Cutera, Inc. (NASDAQ:CUTR) Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

So our budget and guidance do assume that we’re adding reps, we factored in the operating expense associated with that. So we’ve got room to add 15 or more reps on the capital equipment front, and we’re planning on getting to about 25 in our CAM organization. And so that’s part of the guidance, and it is also part of the reason that we would expect sequentially to be stronger as we’re — as we get to the back half of the year relative to the first half of the year and that also gives us confidence in what we were talking about previously to your question, Margaret, about trajectory as we’re heading out of 2024. And then the last comment I’d say is especially on the CAM front, we think that number getting into the mid-20s based on where we’re at right now or where we expect our AviClear installed base to be this year, we think that’s a good coverage level that’s going to allow us to support well the AviClear customers who commit to growing their overall utilization.

Margaret Kaczor: Okay, perfect. Really appreciate it, Taylor. Thanks, guys.

Taylor Harris: Sure.

Operator: Our next question comes from Anthony Vendetti of Maxim Group. Please go ahead.

Anthony Vendetti: Thanks. Yes. So I was just wondering, Taylor, if you just could talk about the transition from Jabil over to your in-house. How long is that going to take to transition or you set up to start manufacturing and AviClear? Or is that going to be a couple of month process or so?

Taylor Harris: Thanks, Anthony. Yes, so good news is we have already made that transition from a manufacturing perspective. In fact, we never fully shutdown our capability with those product lines. So we were — although the plan had been to fully transition, but we retained capability, and we’ve been able to ramp that back up. So the main transition now is simply going to be bringing back the inventory that Jabil had purchased. So we had to purchase that and then we’re going to restock our warehouses. That’s going to be a — it’s a big project for our distribution organization. But from a production line perspective, we’re in good shape already.

Anthony Vendetti: Okay. And then just looking at international sales, obviously, it’s always been a big portion mostly in most cases, a majority of your revenues. Is it going to be, as you move into ’24 as far as you can tell, about 55% or so of your revenue and if it’s going to change how come? Or how do you look at it for ’24?

Taylor Harris: So for 2024, the big change is that our skincare business, which was Japan exclusively is now gone. That was a distributed lower-margin distributed product line. And so we will only have $4 million of skin care revenue this year compared to something in the mid-30s in 2023. So that will bring down the percent contribution from international. And then otherwise, we have similar dynamics in North America and international in terms of the market backdrop. We are launching AviClear for the first time in international, and so that’s creating some new enthusiasm, which is great for the organization. But I think if you adjust for the skin care, you’ll get to the right ballpark.

Anthony Vendetti: Okay. And then just in terms of internationally, direct and indirect or direct and distributors, any change for that ’24?

Taylor Harris: No. We’re in a similar position in 2024. We have direct businesses in some of the major markets in Europe as well as in Japan and Australia. And in other areas, we’re working through distributors and so by and large, that’s the same as we transition from ’23 to ’24.

Anthony Vendetti: Okay, great. Thanks so much. I’ll hop back in the queue. Appreciate it.

Taylor Harris: Thanks, Anthony.

Operator: Our next question comes from Matthew O’Brien of Piper Sandler. Please go ahead.

Unidentified Analyst: Hi, this is Samantha, on for Matt. Thank you for taking our question. I guess to start off with AviClear, could you talk to us about, I guess, the progress that happened with how many of these systems, particularly, I guess, the dormant ones have made it back from the field. And I guess, I’ll just add more details on that?

Taylor Harris: Hi, Samantha. Yes, sure, happy to address. So year-end, we had an installed base of about 1,200 machines, 1,200 machines. We’ve been out. It’s been great to be out and having conversations with our installed base about AviClear. And as I referenced earlier, what’s been interesting is that there are a lot of accounts that are — want to make AviClear work. And so even though we’ve had a significant number, who didn’t do a procedure in the fourth quarter or in the third quarter. There have only been 125 so far, that have been returned. Now we do have a list of another 175 that will be returned. So that’s 300 total out of the 1,200. Others, even if they hadn’t done a procedure or a very low volume, we think that many of them likely will end up returning, but some of them are taking a wait-and-see approach.