Versant Media Q1 2026 Earnings Call - Platforms Revenue Growth Offsets Linear Decline

Operator: Greetings. Welcome to Versant Media’s first quarter 2026 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. The question and answer session will follow the formal presentation. If anyone should require operator assistance during the conference, please press star 0 from your telephone keypad. Please note this conference is being recorded. At this time, I’ll now turn the conference over to Wylie Collins, Executive Vice President of Investor Relations and Treasury. Thank you. You may begin.

Wylie Collins, Executive Vice President of Investor Relations and Treasury, Versant Media Group: Thank you, good morning, everyone. Welcome to Versant Media Group’s 1st quarter 2026 operating and financial results conference call. Joining us today are Mark Lazarus, Chief Executive Officer, and Anand Kini, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer. Also with us are Jordan Fasbender, General Counsel, and Natalie Candela, Vice President of Investor Relations. Before we begin, I’d like to remind you that certain statements made during this call may constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements reflect management’s current expectations and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied. For discussion of these risks and uncertainties, please refer to Versant Media Group’s filings with the SEC and today’s earnings release.

All forward-looking statements are made as of today, May 14, 2026, and we undertake no obligation to update them. In addition, we may refer to certain non-GAAP financial measures. Reconciliations of these measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures are included in today’s earnings release and in the materials posted in the investor relations section of our website. During today’s call, all comparisons to the prior year are against standalone adjusted figures, which represent our estimated 2025 results as if Versant were already a separate independent company. With that, I’ll turn the call over to Mark.

Mark Lazarus, Chief Executive Officer, Versant Media Group: Thank you, Wylie, and good morning, everyone. We’re off to a strong start to the year with continued progress and growth across key areas of the business, driven by disciplined execution and the strength of our portfolio. As we report our first quarter as an independent company, I want to recognize the truly unique culture and organization that we are building. I am incredibly proud of how our teams are executing with focus, rigor, and a shared commitment to performance. The teamwork is evident in the results and in the momentum we’re building across the business. This momentum reflects our strategy at work, operating scale, market-leading brands anchored in live sports and news, winning with premium content, expanding audience reach, and accelerating the growth of our digital platforms.

We hold a leadership position in each of our four large and growing markets: business news and personal finance, political news and opinion, golf, and sports and genre entertainment. Across each, we continue to make meaningful progress against our objectives, deepening engagement and driving new monetization opportunities. Let’s talk about the results. At CNBC, we saw exceptional engagement during a period of heightened market volatility. The network delivered its highest-rated quarter in four years with double-digit year-over-year growth, reinforcing CNBC’s role as the destination for business news when it matters most. That strength was on full display in Davos at the World Economic Forum, where CNBC was on the ground having and covering the most consequential conversations shaping today’s global economic agenda with CEOs, policymakers, and business leaders. Viewership among key demographics increased more than 50% during the week, resulting in our largest Davos audience in five years.

We also continue to expand and build on the strength of our programming with the launch of Morning Call, a new early morning program that begins our business day lineup by delivering pre-market analysis, insights, and global financial developments to set the agenda for the trading day. At MS NOW, the network achieved its most-watched quarter since 2024, with double-digit growth in both total day and prime time viewership among key demographics. MS NOW reached an average of over 30 million viewers weekly, and our viewers watched an average of 9 hours weekly, the second highest engagement across all cable networks, regardless of genre, and nearly double the next closest competitor. That scale extends to digital, where the MS NOW website and app delivered the strongest first quarter on record. MS NOW generated more views on YouTube than the 3 broadcast networks combined from their news divisions.

We had over 1.6 billion views across YouTube and TikTok combined year to date. Growth also continued in digital publishing and podcasts, with original podcast downloads up more than 60% year over year. MS NOW is the network audiences turn to during the most important moments in politics. With the 2026 midterm elections approaching, MS NOW will continue to deliver premium programming with differentiated analysis. In golf, Golf Channel continued to build on its leadership position as the number one golf media outlet driven by strong early season engagement. The PGA Tour is off to an exceptional start with the Golf Channel drawing its largest audience for the Players Championship in 2 decades.

That momentum continued more recently at The Masters Tournament, where Golf Channel reached 13.5 million unique viewers during the week, reinforcing its role as the primary destination not only for live golf but for news, interviews, and post-round analysis as well. We are extending that leadership beyond pay TV through our platforms business. GolfNow delivered broad growth across tee time bookings and payments. GolfPass, boosted by our partnership with Rory McIlroy, in the 1st quarter reached the highest number of subscribers ever. In just a moment, I’ll talk about the platform’s business, but as it relates to golf, this is a clear example of how we are integrating content, commerce, and consumer engagement within a single ecosystem. Turning to sports and genre entertainment.

In the first quarter, we delivered the largest Olympic audience in USA Network history with the Milano Cortina Olympics, which aired across USA Network and CNBC, reaching approximately three-quarters of U.S. pay TV households and securing the number one rank among sports and entertainment cable networks. In addition, we are building on our momentum in women’s sports. Our first season of League One Volleyball on USA Network was a breakout success, highlighted by the most-watched match in league history. We are also proud to have just kicked off our inaugural WNBA season this past Sunday with our opening game and a double header just last night. Beyond live sports, we are driving value from our deep content library.

The licensing of Keeping Up with the Kardashians and other iconic entertainment titles to third-party platforms underscores the enduring demand for our own content and our ability to monetize it across the evolving distribution landscape. In addition, our entertainment brands continue to perform throughout the quarter. E! Live from the Red Carpet drove strong audience engagement around major events, including the Oscars, the Grammys, and the Critics Choice Awards. The Critics Choice Awards aired as a simulcast on E! and USA Network, doubling viewership compared to the prior year. Finally, in platforms, we delivered high single-digit growth in the quarter, continuing to build a scalable revenue stream beyond pay TV while expanding the reach and distribution of our iconic brands. Our performance reflects disciplined execution and progress in scaling these businesses, which remains a foremost strategic priority.

Platform’s growth in the quarter was driven by GolfNow and Fandango, with Fandango One, formerly INDY Cinema, expanding Fandango’s value proposition for cinema operators. An important component of our platform strategy is to build on CNBC’s position as the leading source for business news and expand our audience relationships through deeper and broader coverage. As part of this strategy, we acquired StockStory, an AI-driven platform that enhances our ability to deliver real-time, actionable investment intelligence and supports the next phase of CNBC’s direct-to-consumer product development. We’re building on this momentum with other new platform initiatives as well, including the previously announced MS NOW direct-to-consumer offering and Fandango AVOD service, both on track to launch later this year. These initiatives and strategies underscore that we are actively managing through pay TV’s secular changes.

We are focused not only on continuing to improve the content and reach of our leading brands but also aggressively expanding beyond TV through direct-to-consumer initiatives. Our strong balance sheet enables us to both return capital to shareholders and invest in these growth opportunities. That includes acquisitions such as INDY Cinema Group for Fandango, StockStory for CNBC, and Free TV Networks, which expand our platform capabilities and accelerate our evolution. As I just mentioned, we remain committed to returning capital to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases, including this morning’s announcements of an accelerated share repurchase transaction as we enter the second quarter. With that, I’ll turn it over to Anand. We’ll walk through the financials.

Anand Kini, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Versant Media Group: Thanks, Mark. Good morning, everyone. I’ll begin by reviewing our first quarter 2026 results, then discuss key performance drivers, and finally touch upon our outlook for the remainder of the year. As Mark mentioned, our first quarter performance reflects a strong start to the year, with disciplined execution driving robust profitability, healthy margins, significant free cash flow generation, and continued momentum in platforms revenue. Total revenue for the quarter was approximately $1.69 billion, a 1% decrease from the prior year quarter. This performance reflects the expected continued pressure on pay TV impacting linear distribution and advertising revenues. This was partially offset by significant growth in platforms which, as we’ve mentioned, is a top strategic priority for Versant.

Linear distribution revenue was $1.01 billion, a decline of 7% year-over-year, driven by continued cord-cutting trends, partially offset by contractual rate increases. This decline is consistent with the prior year trajectory. Advertising revenue was $368 million, down 5% year-over-year, a significant improvement from last year’s Q1 decline of 12%, reflecting the power of our portfolio, particularly in our news businesses, where we successfully monetize strong ratings and robust advertiser demand. Platform’s revenue was $192 million, up 9%, with strong results at both GolfNow and Fandango. Mark mentioned the breadth of GolfNow’s growth, and it’s a similar story with Fandango, with robust performance in ticketing and home entertainment with INDY Cinema Group, now known as Fandango One, also fully integrated and contributing to our success.

Content licensing and other revenue was $121 million, a significant increase compared to the $57 million in the prior year. Was favorably impacted by the licensing of select titles in our content library, including Keeping Up with the Kardashians, which we announced in January. A reminder that the value of licensing transactions is generally recognized immediately when the content is delivered. As a result, content licensing and other revenue can vary significantly quarter-to-quarter and year-over-year. In the first quarter, adjusted EBITDA was $704 million, reflecting our continued focus on operating efficiency and increasing 5% versus the prior year. Margins remained well above 30%. Programming and production costs were $519 million in the first quarter, down 5% year-over-year, as we continue to deliver the premium content our audiences love efficiently.

As a reminder, these costs have some degree of seasonality, with higher costs in the second half of the year driven by sports rights timing. Other costs of revenue increased 11% in the first quarter due to our continued investment in platforms, including costs associated with onboarding Fandango ONE. Total cost of revenue was $638 million, down 3% compared to last year. SG&A costs of $346 million represented a decrease of 9%. We remain focused on operating with a lean organization and modernizing our technology infrastructure, driving efficiency and productivity. We expect a modest go-forward increase in SG&A costs to support our growth initiatives, including the ongoing development of our D2C offerings.

Free cash flow totaled $558 million in the quarter, reflecting strong cash generation and timing-related items, including accounts receivable collections and payable processing, which we expect to normalize as the year progresses. Capital expenditures were relatively light in the first quarter and are expected, consistent with our prior commentary, to increase modestly over the remainder of the year, largely driven by the build-out of our Manhattan facility and targeted investments in our platforms and other growth businesses. Demonstrating our commitment to return capital to shareholders, our board has declared a quarterly cash dividend of $0.375 per share. As Mark mentioned, in the first quarter, we repurchased $100 million of Class A shares under the $1 billion authorization approved last quarter.

This morning, we have announced a $100 million accelerated share repurchase agreement, which we expect to complete in the second quarter. Liquidity remains strong with a total cash balance of $1.2 billion at quarter end, supported by healthy free cash flow generation as well as timing-related items discussed earlier, which we expect to normalize in the second quarter. Our capital allocation priorities remain consistent, investing to evolve our business model and generate growth, returning capital to shareholders, and maintaining a strong balance sheet. We mentioned previously our decision to explore strategic alternatives for SportsEngine and sold most of the business on May 1. Our focus will always be to maximize long-term value through disciplined capital allocation, and this sale, along with the growth investments we’ve mentioned, underscores that commitment.

As we look ahead to the rest of the year, we continue to expect $6.15 billion-$6.4 billion in revenue, adjusted EBITDA of $1.85 billion-$2.0 billion, and free cash flow at $1.0 billion-$1.2 billion. We expect quarterly fluctuations driven by content licensing, working capital, and higher programming costs in the second half, particularly in the fourth quarter. These dynamics are reflected in our full year outlook and consistent with 2025. As mentioned, content licensing revenue can vary across quarters, and we expect higher programming costs driven by sports rights timing relative to both Q1 and last year in the second half and particularly Q4. With respect to free cash flow for the remainder of 2026, we also expect continued variability due to working capital timing differences.

With that, I will turn it over to the operator for Q&A.

Operator: Thank you. We’ll now be conducting a question and answer session. Thank you. Our first question is from the line of Michael Ng with Goldman Sachs. Please proceed with your questions.

Michael Ng, Analyst, Goldman Sachs: Good morning. Thank you for the questions. I have two, one on advertising and one on skinny bundles. First, on advertising, it was a little bit better than expected in the quarter. Can you just talk a little bit about how much of the performance was driven by growth initiatives gaining traction versus the strong news cycle across CNBC and MSNBC? Was there any halo effect on USA from the Winter Olympics? Just trying to understand the sustainability of the outperformance in ads. Then on skinny bundles, could you talk a little bit about whether you’re seeing a wider range of performance across your network portfolio? Said differently, are MSNBC and CNBC outperforming the rest of your networks just given their inclusion in the news inclusive plans? Thank you very much.

Mark Lazarus, Chief Executive Officer, Versant Media Group: Thanks, Michael. Thanks for the questions, Mark. On advertising. You know, the marketplace has been strong. The portfolio of news and sports, along with a bunch of the live entertainment we had, has been resilient. The, you know, our partnership with NBCU representing us in the market has proven to be fruitful for both parties. We believe that this is sustainable. It was not a big halo from the Olympics. The Olympics were wonderful and were great for us. As a reminder, you know, that NBC buys the time from us, we didn’t benefit from growth in advertising from the Olympics. Our portfolio of live content is what advertisers are seeking, and I feel that that will continue, and we have all good indicators going forward.

On the skinny bundle side, I think what I would say is that we are, you know, we’re well-positioned, and we are in all of the appropriate bundles. As you point out, we’re in the sports and news bundles with our content. You know, the portfolio is diverse and has networks that is prepared and built to work with the distribution marketplace in this new tiered bundled world.

Anand Kini, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Versant Media Group: Mike, just to add on to what Mark said, you know, on the advertising side, the organic presence drove kind of the trajectory improvement. Yes, we have some new initiatives like Free TV Networks, but to be clear, that was not the reason that we saw that performance improvement. That was just based on the organic businesses and the health of them and, you know, all the factors that Mark just mentioned. Again, just to reiterate, you know, Mark’s point on the skinny bundles. The way we look at this also from a business model and financial perspective is we look at it in total revenue and where, as you saw, the kind of the linear distribution revenue and our focus is on maximizing that across the portfolio.

That’s how we manage the business, and it kinda shows up in the results and how we’ll continue to do so.

Operator: Wonderful. Thank you, gentlemen. The next question is from the line of Brent Thill with Raymond James. Please proceed with your questions.

Brent Thill, Analyst, Raymond James: Hey, good morning, everyone. Thanks for taking the questions. First one for me, on MS NOW and Fandango digital, and AVOD strategies. Appreciate the color launching later this year. Are there any more details you all can give at this point on what the go-to-market or maybe pricing strategies will look like for each? Can you help us size the investment this year to bring those both to market?

Mark Lazarus, Chief Executive Officer, Versant Media Group: Thanks, Brent. We haven’t settled on pricing yet, really that’s only for half the equation. MS NOW will be a direct-to-consumer and be a subscriber-based service, which will center around content that MS NOW, its reporters, its contributors, its anchors, create, but not only that. There’ll be a build-out in a sense of community and mindfulness, and it’ll be a much broader service than what we provide today, bringing together voices that are both on our air and not necessarily on our air today. That will be a subscriber-based service.

Fandango AVOD will be just that, you know, be free with advertising, and it’ll be, you know, we will be able to serve content based on the data and information we have from our current Fandango U.S. users, both in form of buying movie tickets as well as buying home video services for buying and renting TV series and films. We’ll be able to serve advertising, relevant advertising as people consume our content. Again, that’s a free with advertising service.

Anand Kini, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Versant Media Group: Just to answer your question on the investment. The investment is not substantial. We get the benefit of leveraging our existing infrastructure, on the video, for example. We already have a well-established Fandango infrastructure to support video playback. Similarly on MS NOW, we have existing streaming services that have video playback at CNBC. There is some kind of bespoke user design investment, but we have a very strong base that we’re starting with. A lot of the investment is actually just on marketing and driving awareness to the product for the consumer, but it’s embedded in kind of the outlook we set. We mentioned that you’ll see, for example, SG&A tick up modestly, and that’s really to support those plans and a little bit on the CapEx side.

We’ve mentioned that you’ll see a little bit there both for the New York facility build-out and to support them. From a size perspective, it’s not like substantial dollars.

Brent Thill, Analyst, Raymond James: Okay. That’s helpful. On the accelerated buyback, what drove the decision to do that, and why now? Still with $800 million of authorization pro forma for that, is there any color that you can give on what will drive your decisions around the pacing of the remaining buyback?

Anand Kini, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Versant Media Group: Sure. 2 things. Just to reiterate that the buyback, A, both the ASR for Q2, and then we bought back $100 million in Q1, and then we also have the $0.375 dividend. I think all exemplify our capital allocation approach. Just to remind everybody, kind of 3 prongs here, and they’re ands in that we’re uniquely positioned, we think, to do all of them. A is maintain a strong balance sheet, which we think gives us a competitive advantage and a strategic advantage. B is to invest in growth to evolve the business. C is a return of capital to shareholders.

We think each one of them are equal priorities, and I think the results that you just see in our share buyback and dividend kind of exemplify that. I think one other thing in terms of, you know, the ASR, it kind of just underscores our confidence in the business and our commitment to that capital allocation approach. Just one final thing, like we don’t view these capital allocation decisions within this framework as static, but rather, like we make those decisions in the context of the market environment and opportunities we see to add value. That’s going to be our approach going forward as well.

Brent Thill, Analyst, Raymond James: Okay. Final question from me. Could you just size the benefit from Keeping Up With the Kardashians? What’s the timeframe on that licensing deal?

Anand Kini, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Versant Media Group: Sure. Just a couple things. On the, on the sizing, it was a driver, as you can see in the content licensing and other growth. It is a driver of that. I think I reiterated that we have a multifaceted business model where we have content licensing, we have ad sales, you know, linear distribution platforms. This is one of the levers that we have and think it exemplifies the value of the library. Yes, this quarter was Keeping Up with the Kardashians. We have a lot of other programming, great true crime kind of library. We have a lot of other unscripted programming that we will sell in the future as well.

Just by notion or I should note that this is inherently there’s some variability in this revenue stream on content licensing just based off of the timing of the sale. We recognize all the revenue for the sale just based off of GAAP this quarter that it’s announced, and that will be the same with other sales that we do going forward. It’s a multi-year licensing deal that we did with the Kardashians.

Mark Lazarus, Chief Executive Officer, Versant Media Group: I’ll just add to that, you know, we do have a robust library titles that are part of the current structure of the library, but also as we continue to create new and original content, that will also be things that we’re able to put into the marketplace. Shows that we are creating now, we know have been attractive to third parties who have already reached out to us about licensing.

Brent Thill, Analyst, Raymond James: Okay. Thank you both.

Operator: The next question is from the line of David Karnovsky with JP Morgan. Please proceed with your questions.

David Karnovsky, Analyst, JP Morgan: Hey, thank you. Maybe just following up on the prior question. Is there any way to help frame residual costs, I mean, either for Kardashians or just, you know, how to think about your library content generally, to help us better understand flow through to EBITDA or cash flow when you do move some of this programming? Then on SportsEngine, maybe this detail will be in the queue, but I don’t know if there’s anything you can say on the terms of the sale or just revenue and EBITDA impact. Thank you.

Anand Kini, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Versant Media Group: Sure. On, on the residual costs, like, A, I should say like really all of our content sales are profitable. Like, you know, we generate every good margins from our content licensing. It is gonna vary a little bit on deal by deal, depending on the individual talent that’s associated with the show. I guess the best guide I can kinda give on that is it was a driver of kind of 1 of the drivers of the increasing content licensing and other revenue, and those incremental revenues are profitable. You know, it’s a good margin business for us. Then I think your other question that you asked on Can you just remind me what that was?

Mark Lazarus, Chief Executive Officer, Versant Media Group: SportsEngine.

Anand Kini, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Versant Media Group: SportsEngine. On SportsEngine, it’s, you know, like, in terms of we did sell on May 1. We’re very proud of the business. We think this was a, like I mentioned, an attractive deal for our shareholders. It was a way to kind of maximize value of the asset. It’s not gonna be from a materiality perspective within our financials as you look to kind of revenue and EBITDA. It’s not gonna kinda change our trajectory of kind of our guidance and so forth. As you can see, we’ve kinda stuck with where we were, it kinda gives you a sense of that. Financially, again, it’s, you know, we’re pleased with the outcome, you know, we don’t think it’s gonna really change how we run the business going forward.

David Karnovsky, Analyst, JP Morgan: Thank you.

Operator: Our next questions are from the line of Rich Greenfield with Lightshed Partners. Please proceed with your questions.

Rich Greenfield, Analyst, Lightshed Partners: Hey, thanks, guys, for taking the questions. You know, when I look at companies like Disney and Fox even, they sort of talked about how their D2C strategy is sort of counteracting or lessening the declines they’re seeing in the linear business, you know, in terms of how they talk about their overall trajectory of subscribers. I’m wondering, you know, as I know you can’t get into details on pricing and the exact strategy on the MS NOW launch, but I guess how should we judge success? Like, will success be lessening the declines on the linear business? Like, what are sort of the ways you think about we’re gonna be able to understand the success and progress of that D2C strategy?

Just I wanted to follow up on the cord shaving comments at the beginning of the Q&A. You know, Disney warned about the impact of the YouTube TV skinny bundles on their non-sports assets. I guess when you look at both DirecTV and YouTube TV, they’ve gotten more aggressive with sports bundles and sports and news bundles. Anything you can say on, are most people, from what you can tell, taking sports and news? Are they gravitating towards sports? Obviously, you have a unique view given the portfolio you have. Where are consumers gravitating to as these skinny bundles play out? Thanks.

Mark Lazarus, Chief Executive Officer, Versant Media Group: Sure, Rich. Thanks. I’ll start with the second one first. You know, clearly we are seeing You know, there are a set of consumers who are looking for sports and news. We are proud that, you know, 4 of our 7 linear businesses fall into those areas and in those tiers, and that we are participating in that. As it relates to the entertainment side, what we’re seeing is a fair amount of stability. We still have a large and robust subscriber base. We’re also being creative and flexible with how we’re able to distribute.

By way of example, I’ll share that, you know, Oxygen over the last few years, while it is a very, I’ll call it very fair priced to the MVPD, we also have some availability in free over the air as a multicast network, and we think that that’s a way to expand creatively and flexibly without and being additive to our distribution flow mechanisms. We see a lot of opportunity. As the MVPDs change their tiers, we’ll be creative and flexible. That’s one of the things that we, as a standalone company, have the ability to do, to work with all of the MVPD partners to make sure our content is available through them, but also in other forms and factions without damaging or hurting those relationships.

On the MS NOW question, or really the D2C question, our goal is to continue to build scale and expand our audiences. Yes, we hope that comes with a large base of subscribers. Where we’ll gauge ourselves is how do we work, how do revenues look across all of our various forms of distributing content? One of the things that we want to do is make sure we grow revenue diversification within each of our verticals, as we have been doing. As we talked about, we have done a very good job over the years with golf by adding StockStory, adding INDY Cinema Group, adding Free TV Networks. MS NOW is the MS NOW version of growing revenue diversification into that very important vertical for us.

Rich Greenfield, Analyst, Lightshed Partners: It goes well beyond subscription in your mind, but you do think it should lessen subscription declines and success?

Mark Lazarus, Chief Executive Officer, Versant Media Group: Yes. Yes, very much so. I mean, we wanna build an audience, you know, a circular way to move audience between various platforms for our content. This is one of the key elements.

Rich Greenfield, Analyst, Lightshed Partners: Thank you.

Operator: Our next question is from the line of Sean Diffley with Morgan Stanley. Please proceed with your questions.

Sean Diffley, Analyst, Morgan Stanley: Great. Thanks very much, team. I had 2. 1, a capital allocation follow-up, and then a sports rights question. Obviously, you can buy back your own stock. The ASR is helpful, but you’re also able to do M&A. I was hoping you could walk us through how you assess the relative attractiveness of each and where your strategic focus is from an M&A standpoint, and how you would describe the valuation backdrop for some assets out there. Then second, on sports rights, obviously, some of your bigger competitors are very focused on the NFL. Do you see the potential for smaller rights to free up, and which sports we should be focused on? Thank you.

Mark Lazarus, Chief Executive Officer, Versant Media Group: We’ll talk about the framework for M&A. Clearly, we’re looking in a variety of areas and obviously can’t be too specific here. You know, we’re adding to our verticals as the 3 that I’ve already mentioned that we’ve done, and we’re looking for creative opportunities within each of those verticals. More broadly, we are interested in being We’re gonna be very disciplined, but we’re interested in things that help us diversify our revenue streams. As we’ve talked about, a vertical strategy, not a horizontal strategy, across the linear landscape. On the NFL question, I’ll let Anand come back to the capital allocation side.

On the NFL question, yes, the competitive set, they’re working through however they in the NFL are going to work through the next cycle of contracts. I do believe that that will put pressure on those companies that retain or grow their NFL expense to make decisions on other content and that we will selectively look at contracts. If you can just look at who the next groups of leagues that come up, you know, whether it’s baseball, hockey, soccer or Premier League, there’s a variety of content coming due. I think what I would just express is that we are well-positioned. You know, if you think about since we’ve announced our spin, we have extended our USGA contract, we’ve extended our PGA of America Ryder Cup contract, we have expanded our WNBA relationship.

We have done a deal and have now completed our first season of League One women’s Volleyball. I do think there will continue to be opportunity for us to build upon our sports portfolio, being judicious with our capital.

Anand Kini, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer, Versant Media Group: Just to kind of go back to what Mark said on the capital allocation and M&A. In terms of, again, whether it’s share repurchase, whether it’s ASR or on the market at an M&A, again, we view it as these are both two prongs, and the third prong is maintaining a healthy balance sheet that we are gonna execute concurrently. That’s what we’ve been doing, and we hold each one as very important. I think, again, they all work together, so we think we’re in a advantaged position to be able to do it, do it all, and I think our results kind of show that. On M&A, Mark mentioned the strategy focus. It’s also, we have a lot of focus on value.

I think hopefully our results in Q1 demonstrate that we have a resilient, strong business model. We’re gonna do things, whether it’s there’s a lot of room to grow organically. Our platform’s revenue growth this quarter demonstrates that. That was really organic growth in GolfNow and Fandango. We’re gonna look when there’s opportunities that are inorganic. They have a very high threshold, even as they fit within those markets and those strategies. If it makes a lot of sense and it adds a lot of value, we’ll pursue. If it doesn’t, we really like the hand that we have.

Sean Diffley, Analyst, Morgan Stanley: Thank you.

Operator: Thank you. Our last and final question is from the line of David Joyce with Seaport Research Partners. Please proceed with your questions.

David Joyce, Analyst, Seaport Research Partners: Thank you. Anecdotally, it seems like you’ve been self-promoting Fandango and GolfNow and GolfPass more. What’s the engagement and subscription growth been like year-over-year, and where do you see your share going in a few years? Secondly, some of your other peers have been starting to work on vertical video. Is this possibly gonna be part of your strategy, and what would be involved in that? Thank you.

Mark Lazarus, Chief Executive Officer, Versant Media Group: First, thank you for noticing. Yes, we have been utilizing our airtime. Given, you know, the portfolio we have, we’ve been utilizing our airtime to promote Fandango, GolfNow and Rotten Tomatoes. Some of you left that far out. Hopefully, you’ve seen those as well. I think what we’ve been doing there, I think the results that we just announced of growing, you know, growing at 9% is indicative of the power of our linear promotion helping grow those businesses. You know, they’re not really subscription businesses, they’re transaction businesses. Our growth is evident that our transactions are growing. Part of that for sure is our ability to promote those services on our air. We will continue to do that.

It’s one of the benefits we have of having this closed loop of multiple businesses. In terms of vertical video, we are investigating it, where there’s a couple of companies that we’re working with. In fact, if you look, we just launched a new Golf Channel app, and it is built for vertical video. We’ll continue to do that in other areas and other genres as well.

David Joyce, Analyst, Seaport Research Partners: Great. Thank you.

Operator: Thank you. This now concludes our question and answer session and will also conclude today’s conference. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect your lines at this time, and have a wonderful day.