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VNet Group Inc. reported disappointing second-quarter earnings for 2025, with its earnings per share (EPS) falling short of expectations. The company posted an EPS of -$0.06, missing the forecast of $0.11, marking a negative surprise of 154.55%. Despite this, VNet exceeded revenue expectations, reporting $2.43 billion against a forecast of $2.3 billion, a 5.65% surprise. Following the announcement, VNet’s stock decreased by 3.26% in premarket trading. According to InvestingPro analysis, VNet currently appears overvalued based on its Fair Value assessment, with analysts setting price targets ranging from $5.00 to $24.21.
Key Takeaways
- VNet reported a significant EPS miss, with a negative surprise of 154.55%.
- Revenue exceeded expectations, showing a 5.65% positive surprise.
- Stock price fell 3.26% in premarket trading following the earnings release.
- Revenue growth was driven by a 22.1% year-over-year increase.
- The company raised its full-year revenue and EBITDA guidance.
Company Performance
VNet Group showed a robust year-over-year revenue growth of 22.1%, reaching RMB 2.43 billion. This growth was fueled by a substantial increase in wholesale revenues, which surged by 112.5% to RMB 854.1 million. The company’s adjusted EBITDA also improved, growing 27.7% to RMB 732.5 million, with the EBITDA margin rising to 30.1%. This performance highlights VNet’s strong operational capabilities, particularly in the rapidly evolving data center industry driven by AI demand. InvestingPro data reveals the company maintains a concerning debt-to-equity ratio of 3.88, though it holds a "Fair" overall financial health score of 2.18 out of 5.
Financial Highlights
- Revenue: RMB 2.43 billion, up 22.1% YoY
- Wholesale revenues: RMB 854.1 million, up 112.5% YoY
- Adjusted EBITDA: RMB 732.5 million, up 27.7% YoY
- Adjusted EBITDA margin: 30.1%, up 1.3 percentage points
- Adjusted cash gross margin: 43.6%, up from 39.5% last year
Earnings vs. Forecast
VNet’s EPS of -$0.06 missed the forecasted $0.11 by a substantial margin, resulting in a negative surprise of 154.55%. This miss contrasts sharply with the company’s revenue performance, which surpassed expectations by 5.65%. Historically, such a significant EPS miss could indicate underlying operational challenges or increased costs that need addressing.
Market Reaction
Following the earnings announcement, VNet’s stock experienced a 3.26% decline in premarket trading, dropping to $7.72. This reaction reflects investor concerns over the EPS miss, despite the positive revenue surprise. The stock remains significantly below its 52-week high of $16.13, indicating broader market challenges or sector-specific pressures. InvestingPro identifies VNet as a stock that generally trades with high volatility, having delivered a remarkable 320% return over the past year despite recent pressures. Subscribers can access 13 additional ProTips and comprehensive valuation metrics for deeper insights.
Outlook & Guidance
VNet raised its full-year guidance, projecting total net revenues between RMB 9.15 billion and RMB 9.35 billion, representing an 11-13% YoY growth. The company also expects adjusted EBITDA to range from RMB 2.76 billion to RMB 2.82 billion, indicating a 14-16% YoY increase. This optimistic outlook suggests confidence in continued strong performance, particularly in AI-driven sectors.
Executive Commentary
Zhu Ma, VNet’s Rotating President, emphasized the transformative impact of AI on data centers, stating, "As AI permeates every aspect of the world, new growth opportunities for data centers, the bedrock of AI infrastructure, continue to emerge." Qi Yu Wang, CFO, highlighted the company’s leadership in AIDC transformation, noting, "We are well positioned to lead the AIDC transformation, capturing surging AI-driven opportunities."
Risks and Challenges
- Supply chain disruptions could impact future growth and profitability.
- Market saturation in traditional data centers may limit expansion opportunities.
- Macroeconomic pressures, including currency fluctuations, could affect financial performance.
- Competition in the AIDC space is intensifying, requiring continuous innovation.
- Regulatory changes in key markets could pose compliance challenges.
Q&A
During the earnings call, analysts inquired about the company’s strategy to maintain momentum in the wholesale business and the impact of AI chip supply on future growth. Executives expressed confidence in sustaining wholesale business momentum and highlighted the positive outlook for AI chip supply, which is expected to meet rising customer demand.
Full transcript - VNET Group Inc DRC (VNET) Q2 2025:
Conference Operator: Hello, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by for the Second Quarter twenty twenty five Earnings Conference Call for VNet Group Inc. After the management’s prepared remarks, there will be a question and answer session. Please note, the Chinese line is in listen only mode. If you wish to ask questions, please dial in through the English line.
Participants from our management include mister Zhu Ma, rotating president mister Ken Yu Wang, chief financial officer miss Xianling Liu, Head of Investor Relations of the company. Please note that today’s conference call is being recorded. I will now turn the call over to the first speaker today, Ms. Xingling Liu. Please go ahead.
Xianling Liu, Head of Investor Relations, VNet Group Inc.: Thank you, operator. Hello, everyone, and welcome to our second quarter twenty twenty five earnings conference call. Our earnings release was distributed earlier today, and you can find a copy on our IR site 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 US 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 obligations to update any forward looking statements except as required under applicable laws. Please also know that VNet’s earnings press release and this conference call include the disclosure of unaudited GAAP and non GAAP financial matters. VNet’s earnings press release contains reconciliation of the unaudited non GAAP matters to the unaudited GAAP matters. A summary presentation, which we will refer to during this conference call, can be viewed and downloaded from our IR website at ir.vina.com.
Next, I’d like to alert you that we will be utilizing text to speech technology powered by newlink.ai to deliver this quarter’s prepared remarks by mister Chu Ma, our rotating President and Mr. Qi Wang, our CFO. The management team will join the Q and A session in person. Additionally, this conference is being recorded. A webcast of this conference call will also be available on our IR website at ir.vnet.com.
Now let’s get started with today’s presentation. Mr. Ma, please go ahead.
Zhu Ma, Rotating President, VNet Group Inc.: Good morning and good evening, everyone. Thank you for joining our call today. I’ll start with an overview of our major accomplishments during the 2025. We delivered strong quarterly results, thanks to continued effective strategic execution. On the operational side, our wholesale IDC business maintained its significant growth momentum, supported by our customers’ fast move in pace.
As of 06/30/2025, our wholesale capacity in service grew by 17.5% quarter over quarter to six seventy four megawatts, an increase of around 101 megawatts. Wholesale capacity utilized by customers rose by 17% quarter over quarter to 511 megawatts, an increase of around 74 megawatts, while the utilization rate was stable at 75.9%, reflecting a fast moving pace in our wholesale data centers. Our retail IDC business continued to progress smoothly, supported by growing AI driven demand from customers. Both our high quality wholesale and retail IDC services continued to attract customers from various industries in the second quarter. I’ll dig into those details on the next slide.
On the financial side, both our revenues and adjusted EBITDA maintained solid growth. Specifically, our total net revenues increased by 22.1% year over year to RMB2.43 billion for the second quarter. Notably, wholesale revenues reached RMB854 million for the quarter, representing impressive year over year growth of 112.5%, fueled by the rapid growth of our wholesale IDC business. Our adjusted EBITDA for the second quarter also increased by 27.7% year over year to RMB732 million, with an adjusted EBITDA margin of 30.1%, up 1.3 percentage points year over year. Moving on to our new order wins on slide five.
In the second quarter, driven by growing demand from customers for intelligent deployment, we secured a combined capacity of around four megawatts in retail orders from customers in the IT services, Internet, AIoT, and financial services sectors. These orders span multiple retail data centers in the Greater Beijing area, the Yangtze River Delta, the Greater Bay Area, and other regions. Furthermore, we recently won a 20 megawatt wholesale order from a leading cloud services provider for the project we operate in Hebei province with our joint venture partner. As AI permeates every aspect of the world, new growth opportunities for data centers, the bedrock of AI infrastructure, continue to emerge. AI driven demand remains especially robust in China, including training and inference demand from customers across multiple industries conducting intelligent deployments.
To capture these opportunities and strengthen our competitiveness, we unveiled our Hyperscale two point zero framework for the future of our AIDC development at our Investor Day in Wulan Chabu in late June. We also outlined our blueprint for growing the capacity of our data center assets under management to 10 gigawatts by 02/1936. Driven by the proliferation of AI, the data center industry’s development has reached an inflection point where traditional IDCs are shifting to AIDCs to meet dynamic market demand. In parallel, data center’s business model is evolving from simply providing project based capacity delivery to serving as a platform offering comprehensive AIDC solutions. As a pioneer in AIDC development with strong fundamentals and deep industry know how, VNet is poised to shape this trend through our Hyperscale two point zero framework.
Our innovative technologies enable us to construct high quality, flexible AIDCs faster, ensuring rapid deliveries to meet customer needs. For example, our building standardization technology utilizes standardized modules as data centers’ core building units, allowing us to rapidly construct data centers tailored to diverse customer needs. This method cuts construction cycles by one third compared to traditional construction methods. Additionally, our modular data center technology integrates various functions, including power supply systems, cooling systems, etcetera, into separate functional modules. These modules are manufactured and pretested in factories and shipped to data center sites for installation, which significantly enhances our installation efficiency.
They can also be swapped out, allowing us to selectively upgrade only specific modules instead of entire systems, reducing improvement costs and extending data centers’ life cycles. By leveraging these technologies, we can build quickly and combine modules with different functions flexibly to meet customer specific requirements, ensuring fast capacity delivery to our customers. We believe these innovations position us as a front runner in the IDC industry going forward. Execution of our hyperscale two point zero framework is already underway, starting in Inner Mongolia, Hebei province, and Beijing, where we plan to establish data center hubs encompassing megawatt scale cabinets, 100 megawatt scale buildings, and gigawatt scale campuses. Ultimately, as I mentioned earlier, we aim to manage a 10 gigawatt integrated data center asset cluster by 2036 that seamlessly combines computing power and energy management across multiple campuses, empowering us to shape the future development of AIDC solutions.
Now let’s delve into our business updates, starting with our wholesale business on slide eight. Our wholesale business continued to grow rapidly with capacity in service increasing by around 101 megawatts quarter over quarter to 674 megawatts, and utilization rate remaining stable at 75.9%, mainly attributable to our strong delivery capabilities at our NOR Campus 01 and faster than expected move ins at our NOR Campus 01 and EJS Campus 03. Our mature capacity utilization rate also reached 94.6%, a relatively high level. We have a clear growth path for our wholesale data center capacity. Let’s move on to slide nine.
Our overall wholesale data center capacity maintained its growth trajectory in the second quarter. Our capacity under construction was around 326 megawatts with a pre commitment rate for capacity under construction of 55.2% as of the June. Capacity held for short term future development was around three seventy four megawatts, and capacity held for long term future development was around four eighteen megawatts, as we remain confident in the long term growth potential of AI driven demand. Moving to our retail IDC business on slide 10. Our retail business continued to progress smoothly in the second quarter.
Retail capacity in service was 52,131 cabinets, with the utilization rate increasing slightly to 63.9% as of the June. MRR per retail cabinet increased to RMB 8,915 this quarter. Turning to our delivery plan on slide 11. With our robust and efficient delivery capabilities, we successfully delivered a total of around 188 megawatts in the 2025. We currently have eight data centers under construction with six in the Greater Beijing area and two in the Yangtze River Delta.
We plan to deliver around 326 megawatts of capacity over the next twelve months or around 227 megawatts during the 2025 and around 99 megawatts during the 2026. This ambitious delivery plan reflects strong demand from our customers and our outstanding delivery prowess. Now turning to our non IDC business, a key component of our business. Dizian further expanded its customer base by winning new customers in the consulting and intelligent driving industries for its premium dedicated Internet services, VPN services, IDC services, and cloud services. In conclusion, our robust second quarter results further validate our core strengths and effective strategic execution.
Looking ahead, we will continue to sharpen our competitive advantages with faster deliveries and consistently reliable IDC services as we embark on our ambitious hyperscale two point zero framework to build greener, more intelligent data centers for the AI era. And as always, we will remain committed to driving innovation and fostering industry development as we grow, delivering value to all of our stakeholders. Now, I will turn the call over to our CFO, Qi Yu, for further discussion of our operating and financial performance. Thank you, everyone.
Qi Yu Wang, Chief Financial Officer, VNet Group Inc.: Good morning, and good evening, everyone. Before we start the detailed discussion of our second quarter performance, please note that, unless otherwise stated, all the financials we present today are for the 2025 and are in renminbi terms. Furthermore, unless otherwise specified, all the growth rates I am reviewing are on a year over year basis. Let’s turn to slide 13. In the second quarter, we continued to pursue high quality, high margin business.
Our total net revenues increased by 22.1% to RMB2.43 billion, mainly driven by the rapid growth of our wholesale business. Our adjusted cash gross profit rose by 34.9% to RMB1.06 billion, while our adjusted EBITDA also grew year over year by 27.7% to RMB732.5 million. Let’s look more closely at our top line. As you can see on slide 14, in the second quarter, wholesale revenues, our key revenue growth driver, increased significantly by 112.5% to RMB854.1 million, mainly attributable to sales at the NOR Campus 1 and EJS Campus 3. Retail revenues continue to account for the largest part of our total net revenues, reaching RMB $959,000,000 for the second quarter.
Our non IDC business revenues were RMB $621,000,000 for the second quarter. During the second quarter, we maintained solid margins, thanks to our continuous efforts to enhance overall efficiency. As shown on slide 15, our adjusted cash gross margins improved to 43.6% from 39.5% in the same period last year. Our adjusted EBITDA margin rose to 30.1% compared with 28.8% in the same period last year. Moving on to liquidity.
On slide 16, we maintained robust and healthy liquidity, bolstered by a net operating cash inflow of RMB366.6 million during the second quarter, bringing the net operating cash flow for the first half of the year to RMB562.3 million. Our cash positions remained solid with total cash and cash equivalents, restricted cash and short term investments reaching RMB4.66 billion as of 06/30/2025. Next, let’s take a look at our debt structure on slide 17. We maintained our prudent approach to debt management. As of 06/30/2025, our net debt to the trailing twelve months adjusted EBITDA ratio was 5.3, and total debt to the trailing twelve months adjusted EBITDA ratio was 6.4, both remaining at healthy levels.
Also, our trailing twelve months adjusted EBITDA to interest coverage ratio was 6.9. We prioritize long term debt maturity planning in our debt and strategic management to ensure the security of debt repayment. Additionally, the company’s short and medium term debt maturing in 2025 to 2027 comprises 44.1 of our total debt. Turning now to CapEx spending. As you can see on slide 18, for the 2025, our CapEx was RMB3.89 billion, with the majority allocated to the expansion of our wholesale IDC business.
We still expect our CapEx for the full year 2025 to be in the range of RMB10 billion and RMB12 billion. The increase is mainly to support our planned delivery of 400 to four fifty megawatts in 2025, or approximately three times twenty twenty four’s total deliveries and surpassing our total deliveries in the past three years combined. Furthermore, in late June, our board authorized a buyback program under which we may repurchase up to US50 million dollars from time to time on the open market over the ensuing twelve months. The buyback program underscores our deep commitment to delivering value to shareholders and our confidence in VNet’s future development and growth prospects. Now moving to our full year guidance for 2025 on slide 19.
As we announced in a press release in late June, we have increased our full year revenue and adjusted EBITDA guidance fueled by faster than anticipated move ins among wholesale IDC customers and ongoing operational efficiency gains. We now expect total net revenues to be in the range of RMB9.15 billion to RMB9.35 billion, a year over year increase of 11% to 13%, and adjusted EBITDA to be in the range of RMB2.76 billion to RMB2.82 billion, representing a year over year increase of 14% to 16% if the RMB87.7 million on disposal gain of EJS two data center were excluded from the adjusted EBITDA calculation for 2024. The year over year growth would be 18 to 20%. Before I conclude, I’d like to briefly update you on our ESG efforts. We were pleased to receive an A grade, the highest rating, in the 2024 supplier engagement assessment by the Carbon Disclosure Project.
We were also recognized as a supplier engagement leader for our collaboration with supply chain partners on low carbon technology enhancing our IDC operational energy efficiency and empowering our partners to save energy and reduce emissions. Looking ahead, we will remain steadfast in our pursuit of ESG excellence, embracing and promoting a green future. In summary, we maintained our business’ vibrant momentum with strong financial results during the second quarter, supported by our effective dual core strategy and new Hyperscale two point zero framework. We’re well positioned to lead the AIDC transformation, capturing surging AI driven opportunities and delivering sustainable long term value for all stakeholders. This concludes our prepared remarks for today.
We are now ready to take questions.
Conference Operator: Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. Your first question comes from Tom Tang with Morgan Stanley.
Tom Tang, Analyst, Morgan Stanley: Thanks management for the opportunity to ask questions. And first of all, congratulations on very strong quarterly results, especially on the wholesale business. So my question is mainly about the future demand and orders. So we noticed that NVIDIA has regained its permission to ship their new chipsets to China again last month. So just wondering, based on our communication with our big customers, what is our current expectation of their future demand and the pattern of their order tendering?
Thank you.
Zhu Ma, Rotating President, VNet Group Inc.: Thank you for your question. And now the market is relatively active. And according to the report of the third party institutions, we find that in the regions where the digital economy is relatively active, for example, in the Greater Beijing area and in the Yangtze River Delta, I think the AI demand is relatively strong and also the relation between supply and demand has improved a lot. And your question is also mentioned about the bidding and also the demand for the big client. Since you also have noticed that this year, our delivery plan is over 400 megawatt, It is all relatively large.
And also, the new orders should be delivered in six months. So we will pay more attention to the demand released around September. So in addition to the 20 megawatt wholesale business, I think we are also paying a lot of attention to the potential demand. And we are also communicating for this potential demand. I think most of them are highly relevant to the AI.
Xianling Liu, Head of Investor Relations, VNet Group Inc.: Next question, please.
Conference Operator: Your next question comes from Edison Lee with Jefferies.
Edison Lee, Analyst, Jefferies: Hi. Yes. Thank you for taking my questions. I have two. Right?
Number one, can you update us on the build out of wind power in Yulan Top? And when they will actually come into effect and how that’s gonna impact the revenue and also the margin of the company? Number two, can you comment on your MSR on wholesale? Because it seems that your MSR or your MRR on the wholesale in the second quarter is actually up on a year on year basis. So maybe, if you can explain a little bit of what is driving that, unit price, that would be great.
Zhu Ma, Rotating President, VNet Group Inc.: I think now the wind power project in Yulenkap is well underway. And I think by the end of this year and also in the beginning of next year, it will be able to deliver power. I think this is relatively a new trial for us. So we cannot expect its impact on our P and L. However, I think it will mainly deliver positive impact on our IR.
So I think the detailed statistics and the figures will be offered when it began to deliver power. And so for the second question, I think it’s mainly it has two factors. The first one is, I think that the wholesale price is relatively very stable. And you also mentioned that the improvement in the MSR, I think, it’s mainly due to the seasonal factors because of the increase in the revenue from the electricity bills. And also in this quarter, we have the one off income.
Xianling Liu, Head of Investor Relations, VNet Group Inc.: Next question, please.
Conference Operator: Your next question comes from Dai Li Li with BofA Securities.
Dai Li Li, Analyst, BofA Securities: Hi, management. Thanks for taking my question. I have two questions here. The first one is regarding our gross margin. Our adjusted gross margin was, you know, quite healthy growth and improvement.
And for our GAAP level gross margin, if we look at it seems dropped a little bit. And what’s the reason behind this? And how do you think the future normalized gross profit margin? My second question about the new financing channel, the REITs. Could you please update us on the progress of the private REITs and the C REITs going forward.
Zhu Ma, Rotating President, VNet Group Inc.: Thank you for your question. For the changes in the GP margin, I think, is affected by the timing of turning the CID into PPE and also the depreciation. So there can be some seasonal factors that leads to the fluctuation. But if we exclude the if we only consider the cash GP margin, I think it’s still very on a healthy and steady increase. And also for the REITs project, we have been actively promoting the REITs projects.
We have the public and also the private REITs. And I think we have four to five. And also, as mentioned, this year, through the REITs project, we have to have a recovery of CNY 2,000,000,000.
Xianling Liu, Head of Investor Relations, VNet Group Inc.: Next question, please.
Conference Operator: Your next question comes from Timothy Zhao with Goldman Sachs.
Timothy Zhao, Analyst, Goldman Sachs: Great. Thank you, management, for taking my question and congrats on the very strong results. Two questions here as well. First is regarding your full year guidance. I’m pretty glad to see that you raised guidance actually two months ago.
But after the very strong first half results, just wondering how management think about the second half outlook. So if my calculation is correct, I think toward the high end of your guidance, I think the second half growth implied only around single digit growth. Just wondering how should we think about the second half outlook? Secondly is regarding the retail IDC business. As I see, there’s some revenue decline on this retail IDC revenue in the second quarter of this year versus a stronger first quarter.
I was wondering what is the reason behind.
Zhu Ma, Rotating President, VNet Group Inc.: Thank you for your question. As mentioned, in spite of the upgrading in the guidance, I think the guidance for the second half of this year is still relatively conservative. So our consideration is that we needed to watch we needed to watch and see that if the utilization speed and the pace of our customer or client will not be affected by the chips. So if so and if our wholesale utilization business can maintain its speed, I think we can upgrade the guidance for the second half of the year. And your second question is relatively to the RDC revenue from for the retail business.
Yes, there can be some slight decline, but I think it’s still within the reasonable range. And I think the revenue for the retail IDC will maintain relatively stable and even some increase.
Xianling Liu, Head of Investor Relations, VNet Group Inc.: Next question, please.
Conference Operator: Your next question comes from Andy Yu with DBS.
Andy Yu, Analyst, DBS: Hi, thank you for taking my questions. Congratulations on solid results. I have a question regarding the second half outlook. Could management share some color on whether the rapid momentum of client looping can be sustained? Also, do we expect that the impact of AI chip supply constraints could affect new orders or customer movements in the second half twenty five?
Let me translate the question.
Zhu Ma, Rotating President, VNet Group Inc.: So that’s for the outlook for the second half of this year. I think if we compare the second half with the first half of this year, I think I am relatively optimistic about the second half because if we take into account the delivery of the or the delivery in the first half of this year, and we will also closely follow the rules of the new orders unleashed by our client. And I think we will be very optimistic generally about the second half of this year. And also as for the move in pace of our client, I think according to the practice, once the order is have been confirmed, we usually have very fast move in pace. And also as for the supply of the chips of AI, we will closely follow the companies like Navender chips and also the domestic chips.
And I think that the expectation will be very clear very soon. As also according to our experiences of serving our clients or customers, I think once the order is confirmed, the move in pace will be very fast. And also as for the wholesale business, we have also confirmed with the core client that the orders at hand for most of our clients will not be affected. Please.
Conference Operator: Our next question comes from Sarah Wang with UBS. Thank you for the opportunity to ask a question. And again, congratulations on the very solid results. I only have one question is that management just mentioned that there could be potential new tenders from the customers. Do we expect similar customers and similar workload going forward or there could be some change?
Zhu Ma, Rotating President, VNet Group Inc.: So thank you for your question. I think our client will unleash their demand gradually. And from the demand side, I think in terms of the business, the demand for remain unchanged.
Xianling Liu, Head of Investor Relations, VNet Group Inc.: Next question, please.
Conference Operator: Your next question comes from Mingran Li with CICC. Mingran Lee, your line is open with CICC. Mingran Lee, your line is open for your question. We will just pause for a moment to see if we’ll have Mingran back in the queue. That does conclude our call and conference for today.
Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.
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