WildBrain Ltd.

Hello and welcome to Wildbrain's fiscal 2022 third quarter earnings conference call. Today's call is being recorded. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during that time, please press star then one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, press star two. I'd now like to turn the call over to Nancy Chan-Palmatier, Director, Investor Relations at WildBrain. You may begin your conference.

Thank you, Operator, and thank you, everyone, for joining us today. Speaking on the call today are Eric Ellenbogen, our CEO, and Aaron Ames, our CFO. Also with us and available during the question and answer session are Josh Sherba, our President, and Daniel Neith, our EBPS Finance and Chief Accounting Officer. First, we have some standard cautionary statements. The matters discussed on this call include forward-looking statements under applicable securities laws with respect to WildBrain, including but not limited to statements regarding investments by the company, commercial arrangements of the company, the business strategies and operational activities of the company, the markets and industries in which the company operates, and the future objectives and financial and operating performance of the company and the value of its assets. Such statements are based on factors and assumptions that management believes are reasonable at the time they were established. made and information currently available. Forward-looking statements are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties. Actual results or events in the future could differ materially and adversely from those described in the forward-looking statements as a result of various important factors, including the risk factors set out in the company's most recent MD&A and annual information form. Please note that all currency numbers are in Canadian dollars unless otherwise stated. For the question and answer session that will follow, we ask that each analyst keep to one question with one follow-up so that everyone has an opportunity to ask questions. If you'd like to ask an additional question, please rejoin the queue. I'll now turn the call over to our CEO, Eric Ellenbogen.

Thanks, Nancy, and thank you to everyone for joining our call today. In Q3, we delivered double-digit growth in both revenue and EBITDA compared to Q3 of last year, reflecting the success of the 360-degree IP strategy that we've rolled out over the past two years. We're now seeing the returns from investments in our IP library and premium productions now driving momentum across multiple earnings streams. And all parts of our content business are showing growth driven by that 360 strategy. And so today I'd like to provide a little bit more color on how that strategy actually plays out in our financial results. As I've shared with you on previous calls, when we sign significant content deals, it sets up a cascade of revenue that flows through our financials over a period of years. And in the near term, we often benefit from the licensing of rights to our library with revenue recognized in the same quarter in which the library is delivered. And then in the medium term, we realize the production revenue as we ramp up and deliver the new series and our specials. And finally, the newly produced content, taken with the library, drives viewer awareness and engagement, which, depending on the property, creates long-term consumer product opportunities. And I should add, in every instance, adds to the enduring underlying value of our proprietary IP. So let's take a look at some examples of the strategy reflected in our Q3 numbers. First, our recent Degrassi deal with HBO Max, which we signed and announced in Q3 and spoke to you about on last quarter's call. It's a two-part deal. So to start with, there's a library license for U.S. rights to the entire 14 seasons of the franchise's most popular installment, Degrassi The Next Generation. And the revenue from that license, which is distribution revenue, appeared in our Q3 results. And the second part of that deal is a commission from HBO Max for U.S. rights to a brand-new 10-episode Degrassi series, which will go into production this summer. This production revenue will flow through our financials in fiscal 2023. And since we've retained all distribution rights outside of the U.S. to both the new Degrassi series and the full library, we will soon realize additional revenue from territories and media worldwide. Let me take up another example, our Peanuts partnership with Apple TV+. As I've told you about on past calls, this is an extensive multi-year agreement, which includes not only rights to the Peanuts library, but also numerous new series and specials. And the first of that content began rolling out about two years ago, and we're now in continuous production, A great deal more content will continue to premiere for years to come. And we're just in the early days of delivering the largest slate of new content in the history of the Peanuts brand. Production revenue from the Apple deal has already been reflected in our financials for a number of quarters and will continue for the foreseeable future. Our most recent results only reflect production revenue from the first two series of Snoopy in Space and the Snoopy Show, and from the first three of multiple new Peanuts family specials that we're making for Apple TV+. These deals were executed a couple of years ago, so you can see there's a cadence to how the revenue from these large premium production deals come into our results over time. And as I've said, there's a lot more Peanuts content in that pipeline to flow into our financials for many years to come. Now, things get really interesting from a revenue perspective when we look at consumer products for a brand like Peanuts. All that new content, meaning the steady, years-long rollout of new, very high-quality content on one of the world's top streaming platforms, not to mention the world's best marketer, that not only creates a predictable flow of revenue for us, but also drives massive brand awareness and engagement. which in turn generates ever-increasing consumer product revenues. And the synergies of our licensing agency, CPLG, managing multiple territories around the world for peanuts, further contributes to the growth that we're delivering in our consumer product sector. So that's peanuts. Let me highlight one more example. Sonic Prime is the new series for the smash hit character Sonic the Hedgehog that we're producing for Netflix in partnership with Sega. That deal was announced in February 21, and we've been taking production revenue into our earnings over the past few quarters. Sonic is, of course, one of the most popular animated and gaming brands in history. The brand celebrated its 30th anniversary last year, is more popular than ever, with two hit movies that together have grossed over $600 million worldwide in just the past two years. Netflix, in fact, just released a new promotional trailer Their animation is late this week, which featured a tease of the new Sonic Prime content, and fans are buzzing with excitement. So this frenzy, the franchise, perfectly sets up our series to launch on Netflix later this year, and we're already seeing more consumer product opportunities for Sonic. Let's take a look at how those Sonic Prime consumer products economics work for us. First, because we manage licensing, for the Sonic Prime brand in multiple territories through our agency, CPLG, we get a meaningful commission on every consumer dollar. That's the agency piece of consumer products. Then, because WildBrain is a stakeholder in the IP alongside Sega, we also receive a material percentage of net profits for consumer products. So a deal like this is really a triple play. It generates production revenue, agency commission, and a share in consumer products profits. So these are three examples, Grassy, Peanuts, and Sonic Prime, all of how the 360 holistic strategy that we've launched creates multiple revenue streams from the very same deals. This is the strategic model we're using to structure our partnerships across the business. And for the last two years, we've been filling the pipeline with such deals. These also include Strawberry Shortcake, Teletubbies, Yo Gabba Gabba, Johnny Tess, Caillou, Chip and Potato, Johnny Jack Boy, Emojitown, Akato, Go Dog Go, and so on. And as these deals, and many others like them that we're working on behind the scenes, make their way through the pipeline of development, production, and distribution, we are layering on more and more revenue over the coming years. We also continue to extend our licensing reach to drive our consumer products business. WildBrain CPLG is further strengthening its global footprint with expansion across the Asia-Pacific region and the launch of new dedicated offices in Singapore, Taipei, and Seoul. And additionally, a licensing team, or part of WildBrain's existing Shanghai operations, will be expanded and rename WildBrain CPLG China. The new and existing operations will service the entire APAC region across approximately a dozen countries.

So with that, over to Aaron. Thank you, Eric. In Q3 2022, we delivered a strong quarter reflecting growth across all our content-driven businesses. We're aggregating margin across studio distribution and licensing, which is responsible for another quarter of EBITDA growth. We're delighted with our team's early execution of deals, which we had expected to be concluded later in our fiscal year, and we are on track to deliver at the upper end of our fiscal 2022 revenue guidance of $480 million to $500 million. On EBITDA, we continue investing to grow our business, and we maintain our adjusted EBITDA guidance of between $87 million to $93 million. Looking at the key numbers for the quarter, revenue grew 27% to 129.5 million compared with 102.2 million in the prior year, reflecting growth across content production and distribution, Spark, and consumer products. Net income in Q3 grew to 21.3 million versus a net loss of 26.5 million in Q3 2021, reflecting higher gross margins. We generated positive free cash flow of 8.1 million in Q3 2022, and previous negative free cash flow of 3.3 million in Q3 2021. As discussed last quarter, our cash flow reflects the higher deal volume and increasing revenue. We are growing, so there are short-term needs for working capital as we execute on content deals and build receivables, and to accelerate our growth in fiscal 2023 and beyond, We are seeing an incredible step up in proprietary live action production, and by late this summer, we expect to have five live action series in various stages of production further build in on our proprietary IP library. This live action production also requires short-term working capital. By way of contrast, the production cycles for live action are typically less than 12 months versus 24-month lead times for animation. We delivered 30.2 million of adjusted EBITDA on Q3, an increase of 75% compared with 17.2 million in Q3 2021. This was driven by the Degrassi Library licensing deal, distribution agreements with Amazon Prime and BBC, and a robust pipeline of premium productions. Now I'll turn the call back to Eric. Thanks, Aaron.

Our proprietary pipeline is incredibly robust. We're continuously adding more deals. behind those that have already been announced. And as I've always said, we're not chasing the quarter. It's a long game. You're now seeing the start of what's to come. These deals and many more in our pipeline and in development set us up for a phase of accelerated earnings growth for many years to come. I said that's what we're going to do. We're now doing it, and it's coming through in our results. So now, if I may, let's open up to questions.

Thank you. At this time, if you'd like to ask a question over the phone lines, please press star, then 1 on your telephone keypad. And again, to withdraw your question, please press star 2. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster.

And we'll first hear from Drew McReynolds of RBC.

Yeah, thanks very much, and good morning. And Eric, thanks for walking through the way you did in your opening remarks. Pretty crystal clear, so appreciate that. So just maybe three or four for me, and hopefully relatively quick here. Just on fiscal 2022 guidance, obviously, the year-to-date performance has been fantastic. I'm assuming that Q4 is just typical volatility that pulls back a little bit. Just wondering why that guidance wouldn't be higher, but it just could be timing. And then second, just with respect to the overall content cycle, is there any change or shift that you're sensing out there particularly on the streaming side. There obviously is a lot of focus on what's happened to Netflix in the last few quarters or months. And perhaps the answer is absolutely no, there's no change. But just curious to see if the streaming world is entering a new phase from your perspective. And I have a couple of quick ones back here.

Great. Good morning, Drew. And thanks for the question. What I'd like to do is perhaps take your second question first. and then turn it over to Aaron to discuss the guidance issues and where we stand, which, you know, as you correctly said, you know, we're way ahead of plan here in Q3. A lot of it's timing, but he can give you that in detail. So, you know, clearly the Netflix announcement getting a lot of attention. And here's how we see it both, you know, if I may, both a wild brain perspective and then more generally, which may be less interesting to you just as an industry observer about kind of what's going on. So, look, you know, let me state the obvious. Netflix changed the nature of content consumption. And You know, there are course corrections happening, to be sure. They still have 220 million subs. They have been and continue to be an incredible partner to us. And here's how we see it kind of changing the business a bit. It is sort of an equilibrium that was bound to happen where there needs to be a closer alignment between audience delivery and cost of production. And when, you know, you see some of these live action shows kicking out at over $20 million an episode with relatively small audiences, that's difficult to rationalize. Multiple hundred million dollar, you know, incredible theatrical quality films. You know, it's where most people take their content these days. and very aggressive international expansion, which highly favors us. It reflects, and Netflix themselves have said this, a change in the competitive landscape, which frankly favors us. We are suppliers to all of the major services. For us as well, we produce content at a fraction of those license fees. clearly have the advantage of vertical integration with our Vancouver studios, which are busier than ever. And there's a flight to quality that also favors us. And importantly, a migration to known famous brands, which we have in quantum. And it's probably not unlike an earlier era in the movie business where you saw TV shows that were turned into theatrical feature films and the like because they represent pre-sold marketing and they bring in audiences. And the last point that I would make around it is that for all of you who are industry observers, know that kids' content persists as a way of generating subscribers. I mean, look at the takeoff of Disney+. It's remarkable. as well as subscriber retention, keeping down churn. So I think we're really well positioned as the market changes. I think there will be some fits and starts and re-examining strategy. But by and large, these are changes that were bound to happen. But make no mistake, the course of media consumption has been changed forever. And I think we're in a great place when it comes to our content and our cost of production. So maybe more than you wanted to hear on the subject, but let me just go to Aaron with your first question.

Yeah, thanks, Eric, and thanks, Drew. Our distribution and production teams really did a terrific job. Their execution was great. and they completed a number of deals earlier than expected in our fiscal year. So the timing really favored us and accelerated revenue recognition on those deals in the fiscal year. So, I mean, those deals were already in our numbers, and that's why we remain on track to deliver in the upper end of our annual guidance on revenue. On EBITDA, you know, we always said since the beginning that we would invest incremental revenue and EBITDA to continue to grow our organization and to accelerate growth in fiscal 2023 and beyond. And so we're doubling down to do that, and that's why we retain our guidance on adjusted EBITDA from 87 to 93.

Okay. Now, that makes a lot of sense, and it kind of addresses my housekeeping question. If I look at SG&A costs, just say for Q3, a bunch of moving parts in there, but are we really at that kind of run rate going forward? And then last question for me, just on the lower non-controlling interest in the quarter, just if there's anything there that needs to be unpacked. Thank you.

Yeah, so I'll just pass it over to Danielle, and she can talk a little bit about SG&A and non-controlling interest.

Yeah, so, you know, as Aaron mentioned, we are reinvesting the incremental revenue to growth areas. So, we are seeing a bit higher SG&A. But also, we had higher variable compensation accruals. So, given that strong performance in Q3, similar to Q2, given that those were the higher EBITDA quarters. So, we are expecting that Q4 SG&A would fall in line with the Q1 SG&A level. So, you know, $23 to $24 million.

And, Drew, I'm sorry, Danielle, go ahead.

I was going to say the question on NCI, if you could repeat that one, and then I'll let Eric jump in.

Yeah, I was just – I think it was a little bit lower than what we've seen and just wondering if there's anything to flag there or just kind of normal course volatility in that item.

Yeah, that would just be normal following consumer product revenue. So nothing unusual there.

Okay, thank you. And what I was going to add at the risk of some redundancy is that every incremental EBITDA dollar I can get a hold of is going back into investment. And it's all about bringing on those revenue streams in 23 and beyond just as we're doing with the content strategy, the 360 that I described earlier. We are rich with opportunity, and I'm investing everywhere I can.

Crystal clear. Thank you for all the color, Eric.

Next, we'll hear from Adam Schein of National Bank Financial.

Thanks a lot. Good morning. Eric, maybe one for you just in terms of these productions that you're talking about. Is there a new financing model emerging at all? We don't quite see any material pick up really in sort of tax credits as some of the production activity steps up. So just curious if perhaps there's less reliance there and if there's any evolution to how deals have been structured in the past.

I don't know that we're really seeing a material change in the nature of the financing structure. As you well know, we are not deficit financiers. There is margin in every deal that we make. One of the things that we are seeing, and it's a shifting landscape, is the nature of rights acquired by some of the streaming services. So it's a mix. You have certain services, Peacock among them, and to an extent HBO Max. We talked about that in the context of the Degrassi deal, where they are acquiring just U.S. rights, leaving to us the distribution of that content new as well as library in international territories, including Canada. So I won't say that the financing model is at all changing. The opportunity set, though, is because maybe early on what we were seeing, as an example from Netflix with their originals, was the acquisition of outside of China of global rights. So I think that is what I can sort of describe as the landscape. And it changes all the time as these services go international. But what it really is is about very high margin due to our proprietary brands. And that's where we're putting emphasis in development and production. and it allows us the 360 in terms of monetization. So that isn't really a financing plan. It is an exploitation one that we really hit the accelerator on. Does that answer your question?

Yeah, it does. Thanks for that. I appreciate it.

And next we'll hear from Dan Kernos of the Benchmark Company.

Great, thanks. Good morning. Polly's been a little bit of a crazy morning, so at the risk here, Eric, just going back to kind of Drew's original line of questioning, I would think in this environment that you now have a huge opportunity to press deeper into FAST, which we're seeing kind of explode here. No doubt that there was, you know, let's call it plus fatigue on the SVOD side. And so, I think a combination of that and then subsequently with the proliferation that we're seeing of AVOD and content out there, it feels like, I mean, for example, we just saw Paramount come out with Sonic 3 now, I think, and you already have a relationship on that side. So to the extent that these guys probably are trying to right-size their checkbooks, as it were, between content costs it feels like they need to increase their monetization. So I'm wondering if you are getting incremental views on toy production, you know, just other ways that these guys know that they need to monetize their own IP beyond what you're doing kind of with your existing portfolio.

Do you know what? I might ask Josh to address that question. Dan, good morning.

Sure. Yeah, look, I mean, we certainly agree with your assessment of the market and the competition being a positive for all the reasons that Eric spoke about earlier. I think what you're referring to is really just some of these streamers looking for additional revenue streams around consumer products. Is that the nature of the question? Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, I would say, look, I think you have an opportunity maybe more in fast space, and they clearly need to justify the massive streaming losses that they're accruing at the moment. And a lot of that feels like it will have to come through things like consumer products and other alternative channels that you can probably help them with, given your expanded relationships with a lot of these companies.

Yeah, so I would say there are unique deal structures that are happening where we are in certain deals kind of excluding some AVOD rights, which is definitely a positive for us. I would just kind of reiterate our capabilities of being a premium producer, but at costs that are lower than if these streamers were to fully produce this content in-house. So I think that that really continues to be a larger opportunity for us to be a – a better partner to these streamers when they look at the overall cost structure. And then you layer on the fact that we've got known IP, and that's a really great opportunity for them. I think, you know, we were excited with the sonic push that Netflix gave this week, and we're really bullish on how they're going to promote that series. So, So, yeah, these independent known IP brands, efficient production models, I think those things put us in a really good place. And then you layer on our ability to do alternative forms of distribution. And, yeah, I think we're set up as a great partner.

And I'll ask kind of a follow-up to either you, Josh, or Eric. Just in terms of the deals that, you know, Eric, obviously you have a lot more in the pipeline, unsurprisingly. But as you think about deal structure, we've talked about this a little bit on the call already, the way that you're signing deals with, say, with an Apple, for example, it certainly has differed from how you've considered signing deals in the past. And I'm wondering if windowing, exclusivity, how you're thinking about things like that right now, given... sort of what the, you know, the content goldmine that you're sitting on and the need for these guys to retain subscribers and or viewers in this marketplace. You know, you have the ability to also ramp content substantially. So I'm just, I'm wondering if, you know, you have kind of multiple bites of the Apple with expanded deals and maybe even reduce exclusivity where you can still keep prices high if that's an option you should choose. There's how we should think about that.

It's a good question. So, look, from this perspective, and we are a bit of a unicorn in the business because we are a vertical company. We have this amazing marketing and amplification network in Spark. There is a recognition clearly by all of the services that the always-on quality of content and brands is an enhancement to the rights that they own. And when I answered the question a little bit earlier about the financing structures, again, it varies by service, whether they are seeking to acquire only domestic rights, which gives us you know, an incredible library and a flow of new content for international channels and buyers. And, you know, take with that what we're doing now on a global basis in consumer products with CPLG. And, you know, we favor things like Apple. The peanuts content, and I think you know this and something you've observed, is and has been largely unknown outside of the United States. It's been a character property, you know, granted 75 years and going stronger than ever. But now what we have is this sort of Saturn rocket of Apple content that is day and day distributed on a global basis and is persistent content as it remains on the platform. So we are also seeing among a number of the services, both legacy ones and new ones, a desire to participate in consumer products. I think that that is going to be a recognition. And they need partners like us. Many of them do not even have the ability to exploit consumer products on a global basis. They don't have the footprint that we do. So I think we are seeing that. You know, they need to switch on additional sources of revenue. You're seeing things emergent in, you know, SVOD services potentially going AVOD. But it is about the ubiquity of content and the presence of the brands, and we've got the brands. So we celebrate and welcome all of those developments. I think they favor us incredibly well.

Got it. That's helpful. Thanks for the color, guys. I appreciate it.

Sure thing. Thank you.

Next, we'll hear from Aravinda Galapathage of Canaccord.

Good morning. Thanks for taking my question. I wanted to focus a little bit on the consumer product side. Obviously, you continue to grow very nicely. I think it's about 24% year-to-date growth in fiscal 22. Obviously, still led very much by peanuts. Eric, considering some of the comments that you've made, sort of that cycle going from library sales to production to IP, As we think about fiscal 23, do you see, you know, we're getting to that timeline where that CP growth can diversify beyond peanuts. Do you see that mixed change sort of starting to happen by next year, or should we, you know, is that more of a fiscal 24 sort of an event? I wanted to get your thoughts on that. And my follow-up for, I guess, for Aaron, given some of your comments around working capital, and SG&A, you know, you've successfully delivered down to sort of the targets that you talked about, 4.3 now, net debt to EBITDA. You know, considering that you are having good EBITDA growth, you know, the business is sort of gaining good traction and the industry backdrop is still good. Are you thinking along the lines of, you know, being fairly comfortable at that four times range? Or, you know, as we look to 23, do you think that the level of delivering that's happening can continue? Thanks.

Thanks, Saravenda. Good morning. On the consumer products timing, and it really breaks by which IP we're talking about. You know, we build the content base distribution, ubiquity of that content across multiple platforms. And that is sort of job one. We then do marketing, cross promotions, et cetera. For example, Strawberry Shortcake, you may have seen in the current quarter, a big rollout at Grocery, which we're doing programs with Sunkist and Berry Companies and so forth. I mean, it's really intercepting consumers where they shop, reminding them about the brand, delivering more content on our YouTube network and then distributing that broadly, putting up content now on Netflix and a number of high-quality specials around the brand. And then, you know, by and large for that, you'll see consumer products roll on 24. For things like Sonex, where there have been essentially gigantic successes in theatrical motion pictures and a very well-known persistent brand in the marketplace in gaming. There could be some pickups in 23, just off the coattails of all of this amazing activity and our premiering of the Sonic show on Netflix. So it really varies. I want to say... You know, our expectation is that this stuff begins rolling in the latter part of 23 and into 24. And we are in the main very, just in terms of the way revenue recognition works, is that we don't take the MGs into revenue. We are, you know, it's really about the sell through and the royalty receipts. that we get, and that takes a while to flow through the financials. But it's a building process, and we're just layering one after another after another so that we will, I think, fully expect a diversification in the consumer products revenue. But the peanuts business is a very well-oiled machine now, and we've talked about territory expansions that's going to you know, continue to spur increases in revenue, you know, across consumer products. But I think that's probably where I come down on the timing question. And Aaron can answer your second question.

Yeah. Thanks, Eric. And hi, Aravinda. You know, we're very comfortable with our leverage and where we are. And we have a terrific amount of visibility because of the pipeline and all the deals that we've been doing and growing that pipeline in production, distribution, starting to grow the consumer products. So we feel very good about our visibility. Our visibility is better than it's ever been before. And so, you know, historically, we were doing the leveraging with some asset sales and then to a lesser extent EBITDA growth. Now we shift As we look out to 23 and beyond, we're shifting to growing EBITDA to take over as the primary means and driver of accelerating any future deleveraging augmented by improving free cash flow. So a little bit of a shift there, but feeling very good about our leverage.

Excellent. Thank you.

And I don't have further questions over the phone lines at this time, so I will turn the call back over to Nancy Chen, Palmatier.

Nancy, before you pick up, I want to use my soapbox for one more thing. It's really just to publicly acknowledge and thank the amazing team that I have for what they're delivering. It's really fun to go to work these days. I think that everybody is excited about what we have and what we've switched on, and the attention that we're getting, the critical acclaim, you know, these are great properties. They're doing great work with it, and I just want to thank all of my colleagues. And now back to Nancy.

Thanks, Eric, and thank you, Operator, and everyone for joining us today. We look forward to updating you on more exciting news in the next quarter. So thanks and have a great day.

This concludes today's conference. Thank you all for participating. You may now disconnect.