Sunlands Technology Group - Earnings Call - Q3 2025

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to Sunlands' Third Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. Today's conference call is being recorded. I will now turn the call over to your host today, Yuhua, Sunlands' IR representative. Please go ahead.

Yuhua Ye (Head of Investor Relations)

Hello, everyone, and thank you for joining Sunlands' third quarter 2025 earnings conference call. The company's financial and operating results were issued in our press release via NewsWire services earlier today and are posted online. You could download the earnings press release and sign up for our distribution list by visiting our IR website. Participants on today's call will be our CEO, Mr. Tongbo Liu, and our financial representative, Mr. Hangyu Li. Management will begin with three-part remarks, and the call will conclude with a Q&A session. Before I hand it over to the management, I'd like to remind you of Sunlands' safe harbor statement in relation to today's call. Except for the historical information contained herein, certain of the matters discussed in this conference call are forward-looking statements. These statements are based on current trends, estimates, and projections, and therefore you should not place undue reliance on them.

Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. A number of important factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statement. For more information about the potential risks and uncertainties, please refer to the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. With that, I will now turn the call over to our CEO, Tongbo Liu.

Tongbo Liu (CEO)

Thank you, Yuhua. Hello, everyone. Welcome to Sunlands' Third Quarter 2025 Conference Call. Prior to commencing, I would like to kindly remind all attendees that the financial information referenced in this release is presented on a continuing operating basis, and all figures are denominated in RMB unless explicitly specified otherwise. We are pleased to say that the company has now entered a phase of steady and healthy growth. Our performance in this quarter once again underscores the resilience of our business model and the effective execution of our strategic roadmap. We delivered a net revenue of RMB 523 million, coupled with a pronounced acceleration of profitability as net income surged 40.5% year-over-year to RMB 125.4 million. This achievement validates the durability and scalability of our operations. Our strategic pivot towards high-margin, demand-driving process categories continues to yield tangible financial benefits.

The net margin expanded significantly to 24%, primarily attributable to optimized revenue mix and disciplined cost management. Now, let's turn to the performance of our major course programs. Our next degree and diploma programs continue to play a stable, supportive role, accounting for approximately 15% of total revenue. The strategic allocation of resources away from this segment has empowered us to aggressively capture growth in more dynamic markets. Moving to our long-degree offerings, including professional certification and interest-based courses, collectively accounted for approximately 73% of total revenue in the third quarter. In this sector, we continuously optimize our services and expand our offerings by launching new programs tailored to diverse user groups. These initiatives aim to provide engaging and interactive experiences, improve learning outcomes, and ultimately create value for our users. Building on this momentum, we continue to deepen our presence in one of our most distinctive segments, senior learning.

As an early mover in this space, we have established a strong foundation, particularly in arts education, where our curriculum breadth and pedagogical depth remain unmatched. Yet as the market evolves and the competition intensifies, we have deliberately shifted from rapid growth to quality-driven growth, ensuring the long-term resilience of our business. In a recent feature by Beijing News, several of our senior learners shared their enthusiasm and renewed sense of vitality, reaffirming the social and emotional impact of our mission to make lifelong learning both enriching and transformative. We have also successfully cultivated a vibrant private ecosystem for this cohort, which continues to demonstrate exceptional engagement. Our senior learners are not only embracing online learning as a lifestyle but also forming vibrant social ecosystems through our platform. Courses have become gateways to renewed identity, connection, and well-being. To further enrich this experience, we actively pioneer innovative collaborations across industries.

Last quarter, we partnered with a leading television channel to co-host a cultural initiative celebrating traditional arts. They organized an immersive learning journey that allows senior learners to explore the origins and beauty of Chinese calligraphy. Our pipeline for the coming quarter remains robust, with a series of integrated learning lifelong initiatives already in motion. We are launching charity programs in rural schools, participating in senior expos, organizing calligraphy competitions, and preparing for spring festival events. These activities are designed to help older users rediscover purpose, foster social connections, and shine in every aspect of their lives. This holistic approach not only amplifies the intrinsic value of our educational offerings but also builds a powerful and sustainable competitive moat. Parallel to these offline initiatives, we are elevating the learning experiences through an AI-driven transformation of our platform.

In response to learners' key needs, extending post-course engagement, preventing knowledge loss, ensuring 24-hour, 7-day personalized support, and bridging the gap between theory and practice, we have introduced two intelligent assistance models powered by large language models. The course intelligence assistant delivers round-the-clock reinforcement and precise explanations, while the AI agent enables seamless natural language interactions to translate knowledge into actionable insights. As we continue to advance in integration of AI across operations, the results have been encouraging. Our internal data shows that the AI-assisted automated grading now covers over 70% of assignments, increasing review efficiency by more than eight times and achieving an accuracy rate above 95%. This has significantly reduced the repetitive workloads for instructors and enhanced the teaching quality. Looking ahead, the thought education sector is entering a new phase driven by high-quality growth.

For Sunlands, growth is no longer measured by solid skill, but by the balance of efficiency, innovation, and long-term value. We believe that healthy cash flow, organizational agility, and a learner-centered product mindset will remain the core pillar of Sunlands' competitiveness in this field stage. We extend our gratitude for your presence today and the continued support you provide. Thank you, and we look forward to your valuable engagement. With that, I will turn the call over to our Financial Director, Hangyu Li, to run through our financials.

Hangyu Li (CFO)

Thank you, Tongbo. Hello everyone. The third quarter results reflect the company's focus on profitable growth and operational excellence. Net revenues for the quarter increased by 6.5% year-over-year to RMB 523 million, primarily fueled by the strong performance of our interest-based courses. A key highlight was the substantial growth in profitability. Gross profit rose 13.1% to RMB 462.7 million, outpacing revenue growth. This, together with a 5.5% reduction in total operating expenses, drove net income to RMB 125.4 million, with the net margin reaching 24%. The company's balance sheet remains robust, with ample cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments. We have also maintained our streak of generating positive net cash from operating activities, underscoring the health of our core business.

In the third quarter of 2025, the gross billings per new student enrollment for interest, professional skills, and professional certification participation courses grew 11.7% year-over-year, reflecting steady user acquisition momentum despite a more selective marketing approach. This growth indicated that we were attracting more committed users and achieving better monetization from each new cohort. The combination of enrollment growth and improved unit economics demonstrates the effectiveness of our refined strategy, focusing more merely on skill but on sustainable high-quality growth. Looking ahead, we are uniquely positioned at the confluence of demographic tailwinds and technological innovation. Our leadership in serving the civil economy, backed by a profitable and scalable model, sets the stage for continued value creation for our users and shareholders alike. We intend our sincere gratitude to our team and our shareholders for their continued support.

Now, let me walk you through some of our key financial results for the third quarter of 2025. All comparisons are year-over-year, and all numbers are in RMB, unless otherwise noted. In the third quarter of 2025, net revenues increased by 6.5% to RMB 523 million, from RMB 491.3 million in the third quarter of 2024. The increase was primarily due to shorter average service period in 2025, resulting in increased revenue recognition year-over-year. Cost of revenues decreased by 26.5% to RMB 60.3 million in the third quarter of 2025, from RMB 82.1 million in the third quarter of 2024. The decrease was mainly due to declined cost of revenues from sales of goods such as learning materials and books. Gross profit increased by 13.1% to RMB 462.7 million in the third quarter of 2025, from RMB 409.2 million in the third quarter of 2024.

Sales and marketing expenses decreased by 7.7% to RMB 279.7 million in the third quarter of 2025, from RMB 303 million in the third quarter of 2024. General and administrative expenses increased by 4.3% to RMB 36 million in the third quarter of 2025, from RMB 34.5 million in the third quarter of 2024. Product development expenses increased by 48.2% to RMB 8.7 million in the third quarter of 2025, from RMB 5.8 million in the third quarter of 2024. The increase was mainly due to increased compensation expenses related to high-count expansion of the company's product development personnel. Net income for the third quarter of 2025 was RMB 125.4 million, as compared to RMB 89.3 million in the third quarter of 2024. Basic and diluted net income per share was RMB 18.64 in the third quarter of 2025.

As of December 30th, 2025, the company had RMB 601 million of cash equivalents and restricted cash, and RMB 176.5 million of short-term investments, as compared to RMB 507.2 million of cash equivalents and RMB 276 million of short-term investments as of December 31st, 2024. As of September 30th, 2025, the company had a deferred revenue balance of RMB 695.5 million, as compared to RMB 916.5 million as of December 31st, 2024. For our outlook, for the fourth quarter of 2025, Sunlands currently expects net revenues to be between RMB 440 million-RMB 460 million, which would represent a decrease of 4.9%-9% year-over-year. The above outlook is based on the current market conditions and reflects the company's current and preliminary estimates of market operating conditions and customer demand, which are all subject to change. With that, I'd like to open up the call to the questions. Operator?

Operator (participant)

Thank you. To ask a question, you will need to press star one and one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star one and one again. For the benefit of all participants on today's call, if you wish to ask your question to management in Chinese, please immediately repeat your question in English. Thank you. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Once again, if you would like to ask a question, you will need to press star one and one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star one and one again. Once again, that is star one and one for any questions. At this time, we are showing no questions coming through, so this would conclude the question-and-answer session.

At this time, I would like to turn the conference back over to Yuhua for any closing remarks.

Yuhua Ye (Head of Investor Relations)

Once again, thank you, everyone, for joining today's call. We look forward to speaking with you again soon. Good day and good night.

Operator (participant)

This concludes the conference call, and you may now disconnect your line. Thank you.