| BT Group Plc (GB0030913577) | |||
1,95 GBXStand (close): 03.07.25 |
 |
||
Nachrichten |
||
| Datum / Uhrzeit | Titel | Bewertung |
| 19.06.25 05:39:27 | We Think BT Group's (LON:BT.A) Solid Earnings Are Understated |  |
| BT Group plc's (LON:BT.A) recent earnings report didn't offer any surprises, with the shares unchanged over the last week. Our analysis suggests that shareholders might be missing some positive underlying factors in the earnings report. This technology could replace computers: discover the 20 stocks are working to make quantum computing a reality.LSE:BT.A Earnings and Revenue History June 19th 2025 How Do Unusual Items Influence Profit? To properly understand BT Group's profit results, we need to consider the UK£822m expense attributed to unusual items. It's never great to see unusual items costing the company profits, but on the upside, things might improve sooner rather than later. We looked at thousands of listed companies and found that unusual items are very often one-off in nature. And, after all, that's exactly what the accounting terminology implies. Assuming those unusual expenses don't come up again, we'd therefore expect BT Group to produce a higher profit next year, all else being equal. That might leave you wondering what analysts are forecasting in terms of future profitability. Luckily, you can click here to see an interactive graph depicting future profitability, based on their estimates. Our Take On BT Group's Profit Performance Because unusual items detracted from BT Group's earnings over the last year, you could argue that we can expect an improved result in the current quarter. Because of this, we think BT Group's earnings potential is at least as good as it seems, and maybe even better! And the EPS is up 24% over the last twelve months. At the end of the day, it's essential to consider more than just the factors above, if you want to understand the company properly. If you'd like to know more about BT Group as a business, it's important to be aware of any risks it's facing. You'd be interested to know, that we found 3 warning signs for BT Group and you'll want to know about these. Today we've zoomed in on a single data point to better understand the nature of BT Group's profit. But there is always more to discover if you are capable of focussing your mind on minutiae. Some people consider a high return on equity to be a good sign of a quality business. While it might take a little research on your behalf, you may find this free collection of companies boasting high return on equity, or this list of stocks with significant insider holdings to be useful. Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content?Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned. Kommentare anzeigen |
||
| 16.04.25 12:42:36 | BT Group Insider Confidence Rewarded, Stock Hits UK£16b Market Cap | |
| BT Group plc (LON:BT.A) insiders who purchased shares in the last 12 months were richly rewarded last week. The stock climbed by 10% resulting in a UK£1.5b addition to the company’s market value. In other words, the original UK£47.6k purchase is now worth UK£58.3k. While we would never suggest that investors should base their decisions solely on what the directors of a company have been doing, logic dictates you should pay some attention to whether insiders are buying or selling shares. Our free stock report includes 4 warning signs investors should be aware of before investing in BT Group. Read for free now. The Last 12 Months Of Insider Transactions At BT Group In the last twelve months, the biggest single purchase by an insider was when insider Tushar Morzaria bought UK£48k worth of shares at a price of UK£1.36 per share. We do like to see buying, but this purchase was made at well below the current price of UK£1.67. Because it occurred at a lower valuation, it doesn't tell us much about whether insiders might find today's price attractive. You can see the insider transactions (by companies and individuals) over the last year depicted in the chart below. If you click on the chart, you can see all the individual transactions, including the share price, individual, and the date! See our latest analysis for BT Group LSE:BT.A Insider Trading Volume April 16th 2025 There are always plenty of stocks that insiders are buying. If investing in lesser known companies is your style, you could take a look at this freelist of companies. (Hint: insiders have been buying them). Insider Ownership Of BT Group Another way to test the alignment between the leaders of a company and other shareholders is to look at how many shares they own. I reckon it's a good sign if insiders own a significant number of shares in the company. Our data indicates that BT Group insiders own about UK£5.2m worth of shares (which is 0.03% of the company). We do note, however, it is possible insiders have an indirect interest through a private company or other corporate structure. Whilst better than nothing, we're not overly impressed by these holdings. So What Do The BT Group Insider Transactions Indicate? It doesn't really mean much that no insider has traded BT Group shares in the last quarter. On a brighter note, the transactions over the last year are encouraging. We'd like to see bigger individual holdings. However, we don't see anything to make us think BT Group insiders are doubting the company. While it's good to be aware of what's going on with the insider's ownership and transactions, we make sure to also consider what risks are facing a stock before making any investment decision. At Simply Wall St, we found 4 warning signs for BT Group that deserve your attention before buying any shares. Story Continues Of course, you might find a fantastic investment by looking elsewhere. So take a peek at this freelist of interesting companies. For the purposes of this article, insiders are those individuals who report their transactions to the relevant regulatory body. We currently account for open market transactions and private dispositions of direct interests only, but not derivative transactions or indirect interests. Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content?Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned. View Comments |
||
| 21.03.25 11:28:34 | BBC and ITV fined for freelancer cartel | |
| Cameraman watches football Broadcasters including the BBC and ITV (ITV.L) have been fined after they were found to have illegally fixed pay rates for freelancers. The BBC, ITV, BT (BT-A.L) and IMG have been ordered to pay a combined penalty of £4.2m by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) after admitting to cartel-like behaviour in their sports coverage. Sky also admitted to breaking the law but avoided a fine after alerting the watchdog to its involvement before an investigation was launched. The case centred on the broadcasters’ use of freelance workers, such as camera operators and sound technicians, for covering sports events such as major football matches and rugby tournaments. The CMA found 15 instances where at least two companies had illegally shared sensitive information about pay with each other, including daily rates and pay rises. The watchdog said in most cases the explicit aim was to fix how much to pay freelancers across the industry. In one instance, one broadcaster told another they had “no intention of getting into a bidding war” but “want to be aligned and benchmark the rates”. In another example, a company wanted to “present a united front” with its competitor. Juliette Enser, of the CMA, said: “Millions watch sports on TV each day, with production teams working behind the scenes to make this possible – and it is only right they are paid fairly. “Labour markets are important for economic growth as a whole. Good recruitment and employment practices help people access the right jobs where they’re paid appropriately and make it easier for businesses to expand and find the workers they need. “Companies should set rates independently of each other so pay is competitive – not doing so could leave workers out of pocket. Employers must ensure those who hire staff know the rules and stick to them to prevent this happening in the future.” The fines were discounted after all four companies admitted to breaking the law and settled the case, while BT, IMG and ITV also received lower fines for cooperation. The watchdog separately dropped a broader investigation into collusion in freelancer contracts in non-sports programming, saying it was no longer a priority. That investigation covered a number of production companies including Derry Girls maker Hat Trick, Sherlock creator Hartswood Films and Sister Pictures, which was co-founded by Elisabeth Murdoch and is behind shows including This Is Going to Hurt. A BBC spokesman said: “The BBC takes its competition law obligations seriously and has co-operated with the CMA throughout its investigation, which involved a number of sports broadcasters.” Story Continues An ITV spokesman said: “ITV is fully committed to complying with competition law and cooperated with the CMA throughout its investigation. In light of the CMA’s investigation we have implemented further enhanced competition law compliance measures across the business.” A BT spokesman said: “We take our competition law obligations seriously and co-operated with the CMA throughout this investigation. Having accepted the findings of this investigation, we have agreed to settle this case.” A Sky spokesman added: “Sky takes compliance with competition law extremely seriously. As soon as we became aware of the issue, we proactively notified the CMA and cooperated fully with their investigation.” IMG declined to comment. View Comments |
||
| 21.03.25 09:19:40 | BT Approaches AT&T and Orange on International Unit Tie-Up, Sources Say | |
| (Bloomberg) -- BT Group Plc has approached major telecommunications companies about partnerships to help turn around its struggling international business, according to people familiar with the matter. Most Read from Bloomberg New York Subway Ditches MetroCard After 32 Years for Tap-And-Go Despite Cost-Cutting Moves, Trump Plans to Remake DC in His Style LA Faces $1 Billion Budget Hole, Warns of Thousands of Layoffs Amtrak CEO Departs Amid Threats of a Transit Funding Pullback NYC Plans for Flood Protection Without Federal Funds The UK-based operator approached potential partners including AT&T Inc. and Orange SA to explore tie-ups that could involve selling a stake in its global segment, the people said, asking not to be identified because the discussions are private. Deliberations are preliminary and there’s no guarantee of a transaction, the people said. BT’s global unit, which was recently folded into a larger business segment, has dragged down growth metrics for years, with steadily declining earnings and revenue. The unit accounted for about 11% of BT’s revenue in the first half of the 2025 fiscal year. It allows the British operator to serve customers around the world, but many of the contracts generate little profit and are costly to maintain. Chief Executive Officer Allison Kirkby’s turnaround strategy has been to hone in on the UK, where BT dominates in both fixed and mobile customers. She’s said the international segment would be carved out with a full or partial-sale or streamlining. Revenue at BT’s global unit declined 9.9% in the six months ended in September from a year earlier to about £1.1 billion ($1.4 billion). “We’re keeping everything open and this means we’ve been speaking to third parties about a range of possibilities,” a BT spokesperson said by email, declining to comment further. A spokesperson for Orange said the company is focused on its business strategy, declining to comment on a potential approach. A representative for AT&T didn’t respond to a request for comment. When asked about a potential BT partnership recently, AT&T Chief Financial Officer Pascal Desroches declined to comment on the deal. In general, AT&T would “only do something like that if we thought it’d really advance our strategy to be the very best connectivity company in America and deliver to our shareholders a really attractive return,” Desroches said. BT shares rose 0.3% to 163.75 pence at 9 a.m. in London. The stock has gained about 14% this year. (Updates to add details on the size of the unit in the third paragraph.) Story Continues Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek A New ‘China Shock’ Is Destroying Jobs Around the World Tesla’s Gamble on MAGA Customers Won’t Work How TD Became America’s Most Convenient Bank for Money Launderers The Real Reason Trump Is Pushing ‘Buy American’ One Man’s Crypto Windfall Is Funding a $1 Billion Space Station Dream ©2025 Bloomberg L.P. View Comments |
||
| 13.03.25 00:01:00 | Apprentice star and BT boss join Board of Trade | |
| Apprentice star Mike Soutar and BT (BT-A.L) boss Allison Kirkby have been appointed as experts on the Board of Trade as the Government seeks to boost exports. They are among 10 chief executives and business leaders picked to act as advocates and ambassadors for their sectors and support growth, with a focus on the country’s 5.5 million small and medium-sized businesses. Michelle Ovens, who set up trade group Small Business Britain, and Ella’s Kitchen founder Paul Lindley will also join the team.Chief executive of BT, Allison Kirkby (Stefan Rousseau/PA) Business and Trade Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said the new board would not be a “chin-stroking talking shop”. “The new Board of Trade will be another tool in our arsenal to get more businesses trading around the world and taking advantage of our fantastic free trade agreements,” he said. “This won’t be a chin-stroking talking shop, because I’ll be urging them to boost exports and get more SMEs trading across all their sectors. “Because we know that when more small firms export, it leads to more jobs and higher wages and grows the economy.” The Department for Business and Trade is also launching a call for evidence to gather information on financing for small firms and potential private sector measures to boost their funding. Small Business Minister Gareth Thomas said: “For small businesses, getting off the ground is one of the hardest parts of scaling up, and central to that is the ability to access finance. “That’s why this Call for Evidence will be important to allow us to see what more needs to be done to support SMEs so they can go for growth.” Shadow business and trade secretary Andrew Griffith said: “It has taken the Government more than eight months to even appoint the Board of Trade, let alone hold a single meeting.” The Tory MP also said Labour had “trashed the economy”, and were “ramming through an extreme trade union charter”. – The new board advisers are: Omar Ali Mike Hawes Dame Vivian Hunt Allison Kirkby Paul Lindley Catherine McGuinness Michelle Ovens Mike Soutar Sarah Walker Dr Charles Woodburn View Comments |
||
| 08.03.25 15:00:00 | BT brand saved as new boss overhauls telecoms giant | |
| BT boss Allison Kirkby is seeking to refocus the company on its core offering - Pau Barrena/Bloomberg The BT brand has been saved from the consumer scrap heap as its chief executive plots a bold strategy overhaul. The former telecoms monopoly announced in 2022 that it was ditching BT as its “flagship” brand for millions of customers to focus on selling broadband and mobile services under the EE name. However, these plans have now been shelved by Allison Kirkby, its chief executive, amid concerns that dropping the historic brand risked alienating older customers. As a result, both the BT and EE brands will continue to be used side by side. The change comes amid pressure from Sunil Bharti Mittal, the Indian tycoon who became BT’s largest shareholder last summer after taking a stake of almost 25pc. Mr Mittal has taken a hands-on approach to his investment, summoning executives for two days of strategy meetings last month. He also met with Ms Kirkby during the Mobile World Congress industry conference in Barcelona this week. Ms Kirkby is seeking to refocus the company on its core offering and has already scaled back a previously announced move into new products and services. In 2023, the company said it would use the EE brand to start selling consumer electronics such as smart fridges and kettles in an effort to win over more subscribers in a stagnant telecoms market. Insiders said these plans will be refocused on products that are closer to the company’s main telecoms offering, such as gaming, laptops and tablets. Meanwhile, BT will step up its investment in Plusnet, its value broadband brand. The group recently stopped offering Plusnet mobile services, but executives are understood to be considering the launch of a new discount mobile brand as they gear up for tougher competition following the £15bn merger of rivals Vodafone and Three. The moves come as a blow to Marc Allera, BT’s outgoing consumer boss who spearheaded the shift to EE in recent years. He will leave the company later this month after missing out on the top job to Ms Kirkby a year ago. The BT chief has appointed Claire Gillies, formerly a senior executive at telecoms group Bell Canada, as the new head of the company’s consumer division. Her appointment forms part of a wider leadership overhaul that includes the hiring of Jon James as new business boss. The move to retain the BT brand will likely be welcomed by large numbers of Britons who fondly recall the BT phonebook and TV ads featuring the likes of Bob Hoskins, Maureen Lipman and even ET.BT became a household name thanks in part to TV ads featuring the likes of Maureen Lipman - Advertising Archives Formerly known as British Telecom, BT was privatised under Margaret Thatcher in 1982 and shortened its name just under a decade later. Story Continues Under previous plans, BT would have remained the primary brand for business customers and the group’s corporate name, but consumers would have been encouraged to switch to EE. The company previously said it was prioritising the EE brand because of its reputation for good mobile connectivity and its popularity across different age groups. Its own adverts have been fronted by Hollywood actor Kevin Bacon, though more recently he has been restricted to voice-overs in an effort to cut costs. BT bought EE from Deutsche Telekom and Orange in a £12.5bn deal in 2015. The company has since operated under two brands, with the two names now emblazoned side by side on its high street stores. A spokesman for BT said: “EE is our lead consumer-facing brand for converged mobile and broadband customers but there will always be a big role for BT as one of our most highly valued brands by our customers. “BT will therefore continue as part of our portfolio of well-loved consumer brands alongside EE and Plusnet.” View Comments |
||
| 04.03.25 12:05:43 | BT’s £1m leadership guru fell asleep in meetings | |
| Allison Kirkby, BT’s chief executive, appointed JMW on the recommendation of BT’s human resources department - Pau Barrena/Bloomberg BT (BT-A.L) spent more than £1m to bring in a leadership guru for its senior managers who repeatedly fell asleep in meetings owing to medication he was taking. Dan Spiwack, the chief executive of US-based JMW Consultants, was brought in by Allison Kirkby, BT’s chief executive, on a nine-month, £1.3m contract shortly after she took charge early last year. Alongside colleagues he ran a leadership event for senior executives and then attended their committee meetings for months afterwards, with the aim of providing feedback on their interactions. However, multiple sources said Mr Spiwack repeatedly fell asleep in the meetings and missed significant decisions. One source said: “It was ridiculous and became a running joke among some people and their teams. He was openly asleep.” A spokesman for JMW said Mr Spiwack had fallen asleep as a result of heart medication which had made him drowsy and had stopped taking it when this became clear. While Mr Spiwack’s drowsiness was not related to the length of the meetings, BT is notorious among even its own staff for its culture of lengthy discussions and PowerPoint presentations. Executive committee meetings can last up to nine hours, with each attendee handed papers running up to 500 pages. By contrast, Amazon (AMZN) is famous for the succinct six-page memos which are read by everyone at the start of every meeting. It is understood that Ms Kirkby appointed JMW on the recommendation of BT’s human resources department following an open procurement process. The contract was not renewed. One its website, JMW says it has an “unapologetic focus on the human element in organisational and operational success” and that the “the mindset and behaviour of leaders, aligned across and within divisions, is the most powerful multiplier of impact”. Slow-moving culture Ms Kirkby is the latest chief executive of BT, a former state monopoly, to attempt to shift its slow-moving culture. She is seeking to increase collaboration between departments and break down long-standing barriers to growth. Several of the company’s senior leadership have been replaced or are in the process of moving on. She is now under pressure to deliver change from number one shareholder Bharti Global, the Indian conglomerate controlled by billionaire Sunil Mittal. Ms Kirkby is continuing a programme of significant job cuts; by November BT had cut 16,000 roles in two years.Billionaire Sunil Mittal controls Bharti Global, BT’s number one shareholder - Angel Garcia/Bloomberg A spokesman for JWM said: “Mr Spiwack was dealing with a heart condition. He was put on medication to treat it, unfortunately drowsiness was a side effect. “When Mr Spiwack realised the impact the medicine was having, he informed the client of his condition and why the drowsiness occurred. The condition has since been addressed.” A BT spokesman said: “BT Group works with external advisors to support strategic programmes, and following a competitive procurement process engaged JMW Consultants to deliver projects focused on enhancing leadership performance. These projects took place over the course of 2024, and concluded at the end of year.” View Comments |
||
| 28.02.25 15:37:23 | Q1 2025 Altigen Communications Inc Earnings Call |  |
| Participants Gary Stone; Chief Financial Officer; Altigen Technologies Jeremiah Fleming; Chairman of the Board, President, Chief Executive Officer; Altigen Communications Inc Joe Hamblin; Chief Digital and Transformation Officer; Altigen Communications Inc Presentation Operator Good afternoon and welcome to the Altigen Technologies First Quarter fiscal year 2025 results conference call. (Operator Instructions) It is now my pleasure to turn the floor over to Gary Stone, Chief Financial Officer at Altigen Technologies. Gary, the floor is yours. Gary Stone Good afternoon, everyone and welcome to Altigen Technologies earnings call for the first quarter fiscal 2025. Joining me on the call today is Jeremiah Fleming, President, Chief Executive Officer, Joe Hamblin, Chief Digital, Transformation Officer, and as mentioned, I am Gary Stone Chief Financial Officer. Earlier today, we issued an earnings release reporting financial results for the period ended December 31, 2024. This release can be found on our IR website at www.altigen.com. We've also arranged a replay of this call, which may be accessed by phone. This replay will be available approximately 1 hour after the call's completion and remain in effect for 90 days. The call can also be accessed from the investor relations section of our website. Before we begin our formal remarks, we need to remind everyone that today's call may contain forward-looking information regarding future events and the future financial performance of the company. We wish to caution you that such statements are just predictions, and actual results may differ materially due to the certain risks and uncertainties that pertain to our business. We refer you to the financial disclosures periodically by the company with the OTCQB over the counter market, specifically the company's audited annual report for the fiscal year end is September 30, 2024, as well as the safe harbor statement in the press release the company issued today. These documents contain important risk factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in the company's projections or forward-looking statements. Altigen assumes no obligation to revise any forward-looking information contained in today's call. In addition, during today's call, we will also be referring to certain non-GAAP financial measures. These non-GAAP measures are not superior to or a replacement for the comparable GAAP measures, but we believe these measures help investors gain a more complete understanding of results. A reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP measures and additional disclosures regarding these measures are included in today's press release. And with that, I'll turn the call over to Jeremiah Fleming for our opening remarks. Jere. Story Continues Jeremiah Fleming Thanks, Gary, and good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for joining us for today's call. I'll begin the call with a brief summary of our first quarter of 2025 performance followed by an update on the state of the business. Joe Hamblin will then review our progress toward our goal of achieving operational excellence. Following Joe's comments, Gary Stone will present more details regarding our first quarter of financials. As Gary mentioned earlier today, we announced our fiscal first quarter financial results. As a brief summary, our fiscal Q1 revenue of $3.4 million represented a 4% increase compared to the same period a year ago. Net income for the first quarter was approximately $87,000 versus a loss of $346,000 in the year go quarter. Gary will provide further color during his commentary, but I do want to point out we are continuing to make progress. Now I'll spend the next few minutes discussing our key business initiatives. First of all, during the quarter, we outsourced the majority of our accounting department to Armanino. Which is a Top 25 accounting, consulting, and technology firm. This decision was driven by both cost considerations and our desire to modernize our legacy accounting systems. As a result, Carolyn David, our former Vice President of finance, is no longer with the company. During her 18 plus years at Altigen, Carolyn always worked extremely hard at her job, always put the company first, and always had a pleasant demeanor. We certainly wish her the best in her future endeavours. As part of that transition, we brought in Gary Stone as our Chief Financial Officer. Gary has a strong background in financial accounting and many years of experience as a CFO, particularly in the high tech industry. But perhaps more importantly, Gary brings unique perspectives as it relates to driving shareholder value. And Joe and Gary will provide further details on our accounting transition during their commentaries. Turning to Altigen products and services, for the past several years we've expected considerable effort attempting to get our white label UCaaS platform feature ready for our target markets. Consequently, last quarter, we made the decision after years of waiting to replace that white label platform with a new modern UCaaS solution which offers significantly enhanced functionality compared to the old platform. We're now finally in the position to accelerate the migration of our legacy base of PBX customers with our new MaxCloud UC solution. We have an aggressive goal of migrating all legacy PBS customers to Max Cloud GC in the next 15 months. This migration strategy is designed to preserve primarily our existing customer base. For net new revenues, we're also going to soon be begin offering, excuse me, Max Cloud GC as a service to managed IT service providers. Commonly referred to as MSPs, these organizations provide complete outsourced IT resources, often including the phone system to small and mid-sized businesses. Our value proposition to the MSPs is very competitive price points, strong margins, and Altigen's historical white glove support model. Today, a small handful of MSPs carry Altigen solutions in their portfolios. Now that we have the proper solution available with MaxCloud UC, we expect to be able to begin generating new incremental revenues in the UCaaS space through these MSP partners. Transition to Fiserv, as many of Fiserv is a $20 billion global fintech and payments company. They're also a longtime strategic partner of ours delivering Altigen at UCaaS, CCaaS, and customer self-service solutions to their 10,000 bank and credit union customers. As such, we're working closely with Fiserv on a number of key initiatives, including migrating Fiserv's legacy Altigen PBX customers to our new MaxCloud UC platform. Increasing the adoption of Altigen's new core engaged contact center solution which leverages Microsoft Teams. Planning for expanded sales and marketing efforts focused on our secure SIP fraud prevention services, and finally we're closing in on the full launch of our new AI-based conversational IVR platform which will be offered by Fiserv as a standard IVR solution. Fiserv will be providing the new AI capabilities as a fee-based upgrade to their 1,500 bank and credit union customers currently using the Altigen IVR. With the advancements we've made in our UCaaS and CCaaS solutions along with the recent organizational enhancements made by Fiserv, we're more excited than ever about the prospects of the business opportunities this partnership will bring. Moving to our solutions for Microsoft Teams, as discussed last quarter, we recently introduced Core Engage. This is our new contact center platform for Microsoft Teams. Adoption of Core Engage continues to grow. This includes new logos as well as expansion within current customers. This expansion is typically from a single core engaged contact center deployment to multiple contact center deployments throughout various parts of the organization. As a case in point one of our new Core engage customers is among the Top 5 largest school districts in the United States. This customer is expanding their initial rollout of core engage in a single contact center to 12 different departments, collectively resulting in revenue to Altigen of approximately $18,000 per month. We're also seeing continued expansion in the opportunities driven by British Telecom, which is now known simply as BT. As we discussed on last quarter's call, Core engage has been selected by BT to be included in their voice solutions portfolio, as well as a featured product showcased in the BT customer Experience Center located in their London headquarters. We've been engaged by BT in a number of opportunities, generally for their multinational customers. And since BT targets larger companies, their average deal size is in the $10,000 per month range, which is approximately 10 times Altigen's current average revenue per customer. Given BT's global reach and the fact that they have more than 1.6 million users on their hosted UCaaS platforms, the opportunity with BT is absolutely massive. Shifting to AI, it's important to point out that virtually every executive wants to leverage AI in their business, but most companies don't have the expertise or resources to implement an AI solution. And with so many different AI technologies available, it's also quite daunting for these executives to understand which technology is best suited to meet their business requirements. This is where Altigen comes in. Our strategy has been to first develop a trusted AI platform which we call ensemble AI, then deliver applications tailored to a particular use case built on the ensemble AI platform. Customers benefit by having the ability to deploy a single AI platform to address multiple use cases in their company for AI. Ensemble AI also enables Altigen to use any AI engine, excuse me, we'll say AI engine on the back end. So, we're not locked into a particular AI technology. Today we lead with Microsoft Azure OpenAI as our AI engine of choice, but if a customer prefers Gemini from Google or Bedrock from Amazon or any number of other LLMs, we can just as easily utilize those AI models in our ensemble AI platform. Using this best of breed approach, we are building AI applications across four key business areas in which we see the greatest opportunity for AI to add value to our customers. First is our AI enabled core engaged contact center, for which we've added several AI capabilities, including language translation which will soon be available for messaging applications including live agent web chat, and this technology converts text from the web chat user's language to the agent's language and vice versa, which eliminates the need for organizations to hire multi-lingual web chat agents, which can also be a challenge to find. We've also added conversation summary. To core engage which uses AI to automatically summarize a conversation between a customer and a contact center agent, then stores that summary in the customer's CRM for later retrieval and for reporting purposes. Finally, we've incorporated sentiment analysis into core engage which uses AI to determine whether the emotional tone of a particular customer interaction is positive, negative, or neutral. Now with sentiment analysis, rather than requiring a contact center supervisor to evaluate every single interaction, a customer can use the sentiment analysis to flag only those interactions that need further attention. As a fast follow to the new AI enabled contact center capabilities I just mentioned, we're also introducing Core Engaged chatbot, which leverages AI to provide a 24/7 web-based customer self-service. Our future plan is to integrate Core Engage AI with our AI IVR solution, which will enable seamless customer interactions across digital and voice channels without the need for live agent live customer service agents to be engaged. After that, our next initiative is Core Insights, which is a plan a new solution that provides KPI dashboards integrated with AI analytics. Our initial target market is Pfizer's 1,500 Altigen Bank and credit union customers using the IVR. Core Insights will deliver unique actionable insights and AI recommendations for these financial institution executives which are designed to enhance the customer experiences and help them drive new revenues. All of these AI capabilities are delivered as out of the box applications with the ability for the customer or for ultra and professional services to customize the applications as needed. Our final AI initiative involves leveraging our ensemble AI platform to deliver a complete end to end custom AI solution. These solutions are typically targeted at large scale enterprise projects and are performed by the Altering Consulting Services division for these enterprise customers. So, let me with that lead into an update on our consulting services business. Our primary focus today continues to be the Connecticut Department of Transportation, or CTDOT, with whom we've enjoyed a great partnership. We are continuing to expand our engagement with CTDOT, particularly as it relates to new AI projects. In fact, we've just begun a project funded by the federal government for CTDOT to develop a custom AI solution to retrieve, assimilate, and present data to departmental executives in order to improve decision making and streamline business processes. We believe this is just the tip of the iceberg with many more opportunities to leverage. We've also just begun ramping our sales and marketing efforts in our consulting services division with the objective of adding new customers focusing on our AI and digital transformation services. To summarize, we feel like we now have the proper foundation in place in terms of products, services, and internal systems that collectively enable us to improve execution and to deliver increasingly better results. With that, I'll turn the call over to Joe Hamblin to provide additional insights into our business transformation, Joe. Joe Hamblin Thank you, Jerry and good afternoon, everyone. This earnings call marks my one year anniversary as Altigen's Chief Digital Transformation Officer. While I'm proud of the progress we have made our with our transformation efforts, we still have opportunities for improvement. During our last earnings call, one of our longtime supporters asked a baseball analogy question. Specifically, what ending of the game would you say our transformation effort was in? Answer at that time was most likely the seventh inning. If we use that same analogy today, almost three months later, I would say we're still in the seventh inning. However, we're now on offense and beginning to have some very productive at bats. To further highlight our ongoing transformation efforts. I want to provide a brief state of the business overview based on both the tail and headwinds we still face. Starting with their tailwinds, one of the key highlights is achieving an $800,000 of annualized savings year over year from our cost OpEx cost reductions. This was achieved using several operational levers such as the data center consolidation, human resource optimization, SIP trunk migrations to our new SIP services solutions. Plus, we performed a line item by line item cost analysis to eliminate unnecessary expenses. We also conducted a successful launch of Altigen and technologies Native Teams contact center solution, core engage. With several successful customer implementations completed, including the Dallas Independent School District, which is the second largest school district in Texas and the seventh largest in the United States, we're well on our way to achieving customer success. In addition to these first initial sets of successful core engaged deployments, as Jerry mentioned, both Fiserv and British Telecom BT are now embracing this solution to address their customer opportunities. This will provide us with the market visibility needed to help accelerate the growth of our Microsoft Teams practice. Jere also mentioned, we have successfully delivered a major upgrade to the MaxCloud UCaaS platform, and we're now in the early migration phases of moving customers from our legacy platforms to this new system. The significance of this accomplishment is it demonstrates advancements in our technology roadmap, and it enables us to protect our existing customer base. In addition, this upgrade will enable us to capture new revenue through new MSP partnerships as well as existing and long standing partnerships. Now let's discuss the Altigen Consulting Services and the work that Shark and team are doing by highlighting the ongoing partnership with the Connecticut Department of Transportation. I had the pleasure of meeting with the CTDOT leadership team earlier this week and received excellent performance feedback along with high praise of the individuals that work on the ACS team. It is customer compliments such as this that helped validate the organizational progress we are making. On the operations business side. We've made significant improvements. First, we outsourced our accounting functions to Armenia. This will allow us to reduce our operating costs as well as enhance our ability to access and analyze financial data at a faster pace. Next, we consolidated our human resources with Stratus HR to allow us to have a single source for our HR solutions versus the two that we were using in the past. Process automation and customer portal enhancements to reduce manual tasks associated with many of our back office and customer ordering process has also been completed. All of these enhancements are laying the foundation that will allow us to access company data at the speed of business enabling the Altigen leadership team to make more informed decisions. We will continue to refine these areas in the coming months. Lastly, I want to emphasize our AI strategy and how well our approach is resonating with our customers and the potential it has to unlocking new opportunities. One of our first POCs is currently in the design and development process at the Connecticut Department of Transportation, and when delivered should open the door to an untold number of additional use cases. Now let's shift your attention to our headwinds. Like many companies that undergoes a significant transformation effort. It takes time to identify and address all the areas of the business that require modernization. A lot of heavy lifting has been done. However, we are always seeking ways to improve and support our business to make Altigen easy to do business with. At the top of the list of our headwinds is talent acquisition, finding the right talent, particularly in sales, AI development, Customary integrations remains our priority. We continue to explore both onshore and offshore solutions to address these needs. Marketing is next closely related to sales, but with our renewed products, product success, we must now find new ways to innovate and invent ways to amplify our message. Again, we will look both internally and externally for opportunities to improve our marketing position. Now we move on to the sales and new revenue growth. Now that we have a competitive products and services, our focus must be on filling the sales pipeline. This includes strengthening both internal sales force and also our partner channels. Then finally restoring shareholder confidence. We must continue to demonstrate that we have not only stabilized the business, but we have also developed the right strategic plan to drive sustainable growth. In short, we have to deliver significant measurable results. Now that I'd like to turn the call over to our new Chief Financial Officer Gary Stone. Gary, it's great to have you on board. Take it away, buddy. Gary Stone Great. Thank you, Joe. For our 2025 Fiscal first quarter, we reported total revenue of $3.4 million compared to $3.2 million for Q1 2024. Total cloud services revenue for Q1 was approximately $1.7 million, down 9% from the $1.9 million in the same period last year. However, sequentially, cloud services revenue increased 2.5%. Meanwhile, our consulting services revenue increased 37% to $1.4 million from $1million in the prior year's quarter. Gross margin for the quarter was 63% compared to 60% in the same period last year. GAAP operating expenses for the quarter totalled $2.1 million, reflecting the 9% decrease compared to the $2.3 million in the same period last year. GAAP net income for Q1 was $87,000 or just less than a penny per diluted share compared to the GAAP net loss of $346,000 or a loss of 1 penny per diluted share in the prior year's quarter. Let's look at our liquidity. We closed the quarter with $2.2 million in cash and cash equivalents, down 15% compared to the $2.6 million in the prior quarter. It's worth noting that the decrease in cash and related increase in accounts receivable is attributed to a large customer's payment of approximately 700,000 that arrived in the beginning of January. Working capital was $1.9 million compared to $2.1 million in the previous quarter, reflecting the 10% decrease. The decrease is primarily attributed to the increase in accounts payable during the transition of our new accounting and payment platforms. Thankfully, the, it is subsequently returned to our historical levels. Now let me turn the call back over to Jere for our closing remarks. Jerry. Jeremiah Fleming Thank you, Gary, appreciate it. Before we turn the call over for Q&A session, I do want to provide a brief summary that we feel confident that we're continuing to make progress in our business transformation, diligently working to lay the foundation for future growth. As we're closing in on achieving our operational objectives, as Jill outlined, we're also now focusing on top line growth. We're confident that our strategy is solid. Our new solutions are spot on. And our ability to execute have positioned Altigen for sustainable performance and long-term success. With that, I'll now turn the call over to the operator to open the floor for questions. Tom. Question and Answer Session Operator (Operator Instructions) And we have no questions In Que at this time. I would now like to turn the floor back to Jeremiah Fleming. Jeremiah Fleming All right, thanks, Tom, and thank you, everyone. I'm going to attribute no question to Gary's stone job of providing details on the financial results. So, Gary, once again, thank you and for everyone on the call, we do look forward to updating you on our next quarterly conference call in April. Thank you very much. Operator Thank you. This does conclude today's conference call. You may disconnect your lines at this time and have a wonderful day. Thank you for your participation. View Comments |
||
| 23.02.25 07:16:05 | BT Group plc (LON:BT.A) most popular amongst public companies who own 37% of the shares, institutions hold 36% | |
| Key Insights Significant control over BT Group by public companies implies that the general public has more power to influence management and governance-related decisions 51% of the business is held by the top 5 shareholders Institutional ownership in BT Group is 36% To get a sense of who is truly in control of BT Group plc (LON:BT.A), it is important to understand the ownership structure of the business. With 37% stake, public companies possess the maximum shares in the company. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company. Institutions, on the other hand, account for 36% of the company's stockholders. Institutions will often hold stock in bigger companies, and we expect to see insiders owning a noticeable percentage of the smaller ones. In the chart below, we zoom in on the different ownership groups of BT Group. View our latest analysis for BT Group LSE:BT.A Ownership Breakdown February 23rd 2025 What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About BT Group? Institutions typically measure themselves against a benchmark when reporting to their own investors, so they often become more enthusiastic about a stock once it's included in a major index. We would expect most companies to have some institutions on the register, especially if they are growing. BT Group already has institutions on the share registry. Indeed, they own a respectable stake in the company. This suggests some credibility amongst professional investors. But we can't rely on that fact alone since institutions make bad investments sometimes, just like everyone does. It is not uncommon to see a big share price drop if two large institutional investors try to sell out of a stock at the same time. So it is worth checking the past earnings trajectory of BT Group, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.LSE:BT.A Earnings and Revenue Growth February 23rd 2025 We note that hedge funds don't have a meaningful investment in BT Group. The company's largest shareholder is Bharti Airtel Limited, with ownership of 25%. Meanwhile, the second and third largest shareholders, hold 12% and 6.1%, of the shares outstanding, respectively. On looking further, we found that 51% of the shares are owned by the top 5 shareholders. In other words, these shareholders have a meaningful say in the decisions of the company. Researching institutional ownership is a good way to gauge and filter a stock's expected performance. The same can be achieved by studying analyst sentiments. There are plenty of analysts covering the stock, so it might be worth seeing what they are forecasting, too. Story Continues Insider Ownership Of BT Group The definition of an insider can differ slightly between different countries, but members of the board of directors always count. Management ultimately answers to the board. However, it is not uncommon for managers to be executive board members, especially if they are a founder or the CEO. Most consider insider ownership a positive because it can indicate the board is well aligned with other shareholders. However, on some occasions too much power is concentrated within this group. Our data suggests that insiders own under 1% of BT Group plc in their own names. However, it's possible that insiders might have an indirect interest through a more complex structure. It is a very large company, so it would be surprising to see insiders own a large proportion of the company. Though their holding amounts to less than 1%, we can see that board members collectively own UK£4.7m worth of shares (at current prices). It is good to see board members owning shares, but it might be worth checking if those insiders have been buying. General Public Ownership The general public, who are usually individual investors, hold a 14% stake in BT Group. While this size of ownership may not be enough to sway a policy decision in their favour, they can still make a collective impact on company policies. Private Company Ownership It seems that Private Companies own 12%, of the BT Group stock. Private companies may be related parties. Sometimes insiders have an interest in a public company through a holding in a private company, rather than in their own capacity as an individual. While it's hard to draw any broad stroke conclusions, it is worth noting as an area for further research. Public Company Ownership Public companies currently own 37% of BT Group stock. It's hard to say for sure but this suggests they have entwined business interests. This might be a strategic stake, so it's worth watching this space for changes in ownership. Next Steps: I find it very interesting to look at who exactly owns a company. But to truly gain insight, we need to consider other information, too. For example, we've discovered 4 warning signs for BT Group that you should be aware of before investing here. But ultimately it is the future, not the past, that will determine how well the owners of this business will do. Therefore we think it advisable to take a look at this free report showing whether analysts are predicting a brighter future. NB: Figures in this article are calculated using data from the last twelve months, which refer to the 12-month period ending on the last date of the month the financial statement is dated. This may not be consistent with full year annual report figures. Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content?Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned. View Comments |
||
| 18.02.25 17:17:15 | BT faces setback as customers defect to cheaper rivals | |
| An Openreach engineer working on a junction box Broadband price wars will send BT (BT-A.L) into a damaging retreat as customers defect to cheaper rival networks, the company’s former head of investor relations has warned. Carl Murdock-Smith, now a telecoms analyst at Citi, scrapped a recommendation to buy BT shares and cut the bank’s target price for the shares by 44pc as he predicted that BT’s Openreach arm would fall into long-term decline. Openreach owns the network that connects most homes in the UK, whether they are customers of BT, Sky or TalkTalk, as well as other broadband retailers. In recent years upstart rivals such as CityFibre and Gigaclear have borrowed billions to fund the construction of millions of new fibre optic lines across the country meant to compete against BT’s network. Many of these businesses have struggled to make rapid inroads into the market and are under financial stress but are now pricing aggressively in an effort to win customers, putting pressure on BT (BT-A.L) and its boss Allison Kirkby. Mr Murdock-Smith, who led BT’s investor relations between 2015 and 2017, told clients he expected Openreach revenues to go into reverse this year. This would be the first decline since 2019 when Openreach, BT’s most profitable division, was hit by Ofcom price caps. Revenues have grown steadily since then thanks to the boom in providing fibre broadband. The Citi analyst said Openreach revenues may now decline for several years as broadband providers continue to move to rival networks. Openreach lost 585,000 connections in the first nine months of its financial year, with the decline accelerating in the three months to December. The company blamed “moderately higher competitor loss”. It said the vast majority of lost customers were in areas where the company has not built ultrafast fibre lines. Citi’s intervention wiped as much as 6.5pc off BT (BT-A.L) shares on Tuesday before they finished the day 2.7pc down, wiping £429m off the company’s market valuation. Mr Murdock-Smith said the shares should be worth 112p, a further 24pc lower than their price on Tuesday. Last year, Sky struck a deal with CityFibre, Britain’s biggest so-called alt-net, to offer broadband connections on the company’s network. BT cut annual revenue forecasts late last year and said in January that sales had fallen in recent months. It is under pressure to trim costs and this month met with Sunil Bharti Mittal, the Indian billionaire who last year became the company’s biggest shareholder. View Comments |
||
