Yalla Group Limited

Good morning and good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by for YALA Group Limited's first quarter 2024 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. After management's prepared remarks, there will be a question and answer session. Today's conference call is being recorded. Now, I would like to turn the call over to your speaker host today, Ms. Carrie Gao, IR Director of the company. Please go ahead, ma'am.

Hello, everyone, and welcome to YALA's first quarter 2024 earnings conference call. We released our earnings press release earlier today, and the release is now available on our IR website as well as on newswire outlets. Before we continue, please note that the discussion today will contain forward-looking statements made under the safe harbor provision of the U.S. Private Security Certification Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. As such, our future results may be materially different from the views expressed today. Further information regarding these and other risks and uncertainties is included in our earnings release and our annual report filed with the SEC. Yala does not assume any obligation to update any forward-looking statements, except as required by law. Please also note that Yala's earnings press release and this conference call include a discussion of unaudited gap financial information, as well as unaudited non-gap financial measures. Yala's press release contains a reconciliation of the unaudited non-gap measures to the unaudited most directly comparable gap measures. Today, you will hear from Mr. Tao Yang, our Chairman and Chief Executive Officer We will provide an overview of our latest achievements and growth strategies. He will be followed by Mr. Saifis Mayu, the company's president, who will briefly review our recent business developments. Mrs. Karen Hu, our chief financial officer, will then provide additional details on the company's financial results and discuss our financial outlook. Following management's prepared remarks, we will open the call to questions. Mr. Jeff Xu, our chief operating officer, will join the Q&A session. With that said, I would now like to turn the call over to our chairman and chief executive officer, Mr. Tao Yang. Please go ahead, sir.

Thank you, everyone, for joining our first quarter 2024 earnings conference call. We kicked off 2024 with solid first quarter results, even with the impact of Ramadan, which started on March 11th this year. Our Q1 revenue field reached $78.7 million, holding into the upper end of our guidance, and once again demonstrating the remarkable strength of our flagship applications, Yala and Yalalido. Our persistent efforts to deliver quality growth and enhance our operating efficiency are also yielding positive results. In Q1, our net margin reached 39.5%. Our solid quarterly performance showcases our dedication to refining our operations and our ability to enhance our flagship application gamification as well as optimize our user acquisition strategies. Thanks to these successes, we ultimately delivered a better experience for our users, further boosting Yala's and Yala leaders' users' willingness to stay and pay. In 2024, we anticipated continued advancement in an acceleration of digital transformation across the MENA region. As the largest MENA-based online social networking and gaming company, Yala will continue to enrich our services and expand the boundaries of our business. Launching innovative products to fulfill Mina users' evolving needs online. Turning to Yala Games development and further strategy. As we continue to explore and invest in games, our growing expertise and capabilities have strengthened our determination to expand our footprint in Mina's mid-core and hardcore games. Looking ahead, we will continue to prepare our team and grow our game pipeline. As we mentioned on our last call, mid-core games, which we can leverage our extensive expertise, talented workforce, and abundant resources in Nina's casual gaming sector, will be one major focus for the team this year. We look forward to better utilizing our advantages and delivering our exceptional gaming experiences to our users. The Middle East gaming industry is constantly booming with one of the world's fastest growth rates. Global top-tier game developers are increasingly maximizing the Near Eastern gaming market's immense potential. and the region has emerged as a retail growth market for game companies from around the world. As the largest media-based online social networking and gaming company, Yala is actively engaged in discussions with renowned gaming studios on a global scale, exploring potential collaborations in the region. I want to highlight that Yella recently joined the UK Interactive Entertainment Association, UKEE, the oldest video game and interactive entertainment trade body in the world, via invitation from UKEE's CEO and Vice Chairman. UKEE represents nearly 650 businesses across the UK, including major video game platforms, local and international publishers. independent developers and a vast area of service providers. Our goal is to align ourselves with the game developers worldwide and foster greater connectivity within the industry. We aspire to contribute to the Middle Eastern gaming community by delivering a wide range of high-quality game content to players in the region that enhances the gaming experience and building future gaming options for our users. Next, I'd like to elaborate on AI, which has great significance for our business. We have consistently kept pace with the evolving trend and currently have our dedicated AI team focused on researching algorithms, motors, especially tailored to the Arab culture and user habits. We're already reaping the rewards of their work, which is helping us enhance the company's management and efficiency in areas such as content recommendation, content moderation, and customer service. For example, the accuracy rate of our self-developed image review system is already leading in the region, outperforming a number of similar tools developed by major service providers. We have also accumulated considerable expertise in image models. AI now plays a crucial role in tasks such as image recognition and basic artistic creation, enhancing our team's productivity and efficiency. By harnessing the power of AI, we aim to optimize team resources, save time and money, and ultimately improve our overall operational efficiency. Our commitment to leveraging AI also ensures that we can better understand and cater to the needs and the preferences of our users, and provide our users with improved services as well as personalized Before I conclude, a brief ESG update. YALA recently published its 2023 ESG report detailing the company's performance and future goals across five major areas, including responsible governance, environment, trust, people, and community. ESG has been an essential component of our long-term business vision and core values since day one, and we were pleased to share our ongoing progress in terms of sustainability and social responsibility. We look forward to reaching new heights in ESG performance and sustainably enriching local digital lives. In sum, we remain confident in the growth opportunities presented by MENA's increasingly pivotal role on the global stage and the region's rapid digital transformation. As the number one MENA-based online social networking and gaming company, we are dedicated to building relationships locally and globally to broaden our business horizons and contribute to MENA's economic development. With our strong business fundamentals and outstanding product portfolio, we believe we are well positioned to capitalize on potential growth opportunities. Now I will turn this call over to our president, Mr. Saifi Ismail, for a closer look at our recent developments.