VNET Group (VNET) Q1 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

For the period ending March 31, 2023

May 24, 2023 9:00 p.m. ET

Prepared Remarks

Questions and Answers

Call Participants

Prepared Remarks:

Operator

Hello, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by for First Quarter 2023 Earnings Conference Call for VNET Group Inc. [Operator Instructions]. Participants from our management include Mr. Jeff Dong, Chief Executive Officer; Mr. Tim Chen, Chief Financial Officer; and Ms. Xinyuan Liu, Investor Relations Director of the company. Please note that today's conference call is being recorded. I would now like to turn the call over to the first speaker today, Ms. Xinyuan Liu. Please go ahead.

Xinyuan Liu

Thank you, operator. Hello, everyone, and welcome to our first quarter 2023 earnings conference call. Our earnings release was distributed earlier today, and you can find a copy on our website, as well as on Newswire services. Please note that the discussion today will contain forward-looking statements made under the Safe Harbor provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from our current expectations. For detailed discussions of these risks and uncertainties, please refer to our latest annual report and other documents filed with the SEC. VNET does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements, except as required under applicable laws.

Please also note that VNET's earnings press release and this conference call include the disclosure of unaudited GAAP financial matters as well as audited non-GAAP financial matters. VNET's earnings press release contains a reconciliation of the unaudited non-GAAP measures to the audited GAAP matters. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. In addition, a webcast of this conference call will also be available on our website at ir.vnet.com.

I will now turn the call over to our CEO, Jeff.

Jeff Dong

Thank you, Xinyuan. Good morning, and good evening, everyone. Thank you for joining our call today. I will start with an overview of our first quarter results. After that, I will turn the call over to Tim, our CFO, who will discuss our financial results and outlook in more detail.

We got off to a great start in 2023 with a solid first quarter performance, thanks to our effective dual core growth strategy and competitive service offerings. In the first quarter, we officially ended 1,300 utilized cabinets, growing our overall utilization rate to 56.5% from 55% last quarter. Total companies under management reached 87,310 by the end of the first quarter compared with approximately 78,960 1 year ago.