(SPOT) 2023 Q2 法說會逐字稿

Good morning. My name is Julianne, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to Spotify's Q2 2023 Earnings Call and Webcast.

早上好。我叫朱莉安，今天我將擔任你們的會議操作員。此時此刻，我謹歡迎大家參加 Spotify 2023 年第二季度財報電話會議和網絡廣播。

(Operator Instructions) I would now like to turn the call over to Bryan Goldberg, Head of Investor Relations. Thank you. You may begin your conference.

（操作員說明）我現在想將電話轉給投資者關係主管 Bryan Goldberg。謝謝。您可以開始您的會議了。

Thank you, operator, and welcome to Spotify's Second Quarter 2023 Earnings Conference Call. Joining us today will be Daniel Ek, our CEO; and Paul Vogel, our CFO. We'll start with opening comments from Daniel and Paul and afterwards, we'll be happy to answer your questions. (Operator Instructions) Before we begin, let me quickly cover the safe harbor.

謝謝運營商，歡迎參加 Spotify 2023 年第二季度收益電話會議。今天加入我們的是我們的首席執行官 Daniel Ek；和我們的首席財務官保羅·沃格爾。我們將從 Daniel 和 Paul 的開場評論開始，然後我們很樂意回答您的問題。 （操作員指示）在我們開始之前，讓我快速介紹一下安全港。

During this call, we'll be making certain forward-looking statements, including projections or estimates about the future performance of the company. These statements are based on current expectations and assumptions that are subject to risks and uncertainties. Actual results could materially differ because of factors discussed on today's call, in our shareholder deck and in filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

在這次電話會議中，我們將做出某些前瞻性陳述，包括對公司未來業績的預測或估計。這些陳述基於當前的預期和假設，存在風險和不確定性。由於今天的電話會議、我們的股東資料以及向美國證券交易委員會提交的文件中討論的因素，實際結果可能會存在重大差異。

During this call, we'll also refer to certain non-IFRS financial measures. Reconciliations between our IFRS and non-IFRS financial measures can be found in our shareholder deck in the financial section of our Investor Relations website and also furnished today on Form 6-K.

在本次電話會議中，我們還將提及某些非 IFRS 財務指標。我們的 IFRS 和非 IFRS 財務指標之間的調節可以在我們投資者關係網站財務部分的股東資料中找到，並且今天也在表格 6-K 中提供。

And with that, I'm going to turn the call over to Daniel.

就這樣，我要把電話轉給丹尼爾。

All right. Hey, everyone, and thank you all for joining us. I hope you all had a chance to review our shareholder deck. And as you can see, it was a very strong quarter. We beat our own expectations again across both MAU and subs. And in addition, it's really gratifying to see the outperformance in growth that continues to come from markets all over the world.

好的。大家好，感謝大家加入我們。我希望你們都有機會回顧我們的股東資料。正如您所看到的，這是一個非常強勁的季度。我們在月活躍用戶數和訂閱用戶數上再次超出了我們自己的預期。此外，看到世界各地市場繼續表現出色的增長真是令人欣慰。

So let me share some more context on the growth this quarter before we go into what it ultimately means for the business. So this quarter netted the highest MAU growth in Spotify's history. And as a point of comparison, our growth this quarter was 36 million, compared to Q2 of 2022, where we saw MAU growth of 19 million. And this reacceleration is significant and shows that our investments in adding podcasts and improving our platform and user experience are paying off nicely. I have talked before about the fact that the biggest driver of our subscriber growth comes from users who start on our ad-supported service. It is a really powerful funnel where the more our users discover and engage the more they're willing to pay for an enhanced experience. And with 6 quarters of MAU outperformance, we are capitalizing on this momentum and is proving to have a meaningful effect, helping us achieve 10 million net new subscribers this quarter, 3 million more than we originally anticipated.

因此，在我們討論本季度增長對業務的最終意義之前，讓我先分享一些有關本季度增長的更多背景信息。因此，本季度實現了 Spotify 歷史上最高的月活躍用戶增長。相比之下，我們本季度的增長為 3600 萬，而 2022 年第二季度我們的月活躍用戶增長了 1900 萬。這種重新加速意義重大，表明我們在添加播客以及改善平台和用戶體驗方面的投資正在獲得良好回報。我之前曾談到過這樣一個事實，即我們訂閱者增長的最大推動力來自於開始使用我們的廣告支持服務的用戶。這是一個非常強大的渠道，我們的用戶發現和參與的越多，他們就越願意為增強的體驗付費。憑藉連續 6 個季度的月活躍用戶表現優異，我們正在充分利用這一勢頭，並證明會產生有意義的效果，幫助我們在本季度實現了 1000 萬淨新訂閱用戶，比我們最初的預期多了 300 萬。

So now let's talk about revenue growth. There are 3 ways for us to drive revenue growth. We can grow our users, we can create new business with new revenue streams, and we can increase revenue per user. Our preference among them is to focus on growing the overall number of consumers on our platform as this gives us scale advantages and retains optionality for the future. However, we've also been clear that there will come a time when price increases become a more important tool in the toolbox. And to that end, as most of you are now aware, Yesterday, we announced broad price increases across more than 50 markets, including most of Europe and North America. And we've carefully waited this decision, but we felt the timing was right. We've expanded value to price significantly by meaningfully improving our content offering, and we continue to enhance the user experience and lower churn. And over the past few years, we have learned a lot as we've conducted over 50 price increases already.

現在我們來談談收入增長。我們有 3 種方法來推動收入增長。我們可以增加我們的用戶，我們可以通過新的收入來源創造新業務，並且我們可以增加每個用戶的收入。我們的偏好是專注於增加我們平台上的消費者總數，因為這給我們帶來了規模優勢並為未來保留了選擇權。然而，我們也很清楚，總有一天，價格上漲將成為工具箱中更重要的工具。為此，正如你們大多數人現在都知道的那樣，昨天，我們宣佈在 50 多個市場（包括歐洲和北美的大部分地區）廣泛提價。我們一直在仔細等待這個決定，但我們認為時機是正確的。通過有意義地改進我們的內容提供，我們顯著提高了價格的價值，並且我們繼續增強用戶體驗並降低客戶流失率。在過去的幾年裡，我們已經進行了 50 多次提價，學到了很多東西。

And this experience, coupled with our strong offering, put Spotify in an excellent position to make this move. And while this won't impact revenue per user much up until the end of Q3, we expect it to have a meaningful impact on Q4 and beyond.

這種經驗，加上我們強大的產品，使 Spotify 處於採取這一舉措的絕佳位置。雖然這在第三季度末之前不會對每用戶收入產生太大影響，但我們預計它將對第四季度及以後產生有意義的影響。

And finally, we continue to make progress on improving efficiency across the company. As Paul will explain, we have taken several actions to further streamline our operations and reduce costs, which we largely outlined in Q1. These moves position us to become a much stronger business in the future. Despite making these changes in an effort to create more efficiency, we have still managed to increase the overall velocity of experiments and new improvements. And this gives me a lot of confidence. So looking back at Spotify, the lesson we have learned is the daily progress even if faint is more important than the occasional clash of brilliance we've had. Therefore, I believe that the speed of iteration is perhaps the ultimate leading indicator of our long-term success.

最後，我們在提高整個公司的效率方面不斷取得進展。正如保羅將解釋的那樣，我們已採取多項行動來進一步簡化我們的運營並降低成本，我們在第一季度中對此進行了概述。這些舉措使我們在未來成為一家更加強大的企業。儘管做出這些改變是為了提高效率，我們仍然設法提高了實驗和新改進的整體速度。這給了我很大的信心。因此，回顧 Spotify，我們學到的教訓是，即使微弱，每天的進步也比我們偶爾的才華橫溢更重要。因此，我相信迭代的速度也許是我們長期成功的最終領先指標。

And with that, I'll turn it over to Paul for more detail behind the numbers, and then Bryan will open it up for our Q&A.

然後，我會將其交給保羅，了解數字背後的更多詳細信息，然後布萊恩將打開它進行我們的問答。

Great. Thanks, Daniel, and thanks, everyone, for joining us. I'd like to add a bit more color on the quarter and then touch upon the broader performance of the business and our outlook.

偉大的。謝謝丹尼爾，也謝謝大家加入我們。我想為該季度增添更多色彩，然後談談更廣泛的業務表現和我們的前景。

Overall, our user and subscriber growth was exceptionally strong in the quarter. Users grew by 36 million to 551 million, while we added 10 million new subscribers finishing at 220 million. Both MAU and subscriber growth accelerated from Q1, driving the highest quarterly user growth in our history and the best Q2 for subscribers on record. On the revenue front, we grew 11% year-on-year to EUR 3.2 billion during the quarter. Our FX-neutral growth was 14% and accelerated versus the prior quarter's result.

總體而言，本季度我們的用戶和訂戶增長異常強勁。用戶數量增加了 3600 萬，達到 5.51 億，同時新增 1000 萬用戶，最終達到 2.2 億。月活躍用戶數和用戶增長均較第一季度加快，推動了我們歷史上最高的季度用戶增長，以及有記錄以來最好的第二季度用戶增長。在收入方面，本季度我們的收入同比增長 11%，達到 32 億歐元。我們的匯率中性增長為 14%，並且比上一季度的結果有所加速。

Let me turn now to gross margin. As I previewed during the Q1 call, we expected to incur charges in Q2 related to our ongoing efficiency efforts. In the quarter, we took steps to shrink our real estate footprint and rationalize certain areas of our podcasting business. We also exited our Soundtrap marketplace business. We expect all of these moves to have a positive impact on our rate of profitability on a go-forward basis. However, they did result in roughly EUR 135 million of net charges in the quarter with EUR 44 million flowing through gross margin and EUR 91 million flowing through our operating expense. About EUR 25 million of these charges were cash related.

現在讓我談談毛利率。正如我在第一季度電話會議中預覽的那樣，我們預計將在第二季度產生與我們持續的效率工作相關的費用。本季度，我們採取措施縮小房地產足跡，並對播客業務的某些領域進行合理化調整。我們還退出了 Soundtrap 市場業務。我們預計所有這些舉措將對我們未來的盈利率產生積極影響。然而，它們確實在本季度產生了約 1.35 億歐元的淨費用，其中 4400 萬歐元流向毛利率，9100 萬歐元流向我們的運營費用。其中約 2500 萬歐元與現金相關。

With that context, adjusted gross margin, which excludes these charges, was 25.5% and in line with expectations. As a reminder, we guided gross margin excluding potential onetime charges. Adjusted operating loss of EUR 112 million was better than planned, helped by lower marketing and legal spend, which more than offset higher-than-anticipated social charge accruals. Free cash flow was positive EUR 9 million in Q2. Looking ahead to third quarter guidance, we are forecasting 572 million MAU, an increase of 21 million from Q2 and 224 million subscribers, an increase of 4 million over Q2. We're also forecasting EUR 3.3 billion in total revenue a gross margin of 26% and an operating loss of approximately EUR 45 million.

在此背景下，調整後毛利率（不包括這些費用）為 25.5%，符合預期。提醒一下，我們指導的毛利率不包括潛在的一次性費用。調整後的運營虧損為 1.12 億歐元，好於計劃，這得益於營銷和法律支出的減少，這足以抵消高於預期的應計社會費用。第二季度自由現金流為正 900 萬歐元。展望第三季度指引，我們預計月活躍用戶數將達到 5.72 億，比第二季度增加 2100 萬，訂閱用戶數將達到 2.24 億，比第二季度增加 400 萬。我們還預測總收入為 33 億歐元，毛利率為 26%，運營虧損約為 4500 萬歐元。

First, looking at user and subscriber growth. We've had an outstanding start to the year and we see momentum continuing into the back half of the year and to address a likely question right upfront with respect to price increases and subscriber growth. Our data would suggest that historical price increases have had minimal impact on growth, but given the breadth of this change and the significant outperformance in the first half of the year, there is some conservatism baked into our outlook for Q3. We do expect our net adds through Q3 of this year to be higher than the same point last year, roughly 30% better.

首先，關注用戶和訂閱者的增長。我們今年有一個出色的開局，我們看到今年下半年的勢頭將持續下去，並立即解決有關價格上漲和用戶增長的可能問題。我們的數據表明，歷史上的價格上漲對經濟增長的影響微乎其微，但考慮到這一變化的廣度以及上半年的顯著優異表現，我們對第三季度的前景持保守態度。我們確實預計今年第三季度的淨增量將高於去年同期，大約高出 30%。

And turning to revenue, we are forecasting a 600 basis point headwind to growth given the continued strengthening of the euro relative to the dollar, and those trends appear to be continuing into Q3. Excluding this effect, our constant currency revenue will be closer to EUR 3.5 billion, reflecting our expectations for accelerating currency-neutral growth to 16% year-on-year versus the 14% growth that we delivered in Q2. We anticipate further revenue growth acceleration in Q4 relative to Q3 on a currency-neutral basis due to a full quarter benefit from price increases. For clarity, the recently announced price increases will have a small impact on Q3 revenue given building cycles and timing. Q4 will get a full quarter benefit and therefore, the greater impact on accelerating revenue. From a profitability standpoint, we continue to expect a sequential ramp in margins through the balance of 2023 as well as improvements in our operating loss.

至於收入，我們預計，鑑於歐元相對於美元的持續走強，增長將面臨 600 個基點的阻力，而且這些趨勢似乎將持續到第三季度。排除這一影響，我們的固定貨幣收入將接近 35 億歐元，反映出我們對貨幣中性同比增長加速至 16% 的預期，而第二季度我們實現了 14% 的增長。由於整個季度都受益於價格上漲，我們預計在貨幣中性的基礎上，第四季度的收入增長將比第三季度進一步加速。需要明確的是，考慮到建設週期和時間安排，最近宣布的價格上漲將對第三季度收入產生較小影響。第四季度將獲得全季度效益，因此對加速收入的影響更大。從盈利能力的角度來看，我們繼續預計 2023 年利潤率將連續上升，並且運營虧損將有所改善。

And with that, I'll turn it back to Bryan for Q&A.

接下來，我會將其轉回給 Bryan 進行問答。

All right. Thanks, Paul. (Operator Instructions) And our first question today is going to come from Justin Patterson on efficiency. Daniel and Paul efficiency has been a major theme for you in 2023. As you look at actions taken this year and consider your long-term margin targets. Where do you see opportunities to be more efficient while still ensuring you have the right level of investment to support revenue growth?

好的。謝謝，保羅。 （操作員說明）今天我們的第一個問題將來自賈斯汀·帕特森（Justin Patterson）關於效率的問題。 Daniel 和 Paul 的效率一直是您 2023 年的主題。當您審視今年採取的行動並考慮您的長期利潤目標時。您在哪些方面看到了提高效率的機會，同時仍確保您有適當的投資水平來支持收入增長？

Yes. I'll start, and maybe Paul can chime in. So I think, again, if you go back to some of the remarks I had at the beginning of the year, really 2 things. One, the most notable thing is that the hurdle for any new investment that we're going to make is going to be significantly higher going forward. And in particular, I think you should view our investments in our own OpEx as a great indicator of that. And then the second part, I talked about this in the beginning of the year too, which is we probably got a little bit ahead of ourselves in that investment. And so we've rightsized our staff related to that. So I feel good -- much better about the overall OpEx and where we are. So I think going forward, you should just assume that the numbers on a percentage of revenue should come down because we're going to not increase our OpEx to the same extent that we have had in past years.

是的。我先開始，也許保羅可以插話。所以我想，如果你回顧一下我在今年年初的一些言論，實際上有兩件事。一、最值得注意的事情是，我們將要進行的任何新投資的障礙將明顯更高。特別是，我認為您應該將我們對自己的運營支出的投資視為一個很好的指標。然後第二部分，我在今年年初也談到過這一點，我們在這項投資方面可能有點超前了。因此，我們對與此相關的員工進行了精簡。所以我感覺很好——對整體運營支出和我們所處的位置有了更好的了解。因此，我認為展望未來，您應該假設收入百分比的數字應該下降，因為我們不會像過去幾年那樣將運營支出增加到同樣的程度。

And maybe just the final bit here is we invested on the backdrop of all the amazing leading indicators we saw. And I do want to remind all of U.S. investors as well, the phenomenal now 6 quarters of outperformance on MAU growth that is now translating really nicely into subscriber growth as well. So I feel really good about those investments. But we obviously probably got ahead of ourselves a little bit on that, and now we're going to stay steady on the investments we've already made because we're seeing great results from them. I don't know if you want to add something, Paul?

也許最後一點是我們在看到所有令人驚嘆的領先指標的背景下進行投資。我也確實想提醒所有美國投資者，月活躍用戶數增長連續 6 個季度表現出色，現在也很好地轉化為用戶增長。所以我對這些投資感覺非常好。但顯然我們在這方面可能有點超前了，現在我們將在已經進行的投資上保持穩定，因為我們看到了它們的巨大成果。我不知道你是否想補充一些東西，保羅？

Yes. I'll just add a few things. One, I mean, if you look at some of the changes we made both this quarter and the beginning of the year, Q2 was the last quarter where we had headcount higher year-over-year. We expect our head count year-over-year to actually be down in Q3. We'll see where that goes moving forward. But as Daniel said, we're continuing to become more efficient. We're continuing to find ways to innovate and launch new products and experiment at the current level. So we feel really good about where we are. So you will see some of that efficiency have even more of an impact in the back half of the year with respect to the OpEx.

是的。我將添加一些內容。一，我的意思是，如果你看看我們本季度和年初所做的一些改變，你會發現第二季度是我們員工人數同比增加的最後一個季度。我們預計第三季度的員工人數實際上會同比下降。我們將看看未來的發展方向。但正如丹尼爾所說，我們正在繼續提高效率。我們正在繼續尋找創新和推出新產品的方法，並在當前水平上進行實驗。所以我們對自己所處的位置感覺非常好。因此，您會發現其中一些效率在今年下半年對運營支出產生了更大的影響。

All right. Our next question is going to come from Justin Patterson again. This one on AI. Daniel, we've started to see AI extend beyond discovery into areas like the AI DJ what additional opportunities do you see for AI across the product portfolio? How should we think about AI potentially influencing podcast or even audio book growth over time?

好的。我們的下一個問題將再次來自賈斯汀·帕特森。這是關於人工智能的。 Daniel，我們已經開始看到人工智能超越發現領域，擴展到人工智能 DJ 等領域，您認為人工智能在整個產品組合中還有哪些其他機會？我們應該如何看待人工智能隨著時間的推移可能影響播客甚至有聲讀物的增長？

Yes. I think we're in the early innings of even seeing all what's potential. And I assume with the question that you're talking more about Generative AI (inaudible). But for the purposes of this, I think there's almost 3 major applications. We still think there's enormous benefits of just core machine learning or AI improvements. in discovery. So that's going to be massive. And you can see some of those improvements already paying off very nicely and higher engagement and higher retention, which then lowers churn. This is a trend that's been going on now for many years. So I still think that there's quite a lot that we can do there that will improve engagement and retention over time.

是的。我認為我們正處於看到所有潛力的早期階段。我認為您提出的問題更多地是關於生成式人工智能（聽不清）。但就這個目的而言，我認為有近 3 個主要應用。我們仍然認為核心機器學習或人工智能改進有巨大的好處。在發現中。所以這將是巨大的。您可以看到其中一些改進已經取得了很好的回報，更高的參與度和更高的保留率，從而降低了客戶流失率。這是一個已經持續多年的趨勢。因此，我仍然認為我們可以做很多事情，隨著時間的推移，這將提高參與度和保留率。

And then the second bucket, of course, comes into Generative AI, and AI DJ is a phenomenal product. It's probably one of my personal favorites over the last few years that we have developed, and we've seen really strong consumer interactions with that. And that just talks about the ability for us to contextualize and personalize all the amazing content that we already have. on the Spotify platform. So I think you're going to see a lot more of that where we can contextualize and personalize content across the entire platform to make it more accessible. So an easy way to think about it as an investor is, if you think about podcasting today, it's really high-quality content, but it requires quite a lot for you to get into new podcasting. So one very easy thing we can do with these new AI developments is, of course, summarize what these podcasts are about. And by doing so, you can imagine it becoming a lot more easier to merchandise new podcast for consumers, which drives in term higher engagement and more growth for creators, which is a really positive thing.

當然，第二個桶是生成人工智能，AI DJ 是一個現象級的產品。這可能是過去幾年我們開發的我個人最喜歡的產品之一，並且我們已經看到了與消費者的強烈互動。這只是談論我們將我們已經擁有的所有令人驚嘆的內容情境化和個性化的能力。在 Spotify 平台上。因此，我認為您將會看到更多這樣的內容，我們可以在整個平台上對內容進行情境化和個性化，以使其更易於訪問。因此，作為投資者思考這個問題的一個簡單方法是，如果你考慮今天的播客，它確實是高質量的內容，但它需要相當多的東西才能讓你進入新的播客。因此，我們可以利用這些新的人工智能發展做的一件非常簡單的事情就是總結這些播客的內容。通過這樣做，你可以想像，向消費者推銷新的播客會變得更加容易，這會推動創作者更高的參與度和更多的增長，這是一件非常積極的事情。

And then lastly, I would say just making the company overall more efficient. And I think this is probably the part that most people are investing in, in the broader ecosystem, but not enough credit yet of understanding among investors is happening. But I significantly believe that we can become a lot more efficient as a company by leveraging AI. So a great example of that would be if you think about advertisers today, the cost of generating new advertisements on Spotify is quite a big thing, especially on audio ads. By using Generative AI and our tools here, I think you're going to be able to see that we can significantly reduce the cost that it takes for advertisers to develop new ad formats. And that obviously means that you as an advertiser instead of having one ad, you can imagine having thousands and tested across the Spotify networks. Things that you could easily do today using text, but you haven't been able to do over video or in audio. So there's going to be a lot of those opportunities where we're going to be not just on the consumer side, but really across the entire company become a lot more efficient, which will drive more value for all stakeholders, consumers, creators and Spotify itself.

最後，我想說的是，只是讓公司整體更有效率。我認為這可能是大多數人在更廣泛的生態系統中投資的部分，但投資者之間的理解還不夠充分。但我堅信，通過利用人工智能，我們可以提高公司的效率。一個很好的例子是，如果你考慮一下今天的廣告商，在 Spotify 上生成新廣告的成本是相當大的，尤其是音頻廣告。通過使用生成式人工智能和我們的工具，我想您將能夠看到我們可以顯著降低廣告商開發新廣告格式的成本。這顯然意味著，作為一名廣告商，您可以想像擁有數千個廣告並在 Spotify 網絡上進行測試，而不是只有一個廣告。今天使用文本可以輕鬆完成的事情，但無法通過視頻或音頻完成。因此，將會有很多這樣的機會，我們不僅會在消費者方面，而且整個公司都會變得更加高效，這將為所有利益相關者、消費者、創作者和 Spotify 帶來更多價值本身。

Okay. Our next question is going to come from Matthew Thornton on price increases. What does third quarter revenue guidance assume in terms of timing and subscriber guidance assume in terms of churn and gross intake? And do you think a structure is in place with the content owners to now incentivize regular or recurring price increases?

好的。我們的下一個問題將來自馬修·桑頓（Matthew Thornton）關於價格上漲的問題。第三季度收入指引在時間安排方面的假設是什麼，訂戶指引在流失率和總接收量方面的假設是什麼？您認為內容所有者現在是否已經建立了一個結構來激勵定期或經常性的價格上漲？

I'll take the first part of that and maybe I'll let Daniel take the second part of that. So the guidance assumes on price increases, the way I think about it is this way. We announced a price increase yesterday. Most people have a notice period. And then price increase won't -- it won't take effect until the next billing cycle. So for most subscribers, they won't see a price increase until September, which is why I said they will have a minimal impact on Q3 because most of that price increase won't happen until the last month and probably somewhere in the middle of the last month of the quarter. You will see the full benefit of the price increase in Q4. So you'll see a bigger acceleration in ARPU and revenue growth in Q4 than you will see in Q3.

我會講第一部分，也許我會讓丹尼爾講第二部分。所以指導意見假設價格上漲，我的想法是這樣的。我們昨天宣布漲價。大多數人都有一個通知期。然後價格上漲不會——直到下一個計費周期才會生效。因此，對於大多數訂戶來說，他們要到 9 月份才會看到價格上漲，這就是為什麼我說他們對第三季度的影響很小，因為大部分價格上漲要到上個月才會發生，可能會在 2019 年中旬的某個時候發生。該季度的最後一個月。您將在第四季度看到價格上漲的全部好處。因此，您將看到第四季度的 ARPU 和收入增長比第三季度有更大的加速。

In terms of churn and gross intake, it's not something we comment on. I will go back to my comments I made in my prepared remarks, which were definitely -- there's some conservatism baked into the Q3 numbers. If you go back and look historically, and we've said this publicly many times. In the past, when we've raised prices, we've seen very positive results. We've seen minimal impact on gross intake. We've seen minimal impact on churn or variations in churn from trend. And so there's no reason to expect that wouldn't be the case. This is obviously a much larger and more broad-based change than we've made in the past. So there's definitely some conservatism baked into kind of how Q3 rolls out. And then maybe, Daniel, I'll turn it over to you for the second half of that question.

就流失率和總攝入量而言，我們不予評論。我將回到我在準備好的講話中發表的評論，這些評論肯定是——第三季度的數據中包含了一些保守主義。如果你回顧歷史，我們已經多次公開說過這一點。過去，當我們提高價格時，我們看到了非常積極的結果。我們發現對總攝入量的影響很小。我們發現對客戶流失率的影響或客戶流失率與趨勢的變化很小。因此，沒有理由認為情況並非如此。這顯然是比我們過去所做的更大、更廣泛的改變。因此，第三季度的推出方式肯定包含一些保守主義。丹尼爾，也許我會把這個問題的後半部分交給你。

Yes. So I think the second half was around the structure that allows regular and recurring price increases. And I commented on that already. I think, again, we have in the past done over 50 already, so I don't want to overstate this price increases. But obviously, this is the biggest one we've done to date. And I think I addressed it in my opening remarks, but I believe you should all look at it as a tool in our toolbox, but the overall goal is per market basis grow our revenue, and we're trying to grow at that 20% as we've outlined already in our targets. And so there's 3 ways to do that.

是的。所以我認為下半年的結構是允許定期和經常性的價格上漲。我已經對此發表了評論。我想，我們過去已經完成了 50 多次，所以我不想誇大這次價格上漲。但顯然，這是我們迄今為止所做的最大的一項。我想我在開場白中談到了這個問題，但我相信你們都應該將其視為我們工具箱中的一個工具，但總體目標是在每個市場的基礎上增加我們的收入，我們正在努力以 20% 的速度增長正如我們已經在目標中概述的那樣。有 3 種方法可以做到這一點。

One is obviously to grow the number of consumers. That's our preferred way of doing that and keep the value to price super high because that creates optionality. But when user growth slows down, take Sweden as a great example, where we're already at a massive part of the population there, then price increases becomes an even more important tool in the toolbox. And then thirdly, of course, we have grown revenues through our new verticals or new products, which is also another tool we have in the toolbox, but of course, more longer term. So yes, I think you should assume that this is a tool we now have in the toolbox.

一是顯然要增加消費者數量。這是我們這樣做的首選方式，並保持超高的性價比，因為這創造了選擇性。但當用戶增長放緩時，以瑞典為例，我們已經佔據了該國人口的很大一部分，那麼價格上漲就成為工具箱中更重要的工具。第三，當然，我們通過新的垂直行業或新產品增加了收入，這也是我們工具箱中的另一個工具，但當然是更長期的。所以是的，我認為您應該假設這是我們現在工具箱中的一個工具。

Okay. We've got another question from Matthew Thornton on the ad market. Can you talk about the performance and linearity of the ad market through second quarter and into third quarter? And can you provide any updates on SPAN?

好的。馬修·桑頓向我們提出了關於廣告市場的另一個問題。您能談談第二季度和第三季度廣告市場的表現和線性嗎？您能提供有關 SPAN 的任何更新嗎？

Yes. So the quarter on the outside was pretty solid relative to expectations. We did see some improvement throughout the quarter. So definitely the back half of the quarter was better than the first half, although not that out of line with our expectations. We expect advertising to be even better in 3Q, which is baked into our guidance. So on an FX-neutral basis, a better quarter from a growth perspective in Q3 than we saw in Q2.

是的。因此，與預期相比，本季度的外部情況相當穩定。我們整個季度確實看到了一些改善。因此，本季度後半段肯定好於上半年，儘管與我們的預期並沒有那麼出格。我們預計第三季度的廣告業務會更好，這已納入我們的指導中。因此，在匯率中性的基礎上，從增長角度來看，第三季度的季度表現比我們在第二季度看到的要好。

And then progress at SPAN. SPAN was a big driver of the outperformance. It definitely helped podcast ad revenue. Podcast ad revenue got better throughout the quarter as well in terms of growth rate. So SPAN was a big contributor there.

然後在 SPAN 取得進展。 SPAN 是業績優異的重要推動力。這無疑有助於播客廣告收入。整個季度播客廣告收入的增長率也有所提高。所以 SPAN 是其中的一個重要貢獻者。

All right. Our next question is going to come from Michael Morris. In the past, you've referenced seeking a win-win scenario with labels prior to raising consumer pricing. Can you share detail about the when you achieved in conjunction with yesterday's announced increase? Will you pay royalties on the incremental revenue at the same rate as your current agreements?

好的。我們的下一個問題將來自邁克爾·莫里斯。過去，您曾提到在提高消費者價格之前尋求與標籤的雙贏局面。您能否詳細介紹一下您與昨天宣布的增長相關的具體實現情況？您會按照當前協議的相同費率支付增量收入的特許權使用費嗎？

Yes. I'm not going to dive into specifics about anything in our agreements as per usual. But I will say that we are, of course, very pleased with where we are with our partners, and we feel really good about the situation. And that I believe -- again, I think I mentioned this in the past, but I feel like quite often this is being put in a situation where this is kind of a win-lose relationship between our partners and us. That is not how we see it. We very much see it as, again, not a serious sam game, but a growing pie, and the goal is for both parties to be win-win. And I feel like we're at a situation where we are at a win-win with all of our rights partners. And I feel really good about the growth of Spotify, but also the growth of the overall music economy. And that's really the kind of main focus for us at Spotify is we're really trying to create a win-win, and I feel like that's the part that's often missing. But we're really pleased with where we are, both with this price increase and our overall position with our partners.

是的。我不會像往常一樣深入探討我們協議中任何內容的細節。但我要說的是，我們當然對我們與合作夥伴的現狀感到非常滿意，我們對這種情況感覺非常好。我相信——我想我過去曾提到過這一點，但我覺得這經常被置於我們的合作夥伴和我們之間的雙輸關係的情況下。我們不這麼看。我們再次強調，這不是一場嚴肅的山姆遊戲，而是一塊不斷增長的蛋糕，目標是雙方雙贏。我覺得我們正處於與所有權利合作夥伴雙贏的局面。我對 Spotify 的增長以及整個音樂經濟的增長感到非常滿意。這確實是 Spotify 的主要關注點，我們真的在努力創造雙贏，但我覺得這正是我們經常缺失的部分。但我們對目前的狀況感到非常滿意，無論是價格上漲還是我們與合作夥伴的整體地位。

All right. Our next question is going to come from Mario Lu on ARPU. ARPU declined 3% year-on-year, excluding currency in the quarter. Can you help break down the contribution from product and market mix and whether the price increases announced last week, we'll be able to offset these 2 negative impacts by Q4?

好的。我們的下一個問題將來自 Mario Lu 關於 ARPU 的問題。該季度不計貨幣的 ARPU 同比下降 3%。您能否幫忙分析一下產品和市場組合的貢獻，以及上周宣布的價格上漲是否能夠在第四季度抵消這兩個負面影響？

Yes. Thanks, Mario. So the -- the biggest impact on the quarter was the product mix. That was the majority of the impact of the 3% decline FX neutral on ARPU. Looking out, the price increase will moderately help in Q3. We're looking for FX-neutral ARPU kind of flat to down 1% in Q3, and then we should expect a meaningful improvement in FX-neutral ARPU in Q4 as we had the full benefit of the price increase in the Q4. So minus 3 this quarter, call it 0 to minus 1 in Q3 and then nicely positive. We don't obviously guide the Q4 at this point, but nicely positive in Q4 of this year.

是的。謝謝，馬里奧。因此，對本季度影響最大的是產品組合。這是外匯中性下降 3% 對 ARPU 造成的主要影響。展望第三季度，價格上漲將帶來適度幫助。我們預計第三季度的外匯中性 ARPU 會持平至下降 1%，然後我們應該預計第四季度外匯中性 ARPU 會出現有意義的改善，因為我們充分受益於第四季度的價格上漲。因此，本季度為負 3，在第三季度將其稱為 0 到負 1，然後是很好的正值。目前我們並沒有明顯地指導第四季度，但今年第四季度的表現非常積極。

Great. Next question from Rich Greenfield. TikTok recently reached a new supposedly groundbreaking deal with the labels. How should we think about what this means for competition with Spotify?

偉大的。下一個問題來自里奇·格林菲爾德。 TikTok 最近與這些唱片公司達成了一項據稱具有開創性的新協議。我們應該如何思考這對於與 Spotify 的競爭意味著什麼？

Well, again, competition is nothing new. It's something that we've been dealing with since the start of the company, and we have had many formidable competitors. And obviously, TikTok is one. All of that said, I think the results this quarter kind of speaks for themselves with the outperformance in users and outperformance in subs. I feel really, really good about the investments we've been doing over the past few years in improving our competitive position and improving the consumer value that we're having to our consumers. And yes, I mean, again, competition isn't anything new. It is expected, especially in such a large category that so many consumers care about like music. So yes, really nothing to add more than that.

再說一遍，競爭並不是什麼新鮮事。這是我們自公司成立以來一直在處理的問題，我們有許多強大的競爭對手。顯然，TikTok 就是其中之一。綜上所述，我認為本季度的結果足以說明問題，因為用戶和潛艇的表現均出色。我對過去幾年我們在提高競爭地位和提高消費者價值方面所做的投資感到非常非常滿意。是的，我的意思是，競爭並不是什麼新鮮事。這是意料之中的，尤其是像音樂這樣一個有這麼多消費者關心的大品類。所以是的，確實沒有什麼可補充的了。

All right. Our next question is going to come from Mario Lu on podcast economics. The second quarter podcast gross margin improvement. Can you give us a rough ballpark of where we are right now versus a time line of breakeven within the next year?

好的。我們的下一個問題將來自 Mario Lu 關於播客經濟學的問題。第二季度播客毛利率改善。您能否為我們提供一個粗略的大概情況，說明我們目前的狀況與明年實現收支平衡的時間線？

Yes. We continue to see improvements -- the rate of improvement on the gross margin on the podcasting side. I would say that relative to all the expectations we gave at the Investor Day, we're right on track. We expect to hit all the targets we laid out for podcast and podcast breakeven and improvement in margins. And at a higher level, I think we feel really good about all the targets we laid out at the Investor Day.

是的。我們繼續看到改善——播客方面毛利率的改善率。我想說，相對於我們在投資者日給出的所有期望，我們走在正軌上。我們預計將實現我們為播客和播客盈虧平衡以及利潤率提高制定的所有目標。在更高的層面上，我認為我們對投資者日制定的所有目標感到非常滿意。

All right. And then we've got another question from Rich Greenfield. Everyone was expecting you to raise the base single user price, which has never gone up, but you also pushed through a $1 increase on the family plan in April of 2021. How do you think about your family plan pricing power versus the base tier?

好的。然後我們收到了 Rich Greenfield 提出的另一個問題。每個人都期望您提高基本單用戶價格，但該價格從未上漲過，但您還在 2021 年 4 月推動家庭計劃上調 1 美元。您如何看待您的家庭計劃相對於基本套餐的定價能力？

Yes. I mean, again, it's phenomenal value really for consumers, both the standard tier, but obviously, the family pricing as well. So we feel it's a great offering. And as we said before, we've been in the past waiting and kind of reviewing and building up more value. And that's really how you should think about it. We are trying to build more value towards our consumers. That's where we start. And then when we feel like that gap, the value to price ratio is getting out of whack, you should now assume that we have a new tool in our toolbox, which is we have the ability to raise prices. And we feel good about doing that. And the family plan, of course, is an even better value proposition relative to the standard plan. So that's another tier that we have the opportunity to raise prices on.

是的。我的意思是，這對消費者來說確實具有驚人的價值，無論是標準級別，還是家庭定價。所以我們覺得這是一個很棒的產品。正如我們之前所說，我們過去一直在等待、審查和建立更多價值。這確實是你應該如何思考的。我們正在努力為消費者創造更多價值。這就是我們開始的地方。然後，當我們感覺到這種差距時，價值與價格的比率變得不正常，你現在應該假設我們的工具箱中有一個新工具，那就是我們有能力提高價格。我們對此感覺很好。當然，家庭計劃相對於標準計劃來說是一個更好的價值主張。因此，這是我們有機會提高價格的另一個層次。

Okay. We've got a question from Matt Thornton on streaming economics. Do you think the music streaming market will get to a structure where higher value is ascribed to premium music streams versus perhaps other content that may be perceived as less premium?

好的。我們收到了 Matt Thornton 提出的關於流媒體經濟學的問題。您認為音樂流媒體市場是否會形成一種結構，即與其他可能被認為不太優質的內容相比，優質音樂流媒體具有更高的價值？

I think what you're discussing is probably a variance around artist-centric rather than the sort of difference between ad-supported and premium parts. And obviously, this is kind of a big contention. How do we make the economic model fair for as many participants on the platform? And we're always making tweaks to that model. We're always reviewing how we can make the model more fair, and we're in constant dialogue with our partners around how we can do that.

我認為您所討論的可能是以藝術家為中心的差異，而不是廣告支持的部分和付費部分之間的差異。顯然，這是一個很大的爭論。我們如何讓經濟模型對平台上盡可能多的參與者來說是公平的？我們一直在對該模型進行調整。我們一直在審查如何使模型更加公平，並且我們不斷與合作夥伴就如何做到這一點進行對話。

I think the expectation from an investor point of view is -- however, is that it doesn't actually meaningfully impact Spotify's economics one way or the other. This is more around how we divide the pie from the rights holders and to what artists or what groups of artists we should do it. But most studies we've done in this is that even if you change it on a user-centric or an artist-centric approach. It seldom leads to these gigantic differences that most people perceive it to do. So again, we're in constant discussion with our partners, and we're always sharing data about what we see and they are sharing data back, of course. But we're always open to hear how we can make the system more fair to more artists.

然而，我認為從投資者的角度來看，它實際上並不會以某種方式對 Spotify 的經濟產生有意義的影響。這更多的是關於我們如何從權利持有者手中分配蛋糕，以及我們應該向哪些藝術家或哪些藝術家群體做這件事。但我們在這方面所做的大多數研究是，即使你以用戶為中心或以藝術家為中心的方法來改變它。它很少會導致大多數人認為會造成的巨大差異。再說一次，我們與合作夥伴不斷進行討論，我們總是分享我們所看到的數據，當然，他們也會分享數據。但我們始終樂於傾聽如何使系統對更多藝術家更加公平。

All right. Next question from Maria Ripps. Could you comment on the June Bloomberg report that indicated you are planning on launching a HiFi tier later this year? What are your expectations for engagement and plan switching across different pricing tiers if and when you release this offering?

好的。下一個問題來自瑪麗亞·里普斯。您能否對 6 月份彭博社的報導發表評論？該報導表明您計劃在今年晚些時候推出 HiFi 系列產品？如果您發布此產品，您對跨不同定價層的參與度和計劃切換有何期望？

Yes. We don't really have any announcements to make on this call around any new sort of features or things. We tend to do that directly towards consumers when we have them. What I will say, of course, is that HiFi remains something that we think has value, but it's something that has value to probably a more efficient autos in the streaming market and we're interested in, obviously, how we can use that as one tool to, in the future, increase our value even further. But we don't have anything to announce at this point.

是的。在這次電話會議上，我們實際上沒有任何關於任何新功能或新事物的公告。當我們有消費者時，我們傾向於直接向他們這樣做。當然，我要說的是，HiFi 仍然是我們認為有價值的東西，但它對流媒體市場中可能更高效的汽車有價值，顯然我們感興趣的是如何將其用作一種在未來進一步增加我們價值的工具。但目前我們沒有任何消息要宣布。

All right. Next question from Matt Thornton on the user interface. What impacts have you seen engagement, retention, conversion or anything else from the new user interface and how far along are we in the rollout of that new UI?

好的。 Matt Thornton 提出了關於用戶界面的下一個問題。您認為新用戶界面對參與度、留存率、轉化率或其他方面產生了哪些影響？我們推出新用戶界面的進度有多遠？

Yes. So again, the user interface for those that may not be aware that I believe Matt is referencing is the one we announced at Stream On. And as we outlined back then, it was the single largest shift that we've ever made to the user experience, both on a look and feel, but more importantly, on the back end because we had to re-architect all the signals that are machine learning systems we're using as well. And what we're seeing is pretty good results. We have made lots and lots of tweaks based on user feedback, which is normal. And we are making those tweaks. We're also making lots of tweaks on our recommendation based on this new signal.

是的。再說一次，對於那些可能不知道的人來說，我相信 Matt 引用的是我們在 Stream On 上宣布的用戶界面。正如我們當時概述的那樣，這是我們對用戶體驗所做的最大的轉變，無論是在外觀還是感覺上，但更重要的是在後端，因為我們必須重新構建所有信號我們也在使用機器學習系統。我們看到的是非常好的結果。我們根據用戶反饋做了很多很多調整，這是正常的。我們正在做出這些調整。我們還根據這一新信號對我們的建議進行了大量調整。

So I feel really good about where we are, but it's an entirely new system. So we're being very, very careful about how we're rolling it out. And you should expect most of it to be rolled out over the remainder of this year with this new UI. But we feel good about it. And you should expect long term that engagement will increase. And of course, if engagement increases that tends to lead to better retention, which in turn tends to lead to better conversion over time as well.

所以我對我們現在的處境感覺非常好，但這是一個全新的系統。因此，我們對於如何推出它非常非常謹慎。您應該預計大部分內容將在今年剩餘時間內通過這個新用戶界面推出。但我們對此感覺良好。從長遠來看，您應該預期參與度將會增加。當然，如果參與度增加，往往會帶來更好的保留率，而隨著時間的推移，這反過來又往往會導致更好的轉化。

Okay. We've got a question from Maria Ripps on podcasting. Last quarter, you talked about canceling or not renewing underperforming podcast content. Could you provide some further detail regarding how your original content strategy is evolving under more streamlined operations? And are there any audience demographics or genre types that you're more focused on now?

好的。我們收到了瑪麗亞·里普斯 (Maria Ripps) 提出的有關播客的問題。上個季度，您談到了取消或不續訂表現不佳的播客內容。您能否提供一些有關您的原創內容策略在更精簡的運營下如何演變的更多詳細信息？您現在更關注哪些觀眾人口統計數據或類型？

Yes. I think, Maria, you're rightly pointing it out. I think the biggest shift in our strategy is really around the more streamlined operations and that we're being more careful about now that we have a lot more data around doubling down and renewing the things that did work and stop doing the things that didn't work. And I think that's the primary consideration that we're going through. And then in terms of any new genres or demographics, I think the most interesting thing from my vantage point is how the number of podcasters is growing. So you're seeing more and more new podcasters come in and do that. And unlike before where perhaps we saw people in the very early innings that were native to podcasting and didn't do any other form of media, then when we kind of made the announcement, we brought new talent to the platform. Now we're seeing a lot of Internet native creators who are creating new podcasts for it. And I think our video podcasting is a great example of that, where we're seeing podcasters now realizing that they have on video feed on Instagram and YouTube and all these other platforms and now uploading more long-term content on Spotify with great success. So we are very much tailoring on the content type to these new creators broadening the base of podcasters feel really good about that. And then on the consumer side, that tend to lead to much younger consumers getting in and starting to realize that podcasting is not just something for older consumers, but it's something that has a lot of appeal. It could be funny. It could be not just fact.

是的。我認為，瑪麗亞，你指出這一點是正確的。我認為我們戰略上最大的轉變實際上是圍繞更加簡化的運營，而且我們現在更加小心，因為我們有更多的數據來加倍努力並更新那些有效的事情，並停止做那些不起作用的事情。不工作。我認為這是我們正在經歷的首要考慮因素。然後就任何新的流派或人口統計數據而言，我認為從我的角度來看，最有趣的事情是播客數量的增長方式。所以你會看到越來越多的新播客加入並這樣做。與之前不同的是，我們可能在早期就看到人們是播客的本地人，不做任何其他形式的媒體，然後當我們宣布這一消息時，我們為該平台帶來了新的人才。現在我們看到很多互聯網原生創作者正在為其創建新的播客。我認為我們的視頻播客就是一個很好的例子，我們看到播客現在意識到他們在 Instagram 和 YouTube 以及所有其他平台上提供視頻源，現在在 Spotify 上上傳更多長期內容並取得了巨大成功。因此，我們正在為這些新創作者量身定制內容類型，擴大播客的基礎，對此感覺非常好。然後在消費者方面，這往往會導致更年輕的消費者進入並開始意識到播客不僅適合老年消費者，而且具有很大的吸引力。這可能很有趣。這可能不僅僅是事實。

But you're seeing Call Her Daddy, a great example of younger women taking up to podcasting and loving the format. And we're seeing, obviously, something like Call Her Daddy also then cost reference when Alex Cooper brings musical artists onto the show, you're seeing great results in music streams as well. So nice sort of a brand Halo that then chimes onto the music side as well. So that's the expectations. We're going for more creators, which probably will lead to more younger consumers all around the world as well. And more importantly, of course, the big shift being that it has to be efficient.

但你看到的《Call Her Daddy》是年輕女性開始播客並喜歡這種形式的一個很好的例子。顯然，我們看到，當亞歷克斯·庫珀（Alex Cooper）將音樂藝術家帶入節目時，像《打電話給她爸爸》（Call Her Daddy）這樣的東西也會帶來成本參考，你也會在音樂流中看到很好的結果。 Halo 是一個非常好的品牌，它也與音樂方面相呼應。這就是期望。我們正在尋找更多的創作者，這可能也會導致世界各地更多的年輕消費者。當然，更重要的是，最大的轉變是它必須高效。

All right. Next question from Doug Anmuth on sales and marketing. Do you expect sales and marketing to decelerate or decline year-on-year in the back half of 2023, given the heavy spending from 2022? And how does that influence your MAU and premium subscriber outlook?

好的。道格·安穆斯 (Doug Anmuth) 提出了關於銷售和營銷的下一個問題。鑑於 2022 年以來的大量支出，您預計 2023 年下半年的銷售和營銷是否會同比減速或下降？這對您的月活躍用戶數和高級訂戶前景有何影響？

Yes. I mean, as you point out, Doug, it definitely accelerated in the back half of last year. So when you kind of think about it on a year-to-year perspective that the comps are what they are. So that's kind of number one. Number 2 is the last couple of quarters, we have underspent in marketing and still delivered exceptional user growth and subscriber growth. And what we've seen is after a period of time where our LTV-to-CAC, which has always been pretty strong, kind of dipped a little bit, it's back and rising again and rising nicely. So we've seen a really significant improvement in LTV-to-CAC. We've seen an improvement LTV on a LTV to cost per gross add perspective. So we're seeing that officially come into play. So marketing is always going to be a part of how we grow. It's not really a big factor in kind of the guidance we've given on users and subs in terms of any change to marketing plan or year-over-year changes at all. So I think we feel really good about the efficiencies we've got. And I think we feel really good about actually, the marketing spend we made that's now carrying forward, right? You go into new markets when you launch new markets and sometimes there's that awareness factor. And then once you get sort of that, for lack of a better word, flywheel to take hold, it really starts to have a take on a life of its own in terms of growth, and we started to see that in many of our markets.

是的。我的意思是，正如你所指出的，道格，去年下半年它確實加速了。因此，當你從逐年的角度思考時，你會發現這些比較就是這樣的。所以這是第一。第二是過去幾個季度，我們在營銷方面的支出不足，但仍然實現了出色的用戶增長和訂戶增長。我們看到的是，在一段時間之後，我們一直相當強勁的生命週期價值與客戶獲得成本（LTV-to-CAC）略有下降，但它又回來了，並再次上升，而且上升得很好。因此，我們看到 LTV 到 CAC 的顯著改善。從每總增加成本的角度來看，我們已經看到 LTV 有所改善。所以我們看到它正式發揮作用。因此，營銷始終是我們成長的一部分。就營銷計劃的任何變化或逐年變化而言，這並不是我們向用戶和訂閱者提供的指導的重要因素。所以我認為我們對我們所取得的效率感到非常滿意。我認為我們實際上感覺很好，我們所做的營銷支出現在正在結轉，對嗎？當你推出新市場時，你就進入了新市場，有時會有意識因素。然後，一旦你明白了這一點，由於缺乏更好的詞，飛輪就佔據了主導地位，它真的開始在增長方面發揮自己的生命力，我們開始在我們的許多市場中看到這一點。

Okay. Another one from Doug Anmuth, this one on podcast content deals. As some meaningful podcast content potentially comes up for renewal, later this year and through 2024, how is your positioning discipline and thought process different from where you were when you were building out podcast a few years ago?

好的。道格·安姆斯 (Doug Anmuth) 的另一篇文章是關於播客內容交易的。今年晚些時候直至 2024 年，一些有意義的播客內容可能會更新，您的定位原則和思維過程與幾年前構建播客時有何不同？

Yes. I mean, the most notable one, I would say, not only are we in a different climate, of course, that's the obvious one, and that's something I've been addressing before. But I think also to set expectations where we were 4 years ago, we had very little data to back up our decisions on. So the most important thing is to contextualize it for investors. We were in a position where we thought podcast overall was undermonetized and underutilized by consumers and that we had a real chance of breaking into the marketplace. But we were kind of nowhere when we enter the field. And today, we're #1 in most markets around the world. It is proving to be a growing media category, and we feel really good about it. So I think overall, it was the right bet to make and has played off really nicely, and I feel really good about all the impact it's having on our engagement and retention and lower churn.

是的。我的意思是，我想說，最值得注意的一點是，我們不僅處於不同的氣候中，當然，這是顯而易見的，也是我之前一直討論過的問題。但我認為，為了將預期設定為 4 年前的水平，我們幾乎沒有數據來支持我們的決策。因此，最重要的是為投資者提供具體背景。我們認為播客整體上貨幣化不足且未被消費者充分利用，而我們確實有機會打入市場。但當我們進入這個領域時，我們卻無處可去。如今，我們在全球大多數市場中排名第一。事實證明，這是一個不斷增長的媒體類別，我們對此感覺非常好。所以我認為總的來說，這是一個正確的選擇，並且效果非常好，我對它對我們的參與度、保留率和降低流失率產生的所有影響感到非常滿意。

So I feel really, really good about that part. Now that said, now we also have a lot more data. We have a lot more data across the millions of podcasts we already have about what that does to new user acquisition, to retention, to conversion, to subscribers, et cetera. And not surprisingly, what we're finding is that some of these shows work really well with our audience. Some of them don't work well. Some of them work well, but during a different cost structure as we probably overpaid relative to what we should have done. And so we're coming at this with the process of rightsizing some deals, doubling down on some of the things that worked really nicely and then stepping out of some deals and relationships that hasn't worked out. But I think this is very normal given that we kind of went in, in order to get to really win the space and to gather as much data as we could in a short period of time. And so the data we have now is very rich and allows us to make much better decisions than we obviously could 4 years ago.

所以我對這部分感覺非常非常好。話雖如此，現在我們也有了更多的數據。我們已經掌握了數百萬個播客的更多數據，了解播客對新用戶獲取、保留、轉化、訂閱者等的影響。毫不奇怪，我們發現其中一些節目非常適合我們的觀眾。其中一些效果不佳。其中一些效果很好，但在不同的成本結構中，因為我們可能相對於我們應該做的事情付出了過多的代價。因此，我們正在通過調整一些交易規模的過程來解決這個問題，在一些確實效果很好的事情上加倍努力，然後退出一些尚未成功的交易和關係。但我認為這是很正常的，因為我們是為了真正贏得空間並在短時間內收集盡可能多的數據而進入的。因此，我們現在擁有的數據非常豐富，使我們能夠做出比 4 年前明顯更好的決策。

All right. We've got a question from Richard Kramer relating to gross margin. What led to the favorability of other cost of revenues in the quarter? And how might that develop given the introduction of more video on the platform?

好的。我們收到了理查德·克萊默 (Richard Kramer) 提出的有關毛利率的問題。是什麼導致本季度其他收入成本有利？隨著平台上引入更多視頻，這種情況會如何發展？

Yes. So there's really 2 things on that. One is sort of our streaming delivery and compute cost and the other was on customer service, streaming delivery being the bigger one. I think a lot of that is honestly the maturation of the business and our ability to really think through and forecast some of the compute cost and streaming delivery costs for us, and so we've gotten better at it. And that has really helped us. Last year -- if you remember, last year, after a period of time where they were going down, we saw a couple of quarters where they rose, we're now back in a position where as a percentage of revenue, they're declining again. We do feel like we have a better handle as a business on sort of forecasting and managing those costs going forward.

是的。所以這確實有兩件事。一是我們的流媒體交付和計算成本，二是客戶服務成本，其中流媒體交付成本更大。我認為，老實說，這很大程度上是業務的成熟以及我們真正思考和預測我們的一些計算成本和流媒體交付成本的能力，因此我們在這方面做得更好。這確實對我們有幫助。去年——如果你還記得的話，去年，在經歷了一段時間的下降之後，我們看到了幾個季度的增長，現在我們又回到了這樣的位置，即佔收入的百分比，再次下降。我們確實覺得作為一家企業，我們在預測和管理未來這些成本方面有更好的處理能力。

There can always be variations. There always might be some fluctuations. And with respect to video, if it would become a big enough portion that's something we'd have to manage through as well. But again, we have the models now to properly forecast it. So we feel like we're in a pretty good place with kind of maintain the levels we're at on some of those other costs of revenue lines.

總會有變化。總會有一些波動。就視頻而言，如果它成為足夠大的部分，那麼我們也必須處理好這一問題。但同樣，我們現在擁有正確預測它的模型。因此，我們覺得我們處於一個非常好的位置，可以維持我們在其他一些收入線成本上的水平。

Okay. Another one from Doug about pricing power. How do you think about pricing power over the long term and Spotify's ability to innovate on product to continuously make it more valuable to users?

好的。道格的另一篇關於定價權的文章。您如何看待長期定價能力以及 Spotify 的產品創新能力，以不斷提高其對用戶的價值？

Yes, Doug. The way we think about it is, we're constantly thinking about how we can increase the value that we give our consumers on the platform, no matter if they're on their ad-supported tier or our paid subscription tier. And really kind of increasing that sort of value to price ratio that we have. So I think so long as we're able to bring more value to our consumers, then we should have the ability to raise pricing over time as well to sort of narrow that gap. But we're always going to be focused on over-delivering on value towards our consumers on this platform. And then when you think about the innovation, I feel really good about that. As I mentioned in my opening remarks, despite the efficiencies that we've now made across the business, we are at an all-time high on the number of experiments that we're doing and improvements. I mean just in the last quarter, as you could see in our shareholder deck, we've introduced an entirely new redesign of our desktop clients. Last quarter, we did one on the mobile client. We have updated Tesla this quarter. We've updated many of our partner experiences. We've introduced AI DJ to a wide number of consumers and the list goes on and on and on of all of these improvements. And again, podcasting is still growing very nicely, still relatively early. Audio books is even more nascent in this business. And I believe long term, going to be very, very big for Spotify, similarly to how investors may not have necessarily understood podcasting early on. I think audio books will be the next one where we will look back in a few years and say, wow, that became quite meaningful quite fast for Spotify. So I feel really good about us being able to add lots of value to consumers over time. And if we're doing that, I believe that we have the ability to then raise prices to keep the value to price ratio at an appropriate level.

是的，道格。我們的想法是，我們不斷思考如何增加我們在平台上為消費者提供的價值，無論他們是在廣告支持層還是我們的付費訂閱層。確實提高了我們的性價比。因此，我認為，只要我們能夠為消費者帶來更多價值，那麼我們就應該有能力隨著時間的推移提高定價，以縮小這種差距。但我們始終致力於在這個平台上為消費者提供超額的價值。當你想到創新時，我感覺非常好。正如我在開場白中提到的，儘管我們現在在整個業務中提高了效率，但我們正在進行的實驗和改進的數量仍處於歷史最高水平。我的意思是，就在上個季度，正如您在我們的股東資料中看到的那樣，我們對桌面客戶端進行了全新的重新設計。上個季度，我們在移動客戶端上做了一個。我們本季度更新了特斯拉。我們更新了許多合作夥伴的體驗。我們已經向廣大消費者推出了 AI DJ，所有這些改進的例子不勝枚舉。再說一次，播客仍然增長得非常好，而且還相對較早。有聲讀物在這個行業中甚至更為新生。我相信從長遠來看，Spotify 將變得非常非常大，就像投資者早期不一定了解播客一樣。我認為有聲讀物將是下一個，幾年後我們回顧時會說，哇，這對 Spotify 來說很快就變得非常有意義。因此，我對我們能夠隨著時間的推移為消費者增加很多價值感到非常高興。如果我們這樣做，我相信我們有能力提高價格，將性價比保持在適當的水平。

Okay. Our next question is going to come from Zach Morrissey on advertising. Music ad revenues decelerated to mid-single digits in terms of year-on-year growth in the second quarter. How did this perform relative to your expectations? And can you discuss the trends you saw through the quarter and into July?

好的。我們的下一個問題將來自扎克·莫里西（Zach Morrissey）關於廣告的問題。第二季度音樂廣告收入同比增長放緩至中個位數。與您的預期相比，其表現如何？您能否討論一下本季度到 7 月份您看到的趨勢？

Yes. So at a very high level, revenue was right in line with our expectations. We're obviously dealing with some heavier currency than we expected. But if you look at both the advertising side and the premium side, we are almost spot on, on both of those with respect to our own internal forecast. So revenue was right in line with expectations. We don't really guide to music or podcasting and advertising specifically. But I would say music was pretty much in line. The podcast was in line to slightly better. And so we saw good trends in advertising overall. So I would say again, to recap revenue right in line, not much of a difference either on the ad side or premium side with our expectations.

是的。因此，在很高的水平上，收入完全符合我們的預期。顯然，我們正在處理一些比我們預期更重的貨幣。但如果你同時考慮廣告方面和溢價方面，我們在這兩個方面幾乎都符合我們自己的內部預測。因此，收入完全符合預期。我們並不專門針對音樂或播客和廣告提供指導。但我想說音樂幾乎是一致的。播客的情況稍好一些。因此，我們總體上看到了廣告業的良好趨勢。所以我要再說一遍，回顧一下收入，無論是廣告方面還是溢價方面與我們的預期沒有太大差異。

All right. We've got a question from Mike Morris. What are the factors driving third quarter premium subscriber growth, the outlook that is below the prior year's level of net adds? Are there promotions or other activities that are driving increased quarterly variability? And how much is the announced price increase expected to impact net adds?

好的。我們收到了邁克·莫里斯的提問。推動第三季度優質用戶增長的因素有哪些，其前景低於去年的淨增長水平？是否有促銷或其他活動導致季度變化增加？宣布的提價預計會對淨增量產生多大影響？

Yes. So I'd probably take a step back first and just look at sort of subscriber growth in general. We outperformed in Q1 of this year. We outperformed in Q2 of this year. If you look at subscriber growth over the last 12 months, we've added over 30 million net subscribers, which is sort of a phenomenal and accelerating trajectory over any 12-month period of time. So subscriber growth has been really, really strong. Obviously, user growth has been even better. I think we've added something like 118 million users over the last 12 months as well. So both of them have really been strong. And when you look at over a 9-month period, incorporating our guidance, we expect net additions in the first 9 months of this year to be up 30% relative to the net additions we had in the first 9 months of last year. So that's just sort of the level set.

是的。因此，我可能會先退後一步，看看總體用戶增長情況。我們今年第一季度的表現優於大盤。我們今年第二季度的表現優於大盤。如果你看看過去 12 個月的訂閱者增長情況，你會發現我們已經增加了超過 3000 萬的淨訂閱者，這在任何 12 個月的時間段內都是一個驚人且不斷加速的軌跡。所以用戶增長非常非常強勁。顯然，用戶增長更加出色。我想在過去 12 個月裡我們也增加了大約 1.18 億用戶。所以說，兩人的實力確實都很強。當你觀察過去 9 個月的情況時，結合我們的指導，我們預計今年前 9 個月的淨增量將比去年前 9 個月的淨增量增長 30%。這只是級別設置。

And with respect to the absolute guide in Q3, well, one, we did significantly outperform in Q2. So there's always a question of how much, if any, we pull forward from Q3 into Q2, given it was our strongest Q2 ever from a subscriber perspective. The second thing is, as I mentioned in my comments, there's definitely some conservatism baked in. We've done price increases in the past. We've never done them this extensive and in some of our very key markets, and so there's some conservatism baked in there. So in general, I think we feel great about the overall subscriber trends over the last 12 months, over the last 9 months, throughout this year and into Q3. And again, when you look at some of the comments I made into the start of the year with respect to both user growth and subscriber growth, we're on pace to exceed kind of the comments I made in terms of similar growth to the prior year. So we feel really good about the trends on both sides.

就第三季度的絕對指導而言，第一，我們在第二季度的表現確實明顯優於其他市場。因此，始終存在一個問題，即我們從第三季度提前到第二季度的程度（如果有的話），因為從訂閱者的角度來看，這是我們有史以來最強勁的第二季度。第二件事是，正如我在評論中提到的，肯定存在一些保守主義。我們過去曾提價過。我們從未在一些非常關鍵的市場進行過如此廣泛的投資，因此其中存在一些保守主義。因此，總的來說，我認為我們對過去 12 個月、過去 9 個月、今年全年和第三季度的整體用戶趨勢感到滿意。再說一次，當你看看我在今年年初就用戶增長和訂戶增長發表的一些評論時，我們正在超越我在與之前類似的增長方面發表的評論。年。因此，我們對雙方的趨勢都感到非常滿意。

All right. We've got time for a few more questions. We're going to go now to Benjamin Black on Marketplace. How is marketplace growth trended and could new products like AI DJ support incremental growth here?

好的。我們還有時間再問幾個問題。我們現在要去 Marketplace 上的 Benjamin Black。市場增長趨勢如何？AI DJ 等新產品能否支持這裡的增量增長？

So Marketplace has grown really nicely. We haven't updated the numbers in a little while. I think the last time we updated numbers in 2021, it was about EUR 160 million or so of gross profit contribution. I think we said it grew north of 30% last year, and we grew significantly again this year. So Marketplace has continued to grow and be a significant driver. New -- we're always launching new products. We're always launching different things that we think will benefit our partners, the artists as well as the consumer. So we'll continue to innovate, and we think Marketplace still has a nice trajectory of being additive to also from a financial standpoint, but also more importantly, to the artist community and the benefit they receive from being a participant.

因此，Marketplace 發展得非常好。我們已經有一段時間沒有更新數字了。我認為我們上次更新數字是在 2021 年，毛利潤貢獻約為 1.6 億歐元左右。我想我們說去年增長了 30% 以上，今年我們再次大幅增長。因此，Marketplace 持續增長並成為重要的推動力。新——我們總是推出新產品。我們總是推出不同的產品，我們認為這些產品將使我們的合作夥伴、藝術家以及消費者受益。因此，我們將繼續創新，我們認為 Marketplace 仍然具有良好的發展軌跡，從財務角度來看，而且更重要的是，對藝術家社區以及他們從參與者中獲得的好處。

Okay. We've got a question from Jed Kelly on monthly active users. Can you quantify how much MAUs benefited from the decision to delay price increases versus competitors? And will that benefit dissipate now?

好的。我們收到了傑德·凱利 (Jed Kelly) 提出的有關每月活躍用戶數的問題。您能否量化與競爭對手相比延遲漲價的決定讓多少月活躍用戶受益？那麼這種好處現在會消失嗎？

Yes. I think you're referring to subscribers growth and not monthly active users because on the free side, I would say we see -- I don't think we have any impact on the price increases on that. But if you think about the subscriber growth again, it may have impacted, it may not have impacted. But again, if we go back and look at the data based on the about 50 price increases we've seen so far. With that data in mind, I would say it has had very little impact on any future growth or anything in terms of churn or conversion rates. So that's part of the reason why we feel really good about the position we're in and why we feel this is the right time to do this. So my expectation is, while we can't know, of course, is that we don't believe it's meaningfully impacted.

是的。我認為你指的是訂閱者增長，而不是每月活躍用戶，因為在免費方面，我想說我們看到 - 我認為我們對價格上漲沒有任何影響。但如果你再考慮一下訂閱者的增長，它可能會產生影響，也可能不會產生影響。但同樣，如果我們回顧一下迄今為止我們看到的大約 50 次價格上漲的數據。考慮到這些數據，我想說它對任何未來的增長或客戶流失或轉化率方面的影響很小。因此，這就是為什麼我們對自己所處的位置感到非常滿意以及為什麼我們認為現在是這樣做的正確時機的部分原因。所以我的期望是，雖然我們當然無法知道，但我們不相信它會受到有意義的影響。

Okay. Next question from Rich Greenfield on advertising. Ad supported MAUs are growing at over twice the growth rate in your advertising revenues. The ad market is clearly soft. But is there anything else in terms of ad product or advertiser willingness to embrace audio that's dampening your advertising revenue growth?

好的。里奇·格林菲爾德的下一個問題是關於廣告的。廣告支持的月活躍用戶數的增長速度是廣告收入增長率的兩倍以上。廣告市場顯然疲軟。但是，就廣告產品或廣告商接受音頻的意願而言，還有其他因素會抑制您的廣告收入增長嗎？

I think, Rich, part of the explanation is really around 2 factors where we are seeing that growth. And then, I would say, a little bit about just the delay in timing. So some of the growth we're seeing in markets that generally don't have the same strength of advertising as say, United States has. So when you think about the rest of the world, obviously, the ARPUs on the ad side are going to be much lower there than they are in the U.S. So that's some of the explanation when you think about ad MAUs growing. But then the other part is, and I think you can see this as you're looking at all platforms, pretty much all social media platforms follow this similar trend, which is when you have reacceleration of growth or very fast, rapid growth. It usually takes a few quarters before the ad market catches up. .

里奇，我認為部分解釋實際上是圍繞我們看到的增長的兩個因素。然後，我想說一點關於時間延遲的問題。因此，我們在通常不具備像美國那樣的廣告實力的市場中看到了一些增長。因此，當你考慮世界其他地區時，顯然，廣告方面的 ARPU 會比美國低得多。因此，當你考慮廣告 MAU 增長時，這就是一些解釋。但另一部分是，我認為你可以在查看所有平台時看到這一點，幾乎所有社交媒體平台都遵循這種類似的趨勢，即當你重新加速增長或非常快速地增長時。廣告市場通常需要幾個季度才能迎頭趕上。 。

So it is not sort of 1 to 1 when you see a user, you can instantly start monetizing that user. It usually takes a few quarters before you can do that. And I think you can see that very clearly when you go back and look at some of the other players in the space as well. And I think over time, it will start catching up here, too, but it's more of a lag than anything else. And then, of course, the developing markets part.

所以當你看到一個用戶時，這不是一對一的，你可以立即開始通過該用戶獲利。通常需要幾個季度才能做到這一點。我認為當你回頭看看這個領域的其他一些參與者時，你可以非常清楚地看到這一點。我認為隨著時間的推移，它也會開始迎頭趕上，但它比其他任何事情都更加滯後。當然，還有發展中市場。

All right. We're going to take our last question today from Benjamin Black on podcasting. Podcast advertising reaccelerated nicely this quarter. What was the source of the turnaround? And more broadly, how would you characterize the advertising environment?

好的。今天我們將回答本傑明·布萊克關於播客的最後一個問題。播客廣告本季度再次加速增長。扭轉局面的根源是什麼？更廣泛地說，您如何描述廣告環境？

So I think there's a couple of things in there. One, SPAN performed really well in the quarter, which helped on the podcasting side. So a lot of it just came from that. It came from improvements in all areas of kind of our ability to deliver on the podcasting side, better sellout rates in general. So that's really what was on the podcasting side. As I said earlier, the advertising -- podcasting advertising did get better throughout the quarter. So the -- in terms of year-over-year growth rates, the best month was the last month of the quarter for us from a podcasting perspective.

所以我認為裡面有幾件事。首先，SPAN 在本季度的表現非常好，這對播客方面有所幫助。所以很多都是來自於此。它來自於我們在播客方面交付能力的所有領域的改進，總體上更好的售票率。這就是播客方面的真正情況。正如我之前所說，廣告——播客廣告在整個季度確實有所改善。因此，就同比增長率而言，從播客的角度來看，最好的月份是本季度的最後一個月。

All right. Thanks, Ben, and that's going to wrap up our Q&A session today. Let's turn the call back over to Daniel for some closing remarks.

好的。謝謝本，今天的問答環節就到此結束。讓我們將電話轉回丹尼爾，讓他做一些結束語。

All right. Thanks, Bryan. It was really a great and historic quarter for Spotify, and I'm energized by our growth and continued outperformance. The price increases we announced yesterday demonstrate the value we provide to our customers and the strength of our offering. As a team, we're also moving faster than ever, and we're better positioned to deliver on our potential and the ambitions we laid out for you at the last year's Investor Day. We are making tremendous progress towards those goals, and I feel confident about our momentum heading into the second half of 2023. So thank you all for joining us. And as usual, feel free to check out our For The Record podcast, which will be released later today.

好的。謝謝，布萊恩。對於 Spotify 來說，這確實是一個偉大且具有歷史意義的季度，我們的增長和持續出色的表現讓我深受鼓舞。我們昨天宣布的價格上漲證明了我們為客戶提供的價值以及我們產品的實力。作為一個團隊，我們的行動速度也比以往任何時候都快，並且我們能夠更好地發揮我們的潛力和我們在去年投資者日為您制定的雄心壯志。我們正在朝著這些目標取得巨大進展，我對進入 2023 年下半年的勢頭充滿信心。所以感謝大家加入我們。和往常一樣，請隨時查看我們的 For The Record 播客，該播客將於今天晚些時候發布。

All right. And that concludes today's call. A replay will be available on our website and also on the Spotify app under Spotify earnings call replays. Thanks, everyone, for joining.

好的。今天的電話會議到此結束。我們的網站以及 Spotify 應用程序上的 Spotify 財報電話會議重播將提供重播。謝謝大家的加入。

This concludes today's call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.

今天的電話會議到此結束。感謝您的參與。您現在可以斷開連接。