November 2019 Company Newsletter

Note from the Communications Committee: We are looking for additional support in improving communication at Visible Alpha. This newsletter is a great step in the right direction, but there is more we can do with your help! Email [email protected] to learn how to get involved.

Metrics

For all financial metrics, check out the Finance Intranet page >

Five Largest Clients by Total ACV

• Point72 — $1,924,000 (9.11% of Total ACV)
• Millennium — $1,650,000 (7.93% of Total ACV)
• The Capital Group — $1,064,400 (5.04% of Total ACV)
• Balyasny — $680,850 (3.23% of Total ACV)
• Schonfeld Strategic Advisors — $413,190 (1.96% of Total ACV)

Key Client Wins in October

• Capital Group — Insights, $764K ACV, add-on of 98 users, + Resource Tracking and other services
• Blackrock — Insights, $48K ACV, add-on of 6 users, now at 30 users
• Neuberger Berman — Insights, $58K ACV, add-on of 7 users, now at 10 users + Resource Tracking
• Schonfeld Strategic — Insights, $20K ACV, add-on of 2 users, now at 37 users + Resource Tracking
• Voya Investment Management — Insights, $100K ACV, now at 8 users and 10 corporate users + Resource tracking
• Redwood Investments — Insights, $54K ACV, 6 users

Key Contributor Additions in October

• MainFirst — signed & live for models with consensus
• Commerzbank — signed for models with consensus & research
• R5 Capital — signed for models with consensus
• Davy  — live for consensus

A full list of contributor statuses can be found on the Intranet in Contributor Relations >

Company Notes

Milestones & Achievements

New ACV record

In October, we set a new monthly record for new ACV with $1.62mm, beating out the prior record of $1.34mm in July 2019 ($1.34mm). Way to go!!!

In the News

SEC Announces Extension of Temporary Measure to Facilitate Cross-Border Implementation of the European Union’s MiFID II’s Research Provisions >

Fitbit Is Google’s Latest Stretch >

RingCentral (RNG) PT Raised to $210 at Rosenblatt on Beat and Raise Results >

Upcoming Events

• Unbundling Uncovered | Produced by Substantive Research | London | November 15
• Goldman Sachs Hedge Fund Seminar | New York | November 14
• Equity Research & Valuation Conference | Produced by The CFA Institute | New York | November 14-15
• Access & Alpha | Produced by Eagle Alpha | London | November 15

Questions about upcoming conferences? Contact Erin Gifford.

HR News

Engaging book presentation

We organized a book presentation last month on “Sapiens: A brief history of Humankind” by Afaque Zia. The presentation was filled with lucid examples and was well abstracted and narrated. The audience were thrilled and had a healthy discussion revolving around crystalizing the key takeaways, including shared fantasies, common language and our ability to organize and extrapolate their application to emerging avenues like accelerated evolution of social media, running successful political campaign and using social media.

Core Java training

We held the longest external training on Core Java for the testing team between October 14-18. Participants attended with dedication and displayed high commitment that was highly appreciated by the experienced trainer. The trainer, who has taken numerous training programs in multiple MNCs, said, “Your office environment is very open and employees have a sense of ownership for the company. This is rare in today’s scenario.”

Product & Operations

Enterprise Product

New Features and Functionality

The refresh for buy-side navigation UI is undergoing testing and scheduled to launch to clients late Q4/early Q1. The navigational refresh provides:

1. Increased content area which allows the users to see more data on the page
2. Updates default landing page to Interactions (dominant client focus)
3. Groups relative settings with content to reduce the amount of effort to complete setup and manage workflow
4. Ability to hide calendar pages at the firm level

For a sneak peek, check out this video >

Roadmap Update

Project Spark is complete! All buy side clients have transitioned to Resource Tracking version 2 as of mid-October. Congratulations to all involved on this journey.

With the completion of Spark, the Interactions (RT/INTM/RTI) team kicks off the next piece of the enterprise re-platforming project with the update to the interactions publishing module.

For more information about Enterprise, contact Lana Gemmell.

Data Operations

#vaonthenews

Do you follow #vaonthenews on Slack? Here’s a sampling of what the data ops team is working on:

How much medicine will get sold globally by the VA coverage universe? Explore this space by Amit Tarnekar. For a formal introduction to healthcare business terminologies, explore this space.

If you believe elephants can’t fly, be ready for surprises [of the earnings variety] for Novartis by Yogisha Lad and Johnson and Johnson by Vaspaan Avari.

To know how tough the telecom space is turning out to be, take some time out to visit “Chinese telecom operator network sharing strategy” by Nirav Gabani.

Whether you are a Netflix fan or not, this company’s results generate a lot of interest as one of our most covered companies, with 30+ contributors. See Netflix (NFLX) results surprise analysis by Krishna Chodavarapu.

Revisions on revisions on revisions

Revisions for covered models and company filings took up ~50% of the Data Operations effort in 2019. As we approach the 200,000 revisions mark for CY19 (185,000 as of end October), Consumers (Goods and Services) Team leads the pack with >35,000 models and filings revised this year for 800+ companies, along with Airlines, Aerospace and Engineering covering team (Team Industrials) with ~24,000 revisions across 550+ companies.

Consumers as a group approaches 1000 coverage at the end of October 2019, including Media coverage by the Telco-Media-REITs team.

For more information about Data Ops, contact Ravi Shenoy.

Clients & Contributors

Client & Contributor Updates

Scandinavia Broker Trip

Roma and Scott Rosen conducted a productive trip to Scandinavia, meeting with ABG Sundal Collier, Arctic Securities, Carnegie, Danske, DNB, Handelsbanken Nordea, Pareto and SEB. Check out the #contributorchat Slack channel for more details. 

Client & Contributor Resources

Company story: Uber Eats Away At Grubhub’s Growth & Profitability

Grubhub’s customers have become increasingly less loyal as rival services like Uber Eats, DoorDash and others aggressively compete for business with generous promotions and more restaurant selection. The company began noticing Daily Average Grubs (Orders) trending lower in August and that newly acquired customers had more “promiscuous” purchasing behavior than customers in previously established markets. Following their report, analysts drastically cut estimates for gross food sales growth and are now projecting just high single-digit growth through 2H20.For additional information on GRUB, click here >

Contributor Resources

Contributor Relations’ Intranet Page with details on contributor statuses, process overviews and email templates can be found here >

If you’re not a member already, make sure to join the Contributor Chat Slack channel for updates and news on all things sell side.

Competitor News

 In the News

• Charles Stanley selects Red Deer for MiFID II research compliance >
• Fintech aims to ‘atomise’ research >

Fun Facts

The Goldilocks Zone

Failing 15% of the time is the best way to learn, say scientists >

Random fact of the day

Space smells like seared steak. According to some former astronauts, space has a distinct odor that hangs around when they come back in the ship after a spacewalk. They’ve described it as “hot metal” or “searing steak.”