Good afternoon, welcome to the Enthusiast Gaming Fiscal Second Quarter 2023 Financial Results Conference Call. All participants will be in listen-only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by 0. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star, then 1 on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star, then 2. Please note, this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Matt Chesler, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
Thank you, operator. Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to the Enthusiast Gaming second quarter 2023 results conference call. I'm Matt Chesler of FNK IR. With me today is our Chief Executive Officer, Nick Brien, and our Chief Financial Officer, Alex Macdonald. We'll begin with some prepared remarks and then open the floor to questions. Before we begin, I'd like to remind everyone that today's presentation contains forward-looking information that involves known and unknown risks and uncertainties and other factors that could cause actual events to differ materially from current expectations. These statements should not be read as assurances of future performance or results. Such statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other factors that may cause actual results, performance, or achievements to be materially different from those implied by such statements.
A more complete discussion of the risks and uncertainties facing the company appears in the company's management discussion and analysis for the three-month period ending June 30th, 2023, which are available under the company's profile on SEDAR and EDGAR, as well as on the company's website at enthusiastgaming.com. You're cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this presentation. The company disclaims any intention or obligation, except to the extent required by law, to update and revise any forward-looking statements as a result of new information, future events, or for any other reason. Now, I'd like to turn the call over to Nick Brien, CEO of Enthusiast Gaming. Take it away, Nick.
Thanks, Matt, welcome to everyone participating on our earnings call. I joined Enthusiast Gaming as its Chief Enthusiast Officer five months ago, and my conviction continues to be that the gaming media sector is a huge growth opportunity for us as the number one gaming property in the U.S., as measured by Comscore. Throughout the course of my remarks, I'll share concrete examples of our occurring and new business momentum that strengthens my conviction on a daily basis. I'm excited to share with you the strong progress we have achieved over the past quarter, as the management team has focused diligently on executing the strategic initiatives developed as part of our 2023 Transformation Velocity Plan. I will discuss these in detail, I first want to share some important industry context.
The video gaming industry demonstrates continued momentum in terms of exciting new game launches, such as Diablo IV and Baldur's Gate 3, and continued user growth across the mobile gaming sector. Gaming is an entertainment industry that's significantly expanding year-over-year, projected to be worth $366 billion by the end of the year. Massive tech and entertainment companies see the value and opportunity of entering the gaming space as they expand their footprint in gaming through organic growth and acquisitions. The U.S. media industry continues to rapidly evolve from the dominance of the walled garden digital players, such as Meta and Google, to high-growth, innovative digital media sectors such as CTV, retail media, and commerce media. Yet the disruption of legacy media players continues. As Amazon posted a 22% gain this quarter, Discovery posted a 13% decline.
These newer media players continue to attract advertising dollars as they provide marketers with scaled audiences, first-party data, and brand-safe environments. Uber is on its way to building a billion-dollar ad business within the next year. My visit to the annual Cannes Lions Advertising Festival in June reinforced the strong interest from industry leaders in the gaming media sector, given the scale and breadth of the gaming audiences and the remarkably high user engagement metrics they offer. These same brands remain largely uninformed and confused about how to engage the gaming audiences with respect, relevance, and critical authenticity to connect in exciting and effective ways.
During the week at Cannes, I met with many of the largest global marketers, including P&G, Unilever, Intel, PepsiCo, Microsoft, Pfizer, Diageo, and Lenovo, and the message was consistent. For gaming to become an established media sector, attracting large advertising budgets, we must offer these mega brands several things. First, we must offer scale audiences, not niche gamers. Second, we must ensure brand-safe environments to protect their brand equity while respecting the gaming audience's attention. Third, critical that we provide independent measurement to prove ROI. When we and our peers deliver against these criteria, gaming media will move swiftly from being a nice-to-have to becoming a must-buy. Enthusiast Gaming is uniquely resourced to provide leading brands and agency partners with strategic planning, content creation, first-party audience targeting, and marketing campaign measurement to meet industry standards while providing necessary innovation and ROI.
While media channels and marketing approaches continue to evolve, the mission for CMOs remains the same: to build brands and fuel growth. The industry has historically been highly fragmented. Enthusiast Gaming was no different, with several businesses operating completely independently with insufficient communication or coordination. Our strategy of breaking down silos and creating comprehensive Brand Solutions at scale, operating on a single tech stack to ensure brand safety and providing real-time feedback, is exactly what these mega brands are looking for. Our reorganization efforts in Enthusiast Gaming reflect these opportunities to double down on Brand Solutions, previously called direct sales; to create high-quality environments that excite and delight the enthusiasts who come to our gaming sites to play, learn, create and connect; and to work with leading creators to develop exciting content tentpoles and live experiences that delight their communities and attract leading brands.
Even in these early days, this reorganization is driving improvements. Our aggregate monthly average users across our network of gaming sites has increased to nearly 56 million, the largest scaled audience in aggregate of any U.S. gaming property, bigger than the likes of Twitch, Roblox, and Activision Blizzard. Our continued focus is to strengthen our operating model and refine our go-to-market positioning. We are building a solid foundation of robust MarTech technology and first-party data to ensure that yield optimization is embedded into everything we do. Our enterprise technology platform is now centrally managed across the entire organization by Shinggo Lu and Alan Liang, recently promoted to Chief Product Officer and Chief Technology Officer, respectively. This extremely talented team of gaming leaders has now extended their highly successful U.GG product to become a platform that offers similar player statistics and gaming information for World of Warcraft and Valorant.
At the same time, U.GG has just released its first standalone desktop app, and downloads have exceeded expectations and on target to reach 500,000 by the year-end, with no paid marketing support. This product to platform initiative is now being implemented across The Sims Resource, Icy Veins, and select casual games and community sites within Addicting Games. We all know that delivering ad tech excellence is a prerequisite for building a profitable media business in today's programmatic media buying world. Too, is offering the market exciting integrated solutions that enable brands to collaborate with leading creators to develop the gaming content and experiences they're seeking to differentiate from their competitors. Our content division has delivered such creative projects on behalf of major brands such as NFL, Xbox, State Farm, and Mondelez, amongst others.
To highlight our commitment to creative excellence, we've now rebranded our content division as Final Boss Studios, led by our gaming-obsessed Executive Creative Director, Rorke Frost. He and his talented team are busy developing the content tentpole roadmap to build on our continuing success of the NFL Tuesday Night Games. We're now in active negotiations with two other major U.S. sports leagues to create unique content platforms involving their top players competing against the most influential creators. We have just sold our largest brand deal ever for a major sponsorship of the NFL Tuesday Night Gaming for Season 2, and our pipeline is full of significant blue-chip brands, including a number of returning sponsors, renewing and expanding their commitments from Season 1. This achievement, coupled with the increased contribution of Brand Solutions as a percentage of our consolidated revenue, further demonstrates the progress we are making.
We are rapidly moving beyond selling ads, only selling ads, and instead selling integrated solutions. This is especially important considering the continued industry headwinds in the programmatic ad business. We've signed several of the biggest streamers in the world as team captains for Season Two, the identity of which will be announced shortly with the launch of a new season. Season Two of NFL Tuesday Night Gaming will now be streamed on Twitch, the biggest live- streaming platform for gamers, by more than 12 times over YouTube and Facebook combined in total hours streamed, and more than three times bigger in hours watched.
As we analyze our sales pipeline, we're excited to see 78% recurring revenue for 2023, as well as an impressive asset- mix diversification, with over 80% of our Brand Solutions utilizing more than two of our assets and over 50% utilizing more than three. The breadth of Enthusiast's diversified portfolio across the gaming ecosystem allows us to productize our innovative Brand Solutions, offering marketers the opportunity to do so much more than only push display or video ads. Media placements usually accompany our large sponsorship deals and creative properties, such as the Fortnite map, we just produced for Shell in conjunction with Team Unite and WPP's Essence agency.
To drive Enthusiast Gaming's transformation from being a loosely affiliated portfolio of sites to operating as a centrally managed company with a diversified network of gaming assets, I continue to upgrade our management team and recruit proven industry experts to help accelerate our growth momentum and operational excellence. We recently hired a sales analyst, a product and pricing specialist, a data analytics expert, and a product marketing genius to ensure that our sellers are knowledgeable about every single product we're developing across our network. To ensure that our programming and media offering is securing the highest CPMs possible, we're now in the process of finalizing the hiring of a senior ad tech engineer to strengthen all SSP, DSP, and ad server integrations. There can be no room for error as we fight to optimize the yield of our precious media inventory.
At the same time, as we shared on our last earnings call, we're determined to drive more growth from our highly profitable subscriptions revenue. To unlock this subscribe- subscriber growth and strengthen our gaming communities overall, we have hired a leading consultant from Microsoft to drive this important initiative. Our newly created strategic partnership division, led by EVP Matt Goodman, continues to develop exciting and unique properties such as NFL Tuesday Night Gaming, while increasing our dialogue and ideation with leading players across sports, music, fashion, and retail. Many of the world's biggest brands are seeking meaningful engagement in the gaming sector, beyond running pre-roll video ads or simply sponsoring a creator. Long-term partnerships involve thoughtful strategic planning and clear performance indicators to evaluate ROI for both brand building and lead generation. We could not be more excited with the momentum in this critical area of our business.
We've improved our pipeline visibility and revenue forecasting, enabling us to invest more wisely and more precisely guide the company towards profitability for the first time in its history. The pipeline for quarter three, and especially for quarter four, is robust, with 55 potential new logos in the second half pipe, representing 45% of the overall pipeline. Our clients continue to be well diversified across industry verticals, with CPG being at the top at 20%. Entertainment continues to be strong for us, signifying that Enthusiast Gaming remains a key destination despite this industry vertical's headwinds. We've just signed a large deal with Dove, representing our first win with Unilever, as we continue to secure new brand assignments from Coke, Mondelez, Google, and AT&T.
I see massive untapped opportunity in other key industry verticals that are poised for growth, such as travel, food and beverage, and retail. Under the expert leadership of Amanda Rubin, EVP of Brand Solutions, we have reorganized our overall sales effort by industry vertical and agency holding company, as well as the independent agency sector. We expect to convert our strong second-half pipeline of existing and new logos while cementing these clients' convictions that the gaming media sector represents the most innovative and efficient way for brands to reach their future customers while extending their brand vitality in the most dynamic and culturally connected entertainment sector that exists today. I will now hand over to Alex Macdonald, our CFO, to discuss the details of our Quarter Two earnings. Thank you. Alex?
Thank you, Nick, thank you to all our shareholders, analysts, lending partners, and other stakeholders for joining us today to discuss the progress we made in this 2Q of 2023. During the second quarter, we advanced the initiatives Nick has been speaking about since becoming our Chief Enthusiast Officer. We are focusing on profitable revenue streams and margin expansion, as well as creating comprehensive Brand Solutions and leveraging our diverse assets as a platform. As the digital ad market begins to normalize, the second quarter results are beginning to reflect the work we are putting in place to ensure a swift transition to profitability. I'll speak on the numbers shortly, but first, here are my usual notes. I note that our results are presented in Canadian dollars.
The significant majority of our revenues and expenses are measured in US dollars and are translated into Canadian dollars for presentation in our financial statements. The exchange rate between the US dollar and our presentation currency of the Canadian dollar should be monitored and considered when analyzing or forecasting results. I know that our business is affected by seasonal trends in digital advertising, with sequential increases each quarter throughout the year, driven by increasing ad prices and demand, which peaks in Q4. This seasonality is isolated to our Media and Content revenue streams. Now, let's get back to the financial results. Q2 revenue was CAD 42.6 million, which is down 17% year-over-year, but roughly flat versus Q1. Q2 revenue by source was as follows: Media and Content, CAD 36.9 million; subscription, CAD 4 million; and Esports and Entertainment, CAD 1.7 million.
The Q2 Media and Content revenue of $36.9 million compares to $45.4 million reported in Q2 2022, a decrease of 19%. The decrease was primarily driven by a decrease in RPM caused by lower CPMs in the programmatic markets. Our web RPMs were down 28%, while our video RPMs were down 13% in Q2 year-over-year. These year-over-year RPM declines improved in Q2 compared to Q1, and we expect them to continue to narrow, with further improvements being noticeable subsequent to June 30. Q2 Media and Content revenue was also impacted by lower video views year-over-year, with 5.7 billion video views being measured in Q2 2023, as compared to 7.1 billion video views in Q2 2022.
The lower video views related to specific low-margin channels, which we elected not to renew as we focused on more profitable revenues and pruned our portfolio, as Nick discussed. Q2 Media and Content revenue was also impacted by the rescheduling of all NFL TNG episodes originally scheduled for Q2 to later in the NFL TNG Season 2. This was done to better service our customers' objectives. This had an impact on Brand Solutions revenue for Q2. These episodes will now air in season, with the related revenue being recognized in those periods. Q2 subscription revenue remained at an all-time high of $4 million, up 14% from approximately $3.5 million in Q2 last year.
This increase was largely driven by an increase in paid subscribers, which were 272,000 as of June 30, 2023, as compared to 258,000 as of June 30, 2022. The yield on a per subscriber basis was also slightly higher year-over-year. Q2 esports and entertainment revenue was CAD 1.7 million, down 23% from CAD 2.2 million in Q2 of last year. The decrease in esports and entertainment revenue is mainly attributable to decreased esports sponsorship activities, which was offset by an increase in event revenue. Gross profit was CAD 15 million in Q2, which was similar to the CAD 15.3 million of gross profit recorded in Q2 2022. Gross margin increased 520 basis points to 35.2% from 30%.
This gross margin increase reflects the greater contribution of Brand Solutions and subscription revenue to our overall revenue profile, as well as the elimination of certain unprofitable products and channels, as well as the year-over-year decline in market-driven CPMs. In other words, our strategy to reduce our reliance on network programmatic revenue and focus on profitable revenue is driving improvements in our margin profile. Total operating expenses were CAD 24.6 million, down 15.6% from the second quarter last year and down modestly from the CAD 25.2 million we expensed in Q1. Operating expenses in Q2 include non-cash items of amortization and depreciation of CAD 2.9 million and share-based compensation of CAD 1.8 million. Notably, operating expenses also include approximately CAD 1 million of expenses relating to restructuring, which are included in salaries and wages and will be non-recurring.
The decrease in cash-based OpEx year-over-year was primarily due to decreases in esports player, team, and game expenses of $900,000 and decreases in office and general expenses, which decreased by $800,000. In addition, Q2 last year included $2.2 million related to the annual general meeting, legal and advisory costs, with such costs being nominal this year. We expect somewhat higher operating expenses in the third and fourth quarters as the NFL TNG Season 2 kicks off in mid-Q3, with the related revenues also coming back online. Net loss narrowed 40% to $10.2 million in Q2, down from $16.9 million in Q2 2022, resulting in a net loss per share, both basic and diluted, of $0.07 in Q2, down from $0.12 in Q2 2022.
Turning to the balance sheet, the company ended the quarter with $2.7 million in cash and in addition, had an available operating line of $5 million, for total available cash of $7.7 million as of June 30, 2023. The change in cash during the quarter was largely due to $1.4 million in cash generated by operating activities, offset by $1.3 million used in financing activities, mostly relating to repayments on the company's term facility and $800,000 used in investing activities, which is attributable to an earn out payment relating to the acquisition of Fantasy Football Scout in April 2022. Subsequent to the quarter end, we are in advanced discussions with our lender to document an amendment to our credit facilities to provide additional liquidity through our operating line.
Given the improving trends we are seeing in our business and industry, along with the benefit of the amendment to our operating line, we are confident we have sufficient liquidity to execute our near-term objectives. We continue to believe we will exit 2023 and enter 2024 as a profitable business. Now I wish to speak about the primary drivers for the rest of the year. The best way to do that is to use this second quarter as a baseline. Q2 this year was relatively flat compared to Q1, with some modest margin compression. There are some significant differences that need to be considered when analyzing this, and these same items will be the primary drivers of revenue, gross margin, and gross profit lift for the rest of the year.
Number one is, of course, seasonality, which is expected to significantly impact both CPMs and brand solutions. While CPMs remained challenged in Q2 and are still down year-over-year, we do expect a significant lift in the second half, similar to what we have all heard from the earnings commentary of other large digital publishers over the last few weeks. As ad spending increases in the second half, we also expect a positive impact on brand solutions. Second is NFL TNG. NFL TNG had no episodes in Q2, as it is currently in the off-season. NFL TNG has a material impact on brand solutions revenue and will return in September. Third is events. The company does not have any major events in Q2, like the Pocket Gamer Connects London event, which was held in Q1. Our large events will return in Q3, with Pocket Gamer Connects Helsinki scheduled for September.
These events are accretive to gross margin. These items, combined with our product initiatives, including U.GG's expansions into Valorant and World of Warcraft, Icy Veins quickly becoming the primary destination for fans of the newly launched blockbuster title, Diablo IV, and TSR undergoing a complete subscription upgrade drive, drive increased management confidence about the second half. While our product offerings continue to entertain our communities of gaming fans, our Brand Solutions continue to help brands reach our coveted audiences, and the stats about our repeat business speak for themselves. In this second quarter, repeat business accounted for 62% of total direct sold deals and 66% of total Brand Solutions revenue. This means that a customer of Enthusiast Gaming is likely to come back, and when they do, they are likely to spend more.
Therefore, it should be no surprise that we continue to set records with the single largest direct sold deal in company history being sold subsequent to the second quarter. For all these reasons, we believe we have a clear sight line to a successful and profitable second half, particularly in Q4. I wish to thank my team for their work on the quarter, and I also wish to congratulate Nick on his first 4- full quarter as our Chief Enthusiast Officer. We've been very hard at work and are glad to bring this quarter to market and are looking forward to getting back to our business. Of course, ladies and gentlemen, our business is the business of gaming. Thank you. Operator, I kindly turn it back to you.
We will now begin the question and answer session. To ask a question, you may press Star, then one on your telephone keypad. If you are using a speakerphone, please pick up your handset before pressing the keys. To withdraw your question, please press Star then two. At this time, we will pause momentarily to assemble our roster. Our first question is from Mike Crawford with B. Riley Securities. Please go ahead.
Thank you. The first question is regarding Brand Solutions deal pricing, and I know it's not a simple answer because it's not just like, programmatic CPMs, but how would you characterize the, the types of prices you're able to negotiate with your customers that are advertising for your integrated solutions?
Well, hi, Mike. It's Nick here. Thank you. Thank you for that question. I think there's no one standard fits all. We've recognized that it really does depend on the mix of the solution that's being designed. What is the level of content build? What is the scale and the, you know, popularity of the creator that they want? Some brands are more discerning and, and, and determined to choose and be very involved in that process, others leave it for us. What is the set cost gonna be? What level of media support is around it? What kind of impression level do they want? What I would say is that, like anything, we're recognizing that two things that we've, we've made a significant shift on.
One, we hired a top executive in all things pricing and packaging from Barstool Sports. Now, every single one of the Brand Solutions in terms of the way they're packaged and priced, is going through a central, you know, function to ensure that we've certainly got that consistency. The second thing that's important is we've changed all compensation terms for, you know, a change in is going on right now with our sellers to ensure that gross margin is a key factor within their commission plans, as well as gross prop-- gross, you know, gross profit, and gross profit margin, as opposed to just gross revenue. We're, we're looking that the mix of media is certainly higher when we're selling video, with, with display. That is obviously the video that we're generating on YouTube, and we're packaging that up directly.
I'm very pleased with the level of price increase we're generating across the board, and we're especially seeing that on recurring clients. There isn't my one standard, you know, set price, but there is increasingly a standard process and a standard format by which we have individual criteria and the components of each Brand Solution being priced accordingly.
Thank, thank you, Nick. Maybe an extension of some of, of the unique proprietary content you're creating with Tuesday Night Gaming, with the, with the NFL, is what-- when might we hear one way or the other regarding these discussions with two other major U.S. sports leagues? Would it be out of the question that something could be done this season with them?
Unlikely, unlikely to announce both in quarter three. We are very confident to announce one in quarter three, as soon as we have a deal signed, we are packaging and productizing and taking that to market. We've already been doing that conceptually enough to give us the confidence that this is important partnership deal that Matt Goodman is looking to close down. I think it's unlikely that the second one will be in market in 2023, but very confident that's going to start very soon in 2024.
Excellent. Just one, one more, if you don't mind. On, on Friday, it was disclosed that Barstool Sports has has agreed to its, its, its media arm that includes esports and other proprietary content they're creating is is going public, potentially with a business combination, with a SPAC, with a with a $1 billion valuation. I'm wondering, not only the parallels between maybe that business and your business, but if you had any sense of what revenue that entity has, since from what we could tell, the, the, those, those revenue details were kind of missing?
Well, they are. I would imagine that that is a very obviously, with Barcelona being such a high-profile, global team, that is a really smart move for them, and I think they're going to look to leverage that and leverage that brand equity, and into esports, it does make all the sense in the world. Luminosity, we're striking deals with, with one now. We've already done one. We're striking deals with the second of the biggest Mexican teams, and we're also having other conversations across Latin America. I think that we're certainly keen to talk with Barcelona, and the Barca package that we've also seen, to discuss with them how they realize that opportunity.
Because, you know, it's important for us and the big opportunity with, with obviously Spanish content being so strongly, you know, followed and engaged by the US Hispanic, Latino population, there's an opportunity there for us. That's the other thing that I want to make sure that you raise a very, very good point that we want to take on board, is the fact that when we think about the importance in, a market where our main focus is in the US, which of our 332 million people, we do know we have 42 million African American citizens, we have 62 million Hispanic, Latino, we have 18 million Asian American. We know that there are remarkable opportunities for brands seeking to better engage with, particular audiences and particular communities.
We strongly believe that sports and our partnership with sports leagues, and even within esports, is an important opportunity. We, we're going to be, investigating that, Mike.
All right, thank you very much. I was very pleased to hear Alex say you expect to be profitable by year-end. Thank you.
Thanks, Mike.
The next question is from Kevin Krishnaratne with Scotiabank. Please go ahead.
Hey there, good evening. Just on the, just want to confirm on the brand, sorry, the Brand Solutions revenue was down Q1 to Q2. That's because of the dynamic of NFL, right? Would it have been up quarter-over-quarter, and is that the sort of trend that you expect to see over the Q3 and Q4?
Well, Kevin, thank, thank you for your, your question, and the answer is a conclusive yes. The level of effort and resource and energy we're putting against the Brand Solutions, it, it continues unabated. The acknowledgment of the market, and certainly, as I talked about in my remarks, when I look at the, the pipe for quarter two-- for quarter three and quarter four, and I look at the, the scale and size of the, of the logos coming back, recurring clients as well as new logos and the size of the deals, it's very reassuring.
Okay.
The answer is, had we had NFL in quarter two, we would have been in the marketplace and we'd be merchandising and selling those deals, but we didn't.
Okay, got it. Thanks for that. There was some revenue, I guess, pushed out from, from content that you'd produced from, Q2 into, into Q3, Q4. That, that'll come into Q3. Does the profit profile look better, though, in, in Q3 because you've already sort of incurred some of the expenses for the production on that content in Q2? Just trying to think about the profitability profile heading into, into Q3.
Yeah. Alex, can you take that one, please?
I'd be happy to. Thank you, Nick. Hey, Kevin. Yeah, as Nick said, definitely it had an impact. Brand Solutions down slightly quarter-over-quarter, but Brand Solutions included a significant amount of NFL revenue in Q1. What we see in Q2, there, there were some NFL customers, zero NFL revenue recognized in Q2 simply because we did not deliver or air any, any content. As you also heard from myself and Nick, a lot of content's been sold, including the, our largest deal ever. Yes, that revenue, those, the, those episodes will be pushed and served later in the year.
Some costs were recognized in the quarter and no revenue was recognized, so that will improve the profit profile somewhat when we do air those episodes, but there will still be a regular. I wouldn't say it'd be too material. I would still expect you know, in the NFL TMV, because it is a live show, right? Most of the production costs, most of the talent costs will still come into play with those episodes. However, we are selling individual episodes, and these sponsorships are being done profitably. There will be some lift to the profit profile for NFL in the later quarters because there were some expenses in this quarter without any revenue recognized.
Okay, got it. Thanks for that. I think you made It looks like by your, by your, you know, assumptions, you've, you've exited some, some relationships on, on the video side of it, some customers that were maybe less profitable. Do you have an estimate for how much that, that is on an annual basis in terms of revenue?
I can take that again. I mean, it's, it's, it's baked in now. So that, that's... It's, it's baked in now. So you can see, you know, the MD&A, we do disclose the, the movements in RPMs and how much video comes from- how much revenue, excuse me, comes from video and how much comes from web platforms. All the details are in there. Look, Media and Content was, was down substantially year over year, just over CAD 8 million decrease there. The, the, that, you know, a big chunk of that is CPMs, and then further, you know, that decrease in the video views, which I guess would be about 15% on the video view side. Those, those would be the, those would be the pieces that tied together.
The bigger driver is still the CPMs, but the video views did have an impact. That's baked in.
Yeah.
It's normalized at this point, so, so I wouldn't expect a further, further decline from that.
Okay. No, I was just trying to get a sense for. I think there was some commentary that you exited some relationships with some content creators, and if there was a view on how much revenue that those creators may have accounted for in the base. I can just take it offline with you.
Oh, no problem. All that information is in the MD&A.
Got it.
It Yeah, or the video. It'd be the it's more it's, the primary driver is still the CPM. Think of it like 5, you know, 1, 3%-5% would be an approximate number of the total revenue. More, for more specific details, all the RPMs, the video views, and the movement, on specifically on the video, all the stats are provided there.
All right, got it. Thanks. I'll jump back in the queue. Thanks, guys.
Cool. Thanks.
Thanks. Excuse me. The next question is from Robert Young with Canaccord Genuity. Please go ahead.
Hi, good evening. In the release, I think in the prepared comments, you talked about profitability timeline. What type of profitability is that, that EBITDA you're talking about there? Was it by end of year? Maybe just refresh that for me, please.
Yeah, Robert, thank you for that question. As I've said, you know, all along, I said it in, in the last quarter, certainly reemphasizing it now, we will be a profitable company as we go into 2024. It is our determination as a leadership team, we're focusing on the big five drivers to ensure that we enter 2024 as a profitable business. I, I can't give you the specifics as to exactly what month we're gonna be turning profitable, but we're very confident we're gonna be doing that by the end of the year.
Okay, that's great. The second question, I think, just commentary around having sufficient cash, and availability on the credit line to get to that profitability. You also said that you're in negotiations around that credit line. I was just curious, are you able to, to get to profitability on the current credit line, or are you suggesting or, or would you be required to expand that credit line to get there?
No, well, I'll tell you what, Robert, I'll, I'll let Alex take that because he's done a very good job working with our existing lender to demonstrate, you know, their, you know, to reassure their confidence in our business model. Alex, why don't you respond to Robert on that, please?
Well, thank you, Nick, and I'd be, I'd be happy to. Hey, Rob. Yes, I mean, you know what I've always said, there's a couple of things we're doing. One, we're being extremely efficient. Like, like all businesses in our sector and even the broad tech industry, we're being as efficient as possible on our expenses. Number two, though, more importantly, and I've said this a number of times, we are also being very efficient and strict, being more strict with our, our working capital. I've always said there is actually a lot of value tied up in there. You know, this quarter, we have, what? $33 million of accounts receivable, trade receivables and other receivables on the balance sheet. At the same time, when we look then to our facilities, we have an operating line against that of $5 million.
I believe we are under-leveraged on a debt equity basis. I believe we're under-leveraged on a debt to asset basis as well. And this one's a no-brainer. To answer the question, could we get there without? I believe we could, 'cause we could further find ways to unlock the value of our working capital. However, we also are very bullish about our pipeline, and we are setting, we are setting bigger and bigger deals. And some of our success in the short term, we had to pay for, and there's more campaigns to run, and we, we wanna make sure we're prepared for that. But with that said, subsequent to the quarter end, you know, we are, as mentioned, in advanced discussions with our lender, to document an amendment.
to our, our credit facilities to make sure that we have the sufficient and ample liquidity to execute our near-term strategies, and of course, this through the end of the year. By the end of the year, we're very confident, we will be profitable. We're locking that down. You know, we're moving any short-term liquidity risks because we have a clear sight line to the end of the year, and we wanna make sure that there's no hiccups along the way. I think we could without it, but remember, our operating line is also by far our cheapest cost of capital.
It's a preferred method for myself, and as Nick said, we're, you know, we're very grateful to our, our long-standing lending partners who no doubt are listening, and we appreciate their confidence in us and value them as partners.
All right. Thanks a lot for the detailed answer. Maybe the last one for me. Last year, if I remember, I think it suggested that there was some holding back for the Q4, just to make sure that... I think brands were worried that they wouldn't have enough powder for the important Q4 period. Now that you're sort of through maybe a little bit of Q3 here, I'm just curious, is that same dynamic at play? Are your customers weighing up for Q4, or is it more of a linear dynamic this year? I'll pass the line.
Alex, why don't you take that?
Oh, sure. Thank you. You know, we are, we are seeing it. You know, we don't wanna create this as a KPI. We, but, you know, we can see we have increased visibility. As Nick said, we are increasing our visibility, so we can see a pipeline. Nick gave some stats on that, so I don't wanna give more or less. They're out there. But those are very good stats. You can see the visibility we have. Yes, we are seeing activity, a lot of interest in Q4. I think the normal seasonality, which, Rob, you'd be familiar with, over the years, I'm very hopeful that we're returning to that normal. We have a lot of interest in orders for Q4.
As I mentioned earlier, that's one of the reasons, this demand for back half of the year, you know, media, media assets and, and, and other solutions for our brands is, is one of the reasons, we rescheduled those episodes for the NFL TNG. We're seeing a return to that normalcy, which we all recall in the prior years, until at least until 2022, that's how it worked, right? It was, it was always booming in Q4. Hopeful and optimistic for that. Yes, I, I don't think it's linear. I think it's a lift for Q3 and a bigger lift for Q4.
All right. Thanks, gentlemen. I'll pass the line.
The next question is from Drew McReynolds with RBC. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks very much. Two for, for you, Alex, I think, then one for you, Nick. Just on the first two, on the operating line, Alex, in terms of getting that larger, can you, can you without giving a number, obviously, can you quantify, is it, you know, doubling the size or maybe something more? On the sustained profitability, good to hear. As you get into the seasonally softer Q1 of next year, presumably, just based on your commentary, you expect to remain profitable. If you could confirm that. Then, Nick, just bigger picture on the organizational changes, you alluded to quite a few of them. Where, where are you on kind of your own roadmap of optimizing the organization? Are you middle innings, late innings, early innings? Any context there would be great. Thank you.
Okay, Alex, you go first.
Sure. Thank you.
Okay.
Hey, Drew, how are you doing? Okay, I'll start with the operating line. Look, it's a sufficient-- I, I'll put it this way: We're not talking about a major change to our capitalization. We're not really changing the capitalization of the business. Just a modest increase, to, you know, to ensure we have access to tap our working capital for the remainder of the year. Well, it is a permanent increase for the term of the facility. I would, you know, I would expect to double or less. Like, it is modest. We're not really changing the capitalization, but it's sufficient for us.
as our loss narrows significantly and turns positive back of the year, you know, it's, it's plenty for us to, to work with. With that said, I think the, the second question was on the timing of profitability and the patterns for next year. Is that, is that correct?
Yeah, the, the season we saw after Q1 and into next year, like, obviously you'll have good momentum coming out of Q4.
What we're seeing there, yes, we, we have great momentum coming out of Q4. When we start looking into the next year, of course, we would expect, you know, seasonality to kick back in like it traditionally does or customarily does in, in the industry in January. That would have an impact on CPMs, also on brand solutions. We have some interesting dynamics here that I think are shining through more, and, and this quarter, particularly versus last quarter, because now we've introduced a couple things. We're in a post-COVID world, and our events are actually at 40% year-over-year, some of these events. London, and we got Helsinki coming up. Like, there's a real.
You know, it's a much smaller part of the revenue profile, but it's profitable, it's accretive to margin, and we, we love them, and, and, they're doing great. That, the reason I point that out is because now we've introduced London we got in Q1 and the NFL TNG season. That's the other element of, you know, you could call it seasonality, that we've introduced that's now having a stronger than expected impact. That's why when I look at Q1, I think, "Okay, You know, yes, for CPMs and yes for Brand Solutions, but we will still have NFL and we will have London, and the events are booming and NFL TNG is in high demand.
I do expect absolutely it to be less than Q4, but I think our seasonal distribution is starting to flatten out in the first half of the year a bit, and that's why we're seeing comparable Q1s and Q2s. Q2 may be flat this year, but it's missing a big event and it's missing NFL. Apples to apples, it's, it's actually not, you know, it's, it's a reasonable increase, which we would be used to seeing. I think that those two events, those two items in Q1, are starting to flatten that seasonality in, in the first half. Yes, I would expect it to be down, but to be kind of more flattish Q1 and Q2, and then it lift up for the second half.
Got it. Thank you.
Yeah, and Drew, if I could pick up your third question, and thank you for asking it, because when you talked about our roadmap transformation, I love questions like that because I always want to remind everyone that the numbers are a consequence of the business, and the business isn't a consequence of the numbers. The business is being looked at by the leadership team, which is not just exec. There's 32 people in our senior leadership team who took on the lens that I provided to look at the business through a lens of product, through a lens of content, through a lens of brand, growth, culture, and operations.
Each of those 6 pillars make up our transformation velocity, and the teams work in a cross-functional way to ensure that we actually break down silos, increase communication, increase trust and knowing between the different leaders of the different operations. Because as you know, we have 230 employees, and we have over 75 different sort of entities that operate between different games and sites and teams, and you name it. Now, everyone's looking at this through the enterprise lens. When we think about products, the big three there, obviously, technology, platform, and data. You cannot build a skyscraper on weak foundations, and the foundations for this business is just like a SaaS company. We are a platform company. We are a platform. On top of the platform, are products. On top of the products, are services.
The technology integrity, the platform rigor across the first-party data capture and leverage is part of that. The content charter. We talked about the content factory. We are in the ideas business, so we have now rebranded our factory, Final Boss Studios. They're doing great work. They've stopped doing the work that they thought they should be doing, that we couldn't see merit in, either from a fame point of view or a fortune point of view. We're developing the tentpole calendar. Long time in advance, we have a tentpole calendar planned out to mid-2024, so the sales teams can get out there and be selling it and not be twiddling their thumbs, wondering what's happening. Then it's the NFL.
The NFL is proven to be a major landmark marquee for the biggest brands in the world to be leaning in because it is the biggest and most culturally relevant sport in the U.S. today. Following right behind it are the other sports leagues, who are also looking to engage with their next generation of fandom, who are found playing, communicating, and connecting in the gaming communities. We talk about our brand, not just our awareness, but obviously our industry leverage. I've talked about it before, how we're going to market from an industry point of view. How can Uber now be a billion-dollar ad business at the end of the year, putting things, you know, doing pop-ups in Uber Eats, and then what are they going to do? Have TV screens. Next, we have an Uber experience.
I look at the growth of CTV. I look at the growth of retail media. Streaming audio is a $8 billion category. We are predicting that the TV industry, the linear TV, well, linear TV this year is going to be $61 billion. $25 billion is already in CTV. Why is it in CTV? Linear TV's pain is CTV's gain. What does it have over traditional TV? Targeting, measurement, interactivity, and e-commerce. We have all those same things. Who's out there talking to the marketplace, talking to all the big brands? Why is it if I'm looking at traditional TV, you've got $67 billion?
I'm estimating over $11 billion will peel off linear TV in the US in the next 3 years. We are determined to be there to capture it because the industry spends its whole time talking about retail media, commerce media, CTV. No one talks about gaming media because no one has been out there representing the scale, the interactivity, and the measurement of that. When we talk about growth, we've talked about it. Our ad tech needs to be brilliant. We're not gonna have an SSP partner. We're not gonna not be integrated with the right data partners. We're not gonna have a confusion about who's our ad serving partner.
We're cleaning it all up at speed, and then we're driving our Brand Solutions, and then we're really focusing on subscriptions and making sure that where we can, we're gonna build those alternative sources through our growth. From a cultural point of view, that's really important because teams win, not individuals, and every team needs a leader, but it's not about the leader, it's about the team. Now we have a team that's connecting, that's communicating, that's establishing some real pride in the fact that we are at the vanguard of not just fixing a business or building a brand, but building an industry category. To do that, we also need the operations. Great operational rigor. Operations like a proper ERP network, working with NetSuite, having it fully integrated, all the leverage on AI, whether we do now ChatGPT for engineering.
We've now got AI policies on all the data and privacy security. We're using an advanced AI for all data insights and analytics. Then where can we drive automation? The business focus, where are we? We meet as a team. They meet weekly. They meet me bi-weekly by group, and then we meet as a full SLT on a monthly basis. We are on the roadmap. It is-... People say it's very tough and it's aggressive. It's not. It's just accountable. We're introducing a culture of meritocracy and accountability, so people have to do what they say they're gonna do, and they're doing it. I could not be more proud of this young, highly entrepreneurial organization who's getting up to speed very swiftly with what it's like to be an enterprise business, business with a mentality that we're already a billion-dollar market cap.
I hope that answers your question, Drew.
It, it does, Nick. Thank you very much.
The next question is from Gianluca Tucci with Haywood Securities. Please go ahead.
Hi, guys. Good afternoon. Most of my questions have been answered, but just on subscriptions, it's nice to see the continued and methodical growth in that business line. Could you speak to the efforts there in growing the subscriber base going forward, if, if there's anything different that you guys are doing, to add subscribers?
Well, hi, Gianluca, and, and thank you for your question. I mean, at this stage, we have, we have started, single analysis and engineering point of view, there were 18 steps for signing up to be a subscriber. It's now down to 3. We're changing the credit card, acceptance policies on that, so more flexibility about that, and then there's a greater level of analysis going into every email that we've identified that we have in our system, whether they're active or inactive, and how can they be used for remarketing, so we can actually use those as well. As I said, we've signed up our consultant, who's got tremendous experience with Expedia and, and Microsoft, and, and he spent his whole life in the whole customer acquisition, subscription building phase.
We've got a readout from him in two weeks, actually, to the exec team. We're most excited because he's not just focusing on The Sims Resource, and we're already the engineering work is already underway in terms of the site redesign and site reorg, as I said, all things sign on, to make that smooth and seamless UX. I think importantly, we're gonna be looking where, where are the sites and the community areas or the games where we can start to integrate what, what, what value add could we offer to be able to charge a subscription? Certainly, we're gonna institute a policy where there isn't just gonna be all things free, easy download without any attempt to capture people's identity. Still today, in the U.S., the email is the number 1 fidelity for identity that exists.
On our next call, I'll give you substantive response to that specific questions by actually telling the things we've done and how they're driving an uptick to subscription revenue. I can't really say much more today.
Thanks, Nick. Appreciate the color. Just in terms of your pipeline for the back half of the year, like, like, put it in, I guess, context, how can you quantify the degree to which it is bigger than the first half of the year? I'm just trying to get a sense of the magnitude of difference the second half will look from the first half of the year.
Well, that's a great question. Certainly will be bigger. How much bigger? I think, Alex, to make sure that we give the right kind of guidance, I think you should handle that response, please.
Oh, no problem. My pleasure. Well, I'll put it this way: it'll be materially bigger. We don't wanna, we don't wanna set a KPI around it specifically, 'cause I'll give you an example. For example, we've just sold our largest sale ever, and so these are, these are some of these deals are getting bigger and bigger. Of course, Haywood and, you know, you, you, Gianluca, with... You know, there was a time when we celebrated $50,000 deals, $100,000 deals, then we sold $0.5 million and $1 million. We're, we're well above that now. Single deals can now move the levers, which is why I'm cautious to set any KPI against it. What we like to see is a full pipe. We like to see new logos.
We like to see repeat business coming in at, at higher rates like it did this quarter. 62% of deals with repeat clients generating 66% of the, the Brand Solutions revenue. I will just say, expect, you know, a modest or moderate uptick in Q3, like, like we spoke about, and, and then that'll be helped, partly fueled by, by, NFL, and then a larger leap in, in Q4 like I, like I spoke about earlier. I will just say it would be material, certainly.
Yeah. I'd like to jump on that, though, Gianluca. I think there's another part of this, what I get excited about is I'm seeing, new logos in the pipeline, like Dove, you know, having one. That's our, you know, our first, our first, you know, we got our first Unilever brand. When I think about P&G, P&G has 60 household brands. It spends $4.4 billion on global advertising. It has 11 billion-dollar brands. They have Charmin, they have Crest, they have Dawn, they have Gillette, they have Pampers, they have Tide. You know, they have decreased their digital spend by $200 million over the last year, and they're increasing it in TV and radio and retail media.
Now I'm gonna go to the top of P&G, and I already have done, to really understand the global head of innovation and global head of marketing, give us a test. You're testing with us, so now give us another brand or of that individual brand, we want a bigger share, which we ought to get in. The same way we're getting in with PepsiCo, and we're getting in with Unilever, and we're getting in with Google, and we're getting in with Coca-Cola. These are huge multi-brand players, and they are all relatively uninformed, yet excited, unsupported in understanding how to navigate their way through the gaming media, beyond just running the pre-roll video on Twitch. They see that, that's just handled as a programmatic buy, as part of the media buy. I'm talking here about how they can create truly competitive and differentiating platforms.
These are what I'm excited about when I look at the pipe, which is why I need to be out there with our head of our Brand Solutions, making sure that those most senior marketeers understand what they're testing, and we have no ambiguity in what the measurement for success is. That's what I see as the biggest opportunity when I look at our pipe for the second half. By the way, we've now instituted a big deals call. There is no deal over $250,000 that does not come by me. I'm talking about the idea, the proposal, the pitch, the negotiation. I'm all over this now. Those biggest, and anything to do with the biggest advertisers in the world, I'm all over that as well.
Amazing context. Thank you, guys, and talk to you soon.
Thanks, Gianluca.
This concludes our question and answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to Nick Brien for any closing remarks.
Well, thank you, everyone, for dialing in. I appreciate the level of, you know, support our analysts provide us with the, with the accuracy. I also want to extend, you know, a vote of thanks for the vote of confidence from our lender to increase our lending facility, should we need to be able to use it against our increasingly attractive size of our book of blue-chip brands that are signing up to work with us. I want to reiterate to everyone that this is, and I understand there's been historical turbulence on this young company, but I have never worked in an industry sector in my 35 years that I felt so much wind in our sails. There is not just a brand to be built or a business to be fixed. There is an industry category.
I can't do it alone, boy, oh, boy, there's a level of receptivity and excitement, and that is because this is not just a business. This is part of popular culture. It is a defining global phenomena, and it is not slowing down. We have a lot of work to do. We have a very aligned leadership team. We're bringing together a very strong culture, and as I've explained to this company, we are no longer multiple companies operating in the gaming, media, and entertainment space. We are one company with multiple brands. As we start to execute against that vision, we will start to see the results as sure as night follows day. Thank you so much for everyone participating in this call.
The conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.