Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Quick Takes Tim Stinovic from Bloomberg Radio. Well. Shares of
Speaker 1: Twilio have been on a tear this year, stocks up
Speaker 1: more than twenty almost so far in one that's after
Speaker 1: percent rally last year. Recent quarterly update big beat, and
Speaker 1: the company also raised its first quarter outlook. Stock shut
Speaker 1: up nearly eight percent on that news alone. Let's get
Speaker 1: an update though, on the business, the global environment, what
Speaker 1: they're hearing from customers. Because am a Ship Chandler is
Speaker 1: CFO at the cloud communication platform and company Twilio, and
Speaker 1: he joins us on the phone in San Francisco because, Ama,
Speaker 1: nice to have you here. How are you. I'm doing great,
Speaker 1: good afternoon. It's great to be here. Well, it's great
Speaker 1: to have you here with us. A great quarter. Investors
Speaker 1: loved it. What's surprising you about the growth and customers
Speaker 1: that are signing on with Twilio? What what is kind
Speaker 1: of beyond your expectations? Well, you know, we had a
Speaker 1: strong performance, I would say pretty much across the board.
Speaker 1: We are in the early innings of what I would
Speaker 1: characterize as really a generational opportunity in this space of
Speaker 1: customer engagement. I think what we found during the course
Speaker 1: of is that when customers embrace software, when they embrace agility,
Speaker 1: and in particular when they decide to build things on
Speaker 1: their own, that they tend to be the ones that
Speaker 1: are winning. And we're lucky to be able to power
Speaker 1: a number of their use cases, right And that's exactly
Speaker 1: what you guys are doing, providing the tools for them
Speaker 1: to be able to do that. How much though, of
Speaker 1: what you're seeing is a surge to digitally catch up
Speaker 1: and expand because of COVID in the shutdown and the
Speaker 1: big move for the world to digital and e commerce.
Speaker 1: How much is to catch up in your view, that's
Speaker 1: a great question. I do think it's more an acceleration,
Speaker 1: I would say, than catch up. We feel like the
Speaker 1: shift that's been happening is permanent. You know, we've done
Speaker 1: a number of studies I'm sure you've seen a number
Speaker 1: of external studies as well that basically suggests that businesses
Speaker 1: are not going to go back that over of and
Speaker 1: in fact planned to either increase or maintain the levels
Speaker 1: of investment that they've been making in customer engagement after
Speaker 1: the pandemic. So we're very excited about our prospects going forward. Well,
Speaker 1: what do you guys do once you kind of land
Speaker 1: a customer, right and you get kind of that initial
Speaker 1: level and you know, relationship between you and the customer, Like,
Speaker 1: what are the next layers that you can help in
Speaker 1: terms of helping the customer with what they're doing. I
Speaker 1: think what's important about our business model, which is really
Speaker 1: exciting and keeps the cost down as well, actually is
Speaker 1: that most of our interactions start because a developer inside
Speaker 1: of one of the companies that we're working with, starts
Speaker 1: working on our platform, develops a use case. We notice
Speaker 1: that there's a certain amount of activity there, and once
Speaker 1: we do, we have a salesperson contact the company and
Speaker 1: we start doing some work with them, and they'll start
Speaker 1: with the use case. It might be an SMS, it
Speaker 1: might be a one time notification of something, but then
Speaker 1: will offer some of the other aspects of our portfolio.
Speaker 1: It could voice messaging, it could be other SMS use cases.
Speaker 1: It could be email, you know. Now, it could be
Speaker 1: segment with the company that we just bought with respect
Speaker 1: to data. So there are any number of things that
Speaker 1: we can do for a customer as it relates to
Speaker 1: customer engagement. I'll give you a great example. You know,
Speaker 1: last week, obviously we were all watching what was happening
Speaker 1: in Texas, and you know, we were able to deploy
Speaker 1: a hotline in twenty four hours to help them manage
Speaker 1: thousands of calls, not just with respect to all of
Speaker 1: the emergency response activity, but also you know the vaccine
Speaker 1: distribution and the logistics associated with that. We're not just
Speaker 1: doing it in Texas, for doing it all the way
Speaker 1: from California, all the way across the Maine as well,
Speaker 1: So it really does run the gamut. Well, I'm glad
Speaker 1: you took took us there, because that is certainly something
Speaker 1: we kick off every broadcast talking about the latest and
Speaker 1: greatest fingers cross when it comes to COVID and the vaccine.
Speaker 1: Talk to us little bit more about what you folks
Speaker 1: are doing at twilio to help others when it comes
Speaker 1: in particular to getting that vaccine out and communicating communication
Speaker 1: within communities, because we know that has been something that
Speaker 1: was certainly lagging, uh certainly early on. Yeah, So part
Speaker 1: of it is deploying a hotline. Another part of it
Speaker 1: is using our SMS capabilities so that we can provide
Speaker 1: patients with alert and scheduling information. Another part of it
Speaker 1: is so that medical professionals can communicate with one another
Speaker 1: in a time sensitive way visa v text messaging. And
Speaker 1: so if you just consider all of these different areas
Speaker 1: that allow medical professionals, patients, folks that are attempting to
Speaker 1: get the vaccine in the hands of patients, it just
Speaker 1: allows for a very seamless experience. It makes sure that
Speaker 1: patients are able to get the information when they need it.
Speaker 1: They can get it through whatever channel they want, whether
Speaker 1: it's SMS, whether it's voice, whether it's email, And these
Speaker 1: same solutions can be used to register folks and then
Speaker 1: constantly communicate with them to make sure that they're keeping
Speaker 1: their appointments and that they go back for the second
Speaker 1: vaccine as well. Yeah, it's great and it creates some organization.
Speaker 1: Um I think that many would would argue that wasn't
Speaker 1: quite there at the beginning. Okay, I want to go
Speaker 1: back to what you guys are doing and where you
Speaker 1: go from here, especially once you start working with a customer.
Speaker 1: We had on James Chok Mok earlier covers the tech sector,
Speaker 1: and I said to him, Okay, so if you were
Speaker 1: talking Uh, to the CFO of Twilio, what would you
Speaker 1: want to know? And he said, you know what's interesting
Speaker 1: is how do you improve you know, how do you
Speaker 1: kind of boost beyond Once you start working with a
Speaker 1: customer and you are providing data and working with them,
Speaker 1: how do you kind of improve upon that in terms
Speaker 1: of productivity? And I'm curious, how do you guys think
Speaker 1: about that and taking your services to the next level
Speaker 1: for your customers. Yeah, I'll give you a great, great example. Obviously,
Speaker 1: tax season is right around the corner and one of
Speaker 1: our marquee customers has been H and R Block historically,
Speaker 1: and just in the last quarter, we've expanded our relationship
Speaker 1: with that customer as they prepare for the tax season.
Speaker 1: Obviously there's a huge surge and the amount of activity
Speaker 1: that they see, and what we're doing is actually giving
Speaker 1: them tooling so that they're able to provide better virtual
Speaker 1: tax support using our Twilio video product. Obviously, last year
Speaker 1: around this time, the pandemic was just starting. It wasn't
Speaker 1: quite clear how things were going to play out. And
Speaker 1: so now above and beyond the the voice, SMS and
Speaker 1: chat capabilities that we're already providing them, they can now
Speaker 1: also enhance the experience between H and R block and
Speaker 1: their consumer base using a really simple and easy to
Speaker 1: use in app API to deploy video to make for
Speaker 1: a richer consumer experience. That makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 1: What about all the data that that's coming into all
Speaker 1: of these customers that you guys work with um and
Speaker 1: and helping them in terms of be more productive with
Speaker 1: that use of data kind of the data overloads. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a great question. And so we actually bought a
Speaker 1: company towards the end of last year. It's called Segment
Speaker 1: and Segment their entire value proposition of the company is
Speaker 1: to really focus on data. And one of the things
Speaker 1: that they do uniquely, well there's the only company to
Speaker 1: my knowledge on the planet that can actually pull it off,
Speaker 1: is that they can grab data out of all of
Speaker 1: the unique silos inside of a company, put that data together,
Speaker 1: orchestrate it in a way, organize it in a way
Speaker 1: that makes it really simple to understand what's going on
Speaker 1: with the consumer experience. So that what we're then able
Speaker 1: to do is help our customers ensure that they can
Speaker 1: then deliver a rich consumer experience. So using all of
Speaker 1: these disparate data sources We've got the proverbial one pane
Speaker 1: of glass that allows you then to subsequently deliver something
Speaker 1: that's really personalized, really rewarding if you're on the consumer
Speaker 1: ended experience. Sounds like a big growth area for you guys. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: we're really excited about that acquisition. We've signed on some
Speaker 1: interesting winds recently and I think there's a lot more
Speaker 1: that we can do with it. We're just getting started.
Speaker 1: So because they I want to ask you, you do
Speaker 1: work with just about everybody. If you go to your website,
Speaker 1: it's Lift, it's Ubert, Shopify, it's Instacard, it's Morgan Stanley,
Speaker 1: it's lending Tree, it's Netflix, it's Twitter, it's yelp. What
Speaker 1: are you hearing from those clients which crossed so many
Speaker 1: different industries? What are you hearing from them? And what
Speaker 1: are you seeing in terms of your working with them?
Speaker 1: About what that tells us about how the business environment
Speaker 1: is and what's going on more broadly in the economy.
Speaker 1: Maybe what kind of year one might be. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think what's never been truer than it is today is
Speaker 1: this whole idea around the importance of customer engagement. I
Speaker 1: think we're all used to one way experiences sometimes with
Speaker 1: our customers, and unfortunately those experiences weren't enabled previously by technology.
Speaker 1: But now enter Twilio and some of the things that
Speaker 1: we're able to do to help drive that rich consumer
Speaker 1: experience so that you, as a consumer can do business
Speaker 1: with the clients that you really care about. You can
Speaker 1: get the kinds of messages from them that you really
Speaker 1: care about. Obviously, for our customers that helps them drive
Speaker 1: a revenue event, but to the consumer herself, it's really
Speaker 1: important because that individual is able to get the information
Speaker 1: that they want, when they want it, through the channel
Speaker 1: that they want, without it kind of becoming this annoying
Speaker 1: clutter that we sometimes experience otherwise through these channels. And
Speaker 1: so customer engagements the name of the game. And I
Speaker 1: think going forward, every one of the companies that we're
Speaker 1: working with, they see more share of wallet going towards
Speaker 1: these customer facing interactions, and we think that's going to continue.
Speaker 1: We think it's part of a long term secular trend. Frankly, Okay,
Speaker 1: so that's the trend. But what does it say the
Speaker 1: economy doing well? Second half story? You know from from
Speaker 1: these conversations, what does it tell you about the visibility
Speaker 1: for our economy and really our business environment. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean I'm not a macro economist, obviously, I'll I'll maybe
Speaker 1: kind of answer your question through the lens of our
Speaker 1: our consumer experience, our customer experience. Excuse me. What we're
Speaker 1: generally seeing is a lot of strength in in the marketplace,
Speaker 1: and whether it's UH an online retailer, whether it's an
Speaker 1: e commerce provider, whether it's a brick and mortar bank,
Speaker 1: we're seeing a lot of traction and a lot of activity.
Speaker 1: And so I would say we're cautiously optimistic about the
Speaker 1: way that the broader economy plays out, just based on
Speaker 1: the activity that we see on our platform. We do
Speaker 1: see a significant move of that activity from you know,
Speaker 1: sort of an uh an in person environment more much
Speaker 1: more towards an online environment. I think many of the
Speaker 1: things that we were used to previously attending in person,
Speaker 1: as much as I'm desperate to go, you know, do
Speaker 1: a restaurant in person, I think we're all getting used
Speaker 1: to as consumers um the idea of getting things to
Speaker 1: everard and and having communications tools help orchestrate some of that.
Speaker 1: So I think you will see a shift in the
Speaker 1: way some of these organizations work. But we're broadly optimistic,
Speaker 1: I would say cautiously so just given what a what
Speaker 1: a dynamic macro environment it is out there. Hey, one
Speaker 1: last question in terms of you guys seem to be
Speaker 1: firing on all cylinders. It's really impressive and impressive story
Speaker 1: and company to watch. Access to workers, any labor constraints.
Speaker 1: Where are you finding maybe problems as you move forward
Speaker 1: that maybe can be holding back your growth? And just
Speaker 1: got about forty five seconds. Yeah, that's a great question.
Speaker 1: I don't see any real issues in terms of our
Speaker 1: ability to access talent. I think, if anything, Like many
Speaker 1: other companies, what we're finding is is that as everybody's
Speaker 1: working from home, there's a global talent market that we
Speaker 1: can get our talent from. And we're really excited about that.
Speaker 1: All right, good stuff, Hey, listen, thank you so much.
Speaker 1: What a great conversation and really cool to watch what
Speaker 1: you guys are doing. Because Ama Ship Chandler, he is
Speaker 1: the chief financial officer at Twilio, shutting us on the
Speaker 1: phone from San Francisco's I meant and earlier this was
Speaker 1: one of the really top performers in stock is up
Speaker 1: about one so far this year, and the company did
Speaker 1: recently update UH and raise their outlook for the first quarter.