8x8 Inc (EGHT) 2024 Q3 法說會逐字稿

Hello, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to 8x8 Third Quarter 2024 Earnings Conference Call. (Operator Instructions) I would now like to hand the conference over to Kate Patterson. You may begin.

您好，感謝您的支持。歡迎參加 8x8 2024 年第三季財報電話會議。 （操作員指示）我現在想將會議交給凱特·帕特森。你可以開始了。

Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. Today's agenda will include a review of our third quarter results with Samuel Wilson, our Chief Executive Officer; and Kevin Kraus, our Chief Financial Officer. Following our prepared remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session.

謝謝。大家下午好。今天的議程將包括與我們的執行長塞繆爾·威爾遜一起回顧我們的第三季業績；和我們的財務長凱文克勞斯。在我們準備好的發言之後，將進行問答環節。

Before we get started, let me remind you that our discussion today includes forward-looking statements about future financial performance, including investments in innovation, and our focus on profitability and cash flow as well as statements regarding our business products and growth strategies.

在開始之前，請允許我提醒您，我們今天的討論包括有關未來財務業績的前瞻性陳述，包括創新投資、我們對盈利能力和現金流的關注以及有關我們業務產品和增長戰略的陳述。

We caution you not to put undue reliance on these forward-looking statements as they involve risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to vary materially from forward-looking statements, as described in our risk factors in our reports filed with the SEC.

我們提醒您不要過度依賴這些前瞻性陳述，因為它們涉及風險和不確定性，可能導致實際結果與前瞻性陳述有重大差異，如我們向 SEC 提交的報告中的風險因素所述。

Any forward-looking statements made on this call and in the presentation slides reflect our analysis as of today, and we have no plans or obligation to update them. Certain financial measures that will be discussed on this call, together with year-over-year comparisons in some cases, were not prepared in accordance with the U.S. generally accepted accounting principles, or GAAP.

本次電話會議和簡報幻燈片中所做的任何前瞻性陳述均反映了我們截至今天的分析，我們沒有計劃或義務對其進行更新。本次電話會議將討論的某些財務指標，以及某些情況下的同比比較，並未按照美國公認會計原則（GAAP）制定。

A reconciliation of those non-GAAP measures to the closest comparable GAAP measure is provided in our earnings release and earnings presentation slides, which are available on 8x8's Investor Relations website at investors.8x8.com.

我們的收益發布和收益簡報中提供了這些非 GAAP 衡量標準與最接近的可比較 GAAP 衡量標準的對賬，這些幻燈片可在 8x8 的投資者關係網站 Investors.8x8.com 上取得。

With that, I'll turn the call over to Sam Wilson.

這樣，我會將電話轉給 Sam Wilson。

Thank you, Kate, and thank you to all of our investors, analysts, employees, customers and partners for joining us on our Q3 call.

謝謝凱特，也感謝我們所有的投資者、分析師、員工、客戶和合作夥伴參加我們的第三季電話會議。

We delivered solid operating results again in the third quarter. Our financial North Stars cash flow from operations per share and our cash flow from operations performance for the quarter was the second highest ever. Cash flow from operations on a trailing 12-month basis is up 55% year-over-year, and we continue to be very mindful of share count. Cash flow was driven by non-GAAP operating margins significantly above our guidance range.

我們在第三季再次取得了穩健的經營業績。我們的財務北極星每股營運現金流量和本季營運業績現金流量是史上第二高。過去 12 個月的營運現金流年增 55%，我們仍然非常關注股票數量。現金流量由顯著高於我們指導範圍的非公認會計原則營業利潤率推動。

Q3 '24 marks the anniversary of the official launch of our innovation-led strategy to build durable long-term growth. Our path to complete transformation is underway from operating losses and negative cash flow to sustain non-GAAP profitability and increasing cash generation, from a UCaaS-led to a CCaaS-led sales motion across our customer base, from three individual products to an increasingly integrated portfolio of 8 products, with more to come, from selling products to delivering solutions that address urgent business challenges, from transactional arms-link customer relationships to being a strategic partner in our customer success, from over-levered to delevered.

24 年第三季是我們正式啟動以創新為主導的策略以建立持久的長期成長的周年紀念日。我們的徹底轉型之路正在進行中，從營運虧損和負現金流轉向維持非公認會計準則盈利能力並增加現金生成，從UCaaS 主導到CCaaS 主導的整個客戶群銷售活動，從三種單獨的產品到日益整合的產品8 個產品組合，還有更多產品組合，從銷售產品到提供解決緊迫業務挑戰的解決方案，從交易型客戶關係到成為客戶成功的策略合作夥伴，從​​過度槓桿到去槓桿。

Comprehensive transformations take time and the progress is not always perfectly linear, but I'm impressed by the strides our teams have made over the past year across all three fronts, financial, product innovation and go-to-market.

全面的轉型需要時間，而且進展並不總是完美的線性，但我對我們的團隊過去一年在財務、產品創新和上市這三個方面取得的進步印象深刻。

We have been profitable on a non-GAAP basis and positive cash flow for 12 consecutive quarters. For perspective, in fiscal 2020, we reported non-GAAP operating losses of nearly $61 million and negative cash flow from operations of almost $94 million. 3 years later, we're on track to deliver non-GAAP operating profits of about $92 million and operating cash flow of more than $70 million for fiscal 2024.

我們已連續 12 個季度實現非 GAAP 盈利和正現金流。從長遠來看，2020 財年，我們報告的非 GAAP 營運虧損接近 6,100 萬美元，營運產生的負現金流接近 9,400 萬美元。 3 年後，我們預計在 2024 財年實現約 9,200 萬美元的非 GAAP 營運利潤和超過 7,000 萬美元的營運現金流。

We said in the first quarter that we would return $250 million to investors by delevering our balance sheet over the 3 years from fiscal '24 through fiscal '26. Tomorrow, we will officially redeem the remaining $63 million of our 2024 notes using cash on hand. We have already sent the funds to our transfer agent. Since we announced the plan at the beginning of the fiscal year, we have returned to debt holders over $88 million or about 35% of the $250 million plan.

我們在第一季表示，我們將透過在 24 財年到 26 財年的三年內降低資產負債表的槓桿率，向投資者返還 2.5 億美元。明天，我們將使用手頭現金正式贖回 2024 年票據中剩餘的 6,300 萬美元。我們已經將資金發送給我們的轉帳代理。自從我們在本財年年初宣布該計劃以來，我們已向債務持有人返還了超過 8800 萬美元，約佔 2.5 億美元計劃的 35%。

We are aggressively delevering on our way to creating a fortress balance sheet. All things being equal, this should drive increased shareholder value as a greater proportion of our enterprise value accrues to our equity holders. Increasing shareholder value is one cornerstone of our strategy, and it is at the heart of our decisions around compensation, operating expenses and M&A.

我們正積極去槓桿化，以打造堡壘式的資產負債表。在所有條件相同的情況下，這應該會推動股東價值的增加，因為我們的企業價值的更大比例會歸於我們的股東。增加股東價值是我們策略的基石之一，也是我們有關薪酬、營運費用和併購決策的核心。

For example, we took steps to increase the ratio of cash compensation versus equity compensation for many of our employees. While employees see less volatility in their income, we will reduce dilution due to share count issuance over the intermediate term. This is a sharp contrast to some of our peers, who have increased their stock-based compensation expense as their stock prices have declined.

例如，我們採取措施提高許多員工的現金薪酬與股權薪酬的比例。雖然員工的收入波動較小，但我們將減少中期發行股票帶來的股權稀釋。這與我們的一些同業形成鮮明對比，他們隨著股價下跌而增加了股票薪酬支出。

We are harnessing the power of AI to empower our customers to deliver better experiences to their customers. Our unified platform allows us to capture, analyze and correlate data from customer interactions across the organization, but the platform is not the end game. We are closing the loop, breaking down silos in customer engagement and extending specific contact center tools to everyone in the organization who engages with the customer.

我們正在利用人工智慧的力量來幫助我們的客戶為他們的客戶提供更好的體驗。我們的統一平台使我們能夠捕獲、分析和關聯整個組織內客戶互動的數據，但該平台並不是最終目標。我們正在形成閉環，打破客戶互動的孤島，並將特定的聯絡中心工具擴展到組織中與客戶互動的每個人。

Today, we announced a new product line to deliver cross-organization customer engagement, empowering end-to-end CX orchestration for all customer touch points across the entire organization. The beta program is in progress for qualified 8x8 customers.

今天，我們宣布推出新產品線，以提供跨組織客戶參與，為整個組織的所有客戶接觸點提供端對端 CX 編排。測試計劃正在針對合格的 8x8 客戶進行。

This is perhaps the most significant new innovation we have introduced in several years, and it is a direct result of the increase in our innovation investment. Through a combination of cutting-edge AI solutions, platform-level contact center components and both native and third-party data, we will be able to offer built-for-purpose experiences for CX professionals outside the contact center.

這也許是我們幾年來推出的最重要的新創新，也是我們增加創新投資的直接結果。透過結合尖端的人工智慧解決方案、平台級聯絡中心組件以及本地和第三方數據，我們將能夠為聯絡中心以外的 CX 專業人員提供客製化體驗。

This initiative further bridges the gap between UC and CC and transforms the availability, utilization and contextualization of customer interaction data through the entire organization. The resulting customer intelligence provides powerful and predictive insights to enable smarter decisions and positive customer outcomes across many different touch points in an organization. We believe we have a clear lead in delivering build-for-purpose experiences for CX professionals outside the contact center.

這項措施進一步彌合了 UC 和 CC 之間的差距，並改變了整個組織中客戶互動數據的可用性、利用和情境化。由此產生的客戶智慧提供了強大的預測性見解，可以在組織中的許多不同接觸點上實現更明智的決策和積極的客戶成果。我們相信，在為聯絡中心以外的 CX 專業人員提供客製化體驗方面，我們具有明顯的領先優勢。

In addition to expanding our product portfolio with newly targeted experiences for an expanded set of users, we are changing the entire dialogue with prospects and existing customers. It's no longer only about migrating phone service to the cloud or replacing on-prem PBX, it's about making it easier for all employees to deliver great customer experiences both inside and outside the formal contact center.

除了為更多用戶提供新的針對性體驗來擴展我們的產品組合之外，我們還正在改變與潛在客戶和現有客戶的整個對話。它不再只是將電話服務遷移到雲端或取代本地 PBX，而是讓所有員工更輕鬆地在正式聯絡中心內外提供出色的客戶體驗。

As important as this initiative is, it is by no means the only area we are driving innovation. Let me call your attention to a press release we issued last week with details on new features and enhancements delivered over the last few months.

儘管這項舉措很重要，但它絕不是我們推動創新的唯一領域。讓我提請您注意我們上週發布的新聞稿，其中詳細介紹了過去幾個月提供的新功能和增強功能。

On the CCaaS side, we have included improved AI-based call summaries for improved speech analytics, expanded omnichannel capabilities and enhancements to our agent and supervisor workspaces and more. We continue to enhance our UCaaS solutions with value-added features like smart summaries and analytics and improve usability, productivity and efficiency.

在 CCaaS 方面，我們改進了基於人工智慧的呼叫摘要，以改善語音分析、擴展全通路功能以及對座席和主管工作區等的增強。我們繼續透過智慧摘要和分析等增值功能來增強我們的 UCaaS 解決方案，並提高可用性、生產力和效率。

We also continue to expand our outbound customer engagement capabilities, available through our CPaaS solutions, enabling customers to build more effective, customized outbound campaigns.

我們也持續擴展我們的外呼客戶參與能力，透過我們的 CPaaS 解決方案提供，使客戶能夠建立更有效、客製化的外呼活動。

With just a few new products to general availability, we are already seeing 60% year-over-year growth in revenue from our new products, with quarter-on-quarter acceleration driven by workforce optimization, our Intelligent Customer Assistant digital and voice payments compliance solutions, all wrapped in add-on subscription-based services. This is before any benefit from new products spoken about here today, along with several other products in beta.

隨著少數新產品的全面上市，我們的新產品收入同比增長了 60%，在勞動力優化、智能客戶助理數字和語音支付合規性的推動下，季度環比加速增長解決方案，全部包含在基於附加訂閱的服務中。這是在今天討論的新產品以及其他幾種測試版產品帶來任何好處之前。

We are delivering intentional innovation that addresses the needs of a well-defined target customer. New customers like Yakima Valley Farm Workers Clinic and the Museum of Science in Boston have chosen 8x8 for capabilities like a broad feature set, configuration simplicity, ease of use for reporting and analytics and integration with other workflows.

我們正在提供有意的創新，以滿足明確的目標客戶的需求。亞基馬谷農場工人診所和波士頓科學博物館等新客戶選擇了 8x8，因為它具有廣泛的功能集、配置簡單性、報告和分析的易用性以及與其他工作流程的整合。

8x8 customers are also continuing to embrace our leading communications and contact center solutions for Microsoft Teams, with over 400,000 [seats] sold to date. Customers like Walsall Housing Group in the U.K. and [Teradata] are implementing 8x8 solutions to take advantage of our seamless integration with [Teams], our global presence, in our unified UCaaS and CCaaS capabilities, including AI-driven digital self-service.

8x8 客戶也繼續採用我們領先的 Microsoft Teams 通訊和聯絡中心解決方案，迄今已售出超過 40 萬個[席位]。英國 Walsall Housing Group 和 [Teradata] 等客戶正在實施 8x8 解決方案，以利用我們與 [Teams] 的無縫整合、我們的全球業務以及我們統一的 UCaaS 和 CCaaS 功能，包括人工智慧驅動的數位自助服務。

To keep our products future friendly, we are continuing to innovate on Teams and expect to have some very exciting news in the near future.

為了讓我們的產品面向未來，我們將繼續在 Teams 上進行創新，並期望在不久的將來能有一些非常令人興奮的消息。

A third area of innovation that I'm really excited about is our CPaaS solutions. Until recently, this part of our business has focused almost exclusively on SMS customers in the Asia Pacific region, where we remain a leader. But we believe there is a large and growing opportunity to attract new customers and expand CPaaS adoption with our installed base of UC and CC as we add additional services.

讓我真正興奮的第三個創新領域是我們的 CPaaS 解決方案。直到最近，我們的這部分業務幾乎完全專注於亞太地區的 SMS 客戶，我們在該地區仍然處於領先地位。但我們相信，隨著我們添加額外的服務，我們的 UC 和 CC 的安裝基礎存在著巨大且不斷增長的機會來吸引新客戶並擴大 CPaaS 的採用。

With an extensive road map of new solutions like outbound customer engagement and automated employee notification, we are intentional about engineering solutions for specific use cases and wrapping them in a highly automated, easy-to-transact set of technologies. Like our solution for cross-organization engagement, these new CPaaS solutions allow us to partner strategically with our customers, shifting the narrative from price to value.

憑藉出站客戶參與和自動員工通知等新解決方案的廣泛路線圖，我們有意為特定用例設計解決方案，並將其包裝在高度自動化、易於交易的技術集中。與我們的跨組織參與解決方案一樣，這些新的 CPaaS 解決方案使我們能夠與客戶進行策略合作，將敘述方式從價格轉向價值。

Okay. I would be remiss if I didn't talk about AI. AI permeates our solutions. It is embedded in our platform, provides transcriptions, analytics and summaries as shared services across UC and CC. It powers our digital interactions, where we achieve [deflection] rates as high as 80%. It is at the heart of our new cross-organizational engagement initiative, and of course, it is a large part of our highly integrated ecosystem.

好的。如果我不談人工智慧，那就是我的失職。人工智慧滲透到我們的解決方案中。它嵌入在我們的平台中，提供轉錄、分析和摘要作為跨 UC 和 CC 的共享服務。它為我們的數位互動提供動力，使我們的[偏轉]率高達 80%。它是我們新的跨組織參與計畫的核心，當然，它也是我們高度整合的生態系統的重要組成部分。

Our approach to AI integration is two-pronged and is intentionally designed to give customers the flexibility to adapt as the market evolves. First, we allow customers to reap the benefits of AI for common use cases, with native AI-powered features built into the platform. Second, we enable a deep native-like integrations with third-party AI tools built for specific needs, including our curated technology partner ecosystem.

我們的人工智慧整合方法是雙管齊下的，旨在讓客戶能夠靈活地適應市場的發展。首先，我們透過平台內建的原生人工智慧功能，讓客戶在常見用例中獲得人工智慧的優勢。其次，我們實現了與專為特定需求而構建的第三方人工智慧工具的深度原生集成，包括我們精心策劃的技術合作夥伴生態系統。

Some of the advantages to our approach are: We have the data and the platform. We can focus our engineering teams on analytics, integrations and universal use cases, such as interaction summarization, which we announced last week.

我們的方法的一些優點是： 我們擁有數據和平台。我們可以將工程團隊的重點放在分析、整合和通用用例上，例如我們上週宣布的交互總結。

Our customers can adopt AI in their own timeline, with the flexibility to choose the best-in-breed solutions for their needs, and we can leverage the massive investments made by the venture capital community and startups focused on AI-based products through our technology ecosystem.

我們的客戶可以按照自己的時間表採用人工智慧，並靈活地選擇滿足其需求的最佳解決方案，並且我們可以透過我們的技術利用創投界和專注於基於人工智慧的產品的新創公司所做的大量投資生態系。

Our ecosystem extends across UC, CC and now the cross-organizational engagement products to allow for highly differentiated solutions to solve specific customer needs. Similar to our own innovation initiatives, our technology ecosystem aims to transform customer experiences engagement for organizations of all sizes without requiring complex custom development or exorbitant overhead costs that have traditionally only been feasible for the largest of enterprises.

我們的生態系統涵蓋 UC、CC 以及現在的跨組織參與產品，以提供高度差異化的解決方案來解決特定的客戶需求。與我們自己的創新計劃類似，我們的技術生態系統旨在改變各種規模組織的客戶體驗參與度，而無需傳統上僅對最大的企業可行的複雜的定制開發或高昂的管理費用。

We have focused on depth rather than breadth, offering our customers a carefully curated portfolio of integrations with leading technology providers. We recently expanded our technology partner program with a new exclusive tier SellWith8. SellWith8 allows a select group of strategic technology partners to sell directly with 8x8 to solve customer pain points jointly.

我們注重深度而非廣度，為客戶提供與領先技術提供者精心策劃的整合組合。我們最近透過新的獨家等級 SellWith8 擴展了我們的技術合作夥伴計畫。 SellWith8 允許精選的一組策略技術合作夥伴直接透過 8x8 進行銷售，共同解決客戶痛點。

For example, Awaken Intelligence, an inaugural SellWith8 partner, offers an integration with the 8x8 Contact Center that leverages our persistent, cross-platform data to provide real-time agent guidance and AI-supported assistance.

例如，SellWith8 的首個合作夥伴 Awaken Intelligence 提供與 8x8 聯絡中心的集成，利用我們持久的跨平台數據來提供即時座席指導和人工智慧支援的幫助。

Our foundational partner ecosystem initiative, including SellWith8, is one of the foundational building blocks in our go-to-market transformation. When we began the transformation process, I knew that go-to-market would take the longest and will be the most difficult part of our strategy.

我們的基礎合作夥伴生態系統計畫（包括 SellWith8）是我們進入市場轉型的基本組成部分之一。當我們開始轉型過程時，我知道進入市場將花費最長的時間，並且將是我們策略中最困難的部分。

Transforming GTM is not about throwing more money into Google AdWords or increasing sales capacity. We are shifting market perception, developing and empowering channel partners, building pipelines and increasing accountability with experienced leaders and a relentless focus on customer success. It has taken us the better part of the year, but I believe we are now have the right people in the right roles to reaccelerate revenue.

轉型 GTM 並不是投入更多資金或提高 Google AdWords 銷售能力。我們正在轉變市場觀念，開發和授權通路合作夥伴，建立管道並加強與經驗豐富的領導者的責任，並不懈地關注客戶的成功。我們已經度過了今年的大部分時間，但我相信我們現在擁有合適的人員擔任合適的角色來重新加速收入成長。

In closing, I want to summarize our journey so far and the early signs of our success. Last quarter, I discussed becoming a portfolio-of-product company. We are still in the early stages of a lengthy but exciting transformation. Our innovation-led momentum is also evident in our XCaaS ARR, which is up with double-digit year-over-year gains in Q3.

最後，我想總結一下我們迄今為止的歷程以及我們成功的早期跡象。上個季度，我討論了成為一家產品組合公司。我們仍處於漫長但令人興奮的轉型的早期階段。我們以創新為主導的勢頭在 XCaaS ARR 中也很明顯，第三季同比增長達到兩位數。

The average ARR of our enterprise customers has been steadily increasing as we expanded from 3 individual products to an increasingly integrated portfolio of 8. We also see a steady increase in larger deployments with ARR from customers, with more than 250 Contact Center seats, up more than 50% year-over-year.

隨著我們從3 個單獨的產品擴展到8 個日益整合的產品組合，我們的企業客戶的平均ARR 一直在穩步增長。我們還看到客戶的ARR 大型部署穩步增長，擁有超過250 個聯絡中心席位，增加了更多同比增長超過50%。

We have been working towards this vision for a long time. We believe we have the ingredients for success. Our product portfolio is compelling. We have a solid financial foundation. We have a seasoned leadership team committed to achieving our objectives, and we have amazing talent at every level of the organization. I believe the best is yet to come. I want to thank our customers, our partners, our investors and our employees for their hard work and continued support.

長期以來，我們一直在為實現這一願景而努力​​。我們相信我們擁有成功的要素。我們的產品組合引人注目。我們有堅實的財務基礎。我們擁有一支經驗豐富的領導團隊，致力於實現我們的目標，並且我們在組織的各個層面都擁有出色的人才。我相信最好的尚未到來。我要感謝我們的客戶、合作夥伴、投資者和員工的辛勤工作和持續支持。

With that, I will turn the call over to Kevin.

這樣，我會將電話轉給凱文。

Thanks, Sam, and good afternoon, everyone. We remain financially disciplined and delivered strong operating income and cash flow in the fiscal 2024 third quarter, exceeding our guidance range for non-GAAP operating margin and exceeding our expectations for cash flow from operations. We have delivered positive non-GAAP operating income and cash flow from operations for 12 consecutive quarters.

謝謝，山姆，大家下午好。我們保持財務紀律，並在 2024 財年第三季度實現了強勁的營業收入和現金流，超出了我們對非公認會計準則營業利潤率的指導範圍，也超出了我們對營運現金流的預期。我們已連續 12 個季度實現正的非公認會計準則營業收入和營運現金流量。

Total revenue for the quarter was $181 million and service revenue was $175.1 million. Service revenue was approximately flat year-over-year and roughly equal to our guidance midpoint. Other revenue for the quarter was $5.9 million, which was below expectations due to lower onetime professional services and product revenue.

該季度總收入為 1.81 億美元，服務收入為 1.751 億美元。服務收入年比大致持平，大致等於我們的指導中位數。該季度的其他收入為 590 萬美元，由於一次性專業服務和產品收入下降，低於預期。

Total ARR was $707 million at quarter end, up 1% year-over-year and flat sequentially. Enterprise ARR increased 2% year-over-year and $2 million sequentially. A significant amount of the total churn occurred within smaller customers, which shows up in the sequential decline in small- and mid-market business ARR.

截至季末，總 ARR 為 7.07 億美元，年增 1%，與上一季持平。企業 ARR 年成長 2%，季增 200 萬美元。總流失量中很大一部分發生在較小的客戶中，這體現在中小型市場企業 ARR 的連續下降。

We have been devoting additional resources to retention of the Fuze enterprise customers and expect to see an acceleration in upgrades to 8x8, but we probably have at least one more quarter before this headwind to ARR growth begins to dissipate.

我們一直在投入額外的資源來保留 Fuze 企業客戶，並期望看到 8x8 升級的加速，但在 ARR 成長的阻力開始消散之前，我們可能至少還需要一個季度的時間。

Turning to gross margin, operating expenses and operating profit, please remember that all items discussed are non-GAAP unless otherwise noted.

關於毛利率、營業費用和營業利潤，請記住，除非另有說明，否則討論的所有項目均非公認會計準則。

Overall, third quarter gross margin was 71.6%, a decrease of 0.5% year-over-year, primarily due to an increased mix of lower-margin SMS usage revenue compared to Q3 '23, which shows up in our service revenue margins. Service revenue gross margin was 74.5%, roughly flat sequentially, but down approximately 1.2 percentage points year-over-year, driven by pressure on SMS text gross margin.

整體而言，第三季毛利率為71.6%，年減0.5%，主要是由於與23 年第三季相比，利潤率較低的簡訊使用收入組合增加，這反映在我們的服務收入利潤率中。服務收入毛利率為74.5%，與上一季大致持平，但由於簡訊毛利率壓力，年減約1.2個百分點。

We continuously manage our cost of service revenue and expect service revenue gross margins to remain healthy in the 74% to 75% range, given our mix of subscription and usage revenue. Other revenue gross margin came in at negative 11.9% for the quarter compared to negative 1.4% in Q3 '23 on lower professional services deployment revenue, which mainly has a fixed cost base.

我們持續管理服務收入成本，考慮到我們的訂閱和使用收入組合，預計服務收入毛利率將保持在 74% 至 75% 的範圍內。本季其他營收毛利率為負 11.9%，而 23 年第三季為負 1.4%，原因是專業服務部署收入下降（主要具有固定成本基礎）。

Turning to operating expenses. R&D was 14.9% of revenue, in line with our 15% target and indicative of the continued investment we are making in product innovation. Sales and marketing expense was 33% of revenue, slightly down from 33.1% in Q2 '24 but well below the 36.3% of revenue in Q3 '23. On a dollar basis, sales and marketing expense was down more than $7 million year-over-year. The decline reflected the resource realignment we did in Q4 '23 as the first step in our go-to-market transformation.

轉向營運費用。研發佔營收的 14.9%，符合我們 15% 的目標，也顯示我們在產品創新方面持續投資。銷售和行銷費用佔營收的 33%，略低於 24 年第二季的 33.1%，但遠低於 23 年第三季的營收 36.3%。以美元計算，銷售和行銷費用年減超過 700 萬美元。這一下降反映了我們在 23 年第 4 季進行的資源重組，這是我們進入市場轉型的第一步。

G&A as a percentage of revenue was 10.3%, down slightly sequentially as we incurred seasonally lower employer taxes and benefits costs as more employees hit the maximum contribution levels for FICA and other benefits.

G&A 佔收入的百分比為 10.3%，環比略有下降，因為隨著越來越多的員工達到 FICA 和其他福利的最高繳款水平，我們的雇主稅收和福利成本季節性降低。

I would like to point out that we took a noncash charge of approximately $11 million on our GAAP financial statements for ceasing the use of office space, primarily in the U.S. and to a much lesser extent, internationally as we continue to support a hybrid workforce.

我想指出的是，我們在GAAP 財務報表中收取了大約1100 萬美元的非現金費用，用於停止使用辦公空間，主要是在美國，在較小程度上是在國際上，因為我們繼續支持混合勞動力。

Total non-GAAP spending as measured by non-GAAP cost of goods sold, R&D, sales and marketing and G&A, was down approximately $9.3 million or nearly 6% year-over-year and reflects our strategic cost realignment actions since the prior fiscal year.

以非 GAAP 銷售成本、研發、銷售和行銷以及 G&A 衡量的非 GAAP 總支出年減約 930 萬美元或近 6%，反映了我們自上一財年以來的策略成本調整行動。

The combination of a healthy gross margin, carefully managed operating expenses and onetime favorable expense items that increased operating margin approximately 1 percentage point resulted in non-GAAP operating margin of 13.4%, above the high end of our guidance range of 11% to 12%.

健康的毛利率、精心管理的營運費用和一度有利的費用項目相結合，使營運利潤率提高了約1 個百分點，導致非GAAP 營運利潤率為13.4%，高於我們指導範圍11% 至12%的上限。

Operating profit was $24.3 million, up approximately 32% year-over-year. Adjusted EBITDA, which is reconciled to our GAAP results in our press release, was $30.7 million, 16.9% of revenue and up 19% year-over-year. We have generated over $126 million of adjusted EBITDA over the past 4 quarters.

營業利潤為 2,430 萬美元，較去年同期成長約 32%。調整後 EBITDA 與我們新聞稿中的 GAAP 業績一致，為 3,070 萬美元，佔營收的 16.9%，較去年同期成長 19%。過去 4 個季度，我們產生了超過 1.26 億美元的調整後 EBITDA。

Cash flow from operations was $22.4 million for the quarter, a near record, driven by strong profitability and solid cash collections. Given that cash flow can vary quarter-to-quarter due to the timing of interest payments, collections and changes in other balance sheet items, I prefer to look at cash flow from operations on a trailing 12-month basis when evaluating our performance.

在強勁的獲利能力和穩定的現金回籠的推動下，本季營運現金流為 2,240 萬美元，接近歷史最高水準。鑑於由於利息支付、收款時間和其他資產負債表項目的變化，現金流量可能會因季度而異，因此在評估我們的業績時，我更傾向於查看過去 12 個月的營運現金流量。

Over the last 4 quarters, we have generated approximately $80 million in cash from operations, an increase of 55%, compared to the trailing 12-month period ending December 31, 2022. We ended the quarter with approximately $170 million of cash, restricted cash and investments, up over $20 million from the prior quarter.

在過去4 個季度中，我們從營運中產生了約8,000 萬美元的現金，與截至2022 年12 月31 日的過去12 個月期間相比增加了55%。本季結束時，我們的現金約為1.7 億美元，其中包括限制性現金和投資，比上一季增加超過 2,000 萬美元。

As we have said earlier, our plan is to return $250 million to our investors from fiscal 2024 through fiscal 2026 by delevering our balance sheet. Our most recent step in that direction is the $63 million we paid to the loan administrator earlier this week, who will be paying the 2024 debt holders tomorrow to redeem the remaining 2024 notes.

正如我們之前所說，我們的計劃是透過去槓桿化資產負債表，從 2024 財年到 2026 財年向投資者返還 2.5 億美元。我們朝著這個方向邁出的最新一步是本週早些時候向貸款管理人支付了 6,300 萬美元，該管理人將於明天向 2024 年債務持有人付款，以贖回剩餘的 2024 年票據。

As you heard from Sam earlier on this call, this latest payment brings us to 35% completion of our $250 million repayment call from fiscal 2024 through fiscal 2026.

正如您早些時候在本次電話會議上從 Sam 那裡聽到的那樣，最新的付款使我們從 2024 財年到 2026 財年的 2.5 億美元還款計劃已完成 35%。

As we move into fiscal 2025, we intend to begin repaying the adjustable-rate term loan as quickly as possible, which will have a significant and immediate impact on our operating cash flow, by reducing our cash interest payments. You can expect us to begin voluntary early repayment of principal immediately after the expiration of the prepayment penalty in August 2024.

隨著我們進入 2025 財年，我們打算盡快開始償還可調整利率定期貸款，這將透過減少現金利息支付，對我們的經營現金流產生重大而直接的影響。您可以期待我們在 2024 年 8 月提前還款罰金到期後立即開始自願提前償還本金。

Before turning to guidance, I want to restate what we are doing to build shareholder value over time. First, we are investing in innovation with a goal to drive long-term durable growth. Second, we are focused on leading with our Contact Center solution to our target small and medium enterprise customers.

在轉向指導之前，我想重申我們正在採取哪些措施來逐步建立股東價值。首先，我們投資創新，目標是推動長期持久成長。其次，我們專注於將我們的聯絡中心解決方案引導至我們的目標中小企業客戶。

Third, we are reducing the mix of equity-based employee compensation, which will moderate the pace of new share issuances due to employee stock programs over the long term. And fourth, we are retooling our go-to-market organization under new leadership to focus on revenue growth while maintaining solid non-GAAP profitability and cash flow.

第三，我們正在減少基於股權的員工薪酬組合，從長遠來看，這將減緩因員工股票計劃而發行新股的步伐。第四，我們正在新領導層的領導下重組我們的上市組織，以專注於收入成長，同時保持穩定的非公認會計準則獲利能力和現金流。

Increasing cash flow from operations while reducing shareholder dilution over time remains our financial North Star. And our goal remains to generate cash from operations at a compound growth rate of approximately 20% for fiscal years 2024 through 2026.

隨著時間的推移，增加營運現金流，同時減少股東稀釋仍然是我們的財務北極星。我們的目標仍然是在 2024 至 2026 財年以約 20% 的複合成長率從營運中產生現金。

I would like to point out that the significant growth in cash from operations we expect in fiscal 2024 implies more muted growth rates through fiscal 2026 to arrive at the 20% compounded growth rate goal. We are very focused on delivering cash flow with reduced dilution over the long term as the best way to build shareholder value over time.

我想指出的是，我們預計 2024 財年營運產生的現金將大幅成長，這意味著到 2026 財年成長率將更加溫和，以實現 20% 的複合成長率目標。我們非常注重長期提供減少稀釋的現金流，這是隨著時間的推移建立股東價值的最佳方式。

Let me walk you through how our strategies to build shareholder value over time drive our operating expense structure.

讓我向您介紹我們隨著時間的推移建立股東價值的策略如何推動我們的營運費用結構。

We expect sales and marketing to be in the range of 33% to 34% of revenue for fiscal 2024, down from 36% in fiscal 2023, as we focus our go-to-market motions on our target SME customers and cross-selling into our installed base. I believe this cost envelope can accommodate the aforementioned go-to-market retooling as well as programs that drive product awareness and investments required to develop our value-added reseller channel in North America.

我們預計 2024 財年銷售和行銷將佔收入的 33% 至 34%，低於 2023 財年的 36%，因為我們將進入市場的行動重點放在目標中小企業客戶上，並交叉銷售到我們的安裝基礎。我相信這個成本範圍可以容納上述的上市重組以及提高產品知名度和開發北美增值經銷商通路所需的投資的計劃。

We expect R&D as a percent of revenue to remain about 15% as we continue on the path of investment in our customer-focused product strategy.

隨著我們繼續投資以客戶為中心的產品策略，我們預計研發佔收入的百分比將保持在 15% 左右。

Finally, we expect G&A expenses to remain in the range of 10.5% to 11% of revenue for fiscal 2024. We believe we can achieve leverage from our G&A functions over time as revenue increases and we achieve greater efficiencies through automation.

最後，我們預計2024 財年的G&A 費用將保持在收入的10.5% 至11% 範圍內。我們相信，隨著時間的推移，隨著收入的增加，我們可以利用G&A 職能發揮槓桿作用，並且透過自動化實現更高的效率。

Regarding non-GAAP gross margin, we anticipate Q4 '24 to be in the same range as Q2 and Q3, with the full year in the 72% range. Please note that this metric can be influenced by product mix. Over the past quarter, we have seen longer sales cycles on large deals, greater scrutiny by the customer regarding contract approval and a generally tougher economic environment.

關於非 GAAP 毛利率，我們預計 24 年第 4 季的毛利率將與第 2 季和第 3 季的範圍相同，全年將在 72% 的範圍內。請注意，該指標可能會受到產品組合的影響。在過去的季度中，我們看到大宗交易的銷售週期更長、客戶對合約審批的審查更加嚴格以及經濟環境普遍更加嚴峻。

With this context in mind and the operating expense framework described above, we established outlook ranges for the fourth quarter and the full year of fiscal 2024, ending March 31, 2024, as follows: For the fiscal fourth quarter, we anticipate service revenue to be in the range of $171 million to $175 million. We anticipate total revenue to be in the range of $176 million to $181 million, implying other revenue of $5.5 million at the guidance midpoint.

考慮到這一背景和上述營運費用框架，我們確定了截至 2024 年 3 月 31 日的 2024 財年第四季度和全年的展望範圍，如下： 對於第四財季，我們預計服務收入為介於1.71 億至1.75 億美元之間。我們預計總收入將在 1.76 億美元至 1.81 億美元之間，這意味著按指導中點計算的其他收入為 550 萬美元。

Note that other revenue can vary based upon customer-specific deployment schedules and hardware shipments. So there could be some movement in the Q4 '24 other revenue as a result of these dynamics.

請注意，其他收入可能會根據客戶特定的部署計劃和硬體出貨量而有所不同。因此，由於這些動態，24 年第 4 季的其他收入可能會出現一些變化。

We are targeting an operating margin of approximately 10%. As a reminder, our spending increases in calendar Q1, which is our fiscal fourth quarter, as social security taxes and other employee benefits, such as the 401(k) match, restart in January.

我們的目標是營業利潤率約為 10%。提醒一下，我們的支出在第一季（即第四財季）有所增加，因為社會安全稅和其他員工福利（例如 401(k) 匹配）將於 1 月重新啟動。

We expect cash flow from operations to decline sequentially as our cash expenses increased seasonally in fiscal Q4, as I just mentioned, plus we expect to make other planned operating cash payments such as higher debt interest and indirect taxes.

正如我剛才提到的，我們預計營運現金流將連續下降，因為我們的現金支出在第四財季季節性增加，而且我們預計將進行其他計劃的營運現金支付，例如更高的債務利息和間接稅。

We anticipate interest expense of approximately $9 million and cash interest payments of approximately $11 million. Cash interest payments in Q4 will include the semiannual payments on our 2024 and 2028 convertible notes, as well as quarterly interest payments on the variable-rate term loan. We are currently anticipating that the rate on the term loan remains approximately 12% or so for plus 6.6%. We estimate a fully diluted share count of approximately 126 million shares for fiscal fourth quarter.

我們預計利息支出約為 900 萬美元，現金利息支付約為 1,100 萬美元。第四季的現金利息支付將包括 2024 年和 2028 年可轉換票據的半年支付額，以及可變利率定期貸款的季度利息支付額。我們目前預計定期貸款利率仍約為 12% 左右，升息 6.6%。我們估計第四財季完全稀釋後的股票數量約為 1.26 億股。

Given the fourth quarter guidance ranges above, fiscal 2024 ending March 31, 2024 is expected to be as follows: We anticipate service revenue to be in the range of $699 million to $703 million. We anticipate total revenue to be in the range of $725.3 million to $730.3 million.

鑑於上述第四季度指導範圍，截至 2024 年 3 月 31 日的 2024 財年預計如下：我們預計服務收入將在 6.99 億美元至 7.03 億美元之間。我們預計總收入將在 7.253 億美元至 7.303 億美元之間。

We continue to focus on delivering a solid operating margin and anticipate achieving between 12.5% and 13% for the year versus the 8.4% achieved in fiscal 2023. We expect cash flow from operations to exceed $70 million, as Sam stated in his remarks.

我們繼續專注於提供穩定的營業利潤率，預計今年的營業利潤率將達到12.5% 至13%，而2023 財年為8.4%。正如Sam 在演講中所說，我們預計營運現金流將超過7,000 萬美元。

Again, note that cash flow from operations is impacted by timing differences in collections, debt interest and other payables. We anticipate debt interest expense and cash paid for debt interest of $35 million to $36 million, again, noting that our term loan is subject to monthly interest rate adjustments. We estimate an average fully diluted share count of approximately 123 million shares for fiscal 2024.

再次請注意，營運現金流量受到收款、債務利息和其他應付款項的時間差異的影響。我們預計債務利息支出和債務利息支付的現金為 3500 萬至 3600 萬美元，並再次指出我們的定期貸款每月利率調整。我們估計 2024 財年平均完全稀釋股數約為 1.23 億股。

In closing, I believe that our continued focus on profitability while maintaining our targeted investments in innovation plus our go-to-market retooling is the correct strategy for us at this time. This strategy will enable a return to revenue growth while we also return value to our investors initially by reducing our debt. Our goal is to show improving revenue trends in fiscal 2025. I would like to thank the entire 8x8 team for working together to deliver this quarter's solid results.

最後，我相信，我們繼續關注盈利能力，同時保持對創新的有針對性的投資以及我們的市場重組是我們目前的正確策略。這項策略將使收入恢復成長，同時我們也透過減少債務最初為投資者帶來價值。我們的目標是展示 2025 財年收入趨勢的改善。我要感謝整個 8x8 團隊的共同努力，以實現本季度的穩健業績。

Operator, we are ready for questions.

接線員，我們準備好回答問題了。

(Operator Instructions) Our first question comes from the line of Matt VanVliet with BTIG.

（操作員說明）我們的第一個問題來自 BTIG 的 Matt VanVliet。

So Sam, you mentioned continued focus on being a contact center-focused company and starting to see some really good traction there. So maybe just walk us through how the go-to-market process has evolved there? Are you looking to land with new Contact Center opportunities? Are you finding that a lot more of these deals tend to be a sort of combination replacement come in and sort of build a whole new stack?

Sam，您提到繼續專注於成為一家以聯絡中心為中心的公司，並開始在那裡看到一些真正良好的吸引力。那麼，也許請讓我們了解一下那裡的上市流程是如何演變的呢？您是否正在尋找新的聯絡中心機會？您是否發現更多此類交易往往是一種組合替代，並建立了一個全新的堆疊？

Yes. So first off, thank you for the question. It's definitely the latter part of what you said. We do see that the on-prem to cloud transition and digital transformation are frequently linked. .

是的。首先，謝謝你的提問。肯定是你說的後半部。我們確實看到本地到雲端的過渡和數位轉型經常聯繫在一起。 。

As CMOs and CROs and CEOs want to transition their business in this new digital age, they realize that their communication system becomes a core bottleneck and they have to move it into the cloud. And then the fact that we are on a single platform, handling UC, CC and now closing the loop with things in the middle on a single data platform makes it really attractive for those kinds of things.

當 CMO、CRO 和 CEO 希望在這個新的數位時代實現業務轉型時，他們意識到他們的通訊系統已成為核心瓶頸，必須將其遷移到雲端。事實上，我們在單一平台上處理 UC、CC，現在在單一資料平台上用中間的東西閉合循環，這使得它對這類事情非常有吸引力。

So when I talk about transitioning to GTM, and this is not going to be a straight line, but really, it's about the fact that we need to get out of -- starting with the UC-only sale, we need to lead with Contact Center. [myenergi] has done some great research saying that 2/3 of the buying decision, when you're buying these products together, is driven by the contact center choice, number one.

因此，當我談到過渡到 GTM 時，這不會是一條直線，但實際上，這是我們需要擺脫的事實 - 從僅限 UC 的銷售開始，我們需要以 Contact 為主導中心。 [myenergi] 做了一些很棒的研究，表明當您一起購買這些產品時，2/3 的購買決定是由聯絡中心的選擇決定的，這是第一位的。

Number two is, obviously, when we sell multiple products, the retention rates, the ARPUs, all those things are better. And it's really about becoming that portfolio of a products company. And we now -- I used to say we went from 2 products to 8 products.

第二點顯然是，當我們銷售多種產品時，保留率、ARPU 等所有這些都會更好。這其實是為了成為一家產品公司的產品組合。現在我們——我過去常說我們從 2 種產品變成了 8 種產品。

And with today's announcement around what you guys loosely referred to as informal contact center, I don't really like that name because it's a little different than that; we now sell effectively 9 products. And so that's where we need to lead. We need to lead by coming into a business, figuring out where they're at in that digital transformation, what their business problems are and selling them a package of products that specifically solve their business needs.

今天發布了關於你們寬鬆地稱為非正式聯絡中心的公告，我不太喜歡這個名字，因為它與那個有點不同；我們現在有效銷售 9 種產品。這就是我們需要領導的地方。我們需要進入一家企業，了解他們在數位轉型中的位置，他們的業務問題是什麼，並向他們出售專門解決他們業務需求的一攬子產品。

And maybe just a follow-up there on the customer engagement product you announced today, who are the core users that you're envisioning seeing this? Is this more of an outbound sales type of motion? Or is it truly that sort of customer success type of realm? Curious on how you're doing it and sort of what the correction of coming up with this product was, how much was existing customers sort of using the product in unintended ways that open up your eyes to this?

也許只是您今天宣布的客戶參與產品的後續行動，您預期誰是核心用戶？這更像是一種對外銷售類型的動議嗎？或者這真的是那種客戶成功類型的境界嗎？想知道您是如何做到這一點的，以及想知道這個產品的修正是什麼，現有客戶有多少以意想不到的方式使用該產品，這讓您對此大開眼界？

Okay. So we started about a year, 1.5 years ago. I think we've envisioned about 1.5 years ago and started actually coding with a significant number of scrum teams a year ago. The core user is specific users inside of a business, whose job title is generally not contact center agents. So let's say, IT help desk, billing departments or billing support department, field service workers, health care workers, these kinds of things.

好的。所以我們大約一年前，也就是 1.5 年前就開始了。我認為我們大約 1.5 年前就已經有了設想，並在一年前開始與大量 Scrum 團隊一起實際編碼。核心用戶是企業內部的特定用戶，其職位一般不是聯絡中心座席。比如說，IT 服務台、計費部門或計費支援部門、現場服務人員、醫療保健人員等。

And what's interesting is frequently this problem is solved with a ring group. They use a UC solution, and they'll do a ring group, and 10 ten people phone rings and whoever picks up, picks up.

有趣的是，這個問題通常可以透過環組來解決。他們使用 UC 解決方案，他們會建立一個響鈴組，10 個 10 人的電話響鈴，誰接就接。

The problem with that, and this was the feedback we got from customers, is -- the problem with that is you can't really use an ecosystem because it's not really designed to have [thoughts] in front of it and handovers, et cetera, can't get analytics, can't get AI technologies, can't get a bunch of things that are contact center functions in this hybrid type of use case. And so it's very targeted on specific use cases, where there's a desire to have like high-octane UC mixed with high-octane CC in a specific use case.

問題是，這是我們從客戶那裡得到的反饋，問題是你不能真正使用一個生態系統，因為它的設計並不是為了在它之前考慮[想法]和移交等等。 ，無法獲得分析，無法獲得人工智慧技術，無法獲得這種混合類型用例中聯絡中心功能的一堆東西。因此，它非常針對特定的用例，即希望在特定的用例中將高辛烷值 UC 與高辛烷值 CC 混合。

And so -- and we've seen some players in the market that have done bits and pieces of it, but there's no player in the market that can span that full range. They can do everything from UC, this new cross-organizational engagement product and the regular contact center, full-featured, high-performance product design for that.

因此，我們已經看到市場上的一些參與者已經做了一些零碎的工作，但市場上沒有參與者可以跨越整個範圍。他們可以做一切事情，從統一通訊（UC）這個新的跨組織參與產品到常規聯絡中心，全功能、高效能的產品設計。

And so the last part of your question is the idea -- look, the analysts, you guys, the industry analysts have talked about this in formal contact center, that's maybe where the idea started. We talked a lot to our customers. We researched a lot with our customers to really figure out the exact specific use cases, and then we went and built the product, and it's going to beta now.

所以你問題的最後一部分是這個想法——看，分析師，你們，產業分析師已經在正式的聯絡中心討論過這個問題，這可能是這個想法開始的地方。我們與客戶談了很多。我們與客戶進行了大量研究，以真正找出確切的具體用例，然後我們開始建立該產品，現在即將進入測試階段。

Our next question comes from the line of Siti with Mizuho.

我們的下一個問題來自西蒂和瑞穗的關係。

Just wanted to ask, I know at the macro environment, it's tough, some of your peers talked about weakness in small business and even consumer vertical. I'm wondering, I know you talked about some churn on Fuze side, but what are you seeing in terms of macro and different verticals?

只是想問，我知道在宏觀環境下，情況很艱難，一些同行談到了小企業甚至消費者垂直領域的弱點。我想知道，我知道您談到了 Fuze 方面的一些流失，但您在宏觀和不同垂直領域看到了什麼？

Yes. So this is Kevin. We do see some downsell pressure on some renewals right now, as we -- as customers maybe need fewer seats and so forth. So we are seeing some of that. And I did mention in my remarks that we did see some of that in the smaller to -- into the mid-market business areas, which affected our ARR growth rates there.

是的。這就是凱文。我們現在確實看到一些續約面臨一些降價壓力，因為我們——客戶可能需要更少的座位等等。所以我們看到了其中的一些。我在發言中確實提到，我們確實在較小的中端市場業務領域看到了其中的一些變化，這影響了我們在那裡的 ARR 成長率。

Great. And then a follow-up. You talked about the Fuze headwinds to dissipate maybe by this quarter, fiscal Q4. And Sam, you talked about this innovation-led growth. Certainly, your -- last 1 year, we have done a lot of products, now 2 to 8 products. So how should we think about the growth? I know this year, it was almost like 2% decline. But is this like the Q4 is sort of a bottom and then we should start uptake in our -- any kind of trend in -- directionally would be helpful.

偉大的。然後是後續行動。您談到 Fuze 的不利因素可能會在本季（即第四財季）之前消散。 Sam，您談到了這種創新主導的成長。當然，過去一年，我們做了很多產品，現在有 2 到 8 個產品。那我們該如何看待成長呢？我知道今年幾乎下降了 2%。但這是否就像第四季度已經觸底一樣，然後我們應該開始吸收我們的方向——任何類型的趨勢——都會有所幫助。

You are muted, speakers. We can hear you now.

發言者，您已靜音。我們現在可以聽到你的聲音了。

Okay. Sorry. So Siti, you're asking the right question. It's one I ask of myself and the management team every day, are we at the bottom? When are we going to see the growth? We definitely see -- and I sort of hate using this term, but I don't know the right term to use.

好的。對不起。所以西蒂，你問了正確的問題。我每天都會問自己和管理團隊，我們是否處於最底層？我們什麼時候才能看到成長？我們確實看到了——我有點討厭使用這個術語，但我不知道該使用哪個術語。

We see green shoots when I talked about, for example, new product growth being up 60% year-over-year. That gives me a sense that we're seeing product market fit on that innovation. And we're seeing acceleration on a quarter-on-quarter basis in terms of bookings and the forward-looking indicators around the new products.

例如，當我談到新產品成長年增 60% 時，我們看到了復甦的苗頭。這讓我感覺我們正在看到產品市場適合這項創新。我們看到新產品的預訂量和前瞻性指標較上月加速成長。

So I think we're sort of seeing the positive green shoots. When the number will be big enough to really drive that year-over-year growth rate, as you know, in these business models, we need a couple of quarters to stack on top of each other to really get those numbers to kick in. And so I'm not yet ready to call the exact date and time of the bottom. It definitely feels like it's close, close as in it's in the recent past, now next week, I don't know.

所以我認為我們正在看到積極的萌芽。如您所知，在這些商業模式中，當這個數字足夠大到真正推動同比增長率時，我們需要幾個季度的時間來相互疊加才能真正讓這些數字發揮作用。所以我還沒有準備好調用底部的確切日期和時間。絕對感覺就像是很接近，就像最近的過去一樣，現在是下週，我不知道。

But I'll tell you what I'm really happy about, and you mentioned, it is the innovation, right? Those new products, the fact that we're seeing acceleration, we're seeing customer demand, it's just going to take a little while for it to get to be a big enough number and to continue to drive up a higher retention rate.

但我會告訴你我真正高興的是什麼，你提到，這是創新，對嗎？這些新產品，我們看到了加速成長，我們看到了客戶需求，只是需要一段時間才能達到足夠大的數量並繼續提高更高的保留率。

Our next question comes from the line of Ryan MacWilliams with Barclays.

我們的下一個問題來自巴克萊銀行的瑞安·麥克威廉斯 (Ryan MacWilliams)。

Kevin, this is [Damon Coghlan] on for Ryan MacWilliams. How did Contact Center agent hiring and call volumes in fiscal 3Q compared to last year's fiscal 3Q? Are there any differences particularly for any verticals, any particular strength or weaknesses?

凱文，我是瑞安·麥克威廉斯的[達蒙·科格蘭]。與去年財年第三季相比，第三財季聯絡中心座席招募與通話量如何？是否存在任何差異，特別是對於任何垂直行業、任何特定的優勢或劣勢？

Can I ask -- because you're asking me like literally how many phone calls were received by contact centers in the third quarter?

我可以問一下嗎？因為您實際上是在問我第三季聯絡中心接到了多少電話？

Yes. I say usage or in general, like seasonal hiring that typically would come up for, say, open enrollment.

是的。我說的是使用情況或一般情況，例如通常會出現的季節性招聘，例如公開招生。

So as you know, we have -- offer our customers in the Contact Center capabilities the ability to surge seats for kind of holidays or Easter or whatever -- for whatever campaigns they're running, political campaigns, those kinds of things. I would say, we saw a little less than usual. I mean, in these contracted business models, you see a little bit of this lag, right? And so contracts come up, and they may have done a layoff previously, et cetera.

如您所知，我們在聯絡中心功能中為客戶提供了在假期或復活節或其他任何活動中增加座位的能力，無論他們正在進行什麼活動，政治活動，諸如此類的事情。我想說，我們看到的比平常少了一些。我的意思是，在這些契約商業模式中，你會看到一點這種滯後，對吧？於是合約就出現了，他們之前可能已經裁員了，等等。

It's also hard for us because we are seeing increased sales of larger contact centers. As I mentioned in my script, we've seen a 50% increase in the contact centers, over 250 seats. So it's a bit of a moving thing because we are selling more new customers Contact Center, we're selling more seats in Contact Center, we're selling more stuff in Contact Center.

這對我們來說也很困難，因為我們看到大型聯絡中心的銷售額增加。正如我在腳本中提到的，我們看到聯絡中心增加了 50%，座位數超過 250 個。所以這是一件令人感動的事情，因為我們在聯絡中心銷售更多的新客戶，我們在聯絡中心銷售更多的席位，我們在聯絡中心銷售更多的東西。

And at the same time, we do see some -- and Kevin mentioned that some of the economic pressures around -- we probably saw a little less surge, seats that I would have expected, maybe I was a little overly optimistic, those kinds of things.

同時，我們確實看到了一些——凱文提到了周圍的一些經濟壓力——我們可能看到了一些我所預期的激增，也許我有點過於樂觀了，這些事物。

And I think it's been mentioned earlier, but I think out of every segment -- I mean the retail vertical, probably maybe the squishiest, maybe that some travel leisure type stuff. It's hard. I mean we have -- I mean we basically have no customer greater than 0.5%. So we have a lot of different verticals represented. And so it's -- I don't know, it's kind of my sense.

我想這已經在前面提到過，但我認為在每個細分市場中——我指的是零售垂直領域，可能是最脆弱的，也許是一些旅遊休閒類型的東西。這個很難（硬。我的意思是我們基本上沒有超過 0.5% 的客戶。所以我們有很多不同的垂直領域。所以——我不知道，這是我的感覺。

Perfect. And then did the CPaaS business in Southeast Asia continued to show stability like it did in 2Q? And then maybe, what assumptions are factored into the guide for 4Q for this business?

完美的。那麼東南亞的CPaaS業務是否也像2Q一樣持續表現出穩定呢？那麼，該業務的第四季指南中可能考慮了哪些假設？

So the CPaaS business performed as we expected it. And yes, it showed stability for the quarter, so that's good news. I want to point out, though, that seasonally, we have seasonal variability in that business as certain promotions get done over the holiday period and so forth. In the Q4 guide, there's some downward trend as normal, as we enter like the Lunar New Year period and other -- Ramadan and other periods. So that's factored into our guide.

所以CPaaS業務的表現符合我們的預期。是的，本季表現穩定，所以這是個好消息。不過，我想指出的是，從季節性來看，我們的業務存在季節性變化，因為某些促銷活動是在假期等期間進行的。在第四季度指南中，當我們進入農曆新年和其他齋月和其他時期時，正常情況下會出現一些下降趨勢。所以這已納入我們的指南中。

All right. Now look, you mentioned the CPaaS business, so I'm going to consider this a layup to sort of do that CEO thing, deviate a little bit. But we've got some great new products coming out on the CPaaS side. There are some pre-configured bundles for specific use cases that will -- you'll see us start pushing into our installed base and our Contact Center customers. Stay tuned before the end of the quarter.

好的。現在看，你提到了 CPaaS 業務，所以我會認為這是一個做 CEO 事情的上籃，稍微偏離一點。但我們在 CPaaS 方面推出了一些很棒的新產品。有一些針對特定用例的預先配置捆綁包，您將看到我們開始推向我們的安裝基礎和聯絡中心客戶。請在本季末之前繼續關注。

So the reason I brought this up is I'm sort of warning the audience that in the future, it's going to get a little messier because we're starting to view our CPaaS business not as a separate entity inside of 8x8, but it's all starting to become blurred, right? You've got UC, CC, and CPaaS is how we traditionally think about it. But now we have low-end UC, we have cross-organizational customer engagement, we have UC. And then we have CPaaS riding on top of all of it. So it's becoming a bit of a mix.

所以我提出這個問題的原因是我想警告觀眾，未來情況會變得有點混亂，因為我們開始將我們的 CPaaS 業務視為 8x8 內部的一個獨立實體，但這都是開始變得模糊了，對吧？ UC、CC 和 CPaaS 是我們傳統上的想法。但現在我們有低階統一通信，我們有跨組織的客戶參與，我們有統一通信。然後我們將 CPaaS 置於一切之上。所以它變得有點混合。

And it's really all being driven on effectively one platform, as we bring it all together. So you get economies of scale and engineering capacity and CI/CD, continuous innovation can use deployment. And all those things are starting to spin in the right direction.

當我們將所有內容整合在一起時，這一切實際上都是在一個平台上有效驅動的。這樣你就可以獲得規模經濟、工程能力和 CI/CD，持續創新可以使用部署。所有這些事情都開始朝著正確的方向發展。

Our next question comes from the line of Michael Funk with Bank of America.

我們的下一個問題來自邁克爾·芬克與美國銀行的對話。

Yes. Thank you for the color on the call and the focus on profitability. I wanted to dig in, though, some more into the revenue. You lowered the guide for the year. Trying to dissect the piece parts here rather than reading the tea leaves, right? So I'm sure you have an internal forecast for net new, for NRR and then for Fuze customer contraction. So maybe help us with more precision with our own modeling by pointing out which piece of that fell short or is falling short relative to the prior expectation.

是的。感謝您在電話會議中的色彩和對盈利能力的關注。不過，我想進一步了解收入。您降低了今年的指導值。試圖解剖這裡的各個部分而不是閱讀茶葉，對吧？因此，我確信您對淨新增、NRR 以及 Fuze 客戶收縮都有內部預測。因此，也許可以透過指出哪一部分低於預期或低於先前的預期來幫助我們更精確地進行自己的建模。

And then final piece related. I think Fuze was about $130 million in revenue. You've said that's been trading off but should stabilize in a quarter or two. Can you provide us the current revenue number for the Fuze customers, so we can figure out that attrition rate and the potential stabilization point?

然後是最後一塊相關的。我認為 Fuze 的營收約為 1.3 億美元。您說過，這一直在權衡中，但應該會在一兩個季度內穩定下來。您能否向我們提供 Fuze 客戶目前的收入數據，以便我們計算流失率和潛在的穩定點？

Okay. Thanks, Michael. So on the revenue, you're asking about Q4, right? So I talked about headwind in CPaaS due to the holidays coming up. In terms of Fuze, we do see -- what we're doing currently as a company, which is a great thing, it's actually we're migrating...

好的。謝謝，麥可。那麼關於收入，您問的是第四季度，對吧？因此，我談到了由於假期即將到來而導致 CPaaS 面臨的逆風。就 Fuze 而言，我們確實看到了——作為一家公司，我們目前正在做的事情，這是一件偉大的事情，實際上我們正在遷移...

Upgrading.

升級中。

We're upgrading [them] to the 8x8 platform. As we do that, we are seeing some downsell, you would call it, as those customers rightsize their needs for us. So there is a bit of erosion there, and that's what I was referring to as headwind in the prepared remarks. But doing that and doing that early and proactively helps us retain those customers, and that's what we believe. So that's a good thing for us because they'll stick with us.

我們正在將[它們]升級到8x8 平台。當我們這樣做時，我們看到了一些降價銷售，你可以稱之為，因為這些客戶調整了他們對我們的需求。因此，那裡存在一些侵蝕，這就是我在準備好的評論中所說的逆風。但儘早、主動地這樣做有助於我們留住這些客戶，這就是我們所相信的。所以這對我們來說是一件好事，因為他們會堅持我們。

Okay. I want to -- just the second part of your question. Look, I can't give you a number on exact Fuze anymore because we've -- we've upgraded -- see, now you made me do it. We've upgraded hundreds of customers between the platform, we've cross-sold, we've done a lot of things now. .

好的。我想——只是你問題的第二部分。聽著，我不能再給你確切的引信數字了，因為我們已經——我們已經升級了——看，現在你讓我這麼做了。我們已經在平台之間升級了數百個客戶，我們進行了交叉銷售，我們現在做了很多事情。 。

And we don't really break them out separately, internally anymore. We view all of our metrics internal are combined company. And it's just sort of hard to do with that. Just it's easier for us when we manage everything to do it that way, and so that's the way we do it. I just don't have the number to really give you effectively in front of me.

我們不再在內部將它們分開。我們認為我們所有的內部指標都是合併後的公司。要做到這一點有點困難。當我們以這種方式管理一切時，對我們來說會更容易，所以我們就是這麼做的。我只是沒有真正有效地在我面前給你的號碼。

I will tell you, though, what we do see is that the core business is vibrant. We do expect in the next couple of quarters, we should start to see improving growth trends and a resumption of growth in fiscal '25. It's one of those quarters will definitely -- I think we'll see a resumption of growth. And you're going to ask me like, why do I have confidence in that? And it's going to come back to new products, right?

不過，我會告訴你，我們確實看到核心業務充滿活力。我們確實預計，在接下來的幾個季度中，我們應該開始看到成長趨勢有所改善，並在 25 財年恢復成長。這是其中一個季度，我認為我們肯定會看到成長的恢復。你會問我，為什麼我對此有信心？它會回到新產品，對嗎？

If we get that 60% number that's accelerating to keep kind of bumping along and keep going, as we add more new products and as we retool the go-to-market force around that product portfolio, I really do think the math will work itself out to show that resumption of growth. And in the meantime, we paid off $63 million in debt out of cash flow yesterday. Well, we wired the money yesterday. I think we're paying off officially tomorrow.

如果我們得到 60% 的數字，並且隨著我們添加更多新產品以及圍繞該產品組合重組進入市場的力量，這個數字會加速增長並繼續前進，我真的認為數學會自行發揮作用表明經濟恢復增長。同時，昨天我們用現金流還清了 6,300 萬美元的債務。嗯，我們昨天就匯錢了。我想明天我們就正式還清了。

Yes. Love to delevering. Just to make sure I understand, you came in line with the revenue forecast for this quarter and then lower the full year, so explicitly lower at 4Q. Are you saying that, that reduction is entirely due to CPaaS and there wasn't an undershooting on net new NRR...

是的。喜歡去槓桿化。為了確保我理解，你們符合本季的營收預測，然後降低了全年的營收預測，因此在第四季明確降低了營收預測。您是說，這種減少完全是由於 CPaaS 並且淨新 NRR 沒有低於預期...

No. To be clear, look, CPaaS is going to be a little bit below what we maybe had expected 90 days ago. And that's driven by the fact that we are seeing some of the customers a little -- sorry, we're more reluctant to run marketing campaigns during the Lunar New Year, in Ramadan. That's what they're forecasting to us right now.

不。需要明確的是，CPaaS 將略低於我們 90 天前的預期。這是因為我們見到了一些客戶，抱歉，我們不太願意在農曆新年、齋戒月期間進行行銷活動。這就是他們現在向我們做出的預測。

And also, we are seeing a little bit more -- I don't want to tell on what the right word is, pressure or whatever. But as these contracts come due, we have customers that say, "Hey, look, I don't need 100 seats anymore. I need 92 seats."

而且，我們看到了更多——我不想說出正確的字是什麼，壓力或其他什麼。但隨著這些合約到期，我們的客戶會說：“嘿，看，我不再需要 100 個座位。我需要 92 個座位。”

The other thing I'd like to add also, and this is important, in terms of total revenue, we're seeing a trend toward more soft phone usage and less hardware. So if you look at our other revenue, it's a component, obviously, of the total, that has a bit of pressure as the customers are focused...

我還想補充的另一件事，這一點很重要，就總收入而言，我們看到了更多軟電話使用和更少硬體的趨勢。因此，如果你看看我們的其他收入，顯然，它是總收入的一部分，隨著客戶的關注，它會帶來一些壓力...

And it's dropped. Kevin, it's dropped a heck of a lot more than anything else.

它被丟棄了。凱文，它的下降幅度比其他任何東西都要大得多。

Yes. So that's baked in there as well.

是的。所以它也在那裡烘烤。

Okay. It's all very helpful. I'm sorry I [worked] the site on my own modeling guy, that's what I'm trying to do. I know you're reluctant to provide too much detail, secret sauce, on the metrics, but the more we have, the better we can forecast and...

好的。這一切都非常有幫助。很抱歉，我的網站是由我自己的建模人員負責的，這就是我正在努力做的事情。我知道你不願意提供太多關於指標的細節、秘訣，但我們擁有的越多，我們就能更好地預測和...

Michael, it's completely fair. It's not that. It's just we don't -- I mean I don't -- like 2 years ago, it was easy to track Fuze as a separate thing because we had just bought them. But 2 years in, we have hundreds of customers that have upgraded, the building systems are merged. There's all kinds of things happening. It's just no longer that easy unless we sort of -- unless I stick a team of people going line-by-line, and it's just kind of not worth doing that. I got my team is doing other things right now.

邁克爾，這是完全公平的。這並不是說。只是我們不——我的意思是我不——就像兩年前一樣，很容易將 Fuze 作為一個單獨的東西來追踪，因為我們剛剛購買了它們。但兩年後，我們有數百家客戶進行了升級，建築系統也進行了合併。各種各樣的事情都在發生。這不再那麼容易了，除非我們——除非我堅持一個團隊逐行進行，這是不值得這樣做的。我知道我的團隊現在正在做其他事情。

Our next question comes from the line of Meta Marshall with Morgan Stanley.

我們的下一個問題來自梅塔·馬歇爾與摩根士丹利的對話。

Great. I just wanted to go into -- you had a lot of initiatives on kind of selling customers initially. But just what are kind of the initiatives or sales motions you guys are having to kind of add some of these additional solutions to existing customers?

偉大的。我只是想談談——你們最初在銷售客戶方面有很多舉措。但是，你們必須採取什麼樣的措施或銷售行動來為現有客戶添加一些額外的解決方案？

And then maybe piggybacking on that, you guys have talked a little bit about the Fuze upgrades that are happening. But is there like an end-of-life day? Like is there any point where we should kind of consider that the Fuze platform will all be kind of transitioned or upgraded to kind of the XCaaS platform?

然後也許藉此機會，你們談論了一些正在發生的引信升級。但真的有生命終結的一天嗎？例如，我們是否應該考慮將 Fuze 平台全部過渡或升級為 XCaaS 平台？

Okay. So Marshall, a completely fair question. Meta, completely fair question. So let me dig this in reverse order. On the Fuze end of life, there's not a set end-of-life date. We're busy moving hundreds of customers over right now. A lot of them are in flight. We've got kind of the top 400, they're a little bit more special. We're taking care of them. And so there's not a defined date.

好的。馬歇爾，這是一個完全公平的問題。元，完全公平的問題。那麼讓我以相反的順序來挖掘這個。 Fuze 的生命週期結束時，沒有設定的生命終止日期。我們現在正忙著轉移數百名顧客。其中很多都在飛行中。我們有前 400 名，他們有點特別。我們正在照顧他們。所以沒有確定的日期。

And we also -- and with the top 400 customers, we're really doing it in conjunction with them. So I don't want to use that EOL term because that has a tendency that has unintended consequences for us. So it's really, we work with them on that migration.

我們還與前 ​​400 名客戶一起，真正與他們合作。因此，我不想使用 EOL 術語，因為它有一種趨勢，會給我們帶來意想不到的後果。所以，我們確實與他們合作進行遷移。

The first part of your question is, to me, a really insightful question, which is around how do we have to change our motions as a company. As a company, historically, we've been kind of a sell most of the wallet share on the first deal, and that's kind of maybe a few add-on seats here or there as you add employees or those kinds of things.

對我來說，你的問題的第一部分是一個非常有洞察力的問題，它是關於我們作為一家公司必須如何改變我們的動議。作為一家公司，從歷史上看，我們在第一筆交易中出售了大部分錢包份額，當你添加員工或類似的事情時，這可能是一些額外的席位。

That's really changing. And so if you look at how we've evolved, for example, and I don't -- well, we don't know the exact number, we've probably doubled the number of CSMs we have at the company over the last year. And that's really allowing us to then further expand. We've really restructured how we do some of our account management and some of those things around, making sure that we can land and then further expand those customers.

這確實在改變。例如，如果你看看我們是如何發展的，我不知道確切的數字，我們公司的 CSM 數量可能在過去增加了一倍年。這確實讓我們能夠進一步擴展。我們確實重組了一些客戶管理和其他一些事情的方式，確保我們能夠吸引並進一步擴大這些客戶。

I think what's interesting is a lot of the technologies, Secure Pay or workforce management or Intelligent Customer Assistant, are generally not sold on the initial transaction. Most of the time, the initial transaction is typically UC and CC only. And then over the next 3, 6, 12, 18 months, there's further add-ons that are done.

我認為有趣的是，許多技術，例如安全支付或勞動力管理或智慧客戶助理，通常不會在初始交易中出售。大多數時候，初始交易通常只是 UC 和 CC。然後在接下來的 3、6、12、18 個月內，還會完成更多附加元件。

I recently hired, and it's in the press release, Mike McCarron from Gladly. He and I worked together at MobileIron. He Is just a phenomenal executive. But he's really coming in to help us further expand our motions around that land and expand and further add-on sales.

我最近聘請了來自 Gladly 的 Mike McCarron（Mike McCarron），這在新聞稿中有所體現。他和我在 MobileIron 一起工作。他只是一位出色的主管。但他確實是來幫助我們進一步擴大圍繞該土地的行動，並擴大和進一步的附加銷售。

And then the other thing we're doing -- and this is great for me. I don't know if you guys are excited as I get about the stuff, but we've got product-led growth now. So if you go into our product today, our Contact Center product, we can do things like -- and I know all you people that have been around for a while are going to say, "Oh my God, this existed for 20 years." He asked, we're there now. We're caught up, which is we can do admin notifications.

然後我們正在做的另一件事——這對我來說很棒。我不知道當我了解到這些內容時你們是否感到興奮，但我們現在已經實現了以產品為主導的成長。因此，如果你今天了解我們的產品，我們的聯絡中心產品，我們可以做這樣的事情——我知道所有已經存在了一段時間的人都會說，“天哪，這已經存在了 20 年了。 ”他問，我們現在到了。我們已經趕上了，我們可以進行管理通知。

We can do PLG, product-led growth, directly in the platform, where people can sign up for feature functionality, automatically added to their invoice and drive further add-on sales. And so those are all things that we've developed under the notion of innovation and retooling over the last year.

我們可以直接在平台上進行 PLG（以產品為主導的成長），人們可以在平台上註冊功能，自動添加到他們的發票中並推動進一步的附加銷售。這些都是我們去年在創新和重組理念下開發的。

Our next question comes from the line of Josh Nichols with B. Riley.

我們的下一個問題來自 Josh Nichols 和 B. Riley 的對話。

Just wanted to check in -- I mean, so congrats on paying back the $63 million of debt, you're still going to have north of $100 million of cash on the balance sheet. I know that there's going to be some additional paydowns on the higher interest term loan at least later this year after the repayment penalty has gone.

只是想檢查一下 - 我的意思是，恭喜您還清了 6300 萬美元的債務，您的資產負債表上仍然有超過 1 億美元的現金。我知道至少在今年晚些時候，在還款罰金消失後，高利率定期貸款將會有一些額外的還款。

But I would think that now with the company's balance sheet much better, profitability on the upswing that there's also potential opportunities for the company to do like a potential refi. Is that something that you're actively exploring? Or is that -- what's the company doing in terms of looking to potentially reduce debt costs outside the repayments?

但我認為，現在公司的資產負債表好多了，獲利能力上升，公司也有潛在的機會，例如潛在的再融資。這是您正在積極探索的事情嗎？或者說，公司在尋求潛在降低還款之外的債務成本方面正在做什麼？

So absolutely. Great question, Josh. We do have the opportunity to look at refinancing that expensive term loan debt, and we are. So more to come on that later. We'll see the timing on that. We also have an opportunity potentially to look at potentially opportunistic buybacks in the future. No commitment on that yet, but that's an opportunity for us as well. We're generating plenty of cash flow, and we have options.

絕對是如此。好問題，喬許。我們確實有機會考慮為昂貴的定期貸款債務進行再融資，而我們確實這樣做了。稍後還會有更多內容。我們將看看具體時間。我們還有機會考慮未來潛在的機會性回購。目前還沒有任何承諾，但這對我們來說也是一個機會。我們正在產生大量現金流，我們有選擇。

So I'll make the pitch like our leverage ratios have dropped in half, basically, over the last year, if you look at some sort of adjusted EBITDA to net debt kind of ratios. So any commercial bankers out there, call me because we've already got people at our front door. So more can come to the table at any moment.

因此，如果你看看某種調整後的 EBITDA 與淨負債比率，我會說我們的槓桿率基本上在去年下降了一半。所以，任何商業銀行家，請給我打電話，因為我們的前門已經有人了。因此，隨時都可以有更多的內容出現。

We'll take them. Call me directly. But no, it's nice to be in the position we're in now because we're -- as a credit risk per se, we're way better now than we've been for quite some time. It's a good position for us to be in.

我們會帶走他們。直接打電話給我。但不，我們現在所處的位置很好，因為就信用風險本身而言，我們現在比相當長一段時間以來的情況要好得多。這對我們來說是一個很好的位置。

It's good to hear. And hopefully, there's some news over the next few months potentially. And then just looking here, so the company's operating margin for the third quarter came in materially better than the guide by 140 bps or so. I know there are some taxes and our employee stock costs and whatnot that are going to be starting up this year with the new calendar year, that are going to pressure operating margins in the beginning of the quarter.

很高興聽到。希望未來幾個月可能會有一些消息。再看看這裡，該公司第三季的營業利潤率比指導值高出 140 個基點左右。我知道今年新日曆年將開始徵收一些稅收和我們的員工股票成本等，這將給本季初的營業利潤率帶來壓力。

Could you give a little bit more detail on just like the 300-or-so bps sequential decline? And like how would we kind of break out that attribution, given that gross margins are kind of going to be flat and service revenue, at least, is only down like a couple of million bucks, I think, sequentially?

您能否提供更多有關 300 個基點左右的連續下降的細節？考慮到毛利率將持平，而服務收入至少僅下降了幾百萬美元，我認為，我們將如何打破這種歸因？

Yes. Good question. So just to point out, as I mentioned in my prepared remarks, we had some onetime goodness in Q3 that helped us about at a point. A couple of things there. So normalized is more like 200 or so basis points, down 240 or whatever to the 10%.

是的。好問題。因此，我想指出的是，正如我在準備好的發言中提到的那樣，我們在第三季度的一些曾經的優點在某種程度上對我們有所幫助。有幾件事。所以標準化後更像是 200 個基點左右，下降 240 個基點或其他什麼，達到 10%。

So a couple of things that go on in our fiscal Q4, which is January through March, we have the reset of the social security taxes, the FICA and the 401(k) match in the company. So that's a few million dollars right there. And that really impacts us. That's really most of the change, from a quarter-over-quarter perspective, say, the $5 million or so range. That's really driving it.

因此，我們第四財季（即 1 月至 3 月）發生了一些事情，我們重置了公司的社會安全稅、FICA 和 401(k) 匹配。所以這就是幾百萬美元。這確實影響了我們。從季度環比的角度來看，這確實是大部分變化，例如 500 萬美元左右的變化。這確實是它的驅動力。

Got it. It's just those two items, and I would assume that those would kind of be alleviated as you move through the calendar year, right?

知道了。只是這兩個項目，我認為隨著日曆年的推移，這些問題會有所緩解，對嗎？

They do. They dissipate throughout the year. However, you -- historically, what we've done as a company in our fiscal Q2 is when we have the annual pay increases and so forth, so there's a few things that move up and down throughout the quarter -- throughout the year rather.

他們是這樣。它們全年都會消散。然而，從歷史上看，我們作為一家公司在第二財季所做的事情是我們每年加薪等等，所以在整個季度，而不是全年，有一些事情會上下波動。 。

Our next question comes from the line of Peter Levine with Evercore.

我們的下一個問題來自 Peter Levine 和 Evercore 的對話。

Here. Maybe just to piggyback off on the last one is you've talked about obviously repaying the convert, cleaning up the balance sheet. But if you think about your strategy of innovation-led growth, how do you manage cash on the balance sheet versus innovation versus what your competitors are doing in the CCaaS market, given it is a lot more competitive today than it was 12 months ago? How do you balance that all?

這裡。也許只是藉用最後一個，你已經談到了顯然要償還轉換者，清理資產負債表。但如果你考慮以創新為主導的成長策略，考慮到今天的競爭比12 個月前要激烈得多，你如何管理資產負債表上的現金、創新以及你的競爭對手在CCaaS 市場上所做的事情？你如何平衡這一切？

It's a great question. So I think I'm going to take you back to Q1 when we talked about what our sort of our fiscal plan for the next 3 years was. We talked about increasing cash flow and delevering the balance sheet.

這是一個很好的問題。因此，我想我將帶您回到第一季度，當時我們討論了未來 3 年的財政計劃。我們討論了增加現金流和去槓桿化資產負債表。

So step 1 would be generating enough cash to pay down the debt, delever the balance sheet and put all this garbage behind us from the past, would be step one. Step two is be an innovation-led company. So we want to spend between 10% and [16%] in any given quarter on R&D that further continues to then drive an efficient sales and marketing motion. We're a software company, and we should be judged by our software, first and foremost. And so that will be second.

因此，第一步將是產生足夠的現金來償還債務，去槓桿化資產負債表，並將過去所有這些垃圾拋在腦後，這將是第一步。第二步是成為一家創新主導型公司。因此，我們希望在任何特定季度將 10% 到 [16%] 的支出用於研發，從而進一步繼續推動高效的銷售和行銷活動。我們是一家軟體公司，我們首先應該透過我們的軟體來判斷。所以這將是第二位。

And then third, which is more of a swing factor, is how much do we spend in sales and marketing and those kinds of things. And we're -- we need to get that sales and marketing engine a lot more efficient.

第三，也是一個搖擺因素，是我們在銷售和行銷等方面花了多少錢。我們需要讓銷售和行銷引擎更有效率。

Now there's a lot of overlap between R&D and sales and marketing. If you build a product that everybody wants, it's easier to sell. And if you build a product that has PLG built in, product like growth built in, they can be more efficient to sell. And so that's a little bit of the innovation we're going through.

現在研發與銷售和行銷之間有許多重疊。如果你生產出每個人都想要的產品，那麼銷售就更容易。如果你開發的產品內建了 PLG，內建了類似成長的產品，那麼它們的銷售效率就會更高。這就是我們正在經歷的一點創新。

What I've said in the past and as you think forward, at the levels we're at, the cash flow levels we're at, we should pretty easily make our $250 million number that we promised to return to investors. And so after that, we're more focused on spending for reacceleration of growth, for resumption of growth.

我過去說過的話，正如你所想的那樣，在我們目前的水平、現金流水平上，我們應該很容易就能實現我們承諾返還給投資者的 2.5 億美元的數字。因此，在那之後，我們更加關注用於重新加速成長、恢復成長的支出。

You have talked about Lisa. I know she has been on board now for a couple of months. But maybe talk about how she's thinking or how you guys are thinking about go-to-market channel versus direct, obviously, the announcements you made today. But curious if -- what she's made, what's she's changing and kind of what you have in the pipeline with her that you can share with us?

你談到了麗莎。我知道她已經在船上幾個月了。但也許可以談談她的想法，或者你們如何考慮進入市場管道與直接，顯然，你們今天發布的公告。但很好奇——她做了什麼，她正在改變什麼，以及你和她正在醞釀什麼可以與我們分享的東西？

So if there was ever a softball, I mean, I'm absolutely amazed watching Lisa in action. It is phenomenal to watch a world-class sales executive who really knows what she is doing, execute her plan.

所以，如果有壘球的話，我的意思是，我對看到麗莎的比賽感到非常驚訝。看到一位真正知道自己在做什麼、執行計劃的世界級銷售主管真是太棒了。

And I think she has a fantastic vision. Her vision is about a balanced go-to-market strategy with -- not balanced in every region. So for example, in Australia, New Zealand, we're focused mainly on value-added resellers, those kinds of things. But a more balanced strategy in the U.S. and more appropriate strategy in the U.S. and other things.

我認為她有遠見。她的願景是製定一個平衡的進入市場策略，但並非在每個地區都平衡。例如，在澳洲、紐西蘭，我們主要關注增值經銷商之類的事情。但在美國有更平衡的策略，在美國和其他方面有更合適的策略。

Number two is, she's very focused on the sales process and solution selling and running a correct sales process and [solution] and focusing on business outcomes versus "Do you need dial tone or are you making the move from on-prem to cloud?" Those kinds of things.

第二點是，她非常關注銷售流程和解決方案，銷售並運行正確的銷售流程和[解決方案]，並關注業務成果，而不是“您需要撥號音還是要從本地遷移到雲端？”諸如此類的事情。

And then lastly, she's tough. She has a high level of accountability, and I'm sure there's already been some notes written, but she has a high level of accountability and high expectations that she expects of the GTM engine. And she asserts that accountability across the board. And so it's just absolutely phenomenal watching her in action.

最後，她很堅強。她有很高的責任感，我確信已經寫了一些筆記，但她有很高的責任感和她對 GTM 引擎的期望。她主張全面問責。所以觀看她的表演絕對是非凡的。

And I think also that with Bruno is on board, he's even newer than Lisa, and we see -- as our new CMO, and they work hand in glove better than any of the previous combination CRO/CMOs I've seen at 8x8. So it's a fantastic thing to see.

我還認為，隨著 Bruno 的加入，他甚至比 Lisa 還要新，我們看到，作為我們的新 CMO，他們的密切配合比我之前在 8x8 見過的任何 CRO/CMO 組合都要好。所以這是一件很棒的事。

And they're completely aligned on a whole variety of topics in terms of the quality of lead gen, the conversion rates, all these operational things that are going on. They're just trying to improve everything from soup to nuts. So it's great to see.

他們在潛在客戶開發的品質、轉換率以及所有這些正在進行的營運方面的主題完全一致。他們只是想改進從湯到堅果的一切。所以很高興看到。

If I could squeeze one more, so I don't want to paint you into a corner or hold you accountable for this metric, but you did say 250 Contact Center receipts up, I think, 50%. We do hear a lot from your competitors that are starting at the lower end of the market, scaling up, investing a ton to kind of build up that functionality. But can you maybe just give us an idea of how many customers that represents or percentage of your base of Contact Center customers that are 250 north of that?

如果我可以再擠一個，那麼我不想讓您陷入困境或讓您對這個指標負責，但您確實說 250 個聯絡中心收據增加了，我認為增加了 50%。我們確實從競爭對手那裡聽到了很多消息，他們從低端市場開始，擴大規模，投入大量資金來建立該功能。但是，您能否告訴我們有多少客戶代表了您的聯絡中心客戶群中超出該數字 250 名的客戶數量或百分比？

I actually don't know the exact number off the top of my head. It is not an insignificant amount of number. It's not a vanity metric. And to be clear, our product, we've got customers that are next to thousands of seats of contact center running concurrently.

事實上，我根本不知道確切的數字。這並不是一個微不足道的數字。這不是一個虛榮指標。需要明確的是，我們的產品，我們的客戶旁邊有數千個同時運作的聯絡中心座位。

The reason I -- the marketing team pulled together the metric for me was because we have this reputation of, "Oh my gosh, it's 8x8, it only works on 12 contact center agents or 8 contact center agents." It's just BS. It's marketing fud, it's what competitors like to do all the time, is run around and make a story instead of delivering value-added to the customers.

我——行銷團隊為我整理這個指標的原因是因為我們有這樣的聲譽：“天哪，它是 8x8，它只適用於 12 個聯絡中心代理或 8 個聯絡中心代理。”這只是廢話。這是行銷上的胡言亂語，也是競爭對手一直喜歡做的事情，到處亂編造故事，而不是為客戶提供附加價值。

And so we've seen a significant growth in larger Contact Center deals that we're participating in, and we see it in the pipeline every day. And so I'm sorry, I can't give you a number. I'll see if I can scrounge it up by next call.

因此，我們看到我們參與的大型聯絡中心交易顯著成長，並且每天都在醞釀中。所以很抱歉，我無法給你一個電話號碼。我看看下次打電話時能否找到它。

Our next question comes from the line of Catharine Trebnick with Rosenblatt.

我們的下一個問題來自凱瑟琳·特雷布尼克和羅森布拉特的對話。

Sam, let's go back to your press release today. You talk about these non-agents that you're targeting. Do you have a total addressable market for that and a growth projection? And then the follow-on question is, it seems like this is a very different sale than you currently have. So what type of sales motions that you're going to put into play to make this happen?

山姆，讓我們回到您今天的新聞稿。您談論的是您所針對的這些非代理。您是否有一個總的目標市場和成長預測？接下來的問題是，這似乎是與您目前的銷售截然不同的銷售。那麼，您將採取什麼類型的銷售行動來實現這一目標？

Okay. So I'm going to take these in reverse order. You talked about sales motions for -- I don't think they're different from the new sales motions we're developing. Yes, it'd be different from the old sales motions that we had. .

好的。所以我將以相反的順序來處理這些。您談到了銷售動議——我認為它們與我們正在製定的新銷售動議沒有什麼不同。是的，這與我們以前的銷售動議有所不同。 。

But I think in the new sales motion where we're solution selling and a rep and a GTM team shows up, it really dives into what the customers' needs are. We're going to find service workers or health care workers or billing people or accounts who are inside sales reps or any of those kind of things in every company and get them the right solutions for that capability.

但我認為，在新的銷售動議中，我們正在銷售解決方案，並有代表和 GTM 團隊出現，它真正深入了解了客戶的需求。我們將在每家公司中尋找服務人員或醫療保健人員或計費人員或內部銷售代表或任何類似人員，並為他們提供適合該功能的解決方案。

It's a great question on TAM. Let me dig -- I know Gartner has done some work on this, as has [myenergi] and some of the others. I mean I'm presuming it's a multibillion dollar TAM because they talk a lot about the "informal contact center". I really despise that term because it implies that it's like an informal agent. But a lot -- the most use cases we see are where the worker needs contact center-like functionality.

這是關於 TAM 的一個很好的問題。讓我深入探討一下——我知道 Gartner 已經在這方面做了一些工作，[myenergi] 和其他一些公司也是如此。我的意思是，我假設這是一個價值數十億美元的 TAM，因為他們經常談論「非正式聯絡中心」。我真的很鄙視這個詞，因為它暗示它就像一個非正式的代理人。但我們看到的大多數用例都是工作人員需要類似聯絡中心的功能。

But in fact, is not an agent. It's not their day-to-day job to sit at a terminal, waiting for the next case to be delivered or to make outbound phone calls, but instead, they have some other job, nurse plumber, whatever the case may be, but they're on call. They need to deal with emergency situations, those kinds of things. And so it's a...

但事實上，並不是代理。他們的日常工作不是坐在終端前等待下一個箱子送達或撥打外線電話，相反，他們還有其他工作，護士水管工，無論是什麼情況，但他們隨時待命。他們需要處理緊急情況之類的事情。所以這是一個...

So I guess, I understand the non-agent part. I mean would this also fall in with the light contact center that everybody's bouncing around as a new name, calling them light also?

所以我想，我理解非代理部分。我的意思是，這是否也與每個人都以新名稱命名的輕型聯絡中心相符，也稱其為輕型？

Yes. But I mean, like what is that? What's a light contact center? It's like -- the problem is like informal contact center are like -- contact center are, to me, terrible names because it's like light beer. Is it a beer or is it water? I mean, it's like neither.

是的。但我的意思是，那是什麼？什麼是輕型聯絡中心？這就像——問題就像非正式的聯絡中心一樣——對我來說，聯絡中心的名字很糟糕，因為它就像淡啤酒。這是啤酒還是水？我的意思是，兩者都不像。

And so it's -- I don't know, I really think -- and that's why we put the press release today to start the dialogue of what really the category should be as we go into these products. And look, I know some of our competitors have some products in this area, and I think this product is more analogous to them. They call their contacts -- they call their product contact center, 99% of the time I laugh. They're not contact center products.

所以，我不知道，我真的這麼認為，這就是為什麼我們今天發布新聞稿來開始對話，討論我們進入這些產品時真正的類別應該是什麼。看，我知道我們的一些競爭對手在這個領域有一些產品，我認為這個產品與他們更相似。他們打電話給他們的聯絡人——他們打電話給他們的產品聯絡中心，99%的時間我都笑了。它們不是聯絡中心產品。

Yes. And then what do you have for -- like you said it was in beta. So at what point do you think it will go GA? And then what percent of revenue do you think you'll be able to drive in the next 12 to 15 months from this because this actually could be [1 year] better gross shoot?

是的。然後你有什麼用——就像你說的，它還處於測試階段。那麼您認為它會在什麼時候正式發布？然後，您認為在接下來的 12 到 15 個月內您將能夠由此獲得多少百分比的收入，因為這實際上可能 [1 年] 更好的毛收入？

Yes, exactly, right? It's like I said -- so it's a great question. Look, if you look at Supervisor Workspace, I think we kept it in a beta for 9 months. And if you look at Intelligent Customer Assistant digital, I think it was in beta for less than 3 months. .

是的，完全正確，對嗎？就像我說的——所以這是一個很好的問題。看，如果你看看 Supervisor Workspace，我想我們將其保留了 9 個月的測試版。如果你看看智慧客戶助理數位版，我認為它的測試版還不到 3 個月。 。

I suspect this one may be in beta a little longer. So I would lead maybe towards that 9-month number, but it's purely a guess on my part. And I'd like to see this as 10% of revenue as quickly as possible. I think it is absolutely a new product line extension for us as a company.

我懷疑這個測試版可能會持續更長的時間。所以我可能會傾向於那個 9 個月的數字，但這純粹是我的猜測。我希望盡快將其占到收入的 10%。我認為這對我們公司來說絕對是一個新的產品線延伸。

Our next question comes from the line of William Power with Baird.

我們的下一個問題來自威廉·鮑爾（William Power）和貝爾德（Baird）的對話。

This is [Jani Samoas] on for Will Power. So it's clear that operating cash flow has been a focus, and it's grown nicely over the past few years. But looking forward, you talked about more muted revenue growth. Can you talk about some of the other levers that you still can pull to help reach that 20% annual growth target? Is it more on the margin side, maybe more working capital improvements? Can you just help unpack that a little bit?

這是[Jani Samoas] 的意志力節目。因此，很明顯，經營現金流一直是焦點，並且在過去幾年中成長良好。但展望未來，您談到了營收成長更加疲軟。您能否談談您仍然可以利用哪些其他槓桿來幫助實現 20% 的年度成長目標？是否更多的是在利潤方面，也許是更多的營運資本改善？你能幫忙解開一下嗎？

So yes, on the 3-year CAGR that we gave, right, we're starting from -- just to reset, starting from the end of '23, we're expecting -- we just grew cash flow from ops 55%, on a trailing 12-month basis. And as I mentioned in my prepared remarks, we would expect a bit more muted in 2025 fiscal and then going up there in 2026.

所以，是的，根據我們給出的 3 年複合年增長率，我們從 23 年底開始重置，我們預計，我們的營運現金流量成長了 55%，以過去 12 個月為基礎。正如我在準備好的演講中提到的，我們預計 2025 財年會更加平靜，然後在 2026 年會有所上升。

In terms of levers, look, our product mix, we've had -- we've sustained -- or we've been able to sustain really very good underlying service margins right now. We've got a lower-margin business in Southeast Asia. But as that market expands into other parts of the world, maybe we can see an uptick in that part of the usage business that we have.

就槓桿而言，看看我們的產品組合，我們已經擁有——我們已經維持——或者說我們現在已經能夠維持非常好的基礎服務利潤率。我們在東南亞有利潤率較低的業務。但隨著該市場擴展到世界其他地區，也許我們可以看到我們擁有的部分使用業務的成長。

But we're always looking at cost of goods sold, getting better rates on our telephony, for example. So we're able to maintain a pretty healthy gross margins in the face of whatever price pressures may exist at the low end of the market, for example.

但我們始終關注銷售商品的成本，例如，獲得更好的電話費率。因此，例如，面對低端市場可能存在的任何價格壓力，我們都能夠維持相當健康的毛利率。

So we're always looking at that. Sam mentioned earlier about sales and marketing and getting efficiencies out of the group. It's like we want to get more with the same as an example there. So I think with the go-to-market retooling that we have going on in the company, we can get more from the same. That's what we really need to better operational efficiency out of sales and marketing. So those are the kinds of things that we're really focused on to maintain a decent level of profitability and cash flow.

所以我們一直在關注這一點。薩姆之前提到過銷售和行銷以及提高團隊效率。就像我們希望透過同樣的例子獲得更多資訊。因此，我認為透過公司正在進行的上市重組，我們可以從中獲得更多。這就是我們真正需要提高銷售和行銷營運效率的。因此，這些才是我們真正關注的事情，以保持良好的獲利水準和現金流。

And look, I mean I think we're generating enough cash flow, more than enough of cash flow right now. So for me, it's all about scale now. It's about resuming growth and getting back on that growth curve. So that's where the focus of the company is, et cetera. Could we pull levers that we need to share? But really, the focus on the company from here is getting that growth rate higher.

看，我的意思是我認為我們正在產生足夠的現金流，現在的現金流綽綽有餘。所以對我來說，現在最重要的是規模。這是關於恢復成長並回到成長曲線。這就是公司的重點所在，等等。我們可以拉動我們需要分享的槓桿嗎？但實際上，公司現在的重點是提高成長率。

Our next question comes from the line of Ryan Koontz with Needham & Company.

我們的下一個問題來自 Needham & Company 的 Ryan Koontz。

A quick housekeeping item on RPO, and any puts or takes there in that metric? All right. And then -- as stated in the slide deck.

RPO 的快速整理項目，以及該指標中的任何看跌或看跌？好的。然後——如幻燈片所述。

Yes. No. So $765 million RPO is where we have at the end of the third quarter. I wouldn't say any necessarily big commentary on puts and takes there. It's up on a year-over-year basis, I know that. Slightly down sequentially, but up on a year-over-year basis.

是的。不會。第三季末我們的 RPO 金額為 7.65 億美元。我不會對看跌期權和看跌期權發表任何必要的大評論。我知道，它逐年上升。環比略有下降，但同比有上升。

Okay. That's fair. And Sam, as you think about your seat count, and maybe this is kind of the old way of looking at it, but I'm an old guy, is as you think about growth coming from CC and CPaaS and pressure on UCaaS, and you've obviously got some downselling going on with Fuze, churn, pricing probably pressuring UC; if you look at the pressure on the UC market is what I'm saying, the seats, how would you kind of allocate downselling, pricing and kind of general customer churn as pressuring your UC seats?

好的。這還算公平。 Sam，當你考慮你的座位數時，也許這是一種舊的看待它的方式，但我是一個老傢伙，當你考慮來自 CC 和 CPaaS 的增長以及 UCaaS 的壓力時，很明顯，Fuze 出現了一些降價，客戶流失，定價可能會給UC 帶來壓力；如果你看看 UC 市場上的壓力，就像我所說的那樣，席位，你會如何分配降價、定價和一般客戶流失作為你的 UC 席位的壓力？

So in general, customer churn will be the bottom. And downselling and price pressure, it's sometimes hard for me to tell the difference. I mean I can sort calculate it out. I would say probably, and this is pure guessing on my part is that downselling, number one, and price pressure on the low end, #2, and then the last one.

所以總的來說，客戶流失率將是底部。降價銷售和價格壓力，有時我很難區分。我的意思是我可以計算出來。我想說可能，這純粹是我的猜測，降價銷售是第一，低端價格壓力是第二，然後是最後一個。

And then we've got some new things coming out open in the near future to really start to address the pricing environment. As you know, we do a lot of work around [Teams]. And so I think we've got some really interesting things for -- maybe that could get us more traction in that lower end market really efficiently.

然後我們將在不久的將來推出一些新產品，以真正開始解決定價環境問題。如您所知，我們圍繞著[團隊]做了很多工作。所以我認為我們已經有了一些非常有趣的東西——也許這可以讓我們真正有效地在低端市場獲得更多的吸引力。

Thank you. I'm showing no further questions in the queue. I would now like to turn the call back over to Kate Patterson for closing remarks.

謝謝。我在隊列中沒有顯示任何其他問題。我現在想將電話轉回給凱特·帕特森，讓其致閉幕詞。

Thank you all. Thanks for staying on the line. I know we ran a little bit over, so I'll look forward to talking with you this afternoon or later tomorrow or during the following week. Thanks a lot.

謝謝你們。感謝您保持在線狀態。我知道我們有點過了，所以我期待今天下午或明天晚些時候或下週與您交談。多謝。

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

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。