VNET Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:VNET) Q3 2023 Earnings Conference Call November 15, 2023 8:00 PM ET

Company Participants

Xinyuan Liu - IRO

Jeff Dong - CEO

Qiyu Wang - CFO

Conference Call Participants

Yang Liu - Morgan Stanley

Charlie Bai - Jefferies

Timothy Zhao - Goldman Sachs

Daley Li - Bank of America Securities

Operator

Hello, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by for standing by for the Third Quarter 2023 Earnings Conference Call for VNET Group, Inc. At this time all participants are in listen-only mode. After managements prepared remarks there’ll be a question and answer session. Participants from our management include Mr. Jeff Dong, Chief Executive Officer; Mr. Qiyu Wang, Chief Financial Officer; Mr. Tim Chen, Chief Strategy Officer; and Ms. Xinyuan Liu, Investor Relations Director of the company. Please note that today's conference call is being recorded.

I'd 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 third 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, today's call 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, we announced earnings press release and this conference call include the disclosure of audited GAAP and non-GAAP financial matters. VNET's earnings press release contains a reconciliation of the audited non-GAAP measures to the unaudited GAAP measures. 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'd like to start with the overview of our third quarter performance. Our solid growth in the third quarter reflects our continued focus on high-quality business opportunities. Cabinet deliveries are progressing smoothly, by the end of the quarter, we had grown our total cabinets under management to approximately 88,900 compared with approximately 82,660 a year ago. The number of utilized cabinets increased by 1,092 to 52,408 in the third quarter, driving our overall utilization rate to 59%. Furthermore, our retail MRR per cabinet during the quarter stayed high at RMB9,495.