Ituran Location and Control Ltd. ($ITRN)

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. My name is Kenny Green, and I'm part of the Investor Relations team at Ituran. I would like to welcome all of you to Ituran's results Zoom webinar, and I would like to thank Ituran's management for hosting this conference call. [Operator Instructions] I would like to remind everyone that this conference call is being recorded, and the recording will be available from the link in the earnings press release and on Ituran's website from tomorrow. With me today on the call are Mr. Eyal Sheratzky, CEO; Mr. Udi Mizrahi, Deputy CEO and VP Finance; and Mr. Eli Kamer, CFO of Ituran. Eyal will begin with a summary of the quarter's results, followed by Eli with a summary of the financials. We'll then open the call for the question-and-answer session. You should have all received by now the company's press release. If not, please view it on the company's website. I would like to remind everyone, the safe harbor statement in today's press release also covers the contents of this conference call and the associated presentation. And now, Eyal, would you like to begin, please?

Thank you, Kenny. I'd like to welcome all of you to our first quarter 2026 results call, and thank you for joining us today. We are very pleased to report a strong start to 2026, with our revenue crossing the $100 million milestone for the first time in our history. For the quarter, overall revenue grew 19% year-over-year to $102.7 million, a record, with subscription revenue growth of 21% to $75.4 million. Operating income, EBITDA and net income all grew year-over-year by double digit, with EBITDA reaching $26.7 million. During the quarter, we added 40,000 net new subscribers, bringing our total subscriber base to 2,670,000 at the end of March 2026. This is in line with our expected run rate and shows continued healthy organic growth across our core markets. While the pace can derive from quarter-to-quarter for the full year of 2026, we continue to expect to add between 160,000 and 180,000 net subscribers during the year. Our long-term success in growing our global subscriber base constantly is due to our ongoing efforts in offering new products and services to our existing customers, while at the same time, tapping into new market segments and new geographies. Our OEM relationship remain a key growth driver. During the first quarter, we further expanded our strategic partnership with Stellantis through the launch of Connect Fiat exclusive to the Fiat Strada in South America. This is a fully integrated end-to-end solution from Ituran, covering the embedded hardware, connected vehicle services, the technology back end and the end-user mobile application. This new program, with an initial 3-year term and an option to extend by an additional 2 years, builds on the partnership we announced with Stellantis in early 2025, and reinforces our role as a complete connectivity partner for global OEMs in our region. Beyond Stellantis, we remain in active discussions with additional OEMs, and this, alongside our existing partnership with Nissan, Renault, General Motors, Yamaha, BMW and others, gives us strong confidence in our long-term OEM growth trajectory. Beyond our core subscriber-based telematics business, we are advancing the several growth initiatives, which I discussed last quarter in details, that we believe can become meaningful long-term contributor to Ituran. This include Ituranmob, our car rental solution, credit carbon and our big data capabilities, all which significantly grow our addressable market. While these initiatives are still early in their commercial development, we are already involved in active discussions with potential customers and partners, and we are seeing interest across multiple markets and use cases. As an example of our big data capabilities, we recently signed an agreement with one of the entities of the Ministry of Transportation in Israel to provide transportation data, helping it better understand commuter patterns and support plans for the future. We expect more such projects in Israel to mature during the coming quarters. Together with our other interesting projects in the pipeline, this highlights the significant long-term potential of Ituran's data capabilities to support governments, transport authorities, commercial centers, OEMs and other customers, while creating scalable revenue opportunities beyond our traditional subscription model. Ituran continues to be strongly cash-generating business, with cash flow from operations of $18.2 million in the first quarter, reflecting our continuing strong profitability, ongoing positive cash flow and stronger balance sheet. The Board of Directors declared a dividend of $10 million for the quarter, which represent $0.50 per share, in line with our standard dividend policy. During the quarter, $0.5 million in shares were purchased under the buyback program. We see our ongoing dividend, alongside our buyback program, as a reward to our shareholders for their loyalty and long-term support of our company. In summary, we are very pleased with our strong start to 2026, with revenue crossing the $100 million milestone for the first time, double-digit growth in revenue, operating income, EBITDA and net income, and continued healthy subscriber addition, in line with our goal for the year. At the same time, we continue to look for new avenues to drive further growth across all of our regions. The OEM expansion with Stellantis through Connect Fiat, the launch of Ituranmob, our car rental solution in the United States, and our partnership with Griiip, the development of credit carbon and the monetization opportunities around our big data assets are all examples of this. We remain confident in our ability to deliver continued growth and profitability throughout 2026 and in our long-term strategy to transform Ituran into a significantly larger company. And with that, I hand over to Eli. Eli, please go ahead.

Thanks, Eyal. I will provide a short summary of the financial results. You can find the more detailed results in the press release that we issued earlier today. First quarter revenues were a record $102.7 million, a 19% increase compared with revenues of $86.5 million in the first quarter of last year. Revenues from subscription fees in the quarter were $75.4 million, an increase of 21% year-over-year, and represented 73% of total revenues. Product revenues in the quarter were $27.3 million, an increase of 12% year-over-year. The subscriber base expanded to 2,670,000 by the end of the first quarter, an increase of 40,000 from the end of the previous quarter. The geographic breakdown of revenues in the first quarter was as follows: Israel, 57%; Brazil, 22%; Rest of World, 21%. EBITDA for the quarter was $26.7 million or 26% of revenues, an increase of 15% compared with EBITDA of $23.3 million or 26.9% of revenues in the first quarter of last year. Net income for the first quarter was $16.8 million or 16.3% of revenues or diluted earnings per share of $0.85, an increase of 15% compared with $14.6 million or 16.9% of revenues or diluted earnings per share of $0.73 in the first quarter of last year. Cash flow from operations for the first quarter of 2026 was $18.2 million. As of March 31, 2026, company had net cash, including multiple securities of $108 million. This is compared with net cash, including multiple securities of $107.6 million as of year-end 2025. During the first quarter, Ituran paid a dividend to shareholders relating to the third quarter of last year, amounting to a total of $10 million. The Board of Directors declared a dividend of $10 million for the first quarter or $0.50 per share. The current dividend take into account the company's continuing strong profitability, ongoing positive cash flow and strong balance sheet. During the quarter, $0.5 million in shares were purchased under the buyback program. The total remaining authorization is approximately $13 million. Share repurchase will be funded by a valuable cash and will be made in accordance with SEC Rule 10b-18. And with that, I'd like to open the call for the question-and-answer session. Operator?

[Operator Instructions] Our first question will be from Derek Greenberg of Maxim.

Congrats on the quarter. I wanted to just dig into the growth a bit. You had strong results there. I was wondering if you're seeing stronger growth contributions in any specific area, whether it be geographically or new products or if you're seeing just strong results across the board? I was wondering if you could dig into that a little bit?

Actually, we have no specific geography that grows more than usual. Still from the subscribers movement, there is always some volatility and it can vary between quarters and between ARPUs. Actually, we have a nature edge, sometimes Israel growing faster than Brazil in one quarter, and then there is OEM deal like we did with Stellantis and its contribute. So there was nothing specific. But I think that it's fair to mention that when we see Q1 2026 compared to Q1 of 2025, this is the first time that we enjoyed from straightening of the currencies in the geographies that we work, and this is support to, I would say, to a much stronger differences and growth numbers compared maybe to a typical quarter. This is something that we are not counting on. And after almost a decade that it always was in front wind, still we grow, of course, when it's a backwind, we are happy. But in terms of operation, we will continue our growth as we always do. And of course, we work on -- extend it, as I declared and said, regard new businesses and new OEM deals, but this is not something that still we faced in Q1 2026, I think that this will be more material in our growth toward the next years.

That's super helpful. Is there a way to think about maybe what the FX-neutral growth rate was this year versus last year? And maybe what the impact of FX headwinds were in the prior quarter?

In our EBIT, it was about $1 million. Again, it's not material for the overall, but when you compare it quarter-to-quarter, it's something which is fair to mention. And when you -- I will not analyze now each one of the currencies, but this is the total amount raised from the average FX of the currencies.

Got it. And then just in terms of potential lumpiness in the quarter, did you see any lumpiness in the like product revenue segment in terms of like maybe an inflated number there? Or anything else to call out? And then on the subscribers, was there any price increases factored into the quarter as well?

No, since we talked about, more than -- almost 2.7 million subscribers, even if there is a change in the one geography net new subscribers, the influence is very close to 0. This is general, I'll say, but to be more concrete, there was nothing, and I think that one of the, I think, things which are very typical way to run, there is not many lumping situation. I think that the feasibility is very high, the strain -- our market situation in each geography, I think, allow a very stable and constant growth as long as, of course, we will continue with our efforts.

Yes. Great. I have one last question, and then I'll pass it along. I was wondering just on the big data initiative you guys are working on and you had called out that you signed an agreement with a ministry in Israel, the transportation industry. I was wondering maybe if you could talk a little bit about how we should think about the sales cycle in terms of engagements for that or maybe other useful color in terms of the pipeline and potential contract sizes per engagement?

First of all, we are -- as you should know, as I said in our last quarter call, this is only in the beginning. But still, the big data engine that we launched currently in Israel is something that having a lot of traction. And the deal of the contract that we signed, and I just mentioned about it, which is a few hundred -- more than a few hundred thousand of dollars, this model is a little bit different than the subscribers recurring revenues. This is typically a B2B deal, and this is a measure data sizes, data, what is the information and the measurements. And in that case, it's a deal with a onetime -- not onetime payment, but sometimes the project that we have, for example, now in negotiation can go for 4 or 5 years with an annual payment, but this is not based on a specific customer or specific car. So in that case, it's not something that I can disclose. But overall, when I look in more strategic wise, I think that all this information will allow us to, in the future, to increase revenues and create more and more deals of selling data that in one day, that for example, in 3 or 4 years from now, when the Israeli subscriber base will be more cash cow because in Israel, as you know, we have something like 90% market share. We grow very, very aggressive among the new car sales. So in one day, we will have to find another growth engine, and this will be this data and the rental car application, et cetera. Now I don't know how to give you what can be your model, how you model it with the subscriber base today, but it's something that we have to create some -- some model, some expectation and add it first to the revenues, et cetera. We don't -- I don't know how to tell you exactly what will be the numbers or how you model it.

Yes. Got it. That was very helpful. Well, congrats again.

Our next question will be from Sergey Glinyanov from Freedom Capital Markets.

Yes. Good day. And first of all, I would like to congratulate with the significant milestone of $100 million in revenue and [ 1 billion ] in market capitalization breaking through. So the first question is assuming a stable FX rate, does it mean that we should expect strong Q2 as well?

I can't tell you about Q2, but again, some assumption that you can learn from Q1 can be relevant for Q2. I think that you can look backward and try to illustrate it to your model, that's how I would say it.

Okay. Okay. And regarding new agreements, do you have any new substantial OEM agreement on the table? Or were you under discussion now?

We are -- again, we are always under discussion. If you look again backward, you will see that every year, we provide 1 or 2 new agreements. And we do and put all our efforts in order to continue and make it. And I believe that it will be. And of course, we are in discussions. When it's happened, we will report. And of course, we will publish it.

Okay. Good. And I guess last one for me. What's the goal in terms of subscribers, revenue or market share? I have pursued in the U.S., deploying Ituranmob and how is it progressing at all?

This specific solution that we are now start to provide, it's a premature. It's something that we saw it -- we didn't expect that it will be so premature. There are other players with a very, very limited market share, not something that can even be called a market and industry. And as being the first or part of the first comers to this solution, of course, we are -- put a very, very high goal to lead this market. But as I said, it just started. We have to educate market. We just finished a very large conference of rental companies and rental car services that we were speakers as well as demonstrators. And I'm very optimistic after the after the leads and the discussion and that traction that we saw from all the players in this industry, but it's too premature to say what will be our market share, but we aim to be the leaders of this industry in the U.S. in the future.

And that ends our question-and-answer session. Before I hand back to Eyal for the closing statements. So I just want to let everyone know that this call will be available from Ituran's websites in the coming hours as well as from the original Zoom link. And with that, I'm going to hand back to Eyal for his closing statements. Eyal, please go ahead.

On behalf of the management of Ituran, I would like to thank you, our shareholders, for your continued interest and long-term support of our business. We look forward to continuing our accomplishment over the coming years. If you are interested in meeting or speaking with us, please feel free to reach out our Investor Relations team. And with that, we end our call. Have a good day. Bye.