Freightos Limited Ordinary shares (NASDAQ:CRGO) Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Ran Shalev: Thanks, Zvi. Revenue for Q3 ’23 was $5.1 million, up 9% compared to Q3 of ’22 or 7% on a constant currency basis. Total platform revenues in the third quarter were $1.8 million, flat compared to last year, while solutions revenue was $3.3 million, up 14% from Q3 of last year. Profitability measures improved significantly with IFRS gross margin at 54.9%, the same as in Q3 of last year, but non-IFRS gross margins increased to 69.5% compared to 63.5% in Q3 of last year, up 600 basis points. Compared to Q2 of ’23, non-IFRS gross margin was up 450 basis points. The factors that drove the increased margin in Q3 were the organization we implemented at the beginning of the quarter and other efficiencies. We believe these efficiencies are sustainable going forward and expect our non-IFRS gross margins to remain at around 68% to 70% in the coming quarters.

Adjusted EBITDA in Q3 ’23 was negative $4.1 million compared to a negative $3.4 million in Q3 of ’22, primarily due to the cost of being a public company. On the other hand, the EBITDA of negative $4.1 million in Q3 compared to negative $5.3 million in Q2 of this year, the improvement of $1.2 million primarily reflects cost savings due to the reorganization done. We remain committed to navigating a balance between the need to grow while controlling costs. We reiterate our expectations to be able to reach breakeven with the existing cash at hand. Our cash balance at the end of September, including bank deposits and short-term investments, was a healthy $55.2 million compared to $61 million at the end of June. We’re very pleased with our modest cash burn, which is very close to our adjusted EBITDA.

As mentioned before, we are currently fully funded and believe we have the resources and business momentum required to become the international freight digital ecosystem leader we envision. Let’s move to our Q4 ’23 guidance. We believe we will grow transactions across our platform in between 273,000 and 284,000, reflecting a year-on-year growth rate of between 30% to 35%. Gross booking volume is expected to continue to grow less than the number of transactions due to industry freight rates. We expect Q4 ’23 GBV range between $163.5 million and $175 million. We anticipate generating between $5.1 million and $5.3 million in revenues in Q4, representing a growth of between 4% and 10%. Adjusted EBITDA losses are expected to be between $4.7 million to $4.4 million.

A – Anat Earon-Heilborn: Thank you, Ran. Zvi and Ran will now take your questions. Jason Helfstein, Oppenheimer.

Jason Helfstein: Thanks. Good afternoon, everybody. Thoughts and best wishes with all your employees in Israel and all those affected.

Zvi Schreiber: Thanks, Jason.

Jason Helfstein: Just a few questions, one, it obviously makes sense. Platform revenue highly ties to, I mean, particularly like pricing trends you’re seeing. Maybe just for the audience, help us understand how solutions revenue tracks, how it ties back to macro factors, and how you’re thinking about that, broader next year? That’s question one. And then question two, sales and marketing, I think it’s the highest levels of percent of gross bookings and revenue this year. How much of that is a function of the revenue? What are you doing to kind of lean into sales and marketing? How are you thinking about your ability to drive growth next year through your initiatives as opposed to just whatever the macro factors are? Thanks.

Zvi Schreiber: Thanks, Jason, and it was great seeing you last week. Yes, in terms of solutions revenue, it’s not directly tied to transactions as you correctly guessed. It’s subscriptions. It’s tied to the number of users. But take into account that most of our revenue is selling to freight forwarders. And freight forwarders, I don’t need to tell you, are reporting revenue down tens of percent, profit down tens of percent, losses in some cases, so it just makes it much harder to sell software to them. I think we did well to preserve and start to increase our revenue when our customers are hurting quite badly. There’s not a direct connection, but there’s certainly a strong indirect connection with the macro. In terms of sales and marketing to the — Ran, do you want to comment about sales and marketing costs?

Ran Shalev: Yes, sure. I think — hi, Jason. I think it’s in line with our expectations in terms of how we’ve budgeted it originally. We are balancing between the need to grow the revenues and the need to grow transactions, and we are hiring based on needs only. And only when we see incremental growth in both of the KPIs, that’s when we are hiring; same will apply for 2024. We’re not anticipating, obviously, increases in S&M versus revenues on the contrary. So my guess is that you will see noted continuations of growth in all parameters.

Jason Helfstein: So if can follow-up, can you comment on how you think solutions revenue would lay out next year relative to macro? And then just the housekeeping, G&A was up a lot sequentially. Were there any one-time items in G&A this quarter? Thanks.

Zvi Schreiber: Ran, you should take this, please.