Kyndryl Holdings Inc (KD) 2024 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for standing by. My name is Abby, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Kyndryl Fiscal Fourth Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. (Operator Instructions)

早安，女士們先生們，感謝你們的支持。我叫艾比，今天我將擔任你們的會議操作員。此時，我歡迎大家參加 Kyndryl 2024 年第四季財報電話會議。 （操作員說明）

And I would now like to turn the conference over to Lori Chaitman, Global Head of Investor Relations. You may begin.

現在我想將會議交給投資者關係全球主管 Lori Chaitman。你可以開始了。

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to Kyndryl's Earnings Call for the fourth quarter and fiscal year ended March 31, 2024. Before we begin, I'd like to remind you that our remarks today will include forward-looking statements. These statements are subject to risk factors that may cause our actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied. These forward-looking statements speak only to our expectations as of today, and we are under no obligation to update them. For more details on some of these risks, please see the Risk Factors section of our annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended March 31, 2023.

大家早安，歡迎參加 Kyndryl 的截至 2024 年 3 月 31 日的第四季度和財年的收益電話會議。這些陳述受到風險因素的影響，可能導致我們的實際結果與明示或暗示的結果有重大差異。這些前瞻性陳述僅代表我們截至目前為止的預期，我們沒有義務更新它們。有關其中一些風險的更多詳細信息，請參閱我們截至 2023 年 3 月 31 日的年度 10-K 表格年度報告的風險因素部分。

In today's remarks, we'll also refer to certain non-GAAP financial metrics. Corresponding GAAP metrics and a reconciliation of non-GAAP metrics to GAAP metrics for historical periods are provided in the presentation materials for today's event which are available on our website at investors.kyndryl.com.

在今天的演講中，我們也將提及某些非公認會計準則財務指標。今天活動的簡報資料中提供了相應的 GAAP 指標以及歷史時期非 GAAP 指標與 GAAP 指標的調整表，這些資料可在我們的網站 Investors.kyndryl.com 上取得。

With me here are Kyndryl's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Martin Schroeter; and Kyndryl's Chief Financial Officer, David Wyshner. Following our prepared remarks, we will hold a Q&A session.

和我在一起的有 Kyndryl 董事長兼執行長 Martin Schroeter； Kyndryl 的財務長 David Wyshner。在我們準備好的發言之後，我們將舉行問答環節。

I'd now like to turn the call over to Martin. Martin?

我現在想把電話轉給馬丁。馬丁？

Thank you, Lori, and thanks to each of you for joining us. I am excited about all that we at Kyndryl accomplished in our second fiscal year as an independent company, and I cannot be more proud of our teams around the world. We delivered solid fourth quarter results, exceeded our full year targets on all of our 3A initiatives, alliances, advanced delivery and accounts and exceeded our guidance for fiscal 2024. We also delivered strong growth across Kyndryl Consult. We expanded our hyperscaler relationships and accelerated adoption of Kyndryl Bridge, and we're providing our fiscal 2025 outlook that includes substantial earnings growth and free cash flow.

謝謝你，洛瑞，也謝謝你們每個人加入我們。我對 Kyndryl 作為一家獨立公司在第二個財年所取得的成就感到興奮，我為我們在世界各地的團隊感到無比自豪。我們交付了穩健的第四季度業績，超越了所有 3A 計劃、聯盟、提前交付和帳戶的全年目標，並超越了 2024 財年的指導。我們擴大了與超大規模企業的關係並加速採用 Kyndryl Bridge，並且我們提供了 2025 財年展望，其中包括大幅獲利成長和自由現金流。

And importantly, we're pulling forward the timing of returning to revenue growth and now expect to deliver positive revenue growth in the fourth quarter of this fiscal year. With our consistently strong execution in fiscal 2024, we've proven that we can deliver on ambitious goals to strengthen our business and that we can grow in high-value areas that we target for growth. You may recall that at this time last year, I said that our fiscal 2024 was a year of acceleration for Kyndryl. And as you can see from our performance, we've accelerated both our business transformation and our innovation, which have further solidified our leadership position in mission-critical IT services. We'll approach our third fiscal year with the same intensity and determination. This fiscal year, we will pivot from transformation to growth.

重要的是，我們正在推遲恢復收入成長的時間，現在預計將在本財年第四季實現正收入成長。憑藉我們在 2024 財年一貫強勁的執行力，我們已經證明我們能夠實現增強業務的雄心勃勃的目標，並且我們能夠在我們目標增長的高價值領域實現增長。您可能還記得，去年的這個時候，我說過 2024 財年對 Kyndryl 來說是加速的一年。從我們的業績中可以看出，我們加速了業務轉型和創新，這進一步鞏固了我們在關鍵任務 IT 服務方面的領導地位。我們將以同樣的力道和決心迎接第三個財年。本財年，我們將從轉型轉向成長。

It will be the year in which our top line inflects and half of our revenue is generated from higher-margin post-spin signings. It will be another year in which we delivered double-digit revenue growth from Kyndryl Consult. It will be the year in which our hyperscaler related revenue nears $1 billion. It will be the first year that we will have the majority of our managed services customers operating on Kyndryl Bridge, allowing us to drive new levels of automation and innovation and it will be another year in which we expect to deliver substantial earnings growth.

這將是我們收入變動的一年，我們一半的收入來自利潤率更高的旋轉後簽約。今年，Kyndryl Consult 的營收將達到兩位數成長。今年我們的超大規模相關收入將接近 10 億美元。這將是我們的大多數託管服務客戶在 Kyndryl Bridge 上運營的第一年，使我們能夠推動自動化和創新的新水平，這將是我們預計實現大幅盈利增長的另一年。

So on today's call, I'll share more detail on these pivotal shifts in our business, and I'll describe how major secular trends in IT are driving customer demand, fueling our return to growth and putting Kyndryl at the center of our customers' digital transformations. David will then review our financial results and discuss our outlook for fiscal 2025.

因此，在今天的電話會議上，我將分享有關我們業務中這些關鍵轉變的更多細節，並將描述IT 領域的主要長期趨勢如何推動客戶需求、推動我們恢復成長並將Kyndryl 置於客戶需求的中心數位轉型。隨後，David 將回顧我們的財務表現並討論我們對 2025 財年的展望。

I want to start by highlighting the recent accomplishments that have set the stage for our growth trajectory. In fiscal 2024, we grew our adjusted pretax earnings by more than $380 million. We delivered double-digit growth in our more than $2 billion of Consult revenue, and we drove triple-digit growth in hyperscaler-related revenue, validating our ability to return to growth. We grew our total signings, and even more importantly, the projected pretax margins on those signings were consistently in the high single digits, aligned with our medium-term target. And we generated positive adjusted free cash flow demonstrating our focus on cash generation that will support our long-term strategy and goals. Our advisory talent in Consult, together with our design-led Kyndryl Vital methodology and our Kyndryl Bridge delivery services platform allows us to co-create and innovate with our customers and our partners.

首先，我想強調一下最近的成就，這些成就為我們的成長軌跡奠定了基礎。 2024 財年，我們的調整後稅前收益成長了超過 3.8 億美元。我們在超過 20 億美元的諮詢收入中實現了兩位數的成長，並且推動了超大規模相關收入的三位數成長，驗證了我們恢復成長的能力。我們的簽約總數有所增加，更重要的是，這些簽約的預計稅前利潤率始終保持在高個位數，與我們的中期目標一致。我們產生了積極的調整後自由現金流，這表明我們對現金產生的重視，這將支持我們的長期策略和目標。我們的 Consult 諮詢人才，加上我們以設計為主導的 Kyndryl Vital 方法論和 Kyndryl Bridge 交付服務平台，使我們能夠與客戶和合作夥伴共同創造和創新。

We now have over 1,200 of our largest customers operating on the Kyndryl Bridge platform which is allowing us to deliver more value to customers, drive savings for Kyndryl through automation and derive insights from AI learnings powered by the operational data associated with our scale. Even beyond Kyndryl Bridge, Consult and Vital, we have executed powerfully throughout our business. We're delivering sophisticated, optimized multi-vendor solutions to customers to help them address critical needs and major opportunities. We're delivering managed services more efficiently than ever. And as a result, and as we said we would, we're showing up differently for our customers and seizing opportunities that are unique to Kyndryl.

現在，我們有超過1,200 家最大的客戶在Kyndryl Bridge 平台上運營，這使我們能夠為客戶提供更多價值，透過自動化為Kyndryl 節省成本，並從與我們規模相關的營運數據提供支援的人工智慧學習中獲得見解。即使在 Kyndryl Bridge、Consult 和 Vital 之外，我們在整個業務中也表現出色。我們為客戶提供複雜、最佳化的多供應商解決方案，協助他們滿足關鍵需求和重大機會。我們比以往任何時候都更有效率地提供託管服務。因此，正如我們所說，我們將以不同的方式為客戶提供服務，並抓住 Kyndryl 獨有的機會。

We've proven that Kyndryl is a vital and trusted partner to our customers as we help them to run and transform their mission-critical complex hybrid IT estates. Our engineering and advisory talents, our unique operational data IP and embedded AI, our heritage and scale enable us to meet our customers' evolving IT needs and uncover new value from past, current and future technology investments. In fact, our expertise in both running and transforming IT estates differentiates us in the markets we serve and uniquely positions Kyndryl at the heart of secular trends that are shaping the evolution of IT namely the adoption of artificial intelligence, technology skill shortages, organizations needs to modernize, cloud migration and cybersecurity.

我們已經證明，Kyndryl 是客戶重要且值得信賴的合作夥伴，因為我們幫助他們運作和改造其任務關鍵型複雜混合 IT 資產。我們的工程和顧問人才、我們獨特的營運數據 IP 和嵌入式人工智慧、我們的傳統和規模使我們能夠滿足客戶不斷變化的 IT 需求，並從過去、當前和未來的技術投資中發現新價值。事實上，我們在 IT 產業營運和轉型方面的專業知識使我們在所服務的市場中脫穎而出，並使 Kyndryl 處於塑造 IT 發展的長期趨勢的核心，即人工智慧的採用、技術技能短缺、組織需要現代化、雲端遷移和網路安全。

We see these trends as continuing for the foreseeable future, and they're driving demand for our services. For example, through our data architecture capabilities, we're enabling enterprises to apply new AI and Gen AI technologies to drive business outcomes. Through our global delivery centers, our scale and our training programs, we develop and make available the broad range of skills our customers need. Through Kyndryl Bridge, we're helping customers intelligently prioritize infrastructure needs, address technical debt, drive innovation and uncover previously hidden risks. Through our hyperscaler alliances and mainframe modernization skills, we're helping customers migrate, manage and optimize their hybrid IT estates across multiple cloud platforms, ensuring the right workload is on the right platform.

我們認為這些趨勢在可預見的未來將持續下去，並且它們正在推動對我們服務的需求。例如，透過我們的資料架構能力，我們使企業能夠應用新的人工智慧和新一代人工智慧技術來推動業務成果。透過我們的全球交付中心、規模和培訓計劃，我們開發並提供客戶所需的廣泛技能。透過 Kyndryl Bridge，我們正在幫助客戶智慧地確定基礎設施需求的優先順序、解決技術債務、推動創新並發現先前隱藏的風險。透過我們的超大規模聯盟和大型主機現代化技能，我們正在幫助客戶跨多個雲端平台遷移、管理和優化其混合 IT 資產，確保正確的工作負載位於正確的平台上。

And through our global network of security operations hubs and our end-to-end cybersecurity services, we're helping customers protect, detect and recover from cyber threats. What's more, the mission-critical nature of our work is increasingly consultative and tied to customer achievement of business outcomes. And because how important AI is to us and our customers, I want to spend a few minutes on the role Kyndryl plays in AI adoption and how we're applying our capabilities to unlock incremental growth opportunities.

透過我們的全球安全營運中心網路和端到端網路安全服務，我們正在幫助客戶保護、偵測網路威脅並從中恢復。此外，我們工作的關鍵任務性質越來越具有諮詢性，並與客戶實現的業務成果連結在一起。由於人工智慧對我們和我們的客戶非常重要，因此我想花幾分鐘時間介紹 Kyndryl 在人工智慧採用中所扮演的角色，以及我們如何運用我們的能力來釋放增量成長機會。

As we've mentioned, Kyndryl is an AI beneficiary and an AI enabler. As the largest IT infrastructure services provider in the world, we have more tech stack operating data than anyone, and we're using machine learning with this data to give our customers and Kyndryl a data-driven advantage in designing and managing systems. We're using AI in Kyndryl Bridge to identify application performance patterns, produce actionable insights, reduce required maintenance and prevent incidents from occurring. Bridge can operate as a self-healing architecture and is now producing 3 million actionable insights a month and is helping customers achieve nearly $2 billion of annual savings by avoiding maintenance and incident costs. In short, AI is powering Kyndryl Bridge and accelerating our advanced delivery initiative. At the same time, we're seeing revenue growth opportunities associated with both AI and Gen AI.

正如我們所提到的，Kyndryl 是人工智慧的受益者和人工智慧的推動者。作為世界上最大的IT 基礎設施服務提供商，我們擁有比任何人都多的技術堆疊操作數據，並且我們正在利用機器學習來處理這些數據，為我們的客戶和Kyndryl 在設計和管理系統方面提供數據驅動的優勢。我們在 Kyndryl Bridge 中使用人工智慧來識別應用程式效能模式、產生可行的見解、減少所需的維護並防止事件發生。 Bridge 可以作為自我修復架構運行，現在每月產生 300 萬條可操作的見解，並透過避免維護和事故成本來幫助客戶每年節省近 20 億美元。簡而言之，人工智慧正在為 Kyndryl Bridge 提供動力，並加速我們的先進交付計劃。同時，我們看到了與 AI 和 Gen AI 相關的收入成長機會。

Our customers know that their AI is only going to be as good as their data, and this is creating demand for our expertise in data architecture that becomes the foundation for AI and Gen AI applications. And with our alliance partners, we're optimizing infrastructures to facilitate AI deployment in these complex IT environments. And based on our own positive experience with Kyndryl Bridge, we believe machine learning and Gen AI can have a substantial impact on many industries and enterprises. And we see AI readiness as a go-to-market opportunity for us and a natural extension of many of the services we already offer. In fact, revenue in our applications data and AI practice grew double digits this past fiscal year. As our business evolves and we move further away from our spin, our revenue mix will continue to shift to higher-margin post-spin signs.

我們的客戶知道，他們的人工智慧的好壞取決於他們的數據，這對我們在數據架構方面的專業知識產生了需求，而數據架構成為人工智慧和新一代人工智慧應用程式的基礎。我們與聯盟合作夥伴一起優化基礎設施，以促進人工智慧在這些複雜 IT 環境中的部署。基於我們在 Kyndryl Bridge 方面的積極經驗，我們相信機器學習和 Gen AI 可以對許多行業和企業產生重大影響。我們認為人工智慧準備對我們來說是一個進入市場的機會，也是我們已經提供的許多服務的自然延伸。事實上，上一財年我們的應用程式資料和人工智慧實踐的收入成長了兩位數。隨著我們業務的發展以及我們進一步遠離旋轉，我們的收入組合將繼續轉向利潤率更高的旋轉後跡象。

This fiscal year, half of our revenue is coming from post-spin signing. And in fiscal 2026, it will be roughly 2/3. This inflection point when our P&L is largely determined by our higher-margin post-spin signings will dramatically strengthen our earnings and growth profile. Our forecast for fiscal 2025 is for adjusted pretax income of at least $435 million, reflecting a year-over-year increase of more than $270 million. And as David will explain in more detail, the margins at which we're signing contracts and the other actions we're taking to grow our profitability have us on a path to deliver high single-digit adjusted pretax margins by fiscal 2027. And yes, the math associated with that is ultimately a $1 billion or more of adjusted pretax income with very strong conversion of our earnings into cash flow.

本財年，我們一半的收入來自分拆後的簽約。到 2026 財年，這一數字將約為 2/3。當我們的損益主要由我們的更高利潤的旋轉後簽約決定時，這個拐點將極大地增強我們的收益和成長狀況。我們對 2025 財年的預測是調整後稅前收入至少為 4.35 億美元，年增超過 2.7 億美元。正如 David 將更詳細地解釋的那樣，我們簽署合約的利潤率以及我們為提高盈利能力而採取的其他行動，使我們能夠在 2027 財年實現高個位數的調整後稅前利潤率。 ，與此相關的數學最終是調整後的稅前收入達到10 億美元或更多，而我們的收入將非常強勁地轉化為現金流。

I'm tremendously enthusiastic about how our strategic progress and our market leadership are driving solid operating performance and stronger financial results including our forecast to grow revenue in our fiscal fourth quarter, which begins less than 8 months from now. As we approach the second half of this fiscal year, our purposeful efforts to schedule low to no margin components of revenue will be largely behind us. And at the same time, our top line will be driven by our ability to capitalize on our ecosystem of technology alliances and expand our share of wallet with existing customers. We will increasingly benefit from growing demand for cloud, security, data and AI services and ultimately, we expect to gain overall market share as more enterprises look to Kyndryl for their mission-critical IT needs. We are creating significant value for our customers and we'll continue to be bold and ambitious to drive growth.

我對我們的策略進展和市場領導地位如何推動穩健的營運績效和更強勁的財務業績感到非常熱衷，包括我們預測第四財季（距現在不到 8 個月的時間）將實現收入成長。隨著本財年下半年的臨近，我們有意安排低利潤甚至無利潤部分的努力將在很大程度上成為過去。同時，我們的收入將由我們利用技術聯盟生態系統並擴大我們與現有客戶的錢包份額的能力來推動。我們將越來越多地受益於對雲端、安全、資料和人工智慧服務不斷增長的需求，隨著越來越多的企業尋求 Kyndryl 滿足其關鍵任務 IT 需求，我們最終預計將獲得整體市場份額。我們正在為客戶創造巨大的價值，我們將繼續大膽而雄心勃勃地推動成長。

We were born with great engineering talent. And as an independent company, we've been capitalizing on our expertise in providing mission-critical IT services by building our IP and expanding our core capabilities. Capabilities that align with the secular trends driving information technology in the ecosystem that matters to our customers and in the fixed practices that allow us to build and implement leading technology solutions.

我們生來就擁有出色的工程人才。作為一家獨立公司，我們一直透過建立我們的智慧財產權和擴展我們的核心能力，利用我們在提供關鍵任務 IT 服務方面的專業知識。與長期趨勢一致的能力在對我們的客戶至關重要的生態系統中以及在固定實踐中推動資訊技術，使我們能夠建立和實施領先的技術解決方案。

And having invested in our people and our technology to ensure we have the right skills and tools to meet our customers' needs, we're now hitting a pivotal shift in our business. We're not only helping organizations run their infrastructure and their business, we're now also helping them transform, building capabilities on new platforms, allowing them to leverage existing and new technology to drive business outcomes and differentiating Kyndryl in the process. We'll continue to execute our strategy with discipline and agility and will build a culture of operational excellence and collaboration. We are confident that we have the right vision, the right strategy and the right capabilities to capture future growth.

透過對我們的人員和技術進行投資，以確保我們擁有合適的技能和工具來滿足客戶的需求，我們現在正在實現業務的關鍵轉變。我們不僅幫助組織運營其基礎設施和業務，現在還幫助他們轉型，在新平台上建立功能，使他們能夠利用現有技術和新技術來推動業務成果，並在此過程中使 Kyndryl 脫穎而出。我們將繼續以紀律和敏捷性執行我們的策略，並將建立卓越營運和協作的文化。我們相信，我們擁有正確的願景、正確的策略和正確的能力來實現未來的成長。

And with that, I'll hand it over to David to take you through our results and our outlook.

接下來，我將把它交給 David，讓他向您介紹我們的成果和前景。

Thanks, Martin, and hello, everyone. Today, I'd like to discuss our quarterly and full year results, our continued progress on our 3A initiatives, the solid margins at which we're signing customer contracts and our outlook for fiscal year 2025, which began on April 1. We're enthusiastic about each of these topics and particularly, our outlook. Our fourth quarter results reflect strong operational execution and continued progress on our key initiatives. In the quarter, revenue totaled $3.8 billion, a 9% decline in constant currency. The year-over-year decline was anticipated and primarily driven by our intentional exit from negative, no and low-margin revenue streams within ongoing customer relationships, not by macro factors.

謝謝馬丁，大家好。今天，我想討論我們的季度和全年業績、我們在 3A 計劃方面的持續進展、我們簽署客戶合約的穩健利潤以及我們對 4 月 1 日開始的 2025 財年的展望。熱情，尤其是我們的前景。我們第四季的業績反映了強大的營運執行力以及我們關鍵舉措的持續進展。本季營收總計 38 億美元，以固定匯率計算下降 9%。年比下降是預期的，主要是由於我們有意退出持續客戶關係中的負收入、無利潤和低利潤收入流，而不是宏觀因素。

As Martin highlighted, we continue to gain momentum in higher-margin advisory services. Kyndryl Consult revenues grew 15% year-over-year in constant currency which underscores how we're growing our share in this higher-margin, higher value-add space. Consult signings grew even faster at 30% in constant currency. Total signings grew 3% year-over-year in constant currency in Q4, our second consecutive quarter of signings growth, and were up 3% in the year as a whole. Our signings growth for the year was strongest in our security and resiliency, core enterprise and Apps, Data & AI & practices. And with our momentum driving a strong April, our trailing 12-month signings through April 30 were up 7% year-over-year. Our fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA grew 19% to $566 million and our adjusted EBITDA margin increased by 350 basis points year-over-year to 14.7%.

正如馬丁所強調的，我們在利潤率較高的諮詢服務領域繼續保持強勁勢頭。以固定匯率計算，Kyndryl Consult 營收年增 15%，這凸顯了我們如何在這個利潤率更高、附加價值更高的領域擴大份額。以固定匯率計算，諮詢簽約量成長更快，達到 30%。以固定匯率計算，第四季簽約總數年增 3%，這是我們連續第二季實現簽約成長，全年也成長了 3%。我們今年的簽約成長在安全性和彈性、核心企業和應用程式、數據和人工智慧及實踐方面最為強勁。隨著 4 月勢頭強勁，截至 4 月 30 日的過去 12 個月簽約量年增 7%。第四季調整後 EBITDA 成長 19%，達到 5.66 億美元，調整後 EBITDA 利潤率年增 350 個基點，達到 14.7%。

Adjusted pretax income was $30 million, a $91 million improvement in profit year-over-year. Consistent with the trends driving our performance all year, our 3As were the key driver of our earnings growth again in Q4. For fiscal year 2024 as a whole, we generated $16.1 billion of revenue. Our adjusted EBITDA grew 20% to $2.4 billion, our adjusted pretax income was $165 million, representing a $382 million increase from the prior year. We expanded our adjusted EBITDA margin by 310 basis points, and our adjusted pretax margin by 230 basis points year-over-year which were above our targets and represent a momentous leap forward on our path to high single-digit adjusted pretax margins.

調整後稅前收入為 3,000 萬美元，利潤年增 9,100 萬美元。與推動全年業績成長的趨勢一致，我們的 3A 再次成為第四季獲利成長的關鍵驅動力。 2024 財年全年，我們創造了 161 億美元的營收。我們調整後的 EBITDA 成長了 20%，達到 24 億美元，調整後的稅前收入為 1.65 億美元，比前一年增加了 3.82 億美元。我們的調整後EBITDA 利潤率同比增長了310 個基點，調整後稅前利潤率同比增長了230 個基點，這超出了我們的目標，代表著我們在實現高單位數調整後稅前利潤率的道路上邁出了重大一步。

Our financial progress reflects our strategic achievements, leveraging technology alliances, stepping away from empty calorie revenues, fixing focus accounts, growing the Consult portion of our business, driving efficiency throughout our operations and as an independent company skating to where the puck is going in terms of our customers' future IT needs.

我們的財務進展反映了我們的策略成就，利用技術聯盟，擺脫空洞的卡路里收入，固定重點客戶，發展我們業務的諮詢部分，提高整個運營的效率，並作為一家獨立公司滑向冰球的方向。未來的IT 需求。

Our performance in fiscal 2024 gives us strong momentum as we go forward. So as encouraged as I am by the earnings growth we've delivered, I'm even more enthusiastic about how, throughout the year, we also positioned Kyndryl for future revenue, margin and profit growth. The March quarter was a continuation of our signing business with healthy margins. Throughout fiscal 2024, we signed contracts with projected gross margins in the mid-20s in projected pretax margins in the very high single digits. Therefore, as our business mix increasingly shifts towards more post-spin contracts, you'll see significant margin expansion in our reported results. In the middle graph on Slide 13, we've included a gross profit book-to-bill chart that accentuates how we've been creating and capturing value in our business. With an average projected gross margin of 26% on our $12.5 billion of signings this past year, we've added over $3 billion of projecting gross profit to our backlog. Over the same period of time, we've reported gross profit of $2.9 billion.

2024 財年的業績為我們前進提供了強勁動力。因此，儘管我對我們實現的獲利成長感到鼓舞，但我更熱衷於全年我們如何為 Kyndryl 未來的營收、利潤和利潤成長做好定位。三月的季度是我們簽約業務的延續，利潤率可觀。在整個 2024 財年，我們簽署的合約預計毛利率在 20 多歲左右，預計稅前利潤率將達到非常高的個位數。因此，隨著我們的業務組合越來越多地轉向更多的分拆後合同，您將在我們報告的結果中看到利潤率顯著擴大。在投影片 13 的中間圖表中，我們包含了毛利訂單出貨量圖表，該圖表強調了我們如何在業務中創造和獲取價值。去年我們簽下的合約金額為 125 億美元，平均預期毛利率為 26%，因此我們的積壓訂單中增加了超過 30 億美元的預期毛利。同期，我們報告的毛利為 29 億美元。

This means we've been adding more gross profit to our backlog than our contracted book of business has been producing in our P&L. Having a gross profit book-to-bill ratio above 1 at 1.1 is a measure of how we're growing what matters most, the expected future profit from committed contracts and we've been doing this consistently over the last 2 years. Turning to our cash flow and balance sheet. We generated adjusted free cash flow of $291 million in fiscal year 2024. Our growth capital expenditures were $651 million, and we received a larger than typical $138 million of proceeds from asset dispositions. Taxes, being taxes were use of cash. We provided a bridge from our adjusted pretax income to our free cash flow as well as a bridge from our adjusted EBITDA to our free cash flow in the appendix. Our financial position remains strong. Our cash balance at March 31 was $1.6 billion. Our cash, combined with available debt capacity under committed borrowing facilities gave us $4.7 billion of liquidity at fiscal year-end.

這意味著我們在積壓訂單中增加的毛利比我們的合約業務帳簿在損益表中產生的毛利還要多。毛利帳面出貨比為 1.1 以上，是衡量我們如何成長最重要業務的指標，即承諾合約的預期未來利潤，過去 2 年我們一直在這樣做。轉向我們的現金流和資產負債表。 2024 財年，我們產生了 2.91 億美元的調整後自由現金流。稅收，稅收是對現金的使用。我們在附錄中提供了從調整後稅前收入到自由現金流的橋樑，以及從調整後 EBITDA 到自由現金流的橋樑。我們的財務狀況依然強勁。截至 3 月 31 日，我們的現金餘額為 16 億美元。我們的現金加上承諾借貸便利下的可用債務能力，在財年末為我們提供了 47 億美元的流動性。

We refinanced our $500 million term loan in Q4. As a result, our debt maturities are now well laddered from late 2026 to 2041. We had no borrowings outstanding under our revolving credit facility, and our net debt at quarter end was $1.7 billion. As a result, our net leverage sits well within our target range. We are rated investment grade by Moody's, Fitch and S&P. On capital allocation, our top priorities continue to be to maintain strong liquidity, remain investment grade and reinvest in our business. As our earnings increase, they'll drive meaningful free cash flow growth. As a result, over time, we'll be in a position to consider regularly returning capital to shareholders, all while remaining investment grade.

我們在第四季為 5 億美元的定期貸款進行了再融資。因此，我們的債務期限現在從 2026 年末逐步延長到 2041 年。因此，我們的淨槓桿率完全在我們的目標範圍內。我們被穆迪、惠譽和標準普爾評為投資等級。在資本配置方面，我們的首要任務仍然是保持強勁的流動性、保持投資等級並對我們的業務進行再投資。隨著我們收入的增加，它們將推動自由現金流的有意義的成長。因此，隨著時間的推移，我們將能夠考慮定期向股東返還資本，同時保持投資等級。

Our 3A strategy has been a grand slam home run. It's helped us strategically transform our business. It's galvanized our people around initiatives that are game changers for us and for our customers, and it's delivered huge financial benefits. As a reminder, at the start of the year, we provided fiscal 2024 target of $300 million in revenue tied to hyperscaler alliances, $450 million in cumulative annualized cost savings from advanced delivery by fiscal year-end and $400 million of cumulative annualized pretax benefit from our accounts initiative. During the year, we raised each of these targets by $100 million, and we exceeded each of the raised targets. Through our alliances, we recognized more than $150 million in hyperscaler related revenue in the fourth quarter.

我們的 3A 策略是大滿貫本壘打。它幫助我們策略性地轉變了我們的業務。它激勵我們的員工採取一些改變我們和我們客戶遊戲規則的舉措，並帶來了巨大的經濟效益。提醒一下，在今年年初，我們提出了2024 財年目標：與超大規模聯盟相關的收入為3 億美元，到財年末提前交付帶來的累計年化成本節省為4.5 億美元，以及來自超大規模聯盟的累計年化稅前收益為4 億美元。在這一年裡，我們將這些目標每一項都提高了 1 億美元，我們都超額完成了每項提高的目標。透過我們的聯盟，我們在第四季度確認了超過 1.5 億美元的超大規模相關收入。

As Martin mentioned, this brought our year-to-date hyperscaler revenue to $500 million, triple our prior year total. Through advanced delivery initiative powered by Kyndryl Bridge, we continue to drive automation throughout our delivery operations, incorporate more technology into our offerings, reduce our costs, and increase our already-strong service levels. It's a win-win for Kyndryl and our customers.

正如 Martin 所提到的，這使我們年初至今的超大規模提供者收入達到 5 億美元，是去年總收入的三倍。透過 Kyndryl Bridge 支援的先進交付計劃，我們繼續推動整個交付營運的自動化，將更多技術融入我們的產品中，降低成本，並提高我們本已強大的服務水準。這對 Kyndryl 和我們的客戶來說是雙贏的。

To date, we've been able to free up more than 9,500 delivery professionals to address new revenue opportunities in backfill attrition. This is worth roughly $575 million a year to us, representing a $75 million increase in our annual run rate this past quarter. Our accounts initiative continues to remediate elements of contracts we inherited with substandard margins. In the fourth quarter, we increased the cumulative annualized profit from our focused accounts by $125 million to $600 million.

到目前為止，我們已經騰出了超過 9,500 名交付專業人員來解決回填人員流失的新收入機會。這對我們來說每年價值約 5.75 億美元，這意味著我們上個季度的年運行率增加了 7500 萬美元。我們的帳戶計劃繼續糾正我們繼承的利潤率不合格的合約的內容。第四季度，我們重點帳戶的累計年化利潤增加了 1.25 億美元，達到 6 億美元。

Two years ago, we laid out bold ambitions that over the medium term, advanced delivery will drive cost savings equating to roughly $600 million in annual pretax income and accounts will drive annual pretax income of $800 million or more. Due to our progress to date, we're raising the ultimate benefits that we expect from these initiatives by $200 million each to $800 million and $1 billion, respectively. In fiscal 2025, we'll generate incremental benefits from each of our 3As. For alliances, we expect hyperscaler-related revenue to approach $1 billion, roughly double our 2024 level.

兩年前，我們制定了大膽的目標，從中期來看，提前交付將節省相當於約 6 億美元年度稅前收入的成本，而帳戶將推動年度稅前收入達到 8 億美元或更多。鑑於迄今為止所取得的進展，我們預計這些措施的最終收益將分別提高 2 億美元，達到 8 億美元和 10 億美元。到 2025 財年，我們將從每個 3A 產生增量收益。對聯盟而言，我們預計超大規模相關收入將接近 10 億美元，約為 2024 年水準的兩倍。

We expect our advanced delivery initiative to reach $750 million in annualized savings and to deliver $200 million of incremental benefit year-over-year. And in focus accounts, we expect to reach $850 million of annualized savings by year-end and to deliver $300 million of incremental profit this year compared to last. Roughly half of the benefits from advanced delivery and accounts is the full year benefit of the actions we took in fiscal 2024 and half is the part-year benefit of additional actions we will take in fiscal 2025.

我們預計我們的高級交付計劃每年可節省 7.5 億美元，並與去年同期相比帶來 2 億美元的增量效益。在焦點帳戶中，我們預計到年底，年化儲蓄將達到 8.5 億美元，與去年相比，今年將實現 3 億美元的增量利潤。提前交付和帳戶帶來的收益中大約有一半是我們在 2024 財年採取的行動的全年收益，一半是我們在 2025 財年將採取的額外行動的部分年度收益。

In baseball, you can't have back-to-back grand slams, but in our business and through the 3As, we can. In fact, the 3As are becoming a regular part of our operating model rather than distinct initiatives. As we look ahead to fiscal 2025, our core financial goals are to continue to expand our margins, grow our earnings, inflect our revenues back to growth as the year progresses and generate free cash flow. Our outlook is for revenue to be in the range of $15.2 billion to $15.5 billion, a decline of 2% to 4% in constant currency. We still have 2 quarters to go until we anniversary when most of our significant actions to step away from low to no margin revenues took effect.

在棒球運動中，你不可能連續獲得大滿貫，但在我們的行業中，透過 3A 比賽，我們可以做到。事實上，3A 正在成為我們營運模式的常規組成部分，而不是獨特的舉措。展望 2025 財年，我們的核心財務目標是繼續擴大利潤率、增加收入、隨著時間的推移使我們的收入恢復成長並產生自由現金流。我們預計營收將在 152 億美元至 155 億美元之間，以固定匯率計算將下降 2% 至 4%。距離我們的周年紀念日還有兩個季度，屆時我們從低利潤到零利潤收入的大部分重大行動都會生效。

So we expect our year-over-year revenue declines will decrease as the year progresses, and we returned to year-over-year revenue growth in the fourth quarter. Based on recent exchange rates, currency movements are having a $230 million negative impact on reported revenue, but where that lands will depend on how exchange rates move over the next 11 months. In aggregate then, the estimate that our adjusted EBITDA margin in fiscal 2025 will be at least 16.2%, an increase of at least 150 basis points versus fiscal 2024. And our outlook for adjusted pretax income is at least $435 million.

因此，我們預計隨著時間的推移，我們的年收入下降將會減少，並且我們將在第四季度恢復同比收入成長。根據最近的匯率，匯率變動對報告的收入產生了 2.3 億美元的負面影響，但具體影響如何將取決於未來 11 個月的匯率走勢。整體而言，我們預計 2025 財年調整後 EBITDA 利潤率將至少為 16.2%，比 2024 財年增加至少 150 個基點。

This means growing our adjusted pretax income by at least $270 million and increasing our adjusted pretax margin by nearly 200 basis points year-over-year. This means we're doubling down on the strong earnings and margin growth we delivered in fiscal 2024 and keeps us right on track to be generating high single-digit adjusted pretax margins in fiscal 2027. Two more items to note regarding our outlook. We continue to see opportunities to drive efficiency in our operations, both through advanced delivery and in SG&A functions.

這意味著我們的調整後稅前收入將比去年增加至少 2.7 億美元，調整後稅前利潤率將比去年同期增加近 200 個基點。這意味著我們將加倍努力實現2024 財年強勁的盈利和利潤增長，並使我們能夠在2027 財年實現高個位數的調整後稅前利潤率。 。我們不斷發現透過先進的交付和銷售、管理及行政管理職能來提高營運效率的機會。

While we manage labor costs primarily through hiring and attrition, we expect to incur workforce rebalancing charges of roughly $100 million in fiscal 2025. It's important to note that the anticipated charges associated with this program are included in our fiscal 2025 outlook for adjusted EBITDA, adjusted pretax income and adjusted free cash flow, whereas our adjusted results in fiscal 2024 excluded such charges. Also, as part of managing our costs and CapEx, our teams have been working to make our compute and storage hardware last longer. As a result, we're now able to extend the depreciable lives of these assets from 5 years to 6. This benefit will be largely offset by the end of the benefit we've had from certain assets having been transferred to us from our former parent pre-spin at cost.

雖然我們主要透過招聘和自然減員來管理勞動力成本，但我們預計2025 財年將產生約1 億美元的勞動力再平衡費用 值得注意的是，與該計劃相關的預期費用已包含在我們的2025 財年調整後EBITDA 展望中，調整後稅前收入和調整後的自由現金流，而我們 2024 財年的調整後業績不包括此類費用。此外，作為管理成本和資本支出的一部分，我們的團隊一直在努力延長運算和儲存硬體的使用壽命。因此，我們現在能夠將這些資產的折舊年限從 5 年延長至 6 年。按成本進行預旋轉。

The combined impact of these 2 noncash changes will be a roughly $50 million year-over-year reduction in our depreciation expense. Looking at the first quarter in particular, our year-over-year constant currency revenue decline will be similar to Q4 and our adjusted pretax income should be modestly higher than the $47 million we reported in last year's first quarter. On the topic of cash flow for the year as a whole, we project roughly $700 million of net capital expenditures in fiscal 2025 and about $725 million of depreciation expense. We expect to pay roughly $150 million in cash taxes. Unlike fiscal 2024, we won't have any below-the-line systems migration outlays. As a result, we're forecasting roughly 100% conversion of adjusted pretax income less cash taxes into free cash flow.

這兩項非現金變動的綜合影響將使我們的折舊費用年減約 5,000 萬美元。特別是第一季度，我們的固定貨幣收入年減幅度將與第四季度相似，調整後的稅前收入應略高於去年第一季報告的 4,700 萬美元。關於全年現金流，我們預計 2025 財年的淨資本支出約為 7 億美元，折舊費用約為 7.25 億美元。我們預計將繳納約 1.5 億美元的現金稅。與 2024 財年不同，我們不會有任何離線系統遷移支出。因此，我們預測調整後的稅前收入減去現金稅約 100% 轉化為自由現金流。

From a timing perspective, Q1 will be a significant user of cash due to annual software and incentive payments and subsequent quarters will be more favorable. Over the medium term, we remain committed to delivering significant margin expansion and generating free cash flow growth. We have a solid game plan to drive our strategic progress and this game plan starts with the steps we've already taken to expand our technology alliances, manage our costs and earn a return on all of our revenues. To wrap up, our business model centers around providing mission-critical services to large complex organizations that rely on our technology experts and insights to operate and advance their businesses.

從時間角度來看，由於年度軟體和激勵付款，第一季將成為現金的重要使用者，隨後的幾季將更加有利。從中期來看，我們仍然致力於實現利潤率的大幅擴張和自由現金流的成長。我們有一個堅實的遊戲計劃來推動我們的策略進展，這個遊戲計劃從我們已經採取的步驟開始，以擴大我們的技術聯盟，管理我們的成本並獲得我們所有收入的回報。總而言之，我們的業務模式圍繞著為大型複雜組織提供關鍵任務服務，這些組織依靠我們的技術專家和見解​​來運作和推進其業務。

Our leading market position in IT infrastructure services and the mission-critical nature of what we do, distinguish us from other providers of IT services. Our service levels and customer satisfaction scores make it clear that we serve our customers extremely well. And the growth we're delivering through our alliances with multiple technology providers further differentiates us. Our fiscal 2024 results demonstrate that we're successfully realizing the substantial opportunities we have, and we're fortunate to have a long, strong runway of additional growth opportunities in front of us.

我們在 IT 基礎設施服務方面的領先市場地位以及我們工作的關鍵任務性質，使我們有別於其他 IT 服務提供者。我們的服務水準和客戶滿意度評分清楚地表明我們為客戶提供的服務非常好。我們透過與多家技術提供者的聯盟實現的成長進一步使我們脫穎而出。我們 2024 財年的業績表明，我們正在成功實現我們所擁有的大量機遇，而且我們很幸運，我們面前有一條漫長而強勁的額外增長機會。

With that, Martin and I would be pleased to take your questions.

馬丁和我很樂意回答您的問題。

(Operator Instructions). And your first question comes from Divya Goyal with Scotiabank.

（操作員說明）。你的第一個問題來自豐業銀行的 Divya Goyal。

So David, you mentioned towards the end of your script about the macro resilience of Kyndryl, between Martin and yourself, you guys elaborate in the interest of investors, what makes Kyndryl so macro resilient despite a weakness being continuously noted across the technology services ecosystem. And what -- how would this resiliency help you if the interest rates were to truly not go down as anticipated at beginning of the year?

David，你在腳本的最後提到了關於Kyndryl 的宏觀彈性，在Martin 和你之間，你們為了投資者的利益而詳細闡述了，儘管整個技術服務生態系統不斷注意到一個弱點，但是什麼讓Kyndryl 如此具有宏觀彈性。如果利率確實沒有像年初預期的那樣下降，那麼這種彈性會對您有何幫助？

We feel really good about the year we just finished. And as I noted in my prepared remarks and you've heard it in David's as well, we're very excited about the year. I think what we're seeing, and I think what we've been focusing our investors on is the investments we've made in our people, the investments we've made to expand their skills, the investments we've made to build new capabilities combined with the investments we've made in our IP and our ability to turn our data into insights for our customers given the role we play in their environments. And again, we're mission-critical. So you combine great skills and engineering talent, new capabilities and innovation in the form of Kyndryl Bridge and actionable insights. And you put all of that into the context of business outcomes for customers in mission critical and I think you see why we see the momentum in our business and why it can continue to recognize that we have only gotten Kyndryl Bridge into about just over half of the customer base.

我們對剛結束的這一年感覺非常好。正如我在準備好的演講中指出的那樣，你們也在大衛的演講中聽到了這一點，我們對這一年感到非常興奮。我認為我們所看到的，我認為我們一直讓投資者關注的是我們對員工的投資，我們為擴展他們的技能而進行的投資，我們為建設新功能與我們在知識產權方面所做的投資以及我們將數據轉化為客戶洞察的能力相結合，考慮到我們在客戶環境中所扮演的角色。再說一次，我們的任務至關重要。因此，您可以將出色的技能和工程人才、Kyndryl Bridge 形式的新功能和創新以及可行的見解結合起來。您將所有這些都納入關鍵任務客戶的業務成果背景中，我想您會明白為什麼我們看到我們業務的勢頭，以及為什麼它可以繼續認識到我們只讓 Kyndryl Bridge 進入了大約一半以上客戶群。

So we have a lot more to do. And even with that deployment where we're generating about 3 million actionable insights for our customers per month, we have a lot more to get done. So look, we'll continue to invest in our skills. We'll continue to work with the ecosystem that matters to our customers. We'll continue to build new capabilities, and we'll continue to develop and deploy Kyndryl Bridge more broadly. And so as we move into a more consultative form of selling, which makes it very clear to our customers how our work is tied to business outcomes, I think we feel quite confident and quite good about our ability to keep momentum going in our consult business. Would you add anything, David?

所以我們還有很多事情要做。即使透過該部署，我們每月可以為客戶產生約 300 萬個可操作的見解，但我們還有很多工作要做。所以看，我們將繼續投資我們的技能。我們將繼續與對我們的客戶重要的生態系統合作。我們將繼續建立新功能，並繼續更廣泛地開發和部署 Kyndryl Bridge。因此，當我們轉向更具諮詢性的銷售形式時，這讓我們的客戶非常清楚我們的工作如何與業務成果聯繫在一起，我認為我們對保持諮詢業務勢頭的能力充滿信心和信心。大衛，你能補充點什麼嗎？

No, I'm good.

不，我很好。

And just as a follow-up on this very comment that you made, Kyndryl Consult. So obviously, it had an impressive growth this quarter itself. Considering how the Consult business broadly, again, broadly thinking about it, the consulting businesses have been a little bit constrained with respect to the dollars being allocated, but your Consult business has been growing impressively. So could you elaborate on what is it that's truly driving the significant growth and a reasonable run rate? I know David mentioned double digit. But what in our mind could be -- for ourselves, could be a reasonable run rate for the Consult business on a go-forward basis?

正如您所發表的評論的後續行動，Kyndryl Consult。顯然，本季它本身就取得了令人印象深刻的成長。考慮到諮詢業務的廣泛性，再次廣泛地思考它，諮詢業務在資金分配方面受到了一些限制，但您的諮詢業務一直在令人印象深刻地增長。那麼您能否詳細說明一下真正推動顯著成長和合理運行率的因素是什麼？我知道大衛提到了兩位數。但在我們看來，對我們自己來說，諮詢業務的合理運行率可能是什麼？

Yes. So a couple of things. And then obviously, I'll ask David if he wants to supplement. The nature of the Consult opportunities and the focus we have around infrastructure is one that -- is not discretionary, is one that really needs to be addressed no matter what the economic environment is. And when Kyndryl engages with a customer, and provides insights into how their systems are running, those insights can be geared toward helping them optimize their systems. In a macro environment, by the way, everyone is looking to drive productivity. So helping them optimize systems is something that our Consult business does quite well.

是的。有幾件事。顯然，我會問大衛是否想要補充。諮詢機會的本質以及我們圍繞基礎設施的關注點不是任意的，而是無論經濟環境如何都確實需要解決的問題。當 Kyndryl 與客戶互動並提供有關其係統運作方式的見解時，這些見解可以幫助他們優化系統。順便說一句，在宏觀環境中，每個人都希望提高生產力。因此，幫助他們優化系統是我們的諮詢業務做得非常好的事情。

Helping them, for instance, achieve their carbon reduction plans, which Kyndryl Bridge again can help them understand how they're creating carbon across their footprint, helping them keep up with global best practices from the myriad of technologies, helping them understand the monitoring, getting ahead of problems, all of these things, again, related to infrastructure, all of these things in the mission-critical world, will continue to drive our Consult business. From a run rate perspective, and again, I'll ask David to comment as well, when we started talking about Kyndryl Consult about 2.5 years ago, we identified already then that we had a bit of catching up to do, if you will, that we were -- we mixed very light in the advisory side and that we thought the growth path, a very solid double-digit growth path, we would have in front of us for quite a while. And I think that's what we're still experiencing. We are growing the mix of Kyndryl Consult within the overall Kyndryl revenue mix. We are continuing to hire consultants.

例如，幫助他們實現碳減排計劃，Kyndryl Bridge 再次可以幫助他們了解如何在其足跡中創造碳，幫助他們跟上各種技術的全球最佳實踐，幫助他們了解監控，提前解決問題，所有這些與基礎設施相關的事情，所有這些在關鍵任務領域的事情，將繼續推動我們的諮詢業務。從運行率的角度來看，我也會請 David 發表評論，大約 2.5 年前，當我們開始談論 Kyndryl Consult 時，我們當時就已經確定我們還有一些工作要做，如果你願意的話，我們在諮詢方面的混合非常少，我們認為成長路徑，非常穩固的兩位數成長路徑，我們將在相當長一段時間內面臨。我認為這就是我們仍在經歷的事情。我們正在增加 Kyndryl Consult 在整個 Kyndryl 收入組合中的組合。我們正在繼續聘請顧問。

So we're putting more feet on the ground to help, and we are deploying Kyndryl Bridge more broadly across the customer base in markets, by the way, that probably have a kind of a high single-digit growth rate to them. So we're gaining share across the consult space in the markets we serve. So I'll -- again, I'll ask David to comment, but I think we've got a really good long-term growth trajectory ahead of us in Kyndryl Consult. It is part of why we see ourselves getting back to overall revenue growth in the fourth quarter of this year. David?

因此，我們正在投入更多的精力來提供幫助，我們正在更廣泛地在市場的客戶群中部署 Kyndryl Bridge，順便說一句，這些市場的成長率可能很高。因此，我們在我們所服務的市場的諮詢領域中獲得了份額。所以我會——再次，我會請大衛發表評論，但我認為我們在 Kyndryl Consult 面前有一個非常好的長期成長軌跡。這也是我們預計今年第四季整體營收將恢復成長的部分原因。大衛？

That's right. And just to put a few numbers around that. In fiscal 2024, we saw our Consult revenue up 16% in constant currency. It's become about 15% of our business overall. We see it getting over the next few years to 20-ish percent of our business. And given that composition of our revenue mix that we have, it means our Consult business is already quite sizable, north of $2 billion a year. And as a result, the double-digit growth we're seeing has a really significant positive impact on us. From a strategic perspective and an operational perspective, the growth we're seeing in Consult really gives us confidence in our ability to drive growth in areas like Consult in hyperscalers that we focus on for growth.

這是正確的。只是為了提供一些數字。在 2024 財年，我們的諮詢收入以固定匯率計算成長了 16%。它已占我們整體業務的 15% 左右。我們預計它在未來幾年內將占我們業務的 20% 左右。考慮到我們的收入組合的組成，這意味著我們的諮詢業務已經相當可觀，每年超過 20 億美元。因此，我們看到的兩位數成長對我們產生了非常重大的正面影響。從策略角度和營運角度來看，我們在 Consult 中看到的成長確實讓我們對推動我們重點關注的超大規模企業中的 Consult 等領域的成長充滿信心。

And we're confident that, that bodes really well for our return to growth later this year. And then the last thing I'd mention about Consult that's really important is that ideally, we're doing advisory work and implementation work in Consult that then gives rise to a managed services tail. So it actually is a positive feeder not only in its own right as a source of revenue growth that tends to have attractive margins associated with it, it also drives managed services revenues over time in many cases as well.

我們相信，這對我們今年稍後恢復成長來說是個好兆頭。關於 Consult，我要提到的最後一件事非常重要，理想情況下，我們在 Consult 中進行諮詢工作和實施工作，然後產生託管服務尾端。因此，它實際上是一個積極的供給者，不僅本身作為收入成長的來源，往往具有有吸引力的利潤，而且在許多情況下，隨著時間的推移，它還會推動託管服務收入。

Your next question comes from the line of Tien-Tsin Huang with JPMorgan.

你的下一個問題來自摩根大通黃天欽的專線。

I want to ask on signings. I know you mentioned the inflection and you've been marching towards that for a bit. But new logo versus renewals, any comments on pricing? I know that, in general, you're doing some transition with respect to pricing, the back book, but we're still hearing a lot of commentary around difficulty in getting projects started and difficulty in pricing and whatnot. So I'm just curious around all of that.

我想問一下關於簽名的事情。我知道你提到了這種變化，並且你已經朝著這個方向邁進了一段時間。但是新標誌與更新，定價有什麼評論嗎？我知道，總的來說，你們正在對定價、後書進行一些過渡，但我們仍然聽到很多關於專案啟動困難、定價困難等的評論。所以我只是對這一切感到好奇。

Tien-Tsin, thank you for the nice comments. So a few things on signings. As you know, as we've described very consistently, as we focused on moving the business away from low, no and negative margin business that has had an impact on the overall signings, but that's part of why we've driven so much progress in profit. So that focus continues to diminish over time. We made a lot of progress last year, and we drove a lot of profit progress while doing that. And even with the focus on profit, we managed to get a little bit of growth, right, low single-digit growth out of the overall signings number last year. And we would expect that we will continue to build on that base.

田進，謝謝您的精彩評論。那麼關於簽約的一些事情。如您所知，正如我們一直以來所描述的那樣，我們專注於使業務擺脫低利潤、無利潤和負利潤的業務，這些業務對整體簽約產生了影響，但這也是我們取得如此大進展的部分原因在利潤中。因此，隨著時間的推移，這種關注度會不斷減弱。去年我們取得了很大的進步，同時我們也取得了巨大的利潤進步。即使重點關注利潤，我們還是成功地實現了一點成長，對吧，去年的總簽約數量只有低個位數成長。我們希望我們將繼續在此基礎上發展。

Within that, as we've talked about, we focused on our customer base. We focused on expanding our relationships and wallet share within our customer base. So we are getting a fair bit of new scope within the existing customer base. And I know you made a distinction, a brand-new logo. Yes, we're winning some new customers, some entirely new customers. It just hasn't been a focus for us. However, having seen what our teams can execute within our customer base around new scope, having seen the positive response to the capabilities we've built and having seen the positive response to the innovation we're bringing, once we turn our sights toward new customers in earnest and at scale, I'm confident that not only will we grow the scope within our customer base, but we'll bring on new logo as well in order to drive continued revenue growth path over the long term.

正如我們所討論的，我們將重點放在我們的客戶群。我們專注於擴大我們在客戶群中的關係和錢包份額。因此，我們在現有客戶群中獲得了相當多的新範圍。我知道你做出了區分，一個全新的標誌。是的，我們正在贏得一些新客戶，一些全新的客戶。這只是我們關注的焦點。然而，一旦我們將目光轉向新的領域，我們的團隊可以在客戶群中圍繞新的範圍執行哪些操作，看到對我們構建的功能的積極響應，並看到對我們帶來的創新的積極響應。

Okay. Very good. Just then my quick follow-up just on gross margins were very healthy ahead of what we had. Do you feel like you're in a good place from a delivery standpoint? I know different pockets of the world are seeing different issues with respect to tech labor. Do you feel like you're in a good place? I know some of the workforce rebalancing is calming down here as well, but any updated thoughts there?

好的。非常好。就在那時，我對毛利率的快速跟進非常健康，超出了我們的預期。從交付的角度來看，您覺得自己處於一個好的位置嗎？我知道世界不同地區在技術勞動力方面面臨不同的問題。你覺得自己處在一個好地方嗎？我知道這裡的一些勞動力再平衡也正在平靜下來，但是那裡有什麼最新的想法嗎？

Yes. I mean, again, I'll ask David for his comments as well. Look, our delivery remains world-class. Our delivery is the reason our customers are willing to take the journey with us into new spaces. It's the reason they're willing to engage with us and our alliance partners in new scope. And the team -- our team has done a phenomenal job for the last 2.5 years and delivering every day and our focus around advanced delivery and our focus around Kyndryl Bridge has always been part of helping that. It has always been focused on delivering even higher quality, automating more so that our customers have a better experience.

是的。我的意思是，我也會再一次徵求大衛的意見。看，我們的交付仍然是世界一流的。我們的交付是客戶願意與我們一起踏上新空間之旅的原因。這就是他們願意在新範圍內與我們和我們的聯盟夥伴合作的原因。我們的團隊在過去 2.5 年裡做得非常出色，每天都在交付，我們對先進交付的關注以及對 Kyndryl Bridge 的關注始終是幫助實現這一目標的一部分。它始終專注於提供更高的品質和更多的自動化程度，以便我們的客戶獲得更好的體驗。

So I feel -- touchwood, I feel like the role we play, which our teams take very seriously, the role we play in our customers' mission-critical environments is the one that motivates them every day to get up and deliver great service. And I think we're doing that.

所以我覺得 - touchwood，我覺得我們所扮演的角色，我們的團隊非常重視，我們在客戶的關鍵任務環境中扮演的角色是激勵他們每天起來提供優質服務的角色。我認為我們正在這樣做。

Yes. I think that's right. The gross margin improvement that we delivered last year is in the 300 basis point range. So we're making a tremendous amount of progress there. And I feel really good about where we are from a delivery perspective for 2 reasons. Number one, through our advanced delivery initiative, we've driven a substantial amount of progress, reaching $575 million of annualized savings already, it shows the progress that we've made, and we continue to have opportunity to drive incremental efficiencies from where we are and intention. That's one of the reasons we've increased the ultimate goal for advanced delivery from the $600 million we had initially targeted to $800 million now. So it's a sign that we've got more runway and more benefits still to be gained in this area.

是的。我認為這是對的。我們去年實現的毛利率改善在 300 個基點範圍內。因此，我們正在這方面取得巨大進展。從交付的角度來看，我對我們的現狀感到非常滿意，原因有二。第一，透過我們的先進交付計劃，我們取得了巨大進展，年化節省額已達到 5.75 億美元，這表明了我們所取得的進展，並且我們繼續有機會提高效率是和意圖。這就是我們將提前交付的最終目標從最初的 6 億美元提高到現在的 8 億美元的原因之一。因此，這表明我們在這一領域還有更多的跑道和更多的好處有待獲得。

Your next question comes from the line of Jamie Friedman with Susquehanna.

你的下一個問題來自傑米·弗里德曼（Jamie Friedman）與薩斯奎哈納（Susquehanna）的對話。

Congratulations for the hard work here this year. I wanted to ask particularly about the accounts in the 3As on Page 15. I'm just wondering, Martin and David, if I could get your perspective as to why that -- because this is a key part of the investment thesis, why that seems to be performing better and faster with the $300 million of year-over-year earnings benefit. Why is that exceeding your expectations?

恭喜你們今年在這裡的辛勤工作。我想特別詢問第 15 頁 3A 中的帳戶。美元的同比盈利收益，該公司似乎表現得更好更快。為什麼這超出了你的預期？

Yes, so a few things. Thank you also for the nice comments. Look, when we began and laid out the strategy, the 3A strategy, particularly on account focus, we felt very confident that our customers would engage and come with us on this journey because of the role we play in their environments because of the trust that we've built up over years and years and years, and the fact is, we're really good at what we do. So they love the engineering talent, they love the services we provide. So we were very confident in that. Now having said that, we also made a bunch of assumptions around the timing for these and what the ultimate landing spot would be as in how much content will come out, how much new scope will we get?

是的，有幾件事。也感謝您的好評。看，當我們開始製定策略、3A 策略，特別是以客戶為中心時，我們非常有信心我們的客戶會參與並與我們一起踏上這段旅程，因為我們在他們的環境中發揮作用，因為我們對客戶的信任我們經過多年的積累，事實是，我們真的很擅長我們所做的事情。所以他們喜歡工程人才，喜歡我們提供的服務。所以我們對此非常有信心。話雖如此，我們還圍繞這些時間安排以及最終落地點做出了一系列假設，例如將發布多少內容，我們將獲得多少新範圍？

What's the quarter in which or the year in which some of these customers will all align to get to a new relationship and sort of reenergize these relationships? And so we made a bunch of assumptions and the fact is that while we were confident going in with the basis for the strategy, we didn't know how long it would take. We didn't know what they would look like on the other side, and we didn't know what ultimately the ins and outs, the puts and takes would be in these relationships. And what's turned out is that they are as enthusiastic. Our customer base is as enthusiastic to work their way through these as we expected and we're just getting them done a bit faster.

其中一些客戶將在哪個季度或哪年齊心協力建立新的關係並重新啟動這些關係？所以我們做了很多假設，事實是，雖然我們對策略的基礎充滿信心，但我們不知道需要多長時間。我們不知道他們在另一邊會是什麼樣子，我們也不知道這些關係最終的來龍去脈、得失會是什麼樣子。事實證明，他們同樣熱情。正如我們預期的那樣，我們的客戶群熱衷於解決這些問題，而且我們只是做得更快一些。

And I think that's because we have invested heavily in new capabilities. So we show up with new ideas. We've invested heavily in innovation. So we show up with new tools, a new platform to help them get more insights and we put all of that into a context of a business outcome for them. So it makes it easy to understand and easy to see why this will be better for us and obviously be better for them as well.

我認為這是因為我們在新功能上投入了大量資金。所以我們提出了新的想法。我們在創新方面投入了大量資金。因此，我們提供了新工具、新平台來幫助他們獲得更多見解，並將所有這些都融入他們的業務成果中。因此，這使得我們很容易理解，也很容易明白為什麼這對我們更好，顯然對他們也更好。

And remember, all of this was in the context of how do we accelerate it from just its natural renewal periods which extend well out into next 6, 7, 8 years. So we made a lot of assumptions. We've -- the investments we've made in our people, in the ecosystem and in our IP and data are paying off and customers see the benefit to sort of resetting, if you will, these relationships, and they're better off. And obviously, we're better off.

請記住，所有這一切都是在我們如何加速它從自然更新期延伸到未來 6、7、8 年的背景下進行的。所以我們做了很多假設。我們對員工、生態系統、智慧財產權和數據的投資正在獲得回報，客戶看到了重置這些關係的好處，如果你願意的話，他們會過得更好。顯然，我們的情況更好。

Okay. And then for my follow-up, David, you were going kind of quick there and there was something you said that I don't actually see in the slides, but I'm sure it's me, not you. But when you were talking about the $575 million, I may have misheard, I apologize, but I thought that you annualized the savings, I thought related to rescaling, but it doesn't seem to be in the transcript. How are you annualizing the $575 million?

好的。然後，大衛，我的後續行動，你講得很快，你說的有些話我實際上在幻燈片中沒有看到，但我確信是我，而不是你。但是當你在談論5.75億美元時，我可能聽錯了，我很抱歉，但我以為你對節省進行了年度化，我認為與重新調整有關，但它似乎沒有在記錄中。您如何將這 5.75 億美元年化？

Yes. So the $575 million is the benefit that we're getting from advanced delivery compared to where we started. So in fiscal '23 -- at the end of fiscal '23, we were at a $275 million run rate from advanced delivery and by the end of fiscal '24, we had increased that by $300 million to a $575 million annual run rate, and we expect that to continue to grow from there. So that's really the key numbers, the key measure of our progress there that we point to.

是的。因此，與我們開始時相比，5.75 億美元是我們從提前交付中獲得的收益。因此，在 23 財年，在 23 財年末，我們的提前交付運行率為 2.75 億美元，到 24 財年末，我們將其增加了 3 億美元，達到 5.75 億美元的年運行率。數字將繼續增長。因此，這確實是關鍵數字，也是我們指出的衡量進展的關鍵指標。

Your next question comes from the line of David Togut with Evercore ISI.

您的下一個問題來自 Evercore ISI 的 David Togut。

I apologize if this has been asked as there are several calls this morning, but the strength in demand for Kyndryl Consult was notable, particularly against the consulting industry environment, which has been under pressure. Of course, Kyndryl Consult is nondiscretionary and the weaknesses elsewhere are really more in discretionary related demand. But could you go a level deeper on demand drivers for Kyndryl Consult? In particular, how durable those demand drivers are if we look to FY '25 and beyond?

如果有人問這個問題，我深表歉意，因為今天早上有幾通電話，但對 Kyndryl Consult 的需求強勁是值得注意的，特別是在諮詢行業環境一直面臨壓力的情況下。當然，Kyndryl Consult 是非自由裁量權的，其他地方的弱點實際上更多地在於與自由裁量權相關的需求。但您能否更深入了解 Kyndryl Consult 的需求驅動因素？特別是，如果我們展望 25 財年及以後，這些需求驅動因素的持久性如何？

Sure, David. Thank you for the nice comment. Kyndryl Consult has come up, and we do recognize that the performance that we're delivering and our view is not what you're seeing in many other places. And I think the reasons for that, which I'm going to talk about, the reasons for that are enduring and in fact, can continue, I think, for a period of time. So at our heart, as we've been talking about, we've been investing quite heavily in our team skills, we've been investing heavily in building new capabilities, and we've been investing quite heavily in building out our IP and the use of our data around Kyndryl Bridge.

當然，大衛。謝謝你的好評論。 Kyndryl Consult 已經出現，我們確實認識到我們所提供的性能和我們的觀點與您在許多其他地方看到的不同。我認為我將要討論的原因是持久的，事實上，我認為可以持續一段時間。因此，從本質上講，正如我們一直在談論的那樣，我們一直在團隊技能方面投入大量資金，在建立新能力方面投入大量資金，在建立我們的智慧財產權和使用 Kyndryl 大橋周圍的數據。

And so as our teams engage with new capabilities, with innovation and with relevant business outcome-oriented ideas for our customers to pursue in this environment, in any environment, which can be around, for instance, how to optimize their systems, everyone is interested in productivity in a macro environment like this around resiliency, around how to get ready, for instance, for Gen AI, et cetera, because of the role we play in their environments and the mission-critical nature of what we do, those investments are paying off and we expect them to continue.

因此，當我們的團隊致力於新的能力、創新和相關的以業務成果為導向的想法，讓我們的客戶在這種環境中、在任何環境中追求時，例如，如何優化他們的系統，每個人都感興趣在像這樣的宏觀環境中的生產力方面，圍繞著彈性，圍繞著如何為人工智慧做好準備等等，因為我們在他們的環境中扮演的角色以及我們所做的事情的關鍵任務性質，這些投資是得到了回報，我們希望他們能夠繼續下去。

And in fact, keep in mind that Kyndryl Bridge is only in about half of our customer base as we sit here today. So as we continue to build new capabilities with our alliance partners, as we continue to invest in Kyndryl Bridge and bring new functionality and make more use of our data across a broader element -- a broader piece of our customer base, I see the enduring nature of why we're outperforming, why we're performing differently than what you see from others, I think that continues.

事實上，請記住，當我們今天坐在這裡時，Kyndryl Bridge 只占我們客戶群的大約一半。因此，當我們繼續與聯盟合作夥伴建立新功能時，當我們繼續投資Kyndryl Bridge 並帶來新功能並在更廣泛的元素（更廣泛的客戶群）中更多地利用我們的數據時，我看到了持久的趨勢為什麼我們表現出色，為什麼我們的表現與你從其他人那裡看到的不同，我認為這種情況仍在繼續。

Yes. And when you think about some of the initiatives we've been pursuing, we really see Consult at the nexus of them. It's an area of focus in and of itself, but Kyndryl Bridge gives rise to additional Consult opportunities and consultative selling opportunities. The alliances we have are very helpful from a Consult perspective. Our practices are driving progress there, particularly in areas like cloud migration and mainframe modernization and security and resiliency and obviously, Apps, Data and AI and even regulatory changes like DORA, the Digital Operational Resilience Act in the EU is giving rise to additional needs for Consult work on our behalf. So we really see that -- we see Consult benefiting from a number of different initiatives and actions we've taken and even some elements of the macro environment.

是的。當你想到我們一直在追求的一些舉措時，我們確實看到了諮詢與這些舉措之間的關聯。它本身就是一個重點領域，但 Kyndryl Bridge 帶來了額外的諮詢機會和諮詢銷售機會。從諮詢的角度來看，我們的聯盟非常有幫助。我們的實踐正在推動那裡的進步，特別是在雲端遷移和大型主機現代化以及安全性和彈性等領域，顯然，應用程式、數據和人工智慧，甚至像DORA、歐盟數位營運彈性法案這樣的監管變化正在引發額外的需求代表我們諮詢工作。因此，我們確實看到了這一點——我們看到 Consult 受益於我們採取的許多不同舉措和行動，甚至宏觀環境的一些因素。

Understood. And then just as a quick follow-up, your guide to return to revenue growth or to achieve revenue growth in 4Q of FY '25 seems a little early relative to the initial kind of spin presentation you gave. Is that a correct conclusion? And if so, what gives you the incremental confidence that you can get to revenue growth in 4Q FY '25?

明白了。然後，作為快速跟進，您關於恢復收入增長或在 25 財年第四季度實現收入增長的指南相對於您最初給出的旋轉演示似乎有點早。這是正確的結論嗎？如果是這樣，是什麼讓您對 25 財年第四季的營收成長充滿信心？

So we've -- for 2.5 years since we've laid out the investment thesis 2.5 years ago, we said calendar '25 is the year in which we would get back to revenue growth. And really, what we're saying now is that -- and obviously, calendar '25 starts in our fourth fiscal quarter. So really, what we're saying is that because of the progress we've made in the 2 growth sectors, which we've always been counting on to drive us back to growth, Kyndryl Consult and the alliances as an example, and the fact that we've done the hard work, the deepest part of the work last year around focus accounts and cleaning out the backlog and we've eliminated or neutralized, if you will, the other areas that we've been trying to take out of our business like low margin, no margin OEM that we are confident now in the calendar '25, which we're still confident in calendar '25, actually can translate to fourth quarter of this year, which is the beginning.

因此，自 2.5 年前提出投資論以來，我們已經在 2.5 年間表示，25 年後我們將恢復收入成長。事實上，我們現在要說的是——顯然，25 日曆年從我們的第四個財政季度開始。所以說真的，我們所說的是，由於我們在兩個成長領域取得了進展，我們一直指望這兩個領域能夠推動我們恢復成長，以 Kyndryl Consult 和聯盟為例，事實上，我們已經完成了艱苦的工作，去年圍繞著重點客戶和清理積壓工作進行了最深入的工作，如果你願意的話，我們已經消除或中和了我們一直試圖取消的其他領域我們現在對25 年日曆充滿信心，例如低利潤、無利潤OEM 業務，我們對25 年日曆仍然充滿信心，實際上可以轉化為今年第四季度，這是一個開始。

So for those who interpreted calendar '25 as maybe second half versus first half, so we're probably a bit more accelerated than what they would have thought. But look, we've got all the momentum, we've gotten a lot of -- we've chopped a lot of wood last year around what the inhibitors to growth were, and we got great momentum in the growth drivers. So we feel good about it.

因此，對於那些將 25 日曆解釋為下半場與上半場的人來說，我們的速度可能比他們想像的要快一些。但是看，我們已經獲得了所有的動力，我們已經獲得了很多——去年我們圍繞增長的抑制因素砍掉了很多木材，並且我們在增長動力方面獲得了巨大的動力。所以我們對此感覺良好。

Thanks, David. Operator, I believe that was our last question in the queue.

謝謝，大衛。接線員，我相信這是我們隊列中的最後一個問題。

Yes. So that will conclude our question-and-answer session for today. And I will now turn the conference back over to Mr. Martin Schroeter for closing remarks.

是的。我們今天的問答環節就到此結束。現在我將把會議轉回馬丁·施羅特先生致閉幕詞。

Thank you, operator. Thanks, and thanks everybody for joining us. Look, you -- I hope you can hear how proud we are and how energized we are by the progress we've made in the last fiscal year and how our very unique run and transform approach is resonating with and adding a lot of value to our customers because it allows them to continuously innovate while maintaining their operational excellence, which in the spaces where we operate mission-critical is absolutely vital.

謝謝你，接線生。謝謝，也謝謝大家加入我們。聽著，我希望您能聽到我們對上一財年所取得的進展感到多麼自豪和充滿活力，以及我們非常獨特的營運和轉型方法如何引起共鳴並為其增加很多價值。它使他們能夠不斷創新，同時保持卓越運營，這在我們執行關鍵任務的空間中絕對至關重要。

So we're in a fantastic position as we start this fiscal year. We've got many, many opportunities to win, and we're going to capitalize on those opportunities in order to drive profitable growth. As we look ahead to our third year as an independent company, I remain as excited as ever about the growth potential in front of us and our foundational progress to date allows us to continue serving our customers' mission-critical needs with more capabilities and more innovation than ever before. So thanks again for joining us.

因此，在本財年開始之際，我們處於有利的地位。我們有很多很多獲勝的機會，我們將利用這些機會來推動獲利成長。當我們展望作為一家獨立公司的第三年時，我對我們面前的成長潛力一如既往地感到興奮，迄今為止我們取得的基礎性進展使我們能夠繼續以更多的能力和更多的能力來滿足客戶的關鍵任務需求。再次感謝您加入我們。

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's call. And we thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.

女士們、先生們，今天的電話會議到此結束。我們感謝您的參與。您現在可以斷開連線。