Tecnoglass Inc.

Greetings and welcome to the Technoglass Inc. first 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. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to to introduce Rodney Nassier, Investor Relations. Thank you. We may begin.

Rodney Nassier Thank you for joining us for TechnoGlass' first quarter 2021 conference call. A copy of the slide presentation to accompany this call may be obtained on the Investors section of the TechnoGlass website. Our speakers for today's call are Chief Executive Officer Jose Manuel Diaz, Chief Operating Officer Chris Diaz, and Chief Financial Officer Santiago Giraldo. I'd like to remind everyone that matters discussed in this call, except for historical information, are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including statements regarding future financial performance, future growth, and future acquisitions. These statements are based on TechnoGlass' current expectations or beliefs and are subject to uncertainty and changes in circumstances. Actual results may vary in a material nature from those expressed or implied by the statements herein, due to changes in economic, business, competitive, and or regulatory factors, and or other risks and uncertainties affecting the operations of Technoglass' business. These risks, uncertainties, and contingencies are indicated from time to time in Technoglass' filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The information discussed during the call is presented in light of such risks. Further, investors should keep in mind that Technoglass' financial results in any particular period may not be indicative of future results. Tecnam Glass is under no obligation to and expressly disclaims any obligation to update or alter its forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, changes in assumptions, or otherwise. I will now turn the call over to Jose Manuel, beginning on slide number four.

Thank you, Rodney, and thank you, everyone, for participating on today's call. We continue to advance our position as an architectural glass leader. During the first quarter of 2021, we delivered record results across nearly all of our key operating metrics. This includes total revenue, gross profit, operating profit, adjusted EBITDA, operating cash flow, and backlog. Our record revenues were largely attributable to the continued positive recession of our single-family residential products, allowing for additional market share gains in the U.S., which represented 91% of our first quarter revenue. On this positive activity, we increased adjusted EBITDA by an impressive 65% to $33.5 million. Our track record of delivering strong financial results demonstrates our commitment to consistent execution, operational excellence, and innovation. We are achieving this by leveraging our structural and sustainable competitive advantages, expanding relationships, introducing new products, and investing in high return, margin-enhancing opportunities. Already in 2021, the efficiencies in our business are delivering significant structural advantages for tech dollars. We have not been impacted by tech labor constraints and material availability impacting most of our industry. We are positioned really well to efficiently control our supply chain. Manufacturing products with short lead times and best secure customers in what we expect to be a year of significant growth in demand. Based on our success so far this year and the opportunities we see ahead, we are pleased to increase our full-year revenue and adjusted EBITDA growth outlook. Santiago will discuss that in more detail later on the call. We have seen a significant demand recovery since the onset of the pandemic. We are therefore excited to announce today that the plant construction of our previously announced second float glass plant in our JV with Sancoman is back on track. We expect to commence engineering work in the second half of 2021. This plant will be one of the most advanced and efficient glass production facilities in the world. located in close proximity to our current plant network. It will further reinforce our vertically integrated platform and allow us to secure additional flow class supply to serve long-term demand. Our first quarter results are a direct reflection of the market-leading company that we have created. Moving forward, we will continue to leverage our strategic high-return investments in capacity, products, and people. Together with our business development activities and growing project portfolio, we plan to maintain our industry-leading margins and drive above-market growth. We remain very excited about our outlook and the opportunities to generate shareholder value in 2021 and beyond. I'm extremely proud of our outstanding performance, and I have never been more optimistic about the future for Tecnoglass. I will now turn the call over to Chris to provide additional details on our backlog.

Thank you, José Manuel. Moving to our backlog on slide five. In the first quarter, we were thrilled to see the positive momentum continuing our business as we report a sharp acceleration of growth. We are seeing a strong demand in both residential and commercial end markets where we operate, resulting in an increase in our backlog to record levels of 552 million at quarter end. As a reminder, our single-family residential growth trajectory is not fully captured in backlog given shorter term spot duration of projects. Two-thirds of our backlog is comprised of medium and high-rise residential projects as well as single-family residential already in production, while one-third is related to a wide variety of commercial projects where demand has recovered significantly. We are pleased to see several of our large-scale projects resuming activity in line with improving fundamentals and the ABI index, which increased further into expansion territory for the second consecutive month in March. The March ABI index increased to 55.6 compared to 53.3 in February, returning to levels not seen since early 2019. During the quarter, we continue to broaden our customer base, expand our dealer network, and strengthen our presence in new markets across our increasingly diversified footprint. Strength in activity continues to be led by the Southeast U.S., where we are extremely well positioned in both residential and commercial end markets. In addition to adding several new dealers in the single-family residential business, We continue to take market share in different geographies as evidenced by our record backlog. We are pleased and continue multifamily strength, the commercial recovery, and the resumption of larger scale projects. We ended the quarter with good visibility on our attractive multi-year project pipeline. In addition, we are very positive on single family residential demand which we expect to continue to drive the majority of our outsized growth. I will now turn the call over to Santiago on slide six to discuss our strong single family demand profile, vertical integrated strategy, and financial results, and our improved outlook for the year.

Thank you, Christian. Encouraging trends in housing starts, low mortgage rates, and the urbanization combined with our efforts to expand our customer relationships and introduce new products are all supporting the impressive growth of our single-family residential business. Single-family revenues increased over 70% year-over-year in the first quarter, now representing 22% of our U.S. revenue. Our single-family residential sales are comprised primarily of our prestige and elite product lines. However, our largely untapped opportunity with production and home builders through our Multimax product line is also an immense avenue for growth. As we move through the year, we will continue to widen our dealer network for Multimax into attractive areas in Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, and South Carolina. Our strong momentum has continued into the second quarter. mainly driven by new business wins and share gains. Simply put, we are winning because we are able to supply superior quality architectural glass products with much shorter lead times and attractive value, which truly differentiate us in the tight supply environment that the industry is experiencing. As an example, We recently received a call from a publicly traded home builder requesting quotes on several large communities. The first question was about lead times, not prices. So to be able to deliver favorably on both is extremely promising in the current environment. Also, that was just one home builder, and we have discussions ongoing with several others. A lot of our successful business development has been enabled by our operational stability due to both our vertically integrated model and well-situated operations. So let me take a moment to dive deeper into the drivers of our success and above-market growth. Looking at slide seven, I will explain a bit more as to how Tecnoglass is becoming the architectural glass provider of choice in the US. Over many years of investments focused on innovation and operating efficiencies, we have created a defensible architectural glass platform in a well-situated location. This has resulted in no material pressures from raw material inflation. This is due to our vertically integration that reaches across the entire architectural glass and window value chain, providing us with significant control over a substantial portion of cost, resulting in structural advantages relative to industry peers. In 2019, we entered into a joint venture agreement with Sangoban, which had already been the primary supplier of our float glass since 2013. This joint venture provided us with access to ample float glass supply, reduced purchasing costs, and substantially lower inbound transportation costs given its close proximity to our manufacturing facility in Barranquilla, Colombia. In our aluminum, which is another key raw material component in our production process, we are hedged on a significant portion of projects within our commercial portfolio through fixed price contracts. Better control of raw material visibility has been an advantage to Tecnoglass and our ability to quote projects for customers. It is important to note that we currently do not have any long supply chains with virtually all inputs being sourced locally or from the US. Another structural advantage is productivity. In 2019, we invested $20 million in high return automation and expansion initiatives. This helped to optimize our glass and aluminum production capability. with a significant improvement in output of certain automated lines. At the same time, we have invested in our employees. We have gone through great lengths to establish our company as an employer of choice in Colombia, which has allowed us to benefit from efficient access to talented people and very low turnover. This has in turn led to further productivity gains and less downtime. As a result, we are not experiencing material wage inflation or labor constraints, which is keeping our lead times very short. Vehicle integration benefits are transportation costs. Our soft coating, aluminum, laminating, tempering, finishing, assembly, and other facilities are all co-located in the same campus and with our flow glass supply nearby. This has kept our intercompany transportation costs at less than 5% of revenues. In addition, Colombia has a long-term trade deficit with the U.S., which keeps the shipping rates favorable for Colombian exports to many U.S. entry ports, many of which are located close to our project sites. On the energy side, in early 2017, we invested $15 million on solar panels for our facilities. Over time, these investments have provided us with over 15% savings on our energy costs. We also utilize cogeneration facilities to power our plants through on-site natural gas emissions. These actions both reinforce our commitment to ESG initiatives and provide meaningful tax savings. To recap, our structural advantages are powering our ability to quote more projects, expand customer relationships, and deliver products when the customers need them. Contractors value our superior products and dependability, which is unlocking opportunities for continued growth and market share gains. As we further ramp up our production to service the increasing demand for our best-in-class products, we are excited to move forward with the construction of our second state-of-the-art float glass plant in Barranquilla. Engineering work is expected to commence in the second half of 2021, with groundbreaking to take place during the first half of 2022. That said, our existing install capacity following our investments in automation is currently running at about 65% utilization, and we have no operational constraints to meet demand for the foreseeable future. Let's now move to our first quarter financials, starting with our improved balance sheet and leverage profile on slide number nine. As we discussed last quarter, the recent recapitalization of our debt structure combined with our impressive record of cash flow generation is significantly enhancing our financial flexibility to execute on our growth objectives. Strong working capital management, lower interest expense, and our higher mix of residential revenues helped us generate record first quarter operating cash flow of $29 million. I'm extremely proud of the transformational step change in our operating cash flow, which over the past 12 months has represented approximately 90% of adjusted EBITDA. Based on our conservative leverage ratio of 1.4 times as of March 31st, the interest rate spread on our new $300 million senior secure credit facility decreased by 50 basis points to a spread of 2.5% in April 2021 as expected. Annualized interest expense savings are expected to be $11 million as a result of our completed balance sheet recapitalization. Turning to the drivers of revenue on slide number 10. Total revenues increased 27% year over year to a record $110.9 million for the first quarter. This strength was primarily driven by continued strong single-family residential sales, recovering commercial construction activity, as well as market share gains, in part driven by the solid operational execution that I just discussed. We were pleased to have improved Colombia revenue by 18.4% compared to the prior year quarter as the cadence of projects begin to normalize in the country. However, most of our other Latin American markets remain in different stages of recovery from the pandemic. Looking at the drivers of adjusted EBITDA on slide number 11. Record adjusted EBITDA for the first quarter 2021 increased 64.8% to 33.5 million, compared to 20.3 million in the prior year quarter. Adjusted EBITDA margin at a record of 30.2% demonstrated an impressive 690 basis points improvement compared to the first quarter of 2020. First quarter gross profit increased 48.4% to 45.1 million. representing a record 40.7% gross margin. This compared to gross profit of $30.4 million in the prior year quarter, representing a gross margin of 34.9%. Our 590 basis point improvement in margin was mainly attributable to a higher mix of revenue from manufacturing versus installation activity as we continue to increase our mix of single-family residential products, where we did not carry out installation. The improvement was also supported by a full quarter of greater operating efficiencies from prior automation initiatives, which were fully implemented during the first quarter of 2020. Moving forward, as a single family residential becomes an increasing mix of our products, this will continue to provide us with greater manufacturing revenue, which possibly impacts our margins. This business also strengthens our cash flow, given our single family projects carry a shorter cash cycle and no retainage. Higher nominal operating expenses for the quarter mainly reflected higher variable expenses related to marine and ground transportation. As a percentage of revenue, operating expenses were lowered by 200 basis points compared to the prior year quarter, primarily driven by higher revenues and better operating leverage on personnel, professional fees, and other fixed expenses. Moving to our outlook on slide number 13. Based on our positive momentum into 2021 and an improved demand outlook, including solid share gains and strong activity into April and May, we are increasing our full year 2021 outlook for revenue and adjusted EBITDA growth. We now expect full year 2021 revenue of $420 to $435 million, representing growth of 14% at the midpoint. We continue to expect higher year-over-year growth in the first half of 2021 based on anticipated timing of invoicing in 2021 compared to 2020, as well as having a full schedule of operation without any COVID-19-related constraints as we had in March and April of 2020. In addition, we expect to have a higher mix of products versus installation revenue, in line with our continued penetration into the U.S. single-family residential market. We continue to expect the U.S. to represent the significant majority of our growth, offsetting the slower pandemic recovery in Latin America. Based on this sales outlook and anticipated mix of revenues, we raised our full-year adjusted EBITDA outlook to a range of 115 to 125 million, representing a 23% growth at the midpoint of the range, as well as margin expansion. Our gross margins should continue to benefit from our previously completed high-return CAPEX investments in automation initiatives. Additionally, with our increasing mix of single-family residential products bringing more manufacturing revenue to our revenue mix, we now expect gross margins to trend towards a normalized level in the mid-to-high 30s range. higher than our previously communicated mid 30% range. We now anticipate CapEx in 2021 to approximate 20 to 25 million with the increased amount coming from further automation as we continue to expect robust growth. We are firmly on track to produce another year of record results in 2021. We have effectively positioned Tecnoglass to deliver exceptional above-market growth while maintaining our impressive operating leverage to generate a step change in free cash flow. Our vertically integrated and well-situated operations are more prepared than ever to meet a level of demand much stronger than our current outlook. Our solid balance sheet and conservative leverage position further reinforce our flexibility to invest in additional value creation. We truly believe our years of hard work and prudent investment will provide greater returns for our shareholders in the quarters and years ahead. With that, we will be happy to answer your questions. Operator, please open the line for questions.

Thank you.

We will now be conducting a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone keypad. A confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star two 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 your questions. Our first question has come from the line of Brent Dealman with DA Davidson.

Please proceed with your questions.

Hey, thank you. Congratulations on a really strong start to the year.

Thanks Brent.

Yeah, I guess, you know, maybe I'll pick on the margin outlook. Obviously you've taken it up, but you had really extraordinary margins this, this quarter and you know, what tends to be a little seasonally slower quarter doesn't look like anything sort of transitory in terms of benefits. So just wanted to get your views on why you couldn't repeat this sort of gross margin performance going forward, Santiago.

Okay, so a couple of things there. First one is the mix of business, Brent. We did expect the installation segment to have lower revenues within the first half of the year. We are raising our gross margin outlook to mid to high 30s from the mid 30s that we had previously. So I do think that going forward, our gross margin is going to be higher. Based on mix, we just don't know that it's going to be, you know, 40, 41% like we saw this year. But other than that, from an input perspective, you know, raw materials should not be a headwind, you know, as we mentioned earlier. During the call, we are hedged on a large portion of aluminum. Through the joint venture, we have a stable supply of glass. So we are not seeing inflationary pressures that would cause the gross margins to come down. It's going to be more a mixed type of question as to whether manufacturing continues to grow at this pace. But if we do continue to grow into manufacturing as opposed to to installation, the expectation is for them to move higher. So, you know, the mid to high 30s comment was associated with what we're seeing based on input costs and based on the revenue mix that we're expecting going forward for the rest of the year.

Okay. And when would you expect the capacity from the new float glass plant to become available to you, just given the fresh timelines you guys provided today?

Well, the expectation is for that to break ground in the first half of next year, and it is expected to be completed by the end of 2024. But that being said, you know, that's a separate business because that's the raw glass manufacturing. We on our end have, you a lot of excess capacity right now. We're roughly at 65% installed capacity to grow on the transformation of glass, right? So that's not going to be a constraint if we continue to grow at this pace. The Sangoban Joint Venture Plan will add to the raw glass manufacturing, which is a separate business, right? That's just going to provide incremental raw glass to us to transform and make windows. But For the time being, we're set to grow well beyond where we are.

Yep. Okay, and just my last question. I mean, Southeast still appears to be a pretty important driver for you. I guess just wondering if you're starting to see some expansion or growth into some other regions of the U.S., what you're seeing around the country.

We have been growing in commercial in New York, Boston, Washington, Illinois, I mean Chicago area, and Texas. And some, a little bit, we're doing some businesses in California. In the residential side, we are first filling up our orders from the mid-Florida up, and we're going to start growing west to all the Gulf Coast, which is hurricane-proof, and also up the northeast all the way to Virginia, which is also hurricane-rated. But we are starting to do that. I mean, right now we are mostly residential. We're just in Florida.

Yep. Okay, great. Well, congrats again. Thanks for taking the questions.

Thanks, Ray.

Thank you. Our next questions come from the line of Tim Wadges with Baird. Please proceed with your questions.

Hey, guys. Good morning. Nice job. Morning, Tim. Maybe my first question is just about visibility as you kind of look at this second half, maybe relative to where you were a few months ago. You know, obviously you've seen a lot of backlog growth, and I think one of the kind of question marks, you know, last quarter was just if some of the projects would hit in the second half versus kind of 2022. So could you just kind of give us a little bit of an update on maybe some of the visibility there? And, you know, is the guidance range basically better visibility into Q2, or are you actually seeing better visibility in the back half?

Well, the backlog started to grow again, and it's going to keep growing, we see, because there is a lot of quoting right now. I mean, we're quoting hundreds of millions of dollars in jobs, new jobs, that are going to break ground within the next six months to a year. You know, the quoting process... is way before the job starts and way, way before we actually ship. So we believe, I mean, 2022 is going to be an unbelievable year. We have a gap from last year that we didn't do any commercial new jobs. I mean, we didn't land any commercial new jobs. So the first... Six to nine months are going to be really soft in installation and commercial jobs. But then the third quarter, 2022 and 2023, are going to be unbelievable because the strength of the market locally, especially in Florida, it's, I mean, everything that people put out for sale is selling. So all the buildings eventually are going to break ground and they're going to go up and we're going to do the windows.

Just to add to that, Tim, to address your question, the way that we projected the rest of the year was basically with the schedule of commercial projects that we had. But as Jose was saying, since there was some activity that was pushed out at the end of last year, you obviously have a temporary air pocket that moves into 2022, right? So The expectation is that the commercial segment does better in the first half of the year rather than the second half, but that's going to be more than compensated from the activity into the single-family residential. So that's really how we projected the rest of the year. Now, if the single-family residency continues to grow as it is and we have more visibility as we move along into the year, then we'll probably be confident to end up at the higher end of the range, if not higher.

Okay. Okay. That's helpful. And then on the residential business, you know, you're obviously taking share. Are there anything, are there any things that you're doing just to make sure that once some of your competitors lead times normalize that, that you're still, you know, the OEM that there's, you know, kind of new contractors are going to turn to?

After we deliver to a client and they see the difference in not only in liters, I mean, our product is a much, much better product in every aspect, in the finish of the aluminum, in the quality of the design, in the pressures that it withstands, in the water, in the ease of installation. So, After we land a client, we rarely lose them. That's why we don't need to buy any money to grow. We grow organically because our clients will stay with us forever.

Okay. Okay. So it sounds like pretty satisfied after you get them as customers. And then I guess the last question I've got is just how should we think about free cash flow for the year, Santiago? Okay.

I think we're going to continue growing on what you saw. First Q was exceptional from a free cash flow perspective. Depending on working capital the rest of the year, my estimate is that we continue to grow, maybe not at $30 million of operating cash flow per quarter, but certainly we're going to continue to generate free cash flow each subsequent quarter the rest of the year, Tim. It's just going to be a function of what working capital looks like and how we end up growing, especially on the single-family RECI. April and May were outstanding, right? I mean, April and what we have for May so far. So, you know, it's all going to depend on that. But even with that projected growth, we're definitely expecting, you know, robust free cash flow each subsequent quarter and the rest of the year.

Okay. Okay, great. But thanks for the time, and good luck on the rest of the year, guys. Nice job.

Thanks, Tim. Thank you. Thank you. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. Our next questions come from the line of Alex Rigel with B. Riley. Please proceed with your questions.

Thank you, Jose Manuel and Christian. Fantastic quarter. Congratulations.

Thank you. Thank you.

A couple quick questions here. First, can you expand a little bit more upon sort of your interest in M&A over the next, you know, kind of 12 to 24 months?

Well, normally we do not have anything in the light of M&A. But since our growth has been so fantastic organically and there are some markets that we are not in and it's difficult to get in from raw, we are looking into some opportunities with products that we at the moment do not serve. But actually, as of this moment, for example, we have nothing secure. But we are looking. We're always open to look for opportunities. And I believe since we need to grow geographically and in our product line, I mean, we are talking 24 months. Yeah, I believe maybe one or two good opportunities will arise.

That's very helpful. And Santiago, thank you very much for the guidance. It's super helpful. One additional challenge that we have is seasonality last year wasn't really normal. And seasonality from a demand standpoint, especially on the residential side and even on the commercial side, this year does not seem normal. Can you help us to sort of understand a little bit about where you're thinking for revenues sort of in 2Q relative to 1Q and then you know, are we still looking at sort of the third quarter being the peak for the year?

This year is a little bit different, right? Because last year, because obvious reasons, there was some backlog that was not booked. And therefore, 12 months later, you don't get the benefit of invoicing that backlog, right? So that's what we're talking about the second half of the year, having a temporary air pocket that moves into 22, right? Because you just don't you know, put things into backlog and invoice him right away. So this year is just a little bit different. And the way that we model this out is that first half of the year is going to be stronger than the second half on the commercial side. But if things continue to go the way they are on the resi side, that resi side is going to more than compensate that temporary air packet, right? So All in all, to answer your question, we're not expecting seasonality this year. We think that all quarters should basically be around the same. It's just going to be a different mix of commercial versus residential that you have historically seen.

Very helpful. Thank you very much. Thank you, Alex.

Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. I would like to turn the call back over to Jose Manuel Diaz for any closing remarks.

Well, thanks, everyone, for participating on today's call. We will keep you posted. We are doing really good, and we believe the future is even brighter for Technoglass. Looking ahead, we are confident that we have a really good position to deliver Above-market growth in the U.S. with sustained operating leverage to support our industry-leading margins and a strong free cash flow. That should lead to exceptional shareholder returns in the years ahead. We appreciate your continued interest and support. Thank you.

Thank you for your participation. This does conclude today's teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Have a great day.