Good morning, everyone, and welcome to third quarter 2021 Positivo earnings release. My name is Renata Oliva. I am the IR Officer, and it's a great privilege to be here with you. I'd like to introduce Hélio Rotenberg, the President, and Caio Moraes, Chief Financial Officer and IRO. This conference is being recorded, and it will be made available at our website, where you can also find the presentation that supports this conference. For those of you who need simultaneous interpretation, you can find an icon at the bottom of your Zoom bar, written "interpretation."
Please click on that and then select the language of your preference, either English or Portuguese. For those of you listening into the interpretation, you can click on mute original audio. For the Q&A session, we kindly recommend you to send us your questions using the Q&A icon at the bottom of your Zoom bar. You will also tell who you are so that you can ask your question. You will see a message asking you to unmute yourself.
We'd like also to mention that any statement related to business, outlook, projections, and operating goals of our company are the belief of our administration as well based on current information available. Forward-looking statements do not guarantee our performance because they refer to future events and thus depend on circumstances that may or may not occur. Investors should understand that the general economic conditions, market conditions, and other operating conditions may affect the company's performance and lead to results that materially differ from such forward-looking statements. Now, I'd like to turn it over to Hélio to start the presentation.
Good morning, everyone. I'm very happy to be here for this quarter's release. We'll see that our results have been quite consistent. Let me talk about the fourth quarter so that the market can rest assured of what's going on with our company. Our revenue achieved the record. These numbers have been consistent over this year, so BRL 979 million in this quarter. Our annual EBITDA, BRL 348 million. Another record. Our gross revenue, 63% increase over the last nine months, up by 78%. Gross margin, 24%, as well as compared to what we had last year.
Last year, we also had some revenues coming from taxes. That's why the number seems to be lower and adjusted EBITDA much higher than in the previous time period. Next slide, please. Our highlights for this quarter. I'd like to comment and say that we have grown in every single business unit, consumer, corporate, and government. We're very happy that as soon as the exclusivity we had with the smart payment machines with Cielo ended, our team started to work.
Now we signed a large contract with Stone, and we have a very strong pipeline with many new buyers and sub-buyers, many retailers. This is certainly a very relevant market, and we are very strong with a large broad portfolio, not only with the smart machines, but we also added some payment machines in order to broaden our portfolio. Also, high volume of sales in computers, 58% increase year-over-year. What we see is that our growth avenue is also presenting good results, such as HaaS, 120% increase against the same quarter last year.
Thanks to the corporate market and also increase in HaaS considering the corporate market itself. As for government organizations, this is a unique situation, and we have been operating in this market for the last 30 years, but I have never seen so many RFPs and bids. We have already signed contracts, and we ought to be signed, that account for BRL 1.7 billion for the fourth quarter next year. BRL 450 million this year, and the rest for next year. Just as in the corporate market, we see this growth, this hybrid and in-person work.
So companies are now replacing their equipment, and they are also adding and buying notebooks and tablets for students via the Secretariat of Education at municipal and state level. They do have that budget because 25% of their budget should be earmarked for education. We had students at home, distance learning, but now students are going back to school, as well as companies are now having workers going back to the workplace. We also have a very strong pipeline of RFPs and bids.
Another great piece of news is that we are now also participating in this new process of electronic ballot boxes, and we are going to start delivering this year. The other amount by June of next year. We are the only approved company to also run for providing electronic ballot boxes to 2024. So we are now already working on our request for proposal. Next slide, please. Now, I'm going to focus on our business and our revenue. 50% comes from consumers and 27.9% from government organizations and 15.9% from corporate. That means that we also see an increase in corporate.
You can see that all the three major areas have grown. If we compare here for the first nine months, BRL 2.7 billion against BRL 1.5 billion last year. We can see that the numbers are very consistent quarter- after- quarter because of this core business growth avenues and the three areas that we operate on: consumer, corporate, and public organizations or government organizations. As for consumer, sales to our end consumers, smart homes and laptops and notebooks, direct sales via our website. We see this growth from BRL 845 million to BRL 1.5 billion.
We also see an increase in the number of notebooks sold in retail. It's also very important to say that in September, we saw a slowdown in the purchase of notebooks, although still above 2019, but not as big as what we had at the beginning of 2021. We actually expected that to happen after we had the activities resuming. So now we don't see that willingness to buy notebook, but it's still above what we had in 2019. We actually already pictured that.
So to have numbers above 2019 and slightly lower than what we had same period last year and the first half of this year. We signed also a partnership with Infinix and Transsion Holdings is the sixth largest company worldwide in smartphones. It's a company that's increasing its presence, and we are really betting on this partnership. We chose Infinix, which is the brand that caters to young tech-savvy individuals. Our smartphones are being sold at BRL 1,469, but with very good settings. I am using an Infinix, and it's really great. I think it's really worth getting to know it. We expect to increase our share.
We have a very strong presence with Positivo, with smartphones that cost at most BRL 1,000. We are now trying to be present in the different market segments. So this one for premium smartphones. Just as we did with laptops. Also our P3 project, which is really to be. We have all these major retailers. We are working strongly with large retailers, but now we are working with the 101 to 3,000. So the P3-- so working with smaller retailers. We also saw an increase by 32% with small retailers. Smart homes, also 235,000 new users.
So now we are totaling 580,000 users of our smart home app, which is really great. In the future, that also allows us to see recurrent revenue. Products are being welcomed. They are being bought. We are now holding a large brand campaign. Two days ago, we also had a very important conference, and sharing these products with the new line of routers. We are also increasing our portfolio, not to mention the do it yourself, which is also a big seller. This is being sold in major companies where these products are offered.
As for corporate, we see an increase by 24% quarter-over-quarter. Notebook sales increased above sales of desktops. Has impressive number. It already accounts for 15% of our this quarter's gross revenue, which is great. Recurrent revenue increase, and we really enjoy these recurrent revenues. Although we still have a very important revenue coming from single purchase. We are also increasing our customer base. As for the payment machine, we have signed a contract now with Stone, and we are going to deliver this fourth quarter and also next year.
This is really a very strong pipeline as well. Next slide. I have already commented about government organizations. I already shared some numbers, BRL 761 million against BRL 342 million last year, and we expect this number to increase next year, achieving and also considering the BRL 1.7 billion revenue coming from contracts that have already been signed or to be signed. We also have a very robust pipeline. We calculated, and there are an increasing number of RFPs accounting for BRL 6 billion. The volume of notebooks delivered has also increased.
So once again, notebooks increased above desktop. The pandemic also allowed us to have this increase. The strong demand coming from public schools. The Secretariat and Department of Education had some funds left. The pandemic really demonstrated how important it is for students to have a notebook, a tablet on their hands, so that they can study. Also for HaaS, Hardware- as-a-S oftware, we also have these totems available. I would say it is merely a computer, but with a new presentation. Also the rental and leases of notebooks and tablets to public schools. We believe we present a unique presence. We unique engineering and products that allows us to keep on growing. Now, I would like to turn it over to Caio, our CFO, so that he can go over the financial highlights.
Thank you very much, Hélio . Good morning, everyone. It is really a great pleasure to be here. Let us start with the gross margin. As Hélio mentioned, we really have very healthy numbers. Here you can see 23.9% in this third quarter and the nine months, s o today 24.4%. Because we have a very solid margin and a better product mix and service mix. Hardware-as-a-S ervice and this revenue has increased 83% in year- to- date. Also technical services for this quarter, 288%, and year- to- date, 462%. That certainly has impact on our margin, as you can see on this slide.
Next, adjusted EBITDA. Obviously, this number also relates with our presence. Another quarter with a good number. You can see BRL 253 million year- to- date and BRL 89 million for this quarter. I'd like also to clarify that the drop in the margin in this third quarter against the last year's quarter are related to the comparison basis. First, as Hélio mentioned, we had last year some revenue coming from taxes, such as IPI, that has already been converted in cash and that was recognized in the third quarter of last year.
Also starting June of last year, we also decreased working hours. That also had impact on our comparison basis. It's also very important to stress that as for operating expenses, this is really aligned to what we had in 2020. In nine months of 2021, we achieved same level of revenues. If we consider, for example, the G&A expenses, we actually had a decrease as well as for operating expenses. Now moving to our next slide. Our financial results and net income. As for the expenses, as I mentioned, we had really to fund than to borrow for our working capital, not to mention the Selic rate.
As seen before, we are also generating more cash, and that is certainly proved by the results. We see a leverage, a very healthy leverage. We can see this net debt against EBITDA, adjusted one against 1.3x in the third quarter of 2020, not to mention the FX changes that we promoted. We implemented mitigations in order to fight FX volatility. Today, we have a quarter net income of BRL 54 million, and year- to- date, BRL 161 million.
Now for capital market, I'd like to highlight once again that the company entered IBrX 100 now in the third quarter, not to mention the expressive number of stocks that have been negotiated, 483% increase, and also an increase in the number of corporate investors. As you can see here, or institutional, rather, 63% increase. Also the numbers we have here are related to the stock exchange market numbers from yesterday. Now let's turn it over to Hélio for his final remarks.
For the first time, considering all the market uncertainties regarding computer market and giving you an outlook for next quarter, we will achieve BRL 1.5 billion- BRL 1.4 billion. We are still facing challenges, particularly considering international freight. We do not know exactly what we will be able to recognize for that quarter. But our outlook for the fourth quarter is revenues of BRL 1.2 billion- BRL 1.4 billion. With that, the company annual revenue will achieve BRL 4 billion, an amazing growth compared to 2020. We also see strong demand in all business units.
I'd say that not that strong in consumers, and although we do have the Black Friday and Christmas coming up around the corner and our growth avenues working, all of them taking place, HaaS, P3, and even servers that presented a not so strong result, it's important to say that we achieved good results compared to last year. I'd say that our performance is really good. I have already mentioned some numbers for next year, considering the electronic ballots, 935 that will be delivered, and we have BRL 1.2 billion that has already been signed for next year.
That demonstrates that we are going to see a very robust performance next year. I believe that everything we planned starting 2017 by diversifying our revenue source is now bearing fruit. Not to depend on a single product, on a single segment, consumer or corporate or government, not to depend only on computers and notebooks. We are now present in different areas. This change by presenting different laptop brands also, now we are increasing our smartphone portfolio and also in IT with Positivo servers and solutions.
When we think about 5G, we will also see the need of more servers. Our education technology is also being very successful, and it will play a very important role with regard to education software, of the ones we produce and also considering Brazilian and international startups. We see an increase in smart home app, 480,000 already.
We have, for example, sales for buyers and suppliers and retailers. We also see this contract signed with Stone that is for smart payment machines. What we see is that technology presence in our society has increased and it's here to stay. We have been able to deliver revenue and also profitability in a very healthy performance so that we can keep on growing. Thank you very much for your attention. Now we open the Q&A session.
Thank you, Hélio . Please allow me to present the recommendations for the Q&A. We kindly ask you to ask all the questions you have and wait for the company's answer. You can use the Q&A icon at the bottom of your Zoom bar. Please send us also your name, the subject or the issue, and then I will announce your name so that you can directly ask your questions to the company's executive. You will also see a note asking you to unmute yourself. Our first question, we already have a quite good number of questions from Marcos Nardini from XP Investimentos. Marcos, go ahead.
Hello, everyone. Good morning. Good morning, Hélio , Caio, Renata, the entire team. I'd like to commend you for your results, and I have two questions. First, can you please elaborate on how you see the increase in revenues and the impact on margin in 2022 with Infinix. The second is about retail. Can you please talk to us about how retail is doing in this first month and also considering [audio distortion] Black Friday. What are your expectations with regard to retail?
Thank you very much, Marcos. Infinix revenues will be important next year. We are launching one model with two memory sizes, but in January and February of next year, we will add eight new models to be added to that portfolio. And we expect to really present good revenue. The margin will be the regular margin what we see in the retail. We expect to see what we have with regard to smartphones in Brazil, not different from what we have. But the average ticket will be higher. Price is higher. The average ticket will increase.
As for retail behavior, as I said, at the end of August and September, we started to see a slowdown in computers. It is doing well with the tablets and smartphones, but a slight decrease in computers. But compared to the peak we saw at the beginning of 2021, when people were still working from home, where people were still using these pieces of equipment.
Still above the numbers we had 2019. The same will be seen in October. We are now delivering for companies that will carry out Black Friday promotions. If they sell good, and we expect for that to happen, I do not know if we are going to achieve the same levels of 2020 because of the situation in computers. But we believe that will still be very important.
Thank you very much.
Our second question comes from Ricardo Rego, Investor. Please go ahead, sir. Mr. Ricardo Rego please go ahead. While we wait for Mr. Rego I am going to move to the third question from Luis Leal from Premium. Please, if you can please unmute yourself.
Hello. Good morning, everyone. My question is about WEG, WEG Home in the IoT market. What are your expectations regarding WEG, and what are you going to do in order to fight this competition?
Good morning. We will keep on working. We know that there are many companies entering this market segment, including WEG, which is not their core business. We do not know exactly how they are going to operate, and we are still stepping up our strategy of being the first, particularly with a smart home and particularly lighting. We are the leaders in this segment. We carried out a very strong campaign, and perhaps that is why we see this large number of competitors entering this market. We carried out a large advertisement campaign. We are also increasing our portfolio. I believe we are very well-positioned for this category.
Okay. What about Intelbras, another large competitor? Do you see that as a threat?
Intelbras is certainly leader in security. Our share is smaller for that segment. But as for lighting, we are much bigger. Intelbras is certainly a competitor, but for do it yourself, we are leaders.
Okay, thank you very much.
Now turning it over to Mr. Ricardo. He sent us this question in writing. With Infinix next partnership, the power to bargain, will that also affect other products such as tablets, smart homes, notebooks? Can you please comment on that?
Certainly, when you see an increase in volume of a product, your bargain power increases. We will buy more processors, and that will also position us better with our suppliers. We are very happy with this partnership.
Thank you, Hélio . Next question from Mr. Wagner Silva. He is an investor. Please, Mr. Silva, can you open your microphone? Wagner Silva, we kindly ask you to please unmute yourself. I will move to the next question. Mr. Henrique Aiex . Mr. Henrique Aiex , please go ahead.
Good morning, Hélio and team. Congrats for another great quarter. I would like to ask you to please talk about equity equivalent and also about Hilab. The second question is to Caio. We see that the cash position decreased slightly this quarter. Taking advantage of the strong results, are you considering another borrowing?
I will let Caio ask about the most financial aspects, okay?
Thank you very much for your question. As for equity equivalence, it is true, we saw an increase, a positive result against the negative of last year. Thanks to improving our international operations that are captured using equity equivalence, both in Latin America and Africa. That is why we see these more favorable results. This revenue, they are also managed in dollar, and that also helps considering FX. As for the potential issuing of a new debt, it is true that the company is generating more cash.
You can see our EBITDA over the last 12 months, much stronger compared to the same period last year. Cash generation is being also applied in our activities. We can see the guidance for our fourth quarter, I think, already speaks for that. With good results, we are certainly also examining to be more active in capital markets. This is part of our to-do list. Now I would like to turn it over to Hélio .
The Hilab is doing well. During the pandemic, we saw good results with the COVID test. This is a second event in which people had to be tested, and Hilab was in charge of doing that. You draw your blood, and then you have the result in three minutes, which is something that is not really possible in rapid test, in swab test, not blood test. What we see is that the technologies are progressing. It is doing well. We expect a new round of C series with them. Today our stake is 27%. We are very happy with this investment as well as other investments in startups.
Thank you, Hélio . I will read the question by Mr. Wagner Silva, investor. Two questions. Good morning. With regard to payment machines, you have Cielo and Stone as your clients. Which are the major competitors, and what is your current market share, and what is your forecast? Second question to Hilab. Hilab celebrated 17 years yesterday. How do you see development with regard to its growth, and what to expect for the next two years?
I think I have already commented on Hilab. We are very happy with this investment, and we believe that it keep on growing, and perhaps we will see also a C Series that will allow it to increase much more. As for the payment machine, 6 million units for next year, we expect to have an an important market share. We have many competitors, PAX and Gertec.
We have many competitors, both for smart and non-smart. We also have some Chinese companies enter in this market. But we also hold a very strong position considering our unique projects, allowing buyers to really adapt. It is our technology so that we can really master Android and security layers. Today, our share is not that big, but we expect to present a significant share starting next year.
Now, in continue, we receive the question from Mr. Marcos Carneiro from Targus Investimentos. Please, Mr. Carneiro, if you can unmute yourself.
Hello. Good morning, everyone. Congratulations for your results, for your performance, for your growth. I'd like to ask about financial expenses. In issuing debentures, was there any swap for a predetermined rate or not? Considering also the adjustments and increase in the Selic rate over time. Thank you very much.
I will answer your question. Swap was not done, so we worked with CDI plus spread. We also did not work with the prefixed rate. A swap can be done when you are converting the currency, but that was not done.
Next, question from Mr. Fabio Bica, investor. Mr. Bica, can you please unmute yourself? The floor is yours.
Good morning, everyone. Thank you, Renata and the Positivo team. Congrats on the results. I am very happy to be part of such a company that is doing everything right. Looking at the future, can you please talk about your CapEx for 2022, and how does the company see that happening for the next five, 10 years? I know that that is quite complex and complicated, but if you can please share that. Thank you very much.
With regard to CapEx, our CapEx is never high. We actually allocate more for OpEx because we have a high working capital. CapEx, if we need to set up a new line for Board, it accounts for BRL 20 million. It is never a significant number. We have not determined next year's number, so I cannot provide you any specific number, but it is not going to be anything that is above. As for 10 years, I am sorry, I really do not foresee 10 years, but five years, yes, very clearly.
I see a growth of our avenues that we call growth avenues. So payment machine, HaaS, P3, education technology, smart homes, servers, storages. We see an increase in these segments above our core businesses. So it is a matter of reaching balance between these different products. We also see, for example, totems. We see the electronic ballot boxes. We believe that the growth avenues will increase slightly above the increase in core business. So perhaps we will have the possibility of increase our margin as well, and also to see more of recurrent revenues.
So these are the areas that we want to focus on. The areas that we have determined as growth areas or growth avenues, as we call it. I cannot say that. What we want is to really let them grow in the pace they are growing right now and to reach a balance with the core business, so computers and smartphones. Although we really saw that increase of computers in this last month. But we are now adding Infinix and other brands in order to also strengthen our core business. This is our five year forecast.
In the chat, we also received a question by João Vega, from Oracle Capital. He is an analyst. Considering the guidance that was presented, how much do the electronic ballot boxes account for, and how often are you going to deliver them, and how many starting when? First quarter of 2021?
BRL 925 million, 10% will be delivered now in this last quarter of 2021, November, December. Everything else will be delivered by June of 2022. Then there will be another bid, but we will certainly see an increase in our revenues coming from that in 2023.
Perfect. Once again, I would like to remind you to please, in the Q&A icon, please enter your numbers so that we can call your name out. We have a question from Wagner Silva, an investor, and I will read his question. The electronic ballot box is certainly a major technology project that you achieved. However, once you renew [audio distortion] what about investment and the securities exchange? What about the 7.5% of Hilab?
Let us try to answer the first question, perhaps. For electronic ballot box, that is such a major product. But once we renew all the electronic ballot boxes, what the company has been studying for next years is to also study how the company can keep on growing. We have been participating in many special projects. I showed you the totems that are sold for the state of São Paulo government.
We also have a project. We do not know if we are going to actually finish that, but it is about payment of buses fees because in Rio de Janeiro, that will be done electronically, and we are also studying that for other municipalities, also for lottery houses. These are just some examples of what we have been doing. But there are many projects. We have an area of special projects, a very competent engineering, and we will examine the opportunities available in the market.
If you have any other questions, please write your name here in the Q&A icon. Otherwise, we will close the session. If there are no further questions, I would like to thank you all for participating.
I would like to invite you for our Investors Day on November 24th. It will be a hybrid event. We will have the participation of our executives addressing each business unit, and the invitation is already available at our RI website so that you have more information about date, time and site. We hope you can be with us, be it in person or online. I would like to turn it over to Caio and Hélio for their closing remarks.
Thank you very much, everyone. I believe that the results have been very good. We are very happy, and we are certainly available to answer any questions you may have. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much. I would like to echo what Hélio just said. We see an increase in every single business areas, and we also see the new RI. We are more proactive, communicating to and with the market. We are now holding our Investors Day on November 24th, and we hope that you can join us either in person or online. This event will certainly allow us to provide more information. Thank you very much.