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25. Playboy Metaverse, P2E Cockfighting, Roblox Tough Quarter, Unity Falls
Episode 2516th May 2022 • META Business • Holodeck Media
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In this episode, we discuss Playboy making their entry into the metaverse, Roblox shares falling by about 10% after an underwhelming quarter, Unity Software's stock falling by almost 30%, Irreverent Labs closing out a $40 million funding round for play to earn rooster fighting, and so much more!

Episode 25 Keywords: Playboy, metaverse, stock, Roblox, shares, Unity Software, Irreverent Labs, $40 million funding round

Transcripts

Unknown:

Welcome to the metaphysics podcast. The

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Metaverse and web three are bringing about the biggest

Unknown:

revolution since the internet itself. With your hosts Paul the

Unknown:

prophet Dawalibi And Jeff the juice Cohen. We will be bringing

Unknown:

you the latest Metaverse, business news and insight into

Unknown:

what it all means. The meta business podcast starts now.

Unknown:

From the boardroom

Paul Dawalibi:

to the metaverse. This is the meta business

Paul Dawalibi:

podcast. I am Paul the Prophet Dawalibi. I'm joined today by my

Paul Dawalibi:

friend and co host, Jeff the juice Cohen, those of you who

Paul Dawalibi:

are new here, welcome to the official podcast in the

Paul Dawalibi:

metaverse what we do is we cover the most pressing, Metaverse,

Paul Dawalibi:

stories and news of the week, but we look at all of it through

Paul Dawalibi:

a business and C suite lens dissect. We analyze the business

Paul Dawalibi:

implications of everything happening in this incredible

Paul Dawalibi:

industry. For our regular listeners. Thank you guys for

Paul Dawalibi:

tuning in every week. Thank you for leaving a five star rating

Paul Dawalibi:

and review on the podcast. If you haven't already. Hit

Paul Dawalibi:

subscribe. Leave a Review share the podcast with a friend or

Paul Dawalibi:

colleague. This is how we've grown. We really appreciate it.

Paul Dawalibi:

Jeff, how you doing this week?

Jeff Cohen:

I'm doing well. I'm doing good week. I know we're

Jeff Cohen:

both both actual we're both moving. And I don't want to

Jeff Cohen:

Doc's, you on the pipe. We're both all as also, Paul's move is

Jeff Cohen:

bigger than me as much rather than mine.

Paul Dawalibi:

We are both moving not into the metaverse so

Paul Dawalibi:

we can at least confirm that Not yet. Not yet. But I have been

Paul Dawalibi:

thinking about it. You know, I will say I was playing with

Paul Dawalibi:

epics like Unreal Engine today a little bit. I had a little bit

Paul Dawalibi:

of time in between calls and I was toying with Unreal Engine

Paul Dawalibi:

five and their meta human integration in Unreal Engine

Paul Dawalibi:

five. So I'm thinking at some point we'll have to create meta

Paul Dawalibi:

humans, and do this whole thing as unreal, Unreal engine powered

Paul Dawalibi:

meta humans.

Jeff Cohen:

I agree with that I was gonna make the joke. And

Jeff Cohen:

this is why you're so much more successful than me. Because in

Jeff Cohen:

between your calls, you go on Unreal Engine five and innovate

Jeff Cohen:

in between my calls, I go get a snack and try to play with my

Jeff Cohen:

dog. So this is why we're not the same.

Paul Dawalibi:

Well, I'm gonna get you a meta human avatar

Paul Dawalibi:

here. And we're going to do this at some point. You guys will can

Paul Dawalibi:

look forward to that because it is cool. I am Will's I will say,

Paul Dawalibi:

I have been very bearish on Tim Sweeney, but I am thoroughly

Paul Dawalibi:

impressed with Unreal Engine five, I think. You know, for

Paul Dawalibi:

someone I'm not a 3d designer, like I thought what I do for a

Paul Dawalibi:

living, obviously, but you know, tech savvy enough to go in and

Paul Dawalibi:

get a good feel for what this thing can do. And I was very,

Paul Dawalibi:

very impressed. Let's put it that way. So interesting

Paul Dawalibi:

anecdote. We often talk about things like gaming and stuff

Paul Dawalibi:

like that. So let's start with a story. Jeff that is short to

Paul Dawalibi:

attract attention. I'm sure we're going to turn it into a

Paul Dawalibi:

very click baby headline for the podcast here. But the article

Paul Dawalibi:

here is from Seeking Alpha and the headline says Playboy, and

Paul Dawalibi:

the metaverse could imply significant stock

Paul Dawalibi:

undervaluation, so Playboy, it says PLB why? Well, I guess PLDI

Paul Dawalibi:

group is the group that owns Playboy, obviously one of the

Paul Dawalibi:

most recognizable brands in the world. They recently launched a

Paul Dawalibi:

virtual Playboy Mansion in the metaverse and and what they're

Paul Dawalibi:

saying is, if management is successful in its efforts in

Paul Dawalibi:

this industry in the gaming industry, Metaverse, whatever

Paul Dawalibi:

net revenue could trend north. So not a whole ton of detail in

Paul Dawalibi:

this article. They're just saying, you know that the

Paul Dawalibi:

metaverse and their expansion in China and India, I don't know

Paul Dawalibi:

why those are in the same sentence. They're two very

Paul Dawalibi:

different initiatives. But they're very bullish on their

Paul Dawalibi:

Metaverse play here for Playboy. You know, we always start what

Paul Dawalibi:

was tried to start with kind of a fun, lighthearted story. What

Paul Dawalibi:

do you think of a virtual Playboy Mansion? In the

Paul Dawalibi:

metaverse? Like,

Jeff Cohen:

I think it's super interesting. Obviously, you

Jeff Cohen:

know, I'm not familiar with Playboy stock. So I'm not going

Jeff Cohen:

to try to get into the nuances of what this actually does for

Jeff Cohen:

Playboy stock. And as you're going through so this is a

Jeff Cohen:

Seeking Alpha article, which is a investor website where people

Jeff Cohen:

will post, you know, their stock ideas and their pitches, as

Jeff Cohen:

you're scrolling through it here. For people who are

Jeff Cohen:

watching on, you know, video, it's pretty impressive. They

Jeff Cohen:

actually have like a lot of detail. You know, click Beatty

Jeff Cohen:

article like this is someone put together like a very detailed

Jeff Cohen:

stock pitch. I don't think we're gonna get into that because

Jeff Cohen:

neither of us know the Playboy business model that well, but I

Jeff Cohen:

think it's interesting. I mean, you know, the, the porn

Jeff Cohen:

industry, interestingly enough, has actually been very early to

Jeff Cohen:

a lot of like technological trends, like porn was one of the

Jeff Cohen:

early kind of use cases of the internet, you know, especially

Jeff Cohen:

of high speed broadband, things like that. So I don't think it's

Jeff Cohen:

actually that crazy that, you know, virtual illicit behavior

Jeff Cohen:

could actually be a very early use case. For the metaverse, you

Jeff Cohen:

know, there's a lot of different ways you could take that in

Jeff Cohen:

terms of what that means for society and how you know that

Jeff Cohen:

how that could be negative and in many different ways, but

Jeff Cohen:

there is a big market out there for this kind of thing. And so I

Jeff Cohen:

think it's interesting that that Playboy is kind of digging in

Jeff Cohen:

and having a presence in the metaverse. We often joke that

Jeff Cohen:

every bit, you know, it seems like every business is at some

Jeff Cohen:

point going to have their their fingers in the metaverse. And

Jeff Cohen:

obviously Playboy is not, is not not one of those businesses.

Paul Dawalibi:

Obviously, I agree with everything here. But

Paul Dawalibi:

like, my take on this is a little bit different in the

Paul Dawalibi:

sense that, Aren't you surprised that Playboy was maybe the first

Paul Dawalibi:

mover here, right, because Playboy traditionally has been

Paul Dawalibi:

kind of the laggard when it comes to new tech, right. They

Paul Dawalibi:

like stuck with a magazine probably a lot longer than they

Paul Dawalibi:

should have. And there are definitely adult entertainment

Paul Dawalibi:

websites that are more forward thinking tech savvy, you know,

Paul Dawalibi:

innovate on the tech side. And at least I don't know about

Paul Dawalibi:

them. But I don't think I've heard of any efforts from those

Paul Dawalibi:

companies to do something, you know, in existing meta verses,

Paul Dawalibi:

or in their own or whatever, right? Like, I have not heard

Paul Dawalibi:

any of the adult sites doing something in decentraland or

Paul Dawalibi:

sandbox. And I don't know if that's because existing meta

Paul Dawalibi:

verses have turned them down. And maybe Playboy's a little bit

Paul Dawalibi:

of a safer not so you know, hardcore brand, you know, adult

Paul Dawalibi:

brand. But I'm surprised that it's Playboy, sort of making the

Paul Dawalibi:

first move here.

Jeff Cohen:

It's a great point, I guess, to be fair, and maybe

Jeff Cohen:

as we're like, looking through this article, I wonder if this

Jeff Cohen:

is something Playboy actually announced, or if it's this, just

Jeff Cohen:

this investor saying, hey, they should do this. Because you

Jeff Cohen:

brought up a good point about content moderation, like I do

Jeff Cohen:

wonder, you know, this isn't going in Roblox I'm sure. I

Jeff Cohen:

highly doubt Roblox would would allow, you know, something like

Jeff Cohen:

this on their platform. So it's probably going to have to go

Jeff Cohen:

into one of maybe the more upstart, mega versus like, even

Jeff Cohen:

epic, you know, I don't know just, is fortnight gonna put

Jeff Cohen:

Playboy into into fortnight? Maybe, but probably, you know,

Jeff Cohen:

you're probably looking at one of these more. It's, it's a

Jeff Cohen:

great move for an up and coming Metaverse that we're always

Jeff Cohen:

talking about, hey, they don't have, they don't have people

Jeff Cohen:

there. There's no use case like something like the sandbox or

Jeff Cohen:

decentral. And maybe this becomes a little bit of their

Jeff Cohen:

way to get a little more publicity and kind of like,

Jeff Cohen:

bring in that 18 to 35 year old male, which, frankly, you know,

Jeff Cohen:

Sex sells. So

Paul Dawalibi:

I clicked through this article from last year from

Paul Dawalibi:

late last year. And it was, you know, my just quick read of this

Paul Dawalibi:

article is, it seems a lot of this is being driven by the new

Paul Dawalibi:

spec owners right of Playboy, because they use the spec to go

Paul Dawalibi:

public and they did a sale of NF TS called rabbit tars. And every

Paul Dawalibi:

owner of these NF T's can belong to the Playboy Club. So if

Paul Dawalibi:

you're watching again, these are some of the lefties. It looks

Jeff Cohen:

really just throwing everything at the wall, I guess.

Paul Dawalibi:

But, you know, again, I'm impressed that

Paul Dawalibi:

Playboy is sort of the first mover here that that they're

Paul Dawalibi:

thinking about this before other adult brands, which have

Paul Dawalibi:

definitely shown a more tech savvy or more tech innovation.

Paul Dawalibi:

So bid on Playboy, maybe this is their chance to reinvent

Paul Dawalibi:

themselves, right? In some ways. The move to web three in the

Paul Dawalibi:

metaverse is allowing older, slower brands that may have

Paul Dawalibi:

fallen behind the web to, to to catch up or to even take

Paul Dawalibi:

leadership roles or positions. Because it's a clean slate.

Jeff Cohen:

Yeah. And we've seen web three companies try to

Jeff Cohen:

resurrect even like decidedly dead break right blockbuster

Jeff Cohen:

Limewire like a couple of you know, maybe those are a little

Jeff Cohen:

bit more of like meme brands, but yeah, I think you can

Jeff Cohen:

reinvent yourself and web three, the new audience to some extent.

Paul Dawalibi:

Let's move on. Jeff, let's talk about Roblox.

Paul Dawalibi:

We're gonna talk about Roblox in unity, call it back to back

Paul Dawalibi:

here. Both had their earnings calls this like for this

Paul Dawalibi:

quarter? And some interesting takeaways here. I think there

Paul Dawalibi:

may be some interesting discussion to go through. Let's

Paul Dawalibi:

start with Roblox. And, you know, there was a whole

Paul Dawalibi:

shareholder letter which we don't know, the half hour

Paul Dawalibi:

podcast, so we don't have the time to get that deep into that

Paul Dawalibi:

shareholder letter. But this CNBC article has a bit of a

Paul Dawalibi:

summary. So the headline here robot, Roblox shares sync on

Paul Dawalibi:

disappointing revenue and wider than expected loss. ROBLOX

Paul Dawalibi:

reported fewer users in the quarter than Analysts had

Paul Dawalibi:

expected and bookings dropped from a year earlier. Company

Paul Dawalibi:

which generates revenue from purchases of its robux virtual

Paul Dawalibi:

currency has suffered along the rest of the tech industry. So

Paul Dawalibi:

just a bit of a read cap here, they had a loss of 27 cents a

Paul Dawalibi:

share versus 21 cents, which is expected by the analysts revenue

Paul Dawalibi:

631 point 2 million versus 645 million. It's a little bit of a

Paul Dawalibi:

mess, their bookings declined by 3% in the quarter. So a little

Paul Dawalibi:

bit of a cooling from the pandemic. That is what the CNBC

Paul Dawalibi:

article is saying here. And the daily active users, though, are

Paul Dawalibi:

up, and they're up 28% From a year earlier. The only problem

Paul Dawalibi:

was the street was expecting 55 million da use, and Roblox

Paul Dawalibi:

reported 54 point 1 million users spent 11 point 8 billion

Paul Dawalibi:

hours engaged in Roblox and the average booking per daily active

Paul Dawalibi:

user slid 25% to $11.67. So more users not as many as expected,

Paul Dawalibi:

but they're spending a little bit less than they used to. And

Paul Dawalibi:

so revenue missed a little bit and earnings missed a little

Paul Dawalibi:

bit. What do you make of the overall Roblox picture here,

Paul Dawalibi:

Jeff? And do you think there's a bit of an overreaction just or

Paul Dawalibi:

general market sentiments bad? So Roblox is a victim? Or do you

Paul Dawalibi:

think there's anything in these numbers scare you?

Jeff Cohen:

I mean, number one, definitely there is a bit of a,

Jeff Cohen:

you know, the market sentiment has completely shifted. And

Jeff Cohen:

obviously, this is a business podcast, but we're not, you

Jeff Cohen:

know, going too deep into stock analysis. But the macro picture

Jeff Cohen:

right now is is pretty bleak. And the whole market is, is kind

Jeff Cohen:

of selling off particularly these these large cap like

Jeff Cohen:

growth tech stocks, so it makes sense that any hiccup you're

Jeff Cohen:

gonna get, you're gonna get punished. I do think the

Jeff Cohen:

interesting piece here is around the a the bookings declining,

Jeff Cohen:

year over year is not great. Like because even if, if growth

Jeff Cohen:

is slowing, like, it's pretty bad. And I understand it's Tough

Jeff Cohen:

comps, and you had COVID Last year, but shrinking like as a

Jeff Cohen:

business is not great when you're trading as a premium

Jeff Cohen:

brand and a premium multiple. So that's a little surprising. And

Jeff Cohen:

then this stat around like the time spent per user shrinking is

Jeff Cohen:

actually probably the most the dollar alarm. But I think there

Jeff Cohen:

was also it might not have said it in this, the the the actual

Jeff Cohen:

time spent per daily active user was down on average. So that's

Jeff Cohen:

probably the most alarming piece. And, you know, they did

Jeff Cohen:

say, hey, it was slowed down because, you know, probably was

Jeff Cohen:

because last year was a little bit more code, you know, COVID

Jeff Cohen:

locked down versus this, this kind of spring. I don't know Do

Jeff Cohen:

you buy Do you buy that like that, to me is a little bit of

Jeff Cohen:

alarming, alarming picture. Because, you know, you could

Jeff Cohen:

blame COVID. But you could also say, hey, people are moving on

Jeff Cohen:

to other metal versus people are moving on, you know, aging up

Jeff Cohen:

out of the platform. Like that's an alarming stat, that usage per

Jeff Cohen:

per person is dropping. I mean,

Paul Dawalibi:

but but the daily active users are growing now.

Paul Dawalibi:

They missed analysts expectations, but there was

Paul Dawalibi:

still growth and 28% year over year is not like anything to

Paul Dawalibi:

sneeze at that grew an average of 46% annually. Now, is growth

Paul Dawalibi:

potentially slowing? Yes. But you're also now have a user base

Paul Dawalibi:

that is, is pretty large. I mean, the simplest question I

Paul Dawalibi:

have to come back to your question, Jeff, I'll answer your

Paul Dawalibi:

question. But the question is, you know, market cap of Roblox

Paul Dawalibi:

today is 14 billion and just looked it up. Right. We know

Paul Dawalibi:

epic, just raised around at 30 plus billion, right? 31 and a

Paul Dawalibi:

half billion I think was the $2 billion dollar round they just

Paul Dawalibi:

did. Is epic worth to Roblox says,

Jeff Cohen:

Well, it's funny that you're posing it that way.

Jeff Cohen:

Because actually, like a month or two ago, we were having the

Jeff Cohen:

exact same conversation but the opposite. Where it was like,

Jeff Cohen:

well, Roblox is worth 58 billion, and like epic is worth

Jeff Cohen:

20. Like, does that make sense? And the answers, they're

Jeff Cohen:

probably pretty similar. You know, that's the benefit and the

Jeff Cohen:

negative of being on the public market where every day your your

Jeff Cohen:

sort of valuation fluctuates. Good on Epic to have closed

Jeff Cohen:

that, you know, $2 billion round, like a month ago, which

Jeff Cohen:

doesn't seem like a lot of time, but the markets have really

Jeff Cohen:

shifted so good on them to get that money. Yeah, they probably

Jeff Cohen:

should be about the same, the same valuation. It's probably

Jeff Cohen:

overshot on the downside at this point. But I think investors are

Jeff Cohen:

going to want to see those metrics kind of reach

Jeff Cohen:

accelerate, where if bookings are declining, and time spent on

Jeff Cohen:

the platform is declining, even though, you know, users are

Jeff Cohen:

still growing? Like, that's not great. And I think I saw

Jeff Cohen:

somewhere in here that like users in particularly in North

Jeff Cohen:

America, like I think daily active users may have even been

Jeff Cohen:

like flat to down. So they're growing in other regions, which

Jeff Cohen:

is great. That's a big initiative for them to grow

Jeff Cohen:

internationally. But those people are obviously not

Jeff Cohen:

monetizing, as much. So, you know, investors will look for

Jeff Cohen:

signs that they and monetize those international users. If

Jeff Cohen:

they start doing that you'll see this doc, I'm sure you start to

Jeff Cohen:

start to go higher.

Paul Dawalibi:

Yeah, I think the one thing that I find

Paul Dawalibi:

encouraging from the whole Roblox story is their story

Paul Dawalibi:

hasn't really changed. Right? Like they've they've, they've

Paul Dawalibi:

not said one thing, and then six months later said another thing,

Paul Dawalibi:

right? They seem pretty focused on what they want to achieve. I

Paul Dawalibi:

just did a quick search through their shareholder letter, right?

Paul Dawalibi:

There's five mentions of the word Metaverse in a 12 page

Paul Dawalibi:

letter. Right. And where they mentioned it, I think makes

Paul Dawalibi:

sense, right. But they talk about and I think maybe the most

Paul Dawalibi:

exciting place I'll just read the sentence. And this is where

Paul Dawalibi:

I sort of get excited for the long term opportunity for

Paul Dawalibi:

Roblox. They're they're not just thinking about user growth.

Paul Dawalibi:

They're thinking about monetization. They're thinking

Paul Dawalibi:

about, you know, every angle of building out these this

Paul Dawalibi:

metaverse. They said beyond sponsored ads were at the

Paul Dawalibi:

beginning stages of developing native and immersive advertising

Paul Dawalibi:

in the Roblox metaverse. We envisioned several new

Paul Dawalibi:

advertising units that we imagined as being complementary

Paul Dawalibi:

to our user experience that I think is, in and of itself is

Paul Dawalibi:

maybe one of the most interesting things from this

Paul Dawalibi:

whole story. Because so far, all of the advertising we've seen in

Paul Dawalibi:

any Metaverse is like, slap a logo or like a banner,

Paul Dawalibi:

essentially, in the virtual world. In the same way, you may

Paul Dawalibi:

have a, you know, a digital sign on the highway in the real

Paul Dawalibi:

world, right. Like there's, there's not much innovation that

Paul Dawalibi:

has happened there. And if Roblox sort of figures that out

Paul Dawalibi:

unlocks that, that could be really massive, right? Like that

Paul Dawalibi:

could be pretty consequential for the entire Metaverse story

Jeff Cohen:

100% agree. And it's not really something that I

Jeff Cohen:

think investors had really baked a ton into in their projections,

Jeff Cohen:

like, they were probably more thinking in terms of user

Jeff Cohen:

monetization, like in app purchasing avatars, purchasing

Jeff Cohen:

skins, if they can really unlock like an advertising side of the

Jeff Cohen:

business and make that you know, 20 or 30% of revenue. That that

Jeff Cohen:

is, that would be kind of game changing. Funnily enough, my one

Jeff Cohen:

of my impressions for whatever reason, maybe it's just having

Jeff Cohen:

heard Roblox talk a lot and listened to their investor days

Jeff Cohen:

and stuff in the past, I almost was alarmed by the focus on

Jeff Cohen:

monetization a little bit. And I'm putting my tinfoil hat on.

Jeff Cohen:

Like, it almost felt to me like what's like the Shakespeare

Jeff Cohen:

thing, like the lady doth protest too much, like, because

Jeff Cohen:

it was sterically, their line has always been like, look,

Jeff Cohen:

we're about user growth, we're about to experience the

Jeff Cohen:

platform, like, we don't care about money, you know, like,

Jeff Cohen:

people will monetize. But like, we're not trying to like, shake,

Jeff Cohen:

turn them over and shake the coins out of their pockets. And

Jeff Cohen:

the fact that they made like half the shareholder letter

Jeff Cohen:

about like, look at all these ways we can, like don't worry,

Jeff Cohen:

Wall Street, like we're gonna monetize, almost made me like

Jeff Cohen:

feel like that, like, worse about it as an investor.

Paul Dawalibi:

Interesting, that is kind of like that. tinfoil

Paul Dawalibi:

hat theory weapon. It makes sense, right? It could be the

Paul Dawalibi:

distraction like, I don't worry like that it's slowing here

Paul Dawalibi:

because we're gonna figure out how to squeeze more out of what

Paul Dawalibi:

we've got.

Jeff Cohen:

Right? Like an ending to or like any one of

Jeff Cohen:

what we think is like this, you know, you're on record saying

Jeff Cohen:

they're gonna have more users than Twitter in however many

Jeff Cohen:

years our bet is, like, you know, we're expecting them to

Jeff Cohen:

get to two 300 million, you know, daily monthly sort of

Jeff Cohen:

monthly active players I think there are 50 so if they're

Jeff Cohen:

starting to say hey, like monitor, it's all about

Jeff Cohen:

monetization now like that, as a long term investor would

Jeff Cohen:

probably worry me just maybe reading between the lines a

Jeff Cohen:

little bit and and maybe they're just putting some of this stuff

Jeff Cohen:

in there because they see the market and every stock is

Jeff Cohen:

getting killed, you know, right now and growth plans so maybe

Jeff Cohen:

they they're, they want to play up the monetization side but a

Jeff Cohen:

little something in my head kind of just like made my alarm bells

Jeff Cohen:

go off a little bit.

Paul Dawalibi:

i I wonder what is hampering the user growth at

Paul Dawalibi:

Roblox? Like why is it why is it not growing? You know, 50% a

Paul Dawalibi:

quarter and I'm exaggerating but like, what what is stopping the

Paul Dawalibi:

growth at Roblox or what is slowing the growth at Roblox? Is

Paul Dawalibi:

it an inability to break out of their age range? Is it not

Paul Dawalibi:

enough novel experiences built by developers? Is it not enough

Paul Dawalibi:

awareness because Roblox truly is not doesn't have the same

Paul Dawalibi:

presence of of mind or mind sharing that in the mainstream

Paul Dawalibi:

community as like a Minecraft or fortnight?

Jeff Cohen:

I think it is that a lot. I'd be curious to know how

Jeff Cohen:

their, their their advertising, like where, you know, clearly

Jeff Cohen:

kids are finding this. Like I'm always whenever I'm with my

Jeff Cohen:

cousins and stuff. They're always talking like I'm always

Jeff Cohen:

surprised that they are playing and talking about robots, but

Jeff Cohen:

it's not like you see ads on TV or like You know, if you watch

Jeff Cohen:

cartoons with your kid on the week, it's not like you see a

Jeff Cohen:

Roblox ad. So I'm not sure what how they're actually targeting

Jeff Cohen:

these kids. Which thing to say targeting these kids, but I'm

Jeff Cohen:

not sure how they're getting their name out there.

Paul Dawalibi:

Yeah, that may be the issue. Let's let's switch

Paul Dawalibi:

over here to unity because unity also had a bit of a problematic

Paul Dawalibi:

quarter. And the headline here, so this is from MarketWatch. The

Paul Dawalibi:

headline here says unity software stock plunges nearly

Paul Dawalibi:

30% On week revenue guidance. So this is on Tuesday of last, like

Paul Dawalibi:

if you're listening to this well, on Monday, when this comes

Paul Dawalibi:

out, this would have been Tuesday of last week. And so

Paul Dawalibi:

they reported first quarter results, largely in line with

Paul Dawalibi:

Wall Street forecasts, they reported a net loss of 177

Paul Dawalibi:

million, compared with 107 point 5 million in the year ago

Paul Dawalibi:

quarter. So they're losing more money than they did a year ago

Paul Dawalibi:

in the same quarter. But revenue increased 36%, which is not

Paul Dawalibi:

insignificant. And unity said that q2 revenue should be

Paul Dawalibi:

between 290 and 295 million, while analysts anticipated 360

Paul Dawalibi:

million. So it seems like the analysts are expecting faster

Paul Dawalibi:

growth than the company believes they can achieve. And again, are

Paul Dawalibi:

there any alarm bells for you here? Or is it just market

Paul Dawalibi:

softness,

Jeff Cohen:

I think it's a bit of a bit of market softness.

Jeff Cohen:

Again, you know, this story, I'm a little less in tune with than

Jeff Cohen:

the Roblox store, because unity is more of a software to b2b

Jeff Cohen:

software company. So it's, even though it is a gaming company,

Jeff Cohen:

it really trades like a, like a SaaS company. So as I understand

Jeff Cohen:

that, the quick, I guess, the quick take is that unity has

Jeff Cohen:

sort of two sides of the business. One side is the SAS

Jeff Cohen:

business where, you know, if you're a developer on unity, you

Jeff Cohen:

pay them, you know, on a per seat basis for a subscription.

Jeff Cohen:

And then the other side is really almost like an ad

Jeff Cohen:

network, and they have a bunch of stuff that helps monitor

Jeff Cohen:

these developers then monetize their game. And that's paid for

Jeff Cohen:

on like a per usage basis. So I think there was an issue on that

Jeff Cohen:

side of the business, like the ad piece, and it had some, you

Jeff Cohen:

know, something to do with the Apple changes that have gone

Jeff Cohen:

into effect in the last year. Basically, there was some, some

Jeff Cohen:

change that caused them to have their growth be slower. And so I

Jeff Cohen:

think that was a big piece. And then they talked a lot about in

Jeff Cohen:

the call how it's going to take them a few quarters to like ramp

Jeff Cohen:

back up to the same growth on that side of the business. So

Jeff Cohen:

yeah, I mean, it's interesting. I will just go you know, full

Jeff Cohen:

disclosure, I bought some of the some stock today in Unity. For

Jeff Cohen:

my my PA, it just seemed like the stock is at such a fall from

Jeff Cohen:

where I think it was over $200, like, a few months ago. And I

Jeff Cohen:

just see how 85% In the last six months. So I just see how

Jeff Cohen:

valuable unity is in terms of an engine. Like I know, you spoke

Jeff Cohen:

at the top about Unreal Engine, and we were talking about

Jeff Cohen:

immersive worlds and stuff like that. Unreal is the number one

Jeff Cohen:

engine the one to go with. But when you're talking about mobile

Jeff Cohen:

gaming, I mean unities market share is passing. Well, well

Jeff Cohen:

over 50%. And they're doing a lot in terms of Metaverse, web

Jeff Cohen:

three, like a lot of the gaming companies that are building web

Jeff Cohen:

three games are building them on unity. So I think it's a pretty

Jeff Cohen:

strategic asset. And, you know, at the I think it's like a $9

Jeff Cohen:

billion company now, the growth of gaming and just still the

Jeff Cohen:

popularity of mobile gaming. Throwing web three. I think it's

Jeff Cohen:

too cheap.

Paul Dawalibi:

I want to keen on something you said you're

Paul Dawalibi:

because Unity has market share very similar to Unreal, right.

Paul Dawalibi:

And in some ways on mobile, they're stronger, but very

Paul Dawalibi:

similar, like pretty apples to apples comparison between Unity

Paul Dawalibi:

and Unreal Engine when it comes to sort of market share size,

Paul Dawalibi:

scope, you know who it reaches, etc. And you're right. A lot of

Paul Dawalibi:

web three developers are building on unity. What I find

Paul Dawalibi:

interesting, and this is totally anecdotal. I rarely see any

Paul Dawalibi:

articles or any kind of press or any kind of communication from

Paul Dawalibi:

Unity, talking about Metaverse, web three, like almost nothing,

Paul Dawalibi:

but they have not tied themselves to that horse at all.

Paul Dawalibi:

Whereas epic very much has right epic talks about it quite

Paul Dawalibi:

frequently, and Unreal Engine in that context. And I wonder if

Paul Dawalibi:

part of it is just they haven't done a good job of communicating

Paul Dawalibi:

sort of what they are doing in that space in this space.

Jeff Cohen:

I think that's a fair point. It's funny you say

Jeff Cohen:

that because right before before taping, I had Mad Money. This

Jeff Cohen:

has become like the final episode, which is funny, but I

Jeff Cohen:

was watching Jim Cramer like mad money on CNBC and John reputa.

Jeff Cohen:

Oh with on being interviewed. And he actually said something

Jeff Cohen:

around Metaverse like basically like, that's become a buzzword

Jeff Cohen:

like we don't even think about Like we don't talk about that,

Jeff Cohen:

like we're, you know, we're were like building he kind of like

Jeff Cohen:

said we're doing all these things but was like the

Jeff Cohen:

metaverse has become a buzzword like here's what we're, you

Jeff Cohen:

know, we have 70% market share on mobile. He kind of like was

Jeff Cohen:

like, this is the tangible stuff we're doing, like all this

Jeff Cohen:

Metaverse stuff is just a distraction. So it's funny that

Jeff Cohen:

you said that it seemed like almost it's like, part of like a

Jeff Cohen:

conscious decision, not the hype up Metaverse speech, which if we

Jeff Cohen:

were talking three months ago would have been negative but now

Jeff Cohen:

it seems like maybe that's a positive a good strategy. Yeah,

Jeff Cohen:

it

Paul Dawalibi:

feels like a bit of a miss. Right. And when your

Paul Dawalibi:

stocks down at 5% in the last six months, maybe that's not the

Paul Dawalibi:

hill to die on. Right, like seeing worse hills to die on,

Paul Dawalibi:

but that one's not a good one. All right, let's get to our last

Paul Dawalibi:

story. Here. We have a an interesting one here. This is

Paul Dawalibi:

news from VentureBeat. The headline here is irreverent or

Paul Dawalibi:

GamesBeat irreverent labs confirms $40 million round

Paul Dawalibi:

funded by Andreessen Horowitz and others. So this is talking

Paul Dawalibi:

about a reverent labs, their web three game developer, they've

Paul Dawalibi:

confirmed that they've raised 40 million to create Mecca

Paul Dawalibi:

fightclub, a robot cockfighting game that uses NF T's This is

Paul Dawalibi:

the founder here is the was the founder of voodoo PC who I think

Paul Dawalibi:

they sold to, I want to say HP I think or Dell, Dell or HP bought

Paul Dawalibi:

and

Jeff Cohen:

then bought or all said it was also the founder of

Jeff Cohen:

unicorn which is that they didn't let's that is they just

Jeff Cohen:

sold they were the sports betting company that you know

Jeff Cohen:

was backed by Mark Cuban and had a had a lot of success and then

Jeff Cohen:

about failure but then was recently sold to obtain a

Jeff Cohen:

massive gambling company so

Paul Dawalibi:

so it's a play to earn game. You you the Mecca

Paul Dawalibi:

fight clubs. I'll read this from the article. fight clubs

Paul Dawalibi:

chickens are mega bots with NF T's which use the blockchain to

Paul Dawalibi:

verify the uniqueness of each chicken played to earn. Players

Paul Dawalibi:

can own the characters that they buy and profit from if they can

Paul Dawalibi:

resell them to someone else once they're leveled up. While

Paul Dawalibi:

cockfighting is controversial, it's popular in Asia, and the

Paul Dawalibi:

creators are aware that the people are concerned about the

Paul Dawalibi:

cruelty of the real world sport. And so the developers are

Paul Dawalibi:

emphasizing humorous combat, not gory realism. So you'll collect

Paul Dawalibi:

train and battle combat robots. Sounds a little bit like Pokemon

Paul Dawalibi:

to be honest. And each mech robot has unique styles,

Paul Dawalibi:

abilities, preferences, etc. So big round $40 million for

Paul Dawalibi:

cockfighting.

Jeff Cohen:

I mean, if you had read that story to me, a year

Jeff Cohen:

and a half ago with nothing like I wouldn't believe the single

Jeff Cohen:

you've said this before. Later earn like a virtual digital

Jeff Cohen:

cockfight where you earn money, like fighting your Cox, like

Jeff Cohen:

it's crazy. But the craziest part actually, of all, this is

Jeff Cohen:

like we really crossed the Rubicon in terms of Andreessen

Jeff Cohen:

Horowitz backing something like a content play like this, like,

Jeff Cohen:

for the longest time, I mean, gaming was really shone that

Jeff Cohen:

large VCs because it was, hey, it's too hit driven. It's, you

Jeff Cohen:

know, it's cyclical, blah, blah, blah, there's too much risk in

Jeff Cohen:

the content cycles. And if they were even going to look at or

Jeff Cohen:

touch gaming, it was, hey, we're interested in platforms, we're

Jeff Cohen:

interested in tools and technology, and a picks and

Jeff Cohen:

shovels plays, the fact that we're now seeing, you know, a

Jeff Cohen:

venerable VC firm, like Andreessen Horowitz investing in

Jeff Cohen:

this, which, I mean, good for them, I wish them a lot of

Jeff Cohen:

success. They clearly founders have a track record of exits. So

Jeff Cohen:

that's probably what, what Andreessen is betting on, but

Jeff Cohen:

this is a pure content play. If the game doesn't work, the

Jeff Cohen:

money's gone. Like there is no backup plan. So yeah, I mean,

Jeff Cohen:

this It's surprising. I don't know if you as a VC, if you have

Jeff Cohen:

any thoughts on that.

Paul Dawalibi:

I mean, this has to be all about the founder.

Paul Dawalibi:

Right? Like, I have to believe that this is essentially almost

Paul Dawalibi:

like a favor because I just feel like there's a lot of risk here.

Paul Dawalibi:

First of all, just in like, the the nature of the content,

Paul Dawalibi:

right? And I get maybe it's an Asia play, which where I firmly

Paul Dawalibi:

believe that played earn is probably only going to survive

Paul Dawalibi:

in developing countries, not in North America. So maybe the

Paul Dawalibi:

whole cockfighting like, subject matter is fine then, but I can

Paul Dawalibi:

see how this gets backlash in a place like the US where people

Paul Dawalibi:

are a lot more sensitive to these things, and are much more

Paul Dawalibi:

vocal about these things. So I'm not I'm not 100% Sure, where the

Paul Dawalibi:

innovation is coming from, like, what justifies a $40 million

Paul Dawalibi:

investment in something that is no different than just about any

Paul Dawalibi:

other fighting game. Other than the fact that it's an NFT,

Paul Dawalibi:

right? Like you've integrated NF T's. And I think that's where

Paul Dawalibi:

the blockage for me is, it's, you know, where where is the

Paul Dawalibi:

10x 100x kind of return? If we believe that if like, unless you

Paul Dawalibi:

believe the economics of adding in the NF TS changes the game so

Paul Dawalibi:

drastically. This is a hard one to get my head around. And I'm,

Paul Dawalibi:

I'm, I'm just skeptical that anyone will care to play this

Paul Dawalibi:

beyond like, a bit of a meme thing that some streamer will do

Paul Dawalibi:

for like, an hour. And then there's not much to it right?

Paul Dawalibi:

Like, you, this really has to be the next Pokemon to justify a

Paul Dawalibi:

$40 million investment. That's the way I think about it. Right?

Paul Dawalibi:

It has to be the next Pokemon. And I don't know if you know,

Paul Dawalibi:

the same way I buy Pokemon cards for my five year old nephew,

Paul Dawalibi:

will I go buy him? You know, Mecha COC whatever? Like? I

Paul Dawalibi:

don't know, I don't think so. And so, it seems disconnected

Paul Dawalibi:

from the size of the investment. If this was like 4 million, and

Paul Dawalibi:

it's a flyer, and, you know, you want to test out something fun,

Paul Dawalibi:

and you're investing in 50 of these, I guess with Andreessen,

Paul Dawalibi:

they can invest in 50 of these and they can still put this

Paul Dawalibi:

amount of money. And so the economics may be different, but

Paul Dawalibi:

I just, I just don't see it. I mean, they say the discord

Paul Dawalibi:

community has 25,000 fans. I mean, hey, our sister pie are

Paul Dawalibi:

like meta TV, our parent, that's discord community of the same

Paul Dawalibi:

size, right? Like, this is not Yeah, this is not, you know,

Paul Dawalibi:

World of Warcraft, Counter Strike level of interest,

Jeff Cohen:

right? And assume that even even, you know, I

Jeff Cohen:

think 10% of those people getting 10% of those people to

Jeff Cohen:

actually download and play the game would be probably a massive

Jeff Cohen:

success. Think about how much money they'd have to spend to

Jeff Cohen:

even come close to justifying anything near this $40 million

Jeff Cohen:

raise. That'll be in the fall.

Paul Dawalibi:

It'll be interesting to follow. And, you

Paul Dawalibi:

know, I would be curious to see long term, how many of these

Paul Dawalibi:

plays and recent puts in their fund for example, right? Is it

Paul Dawalibi:

five? Is it 10? Is it 25 bets? Like I can't wait to see sort of

Paul Dawalibi:

the overall picture come become clear in terms of their thesis.

Paul Dawalibi:

Jeff, that wraps up this week's podcast flew by. As always guys,

Paul Dawalibi:

make sure to subscribe, leave a review, go follow the juice on

Paul Dawalibi:

Twitter at Jeff Cohen 23. Instead of following Mecca,

Paul Dawalibi:

Fight Club, whatever, go follow Jeff Cohen 23 on Twitter. Also

Paul Dawalibi:

make sure to share the podcast with your friends with your

Paul Dawalibi:

colleagues, anyone you know operating in this industry, put

Paul Dawalibi:

it on your LinkedIn. Get people talking about it. We really

Paul Dawalibi:

appreciate it. Don't forget the future is fun, guys. We'll see

Paul Dawalibi:

you next week.

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