Vice President of Investor Relations. Sir, please go ahead.

[David Stein:]

Thank you, Michelle, and good morning. Welcome to the Concentrix Fourth Quarter and Full Year Fiscal 2020 Earnings Call. This call contains forward-looking statements that address our expected future performance and that, by their nature, address matters that are uncertain. These uncertainties may cause our actual future results to be materially different than those expressed in our forward-looking statements.

[Chris Caldwell:]

Thank you very much, David. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the first Concentrix Corporation earnings call. Let me first start by thanking all our SYNNEX colleagues and specifically, Dennis Polk, Peter Irock and Marshall Witt for all the support over the years to get us to this point. And last but not least, Bob Long, the founder of SYNNEX, who decided to start investing in the BPO business those 16 years ago. I'm extremely proud with what we've accomplished over the last 16 years. We have built an award-winning global delivery platform augmented by technology for our clients that delivers at scale incredibly well through very dynamic business environments. This has positioned us for a successful spin-off from SYNNEX on December 1, 2020, into our own publicly-traded company. Even though we are 16 years into our history, I'm incredibly excited about the opportunities that lay in front of us. While the results we are announcing today were our last quarter as part of SYNNEX, I believe they demonstrate our strong positioning in the marketplace and our ability to execute as our own independent company. Our revenue growth and profitability exceeded our guidance and expectations, driven by strong execution and our ability to ramp wins from our third quarter faster than originally forecasted. We also benefited from higher-than-expected volumes with a broad set of clients during the quarter.

[Andre Valentine:]

Well, thank you, Chris, and good morning. I'll begin with a look at our financial results for the fourth quarter and then discuss our business outlook for the first quarter of fiscal 2021. We experienced a strong improvement in revenue and profitability in the fourth quarter. Revenue in the fourth quarter was $1.3 billion. On a constant currency basis, revenue increased 6.3% compared with last year. Reported revenue reflected a positive foreign currency impact of $12 million. Our strong growth was generated by a number of our strategic verticals. Revenue from the technology and consumer electronics vertical grew approximately 19%, reflecting strong growth across a broad-based group of clients. Revenue from clients in the retail, travel and e-commerce vertical grew by approximately 20% as growth with several retail and e-commerce clients more than offset the expected lower volumes from travel and tourism clients. Revenue from travel and tourism clients was just under 5% of total revenue in the fourth quarter of 2020, down from approximately 6% last year, reflecting an approximate 1% impact on the overall company growth rate for the quarter. Revenue from health care clients grew 17%, largely as a result of strong seasonal volumes. Our strong growth across these verticals was partially offset by a 12% reduction in revenue from communications clients. Revenue from communications clients was approximately 18% of total revenue in the fourth quarter, down from 22% last year, reflecting a nearly 3% impact on the overall growth rate for the quarter.

[Operator:]

Thank you. Our first question comes from the line of Ruplu Bhattacharya with Bank of America. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

[Ruplu Bhattacharya:]

Thanks for taking my question and congrats on the strong results in the first quarter as a public company. Chris, maybe can you talk about your thoughts on inorganic growth? You had strong organic growth this quarter, but in the past, you've talked about potential -- your propensity for M&A. Just what -- any thoughts on the potential size and which end markets -- I mean, what would make sense for Concentrix from an inorganic standpoint?

[Chris Caldwell:]

Thanks, Ruplu. So from my perspective, I mean, really what we're looking at is what's additional accretive to our client base, either from adding unique clients into our client set that we have service offerings to take advantage of and/or sort of capabilities, as I've talked about in the past, to go into the verticals that we're already dealing with. Good example would be commercial banking, we're very interested in because we're very strong in the retail business. From a size perspective, really, we're quite open. It's really about what we believe has the highest return for our shareholders, and what is the fastest we can have additive to our revenue and profitability when you look at doing the acquisition.

[Ruplu Bhattacharya:]

Got it. And can you comment on the mix of voice versus non-voice services that you have currently? And what would be the long-term target? And can you just talk about some of the non-voice services that you provide today? And how should we think about that mix going forward?

[Chris Caldwell:]

So, non-voice continues to kind of creep up as we go ahead and automate a lot of the voice and put in more IVR and more digital solutions for our clients. That being said, voice still continues to be strong. I think we've talked about trying to get to a 50-50 split and that still is sort of our goal over a period of time, and we continue to make progress towards that. That being said, we have found clients who are looking for sort of true high-end customer experience, wanting a balance between voice and non-voice solutions to kind of handle their customer demand, but overall, that's directionally where we're headed.

[Ruplu Bhattacharya:]

Got it. And maybe just last one more question. In terms of working from home, I think you said that 60% of the workforce is currently working from home. In the past, you've talked about needing some time to judge the productivity of people working from home. I mean, do you think that people working from home are equally effective versus working in the office? And how should we think about -- I think you said the long-term target was around 30%, 35%. So how should we think about people getting back into the offices? I mean, what timeframe are we thinking about? And just related to that, you've also talked about like international expansion. I mean, do you need to hire more staff to do that or -- and the go-to-market in trying to expand internationally? Can you just comment on the move back into the call centers as well as the -- your plan for international expansion, how the go-to-market there kind of works?

[Chris Caldwell:]

Yes. For sure, first off, I wouldn't call them call centers. The reality is that our sites deliver a lot of services, voice, non-voice, technical solutions, development and just a host of different types of services out of our physical delivery sites. In terms of the work at home, productivity for the whole is better in most regions. I will tell you, there are some regions just because of the -- how people live and they might have a higher density of living capacity within the regions, the productivity is at par to delivery sites or maybe just a tiny bit less. So it is a bit of a flux. There is not one answer fits all around it, but overall, we're very happy with the productivity that we're seeing from our team members around the world. In terms of when we look at getting back to a 30%, that's really something that we've kind of ballparked out based on the type of work we do, based on some staff who are looking forward to getting back and being with a team group within a physical building. But our expectation is, probably 2022 discussion, not in 2021 based on vaccine rollouts and based on where our staff are and a whole host of other things, we're in no rush to bring people back. It's really about when the right time for our team members to come in. And then the last question in regards to sort of hiring up for international expansion. We have a very distributed sales and account management team and obviously, clearly, the operations team around the globe with local team members in all the markets that we serve for the most part. And so really, we will continue to add and invest in those areas, in the verticals that we want to grow in those markets, but there is no real need to go out and hire significantly more in order to grow that business in a regional nature.

[Ruplu Bhattacharya:]

Got it. Thanks for all the details and congrats again on the strong results as well as the strong guidance. Thank you.

[Chris Caldwell:]

Great, thanks very much.

[Operator:]

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Shannon Cross with Cross Research. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

[Shannon Cross:]

I guess, my first question is -- and obviously, work from home, it plays very strongly into this, but I'm curious what else you've kind of learned about your business given COVID with such a -- I don't know, people-intensive nature of the business. So I'm just curious what things you put in place where might think that there is more opportunity for automation or if there is anything else that you've learned and that's also from the standpoint of COVID-related costs. How quickly you expect some of those to wind down? And where we might see that? And then I have a follow-up.

[Chris Caldwell:]

Shannon, good to talk again. I think first off, what we've learned from just the overall business model is how robust the services business model is. We provide and support businesses day in and day out and in effect, are very tied at the hip to our clients to make sure that they're successful in the marketplace and through COVID and through all the ups and downs, really showed the strong working relationships that we have with our clients. From a staff perspective, the reality is that things that -- and we've talked about this in the past, things that we could automate that, historically, we've been talking to clients that might have taken a few months to get decided during covet, those decision time frames have been turned around very, very, very quickly because it's easier to manage. It's faster. Sometimes it's more cost effective in a quicker period of time. And so, we've seen a lot more consumption of our digital services in a faster period of time than historically how we've rolled them out. From a care and taking care of our staff perspective, we put a big emphasis on mental health. We put a big emphasis on making sure that there is comfort within the whole environment and tips on how to be productive in the home environment as well as different digital training delivery to make sure that our staff are up to speed and what they need to do as well as, frankly, recruiting digitally. And so, if you look at all the processes that historically might have been done in the site, very quickly, we've been able to expand that in a purely automated and digital caution for our team members around the world, which has allowed us to kind of scale very, very quickly from a work in home perspective.

[Andre Valentine:]

And then, Shannon, to your question on the COVID-19 costs. Those costs that we're incurring are very much around being fanatical about delivering for our clients and keeping and being fanatical about our staff and keeping them safe. And so certainly, as we think about our guidance for the first quarter, you should assume that those similar level of spending is likely in there, and we think that will be with us for certainly a few quarters as we look out into 2021.

[Shannon Cross:]

Okay. And then I guess my final question is just, with regard to the sales process and the customers you're talking to. If you could give us any idea, if you've been able to expand into maybe incremental, not verticals but tangential areas with the conversations that you've had with your customers, again, COVID has probably opened up some opportunities, I would assume, rather than close down some given the nature of your business?

[Chris Caldwell:]

Shannon, so we haven't expanded our verticals that we're focused on delivering for. We're very focused on keen to build up deeper domain knowledge within the verticals that we've called out as being strategic to us. I think in terms of offerings, what has happened with our clients is that they're looking at giving us more of their work and asking us to kind of transform that work in whether it be, as I talked about, more digital solution, more automation, sort of one more stop shop, and not only within one region, in multiple regions. So when we talk about gaining share, that's really what we're talking about is gaining share across their share of wallet by offering a more comprehensive one-stop solution. That has gotten us into some work within those verticals that perhaps, we might not have always focused on, but it's been the right thing to do for these clients to build a stronger relationship and certainly be a more valued partner to them.

[Operator:]

Thank you. And our next question comes from the line of Dave Koning with Baird. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

[Dave Koning:]

Great job.

[Chris Caldwell:]

Thank you, David.

[Dave Koning:]

Yes. Yes. I guess, first of all, I'm interested just the shift of business over time. I mean, you've done a great job diversifying away from the telecom clients, and now it sounds like an increasing portion is within the global disruptors. Does that change the margin dynamics overtime? Like are those global disruptors a little higher yielding or different services you provide? Whatever it is that kind of generates potentially higher margins? Like is this just a really good mix shift, both from a revenue and margin standpoint?

[Chris Caldwell:]

So David, it's a bit of a combination. Like first of all, within the verticals that we service that are not mobile disruptors, clearly, we've seen margin progression as we move up the stack in value as we put in more technology, more automation. And that's obviously continued our goal, and we continue to message that we believe that there is more room to continue to progress our operating income over the coming quarters and years as we go forward as we brought it up over the last three to five years. From a disruptive perspective, they are consuming similar services to a lot of our enterprise clients, albeit differently. And when I say differently, they tend to look at different geo deliveries, they tend to look at more rapid scale, they tend to look at less onshore mix and more offshore mix, which tends to have a higher-margin out of a date, which does help us overall in our margin mix as we go forward. So as you see that progress, is part of our margin story as we see margin improvements and increases over the coming quarters and years.

[Dave Koning:]

Okay, got you and thanks on that. And I guess, secondly, just on long-term margins. I mean, you've done a really nice job just overall with margins, but is the at-home mix sustainable? And will that help overtime? I mean I guess that's really the question. Like is -- are you -- is there parts of the business now that are just going to be long-term at better margin just simply because you have more people at home?

[Chris Caldwell:]

Yes. David, the way I look at it is, first of all, we have a very variable cost model from a facilities perspective. So if for whatever reason, we want to continue to have a larger percentage of work at home, then we could look at removing facilities from our infrastructure. That has not seemed to be the case, and that hasn't seemed to be the messaging from clients at this point in time. But should we go down that path, we can certainly do it. When we talk about sort of that 30% of our business kind of remaining at work at home, where it makes sense for the client, where it makes sense for our staff members, we would certainly support that. And that margin profile is slightly better, but it's not significantly better because there is a lot of investment costs that we do in some of the regions for our work at home staff that are costs that you might not necessarily appreciate, whether it be more mental health services, whether it be more bandwidth services, whether it be different security costs and a whole list of other things that go into our work at home solution. So while it does help, again, it's not a vast call out that would say, if we stayed at 60% of our staff work at home that you'd see a large margin improvement.

[Andre Valentine:]

David, we would probably see more of the long-term drivers of margin progression being growth in the strategic verticals, growth in emerging markets, where margins can be higher, again infusing more technology into our offerings and kind of moving up the stack, as Chris has mentioned, becoming more efficient in our delivery through the introduction of technology, and then with the growth, some leverage on G&A. So those are kind of the long-term drivers to margin progression. Those have been the things that have allowed us to kind of get to where we are that plus acquisition synergies. And those are the things that I think we will drive margins -- give us confidence that we can drive margins higher as we go forward.

[Dave Koning:]

Got you. Well, okay, and then maybe if I can just sneak one more in. I saw something interesting from Fiserv as a bank software company that we cover. They talked about within their banks, 33% lift in calls to the call centers of banks, and I thought that was interesting. And just wondering that, that maybe is a little bit of unsustainable call volume throughout pandemic, but at the same time, you've also had e-com probably sustainably good now forever maybe, right? Like -- so it seems like there is a little crosscut, there might be a little kind of one-time revenue, but then some that's just permanently maybe better, too. And maybe if you could kind of isolate, like is there some extra growth right now? Or maybe are we just in a sustainably better kind of situation?

[Andre Valentine:]

I mean...

[Chris Caldwell:]

Sorry, we're getting a bit of back. David, we see both. We see one-time volume that's coming through that's primarily driven by the pandemic. We've talked about this, people wanting to refinance their mortgages because of lower interest rates or people who are looking for telemedicine or telehealth consults or whatever the case may being that, that is clearly driven by the environment that we're in. We've also seen -- and what we're supporting a lot of our growth on is sustainable long-term switch to an outsourcing model and long-term sustainable type of volume of business, whether it be digital, voice and non-voice, doesn't really matter, of the new models. And some of that, as an example, is coming from retail traffic, which is now driving more e-commerce through traditional retailers, which we benefited from and/or the fintechs who are doing more things virtually versus walking into a branch. That's sustainable, that's here to stay and will continue to grow.

[David Stein:]

So -- go ahead, operator.

[Operator:]

I was just going to say, I'm showing no further questions, sir.

[David Stein:]

All right. Well, at this time, thank you all very much for your participation on the call today, and we will end the call.

[Operator:]

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for participating in today's conference. This does conclude the program, and you may all disconnect. Everyone, have a great day.