BuzzFeed Inc (BZFD) 2023 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Thank you for standing by, and welcome to BuzzFeed Inc's fourth quarter 2023 earnings conference call.

感謝您的耐心等待，歡迎參加 BuzzFeed Inc 的 2023 年第四季財報電話會議。

At this time, all participants are in a listen only mode. I would now like to hand the call over to SVP, Investor Relations, Amita Tomkoria. Please go ahead.

此時，所有參與者都處於只聽模式。我現在想將電話轉交給投資者關係高級副總裁 Amita Tomkoria。請繼續。

Thank you. Hi, everyone. Welcome to BuzzFeed Fourth Quarter 2023 earnings conference call. I'm Amita Tomkoria, Senior Vice President of Investor Relations. And joining me today are CEO, Jonah Peretti, and CFO, Matt Omer.

謝謝。大家好。歡迎參加 BuzzFeed 2023 年第四季財報電話會議。我是投資者關係高級副總裁 Amita Tomkoria。今天加入我的還有執行長喬納佩雷蒂 (Jonah Peretti) 和財務長 Matt Omer。

Before we get started, I would like to take this opportunity to remind you that our remarks today will include forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially from those contemplated by these forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause these results to differ materially are set forth in today's press release, our 2023 Annual Report on Form 10 K to be filed with the SEC and our 2023 quarterly reports on Form 10 Q. Any forward-looking statements that we make on this call are based on assumptions as of today, and we undertake no obligation to these statements as a result of new information or future events.

在我們開始之前，我想藉此機會提醒您，我們今天的言論將包含前瞻性陳述。實際結果可能與這些前瞻性陳述預期的結果有重大差異。今天的新聞稿、我們向 SEC 提交的 10 K 表 2023 年年度報告以及 10 Q 表 2023 年季度報告中闡述了可能導致這些結果出現重大差異的因素。這一呼籲基於截至目前的假設，我們對因新資訊或未來事件而導致的這些陳述不承擔任何義務。

During this call, we present both GAAP and non-GAAP financial measures, including adjusted EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA margin. The use of non-GAAP financial measures allows us to measure the operational strength and performance of our business to establish budgets and to develop operational goals for managing our business. We believe adjusted EBITDA and adjusted EBITDA margin are relevant and useful information for investors because they allow investors to view performance in a manner similar to the method used by our management. A reconciliation of these GAAP to non-GAAP measures is included in today's earnings press release. Please refer to our Investor Relations website to find today's press release, along with our investor letter. And now I'll pass the call over to Jonah.

在本次電話會議中，我們介紹了 GAAP 和非 GAAP 財務指標，包括調整後 EBITDA 和調整後 EBITDA 利潤率。使用非公認會計原則財務指標使我們能夠衡量我們業務的營運實力和績效，以製定預算並製定管理我們業務的營運目標。我們相信調整後的 EBITDA 和調整後的 EBITDA 利潤率對投資者來說是相關且有用的信息，因為它們允許投資者以類似於我們管理層使用的方法來查看業績。這些 GAAP 與非 GAAP 指標的調整包含在今天的收益新聞稿中。請參閱我們的投資者關係網站，尋找今天的新聞稿以及我們的投資者信函。現在我將把電話轉給喬納。

Thank you, Amita, and good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. Buzz feed the way we pursue our mission to spread troops, Joy and creativity on the Internet is as important as the mission itself. We've never been a conventional media company focused on just content output. We've always been as obsessed with the medium as we are with the message by embracing new technologies pioneering new formats and innovating to create new ways to bring our content to life. We have built some of the most iconic brands on the Internet. Our early teams are responsible for much of the foundational work, establishing social media. It is now commonplace, but we started. But when we started, it wasn't the norm for our content to be shared for content to be shareable relatable identity firming and purpose built to connect people into fandom and affinity groups based on shared passions. And over the past 15 years, we've been part of this medium emerging maturing becoming ubiquitous and inspiring media outlets as diverse as The New York Times and Mr. Bass by empowering these same core tenants of identity fandom insurability, I believe we have a tremendous opportunity in front of us to build the defining media company for the AI era capitalizes on on this opportunity, we have aggressively refocused our business around our iconic brands, BuzzFeed, HuffPost PC first piece in hotlines, which combined continued to lead the industry in Q4, turns into in terms of time spent according to comScore, our owned and operated websites and apps where we have more control over monetization, our more our most scale, our most scalable, highest margin tech-led revenue streams, programmatic advertising and affiliate comp. With this as a backdrop I would like to share some important and exciting updates on our business. We continue to operate in a peak period of unprecedented change for digital media. So last month, we announced the sale of complex for approximately two times 2023 revenue in an all-cash deal that brought in $114 million for the Company, our acquisition of complex in 2021 coincided with the downturn in the advertising market. So instead of being able to close bigger bundle portfolio deals, each of our brands ended up competing against each other for the available smaller opportunities.

謝謝阿米塔，大家下午好，謝謝您今天加入我們。嗡嗡聲是我們追求分散軍隊使命的方式，網路上的快樂和創造力與使命本身一樣重要。我們從來都不是一家只專注於內容輸出的傳統媒體公司。我們一直對媒體和資訊同樣著迷，透過擁抱新技術、開拓新格式並創新創造新方式將我們的內容變為現實。我們已經建立了一些互聯網上最具標誌性的品牌。我們的早期團隊負責大部分基礎工作，即建立社群媒體。現在這已經很常見了，但我們已經開始了。但當我們開始時，我們的內容共享並不是常態，因為內容是可共享的、相關的身份鞏固和目的，旨在根據共同的熱情將人們與粉絲群體和親和力群體聯繫起來。在過去的15 年裡，我們已經成為這種新興媒體的一部分，它正在走向成熟，變得無處不在，並通過賦予這些相同的核心租戶身份粉絲保險的能力，像《紐約時報》和巴斯先生那樣鼓舞人心的媒體機構，我相信我們有一個我們面臨著建立人工智慧時代定義媒體公司的巨大機遇，利用這一機遇，我們圍繞我們的標誌性品牌BuzzFeed、HuffPost PC 熱線第一條積極重新調整我們的業務，這些品牌結合起來繼續在行業中處於領先地位。第四季度，根據comScore 的統計，我們擁有和經營的網站和應用程序，我們對貨幣化有更多的控制權，我們的規模最大，我們最具可擴展性，利潤率最高的技術主導的收入流，程序化廣告和聯盟比較。以此為背景，我想分享一些關於我們業務的重要且令人興奮的更新。我們繼續在數位媒體前所未有的變革高峰時期運作。因此，上個月，我們宣布以大約兩倍於 2023 年收入的全現金交易出售綜合體，為公司帶來 1.14 億美元的收入，我們在 2021 年收購綜合體恰逢廣告市場低迷。因此，我們的每個品牌最終都沒有能夠完成更大的捆綁組合交易，而是相互競爭以獲得較小的機會。

Sale marks an inflection point for BuzzFeed, Inc. as we refocus our business around scalable, high-margin tech-led revenue streams complex with an asset to drive revenues predominantly from lower margin businesses, custom branded video content and events following the sale. The majority of our revenue is now generated through programmatic advertising and affiliate commerce, both capital efficient, high-margin, scalable businesses that lever our that leverage our existing tech infrastructure and have less exposure to the market and secular headwinds that have that we have experienced over the last several quarters further selling complex has allowed us to restructure our business around our own sites and ops where we can better control monetization and build amazing experiences for our audience.

此次出售標誌著BuzzFeed, Inc. 的一個轉折點，因為我們重新將業務重點放在可擴展、高利潤的技術主導型收入流上，該收入流的資產主要來自利潤率較低的業務、定製品牌影片內容和出售後的活動來推動收入。我們的大部分收入現在是透過程序化廣告和聯盟商務產生的，這兩種業務都是資本效率高、利潤高、可擴展的業務，可以利用我們現有的技術基礎設施，並且較少受到市場和我們所經歷的長期逆風的影響。在過去的幾個季度中，進一步的銷售綜合體使我們能夠圍繞自己的網站和運營重組我們的業務，從而更好地控制貨幣化並為我們的受眾打造令人驚嘆的體驗。

Sale proceeds also improved our liquidity, helping us reduce our debt and interest obligations and optimize working capital. As a result, our company is now organized around the business lines that have historically been the most stable, profitable and nimble. In fact, gross margin on revenues from continuing operations across BuzzFeed, HuffPost safety first with decent hotlines, was approximately 44% as compared to a 40% gross margin for the combined business, including complex, a difference of 400 basis points.

銷售收益也改善了我們的流動性，幫助我們減少債務和利息義務並優化營運資金。因此，我們公司現在圍繞著歷史上最穩定、最盈利和最靈活的業務線進行組織。事實上，BuzzFeed、《赫芬頓郵報》安全第一、熱線電話等持續營運業務的毛利率約為44%，而合併後的業務（包括複雜業務）的毛利率為40%，相差400 個基點。

Turning to our financial results for our continuing operations, excluding complex fourth quarter revenues were set were $76 million, down 26% year over year. In line with our revised outlook outlook provided last month. We aren't satisfied with this performance and have made changes to drive improvements in our performance, which I will discuss shortly. We delivered fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA of $15 million, also in line with our revised outlook. first year revenues were $253 million. Also down from full year revenues were were $253 million, also down 26% year over year. We generated an adjusted EBITDA loss of $5 million versus approximately breakeven adjusted EBITDA in the prior year. For both Q4 and the full year, adjusted EBITDA remained relatively stable year over year, despite significant top line pressure, which reflects the cost-saving initiatives we implemented throughout 2023. I think it is worthwhile to outline the current dynamics impacting our revenue performance as well as some of the strategic decisions we've made to adapt in this environment.

談到我們持續經營業務的財務業績，排除複雜的情況，第四季收入定為 7,600 萬美元，年減 26%。與我們上個月提供的修訂後的展望一致。我們對此性能並不滿意，並進行了更改以推動性能改進，我將很快討論這一點。我們在第四季度調整後 EBITDA 為 1500 萬美元，也符合我們修訂後的前景。第一年的收入為 2.53 億美元。全年營收也下降了 2.53 億美元，年減 26%。我們的調整後 EBITDA 虧損為 500 萬美元，而前一年的調整後 EBITDA 約為損益兩平。儘管營收壓力巨大，但第四季和全年調整後 EBITDA 仍比去年同期保持相對穩定，這反映了我們在 2023 年全年實施的成本節約措施。我認為有必要概述一下當前影響我們收入表現的動態，以及我們為適應這種環境而做出的一些策略決策。

First, digital publishers continue to be impacted by intense competition for audience time between the largest platforms as these platforms tried to retain users. They are sending less traffic to publishers, which has impacted our ability to drive advertising revenues based on audience time spent.

首先，數位出版商繼續受到最大平台之間對受眾時間的激烈競爭的影響，因為這些平台試圖留住用戶。他們向發布商發送的流量減少了，這影響了我們根據受眾花費的時間來增加廣告收入的能力。

Second, in a tough market for digital advertising, our clients have often had to forgo custom branded advertising campaigns. This has resulted in lower demand for custom branded video products and experiential events. And third, with limited budgets, partners want to go deeper with one brand with one specific target audience. They are also they are no longer looking for offerings from a collection of brands in this environment. Our brands ended up competing against one another for fewer opportunities.

其次，在嚴峻的數位廣告市場中，我們的客戶常常必須放棄客製化品牌廣告活動。這導致對定製品牌視訊產品和體驗活動的需求下降。第三，由於預算有限，合作夥伴希望更深入研究某一特定目標受眾的品牌。他們也不再在這種環境下尋找一系列品牌的產品。我們的品牌最終為了爭奪更少的機會而相互競爭。

To address these headwinds, we have made strategic up organizational changes that I am excited to share with you today. First, in order to reduce our dependence on the major platforms for audience traffic. We are prioritizing new content initiatives on our owned and operated websites and apps where we have a loyal, highly engaged audience with more control over monetization. Specifically, we are harnessing the power of AI to get more leverage on human creativity. This includes leaning into AI, assistant content formats that are more engaging for our audience as well as AI tools and tech that make our teams and our clients more efficient.

為了解決這些不利因素，我們進行了策略性的組織變革，我很高興今天與您分享。第一，為了減少我們對各大平台觀眾流量的依賴。我們正在優先考慮在我們擁有和經營的網站和應用程式上推出新的內容計劃，這些網站和應用程式擁有忠實、高度參與的受眾，並且對貨幣化有更多的控制權。具體來說，我們正在利用人工智慧的力量來更多地發揮人類的創造力。這包括傾向於人工智慧、對我們的受眾更具吸引力的輔助內容格式，以及使我們的團隊和客戶更有效率的人工智慧工具和技術。

Second, we are moving away from branded video to focus on our most scalable tech lead and highest margin revenue lines, specifically programmatic advertising and affiliate commerce. Together, these businesses drove more than $130 million in revenue in 2023. Divesting complex was a significant step in this direction since branded video drove the majority of complex revenue. This was also some of our lowest margin revenue position us to improve profitability as a result Third, we are reorganizing our sales team by brand to enable this. We implemented the restructuring program we shared with you last month to reduce centralized costs and direct more dedicated resources to our individual brands plus the HuffPost pace for Sleepy's to Holland. This includes operating with a much leaner direct sales team as we leverage our existing tech infrastructure to drive programmatic advertising revenue. I am confident this is the right strategy for our business because it is centered on our leadership in the marketplace across our network of brands. We continue to lead the industry in terms of time spent in Q4 audiences once again, spent more time consuming our content than that of any other digital media company in our competitive set according to comScore. This is driven by strong and differentiated IP across BuzzFeed, HuffPost AC for as we ceased and hotlines and each has a trusted and established brand identity for BuzzFeed. It is pop culture, entertainment and curating the best of the Internet. As we continue to innovate around new AI-assisted formats and develop a more personalized experience, we see huge opportunity to reach even more young people and deepen engagement with our loyal website and app base users. In fact, among among our app-based audience, we grew time spent per page view quarter over quarter throughout 2023 for HuffPost. It's breaking news coverage and audience centric stories for a massive direct to front-page audience. The brand is also reaching an audience in new ways with expanded shopping content into new podcasts, both of which have opened up new sources of advertising revenue for Tasty, it's building the next generation of food creators with more than $300 million cross-platform followers. Three times the size of the next closest competitor pace continues to lead the way in 2023 pace drove impressive growth in viewership, and it's in its of its short-form creator like content up 25% year over year to reach 5 billion views across platforms. Pace has translated this momentum into new opportunities for brands to partner with us, including sponsorships of Creator video series brand integrations with creator recipe content and advertiser sponsored experiences to connect creators and food lovers in real life for fees for first, we feed it is expanding the hotlines universe and building more IP at the intersection of food and pop culture with over 30 billion minutes watched to date, hotlines continues to track premium and episode sponsorships with household names like Sprycel and Snickers. The franchise has continued to build on its cultural relevance and serve the insatiable demand of IT spend with spin-off series like heaters and new CPG launches like hotlines hotspots.

其次，我們正在從品牌影片轉向專注於我們最具擴展性的技術領先和最高利潤的收入線，特別是程序化廣告和聯盟商務。這些業務在 2023 年總共帶來了超過 1.3 億美元的收入。剝離綜合體是朝這個方向邁出的重要一步，因為品牌影片推動了綜合體的大部分收入。這也是我們利潤率最低的收入之一，使我們能夠提高獲利能力。第三，我們正在按品牌重組我們的銷售團隊，以實現這一目標。我們實施了上個月與您分享的重組計劃，以降低集中成本，並將更多專用資源分配給我們的各個品牌，以及《赫芬頓郵報》將 Sleepy's 推廣到荷蘭的步伐。這包括與更精簡的直銷團隊合作，因為我們利用現有的技術基礎設施來推動程式化廣告收入。我相信這對我們的業務來說是正確的策略，因為它的核心是我們在品牌網路的市場中的領導地位。根據 comScore 的數據，我們在第四季度觀眾花費的時間方面繼續領先行業，在我們的內容上花費的時間比我們競爭對手中的任何其他數位媒體公司都多。這是由 BuzzFeed、HuffPost AC 和熱線的強大且差異化的智慧財產權所推動的，每個智慧財產權都擁有值得信賴且已建立的 BuzzFeed 品牌識別。它是流行文化、娛樂和網路最好的策劃。隨著我們繼續圍繞新的人工智慧輔助格式進行創新並開發更個人化的體驗，我們看到了接觸更多年輕人並加深與我們忠實的網站和應用程式基礎用戶的互動的巨大機會。事實上，在我們基於應用程式的受眾中，《赫芬頓郵報》在 2023 年的每個頁面瀏覽時間都逐季增長。它為大量的直接頭版觀眾提供突發新聞報道和以觀眾為中心的故事。該品牌還以新的方式接觸受眾，將購物內容擴展到新的播客中，這兩者都為Tasty 開闢了新的廣告收入來源，它正在培養擁有超過3 億美元跨平台粉絲的下一代美食創作者。到2023 年，其規模是緊隨其後的競爭對手三倍的步伐將繼續引領潮流，推動觀看人數的驚人增長，其短格式創作者之類的內容同比增長25%，跨平台觀看次數達到50億次。佩斯將這一勢頭轉化為品牌與我們合作的新機會，包括贊助創作者視頻系列品牌與創作者食譜內容的整合以及廣告商贊助的體驗，以將創作者和現實生活中的美食愛好者聯繫起來，首先是收費的，我們提供的服務正在擴大迄今為止，熱線熱線的觀看時間已超過300 億分鐘，並在美食和流行文化的交匯點打造更多IP，熱線繼續跟踪Sprycel 和士力架等家喻戶曉的品牌的付費和劇集贊助。該特許經營權繼續建立其文化相關性，並透過加熱器等衍生系列和熱線熱點等新的 CPG 推出來滿足 IT 支出的永不滿足的需求。

Before I wrap up, I want to reiterate my excitement for the future. We have taken steps to stabilize our business. We have organized around our most profitable business lines, and we are excited to continue building on this stronger foundation by innovating to create the future of media. More specifically, we have a tremendous opportunity in front of us to build the defining media company for the AI era. We have only begun to see the power of AI in transforming the way we live and the way we work the way we interact the Internet will be a vastly different place in a few years will emerge as an entirely new medium creativity will flourish. And I believe buzz feeding is at the forefront of that change. We are already harnessing the capabilities of AI to be more creative and more efficient. And while today, it is primarily a tool to adapt our existing businesses. I foresee entirely new businesses and revenue opportunities emerging as new technology evolves, and we continue to learn from our own experimentation with a I am excited to work alongside you, our employees, creators, partners and shareholders to realize this vision, and I look forward to sharing more in our annual letter to shareholders next month.

在結束之前，我想重申我對未來的興奮。我們已採取措施穩定我們的業務。我們圍繞著利潤最高的業務線進行組織，我們很高興能夠透過創新繼續建立在這個更強大的基礎上，創造媒體的未來。更具體地說，我們面前有一個巨大的機會來打造人工智慧時代的定義性媒體公司。我們才剛開始看到人工智慧在改變我們的生活方式和工作方式方面的力量，我們與網路互動的方式將在幾年內發生巨大的變化，隨著一種全新的媒體創造力的蓬勃發展，人工智能將出現巨大的變化。我相信嗡嗡聲餵養是這一變化的最前沿。我們已經在利用人工智慧的能力來提高創造力和效率。如今，它主要是調整我們現有業務的工具。我預見隨著新技術的發展，將會出現全新的業務和收入機會，我們將繼續從自己的實驗中學習，我很高興與您、我們的員工、創造者、合作夥伴和股東一起努力實現這一個願景，我期待在下個月致股東的年度信中分享更多資訊。

I'll now hand the call over to Matt to discuss our financial performance and outlook.

現在我將把電話轉給馬特，討論我們的財務表現和前景。

Thank you, Jonah. I want to echo Jonah's remarks regarding the strength of our go forward business with the sale complex behind us and our restructuring program nearly fully executed. We believe we are a stronger, more stable and more profitable business. We now have less exposure to declining lower margin branded video revenue, we have meaningfully reduced our go-forward headcount and cash cost structure. And as a result of paying down a significant portion of our debt, we have also reduced our go-forward cash interest obligations. And while we still have work to do to address the traffic and revenue headwinds facing our business and digital publishers at large, I believe we are significantly better positioned than our peers to navigate the Way Forward sustainably and profitably.

謝謝你，喬納。我想呼應喬納關於我們未來業務實力的言論，我們身後有銷售綜合體，而且我們的重組計劃幾乎完全執行。我們相信我們是一家更強大、更穩定、獲利能力更強的企業。現在，我們對利潤率較低的品牌影片收入下降的風險減少了，我們已經有意義地減少了我們的未來員工人數和現金成本結構。由於償還了很大一部分債務，我們也減少了遠期現金利息義務。雖然我們仍然需要努力解決我們的業務和整個數位出版商面臨的流量和收入逆風，但我相信我們比同行處於更有利的位置，能夠以可持續和盈利的方式引領前進的道路。

Moving on to our fourth quarter results. As a reminder, all financials and comparables presented here are on a continuing operations basis, which excludes comp overall revenues for Q4 2023 declined 26% year over year to $75.7 million. In line with the revised outlook, we provided last month, performance by revenue line was as follows. Advertising revenues declined 25% year over year to $31.9 million, predominantly driven by lower year over year directional revenues. Our direct sales channel has been more acutely impacted by current trends in the advertising market. Bundling our brands into a single portfolio proved challenging during a time in which many of our clients face uncertainty with respect to their own budgets and spending, NOVeA contrast trends in our programmatic advertising, which makes up the significant majority of our advertising revenues saw a more moderate decline of 11% year over year in Q4. This was entirely driven by declines on third party platforms, which offset growth in programmatic revenues on our owned and operated advertising revenues are driven in large part by AUDIENCE time spent with our content across platforms in conjunction with advertising revenues. We continue to report US time spent across our owned and operated properties and third-party property platforms. According to comScore, in Q4, U.S. time spent as reported by comScore declined 12% year-over-year to 72 million hours, driven primarily by ongoing declines in referral traffic from third-party platforms. However, we once again outpaced peer digital media companies and our competitors.

接下來是我們第四季的業績。需要提醒的是，此處提供的所有財務數據和可比較數據均以持續營運為基礎，其中不包括 2023 年第四季的公司總收入，年減 26% 至 7,570 萬美元。根據我們上個月提供的修訂後的前景，按收入線劃分的業績如下。廣告收入較去年同期下降 25% 至 3,190 萬美元，主要是由於定向收入較去年同期下降。我們的直銷管道受到當前廣告市場趨勢的影響更為嚴重。在我們的許多客戶在自己的預算和支出方面面臨不確定性的時期，將我們的品牌捆綁到一個單一的產品組合中被證明是具有挑戰性的，NOVeA 對比我們的程序化廣告（占我們廣告收入的絕大多數）的趨勢，看到了更多第四季度同比小幅下降 11%。這完全是由第三方平台的下降所推動的，這抵消了我們擁有和經營的廣告收入的程序化收入的增長，而廣告收入在很大程度上是由觀眾在跨平台內容上花費的時間以及廣告收入推動的。我們繼續報告在我們擁有和經營的房產以及第三方房產平台上花費的美國時間。根據 comScore 的數據，第四季度，comScore 報告的美國用戶花費時間年減 12% 至 7,200 萬小時，這主要是由於第三方平台推薦流量持續下降。然而，我們再次超越了同行數位媒體公司和競爭對手。

Content revenues declined 34% year over year to $27 million, driven primarily by a decline in the number of branded content advertisers amid tighter digital ad market. We have continued to experience lower demand for our custom branded content products, which are typically focused on top of funnel ad spend aimed at driving overall brand awareness that Q4 branded content net revenue retention was lower year over year, driven by the trends I just described. Commerce and other revenues of $16.7 million declined $1.4 million or 8% in Europe. Nearly all of our commerce revenues are generated from commissions earned on transactions initiated from our editorial shopping content. We delivered fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA of $15.1 million, also in line with our February outlook. It is important to note that per US GAAP, we have not allocated any of the shared expenses to due to discontinued operations. As a result, our fourth quarter and full year 2023 adjusted EBITDA includes complexes portion of shared corporate expenses, which are significant. However, as Joe discussed earlier, as a result of the sale complex, the underlying profitability of our ongoing operations has already improved meaningfully in 2023. The gross margin on revenues from continuing operations to across BuzzFeed, HuffPost TAC And firstly, fees were approximately 44% as compared to a 40% gross margin for the combined business when including comp, we ended the fourth quarter with cash and cash equivalents of approximately $36 million. And in February, we closed the sale of complex in an all cash deal for approximately $114 million, including additional cash consideration. We used the sales proceeds to redeem $30.9 million of the Company's $150 million convertible note at par value plus accrued interest of $0.6 million. We eliminated the Company's revolving credit facility by repaying it in full for $35.5 million, which includes the outstanding balance plus accrued interest and certain seats. And we will finance the strategic restructuring program we announced last month estimated in the range of $2.5 million to $4 million. The remaining cash proceeds will be retained for working capital optimization and general corporate purposes. As you can see, we have already made meaningful strides in strengthening our balance sheet and improving overall liquidity. And looking ahead, as we lean into our highest margin revenue streams, we expect to make even more progress towards becoming a cash profitable business.

內容收入較去年同期下降 34% 至 2,700 萬美元，主要是由於數位廣告市場趨緊導致品牌內容廣告商數量下降。我們對定製品牌內容產品的需求持續下降，這些產品通常專注於漏斗廣告支出的頂部，旨在提高整體品牌意識，即受我剛才描述的趨勢的推動，第四季度品牌內容淨收入保留率逐年下降。歐洲的商業和其他收入為 1,670 萬美元，下降了 140 萬美元，即 8%。我們幾乎所有的商業收入都來自於我們的編輯購物內容發起的交易所所賺取的佣金。我們在第四季度調整後 EBITDA 為 1510 萬美元，也符合我們 2 月的預期。值得注意的是，根據美國公認會計原則，我們沒有將任何分攤費用分配給終止營運。因此，我們的第四季和 2023 年全年調整後 EBITDA 包括複雜的分攤公司費用部分，這一比例相當大。然而，正如 Joe 之前討論的那樣，由於出售綜合體，我們正在進行的業務的潛在盈利能力在 2023 年已經有了顯著改善。BuzzFeed、HuffPost TAC 持續營運收入的毛利率約為 44%，而合併後業務的毛利率為 40%（包括公司在內），我們第四季末的現金和現金等價物約為3,600萬美元。2 月份，我們以約 1.14 億美元的全現金交易完成了綜合體的出售，其中包括額外的現金對價。我們用銷售所得款項以面額加上 60 萬美元的應計利息贖回了公司 1.5 億美元的可轉換票據中的 3,090 萬美元。我們透過全額償還 3550 萬美元來取消公司的循環信貸額度，其中包括未償餘額加上應計利息和某些席位。我們將為上個月宣布的策略重組計劃提供預計 250 萬至 400 萬美元的資金。剩餘的現金收益將保留用於營運資本優化和一般公司用途。正如您所看到的，我們在加強資產負債表和改善整體流動性方面已經取得了有意義的進展。展望未來，隨著我們轉向最高利潤的收入來源，我們預計將在成為現金獲利業務方面取得更大進展。

So before I share our financial outlook for the first quarter, let me provide some context starting with revenues. As I discussed earlier, our revenue performance reflects the challenges of a market with a bundled portfolio of brands going a market that is too bundle portfolio brands during a time in which our advertising partners have had a pullback or delay spending against the backdrop of prolonged uncertainty in the macroeconomic environment. As John outlined earlier, we've made some strategic and organizational shifts to adapt our business and drive revenue improvement in this environment. Specifically, we have refocused the business around our owned and operated websites and apps were trends in both time. Spent and revenue have performed better relative to the distributed network, we have prioritized our most scalable and highest margin revenue streams, programmatic advertising and affiliate commerce, which drove more than $130 million in 2023 revenue and fared significantly better in Q4 in terms of year-over-year revenue trends relative to our direct sales channel and branded content, and we've adopted a brand first go-to-market approach. This includes operating with a much leaner direct sales team as we leverage our existing tech and infrastructure to drive programmatic advertising. Each of our brands continue to resonate in the marketplace with a leadership position among its core audience and a differentiated value proposition for advertisers. To building on this, we see an opportunity to drive improved revenue trends over time and programmatic advertising in affiliate commerce as we bring our brands to market individually, continue to introduce AI assisted formats to drive audience engagement on our owned and operated websites and apps where we have much more control over monetization and deepen our relationships with our retail.

因此，在分享我們第一季的財務前景之前，讓我先從收入開始提供一些背景資訊。正如我之前所討論的，我們的收入表現反映了在我們的廣告合作夥伴在長期不確定性的背景下撤回或推遲支出的時期，捆綁品牌組合的市場走向過於捆綁品牌組合的市場所面臨的挑戰在宏觀經濟環境下。正如約翰之前概述的那樣，我們已經做出了一些策略和組織轉變，以適應我們的業務並推動這種環境下的收入提高。具體來說，我們將業務重新集中在我們擁有和經營的網站和應用程式上，這是這兩個時期的趨勢。相對於分散式網絡，支出和收入表現更好，我們優先考慮了最具可擴展性和最高利潤的收入流、程序化廣告和聯屬商務，這些收入在2023 年推動了超過1.3 億美元的收入，並且在第四季度的同比表現明顯更好 -相對於我們的直接銷售管道和品牌內容的同比收入趨勢，我們採用了品牌優先的市場策略。這包括與更精簡的直銷團隊合作，因為我們利用現有的技術和基礎設施來推動程式化廣告。我們的每個品牌都憑藉著在核心受眾中的領導地位以及為廣告商提供的差異化價值主張，繼續在市場上引起共鳴。在此基礎上，隨著我們將我們的品牌單獨推向市場，我們看到了隨著時間的推移推動收入趨勢和聯盟商務中的程序化廣告改善的機會，繼續引入人工智能輔助格式以提高受眾在我們擁有和經營的網站和應用程式上的參與度，其中我們對貨幣化有更多的控制權，並加深了我們與零售業的關係。

In terms of adjusted EBITDA, our Q1 outlook outlook reflects a partial benefit of our recently announced restructuring program. As a reminder, the program is expected to drive approximately $23 million of annualized compensation cost savings. We expect the program to be fully executed by the end of April.

就調整後的 EBITDA 而言，我們第一季的展望反映了我們最近宣布的重組計劃的部分好處。需要提醒的是，該計劃預計將每年節省約 2,300 萬美元的薪資成本。我們預計該計劃將在四月底全面執行。

So looking ahead, we expect that our Q2 operating expenses will be much more representative of our ongoing cost structure. And from a year-over-year perspective, we expect to drive significant improvement in Q1 adjusted EBITDA despite the top line pressure.

因此，展望未來，我們預計第二季的營運支出將更能代表我們目前的成本結構。從年比角度來看，儘管面臨營收壓力，我們預計第一季調整後 EBITDA 仍將顯著改善。

So with that, I'd turn to our financial outlooks. All figures and comparables are presented on a continuing operations basis for Q1 2024. We expect overall revenues in the range of $42 million to $44 million or 20% to 23% lower than the year-ago quarter. And we expect adjusted EBITDA losses in the range of $10 million to $12 million, an improvement of approximately $7 million year over year at the midpoint.

因此，我將轉向我們的財務前景。所有數據和可比較數據均以 2024 年第一季的持續營運為基礎呈現。我們預計總收入在 4,200 萬美元至 4,400 萬美元之間，比去年同期下降 20% 至 23%。我們預計調整後的 EBITDA 損失將在 1,000 萬美元至 1,200 萬美元之間，年比中點減少約 700 萬美元。

Before I wrap up, I want to highlight that the changes we have made specifically to prioritize our high margin programmatic and fleet businesses and significantly reducing our cash cost structure have positioned us to build a much stronger balance sheet in 2024 and take meaningful steps to becoming a cash-positive business.

在結束之前，我想強調的是，我們專門為優先考慮高利潤的程序化和車隊業務以及顯著降低現金成本結構而做出的改變，使我們能夠在2024 年建立更強大的資產負債表，並採取有意義的步驟，成為現金積極的業務。

Thank you. I'll hand the call back to Amita so we can take Quest.

謝謝。我會把電話轉給阿米塔，這樣我們就可以進行任務了。

Great. Thanks, Matt. We have received a bunch of questions ahead of the call and during the call, which I've gathered here. So we'll go ahead and get right into it.

偉大的。謝謝，馬特。我們在電話會議之前和電話會議期間收到了很多問題，我將這些問題收集在這裡。那我們就直接開始吧。

John, the first question is for you around the impact of AI., can you talk a little bit more about like how we might and when we might see some of this impact showing up in numbers?

約翰，第一個問題是關於人工智慧的影響，你能多談談我們如何以及何時會看到這種影響以數位形式出現嗎？

Yes. Thanks for the question. So the first impact of AI will be on our core business, which is programmatic and affiliate revenue lines in particular, what's so exciting about our programmatic and affiliate businesses is they are both highly scalable, tech-enabled revenue lines that are high margin and you can get a lot of leverage for applying additional technology to those to those business lines.

是的。謝謝你的提問。因此，人工智慧的第一個影響將是對我們的核心業務，特別是程序化和聯盟收入線，我們的程序化和聯盟業務令人興奮的是，它們都是高度可擴展的、技術驅動的收入線，利潤率很高，你可以獲得很大的優勢，將額外的技術應用於這些業務線。

If you look at the recent developments in AI, particularly with LM.s, it's now possible to have a machine read all of our content and understand it, and that's a huge difference. And the ability to actually understand our content means that opportunities for contextual advertising for programmatic are greatly enhanced. It wouldn't have been possible until very recently to to have someone who can would like have a person read all of our articles and pick the perfect ads contextually aligned with that article. But with a I actually able to understand the content of articles and that kind of alignment and contextual alignment of advertising is possible the same with shopping, the ability of if everyone had their own personal shopper, who knows all the things that you've bought previously knows things you're browsing and interested in maybe fine and can make personalized recommendations to you. That's something that we feel will be able to drive additional transactions in the future. And so those two big the two big areas where we're seeing a I apply to our existing business, but I think there are going to be new businesses that are new business lines that haven't been invented yet as AI. starts to power a new medium. And I think we have a great opportunity for us to help invent that new medium where content is will be possible that just wasn't possible before. And so to look at a historical analogy, when TV was the new media, the first thing that a lot of media companies did is they put radio shows or prerecorded plays on television because that is the mistake that people tend to make when a medium is new. They look at all their medium and they say, okay, we can use this two to sort of distribute something that we're familiar. We're all familiar with turns out, watching it play or radio on TV isn't the best use of TV and quickly, the smart media companies figured out how to change the way they make content for television, where there were close out some people's faces. Quick cuts seem changes. All the things that we know from about television programming today were invented during that period. And I think that similar thing is starting to happen right now with a high-powered content and where our teams are starting to create content that feels more alive that has intelligence embedded in it that can interact with people that can personalize and the experience are different for different people. And all of that is the very beginning of what I think is the new medium and for content companies, particularly digital media content companies like like, BuzzFeed that is going to be a huge driver of future growth as that that new medium starts to emerge. And as we start to see the benefit of things that just were never possible previously.

如果你看看 AI 的最新發展，特別是 LM.s，現在可以讓機器讀取我們所有的內容並理解它，這是一個巨大的差異。真正理解我們的內容的能力意味著程序化內容廣告的機會大大增加。直到最近才有可能有人願意讓一個人閱讀我們所有的文章並選擇與該文章上下文相符的完美廣告。但有了我實際上能夠理解文章的內容，並且廣告的這種對齊和上下文對齊是可能的，就像購物一樣，如果每個人都有自己的私人購物者，他知道你買過的所有東西以前知道您正在瀏覽和感興趣的內容也許很好，並且可以向​​您提出個人化推薦。我們認為這將能夠在未來推動更多交易。因此，我們看到這兩個大領域適用於我們現有的業務，但我認為將會有新的業務，即尚未被發明為人工智慧的新業務線。開始為新媒材提供動力。我認為我們有一個很好的機會來幫助發明一種新的媒體，使以前不可能的內容成為可能。以歷史為例，當電視成為新媒體時，許多媒體公司做的第一件事就是在電視上播放廣播節目或預先錄製的戲劇，因為這是當媒體被取代時人們容易犯的錯誤。新的。他們查看了所有的媒體，然後說，好吧，我們可以用這兩個來分發我們熟悉的東西。我們都熟悉事實證明，在電視上觀看播放或廣播並不是電視的最佳用途，很快，智慧媒體公司就想出瞭如何改變他們為電視製作內容的方式，其中有一些接近人們的臉。快速削減似乎發生了變化。我們今天從電視節目中了解到的所有內容都是在那個時期發明的。我認為類似的事情現在開始發生在高性能內容上，我們的團隊開始創建感覺更生動的內容，其中嵌入了智能，可以與可以個性化的人互動，體驗是不同的對於不同的人。所有這些都是我認為新媒體和內容公司的開始，特別是像 BuzzFeed 這樣的數位媒體內容公司，隨著新媒體開始出現，這將成為未來成長的巨大推動力。當我們開始看到以前不可能實現的事情的好處時。

Great. Thank you. Matt, the next question is for you on the topic of profitability. So you mentioned in your remarks possibly becoming a more profitable business on the other side of the complex transaction? And just how should we think about that relative to your Q1 guidance, which is which is forecasting adjusted EBITDA losses can you just kind of step us through that?

偉大的。謝謝。馬特，下一個問題是關於獲利能力的問題。那麼您在演講中提到，在複雜交易的另一邊，可能會成為一項利潤更高的業務？相對於您的第一季指導，我們應該如何考慮這一點，即預測調整後的 EBITDA 損失，您能告訴我們這一點嗎？

Yes. And if so, you can see the immediate profitability impact by just looking at our full year 2023 results, gross margin for continuing operations was 44% as compared to 40% for the consolidated business when you include complex. So a difference of 400 basis points. And in terms of Q1 guidance at the midpoint, adjusted EBITDA expected to be $7 million better year over year. This despite lower year-over-year revenues, which reflects the current and the cumulative impact of last year's cost saving initiatives, but only a partial impact of our most recent restructuring. Again, as a reminder, that recent restructuring is expected to drive approximately $23 million in annualized compensation cost savings, and we expect that program to be fully executed by the end of April. And so looking ahead, we expect that our Q2 operating expenses will be much more representative of our ongoing cost structure.

是的。如果是這樣，您只需查看我們2023 年全年業績就可以看到對盈利能力的直接影響，持續經營業務的毛利率為44%，而考慮到綜合業務時，合併業務的毛利率為40% 。所以相差400個基點。就第一季中期指引而言，調整後的 EBITDA 預計將年增 700 萬美元。儘管收入同比下降，這反映了去年成本節約舉措的當前和累積影響，但只是我們最近重組的部分影響。再次提醒您，最近的重組預計將節省約 2,300 萬美元的年化薪酬成本，我們預計該計劃將在 4 月底之前全面執行。因此，展望未來，我們預計第二季的營運支出將更能代表我們目前的成本結構。

Got it. And Jonah, back to you in terms of branded video. So you talked about moving away from branded video as a source of revenue. Does that mean like what does I mean, does that mean you'll no longer offer these types of products to clients? Or can you just elaborate on that shift a bit more?

知道了。喬納，回到你的品牌影片方面。因此，您談到放棄將品牌影片作為收入來源。這是否意味著就像我的意思一樣，這是否意味著您將不再向客戶提供這些類型的產品？或者您能詳細說明一下這種轉變嗎？

Yes. I think the biggest challenges with with them branded video. And I would say the way we previously operated with video was that the one off video that is posted on a social platform or video platform like YouTube. It is not a very scalable, durable form of video production where every single video needs to succeed on its on its own. And on the branded side, it's a lot of work to come up with some unique idea for every single and branded integration that doesn't necessarily have a natural home or reason for someone to watch it. So I don't think it's great from a margin standpoint from a time standpoint are great for clients really. We have put a lot of thought into this and to be smarter about how we make video. And so certainly from one form of making video is partnerships that we've done with streamers to make feature films and video that it costs millions of dollars to make, but it is really differentiated because it's unique IP. I think when we look at something like hotlines, it's also very strong IP that we can extend into a whole bunch of different business lines from selling hotspots to sponsorships to product integrations, but they're none of them are one-off videos. It's a familiar format that repeats that audiences love and are expecting and that has natural ways to integrate brands. And so I think that is a great area to focus on where you have strong IP and repeat viewership like that for KC., it's really about creators. And the Tasty brand plus creators is just incredibly powerful. And we've seen food creators to be so excited to engage with us and partner with brands as well. And so we're focused on really looking at how do we make video in a way that is sustainable and profitable. And that lends itself to higher-margin revenue and is something that can scale better than the one-off branded videos. I think the divestiture of complex helps us move away from some of the high-cost, lower-margin custom branded content. A lot of a lot of the brands that transacted with complex kind of wanted some totally unique type of branded integration where you'd be starting from zero in some cases, in terms of building something. And I think that's some pretty different from PACE. And firstly, feast, which are also much more pop culture focused and really fit well with BuzzFeed buzz feed once pace. They're all pop culture, brands that reach huge audiences and that have a great context for brand integration that can be done in a way that is more scalable where you're not doing sort of agency type work of coming up with denovo concepts for one-off videos or limited series and things like that. So I think I'm I think, overall we're being smarter. We're picking our spots. We are made decisions that make us less dependent on the platforms. And this is the type of video that also really helps us work strategically with clients, entertainment, clients and retail clients and other of other partners were up who can align with the great viewership and formats and IP that we're creating in video and get really great value working with us in a way that also is beneficial to our business and doesn't require as much of a heavy lift to deliver for our clients. So that's the how we're thinking about it is that area of our business that it is a bit more nuanced and we're trying to stay out of the middle area of the one-off kind of high cost videos and focusing on our studio business to our IP. to creators all in ways that are met that maximize the scalability and opportunity to integrate brands in a way that's more seamless.

是的。我認為品牌影片面臨的最大挑戰。我想說的是，我們以前處理影片的方式是在社群平台或 YouTube 等影片平台上發布一次性影片。它不是一種可擴展性強、持久的影片製作形式，每個影片都需要靠自己取得成功。在品牌方面，為每個單獨的品牌整合提出一些獨特的想法需要做很多工作，而這些想法不一定有自然的歸屬或有人觀看它的理由。因此，我認為從利潤的角度來看，從時間的角度來看，這對客戶來說並不是很好。我們對此投入了很多思考，並更明智地製作影片。因此，製作視頻的一種形式肯定是我們與串流媒體合作製作長片和視頻，製作成本數百萬美元，但它確實與眾不同，因為它是獨特的 IP。我認為，當我們看到像熱線這樣的東西時，它也是非常強大的智慧財產權，我們可以將其擴展到從銷售熱點到贊助到產品整合的一大堆不同的業務線，但它們都不是一次性視頻。這是一種熟悉的形式，重複著觀眾的喜愛和期待，並且有自然的方式來整合品牌。所以我認為這是一個很好的領域，需要專注於那些擁有強大 IP 和重複收視率的領域，就像 KC 那樣。這實際上與創作者有關。Tasty 品牌加上創作者的力量非常強大。我們看到食品創造者非常高興與我們合作並與品牌合作。因此，我們專注於真正研究如何以可持續且有利可圖的方式製作影片。這有助於獲得更高的利潤收入，並且比一次性品牌影片更能擴大規模。我認為剝離複雜內容有助於我們擺脫一些高成本、低利潤的定製品牌內容。許多進行複雜交易的品牌都需要某種完全獨特類型的品牌整合，在某些情況下，在建立某些東西方面，你需要從零開始。我認為這與 PACE 有很大不同。首先，盛宴，它也更注重流行文化，並且非常適合 BuzzFeed 動態推送。它們都是流行文化，是能夠吸引大量受眾的品牌，並且具有良好的品牌整合背景，可以透過更具可擴展性的方式來完成，而無需進行代理類型的工作，為品牌提出全新的概念。一次性愛影片或限量系列之類的東西。所以我認為我認為，總的來說，我們變得更聰明了。我們正在挑選自己的位置。我們所做的決定使我們減少對平台的依賴。這種類型的影片也確實有助於我們與客戶、娛樂、客戶和零售客戶以及其他合作夥伴進行策略合作，他們可以與我們在影片中創建的巨大收視率、格式和 IP 保持一致，並獲得與我們合作非常有價值，這對我們的業務也有利，並且不需要為我們的客戶提供太多繁重的工作。這就是我們的想法，我們的業務領域更加細緻，我們試圖遠離一次性高成本視訊的中間區域，並專注於我們的工作室業務到我們的知識產權。為創作者提供最大限度的可擴展性和以更無縫的方式整合品牌的機會。

And maybe continuing on from that, you made several references to both your programmatic advertising business and then your affiliate commerce business and sort of refocusing around those two revenue streams. Can you discuss some of the specific opportunities that you see in each of those areas? And maybe on a related note also, how are you guys are thinking about Google's rollout of cookie deprecation and where and how that might impact you or maybe how you guys are sort of getting in front of that?

也許接下來，您多次提到了您的程序化廣告業務，然後是您的聯盟商務業務，並重新關注了這兩個收入來源。您能否討論一下您在每個領域看到的一些具體機會？也許還有一個相關的說明，你們如何看待 Google 推出 cookie 棄用以及這可能會在哪裡以及如何影響你們，或者你們是如何採取行動的？

Yes, I mean, as I said earlier, I love our affiliates and programmatic businesses because they are very scalable, high-margin businesses that allow us to get leverage from tech investments. And I think with with a eye being able to read and understand content that's just going to add to those to those businesses at a very abstract level, affiliate generates revenue from driving transactions, which means people taking action and our audience is very active, and we are able to inspire a lot of action from our audience to transact. And so if you look just taking the programmatic or taking the affiliate business. First, we drive have more than $0.5 billion in transactions on behalf of our retail partners. And that results in about $50 million in commerce revenues for us. So you can see it some driving those significant GMV for our partners. It's also a great business for us, and it is something that will benefit and does benefit from our tech investments. Some of those things might be a little more nuts and bolts like being able to really do a great job featuring the products and the prices and great post format and collections and gift guides and things like that, our editorial and tech work and some of it is deeper machine learning recommendations. And now with Gemini, the ability to remix content and feature as a bonus product for someone that might be a personalized selection for them and other other things that and we're just starting to Emageon, and that could extend far beyond that. And so we really like to be in businesses that are they benefit from from our tech investment and also benefit from new technology trends like JNI that will allow those businesses to get even more leverage six months from now a year from now two years from now, programmatic is similar. If affiliate is about transactions and getting paid to drive transactions.

是的，我的意思是，正如我之前所說，我喜歡我們的附屬公司和程序化業務，因為它們是非常可擴展的、高利潤的業務，使我們能夠從技術投資中獲得槓桿作用。我認為，憑藉一雙眼睛能夠閱讀和理解那些將在非常抽象的層面上添加到這些業務中的內容，聯盟行銷機構可以透過推動交易來獲得收入，這意味著人們採取行動，我們的受眾非常活躍，並且我們能夠激發觀眾採取大量交易行動。因此，如果您只是尋求程序化或聯盟行銷業務。首先，我們代表零售合作夥伴實現了超過 5 億美元的交易。這為我們帶來了約 5000 萬美元的商業收入。因此，您可以看到它為我們的合作夥伴帶來了顯著的 GMV。這對我們來說也是一項偉大的業務，它將受益於並且確實受益於我們的技術投資。其中一些事情可能更具體一些，例如能夠真正做好產品和價格、出色的帖子格式、收藏品和禮品指南之類的工作，我們的編輯和技術工作等等。是更深入的機器學習建議。現在，有了Gemini，能夠將內容和功能重新混合為某人的獎勵產品，這可能是他們的個人化選擇，以及我們剛開始為Emageon 提供的其他東西，而且這可能會遠遠超出這一範圍。因此，我們真的很喜歡從事那些既能從我們的技術投資中受益，又能從JNI 等新技術趨勢中受益的企業，這將使這些企業在六個月後、一年後、兩年後獲得更大的影響力，程序化是類似的。如果聯盟是關於交易並獲得報酬以推動交易。

Programmatic is more about attention. Classically advertising is about selling the audience's attention and programmatic is the most tech. It enables most scalable, highest margin way of selling attention. And we have more time spent than anyone in our competitive set. So we have a lot of attention that we can monetize through through programmatic and I think when I mentioned earlier, how programmatic can be enhanced by more data, I am and particularly data around contextual alignment of advertisements, and that's something that we can do with advances and advances in AI where we actually have machines that can understand our content at hand is almost hands Select, but at a massive scale, how advertising should be placed to maximize architectural alignment and conversions and things like that. Overall AI. and also will help us get more audience to the site and spend more time on the site. And we've seen that AI. content drive more time spent than other forms of content because it's more alive, more personalized, more interactive. And as we continue to push the envelope on that kind of work and there will be people spending even more time on our site. And we expect and that will drive more opportunity for programmatic monetization to monetize that time. And attention that people are spending. And so there's some a lot of excitement about sort of focusing on the next stage of the Internet and how to build a really strong scalable business in commerce and advertising for the next stage of the Internet. And I think that cookies kind of represent an earlier stage of the Internet sort of the pre AI. stage stage where a lot of the targeting and retargeting that with cookies has been, you know, you visit a retailer site and then they add for that product policy around the web everywhere you go in and that kind of very dumb basic form of retargeting and that was very effective is going to be harder and harder to do as cookies get depreciated. But more interesting, more sophisticated forms of targeting that are based on IAI. based on contextual alignment are going to start to replace that. And I think you I've already seen. As you know, Apple search has changed there and the ability of search for targeting within apps you're already seeing that companies have been able to adapt and evolve. I'm using new technologies that can perform as well as although differently than some of the older targeting.

程序化更多的是關注。傳統的廣告是為了吸引受眾的注意力，而程式化廣告是最具技術含量的。它提供了最具可擴展性、最高利潤的銷售注意力方式。我們花在競爭上的時間比任何人都多。因此，我們有很多注意力可以透過程式化來貨幣化，我想當我之前提到如何透過更多數據來增強程式化時，我特別是圍繞廣告上下文對齊的數據，這是我們可以做的事情人工智慧的進步和進步，我們實際上擁有可以理解我們手頭內容的機器，這幾乎是手動選擇，但在大規模上，應該如何放置廣告以最大化架構對齊和轉換等。整體人工智慧。並且還將幫助我們吸引更多的受眾訪問該網站並在該網站上花費更多的時間。我們已經看到了人工智慧。與其他形式的內容相比，內容會吸引更多的時間，因為它更生動、更個性化、更具互動性。隨著我們繼續挑戰此類工作的極限，人們將會在我們的網站上花費更多的時間。我們預計，這將為程序化貨幣化帶來更多機會來實現貨幣化。以及人們所花費的注意力。因此，人們對關注互聯網的下一階段以及如何為互聯網的下一階段在商業和廣告領域建立真正強大的可擴展業務感到興奮。我認為 cookies 代表了互聯網的早期階段，即前人工智慧時代。在這個階段，許多使用cookie 進行的定位和重定向都是，你知道，你訪問一個零售商網站，然後他們在你所訪問的任何地方的網絡上添加該產品政策，以及那種非常愚蠢的基本形式的重定向和雖然這種方法非常有效，但隨著 cookie 的貶值，這種方法將變得越來越難實現。但更有趣、更複雜的定位形式是基於 IAI 的。基於上下文對齊的方法將開始取代它。我想你我已經見過了。如您所知，蘋果搜尋已經發生了變化，您已經看到公司已經能夠適應和發展在應用程式中進行定位搜尋的能力。我正在使用的新技術雖然與一些舊的目標定位有所不同，但其性能也同樣出色。

Thank you. So maybe to switch gears a little bit, Matt. Yes, we've seen some of the press reports around a potential licensing deal for about seed in the UK. Could you just discuss like the nature of that deal and what we should know about?

謝謝。所以也許要稍微改變一下態度，馬特。是的，我們已經看到了一些有關英國種子潛在許可協議的新聞報導。您能否簡單討論一下該交易的性質以及我們應該了解什麼？

It is that material? Just sort of recap that for us?

是那種材料嗎？請為我們回顧一下？

Yes, sure. I know the deal hasn't closed yet. So we'll, of course, share more as soon as we're able to do so but briefly when the final stages of an agreement with the independent to license our bus, the UKKCUK. seasoned and HuffPost U.K. brands, this is very similar to the strategic partnership we announced last June between our Australia business and Bill Morgan digital, so which employees that support revenue generation in the UK would move over to the independent and BuzzFeed would continue to own the IP, but we simply earn a share of the go-forward revenues. So under the proposed license, the independent would put resources behind our brands across editorial and sales and offer a wider mix of products and media bundling in terms of materiality, again, hasn't closed yet. So we'll share more as soon as we can on the expected impact to our business.

是的，當然。我知道交易還沒結束。因此，當然，我們會盡快分享更多信息，但會在與獨立機構 UKKCUK 簽署協議的最後階段進行簡短分享。經驗豐富的 HuffPost 英國品牌，這與我們去年 6 月宣布的澳洲業務和 Bill Morgan digital 之間的策略合作夥伴關係非常相似，因此支持英國創收的員工將轉移到獨立公司，而 BuzzFeed 將繼續擁有該公司智慧財產權，但我們只是賺取未來收入的一部分。因此，根據擬議的許可，獨立媒體將在編輯和銷售方面為我們的品牌提供資源，並在實質方面提供更廣泛的產品組合和媒體捆綁，這一切尚未結束。因此，我們將盡快分享更多有關對我們業務的預期影響的資訊。

Got it and then Jonah back to you just on the topic of TikTok. Obviously with us potential TikTok ban looming of what does that mean for BuzzFeed and maybe more broadly, just with your renewed focus on the owned and operated platforms, like how do you view the role of the social platforms and that feeds future?

明白了，然後 Jonah 就 TikTok 的話題回覆了你。顯然，隨著我們潛在的 TikTok 禁令的臨近，這對 BuzzFeed 以及更廣泛的範圍意味著什麼，只是你重新關注自有和運營的平台，例如你如何看待社交平台的作用以及它對未來的影響？

Yes. So TikTok is obviously massive in terms of time spent. They don't send much traffic out. And two other properties include we don't get much audience from TikTok, occasionally some some like Lincoln bio type stuff, but not much. And they have been among the worst in terms of monetization. So we've achieve tremendous scale on TikTok, but we've had to build our own monetization by DOING branded content and other other types of monetization that doesn't depend on platform revenue from TikTok. So I would say our preference would be or are one when I look at the market. If TikTok is banned, probably that will benefit Facebook, Instagram, Snap other platforms. And the time spent on TikTok would start to move to a lot of these other other platforms and some of those other platforms are better monetized and could could actually be a benefit to us. And then if TikTok isn't band, I think and continues. I think we our hope is that they will begin to continue that maturation of their ad products and partnership ability so that they will get closer to parity with other social platforms in terms of revenue for partners. So either of those outcomes are okay. I would say the current the current state of affairs is not it's not the best wear. There's just this ongoing and fierce battle between between these social platforms. And as a result, they've they've kind of stop focusing as much on how to be good partners to the larger ecosystem. So that's the main thing. And I guess in terms of role of the role of platforms and to me, it feels very much in the interest of any platform that achieves enough strength that that has the security that they're in a strong position for them to partner with as many different types of content creators as possible to make sure that their ecosystem is really strong and that they're able to aggregate as broadly as possible, come and spend money with publishers and creators and have personal content and all the different kinds of content that people love. And for us, some we just don't want to be in a position where we're dependent on supply on any of the big tech platforms sort of making the right decisions and being a favorable friendly place for content companies. The recent history has not been great on that front, but we have seen continued strength in our owned and operated platforms. And even as as some there's been decline in outbound traffic from, say, Facebook's to BuzzFeed. And we've seen that the audience is spending more time with us and the direct audience is a lot more valuable than than people who are on an app, clicking to see an article and then kind of clicking away and not spending as much time and so we really want to come have the ability to to build amazing products and have an audience that spends as much time with us as possible so that we can spread trees enjoy and creativity and delight them. And and then probably most importantly, having and owned and operated business as our owned and operated the core of our business gives us the ability to get more tech leverage as we go great content developed technology and also benefit from new technology revolutions like like the explosion in Shanghai that will allow us to continually evolve and improve and change our owned and operated in a way that we couldn't if we were just having content riding on top of someone else's platform.

是的。因此，從花費的時間來看，TikTok 顯然是巨大的。他們不會發送太多流量。另外兩個屬性包括我們從 TikTok 獲得的觀眾不多，偶爾會有一些喜歡林肯生物類型的東西，但不多。就貨幣化而言，它們是最糟糕的。因此，我們在 TikTok 上實現了巨大的規模，但我們必須透過做品牌內容和其他不依賴 TikTok 平台收入的其他類型的貨幣化來建立自己的貨幣化。所以我想說，當我觀察市場時，我們的偏好將會是或正在是其中之一。如果 TikTok 被禁止，可能這將使 Facebook、Instagram、Snap 其他平台受益。在 TikTok 上花費的時間將開始轉移到許多其他平台，其中一些其他平台的貨幣化效果更好，實際上可能對我們有利。然後，如果 TikTok 不是樂隊，我想並會繼續。我認為我們的希望是他們將開始繼續其廣告產品和合作能力的成熟，以便他們在合作夥伴的收入方面能夠與其他社交平台更加接近。所以這兩種結果都可以。我想說，目前的情況並不是最好的穿著。這些社交平台之間正在進行持續而激烈的戰鬥。結果，他們不再關注如何成為更大生態系統的良好合作夥伴。這就是主要的事情。我想就平台的角色而言，對我來說，任何擁有足夠實力的平台都非常有利，因為他們擁有足夠的安全性，可以與盡可能多的人合作。盡可能吸引不同類型的內容創作者，以確保他們的生態系統真正強大，並且能夠盡可能廣泛地聚合，與出版商和創作者一起花錢，並擁有個人內容以及人們喜歡的所有不同類型的內容愛。對我們來說，有些人只是不想依賴任何大型科技平台的供應來做出正確的決定，並成為內容公司有利的友善場所。最近在這方面的歷史並不好，但我們看到我們擁有和經營的平台持續強勁。即使像某些人一樣，從 Facebook 到 BuzzFeed 的出站流量也有所下降。我們已經看到，受眾在我們身上花費了更多的時間，而且直接受眾比使用應用程式的人更有價值，點擊查看一篇文章，然後點擊離開，而不是花費太多時間和時間。因此，我們真的希望有能力打造出令人驚嘆的產品，並擁有盡可能多的觀眾與我們在一起，這樣我們就可以傳播樹木的樂趣和創造力，並讓他們感到高興。然後可能最重要的是，擁有並擁有和經營業務作為我們擁有和經營業務的核心，使我們能夠在我們發展內容開發技術時獲得更多的技術槓桿，並從爆炸等新技術革命中受益在上海，這將使我們能夠不斷發展、改進和改變我們擁有和經營的方式，如果我們只是將內容放在別人的平台上，我們就無法做到這一點。

Great. Thank you. So much. We've got a couple time for a couple of more questions here. Matt, just pivoting to the debt piece of it and the balance sheet. You talked about the use of proceeds falling complex. How should we think about plans to address what's still significant amount of debt remaining on the on the Company's balance sheet?

偉大的。謝謝。非常。我們還有一些時間來回答幾個問題。馬特，只是轉向債務部分和資產負債表。您談到收益的用途變得複雜。我們應該如何考慮解決公司資產負債表上仍有大量債務的計劃？

Like you said, there were other touched on earlier, the fuel complex will enabled us to meaningfully reduce our outstanding debt and interest obligations. So we again, we eliminated our revolving credit facility that was about $35 million and also paid down approximately 20% of the convertible note. So roughly $31 million, up $150 million that was outstanding as it relates to the balance of the convertible note, European unsecured lenders do have an option to call the debt in December this year. However, we expect that we'll be able to work with them in advance of the date of the call option. And in fact, when you look at the proceeds, they agreed to a 31 roughly $31 million paydown so that we could direct more of the proceeds from the complex transaction towards the underlying business to fund the restructuring and optimize working capital. That said, as part of the agreement, they do have claimed 95% of proceeds from any future asset sales. So if such asset sales occur, which obviously would further reduce the debt load, but more broadly discuss the changes we have made to prioritize our high-margin programmatic and affiliate businesses and significantly reduce our cash cost structure have positioned us better to build a much stronger balance sheet in 2024 and take meaningful steps to becoming cash positive.

正如您所說，之前提到過其他問題，燃料綜合體將使我們能夠有意義地減少未償債務和利息義務。因此，我們再次取消了約 3,500 萬美元的循環信貸額度，並支付了約 20% 的可轉換票據。因此，歐洲無擔保貸款人確實可以選擇在今年 12 月贖回這筆債務，約為 3,100 萬美元，比可轉換票據餘額增加了 1.5 億美元。然而，我們希望能夠在看漲期權日期之前與他們合作。事實上，當你查看收益時，他們同意支付約 3,100 萬美元的付款，以便我們可以將複雜交易的更多收益用於基礎業務，為重組和優化營運資金提供資金。也就是說，作為協議的一部分，他們確實要求未來資產出售收益的 95%。因此，如果發生此類資產出售，這顯然會進一步減少債務負擔，但更廣泛地討論我們為優先考慮高利潤的程序化和附屬業務並顯著降低我們的現金成本結構而做出的改變，使我們能夠更好地建立一個更到 2024 年加強資產負債表，並採取有意義的措施來實現現金正值。

And then, Jonah, just a final question for you. In terms of the executive team, over the past few months, there have been some departures up, including your president? And do you have plans to rehire or kind of how are you thinking about the executive team?

然後，喬納，我想問你最後一個問題。就執行團隊而言，在過去的幾個月裡，有些人離職了，包括你們的總裁？您是否有重新聘用的計劃，或者您對管理團隊有何看法？

Yeah. Thanks for the question. So I'm confident in our go-forward leadership team. And I'm also really thrilled to share that we are elevating Ken Blum, a leader with tremendous knowledge, experience and perspective to the role of Chief Business Officer across all our brands, and he joins our new CFO, Matt Homer, and just progress our new publisher for BuzzFeed Inc. So we got a great team and we are all very leaned in for this next stage of building the Company.

是的。謝謝你的提問。因此，我對我們不斷進取的領導團隊充滿信心。我也非常高興地告訴大家，我們正在提拔肯·布魯姆（Ken Blum）擔任我們所有品牌的首席商務官，他是一位擁有豐富知識、經驗和遠見的領導者，他加入了我們新任首席財務長馬特霍默（Matt Homer）的行列，一切都在進步。我們是BuzzFeed Inc. 的新發行商。因此，我們擁有一支優秀的團隊，我們都非常致力於公司建設的下一階段。

Fantastic. Thank you, Jonah, and thank you, Matt. Thank you so much, and thanks, everyone, for joining us. That wraps our Q&A session for today, and I will hand the call back over to our operator so we can wrap up.

極好的。謝謝你，喬納，謝謝你，馬特。非常感謝你們，也感謝大家加入我們。今天的問答環節就到此結束，我會將電話轉回給我們的接線生，以便我們結束。

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.

謝謝。女士們、先生們，今天的電話會議到此結束。感謝您的參與。您現在可以斷開連線。