AppHarvest, Inc. (NASDAQ:APPH) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Jonathan Webb: Yes. Brian, this is Jonathan. Just to kind of layer on what Tony was saying a moment ago, we’re deepening that relationship. I mean, to put it in perspective for the industry, AppHarvest had nothing three years ago, and now we have the second largest footprint of CEA facilities in the U.S. and the only party with a larger footprint in the U.S. is our distribution partner, Mastronardi. So – and Tony’s previous employer, where he was CFO at Windset, is roughly tied with us on second. So around the table, we make up a vast majority of that production in the U.S. And so for us, it’s far more than a transaction with Mastronardi and they’re not just selling our product. And I think showing what the deal we announced in Berea is just a glimmer of that, which is they want to see us succeed in a market where interest rates are going up and capital markets are tight for us to be able to get 7.5% infrastructure dollars on a sale leaseback of that facility shows the types of conversations that are happening with Mastronardi, But yes, Tony is taking his experience he’s executed on previously at Windset, bringing that here and then helping us figure out how can we best optimize this relationship with Mastronardi where they do have deep experience all across Mexico, deep experience in Canada and what can we use to leverage the farm network we’ve built and the experience they have to optimize these assets and get to profitability as quickly as possible.

But I would say you’ll continue to see us pushing that Mastronardi relationship forward and what you saw in Berea is just a signal of what we’re working on with them.

Tony Martin: It’s Tony. I think from a farm perspective, the advantages we have with Mastronardi are they themselves are farmers. They help us with a varietal selection. They provide expertise in crop maintenance, crop management, crop services work. They assist us in the analysis and design of productivity bonus. They have provided guidance on such matters as crop care, but also in terms of the types of certifications we have to undergo in order to meet the quality specifications of customers. They have an incredible team of growers that they make available to us to help our growers deepen their understanding and knowledge. And so, the advantage of someone like Mastronardi from the perspective of our productivity and our production is they bring years of experience that we can parlay that experience into the benefit to AppHarvest, enhancing and strengthening the understanding of our crew here.

Jonathan Webb: Yes. And just – and with a specific note Brian , I mean they’re sending large groups of their executive team down to Kentucky on a regular basis, sitting in the middle of our facilities with us. So it’s, again, far more than a sales and distribution relationship. It’s something that we’re trying to heavily integrate as we go from not just one facility and one crop type, but a whole host of variety of crops and tomatoes and now strawberries, leafy greens, how can we best integrate and optimize for the facilities we have, and that’s going to be something where we try to deepen and strengthen that relationship.

Tony Martin: In terms of enhancing our communication, we have weekly, sometimes daily meetings with them both on-site and in Zoom and we speak specifically to their operating team. It’s a great advantage for us, especially as we start up and roll out these new operations.

Operator: And thank you and one moment for our next question. And our next question comes from Ben Theurer from Barclays. Your line is now open.

Ben Theurer: Perfect. Thank you so much. Good afternoon. First question I have is as you change going forward, the reporting because obviously, now you have a more diversified portfolio. How should we think about the contribution, particularly to your guidance of $40 million to $50 million revenues this year? How much is to come from which, call it, sub-segment, tomatoes versus berries versus leafy greens, just to get a little bit of a sense of the magnitude here that would be my first question? Thank you.

Jonathan Webb: Yes. So we’re not hey Ben – we’re not going to give guidance by produce type, is not for this year, but I think it’s fair to assume for this year that tomatoes will make up the vast majority of the net sales for this year. We are going to have salad greens, strawberries and cucumbers, and I would expect that it could be in that order in terms of magnitude. But I would expect that tomatoes could likely be at least 50%, if not more, of the net sales for this year.

Ben Theurer: Okay, perfect. And then just to understand a little bit the balance sheet and where we’re at. I mean, obviously, a lot of things have moved since the fourth quarter and what you’re showing in terms of cash, restricted cash, you had the capital raise, which was almost $40 million income. But if you would have to like kind of think of like, okay, maybe last Friday, where do we stand on cash versus restricted cash? And as we’ve seen in the first facilities, I mean gross profit continues to be negative. So just to understand how that evolves now with four facilities because that’s not an SG&A dilution yet, but how should we think about the losses and how it impacts the cash burn rate?

Loren Eggleton: Yes. So I would say, as we think about ending the year with $54.3 million cash, we raised $43.1 million approximately net on the share offering. We announced – we’ve got about $60 million to $65 million remaining in CapEx. Now I guess, what may not have been clear in the prepared remarks is only about $40 million to $45 million of that CapEx range is what we would expect to use and unrestricted cash. And we’ve got a $9.8 million holdback on Berea as part of the sale-leaseback transaction for the changes in enhancements, $7.9 million in restricted cash for greater about as of the end of the year for completion of the Somerset project and then about $2.4 million that was in escrow for the completion of the Berea EPC contracts so maybe about $40 million to $45 million of unrestricted cash from the beginning of the year to finish out the CapEx. But I would say – with the recent share offering, plus the potential sources of financing to get us through the end of the year.

As you’ve seen with Berea there’s interest in the sale leasebacks on our facilities. Since we announced Berea sales leaseback, we’ve had some inbound interest, and we’ll continue to evaluate additional sale leasebacks as a form of non-dilutive capital.

Ben Theurer: Okay perfect. And then my last question, I guess, that one is most likely more for Tony as it comes to the ramp-up and have all the people aligned and as you’ve nicely laid it out in your prepared remarks, but what also was within the press release, one of the things that just came to my mind was around this enabling labor efficiency. And clearly, that’s been one of the issues you had at the beginning? So Tony, from your experience, maybe help us understand what you think needs to change. What do you think needs to be implemented in order to make labor more efficient and to ultimately be at that gross profit positive, which I think is a lot related to some of these inefficiencies?