Huron Consulting Group - Q4 2023

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Good afternoon and welcome to Huron Consulting Group's Webcast to discuss financial results for the Q4 and full year of 2023. At this time, all conference lines are on a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a Q&A session for conference call participants, and instructions will follow at that time. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. Before we begin, I would like to point all of you to the disclosure at the end of the company's news release for information about any forward-looking statements that may be made or discussed on this call. The news release is posted on Huron's website. Please review that information along with the filings with the SEC for a disclosure of factors that may impact subjects discussed in this afternoon's webcast. The company will be discussing one or more non-GAAP financial measures.

Please look at the earnings release and on Huron's website for all of the disclosures required by the SEC, including reconciliation to the most comparable GAAP numbers. Now I would like to turn the call over to Mark Hussey, Chief Executive Officer and President of Huron Consulting Group. Mr. Hussey, please go ahead.

Mark Hussey (CEO and President)

Good afternoon and welcome to Huron Consulting Group's Q4 and full year 2023 earnings call. With me today are John Kelly, our Chief Financial Officer, and Ronnie Dail, our Chief Operating Officer. Driven by strong growth across all three operating segments in 2023, we achieved record revenues and expanded our operating margins for the third consecutive year. Our Q4 performance was consistent with our expectations, culminating in record financial performance for full year 2023. Revenues in the Q4 and full year 2023 grew 8% and 20%, respectively. In 2023, our consulting and managed services capability, which represents over half of our revenues, grew 23%, while our digital capability grew 17%, achieving revenue that is approaching $600 million and represented 43% of our revenues across all three operating segments.

Full year adjusted EBITDA margins improved 70 basis points over the prior year, reflecting continued progress toward our objective of returning to mid-teens EBITDA margins by 2025. Our strong cash flow enabled us to return $124 million to shareholders via share repurchases in 2023 while maintaining a strong financial position. Our financial performance demonstrates the strength of the foundation we've established under our integrated go-to-market model to continue delivering on our medium-term investor objectives. Our deep industry expertise in leading market positions in healthcare and education, our expanding presence in commercial industries, and our growing portfolio of digital capabilities positions us well to meet or exceed our medium-term financial objectives for low double-digit revenue growth and increased profitability. Now we'll discuss our Q4 and full year 2023 performance along with our expectations for 2024.

In the Q4 of 2023, healthcare segment revenue grew 12% over the prior year quarter, reflecting the strong demand across our digital strategy and innovation, performance improvement, and financial advisory offerings. On a full-year basis, the healthcare segment achieved record revenues of $674 million, growing 26% over 2022. Demand was widespread across our performance improvement, digital financial advisory strategy and innovation, and managed services offerings. Our consulting and managed services revenues increased 30%, and digital capability revenues increased 16% over the prior year. We continue to diversify our portfolio to meet the expanding needs of our healthcare clients and build a strong foundation for ongoing growth for this segment. As I mentioned on our last earnings call, the operating environment for healthcare providers began to improve in 2023. Despite some improvements in overall patient volume, many health systems continue to face significant financial pressures.

A confluence of labor-driven financial and operating challenges, combined with increasing competition, deteriorating payer mix, and inflationary and interest rate headwinds, create challenges for health system business models. We believe these market pressures create opportunities for our diverse set of healthcare offerings. The investments we've made and will continue to make in innovation, new services, products, and partnerships positions our healthcare segment well, continued growth in 2024. Turning now to the education segment. In the Q4 of 2023, education segment revenues increased 7% over the prior year quarter, primarily driven by demand for our digital offerings. Annual revenues in the segment grew 19% compared to 2022, achieving record revenues of $430 million. For the full year, demand was broad-based, with our digital revenues and consulting and managed services revenues increasing 28% and 12%, respectively, over 2022.

We believe the solid demand for our digital research and strategy and operations offerings will remain strong as higher education institutions face continued financial and operational challenges. The frequently mentioned demographic challenges leading to declining numbers of college-bound students create a highly competitive environment for admissions. Similar to our healthcare clients, increased labor and facilities costs, unfunded government mandates, and the increased reliance on digital platforms create financial pressures and challenges to the achievement of university missions. Huron's well-established reputation, long history of proven results in deep client relationships, makes us one of the most trusted advisors to the industry, which we believe positions us well to support our clients through the diverse set of challenges faced by the higher education industry.

Before I turn to the commercial segment, I would like to highlight a recently announced investment we will make to accelerate our growth in our mission-driven end markets, which is a key pillar of our strategy. Earlier this month, we announced our intent to acquire GG+A, a leading philanthropy-focused management consulting firm that serves education institutions and healthcare, arts, and other nonprofit organizations. This acquisition strengthens our philanthropic consulting offerings, complements our advancement-focused digital services, and creates new pathways for us to serve our mission-driven clients. And we expect the transaction to close next month. Now turning to the commercial segment. In the Q4 of 2023, commercial segment revenues were flat over the prior year quarter, primarily attributable to growth or digital offerings offset by declines in our strategy and innovation offerings. On a full-year basis, commercial segment revenues grew 9% year-over-year.

The growth was broad-based as our consulting and managed services capability and digital capability grew 13% and 7%, respectively. A standout performer within the commercial segment was our financial advisory business, which grew 68% for 2022, driven by strong demand for our restructuring and turnaround offerings. The uncertainties in the broader macroeconomic environment, including rising interest rates, inflationary pressures, and geopolitical risks, have created unique challenges, particularly among some of our mid-market commercial clients. As is often the case, an uncertain economic environment leads many organizations to take a more cautious approach to executing large-scale initiatives. This created mixed demand for our offerings in 2023. Our financial advisory offerings were in strong demand during the past year as many organizations facing financial distress sought our expertise. Our digital offerings grew more slowly as some organizations were more cautious about their spending on large-scale digital initiatives.

We are now seeing positive indicators that demand for commercial digital projects is improving as we begin 2024. Our growth in 2023 demonstrates the importance of a balanced commercial portfolio. We remain focused on growing our presence in commercial industries by pulling more industry depth and expanding our capabilities while maintaining balance within the commercial segment and across a more diversified enterprise platform. Now let me turn to our expectations and guidance for 2024, which contemplates our pending acquisition of GG+A. Our revenue guidance for the year is $1.46 billion-$1.54 billion. We also expect Adjusted EBITDA in a range of 12.8%-13.3% of revenues and adjusted diluted earnings per share of $5.35-$5.95, company-wide guiding to 10% revenue growth at the midpoint for 2024.

We're proud of the significant growth we achieved in 2022 and 2023, and we believe demand for our portfolio of offerings will continue into 2024. We remain focused on achieving the low double-digit annual revenue growth objective that we established at our 2022 investor day while pursuing opportunities to accelerate growth beyond those goals as demonstrated in recent years. In terms of margins, the midpoint of our 2024 guidance, we expect a 70 basis point improvement over 2023, building off the collective 150 basis point improvement achieved in 2022 and 2023. The midpoint of our guided adjusted earnings per share range of $5.35-$5.95 per share is actually 116% higher than our 2021 adjusted EPS of $2.61, which reflects the compounding impact of revenue growth, margin expansion, and return to shareholders via share repurchases. We remain committed to achieving our financial objectives for sustainable revenue growth and improved profitability.

To deliver these objectives, we remain focused in five key areas. First, accelerating growth in our core end markets of healthcare and education. Second, expanding our growing commercial business. Third, advancing our global digital technology and analytics platform. Fourth, broadening our offerings and capabilities to build a sustainable base from which to drive consistent revenue growth and margin expansion. And fifth, strategically deploying capital to invest in the areas of our business with the greatest growth potential while returning capital to shareholders. Our growth strategy has delivered strong results in recent years, and we believe it will continue to be the foundation from which we will achieve top and bottom-line growth in the future.

Each of the pillars of our growth strategy reinforce and build upon one another, and when executed together, they'll help us enhance our ability to deliver on our clients' most complex challenges, strengthen our competitive advantage, and create value for our shareholders. 2023 was a record year for Huron, and these results are only possible because of our incredibly talented team and their commitment to making a lasting impact on our clients and our business. Huron's always had a vibrant and collaborative culture, and that culture remains at the heart of our success. Together, we've collectively built a client-centric culture and supportive work environment, which was reflected by Huron securing the 32nd position out of 100 on Glassdoor's Best Places to Work U.S. Large Companies list. The Glassdoor rankings and our financial results demonstrate considerable impact our team has had on Huron's performance.

We don't take our recent success for granted. We remain focused on executing our strategy. We're excited about our prospects for 2024 as we strengthen our competitive position and take advantage of the market opportunities that lie ahead. Now, before I lose my voice, I'm going to turn it over to John for a more detailed discussion of our financial results. John?

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

Thank you, Mark, and good afternoon, everyone. Before I begin, please note that I will be discussing non-GAAP financial measures such as EBITDA, adjusted EBITDA, adjusted net income, adjusted EPS, and free cash flow. A press release, 10-K, and investor relations page on the Huron website have reconciliations of these non-GAAP measures, the most comparable GAAP measures, along with a discussion of why management uses these non-GAAP measures and why management believes they provide useful information to investors regarding our financial condition and operating results.

I'd first like to touch on two housekeeping items before discussing our financial results for the quarter. First, earlier this month, we announced our intent to acquire GG+A. We expect that transaction to close in the Q1 of 2024, and as such, it is not included in our Q4 results. The acquisition of GG+A will strengthen our industry expertise and expand our consulting offerings to help our mission-driven clients build and accelerate their philanthropic programs. Second, let me provide a brief comment on a note in our press release. GAAP net income includes a non-cash, unrealized loss of $19.4 million net of tax during the quarter related to our investment in a hospital-at-home company. As a reminder, in 2019, we invested $5 million in a hospital-at-home company as a strategic investment that has annually produced meaningful implementation projects for our healthcare segment.

In the Q1 of 2022, we recognized a non-cash, unrealized gain on this investment of $19.8 million net of tax based on the valuation established in a round of financing that closed that quarter. In the Q4 of 2023, the company reported a non-cash impairment loss of $19.4 million net of tax on the investment, essentially reversing the 2022 gain based on the valuation established in a new round of financing expected to close in early 2024. As of December 31st, 2023, the investment's carrying value was $7.4 million, reflecting a net unrealized gain of $2.4 million on the investment since inception. Huron's ownership percentage in this Hospital-at-Home company is less than 5%. Now I'll share some of the key financial results for the quarter and full year 2023.

Revenues for the Q4 of 2023 were $339.2 million, up 8.1% from $313.7 million in the same quarter of 2022. The increase in revenues in the quarter was driven by growth in the healthcare and education segments. In addition, our digital capability posted strong growth across all three segments. For the full year of 2023, revenue was $1.362 billion, up 20.3% from $1.132 billion in 2022. We achieved record revenues in 2023, reflecting broad-based demand for our portfolio of offerings across all three operating segments. Our performance in 2023 also reflects strong execution on the key elements of our growth strategy: accelerating growth in healthcare and education, expanding our presence in commercial industries, and further growing our digital capability.

Net income for the Q4 of 2023 was $2.8 million or $0.15 per diluted share compared to net income of $17.1 million or $0.85 per diluted share in the Q4 of 2022 and reflects the non-cash, unrealized loss of $19.4 million net of tax or $1 per diluted earnings per share related to our investment in a Hospital-at-Home company, as discussed earlier. For a full year of 2023, net income was $62.5 million or $3.19 per diluted share. This compares to net income of $75.6 million or $3.64 per diluted share in 2022. Both periods reflect the impact of non-cash changes in fair value related to our investment in a Hospital-at-Home company, as discussed earlier.

Our effective income tax rate in the Q4 of 2023 was -60.2%, which is more favorable than the statutory rate inclusive of state income taxes, primarily due to a tax benefit related to non-taxable gains on the investments used to fund our deferred compensation liability and a discrete tax benefit for share-based compensation awards that vested during the quarter and the positive impact of certain federal tax credits. On a full-year basis, our effective income tax rate for 2023 was 25.5%, which is more favorable than the statutory rate inclusive of state income taxes, primarily due to a discrete tax benefit for share-based compensation awards that vested during the year and the positive impact of certain federal tax credits. These favorable items were partially offset by certain non-deductible expense items.

Adjusted EBITDA was $41.4 million in Q4 2023 or 12.2% of revenues compared to $39 million in Q4 2022 or 12.4% of revenues. For a full year of 2023, adjusted EBITDA as a percentage of revenues increased 70 basis points to 12.3% compared to 11.6% in 2022. The increase in full-year adjusted EBITDA reflects higher consultant utilization, improved pricing, expanded deployment of our global delivery capabilities, and lower corporate SG&A expense as a percentage of revenues in 2023 compared to 2022 after adjusting for the impact of our deferred compensation plan liability. Partially offsetting these factors is continued investment in the growth of our business and increased bonus compensation related to the strong performances across our business. Adjusted net income was $25.1 million or $1.29 per diluted share compared to $22.6 million or $1.12 per diluted share in the Q4 of 2022.

For the full year 2023, adjusted net income was $96.2 million or $4.91 per diluted share compared with $71.1 million or $3.43 per diluted share in 2022. Now I'll discuss the performance of each of our operating segments. The healthcare segment generated 51% of total company revenues during the Q4 of 2023. This segment posted revenues of $172 million, up $18.7 million or 12.2% from the Q4 of 2022. The increase in revenues in the quarter was driven by strong demand for our digital strategy and innovation, performance improvement, and financial advisory offerings. On a full-year basis, healthcare revenue increased 26% to $674 million compared to $535 million in 2022, also driven by strong demand for our performance improvement and digital offerings as well as our financial advisory and strategy and innovation offerings.

In 2023, our consulting and managed services capabilities in healthcare, which is our largest capability company-wide, grew 30%. Operating income margin for healthcare was 25.9% in both Q4 2023 and Q4 2022. On a full-year basis, the healthcare segment's operating income margin was 25.7% compared to 24.5% in 2022. The increase in operating income margin year-over-year was primarily due to revenue growth outpacing compensation costs for our revenue-generating professionals, partially offset by an increase in contractor expenses. The education segment generated 31% of total company revenues during the Q4 of 2023. The education segment posted revenues of $103.8 million, up $7.2 million or 7.4% from the Q4 of 2022. The increase in revenues in the quarter was primarily driven by demand for our digital offerings.

On a full-year basis, education segment revenues grew 19.4% year-over-year, driven by demand for our technology and analytics services and software products within our digital capability, as well as increased demand for our strategy, operations, and research solutions within our consulting and managed services capability. The operating income margin for education was 21.2% Q4 2023 compared to 20.8% for the same quarter in 2022. The increase in operating income margin in the quarter was primarily driven by decreased restructuring and contractor expenses, partially offset by increased compensation costs for our revenue-generating professionals. On a full-year basis, operating income margin was 23.1% compared to 21.9% in 2022, primarily due to a decrease in contractor expenses, partially offset by increases in compensation costs for our revenue-generating professionals and technology expenses.

The commercial segment generated 18% of total company revenues during the Q4 of 2023 and posted revenues of $63.5 million compared to $63.8 million in the Q4 of 2022. On a full-year basis, commercial segment revenues increased 8.7% to $258.4 million compared to $237.6 million in 2022. The increase in full-year revenues was driven by strong demand for our financial advisory and digital offerings. Operating income margin for the commercial segment was 22.4% for Q4 2023 compared to 18.4% for the same quarter in 2022. The increase in operating income margin in the quarter was primarily driven by decreases in compensation costs for our revenue-generating professionals and contractor expenses. On a full-year basis, commercial segment operating income margin was relatively even at 21% in 2023 compared to 21.1% in 2022.

Corporate expenses not allocated at the segment level and excluding restructuring charges were $45.2 million in Q4 2023 compared to $40.1 million in Q4 2022. Unallocated corporate expenses in the Q4 of 2023 and 2022 included $3.2 million and $1.8 million, respectively, of expense related to the increase in the liability of our deferred compensation plan, which is offset by the investment gain on the assets used to fund that plan reflected in other income. Excluding the impact of the deferred compensation plan in both periods, unallocated corporate expenses increased $3.7 million, primarily due to increased compensation costs for our support personnel and third-party professional services expenses.

On a full-year basis, corporate expenses not allocated at the segment level increased to $174.8 million, including $5.5 million of expense related to the deferred compensation plan compared to $136.5 million of unallocated corporate expenses in 2022, which included a $6.9 million reduction of expense related to the deferred compensation plan. Excluding the impact of the deferred compensation plan in both periods, unallocated corporate expenses increased $25.9 million, primarily driven by an increase in compensation costs for our support personnel as well as increases in third-party professional services expenses and software and data hosting expenses. Now turning to the balance sheet and cash flows. Total debt as of December 31st, 2023, was $324 million, consisting entirely of our senior bank debt. We finished the year with cash of $12.1 million for net debt of $311.9 million. This was a $36.8 million decrease in net debt compared to Q3 2023.

The Q4 included $34.9 million of share repurchases or approximately 345,000 shares. Our Leverage Ratio, as defined in our senior bank agreement, was 1.6 times Adjusted EBITDA as of December 31st, 2023, compared to 1.9 times Adjusted EBITDA as of December 31st, 2022. Cash flow generated from operations for 2023 was $135.3 million. We used $35.2 million of our cash to invest in capital expenditures inclusive of internally developed software costs, purchases of property and equipment, resulting in free cash flow of $100.1 million. In addition, in 2023, we used $123.6 million to repurchase approximately 1.5 million shares, representing 7.4% of our outstanding shares as of the beginning of the year. We used $1.6 million for strategic tuck-in acquisitions. As of December 31st, 2023, $86.2 million remained available for share repurchases under our current share repurchase program.

DSO came in at 87 days for the Q4 of 2023 compared to 83 days for the Q3 of 2023 and 77 days for the Q4 of 2022. The increase in DSO during the Q4 when compared to the Q3 reflects the impact of contractual payment schedules for certain larger healthcare projects. Today, we also announced that we have amended our senior secured credit facility to include a $275 million term loan in addition to our existing $600 million revolving credit facility, both of which mature in November of 2027. The proceeds from the term loan will be used to reduce borrowings under the company's revolving credit facility, which increases the company's capacity for investment by $275 million.

This expanded capacity will enable us to continue executing on our balanced capital deployment strategy inclusive of strategic tuck-in acquisitions and returning capital to shareholders through targeted share repurchases. Finally, let me turn to our expectations and guidance for 2024, which contemplates our pending acquisition of GG+A. For the full year of 2024, we anticipate revenues before reimbursable expenses in a range of $1.46 billion-$1.54 billion, adjusted EBITDA in a range of 12.8%-13.3% of revenues, and adjusted non-GAAP EPS in a range of $5.35-$5.95. We expect cash flows from operations to be in a range of $155 million-$185 million.

Capital expenditures are expected to be approximately $40 million inclusive of costs to develop our market-facing products and analytical tools, and free cash flows are expected to be in a range of $115-$145 million net of cash, taxes, and interest and excluding non-cash stock compensation. Weighted average diluted share count for 2024 is expected to be in a range of 19-19.5 million shares. Finally, with respect to taxes, you should assume an effective tax rate in the range of 28%-30%, which comprises the federal tax rate of 21%, a blended state tax rate of 5%-6%, and incremental tax expense related to certain non-deductible expense items. Let me add some color to our guidance starting with revenue. The midpoint of the revenue range reflects 10% growth over 2023.

As Mark mentioned, while we are proud of the accelerated 20%+ growth we achieved in 2022 and 2023, we believe that our guidance aligns with a more normalized level of growth for our business and is consistent with our previously stated medium-term financial objectives. We remain focused on executing our growth strategy across all segments of our business and have fully aligned the incentives for all of our managing directors and principals with our strategic goals and integrated operating model. With regard to our healthcare segment, we expect mid to high single-digit percentage revenue growth for the full year 2024, and we expect operating margins will be in a range of 25%-27%.

In the education segment, we expect low-teen% revenue growth for full year 2024 inclusive of a mid- to high-teen $ million contribution for 10 months of GG+A, and we expect operating margins will be in a range of approximately 24%-26%. In the commercial segment, we expect to see low double-digit% revenue growth for 2024, and we expect our operating margins in this segment to be in a range of approximately 21%-23%. We expect unallocated corporate SG&A to increase in the low- to mid-single-digit% range year-over-year.

Also, in the Q1 consistent with prior years, we note the following items as it relates to expenses: the reset of wage bases for FICA and our 401(k) match, our annual merit and promotion wage increases going to take effect on January 1st, and an increase in stock compensation expense for restricted stock rewards, though granted in March to retirement-eligible employees. Based on these factors, we anticipate approximately 15%-20% of our full-year Adjusted EBITDA and full-year Adjusted EPS to be generated during the Q1 consistent with the pattern we have seen for the last several years. As a closing reminder with respect to 2024 Adjusted EBITDA, adjusted net income, and Adjusted EPS, there are several items that you will need to consider when reconciling these non-GAAP measures to comparable GAAP measures.

The reconciliation schedules that we included in our press release will help walk you through these reconciliations. Thanks, everyone. I'd now like to open the call to questions. Operator?

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you have a question at this time, please press star 11 on your touchtone telephone. If your question has been answered or you wish to remove yourself from the queue, you may do so by pressing star 11 again. One moment for our first question. Our first question comes from the line of Tobey Sommer of Truist Securities. Please go ahead, Tobey.

Tobey Sommer (Managing Director covering Public Companies in Business and Government Services)

Thank you. I was curious if you could speak to your medium-term financial targets laid out at Investor Day. You know, it's been I don't know if we're exactly at the midpoint between when you gave them and when they'll ultimately be rendered. But how do you feel about those, in particular the EBITDA margin figure? Thanks.

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

Hey, Tobey. It's John. So we feel good about our progress against those medium-term financial objectives that we established in our Investor Day back in 2022. Certainly, I think if you're looking at it from the perspective of our EBITDA dollars and adjusted EPS, we feel like we're pacing ahead of the projections that we talked about during that Investor Day. I think the mix has maybe been a little bit different than what we might have projected at that point in time. The growth has been much stronger. So we talked about low double-digit growth, and our growth has actually been in excess of 20% the past couple of years. And related to that growth, we've needed to continue to invest in our talent and our team to build out the resources to be able to deliver on that growth.

And I think that's put a little bit of pressure on the margin percent. So the net net has us ahead in terms of the EBITDA dollars and in terms of the adjusted EPS. But the mix has probably been a little bit different. I think going forward from where we're at, we still feel good about our ability to meet or beat those revenue objectives. And I think we feel really good about our guidance for 2024 from a margin perspective. And our focus will be on meeting or beating those margin percent objectives for 2024, which at the top end would be in the low 13% range.

If we're able to continue to execute and have a similar sort of step next year, I think that would get us comfortably into kind of that 14%+ range for the mid-teen range at that point in time. But that's kind of the outlook halfway through.

Mark Hussey (CEO and President)

Yeah. And maybe, Tobey, I'll add one comment to that just to say, you know, when you look at the drivers, say, "Okay, well, what is it that we're doing that enables us to achieve those things?" You know, we've made really good progress on utilization. We have more room to run there. The pricing work that we've been doing is probably not fully baked in yet to everything we're doing across the enterprise. Our global delivery model continues to expand and then, you know, just continuing scaling our corporate SG&A. So we've got a lot of levers still that we're pretty confident in. As John said, there's been you know, it's just the growth has created some headwinds, but we think we're going to get there. It'll probably be in that 14%+ range into 2025.

Tobey Sommer (Managing Director covering Public Companies in Business and Government Services)

Thank you. How long, sorry. Do you think your hospital customers what are you hearing from them in terms of how long they expect activity to remain at elevated levels and therefore, you know, some of them, you know, doing fine from a profitability perspective before that activity level normalizes? And maybe in the context of that answer, you could speak to what you're seeing from an assessment perspective in your PI offering.

Mark Hussey (CEO and President)

Sure. Sure, Tobey. This is Mark. I'll keep talking as long as my voice holds up. But we actually, as I noted in the script, started to see some improvement across the industry toward the latter half of 2023. There really is, I would say, a mixed story coming into 2024. So you have those systems, I think, that have actually done a pretty good job of recovering, and we're seeing them continuing to spend, but they're spending on the growth aspect of what they're trying to do. They're trying to enhance their digital platforms and, you know, things that are perhaps more prolific in nature. And we've repositioned our portfolio very well to be able to play in both the up and down aspects of that.

But having said that, there are still a number of clients, and we are quite busy on a number of assessments coming into 2024 for those clients who are still facing ongoing challenges. So by no means do we think that demand is going to run out of the cycle here. We feel that 2024 will be, you know, just continuing to evolve. And that's kind of reflective of the pipeline.

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

Right. Yeah, that's right, Mark. If we look at the pipeline and what gives us confidence in our guidance for the year and the continued growth, really is an evolving mix where we've got still plenty of projects in the pipeline that relate to clients that are going through some level of financial strain and are seeking performance improvement help.

But now we're seeing increased pipeline activity related to some of our other offerings, which, as Mark said, are more procyclical, like our strategy offerings, our non-distressed financial advisory offerings, and then critically, really, the digital offerings, which, you know, I think a lot of clients at this point are now seeking to invest funds in their technology platforms and really try to modernize those to help them operate more efficiently, to help them better get actionable insight from their data, to protect their data, to automate as many processes as possible in a high labor cost environment. So we're seeing a nice mix of projects right now that really reflect both dynamics going on in the market.

Tobey Sommer (Managing Director covering Public Companies in Business and Government Services)

Okay. Two things from me, and I'll get back to the queue. Could you speak to why to expand liquidity now? And then, John, if you could, what is the inorganic contribution to EBITDA and EPS in the initial guides?

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

Sure, Tobey. So the first question about why expanding the borrowing capacity now, it really just has to do with the significant growth we've seen in the company over the past couple of years. When we first entered into our $600 million revolving credit facility, that was really designed to support 3.7x EBITDA leverage, so based on our trailing 12-month EBITDA. And having seen our EBITDA practically double since 2021, that has significantly cut into our capacity on the $600 million revolver. So really adding the $275 million term loan, that just kind of gets us back to the capacity that we originally had on a leverage basis given the much bigger size of the company now. So from our perspective, you know, in terms of capital deployment strategy with that extra capacity, I think it's the same messaging.

I think you're going to see some mix of strategic tuck-in acquisitions as a result of our programmatic M&A process as well as continued targeted share buybacks. But we just felt like, given our increased size, that we needed some more capacity. And then as far as GG+A and the guide, you know, I commented from a revenue perspective, given it's a partial year, kind of high-teen $ million revenue, I'd expect that to flow through at the same % as our overall corporate EBITDA %, just given that there will be some transition-type expenses during the first year. And then from an EPS perspective, it's accretive, but in this first partial year, it's pretty minimal from an EPS perspective.

Tobey Sommer (Managing Director covering Public Companies in Business and Government Services)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Andrew Nicholas of William Blair & Company. Your question, please, Andrew.

Andrew Nicholas (Analyst covering Consulting, HR Technology and Information Services Companies)

Thanks and good afternoon. I wanted to double back on the margin conversation. Pretty good expansion that you expect here in 2024. I think, Mark, you highlighted a few things where there's more room to run between utilization and pricing and the delivery model. I'm just wondering if there's any way to maybe split up the 70 or 80 basis points of expansion across some of those drivers. Like, what is the primary set of drivers in 2024? And maybe related to that, how much of this is maybe expecting a pullback in headcount growth and some improved utilization as we progress through the year?

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

You know, Andrew, I don't know if I would describe it as a pullback in headcount growth. I think what you'll probably see from a headcount growth perspective is headcount growth. I think the base case this year is that headcount growth will be generally in line with revenue growth. I think in terms of the breakout of that 70 basis points of improvement, between the key things that Mark mentioned, utilization, pricing, and then SG&A leverage, that's actually more than 70 basis points of improvement that we're expecting. And then on the flip side of that, we do expect to continue to invest in our business, continuing to add talent, new areas to keep the growth going.

So I think the initiatives that we have underway actually contribute more than 70 basis points margin improvement, and then we do expect to invest some of that back in the business. So in terms of, you know, you think of those investments as 100 basis points of investment. So if you're thinking of then, okay, between 100 and 50 basis points to 200 basis points of operational efficiency improvement, I'd say that that's about split 50/50 between some of our pricing and utilization objectives as well as continued global deployment of our India team and then just some of the natural scaling of SG&A that we expect to experience this year.

Andrew Nicholas (Analyst covering Consulting, HR Technology and Information Services Companies)

Great. That's helpful. Thank you. And then you mentioned, I think briefly, some pickup in Innosight and some of the strategy pieces. Can you unpack that a little bit more? And, you know, are there particular end markets where that is strongest, and how much of that recovery are you baking in for 2024?

Mark Hussey (CEO and President)

Yeah, Andrew, it's Mark. I would say that in 2023, what we saw was, for Innosight, a little bit slower start to the year. But really, what we were very excited to see was very good strength in the healthcare market and really in conjunction with working across our team. So very, very much kind of integrated into our overall delivery. At the same time, some of the industrial areas that we've had great strength in had a little bit quieter year. But coming into 2024, we feel like they have a very strong pipeline across both sides of that business, and we're excited about just the good recovery into 2024.

Andrew Nicholas (Analyst covering Consulting, HR Technology and Information Services Companies)

Great. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Bill Sutherland of Benchmark. Please go ahead, Bill.

Bill Sutherland (Equity Research Analyst in Healthcare Services and Digital Health)

Thank you. Hey, guys. Another terrific year in the books. I was curious on the refi, John, kind of the what's the did you mention kind of how to think about interest expense with the new you know, with the change?

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

The change is really pretty minimal, Bill, because it's if you think about the funds flow on it, we added a $275 million term loan, but then we used the proceeds from that term loan to immediately pay down the revolver. So it's really about adding capacity. There'll be some minimal incremental expense related to just the fees of establishing that as well as now some more unused fees on the revolving credit facility, but that'll be pretty minimal in the scheme of things.

Bill Sutherland (Equity Research Analyst in Healthcare Services and Digital Health)

Okay. I wasn't sure. I don't think you mentioned if there's any change in rates. Okay.

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

So on the ability, there's a 50 basis point additional spread on the term that we just think is more reflective of the market right now versus when we were able to lock in the revolving credit facility. But again, that probably in the scheme of things, that will be pretty minimal. We did also, in the early Q1, do an interest rate swap that we were able to lock in some more short-term savings versus the SOFR spot rate right now that largely offsets any of that additional expense in 2024.

Bill Sutherland (Equity Research Analyst in Healthcare Services and Digital Health)

Okay. Okay. And, John, when you were talking about the drivers for the 2023 segment results, it was interesting. On education, you mentioned digital, and then but for the year, there was the other parts of the business that seemed to be important. Was digital just kind of the centerpiece of the Q4, or was that just am I reading too much into it? And I'm curious how you're thinking about the offerings in education and contributing to 2024's outlook.

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

It was, you know, the Q4. It was broad-based demand, Bill. I I would say that the leader in the clubhouse, though, was the digital offerings during the Q4, which is why we why we highlighted. But our our consulting offerings as well as our managed service offerings, which is a smaller base of revenue right now, they both also had healthy growth during the Q4. And then if you pivot towards 2024, again, I think it's going to be a a broad-based story in the education business. Clearly, from a digital perspective, we see clients investing in what many institutions right now are gated legacy technology infrastructure that that really needs to get modernized to help those universities meet their meet their missions.

But then even beyond the digital side on the consulting side, it's you probably see it quite a bit now in the headlines, a lot of the pressure that universities are under. So some of our offerings that help our university partners enroll students from a philanthropic perspective that help them with their fundraising and then help them minimize risk and efficiently manage their research function, those are all things that are very important to our education clients right now. So I think the growth we expect to see is pretty balanced across those areas.

Mark Hussey (CEO and President)

Yeah. I'll just add research as well. Research has been a very important part of our portfolio, continues to be an area that clients pay a lot of attention to because it's so important not only to their revenues but to their risk management around the research enterprise. So, you know, I think it's been a very balanced story. You may have quarters where one is a little bit ahead of another, but I would just say from a demand backdrop, it's been a very consistent demand across all of them.

Bill Sutherland (Equity Research Analyst in Healthcare Services and Digital Health)

Right. No, it certainly has. Finally, I was just curious, as you look at your headcount plans this year, are you weighting it heavily towards offshore, or is it going to be this kind of the same kind of mix?

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

I think it's going to be a similar mix to our total headcount, Bill.

Bill Sutherland (Equity Research Analyst in Healthcare Services and Digital Health)

Okay. So that's not part of the 150-200 basis points?

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

So there is continued increased utilization out of our team, the global delivery team in India is part of the margin story. But if you look at our headcount as of 12/31/2023, it's about 70% in North America and about 30% in India. When we look at our headcount modeling for the year, I don't think we expect any big shift in that percentage. It could be a little bit more weighted towards India, but it will be modest. I think it's going to be pretty balanced.

Bill Sutherland (Equity Research Analyst in Healthcare Services and Digital Health)

Okay. All right, guys. Thanks.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Once again, to ask a question, please press star 11 on your touch-tone telephone. Again, that's star 11 on your touch-tone telephone to ask a question. Our next question comes from the line of Kevin Steinke of Barrington Research Associates. Please go ahead, Kevin.

Kevin Steinke (Senior Research Analyst in Business Services)

Hi, Mark and John. So I just wanted to ask about the education segment. Certainly another strong year, solid Q4. Just, you know, we did see a sequential dip in revenue Q4 versus Q3. I guess we've kind of gotten, you know, spoiled by these, you know, continually sequential increases, although it's, you know, kind of flattened out Q3 versus Q2. But, you know, is there anything to note there in terms of, you know, timing of projects or anything that might have led to that sequential change Q4 versus Q3?

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

Hey, Kevin. It's largely just related to business days and holidays during the Q4. We see it across the entire business. There's always less effective business days in the Q4 than there are in other quarters. Within education, just based on our client schedules, sometimes that can be even a little bit more pronounced, and that's all that you're seeing. As I said in my remarks, we're expecting low-teens growth for next year. So we feel good about the growth trajectory in the education segment.

Kevin Steinke (Senior Research Analyst in Business Services)

Okay. Great. So, you know, just following up on the GG+A acquisition, maybe just a little more color on what attracted you to that business and how it fits in. And, you know, I guess it slots into the education segment. So I'm assuming it predominantly serves education institutions, but you also mentioned healthcare nonprofit, just also trying to get a sense for the business mix there.

Mark Hussey (CEO and President)

Yeah. Kevin, this is Mark. We're very excited about the GG+A acquisition and that John Glier is joining us as well and, you know, will continue to be very active in the market. You know, you noted correctly that they're positioned in education, but they actually do serve nonprofit much more broadly. And also, on a global basis, they have clients in Europe as well. And so as an example, what we believe will be the pitch here is, you know, obviously, philanthropy is a huge lever within higher education to drive their revenue. But at the same time, it really gives an opportunity for us to bring some of our digital solutions and enablement to advancement function, which has been just a great area of momentum for us from a Salesforce point of view.

We think the combination of that, their expertise around, you know, the whole advancement function will be highly accretive to us. We think it's well-positioned. Then at the same time, because of our operating model that really enables us to bring solutions across lines, we feel that as we have opportunities, whether it's in healthcare or even outside of healthcare and not-for-profit more generally, we'll have really very full ability to take advantage of the full scope and scale of that acquisition.

Kevin Steinke (Senior Research Analyst in Business Services)

Okay. Great. Thank you. Hey, John, I think when you were talking about the, you know, the progression towards the mid-teens margin target by 2025, you mentioned the mix has been maybe a little bit different than you would have expected. Is that just were you referring to a mix of digital versus consulting, or what what what what was that comment targeted at?

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

Thanks for asking, Kevin. And to clarify, I was more referring to the mix to get to the increase in adjusted EBITDA dollars and adjusted EPS that we've seen and how that's, at this point, pacing significantly ahead of our investor day targets. In the path to getting to those increased EBITDA dollar amounts and increased EPS amounts, the mix has been a little bit more towards higher growth than what we had initially projected with a little bit of pressure on the margin percent just as we've been investing in our team to deliver that growth. So I was speaking about the two levers of revenue growth versus margin percent in getting to the nice results we've had from an increased EBITDA dollars and adjusted EPS.

Kevin Steinke (Senior Research Analyst in Business Services)

Okay. Understood. Thanks. And then lastly, you mentioned continued ramp or, you know, greater utilization of your staff in India is one of the margin drivers going forward. Can you just update us on utilization there and, you know, plans to build out the team there, et cetera?

Mark Hussey (CEO and President)

So so Kevin, I think John and I will tag team on this one. So let me just tell you, I think from an expansion standpoint, we're really happy with how that team has been built out. And the way we view this is not an offshore capability. We really run the business truly on a global integrated basis by each service line. So our team in India and our team in the U.S., we consider part of one unified team, and their goal is to optimize their performance in the market together. So over time, we've continued to expand that to other areas of service line. We've added small team, as an example, in our business advisory practice doing some consulting support around financial advisory engagements. It's had great success and impact.

But more broadly, in terms of just the utilization numbers themselves, let me just ask John to just give you an update.

John Kelly (EVP, CFO and Treasurer)

Yeah. Kevin, that's been a really great story for us as the year has progressed. So as you may recall, at the end of 2022, we had made some targeted investments in our team in India to really build out our capacity there and anticipation of growth. And, you know, part of that investment was we experienced some lower utilization in the back half of last year and into really the Q1 of this year. We've seen that utilization steadily increase over the course of the year.

By the time we got to the Q4, it's very much in line with our overall utilization, which I would note for the Q4 was in the 78%-79% range overall as a company, which is really one of the strongest utilization metrics we posted that I can remember and definitely gives us encouragement about the margins heading into next year as we expect to continue to operate at roughly that level heading into 2024.

Kevin Steinke (Senior Research Analyst in Business Services)

All right. Thanks for the insight and thanks for taking the questions.

Operator (participant)

Seeing no more questions in the queue, I'd like to turn the call back to Mr. Hussey.

Mark Hussey (CEO and President)

Thank you very very much for joining us this afternoon. We look forward to speaking with you again in April when we announce our Q1 results. Have a good evening.

Operator (participant)

That concludes today's conference call. Thank you, everyone, for your participation.