The Beauty Health Company (NASDAQ:SKIN) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Navann Ty: Just a question on China. There’s a comment on the related return on investment. So shall we see further investment in China? And if yes, what’s the timing of investments? In the U.S., my second question is, have you seen — or do you expect a change in competitive pressure? And just a final quick one. Do you plan similar acquisitions in the low double-digit range in 2023?

Andrew Stanleick: Thank you. Thanks for your question. There’s a lot in there. So let me start, first of all, with China. If you’re relatively newer to our story, we’ve said that ’21 and ’22 as a new public company were our years of elevated investment where we set up globally our infrastructure systems and local manufacturing, training, education and teams, which we did in ’21 and ’22 and especially in 2022 in China. So the — predominantly, the bulk of our investment is done in China, and that’s where we’re so well positioned now to capture the opening growth as this market starts to open, especially as we launched Syndeo in Q2 across the region.

Liyuan Woo: Yes. I think the other question that you had in terms of acquisition, we’ve always looked through those three criteria that Andrew has mentioned. It has to be accretive to the bottom line and need not to be a fad, and they need to have a common call point. And we continue to be very mindful and thoughtful in terms of our execution.

Andrew Stanleick: And then the final question I’ll take. You asked about the guidance for the year. Yes, I want to reiterate, we absolutely confident to deliver between the 18% and 20% adjusted EBITDA guidance we gave for 2023. The upper limit, as we discussed earlier, will be really dependent on China and also just reaffirming our long-term 2025 guidance, which we gave during Investor Day. Thank you.

Operator: The next question is from Linda Bolton-Weiser of D.A. Davidson.

Linda Bolton-Weiser: Sorry if I missed this, but can you give an operating cash flow number for 2022? And then I know you kind of mentioned some investment in working capital. Is there some kind of a rough outlook that you have for operating cash flow in 2023? And then my second question is, what are you seeing or learning so far regarding the connectivity and the data and analytics you’re able to have now with the connectivity of that new Syndeo device? What are you seeing or learning so far with that?

Liyuan Woo: I’ll address the free cash flow question first. We had spoken about we invested in working capital heavily in 2022 as we’re getting ready to launch Syndeo globally. As we learned, if you recall, when we launched in the U.S., we run out of inventory. We were very quickly trying to speed up and really shift the units out. So we’re in a really good position as you can observe our inventory balance. Obviously, if you look at us, we pay about $10 million in terms of interest. We pay about $20 million CapEx, if you assume the EBITDA margin will be guaranteeing for 2023. That by definition should be in a cash flow positive position. So then they all boil down to working capital. So once we launch globally in the second quarter, Linda, our expectations really managing that working capital closely, and you should see more of a beneficial trend coming through the second half of 2023. We feel positive about cash flow generation starting at the end of 2023.

Andrew Stanleick: Thanks, Linda. And in terms of what we’re learning, coming up for nearly a year since we launched Syndeo in the U.S., we’re learning a lot. I think we’re learning, adjusting. It’s giving us a number of insights, firstly, on the consumer and the number of sort of more depth of knowledge on the consumer. It’s helping us develop new products and protocols such as body, which is obviously going to be a key strategically for us this year. Also, we’re learning how to improve the system and the software. And we’re always iterating and learning and improving the system based on provider feedback, based on what we’re learning of that data. And that’s why, again, I think it’s another advantage why we waited for a year before launching internationally. We’re able to take all of those learnings and optimize that for that launch in Q2 overseas. And I think in coming quarters, we’ll share more insights with you on what we’re learning.