Accenture - Earnings Call - Q1 2012
December 15, 2011
Transcript
Speaker 1
Ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon. Thank you for standing by, and welcome to Accenture's first quarter fiscal 2012 earnings conference call. At this time, all lines are in a listen-only mode. Later, there will be an opportunity for your questions. If you do wish to ask a question, please press star followed by the one. If you should require any operator assistance during today's call, please press star then zero, and an AT&T operator will assist you. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to our host, Managing Director of Investor Relations, Ms. Kathleen McClure. Please go ahead.
Speaker 3
Thank you, Tom, and thanks everyone for joining us today on our first quarter fiscal 2012 earnings announcement. As Tom just mentioned, I'm Kathleen McClure, Managing Director of Investor Relations. With me today are Pierre Nanterme, our Chief Executive Officer, and Pamela Craig, our Chief Financial Officer. We hope you've had an opportunity to review the news release we issued a short time ago. Let me quickly outline the agenda for today's call. Pierre will begin with an overview of our results. Pam will take you through the financial details, including the income statement and balance sheet, along with some key operational metrics for the first quarter. Pierre will then provide a brief update on market positioning and progress against our growth strategy.
Pam will then provide our business outlook for the second quarter and full fiscal year 2012, and then we will take your questions before Pierre provides a wrap-up at the end of the call. As a reminder, when we discuss revenues during today's call, we're talking about revenues before reimbursements or net revenues. Some of the matters we'll discuss on this call are forward-looking, including the business outlook. You should keep in mind that these forward-looking statements are subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such statements, and that such statements are not a guarantee of our future performance.
Such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, general economic conditions and those factors set forth in today's news release and discussed under the risk factor section of our annual report on Form 10-K and quarterly reports on Form 10-Q and other SEC filings. During our call today, we will reference certain non-GAAP financial measures, which we believe provide useful information for investors. We include reconciliations of those measures where appropriate to GAAP in our news release or on the Investor Relations section of our website at accenture.com. As always, Accenture assumes no obligation to update the information presented on this conference call. Now, let me turn the call over to Pierre.
Speaker 0
Thank you, Kathleen, and thanks everyone for joining us. I'm pleased to tell you about our excellent results for the first quarter, which demonstrate that we continued to execute very well against our growth strategy. Here are a few highlights. We delivered strong new bookings of $7.8 billion. We grew revenues 14% in local currency to $7.1 billion, with all five operating groups and all three geographic regions delivering double-digit growth. Earnings per share grew 19% to a record $0.96. Operating income was $981 million, our highest ever, with a strong operating margin of 13.9%. We continue to have a very strong balance sheet, ending the quarter with a cash balance of $5.1 billion. We continue to return cash to shareholders through share repurchases and the payment of a semi-annual cash dividend of $0.675 per share, which was a 50% increase over our prior dividend.
As you can see, we performed very well in Q1, and we are particularly pleased that our growth was broad-based across all dimensions of our business. Now, let me hand over to Pam, who will review the numbers in greater detail. Pam, over to you.
Speaker 3
Thank you, Pierre, and happy holidays, and thank you all for joining us today. I am pleased to tell you more about Accenture's fiscal 2012 first quarter financial results. We delivered strong bookings and revenue growth in Q1, including, as Pierre mentioned, double-digit local currency revenue growth across our broad base of business in all five operating groups and all three geographic regions. Our record revenues for the quarter drove record EPS results as well. Unless I state otherwise, all figures are GAAP except the items that are not part of the financial statements or that are calculations. New bookings for the quarter were $7.8 billion and reflected a positive 3% foreign exchange impact compared with new bookings in the first quarter last year. Consulting bookings were $4.2 billion. Outsourcing bookings were $3.6 billion. Now, let me give you some detail on bookings in the first quarter.
In management consulting, we had strong bookings, in large part because of increased client demand for projects that deliver near-term and structural cost takeout, especially for sourcing and other parts of the supply chain. Bookings also reflected demand for services on large-scale business transformation programs. We continue to see clients seeking to drive new revenue through improved sales and marketing effectiveness. Overall, we see our clients taking proactive action in focused ways to respond to the current more volatile market conditions. Turning to technology consulting, our bookings moderated in the quarter, but our skills are in high demand. Clients continue to value our independence and track record as they seek strategic help to further optimize global IT operations and leverage cloud-based solutions to reduce fixed costs and increase business agility.
Systems integration bookings continue to reflect strong demand for ERP and custom systems, including large-scale transformation programs and the use of newer technologies. Clients continue to extend such solutions across the enterprise and to expand their capabilities in mobile, data management/analytics, and social to improve processes and customer relationships. Turning to outsourcing, in technology outsourcing, we see more demand for application outsourcing that is broad-based. We signed many new contracts in the quarter across multiple industries and notably in Europe, as well as expansions for scope and volumes on existing client contracts. This trend reflects clients' needs to reduce ongoing systems costs so they can direct more IT spending to new technology areas to support changes in their businesses. BPO bookings in Q1 were very strong for a second consecutive quarter.
Demand was most pronounced in North America and in our industry-specific offerings, especially in our resources, communications, media, and technology, and health and public service industries. Demand for our global delivery network continues to grow as we are leveraging it for increasingly complex work. Across the globe, clients are tapping our global delivery capability, not only to take advantage of cost-effective delivery, but also to tap specialist skills in ERP, specific industries, and newer technologies. The work we are doing in the global delivery network is increasingly more sophisticated and made up of longer-term committed relationships for maintenance, development, and enhancements. In summary, we had a strong bookings quarter with $100 million or more in bookings at nine clients around the world. Turning now to revenues, net revenues for the first quarter were just under $7.1 billion, an increase of 17% in U.S.
dollars and 14% in local currency from the same period last year. These revenues reflected a positive foreign exchange impact of nearly 3% compared with Q1 last year. They were also above our guided range of $6.8 to $7 billion, as our foreign exchange assumption given last quarter was 3% as well. Consulting revenues were $4.1 billion, an increase of 14% in U.S. dollars and 11% in local currency. Outsourcing revenues were $3 billion, an increase of 21% in U.S. dollars and 18% in local currency. Now, let me give you some highlights of revenue growth in our operating groups. The products operating group had local currency revenue growth of 17%, driven by strong and well-balanced growth across the broad set of products industries in both consulting and outsourcing and around the world. Our core ERP transformation offerings continue to be the backbone of products.
In addition, we saw strong demand for our services related to sales and channel management solutions and supply chain. Notably, we are growing the number of clients where we have deep relationships globally. Communications, media, and technology revenues increased 16% in local currency with growth that was also broad-based geographically and across the CMT industries. Outsourcing growth was very strong and was driven by clients' continued focus on improving their operations, particularly in supply chain, procurement, finance, and customer care, and by demand for additional support for mobility solutions. Consulting revenue reflected our clients' continued focus on increasing operational effectiveness, improving customer service, and launching new products and services. Resources revenues grew 15% in local currency, also with strong growth in both consulting and outsourcing.
This revenue growth was driven by ERP and global operating model programs, with particularly high growth in energy and natural resources and in several of our priority emerging markets. Health and public service revenues increased 11% in local currency, reflecting strong growth in health again this quarter, including our connected health and health administration offerings. Our repositioning in public service continues, with our focus being to help our public service clients drive efficiencies, as well as to support human services clients to modernize their systems. In financial services, revenues grew 11% in local currency due to very strong growth in outsourcing across all industries. This growth reflects clients' focus on near-term cost reduction and operational effectiveness, as this has become an even stronger imperative across our financial services industries globally. We did see modest consulting growth in financial services, driven by strong growth in insurance across their geographic regions.
This growth was partially offset by lower year-over-year consulting revenue in banking and capital markets, which we had largely expected. In summary, we were pleased with the strong and balanced revenue growth delivered in Q1 by all five operating groups. Moving down the income statement, gross margin was 31.8%, down 40 basis points from 32.2% in Q1 last year. Sales and marketing costs were $837 million, or 11.8% of net revenues, compared with $731 million, or 12.1% of net revenues for the first quarter last year, a 30 basis point decrease. General and administrative costs were $433 million, or 6.1% of net revenues, compared with $386 million, or 6.4% of net revenues for the first quarter last year, also a 30 basis point decrease.
This all resulted in record operating income for the first quarter of $981 million, reflecting a 13.9% operating margin compared with $827 million, or a 13.7% operating margin for the same period last year, a 20 basis point expansion. As a reminder, we manage our business to operating margin. Although our payroll costs grew slightly faster than revenue, we worked to offset that through tighter management of non-payroll costs. Our margin was also impacted by favorable foreign exchange movement. Operating margin improved in health and public service and in products, due primarily to improved contract profitability in those operating groups. Operating income decreased and operating margin fell from a high level in last year's Q1 in financial services, reflecting lower contract profitability, higher business development costs, and higher costs related to recently closed acquisitions.
Below operating income, our effective tax rate for the quarter was 28.3%, flat compared with the same period last year. Net income for the quarter was $712 million, compared with $606 million for the first quarter last year, an increase of 18%. Diluted earnings per share were $0.96, compared with $0.81 in the first quarter last year, an increase of 19%. This $0.15 increase reflects a $0.12 increase from higher revenue and operating income in local currency, a $0.02 increase from favorable foreign exchange rates, and a $0.02 increase from a lower share count, offset by a $0.01 decrease from lower non-operating income. Turning to some other key operational metrics, we ended the quarter with global headcount of about 244,000 people, and we now have approximately 146,000 people in our global delivery network. In Q1, our utilization was 87%, up from 85% in Q4.
Attrition, which excludes involuntary terminations, was 12%, down from 14% in Q4 and 15% in Q1 last fiscal year. Lastly, we expect that at least 60,000 people will join our company around the world this fiscal year. Now, let's turn on our cash flow. Free cash flow for the quarter was $394 million, resulting from cash generated by operating activities of $475 million, net of property and equipment additions of $81 million. For the same period last year, free cash flow was $31 million. The higher level this year included an uptick in client prepayments. Turning to DSOs, our days sales outstanding were 32 days, up from 30 days last quarter and down from 33 days in the same quarter last year. Our total cash balance at November 30 was $5.1 billion and compares with $5.7 billion at the end of August.
The Q1 ending balance includes a negative impact of approximately $257 million, reflective of how much other currencies moved versus the U.S. dollar between November 30 and three months prior. Before I turn things back to Pierre, I will comment on our ongoing objective to return cash to shareholders through share repurchases and dividends. In the first quarter, we repurchased or redeemed approximately 5.3 million shares for $285 million at an average price of $53.36 per share, including 3.4 million shares repurchased in the open market. At November 30, we had $5.8 billion of share repurchase authority remaining. Also, in November, we paid a semi-annual cash dividend of $0.675 per share for a total of $475 million. This represented a 22.5% or 50% increase over the dividend we paid in May. In summary, we had a strong first quarter and are off to a good start in fiscal 2012.
I continue to be very proud of our Accenture people and their exceptional ability to drive our business in a way that serves our clients and shareholders so well. Now, here's Pierre to give you some interesting color on how we are executing our growth strategy and delivering business value for our clients around the world.
Speaker 0
Thank you, Pam. Now, I would like to talk about how we are leveraging marketplace opportunities to drive growth, particularly in the context of the current economic environment. Of course, there continues to be volatility in the global economy, largely due to uncertainty around Europe's sovereign debt challenges. We're carefully watching the actions that governments in Europe are taking to stabilize markets, restore confidence, and create conditions that would support a return to economic growth. While Europe works on these issues, other parts of the world are exhibiting positive economic growth, especially our priority emerging markets. Moving forward, we will continue to monitor the macroeconomic environment very closely and assess the implications for our business. In this context, we are executing a growth strategy that resonates with the needs of our clients. We have a relentless focus on industry and technology differentiation and accelerated geographic expansion.
Our clients continue to invest in transformation and realize that they must address major structural issues resulting from the long-term trends we previously identified: globalization, regulation, operational efficiency, to which we can also add consumerization. This is driving demand for our services. Let me give a few examples of the work we are doing for some of our largest clients at the very core of their businesses. For one of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies, Accenture is the partner of choice on many projects, including an IT infrastructure rationalization program across more than 30 countries. We are helping one of the world's leading mining companies develop and upgrade its core ERP system. The program is designed to significantly improve and standardize processes to drive business value across the entire organization. Just this week, we announced an agreement with a leading U.S.
property and casualty insurer to provide claims management support on a software-as-a-service basis. To be delivered from the cloud, Accenture's claim management services will enable carriers to have variable capacity and better align costs with the volume of claims activity. In terms of industry and technology differentiation, we continue to invest in our priority industries. In the communications industry, through Accenture Network Services, we are helping our clients manage the rapid growth in mobile and broadband data traffic while improving customer service and operating efficiency. Another example is how we are helping clients across the utilities, energy, chemicals, and natural resources industries accelerate enterprise-wide business value through Accenture Advanced Enterprise Services, which links industry-leading processes to a pre-configured ERP solution, leveraging leading technology platforms. Geographic expansion remains key to the execution of our growth strategy.
I'm particularly pleased with the progress we are making in our ten priority emerging markets, which in Q1 grew at a significantly faster rate than the rest of Accenture. Just as important as our growth in these markets is the quality of the relationships we have with our clients there. In addition to helping global clients expand into emerging markets, we have developed major client relationships with leading companies in these markets, several of which are already our diamond clients. To further support our growth strategy, we continue to invest in our brand, which is among the top 50 in the world. Last month, we launched a new global brand campaign featuring clients and how we are helping them create significant and tangible business value. This new campaign is bringing our high-performance delivered brand positioning to the next level.
Of course, we continue to manage our company with rigor and discipline to drive profitable growth. With that, I will turn the call back to Pam, who will provide our business outlook for the second quarter and the full year.
Speaker 3
Thank you, Pierre. As a reminder, each quarter, we provide an outlook for the next quarter's revenue and an update on our annual outlook for the full fiscal year. As our fiscal Q2 takes shape and we turn into calendar year 2012, we recognize, as Pierre said, that we are operating in a macroeconomic environment that continues to be uncertain and volatile, with a particular focus on what is happening in the eurozone. We are vigilant about any impact these and other developments may have on our global business. With that in mind, let me share our view on Q2 and the remainder of the fiscal year. For the second quarter, we expect revenues to be in the range of $6.5 to $6.8 billion. This range assumes a foreign exchange impact of negative 1% for the quarter.
We have broadened the revenue range we see for the quarter in order to allow for some flexibility in timing of the start of new work in the calendar year. Now, turning to the full fiscal year, we now assume a foreign exchange impact also of negative 1%. As you know, we formed this assumption based on how the rates have moved over the last couple of weeks, and we have seen them bounce around in the range of negative 1% to negative 2%. Taking into account our Q1 results, what we see for Q2, and how the pipeline is shaping up for the second half, we continue to expect our fiscal year 2012 revenue outlook to be 7% to 10% growth in local currency.
We've had strong bookings over the last two quarters, and we have some work to do to shape more business for the second half of our fiscal year and into the next. We continue to expect new bookings for the fiscal year to land in the range of $28 to $31 billion. We continue to target the same level of bookings in local currency and support the same overall range, even with our updated assumption for foreign exchange. Within that, we also expect system integration bookings to moderate somewhat going forward, and there may potentially be a further lift in outsourcing bookings over what we expected three months ago. We continue to expect operating margin to be in the range of 13.7% to 13.9%. You should expect some fluctuations quarter to quarter, as we've experienced in the past.
We continue to expect our annual effective tax rate to be in the range of 27% to 28%. We now expect our earnings per share for the full fiscal year to be in the range of $3.76 to $3.84, down $0.04, reflecting our updated assumption for foreign exchange. Finally, we continue to expect operating cash flow to be in the range of $3.6 to $3.9 billion, property and equipment additions to be about $500 million, and free cash flow to be in the range of $3.1 to $3.4 billion. We remain committed to return a substantial portion of the cash we generate to shareholders. In fiscal 2012, we continue to expect to return at least $3 billion through dividends and share repurchases. We now expect to reduce the weighted average diluted shares outstanding by closer to 2% due to our current view on the phasing of repurchases over the year.
I would like to give credit to our experienced leadership team and to our people overall, as our business right now is well-balanced and well-positioned for the future. We remain focused on executing our growth strategy with discipline, maintaining a world-class balance sheet, and generating strong free cash flow while staying close to our clients and working with them on their most critical business needs as we drive our business forward. With that, let's open it up so that we can take your questions. Kathleen?
Speaker 5
Thanks, Pam. I would ask that you each keep your questions limited to one question, one follow-up to allow as many participants as possible to ask questions. Tom, would you provide instructions for those on the call, please?
Speaker 1
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen on the phone lines, if you wish to ask a question, please press star followed by the one. You'll hear a tone indicating that you've been placed in queue, and you may remove yourself from queue at any time by pressing the pound key. Once again, star one for questions. Our first question today comes from the line of Tien-Tsin Huang. Please go ahead, representing JPMorgan.
Speaker 2
Hi. Good afternoon. Can you hear me?
Speaker 3
Yes. Hi, Tien-Tsin.
Speaker 2
Hi, Pam. Sorry about that. Just wanted to make sure you could hear me. Good quarter, good color commentary as well. Thanks for all of that. I guess I observed definitely an uptick in cost takeout projects that you were highlighting there, Pam, in terms of your bookings commentary. My question there is, is there enough of this cost-cutting work to do to offset this transition away from perhaps some of the discretionary work that you typically see or some of the transformational projects that you might see? I'm just trying to understand this transition, assuming this path continues and what that might mean for the bookings trajectory.
Speaker 3
There is plenty of cost-cutting work, and I would suggest that much of it is indeed transformational, given that there's a lot of structural costs to be addressed as well. Let me let Pierre give some color to.
Speaker 0
Yes. When we are talking about cost takeout, probably you would have in mind the work associated with the outsourcing and that kind of work. When you're talking about cost takeout, you have a large variety of activities we are doing. I mean, from an MC standpoint, and especially I'm thinking about all the work we're doing in technology consulting with all the technology rationalization, if you will. I'm thinking about all the work we could do in management consulting, in terms of driving more operating model efficiency. I'm thinking, of course, about all the new technologies, if you will, and innovation, we're putting in the market, which are contributing to cost takeout improvement. I'm thinking about some cloud-based services we are providing to clients through different business models, we're contributing to cost takeout.
It's not only one part of our business, but it's the full range of our services we can bring to bear.
Speaker 2
Understood. Just as my follow-up, I guess, I think you mentioned it, Pam, the wider range for the second quarter revenue guidance. What's driving that? It sounds like you're buffering for a little bit of transition for the calendar year?
Speaker 3
Yeah, our business runners don't see it, but I just thought that it was a good idea to just put a little in there. I just put a little in there on the bottom.
Speaker 2
Understood. Thank you.
Speaker 3
Just in case the startup on a few things is delayed a bit.
Speaker 2
OK. Thanks.
Speaker 3
Thank you, Tien-Tsin.
Speaker 0
Thank you.
Speaker 1
Our next question is from the line of Rod Bourgeois with Bernstein. Please go ahead.
Speaker 3
Hi, Rod.
Speaker 6
All right, guys. Hi there. It's great to see the bookings off to such a great start. Congrats on that. I guess where the questions are going to turn from an investor standpoint is all about whether discretionary services spending is beginning to show signs of softening. Yesterday, as you know, Logica in Europe attributed its struggles to a weaker economy in Europe. We argue that a lot of those issues are company-specific coming out of Logica. Still, it raises a question about whether the consulting market demand scenario in Europe is starting to fade. Can you comment on that, please?
Speaker 0
To get started with that, we are very pleased with what have been our bookings in Q1 in terms of consulting, and we're coming very strong. I think at the end of the day, all depends on your positioning and what you do with clients. As you know, our positioning has always been to be much more on the kind of CEO corporate agenda, driving work around what we are calling transformations, i.e., programs which are critical for the company to drive better performance. I think this is what we continue to focus on, and it's with the right mix of work from the consulting and the outsourcing. So far, we do not see a significant shift in the buying pattern of our clients.
Speaker 3
Just to add a little more specific industry color there, Rod, I commented that we did see some consulting off a little bit in financial services and banking capital markets. We also see a lot of opportunity in more imperative-based projects in financial services. It is interesting how that's shifting. The only other industry where we maybe see that a little bit is chemicals.
Speaker 6
OK. I mean, clearly, your Q1 bookings were great, but I guess are you seeing any indication that the pace of bookings is starting to temper or that that could happen over the next year, given all the macro volatility that's going on around the world?
Speaker 3
At this point, we don't see a significant change in client behavior. We see that budgets may not go up very much, but we also don't hear about them going down. What we talked about before in Tien-Tsin's question, cost optimization really is paramount. That plays to our strengths in terms of getting to real outcomes on business cases there.
Speaker 6
Pam, just real quick on that, would you expect your outsourcing revenue growth rate in fiscal 2012, particularly in the back half, to be meaningfully better than your consulting revenue growth rate? Are you still expecting a relatively balanced revenue growth mix across consulting and outsourcing?
Speaker 3
The way we see it today, Rod, is that we do expect the consulting growth rate to continue to moderate somewhat, and we expect the outsourcing growth rate to be double-digit.
Speaker 6
OK, great. Thanks, guys.
Speaker 1
Question comes from the line of Julie T. Sweet with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.
Speaker 2
Hey, thanks, Pam. Can you comment on the contracted revenue versus last year at this point?
Speaker 3
Contracted revenue?
Speaker 2
Yes.
Speaker 3
Oh, contracted. I thought you meant like going down.
Speaker 0
Going down better.
Speaker 2
No, not contracting. Contracted, sorry.
Speaker 3
Yeah, the revenue that we have under contract, which we call our visibility, basically, as we sit here today versus last year, we have 13% more under contract than we did last year.
Speaker 2
At the same pace coming out of the fourth quarter, it sounds like, right?
Speaker 3
Yes.
Speaker 2
OK. OK. Was the headcount adds for the year, the 60,000, a gross or a net number?
Speaker 3
That's a gross number of the people we expect to join our company this year.
Speaker 2
there any mixed contribution there, offshore or global delivery versus onsite, or is it balanced across?
Speaker 3
We're expecting to continue everywhere. We do have hiring down a little bit, but that's in part due to the improved attrition or largely due to the improved attrition. We do have some people joining us from some acquisitions. It's all in the mix.
Speaker 2
Thanks.
Speaker 1
Question is from the line of Bryan Keane with Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.
Speaker 6
Hi, guys. Great job with the quarter. I guess my question's on the EMEA. EMEA constant currency revenue growth was 10%, and that accelerated from 8% last quarter. That's a little bit of a head scratcher, given all the negative headlines we've heard. I guess, you know, what's driving that outperformance there, and is there some sustainability in that?
Speaker 3
First of all, Brian, welcome back. It's great to have you back. I'll let Pierre take the question since it's Europe.
Speaker 6
Thanks.
Speaker 0
Yeah, I mean, of course, Europe is always a little bit unpredictable. Probably that's why you've been taken by surprise. There are probably more fundamental reasons that, indeed, as you know, we're working with large companies. At the same time, we are, of course, watching carefully. We are watching carefully what's happening in Europe from a macroeconomic standpoint, but we are putting the same attention to what's happening with our clients. Many, if not all, of our clients operating in Europe are operating on a global basis. They are not totally dependent, if you will, on the economic environment in Europe per se. We have many projects and programs we are delivering around the world, which are indeed located in Europe, and which is reflected in this 10% growth.
Speaker 6
OK, great. That's helpful. My follow-up is just on outsourcing in general. Just from your comments and looking at the bookings in the last two quarters, they're really booming. I guess what's driving that kind of change that we're seeing such a big delta in outsourcing? Maybe where is that strength coming from? Is it across the board in the segments? I know we talked a little bit about it, but it's just a little bit surprising to see it come on that strong.
Speaker 0
Yes, I think it is indeed coming across the patch. I think it just reflects, first, the nature of the client demand in terms of cost takeout. I think what we are providing, both from an application outsourcing or BPO standpoint, is extremely relevant in response to the client's need. Second is the positioning we have taken in both BPO and AO, where we continue to drive a lot of innovation compared to the competition. I think in BPO, we have now extremely good solutions. We're calling fourth or fifth generation BPO, where we are bringing more value in the BPO services to avoid commoditization. If you think about the application outsourcing, we are much more service level based, business case driven. I think as well, what we are proposing is more relevant for our clients.
Speaker 3
The way our global delivery network has really gotten so strong in terms of our ability to deliver more and more of these services, as I mentioned in my comments.
Speaker 6
OK, congrats on the job.
Speaker 0
Thank you.
Speaker 3
Thank you, Bryan.
Speaker 1
Robert, please go ahead. Your line is open.
Speaker 3
David?
Speaker 1
will go to the next question. We have a question from the line of Darrin Peller with Barclays Capital. Please go ahead.
Speaker 4
Thanks. Would you mind just touching for a moment on the actual timing you're seeing in terms of decision making? Maybe just touch on budgets, how they're shaping up in terms of when they should be decided. Are you still expecting January, February, maybe even March? Just give us some sense around that.
Speaker 0
Hi, David. Hi, Darrin.
Speaker 4
Hi, guys.
Speaker 0
No, I mean, when you look at it, and as you can imagine, we're looking at this extraordinarily carefully around whatever the velocity, speed to decision, and so forth. As we speak and when you're looking in Q1, we've not seen a significant change in clients' behavior.
Speaker 4
OK, that's helpful. I mean, I guess bottom line is you'd expect probably February time frame then, right? January, February time frame still to help you guide in your planning.
Speaker 3
Yeah, we are not seeing any sort of blips in the way clients are stopping or starting projects, right? We're just not seeing anything in that. As I mentioned, we did allow for a little bit just in terms of how the revenue kicks in after the start of the calendar year, just in case something like that does happen.
Speaker 4
Right. No, it's just a type of contrast, perhaps. On the public sector local currency growth rate, I know that health is in there also, but still, I mean, 11% was pretty impressive considering an environment of, I guess, just fiscal tightening around the globe. I think it's also been somewhat better than we've seen with peers. Can you give us a little sense of what you think is maybe driving that outperformance?
Speaker 3
I'll start and let Pierre go then. We are really, really focused on this repositioning, as we've been telling you for several quarters now. I think what is paying off for us is focus. We are really helping or working with the governments around the world on helping them get more efficient, right? Helping them get much more efficient in terms of the services they're providing to their citizens. We've really narrowed it down to a few offerings, and it is starting. I mean, we're still doing it, right? We're not done. We're really pleased with the progress of how this is going.
Speaker 4
That's great.
Speaker 0
You said that day went past, right? Nothing to add, that was just brilliant.
Speaker 4
Thanks, guys.
Speaker 3
OK?
Speaker 1
we'll move on to the line of Moshe Katri with Cowen. Please go ahead.
Speaker 6
Yes, hi. It's Avishai Kanter from Moshe. First question, telecom seems to be up very strong, 21% sequentially, and BFSI up strong, 15% sequentially. Can you elaborate on the drivers for that?
Speaker 3
Sorry, you said telecom's up?
Speaker 6
Operating income in telecom in BFSI in telecom was up 21% sequentially, and in financial services was up 14.7% sequentially, the operating income in those verticals. Can you elaborate on that? What were the drivers?
Speaker 3
There is, you know, just as I mentioned before with operating margin, a lot that goes into that. Generally, contract profitability is the major driver, and then there are a few other puts and takes that go into that every quarter. In terms of this quarter versus last year, last year, you may have seen we took a benefit from bad debts. This year, we did not have that. There are just lots of things that go into that, and there is nothing notable in those two operating groups.
Speaker 6
OK. On a sequential basis, revenues in Europe were up much stronger than the U.S., which grew only 1%. Can you talk about that a little bit?
Speaker 3
I'm not sure I have your sequential 1%. There's always, you know, the quarters are different just in terms of the seasonality of our business. Sequential generally doesn't make sense, and I'm not sure there's anything too much you can draw from that.
Speaker 6
OK, any change in visibility compared to prior quarters?
Speaker 3
Not really, beyond what we provided in the comments. The bookings were strong, and generally, we see clients' budgets continuing to shape up for next year as we expected. There's nothing really major to point out there.
Speaker 6
Great. Thank you very much.
Speaker 3
Thank you.
Speaker 0
Thank you.
Speaker 1
We have a question from Keith Bachman with BMO Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Speaker 4
Hi, good afternoon. I understand you managed the operating margins, but I did want to hear a little bit more color about the gross margins. Utilization rates were up, and attrition was down. Could you just talk about, again, why gross margins were down and what you expect the trends to be over the next quarters? I have a follow-up. Thanks.
Speaker 3
OK, great. Hi, Keith. I'm going to stick to the story in that we managed the business to operating margin. I mentioned to you that payroll was up a little bit in gross margin, but it was down a little in sales and marketing. As I mentioned, most of our people, to the degree when they're not charging contracts, spread their time between those two lines in terms of the activities that they do. I think that you just, again, we managed the business to operating margin. I think we were, the contract profitability was good. We had compensation increases that went in on September 1. We're absorbing those well. There really isn't too much to add there right now.
Speaker 4
If you're absorbing those compensation, would you expect the gross margins to go up over the next couple of quarters?
Speaker 3
I mean, you know, again, we managed the business to operating margin. There's a lot of puts and takes. There's contracts that are beginning, contracts that are ending. I mean, there's just so much that's going on in a given quarter. As you know, we did give an annual outlook for 10 to 20 basis points expansion in operating margin, and that's what we're working to do.
Speaker 4
OK. All right. I will cede the floor then. Thank you.
Speaker 0
Thank you.
Speaker 3
Thank you, Keith.
Speaker 1
Azhar with Morgan Stanley, please go ahead.
Speaker 2
Hi, guys.
Speaker 3
Hey, Nathan.
Speaker 2
Maybe a first one for Pierre here, because I'd like to turn it back to Europe. Are you guys seeing any noticeable or perceptible shift in clients' adoption of offshoring in particular? If so, if you could kind of speak to the drivers of that or how they are leveraging offshore more and how it's impacting your business.
Speaker 0
Yes, definitely. This is a trend which is as well touching Europe. I mean, this offshore adoption, if you will, has already been very vibrant if you take the UK or the Nordic countries. The question has always been what's going to be the level of penetration in more of the Latin countries. We're starting to see more adoption of offshore or nearshore as well. As you know, we have a number of delivery centers. Some are more nearshore, others are more offshore. We have the possibility to leverage, of course, our offshore centers, such as India. As well, we can work from Romania, even from Morocco or other places. We have a full range of possibilities when it comes to offshore. We can deal with language, with culture, as well as with time zone. Clearly, we see a higher rate of adoption from an offshore standpoint.
Speaker 2
OK, great. Thank you for that. I wanted to turn it quickly back to the bookings number. Pam, I think you mentioned that there were nine clients who added at least $100 million in new bookings. I just wanted to check to see if there were any very large or chunky bookings closer to the billion dollar range, like we had seen last quarter, that may have also benefited bookings this quarter. Thank you.
Speaker 3
Yeah, you know, we didn't have any giants like that. Otherwise, probably won't comment any further, but there weren't any up close to a billion.
Speaker 2
Great, thank you.
Speaker 3
Thanks. I just want to say that I'm still sticking to the 10 to 30 basis points. It was pointed out to me that I said 10 to 20, and it is 10 to 30.
Speaker 1
Next, we'll go to the line of Ashwin Shirvaikar with Citi. Please go ahead.
Speaker 3
Hi, Ashwin.
Speaker 6
Hi, Pam. Hi, Pierre. It was a solid quarter, good execution in tough times. Congratulations on that. Not that much of a surprise in our comments or the quarter itself. I wanted to go to the topic of vendor consolidation. I continue to hear that Accenture continues to gain wallet share versus competition, including especially mid-tier companies that may not have a full range of services. I just wanted to ask, what inning are we in here? How strong of a driver could this be over the next couple of years?
Speaker 0
Yes, thank you, Ashwin, for the question. I think this is a driver for our growth. As we can see, this vendor consolidation is moving forward for very good reasons from our clients. If you want on the first hand to rationalize your IT cost and second, drive more transformational programs, you need to rely upon a lower number of providers which are able to support you on a much more global basis. All this, especially when you're working for large companies, large and global companies like Accenture. This vendor consolidation is still moving forward and is still a driver for our growth and a way for us to increase the share of wallets in our existing clients.
Speaker 6
OK. On currency, the impact of currency is, of course, expected. Does the continued volatility change how you hedge the risk or whether you try to contractually offset some of it, or even where you hold your cash? There was that cash impact on the balance sheet this time, right?
Speaker 3
Yeah, I mean, first of all, we're not going to be changing anything we do. What we do is we do hedge certain balance sheet risks where we need to. What was reflected in the cash balance is reflected in the cash we need around the world to run the businesses in those countries. Sometimes it goes one way, and sometimes it goes another. That's just the way it goes. We also are going to continue to hedge part of the work in our global delivery network, where we have revenues and costs in different currencies. We're going to continue with that practice. We're very pleased with how that's going.
Speaker 6
OK, understood. Thank you, guys.
Speaker 3
Thanks, Ashwin.
Speaker 1
Question comes from the line of David Grossman with Stifel Nicolaus. Please go ahead, sir.
Speaker 4
Great, thank you. Pierre, you talked very positively about emerging markets. Sorry if I missed this, but what percentage of revenue is emerging markets, and what rate is it growing, and how does the competitive landscape look?
Speaker 0
We're not giving the information to that level of detail. I can just mention two things. First, I'm very pleased with the progress we are making with our priority emerging markets. We've been extraordinarily focused on growing in that part of the world and putting our act together. Second, as I mentioned before, we've been growing in those markets at significantly higher rates than the rest of Accenture.
Speaker 4
How about the competitive landscape? Is it materially different than what you're seeing in the other geographies?
Speaker 0
Yes, I mean, of course, you need to face local competition. It's not different from what we are facing in most of the markets. You know, at the end of the day, the market is split between the large and global companies like us, the local providers, and what we are calling more the Indian pure players as well, which are providing a kind of different kind of services. What we are facing in those markets is the same competition we used to face in the other markets. I think we're extremely well prepared to compete in those markets.
Speaker 4
I see. Thank you. Just one for you, Pam. It looks like the impact of currency on revenue and EPS were more or less proportionate. Does that relationship generally hold true, or does it really just depend on other factors?
Speaker 3
Yeah, it generally holds true, I would say.
Speaker 4
OK, very good. Thank you.
Speaker 1
The line of Joseph Foresi with Janney Montgomery. Please go ahead.
Speaker 4
Hi. My first question here is just on utilization. I see that it's at around 87%. Are you running that a bit too hot? I think you talked about maybe potentially bringing it down. Is that an inhibitor at all to servicing any business, or how should we think about that in relation to a margin as well?
Speaker 3
I don't think it's too hot, right? I mean, it's maybe on the border of getting too hot. We don't believe it's too hot. You know, the mid-80s is where we look for it to be, and it's really been tracking in that area. I think we're doing an excellent job of supply and demand balancing right now.
Speaker 4
Thank you for that. Just so I can kind of characterize your positioning right now, it sounds like there's nothing really that you're seeing in the marketplace. Would you say that your optimism towards the demand environment is just as strong as it was last quarter? The element of conservatism may be coming from a headline rather than what you're seeing in the market. Maybe you could just frame that for us.
Speaker 0
Yes, I mean, good question indeed. I think we know we are entering fiscal year 2012 in a position of strength. This is what we mentioned last quarter. We're very pleased with our Q1. We are remaining extremely close to our clients. What we see as we speak is indeed the kind of services we are providing are extremely relevant to respond to the needs of our clients. On the other hand, we are very thoughtful, and we're watching carefully what's happening in the marketplace, especially in the macroeconomic environment, and especially in the eurozone. This is what we're providing in our guidance and in our direction. I think it is exactly the right balance between the confidence in ourselves and the services we are providing and just being aware of what's happening outside.
Speaker 4
I'm going to squeeze one last one in here, Pam. How should we think about the depreciation of the rupee as we look at your margins? I know you have a larger global delivery model, but maybe you could just talk to that. Thank you.
Speaker 3
Movements of the rupee really only have a modest impact on our margins, because even though we have a large headcount in India, it's really not proportional to our total costs. We do offset them partially by hedging. The whole intent is to really try to minimize that impact on our overall global results.
Speaker 4
Thank you.
Speaker 1
Another line of George Price with BMO Capital Markets. Please go ahead, sir.
Speaker 6
Great, thanks. Can you guys hear me OK?
Speaker 3
Yes. Hi, George.
Speaker 6
Hi. Congratulations. Nice quarter, particularly very strong bookings. I guess I know some questions have been asked, and it's been circled around. I want to press a little bit more on the guidance. In keeping the 7% to 10% range in light of the strong first quarter results and the second quarter guidance, just doing a little preliminary work on what it's for the year. At the upper range of the constant currency guidance range, it implies a fairly significant deceleration in the second half of the fiscal year, maybe to around the 7% kind of range in constant currency. Obviously, even lower if we think of the low end of the constant currency guidance range. If we think outsourcing is going to grow faster than consulting, given what we were observing in your comments, then potentially a real deceleration in consulting.
Notwithstanding that, I know you want to be conservative in light of what we're seeing in the macro environment. I guess it's just kind of if you can give a little bit more color on that, because it just feels beyond just conservatism.
Speaker 0
Yes, I will start, and Pam will give more color on this as well. We want to be thoughtful and balanced in our judgment. We have a strong start, and we are very pleased with where we are. We have strong bookings, which is giving us some visibility. However, we know that there are remaining uncertainties and volatility in the marketplace. When we are putting all of this together, we need to apply our judgment, and we believe that the guidance we are giving from 7% to 10% is the right one, given where we are and what we know and what we are starting from. Pam, you can further comment.
Speaker 3
I'll probably just sort of repeat what you said. I think similar to last quarter, we look at this very seriously. We look at puts and takes. Q1 was even stronger than we expected. Q2, we have factored in some prudence in case there are some slight level of calendar year delays. As you look past Q2, we recognize that GDP forecast globally has maybe inched down a little bit when you think about places like the eurozone, the UK, and Japan. As I mentioned, we do have some work to do to replenish the pipeline. We're just kind of trying to take all that into account and be thoughtful and prudent about how we see it.
Speaker 6
OK, I guess just kind of segueing to that comment on replenishing the pipeline and the work that you have to do, I guess what's driving that? Obviously, you're pulling a lot out of the pipeline in terms of booking it, and that's great. In terms of having to replenish it, I mean, what's driving? Is there just slower decision making on things coming in? I mean, just a little bit more around that would be helpful.
Speaker 3
I think coming off of two strong quarters of bookings, there's replenishment work to do. That's just a given. As I mentioned, we also see some shifting from consulting to outsourcing from how we originally did our plan this year. That's what we're focused on.
Speaker 6
OK. Last thing, if I could, was fiscal 1Q 2012 the first quarter for year-over-year decline in the banking and capital markets consulting work? You mentioned that that actually had a year-over-year decline. Was this the first quarter that we saw that, and was that driven by consulting predominantly in Europe, or did you see that in the U.S. as well? Thank you.
Speaker 3
We did not see it in the U.S. I believe this is the first quarter. I don't think last quarter had a year-over-year consulting decline. We can confirm that with you, but I don't believe it did, if memory serves me.
Speaker 4
Yeah, I don't think so.
Speaker 6
OK, great. Thank you for taking my questions.
Speaker 0
Thank you.
Speaker 3
That's Tom.
Speaker 5
Tom, we have time for one more question, then Pierre will wrap up the call.
Speaker 1
Final question today will come from the line of Dave Koning with Robert Sell. Please go ahead.
Speaker 2
Hey, guys. This is actually Nathan Novak on the line for Dave.
Speaker 3
Great, you're back.
Speaker 2
This is sort of just piggybacking off that last question. In the financial services vertical, the last couple of quarters, profitability has been a little worse than, let's call it, the prior seven quarters. What would it take to materially change to get that back up to 17%, 18%? Is it a mix shift thing compared to some of the other verticals? Could you talk a little bit more specifically about the drivers there?
Speaker 3
I think financial services has exhibited very strong profitability in the past. They're probably a little bit more in the pack now. I think that, as I mentioned, operating groups go through different cycles, right, in terms of their business and big stuff starting up and that sort of thing. I think we have, as I mentioned in the comments, we just have lower contract profitability right now. They're focusing on business development. We also had some acquisitions that we're integrating and had some costs related to those.
Speaker 2
Excellent. Thanks a lot.
Speaker 3
Thank you, Robert.
Speaker 0
Thank you. As you know, financial services is very close to my heart. I am going to work with the current leadership to make sure they will show good game. Thanks again for joining us today. We are very pleased with our excellent results in the first quarter, and we remain confident in our ability to drive profitable growth. We continue to invest to differentiate Accenture in the marketplace and to ensure that our strategy and capabilities are closely aligned with our clients' long-term competitive needs. In closing, I would like to thank each and every one of our dedicated men and women around the world for their commitment to Accenture and to our clients. I would also like to thank our investors for your continued support. We look forward to speaking with you again next quarter.
In the meantime, if you have any questions, please feel free to call Casey to make arrangements for follow-up. I wish you a happy holiday season and all the best for a happy New Year.
Speaker 3
Thank you.
Speaker 1
Ladies and gentlemen, that does conclude our conference for today. This conference will be available for replay starting at 7:00 P.M. this evening and running through March 22, 2012. You may access the AT&T Executive Playback Service at any time by dialing 1-800-475-6701 and entering the access code of 222491. International participants, please dial 1-320-365-3844. Again, the access code is 222491. That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for your participation and for using the AT&T Executive Teleconference. You may now disconnect.