United Development Company Q.P.S.C. (UDCD) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Hello, and welcome to United Development Conference Call. Please note that this call is being recorded. [Operator Instructions] I'd like to hand over the call to our moderator, Roy Thomas. Please go ahead.

Thanks, Kris. Hello, everyone. This is Roy Thomas from QNB Financial Services. I want to welcome everyone to United Development Company's First Quarter 2025 Financial Results Conference Call. On this call from United Development Company, we have Maher Omar Naim, the Executive Director, Corporate Strategy; and Karim Farhat, the Executive Director of Finance. We will conduct this conference call with management first reviewing the company's results, followed by Q&A. I will turn the call now over to Maher. Go ahead.

Yes. Hello, everyone. United Development Company financial results as of the end of the first quarter, 31st March 2025. The company has achieved a revenue of QAR 679 million with a net profit of QAR 68 million, while the net profit attributable to the equity shareholder amounts to QAR 72 million and the earnings per share is QAR 0.02. The company is continuing to complete the remaining development in the Gewan Island development, which is primarily the villas and the hotel, which is considered the resort part of Gewan Island. While the mixed-use building has been completed towards the end of the year 2024 and handover have commenced to respective buyers. And accordingly, the revenue of such executed sales have been recognized and which is included in the financial results of the United Development Company as of the first -- end of first quarter. I leave the floor to you. Should you have any questions, please go ahead.

[Operator Instructions] And your first question comes from the line of Ejayan Al-ahbabi with Al Rayan Investment.

This is Zohaib from Al Rayan Investment. So just to confirm, you said the growth in your Urban Development is from the handover of Gewan Island units. Could you give us -- could you let us know how many units have been handed over? And how -- what were the total number of units that were sold and how many have been handed over? That's my first question. The second question is on the Qatar Cool deal. Have you received the entire payment for the sale of the Qatar Cool cash payment? Has that been received already? That's my second question. And the third, if you could give us some color on what's the occupancy for your residential and commercial spaces?

In respect, approximately more than 30% of the sold units have been handed over in the end of first quarter, okay? So -- or more -- let me rephrase more than 30% of the total units have been handed over to clients, and the handover is continuing throughout the year. As for Qatar Cool, definitely, Qatar Cool, we received, and this is -- we disclosed this in November 2024, we received the full amount. And the transaction is closed and completed and a new owner now or a new shareholder is there in Qatar Cool owning 40% of Qatar Cool capital. Now in respect to the residential occupancy, it is approximately in the range of 60%, 65%. Likewise, the commercial and retail in the same range as well.

On the Qatar Cool receipt of your proceeds, I'm just -- if you could just help me explain where I can see -- because I'm looking at your cash flows for 2024 and the first quarter or so, and I can't seem to figure out where the QAR 800 million or so has been received. I think it only says proceeds received from subsidiary disposal is QAR 222 million.

No, no. It is there in the cash flow. You can send your query via e-mail, and we will respond to you. But it was included, definitely, part of the cash balance, cash and bank balance of 2024 and amount was bid and deal is concluded. And there is a separate note on the financial statement, if you see about the conclusion of the transaction.

Sounds good. I'll send you a separate e-mail on this subject.

[Operator Instructions] And your next question comes from the line of [indiscernible] with QIC.

I only have two questions. First is your G&A increased by 18% year-on-year. Why is this so? And then, how do we look at it in the next quarters?

No. The G&A, the hospital, mainly, as you know, hospital operation, irrespective of the volume of the business or the revenue of the hospital, you should be having the minimum number of doctors, technicians and professionals and so forth. If you see March last year, the hospital was not in operation. And the hospital started it's operation in December 2024. And now it's a 4 months of operation. And now the hospital has a good number of staff, including staff and doctors, okay, as of March 2025, which this mainly caused the increase of the expenses. And there is depreciation expense for owner-occupied. There are certain owner-occupied assets that are depreciated and the depreciation accordingly reflected in the income statement.

Okay. Okay. And second question is your work in progress under your balance sheet. The one is referring to investment or development?

It is working -- construction work in progress. These are mainly the Gewan Island. It gets reduces by whatever units are being recognized, and it will continue to be added the villas and the hotel until the time they are completed and revenue is recognized or transferred to, it is a proper caption.

And there are no questions at this time. I will now turn the call back over to our moderator, Roy Thomas, for closing remarks.

If there are no further questions, we'd like to thank United Development Company's management for the results update.

Thank you.

And for all the queries. And we look forward to speaking to you all for the second quarter 2025 results conference call. Thank you.

Thanks a lot. Thank you very much all. Thank you. Bye-bye.

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you all for joining. You may now disconnect.