Velodyne Lidar Announces Inaugural Public-Company Third Quarter 2020 Results

  • Completed business combination with Graf Industrial Corp. on September 29, 2020, and started trading on Nasdaq
  • Grew revenue 137% year-over-year to $32.1 million
  • Signed six (6) multi-year agreements during the quarter and now count 24 total contracts
  • Initiated commercial shipments of Velarrays – our next-generation, compact lidar product with best-in-class range and resolution
  • Finished the quarter with $298 million of cash
  • Continued to build upon #1 position in lidar as evidenced by our shipment of 47,500 sensors to date for cumulative revenue of over $650 million


Velodyne Lidar (NASDAQ: VLDR, VLDRW), the global leader in lidar technology, today announced financial results for its third quarter ended September 30, 2020.

Dr. Anand Gopalan commented, “We are pleased to present our third quarter results for the first time as a public company. We are also excited about the continued strength we see in the overall lidar markets. Despite the continued impacts of COVID-19, we see growing interest in lidar applications across multiple industries, as evidenced by our accelerating commercial success across all of our focused markets. In this environment, Velodyne continues to demonstrate its leadership as the only at-scale lidar player, through strong technical and business execution.”


Third Quarter 2020 Financial Highlights

  • Revenue: Total revenue of $32.1 million represents a 137% increase year-over-year. Product revenue was $26.1 million in the quarter versus $11.7 million in Q3 2019, and License and Services revenue was $6.0 million, up from $1.8 million in Q3 2019.
  • Units and ASPs: We shipped 2,235 sensor units with a weighted average selling price (ASP) of approximately $5,600. We continue to build out our portfolio of sensor products at different price points that meet many industries’ needs, including those with lower-price application entry points.
  • Agreements: Total active multi-year agreements increased to 24 during the quarter.
  • Pipeline Strength: At the end of the quarter, we are tracking 175 pipeline projects across 25+ industries, representing a 34% increase over 131 projects at the end of 2019.
  • Gross Profit: GAAP and non-GAAP gross profit totaled $15.0 million compared to a third quarter 2019 gross profit of $1.1 million. Previous public guidance reflected a third quarter benefit from a one-time $11 million stocking fee, which positively impacted gross profit.
  • Net Loss and EPS: GAAP net loss was $5.3 million and non-GAAP net loss was $9.1 million. Accordingly, GAAP loss per share was $0.04 and non-GAAP loss per share was $0.06.
  • Shares Outstanding: EPS for the third quarter is calculated using weighted average shares outstanding of 140.5 million. As of September 30, actual shares outstanding were 168.7 million.
  • Liquidity: Cash of $298 million was on the balance sheet at the end of the third quarter.


Third Quarter 2020 Business Highlights

  • Consummated business combination with Graf Industrial Corp. and began trading on Nasdaq under the tickers VLDR (common stock) and VLDRW (public warrants) on September 30, 2020
  • Awarded six new agreements with diverse applications among each of our three focused market segments – moving people, moving goods, security and smart cities
  • Ongoing activities with our 300+ customers, which include nearly all the leading global automotive manufacturers and technology companies
  • Successfully defended patents with Hesai and RoboSense by entering into recurring global licensing payment agreements
  • Announced a three-year sales agreement with Baidu for our Alpha Prime lidar sensors


Financial Outlook

Velodyne is pleased to reiterate the guidance shared in early September as part of our business combination with Graf Industrial Corp.

  • For the full year 2020, we expect total revenue of approximately $101 million, as previously forecasted.
  • We expect the full year GAAP gross margin, including approximately $7.5 million of stock-based compensation, in the range of 22.6% to 25.6% and the non-GAAP gross margin to be approximately 30% to 33%.
  • For the full year, GAAP operating loss is expected to total between $208 million and $205 million. Non-GAAP operating loss is expected in the range of $67 million to $64 million for the full year of 2020. The primary difference between GAAP and Non-GAAP operating loss is the amortization of stock-based compensation equaling approximately $142 million. Stock-based compensation is calculated using the closing common share price for VLDR on October 30, 2020, which was $12.20. The charge for each employee equity incentive is based on the actual day that the incentives vest.
  • Given our business combination, we estimate fourth quarter actual and fiscal year weighted average shares outstanding of approximately 175.4 million and 148.5 million, respectively.
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