ZoomInfo Earnings Expectations

ZoomInfo is reporting on Tues, Feb 15. I’ve found it good practice to document my expectations in advance, so I know how to quickly react to earnings. Price action is often swift, so I want to take advantage of after hours trading. Posting it here in case anyone finds it helpful or has meaningful disagreement and rationale around why my expectations may be off base. I like to track and predict the metrics that the company include in the press release as “important” numbers. For ZoomInfo this is Revenue Growth, Unlevered Free Cash Flow (uFCF), and the number of customers with Annual Contract Values over $100k. I’m expecting another strong quarter from ZoomInfo, as shown in the table below. If I see numbers that are Below my expectations, that is an indicator to sell and shrink my position. If the report meets my expectations, I typically hold my existing postition. In most cases I will add if the numbers come in and exceed expectations.

For ZoomInfo in particular, I think expectations have to be in the 12-14% range for sequential revenue growth where they landed for 3 of the last 4 quarters, anything less would be a sign of slowing growth. The beauty of ZoomInfo is in its ability to keep generating cash. Last quarter hit a dip in the unlevered free cash flow, and I expect this to bounce back this quarter. ZoomInfo has grown large customers by at least 150, each of the last 2 quarters and I expect this to continue. ZoomInfo only reports its NARR annually, so I expect it to stay in the 108-109% range. It will be interesting to see how customer pressure on supply chains impact their spend on a product like ZoomInfo.

ZoomInfo Earnings Expectations:


ZI           Rev     YoY       SQoQ    TTM    YoY      uFCF    GM   *NARR     **>100k ACV   YoY      SQoQ
F18 Q3      37.40
F18 Q4      40.80                 9%                                  102%
F19 Q1      54.60                34%
F19 Q2      68.50                25%  201.3
F19 Q3      79.10    111%        15%  243.0
F19 Q4      91.10    123%        15%  293.3             41.5   86%    109%            580
F20 Q1     102.20     87%        12%  340.9             55.0   86%                    630               9%
F20 Q2     110.90     62%         9%  383.3    90%      52.2   75%                    650               3%
F20 Q3     123.40     56%        11%  427.6    76%      59.8   83%                    720              11%
F20 Q4     139.70     53%        13%  476.2    62%      76.6   86%    108%            850    47%       18%
F21 Q1     153.30     50%        10%  527.3    55%      97.5   86%                    950    51%       12%
F21 Q2     174.00     57%        14%  590.4    54%      91.8   86%                   1100    69%       16%
F21 Q3     197.60     60%        14%  664.6    55%      73.3   86%                   1250    74%       14%

**Mid-point Company Guidance:**
F22 Q1 (G)  207.0                 5%                    59.9

**My Expectations:**
Below       <221               <12%                     <75   <86%  <108%          <1400
Meets      221-225           12-14%                   75-95    86%  108-109%   1400-1450
Exceeds     >225               >14%                     >95   >86%  >109%          >1450

*Net Annual Retention Rate (NARR): We measure our retention rate on an annual basis and define annual net revenue retention as the total ACV generated by our customers and customers of Pre-Acquisition ZI at the end of the year divided by the ACV generated by the same group of customers at the end of the prior year.
**Customers with $100,000 or greater in annual contract value.

Keeping score, here’s how we’re doing this quarter, IMHO:


DataDog:     Exceeded expectations!
Cloudflare:  Met expectations.
ZoomInfo:    TBD

I hope you find this helpful.

Cheers,
Daws (Long ZI ~8%)

161 Likes

Daws,

Very nice summary of expectations there. One small thing on the gross margins - I can’t find where you got those numbers (ie. neither GAAP nor Adjusted line up for me)

Here’s what I have


  ZI           GM (adj)   Op Margin (Adj)  
  F20 Q2       89%        49%              
  F20 Q3       88%        47%              
  F20 Q4       88%        45%              
  F21 Q1       89%        43%              
  F21 Q2       89%        43%              
  F21 Q3       88%        39%                  

Those are from their Financial Results PDFs they issue every quarter, most recent is on pg. 32 under “adjusted margin %” - https://ir.zoominfo.com/static-files/8a9ae383-5e32-4b9b-8270….

Relevant because those GM’s are about as good as it gets (second only to MNDY of stocks I track).

With my modeling I have them coming in at $223M, which would be 59% YoY and 13% QoQ, but I agree that $220M would be below expectations.

Also, if they keep humming at 13% QoQ, that’s 63% annualized. I’m pretty sure ZI doesn’t have a seasonality issue, so if they maintain at 13% I think that’s super positive.

ZI is a very high confidence position for me (second only to DDOG). I added Op Margin (Adj) to your data as well, and this is one area I’d like to seem them turn the direction around and back into the 40%'s.

-Chris

22 Likes

Thanks Chris, I think the difference is I’m calculating the gross margin using the GAAP Revenue less Cost of Service / GAAP revenue. You’re using the adjusted non-GAAP numbers, which are probably a better measure in this case.


For Q3:
GAAP Revenue         197.6
GAAP Cost of Service  27.2
Gross Margin           86%

Adj Revenue          199.2
Adj Cost of Service   23.7
Adj Margin             88%

Cheers,
Daws

7 Likes

Hi Dawes,

I’d like to welcome you to the board.

Yes, I know that you’ve been here for a year or more, but that was just an occasional post once or maybe twice a month, but now, all of a sudden you’ve blossomed into five really useful posts in a week. With lots of recs.

Really glad to have you! Keep up the good work. You will be a real asset to the crowd sharing of information and thinking that we do here.

Best,

Saul

74 Likes