Waterdrop - Q4 2023

Transcript

Tracy Lee (Company Representative)

Morning everyone, this is Tracy Lee from Waterdrop Investor Relations. It is my pleasure to welcome everyone to Waterdrop Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2023 earnings conference call. All participants are in listen-only mode on our English line. As a reminder, today's conference call is being recorded. Please note that this discussion today will contain forward-looking statements made under the Safe Harbor Provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties and actual results may differ materially from our current expectations. Potential risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, those outlined in our public filings with the SEC. The company does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements except as required by applicable law. Also, this call includes discussion of certain non-GAAP measures.

Please refer to our earnings release for confirmation between net GAAP and GAAP. Joining us today on the call are Mr. Shen Peng, our founder, chairman, and CEO; Mr. Yang Guang, co-founder, director, SVP and GM of International Business; Mr. Zhu Zitao, GM of Medical Crowdfunding and Pharmatech Business; Mrs. Li Jiawu, board secretary. I would be happy to take some of the questions in the Mandarin line at the end of the conference call.

Peng Shen (Founder, Chairman and CEO)

Hello everyone, this is Shen Peng. Let's talk about our industry developments first. Looking back on 2023, thanks to various economic stimulus policies, the Chinese economy shows a gradually stable and recovery trend. Despite that, the regulation of the personal insurance industry remains cautious as it continues to evolve towards high-quality development.

So as we saw both challenges and opportunities, we firmly believe that with the clear guidance and gradual implementation of new regulation policies, the health, innovation capabilities, and sustainability of the industry will improve further in the future. Market participants with brand and technological advantages are more likely to stand out. As such, we will build up new quality productivities with improved technologies and innovative business models, leading our industry to its transformation and upgrading. We are filled with confidence about this. In terms of financial performance, in the Q4 of 2023, the company continues to uphold its entrepreneurial spirit and pursue healthy business development, which was attested by stable and resilient financial results. Total revenue reached about RMB659 million. Since Q1 of 2022, we have continuously recorded stable profitability for every quarter.

In the fourth quarter, the bottom line performance further improved, with a GAAP net profit attributed to the company reaching about RMB59.1 million, representing a 61% Q2 growth. For future year 2023, the GAAP net profit attributed to the company is about RMB167 million. In the meantime, we saw consistent cash inflow from operations, building up our cash balance. As of the end of 2023, the cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments totaled about RMB3.39 billion, an 8% increase from last quarter. Our annual cash reserves strengthen our foundation for carrying out steady business development plans, supporting us in our long-term growth initiatives and enabling us to embrace industry change with confidence and technology competitiveness. From a business perspective, in Q4, all business segments maintain stable and healthy development, continuously solidifying our leading position in the industry.

For Waterdrop Insurance Marketplace, despite a difficult industry situation, we actively developed new products and models with our insight into the diversity of cross-brand demographics and continuously generate steady profits. For Waterdrop Medical Crowdfunding, we remain committed to our principle of "User First, Service Promote." Continuously participating in development of a multi-level medical support system, we consistently improved its transparency and operational efficiency. Loss in the segment was reduced compared to last quarter. For Insights Platform, we continuously enhanced its service capabilities through business upgrades. In Q4, the number of partnering clients increased significantly, making breakthroughs in our cooperation with both domestic and foreign compatible companies. For the same year, this segment recorded year-over-year revenue growth of nearly 70%. For R&D, as a technology-driven company, we maintained substantial investment in R&D and applied for more than 10 AI large language model (LLM) patents.

In the fourth quarter, our self-developed LLM, Waterdrop Da Mo, completed internal task upgrades and extended its application into multiple cases, which brought efficiency improvements throughout the entire insurance service group. Now I will touch upon our charity and ESG initiatives. Waterdrop actively incorporated ESG principles into various aspects of our operations, environmental protection, talent development, and community investment, tightly integrating ESG values with our corporate DNA. The latest ESG rating resulting from China's leading ESG institution today shows that our ESG rating has recently been upgraded to A, the leading score among players in the insurance sector. For Waterdrop Charity Platform, we remain relevant with our CSR. We joined the Hui Bang multi-level medical support information system, which have effectively connected business members to security-critical units, insurance, medical assistants, and charities in Hainan Province.

Upon its launch in August 2023, it has assisted the government in establishing a provincial-level medical support platform. By year-end, nearly 1,000 patients have applied for assistance on the platform. This project was honored with the Annual CSR Case Award, hopefully by People's Daily Online. In December 2023, in response to the Gansu earthquake, Waterdrop Charity Fund promptly sent an emergency team and launched a 14-fundraising project to assist with disaster-affected areas and rebuilding damaged homes. I would also like to update everyone with our actions taken in the capital market. Regarding the share buyback, as of the end of February 2024, the company has cumulatively repurchased about RMB39.7 million ADS on the open market, at a total of nearly RMB88.8 million, which affirms our confidence in our business value and its long-term perspective. Furthermore, the repurchased shares will be used for ESOPs to motivate our talented employees.

Moreover, Waterdrop continues to uphold our commitment to our shareholders. Our board of directors has approved a special cash dividend plan totaled about RMB15 million with RMB0.04 per ADS. On the healthy financial performance of the company and its commitment to shareholder value, the company is pleased to initiate its first dividend program, and it will strive to continue bringing return value to shareholders in the future. This is the recap of our developments in Q4. We are confident in our business outlook as well as that of this industry. Looking into 2024, our strategies are for insurance marketplace business. We are here to use the first as core principle, committing to providing the best service to existing users. Meanwhile, we will develop more customized, better-usable money insurance products through technological innovation to target various demographics.

For Medical Crowdfunding, we will continuously take advantage of our scale and technological capabilities to ensure sustainable development while fulfilling CSR and meeting user needs. For Insights Platform, we will continue to leverage Waterdrop's big data advantage, actively exploring innovative service models, rapidly increasing network penetration, establishing service capabilities covering multiple disease categories, and creating a new growth engine for long-term growth. With abundant cash reserves, the company will continue to seek cooperation and investment opportunities around insurance and healthcare sectors. As for technology, we will accelerate technological environment by enhancing our AI capability and build our core technological moat to support long-term development. Based on nearly eight years of business accumulation, our self-developed LLM, Waterdrop Shui Shou, has significantly improved internal efficiency, and we will further empower the industry partner soon. Now I will pass to Yang to discuss our insurance marketplace business.

In the fourth quarter, the growth of personal insurance premiums in the industry experienced a slowdown. Against this backdrop, we focused efforts on new data creation and long-term development, and continuously optimized operations for existing users. Meanwhile, we actively explored new product offerings and models, expanding customer acquisition channels, laying the foundation for advanced high-quality business development. In the fourth quarter, FYP reached RMB1.53 billion. Insurance-related income reached RMB588 million, and operating profit reached RMB128 million. For the full year of 2023, the FYP reached RMB7.11 billion. Insurance-related income reached RMB2.34 billion, and operating profit reached RMB528 million. In the fourth quarter, FYP of short-term insurance products reached over RMB990 million. During this quarter, the company strengthened platform operational management for users, enhancing policy service, and optimized user engagement, resulting in increased customer satisfaction.

The number of users grew steadily, with the number of policies per user rating for two quarters in a row, and the renewal rate for short-term insurance remained at a level of 95%. We were acquiring users from content production, enhancing the quality and the product choice on video channels. As a result, video playback volume increased by 68.6%, leading to a 34.5% crucial increase in premiums. As we further diversified our product offerings, the FYP of long-term insurance policy reached RMB530 million in the fourth quarter, an increase of 22.9% worldwide, among which life insurance premiums increased 116.2% worldwide. During this quarter, we improved the underwriting quality for long-term insurance users, strengthening partnerships with insurance companies to launch more customized products. Following the removal of high-interest products in the third quarter, we saw both opportunities and challenges in our industry.

In terms of online brokerage channels, we emphasized the integrated capability of our product portfolio, ensuring a better user experience. At the same time, we cooperated with high-quality self-media channels to grow a high-quality user base. On offline brokerage front, we launched the Waterdrop CP100 program in this quarter. Offline brokerage prioritized its resources to better serve those high-net-worth customers. This initiative is in cooperation with industry partners to build a one-stop platform encompassing insurance, pension planning, and wealth succession, as well as empower the team of high-quality brokers. During the fourth quarter, we struck to pick the top performance agents from the team. The number of active agents increased by 108% worldwide, and productivity per capita of long-term insurance products rose by 8% worldwide. In the fourth quarter, Waterdrop Insurance Marketplace enhanced our synergy with Shenlanbao.

While Shenlanbao continues to maintain independent operations, the two teams deepened their cooperation on various aspects, including R&D, content marketing, and product offerings. Shenlanbao contributed the FYP of RMB102 million in the first quarter. The policy quality remained at the industry-leading level, with the renewal rate remaining above 90%. In the fourth quarter, we continued to deepen its innovative capabilities across health insurance and critical insurance. Regarding health insurance, we launched a variety of innovative products to address the needs of a broader user base. Among this, the Shenlanbao health insurance essentially covers all groups with chronic diseases, critical illnesses, and minor ailments. Through our intelligent and underwriting capabilities, users with pre-existing conditions can also buy insurance online reliably. On top of regular health insurance plans, we also launched a product called Eseng Shuhui.

This product is the first online long-term critical illness insurance plan that covers users with pre-existing conditions. Moreover, we developed services and products to address the needs of each demographic group. We launched Waterdrop Jiahao Yun, the industry's first maternal and infant insurance designed to cover the entire pregnancy cycle. Upon its debut, its product has been widely recognized by users. In terms of savings insurance products, we launched a monthly payment life insurance product. Different from the traditional annual payments or lump-sum payment products in the market, the monthly payment plan is more flexible for users with lower thresholds. This is an important practice for us to serve and diversify savings needs across different market segments. Next, let me brief you about our development of AI. We apply our insurance-focused large language models, Waterdrop Threshold. Threshold is named after our commitment to safeguard users' health with AI technology.

Currently, Damo already covers multiple scenarios in the industry business, including consulting, underwriting, claim processing, customer service, and more. It can support multi-professional services such as answering fundamental questions, consulting on insurance policy terms, answering underwriting questions, and post-insurance service. We can also independently develop two major applications: the AI insurance consultant and the recovery assistant. Both of them are based on the Damo LLM. The AI insurance consultant acts as a smart agent that is equipped with large model technology, capable of independently communicating with customers in real time. It can recommend insurance policy products tailored to the customer's specific needs, utilizing a vast amount of insurance knowledge to better understand user needs. It has been internally tested and used in medical insurance scenarios.

In this context, the AI insurance consultant can carry independent dialogue for up to 40 minutes, undertaking 90% of the work for an average human broker. The second application, the super assistant, can build an intelligent co-pilot system for aiding human agents. For example, based on the conversation between agents and users, it displays real-time professional tips for insurance-related questions, recommending more suitable products for each user in real time. It finds answers in a way that is easier for users to understand and improve insurance service efficiency while increasing customer satisfaction. Currently, Bang Bang, the assistant, has been internally launched as Waterdrop. In the development process of Waterdrop Threshold, we have obtained three patents and accumulated more than 10 patents related to the large model. In the future, we will continue to adhere to the path of technology and talent in the industry, bringing high-quality insurance service to millions.

This concludes my briYifanng on insurance business. So let me hand over to Zhu Zitao and update on our Medical Crowdfunding and Digital Clinical Trial Solution business. Thank you, Yang Guang. As of Q4 2023, an accumulated total of 450 million people donated more than RMB 62.6 billion to over 3.1 million patients through Waterdrop Medical Crowdfunding platform. Both the number of users and the fundraising amount continued to grow. In Q4, our platform established the Guardian Plan, which provides service fee reductions and exemptions for extremely poor people. Moreover, our offline consulting team has tried offering additional supportive services to hospitalized patients. In the fourth quarter, the platform further deepened transparency and recruitment. Platform providers, from public to participants in business role discussion and fund review, platform providers can randomly check the cost details of any fundraising transaction and supervise the entire fundraising process.

By continuously valuing transparency, we keep optimizing the service experience. To make critical illness assessment more accurate and efficient, we have continuously participated in the establishment of our multi-level medical support system, actively responding to the amendments of charity law in China. In Q4, the amended version of PRC charity law has touched, incorporating individual assistants into its provisions. Furthermore, on December 21, our Hui Bang multi-level medical support system project has awarded the NECSR Case Award, hosted by People's Daily Online. In the fourth quarter, the Yifan platform, our Digital Clinical Trial Solution business, maintains steady and healthy development revenue with about RMB 20.8 million. For the full year, revenue exceeded RMB 100 million, with an increase of 69% worldwide. In Q4, the Yifan platform collaborated with 167 funds from several companies and CROs.

We made great progress on partnering with more leading MNCs during this quarter, successfully joining the supply list of two of the top five global MNCs. And to formally kick off projects with one of them, more projects are expected to officially launch in 2024. Additionally, the Yifan platform signed a cooperation agreement with one of the top three global CROs and officially initiated patient recruitment. In Q4, the platform signed 82 new projects. With the rapid development of innovative drug R&D for chronic disease in China, the Yifan platform continues to improve our ability accordingly. Through efficient digital operation capabilities and AI-driven matching, we enrolled in a record number of patients and projects. Our projects cover categories including dermatology, respiratory, cardiovascular, immunology, digestive disease, and so on. In terms of CROs.

Diseases, leveraging the experience operation, we successfully secured a clinical trial project in the rare disease field of cell therapy, providing more partners with comprehensive digital services such as data insights, medical affairs, product management, clinical supervision, patient recruitment, and mathematical statistics, and so on. Regarding patient service, the platform continues to deepen cooperation with a leading global MNC in the patient health management of chronic disease. By integrating technologies such as large models, it significantly enhanced patient service experience and efficiency, gaining high recognition from customers. We also signed contracts with multiple leading domestic and MNCs for medical patient operations, patient education, and data insights, continuously expanding the number and scope of cooperation clients. We continue to strive for technological empowerment.

For patient private domain operations scenarios, we integrated AIPC technology into our platform, intelligently identifying keywords and interaction intentions from the conversation with users, allowing medical assistants to generate simple, quick, and reliable judgments. Such applications greatly improve the service quality compared to traditional methods. Thanks for listening. I will now hand over to Yang Guang to discuss our financial performance.

Yang Guang (Co-Founder, Director and SVP)

Thank you, Guo Tao. Hello, everyone. We now will get through our financial highlights for the fourth quarter. Before I go into details, please be reminded that all numbers quoted here will be in RMB. Please refer to our earnings release for detailed information on our financial performance on both year-over-year and quarter-over-quarter basis, respectively. For the fourth quarter, amid complicated environments, our commitment to pursuing steady and healthy development, net operating revenue decreased by 3% year-over-year to about RMB 659 million.

For the full year, net operating revenue reached about RMB 2.63 billion. Among that, insurance-related income amounted to about RMB 2.34 billion, representing a decrease of 8.5% worldwide. Crowdfunding service fees amounted to RMB 162 million, representing an increase of 4.4% worldwide. Digital clinical trial solution income amounted to RMB 100 million, representing an increase of nearly 70% worldwide. About the operating costs and expenses on a worldwide basis, since the last quarter, we consolidated the financial results of Shenlanbao. For the full year, the operating costs and expenses increased by 13.5% worldwide to RMB 2.64 billion. For the third year, operating costs and expenses increased by for Q4, it increased by 4.3% worldwide to RMB 633 million. On quarter-on-quarter basis, the operating costs and expenses decreased by 8.1% as we adjusted our standing pay to adapt to changes in the external environment.

For Q4, operating costs were about RMB 202 million, increased by 8.5% year-on-year and decreased by 3.2% in Q2. The decrease was primarily due to, firstly, a decrease of RMB 5.8 million in cost of revenue and service fees, and secondly, a decrease of RMB 2.3 million in the cost of patient recruitment and consulting fees. For Q4, S&M expenses increased by 26.9% year-over-year to RMB 175 million. The increase was primarily due to, firstly, the consolidation of Shenlanbao, which generated S&M expenses of RMB 39 million, and secondly, an increase of RMB 15.8 million on third-party traffic channel fees, partially offset by a decrease of RMB 21.1 million in personnel costs and share-based compensation expenses. On Q2 basis, it decreased by 6.9%, primarily due to a decrease of RMB 11.3 million in sales and marketing, personnel costs, and share-based compensation expenses. G&A expenses were RMB 96 million, a decrease of 19.1% year-over-year and 16.3% quarter-over-quarter in Q2.

The decrease was mainly about personal costs and the share-based compensation expenses and the professional service fees. R&D expenses were RMB 59.8 million, a decrease of 16.6% year-over-year and 19.1% in Q2, respectively. The decrease was mainly about personal costs and the share-based compensation expenses, too. For Q4, net profit attributed to the company's ordinary shareholders was RMB 59.1 million. The objective net profit attributed to the company's ordinary shareholders was RMB 74.7 million. For Q1 2022, the company has achieved net profit for eight consecutive quarters. As for year-end 2023, cash equivalents and short-term investments amounted to RMB 3.39 billion, an 8% increase from last quarter. The abundant cash reserves positioned us well to focus on long-term development priorities.

To better reward shareholders and boost investors' confidence, our board of directors has approved a special cash dividend total of approximately RMB15 million, with RMB0.004 per ordinary shares and RMB0.04 per ADS. The shareholders of ordinary shares and ADSs of the closing date of April 19, 2024, U.S., is sometime entitled to the difference. In summary, we made our financial guidance to the market as we achieved the profitability in each quarter of 2023. Like 2024, we will continue to create shareholder value with healthy growth and profits. Ladies and gentlemen, with that, we will conclude today's conference call. We do thank you for joining. Have a good time.

Operator (participant)

The conference has now concluded. We thank you for attending.