Nanophase Technologies Corporation (PNK:NANX) Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript March 21, 2024

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Operator: Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to Nanophase Fourth Quarter 2023 Financial Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speakers’ presentation, there will be a question-and-answer session [Operator Instructions]. Please be advised that today’s conference is being recorded. The words believe, expects, anticipates, plans, forecasts and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Statements contained in this news release that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements that are made pursuant to the Safe Harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements reflect the company’s current beliefs and a number of important factors could cause actual results for future periods to differ materially from those expressed in this news release.

These important factors include, without limitation, a decision of the customer to cancel a purchase order or supply agreement, demand for and acceptance of the company’s personal care ingredients, advanced materials and formulated products, changes in development and distribution relationships, the impact of competitive products and technologies, possible disruption in commercial activities occasioned by public health issues, terrorist activity and armed conflict, and other risks indicated in the company’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Nanophase undertakes no obligation to update or revise these forward-looking statements to reflect new events or uncertainties. I would now like to hand the conference over to the President and CEO, Jess Jankowski.

Please proceed.

Jess Jankowski: Thanks for that introduction, Carmen. Good morning, to all of those listening live and welcome to those who choose to listen later online. Thanks for joining us today for a discussion of our full year 2023 results and more importantly, an update of the state of the business and our outlook for 2024. We've seen many changes over the past year and we believe we're beginning to see some of them pay off. Kevin Cureton, our Chief Operating Officer, is joining me on the call today. We have prepared comments. Then, Kevin and I will be available for some Q&A afterwards. Today, we plan on covering 2023 results, the ongoing litigation between Nanophase and BASF and critically, how we position ourselves to turn the corner to sustainability and profitability going forward.

An aerial view of an industrial complex being stocked with engineered solutions.

We'll spend the bulk of our time today talking about the future as it reflects why we're all here. In discussing this, we'll also share some of the major efforts we've made to measure and manage to our 2024 plans through KPIs and a high degree of focus on critical areas that have presented chronic problems in the past. In Q4, we added an experienced purchasing manager followed by an experienced buyer in Q1 of this year. We've seen the impact of our new VP of Operations supported further by our purchasing adds yield a higher degree of control and greater efficiencies in our operations. We've also just concluded an additional financing, which will give us some breathing room in terms of supporting the rapidly expanded working capital demands that our incredible growth has placed on our companies.

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