Pixelworks, Inc.
Q2 2019 Earnings Call Transcript

Published: 2 Aug 2019

[Operator:]

Good day, ladies and gentlemen and welcome to Pixelworks, Inc. Second Quarter 2019 Earnings Conference Call. I will be your operator for today’s call. At this time, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. Following management's prepared remarks, we will conduct a question-and-answer session. This conference call is being recorded for replay purposes.I would now like to turn the call over to Pixelworks’ Vice President and CFO, Mr. Steven Moore.

[Steven Moore:]

Good afternoon and thank you for joining us today. With me on today’s call is Todd DeBonis, Pixelworks’ President and CEO. The purpose of today’s conference call is to supplement the information provided in our press release issued earlier today announcing the Company’s financial results for the second quarter 2019.Before we begin, I would like to remind you that various remarks we make on this call including those about our projected future financial results, economic and market trends and our competitive position constitute forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements and all other statements made on this call that are not historical facts are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially.All forward-looking statements are based on the Company’s beliefs as of today, Thursday, August 1, 2019 and we undertake no obligation to update any such statements to reflect events or circumstances occurring after today. Please refer to today’s press release, our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2018 and subsequent SEC filings for a description of factors that could cause forward-looking statements to differ materially from actual results.Additionally, the Company’s press release and management statements during this conference call will include discussions of certain measures and financial information in GAAP and non-GAAP terms, including gross margin, operating expenses, net income loss and net income loss per share. These non-GAAP measures exclude gain on sale of patents, inventory step-up and backlog amortization, amortization of acquired intangible assets, stock-based compensation expense, restructuring expenses, discount accretion on convertible debt fair value and gain on extinguishment of convertible debt.We use these non-GAAP measures internally to assess our operating performance. The Company believes these non-GAAP measures provide a meaningful perspective on our core operating results and underlying cash flow dynamics, but we caution investors to consider these measures in addition to, not as a substitute for, nor superior to, the Company’s consolidated financial results as presented in accordance with GAAP. Included in the Company’s press release are definitions and reconciliations of GAAP to non-GAAP net income loss and GAAP net income loss to adjusted EBITDA, which provide additional details.With that said, I will now turn the call over to Todd for his opening remarks.

[Todd DeBonis:]

Thank you, Steve, and good afternoon, and welcome to everyone joining us on today’s call. As outlined in today's press release, we have solid quarter with financial results that were in line or better than our guidance.Second quarter revenue of $18 million was at the midpoint of our guidance range, reflecting a continued year-over-year growth in mobile and video delivery businesses. Gross margin expanded 80 basis points sequentially and 140 basis points year-over-year to 54.1%, and operating expense came in better than anticipated resulted in breakeven adjusted EPS for the quarter which was at the high end of our guidance.During the quarter, we continue to execute well across all areas of the business. As I emphasized on previous calls, the team's priority and focus continue to beyond advancing our growth initiative in mobile while maintaining our position in projector and Video Delivery. Customers have responded positively to Pixelworks expanded portfolio of visual processing solutions.Our product portfolio for mobile devices now includes multiple Iris visual processors with distinctive feature sets and at different but compelling price points as well as our software-only Soft Iris solutions. This expanded portfolio provides us with greater flexibility to meet specific customer needs and requirements in addition to expanding the total addressable market.Looking more specifically at our mobile business during second quarter, revenue grew year-over-year for the sixth consecutive quarter and for the first half of 2019 mobile revenue increased more than 100% over the first half of last year. In addition to the wins we announced on recently launched smartphones incorporating both our Iris visual processors and our newly introduced Soft Iris solutions, we continue to actively sample production volume of our fifth generation iris visual processor to a targeted group of mobile OEMs. One of these engagements is a close collaboration with a Tier 1 OEM customer targeting a launch before year end.To briefly highlight our most recent announced wins. Earlier this week, Black Shark introduced its newest gaming phone the Shark 2 Pro, which is the fourth Black Shark device to include our Iris visual processor. This flagship smartphone also leverages Pixelworks' True View auto-adaptive display capabilities including our next generation DC Dimming technology designed specifically to enhance visual and system performance for AMOLED displays.Built on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 855 Plus Mobile Platform, the Shark 2 Pro smartphone also embraces the full suite of visual enhancements provided by our Iris visual processor, including Pixelworks’ industry-leading Motion Engine, MEMC, technology, Always-HDR mode that provides real-time SDR-to-HDR conversion as well as a combination of Picture Quality Enhancements and High-efficiency Display Calibration.Also recently announced, ASUS launched its next-generation ROG Phone II in conjunction with Tencent Games. The ROG II is the first smartphone to utilize our recently introduced Soft Iris technology running on Qualcomm’s flagship Snapdragon 855 and 855 Plus Mobile Platform. Leveraging our Soft Iris solution, the ROG II smartphone features industry-leading color calibration and HDR tone mapping.As a reminder, we introduced Soft Iris in March as part of our announced cooperative agreement with Qualcomm to provide smartphone OEMs with a seamless solution to implement Pixelworks’ visual enhancement technology on mobile devices based on the Snapdragon 855 platform. This first win and commercial launch of a smartphone incorporating Soft Iris in less than five months is a significant accomplishment and a testament to the team’s commitment to advancing our mobile growth initiatives.As we discussed on last quarter’s conference call, I want to re-emphasize that Soft Iris provides only a sub-set of the visual processing enhancement offered by our Iris processors. Additionally, our Soft Iris solution requires an existing high-quality display pipeline and currently, that high-quality display pipeline is exclusively available on Qualcomm’s flagship Snapdragon 855 platform. These two distinguishing factors are important, because they demonstrate why Soft Iris is complementary to our Iris family of mobile solutions and expands our total mobile TAM versus cannibalizing our Iris visual processors.Turning to an update on TrueCut, our innovative end-to-end solution for cinematic motion and HDR that we introduced in early Q2, as a result of close and ongoing collaboration with our lead customer YouKu, today our TrueCut solution is now enabling what’s arguably the single most comprehensive ecosystem for the creation, delivery and viewing of high-quality HDR video on mobile devices in China.The following metrics demonstrate our significant early progress on extending TrueCut’s reach since our introduction of this innovative Video Delivery platform in April

[Steven Moore:]

Thank you, Todd. Revenue for the second quarter of 2019 was $18.0 million, compared to $16.6 million in the first quarter of 2019 and revenue of $19.3 million in the second quarter of 2018. Revenue for the second quarter of 2019 reflects continued growth in the Company’s Mobile and Video Delivery businesses, offset by below normal seasonal demand in the Digital Projector market.The breakdown of second quarter revenue by end market was as follows

[Operator:]

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from Suji Desilva with ROTH Capital. Your line is now open.

[Suji Desilva:]

So, on the Video Delivery business in Japan, just understand what are the puts and takes as to what, are they absorbing the initial ramp of product? And then we'll move forward and exactly with the competence of growth recovers in a couple of quarters, any color there would be helpful?

[Steven Moore:]

Right now, we anticipate growth recovering. First of all, we don't see that big of a downtick in Q3, but we are having some headwinds, one. And so I would say that, what you're seeing is continued strength in the 4K PVR that is offset by effectively a digestion of the set top box inventory that got shift over the first two quarters.We expect growth to continue actually in the fourth quarter. And really, that is just looking at the PVR market. And then actually what we did mention in the prepared remarks is, the OTA market certainly hit up a little bit as well. So, a combination of those two things, we expect to resume growth in the fourth quarter.

[Suji Desilva:]

And now you've had on the Iris side, not that you have that Soft Iris out there for a couple of months, at least what are you seeing customers new design win about their decision point by going with Iris software versus the Soft Iris. Any color on what customers are, which way are customers leading toward and trending as they have the choice between two?

[Steven Moore:]

Well, I mean, so I am going to complicate it further Suji, we have server customers that are designing both into a single phone. So, remember, we're not really just adding the chip, okay. This is -- and we're not really just adding the chip in software. This is -- when you make a commitment to -- Soft Iris, I think you can make commitment to just the features of Soft Iris and it’s an easier integration. And so, we're seeing a broad mechanics for that and probably we have more than we have the resources to engage with so we are been picky.But when you engage with our visual processor, it is really a commitment to do a full system engineering effort with a display that you picked and the AP that you picked and us, and then optimizing that phone for the visual experience for the customers. When do you use MEMC, when do you not use MEMC, when do you use our tone mapping, when do you not. And in some cases, there is a power consumption experience straight off.And by combining our visual processors with our software solutions, you get -- under certain conditions, you get a very low power consumption using just a Soft Iris and then putting our processors a state, a suite state effectively, all right. But there are many different experience where the only way you get the improvement and it’s a bank easy to have our visual processor on.And in fact in some -- in the gaming environment when you turn our processor on, the total system power goes down dramatically, the power consumption. And I’m not going to get into specifics on how we do that, but I want to articulate the complexity of this type level of engagement. So, the bottom line to get back to your answer by integrating software and hardware together the customers can maximize that profile and that experience for the customers, I mean for their end customers.

[Suji Desilva:]

Last quick question, with [indiscernible] on the progress with YouKu and TrueCut product, it sounds like its gaining traction there. How soon do you anticipate the conversion of YouKu's wide menu to cause incremental iris hardware sales. Do you kind of see a A leap to B kind of relationship there? Or is it not that clean cut in terms of how it translates?

[Steven Moore:]

Well, I will take your question at face value. We've already seen it dramatically. Now what you are asking me is when it's going to show to my financials. I’m not going to answer that one.

[Operator:]

[Operator instructions] Our next question comes from Charlie Anderson with Dougherty & Company. Your line is now open.

[Charlie Anderson:]

Just on the sub seasonal guide for projector, I wonder if you're going to be talk about what's happening out there on a kind of sell-through basis. Are you just sort of reflecting end demand or lead times changing than agree in industry? Then I've got a follow-up.

[Todd DeBonis:]

The projector you're asking I'm sorry, I missed it.

[Charlie Anderson:]

Yes, on projector, correct.

[Todd DeBonis:]

Okay. No, we're just seeing, I mean, what we're seeing is consistent feedback from our customers that both tenders in general business in China have subsided considerably. And some impact the rest of the world -- and so let me, I can probably dig into a little color that. I mean, part of it is demand. I would say to some degree, projectors uptick when a couple of things happen. When infrastructure is getting built out, you move into a new office, you need loaded up with new projector technology, right, or new auditorium or new school et cetera. There is clearly a slowdown in that environment.Secondly, the RMB to Japanese yen has moved quite a bit, and it's making the Japanese exports to China more expensive. You put the two together and I think you're seeing a lack of demand, from an out of there. To some degree, we have one customer, one Japanese customer that manufactures some product in China. And so, they're little worried about tariffs coming this way, up until today that wasn't an issue if you get my reference to our presence tweet.

[Charlie Anderson:]

No, absolutely. Okay. Perfect. And then, as it relates to the mobile pipeline. Todd, I wonder, if you maybe just said any qualitative light on how the pipeline is looking today versus three months ago across anything that you're going to market in mobile? Thanks.

[Todd DeBonis:]

I thought, I articulated it quite well. I mean, I don't think I've ever mentioned the Tier 1 engagement prior to today's call, one. Two, the quality of the pipeline is the best it's ever been. Three, the levels of the pipeline is at a point that is clearly outstripped our resources to respond. And so, I have finally let go the hiring and we are hiring.

[Charlie Anderson:]

And then just last one for me, I noticed, I think media tech came out with a new SoC with some HDR tone support. Anything is changing competitive environment from your standpoint?

[Todd DeBonis:]

No, no. They supported HDR tone mapping previously. I'm sure they came out with a new one to support it, such as Qualcomm. But we do way more than just tone mapping. So, our solution is really -- you got to buy into all the features and functionality. We don't compete just on tone mapping. We will go compete on our tone mapping versus somebody else's on a straight of benchmarking.So far, we win those benchmarks. But that's not why people are using us. So even our Soft Iris, even though it's a reduced, subtract, one of them being is your tone mapping. They're buying into the highly efficient calibration is probably the primary reason. And then once you've done that, you probably want the best HDR tone mapping, you can you can put on the phone. So, these use ours.

[Operator:]

Thank you. I'm not showing any further questions at this time. I'd now like to turn the call back over to Todd DeBonis for closing remarks.

[Todd DeBonis:]

All right. Well, good call today, only few questions. Thanks for your time. I don't know if you can tell the tone of my voice, but we're extremely excited. Things are really moving forward and strategy is -- the strategy is unveiling itself and we're very excited. So, hopefully you as investor you're also excited. Thank you.