Duos Technologies Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:DUOT) Q1 2023 Earnings Conference Call May 15, 2023 4:30 PM ET

Company Participants

Chuck Ferry - CEO & Director

Andrew Murphy - CFO

Conference Call Participants

Michael Latimore - Northland Capital Markets

Edward Woo - Ascendiant Capital

Operator

Good afternoon. Welcome to Duos Technologies First Quarter 2023 Earnings Conference Call. Joining us for today's call are Duos' CEO, Chuck Ferry, and CFO, Andrew Murphy. Following their remarks, we will open the line for your questions. Then, before we conclude today's call, I'll provide the necessary cautions regarding the forward-looking statements made by management during this call.

Now, I'd like to turn the call over to Duos’ CEO, Chuck Ferry. Sir, please proceed.

Chuck Ferry

Welcome, everyone, and thank you for joining us. Earlier today, we issued a press release announcing our financial results for the first quarter as well as other operational highlights. A copy of the press release is available in the Investor Relations section of our website. I encourage all listeners to view that release as well as our 10-Q filing with the SEC to better understand some of the details we'll be discussing during our call.

Now, let's get started. We began the year building on the significant momentum we've generated over the past several quarters which has us on track to deliver on our financial and operational goals for 2023. In the first quarter, we increased revenues 84% to $2.64 million and gross margin 142% to $537,000. Additionally, over the last 12 months we've generated approximately $16.2 million in revenues underscoring our ability to deliver long-term performance over a sustained period and outside of quarterly fluctuations. Growth during the time has come from a diversified pool of new customer contracts, add-on sales to existing agreements, and an increasing stream of recurring revenues as we expand our customer base as well as the breadth of our artificial intelligence offerings. By the end of this year, we expect to have more than 50 commercialized artificial intelligence use cases covering a wide range of railcar inspection points including several derailments specific indicators, along with newly developed AI specific to passenger rail cars.

We have also remained in active discussions with many congressional leaders, regulators, rail operators and other major stakeholders in providing support and technical information for the Rail Safety Act, which is continuing to make its way through Congress. Current versions of the bill include our technology as one of several types of wayside detection systems. While our operational roadmap is not reliant on this bill passing, we have seen increased levels of interest from a wide range of rail operators and railcar owners who are looking to accelerate their technology investments to improve safety standards.