Exlservice Holdings Inc (EXLS) 2023 Q2 法說會逐字稿

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the second quarter of the 2023 ExlService Holdings, Inc. Earnings Conference Call. (Operator Instructions) Please be advised today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, John Kristoff, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, John.

美好的一天，感謝您的支持。歡迎參加 ExlService Holdings, Inc. 2023 年第二季度收益電話會議。 （操作員指示）請注意，今天的會議正在錄製中。現在我想將會議交給今天的發言人、投資者關係副總裁約翰·克里斯托夫 (John Kristoff)。請繼續，約翰。

Thanks, James. Hello, and thank you for joining EXL's Second Quarter 2023 Financial Results Conference Call. On the call with me today are Rohit Kapoor, Vice Chairman and Chief Officer; and Maurizio Nicolelli, Chief Financial Officer. We hope you've had an opportunity to review the second quarter earnings release we issued this morning. We've also posted an earnings slide deck and investor fact sheet in the Investor Relations section of our website.

謝謝，詹姆斯。您好，感謝您參加 EXL 2023 年第二季度財務業績電話會議。今天與我通話的是副主席兼首席執行官羅希特·卡普爾 (Rohit Kapoor)；毛里齊奧·尼科萊利 (Maurizio Nicollelli)，首席財務官。我們希望您有機會回顧我們今天早上發布的第二季度收益報告。我們還在我們網站的投資者關係部分發布了收益幻燈片和投資者情況說明書。

As a reminder, some of the matters we'll discuss this morning are forward looking. Please keep in mind that these forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such statements. Such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, general economic conditions, those factors set forth in today's press release, discussed in the company's periodic reports and other documents filed with the SEC from time to time. EXL assumes no obligation to update the information presented on this conference call today.

提醒一下，我們今天早上將討論的一些問題是前瞻性的。請記住，這些前瞻性陳述受到已知和未知的風險和不確定性的影響，可能導致實際結果與此類陳述明示或暗示的結果存在重大差異。此類風險和不確定性包括但不限於總體經濟狀況、今天新聞稿中闡述的因素、公司定期報告中討論的因素以及不時向 SEC 提交的其他文件中討論的因素。 EXL 不承擔更新今天電話會議中提供的信息的義務。

During our call, we may reference certain non-GAAP financial measures, which we believe provide useful information for investors. Reconciliation of these measures to GAAP can be found in our press release, slide deck and investor fact sheet. And with that, I'll turn the call over to Rohit.

在我們的電話會議中，我們可能會參考某些非公認會計準則財務指標，我們認為這些指標為投資者提供了有用的信息。這些措施與公認會計準則的協調可以在我們的新聞稿、幻燈片和投資者情況說明書中找到。然後，我會將電話轉給羅希特。

Thanks, John. Good morning, everyone. Welcome to EXL's Second Quarter 2023 Earnings Call. I'm pleased to be with you this morning reporting another strong quarter. We continued our growth momentum in the second quarter with total revenue of $405 million, representing growth of 17% on both a reported and constant currency basis. We grew adjusted diluted EPS 21% to $1.82 per share. Our balanced portfolio across data analytics and digital operations and solutions makes our business resilient by focusing on both growth enablement and cost management for our clients. This has enabled us to generate continued strong double-digit growth despite a slow growth economic environment.

謝謝，約翰。大家，早安。歡迎參加 EXL 2023 年第二季度收益電話會議。我很高興今天早上與您一起報告另一個強勁的季度。第二季度我們繼續保持增長勢頭，總收入達到 4.05 億美元，按報告收入和固定匯率計算均增長 17%。調整後稀釋後每股收益增長 21%，達到每股 1.82 美元。我們在數據分析、數字運營和解決方案方面的平衡投資組合通過專注於客戶的增長支持和成本管理，使我們的業務具有彈性。這使我們能夠在經濟增長緩慢的環境下持續實現兩位數的強勁增長。

In Analytics, we delivered revenue of $182 million for the quarter, up 13% year-over-year, which included strong growth in decision analytics services, data management and payment integrity. This growth was driven by clients leveraging analytics to drive cost efficiencies, manage risk and increase effectiveness. Analytics growth was impacted by a decline in marketing analytics, which is a trend we have highlighted previously. In a slow growth and high interest rate environment, banks and insurance companies have slowed down their investments for new customer acquisition. We have been successful in diversifying our marketing analytics client portfolio across other industry verticals.

在分析方面，我們本季度實現了 1.82 億美元的收入，同比增長 13%，其中包括決策分析服務、數據管理和支付完整性方面的強勁增長。這一增長是由客戶利用分析來提高成本效率、管理風險和提高效率所推動的。分析增長受到營銷分析下降的影響，這是我們之前強調過的一個趨勢。在增長緩慢和高利率環境下，銀行和保險公司放緩了新客戶獲取的投資。我們成功地在其他行業垂直領域實現了營銷分析客戶組合的多元化。

We have already won some new business in health care and marketing analytics for Medicare Advantage, which will convert to revenue later this year. Overall, our Analytics business continues to show strong growth across industries and geographies, which we expect will be further boosted by our focus on generative AI.

我們已經為 Medicare Advantage 贏得了一些醫療保健和營銷分析方面的新業務，這些業務將在今年晚些時候轉化為收入。總體而言，我們的分析業務繼續在各個行業和地區呈現強勁增長，我們預計我們對生成人工智能的關注將進一步推動這一增長。

Looking at our digital operations and solutions business, during the second quarter, we generated revenue of $223 million with a growth of 2% sequentially and 20% year-over-year. This is the ninth consecutive quarter where we have grown this business by double digits. This strong growth was driven by momentum across all of our digital operations and solutions businesses as our new and existing clients focus on lowering costs improving efficiencies and enhancing end customer experience.

看看我們的數字運營和解決方案業務，第二季度我們的收入為 2.23 億美元，環比增長 2%，同比增長 20%。這是我們的業務連續第九個季度實現兩位數增長。這一強勁增長是由我們所有數字運營和解決方案業務的勢頭推動的，因為我們的新老客戶專注於降低成本、提高效率和增強最終客戶體驗。

Our data-led strategy, combined with our deep domain expertise continues to resonate with our clients and fuel our growth. This has significantly increased our total addressable market and grown our sales pipeline, particularly in large transformative deals. I'm very encouraged by the size, scale and complexity of the deals we are winning, which is driven by our ability to embed market-leading data analytics, digital and AI competencies into our clients' core operations.

我們以數據為主導的戰略，結合我們深厚的領域專業知識，繼續與我們的客戶產生共鳴，並推動我們的增長。這顯著增加了我們的總目標市場並擴大了我們的銷售渠道，特別是在大型變革性交易中。我對我們贏得的交易的規模、規模和復雜性感到非常鼓舞，這是因為我們有能力將市場領先的數據分析、數字和人工智能能力嵌入到客戶的核心運營中。

Looking at the overall demand environment, we continue to hear from our current and prospective clients that their priorities over the next 12 to 18 months include cost reduction, increased efficiency and improved customer experience. There is strong demand from clients for using generative AI to achieve these priorities. As our clients plan their generative AI investments, they need a partner who has deep business domain knowledge, can harness the data, create the appropriate use cases and implement them as part of the workflow. Our clients view EXL as an ideal partner who combines all these capabilities.

縱觀整體需求環境，我們不斷從現有和潛在客戶那裡得知，他們在未來 12 至 18 個月的首要任務包括降低成本、提高效率和改善客戶體驗。客戶強烈要求使用生成式人工智能來實現這些優先事項。當我們的客戶規劃其生成式人工智能投資時，他們需要一個擁有深厚業務領域知識、能夠利用數據、創建適當用例並將其作為工作流程一部分實施的合作夥伴。我們的客戶將 EXL 視為兼具所有這些能力的理想合作夥伴。

During the quarter, we launched our new generative AI platform, which builds on our strength in analytics, AI and digital operations and solutions. It includes our AI workbench, plug-and-play AI accelerators, data security and compliance framework and our enterprise data management capabilities. Our platform launch attracted more than 1,000 attendees and has created a very strong pipeline. As we engage with our clients, we are helping them in 3 areas: first, we help them evaluate, select, build and roll out generative AR use cases; second, we help them make their data AI-ready, which includes data engineering, unstructured data management, data security and data and cloud operations; and finally, we help them reimagine and design new AI-enabled operations with human in the loop.

本季度，我們推出了新的生成式人工智能平台，該平台建立在我們在分析、人工智能以及數字運營和解決方案方面的優勢之上。它包括我們的人工智能工作台、即插即用人工智能加速器、數據安全和合規框架以及我們的企業數據管理功能。我們的平台發布吸引了 1,000 多名與會者，並建立了非常強大的渠道。當我們與客戶互動時，我們在三個領域為他們提供幫助：首先，我們幫助他們評估、選擇、構建和推出生成 AR 用例；其次，我們幫助他們做好數據人工智能準備，包括數據工程、非結構化數據管理、數據安全以及數據和雲運營；最後，我們幫助他們重新構想和設計新的人工智能支持的操作，並以人為本。

I'd like to share a couple of real-world examples where we are already deploying generative AI solutions for our clients. The first is with a large international insurance client. The client's objective was to streamline their claims process to reduce cost and improve customer experience. We developed a generative AI-based smart claim solution. It uses open source large language models and leverages the latest retrieval augmented generation architecture. Our innovative AI solution swiftly accesses end-to-end claim information and delivers accurate and concise insights through a user-friendly interface. This streamlines the claim agent's workflow and reduces the amount of time needed to process the claim, resulting in lower costs and improved customer experience.

我想分享幾個現實世界的例子，我們已經在為客戶部署生成式人工智能解決方案。第一個是與大型國際保險客戶合作。客戶的目標是簡化索賠流程，以降低成本並改善客戶體驗。我們開發了基於生成人工智能的智能索賠解決方案。它使用開源大型語言模型並利用最新的檢索增強生成架構。我們創新的人工智能解決方案可快速訪問端到端索賠信息，並通過用戶友好的界面提供準確、簡潔的見解。這簡化了索賠代理的工作流程，減少了處理索賠所需的時間，從而降低了成本並改善了客戶體驗。

Another example involves a large energy company in the U.K. where EXL is implementing a generated AI-led agent assist solution across all of their contact center operations which will run on our cloud. This solution provides live assistance to the contact center executives while they're engaged with end customers. It monitors conversations in real time using large language models to extract relevant information and provides both proactive nudges and on-demand procedural guidance. Our solution not only helps improve compliance and first call resolution rates but also reduces the amount of time customers spend with contact center executives, thus improving customer experience.

另一個例子涉及英國的一家大型能源公司，EXL 正在其所有聯絡中心運營中實施生成的人工智能主導的座席輔助解決方案，該解決方案將在我們的雲上運行。該解決方案為聯絡中心管理人員在與最終客戶互動時提供實時幫助。它使用大型語言模型實時監控對話以提取相關信息，並提供主動推動和按需程序指導。我們的解決方案不僅有助於提高合規性和首次呼叫解決率，還可以減少客戶與聯絡中心管理人員交談的時間，從而改善客戶體驗。

These are just 2 examples of how we are currently deploying generative AI-based solutions, differentiating ourselves in the marketplace and creating value for our clients. We expect generative AI to create new revenue sources for us as well as augment our existing data analytics and digital operations and solutions businesses. We will continue to invest heavily in our generative AI capabilities, including creating a center of excellence with more than 1,500 dedicated generative AI specialists.

這些只是我們目前如何部署基於人工智能的生成解決方案、在市場中脫穎而出並為客戶創造價值的兩個示例。我們預計生成式人工智能將為我們創造新的收入來源，並增強我們現有的數據分析、數字運營和解決方案業務。我們將繼續大力投資我們的生成式人工智能能力，包括創建一個擁有 1,500 多名專門的生成式人工智能專家的卓越中心。

With our continued focus on talent, I'd like to recognize 2 new leaders that recently joined our senior leadership team. First, Pam Harrison joined as Executive Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer. Pam has helped execute HR strategies for large and complex global organizations. Her extensive domain expertise will make her an invaluable resource in developing HR strategies as we continue to grow and recruit top talent, particularly in digital and AI.

隨著我們對人才的持續關注，我謹對最近加入我們高級領導團隊的兩位新領導者表示認可。首先，帕姆·哈里森 (Pam ​​Harrison) 加入，擔任執行副總裁兼首席人力資源官。 Pam 幫助大型複雜的全球組織執行人力資源戰略。隨著我們不斷發展和招聘頂尖人才，特別是在數字和人工智能領域，她廣泛的領域專業知識將使她成為製定人力資源戰略的寶貴資源。

And most recently, Vishal Chhibbar has rejoined EXL as our Chief Growth and Strategy Officer. You may recall that Vishal served as CFO from 2009 to 2019, where he instituted some of EXL's foundational growth strategies. In his new role, Vishal will spearhead our growth initiatives, leading strategy, marketing, sales governance, M&A and strategic partnerships. As our business continues to grow at a rapid pace, Vishal's practical insights and keen instincts will be tremendously valuable. I'm thrilled to have both Pam and Vishal on our team.

最近，Vishal Chhibbar 重新加入 EXL，擔任我們的首席增長和戰略官。您可能還記得，Vishal 在 2009 年至 2019 年期間擔任首席財務官，期間他制定了 EXL 的一些基礎增長戰略。在他的新職位上，維沙爾將領導我們的增長計劃、領導戰略、營銷、銷售管理、併購和戰略合作夥伴關係。隨著我們的業務繼續快速增長，維沙爾的實際洞察力和敏銳的直覺將非常有價值。我很高興帕姆和維沙爾都加入我們的團隊。

Looking ahead, we are encouraged by the momentum in our revenue and EPS growth, our growing sales pipeline and the resiliency in our business model. We are making significant progress on our generative AI offerings, and we will continue to build off that momentum as we invest further in advancing our capabilities in the coming quarters. I want to extend my sincere gratitude to every member of the EXL team for their unwavering dedication and relentless pursuit of innovation to better serve our clients.

展望未來，我們的收入和每股收益增長勢頭、不斷增長的銷售渠道以及業務模式的彈性令我們感到鼓舞。我們在生成式人工智能產品方面正在取得重大進展，並且我們將在未來幾個季度進一步投資以提高我們的能力，從而繼續鞏固這一勢頭。我謹向EXL團隊的每一位成員致以誠摯的謝意，感謝他們堅定不移的奉獻精神和不懈的創新追求，以更好地服務我們的客戶。

Given these factors and our current visibility for the remainder of the year, we are raising our 2023 revenue and EPS guidance. Maurizio will walk you through the details in a few moments. Finally, I want to reflect on our recent decision to execute a 5-for-1 forward stock split. This split brings several expected benefits, including increased liquidity, improved transparency and lower trading costs for our stockholders. Additionally, the lower post-split share price enhances accessibility for our employees to participate in the company's employee stock ownership program. But perhaps most importantly, it demonstrates the confidence we have in our ability to continue to grow the company and generate long-term stockholder value.

考慮到這些因素以及我們目前對今年剩餘時間的能見度，我們正在提高 2023 年收入和每股收益指引。 Maurizio 稍後將引導您了解詳細信息。最後，我想反思一下我們最近執行 1 股 5 股遠期股票分割的決定。這次拆分帶來了一些預期的好處，包括增加流動性、提高透明度和降低股東的交易成本。此外，分拆後較低的股價提高了我們的員工參與公司員工持股計劃的機會。但也許最重要的是，它表明我們對繼續發展公司並創造長期股東價值的能力充滿信心。

We have a highly resilient business model with long-term clients, a large percentage of recurring revenue and a balanced portfolio of business across data analytics and digital operations and solutions. Coupled with our increasing total addressable market and leading position in data analytics, digital and AI in the markets we serve, I am very excited about the opportunities that lie ahead of us. And with that, I turn the call over to Maurizio.

我們擁有高度彈性的業務模式，擁有長期客戶、很大比例的經常性收入以及跨數據分析、數字運營和解決方案的平衡業務組合。再加上我們不斷增長的潛在市場總量以及我們所服務的市場中數據分析、數字和人工智能方面的領先地位，我對我們面前的機遇感到非常興奮。說完，我把電話轉給了毛里齊奧。

Thank you, Rohit, and thanks, everyone, for joining us this morning. I will provide insights into our financial performance for the second quarter and the first 6 months of 2023, followed by our revised outlook for 2023. We delivered a strong second quarter with revenue of $405 million, up 16.8% year-over-year on a reported basis. On a constant currency basis, we grew revenue 17.1% year-over-year and 1% sequentially. Adjusted EPS was $1.82, an increase of 21.3% year-over-year.

謝謝羅希特，也謝謝大家今天早上加入我們。我將深入介紹我們 2023 年第二季度和前 6 個月的財務業績，然後是我們修訂後的 2023 年展望。我們第二季度表現強勁，收入達 4.05 億美元，同比增長 16.8%。報告依據。按固定匯率計算，我們的收入同比增長 17.1%，環比增長 1%。調整後每股收益為 1.82 美元，同比增長 21.3%。

All revenue growth percentages mentioned hereafter are on a constant currency basis. Revenue from our digital operations and solutions businesses as defined by 3 reportable segments, excluding Analytics, was $222.8 million, which represents year-over-year growth of 20.8%. Sequentially from the first quarter of 2023, we grew revenue 1.8%. In the Insurance segment, we generated revenue of $128.5 million, an increase of 19.2% year-over-year and 2.2% sequentially. This growth was driven primarily by the expansion of existing client relationships. The Insurance vertical, consisting of both our digital operations and solutions and Analytics businesses, grew 16.5% year-over-year with revenue of $164.4 million.

下文提到的所有收入增長百分比均按固定匯率計算。我們的數字運營和解決方案業務由 3 個可報告部門（不包括分析）定義，收入為 2.228 億美元，同比增長 20.8%。從 2023 年第一季度開始，我們的收入增長了 1.8%。在保險領域，我們實現收入 1.285 億美元，同比增長 19.2%，環比增長 2.2%。這一增長主要是由現有客戶關係的擴展推動的。保險垂直領域由我們的數字運營和解決方案以及分析業務組成，同比增長 16.5%，收入達 1.644 億美元。

In the Emerging segment, we grew revenue 25.4% year-over-year and 1.1% sequentially to $67.2 million. This growth was driven by the expansion of existing client relationships and new client wins. The Emerging vertical consisting of both our digital operations and solutions and Analytics businesses grew 14.3% year-over-year with revenue of $152.4 million. The Healthcare segment reported revenue of $27.2 million, growing 17.9% year-over-year and 1.7% sequentially. This growth was driven by higher volumes in our clinical services business. The Healthcare vertical consisting of our digital operations solutions and Analytics businesses grew 23.4% year-over-year with revenue of $88.2 million.

在新興市場，我們的收入同比增長 25.4%，環比增長 1.1%，達到 6720 萬美元。這一增長是由現有客戶關係的擴大和新客戶的贏得所推動的。由我們的數字運營和解決方案以及分析業務組成的新興垂直市場同比增長 14.3%，收入達到 1.524 億美元。醫療保健部門報告收入為 2720 萬美元，同比增長 17.9%，環比增長 1.7%。這一增長是由我們的臨床服務業務量增加推動的。由我們的數字運營解決方案和分析業務組成的醫療保健垂直領域同比增長 23.4%，收入達到 8820 萬美元。

In the Analytics segment, we generated revenue of $182.2 million, up 12.8% year-over-year. As Rohit noted, we generated strong growth in our decision analytics services, data management and payment integrity businesses during the quarter, partially offset by a sequential and year-over-year decline in marketing analytics as our clients in insurance and banking continue to reduce their marketing spend. We reduced SG&A expenses as a percentage of revenue by 40 basis points year-over-year to 18.2%, driven by continued cost discipline and operating leverage.

在分析領域，我們實現了 1.822 億美元的收入，同比增長 12.8%。正如羅希特指出的那樣，本季度我們的決策分析服務、數據管理和支付完整性業務實現了強勁增長，但由於我們的保險和銀行客戶繼續減少他們的業務，營銷分析的環比和同比下降部分抵消了這一增長。營銷支出。在持續的成本控制和運營槓桿的推動下，我們將銷售、管理及行政費用佔收入的比例同比下降了 40 個基點至 18.2%。

Our adjusted operating margin for the quarter was 20%, up 130 basis points year-over-year, driven by higher volumes and operating leverage. Adjusted operating margin for the second quarter includes approximately 1% of non-reoccurring revenue with lower associated costs in our digital operations and solutions business. Our effective tax rate for the quarter was 23.9%, up 60 basis points year-over-year, driven by higher U.S. state taxes. Our adjusted EPS for the quarter was $1.82, a 21.3% increase year-over-year on a reported basis.

在銷量和運營槓桿增加的推動下，本季度調整後的運營利潤率為 20%，同比增長 130 個基點。第二季度調整後的營業利潤率包括約 1% 的非經常性收入，以及我們數字運營和解決方案業務相關成本的降低。受美國州稅上漲的推動，我們本季度的有效稅率為 23.9%，同比增長 60 個基點。我們本季度調整後的每股收益為 1.82 美元，按報告數據同比增長 21.3%。

Turning to our 6-month performance. Our revenue for the period was $805.6 million, up 20% year-over-year on a constant currency basis. This growth was driven by both our digital operations and solutions and Analytics businesses. Adjusted operating margin for the period was 19.7%, up 130 basis points year-over-year. Six-month adjusted EPS was $3.56, up 21.9% year-over-year on a reported basis.

轉向我們 6 個月的表現。我們該期間的收入為 8.056 億美元，按固定匯率計算同比增長 20%。這一增長是由我們的數字運營和解決方案以及分析業務推動的。調整後營業利潤率為 19.7%，同比增長 130 個基點。據報告，六個月調整後每股收益為 3.56 美元，同比增長 21.9%。

Our balance sheet remains strong. Our cash, including short- and long-term investments as of June 30 was $263 million, and our revolver debt was $220 million for a net cash position of $43 million. We generated cash flow from operations of $64 million in the first 6 months compared to $53 million in the same period in 2022. This was -- this improvement was driven by the expansion in our adjusted operating margin. During the first 6 months, we spent $26 million on capital expenditures and repurchased $65 million of our shares at an average cost of $160 per share.

我們的資產負債表仍然強勁。截至 6 月 30 日，我們的現金（包括短期和長期投資）為 2.63 億美元，循環債務為 2.2 億美元，淨現金頭寸為 4300 萬美元。前 6 個月，我們的運營現金流為 6400 萬美元，而 2022 年同期為 5300 萬美元。這種改善是由我們調整後的運營利潤率的擴大推動的。前 6 個月，我們花費了 2600 萬美元的資本支出，並以每股 160 美元的平均成本回購了 6500 萬美元的股票。

Now moving on to our outlook for 2023. Based on our strong performance for the first half of the year and our current visibility across all verticals, we are raising our outlook for the year. We now anticipate revenue to be in the range of $1.605 billion to $1.625 billion, representing year-over-year growth of 14% to 15% on both a reported and constant currency basis. This represents an increase of $8 million at the midpoint of our previous guidance of $1.595 billion to $1.62 billion.

現在談談我們對 2023 年的展望。基於我們上半年的強勁表現以及我們目前在所有垂直領域的能見度，我們正在上調今年的展望。我們目前預計收入將在 16.05 億美元至 16.25 億美元之間，按報告匯率和固定匯率計算，同比增長 14% 至 15%。這比我們之前指導的 15.95 億美元增加了 800 萬美元，達到 16.2 億美元。

We expect a foreign exchange gain between $1 million to $2 million, net interest expense to be approximately $1 million and our full year effective tax rate to be in the range of 22% to 23%. Based on this, we anticipate our adjusted EPS to be in the range of $6.90 to $7.05, representing year-over-year growth of 15% to 17%, which is an increase from our prior adjusted EPS guidance of 12% to 15% growth. We expect capital expenditures to be in the range of $47 million to $52 million.

我們預計外匯收益為 100 萬至 200 萬美元，淨利息支出約為 100 萬美元，全年有效稅率為 22% 至 23%。據此，我們預計調整後每股收益將在 6.90 美元至 7.05 美元之間，同比增長 15% 至 17%，高於我們之前調整後每股收益增長 12% 至 15% 的預期。我們預計資本支出將在 4700 萬美元至 5200 萬美元之間。

In summary, our business model remains resilient due to our long-term client contracts, substantial reoccurring revenue and a well-balanced portfolio across our data analytics and digital operations and solutions businesses. Our data-led strategy coupled with our expanding capabilities in data management and generative AI has led to a larger total addressable market, placing us in a strong position to consistently outperform in the long run. With that, Rohit and I would be happy to take your questions.

總而言之，由於我們的長期客戶合同、大量經常性收入以及數據分析、數字運營和解決方案業務的均衡投資組合，我們的業務模式仍然具有彈性。我們以數據為主導的戰略，加上我們在數據管理和生成人工智能方面不斷擴大的能力，帶來了更大的總體潛在市場，使我們處於長期持續領先的有利地位。羅希特和我很樂意回答您的問題。

(Operator Instructions)

（操作員說明）

Our first question comes from Puneet Jain from JPMorgan.

我們的第一個問題來自摩根大通的 Puneet Jain。

So I quickly wanted to ask about like overall demand trends, specifically as it relates to Operations Management. So that segment was up 20%, has been growing double digits for a while. Given like the potential impact from generative AI there, like how should we think about medium-term growth rates for that segment?

因此，我很快想詢問總體需求趨勢，特別是與運營管理相關的需求趨勢。該細分市場增長了 20%，一段時間以來一直保持兩位數增長。考慮到生成人工智能的潛在影響，我們應該如何考慮該領域的中期增長率？

Yes. Puneet, this is Rohit. So from our perspective, the demand environment continues to remain very favorable, and particularly for digital operations and solutions, we are seeing continued strength in that segment. For us, this seems to be resonating really well because our ability to bring in analytics, technology and automation and combine that into the operations, that's exactly what clients are seeking. As we get into the adoption of generative AI, it's becoming clearer and clearer to us that we are likely to see a further increase in demand on digital operations. And therefore, we think we are positioned really, really well as far as that is concerned.

是的。普尼特，這是羅希特。因此，從我們的角度來看，需求環境仍然非常有利，特別是對於數字運營和解決方案，我們看到該領域持續強勁。對我們來說，這似乎引起了很好的共鳴，因為我們有能力引入分析、技術和自動化並將其結合到運營中，而這正是客戶所尋求的。隨著我們開始採用生成式人工智能，我們越來越清楚地意識到，我們可能會看到對數字操作的需求進一步增加。因此，我們認為就這一點而言，我們的定位非常非常好。

Keep in mind one other thing, which is the slow growth economic environment is actually causing companies to focus a lot more on expense reduction and, at the same time, improving the end customer experience. So what we are seeing is clients, which previously would not have thought about digital operations and solutions outsourcing, are now kind of coming forward and engaging with us. And so we are seeing more midsized companies come forward. We are seeing more mutuals in the insurance segment come forward. We're seeing more clients in Europe come forward. And I think that's a very good and healthy trend for us.

請記住另一件事，即緩慢增長的經濟環境實際上使公司更加關注減少費用，同時改善最終客戶體驗。因此，我們看到的是，以前不會考慮數字運營和解決方案外包的客戶現在正在主動與我們互動。因此，我們看到更多的中型公司挺身而出。我們看到保險領域有更多互助機構出現。我們看到越來越多的歐洲客戶挺身而出。我認為這對我們來說是一個非常好的、健康的趨勢。

So frankly, the demand environment is great. It seems to be we're seeing larger deals in the pipeline. And we think the digital operations and solutions business in this kind of environment will continue to do well.

坦白說，需求環境是很大的。我們似乎看到更大的交易正在醞釀之中。我們認為在這種環境下的數字運營和解決方案業務將繼續表現良好。

Got it, got it. And then on Analytics while it's clear like generative AI should benefit Analytics on an overall basis, like you -- it's great to hear like the examples of 2 projects you talked about in that area. But will that work represent incremental opportunity, driving higher than previously expected growth in the segment? Or could it just like crowd out like other investments from clients in Analytics and the overall growth could remain in the mid- to high teens levels over next few years?

明白了，明白了。然後在分析方面，雖然很明顯生成式人工智能應該在整體上使分析受益，就像您一樣，但很高興聽到您在該領域談到的兩個項目的例子。但這項工作是否會帶來增量機會，推動該領域的增長高於之前的預期？或者它是否會像分析領域客戶的其他投資一樣被擠出，並且未來幾年的整體增長可能保持在中等到十幾歲的水平？

Sure. So we think in order for any client to adopt generative AI, there are a few things which are prerequisites to kind of enabling that. Number one is to have a business understanding and a domain knowledge understanding so that you have the applicable use cases that you can apply generative AI to. And the second more important piece, particularly for analytics is the data that needs to be used for large language models, that data prep and the data architecture and the ability to use data, there's a huge need from all clients to upgrade their data platforms and their data availability.

當然。因此，我們認為，為了讓任何客戶採用生成式人工智能，有一些條件是實現這一目標的先決條件。第一是擁有業務理解和領域知識理解，以便您擁有可以應用生成式人工智能的適用用例。第二個更重要的部分，特別是對於分析來說，是需要用於大型語言模型的數據，數據準備和數據架構以及使用數據的能力，所有客戶都迫切需要升級他們的數據平台和他們的數據可用性。

We, in our Analytics business, we think we're going to get a big boost up on the data management side of the business because we can help clients architect their data, manage their data, make that data available. There's a lot of data which is unstructured that is -- needs to be used for generative AI. There is a lot of vectorizing of the databases that needs to happen. There's cleansing of the databases that needs to happen. So frankly, there is a lot of work that needs to happen in order for generative AI to be practically usable by a client. And therefore, we think the analytics growth rate as well as the analytics portfolio for us is going to see actually a net tailwind behind it because of generative AI.

在我們的分析業務中，我們認為我們將在業務的數據管理方面得到巨大的推動，因為我們可以幫助客戶構建他們的數據，管理他們的數據，並使這些數據可用。有很多非結構化數據需要用於生成人工智能。需要對數據庫進行大量矢量化。需要清理數據庫。坦率地說，為了讓生成式人工智能能夠被客戶實際使用，還需要做很多工作。因此，我們認為，由於生成人工智能，我們的分析增長率以及分析組合實際上將看到其背後的淨推動力。

Our next question comes from Bryan Bergin from TD Cowen.

我們的下一個問題來自 TD Cowen 的 Bryan Bergin。

I wanted to start on Analytics here as well, I guess more near-term view. So the underlying Analytics performance in the quarter, can you comment on how 2Q did relative to your plan? Maybe talk about the current demand trends there versus maybe 3 months ago. And any change in your target for Analytics growth in 2023?

我也想從這裡開始分析，我想這是更近期的觀點。那麼本季度的基本分析性能，您能否評論一下第二季度相對於您的計劃的表現？也許可以談談當前的需求趨勢與 3 個月前的對比。您的 2023 年分析增長目標有何變化？

Sure, Bryan. So first off, the Analytics business, we think that's a very attractive, high-growth vertical for us. We think the growth rate of that particular business segment should be 15% to 18% over the medium term. We think that growth rate is absolutely intact and kind of in place. If you take a look at the growth rate of our Analytics business in the first half of 2023, I believe the growth rate is 17%, so it's actually a very healthy growth rate.

當然，布萊恩。首先，我們認為分析業務對我們來說是一個非常有吸引力、高增長的垂直領域。我們認為該特定業務部門的中期增長率應為 15% 至 18%。我們認為增長率絕對完好無損且到位。如果你看一下我們2023年上半年分析業務的增長率，我認為增長率是17%，所以這實際上是一個非常健康的增長率。

Coming specifically to Q2, the Q2 growth rate for Analytics was lower at 13%. We did see an impact of marketing analytics, which was a negative growth rate for us quarter-on-quarter as well as year-on-year, and that's what has impacted us. That is certainly not something which we had in our plan, and it was something that did reduce our growth rate in Analytics for the quarter. But we think that, that is a temporary phenomenon.

具體到第二季度，Analytics 的第二季度增長率較低，為 13%。我們確實看到了營銷分析的影響，這對我們來說是季度環比和同比的負增長率，這就是對我們的影響。這當然不是我們計劃中的事情，但它確實降低了我們本季度分析的增長率。但我們認為，這是暫時的現象。

And as insurance companies and as financial institutions get back into the customer acquisition mode, our growth rate in Analytics should kind of climb right back up. Keep in mind, analytics services, data management and payment integrity, which are all parts of Analytics, they all grew at a very healthy pace. And like I just said, with generative AI creating more demand on data management and on data analytics, we think actually this growth rate of 15% to 18% over the medium term is likely to continue and continue for a long period of time.

隨著保險公司和金融機構重新進入客戶獲取模式，我們在分析方面的增長率應該會回升。請記住，分析服務、數據管理和支付完整性都是分析的一部分，它們都以非常健康的速度增長。正如我剛才所說，隨著生成式人工智能對數據管理和數據分析產生更多需求，我們認為實際上中期 15% 至 18% 的增長率可能會持續很長一段時間。

Okay. Understanding that, that pressure appears transitory in the customer marketing piece, do you plan that 3Q may actually decline sequentially, too? Or do you think it's stabilized?

好的。了解了這種壓力在客戶營銷方面似乎是暫時的，您是否計劃第三季度實際上也可能會連續下降？還是說你覺得已經穩定了？

So we have factored in our assessment of where we think marketing analytics will be in the second half of the year. As we said in the prepared remarks, we have diversified our marketing analytics capabilities, and we've gone into other industry verticals like health care. And health care, as you know, is not interest rate-sensitive and has a very, very stable kind of a demand environment.

因此，我們考慮了對下半年營銷分析的評估。正如我們在準備好的發言中所說，我們已經實現了營銷分析能力的多元化，並且我們已經進入了醫療保健等其他垂直行業。如您所知，醫療保健對利率不敏感，並且具有非常非常穩定的需求環境。

So as we diversify into other industry verticals for marketing analytics, we believe that the volatility associated with the growth rate of marketing analytics will diminish. And it will actually help us protect the portfolio and grow the portfolio much better.

因此，當我們將營銷分析擴展到其他垂直行業時，我們相信與營銷分析增長率相關的波動性將會減少。它實際上將幫助我們保護投資組合併更好地發展投資組合。

Okay. And if I could sneak one more in on margins, so nice outperformance here in the quarter on operating margin. Can you just comment on second half cadence expectations?

好的。如果我能在利潤率上再增加一點，那麼本季度的營業利潤率將表現出色。您能評論一下下半場的節奏期望嗎？

Yes, Bryan, it's Maurizio. So we have performed very well in the first half of the year on margins. Our adjusted margin was 19.7% for the first half of the year and we got up to 20% in Q2. Now keep in mind, in both quarters, we had the benefit of non-reoccurring revenues, particularly in the second quarter also, about $4 million, and that was -- and that had very low associated costs coming through. So you have a margin that's been elevated to a certain extent by that non-reoccurring revenue in both quarters, including Q2.

是的，布萊恩，我是毛里齊奧。所以我們上半年的利潤率表現非常好。上半年我們的調整後利潤率為 19.7%，第二季度達到 20%。現在請記住，在兩個季度中，我們都受益於非經常性收入，尤其是在第二季度，約為 400 萬美元，而且相關成本非常低。因此，兩個季度（包括第二季度）的非經常性收入在一定程度上提高了利潤率。

Going forward, we have -- we'll be making some significant investments into gen AI to really drive our revenue growth in both digital operations solutions and analytics. And then we'll also be making investments in front-end sales to really drive the business going into 2024. So you should think about margins in the second half of the year much more in the 18% range as we talked about earlier in the year.

展望未來，我們將對人工智能進行一些重大投資，以真正推動我們在數字運營解決方案和分析方面的收入增長。然後，我們還將對前端銷售進行投資，以真正推動業務進入2024 年。因此，您應該更多地考慮下半年的利潤率，在18% 的範圍內，正如我們在2024 年早些時候討論的那樣年。

Our next question comes from Maggie Nolan from William Blair.

我們的下一個問題來自威廉·布萊爾的瑪吉·諾蘭。

You just gave some good color on the marketing analytics, in particular, in the second half of the year. But I'm curious, are there any other factors for how you're thinking about demand and the growth rate for the business in the second half versus the first half at the consolidated company level?

您剛剛對營銷分析進行了一些精彩的闡述，特別是在今年下半年。但我很好奇，您如何考慮下半年與上半年合併公司層面的需求和業務增長率？還有其他因素嗎？

Maggie, for us, if you take a look at our digital operations and solutions business, we are actually very happy with the new client wins that we have and the expansion of work that we are seeing from our existing clients. And there, it's all about execution and implementation. And we think that, that momentum pretty much continues into the second half of this year and even going into next year.

瑪吉，對於我們來說，如果你看看我們的數字運營和解決方案業務，我們實際上對我們贏得的新客戶以及我們從現有客戶那裡看到的工作擴展感到非常滿意。在那裡，一切都與執行和實施有關。我們認為，這種勢頭幾乎會持續到今年下半年，甚至明年。

The Analytics part of our business, again, the data management part, payment integrity piece as well as analytics services, we continue to see good growth. We think the data management piece will actually accelerate with generative AI. So that's a net positive for us. The marketing analytics, frankly, will likely remain soft for some time. Q4 will likely see some increase in the health care analytics -- health care marketing analytics, so that's something which we have factored in.

我們業務的分析部分、數據管理部分、支付完整性部分以及分析服務，我們繼續看到良好的增長。我們認為數據管理部分實際上會隨著生成式人工智能的發展而加速。所以這對我們來說是一個淨積極的結果。坦率地說，營銷分析可能會在一段時間內保持疲軟。第四季度可能會看到醫療保健分析——醫療保健營銷分析——有所增加，所以這是我們考慮的因素。

For us, what we are really, really happy with is how the portfolio is performing for the company. So if you take a look at EXL and our portfolio, we have 55% of our business in digital operations and solutions, and that's -- it's grown in the first half at 20%. We have 45% of our business which is in data analytics and that's growing nicely at 17% as well. What we like is between these 2 business segments that we have, there's -- both of them are high-growth segments. Between the 2 of them, it builds up resiliency.

對我們來說，我們真正非常滿意的是該投資組合為公司帶來的表現。因此，如果你看一下 EXL 和我們的產品組合，我們 55% 的業務來自數字運營和解決方案，也就是說，它在上半年增長了 20%。我們 45% 的業務屬於數據分析，並且還在以 17% 的速度快速增長。我們喜歡的是我們擁有的這兩個業務部門之間的兩個部門都是高增長部門。在他們兩個之間，它增強了彈性。

So when it's a favorable economic environment and there's growth taking place, clients are focusing on growth. That works very well for us. And in slow growth economic environments, that works very well for us. And the last piece is the integration between analytics and operations is a sweet spot for us. And that's why our overall growth rate is much faster than the marketplace. And we think that, that business model continues to resonate very heavily and we think we're going to keep driving that. And by the way, generative AI is going to further that tight integration between analytics and digital operations.

因此，當經濟環境有利並且出現增長時，客戶就會關注增長。這對我們來說非常有效。在經濟增長緩慢的環境中，這對我們來說非常有效。最後一點是分析和運營之間的集成對我們來說是一個最佳點。這就是為什麼我們的整體增長率比市場快得多。我們認為，這種商業模式將繼續引起強烈反響，我們將繼續推動這一趨勢。順便說一句，生成式人工智能將進一步推動分析和數字運營之間的緊密結合。

And then can you comment a little bit on wage dynamics since last quarter, how wage inflation is kind of intersecting with the current demand trends to inform your pricing expectations for the next couple of quarters?

然後，您能否對上季度以來的工資動態發表一些評論，工資通脹如何與當前需求趨勢相交叉，以告知您對未來幾個季度的定價預期？

Sure. So on wage inflation, this is something which we had factored in previously. We typically give salary increments which are across the company on first of April. We already were seeing the slowdown in the economic environment in the first quarter and we planned appropriately. And I think this year across the industry, the salary increments have been somewhat moderate as compared to last year. So that's been actually very helpful. I think you can see that some of that has been disciplined execution on the part of EXL, and we continue to be very, very careful in terms of how we plan that out.

當然。因此，關於工資通脹，這是我們之前考慮的因素。我們通常會在 4 月 1 日在全公司範圍內進行加薪。我們已經看到第一季度經濟環境放緩，我們做出了適當的計劃。而且我認為今年整個行業的薪資漲幅與去年相比還是比較溫和的。這實際上非常有幫助。我想你可以看到 EXL 方面已經嚴格執行了其中的一些內容，並且我們在如何計劃方面仍然非常非常謹慎。

There are certain skill sets which do require us to actually have a much higher wage inflation, particularly around digital, analytics, data management and specialized domain skills. And in those areas, we have been very, very -- we have a very differentiated policy of making sure that we are market competitive. So frankly, wage inflation this year has not been that much of a challenge. But we are differentiated across skill sets, and we'll continue to be very, very judicious and careful and disciplined in terms of how we manage that.

有些技能確實要求我們擁有更高的工資通脹，特別是在數字、分析、數據管理和專業領域技能方面。在這些領域，我們一直非常非常——我們有非常差異化的政策，以確保我們具有市場競爭力。坦率地說，今年的工資上漲並沒有構成太大的挑戰。但我們在技能方面存在差異，我們將在管理方式方面繼續非常非常明智、謹慎和自律。

Our next question comes from Ashwin Shirvaikar from Citi.

我們的下一個問題來自花旗銀行的 Ashwin Shirvaikar。

Let me start with this is a bit of an involved question. But when you reported 1Q, your expectation for 2Q was that you would be comparable to 1Q for revenues adjusted for onetime rev. In other words, you were looking for, roughly speaking, $395 million. You did not, as you mentioned, expect the marketing analytics thing to shrink. So if I take that into account, you probably outperformed your expectations by about $15 million.

讓我從這個有點複雜的問題開始。但是，當您報告第一季度時，您對第二季度的預期是，根據一次性收入調整後的收入將與第一季度相當。換句話說，粗略地說，您正在尋找 3.95 億美元。正如您提到的，您並沒有預期營銷分析業務會萎縮。因此，如果我考慮到這一點，您的業績可能超出預期約 1500 萬美元。

So I just want to figure out, what was on the other side that helped you? Was it faster ramps on the operations side? Did other parts of Analytics come through as you, I think, always expected because marketing analytics, best I understand, is what, 15% of overall Analytics? So any details that you can provide with regards to the breakout of what worked as well?

所以我只是想弄清楚，另一邊是什麼幫助了你？運營方面的提升速度是否更快？我認為，分析的其他部分是否如您一直期望的那樣完成，因為據我所知，營銷分析佔整體分析的 15%？那麼，您能提供有關突破的詳細信息嗎？

Yes, Ashwin, that's a very good observation, to be quite honest. So we closed the quarter at $401 million. We had -- and we talked about $6 million in non-reoccurring revenue, which would have dropped you to just at a starting base of $395 million. And in the midpoint of the range, if you calculate it within our annual guidance, you would have gotten to about $400 million.

是的，阿什溫，說實話，這是一個非常好的觀察。因此，我們本季度的收盤價為 4.01 億美元。我們談到了 600 萬美元的非經常性收入，這將使您的起始基數降至 3.95 億美元。在該範圍的中點，如果在我們的年度指導範圍內計算，您將獲得約 4 億美元。

And so you're 100% correct in that we saw marketing analytics come down a little bit more than what we had expected. What we did not factor in was continued acceleration or very good growth within digital operations and solutions because that piece of our business grew 23% in Q1 and continue to grow at 20% in Q2. And this is the third quarter in a row that, that part of our business has grown 20%-plus. So that was the differentiated factor. And that's the area that now we're seeing some continued momentum going into the second half of the year and into 2024.

所以你說得 100% 正確，我們看到營銷分析的下降幅度比我們的預期要高一些。我們沒有考慮到數字運營和解決方案的持續加速或非常好的增長，因為我們的這一部分業務在第一季度增長了 23%，在第二季度繼續以 20% 的速度增長。這是我們這部分業務連續第三個季度增長 20% 以上。這就是差異化因素。現在，我們看到該領域在下半年和 2024 年仍將保持強勁勢頭。

Understood. And I mean, derisking is a big deal for investors nowadays in terms of the numbers. So Rohit, you mentioned that you expect marketing to snap back. It will -- eventually growth is important to companies. But when you say snap back, do you mean beginning next year or are you kind of factoring in snap back later this year? What sort of explicit assumptions are you making? And it might help if you kind of break down overall Analytics into what percent is marketing, what percent is other parts of it and so on, so forth kind of start with that maybe?

明白了。我的意思是，就數字而言，降低風險對於當今的投資者來說是一件大事。羅希特，您提到您預計營銷會迅速復蘇。最終增長對公司來說很重要。但是，當你說快速恢復時，你的意思是從明年開始，還是在今年晚些時候考慮快速恢復？您正在做出什麼樣的明確假設？如果您將整體分析分解為營銷的百分比、其他部分的百分比等等，可能會有所幫助，等等，也許可以這樣開始？

Right, Ashwin. So the marketing analytics, we do expect will kind of recover. We think the fourth quarter is likely to see strength in marketing analytics, like I mentioned, because of the diversification into health care marketing analytics. All the work that we do with the payers, helping them with marketing for Medicare Advantage plans all typically ends up being in the fourth quarter, and we would expect to see that kick in, in the fourth quarter.

對了，阿什溫。因此，我們確實預計營銷分析將會有所恢復。正如我提到的，我們認為第四季度營銷分析可能會表現強勁，因為醫療保健營銷分析的多元化。我們與付款人所做的所有工作，幫助他們營銷 Medicare Advantage 計劃，通常都會在第四季度結束，我們預計會在第四季度看到這一結果。

Keep in mind a couple of other things. Today, most insurance carriers have stepped out of California and they've stepped out of Florida. And they're simply not expanding their presence out there because all the rate increases that they need to get done, they need regulatory approvals on that, and that's taking time and that's not been put into place. So because of the inflationary pressures that we saw in the previous cycle, there is pretty much a standoff in terms of expanding and offering insurance in California and Florida, which are 2 of the largest markets in the country.

請記住其他幾件事。如今，大多數保險公司已經走出了加利福尼亞州，也走出了佛羅里達州。他們根本就沒有擴大他們的存在，因為他們需要完成的所有加息，都需要監管部門的批准，而這需要時間，而且還沒有落實到位。因此，由於我們在上一個週期中看到的通脹壓力，加州和佛羅里達州這兩個美國最大的市場在擴大和提供保險方面幾乎陷入僵局。

So frankly, that has to normalize at some point of time with the price increases that are necessary to kind of be brought in and for the insurance carriers to go back there. So we think -- that's why we think that this is a temporary kind of a phenomenon. We don't think that this is going to be something that is lasts into perpetuity.

坦率地說，隨著價格上漲，這種情況必須在某個時間點正常化，而價格上漲是必要的，保險公司也必須回到那裡。所以我們認為——這就是為什麼我們認為這是一種暫時的現象。我們認為這不會永遠持續下去。

And frankly, marketing analytics is becoming more and more critical and more and more important because the ability to hyper-personalize your service offerings to the relevant customer segment, the ability to target on a geographic basis and a zip code basis, the ability to rely on data and use data signals for effectiveness in marketing, that's becoming more and more important. So frankly, we think marketing analytics is a good play for our Analytics business, but it does have volatility associated with it at this point of time.

坦率地說，營銷分析變得越來越重要，因為向相關客戶群提供超個性化服務的能力，基於地理和郵政編碼的定位能力，依賴於基於數據並使用數據信號來提高營銷效率，這變得越來越重要。坦率地說，我們認為營銷分析對我們的分析業務來說是一個很好的選擇，但目前它確實存在與之相關的波動性。

Understood. If I could ask a quick last question to Maurizio. Free cash flow, the $200 million-plus, what are the drivers in the back half of the year? And I'm not sure if I might have missed it, have expectations for free cash flow changed or are they still the same?

明白了。我可以向毛里齊奧問最後一個問題嗎？自由現金流，2億多美元，下半年的驅動因素是什麼？我不確定我是否錯過了它，對自由現金流的預期是否發生了變化，還是仍然相同？

Our free cash flow expectations are very similar. In the first half of the year, we have a number of higher cash outlay events. We pay our annual bonuses in March, which is a big number. We have some higher tax payments earlier in the year that hit us pretty hard in terms of free cash flow. So you're going to -- so you would see -- you see less free cash flow in the first half of the year. But in the second half of the year, we see very comparable to what we've seen in the past.

我們的自由現金流預期非常相似。上半年，我們發生了多起現金支出較高的事件。我們在三月份發放年度獎金，這是一個很大的數字。今年早些時候，我們繳納了一些較高的稅款，這對我們的自由現金流造成了相當大的打擊。所以你會看到，今年上半年的自由現金流會減少。但在今年下半年，我們看到的情況與過去非常相似。

Our next question comes from Mayank Tandon from Needham.

我們的下一個問題來自尼達姆的 Mayank Tandon。

Congrats on the quarter. Rohit, I wanted to ask you on the recruiting front. As you think about the implications of gen AI, rather, on your business, how do you go about changing your recruiting engine? And what kind of skill sets will you be looking to hire? And maybe on a related note, what does that mean for attrition longer term? Does that change the dynamic for your business?

恭喜本季度。羅希特，我想問你關於招聘方面的問題。當您思考新一代人工智能對您的業務的影響時，您將如何改變您的招聘引擎？您希望僱用什麼樣的技能組合？也許與此相關的是，這對於長期流失意味著什麼？這會改變您的業務動態嗎？

Yes. Thanks, Mayank. So the recruitment for us for gen AI, in particular, requires us to hire the same type of resources that we were hiring previously for all the machine learning and AI work that we were doing within analytics. It requires us to provide training to these resources. Keep in mind, because gen AI is so, so new, there aren't very many experienced resources out in the marketplace. So frankly, our ability to train and provide that inputs to these individuals, that becomes really, very important.

是的。謝謝，瑪雅克。因此，對我們來說，Gen AI 的招聘尤其需要我們僱傭與我們之前在分析領域所做的所有機器學習和人工智能工作相同類型的資源。它需要我們為這些資源提供培訓。請記住，由於人工智能時代太新了，市場上沒有太多有經驗的資源。坦率地說，我們培訓並向這些人提供投入的能力變得非常非常重要。

The talent pool that we are kind of targeting for gen AI tends to be people who have a strong understanding of data, have a strong understanding of using these large language models. There's a lot of work that we do around managing databases and moving data to the cloud. So I think there, we pick up experienced talent. But most of the actual usage on generative AI is internal training that we provide to these folks.

我們針對新一代人工智能的人才庫往往是對數據有深入了解、對使用這些大型語言模型有深入了解的人。我們在管理數據庫和將數據移動到雲方面做了很多工作。所以我認為我們在那裡挑選了經驗豐富的人才。但生成式人工智能的大部分實際用途是我們為這些人提供的內部培訓。

We are fortunate we've got 8,000 data scientists internally in the company, and we've got 1,500 who are already trained on AI. So frankly, we've got a very good bench strength to kind of buildup on. And all the hiring that we have done this year and that we continue to do, we'll be able to kind of provide them with this kind of knowledge and upskill them. And the last piece on the generative AI is, there are a number of the high-tech companies that have actually been laying off people and resources that were doing work around AI. And that is actually a target-rich environment for us to be recruiting from.

幸運的是，我們公司內部有 8,000 名數據科學家，其中 1,500 名已經接受過人工智能培訓。坦白說，我們有非常好的板凳力量可以積累。我們今年所做的以及繼續進行的所有招聘工作，我們將能夠為他們提供這種知識並提高他們的技能。關於生成式人工智能的最後一點是，許多高科技公司實際上一直在裁員與人工智能相關的人員和資源。這實際上是一個我們可以從中進行招聘的目標豐富的環境。

Understood. That's helpful. And then just a related question on gen AI. Again, this might be a little premature. But what do you see in terms of the impact on the size and scope of deals over time? And then just given the productivity benefits, do you imagine that you'll have to pass on more of that to your end customer versus what you've been providing at least in a more traditional digital operations and analytics space?

明白了。這很有幫助。然後是關於 gen AI 的相關問題。同樣，這可能有點為時過早。但您認為隨著時間的推移對交易規模和範圍的影響如何？然後，考慮到生產力方面的優勢，您是否認為與您至少在更傳統的數字運營和分析領域所提供的相比，您必須將更多的東西傳遞給最終客戶？

Yes. I think that's a very, very important question. Let me address it in the 2 parts that you asked for it, Mayank. One, because of generative AI, we think the deal size actually increases. So we think there'll be a larger opportunity for us to play. We can actually deploy generative AI across the enterprise. And because we are deploying generative AI across the enterprise, it's not only on the work that we do but it's the work that our clients are doing with other partners as well as work that they're doing themselves that we can apply this to. And therefore, it becomes a much larger opportunity for us.

是的。我認為這是一個非常非常重要的問題。 Mayank，讓我按照您要求的兩個部分來解決這個問題。第一，由於生成式人工智能，我們認為交易規模實際上有所增加。所以我們認為我們會有更大的比賽機會。我們實際上可以在整個企業中部署生成式人工智能。因為我們正在整個企業中部署生成式人工智能，所以我們可以將其應用到我們所做的工作上，還包括我們的客戶與其他合作夥伴一起做的工作以及他們自己做的工作。因此，這對我們來說是一個更大的機會。

The second part of it is the productivity benefits and the kind of headwind that, that might provide. Well, we are in a very fortunate position that the work that we do in digital operations is very complex, very fragmented and it's at the upper end of the complexity spectrum. So the level of cannibalization out there is very, very low. And therefore, we think the productivity benefit that needs to be provided, that's not going to impact our business model by very much. It's really where you have large call centers and contact center employees and workforces or where you have simple processes being managed, I think there the impact of the productivity benefit and cannibalization is going to be a lot, lot higher. And we will actually benefit from that because we will be the ones implementing this gen AI strategy for our clients and therefore, we think it's a net positive for us.

第二部分是生產力的好處以及可能帶來的不利因素。嗯，我們處於一個非常幸運的位置，我們在數字運營方面所做的工作非常複雜、非常分散，並且處於復雜性範圍的高端。因此，那裡的蠶食水平非常非常低。因此，我們認為需要提供的生產力優勢不會對我們的業務模式產生太大影響。實際上，在擁有大型呼叫中心和聯絡中心員工和勞動力的地方，或者在管理簡單流程的地方，我認為生產力效益和蠶食的影響將會大得多。我們實際上將從中受益，因為我們將成為為客戶實施這一新一代人工智能戰略的人，因此，我們認為這對我們來說是一個淨積極的結果。

Our next question comes to Moshe Katri from Wedbush.

我們的下一個問題來自 Wedbush 的 Moshe Katri。

Just a couple of follow-ups here. First, so clearly the demand remains strong. Can you talk a bit about -- maybe you can describe from your perspective what you're seeing in terms of project ramp, especially for the new deal flow that's coming on board. That's my first question.

這裡只是一些後續行動。首先，顯然需求依然強勁。您能否談談——也許您可以從您的角度描述一下您在項目升級方面所看到的情況，特別是對於即將到來的新交易流程。這是我的第一個問題。

Yes. So I think from our perspective, the demand is strong and the decision-making cycles continue to be at the same pace as previously. We really have not seen any change to that happening. And so what that means is that the ramps and the project implementation cycles are pretty much in the same way as they were previously. And so we expect that to continue. It's in areas where there is discretionary expense that needs to be incurred, where there is discretionary project work.

是的。因此，我認為從我們的角度來看，需求強勁，決策週期繼續與以前相同。我們確實沒有看到這種情況發生任何變化。這意味著斜坡和項目實施週期與以前幾乎相同。因此我們預計這種情況會繼續下去。它是在需要產生可自由支配的費用、有可自由支配的項目工作的領域。

So if it's consulting work that needs to be done or an advisory work that needs to be done or it is a short-term project engagement that is discretionary, there we are seeing a shift. But again, we are very, very fortunate, Moshe, that at EXL in our portfolio, we have very, very limited work that we do around advisory and consulting and very limited work around discretionary projects. So frankly, for us, it feels like the environment is very conducive to our growth.

因此，如果是需要完成的諮詢工作或需要完成的諮詢工作，或者是可酌情決定的短期項目參與，我們就會看到一種轉變。但是，Moshe，我們再次非常非常幸運，在我們的投資組合中的 EXL，我們圍繞諮詢和諮詢所做的工作非常非常有限，圍繞全權委託項目的工作也非常有限。坦白說，對於我們來說，感覺這個環境非常有利於我們的成長。

Okay, that's great. And then we got some questions from investors about any noticeable volume reductions during the quarter. And I'm assuming if it does happen or did happen, it's probably more on the insurance and banking verticals. Is that the right way of looking at it?

好的，太好了。然後我們收到了投資者關於本季度交易量明顯減少的一些問題。我假設如果它確實發生或確實發生過，它可能更多地發生在保險和銀行垂直領域。這是正確的看待方式嗎？

We have not really seen any volume reduction in the second quarter. If you take a look at our digital operations and solutions business, like Maurizio mentioned, we grew that 20%. That's well above our expectation levels. And we didn't have any volume reductions out there.

我們實際上並沒有看到第二季度銷量有任何減少。如果你看看我們的數字運營和解決方案業務，就像 Maurizio 提到的那樣，我們增長了 20%。這遠高於我們的預期水平。我們並沒有減少任何體積。

Okay. And then Healthcare continues to look really strong. What are we doing to kind of continue to sustain this growth rate that we are kind of seeing here?

好的。然後醫療保健看起來仍然非常強勁。我們正在做什麼來繼續維持我們在這裡看到的增長率？

Yes. So Healthcare is, again, a very, very large industry vertical. It's also a vertical that's very rich in terms of the ability to apply digital and apply data and AI into Healthcare. I think a lot of clients are moving in that direction. What we are doing is we are expanding our service offerings and solutions for the Healthcare industry vertical. So we've built up more new capabilities, and we are investing in newer capabilities around risk adjustment. We are working around how we can leverage conversational AI, how we can kind of have a number of the generative AI capabilities be embedded into Healthcare and be helpful to members, be helpful to some of the contact center reps, and actually leverage that capability across the enterprise.

是的。因此，醫療保健又是一個非常非常大的垂直行業。這也是一個在將數字化以及將數據和人工智能應用於醫療保健方面的能力非常豐富的垂直行業。我認為很多客戶正在朝這個方向發展。我們正在做的是擴大我們針對醫療保健行業垂直領域的服務產品和解決方案。因此，我們建立了更多新功能，並且正在圍繞風險調整投資新功能。我們正在研究如何利用對話式人工智能，如何將一些生成式人工智能功能嵌入到醫療保健中，為會員提供幫助，為一些聯絡中心代表提供幫助，並在整個行業中實際利用該功能。企業。

All right. And then the last one, since you mentioned AI, can we get any color on the pipeline here? And you kind of indicated there's a lot of interest, but in terms of sold deals or any sort of color and details on how this is actually -- this could potentially trigger incremental growth down the road?

好的。最後一個，既然你提到了人工智能，我們可以在這裡的管道上得到任何顏色嗎？你表示有很多興趣，但就已售交易或任何形式的顏色和細節而言，這可能會引發未來的增量增長？

Sure. So what I can share with you is on generative AI, we have more than 150 conversations taking place with clients at this point of time. We've got several advanced stage deals that have been signed up that we are working on. We've got 120 use cases across industry segments. We have 20 gen AI demos that we've created and these are up on our website, so it's available for our clients and our prospects and our partners to see.

當然。所以我可以與您分享的是關於生成式人工智能，目前我們與客戶進行了 150 多次對話。我們已經簽署了幾項高級階段的交易，我們正在處理這些交易。我們有 120 個跨行業領域的用例。我們已經創建了 20 代 AI 演示，這些演示已發佈在我們的網站上，因此我們的客戶、潛在客戶和合作夥伴都可以查看。

So frankly, there's a lot of activity that's taking place on generative AI. And we think that gives us a lot of confidence in terms of how this will result in a greater volume of work and a greater amount of revenue for us going forward.

坦率地說，有很多關於生成人工智能的活動正在進行。我們認為這給了我們很大的信心，我們相信這將如何為我們帶來更多的工作量和更多的收入。

(Operator Instructions) Our next question comes from Vincent Colicchio from Barrington Research.

（操作員說明）我們的下一個問題來自 Barrington Research 的 Vincent Colicchio。

Rohit, on the generative AI use cases at 120, do you expect that to ramp up considerably in the coming quarter?

Rohit，關於 120 個生成式 AI 用例，您預計這一數字在下個季度會大幅增加嗎？

Yes, Vincent. I think we are likely to get clients to sign up on that. The big, big thing that needs to kind of take place out there is that the data needs to be ready and usable for generative AI. Most of our clients require a ton of work to be done around their data. And we're talking about unstructured data being available on these large language models. We're talking about how do we protect the confidentiality and security of this data, and how do we kind of integrate in various data sources real-time because generative AI, it's only useful and powerful if you can leverage that in a real-time environment.

是的，文森特。我認為我們很可能會讓客戶簽署這一協議。需要發生的一件大事是，數據需要準備好並可用於生成人工智能。我們的大多數客戶都需要圍繞他們的數據完成大量工作。我們正在討論這些大型語言模型上可用的非結構化數據。我們正在討論如何保護這些數據的機密性和安全性，以及我們如何實時集成到各種數據源中，因為生成式人工智能只有在您可以實時利用它時才有用和強大。環境。

So frankly, there's a lot of work that needs to happen on that before the generative AI use case can be practically deployed, and that's where the bottleneck is right now. We are in a -- again, in a great place to help our clients on that data side. Keep in mind, most of our clients were already moving some of their structured data sets onto the cloud, and we were helping them and others were helping them. But now what you need to do is you need to do a vectorization of these databases. And that's become hugely important for applying generative AI to them. So that's another whole work stream that needs to be undertaken before this can be practically enabled.

坦率地說，在實際部署生成式人工智能用例之前，還需要做很多工作，而這正是目前的瓶頸所在。我們再次處於一個在數據方面為客戶提供幫助的好地方。請記住，我們的大多數客戶已經將他們的一些結構化數據集轉移到雲端，我們在幫助他們，其他人也在幫助他們。但現在您需要做的是需要對這些數據庫進行矢量化。這對於將生成式人工智能應用於它們變得非常重要。因此，這是在實際啟用之前需要進行的另一個完整工作流程。

And could you provide some color on the new logos added in the quarter? Specifically, do any of them feel like they could be strategic clients?

您能否為本季度添加的新徽標提供一些顏色？具體來說，他們中有人覺得自己可以成為戰略客戶嗎？

Yes, Vincent. I think the portfolio mix of new clients actually is very, very healthy. We've seen some clients come in which are first time users of digital operations and solutions and analytics. We think many of these will become strategic and large opportunities for us. Keep in mind one thing that even a midsized client for us, because we are kind of doing work across the spectrum on digital operations and analytics, can become very, very meaningful for us very quickly.

是的，文森特。我認為新客戶的投資組合實際上非常非常健康。我們看到一些客戶是首次使用數字運營、解決方案和分析的客戶。我們認為其中許多將成為我們的戰略性重大機遇。請記住一件事，即使是我們的中型客戶，因為我們在數字運營和分析方面開展了跨領域的工作，很快就會對我們變得非常非常有意義。

So frankly, the quality of that portfolio of new clients signed up is very strategic, and we think it's very healthy that will provide us a good runway over the next several years.

坦率地說，新簽約客戶組合的質量非常具有戰略意義，我們認為它非常健康，將為我們在未來幾年提供良好的跑道。

Our next question comes from David Grossman from Stifel.

我們的下一個問題來自 Stifel 的 David Grossman。

This question has come up several times and kind of asked probably in a different way, but -- so sorry to ask it again. But I guess I'm just thinking about the cadence of the digital ops and solutions business. Obviously, last year was a good bookings year and you saw some acceleration in the fourth -- beginning of the fourth quarter.

這個問題已經出現過好幾次了，而且可能是以不同的方式提出的，但是——很抱歉再次問這個問題。但我想我只是在考慮數字運營和解決方案業務的節奏。顯然，去年是預訂量不錯的一年，第四季度初，您看到了一些增長。

So you're going to anniversary the comparison in the fourth quarter '23. I know you don't really disclose bookings and backlog, but maybe you could give us some context of how to think about when you anniversary that more difficult compare, particularly in the fourth quarter, and kind of what the setup is into that and as we get into next year because you did comment that you expect strong growth in digital ops into 2024. But just really interested in some context around that, particularly given how difficult the compares get beginning in the fourth quarter.

因此，您將在 23 年第四季度進行比較週年紀念日。我知道您並沒有真正披露預訂和積壓訂單，但也許您可以向我們提供一些背景信息，讓我們思考當您的周年紀念日發生更困難的比較時，特別是在第四季度，以及設置的內容以及作為我們進入明年是因為您確實評論說預計到 2024 年數字運營將出現強勁增長。但只是對圍繞這一點的一些背景非常感興趣，特別是考慮到第四季度開始比較的難度。

Sure, David. So as you know, in digital operations and solutions for us, we sign up large clients and we ramp up the work that we are doing for them. But that transition takes place over an 18- to 24-month period. So frankly, for us, some of the large bookings that we had in 2022, the full implementation of that cycle is likely to continue into '24, and it's not fully reflected in our '23 numbers.

當然，大衛。如您所知，在我們的數字運營和解決方案中，我們簽約了大客戶，並加大了為他們所做的工作。但這種轉變需要 18 至 24 個月的時間。坦率地說，對於我們來說，我們在 2022 年獲得的一些大額預訂，該週期的全面實施可能會持續到 24 年，並且並沒有完全反映在我們的 23 數據中。

So it's also a business which is much less volatile. It's a business that when you go up in terms of the growth rates, it's likely to stay there for a longer period of time. And we think the bookings that we had in '22 were very healthy, and bookings continue to be healthy in '23. And some of the large deals that we are seeing right now in the marketplace, those are very healthy.

因此，這也是一項波動性較小的業務。這是一項當增長率上升時，很可能會保持更長一段時間的業務。我們認為 22 年的預訂量非常健康，並且 23 年的預訂量也將繼續保持健康。我們現在在市場上看到的一些大型交易非常健康。

The insurance industry is a great industry vertical for us to be playing in because there's a lot of technology modernization that needs to happen out there and there's a lot of cost rationalization that needs to happen over there. And we are helping our clients do that and we are the market leader out there. And then we're seeing that in Emerging. We're seeing that in Healthcare. So frankly, the digital operations business for us feels that it's got elevated growth rates as compared to our historical growth rate out there. And that's something which continues to happen.

保險業對於我們來說是一個很好的垂直行業，因為那裡需要進行大量的技術現代化，並且需要進行大量的成本合理化。我們正在幫助我們的客戶做到這一點，我們是市場的領導者。然後我們在新興市場中看到了這一點。我們在醫療保健領域看到了這一點。坦率地說，我們認為與我們的歷史增長率相比，數字運營業務的增長率更高。這種情況還在繼續發生。

And as more digital gets embedded into operations and as more gen AI gets embedded into the operations, we actually think that, that's a net positive for us.

隨著更多的數字化融入到運營中，隨著更多的新一代人工智能融入到運營中，我們實際上認為，這對我們來說是一個淨積極的結果。

Right. And then you did make a comment, Rohit, about health care analytics and some activity ramping in the fourth quarter. So is that seasonal or a seasonal uptick in the fourth quarter because of the work you're doing for Medicare Advantage? Or is this new business coming on in the fourth quarter that would continue on into 2024?

正確的。羅希特，然後您確實就醫療保健分析和第四季度的一些活動發表了評論。那麼，第四季度的季節性或季節性上升是因為您為 Medicare Advantage 所做的工作嗎？或者這項新業務是否會在第四季度推出並持續到 2024 年？

No, no, David, you're right. That business will be seasonal business. The marketing analytics piece for Medicare Advantage is only in the fourth quarter. Some of that might spill into the first quarter, but it's typically around the end of the year when there's the annual enrollment cycle that takes place.

不，不，大衛，你是對的。該業務將是季節性業務。 Medicare Advantage 的營銷分析部分僅在第四季度發布。其中一些可能會蔓延到第一季度，但通常是在年底左右，屆時會有年度招生週期。

Got it. And then just one last quarter -- or question, excuse me, on this nonrecurring revenue. At least I don't recall you reporting that before this year. So is there something changed in the way you're contracting that we would expect this nonrecurring type revenue to kind of be more of a common occurrence? Or is this really just an unusual contract where you're showing something up or your performance base that you're getting some revenue?

知道了。然後只是最後一個季度 - 或者問題，對不起，關於這一非經常性收入。至少我不記得你在今年之前報告過此事。那麼，您簽訂合同的方式是否發生了變化，我們預計這種非經常性收入會更常見？或者這真的只是一份不尋常的合同，您可以在其中展示一些東西或您獲得一些收入的績效基礎？

I think, David, we've had a few things that have occurred over the last couple of quarters. One is we are getting -- some of these items are coming up that haven't come up in the past, whether it's a onetime payment or it's accruing revenue from an increase from a previous period. It just gives investors a little bit more insight into forecasting going forward, to be quite honest.

我想，大衛，過去幾個季度我們發生了一些事情。一是我們正在得到——其中一些項目正在出現，而這些項目是過去沒有出現過的，無論是一次性付款還是從上一時期的增長中獲得的收入。老實說，它只是讓投資者對未來的預測有更多的了解。

And it does have a pretty big effect on our margin. We are investing back into the business, but we also have very healthy margins right now, especially in the first half of the year of 19.7%. So we're working on increasing our margins but we've had very healthy margins in the first half of the year. And a piece of that is attributable to that, there's onetime revenue. So we do want to call it out just to give a little bit more context to investors.

它確實對我們的利潤產生了相當大的影響。我們正在重新投資該業務，但目前我們也擁有非常健康的利潤率，尤其是上半年達到 19.7%。因此，我們正在努力提高利潤率，但今年上半年我們的利潤率非常健康。其中一部分歸因於一次性收入。因此，我們確實想指出這一點，只是為了向投資者提供更多背景信息。

Okay. But it sounds like that's something that could continue going forward, right? That you would have this one to -- it's something that's part of the contracts that you're signing, so it wouldn't be unusual for those to just continue to occur in the future?

好的。但聽起來這可能會繼續下去，對吧？你會讓這個——這是你正在簽署的合同的一部分，所以這些在未來繼續發生並不罕見？

Potentially. We'll have to see, but potentially.

有潛力。我們必須看看，但有可能。

I would now like to turn the conference back to John Kristoff for any closing remarks.

現在我想請約翰·克里斯托夫（John Kristoff）發表閉幕詞。

Okay. Thank you for joining us today, and as always, if you have additional questions, please reach out to me directly. Thank you, and goodbye.

好的。感謝您今天加入我們，與往常一樣，如果您有其他問題，請直接與我聯繫。謝謝，再見。

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.

今天的電話會議到此結束。感謝您的參與。您現在可以斷開連接。