Medpace Holdings, Inc. (MEDP) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and welcome to Medpace Holdings Annual Meeting of Stockholders. I'm August Troendle, Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of Medpace and also Chairman of today's meeting. I'm pleased to welcome you to the 2020 Annual Meeting of Stockholders. We are conducting this meeting virtually this year due to concern for the health and safety of our stockholders and employees. So please bear with the unusual format. I'd like to acknowledge the following Board members who are invited to attend by telephone, and I would like to thank them for their participation. I understand that each of them is on the line listening: Brian Carley; Fred Davenport; Ashley Keating; Thomas King; Robert Kraft; and Neal McCarthy, I believe all are participating. Officers of the company who are attending by telephone include Jesse Geiger, our Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer of Laboratory Operations; and Steve Ewald, our General Counsel and Corporate Secretary. Also present by phone are David Crowley, Scott Homer, and Lance Mall of Deloitte & Touche, the company's independent auditor, will have the opportunity to respond to appropriate questions. First thing I'd like to do is go over a little bit of the rules. The agenda for the meeting is displayed on the website for this meeting, and the rules of conduct are posted as an attachment that is available on the website. Following the conclusion of my remarks, there will be a brief opportunity for questions about the proposals voted upon during the meeting. Stockholders may submit questions in the text box field provided on the website at any time before I finish describing the meeting proposals. So don't wait, go ahead and enter any questions you may have on the 4 proposals that we have to discuss today. We are asking stockholders to submit a question -- that do submit a question include their name and e-mail address. All right. With that background in place, I would like to call the meeting officially to order. We will proceed with the formal business of the meeting as indicated in the Notice of the Annual Meeting and the company's proxy statement. All stockholders of record at the close of business on March 20, 2020, where holders of valid proxy, are entitled to vote at this meeting. I also want to introduce Todd Schaffer, the inspector of election for this meeting. Todd has signed the customary oath of office to execute his duties with strict impartiality. He will file his oath with the records of the meeting. He is also participating virtually by phone. And I have been informed that we have a quorum for this meeting. Therefore, I declare the meeting to be duly constituted for the transaction of business. So we can proceed on to the formal business of the meeting, in which there are 4 proposals to be considered by the stockholders at this meeting, all of which are fully described in the proxy statement. The first proposal is for the election of Brian Carley, Thomas King and Robert Kraft to Class I -- to serve as Class I directors of the company for term of office expiring at the Annual Meeting of Stockholders held in 2023. The company recommends that stockholders vote for each nominee. The second proposal is for the ratification of the Audit Committee's appointment of Deloitte & Touche LLP as the independent registered public accounting firm for the company for the year ending December 31, 2020. The company recommends that the stockholders vote for this proposal. The third proposal is for the approval on an advisory basis for compensation of our named executive officers as disclosed in the proxy statement for the 2020 Annual Meeting. This proposal is required by Frank-Dodd Wall Street Reform (sic) [ Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform ] and Consumer Protection Act and is referred to as the say-on-pay vote. The company recommends that stockholders vote for this proposal. And finally, the fourth proposal relates to the frequency of say-on-pay votes. The company recommends that the stockholders vote for the option of 1 year for this proposal. That is -- it would be taken up every year. [Voting]

Okay. Just wait a minute to see if there are any questions come through the queue that I should be answering. It appears that no questions have appeared up till now so I will close the polls. The time is now 9:06 a.m. on May 15, 2020, and the polls are now closed for voting. The inspector of election will count the votes, all of which are subject to final tabulation. I can report to you that I will have the final report of the inspector of election to be kept with company records of the Annual Meeting. And based on the inspector of elections count that I have been given, the information that proposal one, Brian Carley, Thomas King and Robert Kraft have been elected as Class I directors. The vote was in favor. The second proposal, the appointment of Deloitte & Touche LLP as independent registered public accounting firm for the year ending December 31, 2020, has been ratified. Proposal three which was the proposal to approve the compensation on an advisory basis of our named executive officers, has not been approved. This proposal received more against votes than for votes. And the fourth proposal with respect to the frequency of future advisory votes on named executive officer compensation, the majority of shareholders voted in favor of 1 year. The final tally of the votes will be published within 4 business days on a Form 8-K that will be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. And with that, I think that concludes all our business. This meeting is now adjourned. I want to thank you for attending and for your interest in Medpace. Thanks, everyone.