iSun, Inc.

Good morning. My name is Melissa, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the ISUN earnings conference call for the first quarter of 2021. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. If you should need assistance during the call, please press star, then zero, and an operator will come back online to assist you. I would now like to turn the call over to Chase Jacobson, ISUN's investor relations advisor, and Managing Director with Vallum Advisors. Please go ahead.

Thank you and good morning. We are pleased to welcome you to ISUN's conference call where we will discuss financial and operating results for the first quarter of 2021. Jeffrey Peck, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, will provide an update on ISUN and key highlights from the quarter. And John Sullivan, Chief Financial Officer, will provide an overview of the first quarter of 2021 financial results. In addition, management will provide its outlook for 2021 and beyond and discuss in more detail ISUN's unique position in the market and its long-term growth strategy. After our prepared remarks today, we will open the lines to address any of your questions. As a reminder, the earnings release, which can be found on ISUN's website, includes financial disclosures and reconciliations for non-GAAP financial measures that should help you analyze results. Comments and answers to questions during the call will include forward-looking statements that refer to management's expectations or future predictions. These statements are made as of the date of this call, and management is under no obligation to update these forward-looking statements in the future. They are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ from management's expectations. With that, I will now turn it over to our CEO, Jeff Peck.

Good morning. and thanks to everyone who dialed in today. I'm happy to be speaking with you today to provide you an update on our first quarter results, strategy, and our 2021 outlook. We had a strong start to the year with record first quarter revenue and strong backlog growth. Although our gross profit was impacted by COVID-related shutdowns and a procurement issue that has now been addressed, importantly, we continue to invest in the future with multiple strategic investments that further establish iSun as a leading player in the solar energy and e-mobility markets, positioning us for robust growth in 2021 and beyond. Our first quarter revenue grew 82% year-over-year, driven by the robust backlog growth that we experienced in 2020 in both our traditional geographic markets in the northeastern United States as well as new geographic locations throughout the East Coast. Backlog grew to $81 million, nearly doubling compared to the first quarter of 2020, and up 33% from the end of 2020. Backlog growth was driven by new project awards in our core commercial and industrial New England markets, as well as our largest project win ever in Tennessee. This $25 million project in Jackson, Tennessee, with northern reliability and community development enterprises, is currently the largest solar energy and storage microgrid project in the United States. Importantly, this project combines expertise from our legacy EPC business and ISM's deep relationships in the solar energy market. Further, working with community development enterprises whose mission is to provide green energy solutions and economic relief to cities that have been hit by natural disasters and economic challenges, emphasizes our commitment to the transition to clean energy from dirty energy in creating jobs in American cities. We look forward to pursuing further opportunities with CDE in the future. While the broader operating environment is improving following a number of pushouts and delays in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we continue to experience the impact from the pandemic in the quarter. With the safety of our employees and contractors as a top priority, we experienced several COVID-related work stoppages at one of our largest projects during the quarter, driving higher costs and lower productivity. Despite the work stoppages, We maintained our employee base and are now fully back to work. Additionally, we experienced a procurement issue on another project, which has now been addressed, and work is progressing on schedule. As our company grows and we take on larger projects, including in these states, we have taken action to reduce the similar issues going forward. John will provide more details on the financial impact of these events. As it stands today, we believe ISUN offers the most comprehensive package of services to the solar energy and e-mobility infrastructure markets, and we are continuing to build on that, including with multiple strategic investments during the quarter. First, to provide some perspective and refresh everyone on what we discussed in our last earnings call, in January, we acquired ISUN Energy LLC, a provider of innovative solar power and e-mobility solutions. and subsequently rebranded the company under the ISUN name. While the core of our company has been in the construction markets for over 50 years, we are also a company that embraces innovation in new markets. ISUN's flagship solution is the ISUN Energy and Mobility Hub, an electric vehicle carport charging system offering both grid-connected and off-grid battery-backed solutions to charge electric vehicles. It also brought ISUN OS, an operating system that provides owners the ability to monitor and analyze key metrics of their solar assets, allowing for more efficient operations and cost savings over time. This acquisition was a prime example of a 50-year-old construction company embracing innovation, and we are committed to building on that foundation. In March, we announced two investments to enhance our already strong e-mobility offering we invested 1.5 million in gemini electric mobility corporation gemini is an electric vehicle car sharing company for the gig driver drivers for companies like uber lyft doordash and many others over the next several years gemini will be building a network of electric vehicles first in california and then another state Our investments position us well to participate in their network build-out, which will require dedicated charging stations, which we believe we are well positioned to benefit from with the ISUN Electric and Mobility Hub carport charging solution. Secondly, we invested $1 million in Ampop, an electric vehicle software company that improves charging efficiency for EV fleet operators. This investment is complementary to the ISUN operating system and provides us another competitive advantage as we work to grow our presence in the e-mobility market. In early April, we expanded into the utility scale solar EPC market with a $2.7 million acquisition of the intellectual property of Oakwood Construction Services. With $1 million due immediately and the remaining $1.7 million, due upon the achievement of certain milestones. This acquisition significantly expands our large project capabilities and materially grows our addressable market, as there are currently over $69 billion of unconstructed utility-scale solar projects that are already executed power purchases agreements. As part of this acquisition, we have the option to acquire all rights to provide EPC services for the Hartzell Solar Project, which is approximately $100 million solar development in Colorado. Hartzell is currently in early development, and as it progresses, we will provide additional updates on our potential participation in this project. Importantly, the acquisition of OCS also improves our position in other areas as we seek to work on larger commercial and industrial projects and in our partnership with Green Bond Advisors. which continues to develop its pipeline of potential projects. Green Bond and its affiliates are working with a number of solar energy developers and are reviewing or bidding on over 20 projects representing 5,500 megawatts of solar power, which combined with their financing commitments could lead to meaningful EPC projects and project ownership opportunities for ISUN in the near future. With that, I will turn the call over to John to discuss our financials in the quarter, and I will be back to discuss our go-forward strategy and our 2021 outlook.