Unity Software Inc. (NYSE:U) Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

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Luis Visoso: Yes. I mean, we’re being very choiceful on where we invest. And we’re particularly investing in things that make — this is going to resonate because it’s in line with everything we’re saying. So where are we investing? We’re investing in data. That’s one of the — I was expecting you guys to ask, why is our EBITDA kind of not improving significantly in Q2? And one of the reasons is because we’re investing in cloud consumption to drive that data that will help us on our growth side. So we see the benefit of the savings, the benefit of the restructuring on cost on the portfolio, and it flows through the bottom line. But then we’re investing particularly on two things, cloud consumption to drive more data and data scientists, because that’s an area where we need to continue to improve.

And that just pays out very quickly. So that’s kind of where we’re going. On capital allocation, as you know, we’ve been buying shares. We also reduced our debt significantly at a good discount, by the way. We had a $61 million gain, as you saw. And we’ll continue to evaluate what we do based on whatever the market is going. So we’re constantly looking at that, Gili.

Daniel Amir: The last question is from Bernie McTernan from Needham.

Bernie McTernan: Jim, can you just impact some of the comments you made about the runtime fee? Just thinking about why customer sentiment has improved so much? And then also on Grow, just any impact on, or any thoughts on macro impact on the business and how you expect it to progress throughout the year? Thank you.

Jim Whitehurst: Well, so a couple of things. I think, in the cold light of day, when you sit down with customers and you’re talking about kind of our existing contracts and what this really means and where those dollars get spent, I think people have realized, A, it’s not as dire as they thought it was, depending on the game and how it monetizes. It kind of varies around whether it’s a net purchase or ad or whatever. So I think people now are moving from worst case to a realistic view of what a runtime fee would be, because we can sit down and work that through with them. And then, it does create an opportunity. And I actually saw this a lot even as far back as Unity about, let us talk about the engineering effort that goes into the runtime.

Forget about the engine, the runtime, and building the most performant runtime, keeping it performant, and continuing to drive value into that as we go forward. And people start to say, okay, I get it. A, I’m not like immediately saying, oh, it’s 2.5% of all of my revenue. It depends, right? And you kind of work through that. And then you kind of work through, but here’s the value and what we can drive with that. People kind of calm down and you start to have more rational conversations. I wish I could say it’s more than that, but I think some of it’s just from knee-jerk reaction about, oh, my God, it’s not a great time in the market. You want to charge me more, to, well, here’s what we’re doing. Here’s the relationship. Here’s the value you’re actually getting.

And here’s what it looks like it’s really going to cost you. And the conversations kind of soften and they become much more productive for how we work together. I don’t know if it’s a lot more than that. It’s just, I think, a little bit of sobriety after a while and a combination of moving from kind of thinking the math in worst case to actually seeing what it’s likely to be.

Daniel Amir: Great. Thanks a lot. So with that, we’re going to wrap up the call. Thank you for dialing in today. And we’re looking forward to meeting you during the quarter at various Investor Conference. Have a great day.

Luis Visoso: Thank you.

Jim Whitehurst: Thank you.

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