Landec Corporation

Good afternoon and thank you for joining landex fiscal 2021 fourth quarter earnings call during the presentation all participants will be in a listen only mode. Afterwards, we will conduct a question and answer session at that time, I will provide instructions on how to ask a question now, I would like to turn the call over to Jeff sonic investor relations at icr.

Good afternoon, and thank you for joining us today to discuss Landec Corporation's fourth quarter fiscal 2021 earnings results. On the call today from the company are Dr. Albert Bowles, President and Chief Executive Officer, John Moorberg, Chief Financial Officer, and Jim Hall, President of LifeCorps. By now, everyone should have access to the press release, which went out today just after 1 p.m. Pacific or 4 p.m. Eastern time. If you have not received the release, It's available on the investor relations portion of Landec's website at ir.landec.com. Before we begin today, we'd like to remind everyone of the safe harbor statement. Certain statements made in the course of this conference call contain forward-looking statements. It's important to note that the company's actual results could differ materially from those projected in such forward-looking statements. Additional information concerning risk factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements is contained from time to time in the company's filings with the SEC, including but not limited to the company's Form 10-K for fiscal year 2020. Copies of those filings may be obtained from the company's website. And with that, I'd like to turn the call over to Al.

Thanks, Jeff. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. On today's call, I will provide highlights from our fiscal 2021 results. Jim Hall will then review some of the exciting developments at LifeCorp. I'll cover our operational progress at Curation Foods and John Morberg will discuss our financial results in Fiscal 2022 outlook. We will then open the call for your questions. We had a solid finish to Fiscal 2021 with a Fiscal fourth quarter performances that exceeded our revised expectations. Full year consolidated revenues of $544 million exceeded the high-end expectations by $12 million, driven by both Curation Foods and LifeCorp. Similarly, consolidated adjusted EBITDA for the year end was $31.4 million, ahead of the high end of our guidance by $2.4 million. Both segments performed well, and I'm proud of the team for the collective efforts in what was a challenging year. complete with a turnaround of our curation food segment during a global pandemic. LifeCorps proved to be especially resilient to the COVID-19 disruptions, generating top-line growth of 14% and adjusted EBITDA growth of 22% for the full year. This was really an exceptional performance in a highly uncertain year and is consistent with the low to mid-teens compound annual growth trajectory that we expect out of this business over the long term. And at Curation Foods, we were pleased to meet a year-end steady state goal of generating segment gross profit margins in the range of 11 to 14% with a reported margin of 11.9% in the fiscal fourth quarter. Our turnaround efforts with Creation Foods are on track, and we have the added support of a more efficient distribution network that expands our reach while further simplifying our operations. Looking ahead to fiscal 2022, we have the benefit of some customer momentum at both LifeCorps and Creation Foods. A nimbler organization and an improving balance sheet that will help us keep pace with our long-term growth objectives. For FY22, we currently anticipate full-year consolidated revenues of 545 to 554 million and consolidated adjusted EBITDA of 33.3 to 35.5 million. I think FY22 is best characterized as an investment year for LifeCorps. We will be spending additional funds on CapEx and in areas of sales and marketing to grow new development channels, thereby expanding our future opportunities in this attractive CDMO space. As we will discuss in further detail, certain customers were carrying larger inventories during COVID, resulting in our FY22 revenue growth expectations having an annual impact of approximately 5 percentage points. Including this impact, we expect revenue growth of 7 to 10 percent and adjusted EBITDA growth of 6 to 10 percent next year. We are continuing to position the life core segment for consistent long-term profitable growth going forward. On the curation side, we continue to see growth in our avocado products business offsetting planned declines in our core VAD and trade business. We expect overall revenues to be flat to slightly negative year over year. However, we are expecting adjusted EBITDA to grow 9% to 18% based on the full-year benefit from our operational enhancements and cost controls, which will drive improved gross margins, partially offset by inflationary pressures that we expect to continue. I'm proud of our accomplishments and excited by the opportunities that lie ahead. We have more work to do, but we are on the right track. We have a solid foundation at both our businesses and expect to drive more consistent results going forward as we work towards delivering shareholder value. I do want to mention that Pat Walsh, one of our directors resigned due to personal reasons. As we stated in our 8K, There were no disagreements with Pat and the company, and we thank him for his invaluable service to Landec and wish him all the best. And currently the board also voted to reduce the size of the board from 11 to 10 directors. With that, I'll turn the call over to Jim.