Extreme Networks Inc (EXTR) 2023 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to Extreme Network's Fourth Quarter Fiscal Year 2023 Financial Results Conference Call. (Operator Instructions) Please note that today's conference is being recorded. I will now hand the conference over to your speaker host, Mr. Stan Kovler, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

早上好，女士們，先生們。謝謝你的支持。歡迎參加 Extreme Network 2023 財年第四季度財務業績電話會議。 （操作員指示）請注意，今天的會議正在錄製中。我現在將會議交給演講主持人、投資者關係主管斯坦·科夫勒先生。請繼續。

Thank you, operator. Good morning, everybody, and welcome to Extreme Networks' Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year-End 2023 Earnings Conference Call. I'm Stan Kovler, Vice President of Corporate Strategy and Investor Relations. With me today are Extreme Networks' President and CEO, Ed Meyercord; and CFO, Kevin Rhodes. We just distributed a press release and filed an 8-K detailing Extreme Networks' financial results for the quarter. For your convenience, a copy of the press release, which includes our GAAP to non-GAAP reconciliations is available in the Investor Relations section of our website at extremenetworks.com along with our earnings presentation.

謝謝你，接線員。大家早上好，歡迎參加極進網絡第四季度和 2023 財年終收益電話會議。我是斯坦·科夫勒 (Stan Kovler)，公司戰略和投資者關係副總裁。今天與我在一起的有 Extreme Networks 總裁兼首席執行官 Ed Meyercord；和首席財務官凱文·羅德斯。我們剛剛發布了新聞稿並提交了 8-K，詳細介紹了極進網絡本季度的財務業績。為方便起見，我們網站Extremenetworks.com 的投資者關係部分提供了新聞稿的副本，其中包括我們的 GAAP 與非 GAAP 調節表以及我們的收益演示。

Today's call and our discussion may include forward-looking statements based on our current expectations about Extreme's future business, financial and operational results, growth expectations and strategies. Our financial disclosures on this call will be on a non-GAAP basis unless stated otherwise. We caution you not to put undue reliance on these forward-looking statements as they involve risks and uncertainties that can cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated by these statements. These risks are described in our risk factors in our 10-K report for the period ended June 30, 2022, and subsequent 10-Q reports filed with the SEC. Any forward-looking statements made on this call reflect our analysis as of today, and we have no plans or duty to update them except as required by law. Following our prepared remarks, we will take your questions. And now I will take -- I will turn the call over to Extreme's President and CEO, Ed Meyercord.

今天的電話會議和我們的討論可能包括基於我們當前對 Extreme 未來業務、財務和運營業績、增長預期和戰略的預期的前瞻性陳述。除非另有說明，我們在本次電話會議上的財務披露將基於非公認會計原則（non-GAAP）。我們提醒您不要過度依賴這些前瞻性陳述，因為它們涉及風險和不確定性，可能導致實際結果與這些陳述預期的結果存在重大差異。這些風險在我們截至 2022 年 6 月 30 日的 10-K 報告以及隨後向 SEC 提交的 10-Q 報告中的風險因素中進行了描述。本次電話會議中所做的任何前瞻性陳述均反映了我們截至目前的分析，除非法律要求，否則我們沒有計劃或義務對其進行更新。在我們準備好的發言之後，我們將回答您的問題。現在我將把電話轉給Extreme 的總裁兼首席執行官Ed Meyercord。

Our perfrmance, with revenue growth accelerating to 31% in the fourth quarter and 18% overall for the year. This is the second consecutive year of double-digit organic growth. We also delivered $1.09 a share in EPS, up 42% year-over-year, and we expect the bottom-line trends to continue with earnings growing faster than revenues. Our free cash flow doubled in fiscal '23, and we ended the year with a net cash position even after paying down $80 million in debt and buying back $100 million of our stock. We outperformed our original top line outlook for fiscal '23 and based on industry analyst estimates outgrew the market by 2x. This, combined with the increase in volume of larger deals and new logos is a clear indication that we're taking share from our largest competitors. Customers recognize that Extreme offers the simplest and easiest to manage end-to-end enterprise networking platform in the industry.

我們的業績，第四季度收入增長加速至 31%，全年整體收入增長 18%。這是連續第二年實現兩位數的有機增長。我們還實現了每股 1.09 美元的每股收益，同比增長 42%，我們預計盈利增長速度將快於收入增長，盈利趨勢將持續下去。我們的自由現金流在 23 財年翻了一番，即使在償還了 8000 萬美元的債務並回購了 1 億美元的股票後，我們的年末仍保持著淨現金頭寸。我們的業績超出了 23 財年最初的營收預期，並且根據行業分析師的估計，我們的增長速度超過了市場的 2 倍。這一點，再加上較大交易量和新標識的增加，清楚地表明我們正在從最大的競爭對手那里奪取市場份額。客戶認識到 Extreme 提供了業界最簡單、最容易管理的端到端企業網絡平台。

Our One Network, One Cloud, One Extreme Solution, enhanced with our AIOps capabilities excels relative to the complex and high total cost of ownership solutions of our competitors. With this differentiation, new growth vectors and the higher level of our team's execution, I am confident in our continued growth outlook. With today's modern network is a connected tissue and enterprise digital transformations, the demand for our advanced cloud-driven solutions remains strong. We continue to elevate both our competitive position and the awareness of the Extreme brand in the market resulting in funnel growth. Increasingly, customers are recognizing our value proposition and placing their trust in Extreme to deliver better outcomes for their mission-critical network deployments. Given our market share position, we're benefiting from being in such a large and growing market where small share gains have a big impact on Extreme's financial results.

我們的“一個網絡、一個雲、一個極端”解決方案通過我們的 AIOps 功能得到增強，相對於競爭對手複雜且高總體擁有成本的解決方案而言，它表現出色。憑藉這種差異化、新的增長方向以及我們團隊更高水平的執行力，我對我們的持續增長前景充滿信心。隨著當今現代網絡的互聯組織和企業數字化轉型，對我們先進的雲驅動解決方案的需求仍然強勁。我們繼續提升我們的競爭地位和 Extreme 品牌在市場上的知名度，從而實現渠道增長。客戶越來越認識到我們的價值主張，並信任 Extreme 能夠為其關鍵任務網絡部署提供更好的結果。鑑於我們的市場份額地位，我們受益於如此龐大且不斷增長的市場，在這個市場中，微小的份額增長會對 Extreme 的財務業績產生重大影響。

In our fourth quarter, bookings grew mid-single digits sequentially and were in line with normal seasonality. We expect normal seasonal trends going forward as industry lead times returned to normal. Our U.S. business was particularly strong in Q4, partially offset by Germany and the APAC region. With this backdrop, we expect revenue growth to remain strong in fiscal '24 and to start the year with mid-teens growth in Q1. Our competitive differentiation and continued success is being driven by our One Network, One Cloud, One Extreme solution. At the core of our One Network promise is our universal hardware portfolio. This is the most flexible, highest performing end-to-end networking hardware in the industry. And with Extreme's unique and highly differentiated fabric, we make it simple to orchestrate applications and policy across the entire campus from the core to the wireless edge and across the wide area network.

在第四季度，預訂量連續增長中個位數，與正常的季節性相符。我們預計，隨著行業交貨時間恢復正常，正常的季節性趨勢將會繼續發展。我們的美國業務在第四季度尤其強勁，部分被德國和亞太地區抵消。在此背景下，我們預計 24 財年的收入增長將保持強勁，並在年初第一季度實現 15% 左右的增長。我們的競爭優勢和持續成功是由我們的“一個網絡、一個雲、一個極端”解決方案推動的。我們 One Network 承諾的核心是我們的通用硬件產品組合。這是業界最靈活、性能最高的端到端網絡硬件。借助 Extreme 獨特且高度差異化的結構，我們可以輕鬆地在整個園區（從核心到無線邊緣）以及整個廣域網中編排應用程序和策略。

We bring enhanced security, the ability to segment networks and zero-touch provisioning, eliminating confusion complexity and the need for additional IT staff. This is in stark contrast to our competitors' fabric solutions, which were designed for service provider and data center networks and not meant for campus. With One Cloud, we're the only provider to offer choice in how customers manage their networks, public, private, edge or hybrid cloud through a single interface. And we're the only vendor that can manage both Extreme and third-party hardware, providing enhanced visibility, flexibility and the ability to seamlessly upgrade to an Extreme network at your own pace. Finally, our copilot AIOps capabilities provide proactive insights and analytics to improve network availability and management.

我們帶來了增強的安全性、網絡分段能力和零接觸配置，消除了混亂的複雜性和對額外 IT 員工的需求。這與我們競爭對手的結構解決方案形成鮮明對比，這些解決方案是為服務提供商和數據中心網絡設計的，而不是針對校園的。憑藉 One Cloud，我們是唯一一家為客戶提供通過單一界面管理網絡、公共雲、私有云、邊緣雲或混合雲的選擇的提供商。我們是唯一一家能夠同時管理 Extreme 和第三方硬件的供應商，提供增強的可見性、靈活性以及按照您自己的節奏無縫升級到 Extreme 網絡的能力。最後，我們的副駕駛 AIOps 功能提供主動的見解和分析，以提高網絡可用性和管理。

And with One Extreme, we deliver the industry's most simple commercial terms for licensing with one price for all devices. Our licenses are portable and poolable, providing unmatched value and simplicity. Again, this is in stark contrast with our competitors who have complex tiered licensing models that are notorious for hidden costs. Customers increasingly view their network as a strategic asset to streamline operations, power and scale new services and reduce business risk. Our AIF solutions are getting traction with customers as they look for new ways to leverage the network to drive better business outcomes. This is evidenced by the 182 customers that spent over $1 million with Extreme in fiscal '23. Some highlights from our fourth quarter include wins with the University of Mount Union. They upgraded their network with our end-to-end wired and wireless solution. The new network provides seamless AI and fabric powered automation and optimization across the campus, which improves IT productivity.

通過 One Extreme，我們為所有設備提供了業界最簡單的商業許可條款，並且統一價格。我們的許可證是可移植和可共享的，提供無與倫比的價值和簡單性。同樣，這與我們的競爭對手形成了鮮明的對比，他們擁有復雜的分層許可模式，且因隱性成本而臭名昭著。客戶越來越多地將其網絡視為簡化運營、支持和擴展新服務以及降低業務風險的戰略資產。我們的 AIF 解決方案受到了客戶的青睞，因為他們正在尋找新的方法來利用網絡來推動更好的業務成果。 23 財年有 182 名客戶在 Extreme 上花費超過 100 萬美元就證明了這一點。第四季度的一些亮點包括與芒特聯合大學的勝利。他們使用我們的端到端有線和無線解決方案升級了網絡。新網絡在整個園區內提供無縫的人工智能和結構驅動的自動化和優化，從而提高了 IT 生產力。

Northampton, NHS Trust, a leading hospital in the U.K. needed to upgrade its network to keep pace with increasing bandwidth demands generated by IoT medical devices, AI in medical applications and WiFi in patient rooms. With the new WiFi 6 network, they are simplifying IT operations and improving patient care. One of the world's largest ski mountain conglomerates with 5 resorts across 15 states and 3 countries chose Extreme after deep frustration with one of our largest competitors. Our value proposition of creating one network managed by one cloud was essential to the customer in order to conduct a seamless migration with visibility and management capability to both the legacy and new network environments from our cloud, eliminating the risk of rip and replace. We extended success in retail with a key win with a leading grocery chain in Mexico with nearly 900 locations, the company is upgrading its network with analytics and cloud management capabilities to support a better retail experience. They're also leaning into AIOps with our copilot solution to help augment their IT staff.

北安普頓 NHS Trust 是英國一家領先的醫院，需要升級其網絡，以滿足物聯網醫療設備、醫療應用中的人工智能和病房 WiFi 所產生的不斷增長的帶寬需求。借助新的 WiFi 6 網絡，他們正在簡化 IT 運營並改善患者護理。世界上最大的滑雪山集團之一，在 15 個州和 3 個國家擁有 5 個度假村，在對我們最大的競爭對手之一深感失望後，選擇了 Extreme。我們創建一個由一云管理的網絡的價值主張對於客戶來說至關重要，以便從我們的雲向舊網絡環境和新網絡環境進行具有可見性和管理功能的無縫遷移，從而消除淘汰和更換的風險。我們在零售業取得了重大勝利，贏得了墨西哥一家擁有近900 個門店的領先雜貨連鎖店，從而擴大了零售業的成功，該公司正在通過分析和雲管理功能升級其網絡，以支持更好的零售體驗。他們還通過我們的副駕駛解決方案傾向於 AIOps，以幫助增強他們的 IT 員工隊伍。

And lastly, we expanded our footprint within MLB and the NHL, winning new deals with the Arizona Diamondbacks, Philadelphia Phillies and Philadelphia Flyers, cementing our leadership position in sports and entertainment venue. Extreme was once again recognized by Gartner Peer Insights as the customer's choice for enterprise networking for the sixth consecutive year. We're recognized for our strength in product innovation, ease of deployment and outstanding customer support. We're also named one of the best places to work based on our Flex First remote work policy, our culture of inclusivity and employee satisfaction. This quarter, we were able to bring our product lead times down again as our supply chain environment continues to improve. We have the benefit of a healthy backlog of customer orders with request dates that spread fairly evenly through the end of our fiscal year. End customer orders remain firm and distributor orders have normalized, giving us confidence in our outlook for this fiscal year.

最後，我們擴大了在 MLB 和 NHL 中的足跡，贏得了與亞利桑那響尾蛇隊、費城費城人隊和費城飛人隊的新合同，鞏固了我們在體育和娛樂場所的領導地位。 Extreme 連續第六年再次被 Gartner Peer Insights 評為客戶企業網絡選擇。我們因其在產品創新、易於部署和出色的客戶支持方面的實力而獲得認可。基於我們的 Flex First 遠程工作政策、我們的包容性文化和員工滿意度，我們還被評為最佳工作場所之一。本季度，隨著我們的供應鏈環境不斷改善，我們能夠再次縮短產品交貨時間。我們的優勢在於，客戶訂單積壓良好，請求日期在整個財政年度結束時分佈相當均勻。最終客戶訂單依然堅挺，經銷商訂單也已正常化，這讓我們對本財年的前景充滿信心。

We continue to expect our backlog to settle in a range of $75 million to $100 million in Q1 '25. Our exposure to the fastest-growing areas of the networking market, share gains, new go-to-market partnerships provide ample growth opportunities to drive double-digit growth long term. We are forecasting market share gains with channel partners, leveraging the strength of our unique solutions in the enterprise market. We also have an opportunity to expand our subscription business to our entire hardware portfolio in fiscal '24. And we introduced a disruptive managed services platform that will expand our go-to-market footprint and add a new growth vector for Extreme as we progress through the year. I'm looking forward to our Investor Day currently scheduled for November 7 at the NHL headquarters in New York City. We will provide details soon, and we hope to see you there. And with that, I'd like to welcome our new CFO, Kevin Rhodes, and ask him to cover the financials and he's in all your earnings call with Extreme. Kevin?

我們仍然預計 25 年第一季度我們的積壓訂單將在 7500 萬美元至 1 億美元之間。我們涉足網絡市場增長最快的領域、份額增長、新的上市合作夥伴關係提供了充足的增長機會，可推動長期兩位數的增長。我們正在預測，利用我們在企業市場中獨特解決方案的優勢，與渠道合作夥伴一起獲得市場份額。我們還有機會在 24 財年將訂閱業務擴展到整個硬件產品組合。我們還推出了一個顛覆性的託管服務平台，該平台將擴大我們的市場覆蓋範圍，並隨著我們今年的進展，為 Extreme 添加新的增長向量。我很期待我們定於 11 月 7 日在紐約市 NHL 總部舉行的投資者日活動。我們將很快提供詳細信息，希望在那裡見到您。在此，我要歡迎我們的新任首席財務官凱文·羅茲 (Kevin Rhodes)，並請他介紹財務狀況，他參加了 Extreme 的所有財報電話會議。凱文？

Thanks, Ed. Let me say it's been a pleasure for me to join Extreme at a time when its financial position has never been stronger. I'm encouraged not only by our financial performance, but also our competitive differentiation in this large market with great opportunities to take share. In my first couple of months on the job, I'm impressed with the company's culture and the level of talent we have in this organization at all levels in our company, I see strong sense of urgency, ownership, curiosity and commitment and a real desire to win. During fiscal '23, we once again demonstrated the level of execution this management team expects, and we are committed to continuing that in the future.

謝謝，艾德。我想說的是，我很高興在 Extreme 的財務狀況變得前所未有的強大之際加入該公司。我不僅對我們的財務業績感到鼓舞，而且對我們在這個巨大市場中的競爭差異化以及獲得份額的巨大機會感到鼓舞。在我上任的頭幾個月裡，我對公司的文化和公司各個級別的人才水平印象深刻，我看到了強烈的緊迫感、主人翁意識、好奇心和承諾以及真正的責任感。渴望獲勝。在 23 財年，我們再次展示了管理團隊期望的執行水平，我們致力於在未來繼續保持這一水平。

Let me get into the numbers. First, I'll start with the fourth quarter. Revenue was $363.9 million and grew 31% year-over-year and 9% quarter-over-quarter, exceeding the high end of our expectations entering the quarter. Product revenue accelerated to $261.7 million or 40% growth year-over-year and 9% sequentially, reflecting continued improvement in our supply chain environment. We achieved strong double-digit growth in both campus switching and wireless LAN partially offset by a decline in data center revenue. Our SaaS ARR grew 25% year-over-year to $129 million, up from $103 million in the year ago quarter. Driven by the strength of our renewals, subscription deferred revenue was up 38% year-over-year to $217 million. Total services and subscription revenue was $102.2 million, up 12% year-over-year. This growth was largely driven by the strength of our cloud subscription revenue, which was up 27% year-over-year.

讓我來談談數字。首先，我將從第四季度開始。收入為 3.639 億美元，同比增長 31%，環比增長 9%，超出了我們進入本季度的預期上限。產品收入加速至 2.617 億美元，同比增長 40%，環比增長 9%，反映出我們供應鏈環境的持續改善。我們在園區交換和無線局域網方面實現了兩位數的強勁增長，但部分被數據中心收入的下降所抵消。我們的 SaaS ARR 同比增長 25%，達到 1.29 億美元，高於去年同期的 1.03 億美元。在續訂力度的推動下，訂閱遞延收入同比增長 38%，達到 2.17 億美元。服務和訂閱總收入為 1.022 億美元，同比增長 12%。這一增長主要是由我們的雲訂閱收入強勁推動的，該收入同比增長 27%。

The growth of cloud subscriptions and maintenance drove the total deferred revenue to $501 million, up 25% year-over-year and 8% sequentially. Our gross margin came in at 60.2%, up 110 basis points sequentially and 320 basis points from the year ago quarter. We attribute this to improvements in product gross margin due to higher revenue and an improvement in the supply chain and distribution costs as well as product mix. Fourth quarter operating expenses were $156 million, up from $132 million in the year ago quarter and up from $144 million in the third quarter of '23, reflecting higher investment in R&D and sales and marketing expenses to support our higher revenue growth. Our strong revenue growth, gross margin expansion and operating leverage contributed to another record quarter for operating margin at 17.4%, up from 9.6% in the year ago quarter and up from 15.6% in the prior quarter.

雲訂閱和維護的增長推動遞延收入總額達到 5.01 億美元，同比增長 25%，環比增長 8%。我們的毛利率為 60.2%，比上一季度增長 110 個基點，比去年同期增長 320 個基點。我們將此歸因於收入增加以及供應鍊和分銷成本以及產品組合的改善導致產品毛利率的改善。第四季度運營費用為1.56 億美元，高於去年同期的1.32 億美元，也高於2023 年第三季度的1.44 億美元，反映出在研發以及銷售和營銷費用方面的投資增加，以支持我們更高的收入增長。我們強勁的收入增長、毛利率擴張和運營槓桿推動季度運營利潤率再創新高，達到 17.4%，高於去年同期的 9.6%，也高於上一季度的 15.6%。

To that end, fourth quarter earnings per share were $0.33 at the high end of our guidance entering the quarter. For the full year, fiscal '23, revenue of $1.3 billion grew 18% from the prior year on product revenue growth of 22%. During fiscal year '24, we expect continued strong product revenue growth, given the growing interest in our solutions by customers and the ongoing normalization of our backlog. Wireless product revenue grew at over twice the rate of our switching product revenue during the year. Recurring revenue is another positive story here at Extreme. We generated $380 million of subscription, maintenance and a small amount of professional services revenue. This is highly predictable and visible revenue for our company, and we continue to drive more recurring revenue over time as we ship products from backlog and is generating a tail wind for SaaS growth.

為此，第四季度每股收益為 0.33 美元，處於我們進入本季度指導的最高值。 23 財年全年收入為 13 億美元，較上年增長 18%，產品收入增長 22%。在 24 財年，鑑於客戶對我們的解決方案越來越感興趣以及我們積壓訂單的持續正常化，我們預計產品收入將持續強勁增長。年內，無線產品收入的增長速度是我們交換產品收入增長速度的兩倍以上。經常性收入是 Extreme 的另一個積極的故事。我們產生了 3.8 億美元的訂閱、維護和少量專業服務收入。這對我們公司來說是高度可預測和可見的收入，隨著時間的推移，我們將繼續推動更多的經常性收入，因為我們從積壓的產品中發貨，並為SaaS 的增長帶來了順風。

Gross margin for fiscal '23 ended the year at 58.9%, up 50 basis points year-over-year based upon improvements in supply chain-related costs, price increases and cost absorption owing to higher revenue and larger scale. Operating margin of 15.2% grew 290 basis points from a year ago and operating expenses as a percentage of revenue improved to 43.7%, which is better than our Investor Day guidance. GAAP EPS grew 76% from a year ago and non-GAAP EPS of $1.09 per share grew 42%, representing the significant operating leverage we have in our model. We also strengthened our balance sheet with strong cash generation and the refinancing of our debt. We ended the quarter -- the end of the year with net cash position of $10 million after repurchasing $25 million worth of our shares at the average price of $17.32 per share.

23 財年的毛利率為 58.9%，同比增長 50 個基點，這是由於收入增加和規模擴大導致供應鏈相關成本改善、價格上漲和成本吸收。營業利潤率為 15.2%，較去年同期增長 290 個基點，營業費用佔收入的百分比提高至 43.7%，優於我們的投資者日指引。 GAAP 每股收益較上年同期增長 76%，非 GAAP 每股收益 1.09 美元，增長 42%，這體現了我們在模型中擁有的巨大運營槓桿。我們還通過強勁的現金生成和債務再融資強化了我們的資產負債表。在以每股 17.32 美元的平均價格回購了價值 2500 萬美元的股票後，我們在本季度末（即年底）的淨現金頭寸為 1000 萬美元。

The $235 million of free cash flow we generated during the year represents an 18% free cash flow margin at the high end of our long-term model. Of this amount, $75.5 million was generated in the fourth quarter, driven by higher gross margins and EBITDA. Lastly, at the end of fiscal '23, we refinanced our long-term facility with a $200 million term loan and $150 million of available revolving credit. The interest rate is currently just over 7% annually. Our balance sheet remains in excellent condition with a leverage ratio well below 0.5 a turn.

我們在這一年中產生了 2.35 億美元的自由現金流，相當於我們長期模型高端的 18% 自由現金流利潤率。其中，由於毛利率和 EBITDA 提高，第四季度產生了 7550 萬美元。最後，在 23 財年末，我們通過 2 億美元的定期貸款和 1.5 億美元的可用循環信貸為我們的長期融資進行了再融資。目前年利率略高於7%。我們的資產負債表狀況依然良好，槓桿率遠低於每轉 0.5。

Now turning to guidance. We remain optimistic about the enterprise networking spending environment and our ability to take share. Customer spending trends are reverting back to normal seasonal patterns given the improvements in our networking supply chain. As a reminder, the fourth quarter tends to be a seasonally higher quarter than the first quarter. Our gross margin outlook is also benefiting from an improved supply chain and expedite fees and shipping costs continue to improve. For the first quarter, we expect the following: revenue to be in the range of $342 million to $352 million, gross margin to be in a range of 59.5% to 61.5%. Operating margin to be in a range of 15.3% to 17.6% and earnings to be in a range of $0.28 to $0.33 per diluted share. All in, I see tremendous opportunity for Extreme to grow our business, accelerate our revenue contribution from SaaS and improve our margins and cash flow. I look forward to laying out some of our plans at our Investor Day later this year. And with that, I will now turn it over to the operator to begin the question-and-answer session.

現在轉向指導。我們對企業網絡支出環境和我們搶占市場份額的能力保持樂觀。鑑於我們的網絡供應鏈的改進，客戶支出趨勢正在恢復正常的季節性模式。提醒一下，第四季度往往是比第一季度季節性更高的季度。我們的毛利率前景也受益於供應鏈的改善以及加急費和運輸成本的持續改善。對於第一季度，我們預計：收入將在 3.42 億美元至 3.52 億美元之間，毛利率將在 59.5% 至 61.5% 之間。營業利潤率將在 15.3% 至 17.6% 之間，攤薄後每股收益將在 0.28 美元至 0.33 美元之間。總而言之，我看到 Extreme 擁有巨大的機會來發展我們的業務、加速 SaaS 的收入貢獻並提高我們的利潤和現金流。我期待著在今年晚些時候的投資者日上列出我們的一些計劃。現在，我將把它交給接線員，開始問答環節。

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen. (Operator Instructions) Now, first question coming from the line of Alex Anderson with Needham.

謝謝。女士們，先生們。 （操作員說明） 現在，第一個問題來自 Alex Anderson 和 Needham 的線路。

Nice print, and thanks for the good performance for the year. I was hoping you could give us some sense of what your expectation is as we look out at the full year. You had talked about 15% plus growth over the 3-year period. I think earlier, obviously, you've outperformed that in '23. Is it reasonable to think that you're still on track given the backlog for another 15% plus type year in '24. And just operationally, can you give us a little bit of a guidance on the interest and tax line for the FY '24 period?

印刷精美，感謝您今年的良好表現。我希望您能告訴我們，當我們展望全年時，您的期望是什麼。您談到了 3 年期間 15% 以上的增長。我認為早些時候，很明顯，你在 23 年的表現已經超過了。考慮到 24 年還有 15% 以上的積壓，認為您仍在正軌上是否合理？就操作而言，您能給我們一些關於 24 財年期間的利息和稅收額度的指導嗎？

Thanks, Alex. Kevin, as far as outlook for the year. Do you want to -- do you want to take that one?

謝謝，亞歷克斯。凱文，就今年的展望而言。你想——你想接受那個嗎？

Yes, I'm happy to. I would say, Alex, we're very much on track with what we laid out already from fiscal '23 to '25 outlook. We feel good about that. And I would say, yes, we feel that we are still going to be in the mid-teens growth for the full year.

是的，我很高興。我想說，Alex，我們非常符合我們已經制定的 23 至 25 財年展望。我們對此感覺很好。我想說，是的，我們認為全年仍將保持十幾歲左右的增長。

And then on trade... Interest rate?

然後是貿易……利率？

Yes. On the interest rate, let me just pull that up, and we can certainly talk through that. We believe that we're feeling comfortable. So taxes for the year, we believe, are going to be somewhere, again, looking for the full year at around 22% on full year tax rate.

是的。關於利率，讓我把這個問題提一下，我們當然可以討論這個問題。我們相信我們感覺很舒服。因此，我們相信，今年的稅收將再次達到全年稅率 22% 左右的水平。

Non-GAAP?

非公認會計準則？

Non-GAAP, yes. And then when we think -- yes, that's what I'm talking about, non-GAAP. And then when we're thinking about interest, we have $200 million outstanding. We've got about 7% cost of debt, but then we've got about 5% generation against that sort of 2% spread, but not all $200 million all the debts outstanding. And then we -- I'd say we generally think that we'll probably have about $150 million to $200 million of investment income of that 5%. So, I think they're going to somewhat breakeven or be slightly interest expense, but not a tremendous one.

非公認會計原則，是的。然後當我們想到——是的，這就是我所說的，非公認會計原則。當我們考慮利息時，我們還有 2 億美元的未償債務。我們的債務成本約為 7%，但相對於 2% 的利差，我們的發電成本約為 5%，但並非全部 2 億美元的未償債務。然後我們——我想說的是，我們通常認為我們可能會獲得這 5% 的大約 1.5 億至 2 億美元的投資收益。因此，我認為它們將在一定程度上實現收支平衡或略有利息支出，但不會是巨大的。

So last year in 2023, you did $12.7 million in interest expense and other income. Is it reasonable to think that, that will come down very slightly?

因此，去年 2023 年，您的利息支出和其他收入為 1270 萬美元。認為會略有下降是否合理？

Yes, I think it will. I think it will come down.

是的，我想會的。我認為它會下降。

And our next question the line of Dimitra with Oppenheimer.

我們的下一個問題是迪米特拉與奧本海默的關係。

Two questions, if you don't mind. And I'm getting a lot of the same questions. But why are you doing so well with bookings at this point with very large customers, why the success in large deals? And can you talk about your new Extreme Cloud Edge product? Has that been launched maybe some of the learnings from that?

如果你不介意的話，有兩個問題。我收到了很多同樣的問題。但是，為什麼你們在這一點上對大客戶的預訂做得這麼好，為什麼在大額交易中取得了成功？您能談談您的新 Extreme Cloud Edge 產品嗎？是否已經啟動了，也許可以從中學到一些東西？

Thanks, Tim. And I think what's happened -- we talked about it in my comments, I talked about the volume of large deals. I have deals through over $1 million growing. And I think this is really about the up-leveling of Extreme in the marketplace. We've been in the leadership quadrant at Gartner now for 5 years running and our position only strengthened. It was last year that we actually went in front of Cisco. And as enterprise customers are looking to upgrade their networks, they're considering Extreme now more than ever before. And people are surprised to learn that the kinds of customer relationships that we have. So when we win Kroger, which is the world's largest grocer, and we are building out the world's largest cloud managed network, that was a hotly contested piece of business. All the major competitors were there and Extreme one out. When we win one of the world's largest cruise lines where each ship is $4 million or $5 million, and we win the first ship and a fleet of 43 and the customer is thrilled with the difference in experience in dealing with Extreme versus dealing with one of the largest competitors. That just opens up the door for more.

謝謝，蒂姆。我認為發生了什麼——我們在評論中談到了這一點，我談到了大筆交易的數量。我的交易金額增長超過 100 萬美元。我認為這實際上是關於 Extreme 在市場上的升級。我們已經連續 5 年處於 Gartner 的領導象限，並且我們的地位只會得到加強。去年我們真正領先於思科。隨著企業客戶尋求升級其網絡，他們現在比以往任何時候都更多地考慮 Extreme。人們驚訝地發現我們擁有如此豐富的客戶關係。因此，當我們贏得世界上最大的雜貨商克羅格時，我們正在構建世界上最大的雲管理網絡，這是一項競爭激烈的業務。所有主要競爭對手都在場，Extreme 則出局了。當我們贏得世界上最大的郵輪公司之一（其中每艘船價值400 萬或500 萬美元）時，我們贏得了第一艘船和43 艘船隊，客戶對處理Extreme 與處理其中一艘的體驗差異感到興奮最大的競爭對手。這只是為更多的事情打開了大門。

And then we can take these reference accounts and enterprise customers are surprised to learn that every time you get a FedEx package, it's run through an Extreme network or every time you fly in the U.S. aerospace that you're flying on an Extreme network technically because the FAA runs on Extreme. And these kinds of stories are becoming more and more known out in the industry. And so our reputation has gone up. And what it's doing is it's giving us more opportunities. And then when we come in with our One Network, One Cloud, One Extreme Solution, which is really about the seamless end-to-end hardware, super flexible, high-performance hardware, all managed within one cloud end to end. Our competitors don't have that. And when you look at the commercial terms and the simplicity of our licensing, the quality of our service and especially the performance of our fabric, which is truly the only campus grade fabric in the industry, it really turns heads, and so it's just -- it's creating a lot more opportunities.

然後我們可以利用這些參考賬戶，企業客戶會驚訝地發現，每次您收到聯邦快遞包裹時，它都是通過Extreme 網絡運行的，或者每次您在美國航空航天領域飛行時，從技術上講，您都是在Extreme 網絡上飛行，因為FAA 運行在 Extreme 上。此類故事在業內越來越為人所知。這樣我們的聲譽就提高了。它所做的是給我們更多的機會。然後，當我們推出“一個網絡、一個雲、一個極端”解決方案時，它實際上是關於無縫的端到端硬件、超級靈活、高性能的硬件，所有這些都在一個雲中端到端進行管理。我們的競爭對手不具備這一點。當你看到商業條款和我們許可的簡單性、我們的服務質量，尤其是我們的面料的性能（這確實是業內唯一的校園級面料）時，它確實會引起人們的注意，所以它只是 - - 它創造了更多的機會。

So here, it's about success -- getting success. I mentioned Kroger, they're in the middle of a large acquisition. That initial deal was for wireless. We have a larger switching opportunity there. And then when they close that acquisition, they standardized on our technology. So just some examples of kind of what's happening in the market. Our competitive position is truly differentiated and then our brand, we've up-leveled our brands. So that's really helping us get the attention. And by the way, that also plays into the channel community because partners realize that they see that we're winning these larger deals, and it allows us to gain more mind share within the channel. So that's been a big part of it. In terms of Cloud Edge, Tim, we know you were over in Berlin at our user conference. This is a big deal, especially aware sovereign data becomes more and more important. And we have begun to sell our Cloud Edge, not surprisingly to European customers.

所以這裡的重點是成功——獲得成功。我提到了克羅格，他們正在進行一項大型收購。最初的交易是針對無線業務的。我們在那裡有更大的轉換機會。然後，當他們完成收購時，他們對我們的技術進行了標準化。這只是市場上正在發生的事情的一些例子。我們的競爭地位是真正差異化的，然後我們的品牌，我們已經提升了我們的品牌。所以這確實幫助我們獲得了關注。順便說一句，這也對渠道社區產生了影響，因為合作夥伴意識到他們看到我們正在贏得這些更大的交易，這使我們能夠在渠道內獲得更多的思想份額。所以這是其中很重要的一部分。就 Cloud Edge 而言，Tim，我們知道您在柏林參加了我們的用戶會議。這是一件大事，尤其是意識到主權數據變得越來越重要。我們已經開始向歐洲客戶出售我們的 Cloud Edge，這並不奇怪。

One of the things I mentioned in our notes is that we're building -- and we've just come out with our managed services platform, which is a brand-new growth vector for Extreme. More on this later to come. But here again, this is where having an edge cloud that could be part of an MSP service offering can be very powerful. So, I'd say early innings on Cloud Edge, we have a lot of interest. And then it's going to be an important part of our platform and managed services going forward.

我在筆記中提到的一件事是，我們正在構建——而且我們剛剛推出了我們的託管服務平台，這是 Extreme 的一個全新的增長載體。稍後會詳細介紹這一點。但同樣，邊緣雲可以成為 MSP 服務產品的一部分，其功能非常強大。所以，我想說，在 Cloud Edge 的早期階段，我們有很大的興趣。然後它將成為我們平台和託管服務未來的重要組成部分。

And just on Cloud Edge. Could you -- are you getting much interest in doing AI inferencing or even some maybe training on this infrastructure?

就在 Cloud Edge 上。您是否對進行人工智能推理甚至在該基礎設施上進行一些培訓非常感興趣？

Tim, I think it's early innings, and it's a little too soon to call. I think right now, the major interest is around the cloud sovereignty and keeping data in market, if you will. Obviously, with European countries is actually important. And so there's a lot of examination going on right now. And our teams are actively working a lot of opportunities in markets. Japan is another market where maintaining the data in market becomes really important. And I'd say that's the primary interest today, but I think more to come on that.

蒂姆，我認為現在還處於早期階段，現在下結論還為時過早。我認為現在主要的興趣是圍繞雲主權和將數據保留在市場上（如果你願意的話）。顯然，與歐洲國家的合作實際上很重要。所以現在正在進行很多檢查。我們的團隊正在積極尋找市場上的大量機會。日本是另一個市場數據維護變得非常重要的市場。我想說這是今天的主要興趣，但我認為還會有更多的興趣。

Next question. And our next question coming from the line of Eric Martinuzzi with Lextar Capital Markets.

下一個問題。我們的下一個問題來自 Lextar Capital Markets 的 Eric Martinuzzi。

Yes. I'm looking for a little bit more detail. You talked about -- I think it was weakness in Germany and APAC. Is that something that you expect to get resolved in the relatively near term?

是的。我正在尋找更多細節。你談到——我認為這是德國和亞太地區的弱點。您希望在近期內解決這個問題嗎？

Eric, yes, we do. And actually, we're seeing it happen now. Germany went into a recession, and it was the first time that the country went into a recession since World War II. And so it definitely created a bit of a shock. It slowed down some of the buying cycles. And that has impacted us for the last 6 months or so. But we've seen encouraging signs. We've seen the funnel pick up. We've seen larger deals come back into the funnel, and we see that strengthening. The other key driver is what we call a run rate business. This is really coming from the channel. The run rate business dried up with supply chain constraints, and we're seeing that come back. And that also plays a big role in EMEA and in German markets where we have a very deep channel and partner community where we see a lot of that run rate business. So the signs are encouraging for us. We feel like we bottomed out there, but we're coming back.

埃里克，是的，我們願意。事實上，我們現在就看到它發生了。德國陷入衰退，這是二戰以來該國首次陷入衰退。所以這確實引起了一些震驚。它減緩了一些購買週期。這在過去 6 個月左右的時間裡一直影響著我們。但我們已經看到了令人鼓舞的跡象。我們已經看到漏斗回升。我們已經看到更大的交易重新進入渠道，並且我們看到這種情況正在加強。另一個關鍵驅動因素是我們所說的運行率業務。這確實是來自渠道的。運行率業務因供應鏈限製而枯竭，但我們看到這種情況又回來了。這在歐洲、中東和非洲和德國市場也發揮著重要作用，我們在這些市場擁有非常深入的渠道和合作夥伴社區，在那裡我們看到了很多運行率業務。因此，這些跡像對我們來說是令人鼓舞的。我們感覺我們已經觸底了，但我們正在回來。

With Asia Pacific, I would say the same thing. In last quarter, we saw the run rate business as well as some of the larger project deals go away. And now we're seeing them come back with strength. So Asia Pacific is usually one of the first markets to come back, and we're seeing that happen, and we're also seeing it happen in Germany. Interestingly, in EMEA and the rest of the markets, they remain very strong, and the demand in the U.S. market remains very strong. Got it.

對於亞太地區，我也會說同樣的話。在上個季度，我們看到運行率業務以及一些較大的項目交易消失了。現在我們看到他們帶著力量回來了。因此，亞太地區通常是最早回歸的市場之一，我們看到這種情況發生，我們也看到這種情況發生在德國。有趣的是，在歐洲、中東和非洲以及其他市場，它們仍然非常強勁，美國市場的需求仍然非常強勁。知道了。

You talked about share gains. And I'm wondering if you're doing anything different this fiscal year with regard to channel partner engagement or incentive to really capitalize on what you characterize as your rising reputation to continue to expand those gains?

您談到了股票收益。我想知道本財年您在渠道合作夥伴參與度或激勵方面是否採取了任何不同的措施，以真正利用您所描述的不斷上升的聲譽來繼續擴大這些收益？

Absolutely, Eric. So what we've done is we put in place -- we've got named partners, which are just over 200 partners that are our target and more strategic partners where we put in place specific business plans with them, with quarterly business reviews. And I can tell you the growth targets there are significantly higher than what we're calling for the company. And the interest level is quite high. I think with the supply constrained environment and some of the macro challenges, they've been pinched by some of the larger players, and they're excited about the opportunity to work with Extreme. And for us, it's a big opportunity to expand wallet share. So there's our name partners.

當然，埃里克。因此，我們所做的就是落實到位——我們已經指定了合作夥伴，其中超過200 個合作夥伴是我們的目標，還有更具戰略意義的合作夥伴，我們與他們一起制定了具體的業務計劃，並進行了季度業務審查。我可以告訴你，那裡的增長目標明顯高於我們為公司設定的目標。而且利息水平相當高。我認為，由於供應緊張的環境和一些宏觀挑戰，他們受到了一些較大參與者的擠壓，他們對有機會與 Extreme 合作感到興奮。對於我們來說，這是擴大錢包份額的絕佳機會。這就是我們的合作夥伴。

There are new partner opportunities that we've -- that we're looking at. I mentioned the MSP platform that we're building. We will attract new partners, higher volume partners with our platform. And finally, with non-name partners or the larger base of what we call authorized partners, when the run rate business comes back with supply chain loosening, we'll see more volumes out of those partners as well. So the answer is yes, we see a huge opportunity in the channel. There is clearly channel fatigue with some of the larger players and some of the issues with their solutions in the marketplace and then some of the issues with their commercial practices.

我們正在尋找新的合作夥伴機會。我提到了我們正在構建的 MSP 平台。我們將通過我們的平台吸引新的合作夥伴、更多的合作夥伴。最後，對於非知名合作夥伴或我們所謂的授權合作夥伴的更大基礎，當運行率業務隨著供應鏈的放鬆而恢復時，我們也將看到這些合作夥伴的銷量增加。所以答案是肯定的，我們在渠道中看到了巨大的機會。一些較大的參與者顯然存在渠道疲勞，他們的解決方案在市場上存在一些問題，然後他們的商業實踐也存在一些問題。

And our next question coming from the line of Christian Schwab with Craig Hallum.

我們的下一個問題來自克里斯蒂安·施瓦布和克雷格·哈勒姆。

So Ed, I'm just wondering if you could go through the puts and takes of upside or potential risk of the 50% guidance for this year. We have supply chain normalizing. We kind of have a mixed geographical situation. We have tremendous shown success in market share gains and we kind of have a mixed geographical outlook for the year by people other than myself. So I'm just wondering as we have a conversation this time next year, what are the 1 or 2 things that would make that 15%, 20%? And what would be the 1 or 2 things that may be put in at risk?

Ed，我只是想知道您是否可以了解一下今年 50% 指導的上行或潛在風險的看漲期權和看跌期權。我們的供應鏈正在正常化。我們的地理情況有些複雜。我們在市場份額增長方面取得了巨大的成功，除了我之外，我們對今年的地域前景有不同的看法。所以我只是想知道，當我們明年這個時候進行對話時，有哪些 1 或 2 件事可以使這一比例達到 15%、20%？可能面臨風險的 1 或 2 件事是什麼？

Sure. Thanks, Christian. And there -- I mentioned, if I go through -- you mentioned GOs. We have considerable strength in Americas. The growth was very strong throughout the year in Americas and in Q4, and we see that continuing. And I made the comment on the call earlier, and you're familiar with this. But again, given our relative market size as a, call it, 6%, 7% share player in the industry, there are these large crumbs, small share gains for us have a big impact on our financial statement. So it doesn't take a lot of market share for us to grow our top line and hit that target that we've laid out there. In terms of GOs, EMEA is our second largest GO market, and it is very healthy. The challenge for us was specifically in Germany there. And as I mentioned earlier, we are seeing them start to come out, and we're seeing strengthening in the funnel and the forecast with Germany. And then importantly, there is this run rate business. And I'll come back to that in a second.

當然。謝謝，克里斯蒂安。在那裡——我提到過，如果我經歷過的話——你提到了 GO。我們在美洲有相當的實力。美洲地區全年和第四季度的增長非常強勁，而且我們看到這種情況仍在持續。我早些時候在電話會議上發表了評論，你們對此也很熟悉。但同樣，考慮到我們作為行業中 6%、7% 份額參與者的相對市場規模，這些大麵包屑、小份額收益對我們的財務報表有很大影響。因此，我們不需要太多的市場份額就可以增加收入並實現我們設定的目標。就GO而言，歐洲、中東和非洲是我們第二大GO市場，而且非常健康。我們面臨的挑戰尤其是在德國。正如我之前提到的，我們看到它們開始出現，並且我們看到漏斗和德國的預測正在加強。然後重要的是，有運行率業務。我稍後會回到這個話題。

Finally, APAC, we have new leadership and strengthen relationships with distribution as well as channel there. And again, I think if I look at the health of our funnel globally relative to what we're calling, I'd say we have the strongest funnel in that region today. And so that's changed pretty quickly. So we're very bullish on Asia Pacific and a sharp rebound, I'd say, at a higher growth rate. I'd say with EMEA, we think the other markets are going to pick up the slack in Germany, and then we'll see that recover. And then we see continued strength in the U.S. market. One of the things we're doing is we're doubling down on our certification investment. We are opening up fairly large opportunities that we haven't had in the past in the federal space and also our commitment to certifications are helping out what's happening in SLED with state and local governments as they look more and more to federal search. So this is providing some wind in our sales and opening up some new opportunities.

最後，在亞太地區，我們有了新的領導層，並加強了與那裡的分銷和渠道的關係。再說一次，我認為如果我看看我們全球漏斗的健康狀況相對於我們所說的，我會說我們今天擁有該地區最強大的漏斗。所以這種情況很快就發生了變化。因此，我們非常看好亞太地區，我想說的是，亞太地區將以更高的增長率急劇反彈。我想說的是，對於歐洲、中東和非洲地區，我們認為其他市場將彌補德國的疲軟，然後我們將看到其複蘇。然後我們看到美國市場持續走強。我們正在做的事情之一就是加倍加大認証投資。我們正在聯邦領域開闢過去從未有過的相當大的機會，而且我們對認證的承諾正在幫助州和地方政府在 SLED 中發生的事情，因為他們越來越多地關注聯邦搜索。因此，這為我們的銷售帶來了一些動力，並開闢了一些新的機會。

The run rate business is important to mention because if we look at run rate at its peak, generating, call it, between $15 million to $20 million a quarter, we saw that cut in half or more with the slowdown of supply chain. So as that returns to normal, that's going to provide us with some tailwinds. And then -- we do have, I mentioned some new growth vectors with commercial terms. MSP is really us packaging our existing portfolio and creating a very simple platform. And it's really about commercial simplicity and then the strength of our One Network, One Cloud, One Extreme that generated a lot of interest out there with some of our existing partners as well as some new partners that are a lot larger than the traditional profile of an Extreme partner. So we're guardedly optimistic. We've just launched the platform, and that will ramp throughout the year as we turn the corner to 25. I mentioned that we're enabling the entire portfolio at Extreme to be run and managed from the cloud, and this is going to open up growth in subscription. This will happen at the beginning of our calendar year, and you'll see us build momentum there.

運行率業務值得一提，因為如果我們觀察運行率的峰值，每季度產生 1500 萬至 2000 萬美元，我們會發現隨著供應鏈的放緩，運行率減少了一半或更多。因此，當這種情況恢復正常時，這將為我們帶來一些順風。然後——我們確實有，我提到了一些帶有商業條款的新增長載體。 MSP 實際上是我們打包現有的產品組合併創建一個非常簡單的平台。這實際上是關於商業簡單性，然後是我們的“一個網絡”、“一個雲”、“一個極限”的實力，這引起了我們的一些現有合作夥伴以及一些比傳統合作夥伴規模大得多的新合作夥伴的極大興趣。極限合作夥伴。所以我們持謹慎樂觀的態度。我們剛剛推出了該平台，隨著我們的數量達到 25 個，該平台將在全年不斷增長。我提到過，我們正在使 Extreme 的整個產品組合能夠從雲中運行和管理，這將開放訂閱量的增長。這將在我們的日曆年年初發生，您將看到我們在那裡建立勢頭。

And then we also have some other initiatives that we believe will be disruptive and create high growth with some very large partners like Verizon, for example, very excited to run with Extreme. And so we're being added to their selling list. So that -- I mean these are the upside opportunities. Obviously, from a macro perspective, there are always macroeconomic risks. And I think we've seen that. We've heard about that. There's always something unforeseen that kind of comes around the corner. But at this stage of the game, I've just been -- we've just gone through regional director reviews going around the world, examining and scrubbing pipeline and funnel. And at this stage of the game, we feel very confident in the demand outlook.

然後我們還有一些其他舉措，我們相信這些舉措將具有顛覆性，並與一些非常大的合作夥伴（例如 Verizon）一起創造高增長，例如，非常高興與 Extreme 合作。因此我們被添加到他們的銷售名單中。所以——我的意思是這些都是上行機會。顯然，從宏觀角度看，宏觀經濟風險始終存在。我想我們已經看到了這一點。我們聽說過這件事。總有一些不可預見的事情即將來臨。但在遊戲的這個階段，我剛剛——我們剛剛在世界各地進行了區域總監的審查，檢查和清理了管道和漏斗。在這個階段，我們對需求前景非常有信心。

Next question our next question coming from the line of Dave Kang with B. Riley.

下一個問題 我們的下一個問題來自 Dave Kang 和 B. Riley。

My first question is regarding your competitive landscape. Just wondering if you're seeing much of a Juniper in various -- in the enterprise segment, it seems like they've been very vocal about their success in enterprise segments.

我的第一個問題是關於你們的競爭格局。只是想知道您是否在企業領域的各個方面都看到了瞻博網絡，他們似乎一直在直言不諱地談論自己在企業領域的成功。

Yes, Dave, thanks. And good question. And I would say, if we had to pick a competitor where we go toe to toe that it is most competitive out there. It's probably Juniper and their enterprise solution today. Juniper and Extreme are about the same size in the enterprise space. We don't see them as much as we see Cisco and HPE 60% and 15%. So 75% of the market that we run into is with Cisco and HPE and then to a much lesser extent, Juniper but they're out in the market. So we are seeing them more, and I think they're experiencing some of the same success that we are. And we do have competitive differentiation with Juniper, as you know, and the market knows Juniper has been a service provider company first. They acquired Mist, which is a WiFi was a WiFi only, a cloud WiFi-only company. And now they're trying to migrate their switching solutions and they're trying to push that into the NIST framework. It's more complicated than Extreme. We have advantages with respect to our cloud, in One Cloud, where -- versus a multi-cloud environment. We have advantages around Cloud Choice. And we also have advantages with our network and our universal hardware platform that's end-to-end.

是的，戴夫，謝謝。好問題。我想說，如果我們必須選擇一個我們面對面的競爭對手，那麼它是最具競爭力的。今天可能是瞻博網絡及其企業解決方案。 Juniper 和 Extreme 在企業領域的規模大致相同。我們看到它們的比例不如思科和 HPE 的比例分別為 60% 和 15%。因此，我們遇到的 75% 的市場是思科和 HPE，其次是瞻博網絡，但他們已經退出市場了。因此，我們越來越多地看到他們，我認為他們正在經歷一些與我們相同的成功。如您所知，我們確實與瞻博網絡有競爭優勢，而且市場也知道瞻博網絡首先是一家服務提供商公司。他們收購了 Mist，這是一家只提供 WiFi 的 WiFi 公司，一家只提供 WiFi 的雲公司。現在他們正在嘗試遷移他們的交換解決方案，並嘗試將其推入 NIST 框架中。它比Extreme還要復雜。與多雲環境相比，我們在雲方面有優勢，在一個雲中。我們在雲選擇方面有優勢。我們的網絡和端到端的通用硬件平台也具有優勢。

And I'd say the big differentiator for us in the market today is our fabric. So it's cloud differentiation and fabric. We are the only player that has a truly differentiated campus fabric. Juniper has an IP fabric designed for data center, it just doesn't work well in a campus environment. When customers see our fabric and if we do a comparison head-to-head, we're really blowing away our competitors, and that's kind of a secret sought for us right now. As people learn about the ease of provisioning network, the ease of deploying policy into a fabric that automatically updates the entire campus environment. Most of the data center fabrics are static by definition, ours is dynamic and flexible. And customers really don't believe it when it's pitch and PowerPoint, but when they see it and then they experience it, they're blown away. So this has been a huge factor for us winning. And it's one of our -- for us, it's a big competitive advantage for us against.

我想說，我們在當今市場上最大的區別在於我們的面料。所以這就是雲差異化和結構。我們是唯一擁有真正差異化校園結構的參與者。 Juniper有一個專為數據中心設計的IP結構，但它在園區環境中效果不佳。當客戶看到我們的面料並進行面對面的比較時，我們確實擊敗了我們的競爭對手，而這正是我們現在尋求的秘密。隨著人們了解配置網絡的便利性以及將策略部署到自動更新整個園區環境的結構中的便利性。根據定義，大多數數據中心結構都是靜態的，而我們的數據中心結構是動態且靈活的。當客戶看到宣傳和 PowerPoint 時，他們真的不相信，但當他們看到並體驗它時，他們會被震撼。所以這是我們獲勝的一個重要因素。這是我們的一個——對我們來說，這是我們面臨的一個巨大的競爭優勢。

But I guess, my follow-up question is, they've been very vocal about their AI capability. What is your strategy -- AI strategy going forward?

但我想，我的後續問題是，他們對自己的人工智能能力非常直言不諱。你們的戰略——未來的人工智能戰略是什麼？

Yes. I mean, look, we -- Extreme and Juniper are the leaders in the space in terms of AIOps. And so we have different capabilities. But this is -- I go to Kroger, right? I mean we won Kroger. And obviously, they want to build the grocery store of the future, and that hinges on AI capabilities and AIOps. They're looking to automate their environments. They're looking for unique insights, actionable insights. When we look at our differentiation versus Juniper, I'd say, it's about the quality of actionable insights from our AIML tool. But yes, this is where we're focused, Dave. And I would say Juniper is very good at marketing their capabilities here.

是的。我的意思是，看，我們 - Extreme 和瞻博網絡是 AIOps 領域的領導者。所以我們有不同的能力。但這是——我去克羅格，對吧？我的意思是我們贏了克羅格。顯然，他們希望建立未來的雜貨店，這取決於人工智能功能和 AIOps。他們正在尋求自動化他們的環境。他們正在尋找獨特的見解、可行的見解。當我們審視我們與瞻博網絡的差異時，我想說，這取決於我們的 AIML 工具提供的可行見解的質量。但是，是的，這就是我們關注的地方，戴夫。我想說瞻博網絡非常擅長在這裡推銷他們的功能。

And our next question coming from the line Greg Mesniaeff with Westpark Capital.

我們的下一個問題來自 Westpark Capital 的 Greg Mesniaeff。

Ed, just a high-level question for you. If just for argument's sake, one of your strategic goals were to come true in its entirety and your entire subscription base transition to a subscription model, how would that impact product revenue and revenue growth and the timing of revenues?

艾德，只是問你一個高級問題。如果只是為了論證，您的戰略目標之一是完全實現，並且您的整個訂閱基礎轉變為訂閱模式，那麼這將如何影響產品收入和收入增長以及收入的時間安排？

Thanks, Greg. It's a good question. If you look at -- if you look at today, if you look at our portfolio and what we can manage from the cloud, it's about -- it's less than 50% of our installed base. But in terms of what we're selling, it's probably in the 60% range. So the idea that we could increase the volume from 60% to 100% is obviously a big deal for us. There will also be an opportunity for migrations of our existing base, which would accelerate the subscription revenue as well. And our solutions, the current solutions that we're offering today where we have our subscriptions being tied to hardware, some of the new growth initiatives we have, we are untethering the hardware in a way where we'll be able to sell subscription, cloud subscriptions and software subscriptions that are untethered to our hardware. And that obviously will create a unique growth opportunity.

謝謝，格雷格。這是一個好問題。如果你看看——如果你看看今天，如果你看看我們的產品組合以及我們可以從雲中管理的內容，就會發現——它還不到我們安裝基礎的 50%。但就我們銷售的產品而言，它可能在 60% 的範圍內。因此，我們可以將體積從 60% 增加到 100% 的想法對我們來說顯然是一件大事。我們現有的基礎也將有機會遷移，這也將加速訂閱收入的增長。我們的解決方案，我們今天提供的當前解決方案，我們的訂閱與硬件綁定，我們擁有的一些新的增長計劃，我們正在以一種能夠銷售訂閱的方式擺脫硬件的束縛，不受硬件限制的雲訂閱和軟件訂閱。這顯然將創造一個獨特的增長機會。

But as the sales mix continues to transition to software and subscription, would the impact on hardware revenue be in any way impacted negatively?

但隨著銷售組合繼續向軟件和訂閱過渡，對硬件收入的影響是否會受到任何負面影響？

Well, for us, it's -- you still need hardware in the network. And so I think it's our subscription differentiation, our cloud differentiation, our fabric capabilities that when we win because of our cloud story and our AIOps tools and our AIOps stories, it pulls through the hardware. So as people are looking at building the network of the future and modernizing their infrastructure and they consider our capabilities as it relates to software and what we can do with our cloud. It helps us take share and it helps us in winning that business that pulls through hardware. So I would say, no, this is really about us picking up share. We can lead with our software capabilities, our cloud capabilities, AIOps and then when we win, we pull through the hardware.

嗯，對我們來說，網絡中仍然需要硬件。因此，我認為這是我們的訂閱差異化、我們的雲差異化、我們的結構能力，當我們因為我們的雲故事、我們的AIOps 工具和我們的AIOps 故事而獲勝時，它會通過硬件發揮作用。因此，當人們考慮構建未來的網絡並對其基礎設施進行現代化改造時，他們會考慮我們與軟件相關的能力以及我們可以使用雲做什麼。它幫助我們獲得份額，幫助我們贏得通過硬件拉動的業務。所以我想說，不，這實際上是為了我們獲得份額。我們可以憑藉我們的軟件能力、雲能力、AIOps 來領先，然後當我們獲勝時，我們會通過硬件來拉動。

And our next question coming from the line of Mike Genovese with Rosenblatt Securities.

我們的下一個問題來自羅森布拉特證券公司的邁克·吉諾維斯 (Mike Genovese)。

Can we get just an update on the backlog. Last quarter, you said 5x normal. Do we have a metric for this quarter?

我們能得到積壓訂單的最新信息嗎？上個季度，您說是正常水平的 5 倍。我們有本季度的指標嗎？

So Mike, we said last quarter that we were not going to give -- we were going to move away from giving a specific backlog number each and every quarter. I think what Ed said in his prepared remarks is that our backlog is now -- we feel like it will start to normalize throughout 2024 and into Q1 of 2025. We feel good about the level of backlog we have. For instance, it's primarily, I'd say, 90-plus percent is all end customer orders at this point. And so the distribution orders that we had in the past have basically worked themselves through the system, especially with supply chain getting better. And so we feel good about those end customer orders and the timing of when those orders need to be shipped to those customers based on their own, I'll call it, like upgrade cycle and whatnot, we feel like it will come down fairly evenly throughout the year and into Q1 of '25. So feeling good about the level of backlog that we have and the timing of that coming out.

邁克，我們上個季度說過，我們不會提供——我們將不再每個季度提供具體的積壓訂單數量。我認為埃德在他準備好的發言中所說的是，我們的積壓現在是——我們覺得它將在 2024 年全年和 2025 年第一季度開始正常化。我們對積壓的水平感到滿意。例如，我想說，目前 90% 以上都是最終客戶訂單。因此，我們過去的分銷訂單基本上都是通過系統自行運作的，尤其是隨著供應鏈變得更好。因此，我們對這些最終客戶訂單以及這些訂單需要根據自己的訂單運送給這些客戶的時間感覺良好，我稱之為升級週期之類的，我們覺得它會相當均勻地下降全年直至25 年第一季度。因此，我們對積壓的數量和發布的時間感到滿意。

Okay. That's helpful. What's not an expectation since we're 3 months later here, and just an expectation for when orders might turn positive year-over-year. Do you have a view there?

好的。這很有幫助。這並不是一個預期，因為我們已經 3 個月後到達這裡了，而只是對訂單何時可能同比轉正的預期。你有那裡的風景嗎？

So orders turning positive year-over-year. I think we expect that as a growing company, we expect orders to continue to grow throughout the year in 2024. So I would say each quarter, we are expecting continued improvement in growth year-over-year. And I think, Mike, for pointing to the -- if you recall last September quarter, we had a price in October 1, price increase that we put in place. And that pulled in a huge amount of order volume literally in the last 2 weeks of the quarter to create somewhat of a lopsided quarter -- a record quarter, if you will, for bookings last year in September. We do not have a price increase on the Board for this year. But we have, as Kevin said, as we look out at the year, we are looking at bookings growth throughout the year.

因此訂單同比轉正。我認為，作為一家成長型公司，我們預計訂單將在 2024 年全年繼續增長。因此，我想說每個季度，我們預計同比增長將持續改善。我想，邁克，如果你還記得上個 9 月份的季度，我們在 10 月 1 日進行了價格上漲，我們實施了價格上漲。這在本季度的最後兩週確實帶來了大量的訂單量，創造了一個有點不平衡的季度——如果你願意的話，這是去年 9 月份預訂量創紀錄的一個季度。今年我們董事會沒有提價。但正如凱文所說，當我們展望這一年時，我們正在關注全年的預訂量增長。

Okay. Fantastic. And then last question for me. I mean, you guys have just reiterated, I think, '24 and '25, so at least mid-teens revenue growth. And you obviously have a ton of competitive and product momentum there. I'm kind of wondering in '26, '27, even '28, do you think that the basis of competition in the industry is going to be sort of the same as it is now? Or is there more work to be done in the corporate development and product development areas? My question really is, what do you have to do now to ensure that the momentum continues in '26, '27, '28?

好的。極好的。然後是我的最後一個問題。我的意思是，我認為你們剛剛重申了“24 和 25”，所以至少有十幾歲左右的收入增長。顯然，您在那裡擁有大量的競爭力和產品動力。我有點想知道，在26年、27年、甚至28年，你認為這個行業的競爭基礎會和現在一樣嗎？還是在企業發展和產品開發領域還有更多工作要做？我真正的問題是，你現在必須做什麼才能確保這種勢頭在 26 年、27 年、28 年繼續下去？

Yes. And that really goes back to some of the investments that we're making. I mentioned that we are doing a lot of work in -- with some of our growth with some of our new growth vectors. Managed Services, the industry is moving more towards managed services. And we are building, I mentioned in my comments, a very disruptive platform, and it's disruptive in the simplicity of how it operates commercially. The fact that you can have the entire network that you can have complete visibility through a cloud and that you can orchestrate services from the cloud and that you have a workspace that you can use to manage -- it makes it very easy for you to deliver a managed service. And it's -- the managed service model falls down because of the complexity of the commercial terms and then the execution and the operation of delivering all of these services in a way that can be managed.

是的。這確實可以追溯到我們正在進行的一些投資。我提到我們正在做很多工作——我們的一些增長和一些新的增長向量。託管服務，該行業正在更多地轉向託管服務。我在評論中提到，我們正在構建一個非常具有顛覆性的平台，它的商業運作方式非常簡單，具有顛覆性。事實上，您可以擁有整個網絡，您可以通過雲獲得完整的可見性，您可以從雲中編排服務，並且您擁有一個可以用來管理的工作區 - 這使您可以輕鬆交付託管服務。由於商業條款的複雜性以及以可管理的方式交付所有這些服務的執行和操作，託管服務模型會失敗。

And so what we're providing will be, by far, the industry's most simplest platform for delivering this, and we see a massive growth opportunity here. It's early innings. We're not calling a forecast there, but that is clearly a growth vector. We're also branching out into new large more -- it's more of a service provider type relationship with large customers that have potential to spend a significant volumes relative to our traditional partner base, and we're creating a very -- a private offer that will be very compelling that we believe will be an opportunity for us to take share and it provides significant value to these large players relative to the current arrangements they currently have with some of the largest players in the industry.

因此，到目前為止，我們提供的將是業界最簡單的平台，我們在這裡看到了巨大的增長機會。現在是早幾局。我們並沒有稱之為預測，但這顯然是一個增長向量。我們還擴展到新的更大的領域——它更像是與大客戶的服務提供商類型的關係，這些客戶相對於我們的傳統合作夥伴基礎有可能花費大量資金，並且我們正在創建一個非常— —私人報價這將是非常引人注目的，我們相信這將是我們分享市場份額的機會，並且相對於這些大型參與者目前與行業中一些最大參與者的現有安排，它為這些大型參與者提供了巨大的價值。

So there is a share shift. We have some big ideas about being disruptive and share shift there. The final thing I'll mention is our federal investment. We have been underinvested in federal. Our investment now is really proving to be timely with some of the large opportunities that we have. And so with the certs that we're investing in, it will truly open up other investments. There's also the convergence of networking with cloud and security. We bring a lot of security elements. If you look at technology that we have that's very mature, we'll also be introducing access security technologies in the future that will be announced in the future that can also be somewhat disruptive.

因此，存在份額轉移。我們有一些關於顛覆性和分享轉變的偉大想法。我要提到的最後一件事是我們的聯邦投資。我們對聯邦的投資不足。事實證明，我們現在的投資確實是及時的，因為我們擁有一些巨大的機會。因此，通過我們正在投資的證書，它將真正開啟其他投資。還有網絡與雲和安全的融合。我們帶來了很多安全元素。如果你看看我們擁有的非常成熟的技術，我們還將在未來引入訪問安全技術，這些技術將在未來宣布，這也可能具有一定的顛覆性。

Now I'm not showing any further questions in the queue at this time. I would now like to turn the call back over to Mr. Ed Meyercord for any closing remarks.

現在我不會在隊列中顯示任何其他問題。現在，我想將電話轉回給埃德·邁耶科德先生，讓其發表結束語。

Thanks, Olivia, and thanks, everybody, for your participation on the call. Obviously, for the investors that joined in today. And also, we have our employees that dial in, and we have partners and distributors who listen in as well and maybe some customers, so we appreciate that. I'd say -- I'd reiterate, there's never been a better time to be at Extreme. Kevin mentioned it in his remarks, we are in an incredibly strong financial position, and we have very interesting and unique growth opportunities that we believe will sustain this -- the growth levels that we mentioned. So I would encourage investors to please attend the upcoming investor conference. And then over the next several months coming up in New York, details to follow, and we hope to see you there. Thanks, everybody, and have a great day.

謝謝奧利維亞，也謝謝大家參與這次電話會議。顯然，對於今天加入的投資者來說。而且，我們有撥通電話的員工，我們有也會傾聽的合作夥伴和分銷商，也許還有一些客戶，所以我們對此表示讚賞。我想說——我要重申，現在是加入 Extreme 的最佳時機。凱文在講話中提到，我們的財務狀況非常強勁，我們擁有非常有趣且獨特的增長機會，我們相信這些機會將維持我們提到的增長水平。所以我鼓勵投資者參加即將舉行的投資者會議。接下來的幾個月將在紐約舉行，詳細信息將公佈，我們希望在那裡見到您。謝謝大家，祝你有美好的一天。

Ladies and gentlemen, that does end our conference for today. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.

女士們先生們，今天的會議到此結束。感謝您的參與。您現在可以斷開連接。