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FiscalNote announced Second Quarter 2023 Financial Results

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Increases Q3 Profitability Guidance with Expectation to be Profitable on an Adjusted EBITDA Basis in Q3 2023, a Quarter Earlier than Expected Deepens its AI Leadership in the Legal, Regulatory and Policy Sector with new Proprietary FiscalNoteGPT and AI-Powered FiscalNote Risk Connector for Global Operational and Supply Chain Risk Intelligence
FiscalNote

FiscalNote Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: NOTE) (“FiscalNote” or the “Company”), a leading AI-driven enterprise SaaS technology provider of policy and global intelligence, today announced financial results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2023. These results mark another quarter of delivering results in-line with the Company’s guidance driven by durable recurring revenue and high gross margins that also form the basis for the accelerated expectation of reaching adjusted EBITDA profitability next quarter – a quarter earlier than the Company’s prior guidance. The results reflect ongoing demand for FiscalNote’s trusted, AI-enabled policy and market intelligence that empowers organizations to mitigate risk and more confidently navigate their businesses in an increasingly complex global geopolitical, economic, and regulatory environment.“Our Progress Toward a Sustainable Future: FiscalNote’s Sustainability & Social Impact Efforts.”Tweet this

Second Quarter 2023 Financial Highlights

  • Revenue increased 21% to $32.8 million, compared to $27.2 million in Q2 2022 and consistent with the guidance range the Company previously provided. Subscription revenue, which comprises approximately 90% of total revenue, grew 21% year-over-year of which 9% was on an organic basis.
  • Gross profit was $23.4 million representing 71% gross margin, and non-GAAP adjusted gross profit(1) was $26.4 million representing 80% non-GAAP adjusted gross margin(1).
  • GAAP net loss of $(30.9) million.
  • Adjusted EBITDA loss of $(4.3) million(1), consistent with the guidance range the Company previously provided.
  • Cash and cash equivalents of $38.1 million and approximately $94 million of additional debt capacity.* The Company continues to have sufficient capital to support its current growth plans and M&A opportunities, and does not require additional capital raises to achieve its plan.

Second Quarter 2023 Operational Metrics

  • Run-Rate Revenue(2) increased to $135 million as of June 30, 2023 inclusive of businesses acquired in 2022 and 2023. Organic Run-Rate Revenue(2)(3) increased to $126 million in the period, a 6% increase from $119 million as of June 30, 2022 on a pro forma basis.
  • Annual Recurring Revenue(2) (“ARR”) rose to $120 million at June 30, 2023 inclusive of businesses acquired in 2022 and 2023, representing 16% total growth year-over-year and 7% growth over the prior year on a pro forma basis. Organic ARR(2)(3) was $113 million as of June 30, 2023 compared to ARR of $107 million at June 30, 2022, representing a 6% growth rate on a pro forma basis. The Company continues to deliver mid-teens organic ARR growth among its base of corporate customers in the large enterprise sector.
  • Net Revenue Retention(2) was approximately 98% in the second quarter.

Financial Outlook

FiscalNote is accelerating its path to profitability on an Adjusted EBITDA basis and increasing its expectation for Adjusted EBITDA profitability in the third quarter of 2023, one quarter earlier than previous guidance, as the Company continues to deliver year-over-year revenue growth, maintain strong adjusted gross profit margins in the 80% range, and realize the benefits of its cost management actions.(5)

Guidance for the third quarter of 2023 is as follows:

  • GAAP revenue of $34 million to $35 million, representing 17% to 20% year-over-year growth.
  • Adjusted EBITDA(1)(5) of positive $0.2 million to $1.0 million for the quarter, marking an increase from the Company’s prior guidance of approximately break-even in the third quarter. This marks a year-on-year improvement of between $7.6 million and $8.4 million in adjusted EBITDA profitability compared to Q3 2022. The Company has implemented efficiency programs that are expected to significantly benefit adjusted EBITDA in the second half of 2023.

Guidance for full year 2023 is as follows:

  • GAAP revenue of $136 million to $138 million, representing 20% to 21% year-over-year growth, consistent with the range of previously provided guidance, with a more narrow range to reflect the increased visibility to the second half of the year.
  • Total run-rate revenue(2)(4) of $143 million to $150 million, representing growth of 13% to 18% over the prior year inclusive of the Company’s acquisition of Dragonfly Eye, Ltd. in January 2023. This is an update from the Company’s previously provided run-rate revenue guidance range due, in part, to the Company’s decisions to sunset revenue for select unprofitable products and take other actions to drive accelerated profitability of the overall Company.
  • An adjusted EBITDA(1)(5) loss of $(8) million to $(6) million for the full year, marking an improvement of approximately 71% year-over-year and consistent with previously-provided guidance.
  • The Company’s full year 2023 guidance indicates the Company will achieve a fourth quarter 2023 adjusted EBITDA(1)(5) margin of 7% to 12%.

FiscalNote expects adjusted EBITDA profitability growth moving forward and, over time, expects to achieve adjusted EBITDA and free cash flow margins in line with other information services companies long-term.(5)

“Our operational and financial achievements in Q2 and our expectation to reach the inflection point of Adjusted EBITDA profitability next quarter, in Q3, reflect our unwavering commitment to building an enduring, profitable, sustainable compounding growth company for the world’s most important decision makers,” said Tim Hwang, Chairman, CEO, and Co-founder of FiscalNote. “In the year since our public listing, we have continued to advance our position as the de facto AI leader in the legal, policy and regulatory intelligence sector by growing our customer base, closing and integrating accretive acquisitions that expand our offerings, bringing new AI enabled products and solutions to market, establishing partnerships with market leading large language model engines and positioning the business for profitability and free cash flow growth. Our recent new product developments of FiscalNoteGPT and FiscalNote Risk Connector exemplify this AI leadership and underscore the essential value we bring to thousands of global customers who trust FiscalNote intelligence every day to turn insights into actions, convert challenges into opportunities, and mitigate risk to protect operations. We look forward to extending our track record of compounding growth, unmatched innovation, and customer excellence in the second half of 2023 and beyond.”

In the second quarter and in recent weeks, FiscalNote has received multiple industry recognitions for the Company’s decade-long leadership in AI innovation and made several advancements in the depth and breadth of its technology portfolio including:

  • Introduced FiscalNoteGPT, the first proprietary platform incorporating generative AI and large language model (LLM) capabilities customized for legislative, regulatory, and policy workflows. This large language model has been specifically adapted to a wide range of legal and regulatory data to support a diverse set of natural language processing (NLP) tasks within the legal and regulatory industry.
  • Launched FiscalNote Risk Connector, a new, internally-developed risk intelligence solution that harnesses the power of the Company’s data and AI capabilities to reveal operational, relational, and reputational risk for enterprises and government organizations.
  • Announced a collaboration with Microsoft to develop a plugin for Microsoft’s new AI-powered Bing, enabling access to select FiscalNote market-leading real-time data sets and content for users. Similar to the Company’s recent selection as an inaugural launch ‘trusted partner’ for OpenAI’s ChatGPT Plugin and its integration partnership with Bard by Google, this integration enables FiscalNote to capture critical insights into how users engage generative models to understand political and regulatory information.
  • Awarded three new patents through its Aicel Technologies subsidiary by the Korean Intellectual Property Office (KIPO). This brings the Company’s total global intellectual property portfolio to 17 patents, underscoring FiscalNote’s commitment to delivering innovative AI and machine learning solutions and industry-leading expertise in analyzing unstructured data.
  • Selected as an inaugural launch partner for a new data marketplace created by data, analytics, and AI company Databricks. Through this partnership, FiscalNote will make select datasets available for sale to Databricks’ expansive global base of more than 9,000 customers, driving new customer acquisition opportunities for FiscalNote.
  • Introduced new, proprietary AI tools and an integration with OpenAI’s ChatGPT, called VoterVoice SmartCheck. This makes VoterVoice the first SaaS advocacy campaign platform to embed both proprietary AI and ChatGPT into a patented platform.

Also in the second quarter and recent weeks the Company achieved other notable operational and business milestones which reflect its ongoing leadership in global policy, risk mitigation, and market intelligence including:

  • Continued to expand its enterprise customer accounts, which is the Company’s largest and fastest growing customer base, by securing new agreements in the second quarter with customers across a variety of sectors, including retail, software, manufacturing, energy, and health care, among others.
  • Announced wide-ranging new customer agreements and renewals across the global public sector, as overviewed in the Company’s separate press release issued today.
  • Added to the broad-market Russell 3000® Index at the conclusion of the 2023 Russell indexes annual reconstitution on June 26, 2023. The annual Russell indexes reconstitution captures the 4,000 largest U.S. stocks as of April 28, ranking them by total market capitalization
  • Established a first-of-its-kind partnership with Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, providing a framework for the Ministry to use FiscalNote’s proprietary data sets and enhanced AI capabilities to assist the Ministry in responding to rapidly changing international dynamics and associated domestic policymaking needs.
  • Published its second annual corporate Sustainability overview, “Our Progress Toward a Sustainable Future: FiscalNote’s Sustainability & Social Impact Efforts.”
  • Announced CEO Tim Hwang’s selection as an Ernst & Young (EY) “Entrepreneur of the Year” 2023 award winner – one of the most preeminent competitive awards for entrepreneurs and leaders of high-growth companies.

Additional information regarding the non-GAAP financial measures discussed in this release, including an explanation of these measures and how each is calculated, is included below under the heading “Non-GAAP Financial Measures.” A reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP financial measures has also been provided in the financial tables included below. Information regarding our key performance indicators is included below under “Key Performance Indicators.”

Quarterly Conference Call

FiscalNote will host a conference call today, Wednesday, August 9, 2023, at 9:00 a.m. Eastern Time (U.S.) to review the Company’s financial results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2023. To access this call, dial 1 (888) 660-6510 for the U.S. or Canada, or 1 (929) 203-0882 for callers outside the U.S. or Canada with the conference ID 1271923. A live webcast of the conference call will be accessible from the Investor Relations section of FiscalNote’s website at https://investors.fiscalnote.com/, and a recording will be archived and accessible at https://investors.fiscalnote.com/. An audio replay of this conference call will also be available through September 9, 2023, 11:59 p.m. ET (U.S.), by dialing 1-800-770-2030 for the U.S. or Canada, or 1-647-362-9199 for callers outside the U.S. or Canada, and entering 1271923.

* In connection with its public listing, FiscalNote entered into a 5-year senior secured term loan of up to $250 million, including $150 million of committed financing at closing with an additional uncommitted accordion facility for $100 million, subject to certain conditions.

(1) Non-GAAP measure. Please see “Non-GAAP Financial Measures” in this earnings release for definitions and important disclosures regarding these financial measures, including reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP measure.

(2) “Run-Rate Revenue,” “Annual Recurring Revenue” or “ARR”, and “Net Revenue Retention” are key performance indicators (KPIs). Please see “Key Performance Indicators” in this earnings release for the definitions and important disclosures regarding these measures.

(3) Organic run-rate revenue and organic ARR for Q2 2023 include businesses acquired as of December 31, 2022, plus Aicel Technologies (for which a definitive acquisition agreement was signed as of December 31, 2021, with closing conditioned upon FiscalNote’s public listing).

(4) Total run-rate revenue includes completed acquisitions but does not include any future acquisitions under consideration.

(5) Because of the variability of items impacting net income and unpredictability of future events, management is unable to reconcile without unreasonable effort the Company’s forecasted adjusted EBITDA to a comparable GAAP measure.

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