Better Collective A/S

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Better Collective Q1 2025 presentation. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star 1 1 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. If you wish to ask a question via the webcast, please use the Q&A box available on the webcast link at any time during the webcast. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Retro Collective IR, Michael Monk. Please go ahead.

Thank you very much, and good morning, everyone. My name is Michael Monk-Jakobskoll, and thank you for joining us today for our Q1 2025 webcast. I'm joined as always by our co-founder and now co-CEO Jesper Søgaard and CFO Flemming Pedersen who will provide today's business update in connection with our Q1 report that was disclosed yesterday. Please follow me to the next slide. We ask you to pay attention to this slide where we display our disclaimer regarding any forward-looking statements in today's webcast. Please turn to the next slide as I hand over the word to Jesper for the first quarter highlights.

Thank you, Mikkel. Good morning, all, and thank you for joining today's webcast. Let's dive into the Q1 highlights. Please follow me to the next slide. Before we dive into the numbers, I want to take a moment to reflect on the journey we've been on over the past year. 2024 was a turbulent year, not just for Better Collective, but for the industry. We faced unexpected external headwinds. from changes to the search landscape for the global publishers to regulatory shifts in Brazil, as well as changing dynamics in the US market. While these challenges tested us, they also pushed us to think bigger, act faster, and ultimately become a leaner, more focused company. As we headed into Q1, visibility into the Brazilian market was extremely limited. And from a player migration standpoint, we started from zero. Despite this uncertainty, we were the only ones to provide guidance on our expectations for the market. And I'm pleased to say that Q1 delivered in line with our expectations. Let's look at the highlights for the quarter. Brazil posed significant challenges for us throughout 2024, as the market participants started preparing for the long-waited local regulations. Following the implementation of the new regulation on January 1st, 2025, we've gained valuable insights as the market has begun to stabilize. It's still early days, particularly as the main soccer season only began at the very end of the quarter, but initial signs are encouraging. In Q1, we were positively surprised by the strength of player migration and post-regulation activity. Churn was lower than expected, and player values remain solid. That said, the absence of welcome bonuses in the new regulated environment has naturally slowed new customer acquisition, which impacted our NDC volumes during the quarter. In the US, performance was also broadly in line with expectations. We faced tough comparables due to last year's North Carolina state launch, combined with lower marketing activity from partners. Nonetheless, we continue to build a solid revenue share foundation in the market. On the cost side, we delivered meaningful savings, reducing costs by approximately 9 million euros year over year in Q1. Our 50 million euros cost efficiency program initiated in October remains fully on track and is expected to deliver its full impact throughout 2025. After the close of the quarter, we made some important strategic changes. I'm really happy to share that my co-founder, Christian Kirk Rasmussen, has joined me as co-CEO. At the same time, we finalized a major organizational restructuring, shifting away from a geographically structured business to three global business units, publishing, paid medium, and esports. This move is designed to reduce complexity, eliminate duplication, and create the scalability we need to unlock the next chapter of growth. Finally, we also launched another new 10 billion euro share buyback program. Please turn to the next page as we dive deeper into the business highlights. I have decided to focus on the two key regions that demand our attention right now, Brazil and the US. First, let's now take a look at Brazil. which officially became a fully regulated market on January 1st, 2025. This first quarter has given us some valuable insights, and I'm happy to say we're seeing encouraging signs. The total amount wagered in our player databases has developed nicely, and the drop in wagering activity was actually less than we had anticipated. This tells us that the players we've historically sent are staying active and that retention and loyalty remain strong, especially in this new regulatory environment. That said, the ongoing ban on welcome bonuses has had an impact. Without those incentives, new customer acquisition has been slower than expected, which has also led to less aggressive competition between sportsbooks in the market. There are several market participants that are working to get welcome bonuses back into the laws. to reduce the channelization towards non-licensed sportsbooks. Our media inventory has continued to be sold out, and our focus is now to increase the product offering to cater to the high demand. We continue to see significant long-term potential in Brazil, and we remain confident in our leading position as the market matures. Turning to North America. The business performed in line with our expectations during Q1. Following the organizational rebasing we implemented back in October, the overall market activity level continued in line with the developments from last fall. What's important to highlight is that we're continuing to strengthen our revenue share foundation in the region as we send more players and revenue share agreements to our partners. The buildup of unrecognized revenue keeps growing. This is a key part of our long-term strategy. Over time, as these deferred earnings begin to materialize, our North American business will become increasingly stable, backed by a solid base of recurring revenue. We remain very excited about the potential in North America and about a strong position in what is expected to become by far the largest regulated market for online sports betting and iGaming globally. Let's go to the next slide. After Q1 closed, Better Collective embarked on an exciting new chapter to ensure our continued success and position us for sustained long-term growth. We've made strategic adjustments. Central to this transformation is our shift from a regional to a global management structure, allowing us to organize around three core business units, publishing, paid media, and esports. This move is designed to simplify operations and optimized for global scalability. Moreover, we have taken decisive steps to streamline our brand portfolio, censoring our efforts on flagship brands such as Action Network, Ace Arts, Bola VIP, Footbin, and HLTV. This refined focus enables us to concentrate our resources and energy more effectively. ensuring we not only maintain but enhance our competitive edge across the global market. In addition to this, I'm pleased to announce that my co-founder, Christian Kirk Rasmussen, has stepped into the role of co-CEO alongside me. With our combined leadership strengths, Christian will drive innovation and operational excellence, while I remain focused on our external strategic initiatives and representing Better Collective to our stakeholders. As part of the leadership transition, I'm also pleased to share that Sophia Eielson has joined Better Collective as our new Chief Operating Officer. Over the past six months, Sophia has worked closely with us in a strategic advisory role, playing a central role in shaping the vision and execution of the new Better Collective. This strategic realignment is about more than just efficiency. It's about positioning Better Collective to achieve focused growth and leverage opportunities in the ever-evolving global landscape. We're excited about this new era and confident that these changes will propel us towards a brighter, more aligned future. Please turn to the next page as I hand over the word to Flemming for a financial update.