Sequans Communications S.A. (NYSE:SQNS) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

So this remains a very solid segment. Telematic and asset tracking will be the second one. And then you will have more security, the third one. But we’re seeing this as very diversified as well. And as I said, it’s diversified in product as well because we have Cat 1 and Cat M addressing this market.

Craig Ellis: That’s helpful. And then, just lastly, before I hop in the queue, given that you’ve got nine customers and 20 projects with metering, are you basically penetrated in all the major metering companies globally, or where do you stand? Yes, go ahead.

Georges Karam: Absolutely. I mean, Craig, I don’t want to be — I’ll say, I’m a little bit prudent of saying I have all the top guys, but I could claim this, yes, from the top 10.

Craig Ellis: Congratulations on that. Yes, thanks, Georges. Thank you.

Georges Karam: Thank you.

Operator: Our next question comes from Raji Gill with Needham & Company. Please proceed with your question.

Nick Doyle: Hi, this is Nick Doyle on for Raji Gill. My question is, you talked about how Calliope 2 now has a competitive advantage. Can you expect market share gains? Could you just talk a little bit more about that?

Georges Karam: Hi, Nick. I mean, Calliope 2 what happened in the market that many people thought at some time when LTM were — was coming that LTM will jeopardize the Cat 1 market. And honestly, even me, I was thinking like this at the beginning. So for a while no one was investing in Cat 1 next-generation, milking what — whatever they have in hand and relying all on LTM NB-IoT. But as soon as we start playing, working with the customers and so on, and realizing the limitation of the LTM in some use cases, I felt like this is something we invest in. And there is really a space that remains extremely big and Sequans can make the difference. So we moved early in this, we invested when no one was investing there to come with this platform and practically the only guys who invested in this is Chinese.

We have some people that even licensed Chinese technology to bring it to Europe. And with this, give us really a competitive advantage because as you know, there is a sensitivity of playing Chinese, non-Chinese in many markets. So Sequans is unique in this and obviously, it’s a great product, very new, and that it reduced the cost structure by at least 30% versus the first-generation. So if you take a module first-generation, a module second-generation, you can cut the cusp by 30%, which is major for all new projects where they need Cat 1. We are in very, very good position. And obviously, you have some projects where they use even Cat 1 for coverage reason, not only for speed. So this is really why we feel very good about it. We have done three big wins last year in Q4.

We are developing the project with them, really major one. We have one of them exceeding $10 million, $50 million yearly revenue. And we have in the pipe a dozen of them, very, very advanced. Some maybe should close this quarter. If my sales team is, we are able to deliver on this, this quarter; we should close two, three more deals on this Cat 1. So we are very optimistic on this.

Nick Doyle: Thanks for that. And then another maybe technical question, why do the metering applications take longer to qualify? Is that you mentioned that a year longer? Is that about two years to qualify these metering applications?

Georges Karam: Yes, I mean, when I say maybe two years, sometimes three years, because depending what is better for us.

Nick Doyle: Okay.