TKO Group Holdings, Inc.

Good afternoon. Thank you for attending today's first quarter TKO 2024 earnings call. My name is Tamia and I will be your moderator for today's call. All lines will be muted during the presentation portion of the call with an opportunity for questions and answers at the end. If you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 on your telephone keypad. I would now like to pass the conference over to your host, Des Zaslow, Head of Investor Relations. You may proceed.

Good afternoon and welcome to TKO's first quarter 2024 earnings call. A short while ago, we issued a press release, which you can view on our investor relations website. A recording of this call will also be available via our website for at least 30 days. Joining me on today's call are Ari Emanuel, TKO's executive chair and chief executive officer, Mark Shapiro, our president and COO, and Andrew Schweimer, our CFO. After prepared remarks from Ari and Andrew, we'll open the call for questions. The purpose of this call is to provide you with the information regarding our first quarter 2024 performance. I want to remind everyone that the information discussed will include forward-looking statements and or projections that involve risks, uncertainties, and assumptions. Please see our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission for further detail. If these risks or uncertainties were to materialize or any assumptions prove incorrect, our results may differ materially from those expressed or implied on this call. Forward-looking statements speak only as of the date they are made, and we undertake no obligation to update them in light of new information or future events, except as legally required. Our commentary today will also include non-GAAP financial measures, which we believe provide an additional tool for investors to use in evaluating ongoing operating results and trends. These measures should not be considered in isolation from or as a substitute for financial information prepared in accordance with GAAP. Reconciliations between GAAP and non-GAAP metrics can be found in our press release issued today. as well as the information posted on our IR website. With that, I'll now turn the call over to Ari.

Thanks, Seth. TKO is off to a solid start in 2024 with strong performance across both UFC and WWE. Coming off a record 2023 for both businesses in terms of revenue and profitability, we've continued to deliver through the first quarter. We had record attendance and gates across our live events portfolio in the quarter. we secured a landmark global deal for WWE with Netflix and renewed UFC rights in multiple international markets. We landed groundbreaking brand partnerships, including a first-ever in-ring sponsor for WWE. We settled all claims in the UFC antitrust lawsuits, bringing that matter to a close without introducing any further changes to our existing business operations. In April, WrestleMania 40 drew its largest-ever viewership and set a WWE gate record with 145,000 fans over two days at Philadelphia's Lincoln Financial Field. And the following weekend, UFC 300 became one of the highest grossing events in UFC history. Based on Q1 performance and business momentum, today we are raising our full year guidance for revenue and adjusted EBITDA. Andrew will share more detail on our financials shortly, but first I will touch on recent highlights that underscore our conviction. First, as our record setting events demonstrate, The experience economy is alive and well, especially for premium content and experiences like ours. For UFC, during Q1, we sold out all five events with live audiences, setting numerous arena gate records. These included UFC 297 in Toronto, UFC's highest grossing arena event in Canada, UFC 298 in Anaheim, the highest grossing MMA event ever in California, and UFC 299 in Miami, setting the arena record and ranking among the highest-grossing UFC events of all time. UFC also returned to Mexico City with a fight night that became our highest-grossing event in the country and coincided with the launch of our Performance Institute there. The Mexico City facility, our third Performance Institute worldwide, will accelerate our efforts to develop and support MMA athletes across Latin America, an important growth market and source of some of UFC's top talents. We're equally excited about several big upcoming fights, including Conor McGregor's highly anticipated return to the Octagon at UFC 303 on June 29th and UFC's planned debut at the Las Vegas Sphere this September. Turning to WWE. Premium live events in the quarter, Royal Rumble and Elimination Chamber delivered record gross revenue and viewership. Royal Rumble broke the all-time attendance record for Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida. an elimination chamber in Perth, Australia brought out more than 52,000 fans to mark WWE's first Australia event since 2018 as part of an agreement with Tourism Western Australia. Throughout the quarter, WWE's events also benefited from momentum leading up to WrestleMania with 17 consecutive sellouts for televised events. This sellout streak is the longest for televised events in WWE history. In total, WWE events in Q1, set 54 individual market records for both gross and paid tickets across all event types. These attendance records speak to the broader economic benefits we bring to host cities, and we are focused on partnering with local governments and maximizing revenue opportunities from site fees. As one recent example, during the quarter, Tourism Western Australia entered a multi-year partnership for UFC to return to Perth with at least two events, including the UFC 305 pay-per-view in August, and one additional fight night in subsequent years. These initiatives all follow WWE's own successful partnership with the Western Australian government. Next, we are well positioned to continue growing our brand partnerships. At the beginning of the year, we merged the global partnership teams of UFC and WWE to go to market in a unified way and enable more brands to engage with our fans. Right out of the gates, our team has delivered significant wins expanding both businesses' brand relationships across new categories, territories, and assets. UFC's record-setting partnership with Anheuser-Busch is off to a successful start, and we've added multiple first-time partners across the beverage, health and beauty, vocational training, healthcare, and medical equipment categories. For WWE, we announced a first-ever brand partner to appear center mat at premium live events, as well as multiple premium brands, including Wheatley Vodka Amazon Studios, and Coca-Cola. All told, we're encouraged by this fast start and remain confident in our ability to grow global partnerships revenue, particularly on the WWE side, as our team has done for UFC. Finally, our premium sports and entertainment content remains in demand. This is clearly demonstrated by the global five plus billion dollar Netflix deal WWE announced early in the quarter. We're incredibly excited about the potential we see with Netflix and for our fans around the world. Well ahead of the 2025 launch, the partnership is already getting off to a promising start. WrestleMania 40 streamed live on Netflix in New Zealand last month through a one-time arrangement. Despite no marketing push, WWE fans tuned in in full force, propelling the event to the number one spot in Netflix's local programming lineup over a four-day span. In addition to Netflix, we remain focused on our upcoming media renewal. During the quarter, we secured a short-term agreement with USA Network to extend raw through the fourth quarter of 2024. We also continue to secure rights agreements and renewals for UFC and international territories at healthy average annual increases. In closing, across each of our lines of business, we believe TKO is well-positioned to capitalize on its strengths to drive continued growth and profitability. We remain focused on generating cost and revenue synergies executing our strategy and delivering sustainable long-term value for shareholders. With that, I'll turn the call over to Andrew.