Enghouse Systems Q3 2026 Earnings Report

Enghouse Systems EPS Results

• Actual EPS: C$0.28
• Consensus EPS: N/A
• Beat/Miss: N/A
• One Year Ago EPS: N/A

Enghouse Systems Revenue Results

• Actual Revenue: $117.58 million
• Expected Revenue: N/A
• Beat/Miss: N/A
• YoY Revenue Growth: N/A

Enghouse Systems Announcement Details

• Quarter: Q3 2026
• Date: 9/10/2026
• Time: After Market Closes
• Conference Call Date: Friday, September 11, 2026
• Conference Call Time: 8:45AM ET

Enghouse Systems (TSE:ENGH) is a Canadian publicly traded company (TSX: ENGH) that provides mission-critical vertically focused enterprise software solutions. Our core technologies are used for contact centers, video communications, virtual healthcare, education, telecommunications, networks, IPTV, public safety and transit. The Company's two-pronged strategy to grow earnings focuses on both organic growth and acquisitions, which, to date, have been funded through net cash provided by operating activities as the Company has no external debt financing. The Company is organized around two business segments, the Interactive Management Group ("IMG") and the Asset Management Group ("AMG") due to their unique customer segments and technology offerings.

Enghouse Systems Q3 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

Key Takeaways

• Neutral Sentiment: Revenue improved sequentially to CAD 117.6 million from CAD 114.3 million in Q2, but remained below the prior-year CAD 125.6 million; recurring revenue was stable at approximately 69.5% of total revenue.
• Positive Sentiment: Cost reductions and restructuring lifted adjusted EBITDA to CAD 30.8 million, with the margin increasing to 26.2%. Management expects further benefits as the CAD 4.6 million restructuring program, focused largely on R&D, phases in, although it views mid-20% margins as more realistic than a return to the high 20s.
• Positive Sentiment: Enghouse generated CAD 28.4 million of operating cash flow before working-capital changes and taxes, held CAD 267.8 million in cash and short-term investments with no external debt, and returned capital through dividends and CAD 7.5 million of share repurchases.
• Negative Sentiment: Management said customer demand remains cautious, with no clear market normalization; churn has moderated but persists, particularly in challenging video and contact-center markets, while aggressive pricing from financially distressed competitors continues to pressure growth.
• Neutral Sentiment: AI activity is increasing internally and in customer discussions, but management said monetization remains limited and many proof-of-concept projects do not yet generate attractive returns. No acquisitions were completed in the quarter as Enghouse continues to assess a sizable pipeline cautiously, citing elevated risks and private-market valuations.

Presentation

[Operator]

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Enghouse Q3 2026 conference call. At this time, all lines are in a listen-only mode. Following the presentation, we will conduct a question and answer session. If at any time during this call you require immediate assistance, please press star zero for the operator. This call is being recorded on Friday, September 11, 2026. I would now like to turn the conference over to Stephen Sadler. Please go ahead.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Good morning, everybody. I am here today with Todd May, VP and Legal Counsel, Vinh Lien, VP, Finance and Accounting, and Rob Medved, Chief Financial Officer, is also on the call, but he is actually in Croatia. This will be Rob's last conference call for Enghouse as he moves to a new adventure. Before we begin, I will have Todd read our forward disclaimer.

[Todd May, VP and Legal Counsel at Enghouse]

Certain statements made may be forward-looking. By their nature, such forward-looking statements are subject to various risks and uncertainties, including those in Enghouse's continuous disclosure filings, such as its AIF, which could cause the company's actual results and experience to differ materially from anticipated results or other expectations. Undue reliance should not be placed on forward-looking information, and the company has no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking information, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Thanks, Todd. Rob will now give an overview of the financial and business results.

[Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse]

Thank you, Steve. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. I will begin with a review of our third quarter results and then provide some additional context around our operating performance. The third quarter reflected many of the trends we have discussed over the past several quarters. While the global business environment remains uncertain due to ongoing geopolitical tensions, evolving trade dynamics, and broader economic caution, we continue to focus on the factors within our control, serving our customers, improving operational efficiency, managing costs prudently, and generating strong cash flow. Revenue for the quarter was CAD 117.6 million, compared to CAD 114.3 million in Q2, and CAD 125.6 million in the prior year period. While revenue remains below last year's level, we were encouraged by the sequential improvement from Q2, which was driven by stronger software sales, favorable foreign exchange, and the timing of certain transactions.

[Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse]

Recurring revenue remained stable at approximately 69.5% of total revenue, continuing to provide a strong foundation for the business. One point I would emphasize this quarter is that while revenue growth remains important, our primary focus has been on profitability and operating discipline. Over the last several quarters, we have taken steps to better align our cost structure with current business activity, and we are beginning to see the benefits of those actions reflected in our financial results.

[Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse]

Operating expenses, excluding special charges, declined to CAD 45.7 million, compared to CAD 49.9 million in the prior year. While adjusted EBITDA increased to CAD 30.8 million, up from the CAD 26.5 million in Q2. EBITDA margin improved to 26.2%, compared to 23.2% in Q2 and 25.7% in the prior year quarter. These results demonstrate that our profitability initiatives are having a favorable impact on the business, despite continued revenue pressure in certain areas.

[Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse]

Results from operating activities were CAD 24.5 million compared to CAD 23.6 million in Q2, despite recording CAD 4.6 million restructuring charge during the quarter. These restructuring activities were the most significant we have undertaken this fiscal year and were done late in the quarter, so there will be further phasing of benefits. Within the Asset Management Group, revenue was CAD 53 million, compared to CAD 51.4 million in Q2 and CAD 55.9 million in the prior year quarter. Sequential improvement was driven by stronger maintenance, SaaS, and professional services revenue, along with contributions from the Sixbell acquisition. Professional services activity improved as several delayed projects moved forward during the quarter. Segment profit increased to approximately CAD 18.5 million from CAD 15.3 million in Q2, reflecting both improved revenue and continued cost discipline. Within the Interactive Management Group, revenue was CAD 64.6 million, compared to CAD 62.8 million in Q2.

[Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse]

Software sales improved from the prior quarter and recurring revenue was stable. Maintenance revenue remained below prior year levels. However, churn moderated during the quarter and renewal performance improved. Lifesize and Qumu continued to experience declines, but the magnitude of these declines has reduced compared to prior periods. Segment profit increased to approximately CAD 21.5 million compared to CAD 18.5 million in Q2. Cost reductions, particularly within R&D, helped offset ongoing pressure from recurring revenue attrition. Cash generation remains a key strength of Enghouse. We generated CAD 28.4 million of operating cash flow before changes in working capital and income taxes paid and ended the quarter with CAD 267.8 million in cash equivalents, and short-term investments while continuing to carry no external debt.

[Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse]

During the quarter, we returned capital to shareholders through CAD 16.9 million of dividends and CAD 7.5 million of share repurchases, reflecting our confidence in the long-term value of the company and the strength of our balance sheet. Subsequent to quarter end, our board declared a quarterly dividend of CAD 0.31 per common share, payable on November 27th, 2026, to shareholders of record at the close of business on November 13th, 2026.

[Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse]

This continues our longstanding commitment to returning capital to shareholders while maintaining the financial flexibility to invest in the business and pursue acquisition opportunities. Before concluding, I will briefly touch on AI. Across both IMG and Asset Management Group, our approach remains practical and customer-focused. We continue to see customer interest in AI-enabled solutions and recorded growth in AI-related activity during the quarter. Internally, we are also leveraging AI to improve productivity, accelerate development efforts, and support operational efficiency.

[Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse]

As always, our focus is on solutions that provide measurable value to customers rather than pursuing technology for its own sake. In summary, revenue improved sequentially during the quarter, and importantly, our focus on cost management and operational efficiency is beginning to translate into stronger profitability. While the external environment remains uncertain and customers continue to make purchasing decisions cautiously, Enghouse remains financially strong, highly cash generative, and disciplined in its execution. We believe these characteristics continue to position the company well, regardless of broader market conditions. Before I hand the call back, I want to thank Steve, the board, and the entire Enghouse team for the many opportunities I have been given during my time here. It has been a privilege to be part of the company, and I wish everyone at Enghouse continued success in the future. With that, I will turn the call over to Steve.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Need to speak to the moderator.

[Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse]

You want to try hanging up and go back in?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

I think we need to.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

What did they say?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

She's trying to find our moderator.

[Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse]

There, folks, you are back.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Are we back?

[Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse]

Yes, you are, Steve. Looks like we had a bit of technical difficulties.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

That is good. Okay. I think Rob was just going to hand it over to me.

[Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse]

Correct, Steve. I did.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Okay. Well, thanks, Rob. At least we know there was not anything from Russia or something over there in Croatia doing damage to us because we still hear you. So that is good. As noted in our last conference call, the markets which we operate in continue to be challenging. With respect to AI, which Rob mentioned, although there is a lot of interest and promotion by major AI players, it continues to be difficult to monetize AI investment in our markets. We continue to explore and use AI leading models for internal productivity and building practical solutions which provide a return on our investments.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Monetizing AI with customers, like the many solutions noted in our last quarterly call, continue to improve to benefit both ourselves and our customers. With respect to capital deployment, there has not been much change since the last quarter. We continue to investigate a lot of opportunities in the private and public markets in our business sectors and continue to find that private market valuations are smaller, but also are at a premium to public market valuations. Although we investigated a number of opportunities, no new acquisitions were completed in the quarter. We continued to purchase our own Enghouse shares using our internal generated funds under the TSX defined normal course issuer bid. We believe the purchase of our own shares is a good use of our funds and better value in many cases than the acquisition opportunities that we are seeing, especially in the private markets.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

I would now like to open the call to questions.

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question-and-answer session. If you would like to ask phone questions, you will need to press star one on your telephone keypad. Again, that will be star, then the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, just press star, then the number two. We have your first question, comes from Erin Kyle from CIBC. Please go ahead.

[Erin Kyle, Analyst at CIBC Capital Markets]

Hi. Good morning. Thanks for taking the questions. Maybe just to start with the demand environment. SaaS and maintenance revenue increased sequentially this quarter, which was good to see. We have talked about cautious customer spending for a few cycles now. Just wondering if you are starting to see any signs there of normalization or stabilization. I believe Rob mentioned some churn moderated in the quarter and some renewals improved. Maybe if you can just expand on what you have been seeing there.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Yeah, I would say, Erin, it's about the same as it has been in the past. Our quarters can vary a little bit up or down. I do not really see any big improvement at this stage in the marketplace. It is like it has been for the last few quarters.

[Erin Kyle, Analyst at CIBC Capital Markets]

Okay. Thanks, Steve. Then maybe just on the profitability side. Good to see the EBITDA margin in the quarter as well. You have been taking cost actions for several quarters now. Just on that, do you think there is still meaningful efficiency opportunities remaining, or are we starting to approach a point where future margin gains will require revenue growth to achieve them?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Yeah, I am not sure the revenue growth is the answer for margin gains because it is a tough market. As you probably know, some of our major competitors are in a difficult financial situation. So they are keeping margins down, trying to get some revenue, basically to survive. These are pretty large competitors, with CAD 1 billion+ in revenue. So I do not see the cost reductions improving margins that way. Internally, as Rob mentioned, we did some of the restructuring that you see in the quarter right at the end of the quarter. So that will benefit future quarters.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

It did not really benefit this quarter. It takes time because you give notice periods, then you talk to people. It is unfortunate that we have to do that, but that is just the way the market is today, and we match cost to revenue, so we continue to do so.

[Erin Kyle, Analyst at CIBC Capital Markets]

Thank you. That is helpful. Maybe just one last one on the leadership changes. Congratulations to Rob and Vinh on the promotion here. Just on authority and any changes regarding acquisition evaluation, financial oversight, how are you thinking about Vinh's promotion here to Vice President, Finance and the M&A evaluation team?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Yeah. The acquisition teams are both the same. They are working hard on many opportunities, but the environment is quite difficult. One, because there is a lot of risk, so you have to be careful what you buy, so you do not buy something that is not going to produce the return that we have committed for shareholders on our website and elsewhere. We have a high return on investment, generally at 20% or higher. We will continue to do that.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

We are not trying to rush to make the revenue look better by buying things that will not give us the return that we need. But there are a lot of opportunities out there. It is probably a more difficult environment than people understand, especially for the medium and smaller-sized companies. And larger companies are having difficulties as well, and it is showing up somewhat in their marketplace, but they are very large, which increases the risk. You do not want to do a large error. You would like to do at least a medium or a smaller error. So we are very conscious of that. We try to avoid mistakes, shall we say.

[Erin Kyle, Analyst at CIBC Capital Markets]

Thanks, Steve. I will pass the line.

[Operator]

Your next question comes from Kevin McVeigh from UBS. Please go ahead.

[Kevin McVeigh, Analyst at UBS]

Great. Thanks so much, and good morning.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Morning

[Kevin McVeigh, Analyst at UBS]

Good to see some of the cost adjustments. Good morning. Good to see the cost adjustments. I wonder, can you help us understand where are you in that journey? Is there any way to think about what the business is sized for from a revenue perspective in terms of, is the adjustment factor the new normal? I guess, how are you thinking about those cost adjustments and should we see some more?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

We really always have taken the approach, we match costs to revenue. Unfortunately, as you noted, our revenue over several quarters, it happens to be up this quarter over last quarter. We had projected before that our margin dropped last quarter, and we had to get it back to what we see as more normal, which is at the 25% EBITDA level. To answer your question, it depends what happens in the marketplace. We do match cost to revenue and hopefully the revenue has stabilized and can grow, but it may not have. It's a difficult market for us right now in all the markets. The contact center market is generally difficult. Again, some think it's AI. It's really not AI causing a lot of it.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

What's causing it is major, I mean, billion-dollar contact center solution providers hit receivership or being taken over by creditors. They're pretty desperate, and that makes it tough on a market to compete against, because they have to get the revenue to keep going. They probably are doing it still at a loss. We are profitable. We tend not to jump into that game just to get the revenue higher and lose or have less profitability. We manage to profitability, not to revenue.

[Kevin McVeigh, Analyst at UBS]

That's helpful. Steve, I wonder, could you give us a sense, AI as a percentage of your revenue? One of the things we're kind of focused on is we're more than one year into this AI journey, and the clients haven't changed the behavior, and will likely, probably aren't going to change nearly as much as what the sector's discounting. If you think about that thought process, is there anything from a client perspective that gives you more confidence? Because I happen to agree with you that I don't think it's going to be nearly as meaningful as what the stocks are discounting.

[Kevin McVeigh, Analyst at UBS]

But any thoughts as to goalposts you can point to, whether it's renewals or just, again, as these competitors go through the adjustment process on the receivership, any sense of when we start to come out of this malaise, I guess, for lack of a better word?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

I think there's lots of different views on that. I might have a contrary view to some of the others because there's a lot of promotion of AI, but not a lot of results except for the platforms where everyone's experimenting, doing proof of concepts. Studies that I've seen show these proof of concepts rarely provide a return on investment. The number I saw from an MIT study was 95% do not add any value at this point in time. But we're new in the game, so you've got to be in the game. You got to play. You got to keep trying things because you never know when you've hit a very good one. But right now, AI is just like all technology in the past. It used to be in the cloud was a technology.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Technology is a history of coming out with new things, and it takes some time for them to produce results, and you've got to keep experimenting a little bit until you find the right path forward. So right now, internally, we're using it. It's providing some help in getting our costs down, for sure. I'm sure that's the same with customers. But putting it in a product that a customer buys, not so much. We don't see that yet.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

We still experiment with it, but customers generally will do their own or try their own, and again, most of them aren't producing results in enterprises. It's quite different in different markets. If you're in the film industry and you can use AI to automate images, et cetera, that's probably quite good. If you're in retail, it's probably quite good but in the areas that we're in, it's still challenging, but there's potential there, and therefore, we got to keep up with it.

[Kevin McVeigh, Analyst at UBS]

That makes a lot of sense. One more from me, if I could. It was great to see that the previously delayed professional services re-engage. As we think about that as a proxy for future revenue, where does that surface on the income statement in terms of lines of revenues that professional services starts to. Obviously, it sounds like that occurred in the quarter. Where will we see the transition to other parts of the revenue stream?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

It's interesting. The professional services can be seasonal. We have a fair bit of our business in Europe. They take a lot of time off in the summer, a lot more than the Americans do. So professional services drop sometimes down a little bit then. But on the other hand, as you go to SaaS and you go in the cloud, it's more of a standard system. You're not customizing as much as when it was on-prem for a particular customer. So professional services, generally in a cloud environment, will decline. So we've gone through a lot of that already because we have just under 70% of our re-

[Kevin McVeigh, Analyst at UBS]

Thanks.

[Operator]

Hello, presenters, you have now connected.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Hello. Are we back?

[Operator]

Yes.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Okay. Well, technology's interesting. Let's go back to the questions. I guess that's why you got to be careful on all automated technology taking over everything, because sometimes it doesn't work very well. Question?

[Operator]

Your next question comes from Steven Lin. Please go ahead.

[Steven Lin, Analyst at Stifel]

Hi. Good morning. Could you hear me okay?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Yep, you are good. I hope we stay good.

[Steven Lin, Analyst at Stifel]

Okay, perfect. Thank you very much. Thanks for taking the questions. Maybe start off with, could you help us unpack the churn picture a bit? How much of churn is still coming from acquired business, like Lifesize, versus your existing customer base? Are you seeing any signs of stabilization in either buckets? A quick one on AI front. You guys just set up dedicated AI groups in both IMG and Asset Management Group earlier this year. Just wondering, how are the conversations going, how customer engagement is tracking, and whether some AI offering in the pipeline coming up.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

I think you have asked too many questions for me to remember them all.

[Steven Lin, Analyst at Stifel]

Sorry.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Churn in general is still an issue. Again, some of it comes from acquisitions, some of it is just general in the marketplace. Remember what I said is major competitors, like billion-dollar revenue, especially in the IMG market, which is our contact center market, are in difficulty. Think of a retail store that gets in difficulty. They start lowering all prices, and that attracts some customers, but there is risk involved in going with a company like that. It gets them to think about what they are doing. So churn is continuing. It is still there. It is a little lower. When you say from the acquisitions, we are mostly built by acquisitions, so everything sort of was an acquisition at one time for the last 10 years. Again, some of it, especially video, is still part of our IMG group, and it is a tough market right now.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

It continues like it was. It is a little bit better, but I would not say it has improved drastically.

[Steven Lin, Analyst at Stifel]

All right. Appreciate the color on that. Then just the second part to the question will be on the AI front, on just how are conversations happening with customers, and how is customer engagement tracking?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

We have two groups, one in AMG and one in IMG that do AI. We have got some projects. We had an interesting one that we have gotten in the quarter, but it is all small. It is nowhere near the promotion that you see in the marketplace. They are not all rushing to it. It is hard to get a return, and the token costs have gone up, or the usage of it has gone up, and they are eating through their budgets pretty quick doing some of these proofs of concepts. We find it interesting. We find it helps internally for us, because we try and do practical solutions, but we do not see a huge uptake in our customer base.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

That could be the areas we are in. It does not mean it is not happening in films or in other places, but in our products, we do not see a huge update. That could change in the future, so you have to be in the game and you have to understand how to do it so you can react to things as they change. Every day, I heard somewhere today that everyone is going to be eliminated totally in two years. I just do not see it. Maybe I am missing something. But I heard that about driverless cars 10 years ago, and I still am looking out the window right now. I do not see any on the road.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

There are some somewhere, but they are not on the road here in Toronto where I am. Maybe they are on the road in Croatia where Rob Medved is. I have no idea. But it is something you are going to be in. Everyone is talking about it. But monetizing it, unless you are a platform or a chip maker, is still difficult as far as we can tell, in the areas that we are in.

[Steven Lin, Analyst at Stifel]

Appreciate the color. I guess switching gears a little bit, besides the private market valuations at a premium to public factor that you mentioned earlier, wondering any other constraint on the pace of deals, and then how would you characterize the current M&A pipeline?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

The M&A pipeline is quite large. We have a lot of activity going on. We do take risk into consideration, and just think of all what you said on AI. Are they going to be disruptive in some of the areas that we are looking at? So it takes a little more thinking and a little more due diligence to make sure we do not do a bad deal. We have always take pride in the fact we have generally done good deals, and since got a return for our investors. So there is actually more opportunities than usual, but there is more risk, for all the reasons that we have talked about on the call today, than usual as well. So we are trying to avoid a mistake, but there is lots of opportunities. We should be doing more.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

The private companies are smaller, which less risk when you are smaller, you can make a mistake, it is not a huge one. The public companies are huge and bigger, but they are having trouble, mainly because of the public markets, and no one is willing to put new money. If you are not making money and you have debt, to get new money in the markets we are in is very difficult. So we are in quite a good position because of our financial resources. But it makes the market tough to get new business because others who are more desperate will lower prices because they have to get some revenue in to support the cost that they have.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

We tend to take the other approach of, rather than rushing to take revenue that will hurt us maybe in the long run, we have taken our cost down to match to the revenue that we have and are going to have.

[Steven Lin, Analyst at Stifel]

Mm-hmm. Thank you. Just final one from me on the restructuring charges. That took a very sizable CAD 4.6 million this quarter. It seems like toward the end of the quarter. Maybe you could give us some color, like more detail on where the cost cuts are being made, and then whether from a margin perspective, there is room to further improve and rightsize, and then put the margins further.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Okay. They are made in various areas. Of course, as our customer support and our revenue drops, we match to it. We generally have not taken out much cost in sales, because we are trying to improve that area. Where we have taken out more costs in that number is in R&D. We have some older products where we are trying to concentrate more in our go-forward products versus our regional products that we have had for quite a time. They are good products. They still work, but we do not have to develop a lot of things new there because the customers are happy with what they have. In the last reduction, which was done towards the end of July, you will find our R&D, which is nearly 20% of our revenue, that is quite high for the industry. We did some reductions in that area.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

That was the majority of where the cost reduction came from. I could say, like many others, "AI, hey, we are using it." That is not true, though, so I do not do that. It is generally we had to fine-tune that, looking at putting more emphasis on our go-forward products and our more regional products that we have had for some time. We still want to make sure we give good service to the customers, but we are not doing a lot of new things in them except for new products that we are tying to the platforms that we have.

[Steven Lin, Analyst at Stifel]

Thank you very much. I will pass the line.

[Operator]

Again, if you would like to ask a question, please press star then the number one on your telephone keypad. For your next question from David Kwan from TD Cowen. Please go ahead.

[David Kwan, Analyst at TD Cowen]

Thanks. Steve, you mentioned, or I think Rob did too, mentioned that the restructuring happened late in the quarter, so there was modest benefit to margins this in Q3. Should we expect margins to improve from these levels in Q4 and into 2027?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

When you talk about margins, I think about it differently. There is a cost of revenue. We are working to improve that to make that better. A lot of people who have gone into the cloud use a lot of third-party products and have a high cost of revenue, much higher than when it was on-prem. So we have worked on that side. That is what we see as margin. And then below, to get to EBITDA, you have all your costs of professional services, you got your costs of sales, you got financial costs, et cetera. We trim those back, again, to match to the revenue that we have. We constantly look at doing this. Although you say there is costs at the end of the quarter, we still have people who, especially in Europe, have to work out their notice period.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

So again, it takes a little bit of time. You will see some of the savings this quarter and next quarter because some notice periods are quite long. We do not just take all that cost and do it right away. We finish our projects we are working on, especially in R&D. Again, we hope to see some savings, and hopefully our revenue does not go down to cause more issues in that area. It is a tough environment, and again, if you knew some of the major, if you look at, let us say, the IMG side, contact center side, big billion-dollar companies are in financial difficulty, and so they are hustling to do something.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Again, it is hard to get money because investors are not investing in that because of the promotion and image that AI may take it all over. We do not see that, but one never knows. You got to make sure you are prepared for anything that can come up when technology is at stake, because it changes quickly, and you got to be ready for it.

[David Kwan, Analyst at TD Cowen]

Do you think that getting margins back into the high 20s is realistic, or are you kind of targeting something around the current levels in the mid-20s?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

I would say mid-20s is more realistic now. Again, for the very comments I just made, the competition are being active because they have issues. Their issues is they cannot really get more financial resources easily. The marketplace is not rewarding the area, so if you have debt and you are not making money, you have got a problem. Fortunately, we have cash, and we make money. So we do not have that problem, but I do not want to have that problem. In other words, we got to keep watching and matching our cost to revenue. It is still a tough market. There is no doubt about it.

[David Kwan, Analyst at TD Cowen]

That's helpful. Do you expect any more material restructuring in Q4? Is what happened at the end of July kind of the big restructuring work for now?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

We're hoping the July one has helped us going forward and has done what we need to do. But again, it depends on the market, the revenue, and all the things that are happening out there these days. We match cost to revenue. I'm hoping that's done. But if it isn't done, we may have to look at some more. We don't try and keep doing it. In other words, we tried to do it once, and again, a lot of it was in the R&D side, which we hadn't done for quite a while. If you look at the competition, you'll see they can run around 12%-13% of revenue for their R&D expense. We're closer to 20%, 19%, so we're a little high.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Some of that we should be a little higher because we have different solutions in different geographical regions, but we're a little bit too high. So we've started to say, "Okay, it's time to fix some of that." Again, obviously, spending that extra money wasn't getting us the extra revenue. So it's a matching of cost and revenue, and no one likes to do it, but that's what we have to do, and we don't want to be in the position of some of our major suppliers. You can talk Avaya, you can talk Mitel. They all have some difficulties. We've seen quite a few more, even CAD 200 million-CAD 300 million companies, especially in the contact center market, for whatever reason. It's a more mature market. But also, if you look at the telcos, that's our Interactive Management Group or networks area. Think of Bell. Think of Telus Corporation.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Look how they're doing. That's pretty standard we're seeing in that market as well. So we've got a bit of a perfect storm against us. We have to manage for that, and we expect we'll come out ahead of the game, but it'll take a little bit of time.

[David Kwan, Analyst at TD Cowen]

That's helpful. Just two more questions. One, I think last quarter, you alluded to some deals that might have been delayed there. Did this quarter benefit from some of those slipped deals and maybe help lead to that sequential improvement in revenue?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

I usually don't talk about slipped deals because then I find they slip forever. In other words, they slip, but then they come in, and new ones slip. I really think we've done pretty well on the revenue growing over last quarter. I'm not sure where that goes forward because, again, the competition have difficulties, and they're making how much margin decline do you want to take to get revenue versus make money on the bottom line? That's something we have to deal with every day.

[David Kwan, Analyst at TD Cowen]

Thanks. One last question, just on cap allocation in the balance sheet. I was wondering how much cash do you think is enough to fund the business and provide enough flexibility to fund acquisitions should things kind of turn around here? I'm just trying to get a better sense of when you might look to redeploy your cash in a more significant way, like a special dividend or an SAB, given the tougher M&A environment. Just looking back, what, I think it was roughly five years ago, when you paid the special dividend, you had less cash than you have right now. So why not maybe pay a special dividend or maybe do an SAB, especially given where the valuation is right now, kind of multi-year lows?

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Our dividend's actually quite high right now, not because of the absolute CAD dollar of the dividend, but because our stock price went down. We're at 7%. What other tech companies out there are paying 7%, 8% dividends? I'm hoping that we can improve the stock price. I don't think we have to improve really the dividend. We actually put a smaller dividend increase in this year to do buybacks instead, because quite frankly, our stock price, in our opinion, is a good investment right now. It hasn't been like this for 10 years+. Because we're in the public markets, but it's probably better than some of the acquisitions we're looking at currently. But these things change pretty quickly. There's lots of criticisms you can do, but I criticize that we aren't doing enough deals.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

I think there are deals out there that are good value, and it comes down to if they are larger ones, do I want to accept that risk? It is tough in this market. Everyone thinks contact centers are going to be eliminated, I have heard, in one year. Well, that didn't happen because they said that a year ago. Then I have heard, well, three years, five years. I think AI, in particular, helps make the contact centers more productive and more responsive, but you are going to need both. You are going to need humans, and you are going to need better technology to help do contact centers. Remember, a contact center is not inbound, it is also outbound. We do both. We actually call it internally communication centers because we do both in and outbound. But there are challenges there for sure.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Some of it is theoretical challenges, and some of it are real, and sometimes you cannot tell the difference what is theoretical and could become real, or is it really real? Is it really happening? I think more and more people seeing AI, and always as being technologies, help do better things and give better service. That is how we see it. We see AI with humans, I guess you will say, working together to provide better service to customers, and that is how we are approaching it right now.

[David Kwan, Analyst at TD Cowen]

That is right. Thanks, and good luck, Rob.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Thank you.

[Operator]

There are no further questions. I'll turn the call back over to Stephen.

[Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse]

Well, thank you everybody. I know these are interesting times, to say the least. Sorry for the interruptions. Again, with technology, sometimes you get them with calls. But thank you for attending the call and your continued support. We understand a little bit of patience is hard to do sometimes, but we're hopefully will prove to be the right thing for you to do. Enghouse has a good positive cash flow and overall a strong debt-free financial position. This is very good in this marketplace. We just need a little more visibility and certainty of where it's all going. We look forward to our year-end conference call in December. Thank you for attending.

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.

Participants

Analysts

• Stephen Sadler, Chairman and CEO at Enghouse
• Todd May, VP and Legal Counsel at Enghouse
• Rob Medved, CFO at Enghouse
• Erin Kyle, Analyst at CIBC Capital Markets
• Kevin McVeigh, Analyst at UBS
• Steven Lin, Analyst at Stifel
• David Kwan, Analyst at TD Cowen