Morning, everyone. Thanks for attending. My name is Kurt Nagel. I'm with Oppenheimer, Internet. With me today is Anu Subramanian . Yes, I always mess that up, my apologies. I know who is the CEO of yours. Before we get kicked off and start the questions, I'm just gonna read the Safe Harbor. This presentation, including comments and answers to questions, may reflect forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are certainties and reflect our current expectations on our beliefs, assumptions, and information currently available to us.
Descriptions of these risks and other factors could cause forward-looking statements and are discussed in more detail on our earnings press release dated May 8, 2024, and in our filings with the SEC, including our annual report in December 31, 2023, and for subsequent periodic filings. So with that said, Anu, thank you so much for joining. I guess just kicking it off, history would probably be a good place to start. Historically, online dating apps, you know, high growth or relatively high growth, both in terms of top of funnel, in terms of perhaps too slow in 2023 at the start of the year for the industry as a whole, and it kind of stayed there for a bit.
In terms of why, all sorts of theories floating around, whether it's demographics, whether it's lifestyle or innovation over the past few years. In terms of your expectations and your biggest competitors' expectations, you do think that there's action in growth trends in the second half of this year. Both of you are launching new products, you've got new marketing, brand, you know, new apps coming out or new versions. With that said, though, confidence that the industry at least, you know, can start to reaccelerate after, you know, about a year and a half or so of soft trends.
Sure. Of course. Thanks. Great to see everyone. I think, you know, if you zoom out for a second, and you think about back to when dating apps started, you have a ton of people in the world-
Mm-hmm.
that are constantly looking for relationships. That trend has not slowed in any way, if anything, ever were, and so they only need relationships at a higher rate than they needed. A lot of these trends that we saw 10, 12 years ago, again, when dating apps started, in terms of, stigma around using dating apps, have all become, you know, only easier and have less impact. The world is more digital than they ever were. A lot of younger users, dating apps, users, dating app, using dating apps, and these people are, have grown up in the online world, right?
Yep.
None of these people are going to bars and restaurants and churches, right? So all the trends absolutely point to, people continuing to be online and continuing to use online mechanisms to find people. Across the board, when we talk to our users, they tell us that the value that dating apps provide in terms of being the most effective and efficient way to meet other people has not gone away in any... We need to really be focused on, and this is what Bumble's been doing from the relaunch perspective, is on, enhancing and evolving the product experience in a wide idea of users. And that is the fundamental premise of what our relaunch was about.
And, you know, in the months that we've done this feedback from users around how excited they are that we've acknowledged that we need to evolve the current user experience. That's what gives us a ton of confidence, because, you know, when, that the new Bumble was coming, we heard so much feedback from especially our younger users about how excited they were to see how this would evolve. So, you know, we're super excited about... And as we've said about our relaunch, for us, it's step one of a series of steps that we intend to take.
Mm-hmm.
This isn't a one and done thing. I think you'll hear us talk about this quite a bit over the course.
I guess maybe stay on this topic of the new Bumble. So you, you've been at the company four years. New CEO, Lidiane Jones, came from Slack, been in the seat for a little less than six months. So a lot of changes come through, right? You know, processes in terms of making quicker decision in, you know, under Lidiane. So I guess just from your perspective and, right, someone who's been there, you know, a while, I guess, could you give some specific examples in terms of, some, like, have adapted Bumble to, you know, be leaner, quicker, and, you know, quick- hopefully quicker growing?
Yeah, sure.
Yeah.
Maybe I'll give a little bit of context around, you know, how we've thought about some of the-
Yep
... changes that we've made. And, early Q1, we announced, that we had made the difficult decision to eliminate about approximately 350 roles. And, you know, a new CEO come in and take a fresh look at the sector and also the state of the business, and, and just bring a Silicon Valley mindset to how she wants to think about how fast she wants the engineering teams to move. And a lot of the changes that we're making are really for us to be better set up for growing faster.
Yep.
So that's really, you know, is that we're making. The org transformation was largely centered around sort of three big operating philosophies. One, we decided to a functional model-
Mm-hmm.
And we wanted to be building products more from a platform perspective and not be siloed.
Mm-hmm
... in sort of different apps. Have a new CTO that has joined, you know, who has, you know, decades of experience from places like Microsoft. We have a new Chief Product Officer again, who has spent her entire career coming in the very sort of unique way-
Yeah
... of how do you build products that span the entire ecosystem and not just for one single app? So that's been a big part of it. We've also been looking at our location strategy and how do we rationalize where our engineers and where our product and teams sit. So that was again part of how we thought about the origin. As a company grows bigger, inefficiencies creep in terms of multiple layers-
Yeah
- and additional things that get in the move fast. And so, we've taken a hard look at spans and layers, and eliminated some roles, primarily again, with the goal to set us up to move faster. Really exciting to see over the course of the last five, you know, plus months since we've had the new team come in is, you know, we got the new product out really fast. We announced the acquisition of-
Yep
... Geneva, again, record time in terms of starting to when we. We're seeing that the organization is moving fast.
Yeah.
But it's a continuous effort, right? You know, again, this isn't like one and done. I think you'll see us-
Yeah
... get better and better at it.
Maybe just staying on, I guess, that theme in terms of efficiencies and specifically with costs. So as you alluded to, you've made some pretty significant headcount cuts, like roughly, well, less than two months into the start of your tenure, but I think about 30%. Just kind of the basic question is, in terms of thinking about the current expense base, right now, are you in a position, right, or are you to reaccelerate, you know, back to a double-digit rate? And yeah, so how should we think about that?
Sure. So, like you said, we eliminated about 350 roles, which is roughly it was at the beginning of the year. That roughly translates to about $55 million of annualized savings going forward. We are investing about this. And again, we have made the decisions that we've made around org changes primarily to set us up for growing faster, have the right talent that we need. And so in terms of the investments, you'll see us invest in talent in, you know, being-
Mm
... Gen AI engineers. That's the talent-
Yep
that we want to be investing in. And so a lot of what we've done is to make room for the growth that we know is ahead of us. And so growth, much top of mind for us.
Mm-hmm.
We feel very good about where we are from a P&L perspective-
Yep
... to enable that.
Yep.
This year, we expect, you know, at least 300 basis points.
Yep.
So while we are feeling very good about investing for the growth that we have, and we have room in the P&L for that, we are still very committed-
Yep
... to continue to be deliberate about the decisions that we make. And, you know, there are still efficiencies that we expect to find.
Mm.
Whether it is in how we think about our marketing strategy, whether it's about how we think about our. So that's an ongoing effort this year, and there's more that the teams are doing. And there's a lot of bottom-up work that we are doing. And the goal would be to find savings and either drop it to the bottom line or to the growth that we talked about.
Okay, got it. And so I'd like to spend a little bit of time, so you made another big change, right? Introduced Opening Moves, which fairly, not gonna go radical, a big change in terms of kind of a signature feature, you know, of Bumble, right? And women can now have the option, right, of making the first move, right? Again, just a sort of a cornerstone. So I think part of the decision, you know, you and Lidiane had indicated that some of your users had indicated there's something that maybe looking for, I think the initial percent. But maybe if you could just share a little more on the customer response, right?
I guess, you know, what you think could come with this in terms of perhaps broadening the user base, you know, with this, this change?
Yeah, sure. If you go back to when Bumble started, you know, Bumble started as the app that puts women at the center. And the relaunch has been about us reaffirming that commitment-
Yep
... that we've always had to women.
Yep.
At Bumble, women still make the first move.
Yep.
will continue to do so, and that has not changed. What we have heard from our user base, and more recently, is how people think about empowerment, how people think about equality.
Mm-hmm.
Those things are evolving-
Mm
... especially among younger users, or where they have said that they feel like the burden is always on them-
Sure
... to make the first move. So we've effectively introduced what we call Opening Moves, if you are, you know, if you're on Bumble, it allows you to set an opening question-
Mm
... in your profile. So if you're a woman, you still have a choice. You can either still choose to make the first move like you used to-
Yep
... before the relaunch, or now you can set an opening question, and a man can effectively use that to start a conversation.
Right.
This is really much more to lean in or lean out, depending on how they feel at a-
Mm
... certain point in time. It doesn't change the focus that we have in-
Yep
... terms of women are still in control. This is not the burden-
Sure
... that they feel like sometimes is put on them. So we definitely see this as benefiting both men as well as women-
Yep
... because both sides feel like they have a benefit, feel like they have the chance to start a conversation-
Yep
... and they can express their personality, and women can effectively-
Sure
... can open the first move if they choose to. Like you said, we've seen very strong adoption so far. We are very pleased with, you know, what we are seeing. We're also seeing quality of conversation. So overall, we, you know-
Mm
... absolutely believe that this will be a positive to the overall ecosystem, and we are very thrilled with the way the teams have built the product.
Got it. I'd like to talk about perhaps, I guess, the potential upside case, you know, from AI. So you've talked a little bit about improve tools or, you know, building in AI tools that should help, you know, great collection, you know, whether it's from profile building, these things where, you know, perhaps someone doesn't know what to say, doesn't have the confidence, right? I mean, have been friction points, right, in terms of the process.
I guess just, you know, walking through that in terms of, you know, what that upside case is, and then as a related point, you know, thinking out, I mean, kind of who knows, but you know, the next 5-10 years, in terms of the impact from AI on the current form of the dating apps, you know, within that time period, do you think?
Listen, I think, you know, everyone, you know, the context of AI can differ for different industries. I think for dating and for us specifically, AI is much more about enabling.
Mm-hmm.
It's not to replace human connections in any way.
Right.
We are ultimately about helping you meet other people that you can then go meet in real life. That's the goal, and that's the mission that we have. It's a enhanced tool that makes relevancy, that makes conversations like at a more-
Mm
... than we've historically seen.
Mm.
We use sort of more traditional AI models, machine learning models, quite extensively today on our platform, and that's what powers our matching algorithms, it powers et cetera. I think with Gen AI, you have the option, like you said, to remove a lot of the friction that exists today-
Yeah
... in a user's journey, and there is a lot of data of onboarding a user.
Yeah.
Right? And so with the new tools that exist from a Gen AI perspective, I think we have the ability to further sort of make that process much more-
Mm
... easy and the best profile picture for you, whether that involves, getting you to match with the most relevant person-
Yeah
... whatever the case may be, helping you out. All of those things get pretty exciting. I think over the long term, you know, I think we are still in very early innings of what Gen AI can look like. But as Gen AI becomes more multi-mode, more than just text, I think there are lots of use cases that we will see emerge. But again, with the core ultimate-
Yeah
... aim of still-
Yeah
... helping you meet real people in real life.
Yeah. Not a product for the sake of a product.
Just for the sake of building AI.
Yeah. Okay.
Exactly.
That makes sense. So you touched on it a few moments ago, acquired a company called Geneva, integrating it now in Bumble For Friends, moving beyond just sort of remote, romantic relationships in terms of, you know, the platform that Bumble offers. You've talked frequently and, you know, something that Whitney certainly has talked a lot about, about sort of a crisis, this being kind of a means to address it. But specifically kind of, I guess, what is that opportunity for Bumble, from a monetization perspective? I guess, how would it perhaps differ from a friendship or a community app? But just, you know, a little bit more specifically talking about what that could mean for Bumble from a-
So, you know, if you go back to when BFF was started, BFF, because we heard feedback from our users. Users that had come to Bumble, found their romantic partners were committed, but still felt like they needed a product that allowed them to meet other people for platonic relationships. And so people started to say: "Hey, I'm in a relat-- I'm in a committed relationship, but I'm looking for a friend. I just moved to a new city. I need a new yoga buddy." That's really how BFF was, was started, right?
Yeah.
We built it as a response to a lot of that. And today, BFF has a very loyal user base of people that have gone on to become, you know, best mates at their weddings and-
Mm
... you know, guides and really long friendships, that have come out of the BFF product. And if you think about the product experience today, BFF is still very much what the date product looks like.
Mm.
As we've thought about evolving that, we've always talked about friendships as being much more community-based.
Yeah.
We all tend to find, you know, stages of our life where we either go through moments of happiness or, you know, we have moments of grief, and that's when we all-
Mm
... you know, come together as community. We are thinking about evolving BFF to be much more of a community-based product.
I see.
That's where Geneva comes in.
Yeah
... because Geneva has built a very strong technology, the interaction to happen. I think where we are different from some of the other products that you referenced is, our goal is not to again, a mass group environment-
Mm-hmm
... and still not know who each person is.
Yeah
... in a group of, you know, 100 or 200, whatever the case may be. We are still going back to, you know, what we said about dating, to enable-
Mm-hmm
... you to meet people that you then go become friends with in real life. And so it may be three people that live around you, that you become running partners. Could be a group of three, four, five women that all gave, you know, had babies the same time as you, and you are growing as a new mom. So it's much more about making that real-life connection-
Mm
... and that real-life connection. That's how we're thinking about our friendship platform. And just briefly touch on what that means from a monetization perspective is, I think BFF now gives us a really evolved beyond just the core subscription product that we have.
Yeah.
If you think about the use cases that can span sponsorships, advertising.
Yeah
... it's quite more we can do-
Mm
... from a brand perspective. I think the most important thing to remember here is, our brand gives us permission-
Mm
... to go beyond dating-
Yeah
... because I think a very simple one.
Mm-hmm.
The brand extensibility we have is quite sort of unmatched.
Yeah.
So we're very excited. More to come, but this is, I think, the beginning of that.
Maybe just as a quick question, what about from a perhaps maybe an engagement perspective, right? So, you know, unlike sort of traditional subscription services, it might be a year, right? I mean, you know, you know what sort of the stickiness is, I mean, of the app is, you know, people churn in and off. So in terms of maybe broadening engagement, keeping the brand, obviously it's, you know, a great brand, but keeping a little more top of mind and maybe making it a little bit easier to kind of use.
Absolutely, yeah. If you think about sort of LTV-
Yep
You know, on our platform, because of the fact that dating generally tends to have high churn, you meet someone and hopefully you have a happy relationship. You often get someone on the platform, they meet someone, and then you effectively lose them. And so having a lot of points in that relationship.
Yep
allows us to extend that LTV.
Yep.
Historically, we've always found that, you know, people that use multiple modes both dating as well as friendship realize our power, because they just see more value in the product.
Mm-hmm.
And so we definitely see this as a mechanism to extend the LTV of a dating user as well, and also [for those who] are on the platform already using us for friendship, but their romantic relationship doesn't work out. It enables us to recapture them into the dating app.
Right.
Also, there are benefits to the dating ecosystem as well-
Mm
... with us expanding our platform beyond just dating.
Okay. I'd like to touch on the new marketing campaign or, you know, brand relaunch. I think... So, I mean, kind of a couple ones in terms of just, you know, obviously, it's a, you know, a means to try and acquire new users, but primarily targeted users within, you know, perhaps the ecosystem and, you know, perhaps promoting new features. How are you thinking about that? And then just, I guess, from the perspective of thinking of past big, you know, brand campaigns, any metrics of usage or, you know, payer conversion or any other metrics you think are relevant?
Yeah, sure. So, you know, we have a pretty strong brand market over the course of almost a decade now, more than a decade now, which is something that we're actually very proud of. We always say our brand is our biggest moat.
Yep.
and we multiple different touch points from a marketing perspective. And each marketing campaign obviously has different KPIs and different metrics. I mean, that we are doing in Q2-
Mm-hmm
... is a little bit different because it's much more about relaunching-
Yep
- the brand.
Yep.
Like I said, this is the tenth anniversary of Bumble having kicked off with a sort of a bigger brand refresh, talking about, you know, what the app means to different people and in different people's lives. So, we are having a revamped version of what the brand means. We are still leaning into what we are very famous-
Mm-hmm
... for, right? Which is about women's experience, which is about safety, which is about form. So we are not trying to change our image. We are much more about showcasing what we've already been historically-
Yep
... very, very good at.
Yep.
And as we evolve, and as we also launch other product features throughout the second half and beyond, we want to be pairing our marketing much more closely with those.
Right
... those products. So we will move from much more high-level holistic brand campaigns to much closely tying it to the product feature-
Right
... that we are launching. So much more closely tied-
I see
... conversion and product. Right now, we are much more focused on reach and awareness.
Yep.
that is what the brand-
Yep
... campaign is focused on.
Got it. And then there's another related question, on the ground, guerrilla marketing, that's something historically it's been a big strength of yours. I guess the biggest example would be the Honey ambassadors you have, you know, on campuses.
Yeah, campuses. That's how Whitney started the-
Yep
... the app, and it's always been a core strength for us.
Yep.
I think what you will see us continue to lean into that. We have 500+ brand ambassadors, you know, at any point. We are looking to further evolve that-
Mm-hmm
... make those brand ambassadors have even more targeted goals in terms of what they-
Mm
... what they, we've also recently launched a legacy Bumble program, where these are people that have just recently graduated from colleges-
Mm
... have moved to new cities-
Oh, interesting
... but have had very, they then start to replicate a lot of what they used to do-
Yeah
... at a different level in some of these newer cities.
That's brand new?
That's new, yeah.
Yeah.
That's new that we are launching-
Yeah
... we are launching this year. So there are different things that we are doing-
Yep
... to marketing campaign really special.
Yep.
Because, again, it's something that's been very strong for us historically-
Yeah
... and we want to continue to lean into that.
Okay, let's see here. I guess we have only a few minutes left. So still a growth brand, right? If I'm thinking about, you know, in terms of just your geographic spread, there are a lot of markets where, you know, you're not highly penetrated relative to, say, in Europe. So, I guess, where are we, you know, in terms of the innings for some of your more mature markets, and in terms of newer or kind of frontier markets, where you see the biggest opportunities from a total user and the-
I think across the board, even at a global level, I would say at a payer conversion level, we are in very early innings.
Mm.
In a market like the US, which is our largest market, you know, we would still characterize us as-
Yeah
... being in early innings. We obviously have a ton of strength in starting to get more strength in tier two cities, but there's still a lot more that we can do.
Mm-hmm.
If you think about the size of the available market-
Yep
... and where our presence is, I think there's a lot more that we can do to further. And then in international markets, I would say we are in very early innings.
Yep.
2 years ago is really when we started to make a big push-
Mm-hmm
... internationally, and now, like Germany and France, have been very strong for us. We have organic presence in a lot of markets, in Asia, markets in like India-
Mm-hmm
... where we have spent some, we've really gone and done.
Right.
We're excited about having a more deliberate strategy there in those markets. Similarly, for that have just organically grown.
Yep.
I think the advantage of having a free app is anyone can download the app and just start using it.
Yep.
Two people find success on the app, they talk about it on TikTok.
Yep.
There is virality, and more people download it. And then we can then follow that up with more targeted marketing campaigns that then-
Mm
... starts to build the buzz up. So we're very excited about our international-
Mm-hmm
... as you can see in our download data-
Yep
... and top of the funnel. So, I'm excited to see where we go with that.
One more really quick question, just, segue on that. In terms of, and this maybe is more focused on your interest in or, well, willingness to use advertising, right, to better monetize some of these non-payers or, you know, some of your more emerging growth markets. Is that a focus?
We've always said advertising in the core dating construct for us, you have to be careful about-
Sure
... it can feel invasive to someone's personal experience.
Yes.
I think we've started testing some innovative app, but I think advertising for us is much more exciting.
Yep
... in the beyond dating world-
Yep
... where it can be much more sense.
Makes sense.
Yeah.
Yeah. Okay, well, terrific. Anu, thank you so much. Great conversation and-