Kanzhun - Q3 2023
November 14, 2023
Transcript
Operator (participant)
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to the Kanzhun Limited Third Quarter 2023 Financial Results Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Ms. Wenbei Wang, Head of Investor Relations. Please go ahead, ma'am.
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Thank you, operator. Good evening, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to our third quarter 2023 earnings conference call. Joining me today are our Founder, Chairman and CEO, Mr. Jonathan Peng Zhao, and our Director and CFO, Mr. Phil Yu Zhang. Before we start, we would like to remind you that today's discussion may contain forward-looking statements, which are based on management's current expectations and observations that involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors not under the company's control, which may cause actual results, performance or achievements of the company to be materially different. The company cautions you not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements and does not undertake any obligation to update this forward-looking information, except as required by law. During today's call, management will also discuss certain non-GAAP financial measures for comparison purposes only.
For a definition of non-GAAP financial measures and the reconciliation of GAAP to non-GAAP financial results, please see the earnings release issued earlier today. In addition, a webcast replay of this conference call will be available on our website at ir.zhipin.com. With that, I will now turn the call to Jonathan, our Founder, Chairman, and CEO.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
大家好，欢迎参加我们公司2023年第三季度业绩发布会。我谨代表公司全体员工、管理层和董事会，感谢一直相信我们，支持我们的用户和投资者。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Hello, everyone. Welcome to our third quarter 2023 earnings conference call. On behalf of the company and our employees, management team and board of directors, I would like to express our sincere gratitude to our users and investors who trust and support us.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
首先介绍一下第三季度的业绩情况。三季度公司GAAP收入16.1亿元，同比增加36.3%，经计算现金收款16.4亿元，同比上涨32.1%。经调整后的净利润，即扣除股权激励费用后的净利润，进一步提升至7.1亿元，同比增长89.6%。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
First, I would like to share with you our performance for the third quarter of 2023. We recorded GAAP revenue of CNY 1.61 billion for this quarter, up 36.3% year-on-year. We booked CNY 1.64 billion in calculated cash billings, up 32.1% year-on-year. Our adjusted net income, which excluded share-based compensation expenses, increased by 89.6% year-on-year to CNY 710 million.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
不考虑理财等其他收益的话，公司的经调整后的营业利润为CNY 550 million，创了公司成立以来单季度最高的利润额和利润率水平。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Our adjusted operating income, which excludes other income such as financing returns, was CNY 550 million, hitting a quarterly record high in terms of both absolute amount and margin.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
截至今年第三季度末，在过去12个月内，在平台上付过费的企业端客户数为490万，同比增长32.4%，环比增长8.4%。付费用户的数和活跃用户付费率水平都达到历史的新高。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Our total paid enterprise customers in the twelve months ending this quarter reached 4.9 million, up 32.4% year-on-year and 8.4% quarter-on-quarter. Both the total paid enterprise customer number and active user paying ratio continued to improve.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
过去的 一个季度，公司 在APP端 平均完善的MAU达到4,460万人，同比 增长了37.7%。新增的 完善用户接近1,200万。今年 前三个季度，累计 新增的 完善用户数已经 超过4,000万。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
In the past quarter, the average number of monthly verified active users on the BOSS Zhipin app reached 44.6 million, up by 37.7% year-on-year, with approximately 12 million newly added verified users. Our total accumulated newly verified users for the past three quarters of this year exceeded 40 million.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
在年底，去年十一月底，三季度的汇报会上，我们预测在未来三年之内，公司会增长1亿新的完整用户。...目前看来，这个预测是可期待的。同时，一如既往的用户活跃度，从平均的DAU占比来看，继续维持在较高的水平。三季度平台上平均每个月有收获的人次是1.35亿人次。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
During our third quarter 2022 earnings call in late November last year, we forecasted that the company will add 100 million newly verified users in the next three years, which seems to be expected at this moment. At the same time, our user activeness, which is the average DAU as percentage of average MAU, remains stable at a relatively high level. In the third quarter, there are more than 135 million monthly average number of mutual achievements on the platform.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
第三季度是一个传统的招聘旺季，我们看到招聘需求在第三季度保持增长。在求职者的月活规模保持稳定的同时，平均月活的招聘者数量和月活的企业数量环比都有明显的提升，环比的增长都超过5%，并且都达到了历史新高。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Third quarter is a traditional peak season for job seeking and recruitment, we witnessed a continuous increase in recruitment demand. While the number of average monthly active job seekers remains stable, the average number of monthly active enterprise users and monthly active enterprise increased significantly by more than 5% sequentially, both reaching record highs.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
分行业来看，蓝领行业仍然是最为亮眼，尤其是蓝领服务业，是单季度职位数和收入增长贡献最大的行业。日均在线的职位已经超过100万。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
In terms of industry breakdown, the blue collar industry delivered the most outstanding performance, especially the blue collar urban service sector, which was the largest segment contributor in the increments of both number of job postings and revenue for this quarter. The average daily active job posting for urban service sector exceeded 1 million.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
看一下另外两个年轻人就业比较多的蓝领行业。供应链物流行业中的交通运输和仓储，以及生产制造业中的普工、技工等职位，他们的环比增幅都靠前。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Let's take a look at other blue collar sectors, which involves more young job seekers. The supply chain, logistics and manufacturing industries, especially sub-job categories such as transportation, warehousing, and workers, also boosted overall increase.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
整体看，蓝领的收入占比进一步提升至接近35%。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
These drivers raised the blue collar industry revenue contribution to nearly 35%.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
那么，消费品、汽车的后市场、新能源、互联网生活服务与机械制造相关的原材料等行业环比增幅都比较明显。互联网行业整体也保持了一个环比增长的态势。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Other industries, such as consumer goods, automobile aftermarket, new energy, Internet lifestyle service, and raw materials related to machinery manufacturing fields, also grew, very good on a quarter-on-quarter basis, while the overall Internet industry maintained growth momentum, on a quarterly basis.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
与上半年有所不同的一个数据。三季度按照新增的和在线的职位数来看，规模越大的企业，它的的需求恢复相对会更为明显。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
In contrast to the first half of the year, the recovery of demand from larger enterprises increased relatively more quickly in this quarter in terms of the number of newly added and active job positions.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
其中的话，10,000人以上的企业，它的环比增速最快。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Enterprises is more than 2,000 employees grew the fastest.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
从城市的分级来看，二线和二线以下的城市依然表现良好，无论是在职位数还是在收入的比例都有进一步的提高。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
From the city-level perspective, second-tier and lower-tier cities continue to outperform, with increase in both the number of job positions and income.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
在企业的承担社会责任方面，本季度我们重点关注了一种有困难的人群，具体讲就是残疾人就业。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
In terms of corporate social responsibilities, this quarter we focused on and dedicated in helping the employment of difficult group of people, which is disabled workers.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
BOSS直聘一共举办了33场公益招聘活动，有近5000家企业为残疾人求职者提供了1.1万个职位，那么参与的残疾人达到42.2万人次。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
BOSS Zhipin provide live broadcasting for 33 public recruitment activities. Nearly 5,000 enterprises providing more than 11,000 positions for disabled job seekers and covered more than 423,000 participants.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
还有一件事，经过董事会的批准，公司将首次派发特殊现金股息，这是在公司的盈利水平稳定并且不断提高的情况下，对于一直坚定支持我们的股东的应有的回报。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
One more thing to add, with the company's board approval, we declared a special cash dividend for the first time. This is a return to our shareholders and friends for their firm support as our profitability continues to be stable and improve.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
本次派息的金额为每个普通股$0.09，也就是每个ADS $0.18，合起来大概在$80 million，预计于今年12月中下旬派发。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
The dividend amount is $0.09 per ordinary shares, which is $0.18 per ADS, for an aggregated dividend amount of approximately $80 million. This is expected to be distributed in the mid-to-late December this year.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
我的部分就介绍到这里，接下来由我们的CFO Phil为大家介绍我们的财务情况，谢谢。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
That's all for my part of the call. I will now turn it over to our CFO, Phil, for the review of our financials. Thank you.
Phil Yu Zhang (Director and CFO)
Thanks, Jonathan. Hello, everyone. Now let me walk you through the details of our financial results of the third quarter 2023. We achieved a solid financial performance in the past quarter, with all key figures beating our expectations. Our revenues exceeded the high end of our guidance to CNY 1.61 billion in this quarter, representing a solid 36% year-on-year growth and a 8% quarter-on-quarter. Our calculated cash billings reached CNY 1.64 billion, up 32% year-on-year and 1% quarter-on-quarter. The good results were mainly due to strong user growth, plus healthy user engagement, as well as recovery on recruitment demand in the quarter. The number of paid enterprise customers for the twelve months ended September 30, reached another new high to 4.9 million, indicating an improved paying ratio level among active enterprise users.
Despite the slight declining of overall ARPPU, ARPPU stands for Average Revenue Per Paying User, which was mainly dragged down by the increased revenue contribution from small sized accounts. We are happy to see that the ARPPU of key accounts showed sequential growth trend, a sign that recruitment demand is improving among large enterprises. Moving to the cost side, total operating costs and expenses for this quarter were CNY 1.36 billion, up 30% year-over-year. Excluding share-based compensation, our adjusted operating costs and expenses were CNY 1.07 billion, relatively stable with the last quarter and up 22% year-over-year. The quarterly adjusted operating margin reached a record high, improved from 25.7% in the same period last year to 34.2% this quarter, up by 8.5 percentage points year-over-year.
This strong profitability once again proved our efficiency, our effective monetization model and the powerful operating leverage. Our cost of revenues increased by 33% year-on-year to CNY 268 million this quarter, representing a gross margin of 83.3%, up by 1.5 percentage points quarter-on-quarter. Our gross margin bottomed out from the first quarter this year and achieved a sequential improvement in the past two quarters, mainly due to the recovery of revenue growth momentum on top of an effective cost control. Our sales and marketing expenses were CNY 457 million, up 15% year-on-year. Adjusted sales and marketing expenses was CNY 389 million, up 10% year-on-year, and this increase was primarily due to increased sales, employee related expenses, and enhanced advertising activity.
Notably, ratio of selling and marketing expenses continued to decline while our trailing twelve months paid enterprise customers and MAU continued to grow. Once again, showcased our enhanced marketing efficiency and our superior economy of scale. Our R&D expenses in this quarter increased by 43% year-on-year to CNY 414 million, and our adjusted R&D expenses was CNY 306 million, up 39% year-on-year. Primarily due to our further investment in talent and technology development, especially in areas related to AI technology. Our G&A expenses increased by 41% year-on-year to CNY 219 million in this quarter, and adjusted G&A expenses remained relatively stable with the same period last year.
Our net income was CNY 426 million this quarter, more than doubled that in the same quarter last year, and our adjusted net income set a new record and reached CNY 714 million, translating to an adjusted net margin of 44%, up 12 percentage points year-on-year. Net cash provided by operating activities grew by 122% year-on-year, to CNY 813 million for this quarter, mainly contributed by increased cash collection from operations. As of September 30, 2023, our cash, cash equivalents, time deposits and short-term investments were CNY 12.8 billion, and the long-term investments in wealth management products were CNY 2.3 billion, which totaled as CNY 15.1 billion.
Supported by our ample cash reserve and outstanding cash generation capability, we will try our best to deliver sustainable returns to our shareholders. Now for our business outlook. For the fourth quarter of 2023, we expect our total revenues to be between CNY 1.51 billion and CNY 1.55 billion, a year-on-year increase of 40%-43%. Based on our current progress, we expect the cash billings in Q4 to continue to grow sequentially, mainly due to key accounts contributions. With that, that concludes our prepared remarks. Now we would like to answer questions. Operator, please go ahead.
Operator (participant)
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star, then one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star, then two. If you are on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Your first question will come from Eddy Wang of Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Eddy Wang (Executive Director, Equity Research)
Hey, 赵总，Phil，文蓓，晚上好！非常感谢接受我提问，首先也非常恭喜这个非常强劲的第三季度的业绩。然后我这边有两个问题请教一下，第一个就是说，赵总之前也提到第三季度的这个就业市场啊，其实还是不错的。还想追问一下，就是说如果看到十月和十一月的话，整个就业市场的这个趋势是怎么样的？另外就是整个求职者和招聘者这个供需，供需的关系是否，是否在持续地改善。然后就是，之前你也提到，就是说，大于10,000人的这个企业在第三季度的这个旺季，其实它的需求是在上升的，那这样的趋势是，近期的这个表现是怎么样的？这是第一个问题。然后第二个问题，其实我们也看到，就是，非常高兴地看到公司啊，这次也是首次宣布了这个派息的计划。想请问一下，在这个时点，我们考虑这个派息主要的是有什么方面的原因啊？然后未来还有没有其他就是增加股东回报的这个计划？我自己可能简单翻译一下。
Thank you, management, for taking my question. My first question is regarding the job market trend in the third quarter and in the fourth quarter so far, is there, do you, have you see any, you know, continue improving in terms of the supply-demand dynamic between the job seeker and the employers?
Or what have you seen of the recovery of the KA employers in the third quarter and so far? And the second question is the special dividend we have just announced. What have you been considering, you know, to announce this special dividend plan at this time? And is there any, you know, further plan to increase the shareholder return in the future? Thank you.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
好，好的，谢谢。谢谢你的问题。然后，第一个问题就是，十月、十一月的时候，我们看到的招聘需求的恢复的情况仍然在继续，是一个确定性的一个观察。...
但是有一个不同之处，因为每年的Q3还是会比较旺。所谓我们知道金三银四，金九银十这样的说法，但实际上，在今年看到三季度是一个招聘需求比较旺的一个季度，那么进入四季度之后，也是一样，传统有一点回落，十一月份有一点回落，但总的这个趋势还可以，这是这个问题。然后关于。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Thank you for your question. Regarding your first question, the recruitment market trend in December, October and November, we observe that the recruitment demand is still continue to recover, and that's a very good observation. A little bit different is that for the third quarter is traditionally is a high season for recruitment, that's what we call golden September and silver October. This year, the third quarter is especially good. So for the fourth quarter, traditionally, seasonality wise, there will be some fall back for the recruitment demand. But the overall trend, if you take into the consideration of seasonality, is still quite good.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
然后，您关心的大企业的招聘需求恢复的情况，正如我们做过的介绍，实际上，这个要分两边看，一边就是从下半年大企业的招人的动机在变强，他们发职位的动力在变强。这个讲的是一个过程，过程上是这样的，但是这个是需要时间的，因为他们的情-情况苏醒得比较晚。而小公司，尤其是非常小的公司，在今年年初，我们以前做过介绍，他们醒过来得很快，而且他们的状况一直保持得很好。所以的话，大企业我觉得恢复的态势很淡，但是要给它时间。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Regarding the recovery of larger companies, we observe that their job postings, their motivation to post more jobs has been increasing, but this is only a progress they need to take some time to fully recover. As we introduced before, smaller companies, especially very small companies, they recovered much earlier, faster, and still maintain a very good trend even at this stage. For the larger companies, they are on the recovery trend, recovery path, but we need to give them some time.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
补充一点，就是随着大企业的招聘者数量的恢复和发布的职位的恢复，实际上它对于求职者市场它提供的支持会更大。因为，容易理解，大企业的 一个招聘者，他能带来的职位数量和品种都会更多。大企业发布的一个职位，它有可能招聘的 headcount 的数量就可能会有更多。所以的话，这个还是一个挺值得期待的一个事儿。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
And one more point to add, with the recovery of the number of recruiters and job postings from the larger companies, their support to the job market will be even bigger, because for one single recruiter in larger companies, they can bring more numbers of job postings and more categories of jobs, which also means they can recruit more headcounts for one single job posting, and that's something we are expecting.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
那么在介绍了您所关心的情况，十月、十一月的情况，大企业的情况的基础上，我们还是想强调，在今年的Q3，在招聘端的月活的数量是达到了历史的新高，这是一个整体需求变好的一个很明确的一个印证。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
We also want to emphasize that for the third quarter, number of average monthly active recruiters reached a historical high, which is a very clear sign that the overall trend, overall, demand is recovering.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
关于您的第二个问题，就是我们这次派息的考虑。这个考虑其实很简单，就是公司的发 展当中一直有来自股东的支持，那么公司取得的发 展应当跟我们的股东有分享的一个方法，其中的一个方法就是派息，这也是很多公司，在做的事情，过去在做的事情。所以我们现在看了一下我们的实际情况，觉得这个时机是可以，把公司的发展当中带来的部分收益能够跟我们的股东，特别是长期跟公司在一起的股东能够有分享，这个我们自己也觉得，非常开心。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Yeah, and for your second question, regarding our considerations of this dividend payment, we, alongside with our development history, always received very strong support from our shareholders, and we would like to share our results with our shareholders, and one of that is dividend payment. We have saw that from other many other companies, and we decided to take that, take the talent opportunity and to share our results with our long-term shareholders, and we are very happy to do that.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
当然这里面有一个前提，就是公司现在有很好的一个净经营现金流。同时我们从整个公司来看，有超过 CNY 150亿 的现金和理财，所以这也是我们可以做这样的事情的一个信心的来源。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Also this is under the premises that we have very good and strong operating cash flows. The company now holds over more than CNY 15 billion of cash and related cash management products. That's why we are very confident to do the dividend payment.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
对，就顺便说一下，就是公司在过去两年，宣布了两期的股票回购计划，在一定的条件下，进行了大量的股票回购，那么我们觉得这个也是能够跟股东一起，跟市场一起，能够在更大的视角当中来把公司经营好，的一个做法，这个我们也会持续。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
And also I want to add that, we have, we have already announced the two terms of share purchase program, and we repurchased a, a very some amount of shares under certain conditions, and this is a very good method to to continue to share our results and return to our shareholders on a broader view, and we will continue to do that.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
对，我就说这么多。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
That's, that's my answer to your questions.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
谢谢赵总，谢谢，谢谢。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Operator, please, proceed to the next one.
Operator (participant)
The next question comes from Timothy Zhao of Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.
Timothy Zhao (Equity Research Analyst)
好的，谢谢赵总接受我的提问，也恭喜非常强劲的业绩以及业绩的展望啊。那我这边有两个问题，那第一个是，可否请赵总展开介绍一下，那我们看到三季度和四季度以来，不同类型的用户，比如说这个白领、蓝领、大学生的这个招聘需求的变化。那另外在B端，那三季度在不同行业和企业类型，在这个职位发布付费的情况，有哪些特别的趋势，可以和我们分享的，以及我们这方面对于四季度的展望是怎样？那第二个问题是，我看到今年以来，包括三季度，那公司在蓝领职位和对应的收入上面取得了很大的进展，包括您刚刚也提到，我们蓝领的这个收入在三季度做到了接近35%的占比，那能不能请赵总分享一下我们在蓝领的招聘市场上面的进一步渗透的策略是什么，以及可能有哪些，可能的这个商业模式。那我很快翻译一下。
Thank you very much for taking my question and congrats on the very strong result as well as the strong outlook.
I have two questions. First, could management share more detailed color regarding the recruitment demand for different type of individual users, including blue collar, white collar, college students in the third quarter and fourth quarter so far? Besides, on the enterprise side, how did the job posting and paying behavior perform in the third quarter? And what is our outlook for fourth quarter? And my second question is regarding blue collar, because I noticed that company has made multiple progress in the blue collar job postings and revenue year to date, including, as you mentioned, third quarter blue collar contributing close to 35% of the revenue. Could management share or elaborate your strategies in further penetrating the blue collar sector and what are the potential business models they have? Thank you.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
好，好的，谢谢你，谢谢 Timothy。实际上，实际上最近这个月，最近这个 Q，它有一些行业的景气的程度会比较高。举个例子吧，服务业，服务业其实恢复的情况很好，也给我们带来了很多蓝领的招聘者，也带来了蓝领收入的提高。很快的原因呢，我想简单地说一下，也容易理解。首先就是这种面对面要见面的这种行业在今年恢复起来，跟去年相比有更好的条件。第二点就是说，这种服务业的企 业呢，有很多，它其实几个人就可以干，所以不论是在今年在经济恢复的过程中，是成立新的企业进行创业，还是在原有的休眠的情况 下进行恢复，补充资金和员工，相对来说难度都会比较小一些，但却可以带给人同样的希望和感受。还有一个就是这种服务业，它其实也比较容易获得消费者。在今年的情况 下看，整个服务业的景气情况是不错的。此外，我们也看到像交通运输、物流，汽车行业，然后，能源、化工、环保行业的恢复情况都还可以。这是，从这个景气的这个恢复的情况看，然后，我们也可以看几个数啊，比如说，从这个三季度的活跃的......
所谓活跃的就是一定要后面有一个老板在看，不是说发了一个职位他可以睡觉了，因为我们要定义这个活跃比较严格。活跃的在线职位的情况看，服务业环比增长超过13%，其中你看餐饮的零售就超过了20%。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Yeah, thank you for your question. Regarding the first one, yes, we have witnessed that some industry has performed relatively good in the third quarter, especially the urban service industry, which brings the increase, the growth of both enterprise user for and revenue for blue collars. The reason behind that is quite easy to understand, because the industries which involves face to face communications has better recovery condition compared to last year. And also, it is quite easy to start a new company or recover from the original hibernate situation. And some very few people can provide service in the urban service industries.
And so that their recovery, the difficulty to recover is relatively low, but the feelings, the trend, the recovery trend that brought to people has been very good. And also it was very easy to acquire customers and consumers for other service industry, so this industry is the best one. And other industries performed relatively better are transportation, logistics, automobile, new energy, environment protections and etc. And also would like to share some numbers.
For third quarter, the active online job postings, which is very strict metrics, which means the boss need to be very active in recruiting. So the urban service industry, the active online job postings for this quarter grew by more than 13%, sequentially, among which the restaurant and retailing grows more than 20% sequentially.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
还有，还有一个数据也很有说服力，就是在整个供应链物流的领域，交通运输，然后仓储这些岗位，它的活跃的在线职位的环比增长超过25%。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Another convincing number is that, among the logistics industries, transportation and warehousing in terms of active online job postings, grew more than 25% quarter-over-quarter.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
那在整个白领的这个角度来看，有一个大家应该是都能感受到的，就是在整个新能源的领域，在汽车后市场领域，其实需求增长是比较快的，这个我想，很多人都感受到。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
In terms of the blue collar, white collar industries, one thing people, a lot of people have already noticed is that, the new energy and the automobile aftermarket, these two industry demand recover, recover relatively very fast.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
另外一个有趣的观察就是，大家很容易想到，现在这个时候人工智能的岗位需求会明显上涨，那么确实如此。与此同时，我们看到相对通用一些的岗位，在整个互联网IT的行业中，整个通用一些的岗位，比如说前端开发工程师这样的岗位，在整个Q三有持续的变好。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Another interesting observation is that people might guess jobs related to artificial technology might increase, which is definitely the case. And also a more general job positions such as the front development of Internet technology also show a significant increase in this quarter.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
我知道，有一个这个数，也值得跟你说一下，就是我们看到环比的话，100个人以下的企业，日新增就每天新发的职位的话，环比的增加，第三季度第二季度大概在3个百分点左右，但是10,000人以上的企业的话，这个增加就在8个百分点以上。所以的话，这都是在体现这个季度不一样的地方。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
And another interesting number is enterprise with less than 100 employees is daily average newly posting jobs in the third quarter compared to last quarter increased by around 3%. While in enterprise with more than 10,000 people, their average daily newly added jobs increased more than eight percent, which also shows the difference in this quarter.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
对，这是我们的第一个问题的回答。您的第二个问题是关于蓝领，我们在蓝领市场的，进一步渗透的策略和商业模式。实际上，我们对于公司提供的服务，现在在整个蓝领市场的渗透的情况、速度，还有用户的NPS的角度来看，我们相对还比较满意，也没有更加aggressive地去在蓝领的领域加强渗透的眼前的计划。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Regarding your second question for our further penetration strategy and the monetization model in blue collar market. The answer is that, we, in terms of, our current, penetration and coverage in blue collar users, and the user satisfaction rate, which is NPS scores, we are, quite, satisfied with current, situation, and we, doesn't have any, more aggressive plans, to accelerate this process.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
那实际上我们有计划，实际上是要在蓝领的领域来提高我们对用户的服务水平。其中可以举一个例子，就是对于更多制造业的求职者跟招聘者来说，我们也要进一步探索，对他们在服务中提高我们的闭环服务能力这样的一个探索的方向。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
But also we are continuously exploring the service capability to the blue collar users. For example, in the manufacturing sector, we are exploring the cost service to provide for the blue collar manufacturing sector users.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
这以上是我的对您的问题的回答。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
That's my answer to your question. Operator, let's proceed to next question.
Operator (participant)
The next question comes from Wei Xiong of UBS. Please go ahead.
Wei Xiong (Analyst)
哎，管理层晚上好，感谢接受我的提问。我这边也有两个问题想请教。第一个是关于竞争方面的，就是想请教一下，咱们有没有看到，竞争格局最近有什么变化？因为考虑到市场环境，包括现在的宏观情况还是比较不确定，那是不是咱们看到，比如说现存的这些，老的招聘平台其实增长乏力，然后这个新进入者其实进展也比较缓慢，那相对而言，咱们的龙头效应可以更加凸显。那么展望明年的话，咱们对于这个竞争格局有什么进一步的判断吗？第二个问题呢，也想很快请教一下，就是，过去几个月咱们平台上整体这个付费率和ARPU的趋势，那尤其是大企业这边，刚才咱们也提到，最近这个招聘需求恢复比较明显嘛，那想请教一下大企业的这个ARPU增长的情况是怎么样的？那我也很快自己翻译一下。
Thank you very much for taking my question. My first question is regarding the competition landscape. So given the uncertain macro situation and the market conditions, is it the case that the existing recruiting platforms lack the growth potential, while the new entrants seem to make slow progress, which makes our market leadership even more stronger?
And looking into next year, how do we expect the competitive landscape to change in the online recruiting market? And second, could management share more color on the paying ratio as well as ARPU trend on our platform, especially on the KA side, how is the ARPU growth trending recently? Thank you.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
好的。竞争格局的话，总体来看，现有的玩家是国内的互联网招聘的玩家，我们的判断就是竞争格局基本处于一个稳定的状况，在三季度没有发生明显的变化。那么实际上，由于这两两年大家都在经营上的一些困难和压力，所以我倒觉得各自的优势，在最近的几个季度体现得很明确。比如说，某个企业在更多的央国企的服务，大型集团化的外企的服务当中的一贯的优势，那么其实是得到了明显的体现。另外一家企业，在中高端，对一部分企业提供中高端人才服务上有优势，也得到了市场充分的认可。我觉得就是，就是每个人的特点会显得更加的清楚吧。市场也足够大，可能也足够很多人都在共同生存，这是我对竞争格局的看法。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Thank you for your question. For the first one, about the competitive landscape, the overall situation is relatively stable. No clear change in the third quarter. However, in the past two years, due to all kinds of pressure, internally or externally, I believe actually the every company has quite showed their distinctive advantages. For example, one company, it has very strong advantages in state-owned SOE companies and good, good strategic clients. And we have been seeing increased competitiveness in that front. And for another company, they are good at providing service to mid to high-end talents, and that perspective is also recognized by the market.
I think every enterprise has its unique characteristics, and we are continuing to further enhance that. That's my answer for the competitive landscape.
Phil Yu Zhang (Director and CFO)
Okay, so regarding your second question of the ARPU trend. So, I'd like to comment a little bit. So we announced that in the quarter, we reported 4.9 million trailing twelve months paid enterprise customers. So as you probably remember that in the second quarter, the trailing twelve months paid customers, that number was 4.4 million, so we roughly increased 0.5 million paid enterprise customers. So this growth of the paid enterprise customers, I think the main reason is that the overall user growth is, at this moment, still fast. So when a new user come to our platform, when they want to pay to use our service, most of them, they prefer purchase the, our, or try our service through the self-serve, the online portal, to do the online purchase.
So that increased our overall paid enterprise customer number. In terms of the paying ratio, we see improved trend for the small size purchase. And we believe that when they, you know, familiar—when they are familiar with our service and they, you know, love our service, they definitely will use more, and we definitely will, you know, try to convert them into heavy user usage and buy the service through our offline contract sales. And so we believe the online and the active users, the paid active users definitely will continue to grow, and the paying ratio definitely will also improving.
The ARPPU from small, medium-sized enterprises kept at a relatively stable situation in the quarter. The same trend happened with the key accounts. So basically large corporates their ARPPU also increased, driven by the increasing recruitment demand. But the contribution to our revenue, you know, small-sized enterprises, they contribute higher, you know, larger revenue to the overall of our business. So basically, their smaller ARPU blended with a higher ARPU let the overall blended ARPU you know decline a little bit. So basically, small size they maintain the you know good ARPU, and the large accounts their ARPU increased, but the overall blended ARPU you know decreased a little bit. This is you know the current situation with the ARPU in quarter three.
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
And that's all for our answer to your question. Operator, let's proceed to next question.
Operator (participant)
The next question comes from Robin Zhu of Bernstein. Please go ahead.
Robin Zhu (Senior Analyst, China Internet)
谢谢，庄立诚。我这边两个问题吧，一个是如果看2024年，不知道往前看的话，庄立诚是怎么去思考这个公司规划，增长投放的后续，就是投放的思路能不能讨论一下，从目标上怎么平衡，就是公司的增长和利润率的一个提升。第二个问题是，对于......
就是如果现在看公司跟大客户续签的这样一个情况的话，对于明年的整体招聘的情况，用户增长，ARPPU会有什么样的前瞻性的一些看法吧？现在咱们的能见度能看到多远？对，我翻译一下。
My first question, so how does management think about the magnitude and nature of growth investments for 2024? How does the company plan to balance growth versus margin expansion as we go forward?
Second question, you know, thoughts on the state of the hiring market going into 2024, the state of renewal discussions with key accounts going into the next year. You know, to the extent that possible, if management can share any outlook on 2024 growth and ARPPU growth, and retention and so on. Thank you.
Phil Yu Zhang (Director and CFO)
Okay. So I'll answer the first question. So we previously announced that we will achieve 100 million new users in next to the three years. So basically, according to this year's progress, we are, you know, on track. So by the end of October, we achieved 40 million verified new users. So basically, this year, you know, we would like to have very good results in terms of the, you know, new user growth. Definitely, next year, we will continue, you know, our growth for the new users. And when we talk about the user growth, you have noticed that in third quarter, we achieved a historical high of our operating margin.
So that's basically, we managed to grow users without spending too much marketing expenses. We previously communicated our strategy. So our strategy is putting more resources on brand advertisement over traffic acquisition costs. So basically, this strategy works well. And so next year, we will, you know, further increase new users, and we will continue to follow this strategy, and we will try our best to find the best balance point between the growth and the profitability. So what I mean that the growth is a priority for the company, and all the growth come from the, you know, it began from the new user growth, and we will, you know, do it, you know, carefully and spend our market expenses carefully.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
那我回答你的第二个问题，就是，整个明年的情况看，我还是先说我我们在2022年11月，预测我们在未来的3年获得1亿新的完整口径的用户。我们虽然现在已经做了今年的，不是现在的，9月底的时候，我们已经做了今年的几千万。但是我们现在暂时不会调整这个用户增长的计划。原因是这样的，原因就是说，取決于在明年整个经济的情况，它的恢复的速度，和质量，这样能够我们来调整，我们来对于C端用户的，获取跟增长的情况，以使之达到，尽可能达到一个相对的平衡。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
Yeah, I will take your second question for the outlook to the next year. I will, I will go back to our forecast by end of November 2022, with 100 million newly verified users. By end of September, we have already achieved 40 million, but we are not planning to change our target at this moment, because reason is that we will, based on the recovery trend of the enterprise side of users on its quality and the recovery speed to adjust our acquisition for job seeker side, which will achieve a relatively better to better balance the, the, supply and demand.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
那么B端究竟会怎么样呢？我觉得我们现在，没有办法做出非常确切的预测，但是我们只能是根据我们今年以来看到的情况，我们觉得每个季度的情况都是在持续向好的，所以我们基本相信，也十分希望明年，B端的情况是持续向好。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
In terms of how, in the end, the enterprise side will perform. We don't have exact focus at this moment, but based on what we have observed this year, that the recruitment demand recovered every quarter, and so we believe, and we sincerely hope that the enterprise side will perform, continue to perform very good next year.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
最近的第三方数据显示，在整个互联网招聘乃至泛互联网招聘的各个平台来看，我们的MAU是第一名的位置，我们的DAU在九月份已经达到一个第一名的位置，我们的DAU跟MAU之比已经非常、非常明确地处于一个第一名的位置，那么这样的一个态势的话，我们非常相信这样的一个态势会得到保持。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
According to third party numbers, you can see that our monthly active users in October has been quite close to number one, and we are already the largest in terms of daily active users. And the user activities, which is DAU as percentage of MAU, we maintain the highest among our peers, and we believe this trend, this growing trend will continue to maintain.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
年底的大客户跟公司，因为确实有一部分客户是年底的时候开始进行一个年单的签署。我觉得这件事情我现在看到的就是，大客户对于明年要赚多少钱有一个计划，然后要花多少钱有一个预算，那么其中包括在招聘预算上花多少钱，这件事情我觉得，大客户完全恢复，对于未来的信心是需要时间的。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
In terms of the large companies renewing their contract by end of this year. Yes, we are expecting the larger companies to spend their budget for next year and sign the contract in the coming months. But we see a very encouraging trend, but still, the fully recover of the recruitment demand for larger companies still need to take some time. And that's our answer to the question. In consideration of the time constraint, we will take one last questions. Operator.
Phil Yu Zhang (Director and CFO)
The next question comes from Yang Bai of CICC. Please go ahead.
Yang Bai (Analyst)
好的，那个谢谢管理员。我这边两个简单的小问题，第一呢，就是我们看到，公司在这两个季度毛利率是有所回升的，那想问一下公司对未来毛利率变化的预期是一个什么样的？然后，第二个问题想问一下公司关于，新产品和业务上的一些计划，就是比如说咱们在这个AI大语言模型上的这样的一个开发进展。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
...啊，国际化，啊，以及包括其他的这个新业务。啊，我简单翻译一下。
The first is, we have seen the company's gross margin has rebounded in these two quarters. What are the company's expectations for future gross margin change? And the second one is, could the company give more color on the plans for new products and business, such as the progress of a large language model, globalization and other new initiatives? Thank you.
Phil Yu Zhang (Director and CFO)
So I'd like to answer the gross margin question. So basically, you said, our gross margin bottom out for consecutive two quarters, and so basically this gross margin improvement is the result of a faster revenue growth, and relatively controlled and stable cost of the business. So, in the fourth quarter, so next quarter, we expect due to the seasonality reason, Q4 is the revenue low quarter, so the gross margin is you know would be affected by the lower revenue, so temporarily the gross margin will contract in Q4.
But for 2024, for the next year, because of the revenue growth, we expect the gross margin you know will return to recovery trajectory because our cost will maintain at a mild growth, but we probably will have a you know faster revenue growth, so that will secure our gross margin to recover, further recover based on this year's base. So this is a gross margin plan.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
我们，在新的业务上，现在比较明确的想法就是一个在中国已经验证了的一个用户服务模式和一个 revenue model，我们能够希望在相对发达的国家地区进行布局，在未来的3-5年内形成一个收入增长的新 driver。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
About new initiatives. The first one is, we believe that already proven and established user service model and also a revenue model, we want to expand our service to other developed countries and areas, and we will, we are currently under the progress of doing that, and hopefully in the next 3-5 years, we'll create another revenue growth contributor.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
然后在大语言模型这个领域，每次投资者都很关心啊，我们一直在，从今年年初开始，我们一直持续地投入，保持关注。最近的话，我们的一个实验室叫南北阁，南北阁的大语言模型实验室是我们其中一个实验室，开源了一个模型，可以稍微值得说一下。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
In terms of large language models, which is a question the investors are concerned a lot. Actually, since the beginning of this year, we have made some substantial investment into this area, and we continue to focus on, and continue to focus on it. One thing worth mentioning is that one of our laboratory, Nanbeige, recently open-sourced this model, and we have seen a very good results for that.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
这是16B的一个chat模型，它在同等尺寸的开源模型当中，我们看了一下，大概在国内吧，在国内所有的player当中，大概能排在一个top 10的位置。
Wenbei Wang (Head of Investor Relations)
That's a 30- that's a 16B chat model. Among the same size of open source models, we believe we are among the top 10 players domestically.
Jonathan Peng Zhao (Founder, Chairman and CEO)
我们的战略不是要去跟别人卷那个更大更强大的通用性模型，我们还是在应用层面上更多去卷这个事儿。不过在此之前呢，我觉得，我们公司的科学家和程序员，还是做出了自己的这样的一个模型，保持着在科研上的一个张力。同时我们会继续在应用层面，在合法合规 ...
Operator (participant)
That concludes today's question-and-answer session and today's conference. Thank you for attending today's presentation, and you may now disconnect.