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This conference call will contain forward-looking statements, which are based
on the company's current expectations, forecasts and assumptions, including
statements related to our business strategy, growth opportunities, the
impact of the Affordable Care Act, the 2014 Medicare fees schedule, our
2014 guidance, our expected capital expenditures for 2014, expected cost
reduction and the company's effective tax rate.
On today's call, our CEO, Tom Tomlinson, will provide a brief overview of our
business, our second quarter 2014 results, the progress of our strategic
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Alliance HealthCare Services' (AIQ) CEO Tom Tomlinson on Q2 2014 Results - Earnings Call Transcript | Seeking Alpha 9/7/2014
transformation and growth strategies initiatives and our priorities for 2014
and beyond. Our Chief Financial Officer, Howard Aihara, will follow with the
details of the second quarter 2014 results and confirm our 2014 guidance.
W ith that, I will now turn the conference over to Tom. Tom, please go
ahead.
T om C. T omlinson - CEO
Thank you, Rick, and good afternoon, everyone. W elcome to Alliance's
second quarter 2014 earnings call. As always, we appreciate your time and
participation. W e’re pleased with our second quarter results and the progress
we have made in transforming Alliance into the outsource partner of choice
for the radiology and radiation oncology service lines.
On our last call, we highlighted an important win for our Alliance Oncology
Division with the closing of our agreement with the Medical University of
South Carolina or MUSC. This quarter I’d like to highlight a similar
partnership win in our Alliance Radiology Division where we have acquired
two existing diagnostic radiology clinics and merged them into a newly
formed joint venture with the major for-profit operator of hospitals. W e
expect this single market joint venture to be the model for executing on
outsourced radiology operations in additional markets with this customer.
Like many in the healthcare sector, we’ve been keenly focused on the rollout
of the Affordable Care Act. During the second quarter, there was clear
evidence that expanding coverage is lifting utilization in decisionable
services like MRI. W hen we examined same-store results for MRI and
Medicaid expansion states versus non-Medicaid expansion states, we’re
seeing 100 to 200 basis point differential. W hile there are always many
factors involved, our sample population covers nearly every state in the
country and we believe at least a portion of this increase is a result of the
Affordable Care Act.
Moreover, we note that many of the large hospitals and health systems have
guided towards increased volumes from the ACA in the current calendar year
and a number of these hospitals and health systems are our customers. W e
continue to see evidence that our growth strategy is sound and both
divisions are pipelined of opportunities and strategic outsourced services
continues to grow and, like the example of our new radiology joint venture,
is starting to come to fruition.
W e’re focused on building upon the success of these projects through the
investments we have made this year in additional sales and business
development talent. Of course, a part of this transformation is also
operational. Our new growth strategy in radiology called RAD360 in which we
provide an enhanced value proposition to our customers enabling us to be a
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Alliance HealthCare Services' (AIQ) CEO Tom Tomlinson on Q2 2014 Results - Earnings Call Transcript | Seeking Alpha 9/7/2014
Second quarter revenue results in Alliance Radiology were down slightly from
the prior year due largely to the impact of our pruning of unprofitable
accounts and challenging dynamics in the PET/CT market. Same-store
volumes rebounded from the first quarter’s inclement weather slowdown with
sequential improvements of 5.9% for MRI and 1.2% for PET/CT. Y es-over-
year MRI same-store volumes were up by 0.3% this quarter but PET/CT was
down 4.9% due in large part to payor changes and tighter RBM utilization
management.
The second element of this dual mandate driving to a position as the clear
partner of choice for a hospital or provider looking to outsource their
radiology service line is progressing well. The recent win noted earlier is
exactly the type of outcome we’re looking to create and becoming the long-
term strategic partner. Operating an outpatient radiology service line
strategy for a hospital, we can make our partners more successful.
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Alliance HealthCare Services' (AIQ) CEO Tom Tomlinson on Q2 2014 Results - Earnings Call Transcript | Seeking Alpha 9/7/2014
Our Linac centers delivered same-store volume growth of 4.2% and our
stereotactic radiosurgery centers generated growth of 4.1%. One element of
our radiation oncology outsourced value proposition to prospective hospital
customers is our ability to drive exceptional volume results at our sites. Our
industry-leading demand capabilities result in average SRS case volumes
that are 80% higher than peers.
One of the investments we’ve made this year has been to bring in a senior
VP of sales strategy to support physician facing sales and marketing,
building upon our strength in direct marketing tactics, our team’s focus on
effective engagement with physicians is driving even greater results and
further strengthening our outsourced value proposition.
W e’ve also moved into the construction phase on the Dignity Health facility
in San Francisco and we expect it to be operational no later than the first
quarter of 2015. These deals and pipeline activities illustrate the success of
both our business development and sales investments and overall
outsourced partner strategy.
Additionally, we’re also seeing growing interest from new hospital partners
and expanding our oncology relationship and service line offering to their
other sites and markets. Hospital and health systems value our expertise
and are looking to leverage our strengths, including the ability to develop
and execute sales and marketing strategies, rapidly deploy cutting-edge
clinical equipment, drive efficiencies through operational expertise and
leverage a national network of clinicians to rapidly expand treatment into
new disease states, all for the purpose of growing and optimizing their
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Alliance HealthCare Services' (AIQ) CEO Tom Tomlinson on Q2 2014 Results - Earnings Call Transcript | Seeking Alpha 9/7/2014
I’ll now hand the call over to Howard to provide the financial details of our
second quarter. Howard?
On the highlights from Q2, revenue in the second quarter of 2014 totaled
$111.2 million compared to $114.4 million last year. After adjusting for the
sale of our professional radiology service business line in December of 2013
and to a much lesser degree some pruning in Alliance Radiology totaling
$3.8 million in the aggregate, we posted Q2 revenue growth of 60 basis
points over last year’s second quarter.
Both Linac and SRS same-store volume growth exceeded 4% in the second
quarter and our MUSC radiation oncology outsourcing hospital relationship
contributed significantly to this quarter’s results. Also, as expected, our
second quarter Alliance Radiology revenue bounced back after severe winter
storms experienced in many parts of the country during January and
February. Sequentially, radiology revenue increased 3% to $87.3 million in
Q2 over Q1.
Second quarter adjusted EBITDA was $36.7 million and totaled almost $70
million for the first half of 2014. W e invested $1.5 million in the second
quarter to build our sales, business development and marketing capabilities
in our Alliance RAD360 program and have invested $2.5 million in the first
half of this year. After adjusting for our RAD360 investments, we have
produced stable adjusted EBITDA compared to Q2 of last year.
Another highlight from the same quarter is our bottom line profitability. Pro
forma of diluted EPS was a profit of $0.52 in the second quarter of 2014
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Alliance HealthCare Services' (AIQ) CEO Tom Tomlinson on Q2 2014 Results - Earnings Call Transcript | Seeking Alpha 9/7/2014
forma of diluted EPS was a profit of $0.52 in the second quarter of 2014
compared to $0.23 in last year’s second quarter. As reported, diluted EPS for
the second quarter was a profit of $0.26 compared to a loss of $1.22 a year
ago.
Included in the as reported diluted EPS with a $0.26 charge in the second
quarter of 2014 and a $1.45 charge in the second quarter of 2013 due to the
following items; restructuring, severance related to costs, legal costs,
impairment, extinguishment of debt and differences in the GAAP income tax
rate from our historical rate of 42.5%.
W e also continue to generate strong free cash flow. W e define free cash
flow as a change in net debt before investments and acquisitions and debt
financing fees. W e generate free cash flow by focusing on organic growth
and adjusted EBITDA, efficient CapEx spending and effective pricing of our
debt structure. This focus has resulted in Alliance generating $10.4 million of
free cash flow in the second quarter of 2014.
In the LTM period ended this June, we generated $44.4 million of free cash
flow or $4.08 per share. This strong free cash flow generation continues to
strengthen our balance sheet. As of the end of June, total leverage is 3.6
times and net leverage is 3.3 times. At the end of the quarter, Alliance had
cash balances of $31 million, long-term debt totaled $508 million and net
debt was $477 million.
Now I’ll make a few comments on CMS’ proposed 2015 fee schedules.
Alliance is largely shielded from proposed reductions in the Medicare
physician fee schedule through the vast majority of our revenue as
generated from hospital relationships. Only 6% of our total revenue is
directly reimbursed by Medicare.
The 2015 proposed Medicare physician fee schedule does not address PET/CT
services. PET/CT reimbursement is proposed to be governed by the individual
Medicare intermediaries and no impact is expected.
In the aggregate, the proposed 2015 CMS fee schedule changes will reduce
Alliance’s Medicare reimbursement by a total of $700,000 or 0.5% of our
2014 adjusted EBITDA guidance range. These proposed changes, if enacted,
are manageable.
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Alliance HealthCare Services' (AIQ) CEO Tom Tomlinson on Q2 2014 Results - Earnings Call Transcript | Seeking Alpha 9/7/2014
Now I’ll reaffirm our 2014 guidance ranges which remain unchanged. For full
year 2014, Alliance expects revenue to range from $437 million to $462
million. As Tom mentioned, 2014 is a foundational year for the
transformation phase of Alliance. W e believe that 2014 will be a pivotal year
in terms of growing our capabilities in a meaningful and significant way as
we look into 2015 and beyond.
Our 2014 revenue guidance range also assumed a negative impact of $15
million, almost all of which is related to the sale of our professional
radiology services business in December 2013. Our 2014 adjusted EBITDA
guidance range is $140 million to $160 million, which includes incremental
investments on our sales business development and marketing teams of $5
million to grow Alliance into the premier hospital partner for radiology and
radiation oncology services. W e’ll continue to remain cost disciplined
throughout the organization.
Our free cash flow guidance range is a range from $27 million to $37 million.
Impacting our 2014 free cash flow guidance range, our cash income tax
payments for full year 2014 are $14 million to $17 million, which increased
from $2 million of cash income taxes paid in 2013.
At year end 2013, we had $22 million of federal NOLs and $12 million of
state NOLs, all of which are expected be used during 2014, as Alliance
transitions into becoming a regular cash taxpayer during 2014. W e expect to
pay $24 million to $25 million of cash interest payments in full year 2014.
Thank you for your interest in Alliance. W e look forward to answering your
questions. I'll now turn it back over to the operator to begin the Q&A
session. Operator, we’re ready to begin the Q&A session.
Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
Y es, sir. (Operator Instructions). There are no questions at this time, sir.
T om C. T omlinson - CEO
Okay. Thank you. Thank you everyone for listening in today and look forward
to talking to you again at the end of our next quarter. Thank you.
Operator
This concludes today’s conference call. Y ou may now disconnect your lines.
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Alliance HealthCare Services' (AIQ) CEO Tom Tomlinson on Q2 2014 Results - Earnings Call Transcript | Seeking Alpha 9/7/2014
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