Press Release

TELUS International reports second quarter 2021 results, with strong business growth driving higher revenue and profitability, and raises outlook for full-year 2021

Revenue of $533 million, up 36% year-over-year, driven by continuing strong organic growth and contributions from acquisitions

Adjusted EBITDA of $131 million, up 56% year-over-year, driven by overall business growth, digital and client mix, and continued efficiency improvement; Net Income of $16 million and diluted EPS of $0.06

Adjusted diluted EPS of $0.24 was 100% higher year-over-year

Free Cash Flow of $71 million, up 109% year-over-year; Cash provided by operating activities of $96 million, up 92% year-over-year

Continued progress on debt repayment further expands available liquidity while reducing borrowing costs

Playment acquisition enhances AI image and video annotation capabilities

Management raises outlook for robust double-digit growth for full-year 2021 driven by strong Q2 results and continued business momentum

Vancouver, Canada – July 30, 2021 – TELUS International (NYSE and TSX: TIXT), a digital customer experience innovator that designs, builds, and delivers next-generation solutions for global and disruptive brands, today released its results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2021. TELUS International is a subsidiary of TELUS Corporation (TSX: T, NYSE: TU). All figures in this news release, and elsewhere in the TELUS International disclosures, are in U.S. dollars, unless specified otherwise, and relate only to TELUS International results and measures.

“TELUS International’s second quarter results once again reflect our highly-engaged global team’s ability to achieve strong growth amidst a global pandemic, and further validate the long-term, financial benefits we continue to realize from strategically cultivating our diversified digital revenue streams,” said Jeff Puritt, president and CEO of TELUS International. “This significant and sustained organic growth, in concert with our ongoing, successful acquisition activity, is key to strengthening our company’s already robust technology stack in order to remain on the leading edge of digital CX innovations and to anticipate and fulfill our clients’ future needs for incremental new economy services to keep up with the evolution of consumer behavior shifts. One exciting way we are helping our clients meet these heightened expectations for hyper-personalized and authentic brand experiences is by using our AI data annotation capabilities to help bots better understand human emotions in order to meaningfully enhance these interactions. Indeed, our team’s capacity to embrace an innovation mind-set has established the solid foundation required to surface value by optimizing our existing capabilities, exploring adjacencies and synergies among our diverse service portfolios. We are also developing new services, such as leveraging our AI data solutions and premium content moderation capabilities together to, for example, more efficiently separate fake news and content from what is real, to foster higher brand trust and loyalty in online communities.”

Jeff continued, “TELUS International remains a highly sought-after partner in the industry thanks to our team members’ mastery of our next-gen digital capabilities and expertise in driving digital CX innovation. Among the many notable accolades we received in the second quarter, our team won the AI Breakthrough Award in the Best Informational Bot Solution category for the development of our intelligent Agent Assist chatbot. More recently, our company was named a Leader on the Everest Group Customer Experience Management Services PEAK Matrix for the third consecutive year, and we are also listed among the Top 10 providers on the Everest Group BPS Top 50 list. Importantly, our company was also named one of Mogul's Top 100 Workplaces With The Best Diversity and Inclusion Initiatives for 2021, a list that celebrates the efforts of companies that have implemented practices, invested in resources and developed strategies to create more inclusive and diverse workplaces. This third-party recognition illuminates our team members’ passion, ingenuity and dedication in everything they do, and I am so very proud of their collective achievements.”

Jeff concluded, “We remain focused on the continuous enhancement of our digital capabilities, as we have recently demonstrated with the acquisition of Playment that builds on our deep domain expertise and experience in data annotation. This acquisition adds meaningful capabilities in computer vision, uniquely positioning us to support technology and large enterprise clients developing complex AI-powered solutions across a variety of verticals, adding yet another digital capability to our diverse service offering.”

Vanessa Kanu, CFO said, “In the second quarter, we delivered 36% revenue growth, with yet another strong showing in both our organic business, achieving 20% year-over-year organic growth, along with growth from acquisitions. Expanding service agreements with our existing clients, as well as winning brand new logos, all contributed to exceptional top line performance. We have continued to see higher activity across all verticals, most notably in our Tech & Games and eCommerce & FinTech verticals, driven by increased demand from the disruptive technology and digital native clients that we serve. Our strategic focus on digital solutions and seeking high-value engagements that result in an increasingly accretive client mix, coupled with our continued efforts on improving efficiency in our own operations, translated to Adjusted diluted EPS of $0.24 in the second quarter of 2021, up 100% year-over-year.”

“We generated $71 million of free cash flow in the quarter, up 109% year-over-year, driven by strong cash from operations. We also continued to strengthen our balance sheet, with $55 million in cash from operations put toward debt repayment. Following the meaningful reduction in debt in the prior quarter, the incremental repayment in the second quarter of 2021 further illustrates the benefits of our robust business model, with the proven ability to quickly de-lever while continuing to generate solid top line growth and higher profitability,” continued Vanessa. “Our momentum remains positive and, reinforced by the strong overall business performance achieved in the second quarter, we have raised our outlook and continue to expect strong double-digit growth for the full year.”

Complete version of the Earnings Release is available at the link below.