Yunji - Q1 2024

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Good morning, and good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by, and welcome to Yunji's Q1 2024 Earnings Conference Call. With us today are Mr. Shanglue Xiao, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Yeqing Cui, Senior Financial Director, and Ms. Kaye Liu, Investor Relations Director of the company. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. Now, I would like to hand the conference over to our first speaker today, Ms. Kaye Liu, Investor Relations Director of the Yunji. Please go ahead, ma'am.

Kaye Liu (Investor Relations Director)

Hello, everyone. Welcome to our Q1 2024 Earnings Call. Before we start, please note that the call will contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, that are based on our current expectations and current market operation conditions, and relate to events that involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors of Yunji and its industry. These forward-looking statements can be identified by terminology such as will, expect, anticipate, continue, or other similar expressions. For a detailed discussion of these risks and some uncertainties, please refer to our related document filed with the U.S. SEC. Any forward-looking statement that we make on this call are based on assumptions as of today, and are expressly qualified in entirety by cautionary statements, risk factors, and details of the company filing with SEC.

Yunji does not undertake any obligation to update this statement, except as required under applicable law. With that, I will now turn over to Shanglue Xiao, Chairman and CEO of Yunji.

Speaker 5

Hello, everyone. Welcome to Yunji's Q1 2024 earnings call. The Q1 is traditionally an off-peak season for e-commerce. We seize the opportunity to further refine our operations, allowing us to maintain a solid gross margin. As consumers' appetite for pursuing better lives intensify, we are laser-focused on driving high-quality growth by stabilizing average order values and gaining deeper insights into our core users' consumption preferences. In May, I celebrated Yunji's ninth anniversary alongside our service managers, partners, and employees. During the festivities, we unveiled several exciting new initiatives. One such initiative is our plan to provide our users with a holistic health solution. To realize this, we will extend our presence into offline communities and establish wellness spaces, bringing our healthcare products directly to consumers. These initiatives are set to generate both part-time and full-time employment opportunities, nurturing individual entrepreneurship through our top-tier retail services.

Our private label beauty brands, Su Ye and P&S continue to roll out new products that prove to be mega hits. These products are specially formulated with ingredients that are tailored for mature skin, mirroring the effectiveness of the leading Western beauty brands. In terms of marketing, we are actively expanding our partnerships across a variety of external channels this year. Our approach includes creating engaging content on diverse content platforms, leveraging the power of the short video platforms, and harness the influencer marketing on live streaming platforms. In the healthcare sector, we will continue to utilize cutting-edge manufacturing technology and natural ingredients with medicinal properties to create products that further enrich our health supermarket metrics. Our goal is to transition Chinese families from a reactive approach to healthcare to a proactive one that emphasizes daily dietary enhancements.

At the same time, we will continue to innovate and enhance the virtual community service experience and deploy advanced AI applications. In addition, we will further evolve our training system to cultivate professional health nutritionists who provide value-added services beyond our products. Our mission is to ensure that every family has access to a professional health advisor.

While apparel has historically been a less prominent category for us, we have seen increasing demand from users and our service managers for a broader range of products in this category. With the emergence of the short video trend, we see a golden opportunity for Yunji's apparel category to become an integral component of our beauty segment. This year, we've embraced the integration of short videos and live streaming, hosting weekly live streams on Yunji's official channel. While our primary focus is on apparel, we also feature our beauty and food categories to bolster Yunji's image as a beauty brand. This approach allows us to infuse a sense of fashion into our offerings, while ensuring they remain practical.

While every industry is currently grappling with changes and challenges, and the new consumption industry in which we operate is no exception. However, we firmly believe that where challenges exist, opportunities also thrive. At Yunji, we harness our entrepreneurial spirit, leverage our 9-year experience in the realm of the social e-commerce within the WeChat ecosystem, and keep our finger on the pulse of the video channel trends. Over the past 6 months of the exploring content creation and live streaming on video channels, we have gradually developed a business model that fully aligns with Yunji's entrepreneurial DNA. Our focus is on nurturing leaders in video channels who can produce and distribute high quality content on large scale. To streamline product promotion and make communication more efficient, we equip our service managers with new skills, enabling them to kick-start business with nothing more than a mobile phone.

We recruit aspiring ordinary people to become video channel leaders, providing them with training in creating product promotional short videos and live streaming, and helping them stay updated with new capabilities. Our video channel leader incubation program, which was piloted in the Q1, is set for a more extensive rollout in the Q2.

Shanglue Xiao (Chairman and CEO)

微信图文时代创造了云集，短视频时代将给大家带来一个更加生动高效的云集。我们希望成为用户实现健康美好生活的伙伴。

Speaker 5

The WeChat community era created Yunji, and now the advent of short video era promises to enrich Yunji with greater vibrancy and efficiency. We aspire to be the trusted partner that empowers our users to lead a healthy and beautiful life.

Shanglue Xiao (Chairman and CEO)

我今天的分享就到这里，下面欢迎我们的财务高级总监崔叶青给大家分享财务的情况。

Speaker 5

With that, I will turn the call over to Mr. Cui, our Senior Financial Director, to go through the financial results.

Yeqing Cui (Senior Financial Director)

Thank you, Shanglue. Hello, everyone. Before I go through our financial results, please note that all numbers stated in the following remarks are in RMB terms, and all comparisons and percentage changes are on a year-over-year basis, unless otherwise noted. During the Q1 of 2024, our operations remained relatively steady as we continued to bolster the core process underpinning our operations. Refinements to our inventory management protocols enable us to sustain a consistent level of gross profit. Inventory management remains a strategic focal point. With vigilant monitoring of assorted product categories on a weekly or monthly cadence to optimize stock levels. By doing so, we enhance utilization of our assets while more efficient, more effectively managing our cash flows. At the same time, we are actively making our cash flow management more efficient. Now, let's take a close look at our financials.

Total revenues were CNY 128 million, compared to CNY 179 million a year ago. Revenues from sales of merchandise were CNY 102 million, and the revenue from our marketplace business was CNY 24 million. The changes were primarily driven by ongoing refinements to our product range across all categories. This, coupled with the optimization of our supplier and the merchant network, results in a short-term impact on sales. Despite these changes, our gross margin remained relatively solid at 49.4%. This was due to sustained customer loyalty towards our private labels and our effective product creation strategy. Now, let's take a look at our operating expense. Fulfillment expense was CNY 22 million, compared to CNY 27 million a year ago.

This was primarily driven by a decrease in warehousing and logistics expense, due to lower merchandise sales and reduced personnel costs, resulting from staff structure optimization. Sales and marketing expense decreased to CNY 26 million from CNY 30 million a year ago. This was primarily a result of a decline in member management fees, partially offset by an increase in business promotion expense. Technology and content expense were CNY 13.3 million, compared to CNY 13.4 million a year ago. This decrease was mainly due to reduced server costs. General and administrative expense were CNY 14.9 million, compared to CNY 15.2 million a year ago. This was mainly due to the reduction in personnel costs, resulting from staff structural refinement, partially offset by increase in the allowance for credit loss.

Total operation expense in the Q1 decreased to CNY 76 million from CNY 85 million in the same period of 2023. Loss from operations were CNY 9 million, compared to income from operation of CNY 1 million a year ago. Net income was CNY 4 million, compared with the net loss of CNY 23 million a year ago, while adjusted net income was CNY 3 million, compared with adjusted net loss of CNY 27 million a year ago. Basic and diluted net income per share attributable to ordinary shareholders were CNY 0.01, compared with basic and diluted net loss per share of negative CNY 0.01 in the same period of 2023. Turning to liquidity.

As of March 31, 2024, we had a total of CNY 505 million in cash and cash equivalents, restricted cash and short-term investments on our balance sheet, compared to CNY 552 million as of December 31, 2023. Our liquid assets were sufficient to cover our payable obligations, and we do not hold any long-term bank loans or debts on our balance sheet. In addition, we are dedicated to making the most of our working capital and smartly managing our assets to better support our operations. To sum up, the Q1 makes important progress on the road to realizing our long-term strategy goals. Our ongoing improvements in inventory management, along with our dedication to sustainable and effective asset management, we are pivotal to this advancement. Moving forward, we will focus on further enhancing our efficiency and to strengthen our company's resilience and adaptability.

Our strategy positions us to effectively address future challenges and seize emerging opportunities in the evolving e-commerce landscape. This concludes our prepared remarks for today. Operator, we are now ready to take questions.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. We will now begin the Q&A session. To ask a question, you may press star, then one 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 two. When asking a question, please state your question in Chinese first, then repeat your question in English, English, for the convenience of everyone on the call. At this time, we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster. Our first question is from the line of Ethan Yu from First Trust Group. Please go ahead.

Ethan Yu (Representative Analyst for First Trust China on Yunji Inc)

...好，嗨，一名，谢谢管理层接受我的提问。刚才肖总，提到了就短视频和直播的我们公司的一些进展，能否详细分析一下，详细分享，分享一下Yunji和，其他的平台有什么不同。

Speaker 6

Hi, good evening, thanks for taking my question. The management just mentioned our progress in short video and live streaming. Could you share more details about how we differs from other platforms, in this area? Thank you.

Shanglue Xiao (Chairman and CEO)

谢谢您的提问。

Speaker 5

Thank you for your question.

Shanglue Xiao (Chairman and CEO)

首先我们在商品端继承了精选的基因，我们在品类和性价比上精挑细选，用低价低质量的卖清仓，卖清仓货和引流。

Speaker 5

Firstly, we will select every commodity in all categories and ensure they are cost-effective. We do not resort to selling low-price, low-quality clearance items to draw traffic.

Shanglue Xiao (Chairman and CEO)

其实呢，在内容上我们是短视频内容创作者的同时，也是许多商品的开发者。我们的团队从产品的立项开始，亲自参与产品的溯源，投入生产，包装选定，比其他内容生产者更懂得商品，并且呢拥有更多全商品链路的真实素材。

Speaker 5

Secondly, we are not only content creators, but also developers of numerous commodities. Our team engages from the inception of the product project, actively participating in the traceability of the origins, production, and selection of packaging materials. This hands-on approach equips us with a deeper understanding of the commodities and a more tangible grasp of the entire commodity chain compared to other content producers.

Shanglue Xiao (Chairman and CEO)

另外呢，从最关键的人的层面，云集的短视频战略，无论 是内容的 生产还是分发，都以素人为主，助力个体创业，也让我们的内容呢更加有亲和力。

Speaker 5

As in most critical human level, Yunji's short video strategy, encompassing both content production and distribution, is rooted in an ordinary people-centric approach, facilitating individual entrepreneurship and rendering our content more accessible.

Shanglue Xiao (Chairman and CEO)

这是我们其余其他平台的最大的差异。

Speaker 5

Also, all these have differentiated us from other competitors.

Shanglue Xiao (Chairman and CEO)

谢谢你。

Speaker 5

Thank you for your question.

Ethan Yu (Representative Analyst for First Trust China on Yunji Inc)

OK, got it. OK, thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, as there are no further questions at this time, I'd like to hand the conference back to the management for closing remarks.

Speaker 5

Thank you for joining us today. Please do not hesitate to contact us if you have any further questions, and we looking forward to talk with you next quarter. Bye.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. This conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending. You may now disconnect.