00:00Jeremy, what can you tell us that would enthuse us about the shares, given that we're seeing a sell-off,
00:04even though you reported a 35% increase?
00:07Thanks for having me back on the show, Vani. It was a really strong quarter for Liftoff.
00:12We grew 7% quarter over quarter, 35% year over year.
00:16We expanded EBITDA margins, and we have a head full of steam heading into Q3.
00:22Most of the growth that we saw came from existing customers.
00:26We performed better for them, and that's the engine of this whole business.
00:29We help apps acquire valuable users, and we help apps monetize their user bases through advertising.
00:36The secular tailwinds are really strong, and we're excited heading into the back half of the year.
00:40Jeremy, very interested in those existing customers.
00:42What are they telling you about their appetite to spend money on advertising?
00:45If they're not telling you that, what are you seeing in the data in terms of their capacity or appetite
00:49to do it?
00:50Yeah, exactly, David. It's a great question.
00:52When we look at the market right now, the secular tailwinds are very strong heading into mobile app.
00:58If you look at the density of mobile app economics, mobile app is monetizing at one-sixth of the density
01:04of TV right now.
01:05So the secular appetite is huge to build an app presence as a business, and this is across categories.
01:12Liftoff works with advertisers across gaming and across all of the other major verticals that you see in your phone
01:21every day.
01:21For instance, sports books, which was thematically relevant in Q2, travel, those who are booking hotel rooms.
01:29And so if you look across the categories, the appetite is quite profound, and we're seeing that play out through
01:35our business as an index for the app economy.
01:38So your core AI platform is Cortex, right?
01:41How do you convince the small business owner that it can really bring them that incremental advertising revenue that will
01:50come from the incremental or marginal consumer?
01:53The beauty of our business is that it is a perfect meritocracy and that as an advertiser, you will only
01:59continue to spend with Liftoff if you're acquiring users that are hitting your KPI.
02:04So let me explain that. What that means is an advertiser wants to pay for a subscriber or pay for
02:11someone who will book a hotel or book a ride as a ride-hailing app or open a prediction markets
02:17account.
02:18Now, in order to continue to spend with a company like Liftoff, you need to be acquiring users that are
02:23ROI positive.
02:24So the beauty of this business is that the overwhelming majority of our customers are tracking the performance of those
02:31outcomes on a minute-by-minute basis rather than if you look at some of the older world advertising where
02:37it may be asynchronous in terms of setting up budgets for the given year, it's always on with a business
02:43like Liftoff.
02:44And Cortex, which is our answer to AI today, the implementation of Cortex, is purely in our recommendation engine.
02:52So it helps recommend ads for advertisers.
02:56This is probably the most profound economic application of AI today, driving profits for businesses today.
03:04We mentioned your rival, AppLovin, at the top just down the road from you in Palo Alto.
03:08This is a bigger company, and I wonder sort of what your pitch is to a company about what you
03:13can do versus what they can do.
03:14It's, again, a more sizable company.
03:16I imagine they have more data than you do.
03:18Differentiate yourself between them, if you would.
03:20At Liftoff, we work with advertisers across the entire app economy.
03:24The customer breadth is a really important distinction.
03:27We work with advertisers in gaming but also across all of these other verticals that are growing at a quite
03:34rapid rate
03:35with our external studies showing a CAGR outside of gaming in-app of 14% from 2026 to 2030.
03:44And so if you think about all of those verticals that we're familiar with watching advertisements on TV for,
03:50they're coming to app, and we have been working with all of these verticals since our inception, truly as an
03:57index.
03:57Now, what I would also say is you need at least two of us as an advertiser to grow your
04:04user base with a composite of models
04:07that are helping you find your users.
04:10So each one of our recommendation engines functions differently from app to Liftoff to others,
04:15and a smart user acquisition manager or a smart growth marketer is using multiple partners
04:21to try and get the perfect cohort for their business.
04:26So Blackstone is involved.
04:28It's probably too early for Blackstone to sell its stake,
04:31but do you think there's an overhang because of Blackstone's involvement?
04:36Blackstone has been a great partner.
04:38We've worked with them very closely for seven years.
04:41We are very, very long-term focused, and as are they.
04:45We think that having a shareholder like Blackstone has helped us in getting to the public markets
04:51and having the strength as a business to deliver a really strong value proposition.
04:57We're going to be long-term focused, and we'll continue to work with our shareholders
05:01to deliver results that deliver for all of those shareholders, inclusive of Blackstone.
05:08I wonder if there is, maybe lastly, a pool of ad dollars you haven't been able to get access to
05:13that you're eyeing.
05:14So when you think about growth of the company, where you'd like to see the company move next?
05:20The future is vast for ad tech.
05:23When you look to what can happen in the mobile app economy that hasn't yet,
05:28there are a variety of verticals that have really just started forming
05:32that will be looking to acquire users through the in-app channel.
05:37I think very well chronicled the LLM population.
05:41We talk about a lot of those businesses today.
05:43They will be focused on growth marketing as the quarters roll on.
05:48You also have a lot of different, really, really big endemic verticals
05:52outside of what we typically see in performance
05:56that are enhancing their focus on measurement and enhancing their use of AI.
06:01And so Liftoff really benefits twice from AI in that sense,
06:05in that we talked about how we apply AI in Cortex.
06:09It helps our recommendation engine.
06:10But our customers, and I think well covered in this earnings cycle,
06:15are starting to use AI to grow their businesses and enhance their user funnel,
06:19which will then make performance marketing a lot more effective for them through app.
06:23And so we benefit twice from that secular shift.
06:26I think that the categories that can come are really a function of
06:30the tastes of the three of us and other consumers out there.
06:34What types of apps do we engage with?
06:36Well, we know that those businesses will be working with Liftoff to help grow their user base.
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