Teleconferência de Resultados da Korn Ferry (KFY) do 1T do AF2027: Receita Cresce 7%, AMS Expande Backlog

Principais Destaques

• A receita de honorários da Korn Ferry no 1º tri do ano fiscal de 2027 aumentou 7% em relação ao mesmo período do ano anterior, atingindo US$ 756 milhões, marcando o sexto trimestre consecutivo de crescimento.
• O EBITDA ajustado subiu 7%, para US$ 128 milhões, enquanto a margem EBITDA ajustada permaneceu estável em 17%. O LPA diluído ajustado cresceu 9%, para US$ 1,43.
• Os novos negócios cresceram 12%, e a estimativa de honorários remanescentes em contratos existentes aumentou 14%, para US$ 1,92 bilhão. A administração afirmou que o backlog combinado atingiu cerca de US$ 3,5 bilhões após a transação com a AMS.
• A receita de honorários cresceu em todas as regiões: nas Américas, o avanço foi de 9%, para US$ 442 milhões; na EMEA, subiu 4%, para US$ 228 milhões; e a APAC voltou a crescer, com alta de 1%, atingindo US$ 87 milhões.
• A Korn Ferry concluiu sua combinação com a AMS. A administração espera que a AMS atinja US$ 140 milhões em EBITDA run-rate dentro de um ano após o fechamento, incluindo US$ 40 milhões em EBITDA incremental, e afirmou que espera alcançar a meta antes do prazo.
• As projeções para o 2º tri do ano fiscal de 2027 preveem receita de honorários entre US$ 860 milhões e US$ 878 milhões, margem EBITDA ajustada de 16,8% a 17,2% e LPA diluído ajustado de US$ 1,30 a US$ 1,40.

Dados Financeiros Principais

A Korn Ferry espera reconhecer aproximadamente 56%, ou US$ 1,1 bilhão, de seus honorários contratados remanescentes ao final do trimestre ao longo dos próximos quatro trimestres. Os outros 44%, ou US$ 835 milhões, devem ser reconhecidos após esse período.

Desempenho Operacional e dos Negócios

A região das Américas gerou US$ 442 milhões em receita de honorários, alta de 9%, impulsionada por Search e Soluções de Força de Trabalho. A receita da EMEA cresceu 4%, para US$ 228 milhões, com avanço em todos os grupos de soluções, apesar da pressão dos desdobramentos no Oriente Médio. A receita da APAC subiu 1%, para US$ 87 milhões, liderada por Search, após fraqueza anterior associada em parte a mudanças socioeconômicas na China.

Search e Soluções de Força de Trabalho registraram crescimento de aproximadamente 10% a 11% durante o trimestre. As novas conquistas em RPO somaram cerca de US$ 160 milhões, com aproximadamente metade vinda de novos clientes. A administração caracterizou os contratos de RPO como recorrentes, mas observou que o momento em que grandes contratos de terceirização são concedidos pode tornar os resultados de novos negócios oscilantes.

A taxa de indicações internas atingiu 29,4%, em comparação com aproximadamente 18% quando a Korn Ferry começou a medir a métrica. A administração vê o aumento como evidência de que seu modelo go-to-market unificado e focado no cliente está gerando oportunidades de vendas cruzadas.

A combinação com a AMS cria uma empresa com quase 17.000 funcionários em mais de 130 escritórios. A AMS agrega capacitações em RPO, serviços temporários, soluções de mão de obra contingente, recrutamento universitário e de início de carreira, e consultoria em tecnologia. A administração afirmou que os 10 principais relacionamentos de clientes da AMS têm um tempo médio de permanência de 14 anos.

A Korn Ferry planeja priorizar a redução da dívida relacionada à aquisição da AMS ao alocar caixa investível, mantendo a flexibilidade para recomprar ações caso a administração considere esse uso de capital mais atraente.

Projeções da Administração

Para o 2º tri do ano fiscal de 2027, a administração forneceu as seguintes perspectivas:

A projeção inclui dois meses de resultados da AMS, cobrindo setembro e outubro. O LPA diluído ajustado incorpora os efeitos após impostos da amortização adicional de ativos intangíveis, despesas financeiras líquidas com juros e ações emitidas em conexão com a aquisição.

As perspectivas supõem que não haverá alterações adicionais nas condições geopolíticas, econômicas, nos mercados financeiros ou nas taxas de câmbio.

Riscos e Pontos de Atenção

A administração descreveu o ambiente operacional como desafiador, citando a perspectiva de juros mais altos, crescimento limitado fora de data centers e atividades relacionadas à IA, e a continuidade do conflito no Oriente Médio. Ela afirmou que as condições não pioraram de forma relevante nos últimos três a quatro meses.

A integração da AMS é outro foco de execução. A Korn Ferry tem como meta 1º de maio de 2027 para migrar os funcionários para plataformas comuns de SAP, CRM e sistemas correlatos. Espera-se que os benefícios de custo sejam concentrados no período posterior à integração das plataformas, enquanto as iniciativas de receita e indicações cruzadas de clientes já começaram.

A sazonalidade deve permanecer consistente com o padrão histórico da Korn Ferry. A administração identificou o 3º tri fiscal como o ponto mais baixo devido ao Ação de Graças e às festas de fim de ano.

Destaques das Perguntas e Respostas dos Analistas

Sinergias e crescimento da AMS: A administração espera que a AMS aumente o EBITDA run-rate de aproximadamente US$ 100 milhões para US$ 140 milhões dentro de um ano após o fechamento e expressou confiança de que a meta será atingida antes. A expansão da receita é o foco principal, apoiada por vendas cruzadas na base de clientes combinada, enquanto compras e escala de plataforma oferecem oportunidades de redução de custos.

Visibilidade do backlog: A Korn Ferry encerrou o 1º tri com US$ 1,92 bilhão em honorários contratados remanescentes. A administração afirmou que a AMS adiciona contratos de maior duração, com cerca de 40% do seu backlog previsto para o primeiro ano e 60% nos quatro anos seguintes. O backlog combinado é de aproximadamente US$ 3,5 bilhões.

Inteligência artificial em Search: A administração afirmou que a IA permite à Korn Ferry fornecer grupos de candidatos mais amplos e informações adicionais, mas não encurtou de forma relevante o tempo de conclusão das buscas, pois o agendamento de reuniões pelos clientes e a tomada de decisões continuam sendo os principais gargalos. A empresa está usando a IA com cautela porque seus dados proprietários incluem informações salariais de 30 milhões de pessoas, dados que cobrem 30.000 empresas, 113 milhões de avaliações executivas e até 15.000 perfis de sucesso.

Estrutura de crescimento de longo prazo: A administração citou a taxa de crescimento histórica de toda a Korn Ferry de aproximadamente 10% a 12%. Após a transação da AMS, descreveu a composição histórica do crescimento migrando de cerca de 60% orgânico e 40% inorgânico para aproximadamente 50% orgânico e 50% inorgânico. Isso foi apresentado como uma estrutura histórica, e não como projeção formal.

Transcrição Completa da Teleconferência de Resultados

Transcrição completa da teleconferência de resultados

Comentários da administração

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Korn Ferry First Quarter Fiscal Year 2027 Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded for replay purposes. We have also made available in the Investor Relations section of our website at kornferry.com, a copy of the financial presentation that we'll be reviewing with you today.

Before I turn the call over to your host, Mr. Gary Burnison, let me first read a cautionary statement to investors. Certain statements made in the call today, such as those relating to future performance, plans and goals constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, although the company believes the expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, investors are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such statements.

Actual results in future periods may differ materially from those currently expected or desired because of a number of risks and uncertainties, which are beyond the company's control. Additional information concerning such risks and uncertainties can be found in the release relating to this presentation and in the periodic and other reports filed by the company with the SEC, including the company's annual report for fiscal year 2026 and in the company's soon to be filed quarterly report for the quarter ended July 31, 2026,

Also, some of the comments today may reference non-GAAP financial measures such as constant currency amounts, EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA. Additional information concerning these measures, including reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measures is contained in the financial presentation and earnings release relating to this call. both of which are posted in the Investor Relations section of the company's website at www.kornferry.com.

With that, I'll turn the call over to Mr. Burnison. Please go ahead, Mr. Burnison.

Gary Burnison

Thanks, Regina, and thank you, everybody, for joining us. I'm going to have the team walk through the numbers. But first, I'd just comment that our performance was absolutely outstanding. All regions are up and it marks our sixth consecutive quarter of top line growth, which underscores the strength of our strategy. And we remain focused on executing with discipline, investing in opportunities that will drive sustainable impact and create lasting value for our shareholders all of which reflects the confidence we have in our strategic direction and long-term outlook.

As I reflected during our previous quarterly call, I used to talk about opportunities measured in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Today, I think, in terms of opportunities measured in the billions. And last week, we took another significant step in that direction with the completion of our combination with AMS. This brings together 2 iconic brands and creates a global leader in talent and organizational consulting. AMS is a world-class firm that propels our are KornFerry strategy to be the world conductor of talent and organizational orchestration.

We now offer 1 of the most comprehensive organizational talent solution portfolios in the world. The combined firm has nearly 17,000 colleagues in more than 130 offices, complementary strengths, and more expansive industry coverage, all united in a shared commitment to accelerate our clients' success. Together with AMS, we have profound operational capability, delivering technology-enabled talent solutions at scale supported by long-term contracted client relationships. We've deeply deepened our client-centric approach as we expand the breadth of our solutions with every relationship. And here, just a couple of examples that a global energy company. We're supporting their strategic and talent transformation. impacting 60,000 roles across 200 business units.

So we're a global consumer products company with more than 100,000 employees turn to us for worldwide delivery of org design, analytics and workforce planning. And at the heart of how we serve our largest clients is Talent Suite. powering our work and enabling better people decisions at scale. In fact, more than 90% of our Marquee and diamond accounts have an active talent suite subscription today. I couldn't be more excited about the evolution and the trajectory of our firm.

Today's Korn Ferry has a unique ability to serve our clients across the entire talent spectrum. Search is about identifying talent. Workforce Solutions is scaling that talent. And talent and organizational solutions is unlocking their potential. There's no question that technology will continue to play a significant role in the future, bridging the imbalance of supply and demand of labor, but it's not technology alone. people are the catalysts for organizational success. human beings, not human doings. It's a belief that defines who we are and that's why Korn Ferry is in the people business.

With that, Bob, I'll turn it over to you.

Robert Rozek

Great. Thanks, Gary, and good afternoon and good morning, everyone. Our financial performance continues to steadily improve and outpaced the broader industry. In the first quarter of FY '27, our fee revenue grew for the sixth consecutive quarter with strong earnings growth and steady profitability. Our improving performance in this ever-changing business environment really continues to underscore both the effectiveness of our strategy, the hard work and talent of our colleagues and our operational excellence. Before reviewing the quarter in detail and as we announced on our fourth quarter earnings call for fiscal year '26, we are now reporting our financial results of the company in 3 geographic segments, the Americas, EMEA and APAC. This new reporting structure aligns with our Wear Korn Ferry go-to-market initiatives and actually with how our clients engage with us. To assist with the transition from a global solution focus, to regional geographies. The slides posted in our investor presentation include 3 new solution groupings within each geographic region.

The 3 new solution grouping is our search which is the old executive search and professional search, talent and organizational solutions, which is comprised of consulting and digital and then Workforce Solutions, which is comprised of RPO in interim.

Now turning to our first quarter performance highlights. Estimated remaining fees under existing contracts grew 14% year-over-year to $1.92 billion led by global new business growth in Workforce Solutions. Our internal business referral rate increased to 29.4% of consolidated fee revenue, it's up by about 300 basis points year-over-year, and our marquee and diamond accounts remained steady at about 40% of consolidated fee revenue.

Now both of these metrics really demonstrate the fee revenue synergies we're creating with our Warora go-to-market activities. Our consolidated new business grew 12% year-over-year and fee revenue grew in all regions and all industry groups. The earner productivity, which we measure as new business per average fee earners annualized grew year-over-year in all regions.

Now I'll talk a little bit about the company results. late fee revenue grew 7% year-over-year to $756 million, again, marking our sixth consecutive quarter of growth. Earnings and profitability also remained strong. Adjusted EBITDA grew $8 million or 7% year-over-year to $128 million. Adjusted EBITDA margin was flat year-over-year at 17% and adjusted diluted earnings per share grew $0.12 or 9% year-over-year to $1.43. As previously mentioned, our estimated remaining fees under existing contracts were $1.92 billion at the end of the quarter. And we estimate about 56% or $1.1 billion will be recognized within the next 4 quarters, and the remaining 44% or $835 million will be recognized beyond next year.

Turning to our regional results. Fee revenue in the Americas grew 9% year-over-year to $442 million, led by growth in Search and Workforce Solutions. EMEA fee revenue continued to strengthen growing 4% year-over-year to $228 million. Growth was broad-based with strength in all solution groups. In APAC fee revenue inflected to growth in the first quarter, reaching $87 million, up 1% year-over-year, led by search.

Finally, we continue to maintain a disciplined balanced approach to capital allocation over the quarter. During the quarter, we paid $30 million of dividends and invested $15 million in capital expenditures. In the future, we will be inclined to use investable cash for the reduction of debt associated with the acquisition of AMS. However, we will also closely monitor our share price and use capital for that if we find that more attractive.

Turning to our outlook for the second quarter of fiscal '27. Assuming no further changes in worldwide geopolitical conditions, economic conditions, financial markets and foreign exchange rates and including the addition of AMS, it's only for 2 months, September and October, our second quarter fee revenue is expected to range from $860 million to $878 million. Our adjusted EBITDA margin is expected to range from 16.8% to 17.2% and adjusted diluted earnings per share are expected to range from $1.30 to $1.40 per share.

We have a page in the investor deck and provided some guidance assumptions. And you'll find adjusted diluted earnings per share includes the net after-tax impact of the 2 months of incremental intangible asset amortization, incremental interest -- net interest expense and incremental shares issued in connection with the acquisition of AMS.

In closing, we remain focused on executing our Wear Korn Ferry go-to-market initiatives, which are driving deeper, more durable client relationships. Additionally, with the recent addition of AMS to the Korn Ferry family, we will strengthen our position in RPO and interim while broadening our capabilities into contingent workforce solutions, and early career and campus recruiting. AMS has a substantial backlog of multiyear contracts and long-tenured client relationships.

Going forward, it is our goal to deepen the value of those client relationships, introducing clients to all their Korn Ferry offers. Together with AMS, we are a much stronger company with greater capabilities to drive client business performance through their most precious asset, which is their people.

With that, we would be glad to answer any questions you may have.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Our first question will come from the line of Tobey Sommer with Truist.

Perguntas e respostas

Tyler Barishaw

This is Tyler Barishaw for Tobey. I just wanted to start with the new reporting structure. Can you maybe give us how we should think about growth rates in each of these segments going forward?

Gary Burnison

Well, when you look at the firm as a whole, that's what I tend to look at. And this was precipitated. We made this decision several quarters ago that we had to change how we were facing off with clients. And what we wanted was not an isolated solution-by-solution approach, but rather a holistic face off with our clients as we are Korn Ferry. And so that's been a very systematic effort that's been driven top-down and bottom-up, top-down through our Marquee diamond accounts or in bottom up every single day through what we're doing in terms of looking at new engagements that are open.

So I look at the firm overall over the last 10 years, 20 years, and you'd find a growth rate that's probably going to be around 10%, 11%, 12%, something like that. Up until this latest investment that we've made, we looked at that growth rate, and we said 60% was organic. 40% was inorganic. Obviously, with the combination of AMS, that changes those calculations, and it's more like 50-50. So I first look at the overall firm's growth rate historically. And when I look at the demographic trends and what's happening in the world, there's no reason to believe. I don't certainly see any reason that, that kind of growth rate that we've experienced in the past, we wouldn't continue to experience now -- clearly, from quarter-to-quarter, there's going to be regional differences.

And APAC going back now several quarters has been impacted by the socioeconomic changes that have been happening, particularly, for example, in China. And so that region has been impacted pretty severely by that falloff since the pandemic. EMEA over the last several quarters is actually been our best-performing region. More recently, over the last couple of quarters, you'll see that the Middle East has had a pretty big impact on the results there. Then Americas has been steady. So I tend to look at it from a geographic perspective, the total first of in each geography. And what it really reflects is how we're trying to drive a client-centric approach.

And then when you look at solutions, this last quarter, the Workforce Solutions group and search. Those were both outstanding, really, really outstanding growth rates in 10%, 11%. And looking at new business over the last several months, it continues to reflect that trend.

Tyler Barishaw

And in your executive search business, can you just talk about how AI is driving efficiencies and whether that's changing completion times or changing the margin structure of this business.

Gary Burnison

It is. It's impacting the total firm. And it certainly has an impact on how we're completing searches. But the thing that we're very, very careful about there is the data that we have. We have significant proprietary data -- comp data on 30 million people around the world, 30,000 companies. We've done 113 million executive assessments. We have upwards of 15,000 success profiles. We have pretty sensitive information on not just what people have done, but who they are.

And so with respect to AI, particularly as it relates to the search group, we've been very, very careful about how we use that. And we're going to continue to be very cautious about that. because of the nature of our data. So certainly, it has had an impact. I think it's going to continue to have an impact, absolutely.

Robert Rozek

This is Bob. Maybe a little bit more granular. I don't -- I think what's happening is clients are expecting more from us in terms of candidates lakes and we're able to deliver more of it, but it is not materially impacted the time line of a search. It's pretty consistent with what we've been seeing all along. And a lot of it's dependent on the client scheduling making decisions and so on. So while we're meeting their demands on additional information quite the time line has not changed.

Gary Burnison

And Bob, it's an interesting point because what we're seeing from clients as a candidate is everybody, everybody seems to have a perfect resume. So what the -- our firm has been built on IP and data. And it's not what somebody has done at the levels that we operate, it's who you are. And so the IP and the data that I was talking about are absolutely fundamental to how we are dealing our search work as well as our talent and organizational development activities. So it's actually because of AI, it's actually increasing the demand for what we have given our -- the proprietary nature of the database. And ultimately, it's about who somebody is, you -- that's just the truth.

Operator

Our next question will come from the line of Trevor Romeo with William Blair.

Melissa McMahon

This is Melissa McMahon on for Trevor Romeo. I guess I just have a couple on AMS' start. Congratulations on closing that one, too. How do we think about the cadence of synergy realization? Like, I guess, how much of the $40 million do we think we can be achieved immediately after close versus how much is back-end loaded?

Gary Burnison

Well, what we said when we announced the investment was that we would get to $140 million of run rate EBITDA within a year -- within a year of the date of the announcement. The date of close actually is what we said. And so I look at that $40 million. And first of all, when you look at our track record, which is critically important here, we have an enormous track record of gearing the top line of a company that we make an investment in. That's demonstrated, it's proven and we also have a track record of tapping the economies of scale that come with platforms such as Korn Ferry. And so I'm absolutely 200% confident that we are going to achieve that level of incremental EBITDA and more because I think that the revenue opportunity here and the growth opportunity for us is enormous.

In terms of the exact timing, what we have said, as I indicated, is that incremental $40 million, you would see by a year from closing, which would have been last week. And we're going to achieve that much faster than that.

Melissa McMahon

Great. And then maybe just to follow up on that. I guess, how can we think about the role that seasonality plays for AMS? I know early careers and campus recruiting might have a schoolyear angle. Just wondering if there's anything else.

Gary Burnison

Yes, it does. And the also -- it's going to follow the typical kind of calendarization of holidays. And so that's -- you're absolutely correct, generally speaking. And Bob, I don't know if you want to provide any more precision around that.

Robert Rozek

Yes. So what I would do is I would just follow the traditional Korn Ferry seasonality. Their business is pretty similar to ours where we always have our low watermark in Q3 where you got Thanksgiving in the U.S. and then the year-end holidays. We give our people a week off, clients give their folks 1 week or 2 weeks off. So it's just not as many hours in that quarter. So you'll see that the same sort of pattern, if you will, that you experience with Korn Ferry.

Operator

Our next question will come from the line of George Tong with Goldman Sachs.

Keen Fai Tong

You saw a 12% new business growth in the quarter. Can you unpack that a little bit and talk about how much of that growth came from RPO or more lumpy wins versus recurring revenue wins?

Gary Burnison

Well, I would say the RPO is actually recurring wins when you look at the new business, clearly over the last several months, given what's happened in the Middle East and the demographic factors that we've talked about on previous calls, search and workforce solutions have been absolutely the stronger performers and what's been really nice to see and supported our thesis when we made this decision. is all the investments that we've made in Workforce Solutions and whether that's interim or RPO. that's really paying dividends. And in this quarter, the RPO new wins were something like $160 million, 50% of those were from new logos.

So you're going to see -- you're definitely going to see lumpiness around the, for example, the outsourcing wins. But that's 1 of the reasons why we entered into this investment with AMS because what you have there is you have recurring loyal client relationships of scale. and their client relationships there just take their top 10, the average tenure of those client relationships is 14 years. So 2/3 of their business is in the RPO area. And I look at that as incredibly sticky and recurring. And when you look at the combined backlog now, this firm has absolutely made an enormous transformation over the last decade and even 2 decades, where now you're looking at a firm that looks completely different. than the Korn Ferry where I started. And today, we've got a backlog of $3.5 billion now with AMS.

And so yes, the Workforce Solutions is an argo part and we've certainly seen a lift in new business, including, like I said, including the interim area, which has had a significant lift. And I think that's all that above-market growth has been driven by the WR Korn Ferry strategy and look at our -- the cross referrals this quarter, we're almost 30%, which is really, really good to see.

Robert Rozek

And Gary, you maybe just -- because I think the backlog commentary is really important for folks to understand. So if you look at our backlog, George, we were, at the end of the quarter, about $1.9 billion. and 60% of that or roughly 60% comes out into next year. And then after that, you probably have another 1.5 years for the remainder, what AMS brings is not only a very large backlog, but it's also given the strength and tenure of the customer relationships that Gary talked about, they're about 40% within the first year, 60% comes out over the next 4 years. So it gives us much more durability and visibility and resilience going forward.

Keen Fai Tong

Got it. That's helpful. And then you're expecting AMS EBITDA to go from $100 million to $140 million within the year. Can you break out how much of the the increase is going to come from revenue versus cost synergies?

Gary Burnison

Well, our focus is absolutely on revenue, and we've already -- we've hit the ground running. We've had big teams together now over the last week since we've closed, and there is obviously a little bit of pre-integration planning where we've mapped top 100 customers, put teams against them. There's actually meetings happening this week with clients. I mean we are absolutely all over that. It's certainly going to change the nature of our Marquee and Diamond portfolio that undoubtedly will go up. As you know, it's incredibly complementary given AMS' industry and geographic footprint. with Korn Ferry. And so I look at not only the RPO solution, but I look at contingent Workforce Solutions and early careers and technology consulting and integration as well as reskilling.

I look at all 5 solutions, if you will, very, very positively. And the contingent workforce solutions, I think could be something that is definitely, definitely multi-hundred million and could be multibillion dollars given the amount of money the company spend on the temporary side. And the offering is really cool where we will now go in and we can consolidate vendors and save a company 600, 700, 800 basis, 900 basis points on their spend.

I mean this is material, material savings and the contingent workforce solutions, we're going to take that given the relationships we have around the world. And it's the same with early careers with the early careers and the campus hiring that they do and just the marquee logos, their client logos are so impressive. And like I said, I mean, everybody's got a perfect resume and understanding who somebody is, is incredibly important to that hiring decision and then on the technology consulting side, they bring skills that we need, particularly around integrating talent suite with CRM and HR platform.

So I look at all of those and say, "Wow, over the next 3 to 5 years, you're going to see incredible lift, I believe, given this iconic brand and bringing our organizations together. So we are absolutely off and running on the revenue side.

And on the economies of scale side, we have a track record. And we have a global platform that is highly scalable. And so we definitely are going to look at the economies of scale. And whether that's in vendor spend, we're looking at that. very, very closely. And I would just go back to our track record and say, we do everything we say we're going to do and more. will we hit that $40 million? We will absolutely hit that. Will we hit it before 1 year, we absolutely will.

Operator

Our next question will come from the line of Mark Marcon with Baird.

Mark Marcon

One, Gary, just there's been a lot of mix news with regards to the economy, you obviously had really good results during this last quarter. Just wondering like how much of your performance would you attribute to just kind of the general macro versus what you guys are specifically doing? And what is your sense of how the macro has evolved over the last 3, 4 months? And what the near-term outlook is.

Gary Burnison

Well, I think the question of raising rates. I mean it's -- that's a real issue. And growth is very, very hard to come by for most companies if they're not building data centers or in the AI area. So I think it has been a challenging environment, and the Middle East has not made about any easier, and you see the impact on our EMEA results for sure. So has it -- has it worsened over the last 3 or 4 months, I would say no. But again, we've got the big question of increasing rates and more conflict in the Middle East. It doesn't seem to end.

I guess on the other side, Mark, what I would point out is just the tremendous demographic opportunities because there is a supply-demand imbalance, and you know this better than anybody. I mean the U.S. economy is only projected to produce like 5 million or 6 million jobs over the next decade compared to 25 million over the previous decade. So baby boomers are retiring -- it's -- and the labor force just isn't going to grow.

So the question then is how do you really find that talent that's not going to not just have a good company, but a great company. And I think my earlier comments about AI are absolutely right. I mean everybody does have a perfect resume. And I think our IP and our skill sets and our success profiles actually play an enormous role with that kind of backdrop.

Mark Marcon

That's terrific. And then with regards to AI and IP, how would you characterize the difference between the development of AI and making it easier to find people relative to what happened with LinkedIn when that first came along. And how that ended up impacting your discussion with your clients and how it ended up impacting the discussion around pricing.

Gary Burnison

Yes. With LinkedIn, it was around finding people. it's a big question. And I think even back then, I said it's not a question of finding somebody. It's a question of finding out who they are. And I think with the AI, it's even more pronounced because what I am seeing, what I am hearing from clients is just everybody is perfect. and everybody has this stellar background. And so I actually think it's way different from the LinkedIn days.

And if you look at our pricing overall on the entire platform, it's gone up. It's increased over time. And I think you could make the argument that the same thing could happen here because this 1 is -- it's not because it's recent. I just think this is way, way more profound than the linked end days 15, 20 years ago.

Mark Marcon

Great. And then last 1 for me. Just with regards to AMS, I mean, your RPO group has competed against Alexander Mann and AMS for more than a decade now. How are the groups getting along together? And what was AMS' trajectory on a month-by-month basis kind of going into the close of this.

Gary Burnison

It's the same as what we had forecasted. So their CAGR over the last several years has looked similar to ours. And if you go back further than that, the trend would be remarkably identical, even before COVID, and you've got the great resignation, everything kind of trended the same way. And going into the close, when we announced it, we said excluding -- at the time, it was about $650 million a year in annualized revenue. And going into the close and what we forecasted for the first 2 months is the pro rata share of that. It really hasn't changed.

And so we're looking at this. What we're going to do now, the go-to-market side, we're all over, as I talked about to George, we're absolutely all over that. So we are integrating right off the bat, I hate the word integrating, but synchronizing the go-to-market activity. So that's absolutely happening. It's going to take us about 8 months or so to get everybody on the same platform, and we're targeting our fiscal year ends April 30. We're targeting a May 1, 2027 date where we would get everybody on to a common platform that would be SAP and the like and the common CRM, all of that. We are going to do some things immediately so that our frontline consultants, we have about 1,800, 1,900 of those so they have visibility into the customer activity for our largest clients.

So we're absolutely doing that right off the bat. AMS has a completely different industry coverage than Korn Ferry. They're very, very heavy into financial services. It's about almost 50% of their overall portfolio. So I look from an industry and geographic, it's very, very complementary. At the end of the day, we -- we're looking at the business through a regional lens and then through these 3 solutions. Our goal here is to have a unified RPO offering, which we will have. But we're not going to be on -- even on the same system for a number of months.

So the first few months here is really around learning about each other and not saying, well, this is the way we've always done things. So this is the way we're going to do it in the future. It's really around finding a third way. And that includes the IP from both organizations. And that IP is obviously very, very meaningful in the RPO area. So our principle here is Dino harm, focus on the customer right off the bat, look at the economies of scale here over the next several months. but it's around culture. I mean people ignore when you do something like this, people ignore culture. But culture is the way an organization gets things done. And by definition, that's going to have to change. And that's 1 of the exciting things about being in business. It's not stagnant. It constantly changes. So we have to continue to evolve our culture collectively together.

Operator

Our final question will come from the line of Brianna Camden with UBS.

Brianna Kamdoum

This is Brent Camden on for Josh. For my first question, are there any key metrics you're paying attention to and reviewing the progress of integration? And any milestones you're looking to reach the next couple of quarters?

Gary Burnison

Well, look, it's 2 quarters is it's a pretty short amount of time. We want to look at whether we're expanding client relationships. That's every organization, whether it's a family church. Every organization has to grow. And so we look at this and say, well, 2 iconic brands, complementary geographic fit, industry fit, marquee logos, and so for us, what we tend to look at is how do our enterprise accounts to our Marquee and Diamond clients and what's happening with the cross referrals. And you've seen that now over time, it's gone up and to the right pretty consistently. We would look to that. It's all about deepening relationships and innovation, bringing new offerings to market.

So all of those things, we would certainly look at. But the first principle is Dino harm. and make sure you understand and you understand each other before we find a third way.

Robert Rozek

And Gary, I would just add to that, if you think you're trying to think over the next 2 months, remember what Gary said, we're not going to be integrated from a platform perspective until May 1. So that just in and of itself who should frame it up for you saying over the next couple of quarters, you'll see some drivers, but it will be more heavily weighted towards after the integration, and that's primarily on the cost side. as Gary indicated on the top line side, we're starting that right now.

Brianna Kamdoum

That's helpful. And then my second question, do you expect AMS have any direct or indirect impact on your other existing businesses outside of RPO?

Gary Burnison

Well, we do. We think that there is enormous opportunity to continue to deepen relationships. And that's reflected in the cross referrals. So after this investment, we're going to have something like 2,000 consultants that are responsible for originating business. And so for the AMS colleagues that have come in to legacy Korn Ferry. They have the opportunity to be able to deepen those relationships with other solutions that they didn't have, and the same holds true for Korn Ferry -- for legacy Korn Ferry and the 1,850 million frontline consultants that we have where the -- we have new capabilities to be able to offer to our existing customer base. And we've already put in cross referral incentives, and we're doing it as we speak, literally as we be introducing other solutions.

So -- yes, you're going to -- at the end of the day, here after this transaction, you're going to have a couple of thousand frontline consultants. And we're looking at that productivity, and we see that productivity being about $2 million per consultant, and that has -- obviously, that has room for significant expansion given the complementary nature of the solutions that we have here.

Robert Rozek

Gary, the other thing I would add to that is if you think about our go-to-market activities and go-to-market mindset, it's driven through the marque Diamond accounts, and it's all about deepening our client relationships and demonstrated by our referral rates going from 18% back when we started measuring up to almost 30% today. The only thing I would add for AMS, they operate very similar to us. And if you go back to 2020 and you look at their growth, Gary indicated it was kind of the same as ours. Their CAGR is 10%, 11%. Over 50% of that came from expanding their existing client relationships. So those go-to-market activities that are important to us are also obviously very important to them and very consistent with what we've done over time.

Operator

Thank you, both, And it appears there are no further questions, Mr. Burnison.

Gary Burnison

Okay. Regina, thank you for hosting this, and I thank everybody for joining -- and we're very, very excited about what we can do now with, I think, the dominant firm in talent and organizational consulting. So thank you all, and we'll talk to you soon. Bye-bye.

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, this conference call will be available for replay for 1 week starting today running through the end of the day on September 16, 2026, ending at midnight. You may access the Echo replay service by dialing (800) 770-2030 and entering the access code to 267-2007, followed by the pound key. Additionally, the replay will be available for playback at the company's website, www.kornferry.com in the Investor Relations section. This concludes today's call. Thank you all for joining. You may now disconnect.