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00:00Look, just go to the fundamentals. You're all about a social network for LGBTQ plus
00:05community. What was driving some of the gains? Yeah, we had a really awesome quarter, grew 30%
00:11in revenue. EBITDA was 47%, which was the highest we ever had, which I know our EBITDA is always
00:16high, but this was kind of extra special. We're really happy with the results. We also actually
00:20released for the first time our demographic data, showing that about 46% of users in the US and
00:27over 50% worldwide are 18 to 29 years old, which is actually what's driving the results, right?
00:33Grindr is kind of a rite of passage for gay men worldwide. As they become 18, one of the things
00:38they do is join Grindr, and that's where they learn about what it's like to be gay, what it's like to
00:44be out and have gay friends, and what the community is like, meet people for a number of reasons.
00:50And that is a really powerful part of what makes a product work. Keeping the free product really
00:55healthy is really important for the younger cohort. And then what you can see with our user data is
00:59that as people age past 30, especially 35, they end up paying at a much higher rate. So a lot of our
01:05payers are kind of on that older cohort of 35 plus. And I think that creates a really healthy dynamic
01:10for the business. And, you know, we think we can continue to nurture that over time. Talk to us about
01:14how you go into the premium experience and what really you're offering them there, because I know
01:18a lot of it is about, of course, personalization. But there are these unique opportunities that they have
01:23in terms of AI features in particular as its optimization, how you and what are you delivering?
01:28Yeah, we just disclosed that earnings that we have started testing what we're calling a new premium
01:33tier. It's named kind of temporarily at least as edge. Let's see if we keep that long term. It's
01:40right now live in one market. It's going to take us a few quarters to get it out globally. But
01:44we're really psyched about it. It's taking all the features we have and putting them into one tier
01:48at one price point. It's not meant for everyone. It's meant for power users who will really benefit
01:54from the features that we create. And the price point is appropriately higher than anything we
01:57offer today. And that one takes things like recommendations and discovery. So we show you
02:04people that we know you will like and also that we expect they will like you. We take all your
02:09conversations, create summaries of those conversations for each person and show you the
02:15summarized view of, hey, this is what you guys talked about. These are the things that we think
02:19are important for you. These are people that are contenders for you to meet. These are people you
02:23probably should just continue talking to, but we don't yet know how the conversation is going to go.
02:26And then lastly, we're getting insights to that where people can actually get a sense of why we're
02:31recommending these people. So we'll tell you, are you matched on interest? Are you matched on,
02:36you know, your position view? Does this person actually reply to messages frequently or
02:41not frequently? Because oftentimes people get upset they haven't heard from somebody. But if this
02:45person very selectively replies only over the weekend, then maybe you shouldn't be mad that he
02:49didn't reply, you know, Monday through Friday. And so there's a lot of really rich data that we
02:53possess that we can actually expose people to and make them have a better experience in the app.
02:58Now, obviously, all that is done with people's permission. We've gone through and asked people,
03:02are you okay with being part of AI features? And, you know, an overall majority of users have said yes,
03:06which we're really psyched about. And I think that will just make the product a lot better over
03:11time. And really set that after, you know, working on this for a year and a half. Now,
03:15we actually have that in tests in real life with people actually checking out,
03:19do they want this high tier or not? And how should we price point it as time goes by?
03:23It's about building trust for the user base. But also, I want to ask about trust of using AI,
03:28deploying AI by your workforce as well. George, when we first started talking, I mean,
03:32you took very bold steps in really limiting the amount of people that were at the business.
03:38Very early on post-COVID, you were saying, look, you've got to come back to the office. You wanted
03:41to change the culture of your workforce. You're doing more with less. And you say EBITDA has
03:44therefore always been a strong point. How are you seeing actually AI pilots run within? Because
03:49many have questioned whether they're really working for businesses.
03:52Yeah, for us, the results have been really awesome. A lot of what we've spent time doing this is
03:56actually determining whether we can measure how much AI is being used. And the numbers are all up to the
04:02right in terms of our engineering team and our product team using AI to develop code, to deploy
04:08that code. We're not yet at the levels we want to be, but some of this is dependent on us actually
04:13improving the foundations of our code. Grindr is not a young company. We've been around for almost 17
04:19years. And so there's an older code base that we still need to clean up. And once you do that, then AI can
04:24work with more part of the code base. But the parts that you can work with, we're actually using it a ton in already.
04:30And I think the team's finding it really, really effective because number one, they know that they
04:34can do a lot more. And number two, if you're an engineer and you're not moving in a direction,
04:40you're going to be much less employable in three to five years. And so to be in a place where the
04:44company is actually encouraging you to learn these things, I think is really powerful for people.
04:48And that's why we want AI first, AI native engineers to come and work at Grindr, because
04:52it is a great place for them to develop those types of skills and become even better at that than they might be today.
04:59We have you on because you reported earnings as a public company. You might become a private
05:03company again, George. There is a take private offer. And one of the members of the board has
05:09stepped down, almost maybe recused themselves, because they want to focus in on this take private
05:15offer in particular. That's James Liu. How are you thinking about it all as the CEO?
05:19Yeah, two shareholders, James Liu and Ray's age have made an offer to take the company private.
05:24The board has formed a committee of independent disinterested directors to deal with that transaction.
05:30They have their own independent financial legal advisors and are doing the work to assess the offer
05:34and make recommendations to the full board on what to do. I'm obviously on the full board, so I can't
05:38really comment on that process because I will have to eventually make a decision one way or the
05:43ever in terms of what we should do. But, you know, we believe that our job is to ensure that we
05:49protect all shareholders and serve in their interests. And that's what the board is doing and is taking
05:54that very, very seriously. James stepping down was for personal reasons. And, you know, I'll let him
06:00speak to that. But we're really fortunate that Michael Guerin stepped in to be our lead independent
06:04director. He's been an awesome mentor to the management team, you know, one of the most successful
06:08entrepreneurs in America today, probably. And he's been awesome at helping me become a better CEO
06:12and really set to have him in a position that he's taken on as well. George, just reset the context to
06:17finish because, look, LGBTQ plus hasn't always been open to every single investor. Some have wanted not
06:25to be investing in Grindr. How has your share price or how's your share holders changed? Have you seen
06:32more people willing to bet on Grindr simply because of the strength of the business, not always about what the
06:37business serves? I think for sure we have way more shareholders that are investors in the company
06:43and are open being invested in the company than we had three years ago when we first got started.
06:48There was a lot of education that we need to do. There's still a lot of education we need to do
06:52because fundamentally most investors don't use our product the way that they might use Instagram or
06:56Snap on a regular basis. And we need to help them understand what the product is like. And that's a
07:01big reason why we do as much disclosure as we do. But I think the total set of people who want to
07:06invest has definitely grown. And that's really encouraging and actually speaks to our mission
07:10of making a world that is more free, equal and just. And in our own success, we're able to kind
07:14of drive that to happen. And I'm very happy with that dynamic. We still do need to attract more long
07:21haul investors, larger mutual funds, et cetera. And that is a really big focus for us over the next
07:27couple of years. I think now that we've been out for a while, the results have been very strong.
07:31I mean, we've had 12 plus quarters of very strong results. Hopefully more of those long term mutual
07:38fund investors that have been looking at us a lot and end up being convinced that, yes,
07:41we should take the plunge and invest in the company now.
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