F5 Inc (FFIV) 2024 Q1 法說會逐字稿

Good afternoon, and welcome to the F5, Inc. First Quarter Fiscal 2024 Financial Results Conference Call. (Operator Instructions) As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. (Operator Instructions)

下午好，歡迎參加 F5, Inc. 2024 財年第一季財務業績電話會議。 （操作員指示）謹此提醒，本次會議正在錄製中。 （操作員說明）

I'll now turn the call over to Ms. Suzanne DuLong. Ma'am, you may begin.

我現在將電話轉給 Suzanne DuLong 女士。女士，您可以開始了。

Hello, and welcome. I'm Suzanne DuLong, F5's Vice President of Investor Relations. François Locoh-Donou, F5's President and CEO; and Frank Pelzer, F5's Executive Vice President and CFO, will be making prepared remarks on today's call. Other members of the F5 executive team are also on hand to answer questions during the Q&A session. A copy of today's press release is available on our website at f5.com, where an archived version of today's audio will be available through April 28, 2024.

你好，歡迎光臨。我是 Suzanne DuLong，F5 投資人關係副總裁。 François Locoh-Donou，F5 總裁兼執行長； F5 執行副總裁兼財務長 Frank Pelzer 將在今天的電話會議上發表事先準備好的演講。 F5 執行團隊的其他成員也在問答環節現場回答問題。今天新聞稿的副本可在我們的網站 f5.com 上獲取，今天音頻的存檔版本將在 2024 年 4 月 28 日之前提供。

The slide deck accompanying today's discussion is viewable on the webcast and will be posted to our IR site at the conclusion of our call. To access the replay of today's webcast by phone, dial (877) 660-6853 or (201) 612-7415 and use meeting ID 13743521. The telephonic replay will be available through midnight, Pacific Time, January 30, 2024. For additional information or follow-up questions, please reach out to me directly at s.dulong@f5.com.

今天的討論附帶的幻燈片可在網路廣播中觀看，並將在我們的電話會議結束時發佈到我們的 IR 網站。要透過電話觀看今天網路廣播的重播，請撥打(877) 660-6853 或(201) 612-7415 並使用會議ID 13743521。電話重播將持續到太平洋時間2024 年1 月30 日午夜。如需了解更多資訊或後續問題，請直接透過 s.dulong@f5.com 與我聯繫。

Our discussion today will contain forward-looking statements, which include words such as believe, anticipate, expect and target. These forward-looking statements involve uncertainties and risks that may cause our actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by these statements. We have summarized factors that may affect our results in the press release announcing our financial results and in detail in our SEC filings.

我們今天的討論將包含前瞻性陳述，其中包括相信、預期、期望和目標等詞語。這些前瞻性陳述涉及不確定性和風險，可能導致我們的實際結果與這些陳述明示或暗示的結果有重大差異。我們在宣布財務表現的新聞稿中總結了可能影響我們業績的因素，並在向 SEC 提交的文件中詳細介紹了這些因素。

In addition, we will reference non-GAAP metrics during today's discussion. Please see our full GAAP to non-GAAP reconciliation in today's press release and in the appendix of our earnings slide deck. Please note that F5 has no duty to update any information presented in this call.

此外，我們將在今天的討論中參考非公認會計準則指標。請參閱今天的新聞稿和收益幻燈片附錄中完整的 GAAP 與非 GAAP 調整表。請注意，F5 沒有義務更新本次電話會議中提供的任何資訊。

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

這樣，我會將電話轉給弗朗索瓦。

Thank you, Suzanne, and hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us. In my remarks today, I will speak to our Q1 highlights as well as our expectations for Q2. Frank will then review the details of our Q1 results and provide some additional color about our outlook.

謝謝你，蘇珊娜，大家好。感謝您加入我們。在今天的演講中，我將談談我們第一季的亮點以及我們對第二季的期望。然後，弗蘭克將回顧我們第一季業績的詳細信息，並就我們的前景提供一些額外的信息。

Q1 was our third consecutive quarter of stability, with the quarter and individual deals playing out largely as expected. We are not yet hearing that customers' budgets are increasing, but the more predictable spending patterns are encouraging. Our team delivered another solid quarter with consistent performance across our geographic theaters.

第一季是我們連續第三個季度保持穩定，該季度和個別交易的表現基本上符合預期。我們還沒有聽到客戶的預算增加，但更可預測的支出模式令人鼓舞。我們的團隊在各個地區的影院中表現穩定，再次實現了穩健的季度業績。

We had a strong performance from our service provider vertical, which correlates to unusually strong perpetual license software revenue in the quarter. This is likely less indicative of service provider trends overall and more of a reflection of F5's position in some key projects.

我們的垂直服務供應商表現強勁，這與本季異常強勁的永久授權軟體收入相關。這可能不太能反映服務提供者的整體趨勢，而更多地反映了 F5 在一些關鍵項目中的地位。

We delivered Q1 revenue above the high end of our guidance range. In addition, our continued operating discipline enabled us to deliver non-GAAP operating margins of 35.5%. This is up more than 900 basis points from the year ago period. As a result of these factors and a modest tax benefit, we also delivered non-GAAP earnings per share growth of 39%, with EPS of $3.43 per share, well above the high end of our guidance range.

我們第一季的收入高於指導範圍的上限。此外，我們持續的營運紀律使我們能夠實現 35.5% 的非 GAAP 營運利潤率。這比去年同期上升了 900 多個基點。由於這些因素和適度的稅收優惠，我們的非 GAAP 每股收益增長了 39%，每股收益為 3.43 美元，遠高於我們指導範圍的上限。

Our customers are still watching their budgets closely. As we look ahead, we are encouraged by several factors, including better predictability from customers, improving systems demand and the fact that some customers are making decisions that investments need to happen now. We are cautiously optimistic that these factors signal an easing of the extreme customer spending caution that characterized last year.

我們的客戶仍在密切關注他們的預算。展望未來，我們受到多個因素的鼓舞，包括客戶更好的可預測性、系統需求的改善以及一些客戶正在做出需要立即進行投資的決定。我們謹慎樂觀地認為，這些因素顯示去年客戶支出極度謹慎的情況有所緩解。

And in fact, we are seeing stronger underlying demand. Because of the backlog headwind we faced in FY '24, despite improving demand signals, we expect our Q2 revenue will be down low single digits from Q2 of last year. Frank will discuss our outlook in greater detail in a few minutes.

事實上，我們看到了更強勁的潛在需求。由於我們在 24 財年面臨積壓逆風，儘管需求訊號有所改善，但我們預計第二季營收將較去年第二季降低個位數。弗蘭克將在幾分鐘內更詳細地討論我們的前景。

As little as 5 years ago, nearly every large enterprise organization expected that they would move their application environments from on-premises to the public cloud or SaaS. They also expected that doing so would dramatically simplify their operations and reduce costs. Instead, today, customers are grappling with a more intricate and costly set of challenges than ever before.

就在 5 年前，幾乎每個大型企業組織都希望將其應用程式環境從本地遷移到公有雲或 SaaS。他們也預計這樣做將大大簡化他們的營運並降低成本。相反，如今，客戶正在應對比以往任何時候都更加複雜和成本高昂的挑戰。

In our most recent State of Application Strategy research, 88% of our customers report they are currently operating applications across on-premises and cloud environments. The same research found that 38% of organizations are hosting their applications in 6 different types of environments. The expanding number of applications across distributed environments demands specific expertise and tools for each environment, which adds cost and operational complexity.

在我們最新的應用程式策略狀況研究中，88% 的客戶表示他們目前正在跨本地和雲端環境運行應用程式。同一項研究發現，38% 的組織在 6 種不同類型的環境中託管其應用程式。分散式環境中的應用程式數量不斷增加，需要針對每個環境的特定專業知識和工具，這增加了成本和操作複雜性。

At the same time, this expanded landscape provides cybercriminals with more potential targets, amplifying security concerns. This complexity is further intensified by the rapid growth in the number of applications, a growth trajectory that is poised to accelerate significantly with the widespread adoption and proliferation of AI.

同時，這種擴大的格局為網路犯罪分子提供了更多潛在目標，加劇了安全擔憂。應用程式數量的快速成長進一步加劇了這種複雜性，隨著人工智慧的廣泛採用和擴散，這一成長軌跡將顯著加速。

We firmly believe that F5 is strategically positioned to support our customers as they navigate these escalating challenges across a rapidly evolving landscape. Our innovation and product portfolio evolution over the last several years has been aimed at addressing exactly these challenges.

我們堅信，F5 的策略定位是為我們的客戶在快速發展的環境中應對這些不斷升級的挑戰提供支援。過去幾年我們的創新和產品組合的演變正是為了解決這些挑戰。

Before I pass the call to Frank, I will speak to some customer highlights from the quarter. Our F5 BIG-IP family serves traditional applications, either on-premises, co-located or in cloud environments. BIG-IP's data plane performance, automation capabilities and seamless integration into public cloud environments continues to differentiate it from competitors.

在給 Frank 打電話之前，我將談談本季的一些客戶亮點。我們的 F5 BIG-IP 系列為本地、主機或雲端環境中的傳統應用程式提供服務。 BIG-IP 的資料平面效能、自動化功能以及與公有雲環境的無縫整合繼續使其在競爭對手中脫穎而出。

Our commitment to innovation and to providing customer flexibility through a range of consumption models also has enabled us to continue to gain share in the traditional ADC space. BIG-IP's capabilities drove a significant win in Q1 with a North American service provider. The customer is now deploying F5 cloud-native software at scale in its 5G architecture.

我們致力於創新並透過一系列消費模式為客戶提供靈活性，這也使我們能夠繼續在傳統 ADC 領域獲得份額。 BIG-IP 的能力在第一季與北美服務提供者取得了重大勝利。該客戶目前正在其 5G 架構中大規模部署 F5 雲端原生軟體。

Over the last 5 years, we have invested to modernize BIG-IP and to deliver industry-leading container-native functions to scale and secure 5G cloud infrastructures. These investments made this win possible. Modern F5 BIG-IP software is now powering the growth from this provider's consumer 5G handset demand and securing its overall fixed wireless access offerings, the fastest-growing 5G service in North America.

在過去 5 年裡，我們投資將 BIG-IP 現代化，並提供業界領先的容器原生功能，以擴展和保護 5G 雲端基礎架構。這些投資使這一勝利成為可能。現代 F5 BIG-IP 軟體現在正在推動該供應商消費者 5G 手機需求的成長，並確保其整體固定無線存取產品（北美成長最快的 5G 服務）的安全。

Turning to F5 NGINX, which serves modern container-native and microservices-based applications and APIs, we continue to see large enterprises adopt NGINX for their cloud and Kubernetes-based applications. As those applications scale, we are seeing our NGINX opportunity scale as well.

轉向 F5 NGINX，它為現代容器原生和基於微服務的應用程式和 API 提供服務，我們繼續看到大型企業在其雲端和基於 Kubernetes 的應用程式中採用 NGINX。隨著這些應用程式的規模擴大，我們也看到了 NGINX 機會的規模。

In addition, customers are also leveraging NGINX for app layer security for containers. In Q1, an APAC-based auto manufacturer selected NGINX Plus with App Protect to power and protect its next-generation connected car data and service offering. Beyond the standard car-related maintenance information, the customer is empowering a range of vehicle-related services, from traffic management and statistics to fleet management and automated insurance claims.

此外，客戶也利用 NGINX 來實現容器的應用層安全。第一季度，亞太地區的汽車製造商選擇了具有 App Protect 的 NGINX Plus 來為其下一代連網汽車資料和服務提供支援和保護。除了標準的汽車相關維修資訊之外，客戶還提供一系列與車輛相關的服務，從交通管理和統計到車隊管理和自動保險索賠。

The customer envisions providing rich data-enabled services, including traffic data to government agencies for road maintenance, and enabling automated insurance claim filing using telemetry and location data. The customer selected NGINX for this ambitious project because of its unique ability to implement WAF for containers on AWS as well as its ability to support specific requirements that could not be met by native cloud services.

客戶希望提供豐富的數據支援服務，包括向政府機構提供道路維護的交通數據，以及使用遙測和位置數據實現自動保險索賠申請。客戶選擇 NGINX 來完成這個雄心勃勃的項目，是因為它具有在 AWS 上為容器實施 WAF 的獨特能力，以及支援原生雲端服務無法滿足的特定要求的能力。

F5 Distributed Cloud Services is a portfolio of SaaS and managed services, which we have built from a combination of organic and inorganic efforts. The platform will have its second birthday shortly and continues to gain traction with customers as a result of its flexibility and strong capabilities.

F5 分散式雲端服務是 SaaS 和託管服務的組合，我們透過有機和無機努力的結合建構了它。該平台即將迎來兩週歲生日，並因其靈活性和強大的功能而繼續受到客戶的青睞。

We are intercepting 2 exciting growth categories with Distributed Cloud, Webapp and API Protection, or WAAP, and the emerging opportunity in secure multi-cloud networking. In fact, we have seen explosive growth in the number of attacks blocked by Distributed Cloud's WAAP capabilities with a number of blocked attacks growing more than 100% in Q1 from Q4.

我們正在抓住兩個令人興奮的成長類別：分散式雲端、Web 應用程式和 API 保護（WAAP）以及安全多雲網路中的新興機會。事實上，我們已經看到分散式雲端的WAAP能力攔截的攻擊數量呈現爆炸性成長，第一季攔截的攻擊數量比第四季增加了100%以上。

In one WAAP win from the quarter, a large U.S.-based financial institution selected F5 Distributed Cloud Services to solve its challenge of application security in hybrid cloud. The customer leveraged our flexible consumption program, adding API discovery and protection to manage the many fintech aggregator applications that access their financial data through APIs.

在本季度的一項 WAAP 勝利中，一家美國大型金融機構選擇 F5 分散式雲端服務來解決其混合雲中的應用程式安全挑戰。客戶利用我們靈活的消費計劃，添加 API 發現和保護來管理許多透過 API 存取其財務資料的金融科技聚合器應用程式。

F5 Distributed Cloud Services is also gaining traction in API security. In just the last 12 months, we have observed a substantial increase in the volume of API attacks. 95% of customers surveyed for our State of Application Strategy Report say they have deployed an API gateway. This is a significant increase from 2019 when only 35% have deployed one. In fact, 92% of the total attacks mitigated by Distributed Cloud in Q1 were targeted towards APIs. That is up from 73% in Q4.

F5 分散式雲端服務在 API 安全方面也越來越受到關注。僅在過去 12 個月內，我們就觀察到 API 攻擊數量大幅增加。在接受我們的應用程式狀態策略報告調查的客戶中，95% 的客戶表示他們已經部署了 API 閘道。與 2019 年相比，這一數字顯著增加，當時只有 35% 的人部署了該技術。事實上，第一季分散式雲端緩解的總攻擊中有 92% 都是針對 API 的。這比第四季的 73% 有所上升。

As an example of an API security win in Q1, following multiple service-impacting outages, a service provider in our APAC region selected Distributed Cloud to replace their prior API security vendor. Distributed Cloud's multi-cloud networking capabilities are making it possible for the customer to switch between public clouds when necessary while providing visibility and reporting via a single pane of glass.

作為第一季 API 安全勝利的一個例子，在多次影響服務的中斷之後，我們亞太地區的一家服務供應商選擇分散式雲端來取代他們先前的 API 安全供應商。分散式雲端的多雲網路功能使客戶能夠在必要時在公有雲之間切換，同時透過單一管理平台提供可見性和報告。

F5 Distributed Cloud Services is also gaining traction in secure multi-cloud networking use cases. In another example from Q1, a global provider of traditional and digital learning resources deployed Distributed Cloud Services. The customer was looking for consistent application-level security, multi-cloud scalability and networking.

F5 分散式雲端服務也在安全多雲網路用例中獲得關注。在第一季的另一個例子中，一家傳統和數位學習資源的全球供應商部署了分散式雲端服務。客戶正在尋求一致的應用程式級安全性、多雲可擴展性和網路。

Distributed Cloud enable them to simplify their infrastructure, strengthen the management of their multi-cloud architecture and improve application security. They also deployed multiple F5 customer edge software instances in their cloud infrastructure and in their on-premises data center, enabling them to meet an aggressive cloud migration schedule.

分散式雲端使他們能夠簡化基礎設施、加強多雲架構的管理並提高應用程式安全性。他們還在其雲端基礎設施和本地資料中心部署了多個 F5 客戶邊緣軟體實例，使他們能夠滿足緊迫的雲端遷移計劃。

I will spend just a few minutes talking about the opportunity we see emerging with AI applications. AI will accelerate the growth in the number of applications and APIs. We are seeing the start of this already in the form of AI models and new AI-driven services becoming available from start-ups and established tech companies alike. We expect that as enterprises ramp adoption of AI over the next 1 to 2 years, that adoption will bring with it a flood of new enterprise applications that leverage those AI models and the APIs of the new AI-driven services.

我將花幾分鐘時間討論我們看到的人工智慧應用程式出現的機會。人工智慧將加速應用程式和 API 數量的成長。我們已經看到這一切已經以人工智慧模型和新的人工智慧驅動服務的形式開始，新創公司和成熟的科技公司都在提供這種服務。我們預計，隨著企業在未來1 到2 年內加大對人工智慧的採用，這種採用將帶來大量新的企業應用程序，這些應用程式利用這些人工智慧模型和新的人工智慧驅動服務的API 。

These AI-powered applications differ from typical applications in several important ways: first, they are API-driven, both in terms of leveraging the APIs of third-party AI models and services and also in terms of exposing their own capabilities as APIs for downstream use. Thus, API security for these AI-powered apps is critical.

這些人工智慧驅動的應用程式在幾個重要方面與典型應用程式不同：首先，它們是API驅動的，無論是在利用第三方人工智慧模型和服務的API方面，還是在將自己的功能暴露為下游的API方面使用。因此，這些人工智慧應用程式的 API 安全性至關重要。

Customers tell us that API security is the top security service in use or planned for use to protect the integrity of AI and machine learning models. Customers also tell us that AI is driving demand for a comprehensive API security solution, inclusive of DDoS protection, bot detection and data masking and leak protection.

客戶告訴我們，API 安全是正在使用或計劃使用的頂級安全服務，用於保護人工智慧和機器學習模型的完整性。客戶也告訴我們，人工智慧正在推動對全面 API 安全解決方案的需求，包括 DDoS 防護、機器人偵測以及資料屏蔽和洩漏防護。

Second, AI-powered applications tend to be comprised of many different components and data sources, which are distributed across hybrid and multi-cloud environments. F5 is an AI enabler. Effectively optimizing, managing and securing AI applications and the APIs that connect them demands a blend of specialized expertise and capabilities that align seamlessly with our solutions portfolio.

其次，人工智慧驅動的應用程式往往由許多不同的元件和資料來源組成，這些元件和資料來源分佈在混合和多雲環境中。 F5 是人工智慧的推動者。有效優化、管理和保護人工智慧應用程式以及連接它們的 API 需要結合與我們的解決方案組合無縫結合的專業知識和能力。

We are the application and API expert with a deep understanding of the needs of demanding applications built over decades. This expertise and the capabilities of F5 Distributed Cloud Services is a powerful combination, particularly as customers begin to deploy real-life AI use cases.

我們是應用程式和 API 專家，對數十年來建立的高要求應用程式的需求有著深入的了解。這種專業知識和 F5 分散式雲端服務的功能是一個強大的組合，特別是當客戶開始部署現實生活中的 AI 使用案例時。

During Q1, we secured a win that highlights the synergies of our product families and showcases how F5 supports and enables AI-driven use cases. An EMEA-based service provider selected the combination of F5 Distributed Cloud Services and BIG-IP to secure and deliver a first-of-its-kind AI-as-a-service offering for their B2B customers.

在第一季度，我們取得了一場勝利，凸顯了我們產品系列的協同效應，並展示了 F5 如何支援和實現人工智慧驅動的用例。一家位於 EMEA 的服務供應商選擇將 F5 分散式雲端服務與 BIG-IP 結合，為其 B2B 客戶提供安全並提供首創的人工智慧即服務產品。

After comparing F5's capabilities to alternatives, the customer determined only F5 can meet the security and scalability requirements needed to deliver their offering in a cost-efficient way. These real-life use cases offer a view to how we are enabling customers to secure, deliver and optimize their applications and APIs and how we simplify the challenges of operating in a complex, hybrid, multi-cloud world.

在將 F5 的功能與替代方案進行比較後，客戶確定只有 F5 能夠滿足以經濟高效的方式交付其產品所需的安全性和可擴展性要求。這些現實生活中的用例讓我們了解了我們如何幫助客戶保護、交付和優化他們的應用程式和 API，以及我們如何簡化在複雜、混合、多雲世界中營運的挑戰。

Now I will turn the call to Frank. Frank?

現在我將把電話轉給弗蘭克。坦率？

Thank you, François, and good afternoon, everyone. I will review our Q1 results before I elaborate on our Q2 outlook. We delivered Q1 revenue of $693 million, reflecting sales that were down 1% year-over-year, with a mix of 56% global services and 44% product revenue. Global services revenue of $387 million grew a strong 7% due to continued high maintenance renewals as well as the continued benefit from price increases we introduced in FY '22.

謝謝弗朗索瓦，大家下午好。在詳細闡述第二季的前景之前，我將回顧第一季的業績。我們第一季的營收為 6.93 億美元，銷售額年減 1%，其中全球服務收入佔 56%，產品收入佔 44%。由於持續的高維護續約以及我們在 22 財年推出的價格上漲帶來的持續收益，全球服務收入達到 3.87 億美元，強勁成長 7%。

Product revenue totaled $306 million, down 10% year-over-year. Systems revenue of $135 million declined 22% year-over-year, reflecting a lower level of backlog-related shipments than we had in the year ago period. Software revenue grew 2% over the year ago period to $170 million.

產品收入總計3.06億美元，較去年同期下降10%。系統營收為 1.35 億美元，年減 22%，反映積壓相關出貨量低於去年同期。軟體營收較去年同期成長 2%，達到 1.7 億美元。

As François noted, Q1 was an unusually strong perpetual software license quarter, with several service providers opting to leverage CapEx versus OpEx models. Our perpetual software revenue was $46 million in Q1, representing 19% growth year-over-year, and 27% of Q1 software revenue.

正如 François 指出的那樣，第一季是一個異常強勁的永久軟體授權季度，多家服務供應商選擇利用資本支出而不是營運支出模式。第一季我們的永久軟體營收為 4,600 萬美元，年增 19%，佔第一季軟體營收的 27%。

We believe providing consumption model flexibility to our customers is a strategic advantage over competitors who restrict customer choice. The result can be quarters like this one, where we have unusual growth in perpetual software revenue. We do not believe that Q1 software revenue mix is indicative of changing customer preferences. Rather, it is a function of preferences of specific customers in the quarter.

我們相信，與限制客戶選擇的競爭對手相比，為客戶提供靈活的消費模式是一項策略優勢。結果可能是像本季一樣，我們的軟體收入持續成長異常。我們認為第一季的軟體收入組合並不表示客戶偏好改變。相反，它是該季度特定客戶偏好的函數。

Our subscription-based revenue declined 3% year-over-year to $125 million, representing 73% of Q1's total software revenue. New subscriptions and renewals both performed to plan in the quarter. Revenue from recurring sources contributed 73% of Q1's revenue, up from 68% a year ago. This is down slightly from recent levels as a result of the perpetual license revenue contribution in the quarter.

我們的訂閱收入年減 3%，至 1.25 億美元，佔第一季軟體總收入的 73%。本季度的新訂閱和續訂均符合計劃。來自經常性來源的收入佔第一季營收的 73%，高於一年前的 68%。由於本季度永久許可收入的貢獻，這一數字比最近的水平略有下降。

Recurring revenue includes subscription-based revenue as well as the maintenance portion of our services revenue. On a regional basis, revenue from Americas was down 6% year-over-year, representing 54% of total revenue; EMEA grew 5%, representing 28% of revenue; and APAC grew 8%, representing 18% of revenue.

經常性收入包括訂閱制的收入以及我們服務收入的維護部分。從地區來看，美洲地區的營收年減6%，佔總收入的54%；歐洲、中東和非洲地區成長 5%，佔營收的 28%；亞太地區成長 8%，佔營收的 18%。

Looking at our major verticals. During Q1, enterprise represented 64% of product bookings, service providers represented 17% and government customers represented 19%, including 4% from U.S. federal. Our Q1 operating results were strong, reflecting our continued operating discipline.

看看我們的主要垂直領域。第一季度，企業客戶佔產品預訂的 64%，服務提供者佔 17%，政府客戶佔 19%，其中 4% 來自美國聯邦政府。我們第一季的經營業績強勁，反映出我們持續的經營紀律。

GAAP gross margin was 80.3%. Non-GAAP gross margin was 83.1%, an improvement of 264 basis points from Q1 of FY '23. GAAP operating expenses were $392 million. Non-GAAP operating expenses were $330 million. Our GAAP operating margin was 23.8%. Our non-GAAP operating margin was 35.5%, an improvement of more than 900 basis points from Q1 of FY '23.

GAAP 毛利率為 80.3%。非 GAAP 毛利率為 83.1%，比 23 財年第一季提高了 264 個基點。 GAAP 營運費用為 3.92 億美元。非 GAAP 營運費用為 3.3 億美元。我們的 GAAP 營業利潤率為 23.8%。我們的非 GAAP 營業利潤率為 35.5%，比 23 財年第一季提高了 900 多個基點。

Our GAAP effective tax rate for the quarter was 20.7%. Our non-GAAP effective tax rate was 19.9%. This is below our initial expectations for the year as a result of IRS guidance issued during the quarter relating to foreign tax credits. Our GAAP net income for the quarter was $138 million or $2.32 per share. Our non-GAAP net income was $205 million or $3.43 per share, well above the top end of our guidance range. This is a result of the revenue beat, continued operating discipline with $0.09 as a result of the Q1 tax benefit.

我們本季的 GAAP 有效稅率為 20.7%。我們的非 GAAP 有效稅率為 19.9%。由於美國國稅局在本季發布了有關外國稅收抵免的指導意見，這低於我們對今年的初步預期。我們本季的 GAAP 淨利潤為 1.38 億美元，即每股 2.32 美元。我們的非 GAAP 淨利潤為 2.05 億美元，即每股 3.43 美元，遠高於我們指引範圍的上限。這是由於第一季稅收優惠帶來的收入成長和持續的營運紀律（0.09 美元）的結果。

I will now turn to cash flow and the balance sheet, which also remain very strong. We generated $165 million in cash flow from operations in Q1. Capital expenditures for the quarter were $9 million. DSO for the quarter was 67 days due to the back-end linearity of invoicing in the quarter. Cash and investments totaled approximately $832 million at quarter end. Deferred revenue increased 4% year-over-year to $1.83 billion.

我現在將談談現金流和資產負債表，它們也仍然非常強勁。我們第一季的營運產生了 1.65 億美元的現金流。該季度的資本支出為 900 萬美元。由於本季發票的後端線性性，本季的 DSO 為 67 天。截至季末，現金和投資總額約為 8.32 億美元。遞延營收年增 4%，達到 18.3 億美元。

Our share repurchases reflect our ongoing commitment to returning cash to shareholders. We repurchased $150 million worth of F5 shares in Q1 at an average price of $163 per share. Finally, we ended the quarter with approximately 6,440 employees.

我們的股票回購反映了我們對向股東返還現金的持續承諾。我們在第一季以每股 163 美元的平均價格回購了價值 1.5 億美元的 F5 股票。最後，本季結束時，我們的員工總數約為 6,440 名。

François outlined our Q2 outlook at the start of the call. I'll recap it with some additional color. We expect Q2 revenue in the range of $675 million to $695 million. We expect gross margins in the range of 82% to 83%. We estimate Q2 operating expenses of $347 million to $359 million. This is a step-up from Q1, reflecting our seasonal sequential uptick related to the reset and payroll taxes.

弗朗索瓦在電話會議開始時概述了我們對第二季度的展望。我將用一些額外的顏色來回顧一下。我們預計第二季營收在 6.75 億美元至 6.95 億美元之間。我們預計毛利率在 82% 至 83% 之間。我們預計第二季營運費用為 3.47 億美元至 3.59 億美元。這比第一季有所上升，反映了我們與重置稅和工資稅相關的季節性連續上升。

This year, it also reflects marketing expenses related to our global AppWorld customer events, which will take place in Q2 in San Jose and in other locations across the globe. We are targeting Q2 non-GAAP EPS in the range of $2.79 to $2.91 per share. We expect Q2 share-based compensation expense of approximately $56 million to $58 million. At this point in the fiscal year, we are not revising our revenue or operating margin targets for FY '24.

今年，它還反映了與我們的全球 AppWorld 客戶活動相關的行銷費用，這些活動將於第二季度在聖荷西和全球其他地點舉行。我們的第二季非 GAAP 每股盈餘目標為 2.79 美元至 2.91 美元。我們預計第二季的股權激勵費用約為 5,600 萬美元至 5,800 萬美元。在本財年的此時點，我們不會修改 24 財年的營收或營業利益率目標。

We continue to expect to achieve our FY '24 operating margin target range of 33% to 34%, which accounts for the normal seasonal step-up in operating expenses from Q1 to Q2. We now expect our FY '24 tax rate will be in the range of 21% to 22%, down slightly from our prior range of 21% to 23%. Given the new outlook in our annual tax rate, we now expect FY '24 non-GAAP EPS will grow between 6% to 8%. This is up from the 5% to 7% range we provided last quarter.

我們繼續預期 24 財年營業利潤率目標範圍將達到 33% 至 34%，這是第一季到第二季營業費用正常季節性成長的原因。我們現在預計 24 財年的稅率將在 21% 至 22% 之間，比之前的 21% 至 23% 略有下降。鑑於我們的年度稅率的新前景，我們現在預計 24 財年非 GAAP 每股盈餘將成長 6% 至 8%。這高於我們上季度提供的 5% 至 7% 的範圍。

I will now turn the call back over to François. François?

我現在將把電話轉回給弗朗索瓦。弗朗索瓦？

Thank you, Frank. In conclusion, I will reiterate that F5 is the only company capable of securing, delivering and optimizing any application, any API regardless of its location, be it in the data center, any one of the public clouds, as SaaS, or at the network edge.

謝謝你，弗蘭克。總之，我要重申，F5 是唯一一家能夠保護、交付和優化任何應用程式、任何 API 的公司，無論其位置如何，無論是在資料中心、任何一個公有雲、SaaS 還是網路中邊緣。

Amidst a complex web of environments and solutions, F5 empowers customers to establish and maintain a consistent security posture across all of their applications, enhancing security, streamlining operations and reducing costs. Moreover, we unifying our solutions to provide customers with unprecedented levels of visibility, manageability and automation.

在複雜的環境和解決方案網路中，F5 使客戶能夠在所有應用程式中建立和維護一致的安全態勢，從而增強安全性、簡化營運並降低成本。此外，我們統一我們的解決方案，為客戶提供前所未有的可見性、可管理性和自動化水準。

Before we go to questions, I will elaborate on the strategy and product session we are hosting next Thursday. We are going to use this event to discuss the hybrid multi-cloud challenges faced by large organizations worldwide, including the implications of AI on applications, APIs and security.

在我們提問之前，我將詳細介紹我們下週四舉辦的策略和產品會議。我們將利用本次活動討論全球大型組織面臨的混合多雲挑戰，包括人工智慧對應用程式、API 和安全性的影響。

We also will provide an overview of our product families, the market opportunities we see for them and how our portfolio transformation benefits our customers and differentiates F5. We look forward to seeing several of you live in San Jose and more of you virtually.

我們還將概述我們的產品系列、我們為它們看到的市場機會以及我們的產品組合轉型如何使我們的客戶受益並使 F5 脫穎而出。我們期待見到你們中的一些人住在聖荷西以及更多的人在網路上。

Operator, please open the call to questions.

接線員，請打開電話提問。

(Operator Instructions) Our first question is from Samik Chatterjee with JPMorgan.

（操作員指示）我們的第一個問題來自摩根大通的 Samik Chatterjee。

This is Joe Cardoso on for Samik. Just 1 question from me. You highlighted encouraging signs of stabilizing demand trends. Can you maybe just talk to the year-over-year revenue trends that you're seeing, excluding the backlog headwinds from a year ago?

我是喬·卡多佐 (Joe Cardoso) 替補薩米克 (Samik)。我只有 1 個問題。您強調了需求趨勢穩定的令人鼓舞的跡象。您能否談談您所看到的年收入趨勢，排除一年前的積壓不利因素？

And then perhaps can you just provide a bit more granularity around that comment? Like what are you seeing specifically under the hood from a customer or product portfolio perspective, and whether you're seeing any areas trending or any areas trending better than others?

然後也許您可以圍繞該評論提供更詳細的資訊嗎？例如您從客戶或產品組合的角度具體看到了什麼，以及您是否看到任何領域的趨勢或任何領域的趨勢比其他領域更好？

Well, thanks, Joe. Let me start with the first part of your question. Look, we shared at the beginning of the fiscal year that even though we were guiding revenue down -- flat to down to 3% down for the fiscal year, that, if you excluded the backlog effect, that would amount to about mid-single-digit growth.

嗯，謝謝，喬。讓我從你問題的第一部分開始。看，我們在本財年之初就表示，儘管我們引導收入下降——本財年收入持平至下降 3%，但如果排除積壓效應，這將相當於大約中單- 數字增長。

In terms of the demand that we are seeing, certainly, in terms of demand, if I compare what we saw in the first half of 2023 versus the demand that we saw in Q1 and what we expect to see in our Q2, half-on-half, first half '23 to first half '24, demand is meaningfully up relative to last year.

就我們所看到的需求而言，當然，就需求而言，如果我將 2023 年上半年的需求與我們在第一季度看到的需求以及我們預計在第二季度看到的需求進行比較，一半-23 年上半年到24 年上半年，需求相較於去年大幅成長。

Now that is, I would say, generally broad-based across all major theaters, and it's also across most industry verticals. We talked to -- some verticals are performing better than others. But generally, broadly, we've seen that across all industry verticals.

我想說，現在這在所有主要影院中普遍存在，也遍及大多數垂直行業。我們採訪過——一些垂直行業的表現比其他行業更好。但總的來說，我們在所有行業垂直領域都看到了這一點。

In terms of the product trends, I would say the trends are similar across the portfolio and not different than what we described in October, with continued great progress on our core franchise, BIG-IP, continued progress on NGINX and modern applications and continued strong adoption of our Distributed Cloud Services.

就產品趨勢而言，我想說整個產品組合的趨勢相似，與我們在10 月份描述的沒有什麼不同，我們的核心特許經營權BIG-IP 持續取得巨大進展，NGINX 和現代應用程序持續取得進展，並且持續強勁採用我們的分散式雲端服務。

Our next question is from Tim Long with Barclays.

我們的下一個問題來自巴克萊銀行的蒂姆·朗。

Two questions, if I could. First, maybe Frank or François, if you could just talk a little bit about the subscription number in the quarter. I guess the perpetual is really strong, but could you talk a little bit about particularly the sequential downtick in subscription? Is this related to kind of true-forwards or any kind of cannibalization? Or anything else in there you could go a little deeper on the software subscription weakness?

如果可以的話，有兩個問題。首先，也許是 Frank 或 François，請您簡單談談本季的訂閱數量。我想永續股確實很強勁，但您能談談訂閱量的連續下降嗎？這是否與真正的前鋒或任何類型的蠶食有關？或者還有其他什麼可以讓您更深入了解軟體訂閱的弱點？

And then the follow-up for François, I think you mentioned something about competitive wins in -- more in the systems and traditional ADC area. Obviously, there's some disruption at one of your major competitors. Could you just give a little color on how things are going competitively and how win rates are? And how much room do you think there is to take share in that more traditional ADC area?

然後是 François 的後續行動，我認為您提到了一些關於競爭性勝利的內容——更多是在系統和傳統 ADC 領域。顯然，您的主要競爭對手之一出現了一些混亂。能否簡單介紹一下競爭的進展以及勝率如何？您認為在較傳統的 ADC 領域還有多少份額空間？

Yes. Absolutely, Tim. Let me take the first part, and I'll let François take the second part. So with subscriptions, again, as I mentioned in the prepared remarks, largely performed to our expectations. On a sequential basis, if we were purely ratable, obviously, that would be concerning. But since we obviously have got some 606 term-based subscriptions in there that will hit at different points in time.

是的。當然，提姆。讓我講第一部分，我請法蘭索瓦講第二部分。因此，正如我在準備好的發言中提到的那樣，訂閱量基本上達到了我們的預期。從順序來看，如果我們純粹是可評級的，顯然，這將是令人擔憂的。但顯然我們已經有一些 606 個基於期限的訂閱，這些訂閱將在不同的時間點發生。

We had more renewals, frankly, in Q4 than we did in Q1. And so that's just the natural progression on the sequential growth side there. But we're not concerned at all about it. This is really our renewals and the new performed to our expectations. And no change for our outlook for the year based off of that, but I'll let François talk a little bit on the competitive side.

坦白說，我們在第四季的續訂量比第一季要多。所以這只是連續成長方面的自然進展。但我們對此根本不關心。這確實是我們的更新和新表現，符合我們的期望。我們對今年的展望不會因此而改變，但我會讓弗朗索瓦談談競爭方面的問題。

Tim, on the competitive side, we feel we are in a pretty strong competitive position, and I think our position of strength is, in fact, growing. And I would say, we are seeing, actually, increased inbound interest from both customers and partners into F5. And I think that's largely due to 2 big factors. .

提姆，在競爭方面，我們覺得我們處於相當強大的競爭地位，而且我認為我們的實力地位實際上正在成長。我想說，實際上，我們看到客戶和合作夥伴對 F5 的興趣都在增加。我認為這主要是由於兩大因素。 。

One factor is, frankly, we have not 1 but 3 competitors that have gone through change of control events in the last 12 to 18 months. One was primarily a hardware/software competitor, one has been a software competitor and one has been a SaaS competitor. And all 3 have had to kind of change their customer playbook as a result, and we're seeing inbound customer interest from that.

坦白說，一個因素是，我們有不是 1 個而是 3 個競爭對手在過去 12 到 18 個月內經歷了控制權變更事件。一個主要是硬體/軟體競爭對手，一個是軟體競爭對手，另一個是 SaaS 競爭對手。結果，這三家公司都必須改變他們的客戶策略，我們看到了入站客戶的興趣。

That contrasts with our approach and, frankly, the investments we've made over the last several years, where we have, just at this point in time where some competitors are getting weaker, we're introducing a very exciting set of proposition. You know that rSeries has had very strong adoption in the market. We're introducing next-generation hardware and software. That creates an exciting road map for competitors -- sorry, for customers.

這與我們的方法形成鮮明對比，坦白說，與我們過去幾年所做的投資形成鮮明對比，就在一些競爭對手變得越來越弱的時候，我們正在推出一套非常令人興奮的主張。您知道 rSeries 在市場上的採用率非常高。我們正在推出下一代硬體和軟體。這為競爭對手創建了一個令人興奮的路線圖——對不起，為客戶創建了一個令人興奮的路線圖。

And so the contracting sort of investments and road maps between players is really strengthening our head -- hands, sorry. And we're seeing a lot of accounts where, historically, we had been blocked or locked out of these accounts that we have been able to crack in the last couple of quarters, and we expect that to continue.

因此，參與者之間的承包式投資和路線圖確實增強了我們的頭腦——抱歉，雙手。我們看到很多帳戶在歷史上都曾被封鎖或被封鎖，但我們在過去幾個季度中能夠破解這些帳戶，我們預計這種情況將繼續下去。

In fact, just this week, we had a customer here that is one of the largest companies in America, one of the Fortune 100. We have not been able to crack that account. And we are now migrating pretty much their entire application estate from a competitor to F5. And the approach with these customers is we are landing them generally on our BIG-IP platform, but then we're able to land and expand and cross-sell into the other value propositions in the portfolio once they discover the full portfolio of F5 when they start working with us.

事實上，就在本週，我們這裡有一個客戶，它是美國最大的公司之一，也是財富 100 強之一。我們還無法破解該帳戶。我們現在正在將他們的幾乎整個應用程式資產從競爭對手遷移到 F5。針對這些客戶的方法是，我們通常會將他們登陸到我們的BIG-IP 平台上，但是一旦他們發現了F5 的完整產品組合，我們就能夠登陸並擴展並交叉銷售到產品組合中的其他價值主張。他們開始與我們合作。

So we think that, that trend is going to continue, and we feel very good about our competitive position over the next 2 to 3 quarters. And we're starting to see a growing pipeline that reflects that stronger position.

因此，我們認為這種趨勢將持續下去，我們對未來 2 到 3 個季度的競爭地位感到非常滿意。我們開始看到不斷增長的管道反映了這種更強大的地位。

Our next question is from Amit Daryanani with Evercore ISI.

我們的下一個問題來自 Evercore ISI 的 Amit Daryanani。

I have 2 as well. I guess first up on the software performance, I'd love to just understand if you still think for the fiscal year flat to up modestly the right way to think about it? And is any change in how you think about sort of the -- what happens to the perpetual market or the managed services or subscription as you go from here? Just an update on how you think about software stacking up for the rest of the year in any of those 3 buckets that changed your perspective right now?

我也有2個。我想首先是關於軟體效能，我想知道您是否仍然認為本財年持平適度上升是正確的思考方式？當您從這裡開始時，您對永久市場或託管服務或訂閱的看法是否會發生任何變化？只是更新您對今年剩餘時間軟體在這 3 個類別中的任何一個的看法，這改變了您現在的觀點？

Amit, let me start with that one. No is the answer. It's -- one quarter doesn't make a trend. We're obviously encouraged by what we saw in software in Q1. More to come on Q2 and beyond. But at this point, we're not changing the outlook on that modest growth view for software, and largely, again, subscription and perpetual service.

阿米特，讓我從那個開始。答案是否定的。這是──四分之一並不能形成趨勢。顯然，我們對第一季軟體中看到的情況感到鼓舞。第二季及以後還會有更多內容。但在這一點上，我們不會改變對軟體溫和成長的看法，尤其是訂閱和永久服務。

It was a big quarter for perpetual this quarter. It may not be the same next quarter in that regard. This is really about some specific customer preferences in the service provider market. And they could have easily have gone into a subscription model, and we would have seen that dynamic reverse. So no real change in our outlook for software right now for FY '24.

對 Perpetual 來說，這是一個重要的季度。在這方面，下個季度可能會有所不同。這實際上與服務提供者市場中的一些特定客戶偏好有關。他們可以很容易地進入訂閱模式，我們會看到這種動態逆轉。因此，我們對 24 財年軟體的展望目前沒有真正的變化。

Got it. And then I guess last time around, you talked about there might be a 400, 500 basis point headwind from this managed services transition you're going to take across '24 and '25. I was wondering if there was a better sense of when do you think those headwinds would happen if it's this year or next year?

知道了。然後我想上次您談到，您將在 24 年和 25 年進行的託管服務轉型可能會帶來 400、500 個基點的逆風。我想知道您是否能更好地判斷這些逆風何時會發生，是在今年還是明年？

And then, Frank, on the operating margin side, you had quite a bit of outperformance in the December quarter, which is really notable. And I realize you don't want to change the long-term target, but I'm wondering, was there anything one-off that enabled this upside in December or not?

然後，弗蘭克，在營業利潤方面，您在 12 月季度的表現相當出色，這確實值得注意。我知道你不想改變長期目標，但我想知道，是否有任何一次性因素導致了 12 月的這項上漲？

Sure, Amit. So look, we changed the outlook on EPS for the year, up 1%, really driven by tax. In the quarter itself, with OpEx, there were a few expenses that probably got pushed into either Q2 or beyond. But seasonally, Q1 is relatively strong, Q2 goes down because of the tax resets. It's also going down this year, in particular, because we're having our marketing event.

當然，阿米特。所以看，我們改變了今年 EPS 的前景，成長 1%，這實際上是由稅收推動的。在本季本身，由於營運支出，有一些費用可能被推到第二季或以後。但從季節性來看，第一季相對強勁，第二季因稅收重置而下降。今年也有所下降，尤其是因為我們正在舉辦行銷活動。

We take those expenses in the quarter in Q2 versus previous years, where they have been in Q3 or Q4. We actually didn't do one in FY '23. And so as a comparative point, that's new expense this year on a year-over-year basis. But the seasonality of where we really hit that tax reset happens in Q2, and we build our way back up from there. So that's that.

我們將第二季的這些支出與往年的第三季或第四季的支出進行比較。事實上，我們在 23 財年並沒有這麼做。因此，作為比較點，這是今年同比的新支出。但我們真正實現稅收重置的季節性發生在第二季度，我們從那裡開始恢復。就是這樣。

In terms of some of the migration of our Silverline, it's going as expected. It's very early. There's not really a lot more to say about it. As we said, generally, we're going to see more -- we'll probably see a balanced amount of customer accounts, but more of the ARR come across. That will come across in FY '25.

就我們 Silverline 的一些遷移而言，一切都按預期進行。時間還很早。對此真的沒什麼好說的。正如我們所說，一般來說，我們會看到更多——我們可能會看到平衡數量的客戶帳戶，但會出現更多的 ARR。這將在 25 財年實現。

Just given some of the feature parity that we're still working on, that's going to take some time. And the bigger customers are the long tail of the ones to migrate. So it's just going as planned right now, but we're obviously 1 quarter into an 8-quarter transition.

考慮到我們仍在研究的一些功能對等性，這將需要一些時間。較大的客戶是需要遷移的長尾客戶。所以現在一切都按計劃進行，但我們顯然已經進入 8 季過渡期的 1 季了。

Our next question is from Meta Marshall with Morgan Stanley.

我們的下一個問題來自摩根士丹利的梅塔·馬歇爾。

François, you noted that you weren't yet seeing kind of customer budgets change but getting to more predictable spending patterns. Just what are you seeing in terms of RFP activity? Understanding people are still kind of doing evaluations, but are you starting to kind of see a pickup in the valuations that they're doing? And any particular categories in which you're seeing that pickup in activity?

弗朗索瓦，您注意到您還沒有看到客戶預算發生變化，但支出模式變得更加可預測。您對 RFP 活動有何看法？了解人們仍然在進行評估，但是您是否開始看到他們正在做的估值有所回升？您在哪些特定類別中看到了活動的回升？

And then second, just on the service provider piece, it sounds as if that's really just an election decision. But anything that you're -- just given how constrained service provider spending has been over the last year, just anything that you were seeing in terms of them being more active in the market? Or any specifics around that vertical would be helpful.

其次，就服務提供者而言，聽起來這實際上只是一個選舉決定。但是，考慮到去年服務提供者支出受到的限制，以及您看到的他們在市場上更加活躍的情況，您會想到什麼？或有關該垂直領域的任何細節都會有所幫助。

Meta, it seems -- so let me start with the environment. What we have seen Meta is the -- relative to -- if I compare to where we were kind of 9, 12 months ago, we feel that the environment is more stable and more predictable in the sense that the budgets that are in place and the projects that our customers have told us they're moving forward to, when we get to the end of a selection process or the end of an RFP process, we very rarely get into a surprise where a project is canceled or an extra approval comes in and deals get delayed or pushed out. So that has subsided largely, and therefore, we see more predictability with customers.

看起來是元的——所以讓我從環境開始。我們所看到的 Meta 是——相對於——如果我與 9、12 個月前的情況進行比較，我們認為環境更加穩定、更加可預測，因為現有的預算和我們的客戶告訴我們他們正在推進的項目，當我們進入選擇過程或RFP 過程結束時，我們很少會對項目被取消或獲得額外批准感到驚訝交易被推遲或推遲。因此，這種情況已經在很大程度上消退，因此，我們看到客戶的可預測性更高。

That said, I would say there -- we haven't seen yet a notable increase in budgets. I think for the most part, for the calendar year, our customers don't have the kind of budget fully in place yet. So we'll start to learn more about that as the quarter goes on here. But what we are seeing that is encouraging is when you look at our pipeline over the next 4 quarters, we are seeing an uptick in the pipeline and potentially more tech refresh kind of activities. So that's an encouraging sign for what's ahead.

也就是說，我想說的是——我們還沒有看到預算顯著增加。我認為在大多數情況下，對於日曆年，我們的客戶還沒有完全到位的預算。因此，隨著本季的繼續，我們將開始了解更多相關資訊。但令人鼓舞的是，當您查看未來 4 個季度的管道時，我們會發現管道數量增加，並且可能會出現更多技術更新類活動。因此，這對未來來說是一個令人鼓舞的跡象。

In terms of service providers, I would say, generally, we're still seeing service providers continue to sweat their assets as much as they can, and therefore, suppress CapEx spend as much as they can. There are some exceptions to that, including, I mentioned in my prepared remarks, a significant win with a North American service provider in their 5G architecture. And so this is work that we have been doing with them now for several years, and we have been able to be part of their core 5G architecture.

就服務提供者而言，我想說，一般來說，我們仍然看到服務提供者繼續盡可能地消耗其資產，因此盡可能地抑制資本支出。但也有一些例外，包括我在準備好的發言中提到的，北美服務供應商在 5G 架構方面取得了重大勝利。因此，這是我們多年來一直與他們合作的工作，我們已經能夠成為他們核心 5G 架構的一部分。

And this is a spend for the next phase of scaling of their 5G services, which is really driven by consumer demand for 5G as well as fixed wireless access, which is a fast-growing service. And so there are a couple of carriers in America and outside that are moving forward with 5G and are investing in their architecture and scaling their architecture, and we're part of that, and that's where we're seeing success.

這是下一階段擴展 5G 服務的支出，這實際上是由消費者對 5G 以及固定無線存取（這是一項快速增長的服務）的需求所推動的。因此，美國內外有幾家營運商正在推進 5G，並投資於他們的架構並擴展他們的架構，我們是其中的一部分，這就是我們看到成功的地方。

That Meta, I should also say, is the result and the benefit from investments we started making over 4 years ago. And so over the last 4 years, we have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in our BIG-IP franchise really to future-proof the BIG-IP franchise for the next decade, and really by bringing to the BIG-IP franchise benefits that customers would have seen either in the public cloud or in cloud-native architectures.

我還應該說，Meta 是我們 4 年前開始投資的結果和收益。因此，在過去4 年裡，我們在BIG-IP 特許經營權上投資了數億美元，真正確保BIG-IP 特許經營權在未來十年能夠經受住未來考驗，並真正通過為客戶帶來BIG- IP 特許經營權的好處在公有雲或雲端原生架構中都會看到。

And those 5G architectures in the case of service provider are container-native and cloud-native, and we were really first out of the gate to bring a lot of 5G functions into a cloud-native architecture. And these investments that we've made into our BIG-IP platform are really starting to benefit in terms of customer wins, where customers are now starting to reinvest for the future. We're seeing that in service provider, but I think that's also going to play out in the enterprise as enterprises start to adopt the next generation of BIG-IP.

對於服務供應商來說，這些 5G 架構是容器原生和雲端原生的，我們確實是第一個將大量 5G 功能引入雲端原生架構的人。我們對 BIG-IP 平台進行的這些投資確實開始在贏得客戶方面受益，客戶現在開始為未來再投資。我們在服務提供者中看到了這一點，但我認為隨著企業開始採用下一代 BIG-IP，這也將在企業中發揮作用。

Our next question is from James Fish with Piper Sandler.

我們的下一個問題來自詹姆斯·菲什和派珀·桑德勒。

Just building off of some of the prior ones. Frank, can you just help us with how much of the recurring software product was tied to that SaaS drawdown or the headwinds that we've talked about with moving this more towards the Distributed Cloud Services over time versus the term license or roughly where that SaaS ARR sits today? And what's the early feedback then from some of these customers on this transition, François?

只是在之前的一些基礎上進行構建。 Frank，您能否幫助我們了解有多少重複性軟體產品與SaaS 縮減或我們討論過的逆風相關，隨著時間的推移，與術語許可證相比，更多地轉向分散式雲端服務，或者大致了解SaaS 的位置ARR 今天坐嗎？弗朗索瓦，這些客戶對這項轉變的早期回饋是什麼？

Yes, Fish, not going to update Q1. Obviously, we talked about doing that on an annual basis. But where we were at the end of Q4 was roughly $200 million of ARR associated with that business. $135 million of that was going to be recurring. We are going to be growing that, really, on the back of Distributed Cloud.

是的，Fish，不打算更新 Q1。顯然，我們討論過每年都這樣做。但截至第四季末，與該業務相關的 ARR 約為 2 億美元。其中 1.35 億美元將用於經常性支出。事實上，我們將在分散式雲端的支援下實現這一目標。

And $65 million of that was split between $30 million of product that we were retiring and did not expect to have a future, and $35 million or so was from Silverline that would migrate -- some portion of that would hopefully migrate over the next couple of years. But not going to update where we are at the end of Q1 in regards to that. We will give an update for that at the end of the year. But I'll let François answer the second part of your question.

其中 6500 萬美元分配給我們即將退役且預計不會有未來的 3000 萬美元產品，還有大約 3500 萬美元來自將遷移的 Silverline——其中一部分預計將在接下來的幾年內遷移年。但不會更新我們在第一季末的情況。我們將在今年年底提供更新。但我會讓法蘭索瓦回答你問題的第二部分。

What's the second part?

第二部分是什麼？

Sorry, sorry.

實在抱歉。

Jim, can you repeat the second part?

吉姆，你能重複第二部分嗎？

Yes. I was just looking for the early feedback from some of those customers that were part of that $65 million that essentially is being end of life, what those conversations are looking like at this point?

是的。我只是在尋找一些客戶的早期回饋，這些客戶是這 6500 萬美元產品的一部分，該產品基本上即將結束，目前這些對話是什麼樣的？

Okay. Great. No, Jim, look, those -- we are -- as Frank said, we are early days in this process, Jim, and we said it's going to happen over the next couple of years. So I think it's very early to draw some kind of long-term conclusions. However, we have migrated some customers from Silverline to F5 Distributed Cloud Services. And for those customers who have completed the migration, it has gone very well. And generally, they're very happy with the outcome. So we are pleased with the early results of these migrations, but more to come as we get more into it.

好的。偉大的。不，吉姆，聽著，那些——我們是——正如弗蘭克所說，我們正處於這個過程的早期階段，吉姆，我們說這將在未來幾年內發生。所以我認為現在得出某種長期結論還為時過早。不過，我們已將一些客戶從 Silverline 遷移到 F5 分散式雲端服務。對於那些已經完成遷移的客戶來說，一切都很順利。一般來說，他們對結果非常滿意。因此，我們對這些遷移的早期結果感到滿意，但隨著我們深入研究，還會有更多結果。

Got it. I know you don't want to give too much ahead of the event here in a few weeks, but are you guys seeing much contribution from AI? Or how should we think about when this contribution could really pick up for you guys and accelerate product growth?

知道了。我知道你們不想在幾週後的活動之前給出太多信息，但是你們看到人工智能做出了很多貢獻嗎？或者我們應該如何考慮這種貢獻何時才能真正為你們帶來並加速產品成長？

Thank you, Jim. So our view on AI, so we have started seeing this quarter kind of the first emerging AI use cases of AI workloads that either needed to be traffic managed or load balanced or required some security. It's early days because we think enterprise adoption and deployment of AI workloads is going to really start happening more, we think, in 12 to 24 months.

謝謝你，吉姆。我們對人工智慧的看法是，本季我們開始看到人工智慧工作負載的第一個新興人工智慧用例，這些用例要么需要流量管理、負載平衡，要么需要一定的安全性。現在還為時過早，因為我們認為企業採用和部署人工智慧工作負載將在 12 到 24 個月內真正開始發生更多情況。

We think a lot of enterprises right now are testing some AI models and experimenting and getting through the learning curve, but they're not at a stage of deploying in production. So we think it's kind of 12 to 24 months away, even though we're starting to see the first couple of use cases. That being said, from what we are seeing today, we feel very good that F5 is going to be an enabler of AI adoption and AI deployment. And we feel this way for 2 reasons.

我們認為現在很多企業正在測試一些人工智慧模型並進行實驗並完成學習曲線，但他們還沒有處於生產部署階段。因此，儘管我們已經開始看到最初的幾個用例，但我們認為還需要 12 到 24 個月的時間。話雖如此，從我們今天所看到的情況來看，我們非常高興 F5 將成為人工智慧採用和部署的推動者。我們有這種感覺有兩個原因。

The first is AI workloads are heavy consumers of APIs. And so APIs play a big role in the architecture of AI workloads because they need to ingest data and information or services from other AI models and also expose their own capabilities to other AI models or data sources. And because of that, there's a lot of API traffic in AI workloads. And therefore, API security is going to be a substantial opportunity for AI, and we are very well positioned for that with the investments that we've made across the portfolio, including in F5 Distributed Cloud Services.

首先，人工智慧工作負載是 API 的大量消耗者。因此，API 在人工智慧工作負載的架構中發揮重要作用，因為它們需要從其他人工智慧模型獲取資料和資訊或服務，並將自己的功能暴露給其他人工智慧模型或資料來源。正因為如此，人工智慧工作負載中存在大量 API 流量。因此，API 安全性對於 AI 來說將是一個巨大的機會，透過我們在整個產品組合（包括 F5 分散式雲端服務）中所做的投資，我們已經做好了充分的準備。

And then the second reason is that we're seeing AI workloads becoming quite distributed because some of the compute needs to be at the edge, but the data and the data sources could be in more central locations or in public clouds or at the edge. So the fact that these workloads are distributed plays very well to the value -- the core value proposition of F5 being a company that can serve any application or any API anywhere in any environment. And we're quite unique in being in that position, so we think with AI, that is going to play to our strength.

第二個原因是，我們看到人工智慧工作負載變得相當分散，因為一些運算需要位於邊緣，但資料和資料來源可能位於更中心的位置、公有雲或邊緣。因此，這些工作負載是分散式的，這一事實很好地體現了價值——F5 的核心價值主張是一家可以在任何環境中的任何地方為任何應用程式或任何 API 提供服務的公司。我們在這個位置上是非常獨特的，所以我們認為人工智慧將發揮我們的優勢。

Our next question is from Michael Ng with Goldman Sachs.

我們的下一個問題來自高盛的 Michael Ng。

I just have 2. First, on global services, very strong growth in the quarter, 7%. Could you talk about what may have gone better than expected? Are you still expecting global services revenue to grow low single digits for the full year?

我只想說 2。首先，在全球服務方面，本季成長非常強勁，達到 7%。能談談哪些方面可能比預期更好嗎？您是否仍預期全年全球服務收入將成長低個位數？

And then second, I was just wondering if you could provide a little bit more color on the recurring revenue figure in the quarter, whether you could talk about the year-over-year increase or the sequential increase, kind of key factors impacting the change in recurring revenue.

其次，我只是想知道您是否可以對本季度的經常性收入數據提供更多信息，您是否可以談論同比增長或環比增長，這些是影響變化的關鍵因素在經常性收入中。

Sure, Michael. So the -- let me -- I'll take both but let me start with your first question on global services. It was quite strong for the quarter. There are a couple of factors. We are still seeing high maintenance attach, particularly for some of our older platforms.

當然，邁克爾。所以，讓我，我將兩者都考慮，但讓我從你關於全球服務的第一個問題開始。本季的表現相當強勁。有幾個因素。我們仍然看到高維護成本，特別是對於我們的一些舊平台。

We're starting to see some of that decline a little bit, which gives us some thoughts that over time. We're going to see some of the refresh happen, but it's too early to call like which quarter, in particular, that, that starts to take place. And it's still, as I mentioned in the prepared remarks, we had our price increase that impacted our global services revenue as well in July of '22.

我們開始看到其中一些有所下降，這讓我們隨著時間的推移有了一些想法。我們將看到一些更新的發生，但現在判斷哪個季度，特別是哪個季度開始發生還為時過早。正如我在準備好的演講中提到的那樣，我們的價格上漲在 2022 年 7 月也影響了我們的全球服務收入。

We captured some of that, a good portion of that in Q1 of '23, but there was some more that came forward in Q1 of '24 that ended up lifting that as well. We have not changed our outlook for the full year on low single digit. There's a possibility we do better than that, but I wouldn't change -- we're not changing our model at this stage for this first quarter.

我們捕捉了其中的一些內容，其中很大一部分是在 23 年第一季實現的，但在 24 年第一季出現了更多內容，最終也提升了這一點。我們沒有改變對全年低個位數的展望。我們有可能做得更好，但我不會改變——我們在第一季的現階段不會改變我們的模型。

We'll see what happens over the next couple of quarters because there are some of those dynamics that could flop that we've seen for the past 5 or 6 quarters on asset sweating to turn into a refresh cycle. And so some of that could swap out, but we will see as we continue to go throughout.

我們將看看接下來幾季會發生什麼，因為我們在過去 5 或 6 個季度中看到的資產流失的一些動態可能會失敗，從而轉變為更新周期。因此，其中一些可能會被替換，但我們會在繼續進行的過程中看到。

And then in the recurring revenue piece of the total business, some of that was just impacted by the large service provider deals. It is on track to exactly what we were expecting and modeling. And so we are feeling quite good about the business to come.

然後，在總業務的經常性收入部分中，其中一些只是受到大型服務提供者交易的影響。它正朝著我們所期望和建模的方向發展。因此，我們對未來的業務感覺非常好。

Our next question is from Alex Henderson with Needham & Company.

我們的下一個問題來自 Needham & Company 的 Alex Henderson。

I was hoping you could talk a little bit about the enterprise behavior patterns around what has been termed the year of efficiency, which, obviously, had a negative impact on new application development as well as the impact it had on existing applications, which were then shut down, downsized or cleaned up. I've heard some indications that, that's starting to shift to a reacceleration. And I would think that, that would play well to your application and, particularly, NGINX and other product lines. So is that something that you're seeing? Or are you just too early to say that there's any reacceleration since the application growth?

我希望您能圍繞所謂的「效率年」談談企業行為模式，這顯然對新應用程式開發以及對現有應用程式的影響產生了負面影響。關閉、縮小規模或清理。我聽到一些跡象表明，這種情況開始轉向重新加速。我認為，這對您的應用程序，特別是 NGINX 和其他產品線來說會很好。那是你所看到的嗎？或者您現在說自應用程式成長以來有任何重新加速還為時過早嗎？

Alex, it's a great question. Let me parse it out. I think 1 thing we have seen perhaps accelerate in large enterprises, really, over the last 12 months is consolidation. And so really going through their portfolio of applications in an enterprise and looking through that portfolio and looking at what apps are really mission-critical, which apps really need to continue to be in service and which apps need to be decommissioned or rationalized. And we have seen more enterprises pick the decisions of rationalizing some apps and, in some cases, reducing their application portfolio to focus on the ones that are most meaningful.

亞歷克斯，這是一個很好的問題。讓我來解析一下。我認為，在過去 12 個月裡，我們在大型企業中看到的可能加速的一件事就是整合。因此，要真正檢查企業中的應用程式組合，並查看該組合併查看哪些應用程式真正是關鍵任務，哪些應用程式確實需要繼續使用，哪些應用程式需要退役或合理化。我們看到越來越多的企業選擇合理化某些應用程序，並在某些情況下減少應用程式組合，以專注於最有意義的應用程式。

At the same time, we have seen those apps that are important to enterprises. Application traffic on these apps continue to grow. And they continue to modernize applications, meaning, they can start with traditional applications and add modern components that are in a public cloud or in a private cloud. And that leads to more and more of these multi-cloud environment for application portfolio.

同時，我們也看到了那些對企業來說很重要的應用程式。這些應用程式的應用程式流量持續增長。他們繼續對應用程式進行現代化改造，這意味著他們可以從傳統應用程式開始，然後添加公有雲或私有雲中的現代元件。這導致越來越多的多雲環境用於應用程式組合。

And that's where, really, we have positioned F5 to be the ideal partner for large enterprises that have an application portfolio that is distributed across multiple environments: private cloud, public cloud, on-prem and, increasingly, at the edge. And we are starting -- in our engagement with customers, we're starting to see that play out.

事實上，這就是我們將 F5 定位為大型企業的理想合作夥伴，這些企業擁有分佈在多個環境中的應用程式組合：私有雲、公有雲、本地部署以及越來越多的邊緣環境。我們正在開始——在與客戶的接觸中，我們開始看到這種情況的發生。

So for example, [OAuth] today, 2/3 of our NGINX customers are also BIG-IP customers. So the cross-selling effect on the portfolio, off-taking a BIG-IP customer that has a traditional application that then goes and wants to modernize that application or parts of their application portfolio landing on NGINX, is a motion that we have made easier for customers, both technically and in our commercial agreements.

例如，今天的 [OAuth]，我們 2/3 的 NGINX 客戶也是 BIG-IP 客戶。因此，對產品組合的交叉銷售效應，即承購擁有傳統應用程式的 BIG-IP 客戶，然後希望對該應用程式或其部分應用程式組合進行現代化改造，登陸 NGINX，這是我們簡化的一項動議對於客戶來說，無論是在技術上還是在我們的商業協議中。

We mentioned in the call on Q4 that we had passed 500 Distributor Cloud customers, and 2/3 of those customers of Distributed Cloud are also existing F5 customers on BIG-IP or NGINX. And so again, these are examples of customers that are distributing apps across multiple environments, and they are leveraging more and more multiple products in the F5 portfolio to do so.

我們在第四季的電話會議中提到，我們已經突破了 500 個分散式雲端客戶，其中 2/3 的分散式雲端客戶也是 BIG-IP 或 NGINX 上現有的 F5 客戶。同樣，這些都是跨多個環境分發應用程式的客戶的範例，並且他們正在利用 F5 產品組合中越來越多的多種產品來實現這一目標。

And then the second question was on the upgrade cycle around the rSeries versus the older iSeries. We've been now, I think, 18, almost 24 months into that product launch. Initially, it was hampered by inability to do a lot of the use cases. My assumption is that you have now completed all of the use cases that were on the iSeries and therefore should be seeing a meaningful upgrade cycle over the next 12 to 18 months to that platform. Can you talk a little bit about what type of renewal cycle you expect there?

第二個問題是關於 rSeries 與舊 iSeries 的升級週期。我想，我們推出該產品已經 18 個月了，差不多 24 個月了。最初，它因無法完成許多用例而受到阻礙。我的假設是，您現在已經完成了 iSeries 上的所有用例，因此應該會在未來 12 到 18 個月內看到該平台的有意義的升級週期。您能談談您期望的更新周期類型嗎？

Alex, thank you. Well, first of all, we are really pleased with the adoption of rSeries in our customer base. I mean, I mentioned earlier that we have put a lot of work towards bringing these cloud benefits like multi-tenancy to our customers. And that's one of the reasons the adoption of rSeries has gone very well.

亞歷克斯，謝謝你。首先，我們對 rSeries 在我們的客戶群中的採用感到非常高興。我的意思是，我之前提到過，我們已經投入了大量工作來為客戶帶來多租戶等雲端優勢。這就是 rSeries 的採用進展順利的原因之一。

Relative to where we were a few quarters ago, Alex, you're absolutely right. We have maybe now the majority of the use cases with -- that we had on our private platform, iSeries, are now covered by rSeries. Not all of them, we're still working through some of them, but the majority are covered. And I think, this year, the majority of the appliances we ship will be rSeries. So they are -- I think they have passed already 50% -- more than 50% of the appliance we're shipping are now rSeries.

相對於我們幾個季度前的情況，亞歷克斯，你是絕對正確的。我們現在可能擁有私有平台 iSeries 上的大多數用例，現在都由 rSeries 覆蓋。並非全部，我們仍在解決其中一些問題，但大多數都已涵蓋。我認為，今年我們發貨的大部分設備將是 rSeries。所以他們——我認為他們已經超過了 50%——我們現在發貨的設備中超過 50% 都是 rSeries。

In terms of would we see a big refresh cycle or a big ramp related to rSeries in coming quarters? I would say, I wouldn't think about this the way we used to think about refresh cycles 7, 8 years ago when our business model was entirely appliance-driven. But I do think we are seeing a pipeline of tech refresh in the coming quarters that is stronger than what we had 6 to 12 months ago, and that will go to rSeries largely.

就未來幾季我們是否會看到與 rSeries 相關的大更新周期或大增長而言？我想說，我不會像七、八年前我們思考更新周期的方式來思考這個問題，當時我們的商業模式完全是設備驅動的。但我確實認為，我們將在未來幾季看到一系列技術更新，這比 6 到 12 個月前更強勁，而這將主要流向 rSeries。

So the pipeline is improving and the subscription turnover should be amplified over the next 2, 3, 4 quarters is sort of the read?

那麼管道正在改善，訂閱成交量應該會在接下來的 2、3、4 個季度內放大，這是一種解讀嗎？

Well, I just want to make sure, Alex. I'm talking about the pipeline of tech refresh, which is hardware, which is largely not sold on a subscription basis, but rather, typically, on a perpetual basis. But yes, that pipeline is increasing. Of course, what we'll have to see is what is the conversion on that pipeline when we get to it.

好吧，我只是想確定一下，亞歷克斯。我說的是技術更新的管道，即硬件，它很大程度上不是以訂閱方式出售，而是通常以永久方式出售。但是，是的，這條管道正在增加。當然，我們必須看到的是，當我們到達該管道時，它的轉換是什麼。

Over the past, I would say, in 2023, pipeline conversion was, of course, not as good as it has been in prior years. But we're hoping, with more predictability, we would -- that we would see a better pipeline conversion.

我想說，在過去，2023年，管道改造當然不如前幾年好。但我們希望，透過更多的可預測性，我們會看到更好的管道轉換。

The other data point that we're seeing is the rate of increased aging at our customers. Aging of the platform is slowing down, which suggests that the sweating of assets is tempering down a little bit, specifically with enterprise customers. And so hopefully, this will play out in coming quarters.

我們看到的另一個數據點是客戶的老化速度加快。該平台的老化速度正在放緩，這表明資產的消耗正在減弱，特別是對於企業客戶。希望這將在未來幾個季度發揮作用。

Our next question is from Tal Liani with Bank of America.

我們的下一個問題來自美國銀行的塔爾·利亞尼 (Tal Liani)。

I have 2 questions, more kind of longer term, not on the quarter. SaaS is about 7% of total revenues, give or take, if I look at what you disclosed last year. What needs to happen or what can you do in order to grow SaaS revenue substantially? And I'm talking about what are you doing on front of educating the channels and things you need to do with the channels and go-to-market and things?

我有兩個問題，更多的是長期問題，而不是季度問題。如果我看看你去年披露的內容，無論多少，SaaS 約佔總收入的 7%。為了大幅增加 SaaS 收入，需要做什麼或可以做什麼？我說的是在教育管道方面你正在做什麼以及你需要對通路和進入市場等事情做些什麼？

And the second question is related to that, but kind of an aside. How much competition do you see from CDN companies like Akamai and CloudFlare are adding features? And how much of a risk is it to F5?

第二個問題與此相關，但有點旁白。您認為 Akamai 和 CloudFlare 等 CDN 公司在添加功能方面的競爭有多大？ F5的風險有多大？

Thank you, Tal. I think I'll start here. So Tal, first of all, let me make sure we're using the same terminology here. So SaaS and managed services represent, you're right, about 7% of our revenues. We have said on our October call that given the transition we were going through in our managed services, that we expected our ARR in SaaS and managed services to be flat over the -- basically, over FY '24, FY '25, but then beyond that, returning to growth.

謝謝你，塔爾。我想我會從這裡開始。塔爾，首先讓我確保我們在這裡使用相同的術語。所以，你說得對，SaaS 和託管服務約占我們收入的 7%。我們在 10 月的電話會議上表示，考慮到我們在託管服務方面正在經歷的轉型，我們預計 SaaS 和託管服務的 ARR 在 2024 財年和 25 財年基本上持平，但之後除此之外，恢復增長。

In terms of the things that we can do to drive growth in this business, it's -- we're continuing to focus on areas that are markets that are growing and where we will gain more customer adoption, specifically the WAAP market for all application security, API security, bot defense, web application firewall, DDoS, this bundle of services. We're doing very well in the WAAP market today with Distributed Cloud Services, but there's plenty of opportunity for us to grow.

就我們可以採取的措施來推動這項業務的成長而言，我們將繼續關注正在成長的市場領域，以及我們將獲得更多客戶採用的領域，特別是所有應用程式安全的 WAAP 市場、API 安全性、機器人防禦、Web 應用程式防火牆、DDoS，這一系列服務。如今，我們的分散式雲端服務在 WAAP 市場上表現非常出色，但我們還有很多發展的機會。

And the multi-cloud networking market, we're starting to see traction and more customers needing to connect applications between clouds. And we have a perfect solution that is a SaaS-based solution for that marketplace. So I think the ambition here is to really win in these 2 markets, and that alone should drive substantial growth over time in our SaaS and managed services business.

在多雲網路市場中，我們開始看到吸引力，越來越多的客戶需要在雲端之間連接應用程式。我們有一個完美的解決方案，是針對該市場的基於 SaaS 的解決方案。因此，我認為我們的目標是真正贏得這兩個市場，僅此一點就應該推動我們的 SaaS 和託管服務業務隨著時間的推移而大幅增長。

And the approach to that is really landing the customers on an initial service and then expanding, over time, to other services. In terms of competition with CDN players, yes, in this market, we will compete more and more with those players. They have been, frankly, in the market for longer than we have, and they have more maturity today in this market than we have.

實現這一目標的方法實際上是讓客戶獲得初始服務，然後隨著時間的推移擴展到其他服務。在與CDN玩家的競爭方面，是的，在這個市場上，我們將與這些玩家進行越來越多的競爭。坦白說，他們進入市場的時間比我們長，而且他們今天在這個市場上比我們更成熟。

So we are in the SaaS part of the business. We are -- this is really a net new opportunity for us, and we are an attacker in this market. I think the 2 big strengths we bring to this competition is, number one, the architecture that we have is a more recent architecture and it's entirely defined in software. And so it's not limited by the limitation of hardware in any given thought. And so it's more universal and more flexible than prior architectures.

所以我們從事的是 SaaS 業務。我們——這對我們來說確實是一個全新的機會，我們是這個市場的攻擊者。我認為我們為這次競賽帶來的兩大優勢是，第一，我們擁有的架構是更新的架構，並且完全在軟體中定義。因此，在任何給定的想法中，它都不受硬體限制的限制。因此它比以前的架構更通用、更靈活。

Number two, we bring 20,000 customers that we have that have used F5 hardware, software, deployable hardware/software products in the past and often want to continue to use those products and add SaaS to support other applications. And ideally, we want to be able to manage the whole thing from a single pane of glass. And that is something that F5 is going to be able to do that our competitors are not able to do.

第二，我們擁有 20,000 名客戶，他們過去使用過 F5 硬體、軟體、可部署的硬體/軟體產品，並且經常希望繼續使用這些產品並添加 SaaS 來支援其他應用程式。理想情況下，我們希望能夠透過單一管理平台管理整個事情。這是 F5 能夠做到但我們的競爭對手無法做到的事情。

In addition to all the sort of product capabilities, we're also -- I think you touched on it, Tal. We're also spending a lot of time on our go-to-market, educating our channel partners. We are very pleased that a lot of the deals we're winning in SaaS, actually, over the last -- I think over the last 12 months, close to 50% of the deals we have won in SaaS have been partner-initiated opportunities. And so we are very pleased with the early contribution of our partners to this growth.

除了所有類型的產品功能之外，我們還——我想你也提到了這一點，塔爾。我們也花費大量時間進行市場推廣，教育我們的通路夥伴。我們非常高興我們在 SaaS 領域贏得的許多交易實際上是在過去 - 我認為在過去 12 個月中，我們在 SaaS 領域贏得的交易中有近 50% 是合作夥伴發起的機會。因此，我們對合作夥伴為這一成長做出的早期貢獻感到非常高興。

But there's more to do. We've been on the road show over the last several months, educating all of our partners on the value proposition, and we're seeing more and more traction with them. So a lot more work to do on the go-to-market because it's early days, but we're happy with their initial contribution to the success.

但還有更多事情要做。在過去的幾個月裡，我們一直在進行路演，向所有合作夥伴介紹價值主張，我們看到他們越來越受到關注。由於現在還處於早期階段，因此在進入市場方面還有很多工作要做，但我們對他們對成功的初步貢獻感到滿意。

Our final question will be from Sebastien Naji with William Blair.

我們的最後一個問題將由塞巴斯蒂安·納吉和威廉·布萊爾提出。

Can you maybe comment on how much of your software growth outlook here in fiscal year '24 is underpinned by that app growth that you've been talking about, driving expansions versus your ability to cross-sell some of your existing customers to either additional security or to Distributed Cloud Services? And then as a second question, just following up on the CDN commentary. What are the types of customers that have been the early adopters of that CDN module and Distributed Cloud?

您能否評論一下您在 24 財年的軟體成長前景有多少是由您一直在談論的應用程式成長所支撐的，推動擴張與您向某些現有客戶交叉銷售額外安全性的能力或者分佈式雲端服務？接下來是第二個問題，跟進 CDN 的評論。 CDN 模組和分散式雲端的早期採用者有哪些類型的客戶？

Let me start with the second part of the question. So the CDN module of Distributed Cloud, as you know, is fairly recent. I think we launched it about a quarter ago, if I recall. And we've had adoption. So this has been, I was mentioning earlier, a land and expand motion. So the customers who have adopted that are customers that typically did not start with F5 for CDN.

讓我從問題的第二部分開始。如您所知，分散式雲端的 CDN 模組是相當新的。如果我沒記錯的話，我想我們大約在一個季度前推出了它。我們已經領養了。所以，我之前提到過，這是一項土地和擴張動議。因此，採用 F5 的客戶通常不會開始使用 F5 CDN。

But typically, they started with F5 for a security solution. And it may have been web application firewall, it may have been DDoS protection or, in some cases, they may have been load balancing on distributed cloud, but then having landed on our platform, wanted to simplify their architecture and then adopted CDN as an additional module. We've seen service providers do that, and we've seen enterprises do that across a number of verticals.

但通常情況下，他們會從 F5 開始尋找安全解決方案。它可能是Web應用程式防火牆，可能是DDoS防護，或者在某些情況下，他們可能是分散式雲端上的負載平衡，但後來登陸了我們的平台，想要簡化他們的架構，然後採用CDN作為附加模組。我們已經看到服務提供者這樣做了，我們也看到企業在多個垂直領域都這樣做了。

To the first part of your question around our software growth for the year, okay, it's really about having a strong renewal performance on a renewal basis. So we have pretty good visibility on our renewals in the first quarter, frankly, and even most of last year. Even in a tough environment last year, renewals performed largely as we expected. So we continue to expect to see strong performance on our renewals and true-forward and some expansion.

對於您關於今年軟體成長的問題的第一部分，好吧，這實際上是關於在更新的基礎上擁有強大的更新效能。因此，坦白說，我們對第一季甚至去年大部分時間的續約都有很好的了解。即使去年環境嚴峻，續約表現基本上符合我們的預期。因此，我們繼續期望看到我們的續約、真實前瞻和一些擴張的強勁表現。

And then in the new software subscription, our premise here is that the environment hasn't changed too much from last year. We have a lot of predictability. But we are not expecting a lot of these large transformational projects to really be a big contributor to our new software subscriptions in the year. Thank you.

然後在新的軟體訂閱中，我們這裡的前提是環境與去年相比沒有太大變化。我們有很多可預測性。但我們並不期望許多大型轉型專案真正成為我們今年新軟體訂閱的重要貢獻者。謝謝。

Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. This does conclude our conference today. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.

謝謝。目前沒有其他問題。我們今天的會議到此結束。此時您可以斷開線路。感謝您的參與。