Biokey International Inc (BKYI)

[Louied91]

$BKYI Digital Authentication and Identity Provider BIO-key Sees Q3 Revenues Rising over 30% to $1.8M on Strength in Software License Fees, Services and Hardware Sales


https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2023/10/25/2766662/0/en/Digital-Authentication-and-Identity-Provider-BIO-key-Sees-Q3-Revenues-Rising-over-30-to-1-8M-on-Strength-in-Software-License-Fees-Services-and-Hardware-Sales.html

HOLMDEL, N.J., Oct. 25, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- BIO-key® International, Inc. (Nasdaq: BKYI), an innovative provider of workforce and customer Identity and Access Management (IAM) featuring passwordless, phoneless and token-less Identity-Bound Biometric (IBB) authentication solutions, announced results for its third quarter ended September 30, 2023 (Q3’23).

Highlights:

Revenue rose over 30% to $1.8M vs. $1.4M in Q3’22
Gross profit improved more than 40% to $1.4M vs. $1.0M in Q3’22
Q3’23 operating loss improved to approximately ($750,000) vs. an operating loss of ($2.4M) in Q3’22.
Q3’23 net loss per share reduced approximately 72% to ($0.08) vs. ($0.29) in Q3’22.
CEO Commentary
BIO-key CEO, Mike DePasquale commented, “Our Q3 performance reflects continued progress driving revenue growth and reducing expenses to move our business toward sustained profitability. These trends are also reflected in our nine-month results, with revenues up approximately 30% to $6.8M and our operating loss reduced by over 50%.

“We are pleased to report that our sales team has developed a significant pipeline of larger customer opportunities interested in the savings and superior user experience of our phoneless, tokenless, passwordless authentication. Our team is focused on those opportunities with the greatest potential for generating meaningful Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR). Our Channel Alliance Partner (CAP) program continues to build both its geographic scope and its sales productivity. These channels have enabled us to build our ARR to approximately $7M per year, providing a solid base on which to layer new SaaS deployments around the globe, through new customer wins and the expanded penetration of existing customer accounts.

Outlook
“We believe BIO-key is well positioned to deliver solid top-line and bottom-line improvements going forward. This view is based on the very attractive value proposition of our secure, convenient, scalable and cost-efficient solutions incorporating the industry’s widest array of multi-factor authentication methods, including our identity-bound biometric solutions. With greater cyber-insurer scrutiny and the recent SEC regulation requiring companies to report on their cybersecurity measures beginning in mid-December, we expect that most sizeable companies will be implementing multi-factor authentication throughout their workforce. We believe the market is ripe for a phoneless, tokenless passwordless FIDO passkey authentication option for manufacturing, retail, call center, and other roving workforces. Historically, Q4 tends to be one of our strongest quarters each year in terms of business volume, and we are confident about our prospects for continued growth and improved bottom line performance in 2024.

“Supporting our near-term outlook is a significant recent commitment from a long-standing international defense ministry customer, for additional software and hardware to support their expanded rollout of our biometric authentication solution. To support our working capital requirements, we are working to convert certain inventories into cash while also pursuing operating expense reduction opportunities, including relocating our headquarters, to accelerate our path to cash flow breakeven.”

Financial Results
Please note that the review of our Q3 FY2023 financial statements has not been completed by our independent registered public accounting firm as of the date of this press release and are therefore subject to change.

Q3’23 revenues rose 33% to $1.8M, reflecting increased services, software license and hardware revenue versus Q3’22. Q3’23 service revenue was driven by custom service installations for new and existing customer deployments and upgrades, and hardware revenue reflected new contact activity as well as progress in reducing hardware inventories. For the first nine months of 2023, total revenues rose 30% to $6.8M compared to $5.3M for the first nine months of 2022, reflecting growth in service and license revenue and a decline in hardware revenue.

Gross profit grew 43% to $1.4M in Q3’23 from $1.0M in Q3’22, reflecting an increase in gross margin to 77% from 71% in Q3’22. Gross profit and gross margin benefitted from a year-over-year increase in higher margin services and software license revenue and a decrease in third-party software costs, principally due to the seasonal, vacation-related slowdown in Q3 business activity in Europe.

Q3’23 operating expenses decreased 36% to $2.2 million from $3.3 million in Q3’22, due primarily to lower selling, general and administrative expenses reflecting progress in BIO-key’s expense reduction initiatives as well as lower research and development investments. BIO-key continues to seek expense reduction opportunities to further benefit its operating results.

Reflecting higher gross profit and lower operating costs, BIO-key trimmed its Q3’23 net loss to $749,000, as compared to $2.4M in Q3’22. Similarly, for the first nine months of 2023 compared to 2022, the Company reduced its year-to-date 2023 net loss to $2.5M from a net loss of $5.1M.

At September 30, 2023, BIO-key had current assets of $7.9M, including $0.3M of cash and cash equivalents, $2.9M of accounts receivable, and $4.3M of inventory.