The following is excerpted from the question-and-answer section of the transcript.
(Questions from industry analysts are provided in full, but answers are omitted - download the transcript to see the full question-and-answer session)
Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: So Brian, I just wanted to start with the question that's often most topical as we speak with investors on the name, and that relates to organic
growth. I think if I think about the medium-term organic outlook of 4% to 8%, over the last several years, you've been operating a touch below
that. I think most of the underlying business segments you can make the case for near- to medium-term acceleration. How do you feel about your
confidence level in being able to durably execute on that 4% to 8%?
Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: Perfect. That's helpful. How should we think about what you've seen post regulatory and geopolitical clarity of late? Have you seen any positive
sentiment from your end customers, either from a specific vertical or customer type that is really more optimistic about the near-term environment?
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DECEMBER 10, 2024 / 3:00PM, SSNC.OQ - SS&C Technologies Holdings Inc at Nasdaq Investor Conference
Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: Helpful. Maybe from a product perspective, it'd be great to hear the early feedback from your customers on the Genesis platform and some of the
early cross-sell opportunities you're seeing there. I think one of the things that's underappreciated about SS&C is not only your relative position in
the fund admin space, but just the breadth of capabilities that you can bring across front, middle and back office. So I would be curious to hear
how you sort of re-incentivize the sales force to drive adoption of that?
Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: Helpful. How about just with the inflection we've seen in private credit over the last couple of years and effectively over the last 12 months with
the acceleration? What have you seen or what have you done from a product perspective to position SS&C to be a beneficiary there? I think of
things like Black Diamond and what you're doing in terms of alternative asset reporting. But any highlights here that you would call out?
Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: Perfect. Maybe just progressing to the health care business. I know this has been a challenge over the last, call it, 12 to 18 months. I think Bill has
been of the view that we would see that business sort of stabilize and get back to growth. What caused the drivers of some of the sequential
deceleration that we saw in 3Q?
What gives you the confidence that, that business is close to or at a trough?
Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: One of the more exciting components about the healthcare business is DomaniRx. Maybe just unpack what you're doing there, what the opportunity
set looks like and how you think about the potential for that business to be a real growth driver in the health care business specifically?
Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: Helpful. Maybe progressing to some of your earlier commentary on M&A. The Intralinks business has been growing well north of the corporate
average for quite some time. I think if you look at the level of announced M&A relative to US nominal GDP, it's been running well below historical
levels for quite some time.
There's a view that we're not only going to get an inflection in '25, but that inflection is going to prove durable in '26 and '27. How do you sort of
think about the capacity of that business to continue to grow in this mid- to high teens range over the next several years?
Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: Helpful. One of the assets that you've acquired in the last couple of years is Blue Prism. You have been pretty prescriptive just in terms of the level
of savings that you're able to generate per digital worker deployed. I think one of the things that's been interesting is that asset was growing. It
was growing at a really healthy rate at the time at which you acquired it.
That growth rate has now stepped a little bit below 10%. How do you think about, not only the level of expense savings that you're able to generate,
but also the capacity to sort of incentivize the sales force to really reaccelerate the growth profile?
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Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: Perfect. Maybe just on the GIDS business, great to see that business reaccelerate to mid-single-digit growth in the most recent quarter. I think one
of the things that we've been monitoring is if you look at the commentary from some of the asset managers and brokers about the potential for
tokenization and what that might mean in terms of bringing down the unit cost of transfer agency. What have you all done to sort of position SS&C
Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: Helpful. One of the key metrics that I tend to look at to determine whether or not a business is sort of being successful at sort of exerting pricing
power is churn, right? And if you look at the churn metrics that you all have been producing and how retention continues to sort of sequentially
uplift while you're continuing to take price, I think it's evidence of the fact that our SS&C is still pretty dominant in the space. With that said, there's
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DECEMBER 10, 2024 / 3:00PM, SSNC.OQ - SS&C Technologies Holdings Inc at Nasdaq Investor Conference
obviously been a cohort of businesses that came public around the '21 IPO period that compete with you across certain segments, and there have
also been some European competitors that are incrementally more interested in sort of penetrating the US market and probably getting creative
with price to do that.
So maybe just the state of the union on what you've seen competitively over the last, call it, 12 months and whether or not anything has sort of
changed from a rate of change perspective?
Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: Helpful. Maybe just on the margin front, I think if you sort of listen to Bill over the years and you sort of think about the trade-off between growth
and profitability, he's often expressed this view that there is a level of diminishing marginal returns as margins sort of proceed to the low 40s type
range. How do you sort of think about your willingness to reinvest and push margins beyond 40%? Or is it more of a function of driving higher
levels of organic growth?
Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: Helpful. Continuing on this M&A theme, talk to us about the strategic rationale of the Battea acquisition, the type of financial performance that
business is putting up. I know it obviously is running at some pretty high incremental margins relative to the existing opportunity there. So what
interested you there? And sort of how do you think about what you can do to drive higher levels of growth in that business?
Question: Michael Infante - Morgan Stanley - Analyst
: Helpful. Just given the perspective that you have in private market valuations, I'd be curious to get your thoughts on how you're thinking about
capital allocation on a go-forward basis. What are you seeing in terms of private market valuations? And if there is an asset that is particularly
interesting, any particular vertical and/or geography that you think would tick the box?
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