Points.com Inc. (PCOM) 2022 Q1 法說會逐字稿

Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for participating in today's conference call to discuss Points Financial Results for the First Quarter Ended March 31, 2022. Delivering today's prepared remarks are Chief Executive Officer, Rob MacLean; President, Christopher Barnard; and Chief Financial Officer, Erick Georgiou. Following their prepared remarks, the management team will open the call for any questions.

大家下午好。感謝您參加今天的電話會議，討論 Points 截至 2022 年 3 月 31 日的第一季度財務業績。首席執行官 Rob MacLean 發表了今天準備好的講話；主席克里斯多福·巴納德；兼財務長 Erick Georgiou。在他們準備好發言後，管理團隊將開始電話詢問任何問題。

Before we go any further, I would like to turn the call over to Jackie Keshner of Gateway Group, Points IR Advisor, as she reads the company's safe harbor that provides important cautions regarding forward-looking statements. Jackie? Please go ahead, ma'am.

在我們進一步討論之前，我想將電話轉給 Points IR 顧問 Gateway Group 的 Jackie Keshner，她閱讀了該公司的安全港條款，其中提供了有關前瞻性陳述的重要警告。傑基？請繼續，女士。

Thank you. Please be reminded that the remarks on this conference call may contain or refer to forward-looking statements within the meaning of Canadian and U.S. securities laws. Management may also make additional forward-looking statements in response to your questions. Although management believes these forward-looking statements are reasonable, such statements are not guarantees of future performance or action and are subject to important risks and uncertainties that are difficult to predict.

謝謝。請注意，本次電話會議的言論可能包含或引用加拿大和美國證券法含義內的前瞻性陳述。管理階層也可能針對您的問題做出額外的前瞻性陳述。儘管管理階層認為這些前瞻性陳述是合理的，但此類陳述並不能保證未來的績效或行動，並且會受到難以預測的重要風險和不確定性的影響。

Certain material assumptions are applied in making forward-looking statements and may not prove to be correct. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially and the assumptions used in making such statements were included in our first quarter 2022 financial results press release issued prior to this call as well as other documents filed with the Canadian and U.S. securities regulators. Except as required by law, the company does not undertake any obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

在做出前瞻性陳述時採用了某些重大假設，但事實可能不正確。可能導致實際結果出現重大差異的重要因素以及做出此類聲明時使用的假設已包含在我們在本次電話會議之前發布的2022 年第一季財務業績新聞稿以及向加拿大和美國證券監管機構提交的其他文件中。除法律要求外，本公司不承擔任何更新或修改任何前瞻性聲明的義務，無論是由於新資訊、未來事件或其他原因。

With that said, I'll turn the call over to Point's Chief Executive Officer, Rob MacLean. Rob?

話雖如此，我會將電話轉給 Point 的執行長 Rob MacLean。搶？

Thanks, Jackie, and good afternoon, everyone. While we are here today to discuss our Q1 2022 performance, which Erick will touch on in a moment, I will focus my comments on the Plusgrade transaction we announced on Monday. As we disclosed, we have entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by Plusgrade, a market-leading technology company at the forefront of ancillary revenue and merchandising in the global travel industry. Under the terms of the transaction, Plusgrade will acquire Points in an all-cash transaction for a total consideration of approximately $385 million or $25 per share, representing a 52% premium to our 20-day volume weighted average as of the close of May 6.

謝謝，傑基，大家下午好。雖然我們今天在這裡討論我們 2022 年第一季的業績（艾瑞克稍後會談到），但我將重點放在我們週一宣布的 Plusgrade 交易。正如我們所揭露的，我們已達成最終協議，將被 Plusgrade 收購，Plusgrade 是一家市場領先的科技公司，處於全球旅遊業輔助收入和銷售的最前沿。根據交易條款，Plusgrade 將透過全現金交易收購 Points，總代價約為 3.85 億美元，即每股 25 美元，較截至 5 月 6 日收盤時的 20 天成交量加權平均值溢價 52% 。

This is a historic moment for Points and our senior management and Board are in full unanimous support of the transaction, which provides strategic benefits to both Points and Plusgrade. From an operational perspective, Plusgrade has extensive experience collaborating with airlines to improve booking optionality for their passengers as well as target customers who are likely to place quality offers on seat upgrades. Plusgrade's large partner base and core offerings are a strong complement to the growing platform capabilities and enduring partnerships we have built with our loyalty program partners.

對 Points 來說，這是一個歷史性時刻，我們的高階管理層和董事會完全一致支持這項交易，這為 Points 和 Plusgrade 都帶來了策略利益。從營運角度來看，Plusgrade 擁有與航空公司合作的豐富經驗，以提高乘客的預訂選擇性以及可能對座位升級提供優質優惠的目標客戶。 Plusgrade 龐大的合作夥伴基礎和核心產品是對不斷增長的平台功能以及我們與忠誠度計劃合作夥伴建立的持久合作夥伴關係的有力補充。

With our unique operating models, we believe there are a few other companies that would deliver similar strategic benefits to our respective businesses. From a financial perspective, the purchase price premium reflects the belief in our continued robust operating performance and expectations for growth in the future. We are grateful for the support our shareholders have shown us from the lows of the pandemic to the stronger position we occupy today, and we believe this transaction offers them a substantial premium over our current market value with the cash purchase price offering certainty of value and liquidity. Plusgrade is also a very credible purchaser with significant financial backing from both Novacap and CDPQ.

憑藉我們獨特的營運模式，我們相信還有一些其他公司可以為我們各自的業務帶來類似的策略利益。從財務角度來看，收購價格溢價反映了我們對持續強勁的經營業績的信心以及對未來成長的預期。我們感謝股東對我們的支持，從大流行的低谷到我們今天佔據的更強大的地位，我們相信這次交易為他們提供了比我們當前市值高得多的溢價，現金購買價格提供了價值的確定性和流動性。 Plusgrade 也是一個非常可信的購買者，獲得 Novacap 和 CDPQ 的大力財政支持。

From a strategic perspective, the Plusgrade transaction will enable us to better execute on our core growth drivers with expanded resources, greater breadth and more opportunities for diversification. As we plan to continue to invest in our business, we expect that combining with Plusgrade's robust platform and operating model will provide significant incremental scale and support to our growth initiatives. In an industry with ramping consumer demand and a strong appetite for growth among travel and hospitality operators, this partnership has come at a perfect time.

從策略角度來看，Plusgrade 交易將使我們能夠透過擴大資源、擴大業務廣度和更多多元化機會，更好地執行我們的核心成長動力。由於我們計劃繼續投資我們的業務，我們預計與 Plusgrade 強大的平台和營運模式相結合將為我們的成長計劃提供顯著的增量規模和支援。在這個消費者需求不斷成長且旅遊和旅館業者對成長有強烈需求的行業中，這種合作關係來得正是時候。

In our over 20 years of operations, our team has worked tirelessly to execute on our new business pipeline buying cross-sell opportunities to increase service deployments within our current partner base and continuously enhance the services we have in market. I'd like to thank the entire Points team for helping us reach the strong position we are in today as we prepare to enter our next phase of growth.

在我們 20 多年的營運中，我們的團隊孜孜不倦地努力執行我們的新業務管道，購買交叉銷售機會，以增加我們當前合作夥伴基礎中的服務部署，並不斷增強我們在市場上的服務。我要感謝整個 Points 團隊，在我們準備進入下一階段的成長之際，他們幫助我們取得了今天的強勢地位。

Joining forces with Plusgrade is what will become a truly global leader and provider of value-adding and revenue-generating services for partners in the airline, hospitality, rail and financial service industries is an exciting future. Additionally, we have benefited from a supportive group of shareholders over the past number of years and are pleased to have created this compelling outcome.

與 Plusgrade 聯手，將成為真正的全球領導者和為航空、酒店、鐵路和金融服務業的合作夥伴提供增值和創收服務的提供商，這是一個令人興奮的未來。此外，過去幾年我們也受惠於股東群體的支持，並且很高興創造了這一引人注目的成果。

I'll now hand it over to Erick, who will briefly review our financial performance for the first quarter, and then Christopher will provide some additional highlights and perspective on our partner activity. Erick?

現在我將把它交給艾瑞克，他將簡要回顧我們第一季的財務業績，然後克里斯托弗將提供一些關於我們合作夥伴活動的額外亮點和觀點。艾瑞克？

Thank you, Rob, and thanks for joining, everybody. As always, all figures on today's call are in U.S. dollars. Our first quarter results reflected continued execution on our core growth drivers and the ongoing demand for our products and services. We generated quarterly records for both total revenue and gross profit in the quarter. Total revenue in the first quarter of 2022 increased significantly to a quarterly record of $127.4 million, a 96% increase over the year ago quarter and an 11% increase over the fourth quarter of 2021.

謝謝你，羅布，也謝謝大家的加入。與往常一樣，今天電話會議上的所有數字均以美元為單位。我們第一季的業績反映了我們對核心成長動力的持續執行以及對我們產品和服務的持續需求。我們創造了該季度總收入和毛利的季度記錄。 2022 年第一季的總營收大幅成長，達到季紀錄的 1.274 億美元，比去年同期成長 96%，比 2021 年第四季成長 11%。

Gross profit in the first quarter of 2022 was $18.7 million, more than doubling from $9 million in the year ago quarter and growing 9% on a sequential basis. The increases in both metrics primarily reflected sustained performance improvements from our marketing activity and the benefit from pandemic recovery tailwinds with many of our partners continuing to generate strong organic growth. The U.S. remains our strongest market, largely driven by ongoing recovery trends across many hospitality and domestic airline operators.

2022 年第一季的毛利為 1,870 萬美元，比去年同期的 900 萬美元增長了一倍多，環比增長 9%。這兩項指標的成長主要反映了我們的行銷活動帶來的持續績效改進，以及我們的許多合作夥伴繼續產生強勁的有機成長，受益於大流行復甦的順風車。美國仍然是我們最強勁的市場，這主要是由許多酒店和國內航空公司營運商持續復甦趨勢所推動的。

Across our platform, we have also continued to benefit from the contributions of our newer partnerships and in-market services we deployed during the pandemic, which have ramped quickly over the past few years. Operating expenses increased sequentially and year-over-year in the first quarter of 2022 to $16.4 million, an increase from $10.2 million in the year ago quarter. The increase was attributable to the gradual easing of spending restrictions tied to the start of the pandemic, higher stock-based compensation and the effect of $1.2 million in wage subsidies we recorded in the year ago period, which had previously helped to offset our operating expenses.

在我們的平台上，我們也繼續受益於我們在大流行期間部署的新合作夥伴和市場服務的貢獻，這些服務在過去幾年中迅速增長。 2022 年第一季營運費用季增至 1,640 萬美元，高於去年同期的 1,020 萬美元。這一增長歸因於與大流行開始相關的支出限制的逐步放鬆、股票薪酬的提高以及我們去年同期記錄的 120 萬美元工資補貼的影響，這些補貼此前有助於抵消我們的運營支出。

Adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter of 2022 came in at $6.7 million, up significantly from $1.2 million in the year ago quarter and $5.5 million in the fourth quarter of 2021. The increases were primarily driven by our strong gross profit performance during the quarter. Turning to our balance sheet, the strong sales activity we had during the quarter generated total funds available of approximately $145 million at the end of Q1, up significantly from approximately $109 million at the end of 2021.

2022 年第一季調整後 EBITDA 為 670 萬美元，較上年同期的 120 萬美元和 2021 年第四季的 550 萬美元大幅成長。這一增長主要是由於我們在本季強勁的毛利表現。轉向我們的資產負債表，本季強勁的銷售活動在第一季末產生了約 1.45 億美元的可用資金總額，比 2021 年底的約 1.09 億美元大幅增加。

To summarize our first quarter performance, we continue to drive strong growth across our key financial metrics, driven by strong marketing activity and supported by sustained recovery related tailwinds, which increased transaction activity across the platform. While today's macro environment remains fluid and difficult to predict, we remain encouraged by our first quarter results and solid financial position and believe we will enter our next chapter of growth with Plusgrade from a position of strength. To echo Rob's earlier remarks, we believe the Plusgrade transaction comes at a very attractive valuation that provides strong value for our shareholders. We look forward to working with Plusgrade to drive progress on our growth strategy with even greater scale and resources.

總結我們第一季的業績，在強勁的營銷活動的推動和持續復甦相關的有利因素的支持下，我們繼續推動關鍵財務指標的強勁增長，這增加了整個平台的交易活動。儘管當今的宏觀環境仍然不穩定且難以預測，但我們仍然對第一季的業績和穩健的財務狀況感到鼓舞，並相信我們將與 Plusgrade 一起進入下一個成長篇章。與 Rob 先前的言論相呼應，我們相信 Plusgrade 交易的估值非常有吸引力，可以為我們的股東帶來巨大的價值。我們期待與 Plusgrade 合作，以更大的規模和資源推動我們的成長策略取得進展。

With that, I'll turn it over to Christopher.

這樣，我就把它交給克里斯多福。

Thanks, Erick. To review some of our commercial highlights from the quarter, much of our first quarter activity deepened our growing footprint in the Middle East and sustain the momentum we have generated with our exchange deployments. In February, we enabled Qatar Airways as an exchange option for the AIMIA's Air Miles Middle East program. Qatar joins Emirates Skywards and Etihad Airways Guest program as exchange options on the platform.

謝謝，埃里克。回顧本季的一些商業亮點，我們第一季的大部分活動加深了我們在中東不斷增長的足跡，並維持了我們透過交易所部署產生的勢頭。 2 月份，我們啟用卡達航空作為 AIMIA 中東航空哩程計畫的兌換選項。卡達加入阿聯酋航空 Skywards 和阿提哈德航空常旅客計劃，作為該平台上的兌換選項。

In addition, we also added Turkish Airlines, Miles&Smiles program as another transfer auction for Citibank's ThankYou program in February. Rounding out our progress in the Middle East, we signed new partnership with Kuwait Airways subsequent to the end of the first quarter. Under this agreement, we will deploy several of our core service offerings, including our Buy, Gift, Transfer and Top-Up products as well as Accelerate Anything. Turning to some of our long-running North American partnerships, we launched our car redemption product with Air Miles Canada in January, complementing the existing hotel booking service we have powered for several years.

此外，我們還增加了土耳其航空、Miles&Smiles 計劃，作為 2 月花旗銀行ThankYou 計劃的另一個轉讓拍賣。為了完善我們在中東的進展，我們在第一季末與科威特航空簽署了新的合作夥伴關係。根據該協議，我們將部署多項核心服務產品，包括購買、禮品、轉讓和充值產品以及 Accelerate Anything。談到我們在北美的一些長期合作夥伴關係，我們於一月份與加拿大航空里程推出了汽車兌換產品，補充了我們多年來提供的現有酒店預訂服務。

With this new deployment, program members can now earn or redeem their miles when making a car booking online. As we announced in March, we also renewed our long-standing partnership with Marriott Bonvoy to a multi-year extension. As we previously shared, we've been engaged with Marriott for well over a decade and have actively expanded and enhanced our end market services for them most recently, adding our Top-Up capability directly into their booking flow in the fourth quarter of 2021.

透過這項新部署，計劃會員現在可以在線上預訂汽車時賺取或兌換里程。正如我們在三月宣布的那樣，我們還將與萬豪旅享家的長期合作夥伴關係延長至多年。正如我們之前分享的，我們與萬豪合作已有十多年了，最近積極擴展和增強了我們為他們提供的終端市場服務，並於2021 年第四季度將我們的充值功能直接添加到他們的預訂流程中。

Finally, we made some additional international progress through deploying a new hotel booking service for EVA Air in March, our first service offering launched under our collaboration agreement with Rocket Travel, which we announced late last year. As Rob and Erick has mentioned, we are excited about our announcement earlier this week and feel that it represents a clear opportunity for our employees and partners moving forward. We are also pleased to have been able to engineer such a strong value for our shareholders.

最後，我們在三月為長榮航空部署了新的飯店預訂服務，取得了一些額外的國際進展，這是我們根據去年底宣布的與 Rocket Travel 的合作協議推出的第一項服務。正如 Rob 和 Erick 所提到的，我們對本週早些時候的公告感到興奮，並認為這為我們的員工和合作夥伴提供了一個明確的前進機會。我們也很高興能夠為股東創造如此強大的價值。

The significant premium reflects our long-term growth prospects and is backed up by blue-chip investors, offering our current shareholders both certainty and liquidity. I'd like to wrap up by offering thanks to our many long-term shareholders. We are very appreciative for the support we've received from you along the way. Thank you very much.

巨大的溢價反映了我們的長期成長前景，並得到了藍籌投資者的支持，為我們現有的股東提供了確定性和流動性。最後，我想向我們的許多長期股東表示感謝。我們非常感謝您一路以來給予我們的支持。非常感謝。

Operator, we can now open up the call for questions.

接線員，我們現在可以開始提問。

(Operator Instructions) So at this stage, it seems that there are no questions. I'd now like to turn the call back over to Mr. MacLean for any closing remarks.

（操作員指示）所以在這個階段，似乎沒有任何問題。現在我想將電話轉回給麥克萊恩先生，讓他作結束語。

Thank you, operator. We would like to thank everyone for listening to today's call. We appreciate your support as we enter the next chapter of our growth trajectory, and we look forward to providing additional updates on the transaction and our operations moving forward. Thanks again for joining us today.

謝謝你，接線生。我們要感謝大家收聽今天的電話會議。在我們進入成長軌蹟的下一個篇章之際，我們感謝您的支持，我們期待提供有關交易和我們未來運營的更多最新資訊。再次感謝您今天加入我們。

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that concludes today's conference. Thank you for joining us. You may now disconnect your lines.

謝謝。女士們、先生們，今天的會議到此結束。感謝您加入我們。現在您可以斷開線路。