Zepp Health Corp (ZEPP) 2020 Q1 法說會逐字稿

Hello, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by for Huami Corporation's First Quarter 2020 Earnings Conference Call. (Operator Instructions) Today's conference call is being recorded.

I will now turn the call over to your host, Ms. Grace Zhang, Director of Investor Relations for the company. Please go ahead, Grace.

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Huami Corporation's First Quarter 2020 Earnings Conference Call. The company's financial and operating results were issued in a press release via Newswire services earlier today and are posted online. You can also view the earnings press release and the slides to which we will refer on this call by visiting the IR section of the company's website at www.huami.com/investor.

Participating in today's call are Mr. Wang Huang, our Chairman of the Board of Directors and Chief Executive Officer; and Mr. David Cui, our Financial -- Chief Financial Officer. The company's management will begin with prepared remarks, and the call will conclude with a Q&A session. Mr. Mike Yeung, our Chief Operating Officer, will join us for the Q&A session.

Before we continue, please note that today's discussion will contain forward-looking statements made under the safe harbor provision of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. As such, the company's actual results may be materially different from the views expressed today. Further information regarding this and other risks and uncertainties is included in the company's annual report on Form 20-F of fiscal year ended December 31, 2019, and other filings as filed with the SEC with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The company does not assume any obligation to update any forward-looking statements, except as required under applicable law.

Please also note that Huami's earnings press release and this conference call include discussions of the unaudited GAAP financial information as well as unaudited non-GAAP financial measures. Huami's press release contains a reconciliation of the unaudited non-GAAP measures to the unaudited most directly comparable GAAP measures.

I'll now turn the call over to our CEO, Mr. Wang Huang. Please go ahead.

Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining our earnings conference call today. Our first quarter revenue continued a robust growth of 36.1% despite the unprecedented challenges created by the COVID-19 pandemic, driven by new product launches, increased brand recognition, successful sales and marketing strategies as well as efficient supply chain management.

At this year's CES, which took place in the first quarter, we launched the Amazfit T-Rex, a device with a military-certified body ideal for outdoor activity. This broadens our smartwatch portfolio to 7 product lines. We also introduced new product categories, including ear buds or hearables and interactive high-tech treadmills, both significant components in building a comprehensive health and fitness ecosystem as part of our Connect Health with Technology aspirations.

While we do not expect meaningful revenue contribution in the near term due to the time it takes to ramp up production and penetrate new market segments, new initiatives like these will create more opportunities for our company's future growth. We feel confident in this growth opportunity because wearable technologies and health techs not only help people monitor and track their physical fitness and well-being, but also potentially shape new behavior patterns and drive real changes of everyday lives. While wearables and health tech offer nearly unlimited applications across a number of product verticals, we have only begun to scratch the surface.

In the meantime, we continue to expand our footprint and have recently continued to make solid headway in international markets. We clearly focus on the market nuances of each key region and adopted a multichannel strategy, including both direct sales and third-party sales channels. We are now in more than 70 countries with 137 channel distributors and strong market share, showcasing the strength of our brand globally. According to the IDC fourth quarter 2019 report, we ranked #1 in market share for India, Indonesia and Spain under the smartwatch category, #3 in luxury and Mainland China and #6 in the U.S.

In terms of partnerships, our continued partnership with Xiaomi remains productive with the launch of the Mi Band 5 scheduled later in 2020. Additionally, our close collaboration with Timex has yield positive results with the first joint product launched in the first quarter. We should note, the sales of our Amazfit-branded products are through independent channels, which are explored by our own sales and marketing team.

Next, let me further discuss our health care strategy and the solid progress we made this year in health care. From the inception of our company, health care has been at the core of our mission. In 2020, we continue to build upon the strong foundation we have established by developing our cloud-based health care services through vertical operation with leading health care institutions.

For example, we partnered with the respiratory disease team of Dr. Zhong Nanshan to jointly establish a laboratory for studies on monitoring respiratory diseases using wearable devices. Dr. Zhong is the global leading epidemiologist and an academician of Chinese Academy of Engineering. He played a significant role as an adviser in managing the COVID-19 epidemic crisis. The focus at his lab is on the early prediction of certain respiratory diseases, specifically COVID-19, and how our smart wearables with our AI and big data advantages can help establish a cloud service system to provide epidemic prediction and diseases recovering monitoring. As such, we look forward to realizing further potential of our wearable devices in the health care industry.

On May 5, we published a research article on infectious disease prediction based on data from wearable devices in journals of Discrete Dynamics in Nature and Society by Hindawi. The premise of the published article will set the popularity of wearable devices enables a new perspective for the precaution of the infectious diseases. In this study, we proposed a framework, which is based on the heart rate and sleep data collected from wearable devices to predict the epidemic trend of COVID-19 in different countries, such as Spain and Italy, and different cities. The experiment result indicated that the prediction model can be utilized to alert the outbreak of COVID-19 in advance. This can be the foundation for a health surveillance system with wearable devices.

In addition, we signed a cooperation agreement with the China Athletics Association in March to become the official partner of China's national track and field team in the smart wearable industry. With our accumulated big data in both health care and our track record in smart hardware research and development, we look forward to helping the development of professional athletics. This collaboration also allows us to showcase the high quality of our products and help our marketing efforts. And we will continue to offer professional sports tracking services to all of our users.

In summary, while we were -- while we experienced some impact from the COVID-19 pandemic, we are confident the underlying demand for our products remains strong with our brand's rising popularity, our strengthening sales channels and new product innovations and line extensions in the works. We're pleased that the wearable technology will further shape the health care industry while helping people enjoy better health care services. We are excited about our unique positioning in connecting health with technology and the strong market potential in front of us. We will look to continue investing in R&D and sales and marketing functions to deliver sustainable growth and healthy profitability once the impact from the pandemic eases.

Thank you again for joining today. I will now turn the call over to our CFO, David Cui.

Thank you, Wang. We are pleased that with the resilience of our first quarter revenue growth during these uncertain times, we achieved solid unit sales of both self-branded products and Mi Band 4, shipping 7.6 million units in the first quarter, a 35.7% rise from the same period last year. Despite of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic that many other companies are also facing, we still kept our robust revenue growth of 36.1%, and we remained profitable in this challenging time period. This was driven by increasing brand awareness and adoption of our products by users, both domestically and in the overseas market.

During the first quarter, we continue to push investment in both R&D and sales and marketing as product innovation and sales channel integrate -- integrity are key components of our success. While we have seen some manufacturing shortage due to disruptions to our supply chain during the quarter, as we discussed during last quarter's earnings call, we are optimistic of stronger profitability in the longer term after the pandemic, along with its impact, runs its course.

Mindful of the length of this call, I will highlight the key financial measures for the quarter, and I encourage you to refer to our earnings press release for further details regarding our financial performance. Now here are some of the highlights of our strong first quarter. All amounts are expressed in RMB unless otherwise stated.

As previously mentioned, revenues in the first quarter 2020 increased by 36.1% to RMB 1.1 billion from RMB 0.8 billion for the first quarter of 2019. Gross profit increased by 12.5% to RMB 244.6 million from RMB 217.5 million in the first quarter of 2019. Our gross margin was 22.5% compared with 27.2% a year ago. The gross margin decrease was attributable to the change of product mix and sales promotion in previous product versions, especially for Mi Band 4, in anticipation of the launch of a newer-generation product.

Moving to expenses. Total operating expenses increased by 60.2% to RMB 224.1 million from RMB 139.9 million for the first quarter of 2019, reflecting our strategy of consistent investment in R&D with an emphasis on health care-related products, development and testing, talent acquisition, in addition to branding and marketing to enhance our company's long-term returns.

Research and development expenses increased 63.5% to RMB 118.3 million from RMB 72.4 million for the first quarter last year. We are striving for building up a top-tier R&D team for our future growth. The increase was primarily due to an increase in the number of R&D staff and a rise in investment in health care-related features, algorithms, cloud services, chip research and new product development as we carry out our mission. We aim to launch a series of new products in the upcoming quarters of this year.

General and administrative expenses increased 12.3% to RMB 50.9 million from RMB 45.3 million for the first quarter last year. This was primarily due to an increase in personnel-related expenses and professional fees related to improving management operations, offset by a decrease in share-based compensation expense and foreign exchange rate fluctuation.

Our selling and marketing expenses increased to RMB 54.8 million from RMB 22.2 million for the first quarter last year, primarily due to an increase in personnel-related expenses and an increase in advertising and promotional expenses for new market exploration and a series of new product releases. We hired more sales staff with heavy experience in overseas market expansion starting 2019 and continue to carry out our plan during this year.

In January 2020, we unveiled 4 new products spanning 3 verticals that go beyond smart bands and watches, including Amazfit HomeStudio, our smart gym hub; Amazfit AirRun, a foldable next-generation treadmill; Amazfit PowerBuds, true wireless stereo fitness earphones with Clip-to-Go design; and Amazfit ZenBuds, sleep comfort and health management earphones.

Our income before income tax was RMB 20.3 million compared with RMB 85.6 million for the first quarter of 2019. Net income attributable to ordinary shareholders of the company decreased to RMB 19.2 million.

Next, for non-GAAP measures, adjusted net income attributable to Huami Corporation decreased to RMB 25.5 million from RMB 95 million for Q1 2019. Relating to cash and cash equivalents, as of March 31, 2020, the company had cash and cash equivalents of RMB 2.5 billion compared with RMB 1.8 billion as of December 31, 2019.

Now let's turn to our outlook. In the second quarter, as the COVID-19 outbreak continues to impact the global economy, we expect our overseas sales demand will be affected. With all things considered, for second quarter 2020, management currently expects net revenues to be between RMB 1 billion to RMB 1.05 billion. The above outlook is based on the current market conditions and reflects the company's management's current and preliminary estimates of market and operating conditions and customer demand, which are all subject to change.

So this concludes our prepared remarks. We will now open the call to questions. Operator, please go ahead.

(Operator Instructions) And today's first question comes from Kyna Wong with Crédit Suisse.

I have 2 questions. So far, on the 2020 outlook, I think right now, we understood the COVID-19 impacting the overseas market in the quarter and then with some supply issue in the first quarter as well. What will be the outlook so far that -- I mean the 2020 company actually tried to control and to achieve even under this uncertainty driven by COVID-19 in the overseas market? I think this is the first thing that -- with regards to the outlook.

The second is, could you share with us if any target on the shipment on the smart band and also smartwatch, especially smartwatch this year, if you see, like, any adjustment for your original expectation?

Thank you for your question. Regarding your first question, we provided a guidance for the second quarter, which is near term and we can better estimate. In the longer term, in particular, in the second half of this year, the impact of the COVID-19, we cannot estimate it for a certain accuracy. So it really depends on how the situation develop. We couldn't estimate. But we do see some positive signs that in Europe, in China, our primary markets are -- the situation is getting better, and we would hope that our sales for our products will picking up in the second half. And we do expect that we will release a number of new products during this year in anticipation of the market recovery for the rest of the year.

So regarding your second question, the shipment estimates for our smartwatch products. And again, it really relates to the first question, we couldn't really estimate and really depends on the COVID-19 situation.

May I ask, like, if you see any signs that customers -- I would say consumers is actually increasing the awareness on the health care such that they will try to buy, like, the smartwatch or smart band to measure their health situations? Yes, I think after all this COVID-19 outbreak, I think there will be some positive support not only just because the containment is like getting better, but all the development in COVID-19 is more under control, et cetera. But do you see, like you say, awareness in health care from human beings or well-being -- the reason well-beings will be helpful to, like, for your point of sales?

Absolutely, absolutely. We do see from the COVID-19 pandemic, we do see increased awareness globally, and not just the demand of our products in the future, but also the general awareness to increase the possibility that we could introduce future services also. And as our CEO mentioned in the previous quotations, that Huami do engage a number of discussion, research and work with top-tier scientists in China and also global partners to step into -- to take on these opportunities because our mission is to Connect Health with Technology. So this -- the COVID-19 pandemic do introduce an opportunity for us, so yes.

And our next question today comes from Arthur Lai with Citi.

So I have 2 questions. I would like to ask one by one. The first one is we noticed that the company actually had a strong quarter 1 revenue despite the virus outbreak. Can you share what's the underlying driver? I guess you mentioned one thing is you do some promotion. And what else effort you do in order to maintain the revenue? That's my first question.

Okay. So 2 primary drivers for our revenue growth despite of COVID-19 pandemic. Number one is we continue to enjoy higher demand on Mi Band products. So the shipments of Mi Band 4 continue to grow year-to-year, and this is number one. Number two is we do see a significant demand increase of our smartwatch -- Amazfit smartwatch. So we see an increase in that. So the combination of these factors do offset by the reduced -- by the impact of the crisis.

Yes, yes. Okay. And the second question is more like on new product. So we know that you highlight, you do -- you already developed the chip business. Can you update us on any new business and also the feature in the future?

You mean the new product features, right?

Yes, yes, yes. The new watch features and also the IC features. You -- I think, like, last quarter, Hanzhong mentioned that they also have a second-generation IC technology. And anything you want to update to the investor?

As of today, this year, we've already launched a couple of the new products, which has been released. So -- and then the upcoming, we have more products, but we can't really disclose much of the details in terms of the technical aspect -- specifications. But we do see some new products with health-related features and, of course, fitness and ECG features. Those are the old features. But we do have new features to add on.

Got you. Good. And a quick follow-up...

And of course, we mentioned earlier that we do have to release -- we do have a plan to release Mi Band 5 in the year.

Okay. And we know that the coronavirus, they will impact the people's blood oxygen significantly. So do you think in our -- the upcoming product, can we detect the share -- the blood oxygen through your product?

Well, that's one of our near-term products.

Our next question today comes from Robert Cowell with 86Research.

I'd like to ask about the gross margin. So what are the factors kind of impacting the gross margin in 1Q both on a year-on-year and quarter-on-quarter basis? And then as we get into 2020, what do you expect in terms of trend on the gross margin?

Right. So the gross margin was primarily impacted by the Mi Band discount we provided to our channels in the quarter. And for the gross margin of Amazfit products, that wasn't changed much from this quarter -- from quarter-to-quarter. The primary reason was the Mi Band 4 because of the COVID-19 situation. And then we -- Xiaomi -- both Xiaomi and us, we wanted to give a higher discount to the channel given that we will soon release Mi Band 5.

In the long run, we would assume that new products will achieve better economy of scales in the later part of the year and also with a higher retail price. And depends on this pricing strategy, we would think for Xiaomi's products, we'll continue to provide a reasonable margin on that. And then for our Amazfit new products, we still strive to keep or even increase a little bit of our margin.

And our next question today comes from Xudong Chen with CICC.

And David, you just said you see some recovery in China market and that there are still some uncertainties outside China. Can you give us more color for this and especially in India and other -- like Western Europe since there are some lockdown in India and some store closing in those regions? And I will have a follow-up.

All right. For -- first of all, I want to emphasize that for Amazfit products, we primarily rely on our own independent sales channel to achieve the sales. And overseas is our primary market. So you can see a higher percentage of our products were shipped overseas. Therefore, markets like Europe did impact our first quarter and second quarter. But we do see positive signs that countries like Spain and Italy are opened up. And we do see that in quarter 3 -- starting quarter 3, we should see some consumers demand coming back. So that's one of our primary market, right?

And then the second market would be our domestic market. For domestic market, we invested heavily in domestic market channels right now. So hopefully, given some time, we should see some sales rebound for our Amazfit products. And in terms of the India market, it is -- that country is impacted greatly. But India -- sales in India wasn't -- represents -- it doesn't represent a significant percentage of revenue. So we will have to see how India goes.

Okay. And my second question is you just said you will release Mi Band 5 in this year. And did you see -- is this -- did you see the delay for those new products pipeline and R&D delay due to the COVID-19 impact?

No, we don't. Actually, our R&D -- actually, right after Chinese New Year, our R&D staff, our supply chain staff were out back. So we are now -- our Shenzhen global hardware center, our R&D research -- our R&D center in Hubei and Beijing are fully operational. So the R&D wasn't impacted. So we will release our products on time.

Thank you. As there are no further questions, now I'd like to turn the call back over to the company for closing remarks.

Thank you once again for joining us today. If you have further questions, please feel free to contact Huami Investor Relations department through the contact information provided on our website or The Piacente Group, the company's investor relations consultant.

This concludes the conference call. You may now disconnect your lines. Thank you.