Allied Esports Entertainment, Inc.

Q3 2021 Earnings Conference Call

11/15/2021

spk06: Greetings. Welcome to the Allied Esports Entertainment third quarter 2021 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star zero on your telephone keypad. Please note this conference is being recorded. I will now turn the conference over to your host, Lassa Glassen, Investor Relations. Thank you. You may begin.
spk02: Thank you, operator. Good afternoon and welcome to the Allied Esports Entertainment 2021 Third Quarter Results Conference Call. Speaking on the call today is Allied Esports Entertainment's Chief Executive Officer, Li-Beng Claire Wu, Chief Financial Officer, Roy Anderson, and Co-Chairman of the Board and President, Lyle Berman. Before I turn the call over to management, please remember that our prepared remarks and responses to questions may contain forward-looking statements. Words such as may, will, expect, intend, plan, believe, seek, could, estimate, judgment, targeting, should, anticipate, goal, and variations of these words and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Actual results could differ materially from those implied by such forward-looking statements. due to a variety of factors discussed in the company's public filings, including the risk factors discussed in documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Although the company believes the expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are based upon reasonable assumptions, it can give no assurance that its expectations will be attained. The company undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. In addition, certain of the financial information presented in this call represents non-GAAP financial measures. The company's earnings release, which was issued this afternoon and is available on the company's website, presents definitions of such non-GAAP financial measures, reconciliation to the appropriate GAAP measure, and an explanation of why the company believes such non-GAAP financial measures are useful to investors. With that, it's now my pleasure to turn the call over to Allied Esports Entertainment's CEO, Claire Wu. Claire.
spk05: Thank you, Liza, and thank you, everyone, for joining us this afternoon. My remarks today will begin with a discussion of recent changes in our leadership team at AESE, as well as an overview of the important operating highlights from this past quarter. Roy Anderson, our Chief Financial Officer will follow with additional details on our third quarter financial performance. And Lyle Berman, co-chairman of the board and the president, will conclude with an update on the previously announced strategic process for our esports business, along with the company's progress on our ongoing activities to invest our cash from the sale of the World Poker Tour, or WPET. After our prepared remarks, we will open the floor to questions. Turning first to recent changes in our leadership team. As announced earlier this month, Lyle Berman, currently the co-chairman of the board, has assumed additional duties as president of the company and will head up our investor relations efforts. Furthermore, Yinghua Chen, a current director has been named the Chief Investment Officer. Together, Lila and Yinhua will focus on completing the sale of our esports business and identifying opportunities to invest our cash to maximize shareholder value. And finally, I am very pleased to introduce Roy Anderson as our new Chief Financial Officer. Roy joined the company last month and has truly hit the ground running. As CFO, he will have responsibility for overseeing all aspects of our accounting, financial reporting and planning, treasury, and tax activities. Before joining AESE, Roy was a partner with MedZap USA, an independent member firm of MedZap Group, where he advised and worked closely with the top executives and investors of companies in the technology, media, and the telecommunications markets, ranging from startups to large multinational companies. Roy brings strong leadership qualities, financial insight, and the strategic M&A experience to our executive team. This combined with his broad-based industry expertise makes him ideally suited to lead our finance and accounting activities as we move forward. With that, let's move on to an overview of our results for the third quarter of 2021. This quarter was a very productive period for AESE. highlighted by a strong quarter of growth from our esports business. During this quarter, total revenue more than doubled from the last quarter and increased over 182% compared to the third quarter last year. This growth was driven by a sharp recovery of the in-person pillar of our esports business, with the U.S. economy almost fully reopened. coupled with a steady climb in Las Vegas food traffic and the return of live entertainment events. That said, game publishers, who were our last customers prior to the pandemic, have not yet resumed in-person events and could provide an additional boost to our in-person parallel when they resume normal activities. In addition, our multi-platform content parallel generated solid revenue contributions as we continue to make strides towards monetizing our growth content library with key streaming partners, as well as building out our production services capabilities through AE Studios. Importantly, during the quarter, we significantly improved our liquidity position with the sale of WPT to Element partners in an all-cash transaction for $105 million. Since the completion of the WPT transaction this summer, we have made a good headway in evaluating opportunities to invest our cash. We also made good progress exploring strategic alternatives for our esports business and recently signed a long-binding net of intent to sell our esports assets. Lyle will discuss this in more detail in his remarks. With that, let's now turn to our third quarter operational highlights for our esports business. The recovery from the pandemic continued in the third quarter with increased demand for tournament and production services. This led to LA Esports production of 110 events in this quarter, an increase of 31% versus the last quarter. This included 39 pro-territory events and 71 third-party online and in-person productions. In total, over 8,000 players competed in allied esports productive events during the third quarter. With the easing of pandemic-related restrictions, The company's pre-territory events such as lockdown and Saturday Night Speedway saw a 24% increase in player entries compared with last quarter. Also, Hyundai Mazda, a well-known auto dealership in the metro Las Vegas area, has become the new presenting sponsor of Saturday Night Speedway featuring Mario Kart at the HyperX Esports Arena, Las Vegas. Third-party events company-wide were up by 51%, quarter over quarter. This was driven by an 89% increase in third-party events and productions booked at the HyperX Esports Arena, made by a fixed production of the Rainbow Six North American Net Red Cross Rescue L'Oreal featuring four guys and the World Port Control final tables. Additional contribution came from the company's organization and the production of Travel Titans in North America, Europe, and Latin America for attention-backed streaming platform Travel. AE Studios, the company's new original content, story painting, and the production service arm also produced a number of events, including the celebrity showdown for Twitch. Although the company's more expansion plans with Simon Properties and the Brookfield Property Partners continue to remain on hold, the Allied Esports track in North America continued to bring gaming activations to fans around the country. During the quarter, the Allied Esports track began a seven-stop tour at Alaska Cup Series event and offered gaming activations. The track was also utilized by Monster Energy in its activations at a three-day hard work festival, Roknagoma. As sequence to quarter end in October, the AI Esports track in Europe returned to action with partner travel and the Ponds Lake Game Arena, which is the largest computer console and multimedia entertainment fair in Central and Eastern Europe. Throughout the pandemic, we also made significant strides to advance Ally Esports' multi-platform content payroll. To this end, the first major milestone was the launch of a 24-hour content strategy on Twitch, which saw 3.2 million live views in the third quarter of 2021 and increased the followers by 24%. So far, the company has delivered 14.7 million live views on its Twitch channel since launching the 24-hour strategy in November 2020. I am pleased to report that the company's content library currently holds over 1,000 hours of esports programming with distribution on 10 streaming platforms around the world. Earlier this year, we successfully launched AE Studios. Through AE Studios, we leverage our years of digital content creation and world-class production facilities to design and produce digital-first content for clients and partners spanning a variety of industries, such as gaming, entertainment, pop culture, music, and sports. During the third quarter, AE Studios' production of Celebrity Showdown, a footage on its Twitch Sports channel, aired 16 episodes, and the showdown was extended from 24 to 30 episodes for 2021. Subsequent to quarter end, Allied Esports was recognized at the Tempest Esports Business Awards in October as a finalist in the innovative use of technology category. This award acknowledged the company for its production of the world's first esports tournament between live animated commentators in a partnership with motion capture technology leader, Accent. This is a great honor and reflects the spirit of innovation that has made Ally Esports a leader in the competitive gaming industry. Also subsequent to the end of this quarter, AE Studios produced the live stream of the first ever Ulo Championship Series Invitational Tournament from the HyperX Esports Arena on November 11th. The event was hosted by professional gamer and streamer Tyler Ninja Blevins, and viewers from around the world were able to watch live on Uno's TikTok channel as finalists competed for a winner-take-all $50,000 prize. That concludes my prepared remarks, and at this time, I would like to turn the call over to Roy Anderson, our CFO, for an update on our third quarter financial results. Roy?
spk03: Thank you, Claire. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. I am excited to join AESE during this transformational period, and I look forward to contributing my expertise and leading the accounting, finance, and M&A activities of the company. As Claire mentioned, we continue to see the recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic positively impact our business with increased demand for our tournaments and production services, which led to strong growth in the third quarter. In addition, we continue to make progress on the development of our multi-platform content pillar, led by contributions from the recent launch of AE Studios. Now, let's turn to our third quarter results from continuing operations. Total revenues for the quarter increased to $1.7 million, up 182% compared to the third quarter of last year. Looking at these results in greater detail, in-person revenues for the third quarter increased 144% to $1.5 million, compared to $600,000 in the prior year period. The strong growth was primarily driven by the increased number of events and loosened restrictions of operating hours and social distancing measures at our HyperX esports arena in Las Vegas. Multi-platform content revenues for the third quarter totaled $200,000, driven by our new tournament organization partnership with Trovo, the Tencent Backstreaming Platform. Total costs and expenses for the third quarter were $5.6 million, up from $4.4 million compared to the prior year period. The year-over-year increase was due to several factors. First, in-person pillar costs and expenses increased by 95 percent, and selling and marketing expenses increased by 66 percent compared to the prior year period due to the strong recovery of live in-person events. Secondly, general and administrative expenses increased by 41% as compared to the third quarter of 2020. The year-over-year increase was primarily due to a $400,000 severance accrued for our former CEO, along with additional compensation, including the normalization of salaries in 2021 as compared to the temporary salary reductions that were in place during the third quarter of 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. We continue to prioritize expense management and actively reduce all nonessential spending across all of our cost and expense items. Adjusted EBITDA from continuing operations for the third quarter was a loss of $3 million compared to a loss of $2.4 million in the prior year period. Net income for the third quarter was $74.3 million compared to a net loss of $6.5 million in the third quarter of 2020. The year-over-year improvement was primarily driven by the gain on the sale of WPT. While the gain on the sale of WPT for financial statement purpose was approximately $80 million, there are no current federal or state income taxes payable due to a combination of the following. the company's tax basis in the stock of WPT of $99.9 million on the date of sale. Second, the company's current year 2021 projected tax losses. And finally, as needed, the company has net operating losses generated by AESE and Allied Sports that would be available to offset any cash tax liability. Now, moving on to our balance sheet. At September 30, 2021, One, our cash position totaled $100.2 million, including $5 million of restricted cash. This compares to our total cash position of $5.4 million at December 31, 2020, which also included $5 million of restricted cash. The company's working capital surplus defined as current assets minus current liabilities was $98.1 million at September 31, 2021 compared to $26.3 million at December 31, 2020, which included $36.2 million of net assets from discontinued operations. On July 12, 2021, the company sold the stock of WPT for $105 million, including a $10 million deposit received in March of 2021 of which $3.8 million was used to pay off company debt. In addition, $1.5 million was used to pay transaction bonus fees and expenses. On that date, $500,000 was used to pay board of directors fees, including a WPT transaction bonus and a catch-up for unpaid fees from January 1, 2021. And $4 million was used to normalize payables and to fund operations through September 30th, 2021, leaving a cash balance of $95.2 million at September 30th, 2021. Importantly, the company has zero debt, having paid off the remaining convertible debt and bridge notes concurrent with the closing of the WPT sale during the quarter. In summary, we continue to see operational improvements in our esports business that are being driven by strong growth of our in-person pillar and a return to a more normalized operational environment. Our multi-platform content pillar is also gaining traction as we launched our 24-hour contract strategy on Twitch in November 2020 and AE Studios last quarter. We will continue to carefully manage our costs and expenses as we continue the process of emerging from the pandemic. With that, I will turn it over to Lyle Berman for a discussion on corporate matters, including an update on the previously announced strategic process for our esports business, along with the company's progress on ongoing activities to invest cash from the sale of WPT.
spk01: Lyle? Thank you, Roy, and thank you all for joining us today. I'm looking forward to my expanded role as co-chairman and president during this very exciting time for Allied Esports Entertainment. First off, a quick housekeeping manner. Our annual shareholder meeting will be reconvened for some time in December 2021, at which time we fully expect to obtain a quorum of shareholders to conduct the meeting. We will be announcing the reconvened meeting in the near future. Next, and as noted on our call last quarter, we have accelerated our plans to explore strategic options for the esports business. We have made substantial progress in identifying a path forward for the esports business that maximizes value for the AESC shareholders. To this end, we have entered into a non-binding letter of intent with a third party to sell our esports business. While we are not yet in a position to publicly announce further details at this time, we will provide updates as quickly as possible. At the same time, we are continuing to identify opportunities to invest our cash on our balance sheet, along with any cash from anticipated sale of the esports business, to acquire or merge with an existing business. To date, we have reviewed a number of potential targets. Our due diligence and the continued sourcing of other opportunities is ongoing. In addition, we are also aggressively interviewing a number of investment banks to assist us in this process. We have asked for proposals from several of these investment banks and we expect to complete the selection process and engage a firm within the next three weeks. Let me be clear that while we are working with a sense of urgency to acquire or merge with an existing business, we are laser focused on finding the absolute best opportunity available to maximize value for our shareholders. These are very exciting times, and I look forward to providing you with an update on our progress at the appropriate time. That concludes our prepared remarks, and we would now like to open the line for Q&A. Operator?
spk06: Thank you. At this time, we will be conducting a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star 2 if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star keys. One moment, please, while we poll for questions. Our first question is from Derek Stoderberg of Collier Securities. Please proceed with your question.
spk04: Hey, everyone. Thanks for taking my questions. So it sounds like you guys did sign an LOI. I'm just curious what sort of drove you guys to sell that business. Any additional color there would be great. And then just given you're exiting an esports business, I think you've talked about potentially buying another business in that area. Why would you exit and then you're still looking for an asset in that area? Or should we sort of read that as you're targeting a non-esports business? as an acquisition target. You know, if there's any additional detail you can give me on specific subsectors of entertainment you're targeting, any additional color there would be great.
spk05: Hi, good afternoon, Derek. Thanks for the question. There are several reasons why we make this strategic decision. I will quickly address one and pass along to Lyle to add more color to that. One of the reasons for us to make the decision is because of the increased interest to the whole esports industry and esports business, especially after a pandemic. We have been approached by potential buyers, including the current one we signed the letter of intent with. And with that being said, I'm going to pass it to Lyle for further address this question. Lyle?
spk01: Hi. Thank you, Claire. It wasn't an easy decision for us. However, although we have made great strides in the eSport business, it is still definitely cash burning. And we have found it to be very competitive landscape. So we made a decision that we would like to exit the eSport business, if possible, and redeploy our cash into a new business. We definitely are not looking at e-sport businesses. I think you asked the question, why would we exit one and look at another? We are not looking at a B-sports of any kind. However, what we are saying is that we are open to any. We are looking at all industries. We're looking at opportunities that can redeploy our cash, that the new company has a number of attributes. Most likely they... They need to have a high growth potential. They have a documented use of our cash. Our cash would be used to further the business. We're not looking to buy out other shareholders. We want our cash to go forward. But we're wide open in looking at any industry that works, that makes sense, and most likely we're looking for a merger where there's a very good management team. Our company would still be on the board of directors, but we're not looking for a company that we would run and manage. We're looking for one that comes with management.
spk04: Got it, got it. You did talk about cash burn a little bit. I'm just curious what that would look like if you did divest the remaining esports business. What would the corporate structure look like? And then just otherwise, what should we expect in terms of cash burn from here if you do not divest that remaining business.
spk03: Yeah, I'll take that. This is Roy. So, on a combined basis, if you add corporate and AEI operations on a quarterly basis, we're right around $2 million at the moment. Corporate by itself, post-sale, is probably about $1 million, which includes payroll and payroll-related costs, insurance costs, along with audit, tax, legal, SEC filings, and so on. So it's roughly a $2 million burn, of which one is corporate and one is AEI presale. But the AEI amount continues to decline as the revenues continue to grow and margins continue to increase. So that will continue to decline.
spk04: Got it, got it. Thanks, guys.
spk06: We have reached the end of the question and answer session. I will now turn the call back over to management for closing remarks.
spk05: Thank you for your support and for joining us on today's call. We look forward to speaking with you again when we report our 2021 fourth quarter results in March. Thank you again for your time and attention this afternoon and your interest in LA Sports Entertainment.
spk06: This concludes today's conference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation and have a great day.
Disclaimer

This conference call transcript was computer generated and almost certianly contains errors. This transcript is provided for information purposes only.EarningsCall, LLC makes no representation about the accuracy of the aforementioned transcript, and you are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the information provided by the transcript.

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