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Speaker 1: Shares of Webtoon Entertainment. Remember this, We talked about this
Speaker 1: on the Close just last week. Searched eighty one percent
Speaker 1: last Wednesday. It was its best day since going public
Speaker 1: last year. You remember this. They announced a partnership with
Speaker 1: Walt Disney. It's going to bring characters such as Marvel,
Speaker 1: Spider Man and Luke Skywalker of Star Wars to its platform.
Speaker 1: The announcement also came as Webtoon reported quarterly results that
Speaker 1: beat analyst expectations that helped fuel the rally last week
Speaker 1: as well. We got with us David Lee. He's CFO
Speaker 1: and COO of the one point nine billion dollar market
Speaker 1: cap company. It calls itself a quote global storytelling platform
Speaker 1: that enables creators and users to discover, create, and share stories.
Speaker 1: David joins us from our Los Angeles bureau. Also with
Speaker 1: us is Nina Trentman. She's Bloomberg News Senior editor. She
Speaker 1: writes the BLOOMBERGSFO Briefing newsletter. She joins us here in
Speaker 1: the studio. Check out her newsletter at Bloomberg dot com
Speaker 1: slash CFO Briefing David will be featured in an upcoming
Speaker 1: edition of that. David, welcome. Good to talk to you again.
Speaker 1: I think last time we spoke you were CFO and
Speaker 1: Coo at Impossible Foods. It was a previous lifetime. You're
Speaker 1: at webtoon now. I think though, at Webtune, a lot
Speaker 1: of people maybe who don't have kids of a certain age,
Speaker 1: maybe they're too young, maybe they're too old, might not
Speaker 1: be familiar with the platform. What is it so?
Speaker 2: Webtune is as you say, it's a global storytelling platform.
Speaker 2: And while many of us may not have heard it ourselves,
Speaker 2: I bet our gen Z kids and friends have. In fact,
Speaker 2: the majority of our one hundred and fifty plus million
Speaker 2: monthly active users are exactly in that demographic. They spend
Speaker 2: thirty minutes a day plus enjoying news stories from this
Speaker 2: network of twenty four million creators globally that get to
Speaker 2: write great webcomic and web novel stories on our platform.
Speaker 2: I bet you've seen a movie or two though, that
Speaker 2: you didn't realize started as a web tune.
Speaker 3: David, thanks for joining us, just wondering actually in terms
Speaker 3: of the spending on the platform. One of the things
Speaker 3: that we've been wondering about at CFO briefing recently is this,
Speaker 3: what is the consumer doing and how are consumers responding
Speaker 3: to all the different news that we're hearing on tariffs,
Speaker 3: on what's going on in DC. I'm wondering, are you
Speaker 3: seeing any changes of spending amongst your consumers.
Speaker 2: Well, web Tune's very fortunate. You know, our consumers love
Speaker 2: a good story. They love a good story and good
Speaker 2: times and bad times, and increasingly they love a good
Speaker 2: story independent of the language or the country that the
Speaker 2: story came out of. We have examples of nine hundred adaptations,
Speaker 2: one hundred rich film, movie and TV series that came
Speaker 2: from all over the world because in good times and
Speaker 2: bad people want to tuck into a story from an
Speaker 2: unexpected source. And our privilege is to allow these twenty
Speaker 2: four million creators. By the way, most of them who
Speaker 2: have full time jobs. They're kindergarten teachers, they're plumbers. They're
Speaker 2: people who are hard at work who get a chance
Speaker 2: to break through and maybe even have a great movie
Speaker 2: like we saw with Sidelined the Quarterback and Me on Tuby.
Speaker 2: So so far we've been immune from some of the
Speaker 2: news that you carry every day because our product is
Speaker 2: great storytelling and consumers seem to still love it.
Speaker 3: And it's good to hear. I'm just wondering. Tim just
Speaker 3: mentioned the Disney partnership. I'm curious for you as a CFO,
Speaker 3: how does it change the financial trajectory of the company.
Speaker 2: Well, the Disney collaboration, I think is pivotal. What it
Speaker 2: indicates to me is that we are not niche. We
Speaker 2: are mainstream for our gen Z consumers today here in
Speaker 2: the US, the largest market that we see ahead of us.
Speaker 2: It also means that a wonderful company is comfortable allowing
Speaker 2: us to take their iconic stories. You know, the Amazing
Speaker 2: Spider Man's coming out soon, and it's coming out as
Speaker 2: a webcomic in our platform. Disney recently said in an article,
Speaker 2: they said, you know, we looked at a lot and
Speaker 2: they're the leader, and we feel grateful to be able
Speaker 2: to bring their stories to life. And frankly, we're going
Speaker 2: to bring alternative endings, background characters to the forefront. We're
Speaker 2: going to write original stories with Disney because our powerhouse
Speaker 2: of creators can allow a story that may have been
Speaker 2: written years ago to be really fresh for the gen
Speaker 2: Z consumers on our platform.
Speaker 4: How important is it to really be working with such
Speaker 4: an established company like Walt Disney and just getting that
Speaker 4: visibility through this partnership.
Speaker 2: I think it's critical because, frankly, the biggest challenge we
Speaker 2: have is that while our gen Z consumers here in
Speaker 2: the US know us, love us, and spend thirty to
Speaker 2: sixty minutes every day on us, a lot of investors,
Speaker 2: a lot of corporations, a lot of your audience has
Speaker 2: never heard of webtom even though we went public a
Speaker 2: little over a year ago. I think part of the
Speaker 2: movement that you may have seen in the company stock
Speaker 2: is simply awareness that Disney is recognizing that webtoon is
Speaker 2: going mainstream here in the US, that we're a great
Speaker 2: source of fresh content, but we're the powerful leader of
Speaker 2: the category where we just released short form video on
Speaker 2: Monday of this week. You know, these short five minute
Speaker 2: videos crafted out of proven stories on our platform is
Speaker 2: exactly what gen Z wants, and so for us, it's
Speaker 2: really important to bring awareness to investors and companies about
Speaker 2: what gen Z consumers here already know, which is that
Speaker 2: we're a great source of storytelling.
Speaker 1: Should investors expect more partnerships similar to the one that
Speaker 1: was announced last week with Disney.
Speaker 2: Well, I think if you look at what we've talked
Speaker 2: about in the last couple of quarters, I mean just
Speaker 2: the quarter released prior we talked about our partnership with IDW,
Speaker 2: We've talked about bringing Sonic, The Hedgehog and Godzilla and
Speaker 2: other great platforms to our content and our storytelling. We
Speaker 2: also are constantly seeing things hit the main screens. You know,
Speaker 2: just last week we saw a major movie release called
Speaker 2: My Daughter Is a Zombie. It just got released in
Speaker 2: the last couple of weeks here in the US, but
Speaker 2: it's one of the number one best selling releases in
Speaker 2: Cree already that came from us. So increasingly you're going
Speaker 2: to see as partner but also create original content on
Speaker 2: our platform and on screens coming to you, whether it's Amazon,
Speaker 2: to be Netflix, or even a movie theater more and more.
Speaker 3: David, I'm wondering, how are you thinking about profitability on
Speaker 3: the back of the partnership with Disney. We talked about
Speaker 3: this before. I'm wondering, does that change how you thinking
Speaker 3: about that?
Speaker 2: Well, one of the great things about our collaboration with
Speaker 2: Disney is it's notable what I did not release. I
Speaker 2: did not release OWNERUS upfront financial terms. I didn't even
Speaker 2: talk about it as being different than the great way
Speaker 2: in which we partner with franchises previously. And we posted
Speaker 2: in the quarter a positive nine point seven million j Justinivada,
Speaker 2: which I think it shows that our cash balance that
Speaker 2: was given to us US from the IPO on Nastac
Speaker 2: little over a year ago is growing. So even as
Speaker 2: we grow our webcomic APPEU here in the US and
Speaker 2: in English speaking locales nineteen percent you're on year for
Speaker 2: the last two quarters, we're still building cash. That doesn't
Speaker 2: mean we hoard it. We love the ability to create
Speaker 2: shareholder value, but we're very careful to return shareholder value
Speaker 2: very prudently. We believe in self reliance. That's why we
Speaker 2: went public and right now there is no need for
Speaker 2: me to disclose any different set of financial conditions other
Speaker 2: than excitement. Strategically for the Disney collaboration.
Speaker 1: We're speaking with David Lee, CFO and COO of the
Speaker 1: one point nine billion dollar market cap webtun Also with
Speaker 1: US is Nina Trattan and Bloomberg News senior editor. She
Speaker 1: writes the Bloomberg CFO briefing newsletter.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Well, unfortunately running out of time, David, But maybe
Speaker 3: one question in terms of the customer group that you
Speaker 3: mostly tracked at webtoon, you mentioned gen Z's to us.
Speaker 3: I'm wondering, how do you keep track of that specific
Speaker 3: customer group.
Speaker 2: Well, it's funny this generation of consumers, the younger generation
Speaker 2: gen Z and jen Alpha, they want to discover on
Speaker 2: their own content. So we're very data rich and we
Speaker 2: want to make sure we have the best sources stories,
Speaker 2: and we have one hundred and twenty thousand stories that
Speaker 2: arrive every single day to our platform. But because we're
Speaker 2: so data driven, we can tell we call her Mattie
Speaker 2: our target consumer. We know what Maddie is reading thirty
Speaker 2: minutes every day, we know what chapter of what story
Speaker 2: she's reading, and so it's easier for us to use
Speaker 2: our technology to ensure she finds her next story, which
Speaker 2: is part of the reason why we've revamped our product
Speaker 2: here in the US. Importantly, as Maddie grows older, we
Speaker 2: know from a longer experience elsewhere that she'll like different genres.
Speaker 2: And the great thing about webtoon is we can offer
Speaker 2: every genre because it comes from twenty four million creators
Speaker 2: that we've cultivated over the last over ten years. So
Speaker 2: she Maddie will grow old with us even as she
Speaker 2: changes her tastes. We love her to finish in complete
Speaker 2: stories because we have so many more coming as an
Speaker 2: ever great platform every day.
Speaker 1: And she's not a zombie. I just want to make sure.
Speaker 2: I would never characterize Maddie as a.
Speaker 1: Zombokay, she said, my daughter talk about Mattie. I just
Speaker 1: want to make sure we're.
Speaker 4: Yeah, no, okay, zombie there, Okay, sorry to go ahead. Well, David,
Speaker 4: I did want to ask you about how you all
Speaker 4: are thinking about AI. Of course, we know this has
Speaker 4: been a really big topic this year as people think
Speaker 4: about how we're using AI spend for some of these
Speaker 4: large companies. So how are you all integrating AI into
Speaker 4: your platform?
Speaker 2: You know, it's interesting. Web Tunes started from a parent
Speaker 2: called Neighbor, which is a tech powerhouse, and we use
Speaker 2: our technology, including our AI which we have a lot
Speaker 2: of actually to protect the human creator. We protect them
Speaker 2: by fighting piracy arguably better than a lot of other
Speaker 2: bigger consumer tech platforms. I know. We allow consumers to
Speaker 2: find these one hundred and twenty thousand stories I mentioned
Speaker 2: that come every day. We help them find the stories
Speaker 2: they want using AI and technology. We may be the
Speaker 2: best untold story about AI promoting human creativity, generating returns
Speaker 2: for our human creators, protecting them in a way that
Speaker 2: I don't think is oftentimes on your network or in
Speaker 2: the press. And we're really excited to have a business model.
Speaker 2: You know, we've shared two point eight billion dollars with
Speaker 2: our creators from twenty seventeen to twenty twenty three because
Speaker 2: from the very beginning, our founder said, we will build
Speaker 2: a global network of people who can fair share in
Speaker 2: the success. Neither of us know how big is yet,
Speaker 2: and that allows an amateur creator somewhere in the world
Speaker 2: with the dream of being a storyteller to change their
Speaker 2: lives and contribute to the platform that we've built. So
Speaker 2: I feel really good about our you SURVEYI I'm held
Speaker 2: accountable by my teenage daughters, who are also consumers, and
Speaker 2: this is one case where I think tech is at
Speaker 2: work for human good.
Speaker 1: David, good to see you, Thanks for joining us on
Speaker 1: Bloomberg BusinessWeek Daily for the CFO Brief. And that's David Lee,
Speaker 1: CFO and COO of webtoon. Also a big thank you
Speaker 1: to Nina Trevman. She's bloomberg new senior editor. She writes
Speaker 1: the Bloomberg c FO Briefing newsletter. You can sign up
Speaker 1: for it at Bloomberg dot com slash CFO Dash Briefing