Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ:CMCSA) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

So, we’re going to continue to leverage mobile, and we’re going to press aggressively with mobile, and even new broadband partners, like NOW TV, which is a great streaming video tier that showcases Peacock. And the net of this is a stable base, 32 million residential broadband customers, and while protecting resi broadband ARPU growth. You saw us do that in Q2 at 4.5% ARPU growth. But in this environment, we’re still competitive in lower activity superior to flux, and in some quarters, we may report customer losses. That being said, to your question, we believe, over time, we will return to subscriber growth. And certainly we’re seeing more normalization. Back-to-school is going to happen in Q3. And most certainly there’s some seasonal normalization.

But over time, I’m confident that we will be able to balance this formula of ARPU, focus, and over time, getting back to the subscriber growth. Mike?

Michael Cavanagh: Thanks, Dave, so, hey, good morning, Ben. So, I think I’d just add a point, that if you look back at the first-half of the year, what Dave and his team have been doing and continue to do in terms of setting the broadband business, which is obviously extremely important to the future of the company, up for long-term success by continuing to improve our product, add innovation around it, segment the base, extend the footprint, all the things that you want to see happen, and while protecting pricing are all outstanding work in a competitive moment in time. But I think as you know, we here and Dave and his team, in particular, are thinking what are the implications for the long-term as we think about how to compete in the short-term.

Going to your question on the NBC side on strikes, I’ll just repeat what I said earlier, which is that we are committed to reaching a fair deal with the guilds as soon as possible. Beyond that, I’d just it’s really for all involved in the industry broadly, a prolonged work stoppage and the longer it goes the worse it’ll be. It’s obviously going to have a negative impact all around. To your question about free cash flow, nothing to quantify in the context of our company, I mean it’s all manageable. But it will shift studio working capital out of the near-term and into the future, so probably for 2023 a little bit of lower working capital, higher free cash flow, and the flipside of that in 2024. As you look at Peacock, I wouldn’t point out anything in particular related to strikes and its effect in 2023 or second-half of the year.

Obviously, the longer the strike the more that could have an affect as you look into 2024 and beyond, and that would be for ourselves and others, obviously. So, it’s a level playing field. But to comment on Peacock in particular in the second-half, we’ve got a lot of strong content coming. So, we’ve got NFL coming back. Obviously then on top of that we have an exclusive NFL wild-card game. We’re going to have Big Ten for the first time, which is fantastic on Saturday nights. In the movie slates, we’ve got Super Mario Bros. coming to Peacock shortly, we’ve got Exorcist, Five Nights at Freddy’s, as Jason pointed out, coming from Blumhouse. And then on TV side, some originals, including Continental, which is related to the John Wick franchise.

So, we feel very good about the strength of what we have coming in the second-half of the year content-wise. And then beyond that, on Peacock, I think there’ll be a continuation of the good work that we’ve done inside the company to convert Comcast subscribers over to a paying subscriber status, which we’re not quite halfway through that as we only got started in June on that score. So, over the remainder of the year that will also be happening. So, when you look at the doubling of Peacock subs year-over-year, and I’m optimistic about what the second-half of the year brings, feel pretty good about Peacock.

Ben Swinburne: Thanks so much.

Marci Ryvicker: Thanks, Ben. Operator, next question please.