Now let's give the floor to Mr. Bo Lin, the Chief Financial Officer, to introduce Kingdee's 2024 interim performance and development strategy. Welcome.
Distinguished investors, shareholders, good morning. I'm Bo Lin from Kingdee. Welcome to join us in the 2024 interim results announcement. This session could be divided into four parts. I will talk about the financial review, Kingdee cloud products, China SaaS market outlook, and appendix. Let's look at the results overview of 2024. You can see that our group revenue has increased by 11.9% year-on-year, reaching RMB 2.87 billion. ARR has increased by 24.2% year-on-year, reaching RMB 3.15 billion. The net loss attributable to shareholders decreased by 23.2%, reaching RMB 218 million. As of July, we have repurchased shares worth about RMB 400 million, and the employee incentive could reach 1 million.
And also, these RMB 514 million also include the cancellation and employee incentive program. This year, we have also made some investments, and we also have some, we have also paid back some loans. So the cash reserve is RMB 4.28 billion. It is quite sound in terms of the cash flow. So Kingdee has committed to our commitment, committed to our principle of providing our services for more enterprises. So here, in terms of enterprise business capability, EBC, we have taken the lead in China, and as the leading company in China, we have also been recognized by many authorities. For example, by IDC report, we have been rated as number one in terms of market share, in terms of SaaS CRM.
We are also the market number one in terms of the low-code and no-code software category. In terms of the market share for growing enterprises, we are also ranking number one. We are also the only Chinese vendor in the Asia Pacific SaaS ERP, small and medium markets and medicine reports. We are also serving over half of the China top 500 companies. At the same time, we're also serving the specialized innovative companies, and we are serving 43% of them. Here I have a stat. We are providing our services to 5,500 specialized innovative companies, and in China, we have 12,000 in total, around 12,000 in total, so we are serving 43% of them.
We have many excellent, excellent clients, making our development really fast in 2023. So the headcount increased 1.6% year-on-year, but it decreased by 1% month-on-month. To compare with December 31 last year, the headcount decreased by 1%. But if we compare with the same period last year, like to compare with July last year, to compare with June last year, the headcount increased by 1.6%. And now let me give you some hints about the revenue growth. So here you can see that our CAGR of seven years revenue CAGR has reached 15.4%. And a lot of customers are willing to choose our services.
But some customers are concerned that maybe we are transforming from a product-based company to a project-based company, but here I want to assure you of that. So here you can see the revenue growth in the past seven years, as well as the headcount growth. So you could say that our company is, of course, still a product-based company or product-driven company. We are also attaching great importance to the performance of our employees. I'm sorry, there is a glitch here with the remote. So here you can see the bar chart. The CAGR reached a double-digit growth, and the headcount increase is within the range of 1%-2%. Specifically, this year, 1.6%... so that you can calculate the performance rate or the headcount efficiency.
So we are actually a company driven by product, and in the product, the most important business is subscription, cloud subscription. So in the H1 of 2024, the cloud services revenue accounts for 83.2%. So you can see, this proportion is quite large, 83.2%. Why are we stressing the subscription model here? A lot of investors are asking us this question. So against these economic crisis nowadays, if we are still a project-based company, we need to have more projects to come in the future so as to sustain our development. But here you can see that we haven't got too many new customers joining in. For example, our customer base is 10,000, and this year, we plan to have 1,000 more customers.
When we are growing and growing, the increased rate of the new customers will be lower down. However, we are now a product-based company, and our business centered on subscription model. That is the main source of our revenue. Here you can also see the contract liabilities. We have also viewed many other industry reports. So now, our annual revenue is RMB 6 billion, and the accounts receivable is RMB 180 million. We have also compared ourselves with other listed companies. That is a peers average. So here you can see that we are transforming in a very healthy and sound way, and our contract liabilities is among the top in terms of among all the peers in the same industry. And the cloud subscription also drive our operating cash flow to uplift.
So here in this chart, you can see the cash flow of each year. At the end of last year, our cash flow could reach RMB 653 million, and in 2024, we are very confident to increase the cash flow. Our goal, because a lot of people are asking us about our goal, despite all the challenges, we also, we still have the same goal, to maintain, to reach a cash flow of RMB 900 million. And you would see, also see that our revenue of cloud service will also improve. So here you can see the revenue, the profit margin of cloud services in the H1 of each year and the H2 of this year.
So here you can see that in the H1 of the last year, it's -21.9%, and in the H2 of 2023, it's 3.2%. So we believe that this year we are expecting to see a turning point in terms of the profit margin. And here, it's all about the cloud subscription services. So you can see that ARR is increasing by 24.2%, reaching RMB 3.15 billion. It's not an easy task to achieve, but our expectation will be a little bit higher than that. We expect to see 25% increase, but now we've achieved a 24.2% increase. If we look at the categories, you can see that the industries...
If we look at the revenue based on different sectors, you would see that in industry clouds area, we are still reaching our expectation. In terms of operating expense, you can see how our expense are distributed in different sectors. So no matter we're talking about S&M, and G&A or R&D, you can see the proportion of operating expense, and they are all decreasing as a proportion of the total expense. The year-on-year growth of expense is far below than the growth rate of our revenue. That is why we are performing very well this last year. Our profit, gross profit is also increasing. And now let's take a look at our business update. A lot of people are paying attention to Cosmic and Constellation.
In the H1 of 2024, we have a contracted, we have signed RMB 900 million worth of contracts, 60% increase, representing 60% increase. And the ROI growth is 29%, and NDR is 97%, a little bit lower somehow with the same period last year. But if we look at the statistics, you will see that we don't have many, customers leaving us. Like, our customer retention rate is so high.... And the reason why the rate is not as high as we expected is because that the customers, our customers are cutting their budgets. But we expect to see the NDR going back to 100% in the years to come. And we also know that we are, Kingdee has suffered some loss in terms of our services provided for those large companies.
We have also done analysis over that. So here you can see from 2018, have many new customers starting to use our customers. Let me give you an example. Like, in 2020, we have signed RMB 400 million worth of the contracts with customers, and then in 2023 and in 2024, the contract could reach RMB 1,200 million. So you could see that even though at the very beginning, the large clients haven't invested a lot in our software, but they have a large potential to increase their investment in the future. That is why we need investment in the software, providing for those large enterprises. They will be our cash cow in the future.
We also need to strike a balance between our services for the large companies and the mid-sized enterprises. Here you can see the ARR is improving consistently in Cosmic and Constellation. So you can see that 35% of our customers with over 1 million ARR, actually contributing 35% of the total subscription. So you can also see the proportion of different customer subscription segments of different ARR. And here, we're going to talk about the Cloud Galaxy. Kingdee Cloud Galaxy is very well recognized, very well acknowledged by the mid-sized enterprises. And now our net customer base could reach 42,000.
When we launched Galaxy, our initial goal is to reach—was to reach 40,000, and we have already exceeded our goal. The ARR growth is 24%, the NDR is 95%, operating margin is 20%. So for Galaxy, we have many excellent mid-sized enterprises as our customers. For small and micro-sized enterprises, we have Cloud Stella and Cloud Kingdo. The net customer base for Stella is 63,000, and NDR is 92%. For Kingdee Jingdou, the net customer base reached the revenue brought by the Kingdee Jingdou has increased by 25%. For Stella, the increase is even higher. For Kingdo, the NDR is 87% and the operating margin is 40%.
Here is all about the market outlook, and this adapted from the China Enterprise Application Market Report. According to this report, we believe that the ERP SaaS market could reach RMB 33.4 billion, with the estimated CAGR reaching 22%. You can also see the different segments under the umbrella of SaaS market, ERP SaaS, SaaS market. With the advent of AI, the growth of AI, Gartner, IDC, and Sequoia have all launched reports here. So according to their consensus, for example, like Gartner, they believe that by 2027, at least 50% of AI functions in ERP application will be realized through generative AI. So that is why in Kingdee, we will also prioritize AI. So here you can see the new generation enterprise AI platform. We don't need to restructure it.
We are already a cloud native. We already have a cloud-native structure. We don't need to restructure our Cosmic. We don't need to rebuild our technology base or rebuild development process or user experience. It haven't brought us a lot of cash flow yet. But we also. We already have our Cosmic application employed by some of the big companies, for example, like HiSilicon, as well as another company in Xiamen. And we have also demonstrated this application in many. So because I know that a lot of you are well-concerned about this topic, so that is why we've shown you this cosmic application interface. But with AI, with generative AI, lots of people will be, it will be very easier for people to use our, use our software.
The user interface is also more friendly, and we can also provide more convenience in terms of data mining. That is all about my report. Thank you again, for attending, to attend this conference on site.
Thank you, Bo Lin. Now, we will open the floor for questions. Should you have any questions, please raise your hands and tell us your name and company before asking, and each of you could only ask two questions.
Hi, executive. Thank you for giving me this, opportunity to raise a question. I'm Bing Duan with Nomura Securities. So I'm Bing Duan, and the first question is about the performance of the software for the large enterprise. We know that in the H1 of this year, the macroeconomy is still under pressure.
So, but you've made a really good performance in the H1 of the year, and you've registered more than 60% of the growth rate of the software provided for the large enterprises. So could you share with us the drivers and the reasons behind? And can you share with us some of the expectations for the future growth in the large enterprise software? And I also noticed that the NDR for the large enterprise software and the mid-size enterprise software is decreasing a little bit. So can you share with us the reason behind, and also, do you have any expectations for the overall growth trends in the whole year?
Thank you. For the large enterprises, from our perspective, we believe that, despite the economic crisis or the challenges, you would still admit that those large enterprises are the big investors on AI. And the country is now encouraging large enterprises to make innovations in terms of IT, to promote digitalization. And a lot of enterprises want to leverage digitalization to promote their transformation. That is why we believe large enterprises are very important customers of us. So that is why they have a higher... They will always have a very high demand on the software provided by Kingdee. And we expect to see a higher growth in the H2 of the year for the large enterprise software. And in terms of the NDR decrease for large enterprises and mid-size enterprises, let's look at the large enterprises first.
Because of the economic transformation in the H1 of the year, a lot of large enterprises are transforming their structures. For example, like they are streamlining. That is why the NDR is decreasing. And also, it is because of the environment. The macro environment is not very good. The enterprises are becoming more and more cautious about the investment, and we could see this decline of investment deferred to the later part of the year. And we can also see that more and more large enterprises are inclined to use our subscription services. So in the future, we believe that we are, like, moving toward a positive direction in terms of our software provided for the large enterprises. Here, I would also like to add something.
Actually, for the large enterprises, the Constellation, the Galaxy and Stella, in terms of the Galaxy and Stella, actually, they are both increasing. For the large enterprises, when they wanna, like, buy our software or product, they need to go through a very complicated process for approval. But, since they've approved, since all of the process been approved, they will purchase our product. They use our products, which will, like, boost our revenue in the H2 of the year. So we are still quite confident.
I'm Liu Yang with Morgan Stanley. I have also got two questions. The first question is that Cosmic, Constellation, Galaxy, Stella have got have experienced a really good performance. But for industry cloud, the pressure is quite large.
So can you shed us more light in terms, in terms of industry cloud? And the second question is that, we believe that since quarter two on, the macroeconomy is weakening, which concerns us all. So we want to hear more from the executive, like from quarter three on, what was the performance of the company in the Q3?
Well, thank you for your question. And also, I believe that you've read through our report very carefully. Industry cloud is not our focus, actually. It accounts for a small part of our business, but I can still give you more information about that. Like, industry cloud includes our, the services for the, like, property management companies or the, 4S stores for the automobile.
But the industry cloud will not influence our main direction, because it's only a small part of our business. And I will go into... I'll be answering the second question. We all know that the macroeconomy in China is not very good in the H1 of the year. But if we divided the market into three parts, the large enterprise market, mid and mid-sized enterprise market, and the small enterprise market. For the large enterprise market, the policy, we have the policies going on, and we also have seen many like challenges going on. So it is inevitable for the large enterprises to digitalize themselves, to decrease their cost and to improve their efficiency.
So the enterprise's customer base will be really large, about 55 million enterprises in China, about 85% of them are small and mid-sized enterprises, or even 90%. And in each segment, we could see those unicorns emerging. So now, despite the challenges, it represents opportunities for the enterprises. So barbaric growth in the past doesn't work nowadays. The enterprises needs to improve their, like, refined management, lean management. So the enterprises ask, the most frequent question asked by the enterprises is that, how, how can we improve our efficiency? For example, like Tongwei, they are a leader in PV industry. They are already a leader in the industry, but they still want to, like, resort to us to reduce their cost.
So I think Kingdee should seize every opportunity to serve all the excellent enterprises in their sectors, for example, that is why we focus on serving those innovative and advanced technological advanced enterprises. And also, we pay attention to those countercyclical enterprises. Despite all the challenges in the macroeconomy, we believe that thanks to our services and products, Kingdee could still thrive in this market, and we will have better results in the future.
The gentleman with the suit.
Thank you for taking my question. I'm Li Huishan from BofA Securities. And my first question is about the growth rate for the large enterprise software, especially based on the already large, already very large customer base.
So my question is that, in the downstream sector, do we have any plans, future plans to provide to our customers so as to increase our future revenue? And the second question is about the profit margin or the gross profit margin. And from last year on, you could see the gross profit margin is improving. So why is that? What are the reasons behind? Or are you going to take many more measures to improve the gross margin, gross margin? And what is the expectation of the gross profit margin in the future?
Just now, we've talked about the large enterprise softwares for many times. And in terms of the taxation field, the finance and taxation field, we still have a long way to go. And our country is also encouraging us to establish a world-class financial management system.
The state-owned enterprises also needs to realize the digitalization of their financial management by the end of September 30. Digitalization has also been well leveraged and adopted in those high-tech sectors, for example, like equipment manufacturing, PV. The PV field is undergoing great transformation. They need to adopt. They need to strengthen their digitalization capability to restructure their capabilities. Another sector we're expecting to see high growth is consumption, for example, food, pharmaceutical, retail. So in those sectors, the aforementioned sectors, they have very high requirements for digitalization, hence the high demand on our software. When they are trying to, like, transforming their management system, they will resort to digitalization. That is why they will resort to our services.
We are providing the different kinds of cloud solutions, for example, like Cloud Constellation and Cloud Galaxy and Cloud Stella, for large enterprises, mid-sized enterprises, and small enterprises at the same time. For Galaxy, we are providing the services for many mid-sized enterprises. We are now undergoing the, we are now going through the maintaining period of Cloud Galaxy, since we've already been through the high speed development phase. We will also strike a balance in terms of the profit and loss in this area, taking a lead in the SaaS market in China. We are expecting to see the profitability emerging this year or next year. We are confident about our future in this area.
Thank you for taking my question. I'm Addison. For the large enterprises, I know that you've already got RMB 900 million worth of the orders, but I wanna know the proportion of the new customers and the existing customers. For mid enterprises, I've noticed that the ARR increase is actually, like, lower than the revenue growth, so I wanna know the reasons behind it.
Can you repeat your question? Sorry.
About the large enterprise.
Well, we believe that in terms of large enterprise, our customers, we're still developing. I don't know, I'm not really sure whether the stat is correct, is exact, but I believe that 50% comes from upsells. But the upsell proportion is actually decreasing to compare with previous years. It is because that the enterprises are controlling their investment or expenses. Can you repeat your second question also?
It's about the revenue growth.
For mid-sized enterprise, the revenue growth is lower than ARR growth. So it depends on the addition of the new users, as well as the proportion and the proportion of our delivery method. And we also need to take into account of the new customers. For the mid-sized enterprises, you know, when the macro environment, the macro economic environment is being challenged. So for the mid-sized enterprises, the upsells rate will be lower than the large enterprises. That is why the revenue growth will be lower. That is why the ARR will account for a larger proportion here. So it's all about the investment cycle.
Hello, executives. Thank you for sharing with us about Cloud Galaxy. Especially, I'm interested in page 16. So my question is, is that for those customers who has spent more than 3 million, you say that they contribute 35%. So can you share with us the absolute number of the customers with the subscription ARR over RMB 3 million? And what is the future expectation over that? And the second question is about the HR product collaborating with Huawei. Can you share with us the progress of this collaboration?
So I wanna answer the first question. Actually, that is not for mid-sized enterprises, it's for large enterprises. If we go back to 16, page 16... That is, that diagram is based on a like, a calculation, our calculation, actual, actuarial figure. We are only taking into account of the trend. So it's very hard to make prediction out of that.
So you can see here from 2018 and 2019, the increase rate is very high, but since 2021 on, the increase rate is lowered, slowing down. We don't know why, but we are still analyzing that. In terms of our business structure, we believe that in the future, the large enterprises with higher subscription ARR will be higher. The acceptance of the subscription will be higher as well. For those large enterprises, if they sign a very large contract with us, the future potential of increase of the subscription ARR will be, like, low, will be lower because the base is higher.
So how many customers are using Kingdee instead of SAP or Oracle?
I think it's 151 enterprises doing that.
So do you have any expectations over the statistics after three years?
Internally speaking, we believe, we hope that we can have 500 enterprises with a large subscription ARR. And here, it is just a diagram for all the large enterprises. We haven't, like, further divided them into super large enterprise or the centrally administered enterprises. So now, let's open the floor for questions online.
Now, the phone number with 9838 can ask a question.
I'm Xiaodan Zhang with CICC. I have two questions. The first question is that in the H1 of the year, you can see the small and micro-sized enterprises, the business for that is developing in a sound way. The NDR is high, and the growth rate, revenue growth rate is also higher than the peers. So can you share with us the reasons behind? And the second question is about the repurchase. So you've already got HKD 400 million worth of the cancellation. So what is the future expectation on that?
And now, I think our distribution system is quite sound. Because, you know, in a distribution system, it is very easy for the distributors to, like, withhold the inventory. But our system is quite sound.
So the ecosystem, the ecosystem allows all the partners in, the system living, like, performing really well. The quality of company running is also high. The macroeconomic environment will definitely influence our newly signed contract. But for our old customers, our counter liability is quite high, so it offsets, it offsets the macroeconomic backwind, headwind. For the small and micro-sized enterprises, they may have some new scenarios of consumption, hence higher demands on, Kingdee’s services. In terms of the repurchase, in the H1 of the year, we’ve repurchased HKD 400 million, and, we will like, further do this process, but I cannot give you an exact number. But we, we will do that. We will repurchase the shares in the H2 of the year.
Now, the participant with a phone number ending with 91949.
Can you hear me?
Very clearly.
Thank you for giving me this opportunity. I am Shupeng Wu with GF Securities. I have two questions. Actually, some of the concerns have been addressed previously in your answers to other colleagues' questions. So my question is that from 2024 to 2025, what is the expectation for about headcounts?
Well, objectively speaking, actually recently, we've also read through many annual reports and the semi-annual reports released by other companies. A lot of them are controlling the risk of the headcount. And for us, we have already mentioned that compared with the end of last year, the headcount decreased by 1%. But compared with last June, the headcount has increased by 1.6%.
For headcount increase, we'll be more cautious, because headcount is also. So I think, internally speaking, we will tap into the potential of existing employees. But I cannot give you an exact answer. I can only tell you that we don't have any plan to expand our headcount. But I cannot give you an exact answer for my expectation. The future headcount growth will be based on our development strategy, as well as the, like, the security of our company. We also understand your concern. I'm sure that in the future, one or two years, we will present a better cash flow performance. Next year.
Just as you mentioned, that in the future, one or two years, the profits will be positive. So in your opinion, as well as taking it into account of the industrial trend, have you made any evaluation about the profitability after 2025, especially, for example, like, from 2026 to 2027? Do you have some quantified expectation for the future growth after 2025, and what are the most important business during that period?
Well, I think our strategy is quite clear. In our financial statement, we have made it very clear that our future development direction is that we will provide more precise services for the large enterprises, so as to avoid the unreasonable financial structure internally. We need to precise or high services for large enterprises. And for the year 2026 to 2027, we internally have our own plan, but there are so many uncertainties here. I don't think I'm going to disclose more details about that, because it will be very risky for both investors in our company.
Thank you, GF Securities. Next question. The participant with the phone number ending in 2562. Please give us your institution and your name first.
Thank you, executives. I am Lipu Yu from TF Securities. So I also have two questions about strategy. The first question is: In the H1 of the year, in terms of the bidding result, you could see there is a rat race. The low price competition is more serious. So what's your opinion about that? Are you expecting to see more rat races in the H2 of the year, and what are your countermeasures?
In terms of large enterprise services, while we would see that, the large enterprises, they will, when they are... Sometimes they will curb the price. They will bargain with us. But for us, we are going to provide high quality services to our customers. We are also choosing our customers. Not only customers choose us, we also choose customers. So we have a guidance internally. We have two modes, and in both two modes, we have a bottom line. And when there are any enterprises which are not worth of investment, not worth of investing, we will, like, stop cooperate, cooperating with them. And for some customers, they are beacons in the industry. For example, like Huawei and other, like, enterprises, big enterprises, excellent enterprises, we will be committed to providing services to them.
So for large enterprises, we have a very clear attitude. We need to provide quality products and services for them, and we'll also choose our customers. We need to stick to our bottom line of price as well. We also need to cherish our reputation, because for enterprises, for large enterprises, our goal is to empower them. We should never join the rat race. I think rat race will compromise the interest of all the stakeholders. So I think any enterprises which could thrive in the market should be sticking to its bottom line as always.
And the second question is about the ecological system development. So for the mid-sized and small enterprises, you've already established a relatively stable cooperation method. But for Cosmic and Constellation, do you have any plan to further develop its ecosystem? And you could also see that in the downstream, the willingness of payment will be lower. So against this backdrop, can we guarantee or how can we guarantee a winning result in the ecosystem?
For the large enterprises, we are mainly do direct sale. Eco, we haven't done many ecosystem development, but in the future, with the maturing of our products, in the future, we will also develop ecosystem for large enterprises. And now in our existing channels, we already have some distributors, being capable of enterprises. And also, we have some partners, from, for example, from Big Four or the industry leaders.
So, also, since Kingdee is developing really well recently, those large enterprises are also recognizing our performance and achievements. They are more willing to cooperate with us. And the consulting firm is another customer type that we will pursue in the future. So the next question?
The phone number, the participant with the phone number ending with 1416.
Thank you. I'm Li Shuhan from China Security Construction Investment. First of all, congratulations on the improvement of the gross profit margin and the contract liabilities. I have two questions. The first question is about the large enterprises. What are the future plan for... what is the current IT innovation, and what are the reasons behind?
Well, just now we've touched upon this topic, like, our country has released a Document 79 for the year 2027, setting a goal for 2027. So for those centrally run centrally administered SOEs, they are more willing to go through the digitalization. And for those large enterprises, they've already realized a digitalized technology base. And the large enterprises will also have higher requirements on the management and digitalization.
They also need to have a higher granularity and refinement of the management. For example, like Tongwei, now the economy is not very good, and Tongwei is also losing money, but they are investing more in digitalization. They are doing a double layer ERP. So for many large enterprises, digitalization also represents great opportunities. We need to make innovations on that, like the double layer ERP. Aligning the overall ERP system in the company with the vertical ERP system in each department. So now you see that although the times is not good, many enterprises tries to thrive based on, like, make a way out, based on innovation.
So for those large enterprises, what we should do is to provide better quality, better products and higher quality services, and to improve our capability of service in our team, personnel team, so as to improve our competitiveness in the market as a whole.
The second question is also about the macroeconomic environment. For the mid-sized enterprise, mid-sized and small enterprises, you are reaching this market through channels. But also, Kingdee is doing well in this regard. And why is that? What have you done to sustain such a high growth?
Well, it's, I, I think it is all attributed to the transformation of our transformation in the cloud service. Previously, distributors may withhold inventory, but now, since we have already migrate all the data on the cloud, the distribution system is more sound. And also, we have seen the great growth in terms of subscription business. That is why the cash flow in the distribution system is higher than our peers. You can also, if you're interested in that, you can also see the performance of the channels for Kingdee and for other peers.
And during the past years, you would also our partners in the ecosystem have also realized that the model will increase, have concretely increased their own interest and benefits. It is exactly because of the transformation of the cloud services that makes us performing better in mid and small-sized enterprise markets, despite the economic challenges.
That is the end for the Q&A session. Now let's give the floor to Mr. Robert Xu, Chairman of the Board and CEO, to deliver remarks.
Distinguished investors, thank you for supporting us as always. So here I want to make three points. First of all, I want to share with you my opinions on the Chinese economy. I always say that the economy is not going downturn, it is actually brewing the new opportunities for development, the upgrade of consumption, the increase of the quality of the product, as well as the new demands of the customers. These are all representing new opportunities for us to grow in the future. And second, I wanna tell you that there is always a market. The only difference is that the market is changing.
The third thing I want to make clear is that a great company will always brave in the midst of the great changes. The market is reshuffling, and the customer base is also reshuffling, bringing us great such great opportunities. We need to pay more attention to management and the quality of management. We need to do that through digitalization. I also see that in many industries, they are increasing. In the industry where Kingdee is in, it's also increasing. That is my opinion about the Chinese economy. Secondly, I want to say that the dividends era for SaaS market in China has already emerged. Previously, I say that the enterprises should pay more attention to management.
So the dividends, actually in the demographic dividends, but in the future, we will have technology dividend, the AI dividend or the management dividend. And also, since the enterprises are transforming, they are paying much attention to cost reduction. So SaaS is less costly than licensing, and it is also easy for us to maintain, and its security level is also higher. And the integration of cloud and AI is better. So after 12 years of transformation of our cloud services, that is the secret recipe to our high growth in ARR in Kingdee. The ARR has increased by 24%, right? So our secret recipe is the transformation of the cloud service, and our relationship with our customers is even firmer. With our customer base becoming larger and larger, our cash flow will also be healthier and healthier.
Even though we faced with some loss in the past years, I think that loss is strategic loss. Our cash flow is quite sound, and last year we registered a cash flow of RMB 6,500, and this year we expect to see RMB 900 million. In the year after next year, we expect to see positive growth margin, positive profits. What we should do is to improve the customer service continuously and to improve the quality of our products and services. When the customer base is getting bigger and bigger, the snowballing effect will be more. Many people are saying that the software industry in China is at danger, it's not making any money, but I don't agree with that. I think the enterprise software industry in China is now embracing the era of dividends.
Let me give you some examples in addition to Kingdee. You know, Fenxiang Xiaoke, one of the company invested by Kingdee, the SaaS revenue increased by 23%. And another company we've invested also witnessed increase by 24%. And [Uncertain], our investment in the retail software industry, the SaaS revenue increased by 23%. We have also invested a human resource management software facing mid-size and small-size enterprises. Their SaaS revenue has also increased by 24. So by giving you this example, I wanna tell you that the dividends era for China, the Chinese SaaS market is coming, and the golden 10 years of the SaaS market in China has arrived. And I think Kingdee has already reached the best stage of our development after 12 years of cloud transformation, and we expect to see stable development in the future.
Next year, we will turn the losses into profits. I think the future for us is very prospective. Here I would like to say thank you to the investors and our old friends. Thank you for your long-term, long, long-term support. I believe that Kingdee will bring you more pleasant surprise and satisfying return on investment in the future. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Xu. Thank you, the executives. Here comes to the end of our investors presentation and announcement. Thank you again for joining us, and thank you for your support.