Sequans Communications - Q1 2023

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Ladies and gentlemen, good morning, welcome to the Sequans Communications Q1 FY 23 earnings conference call. All participants will be in the listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by 0. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star then 1 on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star then 2. Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Ms. Kim Rogers, Investor Relations for Sequans. Please go ahead.

Kim Rogers (Investor Relations)

Thank you, Ryan, and thank you to everyone participating in today's call. Joining me on the call today from Sequans Communications are Georges Karam, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, and Deborah Choate, Chief Financial Officer. Before turning the call over to Georges, I'd like to remind our participants of the following important information on behalf of Sequans. Sequans issued the earnings press release this morning, which was posted to the company's website at www.sequans.com under the Newsroom section. Before we start, I would like to remind everyone that this conference call contains projections and other forward-looking statements regarding future events or our future financial performance and potential financing sources.

All statements other than present and historical facts and conditions contained in this call, including any statements regarding our future results of operations and financial positions, business strategy, plans, including the ability to enter into new 5G strategic agreements, the exploration of strategic options, expectations for massive IoT sales, our ability to convert our pipeline to revenue, and our objectives for future operations are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 as amended. These statements are only predictions and reflect our current belief and expectations with respect to future events and are based on assumptions and subject to risk and uncertainties and subject to change at any time. We operate in a very competitive and rapidly changing environment.

New risks emerge from time to time. Given these risks and uncertainties, you should not rely on or place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements. Actual events or results may differ materially from those contained in the projections or forward-looking statements. More information on factors that could affect our business and financial results are included in our public filings made with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Now I'd like to hand the call over to Georges Karam. Please go ahead, Georges.

Georges Karam (Chairman and CEO)

Thank you, Kim. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for joining our Q1 2023 financial results conference call, and welcome. Our Q1 revenue was $11.9 million, in line with our guidance with a record gross margin of 78.5%, reflecting the contribution from high-margin licensing revenue. Product revenue this quarter reflects the factors we discussed on our Q4 earnings call. One, the impact of a large customer's inventory rationalization. Two, delayed LTE-M project launches. Before I dive into discussing the business details, I would like to update you on a few important strategic developments. Following the quarter's end, we strengthened our balance sheet with a $20 million private placement with several existing shareholders.

Note that despite the challenging market environment, we were able to close this deal very rapidly and reinforce the company's position in our ongoing strategic discussions. The strategic committee appointed by the board is actively evaluating the various options, and we expect to share more on this subject on our Q2 earnings call. We are making strides towards sampling our 5G Taurus chipset later this year and are actively engaging with customers eager to get a 5G NR platform optimized by design for broadband IoT applications. Our progress on Taurus is highly beneficial in our ongoing discussions regarding 5G IP licensing, and we are optimistic that we will be able to reach a new licensing agreement before the end of the year. Our newest 5G strategic partnership, which began last year, continues to evolve and deepen, which is very encouraging.

I am delighted by how closely our teams are collaborating. We are confident in our ability to deliver outstanding results, and I'm excited about the future potential of this partnership, including the possible expansion of our relationship. Before delving into the dynamics of each IoT category in the Q1, let's look at our pipeline. I provided a detailed overview of this topic last quarter, and now I'd like to give an update on our pipeline composition. As you may recall, we measure the revenue potential of our pipeline on a 3-year life revenue basis. But many of the projects could remain in the market for over 5 years, and in some cases, up to 10 years. The largest portion of the revenue pipeline build is with leaders in IoT, addressing various market segments such as smart metering, smart home, tracking devices, and medical.

I'm excited to share that in the Q1, our total pipeline increased to over $750 million of three-year life revenue, mainly driven by the contribution of the recently launched Calliope 2 and the initial interest in the 5G Taurus platform, which will begin sampling later this year. Almost half of our pipeline represents business that has been awarded as design wins, and the other half is advanced design in that we are working on to secure through the remainder of the year. While some of these design win projects have reached mass production, most of these projects are still under development and are expected to reach the production phase in the second half of 2023, and for some in 2024. Over 85% of the design wins are for massive IoT, mainly Monarch 2 and Calliope 2 projects.

80 new design wins have been secured this quarter, mainly in smart city, smart home, and tracking applications. Also, we are very close to sealing a large deal with a module partner. Market traction for Calliope 2, as shown by the number of designs secured or close to be secured in the last six months, is particularly exciting. LTE-M Monarch 2 is still the largest contributor to the massive IoT design wins, but Cat 1 is catching up thanks to the large deal sizes and Calliope 2's higher ASP. We expect this trend to continue. Advanced design in projects reflect opportunities where we have a high level of engagement with customers with a greater than 50% probability of converting to a design win.

Since the launch of Calliope 2, this platform has also had a significant impact on growing the advanced design in portion of the pipeline, where the size of Cat 1 opportunities is now approaching those for LTE-M. In addition to Cat 1 Calliope 2 growth and continuous success with Cat-M Monarch 2, I'm excited about the number of new Taurus 5G project engagements that are beginning to feed into the design-in portion of our revenue pipeline. The 5G Taurus platform will ultimately be the biggest contributor to our future pipeline, and I anticipate seeing a significant increase in the pipeline around the time we start sampling Taurus to market. To illustrate our near-term growth potential, and as I mentioned last quarter, we see a path to $100 million in annualized product revenue starting in 2025 from only the current design win portion of the pipeline.

At this time, we estimate that over 20% of this annualized revenue target is already secured by projects in mass production and in ship-at mode now. Just by adding the design win projects forecasted to launch during the remainder of the year, we should start 2024 with around 70% of this revenue target secured. The balance of the $100 million run rate will be achieved with the design wins projects launching in 2024. As a reminder, this run rate figure is only for product and does not include licensing or NRE services. Let's look at the revenue dynamics of our massive IoT and the broadband IoT categories this quarter and see how we can continue to grow.

Sequans has several developments in progress that position us for a rebound in the second half of 2023 and to continue the revenue acceleration in 2024, as I just outlined. This lays the groundwork for a robust year-over-year growth recovery as delayed Monarch 2 projects move into production and our design wins with Calliope 2 start to ramp. Let me walk you through some details. First, on our massive IoT segment. As predicted, the sequential decline in our massive IoT segment this quarter was due to lower Cat 1 revenue related to our customer's inventory rationalization that carried over from 2022. This customer is expected to resume ordering in the second half of 2023. Cat M and NB revenue grew sequentially, although it was impacted as guided by the delay of project launches last year.

What's crucial at this point is to assess the progress made on these customer projects and ensure that we are on schedule to meet our production and shipment targets. I'm pleased to report that 3 customers are confirmed to resume production in 2023. One customer has received certification on their tracking device and is now ready to move to production in Q3. Another large tracker project for Buy Here Pay Here automotive business, which was delayed by the China shutdown last year, has now obtained product certification and approval. Shipping will resume in Q3 as the customer consumes the carried over inventory from 2022. Finally, a significant medical industry customer, whose production was disrupted by internal challenges last year, intends to resume operations in Q4. Also, we are on track for the other forecasted product launches in the remainder of 2023.

The most important ones are for smart metering application, where 4 new projects are planned to launch in the second half of the year. This is a fast-growing IoT segment where we have strengthened our position with numerous design wins and with more expected to be secured this year. Keep in mind that these are multi-year projects, and when launched, they will generate steady revenue for more than 5 years. We are making great progress on our first Calliope 2 design win projects, and we expect the first Calliope 2 shipments to start in Q4. In 2024, we expect more Monarch 2 projects to move into production, leading to a surge in Cat M momentum. The launch of Calliope 2 projects into mass production will provide us with an extra boost in 2024 and 2025. On to the broadband segment.

5G licensing revenue made broadband our strongest category in the Q1. However, we expect lower licensing revenue in Q2 simply due to the revenue recognition structure of our largest licensing deals. On the broadband IoT product front, we have several interesting Cat 4, Cat 6 engagements. This quarter, we announced a partnership with Anterix to introduce an LTE Cat 4 multiband comms module using our Cassiopeia platform and addressing the private LTE networks for utility companies. We already have several customers engaging in design with this module. Also, we announced a design win with SkyFive for an air-to-ground terminal, which is being used by Flightcell in Australia. In addition, new Cassiopeia opportunities for video surveillance applications requiring Cat 4 speed are in the work.

The future of our broadband category and the biggest potential kicker to longer term growth is our Taurus 5G platform, as this will expand our addressable market by an extra $2 billion in 2025. We expect to begin testing our Taurus chipset platform by the end of Q3 and start engaging alpha customers later this year. With our Taurus 5G IoT solution optimized for cost and performance, we can address a wide range of broadband IoT applications, including fixed wireless, mobile computing, private networks, and high-end IoT industrial applications. It has not yet been formally launched, Taurus has generated significant interest from many tier one customers. I'm excited about the number of Taurus engagements we already have feeding into our revenue pipeline since the Mobile World Congress show in February.

We have a strong conviction that Taurus will be the key driver of substantial growth for Sequans commencing from 2025. Let me provide an update on our channel partners. Our partnership with Renesas continues to deepen, and we remain highly engaged. Renesas has consistently added to the design win and design-in revenue pipeline, and we are fortunate to have them as a second source to solidify our supply capability. They have recently announced the expansion of their activities in India, a new market for us, with a focus on NB-IoT technology, leveraging our Monarch 2 technology. Our other MCU partnerships continue to be valuable to Sequans as well, as most of the IoT projects require the use of an MCU in addition to our 4G, 5G cellular connectivity solution. Finally, we continue developing our partnership with module vendors, increasing our go-to-market strength. We are working on two new deals.

As I mentioned previously, one of them is very advanced and should close soon. This would allow us to secure a new channel for our massive IoT products capable of generating orders of several millions of units per year starting in 2024. In summary, I couldn't be more excited about the future of Sequans given our expanding pipeline, positive developments on existing design win projects, progress on 5G licensing deals, and other important and in some cases transformational strategic opportunities being executed. Sequans is well positioned to increase its market share with the plans to return to revenue growth in the second half of 2023 and ultimately achieve profitability. We extend our gratitude to our shareholders for their commitment to Sequans, I would like to thank our global team for their hard work and dedication. I will now turn the call over to them.

Deborah Choate (CFO)

Thank you, George. Good morning, everyone. As we expected and roughly in line with our guidance, revenue for the Q1 of 2023 was $11.9 million. This compares to $13.9 million in Q1 2022, a decrease of 14.3% year-over-year, and to $15.9 million in Q4 2022. As George has stated, our Q1 revenue reflects the impact of inventory rationalization with a key customer, delayed product launches, and seasonally lower activity in the Q1. Revenue from massive IoT in Q1 2023 accounted for approximately 28% of our total revenue, with Cat 1 driving the sequential decline caused by the inventory issues previously explained.

Revenue from broadband IoT accounted for 72% of our total revenue, as license and services revenue generated by our 5G licensing deals increased year-over-year but declined sequentially as expected due to the structure of the most recent 5G strategic agreement. For the quarter, we had two customers that each represented 10% or more of our revenue, and one of these is our 5G strategic partner. Gross margin in Q1 2023 was an historic high of 78.5%, up from 68.1% in Q1 2022 and up from 75.3% in the prior quarter. The improvement was primarily driven by the higher proportion of licensing revenue in the revenue mix.

IFRS operating expenses were $13.3 million, up a modest 2.9% from $13 million in Q4 2022 due to an increase in R&D expense of $127,000 and an increase of $472,000 in sales and marketing expense. This was partially offset by a $222,000 decrease in general and administrative expense. Year-over-year IFRS operating expenses increased by $1.9 million compared to $11.4 million in Q1 2022. Non-IFRS operating expenses which excludes stock-based compensation expense were $11.6 million in Q1 2023, up slightly compared with $11.2 million in Q4 2022.

Our Q1 2023 operating loss was $4 million compared to an operating loss of $1 million in the Q4 of 2022 and a $2 million operating loss in the Q1 of last year. Net loss in Q1 2023 was $5 million or $0.10 per diluted ADS, and it includes a non-cash benefit of $2.3 million from the revaluation of the embedded derivatives related to our convertible debt, offset by $2.5 million of interest expense.

This compares to a net loss of also $5 million and $0.10 per diluted ADS in Q4 of 2022, which included a non-cash benefit of $1 million from the revaluation of the embedded derivatives. Compares to net income in the Q1 of last year of $2 million or $0.04 per diluted ADS, but that included a net non-cash benefit totaling $6.4 million from the revaluation of the embedded derivatives. In Q1, we had a loss on foreign exchange of $165,000, primarily related to the revaluation of euro-denominated net liabilities on the balance sheet. This compares to foreign exchange losses of $1.5 million in Q4 and a foreign exchange gain of $370,000 in Q1 2022.

On a non-IFRS basis, our net loss was $4.2 million or $0.09 per diluted ADS for the Q1 of 2023. This compares to non-IFRS net losses of $2.8 million or $0.06 per diluted ADS in the Q4 and $1.8 million or $0.04 per diluted ADS in the Q1 of last year. Investors should be aware that the company's results are subject to certain market risks, as a result, our net profit and loss may fluctuate from quarter to quarter. Specifically, the financial income/expense category on the income statement, which is below our operating results, includes foreign exchange gains or losses and the marking to market of the embedded derivatives related to the convertible debt, which can cause significant differences in net income or loss from quarter to quarter.

These fluctuations may be more extreme during periods of increased market volatility in foreign exchange rates or in the company's share price. While swings in the value of the embedded derivative are excluded from our non-IFRS presentation, foreign exchange gains/losses, whether realized or unrealized, are not. Please remember that our IFRS net loss includes significant non-cash interest expense related to our convertible debt, much of which is excluded in the non-IFRS presentation. Turning to the balance sheet, cash and short-term deposits totaled $5.3 million at the end of Q1 2023, compared to $10.7 million at the end of 2022. The Q1 2023 closing amount reflects the cash used in the quarter, primarily for capital expenditures related to our internal development expenses, as well as debt service costs.

The March 31st, 2023 cash balance does not reflect the $20 million proceeds from the private placement, which was funded on April 11th, 2023. Cash provided by operations for the Q1 of 2023 was $3.5 million, compared with cash used by operations of $2.7 million in the Q1 of 2022. Presently, we are exploring alternative non-dilutive funding avenues in the form of market rate loans from the European government and research project financing from the French government, which would be a combination of grants and zero interest loans. Sequans meets the eligibility requirements for both. We are currently initiating the European loan process, and a proposal for the French financing has been submitted. It's possible for us to secure funds from both sources, which could provide up to $50 million or more in total.

Regarding the outlook for Q2, as a result of our primary 5G IP agreement structure, licensing revenue is expected to normalize to a lower quarterly level beginning in Q2. As product shipments are not expected to accelerate before Q3, we expect revenue to be in the range of $9 million-$11 million, with gross margin expected to be around 65% for the quarter ending June 30, 2023. We expect non-IFRS operating expenses in 2023 to average about $12 million per quarter, assuming a stable euro-dollar exchange rate. We expect total interest expense in Q2 on an IFRS basis to be approximately $2.8 million. This comprises the contractual interest expense component of about $1.1 million and the IFRS adjustment of about $1.7 million that we deduct to come to our non-IFRS net result.

Most of our interest expense is PIK interest related to our convertible debt and is not paid in cash. We are not providing guidance on any impact of revaluing the embedded derivatives nor possible foreign exchange gains or losses, given that this is largely determined by market conditions. Finally, for modeling purposes, the number of ADSs outstanding today is $58.3 million, reflecting the private placement in April. At the conclusion of this call, we will post a written version of our formal remarks in the investor relations section of our website on the Webcasts and Presentations page, the same location where you will find the audio replay. Now I'll turn the call back to George.

Georges Karam (Chairman and CEO)

Thank you, Debra. operator, we are now ready to open the call for Q&A, please.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press star then 1 on your telephone keypad. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. To withdraw your question, please press star then 2. At this time, we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster. Our first question comes from Scott Searle from Roth MKM. Please go ahead.

Scott Searle (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

Hey, good morning. Thanks for taking my questions. Hey, quick clarification and a couple of questions. On the cash front, Debra, just wanted to know whether or not I think there was a $7 million scheduled payment that was supposed to come in from the China relationship. Did that happen in the Q1? I believe there was another one scheduled in the Q2. Is that remaining on track? Wanted to clarify the comments around European and/or French loan. Did you say $15 million, 15, or 50? George, on the 5G front, it seems like the timeline in terms of product development sampling is on track for later this year. It sounds like the discussions in terms of the near-term strategic may have slipped a little bit.

I was wondering if you could clarify that, any sort of issues around it. I think you'd also talked about 3 customers or potential strategic partners that were lower in the funnel. Is that still the number we're talking about, or has the number of relationships there expanded?

Deborah Choate (CFO)

Hi, Scott. Just with respect to your questions, the payments that were scheduled to come in in the Q1 did in fact come in, and we are on track for the scheduled payments at the end of Q2 as well. In terms of the finance, the European and French financing options that we're pursuing, if everything came in at the high end, it would be in excess of $50 funding, which would probably come in over a couple of years.

Scott Searle (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

Couple years. Okay. Thank you.

Georges Karam (Chairman and CEO)

Yeah. Scott, just on the other question, indeed, you know, the 5G execution is on track. You know, as I mentioned, we started engaged customer around MWC. We didn't announce yet the product publicly, but it's, you know, you will hear about it in the course of the year. Obviously under NDA, we engaged with many customers. Traction is really great, and we obviously from the beginning of the year until now, at the beginning of the year in our pipeline, we had only some strategic customer, as you know, that they are engaged with us and obviously, their number in the pipeline was integrated.

Since end of Q1, we had, you know, more than half a dozen of very, very serious customer with whom we have very advanced discussion and opportunity, and those now they start to be part of the pipeline, and we start adding more new deals in the pipeline. Obviously, they are not in the design win portion, but yet, those are new deals that we are talking about, as all those customers are waiting for the product to sample and we conclude the deal. The traction is tremendous. People, they love this product.

The way we're positioning in terms of performance and cost, and obviously when you factor in the competitive landscape, it position us in a very good shape to win, hopefully a couple of new deals towards the end of the year and continue next year. Regarding the strategy, obviously this development is on the, you know, the progress we are making on the chip is very positive for our strategic discussion that we continue to have. I tend to say I don't want to say it's slipped because you mentioned this is we're still confident about closing this year. You know, we have a lot of strategic discussion ongoing in the company globally. You could imagine that some of them are connected and related.

That's why I didn't want to give closer timeline, but we still positive about closing something this year. It's taking a little bit, some more time, but I don't call it slipping. It's more developing and taking more of a complex relationship.

Scott Searle (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

Got it. Gotcha. Lastly, if I could, George, the product ramp, I think in the release, you talked about a clear step-up in revenue in the second half, and you referenced that again, growth in the second half of this year. I was wondering if you could clarify that a little bit more. It sounds like you've got some large module opportunities out there that don't actually contribute to the revenue. These are existing design wins. I wonder if you could provide a little bit more clarity when you talk about that step up in the second half of this year. It sounds like you're talking about growth on a year-over-year basis in the second half of this year. Is that in each quarter, or is that collectively for the second half of this year? That would be very helpful. Thanks.

Georges Karam (Chairman and CEO)

It's all obviously, Scott Searle, I'm talking about the product because when we compare year-to-year, we need to factor in, exclude the licensing because you have some variation. Last year in the second half, we did a big number with the strategic deals. You need to normalize this to have the fair comparison if you want on the product. Definitely on this phase, we expect growth in the second half versus, you know, year-over-year. I don't want to say it's quarter every quarter, but in general, the two quarters should be coming up. This is coming from two things, this is what I wanted to insist on the call. Obviously the pipeline is developing, it's developing by having a new opportunity that's coming in, they call them not yet won.

As more and more opportunity engaged, specifically as I mentioned, Calliope 2 and Taurus, we have more opportunities secured than designed and won. In other words, we can take it to market and generate product. The other really focus that really will drive revenue this year and beginning of next year is the design wins that we have in hand since last year, and we are waiting to see those product turning to mass production with the customer. I mentioned that in Q1, just only in Q1, 3 product, they were forecasted to become secured the product. They are now in the green, and they are not really contributing to revenue immediately because most of them is not the 3, have some initial shipment that we did last year and we were stuck.

This is now consumed because the product is qualified and moved to shipment, and we expect those product to generate revenue in the second half. All what we have planned for the second half, to turn to launch, it's on track. I could not guarantee 100% is going to happen on time, but from the execution we have done at the beginning of this year, all of them are on track. Specifically, we have 4 metering project, nice projects. They are developing well, and as we are speaking, still planned to enter into production in the second half. Obviously factoring all this in. We have as well the initial shipment of Calliope 2. We have a major design win that we should ship in Q4, the first shipment.

If you bring all this together, definitely the product revenue should come back, to growth, and this should help the second half of the year. Definitely we'll be in very great position for a full year in 2024.

Scott Searle (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)

Great. Thanks so much. I'll get back in the queue.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Craig Ellis from B. Riley Securities. Please go ahead.

Craig Ellis (Director of Research and Senior Semiconductor and Capital Equipment Analyst)

Yeah, thanks for taking the question and for all the color. Deborah, I wanted to follow up on Scott's question regarding the potential European and French government grants. Can you just talk a little bit more about when you would expect to know if those are successful, and what the qualification or other conditions are for grant receipt in each case?

Deborah Choate (CFO)

So in both cases, they are basically funding what are considered to be strategic projects. And in particular, the European financing is related to the European equivalent of the CHIPS Act that's provided additional pool of resources. The European process, it's a longer one. I don't think we'll know for sure before Probably the end of Q3 or even early Q4. But it could be a very large amount and it's based on, you know, kind of the future projects that we're planning to do. The French project has already been submitted. It's in the process of being evaluated.

This is more of a typical kind of project that we've done many times, where it's a portion is grant, a portion is 0 interest loan. The only difference is it's a bigger amount than we've gone after in the past. I'd say both the items are in process and progressing, they're big amounts, we're dealing with government, it will take a few months to finalize.

Craig Ellis (Director of Research and Senior Semiconductor and Capital Equipment Analyst)

Got it. That's really helpful. Then, Georges, on Taurus. Great to hear the broad customer interest. As we look out at the landscape and one of the big themes coming off of Mobile World Congress was all the enthusiasm around fixed wireless access, and we're seeing that show up in a lot of carrier subscription ramp trajectories. The question is this, given that we're into sampling, exiting 3Q and 4Q, is it possible to see revenues materialize in calendar 2024, or is the real material ramp really starting in calendar 2025? Any color on the timing of revenues conversion and the breadth of customers that might initially start to hit would be helpful. Thank you.

Georges Karam (Chairman and CEO)

Hi, Craig. I mean, you know, the real revenue is really for late 2024 because in terms of product revenue. Obviously, we could have, you know, some, what you call it, licensing, not really to license of use. You know, when people get access to technology like this, they pay some lump sum to get access to the technology and get the support that could be factored in in Q4. We could have some money like this in Q4 this year. Really the product revenue is more towards second half 2024, late 2024 and much more 2025.

Craig Ellis (Director of Research and Senior Semiconductor and Capital Equipment Analyst)

Got it. That's helpful. Then Debra, I'll come back with one to you and then hop back in the queue. We've had just stunning gross margins over the last couple quarters, and they're still really high in the Q1. I know mix is gonna take margins back towards the sixties, but can you provide some color on the expected mix between chips and modules in the second half? While not providing guidance, just give us some help, maybe qualitatively on where you'd expect gross margins to be as we exit 2023 and head into 2024. Thank you.

Deborah Choate (CFO)

Yeah. With the product ramp, I think we're still expecting that to be more weighted toward modules. As we have, we're expecting, you know, license revenues to be lower in the mix. I think we should expect to end the year going back to more normalized gross margin that's, you know, somewhere in the 45%-50% range.

Craig Ellis (Director of Research and Senior Semiconductor and Capital Equipment Analyst)

Got it. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Rajvindra Gill from Needham and Company. Please go ahead.

Rajvindra Gill (Senior Research Analyst)

Yes, thanks for taking my questions. Just on the $350 million design pipeline that you've been speaking about. In the past, you know, you talked about it as it's based on kind of orders. I think you had described that, you know, the orders in terms of the timing, normally it's for shipments three to four months out, and then you kind of adjust the backlog number based on kind of your judgment of that. I wanted to get a sense of that design pipeline now as we sit into going into the, you know, middle of the part of the year. You know, how do you kind of assess this pipeline?

you know, some of these designs come with supply agreements, but they're not guaranteed shipments. Just curious to sort how you're kind of characterizing that design pipeline now?

Georges Karam (Chairman and CEO)

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you know, some of those... I mean, first of all, you know, any design win, what we qualify design win, let's say it in the first phase. Obviously, at some time the guy is buying from us and he has product in the field. Before reaching this mass production, the design win is qualified by us when we are obviously awarded officially by the customer that he kick off a project. We're invited for the kickoff. We launched the kickoff with the customer, and we see first hardware from him, where our product is on it. In other words, it is...

Otherwise, we keep it as advanced design in the company until really we are reaching 100% assurance that the customer has allocated resources and people on his side, and he has product under development that we can see and touch, and obviously we need to support him on this product to get there. Now, obviously, this means all what we get the guarantee is the customer is working with us to bring product to the market. We to generate revenue after this, the customer needs to execute on this phase. Obviously once he has his product certified and shipping, he start buying from us. Now, some of those deals, they come just on the basis of, you know, they buy prototype and there is no supply agreement.

Some they enter in the same time with a big supplier agreement where they guarantee really the, you know, the relationship, over many years. It comes with more complicated term, if you want more sophisticated term for the relationship. Both of them, you know, it's not like binding order. The only binding order you get when you receive real order to ship product, and this becomes binding in a sense that they cannot. We have in the backlog order and we need to ship to it. When I'm talking about my pipeline, obviously some of those customer we could have backlog for them when they are in mass production, but I'm not counting committed order in a sense like it's really binding.

It's, you know, 99% sure that the project is real and it's happening. There is maybe risk in the quantity because we have an estimate based on the discussion with the customer, how much you will buy in the first year, the second year and third year of production. There is obviously a risk in the timing because we could say, "Okay, he's ready end of the year," and then finally he shifts by one quarter or he's ahead of time one quarter, and we have more or less some, you know, risk relative to the revenue ramp, or advance revenue ramp, depending what's happening there.

Rajvindra Gill (Senior Research Analyst)

Just for my follow-up and just along the lines of the pipeline discussion we were talking about, I know you don't guide beyond one quarter, but when we're kinda looking at calendar 2024 and kinda reconciling that with the pipeline, you know, you've talked about in the past that, you know, of a kind of about a $700 million total pipe and 80% of that is related to massive IoT or about $600 million. Then you talked about half of that or $300 million is based on design wins. I guess my question, what percentage of those design wins are now entered into production?

How many of those designs will go into production in 2024 so we can get some sense of what the actual revenue ramp would be in trying to reconcile that with the kind of the design momentum that you're talking about? Any color there would be appreciated. Thank you.

Georges Karam (Chairman and CEO)

That's a very, very good, you know, this is a very good question, Reggie. I mean, I appreciate it. Let me, let me, you know. Exactly what you said is right? I mean, so we have a pipeline, half of it is design win and big percentage of this is related to massive IoT. Now once. This is where you go down, you know, to somewhere in the $300 million, I would say, of massive IoT, a little bit less of massive IoT design win. This is over three years, right? The question is, if you look, year one, year two, year three for every project and you look to the maximum ramp of those projects, you realize, and that's what we said, we exceed $100 million only considering this portion, annual revenue.

In other words, if I look to those projects and I look to the peak of those projects, in one year between those three years, we are well above $100 million. I'm staying cautious by saying, we are around beginning of 2025, we will be there achieving this, close to this. Really we exceed $100 million when we look to this. Okay, this is we know where we can go with this ramp on a yearly basis. The question which is you're raising, where we are today? If I look to this amount of dollar, you know, like 20% of this amount is already with the project that they have passed the certification and the qualification. They are really now in shipment mode.

It doesn't mean they are buying maybe today, because they could be maybe they have inventory in Q2 and they will buy in Q3, but they are not project where there is any risk on execution. It's just only project where the customer will be buying from us and will be around 20%. If I look to the remaining projects, which in other words, the 80% remaining are happening between the remainder of 2023 and let's say 2024, let's say first half of 2024. If we focus on 2023, we believe we exit 2023 with more than 70% in total, like 20% plus 60% extra. Sorry, plus 50% extra that will be in a mass production mode.

In other words, if all those products planned customers on execution to be ready between Q2, Q3, Q4, they come on time, we'll finish the year where we have 70% of those design win already in mass production and all that's missing is having those guys buying simply because they need the product. There is no more execution risk, nothing there. As I said, you know, this is really we can go customer by customer and list them project by project to come this number. In other words, we should exit the year with the $70 million annualized revenue secured, if you want. It does mean we'll do $70 million in 2024. I'm not giving guidance on this. If you take those projects and you take them to their peak revenue, they do $70 million, only those projects.

This will continue the beginning of next year to reach the remaining 30% will come in 2024, to exit 2024 with 100% of those projects in mass production. Once you say this means this $100 million, we there is no more risk if you want on any execution related to the customer. The only or timeline, the only risk after this could be a, you know, an underestimation or overestimation of the potential of the project. The risk on this is very minimum, at least to the downside. We know, often those customer are big customers. They have existing business. We know how much they are shipping per year. Obviously, they promise us some number.

We make our, you know, own estimation by factoring in maybe some risk there, and we come with the number I'm mentioning to you with the $100 million number.

Rajvindra Gill (Senior Research Analyst)

Thank you. Appreciate the details.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Tristan Gerra from Baird. Please go ahead.

Tristan Gerra (Senior Research Analyst)

Hi, guys. My first question is really macro-related. I think there's been clearly admissions in the industry that the adoption rate of IoT node generally has been well behind what the expectations were 5 years ago, and some of that has been the ecosystem versus the type of forecast that Ericsson had 4 or 5 years ago. Now we're seeing obviously a slowdown at the macro. There's been some pushout. There might be a recession. How should we look beyond just your design win and the company-specific traction at your business medium term, particularly if there is a recession? You know, what's the risk that there could be more project delays? Also, is there any particular inflection point that you would expect?

You know, you've talked about, you know, some design wins, including in smart metering. Those, those are the traditional applications for IoT. Is there something that you think could really create kind of an inflection point in your demand and, you know, when could that be?

Georges Karam (Chairman and CEO)

Oh. Hi, Tristan. I mean, you're absolutely right, you know, on the, I would say, let's say, the projection the industry has for IoT node. By the way, combining everything, what they call IoT and counting every device to be connected. I, you know, the idea is still correct, right? I mean, if you managing all your assets, connect all your assets, this is what's about IoT. Makes sense. If you count all those objects, you come to billions of units and big numbers that they didn't materialize in the meantime. First, I still believe that this is going to happen sooner or later because I don't believe the demand is wrong there. It's really related to services and a movement in this industry which is not stopping.

It just only it's more complex to reach, you know, this level of penetration as predicted by Ericsson, I would say five years back. However, on all what I'm talking about, and this is what you mentioned, we're not really. This is what happened to the company, if you want. In the early launch of our massive IoT product, we're engaging many, many customers, which I could say coming out of the blue. Not necessarily small customers. Sometimes they are big customers, but they didn't have experience in cellular or they didn't have experience at all in connectivity IoT. Just only they thought that they can launch projects, obviously, and extend their business, leveraging this IoT. Many of those projects failed or they get delayed and so on. This, by the way, impacted all the industry, including us.

In the last couple of years, the focus and of Sequans, by the way, was really on what we call them traditional businesses. Where we are today is really smart metering. There is no doubt that this is happening big. First of all, it was there, nothing new you could say because smart meter is not something that has been invented yesterday. The arrival of low-power technology expanded the market because now you have water and gas and the low cost of cellular enabling to have more penetration of cellular versus regular mesh technology. That's why we have a lot of projects in metering engaged. We have nine customers Sequans has today in the metering with maybe more than 20 projects with those nine customers.

In the pipeline I have, as I'm speaking, I have at least five I'm hoping I will close now, if you want. I'm watching every day. I'm talking with those customers. So there is really huge demand in this business, in this market, and it's really happening. You can doubt about the, you know, the speed of those guys they execute because qualifying a meter takes time. We could be wrong. We could say this quarter, that quarter. This is what happened to us last year with COVID. There is no doubt that this is happening. If you go to the smart home, similar situation. All those devices exist, and we are coming with our Calliope 2 product, which is an aggressive product to the market, kind of unique.

Customer as well in this space, they do want to avoid the Chinese technology somehow and giving us better position to win with Calliope 2, and we have big names there. When you go to fleet management, when you go to Buy Here Pay Here service, all those services are existing services years. Nothing new there except the development of the technology of cellular, making cellular cheap and low power and expanding a number of points. It's not like the application which has changed. We rely our business on all this. Now, obviously, you can tell me there could be a recession in the market and some macro condition impacting some of those companies, and for whatever reason, they delay their project or their new platform.

We suffered from this during the COVID days, last year. As we are speaking, honestly, all those projects, they are industrial customer. They are not sensitive to consumer, and they have no other choice other than moving forward for their business. It could be sometimes impacted slower than, you know, faster. We're not seeing major impact in the development. As a matter of fact, all what we have planned on the progress in Q1 happened on time. I didn't see any bad news in Q1 at least.

Tristan Gerra (Senior Research Analyst)

Great. Well, thanks for the color on that. As my second question, and as you prep up the ramp of 5G, if you could talk about first the type of ASP uptake relative to units that we could expect in the medium term. The mix between licensing and actual product revenue and also the potential that you get some of the key customers that you had with, you know, with 4G in the past with 5G.

Georges Karam (Chairman and CEO)

Yeah. I mean, obviously 5G, I mean, what's exciting in the 5G, first of all, the application of fixed wireless, mobile computing, all this is happening and there is real demand and networks are developing. The first phase went well. If you look to the number and so on, and you start talking with the customers, with the carrier, all of them, they see the cost of the 5G is too high to really make this really mainstream if you want. There is no doubt that over time, between now and 10 years, you are going to see less 4G, even sometimes switching 4G network and everything becomes 5G.

That's why we are serving with this Taurus platform, which is really coming at optimized cost, dividing by a factor of 2 the current cost structure that you can see it in the 5G. That's why we have a lot of excitement from many customers. For us, the impact on our business model is really major because when you are talking about chipset level, let's not talk about the module. Chipset level, between Cat 1 and Cat-M, you are talking single digit, you know, $3, $4, $5. This is the ASP that you will be talking about. When you are moving to Taurus 5G, you are without giving a price, open price now because the product is not launched, but obviously, a few tens of dollars if you want.

By definition you have a factor of 10 between what you can do on Cat M and on Taurus. Selling 1 million unit on Cat M, you know, you could do chips at $3 million-$4 million. On Taurus, you could do $30 million-$50 million. Obviously the difference is big for us and that's why, you know, as soon as we are going to start getting real customer there, our pipeline is going to explode with those numbers.

Tristan Gerra (Senior Research Analyst)

Great. Thanks for the color. Very useful.

Georges Karam (Chairman and CEO)

Thanks, Tristan.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back to Dr. Georges Karam for any closing remarks.

Georges Karam (Chairman and CEO)

Thank you, operator. Thank you again. Thank you again for joining the call today all of you. We look forward to catching up with you during our Q2 2023 earnings call in August. Please note that we are participating in the B. Riley Institutional Investor Conference on Wednesday, May 24th in L.A. As well as the ROTH MKM London conference on Thursday, June 22nd, obviously in London. We hope to connect with you at one of these events. Thank you very much for all your time, and thank you operator, you can close the call now.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. The conference of Sequans Communications has now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect your lines.