Welcome everyone to one more earnings results presentation for the first quarter 2022. We're very happy to be here. Exercising in practice this hybrid feature, the four of us together again, wearing no masks, and at the same time having you all in a practical and efficient way, everybody safe and being able to be wherever you like to attend our call. It is a great pleasure. Let's remind you that here, if you wish to listen to English. You'll hear the conference through our translator, Laura. Thank you very much, Laura, for being with us again. Today we have a difference for the Q&A session. Rather than you writing down your questions, we have a technological advance.
You can press the button, raise the hand, and we'll see the hands raised, and we will open your mics so that people who want to ask questions can speak at the end and ask their questions at the end of the presentation. We have Marcelo Bueno, our founder and CEO, André Tavares, our CFO, myself, Marina Gelman, our director, Eduardo, whom everybody knows, Edu Cardoso Garcia, who is our IR manager. With this, I once again welcome you all and turn over to Marcelo. Marcelo, it's up to you.
Good morning, everyone. Good morning, Marina, André, Edu. It is a great honor to be here. I'd like to thank the IT people that is making this hybrid experience, feasible. We should walk our talk. We're walking technology, as Marina Castro says, always sustain it.
It's virtual, in-person, how much technology we're going to use in this call. In this call, we're bringing in yet another innovation, which is having questions with more interaction, with more synchronous educationally. Education will be increasingly synchronous, asynchronous. This is thanks to the choice that we made six years ago, approximately for hybrid education. I can say that it is inspired in other sectors. People we were using omni-channel. We went through the pandemic, and we are here very happy to be an example in this call, but also for having returned to our activities with intensive on campus from the seventh on March. With the better situation of COVID, we managed to have in-person activities at all our units.
We have more innovation, greater use of technology for those who wish to have it and having students in the center of our attention and letting them doing that. I had to actually share this message with you. Ânima is different, we are different. We make this hybrid choice in everything we do, including our earnings call, conference call. We have hundreds of investors, analysts, shareholders and partners to experience this quite different technology. It's important to share this message. Moving to the results presentation of our first quarter. First, I'd like to share three important messages. First of all, the increase in our ticket. Education has no price. It has value. This is important for our discipline to put our ticket to where our brands deserve. Second, the continuous evolution of our margins, the increase of our revenue.
Fourteen consecutive quarters that we have had a growth in margin and revenue. This shows discipline in execution. It's important to share this message with you as well. We can see the student base growing to 333,000 students. Net revenue in our quarter, BRL 902.4 million. Net income, BRL 51 million. Free cash generation, very important, 73% of our EBITDA, BRL 247.5 million. EBITDA, BRL 339.1 million. We are capturing BRL 93.3 million in intake. That shows that is quite important of what I said. In retrospect, the past three months, the main transactions of higher education too were of Ânima transformational relationship with the acquisition of the assets of Laureate Brazil in a longer period I mentioned.
It shows we are through the integration process. That put us at another level, something we had always dreamt of doing. We have our expansion area that is both organic and inorganic. We've always sustained that our vision is of greater value generation in higher education in Brazil. We made this transaction, and we had the honor of making a strategic alliance. We've chosen our partner, the best partner in health, greatest ecosystem in healthcare, which is DNA Capital, that made a strategic investment in our medical vertical, which is Inspirali. I'll turn over to André Tavares, who's going to make a presentation. Just let me remind you that we had, in this quarter, the rating that has been quite high at the moment that the macroeconomic situation is so challenging, the risk has increased.
Ânima once again showing its difference with a higher rating. Congratulations to all. It's a reason for great pride. Let me talk to you about our operating performance.
Good morning, everyone. Our first vision we've shown in the first quarter 2022 an increase of the student base of approximately 145%, very much explained by the acquisitions that we had in 2021 that have been quite relevant. We show our distance learning and our new growth path representing 24% of the base with 80.1 thousand students. This is quite important in terms of our consolidation. Another important point that we bring here for our results is dropout. Dropout moved from 7% in first quarter 2021 to 12.1% considering all units.
If I could only compare the integrated units to all of those before the acquisitions of the other units acquired in 2021, we would have a drop of 10.7% to 10%. The greatest reasons for dropout are related to systemic integration we had from December to January. This creates some kind of friction. It was possible it was impacting the re-enrollment. Second point is related to what we had been talking about with all investors that in 2021, because it is a pandemic year, we actually were more lenient in terms of fines and interest. We, in 2022, get back to normality. We actually reduced the level of discounts.
Second point, the units that we had from the acquisitions of last year, they had a level of dropout that was a bit higher, but actually, our bad debt was a bit better. This is a consolidated vision in terms of dropout when we analyze all the results and what happened. Moving to the average ticket, what we can see, which is quite important, something we have been highlighting, that we have been differentiating ourselves and positioning ourselves in terms of tickets according to the quality we believe we implement to our students. This represents directly a transfer of ticket. If we compare 2021 to 2022, only the integrated units, we managed to have a transfer 17.3% in our ticket, very much explained by the increase of the relevance of medical programs.
The way we monitor and control all results, in which we allow the visualization of the impact of real increase that took place in all courses. When I include the acquired units in June 2021, we see a ticket 12% higher than inflation. But as we had been said, this year, we had an impact of carryover of the basis decision of the past two years of the units that have been acquired. They were actually having a lower ticket. This would pressure the ticket this quarter, but with our positioning and our carryover and intake, we had an increase in the ticket still above inflation. We have been talking a lot about this in our last interactions, and I'd like to reinforce the importance to us of this number.
The ticket of all undergrad on campus, not considering distance learning that has a different dynamic in terms of volume. The relevance to this number to us, Marcelo, even with this trend that you have explained in the units being integrated and a certain reduction, how much it's been important to us to present this number? Growth of 12% above inflation in a year which we had very high inflation rate, showing clearly how we have been having very good results, from our work of repositioning ourselves, of putting our price point of the brands, be it of the integrated units and units in integration being integrated at a place in which we believe is more cohesive to the quality and tradition and history of all our brands.
I'd just like to complement, André, that it's quite interesting that we are now living with the integrated brand, something very similar to what we lived with what they had with the integrated brands in 2017, 2018 and 2019. How much prepared we are. We see the results, 70% of integrated units to reposition ourselves because we've also had in 2016, 2017, we had a strategy that was similar and it was a time that we create tools and instruments to deal with the re-positioning of the ticket. It happens. How interesting it is that we are now living the same wave, looking at the integrated units with all our internal learnings that have been matured. Perfect.
To conclude the ticket, bringing ticket of distance learners with level 202 in the third quarter, as he said. This is explained compared to the third quarter. This is a strategy we had, and this actually is related to the process of using the brand as a pilot of the integrated units as we see, and we're going to expand this in a more effective way. Moving to intake. The great highlight that we have here to you, in addition to the increase in the ticket from 17.3% of the integrated units. When I look at the intake, I see an increase of students in 13.3% compared to the same period last year. We can have an appropriate dynamic to attract students, differentiating ourselves because of our quality.
The other pathway we've been exploring that has a significant number is the distance learning that we had 27,000 students first quarter, 2022. Acquisitions that we had in June, the assets of Laureate Brazil, we see getting to the pricing point that is appropriate, as André has just mentioned, getting to a point in which the intake base is a bit more pressured, but the ticket comes in a solid way and we managed to get better net revenue, better point in the midterm. What is important here? We have two very important messages. First, we have been different and showing that what matters is revenue. We have to find the right spot between volume and ticket and looking towards the healthy and best revenue for our company. This is the message and takeaway message for all of you.
We see what's been happening, what Marina mentioned. It's a culture that takes longer to be broken down. The second important message is that we are. I mentioned this to our board of directors. We are here to continue the digital business of Laureate, to keep it growing, and in parallel, we're going to test the hypothesis that Laureate has always sustained that there is another market. The market would not cannibalize our core, our hybrid learning with on campus or in-person. As you said, we are carrying out pilots in our brands, and we realize there is actually a great avenue to be explored that Ânima would not be exploring it. Pathway of access with conditions of integrating quality as we like being different also in this market. These two messages that we have to make them very clear. Absolutely.
To conclude, intake of 93,000 students in the first quarter of 2022. Moving to another important factor for Ânima, though we don't have novelties regarding microdata, is academic quality. I'd like to highlight the chart on the right-hand side on concept, of course. We bring information that since 2018, we launched 375 new courses in the E2A. We've been having intake with synergies and improving quality. 94% of these courses have received grades 4 and 5 from our education ministry. We have it consolidated with the hybrid model, bringing innovation to the education segment. I'd like to turn over to André to talk about the financial performance. At our turn, we implemented E2A with all new entrants and all integrated units, especially Potiguar, FMU, actually, and Anhembi Morumbi. Now we're going to have the rollout for the other units.
Perfect. Thank you, Edu, for presenting the main items of operating performance. I'm going to make a few comments on the financial performance. Looking at our net revenue breakdown or composition, we see greater representativeness, be it from Inspirali and digital learning or distance learning. Inspirali getting close to practically 30% of our net revenue. Distance learning exceeding 5% and lifelong learning reaching close to 4.5%, close to 5%. Thus creating a distribution that is increasingly homogeneous of our net revenue and the growth is quite significant. Be it in terms of net revenue, we reached over BRL 900 million of net revenue in the first quarter.
Be it in gross profit. Yeah, where we reached almost BRL 650 million, is reaching BRL 650 million in gross profit and operating result, and we get this mark of BRL 440 million in this first quarter. On the next slide, we see the breakdown of the three blocks, and basically, we have base block, acquisitions and lifelong learning, as you're used to following in the breakdown of our results. Base and acquisition blocks is something we always said would happen, and it's where we want to head to, right, Marina? We have quite similar numbers with the exception of growth acquisitions, obviously, since the bases are different. We have very strong growth. We look at net revenue of the base block also growing in this quarter, almost 4%.
Although we know that there are difficulties because of the very maturity of markets and institutions that make up this base block, we have, with this growth, an expansion of the growth margin that has been growing efficiency gains of E2A, lower costs related to intensive use of technology and acquisitions at an operating margin that is even higher in the acquisition block. The representativeness of medical schools is higher than the base block, a bit higher than the base block, reaching an operating margin of practically 50%. Revenue of almost BRL 600 million and operating result of practically BRL 300 million. The blocks are at levels that are quite similar. That's where we have been headed to. This is the goals. We broke down into blocks that had different phases, but they're quite similar now.
On the next slide, we can see growth of lifelong learning. In this quarter, we had quite significant growth in graduate studies, both on campus and distance learning, reminding you that this is lato sensu. It contributed quite strongly to the expansion of operating margin, also reaching very close to 47%, very close to the base block and the acquisition block, which makes us very happy and even more confident in this growth strategy of this block of our businesses. On the next slide, we're going to look at. We also see extremely significant growth of distance learning when compared to its own base.
You've seen it accounts for over 5% of revenue, but accounts for 24% of total number of students, having grown over 50%, quite relevant scale in the quarter, reached almost BRL 50 million in revenue, operating result of BRL 11 million, an operating margin of almost 24%. As we all here know, as distance learning gains scale, the expansion of margin is also very significant. As Marcelo mentioned, we see digital learning as a great opportunity. We're learning a lot with distance learning, and it actually is a new growth pathway to our whole Ânima ecosystem. As I've mentioned, we have Eduardo [d] to lead the team and help us make this decision that we have another market.
It is also important to say that we are already working on digital, well, which is our result with qualitative gains and also significant gains. This is important to be mentioned. This is a very interesting agenda. We're very excited about it. On our next slide, we see the growth of Inspirali. Inspirali is a very significant business within our Ânima ecosystem. In our first quarter, we celebrate the completion, not the end, the closing. It was actually the beginning of our relationship, the more than fruitful, more than productive with our DNA Capital partners. At Inspirali, we were very pleased to close this deal on the 31st March, and all the effects are featuring here in our financial statement. We have a long-term process in the board. We have members, independent members that are quite significant and quite important.
Inspirali is only a reason for our pride and it's a very important moment for our education in Brazil. At Inspirali, we had a student-based model, over 122%. We reached almost BRL 270 million in revenue, organic CAGR of 15%. If we consider the acquisition, we reached almost 90% of growth, yearly growth compound in the past four years, reaching an operating margin of 64%. Beginning of operations of another medical school of UniFG Brumado. Special greetings from Brumado, UniFG. It's a beautiful school. We have the management there, CEO, all wonderful team. Greetings to all of you, totally focused on Inspirali, considering the new pathways. We've had over another 50 seats with our UniFG at Brumado.
On the next slide, we can see what is projected in terms of student base and seats. At Inspirali, they reflect the compound annual growth rate. The people are celebrating at Brumado. Greetings to Mr. Zeluso, Chief Medical Officer of Inspirali. As to the synergies, we give continuity to the integration process, work of our transformation and integration office, and we have continuity in this process of capturing synergy. Just to recall, we had a projection of an increment of EBIT in year five, post-integration and acquisition of Laureate at BRL 350 million. In the past 10 months, we've captured BRL 125 million.
If we calculate how much the BRL 125 million would represent on a yearly basis in terms of recurrence, we reach a level that is higher than BRL 200 million. We had the M&A on the sixth of May, 2003. We have been having M&A operations for over on some. Look at this, we feel they are trivial things. It is important to stress this. We moved from December to January, from 19 systems to six. This generates pain, noise. This is a very important movement. Many schools of Laureate had their own academic systems. There were many systems. We simplify the whole structures from 19 to six. This is not trivial to implement E2A, new entrants. This is not trivial.
I've talked about real-life implementation for all the distance learning students replacing market level, adding value in terms of quality for students. This is something that we have to put color and life to this, that has been supported by our board. It generates results. Sorry. I just wanted to add to what you're saying. We know what it is to live an integration. This is our history from day one. We know that making difference, that moving away from the comfort zone, it hurts. We know that sometimes people that feel the pain, very nice. Our confidence is to look at our academic quality indicators and see that there is no situation in our history where academic indices have not improved. We bought institutions of very high quality. We had the pleasure of integrating São Judas Tadeu, UniCuritiba.
It's an honor to have them with us. We're very privileged to have integrated the assets we have integrated that did not come at a poor quality situation, much on the contrary. What has happened, we've improved the quality. It is not trivial for students and professors to have the change in stages, but knowing that the result in 100% of cases is of improvement because we are here to transform the country. We don't have any other goals, and it makes us feel reassured that we get there at all times. Fundamental, Marina. We also have the support of our board and everyone, all the teams, they are at the base. They have actually supported the turnarounds, the pains and the delights of integrations.
Actually, I had a point about making this statement and reminding everyone that despite the decision of ours, despite it having been extremely challenging and demanding, it is a decision that is fundamental to implement the academic model E 2A , and then move on this line of quality improvement, as you've mentioned, and also fundamental, Marcelo, to reap additional synergies benefits so that we can get to the BRL 350 million that we pointed out initially. Very well observed and mentioned by both of you. On the next slide, all of this is seen as an EBITDA growth of 143%.
More importantly than this number, the 3.5% growth of our margin from 34% to 37%, getting to an EBITDA of almost BRL 314 million. On the next slide, we see we have been making great efforts internally, giving priority to our cash generation. We'll talk about it in a while. We have been making great efforts in terms of priority, prioritization of choosing our CapEx, making CapEx to have high return rate. This number shows this quite a lot. We moved from BRL 38 million of CapEx in the first quarter last year, accounting for 9.2% of our revenue to BRL 43 million, which accounts for 4.8%, practically in relative terms, practically half of what we had last year.
Of course, this has an important scale gain in the combined operation. We also have been making great efforts to prioritize the most important activities in our transformation process, digital transformation, because it generates new basis in gains of scale and new service rendering. We're extremely committed to reaching a CapEx level, especially when cash generation is so important to our company, to reaching a CapEx that has high return rate. Getting close to the end, we reinstate how much this execution ability has reflected into a strong generation of cash. We get to operating cash generation. Apologies, the free cash generation after working capital count, the CapEx over BRL 247 million, showing high conversion of EBITDA into cash of 73%.
We've also had the reflection of our activities of investment and funding with the investment of BRL 1 billion, Inspirali, getting to the end of the quarter with a cash position of BRL 1.4 billion. The next slide, I believe, is the last one of our presentation. With these numbers, we have a leverage rate of 3.4x. We consider the past 12 months, pro forma, reminding you of what we said in the beginning. This move has actually been important part of our rating improvement, showing how different we are, how Ânima is different. At a time when it is rare for you to see a Brazilian company to have a better rating, Ânima managed. We all together managed to get yet this other accomplishment.
With a positive outlook of even better rating, we ended with a net debt of BRL 2.5 billion. This leverage rate, although it's a leverage debt, well, we never lost confidence of this ability of deleveraging debt reassures us. We are not yet comfortable. We're still paying attention and committed and prioritizing the deleveraging agenda, be it by operating margins and also by divestitures underway. Because we don't see in the macroeconomic scenario of our country, we do not see a horizon that is close, reduction of the interest rate. We're extremely committed. Now I turn over to Marcelo. I thank you for being with us during the slide presentation. I turn over to Marcelo for the final remarks so that we can move on to our Q&A session.
Thank you, André. I think it's important to have this final point and reinforce that last week we had a conference in New York, and on Saturday I was talking to Botafogo, our CFO at Inspirali. I think it's important for us to watch the film. On the 13 November 2019, we announced both in Curitiba, and then, as Marina said, when in Curitiba, only so we leveraged the company at a moment of great challenges, and we opened 2020 in January with a follow-on and putting the company in healthy levels again. Next, we have pandemic. We had the great honor and success in the transformational transaction of Laureate. Honor, but also courage, right, Marcelo? That's an important moment of a transaction that had a strategy that was specific. Within the strategy, yes, we had a 100% cash operation.
We had the support of great Brazilian banks. December 2020, we had another follow-on. Next, we moved towards a clear agenda of deleveraging. As we mentioned here, we've completed this strategic move of DNA Capital that has brought in important funds to our unit, Inspirali. Following this, we'll have this concern. It's a clear agenda within our priorities of the company, the management, I as CEO. This is very important agenda, which is de-leveraging the company, putting it at levels that we can be reassured. With this, that is it. I'd like to thank everyone. Thanks for this important moment of hybrid in-person experience directly from Ânima at Vila Madalena. I suggest you come and visit us. With this, I will open for the Q&A session. Thank you, Marcelo.
Now, we're going to ask Matheus for his support, who's hiding in the room with us. Everybody knows Matheus. Matheus, let's start with Samuel and the order of raising hands. Thank you, Samuel. Always with us and always honoring us. Matheus is going to open the audio for you to ask a question.
You can ask your question now.
Good morning, Marcelo, André, Marina, Eduardo. Good morning, everyone. I have two questions about the same topic on cost base. You've mentioned on the release that the gross margin improvement has been led by four factors in terms of expenses ramp up of the academic model growth, the segments with greater margins, the readjustment of the wages of the faculty and greater scale gains. The question was more to which factors have been more important in this quarter. If you imagine that the effect of the wage increase of the faculty that has not happened in the first quarter, it should follow inflation for the rest of the year. This is it. Thank you.
Thank you, Samuel. Thank you, Matheus. Well, good morning, Samuel. Thank you for your question. Well, Samuel, actually, we cannot break down the effects of these four items that you've mentioned so well with the attentive reading of our release. I'd like to say that we can give a main highlight to E2A way the implementation of the academic model and the scale gains deriving from the new operations. E2A way is a model that adapts very well to scale gains and adapts very well to your having an ability of integrating different curricula of different schools. I'd say all of them are very important.
None is more representative of the gains deriving from the implementation of E2A, along with the scale gains, represent certainly the most important part. With regards to collective bargaining, they are being agreed on in mid-May, June, and perhaps it's a bit early to talk before we end our negotiations. The pace we see in our negotiations is a pace that is quite respectful. We do not work on any scenario in which we have readjustments that will be above inflation. The scenario here will be a readjustment following inflation or even a bit below. Okay. Thank you, André.
Thank you, Samuel. Big hug. The next one we have with raised hands, Luca Marchesini from Itaú BBA. Thank you for your question.
Yeah, we saw in the release there's been an increase in the methodology of collection. Can we consider the new level as the new normal represented here, which is now the current impact that has led to this increase? Thank you.
Okay, Luca. Thank you for your question. I'd say that we are at a time in which bad debt is the highest. It has reached its highest point. I don't see any sign of increase in bad debt because we have a combination of two factors, the factors of adopting a methodology that is stricter than what we had previously, a methodology that we've adopted in the integration unit.
However, along with the methodology, we've implemented a model of delinquency management in the integration units that were much more successful than what we used to have in the integrated units. I'd say that we're going through this process of change and integration. As we change the methodology, this has a direct impact to the numbers. The management model yields results in a slower way. It yields results as we actually implement all the processes and systems and practices that were more common in the units in integration. I'd say that our expectation here is that with this being implemented, we will see actually an improvement along the year of those bad debt.
Perfect, André. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Luca.
Our next person that has raised the hand is Leandro Bastos from Citibank. From Citi.
Well, Leandro, thank you for being with us once again.
Hi. Hi, everyone. Thanks. I have two questions on my side. First, I'd like to go into dropout topics. You talked about the reasons of unifying criteria, stricter policy after the years of the pandemic. I'd like to understand whether this is a new level we should think from now on, or if you have a one-off because of this change. If you could comment on the direction of this line, this will help. Second question, I just like to get an update in terms of the divestiture, the environment in terms of negotiation of markets today. My side, this is what I had. Thank you.
Okay. I'm going to talk about the first question of Leandro. Can you talk about the second, Marcelo?
Sure.
Leandro, thank you for your questions. As to dropout rate, we have dropout rates from integrated units and units being integrated. As we calculate revenue, we try to get to the optimum point, balancing dropout and bad debt. We are at the beginning of this journey, I would say. You've seen that the units being integrated have higher dropout than the integrated units, and we are trying to optimize this trade-off. I believe that when we look at the dropout of integrated units, the consolidated dropout rate, we have the explanation, we're even seeing a slight improvement because the integrating units should migrate to the number that we're presenting today in the integrated units. The units in integration had a number that were above 12%, integrated units are lower, consolidated above 12%, and integrated above 10%.
We should see actually migration of the consolidated number to a number that would be closer to the integrated units. I'd say that this is a more recurrent base. Right, Leandro?
The agenda of divestiture or disinvestment. As we've mentioned here, we made a presentation that was transformational to invest with [Felipe] at 2%. The interest rate briefly moved from 2% to 13%. This is not trivial, and we have to be paying attention to this. We've been receiving this impact in our pocket. Actually, this is a priority to the company. Not only are we going to leverage the company generating cash and making a healthy operation to generate cash and paying the debt. However, with this scenario that nobody was expecting it to be so aggressive, it's part of our management intensify investment so that we can lower this exposure faster.
This is a priority. We have made some moves, but we have others on our agenda as priority to us. This is the main message I'd like to share with you.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you, Leandro. Thank you, André and Marcelo. Our next question is from Lucas Nagano from Morgan Stanley. Thank you very much for being with us. Welcome, and feel free to ask your question.
Hi, everyone. Good morning. For the space, I have two questions on our side. First is on differentiating the grade block. I'd like to understand the pilot project in terms of challenges and results, and what expectations you have in the future. Second question is regarding the integrating units. If you can give us a bit more color on the performance of intake, mainly Laureate. You mentioned pressure regarding ticket generation. If you can talk about stability and drop. What about re-enrollment on these three units? Were students used to those increases, including or considering current inflation rate? Do you attribute perhaps the increases, the dropout rate to this rate of re-enrollment?
Thank you, Lucas, for your questions. I can talk about the units in integration. Marcelo can talk about distance learning at our units at traditional and the pilot project we carried out. No doubt, the units in integration, as we've mentioned here, our idea, our priority was to set the pricing point at the brands at a place we believe is the correct place for them in terms of the market, and this goal has been fully attained. You've seen that we've grown 17% on our ticket in integrated brands. When we put those of integration consolidated, we had a growth of 12%. This no doubt brought greater pressure to intake because we are on this journey of changing systems. We are on this journey of changing the mindset of our commercial team.
This actually put pressure on the volume, and we actually have a certain difficulty of making comparisons because the level of analysis and systems of the previous year were not into the Ânima system. It is somewhat difficult to make a comparison of a precise number. What we know is that there is a certain pressure on the volume, but we are very much, very comfortable that we are on the path of attaining the optimum point that maximizes revenue between volume and ticket, and especially at a time in which we have the return of macroeconomic activity that is stronger and we know this has great impact to the volume. We will have our pricing point of those units being integrated at the right spot, being able to leverage our revenue of those units even more so.
We are quite comfortable with this possible and momentary pressure to the volume, but seeing the trajectory of revenue in a very positive way. This is a cultural change. This is normal, it's normal in a sales project giving privilege to the volume. We broke this logic. This is kind of slow. It's not trivial. We have systems integration, as I've mentioned, from 19 to 6 systems. We have presentation of the academic model. All of this together led to this process to be even more challenging. The levels are fantastic. In the Northeast of Brazil, there are brands are fantastic in the Northeast of Brazil. Perhaps you don't know. Various marketplaces in the Northeast, major brands are private. They are more recognized than the federal universities. Many of those markets, they are now part of our system of Ânima.
It doesn't make sense for those brands to, so there's no sense in anyone going to war in terms of price. This applies to all units of education. Everybody loses if there is a price war. With these strong brands, we should not be different. It's very important to have this specific intake mentioned regarding our brands.
Regarding the second question on distance learning, digital learning. As I've mentioned, and Marina also mentioned that we are mandated by our board to keep on working on our digital experience and making this agenda being fulfilled. Prior to that is the hypothesis Laureate uses its brands, unlike other players. Other players have a national brand.
If we use regional brands, because higher education in Brazil is regional, we would meet that in another market that was not being met by Ânima before. We've been testing it and practically completed the test so that we can move forward in a sense. One of the important tests has been MVPs that we've used to integrate the brands and using with the, you know, DL portfolio that has not cannibalized the traditional practices, hybrid education previously called on-campus or in-person, that we've proven this at this moment. Very important now. Now improving the product so that we can have a product that actually makes us feel proud considering the Ânima brand.
Thank you, Marcelo and André. Lucas, I don't know if you're happy. If I could just understand better the re-enrollment process at the Laureate units this year.
There has not been any different number from what we already observed at the integrated units. Again, the historical of Laureate units, we have great difficulty that, comparative difficulty because they were different methodologies of calculation. When we compare to the integrated units, the numbers have been quite similar. There's been systems changes, errors occur when we change system, then we correct these things and actually move ahead.
Okay, everyone. Thank you very much. Thank you, Lucas. Well, this was the last hand raised. I'd like to thank everyone for the almost 200 people that have followed the call with us, saying it's a huge privilege to be once again together, that we do not have to be distant anymore, that we can be together. Our students, our professors can be together when they so wish at the convenience of each one.
This is joystick we have been talking about so much. It was so difficult to explain what it was. This is here happening. It's become a reality faster than everybody imagined. Thank you very much indeed. Thank you Edu for the partnership. Eduardo has been actually helping a lot of people. Those that sent the questions on the chat, we're going to answer them directly, most of them. There are two things on the Q&A that André has mentioned at the other questions that have been asked. I'd like to reinstate Marcelo's invitation to get to know Learning Village. Well, you can make an appointment with us. It's very interesting what happens here. Just as getting to back to site visits, Edu is looking forward to traveling around Brazil with everyone. Me too. Lots of things have happened during the pandemic.
We haven't been able to see everything yet, so it's time to get back to get to know places. We've made some visits, and they have been quite interesting. Reinforce actually the availability of our IR team for any questions that you may not have addressed here and respecting the time of everyone and ending punctually at 10:59. Thank you all very much. Have a good day and an excellent week. Thank you very much.