LivePerson, Inc. (NASDAQ:LPSN) Q3 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

And that, that’s really what we’re trying to go after. So I do think we’re in that driver’s seat to execute on that just because of how we approach this strategically. And it’s, and I’ve been out with the customers the last two or three months really focused on what their needs are and I just feel like we’re in a really good place. Just got to execute.

UnidentifiedAnalyst: Excellent. Thanks for the answers, guys.

Operator: Thank you. Next question comes from the line of Ryan MacWilliams from Barclays. Please go ahead.

Ryan MacWilliams: Hey guys, thanks for taking the question. Just a few for John. John investors are pretty happy to see the big operating leverage improvement in the quarter with sales and marketing and R&D spend declining. Was there any call actions taken in the third quarter that weren’t fully reflected in the quarter that could also further benefit for you?

Rob LoCascio: Hi, Ryan. Yeah, there are certainly some that were late in the quarter or, or that have been action but will have p and l impact in the fourth quarter so that that dynamic holds true. Although most of the actions in the, in the third quarter will, will translate and be reflective. And, and of course as we, as I said in the prepared remarks, we have some additional PNL optimizations that we’re working through as we speak.

Ryan MacWilliams: Perfect. And then any way we should think about kind of the differences between EBITDA margins and free cash margin at this point? Like should, is there any like, puts and takes given some of those changes in the quarter and we expect these two to like converge over time?

Rob LoCascio: Over time as you may know there is a large software capitalization component after just EBITDA to get to pre cash flow in addition to a variety of CapEx needed to support our private cloud. So there’s, as those become less over time and we are reducing software capitalization moving forward then we’ll see them start to converge. We’ll see them start to converge. I wouldn’t expect them to ever fully converge however, but that they’ll get closer over time.

Ryan MacWilliams: Perfect. And just two more kind of like, just check the box ones. You mentioned, I might have missed this in the prepared remarks, the contribution from wild health in the quarter and maybe what we could think about impacting four Q for the guide.

Rob LoCascio: Yeah, I think we, the continued strength and I think the upside that we already saw in the third quarter and the growth we’re seeing serves as kind of a baseline for we can expect in the fourth quarter, hence the, the, the contribution to the increased guidance. But because it’s a newer business and we have less predictability at this point in time we’re, we’re being conservative. We’re not sure exactly where that will land.

Ryan MacWilliams: Excellent. Appreciate the color. Thanks guys.

Operator: Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Jeff Van Rhee from Craig-Hallum. Please go ahead.

Jeff Van Rhee: Yeah. Great. Thanks. So several from that, I guess from a guidance standpoint, realize you’re not given ’23, but can you at least give us a framework of how to think about it either at a high level growth rate or and probably preferably you’ve got the hosted versus PS versus consumer segments and just put and take into how we think about ’23. If you can’t at least give us some bounds around it.