Good morning, everyone, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to Vitru Brasil conference call to discuss the results for the first quarter of 2026. For those who need simultaneous interpretation, please click the interpretation button and select the English option. Please note that this conference call is being recorded and will be made available on the company's IR website, investors.vitru.com.br, where the full earnings release materials are also available. During the company's presentation, all participants will remain muted. We'll begin the question and answer session. In order to ask a question, please click the Q&A icon at the bottom of your screen and submit your question to join the line. Once your name is announced, a request to activate your microphone will appear on your screen. You should turn on your microphone to ask your question.
We kindly ask that all questions be asked at once. Today, we are joined by the company's executives, Gabriel Lobo and Aroldo Alves. To begin, I will now turn the floor over to Mr. Aroldo Alves.
Good morning, everyone. It's a pleasure to be here with you as we release our first earnings result for the first quarter of this year. I'd like to start the slide with the highlights for the period, and then Gabriel will go through our financial numbers in more detail, and we'll discuss the outcome of our recent follow-on offering. Here on the left-hand side, we wanted to highlight an important milestone for the period. We surpassed 970,000 students, representing a significant expansion of 10% in our annual student base. This growth is not just a number.
It validates our strategy, it validates our leadership, and above all, it reflects the market's recognition of our academic quality, which is, in fact, our main competitive advantage. Speaking specifically about intake, here we implemented and are presenting a key methodological refinement, which we consider truly important as we extend to UniCesumar the engaged student criterion that, as you know, we have already been using at UNIASSELVI since 2024. We now only count students who effectively pay the first full monthly tuition installment or register academic activity. In other words, they are truly with us on a daily basis. They are learning, and they are meeting their financial obligations. Looking at it from this perspective, we saw our engagement rate increase from almost 55% to 69%, an important gain of 14 PPs in students who are with us day by day.
This is the result of a more precise intake process, bringing students effectively into our learning environments from the very first moment of the learning process. Another highlight in the period was the hybrid learning modality, which represented almost 60% of our intake, growing 65%. This movement is also a direct reflection of our strategic positioning in light of the new regulatory framework. This operational progress translated into robust financial numbers. I'll start with our adjusted EBITDA, which reached BRL 235 million with a margin above 40%, the result of strict operational efficiency discipline. I would like to highlight what was, in fact, the central point of the quarter, our free cash flow generation, which grew 86%, reaching almost BRL 220 million. This is the indicator that we believe best reflects the sustainability of our business model.
This financial strength drove our adjusted net income to almost BRL 92 million, reaching a margin of nearly 16%. To conclude this highlights section, I would like to mention the reduction in our net debt by almost BRL 390 million compared with the same period of last year, bringing our leverage to 1.75x our EBITDA. With these numbers, we're consolidating a much stronger capital structure to support our future growth strategy. Moving on to slide number 5. Before going into the numbers, I would like to talk a little more about the refining methodology we mentioned before. This is not a new concept for us.
UNIASSELVI has been adopting the same criterion since 2024 when we identified that the first tuition installment, dynamic create a group of students or a student base with a very high dropout rate shortly after enrollment. At that point, we started counting only students who effectively paid the first full monthly tuition installment or who are truly with us on a daily basis, accessing our platforms and registering academic activity. What we're doing now is extending the same criterion to UniCesumar, unifying the same metric and the same methodology across both brands. This natural refinement increases our level of transparency and ensures that our indicators accurately reflect real engagement and what will effectively generate revenue during the academic cycle.
To ensure this basis of comparison and help all of you in our models and properly understand what reflects in our evolution during the period, we are also presenting last year's figures under the same perspective. Now moving into the numbers. In this first chart, what we can see here is the distance learning and the hybrid learning student base under this refined methodology, ending the period with 893,000 students, growing almost 12% compared to the same period last year. They are active, engaged students who are effectively generating revenue in an increasingly transparent way. For all of you. Average ticket per students shown below increased 1.7%, reaching BRL 284. This price evolution is consistent with our pricing strategy. Moving to the right-hand side and speaking about intake, we present two different perspectives.
At the top, we present what we call the commercial intake. This is the metric we actually monitor on a daily basis during the intake process before we fully understand the engagement level. Under this perspective, we reached 370,000 students, a decrease of 2.8% compared to the same period last year. There's one very important point here. Excluding the nursing programs, which can no longer be offered through hybrid or distance learning intake, this intake figure would have grown by nearly 1%. Below, we present intake under this refined methodology, considering only engaged students. Under this new methodology, we reached almost 254,000 students, growing 21% compared to the same period last year.
What we see here is in fact, a very significant increase in our engagement rate, which as I mentioned, reached almost 69%. This again reflects the changes in our intake strategy, as well as our engagement and retention strategy, which ultimately result in a lower CAC CAG. I would like also to highlight another important point regarding hybrid programs, which lead this mix composition with 60% of our engaged intake. This is something extremely important within the context of this new regulatory framework. In summary, what we see in the operational data for the first quarter is a student base growing with quality improving ticket, increasing effective intake and rising engagement. These figures reflect a more mature operation and metrics that are fully aligned with what we actually deliver on a first basis. That covers the operational data.
I would like to turn the floor over to Gabriel now, who will provide more details into our financial results.
Thank you, Aroldo, good morning, everyone. Turning on to slide six, let's detail our consolidated net revenue and segment performance. In the first quarter, we delivered consolidated net revenue of BRL 579.2 million, representing a growth of 6.1% compared to the first quarter of 2025. Hybrid undergraduate programs and distance learning naturally continue to consolidate themselves as the strategic engine of our business model, presenting together 71% of total revenue. In the first quarter of 2026, these modalities generated BRL 412.8 million, growing 8.9% compared to the first quarter 2025.
Performance was mainly driven by volume, which contributed approximately 75% of this growth through the expansion of the average student base during the period, while the remainder naturally came from the average ticket growth. For the first time, we're separately disclosing hybrid undergraduate revenue, also within the context of the new regulatory framework. The hybrid learning segment, which naturally represents the largest share of the company's revenue, grew 8% compared to the first quarter of 2025, reaching BRL 254.3 million. Distance learning undergraduate programs posted revenue of BRL 158.5 million, up 10.3% versus the same period last year. Looking at the on-campus segment and separating medicine from other programs, medicine posted net revenue of BRL 80.5 million in the first quarter 2026 or the remain on-campus programs.
Excluding medicine, total BRL 53.6 million, growing by 7.2%. The combined on-campus revenue, including medicine, totaled BRL 134.1 million this quarter, representing a combined growth of 4.1%. Finally, in continuing education, we posted BRL 32.3 million this quarter, a decrease of 14.6% compared to the first quarter last year. As we mentioned at the end of the year, last year, we implemented some strategic adjustments in this segment and this business unit throughout 2025. These changes were mainly structural in nature, including leadership changes. We expect to return to growth by capturing the positive effects of these initiatives over the next quarters. Moving on to slide 7, we present the breakdown of gross profit, gross margin, and the composition of the company costs and expenses.
It's a set of indicators that directly reflect our operational discipline during the quarter. This quarter, adjusted gross profit reached BRL 412.9 million, growing 4.6% compared to the first quarter of 2025, with an adjusted gross margin of 71.3%. It's important to highlight here our ability to continue maintaining gross margins above 70%, which is very high, and it reinforces the structural strength of our app, our ecosystem. What stands out in the composition of adjusted costs and expenses is that we kept the total nominal amount virtually flat compared to last year, even amid Brazil's structural inflationary pressure. Looking at total, we recorded BRL 348.4 million this quarter, only 0.1% above the first quarter of 2025.
It's important to emphasize that we maintain costs and expenses under tight control. Even in an environment of continued operational growth, clearly demonstrating our ability to expand margins through operating leverage. Going a bit deeper into the details, especially in the sales and marketing line, we closed the quarter with BRL 112.9 million in expenses, representing a dilution of 2.1 percentage PPs as a percentage of net revenue, reaching 19.5% of net operating revenue. This is the direct result of the maturation of our marketing model, something we have been discussing since last year, with increasingly precise media allocation guided by data and focused on the channels that deliver the highest value. For the year of 2026, we expect part of this efficiency achieved this quarter to be partially reinvested back into the business.
Our intention is to maintain the company's growth pace with positive intake while continuing to invest in marketing consistently. For the coming quarters, we expect this expensive line as a percentage of revenue to operate much closer to the level seen last year. Obviously, we'll keep pursuing efficiency gains in our algorithms and capital allocation, but at the same time, we'll not lose sight of revenue growth and the opportunities presented by favorable market conditions. The game here is balance, a conscious balance between spending discipline and investment in growing the student base. Looking at the G&A line, we recorded BRL 35 million this quarter, declining from 6.3%, sorry, to 6% of net revenue. Naturally, we again gained efficiency in G&A, reflecting our disciplined approach to cost control. Another extremely positive highlight this quarter was the bad debt provision expense, PCLD.
We recorded 34.2% in bad debt provisions this quarter, a significant improvement of 23.5% when compared to the first quarter of 2025, ending this line around 5.9%. This represents a reduction of 2.3 PPs compared to the same period last year. This natural evolution is explained by two complementary movements. The first is structural, a more engaged student space, naturally tends by definition to present a healthier collection profile. The hybrid and distance learning undergraduate data presented earlier by Aroldo confirms that. The second factor is operational.
Here we're talking about our financial health agenda with today has also a preventive approach, including improvements in communication rules, credit scoring, the recent implementation of more qualified payment methods, naturally increasing higher recurrence in checkout, and increasingly digital collection and renegotiation processes now running much more integrated with the company's retention and student experience strategy. In summary, what we're saying is that we are reducing delinquency with more intelligence, more prevention, and a better student experience, improving revenue quality and reinforcing the sustainability of our growth. From an annual perspective, just to provide some color here, we expect to continue improving in terms of PCLD and delinquency, although at more moderate levels in the coming quarters when compared to the very significant reduction delivered in the first quarter. When we compare to this first quarter, I mean.
Moving to slide number 8, we present the adjusted EBITDA bridge for the quarter. Adjusted EBITDA totaled BRL 235.1 million, representing a robust growth of 16% compared to the first quarter last year. Our adjusted EBITDA margin reached 40.6%, representing an expansion of 3.5 PPs. It's a very solid number. It reinforces one of the company's key attributes, that is being a light, a lean, highly adaptable company with solid operating margins. When we look at the drivers behind this margin expansion, the bridge clearly shows what supported this result. Revenue growth contributed with BRL 33 million. Cost of service, despite being pressured when we look at the percentage by 1.1 PPs of revenue, what was already expected moving, giving the maturation of the hybrid healthcare program costs.
When we talk about those costs, we're basically referring to preceptorship costs, which are more significant for the final stages of the academic journey. Again, we delivered a very strong gross margin. On the expense side, as I mentioned in the previous slide, we achieved important efficiency gains in sales and margins, also in G&A, with a relevant highlight coming from PCLD. In summary, the key point here is that we captured important operating leverage this quarter, while keeping a spending discipline in very solid margins. Moving on to the next slide 9. We present here the evolution of adjusted net income.
It's important to make this indicator very clear because, following the capture of gains resulting from the incorporation of UniCesumar into Vitru executed in January, we will now monitor net income going forward on a cash tax basis. We already introduced this view in the fourth quarter of last year, and we believe that this is the most accurate way to assess the company's earnings, connecting them to our ability to effectively convert already recognized tax assets into cash. Before going into the numbers, I think it's important to provide some context regarding an important accounting dynamic this quarter. This is not a trivial quarter when looking at statutory earnings. The incorporation of UniCesumar into Vitru, completed in January, as I said, generated very significant effects on statutory net income, which closed the quarter at BRL 794.7 million.
Obviously, this was not operational profit. This result was impacted by a non-cash effect of BRL 762.6 million related to the reverse of deferred liabilities recognized at the time of the business combination with UniCesumar back in 2022. This item is strictly accounting in nature and was therefore excluded from the reconciliation process to reach adjusted net income. We also excluded other effects related to temporary differences arising from the amortization of fair value adjustments and goodwill, which together total almost BRL 27 million, both with negative impacts on deferred taxes. Likewise, those items are strictly accounting in nature with no cash impact, and therefore, we make those adjustments to calculate adjusted net income under a cash tax perspective.
Adjusted net profit after all the adjustments I just mentioned, reached BRL 91.8 million, representing a growth of 24.1% compared to the first quarter last year. Adjusted net margin came at 16%, more precisely 15.9%. What truly matters from an operational standpoint is that this adjusted net income was supported by two factors. The first was operation leverage reflected by EBITDA. The second was the tax optimization through the capture of fiscal benefits resulting from the incorporation. These are the two key elements explaining the double-digit earnings growth that we present this quarter. Moving now to slide 10, we present what's one of the most important indicators of our operation and management, that is cash generation.
Once again, we delivered an outstanding quarter in terms of cash generation with high EBITDA to cash conversion. Company's free cash flow reached BRL 217.1, growing 85% compared to the first quarter last year. Cash conversion increased from 53% to 82%. This expansion naturally highlights the company's operational strength and improved efficiency throughout the investment cycle in the company. This performance is mainly explained by two factors. The first was efficient working capital, operating capital management, resulting in a reduction of the financial cycle and consistent improvement in average life term period, which gross PCLD declined by nearly seven days from 86 days to 79 days in the first quarter of 2026. There were also two additional dynamics regarding our working capital that's worth highlighting this quarter.
The first was the advanced payment of certain tuitions in medicine. That's something recurring in our operation. This year we had an additional contribution of approximately BRL 5 million from accelerated medicine program receivables due to those advanced payments. The second point contributing to working capital was a decision we implemented in March at UniCesumar, a highly strategic initiative with a commercial angle. We changed the billing model for what we internally call late entry students, meaning students who enroll themselves after classes have already started. This year we created a pilot program, and it was changing the receivables. We postponed the collection of that to March. We used to collect that later. This year we decided to offer discounted early payment so that this collection will happen during March itself.
It was very strong. Essentially, we accelerated cash collection and because when we wait until December, there's always a dropout risk. By bringing collection forward, we generated approximately BRL 3 million in additional cash generation versus last year. Besides working capital, it's very important also to mention the impact of cash taxes that it reduces significantly by almost BRL 26 million in income tax and social contributions, contribution payments in the 1st quarter compared to the same period last year. These are the main elements explaining the strong cash generation that we present this quarter. Naturally, these two combined elements, both EBITDA growth and cash generation, bring us to the next slide number 11, where we present the company's leverage profile.
As we can see, our leverage trajectory continues to move consistently downward, even at an accelerated pace, fully aligned with our strategic plan. Something we have been discussing very objectively with the market lately. Vitru ended the first quarter of 2026 ex-IFRS of BRL 1.46 billion, representing a significant reduction of nearly 21% compared to the first quarter last year. When we look at net debt to EBITDA ratio, it's important to emphasize that EBITDA is always ex-IFRS. We closed the quarter at 1.75x a reduction of 0.66 versus first quarter 2025, and a decrease of 0.24 compared to last quarter last year. This continuous deleveraging process remains without a doubt hence now one of our main strategic priorities with the goal of quickly approaching our target leverage ratio of 1.5 x.
We already very close to this quarter, and quarter after quarter evolution demonstrates that we're delivering on this agenda with discipline and speed. Another important point is our debt amortization schedule, which reinforces a longer debt maturity profile, with obligations mainly concentrated from 2027 onward and a relatively low amount due in 2026, totaling BRL 226 million. That gives us important financial flexibility from a liability management perspective. Finally, I believe that it's very important to see this last slide. This year has been strong, a year of important operational and financial deliveries, but also marked by a very significant corporate milestone, our first follow-on offering. This was a landmark moment for the company. We completed the first equity offering in the education sector since 2021, almost five years without any offering in the sector.
In practice, we're talking about something like a re-IPO of the company in Brazil two years after the migration from Nasdaq to B3, and the quality of execution became very evident in the numbers. More than 40 investors joined our shareholder base through the transaction, the book was covered more than 5x relative to the base offering. This sends a very clear signal of market confidence in our investments, investment thesis. From a liquidity standpoint, which was one of the main goals of the transaction, the impact has already become quite visible. Our average daily trading volume over the last 30 days increased from approximately BRL 7 million before the offering to something much closer to BRL 15 million at this point. In other words, we achieved exactly what we were aiming for, and we believe this trend should continue accelerating over the coming months.
Regarding the use of resources, this is also an important point. The allocation of proceeds of resources from this primary offering will be handled very carefully. The funds will naturally be directed towards strengthening cash and working capital, operating capital, investments in the campuses of healthcare, something we discussed, expansion of laboratory infrastructure, and also our liability management agenda, including the potential prepayment of some lines or expensive debt lines we carried in our balance sheet. In summary, this offering was not simply a fundraising transaction. It represented an important position milestone for Vitru in the Brazilian capital market. We achieved the attributes we were looking for, greater liquidity, a refreshed investor base with increasingly more qualified investors joining the company, and a stronger capital structure to support the next growth cycle. With that, I conclude my presentation, and I'll open the floor for the Q&A session.
Thank you so much. We will now begin the Q&A session. As a reminder, in order to ask a question, please click the Q&A icon at the bottom of your screen and type your question to join the line. Once your name is announced, the request to activate your microphone will appear on your screen. You should then activate your microphone to ask your question. We kindly ask that all questions be asked at once. Let's do our first question by Samuel Alves, BTG Pactual. We'll open your audio for you to ask your question. Samuel, please go ahead.
Good morning, Aroldo, Gabriel, all the other directors. Two questions from our side. Thank you. First is, could you give us some color on capitation on intake by brands? Is there any disparity, important disparity between both brands? The second question is related to intake.
You showed a slight decrease in intake. Can you tell us the revenue from intake compared to the old basis? We understand that it grew a little since the factor mix. Could you shed some color?
Hi, Samuel. Good morning. Thanks for your question. I'll talk about intake first, and then I'll turn the floor to Gabriel. What we can see is that both brands have been growing from an engaged students perspective. One of the brands had more engagement. We advanced a little more. That was UniCesumar. We equalized when we see from the engaged students perspective. Talking about revenue, both brands are growing. I'm sorry, UNIASSELVI is growing a little more than UniCesumar, but both are very similar.
One of them had a bigger growth, but it equalized the performance this quarter in our vision. Gabriel, please. Let me address the second question.
Good morning, Samuel Alves. How are you doing? Just complementing what Aroldo Alves has said, just another very important point to complement, I think it's important to say we have a baseline of 1st quarter 2025 that was unbalanced between both brands. We didn't disclose that to market, but since you asked, we had a performance at UNIASSELVI from 2023, 2024, and up to the beginning of 2025. It started in the 1st quarter of 2025. That was a performance that was not aligned to our goals. UNIASSELVI's baseline was a little lower. We had a performance that improved a lot at UNIASSELVI, and it connects to our line of marketing sale.
The efficiency in the sales structure in UNIASSELVI was really good, and now we are capturing value. UNIASSELVI improved a lot because it had the bad performance, and we improved the sales machine with big effort in sales and marketing that now show results. UniCesumar had a higher baseline. When we think about the next quarters, the baseline of UniCesumar is a little more mature, so you have more smoother, like smoother comps to achieve. We had that systemic migration. We talked a little about that exclusively at UniCesumar. There are ups and down between quarters, but looking at the first quarter especially, UNIASSELVI grew by a little more because it had room for that, and UniCesumar is a little more shy in that.
If you could repeat your question about intake, I can address, if you don't mind. For sure.
We would like to understand if the revenue from intake grew. Because you talked about growth, but we understand it had some growth. Can you confirm that?
Yes, it grew a little. It's important to qualify that with this change in the engagement model, naturally we have a penalty to be paid in revenue, and we are doing that. We could have grown more, about double digits globally if we had operated the first quarter using the same model of revenue of last year. The base of comparison is not that good to analyze that because we had a different model. Yes, it grew.
Just to seize the moment to talk about another topic. In the first quarter, we have a different quarter because the intake revenue at Vitru has a lower impact compared to presential companies because our intake model is a little different. We look at 20% of total revenue. The biggest share in revenue this year came from the seasoned students, the veteran students, because our experience is very important, our journey team to increase the LTV of the students. It reflects in a more engagement from the students. It's important to talk a little about this second. Answering directly your question, the revenue from intake grew.
Thank you, Aroldo. Good morning.
Moving to our next question. It's by Vinicius Figueiredo from Itaú BBA. Vinicius, please go ahead.
Good morning, everyone. Thanks for choosing my question.
We have two points here, two topics. The first, we had an expectation of a good, strong cash generation. You kept consistency, especially in this key indicator. As you talked at the presentation, you have a very comfortable capital structure. I'd like some update from you about the follow on and talking about dividend share and distribution. You talked about your goal of 1.5x. How it would represent talking about a payout policy looking at 2027 based on your cash generation expectation. Looking at some news, you guys had a different, a new round of the approval of a new campi. You guys had some approvals.
Just for us to understand, what's the timing for future consequences from the education department side, if you have something more to disclose, and how this timing is related to the new operation of those new campi?
Thank you, Vinicius. Very nice question. Let me address the first and Aroldo takes the second. Regarding cash generation, we have been talking a lot about that recently. We had a very good expectation of stronger cash generation, and we surprised ourselves. It was better than we expected actually. As we saw the cash generation, some actions that we implemented, we talked a little about that, this call and in the release, those initiatives were well succeed, especially the change in the commercial perspective in the late entry collection that we received in December.
We advanced that to March, and it was really good. Some medicine tuition payments. Everything is in cash generation. We have a very positive reading for the year. With this follow-on process, the perspective is to bring the ratio to 1.5x that EBITDA. We're not talking that this is an efficient number. We understand that the capital structure will go a little lower than that regarding efficiency, because today we have the tax shield and the reduction due to amortization on a tax basis. It will generate lower and lower effects throughout the next quarters. About revenue, it doesn't mean that to push the button about dividend payouts this year. This discussion will move to the next quarter.
We need to wait a little for the year to happen. If we deliver the year as we are planning, no doubts we're going to discuss that. We've been discussing that internally, and with the board of directors, like what would be the dividends and policy? How would we implement that? We have to do that consistently. Yeah, we can't do that like as a one-shot dividend distribution. It must be consistent for the market to understand. We will talk about that at the end of the year. We're going to dimension the numbers of these payout, since our cash generation and our yield, it seems that we have room for a healthy dividends distribution futurely.
It would help us to do the re-rating because we have a valuation that's lower to our deliverables and I think it will happen soon.
Thank you, Gabriel. Thank you, Vinicius, for your question. Good morning. Talking about the mini campi. In fact, the presencial segments, we had 7 new campi approved. São Paulo, Rio, Florianópolis, cities that are very important to our brand strategy. Our expectation is to have some approvals up to the end of May. When we confirm that, then send the final documentation. We are prioritizing some cases. When operation begins, our original planning was always operating half of that for the second semester intake and half for the next year. Those 7 new campi will start intaking this period.
We prioritized a lot the biggest cities with higher demand to use the strength of our brand. Our the 7 first campi were approved, and we are expecting the other to be approved next month to start collection next semester. Did I answer that?
Yes, you did. Thank you so much.
Next question by Marcio Osako, Sell-Side analyst, Bradesco. Marcio, please go ahead.
Good morning, Aroldo, Gabriel Lobo. Thanks for taking my question. There are two questions. First, talking about intake, if you could like shed some color in performance, because it was like impressive. It was above marketing average in quality and raising engaged students with a lower marketing expense. Opposite to other companies we could see. How can you explain this competitive advantage compared to the market? Is it about the regulatory framework? The second question is about costs.
You had an increase of 10% year-over-year. Do you have any increment caused by the new regulatory framework? The costs will keep growing as we saw 10% compared to last quarter.
Thank you, Marcio. Good morning. First, talking about intake. Gabriel will take the second question. Regarding intake, so we had the best practice and all our digital performance from UNIASSELVI was produced at UniCesumar. Besides that, we've been working a lot in engagement. We have two big factors added here. How we bring our intake commercial intake of students. We had a flat curve compared to last year, but since our intake you prioritize the profile of students that would keep with us, that would not drop out.
We planned our digital machine to bring students that had the same profile that would stay with us. Besides that, we worked a lot for the students to access and pay their invoices. It's what guarantees the collection, the intake collection, and to improve the quality of our students. This is what we expect. Regarding intake, that said, the digital machine of sales is working. The hubs are bringing more students, and we are using everything we have, the digital channels, and we are working on engagement, basically. We didn't change significantly anything. We just did better what we used to do. We expect it will keep happening for the next quarters, but nothing specific.
Thank you. Good morning, Marcio. Thanks for your question. Taking the second question regarding costs.
Let's take the guideline for the year. We have the healthcare program costs from 2022, 2023, 2024, because we sped up the healthcare programs at the company. Naturally, we're moving to the end of those courses, and it bring more costs regarding preceptorship, as I mentioned. This was the main element when we compare year to year. There is nothing regarding the new regulatory framework here. It will impact the company regarding costs from 2027 on. This is our expectation. This is what is in our plan. We have no costs regarding the new regulatory framework. This cost pressure was predicted because we had a gross margin last year, and this year we are going to operate a gross margin 100 BPS lower because you have seasonality, and those costs are fixed.
If the revenue works well, you dilute a little, the gross margin suffers a little less. It works in function of each other. We expect that we are going to run that a little lower than last year, because last year was around 70%. This is our expectation, but no effect from the new regulatory framework. Just the natural costs of the maturity of the healthcare programs, especially the hybrid learning programs that we have been investing, well, the last years. Our revenue share, the hybrid learning mixing to the, you know, our share is really relevant.
Thank you, Aroldo and Gabriel.
Next question from Renan Prata, Sell-Side analyst of Citi. Please move on, Renan.
Thank you, guys. It's a quick question talking about PDD. You talked a lot about that.
There was an improvement from a structural and operational factor. How do you see that line in the long-term perspective? Talking about percentage of revenue, because there is a positive trend, it seems, given the higher mix of hybrid learning programs, better engagement, and this new collection method. How can we see that line for the next years? Not necessarily for the next quarters. Thank you.
Good morning, Renan. Let me take that one. I think we tried to put some light into our PDD, trying to explain that. We don't have an expectation that we'll run PDD. It's important to make it very clear we had 5.9% of net revenue regarding PDD. It's a little lower than that. We don't expect that the structural PDD of the company will not run at those bases.
It depends on seasonality and size. Reminding you that PDD is not a picture. It's a consequence of a curve, an aging of what was contracted throughout the last years. Of course, the receivables is being pressured by that. You have a time dislocation from effective PDD and the revenue of that quarter. We understand that this level is close to 10%, and we should have a gain of 100 BPS. Maybe in long term, we're going to operate below 9%. We're calibrating something related to that in medium term. Around 100 BPS-150 BPS of gain when you look at medium/long term.
It's very clear, Gabriel. Thank you.
Next question is by Mirela Oliveira by Bank of America. Mirela, please.
Good morning Aroldo, Gabriel.
I have one quick question regarding the pricing strategy of hybrid learning cost programs. How do you do that compared to distance learning? Can you practice higher prices for the hybrid course? What's your feeling about the pricing of the competitors? Because the other courses of the market have not carried this increment of costs. This is the question.
Mirela, good morning. Thank you for your question. What we see today, Mirela, is that the prices are very similar to other periods. We don't see impacts in cost and pricing regarding the new regulatory framework. I believe everybody's waiting a little. Some smaller competitors changed a little, ups and downs, as we can see, it's a very similar dynamics compared to the previous cycles.
Slight improvement in some prices regarding healthcare programs. Nothing related to the new regulatory framework. If it happens, it's only happening when the courses actually change. What we can see today is very similar to previous cycles. Thank you.
Thank you so much.
Next question is by Lucas Nagano from Morgan Stanley. Lucas, please move on.
Good morning Aroldo, Gabriel. We have two questions. First is about the regulatory framework. If you could talk about the perspective of a new student, hybrid or distant, compared to that mix that you suggested. Can you quantify the impact that's going to be generated? You commented, you talked about 8% in EBITDA, but if you could quantify if this value is what you expect, if it's your perspective. This is the first question. The second question is about this late entry collection pilot.
We'd like to have some color on, like, how many students were impacted by this new model. If you implement that model to everybody, how much cash you would have generated for first quarter? Thank you.
Good morning, Lucas. How are you doing? Let me take those two, Aroldo can complement. About the regulatory framework, we are in a transition period. This is the first point here we have to be clear. There is no mandatory changes now regarding the curricular matrixes, matrices of the courses. We are using the transition period as it says. We have a plan for the new curricular matrix. It's going to be implemented from 2027 on, we're not operating with the new curricular matrix. Of course, we are prepared.
We are 100% prepared for the change. We're not pressing the button now because it's not necessary since the transition period is valid until 2027. Regarding impact questions, it's important to talk now that the perspective didn't change. We had a range from 8%-10% medium term. I'm talking about nominal EBITDA. Not talking about impact on margin, I'm talking about the nominal EBITDA looking at five years on. When we look at margin, thinking about next year, we have a potential impact of 150 BPS of pressure. Of course, I'm talking about costs to adjust the faculty regarding the presential courses. Of course, we're going to include that in our plans. We have a very big gross margin.
When I'm talking about 100 BPS, 150 BPS, I'm talking about zero effect from repricing. We're going to understand, and this was the previous question from Mirela, like, how can we operate and change pricing? We haven't changed anything so far because we didn't have a cost impact. From the moment that the sector increases its cost because of the framework, we have to equalize the market. We're going to wait a little more just to see how it's going to happen. From now on, we're not, like, passing to the student the cost of these adjustments. How do it brings pressure to the company? 100 BPS, 150 BPS in costs, it's going to reflect on EBITDA.
Talking about the new collection model, now we are talking about one month only. When we compare to last year, it's about BRL 3 million-BRL 3.5 million. It's nothing like, wow. The cash generation from the company didn't come from this, but it's very nice because it's an opportunity we have at home to think differently, to improve, to do better what we have been doing. The focus here is engagement. If we wait to engage the students, to bring the student to our student bases, like in the long run. We brought the students. We wanted not only to increase collection, but from the moment the student pays the first tuition, the commitment of the student increases. Not only the financial commitment, but the academic commitment too.
It brought a better engagement, and we're talking about 13%, and nominally about BRL 3 million rounding up in terms of cash generation.
Thank you, Gabriel.
That's it. The Q&A session is now concluded. Now I'd like to give the floor back to Mr. Aroldo Alves for his final considerations.
I'd like to thank everybody that the results are there, consistent, we're growing, and we've been talking to the market. It's aligned with our strategy. Thank you so much, everyone, and we complete our earnings call. Good morning to everyone.
This earning call regarding the first quarter of Vitru Brasil is now concluded. The IR sector is at your disposal to address further questions. Thank you so much for attending this session.