Clearwater Analytics Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CWAN) Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

In the stable value fund market, that’s another element within these broader asset management complexes that we’re able to drive. So we’ll see what — you’ll continue to see traction and you’ll listen to us as we talk about those new logos in those markets. And you’ll also be able to see traction through seeing NRR 115%. At the highest level, you might say, hey, wait a second, what’s — what are the size of those markets? And I think we’ve talked about it. We get excited about $100 million markets. And so as you think about those, many of those are $100 million markets, but others of them are smaller, but like, for example, stable value, but we are so close to being able to achieve it that it makes sense for us to add that incremental functionality to add those customers.

One data point that just is a reference point. In Q1, about 25% of our total bookings in Q1 were related to these go initiatives. So we won’t share that all the time, because we don’t want to get into disaggregating all of that information. But I think that’s useful for you to understand the pleasant trajectory we’re seeing from these development initiatives. What else would you add?

Jim Cox: It’s good.

Faith Brunner: No, that was all super helpful. And then with a quick follow-up question, if I’ve heard — just curious, with the shift to the T+1 settlement coming up at the end of May, how might this be causing any stress to the capabilities of legacy systems and workflows? And you’ve been seeing anything from a pipeline perspective about this change? Is it causing any anxiety with customers? Or any incentives to maybe push through some transformation and innovation a little bit quicker?

Jim Cox: Yes, Faith, that’s a great call out. And yes, it does. Obviously, that is helpful, right? But it’s one of one million different changes, regulatory changes and environmental changes that our clients and more importantly, our prospects are feeling every day. Another one, for example, is there are huge changes to NAIC reporting that we’re helping our clients build for. T+1 is also important for folks. And so I would say that it’s just another example of this long-term trend that prospects not on Clearwater Solutions, feel more pain and the more pain the better we feel about our ability to solve it.

Faith Brunner: All right, awesome. Thank you. That’s it for me.

Jim Cox: Thank you.

Operator: Our next question today is from the line of James Faucette of Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Michael Infante: Hi, everyone. It’s Michael Infante for James. Thanks for taking our question. Jim, you had previously mentioned last quarter that your objectives for NRR for 2024 were roughly in line with ’23 levels, sort of in that 106%, 107% range, obviously really strong result in NRR this quarter. Do you think that 106%, 107% level is conservative at this stage? I know you called out quarterly variability, but would be great to hear how you’re thinking about it

Jim Cox: Yes. I think if I can just help clarify, it was my fault. I said, hey, as we thought about our annual guide, right, for the year, we thought about NRR looking like that. And obviously, we were very happy with the result that we saw in Q1, and we feel optimistic about the whole year. Having said that, Michael, you’re exactly right, it’s don’t draw a straight line anywhere, but we are definitely trending. And I think it is fair to say that we feel like 106%, 107% would be conservative at this point.

Michael Infante: Got it, that’s helpful. Maybe Sandeep, one for you, really nice win with Aegon on the PRISM side. I was just hoping you could level set with us in terms of the customer profile, the use case on the PRISM side today, and sort of how that’s incremental functionality to the core Clearwater platform? Thanks.

Sandeep Sahai: Thank you, Michael. Yes. Essentially the functionality helps asset managers provide a better service to their clients, and they were improving AUM inflow. So in that use case, it is really, PRISM is helping build client reporting functionality for their clients. And so really, if you think about data that comes in and makes up our entire client report, there’s data from internal systems, there’s data from accounting systems and risk systems, and several other components from within the company. And what PRISM does is takes all of that, intermingles what Clearwater does and other parties do, and come up with one comprehensive view of data and one comprehensive report. So as you can imagine, it makes the client’s reporting very easy. And when you can do that, people tend to provide — give you more assets, if you will, when you go in for the RFP. So again, it’s something which helps clients improve client service, and therefore, attract more assets.

Michael Infante: Got it. Thank you, both.

Sandeep Sahai: Thank you.

Operator: Our next question today is from the line of Michael Turrin of Wells Fargo. Please go ahead. Your line is now open.

David Unger: Hi guys, thanks for taking the question. It’s David Unger for Michael Turrin tonight. Just one from you guys. So you mentioned in the prepared remarks, you’re seeing Gen AI investments having a positive impact. Can you just remind us how we should think about the percentage of spend of Gen AI that’s going to revenue versus expense efficiencies? Thanks.

Sandeep Sahai: Yes. Thank you for the question Dave. Look, I think that Gen AI is a really — it’s a really strategic initiative within the company. And like you pointed out, there are two different streams. One is that, can it make us more efficient? And that we’ve continued to see progress on that. And if you notice what we said on Investor Day about gross margin and the improvement we thought we would get, we had talked about 50 basis point improvement every year. And we already had 78%, which is what we thought we would be in 2025. And definitely some of that is coming from Gen AI. So what does it really do for us? The two points. One is, can it deflect client inquiries? So when a client has a question, can they go to the Gen AI tool they have and get that question answered, and therefore, not even ask us that question?